In any case, it is hardly likely thet any great change of military policy can be carried out until the worst of the winter—which promises to be unusually severe—is over. I am inclined to think that, by the time spring is at hand, the general feeling will be in favour of an attack rather than go on trying to wear the adversary out. The Chamber ha: just voted the Government propo to call out the 1917 class of recruit in spite of the obvious drawbacks of military training for undeveloped youths of eighteen. The training of January, 80 that they will be avail-these recruits is to begin early in
able, in case of need, for the more active operations which may be expected in the early summer. Their predecessors of the 1916 class are now fully trained but have not yet been sent to the front, The Comédie Francaise.
Just as Napoleon, in the midst of the disastrous campaign in Russia, found time to legislate for the Comédie Frangaise, so the present Government has turned aside from the war obsession to deliberate as to who shall look after that famous theatre. Its _administrator—the word "manager" seems inadequate to convey a due sense of this functionary's importance—M. Albert Corre, has hitherto been allowed to combine his duties with those of a lieutenant-colonel on the staff in Paris, The new War Minister, General Galliéni, having decided that, as no man can serve two masters, no one ought to discharge both civilian and military duties simultaneously, M. Corre has had to abandon the Comédie Frangaise, and the Cabinet, after due deliberation, has appointed M. Emile Fabre to replace him until the end of the war.
M. Fabre's qualifications, in addition to having been born at Metz, include the authorship of "Les Ventres Dorés' and some other successful plays, and an undoubted knowledge of stage effects; and his appointment is solemnly approved by the Press, even the temporary headship of the leading State theatre being considered as matter of moment though the country ie invaded. The public is also heartened by the forthcoming reopening, in tentative sort of way, of the opera. Shortly before the war broke out, the Government handed over this establishment to a new director, M. Jacques Rouché, whose arrangements for the coming season were abruptly cut short by the Kaiser. The Opera has since been closed, but M. Rouché now proposes to give afternoon concerts once or twice a week, with a certain admixture of costumes and scenery. He will, for instance, try to reconstitute the stately ballets in which Louis XIV loved to take part in his young days, As for grand opera, we are not likely to see anything of it until after the war, but these concerts are welcomed as an indication of revive ing confidence and business. The theatres in general have of course been very hard hit. They have had to reduce their prices very oonsiderably, and also the salaries of their artistes, Nearly all the younger actors are in the army, but there has not been any great difficulty in
dramatic talent in France being infilling their places, the supply of exhaustible. The Opera Comique has been it going chiefly with a view to providing employment for its large staff, and it certainly need not complain of small audiences, though it issues a good deal. of paper" for the benefit of convalescent soldiers, of whom scores are to be seen at every performance. In fact there is not single Paris theatre in which the spectators do not comprise a large military element, many being, alas, minus a leg of arm, or having their heads swathed in bandages, The Grand Guignol is pluckily pegging away with selections from the characteristic repertoire of this curious little theatre: side splitting one-act comedies and blood-curdling horrors.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.