Stage
in the presentation of drama, the platform of scaffolding upon which the play is performed. In the earliest form of Greek tragedy, the stage was a table upon which the one actor stood. As the drama developed and regular theaters were constructed, the stage was built at the foot of a hill in the side of which seats were cut for the spectators. The stage was the only part of the theater roofed over.
In the time of the English miracle play the stage was at first only a rude scaffolding erected in a church. As the church failed to accommodate the crowds the stage was erected outside. Gradually the pageant or stage on wheels came into use. For a private performance a platform was erected in one end of the castle hall. For the stage in Shakespeare's time, the reader is referred to articles entitled THEATER and GLOBE THEATER.
In modern theaters the stage includes not only that part visible to the spectators, but the spaces on each side behind the proscenium arch used for shifting the side scenes. The stage is divided laterally into five parts for the convenience of the actors and managers. These divisions are known by various names, as prompt side, prompt center, opposite prompt center, etc. It is divided in depth into entrances varying in number according to the number of side scenes or wings. These are called first prompt entrance, second prompt entrance, etc. Everything above the stage from the top of the proscenium arch is called the flies. Here are ropes, pulleys, beams, wires, etc., needed in various performances, and the fly galleries, from the lowest of which the drop scenes are worked.
Stalactites and Stalagmites. When the sun is just warm enough to melt the snow on the roof of a building, icicles form along the eaves, sometimes of great size. If the run of water be sufficient, similar needles of ice build up from the ground directly under the drip of those above. In the course of centuries water passing through limestone absorbs a great deal of lime. Wherever it trickles through the roof of a limestone cavern it deposits a part of this lime in formations like those of icicles just described. The same process in a way takes place in a teakettle in which hard water is boiled. The icicle-shaped formations of lime that hang from the roof of a cave are called stalactites; those rising from the floor are stalagmites. The stalactite is apt to be more regular and pointed in form than the masses which accumulate on the floor. They are sometimes white and nearly transparent, and again they are tinted with pale yellow and brown colors. The caves of Cuba, Virginia, Kentucky, and southern Indiana are noted for these formations. The enormous chambers of the Mammoth and Wyandotte caves contain fine specimens.