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peculiar to himself. In the first place, by repeated exercises, he
enters deeply into the emotions, and his speech acquires the accent
proper to the situation of the personage he has to represent. This
done, he goes to the theatre not only to give theatrical effect to his
studies, but also to yield himself to the spontaneous flashes of his
sensibility and all the emotions which it involuntarily produces in
him. What does he then do? In order that his inspirations may not be
lost, his memory, in the silence of repose, recalls the accent of
his voice, the expression of his features, his action--in a word, the
spontaneous workings of his mind, which he had suffered to have
free course, and, in effect, everything which in the moments of
his exaltation contributed to the effects he had produced. His
intelligence then passes all these means in review, connecting
them and fixing them in his memory to re-employ them at pleasure in
succeeding representations. These impressions are often so evanescent
that on retiring behind the scenes he must repeat to himself what
he had been playing rather than what he had to play. By this kind of
labor the intelligence accumulates and preserves all the creations of
sensibility. It is by this means that at the end of twenty years (it
requires at least this length of time) a person destined to display
fine talent may at length present to the public a series of characters
acted almost to perfection."

You will readily understand from this that to the actor the well-worn
maxim that art is long and life is short has a constant significance.
The older we grow the more acutely alive we are to the difficulties of
our craft. I cannot give you a better illustration of this fact than a
story which is told of Macready. A friend of mine, once a dear friend
of his, was with him when he played Hamlet for the last time. The
curtain had fallen, and the great actor was sadly thinking that the
part he loved so much would never be his again. And as he took off his
velvet mantle and laid it aside, he muttered almost unconsciously
the words of Horatio, "Good-night, sweet Prince;" then turning to his
friend, "Ah," said he, "I am just beginning to realize the sweetness,
the tenderness, the gentleness of this dear Hamlet!" Believe me, the
true artist never lingers fondly upon what he has done. He is ever
thinking of what remains undone: ever striving toward an ideal it may
never be his fortune to attain.

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