“Who is the author?”
“Conan Doyle!”
The author answered at once and the cheque was sent in due course. The play was then named A Straggler of ’15. This Irving changed to A Story of Waterloo, when the play was down for production. Later this was simplified to Waterloo.
Irving fell in love with the character, and began to study it right away. The only change in the play he made was to get Sir Arthur—then “Dr.” or “Mr.”—Conan Doyle to consolidate the matter of the first few pages into a shorter space. The rest of the MS. remained exactly as written.
It was not, however, for nearly two years that he got an opportunity of playing it. It is a difficult matter to find a place for an hour-long play in a working bill. Henry VIII., King Lear, and Becket held the Lyceum stage till the middle of 1893. Then came a tour in America lasting up to end of March 1894. The short London season was taken up with a prearranged reproduction of Faust.
Then followed a provincial tour from September to Christmas. Here was found the opportunity. The Bells is a short play, and for mere length allows of an addition.
In the first week of the tour at the Princes Theatre, Bristol, on September 21, 1894, A Story of Waterloo was given. The matter was one of considerable importance in the dramatic world; not only was Irving to play a new piece, but that piece was Conan Doyle’s first attempt at the drama. The chief newspapers of London and some of the greater provincial cities wished to be represented on the occasion; the American press also wished to send its critical contingent. Accordingly we arranged for a special train to bring the critical force. Hearing that so many of his London journalistic friends were coming an old friend of Irving’s then resident in Bristol, Mr. John Saunders, arranged to give a supper in the Liberal Club, to which they were all invited, together with many persons of local importance.
The play met with a success extraordinary even for Irving. The audience followed with rapt attention and manifest emotion, swaying with the varying sentiments of the scene. The brief aid to memory in my diary of that day runs:
“New play enormous success. H. I. fine and great. All laughed and wept. Marvellous study of senility. Eight calls at end.”
Unfortunately the author was not present to share the triumph, for it would have been a delightful memory for him. He was on a tour in America; “and thereby hangs a tale.”