Page:Rachel (1887 Nina H. Kennard).djvu/159

 clubs, schools, factories, workshops, and poorer citizens, who will obtain them by ballot.

Paris, March 24th, 1848.

The result of this patriotic endeavour was that the Français was perfectly empty ou the second night of the RépresentationsReprésentations [sic] Nationales, and would have been in as bad a plight as all the other theatres of Paris, had not Mademoiselle Rachel introduced the recitation of the "Marseillaise," for which the house filled towards the end of the evening. Ruin, indeed, was only averted by her strenuous exertions. The sociétaires expressed their gratitude in the following terms:—

In June Rachel went a tour, of which her brother Raphaël was the organizer. Strasbourg, Metz, Besançon, Nancy, Dijon, Bâle, Geneva, Lausanne, Marseilles, Avignon, Toulon, Montpellier, BeziersBéziers [sic], Cette, Orleans, Tours, Blois, Agen, &c., were visited in turn at, we need not say, what an immense exertion and fatigue. Her arrival was heralded two months beforehand to all the directors of provincial theatres in a circular issued