Part 15 (1/2)
”Dearest Mary, this is the most celebrated statue in the world. This is the renowned 'Capitoline Venus' you've heard so much about. Here she is with her little blemishes 'restored' (that is, patched) by the most noted Roman artists-and the mere fact that they did the humble patching of so n.o.ble a creation will make their names ill.u.s.trious while the world stands. How strange it seems-this place! The day before I last stood here, ten happy years ago, I wasn't a rich man bless your soul, I hadn't a cent. And yet I had a good deal to do with making Rome mistress of this grandest work of ancient art the world contains.”
”The wors.h.i.+ped, the ill.u.s.trious Capitoline Venus-and what a sum she is valued at! Ten millions of francs!”
”Yes-now she is.”
”And oh, Georgy, how divinely beautiful she is!”
”Ah, yes but nothing to what she was before that blessed John Smith broke her leg and battered her nose. Ingenious Smith!-gifted Smith!-n.o.ble Smith! Author of all our bliss! Hark! Do you know what that wheeze means? Mary, that cub has got the whooping-cough. Will you never learn to take care of the children!”
THE END
The Capitoline Venus is still in the Capitol at Rome, and is still the most charming and most ill.u.s.trious work of ancient art the world can boast of. But if ever it shall be your fortune to stand before it and go into the customary ecstasies over it, don't permit this true and secret history of its origin to mar your bliss-and when you read about a gigantic Petrified man being dug up near Syracuse, in the State of New York, or near any other place, keep your own counsel-and if the Barnum that buried him there offers to sell to you at an enormous sum, don't you buy. Send him to the Pope!
[NOTE.-The above sketch was written at the time the famous swindle of the ”Petrified Giant” was the sensation of the day in the United States]
SPEECH ON ACCIDENT INSURANCE
DELIVERED IN HARTFORD, AT A DINNER TO CORNELIUS WALFORD, OF LONDON
GENTLEMEN: I am glad, indeed, to a.s.sist in welcoming the distinguished guest of this occasion to a city whose fame as an insurance center has extended to all lands, and given us the name of being a quadruple band of brothers working sweetly hand in hand-the Colt's Arms Company making the destruction of our race easy and convenient, our life insurance citizens paying for the victims when they pa.s.s away, Mr. Batterson perpetuating their memory with his stately monuments, and our fire-insurance comrades taking care of their hereafter. I am glad to a.s.sist in welcoming our guest-first, because he is an Englishman, and I owe a heavy debt of hospitality to certain of his fellow-countrymen; and secondly, because he is in sympathy with insurance and has been the means of making many other men cast their sympathies in the same direction.
Certainly there is no n.o.bler field for human effort than the insurance line of business-especially accident insurance. Ever since I have been a director in an accident-insurance company I have felt that I am a better man. Life has seemed more precious. Accidents have a.s.sumed a kindlier aspect. Distressing special providences have lost half their horror. I look upon a cripple now with affectionate interest-as an advertis.e.m.e.nt. I do not seem to care for poetry any more. I do not care for politics-even agriculture does not excite me. But to me now there is a charm about a railway collision that is unspeakable.
There is nothing more beneficent than accident insurance. I have seen an entire family lifted out of poverty and into affluence by the simple boon of a broken leg. I have had people come to me on crutches, with tears in their eyes, to bless this beneficent inst.i.tution. In all my experience of life, I have seen nothing so seraphic as the look that comes into a freshly mutilated man's face when he feels in his vest pocket with his remaining hand and finds his accident ticket all right. And I have seen nothing so sad as the look that came into another splintered customer's face when he found he couldn't collect on a wooden leg.
I will remark here, by way of advertis.e.m.e.nt, that that n.o.ble charity which we have named the HARTFORD ACCIDENT INSURANCE COMPANY-[The speaker is a director of the company named.]-is an inst.i.tution which is peculiarly to be depended upon. A man is bound to prosper who gives it his custom.
No man can take out a policy in it and not get crippled before the year is out. Now there was one indigent man who had been disappointed so often with other companies that he had grown disheartened, his appet.i.te left him, he ceased to smile-life was but a weariness. Three weeks ago I got him to insure with us, and now he is the brightest, happiest spirit in this land-has a good steady income and a stylish suit of new bandages every day, and travels around on a shutter.
I will say, in conclusion, that my share of the welcome to our guest is none the less hearty because I talk so much nonsense, and I know that I can say the same for the rest of the speakers.
JOHN CHINAMAN IN NEW YORK
As I pa.s.sed along by one of those monster American tea stores in New York, I found a Chinaman sitting before it acting in the capacity of a sign. Everybody that pa.s.sed by gave him a steady stare as long as their heads would twist over their shoulders without dislocating their necks, and a group had stopped to stare deliberately.
Is it not a shame that we, who prate so much about civilization and humanity, are content to degrade a fellow-being to such an office as this? Is it not time for reflection when we find ourselves willing to see in such a being matter for frivolous curiosity instead of regret and grave reflection? Here was a poor creature whom hard fortune had exiled from his natural home beyond the seas, and whose troubles ought to have touched these idle strangers that thronged about him; but did it? Apparently not. Men calling themselves the superior race, the race of culture and of gentle blood, scanned his quaint Chinese hat, with peaked roof and ball on top, and his long queue dangling down his back; his short silken blouse, curiously frogged and figured (and, like the rest of his raiment, rusty, dilapidated, and awkwardly put on); his blue cotton, tight-legged pants, tied close around the ankles; and his clumsy blunt-toed shoes with thick cork soles; and having so scanned him from head to foot, cracked some unseemly joke about his outlandish attire or his melancholy face, and pa.s.sed on. In my heart I pitied the friendless Mongol. I wondered what was pa.s.sing behind his sad face, and what distant scene his vacant eye was dreaming of. Were his thoughts with his heart, ten thousand miles away, beyond the billowy wastes of the Pacific? among the ricefields and the plumy palms of China? under the shadows of remembered mountain peaks, or in groves of bloomy shrubs and strange forest trees unknown to climes like ours? And now and then, rippling among his visions and his dreams, did he hear familiar laughter and half-forgotten voices, and did he catch fitful glimpses of the friendly faces of a bygone time? A cruel fate it is, I said, that is befallen this bronzed wanderer. In order that the group of idlers might be touched at least by the words of the poor fellow, since the appeal of his pauper dress and his dreary exile was lost upon them, I touched him on the shoulder and said: ”Cheer up-don't be downhearted. It is not America that treats you in this way, it is merely one citizen, whose greed of gain has eaten the humanity out of his heart. America has a broader hospitality for the exiled and oppressed. America and Americans are always ready to help the unfortunate. Money shall be raised-you shall go back to China-you shall see your friends again. What wages do they pay you here?”
”Divil a cint but four dollars a week and find meself; but it's aisy, barrin' the troublesome furrin clothes that's so expinsive.”
The exile remains at his post. The New York tea merchants who need picturesque signs are not likely to run out of Chinamen.
HOW I EDITED AN AGRICULTURAL PAPER
[Written about 1870.]
I did not take temporary editors.h.i.+p of an agricultural paper without misgivings. Neither would a landsman take command of a s.h.i.+p without misgivings. But I was in circ.u.mstances that made the salary an object. The regular editor of the paper was going off for a holiday, and I accepted the terms he offered, and took his place.
The sensation of being at work again was luxurious, and I wrought all the week with unflagging pleasure. We went to press, and I waited a day with some solicitude to see whether my effort was going to attract any notice. As I left the office, toward sundown, a group of men and boys at the foot of the stairs dispersed with one impulse, and gave me pa.s.sageway, and I heard one or two of them say: ”That's him!” I was naturally pleased by this incident. The next morning I found a similar group at the foot of the stairs, and scattering couples and individuals standing here and there in the street and over the way, watching me with interest. The group separated and fell back as I approached, and I heard a man say, ”Look at his eye!” I pretended not to observe the notice I was attracting, but secretly I was pleased with it, and was purposing to write an account of it to my aunt. I went up the short flight of stairs, and heard cheery voices and a ringing laugh as I drew near the door, which I opened, and caught a glimpse of two young rural-looking men, whose faces blanched and lengthened when they saw me, and then they both plunged through the window with a great crash. I was surprised.
In about half an hour an old gentleman, with a flowing beard and a fine but rather austere face, entered, and sat down at my invitation. He seemed to have something on his mind. He took off his hat and set it on the floor, and got out of it a red silk handkerchief and a copy of our paper.
He put the paper on his lap, and while he polished his spectacles with his handkerchief he said, ”Are you the new editor?”
I said I was.
”Have you ever edited an agricultural paper before?”