The Times, 3d September, 1883.

“Miss Mary Anderson, although but three or four and twenty, has for several years past occupied a leading position in the United States, and ranks as the highest of the American ‘stars,’ whose effulgence Mr. Abbey relies upon to attract the public at the Lyceum in Mr. Irving’s absence.  Recommendations of this high order were more than sufficient to insure Miss Anderson a cordial reception.  They were such as to dispose a sympathetic audience to make the most ample allowance for nervousness on the part of the debutante, and to distrust all impressions they might have of an unfavorable kind, or at least to grant the possession of a more complete knowledge of the lady’s attainments to those who had trumpeted her praise so loudly.  That such should have been the mood of the house, was a circumstance not without its influence on the events of the evening.  It was manifestly owing in some measure to the critical spirit being subordinated for the time being to the hospitable, that Miss Anderson was able to obtain all the outward and visible signs of a dramatic triumph in a role which intrinsically had little to commend it....  Usually it is the rude manliness, the uncouth virtues, the awkward and childlike submissiveness of that tamed Bull of Bashan [Ingomar] that absorbs the attention of a theatrical audience.  On Saturday evening the center of interest was, of course, transferred to Parthenia.  To the interpretation of this character Miss Anderson brings natural gifts of rare excellence, gifts of face and form and action, which suffice almost themselves to play the part; and the warmth of the applause which greeted her as she first tripped upon the stage expressed the admiration no less than the welcome of the house.  Her severely simple robes of virgin white, worn with classic grace, revealed a figure as lissome and perfect of contour as a draped Venus of Thorwaldsen, her face seen under her mass of dark brown hair, negligently bound with a ribbon, was too mignonne, perhaps, to be classic, but looked pretty and girlish.  A performance so graced could not fail to be pleasing.  And yet it was impossible not to feel, as the play progressed, that to the fine embodiment of the romantic heroine, art was in some degree wanting.  The beautiful Parthenia, like a soulless statue, pleased the eye, but left the heart untouched.  It became evident that faults of training or, perhaps, of temperament, were to be set off against the actress’ unquestionable merits.  The elegant artificiality of the American school, a tendency to pose and be self-conscious, to smirk even, if the word may be permitted, especially when advancing to the footlights to receive a full measure of applause, were fatal to such sentiment as even so stilted a play could be made to yield.  It was but too evident that Parthenia was at all times more concerned with the fall of her drapery than with the effect of her speeches, and that gesture, action,