But, though the future was full of charm for her, the present was not without great difficulties. How was she to enter upon her new life? She remembered that some years ago, in the old days when her father was alive, when she was still a school girl and theatrical matters had the charm of mystery, she had been with her father on one occasion when he had met and introduced to her an acquaintance of his who was a manager and an actor too, and whom she had wondered to find so exceedingly silent and grave when she remembered how he had made her laugh upon the stage. She now hit upon the bold measure of writing to him, and asking if he would see her; but a week passed, and her letter received no answer. She wrote again to his theater, and this time inclosed a stamped directed envelope, with an apology for doing so, and an earnest request for five minutes of his time. She received in reply a hasty note naming a day and hour when he could see her; and, more excited than she had ever been in her life before, she arrived at the theater at the appointed time. She had to wait a long, weary time, very much ashamed of herself, very much afraid her application would be in vain, very much wishing herself out of the group of shabby men--whom she mistook for actors--with whom she was waiting, when at last the manager came. As his eyes fell on her, she stepped forward, holding his letter and giving her maiden name. As she had expected, he had long since forgotten her; but he asked her to follow him up-stairs, and gave her a courteous hearing at the back of the dress-circle. After some difficulty, he remembered, or said he remembered, their former meeting. He strongly advised her not to go on the stage, telling her that even great talent did not always command success, that it was a hard life, full of disappointments. Finding her resolution still firm, and for the sake of her father, with whom he had at one time been intimate, he agreed to let her make a very modest first appearance at his theater as a silent “guest.” He did not much approve of lady amateurs, even in this humble capacity, but the girl was much in earnest, her pretty pleading was so touching, that he made this small concession, scarcely doubting that, if she went through all the rehearsals, after a few nights of a suffocating dressing-room and a draughty stage, she would appear no more, cured of her unfortunate whim.