The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1899-03-20

Africa. Several of those from Africa
were Of kingly descent and lived luxu-
riously on subsidies from European
governments who had despoiled their
kingdoms. Others were merchants or
professional men.
After he had become almost a Paris
ian he thought he would try the schools
and studios of Antwerp, and from there
he went to Germany. In Berlin he
found ready occupation; thence he went
to Liepsic, and from there to Munich
In this manner he learned to speak Ger
man. The intervals in his career were
filled in travelling as servant and cour-
Ter over Europe with Americans, who
found this well-informed and polyglot
young American negro very useful.
In the meantime he had not forgotten
his ambition to play Shakespeare, and
continued to study the bard When
ever he essayed to play, however, he
met with so much criticism adverse to
Shakespeare's men in black skins, with
the possible exception of Othello, that
he came to the conclusion that if the
negro were to be seen on the stage,
except in minstrelsy, it must be in
plays constructed especially with re-
gard to his relations with the whites.
Then he decided to write such a play
for himself. This play he has written,
but has not given a name.
In writing a play in which he could
essay the leading part, the hero must
needs be q. negro. So he left America,
ignoring the south and it's negro prob
lens, and based his plot on miscegena-
ton, q theme so startling that he has
not dared to produce the play-and
probably never will. In his play he has
interviewer his own experiences in the
Orient, and the scenes of the piece are
taken from America to Europe, thence
to Asia Minor and into Africa
A young negro student in America
loves and is loved by a white girl in
the town in which ne is attending col
lege. The hero is Lorenzo Barr, an
Afro-American student afterwards
king of Karnak; the heroine is Her
moline Bliss. The other principal char
acters are Mrs. Bliss, a Turk and a
Jew, conspirators against the Ameri-
can missionaries in Armenia; an Amer
lean consul in the Orient a sOothsayer
in Egypt, and Turks, Egyptians, Ar
menians, Kurds, BedouinS, Arabs. etc
The scenes are very gorgeous in their
Oriental coloring, and introduce singers
and the musical instruments of the
east, dancers, jugglers and dervishes.
The scenario of the play is as fol-
lows: Barr declares his love for Her.
moline, which she reciprocates. To-
gether they decide to elope from the
country. The scene is shifted to Paris,
whence they are compelled to flee from
the friends of Hermoine, who are on
the track of the couple, filed with bit
ter vengeance. From Paris they so to
Asia Minor, where Barr, smarting I'M
der the cruelty of the people of the
south to his race, and all Christians,
enters into a plot with a Turk and a
Jew to massacre all the Christians,
and particularly the Americans, at the
mission. The conspirators have gath
cred together a band of Kurds and
Turks. At the last moment impelled
by his love for Hermoine, Barr with
draws from the plot, informs the con-
suls of it, and the conspirators are de-
feated and beaten bSck, Barr leading
the forces hastily got together by the
Christians.
After further adventures in Algiers,
Turkey and other countries, still in adj
vance of the pursuing American aveng-
ers, Barr and Hermoine reach Egypt.
In Cairo Barr meets soothsayer.
whose age is fabulous and who, at
some remote period, had come from
the heart of Africa. When he appears
before her, she receives him as though
she had been expecting him. and aliases
herself before him. With many incan-
tations and weird ministrations, which
form a very effective and impressive
scene in the play, she announces to
him that he Is the king of Karnak
Many years before that the king of
Karnak had been captured by slavers