Francis Wilson's Life of Himself by Francis Wilson, John Davis Batchelder Collection (Library of Congress); Boston, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1924

BOSTON, Oct. 7, 1902

What I have greatly loved about Maude Adams, next to her acting, was the determined way she kept herself to herself, the time she gave to herself to get acquainted with Maude Adams after strenuous hours given over to professional life. This was not wholly original with her. Booth did it. So, too, did Julia Marlowe, at one time. It is so unusual with people much in the public eye as to appear to be a mark of personal peculiarity.

This action aroused curiosity as to Maude Adams's private life with which, in common with other thoughtful and modest people, she felt the world should have no concern. There was no pose in this, simply the natural reserve of one who values privacy as a compensation, as a necessary reaction to public effort.

We have all known actors, politicians, lawyers, doctors, and ministers who in season and out have sought publicity with the persistency and enthusiasm of well-trained bird-dogs on the scent, and who have felt with Oscar Wilde that aside from themselves, as subjects of discussion, nothing, absolutely nothing, was so interesting. But we may be sure that Wilde never really thought that. He was far too clever a man. He said it, as brilliant men are wont to say things, because it was an audaciously witty thing to say.

Another of the wonderments of the curious public, and the wonder extended as well to the people of her own profession, was that Maude Adams never married. It was none of our business, any more than it was the public's, but she is so charming a woman and so original an actress that many of us — and perhaps the public also feels that way about it — are tenderly desirous that such charm and originality should be reproduced and perpetuated. Of course this shunning of wedlock could not be because of lack of opportunity. From the "spindle-legged little girl, unusually tall for her age, with a funny little pigtail, and one of the quaintest little faces you ever saw," of David Belasco's remembrance, up through her successes in "The Masked Ball," "Rosemary," "The Bauble Shop," "The Little Minister" Minister" (in which she first starred), "L'Aiglon," and "Peter Pan," to one of the most extraordinarily successful actresses of modern times, is a far cry. It is the kind of career likely to bring matrimonial opportunities even to less gifted, less masterful persons than Maude Adams. Perhaps I shall not be able to gratify curiosity to the extent of an explanation on the subject. I have never enjoyed the confidence of Maude Adams, but the lady will bear me out in the declaration that I did what I could to change conditions, in short, that I proposed to her.

It was like this: I had just witnessed a performance of "The Little Minister" and both play and player had gone entirely to my head and heart. I was mooning around the block tingling with joyful remembrance of it all, thinking how clever it was of Barrie to have written such a play, and how fortunate he was to find such an ideal representative as Maude Adams for his impish little devil of a woman,

"Lady Babbie,"

with an expression on her face of quizzical good humor like nothing so much as Hogarth "Shrimp Girl," thinking that if — when lo, and behold, I came upon " Lady Babbie" herself sitting in her carriage at the stage door.

It were easy to pour out a string of compliments of my enjoyment of her acting and of the play, easy and trite, and she would have been pleased, perhaps, as from one player to another, but I had been moved to such heights of enjoyment of the play and her playing that I was impelled to offer the highest compliment man has it in his power to offer woman, and I proceeded to do so. After the greeting, I said to her:

"I saw the play this afternoon, and as evidence of my deep appreciation I come to ask your hand in marriage. Being already a benedict as you know, you may perhaps regard me as 'shop-worn,' and therefore unacceptable as matrimonial material; that rests with you; but let me urge as to myself that I am house- broken, eminently docile, and have other qualities which might appeal if one were not over-punctilious."

Not at all overwhelmed, " Lady Babbie" smiled. I felt encouraged, though not necessarily hopeful. The proposal had not startled her, which decidedly comforted me, considering the abruptness and fervor with which it was made. When I left her, I cannot truly say that I was convinced that she would accept the proposal. She never made any reply — but — but — Maude Adams has never married !

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