times moving sky behind her.

"This reminds me," says Miss Morris, "that Mrs. Bradshaw had several
times to go to heaven (dramatically speaking), and as her figure and
weight made the support useless, she always went to heaven on the
entire gallery, as it is called, a long platform the whole width of
the stage, which is raised and lowered by windlass. The enormous
affair would be cleaned and hung about with nice white clouds, and
then Mrs. Bradshaw, draped in long white robes, with hands meekly
crossed upon her breast and eyes piously uplifted, would rise
heavenward, slowly, as so heavy an angel should. But alas! There was
one drawback to this otherwise perfect ascension. Never, so long as
the theater stood, could that windlass be made to work silently. It
always moved up or down to a succession of screaks, unoilable,
blood-curdling, that were intensified by Mrs. Bradshaw's weight, so
that she ascended to the blue tarletan heaven accompanied by such
chugs and long-drawn yowlings as suggested a trip to the infernal
regions. Her face remained calm and unmoved, but now and then an
agonized moan escaped her, lest even the orchestra's effort to cover
up the support's protesting cries should prove useless. Poor woman,
when she had been lowered again to _terra firma_ and stepped off, the
whole paint frame would give a kind of joyous upward spring. She
noticed it, and one evening looked back and said; 'Oh, you're not one
bit more glad than I am, you screaking wretch!'"

Having successfully existed through the Columbus season, in the spring
the company was again in Cleveland, playing for a few weeks before
disbanding for that horror of all theatrical persons--the summer
vacation.

As her mother was in a position, and could not be with Clara, the
young actress spent the sweltering months in a cheap boarding-house,
where a kindly landlady was willing to let her board bill run over
until the fall, when salaries should begin again. Clara never forgot
that kindness, for she was in real need of rest after her first season
of continuous work. Although her bright eyes, clear skin, and round
face gave an impression of perfect health, yet she was far from
strong, owing partly to the privations of her earlier life and to a
slight injury to her back in babyhood. Because of this, she was facing
a life of hard work handicapped by that most cruel of torments, a
spinal trouble, which an endless number of different treatments failed
to cure.