Her mother did not perhaps realise that her words cut the young actress straight to the heart. Above all things Sarah had wanted to please Julie; above all things Sarah had feared her mother’s harsh criticisms.
That night she was found moaning in her dressing-room. A doctor, hurriedly called, declared she had taken poison, and she was rushed off to the hospital.
For five days Sarah hovered between life and death, finally rallying after four of the best doctors in Paris had been called in to aid in the fight.
In response to questioning by her old friend, Madame Guérard, Sarah confessed that she had swallowed the contents of a bottle of liquid rouge. Asked the reason for this strange and terrible act she answered:
“Life was useless; I wanted to see what death was like!”
I have always believed that it was her mother’s want of sympathy for her which caused Sarah’s desperate act, and if there was another reason the world never knew it. Newspapers of the day attributed it to a love affair, but this Sarah denied when she related the episode to me—an episode, by the way, which is not included in her Memoirs.
“I was wrapped up in my art, and had no serious love affairs at that time,” she said. “I was simply despondent because I did not succeed fast enough. Why! not a single critic praised me!”
It was the famous authoress Georges Sand who took Sarah in hand afterwards, preached love of life to her and persuaded her that a great future lay ahead. To Georges Sand Sarah one day confided:
“Madame Sand, I would rather die than not be the greatest actress in the world!”
“You are the greatest, my child!” said Madame Sand with conviction, and added: “One day soon the world will lie at your feet!”