a theatre with him on Monday next.

"Oh, yes! certainly, old man," I replied. "Have you got an order,
then?"

He said:

"No; they don't give orders. We shall have to pay."

"Pay! Pay to go into a theatre!" I answered, in astonishment. "Oh,
nonsense! You are joking."

"My dear fellow," he rejoined, "do you think I should suggest paying
if it were possible to get in by any other means? But the people
who run this theatre would not even understand what was meant by a
'free list,' the uncivilised barbarians! It is of no use pretending
to them that you are on the Press, because they don't want the
Press; they don't think anything of the Press. It is no good
writing to the acting manager, because there is no acting manager.
It would be a waste of time offering to exhibit bills, because they
don't have any bills--not of that sort. If you want to go in to see
the show, you've got to pay. If you don't pay, you stop outside;
that's their brutal rule."

"Dear me," I said, "what a very unpleasant arrangement! And
whereabouts is this extraordinary theatre? I don't think I can ever
have been inside it."

"I don't think you have," he replied; "it is at Ober-Ammergau--first
turning on the left after you leave Ober railway-station, fifty