. The next in number to The
Sunken Bell is The Weavers, forty-three editions. Its strong note of
pity, its picture of poignant misery, and its eloquent cry for social
justice, had much to do with the large sales. Hannele is number three
in the order of sales, twenty-three editions being assigned to it. The
same number stands for Der Arme Heinrich, not the best Hauptmann, and
for that most moving human play, Rose Bernd--so marvellously enacted
by Else Lehmann at the Lessing Theatre--there are eighteen editions.
(These are 1913 figures.)

You can't help contrasting Parisian and Berlin taste, though the
German capital is in the grip of pornographic literature and art. But
it does indicate that a nation has not lost its idealism when it reads
such a beautiful work, a work of such imagination as The Sunken Bell,
does it not? I wish I could admire other of Hauptmann's work, such as
Michael Kramer, Der Biberpalz, or the depressing Fuhrmann Henschel.
And I also wish that I could include among his big works his latest,
The Flight of Gabriel Schilling (written in 1906).

It is a drama, the story of slender interest, because the characters
do not particularly interest--the misunderstood humbug of a
woman--but in an original setting, a little island on the east coast
of Germany, called Fischmeisters Oye, the scenic side is very
effective. The piece plays in five acts, one act too many, and is slow
in action, and unusually wordy, even for the German stage, where the
public likes dialogues a half-hour at a stretch. I shall not bore you
with more than a glance at the chief situations. Gabriel Schilling is
a young Berlin painter who is too fond of the Friedrichstrasse cafe
life, which means wine, wenches, and an occasional song. His friend
the sculptor, Professor Mauerer, has persuaded Gabriel to leave Berlin
during the dog-days, leave what the text calls the "hot, stinking
asphalt," and join him at the seaside. Gabriel has a wife, to whom he
is not exactly nice, being fond of a Vienna lady, who bears the name
of Hanna Elias. This Hanna Elias has played, still plays, the chief
role in his miserable existence. He has promised to give her up, she
has promised to go back to her husband and child (the latter supposed
to be the offspring of Gabriel). So his flight to the east coast is a
genuine attempt to gain his liberty; besides, his health is bad, he
suffers from heart trouble. The play opens with the sculptor talking
of Schilling in t