from his belt, and then and there hanged
himself; swinging backward and forward some
four or five feet from the ground! All our
party were struck by the intense Jewishness of
Judas. The couleur locale was more marked
in him—in his dress, his voice, and what is
technically termed his "make up "—than in any
of the others.

The female performers were less satisfactory,
dramatically speaking. Mary Magdalene was
a buxom fair woman with a flood of blonde
hair. The Virgin somewhat tame, with an
inexpressive face and a painfully whining voice. But
she had the rare merit of walking and moving
with unembarrassed grace and dignity.

It may not be uninteresting to mention the
social condition of some of the chief actors.
St. John and the Magdalene were brother and
sister, the former a miller at Mühlau; Mary was
the daughter of the village shopkeeper at
Brixlegg; St. Peter was a labourer in the iron-
works at Brixlegg; Pilate, a farmer; Caiaphas,
a shoemaker; Herod was a coppersmith; Saint
Veronica was a locksmith's wife; St. James,
the son of the sacristan at Volders; the
centurion, a woodcutter; Joseph of Arimathea, an
agricultural labourer.

On the day on which we saw this play, the
audience numbered two thousand three hundred
persons. This was the tenth performance; and
on none of the former occasions had the attendance
been smaller.

There were some marvellous studies for the
painter and the physiognomist among those
rustic faces: faces which had not been ground
into uniform pattern by custom and the contact
of large masses of their fellows, but belonged to
solitary dwellers in cottages perched high on
toppling crags; on hidden farms wrapped in
some green fold of the great hills; in forest-
darkened dwellings where the wind sings wild
melodies in winter; and in Alpine huts fringed
with blue gentian and forget-me-not, and
fragrant with the breath of lowing kine. Faces
which bore great nature's stamp and impress
unmistakably, but yet in an unconscious way:
much as the dumb boulder lying in a meadow
reveals the record of the circling years in many
a flood of greenest lichen-velvet, brown
weather-stain, or startling blood-red moss. These
faces were as interesting and as pregnant with
food for meditation, as the spectacle presented
on the stage. All were attentive, serious, self-
possessed. If we were to imply that a full
appreciation of the awe and horror and pity of
the story were reflected in them, we should
mislead the reader. Such full appreciation would
demand a higher and wider imaginative faculty
than these poor peasants could lay claim to. A
profound reverence, an awful wonder, must
proceed from power of comparison which they in
nowise possess. But no one looking at them
could doubt two things; first, that they implicitly
believed in the truth of all that their priests
had taught them; secondly, that they had
hearts accessible to the promptings of human
love and fellowship. When Mary parted from
her beloved son, yielding him up to meet a
dreadful death, the tears streamed copiously
down many a rugged face. Nearly all the
women—especially the elder women, who had
known the joys and sorrows of motherhood—
wept bitterly; and so did many men.

Many of the audience shuddered when Jesus
fell under the lash. All sat still as statues,
during the scene of the crucifixion. When the
Roman soldier pierced the Saviour's side, and
blood gushed forth and fell plashing on the
ground, there ran an electrical thrill of horror
through the crowd. Proportioned to the highly-
strung intensity of this terrible scene, was the
popular sense of relief when the stone fell from
the sepulchre, and the rising Lord appeared,
radiant, to the astonished Roman soldiers. The
audience could then have shouted aloud with
joy. They relieved their feelings at the earliest,
decent opportunity by a hearty peal of laughter
at the Roman soldiers aforesaid, who rushed
pell-mell through the streets of Jerusalem,
shouting, "He is arisen! He is arisen!" at the
full pitch of their country-bred lungs. It was
not that the spectators were disrespectful; they
were simply very glad; and, moreover, they
rejoiced in an absolute physical relief after the
strain and immobility of the foregoing scenes.

The performance ends with a tableau of the
victorious Saviour standing triumphant, cross
in hand, surrounded by saints, and angels, and
patriarchs. His snowy drapery is changed for
glowing crimson. His crown of thorns is gone.
He points upward with the cross, in ecstasy.
The victory is achieved, the sacrifice
accomplished!

The notes of a rejoicing hallelujah chorus
resound through the building. The crowd
pours out, and we with the rest, into the damp
autumn air, and we front the changeless aspect
of the great grand mountains, pondering many
things.

PASSENGER POSTAGE.

IN the rose-scented city of Bisnagar, Prince
Houssian overheard a crier offering a piece of
carpet to the multitude. Learning its properties
Prince Houssian marvelled, for it was a magic
carpet. "Buy it," said the owner, "you may
be instantly transported to whatever place you
wish to visit, and will find yourself in the
desired spot almost immediately without being
stopped by any obstacle whatsoever. You
have but to wish and you are there." This was
Arabian Nights romance, but it may be very
nearly sober nineteenth century fact. Progress
is but the realization of old dreamers' fancies.

The modern crier is Mr. Raphael Brandon.
He is the author of a new scheme of railway
organisation, promising results as wonderful as
ever the street seller of Bisnagar vaunted of
his carpet. It is simply an adaptation of Sir
Rowland Hill's Post-office scheme, to railway
passenger traffic. He proposes to treat a
passenger like a letter, and send him anywhere