Along the wire walked a harlequin, taking mincing dance steps and balancing across his shoulders a pole from whose extremities dangled two huge baskets. To make the feat the more interesting by adding a spice of possible peril, announcement had been made that each basket contained a live child. The chance of a triple tragedy in the event of a misstep made the tight-wire walk a right diverting spectacle, and thrilling withal, to the good folk of Dublin. But half way between the two extremity posts, still a new element of interest was added. For, at that point, the top suddenly popped off one of the baskets, and a big-eyed, laughing face beamed down, over the edge, at the crowd. The face of a seven-year-old child--a girl. A roar of applause followed upon the youngster's unrehearsed appearance. Thus did Peg Woffington, a queen of her century's actresses and consummate heart conjurer, make her professional debut. Peg--her full first name, which nobody dreamed of using, was Margaret--was the daughter of an Irish bricklayer who had one point in common with certain modernists in that he was rabidly opposed to all doctors. And the medical guild had in due time its revenge on the sacrilegious brick artist. For once, when Woffington fell ill, he fiercely refused to have a physician summoned. And he rapidly grew better. As her husband was convalescing, Mrs. Woffington sought to make assurance doubly certain by calling in a doctor. The pill juggler looked at the invalid and pronounced him out of danger. Next day Woffington died. Peg was just learning to walk at the time of her lamented father's tilt with the cult of Æsculapius. She and her baby sister, Mary, at once set about helping to earn their own living, by toddling on either side of their mother when the widow hawked watercress through the streets, and shrilly piping in duet the virtues of her wares. To Dublin, when Peg was seven, came one Madame Violante, with a troupe of tumblers and rope dancers. Peg was apprenticed to Madame Violante. But her term of service as a baby acrobat was short. Her employer had better use for her. It was Madame Violante who originated the ever-since-popular custom of producing famous plays and operas, with child actors filling all the roles. Her "Liliputian Troupe" scored a big success in Dublin and the provinces. Much of this success was due to Peg, who almost invariably was cast for old-woman parts, and who "doubled in the brass" by doing quaint little step dances between the acts. It was cruelly hard work for a growing child; nor was the early eighteenth-century theater the very best sort of nursery and moral training school for little girls. But apart from other and less creditable lessons acquired, she learned stage presence and practically every art and trick of the profession.