i68 



The Review of Reviews 



February 30, 1908. 



joined the Army solely in order to make love to Bar- 

 bara. Nevertheless, despite all these backsliders and 

 bread-and-treacle converts and other failures, the im- 

 pression— and it is a true impression — left by the 

 play is that the Salvation Army is a wonderfully 

 real thing, and that it is the power of God unto 

 righteousness to many; and if it is imposed upon 

 and disappointed times without end, therein it but 

 resembles all other religious bodies since the world 

 I he Lasses are genuine — there is no mis 

 take about that. And genuine also is the famous 

 1m xer and wrestler with the Japanese, who, al 

 three days' and nights' struggle with the Evil One, 

 joins the Arm). He it is who, when Bill Walkei 

 spits in his eye, piously thanks God that he is couni 

 ed worthy to be spat upon for the sake of his 

 Saviour, and then, with the knack born of long 

 n the music-hall stage with the experts of 

 jiujitsu, promptly lays Bill Walker on his back in 

 the snow and kneels upon him while he prays for his 



i-ersion. There is something irresistibly comic in 

 the discomfiture of the hulking ruffian thus uncere- 

 i< usly converted into a friedieu for the Salvation 

 Army, but it has a human touch in it that every Sal- 

 vationist would intensely appreciate. 1 tried to draw 

 General Booth or his Chief of Staff about "Major 

 Barbara," but they declined. Neither of them has 

 1 the Chief, from what he has heard of it, 



- not exactly like it. Nevertheless I, who for 

 nearly twenty years have acted as Honorary Trum- 

 pet- r-in-Ordinary to the Salvation Army, do not hesi- 

 tate to express my humble and heartfelt thanks to 

 Mr. Bernard Shaw for thus for the first time putting 

 the Salvation Army on the stage as it reallv is. 

 The sec nd act might easily be converted into a 

 •lay. All the intense human interest of the 

 drama is concentrated there. The struggle for the 

 soul of Bill Walker, faithful as it is to life, is but a 

 sketch — an outline — which might be filled in so as 

 ompel even the least attentive to realise some- 

 what of the sublimity of the conflict of Heaven and 

 Hell for the soul of a sinner. Bill Walker is drawn 

 from the life and acted with conviction. It is curious, 

 but my only criticism of his acting is exactly the 

 opposite to that which I have read in the news- 

 papers. They complain that he is too brutal. My 

 criticism is that he is not half brutal enough. No 

 real ruffian in his mood would have let Jenny Hill 

 off so cheap. He would probably have kicked her. 

 and if he had made up his mind to bash her face or 

 cut her lip he would have done it as if he meant it. 

 When I saw him strike the girl it was as unreal as 

 a stage kiss, and hardly more serious. I have seen 

 Bill Walker's prototype too often at close quarters 

 not to be entitled to speak with some authority on 

 that subject. I have also seen such men en route to 

 the penitent-form, and w-hen Bill Walker is under 

 conviction he is true to the life. 



The part of Major Barbara was prettily played 

 with much painstaking, but it is far too trying a 



role for anyone but a tragic actress of the first class- 

 adequately to render. The actress who plays the 

 part is never lost in her soul -saving role. She is 

 earnest, but she is not consumed with enthusiasm. 

 When she talks to Bill, there is almost a note of ban- 

 ter in her voice which is foreign to that of the genuine 

 Hallelujah Lass. There is, in short, human pathos, 

 but no divine passion in the representation. I can 

 imagine the part being played by an actress of such 

 power and emotional expression that it would be im- 

 possible for the play to proceed after the loss of 

 faith. The curtain would be rung down after Bill 

 Walker's taunt. "What price Salvation now?" But 

 Mr. Shaw can hardly ever be serious, and in creating 

 the character of his heroine he exposes her needlessly 

 to the badinage of the rough. Still, after all is said 

 and done. Major Barbara is a fine creation, and the 

 second act has in it all the elements of a great 

 tragedy. 



Barbara's character, emotionally strong, was intel- 

 lectually weak. Perhaps it is intended by one satiric 

 touch to suggest that most of us are incapable of dis. 

 criminating between the essence and the drapery of 

 our faith, and that, like Barbara, we abandon the 

 whole l>ecause we do not agree with one of its de- 

 tails. How many people have abandoned the faith 

 t their fathers as illogically as Barbara left the 

 Salvation Army merelj because in some particular 

 article of its creed or detail of its practice it does 

 not harmonise with their conceptions of truth, their 

 s of right and wrong. If Mr. Shaw had really 

 wished to pose the ethical problem which wrecked 

 Barbara's faith, he would have pointed out the 

 al surdity of regarding the acceptance of subscrip- 

 tions from a brewer or a cannon maker as a selling 

 of the Army to drink and murder, unless the condi- 

 had been attached to the gift that the Army 

 should weaken in its testimony against drunkenness 

 and war. Even Major Barbara did not insist upon 

 scrutinising the ethical genealogy of every penny sub- 

 scribed for religious purposes before allowing it to 

 be put into the hat on that famous occasion when 

 Snobby Price's stories and her eloquence extracted 

 4 ro from the open-air congregation. Had she done 

 she would probably have found that some pence 

 had Veen the wages of iniquity. The question of ac- 

 cepting the subscriptions of men whose money has 

 been acquired like the fortune of Rockefeller or the 

 wealth of a city boss has been one much debated of 

 late in the United States. The only solution of the 

 problem seems to be that everyone should accept 

 monev from any source provided that the receipt of 

 the subscription of the criminal does not weaken his 

 testimony against the crime. The Salvation Army 

 probably feels itself quite strong enough to accept 

 millions from brewers without endangering the vehe- 

 mence of its temperance crusade. But there is such a 

 thing as running into temptation. And with the 

 melancholy spectacle of the Established Church be- 

 fore our eyes, where State pay and State patronage 



