ut. There was more
ideality than passionate womanliness in her interpretations. For this
reason, perhaps, her Cordelia was finer than her Portia or her Beatrice.

She was engaged at one time to a young actor, called Montagu. If the
course of that love had run smooth, where should I have been? Kate would
have been the Terry of the age. But Mr. Montagu went to America, and,
after five years of life as a matinee idol, died there. Before that,
Arthur Lewis had come along. I was glad because he was rich, and during
his courtship I had some riding, of which in my girlhood I was
passionately fond.

Tom Taylor had an enormous admiration for Kate, and during her second
season as a "star" at Bristol he came down to see her play Juliet and
Beatrice and Portia. This second Bristol season came in the middle of my
time at the Haymarket, but I went back, too, and played Nerissa and
Hero. Before that I had played my first leading Shakespeare part, but
only at one matinee.

An actor named Walter Montgomery was giving a matinee of "Othello" at
the Princess's (the theater where I made my first appearance) in the
June of 1863, and he wanted a Desdemona. The agents sent for me. It was
Saturday, and I had to play it on Monday! But for my training, how could
I have done it? At this time I knew the words and had _studied_ the
words--a very different thing--of every woman's part in Shakespeare. I
don't know what kind of performance I gave on that memorable afternoon,
but I think it was not so bad. And Walter Montgomery's Othello? Why
can't I remember something about it? I only remember that the
unfortunate actor shot himself on his wedding-day!

Any one who has come with me so far in my life will realize that Kate
Terry was much better known than Ellen at the time of Ellen's first
retirement from the stage. From Bristol my sister had gone to London to
become Fechter's "leading lady," and from that time until she made her
last appearance in 1867 as Juliet at the Adelphi, her career was a blaze
of triumph.

Before I came back to take part in her farewell tour (she became engaged
to Mr. Arthur Lewis in 1866), I paid my first visit to Paris. I saw the
Empress Eugenie driving in the Bois, looking like an exquisite waxwork.
Oh, the beautiful _slope_ of women at this period! They sat like lovely
half-moons, lying back in their carriages. It was an age of elegance--in
France particularly--an age of luxury. They had just laid down asphalt
for the