ABSTRACT
Actors belong to the public: their persons are not their own property. They exhibit themselves on the stage: that is enough, without displaying themselves in the boxes of the theatre. The top-tragedian of the day has too large and splendid a train following him to have room for them in one of the dress-boxes. There are some actors by profession, whose faces we like to see in the boxes or any where else; but it is because they are no actors, but rather gentlemen and scholars, and in their proper places in the boxes, or wherever they are. The stage-boxes exist in contempt of the stage and common sense. The private boxes should be reserved as the receptacle for the officers of state and great diplomatic characters, who wish to avoid, rather than court popular notice.
