There was a good deal more of it, for, when he had been furnished with plenty of liquid refreshment, the Muse of Walt ran to length.
From New York Lola set out on a tour to Philadelphia, St. Louis, and Boston. While in this last town, she "paid a visit of ceremony" to one of the public schools. Although the children there "expressed surprise and delight at the honour accorded them," the Boston Transcript shook its editorial head; and "referred to the visit in a fashion that aroused the just indignation of the lady and her friends."
The cudgels were promptly taken up on her behalf by a New York journalist:
"Lola Montez," he declared, "owes less of her strange fascination and world-wide celebrity to her powers as an artiste than to the extraordinary mind and brilliancy of intellect with which Heaven has thought fit to endow her. At one moment ruling a kingdom, through an imbecile monarch; and the next, the wife of a dashing young English lord.... Her person and bearing are unmistakably aristocratic. In her recent visit to one of our public schools she surprised and delighted the scholars by addressing them in the Latin language with remarkable facility."
It would be of interest to learn the name of the "dashing young English lord." This, however, was probably a brevet rank conferred by the pressman on Cornet Heald.
On April 27, 1852, Lola Montez appeared at the Albany Museum in selections from her repertoire. On this occasion she brought with her a "troupe of twelve dancing girls." As an additional lure, the bills described these damsels as "all of them unmarried, and most of them under sixteen."
But the attraction which proved the biggest success in her repertoire was a drama called Lola in Bavaria. This was said to be written by "a young literary gentleman of New England, the son of a somewhat celebrated poetess." The heroine, who was never off the stage for more than five minutes, was depicted in turns as a dancer, a politician, a countess, a revolutionary, and a fugitive; and among the other characters were Ludwig I, Eugéne Sue, Dujarier, and Cornet Heald, while the setting offered "a correct representation of the Lola Montez palace at Munich." It seemed good value. At any rate, the public thought it was, and full houses were secured. But the critics restrained their raptures. "I sympathise," was the acid comment of one of them, "with the actresses who were forced to take part in such stuff"; and Joseph Daly described the heroine as "deserting a royal admirer to court the sovereign public." The author of this balderdash was one C. P. T. Ware, "a poor little hack playwright, who wrote anything for anybody."
March of 1853 found Lola Montez fulfilling an engagement at the Variétés Theatre, St. Louis. Kate Field, the daughter of the proprietor, wrote a letter on the subject to her aunt.
"Well, Lola Montez appeared at father's theatre last night for the first time. The theatre was crowded from parquet to doors. She had the most beautiful eyes I ever saw. I liked her very much; but she performed a dumb girl, so I cannot say what she would do in speaking characters."
During this engagement Lola apparently proved a little difficile, for her critic adds: "She is trying to trouble father as much as possible."