In 1895 the old Cheltenham theatre, which the College had purchased a few years before, was razed to the ground, and the erection of a new, fine building in its place, as an integral part of the College buildings, was begun. This was an immense hall,[90] capable of holding nearly two thousand people, and possessed of remarkable acoustic qualities. It was fitted up with a large stage and everything necessary for the acting which had already become a feature of the Guild meetings. The Guild plays grew to be Miss Beale’s recreation in her old age. It was an immense pleasure to see the stories and poems she had prized all her life made living on the stage. She had a keen dramatic sense, and delighted in watching rehearsals and personally coaching some of the individual actors. She was interested even in getting details of dress as correct as possible, and in the schemes of colour, objecting to a predominance of red, a colour she always disliked. The Guild plays were of course chosen, like the subjects of her literature lessons, with a view to elevate rather than to entertain. Three performances specially stand out in the memory: _Comus_, in 1896, with its exquisite dancing and dressing; that of _Griselda_, in 1904; and the last of all, with its prophetic note of farewell, _Hatshepset_, in 1906. Probably _Griselda_ most of all appealed to Miss Beale, who gave an interpretation all her own to Chaucer’s tale. She saw in it a spiritual allegory of God’s dealings with the soul, and she set it forth in a beautiful little introduction to the story. Years before it had been proposed that Sir Edwin Arnold’s _Griselda_ should be taken for the College play. She wrote very strongly against it to Miss Wolseley Lewis:— ‘I am sure none of you would be able to bear the modernised dramatised Griselda if you learned it. It is like painting the face of an unearthly mediæval saint and clothing her with garments which show the human form. In the Griselda of Chaucer there is nothing of the vulgar love-making of the “merchant.” The love of the “markis” comes as a gift from heaven. ‘Then that scene in which she ministers to his pleasure by music; it is all such a low kind of ministry. Whereas in the original, hers is just the worship of perfect _faith_,—obedience to his _will_, because she will not question it.... The whole thing jars on me.... The quiet, grave “markis” (of Chaucer) may be a type of Him who tries us to confirm our faith, but this human “marquis” is of the earth earthy, and cannot stand for a spiritual type. It reminds me of the passage in which Ruskin comments on the attitude of the Prophets in “The Transfiguration.”[91] Do you remember it in _Modern Painters_? ‘There! enough! I wish it might be _Comus_, or _The Princess_ or _Alcestis_ would not cost so much trouble as something new,—but better nothing than something not really high.