FOOTNOTES
2 For the lives of actresses of earlier days the reader is referred to the bibliography at the end of the volume. The outstanding names are: Elizabeth Barry, 1658–1713; Anne Bracegirdle, 1663–1748; Anne Oldfield, 1683–1730; Catherine Clive, 1711–1785; Hannah Pritchard, 1711–1768; Susannah Maria Cibber, 1714–1766; Margaret Woffington, 1720–1760; Mary Porter—d. 1765; George Anne Bellamy, 1731–1788; Frances Abington, 1737–1815; Sarah Siddons, 1755–1831; Mary Robinson (“Perdita”) 1758–1800; Dorothy Jordan, 1762–1816; Frances Anne Kemble, 1809–1893; Charlotte Cushman, 1816–1876; Helena Faucit, 1817–1898; Rachel Felix, 1821–1858; Adelaide Ristori, 1822–1906; Francesca Janauscheck, 1830–1904; Adelaide Neilson, 1846 (?)-1880.
Some of the names in this list are, of course, among the greatest in theatrical history. In Anne Bracegirdle and Elizabeth Barry the Restoration rejoiced in two actresses of the first order. “Bracey” was the Ada Rehan of her day, a blithe creature of comedy who seems to have possessed the temperament and the charms of the typical born actress. Cibber called her “the Cara, the Darling of the Theatre.” She excelled in the comedies of Congreve, but she was versatile, and played also in tragedy. Elizabeth Barry was England’s first great tragic actress. She was of the august, severe, tragedienne type that was later exemplified in Siddons and Ristori, and that has nowadays, with the decline of the poetic drama, virtually disappeared. With these women, and with a number of others,—some of whom, like Mrs. Betterton and Mrs. Verbruggen, were skilled actresses,—the standard was surprisingly early set high.
Anne Oldfield charmed the England of Addison and Steele with a versatility and brilliance of acting that has never been surpassed. She acted with great majesty and fire in the tragedies of the day,—such as Cato and The Distressed Mother,—while in comedy she “played with the enthusiasm of a child.” There is much in the sunny amiability, the volatile, zestful personality and the wide-ranged equipment of “Nance” Oldfield to remind one of that modern actress,—Ellen Terry,—who often herself impersonated Mistress Oldfield.
One thinks again of Terry in reading of Margaret Woffington. “The Woffington” was a beauty, a hard worker, an adept in comedy, and only less successful in tragedy. She played captivatingly the rakish Sir Harry Wildair in Farquhar’s The Constant Couple; she was notably good in parts as diverse as Sylvia in The Recruiting Officer and Cordelia in Lear; but the parallel to Ellen Terry appears when we read of her lovely Portia and of her Rosalind (a part that Terry was born to play, but somehow never tried). “Peg” Woffington was one of that long line of geniuses with whom Ireland has continued to enrich the English theatre, from her day and Sheridan’s down to that of Ada Rehan, Bernard Shaw and Synge.
Frances Abington, a person of temper and caprice, but a true daughter of comedy nevertheless; Dora Jordan, who was really two Dora Jordans,—“one the whimsical, hoydenish performer, all laughter, or the delineator of graceful sentiment,—the other, only seen off the stage, a shrewd little woman, of kind heart and exquisite sensibility”; Mary Robinson, the “Perdita” of him who was to be George IV of England, and a graceful, appealing actress of the tenderly comic and of such characters as Viola and Rosalind—the Julia Marlowe of the eighteenth century; such are hints of a few of those women who have continued the line of gifted actresses of comedy and sentiment down from the days of Bracegirdle and Oldfield.
For commanding figures in tragedy, for the Duses and Bernhardts of earlier days, we must look, as a rule, outside of England and America. There is, to be sure, always Sarah Siddons, a majestic figure, a veritable Queen of Tragedy, who made her characters—such as Lady Macbeth and Queen Katherine—awe-inspiring even to those who acted with her. Her niece, Frances Ann Kemble, was prevented from being a truly great actress only by a dislike for the stage. As it was, with her Juliet, her Belvidera in Venice Preserved, and her Julia in The Hunchback she takes her place in that succession of tragic actresses which, with the change in theatrical fashions, has now ceased, and which has had its best examplars on the Continent rather than in England.
In Charlotte Cushman, America produced a tragic actress of commanding dignity and power. She was “a noble interpreter of the noble minds of the past,” a stately and vigorous woman, unique as Meg Merrilies, and a powerful and poetic interpreter of Shakespeare’s tragic women.
The daughter of a Jew, Rachel Felix was a Parisian by birth, and thus far she was an earlier Bernhardt. In the thrilling intensity of her acting and in the capricious imperiousness of her own nature, she again suggests Madame Sarah. She introduced a measure of naturalness of speech and spontaneity of action into the French theatre, and here her influence was like that of Duse.
The rise of Adelaide Ristori spelled the decline of the great Rachel. In her earnestness, in her choice of plays, in the quiet dignity of her life and nature, Ristori is recalled by that later great Italian, Duse. And just as Duse invaded Paris and rivaled the reigning queen of the stage there, so (only more successfully) did Ristori when she replaced Rachel in French esteem. Ristori’s parts, however, suggest rather Bernhardt, though in general all four actresses—Rachel, Ristori, Bernhardt and Duse—have worked in the same metier. Ristori’s great parts were Medea, Francesca, Myrrha, Lady Macbeth, Phédre, Marie Stuart and Queen Elizabeth.
Janauscheck, “the last of the actresses of the ‘grand style,’” born in Prague and for years a successful tragedienne in Germany, anticipated Modjeska by her adoption of America and the English tongue. She too was an heroic woman, who impressed her generation by the intensity and sincerity of her acting, her wonderful voice, and the dignity she lent her profession. Her best parts were in Bleak House, Brünnhilde, Medea and Marie Stuart.
Adelaide Neilson, a womanly and gracious personality, an ideal Juliet, and a Shakspearean actress who as Viola, Imogen and Rosalind foreshadowed and combined many of the merits of Modjeska, Rehan and Marlowe, died in the ripeness of her youth and ability.
3 The Wallet of Time.
4 “All these things that I have known only in the telling—all these journeys, these changing skies, these adoring hearts, these flowers, these jewels, these embroideries, these millions, these lions, these one hundred and twelve rôles, these eighty trunks, this glory, these caprices, these cheering crowds hauling her carriage, this crocodile drinking champagne—all these things, I say, astonish, dazzle, delight, and move me less than something else which I have often seen: this—
“A brougham stops at a door; a woman, enveloped in furs, jumps out, threads her way with a smile through the crowd attracted by the jingling of the bell on the harness, and mounts a winding stair; plunges into a room crowded with flowers and heated like a hothouse, throws her little beribboned handbag with its apparently inexhaustible contents into one corner, and her bewinged hat into another, takes off her furs and instantaneously dwindles into a mere scabbard of white silk; rushes on to a dimly lighted stage and immediately puts life into a whole crowd of listless, yawning, loitering folk; dashes forward and back, inspiring every one with her own feverish energy; goes into the prompter’s box, arranges her scenes, points out the proper gesture and intonation, rises up in wrath and insists on everything being done over again; shouts with fury; sits down, smiles, drinks tea and begins to rehearse her own part; draws tears from case-hardened actors who thrust their enraptured heads out of the wings to watch her; returns to her room, where the decorators are waiting, demolishes their plans and reconstructs them; collapses, wipes her brow with a lace handkerchief and thinks of fainting; suddenly rushes up to the fifth floor, invades the premises of the astonished costumier, rummages in the wardrobes, makes up a costume, pleats and adjusts it; returns to her room and teaches the figurantes how to dress their hair; has a piece read to her while she makes bouquets; listens to hundreds of letters, weeps over some tale of misfortune, and opens the inexhaustible little chinking handbag; confers with an English perruquier; returns to the stage to superintend the lighting of a scene, objurgates the lamps and reduces the electrician to a state of temporary insanity; sees a super who has blundered the day before, remembers it, and overwhelms him with her indignation; returns to her room for dinner; sits down to table, splendidly pale with fatigue; ruminates her plans; eats with peals of Bohemian laughter; has no time to finish; dresses for the evening performance while the manager reports from the other side of a curtain; acts with all her heart and soul; discusses business between the acts; remains at the theatre after the performance, and makes arrangements until three o’clock in the morning; does not make up her mind to go until she sees her staff respectfully endeavoring to keep awake; gets into her carriage; huddles herself into her furs and anticipates the delights of lying down and resting at last; bursts into laughing on remembering that some one is waiting to read her a five-act play; returns home, listens to the piece, becomes excited, weeps, accepts it, finds she cannot sleep, and takes advantage of the opportunity to study a part! This is the Sarah I have always known. I never made the acquaintance of the Sarah with the coffin and the alligators. The only Sarah I know is the one who works. She is the greater.”—Edmond Rostand, in Sarah Bernhardt, by Jules Huret.
5 The correct date and place, according to the official record of the Conservatoire. The year has sometimes been given 1845. Some accounts have given Holland, others Havre, as the birthplace. Sarah herself says Paris.
6 At Neuilly her aunt Rosine came one day to see her. “I insisted that I wanted to go away at once. In a gentle, tender, caressing voice, but without any real affection, she said all kinds of pretty things. She then went away. I could see nothing but the dark, black hole which remained there immutable behind me, and in a fit of despair I rushed out to my aunt who was just getting into her carriage. After that I knew nothing more. I had managed to escape from my poor nurse and had fallen down on the pavement. I had broken my arm in two places and injured my knee cap. I was two years recovering.” Memoirs.
7 Memoirs.
8 “One day, when we heard that all the schools in France, except ours, had been given bonbons on the occasion of the baptism of the Prince Imperial, I proposed to several other girls that we should run away, and I undertook to manage it. Being on good terms with the sister in charge of the gate, I went into her lodge and pretended to have a hole in my dress under the armpit. To let her examine the hole I raised my arms toward the cord communicating with the gate, and whilst she was looking at my dress I pulled the cord, my accomplices rushed out, and I followed them. Our entire stock of provisions, ammunition, and sinews of war consisted of a few clothes, three pieces of soap in a bag, and the sum of seven francs fifty centimes in money. This was to take us to the other end of the world! A search had to be made for us, and as the good sisters could hardly undertake it, the police were set on our track. There was not much difficulty in finding us, as you may imagine. I was sent home in disgrace. On another occasion, I had climbed on to the wall separating the convent from the cemetery. A grand funeral was in progress and the Bishop of Versailles was delivering an address. I immediately began to gesticulate, shout and sing at the top of my voice so as to interrupt the ceremony. You can imagine the scene—a child of twelve sitting astride a wall, and a bishop interrupted in the midst of a funeral oration! The scandal was great.”—Huret.
9 “Consequently I entered the Conservatoire. The next question was, in which class was I to study? Beauvallet said: ‘She will be a tragedienne.’ Regnier maintained: ‘She will be a comédienne,’ and Provost put them in agreement by declaring: ‘She will be both.’ I joined Provost’s class.”—Huret.
10 One for tragedy in 1861, and one for comedy in 1862. She never won a first prize.
11 M. Regnier and M. Doucet among them. Both had been her teachers, as had M. Provost and M. Samson, the latter of whom had taught Rachel.
12 She says she had chosen this device at the age of nine, “after a formidable jump over a ditch which no one could jump, and which my young cousin had dared me to attempt. I had hurt my face, broken my wrist and was in pain all over. While I was being carried home I exclaimed furiously: ‘Yes, I would do it again, quand-même, if any one dared me again. And I will always do what I want to all my life.’ In the evening of that day, my aunt, who was grieved to see me in such pain, asked me what would give me any pleasure. My poor little body was all bandaged, but I jumped with joy at this, and quite consoled I whispered in a coaxing way: ‘I should like to have some writing paper with a motto of my own.’ My mother asked me rather slyly what my motto was. I did not answer for a minute, and then, as they were all waiting quietly, I uttered such a furious ‘Quand-même!’ that my Aunt Faure started back muttering: ‘What a terrible child!’”
13 The great critic Sarcey’s comments in L’Opinion Nationale were read to her by her mother: “Mlle. Bernhardt, who made her début yesterday in the rôle of Iphigénie, is a tall, pretty girl with a slender figure and a very pleasing expression. The upper part of her face is remarkably beautiful. She holds herself well, and her enunciation is perfectly clear. This is all that can be said for her at present.” “The man is an idiot,” said her mother, “you were charming.”—Memoirs.
14 Characteristically, she brought her engagement at the Gymnase to a sudden close by quietly going to Spain the day after the first performance of a play in which she disliked her part.
15 Thin she was, and thin she remained. She once said, in after years: “As for me, if I should cease to be thin, what would become of some of the Paris journalists? Scarcely a day but they have some mot about me personally. Really I am almost the raison d’être of some of these small wits!”
16 She played at the Odéon: Albine in Britannicus; Sylvia in Le Jeu de l’Amour et du Hasard; Zacharie in Athalie; the Baroness in Le Marquis de Villemer; Mariette in François le Champi; Hortense in Le Testament de César Girodôt; Anna Damby in Kean (Dumas’ Sullivan); in La Loterie du Mariage; Zanetto in Le Passant by Coppée; in L’Autre by George Sand; Armande in Les Femmes Savantes; Cordelia in King Lear; in Le Bâtard; L’Affranchi; Jean-Marie, by Andre Theuriet; Les Arrêts by de Boissières, Le Legs; Le Drame de la Rue de la Paix; Fais ce que dois, by Coppée; La Baronne by Edmond and Foussier; Mlle. Aïsse; and the Queen of Spain in Ruy Blas by Victor Hugo.
17 On the first night of Dumas’ play, the distinguished author was the victim of a remarkable demonstration by the audience. He sat in a box with “Oceana.” The novelist’s alliance with this woman was evidently unpopular, for a great shout was sent up and many in the audience were heard to call for the woman’s removal. In the midst of the uproar the play, already long delayed, was begun. The woman finally left the house. The Figaro next day said: “Mlle. Sarah Bernhardt appeared wearing an eccentric costume, which increased the tumult, but her rich voice—that astonishing voice of hers—appealed to the public, and she charmed them like a little Orpheus.”
18 Now about five. Although she was a mother Sarah had not yet married.
19 Mme. Bernhardt tells a rather pretty story of the great novelist: “One day when the rehearsal was over an hour earlier than usual, I was waiting, my forehead pressed against the window pane, for the arrival of Mme. Guérard, who was coming to fetch me. I was gazing idly at the footpath opposite, which is bounded by the Luxembourg railings. Victor Hugo had just crossed the road and was about to walk in. An old woman attracted his attention. She had just put a heavy bundle of linen down on the ground and was wiping her forehead, on which were great beads of perspiration. In spite of the cold, her toothless mouth was half open, as she was panting and her eyes had an expression of distressing anxiety, as she looked at the wide road she had to cross, with carriages and omnibuses passing each other. Victor Hugo approached her, and after a short conversation, he drew a piece of money from his pocket, handed it to her, then taking off his hat he confided it to her and, with a quick movement and a laughing face, lifted the bundle to his shoulder and crossed the road, followed by the bewildered woman. The next day I told the poet that I had witnessed his delicate, good deed. ‘Oh,’ said Paul Maurice, ‘every day that dawns is a day of kindness for him!’”
20 It was small enough, to be sure. Her demand was for only 15,000 francs ($3,000) a year.
21 It was on the occasion of the first night of this play that she says she reverted to a trick of her childhood. Once when she had been fed something disagreeable, Sarah deliberately drank off a bottle of ink in the hope that she would die and vex her mother. Now when Perrin refused her a month’s needed holiday and forced her to play Zaïre in midsummer: “I was determined to faint, determined to vomit blood, determined to die, in order to enrage Perrin. Although the rôle was easy, it required two or three shrieks which might have provoked the vomiting of blood that frequently troubled me at that time. I uttered my shrieks with real rage and suffering, hoping to break something. But my surprise was great when the curtain fell at the end of the piece, and I got up quickly to answer to the call and salute the public without languor, without fainting, ready to recommence the piece. I had commenced the performance in such a state of weakness that it was easy to predict that I should not finish the first act without fainting. And I marked this performance with a little white stone—for that day I learned that my vital force was at the service of my intellect.” This is a significant passage. It helps to explain the wonder of Bernhardt’s unexampled vitality in the face of hard work and a frail physique.
22 She remained at the Comédie this time eight years, 1872–1880. Her first appearances were: Gabrielle in Mlle. de Belle-Isle, Junie in Britannicus, 1872; Chérubin in Le Mariage de Figaro, Léonora in Dalila, Mrs. Douglas in L’Absent, Marthe in Chez l’Avocat, Andromaque, Aricie in Phèdre, 1873; Peril en la Demeure, Berthe de Savigny in Le Sphinx, La Belle Paule, Zaïre, Phèdre in Phèdre, 1874; Berthe in La Fille de Roland, Gabrielle, 1875; Mrs. Clarkson in L’Etrangère, Posthumia in Rome Vaincue, 1876; Doña Sol in Hernani, 1877; Desdemona in Aicard’s Othello (once only), Alcmène in Amphitrion, 1878; Monime in Mithridate, 1879; Clorinde in L’Aventurtière, 1880.
23 For many years her tomb in Père Lachaise has been awaiting her.
24 She published an account of these aerial experiences: Dans les nuages; Impressions d’une Chaise.
25 The Associates or Sociétaires of the Comédie Française are sharers in the profits, a custom that has come down from the days of Molière. A member of the company is at first a pensionnaire, and serves upon a salary only. After proving his worth he is made Sociétaire. He does not at once receive a full share of the profits, however, but must progress from an eighth, fourth and half share to the full rank of Sociétaire à parte entière. Bernhardt had been made Sociétaire in 1875. During the year 1879 the share received by the leading actors and actresses of the Comédie varied from 55,000 to 70,000 francs, besides their salaries. Sarah’s share was 62,000 francs.
26 Perrin and his fellow directors were not the only ones who felt the strain imposed by Sarah’s presence on earth. She herself tells of the dying words of Charles Varrey: “I am content to die because I shall hear no more of Sarah Bernhardt and the great Français.” The latter was de Lesseps, then much in the public eye.
27 In this statement, for once, M. Sarcey justified Sardou’s tribute, inspired, seven years later, by Sarcey’s criticism of La Tosca: “Sarcey, who knows nothing about painting, music, architecture or sculpture, and to whom Nature has harshly denied all sense of the artistic.”
28 She was to have $1,000 per night, half the receipts over $3,000, $200 a week for hotel bills, and a special car.
29 Huret.
30 She played on this tour: La Dame aux Camélias (sixty-five times); Frou-Frou (forty-one times); Adrienne Lecouvreur (seventeen); Hernani (fourteen); Le Sphinx (seven); Phèdre (six); La Princesse Georges (three); and L’Etrangère (three),—one hundred and fifty-six performances in all, with average receipts of $2,820. She acted in half a hundred cities of the East, Middle West and South, including New York, Boston, Montreal, Ottawa, Springfield, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Chicago, St. Louis, New Orleans, Cincinnati, Memphis, Louisville, Cleveland and Pittsburgh.
31 In Chicago another bishop attacked Bernhardt and her plays. Mr. Abbey, her manager, thereupon sent him this letter: “Whenever I visit your city I am accustomed to spend four hundred dollars in advertising. But as you have done the advertising for me, I send you $200 for your poor.”
32 Huret.
33 A dispatch from Moscow represents the feeling there: “Sarah Bernhardt is extremely hoarse and cannot appear this evening. General consternation prevails.” She finally did act in Berlin, in 1902.
34 Sarah Bernhardt’s son Maurice was born in 1865 and was, therefore, seventeen at the time of his mother’s marriage.
35 The Argentinos, in enthusiastic but ill-advised generosity, presented Sarah with an estate of thirteen thousand acres. As if Sarah could feel at home so far from Paris!
36 Mme. Bernhardt’s more important productions, since she became a manager in her own right, have been as follows: Fédora, 1882; Nana Sahib, 1883; Macbeth, Théodora, 1884; Marion Delorme, 1885; Hamlet (Ophelia), Le Maître des Forges, 1886; La Tosca, 1887; Francillon, 1888; Lena, 1889; Jeanne d’Arc, Cléopâtre, 1890; Pauline Blanchard, La Dame de Chalant, 1891; Les Rois, 1893; Izeïl, Gismonda, 1894; Magda, La Princesse Lointaine, 1895; Lorenzaccio, 1896; Spiritisme, La Samaritaine, Les Mauvais Bergers, 1897; La Ville Morte, Lysiane, Médée, 1898; Hamlet, 1899; L’Aiglon, 1900; Francesca da Rimini, 1902; Andromache, 1903; La Sorcière, 1904; Tisbe, Angelo, 1905; La Vierge d’Avila, 1906; Les Bouffons, 1907; La Belle au Bois Dormant, La Courtisane de Corinthe, 1908; Le Proces de Jeanne d’Arc, 1909; La Femme X, Judas, Le Coeur d’Homme (written by herself), La Beffa, 1910; La Reine Élisabeth, Une Nuit de Noel, 1912; Jeanne Doré, 1913.
To the plays she had acted during the first American tour, 1880–81, (see page 28, note) she added, on her subsequent visits: 1887, Fédora, Le Maître des Forges, Théodora; 1891, La Tosca, Cléopatra; 1891–92, Jeanne d’Arc, La Dame de Chalant, Pauline Blanchard Leah; 1896, Izeïl, Magda, Gismonda, La Femme de Claude; 1900–01, (with Coquelin) L’Aiglon, Hamlet, Cyrano de Bergerac; 1905–06, La Sorcière, Angelo, Sapho, Tisbé. (During the tour of 1905–06, while acting in Texas she was forced on two or three occasions to appear in a circus tent in lieu of a theatre. The “theatrical trust” had for some reason denied her the privilege of acting in its theatres.) In 1910–11 she appeared, for the first time in America, in La Femme X, La Samaritaine, Jean-Marie, Sœur Beatrice, and Judas.
37 It was really written, gossip said, by M. Paul Bonnetain. Sarah replied with an equally abusive book about Mlle. Colombier, which was entitled La Vie de Marie Pigeonnier, and which was probably written by M. Richepin.
38 It carries her story down to her return from the first American tour, in 1881. A second volume was vaguely promised.
39 But to Mr. Winter her Hamlet was a “dreadful desecration”! When she produced the play in Paris, the late M. Catulle Mendes and another journalist fought a duel, having disputed as to whether Hamlet was fat or not.
40 John Corbin in the New York Sun, Dec. 17, 1905. A quarter of a century earlier, Matthew Arnold had written of Bernhardt, then in the midst of her first visit to London: “One remark I will make, a remark suggested by the inevitable comparison of Mlle. Sarah Bernhardt with Rachel. One talks vaguely of genius, but I had never till now comprehended how much of Rachel’s superiority was purely in intellectual power, how eminently this power counts in the actor’s art as in all art, how just is the instinct which led the Greeks to mark with a high and severe stamp the Muses. Temperament and quick intelligence, passion, nervous mobility, grace, smile, voice, charm, poetry—Mlle. Sarah Bernhardt has them all; one watches her with pleasure, with admiration, and yet not without a secret disquietude. Something is wanting, or, at least, not present in sufficient force; something which alone can secure and fix her administration of all the charming gifts which she has, can alone keep them fresh, keep them sincere, save them from perils by caprice, perils by mannerism; that something is high intellectual power. It was here that Rachel was so great; she began, one says to oneself, as one recalls her image and dwells upon it—she began almost where Mlle. Sarah Bernhardt ends.”
41 “Her fiery, voluble utterance of jealous rage when at last she seemed to lose all control of herself (without ever losing it) ... was as splendid, whether viewed as expression of human nature or illustration of proficiency in acting, as any professional exploit of hers in the whole of her long career.... It was in her showing of the sweetly capricious quality of the character, however, that the actress was supremely fine.” The Wallet of Time, Vol. I.
42 When the American comédienne, Elsie Janis, omitted from her London program her imitation of Bernhardt, Sarah heard of it and cabled to Miss Janis: “I am very well. Continue to charm the public with imitations of me.”
43 The Polish diminutive of Helena.
44 “She went into the kitchen when she got home, in order to make the experiment herself. She built a great pile of all the saucepans and frying-pans, and then, climbing to the top, tried to stand there upon one toe. Naturally this venture ended in disaster; and Madame Opid vowed Helcia should go no more to the theatre, for it excited her too much. Nor did she again enter a theatre until she was fourteen.”—Collins, Modjeska.
45 The masculine form. The feminine ends in -ska. Madame Modrzejewska later simplified the name to Modjeska.
46 “The picture of this first professional trip stands vividly before my eyes. The weather was glorious!... We were young, full of spirit and hope, and the country enchanting. The joy was so great that I sang. We made plans for future work, we rode in the clouds, building Spanish castles.”—Memories and Impressions of Helena Modjeska.
47 Marylka; she lived but two years.
48 The capital of Galitzia.
49 One of the circle of friends in the aristocratic and literary world which Modjeska now began to acquire was the Countess Patocka. On the occasion of Modjeska’s first visit to her, “her judgment was just and most kind. She said she thought I was unsuited to certain parts, but she was much pleased with my romantic impersonations and also with some of the characters in high comedy. She had seen Rachel and Ristori, and told me I had neither their strong ringing voice nor their tragic statuesque poses. ‘You see,’ said she, ‘they were born with those gifts, and God created you differently. You have, instead of those grand qualities, sensitiveness, intuition, grace’; and then she added, laughingly, ‘You are as clever as a snake. You played the other evening the Countess in The White Camelia as if you were born among us. Where did you meet countesses?’ I answered that she was the only great lady I had ever laid eyes on. ‘You see,’ said she, ‘that was intuition.’”—Memories and Impressions.
50 Some of her characters at this time were Princess Eboli in Don Carlos, by Schiller; Louise Miller in Kabale und Liebe, by Schiller; Barbara in the tragedy of that name by Felinski; Ophelia in Hamlet; Doña Sol in Ernani, by Victor Hugo; the wife in Nos Intimes, by Sardou; and Adrienne Lecouvreur in the play of that name by Scribe and Legouvé.
51 “I do not recollect going to parties, save to those given twice a year by the manager, Count Skorupka; one dancing party during the Carnival and another at Easter time, and then I danced! Oh, how I danced! with all my soul in it, for I never did anything by halves. Still I preferred the few receptions at my brother’s house.”—Memories and Impressions.
52 Gustave Modrzejewski had died some time before.
53 Ten thousand dollars.
54 Over two thousand dollars.
55 On one occasion Modjeska acted as an impromptu reporter for her husband’s paper, proving the reliability of her stage-trained memory. Liebelt, the scientist, delivered a lecture on Spectrum Analysis, and as no stenographic reporter was to be had, Modjeska went to the hall, listened intently to the lecturer and although the subject was absolutely new to her, went home and wrote a complete résumé of the lecture, technical and Latin words included. Her report was printed, while that of a reporter was used merely as an introduction.
56 “Mrs. Helena.”
57 Her repertoire at Warsaw had been wide-ranged and long, embracing translations of Shakespeare, and of many French and German plays as well as the numerous Polish parts. She introduced the obvious but hitherto neglected method of playing Shakespeare in a Polish translation directly from the English, instead of through a French version.
58 In 1877 Edwin Booth had, rightly enough, declined to play with Modjeska. In 1889, however, it was another story. Lawrence Barrett, at that time Booth’s manager, proposed her appearance as a “co-star.” Modjeska gladly availed herself of the opportunity to act with Mr. Booth, and played with him in Hamlet, Macbeth, The Merchant of Venice, Much Ado about Nothing, and Richelieu. The tour took them throughout the East and the Middle West.
59 The entire party would leave their farm and go on short vacation trips. Of one of these, Modjeska says: “I listened and looked at everything, but I grew quite sad when I turned my eyes toward the ocean. The blue waters of the great Pacific reminded me of our first sea-voyage when we left our country. The recollections of the happy past, spent among beloved people,—Cracow, with its churches and monuments, the kind friends waiting for our return, the stage, and the dear public I left behind,—all came back to my mind, and I felt a great acute pang of homesickness. I stepped away from the rest, threw myself on the sand and sobbed and sobbed, mingling my moans with those of the ocean, until, exhausted, I had not one drop of tears left in my eyes. A sort of torpor took the place of despair, and the world became a vast emptiness, sad and without any charm.”
60 Of the Imperial Theatre in Warsaw.
61 He became an American citizen and dropped his title of nobility. Because of the difficulty in pronouncing Chlapowski, he was known in America by his second name, and was called Mr. Bozenta.
62 “Hill was a worthy man and a good actor ... but there will always be something ludicrous in the thought of Barton Hill sitting in judgment on Helena Modjeska. ‘He was very kind—Meester Hill,’ said the actress; ‘but he was ne-ervous and fussy, and he patronized me as though I were a leetle child. “Now,” he said, “I shall be very critical—ve-ery severe.” I could be patient no longer: “Be as critical and severe as you like,” I burst out, “only do, please, be quiet, and let us begin!” He was so surprised he could not speak, and I began at once a scene from Adrienne. I played it through and then turned to him. He had his handkerchief in his hand and was crying. He came and shook hands with me and tried to seem quite calm. “Well,” I asked, “may I have the evening that I want?” “I’ll give you a week, and more, if I can,” he answered.’”—William Winter, The Wallet of Time.
63 It was John McCullough who at this time suggested the modification of her name. Her professional name in Poland had always remained Modrzejewska. When confronted with this, McCullough said: “Who on earth could read that, I wonder? I fear you will be compelled to change your name, Madame.” She suggested Modgeska, which he smilingly said would remind people of Madagascar. The “g” was changed to “j.” “Now,” McCullough said, “it is quite easy to read, and sounds pretty, I think.”
64 Her first appearance in New York was in Adrienne Lecouvreur. The other plays of that season and the one following were Romeo and Juliet; Camille; Frou-Frou; Peg Woffington (in which she failed); and East Lynne (which she heartily disliked).
Adrienne Lecouvreur, Romeo and Juliet and Camille were for many years retained in her repertoire. Her appearances in other plays were as follows: Heartsease (adaptation of Camille), London, 1880; Marie Stuart, London, 1880; Juana, (a failure, by W. G. Wills), London, 1881; A Doll’s House, Warsaw, 1882; Odette, London, 1882; As You Like It and Twelfth Night, New York, 1882; Nadjezda (by Maurice Barrymore), 1884; Two Gentlemen of Verona, Cymbeline, and Prince Zillah, season of 1885–6; Les Chouans, Measure for Measure, Dona Diana, and Daniela, 1886; with Edwin Booth, Hamlet, Much Ado about Nothing, Macbeth, Merchant of Venice, and Richelieu, 1889; Countess Roudine (by Paul Kester and Minnie Maddern Fiske), and Henry VIII, 1892; The Tragic Mask, 1893; Magda, 1894; Mistress Betty Singleton (by Clyde Fitch), 1895; Antony and Cleopatra, 1898; The Ladies’ Battle, 1900; Marie Antoinette (by Clinton Stuart) and King John, 1900. In a letter furnishing some of the above dates, Modjeska’s husband, who died in Cracow, in March, 1914, wrote from Rzegocin, Posen, July 10, 1913:
“The Tragic Mask was written by Mr. E. Reynolds. It was an original play, somewhat deficient in construction; but the dialogue was very clever. Daniela was a translation from a German play by Phillippi. The translators were Hamilton Bell and Moritz von Sachs. As to Les Chouans: This was an adaptation of Balzac’s novel of the same title, made in French by the well-known actor and dramatist, Pierre Berton, and translated by Paul Potter.
“In addition to the abovesaid repertoire it must be mentioned that Madame Modjeska played A Doll’s House not only in Poland, but also in America, in Louisville, in the season of 1883–1884. This was, to my knowledge, the first production of Ibsen on an English-speaking stage. Though the part of Nora was considered in Poland, I think rightly, one of Modjeska’s best ones, A Doll’s House did not appeal then to the American public. According to local critics, and especially to Henry Watterson, the audiences were not yet ripe for Ibsen.
“Besides the plays you enumerated, Mme. Modjeska appeared yet in a few others on special occasions. Thus, in the spring of 1884, in Cincinnati at a dramatic festival, she played Desdemona to Tom Keene’s Othello. In 1905 in Los Angeles, she took part in a charitable performance and played Hermione in The Winter’s Tale, and in the summer of 1907 appeared equally for charity in a little French comedy entitled The Spark. To be complete, I must yet mention a short proverb by Hamilton Aide, produced in London in a reception for the Prince of Wales in 1883, the name of which has escaped my memory.
“But Mme. Modjeska did not play only in English in America. She gave two consecutive performances in Chicago in Polish for charitable purposes, supported by a company of amateur workingmen. One was a comic part in a popular peasant comedy, the other a tragic queen in a historical drama. Twice also she played in French: once in 1884 in London in a graceful proverb of Augier entitled The Post-scriptum; she was supported by the above-named Pierre Berton. The second time she acted in French in Los Angeles in 1907 for the ‘French Alliance’ in that beautiful one-act drama Le Pater. As I mentioned her several charity performances, I may be allowed to remark that Mme. Modjeska rarely omitted an occasion to appear for charitable objects. In January, 1909, about ten weeks before her end, already then very weak and ill, she took part in a great benefit performance for the victims of the Messina earthquake, in Los Angeles, giving the sleepwalking scene of Macbeth.
“I will add that outside of the twelve Shakespearean plays mentioned by you, and the two named above by me, Madame Modjeska acted in Poland in two more—Richard III and The Taming of the Shrew. Her repertoire on the Polish stage known to me consisted of more than one hundred and ten parts.”