people, brought to their feet in an agony of terror, of fire, panic, and
sudden death by a woman's cry, now at that familiar tap, tap, tap, broke
here and there into laughter. By sixes and sevens, then by tens and
twenties, they sheepishly seated themselves, only turning their heads
with pitying looks while the ushers removed the unconscious woman.

When the act was over, Mr. Daly--a man of few words on such
occasions--held my hands hard for a moment, and said, "Good girl, good
girl!" and I, pleased, deprecatingly remarked, "It was the music, sir,
that quieted them," to which he made answer, "And it was you who ordered
the music!"

Verily, no single word could be spoken on his stage without his
knowledge. Later that evening we learned that the lady who had cried out
had been brought to the theatre by friends who hoped to cheer her up
(Heaven save the mark!) and help her to forget her dreadful and recent
experience of placing her own mother in an insane asylum. Learned, too,
that her very first suspicion of that poor mother's condition had come
from finding her one morning sitting up in bed, her arms embracing her
knees, while she swayed from side to side unceasingly, muttering low and
fast all the time.

Poor lady! no wonder her worn nerves gave way when all unexpectedly that
dread scene was reproduced before her, and worse still before the
staring public.

Then Mr. Charles Matthews, the veteran English comedian, came over to
act at Mr. Daly's. His was a graceful, polished, volatile style of
acting, and he had a high opinion of his power as a maker of fun; so
that he was considerably annoyed one night when he discovered that one