... I shall be surprised if she does not make her way." Praised be Sarcey! That was better than a second prize for Réjane. The Oracle gave her the first, without dividing it. She got an immediate engagement; and in March, 1875, appeared on that stage where to-day she reigns supreme, the Vaudeville, to which she brought back the vaudeville that was no longer played there. She began by alienating the heart of Alphonse Daudet, who, while recognising her clever delivery, found fault with her unemotional gaiety; but, in compensation, another authoritative critic, Auguste Vitu, wrote, after the performance of _Pierre_: "Mademoiselle Réjane showed herself full of grace and feeling. She rendered Gabrielle's despair with a naturalness, a brilliancy, a spontaneity, which won a most striking success." Shall I follow her through each of her creations, from her début in _La Revue des Deux-Mondes_, up to her supreme triumph in _Madame Sans-Gêne_? Shall I show her as the sly soubrette in _Fanny Lear_? as the woman in love, "whose ignorance divines all things," in _Madame Lili_? as the comical Marquise de Menu-Castel in _Le Verglas_? Shall I tell of her first crowning success, when she played Gabrielle in _Pierre_? Shall I recall her stormy interpretation of Madame de Librac, in _Le Club_? and her dramatic conception of the part of Ida?--which quite reversed the previous judgments of her critics, wringing praise from her enemy Daudet, and censure from her faithful admirer Vitu. The natural order of things, however, was re-established by her performance of _Les Tapageurs_; again Daudet found her cold and lacking in tenderness; and Vitu again applauded. Her successes at the Vaudeville extend from 1875 to 1882; and towards the end of that period, Réjane, always rising higher in her art, created Anita in _L'Auréole_ and the Baronne d'Oria in _Odette_. Next, forgetting her own traditions, she appeared at the Théâtre des Panoramas, and at the Ambigu, where she gave a splendid interpretation of Madame Cézambre in Richepin's _La Giu_; and at Les Variétés as Adrienne in _Ma Camarade_. Now fickle, now constant to her first love, she alternated between the Variétés and the Vaudeville; took an engagement at the Odéon; assisted at the birth and death of the Grand-Théâtre; and just lately the Vaudeville has won her back once more.