the authors have not complied with these requirements of the
modern stage; and it is impossible for us, with the best will in the
world, to reconstruct the works. We can only point out, regretfully,
that they do not comply with these modern regulations, and we know quite
well that the dramatists will be unable to make the necessary changes.
The modern system has had the great disadvantage of putting out of the
range of the average writer of comedy a good many subjects that deserve
treatment, but can only be handled with success by writers of great
experience or those who possess remarkable gifts for the semi-mechanical
work of construction, which are not necessarily allied to the higher
qualities needed by the dramatist.

Of course, some of the manuscripts are ridiculous: five-act plays that
would not last an hour and a half upon the stage and three-act comedies
which would require an evening per act; tragedies in rhymed verse not
up to the standard of cracker poetry. It is difficult to understand how
such things come to be written. The authors must sometimes go to the
theatre or read plays, and therefore ought to know that their works are
unsuitable, and that they are wasting money in getting their stuff
typewritten. Presumably the phenomenon is somehow connected with the
curious glamour of the stage. The person who would not dream of trying
to cook a chop without some little study of the methods of the kitchen
will try to write farce or comedy or tragedy and not deem it necessary
seriously to consider the elementary laws governing such works.

His Letter Bag

Possibly the editor sometimes looks with curiosity at the envelopes of
letters addressed to a dramatic critic at the editorial office. Let us
trust that in the case of those envelopes obviously bearing a lady's
handwriting curiosity is not tinged with suspicion. Letters directed to
"The Dramatic Editor" are generally American, and contain statements of
tremendous importance concerning, as a rule, people of whom one has
never heard and requesting the critic to publish them in the next issue
of "his" paper.

The documents forwarded by the office are only a tithe of those which
come to the critic officially, there being several ways of ascertaining
addresses. Many consist of requests to read plays, and exhibit pitifully
the strange blindness of parents. A number are almost according to a
pattern and run about thus: "DEAR SIR,--Having been a constant reader of