THE EVOLUTION OF THE GALLERY.

Evening Post, Volume LXIV, Issue LXIV, 13 September 1902, Page 3 (Supplement)

THE EVOLUTION OF THE GALLERY.

Mr. Pett Ridge gives a humorous description of a tour through the galleries of the principal London theatres in the Windsor Magazine. Kveryihing improves in this world, says Mr. Ridge, and the galleries of London theutres are not excepted. Partly this is caused by the imE roved building of new theatres ; partly y the precise, military, two-by-two line which waits now at most gallery doors for the time of opening. The daj's are gone when only pugilists, with science and force at their command, reached the front rows, aud there protruded their heads between the iron bars. These places have been taken by bands of mild young women, who, with time at their disposal, ore able to seize and hold a position outside at any hour during the afternoon that accords with their desires. There was sport under the old system ; you never knew what turn of the surging, tswnying, excited crowd might whirl you round to a position in the fore or send you well across to the opposite pavement ; you always ran a happy risk of being singled out and swept into prominence, iv the same way that every French statesman has the possibility of being made President. On Saturday nights, when the crowd included sets of joyous youth, the Rnmc wns played as if it were football. "Now, then, fiMf-back. wliere are you?" "Follow up. there, sir! Follow up close. Now for a strum, boys! Al — to— get her!" "Play up, chaps ! Get a goal before half-timo !" This was no place for women folk. Quiet men counted themselves fortunate if tboy reached the gallery with n. good half of their coat intact and the brim of a hnt in their possession. What a roadway (it was no thoroughfare) tho narrow Surrey-street wns wheu the two crowds fouyht und wrestled and contested generally in the desire to hear Florence St. John iv "Um'tte"! What a happy lad you were when one foot found its way on the lodge of the open doorway, and how you complained of Providence when three liir^p men backed you out nnd sent you half way down 'tho street toward the Embankment ! How tho few couragcouH ladies who sometimes took part in the bcrimuiuge, protected by gaUurtt young men, protested uselessly with entreaties and sarcasm ! "Oh ! please, don't scrowge so. There's plenty of time." "When you're tired of standing on my foot, young mnn, don't let me keep you. Densay you've got a lot of other engagements." ",'Krbertl I say, hrbert! is my hnt straight?" "Yes, siV, that's wbnt I called you, and if you like J II call you it nguiu. Pultry 'ound 1 There !" Nowadays iv the galleries of tho West hnd theatres one i»uets, for tho most pnrt, refined, well-mannered people, who speak in low tones, excepting, perhaps, the lady who on some previous occasion has occupied a seat in tho dress circle, and she speaks in a. voice Unit imi'iit reach distant shores. "The one ri«ht up in the corner at the back. , No. that one, denr; the one you can't see; nnd we were rather cramped, nnd wo could only see tho other side of the stage, but It was most comfortable. T wore my pale b.lue, Even the pinaforod programme girl goes about In theso quiet galleries with v reserved air, and murmurs. "Twopence!" in a way that gives one the impression that she is imparting, in tho strictest confidence, a- Cabinet secret. The bt. James's has, I think, always hnd this audipnce in its gallery. There it is that ft set of three or four young women tako some Bnmll interest in the piece, but give all the rest of their interest to the principal attraction, the dresses; between the acts their heads are bunched together exchanging the results of trained observation. I once saw an impetuous lady unpick tbe trimmings of her hat during tho course of a society comedy, nnd rearrange tho headgear on the model of that worn by-Lady Somebody in the first act.