“Sincerely,
“Dave.”

It is probable that, without the sting of this contemptible conduct on the part of the stockholders of the Lyceum (instigated, as I understand, by complaints from Miss Georgia Cayvan), Belasco would, for some time longer, have continued to toil in his treadmill at that temple of liberal virtue. As the ultimate event has proved, it was fortunate that he was thus annoyed. He had resolved to retire before he had finished writing his acknowledgment of Mr. Frohman’s note; he sent in his resignation soon afterward, and, on March 27, 1890, his association with the Lyceum was ended.

A LONG, LONG ROAD.

One of my earliest and best friends, the loved and honored poet Longfellow, sometimes cited to me a maxim (which, alas, I have all my life neglected to heed!) that “he who carries his bricks to the building of every one’s house will never build one for himself.” When Belasco withdrew from the Lyceum Theatre (March 27, 1890) he had been for twenty years,—notwithstanding his efforts toward independence,—carrying bricks to build houses for other persons. He was conscious of this mistake and dissatisfied with himself for having made it, and he now resolutely determined to build for himself. During the five and one-half years, March, 1890, to October, 1895, he worked with persistent diligence, often in the face of seemingly insurmountable difficulties, to train and establish the woman of whose histrionic destiny he had assumed the direction and to achieve for himself position and power as a theatrical manager. He had in mind for his embryonic star, Mrs. Leslie Carter, a play which, ultimately, was written and successfully produced, under the name of “The Heart of Maryland”; but when first he seriously began the task of training that beginner for the stage even the plan of that play was rudimentary, and it became imperative that he should at once secure a practical vehicle for her use and should get her launched as an actress. There could be no question of her beginning in a minor capacity in some obscure company and working her way up: she had no thought of enduring any such novitiate, though she was willing, in fact eager, to perform any amount of arduous labor. But, with her, it was a case of beginning at the top—or not at all. In general, that is a mistaken plan; it results in utter failure a hundred times for once that it succeeds; yet, sometimes, where backed by genuine ability and indomitable courage, the course that seems rash proves really the most judicious, and for those with the heart to endure to lose it proves the way to win. The famous soldier Montrose wrote truly:

“He either fears his fate too much
Or his deserts are small,
That puts it not unto the touch
To win or lose it all.”

To that touch Belasco and Mrs. Carter determined to put her fate at the earliest possible moment, yet not altogether without preparation for the ordeal through which she was to pass. Belasco’s method of instructing her was the only practical one: he treated her as if she had been the leading woman in a stock company, under his direction, in circumstances which made it peremptory that she, and only she, should act certain parts, and with whom, accordingly, he must do the best he could. His experience as a teacher was onerous and often discouraging, but he and his pupil persevered. “Mrs. Carter,” he writes, “had no idea of the rudiments of acting. In Chicago she had been a brilliant drawing-room figure. Very graceful in private life, she became awkward and self-conscious on the stage. Our first lessons included a series of physical exercises, to secure a certain grace and ease of motion.” During the period from April, 1890, to about June, 1891, according to Belasco’s statement to me, Mrs. Carter, under his direction, memorized and rehearsed (sometimes on the stage of Palmer’s Theatre, sometimes in private rooms) more than thirty different parts, in representative drama, ranging from Nancy Sikes, in “Oliver Twist,” to Parthenia, in “Ingomar”; from Camille to Lady Macbeth; from Julia, in “The Hunchback,” to Mrs. Bouncer, in “Box and Cox,” and from Leah the Forsaken to Frou-Frou. Meantime, however, Belasco had a wife and children to support, as well as himself; his resources were little and day by day were growing less; Mrs. Carter and her devoted mother were no better off, and it was essential that the hopeful but harassed adventurer should add to his income, derived from miscellaneous private teaching and coaching for the stage, to which precarious expedient he was, at this period, compelled to revert, to eke out his slender revenue. At this juncture his friend Charles Frohman, who had bought Bronson Howard’s war melodrama of “Shenandoah” and had prospered with it, and who had undertaken to provide dramatic entertainments for Proctor’s Twenty-third Street Theatre, applied to him for a new play.

CONFEDERATION WITH CHARLES FROHMAN.

“There was an old building on Twenty-third Street. Proctor now [1890] turned this building into a theatre, and ’C. F.’ asked me to write a play for the opening.... Frohman,” writes Belasco, “had persuaded F. F. Proctor to turn an old church ... into a theatre. ’C. F.’ was to supply the company and a new play. Proctor, a pioneer with a tremendous amount of ambition, had been making money in vaudeville and wanted to enter the theatrical field. ’Dave,’ ’C. F.’ said, ’I shall depend upon you for the play.’... I advised him not to wait an instant, lest Proctor’s enthusiasm die out. The following week the old church began dropping its ecclesiastical aspect as fast as the wreckers could do away with it.

“I was strongly tempted to write the opening play alone, but when I saw how much depended upon it I had a touch of stage fright. Naturally, my thoughts turned to Henry De Mille.... We had always been successful because our way of thought was similar and we were frank in our criticism of each other’s work. He excelled in narrative and had a quick wit. The emotional or dramatic scenes were more to my liking. I acted while he took down my speeches. When a play was finished, it was impossible to say where his work left off and my work began [???—W. W.]. This is what collaboration should be.

“It was five o’clock in the morning when I was seized with the idea of asking De Mille to assist me and I hastened at once to his house. I knocked on his door with the vigor of a watchman sounding a fire alarm, and when De Mille at last appeared he was armed with a cane, ready to defend his hearth and home. I told him of the necessity for a play for ’C. F.’s’ opening and he agreed to work with me. In the profession De Mille and I were thought to be very lucky as ’theatre openers.’ Looking back, I see how many, many times it has been my fate to break the bottle over the prows of theatrical ships. Here we were again,—De Mille and I,—talking over the birth and baptism of yet another New York manager!”