ean was
before the house, to keep their eyes on him, and at the first sign of
hesitancy on his part one of them gave him the needed word. Once or
twice, when he seemed quite bewildered, Mr. Cathcart, turning his back to
the audience, spoke Mr. Kean's entire speech, imitating his nasal tones
to the life.

But it was off the stage that the ancient couple were most delightful.
Ellen and Charles were like a pair of old, old love-birds--a little dull
of eye, nor quite perfect in the preening of their somewhat rumpled
plumage, but billing and cooing with all the persistency and satisfaction
of their first caging. Their appearance upon the street provoked
amusement--sometimes even excitement. I often saw drivers of drays and
wagons pull up their horses and stop in the crowded street to stare at
them as they made their way toward the theatre. Mrs. Kean lived inside
of the most astounding hoop woman ever carried. Its size, its weight, its
tilting power were awful. Entrances had to be cleared of all chairs or
tables to accommodate Mrs. Kean's hoop. People scrambled or slid sideways
about her on the stage, swearing mentally all the time, while a sudden
gasp from the front row or a groan from Mr. Cathcart announced a tilt and
a revelation of heelless slippers and dead-white stockings, and in spite
of his dignity Charles was not above a joke on Ellen's hoop, for one
rainy day, as she strove to enter a carriage door she stuck fast, and the
hoop--mercy! It was well Mr. Kean was there to hold it down; but as a
troubled voice from within said: "I'm caught somehow--don't you see,
Charles?" With a twinkling eye Charles replied: "Yes, Ellen, my dear, I
do see--and--and I'm trying to keep everyone else from seeing, too!" a
speech verging so closely upon impropriety that, with antique coquetry,
Mrs. Kean punished him by tweaking his ear when he squeezed in beside
her.

The Kean bonnet was the wonder of the town. It was a large coal-scuttle
of white leghorn and at the back there was a sort of flounce of ribbon
which she called her "bonnet-cape"; draped over it she wore a great,
bright-green barege veil. But she was not half so funny as was her
husband on the street. His short little person buttoned up tightly in a
regular bottle-green "Mantellini" sort of overcoat, loaded with frogs of
heavy cord, and lined, cuffed, and collared with fur of such remarkable
color, quality, and marking as would have puzzled the most experienced
student of nat