Unpleasant and ungracious as these remarks may appear to those who look to the Earl's Court Exhibition as a means for raising money for a national theatre, they are not unnecessary. From all parts of the country visitors, comprising many teachers and their scholars, come to this exhibition expecting to receive a correct impression of Shakespeare's playhouse and of the Elizabethan method of staging plays. But what they see cannot inspire them with confidence or belief that dramatic art at that time, both in its composition and expression, was at its high-water mark. This is because the spirit and the intellect of Elizabethan times are wanting. These qualities do not appear in modern actors nor in their productions. There is nothing to be seen but the restlessness of our own stage-methods, which no more fit the Elizabethan stage than would the Elizabethan methods fit the modern stage. In another of the excerpts given at Earl's Court, which is entitled the "Enchantment of Titania," the costumes, business, and action of the proscenium stage are wholly reproduced on the open platform. In Shakespeare's time the actors did not scamper all over the stage and in and out of the private boxes while they were saying their lines, nor was music played during their speeches. Then, again, the stage-management of the scenes from "The Merchant of Venice" in the poverty and meanness of their appointments and costumes is a libel on the old Globe representation. It is only necessary to consult the stage-directions in the first folio to recognize the fact. Bassanio then came on to the stage dressed like one of the Queen's noblemen, with three or four servants. At Earl's Court he comes on unattended in a pair of patched leather boots and worn suit, looking more like a bandit than a nobleman. There is no indication given of his superior rank to which so much importance was attached in Shakespeare's time. Indeed, those who are anxious to revive an interest in Elizabethan staging, and who urge its claim for recognition, are justified in making their protest against this travesty of Shakespearian drama. A STUDENTS' THEATRE.[18] 1. _Miss Rosina Filippi's Project._