affectionate, patient nature beneath the mean outside of a petty huckster subjected to cruel disappointment and hardship.--This was the original cast of “The Auctioneer”: _Simon Levi_ David Warfield. _Mrs. Levi._ Maria Davis. _Mrs. Eagan._ Marie Bates. _Callahan._ Odell Williams. _Jacob Sampson._ Harry Rodgers. _Richard Eagan._ Brandon Tynan. _Mo Fininski._ Eugene Canfield. _Minnie._ Nellie Lynch. _Groode._ William Boag. _Mrs. Sampson._ Helena Phillips. _Helga._ Maude Winter. _Dawkins._ Horace James. _Critch._ H. S. Millward. _Miss Manning._ Nina Lyn. _Miss Crompton._ Elizabeth Berkeley. _Miss Finch._ Corah Adams. _Zeke._ Cyril Vezina. _Mandy._ Ruth Dennis. _Policeman._ Harry Rawlins. _Chestnut Vender._ Richard Bevan. IN THE GRIP OF THE OCTOPUS.--ANCIENT METHODS IN MODERN BUSINESS. “The Auctioneer” played at the Bijou Theatre until December 21,--105 consecutive performances being given there. On December 23 Warfield began a “road tour” in that play which lasted for twenty weeks, ending at the Illinois Theatre, Chicago, May 10, 1902. The net profit from this tour was $80,000,--certainly an amazing sum to be gained by presentation in the regular Theatre of an unknown star, fresh from the music halls, who, all told, had appeared in perhaps a score of productions! But Belasco’s actual profit from the fruits of his perspicacious judgment and enterprise was far less than that great sum. The reason of this seemingly strange fact is that in his professional exploitation of Warfield he had fallen into the ruthless grip of an iniquitous “booking-monopoly” which, practically, dominated for many years what are known as “the first-class theatres” of America and which is still perniciously active. Belasco’s conflict with that monopoly was long and bitter; thousands of columns have been devoted to it in the newspaper press of the country, and it has, at various times, occupied a prominent place in public attention. That conflict grew directly out [Illustration: DAVID BELASCO About 1885 Photograph by Falk. Belasco’s Collection. ] of his undertaking the management of Warfield. Several actions at law have been incident to it. Testifying under oath in one of them, in 1905, Belasco gave an account of his experience in relation to “The Auctioneer” which I believe to be true in all essentials and of which I make the following abstract and brief chronicle: