Great monarchs still live after their fall. The Napoleon of the stage would have died at Waterloo instead of crawling out of life at St Helena. One need not multiply instances after such a prodigious example. Managers naturally respect--some will say "pander to"--the public taste; wherefore our real life plays rarely see the footlights, and when they do sometimes are cruelly forced into an artificial ending.
From time to time one even sees quaint announcements that, owing to the wishes of the public, the conclusion of a particular play has been twisted from the author's original idea into some termination that gratifies the audience's desire to leave the theatre in a mood to enjoy a supper afterwards. The question of art involved in the matter hardly needs discussion. No one will deny that, in comedy at least, the greatest suggestion of truth is the greatest art, even whilst admitting that the inevitable circumstances of the production of a play demand certain modifications and adjustment of truth. The dramatist can never hold the mirror up to Nature; he can only reflect her in a distorting glass.
A few years ago in a play that made a sensation came the worst example of the forced conventional "happy-ever-after" ending on record. The case was that of _An Englishman's Home_, where there was foisted upon the author, who was abroad, a quite imbecile happy ending which caused much discussion: it is not unlikely that this crime against drama and the dramatist prevented the piece from enjoying the immense success confidently prophesied for it.
Nowadays authors are in a greater difficulty, because people--particularly the so-called "smart" folk--are eager to get away early for supper, whilst many are compelled to steal off to catch trains to Brighton and other suburbs, and leave the theatre before the ending of a play. The result threatens to be curious. The dramatists will be induced to make their big effort in the penultimate act, leaving nothing for the last but some tranquil rounding off which you may miss without serious loss. Instead of the notice, often, alas! untrue: "The audience is requested to be seated punctually at eight o'clock, since the interest in the play begins at the rise of the curtain," we shall have: "Members of the audience anxious for supper or to catch suburban trains are requested to leave before the curtain rises on the last act, which is only a kind of needless epilogue."