The Monday-afternoon bill is a tentative one, but thereafter one's position on the bill and the time of one's performance are fixed and mathematical for the remainder of the week. The principal artists appear only twice a day, once in the afternoon and once in the evening, but there is an undivided middle, composed of artists not so independent as some others, which "does three turns" a day (more on holidays), and forms what is picturesquely known as the "supper bill." The "supper bill" explains itself. It lasts from five o'clock, say, till eight or eight-thirty. Who the singular people are who do not eat, or who would rather see the undivided middle than eat, will always be a mystery to me. But if they were not _in esse_, and in the audience, the management would certainly never retain the "supper bill." The man who arranges the programme has to have some of the qualities of a general. To fix eighteen or nineteen different acts into the exact time allotted, and so to arrange them that the performance shall never lapse or flag; to see that the "turns" which require only a front scene can be utilized to set the stage for the "turns" which require a full stage, requires judgment and training; but there is very little confusion even at the first performance, and none thereafter. Many of our best comedians, men and women, have come from the variety stage, and it is rather remarkable that some of our best actors have of late turned their attention to it. This interchange of courtesies has brought out some amusing contrasts. A clever comedian of a comic-opera organization was explaining to me his early experience in the "old days," when he was a song-and-dance man. "The tough manager," he said, "used to stand in the wings with a whistle, and if he didn't like your act he blew it and a couple of stage hands ran in and shut you out from your audience with two flats upon which were painted in huge letters 'N. G.,' and that was the end of your engagement." Then he proceeded to tell with honest pride of his struggles, and his rise in the world of art. "And now," said he to me, "I can say '_cawn't_' as well as you can." [Illustration: German Dialect Comedians.] Our first day in vaudeville was rich in experience for us, and particularly for one of the members of my little company. He was already busy at the dressing-table making up, when the two other occupants of his room entered—middle-aged, bald-headed, bandy-legged little men, who quickly divested themselves of their street-clothes, and then mysteriously disappeared from sight. Suddenly a deep-drawn sigh welled up from the floor, and turning to see what had become of his companions, the actor saw a good-humored face peering up out of a green-striped bundle of assorted legs and arms. He was face to face with the Human Lizard, and his partner in the Batrachian business, the Human Frog. [Illustration] "Good Lord! what are you doing?" exclaimed Mr. Roberts. "Loosenin' up!"—laconically.