THE CONCLUSION OF THE WHOLE MATTER.
Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. But first of all let us
think of the many mercies for which we have to be thankful, and then
let us be just as well as generous; for certainly the magazines have
been of enormous benefit to the reading public as well as to those
whose profession it is to entertain, amuse, or instruct that public.
The magazines have not only raised the rates of compensation for
literary labor, but they have spread the reading habit to an
enormous extent, and are still educating vast numbers of people--of
a class that do not read at all when they happen to be born in
other countries--to become habitual buyers of books and periodicals.
Moreover it must be said of the editors of these publications that they
place their time at the disposal of every aspiring author who brings
his manuscript to them. In other words, they give careful attention
to whatever work is submitted to them, and are glad to buy and pay
promptly for such stories and poems as they may deem suitable to their
needs. I have never seen any disposition on the part of any of them to
crush budding genius, but, on the contrary, I have frequently met them
on dark, rainy nights hunting through the town with lanterns in their
hands for new writers. In fact, I do not know of any place in this
world where a young man may look for fairer attention and encouragement
than he will find in the office of a modern magazine.
I have heard these editors denounced, one and all, by infuriated poets
and romancers, for the “favoritism” which had been shown to certain
contributors, but I have generally found that when they erred in
this way it was on the side of charity; and if certain writers whose
contributions we generally skip occupy more room in the monthlies than
we think they ought to, it is not because they are editorial pets,
but because they have been careful students of the great literary
principles described in these pages, and have thereby acquired the
art of writing exactly what can be printed without injury to the
susceptibilities of a single advertiser or subscriber.
But we have special cause for being thankful to the magazines when we
read some of the hysterical, obstetrical, and epigrammatic romances
which have enjoyed such an astonishing vogue in England of late years.
Thank Heaven! no American magazine--so far as my knowledge goes--has
had the effrontery to offer its readers any such noisome, diseased
literature as that with which the alleged “clever” people of London
have flooded our market. To my way of thinking the epigrammatic books
are the most offensive of the whole lot, and certainly there is nothing
better calculated to plunge one into the depths of despair and shame
than the perusal of a modern British novel whose characters are forever
“showing off,” as children say, and who seem to devote their lives
to uttering sixpenny cynicisms and evolving, with infinite pains and
travail, the sort of remarks that pass current in the “smart London
set”--if these chroniclers are to be believed--as wit.
Callow and ingenuous youth betrays itself by two unmistakable earmarks.
One of these is in the form of a slight down on the cheek, and the
other is the belief that Oscar Wilde writes brilliant epigram.
I attended the first American representation of a play by that
distinguished author, and can well recall my feelings when an
able-bodied mummer took the centre of the stage and said, with the air
of a man who has been rolling a good thing under his tongue all the
evening, and at last has a chance to utter it: “Time is the thief of
procrastination.” A murmur of admiration ran through the house, but
I--I sobbed like a heart-broken child.
And yet Mr. Wilde is one of the cleverest of the whole brood of
fat-witted chromo-cynics whose vulgar flippancies have somehow come
to be regarded as witty and amusing, and that, too, by people who
ought to know better. It positively makes me sick to see one of these
paper-covered chronicles of fashionable imbecility lying on a parlor
table, and to hear it spoken of as “so delightfully bright and clever,
don’t you know.”
Heine was a genuine cynic and the maker of epigrams which he wrote
as easily and naturally as Bobby Burns wrote verses; and if there
is anything in the world which can be accomplished, if at all,
without manual labor and the accompanying sweat of the brow, it is
the utterance of really witty or epigrammatic remarks. But these
leaden-footed English wits somehow convey to me a vision of a cynic in
toil-stained overalls going forth in the gray of the early morning,
dinner-pail in hand, for a hard day’s work at being epigrammatic and
funny.
And while I am on the subject of epigram and cynicism, I cannot help
wondering what Heine would have done for a living had his lot been
cast in our own age and country. Imagine him offering manuscript to
the _Ladies’ Home Journal_! (By the way, Bok ought not to let those
photographs go for twenty-five cents apiece. They’re worth a dollar if
they’re worth a cent.) Think of the sensation that the _Reisebilder_
would create in the _Century_ office!
My own opinion is that Heine would, were he living here to-day, find
occupation as a paragrapher on some Western paper, acquire some
nebulous renown as the “_Ann Arbor Clarion_ man” or the “_Omaha
Bumblebee_ man,” and be consigned in his old age to that Home for
Literary Incurables known as the McClure Syndicate.
There is a book of excerpts from the writings of this gifted man,
published some years ago by Henry Holt & Co., and now, unhappily
enough, out of print. These excerpts are so well selected and convey
to us so vividly the charm of this matchless writer that I took the
trouble some time ago to inquire into the way in which the work was
done. I learned on undisputed authority that Mr. Holt, who has not
spent his life in the literary business for nothing, borrowed a
pruning-hook from the _Century_ office, placed it, together with
Heine’s complete works, in the hands of an experienced and skilled
magazine editor, and bade him “edit” them as if they were intended
for publication in his own monthly. The skilled and experienced
editor opened the volumes, and the pruning-hook--also a skilled and
experienced instrument of mutilation--fairly leaped from its scabbard
in its eagerness to eliminate the dangerous passages. When the editor
had completed his task Mr. Holt gathered up the parings from the floor
and published them under the title of _Scintillations from Heine_; and
I sincerely hope that a new edition of this book will be brought out
before long, if for no other purpose than to show people what a real
epigram is and how sharp it can bite.
There is another variety of literature which I dislike, and which seems
to have attained a ranker and more unwholesome growth in this country
than elsewhere. I refer to those articles and books whose sole purpose
seems to be the exploiting of men and women who are really unworthy of
any serious consideration. The Johnsonian period is rich in specimens
of this sort of work, and the future historian will marvel at the
absurd prominence given in this enlightened age to people who have
never accomplished anything in their lives, and who themselves evince
the greatest eagerness to transmit to posterity authentic records of
their failures.
“How I Lost the Battle,” by Captain Runoff, of the Russian army;
“Driven out of Asia Minor,” by General Skates; and “Ever so Many Miles
from the North Pole,” by Lieutenant Queary, are excellent examples of
this style of literature; but a far lower depth was reached about two
years ago, when the Harpers burst into enthusiastic praise of a young
man named Chanler, who had announced his intention of discovering
Africa, and proposed to awe and conciliate the ferocious native chiefs
by performing in their presence various difficult feats of legerdemain
which he had taken the pains to learn from a professional master in
London.
What has become of that gifted young man for whom the Harpers predicted
such a rosy future? Perhaps at this very moment he is seated in a deep,
shady African jungle making an omelet in a high silk hat or converting
a soiled pocket-handkerchief into a glass globe full of goldfish. I can
picture him standing, alone and unarmed, before thousands of hostile
spears. His eye is clear and his cheek unblanched. In another moment
he will be taking rabbits out of the chieftain’s ears, and the dusky
warriors will cower, in abject submission, at his feet.
There is one thing that can be said in favor of Mr. Chanler, and
that is that up to the present moment he has not annoyed his
fellow-creatures with any lectures or articles or stories descriptive
of the wonders that he did not discover during his journeyings in the
Dark Continent. His reticence is commendable, and should serve as an
example to various windy travelers who “explore” during a period of
eight weeks and then talk for the rest of their lives.
Verily this is a golden age for “fakirs,” quacks, and intellectual
feather-weights, and my friendly advice to all who may be classified
under any one of those three heads is to make hay while the sun shines,
because, in my belief, the coming decade will see them relegated to the
obscurity in which they naturally belong. But our little tuppenny gods
and celebrities have kicked up so much dust of late years that they
have contrived to obscure the fame of men who are infinitely better
worth talking about.
Singularly enough, the American who achieved more with his pen than any
one else in his generation is almost unknown to the majority of his
countrymen and countrywomen, although our government paid an unusual
tribute to his memory by bringing his remains back to his native land
in a man-of-war. The man of whom I write was simply a reporter employed
by the _New York Herald_ to chronicle contemporaneous European history.
It was he who told the civilized world the truth about the atrocities
committed by the Turkish invaders of Bulgaria in a series of letters
to the _London Daily News_--letters which became, in the hands of Mr.
Gladstone, a weapon with which he aroused the popular feeling until
the Beaconsfield ministry was swept from power and the Jingo spirit
held in check while Russia carried on her “holy war” against the Porte.
There is not a statesman or sovereign in Europe who does not know of
the important rôle which this American reporter played in continental
affairs at the time of the Russo-Turkish war. If you ask a Bulgarian or
Montenegrin if he ever heard of J. A. MacGahan he will very likely say
to you what one of them said to me: “Did you, an American, ever hear of
George Washington? Well, MacGahan was our Washington, and there is not
a peasant in all my country who is not familiar with his name.”
This countryman of ours, in whose achievements I have such a sturdy
pride, died literally in the harness in 1879, and every year on the
9th of June, throughout all the land of which he was the acknowledged
savior, the solemn prayers of the church are offered for the repose
of his soul. It may be that he has won a higher fame than he would if
he had lived to make himself known to the American public through the
medium of the lecture platform, but nevertheless I often wish that his
renown in the land of his birth were nearer in accord with his deserts
than it is.
I doubt if any system, either literary, political, or social--unless
it be negro slavery--has ever had a fairer trial in this country than
has that of pruning-hook editing, of which I have treated in these
pages; and that system may be responsible, in part, for the fact that
three quarters of the fiction offered in bookstores to-day is the work
of foreign writers, most of whom have been reared in the comparatively
free and independent literary atmosphere of Great Britain, and have
always addressed their books directly to the public instead of the
editors of magazines. It is true that Smith or Mudie, whose influence
in the book-trade is almost incalculable, occasionally refuse to
circulate a novel out of consideration for the feelings of the “young
person,” but such a proceeding is not nearly as disastrous to a writer
as the refusal of his manuscript by all the magazines would be to an
American. A ton of manuscript makes no more commotion when returned
to its authors than the touch of a humming-bird on a lily-petal; but
when a book like _Esther Waters_ is cast out of an English circulating
library it falls with a crash that is heard throughout the length and
breadth of the three kingdoms, while the author and his friends, with a
little assistance from the author’s enemies, make the welkin ring with
their cries.
The recent discussion over “Trilby” and the action of its publishers
in cutting out this passage and pruning that have given the public
a little insight into the methods in vogue in our large literary
establishments--methods which I have tried to explain in this book.
The very fact that Mr. Du Maurier’s manuscript stood in need of the
pruning-hook is, to me, proof positive that he never sat on the poets’
bench in the _Ledger_ office or practised his profession under the rule
of Dr. Holland.
It may be that at this very moment a great many American story-readers
are asking themselves why it is that native authors who know their
trade so well that the magazines will publish anything that they offer
should be unable to write a serial equal to that of a gray-haired
novice like Mr. Du Maurier, who, I will wager, knows absolutely nothing
about the immortal principles which are the very lamps unto the feet
of his American contemporaries. I shudder to think of what the world
would have lost had the author of “Trilby” gone about his work with the
Holland fetters on his wrists, the fear of the gas-fitter in his heart,
the awful pruning-hook hanging by a single hair over his head, and the
ominous shadow of Robert Bonner falling across the pages of his story.
There are other English writers who have “arrived” during the past
half-dozen years--a sufficient number, indeed, to make us feel that
there must be some deep-seated cause for the comparatively slow
progress which our own literature has made in the same time.
It is no easy matter to fairly estimate the literary worth of writers
who have been before the public such a short time, especially when we
take into consideration the wide difference in personal tastes, and
therefore I have sought the aid of a number of critical and learned
friends in the preparation of a list of writers which I confess is not
exactly the one that I would print had I consulted only my own personal
tastes.
This is the list which I offer as a result of many consultations with
people who are supposed to understand the subject: J. M. Barrie,
Mrs. Humphry Ward, Hall Caine, Rudyard Kipling, Conan Doyle, Barry
Paine, J. K. Jerome, I. Zangwill, Marie Corelli, Quiller Couch, S. R.
Crockett, Sarah Grand, Beatrice Harraden, Anthony Hope, and Stanley J.
Weyman--fifteen in all besides Mr. Du Maurier.
From this catalogue of talent and genius it is possible to select ten
whose position in letters is assured, although tastes will differ as to
the names on the last end of the list.
Now let us see how many writers have been raised to maturity in the
carefully watched and over-cultivated magazine soil during the same
period of time--say half a dozen years. Can we point to sixteen, or
ten, or even five who have made their way into the great white light
within that time?
No; we have precisely one writer to show as the fruit of American
literary endeavor during six years, and that writer is a woman who has
confined herself--and wisely, too, I suspect--to the portrayal of
life and character among the New England hills and villages. A narrow
field, it may be said, but she has surveyed it with the true artistic
eye, and at her touch it has yielded truthful, appreciative, honest
literature--stories with an underlying note of sadness that rings
true as steel and is a bit of the very essence of rural New England
life. Of course this writer is in an enviable position because she
enjoys all the advantages of magazine authorship and the prestige
which accompanies it, and is, to all practical purposes, exempt from
the ordeal of the pruning-hook to which other authors are obliged to
submit. I do not say this in disparagement of her great talents; I only
mean to say that her stories all lie within the necessary magazine
limitations, and she can write to the very top of her bent without
getting within gunshot of the barbed-wire fences which restrict the
endeavors of authors whose natural impulse it is to work in the deeper
and broader strata of humanity.
I do not deny that there are several bright and clever young men and
women who have done excellent literary work in the magazines and will
undoubtedly live to do even better in the future. I know of two or
three who are, according to my way of thinking, better entitled to
mention than some of the English authors whom I have named; but the
woman whom I have in mind is the one recent acquisition to American
letters, who draws truthful pictures from a proper point of view,
writes fully as well to-day as she did six years ago, and has,
moreover, given us one good novel. I do not know of a single other
bright young American writer--and very clever some of them are, too--of
whom nearly as much as this can be fairly said.
If the names of Hamlin Garland or Edward Bellamy occur to any of my
readers it should be remembered that they sprang up by the wayside and
are not the product of the rich magazine soil.
In bringing my modest preachment to a close, it is with a hope that my
readers will pardon any errors of humor into which I may have fallen,
or at least find in them a reasonable excuse for my effrontery in
offering advice while I am still under ninety-seven years of age. I
hope that I have done full justice to the established literary dynasty
which began with Robert Bonner and of which Mr. Johnson is now the
acknowledged head.
And let my last word be one of thankfulness because that dynasty has at
least kept our national literature clean--as clean as a whistle or a
pipe-stem.
AND OTHER TALES
THE POETS’ STRIKE.
It was just three o’clock on a warm day in August, and the deep silence
that prevailed in the Franklin Square Prose and Verse Foundry indicated
plainly that something unusual had happened. The great trip-hammer in
the basement was silent; there was no whir of machinery on the upper
floors; and in the vast, deserted dialect department the busy file was
still. It was only in the business office that any signs of life were
visible, and there the chiefs of the great establishment were gathered
in anxious consultation. Their stern, determined faces indicated that
they had taken a stand and had resolved to maintain it, no matter what
might happen. From the street came the faint sound of newsboys crying
extras. By nightfall the tidings would be carried to the remotest
corners of the town.
The poets of the Franklin Square Foundry had been ordered out on strike!
Well might the heads of the various departments look grave, for never
before in the history of the factory had there been a strike in its
literary department. Down in Pearl Street the poets were congregated in
groups, talking over the situation and casting ominous glances at the
great window, through which they could faintly distinguish the forms of
the men against whose tyranny they had rebelled.
Suddenly a tall form loomed up in the centre of a large group of
excited men. It was a master poet who had climbed up on some boxes to
address his comrades; and they grew quiet and closed in about him to
hear his words.
“Prosers, rhymesters, and dialectists,” exclaimed the master poet, “the
time has come for us to make a stand against the oppression of those
who call themselves our masters. The time has come for the men who toil
day after day in yonder tall factory to denounce the infamous system
by which they are defrauded of the greater part of their wretched
pittance. You know, of course, that I am speaking of the ruinous
competition of scab or non-union labor. See that cart!” he cried,
pointing to a square, one-horse vehicle, similar to those employed in
the delivery of coal, which had been backed up against the curb in
front of the factory.
“Do you know what that cart contains? See those men remove the iron
scuttle on the sidewalk, and listen to the roar and rumble as the cart
discharges its contents into the cellar beneath the pavement! Is that
coal they are putting in with which to feed the tireless engine that
furnishes motive power to the factory? No, my friends; that is a load
of jokes for the back page of _Harper’s Bazar_, collected from the
sweating-shops about Washington Square and Ninth Street. Do those jokes
bear the union label? They do not. Many of them, no doubt, are made by
Italians and Chinese, to the shame and degradation of our calling.”
The master poet’s words were received with a howl of rage that reached
the ears of the men who were closeted in the business office, and
brought a pallor to their stern, set faces.
“There is no time to be lost!” exclaimed one of the firm; “that yell
of defiance convinces me that any attempt to introduce non-union poets
would precipitate a riot. It will not be safe to do it unless we are
prepared for the worst.”
“For my part,” said Mr. Harry Harper, “I believe that it would be a
good policy for us to introduce machinery at once, and get rid of those
poets, who are forever making new demands on us. The _Century_ people
have had machines in operation for some time past, and have found them
very satisfactory. We must admit that a great deal of their poetry is
as good as our hand-made verses.”
“Do you know,” cried Mr. Alden, “that that Chicago machine they put in
some time ago is simply one of Armour’s old sausage-mills remodeled? It
is the invention of a man named Fuller, who two years ago was merely an
able-bodied workman in the serial shops. It is really a very ingenious
piece of mechanism, and when you think that they throw a quantity of
hoofs, hair, and other waste particles from the Chicago stock-yards
into a hopper, and convert them into a French or Italian serial story
of firm, fine texture--well, making a silk purse out of a sow’s ear is
nothing to it.”
“Gentlemen,” said the head of the firm, rising as he spoke, and taking
from the desk beside him some large cardboard signs, “I do not propose
to have my own workmen dictate to _me_. I am going to hang these signs
on our front door and give employment to whomever may apply for it.”
The signs were thus inscribed:
x-------------------------------x
| |
| HANDS WANTED |
| |
| ON |
| |
| SHORT STORIES. |
| |
x-------------------------------x
x-------------------------------x
| |
| GIRLS WANTED |
| |
| FOR THE |
| |
| BAZAR AND YOUNG PEOPLE. |
| |
x-------------------------------x
x-------------------------------x
| |
| STEADY EMPLOYMENT |
| |
| FOR |
| |
| SOBER, INDUSTRIOUS POETS. |
| |
| TWO RHYMES TO THE QUATRAIN. |
| |
x-------------------------------x
But before Mr. Harper could carry out his resolution, a young man, clad
in the ordinary working-garb of a poet, hurriedly entered the office,
and, placing himself before the chief, exclaimed:
“Stop, sir, before it is too late!”
“And who are you, sir?” demanded the amazed publisher.
“I am Henry Rondeau,” replied the young man, “and although I am only
a humble, laboring poet, I feel that I can be of assistance to you
to-day. I have a grateful heart, and cannot forget your kindness to me
when I was unfortunate.”
“Kindness? I confess that I do not remember any--” began Mr. Harper;
but the poet interrupted him with: “Last summer, sir, when I got my
fingers frost-bitten by being permitted to shake hands with Mr. Harry
Harper, you not only allowed me half-pay, but gave my poor idiot sister
a job in the factory as a reader of manuscript, thus enabling us to
keep the wolf from the door until I was able to use a scanning-rule
again.”
“And a most invaluable assistant she is, too,” cried Mr. Alden, warmly;
“she selects all the short stories for the magazine, and I doubt if you
could find, even in the office of the _Atlantic Monthly_, any one with
such keen perceptions of what the public do not want as Susan Rondeau,
the idiot reader of Franklin Square.”
At this moment a hoarse yell arose from the crowd of strikers beneath
the window, and was borne to the ears of those who were gathered in the
business office.
“What does that noise mean?” demanded the senior partner, an angry
flush suffusing his cheek. “Do they think they can frighten me with
yells and threats of violence? I will hang out these signs, and bid
them do their worst!”
“Stop! I implore you, stop!” cried Henry Rondeau, as he threw himself
before his chief. “The sight of those signs would madden them, and the
counsel of the cooler heads, which has thus far controlled them, would
be swept away in a moment. And then--the deluge!”
“But we do not fear even death,” cried the courageous publisher.
“Mr. Harper,” continued the young workman, earnestly, “at this very
moment the master poet is urging them to desperate measures. He
has already in his possession the address and dinner-hour of every
gentleman in this room, and--”
“Well, even if dynamite is to be used--”
“And,” pursued Henry Rondeau, “he has threatened to place the list in
the hands of Stephen Masset!”
“Merciful heavens!” exclaimed the veteran publisher, as he sank, pale
and trembling, in his easy-chair, while his associates wrung their
hands in bitter despair; “can nothing be done to prevent it?”
“Yes,” cried the young working-man. “Accept the offer of the Poets’
Union to make a new sliding-scale. Make a few slight concessions to the
men, and they will meet you half-way. Put emery wheels in the dialect
shop instead of the old-fashioned cross-cut files and sandpaper that
now take up so much of the men’s time. Let one rhyme to the quatrain
be sufficient at the metrical benches, and--it is a little thing, but
it counts--buy some tickets for the poets’ picnic and summer-night’s
festival at Snoozer’s Grove, which takes place next Monday afternoon
and evening.”
Henry Rondeau’s advice was taken, and to-day the great trip-hammer
is at work in the basement of the foundry, and the poets and
prose-writers are busy at their benches on the upper floors. The master
poet is at work among the rest, and sometimes he chuckles as he thinks
of the concessions that were wrung from the foundry-owners by the great
August strike. But little does the master poet dream of the vengeance
that awaits him--of the awful midnight oath taken by Joseph Harper
after he had signed the treaty with his employees.
Not until after death will that oath be fulfilled. Not until the
members of the Poets’ Union have borne the remains of their chief to
Calvary with a following as numerous as that which accompanies the
deceased aunt of a Broadway janitor to her last resting-place--not
until then will the surviving members of the firm carry out the sacred
trust imposed upon them.
They will collect the poems of the master poet and publish them in a
mouse-colored volume--_edited by Arthur Stedman_.
ANCIENT FORMS OF AMUSEMENT.
(_From the Hypnotic Gazette, January 1, A. D. 2203._)
Workmen employed on the mesmeric dredge near what was in old times the
bed of the Harlem River discovered yesterday a leaden box in which was
the following manuscript, which gives us a vivid idea of the crude
condition of the drama toward the close of the nineteenth century:
“FUN ON THE ROOF.”
Farce Comedy in Three Acts.
ACT I.
SCENE. _A garden with practicable gate R. U. E._
SPARKLE MCINTYRE (_entering through gate_). Well, this is a pretty
state of affairs! Rosanna Harefoot lived only for me until that
theatrical troupe came to town; but now she’s so stuck on singing and
dancing and letting those actor men make love to her that I can’t get a
moment with her. Hello! here comes the whole company. I guess they’re
going to rehearse here. I’ll hide behind this tree and watch them do
their acts.
_Enter company of_ PLAYERS.
FIRST PLAYER. Well, this is a hot day; but while we’re trying to keep
cool Miss Kitty Socks will sing “Under the Daisies.”
(_Specialties by the entire company._)
FIRST PLAYER. Well, we’d better hurry away down the street, or else
we’ll be late.
[_Exeunt_ OMNES.
SPARKLE MCINTYRE (_emerging from behind tree_). That looks easy enough.
I guess I’ll see what I can do myself.
(_Specialties._)
FIRST PLAYER (_entering with company_). Now that rehearsal is over,
we’ll have a little fun for a few moments.
SPARKLE (_aside_). Rosanna will be mine yet.
(_Grand Finale._)
CURTAIN.
ACT II.
SCENE. _Parlor of_ SPARKLE MCINTYRE’S _house_; SPARKLE _discovered
seated at table with brilliant dressing-gown on_.
SPARKLE. I invited all that theatrical company to spend the evening
with me; but I’m afraid they won’t come. I just wanted to surprise them
with that new song and dance of mine. Ah! here they come now.
_Enter_ THEATRICAL COMPANY.
FIRST PLAYER. We are a little late, Mr. McIntyre, but the fact is I
had to go to the steamer to meet some friends of mine who were coming
over to try their luck in glorious America; and as they’re all perfect
ladies and gentlemen, I took the liberty of bringing them along. Allow
me to introduce them to you: Mr. and Mrs. Lorenzo Sirocco and the Miss
Siroccos from the Royal Alhambra in Rooshy.
SPARKLE. Ladies and gentlemen, I’m pleased to meet you; and now, if
you’ll favor us with an act, we’ll be greatly obliged.
(_Specialties by everybody, and Finale._)
CURTAIN.
ACT III.
SCENE. _Same as Act I._
_Enter_ ROSANNA.
ROSANNA. This is the very garden where I used to meet my own true
Sparkle. In fact, it’s right here that he used to _spark_ me. Well,
while I’m feeling so downhearted, I’ll do a little dance just to cheer
myself up.
(_Specialties by_ ROSANNA.)
SPARKLE (_entering_). What! _you_ here. Rosanna? Then you must love me.
ROSANNA. Yes, Sparkle, I do.
SPARKLE (_embracing her_). Then, darling, we will be married this very
day. Call the neighbors all in, and we will sing, dance, and be merry.
_Enter_ COMPANY.
(_Specialties._)
CURTAIN.
THE SOBER, INDUSTRIOUS POET,
AND HOW HE FARED AT EASTER-TIME.
“Alas, Mary!” exclaimed William Sonnet, as he entered his neat but
humble tenement apartment a few days before the close of Lent, “I fear
that our Pfingst holiday this year will be anything but a merry one. My
employers have notified me that if they receive any more complaints of
the goods from my department they will give me the sack.”
William Sonnet was certainly playing in hard luck, although it would
be difficult to find in the whole of Jersey City a more industrious,
sober young poet, or a more devoted husband and father. For nine
years he had been employed in the Empire Prose and Verse Foundry,
the largest literary establishment on the banks of the Hackensack,
where by sheer force of sobriety and industry he had risen from the
humble position of cash-boy at the hexameter counter to that of foreman
of the dialect floor, where forty-five hands were kept constantly
employed on prose and verse. During these years his relations with his
employers, Messrs. Rime & Reeson, had been of the pleasantest nature
until about six months previous to the opening of this story, when they
began--unjustly, as it seemed to him--to find fault with the goods
turned out by his department. There were complaints received at the
office every day, they said, of both the dialect stories and verses
that bore the Empire brand.
The _Century Magazine_ had returned a large invoice of hand-sewed negro
dialect verses of the “Befoh de Wah” variety, and a syndicate which
supplied the Western market had canceled all its spring orders on the
ground that the dialect goods had for some reason or other fallen far
below the standard maintained in the other departments of the Empire
Foundry. William was utterly unable to account for this change in the
quality of the manuscript prepared on his floor, and as he sat with his
bowed head resting on his toil-hardened hand, and the sweat and grime
of honest labor on his brow, he looked, indeed, the very picture of
dejection.
“William,” said his wife, as she placed a caressing hand on his
forehead, “you have enemies in the foundry whom you do not suspect.
You must know that when you wooed and won me a year ago I had been
courted by no less than four different poets who at that time were
employed at the Eagle Verse Works in Newark, but have since found
positions with Messrs. Rime & Reeson. I will not deny, William, that I
toyed with the affections of those poets, but it was because I deemed
them as frivolous as myself, and when they went from my presence with
angry threats on their lips I laughed in merry glee. But when I saw
them standing together on street corners, with their heads together in
earnest conversation, I grew sick at heart, for I knew it boded us no
good. Be warned, William, by my words.”
The next day, when the whistle blew at noon, William Sonnet ate his
dinner from his tin pail as usual; but then, instead of going out into
the street to play baseball with the poets from the adjacent factories,
as the Empire Foundry employees generally did, he took a quiet stroll
through the whole establishment, under the pretense of looking for an
envoy that had been knocked off the end of a ballade.
In the packing-department was a large consignment of goods from his
floor ready for shipment, and he stopped to examine the burr of a
Scotch magazine story to make sure that it had not been rubbed off by
carelessness. What was his surprise to find that the dialect, which
he himself had gone over with a cross-cut file that very morning, was
now worn completely smooth by contact with an emery-wheel! He replaced
the story carefully in the fine sawdust in which it was packed, and
then examined the other goods. They had not yet been touched, but it
was evident to him that the miscreants fully intended to finish the
destructive work which they had only had time to begin. Returning to
his own bench, he passed two or three poets who were talking earnestly
together, and by straining his ears he heard one of them whisper:
“We’ll finish the job to-night. Meet me at ten.”
That was enough for William Sonnet. He determined, without delay, what
course to pursue.
At half-past nine that evening, three mysterious figures draped in
black cloaks entered the Empire Prose and Verse Foundry by a side
door. William Sonnet was one of the three, and the others were his
employers, Messrs. Rime & Reeson. He led them to a place of concealment
which commanded a full view of the packing-room. Before long stealthy
footsteps were heard, and the four conspirators entered.
“Listen,” said the eldest of the quartet, as he threw the light from
his dark lantern on the sullen faces of his companions; “you all know
why we are here. This night we will complete William Sonnet’s ruin, and
Easter Monday will find him hunting for work in Paterson and Newark,
and hunting in vain. Why is he foreman of the dialect department, while
we toil at the bench for a mere crust? Mary Birdseye is now his bride;
but when we wooed her we were rejected like our own poems.”
“And that, too, although we inclosed no postage,” retorted the second
poet, bitterly.
“Now to work,” continued the first speaker, as he stooped to examine
some goods on the floor. “What have we here? A serial for the _Atlantic
Monthly_? Well, we’ll soon fix that,” and in another moment he had
injected a quantity of ginger into the story, ruining it completely.
Then the work of destruction went on, while Messrs. Rime & Reeson
watched the vandals with horror depicted on their faces. A pan of
sweepings from the humorous department, designed for Harper’s “Editor’s
Drawer” and the _Bazar_, was thrown away, and real funny jokes
substituted for them. A page article for the Sunday supplement of a
New York daily, entitled “Millionaires who have Gold Filling in their
Teeth,” embellished with cuts of twenty different jaws, was thrown
out, and an article on “Jerusalem the Golden,” ordered by the _Whited
Sepulchre_, substituted.
Messrs. Rime & Reeson could control themselves no longer. Stacked
against the wall like a woodpile were the twelve instalments of a
_Century_ serial by Amelia E. Barr, which had been sawed into the
proper lengths that afternoon. Seizing one of these apiece, the three
men made a sudden onslaught on the miscreants and beat them into
insensibility. Then they bound them securely and delivered them over to
the tormentors.
As for honest William Sonnet, he was made foreman of the whole foundry;
and his wife, who was a fashion-writer, and therefore never fit to be
seen, received a present of two beautiful new tailor-made dresses,
which fitted her so well that no one recognized her, and she opened a
new line of credit at all the stores in the neighborhood.
It was a happy family that sat down to the Easter dinner in William
Sonnet’s modest home; and to make their joy complete, before the
repast was ended an envelope arrived from William’s grateful employers
containing an appointment for his bedridden mother-in-law as reader for
a large publishing house.
THE TWO BROTHERS;
OR, PLUCKED FROM THE BURNING.
“No, Herbert, I would advise you to tear up that card and put
temptation away from you. If you yield now you will weaken your moral
character, and you will have less strength to resist another time.”
The speaker, a young man of grave, honest aspect, was standing with
his hand laid in a kindly way on his younger brother’s shoulder. The
latter, whose face was cast in a more delicate and a weaker mould,
stood irresolutely twirling in his hand a card of invitation to an
afternoon tea.
“I don’t see what harm it will do just for this one time,” he said,
pettishly. “You’re always preaching about temptation, John; but, for
my part, I think it’s my duty as a writer to see a little of every side
of life. I want to write a novel some day and to have one of the scenes
laid at a kettledrum. How can I describe one unless I see it myself?”
“I hope, Herbert,” said the elder brother, mildly, “that you will
never sink so low as to write a New York Society novel; but that is
surely what you will come to if you abandon yourself to the pernicious
habit of attending afternoon teas. Do you remember your old playfellow,
Walter Weakfish? It is only three years since he began to sip tea
at kettledrums. At that time he was considered one of the very best
reporters in the city, while at the poker table he commanded universal
respect. You know, of course, that his downward career has been very
rapid since his first fall, and that he has sounded every depth of
ignominy and shame; but do you know where he is now?”
“I heard some time ago,” replied Herbert, “that he had become an
habitual frequenter of the most exclusive musical circles in Boston,
and that--”
“No,” interrupted the elder; “that was a malicious report. It is true
that he once attended an organ recital, but that was all. At present he
is conducting, over his own signature, a department entitled ‘Old Uncle
Squaretoes’s Half-hour Chats with the Little Folks,’ in a Philadelphia
paper.”
“Merciful heavens!” cried Herbert; “I had no idea it was as bad as
that; but can nothing be done to save him?”
“I fear not,” replied the elder brother, sadly; “and now, Herbert, I
shall say no more. You must choose your own course; but remember that
our poker club meets to-night in the room over Cassidy’s Exchange, and
you must--”
“Yes, and drop another double X,” exclaimed Herbert, bitterly.
“And learn the great lesson of life,” said John, “that in this vale of
tears the hand that shapes our destiny will ofttimes beat three of a
kind.”
And with these impressive words John Dovetail departed, leaving his
brother still twirling the engraved card between his fingers and
hesitating.
“Pshaw!” he exclaimed at last, “I don’t care what John says. I’m sick
of his preaching, anyhow; and besides I’m not going to get the Society
habit fastened on me through just one kettledrum! I’ll go there just to
see what it’s like.”
* * * * *
That afternoon Herbert tasted of the forbidden intoxicant of feminine
flattery, drank five cups of tea, and ate four pieces of sticky cake.
He was introduced to a leader of the Chromo Literary Set, who told
him that she “adored clever men,” and begged him to come to her next
Sunday evening reception. Then he allowed himself to be patronized
by a dude who copied letters in a broker’s office by day and led the
cotillion by night; and he had not been in the drawing-room half an
hour before his mind became affected by the “Society talk” going on
about him to such a degree that he found himself chuckling in a knowing
manner at an idiotic story about Ollie Winkletree, of the Simian Club.
It was at this moment that the warning words of his brother John
suddenly came back to him, and he realized that it was time to go.
He had no appetite for dinner that night--the tea and the sticky cake
had done their work; and instead of joining the poker class over
Cassidy’s Exchange, he sat down by the fire to brood over the new life
that was opening before him. The Society bee--the most malevolent
insect in the world’s hive--had stung him under his bonnet, the poison
was already in his veins, and when John returned at midnight from the
poker meeting his brother addressed him as “deah boy.”
Now John Dovetail had always looked after his younger brother with the
same solicitude that he would have bestowed upon a helpless child, and
to-night there was an anxious look in his face as he seated himself by
the open fire and drew from his vest-pocket the cigar which he had won
by throwing dice with Cassidy at the Exchange. He was prepared to enjoy
himself for a half-hour in that peace of mind which an easy conscience
alone can give. His evening had been well spent--thanks to that
merciful dispensation which has ordained that even the vilest sinner
shall fill a bobtail flush once in a while--and yet, as he sat there
before the glowing embers, dark misgivings filled his mind. Older than
his brother by fully four years, and of infinitely wider experience and
knowledge of the world, he knew only too well the danger that lurked in
the leaves of the five-o’clock tea.
“Alas!” he said to himself, “I hear that the Swelled Head is very
prevalent this winter. It is contagious, and there is no place--not
even an amateur theatrical company--where one is so sure to be exposed
to it as at a kettledrum. Suppose, after my years of watchful care, my
poor brother were to be taken down with it!”
* * * * *
The weeks rolled on, and Herbert, having once yielded to temptation,
soon found it almost impossible to control his appetite for
Society functions. Not only had he formed as undesirable a list of
acquaintances as he could have made by heading the cotillion for three
seasons, but he even had the temerity to tell his brother John--whose
life was still one of noble purpose and lofty endeavor--that he
wondered how he could spend all his evenings playing poker in the room
over Cassidy’s Exchange, instead of--
“Instead of what, Herbert?” demanded John, in clear, ringing accents.
“Instead of doing as you have been doing ever since you took your
first plunge into the maelstrom of tea and cake and lemonade that is
fast whirling you to destruction? No, Herbert, I have watched you day
by day, and I have noted the change that has gradually come over you.
For weeks past you have been gradually growing apart from me and from
your old-time associates, and have affiliated yourself with a class of
people who are far beneath you. Where were you last night at the hour
when you should have been opening jack-pots in the room over Cassidy’s
Exchange? You were up-town skipping the tralaloo.”
Herbert started and grew pale. “How did you find that out?” he asked,
hoarsely.
“And whose tralaloo were you skipping?” continued John, sternly,
without heeding the interruption. “You were tralalooing with the De
Sneides of Steenth Street, and you dare not deny it!”
“Well!” exclaimed the younger brother, “I don’t see any harm in that.
Isn’t the De Sneide family all right?”
John Dovetail’s clear, honest eyes blazed with anger. Then with a great
effort he controlled himself, and went on in a voice which trembled a
little in spite of him.
“All right? Herbert Dovetail, do you dare to stand before me and to
talk about the De Sneides being all right, when you yourself told me
that they concocted from a half-pint of Santa Cruz rum--a half-pint,
mind you--a beverage which they served to over one hundred human souls?
And did they not add to this crime that of blasphemy, by calling it
punch? O Herbert! Do you know what will happen if you keep on in the
path which you have chosen? You will become the victim of that awful
form of paresis known as the Swelled Head. Already I have noticed
symptoms of it in you.”
“Oh, pshaw!” cried Herbert, impatiently; “just as soon as a man begins
to go into Society a little you say he’s got the Swelled Head. It’s
simply because you’re jealous of my success--but what’s the matter,
John? Are you ill?”
For his brother was leaning against the table, his hand pressed to his
heart and his face white with an awful fear.
“Merciful heavens!” John exclaimed; “a sure and unfailing sign; the
poor boy is stricken already and does not know it. But he shall be
saved!”
* * * * *
One night John persuaded his brother to attend a meeting of the poker
class, by telling him that two German gentlemen who had played the game
just enough to think they knew it all were going to be present.
Herbert accepted the invitation chiefly because he knew he would not
meet any one he had borrowed money from, and was given a kindly welcome
by his old associates, although, owing to the peculiar nature of his
disease, he had failed to recognize several of them when he met them in
the street the week before.
To be sure, he cast a slight gloom over the company by calling for
sherry when the rest of the company were drinking the old stuff; but
that was pardoned because of his unfortunate tea-drinking propensities,
and the game went on merrily.
Something of the old light came back into the boy’s eye as the pile of
chips in front of him began to grow apace; and the old glad smile lit
up his face once more as Baron Snoozer laid down two big pair only to
be confronted by Herbert’s three little fellows.
And yet still he called for sherry.
But it is always the unexpected that happens. Just as the game broke
up the waiter informed John Dovetail that there was a gentleman
down-stairs who wished to see him.
“Show him up!” cried John, pleasantly, as he cashed in his chips.
The stranger appeared and John arose to greet him. He wore a large
chrysanthemum in his buttonhole and held a macaroon in his hand, which
he nibbled from time to time. His make-up was that of a dude.
“You do not know me, I fear,” he said to John. “I am sadly changed, I
know; but the time was, gentlemen, when I sat at this very table; and,
oh, how I would have enjoyed a night like this!” he added, glancing
significantly at the rueful faces of the two German gentlemen, who were
turning their pockets inside out.
All the members of the club were now listening with intense interest;
and John began with, “Your face, sir, seems strangely familiar--”
“Wait,” said the visitor, with a sad smile, “until you hear my story.
Once, as I said before, I sat in this very game nearly every night; but
now what am I? One day--it was five years ago--some fiend incarnate
led me all unknowing to a reception in an artist’s studio. Tea was
ordered--I partook of it and was lost. Since then I have gone down,
down, down; and to-morrow I leave this city forever. There is but one
thing left for me to do. You will see me no more after to-night. Do
none of you remember Walter Weakfish?”
“Walter Weakfish!” gasped John. “Why, I thought you were in
Philadelphia, doing the ‘Old Uncle’--”
“No,” replied the unhappy young man, “I have been worse than that.
I have been a Society reporter. Yes, it is I who have written about
the lovely ‘Spriggie’ Stone and the queenly Mrs. ‘Jack’ Astorbilt,
who wore a passementerie of real lace down the front breadth of her
moire antique gown. I wrote about those people so much that finally I
imagined that I knew them; and then I borrowed money from people who
did know them, and ordered clothes from their tailors, until now Avenue
A is my favorite thoroughfare. And now I must leave the city forever;
but, Herbert, do you take warning from the wreck you see before you
now. Good-by, my old friends!” And Walter Weakfish started for the door.
“Stay!” cried John. “Can we do nothing for you? Shall we never see you
again?”
“No,” replied Walter, pausing for a moment on the threshold, “never
again: for I am going to Washington to patrol the great national
free-lunch route which they call Official Society, and to write
correspondence for the Western papers. After that, the morgue.”
The door closed, and he was gone. Then a moment’s silence was broken by
a wail of anguish from Herbert.
“Thank Heaven!” cried John, “his heart is touched, and he is saved.
Everybody in the room have something with me.”
And before morning the swelling in Herbert’s head was reduced so
rapidly that he had to drink thirteen hot Scotches to counteract it.
And from that day to this he has never been to another kettledrum, nor
taken anything stronger than rye whisky.
THE STORY OF THE YOUNG MAN OF TALENT.
Once upon a time there was a Young Man of Talent, whose stories were
so good that the editor of the paper on which he was employed heard
the Professional Humorist, who had been attached to the paper for
twenty-eight years, ask the city editor, “what the deuce the old man
meant by loading up the Sunday supplement with all that stuff;” and
the very next night the Young Man asked if he might sign his name to
his special articles in the Sunday paper. Now this was a privilege
which had never been accorded to anybody who knew how to write, and
the editor was afraid to make an exception in favor of the Young
Man for fear of bringing down upon his own head the wrath of the
prize-fighters, skirt-dancers, prominent citizens, and other windbags
who had always regarded signed articles as their special prerogative.
So he made answer that the signature was usually considered a badge
of shame. But the Young Man persisted in his demand until the editor
was forced to give way, and the following Sunday the eyes of the
Professional Humorist fell upon an article which bore the signature
of the Young Man of Talent, and which was sandwiched in between a
graphic description of “How I Slugged McGonegal’s Unknown,” by Rocksey
McIntyre, and “The Spontaneity of Mediæval Art,” by Professor Stuffe.
A jealous, angry light gleamed in the eyes of the Professional
Humorist, and he swore an awful oath to be revenged on the rival
who had come into the field with a variety of humor that would
inevitably put an end to his own calling--that of manufacturing “crisp
paragraphs”--which he had pursued without interruption for more than a
quarter of a century.
Now the Professional Humorist belonged to the “Association of Old-time
Funny Men,” to which nobody could gain admittance who was under
fifty-five years of age or who had ever been guilty of an original
piece of humor.
When one of the order wrote a crisp paragraph about a door being
not a door when it happened to be ajar, it would become the duty of
some fellow-member to quote it with the prefix: “Billy Jaggs of the
_Blankburgh Banner_ says--” and add some refined pleasantry of this
sort: “Billy’s mouth is usually ajar when the whisky-jug goes round.
How is that for high, Jaggsey, old boy?” and then the crisp paragraph
would be “passed along” after the fashion prevalent in the old days
when American humor was struggling for popular recognition.
So the Professional Humorist communicated with his fellow funny
men, and told them that unless concerted measures were taken the
old-fashioned crisp paragraphs would be relegated to the obscurity
shared by other features of ante-bellum journalism; and, the funny men
becoming alarmed, a general convention of the order was promptly called
and as quickly assembled.
At this gathering of the comic writers various means whereby the Young
Man of Talent should be destroyed were discussed.
“It would be better,” said a hoary and solemn humorist, whose calling
was indicated by a cane made in imitation of a length of stovepipe,
with a handle of goat’s horn, “much better, I think, if we were to
prevail upon him to enter Society as a literary celebrity, and make
a practice of attending kettledrums and receptions, where he will be
encouraged by women to talk about his literary methods, and where he
will be tempted to partake of the tea and cake and weak punch which
have ruined so many brilliant careers. If, in addition to that, we
can arrange with the Society reporters to publish his name among ‘the
well-known literary and artistic people present’ as often as possible,
his descent will be swift and sure.”
“There is one thing necessary to make that combination invincible,”
said a paragrapher whose sound logic and conservatism had long since
gained for him the name of “The Sage of Schoharie”: “we must call the
attention of somebody like Mr. Aldrich or Mr. Howells to his work, and
induce him to express a favorable opinion of it. If Mr. Aldrich would
only say that he has a ‘dainty style,’ or if Mr. Howells would praise
him for his ‘subtle delineation of character,’ his book, which is
coming out in a few weeks, would fall flat on the market. Then, if he
showed any signs of life after that, Edmund Gosse might administer the
_coup de grâce_ with a favorable review in some English fortnightly.”
These measures having received the indorsement of every member of the
union, it was resolved that they should be promptly carried through;
but before the meeting adjourned the Professional Humorist arose and
begged to be allowed to say a few words.
“I have no doubt,” he said, “that the course we have decided upon will
result in driving this newcomer from the field of letters; but if it
does not I have a plan in my head which has never failed yet. It has
already, within my own memory, driven several of our most promising
writers to the Potter’s Field, and if desperate measures become
necessary we will try it, but only as a last resort.”
* * * * *
A year rolled by, and again the members of the union assembled for
their annual convention.
As they passed through Fourteenth Street on their way to the hall
of meeting, a sad-eyed, despondent figure stood on the sidewalk and
endeavored to sell them lead-pencils at their own price. A smile of
triumph lit up the face of the Professional Humorist as he directed the
attention of his fellow-members to the mournful, ill-clad wretch on the
curb-stone. “I told you my scheme would work,” he said.
It was even so. Neither the kettledrums nor the commendations of
the wiseacres of literature had had any effect on the Young Man of
Talent, who had gone steadily on with his work, unspoiled by feminine
flattery, and heedless of the praise or commendations of the critics.
It was only when these attempts upon his reputation and popularity had
failed that the Professional Humorist threw himself into the breach
with a paragraph--which was given instant and wide publicity by the
rest of the Association--stating that the gifted young writer was _the
Dickens of America_.
And then the Young Man of Talent tottered to his fall.
THE SOCIETY REPORTER’S CHRISTMAS
Early morn in the little parlor of a humble white cottage, where Susan
Swallowtail sat waiting for her husband to return from the ball. It
lacked but a few days of Christmas, and she had arisen with her little
ones at five o’clock in order that William, her husband, might have
a warm breakfast and a loving greeting on his return after his long
night’s work.
Seated before the fire, with her sewing on her lap, Susan Swallowtail’s
thoughts went back to the days when William, then on the threshold of
his career as a Society reporter, had first won her young heart by his
description of her costume at the ball of the “Ladies’ Daughters’
Association of the Ninth Ward.” She remembered how gallantly and
tenderly he had wooed her through the columns of the four weekly and
Sunday papers in which he conducted the “Fashion Chit-chat” columns,
and then the tears filled her eyes as memory brought once more before
her the terrible night when William came to the house and asked her
father, the stern old house and sign painter, for his daughter’s hand.
“And yet,” said Susan to herself, “my life has not been altogether an
unhappy one in spite of our poverty. William has a kind heart, and I am
sure that if he had anything to wear besides his dress-suit and flannel
dressing-gown he would often brighten my lot by taking me out somewhere
in the daytime. Ah, if papa would only relent! But I fear he will never
forgive me for my marriage.”
Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of familiar footsteps in the
hall, and the next moment her husband had clasped her in his arms,
while the children clung to his ulster and clamored for their early
morning kiss.
But there was a cloud on the young husband’s brow and a tremor on
his lips as he said, “Run away now, little ones; papa and mama have
something to say to each other that little ears must not hear.”
“My darling,” he said, as soon as they were alone, “I fear that our
Christmas will not be a very merry one. You know how we always depend
on the ball of the Gilt-edged Coterie for our Christmas dinner?”
“Indeed I do,” replied the young wife, with a bright smile: “what
beautiful slices of roast beef and magnificent mince-pies you always
bring home from that ball! Surely they will give their entertainment on
Christmas eve this year as they always have?”
“Yes, but--can you bear to hear it, my own love?”
“Let me know the worst,” said the young wife, bravely.
“Then,” said William, hoarsely, “I will tell you. I am not going to
that ball. The city editor is going to take the assignment himself, and
I must go to a literary and artistic gathering, where there will be
nothing but tea and recitations.”
“Yes,” said Susan, bitterly, “and sandwiches so thin that they can be
used to watch the eclipse of the sun. But what have you brought back
with you now? I hope it is something nourishing.”
“My darling,” replied William Swallowtail, in faltering tones, “I fear
you are doomed to another disappointment. I have done my best to-night,
but this is all I could get my hands on;” and with these words he
drew from the pockets of his heavy woolen ulster a paper bag filled
with wine jelly, a box of _marrons glacés_, and two pint bottles of
champagne.
“Is that all?” said Susan, reproachfully. “The children have had
nothing to eat since yesterday morning except _pâtés de foie gras_,
macaroons, and hothouse grapes. All day long they have been crying for
corned-beef sandwiches, and I have had none to give them. You told me,
William, when we parted in the early evening, that you were going to a
house where there would be at least ham, and perhaps bottled beer, and
now you return to me with this paltry package of jelly and that very
sweet wine. I hope, William”--and a cold, hard look of suspicion crept
into her face--“that you have not forgotten your vows and given to
another--”
“Susan!” cried William Swallowtail, “how can you speak or even think of
such a thing, when you know full well that--”
But Susan withdrew from his embrace, and asked in bitter, cold
accents, “Was there ham at that reception or was there not?”
“There was ham, and corned beef too. I will not deny it; but--”
“Then, William, with what woman have you shared it?” demanded the young
wife, drawing herself up to her full height, and fixing her dark,
flashing eyes full upon him.
“Susan, I implore you, listen to me, and do not judge me too harshly.
There _was_ ham, but there were several German noblemen there
too--Baron Sneeze of the Austrian legation, Count Pretzel, and a dozen
more. The smell of meat inflamed them, and I fought my way through them
in time to save only this from the wreck.”
He drew from his ulster-pocket something done up in a piece of paper,
and handed it to his wife. She opened the package and saw that it
contained what looked like a long piece of very highly polished
ivory. Then her face softened, her lips trembled, and her eyes brimmed
over with tears. “Forgive me, William, for my unjust suspicions,” she
exclaimed, as she threw herself once more into his arms. “This mute
ham-bone tells me far more strongly than any words of yours could the
story of the Society reporter’s awful struggle for life.”
William kissed his young wife affectionately, and then sat down to the
breakfast which she had prepared for him.
“I hope,” she said, cheerfully, as she took a dish of lobster salad
from the oven, where it had been warmed over, “that you will keep a
sharp lookout for quail this week. It would be nice to have one or two
for our Christmas dinner. Of course we cannot afford corned beef and
cabbage like those rich people whom you call by their first names when
you write about them in the Sunday papers; but I do hope we will not be
obliged to put up with cakes and pastry and such wretched stuff.”
“Quail!” exclaimed her husband; “they are so scarce and shy this winter
that we are obliged to take setter-dogs with us to the entertainments
at which they are served. But I will do my best, darling.”
As soon as William had gone to bed Susan took from its hiding-place the
present which she had prepared for her husband, and proceeded to sew
it to the inside of his ulster as a Christmas surprise for him. She
sighed to think that it was the best she could afford this year. It was
a useful rather than an ornamental gift--a simple rubber pocket, made
from a piece of an old mackintosh, and intended for William to carry
soup in.
But Susan had a bright, hopeful spirit, and a smile soon smoothed
the furrows from her face as she murmured, “How nice it will be
when William comes home with his new pocket filled with nice, warm,
nourishing bouillon!” and then she glanced up from her work and saw
that her daughter, little golden-haired Eva, had entered the room and
was looking at her out of her great, truthful, deep-blue eyes.
* * * * *
It was Christmas eve, and as Jacob Scaffold trudged through the frosty
streets the keen air brought a ruddy glow to his cheeks and tipped his
nose with a brighter carmine than any that he used in the practice of
his art. Entering the hall in which the ball of the Gilt-edged Coterie
was taking place, the proud old house and sign painter quickly divested
himself of his outer wraps and made his way to the committee-room.
Then, adorned with a huge badge and streamer, he strolled out to
greet his friends, who were making merry on the polished floor of the
ball-room. But although the band played its most stirring measures and
the lights gleamed on arms and necks of dazzling whiteness, old Jacob
Scaffold sighed deeply as he seated himself in a rather obscure corner
and allowed his eyes to roam about the room as if in search of some
familiar face.
The fact was that the haughty, purse-proud old man was thinking of
another Christmas eve ten years before when his daughter Susan had
danced at this same ball, the brightest, the prettiest, and the most
sought-after girl on the floor.
“And to think,” said the old man to himself, “that, with all the
opportunities she had to make a good match, she should have taken up
with that reporter in the shiny dress-suit! It’s five years since I’ve
heard anything of her, but of late I’ve been thinking that maybe I was
too harsh with her, and perhaps--”
His thoughts were interrupted by the arrival of a servant, who told him
that some one desired to see him in the committee-room. On reaching
that apartment he found a little girl of perhaps eight years of age,
plainly clad, and carrying a basket in her hand. Fixing her eyes on
Jacob Scaffold, she said:
“Please, sir, are you the chairman of the press committee?”
“I am,” replied the puzzled artist; “but who are you?”
“I am the reporter of the _Sunday Guff_. My papa has charge of the
‘What the Four Hundred are Doing’ column, but to-night he is obliged to
attend a chromo-literary reception, where there will be nothing to eat
but tea and cake. Papa has reported your balls and chowder excursions
for the past five years, and we have always had ham for dessert for a
week afterward. We had all been looking forward to your Christmas-eve
ball, and when papa told us that he would have to go to the tea and
cake place to-night mama felt so badly that I took papa’s ticket out of
his pocket when he was asleep and came here myself. Papa has a thick
ulster, full of nice big pockets, that he puts on when he goes out to
report, but I have brought a basket.”
The child finished her simple and affecting narrative, and the members
of the press committee looked at one another dumfounded. Jacob Scaffold
was the first to break the silence.
“And what is your name, little child?” he inquired.
“Eva Swallowtail,” she answered, as she turned a pair of trusting,
innocent blue eyes full upon him.
The old man grew pale and his lips trembled as he gathered his
grandchild in his arms. The other members of the committee softly left
the room, for they all knew the story of Susan Scaffold’s _mésalliance_
and her father’s bitter feelings toward her and her husband.
“What!” cried Jacob Scaffold, “my grandchild wanting bread? Come to me,
little one, and we’ll see what can be done for you.”
And putting on his heavy ulster he took little Eva by the hand and led
the way to the great thoroughfare, on which the stores were still open.
* * * * *
It was a happy family party that sat down to dinner in William
Swallowtail’s humble home that bright Christmas day, and well did the
little ones enjoy the treat which their generous new-found grandparent
provided for them. They began with a soup made of wine jelly, and ended
with a delicious dessert of corned-beef sandwiches and large German
pickles; and then, when they could eat no more, and not even a pork pie
could tempt their appetites, Grandpa Scaffold told his daughter that he
was willing to lift his son-in-law from the hard and ill-paid labor
of writing Society chronicles, and give him a chance to better himself
with a whitewash brush. “And,” continued the old man, “if I see that
he possesses true artistic talent, I will some day give him a chance at
the side of a house.”
THE DYING GAG.
There was an affecting scene on the stage of a New York theatre the
other night--a scene invisible to the audience and not down on the
bills, but one far more touching and pathetic than anything enacted
before the footlights that night, although it was a minstrel company
that gave the entertainment.
It was a wild, blustering night, and the wind howled mournfully around
the street-corners, blinding the pedestrians with the clouds of dust
that it caught up from the gutters and hurled into their faces.
Old man Sweeny, the stage doorkeeper, dozing in his little glazed box,
was awakened by a sudden gust that banged the stage door and then
went howling along the corridor, almost extinguishing the gas-jets and
making the minstrels shiver in their dressing-rooms.
“What! you here to-night?” exclaimed old man Sweeny as a frail figure
muffled up in a huge ulster staggered through the doorway and stood
leaning against the wall, trying to catch his breath.
“Yes; I felt that I couldn’t stay away from the footlights to-night.
They tell me I’m old and worn out and had better take a rest, but I’ll
go on till I drop;” and with a hollow cough the Old Gag plodded slowly
down the dim and drafty corridor, and sank wearily on a sofa in the big
dressing-room, where the other Gags and Conundrums were awaiting their
cues.
“Poor old fellow!” said one of them, sadly, “he can’t hold out much
longer.”
“He ought not to go on except at matinées,” replied another veteran,
who was standing in front of the mirror trimming his long, silvery
beard; and just then an attendant came in with several basins of gruel,
and the old Jests tucked napkins under their chins and sat down to
partake of a little nourishment before going on.
The bell tinkled and the entertainment began. One after another the
Jokes and Conundrums heard their cues, went on, and returned to the
dressing-room; for they all had to go on again in the after-piece. The
house was crowded to the dome, and there was scarcely a dry eye in the
vast audience as one after another of the old Quips and Jests that
had been treasured household words in many a family came on and then
disappeared to make room for others of their kind.
As the evening wore on the whisper ran through the theatre that the Old
Gag was going on that night--perhaps for the last time; and many an eye
grew dim, many a pulse beat quicker at the thought of listening once
more to that hoary Jest, about whose head were clustered so many sacred
memories.
Meanwhile the Old Gag was sitting in his corner of the dressing-room,
his head bowed on his breast, his gruel untasted on the tray before
him. The other Gags came and went, but he heeded them not. His thoughts
were far away. He was dreaming of old days, of his early struggles
for fame, and of his friends and companions of years ago. “Where are
they now?” he asked himself, sadly. “Some are wanderers on the face
of the earth, in comic operas. Two of them found ignoble graves in
the ‘Tourists’’ company. Others are sleeping beneath the daisies in
Harper’s ‘Editor’s Drawer.’”
“You’re called, sir!”
The Old Gag awoke from his reverie, and started to his feet with
something of the old-time fire flashing in his eye. Throwing aside his
heavy ulster, he staggered to the entrance and stood there patiently
waiting for his cue.
“You’re hardly strong enough to go on to-night,” said a Merry Jest,
touching him kindly on the arm; but the gray-bearded one shook him off,
saying hoarsely:
“Let be! let be! I must read those old lines once more--it may be for
the last time.”
And now a solemn hush fell upon the vast audience as a sad-faced
minstrel uttered in tear-compelling accents the most pathetic words in
all the literature of minstrelsy:
“And so you say, Mr. Johnson, that all the people on the ship were
perishing of hunger, and yet you were eating fried eggs. How do you
account for that?”
For one moment a deathlike silence prevailed. Then the Old Gag stepped
forward and in clear, ringing tones replied:
“The ship lay to, and I got one.”
A wild, heart-rending sob came from the audience and relieved the
tension as the Old Gag staggered back into the entrance and fell into
the friendly arms that were waiting to receive him.
Sobbing Conundrums bore him to a couch in the dressing-room. Weeping
Jokes strove in vain to bring back the spark of life to his inanimate
form. But all to no avail.
The Old Gag was dead.
“ONLY A TYPE-WRITER.”
SCENE. _Cave of the experienced_ MANAGER _in the centre of a labyrinth
under the stage_.
MANAGER (_to energetic young_ DRAMATIST _who has tracked him to his
lair_). Yes, young feller, I’ve read your play, and, while it’s
first-class in its way, it ain’t exactly what I want. Now you seem to
be a pushing, active sort of a feller--if you hadn’t been you never
would have found your way in here--and if you can only get me up the
sort of piece I want we can do a little business together. In writing
a play you’ve got to bear one thing in mind, and that is to adapt
yourself to the public taste and the resources of the theatre. Are you
on?
DRAMATIST. Certainly, sir; and I shall be only too happy to write
something especially for your theatre. I think I can do it if I only
get a chance. Sardou is my model.
MANAGER. Well, Sardou is all right enough in his way, but I’m looking
after something entirely different. Now I want a strong melodrama, and
I’m going to call it _Only a Type-writer; or, The Pulse of the Great
Metropolis_. There are twenty thousand type-writers in the city, and
they’ll all want to see it, and each of them will fetch her mother or
her feller along with her. Then they’ll gabble about it to all the
people they know--nothing like a lot of women to advertise a piece--and
if there’s any go in the play at all it’ll be talked about from Harlem
to the Battery before it’s been on the boards a week. Now, of course,
there’s got to be a moral; in fact, you’ve got to come out pretty d--d
strong with your moral. My idea is this: In the first act you show the
type-writer--whose folks are all gilt-edged people and ’way up--in an
elegant cottage at Newport. She’s a light-hearted, innocent girl in a
white muslin dress with a blue sash. I’m going to cast Pearl Livingston
for the part, and she’s always crazy to make up for an innocent girl.
Recollect you can’t spread the innocence and simplicity on too thick.
Livingston wants to say a prayer with her hair hanging down her back,
so if you can ring that in somehow it’ll be all the better. You must
give her a good entrance, too, or she’ll kick like a steer.
DRAMATIST. Excuse me, but I don’t see exactly how a type-writer could
live in a Newport cottage.
MANAGER. I’m coming to that right away. You see this act is just to
show her as a light-hearted, innocent girl whose father has always been
loaded up with dust, so she’s never known what it was to holler for a
sealskin sack and not get it. But in the end of the act the father goes
broke and exclaims, “Merciful heavens, we are beggars!” and drops dead.
His wife gives a shriek, and all the society people rush on from the
wings so as to make a picture at the back, while the daughter--that’s
Livingston, you know--takes the centre of the stage and says, “No,
mother”--or “mommer” would sound more affectionate, maybe--“No,
mommer,” she says, “not beggars yet, for I will work for you!” Curtain!
Are you on to the idea?
DRAMATIST. Well, I believe I understand your scheme so far. But who’s
the hero, and where do you get your comedy element?
MANAGER. Oh, the comedy is easy enough to manage, and as for the hero,
I forgot to tell you that he shows up in the first act and wants to
marry her, but she gives him the bounce because he’s poor as a crow.
Better make him an artist or something of that sort. It might be a good
idea to have him a reporter, and then he can read some good strong
lines about the dignity of his profession or something of that sort,
just so as to catch on with the press boys. Well, the next act shows
the girl living in a garret in New York, supporting herself and her
mother by type-writing. Lay it on thick about their being poor and
industrious and all that, and have some good lines about the noble
working-girl or the virtuous type-writer or something of that sort.
Livingston’s got an elegant new silk gown that she says she’s going to
wear in that act, so you’ll have to give her a few lines to explain
that although they’re poor she still has that dress and won’t part
with it because her father gave it to her, and so she wears it at home
nights when the other one’s in the wash.
DRAMATIST. Excuse me, but isn’t it rather strange for a poor
type-writer to appear in a handsome new silk dress when she’s having
hard work to support herself and her mother? Why not put her in a plain
gingham gown--?