Sales catalogue 467: Maggs Bros

Date:
1925
Reference:
WA/HMM/CM/Sal/13/37
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Sales catalogue 467: Maggs Bros. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    [242] with the sweat of your brow? I am so often tempted to go and bury myself in a little isolated corner of the world with my two sons, I am weary and discouraged at everything. “* Papa has just received a letter from Rebecca who tells him of a_scene which occurred between you, herself and mamma. It rs quite time, my dear Sarah, for you to alter your disposition, for Rebecca is no longer a child, ‘and allow me to tell you that at her age you were in no respect equal to her. Doubtless I am Wrong to meddle in your quarrels, but, in truth, I am not always as cool as I ought to be and it is humiliating to me to see my children constantly going on in such a way that I feel inclined to ask myself whether God did not make a mistake in taking us out of the gutter in which we were before I entered the dramatic profession. Neither you nor the others are worthy of the happiness which God has bestowed on you for the last ten years. It is shameful that the whole family 1s not more grateful, in words they are more than generous, in actions they are most ungrate- ful. There are no two families in which there is less heart than amongst yow.’’ Kte. HER FAREWELL TO THE STAGE. — A lengthy A.L.§S. to M. Lacroi. 7 pp.; Svo. N.D. With transla- tion. £6 10s A very lengthy letter of great interest explaining her position with regard to the Théatre Francaise and desiring M. Lacroi to write a letter intended for the public, giving her reasons for retiring from the stage of that Theatre. (Trans.): —'* You have been so willing to approve the course of conduct which I wish to pursue with the Parisien public the day after my last performance which I shall give next Saturday. You have understood all the importance of ae wording of that letter while being so kind as to undertake the task of writing Gite 2 “You would like to have the principal fact which I wish to write to the public. Well, this is my outline. “st. At first, to write or rather address this letter for instance to M. de Griardin—the excuse 1s found, I wish to play his Cleopatra before leaving the French stage and M. Beausullet’s complaint of the eyes has prevented me. . “2nd. To say why Iam quitting the Thédtre Francaise, and with regard to that, you know as well as I, the motives, explain them in a few lines, not, showing any animosity towards what one calls fellow-workers, but striking G death-blow to a corruption of fellowship which is no longer either possible or supportable throwgh this fact, that the Comédie is no longer what it was fifteen and twenty years ago. for then distinguished artists had the majority in the house through talent. to-day it 1s the mediocrity which carries it off because it is the strongest; to recall my zeal for the theatre every time that the theatre has made an appeal to it, and at this point a word with respect to the Marseiliaise which I have sung only at a denouement in a moment more than critical, since without it, after all, the Thédtre Francaise would have perished like so many others in this shipwreck of revolutions. . . . TI leave to-day with sorrow and more still, but that it would be impossible for me to pursue any longer a career, which to be earnest and fine, ought to find on return to the greenroom if not faces happy at our success, at least serious artistes and perhaps some grateful for the prosperity which artistes intellogent and fortunate enough to attract the paying public bring to a theatre. Then afterwards to finish by asserting that this resignation has not been addressed to a public which has overwhelmed me with its favours, but solely to a society which has grown obsolete and whose actors are more obsolete still and if nothing can change this state OF things then indeed I shall be obliged to go and expatriate myself beyond the sea.’ LEtc., etc. :
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