Chapter VII: Preface (6)

Dean Stubbs is a man above middle stature, of robust frame and English aspect, with just a trace perhaps of some Scandinavian ancestor in the long head and face and the ruddy complexion. He is descended from the same Yorkshire yeoman stock as the present Bishop of Oxford, the author of the “Constitutional History of England,” whose kinsman he is, and from which stock in old days there came such men as the well-known Puritan writer, John Stubbs, who wrote the “Discovery of a Gaping Gulph,” and who, when his hand was cut off by order of the Queen, as a penalty for the publication of his outspoken pamphlet, waved his hat with the other hand and cried, “God save Queen Elizabeth!” The distinction which some men have gained as the champions of a great cause, or the leaders of a great movement, is a surprise to us when we see them. In their bodily presence there is nothing indicative of power, and we have to wait for the explanation of their ascendency. No such surprise will be felt by those who look upon Dr. Stubbs for the first time. We see at once that his physical endowments fit him for leadership. The tall, massive, upright frame, suggestive of his yeoman ancestry; the easy, natural dignity of his bearing; the firmness of his step, as of one who is clear as to his own course, and whom it would not be easy to move from any position that he felt called upon to take; the high, broad forehead, the alert and penetrating glance--all make it easy for us to believe, even before we have heard him speak, that he possesses characteristics which explain his position and influence. He impresses one immediately as a strong man both intellectually and physically.

In speaking of his recreations, he said: “I am president of the Ely Golf Club, am fond of bicycling, work at carpentering, am maker and patentee of the Sleepy Hollow chair, and few things please me more than to show my English, especially my American friends, round the cathedral.” And any one who has heard the Dean’s exquisite lectures on the Ely Cathedral may well be delighted with such a guide.

Unlike other clergymen who devote themselves exclusively to theological studies and abstract disquisition, Dr. Stubbs has examined and discussed some of the most vital practical questions of the day--the relief of the poor, the condition and needs of laborers, the welfare of artisans in the great manufacturing centres, the advancement of women, and the education of the masses. His life, accordingly, has been one of practical industry and effort for the good of others, and, while building an honorable renown for himself, he has been, in the largest sense of the word, a public benefactor.

He has always taken such a deep and active interest in the problems of labor and capital that he has become known as a “Christian Socialist.” In explanation of the meaning of this term as applied to himself, he relates the following anecdote:

“I had called on a rich old merchant in the North to ask him for a subscription. At first he was somewhat grumpy. ‘Come,’ he said, ‘they call you a Socialist; what do you mean by Socialism?’ ‘My dear sir,’ I replied, ‘it depends on _what_ Socialism you mean, political Socialism or Christian Socialism, for there is a great difference between the two. Of the Political Socialist I hold very much the same opinion as that of Ebenezer Eliot, the Corn-Law Rhymer, who wrote long ago--

‘“What is a socialist? one who hath yearnings
For equal division of unequal earnings,
A rogue, or a bungler, or both, he is willing
To fork out his penny and pocket your shilling.”

But while the political Socialist says, “What is yours is mine,” the Christian Socialist says, “What is mine is yours.”’ The old man’s eyes twinkled. ‘Ah!’ he said, ‘I’ve met a good many of the first sort; I never met any of the second. However, here’s £5 for your fund.’”

The Dean began his American tour with a course of six matinee lectures in the Lyceum Theatre, New York. His subjects were: “Shakespeare as a Religious Teacher,” “Ely Cathedral” (illustrated), “Milton and the Puritans,” “Ideal Women of the Poets,” “James Russell Lowell,” and a second lecture on “Ely Cathedral” (also illustrated). Other lectures which he gave in this country were on “Shelley,” “Browning,” and “Charles Kingsley and Christian Socialism,” but the illustrated lectures on “Ely Cathedral” were the only ones that drew big money. The others were too scholarly for the American lyceum in its present condition.

Some idea of the delightfulness of the Dean’s illustrated lectures on the Cathedral of Ely may be had from the following criticism by William Winter, published in the New York Tribune: “The exordium of the Dean’s discourse, devoted to a portrayal of the physical beauty of the wide, dream-like fenlands of England, with Ely Cathedral--an image of sublimity and mystery--towering through the white mist and the hazy, golden light, fell upon the ear like a strain of music, and easily lured his hearers into a mood of fancy and sentiment, making them sympathetic with the glories of the past and reverent of the grandeur of the passionate religious devotion expressed so well in those wonderful old minsters of Europe--which seems to have utterly died out of the earth. Later it pleased the Dean to make his lecture a familiar talk, and to grace it with occasional tints of playful humor: the colloquial and rhetorical strains are not harmonious, and it is never easy to mingle them, but, certainly, the speaker managed this difficult involution with singular grace; but, at the last, reverting to his poetic vein, he rounded his work with noble eloquence and power. More than seventy pictures, many of them very lovely, were incidentally displayed--the spectacle culminating in a view of the shrine of St. Awdry, from which the white marble sarcophagus of the virgin Queen Etheldreda has disappeared--hidden, it is believed, somewhere in the great cathedral--perhaps to be restored in a purer, because a more spiritual, age, now dawning on the world.”

While in New York, the Dean being very anxious to hear Dr. Hillis, the Plymouth pulpit being the Mecca of all visiting clergymen and ministers from the other side, we arranged to attend one Sunday morning. The Dean was intensely interested, but I think was much surprised by Dr. Hillis’ unique style. “A nightmare of eloquence!” he exclaimed.

In Boston he repeated his New York course of lectures in Steinert Hall, which seemed to be the most popular lecture hall in Boston at this time. It is a very deep cellar under the Steinert Piano Rooms, and is quite prettily fitted up, but oh! if there should happen to be a panic down there, no one would escape to tell the story. Back of the stage is an elevator shaft used for carrying pianos up and down from the basement to the top of the building, and this causes a strong draught from the back of the stage, through the auditorium, and out to the sidewalk. Acoustically there is an advantage in this, because the draft carries the sound through the audience room, and one can be distinctly heard throughout the place in almost a whisper. But in cool weather both audience and speakers have to keep on their coats and wraps, as the cold draught carries away with it all the heat from the radiators. It is the best Boston has, unless you go up two or three more flights to the Y. M. C. A. Hall, which is about as inconvenient for an audience as anything could possibly be.

Notwithstanding all these drawbacks, the fashionable people of Boston turned out to welcome the Dean of Ely. He was the social lion of the season and the special pet of the literary Episcopalians and the faculty of Harvard University. He preached three times in Trinity Church--Phillips Brooks’ old pulpit--for his friend, Dr. Donald, and was also university preacher in the Appleton Chapel, Harvard, where he was listened to by a great crowd of undergraduates. Some of these sermons are published this autumn in a volume with the title “Pro Patria!”--sermons on special occasions in England and America.

The papers gave excellent accounts of his sermons and lectures, and, on the whole, Dr. Stubbs’ visit proved a financial success; but, compared with former days, when a first-class lecturer was a first-class attraction, there was much to be desired. Fifteen years ago a course of such lectures would have filled Tremont Temple or Music Hall.

At Columbus, Ohio, he preached for the St. Andrew’s Brotherhood, and met with a very cordial reception. He preached in Philadelphia and gave a course of lectures there with great success.

On the announcement of his proposed visit to Chicago I received a letter from the Episcopalian Bishop of that city denouncing a dean who could come to America to lecture for money; but notwithstanding this, the appointments were made for that city.

The Dean of Ely did not come to America to make money. He came to make friends, and I am sure he did it. He wanted a holiday, and he came to our country to get it, and if, not being a rich man, and having six sons to educate and put out in the world, he chose to pay his way by earning his travelling expenses, I do not see what business it is of the Bishop of Chicago to question the dignity of the Dean. That can quite well take care of itself.

Dr. Stubbs gave his first lecture in Chicago for the Twentieth Century Club, which for a number of years has had the first appearance of all my stars, and generally assures a good audience on the following evening in Central Music Hall. The local manager, however, in that city in some way conceived the idea that nobody but Episcopalians would care to hear the Dean of Ely, and so worked through the church instead of advertising through the general public. The result of such a course, together with most gloomy conditions of mud, sleet, rain, and snow combined, was poor business, although a delightful lecture to those who were present. The Chicago _Journal_ said:

“Because of his scholarly attainments, his bright and sympathetic views, the lecture of last evening was one of the most charming and instructive addresses of the kind ever heard in Chicago.”

“_The Elite_, an illustrated society journal of Chicago, addressed to people of culture and fashion,” in an article on the Dean, says in allusion to his lecture before the Twentieth Century Club: “He gave his hearers much pleasure. They all said so at the time. Many remarked that the occasion was one of the club’s best evenings. The Dean has been misquoted in the newspapers (of course without intention) as to what he said on that evening by way of rebuke. The manner in which he administered the rebuke was gentle to playfulness--yet it held a bit of quiet sarcasm. But no offence was given and no offence was felt. He caused his audience to laugh and put it on its mettle.”

This is, of course, in allusion to the foolish indignation of the yellow journals of Chicago about an interview with the Dean by the American _Outlook_ in which Dr. Stubbs spoke of “the hateful unloveliness of the city, and its wilderness of mean streets.”

This interview happened to appear just at the time when there was a lull in yellow journalistic excitements in Chicago, and his description of that city furnished material for some very elaborate editorials and cartoons and the publication of private letters which patriotic Chicagoans were invited to contribute. The affair was taken up by the press throughout the country, and at the present writing the Dean of Ely is the best-advertised clergyman of the Church of England. There would be no difficulty in booking a profitable tour for him this season (1900-1901) if only he were available. Several of my friends in Chicago wrote to me that if I dared to visit their city again I would be a candidate for the Vigilance Committee, for having brought Dean Stubbs to this country. Knowing that the Dean would appreciate the humorous side of the situation, I sent him some of the newspaper clippings and wrote him that if I were driven out of my own country on his account I might wish to seek refuge in the confines of Ely Cathedral. To this he replied as follows:

* * * * *

“Deanery, Ely, July 25, 1900.

“MY DEAR GOOD MAJOR: I am delighted to hear that you and Mrs. Pond are coming to the Isle of Refuge--you are quite safe here. If the Vigilance Committees of Chicago meditate a raid upon you at Ely, we will open the sluice at Denver and put the whole of Cambridgeshire outside the Isle twelve feet under sea water. But how sadly wanting in humor some of your journalists must be. I thought that was an English prerogative. The Chicagoans were really very kind, my hostess at the Twentieth Century Club quite charming, and I believe she was the sister of the mayor. How strange! And Mr. Newman was as kind as he could be and his wife was more so. But why must I praise an ugly street because I like a man who lives in it? I didn’t praise New Jersey; why Chicago? No. It is a hatefully unlovely place, but I admire greatly the men who, because they live there--poor things--are so loyal and patriotic. To be loyal for a noble city like New York is fine, but to be loyal to Chicago, that is sublime. Pray announce that I am coming over next spring to lecture in Chicago on ‘The Ideal City of the Poets,’ to be illustrated with ‘dinky second number’ lantern slides of the City of the Wind.

“I have just had a pleasant visit from Mr. and Mrs. Thomas, my kind hosts in Philadelphia, and a continual stream of Americans who heard one or the other of my lectures are passing through here daily, and very pleasant it is to me to welcome them. We are suffering from an exceptionally torrid summer--93 degrees in the shade yesterday. I feel, to use one of your quaint Americanisms, as ’limp as a half-yard of chewed string.’

“Kindest regards to your wife and Bimbo and Miss Glass.

“Ever sincerely yours, “CHARLES W. STUBBS.”

* * * * *

Evidently the good Dean retains the humorous pluck of his old Puritan ancestor, and if on his next visit the irate Chicagoans cut off the offending right hand which wrote the _Outlook_ article, the dean will good-humoredly wave the bleeding stump and cry--“Bravo Chicago!”

WOMEN LECTURERS

WOMEN LECTURERS.

After my first experience as a manager with Ann Eliza Young and my joining the Redpath Lyceum Bureau, the field enlarged quite as rapidly as was desirable. Boston remained the headquarters, for the New England States maintained very largely the older lyceum courses and organizations. Women speakers were notably in demand, quite in contrast with the public requirements of later years. The suffrage agitation held place in the North with anti-slavery discussions and correlative topics. It was the twin sister of the temperance movement which Gough so graphically and eloquently presented, and there were strong personalities among the women lecturers. Their cause commanded, in days of public scorn and denial, the splendid service of orators like Wendell Phillips, Frederick Douglass, and George William Curtis, as well as scholars and speakers like Higginson, Hale, and others whose names come to me in crowding memories.

But their most efficient arguments for mental, civic, and industrial equality were always best illustrated in the person and speech of their own brilliant agitators: Lucy Stone, the incomparable Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and a score and more of others.

There were many able women of letters and art, too; among others, Julia Ward Howe, Mary A. Livermore, Mrs. Scott Siddons, Clara Barton, Charlotte Cushman, Helen Potter, Clara Louise Kellogg, Annie Louise Gary, and Mary Proctor.

Susan B. Anthony is one of the best-known women of our times and one of our ablest women orators. She will occupy in the history of the Woman’s Rights movement the same position that William Lloyd Garrison held in the history of the anti-slavery movement--the position of a sincere pioneer whose fidelity to principle and tenacity of purpose never faltered or failed. She deserves a place in the foremost ranks of the champions of her sex, for she has given her whole life and her whole heart to the work. It seems probable that these veteran women may live to see the triumph of their cause.

Miss Anthony is now eighty years young, and her vigor of youth is constantly growing. To show that there is no rivalry between her and Mrs. Stanton, the two great champions of woman’s rights, I submit the following tribute from Mrs. Stanton to her life-long friend on her eightieth birthday:

I.

My honored friend, I’ll ne’er forget,
That day in June, when first we met:
Oh! would I had the skill to paint
My vision of that “Quaker Saint”:
Robed in pale blue and silver gray,
No silly fashions did she essay:
Her brow so smooth and fair,
’Neath coils of soft brown hair:
Her voice was like the lark, so clear,
So rich, and pleasant to the ear:
The “‘Prentice hand,” on man oft tried,
Now made in her the Nation’s pride!

II.

We met and loved, ne’er more to part,
Hand clasped in hand, heart bound to heart.
We’ve travelled West, years together,
Day and night, in stormy weather:
Climbing the rugged Suffrage hill,
And bravely facing every ill:
While resting, speaking, everywhere;
Quite often in the open air;
From sleighs, ox-carts, and mayhap coaches,
Besieged with beetles, bugs and roaches:
All this for the emancipation
Of the brave women of our Nation.