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A FRENCHMAN IN AMERICA.
[Illustration: Max O'Rell]
_A FRENCHMAN IN AMERICA_
Recollections of Men and Things
BY MAX O'RELL
AUTHOR OF "JONATHAN AND HIS CONTINENT," "JOHN BULL, JUNIOR,"
"JACQUES BONHOMME," "JOHN BULL AND HIS ISLAND," ETC.
WITH OVER ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY ILLUSTRATIONS
BY E. W. KEMBLE
NEW YORK
CASSELL PUBLISHING COMPANY
104 & 106 FOURTH AVENUE
COPYRIGHT, 1891, BY
CASSELL PUBLISHING COMPANY.
_All rights reserved._
THE MERSHON COMPANY PRESS,
RAHWAY, N. J.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER. PAGE.
I.--Departure--The Atlantic--Demoralization of the "Boarders"--
Betting--The Auctioneer--An Inquisitive Yankee, 1
II.--Arrival of the Pilot--First Look at American Newspapers, 11
III.--Arrival--The Custom House--Things Look Bad--The
Interviewers--First Visits--Things Look Brighter--"O Vanity
of Vanities," 14
IV.--Impressions of American Hotels, 25
V.--My Opening Lecture--Reflections on Audiences I Have Had--The
Man who Won't Smile--The One who Laughs too Soon, and Many
Others, 37
VI.--A Connecticut Audience--Merry Meriden--A Hard Pull, 48
VII--A Tempting Offer--The Thursday Club--Bill Nye--Visit to Young
Ladies' Schools--The Players' Club, 52
VIII.--The Flourishing of Coats-of-Arms in America--Reflections
Thereon--Forefathers Made to Order--The Phonograph at
Home--The Wealth of New York--Departure for Buffalo, 60
IX.--Different Ways of Advertising a Lecture--American
Impressarios and Their Methods, 66
X.--Buffalo--The Niagara Falls--A Frost--Rochester to the Rescue
of Buffalo--Cleveland--I Meet Jonathan--Phantasmagoria, 74
XI.--A Great Admirer--Notes on Railway Traveling--Is America a
Free Nation?--A Pleasant Evening in New York, 81
XII.--Notes on American Women--Comparisons--How Men Treat Women
and Vice Versa--Scenes and Illustrations, 90
XIII.--More about Journalism in America--A Dinner at Delmonico's--
My First Appearance in an American Church, 110
XIV.--Marcus Aurelius in America--Chairmen I Have Had--American,
English, and Scotch Chairmen--One who had Been to
Boulogne--Talkative and Silent Chairmen--A Trying Occasion--
The Lord is Asked to Allow the Audience to See my Points, 124
XV.--Reflections on the Typical American, 137
XVI.--I am Asked to Express Myself Freely on America--I Meet Mrs.
Blank and for the First Time Hear of Mr. Blank--Beacon
Street Society--The Boston Clubs, 149
XVII.--A Lively Sunday in Boston--Lecture in the Boston Theater--
Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes--The Booth-Modjeska Combination, 156
XVIII--St. Johnsbury--The State of Maine--New England
Self-control--Cold Climates and Frigid Audiences--Where is
the Audience?--All Drunk!--A Reminiscence of a Scotch
Audience on a Saturday Night, 163
XIX.--A Lovely Ride to Canada--Quebec, a Corner of Old France
Strayed up and Lost in the Snow--The French Canadians--The
Parties in Canada--Will the Canadians become Yankees? 172
XX.--Montreal--The City--Mount Royal--Canadian Sports--Ottawa--
The Government--Rideau Hall, 182
XXI.--Toronto--The City--The Ladies--The Sports--Strange
Contrasts--The Canadian Schools, 191
XXII.--West Canada--Relations between British and Indians--Return
to the United States--Difficulties in the Way--Encounter
American Custom-House Officer, 196
XXIII.--Chicago (First Visit)--The "Neighborhood" of Chicago--The
with an History of Chicago--Public Servants--A Very Deaf
Man, 203
XXIV.--St. Paul and Minneapolis, the Sister Cities--Rivalries and
Jealousies between Large American Cities--Minnehaha
Falls--Wonderful Interviewers--My Hat gets into Trouble
Again--Electricity in the Air--Forest Advertisements--
Railway Speed in America, 214
XXV.--Detroit--The Town--The Detroit "Free Press"--A Lady
Interviewer--The "Unco Guid" in Detroit--Reflections on the
Anglo-Saxon "Unco Guid," 222
XXVI.--Milwaukee--A Well-filled Day--Reflections on the Scotch in
America--Chicago Criticisms, 236
XXVII.--The Monotony of Traveling in the States--"Manon Lescaut"
in America, 244
XXVIII.--For the First Time I See an American Paper Abuse Me--
Albany to New York--A Lecture at Daly's Theater--Afternoon
Audiences, 248
XXIX.--Wanderings Through New York--Lecture at the Harmonie Club--
Visit to the Century Club, 255
XXX.--Visit to the Brooklyn Academy of Music--Rev. Dr. Talmage, 257
XXXI.--Virginia--The Hotels--The South--I will Kill a Railway
Conductor before I Leave America--Philadelphia--Impressions
of the Old City, 263
XXXII.--My Ideas of the State of Texas--Why I will not Go
There--The Story of a Frontier Man, 274
XXXIII.--Cincinnati--The Town--The Suburbs--A German City--"Over
the Rhine"--What is a Good Patriot?--An Impressive
Funeral--A Great Fire--How It Appeared to Me, and How It
Appeared to the Newspaper Reporters, 279
XXXIV.--A Journey if you Like--Terrible Encounter with an
American Interviewer, 296
XXXV.--The University of Indiana--Indianapolis--The Veterans of
the Grand Army of the Republic on the Spree--A Marvelous
Equilibrist, 306
XXXVI.--Chicago (Second Visit)--Vassili Verestchagin's
Exhibition--The "Angelus"--Wagner and Wagnerites--
Wanderings About the Big City--I Sit on the Tribunal, 311
XXXVII.--Ann Arbor--The University of Michigan--Detroit
Again--The French Out of France--Oberlin College, Ohio--
Black and White--Are All American Citizens Equal? 322
XXXVIII.--Mr. and Mrs. Kendal in New York--Joseph Jefferson--
Julian Hawthorne--Miss Ada Rehan--"As You Like It" at
Daly's Theater, 330
XXXIX.--Washington--The City--Willard's Hotel--The Politicians--
General Benjamin Harrison, U. S. President--Washington
Society--Baltimore--Philadelphia, 332
XL.--Easter Sunday in New York, 342
XLI.--I Mount the Pulpit and Preach on the Sabbath, in the State
of Wisconsin--The Audience is Large and Appreciative; but I
Probably Fail to Please One of the Congregation, 347
XLII.--The Origin of American Humor and Its Characteristics--The
Sacred and the Profane--The Germans and American Humor--
My Corpse Would "Draw," in my Impressario's Opinion, 353
XLIII.--Good-by to America--Not "Adieu," but "Au Revoir"--On
Board the _Teutonic_--Home Again, 361
A FRENCHMAN IN AMERICA.
CHAPTER I.
DEPARTURE--THE ATLANTIC--DEMORALIZATION OF THE "BOARDERS"--BETTING--THE
AUCTIONEER--AN INQUISITIVE YANKEE.
_On board the "Celtic," Christmas Week, 1889._
In the order of things the _Teutonic_ was to have sailed to-day, but the
date is the 25th of December, and few people elect to eat their
Christmas dinner on the ocean if they can avoid it; so there are only
twenty-five saloon passengers, and they have been committed to the brave
little _Celtic_, while that huge floating palace, the _Teutonic_,
remains in harbor.
Little _Celtic_! Has it come to this with her and her companions, the
_Germanic_, the _Britannic_, and the rest that were the wonders and the
glory of the ship-building craft a few years ago? There is something
almost sad in seeing these queens of the Atlantic dethroned, and obliged
to rank below newer and grander ships. It was even pathetic to hear the
remarks of the sailors, as we passed the _Germanic_ who, in her day, had
created even more wondering admiration than the two famous armed
cruisers lately added to the "White Star" fleet.
* * * * *
I know nothing more monotonous than a voyage from Liverpool to New York.
Nine times out of ten--not to say ninety-nine times out of a
hundred--the passage is bad. The Atlantic Ocean has an ugly temper; it
has forever got its back up. Sulky, angry, and terrible by turns, it
only takes a few days' rest out of every year, and this always occurs
when you are not crossing.
And then, the wind is invariably against you. When you go to America, it
blows from the west; when you come back to Europe, it blows from the
east. If the captain steers south to avoid icebergs, it is sure to begin
to blow southerly.
Doctors say that sea-sickness emanates from the brain. I can quite
believe them. The blood rushes to your head, leaving your extremities
cold and helpless. All the vital force flies to the brain, and your legs
refuse to carry you. It is with sea-sickness as it is with wine. When
people say that a certain wine goes up in the head, it means that it is
more likely to go down to the feet.
There you are, on board a huge construction that rears and kicks like a
buck-jumper. She lifts you up bodily, and, after well shaking all your
members in the air several seconds, lets them down higgledy-piggledy,
leaving to Providence the business of picking them up and putting them
together again. That is the kind of thing one has to go through about
sixty times an hour. And there is no hope for you; nobody dies of it.
[Illustration: "YOUR LEGS REFUSE TO CARRY YOU."]
Under such conditions, the mental state of the boarders may easily be
imagined. They smoke, they play cards, they pace the deck like bruin
pacing a cage; or else they read, and forget at the second chapter all
they have read in the first. A few presumptuous ones try to think, but
without success. The ladies, the American ones more especially, lie on
their deck chairs swathed in rugs and shawls like Egyptian mummies in
their sarcophagi, and there they pass from ten to twelve hours a day
motionless, hopeless, helpless, speechless. Some few incurables keep to
their cabins altogether, and only show their wasted faces when it is
time to debark. Up they come, with cross, stupefied, pallid,
yellow-green-looking physiognomies, and seeming to say: "Speak to me, if
you like, but don't expect me to open my eyes or answer you, and above
all, don't shake me."
Impossible to fraternize.
The crossing now takes about six days and a half. By the time you have
spent two in getting your sea legs on, and three more in reviewing, and
being reviewed by your fellow-passengers, you will find yourself at the
end of your troubles--and your voyage.
No, people do not fraternize on board ship, during such a short passage,
unless a rumor runs from cabin to cabin that there has been some
accident to the machinery, or that the boat is in imminent danger. At
the least scare of this kind, every one looks at his neighbor with eyes
that are alarmed, but amiable, nay, even amicable. But as soon as one
can say: "We have come off with a mere scare this time," all the facial
traits stiffen once more, and nobody knows anybody.
[Illustration: "LIKE EGYPTIAN MUMMIES."]
Universal grief only will bring about universal brotherhood. We must
wait till the Day of Judgment. When the world is passing away, oh! how
men will forgive and love one another! What outpourings of good-will and
affection there will be! How touching, how edifying will be the sight!
The universal republic will be founded in the twinkling of an eye,
distinctions of creed and class forgotten. The author will embrace the
critic and even the publisher, the socialist open his arms to the
capitalist. The married men will be seen "making it up" with their
mothers-in-law, begging them to forgive and forget, and admitting that
they had not been always quite so-so, in fact, as they might have been.
If the Creator of all is a philosopher, or enjoys humor, how he will be
amused to see all the various sects of Christians, who have passed their
lives in running one another down, throw themselves into one another's
arms. It will be a scene never to be forgotten.
Yes, I repeat it, the voyage from Liverpool to New York is monotonous
and wearisome in the extreme. It is an interval in one's existence, a
week more or less lost, decidedly more than less.
One grows gelatinous from head to foot, especially in the upper part of
one's anatomy.
In order to see to what an extent the brain softens, you only need look
at the pastimes the poor passengers go in for.
A state of demoralization prevails throughout.
They bet. That is the form the disease takes.
[Illustration: THE AUCTIONEER.]
They bet on anything and everything. They bet that the sun will or will
not appear next day at eleven precisely, or that rain will fall at noon.
They bet that the number of miles made by the boat at twelve o'clock
next day will terminate with 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, or 9. Each draws
one of these numbers and pays his shilling, half-crown, or even
sovereign. Then these numbers are put up at auction. An improvised
auctioneer, with the gift of the gab, puts his talent at the service of
his fellow-passengers. It is really very funny to see him swaying about
the smoking-room table, and using all his eloquence over each number in
turn for sale. A good auctioneer will run the bidding so smartly that
the winner of the pool next day often pockets as much as thirty and
forty pounds. On the eve of arrival in New York harbor, everybody knows
that twenty-four pilots are waiting about for the advent of the liner,
and that each boat carries her number on her sail. Accordingly,
twenty-four numbers are rolled up and thrown into a cap, and betting
begins again. He who has drawn the number which happens to be that of
the pilot who takes the steamer into harbor pockets the pool.
I, who have never bet on anything in my life, even bet with my traveling
companion, when the rolling of the ship sends our portmanteaus from one
side of the cabin to the other, that mine will arrive first.
Intellectual faculties on board are reduced to this ebb.
* * * * *
The nearest approach to a gay note, in this concert of groans and
grumblings, is struck by some humorous and good-tempered American. He
will come and ask you the most impossible questions with an ease and
impudence perfectly inimitable. These catechisings are all the more
droll because they are done with a _naivete_ which completely disarms
you. The phrase is short, without verb, reduced to its most concise
expression. The intonation alone marks the interrogation. Here is a
specimen.
We have on board the _Celtic_ an American who is not a very shrewd
person, for it has actually taken him five days to discover that English
is not my native tongue. This morning (December 30) he found it out,
and, being seated near me in the smoke-room, has just had the following
bit of conversation with me:
"Foreigner?" said he.
"Foreigner," said I, replying in American.
"German, I guess."
"Guess again."
"French?"
"Pure blood."
[Illustration: "GOING TO AMERICA?"]
"Married?"
"Married."
"Going to America?"
"Yes--evidently."
"Pleasure trip?"
"No."
"On business?"
"On business, yes."
"What's your line?"
"H'm--French goods."
"Ah! what class of goods?"
"_L'article de Paris._"
"The what?"
"The _ar-ti-cle de Pa-ris_."
"Oh! yes, the _arnticle of Pahrriss_."
"Exactly so. Excuse _my_ pronunciation."
This floored him.
"Rather impertinent, your smoke-room neighbor!" you will say.
Undeceive yourself at once upon that point. It is not impertinence,
still less an intention to offend you, that urges him to put these
incongruous questions to you. It is the interest he takes in you. The
American is a good fellow; good fellowship is one of his chief
characteristic traits. Of that I became perfectly convinced during my
last visit to the United States.