length. Lavin, of the tenor voice rich in poetry and prospects, humbled
himself to sing, "There was a Lady Loved a Swine," with "Humph, quoth
he"--s almost too realistic. Then came Lew Dockstader.

Now, report had spread that Mrs. Hawthorne was to appear as a negress;
no one was prepared to see her appear as a negro. The surprise, when it
dawned on this one and the other that that stove-black face with rolling
eyes and big red and white smile, that burly body incased in old,
bagging trousers, those shuffling feet shod in boots a mile too large
for them and curling up at the toe, belonged to Mrs. Hawthorne, the
surprise was in itself a success. Then, as has been said, Aurora was
undeniably in the vein that evening.

She had seen Lew Dockstader, the negro minstrel, once in her life, but
at the impressionable age, when you see and remember for good. It had
been the great theatrical event of her life. "What, haven't seen Lew
Dockstader! Don't know who he is!" thus she still would measure a
person's ignorance of what is best in drama and song. She loved Lew.
When she impersonated him she did not try to imitate him, she simply
felt herself to be he.

In this character she now told a string of those funny anecdotes which
Americans love to swap. She sang divers songs, pitched among her big,
velvety chest tones: "Children, Keep in de Middle ob de Road," "Fluey,
Fluey," "Come, Ride dat Golden Mule." With the clumsy nimbleness and
innocent love of play of a Newfoundland pup, she flung out her enormous
feet in the dance.

The crimson curtains drew together upon her retreat amid unaffected
applause. Recalled, she gave the encore prepared for such an event.
Recalled over and over, like singers of topical songs, to hear what she
would say next, Aurora, a little off her head with the new wine of
glory, exhausted her bag of parlor tricks to satisfy an audience so
kind. Then it was that she made her mistake. Recalled still again, she
invented on the spot one last thing to do. She recited a poem indelibly
learned at public school, giving it first as a newly landed Jewish pupil
would pronounce it, then a small Irishman, then a small Italian, finally
an English child. To add the latter was her mistake, because her
caricature of the English speech was very special.

The sound of it started an idea buzzing in the head of one of her
audience--Charlie Hunt, who sat well in front, and in applauding raised
his hands above the level of his