I could not but think of the State performance of “Money” at Drury Lane on the previous night:  that amusing smack at living artists.  There has been a good deal of straight talk about it in the daily and weekly papers.  But the psychology of the matter has not been satisfactorily explained.  Blame has been laid at the King’s door.  I think wrongly, or at least unfairly.  Besides being one of the two best shots in the United Kingdom, the King is beyond any question a man of honourable intentions and of a strict conscientiousness.  But it is no part of his business to be sufficiently expert to choose a play for a State performance.  He has never pretended to have artistic proclivities.  Who among you, indeed, could be relied upon to choose properly a play for a State performance?  Take the best modern plays.  Who among you would dare to suggest for a State performance Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest,” Bernard Shaw’s “Man and Superman,” John Galsworthy’s “Justice,” or Granville Barker’s “The Voysey Inheritance”?  Nobody!  These plays are unthinkable for a State performance, because their distinction is utterly beyond the average comprehension of the ruling classes—­and State performances are for the ruling classes.  These plays are simply too good.  Yet if you don’t choose an old play you must choose one of these four plays, or make the worst of both worlds.  Modern plays being ruled out, you must either have Shakespeare or—­or what?  What is there?  “The Cenci”?

* * * * *

Can you not now sympathize with the King as he ran through, in his mind, the whole range of British drama?  But the truth is that he did not run through the whole range of British drama.  Invariably in these cases a list is submitted for the sovereign to choose from.  It is an open secret that in this particular case such a list was prepared.  Whether or not it was prepared by Mr. Arthur Collins, organizer of Drury Lane pantomimes, I cannot say.  The list contained Shakespeare and Lytton, and I don’t know who else.  Conceivably the King did not want Shakespeare.  To my mind he would be quite justified in not wanting Shakespeare.  We are glutted with Shakespeare in the Haymarket.  Well, then,—­why not “Money”?  It is a famous play.  We all know its name and the name of its author.  And that is the limit of our knowledge.  Why should the King be supposed to be acquainted with its extreme badness?  I confess I didn’t know it was so bad as now it seems to be.  And, not very long ago, was not Sir William Robertson Nicoll defending the genius of Lytton in the British Weekly?  It is now richly apparent that “Money” ought not to have been included in the list submitted to the King.  But it is easy to be wise after the event.

* * * * *