iece first in Toronto as he had meant to do. It
appeared that, upon second thoughts, he had reserved this purely
American drama for the opening night of his engagement in one of the
most distinctively American cities, after having had it in daily
rehearsal ever since the season began.

"I should think they had Pinney out there," said Maxwell, as he and his
wife looked over the interview, with their cheeks together.

"Not at all!" she retorted. "It isn't the least like Pinney," and he was
amazed to find that she really liked the stuff. She said that she was
glad, now, that she understood why Godolphin had not opened with the
play in Toronto, as he had promised, and she thoroughly agreed with him
that it ought first to be given on our own soil. She was dashed for a
moment when Maxwell made her reflect that they were probably the losers
of four or five hundred dollars by the delay; then she said she did not
care, that it was worth the money. She did not find the personal account
of Maxwell offensive, though she contended that it did not do him full
justice, and she cut out the interview and pasted it in a book, where
she was going to keep all the notices of his play and every printed fact
concerning it. He told her she would have to help herself out with some
of the fables, if she expected to fill her book, and she said she did
not care for that, either, and probably it was just such things as this
interview that drew attention to the play, and must have made it go
like wildfire that first night in Midland. Maxwell owned that it was but
too likely, and then he waited hungrily for further word of his play,
while she expected the next mail in cheerful faith.

It brought them four or five morning papers, and it seemed from these
that a play might have gone like wildfire, and yet not been seen by a
very large number of people. The papers agreed in a sense of the
graceful compliment paid their city by Mr. Godolphin, who was always a
favorite there, in producing his new piece at one of their theatres, and
confiding it at once to the judgment of a cultivated audience, instead
of trying it first in a subordinate place, and bringing it on with a
factitious reputation worked up from all sorts of unknown sources. They
agreed, too, that his acting had never been better; that it had great
smoothness, and that it rose at times into passion, and was full of his
peculiar force. His company was well chosen, and his support had an even
ex