My father’s days in Paris, in which he escaped from the hard labor and heavy anxiety of his theatrical life of actor, manager, and proprietor, and I from the dull routine of school-room studies and school-ground recreations, were pleasant days to him, and golden ones in my girlish calendar.  I remember seeing, with him, a piece called “Les deux Sergens,” a sort of modern Damon and Pythias, in which the heroic friends are two French soldiers, and in which a celebrated actor of the name of Philippe performed the principal part.  He was the predecessor and model of Frederic Lemaitre, who (himself infinitely superior to his pupil and copyist, Mr. Fechter, who, by a very feeble imitation of Lemaitre’s most remarkable parts, has achieved so much reputation) was not to be compared with Philippe in the sort of sentimental melodrama of which “Les deux Sergens” was a specimen.

This M. Philippe was a remarkable man, not only immensely popular for his great professional merit, but so much respected for an order of merit not apt to be enthusiastically admired by Parisians—­that of a moral character and decent life—­that at his funeral a very serious riot occurred, in consequence of the Archbishop of Paris, according to the received opinion and custom of the day, refusing to allow him to be buried in consecrated ground; the profane player’s calling, in the year of grace 1823, or thereabouts, being still one which disqualified its followers for receiving the sacraments of the Roman Catholic Church, and therefore, of course, for claiming Christian burial.  The general feeling of the Parisian public, however, was in this case too strong for the ancient anathema of the Church.  The Archbishop of Paris was obliged to give way, and the dead body of the worthy actor was laid in the sacred soil of Pere la Chaise.  I believe that since that time the question has never again been debated, nor am I aware that there is any one more peculiarly theatrical cemetery than another in Paris.

In a letter of Talma’s to Charles Young upon my uncle John’s death, he begs to be numbered among the subscribers to the monument about to be erected to Mr. Kemble in Westminster Abbey; adding the touching remark:  “Pour moi, je serai heureux si les pretres me laissent enterrer dans un coin de mon jardin.”

The excellent moral effect of this species of class prejudice is admirably illustrated by an anecdote I have heard my mother tell.  One evening, when she had gone to the Grand Opera with M. Jouy, the wise and witty Hermite de la Chaussee d’Antin, talking with him of the career and circumstances of the young ballet women (she had herself, when very young, been a dancer on the English stage), she wound up her various questions with this:  “Et y en a-t-il qui sont filles de bonne conduite? qui sont sages?” “Ma foi!” replied the Hermite, shrugging his shoulders, “elles auraient grand tort; personne n’y croirait.”