The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-05-30
The Moulin Rnnne.

From the Memphis News-Scimetar.
 The great French resort on Mont Mar ire. the Moulin Rouge, or the Red NH, has gone up in smoke, and a historic place of unsavory memory has passed away.
 Mark Twain should feel a sense of per sonal loss, because the moulin Rouge was nourished for at least the third of a century by his rococo description of it.
 Few Frenchmen ever visited the place, and few foreigners outside of the callow younglings who thought they were "seeing the world"
 The Moulin Rouge drew Its sustenance from Americans chiefly, and Mark Twain was their impresario. He started the tide in it's direction, and the flow has been constant and the overflow regular ever since
 When in the early days the French patronzed the place, it was what the language of the street would call the real thing" Latterly 1t has been make believe, theatrical. perfunctory, and as lacking in romantcsm and originality as is the multiplication table. Those who enliven things there were mere marion cites who act by rule and rote, and who, unlike acors on the stage, not per mitted to 'create" any character or in- dulge in embellishments or amplifca- lions.
 The demure widow in her weeds was
 
 night sprung suddenly into life and ac- tivity, romped and cayorted and cara coled about, then jumped upon a table and performed a dancing stunt, and this meant a few bottles of wine If the men sitting about would submit to her meth cd of limb ductility. Her simulated spon- taneity and sudden access of abandoned deviltry deluded only the uninitiated The acrobatic girl who dressed 'splen- daciously' and wound up her stunt by kicking somebody's hat off. was there The alleged grisettes and their compan- ions, who performed fantastic dances and cut up monkey shines, in the hope of capturing men with real money, from over the Atlantic, were there, and once they lassoed a young American gallant for languorous waltz, which deviated every now and then into strange figures of physical culture, wine flowed, and the cash register furnished the watching proprietor music more pleasing to him than a cathedral anthem or grand opera. Our countrymen cared nothing for expense, They were seeing Paris" and that was enough. Of course the band played and the gilded American would sometimes send the leader a five or ten spot for his favorite piece, a Chopin mazurka of the livelier and more passionate class, to show that he was no stranger to music, and while listen ing to 1t he gave every outward and vis- ible sign of an inward and tempestuous enjoyment. Meantime, the alert ears of the proprietor caused him to swoon in ecstatic ausculaton of the cash registers staccato anvil chorus
 The cognoscenti enjoyed it not The ensemble had the form and being of the real thing but the soul was not there. In moments of widest abandon the be- dizened siren could not conceal her pre- occupation in computing the number of francs her commissions would bring her. It was all so mercenary, all so meter like, or day-laborer-l like. Mimi was not there, and Musette was nowhere to be seen, and their chic. dainty, poetic in- quity that was it's own consolidating apol- ogy, because of It's bubbling, effervescent naturalness. because of It's unrestraned, unconscious winsomeness, that success fully counterfeited lily-like virtue. had been supplemented by the unspiritual limitations of hired help" who did their work badly. Even Marse Henry Waiter son a short time ago witnessed 1t with no other emotion than that produced by a breakfast of cold mush on a January morning and Marse Henry Is neither cold calous nor cloyed.
 That such a place should have so long hourished by mongering factory or ma chine-made turpitude, Is more than strange. It proves the force and magnet, ism of an illusion. When a thing is pro- nounced good or bad by those who have sufficient influence to make it fashionable conventional or formal, the herd will fol- low without inquiry or question. The most sturdy and invincibe prOtagonists l of an idea are those who accept 1t on | trust and who know least about it. The Moulin Rouge Is dead, but some l other delusions will take it's place. Let us hope that they will be more edifying.