^lff^ff^lff^f^l??^^ 1
THE WORKS OF
EUGENE FIELD
Vol. XI
THE WRITINGS IN
PROSE AND VERSE
OF EUGENE FIELD
3 ASPS r,N
I I
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S
SONSJNEWYORKJI90J
Copyright, 1900, ipo'ijlSy'
JULIA SUTHERLAND FIELD.
IT is something over eleven years since I
assisted Eugene Field in the publication
of "A Little Book of Profitable Tales" and
" A Little Book of Western Verse." They
consisted of what he deemed "the best of
his verse and prose that had appeared prior
to 1888, selected with a jealous personal care
not bestowed on his other collections. They
remained the favorite children of his pen to
the last, possibly because they were his first
love, but more probably because they repre-
sented the culling from the work of ten of
his most fruitful years.
It is easily within the fact to say that
Eugene Field contributed one hundred times
as many words as compose these volumes to
the column in the Chicago Daily News (now
the Chicago Record) which, under the title of
INTRODUCTION
"Sharps and Flats/' won him recognition as
the most popular newspaper paragrapher in
the United States. It is a simple calculation,
which the reader may make for himself.
Six days of the week for twelve years he
wrote what made the even column, to a line,
of ''leaded agate" which appeared almost
invariably in the last column of the editorial
page of that paper. This column averaged
two thousand words. Multiply this by
three hundred and thirteen days each year
for twelve years, and the product is a grand
total of 7,512,000 words. The odd 512,000
may be deducted for the interruptions,
which occurred with increasing frequency
during the later years of Mr. Field's life,
so leaving 7,000,000 words of literature,
ranging all the way from the most epheme-
ral paragraph on a passing event to as ex-
quisite bits of prose and verse as ever
illumined the pages of a newspaper.
Before coming to Chicago, Eugene Field
had attracted some attention in the news-
paper offices of the country by his Denver
Tribune primer stories. But his real career
as a newspaper writer and author dates
INTRODUCTION
from August, 1883, when his connection
with the News first began to show in para-
graphs under the commonplace heading of
"Current Gossip/' In such a paragraph
as this (August 16, 1883):
It is said, though not authoritatively, that, purely
upon grounds of self-protection, tlie buffaloes are flee-
ing to the Yellowstone Park in great numbers,
there was the flavor of Field's peculiar
humor, which was still present in the last
paragraph he ever wrote. To appreciate
this humor at this late date it needs to be
recalled that President Arthur, with a hunt-
ing-party of distinguished friends, was in
the Yellowstone Park at that time.
On August 31, 1883, the title "Current
Gossip " gave place to that of " Sharps and
Flats, " which was retained to the end. This
heading was taken from the title of a play
by Clay M. Greene and the writer, then be-
ing performed by Messrs. Robson and Crane.
Mr. Field's early work had the character
of the breeziest sort of table-talk. It con-
sisted of daily gossip about persons and
things. From the President and affairs of
INTRODUCTION
state down to the doorkeeper of a local
theatre and the most trivial happening of
the day, everything was grist to his whim-
sical mind. Sometimes his whole column
would be filled with a "Profitable Tale,"
but more often it was broken up into forty
or more paragraphs, upon as many differ-
ent subjects. I have counted twenty-nine
political paragraphs out of a total of thirty-
three; and again, I have known more
than half of a larger total devoted to the
national game of base-ball, of which Mr.
Field was an ardent and critical follower.
The greatest number of paragraphs I re-
member to have seen in the " Sharps and
Flats " column was sixty-four, and this was
in October, 1894 long after Mr. Field had
abandoned the theory that the wit of a
paragraph consisted in its brevity.
In his earlier days Mr. Field was addicted
to the use of such phrases as " we opine,"
" we are free to admit/' " we violate no con-
fidence/' {< we are pained to learn/' etc., in
opening his paragraphs. He employed
them ironically until they became a habit,
from which he was rudely shocked when,
INTRODUCTION
during his absence, his associates filled his
column with miscellaneous comments all
beginning with his favorite expressions.
Political comment largely predominated
in the early years of "Sharps and Flats."
Mr. Field was permitted the utmost freedom
in his paragraphs, which often resulted in a
conflict of views between his column and
the more formidable brevier type of the edi-
torial page. In the campaign of 1884, when
the News was strongly Mugwump and
favored the election of Mr. Cleveland, the
"Sharps and Flats" column was persistently,
not to say "perniciously," active in advo-
cating the election of Mr. Blaine. It was
about this time that Mr. Field advised Mr.
Cleveland, then Governor of New York, to
follow the advice of Mr. Dana to "turn the
rascals out," by pardoning all the convicts
in the State prison.
It was not until 1885 that Mr. Field's col-
umn betrayed in the daily use of archaic
English the effects of his browsing in
Malory's "Morte d' Arthur," Percy's "Re-
liques," and British balladry. About the
same time he indulged in frequent imita-
INTRODUCTION
tions of Dr. Watts, often taking infinite
pains to pass them off on the reader as gen-
uine. Mr. Field took especial delight in
composing verses in which the mixed meta-
phor fairly bristled, as in the following,
attributed to a "Missouri poet":
In Cupid's artful toils I roll,
And thrice ten thousand pangs I feel;
For Susie's eyes have ground my soul
Beneath their iron heel.
Along in 1888 his writings began to reflect
the spirit of bibliomania, which possessed
him from that time on to the end. In the
same year Mr. Field indulged in frequent
paraphrases of Horace, some of them genuine
efforts to interpret the spirit of the Sabine
poet, and others grotesque in their adapta-
tion of that spirit to modern incidents. To
this same period we are indebted for a
majority of the lullabies that form such a
noteworthy feature of Mr. Field's collected
verse.
In September, 1889, Mr. Field went
abroad, and was absent from the United
States until December of the following year.
INTRODUCTION
His "Sharps and Flats " at this time afford
an interesting running comment on British
and European people and their habits. His
inborn Yankee spirit was accentuated by
attrition with English stolidity and French
frivolity. Much of his best verse bears a
foreign date.
On his return, a noticeable change ap-
peared in his daily column. There was less
of personal persiflage and more of the phi-
losophy of life and events. The paragraphs
became less numerous and personal, and
more bookish in tone and reference. Mr.
Field was thenceforth a willing victim to the
mania for collecting old and odd editions of
books and engravings. Frequently one
theme sufficed to fill his column, until, in
1895, he printed "The House " and "The
Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac " in succes-
sive chapters of three hundred agate lines
each.
More than ninety per cent, of all the verse
Mr. Field ever wrote first saw the light of
print in "Sharps and Flats. " I venture to be-
lieve that in the following pages there is pre-
served more of the exhaustless gayety of
INTRODUCTION
Eugene Field's daily life than in any other
volume of his collected works. There are
touches of the elfish genius that found food
for mirth or satire, for quip or sentiment, in
everything that daily attracted the attention
of his kind as he regarded all mankind.
From first to last it is as singularly free from
the maliciousness that leaves a sting as are
the writings of the gentle Charles Lamb.
Many a thought, a pregnant phrase, a sig-
nificant incident in the history of our time,
its politics and daily life, is herein caught
up by Mr. Field and crystallized in a verse
or paragraph which was apt when written
and is worthy of preservation in more per-
manent form than that in which it was
originally printed. Mr. Field's felicitous
command of English rhythm and deftly
worded phrase nowhere appears to better
advantage than in this volume where rhymes
and verbal eccentricities are his playthings.
This collection contains several instances
where Mr. Field attributes verse of his own
composition to others a form of humor in
which to the end he took peculiar delight
The seventeenth and last chapter of "The
INTRODUCTION
Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac" was printed
under the " Sharps and Flats " title, October
30, 1895. The last column of "Sharps and
Flats " from the pen of Eugene Field was
printed November 2, 1895. Two days later
the man who for twelve years had filled it
with his odd conceits, his effervescent wit,
and his thoroughly American humor, all ex-
pressed in faultless English, was dead.
SLASON THOMPSON.
CHICAGO, October 16, 1900.
xv
PAGE
GOSSIP OF BOOKS AND MEN WHO MAKE THEM . . 3
WHAT is FAME? 3
LITERAL RETORTS COURTEOUS 3
PEN-PICTURE OF GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS . . 4
THE ATHLETIC HAWTHORNES 5
REVIEW OF A CATERER'S PAMPHLET 7
THREE LITERARY FISHERMEN 1 1
THE LOWELL-HAWTHORNE INCIDENT 12
THE OFFICIAL EXPLANATION 15
CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER'S WELCOME TO CHICAGO 16
THE FRIENDSHIP OF LOWELL AND RUBLEE ... 19
RHYMING ADDRESS ON A LETTER 23
WILLIAM DEAN HOWELLS'S EARLY VERSE ... 23
PHILOLOGY OF THE "JAG." 30
DERIVATION OF " IN THE SOUP" 32
WILLIAM MORRIS AND THE SAILOR ..... 34
Two ESTIMATES OF RUDYARD KIPLING .... 35
BRUSQUENESS OF TENNYSON AND DICKENS ... 38
THE EVIL PRACTICE OF BORROWING BOOKS . . 42
HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN AT THE WORLD'S FAIR 43
xvii
CONTENTS
PAGE
No USE FOR PAPER-COVERED BOOKS .... 47
THE BATTLE OF THE REALISTS AND ROMANCISTS . 47
THE TRUTH ABOUT ORANGE GROVES .... 51
ENCOURAGEMENT FOR F. MARION CRAWFORD . . 53
SMALL PRICE FOR A GREAT POEM 53
THE SHOE-STRINGS OF METHUSELAH 54
THE POET WHITTIER'S TAXES 56
MAX NORDAU APPROVED 57
THE POET'S RETURN 59
A SHOSHONE LEGEND 60
A ZEPHYR FROM ZULULAND 63
THE FRENCH MUST Go 65
A BATTLE IN YELLOWSTONE PARK 68
His LORDSHIP, THE CHIEF JUSTICE 71
A HINT FOR 1884 73
THE INDIAN AND THE TROUT 74
A PLAY ON WORDS 76
How FLAHERTY KEPT THE BRIDGE 78
THE THREE-CENT STAMP 81
BIG THURSDAY 83
THE STAGE AND STAGE FOLK 85
MUCH IN A NAME 85
COUNT BOZENTA'S POSSIBILITIES 85
AFTER MICHAEL ANGELO . 86
STUART ROBSON IN A SERIOUS ROLE .... 87
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE STAGE 89
A COMEDIAN'S LEGS 90
xviii
CONTENTS
PAGE
MORTIFYING DISCOVERY OF " OLIVER OPTIC " . 92
SALVINI IN POLYGLOT DRAMA 94
STUART ROBSON'S POLITICS 98
THE PERENNIAL Miss LOTTA 99
THE MYSTERY OF PASADENE 102
WAS H. C. BARNABEE A POET? 103
A FELICITOUS TOAST 106
THE AMERICAN WHO DISCOVERED BERNHARDT . 107
" FROUFROU " IN CHICAGO 108
ONLY FIT FOR THE STAGE 112
THE MINISTER AND THE ACTOR . . . . . .114
THE PRESIDENT REBUKES "Jos" JEFFERSON . .117
WHEN ROBSON SHED REAL TEARS 118
A SURFEIT OF REALISM 119
A NIGHTMARE 123
BACHELOR HALL 126
HUMAN NATURE 128
A VERY WEARY ACTOR 130
GETTYSBURG 132
HER FAIRY FEET 134
THE REMORSEFUL CAKES 136
A PATRIOT'S TRIUMPH 138
" YOURS FRATERNALLY" 140
SONG OF THE ALL-WOOL SHIRT 141
OF BLESSED MEMORY 143
A LEAP-YEAR EPISODE . , 145
THE DEBUTANTE * 147
xix
CONTENTS
PAGE
OF DIET AND DYSPEPSIA 149
ORIGIN OF THE WORD " HASH " 149
YE PLAINTE OF A DYSPEPTIC 150
THE ENGLISH MINCE PIE 153
REFLECTIONS ON CARLSBAD 165
How JOB SUFFERED FROM DYSPEPSIA . . . .171
THE MODERN MARTYR 182
AN OHIO IDYL 184
A SCHERZO r 86
AN OHIO DITTY 188
A GOOD MAN'S SORROW 190
LAMENT OF A NEGLECTED Boss 192
ROMANCE OF A "Cuss-WoRD" 194
COLD CONSOLATION *9^
MR, HOLM AN'S FAREWELL 197
THE APRIL FOOL 199
THE OLD SEXTON 201
OGLESBY (1884) 203
THE POLITICAL MAUD . 205
THE ENGLISH AND THEIR ENGLISH 207
IT COSTS TO BATHE IN ENGLAND 207
THEY CALL THINGS DIFFERENTLY IN LONDON . .210
THE NATIONAL GREED FOR TUPPENCE . . , .216
A VIRGILIAN PICNIC 228
AN ILLINOIS WAR-SONG 230
THOMAS A. HENDRICKS'S APPEAL 232
THE EXPLORER'S WOOING 234
xx
CONTENTS
PAGE
THE AHKOOND OF SWAT 256
A PLEA FOR THE CLASSICS 239
THE SECRET OF THE SPHINX 241
FANCHON THE CRICKET 243
NOVEMBER 245
PARLEZ-VOUS FRANCAIS? 247
"GEE SWEE ZAMERICANE" .... ... 249
CHRISTMAS 251
CHICAGO WEATHER 253
anli
GOSSIP OF BOOKS AND MEN WHO
MAKE THEM
What is Fame ?
INGE it appears that Matthew
Arnold is neither the man who
betrayed his country nor the man
who wrote the "Light of Asia," it is sur-
mised he can't amount to very much, un-
less, perchance, he should happen to be the
author of Arnold's writing-ink.
October 23, ;88j
Literal Retorts Courteous
IT is s#id that when James T. Fields dated
one of his letters at Manchester-by-the-Sea
Oliver Wendell Holmes replied in a note
dated " Beverly-by~the-Depot." But this
species of the retort courteous did not origi-
3
SHARPS AND FLATS
nate with the funny Dr. Holmes. Years
and years ago, Bishop Comstock of Con-
necticut addressed a note to Henry Ward
Beecher under the date of Whitsunday
morn, to which Mr. Beecher replied the
next day under date of Washing-day morn.
November 20, /88j
Pen-Picture of George William Curtis
A CURRENT newspaper paragraph says that
" George William Curtis at fifty-six is a
handsome man with snow-white hair and
whiskers/' etc. Mr. Curtis was in Chicago
about two months ago. At that time his
hair was not snow-white; it was very far from
snow-white it was plentifully streaked
with gray. Curtis's profile is fine; we sup-
pose it might be called classical. The fore-
head and nose are particularly good. The
chin is faulty, as one sees, when Mr. Curtis
turns his face full in view, that it has a dim-
ple, and we have yet to find a man with
a dimple in his chin who has any staying
qualities. The lower part of Curtis's face is
full of contradictions: the mouth is square,
yet the lips are decidedly sensuous, and
SHARPS AND FLATS
there is an expression of finickiness and ef-
feminacy about them and the mouth. Curtis
parts his hair in the middle, and that lends
him an air of effeminacy again; yet his
deep, musical voice is a splendid proof of his
virility. He does not seem to be overnice
in the particular of dress, his apparel being
stylish and neat, but strictly modest. He
has deep wrinkles, and he seems to wear an
expression of continual worry. His whole
appearance is that of an overworked confi-
dential clerk in a metropolitan jewellery-store.
July 28, 1884
The Athletic Hawthornes
WHEN Mr. Julian Hawthorne, the novelist,
was a student in Harvard College, John C.
Heenan was his instructor in athletics, and
Hawthorne took so kindly to this sort of
training that Heenan used to say to him:
"If you put yourself under my care I 'II
guarantee that in less than two years you
can lick any man in America/* When tales
of his son's predilections and of the pre-
posterous future which the pugilist had
mapped out reached the ears of Hawthorne
5
SHARPS AND FLATS
pere he was inexpressibly shocked, and he
took pains to have Julian removed altogether
beyond the influence of the genial prize-
fighter. But his fondness for athletics still
sticks to Hawthorne, and he keeps in train-
ing all the time. One of his daily practices
is to run fifteen miles before breakfast. From
his home in Sag Harbor down to the sea is
a distance of seven and one half miles; he
trots down every morning, summer and
winter, takes a sea-bath, and brings back
home a raging appetite for breakfast. Yes-
terday afternoon Mr, Hawthorne dined with
Colonel Walter Cranston Larned, the distin-
guished art critic and music connoisseur,
at the Chicago Club. During a lull in the
conversation, and while the soup-tureen
was being removed for the second course,
Mr. Hawthorne excused himself for a mo-
ment or two. Observing that his honored
guest was just a trifle flushed when he re-
turned, Colonel Larned asked Mr. Hawthorne
what it meant. " I have been taking a lit-
tle spin out to Evanston and back," said
Mr. Hawthorne, quietly. " Your Western
roads are not so well gravelled as those I
6
SHARPS AND FLATS
have been used to, or I would not be out
of breath at all."
Mr. Hawthorne's oldest boy is thirteen years
old, and that he has inherited much of his
father's spirit is evidenced in the fact that
he can thrash any boy under sixteen years
of age in Sag Harbor. This living terror
enjoys the peaceful, amiable name of Felix.
Mr. Hawthorne's oldest girl is fourteen, and
she runs her mile in seven minutes. The
four-year-old boy is the one who seems to
have inherited the genuine Hawthorne imagi-
native qualities. He tells stories of wonder-
ful dreams, and the other night he called to
his mother: "Mamma, bring the light in
here. I know there is something perfectly
horrible crawling down the chimney."
December 3, 1885
Review of a Caterer's Pamphlet
WHILE it is universally conceded that
Chicago is rapidly achieving world-wide
reputation as the great literary centre of the
United States, it is distressing to note that
local critics are slow to recognize and to en-
courage the efforts of Chicago litterateurs.
7
SHARPS AND FLATS
We have been plunged into a most unhappy
condition of mind by the continued neglect
with which a recent literary work of our
esteemed fellow-townsman, Mr. H. M. Kins-
ley, has been treated by the moulders of lit-
erary thought in Chicago. We do not
know whether it is envy that lurks in the
bosom of our literary critics and instigates
them to ignore home industries, but we do
know that for the last three months the
Dial, the Scandinavia, the Current, and
other hypercritical reviews have devoted
much space to literature in Norway, France,
Italy, Belgium, England, and Russia, but
have had never a word to say of Mr. Kins-
ley's valuable treatise. We mention this
plain truth more in sorrow than in anger.
Mr. Kinsley's book, which now lies be-
fore us, treats of topics of the greatest social
importance. The introductory pages give
a careful description of Mr. Kinsley's palatial
refectory, and following these are several
chapters on the prices of viands, upon the
lofty dignity of which (the prices) Mr. Kins-
ley's claims to literary recognition would ap-
pear to be based. We learn that we can
8
SHARPS AND FLATS
obtain a quart of Nesselrode pudding with
maraschino sauce for $1.25; a quart of
tutti-frutti ice for $i; a dozen pommes de
terre fraises for $3; Sauterne frappe for
$2.50 per gallon; chicken & la Reine soup
for $i per quart; a la Marengo sauce for
$2 per quart; fricandelle de foie gras for 75
cents per pound, etc. This important, not
to say necessary, information is supple-
mented with a large number of recipes,
which should prove of vast value to the
humbler classes in this city. These recipes
give careful instruction as to the compound-
ing of mushroom salads, terrapin croquets,
bisque of whitebait tongues, fricassee of
canary-birds' livers, and other viands com-
mon to the groaning board of the metro-
politan day-laborer. These recipes are
stated in that idiomatic, direct English
which instantly conveys intelligence to the
mind of the reader, and joy ineffable to the
soul of the printer at 40 cents per 1000 ems.
So much for what we may term the sor-
did, worldly, practical part of the book. On
the succeeding pages the versatile author
proceeds to treat of weddings, parties, re-
SHARPS AND FLATS
ceptions, etc. ; and we note with pleasure
that the importance of elaborate and costly
refreshments is urged in each instance. But
it is in his chapter on " Etiquette of the
Table" that if we may be allowed to use
the figure Mr. Kinsley out-KinsIeys Kins-
ley. Perchance it was this chapter that
gave our contemporary, the Dial, and other
critical reviews, pause. Howbeit, we shall
venture to regale our readers with a very
few specimen excerpts :
''Fashions change in modes of eating."
t( Never appear impatient, and employ
the time in agreeable conversation."
"Soup should be eaten carefully."
"Never eat with a knife."
"Never rise until the meal is finished."
"Sit upright, with grace and dignity."
"A fork should be used gracefully."
"Do not pick the teeth with the cutlery."
"Do not break the china or glassware
unless you expect to pay double price for it"
These are a few of the pleasant and
admirable fundamental laws which author
Kinsley lays down for the guidance of his
patrons, presumably the elite, the creme de
SHARPS AND FLATS
la creme, of Chicago. And, possibly with
economic ends in view, Mr. Kinsley warns
his readers, "Never eat so much of any ar-
ticle as to attract attention."
So we say we like the book, and, having
perused it carefully, we feel warranted in
declaring that it appears to us that none
could quit Mr. Kinsley's soothing influences
without exclaiming, in the historic language
once employed by Ali Baba: "Allah be
praised for this deliverance! "
March 29, 1886
Three Literary Fishermen
THE latest story told in literary circles is
about Julian Hawthorne, Richard H. Stod-
dard, and the Reverend E. P. Roe. These
three authors have been summering at Sag
Harbor, Long Island, and if they have not had
a frisky time it has not been because they
were not the queerest combination ever got
together. One day, so the story goes, the
three went fishing in the harbor, and after
toiling and sweating around in the sun for
several hours Mr. Stoddard hauled in a
two-pound sculpin, bristling like a hedge-
11
SHARPS AND FLATS
hog, and groaning dismally. Now, the
sculpin is perhaps the most worthless fish
that swims it is, in sooth, so utterly
worthless as to be positively humorous.
Well, the sculpin floundered around in the
bottom of the boat and groaned and panted
prodigiously, while Hawthorne hilariously
bantered Stoddard on his luck, and Stod-
dard laughed merrily at the awkward floun-
derings of the fish. But the Reverend E. P.
Roe did not join in the mirth. He sat gloom-
ily in the stern of the boat, and shook his
head sadly. At last he addressed his com-
panions. "How can you, " he asked in tones
of imposing solemnity " how can you aban-
don yourselves to frivolous hilarity at this
moment? It seems to me that a reveren-
tial silence would better become us, standing
as we do in the awful presence of death."
July 31, 1886
The Lowell-Hawthorne Incident
MR. JULIAN HAWTHORNE is finding out how
it is himself. He has added interviewing
to his other duties upon the New York
World, and in last Sunday's edition of that
SHARPS AND FLATS
paper he signs his name to four columns
and a half of as racy gossip as we remem-
ber to have seen. It is an interview with
James Russell Lowell on the phases of social
and literary life in England, with a sharp
running fire of comment on the principal
topics of the day. Lowell spoke with re-
markable freedom, and the interview bristles
with satirical personalities. He denominated
the Queen as " very tough," and said of the
Prince of Wales that he was "very fat."
"He *s immensely fat, and his labors,
such as they are, are chiefly physical. He
delivers very good speeches, but I think
there 's no doubt they are written for him.
They are written by a man who also used
to get up the addresses delivered by the
late Duke of Albany (Prince Leopold)."
Further on, speaking of Leopold, Mr.
Lowell says a man who knew the prince
well denominated him as a "great cad."
This is a sample of the personal gossip which
dribbled out of Mr. Lowell when he had
thrown away the spigot of his discretion.
The interview appeared, and it created a
great sensation. The first thing Mr. Lowell
13
SHARPS AND FLATS
did on reading it was to write a letter deny-
ing most of the statements, and saying that
he was not aware that Mr. Hawthorne was
interviewing him. It is the old story, " he
did n't know it was loaded." He allowed
his tongue to run away with his discretion,
and told the truth. Why should he regret
it? Perhaps, however, the fumes of the
turtle soup he consumed in England are
stronger than his independence, and the
smiles of royalty are dearer than his love of
truth. Whether he knew his remarks were
to be published or not is a matter of veracity
between him and Mr. Hawthorne, for the
latter prints at the first of his interview
the following:
"I have come here on an errand "
"Not of mercy," interrupted Mr. Lowell,
laughing, as a brave man will, in the face of
danger.
"No; to be merciful is not my privilege.
I have come to learn from you what no one
else can tell me your opinion of England
and the English. It is likely to be of more
worth than any other American's, and I be-
lieve the American people want to know it. '
14
SHARPS AND FLATS
Mr. Hawthorne has written a card reply-
ing to Mr. Lowell's, but he does not seem
disposed to take back anything. There is
a tone of sadness that we are not surprised
at. Reporters all feel that way at first.
When Mr. Hawthorne has for a year or so
been waking up men at two in the morning
to interview them about the state of their
health or as to the amount of their embezzle-
ments he will get used to having the accuracy
of his writings called to account.
October 29, 1886
The Official Explanation
ONE night aside the fire at hum,
Ez I wuz sittin' nappin',
Deown frum the lower hall there come
The seound of some one rappin'.
The son uv old Nat Hawthorne he
Julian, I think his name wuz
Uv course he feound a friend in me,
Not knowin' what his game wuz.
An' ez we visited a spell,
Our talk ranged wide an' wider,
An 7 if we struck dry subjects well,
We washed 'em deown with cider.
15
SHARPS AND FLATS
Neow, with that cider coursin' thru
My system an' a-playin'
Upon my tongue, I hardly knew
Just what I was a-sayin'.
I kin remember that I spun
A hifalutin story
Abeout the Prince uv Wales, an' one
Abeout old Queen Victory.
But, sakes alive! I never dreamed
The cuss would get it printed
(By that old gal I 'm much esteemed,
Ez she hez often hinted.)
Oh, if I had that critter neow,
You bet your boots I 'd Tarn him
In mighty lively fashion heow
To walk the chalk, gol darn him !
Meanwhile between his folks an' mine
The breach grows wide an' wider,
An*, by the way, it 's my design
To give up drinkin' cider.
November i, 1886
Charles Dudley Warner's Welcome to Chicago
LOCAL literary circles were thrown into a
condition of feverish excitement yesterday
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by the rumor that Mr. Charles Dudley War-
ner, a well-known Eastern litterateur, had
arrived in the city and was the honored
guest of Colonel Wirt Dexter, the popular
South Side Boniface. When the rumor first
gained circulation it was discredited by very
many, including that cautious and exacting
body known as the Chicago Literary Club.
Mr. T. Arthur Whiffen, the talented son
of the wealthy fig-dealer and a member
of the club in high standing, refused to
believe that Mr. Warner was really in the
city.
"As soon as I heard it," said he, "I
stepped around to Dale's drug-store and
asked the proprietor if he had received any
confirmation of the rumor, and he replied
in the negative. Mr. Dale is the general
Western agent for Mr. Warner's works, and,
as he very pertinently observed, he would
have been likely to know if Warner were in
the vicinity."
Later in the day, however, it was learned
that Mr. Warner was indeed in the midst of
us ; in fact, along about three o'clock in the
afternoon he was seen bowling down Drexel
17
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Boulevard in Mr. Baxter's elegant dog-
cart, behind Mr. Dexter's famous bay geld-
ing Grover Cleveland. It was stated that
Mr. Warner had come to Chicago for the
purpose of delivering an address before the
Clan-na-Gael on St. Patrick's day, the i7th
instant, and had chosen as the theme for that
address "The Theory that Ben Jonson did
not Write ' Rasselas/ " Subsequently, how-
ever, it was ascertained that this statement
was unfounded. In a conversation with
Professor Benjamin F. Lawkins, president of
the Emerson Literary Society and author of
the scholarly brochure entitled "The Rela-
tions between Fifteen-Ball Poole and the
Librarian of our Public Library/' it was de-
veloped that Mr. Warner had produced the
following works: "A Liver Safe Cure/'
"Some Golden Remedies/' "Comets and
their Relations to Purgative Pellets/' and
"What I Know about Farming."
We are told that Mr. Warner will leave
for the Pacific slope in a day or two, but
will be in Chicago again during the month
of June, and we doubt not that upon his
return he will be cordially welcomed and
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handsomely entertained by our appreciative
public.
March 4, 1887
The Friendship of Lowell and Rublee
To the Lowell literature that is flooding
the Western country at the present time,
Colonel Horace Rublee, the distinguished
editor of the Milwaukee Sentinel, contributes
an interesting page, reminiscent in character.
"It was in 1855," says Colonel Rublee,
"that Colonel Lowell visited Milwaukee,
and he was then in the prime of his intel-
lectual and physical manhood, and to this
day I can remember with what pride I intro-
duced him to the large and enthusiastic audi-
ence which had assembled in Turner Hall to
hear his eloquent and thoughtful address on
'Early English Ballads.' This lecture was
conducted under the auspices of the Milwau-
kee Lecture Lyceum Bureau. In those days
lectures were all the rage, and none but the
very best talent was employed. The week
after Lowell's appearance here Bayard Taylor
came with his lecture on 'The Rhine/ and
Lowell remained in town just for the sake
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of having a visit with his bright young
friend. Taylor must have been about thirty
years of age, and he was as brilliant and as
companionable a fellow as you could expect
to meet. Well, Lowell and Taylor had a
great time together, and as I knew the town
pretty well and was inclined to be somewhat
coltish myself in those days, it was my good
fortune to be chosen as the third member of
the party. Every night we would go around
to Schimpf ermann's hall and sit there, drink-
ing beer and telling stories, until early morn-
ing. Lowell was a great hand for Yankee
stories, and Taylor could mimic the German
dialect and Irish brogue most artistically.
As for me, I did most of the singing, for I
had a fine barytone voice in those days; and
when it came to the chorus Taylor would
help me out with his deep, mellow bass, and
Lowell would chip in with his clear, ringing,
bird-like tenor. The last night they were
in town (ah, how distinctly I remember it!)
we all met at Schimpfermann's, and how
it came about I don't know we got into a
game of tenpins. I was an old hand at it,
and so was Taylor, but Lowell had never
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played before. Well, Taylor beat the first
game with 215 pins, I followed with 187,
and Lowell brought up the rear with 96.
He was a preposterously bad player, but he
was so earnest and so solemn about it that
we did n't dare laugh at him. We played
away until eight o'clock in the morning. In
six hours Taylor had rolled 3136 pins, my
score was 2944, and Lowell's was 1082. I
am able to give the figures because I wrote
them on the back of a daguerrotype that
Lowell had made of himself that morning
before he started away on the train.
" It lacked an hour of train-time, and we
went up into Bumglegarten's gallery and
had our pictures taken just as we looked
when we got through that five hours' bowl-
ing-match. I have the daguerrotype still,
and would not part with it for the wealth
of a Midas. Lowell was pretty well played
out, poor fellow, but he did not make any
complaint When he reached St. Louis,
however, he wrote me a pathetic letter, full
of scholarly reference and classical allusion.
f l am as sore/ said he, 'as if I had en-
gaged with the Pythian monster or had been
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drawn on the Procrustean bed ; not a muscle
in all my anatomy that does not ache, nor a
joint that is not as stiff as the senile An-
chises. What Simothean balm is there for
me ? I am, in short, reduced to such a con-
dition that neither Pisistratus nor the af-
flicted son of /Egeus would envy me, and
I have changed the subject of my St. Louis
lecture from that of "Italian Literature" to
that of "The Fall of Ilium. '""
When Colonel Lowell lectured on "The
American Richard III. of Politics" in this city
last month, Colonel Rublee came down from
Milwaukee to renew acquaintance with him.
They got together one evening in Colonel
Wirt Dexter's back parlor and talked about
the old Grecian and Latin poets until day-
light. Neither gentleman could sing as well
as he used to, but in his travels abroad Colo-
nel Lowell had picked up a number of jocose
Horatian odes and mirthful classic stories,
which he recited with exceeding zest, and
Colonel Rublee kept up his end of the con-
versation by narrating the many humorous
tales and sketches he had heard at Madison
during the sessions of the Wisconsin Legis-
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lature, all which Colonel Lowell enjoyed
mightily and made memoranda of, that he
might repeat them to his family physician,
a Dr. Holmes, whom he credited with being
a fellow of hearty appreciation and keen wit.
i, 1887
Rhyming Address on a Letter
NOT long ago Mr. Edmund Clarence Sted-
man, the banker-poet, received a packet bear-
ing a superscription as follows :
Herein there is a mournful ditty
For E. C. Stedman, New York City.
You 'II find him in his pristine glory
In Broadway, 66, top story.
So take this package to that Stedman,
Or, by St. Hokus, you 're a dead man !
When Mr. Stedman opened the bundle he
found that it contained a lot of manuscript
from his friend Lowell. Among them-
selves these poets have a great deal of fun
that the public never gets the benefit of.
April 18, 1887
William Dean Howells's Early Verse
IT has become our rare fortune to become
possessed of a volume printed at Columbus,
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Ohio, in 1860, under the auspices of one
William T. CoggeshalL This book is en-
titled " The Poets and Poetry of the West,
with Biographical and Critical Notices."
We think that the compilers of " The His-
tory of American Poetry/' Mr. E. C. Stedman
and Miss Ellen M. Hutchinson, ought to have
a copy of this book, and we have asked the
indefatigable Mr. Sizer (who is truly one of
the most learned and most ingenious of
Chicago bibliophiles) to hunt us up an extra
copy for our Eastern friends.
"William D. Ho wells," says fc Poets and
Poetry of the West," " was born in Martins-
ville, Belmont County, Ohio, in the year 1837,
His father being a printer and publisher, he
learned the printing business in the paternal
office at Hamilton, Butler County, whither
his parents moved in 1840. Mr. Ho wells has
been recognized as a writer about six years.
He has been editorially connected with the
Cincinnati Gazette and with the Ohio State
Journal, and has contributed poems to the
Atlantic Monthly magazine and to the Sat-
urday Press, New York, and is now a regu-
lar correspondent of the Ohio Farmer.' 1
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The only misstatement in this biography
is that concerning Mr. Howells's present em-
ployment Mr. Howells is now in Europe,
but not as the correspondent of the Ohio
Farmer; he is connected with a pictorial
magazine published in New York City.
However, we may overlook the inaccuracy
of the biographer as to this particular, since
the information he had at hand was neces-
sarily limited.
Before he left the West Mr. Howells wrote
a good deal of poetry; it was the genuine
stuff. His was a true poetic nature, to
which the beauteous surroundings of his
quiet Ohio home appealed for tuneful re-
sponse, and ne'er appealed in vain. " Poems
of Two Friends," " Drifting Away,"
"Dead/' "The Poet's Friends/' "The
Movers," " Summer Dead," and " The Bobo-
links are Singing " will live among the last
lingering remnants of Western literature.
We mean this ; we do not say it in the sa-
tirical sense in which Porson said of one of
Southey's poems: "It will be read when
Virgil and Homer are forgotten." And, by
the way, that nasty creature Byron stole this
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witticism for his " English Bards and Scotch
Reviewers "stole it and spoiled it
All the long August afternoon,
The little, drowsy stream
Whispers a melancholy tune,
As if it dreamed of June
And whispered in its dream.
There is no wind to stir the leaves,
The harsh leaves overhead;
Only the querulous cricket grieves,
And shrilling locust weaves
A song of summer dead.
This is a beautiful picture; it is full of sug-
gestion, of beautiful suggestion. The refer-
ence to leaves reminds us of a little novel
recently written by Miss Amelie Rives.
This novel begins with a description of
weather, and in this description we read
that the dry leaves were driven hither and
thither by the incessant rain.
That the poet Howells is an admirer of
Longfellow appears in the poems " Drifting
Away " and " The Movers/' for the ancients
spake truly when they argued that imitation
is the sincerest admiration :
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Parting was over at last, and all the good-bys had been
spoken ;
Up the long hillside the white-tented wagon moved slowly,
Bearing the mother and children, while onward before
them the father
Trudged with his gun on his arm, and the faithful house-
dog beside him,
Grave and sedate, as if knowing the sorrowful thoughts
of his master.
The words "grave" and " sedate " appear
to be favorites with the poet. They occur
again in " The Poet's Friends " :
The robin sings in the elm ;
The cattle stand beneath,
Sedate and grave, with great brown eyes
And fragrant meadow breath.
It seems that in the field of humor and of
dialect our Howells once exploited a genius
whose fire now inspires the best and most
popular of the Hoosier bards, viz., James
Whitcomb Riley. To the Ohio Farmer,
April 13, 1858, Mr. Howells contributed the
following verses, entitled " Deep Rock " :
A fell'r may live till he reckins he knows p'etty much all
wuth knowin',
But the longer he lives the more he finds that the world
keeps on a-goin'.
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Last week I went down to York state to visit my marr'd
daughter,
An' ther I met up with a newfangled trick 'at folks calls
mineral water.
Was n't a-feelin' none too peart, sperrits was kind er
droopin' ;
Reckin a pint er tansy gin 'u'd er fetched me round a-
whoopin';
But Lizzie allowed when folks were sick along in the
spring they 'd orter
Doctor their livers with that 'ere stuff 'at folks calls mineral
water.
Harnsome liquor as ever flowed, an' clear as the Miamy
River,
But stronger 'n a yoke er speckled steers when it tackles a
fell Vs liver;
Took one swig on 't, thess f r fun, then fer a day 'nd a
quarter
Did n't do much but loaf around tendin' that mineral water.
Made all the home folks madder ; n fire, specially Daughter
Lizzie ;
Did n't hev time fer visitin' J em water kep' keepin' me
busy.
Of all the say, efyou 'refeelin' sick or under the weather
sorter,
Jest sen' to town f'r a bottle or two of that nice, smooth
mineral water.
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Since Mr. Howells has left the West he has
written very little verse. It is probable that
in the noisy streets of Gotham he finds little
inspiration to set the bird to singing in his
heart. We remember to have heard the
eminent John A. Cockerill say: "To the
man fresh from the West, life in this great
city is oppressive; the high buildings, the
multitudes of people, even the very atmos-
phere, weighs him down." Yet we doubt
not that ever and anon the poet Howells
wanders in mind back to the pleasant rural
scenes of yore, and that there then comes
into his bosom that same yearning that
forced from the gifted Ada Sweet the im-
passioned cry:
Oh for the trill of a robin's note
And a whiff of the new-mown hay,
And oh for a book in the quiet nook
Of the barn where the dorkings lay !
To the perusal of Mr. Stedman and his
fair collaborates we would commend this
reference to our poet in a review printed in
the New York Saturday Press nearly thirty
years ago : " Mr. Howells is a man of genius,
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nevertheless. All along the chain of his
thought play keen lightning jets of poetic
passion, which illumine the dark places of
the human heart as lightning illumines the
midnight sky/'
May 19, 1888
Philology of the "Jag"
GALESBURG, ILLINOIS, July 12.
To THE EDITOR: In your pleasant article
of to-day you by no means exhaust the
authorities which have to deal with the sub-
ject of jags. We find in Sir Walter Scott's
"Border Minstrelsy" a ballad about St.
George and "his most fearfullest fyghte
with ye draggon," and here is one of the
stanzas :
When that Seint George had slayne ye draggon,
He sate him down furninst a flaggon,
And, wit ye well, within a spell
He had a bien plaisaunt jag on.
And surely you remember this passage in
the immortal Wordsworth's beautiful " Ex-
cursion " :
Tim, the good gossip dwelling in the cot
Beyond the stile where love gregarious thrives,
Tim hies anon behind the hawthorn hedge,
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And has to do with budge 'til, overcome,
He sinks beneath his jag upon the sod,
And flies come leagues to feast upon his smile,
In Mr. Pettigrew's most interesting col-
lection of epitaphs the following verses are
to be met with as having been inscribed on
a slab in the Ipswich burying-ground:
Here lies Middlesex Mag,
That tried to cany too big a jag;
Along came divell and toke the hag,
You seem to have forgotten that one of
the most popular saints in the olden time
was St. Jago, who, we can readily under-
stand, was to mediaeval humanity what
Bacchus was to the ancients. It is from the
proper name Jago that our word " jag" is de-
rived. (Vid* Skeat, Stormonth, Richardson,
Sweet, and Fallows.) Philologists agree
that in the course of time words drop their
tails, just as the human being has dropped
or absorbed that caudal member or corporeal
colophon which distinguishes the monkey
from the naturalized voter. (Vid* Darwin's
"Descent of Man" and Scott's " Tails of a
Grandfather.") In the course of centuries
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the final vowel of the good saint's name has
become absorbed, and instead of the St. Jago
of Arthurian days we now have the plain,
simple, unostentatious jag, which, however
large may have been its losses in other re-
spects, has lost none of its popularity among
the peoples of the earth.
Truly yours,
R. B.
July 14, 1888
Derivation of " In tie Soup "
WE should like to learn the origin of the
phrase "in the soup/'
This phrase implies the floating, uncer-
tain condition of an entity (or being) that,
foiled of a specific purpose, drifts helplessly,
if not aimlessly, in the swirling tide of un-
toward and irremediable circumstance.
But whence comes the phrase? We are
told that it came into vogue during the politi-
cal campaign last summer, the gamins of
New York noisily regaling the divers Demo-
cratic processions with the disheartening
prediction that Cleveland was " in der soup."
A learned and ingenious friend of ours
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suggests that the phrase may have arisen
from the custom (prevailing among the
humbler classes) of putting all refuse meat
and scraps into the soup-pot. Therefore, to
be "in the soup" signifieth worthlessness
so far as other purposes may be concerned.
Another friend shows us that the phrase
is a very old one in English literature. It is
to be found in the " Schole House of Hus-
bands JI (a publication made as early as
1583), to wit:
Now, full many evil things men do
They drinke, they lecher, and they whoop ;
But wherein shall these things profit you
When that you once get in ye soupe ?
And in Quarles's " Emblems " we are told
that
Even ye cursedest pride will droop
When one doth flounder in ye soupe.
Bunyan represents Apollyon straddling
across the way and threatening to put Chris-
tian into the soup; and in the old chap-
books of " Jacke and ye Gyaunts " the threat
of the " gyaunt " to put Jack into the soup
is frequently to be met with.
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Now, we shall really like to know whether
this phrase as it is commonly used now
comes legitimately from the ancients or
whether it is modern coinage, originating
perhaps in a ribald jest, the creation of a
Bowery raconteur.
February 12, 188$
William Morris and tie Sailor
WILLIAM MORRIS, the poet-author, seems to
be an eccentric genius. His work is singu-
larly beautiful; certainly no other writer at
the present time has so strong and so pure
a literary style. Even his prose works are
poems. In person Morris is robust and
square-built; he has shaggy hair, and he de-
lights in rude apparel. He loves the sea, and
nothing pleases him more than to be mis-
taken for a sailor; in fact, his appearance is
somewhat nautical.
One night he was rolling through one of
the narrow streets in the old city, when he
was overhauled by a seafaring man. "Avast,
there! " cried the stranger. "Don't I know
you ? Were n't you at one time the mate
of the brig Sea Swallow ? "
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To be mistaken for a sailor was charming ;
to be taken for the mate of a ship bearing so
poetic a name as the Sea Swallow was sim-
ply glorious. " Yes, I am he/' said Morris,
and he locked arms with the stranger, piloted
him into an ale-house, and filled him full of
liquids and substantials.
February 15, 1890
Two Estimates of Rudyard Kipling
MR. HENRY GUY CARLETON has gone to the
trouble of reviewing at some length the
amusing criticism which Mr. Rudyard Kip-
ling has passed upon the people of this
country their customs, habits, manners,
and peculiarities. Unfortunately, the tone
of Mr. Carleton's review is not dispassionate.
Mr. Carleton himself appears to attach alto-
gether too much importance to the young
Indian's criticism.
The truth seems to be that Mr. Kipling is
an unusually bright fellow who enjoys a
somewhat exaggerated opinion of his own
brightness ; it is quite natural that he should
35
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be somewhat swollen in vanity, for he has
been flattered to an amazing degree since
he woke up one morning and found him-
self famous. We certainly should expect
to find youth susceptible to the charms
of compliment, and we are free to con-
fess that we recognize a distinct loveli-
ness in that freedom and confidence with
which youth gives expression to those
views which it invariably has upon all hu-
man things.
Mr. Kipling's literary work is faulty, but
it is brilliant and strong. There may be, as
Mr. Carleton avers, twenty newspaper re-
porters in New York City capable of doing
as good work as Mr. Kipling has done; at
the same time, they have not done it and
Mr. Kipling has.
The error into which Mr. Kipling appears to
have fallen is an overweening greed to profit
at once by the reputation made by his earlier
publications. He is bulling his own market.
The trade instinct is big within him. Mr.
Kipling's business methods are not those of
a literary man; he is a hustler, and we fear
that he is also a paranoiac. He believes in
36
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haying in sunny weather, no matter whether
there is any grass or not, and he is working
his boom for all there is in it.
Nobody should take to heart what this
young man has to say of this country and
its people. Much that he says is true. We
are very different from other countries, and
in that difference should we find continual
reason for devoutly returning thanks to the
Almighty. If there be aught of praise-
worthiness in the progress of civilization,
we stand forth as the conspicuous illustra-
tion of that progress.
We hope that Mr. Kipling will go ahead
with cracking his whip. He is young and
lusty and full of fight, and these things help
to keep other things moving. We have
much more respect for the sauciness of
youth than we have for the hypocrisy of
age ; in other words, when we think of the
absurd flatteries and lying arts which certain
foreigners have employed to mulct us of our
money and good opinion, we are disposed to
regard Mr. Kipling's combative pertness as
refreshing and praiseworthy to a degree.
January i6 f 1891
37
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Is Rudyard Kipling a young man ?
Well, he confesses to being twenty-four
years of age.
Is a man at twenty-four a young man ?
That depends.
An American, an Englishman, a French-
man, a German these are young men at
twenty-four.
But Rudyard Kipling is an Indian, and in
India humanity develops much earlier than
in the higher latitudes.
In India the males marry at fourteen years
of age ; one may be a grandfather at thirty.
Is it possible that Kipling, now twenty-
four years of age, is at his perihelion, physi-
cally and intellectually ?
February 19, 1891
Brusqueness of Tennyson and Dickens
A STORY illustrating Tennyson's brusque
humor involves a gentleman who is begin-
ning to be known this side of the Atlantic
as the author of scholarly biographical mono-
graphs. Oscar Browning is professor of
38
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history at Christ's College, Cambridge ; he is
about fifty years of age, is a bachelor, has
aggressive manners, a short, stout physique,
and a Hebraic cast of countenance. One day
Professor Browning was walking in Regent
Street, and suddenly he came face to face
with the poet laureate. The two had met
several times before, and Mr. Browning is
hardly the man to forget a distinguished
acquaintance. He rushed enthusiastically
upon the poet laureate, grasped his hand,
and overwhelmed him with effusive com-
pliments. Tennyson, evidently surprised,
regarded him with a stony glare.
"Why, Mr. Tennyson," explained the
professor, "have you forgotten me? Don't
you know me? I 'm Browning."
The poet laureate, continuing to regard the
professor with that awful glare, answered
gruffly: "So you are Browning? No, I } m
if you are ! " And with these words he
stalked away gloomily.
A somewhat similar rebuke is recorded of
Charles Dickens. In his " Memories of Many
Men " the late Maunsell B. Field tells of a call
he made upon Charles Dickens while the lat-
39
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ter was visiting Cincinnati in the spring of
1842. " There were not many persons in the
room when we entered. Immediately be-
hind us followed a small English gentleman
of subdued and timid manners. Mr. Dickens
was standing in front of the fireplace, with
his coat-tails under his arms, gorgeously at-
tired, and covered with velvet and jewellery.
Mrs. Dickens was lounging on a sofa at the
farther end of the room. We were duly pre-
sented by an usher, the masterof ceremonies,
and after exchanging a few words with the
author of ' Pickwick/ retired to give place
to the little Englishman who was behind us.
Upon being introduced, this gentleman def-
erentially remarked : ' I had the pleasure of
meeting you, Mr. Dickens, at Mr. Love's, in
shire, two years ago/ Dickens looked
him steadily in the face for a minute, and
then answered in a loud voice: ' I never was
there in my life.' ' I beg your pardon/ re-
plied his interlocutor, overcome with con-
fusion. ' It was in the winter, and [naming
several persons] were there at the same
time.' Dickens again gave him a withering
look, and after a pause repeated in a still
more elevated tone: 'I tell you, sir, I never
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was there in my life!' Here Mrs. Dickens
interposed, and addressing her husband,
said: 'Why, Charles, you certainly were
there, and I was with you; don't you re-
member the occurrence ? ' Mr. Dickens
glared at her almost fiercely, and, advancing
a step or two, with his right hand raised,
fairly shouted : ' I tell you I never was there
in my life ! ' "
Mr. Field proceeds : " I had never been so
disenchanted in all my days. The unfor-
tunate Englishman withdrew without an-
other word, and my friend and I retired
disgusted. I then for the first time reluc-
tantly appreciated the fact that a man may
be a great author without being a gentleman,
a conclusion which I have frequently seen
verified in my more mature years."
That Dickens was upon general principles
a cad seems to admit of little doubt. It is
better, perhaps, not to become so well ac-
quainted with the objects of our hero-wor-
ship. Byron becomes unbearable, Shelley
becomes pitiable, Keats becomes offensive,
Swinburne becomes shocking, the more we
study their personalities and pry into their
private lives. One can hardly help losing
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somewhat of his veneration for dear old
Thackeray, even, when he learns of that
literary giant's supersensitiveness : how he
belittled himself when he applied himself to
the small, small business of hounding Ed-
mund Yates out of the Garrick Club!
March 9, 1892,
The Evil Practice of Borrowing Books
THE practice of borrowing books is essen-
tially an evil one in those who can afford to
own books, and public libraries serve to
encourage and foster the evil, though they
are of very great value to the poor student.
We think that, upon general principles,
people should own the books they read.
We believe heartily in buying books, reading
books, and keeping books. As a reference
a public library serves an admirable pur-
pose, and in many instances it is of un-
doubted advantage to the people. But one
that would be surely profited by books
should own them if he can, and should have
them for companions continually around
him.
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Hans Christian Andersen at the World's
Fair
No child should corne away from the
World's Fair without visiting the Danish
exhibit in the Manufactures Building, for in
this particular exhibit is to be seen the large
collection of mementos of Hans Christian
Andersen. We unreservedly pity the boy
or the girl who grows up without feeling
the tender, persuasive influences of Ander-
sen's teachings ; fortunately, there are very
few children anywhere in Christendom who
do not at one period or another fall under the
spell of this dear old man's genius.
In this collection of souvenirs to which we
refer are to be found just such quaint relics
as you would suppose would come from the
great child-lover and child-teacher. Their
quaintness and their simplicity prove their
genuineness. We see the curious, old-fash-
ioned chairs and sofa in which he used to
sit, and the homely stove before which he
used to warm himself, for, ough ! that was
a very cold country in which he lived, and
there was need for big, broad, honest stoves.
43
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How pleasant it must have been to sit in
those stout chairs or to curl up in that hos-
pitable sofa before that genial stove and hear
the dear old master telling his pretty tales
to a group of little folks, while all the time
the fire in that genial stove kept humming, in
a kind of crooning undertone, a half-cheery,
half-solemn accompaniment to the dear old
master's voice !
And here are the very spectacles through
which his honest blue eyes beamed benevo-
lently upon his little children ; and here, too,
is the curious high old hat he used to wear
do not touch it, lest you ruffle the nap
which his big, homely, gentle hands so
diligently smoothed and smoothed and
smoothed until that curious high old hat
became actually resplendent; and how the
children shouted and scampered to him and
clasped him about the knees and tugged at
his coat-tails when, away up or away down
the street, they saw by the sunbeams that
danced around that glossy, curious old hat
that their beloved friend was coming!
The table at which he wrote, and the silver
candlesticks which were silent witnesses to
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his labor; his footstool with its fading em-
broideries; the inkstand and the pens he
used; the slippers in which he shuffled to
and fro ; the snuffers with which he reproved
and corrected the lazy, complaining, sput-
tering candles ; the pictures upon which he
loved to look; the oval table with its old-
fashioned spread, about which he and his boy
and girl friends used to play at games those
long, lovely winter evenings when it was
cold outside and the storm king went bluster-
ing up and down the streets for little noses
and ears and cheeks to pinch these and so
very many other delightful remembrances of
your friend and mine it is very pleasant to
find in this quiet corner of the Danish section.
If you are so disposed, you can see poems
and tales that he wrote, yes, in his very hand-
writing, for there are many of his manu-
scripts, and here and there you will come
upon dear little pictures he made and curious
little figures carved or cut out of paper by
him. No child need be told their meaning,
for childhood has an art and a wisdom pe-
culiar to itself, and this old friend of ours
was a child to the very last
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It is restful to come out of the noise and
confusion of the great parade and pomp and
show all around about into this quiet little
spot where reverent and loving hands have
gathered together mementos of the kindly
genius that shone for the little ones and the
lowly of humanity. And who shall say that
the spirit of the dear old master is not there ?
Why, one can almost fancy that in the quaint
chair by the quaint stove there is to see that
personality about which so many tender as-
sociations linger. And one can hear again
the kindly voice and feel again the benedic-
tion of the friendly smile and gentle touch.
Elsewhere in the vast structure where you
are to see these things and feel these soft-
ening emotions, other hands have brought
together and piled up in confusion and im-
posing splendor the works of labor and
science and art ; and they are beautiful and
rare and costly. The children should see
them and be told of them, for to know of
these things gives one a noble appreciation of
this beautiful world of ours and of mankind.
Yet, after all these things have been seen
and known, how ready is every one to turn
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to the homely, pathetic memorials of that
dear heart which beat in unison with the
simplicity, the truth, the candor, the enthu-
siasm, the wisdom, and the pathos of child-
hood ! Far nobler than the conquests of war,
more beautiful than the triumphs of art, more
persuasive than the logarithms of science, is
that sympathy of the human heart for the
little ones created in God's image, who bring
with them to earth a promise and a foretaste
of the joys in the kingdom of heaven.
July 4, 1893
No Use for Paper-Covered Books
THE writer of "Sharps and Flats" re-
quests that publishers and authors send him
no more paper-covered books. He simply
throws away all books of this kind, it being
his notion that a book that is worth reading
is surely worth keeping, and is therefore
entitled to a durable dress.
July i} 9 1893
The Battle of the Realists and Romancists
THE chances are that to the end of our
earthly career we shall keep on regretting
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that we were not present at that session of
the Congress of Authors when Mr. Hamlin
Garland and Mrs. Mary Hart well Gather-
wood had their famous intellectual wrestling-
match. Garland is one of the apostles of
realism. Mrs. Catherwood has chosen the
better part: she loves the fanciful in fiction;
she believes, with us, in fairy godmothers
and valorous knights and beautiful prin-
cesses who have fallen victims to wicked
old witches.
Mr. Garland's heroes sweat and do not
wear socks; his heroines eat cold huckle-
berry pie and are so unfeminine as not to
call a cow " he."
Mrs. Catherwood's heroes and they are
the heroes we like are aggressive, courtly,
dashing, picturesque fellows, and her hero-
ines are timid, stanch, beautiful women, and
they, too, are our kind of people.
Mr. Garland's in loc signo is a dung-
fork or a butter-paddle; Mrs. Catherwood's
is a lance ' or an embroidery-needle. Give
us the lance and its companion every time.
Having said this much, it is proper that we
should add that we have for Mr. Garland
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personally the warmest affection, and we
admire his work, too, very, very much ; it is
wonderful photography. Garland is young
and impressionable; in an evil hour he fell
under the baleful influences of William D.
Howells, and there you are.
If we could contrive to keep Garland away
from Howells long enough we J d make a
big man of him, for there is a heap of good
stuff in him. Several times we have had
him here in Chicago for eight or ten days at
a stretch, and when he has associated with
us that length of time he really becomes quite
civilized and gets imbued with orthodoxy;
and then he, too, begins to see fairies and flub-
duds, and believes in the maidens who have
long golden hair and cannot pail the cow;
and his heroes are content to perspire instead
of sweat, and they exchange their cowhide
peg boots for silk hose and mediaeval shoon.
But no sooner does Garland reach this
point in the way of reform than he galli-
vants off again down East, and falls into
Howells's clutches, and gets pumped full of
heresies, and the last condition of that man
is worse than the first.
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We can well understand how so young
and so impressionable a person as Garland
is should fall an easy prey to Ho wells, for
we have met Howells, and he is indeed a
charming, a most charming gentleman. So
conscious were we of the superhuman
power of his fascinations that all the time
we were with him we kept repeating pater-
nosters lest we, too, should fall a victim to
his sugared and persuasive heterodoxy; and
even then, after being with them an hour or
two, we felt strangely tempted to throw
away our collar and necktie and let our vict-
uals drop all over our shirt-front.
The fascination of realism is all the more
dangerous because it is so subtle. It is a
bacillus undoubtedly, and when you once
get it into your system it is liable to break
out at any time in a new spot. But Gar-
land is not yet so far gone with the malady
but that we can save him if he will only
keep away from Howells. In all solemnity
we declare it to be our opinion that Howells
is the only bad habit Garland has.
So we are glad to hear that there is a pros-
pect of Mr. Garland's making his home here
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in Chicago, where the ramping prairie winds
and the swooping lake breezes contribute
to the development of the humane fancy*
Verily there will be more joy in Chicago
over the one Garland that repenteth than
over ninety-and-nine Catherwoods that need
no repentance.
July 27, 1893
The Truth about Orange Groves
A CURRENT paragraph tells of the pine-
apple and citron groves on Robert Louis
Stevenson's estate in Samoa, and the impli-
cation is that they are paradisiacal spots.
We are reserving all opinions as to groves
until we have seen the groves. We have
had a bitter, never-to-be-forgotten experience
in that direction. Before we had ever seen
an orange grove we fancied that it must be
the most beautiful, the most delightful, the
most restful spot in all the world. We pict-
ured the joys of lying upon the velvety sward
in the shade of this grove, listening to the
solemn music of the wind in the foliage, and
catching kaleidoscopic glimpses of the dis-
tant empyrean. This was all pleasant enough
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in the warmth of a well-heated Chicago
home. But the awakening from the poetic
dream was rude to the degree of brutality.
What, in fact, is an orange grove but the
lonesomest, dampest, chillest, most cheerless
of all existing or imaginable things ? The
hideousness of its mouldy gloom is enhanced
by the mathematically severe regularity in
which the trees are arranged. And such
trees ! Wretched little creatures they are, re-
minding one, with their distressing burden of
fruit, of nursery-bred, precocious children.
They look so premature, so stunted, so un-
like our notion of what a tree should be
who can help pitying them ?
And how about the velvety sward?
There J s not an inch of it, except in the
mind of the dreamer! Sward, indeed!
Ploughed ground is what it is actually, for
the orange-tree must have plenty of moist-
ure, and so the soil must be kept turned and
broken. If you would fain stroll in an
orange grove you must wear rubber boots
and hump your shoulders, for the ploughed
ground is wet and the trees are dwarfs.
One stroll will suffice; you will then return
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to your hotel, call a doctor, and nurse the
influenza for ten days.
A good view of an orange grove is to be
had from Mount Lowe or any of the other
peaks back of the Sierra Madre valley.
Seen from above and at a distance of thirty
miles, an orange grove presents a pretty
spectacle, fresh, green, and picturesque.
The farther away it is the more charming.
Seen at its best, it is seen three thousand
miles off through the eyes of the imagination
of one poetically minded and kept at normal
temperature by that sweetest of all human
inventions, a well-regulated furnace.
May 23, 1894
Encouragement for F. Marion Crawford
THE new national library will have space
for four million books. We mention this
merely to encourage Mr. F. Marion Craw-
ford to keep right on.
June 4, 1894
Small Price for a Great Poem
JULIA WARD HOWE received only five dol-
lars for her " Battle Hymn of the Republic,"
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and it was first printed in the Atlantic
Monthly. It was worth more than that
at that time, but it would probably not
be accepted by any magazine now, for
the reason that there is no demand for
verse of that character. We do not rate
it very high either as a patriotic inspiration
or as a literary composition. But the context
of contemporaneous history has made it
great
June 22, 1894
The Sloe-Strings of Mettuselah
OUR learned, ingenious, and charming
friend Franklin H. Head is reported to have
credited to Oliver Wendell Holmes the
authorship of a story he told at a banquet
at the Union League Club, when introduc-
ing the stalwart Rev. Dr. F. A. Noble to
the rest of the company. He recalled the
physiological fact that after fifty years of
age men become appreciably smaller; by
a gradual settling process they will lose in
thirty years possibly one quarter of an inch
in height.
"Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes/' said Mr.
54
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Head, " once discussed this fact very enter-
tainingly among some friends. He pointed
out in a fanciful picture the strange effect in
the early days of the world. ' Imagine/ he
said, ' men of biblical times who lived to be
five hundred or one thousand years old thus
growing shorter continually during the latter
centuries of life. The settling we do in our
brief lives must be but a bagatelle to the
extended shortening process they endured.
You can imagine Methuselah at the latter
end of his span starting out of a morning
and being saluted with:
"'"Good morning, Methusy; how do
you find yourself? "
"'"Oh, pretty well/' would be the an-
swer, " pretty well for an old fellow. But
I am bothered somewhat by my shoe-strings
getting in my eyes." ' "
Now, this amusing skit is indeed very
Holmesy, and it originated in the Holmes
family, but not with Oliver Wendell. The
genial Autocrat's equally genial and witty
brother John invented and told the story.
A good many of the bright things said by
brother John have been credited to Oliver
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Wendell. The Autocrat was the famous
member of the family, and as such he was
honored with the paternity of all the bon-
mots that bore the Holmes trade-mark.
December ij, 1894
The Poet WUttie-fs Taxes
MR. HORACE FLETCHER, one of the most
charming of New Orleans's charming people,
visited Boston last summer, and while there
he determined to make a trip to Ames-
bury, the former home of the poet Whittier.
Mr. Fletcher has a poetic nature, and he re-
veres the memory of the dear old Quaker
lyrist. He got aboard an electric car and
whirled to and fro amid the quiet scenes in
which Mr. Whittier used to participate, and
presently he could suppress his emotions no
longer; he had to unbosom his thoughts to
a fellow-traveller, resident in Amesbury, a
humble-looking man, seemingly a carpenter,
for he had a kit of tools with him. Mr.
Fletcher praised Amesbury and its people,
and then he discoursed long and eloquently
upon the poet Whittier and upon the honor
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which his genius had reflected upon his
townsmen and associates. Mr. Fletcher
even quoted whole poems, by way of clinch-
ing his argument with his fellow-traveller;
but, curiously enough, the Amesbury man
sat silent and unmoved.
Finally, after our New Orleans friend had
talked himself to the verge of bronchitis,
the Amesbury man said, coldly and forbid-
dingly:
" We folks here in Amesbury don't think
as much of Mr. Whittier as we did. You
know we don't go much on a tax-dodger.
While he was livin' he never paid no taxes
on more *n four thousand dollars, but after he
died howlin' Jehos'aphat ! it came to light
before the jedge of probate that he wuz
worth two hundred and sixty thousand
dollars."
March 21 } 1895
Max Nordau Approved
So far as the scope of our vision extends
we are unable to detect any reason for sus-
pecting that Max Nordau is not amply quali-
fied to defend himself against any of the
57
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adversaries whom his remarkable book has
raised up. There is a probability, too, that
a good many calmly observant people will
love Professor Nordau for the enemies he
has made.
April 26 j
THE POET'S RETURN
A POET, crazed by Mammon, hung
His harp upon the willows, and
Forgot the songs which he had sung,
Sweeping that harp with master hand.
Long wailed the Muse with much ado,
The votary which Mammon stole,
Till Mammon pitying her withdrew
The spell that bound the poef s soul.
The poet then with master hand
Took down the old familiar lyre
And sang unto a listening land
His song aflame with heav'nly fire.
Sing on, O poet, while ye may,
As sweetly as in years of old,
For thy sweet songs shall live for aye,
A grander heritance than gold !
August tj } 1883
59
A SHOSHONE LEGEND
THE brave Shoshones much revere
Our presidential Arthur,
And they proclaim him, far and near.
The mighty pale-face father.
This reverence, 't is said, is due
Unto a little caper,
Which, whether false or whether true,
Hath ne'er before seen paper.
Down in the Yellowstone, one eve,
Quoth Vest, the statesman-joker:
"Since time hangs heavy, I believe
I '11 start a game of poker."
He called the bold Shoshones round
And filled their pipes with Gravely,
And, seated on the dewy ground,
They all chipped in right bravely.
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And lo! the President did choose
To lend approval hearty;
So, purchasing a stack of blues,
He sat in with the party.
Out spake the brave Po-Dunk-a-Wee,
Rending his purse asunder:
" Big Injun bet heap dollar he
Beat pale-face all to thunder! "
Whereat the pale-face chief sublime
Did manifest a wincing
And yet allowed it was no time
For presidential mincing.
So none dropped out, but all came in,
Till groaned the pot with stuffing
And, consequently, rose the din
Of multifarious bluffing.
An d when the show-do wn word was spoke
Alas, its dreadful uses !
The brave Po-Dunk-a-Wee went broke
On sixes full on deuces ;
"Two pair/' the brave Tim-Tom-Kee
moaned
Amid regretful blushes,
While other rash Shoshones groaned
O'er various bobtail flushes.
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And then a miracle ensued
Which blanched the copper faces
Our Arthur, with rare fortitude,
Showed down five awful aces.
August 22, 1883
A ZEPHYR FROM ZULULAND
FROM Onathlamba in the west,
Where rise the walls of Quangar,
And where the brave Bapedis rest,
Is heard a joyous clangor:
From Unyanyembe's pagan towers
The Umtamtuna River
Where dark Kabompo's noisome bowers
Disturb the Kaffir's liver;
Where bloom the nutmeg and the rose
And thrives the tapir greasy,
And where the Unzimkulu flows
Into the fair Zambesi;
Where dwells the cruel assagai
Among the fierce Potgeiters,
And Sekukunis live and die
As Amas wazai fighters ;
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And from the huts of Mozambique
Upon the northern shore,
Unto old Umoolosi peak,
And fragrant Delagoa
Around and round the tidings go,
Inspiring vast thanksgiving
That all in spite of dastard foe
Their monarch still is living.
Hail, monarch! Cetewayo, hail!
Great England's pagan hobby
And bless thy fate that foes should fail
To slay a nibs so nobby!
32,
THE FRENCH MUST GO
UNTO his valiant aide-de-camp
Remarked the brave Bouet:
t( To-morrow we will move along
To battle, s'il vous plait.
Hard by the walls of Hue, we
Our pagan foe shall meet,
And then and there, mon cber ami,
We *11 warm him tout de suite*"
Next morn, as brave Wun Lung with zest
Partook his matin rice,
And stored away beneath his vest
A pie composed of mice,
Into his presence rushed Gin Sing,
And cried in sore dismay :
"Oh, save thyself, most potent king
The Flenchmen come this way!"
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Wun Lung looked daggers, and replied:
"If that 's the Flenchman's gamee,
We '11 .meet him on the plain outside,
And lick him allee samee.
Close up the laundries, whet your swords ;
And, with your spears in hand,
Call in the servile cooly hordes
And let the junks be manned."
When this commotion brave Bouet
Discovered from afar
"I fear," he muttered in dismay,
"I 've made un grand faux pas.
I do not understand," quoth he,
" This hurrying to and fro;
But I suspect, from what I see
And hear, je suis de trop! "
The hostile forces soon imbrued
With murd'rous shock and blow,
And in the struggle that ensued
The Frenchman had to go.
The fierce Wun Lung, amid the strife,
Beheld brave Bouet near,
And took his horse-du-combat's life
With battle-axe and spear.
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And when his horse-du-combat fell
All lifeless at his feet,
Brave Bouet, with a sickening yell,
Commanded a retreat.
Wun Lung now lolls in his abode
From morn till dewy eve,
And eats his rat-pie a la mode
And Bouet takes " French leave/'
August 24 } 1883
A BATTLE IN YELLOWSTONE PARK
THE sun had slipped down
The blue slant of the west;
The pale, queenly moon
Sat upon the night's crest,
With her face from the world
Turned in shame half away,
As she fondly pursued
Her loved king of the day.
The Yellowstone camp
In the valley below,
With its tents like tombstones
Set out in a row,
Was quaking with fear ;
For the word had been brought
That a train was en route
With bold kidnappers fraught.
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The President lay
In his well-guarded tent;
The general hither
And thither had sent
The men of his staff
And the men of his troop;
The visiting statesmen
Were crouched in a group.
On the soft summer breeze
Came a sharp, startling sound.
For a moment all stood
As in fear's fetters bound.
" What was that ? " whispered Robert.
SaidRufus: "Ply I Hide!
'T is the savage war-whoop
Of the robber's red guide/'
" Man the outposts ! Look sharp ! "
The brave general said.
"''Guard the President well."
And with field-glass he read
The circling horizon,
To south and to east,
Till his eye fell, at last,
On the skulking red beast.
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Every eye in the camp
Strained, the pale night to pierce;
Every hand clutched a gun,
As by fear rendered fierce;
Every heart pounded hard
At the ribs of its cage
As forms were spied, veiled
By a thicket of sage.
Flash ! each gun laughed a flame
Like a demon at sport
Crash ! the still night was rent
By the awful report,
And the craggy old mountains
Reechoed "Ha, ha!"
Till the sounds seemed to blend
In a giant guffaw.
Hours and hours the camp 'watched
Till the bright threads of dawn
Wove a shining gold veil
For the night to put on.
Then, there in the sage-brush,
In bullet-torn coats,
Lay the earthly remains
Of a pair of coyotes.
August 28 } 1883
70
HIS LORDSHIP, THE CHIEF JUSTICE
WHEREAS, it is alleged, to wit:
There cometh from afar
A certain party in whose cause
Herewith these presents are;
One Coleridge is said party's name,
A lord of high degree,
Well known unto this court and fame
A judge, so called, is he.
As parties of the second part,
We, the appellants, pray
That sundry courtesies be shown
Said judge who comes this way;
And, furthermore, appellants crave
Said judge be dined and feted
As would become said judge and court
Hereinbefore narrated;
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And that said divers compliments
Be also well intentioned,
As to delight said judge, so called,
Above and afore mentioned.
August 29, 1883
A HINT FOR 1884
THE sage of Greystone, so they say,
Has two imported steeds;
The one is black, the other bay,
And both of noble breeds.
Before he bought these chargers rare
Of stylish blood and tone
He used to drive another pair,
A humble gray and roan.
When Tilden hankers after style
On boulevard or street,
A coachman reins the chargers,
While he lolls on cushioned seat
But when he J s out for holiday
To scour the hedge and thicket,
Alone he drives the roan and gray
The good old-fashioned ticket.
August 31, 1883
13
THE INDIAN AND THE TROUT
THE morning sun in splendor shone
On the mellow park of the Yellowstone.
The President at the break of day
Had packed his duds and moved away.
A brave Shoshone chief came out
With his willow pole to fish for trout
It was half-past six when he cast his line,
And he kept on fishing till half-past nine ;
And then he baited his hook anew
And patiently fished until half-past two
The meanwhile swearing a powerful sight
For fishing all day with nary a bite.
And he swore and fished, and fished and
swore
Till his Elgin watch tolled half-past four;
When a big, fat trout came swimming by
And winked at the chief with his cold, sad
eye.
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" And do you reckon, you pagan soul,
You can catch us trout with a willow pole ?
The President taught us manners while
He fished for us in the latest style.
You 've no idea how proud we feel
To be jerked ashore with a Frankfort reel! "
The red man gathered his dinner-pail
And started home by the shortest trail,
And he told his faithful squaw he guess'd
They } d better move still farther west,
Where presidents did n't come fooling about,
Turning the heads of the giddy trout.
September 5, 188}
75
A PLAY ON WORDS
(TO BE READ ALOUD RAPIDLY)
A SSERT ten Barren love day made
1\ Dan woo'd her hart buy nigh tan day ;
Butt wen knee begged she 'd marry hymn,
The crewel bell may dancer neigh.
Lo atter fee tin vein he side
Ant holder office offal pane
A lasses mown touched knot terse sole
His grown was sever awl Lynn vane.
" Owe, beam my bride, my deer, rye prey,
And here mice size beef ore rye dye;
Oak caste mean knot tin scorn neigh way
Yew are the apple love me nigh ! "
She herd Dan new we truly spoke.
Key was of noble berth, and bread
Tool lofty mean and hie renown,
The air too grate testates, 't was head.
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"Ewe wood due bettor, sir/' she bald,
" Took court sum mother girl, lie wean
Ewer knot mice stile, lisle never share
The thrown domestic azure quean ! "
" T is dun, no farebutt Scilly won
Aisle waiste know father size on the! "
Oft tooth the nay bring porte tea flue
And through himself into the see.
September 12, 188$
77
HOW FLAHERTY KEPT THE BRIDGE
OUT spake Horatius Flaherty, a Fenian
bold was he,
" Lo, I will stand at thy right hand and turn
the bridge with thee !
So ring the bell, O'Grady, and clear the rail-
way track
Muldoon will heed the summons well and
keep the street-cars back/'
Forthwith O'Grady rang the bell, and
straightway from afar
There came a rush of humankind and over-
loaded car.
" Back, back! a schooner cometh," the brave
O'Grady cried;
"She cometh from Muskegon, packed down
with horn and hide."
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And "Back!" Muldoon demanded and
Flaherty declaimed,
While many a man stopped short his course
and muttered, " I 'II be blamed! "
And many a horse-car jolted, and many a
driver swore,
As the tother gangway of the bridge swung
off from either shore.
And bold Horatius Flaherty a storm of curses
heard,
But pushing bravely at his key, he answered
not a word;
And round and round he turned the bridge
to let the schooner through,
And round and round and round again
O'Grady turned it too;
Till now at last the way is clear, and with a
sullen toot
Twixt bridge and shore, ten rods or more,
the tug and schooner shoot.
"Now swing her round the tother way/'
the brave O'Grady cried.
"T is well! " Horatius Flaherty in thunder
tones replied.
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Muldoon waved high his club in air, his
handkerchief waved high,
To see the stanch Muskegon ship go sail-
ing calmly by ;
And as the rafters of the bridge swung round
to either shore,
Vast was the noise of men and boys and
street-cars passing o'er.
And Flaherty quoth proudly, as he mopped
his sweaty brow,
"Well done for you, and here 's a chew,
O'Grady, for you now/'
September 19, 1883
So
THE THREE-CENT STAMP
GOOD-BY, old stamp; It 's nasty luck
That ends our friendship so.
When others failed, you gamely stuck,
But now you 've got to go.
So here 's a flood of honest tears,
And here 's an honest sigh.
Good-by, old friend of many years
Good-by, old stamp, good-by!
Your life has been a varied one,
With curious phases fraught
Sometimes a check, sometimes a dun,
Your daily coming brought;
Smiles to a waiting lover's face,
Tears to a mother's eye,
Or joy or pain to every place
Gooci-by, old stamp, good-by!
Si
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You bravely toiled, and better men
Will vouch for what I say;
Although you have been licked, 't was when
Your face turned t j other way.
'T was often in a box you got
(As you will not deny)
For going through the mails, I wot
Good-by, old stamp, good-by!
Ah, in your last expiring breath
The tale of years is heard
The sound of voices hushed in death,
A mother's dying word,
A maiden's answer, soft and sweet,
A wife's regretful sigh,
The patter of a baby's feet
Good-by, old stamp, good-by!
What wonder, then, that at this time
When you and I must part,
I should aspire to speak in rhyme
The promptings of my heart ?
Go, bide with all those mem'ries dear
That live when others die;
You *ve nobly served your purpose here
Good-by, old stamp, good-by !
September 24, 1883
82
BIG THURSDAY
IN this week's history of the Fair,
To-day will be the banner day.
The commonwealth will all be there
To view the truly grand display.
The country folk from miles around
Will gather in this monstrous hive,
And will in wondering groups be found
Where pigs and cows and squashes thrive
The rural bumpkin and his gal
Will proudly note the Lima bean
And golden pumpkin from La Salle,
The sweet potato from Moline,
The toothsome cheese from Kankakee,
The turnip bred in Kickapoo ;
And squashes fair and round we '11 see
From Crete and Big Foot Prairie, too.
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Or, fancying live stock, they will ponder
On blooded cattle by the drove
Sleek Berkshire bullocks from Golconda,
And Durham swine from Downer's Grove ;
On gentle Southdown mules from Pana,
On Poland China sheep from Niles,
On calves from Buda and Urbana,
And likewise cows in divers styles.
Unhappy, most unhappy being
Who thinks to stay away from there
Who misses all such sights worth seeing
At and around our glorious Fair!
So don, O youth, your paper collar,
And prink your best, O maiden gay,
A ticket costs but half a dollar
Go join the multitude to-day!
September 2j, 1883
84
THE STAGE AND STAGE FOLK
Mucb in a Name
IT transpires that Mme. Janauschek's
name, translated from the Bohemian into
pure Anglo-Saxon, is Johnson. One can
more fully appreciate the richness and ripe-
ness of the change when he contemplates
the possibility the ridiculous possibility-
of the burly old lexicographer's having been
known to posterity as Dr. Samuel Janau-
schek.
August 22, 1882
Count Bosnia's Possibilities
MR. CHARLES BOZENTA'S address delivered
night before last before the Polish societies
of this city was a scholarly, thoughtful effort.
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In some respects Bozenta reminds one very
forcibly of Carl Schurz : he is a scholar and a
thinker, and, in spite of his bad accent, is an
agreeable, rapid, entertaining, and instructive
talker. He has all of Schurz's vagary, com-
bativeness, wit, and cynicism, with much
more sociability and heartiness, and a much
keener appetite for the smaller details of
every subject he investigates. Bozenta has
a fondness for politics, and after he has con-
ducted his wife, Mme. Modjeska, through
her farewell season, it need not surprise any-
body to hear of him as bobbing up serenely
in the troubled sea of California politics.
September 14, 1883
After Miolael Angela
HENRY E. DIXEY tells a story to the effect
that John Stetson once went behind the
scenes in his New York theatre and found
fault with a certain piece of scenery then in
use. " What is the blamed thing, anyway ? "
he asked. The stage-manager informed him
that it was a scene after Michael Angelo,
whereupon Stetson pompously exclaimed:
" Well, it 's no good. Pay Mike his salary
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and let him go!" A day or two afterward
Dixey was reciting the incident to Jack
Haverly, but Haverly did n't seem to catch
on to the joke. So Dixey repeated the yarn,
and Haverly, forcing a property smile, ex-
claimed : " Oh, yes, I see there ain't no such
person as Angelo!" This amused Dixey
more than the original story, and he hurried
off to tell Stetson about it. But Stetson was
quite as thick-witted as Haverly had been in
detecting the humor of the thing. " Why,
don't you see," exclaimed Dixey, with great
earnestness, " I told this yarn to Haverly, and
he replied, ' There ain't no such person as
Michael Angelo'!" "Ah, yes/' cried Stet-
son, with a sudden gleam of intelligence;
" he ought to have said, ' There is n't any
such person as Michael Angelo ' ! Yes, yes ;
a good one on Haverly! Ha, ha, ha! "
August i2 } 1884
Stuart Robson in a Serious Role
SAYS Mr. W. H. Crane, the comedian:
" Very few people are aware that my friend
and partner Mr. Stuart Robson once con-
ceived the notion that he was created for the
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interpretation of the romantic drama. This
was in 1840. Robson had acquired a de-
served reputation for his comedy powers,
but he cherished a burning ambition to figure
in more heroic parts. This ambition was
encouraged by numerous Baltimore friends,
who assured Mr. Robson that he was in-
finitely better qualified for romantic roles
than many other actors who were high in
public favor. The upshot of all this agita-
tion was that Robson got together a splen-
did company, hired the old Holliday Street
Theatre in Baltimore, had the event properly
advertised, and made his appearance as
Claude Melnotte in 'The Lady of Lyons/
The theatre was packed to overflowing, and
the public seemed determined to give Rob-
son all the encouragement at its disposal.
His appearance was the signal for rapturous
applause, and he got through the first act in
fine shape. His friends were overjoyed.
' We told you so, * said they ; ' this young
man has leaped already to the front of the
profession/ But in the second act Mr. Rob-
son began to weaken, and when he came to
his love-scene with Pauline he felt all the
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divine afflatus leave him, and he began to
wilt and droop, pine and falter, till finally
he broke down completely and stood like
one in a semi-comatose condition. The
pause was unspeakably painful, but at last
Mr. Robson seemed to recover his self-
possession, for he came to the front of the
stage, bowed to the audience, and said:
'Ladies and gentlemen, I find the role of
Claude Melnotte a leetle too hefty for me,
and, with your kind permission, I will sub-
stitute therefor the beautiful sentimental
ballad "I would not Die in Springtime."'
I was telling this story/' continues Mr.
Crane, " to John Stetson once upon a time,
and when I got through with it Stetson ex-
claimed, with earnest solemnity: 'Now, do
you know, Crane, that is a damned beautiful
song, all the same! ' "
October 25, 1884
Qualifications for the Stage
" I HAVE just arrived from England, and
want to join your company."
" Have you the catarrh ? "
" Yes; a case of twelve years' standing."
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" Good ; and have you deserted your wife
and family ? "
"Yes; they will be here next month to
claim a divorce and alimony. The amount
of good the scandal"
"Hush say no more; you are engaged. "
December 31 } 1884
A Comedian's Legs
WE regard Mr. Francis Wilson's legs as
the greatest curiosities on the American
stage at the present time. We call them
curiosities when perhaps we should term
them prodigies. The truth is, they are so
versatile, so changeful, that we hardly know
what epithet could be applied to them most
properly. They are twins, yet totally un-
like, reminding one of a well-mated man and
wife, who are so very different that we
speak of them as well matched. The left
leg is apparently of a serious turn, as may
be observed on all occasions requiring a
portrayal of those emotions which bespeak
elevated thought and philosophic tendencies.
The right leg is mercurial, obliquitous, pas-
sionate to a marked degree, whimsical, fan-
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tastic, and grotesque. The contrast between
the two gives us a comedy in itself which
is very pleasing, for the constant struggle
between the perennial levity of the right leg
and the melancholy demeanor of the left leg
is funnier by far than most of the horse-play
which passes for comedy in these times.
While one with sad emotion throbs
And wildly palpitates,
The other makes its grievous sobs
And loudly cachinnates.
While this one jigs along the floor,
Intent on noisy pleasure.
The other treads the carpet o'er
In many a stately measure.
The combination is a happy one. The left
leg pleases the serious-minded, the senti-
mental, and the lovers of the emotional
style of the dramatic art; the right leg sol-
aces those who believe there is nothing
more enjoyable than mirth. Here we find
two legs capable of every variety of action.
They can shake you out a jig or stride you
a minuet; they can sob plaintively or titter
hysterically; they can strut imperiously or
wobble ludicrously; they can suggest a
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spondaic pentameter of the best old classic
poets, or a bit of modern doggerel from
Puck. Their name is Versatility, and in
them we find all the passions clearly defined
and deftly combined.
June 13, 1885
Mortifying Discovery of " Oliver Optic "
A MODEST, quiet, benevolent-looking old
gentleman was sitting in the rotunda of the
Tremont House yesterday, when he heard
a stranger seated near by make the remark
that he believed he would try to see Sol
Smith Russell in the evening.
" Excuse me, sir/' said the old gentleman
to the stranger, " but that is a wise deter-
mination. Mr. Russell is one of the greatest
comedians of the present time. I know of
no actor who possesses such extraordinary
histrionic talents/ 7
" Oh, thunderation!" replied the stranger.
" I 've seen Sol Smith Russell once afore, an'
hearin' he had a new play, I sort o j calculated
I 'd dodge in an' catch on. Mighty peert
chap, that Sol!"
"And he is as clever personally as he is
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professionally," said the old gentleman,
warming up. " His New England training
and associations have gone a long way to-
ward stimulating in his bosom those virtues
which, alas! are too infrequently met with
in theatrical life nowadays. And, pray,
may I ask where you saw him last? "
"Well, the last time I seen Sol," replied
the stranger, "was at Milwaukee about a
year ago. He was settin' in the Plankinton
House behind three of the biggest jacks ever
showed down."
"I don't know that I understand you," said
the old gentleman. " What was the play ? "
" Three of a kind," said the stranger, " and
a mighty good play it was, too."
"Comedy?" asked the old gentleman.
" Waal, no leastwise not for the rest of
us fellers," said the stranger. " We kind o'
reckoned as how it was tragedy when we
saw him rakin 1 in the pot."
"Gee-whillikins!" cried the old gentle-
man, as his white hair raised up and his
benevolent face stretched out about a yard
long, " you don't mean to tell me that my
boy that my Sol plays cards ! "
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"Your boy your Sol?" repeated the
stranger. " Say, look-a here, stranger, who
be you, anyway?"
" Who am I ?" gasped the old gentleman.
" Why, I 'm Mr. Adams, otherwise known
as ' Oliver Optic/ and I 'm Sol Smith Rus-
sell's father-in-law !"
December 9, 1885
Salvini in Polyglot Drama
WHEN Dennis Malley came out of Mc-
Vicker's Theatre night before last, between
acts, he said to Colonel Tom Geary, the Cer-
berus at the door: " Wall, Oi '11 be dommed
ef that is n't the quare-est piece Oi 've iver
sane." "How so?" asked Colonel Geary.
'* The dommed naygur is the bist one in the
hull crowd," replied Mr. Malley.
Yet we presume to say that Mr. Malley's
appreciation of " Othello " as given by the
Salvini company was not very different from
the appreciation which the rest of the audi-
ence manifested. We noticed that a good
many of the ladies present carried bouquets
that looked like young asparagus beds, and
that quite a number of the gentlemen were
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rigged out with spike-tail coats, and collars
that chafed their jaws ; we noticed that these
persons applauded vociferously whenever
the Dagos in the gallery gave the cue that
they smiled approvingly on one another
and bore an expression of comfort and self-
gratulation, as if, forsooth, they were mighty
glad they could afford to patronize an enter-
tainment which called for two dollars a seat
But none of these persons wore upon his or
her physiognomy that intelligent expression
which invariably bespeaks an understanding
of what it is all about. To their credit be it
said that very few attempted to simulate the
understanding they had not.
Mr. Salvini is a great actor and a great
artist; he has a magnificent physique, a noble
voice, and a splendid intellect. In certain
lines he is simply incomparable. But we do
not wonder that his performances are not
generally popular in this country. He plays
his parts in Italian, his company play their
parts in English. Could anything in a
dramatic way be more preposterous?
To the lover of good round English the
Italian language is the most namby-pamby
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in the world; it is the vernacular of tenor
singers ; it is composed of five vowels, waxed
mustaches, and shiny silk trunks ; its litera-
ture has come to consist of the measly li-
brettos of a dying operatic school.
What lover of English does not revolt
against the translation of Shakspere's trage-
dies into Italian as a profanation? What
have these bastard Latin tongues the Ital-
ian, French, et id genus omneto do with
Shakspere? What a mockery it is to hear
Hamlet called "monsieur," Ophelia ad-
dressed as "signorita," and Desdemona
talking of her father as "papa"!
During the performance of " The Gladia-
tor" last Monday night we heard Roman
matrons the most austere representa-
tives of the feminine sex we know of
addressed as "signoras." We would as
soon think of calling an Italian brigand a
dude!
But there are humorous features about
these Salvini entertainments which partly
compensate us for this other desecration.
For instance, the dialogue of a Salvini tragedy
impresses the average auditor much as the
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subjoined dialogue will impress you, gentle
reader:
VIOLA ALLEN. You sent for me, me lord?
SALVINI (gloomily). Si, signora.
VIOLA ALLEN. Wherefore, I prithee, tell
me?
SALVINI (seizing her by the arm). Questa
infelice grazzio guglielmo si giacomo puella
leustra!
VIOLA ALLEN (deprecatingly). Oh, me
lord!
SALVINI (with suppressed rage). Sospiro,
ah ! m'appari questa adagio banana rodrigo
piano?
VIOLA ALLEN (eagerly). On me soul, I
know not!
SALVINI (glaring at her) . Che la morte sos-
tenuto miserere piazza milano presto patti?
VIOLA ALLEN (shuddering) * Me lord, you
amaze me!
SALVINI (dragging her to L. U. E.). Spe-
rato hernani guestato habani viglio genoa
Colombo guesta grazzia nouvello!
VIOLA ALLEN. Oh!
SALVINI. Descendo, crescendo et diminu-
endo piano-forte!
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VIOLA ALLEN. With a dagger, me lord ?
SALVINI. Fortissimo.
VIOLA ALLEN. When the pale moon shines
on yon pallid copse?
SALVINI (frown ingly and hoarsely] . Lazza-
roni pianissimo!
VIOLA ALLEN. Heaven's will be done!
But what if he bear it not hither?
SALVINI (raising his sword on 'high) . Q uesta
padre nouvello bella donna trovatore. Sig-
nora! die la mezza?
VIOLA ALLEN. Yes, my lord.
SALVINI. Si?
VIOLA ALLEN. Yes.
SALVINI (approvingly). Si. (Exeunt.)
By this fair sample of a Salvini play it can
be seen that a man with a fertile imagination
can derive a large amount of satisfaction from
the Dago drama if he is willing to pay for
the pleasing experiment.
January 14, 1886
Stuart Robson's Politics
THE election of Mr. Stuart Robson as an
honorary member of the Cook County
Democratic Club will serve to remind the
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public that this popular comedian is one of
the bitterest of partisans. His father was
one of the most extensive slave-owners in
Maryland, Naturally, therefore, Robson has
always been a Democrat, and he glories in
the fact that his first vote was cast for An-
drew Jackson. Mr. William H. Crane, on
the other hand, is a rabid Republican, and
it is a wonderful coincidence that it should
have been his father, the Rev. Moses Dickin-
son, who, as far back as 1826, harbored and
protected in his home at Penobscot, Maine,
three of the slaves who had fled from bond-
age on the Robson terrapin plantation near
Baltimore.
September 26, 1886
The Perennial Miss Lotia
THERE is playing in Chicago at the present
time one of the most charming little ac-
tresses it has been our good fortune to see
and hear. A great many years ago, when
we were much more impressionable than
now, it was our pleasure to see this delight-
ful creature's mother in the very same role
in which the beautiful and gifted Lotta is
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charming the Chicago public this week.
At that remote period we were satisfied that
never before had human eyes beheld so fair,
so graceful, and so vivacious a wee bit of
femininity, and that never until her voice was
heard had human ears been ravished by such
heavenly tones. Yet now we are compelled
to admit that the daughter is even more
comely, more graceful, and more vivacious
than her mother, the popular idol of other
days. Petite, frolicsome, joyous, this deli-
cious morceau of human sunshine dances
and carols and laughs her way right into
our hearts, and there she riots, sweet icono-
clast that she is, tearing down the images
set up there, and enthroning herself as the
one queen regnant.
Footlight favorites come and go; they live
and move and have their being, and then
they are forgotten, or, at least, they are put
aside for some other new favorite. The
public is called very fickle, but perhaps this
seeming fickleness is not, after all, so much
the fault of the public. In this little lady,
Lotta, we have one of those singularly fas-
cinating and lovable characters of which
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the public never wearies. This merry sprite,
who combines with all the mirth, the grace,
and the art of her maternal predecessor a
personal beauty essentially her own, this
tuneful little fairy, who manipulates with
subtle sorcery our lachrymal glands and our
cachinnatory organs, will dance on and sing
on, and keep us always laughing and weep-
ing at her sweet will. She appeals to all
alikethe young, the old, the grave, the
gay, the rich, the poor, the lowly, the proud :
all own the spell of little Lotta's fascinations,
and all surrender to it cheerfully.
We hear of others who are called queens
of the dudes, of some who appeal to the
intellectual only; in short, there are very
many specialists in this great profession of
the drama, but little Lotta is everybody's
favorite. It is right that she should be so,
for what- is there worth loving if it be not
the incarnation" of girlhood, innocence, and
vivacity ? So, like the brook, her popularity
will go on forever, and when we give this as
an opinion we wish it to be distinctly under-
stood that our wish is father to the thought
September 22, 1886
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The Mystery of Pasadene
OUR gifted and genial friend Mr. William
J. Florence, the comedian, takes to verse as
naturally as a canvasback duck takes to
celery sauce. As a balladist he has few
equals and no superior, and when it comes
to weaving compliments to the gentler sex
he is without a peer. We find in the New
York Mirror the latest verses from Mr."
Florence's pen; they are entitled "Pasa-
dene/* and the first stanza flows in this
wise:
I 've journeyed eastj I Ve journeyed west,
And fair Italia's fields I Ve seen ;
But I declare
None can compare
With thee, my rose-crowned Pasadene.
Following this introduction come five
stanzas heaping even more glowing com-
pliments upon this Miss Pasadene, whoever
she may be we know her not. They are
handsome compliments, beautifully phrased,
yet they give us the heartache, for we know
Mrs. Florence, and it grieves us to see her
husband dribbling away his superb intellect
SHARPS AND FLATS
in penning verses to other women. Yet we
think we understand it all: these poets have
a pretty way of hymning the virtues of their
wives under divers aliases. So, catching
the afflatus of the genial actor-poet's muse,
we would answer:
Come, now, who is this Pasadene
That such a whirl of praises warrants ?
And is a rose
Her only clo'es?
Oh, fie upon you, Billy Florence!
Ah, no ; that 's your poetic way
Of turning loose your rhythmic torrents.
This Pasadene
Is not your queen
We know you know we know it, Florence!
So sing your song of women-folks ;
We r ll read without the least abhorrence,
Because we know
Through weal and woe
Your queen is Mrs. Billy Florence !
January 3, 1887
Was H. C. Barnabee a Poet?
CHICAGO, ILLINOIS, March 9.
To THE EDITOR: I have read with great
interest the many complimentary references
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you have made from time to time to Colonel
H. C. Barnabee, the famous humorist of the
Boston Ideal Opera Company. I am a great
admirer of that gifted gentleman, but never
having had the honor of an introduction to
him, I have found it impossible to gratify
my curiosity upon a certain question. which
has vexed me for a long time. In my father's
library there was a small volume entitled
C Barnabee's Journal/' printed under date of
1818 (London). My father used to peruse
this book with great relish, and many a time
have I heard the old gentleman laugh heart-
ily over a certain poem printed therein and
entitled "The Sabbath-Breaker; or, Murder
Revenged." As nearly as I can recall, the
poem was as follows :
A Presbyterian cat sat watching of her prey,
And in the house
She caught a mouse
Upon the Sabbath day.
The minister, offended at such a deed profane,
Threw by his book j
The cat he took,
And bound her in a chain.
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"Thou damn'd, confounded creature and "blood-sucker,"
says he,
" And wouldst thou throw
To hell below
My holy house and me ?
" Thou well mayst be assur'd thou blood for blood shalt
pay
That in thy strife
Took Mouse's life
Upon the Sabbath day! "
Oh, then he took his Bible book, and earnestly he prayed
That the great sin
The cat was in
Might not on him be laid.
To death they bore Grimalkin, the cause of that alarm,
And on a tree
Well hang'd was she,
While Pres John sang a psalm.
Since the act of Puritan and they that bear such sway,
Clear not your house
Of louse or mouse
Upon the Sabbath day.
You will agree with me, I think, that this
is a very funny poem ; now, will you please
tell me whether or not old Barnabee is the
author of it ? If you answer in the affirma-
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live I shall enjoy his operatic performances
more than ever hereafter.
Yours truly,
EBEN NESMITH.
It is not probable that Colonel Barnabee
wrote the poern above quoted. The lines
are to be found in a magazine printed in
London many years before the publication
of "Barnabee's Journal": 1740 was the
date, we think, and our Colonel Barnabee
was not alive then. The Barnabee who
wrote the ballad in question was presumably
one of the colonel's ancestors, and we vent-
ure to say that the colonel has paid to the
memory of that ancestor the tribute of many
a blush ; for the ballad is a satire on the sect
among whom Colonel Barnabee was reared
and by whom were inculcated into his ex-
panding nature the glorious spiritual truths
which have been to him in his life's journey
a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night
March 10, i88j
A Felicitous Toast
"MAY your shadow never grow less,"
was the singularly felicitous toast which
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Major M. P. Handy, president of the Clover
Club, proposed to Miss Sarah Bernhardt at a
Philadelphia banquet the other evening.
April j, 1887
The American Who Discovered Bernhardt
COLONEL HORACE RUBLEE, the able editor
of the Milwaukee Sentinel, is to be the guest
of Miss Sarah Bernhardt in this city next
week. The friendship between the two
has been of long duration and had a curious
beginning. It was while Colonel Rublee
was United States minister to Switzerland
that he visited Paris for the first time. Being
then a young and enterprising man, he ex-
plored the French metropolis thoroughly,
and one evening he happened to attend a
performance at the Theatre de Haut Monde,
one of the very many variety halls in which
Paris abounded at that time. It was here
that he first saw and heard Sarah Bernhardt,
then a mere girl, doing the song-and-dance
business. But the weird beauty and subtle
grace of the young Jewess impressed the
sagacious diplomatist so strongly that he
determined to interest himself in her behalf.
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In a few days he had set her case before the
American minister, and through the influ-
ence of that official secured an audience with
the director of the Comedie Franjaise, who
finally consented to give the girl a trial in
the role of Phedre. From that day up to
the present time Bernhardt has trod a flowery
path to glory, and it is vastly to her credit
that she has never forgotten the kindness
done by her good friend " Monsieur le Colon-
nel," as she calls him. To a reporter of the
New York Times she said last week: " Wiz-
out Monsieur le Colonnel vaire leetle good
would my airt to do; he find me in ze song-
an'dance, and he say, * Saira, you air one
what you call him one daisie.' Ozzer men
see me zen, but zey nevaire say me to be one
daisie. Monsieur le Colonnel knows one
daisie when he see him, and zat is ze grand
plaisere to be one daisie."
April 21, 1887
" Froufrou " in Chicago
THE Bernhardt engagement has brought
out all the French scholars in Chicago.
Never before had we suspected that there
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were so many able linguists in the midst of
us. General Stiles, we have just discovered,
speaks French like a native of Paris (Ver-
milion County). He attended the " Frou-
frou " performance last evening with his
friend Judge Prendergast. The judge is a
proficient Greek and Latin scholar, but he
knows little of French, his vocabulary being
limited to such phrases as "fo par/' "liai-
son/' "kelky shoze," and "oily bonnur";
so General Stiles had to explain the play to
him as it progressed last evening.
'Now what is she saying?" the judge
would ask.
"She said 'Good evening/" the general
would answer.
"Does 'bung swor' mean 'good even-
ing'?" the judge would inquire.
"Yes."
" Oh, what rot ! " the judge would exclaim,
and then a dude usher in one of Willoughby
& Hill's nineteen-dollar dress-suits would
teeter down the aisle and warn the gentle-
men not to whisper so loud.
Presently Colonel William Penn Nixon,
the gifted editor of the Inter-Ocean, came
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along and slipped Into the seat next to Gen-
eral Stiles. He had an opera-glass, and he
levelled it at once at Bernhardt's red red hair.
*'Do you speak French?" asked General
Stiles, in the confidential tone of a member
of the Citizens' Committee.
" Oony poo," said Colonel Nixon,
guardedly.
u Vooley-voo donny moy voter ver de
lopera?" asked the general, motioning to-
ward the opera-glass.
"See nay perzoon ver de lopera," pro-
tested the colonel. " Say lay zhoomels."
"Mong doo! What do I want of zhoo-
mels?" cried General Stiles. " Zhoomels is
twins."
" Parbloo! " said Colonel Nixon, " it is not
twins; it is opera-glasses."
"You 're all wrong, William," urged the
general. " The French idiom is ' the glass of
the opera/ Peris 'glass,' and de lopera
is * of the opera/ "
" I have heard them called lornyets," sug-
gested Judge Prendergast, in the deferential
tone of a young barrister seeking a change
of venue.
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" Well, I don't know what the general's
opera-glass is," said Colonel Nixon, "but
this one of mine is a lay zhoomels."
"Call it what you please/' replied the
judge; "it is der tro, as far as I am con-
cerned, until the corpse de bally makes its
ontray."
"I thought you did n't speak French/' said
General Stiles, turning fiercely upon the
judge.
"Oh, well/' the judge explained apolo-
getically, " I 'm not what you and the colonel
would call oh fay, I 'm a June primmer at
the business, but when the wind is south-
erly I reckon I can tell a grizet from a
garsong."
Chicago society is still in considerable
doubt as to where Bernhardt should be lo-
cated in the artistic scale. A good many of
the elite think that her Fedora is second to
Fanny Davenport's, and there are very many
others who prefer Clara Morris's Camilla.
We notice that the popular inquiry in cult-
ured circles is, " Have you been to see
Bernhardt? " not, " Have you been to hear
Bernhardt? "
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" Oh, you don't know how I enjoyed Bay-
ernhayerdt the other evening!" exclaimed
one of our most beautiful and accomplished
belles. " Her dresses are beautiful, and they
do say she is dreadfully naughty ! "
April 29, 1887
Only Fit for the Stage
SOL SMITH RUSSELL tells of how he was
travelling on Long Island some seasons ago,
doing his monologue in town halls and
church basements. At the railway station
in one of these little eel-catching communi-
ties a native, rusty and hoary, sat on a
freight-truck and accosted the comedian
with: u Be you Mr. Russle? "
"Yes, that J s my name," answered Sol.
"Waal, I thought so/ 7 said the native.
" I seen yeow up to the teown hall las 7 night,
an' waal, you Ye a good *un!"
"Oh, thank you," said Sol; "I 'm glad
you like the entertainment."
"Since I come away/' resumed the na-
tive, 44 I Ve been thinkin' that mebbe you
might do sumpin' fer my boy good, likely
critter as ever lived, but so pesky full of his
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gimcracks that we can't do nuthin* with
him. Put him in a shingle-factory last
spreng fer to Tarn the trade, but he kep' 'em
all laffin' so that they could n't do no work,
an' one mornin' they threw him out, an' he
hain't doin' nuthin' neow. Settin' up to
your show las' night, I jest about made up
my mind that Rube would make a mighty
good livin' in your business, and I thought
I 'd ask you to take him along with you.
He 's the gol-durnedest fool you ever see in
all your born days."
The ex-Rev. George C. Miln once had a
similar experience out in Nebraska City.
He was playing " The Fool's Revenge/' and
he noticed that one old lady sitting well
down in front was fearfully agitated. She
sobbed and wept like a child. Mr. Miln
knew he was a pretty powerful actor, but
he had never suspected that he had it in
him to exercise so terrific a control over
another's emotions. He sent word down
to the old lady that he 'd like to talk with
her after the play. So the old lady waited.
When Mr. Miln had exchanged his stage
toggery for civilized raiment he stepped
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down into the parquet and greeted the old
lady cordially.
" My acting moved you? " he suggested in
his deepest and most soothing tones.
"Lor's sakes alive!" said she, "I should
rayther say it did. I Ve got a son who 's
an actor in Cheyenne, and it broke me all
up to think that mebbe he was n't no better
at actin' than you be."
May 2, 1888
The Minister and the Actor
FRANCIS WILSON, the actor, and the Rev.
Dr. Francis M. Bristol, heir apparent to a
Methodist bishopric, are great friends. The
bond which holds them together is the pas-
sion which they have in common, the dear,
delightful passion of bibliomania. When-
ever Dr. Bristol goes to New York he visits
Mr. Wilson, and the twain discuss Elzevirs
and Mazarins and Groliers and crankisms
of that character to their hearts' content
On the other hand, when Mr. Wilson comes
to Chicago most of his spare time is spent
in the study back of Dr. Bristol's church,
where, for the nonce, with musty tomes and
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rare copperplates around them, they forget
all about theology and the drama, and be-
come absorbed in that everlasting biblio-
mania discussion.
It happened early last summer that the
two friends met in Omaha. Dr. Bristol was
there as a delegate to the Methodist con-
ference. Mr. Wilson was there with his
comic-opera company. Both gentlemen
did a big week's business.
" Now is the time for you to come to one
of my performances," said Mr. Wilson one
day.
" Oh, no ; that would never do, " answered
Dr. Bristol. "I never was in a theatre in
all my life, and I could n't conscientiously
go now/'
" But I Ve been to hear you," argued Mr.
Wilson ; " surely you should come to hear
me!"
The clergyman shook his head and set his
teeth firmly. His friend and he never be-
fore had discussed the relations of pulpit
and stage; their talk hitherto had been, as
above intimated, confined to such subjects
as Groliers, Mazarins, and Elzevirs. The
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tie that bound their hearts In kindred love
was bibliomania. It was reserved un-
happy fate ! it was reserved for them to put
a first strain upon their cordial relations when
they met far from their quiet homes, in the
strange, wild, unkempt city of Omaha.
To make short of a long story, the clergy-
man and the actor had a fair, square talk
upon the subject which had hitherto been
avoided by both. Mr. Wilson stood up for
his profession, of course, and in the course
of his elaborate argument he said: "I try
to make my fellow-men happy, and so do
you. Now, I claim that my efforts are
more successful than yours. For two hours
every night I am before the public, and
people go away happy. Many of these
same people go to hear you twice a week,
and with what result? They come away
miserable as ! "
Do you think that the free interchange of
practical theological opinions between the
clergyman and the actor interrupted the old-
time entente cordiale ? Not a bit of it. They
had their argument, and that was the end of
it And to strengthen their friendship they
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exchanged gifts before parting. Mr. Wilson
presented Dr. Bristol with a rare old octavo
first edition of Collier's " The Prophaneness
of the English Stage," and Dr. Bristol pre-
sented Mr. Wilson with an equally rare old
first edition of William Prynne's " Of the
Unloveliness of Love-Locks."
September io } 1892
The President Rebukes "Joe " Jefferson
MR. WILLIAM CRANE, the comedian, is
somewhat of a fisherman himself, but he
yields the palm to Grover Cleveland. " I
never saw a man," says Dr. Crane, "who
has the passion for angling and the patience
at it that Cleveland has. He does n't seem
to care whether he catches any fish or not;
he '11 sit for hours under a broiling sun,
watching his bob go dancing in the water,
and never utter a complaint if he does n't
get a nibble. I went out several times with
him last summer Joe Jefferson took us
out Joe is n't any sort of a fisherman;
he 's a great actor and a great painter and
all that kind of thing, but he can't fish a
little bit Joe can't bait a hook, seems to be
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afraid of the worms; so Cleveland and I
took turns of putting bait on his hook. Joe
got restless before we had been out half an
hour; he kept wanting to move around
was sure that it was better fishing on the
other side of the pond. Perhaps you Ve
been fishing with that sort of a man. It
worried Cleveland a good deal, and by and
by says he, 'Joe/ says he, 'when I was a
small boy I went fishing with my uncle
Elihu, and I remember that he told me that
one of the secrets of success in life was to
stick to the place where you 'd thrown your
anchor out. Too many folks, said Uncle
Elihu, spent all their time pulling up anchors
and rowing around; they don't catch the
fish. As for me/ said Cleveland, 'when I
start in to fish/ says he, ' I sit right there and
fish until either the pond runs dry or the
horn blows for supper/ "
September 29, 1892
When Robson Shed Real Tears
WHEN Lawrence Barrett's daughter was
married, Stuart Robson sent a check for five
thousand dollars to the bridegroom. Miss
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Felicia Robson, who attended the wedding,
conveyed the gift,
" Felicia," said her father, upon her return,
" did you give him the check?"
"Yes, father," answered the dutiful
daughter.
" What did he say? " asked Robson.
"He did n't say anything," replied Miss
Felicia, "but he shed tears."
" How long did he cry?"
" Why, father, I did n't time him ; I should
say, however, that he wept fully a minute."
" Fully a minute ! " roared Robson. " Why,
I cried an hour after 1 'd signed it!"
May 12, 1893
A Surfeit of Realism
NAT GOODWIN tells a story of a tramp
who, upon being asked to undertake the
task of eating thirty quails in thirty days,
pathetically exclaimed: " Make it turkeys!"
In the experience of Mr. James A. Herne
with his play of " Shore Acres " we have an
instance wherein a number of people have
eaten turkey once a day for the last eighteen
months. In one scene of this realistic drama
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a turkey is cooked and eaten upon the stage,
and this scene never fails to make a hit with
the spectators, many of whom (and particu-
larly the gods in the gallery) actually be-
grudge the participants in that savory meal
the steaming viands so temptingly spread
out before them. But Mr. Herne and his
associates no longer sing the praises of
turkey. There was a time when that na-
tional bird stood high in their favor, but
having eaten steadily of turkey for eighteen
months, there is no other viand so odious to
them as is this same once prized and pam-
pered fowl.
"Even those holidays which are hailed
with delight by other good people/* says
Mr. Herne, "are anticipated by us with
wretched forebodings, simply because we
know that with them will come a universal
renaissance of the bird which has been our
principal article of daily diet for weary
months. We have grown so desperate
that we really should like to rub Thanks-
giving, Christmas, New Year's, and other
winter holidays out of the calendar."
Ten days ago the veteran manager J. H.
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McVicker gave Mr. Herne a splendid dinner.
When the piece de resistance was ushered
in, lo and behold, it was a turkey a mag-
nificent bird, and done to the queen's taste,
but still a turkey. Mr. McVicker detected
the look of subdued horror on his guest's
face, and all at once the absurdity of the
situation dawned upon him.
"My dear," said he to Mrs. McVicker," it
has just occurred to me that Mr. Herne
would much prefer a cut of that cold roast
beef which was left over from dinner last
evening."
Last Sunday Mr. Franklin H. Head enter-
tained a number of professional people, and
among them was Mr. Herne. There was a
splendid dinner, and the crowning glory
thereof was a turkey, a noble twenty-four-
pounder, browned to a crisp and reeking
with delectable juices.
" Why do you shudder ? " asked Mr. Head
of Mr. Herne, for his Argus eyes detected
his guest's emotion.
Mr. Herne politely denied that he had
shuddered, and he tried to laugh a cheery
laugh and to look happy; but Hamlin Gar-
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land gave the secret away, and there was
any amount of fun at poor Herne's expense.
This, we take it, is one of the penalties of
realism. As long as Mr. Herne stuck to pure
romance he was a sleek, contented man.
He did not suffer from a glut of turkey, be-
cause he could n't afford to. Ever since he
became a veritist he has been so prosperous
that he has had to pay the penalty of pros-
perity, which in this particular instance has
been an oversupply of that which to the
average man is properly accounted the most
appetizing and most satisfying of edibles.
February 20,
A NIGHTMARE
(CAUSED BY FAILURE TO DIGEST A BLANKET-
SHEET)
D'
I dream? Was 't a fancy
Of weird necromancy
That mingled the living with shades of the
dead?
Was 't a deep meditation,
Or hallucination
Provoked by a paper I had but just read ?
Blanket-sheet editor
Sat in his den,
With his yardstick and tape-measure,
Paste-pot and pen,
When there came to the doorway
And stood in a row
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The spirits of Shakspere
Of Addison, Poe,
And a multitude more
Of the same brainy school;
And one in clown's raiment -
A poor verbose fool.
f 'So you 're looking for places?*'
The editor said.
Each shade in his turn
Gave a nod of the head.
C How much can you write
In the course of a day?"
The spirits proceeded
Their work to display.
One had written a sonnet
Of usual length;
Another a paragraph
Towering in strength;
Still another romanced
In sensational strain
Every thought a rare gem
From a procreant brain.
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Then forth from his bag
The poor, motley clown brought
A haymow of \vords
With a needle of thought;
And the editor measured
Them all with his rule,
And dismissed every spirit
Save that of the fool.
October 3, /SSj
BACHELOR HALL
IT seems like a dream that sweet woo-
ing of old
Like a legend of fairies on pages of gold
Too soon the sweet story of loving was
closed,
Too rudely awakened the soul that reposed;
1 kissed the white lips that lay under the
pall,
And crept back to you, lonely Bachelor Hall.
Mine eyes have grown dim and my hair has
turned white,
But my heart beats as warmly and gayly
to-night
As in days that are gone and years that are
fled
Though I fill up my flagon and drink to the
dead;
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For over my senses sweet memories fall,
And the dead is come back to old Bachelor
Hall.
I see her fair face through a vapor of tears,
And her sweet voice comes back o'er the
desert of years,
And I hear, oh, so gently, the promises she
spoke,
And a soft, spirit hand soothes the heart
that is broke;
So I fill up the flagon, and drink that is
all
To the dead and the dying of Bachelor Hall
October 5, 1883
127
HUMAN NATURE
A BEGGAR-MAN crept to my side
1\ One bitter, wintry time;
e I want to buy a drink," he cried;
"Please give me, sir, a dime/'
If he had craved this boon forlorn
To buy his family meat,
I had passed on in silent scorn,
And left him in the street.
I tossed the money in his hand,
And quoth : " As o'er your wine
Within the tippling-room you stand
Drink thou to me and mine/ 1
He let an earnest te Thank ye " drop
Then up the street he sped,
And rushed into a baker's shop,
And bought a loaf of bread !
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I know not why it was, and yet,
So sudden was the blow,
I felt emotions of regret
That he had duped me so.
Yet, had the hungry beggar said
That he was sore in need
Of that necessity called " bread,"
What man would pay him heed ?
October io 3 1883
129
A VERY WEARY ACTOR
A1BER clouds on a cobalt sky,
The hour for work is drawing nigh !
An all-night journey, an aching head,
A longing to strike and go to bed!
Not a friend to greet or a friend to meet,
A lonely room on a noisy street.
A silent meal in a crowded room,
A silent smoke in a cloud of gloom.
A scene rehearsed, a stammering crew,
Letters received, and more work to do.
Business bothers, intrigues, and war;
The future a blank, the present a bore.
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A cup of strong tea, a smoke, and I 'd better
Screw up my courage, and seek the theatre.
Dress for an hour in a cell that is stifling,
And then play a part with a heart but I 'm
trifling.
(Attributed to) RICHARD MANSFIELD.
October 25, 1883
GETTYSBURG
YOU wore the blue and I the gray
On this historic field;
And all throughout the dreadful fray
We felt our muscles steeled
For deeds which men may never know,
Nor page of history ever show.
My father, sir, with soul to dare,
Throughout the day and night,
Stood on old Little Round Top there,
And watched the changeful fight,
And, with a hoarse, inspiring cry,
Held up the stars and bars on high.
At last the flag went down, and then
Ah, you can guess the rest
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I never saw his face again.
My father's loyal breast
Is strewn with these sweet flow'rs, I wot,
That seem to love this sacred spot.
The smoke of battle 's cleared away,
And all its hatreds, too;
And as I clasp your hand to-day,
O man who wore the blue,
On yonder hill I seem to see
My father smiling down on me.
October 2j, /88j
'33
HER FAIRY FEET
CORING me a tiny mouse's skin/*
13 The boisterous tanner cried ;
*' It must be as a rose-leaf thin
And scarce three fingers wide."
He seized the fragile, tiny bit
Within his brawny hand,
And cast it in the seething pit,
And so the skin was tann'd.
Then came a cobbler to his side
With tools that cobblers use,
And deft they wrought that mouse's hide
Into a pair of shoes.
* ' Tell me," I asked, "O cobbler, tell
For whom these morceaux be ? '*
* ' A lover bade me build them well
For his true love/* quoth he.
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'* Where dwells this maid with fairy
feet?"
In wonderment I cried ;
The old man shifted in his seat
"Chicago," he replied.
October 29, i88j
THE REMORSEFUL CAKES
A LITTLE boy named Thomas ate
/I Hot buckwheat cakes for tea
A very rash proceeding, as
We presently shall see.
He went to bed at eight o'clock,
As all good children do,
But scarce had closed his little eyes,
When he most restless grew.
He flopped on this side, then on that,
Then keeled upon his head,
And covered all at once each spot
Of his wee trundle-bed.
He wrapped one leg around his waist
And t' other round his ear,
While rnamma wondered what on earth
Could ail her little dear.
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But sound he slept, and as he slept
He dreamt an awful dream
Of being spanked with hickory slabs
Without the power to scream.
He dreamt a great big lion came
And ripped and raved and roared
While on his breast two furious bulls
In mortal combat gored.
He dreamt he heard the flop of wings
Within the chimney-flue
And down there crawled, to gnaw his
ears,
An awful bugaboo !
When Thomas rose next morn, his face
Was pallid as a sheet;
" 1 nevermore/* he firmly said,
c< Will cakes for supper eat! "
November 6, 1883
A PATRIOT'S TRIUMPH
WILLIAM CURTIS met a lad
As down the street he hied.
'* Pray tell me, boy, if eke you can,
Where Schurz doth now reside/ 1
" In sooth I can, my gentle sir,"
The honest lad replied ;
" Proceed due north and soon you '11 come
To where he doth abide."
*' You speak some words I ken not of,"
George William Curtis cried ;
"Now tell in speech non-sectional
Where doth my friend reside.
I know not north Schurz knows no south ;
Such terms do ill betide.
The north is south the south is north
The west the east, beside."
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" Good sir, you jest," complained the youth,
And hung his fuddled head.
" Nay, foolish boy, I speak the truth/'
George William Curtis said;
"Lo, from the south the north wind blows
And eke the rising tide,
That splashes on our eastern shores,
Laves all the western side.
"The snows do fail on southern soil
And on the prairies wide;
The cotton on the northern hills
Is now the Yankee's pride.
There is no north there is no south
These terms have long since died;
So tell in reconstructed speech
Where now doth Schurz reside."
" Good master, turn ye to the west,
And on the eastern side
Adown the northern path, due south,
Two blocks he doth abide."
George William Curtis missed his way,
But still it gave him joy
To know our land had gained that day
A reconstructed boy.
November j f i88j
'39
' YOURS FRATERNALLY "
A~ 4 editor in Kankakee
Once falling in a burning passion
With a vexatious rival, he
Wrote him a letter in this fashion :
" You are an ass uncouth and rude,
And will be one eternally."
Then, in an absent-minded mood,
He signed It, "Yours fraternally/'
November $, 1883
140
SONG OF THE ALL-WOOL SHIRT
MY father bought an undershirt
Of bright and flaming red
" All wool, I 'm ready to assert,
Fleece-dyed," the merchant said;
"Your size is thirty-eight, I think;
A forty you should get,
Since all-wool goods are bound to shrink
A trifle when they 're wet."
That shirt two weeks my father wore
Two washings, that was all ;
From forty down to thirty-four
It shrank like leaf in fall
I wore it then a day or two,
But when 't was washed again
My wife said, "Now J t will only do
For little brother Ben."
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A fortnight Ben squeezed into it;
At last he said it hurt
We put it on our babe the fit
Was good as any shirt.
We ne'er will wash it more while yet
We see its flickering light,
For if again that shirt is wet
'T will vanish from our sight
December 6 f 1883
142
OF BLESSED MEMORY
1 OFTEN wonder mother loves to creep
Up to the garret where a cupboard
stands,
And sit upon the musty floor and weep.
Holding a baby's dresses in her hands.
I often wonder grandma loves to sit
Alone where hangs a picture on the wall
A handsome face across whose features flit
The phantoms of a love she would recall.
I wonder, too, that sister, pale and sad,
Waits at the gate, and, waiting, seems to
hear
The footfalls of the brave, heroic lad
Who nevermore may woo her waiting
there.
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ENVOY
The little lips in voiceless death are sealed ;
The haughty squire seeks now a lasting-
sleep;
The lover's bones bleach on a battle-field
And broken-hearted women live to weep.
December 11, 1883
144
A LEAP-YEAR EPISODE
CAN I forget that winter night
In eighteen eighty-four,
When Nellie, charming little sprite,
Came tapping at the door?
" Good evening, miss," I, blushing, said,
For in my heart I knew
And, knowing, hung my pretty head
That Nellie came to woo.
She clasped my big red hand, and fell
Adown upon her knees,
And cried; " You know I love you well,
So be my husband, please! "
And then she swore she 'd ever be
A tender wife and true.
Ah, what delight it was to me
That Nellie came to woo!
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She 'd lace my shoes, and darn my hose,
And mend my shirts, she said;
And grease my comely Roman nose
Each night on going to bed ;
She J d build the fires, and fetch the coal,
And split the kindling, too.
Love's perjuries overwhelmed her soul
When Nellie came to woo.
And as I, blushing, gave no check
To her advances rash,
She twined her arms about my neck,
And toyed with my mustache;
And then she pleaded for a kiss,
While I what could I do
But coyly yield me to that bliss
When Nellie came to woo ?
I am engaged, and proudly wear
A gorgeous diamond ring,
And I shall wed my lover fair
Sometime in gentle spring.
I face my doom without a sigh ;
And so, forsooth, would you,
If you but loved as fond as I,
And Nellie came to woo.
December 22, 1883
THE DEBUTANTE
HAVE you got the jellies made, mother?
Are the sandwiches aufait?
Are the salads wrought and the wine all
bought
For the splurge on New Year's day ?
You look serene as a regnant queen,
But there '11 be some hitch, I fear,
For I 'm to receive this year, mother
I 'm to receive this year.
My dress Is such a daisy, mother,
What wonder if I am vain ?
T is a white pique, decollete,
With a princesse skirt, en train.
That *s why I yearn and impatient burn
For the splurge that is, oh, so near,
For I 'm to receive this year, mother
I 'm to receive this year.
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Jack says he will come at ten, mother,
And tarry the rest of the day.
Why turn up your nose ? You don't sup-
pose
He 'd dare to stay away ?
Though Jack is proud and hates a crowd,
I 'm certain he will be here,
For I 'm to receive this year, mother
I r m to receive this year.
So call me at half-past eight, mother
Don't let me sleep till nine.
I Ve crimped my hair, and over the chair
I Ve thrown my dresses fine;
At half-past eight now don't be late
Come early, O mother dear,
For I 'm to receive this year, mother
1 'm to receive this year.
December 27, i88j
OF DIET AND DYSPEPSIA
Origin of tie Word lt Hash "
PROFESSOR BUTLER of Milwaukee says the
cooks of ancient Athens had a fashionable
dish that they called " lopadotemachosela-
chogaleokranioleipsanodrinupotummatrsil-
phioparasmelitokechumenokichleipikossu-
phophattoperisteraiekruonoptekephaillo-
kingklopeliollagooshirairobaphetragano-
pterugon." We have it from private sources
that this name was discontinued by royal
order soon after Theseus took the throne. It
happened in this wise: When Theseus came
back from his bull-fight with the Minotaur
he naturally strolled into a restaurant in the
basement of the Pantheon and asked for a
plate of the fashionable dish. Before the
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waiter had time to pronounce the word the
king was almost starved to death. He had
just strength enough left to draw his ante-
sty lographic pen from his vest pocket and
write a royal order in these words : " Hence-
forth and forever let lopadotemach-etc. be
called hash, under penalty of death." The
order has never been revoked.
February 25, 1884
Ye Plainte of a Dyspeptic
DYSPEPSIA is a thankless malady. No
matter how wretchedly the victim feels, he
gets no sympathy whatsoever. The hand
of the world is against him, as if, instead of
being a worthy sufferer, he were a veritable
Ishrnaelite. Even his doctor laughs him to
scorn.
" Well, what have you been doing now?"
the doctor asks. "What have you been
eating?" The callous scoffer knows very
well, perhaps, that his miserable patient has
not eaten a blessed thing within ten days.
Yet the doctors have fallen in with the
popular heresy that the best way to sym-
pathize with a dyspeptic is to rail at him.
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When you have dyspepsia every man you
meet asks you to go to lunch with him;
every house you pass is a restaurant; every
gale that blows wafts to your nostrils the
odor of ham and eggs; every newspaper is
full of domestic recipes ; every wagon in the
street is loaded with spring chickens or
dressed hogs (ough!) or fresh berries. The
only sign you can see is " Dinner now ready "
or " Supper only fifteen cents." Why, even
the beggars who waylay you importune you
for pennies with which to buy " something
to eat." It would be a pleasure to do an act
of charity once in a while, but why do the
beggars never importune for money with
which to buy pepsin or lactopeptin or a
Sedlitz-powder?
Dyspepsia never kills, they say ; yes, that's
the sneaking villany of the malady it
thwarts every high purpose and every am-
bition, and compels its prey to dodder and
mope through life in a condition of peren-
nial consciousness of his weakness and of
his helplessness. We do not agree with
those who say that it necessarily sours
its victim that may be its diabolical pur-
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pose, but we do not think it always suc-
ceeds. On the contrary, we think that it
very often serves to soften the temper, to
broaden and to deepen the sympathies, and
to instil into the heart a sweeter and nobler
charity. Physical discipline, however rigor-
ous, serves the grand purpose of chastening
the soul ; it is one kind of sorrow, and sor-
row is good for humanity. A very interest-
ing essay upon this subject was written
many years ago by Bulwer-Lytton ; it would
repay invalids, we think, to read that essay
occasionally. We regard it as one of the
great man's best bits of work.
Dyspepsia, if humored properly by long
and circumspect fastings, occasionally gives
its victim a season of rest, and during these
seasons, whensoever they occur, it behooves
the dyspeptic to improve his opportunity.
Hot mince pie with melted cheese ah, there
is a dish that will compensate you for weeks
of torture! Another glorious viand is Nes-
selrode pudding. This is a cross between
ice-cream and the Spanish Inquisition ; it is
of a decomposed hue, and it is full of candied
fruits, nightmares, Arabian perfumes, pun-
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gent flavors, ecstatic sapidities, etc. Then,
again, there is nothing the matter (if we may
be pardoned the slang phrase) with a Welsh
rarebit, yet the banqueter should insist upon
having a nice overdone, indigestible poached
egg served with the rarebit.
But we shall we can go no further; it
makes the mouth water, the palate yearn,
and the heart throb to think of these pre-
cious boons, and even in the midst of sto-
machic paroxysms we feel constrained, like
old Louis XL, to plead indulgence not only
for the sins we have committed, but also for
the sins which we hope to have the pleasure
of committing by and by we regret that we
cannot fix the exact date.
June i8 } 188$
The English Mince Pie
THE last of the Thanksgiving mince pie is
gone; its end was as mysterious and por-
tentous as its beginning and its career. I
refer, of course, to the London mince pie, the
occult conglomeration which we were be-
guiled into buying last November, while we
labored under the delusion that to buy a
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mince pie was the patriotic thing for an
American to do.
I remember the day distinctly ; it was one
of those cheerful, typical, frosty, suicidal days
in which this London climate abounds. We
were sitting in a drawing-room in the Quad-
rant The slavey had just replenished the
grate fire, and Colonel Reid, Cowen, Harry
Dam, Tom Fielders, and I, as superb a quin-
tet of dyspeptics as ever discussed high food
and hot biscuits, gathered around the hearth-
stone and gazed into the flickering flames
and talked about Thanksgiving dinner. It
was agreed that turkey should be the piece
de resistance, and we rejoiced to hear Tom
Fielders say that he had heard Ralph Meeker
tell somebody else that Leigh Lynch had told
him that genuine American cranberries could
be bought at a shop under Egyptian Hall in
Piccadilly. With turkey and genuine cran-
berry sauce we should be happy, and with
that combination we should have been satis-
fied. But in an unlucky moment I ventured
the suggestion that without a mince pie to
symmetrize it no Thanksgiving dinner could
be complete. A profound grunt of ap-
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proval all around assured me that I had the
sympathy of the entire community.
" And I know where mince pies can be
bought," said Harry Dam. "I understand
that there is but one caterer's in town where
satisfaction is guaranteed. That is Buszard's
in Oxford Street"
" I do not know that I particularly fancy
that name," remarked Colonel Reid. " Bus-
zard is a significant, not to say an ominous,
name; as one who has always been loyal to
the eagle, 1 object to Buszard." " But really,
colonel," expostulated Tom Fielders, " Bus-
zard is the swell caterer of London ; for years
he has pandered to the royal household and
to the nobility, and his shop is regarded
hereabouts as the Mecca for all in quest of
sapid, succulent, and savory viands. If any-
body can make a mince pie, Buszard can."
The result of the talk was that we all be-
came highly enthusiastic on the subject of
Buszard's mince pies, and when Cowen and
I left the cheerful bachelor chambers we pro-
ceeded forthwith to Buszard's shop, a some-
what pretentious shop in Oxford Street,
just off Regent The show-windows were
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filled with divers-colored confections, the
tables were covered with truculent-looking
puddings and cakes, and the atmosphere
was laden with a perfume as of boiling
maple sap.
It was our misfortune to fall into the
clutches of a sallow-faced young man wear-
ing a checkered suit of clothes, a dark-red
necktie, and a head of coarse black hair larded
down with odoriferous bear's grease one of
those garrulous young chappies who know it
all and tell more. He assured us that " we "
could make a mince piehe called it " poy " ;
he knew what a genuine American mince pie
was, had often made them for Americans,
and would guarantee entire satisfaction.
Miserable dupes that we were, we trusted
the loquacious cockney. How much would
a pie, a genuine American mince pie with
real apples and real meat in it, cost us?
We were somewhat startled when he an-
swered half a guinea. We told him that
this was simple extortion ; nay, the equiva-
lent of two dollars and sixty-five cents for
a mince pie was unadulterated robbery 1
Why, in Potter Palmer's conscienceless res-
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taurant in Chicago the finest native mince
pie cost only one dollar, and that included
melted cheese on top, and a genuine Sene-
gambian prince at the side to serve it on
hot plates. We rebelled against half a
guinea as a man would take up arms against
the iron heel of oppression. The garrulous
young cockney then said that " we " would
consult with the manager, and he disap-
peared through a swinging door, only to
return presently to announce sententiously
that seven and six was the very, very lowest
price for which the pie could be provided.
Fancying that we could do no better, we
paid the low-browed robber that amount
of money and bade him send the pie to
our lodgings upon Thanksgiving afternoon,
not later than three o'clock, Greenwich
time.
At the appointed hour, surely enough, the
goods (you see I speak cautiously) were
delivered in an oblong box, which, upon
examination, was found to contain a dish,
and in the dish was the pie, or rather a pie,
still warm. The dish was oval in shape,
ten inches long and four inches in depth.
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I asked the servant if she knew what it
was.
" Yes, sir; it 's a Yorkshire pudding," said
she.
" Put it away, " said I.
Billy Knox and J. L. Sclanders, old news-
paper co-workers from Chicago, dined with
us.
"Now, boys," said I, at last, "I J ve got
a surprise for you " ; and the servant pro-
duced the pie Buszard's mince "poy."
" I thought we were going to have mince
pie/' said Co wen.
"So we are," said L
" Ah, it 's to come later?"
"No; this is it."
"That is n't a mince pie," expostulated
Cowen ; " that 's a pudding. Nobody ever
saw a mince pie made in a bowl!"
" But it is a mince pie," I insisted. " The
leading London caterer made it; it must be
good."
I served the pie liberally. I did not
dare eat any myself, for the doctor had
forbidden that sort of thing. Then, too,
on Thanksgiving day one can afford to be
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princely even in doling out pie at seven and
six.
The pie had a thick double crust (by which
I mean an upper and lower crust), and be-
tween these crusts (id est, supra et infra)
lay a black mass of lovely indigestible
matter that smelled like a barber's shop.
Three inches of mince meat, think of it, ye
housewives of my beloved native land.
I felt indignant when I saw that our guests
did not devour the viand with voracity. I
knew that the pie was good; it must be
good, it had to be good, at seven and six.
"I think you must be mistaken about
this," said my friend Knox, cautiously. " I
have eaten mince pie all my life, mince
pie in the sacred groves of the Des Plaines,
mince pie in the academic shades of Evans-
ton, mince pie in the black-jack thickets of
Egypt, and mince pie in the subterranean
recesses of the Boston Oyster-house, but
never, no, never before have I tasted mince
pie like this mince pie. As I figure it, with-
out prejudice, this is more like a fruit pud-
ding."
My friend Sclanders said that upon one
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occasion, while he was a student in Munich,
he had seen and partaken of a dish that quite
resembled this particular dish; as he recol-
lected, it was called Splutterungenleischlied-
gehabten. As for my old chum, Cowen, he
had done (with every possible variation) all
the territory between Buenavista, Colorado,
and Vienna, Austria, and he had never be-
fore met up with mince pie the like of this
mince pie.
To make a long story short, what was
left of Buszard's mince pie was set away in
a corner of the cupboard, and Buszard's name
was frequently but not felicitously men-
tioned.
In some way or other it got noised about
that we had a genuine American mince pie
in the house, and forthwith the Americans
began to flock in upon us from every side.
Ralph Meeker and his wife were among the
first. Having had dyspepsia twenty years,
Ralph was a mince-pie virtuoso. He just
looked at our mince pie, and sard: " That *s
no pie; that 's a Scotch bun."
J. P. Andrews of Grand Rapids, Michigan,
went so far as to taste it, and for weeks and
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weeks afterward he said he felt as if he had
a slab of verd-antique marble in his stomach.
M. E. Stone tried it, and then (just like him)
he posted off to Scotland Yard and hired a
gang of detectives to find some clew as to
what it was.
John C. New took a piece of it to his office
with him and used it for a paper-weight.
Will Eaton thought that the substratum of
the pie looked a good deal like the vein of
a coal-mine he once owned out in Iowa,
And so, in one way and another, they all
heaped contumely and obloquy upon that
pie that mince pie for which I had paid
Buszard seven and six.
Once no w, this is a confession that I have
never made before once, I say, I arose in
the middle of the night and stole to the cup-
board and partook of that swarthy pie. I
was curious to determine for myself whether
the pie merited all this ribald abuse, and
whether a serious injustice were not being
done to Buszard. The result of my investi-
gation was complimentary neither to the pie
nor to its compounded We then went back
to bed, the piece of pie and I, and in
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dreams I saw a gaunt figure rise from a dark
corner and approach me with the words : "At
last son-in-law, I have thee in my power."
Next morning we arose, that piece of pie
anc j [ y and I was pale, exhausted, trembling.
We kept company many moons. Had it
not been for my wife, a most frugal soul, I
should have thrown the remnants of the pie
away, but my wife represented that it would
be wicked to indulge in such extravagance.
As it was, I did upon one occasion cast some
bits of the pie to the sparrows that clustered,
shiveringly and appealingly, upon the rail of
the window balcony. It was pathetic to see
each hungry little creature hop down and
pick up a crumb of the pie and hold it in his
mouth and roll his eyes back and think ; then
sneeze, drop the crumb, and fly away, never
to return.
A week ago last Sunday the dolorous
tones of a hand-organ came up from the
street below. A poor woman, wretchedly
clad, was grinding out the melancholy tune
of " Shall We Gather at the River ? ' ' It was
a dreary, raw, chilly day. The woman
looked pinched and hungry. Her husband,
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as ill clad as she, was wandering from house
to house, beseeching pennies.
"My dear/' said I to wife, " would it not
be wise to give the rest of our mince pie to
this poor woman, who is perhaps the mother
of starving little ones?"
That finish caught my wife. " Of course, "
said she. " I knew we 'd put the pie to some
good use if we only kept it till the proper
time came."
So I gathered up the remnants of the pie
and carried them down-stairs to the poor
woman. The squalid creature seized them
eagerly and gulped them down with the
ferocity of a famished wolf. " Grazia, sig-
nore! " I heard her say, as I walked away.
Her eyes were full of the tears of gratitude.
I felt that I had done a worthy deed.
A few days later I chanced to meet Pro-
fessor Robert Aylmer, a distinguished chem-
ist from Boston. He told me that a friend
of his (Colonel John C. Reid) had sent him
for chemical analysis a specimen of English
mince pie, taken from a mince pie com-
pounded by one Crow, an eminent London
baker.
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" You mean Buszard," said I.
" That may have been the name/' said the
professor. "At any rate, I analyzed the
specimen, and found it a curious compound,
quite unlike our American mince pie. The
constituent parts of this composition were,
as I remember, as follows :
Lemon peel . . .10 Green figs ... 2
Orange peel . .
. 10
Brussels sprouts .
. 10
Citron . . .
5
Prunes . . .
3
Pineapple rind .
- 15
Epps' Cocoa . .
2
Almonds , . .
. 2
Scotch whisky .
3
Caraway seeds .
. 8
Stilton cheese .
5
Cocoanut . .
- 5
Pears' Soap . .
. 20
Total . .
IOO
There was a slight trace of Thames water,
but I deemed it hardly sufficient to be no-
ticed. Altogether the compound is a baleful
one as deadly, I think, as the breath of the
vampire or the shade of the upas. I have
sent a specimen to Professor Pasteur, in
order that he may apply the biologic test, to
determine if there be in it a germ likely to
induce an epidemic."
So much for the scientific view of Ameri-
can mince pie as concocted by Buszard, the
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swell caterer of London. I arn no scientist;
I am simply a modest chronicler of passing
events.
Last Sunday I sat in this same chair, here
in these humble lodgings, when suddenly
came up from the street below the voice of
that old, dolorous tune, '* Shall We Gather
at the River?"
u It is the poor swart daughter of Italy/*
I sighed; "she has come back gaunt and
hungry. I would that I had food for her."
Overflowing as to my heart with pity, I
went to the window and looked down at
the sorry wretch grinding that wheezy
organ. It was the husband, tattered and
wan and shivering. He was alone, and
upon his left arm he wore a rude strip of
black crape.
February 22, 1890
Reflections on Carlsbad
Die Verdammgsscb'W&cbe is the most
ferocious malady known to man. It is feline
in its cruelty. It seldom kills. It pounces
upon, it cripples, and it plays with its victim,
revelling in his misery, delighting in his
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groans. Sometimes it steals away and
hides. You think it has forgotten you ; you
flatter yourself that you are no longer its
slave. Wretched creature, miserable dupe
that you are, you smile and you are gay. In
another moment and with redoubled malig-
nity die Verdauungsschwache has its talons
about your throat and its beak in your vitals.
It is a terror whose presence bids defiance
alike to life and to death. This monster has
one surpassing foe, one adversary whose
supremacy it concedes and yields unto.
That foe is Carlsbad.
And what is Carlsbad, and for what is it
so potent and so famed ?
Carlsbad is a spot. It is a streak between
hills in Bohemia. An ancient tradition says
that it was discovered by a dog. That dog
is now dead. Hence has arisen the saying,
" They tried it on the dog/'
The people of Bohemia are known the
world over as wanderers. They are neces-
sarily tramps, because they cannot afford to
live at home. It is cheaper to move. Carls-
bad was the last created spot on earth. It
was made up of what was left over. It
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rains in Carlsbad six sevenths of the time.
It is the most watery watering-place on
earth. The essentials to a successful career
over there are a wallet and an umbrella, both
big. It is a good place for disease, doctors,
and ducks. People who go to Carlsbad may
be sick of anything. When they go away
they are sick of nothing but Carlsbad. The
coming and the going illustrate respectively
the comparative and superlative degrees of
joy. Carlsbad is constructed like the in-
testine of a sand-hill crane. It has an ali-
mentary canal running straight through it.
Everything else in Carlsbad is crooked.
The native of Carlsbad has four hands,
with ten fingers to each hand. Other people
go to Carlsbad for their health, but the na-
tive is not there for that purpose. If you
take your eyes off him you are gone. But-
ton up your coat and put your hands in your
pocket while you talk with him. Make him
sign and swear to every proposition he
makes. He has got you anyway, but do
not walk into the trap with your eyes shut.
Put yourself into a position to be able to say
honestly that you knew it all the time.
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Every house in Carlsbad is a hostelry, and
a bad one. Some may be classed as lar-
cenies, others as highway robberies. The
only difference is the degree of the crime.
It is a tradition that once upon a time the
Goths and Vandals, tempted by rumors of
the exceeding riches of Carlsbad hotel-keep-
ers, made an incursion, but contrived to get
away without losing much.
From America there are many routes to
Carlsbad. But there are only two return
routes, one the northern and the other the
southern route. You swim home by one and
skate home by the other. The marshy char-
acter of the soil between Europe and America
renders walking impracticable. The portier
is one who poses at the entrance of every
hotel and bows as you go out or come in.
He speaks fluently every language except
your language. Your language he speaks
a leedle. For bowing to you and for speak-
ing your language a leedle you have to pay
the portier a florin a week. He also has the
prerogative and inalienable right to charge
you two kreutzers for every newspaper that
comes to you by post
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If you kick he will simply put a snaffle on
you.
The fish that swim in Carlsbad creeks have
many names, but they are one. If you eat
him as the trout, you pay one florin ; if as the
sole, seventy-five kreutzers; if as the zander,
fifty kreutzers. You choose the name and
pay the money.
The doctor is autocrat in Carlsbad. What
he says must go. If you fare ill he says it
is because you are not obeying his orders; if
you fare well he says, " I knew it would be
so." When he assures you that you are
making weight you must take it for granted
that if the scales tell you differently the
scales lie. At any rate, you may depend
upon it that the doctor will not suffer you
to leave Carlsbad until your wallet, at least,
has been reduced in heft.
Then he will send you to Switzerland.
That 's where the Alps are; they are very
high, but they are not so high as things are
in Carlsbad.
The waters in Carlsbad are warm, which,
though watery, is not warm. When the
water and die Verdauungsschwache meet
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within you they are both somewhat sur-
prised. And, for that matter, so are you.
Both water and Verdauungsschwache seem
to fear one another. They strike a truce.
The water goes its way, and so does die
Verdauungsschwache.
But this truce is only temporary. Before
the storm the calm; peace precedes war.
After a week of respectful quiet there is
trouble. The water and die Verdauungs-
schwache fall to quarrelling, and you are the
field of battle, the dead, the dying, and the
wounded. Sometimes the water tempora-
rily succeeds and plays triumphal marches
through your system. Anon die Verdau-
ungsschwache achieves the mastery and
celebrates with pyrotechnics and brass-band
music through your vitals.
This sort of thing continues ten days. It
is merely a question of time whether die
Verdauungsschwache or you succumb first.
This is why he who survives Carlsbad is
vulgarly called a blood of the first water.
In Carlsbad alone does die Verdauungs-
schwache meet its Waterloo.
August 1 6, 1890
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How Job Suffered from Dyspepsia
BY those who know whereof they speak
it is admitted that of all the maladies where-
with man is afflicted there is none more
grievous in its torments than dyspepsia, and
a right marvellous characteristic of this afflic-
tion is that with all its malice it seldom
wholly destroys its victim. Dyspepsia very
often incapacitates a man for endeavor, and
it sometimes extinguishes the fire of ambi-
tion within him; but it is the diabolical
pleasure of this disease not to deprive its
miserable prey altogether of life, and so we
see dyspeptics crawling aimlessly about the
world, too sick to live as they should live,
yet not quite sick enough to die. The lot
of these creatures is wretched indeed.
Dyspepsia is the oldest malady known to
mankind. The oldest piece of literature
and perhaps the oldest poem ever written
treats of the career of a dyspeptic, his physi-
cal and mental symptoms, his curious hallu-
cinations, his reformatory life, his gradual
restoration to life, his subsequent prosperity,
and his wondrous longevity. We refer to
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the Book of Job, to the reading, nay, to the
study of which we urge those who are
aware that they have stomachs and those,
also, who are likely to become so aware.
The first important lesson which this beau-
tiful poem teaches is that Satan invented
dyspepsia. The arch-fiend makes his boast
that it is in his power to win Job from god-
liness by afflicting him sorely in body. Di-
vinity permits the trial to be made, but
insists that the victim shall not be killed, so
Satan invents dyspepsia, as we shall or,
rather, as the poem itself doth prove.
Job was, as you recall, a high liver. He
lived in the land of Uz (the Hebrew for " us "
or " ours "). He had been exceeding prosper-
ous in life ; his flocks and herds were mighty,
he was rich, his domestic relations were
most felicitous he was, in short, a success-
ful man. And he was a high liver. Almost
at the beginning of the poem we are told
of feastings and merrymakings. To this
Divinity did not object; by the same be-
nevolence that bestows good things upon
mankind it would seem to be ordained that
mankind should enjoy those good things.
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It is only when Satan interferes that the
office of digesting and assimilating these
good things becomes a vain, unprofitable,
accursed office, productive of physical tor-
ments and mental anguish and spiritual
pains. Wherefore should all men, particu-
larly dyspeptics, hate the devil and eschew
every practice wherein it is known or even
suspected that that most odious and most
malignant spirit delights.
The first dyspeptic symptom exhibited
in the case of Job was a nervous one, viz.,
an apprehension of evil We are told that
he conceived the idea that his children had
died, that his flocks, herds, and servants
had either been destroyed or carried away,
and that his fortune had suddenly escaped
him. The poet does not assure us that
these things actually befell; on the con-
trary, he seeks to convey the impression,
as subtly as the methods of Oriental rhet-
oric will permit, that these were merely
hallucinations, and just such tormenting
hallucinations as the neurasthenic dyspeptic
is liable to. The symptom exhibited is an
eczema, unpleasant to a degree, but by no
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means dangerous ; the translators of the Old
Testament have chosen to call this eruption
boils, but in the light of advanced medical
science we confidently pronounce it hives,
or, as the British faculty prefer, nettle-rash.
So vexatious is this eruption that Job, un-
questionably broken by the mental distresses
already spoken of, lapses into a condition
verging upon melancholia. He becomes
moody; he casts aside his rich raiment and
shuns the society in which he had been
wont to find enjoyment He seems to fear
association with his fellow-men; this is
what is called anthropophobia, and it is
clearly a neurasthenic symptom.
In the midst of his anguish the sufferer
curses the day wherein he was born. This
is invariably a common practice with dys-
peptics, and in it the cunning artifice of Satan
appears. Yet the teaching of the ages is
that however much the dyspeptic may re-
gret his birth, he is hasty to avail himself of
everything conducive to longevity. Quite
naturally, therefore, Job spread the news of
his ill health, and doubtless experienced a
melancholy delight when he beheld his three
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old cronies with him. Immediately, after the
manner of dyspeptics, Job began to lament
his wretched lot and to enumerate his symp-
toms and pains. " My sighing cometh be-
fore I eat/' says he, "and my roarings are
poured out like the waters/' The proba-
bility is that Job did not use this exact
phraseology; it is more likely that the poet
employed this graceful phrasing to convey
the information that flatulency was one of
the aged valetudinarian's most distressing
symptoms. When Eliphaz seeks to soothe
the old gentleman, Job suddenly becomes
suspicious and wonders why these people
have come to see him; for this is one of
the vagaries of nervous dyspepsia. "Am I a
sea," he asks, " or a whale, that thou settest
a watch over me?"
So he goes on complaining and confess-
ing. Now and again he exhibits a certain
valorous optimism, but quite as frequently a
bitter pessimism tinges his utterances so
fluctuating are the emotions of the neu-
rasthenic. He is troubled with insomnia:
" When I lie down, I say, When shall 1 arise,
and the night be gone? and I am full of
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tossings to and fro unto the dawning of
the day" (vii. 4). He has awful dreams:
" When I say, My bed shall comfort me, my
couch shall ease my complaint; then thou
scarest me with dreams, and terrifiest me
through visions (vii. 13, 14). He suffers
from shortness of breath and from water-
brash: "He will not suffer me to take my
breath, but filleth me with bitterness " (ix.
1 8). He complains of lassitude (xvi. 7.)
and speaks of his wrinkled visage and of
" my leanness " (xvi. 8), which would seem
to argue a certain ansemic condition. Then,
again, he has a bad taste in his mouth (xvii.
i), and his vision is temporarily impaired
(xvii. 7) ; his thoughts are scattered, and he
has lost all power to concentrate them (xvii.
1 1). That he is threatened with a disagree-
able complication in the nature of stomatitis
is suggested by his words, " I am escaped
with the skin of my teeth " (xix. 20) ; for the
teeth have no skin except when, in stomati-
tis, the gums drop down over them. He has
nervous rigors, for, as he says, " trembling
taketh hold on my flesh" (xxi. 6). He has
fantastic hallucinations : " I am a brother to
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dragons, and a companion to owls" (xxx.
29), He exhibits febrile symptoms: " My
skin is black upon me, and my bones are
burned with heat" (xxx. 50).
The mistakes that Job made appear to
have been two. He erred first in an over-
indulgence of his appetite. Then he erred
in not summoning a good doctor as soon as
he felt sick. The leech, in those times, was
not, it is true, a skilful body, but surely one
with the least professional experience would
have diagnosed job's malady at once and set
the sufferer on the way to recovery. As it
was, however, Job had the good luck to fall
into a manner of living which assured his
cure. He got down to hard-pan at once.
He forsook all feasts and merrymakings;
he bowed himself (metaphorically) in sack-
cloth and ashes. He took no medicine
that could not help him. He simply went
back to first and primeval principles, and
that was what cured him. Curiously enough,
there is no other cure for dyspepsia to-day.
In Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shu-
hite, and Zophar the Naarnathite the poet
has ingeniously drawn the characteristics of
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three classes of human beings who make a
practice of worrying dyspeptics with their
consolation and advice. The first class re-
proaches the sufferer for his past life: the
wretched man has brought it all on himself;
he should not complain; he should prepare
for death. The second class insists that
there is nothing in it at all: the dyspeptic
thinks he is sick when he is n't; it is all the
work of the imagination ; by simply getting
up and going about his business as usual he
would soon forget all about his fancied
pains. As for the third class, it believes that
the dyspeptic needs remedies, and it has
thousands of them to recommend as the
only safe, sure, and immediate cure. What
wonder that dear old Job despised and cried
out against these false comforters ! What
wonder that this immortal pioneer dyspep-
tic bade them hold their peace and let him
alone ! There was one sensible adviser ; yes,
and there are Elihus even unto this day, who
in their modest, unobtrusive way go about
doing good. He counselled Job wisely,
soothing his impatience, quieting his fears,
and encouraging him in his practice of
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necessary abstemiousness. Then, better
than all human things, God's voice spake to
the wretched sufferer, and it bade him " be
a man."
What was the end of it all? Why, Job
got well, of course. His recovery was not
accomplished in a day or a week or a month.
No; it takes time to restore a debilitated
system, particularly when Satan has once
laid hold upon it and proselyted the stomach
unto the pernicious pursuit of his wicked
pleasure. But in due time and by means of
the most scrupulous care and patience, in-
volving a frugal diet and an outdoor life,
Job got well He awakened from the hide-
ous dream. His wrinkles were all smoothed
out; he was no longer bothered with in-
somnia or bad dreams; his pneumogastric
nerve resumed Its normal docility; all the
distressing symptoms of heartburn and
water-brash subsided; he gained in weight;
his cheeks got rosy again ; in his limbs he
felt the vigor and elasticity of youth; his
tongue became clean in short, his digestion
was perfect Then he saw that his sons
and daughters still lived there are ten in all,
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and the three girls are exceptionally bonny
creatures, as we are told and as we believe.
His flocks, herds, and servants were secure,
and he found his finances undisturbed. You
see, he had imagined vain things, but, bless
you, he was n't responsible ; it was the fault
of his dyspepsia, and by that we mean the
devil, for we have not found it necessary
to refer to this noble old Hebraic poem to
convince ourselves that dyspepsia is indeed
simply Satan incarnate.
Still, as we have already intimated, we
should urge upon all and particularly upon
anaemic and neurasthenic dyspeptics to
peruse with exceeding diligence that poem
wherein the sorrows of Job are so beauti-
fully and so freely set forth. Therein shall
each sufferer find portrayed some symptom
which he himself hath exhibited and others
which, having read of, he shall duly experi-
ence, too. From this perusal there is much
benefit to be had, for it shall teach temper-
ance and faith in God to be the essentials to
that condition which insureth a sound mind
in a sound body. It shall show, moreover,
and most clearly, that the severest of all
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human pains come of the devil (and him
alone), that essay eth thereby to lay hold
upon the soul of man ; for the devil is fain
to believe that the quickest and surest way
into a man's heart is by the palate, the oesoph-
agus, the stomach, the colon, and the like et-
ceteras of that man. But the devil is wrong,
as usual, and we glory in the determination
to cheat him of his calculation, which de-
termination, sweet and gentle reader, share
thou with us.
io 3 189*
181
THE MODERN MARTYR
NLY an editor's wife/* they say,
As she rides along in her proud coupe;
But they all confess that her face is fair,
That her form is lovely beyond compare,
That her robes are rich and her jewels rare,
That her heart is warm and her gold is free;
Yet "only an editor's wife" is she!
Do they envy her laces and silks so grand,
Or the diamonds she wears on her white
left hand,
Or the satin train that sweeps in her track,
Or the elegant three-ply sealskin sack
That gracefully covers her shapely back?
Or why do the people derisively cry
When "only an editor's wife" rides by?
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Do they envy the palace where she abides,
Or the gilded coach in which she rides,
Or her yacht that sports with the lake's white
foam,
Or the troop of servants that go and come
To do her will in her regal home ?
Do they envy her gold when they descry
That it 's "only an editor's wife" goes by ?
They never think of the man who writes
Through the weary days and the darksome
nights,
To earn the ducats with which to pay
For the laces fine and the jewels gay,
And the robes en train and decollete,
And the other trappings that greet the eye
When " only an editor's wife " sails by.
Oh, could they go to his working-place,
And see his furrowed and pallid face,
And know the grind of his daily life,
How he freely encounters all toil and strife
To humor the whims of his petted wife,
Methinks they would raise their plaudits high
When "only an editor's wife" rode by.
January io f 1884
AN OHIO IDYL
O FATHERS all, reflect upon
The touching story and the fate
Of hapless Mr. Pendleton,
Who had a daughter and a gate.
Once said this Mr. Pendleton
To dapper little John McLean :
" Here, now, get off that gate, my son,
And don't come hanging round again!
You 're not their style, my daughters say;
Your visits do not bring them joy.
Get off the gate and run away
Come, there J s a clever little boy! "
Then dapper little John McLean
Sought out another quiet street,
Where lived a certain Mr. Payne,
Who "had a daughter young and sweet;
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Engaging this enchanting miss
In many a twilight tete-a-tete,
He whiled away long hours of bliss
In swinging on the old man's gate.
Lo, some years after, Messrs. Payne
And Pendleton were candidates;
Then did the dapper John McLean
Recall the story of the gates.
He lent his vengeful nature to
Manipulations darkly deft
And Mr. Payne pulled glibly through,
While Pendleton got badly left.
So, fathers all, reflect upon
The touching story and the fate
Of hapless Mr. Pendleton,
Who had a daughter and a gate.
January 15, 1884
185
A SCHERZO
ONE night the charming Gerster said,
"Now listen, colonel, to me:
I will not sing I '11 quit instead
Unless I 'm paid what 's due me.
I 'm mad to think that you should think
That I am such a greeny
To let you lavish all the chink
On Mrs. Nicolini!"
Then Mapleson in guileful vein
Protested he was busted;
And Gerster on the midnight train
Incontinently dusted.
Back to her babe in York she hied,
This operatic charmer,
And put all other rdles aside
For that of simple mamma*
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But Mapleson, when she had fled,
Forthwith began to worry ;
The telegram he sent her said :
" Come back, and please to hurry.
I '11 build a palace-car for you,
And bear your tantrums meekly,
And pay your salary when it *s due
That is to say, tri-weekly."
So back to Mapleson went she
As sweet as dripping honey,
And now is happy as can be
Because she got her money.
When asked what caused the recent row
They answer 't was the baby;
This fairy tale 's sufficient now
To fool the public, maybe.
January 29 3 1884
187
AN OHIO DITTY
MARY had a little lamb,
Down in Ohio state,
And, ere it grew to be a ram,
Most dismal was its fate.
Its fleece was long and white and full,
And Mary loved to shear
Her lamb for the amount of wool
It brought her twice a year.
But once, upon a summer's day,
She learned, to her dejection,
Her wool investment did n't pay
And so she craved protection.
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And then, with many a pleading word
And copious flow of tears,
She flew to genial Mr. Hurd
To set at rest her fears.
But Mr. Hurd in scorn did hold
Poor Mary and her kid,
And when their tale of woe was told
No kindly act he did.
In vain for help the maiden cried
Upon her bended knees.
"No tariff, girl," the man replied;
** Go ? serve your lamb with peas! "
So Mary slew her little lamb
As might have been expected,
For little lambs are n't worth a d
When they are not protected.
January 28, 1884
189
A GOOD MAN'S SORROW
A;OU BEN HALSTEAD may his tribe
increase!
Thinking one night to steal a sweet surcease
From office work, of which he 'd had a
greed,
Called to his side his faithful Romeo Reed,
And quoth : ' ' By Allah and his great horned
spoon,
I will go home and sleep me until noon
If I can get a paragraph from you
To pull to-morrow's editorial through;
Now, mind you, one short paragraph will
do!"
Good Romeo Reed inclined his reverend
head
"Ismillah robang! " ( e< Good enough!") he
said;
And Halstead straightway hied himself to
bed.
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Abou Ben Halstead woke next day at nine,
And having quaffed, as is his wont, his
wine,
Called for the paper, which he always read
Propped up by pillows in his regal bed.
He seized the sheet, and with an eager flout
He turned the mammoth paper inside out
To see what Romeo Reed had writ about.
Abou Ben Halstead's cheeks grew very red;
He frothed awhile, and stood upon his
head;
His mournful eyes were all ablaze with
fire,
His noble frame quaked with demoniac ire.
Lo! Romeo's paragraph filled up the page
entire !
February 20, 1884
191
LAMENT OF A NEGLECTED BOSS
WITH not a faithful lackey nigh,
With all my vast resources spent,
I find myself enshrouded by
The winter of my discontent.
Gone are the hours of tranquil bliss
1 fondly used to count mine own,
And I, at last, am come to this
The running of a telephone!
Before I took this paltry thing
That keeps a-jingling all the day,
I was a most puissant king,
And most despotic was my sway.
Proud was my lot and proud my mien;
I sat upon a gilded throne
And bossed a radical machine
Where now I boss a telephone!
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Pause, O ye countrymen of mine,
And drop a sympathetic tear,
And carve to me this touching line :
"Oh, what a falling off is here!"
Dear Riddieberger and Mahone,
Grant sweet surcease unto my woe
By wafting through my telephone
A fond, occasional hello!
March ij f 1884
ROMANCE OF A "CUSS-WORD"
BROAD expanse of shiny shirt-front,
Cuffs and collar -white to match,
Overcoat with silken facing
Just the rig to make a catch.
Pretty lady coming toward him;
He prepares to make a mash;
Meets a stumbling horse on crossing
Mud flies o'er him with a splash!
Man who looked so sweet and gentle,
Like a little suckling lamb,
Now becomes a raving lion;
Girl goes by and hears him d n.
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Girl is shocked beyond expression
Thinks his language simply vile;
Yet believes that she can save him
Meets him next time with a smile.
Man apologizes bravely,
Says his anger made him rash.
Girl replies it but convinced her
He 's a man of proper dash.
They are married in November;
Wife is over all her scare ;
Says she thought him soft and sickish
Till the day she heard him swear.
Marcb 20 > 1884
COLD CONSOLATION
I AM booming, brother, booming;
As the tide of time rolls on
Thou wilt see me higher looming
In thy pathway, dearest John.
But oh, brother, in thy sorrow-
Turn thou not thy face away;
Be for me, dear John, to-morrow,
As for thee I am to-day.
I am booming, brother, booming;
See the tempest toss my plume;
See the friends about me grooming,
Grooming lovingly my boom.
Lose no time, nor stumble blindly
Into error, Brother John;
To my boom, I tell thee kindly,
Soon or late thou must catch on.
March 21 , 1884
196
MR. HOLMAN'S FAREWELL
E little boom they said was vain
1 Will strike them now as vainer,
Since you have got aboard the train
And started o'er the cactus plain,
O frail and fickle Dana !
For when you reach the marble halls
Of pagan Montezuma,
What ear will heed my piteous calls
Amid the havoc that appalls
A boom without a boomer ?
Perhaps some charrn of that proud place
Will swerve you from your duty
Will tempt you to forget my face,
My artless ways and simple grace,
My modest Hoosier beauty.
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If so it be, my face will haunt
Your soul where'er you linger;
Within your ears I '11 breath a taunt,
Within your eyes I '11 ever flaunt
My pale and bony finger.
Like amorous Dido am I left
To torturesome reflection
Deceived, cajoled, betrayed, bereft,
My trusting heart by anguish cleft
Though not without OBJECTION.
22, 1884
THE APRIL FOOL
FAIR was her young and girlish face,
Her lips -were luscious red as wine;
Her willowy form betrayed a grace
That seemed to me to be divine.
One evening at the trysting-place
I asked this maiden to be mine.
Unhappy, thrice-unhappy youth
Was I to court the crushing blow;
But why delay the awful truth
She April-fooled me years ago!
Filled with a ghastly, grim dismay
As kneeling at her feet I heard
This fair but cruel angel say
That last, unhappy, severing word,
I fluttered hopelessly away
Like some forlorn and stricken bird.
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For years I played the cynic's part,
For years I nursed my secret woe;
And this reflection galled my heart
She April-fooled me years ago!
But she is forty now, and fat,
And vanished all her graces are:
And many a lusty, brawling brat
Pulls at her skirts and calls her "ma,"
And I have information that
Her horrid husband tends a bar.
And when I see that fleeting years
Have changed my quondam angel so,
I thank my stars, 'mid grateful tears,
She April-fooled me years ago !
March 2j } 1884
THE OLD SEXTON
NIGH to a boom that was newly made
Leaned Charles A. Dana on his pick
and spade;
He smiled sardonic and paused to wait
The funeral train through the open gate.
A savage editor man was he,
And his eyes were aflame with demoniac
glee
As these words came from his lips so thin:
"I gather them in- I gather them in!
" I gather them in, and their final rest
Is here down here in the earth's dark
breast.
Hancock I buried four years ago
'Neath a mossy mound where the daisies
blow;
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Holman and Bayard and Field I boom,
Only to leave them where violets bloom;
For, heedless of what their grandeur ha:
been,
I gathered them in I gathered them in !
" I gather them in, and I never care
How the victims rage or the people swear;
Thurman, McDonald, and Flower, too,
Have gently flocked to my hullabaloo,
And now I am patiently waiting here
For the Grover Cleveland boom to appear;
And, blind to the chances it has to win,
I '11 gather it in I '11 gather it in! "
July 5, 1884
OGLESBY (1884)
WHEN treason boldly stalked the land
And poisoned hearts of men
Till traitors rose on every hand,
A patriot called us then ;
We followed, comrade, you and I,
Where death and wounds were thick,
And gloried in the battle-cry,
" Hurrah for Uncle Dick! "
They say that we, who knew no fears
Of death and carnage then,
Are summoned in these after years,
To follow him again ;
Not with the gun nor with the sword,
But with the hoe and pick,
We come, a brave, determined horde
Hurrah for Uncle Dick !
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His waving hair was black as night
In that dear long ago ;
But now with care and age 't is white
As first December snow;
But round that old and whitened head
Have honors, fast and thick,
A grand, majestic halo shed
Hurrah for Uncle Dick!
Once tall and stately was the form
That now is stooped and bent;
Wait till he scents the coming storm
And marks the base intent
Of foemen circling round about,
And see how pow'rful quick
That grave old body straightens out
Hurrah for Uncle Dick!
And as we rallied in the fray
With him long years ago,
So do we rally round, to-day,
The chief we reverence so.
Beware the foe, O patriots true,
Beware each traitorous trick,
We still are soldiers of the blue
Hurrah for Uncle Dick!
July io f 1884
204
THE POLITICAL MAUD
BEN BUTLER, on a summer's day,
Stood in a convention making hay ;
The hay was sweet and the hay was dry,
But it was n't as cocked as old Ben's eye;
For old Ben saw on a gelding gay
Judge Nomination ride that way.
When the judge saw Ben in the hay at work,
He stopped his horse with a sudden jerk,
And he rolled his eyes on the winsome face
And the buxom form and the air of grace
And the wealth of cheek and the mesh of
hair
Of sweet Ben Butler a-working there.
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"Oh," sighed the judge, "that the fate
were mine
To wed with a creature so divine !
With Ben for a mate, my life would seem
Like a poet's song or an artist's dream ;
But, when they heard of my marital pick,
How like a steer some folks would kick ! "
So, fearful of what his folks might say,
Judge Nomination rode away,
And left Ben Butler standing there
With her wealth of cheek and her mesh of
hair;
And of all sad words of tongue and pen
The saddest are these: "He would n't
have Ben/'
July ti, 1884
206
THE ENGLISH AND THEIR ENGLISH
It Costs to Bathe in England
" You hear of the English people boasting
of their fondness for bathing," said an Ameri-
can resident to me, an evening or two since.
" Now, I have lived in England twenty-four
years, and I happen to know that until within
the last fifteen years it was almost impos-
sible to find such a thing as a bath-tub in
England. Even at the present time a large
majority of the English people do what they
call 'bathing' in a wretched wash-bowl!
Why, there is as much difference between
the American bath and the English bath as
there is between immersion and sprinkling.
It is the American who has introduced the
bath-tub into England not the miserable
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sitz-bath, which so many English folk affect,
but the large, clean, wholesome tub that in-
sures equal cleanliness to the whole surface
of the body."
There is really a good excuse for the Lon-
don people not being clean. It costs money
to keep clean here. If in any of the public
places you invade the lavatory for the pur-
pose of cleansing your face and hands, you
are promptly confronted by a person in uni-
form who demands a fee. Yes, you can't
wash your face and hands in London with-
out being forced to give up twopence for it.
A legal tax on cleanliness !
Last week I visited an old Roman bath lo-
cated in the Strand. It is an ancient affair,
supposed to be fed by a spring in Holywell
Street; the water is clear and cold.
" How old is this bath ?" I asked.
"About eighteen hundred years old," an-
swered the guide, "but it was unknown
until three hundred years ago; then it be-
came a fashionable resort, and subsequently
Queen Elizabeth used to patronize it."
Strange commentary, this. Here in the
heart of a population boasting a passion for
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bathing existed for fifteen centuries a noble
bath that nobody knew anything about
Another point: I have found out why the
English are such famous walkers. It is be-
cause it costs them money to sit down. I
found this out the other day as I sat on
a bench in Hyde Park. A man in a uni-
form came along and demanded twopence.
"What for?" I asked. "For occupying a
seat/' said he. " We are authorized to col-
lect twopence from everybody who sits
down/'
Visitors to the royal mews (stables) are
informed by their tickets of admission that
no feeing is tolerated, the supposition being
that the Queen pays her hired men for the
service they perform. Yet when I visited
the royal rnews the official flunky who acted
as guide expected his shilling, and the su-
perb factotum who is in charge of the
sheds where the royal coaches (valued at
thousands upon thousands of pounds) are
housed stretched forth an itching palm and
returned profuse thanks for a paltry three-
pence.
The trouble is that visitors to England are
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consistently and audaciously robbed, the
Americans being considered the fairest and
fattest prey. There are two things which
the average Englishman can neither forget
nor forgive : the Revolution and the Geneva
award. These things touched his purse,
and that is what kills an Englishman. So
the Englishman really thinks it is his duty to
rob an American whensoever he can.
March j } 1890
They Call Things Differently in London
OUR old friend P, T. Barnum has brought
his London season to an end amid a blaze
of glory. The crowds at the concluding
performances of the Greatest Show on Earth
were simply enormous, and I suspect that
the old gentleman comes pretty near the
truth when he says that one hundred thou-
sand people were turned away from the
ticket-office during the last week. At the
final performance the wealth and fashion
were present in full force. Barnum's private
box was occupied by the Lord Mayor and
his wife, Lord Chief Justice and Lady Cole-
ridge, Consul-General New, Vice-Consul
SHARPS AND FLATS
Johnstone, Dr. Playfair, and Mr. FuIIerton
of New York. There being a great clamor
for Barnum, the crafty old showman made
his appearance and spoke honeyed words.
Later at night the Lord Mayor gave a swell
dinner in honor of Mr. Barnum, and the in-
terchange of compliments would have made
a barrel of molasses turn sour with envy.
You must pardon me for using that word
"molasses." Having lived six months in
Britain, 1 should have said " treacle. " I study
to be correct even in little matters of this
kind, but I find it very hard to conform to
English as it is spoken this side of the saline
pool. Quite at random I make up a list of
articles to which the English assign names
differing from those we use.
That which we call a "bowl" is here
known as a "basin." In England you ask
for a "basin of bread and milk."
That which is known to us as a " pitcher "
is here called a "jug." A donkey is here
called a "rnoke"; in America a "moke" is
a negro. Local slang for a cab-horse is
"cat's-meat," because the meat of horses
is peddled around the streets for feeding to
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cats. By the way, British cats average much
larger than our American cats, and they are
notorious chicken-killers. The brindle cat
seems to be the commonest.
What we call "crackers'' are here called
"biscuit," and I suspect that this is strictly
correct. What we call "shoes" are here
known as "boots/ 5 and what we call
"boots" are here known as "bluchers."
There is one shoe called the " hilo," because
it runs high from the heel up back of the
ankle and is cut low in front.
Our " druggist " is here a " chemist, " many
of the old practitioners retaining the old
spelling " chymist."
What we call "ale" is here known as
"bitter beer."
What is here known as a "hash" we
should call a "stew," and what we call a
" hash " is here known as a " mince."
In England our "overcoat" becomes a
"greatcoat," our "undershirt" becomes a
" vest," and our " drawers " become " panta-
loons." It is said that when Mr. George
W. Childs of Philadelphia was in London a
number of years ago he walked into a haber-
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dashery and, seeking to appear to be a na-
tive, asked to be shown the styles in silk
waistcoats. "Jeems," cried the proprietor
to his assistant, " step this way and show
this Hamerican gentleman our flowery
weskits."
What we call "sick" the Englishman
calls " ill " ; " sickness " here implies nausea
and vomiting. The British usage is wrong,
but the late Richard Grant White settled that
point pretty definitely. How came the
British to fall into this perversion ? It was,
I think, because the British can go nowhere
except by water; that travel by water in-
duces unpleasant symptoms of nausea and
retching, which condition, called "sick-
ness," gradually came to be regarded as the
correct definition of "sickness." I can't
imagine how the British justify their use of
the words "homesick," "heartsick," and
"lovesick."
Here they call a "street-car" a "tram";
correct. Here, too, an "elevator" is a
"lift," and that is right
What we call a " telegram " is here called
a " telegraph " ; it will probably never be de-
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termined which of these usages is the better.
Our " postal card" is here a "post-card";
" cuffs " become " wrists."
That material known to us as "Canton
flannel" is here called "swan's-down," and
our "muslin" is known hereabouts as
"calico."
Our "locomotive" becomes "engine,"
and our "conductor" is here a "guard."
What we call "stewing" (culinary term)
the British call " simmering." Our " lunch "
is here a "luncheon," and our "baggage"
becomes "luggage."
Our "wheat" is called "corn," and our
"corn" is called " maize " or, sometimes,
" Indian corn. " " Pigs' feet" are called " trot-
ters." By the way, a theatrical name for a
bad actor is "rotter."
A "chill" is here called a "rigor/' and
the eruption commonly known among us
as "hives" is here known as "nettle-rash."
Candy is known variously as "sweets,"
"sweetmeats," and "lolly."
Writing to John Smith, your social equal,
you are expected to address him as "John
Smith, Esq."; if he be your tailor, gro-
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cer, etc., you address him as "Mr. John
Smith/'
The word " apt " is exceedingly popular
here. It is " apt to rain, " " apt to be muddy/'
a man is " apt to go down-town/' a bank is
" apt to suspend/' etc. Even the best prints
use this word as a synonym for "likely"
and " like." Another barbarism everywhere
prevalent in the United Kingdom is the use
of " directly " for the conjunction " as soon
as," e.g., " directly he went out I shut the
door." Charles Dickens, who was quite
slovenly at times, seems to have been ad-
dicted to this indefensible vice.
What does this British word " left-tenant "
mean, I should like to know.
" Quite " is another hackneyed word here ;
it is edged in upon every occasion.
The first criticism I would pass upon the
press of London would be for the indirect-
ness of its speech. When a newspaper
writer wishes to convey the idea that yes-
terday was a pleasant day, he says : " Yes-
terday was not an unpleasant day. " A good
play is " not half bad. " A humorous speech
is "not unrelieved by wit" A riotously
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applauded address is "not wholly unac-
cented by demonstrations of approval/' and
so on, ad infin. et ad naus. Now, all this
sort of thing may be subtle and it may be
conservative, but it is not in the spirit of the
Anglo-Saxon, and it vexes me to find so
little of the Anglo-Saxon in the literature,
the speech, and the practice of the very
people where I had thought to find so
much.
March io } 1890
Tie National Greed for Tuppence
CHICAGO, ILLINOIS, February 24.
To THE EDITOR : Why do you suffer so
jaundiced a critic as your " Sharps and Flats "
man to fill the columns of your paper with
misrepresentations of England, its climate,
its people, and its customs ? I have never
read anything more infamous than this per-
son's wretched flings at what he unjustly
calls the Englishman's greed for the tup-
pence. Give us a rest, I beg of you in the
name of honesty and fair play.
Yours truly,
JOHN BULL AT LARGE.
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When that bull gored this ox 't was quite
a different thing. From time immemorial
the English have indulged with exceeding
gusto their penchant for slandering and
lampooning America and Americans. Old
Mother Trollope set what might be called
the high-water mark, but ever since 1842,
from Charles Dickens down to the ineffable
Florence Sinjin, it has been a fad with British
writers to vilify the country, the people, and
the institutions of America.
Why have the English done this ? It has
been not so much because they were jealous
of or envied the Americans as because they
recognized the shrewdness of the tactics
which, by locating a laugh elsewhere, keeps
the laugh away from the object against
which it should properly be directed.
For many years England has been con-
scious of her weakness; she knows now
that at any time she is likely to be wiped off
the map of Europe ; like the small boy we
have read of, she has been traversing a grave--
yard, and she has whistled to keep her cour-
age up. Bismarck was the first to estimate
her physical nothingness, and he said:
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" England! Why, who cares for England? "
Yet England's national brute is properly a
dual creature : when Portugal is to be dealt
with, lo and behold, } t is a lion that bellows
and lashes his tail; but if one of the pow-
ers calls England to taw, the lion vanishes,
and the timid unicorn capers daintily to what
tune soever is discoursed.
It is wholly unnecessary to misrepresent
the English; misrepresentation is with al-
most equal frequency cowardly and futile.
But the truth is potent, and when it is a dis-
agreeable truth it hurts. Saying that Smith
has corns and that you trod upon Smith's
corns neither proves the first proposition
nor harms Smith ; but if you do tread on
Smith's corns, that hurts Smith, and Smith's
bellowing will prove that it is corns that he
has.
The Englishman's greed for the tuppence
is notorious. Every foreigner who has
visited this island will bear me out in the
assertion that at the practice of universal
begging no other so-called civilized and en-
lightened people can be counted in the race
with the English people.
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So far as this humiliating practice concerns
Americans, it begins as soon as one em-
barks at any one of our ports for Liverpool.
The first object that attracts the attention of
a passenger on any of the Atlantic steamers
is a box hung conspicuously between the
deck and the saloon, and bearing a pathetic
appeal for charity in behalf of some English
hospital or school " Spare a penny to the
Disabled Seamen's Home," " Contribute
your mite to the Orphan Asylum" these
and similar legends greet the voyager.
Invariably while the steamer is in its
course across the sea some sort of enter-
tainment (a concert generally) is devised to
raise funds for the benefit of some English
institution. Passengers give the entertain-
ment and pay for it. Thousands of dollars
are annually squeezed out of American tour-
ists by means of these small, pettifogging,
hypocritical practices.
After feeing everybody aboard the ship,
the customs officers at Liverpool, the truck-
men, and the porters at the dock expect
their tips. The train guard waits for his
tuppence just fancy the conductor of a
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magnificent express-train accepting four
cents from a passenger!
On every side are men, women, and chil-
dren eager to get their tuppence. Informa-
tion must be paid for. You ask a man how
far it is to the railway station, and, whether
he tells you or not, he grovels and fawns
when you toss him a ha'penny for his al-
leged servicea tuppence will send him in
the mud at your feet.
On every side, too, are the everlasting
begging boxes, surmounted by a placard
beseeching you to contribute to this hos-
pital or to that home, or to this asylum or to
that charity. .These boxes confront you at
every hotel, in the theatres, at the street-
corners, in the art gallery, at the museums
in short, wheresoever you go you are
haunted by the everlasting box that pleads
and gapes for your money.
But as there are more than two ways of
skinning a cat, so is there more than one
way of begging here in England. The ser-
vants in every public house are beggars.
You patronize a restaurant or a cafe, and you
must give the waiter who serves you a fee.
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In many instances the proprietor of the place
makes the servant divide this fee with him,
and in some instances the proprietor coolly
gobbles all the fees !
At the theatres beggars take the form of
a charge for programmes. Herein is much
discrimination practised. The programme
which costs the patron of the boxes twenty-
five cents is vended in the gallery for
tuppence. At Mr. Charles Wyndham's
theatre the extortion is of a pitiably hu-
miliating character. You ask, " How much
for this programme?" and you are told
(with an anxious look), "Anything you
please."
At Edward Terry's theatre, in the Strand,
you never get back any change unless you
stoutly stand out against the imposition.
It is fair to say that Mr. Henry Irving and
Mr. Beerbohm Tree practise rigidly the de-
termination that no fees of any kind shall be
paid in their theatres, the Lyceum and the
Haymarket
But in most instances where the legend
" No fees " is exhibited you may expect high-
handed extortion. Even at the Queen's
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stables, where veterans have been in service
for many, many years, you are expected to
give up tuppence to every factotum that
crosses your path, and this, too, when upon
every official card of admission is printed the
information that no feeing is tolerated.
The late Earl Sidney, who had the hand-
ling of the Queen's personal affairs, hap-
pened to be standing in front of Buckingham
Palace one morning, when a party of tour-
ists came up. Mistaking the earl for one of
the official guides, the party asked to be
conducted through the palace* It was
surprising enough that the earl should
have consented to serve as their guide;
but it was prepostererus that he should
have accepted, as he did, a shilling for his
services !
The guinea practice is one of the extor-
tions of the genteel beggar. There is no
such coin as a guinea now, but twenty-one
shillings represent it The sovereign is
twenty shillings; when, therefore, the de-
mand is for a guinea, you pay a sovereign
and one shilling. The guinea (actually a
myth) is the standard of the fashionable, the
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ornate, high-toned beggar. Professional
men lawyers, doctors, actors, artists, sing-
ers, et id genus omne reckon by guineas.
In America there is a continual deriding
of the New England people, who pay such
exceeding respect to the cents. Yet here in
England the farthing (or half-cent) figures
conspicuously in trade. At Glave's large
shop in Oxford Street it is customary to buy
of every variety of cloths for so many pence
and so many farthings a yard. There used
to be a shoe-dealer named Ward (" Old Man
Ward " we irreverentially called him) in Fay-
etteville, Vermont, and once when, as a boy,
I went to buy a pair of shoes, he said:
" Neow, here, my lad, is a pair for a dollar
'nd six cents, and here J s a pair with a leetle
better material in 'em for a dollar 'nd seven
cents, but if you want a tiptop pair, han'-
made of the best leather off'n the steer that
took first premium at the cattle show last
fall, I calculate you 'd rather have this pair
at a dollar 'nd eight cents." Well, England
is full of tradesmen of the Old Man Ward
type. And, unlike Old Man Ward, they are
by no means scrupulous about giving you
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back the full amount of change due you.
Detected in their petty dishonesty, they are
profuse and saccharine in their apologies,
and it 's worth half a crown any time to hear
an English tradesman say " Thankjjw/" ; it is
really more of a treat than to hear Patti sing
"Home, Sweet Home." I am no Wagner or
De Koven to be quite frank with you, I am
a poor hand at music composition; yet I
fancy that I can express the divers ways of
returning thanks in this wise :
American French English
-<s*- ~ey-
Thank d } you.
you. Mer- Mon-sieur. Thank
The "thank you" of the American and of
the Frenchman may be hypocritical, but it
sounds honest; the " thank you " of the
English tradesman bears in its very perfunc-
tory intonation the proof of its utter hollow-
ness.
The task of enumerating the methods
practised by these curious people in this
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island to mulct you of your pennies is too
big a one for me to attempt upon the scale
which their number and their ingenuity
would seem to demand. The government
itself not only countenances beggary, but
actually practises extortion. The practice
of imposing and collecting a fine on over-
weight letters is a meanness which no pro-
gressive folk would tolerate. But the most
outrageous evil is that which obtains during
the Christmas holidays, when government
and municipal employees are suffered to go
about extorting sums of money from the
individual public. Every letter-carrier has
to render an account of the moneys thus ex-
torted by him, and the grand total is divided
among the men in the service, even the Post-
master-General coming in for his share
of this picturesque addition-division-and-si-
lence booty.
Yet, when you come to study the whole
situation here calmly and dispassionately,
can you blame these wretched little crea-
tures who hasten to open your cab door
for you and stand waiting with an obse-
quious "me hid" for your grateful penny?
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Can you wonder at the spirit and practice of
beggary that certainly degrades every sense
of manhood in this island ?
What else can be expected of the subject
when the ruler sets an example which justi-
fies beggary and extortion ?
Her Majesty the Queen has enormous
wealth; she is perhaps the richest individ-
ual in all Europe, and her enormous riches
have been contributed largely by the people
over whom she rules. For fifty years this
queen has practically been a beggar; when
in that period has she not been a sup-
pliant for more, and always more, and
more? Abundantly able to provide for
her children and for her grandchildren out
of her private store, she has religiously re-
fused to do so and has as religiously called
upon her people to provide her with money
wherewith to pay for dowries, weddings,
funerals, equipages, households, pensions,
etc. Here we find Dean Swift's epigram
inverted, for here the big fleas have big-
ger fleas to bite 'em, " and so proceed, ad
infinitum."
So, on the whole, you will perhaps agree
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with me when I say that the little beggars
and petty beggaries of England would seem
(however annoying) to be justified by the
shining example of mendicant and miserly
royalty.
April 7, 1890
227
A VIRGILIAN PICNIC
Chloe, beauteous maiden, come,
And here, within the flowery shade,
Enjoy with me the tuneful hum
Of bees that swarm throughout the glade.
Upon the velvet moss reclining,
And with thy murmurings in mine ear,
What thought have I of love's repining ?
So come, sweet Chloe, rest thee here.
"Nay, Cory don; I fear, alack!
The ants would clamber up my back/*
" Ah, Chloe, here amongst the flow'rs,
While linnets coo in vines above,
How sweet to dream away the hours,
Or weave fair sonnets to my love !
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A zephyr, coming to delight me,
Breathes in mine ear a soothing tone,
And tells me Chloe shall requite me,
And so I smile as eke I prone/'
''Rise, Corydon! I prithee rise!
You 're proning on the custard-pies."
July 31, 1884
229
AN ILLINOIS WAR-SONG
COME, let us quaff a stirrup-cup
To Virtue undismayed.
Fill, comrades, fill your glasses up
With sparkling Lemonade!
Here J s death to Whisky, Wine, and Beer,
To Brandy, Gin, and Rum!
We have a million voters here
A million more will come.
We 'II pulverize the Liquor pow'r,
With all its odious jobs,
Until the Demon Drink shall cow'r
Beneath the sword of Hobbs!
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The sale of cocktail, punch, and sling,
We are resolved, must stop.
As substitute therefor we bring
The fragrant Ginger-pop ;
Or else, perchance, refreshing Mead,
Or Soda-water cool:
But Liquor is a fiend indeed
We don't intend shall rule.
Oh, 't is a thief that steals our wits
And all our manhood robs;
So we propose to give it fits
With gallant Brother Hobbs !
So let us quaff a stirrup-cup
Before we join the raid.
Fill, comrades, fill your glasses up
With sparkling Lemonade!
August 6 } 1884
231
THOMAS A. HENDRICKS'S APPEAL
HOW infamous that men should raise
The foul and bitter lie
That in the old secession days,
When din of war was high,
I dealt in traitorous sneer and brag
And did not dare to go
To battle for my country's flag
Against the rebel foe !
Who was it for the Stripes and Stars
Risked fortune, fame, and life?
Who bore away the purple scars
Of many a bloody strife ?
Who was it led the patriot band
And held the flag on high?
Ay, tell me truly, if you can
Who was it, if not I ?
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At Vicksburg, braving sword and shell,
I gloried in the fray
Till finally I fainting fell
With one leg shot away;
But on to Corinth's ghastly field
I hastened to imbrue,
And did not hesitate to yield
A paltry arm or two !
And when with Sherman to the sea
Our gallant army cross'd,
The rebel bullets followed me
Another leg I lost;
But still I gladly drained the cup
Of deep misfortune's harm,
And down at Gettysburg gave up
Another leg and arm!
So, gallant boys who wore the blue
Through all that dismal tide,
By all those bloody days we knew
When battling side by side,
Choke off the hideous lying throats
These slanders issue from
And next November cast your vote
For patriotic Tom !
August 8 f 1884
333
THE EXPLORER'S WOOING
OH, come with me to the arctic seas
Where the blizzards and icebergs
grow,
And dally awhile with the polar breeze
In the land of the Esquimau.
We will fish for seal and the great white
bears
In their caves on the frozen shores ;
We will spread our nets in the frigid lairs
Of the walrus that snorts and roars.
When the rest of creation swoons with heat
All pleasant and chipper we '11 be ;
T would be hard to find a summer retreat
As cool as the arctic sea.
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We will ramble along in some snowy glade
With never a sultry sigh,
Or loll at ease in the grateful shade
Of an iceberg four miles high.
So come with me to the arctic pole
To the land of the walrus and bear,
Where the glaciers wave and the blizzards
roll,
And victuals are frequently rare.
You are plump and fat with such a mate
In my iceberg I would dwell,
In the pleasing hope I could baffle fate
By eating you au natureL
September } } 1884
THE AHKOOND OF SWAT
the writer has written with all
of his might
W HEN
VV ofhi
Of Blaine and of Cleveland a column or
more,
And the editor happens along in the night
(As he generally does betwixt midnight
and four)
And kills all the stuff that that writer has
writ,
And calls for more copy at once, on the
spot
There is none for the writer to turn on and
hit
But that distant old party, the Ahkoond
of Swat.
236
SHARPS AND FLATS
Now the Ahkoond of Swat is a vague sort
of man
Who lives in a country far over the
sea;
Pray tell me, good reader, if tell me you
can,
What 's the Ahkoond of Swat to you
folks or to me ?
Yet when one must be careful, conservative,
too,
Since the canvass is getting unpleasantly
hot,
If we must abuse some let us haste to
imbrue
With that foreign old bloomer, the Ah-
koond of Swat!
Yet why should we poke this insipid old
king,
Who lives in the land of the tiger and
cane,
Since the talk we might make on the dotard
can't bring
The sweet satisfaction of a Cleveland or
Elaine ?
237
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A plague on these politics, statesmen, and
all
Who conspire to embarrass the editor's
lot;
And a plague on the man, we implore, who
will call
On a fellow to write of the Ahkoond of
Swat!
But vain is this fuming, this frenzy, this
storm
The printers care naught for this protest
or that;
A long, dreadful hollow appears in the
"form"
And it 's copy they want, with a pref-
rence for "fat"
So here 's to our friend who 's so handy in
need,
Whose useful acquaintance too soon is
forgot
That distant old party and senile old seed,
The loathsome and pestilent Ahkoond of
Swat!
September 19, 1884
238
A PLEA FOR THE CLASSICS
A BOSTON gentleman declares,
By all the gods above, below,
That our degenerate sons and heirs
Must let their Greek and Latin go !
Forbid/ O Fate, we loud implore,
A dispensation harsh as that;
What! wipe away the sweets of yore;
The dear "Amo, amas, amat"?
The sweetest hour the student knows
Is not when poring over French,
Or twisted in Teutonic throes,
Upon a hard collegiate bench ;
T is when on roots and kais and gars
He feeds his soul and feels it glow,
Or when his mind transcends the stars
With "Zoa mou, sas agapo"!
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So give our bright, ambitious boys
An inkling of these pleasures, too
A little smattering of the joys
Their dead and buried fathers knew;
And let them sing while glorying that
Their sires so sang, long years ago
The songs "Amo, amas, amat,"
And ftf Zoa mou, sas agapo"!
September 23, 1884
240
THE SECRET OF THE SPHINX
UPON the hot Egyptian sands,
Beneath the lurid, blistering skies,
With stolid face and fireless eyes
The Sphinx in sombre grandeur stands.
Within that doleful desert place,
By desolation's doom oppress'd,
No sweet emotion fills her breast
No smile illumes the Sphinx's face.
They say that many years ago
A Roman pretor left his home,
Resolved to go from Rome to roam
A Roman roamin' to and fro.
This pretor happened, so they say,
To meet a humorist, whose name
Was heralded on wings of fame
Through Boston leagues and leagues away.
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They roamed together far and wide
The pretor and the Boston wit
Till finally one night they lit
In Egypt by the Sphinx's side.
"Now tell me, ere we go to bed
Within our tents, some funny tale;
With humorous anecdote regale
My jaded soul/' the pretor said.
The Sphinx was then as fair a bit
Of female flesh as you could find,
And, womanlike, she had a mind
For stories that partook of wit.
She, therefore, smiling bent her ear
To hear the Massachusetts joke
The famous Boston humorist spoke
Unto the pretor, listening near.
What was the joke we do not know
The ancient hist' ries do not state,
Nor legendary lore relate,
Nor hieroglyphic tablets show ;
But since that Boston wit beguiled
The Roman pretor with the joke
Which centuries ago was spoke,
The hapless Sphinx has never smiled.
September 23 , 1884
242
FANCHON THE CRICKET
MY grandsire, years and years ago,
In round old English used to praise
Sweet Maggie Mitchell's pretty ways
And her fair face that charmed him so.
Her tuneful voice and curly hair,
Her coquetry and subtle art
Ensnared my grandsire's willing heart
And ever reigned supremely there.
In time my father felt the force
Of cunning Maggie Mitchell's smiles,
And, dazzled by her thousand wiles,
He sang her glories too, of course.
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Quite natural, then, it was that I
Of such a sire and grandsire, too
When this dear sprite first met my view
Should learn to rhapsodize and sigh.
And now my boy of tender age
Indites a sonnet to the curl
Of this most fascinating girl
That ever romped the mimic stage!
O prototype of girlhood truth,
Of girlhood glee and girlhood prank,
By what good fortune hast thou drank
The waters of eternal youth ?
September 26, 1884
244
NOVEMBER
THE wold is drear and the sedges sere,
And gray is the autumn sky,
And sorrows roll through my riven soul
As lonely I sit and sigh
"Good-by"
To the goose-birds as they fly.
With his weird wishbone to the temperate
zone
Came the goose-bird in the spring;
And he built his nest in the glorious west,
And sat on a snag to sing,
Sweet thing!
Or flap his beautiful wing.
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But the boom of the blast has corne at last
To the goose-bird on the lea,
And the succulent thing, with shivering
wing,
Flies down to a southern sea.
Ah me,
That such separation should be!
But it 's always so in this world of woe:
The things that gladden our eye
Are the surest to go to the bugs, and so
We can only wearily sigh
"Good-by"
To the goose-birds as they fly.
November 5, 1884
246
PARLEZ-VOUS FRANAIS?
E old man sits in veiled by gloom,
1 His bosom heaves with dire dismay ;
For in that editorial room
There booms no presidential boom,
And folks no longer come that way
To whisper, " Parlez-vous Frampais?"
Gone is the time he hoped to be
A diplomat in Paris gay
When, far across the briny sea,
The festive gamins, tres jolis,
And fair grisettes dtcolletees
Should murmur, "Parlez-vous Fran-
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So let the poor old Joseph rest
And let him pine his life away ;
Nor vex that journalistic breath
Which by a hopeless grief 's distressed
The hopeless grief he never may
Respond to " Parlez-vous Franfais ?"
November io } 1884
248
'GEE SWEE ZAMER1CANE"
WHY should I pine and languish so ?
Why should I droop and sigh ?
Why should my soul be bowed in woe,
As weary days go by ?
Why should I drown in sorrow's sea,
When, through the surf of pain,
This sweet salvation comes to me :
" Gee swee Zamericane! "
I thought diplomacy my forte,
And yearned for deeds of state
Amid the solemn pomps of court
In monarchies effete;
And most I hankered to abide
Hard by the river Seine,
Where I could say, with swelling pride,
" Gee swee Zamericane! "
249
SHARPS AND FLATS
And this is why I made the flop
Which Reid and Halstead made,
And this is why I took a drop
On matters of free trade;
I ate my words of '76,
And boomed the " rascal" Elaine,
And played a thousand Jingo tricks
" Gee swee Zamericane! "
The die is cast, the boom is o'er,
And Blaine is beaten bad
The which is why I 'm feeling sore,
And, likewise, very mad;
For, after all this harrowing strife,
I 'm likely to remain
What I have been through all my life
" Gee swee Zamericane! "
November 1 1, 1884
250
CHRISTMAS
MY little child comes to my knee
And tugging pleads that he may climb
Into my lap to hear me tell
The Christmas tale he loves so well
A tale my mother told to me,
Beginning "Once upon a time."
It is a tale of skies that rang
With angel rhapsodies sublime ;
Of that great host, serene and white,
The shepherds saw one winter night;
And of the glorious stars that sang
An anthem, once upon a time.
This story of the hallowed years
Tells of the sacrifice sublime
Of One who prayed alone and wept
While his awearied followers slept
And how his blood and Mary's tears
Commingled, once upon a time.
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SHARPS AND FLATS
And now my darling at my side
And echoes of the distant clime
Bring that sweet story back to me
Of Bethlehem and Calvary,
And of the gentle Christ that died
For sinners, once upon a time.
The mighty deeds that men have told
In ponderous tomes or fluent rhyme,
Like misty shadows fade away ;
But this sweet story bides for aye,
And, like the stars that sang of old,
We sing of " Once upon a time."
December i f 1884
252
CHICAGO WEATHER
TO-DAY, fair Thisbe, winsome girl!
Strays o'er the meads where daisies
blow,
Or, ling'ring where the brooklets purl,
Laves in the cool, refreshing flow.
To-morrow, Thisbe, with a host
Of amorous suitors in her train,
Comes like a goddess forth to coast
Or skate upon the frozen main.
To-day, sweet posies mark her track,
While birds sing gayly in the trees ;
To-morrow morn, her sealskin sack
Defies the piping polar breeze.
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SHARPS AND FLATS
So Doris is to-day enthused
By Thisbe's soft, responsive sighs,
And on the morrow is confused
By Thisbe's cold, repellent eyes.
December 6, 1884
