Turners and your Corots, when, for prices ranging from a shilling
upwards, we can have a dozen pictures such as these rolled up and
down before us every evening?

   But perhaps the most daring hope of all was the dream that came to
Herr Wagner that his opera singers, his grouped choruses, would
eventually satisfy the craving of the public for high class statuary.
I am not quite sure the general public does care for statuary. I do
not know whether the idea has ever occurred to the Anarchist, but,
were I myself organising secret committee meetings for unholy
purposes, I should invite my comrades to meet in that section of the
local museum devoted to statuary. I can conceive of no place where
we should be freer from prying eyes and listening ears. A select
few, however, do appreciate statuary; and such, I am inclined to
think, will not be weaned from their passion by the contemplation of
the opera singer in his or her various quaint costumes.

   And even if the tenor always satisfied our ideal of Apollo, and the
soprano were always as sylph-like as she is described in the
libretto, even then I should doubt the average operatic chorus being
regarded by the connoisseur as a cheap and pleasant substitute for a
bas relief from the Elgin marbles. The great thing required of that
operatic chorus is experience. The young and giddy-pated the chorus
master has no use for. The sober, honest, industrious lady or
gentleman, with a knowledge of music is very properly his ideal.

   What I admire about the chorus chiefly is its unity. The whole
village dresses exactly alike. In wicked, worldly villages there is
rivalry, leading to heartburn and jealously. One lady comes out
suddenly, on, say, a Bank Holiday, in a fetching blue that conquers
every male heart. Next holiday her rival cuts her out with a green
hat. In the operatic village it must be that the girls gather
together beforehand to arrange this thing. There is probably a
meeting called.

   "The dear Count's wedding," announces the chairwoman, "you will all
be pleased to hear, has been fixed for the fourteenth, at eleven
o'clock in the morning. The entire village will be assembled at ten-
thirty to await the return of the bridal cortege from the church, and
offer its felicitations. Married ladies, will, of course, come

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