plan. French playwrights divide the stage into three or four lateral divisions called plans, and corresponding to similarly designated side-scenes, or pans coupés, between which are passages called coulisses; but those speaking from the coulisses, or addressing persons supposed to be in or behind them, are said to speak à la cantonade. The rear of the stage is called fond, and to this actors are said to remonter while they descendre toward the premier plan, nearest the footlights. These are all the stage terms used in this play that present any difficulty.
ACT I. SCENE 1.
madame. French and German usage requires that a title of courtesy be prefixed to designations of adult relatives of the person addressed, as, e.g., madame votre mère, monsieur votre frère, mademoiselle votre soeur; but Charles, as valet, should have said, madame la comtesse alone. The reader should note that from the first his speeches show a refinement which to Léonie seems a surprising presumption. The disguised noble is too courteous to act a menial part successfully.
Page 2.
The letter begins with allusion to the troubles at Lyons, in the environs of which the action is placed. This is the chief city on the Rhône, and was in 1817 the centre of a region seething with political intrigue against the recently restored Bourbon monarchy. That summer a rising had been sternly suppressed, and twenty-eight persons executed by General Canuel, who was recalled in the autumn (cp. [p.14] and [p.12]); but there is no accuracy in details. The last lines of the letter allude to the dissatisfaction of the royalists, who had passed their youth in exile, with the studious moderation and cautious prudence of the new king, who gradually fell under the influence of clerical reactionaries, while many nobles would have preferred a return to the gallant fêtes of the ancien régime.