nder what the mothers of Goneril, Regan, and Cordelia were like! I
think Lear must have married twice.

This was the first of Henry Irving's great Shakespearean productions.
"Hamlet" and "Othello" had been mounted with care, but, in spite of
statements that I have seen to the contrary, they were not true
reflections of Irving as a producer. In beauty I do not think that
"Romeo and Juliet" surpassed "The Cup," but it was very sumptuous,
impressive and Italian. It was the most _elaborate_ of all the Lyceum
productions. In it Henry first displayed his mastery of crowds. The
brawling of the rival houses in the streets, the procession of girls to
wake Juliet on her wedding morning, the musicians, the magnificent
reconciliation of the two houses which closed the play, every one on the
stage holding a torch, were all treated with a marvelous sense of
pictorial effect.

Henry once said to me: "'Hamlet' could be played anywhere on its acting
merits. It marches from situation to situation. But 'Romeo and Juliet'
proceeds from picture to picture. Every line suggests a picture. It is a
dramatic poem rather than a drama, and I mean to treat it from that
point of view."

While he was preparing the production he revived "The Two Roses," a
company in which as Digby Grant he had made a great success years
before. I rehearsed the part of Lottie two or three times, but Henry
released me because I was studying Juliet; and as he said, "You've got
to do all you know with it."

Perhaps the sense of this responsibility weighed on me. Perhaps I was
neither young enough nor old enough to play Juliet. I read everything
that had ever been written about her before I had myself decided what
she was. It was a dreadful mistake. That was the first thing wrong with
my Juliet--lack of original impulse.

As for the second and the third and the fourth--well, I am not more
than common vain, I trust, but I see no occasion to write them _all_
down.

It was perhaps the greatest opportunity that I had yet had at the
Lyceum. I studied the part at my cottage at Hampton Court in a bedroom
looking out over the park. There was nothing wrong with _that_. By the
way, how important it is to be careful about environment and everything
else when one is studying. One ought to be in the country, but not all
the time.... It is good to go about and see pictures, hear music, and
watch everything. One should be very much alone, and should study early
and late--all nigh