Part 3

I afterward heard that President Harrison was very cold and lacked cordiality; still later I discovered, with my own eyes and ears, that he had a kind heart and genial nature. One summer while I was at Saratoga I was asked by Mr. W. J. Arkell to Mount McGregor, to meet President Harrison at dinner and to become a member of a fishing party. The occasion was the president’s birthday, and the invitation was the more welcome when I learned that a list of the people at the Saratoga hotels had been shown the president, who had himself selected the guests for his birthday celebration. At Mount McGregor I found, as one always finds, wherever the President of the United States is staying a few days, thirty or forty newspaper correspondents, all of whom I knew and most of whom professed to doubt my ability to make the president laugh. This did not worry me, for I don’t love trouble enough to look ahead for it, and dinner time, when the laughing was to begin, was a few hours distant.

We all went by carriage to a stream about five miles away and all helped fill the president’s basket with fish,—for which he got full credit, in the next day’s newspapers. My own contributions were few and small, for I never was a good fisherman. So I was grateful when Russell Harrison took me to a little pool where he was sure we would have great luck. But not a bite did either of us get. Then I recalled something that a veteran fisherman played on me when I was too young to be suspicious; it was to beat the water to attract the attention of the fish. Russell kindly assisted me at beating the water, but the fish beat us both by keeping away.

When we got back to the hotel and to the banquet it was announced that there were to be no speeches, but the president would make a few remarks and I would be called on for a few stories. Consequently I had no mind or appetite for dinner, for most of the guests were newspaper men who had been surfeited with stories ever since they entered the business, and the most important listener would be the president, who the boys had said I couldn’t make laugh.

I was still mentally searching my repertoire, although I had already selected a lot of richness, when the president arose and made some general remarks. But it was impossible for him to forget that at this same place—Mount McGregor, Ex-President Grant breathed his last, so Mr. Harrison’s concluding remarks were on the line that any other whole-hearted American would have struck in similar circumstances. As I am a whole-hearted American myself, they struck me just where I live, and I am not ashamed to confess that they knocked me out.

So, when I was called upon, I declined to respond. Several friends came to my chair and whispered: “Go ahead, Marsh.” “Don’t lose the chance of your life; don’t you know whatever is said at this dinner will be telegraphed all over the United States?” But I held my tongue—or it held itself. There is a place for every thing; a table at which the President of the United States had just been talking most feelingly of the pathetic passing of another president was no place for a joke—much less for a budget of jokes, so instead of making the president laugh I allowed the newspaper men to have the laugh on me. In the circumstances they were welcome to it.

Nevertheless I succeeded, for the president succeeded in breaking the strain upon him, and later in the day at his own cottage he transfixed me with a merry twinkle of his eye and said:

“Marshall, what’s this story you’ve been telling about your visit to the White House?”

I saw I was in for it, so I repeated the minstrel joke, already recorded. He laughed so heartily that there wasn’t enough unbroken ice between us to hold up a dancing mosquito, so I made bold to tell him that some men insisted that he did not appreciate humor. Then he laughed again; I wish I could have photographed that laugh, for there was enough worldly wisdom in it to lessen the number of cranks and office seekers at the White House for years to come. But I hadn’t much time to think about it, for we began swapping yarns and kept at it so long that I suddenly reminded myself, with a sense of guilt, that I was robbing the ruler of the greatest nation on earth of some of his invaluable time. Never mind about my own stories that evening, but here is one that President Harrison told me, to illustrate the skill of some men in talking their way out of a tight place.

There was a man in Indiana who had a way of taking his own advice, though he generally had to do things afterward to get even with himself. He was a hog dealer, and one season he drove a lot of hogs to Indianapolis, about a hundred miles distant, though he could get nearly as good a price at a town much nearer home. Arrived at Indianapolis, he learned that prices had gone down, so he held on for a rise, but when offered a good price he stood out for more, and insisted that if he did not get it he would drive the hogs back home, which he finally did, and sold them for less than was offered him in the city. When one of his friends asked him why he had acted so unwisely he replied:

“I wanted to get even with them city hog-buyers.”

“But did you?”

“Well, they didn’t get my hogs.”

“But what did you get out of the transaction?”

“Get? Why, bless your thick skull, I got the society of the hogs all the way back home.”

I had long been puzzled as to the origin of the word “jay,” as applied to “easy marks” among countrymen, and I told the president so. He modestly admitted that I had come to the right shop for information; then he told me this story:

“Winter was coming on and a blue jay made up his mind that he would prepare for it. He found a vacant hut with a knot-hole in the roof, and he said to himself, ‘Here’s a good place to store my winter supplies,’ so he began to collect provender. His acquaintances who passed by saw what he was doing; then they laughed and took a rest, for they knew how to get in by the side door. Whenever he dropped a nut or a bit of meat through the knot-hole they would hop in below and gobble it. So, Marshall, next time you hear any one called a ‘jay’ I’m sure you’ll know what it means.”

The next morning, when we all met on the president’s special train en route to Saratoga, my newspaper friends twitted me anew on not having made the president laugh, but I said: “Now, boys, you wait.” Then I was so impudent as to approach the president and say:

“Mr. President, I am very glad to have had you with me on this fishing trip, and I hope whenever you want to go off on a similar affair you will let me know it. At the foot of the mountain a band of music and escort of troops are waiting for me, and in the hurry I may not be able to say good-bye to you, so I say it now.” But not one eyelash of the president quivered as he shook hands with me and replied: “Glad to have met you, Mr. Wilder,” so the newspaper boys certainly did have the laugh on me.

But the day was still young. Arrived at the Saratoga depot, all hurried into carriages. Waiting until all were seated and started in procession, I found an open landau and gave the driver the name of my hotel. “All right, Mr. Wilder,” was the reply, which did not startle me, for I am pretty well known in Saratoga by the cabbies—and the police. I said:

“Make a short cut, get out of the crowd and get me to the hotel as soon as possible, so I may avoid the parade.” He endeavored to get out, but he got in; and in trying to extricate himself he succeeded in driving through the band and past the troops and finally beside the carriages of the president and his guests. I took advantage of the occasion; as I passed the president I stood up (though it made little difference whether I sat or stood, for not much of me was visible over the top of the carriage door) and I bowed my prettiest. The president raised his hat, as did the other guests, and I led that procession down Saratoga’s Broadway, the sidewalks of which were crowded with New York and Brooklyn people who knew me and to whom I bowed, right and left, to the end of the route, where one of the newspaper men said:

“Marsh usually gets there.”

In Mr. McKinley’s first term I fell in conversation at a hotel with a gentleman of manner so genial that I never forgot him. We exchanged a lot of stories, at which I got more than I gave, but suddenly the gentleman said:

“I can see, Mr. Wilder, that you don’t recognize me.”

“Well, really, I don’t,” I replied, with an apologetic laugh. “You must pardon me; I meet so many. May I ask your name?”

“Certainly. It is Garret A. Hobart.”

“The Vice-president of the United States! Well, that isn’t anything against you”—for I had to say something, to keep from collapsing. He seemed greatly amused, and I could not help wondering if in any other country of the world a high official of the government could be picked up in a hotel corridor, be chatted with, then be compelled to introduce himself, and throughout all conduct himself as if he were no one in particular.

Levi P. Morton, ex-vice-president, has been out of politics for some years, yet he is remembered as a man who could tell good stories to illustrate his points. Here is one of them:

“Not far from my country place is a farmer noted for his fine, large cattle. People come from everywhere to look at his Durhams and Alderneys, but they have to be careful how they venture into the pastures, for some of the bulls are ferocious. A certain major-general, who was very proud of his title, was visiting near by, and one day while walking he cut across the fields to shorten distance. Before he knew of his danger a big bull, bellowing and with tossing head, began to chase him. The general was a swift runner, and made good time, but the animal too was lively, so when the general reached a fence he dared not stop to climb for the bull was near enough to—well, help him. The general doubled on his tracks several times, but the bull kept dangerously near. Suddenly a gate offered a chance to shut off pursuit. Near the gate stood the farmer, who had been viewing the chase; the panting general turned on him fiercely and asked, between gasps:

“‘Sir—sir—did you—see your bull chasing—me?’

“‘Ya-as,’ drawled the farmer.

“‘Is that all you have to say, sir? Do you know whom that bull was chasing?’

“‘You, I guess.’

“‘But do you know who I am, sir? I am General Blank.’”

“‘Wa-all, why didn’t you tell that to the bull?’”

IV

STORY-TELLING AS AN ART

Different Ways of Story-telling.—The Slow Story-teller.—Lincoln’s Stories.—Bad Telling of Good Stories.—The Right Way to Tell a Story.—The Humorous, the Comic and the Witty Story.—Artemus Ward, Robert J. Burdette and Mark Twain as Story-tellers.

The ways of story-tellers differ almost as widely and strangely as the ways of politicians—or women—yet every man’s way is the best and only one to him. I know men who consume so much time in unloading a story that they remind me of a ship-captain who had just taken a pilot and was anxious to get into port. The pilot knew all the channels and shoals of the vicinity, and being a cautious old chap he wasn’t going to take any risks, so he backed and filled and crisscrossed so many times that the captain growled: “Hang him! He needs the Whole Atlantic Ocean to turn around in.”

Yet a lot of these long-winded story-tellers “get there”—and they deserve to, not only because a hearty laugh follows, but because hard work deserves its reward. As to that, Abraham Lincoln, long before he became president, and when time was of no consequence, had some stories almost as long as old-fashioned sermons; but nobody left his seat by the stove at the country store, or his leaning place at the post-office, or his chair on the hotel piazza until “Abe” had reached the point. But there never was more than one Abraham Lincoln. To-day a long-winded story-teller can disperse a crowd about as quickly as a man with a bad case of smallpox.

But it isn’t always length that troubles the listener—the way in which a tale is told is the thing, whether the tale itself be good or bad. It is never safe for some people to repeat a good story they have heard, for they may tell it in a fashion that is like being bitten to death by a duck.

I do not claim originality for my own method and material. I simply tell a story, using whatever material comes my way. Often a friend will tell me of something he has seen or heard; I will reconstruct his narrative, without tampering with the facts, yet so that the people of whom he told it will not recognize it.

There is nothing, except advice, of which the world is more generous than stories. Everybody tells them. They mean well; they want to make you laugh, and they deserve credit for their intention. Yet when neighbor Smith or Brown calls you aside, looks as if he was almost bursting with something good, and then gets off a yarn that was funny when he heard it, but in which you can’t discern the ghost of a laugh—why, you can’t help wondering whether Smith’s or Brown’s funny-bone hasn’t dropped off somewhere, without its owner’s knowledge; you also can’t help wishing that he may find it before he buttonholes you again.

It seems to me that the supreme art of telling a story is to tell it quickly and hide the nub so that the hearer’s wits must find it. But it is possible for some people to tell it quickly at the expense of the essential parts, either through forgetfulness or by not knowing them at sight. For example, here is a tale I heard not long ago:

“The other night Ezra Kendall told about an Irishman who had a habit of walking in a graveyard about twelve o’clock at night. Some boys of the neighborhood planned to so dig and conceal a grave that the Irishman would fall into it; another man was to drape himself in a sheet, to scare Mike. The night arrived, the Irishman took his customary walk and fell into the hole prepared for him. A boy in a white sheet arose, and said in a sepulchral voice:

“‘What are you doing in my grave?’

“‘What are you doin’ out of it?’ Mike replied.”

Soon afterward an amateur gave me the story as follows:

“I heard a story the other day by a man named Kendall about a man who went out in a graveyard at night to walk, about twelve o’clock. He fell into a ditch, and another fellow happened along and said, ‘What are you doing out of it?’—or something like that. I know I laughed like the deuce when I heard it.”

But even when a story has been committed to memory or written in shorthand on a shirt-cuff, to be read off without a word lost or misplaced, much depends upon the teller. Some people’s voices are so effective that they can tell a story in the dark and “make good”; others can’t get through without calling all their features to help, with some assistance from their arms and legs. One man will lead you with his eye alone to the point of a story; another will drawl and stammer as if he had nothing to say, yet startle you into a laugh a minute.

Of course a great deal depends on the story itself. People are too grateful for a laugh to look backward and analyze the story that compelled it; they generally believe that fun is fun, and that is about as much as any one knows of it. The truth is that while there are all kinds of stories there is only one kind of humor.

As a rule, humorous stories are of American origin, comic stories are English, and witty stories are French. The humorous story depends upon the incidents and the manner of telling; comic and witty stories depend upon the matter. The humorous story may be spun out to any length; it may wander about as it pleases, and arrive at nowhere in particular; but the comic or witty story must be brief, and end in a sharp point. The humorous story bubbles along continually; the other kinds burst. The humorous tale is entirely a work of art, and only an artist can tell it; while the witty or comic story—oh, any one who knows it can tell it.

The act of telling a humorous story—by word of mouth, understand, not in print—was created in America, and has remained at home, in spite of many earnest endeavors to domesticate it abroad, and even to counterfeit it. It is generally told gravely, the teller doing his best to disguise his attempt to inflict anything funny on his listeners; but the man with a comic story generally tells you beforehand that it is one of the funniest things he ever heard, and he is the first one to laugh—when he reaches the end.

One of the dreadfulest inflictions that suffering humanity ever endures is the result of amateur efforts to transform the humorous into the comic, or _vice versa_. It reminds one of Frank Stockton’s tearful tale of what came of one of the best things in Pickwick by being translated into classical Greek and then brought back into English.

The Rev. Robert J. Burdette, who used to write columns of capital humor for _The Burlington Hawkeye_ and told scores of stories superbly, made his first visit to New York about twenty years ago, and was at once spirited to a notable club where he told stories leisurely until half the hearers ached with laughter and the other half were threatened with apoplexy. Every one present declared it the red letter night of the club, and members who had missed it came around and demanded the stories at second-hand. Some efforts were made to oblige them, but without avail, for the tellers had twisted their recollections of the stories into comic jokes; so they hunted the town for Burdette to help them out of their muddle.

The late Artemus Ward, who a generation ago carried a tidal wave of humor from Maine to California, with some generous overflows each side of its course, had a long serious face and a drawling voice; so when he lectured in churches, as he frequently did, a late-comer might have mistaken him for a minister, though not for very long. He would drawl along without giving the slightest indication of what was coming. When the joke was unloaded and the audience got hold of it he would look up with seemingly innocent wonder as to what people were laughing at. This expression of his countenance always brought another laugh. He could get laughs out of nothing, by mixing the absurd and the unexpected, and then backing the combination with a solemn face and earnest manner. For instance, it was worth a ten-mile walk after dark on a corduroy road to hear him say: “I once knew a man in New Zealand who hadn’t a tooth in his head”—here he would pause for some time, look reminiscent, and continue, “And yet he could beat a base-drum better than any other man I ever knew.”

Mark Twain is another famous humorist who can use a serious countenance and hesitating voice with wonderful effect in a story. His tale of “The Golden Arm” was the best thing of its kind I ever heard—when told as he himself told it—but everything depended on suddenness and unexpectedness of climax. Here it is, as he gave it:—

“Once ’pon a time dey wuz a mons’us mean man, en’ he live ’way out in de prairie all ’lone by himself, ’cep’n he had a wife. En’ bimeby she died, en’ he took en’ toted her ’way out da’ in de prairie en’ buried her. Well, she had a golden arm all solid gold, f’om de shoulder down. He wuz pow’ful mean—pow’ful; en’ dat night he couldn’t sleep, ’coze he wanted dat golden arm so bad.

“When it come midnight he couldn’t stan’ it no mo’, so he got up, he did, en’ tuk his lantern en’ shoved out troo de storm en’ dug her up en’ got de golden arm; en’ he bent his head down ’gin de wind, en’ plowed en’ plowed en’ plowed troo de snow. Den all on a sudden he stop” (make a considerable pause here, and look startled, and take a listening attitude) “en’ say:

“My lan’, what’s dat? En’ he listen, en’ listen, en’ de wind say” (set your teeth together, and imitate the wailing and wheezing sing-song of the wind): “‘Buzz-z-zzz!’ en’ den, way back yonder whah de grave is, he hear a voice—he hear a voice all mix up in de win’—can’t hardly tell ’em ’part: ‘Bzzz-zzz—w-h-o—g-o-t—m-y g-o-l-d-e-n arm?”’ (You must begin to shiver violently now.)

“En’ he begin to shiver en’ shake, en’ say: ‘Oh, my! Oh, my lan’!’ En’ de win’ blow de lantern out, en’ de snow en’ de sleet blow in his face en’ ’most choke him, en’ he start a-plowin’ knee-deep toward home, mos’ dead, he so sk’yeerd, en’ pooty soon he hear de voice again, en” (pause) “it ’us comin’ after him: ‘Buzzz-zzz—w-h-o—g-o-t m-y g-o-l-d-e-n—arm?’

“When he git to de pasture he hear it agin—closter, now, en’ a comin’ back dab in de dark en’ de storm” (repeat the wind and the voice). “When he git to de house he rush up-stairs, en’ jump in de bed, en’ kiver up head en’ years, en’ lay dah a-shiverin’ en’ a-shakin’, en’ den ’way out dah he hear it agin, en’ a-comin’! En’ bimeby he hear” (pause—awed; listening attitude) “—at—pat—pat—pat—hit’s a-comin’ up-stairs! Den he hear de latch, en’ he knows it’s in de room.

“Den pooty soon he knows it’s—standin’ by de bed!” (Pause.) “Den he knows it’s a-bendin’ down over him,—en’ he cain’t sca’cely git his breaf! Den—den he seem to feel somethin’ c-o-l-d, right down neah agin’ his head!” (Pause.)

“Den de voice say, right at his year: ‘W-h-o g-o-t m-y g-o-l-d-e-n arm?’” You must wail it out plaintively and accusingly; then you stare steadily and impressively into the face of the farthest-gone auditor—a girl, preferably—and let that awe-inspiring pause begin to build itself in the deep hush. When it has reached exactly the right length, jump suddenly toward that girl and yell: “‘_You’ve_ got it!’”

If you have got the pause right, she’ll fetch a dear little yelp and spring right out of her shoes; but you must get the pause right, and you will find it the most troublesome and aggravating and uncertain thing you ever undertook.

V

ACTORS’ JOKES

All of Them Full of Humor at All Times.—“Joe” Jefferson.—J. K. Emmett.—Fay Templeton.—Willie Collier.—An Actor’s Portrait on a Church Wall.—“Gus” Thomas, the Playwright.—Stuart Robson.—Henry Dixey.—Evans and Hoey.—Charles Hoyt.—Wilson Barrett.—W. S. Gilbert.—Henry Irving.

Actors are the most incessant jokers alive. Whether rich or poor, obscure or prominent, drunk or sober, prosperous or not knowing where the next meal is to come from, or whether there will be any next meal, they have always something funny at the tips of their tongues, and managers and dramatic authors as a rule are full of humorous explosives that clear the dull air and let in the sunshine. They are masters at repartee, yet as willing to turn a joke on themselves as on one another, and they can work a pun most brilliantly.

Joseph Jefferson one day called on President Cleveland with General Sherman, and carried a small package with him. All his friends know that dear old “Joe” is forgetful, so when the visitors were going the general called attention to the package and asked: “Jefferson, isn’t this yours?”

“Great Cæsar, Sherman,” Jefferson replied, “you have saved my life!” The “life” referred to was the manuscript of his then uncompleted biography. Jefferson delights in telling of a new playmate of one of his sons, who asked another boy who young Jefferson was, and was told:

“Oh, his father works in a theatre somewhere.”

“Pete” Dailey, while enjoying a short vacation, visited a New York theatre when business was dull. Being asked afterward how large the audience was, he replied: “I could lick all three of them.”

On meeting a friend who was “fleshing up,” he exclaimed: “You are getting so stout that I thought some one was with you.”

J. K. Emmett tells of a heathenish old farmer and his wife who strayed into a church and heard the minister say: “Jesus died for sinners.” The old man nudged his wife, and whispered: