PAGE How I came to play "Rip Van Winkle." The art of To his daughter when a little girl. To his daughter on her studies and on ease of manner. On thoroughness of education. On Jefferson's autobiography. On the actor's life. Lawrence Barrett's death. His theatre in New York in prospect. As to his brother, John As a child a mimic and singer. First visits to the theatre. The calling of the actor. Requirements for the stage. Temptations of the stage. Acting is a great art. тоб - Irving's greatest part. The entrance scene in "Hamlet." The scene with the players. Irving Man and the Actor. All men are actors. Napoleon as an actor. The gift for acting is rare. The creation of a character. Copy life! Self criticism. JOSEPH JEFFERSON [William Winter, the dramatic critic of the New York Tribune, in 1894 wrote the "Life and Art of Joseph Jefferson," published by the Macmillan Company, London and New York. He gives an account of Jefferson's lineage, and then says: "In Joseph Jefferson, fourth of the line, famous as Rip Van Winkle, and destined to be long remembered by that name in dramatic history, there is an obvious union of the salient qualities of his ancestors. The rustic luxuriance, manly vigour, careless and adventurous disposition of the first Jefferson; the refined intellect, delicate sensibility, dry humour, and gentle tenderness of the second; and the amiable, philosophic, and drifting temperament of the third, reappear in this descendant. But more than any of his ancestors, and more than most of his contemporaries, the present Jefferson is an originator in the art of acting. Joseph Jefferson is as distinct as Lamb among essayists, or George Darley among lyrical poets. No actor of the past prefigured him,. and no name, in the teeming annals of modern art, has shone with a more tranquil lustre, or can be more confidently committed to the esteem of posterity." The Autobiography of Joseph Jefferson, copyright, 1889, 1890, by the Century Company, New York, was published 1891. From its chapters, by permission, have been taken these pages.-ED.] How I CAME TO PLAY RIP VAN WINKLE THE hope of entering the race for dramatic fame as an individual and single attraction never came into my head until, in 1858, I acted Asa Trenchard in "Our American Cousin"; but as the curtain descended the first night on that remarkably successful play, visions of large type, |