At some French provincial theatre, where a piece was being played in which the principal character was that of a blind man, the actor to whom this part had been assigned was unwell, and it seemed necessary to call upon another member of the company to read the part. Thus the strange spectacle was witnessed of a man supposed to be totally blind, who read every word he uttered from a paper he carried in his hand. [Illustration: LIZZIE WEBSTER.] At an English performance of "William Tell," the traditional arrow, instead of going straight from _Tell's_ bow to the heart--perforated beforehand--of the apple placed on the head of _Tell's_ son, stopped half way on the wire over which it should have travelled to its destination. Everything, however, succeeded in Rossini's "William Tell," except the apple incident, as everything failed in "Dennis's Appius," except that thunder which Dennis recognized and claimed as his own when he heard it a few nights afterward in "Macbeth." Yet it has never been very difficult to represent thunder on the stage. One of the oldest theatrical anecdotes is that of the actor, who, playing the part of a bear, hears a clap of stage-thunder, and mistaking it for the real thing, makes the sign of the cross. [Illustration: LAWRENCE BARRETT.] CHAPTER XI. THE ILLUSIONS OF THE STAGE. A person can gain an idea of the extent of stage decorations and the possibility of scenic illusions in the old English theatre by reading a description of the theatre as it existed in its poverty of costume and bareness of paint in the Elizabethan era. Rousseau has left a description of the Paris Opera House as he saw it and it will be found interesting to all who are acquainted with the methods and the absolute magnitude of the theatre of the present day. It must be remembered, however, when considering the smallness of the stage described by Rousseau, that it was blocked up on both sides, as was the early English stage, by the aristocratic section of the audience, who sat in rows by the side of the singers while the plebeian music lovers stood up in the pit. It was in exactly the same condition as the English stage, when actors and actresses were interrupted and even insulted by their lordly patrons;--as when Mrs. Bellamy one evening as she passed across the stage at Dublin was kissed upon the neck by a Mr. St. Leger, whose ears the actress boxed there and then; Lord Chesterfield rose in his box on this occasion and applauded; the entire audience followed his example and at the end of the performance St. Leger was obliged by the viceroy to make a public apology to the actress.