by the films were crude and
amusing, such as of Fred Ott's sneeze, Carmencita dancing, Italians
and their performing bears, fencing, trapeze stunts, horsemanship,
blacksmithing--just simple movements without any attempt to portray the
silent drama. One curious incident of this early study occurred when
"Jim" Corbett was asked to box a few rounds in front of the camera, with
a "dark un" to be selected locally. This was agreed to, and a celebrated
bruiser was brought over from Newark. When this "sparring partner" came
to face Corbett in the imitation ring he was so paralyzed with terror
he could hardly move. It was just after Corbett had won one of his
big battles as a prize-fighter, and the dismay of his opponent was
excusable. The "boys" at the laboratory still laugh consumedly when they
tell about it.

The first motion-picture studio was dubbed by the staff the "Black
Maria." It was an unpretentious oblong wooden structure erected in the
laboratory yard, and had a movable roof in the central part. This roof
could be raised or lowered at will. The building was covered with black
roofing paper, and was also painted black inside. There was no scenery
to render gay this lugubrious environment, but the black interior served
as the common background for the performers, throwing all their actions
into high relief. The whole structure was set on a pivot so that it
could be swung around with the sun; and the movable roof was opened
so that the accentuating sunlight could stream in upon the actor whose
gesticulations were being caught by the camera. These beginnings and
crudities are very remote from the elaborate and expensive paraphernalia
and machinery with which the art is furnished to-day.

At the present time the studios in which motion pictures are taken are
expensive and pretentious affairs. An immense building of glass, with
all the properties and stage-settings of a regular theatre, is required.
The Bronx Park studio of the Edison company cost at least one hundred
thousand dollars, while the well-known house of Pathe Freres in
France--one of Edison's licensees--makes use of no fewer than seven of
these glass theatres. All of the larger producers of pictures in this
country and abroad employ regular stock companies of actors, men and
women selected especially for their skill in pantomime, although, as
most observers have perhaps suspected, in the actual taking of the
pictures the performers are required to carry on an