Robert Grant leads the American satirists. Many writers, unnamed
paragraphers and critics of high degree, have pursued him relentlessly;
but he will not surrender. Contrariwise, it is more likely that they
will yet surrender to him. He has Napoleon's way of turning upon
pursuers.
The satirist is not always clearly understood. For some of this
misunderstanding the satirist himself is to blame. Mr. Grant, for
example, has never yet explained what he meant by saying in "The Art of
Living" that a satisfactory life demands an income of ten thousand a
year. On the other hand, some of the misunderstanding is due to a lack
of humor among his critics. And at the bottom of the misunderstanding
is the natural inconsistency which prompted Mr. Aldrich to write in
"Marjorie Daw"--"I have known a woman to satirize a man for years, and
marry him after all."
An incident which took place not long ago illustrates Judge Grant's
sincerity. The statement had been made in a periodical now defunct
that "a sufficiency of money has made things pretty pleasant for our
literary philosopher." Although averse, unlike many professional
writers, to taking advantage of opportunities for controversy, the
Judge made this reply to the statement: "It is true that for some years
I have had a comfortable income; but if I have been able to command the
advantages of modern life at the rate of $10,000 a year, it is because
I have earned the money by the sweat of my brow through literary and
legal work, and not because my 'judicial seat' is 'padded' with
inherited stocks and bonds.... It may interest those who have convinced
themselves that my philosophy is founded on a patrimony, to know that
from the time I left the Law School in 1879 the yearly income which I
have received from vested property has been so small as barely to pay
for the life insurance which I carry, and that I have acquired the
money which I spend or save by my own exertions. It is true that I was
brought up in comfort and given every opportunity to follow my tastes,
but this is all I owe to family income."
The incident is worth recalling for the light which it throws on the
novelist's economical position. The man who is competent to make ten
thousand a year is welcome to his enjoyment of it.
Robert Grant first earned some celebrity as a writer while at Harvard,
which he entered after his graduation from the Boston Latin School in
1869, when he was seventeen years old. His literary career began with
his contributions to the college papers, notably _The Lampoon_. That
his literary skill was recognized at Harvard is proved by his election
to the office of class poet at graduation, in 1873. That summer, while
abroad, he seems to have determined upon following his first taste, to
use his own expression; for at the end of the summer he went back to
Harvard for a three years' course in English and foreign literature,
upon the completion of which he received the degree of Doctor of
Philosophy.
Why he decided to choose another profession has never been divulged,
but, anyhow, at the end of the summer of 1876, he entered the Harvard
Law School. Three years afterward he was graduated from it, and
forthwith he became a member of the Bar and an active practitioner.
Mr. Grant left Harvard with a budding reputation. In company with Mr.
F. J. Stimson ("J. S. of Dale"), Barrett Wendell (now professor of
English at Harvard), F. G. Attwood, whose untimely death has bereft
our literature of one of its happiest decorators, and Mr. John T.
Wheelwright, now a lawyer in Boston, he had polished _The Lampoon_
considerably. Perhaps his most popular work at this time was "The
Little Tin Gods on Wheels; or, Society in our Modern Athens," a
burlesque after the Greek manner, which appeared in _The Lampoon_,
with illustrations by Attwood. In fact, it was to be found in a book
published by Sever, together with the young satirist's other promising
works, "The Wall Flowers," "The Chaperons," and "Oxygen, a Mt. Desert
Pastoral," squibs dealing with the foibles of fashionable society.
Thus favorably introduced to the reading public, he lost no time in
striking the iron while it was hot, and in 1880 gave out his first
novel, "The Confessions of a Frivolous Girl," which, by reason of its
remarkable exposition of the character of the leading lady, as she
may be called, and its popular attractiveness, won immediate success
at home and abroad. Three years later his second book, "The Knave of
Hearts," the autobiography of a ruthless young man, was published; and
the same year appeared in _The Century_ the articles which make up
"An Average Man," and a satire on Wall Street entitled "The Lambs, a
Tragedy." In 1883, too, it may be mentioned, Mr. Grant read at the Phi
Beta Kappa reunion at Harvard a poem called "Yankee Doodle." In 1885
"A Romantic Young Lady," another skit on fashionable life, made its
appearance; and that year he also served as the poet of the two hundred
and fiftieth anniversary of the establishment of the Boston Latin
School.
The following year, 1886, he finished what, up to that time, was by far
his most serious work, "Face to Face," which was published anonymously.
In it Anglomania and the labor problem are touched on boldly and
brilliantly, and even to-day the points of the book are fresh and
sparkling. Later came "The Reflections of a Philosopher," "The Opinions
of a Married Man," "Searchlight Letters," "The Art of Living," and,
last of all, "Unleavened Bread." "He says," once remarked a man, "what
you have thought and wanted to say yourself"; and a better compliment
could hardly be paid his philosophy.
A writer who went to see Judge Grant some years ago said: "He has
cultivated to a rare degree the faculty which is of the utmost
importance to every literary man, namely, that of concentration. The
greater part of his writing is done during the intervals of business
in the morning hours at his office. There, the casual visitor is
almost certain to find him, seated at his desk, with his manuscript
spread out before him. He will drop his pen, upon the instant, to
consider some point of legal technique, with which imagination has
nothing whatever to do, listen attentively, take notes or give advice,
as though this were the sole object of his existence; then, when the
interruption ceases, he will turn back to his unwritten page, finishing
that and another too, it may be, before the morning goes, if he is in
the vein. This power of leaving off and beginning again quickly was
not easily acquired. It is the result of long training in years of
practical experience. But, like every true artist, Mr. Grant really
carries his work with him wherever he goes. He is always recording and
storing up impressions, taking mental notes, or working out details
of construction, even when these matters seem to be the farthest from
his thoughts; and he is accustomed to say that the actual writing
of a story troubles him very little since, with him, when writing
begins, the most difficult part of the task is already accomplished.
But, in spite of his fluent pen, he has learned to look at his work
objectively, and he is extremely self-critical, having destroyed more
than once a tale half told, from conviction that it failed to do him
justice."
In 1882 Mayor Green of Boston selected Mr. Grant as his private
secretary, and in 1888 Mayor O'Brien of Boston appointed him a member
of the board of water commissioners. This latter post he held until a
few years ago, when he was appointed a Judge in the Probate Court of
Suffolk County, sitting in Boston. There, almost every day, he may
be seen by anyone visiting Boston, a medium-sized, delicate-looking
man, with shrewd features, an eye sharp as a detective's, a somewhat
brisk manner, and a faint but pleasant voice, to which the most learned
counsel lend eager ears. Since his appointment to the Bench he has
limited his literary activity to two hours a day, which short but
productive period he has been wont to spend generally at the Athenæum
Library on Beacon Street, a stone's throw from the Court House.
Judge Grant is very happy in his children, and this circumstance may
account for his delightful books for boys, "Jack Hall" and "Jack in the
Bush." He is a keen though perhaps not enthusiastic sportsman. Every
few years he and his wife, who was Miss Galt, the eldest daughter of
Sir Alexander Tillock Galt, the Canadian statesman, go bicycling in
Europe.
This excursive disposition does not narrow his enjoyment of what
is best in town life. It has been said of him: "He is not only an
admirable talker with a nimble wit, apt at repartee, but he is also a
genial sympathetic listener, thus combining very happily the qualities
which make a man hail-fellow-well met wherever he goes; and no one
meeting Mr. Grant for the first time can fail to recognize and delight
in that quick sense of humor which is so characteristic of his writing."
A few years ago he was interviewed regarding his likes and dislikes.
He said that his favorite prose authors were Thackeray and Balzac, his
favorite poets, Shakespeare and Goethe, his favorite book, "Vanity
Fair," his favorite play, "Hamlet," his favorite heroines in fiction,
Becky Sharp and Eugénie Grandet, his favorite heroes in fiction, Santa
Claus and Brer Rabbit; and he admires truth most in men and loving
sympathy in women.
His strength as a writer lies in an unsurpassed ability to detect and
delineate shams, and this ability shines brilliantly in the character
of Selma White, the heroine of "Unleavened Bread." The book is a
protest against superficiality; the character of Selma White is a
monument of vanity. We have all met Selmas, rampant women--there are
men like them, of course--who flatter themselves that they are born to
grace every resting-place and brush aside difficulties that would have
staggered Napoleon or Catherine de Medici. The author has contradicted
the opinion that Selma is a shaft aimed at women's clubs. "It is simply
that modern women's clubs are the best medium for that kind of women,"
he says "that I depicted Selma as a prime mover in some of them. But
she exists outside of women's clubs probably more plentifully than in
them."
It has been said that Judge Grant is timid about forcing his way into
public attention. The reply quoted from early in this article was an
exception to an apparently firmly established rule. At the time when
comment on his ten-thousand-a-year proposition was severest Judge Grant
wrote to a friend for advice, and he was very easily persuaded to give
no heed to his critics. At the same time, if what he had thought of
saying would have blown the fog away, it would have been better for him
then to have settled the question decisively. But, he was content for
the nonce to have his retiring disposition approved; and a philosopher
of this type rather invites than forbids attack. But, after all,
even his harshest critics praise his rare skill in the exposition of
character, his remarkable fertility of wit, and his complete mastery
of the technique of literature. Nor is it to be gainsaid that his
career has illustrated the wisdom of his lines in "The Lambs":
Success is Labor's prize
Work is the mother of fame.
And who on a boom shall rise
To the height of an honest name?
The bee by industry reapeth
The stores which enrich the hives.
All that is thrifty creepeth,
For toil is the law of lives,
And he who reaps without sowing,
A bitter harvest reaps;
The law of gradual growing
Is the law that never sleeps.
[Illustration: F. MARION CRAWFORD.]