approval. On both sides the complaisance was complete. Never did actors and audience work better together; for while we admired, they relished the praise with all the gusto of individual approbation-frequently stopping to assure us that we were right in our applause, that their best hits were exactly those we selected, and that a more judicious public never existed. Stauf was carried away in his ecstasies; and, between laughing and applauding, I was regularly worn out with my exertions.

Want of light-Stauf's candles swilled frightfully from neglect - compelled them to close the piece somewhat abruptly; and in the middle of the second act, such was the obscurity that the Herr Berg-Bau und Weg-Inspector's wife fell over the prompter's bulk, and nearly capsized Stauf into the bowels of the big fiddle. This was the finale; and I had barely time to invite the corps to a supper at the 'Fox,' which they kindly accepted, when Stauf announced that we must beat a retreat by 'inch of candle.' This we did in safety, and I reached the 'Fox' in time to order the repast, before the guests had washed off their paint and changed their dresses.

If it has been my fortune to assist at more elegant reunions, I can aver with safety I never presided over a more merry or joyous party than was our own at the 'Fox.' Die Catinka sat on my left, Die Vrau von Mohren-Kopf, the 'Mère noble' of the corps, on the right; the Herr Director took the foot of the table, supported by a 'bassoon' and a 'first lover'; while various trombones,' 'marquis,' waiting-maids, walking gentlemen, and a 'ghost' occupied the space on either side, not forgetting our excellent friend Stauf, who seemed the very happiest man of the party. We were fourteen souls in all, though where two-thirds of them came from, and how they got wind of a supper, some more astute diviner than myself must ascertain.

Theatrical folk, in all countries, are as much people in themselves as the Gypsies. They have a language of their

own, a peculiarity of costume and habit of life. They eat, drink, and intermarry with one another; and in fact I shouldn't wonder, from their organisation, if they have a king in some sly corner of Europe, who one day will be restored with great pomp and ceremony. One undeniable trait distinguishes them all—at least, wherever I have met them in the Old World and in the New-and that is a most unbounded candour in their estimation of one another. Frankness is unquestionably the badge of all their tribe; and they are, without exception, the most free of hypocrisy in this respect of all the classes with whom it has ever been my fortune to forgather. Nothing is too sharp, nothing too smart to be said-no thrust too home, no stab too fatal; it's a mêlée tournament where all tilt, and hard knocks are fair. This privilege of their social world gives them a great air of freedom in all their intercourse with strangers, and sometimes leads even to an excess of ease somewhat remarkable in their manners. With them, intimacy is like those tropical trees that spring up twenty feet high in a single night; they meet you at rehearsal, and before the curtain rises in the evening there is a sworn friendship between you. Stage manners and green-room talk carry off the eccentricities which other men dare not practise; and though you don't fancy Mr. Tuft asking you for a loan of five pounds, hang it! you can't be angry with Jeremy Diddler! This double identity, this Janus attribute, cuts in two ways; and you find it almost impossible to place any weight on the opinions and sentiments of people who are always professing opinions and sentiments learned by heart. This may be I'm sure it is very illiberal, but I can't help

I won't let myself be moved by the arguments of Brutus on the Corn Laws, or Cato on the Catholic question, any more than I should fall in love with some sweet sentiment of a daylight Ophelia or Desdemona. I reserve all my faith in stage people for the hours between seven and twelve at night; then with footlights and

scenery, pasteboard banquets and wooden waves, I'm their slave-they may do with me as they will; but let day come, and 'I'm a man again!'

Now, as all this sounds very cross-grained, the sapient reader already suspects that there may be more in it than it appears to imply, and that Arthur O'Leary has some grudge against the Thespians which he wishes to pay off in generalities. I'm not bound to answer the insinuation; neither will I tell you more of our supper at the 'Fox,' nor why the Herr Director Klug invited me to take a place in his waggon next day for Weimar, nor what Catinka whispered as I filled her glass with champagne, nor how the 'serpent' frowned from the end of the table-nor, in short, one word of the whole matter, save that I settled my bill that same night at the 'Kaiser,' and the next morning left for Weimar, with a very large and an excessively merry party.

CHAPTER XXXV

CONCLUSION

THE Platz of Weimar was all astir as we drove up to the Elephant,' dingiest and filthiest of all hostels. Troops of horses were picketed before the house, and crowds of peasants poured in from every side with all manner of quadrupeds, gaily decorated with ribbons and caparisoned with flaring saddle-cloths and bright head-stalls.

"What does all this mean?' asked I. 'Is it a fair, or a great holiday?'

'No, mein Herr,' replied the landlord; but there is an officer of rank in the French service just arrived to purchase remounts for the Chasseurs d'Afrique, and the whole country for miles around is eagerly hurrying to the market.'

Promising myself some amusement from the scene, I ordered my breakfast at once, telling the host I should remain for a day or two.

'Ach Gott!' sighed he, 'I can give you nothing. The Frenchman and his staff have ordered all in the house. They have bespoken the rooms, engaged the stable, and retained every scullion in the kitchen.'

'But surely,' said I, 'they would not suffer a traveller to starve amidst this more than plenty that I see here, nor would they ask him to lie in the streets while there is shelter to be had in some nameless corner! Go, mine host, and say that a middle-aged gentleman, of engaging manners and social disposition, is here standing on the threshold, houseless and hungry; that for his entertainment he would willingly pay in cash or conviviality; but that as to leaving an inn without a hearty meal and a good bed, if he wishes it, he'd see all the Frenchmen that ever sacréd-particularly well—'

'What! say it out, mon brave! don't balk your good intentions,' broke in a deep bass voice; while a broadchested fellow, all glittering with crosses and orders, presented his bearded face very close to my own-'say it out, I say!' cried he.

'So I mean to do, mon général,' said I, saluting him. 'I was going to observe, that of all people in Europe for a refined sense of hospitality, for a just idea of what constitutes real politeness, for a truly elevated sense of human intercourse, there is nothing like a Frenchman.'

'Diantre, sir! I am not a Frenchman!' was the stern reply.

'A German, it is true,' I remarked, 'is almost his equal -in some respects a trifle his superior.'

Taper tole! I am no German!'

'Nor a Swede-a Russian-a Spaniard-an Italiana Greek? You can't be English!' said I, at last, fairly beaten in my attempts to fix his nationality.

'Devil a bit, my darling!' said he, 'I'm your own countryman, and, what's more, an old friend into the bargain.'

There is no need of mystification-it was Con O'Kelly