FOR

"HERO AND LEANDER."

OR the rest, the month has produced little work of abiding value-little even of fleeting interest. "Hero and Leander " at the Shaftesbury proved to be a very stilted rendering of a German play, very inaccurately put upon the stage. It would not, indeed, be fatal to a good play that the names of the Grecian deities were inscribed with grotesque inaccuracy upon temple and column if the play had other redeeming features. But, except in so far as Mrs. Brown Potter and Mr. Kyrle Bellew are comely to look upon, it had no other redeeming features. It is unkind-it is more than unkind, it is cruel-to take a beautiful old legend—one of the loveliest of the legends of Greece-and thus barbarously to do what Keats did not do, and dull its brightness. With the verses of a poet, with perfect stage effect and exquisite acting, it would be possible to conceive of that "sad and lovely legend" being successfully presented upon the stage. As it was, the result was disaster. It is possible that with a better play Mrs. Brown Potter and Mr. Kyrle Bellew might have done better things. With that particular play the genius of Ada Rehan, the genius of Mounet Sully, could have done nothing. I saw Kyrle Bellew many years ago play Faust in a queer performance at the Crystal Palace—a performance in which Charles Wyndham, of all men, played Mephistopheles, and Miss Eastlake was the Margaret. Kyrle Beliew made an admirable Faust; his scene in the garden throbbed with passion, lived with the poetry of renewed youth and of rekindled love. I always thought from that performance that Kyrle Bellew ought to do a Romeo some time. If he has ever played Romeo I have never seen him. There was something of the old charm at moments in the love-making of Leander. But Leander had such luckless words to say, and had to say them under such strange conditions, that it was impossible to regard them with conviction. The memory of the play is the memory of a lovely story wofully marred. That the performance at the Shaftesbury was hopeiessly un-Hellenic in feeling and in outward expression would not in itself have mattered much. Hawthorne chose to Gothicise many of the fairest Athenian legends, and the legends still remain fair in their new form from the hands of the master. But where there was nothing to compensate for the glaring libels upon the Greece of one's dream and of one's studies, the offence became grave. "Hero and Leander" was preceded by an exceedingly pretty little one-act piece by Mr. Ian Robertson, called "A Play in Little." The scene was a fencing-school in Paris in the year 1790. Mr. Ian Robertson was an

old fencing-master; Miss Adrienne Dairolles his young and pretty daughter, who dressed in a dainty boyish dress, and gave lessons to young ladies in the art of fence. There was tragedy in the background and a love affair in the present. The main purpose of the play was some very pretty sword-play by the author and Miss Dairolles. People who love fencing-and all right-minded people should love fencing-ought to see how prettily and how skilfully Miss Dairolles handles her weapon.

A

"STRATHLOGAN."

STIRRING melodrama is a goodly sight to see, but a bad melodrama is desperately depressing, and "Strathlogan " is bad among the bad. Admirable scenery, and the services of some excellent players, could do nothing to redeem its dulness. It is really a pity to see so clever an actress as Miss Olga Brandon wasting her time and her intelligence upon work of this kind. She has remarkable ability, which I have often been glad to praise; but she might as well have no ability at all if she is going to allow herself to be sold into the slavery of inept melodrama. She cannot-no actress in the world could make bad work seem good work; but the bad work may in time injure her-harden and coarsen her power of artistic expression, and leave her in the end unfitted for those better things for which she showed such promise. It will be a great pity-a very great pity indeed. What is true of Miss Olga Brandon is true also of Mr. Herbert Waring. Here is an actor of much ability, of much earnestness—full, apparently, of zeal for his art—and his ability, his earnestness, his zeal are utterly thrown away upon commonplace conventional parts in a commonplace conventional play; in repeating words and doing deeds that would paralyse the genius of a Garrick or of a Talma. It does not say much for our public appreciation of good work if this is the best kind of business we can find for an actress like Miss Olga Brandon, for an actor like Mr. Herbert Waring, to do.

THE

MORNING PERFORMANCES.

HE month has been thickly starred with morning performances but only one was of serious note, and that was Mr. Brandon Thomas's "Marriage" at the Court Theatre." Marriage" is a clever fantastic play, which would be cleverer if it were more fully and frankly fantastic. It began on the lines over which Mr. Gilbert has gone with such skill in pieces like "Tom Cobb" and "Engaged,” and if it had

continued gallantly on those lines it would have proved a far more amusing play. But there were times, and long dull times too, when the authors-for Mr. Brandon Thomas has a colleague, a Mr. Keeling seemed to take themselves seriously. Then came sentimental tirades and melodramatic situations and the marring of some very excellent fooling. "Marriage " might still be knocked into a very good play; it was certainly very well played, especially by Mr. Elliot as a cynical solicitor, and by Mr. C. P. Little as a stolid swell. A play which was much talked about before its production, the "Agatha of Mr. Henderson, was given for a series of morning performances at the Criterion. It was a curiously ill-constructed, complicated play, but it gave Miss Olga Nethersole the opportunity for doing the best piece of acting that she has yet done. She promised well when she first appeared; her performance in "Agatha" more than realised that promise. She ought to do, it is to be hoped that she will do, some very fine work indeed.

MY

MAETERLINCK AGAIN.

Y friend Mr. Heinemann lately pleased the world, through the Pall Mall Gazette, with an account of, with extracts from, the new play by Maurice Maeterlinck. The controversy which raged over the author of "La Princesse Maleine" has not yet died out; revived a little by the production of "Les Sept Princesses "-which was, I believe, an earlier work than "Princesse Maleine "—it may be vigorously renewed over the new piece, the sketch of which I must quote:

"The title of the drama is 'Pélléas et Mélisande,' and it is divided into five acts, dedicated 'in friendship and gratitude' to M. Octave Mirbeau. The scene is laid in the vague and mysterious territory of Arkël, King of Allemonde, in an old castle, built over damp and gloomy grottoes and surrounded by woods. The sea in the distance washes a town towards which flocks of sheep wend their way, bleating—or, rather, crying like children—as though they already felt the butcher's knife. The motif of the play rather recalls Dante's touching episode in the 'Inferno,' of the lamentable history of Francesca da Rimini and Paolo-with a little variation, however, in the dénouement. Golaud, the grandson of King Arkël, a widower with a little son named Yniold, meets one day in a wood, beside a spring, a beautiful girl, by name Mélisande. She is in tears, and has fled, from whence she will not say, to escape from some persecution the nature of which she will not disclose. Golaud conjectures that

she is a princess whom her friends have been trying to marry against her will, for at the bottom of the spring shines a golden crown which Mélisande has thrown there, declaring that she wants it no longer. Golaud becomes enamoured of this beautiful stranger; he marries her, and carries her off to the castle of Allemonde. There dwells Golaud's youngest brother, Pélléas, as attractive and charming as the former's young wife. Mélisande and Pélléas meet one another daily, but, noble as they are beautiful, they struggle against their growing mutual attachment. In the meantime Golaud and his little son Yniold play the part of spy, and the father lifts the boy up to a window one day that he may learn the nature of the lovers' tête-à-tête. The fatal hour arrives at last. One evening, at a fountain's edge, where Mélisande and Pélléas had arranged to meet for

supreme farewell,

they embrace one another passionately, in open defiance of Golaud, whom the two lovers have already perceived partly hidden in the shade. Golaud, emerging from his place of concealment, stabs his young brother, and pursues Mélisande, who escapes. In the last act we find the latter dying, forgiven and absolved from all blame by her husband, who has attempted his own life in his remorse, but who, nevertheless, tortures Mélisande to the end with heartrending questions as to how far he has been deceived.

"The following, taken from one of the clandestine meetings between Pélléas and Mélisande, will give an idea of the nature of the dialogue :

"PELLÉAS: Hallo! Hallo!

"MÉLISANDE : Who is there?

"PÉLLÉAS: I, myself! What are you doing there at the window, singing like a bird from another world?

"MÉLISANDE : I am doing up my hair for the night.

"PÉLLÉAS: Is that what I see on the wall? I thought you had a light.

"MÉLISANDE : I have opened the window; it is too warm in the tower, and the night is fine.

"PÉLLÉAS: There are stars innumerable; I have never before seen so many; but the moon is still on the sea. Don't stay there in the shadow, Mélisande; lean over a bit and let me see your flowing hair.

"MÉLISANDE : I look hideous like this.

"PÉLLÉAS: Ah! Ah! Mélisande! You are beautiful! You are beautiful like that. Lean down! lean down! Let me get nearer to you. "MÉLISANDE: I cannot get nearer to you. I am leaning down as far as I can.

"PÉLLÉAS: And I cannot reach any higher; give me at least

your hand to-night before I go. I leave to-morrow.

...

"MÉLISANDE: I shall not give you my hand if you leave.

"PÉLLÉAS: Give it, give it, give it !

"MÉLISANDE: Then you won't go?

“PÉLLÉAS: I will wait; I will wait.

"MÉLISANDE: I see a rose in the darkness.

"PÉLLÉAS: Where? I see nothing but the branches of the willow that hang over the wall.

"MÉLISANDE: Lower down in the garden; there in the green

shadow.

"PÉLLÉAS: That is not a rose. I will go and see directly, but give me your hand first; first your hand.

"MÉLISANDE: Here, here! I cannot lean down any farther. "PÉLLÉAS: : My lips cannot reach your hand. "MÉLISANDE: I cannot lean down any farther. falling. My hair is coming down.

I am nearly

[Her hair falls down as she leans over and covers Pélléas. "PÉLLÉAS: Ah! Ah! What is that? Your hair is coming down

on me.

All your hair, Mélisande, all your hair has rolled down; I hold it in my hands, I hold it in my mouth, I hold it in my arms, I lay it round my neck. I shall not open my hands this night. "MÉLISANDE : Let me go! Let me go! You will make me fall! "PELLÉAS: No, no, no! I have never seen hair like yours, Mélisande! Look, look, look! it comes from so high, and it flows over me down to my heart-it flows over me down to my knees. And it is sweet; it is sweet as if it fell from the skies! I can't see the sky through your hair. You see! You see! My two hands can hold it no longer, and some of it reaches to the branches of the willow. It lives in my hand like little birds. It loves me, it loves me better than you do!

"MÉLISANDE: Let me go! Let me go! Some one might come." This taste of Maeterlinck's quality made me curious to read the complete work. I have done so. I like it better than the "Sept Princesses," not so well as the "Princesse Maleine." I do not think it seems very promising as a stage play. Still, I wish some manager would follow Mr. Beerbohm Tree's example, and give us another opportunity of seeing Maeterlinck on the stage.

JUSTIN HUNTLY MCCARTHY.