n the fifth act was
up to about the mark of a drowning scene at the Adelphi; but it had one
new feature. When the rain ceased, and the ark drove in on the great
expanse of water, then lying waveless as the mists cleared and the sun
broke out, numbers of bodies drifted up and down. These were all real
men and boys, each separate, on a new kind of horizontal sloat. They
looked horrible and real. Altogether, a merely dull business; but I dare
say it will go for a long while."

A piece of honest farce is a relief from these profane absurdities. "An
uncommonly droll piece with an original comic idea in it has been in
course of representation here. It is called _Les Cheveux de ma Femme_. A
man who is dotingly fond of his wife, and who wishes to know whether she
loved anybody else before they were married, cuts off a lock of her hair
by stealth, and takes it to a great mesmeriser, who submits it to a
clairvoyante who never was wrong. It is discovered that the owner of
this hair has been up to the most frightful dissipations, insomuch that
the clairvoyante can't mention half of them. The distracted husband goes
home to reproach his wife, and she then reveals that she wears a wig,
and takes it off."

The last piece he went to see before leaving Paris was a French version
of _As You Like It_; but he found two acts of it to be more than enough.
"In _Comme il vous Plaira_ nobody had anything to do but to sit down as
often as possible on as many stones and trunks of trees as possible.
When I had seen Jacques seat himself on 17 roots of trees, and 25 grey
stones, which was at the end of the second act, I came away." Only one
more sketch taken in a theatre, and perhaps the best, I will give from
these letters. It simply tells us what is necessary to understand a
particular "tag" to a play, but it is related so prettily that the thing
it celebrates could not have a nicer effect than is produced by this
account of it. The play in question, _Memoires du Diable_, and another
piece of enchanting interest, the _Medecin des Enfants_,[200] were his
favourites among all he saw at this time. "As I have no news, I may as
well tell you about the tag that I thought so pretty to the _Memoires
du Diable_; in which piece by the way, there is a most admirable part,
most admirably played, in which a man says merely 'Yes' or 'No' all
through the piece, until the last scene. A certain M. Robin has got hold
of the papers of a deceased lawyer, concerning