One afternoon the nurse happened to bring the child into the museum when Madame Olinza was on the rope; and out of the vast audience that little face was recognized by the fond mother, and her attention so distracted that she lost her balance, dropped her pole, and fell.
Catching the rope with her hands, however, in time to break her fall, she escaped fortunately without the least injury; but ever after that her child was kept out of the audience while she was on the rope.
CHAPTER X.
ADIEU TO THE STAGE.
GOING up the Mississippi from Cairo, we passed, one Sunday, the old French town of Cape Girardeau, Missouri, and its Roman Catholic college on the river-bank. The boys were out on the lawn under the trees, and I became as envious of their lot as I ever had been before of a man who worked on a steamboat or who danced “in the minstrels.” I suddenly resolved that I would go to that college.
We did not stop at Cape Girardeau till our return down the river, some weeks afterward. Then I went boldly up, and sought an interview with the president of the institution. I found him to be a kindly-mannered priest, who encouraged me in my ambition. He told me it would be well to save up more money than I then had, and that he would do all he could for me. I returned to the Palace, and immediately gave warning that I purposed to leave as soon as some one could be got to fill my place.
It struck me as somewhat odd that it was six months from that date before I could get away. It has been explained to me since. The fact is, I received what, as a boy, I thought a good salary, but nothing like what I earned. It took two men afterwards to fill my place. I have been told since, that more than a year before that time, and prior to this last engagement, the late E. P. Christy had written for me from New York, but that the letter had been intercepted by those whose interest it then was that I should not know my own value in the “profession.”
I used to see that my name was larger than almost any other on the bills, but was led to believe that it was because I was a boy, and not likely to excite the jealousy of the other members of the company. It may not be very soothing to my vanity, but, dwelling upon these things dispassionately, I have my honest doubts now whether I was not always a greater success as an advertisement than as a performer.
I was promised at New Orleans that, if I would go over to Galveston, Texas, with the minstrel troupe, I should certainly be allowed to retire from public life. So we left the Palace and the Raymond at the levee of the former city, and took passage in the regular steamship, crossing the Gulf to Galveston. We performed there two or three weeks with great success. Few minstrels then had wandered that way, and thus it happened that my farewell appearance as a dancer was greeted with a crowded house. Except as a poor lecturer, I have never been on the stage since I left Galveston.
Still resolved to go to college at Cape Girardeau, I returned to New Orleans, and took passage to Cairo on the steamer L. M. Kennett. Barney Williams and his wife were on board during the tedious voyage; but I suppose they have long since forgotten all about the urchin who surprised and bored them with his minute knowledge of the early history of the country through which we passed.
The river above Cairo, very much to my sorrow, was frozen over, for it was midwinter. There was no alternative for me but to proceed to Cape Girardeau by land,—a long, difficult, and expensive journey in those times. After a great deal of trouble and some danger, I arrived at the gates of the College, and proceeded directly to the room of the president.