CHAMBERS IN ST. JAMES'S STREET.
THE IDLER, by HADDON CHAMBERS, is a real good play, thoroughly interesting from the rising to the setting of the Curtain. The parts are artistically adjusted, the dialogue unforced, the acting un-stagey, and the situations powerfully dramatic. The climax is reached at the "psychological moment," and the Curtain descends upon all that a sympathetic audience can possibly desire to know of what must be once and for all the story of a life-time. "The rest is silence." Throughout the play there is no parade of false sentimentality, no tawdry virtue, no copy-book morality, no vicious silliness; and, so well constructed is the plot, that there is no need of a wearisome extra Act, by way of postscript, to tell us how all the characters met again at the North Pole or Land's End; how everybody explained everything to everybody else; how the Idler, becoming a busy-body, married the widow of Sir John Harding, M.P., who had had the misfortune to be drowned out shrimping; and how many other matters happened for which the wearied audience would not care one snap of the finger and thumb. On another occasion I shall have something to say about the acting, which, as far as the men are concerned, has certainly not been equalled since the days of Peril. The St. James's is in for a good thing with The Idler; and at this moment I may say, I would be ALEXANDER were I not, briefly,
DIOGENES "THE TUBMAN," B.C.L.
ACTING—ON A SUGGESTION.—The Woman, always well informed, tells us on February 26, that, "owing to numerous applications," Mr. C.T. GREIN is negotiating for the Royalty Theatre, in order to give another Ibsenian performance. Now this is exactly what we suggested in our number for February 14. If the date suits, we will go and see Ghosts, and, if we succeed in keeping up our spirits after seeing Ghosts, we will give a candid opinion on the performance of the piece which hitherto we know only in print. En attendant, we shall have something to say about the recent performance of that piece of Ibsenity A Doll's House—in our next.
WHAT'S IN A NAME?—On the recent occasion of the QUEEN's visit to Portsmouth, no one of the officials seems to have been more on the alert and more generally alive than Mr. DEADMAN, the Chief Constructor of the Yard.
"EN ITERUM CRISPINUS!"—Hamlet on the real distinction between Theatres and Music Halls—
"To B. (and S.) or not to B. (and S.) that is the question!"
HAPPY PROSPECT.—The Wild Birds, if the Bill for their protection becomes law, will remember, the Session of 1891 as a year of PEASE and Quiet.
NOTICE.—Rejected Communications or Contributions, whether MS., Printed Matter, Drawings, or Pictures of any description, will in no case be returned, not even when accompanied by a Stamped and Addressed Envelope, Cover, or Wrapper. To this rule there will be no exception.