LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PAGE
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt[Frontispiece]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt and her son Maurice at the age of five[6]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt and her son Maurice at the age of eleven[8]
Mme. Guérard[13]
As Junie in Britannicus[14]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt when a girl[17]
As Zanetto in Le Passant[20]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt in François le Champi[21]
In Le Drame de la Rue de la Paix[24]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt’s Cheque[26]
As Cordelia in King Lear[29]
As Doña Sol in Hernani[32]
As Léonora in Dalila[35]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt and her son Maurice at the age of fifteen[39]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt as Cleopatra[43]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt in La Fille de Roland[46]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt in her coffin[49]
As Doña Sol in Hernani[53]
As Doña Sol in Hernani[56]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt in her travelling costume[59]
As Léonora in Dalila[63]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt in 1877[67]
Sketch by Caran d’Ache[70]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt as sculptor[71]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt as painter[75]
Caricature by André Gill[77]
Sketch by Mme. Sarah Bernhardt[78]
As Adrienne Lecouvreur[83]
As Adrienne Lecouvreur[87]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt in travelling costume, during her first American tour[89]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt and her friends at Sainte-Adresse[93]
As Léa[97]
M. Damala[101]
As Théodora[103]
Scene from Théodora[107]
As Lady Macbeth[111]
As Jeanne d’Arc[115]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt on one of her tours[117]
As Cleopatra[121]
Vestibule of Mme. Sarah Bernhardt’s studio[125]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt’s drawing-room[129]
In La Dame de Chalant[133]
As Pauline Blanchard[136]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt and the painter Clairin[137]
As Izeïl[140]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt in her entrance-hall[141]
As Gismonda[145]
The Fort-aux-Poulains, Belle-Isle, Mme. Sarah Bernhardt’s country residence[149]
Mme. Sarah Bernhardt, from a drawing by C. Léandre[159]
As Phèdre[163]
As Phèdre[165]
Caricature of Mme. Sarah Bernhardt by Capiello[170]
In La Dame aux Camélias[174]
Scene from Hamlet[181]
As Hamlet[187]

SARAH BERNHARDT

On the 10th February, 1898, Mme. Sarah Bernhardt telephoned to me to come and see her. The occasion was a serious one. She told me that on the following day she would leave her house in the Boulevard Pereire and enter a private hospital in the Rue d’Armaillé, where she was to undergo a painful operation. For some time past she had suffered from a dull, aching pain, and during a performance of Les Mauvais Bergers, in which she had to fall flat on her face, she experienced a sharper pang than usual. She ought to have at once begun to take care of herself and avoid all fatigue, but when she returned to her dressing-room, her first act was to fall on her face again to make sure that what she had felt was not mere imagination. She went on making sure in this way through the remaining forty performances of Les Mauvais Bergers. Finally, however, she called in Dr. Pozzi, who immediately discovered serious internal trouble, and informed her that an operation must be performed in June. In spite of this, Mme. Sarah Bernhardt organized a provincial tour; but her condition suddenly became worse, and Dr. Pozzi decided that the operation must take place almost immediately.

A few days before the date fixed, the actress decided to break the news to her son. She did this on the eve of his duel with M. Champsaur, of which, of course, he had not told her.

“You can imagine what a blow it was to him,” Mme. Sarah Bernhardt remarked to me.

“Were you not afraid?” I asked—I don’t exactly know why, the great artiste being as gay and alert as usual.

“Afraid?” she replied. “No; there’s no danger with Pozzi. It’s just a stroke of bad luck,” she added bravely, with a smile. “I had a wonderful run of success last year, too much in fact, and now this is a set-off.”