"Then I will be merry, mother, or anything else you wish. So don’t vex your poor little head about me. I shall add a grey hair to it if you bother yourself so much." "You would find it hard to change it now, unless you changed it to black," said Lady Jane. When ’Rosalind’ and ’Celia’ together appeared on the stage, a long and hearty welcome was given forth from every part of the house. Mr. Melton was standing in the wings with Mrs. Christmas, and his dry grey face brightened up with pleasure. "They have not forgotten her, have they?" he said, triumphantly. "How could they?" was the natural response. From that moment the old woman’s eyes never left the form of her scholar during the progress of the play. Keenly and narrowly she watched the expression of her face, her manner of acting, the subtle harmony of word and gesture which, in careful keeping, make the part of ’Rosalind’ an artistic wonder. And the more narrowly she studied her pupil’s performance, the more she convinced herself that there was nothing to be found fault with. The timid pleasantries, the tender sadness, the coy love advances, tempered and beautified by that unconscious halo of modesty and virgin grace which surrounds the gentlest of all Shakspeare’s heroines, were there before her eyes, and she was forced to say to herself that no ’Rosalind’ could be more charming than this ’Rosalind.’ She did not reflect that never before had she been constrained so to convince herself, and that never before had she been so anxious to know the effect on the audience. That, so far as was yet appreciable, was satisfactory. The mere charm of admirably artistic acting, combined with a graceful figure and a pretty face, was enough to captivate any body of spectators. Mrs. Christmas, however, dared not confess to herself that they seemed to want that electric thrill of sympathy which had been wont to bring them and the young actress immediately _en rapport_. Once only did they in the first act catch that swift contagion of delight which flashes through an audience bound by the master-spell of genius. It was where ’Rosalind,’ having graced the victorious wrestler with a chain from her own neck, is about to go away with ’Celia,’ and yet is loth to go without having had speech of the young man who has so awakened her interest. The half-interpreted longing, the hesitating glance, and maiden bashfulness with which she turned to him and said: "Did you call, sir?— Sir, you have wrestled well, and overthrown More than your enemies," —her eyes first seeking his face, and then being cast down, as the words became almost inaudible—provoked the house into a sudden tempest of applause which covered her disappearance from the scene, Mrs. Christmas caught her as she came off, and kissed her, with nervous tears in her eyes.