I played it at Yonkers and Mount Vernon, three nights in each place, if memory serves me correctly, but “went through it” is the true description of my performance. For the theatre, either as a writer or actor, I possess no trace of talent, a fact rediscovered recently when playing an insignificant part in Drinkwater’s “Oliver Cromwell” on tour with Henry Ainley. My dismissal at the end of the first week, however, was not due to this lack of skill--it was due to a pail of beer and the leading lady. For the leading lady, handsome daughter, I remember, of a Washington General, was the inspiration of the touring company, and it was for her _beaux yeux_ that the enterprise was undertaken. Gilmour was what is known as “crazy” about her, his jealousy a standing joke among us, so that when those _beaux yeux_ were turned upon my lanky, half-starved self, there were warnings that trouble might begin. But I was looking for salary and food rather than for trouble. In the dressing-room we underlings all shared together, though “dressing” was of negligible kind, I was quite safe. Chance meetings, however, were unavoidable, of course, and Bettina’s instinct for adventure was distinctly careless. It was here the pail of beer came in--into our crowded dressing-room. Who brought it, I have forgotten; the miscreant who stood treat to the band of hungry and thirsty Thespians is lost to memory. I only know that, empty of food as I was, my share of that gallon pail distinctly cheered me. The _beaux yeux_ had been boldly rolling; another pair of eyes, not so lovely, had been rolling too. To be ungallantly honest about it, my own feelings were not engaged in any way, except on this particular night, when they were considerably roused--against that stupid, jealous Gilmour. The way he glared in my direction stirred my bile; the few glasses of beer made me reckless. When the escaping prisoner fought with me for the possession of the great wooden pistol, I refused to be “thrown.”