offer of an engagement at the Varietes, the Lyceum of New Orleans, quickly
followed, and the daring feat of appearing as Meg Merrilies was attempted
on its boards. The press predicted failure, and warned the young aspirant
against essaying a part almost identified with Cushman, then but lately
deceased, who had been a great favorite with the New Orleans public, and
one of whose best impersonations it was. The actors too, with whom Mary
Anderson rehearsed, looked forward to anything but a success. Nothing
daunted, however, and confident in her own powers, she spent two hours in
perfecting a make-up so successful, that even her mother failed to
recognize her in the strange, weird disguise; and then, darkening her
dressing-room, set herself resolutely to get into the heart of her part.
Mary Anderson's Meg Merrilies was an immense success; Cushman herself
never received greater applause, and the scene was quite an ovation.
Hearing, on the fall of the curtain, that General Beauregard, one of the
heroes of the civil war, intended to make a presentation, she threw off
her disguise, and smoothing her hair rushed back to the stage, to receive
the Badge of the Washington Artillery, a belt enameled in blue, with
crossed cannons in gold with diamond vents, and suspended from the belt a
tiger's head in gold, with diamond eyes and ruby tongue. The corps had
been known through the war as the "Tiger Heads," and were famed for their
deeds of daring and bravery. The belt bore the inscription, "To Mary
Anderson, from her friends of the Battalion." She returned thanks in a
little speech, which was received with much enthusiasm, and retired almost
overcome with pleasure and pride. The youthful actress, who had then not
completed her seventeenth year, took by storm the hearts of the impulsive
and chivalrous Southerners. On the morning of her departure, she found to
her astonishment that the railway company had placed a fine "Pullman" and
special engine at her disposal all the way to Louisville. Generals
Beauregard and Hood, with many distinguished Southerners, were on the
platform to bid her farewell, and she returned home with purse and