KING.--"There is no need of any dispute between relatives on such a little matter as this appointment. I appreciate your business capacity. Swear to forget the nonsense you have hinted at, and you shall be collector. Is it a bargain?" HAMLET.--"It is." Here the play would naturally end, and the audience would feel that both "HAMLET" and the "KING" had conducted themselves in a creditable manner. By such a change as this, _Hamlet_ becomes a rational and enjoyable play. But will, you ever find a REFORMING NUISANCE who will offer to improve _Hamlet_? Not a bit of it. There is nothing which your NUISANCE is more reluctant to do than to engage in any really useful work. "OTHELLO" is another idiotic person, who spoils what would otherwise have been a respectable play, by his stupid jealousy. How much better would the drama have been had the fifth act proceeded in this wise:-- OTHELLO.--"Desdy, my dear, are you in bed?" DESDEMONA.--"Yes, and I'm sleepy too, and don't want to be bothered. There's your night-shirt hanging on the chair." OTHELLO.--"IAGO tells me you've been flirting with Lieutenant CASSIO. Now that won't do. Remember that under the Fifteenth Amendment I have the right, being a colored man, of doing pretty much as I choose. If this flirtation isn't stopped promptly I'll go to Indiana, divorce you, and marry EMILIA. Do you know where the boot-jack is?" DESDEMONA.--"I never did flirt with him, and IAGO tells a big story if he says I did. The boot-jack must have been kicked under the bed. As for flirting, after the way you have gone on with EMILIA, the less say about it the better. If you can't find the boot-jack, call the servant and let him pull your boots off--you'll catch your death if you go poking round under the bureau and sofa and things much longer." OTHELLO.--"Of course it's all right, only don't have too much to say to him. There's that confounded boot-jack at last. You see, my dear, that people will talk if you give them the slightest reason. There's a button off this shirt. Are you all ready for me to put the gas out?" With the extinction of the gas, the curtain would naturally fall. And it would fall upon a pleasant, well-constructed, probable, and eminently realistic play. As it is, OTHELLO ends with a complicated massacre worthy of the Bowery Theatre in its bloodiest days. MATADOR. * * * * * "Parlez aux Suisses." It seems that Water Valley, Mississippi, is attracting hosts of Swiss settlers, speaking of whom a contemporary calls them "iron-handed mountaineers." We were not previously aware that the Swiss are provided with iron hands, though we have long known that they have _glaciers_. * * * * * A Warning. The man who tried to arrange his hair with an ice pick got it into a Nice Pickle. * * * * * Suggested by a "Tight" Fit. What county of Scotland is the best to get a foot-hold in? Bute.