This production was entirely modern in its presentment. There was a remarkable simplification of scenery. This was, perhaps, due to the new poverty of Berlin. But it comprised merely a wall, a hole in the wall called the Tower of London, a platform on top of the wall called Tower Hill, carpeted stairs against the wall called the Court at Westminster. Clarence mopes in the hole with one electric light--his butt of malmsey wine is even out of view. Richard appears between the two archbishops on the top of the wall, and finally he fights the battle of Bosworth Field up and down the carpeted stairs. Indeed, he suddenly appears at the top of the stairs naked to his middle and then runs down the red carpet carrying his crown in his hand whilst he shouts, "Mein Konigsreich fur ein Pferd,"--my kingdom for a horse. This last was deservedly hissed by the audience as a palpable absurdity being foisted on the half-stunned _intelligentsia_ of Berlin. At the Lessing Theatre a few days later, "Peer Gynt," that poetical drama of the Teuton's destiny--much better done because really nearer to the German soul than Shakespeare. Solveig had faith; though it was not quite certain that she was the sort of woman to whom one _had_ to return. Peer's romantic return to his mother was, however, much stressed, as in the Greig music. The sentiment that Peer "had women behind him and, therefore, could not perish" appealed strongly to the German mood, though the application of the button-moulder idea to the plight of Germany just now appeared to have been missed. Peer ought to have been a shining button on the vest of the Lord, but has missed his chance, and now is to be melted down with other buttons into something else--into a Polish button, a Czech button, an Alsatian button. There was much scope for meditation looking at "Peer Gynt" at Berlin in 1921. In lighter vein the traveller finds much more to delight him in the operettas of Berlin. As at Vienna, they are better done than classical drama. That is not a slight on the stage. The vulgarity of English musical comedies and imported operettas is lacking on the Berlin and Vienna stage. German pieces of this kind are often extremely charming and diverting, and they impart that light-heartedness which is a first condition of a healthy mind. The audience is in no sense "highbrow," it is the general level of German humanity. It forgets and responds, and is ready to sing choruses with the leaders of song and dance. Three or four evenings spent listening to operetta leave very pleasant memories, and the last of these was on the occasion of the first night of "Morgen wieder lustik," a humorous presentation of the time when Napoleon was splitting up Germany much as the French wish to split her up now--and there was a King of Westphalia who is still memorable for that one phrase, "_Morgen wieder lustik!_"--To-morrow we shall be happy again!