She took a great fancy to the little
fellow, and used to make up his face for him and give him the flowers her
admirers sent her. To the boy she seemed the wonder of the earth, and she
was continually talking about the sunshine of his hair and the earnestness
of his blue eyes.

After that, young Woodruff was for two seasons with Edwin Thorne, doing
_Ned_ in "The Black Flag"--the same Thorne who had inspired the boy with
his great ambition. His longest step forward was made in 1887, when he
joined the stock company maintained by the late A.M. Palmer, at the
Madison Square Theater, starting with _Jack Ralston_ in "Jim the Penman,"
and creating _Lathrop Page_ in Augustus Thomas's first great success,
"Alabama."

Afterward Mr. Thomas wrote for him the role of _Arthur Hubbard_ in
"Surrender," a war play which unhappily did not chance to hit the popular
taste.

SELWYN LOST JOB AS USHER.

Grit, Self-Assurance, and Impudence
Served Author-Playwright Faithfully
in Long Up-Hill Struggle.

"Although I began as an usher, it was failure to do myself credit in the
first part that I ever acted that determined me to take up the stage as a
career."

This bit of personal history was whispered to me by Edgar Selwyn, the
never-to-be-forgotten _Tony_ of "Arizona," who is now the head of the
prosperous play-broking firm of Selwyn & Co., the author of "It's All Your
Fault," and two new farces to be brought out by George Cohan.

I sought him out in his offices, the other day, to obtain from his own
lips for THE SCRAP BOOK the story of his start, and it certainly proved to
be one full of incident and bristling with disappointments. I will give it
here in his own words, prefacing the narrative with the remark that Mr.
Selwyn is dark and good-looking, with the white teeth and swarthy skin
that instantly suggest him for such roles as _Tony_ and _Jose_, whose
"Pretty Sister," a few years since, was Maude Adams.

"I was born in California, but I always had an idea of getting to the city
where the money was--New York. During the World's Fair I had a job in a
store in Chicago, and afterward managed to get to New York, where I landed
with scarcely a cent in my clothes. Then I started in to tramp the streets
in search of a position. I went into store after store on a block, not
picking out the most likely places, but taking them all in. You see, my
need was desperate, and I wasn't taking any chances.

How a Job Was Captured.

"We