The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1872-04-18

gether will prove sufficiently interesting to
repay attentive perusal.
The Musical and Dramatic Triumphs
OF New YOrk-A Brilliant Prospect.
The present theatrical season has been by
far the most advanced ever seen in America.
In saying this we do not speak merely Of the
advent of the lone stars who, in the good days
gone, shed each sufficient light for season.
Our grandfathers and grandmothers, and even
their sons and daughters with all possible
respect to our immediate parents), hug them
selves with delight over the "old school,
which, if occasionally good one, had not too
many pupils worth Dragging about. The
passion for amusement in the theatre is not
always a safe test of national prog
ress and vitality, because the most stagnant
and corrupt peoples have, in the fad
ing days of their prosperity, shown an
inordinate love Of stage display. But we can
gather great deal more from the character of
these amusements than from their mere extent;
and tortiori when the quality is high and the
quantity large and increasing, we can con-
aesthetic among the people. While there is a
large class to whom inane doggerel helped
out by heathenish semi-nudity and profuse
tinselry, give preposterous idea that to be on
the verge of indecency is to approach the
classic, the mass of the public have shown
that the purer and better styles of amusement
need only be properly presented to be lavishly
patronized.
Foremost among our late experiences is the
season Of Italian opera. The Nilsson engage
ment at the Academy showed how even one
divine singer could induce an enthusiasm
which never tagged while the clear, pure
timbre of her voice was to be heard and the
grace and power of her acting to be seen and
felt Although it savored good deal of the
old ''lone STAR affairs it was the initiation of
a revival which has found it's operate apogee
for the season in the combination at present
filling the Academy nightly. Not by any
means perfect in all its details, and leaving
great scope for improvement in important
points, it is useful in showing how magnii-
Gently the wealth, culture and taste of New
York will pay for Italian opera. 1t has blotted
out the old regime and announces the new era
for which we have so long prayed, wherein the
oporatic manager who comes before the public
must provide complete companies of first rate
artists or learn doleful lesson. We know
now that Italian opera needs no further
nursing, and as in the Ingoldsby Legends, we
say woe to the impresario who will ''then fob
us off with fal-de-ral-tit."
In the dramatic encourage the prospect is
equally encouraging AT Wallacks, which has
always been noted for conscientiousness in
presenting the higher school Of comedy, we
are promised an astonishing array on to-
morrow evening in the production Of per-
haps Boucicault's best piece, '.London Assur-
ance." The cast will include Charles
Mathews, in the company of whose father New
York laughed itself sick half century ago.
and who has stood himself at the head of the
high comedy school for thirty years then,
too, John Brougbam, the wit and author, whose
acting has an enlivening, mellowed, rich turn
like the flavor ofcrusted port on the palate; Les
ter Wallack himself, easy, polished effective and
elastic as Damascus blade, and sturdy John
Booths Theatre, with an average company in
which at present Miss Leclercq has most Of the
entertaining to do, we ore promised Orchard
ILL., on scale of especial grandeur, which, we
hope will be artistically what it will doubtless
be as to appointments and mise en- scene, ac-
cording to the generous traditions of the
theatre. The French drama, with it's intense
morbid passions, finds place on the Fifth
Avenue boards in article AZ, and illustrates,
both in its meretricious brilliance and false
sentiment, the loose morale Of the lower en-
pire, SO like the decadence Of the Roman
empire, as seen in the Byzantium of Justinian.
We have Laura Keene finely fretting her life
away every evening at Woods, with spectacu-
lar compromise in the afternoon. The barbaric
has its votaries in many places, as s'Lalla
Rookh,'' at the Grand Opera House, and fun
and burlesque break out in half a dozen smaller
theatres all over the city. not forgetting the
dash Of blood and thunder at the Old Bowery.
OPERA bo4fe has disappeared from the boards
for the present, and we can well afford to
miss it.
We have not enumerated all and some of
those we have are not exactly of the kind we
wish to see permanently among us but the
support which the better and higher receive
indicate the growth of a liberal taste, greater
in proportion to size than any city in the
world. With this state Of things still spread
ing out its friendly arms for musical and dra-
matte talent, and willing and able to pay for it,
we shall not have long to wait before seeing
this city capital of the bemw arts TO rival any
city in the Old World.
HENRY N. SMITH WAS EXAMINED before the
Congressional Committee on Banking and
Currency Yesterday in relation to the recent