I will not trouble the reader with my thoughts about the first-night
audience, strange assembly as it is,--those I reserve for my Memoirs,--nor
the humiliating story of how I got lost during the _entr'acte_ in a
lot of red plush passages, and saw the third act from the gallery. The
only point upon which I wish to lay stress was the remarkable effect of
the acting upon me. You must remember I had lived a quiet and retired
life, and had never been to the theatre before, and that I am extremely
sensitive to vivid impressions. At the risk of repetition I must insist
upon these points.
The first effect was a profound amazement, not untinctured by alarm. The
phenomenal unnaturalness of acting is a thing discounted in the minds of
most people by early visits to the theatre. They get used to the fantastic
gestures, the flamboyant emotions, the weird mouthings, melodious
snortings, agonising yelps, lip-gnawings, glaring horrors, and other
emotional symbolism of the stage. It becomes at last a mere deaf-and-dumb
language to them, which they read intelligently _pari passu_ with the
hearing of the dialogue.
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