whispering in
the entrance. He was nervous and excitable, the annoyance (of which I
was unconscious) threw him out of his stride, so to speak. He glanced
off warningly and snapped his fingers. No use; on went the giggling and
whispering. At last, in the very middle of a speech, wrath overcame him.
He stopped dead. That sudden stop was my cue. Instantly I spoke. Good
heaven! he whirled upon me like a demon. I understood that a mistake had
been made, but it was not mine. I knew my cue when I got it. The humble
Rosalia was forgotten. With hot resentment my head went up and back with
a fling, and I glared savagely back at him. A moment we stood in silent
rage. Then his face softened, he laid the fingers of his left hand on
his lips, extending his right with that unspeakably deprecating
upturning of the palm known only to the foreign-born. An informing
glance of the eye toward the right, followed by a faint "_Pardon_!" was
enough. I dropped back to meek Rosalia, the scene was resumed, the cloud
had passed. But one man who had been looking on said: "By Jove! you
know, you two looked like a pair of blue-eyed devils, just ready to rend
each other. Talk about black-eyed rage; it's the lightning of the blue
eyes that sears every time."

I had been quite wild to see Signor Salvini on his first visit to
America, and at last I caught up with him in Chicago, and was so happy
as to find my opportunity in an extra matinee. The play was "Othello,"
and during the first act he looked not only a veritable Moor, but, what
was far greater, he seemed to be Shakespeare's own "Moor of Venice." The
splendid presence, the bluff, soldierly manner, the open, honest look,
as the "round unvarnished tale" was delivered, made one understand,
partly at least, how "that maiden never bold, a spirit so still and
quiet," had come at last to see "_Othello's_ visage _in his mind_, and
to his honour and his valiant parts to consecrate her fortune and her
soul!" Through all the noble scene, through all the soldierly dignity
and candid speech, there was that tang of roughness that so naturally
clung to the man whose life from his seventh year had been passed in
the "tented field," and who himself declared, "Rude am I in speech, and
little bless'd with the set phrase of peace."

In short, Salvini was a delight to eye and ear, and satisfied both
imagination and judgment in that first act. Like many people who are
much alone, I have the habit of speaking sometimes