The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1888-01-08

and illustrated it the spot, Especially IL you
do it reasonably close to the nose of an unin-
formed person. he she is delightfully."- and
mysterously assailed with faint perfume.n
The society girls bought the perfume pencils
at a dollar apiece, and got them just in time for
this weeks two balls. Whensa possessor was
asked to submit her dancing ehrd TO a candidate
for waitzing or quadrille partnership, she let
him write on it in the ordinasy fashion Then
she stood with her face to him as the
difference in their height and the proprieties Of
the place permitted. search ed out his writing
the card, and, with her magic pencil, drew .
line under his name az though to distinguish it.
The mark was not a good clear jet, and it had q
greasy consistency, but it instantly sent forth
the promised perfume, SO delicateiy, so sweetly
that it seemed to be the breath OF the fair fraud
herself
Four times a week there is great assemblags
of fashion at the opera. No one has told in print
the truth about the famous company at whose
feet the social cotsres, the masters Of $500 000,
600, assemble at the Metropolitan Opera house.
1t is the most awkward and unprepossesslnz
troupe Of men and women that ever trod the
boards of any New York theatsr. OF Mrs Lil-
lie Lehmann the prima donna, . lady said:
"Well. have seen her two dozen times. but
never yet her heels any less that three feet
apart" lima eine the movements of anyone OF
whom this is true, especially when you kno W
that Franlein Lehman is short and broad. and
seems TO be made up, below her head, OF three
protuberances of giant proportions. Her taste
has not been improved by long residence in this
country, and she continues in each new opera to
appear in dresses cut to bring her waist
below the top Of her hips. and with each
costume draped to have BAG
in front reaching below her knees. She
INDUCES in the most vigorous dramatic
action, but it consists in only two movements.
One of these is to cross her left arm the
top of her BODICE where. enormous as her arm
shelf The other is to hold her right
straight in the air. la Bartholdis statue OF
Liberty. With her arm in this lightning-rod
position, she will stand and sing ten minutes as
time until you who are watching her get so
tired in one arm, out of pure sympathy, that
you begin to ache before she puts it down. On
grand occasions she and Fraulen Brandt, the
second female singer in the troupe. both raise
hand this way and stand like two h-orze
lamp bearers on either side of staircase, reach
ing straight up into the air and singing for
several minutes Miss Brandt is thin al
Miss Lehman is stout, and Miss Brandt makes
Eo pretensions to either youth or beauty.
OF the men, neither my love of the opera. my
respect for the stronger SEX nor all the gorgeous
ness and glitter of their costumes. can bring me
TO say more than that one of the principal six
is what is called good looking. Herr Alvary, one
of the teuors is handsome young German, erect,
shapely, graceful, genial and youthful. The rest
represent all degrees of absence of beauty. from
one of the bassos who looks like Gustave Dore's
woebegone picture Of Sancho Papza. to another
great singer " ho seems TO have been cut out by
nature for lifting casks in brewery in the day
time and draining mugs at night All the men
perform what fippantly call the-Goddess-of-
Liberty-act with their right hands, just as the
women do And they all either roll around the
stage like fat sailors, or stalk about like stage
ghosts.
There is a wonderful ballet, numbering soma
thing like eighty or ninety women. the prettiest.
most graceful and best trained this generation
But it is made funny, to say the
least, by having to follow the lead Of a persona
fed butser-keg. for it would not be easy to bet
ter describe Mile Gellert than by this simile-
Her limbs like columns Of butter, and her
torso has the shape of the contents of short
barrel of .butter from which the slaves and
hoops have been Knocked away. Consequently,
her dancing is peculiar.
And yet, in the face OF these pecuiiarities. 10
is the most successful opera troupe New York
ever saw It is the candle around which the
gIlded moths of fashion futter they never
did around any other. And for a good reason.
1t gives the first really grand opera we ever
heard. Laugh as We please at the manners and
looks of the men and women. they can sing like
the seraphiru: like angels individually, like q
celestial choir collectively. They appear in the
heaviest OPERA snd in such, it must be remem-
bered even so great vocalist as Patti could not
sing at all. 1t takes physique, lung power, bulk
and though grace is always welcome. no ereas
amount of elegance, beauty refnemens
of action is needed for those music
ersr ersmAS b., ''h heard Lenmsn and Brsnas
fill that e-ealeried theater the biggest on the
continent it were parlor, and fill II with the
purest. most liquid melody, no longer finds in-
clinaton TO criticise the gowns of the ladies or
their stage manners. And just to hear ME-
mann, Robinson, Elmblad and Alvary is to hear
thsIbest ale voices ever listened to In New York.
Every night the house is packed, and every
night all these men and women are brought be-
fore the curtain again and again. So. too, is the
stage manager, for not even Henry Irving ever
dreamed of mounting plays with such scenery
and costumes as are shown here. And no won-
der. No government in Europe spends so much
on opera as the hackers Of this establishment,
and no government is more Indifferent to the re-
ceipts at the box-ofice than they ''Gve
the best" is all they ask, ''and come to at ths
end of the season for whatever is unpaid"
CLARA BELLE.