"A STAGE PANORAMA."

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 2050, 30 January 1889, Page 2

"A STAGE PANORAMA."

» A good joke is going the rounds of the American papers of which a clergyman who settled m a little county town is the victim. The minister oame to New York a few days ago to visit a friend, and was invited to attend an " entertainment" m the Academy of Musio. The clergyman had always been bitterly opposed to theatres audit was his proud boast that he had never visited one iv his life, a boast whtoh probably accounts for the faot that he kn6w nothing about them but-what was bad. An " entertainmont" was quite a different thiag, however, and the clergyman had no scruples m accepting his friend's invitation. He sat through Denman Thompson's beautiful impersonation of tbe tcoentric old farmer, applauded the many good points of the play with the rest of the great audienoe which filled the Academy, enjoyed every part of the performance, and saw nothing to find fault with. After the performance he appeared to be somewhat puzzled to find words to express himself when b/s friend asked him if he had been pleased. "I didn't quite understand," he remarked, " what kind of entertainment that was. It did not seem to be a lecture or a concert, though there was some good speaking and some very nice singing. In parts of it I thought it was a panorama." 11 That's just what it was," remarked the friend promptly, '«it is what we oall ia New York a ' stage panorama' ' Since his return to his home the good man has not wearied of describing to his parishioners the •' stage panorama " which he saw at the Academy, and of expressing his surprise that such entertainments are pot more frequently given m other places It has not dawned on him that he assisted, by bis presence, m one of those theatrioaf representations which he has co often denounced from his pulpit.