New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1900-08-05
THE PASSION PLAY.
ITS PRESENT PERFORMANCE AT ODER
AMMERGAU.
Oberammergau. July 10.

Oberammergau. July To-
No touch of beauty has been lost to Oberam-
nergau. The return to ii after ten years brings
no disappointment, but only new surprise. The
valley where it lies never lovelier than 1t is
to-day. 1t never could be. The Kofel lifts It's
cross crowned. domelike summit straight above
it, and the other mountains stand around it like
a wall A splendid sunlight pouTs over the
mountains and the valley, and makes the white
and light brown houses of the village and even
the gray roads absolutely dazzling.
Even Oh a day like this when the village,
which has fourteen hundred people of its own.
is entertaining some five thousand guests there
is a of rest and peace about the place. 1t
is so at least to those who have just come from
Munich, as hundreds have. Munich is place
of dire disorder. Oberammergau is little viii
lage. but it receives its guests and takes care of
them Munich is great city. and it gathers
unto itself a part only OF those same guests as
they go and come. and does not know what to
do with them It has huge buildings, which,
according to the signs on them should be hotels,
but they are more like beehives. Their owners
seem to have given up managing them in de-
spair They merely stay in them and let lodg-
ings and sell meals. and that is a very different
thing from keeping hotel.
Even here in Oberammergau confusion fell
upon some last night through their own fault.
hand, they warned not to do. So hun
dreds of them had to seek shelter half an hours
walk away. at Unterammergau. full hours
walk in the opposite direction, at Ettal. Neither
would the theatre to-day hold all who wanted
to get into It. There were enough who could
not find places TO fill It half full again. For
these the play will be given again tomorrow.
The same sunlight that lit the hills shone,
late in the afternoon, straight across the stage,
touched the crowns OF the chorus and the gold
embroidery of their robes, the. spears and he'll
NETS of the soldiers the mitre of the High
Priest and his breastplate with the twelve
Jewels, and the ld-tipped staff of PLATE, and
turned the Passion Play into glistenng spec
tace.
A MUCH DESCRIBED PERFORMANCE
To describe the Passion Play seems almost
superfuous by this time it has been described
so many times And yet to talk about it and
about" critcisinS and philosophizing and
mOraizing, without telling at all what it is,
may be trouble to many. for, after all, it is
done only once in ten years, and every time a
class of readers has grown up who were not
old enough to read about it before, and many
of those who might remember do forget Any
one who lets it be known that he has the
Passion Play is at piled with questions
which prove that the general understanding
with regard to it is, to use mild term, vague.
Therefore, some account of the play and its
surroundings. for the benefit of those who have
still to learn but brief out of Difference to those
who have already learned, may not be
now out of place
The new theatre which has been built for the
play this year suggests, INTELLECTUALLY, big
railway station. But this is only the part Of
it where the audience sits. Although it is not
beautiful, it is we'll fitted for it's purpose. and
every seat. the cheapest well as the dearest.
commands good view OF the stage. The seats
are of hardwood. and the backs formed
by rail, also of hardwood which along
a whole row. The wood is of curious sort too
probably grown only in Bavaria, which has the
peculiar property of growing considerably
harder after 1t has been sat on for five or six
hours.
The stage is of a plan unknown except in