m's voice, my first thought
was, 'Now what have I done? He is surely displeased with me about
something.' Imagine my gratification, when Mr. Braham said, 'Miss
Cushman, I have come to thank you for the most veritable sensation I
have experienced for a long time. I give you my word, when I saw you
in that first scene I felt a cold chill run all over me. Where have
you learned to do anything like that?'"

During her visits to England, Miss Cushman personated Meg Merrilies
more often than any other character. In America she was also famous
for her performance of Nancy, in a melodrama founded upon "Oliver
Twist;" but this part she did not bring with her across the Atlantic.
She had first played Nancy during her "general utility" days at the
Park Theatre, when the energy and pathos of her acting powerfully
affected her audience, and the tradition of her success in the part
long "lingered in the memory of managers, and caused them, ever and
anon, as their business interests prompted, to bring great pressure to
bear upon her for a reproduction of it." Mr. George Vandenhoff
describes Nancy as Miss Cushman's "greatest part; fearfully natural,
dreadfully intense, horribly real."

In the winter of 1842 Miss Cushman undertook the management of the
Walnut Street Theatre, Philadelphia, which was then in rather a fallen
state. Under her energetic rule, however, the establishment recovered
its popularity. "She displayed at that day," writes Mr. George
Vandenhoff--who "starred at the Walnut Street Theatre for six nights
to small audiences"--"a rude, strong, uncultivated talent. It was not
till after she had seen and acted with Mr. Macready--which she did the
next season--that she really brought artistic study and finish to her
performances." Macready arrived in New York in the autumn of 1843. He
notes: "The Miss Cushman, who acted Lady Macbeth, interested me much.
She has to learn her art, but she showed mind and sympathy with me--a
novelty so refreshing to me on the stage." She discerned the
opportunity for study and improvement presented by Macready's visit,
and underwent the fatigue of acting on alternate nights in
Philadelphia and New York during the term of his engagement at the
Park Theatre. Her own success was very great. She wrote to her mother
of her great reception: of her being called out after the play; of the
"hats and handkerchiefs waved to me; flowers sent to me," etc. In
October, 1844, she sailed for England in the pac