The New York herald., 1922-10-15

that little girl of to-day, full of Alice in
Wonderland would feel IL she were
shown Lewis Carroll and told That is
your story"
THERE is so much in "The Print Of
l. My Remembrance" that calls for
quotation. Naturally the stage, the life
Of the stage and the men and women of
the stage are in the foreground. 1t was
In the late eighties that Augustus Thomas
reached New York. The citys Rialto has
been steadily moving northward since the
days Of the first Rialto In John street,
when President Washington was driven
to the theater there from his residence
In Cherry street. Thomas found the Rialto
in state Of migration. 1t was moving
from Union Square to Madison Square.
The latter, to quote Mr.. Thomas, was "the
smart and modern spot, although many
Of the actors Of the comic page fur
trimmed intensity still haunted the older
Rialto. And at Fourteenth street there
was still considerable theatrical power
and vibration. Under the old Morton
House j. M. Hill still managed the Union
Square Theater. One street further south
was the Star, where Cranes long run in
David Lloyd's and Sidney Rosenfeld's
Senator and other plays was to occur
before the passing of that historic house."
@ DON after reaching New York Mr.
~ Thomas became member of the
Lambs. which then occupied an old fash
ioned five story house in Twenty-sixth
street between Broadway and Sixth ave-
nue.. He recalls the table d'hote dinner
that was then served for SO cents at the
large club table. The clubs membership
was limited to total professional number
of one hundred, which included such men
as Lester Wallack, Dion Boucicault, Steele
Mackaye, Mark Smith, Robert G. Ingersoll,
Otis Skinner and the Holland brothers
George, Edmund and Joseph. At the din
ner the gayety of such youngsters as
Harry Woodruff, Cyril Scott, Fritz Will
Jams. Francis Carlyle and Ned Bell was
as memorable as the wise talk of such
elders as Steele Mackaye and Frank Mayo.
At one Of these dinners Mr.. Thomas be-
gan his real friendship with Otis Skinner
"He had come in from trip he
stood In the doorway and answering the
mems demands recited Beranger's When
We Were Twenty-one.'" That is one of
Mr. Thomas's rare literary slips, for it
was Beranger's lie Grenier," and "When
We Were Twenty-one" was entirely the
Thackerayan adaptation.
UCOME day." says Mr.. Thomas. lit will
~ be as respectable to write histori-
cally of the fine barrooms of that time
as it was for Dickens in his day to write
of the taproom." Why not? Do the re-
formers demand that all allusions to the
Mermaid Tavern, where Shakespeare
made his morning breakfast of a tankard
Of ale, to the Cafe Momus of Murger's
vie de Boheme," and to the "Cider Gel
lar" of Thackeray's '"The Newcomers" be
expunged from literature? There is no
doubt about Mr.. Thomas's attitude to-
ward a certain dominating issue of the
times. Il wonder" he writes in an early
chapter, II there is really world spirit
brooding over all, and if the seemingly
disconnected events are more wisely as
sociated than we surmise. A mystic that
autumn walking through his quiet path
at Concord, from which specific fruit
takes its name, wrote in his private diary
not meant for publication but for his own
refreshment only, The grape is fruitful
this year that men may be genial and
gentle and make better laws"