ata_ and
_Manon_. Then he gave me the partition of _Louise_ and told me to go
home and study it. I had the role in my head in fifteen days. This was
in March, and M. Carre engaged me to sing at his theatre beginning in
October.... One spring day, however, when I was feeling particularly
depressed over the death of a dog that had been run over by an omnibus,
M. Carre came to me in great excitement; Mme. Rioton, the singer cast
for the part, was ill, and he asked me if I thought I could sing Louise.
I said 'Certainly,' in the same tone with which I would have accepted an
invitation to dinner. It was only bluff; I had never rehearsed the part
with orchestra, but it was my chance, and I was determined to take
advantage of it. Besides, I had studied the music so carefully that I
could have sung it note for note if the orchestra had played _The
Star-Spangled Banner_ simultaneously.

"Evening came and found me in the theatre. Mme. Rioton had recovered
sufficiently to sing; she appeared during the first two acts, and then
succumbed immediately before the air, _Depuis le Jour_, which opens the
third act. I was in my dressing-room when M. Carre sent for me. He told
me that an announcement had been made before the curtain that I would
be substituted for Mme. Rioton. I learned afterwards that Andre
Messager, who was directing the orchestra, had strongly advised against
taking this step; he thought the experiment was too dangerous, and urged
that the people in the house should be given their money back. The
audience, you may be sure, was none too pleased at the prospect of
having to listen to a Mlle. Garden of whom they had never heard. Will
you believe me when I tell you that I was never less nervous?... I must
have succeeded, for I sang Louise over two hundred times at the
Opera-Comique after that. The year was 1900, and I had made my debut on
Friday, April 13!"

I have no contemporary criticisms of this event at hand, but one of my
most valued souvenirs is a photograph of the charming interpreter as she
appeared in the role of Louise at the beginning of her career. However,
in one of Gauthier-Villars's compilations of his musical criticisms,
which he signed "L'Ouvreuse" ("La Ronde des Blanches"), I discovered the
following, dated February 21, 1901, a detail of a review of Gabriel
Pierne's opera, _La Fille de Tabarin_: "Mlle. Garden a une aimable
figure, une voix aimable, et un petit reste d'accent exotique, aimable
aussi."

O