It is said that my reply was very eloquent, but I cannot affirm that that reply was really made by me. I had lived for several hours in a state of over-excitement from successive emotions. I had taken no food, had no sleep. My heart had not ceased to beat a moving and joyous refrain. My brain had been filled with a thousand facts that had been piled up for seven months and narrated in two hours. This triumphant reception, which I was far from expecting after what had happened just before my departure, after having been so badly treated by the Paris Press, after the incidents of my journey, which had been always badly interpreted by several French papers—all these coincidences were of such different proportions that they seemed hardly credible.
The performance furnished a fruitful harvest for the life-savers. As for me, I played La Dame aux Camélias for the first time in France.
I was really inspired. I affirm that those who were present at that performance experienced the quintessence of what my personal art can give.
I spent the night at my place at Ste. Adresse. The day following I left for Paris.
A most flattering ovation was waiting for me on my arrival. Then, three days afterwards, installed in my little mansion in the Avenue de Villiers, I received Victorien Sardou, in order to hear him read his magnificent piece, Fédora.
What a great artiste! What an admirable actor! What a marvellous author!
He read that play to me right off, playing every rôle, giving me in one second the vision of what I should do.
“Ah!” I exclaimed, after the reading was over. “Ah, dear Master! Thanks for this beautiful part! Thanks for the fine lesson you have just given me.”
That night left me without sleep, for I wished to catch a glimpse in the darkness of the small star in which I had faith.
I saw it as dawn was breaking, and fell asleep thinking over the new era that it was going to light up.