Page:Six Months In Mexico.pdf/78

76 Sunday is the most fashionable theater day. Every person who can possibly collect together enough money goes, from the poor, naked peon to the Spanish millionaire. On Monday all amusement houses are closed and many are only open every other day throughout the entire week; they are not at all particular about fulfilling engagements. A play may be billed for a certain night and on arrival there the servant will politely inform you it is postponed until manana (to-morrow), and all you can do is to go back home and await their pleasure.

The National Theater is a fine building with accommodations for 4,500 persons. The first entrance is a wide open space faced with mammoth pillars. Going up the steps you enter, through a heavily draped doorway, the vestibule or hall. Along the sides are racks where gentlemen and ladies deposit their wraps. The orchestra, or pit—the fashionable quarter in American theaters—is known as the "Lunetas." The seats are straight-backed, leather-covered chairs of ancient shape and most uncomfortable style. They were evidently fashioned more for durability than beauty, being made of very heavy, unpainted wood. Narrow passageways intersect each other, and wooden benches are placed along the seats to serve as foot-rests. Down in front of the stage is the orchestra, flanked at either end by long benches running lengthwise of the stage. Boxes, six stories in height, look out upon the stage, and balconies circle the room. The balconies are divided into compartments holding eight persons. Common, straight chairs, with large mirrors on the door and walls, are the only furnishment. The "Lunetas" command seventy-five cents to $1.50; Palcos (boxes) $2 a chair, and the Galeria (the sixth row of balconies) twenty-five cents.

At 8.30 the orchestra strikes up, people come in and find their places, and about 9 o'clock the curtain goes up and silence reigns; the enthusiasm which is manifested at bull-fights is absent here. Everything is accepted and witnessed with an air of boredom and martyrdom that is quite pathetic. More time is spent gazing around at the audience than at the players. Everybody carries opera-glasses, and makes good use of them.

Without doubt you would like to know how they dress; the men—who always come first, you know—wear