We came again to the front of the theatre: to an entrance--approached
between converging railings, which brought the crowd to an angry focus,
and so passed its parts singly between the ticket-takers--leading into
what once was the postscenium, and thence across where once was the
"court" side of the stage to the tiers of stone seats.
[Illustration: THE GREAT FACADE]
However aggravating was this entrance-effect in the matter of
composition, its dramatically graded light-and-shade was masterly. From
the outer obscurity, shot forward as from a catapult by the pushing
crowd, we were projected through a narrow portal into a dimly lighted
passage more or less obstructed by fallen blocks of stone; and thence
onward, suddenly, into the vast interior glaring with electric lamps:
and in the abrupt culmination of light there flashed up before us the
whole of the auditorium--a mountain-side of faces rising tier on tier; a
vibrant throng of humanity which seemed to go on and on forever upward,
and to be lost at last in the star-depths of the clear dark sky.
Notwithstanding the electric lamps--partly, indeed, because of their
violently contrasting streams of strong light and fantastic shadow--the
general effect of the auditorium was sombre. The dress of the
audience--cloaks and wraps being in general use because of the strong
mistral that was blowing--in the main was dark. The few light gowns and
the more numerous straw hats stood out as spots of light and only
emphasized the dullness of the background. The lines of faces, following
the long curving sweep of the tiers, produced something of the effect of
a grey-yellow haze floating above the surface of a sable mass; and in
certain of the strange sharp combinations of light and shade gave an
eerie suggestion of such a bodiless assemblage as might have come
together in the time of the Terror at midnight in the Place du Greve.
The single note of strong colour--all the more effective because it was
a very trumpet-blast above the drone of bees--was a brilliant splash of
red running half-way around the mid-height: the crimson draperies in
front of the three tiers set apart for the ministerial party and the
Felibres. And for a roof over all was the dark star-set sky: whence the
Great Bear gazed wonderingly down upon us with his golden eyes. We were
in close touch with the higher regions of the universe. At the very
moment when the play was beginning there gleamed across the upper
firmament, and thence went radiantly downward across the southern
reaches of the heavens, a shooting-star.
Not until we were in our seats--at the side of the building, a dozen
tiers above the ground--did we fairly see the stage. In itself, this was
almost mean in its simplicity: a bare wooden platform, a trifle over
four feet high and about forty by sixty feet square, on which, in the
rear, was another platform, about twenty feet square, reached from the
lower stage by five steps. The upper level, the stage proper, was for
the actors; the lower, for the chorus--which should have been in the
orchestra. The whole occupied less than a quarter of the space
primitively given to the stage proper alone. Of ordinary theatrical
properties there absolutely were none--unless in that category could be
placed the plain curtain which hung loosely across the lower half of the
jagged gap in the masonry where once the splendid royal portal had been.
But if the stage were mean in itself it was heroic in its surroundings:
being flanked by the two castle-like wings abutting upon huge
half-ruined archways, and having in its rear the scarred and broken
mighty wall--that once was so gloriously magnificent and that now,
perhaps, is still more exalted by its tragic grandeur of divine decay.
And yet another touch of pathos, in which also was a tender beauty, was
supplied by the growth of trees and shrubs along the base of the great
wall. Over toward the "garden" exit was a miniature forest of figs and
pomegranates, while on the "court" side the drooping branches of a large
fig-tree swept the very edge of the stage--a gracious accessory which
was improved by arranging a broad parterre of growing flowers and tall
green plants upon the stage itself so as to make a very garden there;
while, quite a master-stroke, beneath the fig-tree's wide-spreading
branches were hidden the exquisitely anachronistic musicians, whose
dress and whose instruments alike were at odds with the theatre and with
the play.
Two ill-advised electric lamps, shaded from the audience, were set at
the outer corners of the stage; but the main illumination was from a row
of screened footlights which not only made the whole stage brilliant
but cast high upward on the wall in the rear--above the gaping ruined
niche where once had stood the statue of a god--a flood of strong yellow
light that was reflected strongly from the yellow stone: so making a
glowing golden background, whence was projected into the upper darkness
of the night a golden haze.