She could not hope for that. They had her back in Boston, to ornament the hundredth showing, and the celebration was greater than ever. Miss Crabtree, once the adorable “Lotta,” was there. Lillian went into a stage box to see her. The little old lady, darling of a former generation, kissed her affectionately, and taking her hands, sat stroking them. Presently she said, softly: “Take care of your beauty, dearest—it goes so soon—so very, very soon.”
In an interview, Lillian expressed a belief that colleges might give moving-picture courses, thereby improving the standards of both acting and morals in productions of the future. This was seized upon by the Harvard Dramatic Club, and she was urged to speak at the Harvard Union. She had spoken briefly at a number of churches, during her travels, and presently we find her addressing an audience of several thousand, at the Chelsea Methodist Episcopal Church, in 178th Street, New York. The burden of her purpose, as to the pictures, she conveyed in these words:
“The industry needs the development that the people of the church and the educators can give it. We players are doing our very best to get rid of all objectionable elements, but we want outside help.
“The time is coming when educational pictures will fill library shelves, exactly as books do now, and the universities should anticipate library educational advance. This is a great reason why cinema courses should be given in colleges.”
She did not write her speeches. She carried in her head a few main points, and spoke extemporaneously. Her clear, trained voice, reached every part of the great edifice—a treat for those who heard her. One of them, a woman, wrote:
If I were a poet, I suppose I might make a lovely poem about you; or I might, were I a painter, try to put on my canvas something so glorious that it would speak to everyone of what an inspiration and delight you are; but I am nobody at all—nobody except your sincere admirer.
And it was another woman who wrote of “Orphans of the Storm”:
I cannot get over your acting: I never feel the reality of a character so keenly as when you portray it. And there is no raving. Why, I have watched you play emotional scenes in which you scarcely moved a finger, and still, as someone said: “Your silence is as golden as the voice of Bernhardt.”
Which brings us back to the picture itself.
It was a beautiful and successful production. Some of the sets were especially fine: The garden picture, for instance, with its setting of palace and fountain and richly costumed guests, its magnificent outer gates.