at belong in a forest;
when a throne was there, they saw with the mind's eye a room of state
in a palace. But our modern stage also demands the help of the
imagination. It is very far from presenting a completely realistic
picture. We see three sides of a room and accept the room as complete,
although none of us live in rooms which lack a side. We see a great
cathedral painted on a back drop, and are hardly disturbed by the fact
that an actor standing near it is twice as high as one of the doors.
The difference between the two stages really simmers down to this: our
symbols are of painted canvas, the Elizabethans' were of another sort.
It is extremely unlikely that the Elizabethans used painted scenes in
their public theaters. If they ever did, such 'painted cloths' were of
the simplest sort, and not pictures painted in perspective. Instead,
they relied for their effects upon solid properties--sometimes quite
elaborate ones--such as trees, tombs, wells, beds, thrones, etc.
These, as has been said, were usually set on the rear stage, although
some of them, such as couches and banquet tables, were occasionally
brought forward during the course of a scene.

There were, however, scenes which were acted without any setting. The
Elizabethans did not feel it necessary to have every scene definitely
localized. Consequently, many scenes which are described in our modern
editions of Shakespeare as 'A Street,' 'A Place before the Castle,'
etc., were not definitely assigned to any place, and were usually acted
without settings on the front stage before the closed curtains. In
order that no time should be lost while properties were {44} being
changed, such scenes were commonly inserted between scenes requiring
properties, so that a certain alternation between set and unset scenes
resulted. The fourth act of the _Merchant of Venice_, for example,
begins with the court-room scene, which demanded the whole stage, the
properties for the court-room being set on the back stage, with perhaps
some moved toward the front. The fifth act takes place in Portia's
garden, which also took up the whole stage, with garden properties set
on the rear stage. Between these two scenes comes the one in the
street, which was acted before the closed curtains and required no
properties. The arrangement is somewhat like that followed in many
modern melodramas, where a scene not requiring properties is acted in
front of a drop scene while scenery