After that time, his career was a golden and happy one. He won the affection of the American public as perhaps no recent player has ever done. His art had a peculiarly wide appeal because it was fine and sweet; he won sympathy and inspired affection; and seemed the very embodiment of the tender, artless and lovable characters it was his joy to represent. Jefferson's death marked the passing of the last of the "old school"--that mellow, fluent, and accomplished circle of players who seem so different to their successors. But public taste is different too. We care no longer for the rantings and heroics of Virginius and Spartacus and all the rest of those toga-clothed gentlemen who differed from each other only in their names. We demand something more subtle, more--yes, let us say it!--intellectual. The modern who came nearest to answering this demand, to showing us the complex thing which we know human nature to be, was Richard Mansfield. A great artist, whom no difficulty appalled, he gave the American public, season after season, the most significant procession of worthy dramas that one man ever produced. Mansfield was born in Heligoland in 1857, and studied for the East Indian civil service, but came to Boston and opened a studio, studied art, and then suddenly abandoned it for the stage. Curiously enough, he began with small parts in comic opera, and a few years later, made one of the funniest Kokos who ever appeared in "The Mikado." But he soon changed to straight drama, and the first great success of his career was as Baron Chevrial in "A Parisian Romance," a part which was given him after other actors had refused to take it, and in which he created a real sensation. His reputation was secure after that, and grew steadily until the swift and complete collapse from over-work, which ended his life at the age of fifty-one. Are there any great players alive in America to-day? E. H. Sothern, perhaps, comes nearest to greatness, and has at least won respectful attention by a sincerity and earnestness which have accomplished much. He is the son of Edward Askew Sothern, whose career was a most peculiar one. Intended for the ministry, he chose the stage instead, apparently with no talent for it, and for six or seven years, only the most unimportant of minor parts were entrusted to him. One of these was that of Lord Dundreary in "Our American Cousin." It consisted of only a few lines and Sothern accepted it under protest, but he made such a hit in it that it was amplified and became the principal part of the play. In fact, the play became, in the end, a series of monologues for Dundreary. It had some remarkable runs, one, for instance, in London, for four hundred and ninety-six consecutive nights. Sothern continued playing the part until his death. His son is undoubtedly a far greater actor, and may achieve a high and lasting fame.