Toole did was to him adorable. Marie Linden
gave a really clever imitation of me as Marguerite. She and her sister
Laura both had the trick of taking me off. I recognized the truth of
Laura's caricature in the burlesque of "The Vicar of Wakefield" when as
Olivia she made her entrance, leaping impulsively over a stile!

There was an absurd chorus of girl "mashers" in "Faust-and-Loose,"
dressed in tight black satin coats, who besides dancing and singing had
lines in unison, such as "No, no!" "We will!" As one of these girls
Violet Vanbrugh made her first appearance on the stage. In her case "we
will!" proved prophetic. It was her plucky "I will get on" which finally
landed her in her present successful position.

Violet Barnes was the daughter of Prebendary Barnes of Exeter, who, when
he found his daughter stage-struck, behaved far more wisely than most
parents. He gave her L100 and sent her to London with her old nurse to
look after her, saying that if she really "meant business" she would
find an engagement before the L100 was gone. Violet had inherited some
talent from her mother, who was a very clever amateur actress, and the
whole family were fond of getting up entertainments. But Violet didn't
know quite how far L100 would go, or wouldn't go. I happened to call on
her at her lodgings near Baker Street one afternoon, and found her
having her head washed, and crying bitterly all the time! She had come
to the end of the L100, she had not got an engagement, and thought she
would have to go home defeated. There was something funny in the tragic
situation. Vi was sitting on the floor, drying her hair, crying, and
drinking port wine to cure a cold in her head!

I told her not to be a goose, but to cheer up and come and stay with me
until something turned up. We packed the old nurse back to Devonshire.
Violet came and stayed with me, and in due course something did turn up.
Mr. Toole came to dinner, and Violet, acting on my instructions to ask
every one she saw for an engagement, asked Mr. Toole! He said, "That's
all right, my dear. Of course. Come down and see me to-morrow." Dear old
Toole! The kindliest of men! Violet was with him for some time, and
played at his theater in Mr. Barrie's first piece "Walker London." Her
sister Irene, Seymour Hicks, and Mary Ansell (now Mrs. Barrie) were all
in the cast.

This was all I did to "help" Violet Vanbrugh, now Mrs. Arthur Bourchier
and one of our best actresses, in her stage