Normally, however, these dramas aimed at producing dread, and I naturally avoided one which was advertised as “Guaranteed to make your soul writhe.” We are not yet made of such stern stuff as to derive courage to face the battle of life from art of this sort, though I have seen robust clerks stagger from these booths with white faces and a much increased zest for their humdrum labours. This being so, I had the temerity to suggest that one of these theatres might be installed in each government office for the use of civil servants, and am gratified to be able to say that my proposal was acted upon, only the Inland Revenue Department being excepted. There was one theatre which several young people told me was the best, but as it did not meet with general favour, I did not go there until the end of my visit, for I have always felt an abhorrence of what is at all precious, and avoided the highbrow and snobbish. It was quite a mean place, not in the capital but in a small provincial town, and was regulated by a fairfusser who had never been able to make his way in a decent centre, owing to his poor skill in the art of advertisement. The stage was much like that which we know, but though built in pleasant enough proportions was too simply decorated to be striking. The settings were so unobtrusive that at the end of a scene one could hardly say whether the framing had been good or bad, which I thought a pity, for one was in this manner robbed of a subject for conversation. The effects were obtained chiefly by the lighting, but unfortunately this was kept uniform throughout each scene, and thus one lost the pleasure of admiring the agility of the electrician, who nowadays, is, with his switches, as great a virtuoso as an organist with his stops. The most noticeable difference was the stage being only about two-thirds the size of ours, the reason for it that the actors were not people, but puppets, rather smaller than human beings.