Intimate recollections of Joseph Jefferson . th. It has all dialects, all temperaments, alltemperatures, all possible climaxes suggestedand all possible climates enjoyed, and above itall the grand diapason of our national life call-ing for its great exponents. The veterans enthusiasm was aroused by hisown picture. i Dont fear for our future, either in playsor in players, but dont expect the great in eitherto be repeated in the same way as of old. Ilook for much, but not immediately, of thehighest quality along the line of the older stand-ards. It is a chromo-lithographic age. A manhas to learn
Intimate recollections of Joseph Jefferson . th. It has all dialects, all temperaments, alltemperatures, all possible climaxes suggestedand all possible climates enjoyed, and above itall the grand diapason of our national life call-ing for its great exponents. The veterans enthusiasm was aroused by hisown picture. i Dont fear for our future, either in playsor in players, but dont expect the great in eitherto be repeated in the same way as of old. Ilook for much, but not immediately, of thehighest quality along the line of the older stand-ards. It is a chromo-lithographic age. A manhas to learn so much to be fairly abreast of histime that he would be as old as Methusaleh be-fore he would have time to think of being aShakespeare. After he has read all the Englishand foreign classics and kept up with the re-views and magazines and tried to get hold of thenames in the Russo-Japanese war, what timewould he have to be a Sheridan? Then every-body writes, and that means diffusion. Qualitymust suffer in the face of such a quantity. It is. JOSEPH JEFFERSON 159 chromo-lithographic and not divinely pic-torial. 1 Is the tendency, however, toward refine-ment? Yes, on the whole. Our stage is decent. Iam no milksop of the drama. I do not objectto problem plays if the problem is vital and theexpression of it not offensive to decent ears. Ihold of the play as I do of the player, that itshould be always above its audience—a littleabove it, not too high, for then the audiencecan only see into the flies, if I may use a stagephrase for extreme and fruitless looking up. Inthe same way the actor has a stern responsibilityto his hearers. He is under bonds to respectthem and their wives and children as he wouldhave his own respected. He must not inflictcoarseness upon those in front any more thanhe would tolerate it in his own parlour. WHEN WOMEN WORE MASKS TO PLAYS 4 What a dreadful thing it must have beenin the time of Charles II. to see the great ladiesof the court going to the theatres
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