Whereas, if the situations succeed one another naturally, and in great number; if their being well linked together conducts them with rapidity, from the first situation to the last, which must clearly and strikingly unravel the whole; the choice is complete, and the theatrical effect will be sure.
It is that final effect, of which, in the execution, the composer and performer must never lose sight. Successive pictures must be exhibited, and animated with all the expression that can
result from the impassioned motions of the dance.
This was doubtless the great secret of the art of Pilades, who so highly excelled in his ideas of theatrical expression: this is, perhaps, too for all kinds of theatrical composition, whether to be declaimed, or to be executed by dancing, a general rule that is not to be slighted.
One instance of the regard shewn by Pilades to theatrical propriety is preserved to us, and not unworthy of attention. He had been publickly challenged by Hilas, once a pupil of his, to represent the greatness of Agamemnon: Hilas came upon the stage with buskins, which, in the nature of stilts, made him of an artificial height; in consequence of which he greatly over-topped
the croud of actors who surrounded him. This passed well enough, ’till Pilades appeared with an air, stern and majestic. His serious steps, his arms a-cross, his motion sometimes slow, sometimes animated, with pauses full of meaning, his looks now fixed on the ground, now lifted to heaven, with all the attitudes of profound pensiveness, painted strongly a man taken up with great things, which he was meditating, weighing, and comparing, with all the dignity of kingly importance. The spectators, struck with the justness, with the energy and real elevation of so expressive a portraiture, unanimously adjudged the preference to Pilades, who, coolly turning to Hilas, said to him, ““Young man, we had to represent a king who commanded over twenty kings: “you made him tall: I showed him great.”
It was in the reign of Nero, that a cinical mock-philosopher, called Demetrius, saw, for the first time, one of these pantomime compositions. Struck with the truth of the representation, he could not help expressing the greatest marks of astonishment: but whether his pride made him feel a sort of shame for the admiration he had involuntarily shewn, or whether naturally envious and selfish, he could not bear the cruel pain of being forced to approve any thing but his own singularities; he attributed to the music the strong impression that has been made upon him: as, in that reign, a false philosophy very naturally had a greater influence than the real, this man was, it seems, of consequence enough for the managers of the dances to take notice of this partiality, or at least to be piqued enough, for their own honor, to
lay a scheme for undeceiving him. He was once more brought to their theatre, and seated in a conspicuous part of the house, without his having been acquainted with their intention.
The orchestra began: an actor opens the scene: on the moment of his entrance, the simphony ceases, and the representation continues. Without any aid but that of the steps, the positions of the body, the movements of the arms, the piece is performed, in which are successively represented the amours of Mars and Venus, the Sun discovering them to the jealous husband of the goddess, the snares which he sets for his faithless spouse and her formidable gallant, the quick effect of the treacherous net, which, while it compleats the revenge of Vulcan, only publishes his shame, the confusion of Venus,
the rage of Mars, the arch mirth of the gods, who came to enjoy the sight.