“Box Five on the grand tier shall be placed at the disposal of the Opera ghost for every performance.”

When we saw this, there was nothing else for us to do but to rise from our chairs, shake our two predecessors warmly by the hand and congratulate them on thinking of this charming little joke, which proved that the old French sense of humor was never likely to become extinct. Richard added that he now understood why

MM.

Debienne and Poligny were retiring from the management of the National Academy of Music. Business was impossible with so unreasonable a ghost.