THE EARLY HOLLAND PERIOD.
When, near the close of the year 1870, Dr. J. G. Holland started
_Scribner’s Monthly_, American letters entered upon a new stage of
its development. The literary field was then occupied by the poets,
humorists, and essayists of the Pfaff school, dwelling under the
perpetual shadow of the Bonnerian maxims, and the occasional one of
pecuniary depression; also a few men of the James Parton type who knew
not Bohemia, and women writers like Mrs. Dallas.
It must be remembered that at this time no signatures were allowed in
the Harpers’ publications, and the matter published in the _Monthly_
was either of foreign manufacture or else prepared in the Franklin
Square Foundry by poets employed by the week at fair but not exorbitant
wages. The _Ledger_ principles were observed here to a certain extent,
but were not enforced as rigidly as they were by Mr. Bonner in his
own establishment. I think, myself, that the Pfaff poets were more
directly accountable for the introduction of the Bonnerian maxims than
were the Harpers themselves, because they had become so accustomed to
eliminate stepmothers, sisters, fast trotters, and other objectionable
features from their work that they had come to regard them as quite as
much outside the pale of ordinary fiction as if they were dwellers on
the planet Mars. Moreover a poem or story constructed on the Bonner
plan might, if rejected by the Harpers, still prove acceptable to the
_Ledger_.
From the very first Dr. Holland showed a commendable purpose to raise
the tone of the new _Monthly_ above that of Mr. Bonner’s story-paper,
and although we see distinct evidences, in his earlier numbers, of
_Ledger_ influences, it was not long before a gradual emancipation from
the strictest and most literal interpretation of Mr. Bonner’s iron-clad
rules began. Horses soon began to strike a swifter gait in the serial
stories, and in “Wilfred Cumbermede” one of these quadrupeds has the
hardihood to throw its rider over its head. But that would never have
happened if George Macdonald had been trained in the modern _Ledger_
school of fiction.
Looking over these old numbers in the light of ripened knowledge,
I can see Dr. Holland slowly groping his way along an untrodden
pathway leading from the _Ledger_ office to the broad fields of
literature, where our magazine barons hold undisputed sway. That he
kept a watchful eye on his rural subscribers is shown by an extended
illustrated article on Fairmount Park, and another one descriptive
of Philadelphia--subjects which possess about as much interest for
metropolitan readers as that masterpiece of bucolic romance, _The
Opening of a Chestnut Burr_. Among the writers whose names appear in
these numbers are Alice Cary, Edward Eggleston, J. T. Headley, and
Washington Gladden--all graduates or disciples of the great _Ledger_
school.
Of these I consider Washington Gladden entitled to the highest rank
as an exponent of mediocrity. Indeed, after a careful survey of the
magazine barons’ wide domain, I must award the palm of merit to this
popular manufacturer of literary wares for even mediocrity, unspoiled
by the slightest sense of humor. It is that very lack of humor which
has brought success to many a man whose mission in life has been to
write for the great, simple-minded public. The poets and humorists of
the Jack Moran school, who were compelled to descend to the commonplace
and the stupid because of their temporal necessities, never really
became thorough masters of the divine art of writing mediocrity,
because their sense of the ludicrous brought them to a halt before
those Alpine heights of tedious imbecility which people like E. P. Roe
and Washington Gladden scaled with unblanched cheeks.
But to return to Washington Gladden. If any of the large and thoughtful
circle whom I have the honor to address have never read a story from
this gentleman’s pen, entitled _The Christian League of Connecticut_,
I implore them to seek out the numbers of the _Century_ in which it
appeared about a decade ago, and sit down to the enjoyment of one of
the finest specimens of unconscious humor that our generation has
known.
This story deals with a league composed of all the Protestant churches
in a small Connecticut town, for the promotion of large-hearted
geniality and mutual aid in the work of evangelization. It contains a
description of a scene in the Methodist Church at the moment when it
seems that the congregation will be unable to raise the debt which has
long weighed them down. They are about to abandon the attempt, when
the other churches in the town learn of their distress and proceed
to help them out. The First Congregational Church pledges $1675, the
Universalist Church sends $500, and finally the Second Congregational
Church raises the ante to $1810, while the people burst forth into
shouts of “Hallelujah!” and fervent songs of praise.
If any one were to write a wild burlesque on the ecclesiastical methods
in vogue in Connecticut he would fall far short of Mr. Gladden’s
account of this extraordinary meeting. The New England country
parson who gets his salary regularly is a fortunate man, and as to
subscriptions for the church, they are usually collected with the aid
of a stomach-pump. I have never yet heard of a man giving anything
toward any church save that in which he had a pew, but I do remember
the scene which ensued one morning in a little country meeting-house,
when the richest man in the congregation relaxed his grip on three
hundred dollars--and there was a string tied to every bill, too.
Another chapter of _The Christian League_ tells us how Judge Beeswax
returned to his native village from the city in which he had grown
wealthy, and generously gave a thousand dollars to save the old church,
in which he had worshiped as a boy, from being sold for old timber.
And this _dénouement_ bears such a wonderful resemblance to that in
eight of the sixteen “Two Brothers” poems that I am half inclined to
suspect that in his younger days Mr. Gladden was one of the poets
who turned up at the _Ledger_ office every Friday and waited for the
verdict.
And I am sure that Dr. Holland had been, in his time, a close student
of the Bonnerian maxims, and especially of that which I have already
alluded to--“In real life, yes; but not in the _New York Ledger_!” To
which might be added, “nor in the old _Scribner’s_ either.” All through
the Holland period we find evidences of the deep hold that this maxim
had taken on the minds of both writers and barons.
For example, I believe that it is pretty well known that extreme
prohibition measures bring about the most degrading and terrible
forms of drunkenness known outside of Liverpool, and that of all the
prohibitory statutes the Maine Liquor Law is about the worst. That
is the case in real life, but not in _Scribner’s Monthly_, for in
the year 1877--Dr. Holland being then the dominant figure in American
letters--we find in an article on the Rangeley Lakes the following
paragraph: “The Maine Liquor Law has certainly put an end to this
_régime_ (a barrel of rum to a barrel of beans), and with it have
disappeared to a very great extent drunkenness, profanity, and kindred
vices.”
Yes, my carping friend, we all know that the sentence which I have
quoted is ridiculously untrue, and entirely out of place in a very
interesting article on trout-fishing, but there was just as good a
reason for printing it as there was for publishing _The Christian
League of Connecticut_. That paragraph was well calculated to please
folks of the variety that swooped down upon New York thirty thousand
strong, under the banner of the Christian Endeavor Society.
I do not know why it is, but people of this class fairly revel in
humbug of every description, and nothing pleases them more than to
read about the beneficent influences of prohibitory legislation, or to
swallow once more the old Anglo-Saxon lie about Albion’s virtue and
the wickedness of France--and if you would like to see that miserable
fallacy whacked in the head read Mr. Brownell’s _French Traits_--or
even to gloat over Mr. Gladden’s story of the princely generosity that
prevails in the religious circles of New England.
These Christian Endeavor people are a mystery to me. More than thirty
thousand of them took possession of our city, and there was one
erring brother among them who fell by the wayside, and was locked up
in the House of Detention, charged with having been robbed of his
return-ticket and about two hundred dollars in money. He was confined
nearly a week, and during that time not one of his fellow Christian
Endeavorers held out a helping hand to him. If the unfortunate man had
come on from the West to attend a convention of sneak-thieves he would
have fared better than he did.
“But what have the Christian Endeavorers to do with literature?”
asks my doubting and critical friend. They have a great deal to do
with literature just now, more’s the pity. I did not drag them into
these pages by the neck and ears simply to say what I thought of them
(although I am not sorry to do that), but to give my audience an idea
of one of the elements--and it is a large one, too--to which our
magazine publishers are obliged to cater, if they wish to hold their
own in point of circulation.
It is because of just such people as these that our periodical
literature is constantly defaced by matter of the sort that I have
mentioned, and we are all the time saying, just as Bonner said to the
Pfaff poet, “It’s one thing in real life, but another in _Harper’s_ and
the _Century_.” So it happens that intelligent human beings must have
their nostrils assailed with rubbish about the Maine Liquor Law putting
a stop to profanity, because, forsooth, it is supposed to tickle the
palates of a lot of sniveling humbugs, who are so busy with prayers and
psalm-singing that they have not time to perform the commonest acts of
decency and charity for one of their own kith and kin.
Understand me, I am not blaming the barons for putting stuff of this
sort into their publications. If I were the proprietor of a great
magazine I would have a picture of Robert Bonner over my desk, and the
walls of my editorial rooms and business offices should be hung with
the great _Ledger_ maxims. There are a thousand mediocre people in this
country to where there are five of superior intelligence; but, after
all, the five have _some_ rights that magazine barons are bound to
respect, and I think that about Christmas-time every year some little
attention ought to be shown them.