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“And I’ll go away and fight for myself.”

—Eliza Comes to Stay.

As Mr. Wickfield said to Miss Trotwood—the old question, you know—“What is your motive in this?”

I am sure it is excellent to have a motive, and if possible a good motive, for doing everything; and so before I begin I want to give my motive for attempting to write my memoirs of things and people, past and present—and here it is.

Jack, my son, was on tour with his own company of Eliza Comes to Stay; and Jill, my little daughter, was playing at the St. James’s Theatre, her first engagement—and, incidentally, earning more each week than I did when I first played “lead” (and I found my own dresses). I thought that some day they might like to know how different things were in the “old days”; like to read how one worked, and studied, and tried to save; might like to know something of the road over which their father and mother had travelled; and perhaps gain some idea of the men and women who were our contemporaries. Perhaps, if they, my own boy and girl, would like to read this, other people’s boys and girls might like to read it also: it might at least interest and amuse them.

To me, to try and write it all would be a joy, to “call spirits from the vasty deep,” to ring up again the curtain on the small dramas in which I had played—and the small comedies too—and to pay some tribute to the great men and women I have known. It may all seem to be “my story,” but very often I shall only be the string on which are hung the bravery, kindness, and goodness of the really great people; not always the most successful, but the really great, who have helped to make life what it should be, and luckily sometimes really is!

So I determined to begin, and begin at the beginning.

Brighton! when it was Brighton; still retaining some of the glories of the long past Regency; with its gay seasons, its mounted police, and—no Metropole Hotel; when the only two hotels of any importance were the “Bedford” and the still-existing “Old Ship.” The old chain pier, standing when we went to bed one evening, and swept away when we got up the next morning by a terrific gale. The Aquarium, then a place which people really visited and regarded as something of a “sight worth seeing”—does anyone go there now, except on a very wet day? The Dome in the Pavilion, with its grand orchestral concerts, conducted by the famous Mr. Kuhe, whose son is now a musical critic in London. All these things belonged to Brighton of the—well, the exact date does not matter—but of the time when women did not ride bicycles or drive motor cars, because certainly the one, and certainly the other so far as women were concerned, did not exist. In those days men rode a high “single wheel” bicycle: the higher the wheel, the greater the Knut—only the word “Knut” was unknown then!

Those are some of the memories I have of Brighton at the time when we were a happy, noisy, large family living in Regency Square; a really large family, even as Victorian families went—nine girls and one boy. We had no money, but unlimited health and spirits.

My mother!—well, everyone says “Mine was the sweetest mother in the world,” but my mother really was. She had a most amazing amount of character hidden under a most gentle exterior. As pretty as a picture, adorable—just “Mother.”

And father—an austere, very good-looking man of uncertain temper; one of those tempers which periodically sweep through the house like a tornado. Absolutely upright, and deeply respected, but with a stern sense of his duties as a parent which we, his children, hardly appreciated.

My first recollection is of trying to climb into my mother’s bed, and finding the place that should have been mine occupied by a “new baby.” I heard years afterwards that when my mother was told that her tenth child and ninth daughter had arrived in the world, she exclaimed: “Thank God it’s a girl!” Such a nice feminine thing to say, bless her!

Six of the girls lived to grow up, and we each, as we grew sufficiently advanced in years, took turns at the “housekeeping”. I know I did double duty, as my sister Jessie distinguished herself by fainting one morning when preparing the breakfast, and so was not allowed to do it any more. I remember creeping down the stairs in the dark early mornings (when I think of “getting breakfast”, it seems to me that we must have lived in perpetual winter, the mornings seem to have always been cold and dark, never bright and sunny: I suppose the memory of the unpleasant things remains longer), going very softly past my father’s room, and putting the loathsome porridge—partially cooked the night before—on the gas ring, and, having stirred it, creeping upstairs again to dress.

I remember, too, at breakfast how I would watch my father’s face, to see by his expression if it was “all right”; the awful moment when, eyeing it with disfavour, he would give his verdict: “Lumpy!” The cook for the day, after such a verdict, generally left the table in tears.

It must have been before I was old enough to make porridge that I had my first sweetheart. His name was Johnnie; he was a small Jew, and we met in Regency Square; together we turned somersaults all round the Square, and it must have been all very idealistic and pleasant. I remember nothing more about him, so apparently our love was short-lived.

Up to the time that my sister Decima was six, my father kept a stick in the dining-room; the moral effect of that stick was enormous; should any member of the family become unruly (or what my father considered unruly), the stick was produced and a sharp rap on the head administered.

One day Decima was the culprit, and as my father leant back to reach the stick, she exclaimed cheerfully: “You won’t find the old stick, cos I’ve hided it.”

She had, too; it was not found for years, when it was discovered in a large chest, right at the bottom. It is still a mystery how Decima, who was really only a baby at the time, put it there. Looking back, I applaud her wisdom, and see the promise of the aptitude for “looking ahead” which has made her so successful in the ventures on which she has embarked; for the “stick” certainly affected her most. She was a naughty child, but very, very pretty. We called her “The Champion”, because she would take up the cudgels on behalf of anyone who was “underdog”. I loved her devotedly; and, when she was being punished for any special piece of naughtiness by being interned in her bedroom, I used to sit outside, whispering at intervals, “I’m here, darling”, “It’s all right, dear”, and so on.

Yet it was to Decima that I caused a tragedy, and, incidentally, to myself as well. She was the proud possessor of a very beautiful wax doll; a really beautiful and aristocratic person she was. We always said “Grace” before meals (I think everyone did in those days), and one morning I was nursing the doll. In an excess of religious fervour, I insisted that the wax beauty should say “grace” too. Her body, not being adapted to religious exercises, refused to bend with the reverence I felt necessary; I pushed her, and cracked off her head on the edge of the table. Now, mark how this tragedy recoiled on me! I had a gold piece—half a sovereign, I suppose—given to me by some god-parent. It lived in a box, wrapped in cotton wool, and I occasionally gazed at it; I never dreamt of spending it; it was merely regarded as an emblem of untold wealth. Justice, in the person of my father, demanded that, as I had broken the doll, my gold piece must be sacrificed to buy her a new head. If the incident taught me nothing else, it taught me to extend religious tolerance even to wax dolls!

Not only did we hate preparing breakfast, we hated doing the shopping, and called it “Sticking up to Reeves, and poking down to Daws”—Reeves and Daws being the grocer and laundryman respectively. It was in the process of “Sticking up to Reeves”, whose shop was in Kemptown, one morning, that Decima stopped to speak to a goat, who immediately ate the shopping list out of her hand.

Decima was the only member of the family who succeeded in wearing a fringe—openly—before my father. We all did wear fringes, but they were pushed back in his presence; Decima never pushed hers back! In those days so to adorn one’s forehead was to declare oneself “fast”—an elastic term, which was applied to many things which were frowned on by one’s elders. That was the “final word”—“fast!”

Our great excitement was bathing in the sea, and singing in the church choir. We bathed three times a week; it cost 4d. each. Clad in heavy serge, with ample skirts, very rough and “scratchy”, we used to emerge from the bathing machines. All except Ada, who swam beautifully, and made herself a bathing suit of blue bunting with knickers and tunic. My father used to row round to the “ladies’ bathing place” in his dinghy, and teach us how to swim. As there was no “mixed bathing” then, this caused much comment, and was, indeed, considered “hardly nice”. My brother Henry was the champion swimmer of the South Coast, and he and Ada used to swim together all round the West Pier—this, again, was thought to be “going rather far” in more senses than one!

Though I loved Decima so devotedly, we apparently had “scraps”, for I can remember once in the bathing machine she flicked me several times with a wet towel—I remember, too, how it hurt.

We all sang in the church choir; not all at once; as the elder ones left, the younger ones took their places. Boys from the boarding school in Montpelier Square used to be brought to church: we exchanged glances, and felt desperately wicked. Once (before she sang in the choir) Decima took 3d. out of the plate instead of putting 1d. into it.

At that time our pocket-money was 1d. a week, so I presume we were given “collection money” for Sunday; this was later increased to 2s. a month, when we had to buy our own gloves. Thus my mother’s birthday present—always the same: a pot of primulas (on the receipt of which she always expressed the greatest surprise)—represented the savings of three weeks on the part of Decima and me. It was due to parental interference in a love affair that I once, in a burst of reckless extravagance, induced Decima to add her savings to mine and spend 5d. in sweets, all at one fell swoop.

I was 14, and in love! In love with a boy who came to church, and whose name I cannot remember. We met in the street, and stopped to speak. Fate, in the person of my father (who always seems to have been casting himself for the parts of “Fate”, “Justice”, “Law”, or “Order”) saw us; I was ordered into the house, and, seizing my umbrella, my father threatened to administer the chastisement which he felt I richly deserved for the awful crime of “speaking to a boy”. I escaped the chastisement by flying to my room; and it was there, realising that “love’s young dream was o’er”, I incited Decima to the aforementioned act of criminal extravagance. I know one of the packets she brought back contained “hundreds and thousands”; we liked them, you seemed to get such a lot for your money!

My life was generally rather blighted at that time, for, in addition to this unfortunate love affair, I had to wear black spectacles, owing to weak eyes, the result of measles. “A girl” told me, at school, that “a boy” had told her I “should be quite pretty if I hadn’t to wear those awful glasses.” The tragedy of that “if”!

I was then at Miss Pringle’s school, where I don’t think any of us learnt very much; not that girls were encouraged to learn much at any school in those days. I certainly didn’t. My eyes made reading difficult. Then the opportunity for me to earn my own living offered; it was seized; and I went to Liverpool. I was to teach gymnastics and dancing under Madame Michau.

The original Madame Michau, mother of the lady for whom I was to work, had been a celebrity in her day. Years before—many, many years before—she had taught dancing in Brighton, where she had been considered the person to coach debutantes in the deportment necessary for a drawing-room. Her daughter was very energetic, and worked from morning to night. She had a very handsome husband, who ostensibly “kept the books”, which really meant that he lounged at home while his wife went out to work. Not only did she work herself, but she made me work too—from eight in the morning until eleven at night; in fact, so far as my memory serves me, there was a greater abundance of work than of food. I don’t regret any of it in the least; the dancing and gymnastics taught me how to “move” in a way that nothing else could have done. It taught me, also, how to keep my temper!

Only one thing I really resented; that was, among other duties, I had to mend Madame’s husband’s underwear. Even then I am overstating the case; I did not mind the mending collectively; what I minded was the mending individually—that is, I hated mending his (what are technically known, I think, as) pants. At the end of a year I “crocked up”—personally I wonder that I lasted so long—and came home for a holiday. I was then about 15, and I fell in love. Not, this time, with a small boy in the Square; not with a big boy; this was a real affair. “He” was at least twelve years older than I, very good to look at, and apparently he had excellent prospects on the Stock Exchange. My family, so far as I can remember, approved, and I was very happy. I forget how long the engagement lasted—about a year, I think—and for part of that time I was back in Liverpool. I know the engagement ring was pearl and coral. One day a stone fell out—so did the engagement. The picture “he” had drawn of us living in domestic and suburban bliss at West Norwood—me clad in brown velvet and a sealskin coat (apparently irrespective of times or seasons) vanished. He “went broke” on the Stock Exchange, and broke off the engagement—perhaps so that his love affairs might be in keeping with the general wreckage; I don’t know. I remember that I sat in the bedroom writing a farewell letter, damp with tears, when the sight of a black beetle effectively dried my tears and ended the letter.

I don’t know that this love affair influenced me at all, but I decided I was utterly weary of Liverpool. I came back to Brighton, and taught dancing there, partly on my own and partly in conjunction with an already established dancing class. It was there that I taught a small, red-headed boy to do “One, two, three—right; one, two, three—left.” He was the naughtiest small boy in the class; I used to think sometimes he must be the naughtiest small boy in the world. His name was Winston Churchill.

It was not a thrilling life—this teaching children to dance—on the contrary, it was remarkably dull, and once your work becomes dull to you it is time you found something else to do. I decided that I would. I would make a bid for the Stage.

We, or at least my elder sisters, gave theatrical performances at home—comedies and operettas—and it was during the production of one of these that I met Miss Harriet Young, the well-known amateur pianist, in Brighton.

The production was called Little Golden Hope, the one and only amateur production in which I ever took part. It was written by my brother-in-law, Ernest Pertwee, and the music by Madame Guerini, who had been a Miss Wilberforce, daughter of Canon Wilberforce. Miss Young used to come and play the piano at these productions, and I heard that she knew Mrs. Kendal! Mrs. Kendal was staying at Brighton at the time. A letter of introduction was given to me by Miss Young, and, accompanied by my sister Bertha, I went to see Mrs. Kendal.

No very clear memory of it remains. She was charming; I was paralysed with fright. If she gave me any advice about the advisability of taking up the stage as a profession, it was “don’t”—so I went back to my dancing class.

But hope was not dead! Florrie Toole, who was a pupil of my sister Emily, promised me an introduction to her father, and not only to him but to Tom Thorne of the Vaudeville Theatre as well. I made up my mind to go up to London and see them both. All this was arranged with the greatest secrecy, for I knew that my father would set his face sternly against “the Stage”. Though we might be allowed to have amateur theatricals at home, though we might teach dancing, singing, elocution, or indeed anything else, the Stage was something unthought of in the minds of parents. However, Fate was on my side. I was out teaching all day, and, once the front door had closed behind me in the morning, I was not actually expected back until the evening, so I slipped up to London. There, at the Vaudeville Theatre, I saw both Tom and Fred Thorne.

In those days there were no play-producing societies—no Play Actors, Interlude Players, or Repertory Players—and so new plays were “tried out” at matinées. One was then looming on the horizon of the Vaudeville—Partners—and it was in connection with a possible part in this play that my name and address were taken; I was told that I might hear from Mr. Thorne “in about a week”, and so, full of hope, I returned to Brighton. About a week later I received a letter which told me that I had been given a small part in Partners, and stating the days on which I should have to rehearse in London.

It was then that the question arose, “Should I tell father?” I thought it over, long and earnestly, and decided not to. I did not have to rehearse every day, and, as I had slipped up to London before, “all unbeknownst”, why not again? So, entering on my career of crime, and unheeding the words of—I think—the good Doctor Watts, who says “Oh, what a tangled web we weave when first we practise to deceive”, I used to come up to rehearsal, leaving my family happy in the belief that I was teaching dancing in Brighton!

During rehearsals I heard from Florrie Toole that she had arranged an interview for me with her father, who would see me on a certain day, at his house at Lowdnes Square. That was a real “red letter day”. For some reason, which I forget, I had taken Decima with me, and after the rehearsal I was asked if I would like to see the matinée performance of Hearts is Hearts, which was then playing at the Vaudeville. Would I like! I was given a box—a stage box at that—and there Decima and I sat, thrilled to the depths of our small souls.

Before this auspicious occasion I had seen three theatrical performances, and three only. One had been at the Adelphi, when I saw Harbour Lights, and the other two at the Brighton Theatre-Royal; from the upper circle, or the gallery, I had seen Faust, when a really very stout lady played “Marguerite”; and the other a pantomime, Cinderella, when Florence St. John played “Cinders” (and played it most delightfully, too) and Charles Rock played “Baron Hardup”. Even these two delightful events had been somewhat marred by the fact that father insisted that we should “come out before the end, to avoid the crush”—as though anyone minded a crush after a theatre, when you went only twice a year, and were only 14!

But to return to our stage box at the Vaudeville Theatre. The interview with Mr. Toole was fixed for 5.30, but rather than miss a moment of the play, we stayed until the very end, and were thus forced to be recklessly extravagant and take a hansom to Lowdnes Square. It cost eighteen-pence, but we both felt that it was worth it, felt that this was indeed Life—with a very large capital letter.

I do not think that the interview with the great comedian was impressive. Florrie took me in to her father, and said “This is Eva.” He said “How are you?” and murmured vague things about “seeing what we can do” and—that was all.

The matinée came, I played a little chambermaid. As “Herbert” says in Eliza Comes to Stay: “The characters bear no relation to life, sir. The play opens with the butler and the housemaid dusting the drawing-room chairs”—I was the “housemaid”.

I remember the fateful afternoon we first played Partners. I was in the Green Room—there were such things then—Maud Millet was learning her part between all her exits and entrances. During one of my waits, Mr. Scot Buest offered me a glass of champagne; I thought that I had plumbed the depths of depravity! It was Mr. Buest who later asked me to have dinner with him. I did, but felt sure that all London would ring with my immorality. What a little prude I must have been!

That afternoon Mr. Toole was in front, and so saw me play. A few days later I heard from him; he offered me a part in The Cricket on the Hearth, which he was going to produce at his own theatre. I was to receive “£1 a week, and find your own dresses”. Naturally, I accepted, and was then faced with the necessity of telling my father. I took my courage in both hands, and broke the news.

The expected tornado swept the house, the storm broke and the thunder of my father’s wrath rolled over our heads. My mother was held responsible for my wickedness; she was asked to consider what “her child” had done; for, be it said, when any of us did anything which met with my father’s disapproval, we were always “my mother’s children”; when we met with his approval, we were his, and apparently his only.

So my mother wept, and my father washed his hands with much invisible soap, ordering me never to darken his doors again—“To think that any daughter of his”, and much more—oh! very much more—to the same effect.

I remained firm; here was my chance waiting for me in the greatest city in the world, and I was determined to take it. I left Brighton for London—“the world was mine oyster”.