o this entertainment. A
supper was served at little tables in the great ball-room, and
afterward the guests wandered about the house while the tables were
whisked out of the way and the room turned into a play-house. A company
from one of the Broadway theatres would be bundled into cabs at the end
of the performance, and by midnight they would be ready to repeat the
performance at Mrs. de Graffenried's. Montague chanced to be near when
this company arrived, and he observed that the guests had crowded up
too close, and not left room enough for the actors. So the manager had
placed them in a little ante-room, and when Mrs. de Graffenried
observed this, she rushed at the man, and swore at him like a dragoon,
and ordered the bewildered performers out into the main room.

But this was peering behind the scenes, and he was supposed to be
watching the play. The entertainment was another "musical comedy" like
the one he had seen a few nights before. On that occasion, however,
Bertie Stuyvesant's sister had talked to him the whole time, while now
he was let alone, and had a chance to watch the performance.

This was a very popular play; it had had a long run, and the papers
told how its author had an income of a couple of hundred thousand
dollars a year. And here was an audience of the most rich and
influential people in the city; and they laughed and clapped, and made
it clear that they were enjoying themselves heartily. And what sort of
a play was it?

It was called "The Kaliph of Kamskatka." It had no shred of a plot; the
Kaliph had seventeen wives, and there was an American drummer who
wanted to sell him another--but then you did not need to remember this,
for nothing came of it. There was nothing in the play which could be
called a character--there was nothing which could be connected with any
real emotion ever felt by human beings. Nor could one say that there
was any incident--at least nothing happened because of anything else.
Each event was a separate thing, like the spasmodic jerking in the face
of an idiot. Of this sort of "action" there was any quantity--at an
instant's notice every one on the stage would fall simultaneously into
this condition of idiotic jerking. There was rushing about, shouting,
laughing, exclaiming; the stage was in a continual uproar of
excitement, which was without any reason or meaning. So it was
impossible to think of the actors in their parts; one kept thinking of
them as human beings--th