into the pursuit of mere picture-poster situation; but that is no reason why the artist should not seek to achieve crispness within the bounds prescribed by nature and common sense.  There is a drama—­I have myself seen it—­in which the heroine, fleeing from the villain, is stopped by a yawning chasm.  The pursuer is at her heels, and it seems as though she has no resource but to hurl herself into the abyss.  But she is accompanied by three Indian servants, who happen, by the mercy of Providence, to be accomplished acrobats.  The second climbs on the shoulders of the first, the third on the shoulders of the second; and then the whole trio falls forward across the chasm, the top one grasping some bush or creeper on the other side; so that a living bridge is formed, on which the heroine (herself, it would seem, something of an acrobat) can cross the dizzy gulf and bid defiance to the baffled villain.  This is clearly a dramatic crisis within our definition; but, no less clearly, it is not a piece of rational or commendable drama.  To say that such-and-such a factor is necessary, or highly desirable, in a dramatic scene, is by no means to imply that every scene which contains this factor is good drama.  Let us take the case of another heroine—­Nina in Sir Arthur Pinero’s His House in Order.  The second wife of Filmer Jesson, she is continually being offered up as a sacrifice on the altar dedicated to the memory of his adored first wife.  Not only her husband, but the relatives of the sainted Annabel, make her life a burden to her.  Then it comes to her knowledge—­she obtains absolute proof—­that Annabel was anything but the saint she was believed to be.  By a single word she can overturn the altar of her martyrdom, and shatter the dearest illusion of her persecutors.  Shall she speak that word, or shall she not?  Here is a crisis which comes within our definition just as clearly as the other;[8] only it happens to be entirely natural and probable, and eminently illustrative of character.  Ought we, then, to despise it because of the element it has in common with the picture-poster situation of preposterous melodrama?  Surely not.  Let those who have the art—­the extremely delicate and difficult art—­of making drama without the characteristically dramatic ingredients, do so by all means; but let them not seek to lay an embargo on the judicious use of these ingredients as they present themselves in life.

* * * * *

[Footnote 1:  Etudes Critiques, vol. vii, pp. 153 and 207.]

[Footnote 2:  In the most aggravated cases, the misunderstanding is maintained by a persevering use of pronouns in place of proper names:  “he” and “she” being taken by the hearer to mean A. and B., when the speaker is in fact referring to X. and Y. This ancient trick becomes the more irritating the longer the quiproquo is dragged out.]

[Footnote 3:  The Lowland Scottish villager.  It is noteworthy that Mr. J.M.  Barrie, who himself belongs to this race, has an almost unique gift of extracting dramatic effect out of taciturnity, and even out of silence.]