In the casket scene I wore a dress like almond-blossom. I was very thin,
but Portia and all the ideal _young_ heroines of Shakespeare ought to
be thin. Fat is fatal to ideality!

I played the part more stiffly and more slowly at the Prince of Wales's
than I did in later years. I moved and spoke slowly. The clothes seemed
to demand it, and the setting of the play developed the Italian feeling
in it, and let the English Elizabethan side take care of itself. The
silver casket scene with the Prince of Aragon was preserved, and so was
the last act, which had hitherto been cut out in nearly all stage
versions.

I have tried five or six different ways of treating Portia, but the way
I think best is not the one which finds the heartiest response from my
audiences. Has there ever been a dramatist, I wonder, whose parts admit
of as many different interpretations as do Shakespeare's? There lies his
immortality as an acting force. For times change, and parts have to be
acted differently for different generations. Some parts are not
sufficiently universal for this to be possible, but every ten years an
actor can reconsider a Shakespeare part and find new life in it for his
new purpose and new audiences.

The aesthetic craze, with all its faults, was responsible for a great
deal of true enthusiasm for anything beautiful. It made people welcome
the Bancrofts' production of "The Merchant of Venice" with an
appreciation which took the practical form of an offer to keep the
performances going by subscription, as the general public was not
supporting them. Sir Frederick and Lady Pollock, James Spedding, Edwin
Arnold, Sir Frederick Leighton and others made the proposal to the