Page:The Works of J. W. von Goethe, Volume 12.djvu/179

Rh stout and well-built, speaks admirably, and deports herself cleverly, though she is no extraordinary actress. The subject of the piece is extravagant, and resembled that which is treated by us under the name of “Der Verschlag” (“the partition”). With inexhaustible variety, it amused us for more than three hours. But even here the people is the base upon which everything rests. The spectators are themselves actors, and the multitude is melted into one whole with the stage. All day long the buyer and the seller, the beggar, the sailor, the female gossip, the advocate and his opponent, are living and acting in the square and on the bench, in the gondolas and in the palaces, and make it their business to talk and to asseverate, to cry and to offer for sale, to sing and to play, to curse and to brawl. In the evening they go into the theatre, and see and hear the life of the day artificially put together, prettily set off, interwoven with a story, removed from reality by the masks, and brought near to it by manners In all this they take a childish delight, and again shout and clap, and make a noise. From day to night, nay, from midnight to midnight, it is always the same.

I have not often seen more natural acting than that of these masks. It is such acting as can only be sustained by a remarkably happy talent and long practice.

While I am writing this, they are making a tremendous noise on the canal under my window, though it is past midnight. Whether for good or for evil, they are always doing something.

4.

I have now heard public orators; viz., three fellows in the square and on the stone beach (each telling tales after his fashion), two advocates, two preachers, and the actors, among whom I must especially commend the pantaloon. All these have something