er.
No doubt this gives some uncharitable amusement to people who overhear
the conversation of ignorant playgoers misled by the programme. There
was an unfortunate foreigner who said to his neighbour, "_Pas un aigle,
leur fameux Elgar_" when he thought he was listening to "Pomp and
Circumstance," whilst the orchestra in fact was playing "Whistling
Rufus."

The ideal system, no doubt, was that of Miss Ashwell, who gave a long
list of pieces in the programme with numbers to them, and then had the
number appropriate to the particular work hoisted before it was played.
This is only the ideal in one sense. In reality, the best course is
suggested by a famous maxim: "_Optima medicina est medicina non uti_."
The Stage Society is wise in following the custom sanctioned by such an
august institution as La Comedie Francaise. After all, we want to make
the theatres less of a gamble and to reduce needless expenses so as not
to render the battle a triumph for the long purse. If the orchestras of
the theatres were in the habit of giving a real service to music by
producing the shorter pieces of talented composers who are struggling
for recognition; if, as might well be the case, they offered a hearing
to the young musicians of talent of whom we now have plenty, then no
doubt they would deserve encouragement. As the matter stands, they
perform too small a service to music to warrant the tax imposed by them
on drama.

CHAPTER XI

IN THE PLAYHOUSE

Laughter

Of late years there has been a good deal of censure, most of it
unwritten, upon the stage management of plays. Despite brilliant
exhibitions of the art of stage management by people such as Pinero and
Mr Granville Barker, there have been more bad performances in modern
times than of old.

The matter is one into which it is needless to go at large upon the
present occasion; yet there is one vice that should be mentioned. We
often have much loud laughter upon the stage that hardly causes so much
as a faint echo on the other side of the footlights. Now, when the
characters in a piece laugh heartily, or at least loudly, at something
supposed to divert them, which does not appeal successfully to the sense
of humour of the audience, the effect is disastrous. It is exasperating
to hear laughter--even feigned laughter--in which one cannot join.

There are people who believe that laughter is infectious, and that if
the persons of the play laugh a great deal the audience wil