Just as the petrel of the ocean appears during its flight sometimes to touch the surface of the waves with its feet, so she had daintily fluttered across the boards which were for a time to lose her.
Now that Ellen Terry has for a time said good-bye to the stage that so sorely missed her, I may pause to glance at the brilliant career of her elder sister Kate, who had been, as we have seen, the constant comrade of her 'prentice days. Apart from her conspicuous successes in the youthful Shakespearean characters at the Princess's, she had, before her engagement at that house came to an end, made a profound impression by the purity and pathos of her acting as Cordelia (she was a very young Cordelia) to the King Lear of Charles Kean. This was in the April of 1858. Even at that early age she had, as the saying goes, "arrived," and would no doubt have been promptly secured by any of the then existing London managers. But, wise in his generation, and conscious of his daughter's conspicuous talents, her father decided that she must have more practice before taking that place on the boards to which she should become entitled.
It is interesting to show here one of the Charles Kean play-bills in which Kate Terry figured. To-day it reads curiously as the programme of a fashionable West End theatre.
Under the Management of Mr CHARLES KEAN, No. 3 Torrington Square.
_This Evening, Saturday, January 3rd, 1852_, Will be presented Colman's play of the
Sir Edward Mortimer Mr Charles Kean Captain Fitzharding Mr Addison Wilford Mr J. F. Cathcart Adam Winterton Mr Meadows Rawbold Mr Ryder Samson Mr Harley Orson Mr C. Fisher Gregory Mr Rolleston Helen Miss Frankland Blanch Miss Murray Barbara Miss Mary Keeley
After which (8th Time), a Grand Operatico, Tragico, Serio-Pastoralic, Nautico, Demoniaco, Cabalistico,
THE FLYING DUTCHMAN AND THE KING OF RARITONGO
"Billy Taylor was a gay young fellow Full of mirth and full of glee, And his mind he did diskiver To a maiden fair and free."
Scenery by Messrs Gordon, F. Lloyds, Dayes, etc. Decorations & Properties by Mr Moon. Dances arranged by Mr Flexmore. Machinery by Mr G. Hodson. Costumes by Mr Sefton and Miss Hoggins. Overture & Music composed & arranged by Mr R. Hughes.