The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1897-12-27

later at the Broadway. He tells me this
Is the biggest spectacle since Coyent
scenery The drops at the Olympia are
32Oxe0 feet and single set scene covers
LOCO square yards OF canvas. The pros
cenium opening here is 2i5x45 feet, and the
arch is a. straight wrought iron beam
mounted cantilever fashion iii an immense
span. A drop weights three tons and Is
handled by hydraulic machinery The
London county council has stuck II TO the
show at every step, compelling ire
proof curtain wall from end 70 end OF
the building and to the dome. This wall
netting, over which is asbestos plaster.
Every partition, dressing room, etc, was
required to be of metal. All of the
scenery had to be treated with some
patent non-combustible matter. This is
carrying precaution far beyond that de-
manded of any London theatre. or any
has, or will, cost Mr. Bailey about $4,000,
more than he was expecting to pay when
he made the London engagement. But
he is a man of pluck and rehearsals will
begin on the 18th, while the show is sure
to open on Boxing day
SUBURBAN TRANSIT.
Those rantankeroIs citizens ofthe great
republic who are compelled to hang to a
strap while going from one point to an
other, ought to try a London suburban
train on Sunday. There is nothing like it.
You rush UP and down the platform like
mad-along with a few score of others
peeping into one full compartment after
another. Meanwhile cries of Full up!'
come from the guards, who slam doors
right and left along the train. You are
met by the same cries entering any
one of these crowded places, those with
seats directing to stand. But you must
wait for another train or risk it, and
desperately hurl yourself into a crowd of
human cattle whether they like it or not,
just as the train starts. The sign "smok-
ing and the presence of ten pipes and an
OdOr of incOmprehenSible magnitude are
unconsidered trifles- There is no strap
and you cling to the side door like q
drowning man to a broken oar. Forum
ately. there is no terrific jerking and
swaying around corners as you have had
on the IL road or cables. but you are
expecting it every minute and suffer in
the anticipation of disaster. I'm not alone
in the predicament. but / get my share OF
the scowls. until I'm asked:
Does this go to Addison Road2"
I'm -- if 1 know" 1 reply. ct
Then the young man smiles and the
children giggle, and everybody looks
THIS LITTLE WORLD.
This is such a big world, yet it is so
small that as pass through the crowded
supper rooms in Leicester Square a gen.
tleman suddenly jumps up from the table
| where he is getting an r-the-theatre
repast and calls me by my first name;
and before can fairly recognize my dues-
! toner he begins to ask me about New
York, and what is on now at Chicago,
and of the latest gossip of Pittsburg
while half hundred curious eyesAare
turned our way for the moment. The Lon
don journalist who is kindly showing me
the places smiles good humoredly and
chats with a Bohemian quartet near by.
And we pass out. taking in another resort
the same thing occurring twice more the
same night. One of these acouaintances
has just returned from Paris and has not
seen the states for years. Yet he is
! interested in the recent elections and talks
! of the tariff and presses US in for fresh
! bottle, and becomes difficult to get away
! from We try the Criterion and Waterloo
J tavern, and take a. shy at the Haymarket
for the last act, doubling on the Saturday
night markets in the narrow lanes of
! the foreign quarter near midnight, wind
! ing up with supper at the Liberal club
/ on the Embankment. Dear, dear! When
/ think of the thousands thus eating and
meeting and parting and guzzling, and
note the long lines of twinlSling cabs and
the miles of brilliantly lighted windows. I
suddenly remember that the same thing
| has just been in Berlin and Vienna and is
! in Paris and is about to begin in New
York to be followed by Chicago and San
| Francisco. and l am fooled up Picadilly
| toward home impressed with the bigness
and sameness of the world and the fulfil
| ity of trying to do it, all in one Satur-
| day night.
CHARLES THEODORE MURRAY.