The comedietta to which this was the prelude had been composed by a well-known author, who was called out at the close of the second act, and led forward the prima donna of the clever piece. The interlude showed a moonlighted dell. On the distant hilltop was the gleam of white tents; in the foreground stood a woman as colorless in robe and visage as the moonbeams. Her voice, silvery and plaintive, thrilled through the crowded rooms: “Give us a song!” the soldiers cried, The outer trenches guarding, When the heated guns of the camps allied Grew weary of bombarding. And so, in distinct, unimpassioned narrative up to— They sang of love and not of fame, Forgot was Britain’s glory; Each heart recalled a different name, But all sang “Annie Laurie.” Again the invisible orchestra bore up the uttered words; at first a single cornet bringing down the air from the tented hilltop; then deeper notes joining it, like men’s voices of varying tone and strength, but all singing “Annie Laurie.” “Something upon the _women’s_ cheeks Washed off the stains of powder.” said dissonant, derisive tones at Arthur Cornell’s back, as the curtain fell. “Battered veterans of a dozen seasons are snivelling like _ingenues_ of no season at all. What fools New Yorkers are to be humbugged with their eyes open!” “The fair manager hath a way of whistling the tin out of our pockets,” replied a thin falsetto. “A wonderful creature, that same manager.” A disagreeable, wheezing laugh finished the speech. Arthur made an ineffectual effort to extricate himself from the packing crowd, a movement unnoticed or uncared-for by the speakers. “I admire—and despise—that woman!” continued the harsh voice. “As an exhibition of colossal cheek she is unrivaled. For four years she has preyed upon the majority that is up to her little ‘dodge,’ and the minority that is _not_, pocketing her half of the profits of every ‘charitable’ show; borrowing from innocents that don’t know that she pays not again, and actually—so I am told—receiving a commission for introducing wild Westerners and provincial Easterners into what she calls ‘our best circles.’ And we go on buying her tickets and accepting her specimens, like the arrant asses we are.” “Madame du Bois, upon a limited scale.”