ing him through the imaginary woe with a strange feeling of reality not to be shaken off, as long as the sounds lasted. The audience listened with rapt attention, and the sigh of pent-up agitation with which they greeted her at the end, expressed their emotion better than the loudest applause. Still she had to cope with grave disadvantages. The voice, afterwards Rachel's greatest charm, was then harsh and unmusical; the figure, afterwards so graceful, was then stunted and thin; the face, afterwards so expressive and mobile, was then pale and ugly.
Her appearance at this time is thus graphically described by one, an intimate friend in later years, who saw her for the first time in 1834:—
It was a cold grey November morning. Rachel was dressed in a short calico frock, the pattern of which was the common one of a red ground spotted with white; the trousers were of the same material; the boots of coarse black leather, laced in front, but scrupulously polished. Her hair was parted at the back of the head, and hung down her shoulders in two plaits. Everything about the child was of the cheapest and plainest description, but the "ensemble" conveyed an idea of neatness and even precision—characteristics for which she was always noted. With those older than herself [he goes on to say] little Rachel was punctiliously polite; grave and simple beyond her years, every feature of the long childish face bore the impress of modesty and even dignity, with which education had little to do.
M. Villemont, the correspondent of the Indépendance Belge, also describes Rachel at this period of her life:—
It was at the Salle Molière, where Saint Aulaire made his pupils act, that I first saw her in 1835. One of my friends, a young man of good family, who was possessed with the passion for private theatricals, invited me to witness his performance of the part of Danville in the École des Vieillards. As we entered the theatre, my friend stopped and spoke to a thin half-starved-looking little girl, who leant against a column, under a smoky lamp. "Élisa, would you rather have a bun or fried potatoes?" he asked. "Fried potatoes," was the answer.
