own wretched versions in all directions, thus (as Wills would say)
anticipating and glutting "the market." I registered one play as the
property of Ticknor and Fields, American citizens. But, besides that the
law on the point is extremely doubtful, the manager of the Museum
Theatre, Boston, instantly announced his version. (You may suppose what
it is and how it is done, when I tell you that it was playing within ten
days of the arrival out of the Christmas number.) Thereupon, Ticknor and
Fields gave him notice that he mustn't play it. Unto which he replied,
that he meant to play it and would play it. Of course he knew very well
that if an injunction were applied for against him, there would be an
immediate howl against my persecution of an innocent, and he played it.
Then the noble host of pirates rushed in, and it is being done, in some
mangled form or other, everywhere.
It touches me to read what you write of your poor mother. But, of
course, at her age, each winter counts heavily. Do give her my love, and
tell her that I asked you about her.
I am going on here at the same great rate, but am always counting the
days that lie between me and home. I got through the first fourth of my
readings on Friday, January 3rd. I leave for two readings at
Philadelphia this evening.
Being at Boston last Sunday, I took it into my head to go over the
medical school, and survey the holes and corners in which that
extraordinary murder was done by Webster. There was the
furnace--stinking horribly, as if the dismembered pieces were still
inside it--and there are all the grim spouts, and sinks, and chemical
appliances, and what not. At dinner, afterwards, Longfellow told me a
terrific story. He dined with Webster within a year of the murder, one
of a party of ten or twelve. As they sat at their wine, Webster suddenly
ordered the lights to be turned out, and a bowl of some burning mineral
to be placed on the table, that the guests might see how ghostly it made
them look. As each man stared at all the rest in the weird light, all
were horrified to see Webster _with a rope round his neck_, holding it
up, over the bowl, with his head jerked on one side, and his tongue
lolled out, representing a man being hanged!
Poking into his life and character, I find (what I would have staked my
head upon) that he was always a cruel man.
So no more at present from,
My dear Wilkie, yours ever affectionately.
[Sidenote: Miss Hogarth.]
WESTMINSTER HOTEL, NEW YORK, _Sunday, Jan. 12th, 1868._
As I am off to Philadelphia this evening, I may as well post my letter
here. I have scarcely a word of news. My cold steadily refuses to leave
me; but otherwise I am as right as one can hope to be under this heavy
work. My New York readings are over (except four farewell nights in
April), and I look forward to the relief of being out of my hardest
hall. Last Friday night, though it was only "Nickleby" and "Boots," I
was again dead beat at the end, and was once more laid upon a sofa. But
the faintness went off after a little while. We have now cold, bright,
frosty weather, without snow--the best weather for me.
Having been in great trepidation about the play, I am correspondingly
elated by the belief that it really _is_ a success. No doubt the
unnecessary explanations will have been taken out, and the flatness of
the last act fetched up. At some points I could have done wonders to it,
in the way of screwing it up sharply and picturesquely, if I could have
rehearsed it. Your account of the first night interested me immensely,
but I was afraid to open the letter until Dolby rushed in with the
opened _Times_.
On Wednesday I come back here for my four church readings at Brooklyn.
Each evening an enormous ferryboat will convey me and my state carriage
(not to mention half-a-dozen waggons, and any number of people, and a
few score of horses) across the river, and will bring me back again. The
sale of tickets there was an amazing scene. The noble army of
speculators are now furnished (this is literally true, and I am quite
serious), each man with a straw mattress, a little bag of bread and
meat, two blankets, and a bottle of whisky. With this outfit _they lie
down in line on the pavement_ the whole night before the tickets are
sold, generally taking up their position at about ten. It being severely
cold at Brooklyn, they made an immense bonfire in the street--a narrow
street of wooden houses!--which the police turned out to extinguish. A
general fight then took place, out of which the people farthest off in
the line rushed bleeding when they saw a chance of displacing others
near the door, and put their mattresses in those places, and then held
on by the iron rails. At eight in the morning Dolby appeared with the
tickets in a portmanteau. He was immediately saluted with a roar of
"Halloa, Dolby! So Charley has let you have the carriage, has he, Dolby!
How is he, Dolby! Don't drop the tickets, Dolby! Look alive, Dolby!"
etc. etc. etc., in the midst of which he proceeded to business, and
concluded (as usual) by giving universal dissatisfaction.
He is now going off upon a little journey "to look over the ground and
cut back again." This little journey (to Chicago) is fifteen hundred
miles on end, by railway, and back again!
We have an excellent gasman, who is well up to that department. We have
enlarged the large staff by another clerk, yet even now the preparation
of such an immense number of new tickets constantly, and the keeping and
checking of the accounts, keep them hard at it. And they get so oddly
divided! Kelly is at Philadelphia, another man at Baltimore, two others
are stamping tickets at the top of this house, another is cruising over
New England, and Osgood will come on duty to-morrow (when Dolby starts
off) to pick me up after the reading, and take me to the hotel, and
mount guard over me, and bring me back here. You see that even such
wretched domesticity as Dolby and self by a fireside is broken up under
these conditions.
Dolby has been twice poisoned, and Osgood once. Morgan's sharpness has
discovered the cause. When the snow is deep upon the ground, and the
partridges cannot get their usual food, they eat something (I don't know
what, if anybody does) which does not poison _them_, but which poisons
the people who eat them. The symptoms, which last some twelve hours, are
violent sickness, cold perspiration, and the formation of some
detestable mucus in the stomach. You may infer that partridges have been
banished from our bill of fare. The appearance of our sufferers was
lamentable in the extreme.
Did I tell you that the severity of the weather, and the heat of the
intolerable furnaces, dry the hair and break the nails of strangers?
There is not a complete nail in the whole British suite, and my hair
cracks again when I brush it. (I am losing my hair with great rapidity,
and what I don't lose is getting very grey.)
The _Cuba_ will bring this. She has a jolly new captain--Moody, of the
_Java_--and her people rushed into the reading, the other night,
captain-headed, as if I were their peculiar property. Please God I shall
come home in her, in my old cabin; leaving here on the 22nd of April,
and finishing my eighty-fourth reading on the previous night! It is
likely enough that I shall read and go straight on board.
I think this is all my poor stock of intelligence. By-the-bye, on the
last Sunday in the old year, I lost my old year's pocket-book, "which,"
as Mr. Pepys would add, "do trouble me mightily." Give me Katie's new
address; I haven't got it.
[Sidenote: Miss Dickens.]
PHILADELPHIA, _Monday, Jan. 13th, 1868._
I write you this note, a day later than your aunt's, not because I have
anything to add to the little I have told her, but because you may like
to have it.
We arrived here last night towards twelve o'clock, more than an hour
after our time. This is one of the immense American hotels (it is called
the Continental); but I find myself just as quiet here as elsewhere.
Everything is very good indeed, the waiter is German, and the greater
part of the house servants seem to be coloured people. The town is very
clean, and the day as blue and bright as a fine Italian day. But it
freezes very hard. All the tickets being sold here for six nights (three
visits of two nights each), the suite complain of want of excitement
already, having been here ten hours! Mr. and Mrs. Barney Williams, with
a couple of servants, and a pretty little child-daughter, were in the
train each night, and I talked with them a good deal. They are reported
to have made an enormous fortune by acting among the Californian
gold-diggers. My cold is no better, for the cars are so intolerably hot,
that I was often obliged to go and stand upon the break outside, and
then the frosty air was biting indeed. The great man of this place is
one Mr. Childs, a newspaper proprietor, and he is so exactly like Mr.
Esse in all conceivable respects except being an inch or so taller, that
I was quite confounded when I saw him waiting for me at the station
(always called depot here) with his carriage. During the last two or
three days, Dolby and I have been making up accounts, which are
excellently kept by Mr. Osgood, and I find them amazing, quite, in their
results.
I was very much interested in the home accounts of Christmas Day. I
think I have already mentioned that we were in very low spirits on that
day. I began to be unwell with my cold that morning, and a long day's
travel did not mend the matter. We scarcely spoke (except when we ate
our lunch), and sat dolefully staring out of window. I had a few
affectionate words from Chorley, dated from my room, on Christmas
morning, and will write him, probably by this mail, a brief
acknowledgment. I find it necessary (so oppressed am I with this
American catarrh, as they call it) to dine at three o'clock instead of
four, that I may have more time to get voice, so that the days are cut
short, and letter-writing is not easy.
My best love to Katie, and to Charley, and to our Charley, and to all
friends. If I could only get to the point of being able to hold my head
up and dispense with my pocket-handkerchief for five minutes, I should
be all right.
[Sidenote: Mr. Charles Dickens.]
WESTMINSTER HOTEL, IRVING PLACE, NEW YORK,
_Wednesday, Jan. 15th, 1868._
MY DEAR CHARLEY,
Finding your letter here this afternoon on my return from Philadelphia
(where I have been reading two nights), I take advantage of a spare
half-hour in which to answer it at once, though it will not leave here
until Saturday. I had previously heard of the play, and had _The Times_.
It was a great relief and delight to me, for I had no confidence in its
success; being reduced to the confines of despair by its length. If I
could have rehearsed it, I should have taken the best part of an hour
out of it. Fechter must be very fine, and I should greatly like to see
him play the part.
I have not been very well generally, and am oppressed (and I begin to
think that I probably shall be until I leave) by a true American cold,
which I hope, for the comfort of human nature, may be peculiar to only
one of the four quarters of the world. The work, too, is very severe.
But I am going on at the same tremendous rate everywhere. The staff,
too, has had to be enlarged. Dolby was at Baltimore yesterday, is at
Washington to-day, and will come back in the night, and start away again
on Friday. We find it absolutely necessary for him to go on ahead. We
have not printed or posted a single bill here, and have just sold ninety
pounds' worth of paper we had got ready for bills. In such a rush a
short newspaper advertisement is all we want. "Doctor Marigold" made a
great hit here, and is looked forward to at Boston with especial
interest. I go to Boston for another fortnight, on end, the 24th of
February. The railway journeys distress me greatly. I get out into the
open air (upon the break), and it snows and blows, and the train bumps,
and the steam flies at me, until I am driven in again.
I have finished here (except four farewell nights in April), and begin
four nights at Brooklyn, on the opposite side of the river, to-night;
and thus oscillate between Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington, and
then cut into New England, and so work my way back to Boston for a
fortnight, after which come Chicago, Cincinnati, Detroit and Cleveland,
and Buffalo, and then Philadelphia, Boston, and New York farewells. I
will not pass my original bound of eighty-four readings in all. My mind
was made up as to that long ago. It will be quite enough. Chicago is
some fifteen hundred miles from here. What with travelling, and getting
ready for reading, and reading, the days are pretty fully occupied. Not
the less so because I rest very indifferently at night.
The people are exceedingly kind and considerate, and desire to be most
hospitable besides. But I cannot accept hospitality, and never go out,
except at Boston, or I should not be fit for the labour. If Dolby holds
out well to the last it will be a triumph, for he has to see everybody,
drink with everybody, sell all the tickets, take all the blame, and go
beforehand to all the places on the list. I shall not see him after
to-night for ten days or a fortnight, and he will be perpetually on the
road during the interval. When he leaves me, Osgood, a partner in
Ticknor and Fields' publishing firm, mounts guard over me, and has to go
into the hall from the platform door every night, and see how the public
are seating themselves. It is very odd to see how hard he finds it to
look a couple of thousand people in the face, on which head, by-the-bye,
I notice the papers to take "Mr. Dickens's extraordinary composure"
(their great phrase) rather ill, and on the whole to imply that it would
be taken as a suitable compliment if I would stagger on to the platform
and instantly drop, overpowered by the spectacle before me.
Dinner is announced (by Scott, with a stiff neck and a sore throat), and
I must break off with love to Bessie and the incipient Wenerableses. You
will be glad to hear of your distinguished parent that Philadelphia has
discovered that "he is not like the descriptions we have read of him at
the little red desk. He is not at all foppish in appearance. He wears a
heavy moustache and a Vandyke beard, and looks like a well-to-do
Philadelphian gentleman."
Ever, my dear Charley, your affectionate Father.
P.S.--Your paper is remarkably good. There is not the least doubt that
you can write constantly for A. Y. R. I am very pleased with it.
[Sidenote: Miss Dickens.]
WESTMINSTER HOTEL, NEW YORK, _Friday, Jan, 18th, 1868._
This will be but a very short report, as I must get out for a little
exercise before dinner.
My "true American catarrh" (the people seem to have a national pride in
it) sticks to me, but I am otherwise well. I began my church readings
last night, and it was very odd to see the pews crammed full of people,
all in a broad roar at the "Carol" and "Trial."
Best love to all. I have written Charley a few lines by this mail, and
also Chorley.
[Sidenote: Miss Hogarth.]
WESTMINSTER HOTEL, NEW YORK, _Tuesday, Jan. 21st, 1868._
I finished my church to-night. It is Mrs. Stowe's brother's, and a most
wonderful place to speak in. We had it enormously full last night
("Marigold" and "Trial"), but it scarcely required an effort. Mr. Ward
Beecher (Mrs. Stowe's brother's name) being present in his pew. I sent
to invite him to come round before he left; and I found him to be an
unostentatious, straightforward, and agreeable fellow.
My cold sticks to me, and I can scarcely exaggerate what I sometimes
undergo from sleeplessness. The day before yesterday I could get no rest
until morning, and could not get up before twelve. This morning the
same. I rarely take any breakfast but an egg and a cup of tea, not even
toast or bread-and-butter. My dinner at three, and a little quail or
some such light thing when I come home at night, is my daily fare. At
the Hall I have established the custom of taking an egg beaten up in
sherry before going in, and another between the parts. I think that
pulls me up; at all events, I have since had no return of faintness.
As the men work very hard, and always with their hearts cheerfully in
the business, I cram them into and outside of the carriage, to bring
them back from Brooklyn with me. The other night, Scott (with a
portmanteau across his knees and a wideawake hat low down upon his nose)
told me that he had presented himself for admission in the circus (as
good as Franconi's, by-the-bye), and had been refused. "The only
theayter," he said in a melancholy way, "as I was ever in my life turned
from the door of." Says Kelly: "There must have been some mistake,
Scott, because George and me went, and we said, 'Mr. Dickens's staff,'
and they passed us to the best seats in the house. Go again, Scott."
"No, I thank you, Kelly," says Scott, more melancholy than before, "I'm
not a-going to put myself in the position of being refused again. It's
the only theayter as I was ever turned from the door of, and it shan't
be done twice. But it's a beastly country!" "Scott," interposed Majesty,
"don't you express your opinions about the country." "No, sir," says
Scott, "I never do, please, sir, but when you are turned from the door
of the only theayter you was ever turned from, sir, and when the beasts
in railway cars spits tobacco over your boots, you (privately) find
yourself in a beastly country."
I expect shortly to get myself snowed up on some railway or other, for
it is snowing hard now, and I begin to move to-morrow. There is so much
floating ice in the river that we are obliged to leave a pretty wide
margin of time for getting over the ferry to read. The dinner is coming
in, and I must leave off.
[Sidenote: Miss Dickens.]
PHILADELPHIA, _Thursday, Jan. 23rd, 1868._
When I wrote to your aunt by the last mail, I accidentally omitted to
touch upon the question of helping Anne. So I will begin in this present
writing with reference to her sad position. I think it will be best for
you to be guided by an exact knowledge of her _wants_. Try to ascertain
from herself what means she has, whether her sick husband gets what he
ought to have, whether she is pinched in the articles of necessary
clothing, bedding, or the like of that; add to this intelligence your
own observation of the state of things about her, and supply what she
most wants, and help her where you find the greatest need. The question,
in the case of so old and faithful a servant, is not one of so much or
so little money on my side, but how _most efficiently_ to ease her mind
and help _her_. To do this at once kindly and sensibly is the only
consideration by which you have to be guided. Take _carte blanche_ from
me for all the rest.
My Washington week is the first week in February, beginning on Monday,
3rd. The tickets are sold, and the President is coming, and the chief
members of the Cabinet, and the leaders of parties, and so forth, are
coming; and, as the Holly Tree Boots says: "That's where it is, don't
you see!"
In my Washington doubts I recalled Dolby for conference, and he joined
me yesterday afternoon, and we have been in great discussion ever since
on the possibility of giving up the Far West, and avoiding such immense
distances and fatigues as would be involved in travelling to Chicago and
Cincinnati. We have sketched another tour for the last half of March,
which would be infinitely easier for me, though on the other hand less
profitable, the places and the halls being smaller. The worst of it is,
that everybody one advises with has a monomania respecting Chicago.
"Good heaven, sir," the great Philadelphian authority said to me this
morning, "if you don't read in Chicago, the people will go into fits."
In reference to fatigue, I answered: "Well, I would rather they went
into fits than I did." But he didn't seem to see it at all. ---- alone
constantly writes me: "Don't go to the West; you can get what you want
so much more easily." How we shall finally decide, I don't yet know. My
Brooklyn church has been an immense success, and I found its minister
was a bachelor, a clever, unparsonic, and straightforward man, and a man
with a good knowledge of art into the bargain.
We are not a bit too soon here, for the whole country is beginning to be
stirred and shaken by the presidential election, and trade is
exceedingly depressed, and will be more so. Fanny Kemble lives near this
place, but had gone away a day before my first visit here. _She_ is
going to read in February or March. Du Chaillu has been lecturing out
West about the gorilla, and has been to see me; I saw the Cunard steamer
_Persia_ out in the stream, yesterday, beautifully smart, her flags
flying, all her steam up, and she only waiting for her mails to slip
away. She gave me a horrible touch of home-sickness.
When the 1st of March arrives, and I can say "next month," I shall begin
to grow brighter. A fortnight's reading in Boston, too (last week of
February and first week of March), will help me on gaily, I hope (the
work so far off tells). It is impossible for the people to be more
affectionately attached to a third, I really believe, than Fields and
his wife are to me; and they are a landmark in the prospect.
Dolby sends kindest regards, and wishes it to be known that he has not
been bullied lately. We do _not_ go West at all, but take the easier
plan.
[Sidenote: Miss Hogarth.]
BALTIMORE, _Wednesday, Jan. 29th, 1868._
As I have an hour to spare, before starting to Philadelphia, I begin my
letter this morning. It has been snowing hard for four-and-twenty hours,
though this place is as far south as Valentia in Spain; and Dolby, being
on his way to New York, has a good chance of being snowed up somewhere.
They are a bright responsive people here, and very pleasant to read to.
I have rarely seen so many fine faces in an audience. I read here in a
charming little opera-house built by a society of Germans, quite a
delightful place for the purpose. I stand on the stage, with a drop
curtain down, and my screen before it. The whole scene is very pretty
and complete, and the audience have a "ring" in them that sounds in the
ear. I go from here to Philadelphia to read to-morrow night and Friday,
come through here again on Saturday on my way to Washington, come back
here on Saturday week for two finishing nights, then go to Philadelphia
for two farewells, and so turn my back on the southern part of the
country. Distances and travelling have obliged us to reduce the list of
readings by two, leaving eighty-two in all. Of course we afterwards
discovered that we had finally settled the list on a Friday! I shall be
halfway through it at Washington, of course, on a Friday also, and my
birthday!
Dolby and Osgood, who do the most ridiculous things to keep me in
spirits (I am often very heavy, and rarely sleep much), have decided to
have a walking-match at Boston, on Saturday, February 29th. Beginning
this design in joke, they have become tremendously in earnest, and Dolby
has actually sent home (much to his opponent's terror) for a pair of
seamless socks to walk in. Our men are hugely excited on the subject,
and continually make bets on "the men." Fields and I are to walk out six
miles, and "the men" are to turn and walk round us. Neither of them has
the least idea what twelve miles at a pace is. Being requested by both
to give them "a breather" yesterday, I gave them a stiff one of five
miles over a bad road in the snow, half the distance uphill. I took them
at a pace of four miles and a half an hour, and you never beheld such
objects as they were when we got back; both smoking like factories, and
both obliged to change everything before they could come to dinner. They
have the absurdest ideas of what are tests of walking power, and
continually get up in the maddest manner and see _how high they can
kick_ the wall! The wainscot here, in one place, is scored all over with
their pencil-marks. To see them doing this--Dolby, a big man, and
Osgood, a very little one, is ridiculous beyond description.
PHILADELPHIA, _Same Night._
We came on here through a snowstorm all the way, but up to time. Fanny
Kemble (who begins to read shortly) is coming to "Marigold" and "Trial"
to-morrow night. I have written her a note, telling her that if it will
at all assist _her_ movements to know _mine_, my list is at her
service. Probably I shall see her to-morrow. Tell Mamie (to whom I will
write next), with my love, that I found her letter of the 10th of this
month awaiting me here. The _Siberia_ that brought it is a new Cunarder,
and made an unusually slow passage out. Probably because it would be
dangerous to work new machinery too fast on the Atlantic.
_Thursday, 30th._
My cold still sticks to me. The heat of the railway cars and their
unventilated condition invariably brings it back when I think it going.
This morning my head is as stuffed and heavy as ever! A superb sledge
and four horses have been offered me for a ride, but I am afraid to take
it, lest I should make the "true American catarrh" worse, and should get
hoarse. So I am going to give Osgood another "breather" on foot instead.