The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1898-08-21
Ballads and Jests Discount
Bullets and Jaundice.
CHEAP BIDS FOR APPLAUSE
Beginning of u Plague That Threat,
ems to Last All Winter-Age and
Condition of Jokes No Object
The Dewey Pun and the Cuban
Play.

| general public, and especially the theater-
| going part of it, is beginning to get rather
| tired of the blatant sort and to feel some
| leaning toward settling down to quiet
with little transformations love of coun-
try on the side. Not that affection for the
| land of our birth is anything of which
| 10 be ashamed or on which TO preserve
| rigid silence. But a man can be a nice,
| respectable patriot without going insane
over it, and making himself a fit candi-
| date for padded cell. Gen. Grant prob
ably never in his life sat in a gallery
and whooped at some bombastic speech
ana the statues of Gen. Washington have
no ribbons in their button-holes
| The cause of this TRADE is not far away
The theatrical season is not yet fairly
open, and still people have been absolute
~ surfeited with war jokes and patriotic
| songs. The Cuban plays are yet to come =
| ana go. Ones powers of endurance are
| extremely limited, and the most gentle
| ana forbearing of men cannot help an
occasional longing to maltrcat performers
VINO VIII Insist on repeating 10 us what
Dewey did" or how "Schley was too sly
for them" The thing may be expected
to continue all Winter, for companies
nave already rehearsed the stuff. and are
not likely 10 change it. But it might be
| We'll. just the same to remind these ruth
less entertainers that there is point
| where patience ceases to be virtue
and audiences rise in their wrath and
smite.
There is little or no patriotism in the
| regulation Maine and Spain" ballad and
less still in the average filibusterine las,
The crowds that yell with delight and
pound holes in the gallery floors when
they are uttered are composed mainly of
men who have stayed home from the war
Tor That purpose and the player who
| mouths the sentiment seldom knows the
meaning Of 1t. He is merely a triae du-
Dlous or his own power 10 please and
trieS 10 stimulate enthusiasm by apDeal-
ing TO me national pride of the house
Many performer whose turn has for
years fallen fatter than bread without
! yeast now secures three and four encores
nightly on the strength or what Gen go
d.d in Havana. Houses once started an
piaud with reckless disregard of conse-
| quences.
a man may cheer and cheer and be a
traitor still" The average usher would
nave some difficulty in spotting heroes
ana martyrs by watching the sources
from winch handclapping came Often
me most noisy individual has not heard
What was said. while the true lover of
his country may be sound asIeen j., mo
corner with his head against A Dost ard
ms loot in ahe silk hat OF the specta-
tor in front of him
BUT even the most daring tests have
now little effect of the kind desired The
enthusiasm evoked recently by these
methods in local vaudeville houses womb
nor Keep teething baby from going to
| SieeP' ok are beginning to realize that
there may be other colors worthy of being
used for decorating purposes than the
! red, white and blue. while some advanced
thinkers nave already gotten so far as
10 understand that the flag for which
men have fought and triumphed and died
| during the last century and a half NAV
have more dignified uses than hiding the
deai boards Of a lemonade stand or Afford
ing the background for a minstrel first
part.
The same thing may be said of war
jokes. These feeble attempts al humor
have been simply run to death ait an age
where anything else would have given
up The only man in the Cleveland Will
son Ministries who did not tell Spanish
stories was the wire walker, Juan Ca
ceido, who is himself a Spaniard One
cannot help being bored to death at such
tales.
The most fhick-headed of theater-gpers
have learned that the first of May was
"a dewey day in Manila that the Queen
! Regents eyes were dewey" when she
heard OF the battle and have answered
the question, DO we feel encouraged? ~
He has also discovered, according 10 dif-
ferent current recommendations. that
"Schley was too sly for the enemy" and
that he tried TO 'slay a great many of
the Dagoes." Then we have found that
Camara went 10 Manila for the purpose
of taking snapshots" and that Uncle
| Sam exclaimed to the DonS after the first
big sea fight of the war. "Philipean.'
| Incidentally it has been understood that
a regiment of theatrical folk and con-
victs was being organized to take the
stars and Stripes into Havana; that a
battle recently occurred between some
star fish, striped bass and Spanish macke-
rel: that the Dons have beaten the in
ventor of the Holland by constructing
ships that will stay under water until
the end of time: that the Maine was
.hlew' I'D from the sea Instead of white;
that four hundred years ago Columbus dis
covered American and now his country
men are damn sorry he took the trouble
and many Otner tlliSS- w al Johco 81 I
all alike in their main parts and the
slight changes in form do not save
them After hearing Two Little Girls
in Rlue" a hundred times one would not
find II more enjoyable because given with
variations.
psrodies and Rotations are worse than
the tests themselves, because composed
of them. Then both have the added horror
of being couched in bad grammar and OF
having been written without regard to
meter The men who make up-as our
army and navy heroes are none the less
| renreheusible because it's generally i'm
| nossible to tell one from the other, MOI
| can the average patriot reconcile himself
| TO discovering that the Dewey pro tenn
Is suffering from an aggravated case OF
dirty face, and his comrade Gen. Miles
| appeared only five minutes before as q
loud-voiced negro with a propensity fol
falling down on the slightest provocation
The morbidly sentimental songs of the
dav cannot be mentioned without disgust
THE boy in blue and lad SO true who
cleft his home away to roam and fought
This flag to shield on "the battlefield
and teach proud SPAIN of ''our brave
Maine;" but .'in the strife gave up his
rfe," leaving word to tell the news "tc
mother who knew how dear he loved
her. is getting to be so ridiculously an
| cient as to be nauseating.
| And then, to add insult to injury, there
comes an entire crop of Cuban war plays
These range anywhere from the dainty
pathos of that beautiful drama, Held VI
in Havana to the delicate charm sug
gested in the title. "Strangled on Sun
| dow There will he over thirty Of III,