Page:Europeafter815.djvu/192

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

may be distinguished from the smaller houses in which the serious drama is produced—as the "Alhambra," in Leicester Square; the "Empire Theatre of Varieties," also in Leicester Square; the "Palace Theatre of Varieties" on Cambridge Circus in Shaftesbury Avenue; the "London Pavilion" in Piccadilly; and the "Hippodrome" at the corner of Cranbourn Street and Charing Cross Road. Let us inspect their vaudeville offerings. Let us snoop into their wares. At these theatres, equipped with numerous and eminently available cafés, women, frail and fair, sit and walk about on the promenades and generously waive introductions when the young gentlemen evince a desire to speak to them. But there is no romance here. These promenades are even without illusion. Here, among the theatres, is where London tries to be Paris. Just as she tries to be New York in Regent Street. Here is where the most moral town in Christendom discovers