Boys take my advice, the stage is not the question But whether at three score you'll all have my digestion, Why yearn for plays, to pose as Brutuses or Catos in, When you may get a garden to grow the best potatoes in? You see that at my age by Nature's shocks unharmed I am! Tho' if I sneeze but thrice, good heavens, how alarmed I am! But act your parts like men, and tho' you all great sinners are, You're sure to act like men wherever Irving's dinners are! J. H. Allen (our prompter): Whatever be the play, _I_ must have a hand in it, For won't I teach the supers how to stalk and stand in it? Tho' that blessed Shakespeare never gives a ray to them, I explain the text, and then it's clear as day to them! Plain as A, B, C is a plot historical. When _I_ overhaul allusions allegorical! Shakespeare's not so bad; he'd have more pounds and pence in him, If actors stood aside, and let me show the sense in him![3] [Illustration: ELLEN TERRY WITH HER FOX-TERRIERS, DUMMY AND FUSSIE; FROM A PHOTOGRAPH TAKEN IN 1889] Louis Austin's little "Lyceum Play" was presented to me with a silver water-jug, a souvenir from the company, and ended up with the following pretty lines spoken by Katie Brown, a clever little girl who played all the small pages' parts at this time: Although I'm but a little page, Who waits for Portia's kind behest, Mine is the part upon this stage To tell the plot you have not guessed. Dear lady, oft in Belmont's hall Whose mistress is so sweet and fair, Your humble slaves would gladly fall Upon their knees, and praise you there. To offer you this little gift, Dear Portia, now we crave your leave. And let it have the grace to lift Our hearts to yours this Christmas eve. And so we pray that you may live Thro' many, many, happy years, And feel what you so often give, The joy that is akin to tears! How nice of Louis Austin! It quite made up for my mortification over the camphor pudding! [Illustration: MISS ROSA CORDER FROM THE PAINTING BY JAMES McNEILL WHISTLER _Reproduced from an approved print in the possession of the Lenox Library._] _The Best Ophelia of My Life_