antiquity. In 'Hamlet,' for example, in the
graveyard scene, it was the habit of the _Second Grave-digger_ to take
off his coat before beginning his work, and then to proceed to divest
himself of an indeterminate number of waistcoats, to the increasing
disgust of the _First Grave-digger_. Oddly enough, this same business is
traditional in the 'Precieuses Ridicules,' the less important of the two
comedians going through exactly the same mirth-provoking disrobing.
Probably the business was elaborated for some medieval farce long before
Moliere was born, or Shakspere either. Of late, it has been omitted from
'Hamlet,' but it is still religiously preserved in the performances of
the 'Precieuses' by the Comedie-Francaise, the company of actors that
Moliere founded.

Many another tradition is also cherished at the Francais, the origin of
which is lost in the mists of antiquity. In the 'Malade Imaginaire,' for
example, _Thomas Diafoirius_ is always provided with an absurdly high
child's chair, apparently the property of _Louison_; and in the 'Avare,'
after the miser has blown out a candle twice and finally pocketed it,
the custom is for his servant to sneak behind him and to light the
candle once again as it sticks out of his coat. Regnier, the cultivated
and brilliant comedian (whose pupil M. Coquelin was in his
'prentice-days), published a text of Moliere's most powerful play, which
he called 'Le Tartuffe des Comediens' because he had recorded in it all
this traditional business. M. Coquelin has told me that he hopes to be
able some day to edit other of Moliere's masterpieces on this principle.
And it is greatly to be wisht that some stage-manager of scholarly
tastes would provide us with a record of the customary effects to be
obtained in the performance of most of Shakspere's plays, as these have
been accumulated in the theater itself. Perhaps this book might be able
to tell us why it is that tradition warrants the same rather trivial
practical joke in the performance of the 'Merchant of Venice,' and in
the performance of 'Romeo and Juliet,'--the business of embarrassing a
servant by repeated bows of mock courtesy and protracted farewell.

In preparing for a revival of one of the masterpieces of Shakspere, the
accomplished stage-manager of to-day considers all these traditions
inherited from the past, discarding some of them and selecting those
which appear to him worthy of preservation, and which will accommodate
themse