. When,
therefore, an important point is to be set forth, the dramatist cannot
afford to risk his clearness upon a single line. This is particularly true
in the beginning of a play. When the curtain rises, there is always a
fluttering of programs and a buzz of unfinished conversation. Many
spectators come in late and hide the stage from those behind them while
they are taking off their wraps. Consequently, most dramatists, in the
preliminary exposition that must always start a play, contrive to state
every important fact at least three times: first, for the attentive;
second, for the intelligent; and third, for the large mass that may have
missed the first two statements. Of course, the method of presentment must
be very deftly varied, in order that the artifice may not appear; but this
simple rule of three is almost always practised. It was used with rare
effect by Eugene Scribe, who, although he was too clever to be great,
contributed more than any other writer of the nineteenth century to the
science of making a modern play.

In order that the attention of the audience may not be unduly distracted by
any striking effect, the dramatist must always prepare for such an effect
in advance, and give the spectators an idea of what they may expect. The
extraordinary nose of Cyrano de Bergerac is described at length by
Ragueneau before the hero comes upon the stage. If the ugly-visaged poet
should enter without this preliminary explanation, the whole effect would
be lost. The spectators would nudge each other and whisper half aloud,
"Look at his nose! What is the matter with his face?", and would be less
than half attentive to the lines. Before Lady Macbeth is shown walking in
her sleep and wringing her hands that are sullied with the damned spot that
all great Neptune's ocean could not wash away, her doctor and her waiting
gentlewoman are sent to tell the audience of her "slumbery agitation."
Thus, at the proper moment, the attention is focused on the essential point
instead of being allowed to lose itself in wonder.

A logical development of this principle leads us to the axiom that a
dramatist must never keep a secret from his audience, although this is one
of the favorite devices of the novelist. Let us suppose for a moment that
the spectators were not let into the secret of Hero's pretty plot, in _Much
Ado_, to bring Beatrice and Benedick together. Suppose that, like the
heroine and the hero, they were led to believe tha