Going to Meet the “Britannic”—The “Blackbird”—Skirmishers of the American Press—The London “Standard’s” Message to New York, Boston, and Chicago—“Working” America—“Reportorial” Experiences—Daylight off Staten Island—At Quarantine under the Stars and Stripes—“God Save the Queen!” and “Hail to the Chief!”—Received and “Interviewed”—“Portia on a Trip from the Venetian Seas”—What the Reporters Think and what Irving Says—The Necessity of Applause—An Anecdote of Forrest—Mr. Vanderbilt and the Mirror—Miss Terry and the Reporters—“Tell them I never loved home so well as now”—Landed and Welcomed—Scenes on the Quay—At the Brevoort.

I.

Four o’clock in the morning, October 21, 1883. A cheerful gleam of light falls upon a group of Lotos guests as they separate at the hospitable door-way of that famous New York club. Otherwise Fifth avenue is solitary and cold. The voices of the clubmen strike the ear pleasantly. “Going to meet Irving,” you hear some of them say, and “Good-night,” the others. Presently the group breaks up, and moves off in different directions. “I ordered a carriage at the Brevoort House,” says one of the men who pursue their way down Fifth avenue. They are the only persons stirring in the street. The electric arcs give them accompanying shadows as black as the night-clouds above them. The Edison lamps exhibit the tall buildings, sharp and clear, against the darkness. Two guardians of a carpet-store, on the corner of Fourteenth street, sleep calmly among the show-bales that decorate the sidewalk. An empty car goes jingling along into Union square. A pair of flickering lights are seen in the distance. They belong to “the carriage at the Brevoort House.” It will only hold half our number. The civilities that belong to such a situation being duly exchanged, there are some who prefer to walk; and an advance is made on foot and on wheels towards the North river.

For my own part I would, as a rule, rather walk than ride in a private carriage in New York. The street cars and the elevated railroad are comfortable enough; but a corduroy road in a forest track is not more emphatic in its demands upon the nerves of a timid driver than are the pitfalls of a down-town street in the Empire city. I nevertheless elect to ride. We are four; we might be any number, to one who should attempt to count us, so numerous does the jolting of our otherwise comfortable brougham appear to make us. We are tossed and pitched about as persistently as we might be in a dingy during a gale off some stormy headland. Presently the fresh breeze of the river blows upon us as if to justify the simile; then we are thrown at each other more violently than ever; a flash of gas-light greets us; the next moment it is dark again, and we stop with alarming suddenness. “Twenty-second street pier,” says our driver, opening the door. We are received by a mysterious officer, who addresses us from beneath a world of comforters and overcoats. “Want the ‘Blackbird’?” he asks. We do. “This way,” he says. We follow him, to be ushered straightway into the presence of those active scouts and skirmishers of the American press,—the interviewers. Here they are, a veritable army of them, on board Mr. Starin’s well-known river steamer, the “Blackbird,” their wits and their pencils duly sharpened for their prey. Youth and age both dedicate themselves to this lively branch of American journalism. I tell a London friend who is here to “mind his eye,” or they may practise upon him, and that if he refuses to satisfy their inquiries they may sacrifice him to their spleen; for some of them are shivering with cold, and complaining that they have had no rest. Finding an English artist here from the “Illustrated London News,” I conduct him secretly to the “Ladies’ cabin.” It is occupied by a number of mysterious forms, lying about in every conceivable posture; some on the floor, some on the sofas; their faces partially disguised under slouch hats, their figures enveloped in cloaks and coats. They are asleep. The cabin is dimly lighted, and there is an odor of tobacco in the oily atmosphere. “Who are they?” asks my friend, in a whisper. “Interviewers!” I reply, as we slip back to the stove in the saloon. “What a picture DorÉ would have made of the ladies’ cabin!” says the English artist.

II.

We encounter more new-comers in the saloon. Two of them bring copies of the morning papers. I recognize several of the interesting crowd, and cannot help telling them something of the conversation of the Beefsteak Club room guest who drew their pictures in London, as a warning to the traveller whom they were going to meet. I find them almost as ill-informed, and quite as entertaining, concerning Irving’s mannerisms, as was the traveller in question touching their own occupation. They talk very much in the spirit of what has recently appeared here in some of the newspapers about Irving and his art-methods. New York, they say, will not be dictated to by London; New York judges for itself. At the same time they do not think it a generous thing on the part of the London “Standard” to send a hostile editorial avant-courier to New York, to prejudice the English actor’s audiences and his critics.[2] Nor do they think this “British malevolence” will have any effect either way, though the “Standard” practically proclaims Mr. Irving and Miss Terry as impostors. This article has been printed by the press, from New York to San Francisco, while the Lyceum Company and its chief are on the Atlantic. I have often heard it said, in England, that Irving had been wonderfully “worked” in America. Men who are worthy to have great and devoted friends unconsciously make bitter enemies. Irving is honored with a few of these attendants upon fame. If the people who regard his reputation as a thing that has been “worked” could have visited New York a week before his arrival they could not have failed to be delighted to see how much was being done against him, and how little for him. An ingenious and hostile pamphleteer was in evidence in every bookseller’s window. Villainous cheap photographs of “actor and manager” were hawked in the streets. Copies of an untruthful sketch of his career, printed by a London weekly, were circulated through the mails. The “Standard’s” strange appeal to New York, Boston, and Chicago was cabled to the “Herald” and republished in the evening papers. Ticket speculators had bought up all the best seats at the Star Theatre, where the English actor was to appear, and refused to sell them to the public except at exorbitant, and, for many play-goers, prohibitive rates. So far as “working” went the London enemies of the Lyceum manager were so actively represented in New York that his friends in the Empire city must have felt a trifle chilled at the outlook. The operations of the ticket speculators, it must, however, be admitted, seemed to project in Irving’s path the most formidable of all the other obstacles.

III.

But Irving’s ship is sailing on through the darkness while I have been making this “aside,” and the “Blackbird” is in motion; for I hear the swish of the river, and the lights on shore are dancing by the port-holes. Mr. Abbey’s fine military band, from the Metropolitan Opera House, has come on board; so also has a band of waiters from the Brunswick. Breakfast is being spread in the saloon. The brigands from the ladies’ cabin have laid aside their slouch hats and cloaks. They look as harmless and as amiable as any company of English journalists. Night and dark-lanterns might convert the mildest-mannered crowd into the appearance of a pirate crew.

I wish the Irving guest of my first chapter could see and talk to these interviewers. I learn that they represent journals at Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago, St. Louis, and other cities besides New York. One of them has interviewed Lord Coleridge; another was with Grant during the war; a third was with Lee. They have all had interesting experiences. One is an Englishman; another hails from “bonnie Scotland.” There is no suggestion of rowdyism among them. I owe them an apology on the “excuse accuse” principle, for saying these things; but the “interviewer” is not understood in England; he is often abused in America, and I should like to do him justice. These gentlemen of the press who are going out to meet Irving are reporters. Socially they occupy the lowest station of journalism, though their work is of primary importance. Intellectually they are capable men, and the best of them write graphically, and with an artistic sense of the picturesque. They should, and no doubt do, develop into accomplished and powerful journalists; for theirs is the best of education. They study mankind; they come in contact with the most prominent of American statesmen; they talk with all great foreigners who visit the United States; they are admitted into close intercourse with the leading spirits of the age; they have chatted on familiar terms with Lincoln, Sheridan, Grant, Garfield, Huxley, Coleridge, Arnold, Patti, Bernhardt, Nilsson, and they will presently have added to the long list of their personal acquaintances Irving and Miss Terry. They are travellers, and, of necessity, observers. Their presscard is a talisman that opens to them all doors of current knowledge; and I am bound to say that these men on board the “Blackbird” are, in conversation and manners, quite worthy of the trust reposed in them by the several great journals which they represent.

IV.

“‘Britannic’ ahead!” shouts a voice from the gangway. We clamber on deck. It is daylight. The air is still keen. The wooded shores of Staten island are brown with the last tints of autumn. Up the wide reaches of the river, an arm of the great sea, come all kinds of craft; some beating along under sail; others, floating palaces, propelled by steam. These latter are ferry-boats and passenger steamers. You have seen them in many a marine picture and panorama of American travel. The “Blackbird” is typical of the rest,—double decks, broad saloons, tiers of berths, ladies’ cabins, and every ceiling packed with life-buoys in case of accident. We push along through the choppy water, our steam-whistle screaming hoarse announcements of our course. The “Britannic” lies calmly at quarantine, the stars and stripes at her topmast, the British flag at her stern. She is an impressive picture,—her masts reaching up into the gray sky, every rope taut, her outlines sharp and firm. In the distance other ocean steamers glide towards us, attended by busy tugs and handsome launches. One tries to compare the scene with the Mersey and the Thames, and the only likeness is in the ocean steamers, which have come thence across the seas. For the rest, the scene is essentially American,—the broad river, the gay wooden villas ashore, the brown hills, the bright steam craft on the river, the fast rig of the trading schooners; and above all the stars and stripes of the many flags that flutter in the breeze, and the triumphant eagles that extend their golden wings over the lofty steerage turrets of tug and floating palace.

Now we are alongside the “Britannic.” As our engines stop, the band of thirty Italians on our deck strikes up “God save the Queen.” One or two British hands instinctively raise one or two British hats, and many a heart, I am sure, on board the “Britannic” beats the quicker under the influence of the familiar strains. A few emigrants, with unkempt hair, on the after deck, gaze open-mouthed at the “Blackbird.” Several early risers appear forward and greet with waving hands the welcoming crowd from New York. One has time to note the weather-beaten color of the “Britannic’s” funnels.

“What sort of a passage?” cries a voice, shouting in competition with the wind that is blowing hard through the rigging.

“Pretty rough,” is the answer.

“Where is Mr. Irving?” cries out another “Blackbird” passenger.

“In bed,” is the response.

“Oh!” says the interrogator, amidst a general laugh.

“Beg pardon, no,” presently shouts the man on the “Britannic,”—“he’s shaving.”

Another laugh, drowned by a salute of some neighboring guns. At this moment a boat is lowered from the splendid yacht “Yosemite,” which has been steaming round about the “Britannic” for some time. It is Mr. Tilden’s vessel. He has lent it to Mr. Lawrence Barrett and Mr. William Florence. They have come out to meet Irving and Miss Terry, with a view to carry them free from worry or pressure to their several hotels. The two well-known actors are in the yacht’s pinnace, and some of us wonder if they are good sailors. The waves which do not stir the “Britannic,” and only gently move the “Blackbird,” fairly toss the “Yosemite’s” boat; but the occupants appear to be quite at home in her. She disappears around the “Britannic’s” bows to make the port side for boarding, and as she does so Mr. Irving suddenly appears between the gangway and the ship’s boats, on a level with the deck of the “Blackbird” about midships. “There he is!” shout a score of voices. He looks pale in the cold, raw light; but he smiles pleasantly, and takes off a felt bowler hat as the “Blackbird” gives him a cheer of welcome.

“Won’t you come here? The quarantine authorities object to our visiting the ship until the doctor has left her.”

A plank is thrust from our paddle-box, Irving climbs the “Britannic’s” bulwark, and grasps a hand held out to steady him as he clambers aboard the “Blackbird” right in the midst of the interviewers. Shaking hands with his manager, Mr. Abbey, and others, he is introduced to some of the pressmen, who scan his face and figure with undisguised interest. By this time Messrs. Barrett and Florence appear on the “Britannic.” They have got safely out of their boat and have a breezy and contented expression in their eyes. Irving now recrosses the temporary gangway, and is fairly embraced by his two American friends. The band strikes up, “Hail to the Chief!” Then the gentlemen of the press are invited to join Mr. Irving on board the “Yosemite.” They are arrested by what one of them promptly designates “a vision of pre-Raphaelitish beauty.” It is Miss Ellen Terry.[3] Every hat goes off as she comes gayly through the throng. “Portia, on a trip from the Venetian seas!” exclaims an enthusiastic young journalist, endeavoring to cap the Æsthetic compliment of his neighbor. Escorted by Mr. Barrett, and introduced by Mr. Irving, she is deeply moved, as well she may be, by the novel scene. “Britannic” passengers crowd about her to say good-by; the band is playing “Rule, Britannia”; many a gay river boat and steamer is navigating the dancing waters; the sun is shining, flags fluttering, and a score of hands are held out to help Portia down the gangway on board the “Yosemite,” which is as trim and bright and sturdy in its way as a British gun-boat. While the heroine of the trip is taking her seat on deck, and kissing her hand to the “Britannic,” the “Yosemite” drives ahead of the ocean steamer. Mr. Irving goes down into the spacious cabin, which is crowded with the gentlemen against whose sharp and inquisitive interrogations he has been so persistently warned.

V.

“Well, gentlemen, you want to talk to me,” he says, lighting a cigar, and offering his case to his nearest neighbors.

The reporters look at him and smile. They have had a brief consultation as to which of them shall open the business, but without coming to any definite arrangement. Irving, scanning the kindly faces, is no doubt smiling inwardly at the picture which his London friend had drawn of the interviewers. He is the least embarrassed of the company. Nobody seems inclined to talk; yet every movement of Irving invites interrogatory attack.

“A little champagne, gentlemen,” suggests Mr. Florence, pushing his way before the ship’s steward and waiters.

“And chicken,” says Irving, smiling; “that is how we do it in London, they say.”

This point is lost, however, upon the reporters, a few of whom sip their champagne, but not with anything like fervor. They have been waiting many hours to interview Irving, and they want to do it. I fancy they are afraid of each other.

“Now, gentlemen,” says Irving, “time flies, and I have a dread of you. I have looked forward to this meeting, not without pleasure, but with much apprehension. Don’t ask me how I like America at present. I shall, I am sure; and I think the bay superb. There, I place myself at your mercy. Don’t spare me.”

Everybody laughs. Barrett and Florence look on curiously. Bram Stoker, Mr. Irving’s acting manager, cannot disguise his anxiety. Loveday, his stage-manager and old friend, is amused. He has heard many curious things about America from his brother George, who accompanied the famous English comedian, Mr. J. L. Toole (one of Irving’s oldest, and perhaps his most intimate, friend), on his American tour. Neither Loveday nor Stoker has ever crossed the Atlantic before. They have talked of it, and pictured themselves steaming up the North river into New York many a time; but they find their forecast utterly unlike the original.

“What about his mannerisms?” says one reporter to another. “I notice nothing strange, nothing outre either in his speech or walk.”

“He seems perfectly natural to me,” the other replies; and it is this first “revelation” that has evidently tongue-tied the “reportorial” company. They have read so much about the so-called eccentricities of the English visitor’s personality that they cannot overcome their surprise at finding themselves addressed by a gentleman whose grace of manner reminds them rather of the polished ease of Lord Coleridge than of the bizarre figure with which caricature, pictorially and otherwise, has familiarized them.

“We are all very glad to see you, sir, and to welcome you to New York,” says one of the interviewers, presently.

“Thank you with all my heart,” says Irving.

“And we would like to ask you a few questions, and to have you talk about your plans in this country. You open in ‘The Bells,’—that was one of your first great successes?”

“Yes.”

“You will produce your plays here just in the same way as in London?” chimes in a second interviewer.

“With the same effects, and, as far as possible, with the same cast?”

“Yes.”

“And what are your particular effects, for instance, in ‘The Bells’ and ‘Louis XI.,’ say, as regard mounting and lighting?”

“Well, gentlemen,” answers Irving, laying aside his cigar and folding his arms, “I will explain. In the first place, in visiting America, I determined I would endeavor to do justice to myself, to the theatre, and to you. I was told I might come alone as a star, or I might come with a few members of my company, and that I would be sure to make money. That did not represent any part of my desire in visiting America. The pleasure of seeing the New World, the ambition to win its favor and its friendship, and to show it some of the work we do at the Lyceum,—these are my reasons for being here. I have, therefore, brought my company and my scenery. Miss Ellen Terry, one of the most perfect and charming actresses that ever graced the English stage, consented to share our fortunes in this great enterprise; so I bring you almost literally the Lyceum Theatre.”

“How many artists, sir?”

“Oh, counting the entire company and staff, somewhere between sixty and seventy, I suppose. Fifty of them have already arrived here in the ‘City of Rome.’”

“In what order do you produce your pieces here?”

“‘The Bells,’ ‘Charles,’ ‘The Lyons Mail,’ ‘The Merchant of Venice,’ we do first.”

“Have you any particular reason for the sequence of them?”

“My idea is to produce my Lyceum successes in their order, as they were done in London; I thought it would be interesting to show the series one after the other in that way.”

“When do you play ‘Hamlet?’”

“On my return to New York in the spring.”

“Any special reason for that?”

“A managerial one. We propose to keep one or two novelties for our second visit. Probably we shall reserve ‘Much Ado’ as well as ‘Hamlet.’ Moreover, a month is too short a time for us to get through our repertoire.”

“In which part do you think you most excel?”

“Which do you like most of all your range of characters?”

“What is your opinion of Mr. Booth as an actor?”

These questions come from different parts of the crowd. It reminds me of the scene between an English parliamentary candidate and a caucus constituency, with the exception that the American questioners are quite friendly and respectful, their chief desire evidently being to give Mr. Irving texts upon which he can speak with interest to their readers.

“Mr. Booth and I are warm friends. It is not necessary to tell you that he is a great actor. I acted with him many subordinate parts when he first came to England, about twenty years ago.”

“What do you think is his finest impersonation?”

“I would say ‘Lear,’ though I believe the American verdict would be ‘Richelieu.’ Singularly enough ‘Richelieu’ is not a popular play in England. Mr. Booth’s mad scene in ‘Lear,’ I am told, is superb. I did not see it; but I can speak of Othello and Iago: both are fine performances.”

“You played in ‘Othello’ with Mr. Booth in London you say?”

“I produced ‘Othello’ especially for Mr. Booth, and played Iago for the first time on that occasion. We afterwards alternated the parts.”

“Shakespeare is popular in England,—more so now than for some years past, I believe?”

“Yes.”

“What has been the motive-power in this revival?”

“England has to-day many Shakespearian societies, and our countrymen read the poet much more than they did five and twenty years ago. As a rule our fathers obtained their knowledge of him from the theatre, and were often, of course, greatly misled as to the meaning and intention of the poet, under the manipulation of Colley Cibber and others.”

“Which of Shakespeare’s plays is most popular in England?”

“‘Hamlet.’ And, singularly, the next one is not ‘Julius CÆsar,’ which is the most popular after ‘Hamlet,’ I believe, in your country. ‘Othello’ might possibly rank second with us, if it were not difficult to get two equally good actors for the two leading parts. Salvini’s Othello, for instance, suffered because the Iago was weak.”

“You don’t play ‘Julius CÆsar,’ then, in England?”

“No. There is a difficulty in filling worthily the three leading parts.”

By this time Mr. Irving is on the most comfortable and familiar terms with the gentlemen of the press. He has laid aside his cigar, and smiles often with a curious and amused expression of face.

“You must find this kind of work, this interviewing, very difficult,” he says, presently, in a tone of friendly banter.

“Sometimes,” answers one of them; and they all laugh, entering into the spirit of the obvious fun of a victim who is not suffering half as much as he expected to do, and who indeed, is, on the whole, very well satisfied with himself.

“Don’t you think we might go on deck now and see the harbor?” he asks.

“Oh, yes,” they all say; and in a few minutes the “Yosemite’s” pretty saloon is vacated.

Mr. Irving and his friends go forward; Miss Terry is aft, in charge of Mr. Barrett. She is looking intently down the river at the far-off “Britannic,” which is now beginning to move forward in our wake, the “Yosemite” leaving behind her a long, white track of foam.

The interviewers are again busily engaged with Mr. Irving. He is once more the centre of an interested group of men. Not one of them takes a note. They seem to be putting all he says down in their minds. They are accustomed to tax their memories. One catches, in the expression of their faces, evidence of something like an inter-vision. They seem to be ticking off, in their minds, the points as the speaker makes them; for Irving now appears to be talking as much for his own amusement as for the public instruction. He finds that he has a quick, intelligent, and attentive audience, and the absence of note-books and anything like a show of machinery for recording his words puts him thoroughly at his ease. Then he likes to talk “shop”; as who does not? And what is more delightful to hear than experts on their own work?

“Do your American audiences applaud much?” he asks.

“Yes,” they said; “oh, yes.”

“Because, you know, your Edwin Forrest once stopped in the middle of a scene and addressed his audience on the subject of their silence. ‘You must applaud,’ he said, ‘or I cannot act.’ I quite sympathize with that feeling. An actor needs applause. It is his life and soul when he is on the stage. The enthusiasm of the audience reacts upon him. He gives them back heat for heat. If they are cordial he is encouraged; if they are excited so is he; as they respond to his efforts he tightens his grip upon their imagination and emotions. You have no pit in your American theatres, as we have; that is, your stalls, or parquet, cover the entire floor. It is to the quick feelings and heartiness of the pit and gallery that an actor looks for encouragement during his great scenes in England. Our stalls are appreciative, but not demonstrative. Our pit and gallery are both.”

Irving, when particularly moved, likes to tramp about. Whenever the situation allows it he does so upon the stage. Probably recalling the way in which pit and gallery rose at him—and stalls and dress-circle, too, for that matter—on his farewell night at the Lyceum, he paces about the deck, all the interviewers making rapid mental note of his gait, and watching for some startling peculiarity that does not manifest itself.

“He has not got it; why, the man is as natural and as straight and capable as a man can be,” says one to another.

“And a real good fellow,” is the response. “Ask him about Vanderbilt and the mirror.”

“O Mr. Irving!—just one more question.”

“As many as you like, my friend,” is the ready reply.

“Is it true that you are to be the guest of Mr. Vanderbilt?”

“And be surrounded with ingeniously constructed mirrors, where I can see myself always, and all at once? I have heard strange stories about Mr. Vanderbilt having had a wonderful mirror of this kind constructed for my use, so that I may pose before it in all my loveliest attitudes. Something of the kind has been said, eh?” he asks, laughing.

“Oh, yes, that is so,” is the mirthful response.

“Then you may contradict it, if you will. You may say that I am here for work; that I shall have no time to be any one’s guest, though I hope the day may come when I shall have leisure to visit my friends. You may add, if you will” (here he lowered his voice with a little air of mystery), “that I always carry a mirror of my own about with me wherever I go, because I love to pose and contemplate my lovely figure whenever the opportunity offers.”

“That will do, I guess,” says a gentleman of the interviewing staff; “thank you, Mr. Irving, for your courtesy and information.”

“I am obliged to you very much,” he says, and then, having his attention directed to the first view of New York, expresses his wonder and delight at the scene, as well he may.

Ahead the towers and spires of New York stand out in a picturesque outline against the sky. On either hand the water-line is fringed with the spars of ships and steamers. On the left stretches far away the low-lying shore of New Jersey; on the right, Brooklyn can be seen, rising upwards, a broken line of roofs and steeples. Further away, joining “the city of churches” to Manhattan, hangs in mid-air that marvel of science, the triple carriage, foot, and rail road known as the Brooklyn bridge. Around the “Yosemite,” as she ploughs along towards her quay, throng many busy steamers, outstripping, in the race for port, fleets of sailing vessels that are beating up the broad reaches of the river before the autumn wind.

VI.

“She is not quite pretty,” says a New York reporter, turning to me during his contemplation of Miss Terry, who is very picturesque as she sits by the taffrail at the stern; “but she is handsome, and she is distinguished. I think we would like to ask her a few questions; will you introduce us?”

I do the honors of this presentation. Miss Terry is too much under the influence of the wonderful scene that meets her gaze to receive the reporters with calmness.

“And this is New York!” she exclaims. “What a surprising place! And, oh, what a river! So different to the Thames! And to think that I am in New York! It does not seem possible. I cannot realize it.”

“If you had a message to send home to your friends, Miss Terry, what would it be?” asks Reporter No. 1, a more than usually bashful young man.

The question is a trifle unfortunate.

“Tell them I never loved home so well as now,” she answers, in her frank, impulsive way.

She turns her head away to hide her tears, and Reporter No. 2 remonstrates with his companion.

“I wouldn’t have said it for anything,” says No. 1. “I was thinking how I would add a few words for her to my London cable,—that’s a fact.”

“It is very foolish of me, pray excuse me,” says the lady; “it is all so new and strange. I know my eyes are red, and this is not the sort of face to go into New York with, is it?”

“I think New York will be quite satisfied, Miss Terry,” says a third reporter; “but don’t let us distress you.”

“Oh, no, I am quite myself now. You want to ask me some questions?”

“Not if you object.”

“I don’t object; only you see one has been looking forward to this day a long time, and seeing land again and houses, and so many ships, and New York itself, may well excite a stranger.”

“Yes, indeed, that is so,” remarks No. 1, upon whom she turns quickly, the “Liberty” scarf at her neck flying in the wind, and her earnest eyes flashing.

“Have you ever felt what it is to be a stranger just entering a strange land? If not you can hardly realize my sensations. Not that I have any fears about my reception. No, it is not that; the Americans on the ship were so kind to me, and you are so very considerate, that I am sure everybody ashore will be friendly.”

“Do you know Miss Anderson?”

“Yes. She is a beautiful woman. I have not seen her upon the stage; but I have met her.”

“Do you consider ‘Charles I.’ will present you to a New York audience in one of your best characters?”

“No; and I am not very fond of the part of Henrietta Maria either.”

“What are your favorite characters?”

“Oh, I hardly know,” she says, now fairly interested in the conversation; and turning easily towards her questioners, for the first time, “I love nearly all I play; but I don’t like to cry, and I cannot help it in ‘Charles I.’ I like comedy best,—Portia, Beatrice, and Letitia Hardy.”

“Do you intend to star on your own account?”

“No, no.”

“You prefer to cast your fortunes with the Lyceum company?”

“Yes, certainly. Sufficient for the day is the Lyceum thereof. There is no chance of my ever desiring to change. I am devoted to the Lyceum, and to Mr. Irving. No one admires him more than I do; no one knows better, I think, how much he has done for our art; no one dreams of how much more he will yet do if he is spared. I used to think, when I was with Charles Kean,—I served my apprenticeship, you know, with Mr. and Mrs. Charles Kean,—that his performances and mounting of plays were perfect in their way. But look at Mr. Irving’s work; look at what he has done and what he does. I am sure you will be delighted with him. Excuse me, is that the ‘Britannic’ yonder, following in our wake?”

“Yes.”

She kisses her hand to the vessel, and then turns to wonder at the city, which seems to be coming towards us, so steadily does the “Yosemite” glide along, hardly suggesting motion.

Then suddenly the word is passed that the “Yosemite” is about to land her passengers. A few minutes later she slips alongside the wharf at the foot of Canal street. The reporters take their leave, raising their hats to Miss Terry, many of them shaking hands with Mr. Irving. Carriages are in waiting for Mr. Barrett and his party. A small crowd, learning who the new-comers were, give them a cheer of welcome, and Henry Irving and Ellen Terry stand upon American soil.

“I am told,” says Mr. Irving, as we drive away, “that when Jumbo arrived in New York he put out his foot and felt if the ground was solid enough to bear his weight. The New Yorkers, I believe, were very much amused at that. They have a keen sense of fun. Where are we going now?”

“To the Customs, at the White Star wharf, to sign your declaration papers,” says Mr. Florence.

“How many packages have you in your state-room, madame?” asks a sturdy official, addressing Miss Terry.

“Well, really I don’t know; three or four, I think.”

“Not more than that?” suggests Mr. Barrett.

“Perhaps five or six.”

“Not any more?” asks the official. “Shall I say five or six?”

“Well, really, I cannot say. Where’s my maid? Is it important,—the exact number?”

There is a touch of bewilderment in her manner which amuses the officials, and everybody laughs—she herself very heartily—when her maid says there are fourteen packages of various kinds in the state-room of the “Britannic,” which is now discharging her passengers. A scene of bustle and excitement is developing just as we are permitted to depart. A famous politician is on board. There is a procession, with a band of music, to meet him. Crowds of poor people are pushing forward for the “Britannic” gangway to meet a crowd of still poorer emigrant friends. Imposing equipages are here to carry off the rich and prosperous travellers. Tons of portmanteaus, trunks, boxes, baggage of every kind, are sliding from the vessel’s side upon the quay. Friends are greeting friends. Children are being hugged by fathers and mothers. Ship’s stewards are hurrying to and fro. The expressman, jingling his brass checks, is looking for business; his carts are fighting their way among the attendant carriages and more ponderous wagons. A line of Custom-House men form in line, a living cord of blue and silver, across the roadway exit of the wharf. There is a smell of tar and coffee and baked peanuts in the atmosphere, together with the sound of many voices; and the bustle repeats itself outside in the rattle of arriving and departing carts and carriages. Above all one hears the pleasant music of distant car-bells. We dash along, over level crossings, past very continental-looking riverside cabarets and rum-shops, under elevated railroads, and up streets that recall Holland, France, Brighton, and Liverpool, until we reach Washington square. The dead leaves of autumn are beginning to hide the fading grass; but the sun is shining gloriously away up in a blue sky. Irving is impressed with the beauty of the city as we enter Fifth avenue, its many spires marking the long line of street as far as the eye can see. The Brevoort House has proved a welcome, if expensive, haven of rest to many a weary traveller. To-day its bright windows and green sun-blinds, its white marble steps, and its wholesome aspect of homelike comfort, suggest the pleasantest possibilities.

Let us leave the latest of its guests to his first experiences of the most hotel-keeping nation in the world.