[75] Another childish blunder marks Miss Terry’s only meeting with the great actor Macready. She accidentally jostled him while running to her dressing-room. He smiled at her apology, and said: “Never mind, you are a very polite little girl, and you act very earnestly and speak very nicely.”
[76] Miss Terry relates the rise and fall of her childish vanity at this time: “The parts we play influence our characters to some extent, and Puck made me a bit of a romp. I grew vain and rather ‘cocky,’ and it was just as well that during the rehearsals for the Christmas pantomime in 1857, I was tried for the part of the fairy Dragonetta and rejected. [The children’s parts at the Princess’s were assigned after competitive trials. For Mamillius “Nelly” had been chosen out of half a dozen aspirants.] I believe that my failure was principally due to the fact that I hadn’t flashing eyes and raven hair—without which, as every one knows, no bad fairy can hold up her head and respect herself.... Only the extreme beauty of my dress as the maudlin ‘good fairy’ Golden-star, consoled me. I used to think I looked beautiful in it. I wore a trembling star in my forehead, too, which was enough to upset any girl.” A little later: “I think my part in Pizarro saw the last of my vanity. I was a worshiper of the sun and, in a pink feather, pink swathings of muslin, and black arms, I was again struck by my own beauty. I grew quite attached to the looking glass which reflected that feather! Then suddenly there came a change. I began to see the whole thing. My attentive watching of other people began to bear fruit, and the labor and perseverance, care and intelligence, which had gone to make these enormous productions dawned on my young mind. Up to this time I had loved acting because it was great fun, but I had not loved the grind. After I began to rehearse Prince Arthur in King John, I understood that if I did not work I could not act! And I wanted to work. I used to get up in the middle of the night and watch my gestures in the glass. I used to try my voice and bring it up and down in the right places. And all my vanity fell away from me.”
[77] “It was a chicken! Now, as all the chickens had names—Sultan, Sultan, Duke, Lord Tom Noddy, Lady Teazle, and so forth—and as I was very proud of them as living birds, it was a great wrench to kill one at all, to start with. It was the murder of Sultan, not the killing of a chicken. However, at last it was done, and Sultan deprived of his feathers, floured, and trussed. I had no idea how this was all done, but I tried to make him ‘sit up’ nicely like the chickens in the shops.
“He came up to the table looking magnificent—almost turkey-like in his proportions.
“‘Hasn’t this chicken rather an odd smell?’ said our visitor.
“‘How can you!’ I answered. ‘It must be quite fresh—it’s Sultan!’
“However, when we began to carve, the smell grew more and more potent.
“I had cooked Sultan without taking out his in’ards!
“There was no dinner that day except bread-sauce, beautifully made, well-cooked vegetables, and pastry like the foam of the sea. I had a wonderful hand for pastry.”
[78] Of her first night as Portia the London Daily News said: “This is indeed the Portia that Shakespeare drew. The bold innocence, the lively wit and quick intelligence, the grace and elegance of manner, and all the youth and freshness of this exquisite creation can rarely have been depicted in such harmonious combination. Nor is this delightful actress less successful in indicating the tenderness and depth of passion which lie under that frolicsome exterior. Miss Terry’s figure, at once graceful and commanding, and her singularly sweet and expressive countenance, doubtless aid her much; but this performance is essentially artistic, ... in the style of art which cannot be taught.”