After that I saw there was nothing more to hope for; my doom was fixed and my misfortune inevitable.
I was made to study my part, which my unwillingness made a very slow business, and when the day for acting it arrived, my parents themselves came to introduce me.
When my turn came I found it impossible to open my mouth. My youth and my simplicity stirred the pity of the whole audience, while my father endeavoured to express his displeasure and anger to me by frightful grimaces, which at last forced me to stammer out a few notes.
The spectators made the building echo with their loud cries of brava! brava! coraggio! and at the end of the play several ladies of quality asked to see me, praising me repeatedly and lavishing all sorts of endearments upon me.
All the time the carnival lasted I was compelled to carry out the painful task imposed on me. One day, having tried to play the invalid, my father discovered the trick, and made me pay for it so dear that I did not again think of making that sort of excuse.
God alone knows how delighted I was when my engagement came to an end; but, alas! the relief was a short one. After a few months’ rest, my father announced to me that I was about to have the honour of appearing on a larger stage, adding that everything was arranged and settled and there was nothing left for me but to obey his orders.
The news came upon me like a clap of thunder. Putting aside my nervousness, I felt myself degraded and debased.
More especially did I feel ashamed when I heard the actresses saying to one another: “It is disparaging to us to have the daughter of a constable put amongst us.”
At this period I had two brothers and one sister, three little tyrants all of whose whims I had to humour; for if I made the smallest objection my mother encouraged them to abuse me and beat me, and throw stones at me. Fed and brought up delicately, nothing was good enough for them; but I had no difficulty, nevertheless, in realizing that they were being prepared for no better fate than mine, and they, too, were destined for my degrading profession.
Too unfortunate already in that I belonged to such a family, I was far from expecting fresh troubles, when my father read aloud to us the following letter, which he had just received, addressed to me—