“My first success at the Odéon was as Zacharie in Athalie. I recited the chorus of women, and this was the first occasion on which I really impressed the public. My reception was, I venture to say, really a triumph. In Le Marquis de Villemer I next played a wretched part—a thirty-five-year-old baroness. I wept all the time. George Sand, who had noticed me, consoled me and promised that I should appear in L’Autre, which she had just finished; and she kept her word. Next came Le Passant. Chilly had been induced with great difficulty to have this piece played as a benefit performance. He had no faith in it, and thought it tiresome and without a future. He had so little confidence in its success that he absolutely refused to pay for the costumes, and Agar and I were obliged to order our own and settle the bills out of our own pockets. You know how popular Coppée’s little piece became. Agar and I played it twice before the Court, with immense success![1]
[1] Mme. Bernhardt afterwards appeared as Armande in Les Femmes Savantes, in Les Arrêts (a one-act piece by M. de Boissières), in François le Champi, Le Testament de César Girodot, King Lear, Le Legs, Le Drame de la Rue de la Paix, by Adolphe Belot (1869), and La Loterie du Mariage.
In Le Drame de la Rue de la Paix.
“Kean was being prepared at the Odéon. Chilly wanted the part of Anne Damby to be given to Jane Essler, and Dumas had already promised it to Antonine. Duquesnel advised me to go and see Dumas, and not to leave the house without a written authority to at least rehearse the part. I well remember going to see Dumas. The door was opened by his daughter, and I found Dumas in his shirt-sleeves, with a woman leaning on his shoulder—Oceana I believe she was. I timidly explained the object of my visit. He listened, looked at me, and said—
“‘You would do very nicely, but I have promised the part to Jane Essler.’
“I persisted in my request, and he confessed that he had also undertaken to give the rôle to Antonine.
“Then, I said, ‘As you have promised it to two you may just as well promise it to three.’
“Fortunately I had learnt the part, and I began to recite it to him, inwardly repeating Duquesnel’s words: ‘Don’t leave him before you get a letter.’ Then I urged him again to let me rehearse the part, if only for a week.
“Finally Dumas had enough of it, and gave me a letter for Chilly, to this effect: ‘Jane Essler is to play Anne Damby, but you can let the bearer rehearse for a few days.’