st enthusiastic. I had
reached the pillars, from which hung curtains of intricate Japanese
workmanship, leading to the hall. Victoria, the Jubilee dog, was barking
a friendly "Good-bye," and the lusty throats of Miss Grimston's
two-and-twenty canaries forced their sweet notes from a far-away room
into the passage.

"I will give you some idea of what an American theatre is like," said
Mrs. Kendal. "You reach your destination by rail at some small place for
a one-night stay. If it is raining and the ground is wet, men in long
jack-boots catch hold of you and gallantly take you across the puddles.
You do not see a soul about--and you are in fear and trembling as to
where your night's audience is coming from. You get to your hotel, and
then your next thought is--where is the theatre? You expect to find a
little, uncomfortable, band-box of a place, and you set out to see it
with a heavy heart. It is a palace--a marble palace--a positive poem!
And your heart leaps happily--only to drop dull again, for you suddenly
remember that you have seen--nobody, not even the oldest inhabitant. You
turn to the manager.

"'Yes, yes--but, what about an audience, how are you going to fill it?'
you ask.

"'Wall,' he replies, 'I don't trouble myself much about that. I reckon
that every seat in this theatre is sold for to-night, that's all!'"

HARRY HOW.

[Illustration: MR. KENDAL. _From a Photo. by Maurice Stephens,
Harrogat._]

"_Author! Author_!"

BY E. W. HORNUNG.

This story has to do with two men and a play, instead of a woman, and it
is none of mine. I had it from an old gentleman I love: only he ought to
have written it himself. This, however, he will never do; having known
intimately in his young days one of the two men concerned. But I have
his leave to repeat the story more or less as he told it--if I can. And
I am going to him for my rebuke--when I dare.

* * * * *

"You want to hear the story of poor old Pharazyn and his play? I'm now
going to tell it you.

"Ah, well! My recollection of the matter dates from one summer's night
at my old rooms in the Adelphi, when he spoilt my night's work by coming
in flushed with an idea of his own. I remember banging the drawer into
which I threw my papers to lock them away for the night; but in a few
minutes I had forgotten my unfinished article, and was glad that
Pharazyn had come. We were young writers, both of us; and, let me tell
you