46 The Theatre—Its Literature and General Arrangement. [JULY, 
house jokes, or a translator of French vaudevilles, and two-act ¢o medies* 
Colman, who“did possess strong faculty, can write no longer. He admits it ; 
and it would not be a jot the less apparent if he did not.. Kenney, whovhad a 
touch of something coming very near to genius once, is worn out: his Raising 
the Wind will be a lasting farce; and his comedy of The World had-soul in it ; 
but power has departed from him. Of the existents—regulars—Poole is perhaps 
the best ; there was a good approach to conception in his character of PaulPry 
—if he did not:steal it.. At all events, he is not quite so good as Sheridan, but 
he wrote a clever quiz rather about Leigh Hunt—there is hardly any body else’ 
whom one can think of without horror. rly 
Now this dearth of wit in our daily dramatic productions, may be looked 
at quite apart from the question of sufficient or insufficient existing talent: 
and, looked at as a fact by itself, there is nothing about it very surprising. The 
faculty of writing dramas—apart from any genius which may be concerned in ‘it 
—is an art—a “ mystery’”’—to be learned, ‘That it is an art—a trade of itself— 
is obvious; there are forms to be observed in it, without a knowledge of which, 
the strongest abilities would fail. .And, moreover, that it is a trade which may 
(or must) be acquired, is quite undeniable, because men constantly begin 
clumsily in it, and are found to improve: that is not the case with reference to 
works of the imagination in general; the earlier books of a novelist, or romance- 
writer, are commonly found to be his best. That this trade then—the 
construction of plays—is not very difficult, one would say on the one hand, 
judging from the miserable sort of people who contrive to execute it; and yet, 
that it is most. difficult, when a play is constructed, to guess whether it will or 
will not succeed, is perfectly certain; for we find every day, that actors, 
managers, dramatists themselyes,—all the people most experienced in such mat- 
ters, have very little judgment about it. 
Managers use the best discretion they have—this may be assumed; no man 
but a refused dramatist will doubt it. Mr. A.’s farce may bring good wine, or 
good words, but it can never stand against Mr. B.’s farce, which brings good 
money : both may come in—elect two members—but Mr. B. sits to a certainty. 
But yet, in spite of this entirely good intent, the conclusions of managers are 
constantly negatived by events—and seem as constantly, moreover, to have’ 
proceeded in direct opposition to the most ordinary perception and common- 
sense ;—they refuse plays, or produce them with ill-will and difficulty, which 
afterwards turn out to be highly successful, and even deserve to be so; and 
they act other pieces, bestowing large expense upon, and avowedly expecting 
highly from thera, which one would wonder how any people should fail to see 
must be damned past all redemption. Then, besides this uncertainty in the 
first stage—where the crowd is to decide eventually, there can never be much 
security for a correct conclusion. Our damnation by first night’s audience is 
pretty nearly got over now, by the help of packed houses and pertinacity ; and 
perhaps it is as well that it should be so, except in extreme cases, and there 
the power still applies; but undeserved success is as offensive a possible 
casualty to a man of talent in any pursuit as unmerited condemnation ; and 
plays—ten times more—a hundred times more than any other productions of 
literature—succeed constantly from accidents and causes, with which their 
dramatic merits have nothing at all to do. Personal or political allusion (or a 
belief of the existence of either of these intents); a fancied curious representa~ 
tion (curious only from the impudence of its imposture) of something which 
the audience never saw—the lucky air of a particular song; the painting of a 
particular scene; the dress, gesture, figure—nay, even the moral character of a 
particular performer; every one of these are circumstances which have made 
contemptible plays invaluable; to the necessary disgust and perplexity of that 
writer, who, if he did any, would be content to do no other than respectable 
ones. a, Ba 
The novel-writer can stand for himself. He acts alone, and can be tried by 
the work of his own hand for failure or success. But the dramatist is now, 
at, best, no more than the member of a partnership; consisting, besides 
