THE TRUE MRS CHANT.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XXV, Issue 4252, 26 June 1895, Page 6

THE TRUE MRS CHANT.

Mrs Chant, who <-ook such an active part in the crusade against the London music halls, is a little woman — a motherly, merry little body. She is the wife of a doctor, who is in sympathy with her objects, and does not mind the hard things said about his wife. For years her house in London has been a refuge for fallen women who show a real desire to return to a cleanly and wholesome life. The opposition to the Empire license was not undertaken by the National Vigilance Society, but by Mrs Chant herself, in her individual capacity, with the assistance of members of the British Women's Temperance Association. Mrs Chant said the pitiful thing was that in a crusade like this she appeared to be fighting the fallen women. "My point," said Mrs Chant to an interviewer, "is that it is not fair to interfere with the amusements of the poor man and leave those of the rich to fester unchecked. The County Council has to purify the public places of the city, and it must be fair and just in its efforts. The more an evil is buttressed by rich men and piles of money, the more reason is there why we should attack it. I delight in music and singing and dancing and nice dresses and pretty scenery. It is all so charming to the senses. All that I want is to clear certain of the music halls of the unclean features which debar decent folks from attending and enjoying the performance. A short time ago I was at the Palace in London, and I was charmed and delighted with what I saw. The * Whistling Sportsman ' sketch was as nice as it could be. And as to the living pictures, they were beautiful, and there were only three to which I objected. It is significant that these were received almost in silence by the audience ; all the rest were enthusiastically cheered. The great mass of the audience at music halls do not want impurity on the stage, and they do not applaud it. It is only on the promenade of certain places where such uncleanness is welcomed. Not long ago, in the Living Pictures, when the ' Lost Chord ' was portrayed, and the song was sung, it was encored three times. The house was wild with excitement. And at the end of it, the beautiful end of the song, my ears were assailed with an indecent remark, in a strident voice, from a painted woman behind me. The enthusiasm of the house and the conduct of this woman in the promenade are a significant object lesson. Purged of its grossness, I like a music hall immensely. We cannot always be on the stretch. Wagner opera and problem plays do not fill the whole scheme of entertainment. Who could object to coster songs, to the best of the Christy Minstrel songs, to sleight-of-hand performances, to ballets free from suggestiveness, to bright, happy, music, really funny comic songs, with a pathetic ballad or two thrown in? The Living Pictures (save for one or two which might be deleted) are charming — the gratification of one's artistic senses by eye and ear at the same time. The possibilities of such entertainments are infinite. And why should they call us Puritans ? It is our opponents who are the Puritans. The Puritans ot Cromwell's time said that wickedness was inseparable from dancing and music, and so would have neither. Our opponents also say the two are inseparable, but differ from the Puritans, inasmuch as they will have both. We, on the contrary, would like one without the other. Do I object to the ballet ? Nothing is further from my mind. I can imagine nothing more delightful or artistic than the mummer's dance at the Lyceum, or the ballet of the nymphs in Benson's ' Midsummer Night's Dream.' Behind those there are no suggestions of indecency — nothing ii the drapery, nothing in the action, which can offend. When music hall ballets offend it is because of the motive that is suggested. I don't object to tights, as such. I know that when you dance very vigorously you must not be impeded by clinging petticoats about your ankles, or even about the knees. If need be, I think I could devise a costume which would give this freeness and yet clothe the limbs, although I am not one of those who think it a shame to have legs. It is the motive at the back of it all, the obvious suggestiveness, which makes the thing evil. When you know that the tights are but the medium whereby the bodies of women are exposed for the inspection of the libertine and the roue, then the thing is bad and wrong. A self - respecting woman would not care to exhibit herself in public in that way. It is all very well to say that the ballet girls think nothing of it. If they do not they have lost something which humanity cannot afford to lose ; we have no right to sanction on the stage that which, if it were done in the street, would compel a policeman to lock the offender up. The stage is a public place. I know I shall have hurled at me the reproach of the decollete dresses of ladies in the drawing room. About those I am as much shocked as anybody ; it shows that we have only yet touched the fringe of a pure refinement ; but the answer to the attack is that a drawing room is not a public place as is a stage. The whole question would be solved if men and not women were at slake. Men would I refuse to exhibit their bodies nightly in this j way."