to Dr. Veron to be quite beyond question, while wholly justifiable by their results.  The manager detected the claque system as a pervading element in almost all conditions of life.  To influence large bodies or assemblies, dexterity and stratagem, he declared, were indispensably necessary.  The applause exacted by Nero, when he recited his verses or played upon the lute, or Tiberius, posing himself as an orator before the senate, was the work of a claque, moved thereto rather by terror, however, than by pecuniary considerations.  Parliamentary applause he found also to be of an artificial kind, produced by the spirit of friendship or the ties of party; and he relates how, when the Constitutionnel newspaper was under his direction, certain leading members attended at the printing-office to correct the proofs of their speeches, and never failed to enliven them at intervals by the addition of such terms as “Cheers,” “Loud cheers,” “Great cheering,” “Sensation,” “Excitement,” &c.  These factitious plaudits, tricks, and manoeuvres of players, singers, dancers, and orators, in truth, deceive no one, he maintained; while they make very happy, nevertheless, all those who have recourse to them.

As a manager, therefore, Dr. Veron invariably opposed the efforts made to suppress the claqueurs in the pay of the theatre.  He admits that sometimes excess of zeal on the part of these hirelings brought about public discontent and complaint; but, upon the whole, he judged that they exercised a beneficial influence, especially in the prevention of cabals or conspiracies against particular artists, and of certain scandals attached to the rivalry and jealousy of performers.  And to M. Auguste he thus addressed himself:  “You have a fine part to play; great duties to perform:  put an end to quarrels; help the weak against the strong; never oppose the public; cease applauding on a hint of their disapproval; present an example of politeness and decorum; conciliate and pacify; above all, prevent all hostile combinations, all unjust coalitions, against the artists on the stage, or the works represented.”

Dr. Veron has said, perhaps, all that could be said for the claque system; but his plausible arguments and apologies will not carry conviction to every mind.  There can be no doubt of the value, the necessity almost, of applause to the player; but one would much rather that the enthusiasm of an audience was wholly genuine, and not provided at so much a cheer, let us say, by the manager or the player himself.  “Players, after all,” writes Hazlitt, “have little reason to complain of their hard-earned short-lived popularity.  One thunder of applause from pit, boxes, and gallery is equal to a whole immortality of posthumous fame.”  But if the thunder is but stage thunder?  If the applause is supplied to order, through the agency of a M. Auguste?  Upon another occasion Hazlitt expresses more tenderness for the ephemeral glories of the actor’s art.