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THE SCOTTISH MUSICAL MAGAZINE.
S7
do not admit that it is, for a thing that is not
yet dead scarcely requires to be re-born — then it
is by the publication of such works, and by that
alone, that it ever can be adequately effected.
If we can have a new Burns, by all means let us
have him and honour him in all sincerity and
truth — but, with all due respect to " Lucilius,"
Mr McDiarmid is not yet the reincarnation of our
national bard.
W.S.
THEATRE NOTES.
Both at the King's and Lyceum Theatres, the
Edinburgh play-going public has been for the
past two months treated to a perfect orgy of
drama of the highest standard. Lack of space
prevents us from dealing with these very excellent
performances in detail, but we may just mention
two performances of particularly outstanding
merit which took place at the King's Theatre.
The return visit of Mr Matheson Lang and Miss
Isobel Elsom, for the week commencing 7th ult.,
brought with it a play called The Tyrant, being
an Episode in the Career of Cesare Borgia, which
gave exceptional opportunities for rich dressing,
beautiful staging, and clever acting, which oppor-
tunities were employed to the utmost extent by
these popular principals and their admirable
company. It was an all-round and thoroughly
artistic performance, and special praise is due to
the respective appearances of Mr George Butler ;
Mr David Richards ; Mr Ronald Nicholson, who
in the difficult role of Gianluca Delia Pieve, gave
a consummate delineation of the part, exercising
wonderful restraint, yet letting himself go just
to the necessary point and no further ; Douglas
Ross, who gave a most subtle study of the subtle
Macchiavelli ; and Ralph Truman, a perfect
picture of a fiery Spaniard. Another wonderful
production of the month was that of White Cargo,
a play of the primitive, unvarnished life of the
white man in the Tropics, by Leon Gordon, and
the truest to type play we have ever witnessed.
Here again, a cast presented by Miss Ida Moles-
worth and Templer Powell embodied a set of
characters, whose respective acting and char-
acterisations was perfection itself. The out-
standing week at the Lyceum Theatre was that
of Sir John Martin Harvey's engagement during
the week commencing 14th ult. He submitted a
repertoire of his usual variety and excellence, in-
cluding David Garrick, Hamlet and The Breed
of the Treshams, still, as ever, Sir John Martin
Harvey's greatest production. There is no actor
on the British stage to-day who is more pro-
gressive than Sir John Martin Harvey, and if on
any occasion he fails to include a new play in his
repertoire it is only because of the absence of
good and suitable plays for his purpose.
On this visit, however, Sir John sub-
mitted a double bill comprising Maeter-
linck's short play The Death of Tintagiles,
and George Bernard Shaw's play entitled The
Showing Up of Blanco Posnet. The former is the
sort of play that may appeal to neurotic Belgians
and Frenchmen, but is entirely alien to the
mentality of British audiences. And the Shaw
play with its absurd mixture of blasphemy and
cant, has no better grounds for general accept-
ance. Like the bulk of Shaw plays it can only
be an influence for evil. We were tickled to death
at Sir John Martin Harvey's dictum that Maeter-
linck and Shaw were the two greatest writers of
the present time.
" Bard of Avon."
A MODERN MAID'S CONFESSION.
If I be fair, I'll let who will be clever :
Grease-paint and rouge are all the world to me;
Without a glass and powder-puff', I'd never
Dare to appear where other maidens be.
Our stupid grandmamas' staid waltz and lancers
Possessed not half the charm a two-step has ;
A turkey-trot lends dignity to dancers,
The cultured one-step or the gentle jazz.
I love a crawl upon the flapper-bracket
Of a boy's bike to some quiet, distant spot,
Where one can raise a most infernal racket,
And drive the village parson " off his dot."
" The play's the thing," said dozy, dreary Hamlet ;
The silly owl a real play never knew.
A real play is a thing — a thing — Oh, damn ! Let
Us hop round the "Halls" to see some new
revue. W. Saunders.
BOOK
REVIEWS
MIND THE HEALER: A Psychological Study. By
Vernon Drew. L. N. Fowler & Co., London. 4/6 net.
This is a book of especial interest for singers and teachers of
singing. It contains a particularly valuable chapter on
"Throat and Voice Production," and it contains some truly
remarkable illustrations of the effect of singing as a curative
force. The author was himself a singer of considerable
eminence, and throughout the two hundred pages of the work,
which is exceptionally readable as well as instructive, there
lies the clearest evidence of his being well acquainted with
what he is writing about.