Note I — ON READING SHAKESPEARE.

So called because they stood on the ground. The pit was then a real pit, and its floor was the bare earth. There were no benches. It was so in the French theatre until a much later period. Hence the French name parterre for the pit—par terre, upon the ground. The name parquet, which is given to that part of a theatre in America, is not French, and is no word at all, but a miserable affected nonentity of sound.