fact not to be doubted. Mr. J. P. Collier, referring
to the official account of the expense of
the revels in 1568, finds items to the effect
that "Strato's house," "Dobbin's house," an
"Orestes' house," were provided and painted,
together with a view of Rome, of Scotland, and of
the Palace of Prosperity, which last was very
likely something after the fashion of a modern
"transformation scene." Similar items occur
in accounts of a somewhat later date, and, in
1576, mention is made of a "painted cloth in
two frames," which exactly corresponds to
Malone's rigid definition of a scene as "a painting
in perspective on a cloth, fastened to a wood
frame or roller," which definition Mr. Collier
rightly deems too strict, observing that the
existence of the frame or roller is a secondary
consideration, provided the scene is "a painting
in perspective, and movable with the change
of place mentioned in the play." Indeed, Mr
Collier himself is too rigid, when he insists on
this condition of movability, which, after all, is
contingent on a certain form of drama. Were
not the further end of the dormitory of
Westminster School wanted for non-theatrical
purposes, the scene used for the performance of
Latin Comedy at Christinas might as well be
nailed to the wall as not, for it has remained
unchanged for years, and has answered the purpose
of illustrating five distinct plays.

However, while our courtly ancestors had the
thing called a "scene," they do not seem to
have used the word "scene" in its present
English sense till the reign of James the First. Mr.
Payne Collier can find nothing earlier than the
first edition of Dr. Halliday's comedy
Technogamia, which was printed in 1610, and in
which this stage direction occurs: "Here the
upper part of the scene opened, when straight
appeared Music and all the fine arts sitting on
two semicircular benches, one above another,
who sat thus till the rest of the prologue was
spoken, which, being ended, they descended in
order within the scene, while the music played."
The expression "within the scene" clearly means
in front of the scene, which was regarded as the
back of an enclosure. A passage in one of
Bacon's essays, published in 1612, and cited by
Mr. Collier, is much to the point, as it contains
a reference to movable pictures on the stage.
"The alterations of scenes," says Bacon, "so it
be quietly and without noise, are things of great
beauty and pleasure." Still the word does not
adhere very tightly to the thing. The Royal
Slave, a play acted before the king and queen at
Oxford, in 1636, is divided into acts and scenes
in the Latin sense, but the painted scenes in
the modern sense are called "appearances."
Thus the first appearance is a "Temple of the
Sun," another is a "stately palace," and so on.

According to the theory now accepted, these
painted scenes, or " appearances," were, as I
have already said, only employed for the private
recreation of royalty and aristocracy. The
patrons of the theatres open to the people were
contented with a stage void of pictorial illustration,
in which certain curtains, called " traverses,"
were made clumsilv to indicate the
local position of the actors. There was a pair
of curtains in front of the stage, answering the
same purpose as the green baize at the present
day; "but which, instead of rising as with us, or
sinking as with the ancients, when the
performance was about to begin, was drawn off on
each side by means of a rod. Besides this
were the traverses, which could be drawn
backward and forward at pleasure, so as to
represent an inner and outer apartment, or the
exterior and interior of a house. We can
imagine an interior pair of curtains, hung on a rod
placed over the middle of the stage, partially
withdrawn so as to have an opening at any
convenient point, and that by general consent the
actors seen through this opening were supposed
to be in a more interior position than those who
stood in front. In addition to the traverses,
there were contrivances to place the performers
on different levels when this was required for
the business of the play. Even in the absence
of all historical evidence, we might be perfectly
sure that, in their famous balcony scene, Romeo
and Juliet did not both stand on the floor, but
that the lady was raised some feet above the
gentleman, if only by means of a table.

Taking a general survey of these
contrivances, we find a stage that theatrically
disposed children would, of their own accord,
construct in a room, if they acted a play for
their own amusement. A couple of clothes-
horses would probably be employed for the
same purpose as the old traverses, the space
between them being supposed to represent, say,
a door. A large arm-chair, with its back
turned towards the audience, would stand for
Juliet's balcony, or for those walls of Angiers
whence the citizen in King John addresses the
contending kings. Something of the sort is
done in our modern theatres during the earlier
rehearsals of a play. The scenery and properties
not being ready, "substitutes" are
employed; that is to say, any old box or table is
made to answer the purpose of a splendid
article of furniture, or portion of a set scene,
where the proper position of the actor on the
stage cannot be indicated without some tangible
object. If we adopted the modern technical word,
and said that, according to the received theory,
plays were performed throughout with " substitutes,"
the expression would be strictly correct.

With the aid of a very little reflection we
shall at once perceive that an arrangement,
such as I have above described, must, if
tolerated by the public, prove most beneficial to
the growth of ideal dramatic poetry. No attempt
is made at illusion beyond that which is
produced by the excited imagination of the
audience; the employed " properties" not being
intended to afford any gratification, except so
far as they render possible the action of the
piece. The word "talky," now applied to
pieces in which the dialogue seems somewhat
too diffuse, would scarcely have a signification
to a public assembled for no other end than
to hear "talk" illustrated by appropriate
gesiculation. The impatience of a modern
audience on the subject of dialogue arises from.