  "MY AMERICAN DIARY" NOEL COWARD SATURDAY I felt that some sort of scene was necessary in order to celebrate my first entrance into America, so I said "Little lamb, who made thee?" to a customs official. A fracas ensued far exceeding my wildest dreams, during which he delved down—with malice aforethought—to the bottom of my trunk and discovered the oddest things in my sponge bag. I think I'm going to like America. I have very good letters to Daniel Blood, Dolores Hoofer, Senator Pinchbeck, Violet Curzon-Meyer, and Julia Pescod, so I ought to get along all right socially at any rate. It would be quite impossible to give an adequate description of one's first glimpse of Broadway at night—I should like to have a little pocket memory of it to take out and look at whenever I feel depressed. I shall feel awfully offended for Piccadilly Circus when I get back. God! How I love frosted chocolate! WEDNESDAY For a really jolly evening, recommend me to the Times Square subway station. You get into any train with that delicious sensation of breathless uncertainty as to where exactly you are going to be conveyed. To approach an official is sheer folly, as any tentative question is quickly calculated to work him up into a frenzy of rage and violence, while to ask your fellow passengers is equally useless as they are generally as dazed as you are. The great thing is to keep calm and at all costs avoid expresses. As another means of locomotion the Elevated possesses a rugged charm which is all its own, the serene pleasure of gazing into frowsy bedroom windows at elderly coloured ladies in bust bodices and flannel petticoats, being only equalled by the sudden thrill you experience when the two front carriages hurtle down into the street in flames. I took three of my plays to Fred Latham at the Globe Theatre. He didn't accept them for immediate production, but he told me of two delightful bus rides, one going up Riverside Drive, and the other coming down Riverside Drive. I was very grateful as the busses, though slow moving, are more or less tranquil and filled with the wittiest advertisements—especially the little notices about official civility, which made everyone rock with laughter. FRIDAY Met Alexander Woollcott and Heywood Broun at a first night—we were roguish together for hours—Alexander Woollcott says that each new play is a fresh joy to him, but the question is whether he's a fresh joy to each new play!—I wonder. TUESDAY Spent all last night at Coney Island—I've never known such an atmosphere of genuine carnival. We went on "The Whip," the sudden convulsions of which drove the metal clasp of my braces sharply into my back, I think scarring me for life. Then we went into "The Haunted House" where a board gave way beneath my feet and ricked my ankle, the "Giant Dipper" was comparatively tame as I only bruised my side and cut my cheek. After this we had "hot dog" and stout, which the others seemed to enjoy immensely, then—laughing gaily—we all ran through a revolving wooden wheel, at least the others did, I inadvertently caught my foot and fell, which caused a lot of amusement. I shall not go out again with a sharp edged cigarette case in my pocket. THURSDAY Went down to Chinatown with a jolly party all in deep evening dress which I thought was rather inappropriate. Mrs. Vernon Bale dropped her side comb into the chop suey which occasioned much laughter—Jeffery was very tiresome and refused to be impressed, saying repeatedly that he'd seen it all before in "Aladdin!" We all went to "Montmartre" afterwards. Ina Claire was there looking lovely as usual. Marie Prune was sitting at the next table squinting dreadfully and, I think, rather drunk and obviously upset about her sister running away with a Chinaman—poor dear, she's had a lot of trouble but still even that's no excuse for looking like a blanc mange slipping off the dish, she should cultivate a little more vitality and never wear pink. MONDAY Just back from a week-end at Southampton with Mrs. Vernon Bale. Apart from coming down to breakfast she's a perfect hostess. We played the most peculiar games on Sunday evening and she and Florrie Wick did a Nautch dance which was most entertaining and bizarre! How hospitable Americans are, I've fixed up heaps of luncheon engagements for next week—Edgar Peopthatch was particularly kind—he offered to introduce me to Carl Van Vechten and Sophie Tucker both of whom I've been longing to meet. THURSDAY Such a busy day! Had plays refused by Edgar Selwyn and William Harris, and this book turned down by Scribner's. I also fell off a bus, being unused to getting out on the right-hand side. I just love America. SUNDAY Went with Lester to hear Tom Burke sing at the Hippodrome. His voice is better than it's ever been and he sang exceedingly good stuff. Poor John MacCormack with his winsome Irish ballads. TUESDAY Lunched at the Coffee House—what an atmosphere—even the veal and ham pie tasted of the best American literature, and there was a lovely signed photograph of Hugh Walpole. I do hope I shall be taken again. The "Vanity Fair" offices impressed me a lot, they're so comfortable, artistic, and full of deathless endeavour. They took the proofs of this book in order to publish one or two extracts from it and sent it back full of the loveliest corrections. I was duly grateful as Mr. Bishop had told me a lot about burlesque during the afternoon. WEDNESDAY Lynn Fontanne took me to tea at Neysa McMein's studio which was most attractive, she is a charming hostess and there was an air of pleasing bohemianism about the whole affair which went far towards making me take another cake—in more formal surroundings I should naturally have refrained. After tea I played and sang and everybody talked. It was all great fun. I liked F. P. A. enormously, he really ought to write for the papers. SATURDAY If I had money I should buy the English rights of "Dulcy" and drag Lynn back to England by sheer force—we have few enough good actresses without letting those we have, fly away. There's no denying that America's the place to get on—this book was refused by Harcourt Brace only yesterday. Met the Theatre Guild this morning and played hide and seek with them in the park—such a merry set of rascals! Teresa Helburn invented a new prank—she took all my MSS. and hid them in a tin box for two months—how we laughed! THURSDAY Apparently all the theatrical "Elite" congregate at the Algonquin for supper, I noticed Elsie and Mrs. Janis, Irving Berlin, Frances Carson, and Desiree Bibble who looked appalling in probably the rudest hat that has ever been worn by man, woman, or child. Marc Connelly made me laugh for twenty minutes over a friend's funeral—what a sense of humour! TUESDAY Spent all day on an island in the middle of the Sound with a lot of old gentlemen in towels—returned very sunburned and in great pain—now I know what Jeffery suffered when he embarked for England looking like a fire engine. Went to the first night of "Bluebeard's Eighth Wife" with Alfred Lunt—in which Barry Baxter made an enormous hit, he is now a brilliant light comedian. I think one or two of his sworn acquaintances in England will be quite cross when I tell them. SATURDAY Had my first experience of surf bathing to-day, at Easthampton. Apart from spraining my wrist, being grazed all over, stunned by a breaker, and finally swept several miles out to sea, I enjoyed it thoroughly. MONDAY Met Mr. Liveright—what a dear!
| ||||||||||||
| REFERENCE | |
| America in Sunshine and Shadow | B. F. Bramp. 2 Vols. |
| The Roguish Royalist | Anonymous |
| Mirrors of Salt Lake City | By the Gentleman with the Cuspidor. 5 Vols. |
| Amy Snurge, a Grand Woman | Ernest Frapple. 2 Vols. |
| "Columbia Beware!" | Weedheim. |
I am also deeply indebted to Esther Throtch for her unlimited energy and devoted assistance.
BIANCA DI PIANNO-FORTI
BIANCA DI PIANNO-FORTI
After an engraving by Vittorio Campanele
MEDIÆVAL Italy has in its time boasted many beautiful women, but there is one who must take her place before them all, one whose name is a byword to this day in every corner of that sun-washed country—Bianca di Pianno-Forti. One shudders at that name—so radiant was she, and yet so incredibly evil. Her tragic death somehow seems a fitting ending to a life such as hers—a life so without mercy, so without pity, and yet so amazingly vivid that it seems to be emblazoned on Italy's very heart.
She first saw the light in Florence. Her father, Allegro, of the celebrated house of Andante Caprioso, married at the age of fourteen Giulia Presto, of Verona, at the age of nine. At the birth of Bianca her mother died, leaving her to the care of her broken-hearted father and brother Pizzicato (destined later on to make the world ring with his music). Perhaps the only thing to be said in excuse of Bianca's later conduct is the fact that she never knew a mother's love. The nuns at the convent wherein she spent her ripening childhood were kind; but, alas! they were not mothers—at least, not all of them. Bianca left the convent when she was sixteen. Slim, lissom, sinuous, with those arresting eyes that seemed, so Fibinio tells us, to search out the very souls of all who came near her. Her first love affair occured about a week after her arrival in her home in Florence. She was in the habit of walking to mass at the cathedral with her maid Vivace. One morning, so Poliolioli relates, a handsome soldier stepped out of the shadows of an adjoining buttress and looked at her. Bianca at once swooned. The same thing happened again—and again—and yet again. One night she heard the shutters of her bedchamber rattle! "Who is there?" she cried, yet not too loudly, because her woman's instinct warned her to be wary. The shutters were flung open, and the young soldier stepped flamboyantly into the room. "I am here, cara, cara mia!" he cried. "I, Vibrato Adagio!" With a sibilant cry she fell into his out-stretched arms. "Mio, mio," she echoed in ecstasy, "I am yours and you are mine!" So lightly was the first stepping-stone passed on her reckless path of immorality and vice. Her fickle heart soon tired of the debonair Vibrato, and in a fit of satiated pique she had his ears cut off and his tongue removed and tied to his big toe. Thus was her ever-increasing lust for bloodshed apparent even at that early age. Her next affaire occured when she was travelling to Rome with her brother Pizzicato, who was to become a chorister at the Vatican. On stopping for refreshment at a wayside tavern, Bianca was struck by the arresting looks of the ostler who was tending their steaming steeds. Beckoning to him, she asked of him his name; he turned his vacant eyes round and round wonderingly for a moment. "Crescendo," he replied. Bianca's eyes flashed fire. "Accelerato!" she cried imperiously, and, hypnotised into submission, the scared man fled upstairs, Bianca following.
Upon arriving in Rome, Bianca and Pizzicato repaired to their father's brother-in-law, who was well known as a lavish entertainer. He was one Rapidamente Tempo di Valse, a widower, living with his two sons, Lento and Comprino, handsome lads both in the first flush of manhood, and both destined to fall victims to Bianca's compelling attractions. Contemporary history informs us that Bianca stayed in the Palazzo Tempo di Valse for seven years, visiting Pizzicato from time to time, and employing herself with various love affairs.
In June she became betrothed to Duke Crazioso di Pianno-Forti, of the famous family of Moderato e Diminuendo—indirectly descended from the Cardinal Appassionato Tutti. Tutti was the great-uncle of the infamous Con Spirito, well known to posterity as the lover of the lovely but passionate Violenza Allargando, destined to become the mother of Largo con Craviata, the fearless captain of Dolcissimo's light horse under General Lamento Agitato, whose grandmother, Sempre Calando, was notorious for her illicit liaison with Pesante e Stentato, a union which was to bear fruit in the shape of Lusingando Molto.
Bianca's wedding was celebrated with enormous rejoicing in Venice, where was situated the ducal palace of the Pianno-Fortis. Mention should be made of the life led by Bianca during the first years of her marriage, of her pet staghounds, of her tapestried bedchamber with bloodthirsty scenes of the chase depicted thereon—how she loved blood, this beautiful girl!
Her portrait herein reproduced is after an engraving by Campanele; note the sinister line of the cheek-bone and the passionate beauty of the nethermost lip! One can visualise her—radiant at the head of crowded dining-tables, drinking from gem-encrusted goblets, accepting glances fraught with ardent desire from one or other of the male guests.
All the world knows of her famous visit to the Pope, and how he died a few hours later; while it would be mere repetition of general knowledge to enlarge on her sojourn with the Doge, and his subsequent demise. Let us touch ever so lightly on her three children, Poco, Confuoco, and Strepitoso. How could they help being beautiful with such a mother, poor mites, branded from birth with the sense of their impending fate! After a while Bianca became aware that tongues were a-wag in Venice, sullying her name with foul calumnies. Her decision for their downfall was swift and terrible. She persuaded her easy-going husband to ride to Naples; then, free of his cumbersome authority, she set to work on the preparations for her world-famous supper party. Picture it if you will: five hundred and eighty-three guests
Historians tell us that following close on that event some rather ugly rumours were noised abroad—in fact, some of the relatives of the poisoned guests even went so far as to complain to various people in authority and stir up strife in every way possible. Bianca was naturally furious. Some say that it was her sudden rage on hearing this that caused her to burn her children to death; others say her act was merely due to bad temper owing to a sick headache. Anyhow, as later events go to show, she had chosen the very worst time to murder her children. More ugly rumours were at once noised abroad by those who were jealous of her. Upon her husband's return from Naples he was immediately arrested, and a few days later hung. Too late the hapless Bianca sought to make her escape; she was caught and taken prisoner while swimming across the Grand Canal with her clothes and a few personal effects in a bundle in her mouth. She was carried shrieking to Milan, where she endured a mockery of a trial; on political grounds she was sentenced to being torn to pieces by she-goats at Genoa. Poor, beautiful Bianca! On the fulfilment of her unjust and barbarous sentence it is too horrible to dwell at any length. This glorious creature, this resplendent vision, this divine goddess—she-goats! Dreadful, degrading, unutterable!!!
The day for her death
"Dio mio, concerto—concerto!"
One by one the she-goats advanced....
("Winsome Sal.")
SARAH, LADY TUNNELL-PENGE
SARAH, LADY TUNNELL-PENGE
From a painting by Augustus Punter
FFRADDLE of 1643 was very different from the Ffraddle of 1789, and still more different from the Ffraddle of 1832. At a time when civil war was raging between Jacobites and Papists and Roundheads and Ironsides and everything, Ffraddle stood grey, silent and indomitable—the very spirit of peace allied with strength seemed embodied in its grim masonry. The clash of arms and the death cries from millions of rebellious throats which echoed athwart the length and breadth of young England were unable to pierce the stillness of Ffraddle's moated security. Owls murmured on its battered turrets, sparrows perched on its portcullis, cuckoos cooed all over it, heedless indeed of the turmoil and frenzied strife raging outside its feudal gates.
What a birthplace for one of history's most priceless pearls—Sarah Twig! The heart of every lover of beauty leaps and jumps and starts at the sound of that name—Sarah Twig. Why are some destined for so much while others are destined, alas! for so little? Who knows? Sarah—a rose-leaf, a crumpled atom, dropped as it were from some heavenly garden into the black times of the Merry Monarch—when, according to Bloodworthy, virtue was laughed to scorn and evil went unpunished; when, according to Follygob, virginity was a scream, and harlotry a hobby; and when, according to Sheepmeadow, homeliness was sin, and beauty but a gilded casket concealing vice and depravity unutterable.
History relates that though food was scarce and light hearts hard to find, at the birth of Sarah Twig there was no dearth of these commodities. The snow was on the ground, Follygob says—the woods and coppices and hills lay slumbering beneath a glistening white mantle. What a mind! To have written those words! It was undoubtedly Follygob's artistic style and phraseology that branded him once and for all as the master-chronicler of his time.
Sarah Twig was born in the east wing, a lofty room which can be viewed to this day by all true lovers of historical architecture. To describe it adequately is indeed difficult. Some say there was a bed in it and an early Norman window; others have it that there was no bed but a late Gothic fireplace; while a few outstanding writers insist that there was nothing at all in the room but a very old Roman washstand.
The night of Sarah's birth was indeed a wild one—snow and sleet eddied and swirled around the massive structure destined to harbour one whose radiant beauty was to be a byword in all Europe. The wind, so Follygob with his incomparable style tells us, lashed itself to a livid fury against the sturdy Ffraddle turrets and mullions, whilst outside beyond the keep and raised drawbridge the beacons and camp fires stained the frost-laden air with vivid streaks of red and yellow—colours which formed the background of the Ffraddle coat of arms, thus presenting an omen to the startled inhabitants which history relates they were not slow to recognise.
Bloodworthy describes for us the plan by which Lord Ffraddle was to acquaint the village with the sex of the child. If it were a boy, red fire was to be burnt on the south turret, and if a girl, green fire was to be burnt on the north turret; but unfortunately, he goes on to tell us, owing to some misadventure blue fire was firmly burnt on all the turrets. Imagine the horror of the superstitious populace! Some left the country never to return, crying aloud that a chameleon had been born to their beloved chatelaine!
Of Sarah's youth historians tell us little. She was, apart from her beauty, a very knowing child. Often when missing from the banqueting-hall she would be discovered in the library reading and studying the political works of the period.
Her adolescence was remarkable for little save the rapid development of her supple loveliness, some idea of which can be gauged from the reproduction of Punter's famous portrait on page 74. Though painted at a somewhat later date, this masterpiece still presents us with most of the leading characteristics of its ravishing model. Note the eyes—the dreamy, cognisant expression; glance at the pretty mouth and the dainty ears. Her demeanour is obviously that of a meek and modest woman, but Punter, with his true genius, has caught that glint of inward fire, that fleeting look of shy mischief that earned for her the world-famous nickname of "Winsome Sal."
It was when she was eighteen
The handsome, devil-may-care Julius Fenchurch-Streete applied to Lord Ffraddle for a secretaryship, which was ultimately granted to him. Imagine the situation—this rake, this dark-eyed ne'er-do-well, notorious all down Cheapside for his relentless dalliance with the fair, placed in intimate proximity with one of England's most glorious specimens of ripening womanhood. It was, Sheepmeadow writes, like the meeting of flint and tinder—these two so widely different in the essentials and yet so akin in their physical beauty. As was inevitable, from the first they loved—he with the flaming passion of a hell-rake, she with the sweet, appealing purity of one whose whole life had been peculiarly virginal. There followed swiftly upon their ardent confessions the determination to elope together. The night they bade adieu to Ffraddle and all it held is well known to young and old of every generation. They crept from their rooms at midnight and met at the top of the grand staircase, down which they proceeded to crawl on all fours. A few moments later they were on a sturdy mare, she riding pillion, he riding anyhow. Not a sound had been heard, not a dog had barked, not a bird had called. Once, Sheepmeadow informs us, Lady Ffraddle turned over in her sleep.
History is not very enlightening as to how long Julius Fenchurch-Streete lived with Sarah Twig—poor Sarah, the bubble of her romance soon was to be pricked. For three weeks they lived gloriously, radiantly, at the old sign of "The Cod and Haddock" in Egham. "My heart is a pool of ecstasy," she wrote in her diary. Pitiful pool, so soon to be drained of its joy!
Then the storm-clouds gathered, the sun withdrew its gold. Julius rode away—Sarah was alone, alone in Egham, her love unblessed by any sort of church, no name for the child to come—a sorry, sorry plight. The buxom proprietress of "The Cod and Haddock," little dreaming her real identity, set her to work. Work! for those fair hands, those inexpressibly filbert nails!
Was it the sudden relenting of malleable fate that caused the Merry Monarch to come riding blithely through sleepy Egham, followed by his equerry, Lord Francis Tunnell-Penge, and several of his suite? Halting outside the inn, Bloodworthy relates that his Majesty was immediately struck by a winsome face at an upper window. "Lud!" he cried laconically, and dismounted, taking several dogs from his hat as he did so, and one from his pocket; for he was devoted to animals, Bloodworthy goes on to say, and often spent days stroking their soft ears abstractedly. Then, seized by a sudden inspiration, he inquired of the landlady as to whose was the face he had seen. In a trice the story was told—the King waved his hand imperiously and took a pinch of snuff. "Send her to me," he said.
When Sarah entered, all hot from her manual labours, Charles started to his feet. Here was no scullion, no plaything of an idle hour. Here was breeding, dignity and beauty. Ah! Beauty! Probably these cold shores will never again shelter beauty like Sarah Twig's. On seeing the King she curtsied low. He bowed with the stately elegance for which he was famed.
"Your name?" he asked.
The glorious vision veiled her eyes.
"I have no name, sire—now." With these words, spoken from a heart surcharged with bitterest sorrow, the poor woman swooned away.
"Lud!" remarked the King irritably, "the girl must have a name. You must marry her, Francis—she shall be Lady Tunnell-Penge." Then the impulsive monarch stooped, and, opening a locket on the unconscious woman's breast, read the name Sarah in blue diamonds on an opaque background. "But," he added softly under his breath, "I shall know her only as 'Winsome Sal'!"
Thus Sarah Twig, so nearly an outcast through her own girlish folly, became possessor of a name honoured and even adored throughout England.
The first few years of her life at Court were more or less uneventful—she saw little of her husband and lots of the King. He and she used to wander along the river side, simply loaded with different dogs. Whenever there were theatricals given, Sheepmeadow tells us, Sarah invariably appeared as Diana or Minerva, preferring these parts on account of their suitability to her youth and figure. All these events took place long after Punter's portrait, though several others were done latterly. Her wit and gaiety were of course world-famed, and her political treatises are preserved to this day.
On one dramatic occasion her brilliant political knowledge and presence of mind were the means of saving England from turmoil or worse. Hearing that the people were hungry and restless, Sarah rushed to the King. "What's to do?" she cried breathlessly.
"God knows," replied Charles, adding "Lud!" as an afterthought. Then he went on fondling the long silky ears of one of his lap-dogs with which the room was strewn.
Heartbroken, Sarah left the room and rushed out of Whitehall as fast as her legs could carry her, heeding not the jeers of the crowd. She made for Tower Hill, from the summit of which she delivered her world-famous political speech, ending with the stirring words, "Sift your corn through sieves!"
How that speech sends a throb to one's heart—the defiance of it, the subtlety of it, and yet the intense womanliness of it! The people cheered her back to the palace. She went straight to the King's room—he was feeding his dogs.
"I've saved England!" cried Sarah exultantly.
"Lud!" replied the King, and handed her some cat's-meat. No wonder women loved him!
Incidents like these went to make up the multi-coloured mosaic of Sarah, Lady Tunnell-Penge's life. Her children were many—Arthur, later on Lord Crumpingfax; Muriel, later the Duchess of Dripp; and various others.
She died at the age of seventy-nine,
JABEZ PUFFWATER
JABEZ PUFFWATER,
Of Oggsville, Kentucky
JABEZ PUFFWATER might have been so much physically, mentally and publicly and has been so little any way that a tattered moral must hang sadly upon the gaunt tree of his career.
He might have been many things—he might have been a successful theatrical manager, or only an artistic one—he might have been a naval commander, or a psychoanalyst, or a Christian Science healer—he might have imparted to the United States Senate that infinitesimal something which would probably have proved to be the greatest comfort, especially in the cold weather.
If Mr. Belasco had not preferred Mr. David Warfield, Jabez Puffwater might have made an enormous success in "The Return of Peter Grimm"—had he but possessed an aptitude for histrionic achievement. He might have sung at the Metropolitan year after year without ceasing if Miss Geraldine Farrar had not taken an instantaneous dislike to him at sight—and had he but possessed a flamboyant temperament and an elementary knowledge of Puccini. In fact there is almost nothing he couldn't have been if only Fate had but weaned him at the breast of opportunity instead of ordaining his life drama to be played out in lonely dignity in the drab but intensely political village of Oggsville, Ken.
Oggsville, Ken. has been for many years a hotbed of occasionally seditious, but always subtle intrigue, the constructive and progressive policy of the upper part of the town, near the railway bridge, being in direct opposition to the destructive statesmanship and constitutional conventionality of the lower residential quarter embracing the timber-yard, Elijah Square, and Aunt Martha's Soda Fountain. Naturally Jabez Puffwater, whose modest store stood figuratively and literally at the crossing of the ways, was always in a somewhat uncertain state of mind as to which side he should ultimately pin his colours. Perhaps on a Tuesday St. John Eddle, a staunch upholder of the C. and P.P., would enter Jabez's store and hit him in the face because he'd sent a tin of sardines to the Furdlehoe Mansion on the other side of the River. And maybe on a Friday Moses Whortleberry, a leading light of the D. S. and C. C. would belabour him with one of his own hams for daring to acquaint old Hiram Holdit, the station master, with the result of the cocoa coupon competition.
One thing stood out firmly amid the turmoil of Jabez's environment—and that was his idealistic and almost fanatical admiration of the exploits of Buffalo Bill as depicted on the screen and retailed in small paper-bound books. Indeed so struck was he by the verve and virility of this astounding man that he took to attiring his lower limbs—which seldom showed above the counter—in the breeches, leggings, belt and pistol so well known to all lovers of the limitless prairie. The infinite pathos of Jabez Puffwater's blind devotion to one whom he had never seen will not fail to strike home to the stoniest heart. The tragedy of this man whose dauntless spirit so far outgrew his physical appearance—being compelled to sell cheeses, hams, molasses, etc, in order to live, is far more pitiful to me than the stern virginity of Queen Elizabeth, or even the nose of Cyrano de Bergerac.
It was when Jabez Puffwater had just reached his forty-third birthday that he first became seriously implicated in that political bombshell, the Goodge-Keewee Treaty made out with masterful cunning by Albert Goodge and Nicholas Keewee, with the sole motive of undermining the transcontinental railroad system to a devastating degree. The various reasons both for and against this daring policy are so excellently and clearly put forward in Vernon Treeby's "When Southern Blood is Dripping" that I will not attempt to go into it here. Enough that it caused an unparalleled sensation in Oggsville, Ken. and was indirectly the means of introducing into the heart of Jabez Puffwater the secret fear which was destined to grow ever larger and larger until eventually its black wings beat his battered soul into eternity. "The fear of a Black Rising!" Jabez was undoubtedly a man of more than average courage but after reading the Goodge-Keewee Treaty he went back to his store a harassed man. What did it all mean? Nobody knew. Ah, God! If only Jabez Puffwater had possessed the inspiring rhetoric of a Bernard Proon, or the imposing presence of a Freddie Hooter, what a lot he could have done. As it was he just went home—aching—yet withal as yet subconsciously—for the ability to be of use in some way, the opportunity of distinguishing himself and saving his belovÉd home town from the awful effects of the fear that was fated from now onward to be with him always—the dreaded Black Rising.
For many years after that fateful conference Jabez was to be seen every evening seated outside his store with a horse pistol in his hand ever pointed in the direction of the wooded hills to the Southward. Little boys on their way home from school would throw mud at him, but he never heeded them; little girls would make rude noises quite near him with their rubber overshoes, but he ignored them utterly. I often wonder on looking back what Douglas Bogtoe would have been had he but possessed one half of Puffwater's concentrated repose. That celebrated appeal for the Louisiana Canal installation would have been worded very differently and as for his world-famed piscatorial argument with Olaf Campbell in the Brooke Club—that would have probably been approached from an entirely opposite angle.
To analyse and compare Bogtoe's electrical psychology with the phlegmatic determination and boyish zeal of Puffwater would take, alas, too long; so I will not seek to say more than that had the two widely differentiated spirits but been combined within the same material tissues—that a quainter nor a more peculiar juxtaposition of entities it would have been hard to find, search where you may.
I try occasionally to picture to myself the lonely horror-stricken nights Jabez Puffwater must have endured with that appalling fear always crouching within him, egging him on towards the culminating tragedy of his sad career.
There had been talk of a lynching in New Orleans and of a shooting in Old Virginia and there were even whispers of a slapping in Alabama.
Jabez was priming his pistol one morning while he hastily scanned the elevating disclosures—social and otherwise—of the New York American, when a breathless woman rode up to the store on a tricycle. She delivered a note to Jabez and waited while he read it.
"Come at once—am exceedingly ill—Aunt Topsy."
Jabez thought for a moment—then crushing down his rising apprehensions he mounted his mare Buffalo Babs and made for the hills.
Ten miles there and ten miles back, and the fear always with him—the fear of the Black Rising.
Many psychoanalysts have endeavoured to discover the exact motive for Jabez Puffwater's sudden and unexpected slaying of his old Aunt Topsy—whose coal-black arms had fondled him as a baby. Many theories have been put forward, but none of them—with the exception, perhaps, of Herman Pipper—possess the ring of truth. Pipper's deduction of the circumstantial evidence is that it was all the outcome of a naughty practical joke played by little Michael Drisher who appeared suddenly during Jabez's interview with his Aunt and burst the awful news upon them that there had been a fearful Black Rising in Oggsville, Ken. and that debauch—murder—and worse were going on all over the globe.
"With a great cry," Pipper tells us, "Jabez smote his brow. 'At last!' he moaned in deep anguish. 'At last it has come!' Then he turned, and seizing a large milk bottle he battered the head of Aunt Topsy, crying the while in the voice of a fanatic, 'For my home town! For my home town! This is a just reprisal!!!' Then with a last look at the havoc he had wrought he went out of the house and into the wilderness—"
Pipper's imaginative description ends too abruptly to be really satisfactory; but one fact about the life of Jabez Puffwater will remain emblazoned on America's history for time immemorial—that if he had only possessed the rhetoric of a Proon—the presence of a Hooter—the education of a Floop—the racial understanding of a Bogtoe and the mentality of a Snurge—he would not only have proved himself invaluable to the home constituency of Oggsville, Ken. but have been an entirely different man altogether.
SCHWEINEN-KALBER
GRETCHEN LIEBERWURST ZU SCHWEINEN-KALBER
GRETCHEN LIEBERWURST ZU SCHWEINEN-KALBER
From the famous etching by Grobmeyer
HOW strange it seems that she of whom we write is dust and less than dust below the fertile soil of her so beloved Prussia—Furstin Lieberwurst zu Schweinen-Kalber! Can you not rise from the grave once more to charm us with the magic of your voice? Are those deep, mellowed tones, so sonorous and appealing, never to be heard again? Ah, me! Why, indeed, should such divinity be so short lived? Who could play Juliet as she could? Nobody! Her enemies laughed and said that her chronic adenoids utterly destroyed all the beauty of the part. Jealousy! Vile jealousy! Genius always has that to contend with. Every one has failings. Gretchen Lieberwurst zu Schweinen-Kalber made of Juliet a woman—a pulsating, human woman, with failings like the rest of us, the chief of which happened to be adenoids.
To trace this soul-stirring actress to her obscure birth has indeed been a labour—but withal, a labour of love! For who could help experiencing exquisite joy at unearthing trinkets and miniatures and broken memories of such a radiant being?
Nuremburg, red-roofed and gleaming in the sunlight, was the place wherein she first saw the light of day. Her father, Peter Schmidt, was by trade a sausage-moulder, for in those far-off days there was not the vast machinery of civilisation to wield the good meat into the requisite shape. Gretchen, when a girl, often used to watch her father as he plied his trade and recite to him verses she had learnt at her dame school—fragments from the Teutonic masterpieces of the time—"Kruschen Kruschen," and—
"Baby white and baby red,
Like a moon convulsive
Rolling up and down the bed,
Utterly repulsive!"—
a beautiful little lullaby of Herman Veigel's. Gretchen used to recite it with the tears pouring down her cheeks, so poignantly affected was she by the sensitive beauty of it. Her father also used to weep hopelessly—also her mother, if she happened to be near; and Heinrich, the cat, invariably retreated under the sofa, unutterably moved.
Life dragged on with some monotony for Gretchen. She often used to help her mother in the kitchen—and occasionally in the sitting-room. One day she became a woman! Every one noticed it. Neighbours used to meet her mother in the strasse and say, "Frau Schmidt, your Gretchen is a woman." Frau Schmidt would nod proudly and reply, "Yes, we have seen that; my Peter and I—we are very happy." Thus Gretchen left her girlhood behind her. It was her habit, so Grundelheim tells us, to walk out in the forest with one Hans Breitel, an actor at the municipal theatre. He used to teach her to talk to the birds, and when she besought him ardently to tell her stories of the theatre, he would relate to her the parts he had nearly played. Gretchen's heart thrilled—oh to be an actress, an actress! On her twenty-fourth birthday von Bottiburgen
"The Great Goethe ate at his lunch. What was that noise? He swiftly put down his knife: the door bursts open; Gretchen Schmidt enters, her lovely hair awry, her cheeks flushed. 'I will act!' she cries in bell-like tones. 'Ach, ach!' cries Goethe. Then Gretchen, with a superb gesture, hangs her hat on the door handle, and recites to the amazed man his beloved 'Faust,' word for word, syllable for syllable!"
Thus Brampenrich shows us, with his supreme word imagery, what really happened.
Gretchen never saw Goethe again; he left Berlin almost immediately for the Black Forest. Gretchen, alone in the great capital, alone and a woman, what could she do? Grundelheim, in his celebrated "Toilers who have Toiled," relates how desperately hard she worked with her mangle in the Konigstrasse. Then one day, when things seemed at their blackest, Romance, with its multi-coloured finger, poked a hole in the bubble of her existence. The King of Prussia drove along the Konigstrasse, bowing to right and left. Gretchen stepped lightly over her mangle and dropped a curtsey. The King was immediately captivated, and a few hours later the happy girl found herself in the Royal Palace. After that events moved rapidly. At the lax German Court Gretchen soon forgot her austere upbringing, and entered into the round games and charades with untold abandon! Alas! the fickle heart of the King was soon turned from her. Realising this Gretchen seized upon a noble much enamoured of her, Furst Lieberwurst zu Schweinen-Kalber, and married him one spring morning in the Chapel Royal. For three months they lived together in the Austrian Tyrol; then Gretchen, heeding at last the persistent call of her art, left him, and fled back to Berlin, where she obtained an engagement to play Juliet. It was from that moment that her real passion for her part developed. It grew to be an obsession—she was fÊted, lauded, mentioned in several public speeches. For sixty-five years she played it all over Germany, never tiring, never weakening. People gibbered over her; then came her tragic death at the age of ninety-two in the balcony scene. She stumbled forward, Grundelheim says, then backward, then forward, then backward again, and then forward for the last time. The balcony gave way, and she fell at Romeo's feet (it was the great Fritz Schnotter, with whom she had been playing for two years: in private life he was, of course, her lover—she always insisted on that).
History tells us that he caught her in his arms—Bottiburgen contests that he caught her in the middle of his chest; anyhow, the house is said to have risen and cheered, thinking it was a new scene suddenly interpolated. Then the curtain slowly fell, and they realised the truth—they would never see their idolised Gretchen again.
In passing, it would perhaps be as well to mention some of the famous Romeos who played opposite this bewitcher of all sexes. There was Reginald Bug, a young Englishman, who loved her passionately for a few years; then the renowned Pierre Dentifrice from the ComÉdie FranÇaise; then Angelo Carlini, and Basto Caballero (founder of the Shakespearean Theatre in Barcelona); then Dimitri Chuggski, a very temperamental, highly strung Russian (it is in Volume VIII. of Edgar Sheepmeadow's "Beds and their Inmates" that he relates the story of Chuggski's desertion of Gretchen; he contends that he left her because she always slept with her mouth open).
Her last and most famous lover on and off the stage was the aforementioned Fritz Schnotter; he is treated lavishly in three volumes of Bottiburgen.
Her portrait on page 100 is a reproduction of Grobmeyer's etching. The original could formerly be viewed, I believe, by applying to the Kaiser for permission and paying 18,000 marks.
JAKE D'ANNUNZIO SPOUT
JAKE D'ANNUNZIO SPOUT
World-famed Writer
WHY is it that to some are vouchsafed such supreme gifts while other have perforce to drag out their lives in the hideous monotony of offices and banks and the like?
Jake D'Annunzio Spout—even he, Jake the glorious—Spout the magnificent—commenced his career behind the counter of a delicatessen on Ninth Avenue—and now—his name and glory have waved across America like a pennon of victory. I do not intend as others have done to describe every small detail of his early life
The three books he wrote while still working in the delicatessen store are indelibly stamped with the pathos of his environment—"Thoughts in Vinegar," a bitter satire on bohemianism—"Three Little Pickles," an autobiography of the Barrymores as children and "The lonely Anchovy," a whimsical fantasy which if we are to believe Town Topics made Sir James Barrie quite furious.
The story of the sudden recognition of Jake D'Annunzio Spout's genius by the more advanced literary coterie of New York City, etc., is widely known but too charming to leave unmentioned. He was, so we are told, seated on an upturned wooden box behind a pile of cheeses, sunk in a reverie, when suddenly the door opened and three men came into the store.
"We wish to see Jake D'Annunzio Spout," said the foremost with a rich Harvard accent.
Jake rose shyly, knocking a Camembert to the ground in his embarrassment. "I am he," he said blushing.
A grey-haired man sniffed and waved his hand comprehensively. "You must leave these sordid surroundings," he said in a beautifully modulated voice in which a bad cold and a Yale intonation struggled for precedence, "and come with us."
"Where to?" cried Jake clutching a salami sausage with boyish excitement.
All three men doffed their hats.
"To the Coffee House," they said reverently.
"At this point," says Earl Hank in his exquisite study, 'Spout Through and Through,' tears of ecstasy gushed down the boy's cheeks. 'At last,' he cried in a choked voice and swooned.
The three men gathered him up tenderly and carried him out towards the Elevated—"
Of course the salient feature of Hank's study of Spout is the deep love and affection for his subject which permeates every page. Nobody but a true enthusiast and lover of beauty could ever have been so inspired. It was not until reaching the intellectually austere atmosphere of the Coffee House that Spout regained consciousness: he opened his eyes wearily, but the light of dazzled amazement replaced fatigue when he beheld the company that surrounded him—every man's face seemed to be stamped indelibly with the ineffaceable mark of artistic achievement. Spout rose in happy, awed wonderment.
Hands were stretched forth to him in welcome and friendship—one of the younger members gave vent to a furtive cheer but was instantly suppressed. Lunch, we are told, was to the newly-discovered poet a long dream of ecstasy, with the exception of one incident which, though somewhat painful, it is necessary to retail in order to illustrate what havoc habit can work on even the brightest psychologies. Earl Bowles (a descendant of Senator Didcot Bowles—beloved by all) in his rather wordy dissertation on "Intellects of the Hour" presents to us perhaps the most vivid picture of the scene.
"Harvey Pricklebott, for several years editor of 'Art in the Home,' leant forward to the dazed Spout and requested him to pass a plate of cold tongue which was lying near. With businesslike alacrity Spout did so—and then before anyone could prevent it—detached from his belt a delicatessen payment check for 25 cents and pushed it across the table."
"There was a dreadful silence—Spout realising his appalling error endeavoured to pass it off by humming the Jewel Song from Faust. For a moment his nonchalance amazed everyone then as though a veil had been suddenly snatched from their eyes they gave a great cry: 'This is Spout! What Humour! What Roguery! Spout the Brilliant!'"
After this serio-comic contretemps every remark Spout made was hailed by all as a gem of superlative wit.
From the moment of his entrance into the Coffee House, Spout's career was assured—encouraged by his amazing success in a milieu to which many aspired but few attained, he at once wrote about it, probably his most world-famed novel, "The Continuous Fall of Harriet Ramsbotham." To say that this daring attack upon existing social conditions caused a sensation is to put the case mildly—it was a positive literary tour de force. Take for example the extraordinarily vital passage in volume two—when Harriet is insulted by Donald at a soda fountain, or the sordidly realistic moment in volume three when she is horsewhipped by Frederick on Long Beach—and above all perhaps those few tense seconds in volume one when Norman having lured her to Childs' for supper brands her left thigh with a flat-iron. Immediately upon publication of this masterpiece Spout received five hundred and ninety-four letters from anxious mothers, eight hundred and two requests for sexual advice from oppressed governesses and several threatening telegrams from the police.
The ordinary everyday novelist would at once have become bombastic and conceited at being the cause of such a universal upheaval—not so Spout. He retired quite quietly to his cosy kitchenette apartment in Harlem and wrote that charming and winsome essay in sentiment "Mollie's Holiday"—which in due course he followed with his celebrated treatise on reincarnation "A Drop of Blood" and "To Horse, to Horse" a stirring romance of the Civil War.
I will not seek with convincing falsehoods and unscrupulous sophistry to hide the fact that Jake D'Annunzio Spout was never quite a gentleman. Others have endeavoured to do this and to my mind it is not only degrading but quite unworthy of the man's genius to dwell on such paltry failings as bad table manners, slight personal uncleanliness and the like. Many of the greatest men in the world have bitten their nails, and if we are to believe contemporary biographers, even the gloriously verbose Carlyle was known to expectorate frequently and with the utmost abandon while writing his world-famed fantasy "The French Revolution."
Jake Spout was perhaps twenty-six when he met H. Mackenzie Kump the philanthropic millionaire whose intimate study "Spout, as I Knew Him" met with such a brilliant success last year. Kump it was who cajoled and eventually almost by force persuaded Jake to make a tour of the world. Kump it was who nursed him devotedly through malaria in Mombasa, dysentery in Delhi, hernia in Hong Kong, cramp in Cape Town and acute earache in Edinburgh, and who soothed his bedside with almost womanly tenderness during his fearful outbreak of varicose veins in Vancouver. The work Spout accomplished in spite of slightly adverse circumstances while abroad was quite stupendous and had it not been for his tragic marriage would doubtless have been published with alacrity and read by millions. It was presumably the will of an unkind fate that he should be pursued and eventually captured by EsmÉ Chaddle—a woman not only without scruples of any description but possessing a revoltingly ugly face and the temper of a fiend. It was on their honeymoon that she became suddenly cross at breakfast and burnt all the unpublished MSS. that she could find in the back yard, thereby destroying heartlessly the luscious fruits of untold labour while abroad. Spout with the contradictory stubbornness characteristic of so many geniuses continued—though very hurt—to adore his vixenish wife with the blind concentrated passion which for so many years had impregnated his work and now, alas, was running to waste on such an unyielding desert. His literary friends and admirers one and all shook their heads sadly, perceiving reluctantly that the end was in sight. For two years Spout wrote nothing but three short articles,
For a true and sincere description of that last tragic night we must turn to Richard Floop—whose love for Spout has lent his pen so much glamour and poetry.
"Dusk was falling when Jake stole softly out through the scullery door and clambered on the char-À-banc for Coney Island. On arrival at that home of gaiety and irresponsibility he forgot his troubles—his sordid domestic upheavals—even his talent he suppressed and merged himself like an ordinary human being into the mad spirit of carnival. With boyish shouts he rolled on the joy-wheel; with childish gurgles he bestrode strange and jolting painted horses and waved his hat daringly when the merry-go-round was at its fastest. His excitement on the helter-skelter knew no bounds—while his delighted screams in the river caves called forth many appreciative raspberries from the friendly crowds. With no presentiment that this evening of unadulterated ecstasy was to be the culminating and final sensation in his eventful life he stepped into that fatal compartment on the big wheel—from which a quarter of an hour later he hurtled when at an enormous height from the ground!"
There ends Floop's beautiful and heart-breaking picture of the death of a great and wonderful man. Some say it was suicide—others that he was merely leaning out too far in admiration of the view. Who knows what really inspired that sudden fierce rush to death? But whatever the cause there is one fact that remains—shining like a star above the squalid wreck of his latter years—he died happy. The indisputable proof of this can be obtained from perusal of the first line of a poem which was discovered in his breast pocket:
"All Hail to Fun and Merriment—"
The less widely-known works of Jake D'Annunzio Spout are as follows:
"Sun-dappled Dreams," a book of poems.
"Through Bavaria with a Note-book."
"The Sin of Pharoah Bubster."
and:
"With Lincoln in Calcutta," a Fantasy.
Fountain-pen pieces and ever-sharp pencil in collection of H. Mackenzie Kump.
DONNA ISABELLA ANGELICA Y BANANAS
DONNA ISABELLA ANGELICA Y BANANAS
From the portrait by Baloona (early Spanish)
SPAIN has ever been the home of romance and beauty and fiery passion, but never in its whole history has it bred such a tremulously beautiful love story as that of Donna Isabella Angelica y Bananas. A romance of two passionate hearts in such a vivid setting cannot but fail to make the eye kindle and the pulses throb. Compared to it, Lancelot and Elaine become cardboard puppets, Dante and Beatrice figures of clay utterly devoid of life, while Paolo and Francesca appear merely idiotic.
Picture to yourself, if you will, the Spain of the Middle Ages; if you can't, it doesn't matter. Isabella Angelica was born at Seville in 1582, the daughter of Don Juan de Cabarajal and Maria his wife. Don Juan owned the Castello del Hurtado, having been left it by his infamous but regal uncle, Don Lopez a Basastos.
The Castello lay surrounded in the foreground by turrets and moats, in the middle distance by orange groves and extraordinarily verdant meadows; while in the background the majestic Pyrenees, rearing their snowy peaks in serried ranks of symmetrical splendour, imparted to the whole thing the semblance of rugged grandeur which is the birthright of every true Spaniard. Isabella Angelica's childhood dawned and waned in these exquisite surroundings: she would play with her tutors various games, some of them traditional, such as "catch orange" and "raralara,"
When she reached the age of twenty—"the very threshold of womanhood," as Fernando Lope so beautifully puts it—she was betrothed to Pedro y Bananas, a noble fresh from the vice and debauchery of the Court at Valladolid. Knowing naught of love or passion, she consented without hesitation, being but a tool in the hands of her parents, and a few months later the wedding took place with enormous pomp in the Cathedral at Seville.
After the ceremony the bride and bridegroom repaired to the Palazza Bananas, the country seat of Pedro, who, though poor himself, had had many costly estates handed down to him.
Here, so report tells us, after subjecting Isabella Angelica for three years to the vilest insults and utmost cruelty, Pedro left her temporarily and returned to the Court, now at Castille. Poor Isabella Angelica! This was the gay world she had dreamed of—the ecstatic life she had hoped and fully expected to live!
Then suddenly with the departure of her husband, she found peace—peace in the rocky solitudes, in the scented gardens and rolling foothills; and here this poor, lonely woman found fulfilment of all her maiden dreams—"Love!"
No one knows the authentic story of her first meeting with Enrique Baloona. Some say he was fishing for bolawallas
But alack! as is the way with all beauty, it is but short-lived. The end of their peaceful passion came with the announcement of Pedro's return from the Court, now at Aragon. Isabella Angelica, history relates, was beside herself with misery. Enrique also was considerably upset. Together the doomed couple arranged a plan of escape. They flew together to the Villa Morla, a notorious abode of illicit lovers. It was here that the enraged Pedro caught up with them and killed Enrique with a look. Isabella Angelica was then taken against her will to join the Court. At last at Madrid. For two years, Dr. Polata tells us, her heart was numb with anguish; then gradually the life at Court, still at Madrid, began to take effect on her malleable character. She became intensely vicious: much of the sweetness portrayed in Enrique's portrait vanished, leaving her expression cross and occasionally even sullen. All the world knows of her meeting with the Infanta, so we will not dwell upon it. One day her husband died unexpectedly. Cruel-minded courtiers suspected Isabella Angelica, but she was so obviously crushed that their suspicions were allayed. Her heart exulted—she had killed him with a poisoned pen-wiper. No one knew. Poor Isabella Angelica! Her tragic love affair had indeed transformed her from the appealing girl of yesterday to the recklessly unhappy woman of to-day, forced on to the path of cruelty and vice by unlooked-for circumstances. She performed this deed and that with almost mechanical diabolicism; some say she knew not one day from another. In 1597 she was offered an exceedingly good position by the Inquisition, which she immediately accepted. It was, she felt, her only chance of happiness—to have the opportunity of inventing a few good tortures would comfort her; and why not? People of to-day, narrow and unsympathetic, may censure her as being spiteful and unkind, but in those days things were—oh, so different!
She sent for her little brother and had him burnt; this eased the pain at her heart a little. Then her aunt was conveyed to her from Majorca, and on arrival was pierced by several bodkins and ultimately buried in hot tar. Isabella Angelica almost gave vent to a wan smile.
She supervised her father's death, the actual work being performed by her colleagues of the Inquisition. He was cut in moderate-sized snippets and toasted on one side only.
It says much for Isabella Angelica's charm and personality that the populace, in spite of their knowledge of her deeds, one and all adored her—to the end of her life the unstinting love and adulation of all who came in contact with her was hers irretrievably.
It was during the personal mutilation of her third cousin that she caught the influenza cold which cost her her life. Poor, doomed Isabella Angelica: her death-bed was surrounded by heart-broken mourners who had flocked from all parts of sunny Spain to pay tribute to the dying beauty; the Inquisition issued an edict that no eyes were to be put out for a whole week in honour of her.
She died peacefully, clasping an ivory rosary and a faded miniature on elephant's hide, portraying a handsome, debonair young man. Could it have been Enrique Baloona?
Thus lived and died one of Spain's most entrancing specimens of feminine beauty.
MAGGIE McWHISTLE
MAGGIE McWHISTLE
From an old painting by Ronald Gerphipps
BORN in an obscure Scotch manse of Jacobite parents, Maggie McWhistle goes down to immortality as perhaps the greatest heroine of Scottish history; and perhaps not. We read of her austere Gallic beauty in every record and tome of the period—one of the noble women whose paths were lit for them from birth by Destiny's relentless lamp. What did Maggie know of the part she was to play in the history of her country? Nothing. She lived through her girlhood unheeding; she helped her mother with the baps and her father with the haggis; occasionally she would be given a new plaidie—she who might have had baps, haggis, and plaidies ten thousandfold for the asking. A word must be said of her parents. Her father, Jaimie, known all along Deeside as Handsome Jaimie—how the light-hearted village girls mourned when he turned minister: he was high, high above them. Of his meeting with Janey McToddle, the Pride of Bonny Donside, very little is written. Some say that they met in a snowstorm on Ben Lomond, where she was tending her kine; others say that they met on the high road to Aberdeen and his collie Jeannie bit her collie Jock—thus cementing a friendship that was later on to ripen into more and more—and even Maggie. Some years later they were wed, and Jaimie led his girl-bride to the little manse which was destined to be the birthplace of one of Scotland's saviours. History tells us little of Maggie McWhistle's childhood: she apparently lived and breathed like any more ordinary girl—her griddle cakes were famous adown the length and breadth of Aberdeen. Gradually a little path came to be worn between the manse and the kirk, seven miles away, where Maggie's feet so often trod their way to their devotions. She was intensely religious.
One day a stranger came to Aberdeen. He had braw, braw red knees and bonnie, bonnie red hair. History tells us that on first seeing Maggie in her plaidie he smiled, and that the second time he saw her he guffawed, so light-hearted was he.
One day he called at the manse, chucked Maggie under the chin, and ate one of her baps. Eight years later he came again, and, after tweaking her nose, ate a little haggis. By then something seemed to have told her that he was her hero.
One dark night, so the story runs, there came a hammering on the door. Maggie leapt out of her truckle, and wrapping the plaidie round her, for she was a modest girl, she ran to the window.
"Wha is there?" she cried in Scotch.
The answer came back through the darkness, thrilling her to the marrow:
"Bonnie Prince Charlie!"
Maggie gave a cry, and, running down-stairs, opened the door and let him in. She looked at him in the light shed by her homely candle. His brow was amuck with sweat: he was trembling in every limb; his ears were scarlet.
"What has happened?"
"I am pursued," he replied, hoarse with exertion and weariness. "Hide me, bonnie lassie, hide me, hide me!"
Quick as thought, Maggie hid him behind the door, and not a moment too soon. Then she displayed that strength of will and courage which was to stamp her as a heroine for all time. There came a fresh hammering on the door. Maggie opened it defiantly, and never flinched at the sight of so many brawny men; she only wrapped her plaidie more tightly round her.
"We want Bonnie Prince Charlie," said the leader, in Scotch.
Then came Maggie's well-known answer, also in Scotch.
"Know you not that this is a manse?"
History has it that the man fell back as though struck, and one by one, awed by the still purity of the white-faced girl, the legions departed into the night whence they had come. Thus Maggie McWhistle proved herself the saviour of Bonnie Prince Charlie for the first time.
There were many occasions after that in which she was able to prove herself a heroine for his sake. She would conceal him up the chimney or in the oven at the slightest provocation. Soon there were no trees for thirty miles round in which she had not hidden him at some period or another.
Poor Maggie—perchance she is finding in heaven the peaceful rest which was so lacking in her life on earth. For legend hath it that she never had two consecutive nights' sleep for fifteen years, so busy was she saving Bonnie Prince Charlie.
Then came that great deed which even now finds an exultant echo in the heart of every true Scotsman—that deed which none but a bonnie, hardy Highland lassie could have got away with.... You all know of the massing of James' troops at Carlisle, and later at Glasgow, and later still at Aberdeen. Poor Prince Charlie—so sonsie and braw, a fugitive in his own land—he fled to Loch Morich, followed by Maggie McWhistle in her plaidie, carrying some haggis and baps to comfort him in his exile. History is rather hazy as to exactly what happened; but anyhow, Maggie, with the tattered banner of her country fast unfurling in her heart, decided to save her hero for the last time; and it was well she did not tarry longer, for he was sore pressed. History relates that two tears fell from his eyes on to the shore.
"Eat," she said in Scotch; "you are probably very hungry."
These simple words, spoken straight from her heart, had the effect, so chroniclers inform us, of pulling him together a bit.
"Where can I hide?" he asked.
Maggie looked at him fearlessly for a moment.
"You shall hide in a tree," she cried, with sudden inspiration.
Bonnie Prince Charlie fell on his braw red knees.
"Please," he cried pleadingly, "could it be an elm? I'm so tired of gnarled oaks."
"Yes!" cried the courageous girl exultantly. "Quick, we will trick them yet."
Then came the supreme moment—the act of sheer devotion that was to brand that simple soul through the ages as a noble martyr in, alas! a lost cause. Shading her eyes with her hand, she perceived a legion of the enemy encamped on the one island of which the lonely Gallic loch boasted. Her woman's wit had devised a plan. Flinging baps and haggis to the winds, she leapt into a boat and began to row—you all know the story of that fateful row. Round and round the island she went for three weeks,
Thus did the strategy of a simple Highland lassie defeat the aims of generals whose hearts and souls had been steeped from birth in the sanguinary ways of war. Of her journey home with the Prince you all know; and what her white-haired father said when she arrived you've heard hundreds of times. There has been a lot of argument as to the exact form the Prince's gratitude took. Some say he unwrapped her plaidie and went away with it; others write that he cut a lock of his braw red hair and gave it to her with his usual merry smile; but the authentic version of that moving scene is that of the burnt scone. Maggie had baked a scone and handed it to him; then, after he had bitten it, he handed it back.
"Nay, lassie, nay," he is said to have remarked. "My purse is empty but my heart is full. Take this scone imprinted by my royal teeth, and treasure it."
Then with a debonair bow and a ready laugh, a mocking shout and whimsical wink, he went out into dreary Galway—a homeless wanderer.
Of Maggie's death very little is known. Some say she died of hay-fever; others say it was nasal catarrh; but only her old mother, with a woman's unerring instinct, guessed the truth: in reality she died of a broken heart and a burnt scone.
RUPERT PLINGE
RUPERT PLINGE
Aged 9 Months and 4 Years, Respectively
UNDER the blue-grey shadow of the Didcot Bowles bungalow, with beech trees and pussy willows fringing the banks of the river Sippe which runs, or ran before it was dammed, down past old Caesar Earwhacker's bicycle shed, three miles from the village of Sagrada, Conn., to the West and eight miles from Roosefelt under the hill to the North leaving the South free for a Black Rising and the East for the Civil War;—there in the seventeenth cottage, with green shutters, below the bridge—with the pine cones occasionally tap-tapping against the pantry window—owing to a strange combination of circumstances Rupert Plinge's elder sister first saw the light of day. Rupert himself being born ten months later at Guffle Hoe.
Had he been born on the lower reaches of the Yukon and baptised by a remittance man in a Wesleyan Chapel, he would probably not have suffered so acutely from the cold as he did at Guffle Hoe, nor could he have been more persistently victimised and handicapped in after life by bronchial asthma and pyorrhoea of the gums.
Though coldness for a baby was unpleasant in 1870 it was infinitely more tiresome in 1592 and perfectly devastating in 1306. But Guffle Hoe—try to reflect if possible the troglodytic fun of being born within earshot and eyeshot of people such as Granville Boo, General Udby, Ex-President Sumplethock, Senator Mills-Tweeper and Harriet Beecher Stowe; and places such as Mount Knitting, Mudlake West, Pigeon Park and Appleblossom Villa. These influential factors combined were undoubtedly the foundations of the enormous mathematical ability which became apparent long before the boy attained the age of three, but unfortunately for the level development of his mentality, the repulsive plainness of Senator Mills-Tweeper coupled with the innate idiocy of General Udby, completely overshadowed the girlish charm of Harriet Beecher Stowe. Had Rupert been consulted would he have liked playing the game at all—holding the cards in the wrong hand as he did from the very start without the slightest conception of what the game really was and why they were playing it? But it is quite obvious now to anyone looking back over the years that had the cards of his life been shuffled by his Auntie Gracie before her elopement to the Klondyke with Ex-Senator Fortescue, the ultimate stakes would have been immeasurably dissimilar. At this time the harsh political spirit of Guffle Hoe was morally if not physically and perhaps mentally inflamed by the appearance of several tramp steamers in the mouth of the Sippe, a new hay-cart at Oozeworthy Farm, and the flashing of the electrifying news across the newly erected telegraph wires that Peter Rotepillar and Henry Plugg had, apart from their dramatic refusal to enter themselves as candidates for the Presidency, declined to take any further interest in politics at all and had set up a flourishing bee nursery in Bokewood, Mass. This was on a Friday. Rupert was two months old and naturally sensitive—living and sometimes breathing in such a political atmosphere—to the far-reaching effects of such a shattering blow to the constituency. Of all this that was being performed to complicate his education he became suddenly conscious of an innate sense of the roundness of the whole universe. He began to find himself continually oppressed by the protuberant nearness and corresponding magnitude of his mother's face, which grafted itself upon his infant psychology by looming with maddening regularity over his cot and consciousness. The peculiar rotundity of this good woman's countenance seemed to illustrate to the rising sun of his genius the ethics of that science at which—had he but lived seventy years later—he might have become so famous:—Geography.
On September 9th, 1871, he developed croup, which in due course promoted him to one of the first steps of artistic education—Colour.
For several days he hung between life and death, turning an exquisite shade of purple and black as each new coughing fit seized him. This not unusual phenomenon impressed its vivid seal upon the plastic wax of his unfledged memories with extraordinary precision. In after life, for a long while, he was quite unable to gaze at an ordinary muscat grape or a coal-scuttle without either biting his comforter right through or being extremely sick. Naturally this disability coupled with the physical weakness and sense of impotence that he invariably experienced when in the company of his older companions occasioned him much unhappiness; in fact, many of the intense sorrows of his childhood were caused by the thoughtless mockery of his sister Leah Clara, aged nineteen months.
To the uninitiated spectator it would appear when gazing casually at young Rupert Plinge that the psychologically educational environment surrounding him was deeply impregnated with the spirit of political reformation which, though neither Elizabethan in tone nor strictly Cromwellian in atmosphere, was strongly suggestive to the lay mind of the Second Empire. The subconscious force of this abstract influence went far toward moulding the delicate shoots of his rapidly developing mentality into a brilliant knowledge of weights and measures, decimals, and the native population of Borneo.
Whether Rupert was enjoying his rubber comforter on the cool green grass, or on the slightly painful gravel, or on the fiercely hot asphalt, summer was to him a season of unsurpassed sensuality, flooding his character with rich productive thought and a passionate adoration for his great-aunt Maud, who was wont to beguile the long sun-stained hours by lying amid cushions among the foliage, humming "The Star-Spangled Banner," while she removed with the point of her nail-scissors caramels and other adhesive morsels from the gutta-percha plate of her new false teeth which lay in her lap.
With an amazing clarity of perception which, though generally supposed to be inherited from his great-uncle Miles, for fifty-four years Unitarian minister in the Red Lamp district of Honolulu, would undoubtedly in the searching light of twentieth century vision be mainly attributed to prenatal influences and astronomical premonitions, he realised that the atmosphere was exceedingly chilly in the winter.
Later biographists have exposed with somewhat malicious emphasis the one weak point in an otherwise magnificently constructed intelligence—to wit, the peculiar inability to recognise the inner psychology and spiritual determination of his great-grandfather—Bobbie Plinge—who as all the world knows met a tragic death at the hands of Great Brown Spratt, the last but one of the Mohicans, some fifteen years before the birth of Rupert himself. This deficiency in one of the greatest of all American characters was in a measure remedied by his excessive appreciation of his grandfather O'Callaghan Soddle's luxurious house in Boob Street, later on when the abode of stupendous intellect had been completely gutted by fire and soaked in water. The boy Rupert, then aged two years and a fortnight, exercised a fiercely dominant influence upon the ground charts, plans, etc., for the new palatial residence which was soon to rear its mighty pillars and porticos not so very far from the ivy-grown cottage which in the past had on several occasions sheltered the wistful personality of Harriet Beecher Stowe.
The inherent passion for beauty thus crystallized in the mellowing virility of the boy's finely wrought temperament went far toward satisfying his deep-rooted and well-nigh insatiable yearning for city splendour.
In the strange juxtaposition to his unequalled comprehension of national political problems was a surprising streak of frank insouciance and happy-hearted boyishness, which frequently expressed itself in the open defiance of authority in the shape of his great-aunt Maud, his slightly dropsical mother (nÉe Sheila Soddle) and his two resident cousins, Alexander Chaffinch and Dorothy Bonk, who at moments were entirely unable even to bend the finely tempered steel of his inflexible will, therefore on the one occasion when his decisive plans were unexpectedly frustrated an impression was photographed with extraordinary bas-relief upon his mind of the omnipotence of his quite infirm Grandfather Soddle—and of power as a concrete argument. The incident being the removal of a half-sucked tin soldier from his hand by the subtle device of striking his knuckles sharply with the fire tongs. Then and always the boy insisted that this method of reprimand justified his apparent submission; the emptiness of his hand and the smarting of his knuckles indubitably marking probably the only occasion in his life when all his strategical points abruptly turned inward. Contrary to the suppositions of impartial psychologists, far from breeding the slightest resentment against old Mr. Soddle, this occurrence inspired an active dislike to great-aunt Maud who had indulged in her ever-irritating laugh at his expense. He expressed his natural anger by filling her handkerchief-case with bacon fat, and other boyish revenges of a like nature.
A child whose soaring entity had been nourished and over tended in such an exotic forcing house of accumulated endeavour and democratic emancipation must indubitably have been the first to realise that the austerity of his massive intellect was within measurable distance of completing that predestined cycle of universal knowledge and aspiring ultimately to the glorious pinnacle of political achievement.
Rupert Plinge's fourth birthday had scarce dawned across the hills of time when the long drawn out shadow of earthly obscurity completely enveloped the brightest flower of nineteenth century America. The almost morbid cultivation of his superluminary brain reached its devastating climax while committing to memory the anatomy of the common grub in order to demonstrate to the Eastern constituency the fundamental principles of fiscal autonomy. Lying in his cot, his large pale eyes fixed grimly on a visionary goal, he realised with an intuitive pang that the hour of dismissal was at hand. Calling his mother to him he asked his last illuminating question, his mind groping still in search of truth's flaming beacon:
"Mother, why am I dying?"
Mrs. Plinge leant over him and whispered impressively, "You are dying of dropsy caused by over-education!" And turning on her heel she went slowly out of the room.
Delirium entered the darkening nursery. Rupert, clasping his hot-water bottle raptly, murmured dreamily as he merged into the Great Unknown, the crystallisation of the subconscious influence which had permeated his whole career—
"Dropsy, Dropsy,
Topsy, Topsy—
Harriet Beecher Stowe."
ANNA PODD
ANNA PODD
From a very old Russian oleograph
THOUGH of humble origin, though poor and unblessed with any of life's luxuries, Anna Podd made her way in the world with unfaltering determination. The tragedy of her life was perhaps her ambition, but who could blame her for wishing to better herself? She had nothing—nothing but her beauty. What a woman's beauty can do for herself and her country is amply portrayed in the kaleidoscopic pageant of Anna Podd's life. The only existing picture of her (here reproduced) was discovered in Moscow after Ivan Buminoff's well-remembered siege, lasting seventeen years. Poor Anna! Destiny seemed ruthlessly determined to lead her so far and no further. A Tsar loved her, which is more than falls to the lot of some women, yet fate's unrelenting finger was forever placed upon the pulse of her career.
Of her parents nothing is known. We first hear of her in a low cabaret in St. Petersburg West. All night, so Serge Tadski tells us in "Russian Realism," it was her sordid duty to flaunt that exquisite loveliness which Heaven had bestowed upon her before the devouring eyes of every sort and description of Russian man. She was wont to sway rhythmically and sinuously to the crazy band which played for her; now and then, with pain in her heart and a merry laugh on her lips, she would leap onto the tables and snap her fingers indiscriminately.
Often it was her duty to drink off glass after glass of champagne; but she never became inebriated.
It has been absolutely impossible to unearth the true story of her meeting with the Tsar.
It was after their meeting that the real progress of her career commenced. Her Royal master established her in the palace as serving-maid to the ailing Tsarina, a generous but somewhat tactless act on his part. Somehow or other, history whispers, Anna fell foul of the Tsarina—they simply hated one another. Occasionally the Tsarina would throw hot water over Anna for sheer spite. Poor Anna, her beauty was alike her joy and her terror. The Tsarina, Klick informs us, was somewhat plain, and knew it—hence her distaste for the dazzling Anna.
One day, the Tsarina died—no one knew why. Anna, guileless and innocent enough, was at once suspected by all as having poisoned her, except the Tsar, who, to avert further suspicion, promptly created her Duchess of Poddoff. This mark of royal esteem had the effect of quieting the people for a while at least. Life went on much as usual at the Royal Palace. Anna was kept in close seclusion for safety's sake. The Tsar loved her with a steady, burning devotion which caused him to have all his children by the Tsarina rechristened "Anna," indiscriminately of sex.
One day a messenger arrived in blue and yellow uniform
"He was just retiring to bed," he writes, "preparatory to making an early start the next morning, when the door burst open, and Anna, tear-stained and sobbing, threw herself into the room and, hurling herself to the bed, flung herself at his feet, which, owing to his immensity of stature, were protruding slightly over the end of the mattress. 'Take me with you!' she cried repeatedly. 'No, no, no!' replied the Tsar, equally repeatedly. At length, worn out by her pleading, the poor woman fell asleep. It was dawn when the Tsar, stepping over her recumbent form, bade her a silent good-bye and went out to face unknown horror. Half an hour later Anna was flung into a dungeon, preceding her long and tiring journey to Siberia."
Thus Klick describes for us the pulsating horror of perhaps one of the most pitiful nights in Russian history.
In those days the journey to Siberia was infinitely more wearisome than it is now. Poor Anna! She was conveyed so far in a litter, and so far in a sleigh, and when the prancing dogs grew tired she had perforce to walk. Heaven indeed have pity on those unfortunate women from whom the eye of an Emperor has been removed.
For thirty long years Anna slaved in Siberia. She drew water from the well, swept the floor of the crazy dwelling wherein she lived, lit the fire, and polished the samovar when necessary. In her heart the bird of hope occasionally fluttered a draggled wing: would he send for her—would he? If only the war were ended! But no! Rumours came of fierce fighting near Itchbanhar, where the troops of General Codski were quartered. It was, of course, the winter following the fearful siege of Mootch. According to Brattlevitch in Volume II. of "War and Why," the General had arranged three battalions in a "frat" or large semi-circle, in the comparative shelter of a "boz" or low-lying hill, in order to cover the stealthy advance of several minor divisions who were thus able to execute a miraculous "yombott" or flank movement, so as to gain the temporary vantage ground of an adjacent "bluggard" or coppice. All this, of course, though having nothing material to do with the life of Anna Podd, goes to show the reader what a serious crisis Russia was going through at the time.
It was fifteen years after peace was declared that the Tsar sent a messenger to Siberia commanding Anna's immediate release and return, and also conferring upon her the time-honoured title of Podski. Anna was hysterical with joy, and filled herself a flask of vodka against the journey home. Poor Anna—she was destined never to see St. Petersburg again.
It was while they were changing sleighs at a wayside inn that she was attacked by a "mipwip" or white wolf,
Brattlevitch tells us that the Tsar was utterly dazed by this cruel bereavement. He had Anna's remains embalmed with great pomp and buried in a public park, where they were subsequently dug up by frenzied anarchists.
HENRY VIII
SOPHIE
SOPHIE
CONTEMPORARY history tell us little of Sophie, later chronicles tell us still less, while the present-day historians know nothing whatever about her. It is only owing to concentrated research and indomitable patience that we have succeeded in unearthing a few facts which will serve to distinguish her from that noble band of unknown heroines who have lived, paid the price, and died, unnoted and unsung!
She was born at Esher. The name of her parents it has been impossible to discover, and as to what part of Esher she first inhabited we are also hopelessly undecided.
As a child some say she was merry and playful, while others describe her as solemn and morose. The reproduction on page 170 is from an old print discovered by some ardent antiquaries hanging upside down in a disused wharf at Wapping.
It was obviously achieved when she was somewhere between the ages of twenty and forty. The unknown artist has caught the fleeting look of ineffable sadness, as though she entertained some inward premonition of her destiny and her spirit was rebelling dumbly against what was inevitable.
Esher in those days was but a tiny hamlet—a few houses clustered here, and a few more clustered there. London, then a graceful city set upon a hill, could be seen on a clear day from the northernmost point of Esher. On anything but a clear day it was, of course, impossible to see it at all. Esher is now, and always has been, remarkable for its foliage. In those days, when the spring touched the earth with its joyous wand, all the trees round and about the village blossomed forth into a mass of green. The river wound its way through verdant meadows and pastures. In winter-time—providing that the frost was very strong—it would become covered in ice, thus forming a charming contrast to early spring and late autumn, when the rain was wont to transform it into a swirling torrent, which often, so historians tell us, rose so high that it overflowed its banks and caused much alarm to the inhabitants of Esher proper. We do not use the expression "Esher proper" from any prudish reason, but merely because Little Esher, a mile down the road, might in the reader's mind become a factor to promote muddle if we did not take care to indicate clearly its close proximity.
Esher, owing to its remarkable superabundance of trees, was in summertime famous for its delightful variety of birds: magpies, jackdaws, thrushes and wagtails, in addition to the usual sparrows and tom-tits, were seen frequently; occasionally a lark or a starling would charm the villagers with its song.
The soil of Esher, contrary to the usual supposition, was not as fertile as one could have wished. Often, unless planted at exactly the right time, fruit and vegetables would refuse to grow at all. The main road through Esher proper, passing later through Little Esher, was much used by those desiring to reach Portsmouth or Swanage or any of the Hampshire resorts. Of course, travellers wishing to visit Cromer or Southend or even Felixstowe would naturally leave London by another route entirely.
Dick Turpin was frequently seen tearing through Esher, with his face muffled, and a large hat and a long cloak, riding a horse, at night—there was no mistaking him.
According to Sophie's diary, written by her every day with unfailing regularity for thirty-five years, she always just missed seeing Dick Turpin. This was apparently a source of great grief to her; often she would pause by the roadside and weep gently at the thought of him. Poor Sophie! One was to ride along that very road who was destined to mean much more to her than bold Dick Turpin. But we anticipate.
It was perhaps early autumn that saw Esher at its best—how brown everything was, and yet, in some cases, how yellow! As a hunting centre it was very little used, though occasionally a stag or wild boar would, like Dick Turpin, pass through it.
One evening, when the trees were soughing in the wind and the sun had sunk to rest, Sophie went out with her basket. It was too late to buy anything, but she felt the need of air; not that the basket was necessary in order to obtain this, but somehow she felt she couldn't bear to be without it, such a habit had it become. The darkness was rapidly drawing in. Sophie paused and spoke to a frog she saw in a puddle; it didn't answer, so she passed on.
Suddenly she heard from the direction of London the sound of hoofs! "Dick Turpin!" her heart cried, and she at once commenced to climb an elm the better to see him pass; but it was not Dick Turpin—it was a shorter man with a beard. On seeing the intrepid girl, he reined in his roan chestnut-spotted filly. "Hi!" he cried. Sophie slowly climbed down. "Who are you?" she asked, after she had dusted the bark from her fichu. "Henry the Eighth!" cried the man with a ready laugh, and, leaping off his charger, took her in his arms. "Oh, sire!" she said, and would have swooned but that his strength upheld her. History tells us little about that interview. Suffice to say that later on Sophie walked gravely back to Esher proper, alas! without her basket, but carrying proudly in her hand a brooch cunningly wrought into the shape of a raspberry.
It is known as an authentic fact that Sophie never saw her Royal lover again. He rode away that night, perhaps to Woking, perhaps to Virginia Water—who knows?
Sophie lived on in Esher until the age of thirty-nine, when she was taken to London and flung into the Tower, where she remained a closely guarded prisoner for a year. Every one loved her and used to visit her in her cell. She was exceedingly industrious, and managed to get through quite a lot of tatting during her captivity.
The day of her execution dawned fair over St. Paul's Cathedral. Sophie in her little cell rose early and turned her fichu. "Why do you do that?" asked the gaoler. "Because I am going to meet my end," Sophie gently replied. The man staggered dumbly away, fighting down the lump which would come in his hardened throat.
When the time came Sophie left her cell with a light step. She walked to Tower Hill amidst a body of Beefeaters. "The way is long," she said bravely. Every Beefeater bowed his head.
There was a dense crowd round the scaffold. Sophie heeded them not; she ran girlishly up the steps to where the executioner was leaning on his axe. "Where do I put my head?" she asked simply. The executioner pointed to the block. "There!" said he. "Where did you think you put it?" Sophie reproved him with a look and knelt down. Then she gazed sweetly at the gaoler, who for a year had stinted her in everything. "The past is buried," she said sweetly. "To you I bequeath my tatting!" With these charitable words still hovering on her lips, she laid her head upon the fatal block; from that trying position she threw the executioner a dumb look. "Do your duty, my friend," she said, and shut her eyes and her mouth.
Mastering his emotion with an effort, the headsman raised his axe; through a mist of tears, it fell.
LA BIBI
"LA BIBI"
From the pastel by Coddle
HORTENSE POISSONS—"La Bibi," What memories that name conjures up! The incomparable—the lightsome—the effervescent—her life a rose-coloured smear across the history of France—her smile—tier upon tier of sparkling teeth—her heart, that delicate organ for which kings fought in the streets like common dukes—but enough; let us trace her to her obscure parentage. You all know the Place de la Concorde—she was not born there. You have all visited the Champs ElysÉes—she was not born there. And there's probably no one who doesn't know of the Faubourg St. HonorÉ—but she was not born there. Sufficient to say that she was born. Her mother, poor, honest, gauche, an unpretentious seamstress; she seamed and seamed until her death in 1682 or 1683: Bibi, at the age of ten, flung on to the world homeless, motherless, with nothing but her amazing beauty between her and starvation or worse. Who can blame her for what she did—who can question or condemn her motives? She was alone. Then Armand Brochet (who shall be nameless) entered the panorama of her career. What was she to do—refuse the roof he offered her? This waif (later on to be the glory of France), this leaf blown hither and thither by the winds of Destiny—what was she to do? Enough that she did.
Paris, a city of seething vice and corruption—her home, the place wherein she danced her first catoucha, that catoucha which was so soon to be followed by her famous Japanese schottische, and later still by her celebrated Peruvian minuet. Voltaire wrote a lot, but he didn't mention her; Jean Jacques Rousseau scribbled hours, but never so much as referred to her; even MoliÈre was so reticent on the subject of her undoubted charms that no single word about her can be found in any of his works.
Her life with Armand Brochet (who shall still be nameless) three years before she stepped on to the boards—how well we all know it! Her famous epigram at the breakfast table: "Armand, my friend, this egg is not only soft—but damn soft." How that remark convulsed Europe!
Her first appearance on the stage was in Paris, 1690, at the OpÉra. Bovine writes of her: "This airy, fairy thing danced into our hearts; her movements are those of a gossamer gadfly—she is the embodiment of spring, summer, autumn and winter." By this one can clearly see that in a trice she had Paris at her feet—and what feet! Pierre Dugaz, the celebrated chiropodist, describes them for us. "They were ordinary flesh colour," he tells us, "with blue veins, and toe-nails which, had they not been cut in time, would have grown several yards long and thus interfered with her dancing."
What a sidelight on her character!—gay, bohemian, care-free as a child, not even heeding her feet, her means of livelihood. Oh, Bibi—"Bibi Coeur d'Or," as she was called so frequently by her multitudinous adorers—would that in these mundane days you could revisit us with your girlish laugh and supple dancing form! Look at the portrait of her, painted by Coddle at the height of her amazing beauty: note the sensitive nostrils, the delicate little mouth, and those eyes—the gayest, merriest eyes that ever charmed a king's heart; and her hair—that "mass of waving corn," as Bloodworthy describes it in his celebrated book of "International Beauties." But we must follow her through her wonderful life—destined, if not to alter the whole history of France, why not?
After her appearance in Paris she journeyed to Vienna, where she met Herman Veigel: you all know the story of that meeting, so I will not enlarge upon it—enough that they met. It was, of course, before he wrote his "Ode to an Unknown Flower" and "My Gretchen has Large Flat Ears," poems which were destined to live almost forever. Bibi left Vienna and journeyed to London—London, so cold and grim after Paris the Gay and Vienna the Wicked. In her letter to Madame Perrier she says, "My dear—London's awful"; and "Ludgate Circus—I ask you!" But still, despite her dislike of the city itself, she stayed for eight years, her whole being warmed by the love and adulation of the populace. She appeared in the ballet after the opera. "Her dancing," writes Follygob, "is unbelievable, incredible; she takes one completely by surprise—her butterfly dance was a revelation." This from Follygob. Then Henry Pidd wrote of her, "She is a woman." This from H. Pidd!
Then back to Paris—home, the place of her birth. Fresh conquests. In November, 1701, she introduced her world-famed Bavarian fandango, which literally took Paris by storm—it was in her dressing-room afterward that she made her celebrated remark to Maria Pippello (her only rival). Maria came ostensibly to congratulate her on her success, but in reality to insult her. "Ma petite," she said, sneering, "l'hibou est-il sur le haie?" Quick as thought Bibi turned round and replied with a gay toss of her curls, "Non, mais j'ai la plume de ma tante!" Oh, witty, sharp-tongued Bibi! A word must be said of the glorious ballets she originated which charmed France for nearly thirty years. There were "Life of a Rain Drop," "Hope Triumphant," and "Angels Visiting Ruined Monastery at Night." This last was an amazing creation for one so uneducated and uncultured as La Jolie Bibi; people flocked to the OpÉra again and again in order to see it and applaud the ravishing originator. Then came her meeting with the King in his private box. We are told she curtsied low, and, glancing up at him coyly from between her bent knees, gave forth her world-renowned epigram, "Comment va, Papa?" Louis was charmed by this exquisite exhibition of drollery and diablerie, and three weeks later she was brought to dance at Versailles. This was a triumph indeed—La Belle Bibi was certainly not one to miss opportunities. A month later she found herself installed at Court—the King's Right Hand. Then began that amazing reign of hers—short lived, but oh, how triumphant, dukes, duchesses, countesses, even princes, paying homage at the feet of La Bibi the dancer, now Hortense, Duchesse de Mal-Moulle! Did she abuse her power? Some say she did, some say she didn't; some say she might have, some say she might not have; but there is no denying that her beauty and gaiety won every heart that was brought into contact with her. Every afternoon regularly Louis was wont to visit her by the private staircase to her apartments; together they would pore over the maps and campaigns of war drawn up and submitted by the various generals. Then when Louis was weary Bibi would put the maps in the drawer, draw his head onto her breast, and sing to him songs of her youth, in the attractive cracked voice that was the bequest of her mother who used to sing daily whilst she seamed and seamed. Meanwhile, intrigue was placing its evil fingers upon the strings of her fate. Lampoons were launched against her, pasquinades were written of her; when she went out driving, fruit and vegetables were often hurled at her. Thus were the fickle hearts of the people she loved turned against their Bibi by the poisonous tongues of those jealous courtiers who so ardently sought her downfall.
You all know the pitiful story of her fall from favour—how the King, enraged by the stories he had heard of her, came to her room just as she was going to bed.
"You've got to go," he said.
"Why?" she answered.
History writes that this ingenuous remark so unmanned him that his eyes filled with tears, and he dashed from the room, closing the door after him in order that her appealing eyes might not cause him to deflect from his purpose.
Poor Bibi—your rose path has come to an end, your day is nearly done. Back to Paris, back to the squalor and dirt of your early life. Bibi, now in her forty-seventh year, with the memories of her recent splendours still in her heart, decided to return to the stage, to the public who had loved and fÊted her. Alas! she had returned too late. Something was missing—the audience laughed every time she came on, and applauded her only when she went off. Oh, Bibi, Bibi Coeur d'Or, even now in this cold age our hearts ache for you. Volauvent writes in the Journal of the period: "Bibi can dance no longer." Veaux caps it by saying "She never could," while S. Kayrille, well known for his wit and kindly humour, reviewed her in the Berlin Gazette of the period by remarking, in his customarily brilliant manner, "She is very plain and no longer in her first youth." This subtle criticism of her dancing, though convulsing the Teutonic capital, was in reality the cause of her leaving the stage and retiring with her one maid to a small house in Montmartre, where history has it she petered out the last years of her eventful career.
Absinthe was her one consolation, together with a miniature of Louis in full regalia. Who is this haggard wretch with still the vestiges of her wondrous beauty discernible in her perfectly moulded features?—not La Belle Bibi! Oh, Fate—Destiny—how cruel are you who guided her straying feet through the mazes of life! Why could she not have died at her zenith—when her portrait was painted?
But still her gay humour was with her to the end. As she lay on her crazy bed, surrounded by priests, she made the supreme and crowning bon mot of her brilliant life. Stretching out her wasted arm to the nearly empty absinthe bottle by her bed, she made a slightly resentful moue and murmured "Encore une!"
Oh, brave, witty Bibi!
AH! AH!
AH! AH! Queen of the Rude Islands
THE "Rude" Islands! what a thrill that name awakes in the heart of every wanderer—lying as they do in the very heart of the rolling Pacific. Was it two or three hundred years ago that brave Joshua Mortlake discovered and christened them? History has it that he was standing on the poop deck of his schooner the "Whoops-a-Daisy" when he first beheld those pocket Paradises of the Pacific. He shaded his eyes with his hand and turned to his bosom friend—Eagle Trott:
"What exactly do those islands remind you of?" he asked.
Eagle looked down bashfully. "I'd rather not say," he replied.
At this Joshua slapped him heartily on the back.
"Stap me," he cried, using a colloquialism of the period, "if I do not name them the Rude Islands." And from that moment they have been known as nothing else.
To attempt to describe the wild untameable beauty of the coast scenery would be almost as absurd as to endeavour to portray the seductive sensuality and exotic perfection of the interior landscapes—but a brief catalogue of some of the outstanding horticultural marvels will do no harm to anyone and perhaps convey to the lay mind a slight conception of the atmosphere in which Ah! Ah! was born and bred. For instance, the flowering kaia-ooh! with its exquisite perfume (suggestive of the Californian Poppy), the veemuawees (a small hard fruit suggestive of the oak apple), and the perennial "Pooh!" (merely suggestive) all combined to enwrap the infant Ah! Ah! in a somnolent cocoon of sensual languidness, from which in after life she was hard put to it to escape. To say that her dazzling beauty completely hypnotised any native for miles round into instant submission—would perhaps be exaggerating; but if one is to judge from the accounts of contemporary chroniclers she was undoubtedly attractive.
For those interested in queer native traditions and legends, the origin of her name must indeed prove an instructive object lesson—intermingling as it does the austerity and reproach of the North with the quaint domestic charm of the further South. The story runs thus:
When quite a child this lithe supple young thing was as full of mischief and engaging roguery as any tortoiseshell kitten—with elfin glee her favourite sport was to fill her grandmother's bed with "ouliaries" (Good God! berries, so called because on sudden contact with bare flesh they burst with a loud explosion causing the victim to shout "Good God!" from sheer surprise). For three months this winsome game went undetected until one day her mother—Kia-oopoo—discovered her creeping in at her grandmother's door with a basket full of "ouliaries." Catching her daughter by the scruff of the neck she proceeded to administer several sharp slaps with great precision—the while murmuring "Ah! Ah!" in tones of rebuke. And thus, we are informed, was originated a name that was destined to be handed down to every reigning queen of the Rude Islands until the devastating tidal wave of 1889.
Ah! Ah!'s childhood was spent running completely wild with her three sisters "Beaoui" (meaning "Heavens Above"), "Sua-sua" (meaning "Shut your Face") and young "Goop" (meaning in American "Park your Fanny" and in English, "Sit Down").
Through the long languid sunny hours they would romp in the "lovieeah" (long grass), or play "uou" (toss the cocoa-nut) in the "haeeiuol" (short grass). On moonlight nights when the tide was high they would fish from the reef—catching generally either "youis" (the Pacific haddock) or merely the common "choop" (or dab). Life was one long round of sport and play—until one day—to quote Hans Burdle in his world-famed book of Travel, "Set Sail ahoy" "the radiant Ah! Ah! awoke and found herself to be a woman—with a woman's joys, a woman's sorrows and withal the touch of a woman's hand."
From that moment life in the Rude Islands became a different matter. No more was she to paddle in the "ku-ku" (small stream or rivulet) or chase the playful "erieuah" (or hooped snake, which when pursued by its enemies executes the most peculiar antics eventually disappearing amid a cloud of smoke). The responsibilities of a greater existence were suddenly thrust upon her—she was crowned queen.
The story of the unexpected arrival of a Presbyterian missionery in the midst of her coronation feast is too well known to repeat—and the tale of the landing of eight Bhuddist monks during the christening of her first child is now so hackneyed as to be irritating; therefore we will skip the minor incidents of the early part of her reign and mention a few of the progressive improvements on existing conditions which found their source in her tireless and fertile brain.
To begin with she abolished the "plozza" (or notched club), substituting in its place the "sneep" (a subtle instrument of torture which by means of the sudden expenditure of the breath would cover one's enemies with "noonies") (or red ants).
Then, though flying in the face of time-honoured tradition, the courageous woman completely forbade cannibalism among blood relations; condemning this practice under the heading of "gavonah" (or incestuous conduct) and thereby putting an end to many rowdy Sunday evenings.
Not content with these vast changes in the fundamental Island habits she concentrated her unfailing energies on the reformation of the marriage laws, which at that time were in a deplorably decadent condition, and encouraged with all her might the trade of "fuahs" and "aeious" (nose rings and hair tidies) with the "Bauoacha" Islands a few miles off. Until the ripe age of eighty-seven she ruled her subjects trustingly and lovingly—yet withal firmly—earning for herself from all the British traders the nickname of "Queen Bess of the Pacific."
After her death her eldest illegitimate son, Boo-ah (Goodness Gracious) ascended the throne, and—if we are to believe Professor Furch's "With Dusky Friends"—went far towards undoing the unbelievable good worked by his unflinching mother.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
I have included Ah! Ah! in these memoirs—in the face of almost overwhelming opposition (mainly on account of race prejudice) in the first place because she was as beautiful and authoritative as any of the European queens—and secondly because Ah! Ah! for me stands for something ineffably noble, inspiring—not perhaps for what she has done—maybe more for the things she left undone.
Baloona, Enrique. Artist and dilettante, famous for his "Portrait of Isabella Angelica," "Spanish Peaks," and "Half-Caste Child with Orange."
Ben-Hepple, Nicholas. Eighteenth century historian. Author of "Julie de Poopinac" (17 vols.).
Bloodworthy, Stephen. Author of "International Beauties," "Then and Now," and "Now and Then."
Bogtoe, Douglas. Company promoter and basket-work expert.
Bonk, Dorothy. First cousin to Rupert Plinge—incidentally the first New England girl to say "Gosh!"
Boo, A. Ranville. Celebrated XIXth century sanitary inspector.
Bottiburgen, Hans Von. Science master, Munich College. Author of "Our Women," "Do Actresses Mind Much?" and "Life of Fritz Schnotter" (3 vols.).
Bottle, Elizabeth. Adapter and translator of several works of the period.
Bovine, Gustave. Author of "French without Tears" and "Vive les Vacances," etc.
Bowles, Earl. "Intellects of the Hour," "Cheese Cookery in All Its Branches."
Bramp, B. F. "America in Sunshine and Shadow," "Pinafore Days."
Bramp, Norman. Author of "Up and Away," "Reynard, the Story of a Fox," "Tantivoy," and "Female Influence and Why?" (5 vols.).
Brampenrich, Fritz. German historian.
Brattlevitch, Boris. Russian author. Books: "War and Why," "Women of Russia." Several good cooking recipes.
Bug, Reginald. Actor—occasional property man. Parts he played: "Romeo," "Bottom," "Third Guest" in "The Berlin Girl," "Norman" in "Oh, Charles—a Satire on the Massacre of Saint Bartholomew," and others. Hobbies: Cup-and-ball, tilting, and fretwork.
Burdle, Hans. Bulgarian author; Works: "Set Sail Ahoy," "Abaft," "Belay," etc.
Caballero, Basta. Actor and founder of Shakespearean Theatre in Barcelona.
Campanele, Vittorio. Florentine engraver, "Early Portrait of Bianca di Pianno-Forti," "Raised Pansies on China Plaque," etc.
Campbell, Olaf. Keen angler and piscatorial expert.
Carlini, Angelo. Italian actor—formerly plumber during the Renaissance.
Chaddle, EsmÉ. Daughter of Avery Chaddle, and subsequently Mrs. J. D. Spout.
Chaffinch, Alexander. Second cousin to Rupert Plinge; second man to say "Gee!" in Virginia.
Chuggski, Dimitri. Russian actor.
Coddle, Humphrey. Artist, well known for his "Cows Grazing outside Dover," "Playmates," and "Daddy's Darling."
Cronk, Oswald, Bart. Painter of "Madcap Moll, Eighth Duchess of Wapping," "Pine Trees near Ascot," and "Esther Lollop as 'Cymbeline.'"
Dentifrice, Pierre. Actor—French (early).
Dugaz, Pierre. Court chiropodist, seventeenth century. Author of "Feet and Fashion," "The Valley of Waving Corns," etc.
Earwhacker, Caesar. Owner of Old World Bicycle Shed.
Fibinio, Pietro. Italian—author of "Bianca," "God Bless the Pope," etc.
Floop, Richard. "Spout, the Man" (3 vols.); "The Girls of Marley Manor" and "Janet's Prank."
Follygob, Alan. English Dramatic Critic. Clubs: "The Union Jack" and "The What-Ho" in Jermyn Street.
Fortescue, Ex-Senator. Celebrated for eloping with Rupert Plinge's Auntie Gracie.
Frapple, Ernest. "Amy Snurge, A Grand Woman" (2 vols.) and a political satire, "Don't Vote Till Tuesday!"
Furch, Professor, "With Dusky Friends" and "Where Palm Trees Sway."
Gerphipps, Ronald. Very old Scotch painter—famous for "Portrait of Maggie McWhistle," "Evening on Loch Lomond," and "Glasgow, my Glasgow!"
Goethe. Obscure German author. Suspected of having written "Faust."
Goodge, Albert. Friend of Nicholas Kewee.
Grobmeyer, Carl. Early German etcher.
Grundelheim, Paul. German author and historian. Principal works: "Toilers who have Toiled," "Women of Wurtemburg," and "Byways of the Black Forest."
Hooter, Freddie. Renowned for physical appearance but flat feet.
Hosper, Sholto Z. "Jake the Climber" (7 vols.) and "Diet or Die."
Kayrille, Siegfried. Born in Berlin, 1670. Disappointed playwright, and subsequent art critic.
Kewee, Nicholas. Friend of Albert Goodge.
Klick, Nicholas. Russian—author of "Life of Anna Podd" (6 vols.), and "Was Ivan Terrible?"
Kump, H. Mackenzie. Keen philanthropist and insatiable globe-trotter.
Lincoln, Abraham. President and man.
Mactweed, Sandy. Scotch actor of some note.
Mary, Bloody. Queen of England.
Mettlethorp, Rupert. Compiler of "Asiatic Soldiery" (23 vols.).
Mills-Tweeper, Senator. Famed for hideousness, but kind-hearted and a great insect lover.
Mortlake, Joshua. Explorer and discoverer of the Rude Islands.
Pidd, Henry. Severe dramatic critic—English.
Pipper, Herman. "Poor Puffwater,—A Brown Study."
Pligger, Steve Montespan. "The Fall of a Bloated Aristocrat," "Crab Apples," "Deadly Nightshade," "Don't Tell Aunt Hester," "Under the Moon, or Revels by a Dutch Canal," "America From Behind"; Books of Verse: "Adown the Ganges," "The First Primrose," "Pussy, Pussy, Lap Your Milk" and "Raspberry Time."
Plinge, Bobbie. Killed during Red Indian foray by Great Brown Spratt.
Plinge, Miles. Unitarian minister in Red Lamp District, Honolulu.
Plugg, Henry. One time candidate for the Presidency, subsequently successful bee-farmer.
Polata, Jose. Professor—Spanish. Author of "From Girl to Woman," "Spanish Olives, and How," etc., etc.
Poliolioli, Giuseppe. Author of "Women of Italy" and "Nelly of Naples," a musical comedy of the period.
Pricklebott, Harvey. Editor of "Art in the Home" and "Mother Week by Week."
Proon, Bernard. Well-known speaker, intimate friend of Roosevelt's brother-in-law.
Punter, Augustus. Seventeenth century painter, famous for "Sarah, Lady Tunnell-Penge, with Dog," "Gravesend by Night," and various crayon portraits, notably "A Merry Girl" and "The Drowsy Sentry."
Roosevelt, Theodore. Man and President.
Rotepillar, Peter. Friend of Henry Plugg and author and compiler of "Algebra with Many a Laugh!"
Rousseau, Jean Jacques. French writer of some note. See Carlyle's "French Revolution."
Schnotter, Fritz. German actor, sixteenth century.
Sheepmeadow, Edgar. English writer—author of "Beds and their Inmates" (18 vols.), "The Corn Chandler," "Women Large and Women Small" (10 vols.).
Soddle, O'Callaghan. Gentleman architect of the XIXth century.
Spratt, Great Brown. Indian of the period.
Stowe, Harriet Beecher. Author of "Uncle Tom's Cabin."
Sumplethock, Ex-president. Spaniel trainer and "raconteur."
Tadski, Serge. Early, fairly. Russian. Author and compiler of the following: "Russian Realism," "Natural Mammals of the Steppes," "Flora and Fauna of Siberia," etc., and light verse.
Throtch, Esther. Well-known XXth century "literateur."
Tossele, Yvonne, Mme. First female mezzotinter of the Revolutionary Era.
Trott, Eagle. Mate and pal of Joshua Mortlake.
Turpin, Dick. Highwayman—English. Inventor of straw sun hats for hot horses.
Udey, General. Congenital idiot of the XIXth century (and very mean).
Veaux, Paul. Art critic—Paris.
Veigel, Herman. German poet—famous for "Twilight Fancies," "There was a Garden," and "Collected Poems, including 'The Ballad of Crazy Bertha.'"
Volauvent, Armand. Art critic—Paris.
Voltaire (Christian name unknown). Old writer—French.
Waffle, Raymond. Georgian writer. Author of "Our Dogs," "Canine Cameos," and "Pretty Rover, the Story of a Boarhound."
Weedhein, H. "Columbia, Beware!" (8 vols.).
Clagmouth Chronicle: "A book to be taken up and put down again."
East Bromley Advertiser: "This is a book!"
The Girls' Globe: "Every young girl should read this."
Doctor Cheval in Advice to a Mother: "No bedside table is complete without 'Terribly Intimate Portraits.'"
Joe Bogworth in Capital and Labour says: "This book is perhaps the greatest power for good or evil in democratic England or aristocratic America either, for that matter. Though obviously the work of a thinker, should it by any chance fall into the wrong hands it would go far towards undermining not only the League of Nations, but the London County Council to boot!"
Aunt Hilda in Fireside Fun says: "Darling chicks, get your mumsie to buy you 'Terribly Intimate Portraits' for your birthday."
Lady Minerva Stuffe in Undies writes: "Well-dressed women will eagerly peruse these fascinating memoirs."
The Playing Field: "'Chaps'! Read this book."
The Political Gazette: "Well done, Noel Coward! Bravo, Lorn Macnaughtan!"
Herr von Grob in The Austrian Tyrol: "Gott in Himmel!"
Chicken Chat: "I advise keen poultry keepers to buy and read 'Terribly Intimate Portraits.'"
Cri de Paris: "Ce livre n'est pas seulement stupide, mais c'est excessivement irritant, et absolument sans humeur." (Translation: "This book is not only charming, but it is excessively entertaining and brilliantly humorous.")
Claybank Courier: "Once read—never forgotten."
Wigan World: "Splendid for those just learning to read."
Boxing Weekly: "Dam' good!"
WHAT THE AMERICAN PRESS MAY SAY:
Vanity Fair: "A book for ladies and gentlemen."
New York Times: "This book treats a delicate theme in the most indelicate fashion possible."
The Dial: "The parabolics are unevenly balanced."
George Jean Nathan: "Eugene O'Neill remains our only dramatist."
Life: "Noel Coward's first and best book."
Paper Trade Journal: "The sulphite used in the paper of 'Terribly Intimate Portraits' is of excellent quality."
Judge: "Two hundred and twelve pages."
Review of Reviews: "Some of it is better than the rest."
The World: "H. the 3d says that this book makes better paper dolls than any he has read for a long time."
