“Schmul, why dost thou weep?” asked his neighbor, trying to comfort him. “If thou wert gold, and had to turn to dust, thou would’st lose one hundred per cent. But since thou art dust and returnest to dust, thou gainest nothing and losest nothing.” Her Private Voice A wealthy Jewish society man, of Frankfurt, sat one evening at the opera, in which a foreign singer made her _début_. Next to him sat a lady whom he knew slightly. He asked her very soon, how she liked the singer, and to her favorable comment said: “Oh, I have heard her sing better; she dined at my house yesterday and sang afterwards. Ah; if you could hear her beautiful _private_ voice!” CHAPTER X _On the Stage and Off_ To a Critic You may whistle me in or whistle me off, But that does not say, the whistler is smart. A Candid Answer A young actor was playing Razman in Schiller’s “Räuber” (Robbers). When he says to Moor: “Come, let us go to the Bohemian forest and gather a robber band,” Moor cries harshly: “Fellow, who put these words into your mouth!” The actor pointed at the prompter below, and said timidly: “The fellow down there.” The Prelate and the Singer The following humorous incident is told in verse of Prelate Carl von Gerok, the recently deceased author of “Palm Leaves.” It happened one spring-day in the King’s park at Stuttgart. Along the philosopher’s path, Gerok was walking deep in thought, and carrying an umbrella very carefully in his hand. On a sidepath, never thinking of a possible shower, walked a well-known singer. Suddenly it began to sprinkle, and in a few moments the rain came pouring down. The prelate, a gallant gentleman, offered to take the lady under his umbrella. Neither one knew the other. In pleasant conversation they arrived at the singer’s house, and Gerok begged to know the lady’s name. The clever child of the muses Has her answer quickly ready: “From the question I portend, That to the opera you never went; As the Prima Donna there Everybody knows me here.— Now it is my turn to ask And I beg of you, to tell, Under whose umbrella now I returned, protected well.”— “From your question I portend, That to church you never went; As the pious know me all, For the Prelate I am called.” Acute Hoarseness The singer Tichatschek was once engaged by the Grand Duke of H. to sing for a few nights at his Opera house. On arriving, the singer went at once to an orchestra rehearsal of the opera in which he was to sing, and which was conducted by the Grand Duke, who was an enthusiastic musician. While still behind the stage Tichatschek could hear that the orchestra was playing out of tune and that the wind instruments were ahead. “Great heavens!” cried the singer, “what musical chaos is this? What idiot is occupying the leader’s desk?” With these words he stepped upon the stage, and found himself face to face with the Grand Duke, who exclaimed excitedly: “I am that idiot!”