At Winter Garden, on the evening of March 12, 1862, Miss Matilda Heron produced for the first time _The Belle of the Season_, advertised as "a new and original home play," and as written by Miss Heron herself. Its scenes were laid in the parks of Niagara and in Fifth Avenue drawing-rooms, but it suggested too many familiar plays of _The Lady of Lyons_ school to be altogether free from the suspicion of imitation. That it came from Miss Heron's own brain and pen, however, there could be little doubt; it had, as a literary effort, many of the faults and virtues and strong characteristics so curiously blended in the acting of its author. The production, as a whole, was what is termed "emotional," the part of the heroine being peculiarly so. Unquestionably Miss Heron wrote it to fit herself, and unquestionably it did not fit her so well as did Camille, upon which so much of her fame as an actress now rests. She had all of an author's fondness for the part and for the play. She considered both her greatest works. She produced the comedy many times in many cities of the Union, not always to the benefit of her purse or of her professional reputation, and when urged by her business manager to withdraw it altogether, she is said to have replied, with characteristic determination, that _The Belle of the Season_ she wanted to play, _The Belle of the Season_ she would play, and that when she died she wished nothing placed over her grave but the epitaph, "Here lies _The Belle of the Season_!" [Illustration: BRONSON HOWARD.] Matilda Heron was one of the most remarkable actresses our stage has ever produced. With an intensity and passion in her performances which, at times, were magnificent and carried everything before them, she displayed professional shortcomings and infirmities which were often glaring and unpardonable; but she made and held, by the force of her own genius--and genius she certainly possessed--a position which few modern actresses have ever reached. Her personal faults were of the head rather than of the heart, and may they now rest lightly on her! Miss Heron's immediate successors as native playwrights of society dramas were Miss Olive Logan, with _Surf; or, Summer Scenes at Long Branch_, at Daly's Theatre in 1870; Bronson Howard, with _Saratoga_ in 1870-71, with _Diamonds_ in 1873, and with _Moorcroft_ in 1874; James Steele Mackaye, with _Marriage_ in 1873; and Andrew C. Wheeler, with _Twins_, and Mr. Marsden, with _Clouds_, in 1876.