and until I can call at my Empessy,' he went on, 'I am absolutely without means.' I looked up and down the street. There was nobody about. He was a very small man but a very great nuisance. I hit him hard on the point of the jaw. He fell flat on the curb, and I took to my heels. It was not a heroic act, but it was a very comforting one.

CHAPTER X

Bohemian amenities-Mrs. Alfred Wigan and Mrs. Keeley'Bottle on it!'-My earliest recollection of Beerbohm TreeAn unchronicled conflagration at Her Majesty's Opera-House -One or two Bancroft stories-A conscientious 'extra-lady' -Harry Kemble and Arthur Cecil and the New YearCecil as an equestrian.

No unprejudiced observer who enters Bohemian society can fail to be impressed by the spirit of camaraderie and good-fellowship, by the generous appreciation of a fellow-artist, by the mutual esteem and admiration, which prevails among actors and actresses, and which distinguishes their conversation when they talk of one another. Though I am bound in honesty to say that a very similar tone prevails in the intimate gossip of soldiers and soldiers' wives, parsons and parsons' wives, barristers and barristers' wives, and even of bricklayers and bricklayers' wives.

I remember once, many years ago (unfortunately for playgoers, both ladies have since gone to the realm where there are no critics), hearing Mrs.

Candour thus take up the cudgels on behalf of her friend, Mrs. Checkers. You know, I've heard all sorts of stories about Mrs. Checkers' early life. I don't believe one of them. I believe they're all a pack of malicious falsehoods. And I'll tell you why. Of course, in my life I've had to meet all kinds of women, including plenty who were-well, no better than they should be, as the saying goes. But in every one of them, however old and weather-beaten she might be, there was always some little trace of charm that you could identify and say, "Ah! that's what the men used to admire. Now, there's nothing of that sort about Mrs. Checkers.":

That delightful actress whom many of us remember in our youth, Mrs. Alfred Wigan, began life as a stilt-walker. When a child, with her little feet strapped to a couple of tall poles, she would stalk in and out of the coaches on the hill at Epsom, and rally and cajole small change out of the assembled sportsmen as they lunched. Or in the summer, in Mayfair, old dowagers taking tea at open drawing-room windows would be startled by the sudden appearance of a pathetic little figure, clad in tawdry muslin and spangles, tendering her scallop-shell across the balcony and pleading for coppers.

At the time that I knew the Wigans they were not only universally popular as comedians, but were

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sought after in society, when society was society— that is to say, before it had been successfully raided by Financiers of the Old Law. Alfred and his wife were frequently honoured by a command from Her Majesty to bring their company to perform at Windsor. It is not to be wondered at that her social success rather turned the head of the gifted Leonora―that is to say, that she became a little apt to give herself airs among her brother and sister artists who had been less favoured.

One day, when she was directing the rehearsal of a modern comedy on the stage of the Olympic, some little question of manners arose, and Mrs. Keeley ventured to express an opinion at variance with Mrs. Wigan's. 'Nonsense, my dear!' exclaimed the manageress. 'Such a thing would be unheard of! And I think I ought to know. You must admit, my dear, that I've seen a little more of the inside of a London drawing-room than you have.' 'I know you have, dear,' replied Mrs. Keeley, without a moment's hesitation-through the firstfloor windows!"

Mrs. Alfred Wigan once told me a story which illustrates very graphically the spirit in which the histrionic artist is apt to regard his creations. And which also shows that an author may know nothing of his brightest lines. It was when the Wigans were managing the Olympic Theatre in Wych

Street. The play was a melodrama, in which a shipwreck occurred, and there was a scene upon a desert island. One night Mrs. Wigan stood in the first entrance to watch this scene. The lowcomedian, who represented a sailor, in due course appeared. He had the stage to himself, and advanced to what used to be generically termed a 'bank' (that is to say, an object rather like a coffin, covered with green baize, which, before the days of realism, did duty for a rustic bench, a rock, a bit of a ruin, or, in fact, for any kind of open-air seat). He then produced a black bottle from the sidepocket of his reefer-jacket, placed it upon the 'bank,' admired it for a moment in silence, then came down to the footlights and, smiting the side of his nose with his forefinger, exclaimed mysteriously: 'Bottle on it!' At which there was a shriek of delight from the audience and a deafening storm of applause. As soon as the act was over, Mrs. Wigan called the comedian to her. I wanted to ask you,' she said, ' about that line "Bottle on it!"

'Didn't it go? My word! They're a splendid lot in front to-night-sympathetic! intelligent! quick!' said the stage castaway, glowing with triumph.

'But why do you say "Bottle on it"?' inquired the manageress.

Why do I say it?' repeated the bewildered 'Didn't you hear how they roared?'

artist.