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STAGE FAVORITES NO MORE held that negro minstrel companies Comp anle will be only memory before many years ot of all the varied and manifold kinds of theatrical entertainment negro minstrelsy Is the one which la is absolutely native to these states and which could not have come into existence anywhere else in the civilized world here in america alone has tho the transplanted african been brought into intimate contact with the transplanted european other nations may havo have disputed our claim to the invention ot of the steamboat and the telegraph but negro minstrelsy is as indisputably due to american Invent inventiveness ivene ss as the telephone itsell its elf hero here in the united states it had its humble beginnings i here it expanded and nourished flourished for many years from here it was exported to great britain where it established itself for many seasons from here it mado made sporadic excursions s into france and into germany and here heie at last it has fallen into decline and a d degeneracy erene racy and a decay which seem to doom it to a speedy extinction its life was little longer than that vouchsafed to man threescore years and ten for it was born in the fifth decade of the nineteenth century and in the ho second decade of the twentieth it lingers superfluous on the stage with none to do it reverence time was when the lie negro minstrels held possession of three or four theaters in the single city of new york and when a dozen or more troupes wore were traveling from town to town and now they have long ago surrendered their last hall in the metropolis and only two or three companies wind their lonely way from theater to abea theater throughout the united states the few surviving practitioners ot of the art are reduced to the presentation of 0 brief interludes in the all devouring variety shows or to the impersonation of 0 sparse negro characters in occasional comedies the skidmore guards who paraded so BO gayly at harrigan and harts are disbanded now these many years johnny wild ot of joyous memory is no more and bereft ot of his follows in sable drollery Is seen only in a chance comedy like excuse me or the county chairman george christy and dan emmett and dan bryant have gone and left only fading memories of 0 their breezy songs their nimble dances and their flippant quips brander matthews in scribners Scrib nera magazine |
