he had not written that book he would have been still more popular with
the lyceum. He made a trip through Australia and wrote another book
which the Australians didn’t like. Had he possessed Mark Twain’s
sagacity, sincerity, and love of his fellow-man, and had he seen things
from their favorable point of view instead of from their objectionable
side, he might certainly get as much fun out of it and his popularity
would have continued. He left a riley wake clear around the world,
whereas the American humorist made friends of all who met or heard or
read him. I am very fond of Max O’Rell. At the same time, it is
impossible to enjoy all his eccentricities. But I made allowance for all
of his peculiarities, and my heart went out in sympathy for him when he
was obliged to cut short his last tour and return to London because of
ill health.
He is the heroic mirth provoker of his time--unlike any other humorous
lecturer. His audiences are kept in convulsions of laughter from
beginning to end. Occasionally one thinks he has found a let-up and that
he is going to have a rest, when all of a sudden he is struck in another
funny spot, and things go on that way until he has finished. I never
could understand why he should not be one of the greatest natural
platform attractions in the world, for I have never known a man to give
an audience more delight.
In his “Brother Jonathan and His Continent” he says: “Major Pond was the
only man I met in America who was not a colonel.”
[Illustration: NYE AND RILEY]
* * * * *
BILL NYE was an editor when I first met him, and as I had been a
printer, of course I felt akin to him. I had formed an attachment for
him that made me wish to know him, so when I found myself in Laramie, on
a return trip from California, I improved the opportunity to make his
acquaintance. The trains from East and West across the continent met at
Laramie, and made a stop of one hour, and Laramie was a lively city
during that time.
I used my dinner hour to call on William. I asked a man to direct me to
Bill Nye’s office, and he replied, “Just over that livery stable,”
pointing across the way. I started across the street. Just over the road
doorway of the stable hung a sign painted in black letters on a plain
board:
“LARAMIE BOOMERANG
Walk Down the Alley
Twist the Gray Mule’s Tail
_Take the Elevator Immediately_.”
I went into the sanctum and found Nye writing at a plain table at the
far side of the room, quite unaware of my presence. From photographs and
descriptions I knew him by his back, and at once exclaimed:
“Hello, Bill!”
Nye rose from his seat and replied smilingly: “Hello, Jim! I guess this
is Jim Pond. How are you, Major?”
I told him people were reading and talking of him all over the country,
and that I believed he could make money lecturing. He replied that he
had never given the matter a thought, and was trying to earn a living
with his pen and through the Laramie postmastership, to which he had
just been appointed.
From that time on Bill Nye and I were close friends. When he came East
to live, and purchased his Staten Island home, our wives and children
became friends also, and we knew and loved one another, and that love
never lost any of its ardor.
I did not see Nye again until about 1886. I was looking out of my office
window in the Everett House in New York, and noticed a tall, straight,
slim, fair-haired man, in a slouch hat, whose countenance wore an
expression of inquiry, and who seemed to be trying to find the entrance
to my place. We recognized “ourselves,” and I beckoned to him, and told
him to come around to the front door and have a bell-boy show him to my
rooms. I added that there was no sign, or mule’s tail to twist, or
elevator to take.
Bill came in and stared about at the pictures of great men and women on
the walls as if he were a fresh, unsophisticated country boy--and so he
was so far as experience was concerned. He told me that he had been
engaged on the staff of the New York _World_ and was going to move to
New York. The hardest part was to accustom himself to the politics of
_The World_, but he said he supposed he could become used to that as
soon as he became acclimated.
After a pleasant chat we dined together at Moretti’s. Nye asked if he
would be expected to learn to eat macaroni like some of our Bohemian
neighbors. This was his first Italian dinner; it was all of great
interest to him, all new, and he saw it from the standpoint of an
inexperienced youth.
I told him that now he was coming East to live I would make some money
for him in the lyceum. He seemed doubtful, but said he would try it.
His first lecture under my auspices was given in Bridgeport, Conn. A
certain organization (the Y. M. C. A.) in that place seemed to think the
name of Bill Nye would draw, and engaged to pay him $150; so Bill was
fitted out with his contract, and went to Bridgeport. The committee met
him, and were very polite.
The contract read: “In consideration for said lecture the party of the
first part agrees to pay to the party of the second part (Mr. Nye) $150
in currency on the evening of the lecture, before eight o’clock.”
Mr. Nye was on hand before the appointed time. A little after eight
o’clock the president of the organization said:
“Mr. Nye, we are ready. Will you please follow me to the stage?”
Nothing was said about payment.
Mr. Nye said he was ready, but that he must return to New York as soon
as the lecture was over, and added that he hoped he would not be
detained. The president made no response, but walked on, followed by
Bill. The Opera House was crowded, and the president remarked to the
speaker of the evening that it was the largest house they remembered
having on an opening night.
At the close of the lecture no one came to Mr. Nye to offer payment, and
he was obliged to hint to the president that there was a little matter
of business that had been forgotten.
“Oh, yes,” returned the president; “come with me to the box-office.”
“It’s twenty minutes to ten,” said Nye, “and I must catch the ten
o’clock train.”
When they reached the box-office, the treasurer, who was counting the
receipts of the evening, said:
“Mr. Nye, shall we settle with you or with Major Pond?”
“I have a copy of the contract, the same that you are holding in your
hand, which reads ‘Settlement to be made in currency with party of the
second part before eight o’clock.’”
“Oh, how much is it?”
“One hundred and fifty dollars in currency,” said Nye.
“One hundred and fifty dollars! Why, who ever heard of so much money for
only an hour’s talk?”
“Did you lose any money on the venture?” asked William.
“Oh, no. The house was full; but we don’t think you ought to exact such
an exorbitant sum for an hour’s talk.”
“Gentlemen, I must catch that train in ten minutes. Will you kindly
settle with me?”
“You will take our check, won’t you, Mr. Nye?” asked the treasurer.
“Yes, if the contract says so. How does it read?” asked Mr. Nye, with
impatience.
“It does read currency. You won’t take less than $150?”
Mr. Nye said nothing, and the treasurer counted out the money, for which
Nye signed a receipt. Then he said:
“Gentlemen, I suppose you delayed this payment and decoyed me in here
for the purpose of making me angry, thinking that when you gave me this
money I would fling it back in your faces in a mad fit. You are
mistaken. I’m a good-tempered man.”
Mr. Nye, like every one human who attempts to make a whole evening of
fun, found lecturing irksome. The audience would fairly bubble over with
laughter until every fun-liking muscle of their faces relaxed and left
one sombre, wet-blanket expression all over the assembly; and there they
had to sit, and the humorist had to proceed to the end of the programme
without a response. It was the same with Mark Twain until he took a
running mate and interspersed pathos by introducing George W. Cable, and
by means of a varied programme achieved the greatest success ever known
in the way of a platform entertainment.
* * * * *
JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY’S recitals of his own pathetic and humorous dialect
poems have touched the tender chords in the hearts of the people, and
they have vibrated in sympathy with the joys of his creations. His name
is one of the best-loved household words in our cultivated American
homes. A popular poet is not always a popular reader of his own poems,
but Mr. Riley is fully as effective with his voice as with his pen. He
is our American Burns.
After he had acquired fame as a very successful reader of his poems, Mr.
Nye thought that by combining with him they might be as successful as
some others. So Riley was approached, and the result was a combination
of humor and pathos for the season of 1888-9. Riley came to New York,
and the arrangements were perfected in my office. Nye and I were to be
owners of the combination, and Riley, who always declared, “I’m no
business man,” was to receive $500 a week and his hotel and travelling
expenses.
Advertising methods were next discussed. Something unique must be
thought out. I suggested a short biographical sketch of each one. Mr.
Riley said, “Bill, you write my autobiography, and I’ll write yours.”
This was agreed upon, and the manuscript was put into my hands the next
day.
Finally, the programme had to be decided upon, and in another
twenty-four hours that was mapped out. After it was finished and ready
to send out I had the first copy framed, with a nice mat around it. When
the mat was brought in, Riley asked me to let him see it. He took a pen,
and in about an hour had decorated it with pen drawings worthy of an
artist. It still hangs in my office.
* * * * *
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF BILL NYE
_Written by Himself_
_Through James Whitcomb Riley_
Edgar Wilson Nye was born in Maine, in 1850, August 25th, but at two
years of age he took his parents by the hand, and,
[Illustration: THE NYE-RILEY PROGRAM, WITH MR. RILEY’S DECORATIONS]
telling them that Piscataquis County was no place for them, he boldly
struck out for St. Croix County, Wis., where the hardy young pioneer
soon made a home for his parents. The first year he drove the Indians
out of the St. Croix Valley, and suggested to the Northwestern Railroad
that it would be a good idea to build to St. Paul as soon as the company
could get a grant which would pay them two or three times the cost of
construction. The following year he adopted trousers, and made $175 from
the sale of wolf scalps. He also cleared twenty-seven acres of land, and
raised some watermelons. In 1854 he established and endowed a district
school in Pleasant Valley. It was at this time that he began to turn his
attention to the abolition of slavery in the South, and to write
articles for the press, signed Veritas, in which he advocated the war in
1860, or as soon as the Government could get around to it.
In 1865 he graduated from the farm and began the study of the law. He
did not advance very rapidly in this profession, failing several times
in his examination, and giving bonds for his appearance at the next term
of court. He was, however, a close student of political economy, and
studied personal economy at the same time, till he found that he could
easily live on ten cents a day and his relatives.
Mr. Nye then began to look about him for a new country to build up and
foster, and, as Wisconsin had grown to be so thickly settled in the
northwestern part of the State that neighbors were frequently found less
than five miles apart, he broke loose from all restraint and took
emigrant rates for Cheyenne, Wyo. Here he engaged board at the
Inter-Ocean Hotel, and began to look about him for a position in a bank.
Not succeeding in this, he tried the law and journalism. He did not
succeed in getting a job for some time, but finally was hired as
associate editor and janitor of the Laramie _Sentinel_. The salary was
small, but Mr Nye’s latitude great, and he was permitted to write
anything that he thought would please the people, whether it was news or
not.
By and by he had won every heart by his gentle, patient poverty and his
delightful parsimony in regard to facts. With a hectic imagination and
an order on a restaurant which advertised in the paper he scarcely cared
through the livelong day whether school kept or not.
Thus he rose to Justice of the Peace, and finally to an income reported
very large to everybody but the assessor.
He is the father of several very beautiful children by his first wife,
who is still living. She is a Chicago girl, and loves her husband far
more than he deserves. He is pleasant to the outside world, but a
perfect brute in his home. He early learned that, in order to win the
love of his wife, he should be erratic, and kick the stove over on the
children when he came home. He therefore asserts himself in this way,
and the family love and respect him, being awed by his greatness and
gentle barbarism.
He eats plain food with both hands, conversing all the time pleasantly
with any one who may be visiting at the house. If his children do not
behave, he kicks them from beneath the table till they roar with pain,
as he chats on with the guests with a bright and everflowing stream of
_bons mots_ which please and delight those who visit him to such a
degree that they forget that they have had hardly anything to eat.
In conclusion, Mr. Nye is in every respect a lovely character. He feared
that injustice might be done him, however, in this sketch, and so he has
written it himself.
* * * * *
It is scarcely necessary to say that before these “autobiographies” were
written the humorists exchanged life stories and personal data; and in
writing the sketches they adhered to the essential facts with reasonable
fidelity. The idea proved a happy thought, and there was much comment
upon it at the time. Of the two biographies, the one by Mr. Nye was
conceded to have the keener edge.
AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY
_Written by Himself_
_Through Edgar Wilson Nye_
The unhappy subject of this sketch was born so long ago that he persists
in never referring to the date. Citizens of his native town of
Greenfield, Ind., while warmly welcoming his advent, were no less
anxious some few years ago to “speed the parting guest.” It seems, in
fact, that, the better they came to know him, the more resigned they
were to give him up. He was ill-starred from the very cradle, it
appears. One day, while but a toddler, he climbed, unseen, to an open
window where some potted flowers were ranged, and while leaning from his
high chair far out, to catch some dainty, gilded butterfly, perchance,
he lost his footing, and, with a piercing shriek, fell headlong to the
gravelled walk below; and when, an instant later, the affrighted parents
picked him up, he was--a poet.
The father of young Riley was a lawyer of large practice, who used, in
moments of deep thought, to regard this boy as the worst case he ever
had. This may have been the reason that, in time, he insisted on his
reading law, which the boy really tried to do; but, finding that
political economy and Blackstone didn’t rhyme, he slid out of the office
one hot, sultry afternoon, and ran away with a patent medicine and
concert wagon, from the tail end of which he was discovered by some
relatives in the next town, violently abusing a brass drum. This was a
proud moment for the boy; nor did his peculiar presence of mind entirely
desert him till all the country fairs were over for the season. Then,
afar off, among strangers in a strange State, he thought it would be
fine to make a flying visit home. But he couldn’t fly. Fortunately, in
former years he had purloined some knowledge of a trade. He could paint
a sign, or a house, or a tin roof--if some one else would furnish him
the paint--and one of Riley’s hand-painted picket fences gave rapture to
the most exacting eye. Yet, through all his stress and trial, he
preserved a simple, joyous nature, together with an everwidening love of
men and things in general. He made friends, and money, too--enough, at
last, to gratify the highest ambition of his life, namely, to own an
overcoat with fur around the tail of it. He then groped his way back
home, and worked for nothing on a little country paper that did not long
survive the blow. Again excusing himself, he took his sappy paragraphs
and poetry to another paper and another town, and there did better till
he spoiled it all by devising a Poe poem fraud, by which he lost his
job; and, in disgrace and humiliation shoe-mouth deep, his feelings gave
way beneath his feet, and his heart broke with a loud report. So the
true poet was born.
Of the poet’s present personality we need speak but briefly. His dress
is at once elegant and paid for. It is even less picturesque than
all-wool. Not liking hair particularly, he wears but little, and that of
the mildest shade. He is a good speaker--when spoken to--but a much
better listener, and often longs to change places with his audience so
that he also may retire. In his writings he probably shows at his best.
He always tries to, anyway. Knowing the manifold _faux pas_ and “breaks”
in this life of ours, his songs are sympathetic and sincere. Speaking
coyly of himself, one day, he said: “I write from the heart; that’s one
thing I like about me. I may not write a good hand, and my ‘copy’ may
occasionally get mixed up with the market reports, but, all the same,
what challenges my admiration is that humane peculiarity of
mine--_i.e._, writing from the heart--and, therefore, _to_ the heart.”
* * * * *
The Nye-Riley combination started in Newark, N. J., November 13, 1888.
It was our trial venture. I was ill and unable to be present. The
receipts were light, for both men were of Western fame, and had yet to
acquire reputations in the East. They found some fault because I was not
present, so I got out of bed and went the following evening to Orange,
N. J., where we found a very small audience, so small that Nye refused
to go on, and wished to end the business then and there. It was not
until after much persuasion that he consented to appear. The show was a
great success “artistically,” but the box-office receipts were only
fifty-four dollars.
It was not a pleasant day, for the manager, that followed. The Actors’
Fund had an entertainment in one of the theatres, and I had contributed
these “Twins of Genius” as my share of the numerous attractions. They
were the success of the occasion, and the newspapers so declared the
next day. From that time, applications began to come in from all over
the country, East, West, North, and South. The first week’s business
showed a balance on the wrong side for the owners, but the “no-business
man” did not show a sign of murmuring. Nye’s humorous weekly syndicate
newspaper articles made him a drawing attraction, and Riley’s delightful
readings of his dialect poems made the entertainment all that the public
desired. I ran the show myself in Boston, securing Tremont Temple for
the occasion. “Mark Twain” had come to Boston on purpose to attend the
entertainment, as he had never heard these “Twins of Genius.” I caught
him in the lobby of the Parker House, and told him that he must
introduce them. He replied that he believed I was his mortal enemy and
determined that he should never have an evening’s enjoyment in my
presence. He consented, however, and conducted his brother humorist and
the Hoosier poet to the platform. Mark’s presence was a surprise to the
audience, and when they recognized him the demonstration was tremendous.
The audience rose in a body, and men and women shouted at the very top
of their voices. Handkerchiefs waved, the organist even opened every
forte key and pedal in the great organ, and the noise went on unabated
for minutes. It took some time for the crowd to get down to listening,
but when they did subside, as Mark stepped to the front, the silence was
as impressive as the noise had been, as Mark said afterward. At that
supreme moment nothing was heard but--silence! I had engaged a
stenographer to take down the speech, and this is what Mark said:
“I am very glad indeed to introduce these young people to you, and at
the same time get acquainted with them myself. I have seen them more
than once, for a moment, but have not had the privilege of knowing them
personally as intimately as I wanted to. I saw them first, a great many
years ago, when Mr. Barnum had them, and they were just fresh from Siam.
The ligature was their best hold then, but literature became their best
hold later, when one of them committed an indiscretion, and they had to
cut the old bond to accommodate the sheriff. In that old former time
this one was Chang, that one was Eng. The sympathy existing between the
two was most extraordinary; it was so fine, so strong, so subtle, that
what the one ate the other digested, when one slept the other snored, if
one sold a thing the other scooped the usufruct. This independent and
yet dependent action was observable in all the details of their daily
life--I mean this quaint and arbitrary distribution of originating cause
and resulting effect between the two: between, I may say, this dynamo
and this motor. Not that I mean that the one was always dynamo and the
other always motor--or, in other words, that the one was always the
creating force, the other always the utilizing force; no, no, for while
it is true that within certain well-defined zones of activity the one
_was_ always dynamo and the other always motor, within certain other
well-defined zones these positions became exactly reversed. For
instance, in moral matters Mr. Chang Riley was always dynamo, Mr. Eng
Nye was always motor; for while Mr. Chang Riley had a high, in fact an
abnormally high and fine, moral sense, he had no machinery to work it
within; whereas Mr. Eng Nye, who hadn’t any moral sense at all, and
hasn’t yet, was equipped with all the necessary _plant_ for putting a
noble deed through, if he could only get the inspiration on reasonable
terms outside. In intellectual matters, on the other hand, Mr. Eng Nye
was always dynamo, Mr. Chang Riley was always motor: Mr. Eng Nye had a
stately intellect, but couldn’t make it go; Mr. Chang Riley hadn’t, but
could. That is to say, that while Mr. Chang Riley couldn’t think things
himself, he had a marvellous natural grace in setting them down and
weaving them together when his pal furnished the raw material. Thus,
working together, they made a strong team; laboring together, they could
do miracles; but break the circuit, and both were impotent. It has
remained so to this day; they must travel together, conspire together,
beguile together, hoe, and plant, and plough, and reap, and sell their
public together, or there’s no result. I have made this explanation,
this analysis, this vivisection, so to speak, in order that you may
enjoy these delightful adventurers understandingly. When Mr. Eng Nye’s
deep, and broad, and limpid philosophies flow by in front of you,
refreshing all the regions round about with their gracious floods, you
will remember that it isn’t his water; it’s the other man’s, and he is
only working the pump. And when Mr. Chang Riley enchants your ear, and
soothes your spirit, and touches your heart with the sweet and genuine
music of his poetry--as sweet and as genuine as any that his friends,
the birds and the bees, make about his other friends, the woods and the
flowers--you will remember, while placing justice where justice is due,
that it isn’t his music, but the other man’s--he is only turning the
crank.
“I beseech for these visitors a fair field, a single-minded, one-eyed
umpire, and a score bulletin barren of goose-eggs if they earn it--and I
judge they will and hope they will. Mr. James Whitcomb Chang Riley will
now go to the bat.”
It was a carnival of fun in every sense of the word. Bostonians will not
have another such treat in this generation. It was Mark’s last
appearance in Boston.
After the performance, the three invincibles went to the Press Club,
where a shower of jokes, stories unpublished (and that never will be
published), poems, and epigrams was poured into the Boston writers until
all were full. The event is still fresh in the memory of all who have
survived it. They appeared in all the large cities before great
audiences, and the season was financially successful up to the middle of
April.