Waterbury evening Democrat., 1889-02-12
MISS BRETHDRTON
By ERs. HUMPHREY WARD,

Tt IS amusing to study the dlSSatlSfactlOn of the uncle and aunt with the turn things have taken since they left London. Mir.
 Worrall has been evidently accustomed to choose her plays for her, hell~d by MT. Rob- inson; to advise her as to her fellow-actors and her behavior in society, and ali, of course, with n shrewd eye to the family profit and as little regard as need be to any fantas- Neal conception of art
 "Now, however, Isabel has asserted herself in several unexpected ways. She has refused altogether to open Der autumn season with the play which had been nearly decided on before they left London-a fimsy spectacular performance, quite unworthy of her. As soon as possible she will make important changes in the troupe who are to be with her, and at the beginning of September she is com ing to stay three weeks with us in Paris, and, in all probability (though the world is to know nothing of it), Perrault of the Conservatoire, who is a great friend of ours, will give her a good deal of positive teaching This last ar engagement is particularly exasperating to Mir. Worrall. He regards it as sure to be known, a ridiculous confession of weakness on Isabels part, and so on. However, in spite of his wrath and the aunts sullen or fearful disapproval, she has stood firm, and matters are so arranged"
 Saturday night, August 25.
 This evening we persuaded her at last to give us some scenes of Juliet. How 1 wish you could have been here! It was one of those experiences which remain with one as a sort of perpetual witness to tho poetry which life holds ill it, and may yield up to one at any moment. It was in our little garden the moon was high above the houses oppo- site, and the narrow canal running past our tIn {ls,,,~ S,,{~ ing streak of silver The air was balmy and absolutely still; no more perfect setting to Shakespeare or to Juliet could have been imagined. Paul sat at little table ill front of the rest of us; he was to read Romeo and the Nurse in the scenes she had chosen, while i'll the background were the Worralls and Lucy Bretherton (the little crippled sister, MT. Wallace and myself. She did tho bal cony scene, the morning scene with Romeo the scene with the Nurse after Tybalt's death and the scene of the phiiter. Thero is an old sundial in the garden, which caught the moonbeams. She leaned her arms upon it, her eyes fixed upon the throbbing, moonlit sky, her white brocaded dress glistening here and there in the pale light-a vision of per feet beauty. And when she began her sigh ing appeal
 Q, Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou, Romeo?- 1t seemed to mo as if tho night-the passion ate Italian night-had found its voice-the only vo'cr which fitted it.
 Afterwards l tried as much as possible to shake off the impressions peculiar to the scene Itself to think of her under the ordi- nary conditions of the stage, to judge her purely as an actress. In the love scenes there seemed hardly anything to find fault with, I thought l could trace in many places the in- fiuence of her constant dramatic talks and ex- ercises with Paul. The flow of passion was continuous and electric, but marked by all the slmpleness, all the sweetness, all the young wlrsome extravaganza which belong to Juliet. The great scene with the Nurse had many fine things in it; she had evidently worked hard at it line by line and that speech of Juliets with its extraordinary dra- matic capabilities
 Shall speak ill of him that is my husband9 was given with admirable variety and sup pleness of intonation. Tho dreary sweetness of her
 Banshed! that one word banished! still lives with me, and her gestures as she paced restlessly along the little strip of moon lit path The speech before she takes the potion was the least satisfactory of all; the ghastliness and horror of it are beyond her resources as yet; she could not infuse them with that terrible beauty which Desforets would have given to every line. But where is the English actress that has ever vet suc- ceeded in it?
 ''Ws were all silent for e minute after her great cry
 Romeo. Romeo, Romeo. drink to thee!
 :" I can't do it, that speech; can't do itr
 1t wants moro work, said Paul; you'll get it. But the rest was admirable. You must have worked very hard!'
 "'So have she said, brightening at the warmth of his praise But Diderot is wrong wrong, wrong! When I could once reach the feeling of the Tybalt speech, when could once hate him for killing Tybalt in the same breath in which I loved him for being Romeo, all was easy; gesture and movement came to me; learned them, and the thing was done'
 1.-The reference, of course, meant that Paul had been reading to her his favorite Para doxe sur le Comedien,' and that she had been but not converted, by tho famous contention that the actor should be the mere cold and tranquil spectator the imitator of other mems feelings, while possessing none of bis own. He naturally wv.ld have argued, but would not have it, and made her rest. She was quite worn out by the effort, and I do not like this excessive fatigue of hers. NASSAA is not too exciting for her. This is supposed to be her holiday, and she is really going through more brain waste than she has ever done in her life beforel Paul is throwing his whole energies into one thing only, the training of Miss Bretherton, and he is a man of forty eight, with an immense experience, and she girl of twenty one, with everything to learn, and as easily excited as he is capa- ble of exciting her. I really must keep him in check.
 "Mr. Wallace, when we had sent her home across the canal-their apartment is on the other side, further up towards the railway not say enough to me of his amazement at the change in her.
 "'What have you done to herg he asked. I can hardly recognize the old Miss Brother ton at all. Is it really not yet four months since your brother and went to see her in the "White Ladys" Why, you have be- witched herI'
 "'We have done something, admit, I said; but the power you see developed in her now was reused in her when months ago she first came in contract with tho new world and the new ideal which you and Eustace represented to her.
 There, my dear Eustace, have given l1a2