And I recall a conversation with Sir Henry Irving one night when he said to me, "Fetch me a glass of water, will you?" and I said, "Sir Henry, it is not only a pleasure to get it but it is to me, as a humble devotee of the art that you have ennobled, a high privilege. I will go further--" "Do," he said. Henry was like that, quick, sympathetic, what we call in French "vibrant." Forbes Robertson I shall never forget: he owes me 50 cents. And as for Martin Harvey--I simply cannot call him Sir John, we are such dear old friends--he never comes to this town without at once calling in my services to lend a hand in his production. No doubt everybody knows that splendid play in which he appears, called "The Breed of the Treshams." There is a torture scene in it, a most gruesome thing. Harvey, as the hero, has to be tortured, not on the stage itself, but off the stage in a little room at the side. You can hear him howling as he is tortured. Well, it was I who was torturing him. We are so used to working together that Harvey didn't want to let anybody do it but me. So naturally I am a keen friend and student of the Drama: and I hate to think of it going all to pieces. The trouble with it is that it is becoming a mere mass of conversation and reflection: nothing happens in it; the action is all going out of it and there is nothing left but thought. When actors begin to think, it is time for a change. They are not fitted for it. Now in my day--I mean when I was at the apogee of my reputation (I think that is the word--it may be apologee--I forget)--things were very different. What we wanted was action--striking, climatic, catastrophic action, in which things not only happened, but happened suddenly and all in a lump. And we always took care that the action happened in some place that was worth while, not simply in an ordinary room with ordinary furniture, the way it is in the new drama. The scene was laid in a lighthouse (top story), or in a mad house (at midnight), or in a power house, or a dog house, or a bath house, in short, in some place with a distinct local color and atmosphere. I remember in the case of the first play I ever wrote (I write plays, too) the manager to whom I submitted it asked me at once, the moment he glanced at it, "Where is the action of this laid?" "It is laid," I answered, "in the main sewer of a great city." "Good, good," he said; "keep it there."