for him (and only signs the contact because its pecuniary clauses are to
his satisfaction, and who would withdraw in a moment if these were
suppressed), must have an entirely different point of view from her own
on all the vital issues of life.
Foreigners undoubtedly make excellent husbands for their own women. But
they are, except in rare cases, unsatisfactory helpmeets for American
girls. It is impossible to touch on more than a side or two of this
subject. But as an illustration the following contrasted stories may be
cited:
Two sisters of an aristocratic American family, each with an income of
over forty thousand dollars a year, recently married French noblemen.
They naturally expected to continue abroad the life they had led at home,
in which opera boxes, saddle horses, and constant entertaining were
matters of course. In both cases, our compatriots discovered that their
husbands (neither of them penniless) had entirely different views. In
the first place, they were told that it was considered "bad form" in
France for young married women to entertain; besides, the money was
needed for improvements, and in many other ways, and as every well-to-do
French family puts aside at least a third of its income as _dots_ for the
children (boys as well as girls), these brides found themselves cramped
for money for the first time in their lives, and obliged, during their
one month a year in Paris, to put up with hired traps, and depend on
their friends for evenings at the opera.
This story is a telling set-off to the case of an American wife, who one
day received a windfall in the form of a check for a tidy amount. She
immediately proposed a trip abroad to her husband, but found that he
preferred to remain at home in the society of his horses and dogs. So
our fair compatriot starts off (with his full consent), has her outing,
spends her little "pile," and returns after three or four months to the
home of her delighted spouse.
Do these two stories need any comment? Let our sisters and their friends
think twice before they make themselves irrevocably wheels in a machine
whose working is unknown to them, lest they be torn to pieces as it
moves. Having the good luck to be born in the "paradise of women," let
them beware how they leave it, charm the serpent never so wisely, for
they may find themselves, like the Peri, outside the gate.
No. 6--The Complacency of Mediocrity
Full as small intellects are of queer kinks, unexplained turnings and
groundless likes and dislikes, the bland contentment that buoys up the
incompetent is the most difficult of all vagaries to account for. Rarely
do twenty-four hours pass without examples of this exasperating weakness
appearing on the surface of those shallows that commonplace people so
naively call "their minds."
What one would expect is extreme modesty, in the half-educated or the
ignorant, and self-approbation higher up in the scale, where it might
more reasonably dwell. Experience, however, teaches that exactly the
opposite is the case among those who have achieved success.
The accidents of a life turned by chance out of the beaten tracks, have
thrown me at times into acquaintanceship with some of the greater lights
of the last thirty years. And not only have they been, as a rule, most
unassuming men and women; but in the majority of cases positively self-
depreciatory; doubting of themselves and their talents, constantly aiming
at greater perfection in their art or a higher development of their
powers, never contented with what they have achieved, beyond the idea
that it has been another step toward their goal. Knowing this, it is
always a shock on meeting the mediocre people who form such a
discouraging majority in any society, to discover that they are all so
pleased with themselves, their achievements, their place in the world,
and their own ability and discernment!
Who has not sat chafing in silence while Mediocrity, in a white waistcoat
and jangling fobs, occupied the after-dinner hour in imparting second-
hand information as his personal views on literature and art? Can you
not hear him saying once again: "I don't pretend to know anything about
art and all that sort of thing, you know, but when I go to an exhibition
I can always pick out the best pictures at a glance. Sort of a way I
have, and I never make mistakes, you know."
Then go and watch, as I have, Henri Rochefort as he laboriously forms the
opinions that are to appear later in one of his "_Salons_," realizing the
while that he is _facile princeps_ among the art critics of his day, that
with a line he can make or mar a reputation and by a word draw the
admiring crowd around an unknown canvas. While Rochefort toils and
ponders and hesitates, do you suppose a doubt as to his own astuteness
ever dims the self-complacency of White Waistcoat? Never!
There lies the strength of the feeble-minded. By a special dispensation
of Providence, they can never see but one side of a subject, so are
always convinced that they are right, and from the height of their
contentment, look down on those who chance to differ with them.
A lady who has gathered into her dainty salons the fruit of many years'
careful study and tireless "weeding" will ask anxiously if you are quite
sure you like the effect of her latest acquisition--some
eighteenth-century statuette or screen (flotsam, probably, from the great
shipwreck of Versailles), and listen earnestly to your verdict. The good
soul who has just furnished her house by contract, with the latest "Louis
Fourteenth Street" productions, conducts you complacently through her
chambers of horrors, wreathed in tranquil smiles, born of ignorance and
that smug assurance granted only to the--small.
When a small intellect goes in for cultivating itself and improving its
mind, you realize what the poet meant in asserting that a little learning
was a dangerous thing. For Mediocrity is apt, when it dines out, to get
up a subject beforehand, and announce to an astonished circle, as quite
new and personal discoveries, that the Renaissance was introduced into
France from Italy, or that Columbus in his day made important "finds."
When the incompetent advance another step and write or paint--which,
alas! is only too frequent--the world of art and literature is flooded
with their productions. When White Waistcoat, for example, takes to
painting, late in life, and comes to you, canvas in hand, for criticism
(read praise), he is apt to remark modestly:
"Corot never painted until he was fifty, and I am only forty-eight. So I
feel I should not let myself be discouraged."
The problem of life is said to be the finding of a happiness that is not
enjoyed at the expense of others, and surely this class have solved that
Sphinx's riddle, for they float through their days in a dream of
complacency disturbed neither by corroding doubt nor harassed by
jealousies.
Whole families of feeble-minded people, on the strength of an ancestor
who achieved distinction a hundred years ago, live in constant
thanksgiving that they "are not as other men." None of the great man's
descendants have done anything to be particularly proud of since their
remote progenitor signed the Declaration of Independence or governed a
colony. They have vegetated in small provincial cities and inter-married
into other equally fortunate families, but the sense of superiority is
ever present to sustain them, under straitened circumstances and
diminishing prestige. The world may move on around them, but they never
advance. Why should they? They have reached perfection. The brains and
enterprise that have revolutionized our age knock in vain at their doors.
They belong to that vast "majority that is always in the wrong," being so
pleased with themselves, their ways, and their feeble little lines of
thought, that any change or advancement gives their system a shock.
A painter I know was once importuned for a sketch by a lady of this
class. After many delays and renewed demands he presented her one day,
when she and some friends were visiting his studio, with a delightful
open-air study simply framed. She seemed confused at the offering, to
his astonishment, as she had not lacked _aplomb_ in asking for the
sketch. After much blushing and fumbling she succeeded in getting the
painting loose, and handing back the frame, remarked:
"I will take the painting, but you must keep the frame. My husband would
never allow me to accept anything of value from you!"--and smiled on the
speechless painter, doubtless charmed with her own tact.
Complacent people are the same drag on a society that a brake would be to
a coach going up hill. They are the "eternal negative" and would
extinguish, if they could, any light stronger than that to which their
weak eyes have been accustomed. They look with astonishment and distrust
at any one trying to break away from their tiresome old ways and habits,
and wonder why all the world is not as pleased with their personalities
as they are themselves, suggesting, if you are willing to waste your time
listening to their twaddle, that there is something radically wrong in
any innovation, that both "Church and State" will be imperilled if things
are altered. No blight, no mildew is more fatal to a plant than the
"complacent" are to the world. They resent any progress and are offended
if you mention before them any new standards or points of view. "What
has been good enough for us and our parents should certainly be
satisfactory to the younger generations." It seems to the contented like
pure presumption on the part of their acquaintances to wander after
strange gods, in the shape of new ideals, higher standards of culture, or
a perfected refinement of surroundings.
We are perhaps wrong to pity complacent people. It is for another class
our sympathy should be kept; for those who cannot refrain from doubting
of themselves and the value of their work--those unfortunate gifted and
artistic spirits who descend too often the _via dolorosa_ of discontent
and despair, who have a higher ideal than their neighbors, and, in
struggling after an unattainable perfection, fall by the wayside.
No. 7--The Discontent of Talent
The complacency that buoys up self-sufficient souls, soothing them with
the illusion that they themselves, their towns, country, language, and
habits are above improvement, causing them to shudder, as at a sacrilege,
if any changes are suggested, is fortunately limited to a class of stay-
at-home nonentities. In proportion as it is common among them, is it
rare or delightfully absent in any society of gifted or imaginative
people.
Among our globe-trotting compatriots this defect is much less general
than in the older nations of the world, for the excellent reason, that
the moment a man travels or takes the trouble to know people of different
nationalities, his armor of complacency receives so severe a blow, that
it is shattered forever, the wanderer returning home wiser and much more
modest. There seems to be something fatal to conceit in the air of great
centres; professionally or in general society a man so soon finds his
level.
The "great world" may foster other faults; human nature is sure to
develop some in every walk of life. Smug contentment, however,
disappears in its rarefied atmosphere, giving place to a craving for
improvement, a nervous alertness that keeps the mind from stagnating and
urges it on to do its best.
It is never the beautiful woman who sits down in smiling serenity before
her mirror. She is tireless in her efforts to enhance her beauty and set
it off to the best advantage. Her figure is never slender enough, nor
her carriage sufficiently erect to satisfy. But the "frump" will let
herself and all her surroundings go to seed, not from humbleness of mind
or an overwhelming sense of her own unworthiness, but in pure complacent
conceit.
A criticism to which the highly gifted lay themselves open from those who
do not understand them, is their love of praise, the critics failing to
grasp the fact that this passion for measuring one's self with others,
like the gad-fly pursuing poor Io, never allows a moment's repose in the
green pastures of success, but goads them constantly up the rocky sides
of endeavor. It is not that they love flattery, but that they need
approbation as a counterpoise to the dark moments of self-abasement and
as a sustaining aid for higher flights.
Many years ago I was present at a final sitting which my master, Carolus
Duran, gave to one of my fair compatriots. He knew that the lady was
leaving Paris on the morrow, and that in an hour, her husband and his
friends were coming to see and criticise the portrait--always a terrible
ordeal for an artist.
To any one familiar with this painter's moods, it was evident that the
result of the sitting was not entirely satisfactory. The quick
breathing, the impatient tapping movement of the foot, the swift backward
springs to obtain a better view, so characteristic of him in moments of
doubt, and which had twenty years before earned him the name of _le
danseur_ from his fellow-copyists at the Louvre, betrayed to even a
casual observer that his discouragement and discontent were at boiling
point.
The sound of a bell and a murmur of voices announced the entrance of the
visitors into the vast studio. After the formalities of introduction had
been accomplished the new-comers glanced at the portrait, but uttered
never a word. From it they passed in a perfectly casual manner to an
inspection of the beautiful contents of the room, investigating the
tapestries, admiring the armor, and finally, after another glance at the
portrait, the husband remarked: "You have given my wife a jolly long
neck, haven't you?" and, turning to his friends, began laughing and
chatting in English.
If vitriol had been thrown on my poor master's quivering frame, the
effect could not have been more instantaneous, his ignorance of the
language spoken doubtless exaggerating his impression of being ridiculed.
Suddenly he turned very white, and before any of us had divined his
intention he had seized a Japanese sword lying by and cut a dozen gashes
across the canvas. Then, dropping his weapon, he flung out of the room,
leaving his sitter and her friends in speechless consternation, to wonder
then and ever after in what way they had offended him. In their
opinions, if a man had talent and understood his business, he should
produce portraits with the same ease that he would answer dinner
invitations, and if they paid for, they were in no way bound also to
praise, his work. They were entirely pleased with the result, but did
not consider it necessary to tell him so, no idea having crossed their
minds that he might be in one of those moods so frequent with artistic
natures, when words of approbation and praise are as necessary to them,
as the air we breathe is to us, mortals of a commoner clay.
Even in the theatrical and operatic professions, those hotbeds of
conceit, you will generally find among the "stars" abysmal depths of
discouragement and despair. One great tenor, who has delighted New York
audiences during several winters past, invariably announces to his
intimates on arising that his "voice has gone," and that, in consequence
he will "never sing again," and has to be caressed and cajoled back into
some semblance of confidence before attempting a performance. This same
artist, with an almost limitless repertoire and a reputation no new
successes could enhance, recently risked all to sing what he considered a
higher class of music, infinitely more fatiguing to his voice, because he
was impelled onward by the ideal that forces genius to constant
improvement and development of its powers.
What the people who meet these artists occasionally at a private concert
or behind the scenes during the intense strain of a representation, take
too readily for monumental egoism and conceit, is, the greater part of
the time, merely the desire for a sustaining word, a longing for the
stimulant of praise.
All actors and singers are but big children, and must be humored and
petted like children when you wish them to do their best. It is
necessary for them to feel in touch with their audiences; to be assured
that they are not falling below the high ideals formed for their work.
Some winters ago a performance at the opera nearly came to a standstill
because an all-conquering soprano was found crying in her dressing-room.
After many weary moments of consolation and questioning, it came out that
she felt quite sure she no longer had any talent. One of the other
singers had laughed at her voice, and in consequence there was nothing
left to live for. A half-hour later, owing to judicious "treatment," she
was singing gloriously and bowing her thanks to thunders of applause.
Rather than blame this divine discontent that has made man what he is to-
day, let us glorify and envy it, pitying the while the frail mortal
vessels it consumes with its flame. No adulation can turn such natures
from their goal, and in the hour of triumph the slave is always at their
side to whisper the word of warning. This discontent is the leaven that
has raised the whole loaf of dull humanity to better things and higher
efforts, those privileged to feel it are the suns that illuminate our
system. If on these luminaries observers have discovered spots, it is
well to remember that these blemishes are but the defects of their
qualities, and better far than the total eclipse that shrouds so large a
part of humanity in colorless complacency.
It will never be known how many master-pieces have been lost to the world
because at the critical moment a friend has not been at hand with the
stimulant of sympathy and encouragement needed by an overworked,
straining artist who was beginning to lose confidence in himself; to
soothe his irritated nerves with the balm of praise, and take his poor
aching head on a friendly shoulder and let him sob out there all his
doubt and discouragement.
So let us not be niggardly or ungenerous in meting out to struggling
fellow-beings their share, and perchance a little more than their share
of approbation and applause, poor enough return, after all, for the
pleasure their labors have procured us. What adequate compensation can
we mete out to an author for the hours of delight and self-forgetfulness
his talent has brought to us in moments of loneliness, illness, or grief?
What can pay our debt to a painter who has fixed on canvas the face we
love?
The little return that it is in our power to make for all the joy these
gifted fellow-beings bring into our lives is (closing our eyes to minor
imperfections) to warmly applaud them as they move upward, along their
stony path.
No. 8--Slouch
I should like to see, in every school-room of our growing country, in
every business office, at the railway stations, and on street corners,
large placards placed with "Do not slouch" printed thereon in distinct
and imposing characters. If ever there was a tendency that needed
nipping in the bud (I fear the bud is fast becoming a full-blown flower),
it is this discouraging national failing.
Each year when I return from my spring wanderings, among the benighted
and effete nations of the Old World, on whom the untravelled American
looks down from the height of his superiority, I am struck anew by the
contrast between the trim, well-groomed officials left behind on one side
of the ocean and the happy-go-lucky, slouching individuals I find on the
other.
As I ride up town this unpleasant impression deepens. In the "little
Mother Isle" I have just left, bus-drivers have quite a coaching air,
with hat and coat of knowing form. They sport flowers in their button-
holes and salute other bus-drivers, when they meet, with a twist of whip
and elbow refreshingly correct, showing that they take pride in their
calling, and have been at some pains to turn themselves out as smart in
appearance as finances would allow.
Here, on the contrary, the stage and cab drivers I meet seem to be under
a blight, and to have lost all interest in life. They lounge on the box,
their legs straggling aimlessly, one hand holding the reins, the other
hanging dejectedly by the side. Yet there is little doubt that these
heartbroken citizens are earning double what their London _confreres_
gain. The shadow of the national peculiarity is over them.
When I get to my rooms, the elevator boy is reclining in the lift, and
hardly raises his eye-lids as he languidly manoeuvres the rope. I have
seen that boy now for months, but never when his boots and clothes were
brushed or when his cravat was not riding proudly above his collar. On
occasions I have offered him pins, which he took wearily, doubtless
because it was less trouble than to refuse. The next day, however, his
cravat again rode triumphant, mocking my efforts to keep it in its place.
His hair, too, has been a cause of wonder to me. How does he manage to
have it always so long and so unkempt? More than once, when expecting
callers, I have bribed him to have it cut, but it seemed to grow in the
night, back to its poetic profusion.
In what does this noble disregard for appearances which characterizes
American men originate? Our climate, as some suggest, or discouragement
at not all being millionaires? It more likely comes from an absence with
us of the military training that abroad goes so far toward licking young
men into shape.
I shall never forget the surprise on the face of a French statesman to
whom I once expressed my sympathy for his country, laboring under the
burden of so vast a standing army. He answered:
"The financial burden is doubtless great; but you have others. Witness
your pension expenditures. With us the money drawn from the people is
used in such a way as to be of inestimable value to them. We take the
young hobbledehoy farm-hand or mechanic, ignorant, mannerless, uncleanly
as he may be, and turn him out at the end of three years with his
regiment, self-respecting and well-mannered, with habits of cleanliness
and obedience, having acquired a bearing, and a love of order that will
cling to and serve him all his life. We do not go so far," he added, "as
our English neighbors in drilling men into superb manikins of 'form' and
carriage. Our authorities do not consider it necessary. But we reclaim
youths from the slovenliness of their native village or workshop and make
them tidy and mannerly citizens."
These remarks came to mind the other day as I watched a group of New
England youths lounging on the steps of the village store, or sitting in
rows on a neighboring fence, until I longed to try if even a judicial
arrangement of tacks, 'business-end up,' on these favorite seats would
infuse any energy into their movements. I came to the conclusion that my
French acquaintance was right, for the only trim-looking men to be seen,
were either veterans of our war or youths belonging to the local militia.
And nowhere does one see finer specimens of humanity than West Point and
Annapolis turn out.
If any one doubts what kind of men slouching youths develop into, let him
look when he travels, at the dejected appearance of the farmhouses
throughout our land. Surely our rural populations are not so much poorer
than those of other countries. Yet when one compares the dreary homes of
even our well-to-do farmers with the smiling, well-kept hamlets seen in
England or on the Continent, such would seem to be the case.
If ours were an old and bankrupt nation, this air of discouragement and
decay could not be greater. Outside of the big cities one looks in vain
for some sign of American dash and enterprise in the appearance of our
men and their homes.
During a journey of over four thousand miles, made last spring as the
guest of a gentleman who knows our country thoroughly, I was impressed
most painfully with this abject air. Never in all those days did we see
a fruit-tree trained on some sunny southern wall, a smiling flower-garden
or carefully clipped hedge. My host told me that hardly the necessary
vegetables are grown, the inhabitants of the West and South preferring
canned food. It is less trouble!