The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1897-01-03

about twice as much as 1 earn a year."
said Sothern, twirling a perfumed epistle
in his slender fingers.
Weren't mine funny when / played
Trilby?" chimed in Mrs. Sothern, viva
cious with rememberances.
THE one which broke my heart was
from a man who said / needed rest,
that l was all bones and nothing like the
beautiful heroine. That, after banting
and twenty miles on wheel for twenty
days and raw beef and no chocolates or
champagne! Women wrote me lengthy
dissertations upon the way Trilby should
look, act and sing, and Of course love
letters from impressionable chaps and
poets--they would fill book"
Il wonder if actors are not vainer than
any other mortals on earth?' thought
fully queried Sothern. II know we are
the most sensitive; that is a part of the
art. Temperament and sensitiveness to
rebuke is nothing in the world but
wounded pride"
why, ID, how on earth can an actor
be vain long? For every compliment
there are one dozen sneers and for every
encore there are three yawns, and the
more celebrated, more successful one is
the greater the resistance to his popu-
larity. / do not think they are vain at
al" stanchly asserted Mrs. Sothern.
In the next breath Mr.. S0thern en-
dorsed his pretty wife's sentiment by
posing as an example in his animated
defense Of Shakespeare's avowal. "The
plays the thing" | protested as steadily
as one may in the face of Sothern's mag
netic convictions and ventured to quote
his own experience as yindication that
acting and not literature was more likely
TO "catch the conscience Of the king"
But he shook his handsome head musing
~ and said: New plays always; Rothing
lasts but the Joey's red-hot poker"
He has not the first vestise of self
appreciation, mourned Mrs. Sothern,
comfortingly.
III ever l had regarded the situation
otherwise because of my fathers sue
cesses in rambling comedies and Jeffer-
sons galvanizing Rip into perpetual
youth year after year | was disillusioned
with it after my own luck coming in
swift SUGGESTIONS with good plays and
falling into a shadow with The Victoria
Cross there was a-well let's not talk
about it. Potter, who is the most learned
fellow in America and who always has a
book reason for everything, knows why
4 >
/ don't.
"Such a man as Paul Potter isl He
floors you with references to a memorized
library he carries about in his white,
capacious head and he never credits him
self or anybody else with an original
idea. On, he is prince Of boOkies, is
the sagacious Paul; am devoted to him
and believe in him.
ttGpaa king of TpnuAaYiuc fbie v11orraf =, n
when / rushed out to return Mr.. Jeffer-
sons call in time to prove that / did arise
before bedtime, / found Henry Waiter
son and Joe in close confidence RECALLING
themselves with reflections on the laxity
or the present generation IN many things
aside from payments and politics Some
thing brought to Watterson's mind line
in Rip Van Wrinkle, but he could not re-
call the words. He squinted his game
eye at Joe anG Joe covered his own game
ear and said, 'eh? to the three-cornered
Wattersonian glance. Then he tried to
remember the line, did Jefferson, stumb-
led hopelessly and then said:
" oh, l don't know what it is
" What do you mean by don't know
itT Haven't You been playing it eighty
yearsY shouted Watterson.
" Oh, well, I play the piece, / don't
know itr said Jefferson in his soft, musi-
cal voice, with its odd little snarl at the
periods"
Mr.. Sothern has an unfinished dramati-
cation Of Henry Esmond," Thackeray's
brood in hundred chapters, and he re-
CARDS it a great play for next year; also he
has something amazing from the pen Of
one Mason, who used to act, and who was
led by Yorke Stevens to playwriting much
as Sardon was by Scribe. Maurice Buck
ley" is the play named-but that means
nothing and everything.
AMY LESLIE.