During his visit to this country a few years ago Mr. J. M. Barrie said
to the students at Smith College that no American novelist merits a
higher rank than Mr. George W. Cable. True as, in the abstract, this
foreign estimate of Mr. Cable's worth is, it would awaken a rather
feeble echo among the devourers of our colonial literature. Yet one
of the Southerner's characteristic stories, "The Grandissimes," for
instance, or "Posson Jone," or "Madame Delphine," is deserving of a
recommendation to the liveliest admirer of eighteenth century heroes
and heroines.
At bottom, there is much in common between Mr. Barrie and Mr. Cable,
and this circumstance may account for the Scotchman's enthusiastic
utterance at Smith College. Each has a poetical love for nature; each
has portrayed a picturesque corner of the world with the kindest
intention, the broadest sympathy and the choicest skill; each has been
the object of misunderstanding at home and of warm admiration abroad,
and each has led where others may only follow. It is perfectly natural
that two such lovable and loving men should clasp hands across the sea.
We must admit that the writer who has pictured New Orleans as vividly
as Balzac pictured his beloved Paris was better known, say, ten years
ago, than he is to-day. Then he had fewer distractions than he has
to-day. Then he had reached the climax of his literary productivity.
Then he was personally endearing himself to his fellow-countrymen with
his inimitably delightful recitations and songs. There have been
authors who drew larger audiences, and who, to use a homely phrase,
made more noise on their tours, but there has never been an author
whose readings from his works gave sweeter pleasure; and, as for his
manner of singing the Creole folksongs, it was indescribably charming.
Mr. John Fox, Jr., is the only other American author who has ventured
to sing folk-songs publicly; and we may say, without fear of suggesting
the odious comparison, that the younger man has been very successful,
too.
"Many years ago," Mr. Cable once said, "when I discovered that these
folk-songs of the slaves of former Louisiana Creoles had a great charm
of their own and were preserved by tradition only, I was induced to
gather them and reduce them to notation. I found that others were so
strongly interested in the songs that, without pretending to any
musical authority or original charm of voice, I was tempted to sing one
or two of them before public audiences. The first time I did so was in
Boston, and since then I have rarely been allowed to leave them out of
my entertainment, when the length of my literary program left room for
them."
But we must look back farther. To start at the very beginning, George
Washington Cable was born in New Orleans on October 12, 1844. His
father was of Virginian descent; his mother of New England. They were
married in Indiana ten years before George was born, and they moved to
New Orleans after the hard times of 1837. The father died in 1859, and
then George, at the age of fifteen, went to work to help support the
family. He was a very small boy for his age; and indeed it is related
that in 1863, when the family was sent outside the Union lines for
refusing to take the oath of allegiance, his sisters had no difficulty
in obtaining permission to have their "little brother" accompany them.
The "little brother," however, was not so harmless as he looked. He
volunteered to fight for the Confederacy, and was mustered into the
Fourth Mississippi Cavalry, then in Gen. Wirt Adams's brigade. For
a time after the war he rolled cotton on the New Orleans levees and
carried a surveyor's chain along the banks of the Atchafalaya; and by
and by he found a place on the _New Orleans Picayune_. He is therefore
to be counted among the authors whose literary career started in the
reporter's room. His strong taste for culture and his zeal for the
public welfare soon made an outlet for themselves in short articles
touching on current topics; and, though the articles were much enjoyed
by the readers of the _Picayune_, the young writer before long felt
the distaste for newspaper work which, early or late, comes to almost
every journalist with high literary aims. Journalism is the best school
of experience in the world, but it can be attended too long.
Cable resisted the fascinations of journalism firmly and wisely. At
the height of his success he left the _Picayune_ and went into the
counting-room of a cotton house. He had a good eye for the picturesque
features of daily life, the features met commonly in the daily papers,
and at his leisure he wrote a few short stories based on New Orleans
characters. One day these stories, which he had made no attempt to
sell, came into the hands of an agent of the old _Scribner's Monthly_,
who happened to visit Louisiana in connection with the well-remembered
Great South papers. This agent, by name Edward King, praised the
stories, and, at the author's request, sent one of them to New York.
The story, for some reason, came back; but the next one sent, "Sieur
George," brought a note of acceptance and encouragement from Richard
Watson Gilder, Doctor Holland's associate.
A few years later a volume of these Louisiana sketches was published
under the title of "Old Creole Days." It was immediately recognized as
a notable addition to our short story literature. Nevertheless, the
author stuck to his desk in the counting-room. Many another ambitious
young writer, in the circumstances, would have given up his position
and leaned entirely upon his pen. Young Cable had a cool head. He knew
that he was moving forward handsomely, and that if he yielded to the
excitement of the situation for a moment he might fall back. So his pen
rusted for two years, when he accepted an order for a serial story.
This turned out to be "The Grandissimes," a clear and entertaining
exposition of the author's views of the old-fashioned Southern life,
a happy mingling of fact and fiction, of fun and sobriety, of calm
appreciation of the Louisiana aristocracy and a warm toleration of the
struggles of the poor negro slaves. Of course, this attitude added
nothing to the author's popularity among Southerners.
To illustrate this, a Southern woman, who happened to visit
Northampton, where of late Mr. Cable has made his home, was asked if
she ever read his stories. "Of course not," she indignantly answered;
"I wouldn't think of looking at them." However, she was persuaded to
look at them after a while; and it is a peculiar tribute to their
delicate yet powerful charm that the woman expressed regret that she
had misconceived his work and opposed his ideas.
"The Grandissimes" was so successful that the publishers are said
to have sent the author a check for five hundred dollars more than
the contract price. This first long tale was followed by another much
the same in vein and in atmosphere, "Madame Delphine," which is the
story-teller's own favorite. The subject and the style are equally
delightful.
In 1879, when Mr. Cable was thirty-five years old, the business house
in which he had worked to keep his feet on earth dissolved, and the
clerk had to choose between returning to journalism and devoting
himself entirely to literature. By this time he seems to have been more
self-reliant and more confident. At any rate, he chose literature. The
first thing he did was to decline to write for more than one publisher.
It must be said again that a steadier head never produced a story.
A strong sense of duty, in fact, early established control of his
work. His interests were not permitted to grow narrow. He realized
that he possessed exceptionally abundant resources for the production
of miscellaneous literature touching on the development of the middle
South, and he determined to make the most of his possessions. In 1880,
for example, we find him engaged in a special article on New Orleans
for the Census Bureau, and his native city was also the theme of an
article which he wrote for the "Encyclopedia Britannica." One of his
critics has said: "Since Hawthorne's Custom House reports, few pages of
the Government documents have been enriched by so discriminating a pen
as in the exhaustive census monograph upon the past and present of the
Southern metropolis." This paper led to a series of articles entitled
"The Creoles of Louisiana," written for _The Century_, in which the
reader will note an artistic combination of dry history and vivid
imagination.
That such a painstaking, conscientious, dutiful writer should ever be
charged with falling into an anachronism may seem preposterous; but
although the charge has been made, we find no instance in which it
has been sustained. A writer who once visited him brushed the charge
aside vigorously: "Mr. Cable's plan of work," he said, "is unusually
methodical, for his counting-room training has stood him in good stead.
All his notes and references are carefully indexed and journalled, and
so systematized that he can turn, without a moment's delay, to any
authority he wishes to consult. In this respect, as in many others,
he has not, perhaps, his equal among living authors. In making his
notes, it is his usual custom to write in pencil on scraps of paper.
These notes are next put into shape, still in pencil, and the third
copy, intended for the press, is written in ink on note-paper--the
chirography exceedingly neat, delicate and legible. He is always exact,
and is untiring in his researches.... Before attempting to write upon
any historical point, he gathers together all available material
without reckoning time or trouble; and, under such conditions, nothing
is more unlikely than that he should be guilty of error."
The business life which fortunately imposed so valuable a system
upon him incidentally inspired his second novel, "Dr. Sevier," many
of the scenes in which are faithful pictures of his own experiences
as a youth. As in the historical sketches, so in this second novel
the poetic imagination of the author fairly rivals his grasp of the
prosaic relations existing between man and man. But such relations
were supremely vital from his viewpoint, and his third novel,
"Bonaventure," was written in moments stolen from the discussion of the
questions of elections, prison systems, and the future of the negro.
The reader will note in the hero of this story the personification
of the practical strengthening and yet spiritualizing gospel which
the author has enunciated in his private and public religious work.
For it is important to chronicle that Mr. Cable has done as much to
Christianize several communities as the most energetic minister would
be expected to do; and from his scrupulous performance of not merely
the ordinary Christian duties but also of duties self-imposed, he has
never allowed literature or society to beguile him.
Naturally his social and political studies drew many invitations to
address public meetings. It was at Johns Hopkins University, while
lecturing on literary art, that, upon the suggestion of President
Gilman, he ventured for the first time to read selections from his
own stories. The delight of the audience was no less a surprise to him
than the realization of his own elocutionary skill. This he set about
to cultivate, and with such success that for years afterward he was
enthusiastically welcomed to the great cities. It was once estimated
that in his busiest years on the platform he traveled more than ten
thousand miles every twelve months.
For various reasons, particularly that he might be able to write of the
South impartially and that he might be nearer the literary market, he
moved to Simsbury, Conn., in 1884, and the next year to Northampton,
Mass., where he has lived ever since. But he has never lost sight
of his native concern in the progress of the South; and as for his
philanthropy, in Northampton it has spread wider and wider.
There, on the edge of one of the quietest and loveliest towns in
Massachusetts, he has had built for himself a home suited to all his
excellent tastes, and there he lives, intent always on making someone
happy, and writing simply enough to maintain the brilliancy and
popularity of his name.