“How about the stars of to-day? Were they not nearly all of them shining marks twenty years ago, having been cultivated under the old order of things? The only show a man has nowadays outside of the few cheap stock companies, to play more than one part a season, is when the first play put out fails.
“How different this was around Civil War times, when your star traveled from town to town and the companies in the various theaters were obliged to be up in the various plays he put out? Our cities were so small then that the same people had to be counted on to support a week’s engagement, so the bill had to be changed nightly. Twenty years from now I wonder who will be the stars, how many of them there will be, and—save the mark!—to what artistic merit will they attain?”
In a sense Mr. Dixey is himself a victim of the system he deplores. His season in “The Man on the Box” having been so successful, his manager has secured the dramatic rights to Cyrus Townsend Brady’s novel. “Richard the Brazen,” which will give Dixey a part on very similar lines to the conscienceless Lieutenant Worburton he enacts in the Harold MacGrath story.
THE ROMANCE OF HALLOWE’EN.
Old Superstitions and Observances to Which the Scotch Still Cling Tenaciously—Ceremonies That Accompanied Lighting of Hallow Fires—How Lassies Compel Spirits to Reveal Natures of Those Who Are to Wed Them.
Like almost all of the Christian festivals, Hallowmas, or All Saints day, is associated with an ancient pagan celebration of great antiquity, and from this older rite many of its curious and singular observances are derived. Hallowe’en is the vigil of the feast of All Saints, and the custom of its elaborate observance is general everywhere, though its greatest development has been reached in Scotland.
Modern practise has largely omitted what was at one time the most important part of Hallowe’en ritual—that is, the lighting of bonfires at nightfall by each household. From this practise the relationship that it bears to the older Druidical festival of Samuin is apparent. This was a great occasion in the days of the ancient pagan worship, and all the hearths were on this day rekindled from the sacred fire.
Indeed, sacred fires seem to have been a part of the various forms of worship of many nations. The Germanic people had their fires, as well as the Celtic, so the custom was not wholly Druidical, but from the Druids came most of the superstitions that now cluster around the eve of the Christian festival.
Origin of the Feast.
The feast of All Saints was introduced very early by the Christian Church because of the impossibility of keeping a separate day for every saint. In the fourth century, when the persecutions of the Christians had ceased, the first Sunday after Easter was appointed by the Greek Church as the day for commemorating the martyrs generally.