CERTAIN THINGS WHICH A CONSCIENTIOUS LITERARY WORKER MAY FIND IN THE
CITY OF NEW YORK.
Let us return to my imaginary young friend from Park Row, to whom I
have referred in a previous chapter, and let us picture him at a small
social gathering in the drawing-room of some clever and charming woman
of fashion, of the kind that assiduously cultivate the society of men
of art and letters because they like to hear the gossip of literature,
the stage, and the studio “at first hand,” if I may use the term.
Our young friend is modest and well-bred, and, moreover, carries with
him a certain breezy and intimate knowledge of the men and events of
the day which fairly entitles him to a place of his own in what ought
to be the most enjoyable of all circles of society. He is delighted
with the young women whom he meets here in what his hostess fondly
hopes will become a _salon_--how many New York women have had a similar
ambition!--and yet he cannot understand why they pay so much attention
to certain gentlemen who are present also, and whom he knows to be of
very small account so far as the arts and letters are concerned.
Young Daubleigh is there, the centre of a breathless group, to whom
he is bewailing the utter lack of all true art sense on the part of
Americans, and the hideousness of New York, which, he declares, offers
absolutely nothing to a true artist. Daubleigh never goes into society
without a pocketful of art phrases, such as “_au premier coup_,”
“he has found his true _métier_,” “the divine art of Velasquez,” and
others of the same sort. Of course he is a great social favorite, and
of course he has very high ideals of his art, and is apt to refer
slightingly to artists who know how to draw as “mere illustrators”--a
form of speech which does not somehow endear him to those who know that
he ought to be at Cooper Union learning the rudiments of his calling.
Another guest, and a favorite one too, is the strangely gifted romancer
who poses as a literary man because he has sold two sonnets and a
short story to one of the magazines, and of whom it is related in an
awestruck whisper that he once went through Mulberry Bend, disguised
with green side-whiskers and under the protection of a Central Office
detective--all this in search of what he calls “local color.”
Our young friend from Park Row spent two hours in Mulberry Bend the
night before in search of a “story” for his paper, and has the
hardihood to say so to the charming young girl beside him, adding that
he felt as safe as if he had been at an organ recital. The next moment
he realizes that he has made a mistake in trying to destroy any of the
glamour that shines from the green whiskers and the detective. The
conversation now turns upon the availability of New York as a field
for the writer of fiction, and is ably sustained by a young gentleman
who is known to be “literary,” although no one can say definitely
what he has written. However, he is literary enough to have a place
in this _salon_, and to take a leading part in the discussions which
go on there. He is very decided in his views regarding literature,
as distinguished from what he calls “mere newspaper scribbling,”
and does not scruple to express his contempt for anything that is
not printed either in a magazine or “between covers,” as he puts
it in his careless, professional fashion. Like many a one of the
gentler sex, he has been dazzled in early life by the glare from the
supercalendered paper. It is now nearly two years since he first began
to be a literary man, and he regards the progress that he has made
during that period as extremely gratifying, for he has put himself on
an excellent footing in three or four of the most delightful literary
and artistic _salons_ in the city, and confidently expects to have a
story published in one of the leading monthlies by midsummer. And that
story will be published, as I happen to know, as soon as he has made
certain alterations suggested by the editor--taken out the strong scene
between the banker’s daughter and the poor but impulsive suitor, and
modified various sentences which in their present form might wound the
susceptibilities of a large contingent of subscribers.
This promising young writer has been such a constant visitor to
magazine offices since he first embarked on a literary career, and has
associated so much with the junior members of the editorial staffs
(or staves?), that his opinions are a reflex of theirs, and he is now
thoroughly in accord with those with whom he is anxious to do business.
Therefore when he remarks, in that superior manner which insures for
him the instant credulity of the women in the company, that it is not
worth an author’s while to study the social structure of New York,
he is right from his own point of view, and it ill becomes our young
friend from Park Row to despise him for it. And when he goes on to say
that our beloved city has no individuality of its own, and is permeated
through and through with the awful flavor of commerce, while its
society is nothing but a plutocracy, I would advise my young friend of
the city department to draw him out and make careful notes of what he
says about life and literature.
This young man of letters is merely echoing the opinions of those
at whose feet he has sat, humbly and reverently acknowledging their
literary supremacy, and fondly hoping that they will purchase his
manuscript. He knows that Johnson does not like low life, just as Jack
Moran knew that Bonner would not tolerate second marriages or fast
horses; and so far as his own literary ambitions are concerned, a
thorough knowledge of New York would prove about as useful to him as a
familiarity with the customs and beliefs of the Mormons or the names of
the Derby winners would have been to the old-time _Ledger_ poets.
But the young reporter, who hears him with feelings of either amusement
or contempt or indignation, as the case may be, has already seen enough
of New York--it may be that he is able to compare it with foreign
capitals--to know that there is an abundance of material within its
limits which native writers of fiction have not only left untouched,
but of whose very existence most of them are absolutely unaware. But
it would be useless for him to say so in this company, for he who has
just spoken so decisively is a “literary man,” whose work will one day
be printed on the finest quality of paper and perhaps adorned with
beautiful pictures. And besides, do not all the nice people live north
of Washington Square?
Ah! those nice people and that supercalendered paper--what an influence
they exert in our literary Vanity Fair!
Perhaps one of the young literary men will go on to say, in proof of
his theory about the literary poverty of New York, that the magazines
have already published a great many articles and stories about the
Bowery and the east side, and have in fact quite covered the field
without enriching the literature of the day to any very noticeable
degree. All of which is perfectly true, but the results might have been
different had the work been intrusted in each case to a writer who was
familiar with the subject instead of to one whose only qualification
was that he had mastered the art of writing matter suitable for
magazines--or, in other words, “literature.” An exception to this
rule, and a notable one too, was made in the case of Jacob A. Riis,
who wrote some articles for _Scribner’s Magazine_ a few years ago
on the poor of New York, and who is known as the author of _How the
Other Half Lives_ and _The Children of the Poor_. Mr. Riis knows his
subject thoroughly--he has been a police reporter for years--and his
contributions are valuable because of the accuracy of the information
which they contain, which is more than can be said of the work of some
of the wiseacres and gifted story-writers who seem to stand so well in
the estimation of the magazine managers.
But, fortunately enough, the truth is mighty, and must, in the long
run, prevail, in literature as in other forms of art: and the enduring
novel of New York will be written, not by the man who, knowing his
audience of editors rather than his subject, is content with a thin
coating of that literary varnish known as “local color,” but by this
very young man from Park Row or Herald Square, to whom I take the
liberty of addressing a few words of encouragement and advice. When
this young man sits down to write that novel, it will be because
he is so full of his subject, so thoroughly in sympathy with his
characters--no matter whether he takes them from an opium-joint in
Mott Street or a ball at Delmonico’s--and so familiar with the various
influences which have shaped their destinies, that he will set about
his task with the firm conviction that he has a story to tell to the
world.
In that novel the “local color” will be found in the blood and bones:
it will not be smeared over the outside surface with a flannel rag. And
men and women will read the story and talk about it and think about it,
just as they are reading and talking and thinking about “Trilby” now.
Did you ever hear any one talk about Mr. Du Maurier’s “local color”? I
never did.
But it was for the best of reasons that the barbed-wire fence was
stretched across the city just below Cooper Union, although it shut
out from view a quarter of the town in which may be found a greater
and more interesting variety of human life and customs than in any
other region that I know of. Of course this literary quarantine was
not effected for the benefit of men and women of clean, intelligent,
cultivated minds, but to avoid giving offense to the half-educated
and quarter-bred folks whose dislike for what they consider “low” and
“vulgar” is only equaled by their admiration of all that is “genteel”
and their impassioned interest in the doings of “carriage company.”
I have sometimes accompanied parties of sight-seers through what was
to them an entirely unknown territory, south of the barbed-wire fence,
and I have noticed in almost every instance that it was only the men
and women of a high social and intellectual grade who showed any true
interest in, or appreciation of, what they saw there. There have been
others in these little expeditions who looked to me as if they stood
in perpetual fear of running across some of their own relations, and
one of these once gravely assured me that Hester Street was not at all
“nice.”
Chinatown is to me a singularly attractive spot, because of its vivid
colors, its theatre, joss-house, restaurants, and opium-joints--those
mysterious dens in which the Occident and Orient are brought into the
closest companionship, while the fumes of the burning “dope” cloy the
senses, and outcasts from every clime--the Chinese highbinder jostling
against the Broadway confidence man--smoke and drink side by side,
talking the while with a looseness of tongue that would be impossible
under any influence other than that of opium. Mr. William Norr, a New
York reporter, has told us a great many interesting and curious things
about the human types--Caucasian as well as Mongolian--to be found in
this quarter, and his book, _Stories from Chinatown_, possesses the
rare merit of being absolutely true in color, fact, and detail.
But there is something in this alien settlement that seems to me to
possess a greater interest, a deeper significance, than the garish
lights of the colored lanterns or the pungent smoke of the poppy-seed,
and that is the new hybrid race that is growing to maturity in its
streets and tenements. There are scores of these little half-breeds to
be seen there, and one of them has just come prominently before the
American public in the person of Mr. George Appo, the son of a Chinese
murderer and an Irishwoman, and himself a pickpocket, green-goods
operator, as well as one of the most entertaining and instructive of
all the witnesses examined before the Lexow Committee.
The Chinese and Italians rub elbows in this corner of the town, and
a single step will bring us into Mulberry Bend, bright with red
handkerchiefs and teeming with the olive-skinned children of Italy.
Nowhere in the whole city is there a stronger clan feeling than here--a
feeling that manifests itself not only in the craft and ferocity of the
vendetta, but also in a spirit which impels these poverty-stricken
exiles to stand by one another in the hour of trouble. There is no
better-paying property to be had than one of these Mulberry Street
tenements, for it is seldom, indeed, that the Italian poor will permit
one of their number to be turned into the street for want of a month’s
rent.
The Jewish old-clothing quarter that lies close to the Five Points is
near by. The “pullers-in,” as the sidewalk salesmen are termed in the
vernacular of the trade, transact business with a ferocity that can be
best likened to that of Siberian wolves; but over beyond Chatham Square
lies the Hebrew burying-ground, an ancient patch of sacred soil which
all the money in New York could not buy from the descendants of those
whose ashes repose there.
A few short blocks north of this old landmark lies one of the most
famous political districts in the town, one which is liable to become
the pivotal point in an exciting and closely contested election. There
is a saloon here on one of the side-streets which it may be worth your
while to visit. It is a dark, uninviting place, and its interior, with
its rows of liquor barrels and boxes and its throng of blear-eyed,
tough-looking customers, suggests anything but wealth and power.
Nevertheless the taciturn little Irishman whose name is over the door
has grown rich here and is the Warwick of the district so far as the
minor city offices are concerned. And it was to this rumshop, as the
whole ward knows, that a President of the United States came in his
carriage one Sunday morning not many years ago, to make sure of the
fealty of its proprietor and pour the oil of patronage on the troubled
political waters.
And furthermore it is related of this district boss--who stands in the
same relation to his constituents that the Roman senator of old did
to his clients--that once at the close of an election day of more
than ordinary importance one of his lieutenants burst in upon him, as
he sat with a few faithful henchmen in the back room of his saloon,
and announced triumphantly that his candidate had carried a certain
election district by a vote of one hundred and fifty-five to one. And
at this intelligence the east-side Warwick swore a mighty oath, and,
striking his clenched fist fiercely on the table before him, exclaimed:
“What I want to know is the name of the wan sucker that voted agin us!”
And while you are strolling along the Bowery you may come across an
oldish-looking man with a dyed or gray mustache and a suggestion of
former rakishness in his seedy clothes and well-preserved silk hat--a
man who seems to have outlived his calling, whatever it may have been,
and to have been left high and dry with no intimate companionship save
that of his own thoughts. It will pay you to get acquainted with this
old man, for he belongs to a race which is fast disappearing, the race
of old-time American gamblers, of which Bret Harte’s John Oakhurst is
the best type to be found in our national fiction. He still survives in
the West and South, but here in New York his place has been taken by
the new brood of race-track plungers and Hebrew book-makers; and the
faro-box from which he used to deal with deft fingers, and the lookout
chair from which he was wont in the olden times to watch the progress
of the game with quick, searching eyes and impassive face, know him no
more.
If you are studying the different dialects of the town, you should make
careful notes of this old man’s speech and of the peculiar way in which
he uses the present tense in describing bygone happenings. Mr. H. L.
Wilson has given us, in his excellent book of stories called _Zig-zag
Tales_, the following delicious bit of dialect, which I quote because
it well illustrates what I have said. The words are taken from the lips
of the “lookout,” and are addressed in a cautious undertone to the
faro-dealer:
“See his nobs there with the moniment of azures? I’m bettin’ chips to
coppers that’s Short-card Pete. He’s had his mustache cut off, ’n’ he’s
heavier ’n he was ten years ago. He tends bar in Noorleans, in ’68,
fer Doc Nagle--ole Doc, you rec’lect--’n’ he works the boats a spell
after that. See ’im one night play’n’ bank at Alf Hennesey’s, an’ he
pulls out thirty-two solid thousan’; Slab McGarr was dealin’, ’nis duck
here makes him turn over the box. See ’im ’nother time at San’tone, ’na
little geeser works a sleeve holdout on ’im--one a these here ole-time
tin businesses; you never see a purtier gun play ’n he makes--it goes,
too; mebbe it was n’swif’! He’s a-pullin’ on that gang; get onto that
chump shuffle, will you? Ain’t that a play fer yer life? He ain’t
overlookin’ any bets.”
“What are you giving us?” is the contemptuous cry of my young friend
from Park Row who has done me the honor to read what I have written. “I
know all that about Chinatown and the politicians as well as you do.”
So you do, my young friend, and I have no doubt you know it a great
deal better than I do; but I had a double motive in offering you the
words of suggestion which you have taken the trouble to follow. In
the first place, when the young literary man of limited achievement,
referred to in an earlier part of this chapter, obtains an order for an
article on “The Coast of Chatham Square,” he will probably come to you
to find out where Chatham Square is and at what time they light the gas
there: and I am sure you will be glad to help him to the full extent
of your knowledge, although you may wonder why the order was given to
him instead of to you. In the second place, although the whole of the
east side is familiar ground to you, there are plenty of intelligent,
well-informed men and women who know very little about what this city
contains, and if you will read my next chapter you will learn of the
impression which the tenement-house district made upon a certain
distinguished gentleman who saw it recently for the first time.