After taking leave of my friends I was still full of hope and ambition. My mother in vain tried to share my feelings; she could not avoid painful misgivings. As for me, I wanted to think only of the good things that awaited, and to forget all the past annoyances. During the voyage an evening entertainment was organised for the benefit of the seamen and I agreed to dance. A stage was arranged by the bridge. There with the sea for a background and with the coloured lights used for signalling as the media of illumination, I tried for the first time a series of new dances, each with a special gown. The enthusiasm of passengers and crew knew no bounds and I felt that I had taken my first step in the conquest of a new world. We landed in Germany. My manager came to meet us and took us to Berlin. But, to my great annoyance, I found that I was not to make my initial appearance for a month, and I could not discover in what city I was to make it. That meant a month of inactivity. Finally I learned that I was to make my debut, not at the Opera as my manager had promised, but in a music hall. The Opera was closed, and the music hall was the only place where I could dance. In that event I would dance only my first dance and would exhibit only a single gown, just as I had done in New York. I then chose three of my numbers and prepared myself for my appearance. But this debut was made without personal interest. In America the best theatres offered me engagements on much better terms than those I had to accept in Europe. In Berlin I was obliged to appear where my New York manager wished. If, before signing the contract, he had told me where I should have to dance I should have declined. But when the time for my appearance was at hand I was without resources and quite at his mercy. To cap the climax my mother fell seriously ill. At the time of which I am writing cholera had just broken out at Hamburg. My mother’s illness came on so suddenly that it was thought she was stricken with cholera. Everybody at the hotel was frightened, and we were obliged to take my poor mother to the cholera hospital. All these circumstances, conjoined with frightfully trying weather, put me in bad shape for the struggle. I renounced everything, my pride, my highest hopes, and I started in assiduously to gain our livelihood. But I was disabled and without courage. After a month my German manager informed me he did not care to continue my contract. He was going back to the United States with a company that he had come for the express purpose of engaging in Germany. It seemed clear to me that his only motive in bringing me to Europe had been to procure the means with which to engage this new company and take it back with him. He travelled with his wife, a pretty American woman, who had become a close friend of mine, and who reproached him most bitterly on my account.