FORBES ROBERTSON SENIOR 



at the Adelphi in The Man in the Iron Mask, and 

 much earlier in small parts with Phelps. 



It was curious when conversing with Johnstone 

 once at Manchester to rem_ember those earlier days, 

 when his father and mother would give receptions 

 to their many artistic friends. The father was by 

 accident a business man, connected with Billingsgate 

 through being one of the pioneers of the Aberdeen fish 

 trade. In reality, he was a literary man, as his articles 

 for the Saturday Review and all his work for Cassells 

 testified. It was wonderful the way he fitted it all in. 

 In those early days, at the parties, the boys, with their 

 sister Ida — who married the late Val Bromley, the 

 artist — would erect a stage and play an act of either 

 Hamlet, Othello or Macbeth. I can hear Norman and 

 Ian rehearsing now. Miss Adelaide Neilson, one of 

 the most beautiful actresses who ever appeared on the 

 stage, was at her zenith at that time and she encour- 

 aged the elder son of the Robertsons. What it must 

 have meant to him — the smile of approbation from 

 a lovely and talented woman ! In the artistic sense 

 again it may have been the spur to his already obvious 

 ambition, yet it was intended that art in the way of 

 painting was to be his metier, but the stage called 

 him. Ian and Norman went somewhere near Aber- 

 deen to finish their schooling. I am sure that I can 

 never be accused of bad taste in divulging family 

 secrets when I say that, with the very large family 

 which Mr Robertson had to bring up, it was wonderful 

 the way it was accomplished. He maintained a big 

 house, until they removed to Bloomsbury, and then to 

 Bedford Square, where the present head of the family 

 still lives when in London. The first idea I had that 

 Johnston was to be as great as he has since proved 

 was in a play he appeared in at either the Lyceum or the 



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