We went often to her beautiful house in London, the first years
we were at the embassy, and always met interesting people. Her salon was
very cosmopolitan--every one who came to London wanted to go to Holland
House, which was a museum filled with beautiful things.
Another lady who was often at my uncle's was quite a different type,
Mademoiselle A., an old pupil of the Conservatoire, who had made a short
career at the Comedie Francaise many years before. She was really
charming, and her stories of the coulisses and the jalousies between the
authors and the actors, particularly the stars (who hardly accepted the
slightest observation from the writer of the play), were most amusing.
Once the piece was accepted it passed into the domain of the theatre,
and the actors felt at liberty to interpret the roles according to their
ideas and traditions. She had a perfect diction; it was a delight to
hear her. She recited one night one of Alphonse Daudet's little contes,
"Lettres de Mon Moulin," I think, beginning--"Qui n'a pas vu Avignon du
temps des Papes n'a rien vu." One couldn't hear anything more charming,
in a perfectly trained voice, and so easily and naturally said.
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