'But where do you get your theatrical properties?' I said. 'Who manages the scene-shifting and all the rest of it?' 'Oh, as for scene-shifting, that is all managed by that great hairy-faced man that you saw going down the road just now; he is a grand stage manager and has been at it for twenty years or more.' I did not see him again until after the close of the performance, when I noticed him with his pocket-handkerchief in an unconventional way fanning out the footlights, and then going up on a ladder to puff out the oil lamps above the stage. 'And as for properties,' the good dame replied, 'if you mean by that the things we have on the stage, well everything is lent--there is {73} crockery from one house and chairs from another, and the dresses, why they are the old originals that were worn by our grandmothers, and great-grandmothers. We all know to what farm or to what house we must go for this or that particular dress, and it is lent very willingly.' 'And do you have large audiences?' I said. 'Large audiences, well, if th' room would hold double the number we could fill it, because folk of all maks and sizes come together. This year we are giving a special afternoon performance for the quality, but I am told that all reserved seats have been booked for weeks.' It was growing dark as I stood by the cottage door. The omnibus, as it drove down from the Raise gap with folk from Keswick coming to see the play, was sending sparks out behind from its 'slipper,' as though it were making fireworks. And soon I saw the lamp-lighter lighting up the oil lamps in the quaintly intricate lanes of the village beside the Mere. Knots of people were gathered already at their door-ways talking of the play, and already folk were drawing towards the village hall near the Red Lion. I soon joined them, and passed up a break-neck stairway to a big barn-like room, the {74} back part of which was filled with rough boards knocked up into temporary benches, and the forepart had wooden cottage chairs for reserved seats. The drop-scene was down--the lake and island with Helm Crag and Dunmail Raise, as seen from Loughrigg, on a summer evening.