Year: 1872

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age. Accordingly, one will find, upon


nearly every list offered by the various


committees and managers, the names Of
| triflers and btfoons who are constant


disgrace to the lecturing guild, and


constantly degrading influence upon the


public taste. Their popularity is usual
ly exhausted by single performance


but they rove from platform to platform,


retailing their stale jokes, and doing their


best and worst to destroy the institution


to which they cling for hearing and a


living


This thing was done in better taste


formerly. " Drolleriss' ANA bufloons


and Yankee comedians" were in the


habit of advertising themselves. They


entered a town with no Endorsement but


their own, and no character but that


which they assumed. They attracted


a low crowd 81 men and boys as coarse


and frivolous as themselves, and the bet
ter part Of society never came in con-
tact with them. A woman rarely en-
tered their exhibitions, and lady never
yet they were clever men with quite as
much wit and common decency as some
of the literary wags that are now COM
mended to lecture committees by the
bureaus, and presented by the commit.
tees to confdng public.


There are, and have been for years,
men put forward as lecturers whose sole
distinction was achieved by spelling the
weakest wit in the worst way-men who
never aimed at any result but laugh,
and who, if they could not secure this
result by an effort in the line OF decency,
did not hesitate at any means, however
low, to win the coveted response. If there
is any difference between performances
Of this sort and negro MINISTRIES, stroll
ing "drollerists, who do not even claim
to be respectable, we fail to detect it;
and it is high time that the managers Of
our lecture courses had left them from
their lists, and ceased to insult the pub
lie by the presumption that it can be in-
terested in their silly utterances.


1t would be claimed, we suppose, by
any one who would undertake to defend
the employment of these men, that they
draw large houses. Granted: they do
this once, and perhaps do something to
replenish the managerial exchequer; but
they invariably send away their audi
ences disappointed and disgusted. No
thoughtful or sensible man can devote a
whole evening to the poorest kind of
nonsense without losing little of his
self respect, and feeling that he has spent
his money for that which does not satis-
fly. The reaction is always against the
system, and in the long run the manag.
ers find themselves obliged to rely upon
lower and poorer set of patrons, who
are not long in learning that even they
can be better suited by the coarse comedy
of the theater, and the dances and SONGS
of the negro minstrel. Nothing has
been permap 9ltly gained in any instance
to the lyceum and lecture system by de-
grading the character of the perform
ances offered to the public. 4 tempo
rary financial success consequent upon
this policy is always followed by dissat-
and loss, and it ought to be
Professional testers and trihers are pro-
fessiOnel nuisances, who ought not to be
tolerated by any man of common sense
interested in the elevation and puriioa-
tion Of the pubic taste.


But shall not lyceums and the audi
ences they gather have the privilege Of
laughing! Certainly. Mr.. Coughs
audiences have no lack of opportunity
to laugh, and there are others who have
his faculty OF exciting the ulirthfuluess
Of those who throng to hear them but
Mr.. Cough is a gentleman who is never
low, and who is never without good
object. He is All earnest Christian man,
whose whole life is a lesson of toll and
self sacrifice. Mr. Cough is not triAcr;
and the simple reason that he continues
to draw full houses from year to year is,
that he is not Il triiier. Wit, humor,
these are never out of order in a lecture,
provided they season good thinking and
assist manly purpose. Wit and humor
are always good us condiments, but never
as food. The stupidest book in the
world is book of jokes, and the stupid
est man in the world is one who surren-
ders himself to the single purpose of
making nen laugh. 1t is pupose that
wholly demoralizes and degrades him,
and makes him unfit to be teacher Of
anything. The honor chat has been
shown to literary trifers upon the plat
form has had the worst effect upon the
young. It has disseminated slang, and
vitiated the taste of the impressible, and
excited unworthy ambition and emula-
ton. When our lyccums, on which we
have been wont to rely for good inau.
2nccs in literary matters, at last become
agents of buifoonery and low literary
they dishonor their carly
record and the idea which gave them
birth. Let them Danish trihers from
.bo ,,lo4for,n and oo hack to tho nlan