“It is,” said the Illustration recently, “with a real sentiment of satisfaction that we learn that the Fort des Poulains, the property of Madame Sarah Bernhardt at Belle Isle, is to become a museum consecrated to the great tragedienne and is not to become a tourist hotel and dancing-place, as had been reported. By a sentiment of respect and piety, the group which has purchased the property has so decided. They will try to bring to the property a collection of souvenirs of the great artiste, and tourists will thus be able to visit the surroundings which were so dear to Sarah Bernhardt’s heart.... What souvenirs are attached to Belle Isle, where La Princesse Lointaine will sleep one day perhaps her last repose!”
Once when in Florida, Sarah expressed the desire to hunt an alligator. There was no alligator in that region, and the local admirers of the artiste were in despair until it was remembered that the druggist of the town possessed a baby alligator, which at the moment (it being winter) was tranquilly asleep.
He consented to give the creature for the purposes of the hunt, and it was placed secretly in a marsh near-by. The next day Sarah was told that the hunt had been organised. She was delighted beyond measure and gaily walked the five miles to the spot, where the sleeping alligator was captured without any difficulty.
Maurice Bernhardt was at Belle Isle at the time and Sarah sent him the alligator, together with a letter telling her son that he did not need to be afraid of it, for it was a “quiet little thing” and had not even made a move since it had been caught.
But, unfortunately, when the alligator arrived at Belle Isle, it was its time to wake up, and it became a formidable customer—so dangerous, in fact, that before Sarah could arrive to view her capture in its new home it had to be killed.
Sarah had a regular colony of dogs, horses, and birds on the farm.
After the war she announced her intention of returning to the stage, one-legged though she was. There was a chorus of protest, which, however, had no effect upon her.
Money had to be earned, and it seemed as though she was the only member of the family who could earn it! So she returned to the stage, in Athalie, and was given on the opening night what was possibly the greatest ovation of her career.
Then Louis Verneuil, a talented young poet who had married her beautiful grand-daughter Lysiane, wrote a play specially for her—Daniel. It was the story of a young author, victim of opium. In it Sarah had no need to move, but spoke her lines sitting in an armchair and lying on a couch. Even thus, her tremendous personality and her magnificent voice dominated the house.
Sarah next played in a one-act play, Le Vitrail, by Réné Fauchois, at the Alhambra. Then she produced Régine Armand, and, finally, created La Gloire, by Maurice Rostand.