St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1892-06-12

working and lower middle classes, he is
not. as rule, an uproarious applauder.
When you see in Paris man applaud
ing frenetically and with good staying
power, you may safely conclude that he
has some private Interior reason for so
doing. and that he is, upon the whole.
something of Roman" The Partisan
usually ap plands with little. sharp ejac-
uIati0ns of "BravoW or "BienI bieni
tres bien!" and varied assortment of
"Ah's" and "Oh's," thrown out at the
very moment that anything pleases him
particularly. One of the things that
Paris is the half-suppreSSed gust OF
"O-o-o-o-hh!" that passes over the au-
dience, right in the midst Of the m Isle:
at first it seems an irksome interruption.
but when you are used to it you find It
very communicative of enthusiasm.
Theaters and Newspapers.
The theaters in Paris-at all events
the principal oneS-have no pull"
whatever on the business Office of the
newspaper; no theatrical manager can
hold the possible withdrawal of his adj
vertisement in terrorem over an editor.
as can be done here. Theatrical an
nouncement5 go into the Paris papers
as news, and not as advertisements, 9nd
are, as a rule, of the very briefest and
most summary DIES criptiOn. The dra-
matte or musical critic is absolutely I'M
muZZled; he can write what he pleaSes
and as he pleases, and the managers
have no redress except Indictment for
libel, or else the duel.
Between the Acts
On taking your seat at a theater or
orchestral concert in Paris you notice
that, roughly speaking, every man in
the house, whether in the stalls, the
balcony or the boxes, wears his hat
until the performance begins. The
English wear their hats in clubs, which
1 believe the French, as rule, do not.
On going into shop or bushes office
the German takes his hat off and lays it
merely touches it politely, the English
man does nothing about it. But
neither the Englishman nor the German
wears his hat in theater. A French
man is very careful TO take off his hat
in church or in gambling saloon, but
at the theater he keeps it firmly on his
head until the curtain goes up. As soon
as the actdrop falls at the end of an act,
every man in the stalls ciaps his hat
upon his head, stands up, turns his back
upon the stage, raises his opera glass to
his eyes and scans the ladies in the bal
cony and boxes with leisurely interest.
After this he may stroll out into the
foyer, or make calls in the boxes, or
drop into the cafe next door
for a mazagran black coffee or a
glass of beer. There is always
cafe next door to theater, which
looks to the entr'actes for good deal of
its business. The Partisan is by no
means averSe to long entr' actes; much
as he loves the drama, there is no pleas
ure in life that cannot be heightened
for him by being interspersed with So
cial chit-chat and a glass or two of
something good. He takes an evenings
enjoyment in the most generous accep-
tation of the term, and, unlike the Bos-
tonian theater-gOer, is In no hurry to
get home. When the Madison Square
theater in New York adopted its double
stage, by which the entr'actes were
reduced to minute or two each,
Frenchman in the audience exclaimed
Indignantly that such thing would
never be tolerated in Paris.
Fearfully Bad Air.
The Ill ventilation of Paris theaters
has often been enlarged upon; it, like
the uncomfortable seating. is indeed a
thing of hOrrorl One might almost
take these two items as sufficient proof
of the intense love the French have for
the theater; on the principle of what a
Frenchman once said of the English,
that they must be fonder of smoking
than any other people, judging from
the terrible inconvenience to which they
are willing to put themselves in order
to "enjoy" cigar. ANY one who
knows the Cimmerian gloom, desolation
and discomfort of a London smoking
room can appreciate this. The French
| mans lamb-like federation of super
heated foul air in theaters is not
wholly easy to account for. He
Is largely an out-of-door liver; his
rooms ct home are not over