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fourteen-year-old self--books! books! and yet books, we read. I borrowed
from my friends and she also read--she borrowed from her friends and I,
too, read, and she came to speak of them, and then of her own ideas, and
so I found that this woman, already on the way to age, who was so poor
and hard-working, and had nothing to look forward to but work, was yet
cheerfully contented, because she loved the work--yes, and honored it,
and held her head high, because she was an actress with a clean
reputation!

"Study your lines--speak them with exactitude, just as they are written!"
she used to say to me, with a sort of passion in her voice.

"Don't just gather the idea of a speech, and then use your own words,
that's an infamous habit. The author knew what he wanted you to say--for
God's sake honor the poor dead writer's wishes and speak his lines
exactly as he wrote them! If he says: 'My lord the carriage waits!' don't
you go on and say: 'My lord the carriage is waiting!'"

I almost believe she would have fallen in a dead faint had she been
prompted, and to have been late to a rehearsal would have been a shame
greater than she could have borne. To this woman's example, I owe the
strict business-like habits of attention to study and rehearsals that
have won so much praise for me from my managers.

Had Mr. Ellsler's intention of taking his company to another city for a
great part of the season been known in advance, my mother would never
have given consent to my membership; but the season was three months old
before we knew that we were to be transferred to Columbus, the State
capital, where we were to remain, while the Legislature sat in large
arm-chairs, passing bad bills, and killing good ones, for some three
months or more--at least that was the ordinary citizen's opinion of the
conduct of the State's wise men. It seemed to me that when a man paid his
taxes he felt he had purchased the right to grumble at his
representatives to his heart's content.

But that move to Columbus was a startling event in my life. It meant
leaving my mother and standing quite alone. She was filled with anxiety,
principally for my physical welfare, but I felt, every now and then, my
grief and fright pierced through and through with a delicious thrill of
importance. I was going to be just like a grown-up, and would decide for
myself what I should wear. I might even, if I chose to become so
reckless, wear my Sunday hat to a rehearsal; and wh