DEAREST MADGE,-What they call the London season is over now, and the work at the office has become very much slacker, so the superintendent says I can have my fortnight's holiday now if I like, and I think I should like very much indeed, for the weather is dreadfully hot, and I have been working very hard all the summer, and begin to feel that I want a change. So I write to ask if you can get a holiday at the same time, Madge, and then we might go to some seaside place together, and enjoy ourselves. That would be nicest of all; but if you cannot manage to get away from your duties, I might come down to Springside and go into our old lodging, or one like it, and you could come to see me whenever you were disengaged. If you told Sir Geoffry Heriot your sister were coming down, I don't suppose that he would make any objection to your being a great deal with me, as he seems, from all you say of him, to be a very kind old man. at the same time, he is awfully nice. I can see you raise your eyebrows in astonishment when you read what I am now going to tell you. That frequently during these long summer evenings I have walked with him in Kensington Gardens, and that we have talked for hours and hours together, and that he has never said one word of you. I cannot tell exactly what it is he talks about; I often try to think of it after we have parted, and I am at home again alone, but I never can recollect it exactly; I only know that he talks very cleverly and very charmingly, and I am only required to say a word here and there. Oh, Madge, it is no use my beating about the bush any longer, and attempting to deceive you; I have read over what I have just written, and I might as well put in so many words what you already know, that I am madly in love with Gerald, and think there is no one like him in the world. Don't think this a sudden fit of frenzy, and that I have gone mad; it has For I must see you somewhere, Madge, been growing and growing ever so long, I must, indeed. I know that no amount ever since we were at Wexeter together, of fresh air or change of scene would do and he used to give me drawing lessons. me half as much good as a long talk with Mind, Madge, he does not make love to you, and I shall only fret and worry my-me-at least, I mean to say, exactly make self until I have it. Can you imagine what it is all about, Madge? You are so quick and clever, that I dare say you have guessed already, and indeed I should not be surprised if my previous letters had been filled with no other subject, as I always write to you exactly what I think, and I have scarcely thought about anything else for months. Of course, Madge, I mean Mr. Gerald Hardinge! He has been very kind to me, and I have seen a great deal of him lately; he has lent me plenty of books, and some of his drawings to copy; and the other evening, when I incautiously said something about missing that old piano, which we used to thump and strum away on at Miss Cave's lodgings, Mr. Hardinge asked if I would permit him to hire another for me. I could not sanction this, of course, and said no; but he insisted so strongly, that I had to invent a little story, and tell him that Mrs. Bland would not allow any piano practice in her house. That seemed to satisfy him, for he said Mrs. Bland was a most respectable woman, and I was most happily placed under her charge; and he thought it would be highly inexpedient for me to go to any other lodging Highly inexpedient" were the words he used, looking as grave as a judge all the time; for he is awfully proper and decorous, though, love; he is far too honourable to attempt to take the slightest advantage of my position, and he has never said anything to me which you might not have heard. I mean, of course, anything so far as honour is concerned; but his manner is so kind and gentle, and he is so patient with my ignorance and my folly; so careful to prevent its ever occurring to me that I am not moving in his sphere, or that there is any difference in our rank in life, and so handsome-you have no idea, Madge, what he is like now-that I cannot help loving him immensely. I do not know that I should have taken even you into confidence, Madge, if it could have gone on in this way, but I am suffi-' ciently sensible to know that it cannot. The summer evenings are at an end now, and there will be no more long walks, and then all my chances of seeing Gerald, save for a few moments at a time, are over; and then I sometimes think that if I were to give up seeing him it would kill me, and then I know I must give it up, and then I think I should go mad, only I find comfort in the remembrances of your strong, sound sense, and the certainty that you will advise me for the best; and remember, dear, whatever has to be done, and whatever is to be said to Gerald about it, you must say it for me, because I could never-but we will talk this all over when I come down than we either of us could have given him to see you. Oh, by the way, you recollect my writing to you some time ago of Gerald telling me about an old lady whom he wished me to call upon, but she was ill at the time. She is always ill, it appears, and as Gerald wished her very much to see me I walked there with him the other evening. She lives in a fashionable part of the town, in a tiny little mite of a house, exquisitely furnished, and looking on to Hyde Park; she has been a handsome woman, and was so beautifully dressed, just in good taste, you know, for an invalid, who is always compelled to lie on a sofa. She tried to be very polite, but she is of the old C-A-T order, looking me up and down, and through and through, and "Miss Pierrepointed" me whenever she addressed me. When I rose to go, I almost expected her to ring and order "the young person to be shown out." Gerald looked annoyed, and I rather think the introduction was a failure. He has not said much about it since, only that Mrs. Entwistle (that's her funny old name) was peculiar, and that allowances must be made for her as an invalid, &c. Now, dearest Madge, write to me at once, and tell me what we shall do about meeting; and don't fret yourself about what I have told you, for it is all perfectly right, and I will be entirely guided by your advice. Your loving ROSE. credit for, raised his hat and went away. I wonder who he is; he looked very like was in cipher, and there is therefore nothing in it which led to his identification; it is a funny message, I enclose you a copy of it. "I enclose you a copy of it," repeated Madge, turning over the paper, "and there is nothing enclosed; that's just like Rose. Ah, what is this?" and she stooped down to pick up a piece of paper lying on the ground at her feet. It was the usual printed form of a telegraph message. Madge noticed that it was headed" copy,' that it was filled up in Rose's handwriting, and that it was lengthy, but she read nothing beyond the first two lines, which ran thus: "D. L. B., London, to Philip Vane, Esq., care of P. Kaulbach, Esq., Hollycombe, Sandown, Isle of Wight." Madge started, doubting whether she had read aright; she re-read the address carefully, placed the paper in her pocket, and started off at once for the rectory. She found Mr. Drage at home, and read aloud to him the text of Rose's letter; she did not show him the copy of the telegram, but she repeated exactly the address it contained. There was no need for her to refer to the written document, every word of that address was burning in her memory, as though each had been emblazoned in letters of fire. P.S.-I had almost forgotten to tell you a curious thing which happened yesterday. We have a new clerk at the counter, and it appears he refused to take a message because it was written in cipher; the person delivering it insisted on its being forwarded, and as he refused to go away, higher authority was appealed to, and I was sent for. Directly I set eyes upon the man, who wished the telegram forwarded, I recognised him at once. Don't you recollect, just a short time before the close of the season at Wexeter, I came one morning to fetch you after rehearsal, and, as we walked away from the theatre, we were followed for a long distance by a short stout man, whose hands we noticed were covered with blazing diamond rings, and who kept on dogging our footsteps, to my great amusement? But you were in a tremendous rage about it, and at last you stopped dead, and turning round, looked the man up and down as though you could "I have," said Madge. "I will make have killed and eaten him on the spot, and my way at once to the place where Philip then he, in a far more gentlemanly manner | Vane is staying, and confront him. I a "This is, to say the least of it, very lucky," said Mr. Drage, "for I will use that phrase in preference to any more serious one, which might seem to imply especial interposition on our behalf. Have you thought of what you will do now ?" am sufficient woman of business to have consulted Bradshaw while waiting for you, and I have already arranged my route; I find that I can go across country to Yeovil, sleep there this evening, and proceed to morrow to Southampton, whence I can cross to the Isle of Wight." "May I not accompany you?" said Mr. Drage. "No," said Madge, "I think it will be better that I should go alone: not that I think either of us need have the smallest fear of what the world might say about such a proceeding, but I am sure that my chance of-well, I suppose I may say, of escaping with my life from my husband, will be greater if he imagines I have acted entirely on my own promptings in this affair." "The argument you have used is scarcely one which should induce me to give way to you," said Mr. Drage; "however, since you are determined, go, and God speed you! Sir Geoffry will be perfectly prepared to hear you wish for a few days' change; I have taken care of that." On the second evening after her leaving Wheatcroft, Madge Pierrepoint rang the bell of a large and handsome one-storied villa, standing in a lovely garden, and overlooking Sandown Bay. The hall-door was open, and several servants were flitting about, busily engaged removing the dinner. One of these advanced towards her. "Is Mr. Philip Vane within ?" The servant glanced first at her and then at the fly which had brought her from the hotel, then he was reassured. "Mr. Vane is staying in the house, ma'am," he replied. "I wish to speak with him." Certainly, ma'am," said the man, showing the way into a small room. "Will you walk into the study. Who shall wishes to see Mr. Vane ?" "Say Mrs. Vane, if you please," said Madge, firmly. END OF BOOK THE SECOND. A BILL OF THE PLAY. ARE there, now-a-days, any collectors of playbills? In the catalogues of secondhand booksellers are occasionally to be found such entries as: "Playbills of the Theatre Royal Bath, 1807 to 1812;" or "Hull Theatre Royal-various bills of performances between 1815 and 1850;" or "Covent Garden Theatre-variety of old bills of the last century pasted in a volume;" yet these evidences of the care and diligence of past collectors would not seem to obtain much appreciation in the present. The old treasures can generally be purchased at a very moderate outlay. Still if scarceness is an element of value, these things should be precious. It is in the nature of such ephemera of the printing press to live their short hour, and disappear with exceeding suddenness. They may be originally issued in hundreds or even in thousands; but once gone they are gone for ever. Relative to such matters there is an energy of destruction that keeps pace with the industry of production. The demands of "waste" must be met: fires must be lighted. So away go the loose papers-sheets and pamphlets of the minute. They have served their turn, and there is an end of them. Hence the difficulty of obtaining, when needed, a copy of a newspaper of old date, or the guide-book or programme of a departed entertainment, or the catalogue of a past auction of books or pictures. It has been noted that, notwithstanding the enormous circulation it enjoyed, the catalogue of our Great Exhibition of a score of years ago is already a somewhat rare volume. Complete sets of the catalogues of the Royal Academy's century of exhibitions are possessed by very few. And of playbills of the English stage from the Restoration down to the present time, although the British Museum can certainly boast a rich collection, yet this is disfigured here and there by gaps and deficiencies which cannot now possibly be supplied. The playbill is an ancient thing. Mr. Payne Collier states that the practice of printing information as to the time, place, and nature of the performances to be presented by the players was certainly common prior to the year 1563. John Northbrooke, in his treatise against theatrical performers, published about 1579, says: They use to set up their bills upon posts some certain days before to admonish people to make resort to their theatres." The old plays make frequent reference to this posting of the playbills. Thus in the induction to A Warning for Fair Women, 1599, Tragedy whips Comedy from the stage, crying: 'Tis you have kept the theatre so long Painted in playbills upon every post, While I am scorned of the multitude. Taylor, the water poet, in his Wit and Mirth, records the story of Field the actor's riding rapidly up Fleet-street, and being stopped by a gentleman with an inquiry as to the Lincolnshire company of players, however, this musical preface to their efforts seemed objectionable and derogatory, and they determined, on one of their visits to the town, to dispense with the old-established sounds. But the reform resulted in empty benches. Thereupon the "revered, well-remembered, and beloved Marquis of Granby" sent for the manager of the troop, and thus addressed him: "Mr. Manager, I like a play. I like a player, and I shall be glad to serve you. But, my good friend, why are you all so offended at and averse to the noble sound of a drum? I like it, and all the inhabitants like it. Put my name on your playbill, provided you drum, but not otherwise. Try the effect on to-morrow It is strange to find that the right of printing playbills was originally monopolised by the Stationers' Company. At a later period, however, the privilege was assumed and exercised by the crown. In 1620, James the First granted a patent to Roger Wood and Thomas Symeocke for the sole printing, among other things, of "all bills for playes, pastimes, showes, challenges, prizes, or sportes whatsoever." It was not until after the Restoration that the play-night; if then you are as thinly attended as bills contained a list of the dramatis personæ, or of the names of the actors. But it had been usual, apparently, with the title of the drama, to supply the name of its author and its description as a tragedy or comedy. Shirley, in the prologue to his Cardinal, apologises for calling it only a "play" in the bill: Think what you please, we call it but a "play:" The bill determines not. From a later passage in the same prologue Mr. Collier judges that the titles of tragedies were usually printed, for the sake of distinction, in red ink: and you would be Persuaded I would have't a comedy For all the purple in the name. There is probably no playbill extant of an earlier date than 1663. About this time, in the case of a new play, it was usual to state in the bill that it had been " never acted before." In the earliest days of the stage, before the invention of printing, the announcement that theatrical performances were about to be exhibited was made by sound of trumpet, much after the manner of modern strollers and showmen at fairs and street-corners. Indeed, long after play bills had become common, this musical advertisement was still requisite for the due information of the unlettered patrons of the stage. In certain towns the musicians were long looked upon as the indispensable heralds of the actors. Tate Wilkinson, writing in 1790, records that a custom obtained at Norwich, "and if abolished it has not been many years," of proclaiming in every street with drum and trumpet the performances to be presented at the theatre in the evening. A like practice also prevailed at Grantham. To the you have lately been, shut up your playhouse at once; but if it succeeds drum away!" The players withdrew their opposition and followed the counsels of the marquis. The musical prelude was again heard in the streets of Grantham, and crowded houses were obtained. The company enjoyed a prosperous season, and left the town in great credit. "And I am told," adds Wilkinson, "the custom is continued at Grantham to this day." An early instance of the explanatory address, signed by the dramatist or manager, which so frequently accompanies the modern playbill, is to be found in the flysheet issued by Dryden in 1665. The poet thought it expedient in this way to inform the audience that his tragedy of the Indian Emperor was to be regarded as a sequel to a former work, the Indian Queen, which he had written in conjunction with his brotherin-law, Sir Robert Howard. The handbill excited some amusement, by reason of its novelty, for in itself it was but a simple and useful intimation. In ridicule of this proceeding, Bayes, the hero of the Duke of Buckingham's burlesque, the Rehearsal, is made to say: "I have printed above a hundred sheets of paper to insinuate the plot into the boxes." Chetwood, who had been twenty years prompter at Drury Lane, and published a History of the Stage in 1749, describes a difficulty that had arisen in regard to printing the playbills. Of old the lists of characters had been set forth according to the books of the plays, without regard to the merits of the performers. As, for example, in Macbeth, Duncan, King of Scotland, appeared first in the bill, though acted by an insignificant person, and so every other actor appeared according to his dramatic dignity, all of the same sized letter. But latterly, I can assure my readers, I have found it a difficult task to please some ladies as well as gentlemen, because I could not find letters large enough to please them; and some were so fond of elbow room that they would have shoved everybody out but themselves, as if one person was to do all, and have the merit of all, like generals of an army." Garrick seems to have been the first actor honoured by capital letters of extra size in the playbills. The Connoisseur, in 1754, says: "The writer of the playbills deals out his capitals in so just a proportion that you may tell the salary of each actor by the size of the letter in which his name is printed. When the present manager of Drury Lane first came on the stage a new set of types, two inches long, were cast on purpose to do honour to his extraordinary merit.' These distinctions in the matter of printing occasioned endless jealousies among the actors. Macklin made it an express charge against his manager, Sheridan, the actor, that he was accustomed to print his own name in larger type than was permitted the other performers. Kean threatened to throw up his engagement at Drury Lane on account of his name having been printed in capitals of a smaller size than usual. His engage. ment of 1818 contained a condition, "and also that his name shall be continued in the bills of performance in the same manner as it is at present," viz., large letters. On the other hand, Dowton, the comedian, greatly objected to having his name thus particularised, and expostulated with Elliston, his manager, on the subject. "I am sorry you have done this," he wrote. "You know well what I mean. This cursed quackery. These big letters. There is a want of respectability about it, or rather a notoriety, which gives one the feeling of an absconded felon, against whom a hue and cry is made public. Or if there be really any advantage in it, why should I, or any single individual, take it over the rest of our brethren? But it has a nasty disreputable look, and I have fancied the whole day the finger of the town pointed at me, as much as to say, 'That is he! Now for the reward!' Leave this expedient to the police officers, or to those who have a taste for it. I have none." O'Keeffe relates that once when an itinerant showman brought over to Dublin a trained monkey of great acquirements, Mossop engaged the animal at a large salary to appear for a limited num [Conducted by ber of nights at his theatre. Mossop's name in the playbill was always in a type nearly two inches long, the rest of the performers' names being in very small letters. But to the monkey were devoted capitals of equal size to Mossop's; so that, greatly to the amusement of the public, on the playbills pasted about the town, nothing could be distinguished but the words, MOSSOP, MONKEY. Under John Kemble's management, "for his greater ease and the quiet of the theatre," letters of unreasonable size were abandoned, and the playbills were printed after an amended and more modest pattern. With the rise and growth of the press came the expediency of advertising the performances of the theatres in the columns of the newspapers. To the modern manager advertisements are a very formidable expense. The methods he is compelled to resort to in order to bring his plays and players well under the notice of the public, involve a serious charge upon his receipts. But of old the case was precisely the reverse. The theatres were strong, the newspapers were weak. So far from the manager paying money for the insertion of his advertisements in the journals, he abso lutely received profits on this account. The press then suffered under severe restrictions, and was most jealously regarded by the governing powers; leading articles were as yet unknown; the printing of parliamentary debates was strictly prohibited; foreign intelligence was scarcely obtainable; of home news there was little stirring that could with safety be promulgated. So that the proceedings of the theatres became of real importance to the newspaper proprietor, and it was worth his while to pay considerable sums for early information in this respect. Moreover, in those days, not merely by reason of its own merits, but because of the absence of competing attractions and other sources of entertainment, the stage was much more than at present an object of general regard. In Andrews's History of British Journals it is recorded, on the authority of the ledger of Henry Woodfall, the publisher of the Public Advertiser: "The theatres are a "great expense to the papers. Amongst the items of payment are, playhouses one hundred pounds. Drury Lane advertisements, sixty-four pounds eight shillings and sixpence, Covent Garden, ditto, sixtysix pounds eleven shillings. The papers paid two hundred pounds a year to each theatre for the accounts of new plays, and |