The Arkansaw traveler., 1886-04-17


 acters, would fill room. This popular actor has the highest idea of the dignity of the profession; his swords, collars, etc, are all of intrinsic value. The gold chain he wears in Hdmia was the gift of an admirer among the audience, who begged as favor to substitute it for the one he was in the habit of wear ing. Miss Terry's Venetian dresses are of the finest make and material; and those who witnessed "The Merchant of Venice" will recall the splendid robe of amber brocadcd silk with its fnnum- erable yards of sweeping train, the value of which fair readers will estimate bet ter than can. These dresses are regu- larly designed by competent artists; and 1t IS interesting to see series of pretty water-color sketches one for each char acter, minutely and carefully colored Grevin, in Paris, is at the head of this department; while here the Hon Lewis Wingticld and Mr Alfred Thompson have been particularly successful For one performance at Paris there were eight hundred dresses laid out i'll the dressingrooms, with arms, jewels, dec oratl0ns, etc, and d propOrtionate crowd to wear them. who naturally got con fused, and put on wrong portions of the costumes, mixing them up in wild dsor- der. Apropos of velvet, there s at the Lyccum Theatre a second curtain and draperics of this rich material, first used for the "Corsican Brothers It was made in Paris and contains nearly a thousand yards and costs as it is called a fortune about eGOO or G70O. In the Princess Ida each young lady of the band of young ladies had three dresses, costing ECO for the suite and as there were some thirty OF forty of these fair creatures it "totalled up" as the Americans say, to a large figure
 Formerly the scenic artist was strictly a scene painter, and his work was simply to cover canvass with beautiful and effective pictures To this class be- longed Grirye and Telbin and Stanhcld. who later became Il Royal Academician. The large bold style required for scenery is q fine training, and at this moment it is easy to distinguish one of Telbins landscapes, so poetical and rich is the treatment. The artist of tho Lyceum, Mir Craven, is also remarkable for rich ne's of color, freedom of touch, and much grace and fancy It is curious to visit the paintngroom of this theatre, which is high up in the roof, when some great and costly piece is being got ready. Here on table we find a small model stage, like Il toy theatre, but which is carefully made to scale with all the rn- frances, etc, marked. The artist first paints his little scenes on cardboard, cuts out the doors, windows, etc. exactly as he intends 1t to be on the real boards below. He has, besides, large plans of the stage, done to measure on which can be arranged all the portable struc- lures in their exact position. Now ar rivrs the clever manager, who Is pos srsSed of much suggestive taste. The little scene is set for him-it suts-or he may suggest some more brilliant and effective idea. Meanwhile assistants are busy at the canvas hung on the walls with rules six feet long, ruling the per spectiye lines in black, or getting in the rough colors Of course only a portion of the scene can be painted at d time, as the room is a low one. In the great foreign theatres the canvas can be raised or lowered through slit in the floor, or the wall made high enough, as at Drury Lane, to take in the whole scene.
 But in these times the scene-builder has taken the place of the painter Houses, bridges, porches, streets even, are all constructed in the carpenters s shop. There is now no system for seen cry; all that tho stage manager requires is that his stage should be perfectly clear, open, and unencumbered space on which he can launch his army of men to drag on and build up these great structures. Formerly there were grooves for the scenes to slide in At the sound of whistle the scene was drawn away right and left and we saw the grooves let down on hinges, and in which the new scene was to slide All l this is rococo and old-fashioned. In some of the older theatres one has often seen the two halves of scene driven from right to left, the two men in their shirt sleeves who moved them being i quite visible, until the halves met in the middle with sharp crack. Occa- sonally there used to be an imperfect joining, when, according to the old story, a fellow in the gallery called out We don't expect no grammar here, but yer might make yer scenes meet
 Nowadays, or rather now-a-nights, when the curtain rises, We see the stage closed in by regular structures houses, walls trees, vast flights of steps, up or down which people can walk We have Charing Cross, with St Martin Church, the National Gallery, and the Nelson Monument, all squeezed into small area; while at the present moment, Cleopatra's Needle and all, exhibited on the London stage These huge masses cost vast deal At the Iyceum, under Mir. Bateman's management, simple drawbridge in Louis Xl.," which was raised and lowered, cost some f25, nearly as much as it would if ordered for a gen uine fortress. But there is greater cx- pense in the number of stalwart arms necessary to drag these monsters into their places, and how often do we hear from behind the agitated cloth (as it is calleD the creaking, numbering sounds b,,c Id ,l> 4l,