Saturday Evening Mail, Volume 27, Number 41, Terre Haute, Vigo County, 10 April 1897 — Page 6

BEHIND THE FOOTLIGHTS.

Recollections of Edwin Booth and Lawrence Barrett.

COLLAPSE OF A NOBLE ENTERPRISE

Two of the Most Interesting Figures the American Stage Has Ever Known—A Notable Rehearsal—How Barrett's Death

Was Hastened.

[Special Correspondence.]

NEW YORK, April 5.—There is one phase of Edwin Booth's character which, I think, has been entirely overlooked and which is worthy of comment. The labors of the stage, which in the case of a man playing the type of characters such as he essayed are usually very onerous, were taken by him almost as a pastime. He did not seem to

EDWIN BOOTH.

mind acting at all it was almost play for him. Ho seemed to grasp the requirements of the role which he was to Interpret by intuition.

My recollections of and connection with Edwin Booth date from the time when he played with Charlotte Cushman, for the benefit of the American Dramatic association, at the Academy of Music, toward the close of 1859. "Macbeth" was tho play which it was desired to put on. Miss Cnnhman asked me if Booth was a good Macbeth. I did not know, and she was, I am inclined to think, a triflo nervous about his ability to "body forth" the difficult character.

As these two great artists had never before performed together, the rehearsal was extremely interesting. Miss Cushman was always considerate of her fellow players' whims and caprices, and a little thing which occurred at this rehearsal also served to illustrate the aln%^t startling modesty of Edwin Booth, which was one of the most charming traits of his generally lovable nature.

In referring to the "business" of the piece, which is seldom the same with any two actors, Miss Cushman, at a certain point, inquired, "What do you do hero, Mr. Booth?" "Do as I am told," he replied in the most ingenuous manner.

To drop into stage parlance, this made tho "biggest sort of a hit" with Miss Cushman, who afterward expressed herself as astounded with the merit of his performance of Macbeth, and up to the day of her death she was one of the most loyal admirers that Edwin Booth had in this country.

A l'rofltable Rehearsal.

There was an incident in connection with this same reUrarsal which, I think, has never been paralleled in this country, whero two such renowned performers were concerned. A number of ladies, knowing that a rehearsal would be necessary, had contrived to learn the hour at which it would occur, and the stage door was besieged by many of tho fair sex who wero anxious to obtain a glimpse of the great players without the intervention of footlights. They became a nuisance long before the rehearsal had commenced, and I thought of a plan to get rid of them. I requested the permission of Miss Cushman and Mr. Booth tc admit such of the ladies as were willing to pay $1 for tho privilege to the rehearsal. They both laughingly consented, and the cause of charity was benefited to the extent of something less than $100, which I personally took in at tho stage door.

As wo were leaving tho theater that day Mr. Booth observed tome: "That's the last you'll ever see of those people, Vincent, I don't believe any of them will ooiue to the regular performance. The pi It is off the gingerbread. But as was often the case with tin1 great actor's business predictions he was mistaken, for not only did they come, but I received letters from more than a score of the ladies, thanking mo for having enabled them to enjoy an exceptionally novel experience.

Most actors like the longest roles and thaw in which there is the hardest work. They are almost invariably jealous of any other whose part is nearly so loug. Mr. Booth was very different Tho easier the work for him the better he liked it.

He Would Hare the Genuine.

I shall never forget tho production of "Richard II." which we made at Booth's theater after the great actor bad lost the house which still bore his name. The piece was arranged by William Winter, the accomplished dramatic critic of tho Now York Tribune. As neither Mr. Booth nor I had seen the play, it may bo readily understood that we hod no end of trouble with this gloomy seven act Shakespearean drama. It was a failure in spite of the improvements from the standpoint of modern stage management which had been made by Mr. Winter, and was soon abandoned. An mormons sum of money vras spent on it. and. of coarse, most of it vrat drad loss. At the final rehearsal Mr. Booth refused to eat the candy strawberries which I had provided instead of

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the real fruit, which could not be obtained at that time—February. He insisted that he could not eat the sweets. August Belmont had a fine hothouse on Long Island, and he came to the rescue. His gardener sent me about ten of the precious berries. These were mixed in with the bogus ones, one each night, and Mr. Booth was satisfied.

Booth's theater openetjb Feb. 8, 1869, and ceased to exist^s a place of amusement April 30, 1883. Between these dates the idol of the American stage had demonstrated, at an expense of hundreds of thousands of dollars, that New York would not support a house devoted to elaborate productions of the best and most serious forms of the drama. The failure had a great and depressing effect upon his naturally hopeful nature, and most men would have been soured. But he took it philosophically and used to aver that he had simply made his ex periment a few years too soon and that the people were all right, or would be in time.

Barrett's Genius.

Lawrence Barrett's perception in discovering the merit of a suggestion made by a business friend that he and Booth in a joint starring tour would coin money enabled the latter to recoup his wasted fortune. So that at the time of his death he left an estate valued, think, at something over $600,000. But had it-not been for that fortunate stroke I fear that there would have been very little for his heirs to divide. Booth is gone. The theater which should have been a monument to his name and fame is now a bonnet and ribbon emporium, and few people who pass the spot daily know that it was there that the most ambitious undertaking ever attempted in the dramatic world in this country was born—and died.

Speaking of this theater and Lawrence Barrett in almost the same breath recalls to mind the pet scheme of this actor, who will probably never be given the exact place which is his due in the American theatrical world. Not that I wish to disparage Mr. Barrett's abilities in the slightest, but because of the unevenness of his work in different roles Barrett was either considered a great performer or a very poor one. There was no middle ground on which his ad hirers and detractors ever seemed to be Bible to meet. He was either liked very much, or not at all.

Barrett was one of the most interesting and peculiar figures the American stage has ever known. An almost unerring critic of the ability of others, he was unable to gauge his own powers with any degree of accuracy. This shortcoming it was which caused so many failures. Barrett's career was a long and honorable one, but there are very few persons outside of those connected with the stage who know what a wide scope he gave himself in the selection of plays, or how much money he spent on several which served no other purpose than to deplete his exchequer and gratify a whim.

Barrett's Personality.

"Rienzi" was perhaps the most disastrous production ever made by. Mr. Barrett The first performance was given in Washington. The piece had been rewritten by that talented but erratic fellow, Steele Mackaye, and it was expected to create a sensation. Barrett spent money like water. One robe worn by him cost more than $800. There were two tons of scenery and properties, and the total expense of the production was in excess of $85,000, to say nothing of an enormous salary list.

Most persons are not aware of the fact that Barrett was much more of a scholar than Booth. He was really a bookworm, and he was as greatly Booth's superior as a student as Booth was his euperior as an actor. Cassius in "Julius Cwsar" has always been considered Barrett's mt •terpiece, and it is certain that the modern stage has never seen a better impersonation of the "lean and hungry" one, but I always preferred him in Yorick Love," for the reason that during a long professional connection with him I never saw him give a performance of that play which could not justly be denominated "great."

As a man Barrett was above reproach. He was tender and considerate of the feelings of those with whom he was associated unless he suspected disloyalty. Then ho was about as unreasonable a man as I ever knew. It must be admitted, too, that he was rather intolerant of criticism, and resented the right of members of his company to compare

LAWBEJfCE BARRETT,

him unfavorably with other actors, even though it were done in the most friendly spirit But, take it all in all, the American stage suffered a distinct loss in the death of Lawrence Barrett, which I, in common with many of his friends, think was hastened by the pecuniary troubles brought about by his disastrous visit to England and which were still unsettled when be joi^d Edwin Booth.

L. .IOHN YINCEST.

Poeketknlfe Maaufecture.

Pocketknives are now machine made, the blades being stamped from stripn of steel and afterward ground and polished before being fixed in the handle. Tbe "asaemblying" of tbe different parts of the knife is a matter of hand labor.

PLAINED •.

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ViV

When in 1821 Greece rose against her oppressors, she had the sympathy, as she has today, of the educated and cul tivated men and women throughout the globe.. We can recall that your great Americans, like Webster and Everett, and Britons, like Lord Byron, enlisted themselves on the side of struggling Greece. Byron came here and eventually gave his life to our cause, and though our people had been reduced to such stages of starvation as to be compelled po subsist on roots and leaves and to dwell in caves, yet in the end we triumphed. The battle of Navarino in 1827 settled the Turkish question in Greece and gave our country once more autonomy and freedom. Since that eventful day we have been gradually growing in strength and self respect, constantly enlarging our boundaries, until today we have at least respectable rank among the smaller powers. In truth the great powers, so long ago as 1841, professed to be afraid of our eventual supremacy in the Ottoman territory, the greater portion of whose inhabitants are Greek by birth and religion, and that year guaranteed the integrity of the Turkish empire.

In 1858 followed that strange war of the Crimea, resulting from the desire of the czar to assume a protectorate over bis Christian subjects in Turkey. But what Russia lost as the outcome of that war she more than gained after the last Russo-Turkish war, and by the resultant treaty of Berlin in 1878. That treaty, with the great powers of Ruesia, Turkey, Germany, Great Britain, France, Austria and Italy as signatories, guaranteed the autonomy of Servia, Montenegro, Bulgaria, Roumania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, which, together with Greece, were supposed to be sufficient bulwarks, as between Russia and Turkey, to maintain that modem figment of diplomats, the balanoe of power" in Europe.

It is to this juggernaut that the six great powers of Europe today are willing to sacrifice a Christian nation like Greece and millions of Christian peopb. At least they are committed to it. They are virtually the emissaries of the sultan and seem disposed to work his will and perpetuate his pewer as against the long suppressed desires and prayers of suffering subjects.

The Ottoman Turk must be maintained in Europe—at least, the integrity of his territorial boundaries maintained —in order to preserve the present' 'balance of power."

Let us inquire what is this balance of power. In the first place, Russia has her eye on Constantinople and the Bosporus, more as an outlet from the Black sea than for its intrinsic strategic importance. Russia has made many demonstrations against India, by which the bear has frightened Britannia nearly out of her senses, but his real object is the Bosporus. As weighed against India, Britain will eventually allow the Bosporus to go, but for many years she has striven against this acquisition by Russia with might and main. Then there is Austria. She wants a Danubian province, with access to the Black sea borders, but has no adequate bribe to give John Bull, as Russia has. As between these two, the odds are in favor of Russia.

Last of all comes our little Greece. It, is not possible that she can become a menace to European integrity within the next 800 years but, if you will glance at tho map, you will see that to her by right belongs the coveted territory of the Turk in Europe.

Constantinople was anciently the seat of the Greek church, the present religion not only of Greece, but of Russia, as well as of the minor principalities of Servia, Bulgaria, etc.

Even the great statesman, Gladstone, has lifted up his voice against the continued rule of the Turk. The fact is the powers see that the Turk must go, and more, that to the Greeks must fall his empire in Europe as residuary legatees. It is not, then, Crete solely, nor Macedonia, that excites their apprehension— and justly perhaps, for, unless we are totally extinguished in the coming contest, our ultimate objective shall be a revived Byzantium at Constantinople. We hope the reign of lust and cruelty is near to its end, and that succeeding it will come the reign of art, of beauty, of Christian policy—in sooth, a regenerated, purified Greece, such as onoe astonished the world with its creations and its culture. PHILIP TITTAKIS.

Victoria's Abdication.

Apropos of tbe gossip about Queen Victoria's ill health, El win Barron repeats in tbe Chicago Times Herald tbe rumor that the Prince at

TBKRE HAUTE SATURDAY EVENING MALL, APRIL, 10, 1897.

GEEECE AND TURKEY.

THE EASTERN QUESTION" IN A NUTSHELL

Why the "Unspeakable Turk" Is Permitted to Remain In Europe—The Balance of Power—The Hideous Doctrines of Cravaa Diplomacy. [Special Correspondence.]

ATHENS, March 23.—You ask me for a statement of existing conditions and for an explanation of them. To do this we mnst go back beyond a period in which your country of America had no recorded history and must stick a pin in the chronological chart of Europe and Asia about the year 571, or that in which Mohammed was born, for this false prophet was the cause of all our trouble, the instigator of that religion which teaches its followers that the joys of heaven can only be gained by putting all other religionists to the sword.

Wales will

never ascend the British throne. Albert Edward laaks ambition and energy, and many think he has by tbe conduct of bis life forfeited tbe right to succeed a sovereign of such noble character as Victoria. On tbe other hand, tbe Duke of York is very popular, and it is predicted that Victoria will abdicate this year, and be will become King George at England.

THE BEDROOM.

How t« Keep It In a Healthful Condition.

Too often a bed is made up in a slipshod manner without being thoroughly aired. This should never be allowed. The covering should first be stripped back over two chairs set at the foot of the' bed. The mattress should then be doubled so that the air may get to all parts of it and left so for from half an hour to an hour. In very severe winter weather the time may be lessened. Each piece of bedclothing should be well shaken before it is restored to its place, and the pillows beaten and patted into shape. The white spread, that should have been removed at bedtime the night before and neatly folded, is now fresh and smooth.

The bed is not all that needs close care in the sleeping room. The dusting is far more important than many people suspect Accumulations of fluff and dust form a favorite nesting place for disease germs and unsavory smells. On this account many ornaments are not to be commended in a bedchamber. The bits of drapery, the brackets, the gay Japanese fans, the photographs and the pieces of bric-a-brac that are admirable in other parts of the house are out of place here. Whatever furniture there is should be carefully wiped off each day with a soft clofch, and this shaken out of the window afterward.

The receptacles for waste water should be washed out every day and scalded occasionally. In hot weather the scalding should take place every day and the utensils be sunned, if possible. Shoes and other articles of apparel should not be left lying about the room to gather dust and look untidy. Soiled clothes should never be left in the sleeping room. They contaminate the atmosphere.

How the Cold Affects the Sap In Trees.

Sap is a watery fluid found in the interior of the cells of plants and trees and contains dissolved or suspended in it the materials required for the life and growth of the cell. The idea that i:i winter the sap goes down into the roots and in spring rises again is quite er roneous. Trees and plants are full of watery sap all the winter. The phenomena of freezing in the case of trees and plants are but little understood. The sap in leaves and in smaller branches is often frozen. This is seen especially in the case of twigs of hickory, which in very cold weather are as brittle as glass, though the same twigs at a higher temperature cannot by any possibility be broken with the hands. For various causes the water contained in the cells only begins to crystallize at some degrees below the ordinary freezing point. This is partly due to the chemical composition of the sap, which contains various salts, starch, etc., in solution. Beside:* this the bark of trees is a bad conductor o£iieat, and the interior temperature ol trees and plants is generally higher iii winter and lower in summer than that of the surrounding atmosphere.

...How to Make Prune Jelly.

Wash the prunes thoroughly, cover with cold water and plUce on the back oif the stove in a granite vessel or earthen crock. Let them stand for several hours, and, when swelled until large and plump, place them where they will simmer gently until tender. Drain off the juice, and, when cold enough, remove the. stones from the prunes. Put all together over the fire after measuring and allow half a box of gelatin and a small cupful of sugar for every quart of prunes and juice. The gelatin, of course, must be previously soaked for half an hour in a little cold water. A gill of orange juice or half a gill of lemon juice is an improvement, as is a gill of sherry, allowance for which must be made in measuring the liquid. Pour into a mold or molds and set on the ice over night. Eat with sweetened or whipped cream.

FOUND DEAD.

Why did he do it? He had everything to live for,—happy home, wife, friends, money but he shot himself through the heart. Why

He couldn't have given a good reason himself. But everything looked gloomy to him. He was in a gloomy frame of mina. It was the way he looked at life that day. He had been living in too much of a hurry, rushing and driving at business, hustling through his meals, cutting short his sleep. His nerves got on edge his stomach and liver got out of order he grew dyspeptic and melancholy.

When the digestion is out of order there is little use trying to look on the bright side of things, practically there isn't any bright side. This is a dangerous condition to get into. Yet it is easy to get into and mighty hard to get out of it, unless you go about it in the right way.

There is a remedy that has pulled thou sands of people right out of this depth of despair. It is Dr. Pierce's Golden Medical Discovery. It acts directly upon the stomach and liver. It restores their natural capacity to nourish and purify the system. It purges away bilious poisons, feeds the nerve-centres with healthy, highly vitalized blood, and drives out the blue aevils of melancholy and nervousness.

T. L. Warner, No. 1900 O Street, Sacramento. Cal., writes: During the last five year# I have been doctor!nj with as msny ss six different doc tors here and tn San Francisco for diseased atom ach but none of the doctors gare me even tern porny relief. Two years ago 1 completely

lapsea. and had to fpvt up all work. 1 have fell many times that I would like to leave this world. Ia looking over the ads in the San Prsndscc Examiner 1 ran across yours, and I now owe BIT present good health to Dr. Pierce's med idnes. I have taken fourteen bottles of th

life and 'Golden Medical Discovery' and four little vialf of Pleasant Pellets,' and I am entirely well of all stomach trouble. Can sleep nine hours every night, and now ready to go to work again.1.

J. A. DAILEY

S03 OHIO STREET. Give him a call If you have any kind of Insaranee to place. He will write you In as good companies as are represented In tbe city. 1

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COULD

BEAR HIS

The Strange Affliction of Wilbur Robinson.

In some way—they do not know how—a amphlet found its way to the Robinson ,miiy. Old Mrs. Bandy fished it out of a bureau drawer. It had the picture of two dogs peeping over a fence on one cover, and on the other a herd of cows drinking in a cool stream near a bridge. Both on the fence and on the bridge, on the respective

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He Stopped Growing—Limbs Became Useless and He was Unable to Walk—His Cure Brought About in a Singular Manner.

From the Observer, Charlotte, N.

Hearing that a child near Iron Station, Lincoln County, had been greatly benefited by the use of Dr. Williams' Pink Pills for Pale People, a representative of the

Observer

went thither to see and ascertain the extent of the benefit the child had received. Riding out on December 5, 1895, to a little country cottage in the pine woods, a mile distant from Iron Station, the reporter saw a bright-faced, young woman, a pure anglosaxon type with light hair and blue eyes, standing in the doorway with two plump. rosy-cheeked children half hiding behind her dress. Mentioning that he was looking for a family of Robinsons, the womau seemed at first a little suspicious. "You're a stranger in my eve, "she said.

I am trying to find a child named Wilbur Robinson, who was greatly benefited by Dr. Williams' Pink Pills for Pale People."

The young mother smiled and a pleased look came into her eyes as she said "come in," and added, "I guess that's the one," pointing to the younger of the two little boys.

It was an humble home, the family being composed of that sturdy farming class that "up one of the strongest and truest types of North Carolina's good people. The husband, Robert O. Robinson, runs the farm of 200 acres, but was off to the mill at the time.

The mother, Carrie L. Robinson, told a remarkable story of the cure of her little boy from the effects of la grippe. Her aged, white-haired mother, Mrs. Sarah A. Bandy, sat near and emphasized every word of the daughter. The little boy. Wilbur, who owed his reoovery to Dr. Williams' effective remedy, played about the house and yard, and was into every conceivable kind of mischief. It really seemed that he must have taken too many of Dr. Williams' Pink Pills so great was the energy with which he prosecuted his pranks. Three times his mother had to stop her conversation and rush out to rescue the reporter's bicycle, which was leaning against the house outside, and with which Wilbur was becoming almost too familiar.

This is the story the mother told: "Wilbur was born August 8, 1893. He was a stout, healthy boy till he was nearly five months old. Between Christmas ana New Year's he took the grippe. A physician at Tron Station attended him, ana he was supposed to have recovered. But the after effects of the malady lingered with disastrous results. In March, 1894, his parents noticed that he could not stand upon his feet, although before his taking the grippe he could do so easily. He could not bear the weight of his body on his feet his legs were not growing any nor the muscle in them developing. He was not treated, however, till in the fall, about the last of October. When Mr. Robinson took his cotton to Lincolnton, the county seat, he also carried his baby along, and a Lincolnton physician irescribed for nim. recommending a lotion for rubbing his limbs. This helped the child only temporarily. Twice afterward this physician was consulted. He told the parents that the child might some day be able to walk and again he might not. They would just have to let him grow along," as the mother expressed it, and see what developed. At this period the child's legs appeared to be shrunken. As his mother says they were "as soft as cotton." Here was a boy fourteen months old, who not only could not walk, but could not bear his weight on his feet.

BETTER THAN EVER

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covers, was this line: Dr. Williams' Pink Pills for Pale People." "When I read that those pills would build up the bone. I felt that they were the things for Wilbur,' said his mother.

Old Mrs. Bandy sat up nearly all of one night reading this papphlet, with all the testimonials it contained. A few days after they sent to one of the two village stores and got two boxes of the pills. This was about the last of November, 1894. Before he had finished taking the first box, the little fellow was able to bear his weight on his feet, and before the second box was all gone, he could hold a chair before him and push it across the floor. "We began by giving him a third of a pill at a time, afterward increasing the dose to a half, so they held out a long time," said his mother. "We commenced the second box in January, this year. We had to send to Lincolnton, eight miles away, to get the next boxes. After taking the third box, in March, the child began to go a few steps at a time, but he didnYt walk by himself till in September. The fourth box, or part of it, was administered in August."

The testimony of the mother was that tbe child'8 appetite and, indeed, his whole system was helped by the use of the pills.

Mrs. Banay, who had been looking over a sort of diary she keeps, at this point in the conversation,read this entry: "Sept. the 26th. Wilbur begins to walk alone by himself." "After ne once learned to walk," said his mother, "we could hardly keep him in sight of the house, and he was cured by four boxes, lacking ten pills. Mother says, and always has said, the Lord directed somebody to send us that pamphlet of Dr. Williams." "You really believe the child's cure is due to Dr. Williams' Pills wns asked.

I am really convinced the pills cured I haven't

him," the mother answered. the slightest doubt about it." And the boy's grandmother chimed in: "I'm just as sure of it as I am of living. I'll take an oath on the Bible that that I what did it."

The neighbors in all the Bection around the little village of Iron Station know and talk about the remarkable cure of this baby, who might have been a cripple for life, had he not, eveii at the age or two years, one month and seventeen days, been enabled to walk for the first time by the use of Dr. Williams' Pink Pills for Pale People.

This story may seem to the render like a fabrication, but is told as the child's mother told it to the reporter. In order to show their appreciation, Mrs. Robinson furnished the following testimonial and signed it. (She says she is willing at any time to makt sworn affidavit to her statements):

IRON STATION, LINCOLN Co., N. C., December 5, 1895. My Infant son, Wilbur Lee, .rendered unable to" learn to walk, by the effects of th« ippfe. when he was about five months old, hereby testify that he was entirely cured, and the muscles in his legs developed bv the use of less than four boxes of Dr. Williams' Pink Pills for Pale People, so that hs is now a hale and hearty child. I am entirely convinced that his cure is due to these pills. I also state that the above statements made to the reporter of the

ver

Charlotte Obser

are true. C. L. ROWINSON. SARAH A. BANDY, R. O. ROBERTSON, Witnesses. H. A. RANKS, Dr. Williams' Pink Pills for Pale People are now given to the public as an unfailing blood builder and nerve restorer, curing all forms of weakness arising from a watery condition of the blood or shnttered nerves. The pills are sold by all dealers, or will be sent post paid on receipt of price, 50 cents a box, or six boxes for $2.50 (tney are never sold in bulk or by the 100), by addressing Dr. Williams' Medicine Company, Schenectady, N. Y.