He seemed to have grasped the situation, and with the tact and courtesy
which is never lacking in English gentlemen, he quickly made me feel
entirely at ease. He also offered me refreshments, and as I had not
dined, I gladly accepted. That I might not be alone at table, he kindly
waited with me. I told him many stories, hoping he would not notice my
appetite, but I noticed it myself so persistently that I felt that his
every glance said distinctly:
“You poor little devil, how hungry you are!”
But I persisted; I was conscious of a need to be well fortified, for I
had heard all sorts of stories about entertaining at social functions in
England—stories of arrays of old ladies in low-necked gowns displaying
more bones than beauty,—of a subdued patter of gloved hands in place
of real applause—of “the stony British stare,” which, really, is never
encountered in society, so I felt like a soldier about to face fearful
odds. I was so wrought upon by my fears that when I did appear it seemed
to me that there was not in that great drawing-room a single sympathetic
face at which I might play; all appeared to wear an expression which said:
“Now, then;—make us laugh if you can.”
I began to feel as if I was looking into the rear end of an ice wagon,
but suddenly my eye found a man’s face which filled me with courage—a
face full of kindness, humor and sympathy. It seemed to say:
“My poor boy, you’re in hard luck, and I’m going to give you all the help
I can. If there’s an excuse for a laugh, you’re going to get it.”
My heart swelled and went out to him; although I had much to think of
at the moment, business being business and I about to put my wedge into
it for the first time in an English drawing-room, I mentally vowed that
if ever I met that man again he should know what a tower of strength he
had been to me. I “spread myself,” I “laid myself out,” and was told
afterward that I had succeeded. My own view-point of success was reached
next morning, when I received his lordship’s check.
Several weeks afterward, at a dinner given to Henry Irving, I saw again
the kind face that had been a world of encouragement to me. At the
earliest possible opportunity I went over to him and said:
“I want to thank you for helping me at a very trying moment.”
Through forgetfulness or modesty he appeared not to remember the
affair, so I detailed the circumstance to him. He expressed delight at
having been of any service to me, and confessed that he was a fellow
professional, and could therefore imagine my feelings when first face to
face with an English audience. I asked him what he was doing; he replied
that he was at the Princess Theatre with Mr. Wilson Barrett. I begged him
to let me knew his whereabouts whenever he came to the United States, so
that I might renew my expressions of gratitude and be of any possible
service to him. He promised, but just as I was taking leave of him it
occurred to me that I did not even know his name, so I asked for it. He
replied:
“My name is Willard—Edward S. Willard.”
We became quite close friends in the course of years, although Mr.
Willard did not come to America until 1891. Soon after his arrival I
gave a breakfast at Delmonico’s in his honor and ransacked the city
and vicinity for fine fellows to meet him. Among the guests were Gen.
W. T. Sherman, Col. Robert G. Ingersoll, George W. Childs, editor of
the Philadelphia _Ledger_; Whitelaw Reid, editor-in-chief of the New
York _Tribune_; Hugh J. Grant, Mayor of New York; Chauncey M. Depew,
president of the New York Central Railway Company and his secretary
Captain Henry Du Val; Hon. Daniel Dougherty, the most brilliant member
of the Philadelphia bar; theatre managers Augustin Daly, A. M. Palmer,
Frank Sanger, Henry E. Abbey, and Daniel Frohman; Joseph I. C. Clarke,
editor of the _Morning Journal_; Foster Coates, editor of the _Mail and
Express_; St. Clair McKelway, editor of the Brooklyn _Union_; J. M.
Stoddart, manager of _Lippincott’s Magazine_; Chester A. Lord, managing
editor of the New York _Sun_; Bradford Merrill, managing editor of the
New York _World_; Arthur Bowers managing editor of New York _Tribune_;
Joseph Howard, Jr., America’s most noted newspaper correspondent; Col.
T. P. Ochiltree, the world’s most effective impromptu story teller;
John Russell Young, editor, librarian of the congressional library and
ex-minister to China; Major Moses P. Handy, journalist, club president
and United States Commissioner to the Paris exposition; William Edgar
Nye (Bill Nye, the humorist); Sam Sothern, brother of E. H. Sothern the
actor; W. J. Arkell, manager of _Puck_ and _Leslie’s Weekly_; Harrison
Gray Fiske, editor _Dramatic Mirror_; Col. W. F. Cody (“Buffalo Bill”);
W. J. Florence, the comedian, Henry Watterson, editor of the Louisville
_Courier-Journal_ and also the most quoted editor in America, and Joseph
Hatton the noted English author.
Toward the end of the breakfast I said:
“Gentlemen, I should like to tell you the story of a poor boy and an
actor and the kindness the actor showed the poor boy.” I then related,
in the third person, the story of my first evening as an entertainer in
London, and concluded with:
“Gentleman, I am that poor boy, and the actor, whose kindness I can never
forget, is our guest, Mr. Edward S. Willard.” And straightway the entire
company rose and let Willard know what they thought of that sort of chap.
After I had broken the ice in London by Mr. Willard’s aid, as already
described, I got along quite swimmingly, and felt so at ease that I
imagined I never could find myself unable to capture whatever audience
I might face. But there is no accounting for audiences; occasionally
they take an entertainer right to their hearts, read his stories in
his face and have their applause ready for us the instant the point
appears. A day or two later the entertainer may appear before a lot of
men and women of intelligent appearance without eliciting a smile. These
unaccountable differences are not peculiar to either England or America.
Every summer when I revisit England, some old acquaintance is sure to
say, “Mr. Wilder, those stories you told last year are awfully funny.”
It has really taken him about a year to get at the points of the various
tales; he doesn’t lack appreciation of humor, but he is so accustomed
to having it served in only one way that he is puzzled when it appears
in a new form. One day I told an English audience about New York’s fire
department and its methods; great interest was manifested, so I ventured
to tell the old story of a fire in an India rubber factory. This factory
was a large, tall building, and when the alarm of fire was given one of
the employees found himself on the top floor, with burning stairs under
him. His only chance was to jump, but the pavement was so far below his
windows that death seemed inevitable. Suddenly he bethought himself of
the elastic properties of rubber, of which the room was full; could he
envelop himself with it he might jump and strike the sidewalk softly! So
he donned rubber coats, belts, diving suits and everything else he could
find, until he made the serious mistake of putting on too much, for when
he jumped he rebounded from the pavement again and again and continued to
do so, for five days, when a merciful police officer came along and shot
the poor fellow to save him from starving to death.
[Illustration: “A merciful police officer came along and shot the poor
fellow.”]
About half an hour after I told this veracious story one of my audience
came to me and asked:
“Mr. Wilder, do you think that police officer was justified?”
He was no worse than the person, to be found in both England and America,
who sees a joke so slowly that his laugh comes in when there is nothing
to laugh at. I recall a woman of this kind whose belated laugh was so
immense when it did arrive that I stopped and said:
“Madam, if you will kindly keep that laugh till a little later, it will
do me lots of good.”
Some people who have been of my audience meet me afterward and proceed
to “take the gilt off of the gingerbread” in an amusing fashion—if I
am sensible enough to take it that way. Once I encountered one of the
blundering old chaps who mean well, yet invariably make a break and he
said:
“Mr. Wilder, there was one very good thing among those stories you told.”
I was disconcerted for a moment, but recovering myself I said:
“Well, that’s better than missing the point of all of them.”
At one of my private entertainments I was “making good” and was keeping
my audience in continuous merriment, but my hostess begged me to cease
making them laugh and say something sad and pathetic, so that they might
catch their breath and rest their aching sides.
“My dear madam,” I replied, “I am never sad or pathetic—I mean, not
intentionally.”
With a properly developed sense of humor one can sometimes bring a laugh
out of disconcerting surroundings. While I was talking to an audience at
Flint, Mich., one night, the lights suddenly went out but I succeeded in
saying:
“That’s too bad. Now I’m afraid you won’t be able to see through my
jokes.”
One evening in the course of an engagement I was playing at the Orpheum
in Brooklyn; one of the boxes was occupied by a quartette who had
evidently been drinking “not wisely, but too well.” They were giving the
audience the benefit of their conversation and even sharing the honors of
the entertainment with the ladies and gentlemen on the bill, much to the
annoyance of these, for the disturbance was interfering seriously with
good work. I had been watching from the wings and determined I would not
submit to such distraction, so when I went on I said:
“Ladies and gentlemen, it is an oft-repeated remark that it takes
all kinds of people to make a world. Some people in an audience are
so sensitive that they are affected by any unusual conditions or
surroundings. For instance, if they find themselves among ladies and
gentlemen they are so elated by the fact that their conduct has every
appearance of intoxication—but it really is not intoxication, though it
may look that way.” My performance, which followed immediately, was not
disturbed, nor was that of any one who followed me.
Every entertainer knows what terrible up-hill work it is to stand before
a cold audience. Cold that affects the body is bliss in comparison with
the awful atmosphere that creeps chillingly into one’s soul and the very
marrow of his bones. How an audience can get into such a condition and
become so appalling an influence passes comprehension, for not all the
men and women present can have become dyspeptic on the same day, or had
their consciences awakened at the same hour, or simultaneously “gone
broke” or seen themselves as others saw them. Sometimes I’ve thought
it came of the actual atmosphere of the house, for there are theatres,
halls, churches and parlors that are never properly aired unless
hailstorms or hoodlums chance to break the windows.
But all such speculation is getting away from the audience, whereas that
is the one thing the entertainer daren’t do, much though he may wish to.
He is “stuck” for a given period, and he is reminded of trying to climb
slippery mountains of ice in the fairy tales of childhood’s sunny hour,
and the parallel continues, for the chill—the reserve, is more often
melted by some happy impromptu than by conscientious work.
I recall a time in Pittsburg when I struck the afore-mentioned Polar
current through no fault of my own or of the audience. It was the
custom of the house to begin the evening with a play and follow with a
vaudeville performance. The play on the occasion referred to was “Captain
Swift,” in which the hero was a charming rascal who always took an
audience by the heart, even when he ended the play by killing himself. It
was my misfortune to follow the play and find the audience in a very low
state of mind which, in turn, threw a wet blanket upon me and my work.
After laboring a few minutes I said:
“Ladies and gentlemen, I’ve often followed a prayer, and sometimes
followed a hearse, but this is the first time I ever followed a suicide.”
This touch just tipped the balance—lifted the cloud, squeezed the water
out of the blanket, made the audience mine and kept it so while I held
the stage.
At the Orpheum in San Francisco I was received so kindly that my stay was
extended to three weeks. San Francisco audiences are very responsive,
except on Sunday evenings; then, for some Frisco reason undiscoverable
by the eastern man, they are usually cold and the entertainer has to
cut ice. On my last Sunday evening there a section of Greenland’s Icy
Mountains seemed to have come in collision with a cold-storage warehouse
just before I appeared, for the audience was as unresponsive as a cart
load of frozen clams. I worked over them a few moments as earnestly as
a life-saver over a person rescued from drowning, but to no avail, so I
stopped and said:
“Now I’ve got you nice and quiet, just have a good long sleep while I
go out and leave a call for you.” Then I tiptoed off of the stage so as
not to rouse the sleepers. This started a current of warm good nature;
they called me back and for the rest of the performance there was perfect
understanding and sympathy between them and me.
[Illustration]
VIII
EXPERIENCES IN LONDON
Customs and Climate Very Unlike Our Own.—No Laughter in
Restaurants.—Clever Cabbies.—Oddities in Fire-fighting.—The
“Rogues’ Gallery” in Scotland Yard.—“Petticoat Lane.”—A
Cemetery for Pet Dogs.—Dogs Who are Characters.—The
Professional Toast-master.—Solemn After-dinner Speakers.—An
Autograph Table-cloth.—American Brides of English Husbands.
So many London customs seem strange to an American that I venture to
mention a few experiences of my own by way of preparation, for no
American knows when he may be nominated for the presidency or get a
chance to go to Europe.
The first thing to impress a person from this side of the Atlantic is
the climate, which is generally depressing to any one accustomed to
the dazzling sunshine, brilliant skies and champagne quality of our
atmosphere. Everything seems heavy and solemn by comparison, and life
appears to be a serious matter to all whom one meets, although the truth
is that the English enjoy life heartily and give ten times as much
attention to sports and amusements as we do.
I went one day into a restaurant where a great many people were dining,
yet absolute silence prevailed, instead of the buzz of chatter and
laughter of a French or American restaurant. I asked a waiter,
“Doesn’t any one ever laugh here?”
“Yes, sir,” he replied. “Sometimes we ’ave complaints, sir.”
But there is so much of interest in even the ordinary street sights that
a visitor soon forgets smoke, dampness and gloom. The first natives to
accost an American are the “cabbies,” and they are a never-failing source
of amusement to me. They abound in natural wit, and are past-masters of
sarcasm. One of the sharpest bits I ever heard was told about an old
cabby and one of his younger fellows. The former was a master of whip
and rein; he boasted that he knew every foot of London and declared that
although he had been in many tight places he had never failed to drive
out smoothly. One day, however, he lost control of his horse and ran into
a young cabby’s outfit. The younger man looked him over condescendingly,
contemptuously, and then asked,
“Well? An’ ’ow do _you_ like London?”
A friend of mine once took a cab drawn by an animal which was bony in the
extreme. The driver was hailed by the Jehu of a passing cab with,
“Oi saiy, Bill, I see yer goin’ to ’ave a new ’orse.”
“’Oo told yer so?”
“W’y, I see y’ve got the framework there.”
Not all the quick-tongued cabbies are professionals. At one time it was a
fad of young “bloods” in London to drive cabs, apparently for the purpose
of enriching their slang vocabulary by exchanging remarks with “regulars”
whom they could provoke into freedom of speech. Sometimes decently born
and fairly educated young men from the rural districts, who have handled
horses at home and know no one in London whom they would be ashamed to
face from a driver’s seat, try cab-driving as a business. They can hire
a horse and cab for five shillings a day; London fares are small and
some days they are few, but many men “tip” the drivers, especially those
who say smart things that appear to be impromptu, so amateur cabbies
sometimes make much more than a living.
London’s fire-fighting service interests an American by its differences
from our own. The fire-plugs do not resemble old-fashioned cannon, turned
upside down, as ours do; they are so unnoticeable that their whereabouts
must be indicated by lamp-post signs like this:—“Fire-plug four feet to
the right and three feet to the rear.” Instead of using whistles, the
London engines have a string of sleigh-bells on one of the horses, and
by way of further warning the men on the engine keep up a constant shout
of “Hoy! Hoy! Hoy!” The engines do not respond as quickly to an alarm as
ours; it generally takes them two minutes to get under way, though the
firemen are a “fit” looking lot. I was told they were selected entirely
from ex-sailors of the naval service. To assist the engines’ crews there
are many auxiliaries, who sleep and almost live in small red houses on
wheels; these portable houses are numerous in the more thickly populated
portions of the city, where fires are most likely to occur and extra
firemen be needed.
At convenient corners are kept, also on wheels, the portable
fire-escapes:—mere shafts or chutes of canvas on wooden framework. In
case of fire in the upper part of an inhabited building, the top of
the escape is pushed to a window, and the inmates are expected to save
themselves by going head first down the inclined chute, clinging to the
framework of the sides to keep from descending too rapidly. Of course
in a city of lofty apartment houses and “sky-scraper” office buildings
such a contrivance would be almost useless, but in London a house of
more than three stories is a rarity. “Running to fires” is as popular
with some Londoners as it was in New York before fire alarms reached the
dozen-a-day mark. The Duke of Sutherland enjoyed attending fires; he
would have his private carriage follow the engines, and frequently he was
accompanied by the Prince of Wales.
Scotland Yard, mentioned in every English detective story, is an
interesting place to visit; it is the London equivalent of our Police
Department’s “Central Office.” I was shown a “Rogues’ Gallery” there
which was quite as large and appalling as our own. In photographing a
criminal the London police make assurance doubly sure by placing a mirror
to catch his profile, which is taken, with his front face, by a single
snap. To be still more thorough they have the sitters spread his hands
on his chest, for hands, being hard to disguise, are useful tell-tales.
Thumb impressions complete a record which the criminal regards with far
more discomfort than his evil deeds ever give him.
Petticoat Lane is not a section of the police department, though
the officials wish it might be, for as it is a recognized “stand” of
hucksters, the thieves flock there to sell their ill-gotten wares, so one
may see “Fagins” and “Artful Dodgers” in plenty. Their best customers
are men of their own kind—thieves with enough business sense to know
where certain kinds of stolen property can be resold to advantage.
Jewelry is the principal stock-in-trade, and it is carried in small
boxes, resembling cigar-boxes, hung from the neck. When the coast is
clear of policemen, the thieves lift the lid long enough for a peep at
the contents. I was piloted through “the lane” by a special officer from
Scotland Yard and in an underground passage we came upon a score or more
of the light-fingered gentry. Unfortunately the officer was recognized,
word was passed down the line, everything that might have aroused
suspicion was secreted and the entire crowd gazed at us with an affected
innocence which was transparent enough to be laughable.
The legitimate trades in Petticoat Lane are more interesting to an
American, for they have some business ways which are amusing—even
startling. An orange-dealer will drop his fruit in hot water once in a
while; this makes it swell to almost twice its natural size and look
smooth and glossy. The next wagon to the orange man may be full of
second-hand clothing; the dealer will not allow a would-be purchaser to
“try on” a coat or vest, for fear he may run away with it, but he will
put the garment on his own wife for inspection; the result is often a
picture funny enough to print. Theatrical people often go there for
costumes for “character” parts; apparently some kinds of English clothing
last forever, for in Petticoat Lane may be seen fabrics and fashions and
trimmings that look antiquated enough to have come over with William the
Conqueror. Some of the hucksters’ carts are decorated with suggestive
signs, such as, “Oh, mother, how cheap these eggs are!”
In a corner of Hyde Park I chanced to see a little graveyard; everything
about it was little. The mounds were small, the headstones tiny, and
little children were decorating the graves with flowers. On inquiry I
learned that it was a dogs’ cemetery, but instead of laughing I was
touched by the mental picture of heavy-hearted boys and girls going there
with floral tributes to departed playfellows. A little girl who was
passing noted that one grave was bare, and I heard her say to her nurse:
“That must have been a bad doggie buried there.”
“Why?” the nurse inquired.
“Because he has no flowers on his grave.”
Almost every part of London has its homely “character.” Near St. Martin’s
Lane, off Charing Cross, can be seen every day a blind sailor who sits
knitting small fishing-nets. In front of him sits his Irish terrier with
a cup in his mouth, and passers-by amuse themselves by throwing pennies
for the dog to catch in his cup, as he always does. When he has caught
several he empties the cup into his owner’s hand and returns to business
at the old stand. This goes on till evening, when the dog guides his
owner home through the crowded streets.
One interesting London dog is called Nelson, because he accidentally lost
a leg at the base of the Nelson column in Trafalgar Square. He makes his
home in Seven Dials, where he begs for a living, and gets many pennies
from his admirers. Instead of giving the money to any one he hides it;
whenever he is hungry he goes to his treasury, gets a coin and takes it
to a butcher or baker; he knows, too, how much he should get in return
and he will not leave the shop till he has received full value for his
money.
The professional toast-master is a London institution that America has
not adopted. His services are required at the cost of a sovereign, at
every public dinner, and his qualifications are pomposity and a loud,
deep, resonant voice. Around his neck he wears a big silver chain from
which hangs a silver plate inscribed T. M., and when he exclaims, “We
will drink a bumper to ’Is Gracious Majesty the King,” it is with a
voice that suggests an earthquake announcing its exit from the bowels
of the earth. After the presiding officer has indulged in the usually
introductory and airy persiflage, it is the duty of the T. M. to
introduce the speaker, which he does with a sweep of his arm that is
expected to subdue any noisy applause by the guests.
[Illustration: “’Is Gracious Majesty the King!”]
English after-dinner speakers have little or no humor, but they are
extremely earnest in their remarks. They incline more to argument than
amusement. Occasionally one will indulge in a pun which has the sanctity
of long usage—a pun that an American could not get off without a blush,
and a turn of his face to the wall, but the hearers like it, so no one
else should complain. The English recognize and admit the American’s
superiority as an after-dinner speaker. I heard Mr. Beerbohm Tree say, in
the course of a speech at the Clover Club (Philadelphia),
“Englishmen can handle horses and Americans their tongues.”
But there are exceptions to every rule, even regarding dinners and
after-dinner speaking. London contains some men as clever and witty as
any in the world, and when these fine fellows dine together there is no
formality about the board nor any heavy talk.