In business and religion, people occasionally think for themselves; in the selection of entertainments, never! but are apparently content to receive their opinions and prejudices ready-made from some unseen and omnipotent Areopagus.
The careful study of an opera audience from different parts of our auditorium has brought me to the conclusion that the public there may be loosely divided into three classes--leaving out reporters of fashionable intelligence, dressmakers in search of ideas, and the lady inhabitants of "Crank Alley" (as a certain corner of the orchestra is called), who sit in perpetual adoration before the elderly tenor.
First--but before venturing further on dangerously thin ice, it may be as well to suggest that this subject is not treated in absolute seriousness, and that all assertions must not be taken au pied de la lettre. First, then, and most important, come the stockholders, for without them the Metropolitan would close. The majority of these fortunate people and their guests look upon the opera as a social function, where one can meet one's friends and be seen, an entertaining antechamber in which to linger until it's time to "go on," her Box being to-day as necessary a part of a great lady's outfit as a country house or a ball-room.
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