A few memories

CHAPTER XII
LONG runs, like most things, have their good as well as their bad points. Good, because constant repetition so identifies one with the character impersonated that it becomes second nature to feel and act it. Iteration may in the end make one mechanical, but at least it insures a certain technique which, when inspiration fails, rescues the work from crudity. Joseph Jefferson once told me that, in "The Rivals," he had always gained an effect by pulling off the fingers of his glove separately and deliberately to accentuate certain words, but that under inspiration he would throw technique to the winds, and have the glove off with one jerk. Who that has ever seen his "Bob" can forget those brilliant green gloves, and the fun he got out of them! On the other hand, the evil effects of long runs are indisputable. Prominent among them is a general mental weariness which often causes one to forget the most familiar lines, and turn blankly to the
12om the struggle for