It will scarcely be denied that applause is not only welcome, but necessary to the actor; and even so great an artiste as Mrs Siddons was susceptible to the force of this truth, though not so much in its regard to professional adulation, as for personal convenience. ‘It encourages,’ she was wont to say; ‘and better still, it gives time for breath!’ On this account, as well as for other obvious reasons, the managers of the Parisian theatres have organised a regular system of hired applause, termed the _claque_; and this not only saves the audience the trouble of applauding, but it is frequently the means of influencing the success of a new production, while it affords the actors engaged an opportunity of purchasing a too frequently questionable notoriety by a monetary arrangement with the _claque_, or at anyrate with the head of that department who grandiloquently styles himself ‘the contractor for success.’ But it must not by any means be imagined that the _claque_ is a modern institution. From the time of the ancient drama downwards, the approbation of the spectators has always been eagerly courted by the performers, and hired persons to applaud their acting regularly attended the representations. Both the Greeks and the Romans made use of the device. It has been well attested that Nero, the Roman emperor, who at all times took an active part in the theatrical representations of his day, enforced applause at the point of the sword; and Suetonius tells us that one day when Nero sang the fable of _Atis and the Bacchantes_, he deputed Burrhus and Seneca to incite the audience to applaud. On one occasion, while the emperor was on the stage, singing to his own accompaniment on the lyre, an earthquake shook the imperial city; yet not one among that enormous assemblage dared so much as attempt to flee from the danger, or leave his seat, fearing the summary wrath of the tyrant, whose will held them so powerfully in bondage. At another time, a poor woman fell asleep during the performance, and on one of Nero’s soldiers descrying her situation, she narrowly escaped with her life. But the Romans could not give Nero the honour of a call before the curtain, for the simple reason that drop-curtains were not then in use. Indeed, the introduction of stage-curtains belongs to a comparatively late period. In the reign of Elizabeth, we find that the theatres—or playhouses, as they were termed—were of the most primitive kind. For the most part the performances were conducted on a rude platform in the London inn yards; while the few regular stationary playhouses were little better furnished in the way of proper dramatic accessories. The use of scenery is, of course, nowhere to be traced, and the only semblance to a proscenium consisted of a pair of tapestry curtains, which were drawn aside by cords when the performance began. The same arrangement has also been found in all examples of the early Spanish, Portuguese, and other continental theatres.