they should ask Dallas, and then they remembered that Dallas had been
asked fifty times, and then they "supposed they must give it up;" and
then Vivian Grey made a proposition which the rest were secretly sighing
for, but which they were afraid to make themselves; he proposed that
they should act without asking Dallas. "Well, then, we'll do it without
asking him," said Vivian; "nothing is allowed in this life, and
everything is done: in town there is a thing called the French play, and
that is not allowed, yet my aunt has got a private box there. Trust me
for acting, but what shall we perform?"

This question was, as usual, the fruitful source of jarring opinions.
One proposed Othello, chiefly because it would be so easy to black a
face with a burnt cork. Another was for Hamlet, solely because he wanted
to act the ghost, which he proposed doing in white shorts and a
night-cap. A third was for Julius Caesar, because the murder scene would
be such fun.

"No! no!" said Vivian, tired at these various and varying proposals,
"this will never do. Out upon Tragedies; let's have a Comedy!"

"A Comedy! a Comedy! oh! how delightful!"




CHAPTER IV


After an immense number of propositions, and an equal number of
repetitions, Dr. Hoadley's bustling drama was fixed upon. Vivian was to