Reiif-w of Reviews, 1/11/06. 



Impressions of the Theatre. 



573 



of their comedies a more compact mass of dirty 

 allusions and adulterous suggestions than those 

 which prettv young girls make on the Gaiety stage 

 for the edification of the British public. A wife, 

 for instance, sings how her husband, after a visit to 

 Paris alone on Sunday, mumiurs in his sleep " Mar- 

 guerite,'' and " Oh, my little Marie." She finds in 

 his pocket a bill for a hat, '" And what do you think 

 is the meaning of that?" And the answer is in the 

 r.-frain repeated exultingly by the chorus and wel- 

 •i.imed with laug'nter by the audience, " Of course, 

 I don't know, but I guess.'' And so it goes on. 

 There are four more verses, the audience laughing 

 and applauding as it '' guesses " at the adulteries 

 which seem to a Gaietv audience so exquisitely 

 funnv. 



I suppose I am old-fashioned, but I am certainly 

 not squeamish, and I have frequently brought down 

 upon my head the denunciations of the conven- 

 tional, respectable prudes of both sexes because I 

 have ventured to discuss seriously problems of sex 

 and to describe evils which it seemed to me the 

 duty of law and society to suppress. But how comes 

 it that this prudish, proper, virtuous English society 

 has not a word to sav in condemnation not of a 

 play of illicit love — for there is nctt a scintilla of 

 love to irradiate the putrid filth— but of the glorifi- 

 cation of libidinousness. The hero of this pestilent 

 and pestiferous farrago of filth frankly avows that 

 his adulteries in spring time are in no way prompted 

 by anv affection or romantic attraction to any one 

 woman : — 



I'm fond of any blonde 

 If any blonde be fond of me: 

 I U let a sweet brunette 

 Come walking in my company. 



Ill smile a little wliile 

 At any shade of maid you bring; 



I'll kiss that one or this, 

 I'm not capricious in the spring. 



Now, do not let anyone suggest that this is 

 nothing more than the innocent dalliance of a young 

 man and a maid in the pleasant time of May. A 

 play w'liich opens in the office of a divorce couif 

 lawver and closes in a house of assignation, whili 

 the middle scenes are devoted to the making o 

 appointments to be kept in cabinets pariiculiers, ha- 

 no place for innocent affection. It is ac 

 cepted as the normal thing that wives shoula 

 betray their husbands, that husbands should be false 

 to their wives. The restaurant, '' The Crimson But- 

 terfly," with its head waiter who sees wonders 

 through the keyholes of " private and particular 

 apartments," is not exactly the kind of institution 

 to which one would desire to introduce our boys 

 and girls. The whole thing is evil to the last degree. 

 Everyone is pawing' with vice, hinting at it, grinning 

 at it, indulging in it. The whole duty of man in 

 spring time is to be false to his wife with the first 

 woman whom he can induce to accompany him to 

 the nearest cabinet pariiculier. 



It is the morals of the Cities of the Plain served 

 itp in the Strand for the delectation of the most 

 moral, the most virtuous community in the world. 

 If all plays were like '' The Spring Chicken " the 

 Puritans were right in shutting up the theatre. And 

 I begin to understand the old bitter jest about the 

 early Christian who died in the theatre and went 

 to hell. When Peter complained t'he Devil had no 

 right to a Christian, the plea was barred by the 

 Fiend's rejoinder, " I found him on my premises 

 and I took him." 



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