Paris, Oct. 24.
'A dozen gentlemen in black sat round a large table in the Hotel de Ville the other day, Before them was a collection of delicacies that would have made even a ascetic's mouth water, There was beautiful pink ham on a bed of fole gras; a stuffed goose, holding in its beak a basket of larks, algo stuffed with good things and decorated with cocks! combs, mushrooms, chestnuts and truffles; a dish of potted - snipe' surrounded with the birds' wings gracefully arranged; a poularde Schémienne, © langouste @ ta Parisienne, and baguettes a la Bourguignenne made wich tres! water eels. But the gentlemen in black were not there to enjoy these good things They had neither bread nor wine nor anything that could assist or falsify flavours. 'They were not even provided with plates or knives. 'They dug tentatively with forks into the wende ful concoctions before them, tasted deliberately and compared' notes. Among them were celebrated chefs and hotel men, and writers and poets who have striven gallantly in support of their country's reputation as the homeiof fine cookery. They were the judges of a competition the winner of which will be hailed as the Premier Chef de France—a gorgeous title!—or the Consummately Competent Cook, or any other title that man can invent. in praise of gastronomy. Next month sees the opening of the annual Gastronomic Fair at Dijon, which will be a glorification of Burgundy wines and cookery.
Perhaps all this may be good Propaganda, but it seems a little inappropriate to the times.
Intest reminder of the still inereasing cost of living is the announcement that the price of newspapers is to be raised, at the beginning of next month, from 15 to 20 centimes. The decision to make the increase was taken at a meeting of newspaper proprietors held in Paris, the proposal" being adopted by 83 votes to 22. It was originally intended to make the change Inst January. At that time prices were rising in sympathy with exchange rates, and it was argued that the duty of the Press was to set a good example to the rest of the country and abstain from showing any sign-of panic; but as news-Papers, after all, are enterprises which must necessarily be conduct-business principles, and as the cost of newsprint and the ex-Penses of printing offices have climbed steadily upward—they are now more than five times what they were in 1914, when the public paid only 5 centimes' a' edpy for its morning or evening - paper—the situation had.to be faced: As most of the proprietors who voted against the rise have agreed to, bide, by the decision of the majority, the new price of 20 cen! jimes will apply to-all daily. journals except some local issues which, for special reasons, cannot follow' the lend of the others, Another ad tion to the Frenchman's burden is dearer bread, which is now up to /Frs. 1.85 per kilo and will probably go still higher. On the other side of the account we have the continued low exchange value of the franc, which favours exports and prevents unemployment.
'A Play With a History avis has a new theatre, and a new play. 'The former, of' course, has no history—as yet; the latter has a: curious one. entitled "Marion, Fille Galante" and was written, long before the war, by that great dramatist Henry Bataille, in collaboration with M. Alber Flament. After Bataille's death, Flament suggested to the dead Mile. Yvonne de Bray, the actress, that the play should be produced. As Bataille was in the habit: of revising his works frequently and carefully, she was strongly of opinion that he would not have allowed this particular play to reach the stage in in which he left it, was one of those cases in which the law holds that the rights of the living must take precedence over those of the dead, and finally it was agreed that the play should be produced without either author's name being officially attached to it, Mile. Yvonne de Bray at the same time intimating that her share of the royalties would be given to charities. "Marion, Fille Galante" turns out to be m succession of episodes from the famous 18th century story of Marion, the girl who loves ardently but has no moral principles, and of Des Grieux, the young man who sacrifices everything to his passion for Marion, The views of the critics confirm those of Mile. Yvonne de Bray, They decline to believe that Henry Bataille would have authorized the performance of what is really a rather disconnected series of scones lending no new interest to a well-worn story. But the Theatre de La Madeleine has very comfortable seats.
A Bernstein Drama, By a coincidence, Mf. Henri Bernstein, the dramatist who before the war ranked as high as Bataille, not higher, has just brought out now play, after a long interval, at the Gymnase Theatre, under the curious title of "La Galerie des Glaces." It is really a study of particular type of character—t doubter. Charles Berge is artist, with all the true artist's sensitiveness and far more than the modern artist's modesty. His doubt is mainly directed against himeelf. [The entire play turns, in fact, on his inability to believe that he' can have inspired a sincere and undivided passion. Everything should convince him that Agnes loves him whole-heartedly, but he cannot. bring himself to believe it; perhaps he thinks it is too good to be true. He has painted his own portrait and, in the self-analytical process, hho seems to have formed a decided: ly poor opinion of himself. He is tortured by the idea of his own insignificance in comparison with Agnes. The subject is treated with Power, but the play makes no progress." A crisis, always of the same nature, develops time after ti and is conjured away. Searcely ha: Bergé's incredulity been dispel than it comes into action again. "La Galerie des lay of exceptional li Bernstein's plays it deals with human passions developed to the utmost degree of intensity. In this case the struggle is in the soul, and the violence is not physical but psychological.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.