That first experience was not, of course, as abundant in opportunities for observation as later experiences have been. The world behind the foot-lights--the mimic world as it is called--is a realm of the most startling and pleasing kind. Not only is there food for wonder in what the eye falls upon, but the people who furnish the fun for the world are often among themselves as prolific of pleasantry as if they expected the applause of a full house to follow their jokes. They say and do the strangest things, and for a visitor who is investigating the mysteries of their surroundings, often make the time as lively and the surroundings as enjoyable as it is possible for really clever and good-natured people to do. The best time to go behind the scenes is during the engagement of a burlesque or comic opera company, and I will introduce the reader to a happy crowd of this kind that I once found myself in. [Illustration: BELLE HOWITT IN "BLACK CROOK."] In 1879 the Kiralfys brought out their spectacular burlesque entitled "A Trip to the Moon," and I had the pleasure, during its run, of dropping in behind the scenes of a Western theatre one night to have a peep at the pictures there presented. Now, the moon is something like two hundred and eighty thousand miles from here--that is the one reputed to be made of green cheese, and having phases as numerous as the occasions that ring the April skies with rainbows. But the Kiralfys' moon was in another firmament, shining out amid stars that, when they wink their twinkling eyes or shuffle their shining feet, as they do frequently, the celestial shiners have got to put on their cloud ulsters, and sit down while the lachrymose eyes of the heavens give up their tears. That is why it was raining torrents the night I went behind the scenes with Mr. Bolossy Kiralfy. As I went in the back door _Prof. Microscope_, one of the funny characters in the play, brushed by with a telescope under his arm that was large enough to put Lord Ross's famous spy-glass into its vest pocket, if it had one. The moon to which the trip was to be made was not so far as two hundred and eighty thousand miles by a half block or so, but it was a very funny world, full of gaslight and laughter, and with the most mirthful sports imaginable on its glowing surface. I was inclined somewhat to lunar ways, and thinking like a great many other credulous mortals, that the trans-atmospheric trip was really made in a cartridge-built coach that was fired out of a huge mortar at the rate of about eighteen thousand six hundred and sixty-six and two-thirds miles a minute, had fully made up my mind to ride on the roof or cow-catcher of the concern, at whatever risks to life and limb space might abound in. I expected to find something like a solid space-annihilating Columbiad behind the scenes, but I was somewhat mistaken.