Part 24
Capt. Joshua Slocum, who conceived the idea that he could sail alone around the world, is about the newest and most remarkable of the small list of hazardous adventurers who have _done something that no other man has succeeded in accomplishing_, and thereby acquired world-wide fame. He is well entitled to a place alongside the heroes Peary, Nansen, and Dr. Cook.
Captain Slocum comes of “a blue-nosed ancestry, with Yankee proclivities,” as he puts it. “Both sides of my family were sailors,” says the captain “and if any Slocum should be found not seafaring, he will show at least an inclination to whittle models of boats and contemplate voyages. My father was the sort of man who, wrecked on a desolate island, would find his way home if he had a jack-knife and could find a tree.”
After following the sea twenty years as a shipmaster and losing his bark, _Aquidneck_, wrecked on the coast of Brazil, and making the voyage home with his family in a canoe, Captain Slocum conceived the idea of building a boat and sailing alone around the world. He accomplished this remarkable feat, built the _Spray_ entirely with his own hands, launched, equipped, and sailed her by himself, over forty thousand miles, visiting many foreign ports, to the great amazement of the natives of every clime. In his voyage around Cape Horn there were over seventy days during which he never heard a sound except his own voice, the wind, and the lapping of the waves.
What is most remarkable of all is that Captain Slocum is able to write and describe the incidents of the entire voyage and his wonderful experiences in a manner so graphic and simple that it absolutely charms and fascinates his hearers as few ever did or ever could do.
The experiences of Captain Slocum have proved him to be one of the greatest navigators of the age.
It is wonderful to listen to the descriptions of some of his hairbreadth escapes and to hear him answer, as quick as a flash, questions of every conceivable sort put to him by expert seafaring auditors. I have listened for hours to these seeming tournaments in navigators’ skill, and never yet did the captain hesitate for an instant for a reply that went straight to the mark like a bullet.
Captain Slocum’s book, “Sailing Alone Around the World,” (published by The Century Company), has had a large sale, which is constantly increasing.
Had all this occurred twenty years ago, it would have meant a fortune for Captain Slocum, and a stimulant for the lyceum such as it is impossible to secure under present conditions. “Because why?” you ask. Because under the present conditions, lecture courses are forced upon the communities by agents representing various lecture bureaus, who start out with sample photographs and circulars (regulation size), round up a committee of enterprising citizens who want to do something for the town, and persuade them to go on a guarantee fund to secure a course of lectures and entertainments. They listen to the bureau agent’s recommendations of “the greatest orator of the times, Mr. Breeze,” and “the great traveller and adventurer, Mr. Push,” “the latest and most original dialect poet, Mr. Verse,” “Miss Wonder, whose dramatic recitations have captivated metropolitan audiences in all the large cities,” and “Miss Good, who is a direct descendant of a great-grandniece of Oliver Wendell Holmes’s cousin.” The course is made up, and contracts are signed before the agent leaves town. Then for six months the course is being talked up. The bureau agent remains for a few days to assist the local canvassers in getting started, telling them who the celebrities are that are to make the town so famous by their visit, etc.
Over fifty such courses are already announced for the State of Michigan the coming autumn, August, 1900, over two hundred in the State of Illinois, nearly as many in Iowa, and so proportionately all over the country. More than $6,000 a week is now being disbursed by bureaus to agents “selling courses.”
So when the newspapers and _The Century Magazine_, _McClure’s Magazine_, and _Harper’s Magazine_ publish the accounts of such heroic adventures as Captain Slocum’s, and a circular is sent out announcing his intention to relate from the lecture platform for the enlightenment of the public the story of his adventures, this local guarantee committee informs the captain that they already have “a course” in their city, which means that an independent lecture or entertainment of any kind, no matter how meritorious, is boycotted by the local committee in every city in the Union of from 2,500 to 40,000.
John L. Stoddard was the most phenomenal success as a professional lecturer, pure and simple, that I have ever known. He began in Boston with the bureau in 1878, together with what he could do for himself, as the bureau did not see enough in his lectures to make him an offer for all of his time. I heard him several times in churches in and about Boston, and declared him a success. I wanted to make him a big offer, but partnership stipulations--that our firm should not speculate--prevented that. I went nightly to hear him and see his pictures. Two young men engaged him for a lecture in Music Hall, Boston, and made a lot of money. They tried it again with the same result; then in suburban towns. Until the warm summer days and short nights set in, crowds were limited to the capacity of the auditorium. I have heard many lecturers whom I thought Stoddard’s superior from a professional point of view, but no other lectures with illustrations have ever drawn one quarter the people to hear them that his did. He has held first place as a stereopticon lecturer for twenty years and has retired with a fortune. Men and women have said to me: “What is the secret of this man’s success?” My only reply is: “The people like to hear him. I like to hear him.”
ACTORS AND DRAMATIC CRITICS
Joseph Jefferson is an actor in whom the romantic ardor of devotion to the dramatic art has never languished. Youth is gone, but not its enthusiasm, its faith, or its fire. He still embodies Rip Van Winkle with a sincerity as intense and with an artistic execution as thorough and as fresh as if the part were new, and as if he were playing it for the first time. The spontaneous drollery, the wildwood freedom, the endearing gentleness, the piquant, quizzical sapience, the unconscious humor, the pathetic blending of forlorn, wistful patience with awestricken apprehension, the dazed, submissive, drifting surrender to the current of fate, and the apparently careless, but clear-cut and beautiful method--all those attributes that bewitched the community long ago remain unchanged, and have lost no particle of their charm.
One Sunday morning, in Plymouth Church, just as Mr. Beecher was about to begin his sermon, and there was a deathly silence all over the house, Mr. Beecher said:
“Yes, I have been to the theatre. Mr. Beecher has been to the theatre. Now if you will all wait until you are past seventy years of age and will then go and see Joseph Jefferson in ‘Rip Van Winkle,’ I venture the risk that it will not affect your eligibility for heaven if you do nothing worse.”
Mr. Jefferson can command $1,000 a night in the large cities, if he will only consent to lecture. He and Sir Henry Irving are overrun with invitations to appear before college audiences.
William Winter was first called to my attention by Henry Ward Beecher, in 1876, while we were on the train between Fall River and Boston. Mr. Beecher was reading the New York _Tribune_. He usually read his morning paper from beginning to end, and this time he had got as far as the dramatic criticism, when he said to me:
“If you want to have the true estimate concerning the drama you should read William Winter in _The Tribune_. He is the most graphic writer there is, and he is a fine critic and absolutely clean. Here’s what he says of this young actress, Mary Anderson, as ‘Juliet.’”
Mr. Beecher then read aloud to me a column prophesying a brilliant success, which proved to be fully realized. Since that time I have read everything Mr. Winter has written. I watched and read and admired the man. I noted the interest that he took in all matters pertaining to the advancement, culture, and education of the community where he lives, his founding of the Arthur Winter Memorial Library at the Staten Island Academy, with a contribution of rare books and gems of literature that could have been collected only by one of fine gifts and refined tastes such as Mr. Winter possesses.
Reading of this acquisition to the academy and the erection of a hall for lectures, etc., I felt an interest in the success of this movement, and wrote my first letter to Mr. Winter, proposing to furnish such of my stars as would contribute lectures and entertainments for his public.
A most gracious and appreciative letter of thanks came in return, which is one of my choicest delights. I so wrote him, and received another characteristic reply. So it has kept up ever since. I now, as far as possible, stipulate with my coming stars that they give one evening during their season to the Winter Memorial Library, and it has come about that they all look forward to that appointment with great expectation, because it is an audience that, for fine appreciation, is not to be excelled anywhere. Marion Crawford, Annie Grey, H. E. Krehbiel, and Ernest Seton-Thompson, all declare the Winter Memorial their ideal audience.
For over thirty-five years (since August, 1865), Mr. Winter has been the dramatic critic of the New York _Tribune_, and during that time he has wielded an influence more potent in the advancement of the drama than that of all the other New York critics combined. He is incorruptible and not afraid of consequences. Once a very prominent manager, knowing that Mr. Winter and I were friends, came into my office and asked for a confidential talk, which was granted. He began like this:
“You know William Winter well, do you not?”
“I have very little association with him. I know him well enough to understand that he is my friend and would go as far to serve me as he would any friend.”
“Is he well fixed or is he poor?” asked the manager.
“He’s not rich. How could he be, with only the resources of his pen as his income, and with a family of sons and a daughter to educate?”
“Major, would $2,500 be any inducement for him to visit the Union Square Theatre to-morrow evening, and give that girl, the greatest actress in the world, a send off?”
I said: “It would be a waste of time and money. You would be as safe in offering $50,000 as any other amount. If Mr. Winter goes there he will write as he sees, and will do the subject justice.”
The manager told me that he had made sure of every paper that he wanted but the _Tribune_, and he would give more for that paper than for all the others, because whatever Winter wrote the public believed. He had already secured the next best dramatic writer for less than half he offered me if I could secure Winter.
While I was writing this book, one of the other New York dramatic critics to whom that manager referred was in my office, and we went out to lunch together. He wanted to borrow $2. He said that the New York newspapers of to-day would accept nothing from his pen, nor from other prominent old journalists, while William Winter seemed to be as much in evidence as ever.
I couldn’t help saying: “I will quote what a theatrical manager said to me twelve years ago: ‘I secured the next best writer in New York for less than half what I would offer to Winter, but the public believes what Winter writes’; and it is true.”
In reply to a letter from him recommending a great Shakespearean scholar and reader, I once wrote Mr. Winter that there was no public demand for a scholarly address on Shakespeare or any literary subject; that there was scarcely a statesman even, or any man of letters, that even colleges and institutions of learning cared to engage for commencements and other public occasions, but that I had letters from many leading colleges offering fabulous prices if I could secure Henry Irving or Joseph Jefferson for them, and on this encouraging symptom I offered each of these great actors $10,000 if they would each give ten addresses on these occasions.
Here is Mr. Winter’s reply:
* * * * *
“September 5, 1896.
“MY DEAR MAJOR POND:
“I observed with some wonder your amazing offer of _$1,000 a night_ to Irving and to Jefferson, for ten lectures, for _college commencements_. There must, of course, be some ‘business’ in this, or you would not think of it, but I should be very glad to know what qualifications are possessed by these gentlemen, or by any other _actors_, which entitled them to this peculiar eminence. A university is _a seat of learning_, and I have always supposed that the honors and rewards of _learning_ are due to great _scholars_, whose lives have been passed in study, in thought, and in labor for the art of literature and the cause of education. Mr. Irving and Mr. Jefferson are masters of the art of acting, and no one admires them more than I do; but I should hardly select either of them as monitors for a university commencement, any more than they would select me as a director of the stage.
“Faithfully yours, “WILLIAM WINTER.”
* * * * *
One of Mr. Winter’s most cherished friends was George William. Curtis, and it is his ambition to add a George William Curtis Memorial Lyceum to the Staten Island Academy. He is sure to accomplish the work if he is spared another five years.
He is the last of his kind. Only by his bravery and his fidelity to his profession could he survive the natural loneliness of his environment.
There has been scarcely a great actor or actress or theatrical manager for the last forty years whom he has not known intimately and who has not been his dear friend. Among this number must be included Joseph Jefferson, Sir Henry Irving, Edwin Booth, Lester Wallack, John McCullagh, Lawrence Barrett, Barney Williams, W. J. Florence, William Weaver, John Gilbert, Adelaide Neilson, Ellen Terry, Charlotte Cushman, and Augustin Daly. One can readily come in touch with the tender vibrations and longings of his heart by reading the following poem in memory of his friend Augustin Daly, which is here reprinted by the kind permission of the Macmillan Co.:
A. D.
Died June 7, 1899.
Long he slumbers; will he waken, greeting, as he used to do, With his kindly, playful smile, his old companions, me and you?
Long he slumbers--though the wind of morning sweetly blows to sea, Though his barque has weighed her anchor, and the tide is flowing free.
Long he slumbers; why, so helpless, doth he falter on the shore? Wherefore stays he in the silence, he that never stayed before?
“Do not wake me!” Oh, the pity! How shall we poor toilers strive If his strong and steadfast spirit keep not our frail hope alive?
All his days were given to action, all his powers of mind and will: Now the restless heart is silent, and the busy brain is still.
Gone the fine ideal fancies, glorious, like the summer dawn! Ev’ry passionate throb of purpose, ev’ry dream of grandeur gone!
Courage, patience, deep devotion, long endurance, manly trust, Zeal for truth and love for beauty--gone, and buried in the dust!
Ah, what pictures rise in mem’ry and what strains of music flow, When we think of all the magic times and scenes of Long Ago!
When once more we hear, in Arden, rustling trees and rippling streams; When on fair Olivia’s palace faint and pale the moonlight beams;
When the storm-clouds break and scatter, and o’er beach, and crag, and wave, Angels float, and heavenly voices haunt the gloom of Prosp’ro’s cave!
Well he wrought--and we remember! Faded rainbow! fallen leaf! All fair things are but as shadows, and all glory ends in grief.
Worn and weary with the struggle, broken with the weight of care, Low he lies, and all his pageants vanish in the empty air.
Nevermore can such things lure us, nevermore be quite the same; Other hands may grasp the laurel, other brows be twined with fame.
Far, and less’ning in the distance, dies the music of the Past; In our ears a note discordant vibrates like an angry blast;
On our eyes the Future rushes, blatant, acrid, fraught with strife, Arrogant with tinselled youth and rank with flux of sensual life.
Naught avails to stem the tumult--vulgar aims and commonplace, Greed and vice and dross and folly, frenzied in the frantic race.
Naught avails, and we that linger, sick at heart and old and grim, Can but pray to leave this rabble, loving Art and following him.
Very lonely seems the pathway; long we journeyed side by side; Much with kindred hope were solaced, much with kindred anguish tried;
Had our transient jars and murmurs, had our purpose to be blest, In our brotherhood of travel, in our dreams of age and rest,--
Yonder, where the tinted hawthorns scarlet poppyfields enfold, And the prodigal laburnum blooms in clust’ring globes of gold.
Ended all--and all is shadow, where but late a glory shone, And the wanderer, gray and fragile, walks the vacant scene, alone.
Only now the phantom faces that in waking dreams appear! Only now the aerial voices that the heart alone can hear!
Round and red the sun is sinking, lurid in his misty light; Faintly sighs the wind of evening, coldly falls the brooding night.
Fare thee well--forever parted, speeding onward in the day Where, through God’s supernal mercy, human frailties drop away!
Fare thee well; while o’er thy ashes softly tolls the funeral knell-- Peace, and love, and tender memory! so, forever, fare thee well! WILLIAM WINTER.
Sir Henry Irving’s advancement to the order of knighthood aroused great interest among theatrical people throughout the world. An honor has been conferred upon dramatic art, and it has fallen on the one person in the English-speaking world most fitted to bear it as the representative of all that is best in dramatic art.
Honors of this kind have been bestowed with much freedom on painters, writers, and musicians, but never before accorded to an actor. This instance, therefore, involves an unusual recognition of the acted drama as the peer of its kindred arts.
No actor is held in higher esteem by his fellow-actors than Sir Henry Irving. His high abilities are not more admired on the stage than his personal qualities in private life. The congratulations he has received on this advancement are more general and more sincere than could have been bestowed on any other living actor. For the above reason, Sir Henry Irving is offered fabulous sums if he will lecture or give readings. I offered him $10,000 if he would give ten readings before college societies.
It was my privilege to introduce Henry Irving to Mr. Beecher during the season of the latter’s first visit to this country. I accompanied him and Miss Terry to Plymouth Church; we all sat in Mr. Beecher’s pew with Mrs. Beecher. Two more attentive listeners Mr. Beecher never had. Irving had heard Mr. Beecher lecture once--that memorable lecture in Manchester, England, in 1863, when he stood before that great English mob four hours before they would allow him to be heard. Mr. Irving had told me of having been one of the standees on that occasion, and was so intensely interested that he hadn’t time to be tired.
Mr. Irving listened without moving even a muscle of his face during the sermon.
Of course, no two auditors would have attracted the attention of that great congregation more intensely at that time. After the benediction, everybody seemed fixed in their places with eyes centred on Irving and Terry. Mr. Beecher stepped down from the pulpit and made his way to the pastor’s pew. As he approached Mr. Irving he said in a loud voice that all could hear, “Will the congregation please move out?” He then extended his hand to Mr. Irving, saying to me, “Mr. Pond, please walk with Mr. Irving to my house.” He then shook hands with Miss Terry, who at that time held Mrs. Beecher in her embrace. As the crowd passed out, Mr. Irving and I walked ahead of Mr. Beecher, who had Miss Terry on his left arm and Mrs. Beecher on his right. As we entered Mr. Beecher’s drawing-room, Mr. Irving and Mr. Beecher engaged in topical conversation on the sofa, and Mrs. Beecher sat down in a rocking-chair, and Miss Terry, taking an ottoman, placed it at Mrs. Beecher’s feet and threw herself upon it, with both hands clasping Mrs. Beecher, and her head in Mrs. Beecher’s lap. She was not aware of the capture she had made, to the surprise of all the Beecher family; for of all women that Mrs. Beecher had always shunned and despised, actresses she most abhorred, and Miss Terry was the first one to whom she had even spoken to her knowledge. This was the beginning of a friendship that was more like that of mother and daughter than mere friends, and continued until the end of Mrs. Beecher’s life.
At dinner was such a Sunday scene as was often the custom, one which could occur nowhere else except in the Beecher family. There were present Col. H. B. Beecher, Henry Ward’s eldest son, and his wife; Colonel Beecher’s daughter Kate (the late Mrs. Harper); and Mr. William C. Beecher, the second son, all endowed with Beecher brains. The hour was a display of intellect and wit. I never saw Mr. Irving so delightfully entertaining as on this occasion, and he and Miss Terry told me it was the most interesting and delightful day of their lives.
When Mr. Beecher died, I received a cablegram from Henry Irving, asking me to place a wreath on the casket, with the card, “Adieu, noble friend!--Henry Irving.”
Mr. Irving came into my office one morning in November, 1887, while he and his company were playing at Wallack’s Theatre. He asked if I were busy. Of course I was at his service then and there. He said:
“I see by the papers that a fund is being raised for a statue to Mr. Beecher, in Brooklyn. Can you tell me if the plans are formulated, and if Miss Terry and I can be of assistance? I think my company would gladly contribute their services for an extra matinée of ‘Faust’ for that object.”
I assured Mr. Irving that it would be highly appreciated. I went with him to the theatre, where a rehearsal was on. Mr. Irving asked the attention of the company for a moment. He told them that he and Miss Terry would like to invite them all to join in an extra performance of “Faust,” the entire proceeds to be given to the Henry Ward Beecher Statue Fund. The suggestion met with a very hearty and unanimous approval. The matinée was given, and $3,100 was sent to Ripley Ropes, treasurer of the fund, which was duly acknowledged.
Miss Charlotte Cushman was on the stage forty years. The last twenty-five of these years she was the greatest actress of her time. She died in the Parker House, Boston, February, 1876. I started for Kings Chapel, from where she was buried, at 8:30, and found the little church and neighboring thoroughfares thronged with the sorrowing multitude waiting with the hope of getting just one view of the casket which contained the remains of their departed friend.
Miss Cushman’s memory is still green. Her cottage at Newport and her grave at Mount Auburn are among the first objects inquired for by visitors to these places.