BEAR-TONE
One day about the first of February, Catherine Edwards made the rounds
of the neighborhood with a subscription paper to get singers for a
singing school. A veteran "singing master"--Seth Clark, well known
throughout the country--had offered to give the young people of the
place a course of twelve evening lessons or sessions in vocal music, at
four dollars per evening; and Catherine was endeavoring to raise the sum
of forty-eight dollars for this purpose.
Master Clark was to meet us at the district schoolhouse for song
sessions of two hours, twice a week, on Tuesday and Friday evenings at
seven o'clock. Among us at the old Squire's we signed eight dollars.
The singing school did not much interest me personally, for the reason
that I did not expect to attend. As the Frenchman said when invited to
join a fox hunt, I had been. Two winters previously there had been a
singing school in an adjoining school district, known as "Bagdad," where
along with others I had presented myself as a candidate for vocal
culture, and had been rejected on the grounds that I lacked both "time"
and "ear." What was even less to my credit, I had been censured as being
concerned in a disturbance outside the schoolhouse. That was my first
winter in Maine, and the teacher at that singing school was not Seth
Clark, but an itinerant singing master widely known as "Bear-Tone."
As opportunities for musical instruction thereabouts were limited, the
old Squire, who loved music and who was himself a fair singer, had
advised us to go. Five of us, together with our two young neighbors,
Kate and Thomas Edwards, drove over to Bagdad in a three-seated pung
sleigh.
The old schoolhouse was crowded with young people when we arrived, and a
babel of voices burst on us as we drew rein at the door. After helping
the girls from the pung, Addison and I put up the horses at a farmer's
barn near by. When we again reached the schoolhouse, a gigantic man in
an immense, shaggy buffalo coat was just coming up. He entered the
building a step behind us.
It was Bear-Tone; and a great hush fell on the young people as he
appeared in the doorway. Squeezing hurriedly into seats with the others,
Addison and I faced round. Bear-Tone stood in front of the teacher's
desk, near the stovepipe, rubbing his huge hands together, for the night
was cold. He was smiling, too--a friendly, genial smile that seemed
actually to brighten the room.
If he had looked gigantic to us in the dim doorway, he now looked
colossal. In fact, he was six feet five inches tall and three feet
across the shoulders. He had legs like mill-posts and arms to match; he
wore big mittens, because he could not buy gloves large enough for his
hands. He was lean and bony rather than fat, and weighed three hundred
and twenty pounds, it was said.
His face was big and broad, simple and yet strong; it was ringed round
from ear to ear with a short but very thick sandy beard. His eyes were
blue, his hair, like his beard, was sandy. He was almost forty years old
and was still a bachelor.
"Wal, young ones," he said at last, "reckonin' trundle-bed trash,
there's a lot of ye, ain't there?"
His voice surprised me. From such a massive man I had expected to hear a
profound bass. Yet his voice was not distinctly bass, it was clear and
flexible. He could sing bass, it is true, but he loved best to sing
tenor, and in that part his voice was wonderfully sweet.
As his speech at once indicated, he was an ignorant man. He had never
had musical instruction; he spoke of soprano as "tribble," of alto as
"counter," and of baritone as "bear-tone"--a mispronunciation that had
given him his nickname.
But he could sing! Melody was born in him, so to speak, full-fledged,
ready to sing. Musical training would have done him no good, and it
might have done him harm. He could not have sung a false note if he had
tried; discord really pained him.
"Wal, we may's well begin," he said when he had thoroughly warmed his
hands. "What ye got for singin' books here? Dulcimers, or Harps of
Judah? All with Harps raise yer right hands. So. Now all with Dulcimers,
left hands. So. Harps have it. Them with Dulcimers better get Harps, if
ye can, 'cause we want to sing together. But to-night we'll try voices.
I wouldn't wonder if there might be some of ye who might just as well go
home and shell corn as try to sing." And he laughed. "So in the first
place we'll see if you can sing, and then what part you can sing,
whether it's tribble, or counter, or bass, or tenor. The best way for us
to find out is to have you sing the scale--the notes of music. Now these
are the notes of music." And without recourse to tuning fork he sang:
"Do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, si, do."
The old schoolhouse seemed to swell to the mellow harmony from his big
throat. To me those eight notes, as Bear-Tone sang them, were a sudden
revelation of what music may be.
"I'll try you first, my boy," he then said, pointing to Newman Darnley,
a young fellow about twenty years old who sat at the end of the front
row of seats. "Step right out here."
Greatly embarrassed, Newman shambled forth and, turning, faced us.
"Now, sir," said the master, "catch the key-note from me. Do! Now
re--mi," and so forth.
Bear-Tone had great difficulty in getting Newman through the scale.
"'Fraid you never'll make a great singer, my boy," he said, "but you may
be able to grumble bass a little, if you prove to have an ear that can
follow. Next on that seat."
The pupil so designated was a Bagdad boy named Freeman Knights. He
hoarsely rattled off, "Do, re, mi, fa, sol," all on the same tone. When
Bear-Tone had spent some moments in trying to make him rise and fall on
the notes, he exclaimed:
"My dear boy, you may be able to drive oxen, but you'll never sing. It
wouldn't do you any good to stay here, and as the room is crowded the
best thing you can do is to run home."
Opening the door, he gave Freeman a friendly pat on the shoulder and a
push into better air outside.
Afterwards came Freeman's sister, Nellie Knights; she could discern no
difference between do and la--at which Bear-Tone heaved a sigh.
"Wai, sis, you'll be able to call chickens, I guess, because that's all
on one note, but 'twouldn't be worth while for you to try to sing, or
torment a pianner. There are plenty of girls tormentin' pianners now. I
guess you'd better go home, too; it may come on to snow."
Nellie departed angrily and slammed the door. Bear-Tone looked after
her. "Yes," he said, "'tis kind of hard to say that to a girl. Don't
wonder she's a little mad. And yet, that's the kindest thing I can do.
Even in Scripter there was the sheep and the goats; the goats couldn't
sing, and the sheep could; they had to be separated."
He went on testing voices and sending the "goats" home. Some of the
"goats," however, lingered round outside, made remarks and peeped in at
the windows. In an hour their number had grown to eighteen or twenty.
Dreading the ordeal, I slunk into a back seat. I saw my cousin, Addison,
who had a fairly good voice, join the "sheep," and then Theodora, Ellen,
Kate and Thomas; but I could not escape the ordeal forever, and at last
my turn came. When Bear-Tone bade me sing the scale, fear so constricted
my vocal cords that I squealed rather than sang.
"Sonny, there's lots of things a boy can do besides sing," Bear-Tone
said as he laughingly consigned me to the outer darkness. "It's no great
blessing, after all." He patted my shoulder. "I can sing a little, but
I've never been good for much else. So don't you feel bad about it."
But I did feel bad, and, joining the "goats" outside, I helped to
organize a hostile demonstration. We began to march round the
schoolhouse, howling Yankee Doodle. Our discordant noise drew a prompt
response. The door opened and Bear-Tone's huge form appeared.
"In about one harf of one minute more I'll be out there and give ye a
lesson in Yankee Doodle!" he cried, laughing. His tone sounded
good-natured; yet for some reason none of us thought it best to renew
the disturbance.
Most of the "goats" dispersed, but, not wishing to walk home alone, I
hung round waiting for the others. One window of the schoolroom had been
raised, and through that I watched proceedings. Bear-Tone had now tested
all the voices except one, and his face showed that he had not been
having a very pleasant time. Up in the back seat there still remained
one girl, Helen Thomas, who had, according to common report, a rather
good voice; yet she was so modest that few had ever heard her either
sing or recite.
I saw her come forward, when the master beckoned, and sing her do, re,
mi. Bear-Tone, who had stood waiting somewhat apathetically, came
suddenly to attention. "Sing that again, little girl," he said.
Encouraged by his kind glance, Helen again sang the scale in her clear
voice. A radiant look overspread Bear-Tone's big face.
"Wal, wal!" he cried. "But you've a voice, little one! Sing that with
me."
Big voice and girl's voice blended and chorded.
"Ah, but you will make a singer, little one!" Bear-Tone exclaimed. "Now
sing Woodland with me. Never mind notes, sing by ear."
A really beautiful volume of sound came through the window at which I
listened. Bear-Tone and his new-found treasure sang The Star-Spangled
Banner and several of the songs of the Civil War, then just
ended--ballads still popular with us and fraught with touching memories:
Tenting To-night on the Old Camp Ground, Dearest Love, Do You Remember?
and Tramp, Tramp, Tramp, the Boys Are Marching. Bear-Tone's rich voice
chorded beautifully with Helen's sweet, high notes.
As we were getting into the pung to go home after the meeting, and Helen
and her older sister, Elizabeth, were setting off, Bear-Tone dashed out,
bareheaded, with his big face beaming.
"Be sure you come again," he said to her, in a tone that was almost
imploring. "You can sing! Oh, you can sing! I'll teach you! I'll teach
you!"
The singing school that winter served chiefly as a pretty background for
Bear-Tone's delight in Helen Thomas's voice, the interest he took in it,
and the untiring efforts he made to teach her.
"One of the rarest of voices!" he said to the old Squire one night when
he had come to the farmhouse on one of his frequent visits. "Not once
will you find one in fifty years. It's a deep tribble. Why, Squire, that
girl's voice is a discovery! And it will grow in her, Squire! It is just
starting now, but by the time she's twenty-five it will come out
wonderful."
The soprano of the particular quality that Bear-Tone called "deep
tribble" is that sometimes called a "falcon" soprano, or dramatic
soprano, in distinction from light soprano. It is better known and more
enthusiastically appreciated by those proficient in music than by the
general public. Bear-Tone, however, recognized it in his new pupil, as
if from instinct.
The other pupils were somewhat neglected that winter; but no one
complained, for it was such a pleasure to hear Bear-Tone and Helen sing.
Many visitors came; and once the old Squire attended a meeting, in order
to hear Bear-Tone's remarkable pupil. In Days of Old when Knights were
Bold, dear old Juanita, and Roll on, Silver Moon, were some of their
favorite songs, Still a "goat," and always a "goat," I am not capable of
describing music; but school and visitors sat enchanted when Helen and
Bear-Tone sang.
Helen's parents were opposed to having their daughter become a
professional singer. They were willing that she should sing in church
and at funerals, but not in opera. For a long time Bear-Tone labored to
convince them that a voice like Helen's has a divine mission in the
world, to please, to touch and to ennoble the hearts of the people.
At last he induced them to let him take Helen to Portland, in order that
a well-known teacher there might hear her sing and give an opinion.
Bear-Tone was to pay the expenses of the trip himself.
The city teacher was enthusiastic over the girl and urged that she be
given opportunity for further study; but in view of the opposition at
home that was not easily managed. But Bear-Tone would not be denied. He
sacrificed the scanty earnings of a whole winter's round of singing
schools in country school districts to send her to the city for a course
of lessons.
The next year the question of her studying abroad came up. If Helen were
to make the most of her voice, she must have it trained by masters in
Italy and Paris. Her parents were unwilling to assist her to cross the
ocean.
Bear-Tone was a poor man; his singing schools never brought him more
than a few hundred dollars a year. He owned a little house in a
neighboring village, where he kept "bachelor's hall"; he had a piano, a
cabinet organ, a bugle, a guitar and several other musical instruments,
including one fairly valuable old violin from which he was wont of an
evening to produce wonderfully sweet, sad strains.
No one except the officials of the local savings bank knew how Bear-Tone
raised the money for Helen Thomas's first trip abroad, but he did it.
Long afterwards people learned that he had mortgaged everything he
possessed, even the old violin, in order to provide the necessary money.
Helen went to Europe and studied for two years. She made her début at
Milan, sang in several of the great cities on the Continent, and at
last, with a reputation as a great singer fully established, returned
home four years later to sing in New York.
Bear-Tone meanwhile was teaching his singing schools, as usual, in the
rural districts of Maine. Once or twice during those two years of study
he had managed to send a little money to Helen, to help out with the
expenses. Now he postponed his three bi-weekly schools for one week and
made his first and only trip to New York--the journey of a lifetime.
Perhaps he had at first hoped that he might meet her and be welcomed. If
so, he changed his mind on reaching the metropolis. Aware of his
uncouthness, he resolved not to shame her by claiming recognition. But
he went three times to hear her sing, first in Aïda, then in Faust, and
afterwards in Les Huguenots; heard her magic notes, saw her in all her
queenly beauty--but saw her from the shelter of a pillar in the rear of
the great opera house. On the fifth day he returned home as quietly as
he had gone.
Perhaps a month after he came back, while driving to one of his singing
schools on a bitter night in February, he took a severe cold. For lack
of any proper care at his little lonesome, chilly house, his cold a day
or two later turned into pneumonia, and from that he died.
The savings bank took the house and the musical instruments. The piano,
the organ, the old violin and other things were sold at auction. And
probably Helen Thomas, whose brilliant career he had made possible,
never heard anything about the circumstances of his death.