The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-08-09
DRAMATIC VICTIMS.

From the NJ Y. Tribune
1t is an old story that the gentleman who
came home drunk from dinner party charged
his misfortune to that last picked oyster.
Nobody is ever willing to acknowledge the
exact cause of a shameful effect. In theatri-
cal life, especially, this truth finds frequent
and apt illustration. No player ever fails for
want of ability. Either the public is stupid,
and cannot appreciate, or the critics have
formed a conspiracy to condemn. Usually,
we have observed, there has been a con-
spiracy. 1t is quite awful to reflect indeed,
upon the number of dramatic victims who
have thus been inundated The field of
journalism is strewn with their whitening
bones. One would imagine that the critics
OF the stage have nothing else to do put to
form cOnspiracies against the heroes and
heroines Of the theatre. Lately it appears,
they have conspired against a certain troupe
OF burlesque performers. This we learn
from that usually fecund and immensely
trustworthy source of home news, the
provincial press. We knew already that this
troupe had gradually fizzled out in New York,
like a bad pin-wheel and had left ANYTHING
but pleasant odor behind it, And this re-
suit we had attributed to it's real and very OBJ
Vlous cause.-The puerility and indecency into
whlcbA( after pleasant and promising start)
ITS performances degenerated. But it now
appears, from the out-of-toWn papers. that
we were mistaken. 1t was not the cold punch
that made the gentleman little vague it
was that last picked OYSTER 1t was not a
parade of bare legs, indecent gestures, and
general grossness and foolishness, which
made the burlesquers nuisance on
our stage; it was the conspiracy of
journalists Worse than all, these Jour
nalists did not conspire of their own
free will, but they We're manipulated into
this direful coalition against ''the blondes by
gentleman who lives in the country The
Boston Courier is bounteous enough to di-
vulge this startling fact, and to give the in
dignant public a glimpse of this dark and
willy Philip the Second, in his rural Escurial.
lie Is, 1t seems, ''an eX-manager. a man of
some attalnments, great diner n member of
two or three clubs, great ON suppers, who owns
a country-seat Just beyond the city limits.
where congregate the critics of the dailypress.
the BdRcurS, the tCuHetOHistS, the gOUcg, the
club men, and two or thr9e literary women. "
Here, indeed, is a dreadful disclosure. Clearly
enough the Independence of the press is no
Where. A man who is both "a great diner"
and great on suppers' possesses fascinations
which no journalist can resist For, are we
not all 'Fenny-a-liners' and always ''huugrvg"
Did anybody ever hear of a journalist who
couldn't easily be bought with an oyster-stew?
vi course noJ ana nobody, therefore, will be
surprised to read that this agricultural Epi-
Gurus can manipulate any newspaper in New
York. Here, then, we come to the fact of
the n9tter;-''Ihis gentleman had personal
difficulty with the Thompson troupe, shortly
atter they appeared at Niblo's, and when the
history OF the war on the blondes shall be
Tpthfully written it will, appear that he laid
all the trains, wrote or caused to be written
nearly all the adverse articles, and secured
Their publication, through his ring, at the
clubs and at his country seat. We shall await,
with as much fortitude as possible, the advent
OF that "truthfully written history which is
daily promised in these tremendous lines. 1t
will, OF course, come from Boston. Everything
reth, In the meantime, as we reflect upon the