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 represented an interior, such as a chamber with a bed in it. A good illustration of the arrangement may be found in the scenario for the familiar story of Pyramus and Thisbe, as dramatized about 1617 by Théophile de Viaud.

'Il faut, au milieu du théâtre, un mur de marbre et pierre fermé; des ballustres; il faut aussi de chasque costé deux ou trois marches pour monster. A un des costez du théâtre, un murier, un tombeau entouré de piramides. Des fleurs, une éponge, du sang, un poignard, un voile, un antre d'où sort un lion, du costé de la fontaine, et un autre antre à l'autre bout du théâtre où il rentre.'

The Pandoste of Alexandre Hardy required different settings for the two parts, which were given on different days. On the first day,

'Au milieu du théâtre, il faut un beau palais; à un des costez, une grande prison où l'on paroist tout entier. A l'autre costé, un temple; au dessous, une pointe de vaisseau, une mer basse, des rozeaux et marches de degrez.'

The needs of the second day were more simply met by 'deux palais et une maison de paysan et un bois'.

Many examples make it clear that the methods of the Hôtel de Bourgogne did not entirely exclude the use of perspective, which was applied on the back wall, 'au milieu du théâtre'; and as the Italian stage, on its side, was slow to abandon altogether the use of 'case' in relief, it is possible that under favourable circumstances Mahelot and his colleagues may have succeeded in producing the illusion of a consistently built up background much upon the lines contemplated by Serlio. There were some plays whose plot called for nothing more than a single continuous scene in a street, perhaps a known and nameable street, or a forest.