Trained for the stage from her earliest childhood, and destined unquestioningly for the career of an actress, her first appearance came and went so much as a matter of course that there has remained some uncertainty as to the date and part. Miss Terry herself declares for April 28, 1856, and Mamillius, in _The Winter’s Tale_. Much painstaking research has been applied to the question, confirming her strong impression. Yet Dutton Cook said he remembered seeing Kate and Ellen Terry as the two princes in _Richard III_, and wrote: “My recollection of Ellen Terry dates from her impersonation of the little Duke of York. She was a child of six, or thereabout, slim and dainty of form, with profuse flaxen curls, and delicately featured face, curiously bright and arch of expression; and she won, as I remember, her first applause when, in clear resonant tones, she delivered the lines: ‘Uncle, my brother mocks both you and me; Because that I am little, like an ape, He thinks that you should bear me on your shoulders’ Richard’s representative [Charles Kean] meanwhile scowling wickedly and tugging at his gloves desperately, pursuant to paternal example and stage tradition. A year or two later and the baby actress was representing now Mamillius and now Puck.” Mr. Cook’s recollection is not borne out by the play bills, however, and it may safely be said that Ellen Terry’s first appearance was as Mamillius when she was eight years old.[74] Miss Terry has given us her own impressions of her first night as Mamillius. “How my young heart swelled with pride--I can recall the sensation now--when I was told what I had to do. There is something in a woman’s nature which always makes her recollect how she was dressed at any especially eventful moment of her life, and I can see myself, as though it were yesterday, in my little red and white coat--very short--_very_ pink silk stockings, and a row of tight sausage curls--my mother was always very careful that they should be in perfect order and regularity--clustered round my head. A small go-cart, which it was my duty to drag about the stage, was also a keen source of pride, and a great trouble to me. My first dramatic failure dates from that go-cart. I was told to run about with it on the stage, and while carrying out my instructions with more vigor than discretion, tripped over the handle, and down I came on my back. A titter ran through the house, and I felt that my career as an actress was ruined forever. Bitter and copious were the tears I shed--but I am not sure that the incident has materially altered the course of my life.”[75] The _Times_ concluded its review of the production with the words: “And last--aye, and least too--Miss Ellen Terry plays the boy Mamillius with a vivacious precocity that proves her a worthy relative of her sister Miss Kate.”