In this, as in other plays, he used to make his entrance in the skin of the part.  No need for him to rattle a ladder at the side to get up excitement and illusion as Macready is said to have done.  He walked on, and was the simple-minded old clergyman, just as he had walked on a prince in “Hamlet,” a king in “Charles I.,” and a saint in “Becket.”

A very handsome woman, descended from Mrs. Siddons and looking exactly like her, played the gipsy in “Olivia.”  The likeness was of no use, because the possessor of it had no talent.  What a pity!

“Olivia” has always been a family play.  Edy and Ted walked on the stage for the first time in the Court “Olivia.”  In later years Ted played Moses and Edy made her first appearance in a speaking part as Polly Flamborough, and has since played both Sophia and the Gipsy.  My brother Charlie’s little girl Beatrice made her first appearance as Bill, my sister Floss played Olivia on a provincial tour, and my sister Marion played it at the Lyceum when I was ill.

I saw Floss play it, and took from her a lovely and sincere bit of “business.”  In the third act, where the Vicar has found his erring daughter and has come to take her away from the inn, I had always hesitated at my entrance as if I were not quite sure what reception my father would give me after what had happened.  Floss in the same situation came running in and went straight to her father, quite sure of his love if not of his forgiveness.

I did not take some business which Marion did on Terriss’s suggestion.  Where Thornhill tells Olivia that she is not his wife, I used to thrust him away with both hands as I said—­“Devil!”

“It’s very good, Nell, very fine,” said Terriss to me, “but believe me, you miss a great effect there.  You play it grandly, of course, but at that moment you miss it.  As you say ‘Devil!’ you ought to strike me full in the face.”

“Oh, don’t be silly, Terriss,” I said, “she’s not a pugilist.”

Of course I saw, apart from what was dramatically fit, what would happen.

However Marion, very young, very earnest, very dutiful, anxious to please Terriss, listened eagerly to the suggestion during an understudy rehearsal.

“No one could play this part better than your sister Nell,” said Terriss to the attentive Marion, “but as I always tell her, she does miss one great effect.  When Olivia says ‘Devil!’ she ought to hit me bang in the face.”

“Thank you for telling me,” said Marion gratefully.

“It will be much more effective,” said Terriss.

It was.  When the night came for Marion to play the part, she struck out, and Terriss had to play the rest of the scene with a handkerchief held to his bleeding nose!

I think it was as Olivia that Eleonora Duse first saw me act.  She had thought of playing the part herself some time, but she said:  “Never now!” No letter about my acting ever gave me the same pleasure as this from her: