Some little while before the production of “Naughty Anthony” Belasco had received from a stranger a letter in which he was urged to read a story, called “Madame Butterfly,” by John Luther Long, with a view to making it into a play. When anxiously casting about for some means of providing required reinforcement for his farce he chanced to recollect that suggestion, procured a copy of Long’s book containing his tragic tale, read it and was so much impressed by the possibilities which he perceived of basing on it a striking theatrical novelty that he entered into communication with Long and arranged with him for the use of his story. This proved, in several ways, a most fortunate occurrence: it led to a valued and lasting friendship and, ultimately, to the writing of two other memorable dramas,—“The Darling of the Gods” and “Adrea,”—as well as to the composition of a beautiful and extraordinarily popular opera, and it resulted, directly, in the making and production, by Belasco, of one of the most effective short plays of the last twenty-five years,—the success of which did much to sustain him under the disappointment of failure and the burden of heavy loss.

Belasco’s tragedy of “Madame Butterfly” is comprised in one act, of two scenes, which, connected by a pictorial intercalation, are presented without a break, and it implicates eight persons, besides its heroine, all of whom are merely incidental to depiction of her tragic fate. The substance of its story is contained in Goldsmith’s familiar lines about the sad consequences of lovely woman’s genuflexion to folly. A man commits the worst and meanest of all acts, the wronging of an innocent girl, and then deserts her. The case has often been stated—but it is not less pathetic because it is familiar. In this instance the girl is a Japanese, and in Japan, and thus the image of her joy, sorrow, desolation, and death are investable with opulent color and quaint accessories. Her name is Cho-Cho-San, and, by her lover, she is called “Madame Butterfly.” Her family is one of good position, but her father, a soldier of the emperor, having been defeated in battle, has killed himself, and her relatives, being poor, have induced Cho-Cho-San, in order that she may be able to provide maintenance for them, to enter into the relation of housekeeping prostitute with an officer of the United States Navy, Lieutenant B. F. Pinkerton by name, who is stationed for a few months at Higashi, Japan, and who feels himself to be in need of female companionship and that “comfort other than pecuniary” specified by Patrick Henry. According to the enlightened and advanced customs of Japan (which various English-speaking exponents of progress and free-everything, including free-“love,” are laboring to establish in our benighted country) this relationship is not degrading and despicable but respectable and, in circumstances which are of frequent occurrence, to be desired. As Butterfly expresses it, though the naval officer is described by the Japanese as “a barbarian and a beast,” “Aevery one say: ’yaes, take him—take him beas’—he’s got moaneys,’ so I say for jus’ liddle while, perhaps I can stan’.” Pinkerton, however, proves to be a delightful companion who wins the love of the Japanese girl and, with the crass cruelty common among viciously self-indulgent men, he assures that forlorn waif that her marriage to him is not merely a temporary arrangement of convenience, terminable, according to Japanese law, by the mere act of desertion, but is a binding, permanent one, according to American custom and law and that she is, in fact, Mrs. B. F. Pinkerton. Having led her to believe this, the amiable Pinkerton presently departs upon his ship, after making Butterfly a present of money, informing her that he has “had a very nice time” and assuring her that he will come back “when the robins nest again.” The girl, confidently awaiting the return of her lover, whom she declares and believes to be her lawful husband, after a little time becomes a mother by him. Two years pass—during which she refuses many suitors—and the money given her by Pinkerton has been all but exhausted: Butterfly is confronted by the alternative of beggary or starvation, yet she contemptuously rejects all proffers of rich alliances, serenely trusting in the faith of Pinkerton. Then, at last, he comes back, and she is apprised that though for two weeks after leaving her he was “dotty in love with her” he recovered from his sublime passion and that he has married another woman (who magnanimously offers to take away her child and rear it!)—whereupon Madame Butterfly kills herself.

The play is a situation, and, though some of its detail is trivial, it reveals elemental extremes and contrasts of much human experience; in its essential passages it possesses the cardinal merits of simplicity and directness, and in representation its effect is tragic and afflictingly pathetic. One feature of its performance, devised by Belasco, was, in respect to execution, unique,—namely, the intercalation whereby the two scenes of the tragedy are connected. When, at evening, the forlorn Butterfly,—after two years “jus’ waitin’—sometimes cry in’—sometimes watchin’—but always waitin’!”—sees the warship to which Pinkerton is attached entering the harbor of Higashi she believes that her “husband” will immediately repair to their abode and she becomes almost delirious with joy. She prepares for his

reception, attiring herself and their little child in fine array and decking the house with flowers and lighted lanterns. Then, with the child and a servant maid, she takes station at a window, to give him welcome—and there she waits and watches through the night, until the morning breaks. The lapse of time was, in the performance, skilfully and impressively denoted,—the shades of evening darkening into night; stars becoming visible, then brilliant, then fading from view; the lighted lanterns one by one flickering out; the gray light of dawn revealing the servant and the child prone upon the floor sunk in slumber, with the deserted mother standing over them, pale and wan, still gazing fixedly down the vacant road, while the rosy glow of sunrise grew into the full light of day and the sweet sound of the waking songs of birds floated in from a flowering grove of cherry trees. In the representation this scene, during which no word was spoken and no motion made, occupied fourteen minutes—and surely no tribute to Belasco’s resource and skill in stage management and stage mechanics could be more significant than the fact that during all that time never did the interest of his audiences waver nor their attention flag.

At the end, when Butterfly knows her lover faithless and her life ruined and desolate, she takes her father’s sword,—on which is graven his dying monition, “To die with honor, when we can no longer live with honor,”—and with it deals herself a mortal stroke. This desperate deed is done out of the audience’s sight and as, with ghastly face and a scarf bound round her throat to hide the wound, she staggers forward to clasp her child to her breast, Pinkerton enters the room and Butterfly, holding the child in her arms, sinks at his feet, turning on him a look of anguish as she murmurs “Too bad—those robin’—never nes’—again!”—and so dies.

“Madame Butterfly” was first presented at the Herald Square Theatre, March 5, 1900. The scenic habiliment in which Belasco attired that tragedy was one of great beauty and perfect taste and it had never been equalled by anything rightly comparable, excepting Augustin Daly’s exquisite setting of “Heart of Ruby” (a play on a Japanese theme adapted by Justin Huntly McCarthy from Mme. Judith Gautier’s “La Marchande de Sourires”), produced at Daly’s Theatre, January 15, 1895,—which was a complete failure: it cost Daly about $25,000 and it was withdrawn after seven performances. Belasco’s Japanese venture, happily, was fortunate from the first, creating a profound impression and achieving instant success. A notably effective scenic innovation was the precedent use of “picture drops,” delicately painted and very lovely pictures showing various aspects of Japan,—a rice field, a flower garden, a distant prospect of a snow-capped volcano in the light of the setting sun, and other views,—by way of creating a Japanese atmosphere before the scene of the drama was disclosed. Blanche Bates embodied the hapless Butterfly and animated the character with a winning show of woman’s fidelity, with a lovely artlessness of manner and speech, and with occasional flashes of that vivid emotional fire which was her supreme attribute. Her personation at first caused laughter and at last touched the source of tears,—but the predominant figure in the history of this play, both at the first and now, was and is that of Belasco: more, perhaps, in respect to “Madame Butterfly” than of any other of his productions it may properly be said that his personality seemed to have permeated every detail of this performance and its environment. This was the original cast: