第1章 THE EARLY DAYS(10/23)
Until the summer of 1880my brother continued on at the Episcopal Academy.For some reason I was sent to a different school,but outside of our supposed hours of learning we were never apart.With less than two years'difference in our ages our interests were much the same,and I fear our interests of those days were largely limited to out-of-door sports and the theatre. We must have been very young indeed when my father first led us by the hand to see our first play.On Saturday afternoons Richard and I,unattended but not wholly unalarmed,would set forth from our home on this thrilling weekly adventure.Having joined our father at his office,he would invariably take us to a chop-house situated at the end of a blind alley which lay concealed somewhere in the neighborhood of Walnut and Third Streets,and where we ate a most wonderful luncheon of English chops and apple pie.As the luncheon drew to its close I remember how Richard and I used to fret and fume while my father in a most leisurely manner used to finish off his mug of musty ale.But at last the three of us,hand in hand,my father between us,were walking briskly toward our happy destination.At that time there were only a few first-class theatres in Philadelphia--the Arch Street Theatre,owned by Mrs.John Drew;the Chestnut Street,and the Walnut Street--all of which had stock companies,but which on the occasion of a visiting star acted as the supporting company.
These were the days of B-->>