In "The Rounders" Miss Lessing succeeded Mabelle Gilman as Priscilla during the run of that brisk vaudeville at the Columbia Theatre, Boston. It is a thankless task, that of successorship which results inevitably in direct comparisons, but Miss Lessing met the test surprisingly well. Without Miss Gilman's strength of personality and less apparent art, Miss Lessing indicated with unmistakable correctness the sentimental atmosphere of prudish modesty, which represents Priscilla as a dramatic character. With memories of "Jack and the Beanstalk"--they seem inevitable where Miss Lessing is concerned--one was a little bewildered at Priscilla's embarrassment in her ballet costume during the scene in Thea's dressing-room. This bewilderment was due to Miss Lessing's inability to impersonate. She is always Madge Lessing acting,--never Madge Lessing identified with another and wholly different personality; and at the sight of Madge Lessing embarrassed because she wore tights, one had a right to be bewildered. During the Spring of 1900 Miss Lessing also appeared in the title role of "The Lady Slavey" when that musical farce was revived in Boston. CHAPTER VIII JESSIE BARTLETT DAVIS The name and fame of Jessie Bartlett Davis are linked inseparably with the history of that prominent light opera organization, The Bostonians, with which she was connected for ten years, and from which she resigned during the summer of 1899. If the proprietors of The Bostonians had ever acknowledged that it were possible for any one to be a star in their troupe, that star would have been Mrs. Davis. To be sure, tradition would have been violated by such a procedure, for Mrs. Davis is a contralto, and tradition decrees that a soprano shall be the only woman star in opera. The composer naturally conceives his heroine as a soprano. In fact, his heroine must be a soprano in order that he may invent brilliants for her to sing. You cannot do that sort of thing for the mellow-toned contralto, and consequently she is never the centre of feminine interest. When a composer needs a contralto for a quartette or something of that kind, he usually puts her in tights and calls her a man, gets her as little involved in the plot as possible, gives her some heart-throbbing songs and uses her voice effectively for padding in the choruses, where the high notes of his heroine soprano shine like diamonds. There is, however, one seriously practical reason for the neglect of the contralto, Sopranos, good, bad, and indifferent, are almost as common as piano-players, but contraltos--even bad and indifferent contraltos--are rare enough to be noted when found; while contraltos that vocally are entitled to rank with the best light opera sopranos are so uncommon it is not strange that no one thought it worth while to write operas especially for them.