“You will pauperize the people!” the banker objected. That, he urged, was the trouble with so many humanitarian movements; they deprived the poor people of the joys of competition. The point passed, however, after a feeble discussion. That was a detail evidently to be settled later when the exigencies of deficits would doubtless force a more practical view upon this enthusiast. But a chorus of objections rose when Brainard said that the theaters were to have no reserved seats and no boxes. “No boxes!” Mrs. Pearmain murmured, as if personally affronted. “But where shall _we_ sit?” “Where the others do,” Brainard replied promptly. Significant glances were exchanged about the table. Was this a socialist who had slipped in among them in disguise? “Think what the opera would be without the boxes!” a large bejeweled woman whispered to her neighbor. “These are to be the people’s theaters!” Brainard remarked somewhat sharply. “Oh, I hadn’t understood!” “Where will your theater be in New York?” some one asked. “That is yet to be decided. I am looking into the matter to determine where the largest number of people can most easily reach a theater by the transportation system of the city. Somewhere on the lower West Side, I suspect.” “Nobody will ever go down _there_!” several protested. “Everything is going up town all the time. . . . The Opera is too far away. . . .” “Everybody can get there most cheaply and easily,” Brainard returned. From this point interest waned visibly, and the company merely gave a polite half attention to the remaining notes, including the plan for a great summer festival of drama. “It sounds like a Chautauqua,” Butterfield superciliously remarked. He detested these popular efforts for education, regarding them as “scabs” on the genuine industry. “It would be exceedingly drafty, an open-air theater in the American climate,” said an old gentleman. “Think of a Bar Harbor fog!” When these trivialities had passed, Brainard hastily read a few notes on the ideals of the enterprise—the careful staging of plays, the giving of classics, the revival of old plays, the need for purity of speech, something about poetic plays and the new drama. As he read, there were signs of impatience. At the close came the hard, round voice of the Rev. Thomson Spicer: “What sort of plays, may I inquire, Mr. Brainard, do you propose to give in your theaters?” “All sorts,” Brainard replied, surprised. “I trust there will be a strict moral censorship.” “I agree with you, Dr. Spicer,” Mrs. Pearmain added in a severe tone. “The greatest care should be taken not to incite the people to discontent with their lot. Many of the plays given to-day are most dangerous in their tendency. They hold us up to ridicule, and even criticize our morals and our fortunes!” It was here that Brainard committed his unpardonable blunder, and the secretary knew that he had finally “queered himself” with these influential people.