hich
was revived many times, that Charles Frohman made two more life-long
connections.

At the same boarding-house with Julius Cahn lived an ambitious young
man who had had some experience as an actor. He was out of a position,
so Cahn said to him one day:

"Come over to our offices and Charles Frohman will give you a job."

The young man came over, and Cahn introduced him to Frohman. Soon he
came out, apparently very indignant. When Cahn asked him what was the
matter he said:

"That man Frohman offered me the part of a nigger, _Uncle Rufus_, in
that play. I was born in the South, and I will not play a nigger. I
would rather starve."

Cahn said, "You will play it, and your salary will be forty dollars a
week."

The young man reluctantly accepted the engagement and proved to be not
only a satisfactory actor, but a man gifted with a marvelous instinct as
stage-director. His name was Joseph Humphreys, and he became in a few
years the general stage-director for Charles Frohman, the most
distinguished position of its kind in the country, which he held until
his death.

About this time Charles Frohman renewed his acquaintance with Augustus
Thomas. Thomas walked into the office one day and Rockwood said to him:

"You are the very man we want to play in 'Held by the Enemy.'"

Thomas immediately went in to see Frohman, who offered him the position
of _General Stamburg_, but Thomas had an engagement in his own play,
"The Burglar," which was the expanded "Editha's Burglar," and could not
accept. Before he left, however, Frohman, whose mind was always full of
projects for the future, renewed the offer made in New Orleans, for he
said:

"Thomas, I still want you to write that play for me."

* * *

With "Held by the Enemy" Charles Frohman seemed to have found a magic
touchstone. It was both patriotic and profitable, for it was nothing
less than the American flag. Having raised it in one production, he now
turned to the enterprise which unfurled his success to the winds in
brilliant and stirring fashion.

Early in 1889 R. M. Field put on a new military play called
"Shenandoah," by Bronson Howard, at the Boston Museum. Howard was then
the most important writer in the dramatic profession. He had three big
successes, "Young Mrs. Winthrop," "Saratoga," and "The Banker's
Daughter," to his credit, and he had put an immense amount of work and
hope into the stirring military drama that was to have such an important
bearing