local coloring for the future drama. On its production in the "Cornhill," the novel created a great sensation; but the drama?
Our intention was to play the piece for a week in Leeds, at the end of the summer season, as a sort of public rehearsal, then to take the Adelphi and produce it there. The difficulty was that it involved as much expense to "get up" the play for a week as for a month or two; but that could be got over by bringing it to Leeds again after its run in town. Although the drama was as yet unwritten, we arranged about the scenery, and my people went to work with a will, and a very elaborate production it was.
My own company being then on tour with "Foul Play," I had to engage people from all parts of the kingdom. Mr. Reade promised to be ready with the manuscript and parts for the first rehearsal, which was to take place a week previous to the date arranged for the production of the play. When he arrived from town, I found, to my dismay, that he had only completed the first act. He assured me, however, that he had it all in his head, and that he could get it out as quickly as he could write it down. We commenced our rehearsals, and he stayed at home to work at the remainder of the play. Alas! the next day he was taken seriously ill with a violent attack of neuralgia and toothache, which prostrated him during the greater portion of the week. It was not until the following Monday (the day on which the play actually ought to have been produced) that we got the second act.
I was so dissatisfied with the state of affairs, and with the construction of the play, that, foreseeing nothing but failure, despite the great expense already incurred, I was disposed to abandon the idea of doing the piece altogether; but Mr. Reade appealed to me so strongly on the subject that my better judgment gave way, and I yielded to his wishes.
The position was most disheartening and distressing. It was now Wednesday, the third act was a bitter bad one, and there was neither time nor opportunity to revise or alter; under no circumstances could the existence of the piece be prolonged beyond Saturday, inasmuch as on Monday the Italian opera-company opened; after them came Schneider and company with the "Grande Duchesse;" after her, Charles Mathews, Phelps, Sothern, and the dog-days. Altogether, it was a bad lookout. Driven to desperation, I announced the piece for Friday. The company were quite perfect in the first three acts, and by half-past eleven on Thursday night our rehearsals were as complete as I could make them.
We then set the scenes for the fourth act. At twelve o'clock Mr. Reade, pale and exhausted, came with the last act. I had prepared some refreshment for the company, and requested them to wait in the greenroom while I ran through this act with the author. I then called everybody on the stage, and, holding the manuscript, I read through every part and arranged the business of every situation three times consecutively. This occupied us until two o'clock. Dismissing the rehearsal, I then called the last act for two o'clock in the following afternoon. I copied my own part there and then. The prompter and copyist, whom I had taken the precaution to send home hours before, so that they had been at rest all the evening, now took the manuscript, and sat up all night to copy the other parts. At nine o'clock in the morning every lady and gentleman was furnished with his or her part. And now occurred a circumstance without parallel or precedent in my experience. Notwithstanding the fatigues and anxieties of the preceding night, and the lateness of the hour at which they quitted the theatre, to the honor of the company be it stated that every one was letter perfect at the two o'clock rehearsal, and that night "Put Yourself in his Place" was produced textually perfect, and without one hitch from the rise to the fall of the curtain!
My worst anticipations were, how-
