Any one who has come with me so far in my life will realize that Kate Terry was much better known than Ellen at the time of Ellen’s first retirement from the stage.  From Bristol my sister had gone to London to become Fechter’s “leading lady,” and from that time until she made her last appearance in 1867 as Juliet at the Adelphi, her career was a blaze of triumph.

Before I came back to take part in her farewell tour (she became engaged to Mr. Arthur Lewis in 1866), I paid my first visit to Paris.  I saw the Empress Eugenie driving in the Bois, looking like an exquisite waxwork.  Oh, the beautiful slope of women at this period!  They sat like lovely half-moons, lying back in their carriages.  It was an age of elegance—­in France particularly—­an age of luxury.  They had just laid down asphalt for the first time in the streets of Paris, and the quiet of the boulevards was wonderful after the rattling London streets.  I often went to three parties a night; but I was in a difficult position, as I could not speak a word of the language.  I met Tissot and Gambard, who had just built Rosa Bonheur’s house at Nice.

I liked the Frenchmen because they liked me, but I didn’t admire them.

I tried to learn to smoke, but I never took kindly to it and soon gave it up.

What was the thing that made me homesick for London? Household Words. The excitement in the ’sixties over each new Dickens can be understood only by people who experienced it at the time.  Boys used to sell Household Words in the streets, and they were often pursued by an eager crowd, for all the world as if they were carrying news of the “latest winner.”

Of course I went to the theater in Paris.  I saw Sarah Bernhardt for the first time, and Madame Favart, Croisette, Delaunay, and Got.  I never thought Croisette—­a superb animal—­a “patch” on Sarah, who was at this time as thin as a harrow.  Even then I recognized that Sarah was not a bit conventional, and would not stay long at the Comedie.  Yet she did not put me out of conceit with the old school.  I saw “Les Precieuses Ridicules” finely done, and I said to myself then, as I have often said since:  “Old school—­new school?  What does it matter which, so long as it is good enough?”

Madame Favart I knew personally, and she gave me many useful hints.  One was never to black my eyes underneath when “making up.”  She pointed out that although this was necessary when the stage was lighted entirely from beneath, it had become ugly and meaningless since the introduction of top lights.

The friend who took me everywhere in Paris landed me one night in the dressing-room of a singer.  I remember it because I heard her complain to a man of some injustice.  She had not got some engagement that she had expected.

“It serves you damn right!” he answered.  “You can’t sing a bit.”  For the first time I seemed to realize how brutal it was of a man to speak to a woman like that, and I hated it.