Definition of "heroine"

Miss Phyllis Morgan, as the hapless heroine dressed in the shabbiest of clothes, appears in the midst of a gay and giddy throng; she apostrophises all and sundry there, including the villain, and has a magnificent scene which always brings down the house, and nightly adds to her histrionic laurels.

1905, Baroness Emmuska Orczy, chapter 2, in The Affair at the Novelty Theatre‎