Ten American Girls From History

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"He looked at me in dead silence for a few moments, then he said:
'Humph!' and walked away, while I rushed to the dressing-room and
cried and cried, and vowed that never, never again would I talk to
myself--in the theater, at all events.

"Only a short time afterward I had a proud moment when I was allowed
to go on as the longest witch in the caldron scene in 'Macbeth.'
Perhaps I might have come to grief over it had I not overheard the
leading man say: 'That child will never speak those lines in the
world!' And the leading man was six feet tall and handsome, and I was
thirteen and a half years old, and to be called a child!

"I was in a secret rage, and I went over and over my lines at all
hours, under all circumstances, so that nothing should be able to
frighten me at night. And then, with my pasteboard crown and white
sheet and petticoat, I boiled up in the caldron and gave my lines well
enough for the manager to say low:

"'Good! Good!' and the leading man next night asked me to take care of
his watch and chain during his combat scene, and," says Miss Morris,
"my pride of bearing was unseemly, and the other girls loved me not at
all, for, you see, they, too, knew he was six feet tall and handsome."

The theatrical company of which Clara Morris had become a member was
what was called by the profession, a "family theater," in which the
best parts are apt to be absorbed by the manager and his family, while
all the poor ones are placed with strict justice where they belong. At
that time, outside of the star who was being supported, men and women
were engaged each for a special line of business, to which "line"
they were strictly kept. However much the "family theater" was
disliked by her comrades in the profession, it was indeed an ideal
place for a young girl to begin her stage life in. The manager, Mr.
Ellsler, was an excellent character actor; his wife, Mrs. Ellsler, was
his leading woman--his daughter, Effie, though not out of school at
that time, acted whenever there was a very good part that suited her.
Other members of the company were mostly related in some way, and so
it came about that there was not even the "pink flush of a flirtation
over the first season," in fact, says Miss Morris, "during all the
years I served in that old theater, no real scandal ever smirched it."
She adds: "I can never be grateful enough for having come under the
influence of the dear woman who watched over me that first season,
Mrs. Bradshaw, the mother of Blanche, one of the most devoted
actresses I ever saw, and a good woman besides. From her I learned
that because one is an actress it is not necessary to be a slattern.
She used to say:

"'You know at night the hour of morning rehearsal--then get up fifteen
minutes earlier, and leave your room in order. Everything an actress
does is commented on, and as she is more or less an object of
suspicion, her conduct should be even more correct than that of other
women.' She also repeated again and again, 'Study your lines--speak
them just as they are written. Don't just gather the idea of a speech,
and then use your own words--that's an infamous habit. The author knew
what he wanted you to say. If he says, "My lord, the carriage waits,"
don't you go on and say, "My lord, the carriage is waiting!"'"

These and many other pieces of valuable advice were stored up in Clara
Morris's mind, and she made such good use of them that they bore rich
fruit in later years.

There was great consternation for mother and daughter, on a certain
day when Clara brought home the startling news that the company was
to be transferred to Columbus, Ohio, for the remainder of the season.
It was a great event in the young actress's life, as it meant leaving
her mother and standing alone. But as she confesses: "I felt every now
and then my grief and fright pierced through and through with a
delicious thrill of importance; I was going to be just like a
grown-up, and would decide for myself what I should wear. I might
even, if I chose to become so reckless, wear my Sunday hat to a
rehearsal, and when my cheap little trunk came, with C. M. on the end,
showing it was my very own, I stooped down and hugged it." But she
adds with honesty, "Later, when my mother, with a sad face, separated
my garments from her own, I burst into sobs of utter forlornness."

The salary of the ballet corps was now raised to $5 a week, and all
set to work to try to solve the riddle of how a girl was to pay her
board bill, her basket bill, her washing bill, and all the small
expenses of the theater--powder, paint, soap, hair-pins, etc.--to say
nothing of shoes and clothing, out of her earnings. Clara Morris and
the Bradshaws solved the problem in the only possible way by rooming
together in a large top-floor room, where they lived with a
comparative degree of comfort, and with less loneliness for Clara than
she could have felt elsewhere.

During that first season she learned to manage her affairs and to take
care of herself and her small belongings, without admonition from any
one. At the same time she was learning much of the technique of the
profession, and was deeply interested as she began to understand how
illusions are produced. She declares that one of the proofs that she
was meant to be an actress was her enjoyment of the mechanism of stage
effects.

"I was always on hand when a storm had to be worked," she says, "and
would grind away with a will at a crank that, turning against a tight
band of silk, made the sound of a tremendously shrieking wind. And no
one sitting in front of the house, looking at a white-robed woman
ascending to heaven, apparently floating upward through the blue
clouds, enjoyed the spectacle more than I enjoyed looking at the
ascent from the rear, where I could see the tiny iron support for her
feet, the rod at her back with the belt holding her securely about the
waist, and the men hoisting her through the air, with a painted,
sometimes moving sky behind her.

"This reminds me," says Miss Morris, "that Mrs. Bradshaw had several
times to go to heaven (dramatically speaking), and as her figure and
weight made the support useless, she always went to heaven on the
entire gallery, as it is called, a long platform the whole width of
the stage, which is raised and lowered by windlass. The enormous
affair would be cleaned and hung about with nice white clouds, and
then Mrs. Bradshaw, draped in long white robes, with hands meekly
crossed upon her breast and eyes piously uplifted, would rise
heavenward, slowly, as so heavy an angel should. But alas! There was
one drawback to this otherwise perfect ascension. Never, so long as
the theater stood, could that windlass be made to work silently. It
always moved up or down to a succession of screaks, unoilable,
blood-curdling, that were intensified by Mrs. Bradshaw's weight, so
that she ascended to the blue tarletan heaven accompanied by such
chugs and long-drawn yowlings as suggested a trip to the infernal
regions. Her face remained calm and unmoved, but now and then an
agonized moan escaped her, lest even the orchestra's effort to cover
up the support's protesting cries should prove useless. Poor woman,
when she had been lowered again to _terra firma_ and stepped off, the
whole paint frame would give a kind of joyous upward spring. She
noticed it, and one evening looked back and said; 'Oh, you're not one
bit more glad than I am, you screaking wretch!'"

Having successfully existed through the Columbus season, in the spring
the company was again in Cleveland, playing for a few weeks before
disbanding for that horror of all theatrical persons--the summer
vacation.

As her mother was in a position, and could not be with Clara, the
young actress spent the sweltering months in a cheap boarding-house,
where a kindly landlady was willing to let her board bill run over
until the fall, when salaries should begin again. Clara never forgot
that kindness, for she was in real need of rest after her first season
of continuous work. Although her bright eyes, clear skin, and round
face gave an impression of perfect health, yet she was far from
strong, owing partly to the privations of her earlier life and to a
slight injury to her back in babyhood. Because of this, she was facing
a life of hard work handicapped by that most cruel of torments, a
spinal trouble, which an endless number of different treatments failed
to cure.

Vacation ended, to her unspeakable joy she began work again as a
member of the ballet corps, and during that season and the next her
ability to play a part at short notice came to be such an accepted
fact that more than once she was called on for work outside of her
regular "line," to the envy of the other girls, who began to talk of
"Clara's luck." "But," says Clara, "there was no luck about it. My
small success can be explained in two words--extra work." While the
others were content if they could repeat a part perfectly to
themselves in their rooms, that was only the beginning of work to
their more determined companion. "I would repeat those lines," said
Miss Morris, "until, had the very roof blown off the theater at night,
I should not have missed one." And so it was that the youngest member
of the ballet corps came to be looked on as a general-utility person,
who could be called on at a moment's notice to play the part of queen
or clown, boy or elderly woman, as was required.

Mr. Ellsler considered that the young girl had a real gift for comedy,
and when Mr. Dan Setchell, the comedian, played with the company, she
was given a small part, which she played with such keen perception of
the points where a "hit" could be made, that at last the audience
broke into a storm of laughter and applause. Mr. Setchell had another
speech, but the applause was so insistent that he knew it would be an
anti-climax and signaled the prompter to ring down the curtain. But
Clara Morris knew that he ought to speak, and was much frightened by
the effect of her business, which had so captured the fancy of the
audience, for she knew that the applause belonged to the star as a
matter of professional etiquette. She stood trembling like a leaf,
until the comedian came and patted her kindly on the shoulder, saying:

"Don't be frightened, my girl--that applause was for you. You won't be
fined or scolded--you've made a hit, that's all!"

But even the pleasant words did not soothe the tempest of emotion
surging in the young girl's heart. She says:

"I went to my room, I sat down with my head in my hands. Great drops
of sweat came out on my temples. My hands were icy cold, my mouth was
dry--that applause rang in my ears. A cold terror seized on me--a
terror of what? Ah, a tender mouth was bitted and bridled at last! The
reins were in the hands of the public, and it would drive me, where?"

As she sat there, in her hideous make-up, in a state of despair and
panic, she suddenly broke into shrill laughter. Two women came in, and
one said; "Why, what on earth's the matter? Have they blown you up for
your didoes to-night? What need you care. You pleased the audience."
The other said, quietly: "Just get a glass of water for her; she has
a touch of hysteria. I wonder who caused it?" No person had caused it.
Clara Morris was merely waking from a sound sleep, unconsciously
visioning that woman of the dim future who was to conquer the public
in her portrayal of great elemental human emotion.

With incessant work and study, and a firm determination to stop short
of nothing less than the perfection of art, those early years of Clara
Morris's life on the stage went swiftly by, and in her third season
she was more than ever what she herself called "the dramatic
scrape-goat of the company," one who was able to play any part at a
moment's notice.

"This reputation was heightened when one day, an actor falling
suddenly sick, Mr. Ellsler, with a furrowed brow, begged Clara to play
the part. Nothing daunted, the challenge was calmly accepted, and in
one afternoon she studied the part of King Charles, in 'Faint Heart
Never Won Fair Lady,' and played it in borrowed clothes and without
any rehearsal whatever, other than finding the situations plainly
marked in the book! It was an astonishing thing to do, and she was
showered with praise for the performance; but even this success did
not better her fortunes, and she went on playing the part of boys and
old women, or singing songs when forced to it, going on for poor
leading parts even, and between times dropping back into the ballet,
standing about in crowds, or taking part in a village dance."

It was certainly an anomalous position she held in Mr. Ellsler's
company--but she accepted its ups and downs without resistance, taking
whatever part came to hand, gaining valuable experience from every new
role assigned her, and hoping for a time when the returns from her
work would be less meager.

She was not yet seventeen when the German star, Herr Daniel Bandmann,
came to play with the company. He was to open with "Hamlet," and Mrs.
Bradshaw, who by right should have played the part of Queen Mother,
was laid up with a broken ankle. Miss Morris says: "It took a good
deal in the way of being asked to do strange parts to startle me, but
the Queen Mother did it. I was just nicely past sixteen, and I was to
go on the stage for the serious Shakesperian mother of a star. Oh, I
couldn't!"

"Can't be helped--no one else," growled Mr. Ellsler; "Just study your
lines, right away, and do the best you can."

"I had been brought up to obey," says Miss Morris, "and I obeyed. The
dreaded morning of rehearsal came. There came a call for the Queen. I
came forward. Herr Bandmann glanced at me, half smiled, waved his
arms, and said, 'Not you, not the _Player-Queen_, but GERTRUDE.'

"I faintly answered, 'I'm sorry, sir, but I have to play Gertrude!'

"'Oh no, you won't!' he cried, 'not with me!' Then, turning to Mr.
Ellsler, he lost his temper and only controlled it when he was told
that there was no one else to take the part; if he would not play with
me, the theater must be closed for the night. Then he calmed down and
condescended to look the girl over who was to play such an
inappropriate role.

"The night came--a big house, too, I remember," says Miss Morris. "I
wore long and loose garments to make me look more matronly, but, alas,
the drapery Queen Gertrude wears was particularly becoming to me and
brought me uncommonly near to prettiness. Mr. Ellsler groaned, but
said nothing, while Mr. Bandmann sneered out an '_Ach Himmel!_' and
shrugged his shoulders, as if dismissing the matter as hopeless."

But it was not. "As Bandmann's great scene advanced to its climax, so
well did the young Queen Mother play up to Hamlet, that the applause
was rapturous. The curtain fell, and to her utter amaze she found
herself lifted high in the air and crushed to Hamlet's bosom, with a
crackling sound of breaking Roman pearls and in a whirlwind of German
exclamations, kissed on brow, cheeks and eyes. Then disjointed English
came forth; 'Oh, you are so great, you _kleine_ apple-cheeked girl!
You maker of the fraud--you so great, nobody. _Ach_, you are fire--you
have pride--you are a Gertrude who have shame!' More kisses, then
suddenly realizing that the audience was still applauding, he dragged
her before the curtain, he bowed, he waved his hands, he threw one arm
around my shoulders. 'He isn't going to do it all over again--out
here, is he?' thought the victim of his enthusiasm, and began backing
out of sight as quickly as possible."

That amusing experience led to one of the most precious memories of
Clara Morris's career, when, a month after the departure of the
impetuous German, who should be announced to play with the company but
Mr. Edwin Booth. As Clara Morris read the cast of characters, she
says, "I felt my eyes growing wider as I saw--

QUEEN GERTRUDE............Miss Morris.

"I had succeeded before, oh yes, but this was a different matter. All
girls have their gods--some have many of them. My gods were few, and
on the highest pedestal of all, grave and gentle, stood the god of my
professional idolatry--Edwin Booth. It was humiliating to be forced on
any one as I should be forced upon Mr. Booth, since there was still
none but my 'apple-cheeked' self to go on for the Queen, and though I
dreaded complaint and disparaging remarks from him, I was honestly
more unhappy over the annoyance this blemish on the cast would cause
him. But it could not be helped, so I wiped my eyes, repeated my
childish little old-time 'Now I lay me,' and went to sleep.

"The dreaded Monday came, and at last--the call, 'Mr. Booth would
like to see you for a few moments in his room.'

"He was dressed for Hamlet when I entered. He looked up, smiled, and,
waving his hand, said in Bandmann's very words: 'No, not you--not the
_Player-Queen_--but GERTRUDE.'

"My whole heart was in my voice as I gasped: 'I'm so sorry, sir, but I
have to do Queen Gertrude. You see,' I rushed on, 'our heavy woman has
a broken leg and can't act. But if you please,' I added, 'I had to do
this part with Mr. Bandmann, too, and--and--I'll only worry you with
my looks, sir, not about the words or business.'

"He rested his dark, unspeakably melancholy eyes on my face, then he
sighed and said: 'Well, it was the closet scene I wanted to speak to
you about. When the ghost appears you are to be--' He stopped, a faint
smile touched his lips, and he remarked:

"'There's no denying it, my girl, I look a great deal more like your
father than you look like my mother--but--' He went on with his
directions, and, considerate gentlemen that he was, spoke no single
unkind word to me, though my playing of that part must have been a
great annoyance to him.

"When the closet scene was over, the curtain down, I caught up my
petticoats and made a rapid flight roomward. The applause was
filling the theater. Mr. Booth, turning, called after me:
'You--er--Gertrude--er--_Queen!_ Oh, somebody call that child back
here!' and somebody roared, 'Clara, Mr. Booth is calling you!' I
turned, but stood still. He beckoned, then came and took my hand,
saying, 'My dear, we must not keep them waiting too long,' and led
me before the curtain with him. I very slightly bent my head to the
audience, whom I felt were applauding Hamlet only, but turned and
bowed myself to the ground to him whose courtesy had brought me
there.

"When we came off he smiled amusedly, tapped me on the shoulder, and
said: 'My Gertrude, you are very young, but you know how to pay a
pretty compliment--thank you, child!'

"So," says Miss Morris, "whenever you see pictures of nymphs or
goddesses floating in pink clouds and looking idiotically happy, you
can say to yourself: 'That is just how Clara Morris felt when Edwin
Booth said she had paid him a compliment.' Yes, I floated, and I'll
take a solemn oath, if necessary, that the whole theater was filled
with pink clouds the rest of that night, for girls are made that way,
and they can't help it."

The young actress was now rapidly acquiring a knowledge of her ability
to act; she also knew that as long as she remained with Mr. Ellsler
there would be no advancement for her, and a firm determination took
possession of her to take a plunge into the big world, where perhaps
there might be a chance not only to earn enough to take care of
herself, but also enough so that her mother would no longer be obliged
to work, which was Clara's bitter mortification.

While she was considering the advisability of making a change, she
received an offer from a Mr. Macaulay, manager of Wood's Museum, at
Cincinnati, Ohio. He offered a small salary, but as she was to be his
leading woman she decided to accept the offer. "When the matter was
apparently settled, he wrote, saying that 'because of the youth of his
new star, he wished to reserve a few parts which his wife would act.'
Only too well did Clara Morris understand what that meant--that the
choicest parts would be reserved. Then an amusing thing happened. She,
who was so lacking in self-confidence, suddenly developed an ability
to stand up for her rights. By return mail she informed Mr. Macaulay
that her youth had nothing to do with the matter--that she would be
the leading woman and play all parts or none. His reply was a
surprise, as it contained a couple of signed contracts and a pleasant
request to sign both and return one at once. He regretted her
inability to grant his request, but closed by expressing his respect
for her firmness in demanding her rights. Straightway she signed her
first contract, and went out to mail it. When she returned she had
made up her mind to take a great risk. She had decided that her mother
should never again receive commands from any one--that her shoulders
were strong enough to bear the welcome burden, that they would face
the new life and its possible sufferings together--_together_, that
was the main thing." She says:

"As I stood before the glass smoothing my hair, I gravely bowed to the
reflection and said, 'Accept my congratulations and best wishes,
Wood's leading lady!'--and then fell on the bed and sobbed ...
because, you see, the way had been so long and hard, but I had won one
goal--I was a leading woman!"

Leaving behind the surroundings of so many years was not a light
matter, nor was the parting with the Ellslers, of whose theatrical
family she had been a member for so long, easy. When the hour of
leave-taking came, she was very sad. She had to make the journey
alone, as her mother also was to join her only when she had found a
place to settle in. Mr. Ellsler was sick for the first time since she
had known him. She said good-by to him in his room, and left feeling
very despondent, he seemed so weak. "Judge then," says Miss Morris,
"my amazement when, hearing a knock on my door and calling, 'Come
in'--Mr. Ellsler, pale and almost staggering, entered. A rim of red
above his white muffler betrayed his bandaged throat, and his poor
voice was but a husky whisper:

"'I could not help it,' he said. 'You were placed under my care once
by your mother. You were a child then, and though you are pleased to
consider yourself a woman now, I could not bear to think of your
leaving the city without some old friend being by for a parting
God-speed.'

"I was inexpressibly grateful, but he had yet another surprise for me.
He said, 'I wanted, too, Clara, to make you a little present that
would last long and remind you daily of--of--er--the years you have
passed in my theater.'

"He drew a small box from his pocket. 'A good girl and a good
actress,' he said, 'needs and ought to own a'--he touched a spring,
the box flew open--'a good watch,' he finished.

"Literally, I could not speak, having such agony of delight in its
beauty, of pride in its possession, of satisfaction in a need
supplied, of gratitude and surprise immeasurable. 'Oh!' and again
'Oh!' was all that I could cry, while I pressed it to my cheek and
gloated over it. My thanks must have been sadly jumbled and broken,
but my pride and pleasure made Mr. Ellsler laugh, and then the
carriage was there, and laughter stilled into a silent, close
hand-clasp. As I opened the door of the dusty old hack, I saw the
first star prick brightly through the evening sky. Then the hoarse
voice said, 'God bless you'--and I had left my first manager."

To say that Clara Morris made a success in Cincinnati is the barest
truth. Her first appearance was in the role of a country girl,
_Cicely_, a simple milkmaid with only one speech to make, but one
which taxed the ability of an actress to the uttermost to express what
was meant. Clara played this part in a demure black-and-white print
gown, with a little hat tied down under her chin. On the second night,
she played what is called a "dressed part," a bright, light-comedy
part in which she wore fine clothes; on the third night hers was a
"tearful" part. In three nights she completely won the public, and on
the third she received her first anonymous gift, a beautiful and
expensive set of pink corals set in burnished gold. "Flowers, too,
came over the foot-lights, the like of which she had never seen
before, some of them costing more than she earned in a week. Then one
night came a bolder note with a big gold locket, which, having its
sender's signature, went straight back to him the next morning. As a
result it began to be whispered about that the new star sent back all
gifts of jewelry; but when one matinee a splendid basket of white
camelias came with a box of French candied fruit, it delighted her and
created a sensation in the dressing-room. That seemed to start a
fashion, for candies in dainty boxes came to her afterward as often as
flowers."

On the night of her first appearance, a lawyer of Cincinnati who saw
her play the part of Cicely was so delighted with her interpretation
of the small role that he at once asked: "Who is she? What is her
history?"--only to find that, like most happy women, she had none. She
came from Cleveland, she lived three doors away with her mother--that
was all.

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