the present system a cheap and easy means of procuring a
certificate which relieves them of all social responsibility, and
provides them with so strong a weapon of defence in case of a
prosecution that it acts in practice as a bar to any such
proceedings. Above all, they know that the Examiner of Plays is
free from the pressure of that large body of English public
opinion already alluded to, which regards the theatre as the
Prohibitionist Teetotaller regards the public-house: that is, as
an abomination to be stamped out unconditionally. The managers
rightly dread this pressure more than anything else; and they
believe that it is so strong in local governments as to be a
characteristic bias of municipal authority. In this they are no
doubt mistaken. There is not a municipal authority of any
importance in the country in which a proposal to stamp out the
theatre, or even to treat it illiberally, would have a chance of
adoption. Municipal control of the variety theatres (formerly
called music halls) has been very far from liberal, except in the
one particular in which the Lord Chamberlain is equally
illiberal. That particular is the assumption that a draped figure
is decent and an undraped one indecent. It is useless to point to
actual experience, which proves abundantly that naked or
apparently naked figures, whether exhibited as living pictures,
animated statuary, or in a dance, are at their best not only
innocent, but refining in their effect, whereas those actresses
and skirt dancers who have brought the peculiar aphrodisiac
effect which is objected to to the highest pitch of efficiency
wear twice as many petticoats as an ordinary lady does, and seldom
exhibit more than their ankles. Unfortunately, municipal
councillors persist in confusing decency with drapery; and both in
London and the provinces certain positively edifying performances