I write this after my first night's performance, and I trust my views are not unreasonable. How I wondered at myself, as I stood at the side scene the other night, without any quickening of the pulse or beating of the heart—thanks to the far other experiences I have gone through, which have left me small sensibility for stage apprehensions; and yet I could hardly have believed it possible that I should have been as little nervous as I was. When I went on, however, I had to encounter the only thing I had dreaded; and the loud burst of public welcome (suggestive of how many associations, and what a contrast!) shocked me from head to foot, and tried my nerves to a degree that affected my performance unfavorably through several scenes.
STAGE-LIFE. But this was my first appearance after thirteen years of absence from the stage; and, of course, no second emotion of the kind awaits me. The exertion and exposure of the performance gave me a violent cold and sore throat, and I have been obliged to send for a doctor. I had two rehearsals yesterday, which did not mend matters, but I have bolstered myself up pro tem., and what with inhaling hot water and swathing my throat in cold, and lozenges and gargles, etc., I hope to fight through without breaking down.... I have heard from Catherine Sedgwick, who says that it is a long time since she heard from you or Emily. She adds: "I shall be very glad to hear from them again. In your absence, I had nothing to give interest to my letters to them, and I have not written; and they, naturally, had no sufficient motive to write to me, so that I have been in complete ignorance about them. Harriet S—— I reckon among my friends for both worlds."
God bless you, my dear Hal. Give dear Dorothy my love.
Ever yours,
Fanny.
Manchester, Tuesday, 23d.
A thousand thanks, my dear Lady Dacre, for all your kind inquiries about, and sympathy in, my concerns. I am going on prosperously. The theatre is quite full when I play, in spite of the very bad weather, and I think my employer can afford to pay me, without grudging, my nightly salary.
I think you are right in saying I am my own best critic; my mother being gone, I believe I really am so.
I have played, since I last wrote to you, Juliana, in the "Honeymoon," a rather pretty, foolish part, which I act accordingly; Lady Macbeth, which I never could, and cannot, and never shall can act; and Juliet, which, I suppose, I play neither better nor worse than formerly, but which, naturally, I am no longer personally fit to represent.
I am not very well, for the returning to such labor as this after thirteen years' disuse of it, and at thirty-seven years of age, is a severe physical trial, and has, of course, exhausted me very much. Nothing more, however, ails me than fatigue, and I have no doubt that a few more nights' "hard use" will enable me to stand steady under my new load of heavy circumstance.