Produced by Barry Abrahamsen and The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive) MINERVA’S MANŒUVRES ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Illustration: The balloon, Minerva, a shriek and a shout.] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Minerva’s Manœuvres The Cheerful Facts of a “Return to Nature” By CHARLES BATTELL LOOMIS Author of “Cheerful Americans,” Etc. Illustrated by Frederic R. Gruger [Illustration] New York A. S. Barnes & Company 1905 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ COPYRIGHT, 1905 BY A. S. BARNES & CO. Published August, 1905 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ To J. B. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ PREFACE. When a play makes a tremendous hit the author is called before the curtain and after bowing and allowing his heart (and his head) to swell more and more, he generously points to the actors and actresses who are grouped around him as much as to say, “They did it.” And then the audience goes wild at such unselfishness and cries of “Speech, speech!” rend the air and the author has arrived at the happiest moment of his life. He feels that all creation was evolved just for this supreme moment and his knees shake and (in a voice surcharged with emotion) he says things that do not read well in print, but which rouse the house to greater enthusiasm, and he wishes that William Shakespeare could have lived to see this night, and goes home to dream happy dreams. Sometimes he can’t contain his speech any longer than the end of the third act, and with comparatively little applause, and, it may be, only one solitary call of “Author” (from his devoted brother in the front row) he rushes to the footlights and delivers himself of his pent up eloquence. And then perhaps the critics jump on the piece and kill it, and the next day he wishes he hadn’t spoken. But no dramatic author would think of going out before the gray asbestos curtain had been raised on the overture to say to the cold, sternly critical audience that this was the proudest moment of his life and that he hoped the actors would see their duty and do it. That would be considered assurance.