Part 27

I have recorded Mr. Schurz's words here, as nearly as a trained memory allows me to do, not with the smallest concern for the political issues of nine years ago, but solely because his utterances on that occasion seem to me to have shown forth, as nothing else could have done, the high inspiration of his patriotism, and to explain what many have regarded as the inconsistencies of his political attitude at various periods of his life. That so-called inconsistency was in fact a higher consistency. His allegiance was at all times given to principles, to ideas, to high considerations of right and of human liberty, and in behalf of these he never hesitated to sacrifice his political prospects, his personal advantage, or anything else that he held to be of less human consequence.

LXIX

[Sidenote: The End of Newspaper Life]

In the spring of the year 1900 I finally ceased to be a newspaper worker. I was weary, almost beyond expression, of the endless grind of editorial endeavor. My little summer home in the woodlands on Lake George lured me to the quiet, independent, literary life that I had always desired. There was an accumulation in my mind of things I longingly desired to do, and the opportunity to do them came. Above all, I wanted to be free once more--to be nobody's "hired man," to be subject to no man's control, however generous and kindly that control might be.

Life conditions at my place, "Culross," were ideal, with no exacting social obligations, with plenty of fishing, rowing, and sailing, with my giant pines, hemlocks, oaks, and other trees for companions, and with the sweetest air to breathe that human lungs could desire.

I had just published a boys' book that passed at once into second and successive editions. The publishers of it had asked me for more books of that kind, and still more insistently for novels, while with other publishers the way was open to me for some historical and biographical writings and for works of other kinds, that I had long planned.

Under these favorable circumstances I joyously established anew the literary workshop which had twice before been broken up by that "call of the wild," the lure of journalism.

This time, the summer-time shop consisted, and still consists, of a cozy corner in one of the porches of my rambling, rock-perched cottage. There, sheltered from the rain when it came and from the fiercer of the winds, I spread a broad rug on the floor and placed my writing table and chair upon it, and there for ten years I have done my work in my own way, at my own times, and in all other ways as it has pleased me to do it. In that corner, I have only to turn my head in order to view the most beautiful of all lakes lying almost at my feet and only thirty or forty feet away. If I am seized with the impulse to go fishing, my fishing boat with its well-stocked bait wells is there inviting me. If I am minded to go upon the water for rest and thought--or to be rid of thought for a time--there are other boats in my dock, boats of several sorts and sizes, among which I am free to choose. If the weather is inclement, there are open fireplaces within the house and an ample stock of wood at hand.

[Sidenote: Life at Culross]

For ten years past I have spent all my summers in these surroundings-- staying at "Culross" four or five or even six months in each year and returning to town only for the period of winter stress.

During the ten years in which that corner of the porch has been my chief workshop, I have added twenty-odd books to the dozen or so published before, besides doing other literary work amounting to about an equal product, and if I live, the end is not yet. I make this statistical statement as an illustration of the stimulating effect of freedom upon the creative faculty. The man who must do anything else--if it be only to carry a cane, or wear cuffs, or crease his trousers, or do any other thing that involves attention and distracts the mind, is seriously handicapped for creative work of any kind.

I have worked hard, of course. He who would make a living with his pen must do that of necessity. But the work has been always a joy to me, and such weariness as it brings is only that which gives added pleasure to the rest that follows.

LXX

Every literary worker has his own methods, and I have never known any one of them to adopt the methods of another with success. Temperament has a good deal to do with it; habit, perhaps, a good deal more, and circumstance more than all.

I have always been an extemporaneous writer, if I may apply the adjective to writers as we do to speakers. I have never been able to sit down and "compose" anything before writing it. I have endeavored always to master the subjects of my writing by study and careful thought, but I have never known when I wrote a first sentence or a first chapter what the second was to be. I think from the point of my pen, so far at least as my thinking formulates itself in written words.

I suppose this to be a consequence of my thirty-odd years of newspaper experience. In the giddy, midnight whirl of making a great newspaper there is no time for "first drafts," "outline sketches," "final revisions," and all that sort of thing. When the telegraph brings news at midnight that requires a leader--perhaps in double leads--the editorial writer has an hour or less, with frequent interruptions, in which to write his article, get it into type, revise the proofs, and make up the page that contains it. He has no choice but to write extemporaneously. He must hurriedly set down on paper what his newspaper has to say on the subject, and send his sheets at once to the printers, sometimes keeping messenger boys at his elbow to take the pages from his hand one after another as fast as they are written. His only opportunity for revision is on the proof slips, and even in that he is limited by the necessity of avoiding every alteration that may involve the overrunning of a line.

In this and other ways born of necessity, the newspaper writer learns the art of extemporaneous writing, which is only another way of saying that he learns how to write at his best in the first instance, without lazily depending upon revision for smoothness, clearness, terseness, and force. He does not set down ill-informed or ill-considered judgments. Every hour of every day of his life is given to the close study of the subjects upon which he is at last called upon to write under stress of tremendous hurry. He knows all about his theme. He has all the facts at his fingers' ends. He is familiar with every argument that has been or can be made on the questions involved. He knows all his statistics, and his judgments have been carefully thought out in advance. His art consists in the ability to select on the instant what phases of the subject he will treat, and to write down his thought clearly, impressively, convincingly, and in the best rhetorical form he can give it.

[Sidenote: Extemporaneous Writing]

I think that one who has acquired that habit of extemporaneous writing about things already mastered in thought can never learn to write in any other way. Both experience and observation have convinced me that men of that intellectual habit do more harm than good to their work when they try to improve it by revision. Revision in every such case is apt to mean elaboration, and elaboration is nearly always a weakening dilution of thought.

I am disposed to think that whatever saves trouble to the writer is purchased at the expense of the reader. The classic dictum that "easy writing makes hard reading" is as true to-day as it was when Horace made laborious use of the flat end of his stylus. For myself, at any rate, I have never been able to "dictate," either "to the machine," or to a stenographer, with satisfactory results, nor have I ever known anybody else to do so without some sacrifice to laziness of that which it is worth a writer's while to toil for. The stenographer and the typewriter have their place as servants of commerce, but in literature they tend to diffusion, prolixity, inexactitude, and, above all, to carelessness in that choice of words that makes the difference between grace and clumsiness, lucidity and cloud, force and feebleness.

In the writing of novels, I have always been seriously embarrassed by the strange perversity of fictitious people. That is a matter that has puzzled and deeply interested me ever since I became a practising novelist.

The most ungrateful people in the world are the brain-children of the novelist, the male and female folk whose existence is due to the good will of the writer. Born of the travail of the novelist's brain, and endowed by him with whatever measure of wit, wisdom, or wealth they possess; personally conducted by him in their struggles toward the final happiness he has foreordained for them at the end of the story; cared for; coddled; listened to and reported even when they talk nonsense, and not infrequently when they only think it; laboriously brought to the attention of other people; pushed, if possible, into a fame they could never have achieved for themselves; they nevertheless obstinately persist in thwarting their creator's purpose and doing as they wickedly please to his sore annoyance and vexation of spirit.

In truth, the author of a story has very little control over its course after he has once laid its foundations. The novel is not made--it grows, and the novelist does little more than plant the seed and keep the growth unchoked by weeds. He is as powerless to make it other than what it tends to be as the gardener is to grow tomatoes on corn-stalks or cucumbers on pea-vines. He may create for the story what manner of people he pleases, just as the gardener may choose the seed he will plant; but once created these fictitious people will behave according to their individual natures without heed to the wishes of the author of their being.

In other words, the novelist is under bond to his conscience to represent his personages as talking and acting precisely as such personages would talk and act under the circumstances in which he has placed them. It often happens that their sentiments, their utterances, and their conduct do not fit into the author's preconceived arrangement of happenings, so that he must alter his entire story or important parts of it to make it true.

I have borrowed the last few paragraphs from a playful paper I wrote for an obscure magazine thirty-odd years ago, because they suggest a trouble that must come to every conscientious novelist many times during the writing of every story. There come times when the novelist doesn't know what happened, and must toilsomely explore his consciousness by way of finding out.

[Sidenote: Working Hours and Working Ways]

My working hours are determined by circumstances--morning, afternoon, evening, or late at night. When there is a "must" involved, I work when I must; when I am free I work when I choose or when I feel that I can.

I never carry my work to bed with me, and I never let it rob me of a moment's sleep. To avoid that I usually play a game or two of solitaire --perhaps the least intellectual of all possible occupations--between work and bedtime; and I usually take a walk in the open air just before going to bed, whatever the weather may be. But whatever else happens, I long ago acquired the art of absolutely dismissing the subject of my work from my mind, whenever I please, and the more difficult art of refusing to let any other subject of interest take its place. I do that when I go to bed, and when I do that nothing less than positive physical pain can keep me from going to sleep.

I have always been fond of fishing and boating. In summer, at my Lake George cottage, I have a little fleet of small boats moored within twenty paces of my porch-placed writing table. If my mind flags at my work I step into my fishing boat and give an hour or two to a sport that occupies the attention without fatiguing it. If I am seriously perplexed by any work-problem, I take a rowboat, with a pair of eight-foot oars, and go for a ten-mile spin. On my return I find that my problem has completely wrought itself out in my mind without conscious effort on my part.

I am fond of flower gardening and, without the least technical skill in it, I usually secure astonishingly good results. The plants seem to respond generously to my uninstructed but kindly attention.

In my infancy my mother taught me to begin every day with a plunge into water as cold as I could get, and I have kept up the habit with the greatest benefit. I find it a perfect tonic as well as a luxurious delight.

I have always enforced upon myself two rules with respect to literary style: First, to utter my thought simply and with entire sincerity, and, second, never consciously to write or leave a sentence in such form that even a blundering reader might mistake its meaning.

Here let me bring to an end these random recollections of a life which has involved hard work, distressing responsibility, and much of disappointment, but which has been filled from the beginning with that joy of success which is the chief reward of endeavor to every man who loves his work and puts conscience into it.

THE END

INDEX

=A=

Abbey, Edwin A., 274, 307

Accident, its part in literary work, 181-185

Aldrich, Thomas Bailey, 174, 191, 192

Alexander, Gen. E. P., 94

America. _See_ United States

American authors visiting England, 265, 269

"American Idea," 296, 297

American life, 1840-50, 18-20

American literature provincial, 269-271

Americanism, birthplace of, 27

Amour, 117

Anonymous literary criticism, 203-205

"Appleseed, Johnny," 141

_Appleton's Journal_, 153, 181

Armitage, Rev. Dr., 113-115

Armstrong, Henry, 291

Army of Northern Virginia, 87, 93, 94

Arnold, Matthew, 268

Arthur, T. S., novels of, 25

Ashland, Va., 77

Associated Press, 180, 188, 302, 303

Astor Library, books mutilated, 271

_Atlantic Monthly_, 148, 149, 181

Authors, and editors, 167-172; Virginian, 66-70

Authors Club, organized, 272; presidency, 273; eligibility, 273; meeting-places, 274, 275; in Twenty-fourth Street, 277; social in character, 277, 278; women, 278-280; plainness of quarters, 280; Watch Night, 281, 284; diplomats and statesmen, 284; "Liber Scriptorum," 285, 286. Also 85, 176-178, 228, 232, 254, 258

Authorship, esteemed in Virginia, 66, 67

"Autocrat of the Breakfast Table," Holmes's, 219

=B=

"Bab Ballads," Gilbert's, 137

Bacon-Shakespeare controversy, 220

Bar Harbor, 295, 320-326

"Barnwell C. H.," 242

Bates House, Indianapolis, 28, 29

Bath, American habits as to, 30, 31

Beauregard, Gen., 87, 237-241

Beecher, Henry Ward, 108

"Ben Bolt," 255

Benjamin, Judah P., 237

Bernhardt, Sara, 229, 230

Berry, Earl D., 290

"Big Brother, The," 181-183

Bigelow, John, 188, 228, 289, 303

Bludso, Jim, 160-162

Blunders, compositors', 241-243; literary, 222-227; telegrapher's, 238, 239

Bohemianism, 177

Book-editing, 234-237

Book notices, 190

Book reviewers, 190

Book reviewing, newspaper, 217

Book sales, predicting, 252-254

Book titles, 154-157

Books, mutilation of, 271; in Virginia, 66

Booth, Edwin, 275, 276

Booth, Postmaster of Brooklyn, 125

"Boots and Saddles," Mrs. Custer's, 252-254

Boston, literary center, 148

Boucicault, Dion, 153

Bound boys and girls, 14, 16

Bowen, Henry C., 100, 128

Boys' stories, 181-185

Bragg, Gen., 238

"Breadwinners, The," 165

Briars, The, 71

Briggs, Charles F., 100-107

British authors visiting America, 265, 268, 269

British condescension, 268

_Broadway Journal_, 100

Brooklyn. N. Y., 31, 99, 115, 117

Brooklyn _Daily Eagle_, 126

Brooklyn _Union_, 99, 100, 105, 107, 110, 113, 115, 116, 128

Brooks, Elbridge S., 185

"Browneyes, Lily," 256-258

Bryan, Wm. J., and the _World_ in 1896, 324-326. Also 335-337

Bryant, Wm. C., 68, 129, 143; conduct of the N. Y. _Evening Post_, 187-189; as a reviewer of books, 190; appoints G. C. Eggleston literary editor of the _Evening Post_, 192-194; character, 194-196; relations with Washington Irving, 196-198; consideration for poets, 199-202, 205, 206; views of anonymous literary criticism, 203-205; estimate of Poe, 207; _Index Expurgatorius_, 209-213; his democracy, 214; opinion of English society, 215-217; estimate of Tennyson and other modern poets, 219; his judgment of English literature, 220, 221

Bull Run, 78

Byron, quoted, 83, 84

=C=

Cairo, Ills., 96, 99

"Campaign of Chancellorsville," Dodge's, 208

Campbell, Thomas, 254

Cannon, Capt. John, 161

"Captain Sam," 183

Cary, Alice and Phoebe, 137

Carlisle, John G., 330, 331

Catholicism, 26

Cavalry life, 77-81

Chamberlin, E. O., 329, 330

Champlin, John D., 285

Chance, its part in literary work, 181-185

Charleston, S. C., 86, 164, 241

Checks, bank, in Virginia, 50

Children's stories. _See_ Boys' stories

Church, Col. Wm. C., 204

Civil service system, 235

Civil War, changes wrought in Virginia, 73-76

Clay, Henry, 20

Clemens, Samuel L., 150, 160, 259, 265, 281

Cleveland, President, 214, 226, 330, 331

Coan, Dr. Titus Munson, quoted, 228

Cobham Station, 93

Cockerill, John A., 122, 308-312

Co-education, 57

Colman, Mr., 198

Collins, Tom, 89-93

_Commercial Advertiser._ _See under_ New York

Compositors, 314, 315

Condescension, British, 268

Congress, U. S., in Tilden-Hayes controversy, 331-333

Constitution, U. S., 226, 336

Conversion, religious, 92

Cooke, John Esten, 59, 67, 69-72, 151, 240

Copy, following, 241-243

Copyright, 153, 154, 231-234, 268

Corruption, political, 124-126, 334, 335

Courtesy in Boston, New York, Virginia, 55, 56

Court-martial, 88, 89

Coward, Edward Fales, 291

Cowley, Abraham, 192

Craig, George, 13, 17

Creek War, 183

Criticism. _See_ Literary criticism

"Culross," 338-344

Curtis, George William, 100

Curtis, Gen. Newton Martin, 85

Custer, Mrs., 252-254

Cuyler, Dr. Theo. L., quoted, 147

=D=

"Danger in the Dark," 26

Daniel, Senator, of Virginia, 85

Davis, James, 291

Davis, Jefferson, 164, 165, 237-241

Death-bed repentance, 93

Democracy, Bryant's, 214; Cleveland's, 214

"Democracy," 269

Dictation, 341

Dictionaries, 210

Dime novel, 275, 276

Dodd, Mead, and Co., 244

Dodge, Mary Mapes, 131, 132

Dodge, Col. Theodore, 208

Dranesville, Va., 83

Dress, Joaquin Miller on, 175, 176; men's evening, 175-178

Drinking habits. _See_ Temperance

Dumont, Mrs. Julia L., 9

Dupont, Ind., 21

Dutcher, Silas B., 125

"Dutchmen," 3

=E=

_Eagle_, Brooklyn. _See under_ Brooklyn

Early, Jubal A., 76

Editorial responsibility, 207-209

Editorial writing, 110, 313-315, 323, 340

Editors and authors, 167-172

Education, backwoods, 9, 10; modern, 75, 76; present and past in Virginia, 73-76; western, in 1850, 32-34. _See also_ Schools and school-teaching

Eggleston, Edward, 21, 22; origin of "The Hoosier Schoolmaster," 34-36; connection with _Hearth and Home_, 132; first to utilize in literature the Hoosier life, 145, 146; resigns editorship of _Hearth and Home_, 146; quoted on copyright, 232-234; relations with his brother, 266, 267

Eggleston, George Cary, early recollections, life in the West in the eighteen-forties, 1-20; first railroad journey, 21; free-thinking, 22; early theological thought and reading, 22-26; school-teaching, 34-45; Virginia life, 46-59; occultism, experience of, 60-66; creed, 75; army life, 77; cavalry, 77-81; two experiences, 81-85; artillery, 86, 87; Army of Northern Virginia, 87-96; legal practice, 99; Brooklyn _Union_, 99-129; New York _Evening Post_, 129-131; _Hearth and Home_, 131-135, 145, 146, 148, 151, 180; first books, 146; first novel, 151-155; New Jersey home, 180, 186; boys' stories, 181-185; financial troubles, 186, 187; connection with New York _Evening Post_, 187-231; acquaintance with W. C. Bryant, 192-228; adviser of Harper and Brothers, 231, 234, 236; literary editor of the _Commercial Advertiser_, 287; managing editor, 288; editor-in-chief, 289; health, 292, 306; editorial writer for the _World_, 306-337; retires from journalism, 337; literary habits, 338-344

Eggleston, Guilford Dudley, 184

Eggleston, Joseph, 96, 98

Eggleston, Joseph Cary, 9, 14, 15

Eggleston, Mrs. Mary Jane, 11

Eggleston, Judge Miles Cary, 8

Eggleston family, home of, 46

Election results, predicting, 326

Eliot, George, 255

Elliot, Henry R., 291

"End of the World," E. Eggleston's, 146

English, Thomas Dunn, 172, 255

English authors. _See_ British authors

English language, N. Y. _Evening Post's_ standard, 210-214; Virginia usage, 59; Western usage, 8

English society, 215-217

_Evening Post, The._ _See under_ New York

Extemporaneous writing, 339-341

=F=

"Fable for Critics," 101, 106, 195

Familiarity, President Cleveland contrasted with W. C. Bryant, 214

Farragut, Admiral, quoted, 77

Fawcett, Edgar, 153

Fellows, Col. John R., 121, 122

Fiction, place in 1840-50, 25, 26; writing of, 341, 342

"First of the Hoosiers," quoted, 145

First Regiment of Virginia Cavalry, 77, 78, 81

"Flat Creek," 37

Florida War, 243

Folsom, Dr. Francois, 291

Ford, Paul Leicester, 278, 279, 334

Foreigners, American attitude toward, 1840-50, 2, 3

Francis, Sir Philip, 223-225

"Franco, Harry," 100, 106

Franklin, Benj., 1, 139

Free-thinking, 22

Free-trade and protection, 20

French Revolution, 108, 109

Fulton, Rev. Dr., 113-115

=G=

G., Johnny, 43-45

_Galaxy_, 181, 204

Garfield, Gen., 119

George Eliot, 255

George, Lake, 335, 337. _See also_ "Culross"

Ghost story, 60-66

Gilbert, W. S., 137

Gilder, R. W., 172, 272, 273

Godkin, E. L., 230, 231

Godwin, Parke, 100, 188, 189, 227-230, 286-289, 295-300, 305

Gold coin in Plaquemine in 1886, 248-251

Gosse, Edmund, 177, 265-268

Gracie, Gen., 96

Grant, President, 93, 125, 126, 127, 244

_Graphic, The._ _See under_ New York

Grebe, Charley, 37, 39-45

Greeley, Horace, 139, 167

=H=

Halsted, Dr. Wm. S., 294

"Harold," Tennyson's, 218

Harper and Brothers, 153, 154, 155, 167, 168, 231, 236, 241, 252, 257, 287, 307

Harper, J. Henry, 259

Harper, Joseph W., Jr., 154, 168, 252, 253, 267, 285

_Harper's Magazine_, 141

Hay, John, 157-166, 275, 276

Hayden's "Dictionary of Dates," 234

Hayes-Tilden controversy, 332

_Hearth and Home_, 35, 36, 131-135, 145, 146, 148, 151, 157, 180

Hendrickses, the, 8

"Henry St. John, Gentleman," 69

_Herald, The._ _See under_ New York

"Heterophemy," 223-225

Hewitt, Mr., 291

Hill, A. P., 87

Hilton, Judge Henry, 121

Hirsh, Nelson, 291

Historical intuition, 47

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 177; Bryant's estimate of, 219

_Home Journal_, 140

Hoosier dialect, 8, 14

Hoosier life, 145, 146

"Hoosier Schoolmaster, The," 34-36, 37, 41, 145; in England, 233

Hospitality, 17, 320

Hotels in 1840-50, 28-31

"Houp-la," Mrs. Stannard's, 154

"How to Educate Yourself," 147

Howells, Wm. D., 1, 148-150, 204, 258

Humor, newspaper, 282-284

"Hundredth Man," Stockton's, 135, 136

Hurlbut, Wm. Hen., 177

Hutton, Laurence, 272, 274

=I=

Ideas, 297, 312

Ignorance in criticism, 226, 227

Illicit distilling in Brooklyn, 123-128

Illustration, newspaper, 179, 180

Imperialism, 336, 337

Independence, personal, 1840-50, 18-20

_Independent, The._ _See under_ New York

_Index Expurgatorius_, Bryant's, 209-213

Indian Territory, 183

Indiana, a model in education, 10, 11

Indiana Asbury University, 11

Indianapolis, Ind., 28

Intolerance, 26, 251

Introductions, 255-264

Intuition, historian's, 47

Irving, Washington, relations with Bryant, 196-198

=J=

Jackson, Mr., 314

James, G. P. R., 67, 68

Jeffersonianism, 296

John, a good name, 42, 43

"John Bull, Jr.," O'Rell's, 282

Johnson, Gen. Bushrod, 96

Johnson, Rossiter, 285

Johnson's Dictionary, 210

Jokes. _See_ Humor

Jones, J. B., 275

Journalism, 116, 292, 293. _See also_ Newspapers, Pulitzer

Judd, Orange, and Co., 132

Junius letters, authorship, 223

=K=