"Charley was always at his best in the 'Old Duke' smoking-room with his long clay pipe, after his sixth 'small jug' of eleemosynary beer. Then he was confidential, impressive, sententious, and 'dear boy'd' every one with a friendship which was none the less sincere because its fount was somewhat alcoholic. It is many a year since the earth closed over thee, thou poor, excitable, and sometimes self-indulgent disciple of Thespis, but none who knew thee can ever have any but kindly memories of thy simple undisguised obsequiousness to the 'star,' and thy majestically patronising mien to the super. "I have used the name Ellen Terry throughout the above notes, but at that time she was always and to every one, 'Nelly.' She was announced as 'Miss Nelly Terry' in the play-bills, and I have an old friendly letter from her, written only a few months after she left Bristol, in which she signs herself 'Nelly.' The handwriting is angular and 'school-missish,' with no indication of the soundness and flexible strength which have since become its characteristics. "Perhaps I have laid too much stress on the two burlesque parts which have the deepest roots in my memory. 'Miss Nelly' played other parts; she was the 'walking lady' of the company, and I have (rather hazy) recollections of her in a crinolined dress in that fine old melodrama 'The Angel of Midnight; or, The Duel in the Snow'; as a fashionable dame in the glittering but immoral coterie which forms the personal background in 'The Marble Heart'; and as the _ingenue_ in a once popular comedietta entitled 'The Little Treasure.' "To say that she then showed unmistakable promise of the pre-eminent position to which she has since attained in English dramatic art would be to exhibit that 'after-the-event' wisdom which is so common a feature of modern prophecy. I will only say that we, the young fellows of that day, thought she was perfection; we toasted her in our necessarily frugal measures; we would gladly have been her hewers of wood and drawers of water. She had personal charm as well as histrionic skill. Her smiles were very sweet, but, alack for all of us, they were mathematically impartial." These jottings are not only interesting as regards the early career of Kate and Ellen Terry, but they prove my views as to the affection in which the famous old stock companies were held by their devoted provincial patrons. In these days of ephemeral touring troupes such a condition of things is impossible, and really earnest students of the drama starve for lack of nourishment. On April 2, 1862, the old Bath Theatre of many glorious memories was destroyed by fire; but James Henry Chute was not the man to be dismayed by disaster. Within a year it was rebuilt, and on March 4, 1863, was again ready for its faithful audiences. As the opening programme is now historic, it is well to reproduce it here:-- NEW THEATRE ROYAL, BATH. FIRST NIGHT. _Lessee and Manager_, JAMES HENRY CHUTE.