resses in Paris talked
of having these clever children imprisoned! Upon this the company sought
the precincts of the Temple, where no legal warrant could be served
without the express order of the king himself.

There for a time the performances still went on. Finally, as the other
children were not geniuses, but merely boys and girls in search of fun,
the little company broke up. Its success, however, had determined for
ever the career of Adrienne. With her beautiful face, her lithe and
exquisite figure, her golden voice, and her instinctive art, it was
plain enough that her future lay upon the stage; and so at fourteen
or fifteen she began where most actresses leave off--accomplished and
attractive, and having had a practical training in her profession.

Diderot, in that same century, observed that the truest actor is one who
does not feel his part at all, but produces his effects by intellectual
effort and intelligent observation. Behind the figure on the stage, torn
with passion or rollicking with mirth, there must always be the cool
and unemotional mind which directs and governs and controls. This same
theory was both held and practised by the late Benoit Constant Coquelin.
To some extent it was the theory of Garrick and Fechter and Edwin Booth;
though it was rejected by the two Keans, and by Edwin Forrest, who
entered so throughly into the character which he assumed, and who let
loose such tremendous bursts of passion that other actors dreaded to
support him on the stage in such parts as Spartacus and Metamora.

It is needless to say that a girl like Adrienne Lecouvreur flung herself
with all the intensity of her nature into every role she played. This
was the greatest secret of her success; for, with her, nature rose
superior to art. On the other hand, it fixed her dramatic limitations,
for it barred her out of comedy. Her melancholy, morbid disposition was
in the fullest sympathy with tragic heroines; but she failed when she
tried to represent the lighter moods and the merry moments of those who
welcome mirth. She could counterfeit despair, and unforced tears would
fill her eyes; but she could not laugh and romp and simulate a gaiety
that was never hers.

Adrienne would have been delighted to act at one of the theaters in
Paris; but they were closed to her through jealousy. She went into the
provinces, in the eastern part of France, and for ten years she was a
leading lady there in many companies and in many