Foreign Affairs-[Continued] conspicuously empty. The Ministers nodded comprehendingly one to the other; for they were aware that the minority races (Slovaks, Germans, Magyars, Ruthenians) had carried out their oft-declared intention of boycotting the Parliament. Later, the minority Deputies delivered a solemn protest to the world demanding their "fundamental rights." * Thus, debate on the financial situation (most concerned with an unbalanced budget) went on minus the minority Deputies. That did not mean that the Opposition was not present. The Opposition was there, very much there, loudly protesting that per capita taxation was considerably higher than in Britain and France and that more money was being spent on the Army than on education. Then someone suggested that the country should call in an international financial controller.† Raucous ranting filled the Assembly; indignation, even ire, was on every side; the Deputies had considered the suggestion an insult to their national sovereignty. HUNGARY Wobbling In Budapest, Hungarian capital, the magnificent Parliament building on the left bank of the Danube was the scene of a crisis which rapidly rocked the entire kingdom. The Opposition, like many other Oppositions, became rowdy, rowdier, most rowdy. Heated accusations (not specified) were hurled at the head of Premier Count Stephen Bethlen, Transylvanian industrial magnate. No effort of the Government and its supporters could stem the mighty, endless avalanche of abuse that slid off the asperous tongues of its enemies. Then Police were summoned to the Parliament, entered the debating chamber, seized 14 members of the Opposition, threw them out on the street. meetings of indignation were held all over the city. Anger grew; and the city became alive with people running this way and that. The Government ordered out the Army to occupy the beautiful Royal Castle, on the right bank of the Danube, and all the State buildings. The Bethlen régime, so used to wobbling, wobbled again. *Autonomy was promised to the minority races when the Czecho-Slovak Nation came into existence in 1918-in the case of the Slovaks, as early as the Pittsburgh meeting of 1917. For reasons ascribable to conditions in Central Europe and to the youth of the Republic, none of these promises has been honored. By the Constitution of 1920, the Czecho-Slovak State is a single and indivisible unity. Hence, as a protest, the minority Deputies declined to attend Parliament. Austria and Hungary, states contiguous to Czecho-Slovakia, have financial controllers acting under the authority of the League of Nations. CHINA New Régime While inland China was wrapt in its customary slumber, the coast provinces, Keystone TUAN CHI-JUI "-without ability and undeserving" from Kwangtung to Chihli, effervesced in a variety of bubbles. In the South, Dr. Sun Yat-sen, "perpetual rebel", was reported hostile to the war-lords who controlled Peking. In the Centre, General Wu Pei-fu, until recently the biggest man in China, prepared, with his cronies, for war upon the legions of the Peking war-lords. In the North (i.e. in Peking), General Feng Yu-hsiang, "Chinese Christion Soldier", relinquished his command "now that his military services are no longer needed." This left, controlling Peking, Marshals Chang Tso-lin and Tuan Chi-jui. Evidently there had been dispute among Feng, Chang and Tuan. What were the two remaining ones going to do? A report from London professed to know that Marshals Tuan and Chang were "for restoring the Manchu Monarchy." That would explain the animosity of Dr. Sun and also lend reason to the quarrel with General Feng. This latter, in addition to frowning on his comrade's ideas on foreign policy (see below), is a republican in spirit and no believer in dynasties. The next development seemed further to foreshadow Tuan in the rôle of Regent. With the full consent of the Government, the knowledge of all foreign legations, and on the advice of his English tutor, young Hsuan Tung, whilom "Boy Emperor" of China, sought asylum in the Japanese Legation. The report was that he might cross to Japan, there to wait out of harm's way until Tuan had reduced his realm to order for him. Meanwhile, the young Manchu talked of how good it seemed to be freed of official duties, of how he would like to go to the U. S. to study "at Hamilton College or Columbia University." And meantime, Marshal Tuan issued a mandate: On November 24, 1924, I, Tuan Chi-jui, assumed office as Chief Executive of the Republic of China. At the time of assuming office, I formally announced as follows: I, Tuan Chi-jui, although without ability and undeserving, assume office as Chief Executive of the Republic of China. I swear that I will endeavor to consolidate the Republican Government, respect public opinion, and strive to bring about reform within the country and raise the nation's standing abroad. I swear the foregoing reverently. More mandates followed: The system of the Provisional Government of the Republic of China is hereby promul gated. Seal of the Chief Executive of the Republic of China. ARTICLE 1. The Provisional Government of the Republic of China shall have a Chief Executive who shall have supreme control of civil and military affairs and shall be Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy. ARTICLE 2. The Chief Executive shall act as the representative of the Republic of China in international affairs. ARTICLE 3. The Provisional Government shall have Ministers of State to assist the Chief Executive in attending to the duties of his office. All mandates of the Provisional Government, as well as documents relating to State matters, shall be countersigned by the Ministers of State. ARTICLE 4. The Chief Executive shall empower Ministers of State to control the following ministries: Foreign Affairs, Interior, Finance, War, Navy, Justice, Education, Commerce and Agriculture, and Communications. ARTICLE 5. The Chief Executive shall summon the Ministers of State to hold Cabinet meetings. ARTICLE 6. This system of government shall go into effect from the date of promulgation, but will be declared null and void when a formal government is established. Explanatory of the foregoing were statements, official and otherwise, issued by Tuan through his Foreign Minister, Tang Shao-yi. The gist of these was: "Reform within the country" would precede the Government's efforts to "raise the nation's standing abroad" (i.e. "equalize" China's treaties). The Cabinet appointed: Chief Executive*: Tuan Chi-jui Agriculture and Commerce: Yang Shu-kan *Chief Executive is a combination of President and Premier-virtually a dictator. After the Franco-Prussian War in 1871, M. Thiers, in similar circumstances, temporarily assumed the office of Chief of Executive Power in France, LATIN AMERICA In Mexico Foreign Affairs-[Continued] Beneath a cloudless sky in the openair National Stadium on the outskirts of Mexico City, the Executive Power of the United Mexican States passed from General Alvero Obregon to General Plutarco Elias Calles, peacefully elected by the Labor-Agrarian vote. Without any military display, President Obregon and President-elect Calles left the National Palace in an open barouche, drawn by fine horses with gold-mounted harness, and proceeded along the streets amid the loud plaudits of the assembled public to the Stadium. As the two Generals entered the Stadium a demonstration for the new President was drowned by the martial strains of the National Anthem. Alighting from the carriage the incoming and outgoing Presidents mounted the carpeted stairs to the grandstand where stood distinguished guests. Among those in the stadium: Señora Obregon, wife of the President; Señorita Obregon, sister; Samuel Gompers, head of the American Federation of Labor with 300 followers, visiting merchants of New Orleans, etc. Tense silence reigned in the Stadium -broken from above by the whirring of airplanes which circled around. Hundreds of pigeons were set free to fly wildly overhead and the air became filed in a twinkling with colored toy balloons. The Generals stood on either side of the Speaker of Congress, who in less than two minutes administered the oath of office to General Calles, who then became Mexico's first Labor President. An instant later artillery belched; 25,000 people cheered; bands again crashed out the National Anthem. On the platform President and exPresident embraced: Said ex-President Obregon, visibly moved: "At this moment when I embrace you I pray that your administration may be a complete success." The President, equally moved, returned: "Alvaro, I will be satisfied if I have the same success you have had. May the rest of your days be happy ones, as you have not abused the responsibilities that were entrusted you by the Mexican people. Te compane Dios (God be with you) when you return to the Northern State that gave you to Mexico." Remarked Samuel Gompers: "It was a wonderful sight. It was a good thing to allow everybody to see the President. Mexico is improving every minute." The two generals then walked down the stairs, drove to Chapultepre Castle for an informal reception, after which they attended a bull-fight. All that day and all that night the celebrations lasted. Hundreds of coaches, filled with flowers and gay señoritas singing Mexican songs and throwing confetti, passed endlessly up and down the streets. General Plutarco Elias Calles, "Tiger of the Sonora," is one of those men in whose eyes burn the revolutionary light; yet, of all men, he would probably deny such a contention; he would call it the light of reform. Enemy of the large land-owners, friend of the peons (laborers), socialist, nationalist, he passes among the élite of the "dis"-United Mexican States as a Radical. A Radical? "No," says President Calles, with a powerful, quivering Mexican negative. "Radical? Nonsense! Radical? Yes, if the term is clearly understood. I am frankly for giving the exploited Mexican masses a new deal. . . . Property? Of course property and Capital have rights and rights which must be protected. But in Mexico's past it was considered that property rights were the only rights. . . . We know that Capital will not come unless assured of fair treatment. As far as I am concerned, it shall always have it." Not only does the President champion the oppressed classes of the Nation with the sword of nationalism and win them with a popular land program, but he goes so far as to protect them against themselves. Here consideration of two points reveals two startling facts: The President, while personally "fond of the bottle," is a staunch prohibitionist and, while a large landowner, is a firm supporter of the land act, which aims at splitting up large estates and dividing them among the landless. In general, his policy is very largely that of his predecessor, exPresident Alvaro Obregon. Forty-seven years have fled since Plutarco Elias Calles first squalled and puked in the nurse's arms; and at this age of maturity he is found to be a man of energetic action, resolute, ruthless. Well over average height, with the remains of youthful handsomeness still lurking in his face, Señor Calles is at once an imposing figure with an arresting personality. His head is large and his brow deep, usually puckered into a frown; beneath, two dark eyes flash forth into the world to stir the hearts of men. The mustached mouth-once straight with cruel, thin lips-now droops at the ends, an unmistakable sign of the bodily ailment which has for some time affected him; but the chin-the chin of a fighter, of a leader -is still there. The heights of the Presidency have not been scaled without difficulty by Señor Calles. And it is interesting to note that, during most of his political carcer, he has stood in the shadow of one-armed Alvaro Obregon whom many believe to be the greatest Mexica statesman since Benito Juarez, 1x President who overthrew the Empire in 1867 and ordered shot the unhappy Maximilian, brother of Franz Josti, Emperor of Austria. Plutarco Calles started life as a school teacher and was for 17 years a persuasive pedagog. In the exercise of his profession, he was imbued wit some of that idealism that lit the soa of the late ex-President Woodrow WTson. But in Mexico of that day he was not understood. From the position of Mayor of Fronteras, the proud Mexica aristocrats forced him. Not a public office was open to him. This drove hir to the "soap-box"; and his so-called Radical speeches inflamed the workers to red-hot enthusiasm for him, his enemies to bitter hatred. In 1911 came the Porfirio Diaz Revolution; Calles was among the first to join against Diaz. Came the fierce revolt against Francisco Madero; Calles rose from the ranks to a colonelcy. Came the Victoriana Huerta Rebellion; General Alvaro Obregon found Calles, made him a general in command of the Sonora army. From this moment, the beneficent shade ci Señor Obregon hovered about him. Governor of Sonora he became, and then Cabinet Minister. And, when the snappy struggle against President Carranza began, the Sonora triumvirateObregon, Calles and Adolfo de la Huerta was in being. After the revolt, Adolfo de la Huerta became Provisional President until Señor Obregon was elected to that dignity. Then peace reigned for three years; and the Sonora triplets were indispensable to one another-Calles as Ministro de la Gobernación (Minister of the Interior), de la Huerta as Minister of Finance. In the fourth year of this régime, the 1924 election loomed Mexicans speculated as to whether Calles or de la Huerta would succeed President Obregon. The latter favora his right-hand man and favorite, Gen eral Calles. For a time, de la Huert also favored him, because, as allegedly arranged, he was to become Preside after Calles. Then, with peculiar su denness, de la Huerta rocked the revolutionary cradle of Mexico-the triumvirate was shattered; and, in it ruins, de la Huerta found his politic.! grave. Only one man was left to suc ceed Obregon; nor did Obregon conceal his satisfaction; for the man was Calles, his friend, his protégé, his faithful comrade-in-arms. And now, big as Señor Calles is, i is conceded that Señor Obregon is bigger. Is Plutarco Elias Calles to be therefore, a puppet-President? The odds seem to favor it. Xicales, where the descendant of one who came with Cortez had lived to his end in faith, poverty and style. Sard Harker, sailor, lay on the barque Venturer in Las Paloiras harbor, dreaming of a girl he loved. In his dream, the vision of that proud and now empty house stood up clear and portentious, while a voice rang in his cars: "You will meet her again in that house for the second of three times. It will be very, very important, so be ready." Ten years after his dream, he found himself again in Las Palomas, this time as mate of the Pathfinder. "Now," he thought, "it will come true as appointed." He went ashore to see a prizefight, at the ringside heard one Sagrado plotting to kidnap an English girl named Kingsborough who was staying at Xicales; he borrowed a bicycle, rode out to warn her. Kingsborough was not the name he had known her by when he had seen her for the first of the "three times." His warning went unheeded, his bicycle was stolen, his ship left without him, his girl was kidnapped. Searching for a short cut to town, he wandered into a swamp, was bitten by a deadly sting-ray; into a smugglers' camp, was befriended; into a native train guard, was jailed, far inland. He escaped from jail, hatless, bootless, penniless; cleaned up a bar-room with his good right fist (the jacket design), set out to walk to Los Agostino, 110 miles away across the Sierras, to get news of his ship, of his lady. Fierce and famishing he sojourned to the wilderness. Over the hazardous ice-fields of the Sierras, where only a single man in 100 years had passed before him, he went in safety, came to Los Agostino. There he learned that the Pathfinder had gone down, that Miss Kingsborough was still in the clutches of Sagrado. By chance, he encountered her brother in the street; while the two stood in talk, the stolen lady screamed from a neighboring house. Sard entered; soon he and Sagrado were swapping punches. Sard's right for once failed him; so did his left. Sagrado, who had the muscle of a baboon, was about to sacrifice the intrepid sailer at the very shrine of his unswerving attachment when the door burst down, in pelted Brother Kingsborough with reinforcements, Sagrado was led off in chains; and the happy couple whose separation had given rise *Sard Harker-John Masefield-Macmillan ($2.50). MASEFIELD His book teems with action to so much narrative on the part of Mr. Masefield were-for the time beingunited. Significance. Since it is a graceless business to cast aspersion at the work of one so justly honored as the author of this novel, it may be said that the book teems with action. Like a disorderly street seen from a window, cobbled with yellow faces, it teems; adventures shoulder and jostle; events prod each other's ribs; Sentimentality picks the pocket of Romance. One is forcibly reminded that nothing is quite so dull as unvaried liveliness. It is a book that achieves a forthright swagger that the fiction of this latter day has largely lost. Beauty in distress is white; villainy is black indeed. It relinquishes, at the same time, whatever graces of subtlety and invention the fiction of this latter day has gained. The Author. John Masefield was born in Shropshire, England, in what year few know. He disdained school, tramped around the country till his parents indentured him to the captain of a merchant ship for the sum of a shilling a month. He sailed over a great part of the world. In 1902, derelict in Manhattan, he got a job in a saloon serving beer, washing glasses, taking care of the bartender's baby. The poet Yeats encouraged him to write. His works include: The Everlasting Mercy, The Widow in the Bye-Street, Dauber, The Daffodil Fields, Reynard the Fox, Gallipoli (prose), Enslaved. Life of Conrad JOSEPH CONRAD-Ford Madox Ford -Little, Brown ($2.50). Ford Madox Ford collaborated with Conrad in the writing of Romance, The Inheritors, The Nature of a Crime. In this monograph, which is built up like a house of blocks out of pointed anecdotes, snatches of conversation, brief and vivid scenes recollected, the personality of Joseph Conrad is projected as he revealed it to a human being during many years of close intimacy. You have Conrad hypnotizing a country grocer into giving him three years unlimited credit, throwing teacups into the fire when heated by argument with a lady, sailing up the Thames in a steam launch with cigars, champagne, plovers' eggs in aspic. Mortared with the egotism of Mr. Ford, who jauntily refers to himself as "the finest stylist in England," the blocks fall into place; and slowly there looms up the spirit of Joseph Conrad, who in all the world would have loved nothing better than to have singed the king of Spain's beard; who once outwitted the Dutch Navy; and who wrote "the finest books in the world." Short Stories THREE FLIGHTS UP-Sidney Howard -Scribner ($2.00). Here are four of the most notable short stories of the season. None of them is very short. A Likeness of Elizabeth deals with the forgery of a painting by Holbein. The sham is detected by one of the forger's best friends. Transatlantic is a study of the passengers of a great liner on a voyage to the U. S., their problems and their interrelationship. There are, notably, Harry, young American with a continental veneer of snobbery; Burleigh, placid Britisher; Jennie, "good sport," life of the party. Mrs. Vietch is the story of a woman deserted by her husband and her family, of her trials and how she conquered them. The God They Left Behind Them is the weird tale of a house haunted by the vengeful God of Jonathan Edwards and his Puritan contemporaries to whom the chiefest of sins is Folly. Pleasant Poet A HARP IN THE WINDS-Daniel Henderson-Appleton ($1.25). This is the book of a U. S. poet who finds his country pleasant, the world not wholly bad. Delicately, temperately, he writes of "Springtime along the Pennsylvania Railroad," "Tenement Children," "Keats," "Friendship," "The Lackawanna Ferry." A flowery hedge, a regiment of roses, the filagrees of a frozen brook-these lift his heart; and his eye is quick to value those exquisite banalities of everyday life that the gross cannot see, and the great have not time to write about. When he sings of the "Pony Express." "The First Steamboat on the Mississippi," "The Coming of the Railroad," he strains his note; these themes call for a larger voice than his. The Magnolia Lady. Ruth Chatterton is not a good musical comedienne. She sings only mildly and dances doubtfully. Her charm is forced a trifle out of focus by the unfamiliar medium and her emotional accomplishments are not required. Her experiment behind an orchestra is therefore declared an error. She was hampered somewhat, it is true, by a leisurely and meagerly humored book. The music, too, was uneventful. The combination was based on the kindly comedy Come out of the Kitchen, in which Miss Chatterton starred some seasons past. Dawn broke somewhat unpleasantly behind a cloudy sky of incontinent youth. Two young ladies found themselves abruptly young but no more ladies. One committed suicide on the fringes of a house party and the other lived and married the man she loved. A puritanical papa who objected most determinedly to these unfortunate adventures was argued down by his wife on the grounds that she, too, in the days of her youth had subdivided her virginity. She had made a good wife. Daughter would make a good wife. All this is, of course, in re the younger generation. The young ladies are plentifully petted and cocktailed. Most of it is dull and arrantly absurd. Emma Dunn, as the mother, reinforces it with the single striking performance. They Knew What They Wanted. Seldom in the memory of U. S. theatrophiles have such ecstatics emanated from the critics as those greeting this play, the second of the Theatre Guild's season. Never, in the history of the Theatre Guild, has the demand for seats been so importunate. Never has an author had more cause to be complacent than has Sidney Howard, nor an actress and actor than Pauline Lord and Richard Bennett. Yet edging unaccountably under this wild and high hurrah certain skeptics have discerned a hollow note. A minor note to be sure, and one that detracts only slightly from the aggregate rejoicing. Yet this note is sufficient to persuade these sceptics that They Knew What They Wanted is not a great play and that the performance of Mr. Bennett is undeserving of hysterical superlative. Of the performance of Miss Lord too much can scarcely be said, and therein lies the situation's key. It will be recalled that this actress was welcomed by the London critics as one of the greatest of Americans (in Anna Christie). Her interpretation of the unlettered waitress who married by mail in the present play substantiates their judgment. So brilliantly did she play the part, so perfectly defined were her weaknesses and pathos, so irresistible her reading of the wistful lines that she swept the audience from its mental moorings. It is the opinion of MISS LORD She married by mail these skeptics that to Miss Lord alone is due the thorough public triumph. She marries by mail and arrives at the vineyard farm in California to find that her prospective husband, an old Italian, has tricked her by sending in place of his own, the photograph of his youthful, wayward, farm hand. The deception discovered, she concludes that even old Tony is preferable to the spaghettied dreariness of her 'Frisco job. Tony breaks both his legs just before the wedding and three months pass. The girl is with child by the farm hand Joe. In a severe and somewhat artificial climax Tony, whom she has meanwhile come to love, retains her as his wife. Mr. Bennett's portrait of the voluble old vineyard-keeper is technically adept, artful in appearance, but often lacking in absolute conviction. Glenn Anders does incomparably the best work of his career as the farm hand. The remainder of the production is managed with the usual surety and vigor of the Theatre Guild. It remains only to be said that the dialog is dotted with the most consistently severe profanity of any play within memory. Heywood Broun-"Pauline Lord gave the finest performance I have ever seen." My Girl. If you are one of the agreeable nomads who blend with the hurrying theatre crowds only occa sionally, this play may seem acceptable It is a musical essay on the trials of Prohibition. The fact that a good many of the lines are frayed with age will not depress you. Yet, if you are a suspicious theatre-goer from the midst of the metropolis where a good joke is an old joke in a week, you are cautioned quietly against it. The music is generally excellent. The chorus is more important than the cast. Best Plays These are the plays which, in the light of metropolitan criticism, seem most important: Drama S. S. GLENCAIRN-Four of Eugene O'Neill's earlier sea tales in a sharply etched production by the Provincetown Players. SILENCE-Starts in a death house, jumps back to the murder, evades the electric chair. H. B. Warner and a tense, if trivial, melodrama. CONSCIENCE-A Western feature of a girl who went wrong while her husband was in jail; chiefly conspicuous for the performance of Lillian Foster. WHAT PRICE GLORY?-The brilliance and bitterness of war as told by the marines on the French Front. THEY KNEW WHAT THEY WANTED -Reviewed in this issue. DESIRE UNDER THE ELMS-Eugene O'Neill again, this time in a New England farmhouse where the old farmer marries a youthful bride and discovers she loves his son. WHITE CARGO The things you learn from the natives if marooned on a lonely post in Africa. Comedy THE GUARDSMAN-Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne carry on their own domestic comedy. THE FARMER'S WIFE-In which a rural widower attempts to find a new wife, exhausts the outside possibilities and selects his housekeeper. MINICK-Theatrical version of Edna Ferber's short story of the impossibilities of a middle-class father-in-law. GROUNDS FOR DIVORCE-Ina Claire's delightful prescription for losing and winning a husband via the divorce court. EXPRESSING WILLIE-Closing weeks of the satiric idyll on the contrasting temperaments of the artist youth and the hard-bitten veteran of business. THE SHOW-OFF-The bombs of bragadoccio bursting in the hot air of irresistible overconfidence. Musical Kettledrums, kicks and wisecracks are the most agreeably combined in the following diversions: Kid Boots, The Grab Bag, The Ritz Revue, Rose-Marie. Ziegfeld Follies, Dixie to Broadway, Scandals, I'll Say She Is, Annie Dear. MUSIC Beethoven Association In Manhattan, the Beethoven Association* gave a concert. Sedate and grave was the music heard, the august, the decorous, the lovely works of the great masters of yesterday-Schubert, Schumann, Haydn. One departure from classicism was made-the rendering of Chausson's Chanson Perpétuelle by Mme. Stanley, supported by a stringed quartet. "Very bad," said Critic Deems Taylor of this departure. But for the works august, sedate, all critics had praise. The chamber music of Haydn was the pièce de résistance. Next to the master, Beethoven, the darling of those who attend the Society's concerts is that same Croatian Kapellmeister, who, when about to compose, donned white tie, stiff shirt, suave black coat and worked by candlelight that the formality so delicately affected in his person might with an equal scrupulousness be reflected in his urbane compositions. Koussevitzky On the platform of Carnegie Hall, Manhattan, stood a tall Russian. He had sparkling eyes, thin hands, greying hair, a tailor. He was Serge Koussevitzky, new conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, making his Manhattan début. With uncommon dignity he turned his back on the notable company assembled in that hall, raised his arms. Rank on rank behind him stood, sat, lounged, the many who had come to see whether the Boston Symphony had any chance of regaining the haughty place it held before Dr. Karl Muck went to Fort Oglethorpe under the Espionage act in 1917, whether it were true that this conductor was a "hypnotist," whether he could interpret Debussy, whether he wagged his head. They noted that he had a good back. They noted that every now and then, when he wanted to indicate a sudden pianissimo, he shot his left hand into the air, palm flat, in the way of one who hoists a heavy tray or thrusts a torch aloft. For the rest, his gestures were continent. He led Debussy's Nuages; Honegger's Pacific 231, Scriabin's Poem of Ecstacy. Like a storm of white hail came the clapping. With inexorable courtesy, Koussevitzky bowed and bowed. Serge Alexandrovitch Koussevitzky The Beethoven Association of New York was founded by Harold Bauer, pianist. Its members include many famed musical artists. Its purpose, in general, is to stimulate public interest in classical music, in particular to present the works of Beethoven in all forms, especially those least often heard. Large are its box-office receipts. These proceeds it has devoted to such good works as shall abet the fame of Beethoven, paying for the publication of Arthur Wheelock Thayer's Life of Beethoven in its first English version, contributing to the New York Public Library a valuable collection of works relating to the Master, giving a large sum toward the erection of a new Festspielhaus at Salzburg, Germany. was born in 1874 in Vyshny Volotchk, Russia. He gained admission to the Moscow Conservatory by promising to study the double bass, an instrument much needed at the moment in the conservatory orchestra. Out of the belly of that bull fiddle he brought such music as no Russian, perhaps no other man, had ever brought before. When learning to conduct he grouped chairs about him in the positions players would occupy in actual performance, conducted voiceless symphonies, ghosts responding. He made his first appearance in Berlin, conducted with success in London, Paris, other European capitals. He came to the Boston Symphony to take the place of able Pierre Monteux, Puccini As it must to all men, Death came to Giacomo Puccini, famed composer, at Brussels, Belgium, where he had gone for radium treatment for tumor of the throat. Weakened by the treatment, he died of a heart attack. While he lay dying, his opera Madame Butterfly was being presented at the Costanza Theatre, Rome. On the day of his death, his opera La Bohème was presented at the Metropolitan Opera House, Manhattan, where, after the third act, Chopin's Funeral March was played by the orchestra. In Italy, Premier Mussolini announced that Puccini's funeral would be paid for by the Italian Government. Puccini had just been appointed to the Senate. Incomparably the most popular of contemporary composers, Puccini was born at Lucca, Italy, 1858. His father, his grandfather, his great-grandfather had all composed music. He attracted attention when his one-act opera Le Villi was successfully performed at La Scala, Milan. His next work, Edgar, was a failure; but he won note with Manon Lescaut, and international fame with La Bohème. Tosca and Madame Butterfly followed. The Girl of the Golden West, based on a drama by David Belasco, produced at the Metropolitan with Caruso and Emmy Destinn, did not long survive,* nor did the three short operas Il Tabarro, Suor Angelica, Gianni Schicchi, given their première at the Metropolitan six years ago. These latter failures could detract little from his fame. Tosca, La Bohème, Madame Butterfly. Manon Lescaut are part of the regular repertoire of every opera company. Wherever a fiddle scrapes, his songs are heard. He left behind him an unfinished opera Turandot. In the U. S. Toscanini he One night in 1886 they were giving Aïda at the Rio de Janeiro Opera House. A new conductor had the baton. He showed nervousness; the great house He stirred uneasily. bungled a pianissimo passage, brought in his strings raggedly; a sinister sibilant flew round the galleries. "Hiss-sss-sss" went the fine senhorinas, “sss-sss-sss” went the fierce senhores. Distraught, unmanned, hearing a crooked death in every venomous sss, that new conductor broke his baton over his knee, fled weeping from the house. From his lowly place among the cellos rose up then a young Italian, scuttled to the dais, raised his bow for silence. He did not look at the score; he knew it by heart. So came to fame Arturo Toscanini, now hailed as Italy's "greatest conductor." * Last week in Manhattan, at the home of Mrs. Vincent Astor, met the Board of Directors of the Philharmonic Society. Chairman Clarence H. Mackay made announcements. He said that Arturo Toscanini had agreed to conduct the Philharmonic Orchestra in a series of concerts next year. He added that Willem Mengelberg, tiny Dutch giant of the baton, had been reëngaged for three years; that Wilhelm Furtwäengler, German conductor, will shortly appear in a guest engagement. Toscanini has not been heard in the U. S. since 1920, when he toured the country with his La Scala orchestra, gave a series of concerts which were lavishly heralded, created a sensation with interpretation of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. Before the War, he conducted for seven years at the Metropolitan Opera House, Manhattan, directing with equal aplomb Russian, French, German, Italian opera. He produced Dukas' Ariane et Barbe-Bleu, Moussorgsky's Boris Godounov; reGluck's Orfeo and Armide, Weber's Euryanthe. vived His feats of memory have become legend. Never has he been seen to use a score. In his head are over 100 operas, in addition to an enormous concert repertoire. When the jealous ask, "Why does he not use a score?" they answer themselves "Bravado." It is not bravado. Toscanini is so nearsighted that he cannot read a note that is more than half a foot under his nose. Long before ever his great night in Rio de Janeiro, he scraped his big fiddle with no white sheets propped up before him. "Where is your music?" asked the conductor one day. "Under the seat of my trousers," replied Toscanini. The Directors, beside Mr. Mackay, are: Frederic A. Juilliard, Marshall Field, Otto H. Kahn, Charles Triller, Alvin W. Krech, Arthur Judson, Nicholas Murray Butler, Mrs. Scipione Guidi, E. H. Harriman, Thomas L. Leeming. L. E. Manoly, Frank L. Polk, D. Edward Porter, Walter W. Price, Elihu Root, Charles H. Sabin, Nelson S. Spencer, Maurice Van Praag. Mrs. Vincent Astor is the Chairman of the Executive Committee on the Auxiliary Board. |