The Portland daily press., 1875-02-12
Art. Music and the Drama.

Art, Music ana tne Uramas
The production of "Henry "" at Booths
Theatre, New York. requires "A actors and ac-
tresses, 412 supernumeraries, and 90 ballet
girls. In the battle scene at Agincourt there
are more than 300 persons on the stage at one
time. The production of the piece involved an
outlay of $4,000.
Mr.. w. E. Norton has begun picture OF
ship in cyclone. He has in his studio several
excellent works by Miss M. Beckett, which
she has sent there to be sold. The pictures are
all good, and one of them, copy of Jacques,
is especially worthy of mention.
"Ernani'' has been sung in Berlin with new
termination. Ernani, instead OF dying, marries
Elvira, with Don Carlos's consent.
The book CT Julius Eichberg's lew comic op
eretta. ssSir Marmaduke," is a version OF the
familiar farce, "Betsey Baker," made by Mr..
BENJAMIN E. Woolf Mr.. Eichberg has thus
followed the example Of Mr.. Arthur Sullivan,
who set 'sBox and Cox" to music with wonder
full success Both of these farces BOX and
Cox" and "Betsey Baker"-were written by
Mr.. Madison Morton.
Meissonier has just finished an important
pcture, entitled ''Before the Battle" which is
destined to rank with his best works. 1t rep
resents group of soldiers of the first empire,
in the centre of which two mounted officers,
followed by their orderlies, meet and halt for a
moment to salute each other. The uniforms
and trappings are superb, and although each
figure is painted with so much elaboration
there is no loss of interest in studying the
group as a whole. Meissonie'rs horses are al
ways painted with marvellous care, and the
ones ir this work are no exception to the rule.
The picture is painted on that brilliant and
rich scale of color peculiar to this artist and
everything stands out boldly, bathed in the full
sunlight of an almost cloudless sky. The paint
ing, it is said, will remain in France, to the
great delight of the artists friends.
Messrs. Stewart Robson and Charles Thorne,
fayorite actors at the Union Square theater, have
been engaged to play in London in the spring.
Mr. M. F. fl. De Haas has completed two
companion cabinet pictures of the sea under ef-
fects of "Sunset" and "Moonrse. He has
commenced his Academy picture, splendid
composition of storm-tossed vessels working
off lee shore.
"La File de Madame Angot' has passe its
five hundredth night at the Folles Dramatique
in Paris.
Hofman's symphony 'Frithjof' is the latest
novelty introduced to New York by Mr.. Thom-
as. The critic of the New York Evening Post,
found its orchestration particularly indicative
of highly cultivated taste and great practical
knowledge" 1t consists of four distinct move
ments; entitled "Frithjof and Ingeborg;' SIN
cebore's Lament "Elves of Light and Frost
Giants" and "Frithjofs Return" Nine.
Madeline Schiller was the pianist on this occa-
sion. and the New York Times says: I'VE can
not saw that the lady is an nnrivaed pianist,
for her shading is rather deficient in nicely
her wrists are not the iron wrists of Rubin
stein, and she does not always bring from the
Steinway piano the singing tone which we
have heard players having slighter control of
the graces of their art than herself compel the
instrument to give; Nine Schller's method
however, is so good that her performance is of
unbroken smoothness, never startling, but nev-
er disappointing; her runs, arpeggios, and trills
are simply indispensable in their lqudity and
evenness, neither of these qualities excluding
the crispest definition of every note; and her
rendering, which is rather unimpassioned, is
always CUubIUucu NY iueCLSOhoO ahu 9uC oeilSe-
est TASTE"
The ''Shaugraum," (Irish for vagabond) has
proved to be great success at Wallack's but
it was not so from the start, as great deal of
paper had to be given out during the first few
days it was played. 1t is said that the man.
| agement sent no less than two hundred tickets
to one large dry goods house on Broadway
| alone.
Two Turner'S, the property of the earl Of
Marlborough, are in the royal academy's win
ter exhibition. OF one, the "vintage Festival
at Macon" painted in 1903, the Athenaum
| says: 'It is direct challenge to Claude, snd
! succeeds by carrying the principles of the old
master to a far higher pitch, with greater pow
| er, and immeasurably greater technical skill
above all, with higher poetry. The result is a
| perfect quasi-classc idyl of the most lovely
| sort, illustrating ioyfulness in a way in which
| few can fail to recognize something that is sol
emn." The other painting is that powerful
tragedy. 'The Wreck of the Minotaur," il
which the wind and waves fairly live and pulse
with passion that are matched in words only
by Victor Hugo, and the human anguish is ter
ribly depicted"
Rosenthaps painting of "Elaine, the lily
| maid of Astolat,' continues to attract visitors
to the gallery of Elliott, Blakeslee & Noyes'
in Boston, and is the chief art sensation of the
year in this country. A critic in the Prussian
government organ at Berlin, calls it "a pure
romantic conception of the scene of the poem
in its tone and in all its relations of light anG
shade" The artists latest, and Piloty of Mu
Mich says his best, work has just been sent tc
its purchaser in fittsburg. The scene is the
refectory of a monastery, in which youns
lay brother of elegant form and noble counte
nance has paused in setting the breakfast table
and become absorbed in thought, as his eye,
rest on pair of bright butterflies that fit il
the spring sunlight stealing through the open
window, beyond which blossoms varied gar
den. Without, all is life and freshness ant
joy. Within all takes its tone from the 'Pieta'