it may be stated categorically that no
critic learns immediately the value of opening his ears, so steeped is
he in the false tradition of his craft), by burying his nose in the
scores of the masters, and by reading all that the composers themselves
may have said about the performances of their works. But he can learn
more in a five-minute conversation with a great orchestral conductor, a
great singer, or a great instrumentalist than he can in all the other
ways combined.

Arturo Toscanini, Mary Garden, Ysaye, Marcella Sembrich, Yvette
Guilbert, Pablo Casals, Fritz Kreisler, Waslav Nijinsky, Marguerite
d'Alvarez, or Leo Ornstein can give any reviewer, young or old,
invaluable lessons. Such as these are their own severest critics and
they teach the writer-critic to be severe--and just. One piece of
advice, however, I would give to prospective critics. Become acquainted
with artist-interpreters by all means, but other things being equal, it
is perhaps better to meet good artists than bad ones!

III

Chaliapine, Nijinsky, Mazarin, and Fremstad[A] have not appeared on the
New York stage since I painted their portraits; nor have I seen them
elsewhere. Consequently any revision I might make in these pictures
would be revision of what I felt then in terms of what I feel now.
Nothing could be more ridiculous. So I let them stand as they are.

With Yvette Guilbert the case is somewhat different. She has been before
the American public almost consistently since the original publication
of this book. Her work at her own recitals is still the fine thing it
was and probably will remain so for a great many years to come. Madame
Guilbert, however, has seen fit to appear in a play at the Neighbourhood
Playhouse in New York, a fourteenth century French miracle play called
_Guibour_.

It is often said of an actress that she is too great to fail even when a
part does not suit her. But this is an utterly fallacious theory. Only
_great_ actresses _can_ fail. A really bad actress always fails and
consequently cannot be considered at all. A mediocre or conventional
actress is neither very good nor very bad in any role, but a great
actress, when she fails, fails magnificently, because she plays with
such precision and authority that she is worse than a lesser person
possibly could be.

Certainly Yvette Guilbert failed magnificently in _Guibour_. I have been
told that her infrequent performances in comedy in Paris have been
equally un