My dear Mrs. Hall,—I want to tell you how much I enjoyed hearing about your dear Father, and all the brave, generous things he did for the Greeks, and for all who were poor and unhappy. I think the children who read Wide Awake must have been greatly interested in your story, but they cannot love Dr. Howe as we little blind girls do. Teacher says, she would not have known how to teach me if your Father had not taught Laura Bridgman first, and that is why I feel so grateful to him. How dreadful it would have been if I could not have learned like other boys and girls! I am sure I should have been very sorrowful with no one to talk to me, and so would Edith and many others, but it is too sad to think about, is it not? When you come to Boston I hope you will tell me more about your Father, and what you did when you were a little girl. Mr. Anagnos is going to show me Byron’s helmet some day. Teacher sends her kind regards to you.
Lovingly your little friend,
Helen A. Keller.
In these years Edwin Booth spent the summer at his pretty red-roofed villa, “Boothden,” on Indian Avenue. It was then a quiet and retired part of the island of Rhode Island, yet within easy reach of Newport. The house was placed so near the rocky shore that the ocean breezes might have been too boisterous had not awnings screened the wide piazzas. A large and pleasant boat-house equipped with a sitting- or lounging-room stood on the shore.
“Boothden” was only four miles from “Oak Glen,” so that we were country neighbors of Mr. Booth and his charming daughter. We had the pleasure of seeing them from time to time. When we were invited to take luncheon at their villa, to meet Joseph Jefferson, his wife and daughter, and William Warren, the veteran comedian of the Boston Museum, it seemed too wonderful to be true.
Miss Edwina Booth (whom I remembered as Baby Booth) received us with a grace and charm that vividly recalled her lovely young mother, dead many years before. The resemblance to Mrs. Booth was almost startling. It seemed as if the beloved wife, young and fair as of old, had returned to this earth. We saw the same slender figure, the same movements, as I fancied. What a strange thing is the inheritance of gesture! There could have been no conscious imitation, for Miss Booth could not have remembered her mother.
The three distinguished actors had rashly gone for a sail in Mr. Booth’s yacht. It is always rash to go out in a sail-boat if you expect to return at any particular hour.
When they finally arrived their entrance was like a scene upon the stage. Their behavior was not at all theatrical, but they were mariners returning from a stormy trip. A good stiff breeze had blown them all about, the waves had given them a good wetting, while Mr. Jefferson had lost his hat overboard.
They took all these small mishaps in the best possible humor, as a part of life’s comedy. Joe Jefferson had substituted a red bandanna handkerchief for the lost hat and treated the whole affair as a delightful joke. Presently we all sat down to a luncheon elegant and elaborate, after the fashion of the time, the table being faultless in its service and appointments.
Joseph Jefferson was brilliant and delightful, evidently enjoying the conversation. The geniality and cheeriness of his stage characters were but a reflection of his own sunny disposition. If he had stood in the shoes of Rip Van Winkle, Caleb Plummer, or Bob Acres, he would have taken life as cheerfully as they did. After seeing him in private life I understood better the spirit of his acting. The Jefferson of the parlor was the Jefferson of the stage, save that the man himself was more brilliant, more original than the men of a simple type whom he habitually portrayed. He possessed that highest form of art which conceals itself. At the Booth luncheon he talked of many things—of art, his pictures, the proper light for the stage, his children, his farm in Florida, his delight in roaming through the woods with his fishing-rod.