May, 1914 
HOUSE AND GARDEN 
399 
Garden Theatres; Their Possibil¬ 
ities, Requirements and 
Construction 
(Continued from page 376) 
mass is very dense. A garden that is 
walled or hedged is often a delightful 
beginning; and garden houses and per¬ 
golas, as we find them here so often, de¬ 
tached from the dwelling, can serve no 
better purpose than as the nucleus of 
such an outdoor temple to the gods of 
tragedy and comedy. Similarly a glade 
within a wood is rich in possibilities, and 
woods themselves and wild hillsides, and, 
indeed, almost any conceivable place may 
be turned to account simply by defining 
the theatre’s limitations and providing 
entrance way for guests or spectators, 
and screened space for performers. All 
of this it is quite possible to do, too, 
without destroying in the least degree 
the wild character of woodland—for 
where undergrowth is thick it means 
simply clearing the necessary spaces and 
leaving all the rest, while open woods 
will require simply the introduction of 
defining masses of such “undergrowth.” 
One rule that should be observed very 
carefully is this: adopt a style and carry 
it out consistently throughout the work. 
This does not mean rigid adherence to 
either Italian formality or landscape in¬ 
formality altogether, for it is possible to 
be informally formal and likewise some¬ 
what formally informal in a garden. But 
it does mean careful adjustment of every 
phase to every other phase so that har¬ 
mony will result. For example, exits and 
entrances that are “natural” must be 
provided on the natural type of stage, 
whether it is a lawn corner or wild hill¬ 
side or glade. There must be nine of the 
first, second and third right-and-left- 
exit business, which the Italian outdoor 
stage shares with its indoor prototype— 
although actually the same number of 
exits on either side of the stage may per¬ 
fectly well be compassed. The difference 
will be that these exits will not be ranged 
beside the open center whereon the per¬ 
formance takes place, but will recede 
into the depths of the encircling planting, 
some to a greater distance than others; 
some ascending, perhaps, while others 
vanish over a hill. In other words, the 
actors will simply take their way off into 
the woods, which will hide them sooner 
or later from view. 
This brings us to the subject of light¬ 
ing the stage for night performances. 
For the natural type of stage setting 
nothing can surpass the calcium light 
thrown full upon the stage center, and 
picking out the forest depths within its 
radius with wonderful beauty until these 
vanish into the darkness beyond in a 
perspective which the professional stage 
producer would forswear his soul to 
accomplish. Unless such light is supple¬ 
mented bv another back of the perform¬ 
ers, however — or above them — shed down 
America’s Telephones Lead the World 
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frm 
From “Le Petit Phare de Nantes, ” Paris 
“ But today I found 1 had to talk with Saint-Malo, 
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morning; the operator told me—though very amiably, 
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Herr Haherland, Deputy, in the Reichstag 
“The average time required to get a connection with 
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Antwerp, etc." 
Herr Wendel, in The German Diet. 
“ 1 re f er here to Freiberg. There the entire tele¬ 
phone service is interrupted at 9 o’clock p. m. Five 
minutes after 9 o’clock it is impossible to obtain a 
telephone connection.” 
Dr. R. Luther, in the Dresdner Anzeiger 
“In the year 1913, 36 years after the discovery of 
the electro-magnetic telephone, in the age of the 
beginning of wireless telegraphy, one of the largest 
cities of Germany, Dresden, with half a million in¬ 
habitants, is without adequate telephone facilities.” 
United states 
SWITZERLAND 
NETHERLANDS 
NORWAY 
SWEDEN 
RUSSIA 
DENMARK 
GREAT BRITAIN 
GERMAN EMPIRE 
FRANCE 
ITALY 
HUNGARY 
AUSTRIA 
BULGARIA 
BELGIUM 
SPAIN 
PORTUGAL 
Real Average Cost of Telephone Service 
per year to a subscriber in the United 
States and European countries 
(based on official reports). 
Nole: In translating European costs into 
American dollars, consideration has 
been given to the relative purchasing 
power of money in Europe and the 
United States as shown by oper¬ 
ators wages. 
*10 
l 20 * 30 * 40 * 50 * 60 * 70 * 80 * 90 *100 *110 *120 *130 *140 *150 *160 *170) 
These are the reasons why there are twelve times as many tele¬ 
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