EARLY THEATRICAL EXPERIENCES 



get placed for, say, four months in the year, which is, 

 I suppose, the average employment of the second or 

 third rank actor, but I prefer — and always have — ^the 

 " arf pint of porter brought reg'lar," as Mrs Gamp 

 said. This being paraphrased is that fifty-two weeks' 

 salary in the year is so useful. " See how So-and-so 

 has left us behind," said an actor to me one day: 

 "he's getting forty pounds a week ! " He had sixteen 

 weeks' work that year — I counted the time. That 

 spelt four hundred and eighty pounds ; that amount 

 of income would never go far with me. 



It is still a wonderful pleasure to talk to Tree. He 

 is such a marvel in the tireless work he will put in. 

 How he can switch off what looks, and is, an enormous 

 success to produce another play, or how he can have 

 a special series of Shakespeare matinees, in which 

 there cannot be much gain, shows how indefatigable he 

 is after art. He convinced us as boys that he was a 

 character actor, and he must always be one. He has 

 always conceived a long way ahead how he will render 

 a new role. One evening after a performance of 

 Oliver Twist was finished he spoke about Othello to 

 me, and of his idea that the Moor should be presented 

 as an Oriental, not a negro. He was right ; the 

 subtlety of mind of Othello did the convincing on this 

 score. Herbert Tree remembers old friends, and, 

 although not writing a line about him for years, he 

 would tender the best box in the house to me on 

 occasions, with further hospitality in the retiring-room : 

 the treatment of an old acquaintance as if he were a 

 personage is to be esteemed. I like men who never 

 forget. 



Not a single name of an actor or actress then appear- 

 ing on the London stage was unknown to our play- 

 going coterie. We could repeat the cast of all the 



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