We used to play childish games at Charles Reade's house sometimes,
and with "Follow my leader" came my opportunity. I asked for a basin of
water and a towel and scrubbed my face with a significant thoroughness.
The rules of the game meant that everyone had to follow my example! When
I had dried my face I powdered it, and then darkened my eyebrows. I
wished to be quite frank about the harmless little bit of artifice which
Mrs. Seymour had exaggerated into a crime. She was now hoist with her
own petard, for, being heavily made up, she could not and would not
follow the leader. After this Charles Reade acquitted me of the use of
"pigments red," but he still kept up a campaign against "Chalky," as he
humorously christened my powder-puff. "Don't be pig-headed, love," he
wrote to me once; "it is because Chalky does not improve you that I
forbid it. Trust unprejudiced and friendly eyes and drop it altogether."
Although Mrs. Seymour was naturally prejudiced where Charles Reade's
work was concerned, she only spoke the truth, pardonably exaggerated,
about the part of Philippa Chester. I know no part which is a patch on
it for effectiveness; yet there is little in it of the stuff which
endures. The play itself was too unbusiness like ever to become a
classic.
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