off as long as the sounds lasted.

Even yet, however, the time had not come for any conspicuous
success. The girl was still so puny in form, so monkey-like in
face, and so gratingly unpleasant in her tones that it needed time
for her to attain her full growth and to smooth away some of the
discords in her peculiar voice.

Three years later she appeared at the Gymnase in a regular debut;
yet even then only the experienced few appreciated her greatness.
Among these, however, were the well-known critic Jules Janin, the
poet and novelist Gauthier, and the actress Mlle. Mars. They saw
that this lean, raucous gutter-girl had within her gifts which
would increase until she would he first of all actresses on the
French stage. Janin wrote some lines which explain the secret of
her greatness:

All the talent in the world, especially when continually applied
to the same dramatic works, will not satisfy continually the
hearer. What pleases in a great actor, as in all arts that appeal
to the imagination, is the unforeseen. When I am utterly ignorant
of what is to happen, when I do not know, when you yourself do not
know what will be your next gesture, your next look, what passion
will possess your heart, what outcry will burst from your terror-
stricken soul, then, indeed, I am willing to see you daily, for
each day you will be new to me. To-day I may blame, to-morrow
praise. Yesterday you were all-powerful; to-morrow, perhaps, you
may hardly win from me a word of admiration. So much the better,
then, if you draw from me unexpected tears, if in my heart you
strike an unknown fiber; but tell me not of hearing night after