“THE ART OF MONEY-GETTING”
I
Upon his return to England Barnum was greeted cordially by those who
had admired him in the days of his reputation. His autobiography,
in spite of the few scathing reviews, had not damaged either his
popularity or his esteem in England.
One of the first to greet Barnum in London was Albert Smith,
playwright, dentist, literary hack and showman, who had admired
Barnum and had studied his methods during the first English tour of
General Tom Thumb. Smith at the time of Barnum’s return to England
was exhibiting his panorama of Mont Blanc, which he had ascended the
year before. He gave a descriptive lecture explaining his model. In
the course of this lecture Smith referred several times to a character
he had met on his trip, whom he called “Phineas Cutecraft,” a Yankee
showman, who had visited Cologne Cathedral with him. According to
Smith’s story, the sexton was telling them the sad tale of the ashes
and bones of the eleven thousand virgins of Cologne, who had been
sacrificed upon a certain black historical occasion. “Old fellow, what
will you take for the hull lot of bones?” asked Phineas Cutecraft. “I
want them for my Museum in America.” “Mine Gott! it is impossible,” the
German was supposed to have answered. “We will never sell the Virgins’
bones!” “Never mind,” said Phineas Cutecraft, “I’ll send another lot
of bones to my Museum, swear mine are the real bones of the Virgins of
Cologne, and bust up your show!”
A celebrity who received Barnum cordially upon his return to England
was Thackeray. When Thackeray visited the United States in 1853 to
deliver his lectures on The English Humorists of the Eighteenth
Century, he had called upon Barnum at the Museum with a letter of
introduction from Albert Smith, and he had asked Barnum’s advice on the
management of his lecture tour. Barnum had given Thackeray valuable
information concerning the cities he should visit, the lecture halls
suitable in each city, and the proper admission charges, for which the
novelist was grateful. When he returned to New York in 1855 to deliver
his lectures on The Four Georges, he visited Barnum often. Therefore,
in 1857, when Barnum returned to London, Thackeray hastened to offer
him sympathy and financial aid. To Thackeray’s question whether he
needed money, Barnum replied, “I need more money in order to get out
of bankruptcy, and I intend to earn it; but so far as daily bread is
concerned, I am quite at ease, for my wife is worth 30,000 or 40,000
pounds.” “Is it possible?” Thackeray said. “Well, now, you have lost
all my sympathy. Why, that is more than I ever expect to be worth; I
shall be sorry for you no more.”
It is difficult to reconcile this statement to Thackeray, which
Barnum gives boldly in his autobiography, with the pose of a martyr
to innocent misfortunes which Barnum adopted towards his Bridgeport
friends, and with his statements in court,--which are not included in
the autobiography--that he was supporting himself by keeping boarders
and by boxes of meat from his son-in-law.
Thackeray took Barnum to one of his famous whitebait dinners at
Greenwich, and they dined together at a Covent Garden cabaret, where
music was furnished by a boy-choir. An entertainer dressed on one side
in a woman’s long skirts, and on the other with a man’s side-whiskers,
did a male and female duet, much to the disgust of Thackeray and to the
delight of Barnum. Soon after his return to New York Barnum found a
woman who could sing in two registers. He presented this hermaphroditic
entertainment at the Museum under the name of Dora Dawron, who was
popular with New York audiences for many years.
Otto Goldschmidt, who was in London, called upon Barnum and said that
Jenny Lind, who was then living in Dresden, had asked him to find out
if Barnum needed money and to beg him to accept her aid. Goldschmidt
also advised Barnum to bring his family to Dresden because living
was cheap there, and he added, “My wife will gladly look up a proper
house for you to live in.” Barnum declined the kindness on the ground
that Dresden was too far from his business opportunities. Julius
Benedict and Giovanni Belletti also called and offered assistance. But
Barnum needed none. General Tom Thumb was drawing crowded audiences
wherever he went, and Cordelia Howard’s “Little Eva,” with her mother
as “Topsy,” was a great success in London and the other large cities.
That Barnum was in any way financially interested in these enterprises
was not made public, for fear that his creditors would interfere with
his plans for paying them off. But he remitted money from London
continually, and it was used for paying some of his debts.
After a successful tour of Scotland, Ireland and Wales, as well as
England, Barnum and General Tom Thumb went to Germany. They toured the
spas, where General Tom Thumb drew huge crowds at large prices. Barnum
made so much money at these resorts that he was able to send home
thousands of dollars for the payment of debts and for the repurchase of
Bridgeport real estate.
They visited Holland, which pleased Barnum more than any country in
Europe, except Great Britain. He admired the Dutch most for those
very virtues which counted against his own success in that country:
frugality, industry, and thrift. The Dutch were not enthusiastic over
General Tom Thumb, because they were not accustomed to spend money for
such things. But Barnum enjoyed himself so much in this clean and busy
little kingdom that he was compensated in pleasure for his expense, and
he also found there the Albino Family, consisting of perfect Albino
specimens, a man, his wife and son, whom he sent to America, where they
were the most popular attraction at the Museum for a long period.
Barnum returned to England, where his wife and daughters had arrived.
He settled them in a house in London, arranged for General Tom Thumb’s
management by agents, and made a hurried trip to New York for the
purpose of settling some of his debts. When he arrived in New York,
he found that many of his friends avoided him on the streets, and in
Bridgeport he was cut by a few of those he had known well before his
bankruptcy.
“Iranistan” had been taken over by Barnum’s creditors, but they found
it impossible to sell the weird residence, and they offered Barnum the
use of it as a home. Painters and carpenters were putting the house
in order; they were in the habit of eating their lunches in the dome
room, where there was a circular cushioned seat. One of them left his
lighted pipe on a stuffed cushion, and on December 18, 1857, Barnum,
who was in New York, received a telegram from his brother announcing
that “Iranistan” was burned to the ground. Barnum’s reflections on
this disaster were: “My beautiful Iranistan was gone! This was not
only a serious loss to my estate, for it had probably cost at least
$150,000, but it was generally regarded as a public calamity.” No
doubt; it was also a great loss to Barnum’s immortality, for, were it
standing to-day, nothing could be so effective as a memorial to his
unique personal traits. The insurance on “Iranistan” was only $28,000.
Subsequently Barnum’s creditors sold the grounds and outhouses to Elias
Howe, Jr., the inventor of the sewing-machine needle, who intended to
build another resplendent mansion on the site, but death prevented him
from carrying out his plans.
II
Barnum returned to England early in 1858 and took General Tom
Thumb on another successful tour of the British Isles. Soon after
beginning this tour he discovered that it did not require his personal
attention--General Tom Thumb was now famous enough to require only
routine exploitation--and he therefore placed his midget in the
hands of assistants and devoted his own time to another activity.
Some friends in England suggested that he lecture on “The Art of
Money-Getting.” At first the paradox of the title amused him, and he
tells us that he thought himself more competent to lecture on “The Art
of Money-Losing.” But he came to the conclusion that in order to lose
money, it was first necessary to have made it. However, the paradox
remains, that Barnum helped to pay his debts incurred by careless
handling of money by means of a lecture on “The Art of Money-Getting.”
In his lecture Barnum stated many bald platitudes, no longer honored
even by time, and he added to them none of the humorous twists with
which he sometimes enlivened truisms. It is difficult to realize from
a reading of this printed lecture why it was so successful, unless
many good anecdotes, which Barnum said were omitted in the printed
version for the sake of brevity, alleviated the dullness of his
commonplace ideas. He assured his readers of things they knew so well
that they should have begun to doubt them. In simple terms he urged
economy: he did not believe, he said, in saving extravagantly, but
he was also opposed to lavish spending. Such expressions as “laying
by a ‘nest-egg,’” “easy come, easy go,” are elaborated in great
detail and with little novelty. “The old suit of clothes, and the
old bonnet and dress will answer for another season; the Croton or
spring water will taste better than champagne; a cold bath and a brisk
walk will prove more exhilarating than a ride in the finest coach; a
social chat, an evening’s reading in the family circle, or an hour’s
play of ‘hunt the slipper’ and ‘blind man’s buff,’ will be far more
pleasant than a fifty or a hundred dollar party, when the reflection
on the difference in cost is indulged in by those who begin to know
the pleasures of saving.” Sound health, and above all, abstention
from intoxicating drinks, and from tobacco, “the noxious weed,” are
indispensable to success. He said that he spoke from experience, for
he used to smoke until he “trembled like an aspen leaf,” but on the
advice of a physician he had given up tobacco entirely. But economy
and abstemiousness were not the only attributes of Success: he assured
his audiences that “unless a man enters upon the vocation intended
for him by nature, and best suited to his peculiar genius, he cannot
succeed.” He did not tell them how a man was to determine such natural
fitness for vocation, and he neglected to mention that for some years
of his own early manhood he looked with little success for the vocation
suited to his peculiar genius. “Avoid debt,” “go-aheaditiveness,”
“whatever you do, do it with all your might,” are some of the mottoes
Barnum offered his listeners as substantial, and they listened as to
a man with a message. It does not profit a man to be too visionary,
Barnum warned, and he cited the instance from a London newspaper of
a “philosophic pauper who was kicked out of a cheap boarding-house
because he could not pay his bill, but he had a roll of papers sticking
out of his coat pocket, which, upon examination, proved to be his plan
for paying off the national debt of England without the aid of a penny.”
Luck, in Barnum’s opinion, was for all practical purposes non-existent:
“There never was a man who could go out in the morning and find a purse
full of gold in the street to-day, and another to-morrow, and so on,
day after day. He may do so once in his life; but so far as mere luck
is concerned, he is as liable to lose it as find it.” He also hazarded
the revolutionary belief that Providence was not absolutely dependable;
he urged people to remember Cromwell’s, “Not only trust in Providence,
but keep the powder dry,” and he added a story of Mahomet and a
faithful follower, who remarked in the desert one night, “I will loose
my camel, and trust it to God.” “No, no, not so,” said the prophet in
consternation, “tie thy camel, and trust it to God.”
And above all, Barnum urged, Advertise: “But I say if a man has got
goods for sale, and he don’t advertise them in some way, the chances
are that some day the sheriff will do it for him.” To a man who told
him that he had advertised three times and received no good, Barnum
said he replied: “Sir, advertising is like learning--‘a little is a
dangerous thing.’” He claimed that there was only one liquid a man
could use in excessive quantities without being swallowed up by it, and
that was printer’s ink.
“The Art of Money-Getting” was immediately successful in getting
money for Barnum. In a half-column review of the lecture the _London
Times_ paid tribute to the showman’s “fund of dry humor,” sonorous
voice, and surprisingly respectable appearance, more like that of a
man of business than a charlatan! The _Times_ reported that “hundreds
of people pressed one after another into the large music-hall [St.
James’s] for the purpose of seeing and hearing the most adventurous
and least scrupulous of showmen.... The whole scene was, in fact,
an apotheosis of notoriety.” “Whether a huge multitude,” reflected
the _Times_, “applauding an orator for a deliberate panegyric of
‘humbug’ may be considered as a sign of the high moral state of a
nation is a point that we will not here discuss.” But before taking
credit for the achievements of a Prince of Humbugs, Barnum had taken
a precaution: “... he had so defined the word ‘humbug’ as to render
it comparatively harmless.” “Had he satisfactorily demonstrated,”
said the _Times_, “that he was John Howard or Alfred the Great or any
other immortal benefactor of his race, he couldn’t have been honored
with more encouraging cheers than when, with marvelous effrontery, he
declared that he himself was considered the greatest humbug in the
whole world.... And we may assert, with equal truth, that notoriety
puts itself out at compound interest. If Mr. Barnum has got nothing
else by the admiring throng he has at least got a new chapter for a
second edition of his autobiography. Having already related how he drew
together a mob of Yankees to see a few tame bulls, he can now describe
the eagerness of John Bull to see the most enterprising of Yankees.”
Barnum’s lecture was proportionately as popular in the provinces as it
was in London. He delivered it more than one hundred times during 1859
and repeated it several times with success in London. At Oxford and
Cambridge the undergraduates received his wisdom with enthusiasm, but
it was not always serious applause. At Oxford, after he was interrupted
several times, he added this remark to the lecture: “I am an old
showman, and I like to please my patrons. Now, it is quite immaterial
to me; you may furnish the entertainment for the hour, or I will
endeavor to do so, or we will take portions of the time by turns--you
supplying a part of the amusement and I a part--as we say sometimes
in America, ‘you pays your money, and you takes your choice.’”
The students decided on a compromise: Barnum to supply half the
entertainment, and they would supply the other half, and after fifteen
minutes of the lecture, some one suggested singing “Yankee Doodle.” But
Barnum was pleased with their jocularity and happy with the receipts,
for that night at Oxford brought him £169. A London publisher offered
$6,000 for the copyright to “The Art of Money-Getting,” but, wisely,
Barnum declined, for he intended to deliver the lecture in the United
States and again in England, and he also wanted it for that second
edition of the autobiography, where, he agreed with the _Times_, it
would form an interesting new chapter of the chronicle of his conquests.
III
Barnum returned to the United States in 1859 with enough money to pay
all but $20,000 of his debts. His family had boarded and lived cheaply,
and all their money was devoted to taking up Barnum’s notes and buying
in East Bridgeport real estate at assignees’ sales.
On March 17, 1860, Butler and Greenwood, who had purchased the Museum
collection, sold it to Barnum again. Although during their management
a newspaper reported that “there is no pleasanter temple for the
vacant hour,” and that in the Museum might be seen “parsons, poets,
publishers, and other public characters looking at the curiosities
and studying the fishes,” the Museum had not prospered during Barnum’s
absence. Barnum renovated the building and decorated it with brilliant
flags and streamers. Flaming posters announcing, “Barnum’s on his feet
again,” were plastered throughout the city. A large audience greeted
him on March 24, 1860, when he made a speech about his decline, fall,
and rise again. An advertisement in the _Herald_ of March 24 read:
“Between the first and second acts Mr. P. T. Barnum will appear, and
give a brief history of his Adventures as a Clock Maker, showing how
the clock ran down and how it was wound up; shadowing forth in the same
the future of the Museum.”
Barnum, remantled in the esteem of Success, was received by the large
audience of his fellow citizens with an enthusiasm that caused him to
experience deep emotion. He told them the sad story of his clock debts,
and how, with admirable foresight, he had in the days of his prosperity
made over to his wife some of his property, including the lease to the
Museum. Concerning this piece of sagacity, Barnum added the following
footnote when he reprinted his speech in the autobiography: “I was
worth hundreds of thousands of dollars when as a matter of love I
transferred a portion to my wife, little dreaming that it would be
needed during my lifetime.” Mr. Barnum did for love what so many men do
as a precautionary measure of business.
He told his audiences how his family had lived frugally, although the
value of the Museum lease was more than $80,000, so that his debts
could be paid and his real estate repurchased. “The Christian name of
my wife,” he said, “is Charity. I may well acknowledge, therefore,
that I am not only a proper ‘subject of charity,’ but that ‘without
Charity I am nothing.’ But, ladies and gentlemen, while Charity thus
labored in my behalf, Faith and Hope were not idle. I have been
anything but indolent during the last four years.” Then he told of his
accomplishments in Europe.
“Many people,” said Barnum, “have wondered that a man considered so
acute as myself should have been deluded into embarrassments like mine,
and not a few have declared, in short meter, that ‘Barnum was a fool.’
I can only reply that I never made pretensions to the sharpness of a
pawnbroker, and I hope I shall never so entirely lose confidence in
human nature as to consider every man a scamp by instinct, or a rogue
by necessity. ‘It is better to be deceived sometimes than to distrust
always,’ says Lord Bacon, and I agree with him.” Assuredly, all was
for the best, said Barnum. The very factory which he had built for his
defunct clock company was now a thriving sewing-machine manufactory
“filled with intelligent New England mechanics.”
Barnum’s speech concluded with a reiteration of the Museum policy,
which, he assured his audience, would remain the same as it always had
been under his management: “The dramas introduced in the Lecture Room
will never contain a profane expression or a vulgar allusion; on the
contrary, their tendency will always be to encourage virtue and frown
upon vice.” He sent free tickets to clergymen and editors, assuring
them in a circular letter of the same policy, and asking that after
an inspection of the Museum they would kindly recommend it to their
friends, for he desired “to enlist the influence of the intelligent and
educated.”
Much verse commemorated the return of Barnum, including one woman’s “A
Health to Barnum,” which ended:
“Here’s health and luck to Barnum!
An _Elba_ he has seen,
And never may his map of life
Display a _St. Helene_!”
But there was not much danger of a _St. Helene_, for Barnum was once
more in his element, and he worked with all the verve he had formerly
exhibited in the exploitation of Museum attractions. About one month
after his renewed management began, he was visited by James C. Adams,
known as “Grizzly” Adams, who had traveled from San Francisco by
boat with his collection of California animals, consisting mostly
of vicious bears. He had twenty grizzly bears, several wolves and
buffaloes, California lions, tigers, and elk. One of his stars was “Old
Neptune,” the great sea-lion of the Pacific. Most of these animals
“Grizzly” Adams had captured himself during his long career as a hunter
and trapper in the Sierra Nevada and Rocky Mountains.
“Grizzly” Adams was as much a show as his beasts. He wore a hunter’s
buckskin suit, trimmed with the tails of Rocky Mountain animals. For a
cap he used a wolf’s head, trimmed with tails; his own stiff, bushy,
gray hair grew long. His beard was white, long and grizzly, and after
a voyage of three and a half months around Cape Horn with constant
care and attention to his wild animals, who were trained to obey him
but recognized no other master, “Grizzly” Adams was not natty when
he presented himself to Barnum. During their conversation the hunter
removed his hat out of deference to his prospective employer, and
exposed the top of his skull, which was smashed in; he explained to
Barnum that one of his pet bears, “General Frémont,” had laid open his
master’s brain in a moment of playfulness. Barnum remarked anxiously
that the wound looked dangerous. “Yes,” said Adams, “that will fix me
out. It had nearly healed; but Old Frémont opened it for me the third
or fourth time before I left California, and he did his business so
thoroughly, I’m a used-up man. But I reckon I may live six months or
a year yet.” Later he said: “Mr. Barnum, I am not the man I was five
years ago. Then I felt able to stand the hug of any grizzly living, and
was always glad to encounter, single-handed, any sort of an animal that
dared present himself. But I have been beaten to a jelly, torn almost
limb from limb, and nearly chawed up and spit out by these treacherous
grizzly bears. But I am good for a few months yet, and by that time I
hope we shall gain enough to make my old woman comfortable, for I have
been absent from her some years.”
[Illustration: CASTLE GARDEN IN 1850
From a contemporary color print]
[Illustration: CHARITY BARNUM, P. T. BARNUM’S FIRST WIFE
From 1888 edition of his Autobiography]
[Illustration: JAMES ANTHONY BAILEY
_Harvard Theatre Collection_
]
Barnum and “Grizzly” Adams formed a partnership and exhibited his
animals in a tent at the corner of Broadway and Thirteenth Street. On
the opening day a brass band preceded the animals down Broadway and
up the Bowery, the first forerunner of the Barnum street parade which
became such a popular feature of the circus in later years. Adams,
mounted on his favorite bear, “General Frémont,” who was docile for the
occasion, rode on a float with three bears. He, in his strange costume,
and his uncaged bears attracted great attention in the crowded streets
of New York’s business section.
“Grizzly” Adams’s wife came from Massachusetts to nurse him. His
dangerous wound was dressed daily, but the doctor assured Barnum that
his partner could not live longer than a few weeks, and he also told
Adams that his wound was incurable. But this information did not
seem to interest him; for six weeks he continued to perform with his
animals at Broadway and Thirteenth Street, and then the doctor insisted
that he must take a rest. Barnum bought out his partner, and Adams,
instead of retiring, asked Barnum to employ him as trainer in a tour of
Connecticut and Massachusetts during the hot summer months. For sixty
dollars a week and his traveling expenses “Grizzly” Adams traveled with
the animals, and when Barnum urged him to retire before he died in one
of the cages, he replied that he would guarantee to travel with the
bears for ten weeks longer if Barnum would pay him five hundred dollars
as a bonus for his physical endurance at the end of that period. Adams
was interested in getting as much money as he could for his wife,
whom, he considered, he had neglected long enough. After five weeks
of this endurance test, Barnum took pity on the hunter and asked him
to accept half the bonus and retire to die. But Adams refused to die
until his ten weeks’ engagement was finished, and during the hottest
days of August he continued his vigorous work with the animals, while
his wound became worse and his physical condition weaker. At the end
of the stipulated tenth week Adams collected his five hundred dollars,
traveled to his wife’s home in Massachusetts, went to bed and never got
up again, for five days later he died. After the death of “Grizzly”
Adams, his animals were added to the Museum collection and later sold
to a menagerie, except the famous Sea-Lion of the Pacific, who lived in
a tank in the Museum and was supplied daily with fresh sea water by the
deck hands of the Fall River steamboats.
At the time of his partnership with “Grizzly” Adams, Barnum planned a
large wild west show, with real Indians and western animals, something
in the nature of the Buffalo Bill exhibition which was organized many
years later. He never carried out this plan, although he was always
confident that a show of this character, touring the United States and
Europe, would yield large profits. Several years later, in 1864, ten
Indian chiefs, the most distinguished in the country, visited President
Lincoln at the White House to pay their homage. Barnum bribed their
interpreter to bring them to the American Museum in New York. They
were proud chiefs, and they were under the impression that this New
York reception at Barnum’s American Museum was an honor; they had no
suspicion that they were exhibiting themselves in a theater for the
benefit of the proprietor.
Barnum personally introduced his guests from the platform of the Moral
Lecture Room, and they considered that they were receiving treatment
worthy of their position in the country. After two public receptions at
the Museum, Barnum took the Indians in carriages to visit the Mayor of
New York, who made a speech of welcome at the City Hall. At a public
school the children gave an entertainment in their honor, and they
were delighted. Barnum drove with them in Central Park and through the
crowded city streets, always returning to the Museum in time for the
public receptions, admission twenty-five cents, children half-price.
Barnum paid nothing but the original bribe for these unique
curiosities, but his position was made embarrassing by the interest
which the Indian chiefs took in the other curiosities of the Museum.
Whenever they saw a glittering shell or sparkling ornament, one of
the chiefs would remove his coat or his shirt and insist that Barnum
exchange the article for the garment. Of course, Barnum presented the
chief with the coveted object, and as soon as they realized the extent
of this generosity the chiefs begged for everything portable in the
Museum.
Among the Indian chiefs was Yellow Bear, who, in his belligerent days,
had a reputation as one of the most successful enemies of the white
men. Barnum introduced the chiefs individually and with great ceremony
from the stage of the Lecture Room, and when Yellow Bear’s turn came,
Barnum would always pat him familiarly on the head, place his arm
about the chief, and say in unctuous, flattering tones: “This little
Indian, ladies and gentlemen, is Yellow Bear, chief of the Kiowas. He
has killed, no doubt, scores of white persons, and he is probably the
meanest, black-hearted rascal that lives in the Far West.” A pause
followed, during which Barnum patted Yellow Bear affectionately on the
head; the Indian would respond with smiles and bows of pleasure and
gratitude. “If the blood-thirsty little villain,” Barnum continued,
“understood what I was saying, he would kill me in a moment; but, as
he thinks I am complimenting him, I can safely state the truth to you,
that he is a lying, thieving, treacherous, murderous monster. He has
tortured to death poor, unprotected women, murdered their husbands,
brained their helpless little ones; and he would gladly do the same to
you or to me if he thought he would escape punishment. This is but a
faint description of the character of Yellow Bear.” Then Barnum gave
his pet another pat on the head, and the introduction was finished,
with grateful bows from Yellow Bear and roars of laughter from the
audience.
After a week at the Museum the Indians discovered that people were
paying for admission. They were insulted and left the next day for
Washington, feeling a tremendous loss of dignity. Barnum felt relieved
when he saw them depart without any attempts to wreck the Museum.
The Prince of Wales, later King Edward VII, visited Barnum’s American
Museum on October 13, 1860. The Prince was touring the United States,
and Barnum felt that it would be a pity if he were to go back home
without seeing one of the national institutions, so he sent an
invitation. Just an hour before the royal party intended to visit the
Museum, the manager was informed that Barnum’s invitation was accepted.
Barnum was in Bridgeport, and the Prince of Wales was therefore
received by Greenwood, the manager, instead of by the Prince of
Humbugs. With great interest Albert Edward examined The Siamese Twins
and the “What Is It?” According to the _Herald_, this was a deformed,
idiotic negro boy, whom Barnum exhibited as the connecting link between
man and the ape. After looking over the curiosities in the cases, the
Prince of Wales said that he supposed he had seen all, and almost in
the same breath he asked for Mr. Barnum. When told that he was in
Bridgeport, the Prince said, “We have missed the most interesting
feature of the establishment.” The Prince undoubtedly remembered the
jovial gentleman who had brought his General Tom Thumb to Buckingham
Palace for the entertainment of the Queen and her children. Barnum felt
complimented at the Prince’s visit and the royal statement concerning
him, and he was pleased especially because all the newspapers printed
accounts of the visit and the Prince’s words. He also made much of the
fact that the Museum was the only place of public amusement visited
by the Prince in this country. A few days before the Prince’s arrival
Barnum had prepared for the possible visit by having removed to the
cellar a frightful wax figure of Queen Victoria, which had delighted
Museum patrons for nineteen years. It bore the placard, “An exact
likeness of Her Majesty Queen Victoria, taken from life,” but Barnum
feared the Prince might not recognize his mother in the dirty wax which
was supposed to represent her regality.
Barnum called upon the Prince of Wales in Boston and was received
cordially. He reminded the royal visitor that he knew him when he
was a boy in short pants. The streets of Boston were crowded on this
occasion, and Barnum would have had great difficulty getting to the
Revere House if a policeman had not mistaken his appearance for that of
Stephen A. Douglas and shouted with much spectacular respect, “Make way
there for Judge Douglas’s carriage.” The crowd opened a passageway, and
hurrahs for Douglas were shouted all along the route. Barnum took off
his hat, bowed to right and to left, and received the borrowed cheers
with gratitude and pleasure. When Douglas was a candidate for President
in 1860, several newspapers remarked that he looked the image of P. T.
Barnum.
Barnum’s renewed enterprise and the publicity which came to him by
reason of his past reputation contributed largely to the rejuvenation
of the Museum, until as a source of profit it was as valuable as it
had ever been. Sometimes Barnum was lucky enough to gain publicity
from deceptions practised upon him as well as by means of his own
deceptions. His famous Cherry-Colored Cat was an example of both
forms of deception in one. A farmer visited the Museum one day and
informed Greenwood that he had a cherry-colored cat, which he would
sell for twenty-five dollars. Greenwood agreed in writing to pay that
amount, providing the cat was not artificially colored. The farmer
returned with a handsome black cat, and told Greenwood calmly that
his cat was the color of black cherries. Greenwood refused to pay for
this deception, but as soon as Barnum heard about it he was delighted
at a joke he might have perpetrated himself and insisted that the
practical joker was worthy of his hire. He got back his twenty-five
dollars by exhibiting the cat in a paper bag as a mysterious novelty, a
Cherry-Colored Cat. He fooled his patrons precisely as the farmer had
fooled his manager.
In 1861 Barnum created a sensation with whales. He learned that
fishermen had caught a white whale at the mouth of the St. Lawrence
River, and he hurried to Canada to arrange for the capture alive of a
pair of white whales for his Museum. Barnum witnessed the capture and
arranged for the transportation of his whales, and then he started back
to New York. On the way he informed telegraph operators that they might
take from the wire any news about whales addressed to P. T. Barnum and
give it out to their townspeople. The result was a triumphal procession
seven hundred miles long, with plenty of attendant publicity, when
the white whales started on their journey. People gathered at all the
railroad stations to catch a glimpse of the white whales in their long
boxes, filled with sea weed and salt water. Before he left Quebec,
Barnum wrote accounts of the capture and shipment of the whales for the
Quebec and Montreal newspapers, and these were copied in other papers.
Despatches telling the progress of the trip were posted on bulletin
boards outside the Museum in New York, and the excitement in the city
was great. When the whales were finally deposited in their tank, built
specially for their reception in the basement of the Museum, thousands
rushed to see them.
But neither Barnum nor any of his assistants knew the daily diet of
a whale, and they had neglected to provide salt water in the tanks.
The Museum cellar was badly ventilated, and all these factors caused
the sudden death of the notorious animals. A _Tribune_ editorial
expressed the mock hope, “May both whales meet again in the open
seas of immortality.” Barnum was not discouraged by this unforeseen
catastrophe, and the publicity he had aroused was too valuable to
waste. He ordered pipes laid between the Museum and New York Bay so
that sea water could be pumped into the new tank he ordered for the
second floor, where new whales could get plenty of fresh air. This
tank, according to Barnum’s own estimates, was twenty-four feet square
and lined with slate and French plate glass at a cost of $4,000. Two
whales were soon on their way to New York, and soon they died. Barnum
ordered two more. The public was now excited, and the necessary
controversy was created by the statement in some of the newspapers that
Barnum’s whales were mere porpoises. Professor Agassiz, of Harvard,
visited the animals and gave Barnum a certificate that they were
genuine white whales. The publication of this authoritative statement
silenced all comment by amateur newspaper naturalists.
It was Barnum’s contention that more persons are humbugged by believing
too little than by believing too much. “Many persons,” he wrote, “have
such a horror of being taken in, or such an elevated opinion of their
own acutness, that they believe everything to be a sham, and in this
way are continually humbugging themselves.” In illustration he gave the
instance of a Yankee lady who visited the Museum to see the whales.
Barnum knew her personally, and after she had watched the whales she
called at Barnum’s office. “Mr. B., it’s astonishing to what a number
of purposes the ingenuity of us Yankees has applied india-rubber,”
she said. The whales, in her opinion, were constructed by Barnum of
india-rubber and compelled to rise to the surface at regular intervals
by means of a bellows puffing air into their bodies. Barnum realized
that it would be useless to argue against such an ingenious conviction,
and he therefore begged his friend to keep the secret to herself,
assuring her that she had been the only person acute enough to discover
it. Whenever he met the lady in later years, she assured him that she
never had revealed his secret, and never would so long as she lived.
Barnum advertised his whales in screaming captions daily. The following
is a sample:
BARNUM’S AMERICAN MUSEUM
After months of unwearied labor, and spending
NEARLY TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS
NEARLY TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS
NEARLY TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS
in capturing and transporting them from that part of the Gulf of
St. Lawrence nearest Labrador, the Manager is enabled to offer his
visitors
TWO LIVING WHALES,
TWO LIVING WHALES,
TWO LIVING WHALES,
TWO LIVING WHALES,
TWO LIVING WHALES,
TWO LIVING WHALES,
a male and a female. Everybody has heard of WHALES
IN NURSERY TALES AND “SAILOR’S YARNS,”
IN NURSERY TALES AND “SAILOR’S YARNS,”
everybody has read of WHALES in story, song, and history, and
everybody
WANTS TO SEE A WHALE,
WANTS TO SEE A WHALE,
WANTS TO SEE A WHALE,
WANTS TO SEE A WHALE,
and now they have the opportunity. Barnum has
CAPTURED TWO OF THE LEVIATHANS,
CAPTURED TWO OF THE LEVIATHANS,
CAPTURED TWO OF THE LEVIATHANS,
has built a small ocean in his Museum, filled it from the briny
deep, and there
THE TWO LIVING WHALES,
THE TWO LIVING WHALES,
THE TWO LIVING WHALES,
THE TWO LIVING WHALES,
measuring respectively fifteen and twenty feet in length, may
be seen at all hours sporting in their native element. Who will
miss the opportunity of seeing them? Another may not offer in a
lifetime. Embrace this ere it be too late.
LAST TWO DAYS OF
WILLIAM TILLMAN AND WILLIAM STEDDING,
The Colored Steward and German Sailor of the
SCHOONER S. J. WARING,
Who slew three of the piratical crew, and rescued themselves and
the vessel from their power.
WHAT IS IT? OR, MAN MONKEY.
MADAGASCAR ALBINOS,
PURE WHITE NEGROES, OR MOORS.
SEA LION, MAMMOTH BEAR SAMSON, with a variety of other
living Bears; MONSTER SNAKES, AQUARIA, HAPPY
FAMILY, LIVING SEAL, WAX FIGURES, &c.
In the Lecture-Room, a great Dramatic Novelty is offered,
EMBRACING FARCE, VAUDEVILLE, and BURLETTA,
with a brilliant and talented company, including
LITTLE LOLA, THE INFANT WONDER,
MR. and MRS. C. B. REYNOLDS,
MISS DORA DAWRON, DOUBLE-VOICED SINGER,
LA PETITE ADDIE LE BRUN,
The favorite Juvenile Danseuse, always popular.
MARIE; THE CHILD OF SORROW,
With a laughable farce, every day at 3 and 7¾ o’clock.
Admission to all, 25 cents; Children under 10, 15 cents.
When his last pair of white whales died Barnum utilized his tank for
the abode of a still greater wonder. He obtained for an engagement of
several weeks at the Museum the first and only hippopotamus that had
ever been exhibited in America. He advertised his hippopotamus as “The
Great Behemoth of the Scriptures,” and as such the animal was visited
by clergymen, naturalists, theological students, and devotees of the
Bible, as well as by the common people, whose curiosity was aroused by
the controversy created by the theologists and scientists. Barnum’s
advertisements were a great factor in the popularity of the animal;
the following will serve to show his style of sonorous statement and
ecstatic hyperbole, which later developed into the roaring phrases of
the circus press agent:
BARNUM’S AMERICAN MUSEUM
SECOND WEEK OF THAT WONDERFUL
LIVING HIPPOPOTAMUS,
FROM THE RIVER NILE IN EGYPT,
THE GREAT BEHEMOTH OF THE SCRIPTURES,
AND THE MARVEL OF THE ANIMAL KINGDOM.
The history of this animal is full of interest, and to every
class, especially the educated and intelligent, but above all
to the biblical student, who has read with interest the glowing
description of
THE GREAT BEHEMOTH
in the Book of Job. He is strictly an
AMPHIBIOUS ANIMAL,
living in the water and out of it; under the water, or on the top
of it; floats on its surface with perfect ease, or beneath the
surface, midway between the top and the bottom. In their natural
state these animals are wild and ferocious; though on the land,
they are not very formidable, but when pursued they fly to the
rivers,
DESCEND TO THE BOTTOM AND WALK ACROSS,
frequently appearing on the opposite side without the least
indication of their course on the surface of the stream. If
exasperated by assaults, in the water they are the most
FRIGHTFUL ANTAGONISTS,
their gigantic proportions and herculean strength giving them power
over every opposing force, frequently destroying whole boat-loads
of men and their boats, crushing with their huge jaws everything
that comes in their way.
In the Museum the specimen here exhibited has an
ARTIFICIAL OCEAN OR RIVER,
where he is to be seen in all his natural peculiarities, floating
on, and swimming beneath the surface, walking on the bottom
several feet beneath, exhibiting, in short, all the peculiarities
of his nature; and to perfect the scene a native
ARABIAN KEEPER, SALAAMA,
who is himself a curiosity as a specimen of that historic tribe
of men, who exhibits all the stolidity and Arabian dignity of
that Oriental race; the only man who can control or exhibit his
Hippopotamiship, is in constant attendance. They are both to be
seen at all hours, DAY and EVENING.
This is the
FIRST AND ONLY REAL HIPPOPOTAMUS
ever seen in America. He is engaged at a cost of many thousands of
dollars, and will remain
A SHORT TIME ONLY.
A SHORT TIME ONLY.
Also just obtained at great expense, and now to be seen swimming in
the large tank in the Aquarial Hall,
A LIVING SHARK,
besides a great variety of other living Fish, Turtles, &c., &c.
WHAT IS IT? OR, MAN MONKEY.
SEA LION, MAMMOTH BEAR SAMSON, MONSTER SNAKES,
AQUARIA, HAPPY FAMILY, LIVING SEAL, &c.
The Lecture-Room Entertainments embrace
PETITE DRAMA, VAUDEVILLE, BURLETTA, and FARCE.
By a company of rare musical and dramatic talent.
MISS DAWRON, DOUBLE-VOICED VOCALIST,
MLLE. MATILDA E. TOEDT,
The Talented Young Violinist, &c.
Admission to all, 25 cents; Children under 10, 15 cents.
The description of the behemoth in the Book of Job and Barnum’s
description of the hippopotamus as given above do not tally exactly.
And a comparison of the two leaves the impression that the author of
the Book of Job was the better press agent:
“Behold now behemoth, which I made with thee; he eateth grass as an
ox.
Lo now, his strength is in his loins, and his force is in the navel
of his belly.
He moveth his tail like a cedar: the sinews of his stones are
wrapped together.
His bones are as strong pieces of brass; his bones are like bars of
iron.
He is the chief of the ways of God: he that made him can make his
sword to approach unto him.
Surely the mountains bring him forth food, where all the beasts of
the field play.
He lieth under the shady trees, in the covert of reed and fens.
The shady trees cover him with their shadow; the willows of the
brook compass him about.
Behold, he drinketh up a river, and hasteth not: he trusteth that
he can draw up Jordan into his mouth.
He taketh it with his eyes: his nose pierceth through snares.”
JOB xl., 15–24.
Barnum advertised his behemoth “for a short time only,” then added
another week “by special request,” and continued a “farewell week”
through many months of public curiosity.
By such enterprises and expedients as the Indian chiefs, the whales,
and the behemoth, “The Art of Money-Getting” and the Prince of Wales,
Barnum recovered his fortune and redeemed his reputation for success
and cunning. He was once more a venerated Prince of Humbugs because
he was able to maintain a palace, and many of those who had seen in
his downfall a subject of righteous retribution saw in his revival the
happy achievement of deserving merit.
Before the reopening of the Lecture Room in 1864 with a dramatization
of Dickens’s _Great Expectations_ Barnum delivered the following rhymed
speech, which in bare outline sums up some of the characters and
oddities Barnum had introduced to the public until 1864, when he was
fifty-four years old:
LADIES AND GENTLEMEN:
“That Prince of Humbugs, Barnum,” so it appears
Some folks have designated me for several years.
Well, I don’t murmur; indeed, when they embellish it,
To tell the truth, my friends, I rather relish it,
Since your true humbug’s he, who as a host,
For the least money entertains you most.
In this sense I’m a “humbug,” I succumb!
Who as a “General” thing brought out Tom Thumb?
Who introduced (you can’t say there I sinned)
The Swedish Nightingale, sweet Jenny Lind?
Who brought you Living Whales from Labrador?
The Hippopotamus from Nilus’s shore,
The Bearded Lady with her (h)airs and graces,
The Aztec Children with their normal faces,
The Twins of Siam--rarest of dualities--
Two ever separate, ne’er apart realities?
The Family of Albinos? the Giraffe?
The famous Baby Show that made you laugh?
The Happy Family--cats, rats, doves, hawks, harmonious?
Their voices blend in tones euphonious.
The great Sea Lion from Pacific’s coast,
The “Monarch of the Ocean,” no empty boast;
Old Adam’s Bears, cutest of brute performers,
In modern “peace meetings” models for reformers.
That living miracle, the Lightning Calculator,
Those figures confound Hermann the “Prestidigitator.”
The Grand Aquaria, an official story
Of life beneath the waves in all its glory;
The curious “What Is It?” which you, though spunky,
Won’t call a man and cannot call a monkey.
These things and many more time forbids to state,
I first introduced, if I did not originate;
“The World’s Seven Wonders,” pooh! let them invite you,
Here “seven” saloons all wonder-full delight you.
To call this “humbug” admits of no defense,
For all is shown for five and twenty cents.
And now, good friends, to use less rhyme than reason,
To-day re-opens our dramatic season;
Therefore I welcome you! And though we’re certain
To raise “Great Expectations” with the curtain,
And “play the Dickens” afternoon and nightly,
I bid you welcome none the less politely
To these my “quarters,” merry and reliable,
That yours are always welcome ’tis undeniable!
And Patrick Henry like I say, I boast of it,
If that be “humbug,” gentlemen, “make the most of it.”