Page:The Galaxy, Volume 5.djvu/182

172 to open upon us an invasion of the provincials. The recently-burned Winter Garden was almost without an actor with the gait, speech or manners of a Christian. The Merchant of Venice, produced with so much lavish pictorial splendor, was never so wretchedly acted on the metropolitan boards. Of course this reference is not to Booth. Madame Scheller, who is at times excellent, was simply ridiculous as Portia—although she read the Plea for Mercy with fine accent and good discretion—and all the others were hopelessly incompetent. We neither desire nor need new theatres merely to afford provincial adventurers an opportunity to exhibit of what poor stuff men and woman are sometimes made.

The French actors are such consummate actors, because they breathe, think, feel, know and live art, and art only. They are born under its domain, live penetrated through and through by its influence, and are infused by a mastering enthusiasm in behalf of it.

 

