IT IS TO LAUGH

Boston, affirms a time-worn jest, is not a place but a state of mind. If this be so,--and some foundation must exist for the adage,--the query next follows: what is this state of mind? Intellectual, many will reply; Puritanical, others may suggest; or unbalanced, the sarcastic might intimate. But judging a cross-section of the populace--as exhibited at the theatre, for example--one receives the impression that the true state is irresponsible levity.

Bostonians themselves acknowledge, with what pride they can assume, that they are peculiar. In no way is their eccentricity more obvious than at the play. For on such occasions, there is apparent a phenomenon as incomprehensible to the stranger as it seems to be natural to the native. When the fair heroine is sobbing with all the lachrymose exertions that lie within her dramatic command, when the aged squire is struck dead from behind with an axe, or when, at the w. k. psychological moment, a wailing babe is introduced as evidence, then the audience takes its cue to shake with laughter. Sometimes its amusement is short-lived, barely rippling over the house in a trickle of chuckles; sometimes it is frankly ever-powering, vented by hearty guffaws or gurgles; but always it is indicated in one form or another.

Were it uniformly the fault of the players that occasioned such waves of enjoyment, there would be little cause for complaint, for some sad specimens of acting are only too frequently inflicted upon us. But the jocularity is not confined to "ham" actors, struggling stock companies, or situations so forced as to be suitable for sarcasm, for the most luminous of our stage stars and the efforts of our playwright most applauded elsewhere, have here repeatedly met with a sportive reception.

The average spectator who hails from districts foreign to the solemn traditions of Beacon Hill, is astounded at his display or merriment. And he is perplexed as to its source. Whether it be simply an unrecognized playfulness in the makeup of Boston's citizens, or whether it veers to the other extreme in the shape of a seriously perverted sense of humor, is hard to say. Whatever its excuse, it must be as irritating to the actors as it is to the playgoer who wants to get his money's worth of thrills, shudders, or sighs.