The Republican journal., 1869-04-15
Scenes in Brigham Young's Theatre.
Correspondence of the Boston journal.

Correspondence of the Boston Journal.
Brigham Young owns theatre which cost,
it is said, 100000, and which has yielded a
large revenue. 1t is we'll built edlfce nearly
as large as the Boston Theatre, with parquet
and circle, dress circle, family circle, and gal
lery. Gentiles are consigned to the dress cir
ces, though Saints also sit there. CLIMBING
the narrow stairway we find ourselves in the
dress circle, occupying front seat, giving US
a GOOD position to study the audience. We are
not there to see the play, but the people The
curtain is still down and the audience are TAX
ing their seats. The parquet is arranged with
slips like those in a church. At the right hand
side in the parquet circle, is Brigham's family
pew, distinguished from all others by its red
plush Or damask upholstery. In the right hand
side of the parquet is a rocking chair, which
Brigham sometimes occupies when he wishes
to be on familiar footing with the Saints.
The light in the building is rather dim, gas
not having been introduced to Salt Lake, coal
oil being used instead, but there is light enough
for US to study the countenances ofthese around
us. On seats adjoining ours are two young
girls, fresh, fair, rosy-cheeked, accompanied
by q Young man we'll dressed-Gentiles, Judge,
from 8 remark dropped now and then. At our
right hand is a woman with baby IN her arms,
three other children by her side. Beyond her
another woman with baby and great strap
ping fellow with red whiskers by her side.
Behind us are three registering fellows from the
mines of Montana, ogling the girls in the par
quet. They are Gentle wolves. Elder Will
Jams cautioned the girls last Sunday to beware
of those who come in sleeps clothing to lead
them away from the church and down to per-
dition. These wolves do sometimes carry of
the fairest lambs of the flock. Some of the
girls prefer the undivided love Of a hardy, good
looking young Gentle to the fortieth or tiifteth
part of a withered old apostle
Two seats distant is another baby. The mo-
tier is wrinkled and careworn We can see
lines of care and suffering across her forehead
and in her sunken cheeks, as if Time had been
turning deep burrows and his plowshare had
gone down into the subsoi and had cut the
heart strings. Not her alone. We see the
same joyleSS cast OF cOuntenance on every fe-
male face. Artists who with pen and pen
ell print characters, who can read the joys and
sorrows Of life in the lines OF the human face,
should come to Salt Lake City. They would
find it one vast studio-every woman subject.
Dead Affections" would be an appropriate IT,
lie to their picture. Stihed, rather. These
women have never known what 1t is to love or
to be loved. They know only sacrifice. They
are slaves--in bondage to the church and the
devil at the same time. They are ground TO
powder between two mighty mill-stones-the
upper one a religious idea, the lower one the
lewdness and lust of hard-hearted men. Heav-
en- and hell are together brought into action,
crushing out human affections, and the highest
and hottest instincts of the soul.
But there is the man who runs the mi-the
head Of the church-President and Revelator
in private box by the side of the stage. He
wears q white vest, black broadcloth coat, kid
gloves, puts an opera glass to his eye, and looks
over the gallery containing US Gentiles, to see
who is there. He has broad forehead, a large
nose, and whiSkers turning white. Ability,
decision, duplicity, shrewdness, and cunning
the good and bad elements of characterize
plainly marked in his countenance. Apostle
Wells, a tall, thin, spare man, nearly as old as
Brigham, is by his side.
In Brigham's family circle we see two of his
concubines and twenty-five Of his children-all
but three Of them girls. One of the women is
past the prime of life-pan countenance, plain
lY dressed. She is sad-sad when others laugh
The play is The Somnambulist," but the COM
ic scenes which set the crowd a laughing brings
no smile TO her face. At the end of the seat is
one OF the favorite concubines, woman of
thirty, pale, thoughtless, with an intellectual
east of countenance, with book in hand which
she reads between the scenes. She has a large
lustrous eyes, dark brown hair, Jewels on her
fingers. and mother of-pearl opera glass in her
hand. She is elegantly dressed-wears a cost
ly fine cape. Did | not know that they were
Brigham's concubines should set them down
rs teachers of a girls boarding school, who
had come with their classes to enjoy the even
ING.
1t was motley audience, saints, sinners and
Indians Far up in the gallery l see three of
the Ute tribe, in moccasins and blanket gazing
with imperturable gravity upon the scene.
Brigham looks upon the audience most of
the time, turning his attention to the stage on
" when something especially attractive or
laughable occurs. He talks with Brother
Wells, takes a knife from his pocket, pares an
apple, which he slowly munches. He has the
appearance of a man not well acquainted with
the usages of good society, a5ut who is we'll
off in the world, independent of everybody, and
who, for the remainder of his life, is going to
take things easy, and have everything his own
way,