oward him quickly, but paused, took out his handkerchief, and first
carefully wiping the dirty little nose and mouth, stooped and kissed him
heartily, put some change in each freckled paw, and continued his run to
the telegraph office.

He knew of no witness to the act. To kiss a pretty, clean child under the
approving eyes of mamma might mean nothing but politeness, but surely it
required the prompting of a warm and tender heart to make a young and
thoughtless man feel for and caress such a dirty, forlorn bit of babyhood
as that.

Of his work, I suppose I was too young and too ignorant to judge
correctly, but I remember well hearing the older members of the company
express their opinions. Mr. Ellsler, who had been on terms of friendship
with the elder Booth, was delighted with the promise of his work. He
greatly admired Edwin's intellectual power, his artistic care, but
"John," he cried, "has more of the old man's power in one performance
than Edwin can show in a year. He has the fire, the dash, the touch of
_strangeness_. He often produces unstudied effects at night. I question
him, 'Did you rehearse that business to-day, John?' he answers: 'No, I
didn't rehearse it, it just came to me in the scene, and I couldn't help
doing it; but it went all right, didn't it?' Full of impulse, just now,
like a colt, his heels are in the air, nearly as often as his head, but
wait a year or two till he gets used to the harness, and quiets down a
bit, and you will see as great an actor as America can produce!"

And, by the way, speaking of Mr. Ellsler and the elder Booth, I am
reminded that I have in my possession a letter from the latter to the
former. It is written in a rather cramped hand, that carries the address
and the marks of the red wafers, as that was before the appearance of
envelopes, and it informs Mr. Ellsler that he, "Junius Brutus Booth, will
play a star engagement of one week for the sum of--" how many dollars? if
it were not unguessable, I should insist upon your guessing, but that
would not be fair, so here it is--"for the sum of three hundred
dollars," and wants to know how many and what plays he is desired to do,
that he may select his wardrobe.

Think of it--the mighty father of our Edwin asking but $300 for a week of
such acting as he could do, which, if this bright, light-hearted boy was
so much like him, must have been brilliant indeed.

One morning, going on the stage where a group were talking with John