November 28, 1911:—When Christopher Mahon said: “I killed my father a week and a half ago for the likes of that,” instantly voices began to call from all over the theatre:
“Shame! Shame!”
A potato swept through the air from the gallery and smashed against the wings. Then came a shower of vegetables that rattled against the scenery and made the actors duck their heads and fly behind the stage setting for shelter.
A potato struck Miss Magee, and she, Irish like, drew herself up and glared defiance. Men were rising in the gallery and balcony and crying out to stop the performance. In the orchestra several men stood up and shook their fists.
“Go on with the play,” came an order from the stage manager, and the players took their places and began again to speak their lines.
The tumult broke out more violently than before, and more vegetables came sailing through the air and rolled about the stage. Then began the fall of soft cubes that broke as they hit the stage. At first these filled the men and women in the audience and on the stage with fear, for only the disturbers knew what they were.
Soon all knew. They were capsules filled with asafœtida, and their odour was suffocating and most revolting.
One of the theatre employes had run to the street to ask for police protection at the outset of the disturbance, but the response was so slow that the ushers and the doortenders raced up the stairs and threw themselves into a knot of men who were standing and yelling “Shame!”
(Note to [page 205])
From The New York “Sun”