actice suffices me. I find it
injurious to practice too long. But I study for hours. Such a role as
_Aphrodite_ I take quietly and sing it over mentally time and time again
without making a sound. I study the harmonies, the nuances, the
phrasing, the breathing, so that when the time for singing it comes I
know it and do not waste my voice by going over it time and again, as
some singers do. In the end I find that I know it better for this kind
of study.

The study of acting has been a very personal matter with me. I have
never been through any courses of study, such as that given in dramatic
schools. This may do for some people, but it would have been impossible
for me. There must be technic in all forms of art, but it has always
seemed to me that acting was one of the arts in which the individual
must make his own technic. I have seen many representatives of the
schools of acting here and abroad. Sometimes their performances, based
upon technical studies of the art, result in superb acting. Again, their
work is altogether indifferent. Technic in acting is more likely to
suppress than to inspire. If acting is not inspired, it is nothing. I
study the human emotions that would naturally underlie the scene in
which I am placed--then I think what one would be most likely to do
under such conditions. When the actual time of appearance on the stage
arrives, I forget all about this and make myself the person of the role.

This is the Italian method rather than the French. There are, to my
mind, no greater actors living than Duse and Zacchona, and they are both
exponents of the natural method that I employ.

Great acting has always impressed me wonderfully. I went from Paris to
London repeatedly to see Beerbohm Tree in his best roles. Sir Herbert
was not always uniformly fine, but he was a great actor and I learned
much from watching him. Once I induced Debussy to make the trip to see
him act. Debussy was delighted.

Debussy! Ah, what a rare genius--my greatest friend in Art! Everything
he wrote we went over together. He was a terribly exacting master. Few
people in America realize what a transcendent pianist he was. The piano
seemed to be thinking, feeling, vibrating while he was at the keyboard.
Time and again we went over his principal works, note for note. Now and
then he would stop and clasp his hands over his face in sudden silence,
repeating, "It is all wrong--it is all wrong." But he was too good a
teacher to let it