lled across:

"Are you inviting me to a feast, Barrie--are you casting bread upon the
troubled waters or is it just Frohman?"

In view of Frohman's perfect adoration of Barrie--and it amounted to
nothing else--it is interesting, as a final glimpse of the relation
between these men, to see what the American thought of his friend's
work. In analyzing Barrie's work once, Frohman said:

"Barrie's distinctive note is humanity. There is rich human blood in
everything he writes. He is a satirist whose arrows are never barbed
with vitriol, but with the milk of human kindness; a humanist who never
surfeits our senses, but leaves much for our willing imagination; an
optimist whose message is as compelling for its reasonableness as it is
welcome for its gentleness."

* * *

Through Barrie and "Peter Pan" came another close and devoted friendship
in Charles Frohman's life--the one with Pauline Chase. This American
girl had been engaged by one of Frohman's stage-managers for a small
part with Edna May in "The Girl from Up There." Frohman did not even
know her in those days. After she made her great success as the Pink
Pajama girl in "Liberty Belles," at the Madison Square Theater, Frohman
engaged her and sent her to England, where, with the exception of one
visit to the United States in "Our Mrs. Gibbs," she has remained ever
since.

It was not until she played "Peter Pan" that the Frohman-Chase
friendship really began. The way in which Miss Chase came to play the
part is interesting. Cissie Loftus, who had been playing Peter, became
ill, and Miss Chase, who had been playing one of the twins, and was her
understudy, went on to do the more important part at a matinee in
Liverpool. Frohman said to her:

"Barrie and I are coming down to see you act. If we like you well enough
to play _Peter_, I will send you back a sheet of paper with a cross mark
on it after the play."

At the end of the first act an usher rapped on Miss Chase's
dressing-room door and handed her the much-desired slip with the cross.
Frohman sent word that he could not wait until the end of the play,
because he and Barrie were taking a train back to London. In this
unusual way Pauline Chase secured the part which helped to endear her to
the man who was her friend and sponsor.

Frohman, Barrie, and Miss Chase formed a trio who went about together a
great deal and had much in common, aside from the kinship of the
theater. It was for Miss Chase that Barrie wro