Mlle Delval

A carte-de-visite portrait of a performer identified as Mlle Delval. According to a pencilled inscription verso in a period hand, she is seen here in a production entitled La biche au bois [The Doe in the Woods].

'At the theatre near the Porte St Martin, in the Boulevard du Sebastopol, a sort of burlesque entitled La Biche au Bois, "The Fawn in the Wood," has had an unprecedented run, and it does not seem as yet to have lost any of its attractions for the theatre-going public. [...] The Théâtre de la Porte St Martin is nearly as large as Drury Lane, and on the night of our visit, as on more than a hundred nights previously, it was crowded to excess. To a foreigner unacquainted with the language and its peculiar idiom, the acting was tame and even dull, but the magnificence of the scenery and the splendour of the ballet were singularly striking, and at once appealed to the senses. In all the ballet scenes the electric light was brought to play, and the effect was exceedingly fine. The performance of the single piece lasted from seven o'clock till close upon midnight ('Holiday Trip to Paris by a Correspondent,' Dundee Advertiser, 29 August 1865).

'Paris Correspondent — I was not at the Porte-Saint-Martin last night, where "La Biche au Bois" was performed. It appears that the costumes of the actresses could not have been expensive. Their simplicity has only been rivalled by that of our mother Eve before she gathered the apple' (Supplement to the Daily Post, Liverpool, 29 March 1865).

Photographed by Trinquart of Paris.