The daily morning journal and courier., 1905-06-05

4ASE are LuSfe LOT some suIllclelil IEd- son, They have paid to play a part. They have paid to help produce the play. They are people of some social notoriety. They are women, who, as the Munich Simplicissimus recently put it. do not shrink from any sacrifice in the cause of art. They are there for some sufficient reason, be it only their luminous understanding of the fact that the object of the stage is to make the largest amount of money in the shortest possible time.
 But this wretched New Stage Club that somehow managed to get lot of people quite a mile from their accus- toned haunts, does not understand that the stage ought to be a money
 making machine. At most they could only hope for succes destime. And from the press point of view they have not got it. Even the audience did not
 applaud very much. The audience included many people who dd not
 think that the kind of qualification one
 desires from the stage ought to be ex-
 pressed in terms of noise.
 i To play "SaIome," even in one of
 the great theaters where every kind of
 stage effect could be contrived with
 comparative ease, would be no easy matter On the little stage of the
 Bijou Theater it was naturally more
 difficult still.
 ! For the benefit of any who may not
 be familiar with the work in it's pub
 lished form, had better say that the
 scene of the drama is the grat terrace
 outside the palace of Herod. Here,
 guarded by soldiers, Iokanaan John,
 the Baptist) is imprisoned in deep
 we'll or cistern, the mouth of which
 goes on to the terrace. The evening
 banquet in the palace is just over, and
 to the terrace comes salome, seeking
 to escape the eyes of Herod-the sub
 ject of one of Aubrey Beardsley's illus
 trations. The corrupt tetrarch, hay
 ing married his brothers wife,
 Herodias, has now cast his lustful eyes
 upon her daughter Salome, Princess of
 Judea.
 From the well the prophets voice is
 heard, and Salome demands that he be brought before her. The soldiers dare mot obey, and Salome turns to their
 captain, a young Syrian, who loves
 her. With him she prevails, and loka-
 naan, brough to the terrace, curses her
 as the daughter of an evil woman. But
 Salome is facinated by his beauty; beg
 with a wealth of Oriental imagery that
 she may be allowed to touch him, his
 hair. his body: offers herself to him,
 princess and virgin. She begs that she
 may kiss his mouth, declares that she
 has never loved before; and the
 young Syrian, mad with jealousy,
 stabs himself to death. In the pleading,
 passionate girl the prohet sees only an
 incarnation of evil. Again and again
 her love has flashed into anger, and her
 endearments into ridicule, and now
 she swears that she will some day kiss
 his mouth. Ickanaan is led back to his prison, and Herod, Herodias, Tigel- linus, the envoy of Caesar, and others
 enter.
 The pale. gross senile tetrarch, crowned with flowers, is i'll at ease. He is to cold, too hot, vain-glorious and afraid. In the air he fancies that he hears the sound of mighty wings. He drink, and will not drink. He fat ! ters Caesars envoy, and exalts him self: insults Herodias, says Iokanaan's denunclations are not meant for her, think that he may be a holy man, and looks continually at Salome, sitting moodily apart. He beseeches her to dance for him, offering her finally whatever she may desire, even to the half, of his kingdom . .Herodias commands her daughter not to dance; but Salome dances. and then, as in the Bible, demands that the head of John the Baptist be brought to her in a charger. Now Herodias and the Jews are delighted and the tetrach confounded. Anything but \ that. Wonderful is the description of the treasures he offers rather than ! that. But Salome is int1exible and < Herodias drags the signet ring from # her husbands's finger and gives it to i the executioner
 Raaman, the executioner, dares not H kill the prophet. His sword is heard & to drop from his hand, and the sol- diers are sent down to do the work 4 and the head is brought to Salome. q She places it before her on the ground, 1 kneels beside it, talks to 1t, foundles it, raises it and kisses it. q have i kissed thy mouth Iokanaan, have
 kissed thy mouth" Then the tetrarch,
 besides himself with rage and fear, 8 cries, Kill that woman" And the sol- 3 diers rush upon the kneeling girl and crush her with their shields.
 As one af the matutinal critics sage
 remarks the idea of representing Sa- Home as enamoured of John theBaptist !. lis not original. Possibly that legend is ;. as old as the Biblical version, and , dramatically considered it is much f more logical and effective. The play f is indeed a singular effective presen- $ tation of some of the great human . Iemotions in more primitive and mystic time, and in the writing there [, is much to recall the glamour and im- Iasro..r r.t