Chapter IV: Preface (4)

The theatrical people, too, are berating Mr. Lowell for having maintained that Shakespeare did not write “Richard III.” “If the governor were here,” said Mr. Horace McVicker yesterday, “you can just bet he’d have a card in all the papers, doing Mr. Lowell up in great shape! The governor is a great admirer of Shakespeare: when he was but four years old, he played one of the little princes in ‘Richard III.’”

Manager R. M. Hooley was the only theatrical man who approved the Lowell theory. “I remember having experimented with ‘Richard III.’ once on a time,” said he. “It was about three years ago that George Edgar brought a company to my theatre, and tried to convince me that Shakespeare wrote ‘Richard III.’ After he had tried it for two weeks, I paid railroad-fares for the whole crowd back East. After Mr. Lowell’s lecture the other afternoon, I walked up to the platform, and grasped Mr. Lowell’s hand. ‘You have told the truth,’ said I: ‘I know how it is myself, for I have been there.’”

Mr. T. Percy Bottom-Jones, one of our wealthiest and most cultured citizens, tells us that he entertained Mr. Lowell at dinner the other evening; and, from the description Mr. Bottom-Jones gives, we judge that the entertainment was in every way worthy of Chicago’s reputation. “We had eighteen courses,” says Mr. Bottom-Jones, “and the whole spread cost me in the neighborhood of seven thousand dollars. Lowell seemed to be particularly pleased with the sherry. ‘I must compliment you,’ he said, ‘upon the nice discrimination you have evinced in your choice of sherries: this is simply delicious.’—‘Well, it ought to be,’ says I; ‘for I paid sixteen dollars a bottle for it!’”

“What did Mr. Lowell say to that?” we asked.

“Say?” echoed Mr. Bottom-Jones. “He didn’t say any thing; but you never saw a more surprised-looking man in all your born days.”

This brought to mind very vividly the lines of Paulinas Varro, the Latin poet:—

“Mæcenas is a model host,
Who, o’er his viands nice,
Is wont to name each dish, and boast
Its quality and price.”

We do not know how this epigram will impress others; but, taking it with the results of our daily observations, it goes a long way toward convincing us that (to indulge in a pardonable metaphor) the mantle of the most luxurious, the most fastidious, and the most refined, of grand old Roman times has fallen, so to speak, upon the shoulders of the representatives of Chicago wealth and culture.

* * * * *

WRITING to us upon one of his bill-heads, a prominent member of the Chicago Literary Club takes us severely to task for “indulging in unseemly sarcasm and untimely levity at the expense of Mr. Lowell and those cultured Chicagoans who are seeking to create a healthy literary atmosphere in the West.” Our correspondent goes on to set up a defence of Mr. Lowell’s lecture last Tuesday afternoon, as if a defence were necessary! He says that we should remember that any utterance coming from Mr. Lowell is worth listening to; that to the study of the subject which he treated last Tuesday, Mr. Lowell devoted much time, and that Chicago ought to regard it as a high compliment that Mr. Lowell had prepared especially for her edification a discourse at once so scholarly and so eloquent, and necessarily involving so much time, patience, and discrimination in its preparation.

Our correspondent’s burning words would have great weight with us did they not come to us written upon a sheet whose prefatory printed matter informs us that the writer is the proprietor of a soap-manufactory. We decline to take kindly to that atmosphere, literary or otherwise, which a soap-factory is likely to create. As far as regards the suggestion that we have aimed sarcasms at Mr. Lowell, we will say that there is no truth in it; and touching the allegation that Mr. Lowell wrote his Shakespeare lecture especially for the edification of the Chicagoans, we will say that there is no truth in that, either.

We have before us a copy of “The Boston Evening Transcript” of last Wednesday; and in it we find a scholarly, thoughtful, and elegant editorial, entitled “Mr. Lowell in Chicago.” We quote a few lines:—

“While Mr. Lowell’s praises were being sounded here yesterday, Mr. Lowell himself was creating a great deal of discussion at Chicago by suddenly changing the topic of his address before the Union League Club from a political to a literary one, and talking about the authorship of ‘Richard III.,’ instead of American politics. No doubt, it is quite natural that there should be a good deal of disappointment expressed at the change of programme, since, in lieu of a piquant and healthy political sensation, Mr. Lowell gave his audience a critical address, which had already been delivered at Edinburgh; but he had looked the ground over, and doubtless had reason to believe that he did wisely in altering his programme.”

This is startling information: it gives us to understand, as distinctly as if we had been hit with a club, that, so far from serving up to us a specially prepared discourse, Mr. Lowell regaled us with a chestnut—and a Scotch one, at that! We regard it as the severest joke ever played upon our community.

Speaking of jokes reminds us of a little incident that is being told of the experience Mr. Lowell had at a dinner given in his honor the other evening. A wealthy patron of the arts and sciences wanted to entertain the distinguished poet in fine style, and he invited in all his rich neighbors to help him do the hospitable act. As soon as Mr. Lowell entered the parlors, and was presented to the company, one of the ladies, giggling and gushing, said, in those tones peculiar to giddy female idiocy, “O Mr. Lowell! we’ve been anticipating this pleasure _so_ much; for we’ve all read your poetry, and we know you can be ever so funny when you try!”

Another genial imbecile, who wore about twenty thousand dollars’ worth of big, vulgar diamonds, smilingly assured Mr. Lowell, that, although she had never met him before, she had always felt as if she were well acquainted with him; “for,” she added, “my maiden name was Bigelow.”

In its editorial discussion of Mr. Lowell’s lecture, “The Boston Transcript” says that the distinguished critic has obtained his heterodox opinions touching the genuineness of “Richard III.” from a study of the folio edition. This strikes us as a plausible explanation of the instigation of the melancholy heresy which Mr. Lowell has disseminated in the midst of us. From a scholarly gentleman who is regarded hereabouts as an authority in literary quotations, we learn that the so-called folio edition of Shakespeare’s works is the most palpable fraud ever put upon the market. Its proof-reading alone, so says our informant, is so loose and incorrect as to render the work a bane to admirers of proper orthography and correct punctuation. Among the Chicago people, the most popular edition of Shakespeare is that sold on our trains and at all news-stands for fifty-five cents net. The folio edition costs eight dollars; and we agree with this scholarly gentleman who tells us about it, that a man must be a pitiful idiot indeed to pay eight dollars for a volume of Shakespeare when he can get a great deal better edition for fifty-five cents net. One of the beauties of the Chicago edition of Shakespeare’s works is the numerous elegant engravings, made from designs of local artists. The picture of “Margaret Mather in the Tomb of the Capulets under the Management of J. M. Hill” is said by local art connoisseurs and critics to be a _chef d’œuvre_; and one of the finest iambic tetrameter poems we ever read was inspired by a view of that superb engraving representing that distinguished member of the Citizens’ Association, Col. J. H. McVicker, disguised as the first grave-digger. We have heard the pictures of Tom Keene as “Hamlet,” Master Walker Whitesides as “Richard III.,” George C. Miln as “Romeo,” and N. S. Wood, the boy-actor, as “Lear,”—these portraitures we have heard spoken of as masterpieces. It is impossible, we think, that an edition embellished with such works of art should be supplanted by an edition whose typographical incorrectness is so violent as to be the surest and quickest cause of ophthalmia.

* * * * *

WE have not said any thing about it before, because we surmised that Col. James Russell Lowell’s cup of bitterness was quite full enough without having any more rue and gall poured into it. The fact remains, however, that the Union League Club is not the only Chicago club that feels aggrieved at Col. Lowell. The Chicago Literary Club has a grievance against Lowell,—at least we infer so from divers and sundry bitter invectives which we have heard fired at Col. Lowell by certain distinguished members of that organization. It seems that a formal invitation to visit the club was sent to Lowell some time before he came to Chicago. It was supposed, that, being a literary man himself, he would naturally feel like identifying himself to a degree with the literary characters of this metropolis. It was believed that an association, however brief, with the intellect and culture of our Literary Club, would reinvigorate, refresh, and re-inspire the Boston poet,—in a word, it was, if we mistake not, purely a charitable motive that prompted the Chicago Literary Club to signify to Col. Lowell its willingness to have him commingle with it while he was in this city. Instead of viewing this dainty boon in the proper light, Col. Lowell appears to have regarded it much as he would the cheap effort of a country debating-club, or a commonplace literary lyceum, to get some notoriety out of his patronage. At any rate, he returned a very prompt and equally decisive negative answer to the invitation; and this is why the giant literary intellects of Chicago are so very hostile to Col. Lowell just now. It is far from our intention to be drawn into this unhappy complication; but we cannot forbear giving it as our opinion, that, without the co-operation of the Chicago Literary Club, Col. Lowell will find a literary life hardly worth living.

In our most refined society circles, Col. James Russell Lowell’s recent visit to Chicago is still being discussed with a good deal of relish; and a number of amusing stories are leaking out concerning the eminent Boston _littérateur’s_ experiences in this city. One of our most beautiful and accomplished belles (the eighteen-year-old daughter of a wealthy distiller) is assuring the large circle of her admirers that she doesn’t think Col. Lowell is half as bright a man as he has the credit of being. “I wath introduthed to him at the rethepthion,” says she, “and he indulged in a few commonplatheth until he found out that I uthed to live in Kentucky. Then he thaid, ‘I wonder whether you ever knew my friend Baker of Kentucky: he uthed to be a particular friend of mine, and I’ve often wondered what ever became of him.’—‘Baker?’ thays I, ‘let me thee,—I am acquainted with theveral gentlemen named Baker: what ith hith firtht name?’—‘It ithn’t pothible you could have known him,’ thaid Mr. Lowell: ‘I hadn’t thought of it before, but he’th been dead thirty-theven yearth.’ Now, did you ever hear any thing quite tho thilly ath that? I’d have been real provoked if I’d thought he wath quithing me, but he looked tho theriouth that I made up my mind he wathn’t very thmart; and, ath thoon ath I could get away, I went off to the thupper-room with Tham Thawyer.”

One of the most cultured gentlemen in Chicago society was invited to meet Col. Lowell at a dinner given by a South-Side friend. He arrived very late, and was so profuse and so persistent in his apologies as to make himself really offensive.

“Oh! never mind, my dear sir,” said the genial host in a consoling tone; “it is all right; you’ve arrived in time for the sal-_lad_.”

The host’s patronizing tone and air deeply offended the tardy guest. Telling his club-friends about the circumstance next day, he exclaimed, in a voice full of contempt and scorn, “The idea of that —— bowlegged Michigan farmer’s ‘sal-_lading_’ me!”

* * * * *

TO the Lowell literature that is flooding the Western country at the present time, Col. Horace Rublee, the distinguished editor of “The Milwaukee Sentinel,” contributes an interesting page, reminiscent in character. “It was in 1855,” says Col. Rublee, “that Col. Lowell visited Milwaukee: he was then in the prime of his intellectual and physical manhood, and to this day I can remember with what pride I introduced him to the large and enthusiastic audience which had assembled in Turner Hall to hear his eloquent and thoughtful address on Early English ballads. This lecture was conducted under the auspices of the Milwaukee Lecture Lyceum Bureau. In those days, lectures were all the rage, and none but the very best talent was employed. The week after Lowell’s appearance here, Bayard Taylor came with his lecture on ‘The Rhine;’ and Lowell remained in town just for the sake of having a visit with his bright young friend. Taylor must have been about thirty years of age, and he was as brilliant and as companionable a fellow as you could expect to meet. Well, Lowell and Taylor had a great time together; and as I knew the town pretty well, and was inclined to be somewhat coltish myself in those days, it was my good fortune to be chosen as the third member of the party. Every night we would go around to Schimpfermann’s Hall, and sit there, drinking beer, and telling stories, until nearly morning. Lowell was a great hand for Yankee stories, and Taylor could mimic the German dialect and Irish brogue most artistically. As for me, I did most of the singing,—for I had a fine baritone voice in those days; and when it came to the chorus, Taylor would help me out with his deep, mellow bass, and Lowell would chip in with his clear, ringing, bird-like tenor. The last night they were in town (ah, how distinctly I remember it!), we all met at Schimpfermann’s; and—how it came about, I don’t know—we got into a game of ten-pins. I was an old hand at it, and so was Taylor; but Lowell had never played before. Well, Taylor beat the first game with 215 pins, I followed with 187, and Lowell brought up the rear with 96. He was a preposterously bad player, but he was so earnest and so solemn about it that we didn’t dare laugh at him. We played away until eight o’clock in the morning. In six hours Taylor had rolled 3,136 pins, my score was 2,944, and Lowell’s was 1,082. I am able to give the figures, because I wrote them on the back of a daguerrotype that Lowell had made of himself that morning before he started away on the train. It lacked an hour of train-time; and we went up into Bumblegarten’s gallery, and had our pictures taken just as we looked when we got through that five hours’ bowling-match. I have the daguerrotype still, and would not part with it for the wealth of a Midas. Lowell was pretty well played out, poor fellow! but he did not make any complaint. When he reached St. Louis, however, he wrote me a pathetic letter, full of scholarly reference and classical allusion. ‘I am as sore,’ said he, ‘as if I had engaged with the Pythian monster, or had been drawn on the Procrustean bed: not a muscle in all my anatomy that does not ache, nor a joint that is not as stiff as the senile Anchises. What Simothean balm is there for me, and where is there a Mnestheus to restore me? I am, in short, reduced to such a condition that neither Pisistratus nor the afflicted son of Ægeus would envy me; and I have changed the subject of my St. Louis lecture from that of ‘Italian Literature’ to that of ‘The Fall of Ilium.’”’

When Col. Lowell lectured on “The American Richard of Politics III.,” in this city last month, Col. Rublee came down from Milwaukee to renew acquaintance with him. They got together one evening in Col. Wirt Dexter’s back parlor, and talked about the old Grecian and Latin poets until daylight. Neither gentleman could sing as well as he used to; but in his travels abroad, Col. Lowell had picked up a number of jocose Horatian odes and mirthful classic stories, which he recited with exceeding zest; and Col. Rublee kept up his end of the conversation by narrating the many humorous tales and sketches he had heard at Madison during the sessions of the Wisconsin Legislature,—all which Col. Lowell enjoyed mightily, and made memoranda of, that he might repeat them to his family physician, a Dr. Holmes, whom he credited with being a fellow of hearty appreciation and keen wit.

* * * * *

THE Chicago Literary Club is still feeling very unkindly toward Col. James Russell Lowell because that eminent Bostonian declined to visit the club during his sojourn in Chicago. Every preparation had been made to give the poet a cordial welcome; and several of the most eloquent members had prepared speeches abounding in quotations from the old Greek, Latin, and Hindoo poets, and full of that classic allusion and mythological lore so pleasing to Col. Lowell’s cultured taste. One of the most scholarly members had written an essay on “The Pork Industry in Ancient Athens,” and another had prepared a poem, “Dante:” in short, Col. Lowell would have been astonished at the learning and the culture that would have manifested themselves had he but accepted the club’s invitation. It is said that Col. Lowell took an unjust prejudice against the club, because, having met and having engaged in conversation with one of the members thereof, he was shocked to hear him say that he had always supposed that Sappho was a kind of tooth-paste. But, be this as it may, the club is hostile to Col. Lowell now; and upon the colonel’s picture in the club-room, some sarcastic linseed-oil _littérateur_ has scribbled the following venomous quotation from an ancient satire:—

“Oh! when I think of what I am,
And what I used to was,
I think I gave myself away
Without sufficient cause.”

* * * * *

COL. JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL tells the story that one of the gentlemen he met in Chicago had a great deal to say of his travels in Europe. Col. Lowell remarked that he greatly enjoyed the French literature, and that George Sand was one of his favorite authors.

“Oh, yes!” exclaimed the Chicago gentleman: “I have had many a happy hour with Sand.”

“You knew George Sand, then?” asked Col. Lowell, with an expression of surprise.

“Knew him? Well, I should rather say I did,” cried the Chicago man; and then he added as a clincher, “I roomed with him when I was in Paris.”

* * * * *

IT is understood that the private dinners given to Mr. Lowell during his stay here have called for an expenditure of not less than forty thousand dollars. Yet there are carping critics who say that Chicago is not a great literary centre.

_Mr. Elder’s Fright._

“No words can express the agony of mind I suffered for six hours yesterday,” said Mr. A. P. T. Elder, publisher of “Literary Life.” “I would not for untold millions go through the ordeal again. I had come down to my palatial office, and was sitting in a rosewood rocker, with my patent-leather boots resting gracefully on the cherry desk before me, when my private secretary (who had been setting type, and sweeping out the office) brought me my morning paper. I noticed that his face looked pale; but it did not startle me, for I recollected that he sometimes washed it. But when my eye—in fact, my two eyes—fell upon the paper, my printer’s—no, I mean my secretary’s—pallor was explained. With my blood freezing in my veins, I read that Miss Cleveland’s house at Holland Patent had been attacked by flames, and had well-nigh fallen prey to the devouring element. Then I remembered that I had forwarded to Miss Cleveland a large bulk of manuscript,—poems, essays, criticisms, advertisements, and other contributions to our magazine,—and I shrieked with horror when it occurred to me that this treasure might have been destroyed by the fire-fiend. More dead than alive, I hastened to the telegraph-office, and sent a despatch to Miss Cleveland, begging her to advise me at once whether that precious hoard was safe, or had been wrested from immortality by the demon of the flames. For six hours I received no answer, and during that time I suffered the most exquisite tortures.

“‘What will the world say,’ I asked myself, ‘when it learns that it has lost these inestimable intellectual boons? Will not posterity hold me up to eternal scorn for having jeoparded the literary welfare of this country, by consigning to careless hands the product of Western genius? If this wealth of literature, this cream of poesy, and this flower of prose, be destroyed, how will I be able to bear up under the lamentations of a continent that awaits, with feverish expectations and anxious heart-throbbings, the October number of “Literary Life”?’

“Crucifying my soul with these agonizing interrogations, I survived, rather than lived, the six hours that elapsed between the sending of my telegram and the receipt of an answer. I tore open the telegram that came at last, and read its welcome tidings as follows:—

“‘_To A. P. T. Elder, Chicago Patent, Ill._—Nothing burned except the
back-stoop and the rear-eaves.

“‘R. E. C.’

“I have been receiving congratulatory telegrams all day from such literary men as George Sand, George Eliot, Charles Egbert Haddock, and Oliver Wendell Holmes, author of Holmes’s ‘Iliad:’ I also hold in my hand at this moment a kind telegram from Messrs. Laflin & Rand, publishers of the ‘New-York Powder Magazine.’ But nothing has recompensed me for the suffering I endured during those six hours of waiting. It was a narrow escape, and I hope the literary world will appreciate it as well as the torture I experienced in its behalf.”

* * * * *

PROFESSOR ELBRIDGE G. SMITH, instructor in English literature, and professor of elocution, honored us with a call yesterday for the purpose of pointing out what he called “a remarkable error, or series of errors,” we made yesterday. He referred to that part of our interview with Mr. A. P. T. Elder, the scholarly editor of “Literary Life,” wherein George Sand, George Eliot, and Charles Egbert Haddock are spoken of as literary men; and wherein, furthermore, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes is said to be the author of Holmes’s “Iliad.” Professor Smith assures us that Sand, Eliot, and Craddock were not men at all, but women; the first two being now deceased, and the third having taken up her permanent abode in a St. Louis suburb. “As for Holmes,” said the professor, “he may have translated the ‘Iliad,’ but he certainly did not compose it; the author of that majestic epic having lived so many centuries ago, that the exact time is not known.” We referred these corrections to Mr. Elder, and asked him what he meant by filling our valuable space with blundering statements that were likely to hold us up to the scorn and the derision of society. He declared most solemnly that he had never had so base a purpose in view; and he expressed deep regret that he had left the telegrams from George Sand, George Eliot, and Mr. Craddock in the pocket of his other coat at home.

“But how came you,” we asked, “to say that Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote the ‘Iliad’?”

“Well, didn’t he write it?” inquired Mr. Elder.

“No, sir,” we thundered, for we were deeply mortified. “Homer wrote it.”

“Yes, that’s it—that’s the name,” cried Mr. Elder: “I acknowledge the mistake. Homer was the name I meant: _he_ was the feller who sent me the telegram.”

_Ethel’s Christmas Tale._

CHICAGO, ILL., Dec. 2.

_To the Editor._—My little daughter Ethel, who is only eleven years
old, has written a Christmas story, which I send to you, in the hope
that you will recognize in it some indication of latent literary and
imaginative talent.

Yours truly,
H. G. B.

A CHRISTMAS STORY.

It was a sad sight to see Mrs. Jamison and her little family gathered about the fire one Christmas Eve, for she had been a widow for twenty years. Yes, twenty years before had Mr. Jamison, her husband, set sail on a ship for a foreign land, and nevermore had been heard of. The snow was falling fast, and the wind was howling without.

“Alas!” Mrs. Jamison said, as she pressed her hungry babe to her bosom: “I fear we shall have no turkey to-morrow.”

“Why not, mother?” asked Robin, a bright lad of fourteen.

“Listen,” said Mrs. Jamison. “I have only thirty cents left. To-day I pawned my jewels, and thus we are cast upon the mercy of the cold world.”

Mrs. Jamison wept bitterly, and so did the children.

“Oh, if Henry were only here!” moaned Mrs. Jamison. Henry was Mr. Jamison’s name before he was lost at sea, never, never to return. By and by Mrs. Jamison said, “Put on your fur cape, Lucy, and take this thirty cents, and go down to the grocery-store, and buy one dozen eggs. It is all the money I have; but the eggs will allay our hunger, and keep the wolf from the door another day.”

So Lucy, who was a beautiful girl of fifteen, put on her fur cape; and Robin went with her. Having bought the eggs, each of them took an apple when Mr. Sinclair, the kind-hearted grocer, was not looking; and with joyous hearts they rode home in the street-car. While Lucy was eating her apple, she put the bag of eggs on the seat; and suddenly a big man entered the car, and sat down on the bag. Then Lucy began to cry, and Robin too.

“Children,” said the big man in kind tones, “why do you weep?”

“Alas!” said Lucy: “you have sat on our bag of eggs.”

“Never mind the eggs,” said the man. “But, tell me, have I not heard that voice before, and have I not seen those features? Is your name Lucy Jamison?”

“Yes, sir,” said Lucy.

“Then look upon me, child,” cried the man, “and tell me if you do not know me. Has time and sorrow changed me so that my children do not know me?”

“Father, father!” cried Lucy, throwing herself into her father’s arms.

It was indeed Mr. Jamison. He had been wrecked on a lone island for twenty years; but a passing ship picked him up, and brought him home. He was very rich; and, oh, what a happy meeting it was for Mrs. Jamison and the children! They had turkey for dinner, and cranberries, and lived in peace all the rest of their lives.

_Chicago Weather._

To-day, fair Thisbe—winsome girl!—
Strays o’er the meads where daisies blow,
Or, ling’ring where the brooklets purl,
Laves in the cool, refreshing flow.

To-morrow, Thisbe, with a host
Of amorous suitors in her train,
Comes like a goddess forth to coast,
Or skate upon the frozen main.

To-day, sweet posies mark her track,
While birds sing gayly in the trees:
To-morrow morn, her sealskin sack
Defies the piping polar breeze.

So Doris is to-day enthused
By Thisbe’s soft, responsive sighs,
And on the morrow is confused
By Thisbe’s cold, repellent eyes.

_A Chicago Christmas Legend._

Gabriel Barton was an editor. After years of patient toil and continuous self-denial he had succeeded in amassing as large a competency of boys and girls as you could expect to find in a monogamic community.

Yet Gabriel was not content. Instead of being thankful for the blessings with which his family-board was surrounded three times a day, he pined for other boons which he did not possess. He yearned ever for gold,—that insidious canker that gnaws the soul beyond reparation, and leaves a dark, indelible stain on the proudest escutcheons.

“Gold—gold! I must have gold!” he cried incessantly.

His strange demeanor was the occasion of grievous perplexity to his wife; for Estelle Barton was a simple, unaffected woman, ill acquainted with the selfish nature and ways of the cold world.

“But why, dear husband,” she asked, “why clamor for the unattainable? Be satisfied with what we have; ’tis humble, I know; but so long as our nine children are in good health, and so long as the water-tax is not due, we surely shall not perish of thirst. Would this sordid gold you crave deepen the color in our darlings’ cheeks, or better the quality of the nourishment we drink? Prithee, be content.”

But, alas! Estelle Barton’s wise words weighed naught with Gabriel. Ceaselessly he yearned for debasing lucre; and his morbid appetite made him thin and pale, and brought a faltering into his gait, and a tremulousness into his voice.

One bitter cold Christmas Eve little Eugenia Barton, the nine-year-old daughter and the senior child of the family, asked pleadingly, “Papa, do you not know what day to-morrow is?”

Gazing into the depths of the child’s innocent blue eyes, Mr. Barton said, “How came you to know, child, that my note fell due to-morrow?”

“Nay, papa,” interposed Eugenia, “I did not know it. But surely you cannot have forgotten! To-morrow is Christmas—Christmas, papa! the gladdest, merriest day in all the year!”

A far-off look came into Mr. Barton’s lack-lustre eyes.

“Well?” he uttered inquiringly.

“Tell me, papa,” cried Eugenia, “tell me, will Santa Claus come this year?”

“I think I can safely say, that, unless he intends to break his record, he will not,” replied Mr. Barton promptly.

“Alas!” sighed Eugenia; and with this she hung her beautiful golden head.

Mr. Barton regretted that he had cast a gloom over the child’s hopes. He sought to explain his seeming harshness.

“Why _should_ Santa Claus come?” he asked bitterly. “Haven’t the neighbors got through lending us what we need? Where, in all this great but heartless city, can we expect to borrow any thing to hang up?”

“True,” said Eugenia: “I had not thought of that. Forgive me, dear papa, if, in my puerile heedlessness, I have caused you pain!”

That night Eugenia sobbed herself to sleep on the sofa with a volume of old files tucked around her shivering form. How long she slept, we will not presume to say. But the golden sunbeams of the early Christmas morn were dancing through the window-frames, and floating o’er the hardwood floor, when she awoke. A man stood before her,—a man clad in habiliments of fur. Eugenia uttered a cry of joy.

“Santa Claus!” she cried.

The man smiled pleasantly with that part of his personality that was exposed to the rigorous temperature of the editor’s home.

“O Santa Claus!” said Eugenia, “I knew you would come: we’ve been waiting for you year after year until the rest had given you up, but I—_I knew_ you would come!”

Again the exposed surface of the fur-clad stranger wrinkled into a smile.

“Thank you for coming,” continued Eugenia. “I knew that my faith in you would be rewarded. So tell me, dear Santa Claus, what gifts—what wealth of beauteous things—have you brought to pour out into our grateful laps at last?”

The strange, fur-clad figure stood still a moment, as if dazed; then drew a bit of coin from the mysterious depths of his shaggy robe, and tossed it to the anxious child.

“There’s a nickel for you, little un,” he said; and his tones betokened a kindly heart. “But, bless you, I’m not Santa Claus: I’m the constable!”

_A Plea for the Classics._

A Boston gentleman declares
By all the gods, above, below,
That our degenerate sons and heirs
Must let their Greek and Latin go!
Forbid, O Fate! we loud implore,
A dispensation harsh as that—
What! wipe away the sweets of yore—
The dear “_Amo, amas, amat_”?

The sweetest hour the student knows,
Is not while poring over French,
Or when, in harsh Teutonic throes,
He writhes upon collegiate bench:
’Tis when on roots and _kais_ and _gars_
He feeds his soul, and feels it glow,
Or when his mind transcends the stars
With “_Zoa mou, sas agapo!_”

So give our bright, ambitious boys
An inkling of these pleasures too—
A little smattering of the joys
Their old but knowing fathers knew;
And let them sing—whilst glorying that
Their sires so sang, long years ago—
The songs “_Amo, amas, amat_,”
And “_Zoa mou, sas agapo!_”

_Mlle. Prud’homme’s Book._

WASHINGTON, D.C., Mai 3.

_M. le Redacteur_,—D’apres votre article dans la New-York Tribune,
copie du Chicago News, je me figure que les habitants de Chicago ayant
grand besoin d’un systeme de prononciation francaise, je prends la
liberte de vous envoyer par la malle-poste le No. 2 d’un ouvrage que
je viens de publier; si vous desirez les autres numeros, je me ferai
un plaisir de vous les envoyer aussi. Les emballeurs de porc ayant peu
de temps a consacrer a l’etude, vu l’omnipotent dollar, seront je
crois enchantes et reconnaissants d’un systeme par lequel ils pourront
apprendre et comprendre, la langue de la fine Sara, au bout de trente
lecons, si surtout Monsieur le redacteur vent bien au bout de sa plume
spirituelle leur en indiquer le chemin. Sur ce l’auteur du systeme a
bien l’honneur de le saluer.