Bless you, my children. I am going into the
nearest nunnery." As a matter of fact, Mr. Jones brought his action to
its natural close in a quiet, sufficiently adroit, last act; and I do
not see that criticism has any just complaint to make.
In recent French drama, _La Douloureuse_, already cited, affords an
excellent instance of a quiet last act. After the violent and
heartrending rupture between the lovers in the third act, we feel that,
though this paroxysm of pain is justified by the circumstances, it will
not last for ever, and Philippe and Helene will come together again.
This is also M. Donnay's view; and he devotes his whole last act, quite
simply, to a duologue of reconciliation. It seems to me a fault of
proportion, however, that he should shift his locality from Paris to the
Riviera, and should place the brief duologue in a romantic woodland
scene. An act of anticlimax should be treated, so to speak, as
unpretentiously as possible. To invent an elaborate apparatus for it is
to emphasize the anticlimax by throwing it into unnecessary relief.
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