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DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 REMINISCENCES OF A VARIED LIFE 
 
Gessford Studios 
 
 MAITLAND ARMSTRONG 
 [Born 1836 — Died iqi8] 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 REMINISCENCES OF A VARIED LIFE 
 
 BY 
 
 MAITLAND ARMSTRONG 
 
 1836-1918 
 
 EDITED BY HIS DAUGHTER 
 
 MARGARET ARMSTRONG 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 
 1920 
 
A7H 
 
 Copyright, 1920, by 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 
 Published October, 1920 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGS 
 
 I. Danskammer 3 
 
 II. New York When I Was a Boy 30 
 
 III. My Brothers 57 
 
 IV. The South Before the War 72 
 
 V. At College 88 
 
 VI. Travels and a Shipwreck 103 
 
 VII. New York When I Was a Young Man 125 
 
 VIII. Rome — Church and State 154 
 
 IX. Some Roman Friends 188 
 
 X. The Campagna 215 
 
 XI. Venice 240 
 
 XII. Saint Gaudens and Others 258 
 
 XIII. Some Pleasant Summers 288 
 
 XIV. The Century Club 303 
 
 XV. My Farm at Danskammer . 329 
 
 439198 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
CHAPTER I 
 
 DANSKAMMER 
 
 "To the heart of youth the world is a highway side. 
 Passing forever he fares; and on either hand. 
 Deep in the gardens the golden pavilions hide. 
 
 Nestle in orchard bloom, and far on the level land 
 Call him with lighted lamp in the eventide." 
 
 — Stevenson. 
 
 I v^as born on the 15th of April, 1836, at Dans- 
 kammer on the Hudson, near Newburgh. The date on 
 the house at Danskammer is 1834, so I have alv^ays as- 
 sumed that I was born in that house, although at the time 
 my father, Edv^ard Armstrong, bought the place, about 
 1822, there v^as an old house near the edge of the bank 
 sloping dov^n to the river, a rather fine colonial building 
 with two wings. When this house was torn down to make 
 way for our new one, one of the wings was moved back 
 of the Danskammer stable and used for many years as a 
 carpenter-shop; the walls were hard-finished and the orna- 
 mental ceiling and woodwork bore evidence of its having 
 been a part of a handsome house, probably the dining- 
 room. On the place at that time was a carpenter named 
 Edgar Bloomer, whom my mother hired by the year and 
 who did his work in this room. He was a nice man, and 
 as a child I liked to be out there with him, watching the 
 long shavings curl into ringlets before his plane and build- 
 ing houses with the blocks that he sawed off. I had four 
 brothers — Henry, Gouverneur, Charles, and Jack — and 
 this room was our lounging-place; especially on rainy days, 
 
 3 
 
DAY. BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 we had lots "of fun there. Harry was an ingenious fellow 
 and by working there with Edgar Bloomer he became an 
 excellent carpenter and could build almost anything. 
 
 After my father bought Danskammer he added to it 
 various farms until he had a river-front of about two miles, 
 from Mudhole nearly to Hampton — both these little places 
 have changed their names and are now known as Roseton 
 and Cedar Cliff. Danskammer is one of the few names that 
 appear on the very oldest maps, and it was Henry Hudson, 
 according to tradition, who christened the pretty wooded 
 point that curves out into the river near our house, and 
 called it Duyvil's Danskammer — Devil's Dancechamber — 
 when he sailed up the river in the Half Moon and saw a 
 group of Indians dancing in the firelight on the flat rock 
 that crowned the point in those days. This Indian rock 
 was broken off* some years ago when the steamer Cornell 
 was wrecked there on a foggy night, and the little light- 
 house that stands there now was built after the accident. 
 
 My father had a substantial taste in houses; he built 
 his new house of granite, in the classic style which was the 
 fashion of the day, and finished it throughout in black wal- 
 nut. The dark-colored granite came from Breakneck, near 
 Cornwall, and the light granite of which the columns and 
 trimmings are made was from Quincy, Massachusetts. I 
 have heard that when the columns were landed at our dock 
 there was a great question as to how to get them up the 
 hill, as they were enormous. They finally drilled holes 
 in the ends and made rollers of the columns themselves, 
 and by attaching a tongue were able to roll them up to 
 the house. 
 
 At that time, before the brick-yards came, scarring 
 the landscape and even gnawing away our lawns and 
 gardens, the situation was beautiful, crowning a wooded 
 
 4 
 
DANSKAMMER 
 
 plateau, with a sweeping view across Newburgh bay to 
 the Highlands. We had a delightful bathing-beach of firm 
 white sand, now of course swallowed up by the West Shore 
 Railroad, and a dock where large vessels could land. The 
 river was very gay in those pre-railway days, dotted with 
 hundreds of sails, sloops, and schooners plying between New 
 York and Albany. In very old times my people came from 
 New York in sailboats — *'safe, fast and commodious river 
 sloops" — but when I was a boy they used the big steamers. 
 When I was young there was a horse-boat ferry from Hamp- 
 ton to New Hamburg, a curious affair with a huge wheel 
 flat on the deck, operated by two horses, one on each side 
 on treadmills that turned the two paddle-wheels. When 
 that was given up we had to use sailboats or row across, 
 and we made it a point of honor always to cross the river 
 day or night, no matter what the weather was like. 
 
 My father settled in this part of the country because 
 my grandfather. Colonel William Armstrong, of the British 
 army, had been greatly struck by the beauty of the neigh- 
 borhood when he visited Newburgh during the Revolu- 
 tion. Colonel Armstrong was a Scotchman; he got his 
 commission as lieutenant in the 17th Foot when he was 
 nineteen, and soon after came to this country with Sir 
 Henry Clinton, and served all through the Revolution, 
 being wounded in the battle of Princeton, and losing an 
 eye in the battle of Stony Point. He surrendered with 
 Cornwallis at Yorktown. It is amusing to remember that 
 my wife's grandfather. Colonel Nicholas Fish, was also 
 present at Yorktown, on the winning side; I wonder if the 
 two grandfathers ever met. 
 
 My grandfather was sent to Newburgh under a flag of 
 truce to see Washington at his headquarters. He said 
 after the interview that he had never been so much im- 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 pressed by any man as by Washington, though he had 
 met many of the distinguished men of his time, among 
 them Napoleon and Wellington; and he gave it as his 
 opinion that a country fighting under such a leader could 
 not fail of victory. The late Doctor Forsyth, of New- 
 burgh, who knew my grandfather well, told me this anec- 
 dote at the Century Club in New York some years ago. 
 
 In the War of 1812 my grandfather became colonel of 
 the Nova Scotia Fencibles, but late in life was naturalized 
 as an American citizen. His army chest in my studio is 
 a huge and ponderous affair of solid English walnut and 
 brass. Histories mention that the British in the battle 
 of Princeton were ''much encumbered with baggage." 
 
 Firearms were a hobby of my grandfather's. We used 
 to have the model of a gun that he had invented for the 
 British army. I don't know that it was ever used. Stu- 
 pidly enough, it was given away to a farmer, a neighbor 
 at Danskammer, by one of my brothers when I was a boy. 
 Colonel Armstrong left a fine collection of guns and pistols, 
 among them the pair of pistols, made by Twigg, which were 
 used in the Burr-Hamilton duel in 1804. The seconds 
 came to him to borrow pistols, as he was known to have 
 the best in New York. The one that shot Hamilton is 
 marked with a cross. My grandfather was much annoyed 
 at having one of his handsomest pistols marred by this 
 cross cut on the butt, which he considered a liberty, and 
 some rather acrimonious correspondence ensued on the 
 subject. Later he gave them to his eldest son, Henry, 
 who was in the British army and used them in India, but 
 when Henry was killed there the pistols were returned to 
 my grandfather, who left them to my uncle. Commodore 
 Salter. The commodore in|:ended to bequeath them in 
 his turn to the Navy Lyceum at the Brooklyn Navy Yard 
 
 6 
 
DANSKAMMER 
 
 — in fact, he had promised them to the curator — but my 
 brother Harry persuaded him to give them to him instead. 
 Harry at his death left them to my son Noel, and he has 
 them now. 
 
 It brings that bygone tragedy near to me when I recall 
 that Harry, when he was about fourteen, had the privilege 
 of listening to the story of the famous duel as related by 
 Major William Popham, Burr's most intimate friend, at 
 that time the only survivor of General Washington's aides. 
 You may imagine with what keen interest the boy listened 
 to the old soldier, who had known all the parties concerned 
 in the duel, and my grandfather as well. I wish I had 
 heard him tell about it myself. 
 
 Colonel Armstrong had three children by his first wife, 
 Christian Amiel, a French lady; the two sons were named 
 Henry Bruen and David Affleck, after English generals 
 who were his friends. By his second wife, Margaret Mar- 
 shall, my grandmother, he had four — Edward, Margaret, 
 Charles Marshall, and Rose. (Aunt Rose was named 
 Rosetta, after the place in Egypt where the ''Rosetta 
 stone" was found, because, for some now forgotten reason, 
 my grandfather was interested in a battle that was fought 
 there.) It is strange that of all my grandfather's children 
 and grandchildren I am the only one who has left any 
 descendants. 
 
 Margaret Marshall and her sister Janet lived with their 
 stepfather, John Ramsay, sometimes in New York or 
 Philadelphia, and sometimes in Elizabeth Town, as Eliza- 
 beth was called in the days when it "contained an unusual 
 number of pohte families." And wherever the Ramsays 
 and Marshalls happened to be living they had a remarkably 
 good time, judging from their lively letters and all the pretty 
 little visiting-cards and invitations they left behind them. 
 
 7 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 My great-aunt Janet married first John Rucker (her 
 granddaughter married General Phil Sheridan), and second 
 Alexander Macomb, the "speculator," father of General 
 Macomb of the War of 1 812. He deserved his nickname, 
 for the enterprises he embarked on with Robert Morris 
 and William Duer — such as buying four million acres in 
 western New York at eighteen cents an acre — were on a 
 grand scale; too grand, indeed, for Duer, who landed in 
 jail. Macomb's Dam Bridge, part of his farm, perpetu- 
 ates the name of this old gentleman in New York. 
 
 Margaret Marshall was a belle, so it is not surprising 
 that she had a romance before meeting my grandfather. 
 As a young girl she became engaged to a Spanish gentle- 
 man, Seiior Rendon, secretary of the Spanish Legation. 
 They never married. I gather from his letters — both 
 voluminous and passionate — that the King would not 
 allow him to form an alliance with an American. Don 
 Gardoqui, the first Spanish minister to this country, gave 
 Miss Marshall two little marble busts of Caesar and Scan- 
 tilla, which now stand on my parlor mantelpiece in New 
 York, and I also have an interesting pastel of Madame 
 Van Berckel, wife of the first Dutch minister, given to my 
 grandmother by Van Berckel's daughter. (She went to 
 the West Indies and never returned. I believe the ship 
 was lost.) 
 
 My old friend Judge Kent knew Colonel Armstrong 
 when his daughters were young and much admired. My 
 grandfather was a peppery old gentleman, and when 
 young Judge Kent — ^though I suppose he was not a judge 
 then — went to the Armstrongs' house one night with some 
 other young men to serenade the young ladies, the colonel 
 appeared at an upper window with a gun and threatened 
 to shoot if they did not desist. 
 
 8 
 
DANSKAMMER 
 
 My grandfather died before I was born, but my brother 
 Harry remembered his taking a walk with him wearing a 
 black patch over one eye and his hair in a pigtail. The 
 old gentleman bought a card of peppermints for the little 
 boy; in those days peppermints came stuck in rows on 
 bits of pasteboard. 
 
 A family sorrow, bitter in its day, but carrying only a 
 flavor of romance by the time I arrived upon the scene, 
 was the death of my uncle Henry, my grandfather's eldest 
 son by his first marriage. He was also in the British 
 army, fought in Spain and was at the battle of Corunna 
 and in the famous retreat; perhaps he was at the burial of 
 Sir John Moore, when "not a drum was heard, not a 
 funeral note." Henry was killed at the siege of Bhurt- 
 poor in India — "leading a forlorn hope, blown up by a 
 mine," I was told as a child. Bhurtpoor, the capital of 
 the Jats, was a formidable fortress, and it took the British 
 two months to reduce it, but finally, on the i8th of Jan- 
 uary, 1826, they exploded ten thousand pounds of powder 
 in the chief mine and entered the city through a breach in 
 the wall, incidentally losing six hundred men, among them 
 my uncle Henry — but "the moral effect was deep and 
 lasting," the histories tell us. The news was a terrible 
 blow to his family. My aunt Rose told my brother 
 Harry that they were all sitting at the breakfast-table 
 when the Albion, a British newspaper, was brought in and 
 my grandfather found his son's name among the list of 
 the slain. 
 
 My father, Edward Armstrong, also followed my grand- 
 father into the British army. I have his commission 
 signed by George IV, in which he is styled "Edward Arm- 
 strong, Gentleman," and made an ensign in the 104th 
 Regiment of Foot. He was then ten years old — they 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 caught them young in those days. I don't know whether 
 or not he resigned from the army immediately after he 
 married, but in old letters he is addressed as captain. 
 
 It was at "Morrisania," the old Morris place in West- 
 chester, that my father met my mother for the first time. 
 She was Sarah Hartley Ward, the daughter of Colonel 
 John Ward, of Carolina, and was making the Morrises a 
 visit with her sister Mary, who also met her future hus- 
 band, Gouverneur Morris Wilkins, on this occasion. I 
 have heard that the coming of the Misses Ward from 
 Charleston to New York was something of an event in 
 the restricted society of that time, and doubtless many 
 young men were interested in the advent of these heiresses. 
 My father and mother were married in 1822 at the house 
 of Doctor Wilkes, St. John's Park, in Trinity parish. 
 They had seven children, only four of whom lived to grow 
 up. I was the youngest. 
 
 My father was one of the handsomest men of his time. 
 When Lord Stanley, later Earl of Derby, visited America 
 he went to Charleston with my father and attended church 
 there with him. All the girls were on the lookout to see 
 the nobleman. But they mistook my father for Lord 
 Stanley and said it was easy to see that a British nobleman 
 was much more distinguished-looking than any American. 
 I have a miniature of him by Rogers; it was then the cus- 
 tom for a man to present his miniature to his fiancee, and 
 this was his gift to my mother at the time of their mar- 
 riage. He was an accomplished man; he drew, and wrote 
 poetry, played the violin, and had some knowledge of 
 medicine. He was a great favorite; my Aunt Margaret 
 Salter told me that when he was at a ball, if he saw a plain 
 girl having no attention, he would make a point of dancing 
 with her and trying to give her a good time, and old Mrs. 
 
 10 
 
DANSKAMMER 
 
 Chrystie said he could cut the most beautiful double pigeon- 
 wing she ever saw. He was loved by all his neighbors, 
 high and low. 
 
 My father was athletic, a splendid shot and rider, an 
 adept in all manly arts, and up to all the sports of the 
 time. He raised many fine race-horses, chiefly sired by 
 '*Sir Henry," famous for his race with ** Eclipse"; but my 
 mother objected to racing, so only once did he enter a 
 horse for a race and that was not for money, but for a 
 "pipe of wine." Whether he won or not I don't know. 
 Many of the famous trotting-horses of Orange County are 
 descended from thoroughbred mares that my father owned. 
 Old people have told me how well my father looked on 
 his favorite horse, a mahogany bay named Frank, which 
 I remember perfectly. He also had a particularly favorite 
 gun, a muzzle-loader made by Westley Richards, which he 
 always used. 
 
 My family were all exceedingly fond of shooting and 
 fishing; their old letters almost always mention the size 
 of the trout that had been caught or the number of birds 
 that had been shot lately. When I was a boy the shoot- 
 ing was still good in our neighborhood, even wild pigeons 
 were still plentiful — my father writes to Uncle Charles of 
 killing sixty-two in one day — but they are now entirely 
 extinct. In an old book of travels in the State of New 
 York in 1783 the author speaks of the pigeons breeding 
 in infinite numbers: *'In a valley where they nested, for 
 six or eight miles nearly every tree had a number of nests, 
 and some trees not less than fifteen or twenty." My 
 father used to go off on long hunting expeditions with an 
 intimate friend of his, the Honorable Charles Augustus 
 Murray, grandson of Lord Dunmore, the last English 
 governor of Virginia, notorious for having burned Norfolk. 
 
 II 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Partly because of the fine shooting, but also as a specula- 
 tion, my father and Mr. Murray bought several farms 
 together in Pennsylvania in the centre of the coal region. 
 Unfortunately the resources remained undeveloped while 
 in their hands, and in the end the land was sold to the 
 Scrantons. 
 
 Mr. Murray was a great traveller. He stayed some 
 years over here, much of the time being spent among the 
 savage tribes of American Indians in the Far West, mak- 
 ing what he called a "summer residence" with the Paw- 
 nees, and recounted his adventures in a most interesting 
 book of ** Travels." In a letter to my father Mr. Murray 
 gives an account of a ride he took from Danskammer to 
 Albany in 1834, stopping on the way to see the Hosack 
 place at Hyde Park, where he was shown around the 
 grounds by young Mrs. Hosack. Alas, where is ** young 
 Mrs. Hosack " now ! The Hosack place, which Doctor 
 Hosack bought from Doctor Bard in 1830, has always been 
 celebrated for its beauty — great trees crowning a broad 
 plateau in full view of the Catskills. The old colonial 
 house was torn down about twenty years ago and replaced 
 by one built by McKim, Mead and White for Frederick 
 Vanderbilt. Doctor Hosack must have been a nice old 
 fellow as well as a great scientist; he gave a strawberry 
 festival every year in his garden in New York for the 
 students in his classes at Columbia. 
 
 From Albany Mr. Murray went to Geneseo, where he 
 stayed with the Wadsworths, and wrote: **The extensive 
 farms formed a scene to delight the eye of a Poussin or a 
 Sir J. Sinclair, but possessed less interest to a contempla- 
 tive mind than the venerable and excellent gentleman who 
 had almost created it. For it is now forty-four years since 
 Mr. W. came as the first settler to this spot, with his axe 
 
 12 
 
DANSKAMMER 
 
 on his shoulder and slept the first night under a tree. 
 He is now the universally esteemed possessor of a demesne 
 which many of the proudest nobility of Europe might 
 look upon with envy." This enthusiastic guest must have 
 made an equally pleasant impression on his hosts, for later 
 he married Elizabeth Wadsworth. Mr. Murray was am- 
 bassador to Persia and several other courts, and was at 
 one time Master of the Household to Queen Victoria. 
 One of his letters, speaking of the Queen's marriage and 
 describing Prince Albert, has an engraving at the top of 
 the page of Buckingham Palace, the window of his room 
 marked with a cross, **for the children." Of course he 
 often came to stay with us at Danskammer. My brother 
 Gouverneur remembered that on one occasion Harry and 
 he ran races together and Mr. Murray oflFered them 
 shillings as prizes or tips; as independent Americans the 
 boys refused them, and Gouv remembered that my father 
 was not pleased, because English boys were always ready 
 to take tips. 
 
 My father died in 1840. Though I was about four 
 years old I do not remember him. All I remember is 
 going to the door of the large "north room" at Danskam- 
 mer, and looking in and seeing something covered by a 
 sheet; I knew it was he and that he was lying there dead. 
 He died of scarlet fever just a few days after the death 
 from the same disease of my only sister, Kttle Mary. 
 
 We all had scarlet fever at the same time. I got off 
 very lightly and was out and around while the others were 
 still in their rooms. Old Doctor Van Cleek allowed no 
 refreshing drinks, not even water, or fruit; so Harry, who 
 was imprisoned in Aunt Rose's room on the second floor, 
 used to let down a doubled-up jack-knife on a string, to 
 which I would fasten pears, peaches, and plums, and he 
 
 13 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 would hoist them up. One day he managed to crawl out 
 of bed and drank the whole contents of the water-pitcher 
 on the wash-stand, after which he went to sleep and woke 
 up cured. At the time my father died my mother was so 
 ill that she could not be told of his death or of that of her 
 little girl until much later. 
 
 My earliest recollection is an adventure I had with my 
 little sister Mary when she was six and I was four. I have 
 only this one memory of her. Mary and I were out in the 
 ** sugar-loaf" field alone, standing on the bank of the brook 
 near the bridge, when suddenly a little "skilly-pot" turtle 
 scuttled across the brook, which excited us so much that we 
 both fell off into the water. It was shallow and there was 
 no danger, but we both got a good wetting and were afraid 
 to go home in that condition, so we went to the top of the 
 hill at the end of the avenue and tried to dry ourselves in the 
 sun. Not being very successful in this, we finally went home, 
 where we found my mother in the large storeroom closet. 
 She was getting out rock-candy from a tin box that always 
 stood on the top shelf, and was giving it to the other chil- 
 dren. All these details are impressed so clearly on my 
 memory — they say the first thing a child remembers is 
 invariably connected with something to eat — because my 
 mother did not give Mary and me any of the rock-candy. 
 I remember well the delightful box from which the candy 
 came, the rich dark plum-cake that lived in it, and all the 
 other delicacies. This is, as I say, the only thing I am 
 sure I remember about my little sister, but I have also a 
 very distinct impression — whether real or fancied, I do 
 not know — of a fair little face and long, curling light hair. 
 If I ever reach heaven and see her, as I often pray that I 
 may, shall I know her when we meet? 
 
 I remember other things about that summer of 1840. 
 
 14 
 
DANSKAMMER 
 
 I remember Commodore Salter, Aunt Margaret's husband, 
 being there at Danskammer, and also Mr. David Mait- 
 land, my godfather. Of course Commodore Salter stands 
 out so plainly because he gave me my first ride on horse- 
 back. He had a bay horse that was kept in our stable, 
 and one day he put me on the back of this bay and led 
 him out among the apple-trees in the orchard. This was 
 a memorable ride and I shall never forget it. 
 
 Mr. David Maitland was a frequent visitor at Dans- 
 kammer, and I looked forward to his coming, as he always 
 brought candy — packages of "Stewart's Mixed Broken 
 Candy," made by R. L. and A. Stewart. Their place in 
 New York was on Chambers Street, the north side, where 
 it forms a sort of square. This candy was put up in square 
 packages, blue and white, holding about a pound; there 
 were sticks of pink cinnamon, wintergreen, red and white 
 striped, and white vanilla in squarish pieces, also occa- 
 sional strips of lemon that were very much prized; later it 
 was called "Ridley's Broken Candy." The Stewarts were 
 Scotchmen who made a large fortune and lived in hand- 
 some houses on Fifth Avenue. 
 
 When Aunt Margaret visited Danskammer, the first 
 thing she always did was to go down into the nursery and 
 see my old nurse, Catherine Small, for she had also been 
 nurse for all the Armstrong family and they were devoted 
 to her. She was the widow of a sailor who had been killed 
 by falling from a mast. Her room was in the basement, 
 with one window toward the south that had one of those 
 wide window-seats in which two people could sit comforta- 
 bly; a like window opened into a long hall under the porch, 
 which always kept its white shutters closed, and on them 
 hung life-sized portraits in red crayon by Saint Memin of 
 my grandfather and grandmother Armstrong, of which I 
 
 15 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 now have small steel-engravings. Both pictures and 
 frames were valuable, but in moving from Danskammer 
 they were left in a bureau-drawer and lost, like a good 
 many other nice old things. Our garret was full of such 
 treasures and was a fine place to play on rainy days. At 
 one end was a dark room over the porch, and at the other 
 a raised platform where were kept large portfolios of en- 
 gravings by Boydell and Bartolozzi. There were chests 
 filled with old British uniforms, trappers' and American 
 Indian dresses belonging to my father, made of leather 
 with fringes on them, and quantities of old brocade dresses 
 which we used for charades. My sister-in-law cut up 
 some of the red coats to make iron-holders, and the bro- 
 cades went for pincushions for a church fair, but in the 
 end I secured some of the engravings. 
 
 At one end of the nursery was a Franklin stove, where 
 a wood-fire always burned on chilly days, at the other a 
 tall mahogany press with shelves above and doors below, 
 in which were always goodies of some sort. The nursery 
 was the meeting-place for all the children; we played our 
 games there, and as it was near the storeroom my mother 
 also made a convenience of it and cut up the loaf sugar 
 there. In those days sugar came in the shape of a cone, 
 about eighteen inches high and six inches across at the 
 base; it was wrapped in several layers of paper, the outer 
 being thick and of a dark-purple color. On Christmas 
 Eve we hung up our stockings at the FrankKn, and I 
 remember opening mine one time sitting in the big trundle- 
 bed that stood beside nurse's, so big that several children 
 could sleep in it. It was on the floor in front of the 
 Franklin that we did most of our work, made molasses 
 candy, mended our skates, greased our boots, and around 
 the large table we stoned the raisins for the Christmas 
 plum pudding. 
 
 i6 
 
DANSKAMMER 
 
 When nurse got very old and bent and went about 
 with a stick she could scarcely let me out of her sight, and 
 was always hobbling out to the "cold spring," nearly a 
 quarter of a mile away, to see if I had fallen into it. One 
 rainy day she was missed from the house, and after a long 
 search she was found lying in the raspberry patch insen- 
 sible. She had evidently gone to look for me. After this 
 she was somewhat childish, though she lived for several 
 years, until she was nearly ninety. She was a dear, sweet 
 old soul. 
 
 When the large table which I spoke of in the nursery 
 was not in use for some housekeeping rite we used it for 
 playing games. One game was sea-fighting. We had vast 
 fleets of wooden ships made up from shingles fitted with 
 masts, sails, and bowsprits. They were war-ships with 
 historic names. Wasp, Frolic, and the like. Harry usually 
 cut them out, perhaps a hundred to a fleet. They would 
 sally out and meet the hostile fleet and ram them — it was 
 our only means of warfare — ^the enemy would ram in 
 return, and when any vessel was practically disabled, with 
 mast and rigging gone, perhaps upset, it was towed into 
 harbor as a prize. We really had splendid fun and got 
 very much excited over the exploits of some favorite ship. 
 Then we had jackstraws, cut out in various shapes, such 
 as horses and castles, by Harry, who was very handy with 
 his knife. They all had numbers on the sides, and when 
 one got 500 he was winner. I remember a horse was the 
 highest, 1 00. Now those winter evenings seem ages ago ! 
 Truly "the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts." 
 
 And always as our companion was little Fox, a yel- 
 low, dear, small Scotch terrier, given to Gouv by Mr. 
 David Maitland. Fox was Gouv's regular companion to 
 his rabbit-traps. I was too young then to be allowed to 
 go to the traps, but later I used to set traps and once 
 
 17 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 eaught eleven in one night. When the snow was deep 
 Gouv used to have to carry Fox in his arms for miles; but 
 he always went along. In making our traps we used an 
 Indian tomahawk that had belonged to Brant, the famous 
 chief of the Six Nations, that had been given by him to 
 my grandfather when he went to see him on some mission 
 or other. Of course after a while we lost it. We had 
 many dogs; one, a splendid brindled half-mastiff and half- 
 bulldog named Leo, used to have awful fights with 
 Don, a fine yellow pointer, which we kept for Uncle 
 Charles when he was off on a cruise. Don would seize 
 the mastiff by his fore paws, and it was almost impossible 
 to make him let go, so Leo often went about lame and 
 bandaged up. When my father died he left to our care a 
 beautiful yellow-and-white setter named Ulric, given to 
 him by Mr. Maitland; he lived many years, but finally 
 became so infirm that once when he was taking a drink 
 at the "cold spring" near the barns and sheep-pen he fell 
 in and was drowned. And then there was Jet, a beau- 
 tiful black pointer that Mr. Maitland gave Harry, bred 
 from dogs belonging to Joseph Bonaparte. So we had 
 plenty of dogs. 
 
 My uncle Henry, who was killed in India, was never 
 more to me than a romantic name, but Uncle Charles 
 figured conspicuously and delightfully in our boyish fives. 
 A fieutenant in the United States navy, he spent most of 
 his shore leave at Danskammer, and his visits were great 
 events; he was so jolly and entertaining, so full of life and 
 spirits. And then he was sure to bring us all manner of 
 curiosities that he had picked up on his voyages — rare shells, 
 strange arms, and such-fike barbaric treasure. One of his 
 voyages was in the U. S. Sloop-of-War Saratoga to the 
 coast of Africa — she was built at Portsmouth and this was 
 
 i8 
 
DANSKAMMER 
 
 her maiden trip — and he brought fascinating things from 
 this cruise and thrilled us with fine tales of an African 
 chief he had met, with a marvellous name which I have 
 forgotten. From Egypt he once brought us some wheat 
 that had been found in a mummy-case. It was planted, 
 and in my mind's eye I can see the beautiful waving green 
 patch that sprang from it growing at one side of the avenue. 
 But, sad to say, my brother Gouv insists that it never 
 came up. 
 
 One of uncle's cruises under the command of Commo- 
 dore Perry had an unfortunate termination. It seems 
 that on a certain occasion Perry was obliged to be away, 
 and left the ship under the command of a lieutenant of a 
 lower rank than my uncle. As this was not at all in 
 accordance with etiquette, Uncle Charles considered it an 
 insult and expostulated with the commodore, and finally 
 sent him a challenge to fight a duel, through his friend and 
 second. Captain Hunter. Commodore Perry declined to 
 meet him, and my uncle was court-martial led for challeng- 
 ing his superior officer; but he was practically acquitted, 
 for he was given merely a nominal sentence, being sus- 
 pended for a very short time. I beheve the affair caused 
 quite a stir in navy circles. 
 
 The story of "Alvarado" Hunter, as this friend of my 
 uncle's was called, was pretty tragic. During the Mexican 
 War he was sent with one small ship to blockade the town 
 of Alvarado until the land forces came up, but he managed 
 to take the place before the army got there; for this excess 
 of zeal he was dismissed from the service, to the indigna- 
 tion of his friends. 
 
 My brother Harry was devoted to Uncle Charles, and 
 used to stay on the North Carolina with him; it was then 
 that Harry got the passion for the sea that held him all 
 
 19 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 his life. Uncle gave him the dog Carlo, a beautiful 
 cocker spaniel with long silken ears, brought up on the 
 ship and taught any number of clever tricks by the sailors, 
 such as climbing a ladder and fetching one's shppers. But 
 one accomplishment he had acquired on land. He could 
 catch a snake by the middle and shake the life out of it 
 before it got the smallest chance to defend itself. 
 
 I shall never forget Uncle Charles's last visit to Dans- 
 kammer. It was winter and the snow was on the ground; 
 I was out at the stable and he drove up to say good-by. 
 I watched him as he disappeared through the big black 
 gate. I never saw him again. It was a great grief to all 
 of us boys when we heard of his death, just as he was 
 finishing a cruise, *'at midnight, aboard cruiser Ohio, off 
 Rio, homeward-bound." He died of yellow fever and was 
 buried at sea. I heard at the time that he was taken ill 
 of the fever on shore and did not want to be taken back to 
 the ship, fearing that the disease would be communicated 
 to others. This was like him; he was an unselfish, gallant 
 fellow. We boys loved him dearly. I have heard that at 
 his funeral there was not a dry eye on the ship. 
 
 For years after his death old salts would turn up at 
 Danskammer and tell us about him; they said that on 
 board ship he was a strict disciplinarian, but when any 
 sailor met him on shore he always gave him all the money 
 he had in his pockets. When these old sailors came to 
 Danskammer we always gave them a glass of brandy and 
 two dollars and sent them on their way rejoicing. They 
 would have to go to Hampton to take the ferry across the 
 river for the train at New Hamburg, and the path went 
 through our barnyard. One of these old salts, after the 
 usual drink and tip, started on his way; some time after- 
 ward Gouv happened to go out to the barn, and there 
 
 20 
 
DANSKAMMER 
 
 was the old fellow perched on top of the barnyard gate, 
 watching round-eyed a pair of white oxen sleeping peace- 
 fully in the sun. They were kind, tranquil beasts, but to 
 the old seaman they were an unknown terror. Gouv asked 
 him why he was waiting, and he said he was afraid "one of 
 those fellows would run him down." 
 
 My mother, who you will remember came from Caro- 
 lina, was very hospitable and kept open house at Dans- 
 kammer, most of her guests being our Southern relations. 
 She always kept good horses, and in old times usually 
 drove to Charleston for the winter, with four horses, tak- 
 ing a considerable time for the trip, and as there were few 
 hotels, she was entertained by her friends all along the 
 way. It must have been an ideal way to travel. 
 I remember very well the two large travelling carriages 
 that used to stand in our stable, arranged for four horses, 
 with a high seat for the coachman with a big hammer-cloth 
 below his seat, and platforms behind for footmen and 
 luggage, and flights of folding steps that let down from 
 inside the carriage. 
 
 Our every-day carriage was the shape of a pumpkin- 
 seed, also with a hammer-cloth and steps to let down, and 
 was hung on large springs front and rear. When my 
 mother went to live in New York in 1849 ^^d let the house 
 and farm to Mr. Warren Delano, all the horses except 
 Charley and some of the furniture were sold at auction, 
 what is called a "vandue" in our part of the country. A 
 good many valuable things that were not then appreciated 
 were sold at that time. We had a pair of small mules 
 and I remember how funny Sam and Bill looked when, 
 after the sale, they were driven ofl" by their purchaser, 
 harnessed to our great family carriage. Bill was a 
 vicious animal, but Harry was venturesome and used to 
 
 21 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 ride him. Mules do not have prominent withers like 
 horses, so when Bill stood up perpendicularly on his 
 forelegs, Harry and the saddle would slip over his head, 
 and both come down in a heap, but he would put the sad- 
 dle on and have another try. Harry even rode the cows 
 sometimes. 
 
 My mother was a very humane woman, but she had 
 all her horses' tails docked if they were long when she 
 bought them. Previous to being docked, the muscles of 
 the tail were cut by a veterinary surgeon, then the end was 
 attached to cords that ran over pulleys fastened to the 
 posts at each side of the rear of the stall, which kept the 
 tail in an upright position, and this process was continued 
 for several weeks, until the tail was always carried up. It 
 was then docked. It was cruel, but every one did it; one 
 never saw carriage-horses with long tails. Now it is for- 
 bidden by the S. P. C. A. 
 
 When I was little we went to church in Newburgh, at 
 St. George's, where the Reverend Doctor Brown was rec- 
 tor for more than fifty years. I believe when he first 
 began his Kfe there that there was great prejudice against 
 him on account of his being an Episcopalian — it was shortly 
 after our difficulties with England, and people had not 
 yet got over the dislike for everything English, including 
 the English Church. I remember the long, cold drives 
 to church on winter mornings and the leathery smell of 
 the closed carriage. When we drove into Newburgh for 
 shopping we would stop the carriage in front of the shops 
 and they would bring the things out to show us. The 
 Bank of Newburgh and the Highland Bank were just 
 where they are now, and nearly opposite was Farnham's 
 grocery-store. All the grocers were then liquor dealers as 
 well, and usually had bars in the rear of their stores, and 
 
 22 
 
DANSKAMMER 
 
 it was not thought to be to their discredit. Mrs. Farnham 
 was a very capable lady and I remember her coming to 
 Danskammer to help my mother make calf s-foot jelly for 
 a church fair. The jelly was made in a bag and hung up 
 in the schoolroom to drip — a big round bag like a hot-water 
 bottle dripping into a pan. 
 
 The roads in winter when there was no snow were 
 pretty bad, and everybody was glad when the ice on the 
 river froze thick enough for sleighing. As soon as it was 
 strong some venturesome person would lay out a track 
 and mark it with little cedar-trees, and then we had a 
 fine level road, sometimes for months. Of course there 
 were no big steamboats and ferries to break up the ice as 
 they do now. One of my earliest recollections is a drive 
 across the river with my mother and old John Bush, our 
 colored coachman for forty years, and a visit to the Ver- 
 plancks at Fishkill. I was sent to play with the children 
 — I was perhaps five years old — and presently when a tre- 
 mendous noise emanated from the nursery they all rushed 
 up and found that I had quarrelled with one of the boys 
 and had felled him with a chair. I don't recall what hap- 
 pened afterward; I only remember that I was in disgrace. 
 The Society of the Cincinnati was founded in the old Ver- 
 planck homestead and the place is one of the original 
 manors. 
 
 Until 1849 we always lived summer and winter at 
 Danskammer. For several years we had tutors, three in 
 all, young divinity students. The Reverend Henry Ed- 
 wards I remember as a handsome young man who was 
 fond of chemistry and used to make interesting experi- 
 ments, resulting sometimes in explosions which we thought 
 very exciting. Each of our desks in the schoolroom had 
 under it a small open box, like a carpenter's mitre-box, in 
 
 23 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 which we put our feet, in order to make our toes turn out I 
 I don't know whose idea it was or whether or no it had the 
 desired effect. Our schoolroom, the north basement room, 
 had wide window-seats level with the lawn outside, fine 
 places to sit when we wanted to paint in water-colors or 
 make boats. These windows were guarded by iron bars, 
 soldered with lead into the granite sills and supposed to 
 be immovable. Mr. Edwards's punishment for misde- 
 meanors — and with five boys there were a good many such 
 — ^was "keeping in." So when a punishment was due he 
 would lock the door in the afternoon and go away, leaving 
 us, as he supposed, safely imprisoned. But Harry was an 
 ingenious boy and contrived to drill the solder out from 
 around two of the bars, so that we could all creep out and 
 get safely back by the time Mr. Edwards returned. And 
 I do not think that he ever discovered how we spent our 
 afternoons. At that time we had an old farmer named 
 Jonathan Pierce; when the "Pickwick Papers" came out 
 Mr. Edwards would have old Jonathan into the school- 
 room and read it aloud to him, and he would enjoy it 
 enormously and be convulsed with laughter. 
 
 The Reverend Samuel Hawkesley, afterward rector at 
 Marlborough, was the best of all our tutors. We were 
 awfully fond of him; he was jolly and amused us very 
 much, and was a good man besides. When he was at 
 Marlborough he established missions at Latintown and 
 Ellenville and many other places. As he had no horse, he 
 used to walk to all these missions. It is about forty miles 
 from Marlborough to Ellenville! 
 
 In 1847 Jack and I went to Mr. Alzimora's school in 
 Newburgh, and my mother left us there for the two winters 
 which she spent in New York and Charleston. It was 
 what is called a "select school," but the boys might have 
 
 24 
 
DANSKAMMER 
 
 been "selected" for their badness — they were the only 
 really bad boys I ever met at school. Our principal 
 amusements were skating and coasting in winter — New- 
 burgh has always been famous for its skaters — and swim- 
 ming in summer from a fine beach now swept away by the 
 railroad. I remember a boy named Seabury Lawrence 
 swimming across there. One calm summer evening some 
 years later I swam from our dock to the white house just 
 below the Suydams' place at New Hamburg, about two 
 miles. I was not at all tired. 
 
 One day toward spring, when we were at school, while 
 the river was still frozen. Jack and I got leave to walk up 
 to Danskammer. My mother had left a cook in our house 
 and John Bush was there and a man named Matt Maston, 
 a farm-hand on the place. After dinner we were to drive 
 back, but thought it would be dull to return in a wagon, 
 and there was no sleighing, so we begged John Bush to 
 take us back in the sleigh on the ice. He did not think it 
 very safe, but we got Matt Maston to walk ahead of us 
 with a long pole with which to sound the ice. John Bush 
 drove Bess and Charley; they had broken through the 
 ice the winter before and were still a little nervous on 
 the river, but we did not mind. We sent Maston ahead 
 with his pole, and after he had gone about three miles he 
 reported that it was quite safe, and that he need go no 
 farther with us, so he went home. It was a warm day and 
 the ice was rather soft, but we went merrily on, suspecting 
 nothing, when suddenly the ice broke ! The horses began 
 to plunge — they were a pair of fine, spirited animals — 
 and the sleigh sank down, but the horses managed to pull 
 it out onto firm ice. We got out and walked cautiously 
 ahead and found that the ice would scarcely bear us, that 
 it was all honeycombed and one could almost stick one's 
 
 25 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 finger through ft, so we returned and told John Bush that 
 he would have to drive back the way we had come over 
 the crack, and go ashore. John didn't like the prospect, 
 neither did the horses, who had by this time grown very 
 much excited. We did not get into the sleigh again, but 
 walked along, watching John. He got in, laid the whip 
 on the horses, and they went at a gallop bounding over 
 the crack. They got safely over, but the sleigh sank 
 down and we thought that it was gone, but the horses 
 pulled it out. A little farther on we managed to get 
 ashore; but at that time there was no road there, and we 
 had to drive about three miles over bare ground, old stone 
 walls, and rocks. At last we reached home, had the horses 
 put in a wagon, and drove back to Newburgh. By the 
 time we reached there all the ice in the river, that we had 
 been on a few hours before, was broken up and floating 
 away. 
 
 Horses have always been one of the great interests of 
 my life. After the memorable occasion when Commodore 
 Salter put me on his bay horse, I rode whenever I had the 
 chance. I have a faint memory of a ride up Soap Hill on 
 one of the carriage-horses, a bay — and this miscellaneous 
 riding went on for some years, until finally, when I was 
 about fourteen, I found myself practically the owner of a 
 good horse, as no one used him except myself. He really 
 was a driving-horse that my brother Jack bought from a 
 neighbor, Sam Halsey, a nice active little bay horse named 
 Bill, fifteen hands high. The reason I got him was 
 that Jack's first drive with him turned out badly. Jack 
 started out one evening with his new horse, wagon, and 
 whip, and returned home on foot with nothing but his 
 whip, leaving the rest of his equipage scattered over the 
 
 26 
 
DANSKAMMER 
 
 road. He had been run into. Bill had run home into 
 the stable. Jack said he would never drive him again, so 
 I rode him steadily for several years. He was a perfect 
 little saddle-horse. I once rode him fro^ Danskammer 
 to Goshen and back — in all fifty-four miles — and I do not 
 remember that either Billy or I was at all tired. The 
 use of this horse practically made a good rider of me. 
 Another horse I rode was a black pony that Gouv and I 
 bought together, but he was never much good, and finally 
 fell into the spring and got drowned. 
 
 Newbold Morris, a great friend of mine — he gave me 
 the ring I always wear — was in the habit of riding up to 
 Danskammer on horseback. On one occasion he stopped 
 there for a day or two and I went on with him to Hyde 
 Park, where we stayed with his uncle, Mr. Tom Newbold. 
 I rode a little bay horse called Ruby, and Newbold a 
 gray mare. We met there a Miss Eleanor Jones, an heiress 
 and a very nice girl. In a few days I came home, leaving 
 Newbold at Hyde Park, and shortly after he turned up 
 again at our house, riding another horse — he was a great 
 horse-jockey and had traded his mare for a cream-colored 
 nag — with the news that he was engaged to Miss Jones! 
 Newbold was awfully good-looking. 
 
 Time passed on, I graduated at college and went abroad, 
 and had some nice rides in Madeira, and about a year after 
 my return, having spent a winter studying law in New 
 York, of which more anon, I returned to Danskammer, 
 deciding to study law in Newburgh in the office of Has- 
 brouck and Taylor, and ride back and forth on horseback. 
 It is seven miles from the Danskammer house to New- 
 burgh, fourteen miles to go and return, but the first six 
 months I only missed one day, when the snow was so deep 
 
 27 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 in our avenue that my mare stuck and could not get 
 through. Indeed, during those two years of 1861 and 1862 
 I scarcely missed a day. Rain or shine, snow or whatever 
 the weather might be, I went and came. Very early every 
 morning John Bush would come into my room to light the 
 fire, usually remarking that it was "as cold as Egypt." 
 Gouv and I breakfasted by the bright coal-fire in the din- 
 ing-room and I would be in Newburgh by nine o'clock. 
 I read law, copied papers and such things, and lunched at 
 the baker's, or went to the grocer's for some bread and 
 cheese; sometimes Mr. Hasbrouck would ask me to his 
 pleasant house for lunch or dinner. 
 
 My mount was a chestnut known as "Holden's Mare" 
 — she never had any other name — but she was not really 
 my horse any more than Bill had been. In fact, she 
 was another inheritance from Jack. She belonged to 
 Holden, who kept the steamboat dock at Marlborough, 
 and the first time I saw her was up at Jew's Creek near 
 the dock, where Gouv and I were rail-shooting. We spoke 
 of her to Jack with so much admiration that he finally 
 bought her, but when he got her he didn't like her and 
 lent her to me; as no one ever used her except myself, she 
 was like my own horse. She had a beautiful fast trot; I 
 once rode her the six miles from Newburgh to the hickory- 
 tree at the head of our road in eighteen minutes. I only 
 had two falls from her. One frosty morning John Bush 
 forgot to draw the girths tight and the saddle turned as 
 I put my foot in the stirrup, and the mare went careering 
 off* to the stable, leaving me flat on my back on the lawn. 
 The other time was due to a habit she had of passing 
 vehicles on a dead run; as I rode up behind Dan Barnes 
 she broke into a gallop, caught her left leg on his wheel, 
 
 28 
 
DANSKAMMER 
 
 and we all went headlong. She was hard to mount, too, 
 and always started on a gallop as soon as I got my foot 
 into the stirrup, but barring these little peculiarities 
 "Holden's Mare" was very fine. 
 
 29 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A BOY 
 
 "Broadway, the first that takes the eye. 
 The noblest street I here espy, 
 The new-swept side-walks, neat and clean. 
 With poplars shaded, sweet and green; 
 The numerous steeples towering high, 
 Seen best from ships when passing by , 
 
 And when descending Hudson bold; 
 The City Hotel we behold, 
 Commercial next, and old Tontine." 
 
 — ^Thomas Eaton. 
 
 When I was a little boy about six or seven I went with 
 my mother to stay at Mrs. Plummer's boarding-house, No. 
 65 Broadway, near Rector Street. Mrs. Plummer was a 
 fine old lady, quite a friend of my mother, and her house 
 was perhaps the best of its kind in New York. It was 
 more like a family hotel than a boarding-house, very well 
 kept, the food delicious, and the very nicest people stayed 
 there. I remember the long, handsome table, shining with 
 bright linen and silver, with Mrs. Plummer's portly figure 
 at the head and Miss Eliza Plummer at the foot. Miss 
 Eliza afterward married Mr. Pritchard, a fine-looking 
 man and very much of a gentleman; he was a boarder at 
 that time. Another boarder was a Mr. Albert Speyer, a 
 dashing, interesting man, who told me captivating stories 
 of the wild West. He was a great traveller, a friend of 
 Fremont, the explorer of the West, who was afterward 
 candidate for President against Buchanan. 
 
 I remember Mr. Speyer giving me a half a dollar that 
 
 30 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A BOY 
 
 I kept as a pocket-piece for a long while, as half-dollars 
 were not plenty with me, but one day I wanted very much 
 to go to the American Institute Fair, held in the Castle 
 Garden at the Battery, which at that time stood out in 
 the water, as the ground had not then been filled in around 
 it as it is now. This fair was an annual event in New York 
 and every one went to it. Well, I wanted to go there with 
 some other boys and had no money for a ticket except 
 that half-dollar, so although it was a sore trial to part with 
 it, I used it for my ticket. I have no remembrance of 
 what we saw or did there; the only thing I remember is 
 my pang at parting with my half-dollar. The Castle Gar- 
 den, originally a fort, was later fitted up as a place for all 
 sorts of entertainments. Jenny Lind sang there, and when 
 La Fayette made his triumphal return to America it was 
 here they gave him a reception. 
 
 There was an old gentleman at Mrs. Plummer's, Mr. 
 Phoenix, whose face wore the "livery of good living," and 
 who was very kind to me. He would often take me by 
 the hand and we would go together to his store, a whole- 
 sale grocery-store in some near-by street, which I found a 
 delightful place. I liked the nice smells of the coffee and 
 sugar, and the figs and nuts with which he used to regale 
 me. A great pet of mine was a large gray cat of his that 
 would lie curled up on top of the bags. Mr. Phoenix was 
 a member of the well-known New York family of that 
 name, and, like many gentlemen of those days, combined 
 banking with importing wine, coffee, and other groceries. 
 
 Broadway at that time from the City Hall Park down 
 to the Battery was handsomely built up with hotels and 
 dwelling-houses. Old Trinity Church was being built then. 
 Opposite Mrs. Plummer's was the Globe Hotel; farther up 
 on the east side on the corner of Cedar Street was the City 
 
 31 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Hotel, where my mother sometimes stayed, one of the best 
 hotels in New York. Below on the west side of Broadway 
 was the large house with two lions in front of it, one on 
 each side of the steps, which was afterward occupied by 
 the British consul. These lions remained there until a 
 year or so ago. On the east side, facing the Bowling 
 Green, the block now occupied by the Custom House, 
 were handsome large brick and stone houses, occupied by 
 leading citizens — among them were the Primes and Whit- 
 neys — while around the corner were other fine houses fac- 
 ing the Battery. The Mortons lived in one of these. 
 The Battery at that time was a pretty park, surrounded 
 by a wrought-iron railing, with an iron gate at the corner 
 of the Battery and Broadway, where an old apple-woman 
 was stationed with a tempting array of candy, apples, and 
 oranges. The Bowling Green was also surrounded, as it 
 is now, by an iron railing. The tops of the rails formerly 
 had crowns on them, which were all broken off during the 
 Revolution, when the populace tore down the leaden statue 
 of George HI that stood there. (I understand that within 
 the last few months this railing, an interesting relic of the 
 Revolution, has been taken down, and no one knows what 
 has become of it. Another historical memento that has 
 lately been carelessly injured is the Worth Monument on 
 Madison Square, our only memorial of the Mexican War; 
 one of the four trophies — cannon-balls, muskets, etc. — 
 which formerly stood on the granite posts at the corners 
 of the railing was lost when the Subway was built. The 
 remaining three were replaced for a short time, but then 
 they too disappeared and the posts have stood unfinished 
 ever since; the railing, also, which is rather pleasing in 
 design, is in bad shape.) 
 
 I was allowed to go down and play in the Battery and 
 
 32 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A BOY 
 
 often patronized the old apple-woman at the corner. 
 There was a fountain in the centre of the Bowling Green 
 in the form of a pile of rocks about twenty feet in height. 
 The water did not spurt up into the air but was so arranged 
 that it would come out at the top and fall down in little 
 cascades over the projecting stones into a large basin at 
 the bottom. In this basin could be seen two flamingoes. 
 I remember they would stand on one leg, seemingly asleep. 
 There were also two pretty little deer. I don't think that 
 I had ever seen a deer before; I certainly had never seen 
 flamingoes. The deer were small, tame, and very sweet; 
 one day I remember that I bought some of those little 
 Sicilian oranges from the old apple-woman at the corner 
 and fed them to the deer, who put their noses eagerly 
 through the railing, but there was a certain difficulty in 
 regaling the deer, which added to the interest, for although 
 they could reach out and take the oranges in their mouths, 
 the fruit was so hard and round that they generally dropped 
 them and they would roU down the slanting pavement 
 into the gutter; but I would laboriously pick them up and 
 off'er them again and again, until they managed to masti- 
 cate them. 
 
 In my mind's eye I can see the Battery and the Bowl- 
 ing Green exactly as they were then. The old apple- 
 woman's stall at the gate, that flamingo poised on his one 
 leg in the basin of the fountain, the two little deer nosing 
 after the oranges, and myself laboriously rescuing them 
 from the gutter and off'ering them so persistently. How 
 distinctly one sometimes recalls a trifling memory like 
 this when other events of real moment are forgotten ! 
 
 Not long after this, when I was still a very smaH boy, 
 I went to pay a visit to my Aunt Margaret Salter, who 
 lived in West Fourteenth Street, near Sixth Avenue. Aunt 
 
 33 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Margaret was the wife of Commodore William Dayton 
 Salter, of the United States navy. She was a dear soul; 
 I have never known any one more kind and generous. 
 She was highly educated, fond of reading and, like all my 
 uncles and aunts, an excellent talker. Aunt Margaret 
 told me that when she was with my father, Aunt Rose, 
 and Uncle Charles, she heard the best and most amusing 
 conversation of her life. As she spoke beautiful French, 
 she made herself very agreeable to the foreign visitors 
 whom she entertained at the Brooklyn Navy Yard when 
 her husband was commandant. While he was at sea she 
 lived either in New York or Elizabeth. General Win- 
 field Scott lived in Elizabeth and was a great friend of my 
 aunt's. I believe they were the last couple in America 
 who could dance the minuet. The general was an enor- 
 mous man, about six feet four, and large in proportion, 
 always very kind, polite, and stately. I used often to 
 meet him going up the river on the Mary Powell and have 
 a little chat with him. 
 
 The commodore was a typical sea-captain of the old 
 school; an excellent sailor, a most capable man, and very 
 decided, not to say pig-headed, in all his ideas. He was 
 short, with a ruddy, clean-shaven face. He once told me 
 that he taught all his midshipmen to shave with both 
 hands, so that in case they were wounded they could still 
 shave ! He went to sea as midshipman at the age of ten. 
 There were no naval schools in those days; they got their 
 education at sea, and I fancy they did not teach them 
 much apart from seamanship, for the commodore often 
 complained that he was inferior to his wife in accomplish- 
 ments. He was only twelve when he got into his first sea- 
 fight — the famous battle between the Constitution and the 
 Guerriere in the War of 1812 — and was also in the cele- 
 
 34 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A BOY 
 
 brated stern chase of the Constitution, the **most exciting 
 in naval annals," when she escaped from the British fleet 
 in the fog. Mr. Dana painted an excellent picture of the 
 chase, getting all the facts for his work from the commo- 
 dore, and gave him a photograph of it, framed in a bit of 
 wood from the Constitution, which my son Noel has at 
 Danskammer. The last foreign service of the Constitution 
 was the transport of American products to the Paris Expo- 
 sition of 1878, which makes a link between me and the 
 famous old ship. 
 
 When the commodore was young, duelling was still very 
 popular; he told me that there were frequent duels in the 
 cockpit among the midshipmen, and described to me a 
 duel that he had fought with another officer at Naples. 
 I spoke of this duel once to Loyall Farragut, who told me 
 that it was historic in the navy and that he had seen it 
 mentioned in some book. It seems that the Queen of 
 Naples visited the ship, and after she had left, my uncle 
 remarked that she was a handsome and agreeable lady; a 
 fellow officer denied this vigorously, asserting that she was 
 ugly and ill-favored. This was cause enough for a duel, 
 so one was fought and young Salter shot his opponent in 
 the hip. He said to me : " I met him the other day in an 
 
 omnibus; we are now the best of friends, and by G he 
 
 limps yet!" This seemed to give him great satisfaction 
 after fifty or sixty years. 
 
 In 1 84 1 Captain Salter was put in command of the 
 first steamship in the navy, the Mississippi. Steam was 
 considered a very hazardous experiment, and my uncle 
 said that "it was only when he looked aloft at the sails 
 and yards that he felt at home." In a letter to my aunt 
 he says: '*She is a large ship, 120 feet long and 46 wide. I 
 have two ten-inch guns now mounted and four eight-inch; 
 
 35 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 I suppose the others will be forthcoming soon. I shall 
 have a heavy battery. The ship will be all legs and arms, 
 she really looms like a seventy-four. The engine is six 
 hundred horse power, the stack or furnace pipe as big in 
 proportion as our little church steeple. We have much 
 running ice, lots of snow and visitors, the latter interfere 
 much with our work; a boat-load, principally petticoats, 
 IS coming alongside now." 
 
 The commodore had met many distinguished people, 
 among them Napoleon, who once came aboard his ship in 
 the Mediterranean, and Byron also visited the Constitu- 
 tion. I used to like to hear him talk about them, and 
 about his adventures in South American waters when he 
 was in command of the Brazil squadron. I stayed with 
 Aunt Margaret very often at the Brooklyn Navy Yard 
 when the commodore was commandant there. They had 
 a fine garden and a large fig-tree that lived for many years, 
 and even bore figs, by being covered with straw in winter. 
 
 But we have got very far away from that first visit of 
 mine to Aunt Margaret in New York. Commodore Salter 
 was very kind and took me to the theatre at Niblo's Garden. 
 The play was "Beauty and the Beast." It was my first 
 play. I don't remember much about it except the great 
 impression the terrific beast made on me, and where he 
 changes into the prince and drops his disguise it was most 
 thrilling. The dead beast lay on the stage in a round 
 heap. I remember him distinctly, looking exactly like the 
 old bufl'alo-robes that we had in the stable at home for 
 sleighing. Another treat was a feast on sponge-cake 
 bought for me by the commodore during a walk around 
 the block, down Fifth Avenue, through Sixth Avenue and 
 so home, which I recall with little pleasure, for that eve- 
 ning I was taken very ill and had the doctor, and, indeed, 
 
 36 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A BOY 
 
 was not expected to live. While I was lying ill, supposed 
 to be asleep, I heard my Aunt Margaret trying to console 
 my mother by saying the usual things — that even if I died 
 it would be "all for the best" — when to their surprise I 
 suddenly sat up in bed and remarked: "If I am going to 
 die now what was the use of my ever having been born?" 
 Later Aunt Margaret moved to a house which is still 
 standing, next to the garden of the large Van Beuren house 
 in West Fourteenth Street; it has a bay window overlook- 
 ing their garden, and is now almost the only dwelling, 
 except the Van Beuren house, on the block. At that time 
 Fifth Avenue from Sixteenth Street to Washington Square 
 was the most fashionable part of New York — ^there were 
 practically no shops in that neighborhood, from 1849 to 
 1853, except Cook's grocery -store, on the corner of Thir- 
 teenth Street and Fifth Avenue, where the Heckschers' 
 house was built later — but there were still primitive spots. 
 On the site of the Van Beuren house stood a very pretty 
 little wooden colonial house, painted white, two stories, 
 with a green door and brass knocker, approached by two 
 flights of curving wooden steps. In front of it was a large 
 balm of Gilead tree and a pump then in use, and I have 
 often seen large white sows asleep in the gutter on the 
 corner of Fourteenth Street and Fifth Avenue. Indeed, 
 pigs roamed all the streets of the city at that time. The 
 site of the Fifth Avenue Hotel was then occupied by a 
 road-house, a cottage, and outbuildings called Corporal 
 Thompson's, and back of it was a green paddock and open 
 field running down to Sixth Avenue. I have seen a cow 
 looking over a pair of bars on the corner of Fifth Avenue 
 and Twenty-third Street. Moses H. Grinnell lived on the 
 corner of Fourteenth Street and Fifth Avenue, and the 
 Haights and the Parkers built handsome houses on the 
 
 37 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 corners of West Fifteenth Street and the Avenue. The 
 Grinnell house was later occupied by Delmonico. The 
 August Belmonts hved between Thirteenth and Fourteenth 
 Streets, the Heckschers nearly opposite, then came Mr. 
 Lenox, and on the opposite corner of Twelfth Street the 
 Minturns. 
 
 Directly opposite Niblo's Garden was Pat Hearn's 
 notorious gambling-house, a very celebrated and fashion- 
 able resort for the sporting fraternity. It was a very 
 quiet-looking brownstone house, always tightly closed, 
 with the blinds drawn down. Right around the corner, in 
 Houston Street, J. C. Bancroft Davis and William Robin- 
 son lived a little later than this, and when Thackeray 
 visited America he stayed with them there. The Metro- 
 pohtan Hotel was on Broadway in front of Niblo's Garden, 
 and was one of the most famous hotels in New York. 
 St. Thomas's Church was on the corner of Houston Street 
 and Broadway. Mrs. Eades's boarding-house was next to 
 the church, and next to that were the rooms where the 
 American Art Union used to exhibit, and where later the 
 Academy of Design exhibitions were held before they built 
 their new building at the corner of Twenty-third Street 
 and Fourth Avenue. Maillard's was next door to Mrs. 
 Eades's, and Laura Keene's theatre was opposite. Later 
 than the time of which I am writing, I saw William Burton, 
 the most famous comedian of his day, in his theatre in 
 Chambers Street, opposite the City Hall Park. The same 
 building was occupied for many years by the United States 
 District Court, where I was admitted to practice about 
 1866, and where I practised law. Judge Betts was then 
 on the bench, his son was clerk of the court, and George 
 Morton, Mrs. Shippen's father, was United States com- 
 missioner. They all had offices in this building. 
 
 38 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A BOY 
 
 In 1848 I first knew of Brooks's clothing-store, on the 
 corner of Catherine and Cherry Streets. I was then twelve 
 years old and was very proud to hear that I was to go to 
 Brooks's for a new suit. I remember it well; the trousers 
 were light gray with a stripe on the side of dark gray, the 
 jacket a blue roundabout with brass navy buttons. I 
 think that Brooks was the pioneer of ready-made clothes. 
 I don't think that any one before that ever bought any 
 good ready-made things; clothes were all made to order 
 by regular private tailors. Previous to this visit to Brooks's 
 my clothes were made at Danskammer by my mother's 
 dressmaker, Mrs. de Groot from Marlborough, who came 
 in by the day. I remember her making me a pair of trou- 
 sers of gray cloth, the color of the West Point cadets. I 
 liked the cloth well enough, but they were strapped down 
 with leather straps that I abhorred. The first time I wore 
 them I went to church at Marlborough, and as soon as I 
 came home I took my straps out on the lawn where the 
 dogs had dug a hole and buried them. They were never 
 found and troubled me no more. At the time I got my 
 Brooks suit I also had a pair of patent-leather low shoes 
 made by Sales, a fashionable bootmaker in Houston Street 
 near Broadway. These shoes were interesting to me, as 
 before that my shoes had been made by Atwood in New- 
 burgh, and were not like Sales's, which were very smart 
 and went well with my new suit. But I was inordinately 
 proud of a pair of boots with red tops that Atwood made 
 for me; I used to stuff rny trousers inside the tops and 
 exhibit them on all occasions. 
 
 I seem to remember more about the clothes of 1848 
 than I do about its poHtics, but my friend Mr. Bosworth, 
 of Springfield, has a better memory, and recited to me a 
 campaign song of that date which he used to sing as a boy. 
 
 39 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 I fancy ft has never been published. Cass was Zachary 
 Taylor's opponent in the presidential contest and **Van" 
 was, of course, President Van Buren. The "Barn-burners" 
 were so radical that they were said to be willing to "burn 
 their barns to destroy the rats." The "Locos" took their 
 name from an incident at Tammany Hall, when all the 
 lights being extinguished, the meeting went on with the 
 aid of "loco-foco" matches provided in anticipation of the 
 emergency. 
 
 "Uncle Sam's White House is a very fine station 
 For any man to have and attend to the nation. 
 And many men came to the door and knocked. 
 And Uncle Sam sung while the door was locked, 
 
 * Who's that knocking at the door? 
 
 Is that you, Zac?' *No, 'tis Cass I' 
 
 *WeII you ain't Santa Anna and you've got no pass. 
 
 So there's no use your knocking at the door 
 
 Any morel 
 
 There's no use your knocking at the door I* 
 
 Next the Barn-burners came, with the Locos in their ranks. 
 And Uncle Sam laughed at their foolish pranks, 
 For they brought Matty Van, who had been there before, 
 And Uncle Sam sung, as they knocked at the door, — 
 
 *Is that you, Zac?' *No, 'tis Van!' 
 
 *WeII, you can't come in, you're a used-up man! 
 
 And there's no use your knocking at the door 
 
 Any more ! 
 
 There's no use your knocking at the door!' 
 
 Next the People came, with the brave old chief. 
 Whose brow was decked with a warrior's wreath. 
 He walked right up, as he did to the foe. 
 And knocked like a soldier in Mexico. 
 
 And Uncle Sam said, *Is that you, Zac? 
 
 Well, walk right in, for you've never turned back ! 
 
 And there's no use your knocking at the door 
 
 Any more ! 
 
 There's no use your knocking at the door!"* 
 
 40 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A BOY 
 
 It was some statesman of about this time, though I 
 cannot remember his name, who was responsible for a bit 
 of repartee familiar in my youth. He said to an opponent 
 in the House — he must have been a refined old party: 
 "Sir, you are not fit to carry guts to a bear." This odd 
 statement not being relished, he was told that he must 
 apologize; whereupon he amended it by saying: "Sir, I 
 apologize, you are fit to carry guts to a bear." 
 
 My mother and I used sometimes to visit my godfather, 
 Mr. Maitland, at his house, 41 Barclay Street. He was 
 the head of the firm of Maitland, Kennedy and Company, 
 of No. 14 Stone Street, later Maitland, Phelps, and now 
 Maitland, Coppel and Company. They have been bank- 
 ers for over a hundred years and my family have had an 
 account there since 1830. 
 
 At the time I visited in Barclay Street the whole neigh- 
 borhood near the City Hall park was a residential section. 
 Columbia College was near by, and the Astor House was 
 the best hotel in the city. St. Paul's Church looked much 
 as it does now. The old City Hall was the only building 
 in the park, with Barnum's Museum nearly opposite. 
 Barnum's Museum was then of white marble, with oval 
 pictures of wild animals all over its front, and there was 
 a balcony about half-way up the front where musicians 
 played. This building was burned later. There were all 
 sorts of fake curiosities there — the "Woolly Horse," the 
 "What is-it?" advertised thus: "Oh what is it? Is it 
 man or monkey? It was discovered in the wilds of Africa 
 and may be seen at all hours." It was simply an idiot 
 boy. They also had "real mermaids" and the Siamese 
 twins. The latter were genuine objects of curiosity. Mr. 
 William R. Travers once went to see them and Barnum 
 himself showed him around and introduced him to the 
 
 41 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 twins. Mr. Travers put up his eyeglass and, after examin- 
 ing them carefully, said in his stuttering voice: "B-B-B- 
 Brothers, I presume?" Mr. Travers was a very amusing 
 and witty man, and stuttered just enough to make his 
 remarks more entertaining. His funny sayings were mani- 
 fold, and his manner and action most amusing. He owned 
 some of the finest race-horses of the day, in partnership 
 with Leonard Jerome. Years after the time I am now 
 writing about, I remember coming back from a race-meeting 
 of the Narragansett course with him. We embarked on 
 a boat from Providence to Newport. Mr. Travers was 
 standing on the dock, high above the deck of the boat, as 
 the tide there falls several feet, and there was a man on 
 the boat with a' basket of beer in those round-bottomed 
 bottles that will not stand up. Mr. Travers asked the 
 man to throw him some and Mr. Travers caught them one 
 by one, putting the first under his left arm, the next under 
 his right, two between his legs, and finally one in each 
 hand, so he had six without setting one down — he looked 
 very funny. Once a man slapped him violently on the 
 back, mistaking him for some one else, and then exclaimed : 
 "I beg your pardon; I thought you were my friend Jones." 
 Mr. Travers said: '*D-D-D-Does your friend Jones I-I-I-Iike 
 that sort of thing?" He told of once coming home after 
 a dinner, a httle the worse for wear, late at night, and try- 
 ing to creep into bed very quietly, not to disturb his wife, 
 but she was awake, and just as he was comfortably set- 
 tled she remarked — according to him: " W-W-W-William, 
 d-d-d-do you usually go to bed w-w-w-with your hat on?" 
 But I am getting too far ahead of my period — I must not 
 forget that I am still a little boy in New York. 
 
 About this time I went with my mother to pay a visit 
 to the Luquers, who lived in a pretty country place in the 
 
 42 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A BOY 
 
 outskirts of Brooklyn; Mrs. Luquer was a sister of Mrs. 
 Stewart Maitland. I remember that we went to church 
 and that I had a new pair of suspenders of which I was 
 very proud and which I insisted on displaying by keeping 
 my jacket wide open. The cap which I wore to church 
 on these grand occasions was a Scotch bonnet, a present 
 from my godfather, Mr. Maitland, shaped like a large 
 tam-o'-shanter but made of velvet of the royal Stuart 
 tartan. Though it was considered an exceedingly hand- 
 some thing, I never liked it very much. There were two 
 Luquer boys, Nicholas and Lea. (Lea was afterward a 
 member of the Century Club and rector of the church at 
 Bedford, New York.) They had a donkey which I rode, but 
 he had a tiresome habit of standing on his fore legs and I 
 would slip over his head. 
 
 My mother had great charm and grace of manner, al- 
 though, as I remember her, she was not handsome; she 
 spoke French and Italian, and painted extremely well, as 
 may be seen in a volume of bound water-color drawings 
 done from nature, of flowers and fruits gathered for her 
 by my father. The names are in the handwriting of Mr. 
 Downing, the celebrated landscape-architect. These are 
 not the conventional water-colors of the time, but realistic 
 work, sensitively true to life. 
 
 In 1849 ^y mother rented the Danskammer house to 
 Mr. Warren Delano and we went to live in New York, at 
 12 West Fourteenth Street. In those days there were few 
 opportunities for learning painting, but my mother always 
 encouraged my taste for art, and as soon as we went to 
 New York she put me to work with Mr. Coe, who was 
 about the best teacher then to be found. I worked in his 
 studio for three years with the greatest interest. I see now 
 that he was not a good artist, but he started me so that I 
 
 43 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 became fond of painting and worked hard. My mother 
 always provided me with the best colors and drawing 
 materials, and when I began copying she would have my 
 feeble efforts framed, much to my delight; although they 
 were poor daubs, I was proud to see them hanging up 
 and was encouraged to persevere. 
 
 Mr. Coe's studio was on the same floor in the New 
 York University where I went to day-school. I don't 
 think that I was a very good scholar; I was bright enough, 
 but did not like study, so I used to play hooky and go 
 into Mr. Coe's studio and paint. Mr. Parker, the prin- 
 cipal, came in one day in school hours when I should have 
 been working in his schoolroom, and was surprised to 
 find me there painting. He liked me, however; for one 
 thing, I wrote a good hand, so every week I was told to 
 write out a book for him, with all the boys' names, with 
 six divisions after each name, standing for the six working 
 days of the week, which Mr. Parker would keep on his 
 desk in front of him, and if in looking around the school- 
 room he spied any boy idling or misbehaving, his name was 
 given a bad mark in the book. By the irony of fate my 
 name would be called out and registered very often in the 
 neat list that I had written out so laboriously. Mr. Parker 
 was an attractive man and I am sure he was a good school- 
 master. I gave him a good deal of trouble but we were 
 fond of each other. Another teacher, Mr. Bull, was good 
 at mathematics but poor in English, I remember well, 
 because I was once awfully fresh to him when he used the 
 expression "get red of a fraction." 
 
 The University Grammar School was on the ground 
 floor of the old University Building, a fine castellated 
 Gothic edifice, built of white marble, on the east side of 
 Washington Square. The College Department was up- 
 
 44 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A BOY 
 
 stairs. There were one hundred boys in the First Depart- 
 ment where I was and a Primary Department of nearly as 
 many boys adjoining it, under the charge of Mr. Hobby, 
 known as "Hobby's"; our department was known as 
 "Parker's." We had a fine playground in Washington 
 Square, then called the Washington Parade Ground be- 
 cause the annual parade of the mihtia was held there, and 
 I well remember the stout German militia officers dashing 
 about on their steeds. Mr. Hamilton Fish told me Wash- 
 ington Parade Ground was formerly used as a place for 
 pubhc executions, and that he once saw a colored woman 
 executed there on the site of what is now the Washington 
 Arch. Mr. Janvier, the author of many good stories about 
 the Washington Square neighborhood, once in talking to 
 me about it mentioned that Minetta Creek formerly ran 
 through the square, which made it damp and misty, and 
 that it was also the Potters' Field, where they buried pau- 
 pers and criminals. He added that even now, on a foggy 
 evening, "the ghosts of the potters could be seen wander- 
 ing about there." In my day, notwithstanding its grue- 
 some origin, it was a fine place for games and foot-races, 
 but most of all for playing marbles, which was our favorite 
 game. I had an intimate school friend named Jaudon, 
 who lived at No. i Fifth Avenue, and I used to meet him 
 almost every afternoon to play marbles in Washington 
 Square. It was really a gambling game in a small way, 
 because the winner always took and kept his opponent's 
 marbles; these were the ordinary marbles, which were 
 pooled in the centre of a circle and shot at with "agates," 
 all the marbles knocked out of the ring belonging to the 
 shooter. These agates were ordinarily painted marbles, 
 worth one or two cents each, known as "chaney agates" 
 or "chaney alleys," but there were real "agates" to be 
 
 45 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 had, carved out of agate stone, that cost as much as twenty- 
 five cents or more. So when real ** agates" were in the 
 ring in place of common marbles, the game became an 
 expensive one. The little Jaudon boy was very nice and 
 I was fond of him, but he was a better player than I and 
 won almost all my "agates." He was familiarly known 
 among boys as Billy, but that was not his real Christian 
 name, and at this distant day I do not recall it. He died 
 when very young. 
 
 A quaint old Irish candy-man named Jimmy was a 
 frequenter of Washington Parade Ground. He carried a 
 tray, holding it in both hands, supported by a leather strap 
 around the back of his neck. We had recess at one o'clock 
 and Jimmy would always be on hand at that time and had 
 excellent custom. His tray contained squares of molasses 
 candy, white and pink cocoanut-cakes, and "all-day 
 suckers" — though I am not sure we called them by that 
 appropriate name — round, of lemon candy with white 
 veins running through them, and very durable. All of 
 these were one cent each. 
 
 I was a rather quarrelsome boy and had several 
 encounters, although I do not think that I ever fought a 
 boy smaller than myself. There was a boy at school named 
 Gabriel Chevallier; his father was French and, I think, an 
 instrument-maker. One day when Chevallier was leaning 
 his chair back on its hind legs, I put my foot under it and 
 sent him backward. He said nothing, but a few days 
 later he did the same to me, but I jumped up and imme- 
 diately challenged him to fight, so we selected our seconds, 
 and in recess met in a square space in the hall surrounding 
 the pump, and had a regular set-to of several rounds, but 
 he was too much for me and gave me a black eye which 
 left a little mark on the upper lid that remained there for 
 
 46 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A BOY 
 
 years. He was declared the victor, but we were always 
 afterward good friends. It must have been twenty-five 
 years later that I was looking into Goupil's window on 
 Fifth Avenue and Twenty-second Street when Chevallier 
 came up and spoke to me, and we talked about school-days 
 and I asked if he remembered giving me a black eye, but 
 from politeness, I suppose, he said that he did not recall it. 
 
 In 1852 I went to College Hill, near Poughkeepsie, 
 where my brother Gouv had been educated. This was 
 about the best school in the country, a very large colonial 
 building on top of a high hill, overlooking the whole neigh- 
 borhood, and surrounded by farms and large woods through 
 which we were allowed to roam. I worked hard and 
 really learned something, particularly from Professor 
 Charles Murray Nairn, teacher of the classics, who taught 
 me how to study and became an intimate friend. After- 
 ward I went to his school in New York. He was a Scotch- 
 man, a gentleman, and a fine scholar; later he was professor 
 of English literature at Columbia. College Hill was an 
 up-to-date school; they had a fine gymnasium in a building 
 expressly arranged for it, at a time when very few other 
 schools had gymnasiums, and in this I worked hard and 
 laid the foundation of considerable physical endurance 
 which has served me well all through my life. Mr. Charles 
 Bartlett, the principal, was not a scholar himself, but had 
 the faculty of getting good assistants. He had a peek- 
 hole behind his desk from which he could look out without 
 being seen, and a boy never knew when he would suddenly 
 be pounced upon. It was good in one way, because it 
 kept the boys at work, but it was generally thought to be 
 taking a mean advantage of us. Now Professor Nairn was 
 a gentleman and put the boys on their honor. 
 
 It was while I was at College Hill that the steamer 
 
 47 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Henry Clay was burned. There used to be great rivalry 
 between the various fast Hudson River boats, and when 
 this accident happened the Henry Clay was racing with the 
 Armenia, The Clay took fire from her overheated boilers, 
 and the captain ran her ashore near Yonkers, but the pas- 
 sengers in the stern, which was in deep water, were cut off 
 from the shore by the flames and many of them were 
 drowned. Mrs. Bartlett, the wife of the principal of our 
 school, was lost, and Miss Hawthorne, a sister of Nathaniel 
 Hawthorne; and also an intimate friend of my mother's, 
 Mr. A. J. Downing, the celebrated landscape-architect. 
 He was a fine swimmer and rescued many people, acting 
 very gallantly before he himself went down. Another bad 
 river accident was the loss of the Swallow in 1845. She 
 struck on a rock near Hudson one terribly stormy winter's 
 night, while she was racing with the Express and the 
 Rochester, and many lives were lost. 
 
 I enjoyed all my school life at College Hill. My most 
 intimate friend was Willie Prime; the Primes lived in New 
 York, formerly on the corner of State Street and the Bowl- 
 ing Green, and afterward in one of those swell-front houses 
 in West Sixteenth Street. On Saturday afternoons Bill 
 Prime and I would take long walks together in the woods; 
 we collected birds' eggs and trapped and tamed squirrels, 
 particularly flying squirrels. We once got a mother flying 
 squirrel and a whole brood of young ones; she would sit 
 with her wings spread out over them just like a hen and 
 chickens. Bill was fond of all sorts of natural history and 
 was especially interested in snakes, which he would catch 
 and hold up by their tails, much to my admiration, as I 
 could not do anything except kill them — but this we never 
 did. I had a real love for that boy. I did not see much 
 of him in later years, for he was fond of a wild life, and 
 
 48 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A BOY 
 
 shortly after left school and went to Texas. He was a 
 handsome fellow, with winning ways, tall, and, like David 
 of old, ruddy and of a fair countenance, not only manly- 
 looking but manly and brave in every way. He was the 
 father of Charlotte Prime, who married Will Benjamin, a 
 cousin of my wife's. 
 
 My mother died in New York in February, 1853. 
 
 I did not go back to College Hill, but returned to the 
 University Grammar School for the rest of that winter 
 and boarded at Mrs. Plummer's all by myself. She had 
 moved to the southeast corner of Fifteenth Street and 
 Union Square, to a house which still stands and is now part 
 of the Union Square Hotel. I was there about a year, and 
 as my brothers were at Danskammer, I was alone. 
 
 Billy Prime gave me two red squirrels that I kept in a 
 wire cage in my room at Mrs. Plummer's; she was so kind 
 that she never objected, but it must have been a nuisance 
 to have them in a bedroom. Mrs. Plummer and her daugh- 
 ter Eliza were so kind to me that it was quite like being 
 at home, but it was not a very good plan to leave a boy 
 of my age his own master alone in New York; fortunately, 
 I did not get into any mischief and it did me no harm. 
 
 In pleasant weather I occasionally went to Danskam- 
 mer, and whenever I felt like it I paid a visit to the Gou- 
 verneur Wilkinses at Castle Hill, where I spent some 
 of the happiest days of my childhood, with Uncle Gouv 
 and Aunt Catherine, as I always called them, although 
 they were not really blood relations. As I told you in the 
 last chapter, Gouverneur Morris Wilkins's first wife was 
 my mother's elder sister, Mary Somersall Ward; his second 
 wife was Catherine Van Rensselaer. She was always most 
 sweet and kind to me, and I had a standing invitation to 
 visit them whenever I liked. As I was always welcome I 
 
 49 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 went there very often. Uncle Gouv was a splendid-looking 
 man, somewhat such a man in appearance as Daniel Web- 
 ster, and of great ability, genial and delightful in conver- 
 sation, a graduate of Yale and extremely well read. If he 
 had been a poor man and felt the spur of necessity he would 
 have become distinguished, but he never went in for pub- 
 lic life or any profession. Although he had been a slave- 
 holder he was a Republican and a strong supporter and 
 admirer of Lincoln. 
 
 On my visits at Castle Hill I usually drove with Uncle 
 Gouv when he made his morning rounds. On these occa- 
 sions he himself always drove the same large gray horse, 
 everything spick and span and in perfect order. We would 
 first go to the post-office in Westchester village and then 
 do various errands in the neighborhood, stopping to talk 
 with every one he met, as all his neighbors respected him 
 and liked to hear his views; indeed, I found it part of a 
 liberal education to hear him express them. 
 
 Castle Hill lay just at the junction of Westchester 
 Creek and the Sound, directly opposite Zerega Point, and 
 was one of the most beautiful places in the country. The 
 house was an old one, having been built by Uncle Gouv's 
 father or grandfather, and he had made additions to it 
 himself with taste and discrimination. His library was a 
 fine one, containing many of my grandfather Ward's 
 books, which, of course, when Uncle Gouv died, went to 
 his second wife. On her death she left it to Rensselaer 
 Cruger, her nephew, but I do not know who now owns 
 these books of my grandfather's, that he had brought from 
 England and that had his coat of arms as a book-plate. 
 The grounds of Castle Hill were terraced down to Long 
 Island Sound and beautifully planted, with greenhouses at 
 intervals. I remember the delicious hothouse grapes and 
 
 50 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A BOY 
 
 figs that came from the forcing-houses and graperies against 
 the back of the house. The dining-room was of fine pro- 
 portions, wainscoted to the ceiling with oaken panels on 
 which hung portraits of his father, his grandfather, and 
 Uncle Gouv himself, by Elliot, and also a portrait of Mrs. 
 Wilkins as a young girl in a large flat sort of light-colored 
 garden-hat. 
 
 Mr. Wilkins left all his property, a very great estate, 
 to his only daughter, Ellen, the first wife of John Screven, 
 who was without fortune. She died two or three years 
 after Mr. Wilkins, leaving several children (one of her 
 daughters, Kitty, married Robert J. TurnbuII and had a 
 charming family of sons and daughters), but bequeathing 
 all her property to her husband. Strange to say, when 
 Mr. Screven died he left almost all Mr. Wilkins's property 
 to a daughter by his second wife (Miss Van Rensselaer), 
 who was, of course, no relation to the Wilkins es. 
 
 It was odd that so many of the Wilkins family con- 
 nection should have married Van Rensselaers "en seconde 
 noce." (Kitty TurnbuII was once asked if the Van Rens- 
 selaers were her relations; she said no, they only fur- 
 nished stepmothers for her family.) For besides Mr. 
 Wilkins's and Mr. Screven's second wives (both Van Rens- 
 selaers), Kitty TurnbuII's father-in-law. Doctor TurnbuII, 
 chose a Miss Van Rensselaer when he married for the 
 second time. Mrs. Wilkins and Mrs. TurnbuII had always 
 said that they would never marry either widowers or slave- 
 holders, but their husbands were both. Mr. Wilkins had 
 large plantations in South Carolina and Doctor TurnbuII 
 in Mississippi. 
 
 The Wilkins estate included Castle Hill, containing 
 about three hundred acres, a large tract of land immedi- 
 ately adjoining it, and several hundred city lots on Harlem 
 
 51 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 flat, comprising the whole north front on the Central Park, 
 on iioth Street, and the block fronting on the Central 
 Park from io8th to 109th Streets, and much other prop- 
 erty besides. This Harlem flat property was a large farm 
 caHed the "Nutter Farm," which Uncle Gouv inherited 
 from his mother, who was a Miss Nutter. When Central 
 Park was laid out four hundred lots were taken for the 
 park, so the whole northern end of the park was once the 
 "Nutter Farm" and belonged to Mr. Wilkins. 
 
 Mr. Clarence Davies, in a history of Westchester, does 
 not speak of Castle Hill, but in mentioning that section 
 of Westchester he remarks that there is still standing (about 
 191 2) the remains of a fine old stone gate. This is evi- 
 dently the gate of Castle HiH, all that remains of that 
 lovely and important country place. Nor does Mr. 
 Davies, I think, make any reference to Gouverneur Wilkins 
 in his book, although when I used to visit there he was one 
 of the most distinguished figures in Westchester. It made 
 me sad to read that book and realize that all those times 
 are gone and forgotten, the only record of Castle Hill 
 being a nameless gate-post or two to mark the site of a 
 reafly historic and beautiful spot. 
 
 The celebrated Gouverneur Morris of the Revolution 
 was Uncle Gouv's uncle. Gouverneur Morris was very 
 rich and did not marry until late in life. Uncle Gouv was 
 his prospective heir, and there were others who were look- 
 ing forward to inheriting from him, so they were afl dis- 
 appointed when a son was born to him and their hopes 
 were blasted. They were discussing the name that was 
 to be given to the child — in the end he was named Gou- 
 verneur — and as at that time there was a famous general 
 in Russia named Kutusoff", Uncle Gouv suggested that the 
 child should be called after this general, but I dare say the 
 
 52 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A BOY 
 
 poorer relations did not relish the pun as much as he did ! 
 I took a trip once out to Morrisania, the old Morris place 
 in Westchester, with my mother and Uncle Charles, when 
 I was a very, very small boy. We went by the Harlem Rail- 
 road, one of the first railways in this country, and Uncle 
 made lots of jokes with me about my riding behind the 
 "black pony," as he called the engine. There was a de- 
 lightful swing under a big cherry-tree in the grounds of 
 Morrisania, I remember. 
 
 To return to New York. In 1854 there were many 
 more opportunities for enterprising boys to enjoy them- 
 selves than now. One favorite place for us to play was 
 the large vacant space between Seventeenth Street and 
 Twenty-third Street, which was then mostly open pastures 
 and orchards of large old pear and apple trees. Daniel 
 Giraud Elliot, afterward the distinguished ornithologist, 
 who lived in his father's house in East Fourteenth Street, 
 told me a few years ago that when he used to look out of 
 his rear windows there was nothing in sight to the north 
 but open fields. My chief playmates in those days were 
 the Lathrop twins, Frank and Ned, who lived in Seven- 
 teenth Street; with Albert and Walter Stanton we used to 
 go skating on a pond in an open common about where 
 Forty-second Street and Sixth Avenue cross. 
 
 A large part of the block on Twenty-third Street be- 
 tween Fifth and Sixth Avenues was devoted to Franconi's 
 Hippodrome, the first thing of the kind on a grand scale 
 that New York had seen. It was really a very fine circus, 
 boasting real races with race-horses and jockeys. I was 
 fascinated by these, and spent all my spare cash and most 
 of my evenings there. Union Square, where we used to 
 skate on the fountain, was, of course, a very diff'erent place, 
 also, and it was another of the rallying-places for the boys 
 
 53 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 of the neighborhood, among whom were Bobby Goelet 
 and Elbridge Gerry. Gerry was a tall, awkward boy, 
 the butt of all the others. Doctor Cheever's church 
 stood on the corner of Union Square and Fifteenth Street, 
 where Tiffany built later, and where now some sad sale 
 of rain-coats or the hke is usually in progress. For the rest, 
 there were only dwelling-houses around the square — Judge 
 Kent, Judge Ruggles, and Mrs. Parish lived there. When 
 I returned from abroad in 1859 the Everett House had just 
 appeared on the north side. About the same time the 
 famous Fifth Avenue Hotel, on Madison Square, was fin- 
 ished. Both are now torn down. 
 
 Morris Ketchum lived on Gramercy Park. His boys 
 were great friends of mine, particularly Frank, and we 
 used to congregate with other boys in the vacant lot back 
 of his house, where we kept chickens, invented all sorts of 
 games, and fought with the rowdies who periodically invaded 
 the lots. One day Charley Ketchum, who was a great 
 fighter, had an altercation with a rowdy, and on the latter's 
 invitation we adjourned to a large vacant lot near First 
 Avenue, where Charley fought him. About a dozen of our 
 crowd went over, but there must have been one or two 
 hundred roughs. The lot was level and sunken, with slop- 
 ing sides lined with our enemies; though they played the 
 game fairly it was a wonder we were not all killed. There 
 were several other Ketchum boys, one of the younger of 
 whom, Landon, had his front teeth filed so that he could 
 more readily spit through them without opening his jaw. 
 The Ketchums had lots of horses and ponies, and their 
 stable in Fifteenth Street was a favorite resort where we 
 all went to ride or drive the ponies, play games, and spar. 
 The fine-looking colored coachman, named Ben, as a per- 
 son of position and authority, looked out for us, and used 
 
 54 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A BOY 
 
 to be very good-natured about harnessing up ponies when- 
 ever we wanted them. As I was not accustomed to driving, 
 I remember I had some difficulty in getting around the 
 corners. 
 
 The Ellises were other schoolmates that I liked a great 
 deal. Julius was very handsome, and always beautifully 
 turned out, while Sam dressed very badly. One winter he 
 wore no undercoat, but just a white overcoat buttoned up 
 to the chin, with no shirt-collar showing; there was a tra- 
 dition he wore no shirts ! But by fits and starts he would 
 become a great dandy; I remember one winter, when we 
 were all older, he had a blue coat with brass buttons and a 
 leopard-skin waistcoat. Doctor Ellis lived in Second Av- 
 enue. Later on I used to go there to spar with Sam, who 
 was my particular friend. Between the rooms where we 
 sparred were folding-doors set with stained glass, and once 
 I knocked Sam right through one of the doors and broke 
 all the glass. 
 
 One night Sam, Fred de Peyster — usually known as 
 "Dip" — and I were coming home pretty late from a dance 
 in Washington Place, I don't remember whose — I was 
 boarding at that time in West Fourteenth Street, at Mrs. 
 Jenks's boarding-house — when Sam and Dip espied a 
 freight-wagon standing in University Place, opposite the 
 Society Library, and dragged it up to my landlady's house 
 and deposited it on her front steps. What she thought of 
 it I could never find out without seeming dangerously 
 curious. 
 
 Doctor Ellis was a graduate of West Point, and his five 
 sons inherited military tastes, so in 1861 every one of them 
 enlisted in the army. All were in the battle of Bull Run, 
 and there the handsome Julius, so much admired, was 
 killed; he had a military funeral at St. Mark's Church 
 
 55 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 and a salute fired over his grave. Gus was killed at 
 Gettysburg. Three of the brothers — ^Julius, Ash, and John 
 — were in love with Julie Waterbury, who after numer- 
 ous competing proposals finally decided on John. Sam 
 had a nice turn for drawing and made excellent heraldic 
 designs for the coats of arms of his friends. He had many 
 acquaintances among barkeepers, and would invent gor- 
 geously illuminated armorial bearings for them to hang 
 up in their barrooms. He was a most quaint and witty 
 fellow, altogether delightful. 
 
 56 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 MY BROTHERS 
 
 "We sit beneath the orchard trees. 
 
 We hear, hke them, the hum of bees 
 And rustle of the bladed corn; 
 We turn the pages that they read. 
 
 Their written words we linger o'er. 
 But in the sun they cast no shade, 
 No voice is heard, no sign is made. 
 No step upon the unconscious floor." 
 
 — ^Whittier. 
 
 One summer when I was about fourteen my mother 
 blew off my brother Jack and me to a trip to Niagara, 
 Trenton Falls, Saratoga, and Lake George. It took about 
 two weeks. I remember just how I was dressed. I wore 
 white shirts with a collar turned over my jacket and a 
 colored cravat tied in a bow — we did not have colored 
 shirts or scarfs in my day — my roundabouts were buttoned 
 up the front with pearl buttons, and all my shirts were 
 made with collars and cuffs on them. (I have never worn 
 separate cuffs to this day.) My suits were linen, brown 
 for every-day and colored for best; one was white with nar- 
 row blue stripes. We wore straw hats and boots — real 
 boots with legs — or sometimes low shoes. 
 
 I kept a diary in a butcher's book, entitled, "Journal 
 of my Travels in the United States. Private." And 
 though I don't need to consult its pages to refresh my 
 memory — it is all as clear as if it were yesterday — I shall 
 
 SI 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 quote from it, for my boyish way of putting things seems 
 to me amusing: 
 
 "Started in the steamer New World for Albany, but she 
 got aground and the passengers had to be taken off by a 
 steamer behind us called the Mason. Mr. de Peyster was 
 on board. Travelled all night on the cars and had a recess 
 at Rochester for breakfast. Eat a whole broiled chicken 
 and sundries to match. Saw a girl in the cars dressed in 
 the Bloomer costume, blue with a gold band for border. 
 She looked very ugly." 
 
 At Niagara we stayed at the Clifton House on the Eng- 
 lish side, went under the Horseshoe Falls dressed in oilskins, 
 and saw all the sights, including the animals in the museum 
 — "skeleton of a whale, 3 bald-headed eagles, some very 
 large cat owls, 2 wolves, 4 read headed cranes, the same 
 as ours only they have red heads, they began to gobble 
 when you told them to, 2 Buffaloes, he looked rather sav- 
 age. A poor dinner, grizly beef and a small portion of 
 bony chicken. Saw a great many eels on the rocks, dozens 
 of them laying on the rocks. Went up Lundy's Lane to 
 the Battle field, an old soldier gave us a description of it. 
 Went on a double plank road to the Burning Spring that 
 if you tutch it with fire it blazes up. We bought a bottle. 
 Then we came up to the Devil's Hole. A man told us 
 there were 200 English soldiers driven within and killed. 
 The man was deformed and had only part of an arm with 
 one finger near his armpit. Boiled turkey with oyster 
 sauce, roast beef, ice cream and peaches. Went to Goat 
 Island, a woman lost her handkerchief overboard and I 
 caught it on a stick just as it was passing, a little washing 
 did not hurt it any. Sunday. The service of the church 
 of England is a great deal different, rather a poor sermon." 
 
 "Started for Trenton, first in cars drawn by horses, 
 
 58 
 
MY BROTHERS 
 
 then in a steamboat to Buffalo. Went to Barnum's Mu- 
 seum at Schenectady, a great humbug, and some Ethiopian 
 Minstrels, miserable ones. A woman had $50 stolen from 
 her pocket. After that we came home. There was a man 
 selling paper, a Yankee of course, you put it on a sheat 
 with another over it and a dozen sheats under it and you 
 can write on top and take the impression all the way 
 through. You can take drawings the same as Kthographs 
 and the impressions of leaves. He said he had a book 
 that was full of the impressions of all sorts of leaves that 
 he had offered him last year $250 for, and he would not 
 take it. I beheve it. I bought a paper of it, 4 colors. 
 Black, Blue, Red and Green. You can mark clothes with 
 it indelably and stone, wood, lace, and marble just the 
 same." 
 
 At Saratoga we stayed at Congress Hall, a fine hotel, 
 built around a square, with a lawn in the middle where a 
 band played in the evening. A piazza ran around the 
 square with French windows opening on it, and on this 
 piazza we had our rooms. All hotels were then kept on 
 the American plan — you paid so much, including every- 
 thing. As I remember, the usual charge was three dollars 
 a day and there were no extras. Hotels on the European 
 plan were unknown. At this time Saratoga was the most 
 fashionable resort in America — Newport had hardly been 
 discovered — so the nicest people, particularly Southerners, 
 went there and drank the waters. Every one went down 
 each morning to the spring and drank, so we did too, 
 though we thought it nasty. Saratoga was quite different 
 from what it is now, for there was Kttle racing in those 
 days, and no sporting fast set, though they did have a 
 trotting-course near by where Jack and I went. It was my 
 first trotting-match. 
 
 59 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 At Lake George we got hold of a nice fisherman, named 
 Horace Welsh, and spent most of our time on the lake, 
 catching some fine bass. ''. . . It is Sunday today. After 
 dinner we had ice cream, peaches, pineapples, plums, raisins 
 and almonds. They have eight rattlesnakes here that 
 they have had for some years, and all of that time they 
 have not eaten anything." I remember that in the train 
 coming home a lady asked me to get her a glass of water 
 and when I brought it to her she offered me a tip, which I 
 politely declined. Outwardly I was calm, but inwardly I 
 felt deeply insulted — I thought she should have known 
 that I was a gentleman and above taking tips. It seems 
 funny to remember this for nearly seventy years. 
 
 My brother Charles was drowned in the river in 1848, 
 and I think after the shock of this accident my mother 
 tacitly encouraged us to go in for land-sports — shooting, 
 riding, and the like — rather than for sailboats. However 
 this may be, I know I never cared much for sailing. 
 
 My oldest brother was named William Henry, after 
 my grandfather and my uncle who was killed in India. 
 Harry had unusual natural abilities, but no staying quali- 
 ties, and took up too many different pursuits in life. He 
 began by going to too many different schools. After our 
 tutors at home he went to Mr. Phinney's in Newburgh. 
 Schoolmasters used heroic methods in those days. Mr. 
 Phinney had a colored coachman named Sam, part of 
 whose duty it was to hold the boys on his back by their 
 hands, their bodies being well exposed, while Mr. Phinney 
 flogged them. I think Harry went next to the school at 
 Nazareth in Pennsylvania, built originally by Whitefield 
 and kept by the Moravian Brothers. Judging by the Kt- 
 tle picture on their writing-paper it was a simple place, 
 and the terms were a contrast to the ideas of St. Mark's or 
 
 60 
 
MY BROTHERS 
 
 Groton to-day. They charged thirty-five dollars a quar- 
 ter, I find in an old bill, and four dollars for such extras 
 as "washing and the Greek language." 
 
 After this Harry tried Doctor Muhlenberg's famous 
 school at Flushing, called "College Point." Although 
 Harry gave him a great deal of trouble, Doctor Muhlenberg 
 was attached to him. When Doctor Muhlenberg was talk- 
 ing to a boy of whom he was fond, he had a funny habit 
 of taking off his pupil's cap in an absent-minded way and 
 rubbing his head. Harry told me of meeting the Doctor 
 in the street, after he was grown up, and as soon as Harry 
 took his hat off the Doctor started rubbing his head just 
 from habit. While at College Point Harry once skated 
 across the Sound; it was unusual to have it frozen, and he 
 took advantage of the opportunity, but couldn't skate 
 back because the ice broke up. After going to a military 
 school at West Point he entered Trinity College, Hart- 
 ford, in 1844, but only stayed a year. He was mixed up 
 in some frolic in a room on the second floor of Jarvis Hall — 
 I know the room well and I should say the windows were 
 about twenty feet above the ground. When the professor 
 came and knocked at the door Harry jumped out of the 
 window and was pretty badly hurt; he broke something, 
 his leg, I think, so he left college the end of his freshman 
 year. 
 
 He had always wanted to enter the navy since his 
 visits on board the North Carolina with Uncle Charles, 
 and my mother had tried her best to get him a warrant, 
 through Mr. Legare and other friends. Indeed, it was 
 supposed to be all settled and Harry went to New York 
 with Uncle, only to learn that the secretary of the navy 
 had just died and had not signed the warrant after all. It 
 was a great blow. But he was determined to go to sea 
 
 61 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 anyway. So he got a position as cabin-boy on the clipper 
 ship Water Witch, commanded by the notorious Bob Water- 
 man, a fine sailor but very cruel and arbitrary — I think 
 he was ultimately tried for the murder of a sailor. Harry 
 was one of several cabin-boys, all, I believe, gentlemen's 
 sons. It was the custom in those days for nice boys to 
 go in this way to learn the sea. They went to Hong Kong. 
 It was the ship's first voyage and she made the return trip 
 from there to New York in seventy-six days, the fastest 
 trip of the day. One stormy, dark night Captain Water- 
 man sent Harry up to reef a royal, which is, I believe, the 
 highest and smallest sail on the main, or mizzen, mast of a 
 fuII-rigged ship. Harry tried his best each time, but the 
 bitter wind tore it away from him, so he slithered down to 
 the deck and told the captain it couldn't be done. 
 
 "Go up again and reef it and be d d to you, and 
 
 don't come back till it's done," was the captain's answer. 
 So up the mast Harry went and, finding the sail loose, 
 flapping in the storm, he took out his sheath-knife and 
 cut the whole sail clear and away it went. 
 
 "Can't do it, sir!" he reported to the terrible captain. 
 
 "What ! Why the can't you do it?" 
 
 "Toproyalmizzen gone to leeward, sir!" And, strange 
 to say, that was the end of it. 
 
 A brief flirtation with the law came next in Harry's 
 career. He studied for about a year in the law office of 
 Wells and Van Wagenen, in New York — Mr. Thomas L. 
 Wells was one of my father's most intimate friends — but 
 most of his friends were studying medicine, among them 
 Tom Pinckney, of South Carolina, so he shifted to the 
 New York Hospital and got a smattering of medicine. 
 Surgery had a fascination for him, and he probably would 
 have made a success at it with his skilful hands, but just 
 
 62 
 
MY BROTHERS 
 
 at that time, 1849, g^'^ ^^^ discovered in California and 
 he determined to go there and dig. So with his intimate 
 friend Sam Craig he joined French's Expedition. They 
 prepared themselves with saddles, rifles, etc., and went to 
 Galveston, from which place they were to ride across the 
 plains on horseback to California. French's Expedition, a 
 large company of men, assembled at Galveston and actually 
 started, but dissensions arose and dissatisfaction with 
 French's arrangements; in a short time the whole thing 
 was a failure, the train disbanded, and every man had to 
 shift for himself. 
 
 So Harry bought a horse and started to ride alone to 
 Cahfornia. It took him nine months. He crossed the 
 American Desert, and he has told me how his only com- 
 panions were the little horned toads that used to nestle 
 in his blankets at night, when the desert was so breath- 
 lessly still that he could hear the grains of sand moving. 
 He passed through the site of EI Paso — ^then, I think, only 
 two rocks or perhaps a single house — swam his horse across 
 the Colorado River, and finally reached the coast, where 
 he took passage in a brig. The captain of the brig died 
 on the way, there was no one to navigate her, so Harry, 
 who, of course, knew about sailing, took command and 
 brought her into San Francisco. 
 
 At the mines, as he was so handy with tools, he built 
 himself a nice httle house and was getting along finely, 
 when news came that his mother was ill — or perhaps he 
 was just restless. Anyway, he left his house in the gold- 
 diggings and returned to New York. While in the mining- 
 camp he also practised medicine and surgery, and actually 
 amputated a man's leg. I beheve the patient survived ! 
 
 Harry happened to be in the South, staying with some 
 of our relations, just before the Civil War broke out. 
 
 63 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Though he was a Northern man, he was so closely con- 
 nected with the South that when the neighbors began 
 training a troop he helped them to drill, as he had been to 
 a mihtary school. They had lots of fun. One day— I tell 
 you this just as Harry told it — when the drill was over, 
 they were having a feast in the woods, a splendid affair, 
 with all sorts of good things sent by the Charleston ladies, 
 wild turkey and plum-cake and wine, and every man with 
 his body-servant standing behind him. After the feast 
 one of his friends — I am not sure if it was "Powder" 
 Whaley or "Corkie" Huger — took him aside. 
 
 "Harry," he said, "your interests are all in the North, 
 and^where the purse is there the heart should be. A boat 
 goes from Charleston to-night and it may be the last to 
 leave the port; you'd better take it. I was in love with 
 your mother, so look out for yourself, and don't get a knife 
 in your back!" 
 
 Strange to say, Harry took this advice — a thing he was 
 never known to do before or since — and got the last boat 
 from Charleston. As he was going up the gang-plank he 
 happened to see Miss Sarah Matilda Grayson, a young 
 cousin of my mother's, and "she looked so pretty and 
 rosy" that he proposed then and there, with a "Tilly, will 
 you marry me?" which she found agreeable. 
 
 She was the daughter of the Honorable William Gray- 
 son, of Charleston. (I believe Mattie, as we always called 
 her, came near being named Gardenia Garden, after our 
 relation Doctor Garden and the well-known flower named 
 in his honor by Linnaeus.) Mr. Grayson approved highly 
 of slavery, but was strongly opposed to secession. Unfor- 
 tunately, though he was a Union man, he did not trust in 
 our success in arms and invested all his money in Confed- 
 erate bonds, and, of course, lost it. His theories about 
 
 64 
 
MY BROTHERS 
 
 slavery are summed up in a pamphlet of 1851, whose argu- 
 ments sound so curiously in one's ears to-day that I shall 
 quote a few paragraphs: 
 
 "There are two kinds of labor, hireling labor and slave 
 labor. Let the North enjoy their hireling labor with all 
 its advantages — pauperism, rowdyism, mobism and anti- 
 rentism — its strikes, emeutes and street fights — we of the 
 South are satisfied with our slave labor. The hirelings of 
 Europe are clamoring for what they call the organization 
 of labor. Slave labor is the only organized labor ever 
 known. It is the only condition of society in which labor 
 and capital are associated on a large scale — in which their 
 interests are combined and not in conflict. If the negroes 
 were made free, whether peace or war ensued, they would 
 in time become extinct." 
 
 Mr. Grayson's poem, "The Hireling and the Slave," 
 was widely read and endlessly quoted before the Civil 
 War, and he was the biographer of his friend James Lewis 
 Pettigrew, the great Carolina lawyer, also a Union man. 
 After Mr. Grayson's death I edited his "Life of Pettigrew," 
 and it was published by Harper, with a preface by Henry 
 Tuckerman, the poet. 
 
 To return to Harry — the day was set for his marriage 
 to Miss Grayson, but the South just after the fall of Fort 
 Sumter was in a most turbulent condition, and he had 
 great difficulty in reaching Charleston. At Atlanta, on 
 account of some reckless remark, he excited suspicion, and 
 a furious mob collected and threatened to lynch him. A 
 friend travelling with him was taking a nap in the hotel 
 when he was aroused by the clamor in the street. Looking 
 out he saw Harry standing in a corner between two houses, 
 with his back to a wall and a pistol in his hand, facing a 
 lot of yelling ruffians. He rushed out and brought the 
 
 65 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 mayor, who was able to calm the mob for a moment, and 
 who took Harry's arm and walked him off to safety. The 
 crowd had a rope ready, so it was a pretty close shave! 
 While it was still touch and go, Harry told me that he saw 
 right in front of him the man to whom he had been talking 
 indiscreetly, and who had collected the mob. Harry said 
 he fixed his eyes on him and said, "Perhaps I can kill only 
 one, but you'll be that one!" which he thought took a 
 little of the zest out of this ringleader, and made him keep 
 the others back until the providential coming of the mayor. 
 
 After his marriage Harry stopped touring the world, 
 and his hfe on the old Acker Farm, not far from Danskam- 
 mer, was uneventful except for a tragedy — his only child, 
 little Emmie, was drowned in the brook in front of their 
 house. He never got over it. The Acker, or Eckhert, 
 Farm was part of the original grant of a thousand acres 
 from Queen Anne to Wolfert Eckhert, who built " Wolfert's 
 Roost," the house where Washington Irving lived after 
 changing its name to "Sunnyside." Harry's house was a 
 quaint old place, with huge fireplaces and enormously thick 
 walls of brick and stone, built by Wolfert as a blockhouse 
 to defend the inhabitants against the Indians; it is by far 
 the oldest house in the neighborhood. 
 
 Harry was a splendid rider, an excellent shot, and a 
 good sportsman in every way. There was nothing he did 
 not know about dogs, especially the training of pointers. 
 Most of his pointers were of the famous Wade Hampton 
 breed, named after the governor of South Carolina. One, 
 named Shot, that he had trained from a puppy, was ex- 
 traordinarily clever. If he saw Harry's horse being saddled, 
 he knew that Marlborough was the objective, and he would 
 take a certain short cut across the fields and meet him on 
 the main road. If, on the other hand, he saw the horse 
 
 66 
 
MY BROTHERS 
 
 being harnessed into a wagon, he would guess that he was 
 going in the opposite direction to Newburgh, where all the 
 household shopping was done, and another short cut would 
 bring master and dog together on the Newburgh road. 
 Harry spent a winter at Summerville, and often went in 
 to Charleston with Shot, sometimes by rail, sometimes in 
 a wagon. One day he drove in, and somehow or other lost 
 the dog in town. Shot went to the railway-station in 
 Charleston, boarded the train, and returned alone to Sum- 
 merville. The conductor watched him and told Harry 
 that he got off the train at Summerville like any other 
 passenger, only he did not give him any ticket. 
 
 Harry had the most ingenious hands that I have ever 
 seen. Not only could he carve pretty little heads out of 
 peach-pits and cherry-stones, and whittle all sorts of orna- 
 mental things, such as toys and work-boxes, but he was an 
 excellent cabinetmaker and made good furniture. At sea 
 he had learned to sew and knit and could make a pair of 
 trousers or net the most intricate kind of fish-net. 
 
 He was a fearless rider and could take a horse over 
 almost anything. On one occasion he was in Newburgh 
 with a pair of horses that sometimes ran away, so he 
 thought he would give them a lesson. When they started 
 from Newburgh it was late at night and he had a free road, 
 so he let them run; when they seemed to tire and lag a 
 little he laid the whip on, and instead of turning in at his 
 own road he kept on, eight miles in all, to Marlborough. 
 At Marlborough there is an abrupt decline over a bridge, 
 then a flat road for about a mile, and then a long, long hill. 
 They went over all this distance, between nine and ten 
 miles, on a dead run, without let-up or mishap, but when 
 they struck that last long hill they gave in, only too glad 
 to turn their heads and walk quietly toward home. They 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 never attempted to run away again. Imagine the fun he 
 had — driving lickety-split, regardless of consequences, mile 
 after mile, up and down hill, over a rough narrow road in 
 the middle of the night ! It was characteristic of him — 
 he was afraid of nothing. 
 
 He is buried at Christ Church, Marlborough, near the 
 grave of his wife and little Emmie. 
 
 "Home is the sailor, home from sea, 
 And the hunter home from the hill.'* 
 
 As long as I can remember anything my best friend in 
 the family was my brother Gouverneur, named after Uncle 
 Gouv Wilkins. As a very little boy, when he was away 
 at school, I used to gather the best pears and other fruit 
 and save them for him. He gave me my first rifle and 
 taught me how to shoot it, and as soon as I was able to 
 carry a gun we used to explore all the woodcock swamps in 
 the neighborhood and across the river. Sometimes we 
 went to a swamp near Lattintown, where there was a fine 
 cold spring and a nice place to eat our lunch, while another 
 favorite resort was a large swamp back of Wappingers 
 Falls. We had a dog of Augustus Stebbins's for some time 
 and I remember his following a wounded bird for over four 
 hundred yards through this swamp, and then bringing him 
 in. Gouv was a walker who never tired; in Switzerland 
 he walked the fifty miles over the Simplon Pass in one day. 
 They tell me that in Florida he would start out with his 
 gun early in the morning and tramp all day, with no lunch 
 but a lemon. He was the best shot I ever saw. In Florida 
 Ned was his finest hunting-dog, a black-and-tan Gor- 
 don setter. He was once bitten by a rattlesnake and 
 Gouv carried him home two and a half miles in his arms 
 and nursed him back to health, though he bore the scar 
 
 68 
 
MY BROTHERS 
 
 of the bite the rest of his life. One evening, when he was 
 very old, he went out to the orange-grove with Gouv, and 
 amused himself for a little while hunting the flock of quail 
 that lived there; then he came up to Gouv, lay quietly 
 down at his feet, and died. 
 
 Gouv was educated by our private tutors until he went 
 to "College Hiir* at Poughkeepsie, of which I have already 
 spoken. They made a fine classical scholar of him, and 
 begged my mother to let him go to college, but there was 
 a good opening for him with Maitland, Phelps, so she put 
 him there. I think she made a mistake, for the "counting- 
 house," as it was called in those days, never suited him. 
 In fact, she soon realized this and sent him to live with 
 Isaac Conkling, who worked the Acker Farm for us on 
 shares, to learn farming, which he really liked. Isaac was 
 a fine old fellow and we were all fond of him. He was not 
 garrulous; driving back from Newburgh one day with 
 Gouv, after doing some shopping for his wife, he never 
 spoke the whole seven miles except once when he grunted, 
 "Durn them victorines!" and relapsed into silence. This 
 fashionable kind of ladies' cape was evidently expensive. 
 
 When my mother died she left Gouv as my guardian. 
 In the fall of 1854 I started for Trinity College. Gouv 
 went with me as far as New York and blew me off" to a 
 lunch at old Delmonico's, at the corner of Beaver Street. 
 I don't remember all we had, but I do recall there were 
 apple fritters with sherry sauce. At college Doctor Good- 
 win, the president, was not always, to put it mildly, pleased 
 with my conduct, and he used to write to Gouv as my 
 guardian and ask him to expostulate with me. But he 
 did not try this very long, for Gouv thought everything I 
 did was about right and always answered that he thought 
 Doctor Goodwin had better just talk the matter over with 
 
 69 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 me. So you see after my mother's death I was practically 
 my own master, except in the matter of money, for Gouv 
 held the purse-strings until I was grown up. 
 
 I think it was in 1870 that Gouv went to live in Florida. 
 He had often stayed at Hibernia, a delightful old planta- 
 tion house on the St. John's kept by Mrs. Fleming, and 
 became so fond of the Flemings and of the lovely place 
 that he finally bought some land there and planted a mag- 
 nificent orange-grove, which was very profitable until the 
 great freeze of 1897, when all the trees were killed down to 
 the ground. 
 
 About the pleasantest part of these Florida winters of 
 Gouv's was his camping trips^ Sometimes he went with 
 CaroII Livingston and very often with F. Augustus Peabody, 
 of Boston. Each of them had a Rice Lake canoe and they 
 took along a negro man who was an excellent cook and who 
 rowed the boat with their cooking kit, tents, etc. They 
 often went as far as the Gulf of Mexico and down the 
 coast, sleeping in tents, and except for groceries, Hving 
 on the game and fish they killed. Wild turkeys were plen- 
 tiful, and both Peabody and my brother were splendid 
 shots, so they must have lived high. To call the turkeys 
 Gouv used to go out into the swamps at night, sometimes 
 standing up to his nieck in water, with a "call" made from 
 the wing-bone of a turkey. Lots of big gobblers would 
 come at his summons and light in the near-by trees. As 
 they travelled along they would come across natives who 
 could take them to good turkey ground. I remember Gus 
 Peabody telling me of a boastful fellow who joined them 
 as they walked along a road and began blowing about his 
 prowess in shooting. Suddenly two turkeys were flushed 
 and went sailing straight down the trail. Gouv killed one 
 with each barrel, but the braggart was too scared to get 
 
 70 
 
MY BROTHERS 
 
 his gun off. It was on one of these same trips that Gouv 
 in walking across a swamp felt something writhe under his 
 feet. He gave a spring forward and, looking back, saw 
 an enormous rattler, its head up, ready to strike. He 
 shot it and when it was measured by Doctor Wyman, a 
 friend and associate of Agassiz, he found it was seven 
 feet long, the largest they had ever seen. 
 
 Gouv was the finest of men, temperate, honorable, and 
 straightforward, kindly, loyal to his friends — good to look 
 at, too, with his upright figure, ruddy face, and china-blue 
 eyes. I loved him dearly. He died at Hibernia and is 
 buried in the little churchyard there, a lovely, calm spot. 
 A few years later I went again to Hibernia for the funeral 
 of John Neilson, my brother-in-law and a warm friend of 
 Gouv's. They are buried next to each other. In the eve- 
 ning — a sweet early-winter evening, with a light wind 
 whispering in the pine-trees and stirring the veils of gray 
 moss that drape their branches — I walked over to the 
 churchyard. Palms and roses were piled at the heads of 
 the two graves, side by side. It is a fitting resting-place 
 for my dear Gouv, and the one he would have chosen and 
 loved best. 
 
 71 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR 
 
 "I watch them drift — the old familiar faces, 
 Who fished and rode with me by stream and wold/* 
 
 — KiNGSLEY. 
 
 In the autumn of 1853, when I was seventeen, we were 
 all at Danskammer when my three brothers decided to 
 spend the winter in Charleston. I see now that I ought 
 either to have gone to school again somewhere or entered 
 college, but my brothers thought it would be a good plan 
 for me also to spend the winter in South Carolina, particu- 
 larly as Mrs. Martin Wilkins, who lived in Charleston, had 
 asked me to stay with her. My brothers suggested that I 
 could take my books along and study just as well there as 
 anywhere else. So a little later I went by steamer to 
 Charleston; it was my first experience of the sea and I was 
 very seasick, but when I arrived I was delighted with the 
 semi-tropic climate of CaroKna after the November land- 
 scape I had left at home. The Wilkinses received me at 
 their house in Charleston, a nice old-fashioned house like 
 many others in the town, with an entrance-hall running on 
 one side the whole length of the house, and the parlor and 
 other rooms opening on it. Mrs. Wilkins, who had been 
 a Miss Grimble, was a sweet and gentle old lady, a great 
 friend of my mother's. Her husband, Uncle Gouv Wilkins's 
 brother, had died, leaving her with three sons and three 
 daughters: Gouverneur had just graduated from Yale and 
 was a planter, Martin was a lawyer, and Berkeley was in 
 business in Charleston; Eliza I knew already, for she had 
 
 72 
 
THE SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR 
 
 stayed with us at Danskammer, a charming girl just grow- 
 ing up, and the other two girls were still younger, both of 
 them pretty. The Civil War came on soon after they 
 grew up, the family suffered losses, and these lovely girls 
 never married. 
 
 The first thing I did when I arrived at the Wilkinses' 
 was to put my Latin and Greek books in a closet for future 
 reference, with the result that I did not look at them once 
 until I returned to New York in the spring. A day or two 
 after I got there the family went to the country for the 
 winter, and as there were no other means of transport in 
 those days we drove in their carriage to their plantation, 
 Kelvin Grove, near Rantowle's, about twenty miles from 
 Charleston. It was a rice and cotton plantation, but not 
 a very large one, having only about forty slaves. 
 
 Kelvin was near the plantation of Mr. Tom Lowndes, 
 whose pretty adopted daughter, Adela, afterward mar- 
 ried young Gouv Wilkins. These were typical combina- 
 tion rice and cotton plantations — wide, hospitable houses, 
 the kitchens off in separate buildings with enormous open 
 fireplaces where all the roasting and boiling was done. 
 There were private graveyards with quaint tombstones of 
 former proprietors, and broad rice-fields intersected with 
 ditches, with reserves for water. Along the sedgy banks 
 English snipe abounded and in the higher ground, in the 
 broom-grass, quail were plentiful. There were also deer 
 and wild turkeys in the forest, where there were large 
 tracts of pine-trees, and the vast swamps were swarming 
 with ducks and alligators. Bay-trees grew thickly along 
 the edges of the lakelike reserves, and here was where we 
 found the most woodcock. 
 
 On the plantation was a nice little village of comfortable 
 white cabins for the negroes. But there always was in 
 
 73 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 evidence a driver, as he was called, who was a superior 
 negro and carried a whip. The whips used were made of 
 hickory, with a solid handle that tapered off until it was 
 flexible. To this was attached the ten-foot rawhide whip- 
 lash. The driver always had it in his hand as he walked 
 about among the workers in the cotton-field, and if he spied 
 a loiterer the whip sprang out Kke lightning, so that there 
 was no idling. In the evening the hands were all assembled 
 at the cotton-house, where the cotton was stored. Each 
 hand's bag of cotton was weighed, and if it did not come 
 up to what he ought to have picked he had so many lashes 
 — not on his bare back, but even through his shirt it must 
 have hurt. It was taken as a matter of course, and no 
 remarks were made by the victims. One evening one of 
 the young negroes was caught killing a neighbor's pigs. 
 They had circumstantial evidence and wanted him to 
 confess, so he was brought out and whipped, pretty severely, 
 but he would not acknowledge it; perhaps he was innocent. 
 
 This was a plantation where the slaves were well 
 treated; on places where the owners were really cruel there 
 were, of course, terrible abuses. Here they had medical 
 attendance from Gouverneur Wilkins, who had studied 
 medicine for the purpose, a chaplain visited them at inter- 
 vals, and they were taught to read by the ladies of the 
 family. They were well fed, and on the whole they were 
 comfortable and happy. But they were slaves. Person- 
 ally, in spite of my close connection with the South, I have 
 always detested slavery and felt the greatest pity for the 
 colored people. 
 
 The first morning after my arrival at Kelvin, Gouverneur 
 Wilkins took me out shooting on the rice-fields. I had a 
 nice little gun which had been a flint-lock belonging to my 
 grandfather, Colonel Armstrong, but which had been 
 
 74 
 
THE SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR 
 
 altered to a percussion-lock. It was i8-gauge and had a 
 gold thumb-piece with a crest, our "hand and dagger" — 
 an excellent gun, made by Nock of London. After the 
 rice is planted the fields are flooded at intervals with water, 
 which comes through locks from a vast reserve, or pond. 
 As I was there in winter the water was turned off" and the 
 fields were comparatively dry; they were filled with English 
 snipe and the shooting was very fine. The snipe is a diffi- 
 cult bird because when he first rises and is comparatively 
 quiet he is too near to shoot; he then begins to gyrate and 
 dash from side to side, then sails away. Though not an 
 easy mark, this is the moment to shoot him. I was then 
 only a pretty good shot, but I rapidly improved with so 
 much practice. The best quail-shooting was at a place 
 called "the Winnows," a disused plantation belonging to 
 Mr. Tom Lowndes, the next neighbor. On this place were 
 large fields overgrown with broom-grass, interspersed with 
 small pine-trees. Here there were quantities of quail. 
 Gouv Wilkins had fine hunting-dogs, pointers, and Miss 
 Eliza Wilkins had a nice brown saddle-pony, which she 
 did not ride much, so she lent it to me and it was like hav- 
 ing my own horse. I had him out almost every day. He 
 was broken so that he was not afraid of gun-fire, and 
 would stand so still that one could shoot from his back 
 just as well as from the ground. I often shot quail from 
 his back. I spent almost the entire winter with the Wil- 
 kinses, but as I went shooting almost every day I made some 
 return for their hospitality by keeping them well supplied 
 with quail, snipe, doves, and ducks. The corn-stalks in 
 the fields are not cut as they are in the North, but the ears 
 of corn are picked in the field and the stalks left standing, 
 and these immense fields of standing corn-stalks were a 
 fine cover for doves, which are excellent birds for eating. 
 
 75 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 The best shooting I ever did was to kill eleven English 
 snipe out of thirteen shots. I once had a good shot at a 
 wild turkey, but did not kill him; I only had No. 8 quail- 
 shot and it was too fine, duck -shot being needed. There 
 were almost impenetrable swamps adjoining the rice-fields, 
 swarming with ducks. I well remember my first duck. It 
 was a mallard, a drake, called in South Carolina an Enghsh 
 duck; he came flying over my head, and when I shot him 
 he fell directly at my feet. It was an event of my life. 
 The mallard is one of the handsomest ducks that fly, 
 gray with beautifully barred wings and iridescent head and 
 neck. 
 
 'Coon-hunting was a favorite night amusement. At 
 first I went out with some of the negroes who had 'coon- 
 dogs, but in a little while I thought that it would be fine to 
 have two dogs from home, so I sent to Danskammer and 
 had Wasp and Crib sent down, and they soon devel- 
 oped into exceflent 'coon-dogs. We bought Wasp from 
 the Delanos' coachman. He was a thoroughbred black- 
 and-tan terrier, but the largest terrier I ever saw, very 
 muscular and a wonderful runner and jumper. He caught 
 full-grown rabbits by running them down, and could jump 
 a board fence four feet high, just touching it with his feet 
 as he went over. He could jump up and take a piece of 
 bread from your hand stretched up to its full height. 
 Crib was a white bull-terrier, with a black patch over 
 his eye that gave him a sinister look. I was once out 
 with Wasp and Crib in the woods when we started an 
 otter, which took to the water in a canal in the woods. 
 We chased him some distance and at intervals he would 
 appear above the water and Wasp would jump into the 
 water right on top of him; fortunately he did not close with 
 him, because otters are dangerous beasts. Finally he got 
 
 76 
 
THE SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR 
 
 under a bank with the most awful growling, and we could 
 not dislodge him. When I took Wasp and Crib home 
 to New York, the Wilkinses' colored coachman took me 
 in the carriage with the dogs down to Charleston. Some 
 man came along and admired the dogs, and the old coach- 
 man, who also admired them, remarked: "Dem's not 
 ornary dogs; dem's nordern dogs." 'Coon-hunting was a 
 picturesque sport; two or three darkies would bring their 
 dogs, making, with Wasp and Crib, quite a pack. The 
 'coon, when disturbed by the dogs, would take to a tree, 
 then one of the negroes would light a torch of fat pine, 
 and the whole company, including the 'coon in the tree, 
 would be lighted up by the blaze; one of the darkies 
 would climb the tree and shake the 'coon down and the 
 dogs would kill it. I always gave the 'coons to the negroes, 
 much to their delight. We never found a 'possum, which 
 they esteem even more than the 'coon. 
 
 There were also black and gray squirrels in abundance 
 on the plantation, and many rabbits. The Southern rab- 
 bit looks like the Northern, but the latter is a hare and 
 has a hairy foot, while the Southern cousin has a foot like 
 a dog's. The snakes were the most unattractive feature 
 of that country. They swarmed everywhere, more par- 
 ticularly along the ditches of the rice-fields, which are 
 usually bordered with low bushes; these bushes were liter- 
 ally festooned with them. They were, I believe, usually 
 harmless, but disgusting. One frequently saw black snakes 
 six or seven feet long hanging down from low trees, but 
 one had to get used to them, also to the quantities of alli- 
 gators in the swamps. When surprised the alligators 
 would take to the water and, either in a spirit of bravado 
 or curiosity, they would submerge entirely, except for the 
 extreme tips of their noses, which they left projecting 
 
 11 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 about a quarter of an inch above the surface, and sail up 
 and down for a long while, without causing a ripple. I 
 frequently fired at them, but with no success. 
 
 The Wilkinses were most hospitable. One day I was 
 riding with Gouv near Rantowle's, when two gentlemen 
 came along and asked if there was any hotel near there 
 where they could spend the night. Gouv told them the 
 depressing truth, but then said that he would be happy to 
 have them accept his hospitality, and that if they would 
 go home with us he would look out for them. This they 
 did, although perfect strangers. 
 
 Mr. William Haskell had a plantation near by and he 
 would sometimes go hunting deer with us; he was an excel- 
 lent rider and looked well on his handsome thoroughbred 
 chestnut mare. I admired this mare so much that he once 
 lent her to me, and I rode down to Charleston and back, 
 twenty miles each way. I went down in the morning, had 
 dinner there, and came home in the afternoon, forty miles. 
 We had many fox-hunts as well as deer-hunts. In Caro- 
 lina they only have the gray fox, which is not Kke the red 
 fox that will make a long run straight away, for he keeps 
 doubling so that you may hunt him a long while in a con- 
 fined space. We never caught one, but it made no differ- 
 ence, because we had the fun of riding, and an occasional 
 rail fence to jump, but the obstacles were usually only 
 ditches or fallen logs. Sometimes the countrymen, "poor 
 whites," or "crackers," as they are called, would join in, 
 bringing their hounds. Every man had a dog or two, and 
 all rode little ponies, called ''tackeys." These were com- 
 plete saddle-horses, very small but active and pretty, not 
 ponies but little horses. These "crackers" were a very 
 poor class, morally, intellectually, and physically, pretty 
 low down. Even the negro slaves despised them and 
 
 78 
 
THE SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR 
 
 called them "poor whites." They were wretched-looking 
 men, and as they lived in that malarial country winter and 
 summer, and had fever and ague all the time, they were so 
 weak and languid that they could hardly swing themselves 
 on the backs of their little horses. 
 
 One day Gouv Wilkins took me down to Mr. Hugh 
 Wilson's place on John's Island, about twenty miles from 
 Kelvin. This was a fine plantation, one of those where 
 they raised "sea-island cotton," a long-stapled cotton very 
 celebrated, and only raised, I believe, on the coast and 
 islands near there. Mr. Wilson had a deer-park of five 
 thousand acres, fenced in and kept exclusively for deer- 
 hunting. He had a fine pack of hounds and several hunts- 
 men, Gouverneur Wilkins rode his fine brown saddle-horse 
 and I rode Eliza's brown pony, each of us equipped with 
 saddle-bags and carrying a gun. We arrived at Mr. Wil- 
 son's place in time for dinner and were handsomely enter- 
 tained. 
 
 Early in the morning of the second day of our visit at 
 John's Island we went deer-hunting. Several of the neigh- 
 bors joined in the hunt. The method they follow there in 
 hunting is to station the hunters at certain points where 
 they know from experience that the deer when driven out 
 always go. Sitting on my horse, I was stationed near a 
 sort of road or path, looking out over a part of the forest, 
 thinly wooded with tall pine-trees; I heard the hounds bay- 
 ing, and presently I saw a deer loping through the woods, 
 on its way to pass me about fifty yards away. I fired and 
 evidently hit him, for he slackened his pace, and the hounds 
 coming up they caught him after he had gone a few paces. 
 It was my first deer and it was the custom to mark with 
 blood the fortunate hunter when he bagged his first deer. 
 I was prepared to stand it, and one of the gentlemen began 
 
 79 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 to bathe his hands in blood preparatory to smearing it on 
 my face, when the others protested and they let me off. 
 Later in the day I shot another one, and in the evening 
 we rode home, twenty miles, reaching Kelvin late at night. 
 It was an all-day ride and rather too much for my little 
 pony. I have been deer-hunting several times since, but 
 these were the only deer I ever killed. 
 
 Mr. Wilson had known my grandfather. Colonel John 
 Ward, whose place was near by, for whom he had a great 
 respect and regard. I wish I could remember my grand- 
 father Ward. He seems to have been an ideal grandfather. 
 My mother often told us about the Christmas parties he 
 used to give in Charleston, how he played with the children 
 and told them delightful stories and kept them all in a 
 flutter of happiness. 
 
 Colonel Ward's grandfather, also named John, came 
 from England and was shipwrecked on his way to Carolina, 
 saving nothing but a fat gold watch with St. George and 
 the dragon on the back, which I now have. Colonel Ward, 
 who served in the United States army in the War of 1 8 12, 
 was a distinguished lawyer and for some time president of 
 the Senate of South Carolina. The diary of Edward 
 Hooker, of Hartford, who chronicled his impressions of 
 the South in 1807, while a professor at the University of 
 South Carolina, describes my grandfather as president of 
 the Senate, "wearing a long light blue satin robe edged 
 with white fur." He goes on to say: "A more pleasing 
 speaker I have rarely heard; he has at command a rich 
 stock of words and ideas, and speaks entirely in the Sheri- 
 danean dialect, which is used by most educated Charles- 
 tonians. Mr. Ward is a small man — pleasant and face- 
 tious disposition, penetrating look, quick and graceful in 
 motion, dignified when in the chair but a little prone to 
 levity when out of it." 
 
 80 
 
THE SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR 
 
 My Grandfather Ward was a planter as well as a law- 
 yer. His plantation on John's Island was called Seven 
 Oaks from a huge seven-branched live-oak on the place. 
 I have a large dinner-set of pink Lowestoft china that was 
 buried on John's Island during the Revolution when the 
 British pillaged the neighborhood, after being driven out 
 of their earthworks in the battle of Stony Ferry. All 
 treasures that were not carefully hidden were stolen or 
 destroyed. It must have been quite a job to bury all 
 that china — over a hundred pieces. 
 
 Colonel Ward married Mary Somersall. In an inter- 
 esting picture by Copley which I have she is represented 
 as a young girl standing by the seated figures of her mother 
 and grandmother, Mrs. Thomas Hartley. A little child, 
 a cousin, who was afterward Mrs. Deas, with a small 
 dog, complete the family group. The picture is unusual, 
 as it shows three generations of mothers and daughters; 
 the figure of the old lady is especially well painted. 
 
 My grandfather Ward is buried in Trinity Churchyard 
 in New York, next to the tomb of Alexander Hamilton. 
 His overseer, who begged that when he died he might be 
 buried near by, lies beside him. There is also a tablet to 
 his memory in the "Muniment Room" of Trinity. To 
 my mind it would add very much to the appearance and 
 certainly to the interest of old Trinity if the monuments 
 and tablets which formerly decorated its walls were put 
 back into the church. I have heard strangers remark that 
 in contrast to an English church of the same type the bare 
 walls of Trinity are most uninteresting. 
 
 I wish very much that I had been able to go to Seven 
 Oaks when I was staying with the Wilsons. My brother 
 Harry knew the place well and often visited there. He 
 told me that he had seen in the neighboring cottages old 
 tombstones of the Ward family used in front of fireplaces 
 
 8i 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 and front doors as hearths and door-steps. Mr. Wilson 
 was a very rich man at the time I stayed at his beautiful 
 old place, but the Civil War ruined him; he lost all his 
 slaves and his plantation, and his grandchildren were poor. 
 He was a fine man, a gentleman of the old school, who kept 
 open house and was an all-round sportsman. He not only 
 had a splendid pack of hounds and fine hunting-dogs, but 
 he kept beautiful game-cocks, each of which had his sep- 
 arate run. My brother Harry was very intimate at his 
 house and spent several winters there, and his son John, 
 a fine rider and shot, used to visit us at Danskammer. 
 
 This winter of which I am writing my three brothers, 
 Harry, Gouv, and Jack, spent in Charleston, varying their 
 stay there by visits to neighboring plantations. Jack was 
 a member of the South Carohna Jockey Club and of the 
 Charleston Club, and used to go to the Saint Cecilia balls, 
 all of which it was considered an honor to belong to. He 
 was good-looking, dressed well, and enjoyed the society of 
 that winter. 
 
 I was too young to go to the Saint Cecilias, and I only 
 attended one ball in Charleston, which was at the Haynes'. 
 Miss Hattie Hayne was a beauty, the daughter of the 
 celebrated Hayne who debated with Daniel Webster. The 
 Lowndes, on the plantation next to Kelvin, had a very 
 pleasant party, with dancing and good cheer, and there 
 were several parties in the neighborhood, to all of which I 
 went — ^there were some pretty cousins of the Lowndes's 
 named Brisbane — but my time was chiefly spent in shoot- 
 ing, fox and deer hunting, and as I was already fond of 
 sketching from nature I made several sketches of Kelvin 
 and the neighborhood. 
 
 I attended the races one day at the Annual Meet at the 
 Charleston Race Course, a celebrated course and a great 
 society event. During that year two famous horses had 
 
 82 
 
THE SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR 
 
 been competing at all the race-courses throughout the 
 country and creating great interest; they were Nina, 
 sired by Revenue, and Red Eye, sired by Boston, who 
 also was the sire of Lexington. The excitement over 
 their races was intense, partly because it was a contest 
 between the get of Revenue and Boston, great rivals. 
 If I remember rightly, Red Eye was usually the winner. 
 The day I was there Red Eye was entered in a four-mile 
 race, but as Nina was not on hand, and no other horse 
 dared to meet the famous champion, he ran the four miles 
 alone in order to win the purse. He was a splendid 
 powerful bay horse. 
 
 The earliest races in Carolina were in 1734 on a green 
 on Charleston neck, the prize being a saddle and bridle 
 valued at twenty pounds. In those early times the horses 
 were of the Chickasaw breed, a stock introduced into 
 Florida by the Spaniards, small but active animals. But 
 very soon fine horses were imported from abroad. There 
 was a famous horse called Abdallah, brought from 
 Arabia to Gibraltar and from there to Port Royal not long 
 before the Revolution, who was sixteen hands high and 
 had never been ridden until Mr. Frank Huger, being dared 
 to mount him, "put his hand upon the flowing mane of 
 the snorting animal, with one bound vaulted upon his 
 back, and sat like an equestrian statue, unmoved!" 
 
 Flimnap, a black Godolphin Arabian bred by Sir 
 John Moore and later owned by Major Harleston, of Caro- 
 lina, was another great horse. He had a narrow escape 
 in the War of 181 2, for the British Major Tarleton was so 
 anxious to get hold of him that he actually hung a negro 
 stable-boy to a tree because he would not tell where he 
 was hidden in a swamp. Luckily the Redcoats rode away 
 in time for the boy to be cut down. 
 
 Before going home that winter I spent three very pleas- 
 
 83 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 ant weeks at my cousin Ellen Screven's place near Poco- 
 taligo, Castle Hill, named, I suppose, after Uncle Gouv's 
 place in Westchester of which I have spoken in a previous 
 chapter. I went up by a steamboat, stopping at Beaufort 
 for dinner with some relations of the Screvens. Part of 
 the way the boat ran out to sea and I was very seasick, but 
 quite late in the evening we left the sea and sailed along a 
 river, and when about midnight we landed I had recovered 
 and was fearfully hungry. At the landing a man was 
 waiting for me and we had a considerable drive before we 
 reached Castle Hill, arriving so late that the family had 
 gone to bed. I was cold and hungry, and I shall never 
 forget the bright fire and cheerful, warm dining-room, and, 
 best of all, some delicious wild ducks — they were teal — and 
 a decanter of sherry. 
 
 The Screvens were delightfully hospitable and let me 
 do just as I pleased there. They were still young, with 
 five little children, and lived handsomely in extreme com- 
 fort. They had a stable of good horses, and I had a mount 
 whenever I wanted one; and the shooting was excellent, 
 particularly ducks. There was a large reserve for flooding 
 the rice-fields, filled with flocks of ducks, and at the upper 
 end of it a river where blue-winged teal abounded. I 
 would go up this, shooting as I went, and then down; up 
 and down as long as you wished, all the time the birds 
 rising before you. Screven had a large rice plantation, 
 and to house his slaves had a good-sized village of white 
 cabins, where the negroes were comfortable and seemed 
 happy. These negroes had formerly belonged to Colonel 
 Ward, who had left four hundred slaves to my Aunt Mary, 
 Mrs. Gouverneur Wilkins, but only a few to my mother, 
 as she did not care to own slaves. The few she inherited 
 she set free. When I was staying with the Screvens I had 
 
 84 
 
THE SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR 
 
 a brisk little darky about my own age allotted to me, who 
 brought water for my bath, blacked my boots, ran errands 
 for me, and was always at my command. 
 
 As Screven was then very prosperous, he was adding to 
 his slaves whenever he had a chance to buy a good one. 
 To show what they cost, just before I went there he bought 
 a carpenter for whom he paid thirty-seven hundred dollars. 
 The planters were then at the height of their glory. John 
 H. Screven served in the Confederate army, I think as 
 major. At the close of the war he was ruined, lost all his 
 slaves, and when I saw him later at Mr. Wilkins's place in 
 Westchester he had nothing but his bare land in South 
 Carohna. Some of his TurnbuII grandchildren now own 
 the plantation Castle Hill, and often spend their winters 
 there. 
 
 This winter at the South was delightful and one of the 
 pleasantest times of my life — no care and lots of fun. There 
 was no continuous railway to Charleston in those days and 
 one had to travel back and forth by steamers, which, on 
 the whole, were excellent. Going down had been my first 
 experience of the sea. Returning, I left the South looking 
 like summer, the woods filled with jasmine. I arrived 
 at New York on the 24th of April, and when I stepped off 
 the steamer there was deep snow on the ground. It was 
 at night, so I went to the Stevens House on Broadway 
 near the corner of Rector Street. It was a good hotel; 
 later occupied down-stairs by a branch of Delmonico's. I 
 was accompanied by Wasp and Crib, who were soon safely 
 at home at Danskammer. 
 
 Martin Wilkins was a delightful fellow. He visited us 
 at Danskammer in the summer of 1855, at the same time 
 with Lewis TurnbuII and Elisha Tracy, both of whom 
 had just graduated from Trinity College. We all sparred, 
 
 85 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 except Martin, and used to adjourn to the garret, which 
 was an enormous room covering the whole top story of 
 the Danskammer house. This had a fine open floor and 
 Lewis TurnbuII and I had a series of set-to's there. We 
 sparred so briskly that both he and I got pretty bad black 
 eyes. We had decided that we must all visit West Point 
 and spend the day and night there, but we were almost 
 deterred from going on account of the black eyes, but I 
 tried my hand at painting them in water-colors so that 
 they were not very perceptible. We went to Cranston's 
 Hotel, but as that was crowded and no rooms were 
 available, they put four cots for us in the cupola and we 
 slept up there. 
 
 Long after this Southern winter of mine, in 1897, I got 
 a letter from Gouv Wilkins, whom I knew so well then, 
 speaking of the sad fate of Kelvin and all those other fine 
 old country places. 
 
 "When you visited Kelvin in 1853," he writes, "you 
 made a painting of the residence, and if it lacked the 
 element of beauty it was the fault of the house for you 
 certainly portrayed it correctly. I do not think we have 
 met since and what changes have taken place! My last 
 visit to New York was in 1858 and since then what changes 
 there — Fourteenth Street was almost out of town ! 
 
 "Mr. Lowndes, my father-in-law, died penniless. In 
 1855 he bought Kelvin from my mother and also the Has- 
 kell plantation above it, and added them to his property 
 below, the whole costing him near fifty thousand dollars, 
 which he paid in cash. All of them together were sold in 
 1886 to pay his debts and brought at public sale only 
 $7500. This, with the loss of two hundred negroes, ex- 
 plains his insolvency. He had a dwelling house on each 
 of the four plantations, and all were burned by the Federal 
 
 86 
 
THE SOUTH BEFORE THE WAR 
 
 troops, after the evacuation of Charleston and the coast 
 by the Confederates. The brick house at his home place, 
 which you will remember, was occupied for several weeks 
 as headquarters by Colonel Beecher (brother to Henry 
 Ward Beecher). On leaving he set fire to it and it and 
 all its contents were burned to the ground, leaving only 
 the chimneys standing, which the earthquake shook down. 
 At Kelvin they made a clean sweep, even the negro houses 
 were burned, and when I went there in the fall of 1865 
 there could not have been found enough plank to make a 
 soap box. 
 
 "Thank God, my home life is the best that I could 
 wish. Through all, my wife is as contented and cheerful 
 as in the early days of our married life^^when she was sur- 
 rounded with every comfort." 
 
 87 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 AT COLLEGE 
 
 "River and race and game, gay leaping of brook and hedge: 
 Perils on happy heights, and pleasure nearest the edge: 
 Something we gain as we live: but youth has departed.*' 
 
 — Palgrave. 
 
 I entered Trinity College, Hartford, in September, 
 1854, and had been there only a day or two when I made 
 the acquaintance of Rhoades Fisher, a tall, gallant-looking 
 fellow from Texas with red hair, who asked me to room 
 with him at 32 Jarvis Hall. He didn't graduate, and 
 after he left at the end of the year I thenceforth roomed 
 there alone. Those were primitive days: not a bathroom 
 in the whole college, not even water in our building; it all 
 had to be brought from the yard. I bought a big wash- 
 tub, and a darky, an old fellow named Adams, brought 
 up a pail of water every morning and made my fire. He 
 was a character, and I became quite attached to him 
 during the three years that he ministered to my wants. 
 We were obliged to furnish our own rooms, and supply 
 our own lights and fuel, though we had the luxury of a coal- 
 closet. Strange to say, in this inland retreat of ours the 
 beds were in two berths, like those at sea, with curtains 
 that drew in front of them. We used camphene for our 
 lamps; I well remember filling one, leaving the wick lighted 
 while I poured in the camphene, when suddenly it exploded, 
 and can, lamp, and all shot across the room, leaving a 
 trail of fire behind it and burning a broad swath in the 
 carpet. Outside my window hung a canary. This bird 
 
 88 
 
AT COLLEGE 
 
 had appeared on the campus one afternoon after chapel, 
 and in a moment the whole college was in full cry after 
 him. I didn't make any particular effort to catch him, 
 but somehow he flew right into my hand; so I got him a 
 cage and cherished him for a long time. One day as he 
 was hanging there in the sunshine the string broke, and 
 down he fell, three stories, to the pavement, without being 
 hurt. That bird had a charmed hfe. I lived four years 
 in 32 Jarvis Hall, and just before I graduated I carved my 
 name and "Phi Kappa Fraternity" on the stone shelf 
 outside my window, and looked forward to my return in 
 years to come and finding it still there. Alas ! in a few 
 years old Jarvis was torn down, when the new college was 
 built, and all these old records are gone. 
 
 The old college had been built in 1824 — Washington 
 College it was called then, but in my day it had long been 
 known as Trinity. Seabury Hall was in the centre, with 
 Brownell Hall and Jarvis Hall at the ends; Seabury was a 
 classic building, designed by Samuel Morse of telegraph 
 fame, with large columns in front, and containing the dor- 
 mitories and classrooms. This group of buildings stood 
 at the head of College Street, just where the State House 
 now stands, overlooking the whole city across a wide ex- 
 panse of green lawn, and backed by a lovely wood through 
 which a green lane ran down to a picturesque Httle river 
 known as the "Hog." This stream meandered far back 
 into the country and we had splendid skating there in 
 winter. "Mile after mile," as an old Trinity man said, 
 "have I skated on its reaches with the red squirrel follow- 
 ing me on the banks." 
 
 During my first two years at college the president was 
 Doctor Goodwin, who later became head of the Theological 
 Seminary in Philadelphia. He was a scholar but a cold, 
 
 89 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 unsympathetic man; he was very handsome, and looked, I 
 have always thought, like one of Fra Bartolomeo's prophets. 
 We had a year's German with him — we actually read the 
 whole of "Faust" — but I don't know a single word of Ger- 
 man now. We also, I remember, studied WheweU's "Ele- 
 ments of Morahty" with him (I believe I have the title 
 right), and thereby hangs a tale. There was a Jew whose 
 name I don't know, but we always called him Amsterdam, a 
 dealer in old clothes, cigars, pictures, and all sorts of things. 
 He also carried on a brisk little business in money-lending 
 — the tightness of the money market often constraining us 
 to pawn our watches and any other jewelry we possessed, 
 and for the same reason we did not often actually buy his 
 wares, but bartered our old clothes for his more interesting 
 objets d'art. Of course I — being I — managed to acquire 
 a lot of pictures by this means, and as I decorated my 
 room in other ways, it was considered one of the show- 
 rooms of the college. One of these pictures of mine was 
 a colored lithograph of "Venus Rising from the Sea." It 
 was not an improper picture. I thought it would be good 
 practice to copy this picture in oil. So one pleasant, quiet 
 June morning I was busily engaged in painting, when I 
 felt a hand upon my shoulder and, looking up, I saw the 
 stern face of Doctor Goodwin gazing in horror at my 
 Venus. I don't recall now what he said, but his looks 
 were enough. His face bore the expression of one who 
 looks down from the sanctuary of Abraham's bosom on a 
 soul in perdition, and he gave me a good blowing-up as 
 soon as he found his voice. By the irony of fate, that very 
 afternoon we had our lesson on WheweU's "Elements of 
 Morality." I was called up and flunked, as I couldn't 
 paint and look over my lesson as well, and when it became 
 only too clear that I could not recite. Doctor Goodwin 
 
 90 
 
AT COLLEGE 
 
 roared in a voice of thunder: "If you had not been engaged 
 in reprehensible pursuits this morning, sir, you would prob- 
 ably have known your lesson! Sit down, sir!" I am 
 happy to say, however, that I was told by a friend in after 
 years that Doctor Goodwin "remembered me with pleasure 
 and affection," so perhaps he had forgotten our interview 
 about the Venus, or possibly through the mist of years he 
 was able to view it more leniently than on that June morn- 
 ing long ago. 
 
 I spent all my spare cash at college in hiring saddle- 
 horses. There was an excellent thoroughbred mare that I 
 liked especially, and on Saturdays we used to make up 
 parties and ride out to "Wadsworth's Tower" — afterward 
 owned by the Elys — where there is a lake on top of the 
 mountain. I remember riding there one Saturday with 
 Alexander Preston and some other fellows; I had a new 
 gray coat that I had never worn, and when Preston sug- 
 gested borrowing it I felt greatly honored, as I was a fresh- 
 man and he a senior, and it gave me real pleasure to have 
 him ride in it all day, but reflecting on it now it seems a 
 poor reason for giving up my brand-new coat. 
 
 Athletics were not much cultivated in those days, but 
 we had one of the first boat clubs in any college and had 
 two fast race-boats. We had two spirited races with the 
 town club of Hartford, winning the first but losing the 
 second because we broke a rowlock. I was stroke, 
 although the smallest man in the club. In 1858 the Col- 
 lege Union Regatta at Worcester was established by Har- 
 vard, Yale, Brown, and Trinity. 
 
 Sparring was one of my chief interests in college. 
 When I was seventeen I had been taught to box by Ottig- 
 non, the owner of the gymnasium in Crosby Street, an 
 enormous man over six feet high and weighing two hun- 
 
 91 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 dred pounds, but very agile, nevertheless. And now at 
 college I took sparring lessons from Charley Brewster, one 
 of the best sparrers I have ever seen. I began with him 
 in my freshman year and sparred with him all through my 
 college course, and he taught me that any ordinary man 
 could knock a bigger man down if he knew how to aim 
 his blow aright and how to keep his opponent from closing 
 with him. I got to be pretty good; in fact, Brewster said 
 I was "too good to spar with a gentleman !" 
 
 In my day hazing was rife in all the colleges; somehow 
 or other I managed to escape it, but I confess that I joy- 
 fully assisted in the hazing of others. In our sophomore 
 year we thought it advisable to haze a freshman named 
 Short. I don't remember any reason for this except that 
 his name and person were so incongruous — instead of being 
 short he was extremely long, being about six feet six. The 
 affair was arranged in this way. One afternoon, just after 
 chapel, we captured Short and rushed him out by the back 
 way, where we had a carriage waiting to take him down 
 into the town, where we proposed to try him for his alleged 
 offenses. The carriage got off all right and drove around 
 by way of the station. Where the triumphal arch now 
 stands was situated the jail, and next to it was a terraced 
 bank about ten feet high, on top of which ran a sidewalk. 
 I was on my way down to the trial when I heard shouts of 
 rage and saw Short approaching, sprinting like anything 
 and making good time with his long legs. He had escaped 
 from the carriage and was being pursued by his captors, 
 but they had no chance of catching him, and I saw I was 
 the only obstacle between him and sanctuary at the col- 
 lege. He thought, of course, that with his great weight 
 and height he could run right over me as I stood facing him 
 in the middle of the sidewalk, but just as he reached me I 
 
 92 
 
AT COLLEGE 
 
 stepped aside, put out my foot, and sent him rolling head- 
 long down the grass to the foot of the terrace. There I 
 managed to hold him until the other sophomores arrived 
 and secured him. We tried him — on these occasions we 
 had regular courts, judge, counsel on both sides, etc. — and 
 he was convicted of being too tall, and condemned to drink, 
 as he was a temperance man, three glasses of lager-beer. 
 Just as the penalty was being enforced his class found out 
 where he was, broke down the door, and after a free fight 
 rescued him. Short afterward studied for the ministry 
 and more than forty years later I met some of his family 
 in North Hadley, by whom he sent me affectionate mes- 
 sages, so he cherished no animosity. 
 
 A college character was "Professor Jim," the janitor, 
 a fine old darky. He had been born a slave in the family 
 of Colonel Philip Rhinelander Robert, of Pomona Hall at 
 Yonkers, which afterward belonged to Sidney Morse,, the 
 son of Professor Morse, and he used to tell us tales of 
 Aaron Burr, whom he had often seen at the house, and of 
 his adventures after he ran away to sea in the War of 1 812. 
 Finally Jim turned up at Hartford at about the same time 
 that Bishop Brownell became the first president of Trinity, 
 and soon became one of the bishop's servants. Jim's 
 grand crack of the whip, as he wheeled the bishop's gig 
 close to the church steps when he drove about the country 
 on his visitations, has never been forgotten, nor the ele- 
 gance of his manner as he assisted the bishop to alight 
 and with a wave of the hand turned him over to the rector 
 and wardens in attendance. He was a little man with 
 snow-white hair when I knew him, and looked a good deal 
 like a monkey, but he had a certain dignity withal. 
 
 "Professor Jim" was always popular with the students, 
 for if he caught them in a scrape he never told, but at the 
 
 93 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 same time he contrived to be loyal to the college. He 
 was a feature of Class Day, resplendent in a dress suit 
 and high hat, and was always presented with some token 
 of affection from the senior class. His speeches in return 
 are still remembered. One ran in part as follows: 
 
 "Gentlemen, our communion has been sweet together, 
 our words has been soft, and what you knows I knows and 
 nobody else knows! How you worried and studied all 
 night after you'd been off, for fear you wouldn't get your 
 conditions — how you had to be dragged out from under 
 the bed, sometimes, to visit the faculty — how you got along 
 nicely till you run against chronics — chronics was hard ! 
 Gentlemen, your secrets is mine ! Though you stopped up 
 the key -hole with putty and froze up the bell, I got along 
 somehow! You're soon going to leave this splendid can- 
 vas — don't forget the high privileges that has been granted 
 you here, and the benefit of a Supreme Being you ought 
 to appreciate as gentlemen !" 
 
 At our Class Day the class was assembled on the lawn 
 in a semicircle in front of Seabury Hall facing the chapel 
 steps where the speeches were made. I suppose the 
 president sat in Bishop Berkeley's famous chair just as he 
 does nowadays, but I don't remember — the chair was not 
 such an heirloom then as it is now — neither do I remember 
 much about my oration. I was class orator, but I shall 
 never forget the splendid peroration of "Professor Jim's" 
 speech. 
 
 "My dear young friends, we have come to parting and 
 you must remember that while you are ac/vancing I will 
 be cfevancing. You will all be scattered all over the world; 
 some of you may go to Asia, some to Africa, some maybe 
 to the sandy shores of Arabia, but wherever you go, my dear 
 boys, my heart will go with you to any part of the State !" 
 
 94 
 
AT COLLEGE 
 
 In my senior year an astonishing thing happened — I 
 was awarded the chemistry prize for the best essay "On 
 the Chemical Constitution, Properties, and Uses of Water." 
 No one was more surprised at my gaining it than L The 
 award was made by Professor Jackson, Doctor Oliver, and 
 some other distinguished scientists of Boston, and one of 
 them told my friend Prescott that he liked my essay be- 
 cause it was so evidently written by a gentleman — a strange 
 consideration in a matter of chemistry! It has always 
 amused me to see my name in the college catalogue among 
 the winners of the Sheffield prize. I elected to take my 
 twenty-five-dollar prize in books, and my choice of Mrs. 
 Jameson's books on ecclesiastical art I have often found 
 useful in my profession. There were no schools of art in 
 those days in any of the colleges, and I don't think that a 
 single one of my fellow collegians could draw a line; so I 
 was always selected to do any drawing that was required, 
 such as tail-pieces for catalogues, specimens in natural 
 philosophy for Professor Brocklesby, etc. In my senior 
 year I got a good deal of fun out of preparing and illustrat- 
 ing a catalogue of my fraternity, Phi Kappa, which we 
 published. 
 
 I fancy every one would have agreed that the most 
 
 promising man in the Class of ^$$ was Elisha T ; a 
 
 handsome fellow, of good family, with a fine education and 
 lots of ability, and quite well off". He and I roomed to- 
 gether in New York for a while after leaving college, and 
 he was awfully kind to me when I was ill. I remember an 
 odd labor-saving habit that he had. On Saturday nights 
 he would shave, take a hot bath, put on a clean "boiled 
 shirt" with the studs in place; in fact, dress himself com- 
 pletely, except for his boots and outer clothing, stretch 
 himself flat on his back, and go peacefully to sleep. As he 
 
 95 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 was able to sleep without changing his position a particle 
 he was all ready for church the next morning. 
 
 Later on he roomed with Joseph H. Choate, who was a 
 great friend of his. In fact, it was he who first introduced 
 me to Mr. Choate. Then came the Civil War and perhaps 
 army life made him restless; anyway, after that he went 
 steadily down in the world until at last his friends clubbed 
 together and got him into the Old Men's Home on Amster- 
 dam Avenue. He and Choate had started life pretty 
 evenly equipped; Choate ended his career honored the 
 
 world over and T died at almost the same time in an 
 
 old men's home. I wrote to Mr. Choate when he was 
 ambassador in London, asking him to contribute to the 
 
 fund for T , and he sent me fifty dollars, remarking in 
 
 his letter: "I have watched Elisha T 's long but sure 
 
 descent into the gutter with great interest and wonder; as 
 he seemed to have no vice it was a perfect mystery !" 
 
 But Mr. Choate put it too strongly. T never got 
 
 as far down as the gutter. He always preserved a neat, 
 pleasant appearance, and no one meeting him would have 
 thought him other than a gentleman of leisure in good 
 circumstances. I really believe the years he spent in the 
 Home were the happiest of his life. Luckily he was a 
 member of the Phi Kappa Chapter of Alpha Delta Phi, 
 and the Fraternity House at Columbia seemed to give him 
 everything he needed. He had a fund of anecdote and 
 sang good comic songs, and the young fellows grew really 
 fond of him. He died not long ago and I was present at 
 his funeral, quite an imposing affair, the Episcopal service 
 supplemented by certain fraternal ceremonies and attended 
 by all the brethren of the Columbia Chapter of Alpha 
 Delta Phi. His young friends spoke of him with regret 
 and affection. So perhaps his life was not such an utter 
 failure, after all. 
 
 96 
 
AT COLLEGE 
 
 This story shows the good side of fraternity life, though 
 I can see the disadvantages of college fraternities as they 
 were in my time, how they cut you off from intimacies 
 outside and fostered exclusiveness. But we stuck up for 
 each other on all occasions; a member of one's fraternity 
 could do no wrong; and loyalty through thick and thin is 
 a pretty good thing to count on in a friend. 
 
 My fraternity life and all its associations are among my 
 dearest recollections. I was a member of Phi Kappa, 
 founded in 1835; ^^ ^^^ a senior society, z. e., one did not 
 wear a pin until senior year, and although boys became 
 members from freshman year up, their association with the 
 fraternity was kept a profound secret. The friendships 
 formed in it were something different from anything I have 
 experienced in after life. The rivalry among the various 
 fraternities at Trinity was tremendous and the feeling 
 intense; so much so that it was considered a deadly insult 
 to even mention the name of a man's fraternity. If this 
 custom were trifled with in any way it was apt to be "a 
 word and a blow." 
 
 During the Civil War almost all the students of Trinity 
 went to the front, and the membership of the Phi Kappa 
 was reduced to one man, Hovey, afterward rector of the 
 fine old church in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. This 
 splendid isolation made Hovey feel lonely, so he decided 
 to give up the fraternity and turned all the archives over 
 to a committee of the old graduates, by whom they were 
 burned, and joined a rival local fraternity called the L K. A. 
 It looked as if the Phi Kappa were extinct. However, in 
 1865, or thereabouts, eight or ten young men left St. 
 James's College in Maryland and came to Trinity — St. 
 James's was also an Episcopal college and a very nice class 
 of fellows went there. It had long been a sort of custom 
 for men from St. James's to go to Trinity, and as many 
 
 97 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 of them had become members of Phi Kappa, the fraternity 
 was well known there and liked. These men got together 
 and decided that it would be a good idea to revive the Phi 
 Kappa, so they consulted me and I agreed to go to Trinity 
 and initiate them. 
 
 On my way up to Hartford I met Hovey in the train, 
 but I did not tell him of my errand. He told me how sorry 
 he was to leave the Phi Kappa — how fond he was of it — 
 how deeply he regretted that it had become extinct. I 
 listened and made no observations. The boys were in- 
 itiated. Next morning when they all appeared with their 
 Phi Kappa pins it was a real triumph. Although I never 
 spoke of it again to Hovey, I think that he was sorry he 
 had been faint-hearted, for thenceforth the fraternity pros- 
 pered, and about 1880 it was merged in the Alpha Delta 
 Phi, one of the leading fraternities in Trinity and in many 
 other colleges. At one time there was a chapter at Harvard 
 and Joseph H. Choate was a member. Since his day all 
 the secret societies have been abolished there and Alpha 
 Delta Phi went with the rest. 
 
 Edward Coleman Jacobs was another of my college 
 friends — a nephew by marriage of Bishop H. C. Potter. 
 He was a talented fellow, made the Phi Beta Kappa, and 
 was reputed the best-dressed man in college. After grad- 
 uating at the Harvard Law School he went into the law 
 office of Mr. John H. Glover in New York. But the law 
 proved too sedate a mistress; he went West, travelled 
 among the Indians, and disappeared into space. It was 
 supposed that he had been murdered, but nothing was 
 ever known; only his clothing was found and his saddle, 
 marked with his name. 
 
 Horace C was about my most intimate friend. He 
 
 was the handsomest man in college, very well read, and 
 
 98 
 
AT COLLEGE 
 
 our finest orator for Fourth of July orations and poems. 
 He used to help me out with my compositions, and later 
 rewrote an article of mine, called "From Rome to Thrasy- 
 mene," an illustrated account of a trip I took in Italy in 
 1859. At the time we were both vastly pleased with the 
 result of his efforts, but I see now that he shrouded my 
 facts with such ample classic drapery that whatever local 
 color I had managed to get hold of was completely smoth- 
 ered. 
 
 I lost sight of Horace for years. One day I was riding 
 with Mr. Choate in Stockbridge when a boy passed us on 
 a bicycle, and Mr. Choate happened to remark that it was 
 
 young Horace C , who lived near by. So I jumped off 
 
 my horse and hurried across the road to see my dear old 
 friend. When he appeared I greeted him with effusion 
 and tried to talk about old times. But he only remarked : 
 '*I scarcely remember those days, and I take no interest in 
 them whatever." So with a shake of his limp hand I took 
 my leave. 
 
 William W. Hayes, of Baltimore, was another handsome 
 and delightful fellow, the best scholar in our class. He 
 could read an intricate problem in mathematics only once 
 and then go to the blackboard and write it down perfectly. 
 But he didn't stay long; his mother thought he was in too 
 fast a crowd at Trinity because, unluckily, he sent her a 
 photograph of his room with a bottle on the table; so he 
 finished his course at Kenyon College, Ohio. I met him 
 once only, several years later, and we had a fine talk about 
 old times and the Phi Kappa. He told me he still had 
 Phi Kappa painted on his trunk. 
 
 Ned Perryman, Sidney Hull, and Alexander Preston, 
 all from Perrymansville, Maryland, had been friends from 
 boyhood and came to Trinity together. Preston was a 
 
 99 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 man of ability and became a good lawyer in Baltimore; he 
 married Miss Carroll of Maryland. When I have been 
 in Baltimore I have usually gone to see him. He kept 
 good trotting-horses and took me to drive in the park and 
 to lunch with him at the Maryland Club — "the grave of 
 reputations," as a friend of mine once called it as we were 
 passing. The cooking there is famous and one gets can- 
 vasback duck, crab salad, and fried hominy in perfection. 
 
 Then there was **Batt" Barrow, from St. Francisville, 
 Louisiana, a fine fellow with a beautiful tenor voice, who 
 never did a stroke of work or attended a recitation during 
 the time I knew him, so that at the end of his junior year 
 he left college. He was a devoted attendant on Miss 
 Nellie Marcy, daughter of General Marcy, of the United 
 States army; she afterward married General George B. 
 McCIellan. The last time I saw her was a few years ago 
 at an evening party at Mrs. William Draper's in New York. 
 She was still handsome in her old age and, as always, very 
 charming. She was at that moment carrying on an appar- 
 ently flirtatious conversation with Mr. John Bigelow, at 
 that time about ninety years old. Ah well, she was said 
 to be engaged to Batt Barrow in 1856 ! I don't know why 
 they did not marry, because he was all that a woman might 
 admire in addition to being very rich, but I suppose he 
 lost everything in the Civil War and he died shortly after it. 
 
 After Doctor Goodwin our next president, or "Prex," 
 as we used to call him, was Doctor Samuel Eliot. I loved 
 this man — the finest gentleman, the best scholar, and the 
 best Christian that I have ever known. He graduated at 
 the head of his class at Harvard, and had a peculiarly 
 refined and charming personality. In his classes he put 
 every boy on his honor. We were great friends from his 
 first coming to Trinity till the day of his death. I owe a 
 ■^ 100 
 
AT COLLEG^: /\l^ i i-'O i': iM \A 
 
 great deal to him, to his kindly advice, his example in 
 every way; no young man ever had a better friend. 
 
 Professor Brocklesby was our teacher in mathematics 
 at Trinity. I became quite a friend of his and used to 
 draw for him queer objects, animalculse and such things. 
 He was a most unworldly man and easily embarrassed. 
 Although such a learned mathematician, he once got so 
 balled up at the grocer's trying to solve the problem of 
 seven pounds of sugar at seven cents a pound that he had 
 to give it up and leave the result to the grocer. He had a 
 humorous turn of mind. In those days some of our South- 
 ern boys used to chew tobacco and, I am ashamed to say, 
 to spit on the floor. Professor Brocklesby reproved them 
 in the memorable words, now the dryest of chestnuts, but 
 original with him: "Those who expectorate on this floor 
 need not expect-to-rate high in this class." 
 
 Mr. Belden, one of the tutors, was another nice fellow 
 who had been at coHege with my brother Harry. He was 
 always kind to me, but on one occasion I was particularly 
 grateful to him. It happened in this way: The first two 
 years I was at college the bell rang at half past five in the 
 morning for recitation at six o'clock; then came chapel at 
 seven, with breakfast right after it. Of course in winter 
 it was pitch-dark when we started out at six, and as the 
 recitation-rooms were very badly lighted we used to take 
 our own lights, sometimes a piece of candle with or without 
 a candlestick, sometimes a small lamp. Often in winter 
 the snow was deep, and as the recitation-room was in 
 another building we had to wade in snow up to our knees. 
 There was a boy in our class named Sam Johnson — he 
 afterward married Mary Verplanck — I think he was a 
 relation of Sir William Johnson, so celebrated among the 
 Indians in early colonial days. Sam Johnson had been 
 
 lOI 
 
/^H/; :; day before yesterday 
 
 captain in Everest's Military School and rather bossed our 
 class. He carried a little swagger-stick, and as he was apt 
 to use it, he was considered a trifle arrogant; I liked him, 
 though — he was a good fellow. In class he sat next to me 
 on one of the low pine benches without cushions that were 
 our seats. Sam had a bit of candle which he put on the 
 floor opposite us, and I rofled up bits of paper and threw 
 them at his candle until I put it out. He relighted it and 
 remarked that if I did that again he would slap my face, 
 whereupon I did it again. He did not slap my face, but 
 said he would lick me after school; then there being a dis- 
 turbance Mr. Belden called us to order. Johnson and his 
 friend Strong Vincent went out first and I followed. As 
 I reached the stone hafl outside I saw Johnson with his coat 
 ofl* and Vincent standing by holding his coat and books; 
 Johnson squared ofi" and came at me. He was twice my 
 size, but he didn't know a thing about boxing, so he did 
 not touch me in the whole fight, while I got in two or three 
 blows and the blood poured down his face. We closed, 
 but I got his head "in chancery," and he was quite helpless 
 while I rained blows on him. At this delightful moment 
 Mr. Belden rushed out and separated us; but I knew very 
 well that he had suspected what was going to happen and 
 had wasted a Httle extra time arranging the books on his 
 desk. At afl events, he did not come out until the fight 
 was practically over. That afternoon, skating on the Hog, 
 I got lots of congratulations for having licked Johnson, 
 and felt just as pleased with myself as if I had not been 
 entirely in the wrong. 
 
 102 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 TRAVELS AND A SHIPWRECK 
 
 "Pass we the joys and sorrows sailors find. 
 Cooped in their winged sea-girt citadel. 
 As breezes rise and fall and billows swell, 
 Till on some jocund morn — lo, land and all is well.'* 
 
 — Byron. 
 
 The autumn after I graduated from Trinity College I 
 started for Cambridge, intending to enter the Harvard Law 
 School, armed with numerous letters of introduction, 
 among them one to Mr. Longfellow and another to Doctor 
 Theophilus Parsons, dean of the law school, from Doctor 
 Samuel Eliot. On the way I stopped at Hartford to see 
 my old friends, but was taken ill there and returned to 
 New York, where I was laid up completely, and this caused 
 me to change all my plans. This illness had come from a 
 sprain, which I got the summer before when Jack and I 
 were on our way to New Hamburg to pay a visit to Mr. 
 Philip Van Rensselaer. I chanced to see a snake in the 
 road, and in jumping down from our high box wagon to 
 kill it I gave my leg a wrench which in the end gave me a 
 good deal of trouble; at last I consulted my old friend 
 Doctor George EI Got — by this time I was awfully lame — 
 and he said I was run down and advised a long sea-voyage. 
 
 So we began to look for a sailing-ship and finally chose 
 the bark Celestia, sl beautiful little clipper-built craft of 
 three hundred tons, with a cargo of grain, bound for Sicily 
 via Madeira, whence she was to return with a cargo of 
 fruit. Doctor Elliot, a charming fellow familiarly known 
 
 103 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 as "handsome George," bandaged me skilfully with what 
 he called a. "spica bandage," a contrivance of which he was 
 very proud, warranted not to come off or loosen until I 
 reached Madeira, where I could have it renewed by another 
 doctor. 
 
 On a gloomy, cold, windy afternoon in late November, 
 Gouv, Jack, and I were rowed out in a small boat to the 
 Celestiuy which was lying off the Battery. Several weary 
 hours, which we had previously spent waiting in a ship- 
 chandler's office in Water Street, had added to the sadness 
 of our day. My brothers watched me climb up the ship's 
 side and waved farewells. 
 
 I found three passengers on board: Mr. James O. Put- 
 nam, of Buffalo, a distinguished lawyer, who proved to be 
 a well-educated and agreeable man; his friend, another 
 lawyer, Mr. Noxon, of Syracuse, and the Reverend Mr. 
 Reynolds, a sad, gloomy, Presbyterian minister, who was 
 very homesick and took a pessimistic view of life in general. 
 He told me several times "that to die to him would be 
 gain." Both he and Mr. Putnam were travelling for their 
 health; Mr. Noxon was the only well man among us. This 
 did not seem a very cheerful send-off, but after our sea- 
 sickness wore off — we were all seasick — I found the party 
 pleasant enough. I have forgotten to mention another 
 passenger, more cheerful than the others, a small black pig 
 from Africa, who was a splendid sailor and trotted briskly 
 about the deck, though how he maintained his equilibrium 
 on his slippery little hoofs was more than I could under- 
 stand. Captain Howes was a regular down-east skipper, 
 a Cape Codder, tall, spare, and athletic; his trousers were 
 short and he wore habitually a black frock coat, carpet 
 slippers, and ribbed woollen stockings; but he was a first- 
 class sailor and would stand balancing himself on the deck, 
 
 104 
 
TRAVELS AND A SHIPWRECK 
 
 no matter how rough it was, directing a long Norwegian 
 how to steer, ordering him to mind the wheel and keep 
 the ship straight: "Keep your weather eye lifted, and 
 steer so that you could hit the eye of a mosquito." One 
 day he spied this hapless Norwegian, who was very un- 
 handy, far out on a dipping yard trying to reef a sail and 
 not having much success at it. He was leaning far over, 
 his person much exposed from behind, quite unaware that 
 the captain was watching him with disapproval. Suddenly 
 the captain dropped his carpet slippers, tore up the rigging 
 like a cat and, without uttering a word of warning, ran along 
 the yard and, by way of a gentle reminder, gave the poor 
 Norwegian a tremendous kick a posteriori that nearly 
 knocked him off into the wildly running sea. 
 
 Our cabin, only about a dozen steps down from the 
 deck, was small and square, with our berths around it and 
 the captain's room in the corner; in the centre was the 
 dining-table, above which the skylight opened on to the 
 deck. The sash was generally open, and when a large wave 
 came over, which happened several times, we were drenched 
 and the dinner well salted. The food was plentiful but 
 plain: huge joints of boiled mutton, corned beef and cab- 
 bage, etc. The captain presided at the head of the table 
 and carved, and, incidentally, picked his teeth with the 
 carving-fork. My berth was directly at the bottom of 
 the companionway, and at the foot of my bed stood a 
 barrel filled with most delicious red-cheeked apples. I 
 remember one day, as I crept up on deck feeling pretty 
 sick, I met Mr. Putnam holding one of these apples in his 
 hand (he was homesick as well as seasick), pensively regard- 
 ing it with a longing look and murmuring: "I wish I were 
 now where you grew !" It mattered not to him where that 
 land might be so long as it was dry. 
 
 105 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 It blew a gale all the way across the ocean directly in 
 our favor, and although we only had a few of the sails up, 
 we ran very fast. The waves were mountain-high, and our 
 little ship tossed about like a cork, first trembling on the 
 top of a great wave and then dashing down into a vast 
 abyss, where for a moment nothing was to be seen but the 
 huge green walls of water around us. For several days 
 we made nearly three hundred miles a day, and came in 
 sight of Madeira in eighteen days. As there is only an 
 open roadstead at Madeira and no real harbor, we could 
 not come to anchor; so for nearly five days and nights we 
 beat back and forth; again and again we would approach 
 the shore so that we could almost talk to the inhabitants, 
 and then run out of sight of land. In one of these trips we 
 saw a large brig dashed to pieces on the rocks, and saw the 
 people on board cast ashore and struggling up the cliffs. 
 
 At last there came a delightful calm, and we landed at 
 evening in a haven of peace and beauty. Never did food 
 taste so good as at the excellent hotel to which we went. 
 The first thing next morning we found our way into a 
 lovely garden adjoining the hotel, whose charming walks, 
 laid in colored flints in patterns, were strewn with oranges 
 and pomegranates, scattered by the late storm. There for 
 the first time I saw banana-trees laden with fruit and 
 tasted the delicious custard-apple. Madeira seemed to me 
 then the loveliest spot on earth. Partly because it was the 
 first foreign place that I had seen, I was afraid when I was 
 about to visit it again forty years later that, after seeing 
 so many other famous places, I might be disappointed, but 
 I found it little changed and as delightful as ever. No 
 wheeled vehicles are used there, only little sledges drawn 
 by diminutive oxen, but they have delightful saddle- 
 horses, and I explored the Alpine-Iike tropical mountain 
 
 1 06 
 
TRAVELS AND A SHIPWRECK 
 
 passes, with a "burroquiro," brandishing a horsehair fly- 
 brush, who clung to my horse's tail, keeping up, no matter 
 how fast I rode, and was ready to hold my stirrup when I 
 dismounted. Everywhere were flowers; even the smallest 
 garden was filled with color; the beautiful bougainvillea 
 over all, heliotropes and geraniums trailing on every wall, 
 and all our greenhouse plants growing wild. Altogether 
 it is an enchanting place with a most delightful climate, 
 without any frost or dew, and with an even winter temper- 
 ature night and day of about 70°. 
 
 We were royally entertained by the hospitable residents, 
 and as visitors were then rather rare and I brought excel- 
 lent letters to Messrs. Newton, Gordon and Cossart, the 
 great wine-merchants, we were invited to dine by Mr. 
 Cossart. Mr. Marsh, who had been American consul for 
 many years, was absent, but his vice-consul entertained 
 us in his lovely house, the porch of which was overhung 
 by poinsettias in full bloom. At these dinners we learned 
 what real Madeira wine was; it is not known there simply 
 as "Madeira," but by specific names such as "Sercial," 
 "Bual," '* Malmsey," etc., and great vintages are desig- 
 nated by their special years. When I rode through the 
 country the burroquiro knew where to stop and rest, and 
 wherever that might be a man always came out filling a 
 brimming glass from a pitcher of beautiful amber wine, a 
 few milreis satisfying him in return. 
 
 After a delightful visit in Madeira, our vessel having 
 discharged her cargo and being well supplied with quan- 
 tities of delicious fruit and great bunches of bananas hang- 
 ing in the rigging, we sailed away one evening over a calm 
 sea for our next stopping-place, Gibraltar. The first night 
 out, about three o'clock, when I was fast asleep in my 
 berth, I was awakened by loud and prolonged shouting by 
 
 107 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 some one in mortal terror. It was the mate at the wheel, 
 calling to the captain. I heard the captain leap out of his 
 berth and rush on deck, then came more excited shouting, 
 and then a deafening crash, as if a train of cars going at 
 full speed had run off the track and were jolting over the 
 ties. It was but a step from my berth to the deck. The 
 dawn was only just breaking, but I could see that every- 
 thing was crashing down. The masts and rigging of our 
 ship were being flung about, and all tangled up with our 
 rigging were the spars of a gigantic steamer, towering aloft 
 and looking as if she were right on top of us. It proved to 
 be the Great Britain, the largest steamer, I believe, then 
 afloat. (Her launching some years before had been a 
 great event; she was fuII-rigged like a sailing-ship, but had 
 all the appliances of a steamer as well.) It appeared that 
 the steersman on the steamer had been asleep, and waked 
 just before the ships came together. Our captain, with 
 great presence of mind, caHed out to him to put his wheel 
 hard up, at the same moment putting our wheel hard down, 
 with the result that the steamer went slightly to the right 
 and our vessel to the left, so that she struck us in the bow 
 instead of right in the middle, where she would have cut 
 us in two and sunk us at once. 
 
 So here we were, all lying perfectly still on a calm, misty 
 sea, fastened together ! In a moment the big ship's boats 
 were out and I could see them in the dim gray morning light, 
 manned with crews resting on their oars, for they thought 
 that we were about to sink and were coming to pick us up. 
 Already they were calling to us that they were bound for 
 Melbourne and were ready to carry us there. (When I first 
 ran on deck, when everything was crashing about us and we 
 thought we were going down, the only man who showed any 
 fear was the Reverend Mr. Reynolds, who seemed not at 
 
 io8 
 
TRAVELS AND A SHIPWRECK 
 
 all desirous of embracing this opportunity of gratifying his 
 pious wish, so often expressed, that "to die would be to 
 him gain." He was apparently scared blue.) There we lay 
 until daylight, when the condition of the two ships could 
 be plainly seen. The steamer was but little damaged, but 
 we were in such a state that she waited by us nearly all 
 day, until it was found that although dreadfully crippled 
 our ship was not injured below the water-line, and seemed 
 to be still seaworthy, and would not sink. The steamer 
 had struck us about twenty feet back of the bow; so our 
 figure-head and the whole of the bow and the bowsprit 
 carrying the jibs were gone, the foremast was cut off close 
 to the deck, the mainmast almost entirely carried away, 
 leaving only a stump large enough to support the mainsail, 
 and the top of the mizzenmast with its topsail was gone. 
 The men set to work with axes and chopped everything 
 free, so that by evening little but our hull remained. When 
 all this loose stuff had drifted away we found we had but 
 two sails, the mainsail and the slooplike sail on the miz- 
 zenmast, and only a part of the hull, as in addition to the 
 loss of the entire bow a great piece twenty feet long had 
 been torn off one side of the stern. When the debris had 
 been cleared away, the captain of the steamer came on 
 board and urged us to go to Melbourne with him, but we 
 declined, and feeling satisfied that we could take care of 
 ourselves, he sailed away and left us to our fate. 
 
 Later on the same day we sighted a fishing-smack that 
 came alongside, and after some talk with its captain Mr. 
 Putnam arranged with him to take him back to Madeira, 
 so he clambered down into the Httle boat accompanied by 
 his baggage, and that was the last we ever saw of him, 
 but we learned later that he reached Madeira safely. He 
 begged us to accompany him, but we preferred to stick to 
 
 109 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 our ship. On the second day our captain made up his 
 mind that his best course was to sail straight for Gibraltar, 
 about seven hundred miles distant, and asked us what we 
 wanted to do. We told him that we would trust the whole 
 matter to him and believed that he could bring us safely 
 into port. The sea was perfectly calm, with a gentle fair 
 wind following astern, and after only seven delightful days 
 we were safely at anchor in the splendid harbor of Gibral- 
 tar, where the advent of our strange-looking craft caused 
 some amusement. 
 
 Gibraltar was then, as now, a most cosmopolitan place, 
 the harbor crowded with wonderful ships from all four 
 quarters of the globe, and the streets gay with Arabs in 
 coats of many colors. I found the deck of the Celestia 
 was a fine place from which to make sketches, and I enjoyed 
 the two weeks we spent living on the ship and visiting the 
 sights of the town, before we could find another bark 
 bound for Messina, our original destination. She was a 
 nice little vessel of three hundred tons, named the Emblem, 
 commanded by another down-east skipper. Captain Davis, 
 who proved to be a jolly man, witty and hospitable, like 
 many of these old-fashioned New England sailors. Like 
 the Celestia, the Emblem was bound for Sicily for a load of 
 lemons and oranges. 
 
 We were about a week going to Messina, for it blew a 
 gale all the way and was awfully rough. We were at sea 
 on Christmas Day. Among the few books I had brought 
 with me was a volume of Longfellow's poems just pub- 
 lished, and I read for the first time "My Lost Youth": 
 "The thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts." I also 
 had a copy of Murray's guide-book for South Italy, 
 and Mr. Noxon used to read parts of it aloud. In the 
 accounts of the galleries he always pronounced sarcoph- 
 
 IIO 
 
TRAVELS AND A SHIPWRECK 
 
 agus with the accent on pha, which sounded so odd that 
 I have always remembered ft; indeed, it is almost the only 
 
 thing that I recall about him. He and Mr. R remained 
 
 on the ship at Messina while she was waiting for her return 
 cargo and went back to New York in her. I stayed at 
 the Hotel Trinacria, a fine hotel in an old palace, well 
 kept but guiltless of a bathroom, like most of the Italian 
 hotels of that day. I visited it again with my daughter 
 in 1907 and took tea there, and found it still delightful, 
 but when I passed the site after the earthquake in 1908 
 not a vestige of it remained. 
 
 At Messina on this first visit I had a letter of introduc- 
 tion to Mr. Sanderson, a member of the great house of 
 Ingham and Company, the wine-merchants; he was an 
 accomplished man, who painted, and played the violin, and 
 spoke four or five languages. He was extremely polite and 
 took me out to his villa in the country, where after dining 
 with his beautiful Italian wife he showed me his charming 
 gardens and his groves of oranges and lemons. Mr. 
 Ingham, the head of the house, married the Duchess of 
 Santa Rosalia, a member of one of the most distinguished 
 families in Italy, with splendid palaces in Palermo. I heard 
 that when he introduced any one to her he said: "Allow 
 me to present you to the Duchess of Santa Rosalia, Mrs. 
 Ingham, my wife." The duchess could neither read nor 
 write, for like many of the great Italian nobles in that day, 
 she had no education whatever. 
 
 While I was at Messina I drove out in a cab to Scylla 
 and Charybdis, which seemed not at all a dangerous spot, 
 hardly more than a little ripple — perhaps it has gone off 
 since classic times. The beggars there were peculiarly 
 offensive. It is at least a two-mile drive from there to 
 Messina, but one husky beggar, who was deaf and dumb 
 
 III 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 and could only emit inarticulate noises, followed grunting 
 behind my cab all the way, and in the end had to be 
 rewarded with a tip. 
 
 I went to Naples by steamer at night, lighted on my 
 way by an eruption of Mount Vesuvius. The lava was 
 pouring out from the side of the mountain, but it was still 
 possible to reach the crater, and I determined to go up, 
 though I was still lame from my illness and could not walk; 
 so I hired two bearers, who carried me in a chair up the 
 face of the cone, over the masses of recently discharged 
 lava. Standing on the top, we were able to look down 
 into the crater. It was a wild scene — "hell with the lid 
 taken off" — tremendous clouds of smoke circling around, 
 but no fire or lava. The lava-stream from the side, how- 
 ever, was flowing down into the plain, overwhelming houses 
 and vineyards in its way. My bearers then took me one 
 on each side and rushed me down the cone knee-deep in 
 ashes, an almost perpendicular descent, until we reached 
 the Hermitage, where we had lunch and "lacrima Cristi*' 
 wine, which is grown on the slope of the mountain. By 
 that time it was growing dark and on our way down we 
 passed near an expanse of lava, cool enough to walk over, 
 but the subterranean fire here and there glowed through 
 it and one seemed to be walking on a lake of fire. We 
 amused ourselves by twisting out bits of the still-burning 
 lava with sticks and pressing coins into them, some cop- 
 per, some silver. In coming down the driver overturned 
 the cab and I was thrown out, scattering my coins as I 
 fell, and, strange to say, when the man picked them up he 
 found only the copper and none of the silver ones ! 
 
 If I were to describe the rest of my travels in 1859 it 
 would sound like a page of Baedeker, for I saw all the 
 usual sights. Like most young people, I kept a desultory 
 
 112 
 
TRAVELS AND A SHIPWRECK 
 
 diary, and I find there an occasional note that may be of 
 some slight interest to-day. In Naples on Sunday the 
 church service was held in a room at the British Legation, 
 and you had to pay three carlini before going in, buying 
 your seat just as you would at the theatre. "The preaching 
 was the worst I ever heard and the sermons were always 
 about burnt sacrifices." After fifty years we still some- 
 times suff'er from that kind of sermon. 
 
 The carnival was fine in Florence that year and some of 
 the turnouts were magnificent — four horses, with postil- 
 ions and outriders and everything in style. The ladies, 
 then as now, threw smiles and bouquets right and left, but 
 unluckily none of them fell on me. I remember being 
 shocked by the shortness of the ladies' dresses ! One im- 
 mense van was filled with men wearing lion masks over 
 their faces and dressed in the extreme of the English fashion, 
 loud checks, tiny straw hats with half-inch brims, and eye- 
 glasses, all of them engaged in attentively reading Mur- 
 ray's guide-books. This took immensely, as jokes on the 
 English were popular in Italy at that time. 
 
 I went by diligence from Florence to Bologna. At Bo- 
 logna, when I went to some church or other to see some pic- 
 tures by Guido — I seem to have had a terrible liking for 
 Guido when I was twenty-three ! — I saw before the altar a 
 splendid coffin containing the remains of the Princess Pepoli, 
 sister to Murat, who had died a few days before and was 
 lying there in state. Though I don't like Guido nowadays, 
 some of my admirations have remained unchanged; I am 
 pleased to find that my diary describes the statue of 
 Coleoni in Venice as ''the finest equestrian statue I have 
 ever seen." I added that he "was the first to use firearms 
 in warfare." Is this true, I wonder? It was in Venice 
 that I caught a glimpse of Taglioni at the post-office. 
 
 113 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 My stay in Rome I shall leave for another chapter, and 
 only one incident in Paris stands out clearly. I saw the 
 Emperor Louis Napoleon and Eugenie driving in a car- 
 riage, on the way to his great victories of Solferino and 
 Magenta. He was just at the height of his glory. They 
 passed close to where I stood; I saw that the empress had 
 been crying. 
 
 In London I spent days and days at the National Gal- 
 lery, looking up pictures I had known only in engravings. 
 My diary indicates that I was irritated at finding the 
 Turners hung next to the Claudes. "They stand no com- 
 parison with Claude Lorraine, notwithstanding Mr. Ruskin, 
 and are so imaginative that one cannot tell what they are 
 about." What would I have thought of the "Futurists" 
 and "Vorticists" of to-day! At the Vernon Gallery I 
 liked the Hogarths, naturally enough, and also the Land- 
 seers, but I hope it was as dogs and not as pictures that I 
 admired the latter. 
 
 At the Zoo I saw the two hippopotami presented to 
 Queen Victoria by the Viceroy of Egypt, and a "lovely col- 
 lection of serpents." I went to hear Spurgeon hold forth 
 to seven thousand people at the Surrey Music Hall, but 
 thought him an unctuous oily "Chadband" kind of a fel- 
 low and wondered in what his power lay, though he had a 
 strong pair of lungs and the gift of the gab. I thought 
 Charles Kean in "Henry V" better worth seeing. And I 
 was thrilled by the horses and turnouts in Hyde Park; it 
 was the height of the season and one day I saw thirteen 
 four-horse drags collected there, driven by various well- 
 known men — a club on the way to Greenwich to eat a 
 whitebait dinner — and I was surprised that these scions of 
 the nobility looked, in their cutaway coats and brass but- 
 tons, for all the world like coachmen. 
 
 114 
 
TRAVELS AND A SHIPWRECK 
 
 My greatest day in London and one of the best-remem- 
 bered of my whole life was Derby Day. I shall describe it 
 mther fully, for some of the details may have changed in 
 fifty years. It was the second day of the Epsom meeting 
 and was more than usually crowded. I had a splendid 
 seat in the grand stand, overlooking the whole field. An 
 American lady happened to be sitting next to me, and I 
 remember hearing her ask an English lady whether the 
 horses ever trotted, having our American trotting-matches 
 in mind, and I was amused at the English lady's answer: 
 "No, they gallop just as fast as they can." The course 
 was of turf, about two miles and a half long, and it was 
 cleared by a hundred policemen in an incredibly short 
 space of time, though it was covered with people, and, 
 what was more, it was kept clear. The horses first walked 
 past the grand stand and then ran back and took their 
 places at the starting-point; people did not seem to take 
 much interest in the starting. In front of the grand stand 
 was the betting-ring and I saw a man there who had staked 
 twelve thousand pounds. In the first race, half a mile, 
 there were eleven horses started and it was won by 
 Orchehill ridden by Fordham. The second race, about 
 two miles, was the '"great event," in which thirty-three 
 horses were entered and thirty ran; it was won by Musjid, 
 owned by Sir Joseph Hawley and ridden by Wells. I 
 never saw anything equal to the excitement as the thirty 
 horses rushed by. Musjid only won by a short distance 
 and there were a dozen close behind. Another race was 
 run by three horses and won by Fisherman, ridden also 
 by Wells; it must have been a great feather in his cap to 
 have won two races on the same day. This was the most 
 beautiful race I ever saw, the horses running neck and 
 neck. 
 
 115 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 But, on the whole, the horses were not quite as fine as 
 I had expected them to be, and I thought that they would 
 have made a poor show in one of our four-mile races at 
 home. I picked out the winning horse in three out of the 
 four races that I saw, and might have won my fortune had 
 I bet. 
 
 The racing was splendid, but I enjoyed the excitement 
 of the motley crowd even more; lots of ginger-beer stalls, 
 boxing-matches, running-matches, nigger minstrels and 
 thimbleriggers. West End swells and East End paupers, 
 all gathered together. Every available means of trans- 
 portation was forced into service — horses that had evidently 
 never been in harness before and others that seemed likely 
 never to be there again. The city was deserted and all 
 the world at Epsom. In the evening I went to the cele- 
 brated cider- cellars, where law cases were tried, and heard 
 the Sickles case very well argued. To my mind, if ever a 
 murderer deserved to be hung it was Sickles. 
 
 I was young enough to envy the Eton boys playing 
 cricket out on the meadows and rowing on the river. Their 
 race-boats were splendid, finer than anything we had in 
 America then, some of them with ten oars, and the rowing 
 the finest I had ever seen, although we thought we rowed 
 well at home. I walked some distance out into the coun- 
 try and met some boys bird's-nesting, others fishing and 
 shooting, and all having such a nice time that no wonder 
 I wrote in my diary: " It seems worth while to go to a school 
 like that." 
 
 I shall not dwell on my trip to Ireland or my stay in 
 the English lake country, for I want to tell you about my 
 most delightful visit at Mr. David Maitland's place in Scot- 
 land. I have spoken before of my godfather, Mr. Maitland, 
 a devoted friend of my father and mother. After making 
 
 ii6 
 
TRAVELS AND A SHIPWRECK 
 
 a fortune in America he returned to Scotland and bought 
 back the old family place, Barcaple, in Kirkcudbrightshire, 
 that had gone out of the family. His brother Joseph went 
 to Australia and, I believe, made a huge fortune there in 
 sheep. 
 
 I went by the coach to Castle Douglas and found Mr. 
 Maitland waiting there for me when I got down; although 
 we had not met for several years we recognized each other 
 at once. He had not changed very much, his cheeks were 
 still flushed with health, and he had the elastic step of a 
 young man, as he was accustomed to shooting and fishing 
 and could walk his ten miles as well as ever. As always, 
 he was very well dressed and the picture of neatness, wear- 
 ing a gray morning suit and gaiters, and was addicted to 
 the very same enormous standing collars that I remem- 
 bered, with a check cravat tied in a bow. 
 
 Barcaple had been a wild half-moorland farm, about a 
 thousand acres, which Mr. Maitland had drained and put 
 in beautiful order; the house itself was of stone, surrounded 
 by lovely lawns, shrubbery, and trees. In the charming 
 garden were thousands of rhododendrons and all the new 
 shrubs and trees lately introduced from China, and at one 
 time there were Cherokee roses from South Carolina, 
 though he said he had never been able to grow them in 
 New York. 
 
 The first thing I saw when I went into the parlor was 
 my father's miniature and a little drawing of Danskammer 
 by Wheatfield. I wonder if the la^tter is still in existence. 
 (Not long before his death Mr. Maitland sent me the 
 miniature, and two large silver pitchers that my mother 
 had given him; they have stood on my sideboard ever 
 since.) 
 
 Mr. Maitland's dinners were as good as they had always 
 
 117 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 been in New York, and every evening after family prayers, 
 which were attended by all the servants, the butler would 
 bring in a silver tray, with Scotch whiskey, sugar, and lem- 
 ons for a "night-cap." I was interested in seeing in the 
 stables the chestnut mare, Jessie Morland, now very old, 
 sired by Sir Henry and raised by my father at Danskam- 
 mer, which Mr. Maitland had taken to Scotland. He told 
 me that he had had more than a dozen fine colts from her, 
 some of which had been on the turf, and that he kept her 
 as a memento of some of the happiest days of his life. 
 
 His game-preserve was magnificent, a great moor, pur- 
 ple with heather, through which ran the River Dee. As 
 one walked about grouse would rise under one's feet. In 
 the month of June when I was there quantities of pheasants 
 were setting under the shrubbery in the lawns and gardens, 
 so tame that Mr. Maitland could lift them up while they 
 were on their nests and examine the eggs. Scattered over 
 the moor we saw the graves of the old Covenanters, whose 
 names were preserved by '*OId Mortality's" faithful chisel. 
 
 "Gray, recumbent tombs of the dead in desert places; 
 Standing stones on the vacant wine-red moor, 
 Hills of sheep and homes of the silent vanished races 
 And winds austere and pure." 
 
 The scene of "Guy Mannering," also, was laid near 
 Barcaple, in the ocean caves. I saw Campbell's beech- 
 tree — "Woodman, spare that tree" — still standing in the 
 garden of one of Mr. . Maitland's friends, Mr. "Watty" 
 McCuIIough, and another day we went to Lord Selkirk's 
 place, St. Mary's Isle, and took afternoon tea with the 
 family. They showed us the silver on the table, which 
 was the same tea-set that John Paul Jones had stolen on 
 one of his raids; his father had been a gardener on the 
 
 ii8 
 
TRAVELS AND A SHIPWRECK 
 
 Selkirks' place. Lady Selkirk said that the tea-leaves were 
 still in the teapot when he returned it, as it had been 
 picked up from the table when they were at tea. (Perhaps 
 I ought not to speak of it as stealing, for he did return it !) 
 
 On Sunday we went to the Established Church. The 
 kirk had a two-story pulpit, in the upper part of which the 
 minister held forth, while in the lower the precentor was 
 stationed with a tuning-fork and set the tunes for the 
 hymns and psalms. They had a canny arrangement for 
 saving time. After the morning service and sermon were 
 over, we had a recess and went out into the graveyard to 
 eat our lunches, which we had brought with us; then we 
 went back into the church and had another service and 
 sermon, in this way saving a long drive. But it was a 
 pretty wearisome performance. 
 
 One Sunday morning in Scotland I was sketching, sit- 
 ting out in a field by myself some distance from the high- 
 way, when a party of men on their way to church happened 
 to pass along the road. They stopped and watched me for 
 some time; then an oldish man climbed laboriously over 
 the fence and, crossing the field to me, said: "Young man, 
 do you know that you are breaking the Sabbath?" I said: 
 "What business is it of yours?" He said: "It's my busi- 
 ness to warn you of the error of your ways." I answered 
 ungratefully that he would probably celebrate the Sabbath 
 by getting drunk, and after looking at me a moment in 
 sour silence he went back to his friends. 
 
 Mr. Maitland took me to Caley, one of the most 
 beautiful places in Scotland, belonging to Murray Stewart, 
 but I enjoyed most of all my visits to Stewart Maitland, 
 my godfather's nephew, who lived near by. Mrs. Stewart 
 Maitland was an American, a Miss Lynch from New York, 
 daughter of Dominick Lynch, and an intimate friend of 
 
 M9 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 my mother, who was godmother to one of the girls. Their 
 house was. modern, but there was an old ruin on the place, 
 Compstone Castle, after which it was named. They were 
 all so hospitable that I spent day after day at their house 
 with their large family of children, and had the time of my 
 life. We went on delightful picnics, often to bathe in the 
 sea at a place called Burn-foot. I remember I carried little 
 David into the sea in my arms. He was a baby then, but 
 afterward he was head of the family, and now, if he is still 
 living, he must be a gray-haired man and, alas! all those 
 other dear people have long been in their graves. But it 
 was a happy time to remember and it warms my old heart 
 to recall it. 
 
 It was not the shooting-season, but we had splendid 
 walks over the moor, the heather elastic under one's foot. 
 There was fine salmon-fishing in the Dee, but it was not 
 the season for that either, for the dry weather had sent all 
 the salmon to the sea; however, there were certain things 
 that could be killed out of season and Mr. Maitland had a 
 gamekeeper who kept ferrets. So he gave me a gun and 
 I used to walk all over the place with the gamekeeper. 
 He would put one of the ferrets into a rabbit-burrow and 
 presently a rabbit would come kiting out and I would 
 shoot it — ferrets are trained not to attack and eat the rab- 
 bits, but only to drive them out of their holes. In a strip 
 of marshy ground we killed several ducks and in an orchard 
 grown up with fern a great hare started up. I remember 
 how long his legs looked as I shot him; he was an enormous 
 one, the first I had ever seen. We took him home and 
 the next day he was served up in hare soup. 
 
 Dundrennon Abbey, a magnificent old ruin, belongs to 
 the Maitlands, and there all of the family are buried. My 
 godfather showed me the spot where he was to be buried, 
 
 120 
 
TRAVELS AND A SHIPWRECK 
 
 and doubtless he now lies there — that fine old man with his 
 leonine head, snow-white hair, and ruddy face. Dundren- 
 non was the last house where Mary Queen of Scots stayed 
 on that sad journey to England whence she never returned. 
 
 While I was at Mr. Maitland's I went to Kirtleton, 
 my grandfather's old country place in Dumfriesshire. You 
 will remember that Colonel Armstrong was a Scotchman. 
 He was a direct descendant of the much-sung Border chief- 
 tain Johnnie Armstrong, executed by James V of Scotland 
 when he undertook to pacify the realm. It was not alto- 
 gether surprising that he should have begun with my ances- 
 tors — the old chronicle says: "The Armestrongges of Lid- 
 dersdaill had repoorted presumptuously that thay woode 
 not be ordoured, naither by the king of Scottes thair sov- 
 eraine lorde nor by the king of England, but after suche 
 maner as thaire faders had used afore thayme." More- 
 over, **the said Armestrongges had avaunted thaymselves 
 to be the destruction of twoe and fifty parisshe churches 
 in Scotteland, beside the unlawful and ungracious attemp- 
 tates by thaym committed withynne Einglande." 
 
 So Johnnie and all his men were captured — although he 
 was **als guid ane chiftaine as evir was upoun the borderis 
 and sustained the number of XXIIII weill-horsed gentilmen 
 with him" — and safely hanged on growing trees on the 
 little sandy plateau at Caerlanrig, where no trees grow 
 to-day — the ballads say that it was because of the un- 
 just sentence that the trees withered away. Johnnie's old 
 ruined tower of Gilnockie still stands on the Tweed near 
 Canobie. I made a little drawing of it. I also made a 
 sketch of Kirtleton, when I went there one day to see 
 what the old place was like. It belonged at that time to 
 the Honorable Mrs. Murray, but when my brother Gouv 
 went there in 1871 he found it rented to a farmer named 
 
 121 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Franklin and no longer kept up as a gentleman's place, 
 though the farm was in fine order. Mrs. Franklin was very 
 pleased to see Gouv and gave him a glass of wine. An old 
 sheep-dog greeted him in a friendly way and she remarked 
 that he did not usually speak to strangers, but was wise 
 enough to know that Gouv had a right there. 
 
 I met a Doctor Carlisle while I was in Scotland, who 
 lived near Kirtleton and was able to tell me lots of 
 anecdotes about my family, especially a festive old party 
 called '*Ned of the Heuck," my grandfather's brother and 
 sheriff of the county. He was once at dinner with his 
 friends when it was announced that the house had taken 
 fire, whereupon he said to his guests: *' Let's have another 
 drink, and then go and put out the fire !" 
 
 When I left Barcaple Mr. Maitland blew me off* to 
 a trip to Edinburgh. He wouldn't let me pay for a single 
 thing, and when I protested he said: "Just think how many 
 times your horses have been to Newburgh for me!" We 
 travelled by stage-coach on top, and Stewart Maitland 
 went with us. On the way we passed Glenae House, a 
 fine place on a hill surrounded by beautiful woods, belong- 
 ing to the Dalzells, which Mr. Maitland pointed out to 
 me because my grandfather's sister, Anne Armstrong, had 
 married Robert Dalzell. While we were in Edinburgh we 
 dined with Mr. Maitland's brother, who had the title of 
 Lord Barcaple, given him when he was solicitor-general of 
 Scotland; another brother had received the title of Lord 
 Dundrennon after the abbey that belonged to them, but 
 neither title was hereditary. The Maitlands are a dis- 
 tinguished family; the Earl of Lauderdale is head of the 
 house, and Admiral Maitland, who carried Napoleon to 
 exile in St. Helena, was an uncle of my Mr. Maitland. 
 
 122 
 
TRAVELS AND A SHIPWRECK 
 
 Of course I went to Melrose, and while lunching at the 
 inn I met a Mr. Pringle who lived at Galashiels, an elderly 
 gentleman who seemed to take a fancy to me and asked 
 me to go home with him and spend the night. I accepted 
 his invitation and we arrived at his house in time for dinner, 
 and afterward we went out in the long Scottish twilight 
 to a club that he belonged to, where they had a bowling- 
 green, and there on a closely clipped lawn I played my 
 first and last game of bowls with several of his elderly 
 friends. They were interested in me, a young American, 
 and were most kind and hospitable. Later in the evening 
 we all assembled at Mr. Pringle's house, where we gossiped 
 and drank hot whiskey punch and talked about Bobby 
 Burns. Next morning at breakfast I noticed the hand- 
 some silver on the table and said jokingly to my host: 
 "You ought not to ask strangers like myself to your house, 
 you might lose your spoons !" We were sitting at a round 
 table, he, his maiden sister, and myself, and at this remark 
 I felt him kick me under the table; evidently he did not 
 want his sister to know that I was a perfect stranger. The 
 Scotch are exceedingly hospitable and I think particularly 
 so to Americans. 
 
 After bidding good-by to Mr. Maitland at Edinburgh 
 I took a fine walking trip through the Rob Roy country, 
 stopping at Strath Ire, whence the MacGregors sent out 
 the fiery cross to rouse the clans, and where I made a 
 sketch of Rob Roy's grave and an old ruined cottage near 
 by. I made the acquaintance of an artist sketching at 
 Loch Vail, and took a walk with him, finding him a pleas- 
 ant fellow from whom I was sorry to part. I learned 
 afterward that he was Noel Paton, a well-known Edin- 
 burgh painter. I remember writing to my brother that 
 
 123 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Paton got three or four hundred pounds for his pictures. 
 I fancy I was already hoping to persuade my family that 
 an artist's career was not always a disastrous one. 
 
 My walk took several days. The twilights were so 
 long that I could read my guide-book easily at half past 
 nine o'clock, and in the evening I would stop at some 
 quaint little inn, where sometimes I got delicious broiled 
 salmon-steaks for supper, and sometimes oat-cake and 
 whiskey and nothing else whatever. I finished my Scottish 
 experiences with a trip to the Pass of Glencoe. I am told 
 that this sad valley is unchanged after the passing of fifty 
 years. 
 
 124 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 "This is the end of town I love the best. 
 O, lovely the hour of light from the burning west — 
 Of light that lingers and fades from the shadowy square." 
 
 — Gilder. 
 
 I heard to-day, 191 7, that old Delmonico's, on the cor- 
 ner of Broad and Beaver Streets, was closed; it moved there, 
 I think, in 1846, and I do not remember the time v^hen it 
 was not open and flourishing. It is sad that Delmonico's 
 and Florian's in Venice should both be closing on account 
 of the war. This place of Delmonico's had a flavor of 
 Italy about it because of the marble columns at the corner, 
 which had been brought, it was said, from Pompeii. I 
 believe the original Delmonico brothers had a pastry-shop 
 in William Street in 1828, where the "female members of the 
 family dispensed bonbons, pates and confections," but of 
 the branches in my remembrance the one at Broad and 
 Beaver Streets is the father. They had a "quick-lunch" 
 counter with a fascinating array of tarts, eclairs, and rum- 
 cakes, and it was my favorite lunching-place for years. It 
 was at this Beaver Street place that I took lunch with my 
 dear Gouv the day before I entered college and had such 
 good apple fritters; we had a table on the Beaver Street side. 
 
 There used to be a branch in the Stevens House on 
 Broadway near Rector Street; later they had a place in 
 the Grinnells' old house on the corner of Fourteenth Street 
 and Fifth Avenue, where they had a fine ballroom, and it 
 was here that a famous ball was given — the "Morris and 
 
 125 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 HoIIins Ball." I remember going to an entertainment 
 there when a collection of pictures was rafHed for the 
 benefit of the Sanitary Fair in 1864. All the artists con- 
 tributed, among others Oliver Stone, who gave a sketch 
 he had made of Miss Helen Neilson, afterward my wife. 
 Mrs. Lewis Rutherfurd knew a great many of the artists, 
 and when she asked Stone if he would make a sketch for 
 the fair, he said he would if Miss Helen Neilson would sit 
 for him. Mrs. Rutherfurd was the mother of Stuyvesant 
 Rutherfurd, who changed his name to Rutherfurd Stuy- 
 vesant when he became Mr. Peter G. Stuyvesant's heir. 
 He got a third of "Uncle Peter's" estate, which inchuded 
 the Bowery farm of old Governor Stuyvesant; Hamilton 
 Fish got another third, and the rest was divided among 
 the other nephews and nieces. Most of this property was 
 on Second Avenue, and I have heard that if ** Uncle Peter" 
 had been willing to part with some of his real estate. Second 
 Avenue, at one time a fashionable street, might have been 
 the main avenue of the city instead of Fifth. Stone's pic- 
 ture was won in the raffle by Mr. Walters, of Baltimore. 
 I have often wondered what became of this little portrait 
 of my wife. The Sanitary Fair, which was given to raise 
 money for war relief in the Civil War, was held in Union 
 Square and was a tremendous affair for those days. 
 
 It was, I think, in the Chambers Street building, before 
 Delmonico went there, that a murder was committed that 
 made a vast stir at the time, partly because the murderer, 
 Colt, was a member of a well-known family. An ''oblong 
 box" — as it was called by the newspapers until the term 
 became a household word — being shipped from New York 
 to New Orleans attracted suspicion because of its odor, and 
 was found to contain a dead body. Colt, whose office was 
 next to that of the murdered man, having been seen through 
 
 126 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 a keyhole wiping blood off the floor, was convicted and im- 
 prisoned in the Tombs. But the prison took fire, and though 
 a charred body was found in the cell occupied by Colt, it 
 was suggested that this had been substituted for that of 
 Colt and that he had escaped, but it was never proved. 
 Judge William Kent was the presiding judge at the trial, 
 and I believe that when the skull of the murdered man was 
 brought into court. Judge Kent was so horrified that he 
 resigned his position, dreading a like experience again. I 
 am writing all this after the lapse of so many years that 
 the details may not be quite correct. 
 
 Another cause celebre, so to speak, in society, was the 
 murder in 1850 of Doctor Parkman by Professor Webster, 
 both belonging to excellent Boston families. My wife and 
 I were once at a dinner in Rome when this murder was 
 mentioned, and it was found that two of the guests, Mrs. 
 Van Schaick and Arthur Dexter, were relations, the one of 
 Parkman, the other of Webster. Webster, who was pro- 
 fessor of chemistry at Harvard, killed Parkman in the col- 
 lege laboratory, because he got tired of being dunned by 
 him for some money he had lent him. "He called me a 
 scoundrel and a liar, and went on heaping on me the most 
 bitter taunts and most opprobrious epithets." He killed 
 him with a stick of wood, cut up his body, and succeeded 
 in burning most of the remains in the laboratory, except 
 the teeth. I remember a detail almost too disgusting to 
 repeat — the janitor of the college was an important wit- 
 ness, because he had discovered blood-stains on Webster's 
 floor by industriously tasting all the likely spots he could 
 find in the building ! 
 
 An interesting letter describing the trial, from Bishop 
 Eastburn to John Neilson, my wife's father, shows the 
 intense feeling at the time. 
 
 127 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 "When at last the tidings came," he writes, "that he 
 was to die upon the gallows, it quite overcame me. Noth- 
 ing that we know of in the annals of crime exceeds it, con- 
 sidering all the circumstances. Being favored by the offi- 
 cers with one of the best places I have attended the trial 
 through as great a portion of it as my duties would allow. 
 It was an awful scene, witnessed by a dense and excited 
 crowd of the most distinguished persons of all professions. 
 Webster preserved through the whole a calmness which 
 was anything but favorable to him, and when the Chief 
 Justice asked him if he had anything to say before he 
 delivered his charge he made a few remarks which affected 
 everybody with the most perfect conviction of his guilt. 
 He was hard, cold, vapid, empty; and his profession of 
 confidence *in his innocence and in his God' only strength- 
 ened the evidence which the trial had brought out against 
 him. It was an awful spectacle. 
 
 "What a singular event in the course of Providence 
 that the very teeth which Dr. Parkman had had made in 
 order that he might be present at the opening of the Medi- 
 cal College, for which he gave the ground, should convict 
 his murderer. The utter feebleness of acquisition without 
 principle was very eloquently put by the Attorney General 
 and illustrated by reference to Eugene Aram and Dr. 
 Dodd." 
 
 Doctor Eastburn, Bishop of Massachusetts, was the 
 leader of the "Low Church" party; they say that when 
 Upjohn, the architect, built the Church of the Ascension 
 in New York he wanted a chancel such as is usually seen 
 in Gothic churches, but Doctor Eastburn, at that time 
 the rector, insisted on its being shallow, so that there 
 "would be no room for High Church doings." 
 
 Bishop Eastburn, in another letter from Boston, speaks 
 
 128 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 of seeing Thackeray when he was in this country in 1852. 
 "I had last Sunday a distant view of the distingue Mr. 
 Thackeray in Trinity Church. He is a rough, bluff-looking 
 man. The other evening at the Melodian Mr. James, the 
 novelist, delivered a eulogy on the Duke of Wellington; 
 he made a most prodigious failure. There were 1500 
 present." A little later he writes: "We have had a nice 
 treat in Mr. Thackeray's lectures. His pathos is fully 
 equal to his humor, and his elocution so perfect — being 
 English ! Our young lads and soi-disant orators, who 'saw 
 the air with their hands' may learn from him that elo- 
 quence is not in paws and elbows but in the intonations 
 of the voice. His recitation of Addison's 'Soon as the 
 evening shades prevail' was charming." 
 
 Dickens made a great sensation when he came to 
 America in 1867. Of course, like everybody else, I went 
 to hear him read, but I do not remember being particularly 
 impressed; he did not read well and was rather common 
 looking. When he made his first visit here in 1842 I was 
 too small to remember him, but there is an amusing para- 
 graph in an old letter of my Aunt Margaret Salter's to the 
 commodore. 
 
 "I heard from George Elliot that Foster went to the 
 Boz Ball and was delighted. There were 3000 persons 
 there. He says it was the chief topic of conversation 
 everywhere beforehand and the result quite fulfilled their 
 expectations. It was repeated the next evening. When 
 Boz and his wife entered people filed off" each side and let 
 him walk up the middle of the room. They say that 
 28,000 stewed oysters were eaten that evening, and 10,000 
 pickled, 4000 kisses, 6000 mottoes, and 50 hams and 50 
 tongues. I am afraid at this rate oysters will become 
 scarce 
 
 !" 
 
 129 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 A little later she writes: "The Boz mania seems to be 
 subsiding in New York. He has been quite sick and has 
 refused all public entertainments in Philadelphia — he says 
 he wants to shake hands with the Americans in their 
 homes. The poor man must be tired shaking hands and 
 going to balls and parties." 
 
 I remember well an old New York character, Captain 
 Labouche, famous for his great age. He used to go regu- 
 larly to the Church of the Ascension, and as he was deaf 
 he had a chair placed for him at the head of the aisle and 
 made his responses in a very loud, squeaky voice. He had 
 been a soldier of Napoleon. When he reached his hun- 
 dredth year some of his friends subscribed to a fund to give 
 him a yearly income, thinking, of course, that it would 
 not be for very long, but he lasted ten years more. Strange 
 to say, he was addicted to the use of opium and had grad- 
 ually increased his dose of laudanum until he was able to 
 take half a tumblerful; at a dinner given in his honor, when 
 they drank his health, he responded in his favorite beverage. 
 
 This old gentleman, however, was a youngster com- 
 pared to an ancient inhabitant of Fishkill, Engelburt Hoff, 
 a Norwegian, a tenant of the Verplancks, whose age is 
 vouched for by the most reputable authorities. He lived 
 to be one hundred and twenty-eight. The Gentlemaris 
 Magazine of London mentions his death and age at Fishkill, 
 in 1765, and adds that he had been one of the Life Guards 
 of William HL He distinctly remembered hearing of the 
 news of the execution of Charles I when he was ploughing 
 a field in Norway. 
 
 There used to be an old Frenchman about Marlborough, 
 not so very long ago, who was called "Waterloo Frank" 
 for the odd reason that he had been born on the retreat 
 from Moscow. 
 
 130 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 A tragedy of the time I am recalling, about 1858, was 
 the death of Lawrence Waterbury's little daughter Kitty, 
 a child of thirteen, who was a great friend of Helen Neil- 
 son's. Mr. Robert Roosevelt, the President's uncle, came 
 one day to the Waterbury place on the Sound to invite 
 the family to go out for a sail, but finding them all gone 
 to a fair he took with him Kitty and her governess, I think 
 named Miss Cherrytree. It got rather rough and his two 
 guests went down in the cabin; suddenly a squall struck 
 the little boat and she went over. Being on deck, Mr. 
 Roosevelt and his man were saved, but the two in the 
 cabin were lost, for the door was fast closed by a wave. 
 
 About i860 Mr. Daniel Le Roy built a house in West 
 Twenty-third Street near Fifth Avenue, and at the same 
 time Mrs. Neilson, my wife's mother, bought a lot from 
 Stuyvesant Rutherfurd, 237 East Seventeenth Street, on 
 Stuyvesant Square, and built a house that cost over fifty 
 thousand dollars. Mr. Le Roy's house was smaller and 
 not nearly so fine as the Neilsons', but about 1870 he sold 
 his house for two hundred and fifty thousand dollars and 
 the Neilsons' house was sold for forty-seven thousand five 
 hundred — another instance of the changes in values of 
 New York real estate. Mrs. Daniel Le Roy was my wife's 
 aunt, a charming and extremely dignified old lady, but I 
 believe in her youth she had been exceedingly sentimental. 
 They say that when she was a young girl she once made 
 some currant jelly, and being in a pensive mood she wrote 
 on the labels of the jars, "this was made by poor Susan," 
 as she felt sure she was doomed to an early death. As a 
 matter of fact, she lived to a fine old age. 
 
 Mr. Hamilton Fish, my wife's uncle, remembered many 
 interesting things about New York, and when I went to 
 see him, as I often did, in his house on Stuyvesant Square, 
 
 131 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 on the corner of Seventeenth Street and Second Avenue, 
 I liked to get him talking about those old times. I once 
 told him that he ought to get some good writer to come 
 and talk to him, so that his reminiscences might be pre- 
 served, and he said he had often thought of doing so, but 
 unluckily he never did. 
 
 Mr. Fish went to a school kept by Mr. Bancel, and an 
 excellent school he said it was. Mr. Bancel was a kind man 
 who sometimes played marbles with him and the other 
 boys. In his old age Mr. Fish still seemed really flattered 
 and pleased at the honor that Mr. Bancel had done him 
 in playing marbles with him. 
 
 Mrs. Fish's sister, Mrs. Griffin, was also a most agree- 
 able person to talk to about old times. She was an efficient 
 member of the Sanitary Commission in the Civil War, 
 which was the Red Cross of that day, and when young 
 was considered quite advanced in her views; she was ac- 
 tually a friend of Doctor Elizabeth Blackwell and her sister 
 Emily, the first women doctors in this country, and was once 
 reproved by a member of her family for allowing her step- 
 daughter, Mary Griffin, to wait in the carriage outside 
 their house while she went in to call — ^'a young lady should 
 not even have been seen outside the house of such persons !'* 
 Nevertheless, in her old age Mrs. Griffm was an anti- 
 suff'ragist and abhorred telephones. (I have always been 
 a little impatient with people who think that women ought 
 not to vote.) 
 
 The Honorable Charles Sumner was once staying at 
 the Fishs' house at Garrisons when I was there; he was 
 an old friend of the family and a tremendous talker, ac- 
 customed to holding forth at great length and having every 
 one listen with deference and in silence — though Mr. Fish 
 was a good talker himself. We were at dinner, and Mr. 
 
 132 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 Sumner began telling us all the details of Lincoln's death, 
 at which he had been present, relating it circumstantially 
 and impressively. Gradually he worked up to the most 
 dramatic point in his story — when Mrs. Lincoln threw 
 her arms around her husband and cried in heart-rending 
 tones, "Live, ah live! — Live, ah live!" It was in the eve- 
 ning and the lamps were hghted on the table and the win- 
 dows were open — we were all listening in breathless silence, 
 a silence interrupted by a piercing shriek from Edith Fish 
 — she had found a June bug entangled in her hair, and Mr. 
 Sumner's dramatic climax was completely spoiled, much 
 to his disgust. 
 
 One of the best mayors New York ever had, Mr. Smith 
 Ely, was an old friend of Mr. Fish's. He was intelligent 
 and agreeable, and I have had many interesting talks with 
 him at the Century Club. He told me he had known Mr. 
 Fish for many years, ever since the time that he was a young 
 man in Mr. de Peyster's law office, and had always so ad- 
 mired him that although a Democrat himself he always 
 voted for Mr. Fish whenever he ran for office. Mr. Ely 
 was a very rich man, but he once told me that he never 
 kept any accounts except his check-book. He was a bache- 
 lor and lived not far from the Century Club, and every 
 day after his dinner he would stop at a little ice-cream 
 saloon in Sixth Avenue for his dessert of ice-cream. 
 
 Mr. Ely told me an interesting anecdote about Daniel 
 Webster. A well-known man gave an evening reception 
 for him; the many distinguished guests all assembled, an 
 hour or so went by, but still Mr. Webster did not arrive. 
 After an uneasy interval, a servant whispered to the host 
 that some one wished to see him at the door; he went out 
 and found Mr. Webster in a carriage with several other 
 gentlemen; he had been dining and was then so much over- 
 
 133 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 come that he was unable to speak, in fact, he was quite 
 insensible. , A gentleman who knew him well, suggested 
 that if a tumbler of raw brandy and cracked ice were ad- 
 ministered to him he would soon be all right. Sure enough, 
 as soon as he began to "suck on it," as Mr. Ely expressed 
 it, he began to revive and by the time he had drunk the 
 whole glass he was quite himself and went into the house. 
 All the guests were presented to him and he appeared to 
 be his usual self, and the whole affair passed off without 
 further difficulty. 
 
 When Daniel Webster visited England, the English 
 were much impressed by him. Some great man said of 
 him, "that every word he uttered weighed a pound," and 
 another that he "looked like a cathedral." My brother 
 Gouv once heard him speak at Poughkeepsie, and was tre- 
 mendously struck by his splendid address. But he knew 
 just when to use his powers of oratory. I have heard that 
 he was once engaged in a very important case, with eminent 
 counsel opposed to him — it may have been Rufus Choate 
 — the question was in regard to a patent on some car- wheels, 
 and the wheels were brought into court. The counsel on 
 the other side made a long and eloquent speech, explain- 
 ing the whole case thoroughly and ending with an impas- 
 sioned appeal. When Webster got up he merely pointed 
 to the wheels and said in his grandest manner, "Gentle- 
 men of the jury, there are the wheels!" and without an- 
 other word sat down. He won the case. 
 
 I can remember Mrs. Daniel Webster well. She was 
 an aunt of the Robert Morris girls, and I used to see her 
 at their house, where she was always known as "Aunt Web- 
 ster." She was also an aunt of Mrs. Newbold Edgar, who 
 was a Miss Appleton of Boston. This Mrs. Edgar was a 
 handsome woman and very attractive, and was at the Mor- 
 
 134 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 rises' a great deal. "Aunt Webster" was a tall, stern old 
 lady — she was then a widow — the kind with whom one 
 never felt quite at ease, but she was polite to me and once 
 asked me to a dinner party. 
 
 A well-known figure on Broadway about i860 was Walt 
 Whitman. I often used to see him, generally on the west 
 side of Broadway near City Hall Park. He was a great 
 walker, a large shaggy man, wearing a loose shirt open in 
 front with no cravat, showing his hairy breast. He would 
 stop often at the corners and gaze at the sky. At this time 
 nearly every young lady in New York wore a bright-blue 
 silk dress, of the shade called mazarine, a scarlet camel's- 
 hair shawl, and a white bonnet; it was really absurd to 
 look about a church and see dozens of girls all dressed ahke. 
 Of course, all wore hoops. This was also the era of the 
 horrid little green caterpillars we called ** measuring 
 worms," dangling on webs from the trees, so that it was 
 impossible to walk along the street without having them 
 drop all over one. Many of the trees in New York were 
 cut down at this time in an attempt to get rid of the pest, 
 and the disagreeable Kttle Enghsh sparrow was imported 
 for the express purpose of eating up the worms. The 
 remedy was worse than the disease. 
 
 In those days the place to get good chocolate was at 
 Effray's on Broadway and Ninth Street. It must have been 
 about 1880 that Huyler opened a little shop on Broadway 
 near Seventeenth Street, where at first they only sold plain 
 candy, such as toffee and butter-scotch; they had a liberal 
 way of keeping the candy uncovered on the counter (cus- 
 tomers were expected to munch a little while waiting for 
 their packages), which was most attractive to the young. It 
 was a good advertisement and there was much lamentation 
 when the custom after some years was given up. In 1880 
 
 135 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Dean was just across the street from this place of Huyler's; 
 they had in their window a '* make-believe" mould of wine 
 jelly made of amber glass, much admired by my children. 
 I think that at first it was displayed in the window of their 
 new place on Fifth Avenue, but I have not seen it there 
 for some time. The wedding-cake when I was married 
 was made by Dean, and for old times' sake we ordered some 
 cake from there when my wife and I celebrated our Golden 
 Wedding Day in 19 16. 
 
 I well remember the excitement over the prize-fight 
 between Yankee Sullivan and Tom Hyer, though I did 
 not see it myself. Sullivan was a celebrated English prize- 
 fighter, and came to America with a great reputation. Hyer 
 was a native of Newburgh, a young and somewhat inex- 
 perienced man, but known to possess fighting ability. The 
 betting among sporting men was very heavy and the ex- 
 citement and interest throughout the whole country was 
 intense. They had great difficulty in selecting the ground, 
 for then as now it was against the law, and the police were 
 following them around determined to stop it. However, 
 they finally outwitted the police and the fight took place. 
 Hyer immediately outclassed his opponent and won easily. 
 A friend of mine, Mr. Marrin, attended the battle, and he 
 told me that each time that Hyer struck Sullivan the blood 
 flew out in a spray all over the prize-ring. 
 
 I saw the Prince of Wales when he arrived in New York 
 in i860. I was stationed in a window up-stairs in Broad- 
 way just below Fulton Street. He was a slight, pretty, 
 boyish figure. The next time I saw him, he was driving with 
 the Princess of Wales at the Ascot races in 1869, and I often 
 saw him in Paris in 1878, an elderly fine-looking man, al- 
 ways wearing the decoration of the Legion of Honor when 
 he was in Paris. 
 
 In the winter of 1863, I was boarding in Thirty-third 
 
 136 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 Street near Fifth Avenue, when I was taken very ill with 
 pleurisy and a touch of pneumonia. As soon as the Robert 
 Morris family heard of my illness they insisted upon my 
 going to their house, on the northwest corner of Thirteenth 
 Street and University Place — the house is still there but 
 fallen from its high estate. I was invited to stay as long 
 as I liked, in fact, until I was well. I had grown very inti- 
 mate with the Morrises and felt at home there, so I ac- 
 cepted their generous invitation with alacrity. The family 
 consisted of Mr. Robert Morris, one of the sweetest-tem- 
 pered men I have ever known, his son Edgar, and three 
 daughters, Kate, Cornelia, and Nellie. Kate had just been 
 married to Henry Delafield Phelps, a college friend of mine 
 at Trinity. 
 
 They were all heavenly kind; no one could have been 
 sweeter or more devoted than they were to me. I went 
 right to bed as soon as I arrived, and lay there for many 
 weeks. I had a small room on the third floor looking out 
 on Thirteenth Street; the wall-paper had a fixed pattern 
 on it and I remember how I used to count those spots, lying 
 in bed, across and back again over and over, until I was 
 too weak to do it any more. When I got better I would 
 look out of the window into Thirteenth Street and watch 
 the careless passers-by and wonder if I should ever again 
 like them walk the streets a well man. But there were 
 also very pleasant hours. Not only were the Morrises so 
 good to me, but other friends were kind and sent me all 
 sorts of good things and flowers, so that I can look back 
 on those weeks of illness with real pleasure. I often look 
 up as I pass through East Thirteenth Street, and I can 
 stiH see the window of my little room where I was so ill, 
 but, through the friendship and kindness of those dear peo- 
 ple, so happy. Alas, all of them are gone now ! 
 
 University Place was then a handsome street, mostly 
 
 137 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 occupied by fine private houses all the way down to Wash- 
 ington Square. Mr. James de Peyster lived on the same 
 block with the Morrises; Mr. William H. Aspinwall had a 
 handsome house and gallery of paintings of the old mas- 
 ters on the corner of Tenth Street; Mr. James Brown was 
 on the corner of Eleventh Street; James Renwick, the archi- 
 tect of Grace Church, lived there, and so did the Emmets; 
 lower down were the New York University and the Union 
 Theological Seminary. Gus Schermerhorn's house, next 
 to the Society Library, is almost the only one left there 
 now. 
 
 The Goelet house on the corner of Broadway and Nine- 
 teenth Street was swept away only a few years ago; there 
 are many people who remember the brown house, very 
 dreary-looking in its latter days, standing back from the 
 street in a neglected garden, where pheasants were some- 
 times to be seen, and often a cow trying to get a little 
 pleasure out of the dusty grass. 
 
 Doctor George Elliot, my doctor, was a delightful fellow 
 and charming companion; I think I owe my life to him, 
 for he was one of the then new school and treated me with 
 great skill. He used to stay with us at Danskammer, and 
 I remember that we always gave him one of the two rooms 
 on either side of the front door, for the windows had black- 
 walnut shutters on the inside, and he liked to close them 
 at night to keep out the sound of the crowing cocks. The 
 father of George and Daniel Giraud Elliot was a member 
 of the firm of Foster, Elliot and Company, of 65 South 
 Street, established in the latter part of the eighteenth cen- 
 tury. They were old-time merchants, owning their own 
 ships and often carrying their own cargoes; one of their 
 ships was named the Rebecca after Mrs. Elliot. 
 
 Gus Van Cortlandt was a cousin of the Morrises — his 
 
 138 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 father had changed his name from Morris to Van Cort- 
 landt — and he was in and out of my room all the time. As 
 he was then studying medicine, he was much interested in 
 my case. He was a rough, hearty fellow who had been a 
 sailor for a time, and who retained a loud seaman's voice. 
 Without consulting Doctor Elliot, he conceived the idea 
 that a blister on my side would be good For me, so I allowed 
 him to put on an enormous blister and keep it there until 
 there was a swelling like a great bladder, which so much 
 disturbed Doctor EHiot that he positively forbade Gus ever 
 to prescribe for me again. 
 
 I must have been at the Morrises' from Christmas time 
 until the spring. I was practising law when I was taken 
 ill, and my long illness was a great interruption. Just be- 
 fore, I had conducted and settled a case in favor of Mr. 
 Samuel Bowne against the Staten Island Dyeing Company. 
 It was for diverting the water from a spring on Mr. Bowne's 
 place, and for my services I had received a fee of four hun- 
 dred dollars, a nice wad to pay my doctor's bill. 
 
 In June, after leaving the Morrises, I went for a long 
 visit to the Bancroft Davises, who had rented our Dans- 
 kammer house and were living there. I had a nice saddle- 
 horse to ride in the morning, and when I came in about 
 eleven they made me drink cream; then I would go out 
 in the garden with Mrs. Davis, armed with a pair of garden 
 shears and a basket, and we would cut roses along the wide, 
 old-fashioned garden walk. 
 
 Once when I was staying with the Davises, it may 
 have been this time. Miss Cochrane, a relation of Mrs. 
 Davis and a charming girl, was staying there also. She 
 had beautiful hair, which I remember particularly because 
 of an odd little incident. One evening, sitting on the porch 
 in the twilight, we all got talking about bats, speculating 
 
 139 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 idly whether ft were true that they sometimes became en- 
 tangled in women's hair. Miss Cochrane must have gone 
 to bed with her mind running on bats, for during the night 
 she had a bad dream, and in her sleep she got a pair of scis- 
 sors and cut off one of her two beautiful long braids of hair. 
 You can imagine her consternation the next morning. 
 
 Mrs. Davis was one of the loveliest and most culti- 
 vated women I have ever known. She was withal a great 
 lady. Her mother was Miss Gracie, and her father, James 
 G. King, a distinguished citizen of New York. He was 
 one of three brothers, all educated in England, one of whom 
 was the Governor of New York and the other, Charles 
 King, was president of Columbia College. Some years 
 ago I designed and built a monument for the King family, 
 a boulder on their old family place in Massachusetts, on 
 which was fastened a large bronze tablet bearing the names 
 of all the distinguished members of the family. It was 
 an imposing list. 
 
 Bancroft Davis went to Danskammer for his health — 
 he had broken down from overwork and was supposed to 
 have only one lung, but country hfe completely restored 
 him. The Davises were much given to hospitality and 
 kept open house at Danskammer, liking it there so much 
 that later they bought land from us, and Richard Hunt 
 built them a beautiful house in the style of Fontainebleau, 
 costing about a hundred thousand dollars. This lovely 
 place, "o'erlooking the tranquil bay," was afterward sold 
 to the Rose Brick Company, and has now entirely disap- 
 peared — all made into bricks ! One of Richard Hunt's 
 most successful houses is the gray Vanderbilt house on the 
 corner of Fifty-second Street and Fifth Avenue — I wonder 
 how many of the passers-by have noticed the little figure 
 of Hunt himself, as "Master Builder," perched on one of 
 
 140 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 the pinnacles. The paving stones of the sidewalk in front 
 of this house and of the two brownstone Vanderbilt houses 
 on the block below are the largest in New York — I dare 
 say in the world. 
 
 After graduating at Harvard, Mr. Davis went as secre- 
 tary of legation to London, and then into partnership 
 with Judge Kent, Dorman B. Eaton, and Henry E. Tailer, 
 who were then engaged in a very large law business. He 
 was also correspondent of the London Times in New York 
 for years. When he retired and went to live in Newburgh, 
 he was found to be so public-spirited and useful in the neigh- 
 borhood that they sent him to the New York Legislature, 
 and from there he was selected by Hamilton Fish to be 
 his assistant-secretary of state and later was appointed 
 minister to Berlin. He was the American agent who con- 
 ducted the case for the Alabama Claims before the Geneva 
 Tribunal, and later in life was judge of the Court of Claims 
 in Washington and reporter of the Supreme Court. 
 
 The firm of Kent, Eaton, and Kent — later Eaton, Davis, 
 and Tailer — was an important one. They were all notable 
 men. Dorman B. Eaton was a fine lawyer and a public- 
 spirited man, very active in the prosecution of the Twe^d 
 ring and in the matter of Jay Gould. He so excited the 
 enmity of these people that he was attacked and sand- 
 bagged in the street, and was so badly injured that he 
 never fully recovered. 
 
 Henry E. Tailer, another partner, was a handsome and 
 delightful fellow, a great friend of mine. He had a really 
 beautiful face, although he had lost an eye. It happened 
 when he was a boy living in a basement house on the south 
 side of Washington Square — I think it was number 48, 
 which was removed when Sullivan Street was opened. 
 Tailer was standing in the street in front of his house when 
 
 141 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 a rowdy boy passing by insulted him and they had a fight. 
 Some masons happened to be mixing some quicklime near 
 by, and the rowdy picked up a handful of lime and thrust 
 it in his face and blinded him in one eye for life. Jim Morris 
 was in Tailer's class at college, and he told me that Tailer 
 could see more with his one eye than any other boy with 
 two; he graduated at the head of the class. 
 
 Eaton, Davis, and Tailer had much important business. 
 Among other things they were counsel for the Erie Rail- 
 way, which had gone into the hands of a receiver, and they 
 managed the whole matter of reconstruction and putting 
 the road on its feet. The stock got as low as five dollars 
 a share, and the firm knew positively that it would rise 
 enormously as soon as the aff'airs were settled, but they did 
 not think it right to buy any stock, because of the con- 
 fidential relation they held to the road. They all had high 
 ideals. 
 
 Old Daniel Drew was a client of theirs. He was a power 
 in Wall Street at that time and made an enormous for- 
 tune, all of which I believe he afterward lost. He was 
 a funny-looking, shabby, shambling old man, something 
 between a Methodist parson and a broken-down farmer, 
 and never gave any appearance of wealth. He had begun 
 life as a drover and in early times used to drive herds of 
 cattle down to Carthage Landing, opposite Danskammer. 
 Drovers in those days did not use banks, but kept all their 
 money in their pockets in a huge roll called a wad. 
 
 I studied law for a year in the office of Eaton, Davis, 
 and Tailer at 45 Wall Street. Judge Kent had formerly 
 been a member of the firm, when it was Kent, Davis, and 
 Kent. The first day that I entered the office he took me 
 into the law library and handed me a book, saying, " Begin 
 on that." It was the first volume of Kent's Commentaries, 
 
 142 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 written by his father, Chancellor Kent. Judge Kent made 
 me his secretary to take notes for the cases in which he 
 was referee, and this was a good and interesting experience 
 for a young man, as many distinguished men argued cases 
 before him. Judge Kent had a private room for his refer- 
 ences and shared it with a grave Spanish don, a lawyer, 
 who was seldom there. This gentleman had adorned his 
 walls with two vile landscapes, sunsets. In those days 
 men were often to be seen in the streets with pairs of such 
 pictures, all painted in the same way by the hundred, usually 
 sunsets, which they sold for five dollars apiece, including 
 the frames. Such were these landscapes. I had a fellow 
 student about my age, named Newell, and we played many 
 pranks with the don's furniture and pictures. We took 
 large red notarial seals and improved the sunsets by past- 
 ing them in and adding long rays of white chalk to repre- 
 sent the setting sun. Newell was a bright, amusing fellow, 
 and after hours we used to have fine wrestling matches. 
 He afterward distinguished himself by marrying the no- 
 torious Adah Isaacs Menken, an actress especially well 
 known in her famous part of Mazeppa. I once saw her 
 in this play. She had a beautiful figure and in the great 
 scene she was bound on the back of a fiery black steed, 
 "a Tartar of the Ukraine breed," and dashed across the 
 desert landscape, clad in flesh-colored tights. She excited 
 much admiration ! This actress had a picturesque career; 
 I believe she took "Mazeppa" all over the world. Her 
 matrimonial history was equally varied. She began by 
 marrying Mr. Menken; then she became the wife of Heenan, 
 the prize-fighter, and was divorced; later she married my 
 friend Newell and was separated from him; and ended, 
 they say, by fascinating the Emperor Louis Napoleon. 
 I had a great admiration for Judge Kent, and it was 
 
 143 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 because he was one of the Whig presidential electors that 
 I cast my first vote for Bell and Everett in i860. I 
 remember that Judge Davies, who also lived at Fishkill, 
 said to Judge Kent at this time that he was sorry that he 
 was an elector on that ticket and Judge Kent replied: 
 "Speaking after the manner of men, I don't care a damn !" 
 The Davies pew in church was directly in front of the 
 Kents', the two judges sitting one behind the other, much 
 to the annoyance of Judge Kent, who remarked that it 
 worried him because Judge Davies made the responses so 
 slowly that in the Creed, when everybody else was ** ascend- 
 ing into heaven," Judge Davies was still "descending into 
 hell." 
 
 I was in New York during the Draft Riots in 1863. I 
 came up-town on a stage the afternoon of the first day they 
 began. As the stage neared Houston Street we were horri- 
 fied to see a colored man chased by a great crowd of people 
 running frantically down the street. He caught the bus 
 just in the nick of time, burst open the door and flung him- 
 self in, his face streaming with blood and his clothes half 
 torn off his back. The stage drove on at once and he escaped. 
 Colored people all through the city were in the greatest 
 danger. Edward Ketchum, a friend of mine living on Madi- 
 son Avenue, had a colored butler in his house who had been 
 threatened, and the Ketchums were afraid that some of 
 the Irish, who were the chief off"enders, would attack the 
 house. So several of Ketchum's friends, myself among the 
 number, sat up all night watching, armed with revolvers, 
 but nothing happened. The Irish got up this riot. They 
 objected violently to the draft — they don't like fighting 
 as much as they think they do — and insisted, with their 
 usual logic, that the negroes were responsible as the war 
 was being fought to set them free. 
 
 I was living at this time in Thirty-third Street near 
 
 144 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 Fifth Avenue. I heard that the Colored Orphan Asylum 
 on Fifth Avenue was on fire and hurried up there to see if I 
 could do anything, but when I arrived there was nothing left 
 but smoking ruins. As I walked back down Fifth Avenue, 
 near the corner of Twenty-ninth Street I saw a mob of 
 toughs who had burned and looted a house near by and 
 were carrying off their spoils; a ruffian in a red shirt, open 
 at the neck and smeared with blood, had a rosewood table 
 as his prize, and another of the gang was carrying the marble 
 top of the table on his head. A friend told me he saw the 
 books from Mr. Choate's library scattered all about the 
 streets. Just across the street from this crowd walked a 
 dozen policemen. As they got directly opposite the mob, 
 they suddenly turned, ran across the Avenue, each police- 
 man seized a rioter by his collar and began belaboring him 
 over the head with his club. In a moment the crowd had 
 abandoned the booty and before you could say Jack Robin- 
 son the street was clear — I never saw a neater piece of work. 
 I found the whole block front on Broadway between Twenty- 
 eighth and Twenty-ninth Streets on fire. The buildings 
 were two-story wooden affairs and the rioters had broken 
 in, built fires on the floors, and burned the whole block 
 down. 
 
 The next day I was standing on the corner of Park 
 Place and Broadway, watching a crowd of people gathering 
 in front of the Tribune Building. Park Place was almost 
 empty, except for a dray waiting at the corner without a 
 driver, a whip lying on the floor of the dray. Suddenly 
 the crowd burst into loud shouting and a negro man came 
 flying across the City Hall Park with a crowd of about a 
 hundred men — they seemed a thousand — close after him. 
 He caught sight of the dray, leaped into it, snatched up 
 the whip, laid it furiously across the horse's back, uttered 
 a wild yell, and lashing the horse into a gallop outdistanced 
 
 145 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 his pursuers and disappeared down College Place. If he 
 had been caught he would doubtless have been strung up 
 to a lamp-post, as so many poor negroes were in those ter- 
 rible days. 
 
 Any one, even a clergyman or doctor, seen with a negro 
 was in danger. They tell of a colored man trying in vain 
 to find a clergyman who would bury his dead child, until 
 some one said: "There is a little parson named Dix who 
 isn't afraid of anything, you might try him," and Doctor 
 Dix came up to the scratch. In fact. Doctor Dix's friends 
 said he rather enjoyed driving to the cemetery with the 
 colored family, at the risk of his hfe. 
 
 All law and order were abolished — awful crowds of 
 horrible-looking men thronged the streets — for several 
 days the city was in a state of anarchy as in the time of 
 the French Revolution. All the militia were at the front 
 and no troops were available, but at last, in about three 
 days, some soldiers came, the Seventh Regiment among 
 them, and order was restored. Doctor Stuyvesant Morris 
 was in the Seventh at that time, and he told me that as 
 they marched through the streets they were sniped at from 
 the windows and brickbats were thrown at them; it was 
 pretty dangerous, but he said he did not mind the danger 
 so much as a large rent he got in the seat of his trousers. 
 Some cavalry also appeared and tethered their horses in 
 Union Square amid bales of hay and other fodder scat- 
 tered over the ground, until it quite looked like a be- 
 leaguered city. 
 
 The following letter, written at this time from the front 
 to Miss Neilson, is curiously interesting: 
 
 "... The scarcity of news has left me no alterna- 
 tive but to wait until something occurred worthy of note. 
 
 146 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 I have waited. Something has occurred, and I will pro- 
 ceed at once to make you acquainted with the main facts 
 in the case. The country about Columbus does not at 
 this time harbour any part of the Rebel Army, but is in- 
 fested by gangs of *Cut throat Guerrillas j* who never lose 
 an opportunity of plundering and murdering all who fall 
 in their path; and not content with killing, perform all 
 manner of Barbarities upon their victims, such as cutting 
 off hands and heads. 
 
 "Not being in favor of such cruelties, and knowing 
 that if we submitted to them, we were never sure of our 
 lives, I determined to pay them off in their own coin. I 
 am not naturally a 'bloody-minded' man, but I think that 
 a determined course of action often saves many lives. Find- 
 ing that one of the most notorious leaders, named Forbes, 
 had been bushwhacking some of our men, I determined 
 to make an example of him which his brother murderers 
 would not soon forget. To make a short story, I sought 
 Forbes, found him, put a bullet through his skull, and 
 then ! ! ! now don't faint, cut bis head off! ! ! and carried it 
 back to Columbus, where I was hailed with joy for deliver- 
 ing the Country of such a pest. The General commanding 
 thanked me, and all our officers likewise, and all agreed 
 if others had followed my example, bushwhacking had 
 ceased long ago. I am to have my vignette taken in my 
 Butternut dress which I use in scouting, with some of my 
 Blood hounds, and will send you one." 
 
 I was still living in Thirty-third Street when I heard 
 very early one morning the dreadful news of Lincoln's as- 
 sassination. One could hardly realize it was true until 
 one went out into the street and black began to grow upon 
 the houses — there did not seem to be one that was not 
 
 147 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 shrouded in mourning. Indeed such Copperheads as re- 
 fused to display any signs of grief were in danger of having 
 their windows broken. I never saw anything like it — the 
 sorrow was almost universal, the feeling bitter and intense. 
 I heard of an old farmer driving back from Newburgh, 
 meeting a Copperhead, and telling him that Lincoln had 
 been killed. The traitor said, "Fm glad of it," where- 
 upon the old farmer leaped out of his wagon, attacked the 
 other man, and nearly killed him. But this sort of thing 
 was the exception. People who had hated Lincoln seemed 
 all at once to come to their senses and realize what manner 
 of man it was that they had been vilifying. It is almost 
 impossible at the present time to believe the kind of things 
 that Lincoln's enemies used to say about him, even more 
 absurd than the things Wilson's enemies say to-day. A 
 specimen is a paragraph in an old letter of 1861 — "What 
 can be said for Lincoln now, after his flight by night dis- 
 guised in a Scotch cap, to escape assassination at Balti- 
 more, on the faith of that old driveller Scott?" (How funny 
 Lincoln would have looked in a Scotch cap, if this tale had 
 been true !) I am thankful to say that I have had the sense 
 always to admire both Lincoln and Wilson, though I failed 
 to vote for Lincoln the first time — a lifelong regret. 
 
 I suppose it is pretty much forgotten that President 
 Andrew Jackson once had an attempt made on his life. 
 Mr. Murray, my father's friend of whom I have spoken 
 in a previous chapter, happened to be in Washington soon 
 after and was told all about it. It seems the President 
 was attending the funeral of a member of Congress when 
 an insane man only a few feet away fired at him twice, using 
 two pistols, as he stood under the portico of the Capitol. 
 But each time the pistol missed fire. After the man had 
 been secured, the pistols were carefully examined — both 
 
 148 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 were new and both were properly loaded with ball and 
 powder, yet both caps had been exploded without igniting 
 the charge ! The bystanders told Mr. Murray that the old 
 soldier never flinched but went straight for the assassin 
 with a stout stick he always carried, and would doubtless 
 have finished him off" single-handed if he had been alone. 
 
 In 1864 I bought a thoroughbred mare that I named 
 Lucile, as Owen Meredith's poem was then my favorite. 
 I paid seven hundred dollars for her, which was a great 
 price for me, in fact the most I ever paid for a horse; but 
 she was a beautiful mare, although scarcely broken. I 
 took her to Tallman's stable, corner of Broadway and 
 Thirty-eighth Street, where I kept her for two years and 
 completed her education by riding her out over the pave- 
 ments to Central Park and exercising and training her there 
 until I got her thoroughly broken to the saddle. But she 
 was a hard one to manage, and frequently ran away with 
 me in the park. One day she started near the reservoir 
 and ran down near the pond where they used to keep swans; 
 there is a rather sharp turn there and she was going so fast 
 that I could not bring her round the turn, so I kept straight 
 on over the remains of a wire fence lying coiled up in the 
 bushes, in which she caught her feet and dragged the whole 
 thing out into the driving road, but she did not get me ofi*. 
 She was a bay, sixteen hands high and beautifully made, 
 one of the handsomest horses I have ever seen. I sold her 
 after two years for five hundred dollars to a wine merchant, 
 who was so pleased at getting her that he gave John, my 
 groom at Tallman's, a box of wine as a present. He had 
 bought her for his son, who could not ride her however, 
 and I believe was thrown. But she never got me off* her 
 back through all my experience with her, though I rode 
 her nearly every day for two years. 
 
 149 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Freelance was another horse of whom I think with af- 
 fection. He was a thoroughbred two-year-old, by im- 
 ported Babrownie, that I bought at auction at Jerome 
 Park for three hundred dollars. I did not attempt to ride 
 him until he was three, when I took him to Tallman's stable, 
 where they had a back lot for exercising. I don't know 
 whether he had been ridden before or not, but he gave no 
 evidence of having been broken at all and would buck- 
 jump all over the lot, but in a little while he sobered down 
 and I got him perfectly broken. I taught him to jump, 
 and he jumped well and he was very fast. I rode him at 
 Jerome Park in several races, carrying one hundred and 
 fifty pounds — these were called '* welter weights." When 
 I went to Rome I had to dispose of him, so I left him with 
 Will Crosby to sell for me and he sold him to John Minton 
 for two hundred dollars; he was then five years old, fifteen 
 hands high, and a perfect saddle-horse to my taste. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton Fish celebrated their Golden 
 Wedding, December 15, 1886, and had a reception in their 
 house on Stuyvesant Square. I remember at this recep- 
 tion I met Gouverneur Morris, of Morrisania — not the 
 young writer of that name but his grandfather — and he 
 told me a characteristic anecdote of Doctor Richard Morris 
 of Westchester, who was fond of practical jokes. Doctor 
 Morris met Gouverneur and asked him if he would like 
 a quarter of beef; of course he said he would. ** Well then," 
 said Doctor Morris, "drive out to my place to-morrow and 
 ril give you one." So the next day Gouverneur appeared 
 at the Morris house and '* Uncle Richard" took him out 
 into a field and pointing to a dead cow lying there said: 
 "There's your quarter of beef, she died yesterday, help 
 yourself." 
 
 150 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 "Uncle Richard" was a splendid old gentleman, a good 
 sport. He always kept a barrel of whiskey in the cellar, 
 and he had a fine flock of game-cocks as well as trotting 
 horses and bull-terriers. The doctor owned a celebrated 
 trotting mare Stella, whose grave in Westchester is still 
 marked with a stone and whose portrait used to be well 
 known in a colored engraving published by Currier of Nas- 
 sau Street, of "Stella and Whalebone," a matched pair 
 of trotters, making record time. He had a famous bull- 
 terrier named Terror, who once dashed at me from under 
 his chair, as I was crossing the lawn to speak to the doctor, 
 and fastened his fangs in my leg; luckily he only succeeded 
 in tearing a long strip in my new gray trousers. It was 
 a little embarrassing, as I had only come for a morning call, 
 but one of the girls ofl*ered to mend it for me, so I borrowed 
 a pair of nether garments from one of her brothers, and 
 she very deftly mended the rent so that it could hardly 
 be seen. 
 
 When the doctor and his brothers, Gus Van Cortlandt 
 and Robert, were just approaching manhood, they went 
 abroad together, and went to Paris and were presented at 
 court. All three of them were very handsome, and greatly 
 resembled the royal family, so much so that this likeness 
 to royalty was much remarked. The King said jokingly 
 to one of them apropos of this likeness, "Was your mother 
 ever in Paris?" but the young man answered naively, "No, 
 sire, but my father was." 
 
 Young Nicholas Morris, one of Doctor Morris's sons — 
 always called "Cola" — was lost at sea. He was in the navy 
 and went on a voyage to the South, whence he never re- 
 turned. His ship, the man-of-war Albany, was never heard 
 of again. Curiously enough, the last port she touched at 
 
 151 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 was Pensacola — "think of Cola!" For many, many years 
 **Aunt Lillie" thought that every knock at the door or 
 foot on the stair was her son come home. 
 
 Pelham, Doctor Morris's place in Westchester, was re- 
 nowned for its hospitality. I remember very well the first 
 time I went to Pelham. I was living at 44 Union Square 
 when I was asked up there to spend a week-end. I remember 
 I hesitated on Friday about going, as I did not feel much 
 like it, but a lady who was staying in the same house said 
 to me, "You'd better go, you may meet some one you like." 
 Ladies are apt to be match-makers even when they are 
 speculating with the unknown and, sure enough, I met 
 my future wife there. Miss Helen Neilson, whom I had 
 never seen before. She and her sister Julia were staying 
 at Pelham, and also Miss Pauline Spoffard, Miss Molly 
 Williamson, Harry Redmond, and Robert Barry. Besides 
 Stuyve and his three sisters, Lou Morris was there, home 
 on furlough. They always had a house party when he came 
 home. The next day was Sunday and we all went to church 
 at St. Peter's, Westchester. Coming out of church I spoke 
 to my future wife for the first time — I was never introduced 
 to her. It was at the old Morris place at Morrisania that 
 my father met my mother for the first time, and it was 
 during this same visit at Pelham that Julia Neilson met 
 Robert Barry whom she afterward married. So you see 
 the Morrises have played quite a part in our lives ! In the 
 evenings at the Morrises' we used to play round games, and 
 on Sunday evenings we all said the catechism, taking the 
 questions in turn. Some of us knew it all except "our duty 
 to our neighbor." (I remember how hard it was when my 
 mother gave me the catechism to learn on hot Sunday after- 
 noons, and I don't think I ever mastered the latter part 
 
 152 
 
NEW YORK WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN 
 
 of it, particularly "What desirest thou?" — this was a 
 sticker.) 
 
 I was married to Helen Neilson on the sixth of Decem- 
 ber, 1866, at her mother's house on Stuyvesant Square, 
 by the Reverend Doctor John Cotton Smith of the Church 
 of the Ascension. 
 
 And we celebrated our Golden Wedding on December 
 6, 19 1 6, at 58 West Tenth Street. 
 
 153 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 **Rome, that reformed the world, accustomed was 
 Two suns to have, which one road and the other, 
 Of God and of the world, made manifest. 
 One has the other quenched, and to the crosier 
 The sword is joined." 
 
 — Dante. 
 
 My first sight of Rome was on the twenty-seventh of 
 January, 1859. Happily there was no railway in those 
 days, so the diligence took me from Civita Vecchia to Rome 
 across the Campagna. I remember seeing a lot of French 
 soldiers drilling on the beach at Civita Vecchia — Italy and 
 France went to war with Austria that following summer. 
 
 I had often heard of the "desolate" Campagna, and 
 expected to see an arid waste, but I soon changed my mind, 
 and from that day, throughout a long after-experience, I 
 never ceased to love and enjoy its endless charm. That 
 first morning was one to be remembered, delicious as only 
 an Italian winter's day can be; under a soft haze the land- 
 scape melted away in almost imperceptible folds and tones, 
 in varied gradations and shades of opalescent and silvery 
 color, touched here and there by a line of the first fresh 
 green of the wheat-fields, or a faint glistening spot of water. 
 All was remote and solemn. In the distance, the turrets 
 of an old castle of Julius the Second peered through shadowy 
 groves of stone-pines above vast tan-colored marshes; the 
 fields we passed through were scattered with grass-grown 
 mounds, the remains of long-forgotten cities once great 
 and gay — now dwindled to low hills, where scattered flocks 
 
 154 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 of sheep, guarded by great dogs and shepherds leaning on 
 their staves, were silhouetted against the soft blue-gray 
 sky. An almost deserted land, a great silence enveloping 
 it, only broken now and then by the long-drawn-out and 
 monotonous song of some passing driver of a wine-cart, 
 in a conical hat and red waistcoat, his little horse decked 
 with colored ribbons and pheasants' feathers, tinkling bells 
 and profuse brass mountings, all to keep off the assaults 
 of the evil eye; or by the hoarse cries of a wild rider in sheep- 
 skin breeches, carrying a long iron-pointed goad, where- 
 with to urge his train of black, sad-eyed buffalo, drawing 
 a huge block of white marble, perhaps for some sculptor 
 in Rome. 
 
 The Campagna was then owned by a few great nobles 
 and their vast estates were diversified by many bits of 
 ancient ruins, but nothing modern — no villages and but 
 few houses. An occasional wine-shop displayed its familiar 
 bush above the door, showing that wine was to be had with- 
 in, and here and there a group of farm buildings huddled 
 around a tall mediaeval tower, in the distance the long gray 
 broken lines of the old Roman aqueducts marched across 
 the plain. 
 
 So our day passed. Suddenly our vetturino, with a 
 crack of his whip, shouted "Ecco Roma !" and we saw shin- 
 ing in the extreme distance, like a great pearl, as Story 
 calls it, that grew and grew, the splendid dome of St. Peter's ! 
 And it was a dramatic moment when our horses dashed 
 through a tall archway directly from the quiet Campagna 
 into the Square of San Pietro, and there was the honey- 
 colored fagade of Bramante's basilica embraced by its 
 grand colonnades, and the Egyptian obelisk flanked by 
 the noble fountains, flinging high their spray that drifted 
 across the square in silvery clouds. 
 
 155 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Rome was a very different place then from what it is 
 now. Then the moss and dust of ages lay thick over every- 
 thing; nothing had been repaired for a thousand years. 
 The interior of the Coliseum was then a green lawn. It 
 had been consecrated as a church, and stations of the cross 
 stood around its outer edge; the walls were bright with 
 wallflowers and many low-growing plants, and with all sorts 
 of shrubs and trailing ivy — so many that a book has been 
 written on the flora of the Coliseum. There had been but 
 little excavation in the Forum, which was mostly covered, 
 many feet deep, with the accumulated soil of ages. The 
 ivy-clad walls of the palace of the Caesars rose at the right, 
 and long rows of faflen porphyry and granite columns from 
 some ruined temple lay along its sides. The baths of Car- 
 acafla had been blown up at some remote time, and were 
 now huge masses of ruin overgrown with vines and flowers, 
 most beautiful and picturesque. 
 
 In 1869 when I again saw Rome it was still almost un- 
 changed, but when the Italians took possession in 1870 
 they dug away the soil of the Coliseum, stripped all the 
 vines and flowers from the ruins and cleaned it up, and 
 archaeologists have been busy ever since removing the sur- 
 face of the Forum in order to expose the pavement. The 
 beautiful masses of ruin covered with verdure were re- 
 moved from the floor of the baths of Caracalla, and the 
 whole interior is now bare and uninviting and used as a 
 museum of antiquities. All this is doubtless more interest- 
 ing to the antiquarian, but far less pleasing to the artist 
 and the man of taste. 
 
 I found most of the little common things of Rome un- 
 changed in ten years, when in 1869 I saw it again. Naz- 
 zarri still sold his confections on the corner of the Piazza 
 di Spagna, with the bookshop of Spithoever opposite; there 
 
 156 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 too was the American banking house of Maquay, Hooker, 
 and Company, the latter name softened to "Signor Okeri" 
 by the Italians; Keats's house at the corner of the Spanish 
 Steps looked just the same, and on the steps lounged, as 
 of yore, the gayly dressed models waiting for custom, and 
 apparently the very same beggars and cab-drivers tormented 
 the passers-by. The same little antiquity dealer, rather 
 more mouldy than before, displayed his wares in the Via 
 Condotti, opposite the historic Caffe Greco. In the centre 
 of the square was the same old fruit-stand and the foun- 
 tain with its flock of glass ducks sailing on the little lake — 
 all was unchanged. 
 
 I was appointed Consul to the Papal States in March, 
 1869, and with my family left New York in April for Rome; 
 but I was given a summer's leave of absence before settling 
 down there, because the State Department at Washington 
 considered the climate of Rome unhealthy during the sum- 
 mer, an impression which I never took any pains to re- 
 move. So during the four years of my residence in Rome 
 I had leave of absence in the summers, which we spent in 
 Switzerland, the Austrian Tyrol, the Italian lakes, and 
 Venice. Considering that we travelled with nurses and 
 children, we were rather adventurous. In those days there 
 was no funicular to the hotel on Monte Generoso at Lugano, 
 and I remember our party made an amusing caravan, each 
 trunk on a separate mule, and the nurse on horseback carry- 
 ing the baby in her arms. 
 
 Before going to Rome I wrote to my vice-consul, Pietro 
 Calvi — whom I had inherited from my predecessor Mr. 
 Cushman, the nephew of Charlotte Cushman, the great 
 actress — to engage an apartment and a consular office for 
 me, but when I reached Rome, I found both unsatisfac- 
 tory. The apartment was at 68 Via Capo le Case, a nice 
 
 157 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 situation, but it had no other recommendation — any one 
 who is familiar with Roman furnished apartments will 
 know just what it was like. Our padrone had ransacked 
 the auction-rooms for bits of broken-down furniture, faded 
 gaudy carpets and curtains, chairs and tables with glued- 
 on legs that dropped off when you touched them, and which 
 you were obliged to pay for. This was soon remedied when 
 we began to collect really good old furniture, but the con- 
 sular office looked like an art gallery crammed with hideous 
 copies of the old masters, and the stairway was lined with 
 them, my landlord calmly informing me that they were 
 all for sale and that I would probably like to dispose of 
 them to my countrymen, but to his despair I promptly 
 ordered them all away. 
 
 The next year we moved to the old Palazzo Zuccari, 
 number 64 Via Sistina, which was built by the brothers 
 Zuccaro, well-known artists of the sixteenth century. It 
 stood next to the Tempietto near the top of the Spanish 
 Steps, and was a picturesque old palace, built of a pale red- 
 dish brick, originally covered with white stucco which had 
 partly fallen away; and as it had not been painted or re- 
 paired since it was built, the whole had mellowed to a beau- 
 tiful tint of delicate light pinkish-gray, and from the numer- 
 ous crevices of the walls sprang various plants, tufts of 
 wallflowers and little shrubs. The front door and entrance 
 were on the Via Sistina and the house ran through the block, 
 so that the real front was on the Via Gregoriana. Our 
 padrone was named Zuccaro, a descendant of one of the 
 painters, a shrinking little man who seldom appeared and 
 lived modestly in the basement. The Honorable Mrs. 
 Bruce, lady-in-waiting to Queen Victoria, lived on the second 
 floor and our apartment was on the third. The arched 
 haH and winding stairway were broad and well lighted 
 and frescoed all the way up by the Zuccari in the Raphael- 
 
 158 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 esque manner. Against these oFd and faded frescoes a slight 
 green lattice had been placed and over it trailed green cac- 
 tus, covered with scarlet blossoms that bloomed the winter 
 through. 
 
 It was a delightful apartment. To be sure, we had 
 only one servants' room; and all the water in the house 
 had to be carried to the second floor from a fountain in 
 the courtyard, but we didn't mind that. It was easy enough 
 to get a man to do that or anything else for one in Rome. 
 If we needed a servant it was only necessary to mention 
 it to a friend and several would immediately appear, only 
 too glad to come for whatever wages we chose to give. 
 
 Roman servants are very aff'ectipnate, and become 
 attached to a family in a wonderfully short time. I re- 
 member returning to Rome, after a trip to Naples during 
 the great eruption of Vesuvius, and being greeted with 
 almost frantic joy by the servants, who rushed out into 
 the street and surrounded our carriage, and began kissing 
 our hands and arms, and anything they could reach. The 
 accounts of the loss of life in the eruption had alarmed them. 
 The cook, whom we hardly knew by sight, was in floods of 
 tears. 
 
 From our balcony we looked over the whole of the city, 
 spread out like a map. It was one of the finest views in 
 Rome and wonderful at sunset. There was the yellow 
 Tiber winding through the city, here the Castle of St. An- 
 gelo and St. Peter's dome; while far beyond lay the deli- 
 cately colored Campagna melting into the distant moun- 
 tains. Our palazzo was such a quaint old place that I used 
 to remark that the flights of rooks liked to settle there, 
 when they flew up from the old half-ruined church-tower 
 below, and chatter together for a while, before they went 
 to roost in the trees of the Villa Ludovisi. 
 
 Our drawing-room was caHed the Camera Giuseppe, 
 
 159 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 because its walls were frescoed with scenes from the life of 
 Joseph, by Von Hoffman, a pupil of Overbeck — I believe 
 these pictures have since been removed and sent to Munich. 
 One of them, a desert scene where Joseph was being sold 
 by his brethren, with a train of camels in the foreground, 
 was really fine. They were mentioned in the guide-books 
 and visitors often came to see them. I was once showing 
 them to a party of Americans and one of them, a lady, 
 looked at the picture of Joseph and Potiphar's wife, mod- 
 estly placed over a door where it would attract the least 
 attention, and remarked naively: 
 
 "I always thought that Joseph was a great fool." 
 
 Over the front door of the palace was a shield bearing 
 the arms of the United States, and the rooms of the con- 
 sulate adjoined our apartment. As there was then no rep- 
 resentative of the American Government in Rome except 
 myself, I had charge of the Legation and its archives. A 
 fine library belonged to the Legation, so that the large room 
 of my office was lined with books, and this gave it a literary 
 flavor. Calvi, my vice-consul, was a Roman lawyer; he 
 was also a poet and published his verses; and he had prac- 
 tised in the Roman courts, where all the pleadings were 
 then in Latin, so he spoke and wrote Latin fluently and 
 astonished the Romish ecclesiastics, who often came to 
 the office to execute documents, by his rapid writing in 
 Latin. He spoke English wefl but sometimes turned curious 
 sentences. Once when I was away in the summer, he wrote 
 me of the death of a near relative, at the same time dilating 
 on the extreme heat, and remarked: 
 
 "Heat and affliction are very corroding virtues, I ex- 
 perience both in the highest degree." 
 
 Another time he wrote to me, after I had come back 
 to America, that he hoped when I saw Mr. Nevin, the rec- 
 
 i6o 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 tor of the American Church, his presence would "awake 
 in me all Roman feelings," and added: 
 
 "The American Church in the Via Nazionale is the great 
 religious event of Rome. The Union Church, patronized 
 by Mrs. Gould, and the South Baptist Convention are 
 making strong efforts, but they all feed stomachi coi mac- 
 cheroni, instead of souls with Gospel." 
 
 Unsolicited by me, the government supplied me with 
 a consular clerk, Richard H. Savage, who had lately grad- 
 uated with distinction from West Point, but who because 
 of failing health had left the army and come to Rome. He 
 wrote French with perfect accuracy, but spoke it with a 
 vile accent, and was not much use to me, as Calvi did all 
 my extra work. In a few months he tired of the job and 
 went off to Egypt, ostensibly to join the Khedive's army, 
 but failing in this returned to Rome for a little while and 
 then drifted away and I never saw him again. He was a 
 good recounter of adventures in California, and was after- 
 ward author of several books, among them "My Official 
 Wife." He has been dead for several years. 
 
 On my way to Rome in October, 1869, I happened to 
 be stopping in Bologna at the Hotel Brun. I was sitting 
 in the reading-room and near me was a group of Amer- 
 icans discussing American consuls in Europe, much to 
 their disadvantage. Finally one of them remarked: 
 
 "What can you expect when they appoint such a per- 
 son as they have in Rome now ! You would think a man 
 like Secretary Hamilton Fish might at least select a gentle- 
 man — this Armstrong, who is at Rome, is a sort of a horse- 
 jockey — rides in public races at Jerome Park and all that 
 sort of thing — I call it downright disgraceful ! What they 
 ought to have in Rome is some one who is a judge of art 
 and literature, not a sporting man," etc., etc. 
 
 161 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Later I met the speaker and found him to be a very 
 nice fellow, and got to know him well; but I never referred 
 to this conversation and only trust that he revised his first 
 opinion of me — he was a Mr. Stokes Boyd, of Philadelphia. 
 
 It was part of my duty as consul in Rome to seal the 
 coffins of Americans who died there, for the city govern- 
 ment would not allow them to be removed until they were 
 sealed, and incidentally I learned what exorbitant charges 
 were made to families after a death. It was very expensive 
 to die in Rome, for if any one happened to end his days in 
 a pension or hotel all the rooms had to be papered, painted, 
 and refurnished at the expense of the family. The bankers 
 also had understandings with the undertakers and did not 
 spare their charges, and they usually had an assistant whose 
 special duty was attending to funerals. One of them had 
 a ghoul-like old man, named Ercole, who was sometimes 
 invited to functions other than funerals. On one of these 
 occasions, seeing him in the distance with his arms some- 
 what extended and with a calculating expression in his 
 eye, Fred Crowninshield said: 
 
 "See old Ercole over there, taking time by the fore- 
 lock and measuring that man for his coffin!" 
 
 American consuls are supposed to attend to all sorts 
 of business for their countrymen, whose requests are often 
 unusual and amusing. Among others, I had a letter from 
 a lady who asked me if I could find and send her a pair 
 of rubbers that she had left in the American church the 
 winter before; strange to say they were found and forwarded 
 to her, by Ziegler our faithful sexton, who was equal to 
 almost any emergency. I once got a letter of eighteen pages 
 from a crazy man, and another from a collector of postage 
 stamps in Ohio, asking me to send him Roman stamps. 
 Another time the police sent to me to admonish an Amer- 
 
 162 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 ican, who was leading a dissipated life and wasting his 
 money; and I remember being appealed to by some ladies 
 who had been missing things from their apartment for some 
 time, and at last noticed a trap-door in the roof through 
 which they found their landlady was in the habit of com- 
 ing down at night and walking off with anything she hap- 
 pened to fancy. 
 
 During my residence in Rome I introduced several 
 hundred Americans to His Holiness, Pio Nono. These 
 Papal receptions were frequent. The visitor's name had 
 to be sent in a week beforehand, in return came a permit 
 stating when the applicant should appear, and I sent my 
 vice-consul to present him; I never went myself. Al- 
 though I presented so many Americans to the Pope, I was 
 never actually presented to him myself. I had an appoint- 
 ment for a private interview, but at the last moment was 
 ill and could not go, so I put it off, and then Rome was 
 taken and I was no longer consul to the Papal States, so 
 finally I never went at all. 
 
 I frequently saw him walking on the Pincian Hill. He 
 always walked in a hollow square formed by his guard, 
 followed by his gorgeous carriage. All the people fell on 
 their knees as he passed. My little daughter Margaret, 
 about three years old, a pretty child with a bright color 
 and fair hair, was walking there one day with her Italian 
 nurse, who, of course, went down on her knees as the Pope 
 passed; but little Margaret, when she saw this benevolent- 
 looking, handsome old man in his beautiful robes, escaped 
 from her nurse and ran out to him and took his hand. When 
 he caught sight of the little creature close beside him the 
 kind old man stooped down and kissed her and patted her 
 on the head, remarking **E bella, e buona, e cara," and 
 gave her his blessing, and then she trotted back to her nurse, 
 
 163 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 who was so alarmed at her audacity, and yet so overwhelmed 
 by pride and joy, that the child never forgot it. A favorite 
 game after that was to dress up in a paper cocked hat and 
 long cloak and play she was a bishop. 
 
 Pio Nono was really a beautiful man, if I may use the 
 term, graceful and majestic in his carriage, with a very 
 fair, pink and white complexion, black sparkling eyes and 
 snowy-white, abundant, curling hair. He did not look at 
 all old, in spite of his silvery head, which, far from taking 
 away from his brilliant look, seemed to accentuate it. 
 
 The popes must get pretty tired of functions. On Can- 
 dlemas, Pio Nono was carried about the church on a plat- 
 form borne on men's shoulders, from which he blessed the 
 people, but it swayed so that he was often seasick and could 
 not have enjoyed it as much as did his faithful subjects. 
 Fortunately he was able to leave the curing of diseased 
 animals to St. Anthony — on the seventeenth of January 
 all the sick cattle and broken-kneed horses in Rome were 
 taken to the churcli of St. Anthony, where they were 
 sprinkled with holy water by the priests and made whole. 
 Another curious ceremony was on St. Agnes' Day, when 
 two Iambs, dressed in red ribbons, were placed on the altar 
 of her church, and then given to the nuns to rear, their 
 wool, when they were shorn, being donated to the Pope 
 to be woven into a pallium for a bishop. It must all be a 
 survival of some ceremony of the Vestal Virgins; I wonder 
 if it is still kept up. In Holy Week two priests in lace vest- 
 ments appeared in our house, and went through every room, 
 blessing it and expecting a douceur in return. Every house 
 in Rome used to be blessed in this way once a year. 
 
 From a very good place in St. Peter's I saw the pro- 
 cession at the opening in December, 1869, of the Ecumenical 
 Council, which declared the Infallibility of the Pope. Six 
 
 164. 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 hundred bishops and cardinals marching along, from the 
 Vatican to St. Peter's^ all gorgeously dressed; the Eastern 
 bishops looking more like Arab chiefs than Christian prel- 
 ates, in gowns of many colors carrying tiaras set with jewels; 
 the Western dignitaries in purple and lace, with white-and- 
 gold vestments, and each with his silk mitre in his hand; 
 the Pope bringing up the rear. They were escorted by a 
 French regiment, the Papal Zouaves, and the Swiss Guard, 
 the latter in brilliant steel helmets and cuirasses, and knee- 
 breeches of red, yellow and black stripes. After the open- 
 ing ceremonies the doors were closed to the public. The 
 council dragged on for months, several of the old bishops 
 dying before it was over, for many of the clergy were op- 
 posed to the doctrine of infaHibihty. There was a saying 
 that "the bishops came to Rome shepherds and went home 
 sheep." But in the end the Pope won out — it is strange 
 that he should have been given this vast increase in spiritual 
 power just at the time that he was to lose the temporal. 
 
 In my intercourse with the Vatican, which was con- 
 siderable, I often had private interviews with Cardinal 
 Antonelli, who generally received me alone in the evening 
 in a private room. He was always polite and quite willing 
 to talk and be obliging, when he could conveniently do 
 so. He was very shrewd-looking, with piercing black eyes 
 and a pale face, and usually sat behind a desk, with his 
 head bowed and resting on one hand, looking at one from 
 under his black eyebrows in a sort of catlike and watchful 
 way that gave him a rather sinister look. At the time of 
 the opening of the Ecumenical Council, I thought that as 
 I had charge of the American Legation, and there was no 
 American diplomat at Rome, the cardinal might assume 
 that I held a quasi-diplomatic position and give me a seat 
 in the council; but he very politely but firmly declined, 
 
 165 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 with many apologies, saying that none but actual diplomatic 
 representatives could be so honored. He wrote me many 
 long letters in his own handwriting, mostly about trifling 
 things. I think that he was fond of letter- writing; indeed, 
 they say that he was one of the most profuse letter-writers 
 in Europe, and consequently his autographs, of which I 
 have kept several, are not as valuable as ordinarily would 
 be those of so distinguished a man. 
 
 Pere Hyacinthe spent a winter in Rome about this time. 
 It was after he had left the Romish Church — he had been 
 a priest — and was now married and a professor. He was a 
 fine-looking, attractive, and agreeable man. I never heard 
 him preach, but he was said to be a remarkable orator. 
 His wife was a handsome, rather common woman, of about 
 thirty — I think she had been a corset-maker, or something 
 of that sort. 
 
 The winter of 1870 was very gay and my wife and I 
 were so busy enjoying ourselves that we had no time to 
 think; of the cares and worries of life, but, all the same, we 
 were rather glad when the spring came and we did not have 
 to go out somewhere or other every evening. I remember 
 a very grand ball at the French Embassy, where the dia- 
 monds and dresses were gorgeous and the number of princes 
 and princesses quite overpowering. The rooms at the Co- 
 lonna palace where the ball was given are very fine, and 
 the music and flowers were beautiful, but the Americans, 
 only about a dozen of whom were asked, were astonished 
 to find that the supper consisted of only tea, chocolate, 
 cake, lemonade, and candy. 
 
 At last the rush of Holy Week and the splendid Easter 
 ceremonies at St. Peter's were over, foHowed in the incon- 
 gruous Roman fashion by fireworks, horse-races, and illu- 
 minations. St. Peter's was beautiful, strung all over with 
 
 166 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 little lights — although, of course, it was before the day of 
 electricity — so that the outline of the wonderful dome could 
 be seen sparkling for miles away across the Campagna. 
 
 Mrs, Armstrong to her mother, Mrs. Neilson, New York 
 
 Rome, June 19, 1870. 
 "... Last Thursday was a great festival here, with a 
 splendid procession around the Square of St. Peter's, monks 
 in white and monks in brown, priests in white and in black, 
 and black with huge red crosses on their breasts, bishops 
 in their white robes and mitres, a band of music, the Pope's 
 guard in splendid uniforms on horseback, cone-shaped 
 canopies representing the greatest churches in Rome — 
 the basilicas — with magnificent crucifixes carried before 
 and after them, and then the Pope, carried on a large plat- 
 form with a canopy over him. He is supposed to be kneel- 
 ing at an altar, and his drapery is arranged to look as if 
 his legs came out behind, but in reality he is sitting, as it 
 would be too fatiguing for him to kneel so long. Another 
 day an altar was arranged in the Corso, and as it was just 
 before dusk all the candles shone very prettily in the pro- 
 cession and on the altar." 
 
 The last spree of the season was the Artists' Festival 
 at Cervara. It had been forbidden for the previous ten 
 years, so this time it was gotten up with unusual care. The 
 German artists were the principal performers, though others 
 joined in, making a motley crowd, dressed in every variety 
 of absurd and picturesque costume — Arabs, Druids, In- 
 dians, Greeks, Egyptians — some mounted on horses, but 
 the greater part of them astride of donkeys. They assem- 
 bled at an early hour at one of the gates and marched ia 
 procession to the Tor degli Schiavi, that fine ruin on the 
 
 167 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Campagna, where they breakfasted and then went on to 
 Cervara. The caves there are exceedingly picturesque, cut 
 out of the solid rock, and here they danced, acted httle 
 plays, and rode most entertaining races — fifty or sixty 
 horses and asses, with gayly decorated riders, speeding 
 up and down a meadow for an hour or so, while the lookers- 
 on dotting the hillsides applauded uproariously. Our party, 
 a jolly crowd of intimate friends, took our lunch under the 
 shadow of a great rock, prolonging it until twilight fell, 
 when an immense dragon crawled heavily out of one of the 
 caverns and, was quickly despatched by a nimble St. George, 
 mounted on a stick, whose comic victory brought the pag- 
 eant to a close. Then home across the lovely Campagna, 
 of which one never tired, its delicate colors ever changing 
 into something even more enchanting. 
 
 When all these festivities were over, and spring had 
 really come, most of the bores — the newspaper correspon- 
 dents, the importunate Americans with their strange de- 
 mands on the Consulate, and the tourists in general — left 
 Rome and we settled down to two calm months of charm- 
 ing weather and the pleasantest life in the world. It was 
 like June at home, every old ruin draped with flowers and 
 the air so sweet that it reminded me of the Danskammer 
 apple-orchard in full bloom. The longer I lived in Rome 
 the more I loved it! 
 
 In the autumn of 1870 the Franco-Prussian War was at 
 its height — the battle of Sedan was on the first of Sep- 
 tember. It seems strange now to remember that the sym- 
 pathies of most Americans were with the Prussians, per- 
 haps because it was the French who had declared war, but 
 partly for the reasons implied in the letter from the Reverend 
 Mr. Nevin given below. Mr. Nevin, rector of the Amer- 
 ican Church in Rome, had tried to join the American Am- 
 bulance Corps in France, as he felt it was his duty to do 
 
 168 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 so on account of the experience he had had in our Civil 
 War, but, for the same reason, he realized just what such 
 an offer implied in the way of hardships and horrors. 
 
 The Reverend Robert J. Nevin to D, M, A. 
 
 Geneva, Sept. 13, 1870. 
 
 ". . . The French empire has gone like a dream. No 
 voice to say a word for it. The Papacy goes the same way, 
 at least its temporal power. Both have provoked their 
 fate, and Christianity is the better for it. The world and 
 the Devil went a little too far this year, at both Paris and 
 Rome, and have come to great grief. I shall consider it 
 a blessing to our social life, even if it come in a sharp dis- 
 guise, if the influence of Paris be so broken that it no longer 
 controls the world's society, and I am willing to sacrifice 
 something in the gayeties, and bonnets, and charming 
 toilettes of our girls. Even if Paris be bombarded I shall 
 not grieve greatly over the vandalism. 
 
 They have not called upon me to come to Paris. I 
 expect the chairman of the American Ambulance Corps 
 skedaddled before he got my letter. Communications seem 
 now to be cut, and I breathe freely. I know it would have 
 been bad to do hospital work, before a winter's work in 
 Rome, but I could not help off'ering to go, so sad were the 
 tales of unrelieved suffering. Now especially, since the ma- 
 turing of affairs in Rome, I am glad not to be called on. I do 
 not anticipate resistance in Rome and hope to hear in a day 
 or two of its quiet occupation by the Italian forces, which 
 will be the surest safeguard against revolution within." 
 
 My wife had a friend in Paris of whom she was very 
 fond, Miss Gabrielle Goff'ard, a niece of M. Chez d'est Anges, 
 who had a lovely country place at Ville Neuve St. George, 
 where we once spent a night, as well as a fine house in Paris. 
 
 169 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 He was not only a distinguished lawyer, a senator, and a 
 commander of the Legion of Honor, but he was a collector 
 of objets d'art, and his house was crowded with splendid 
 things. When the Goffards returned to Paris after the 
 war was over they found their own house uninjured, but 
 there was little left of Ville Neuve St. George — every bit 
 of furniture, bronzes, pictures, and porcelain was either 
 broken or burned. 
 
 When I first visited Italy, in 1859, war was imminent, 
 France and Italy being united against Austria, a»nd as I 
 passed through north Italy I saw troops drilling in every 
 town; in a previous chapter I have spoken of seeing Napo- 
 leon in Paris, on his way to the great victories of Magenta 
 and Solferino. But there was to be a different finish to 
 the war of 1870, though Italy was again to come out on 
 top. The temporal power of the Pope, long tottering to 
 its fall, had been sustained only by the artificial prop of the 
 French army, and when Napoleon was obliged to withdraw 
 his troops from Rome to use them against the Prussians 
 every one knew that the end of the Papal States was near. 
 
 In August, 1870 — a memorable date in the history of 
 Italy — I was staying with my family in Bellagio at the 
 Villa Giulia, a palace on Lake Como belonging to the King 
 of Belgium, at that time used as a hotel. It was a lovely 
 place, surrounded by lawns and gardens, shaded by ancient 
 horse-chestnut trees, and there was such a variety of nice 
 subjects that I spent most of my time sketching. I re- 
 member making a study of a group of peasants' cottages, 
 with ears of yellow corn festooned between the windows 
 in their gray stone walls. Over my head, where I sat, a 
 large fig-tree spread its branches and every now and then 
 dropped a luscious purple fig on the pavement beside me, 
 all ready to be eaten — in fact, they almost dropped into 
 my mouth. 
 
 170 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 Broad grassy avenues led away from the villa, out to the 
 top of the cliffs overlooking the lake, and at the end of one 
 of these avenues I made another sketch, where two weather- 
 beaten stone posts, flanked by giant cypresses, guarded 
 a flight of stone steps that led down to the water. From 
 this spot there was a divine view, across Como to Cadenab- 
 bia and the blue mountains towering above it; but the 
 view from the other end of the avenue was just as lovely. 
 Here was a little Greciai> temple, a sort of summer-house, 
 and I was sitting there one peaceful August morning paint- 
 ing a little picture — I have it still, a smaH steamer plough- 
 ing its way across the blue water, leaving a broad wake 
 behind it. I was thinking what a long, pleasant summer 
 lay before me — thinking of anything rather than war — 
 when a telegram was brought to me summoning me to Rome. 
 War had been declared by the Italian Government against 
 the Papal States, troops were marching toward Rome and 
 were about to attack it. 
 
 As there was at that time no other official in Rome rep- 
 resenting the United States, I felt it my duty to go there 
 at once; so my dreams of a long summer holiday were 
 dashed and I started for Rome, leaving my family at Bel- 
 lagio. 
 
 All went quietly and weH until the third morning, when 
 the train stopped at a little station and the passengers — 
 there were but three — were told that the train could go 
 no further, as the tracks had been torn up by the Italians. 
 We found ourselves on the Campagna, about twenty-five 
 miles from Rome; it was a deserted spot and there were 
 no signs of a conveyance of any sort and nothing to be had 
 to. eat; but after exploring the neighborhood I found a 
 wretched little hut, inhabited by a ragged old peasant, 
 owner of a rickety box-wagon without springs or seats, 
 drawn by a half-starved horse, whose dilapidated harness 
 
 171 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 was tied together with bits of string. As I was at his mercy, 
 I had to promise him an enormous price, I have forgotten 
 what, to induce him to take us to Rome. Then I returned 
 to the train and offered the hospitality of the wagon to 
 my fellow travellers, which they were very glad to accept 
 and cheerfully shared the cost of the wagon with me. They 
 were pleasant young fellows, who proved to be connected 
 with the Austrian Legation at Rome, a little patronizing 
 in their manner, asking me how I expected to get into Rome. 
 I told them that I had my American passport and thought 
 I should have no difficulty, but they seemed doubtful and 
 assured me of their help and protection, as being in the 
 diplomatic service they would certainly have no trouble. 
 
 The driver put strips of rough board across the wagon 
 for seats, and we filled the rest of it with our luggage. It 
 was now about ten o'clock and we went on our way. We 
 had had no breakfast except some luscious black and yellow 
 grapes that a boy brought us on the train, so after a while 
 we were glad to see a little "osteria" with a bush over the 
 door, but it proved to have no wine, nor even bread. The 
 only thing they could give us was three of the smallest 
 eggs I have ever eaten, and when I asked for salt they 
 brought it on a vine leaf, perfectly black, just as it had 
 been dug from the soil; so we stood in the road and quickly 
 devoured our little eggs, saltless and breadless. We could 
 not, like Robert Louis Stevenson's amateur emigrant, "line 
 ourselves" very comfortably with these eggs, and we got 
 nothing more to eat that day. It was scorching hot and 
 the long white road was dusty. The Campagna at that 
 season was burned to a uniform tint of light-tan color, with 
 occasionally a strip of green along the water-courses, but 
 it was beautiful as always, the wide yellow plain dissolv- 
 ing into the blue and pink of the distant mountains. When 
 
 172 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 at last we reached the old Nomentano bridge we saw Rome, 
 dominated by the dome of St. Peter's, and the Italian army, 
 sixty thousand strong, their tents dotting the hills and regi- 
 ments of cavalry drilling on the plain. 
 
 All was bustle and confusion at the Porta Pia, where 
 we wished to enter. The front of the gateway and the walls 
 on either side of it were piled high with sand-bags, and in 
 front of the gate itself and almost obscuring it was an earth- 
 work also strengthened by sand-bags. After a long alter- 
 cation with our driver as to the amount of the "buona 
 mano,'' which in Italy no matter how much you pay is 
 never enough, one glance at my passport by the officials 
 assured me of a prompt and polite invitation to enter; but 
 when my Austrian acquaintances presented their passports 
 their reception was quite different, so our relative positions 
 were altered, and much to their chagrin and in spite of my 
 entreaties and assurances they were obliged to remain out- 
 side of the walls all night, and when I met them in Rome 
 the next day their patronage of me had ceased. But they 
 were good fellows all the same, and I recall our long day 
 together with pleasure in the retrospect. 
 
 Having my apartment all ready at 64 Via Sistina, I felt 
 quite at home. I had my breakfast at the Caffe Greco and 
 my dinner at the Hotel d'Angleterre, and I allowed the 
 keeper of the hotel, as I was his guest, to put up the Amer- 
 ican flag, which he seemed to think would be a protection 
 from the northern invaders. There were no travellers and 
 few Americans; all the studios were closed; one could not 
 communicate with the outer world at all, either by letter 
 or telegraph, and I did not receive any word from my family 
 for several weeks — Rome was hermetically sealed. It was 
 dull and very quiet, but I rather enjoyed it, for I had plenty 
 of time to sketch; and there was little else to do, except 
 
 173 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 to interview stranded Americans who wanted the protec- 
 tion of the American flag; it was surprising how many turned 
 up whom I had never heard of. Among those who asked 
 for protection were the American students at the American 
 College and at the Propaganda, who, of course, had a right 
 to it; and I was as liberal as I could be in according every- 
 body such privileges, but I had to draw the line at the ap- 
 plication of an American lady, the wife of a distinguished 
 Roman official, for she was no longer an American citizen. 
 She was very indignant and threatened to complain to 
 Washington. 
 
 In the summer in most of the Italian cities the shops 
 are closed nearly all day, except early in the morning and 
 in the evening, and the streets are deserted, save for a few 
 people crawling along the shady side of the street, because 
 the Italians fear the sunshine in summer as much as the 
 shade in winter. But even then Rome was unusually quiet. 
 We supposed, as it proved later, that the people as a whole 
 were in favor of the Italian Government, but there were 
 no demonstrations or disturbance, and although the troops 
 were busy drilling they showed no evidence of excite- 
 ment. 
 
 The day before the attack came, I went to the grounds 
 of the Villa Medici, to the top of a hill where one had a 
 view of the encampment of the whole Italian army. This 
 hill is apparently an artificial one, covered with trees and 
 approached by a long flight of steps from the "Bosco," 
 adjoining the other grounds and gardens of the Villa Medici, 
 which is occupied by the French Academy of Rome; over 
 the door of the academy is this inscription: 
 
 "Napoleon le Grand 
 Les Arts reconnaissant.'* 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 The Bosco is a lovely wild overgrown spot, gay with flowers 
 in spring, especially cyclamen, and giving charming vistas 
 between gnarled ilex trees over the old walls of Rome and 
 the Villa Borghese — the very place where one would expect 
 to see nymphs and satyrs sporting in the shade. Although 
 I never met any such charming creatures, one seldom went 
 there without finding some artist sketching, or posing a 
 model under the trees. 
 
 When I arrived at the top of this hill, I found there a 
 number of Papal Zouaves with field-glasses, watching the 
 Italian troops and discussing the result, as they expected 
 an attack soon. The Zouaves were attractive, dashing 
 young fellows, a cosmopolitan lot of all nations, Americans, 
 English, Irish, German, and French, many of them of noble 
 families. These boys chatted very pleasantly, were gay 
 and hopeful and did not seem at all cast down at the prospect 
 of a battle with a great army. Poor fellows, they did not 
 realize what humiliation a day would bring forth for them. 
 
 Early next morning at five o'clock, on September 20, 
 1870, heavy cannonading began. Calvi became much ex- 
 cited, and said that he felt very warlike and that it was 
 grand, and suggested that we should go up on the roof and 
 see the fun; but when we reached there, although the noise 
 was deafening, for the firing was quite near, we could see 
 nothing because of the intervening buildings. In a few 
 minutes something whizzed through the air right between 
 us and he exclaimed: 
 
 "What was that?" 
 
 I said, "A bullet." 
 
 Whereupon he said he did not feel so much interested 
 after all and suggested that we descend, which we accord- 
 ingly did, and as we went down through the skylight we 
 saw where a bullet had lodged in the casing through which 
 
 175 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 we had just come up. We found later that a shell had burst 
 in the Terrys' apartment and done a good deal of damage. 
 Calvi and I then walked out through the Via Sfstfna 
 to the Piazza Barberini, where the ground was strewn with 
 bits of shell, some of which we picked up. The firing by 
 this time had ceased; it lasted in all only about two hours. 
 From the Piazza we walked up toward the Porta Pia and 
 on the way passed the Villa Buonaparte, through the grounds 
 of which the Italians had entered at ten o'clock by a gap- 
 ing fissure that they had soon made in the old Roman wall, 
 which was not at all prepared for modern artillery. I saw 
 there a Papal Zouave lying dead on his back under an ilex 
 bush near the gate. Nearby was one of those long, narrow, 
 straight, paved streets with a tiny sidewalk and high walls 
 on either side, and this was lined on both sides as far as 
 one could see, perhaps a quarter of a mile, with Italian 
 bersaglieri, in single file, with their rifles grounded. Pres- 
 ently there appeared the Papal Zouaves, without arms, 
 marching two and two, very much dishevelled, among them 
 my acquaintances of the day before; and as they passed 
 the Italians kept shouting, "Viva Italia!" and ** Verdi!" 
 which stands for Vittorio Emanuele Re d' Italia, and mak- 
 ing a singular rolling sound under their tongues that was 
 like distant thunder, spitting on the Zouaves and thump- 
 ing the butts of their guns on their toes and off'ering them 
 every indignity. It was pitiful to see these poor fellows 
 hopping about to avoid the blows; it was shocking and 
 humiliating. Among them was a young man whom I had 
 often seen, Charette, who belonged to a noble family — 
 one lock of his black hair was perfectly white and he was 
 said to be very proud of this, as it had descended in his 
 family as a distinguishing mark for many generations: he, 
 poor fellow, was hopping about and trying to protect his 
 
 176 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 toes with the rest. The next day the Zouaves were all as- 
 sembled in the great Square of St. Peter's and expelled 
 from Rome and we never saw them more. The whole affair 
 was very different from the gallant defense of the Quattro 
 Venti of Rome by Garibaldi in 1849. 
 
 As soon as it was known that Rome had surrendered, 
 there was a perfect irruption of Italian flags; the colors 
 seemed to float from every window and above every tower — 
 the people had evidently been making and secreting them 
 for a long while. Crowds paraded up and down the streets, 
 mad with joy. The soldiers, looking very friendly and 
 cheerful, were welcomed and embraced, kissed and cheered 
 by every one they met, and the public squares were soon 
 filled with cavalry horses tethered to every projection, 
 and piles of hay and other fodder scattered all over the 
 pavements. It looked like war, although there had been 
 little of a real battle. 
 
 The streets soon assumed their normal condition, ex- 
 cept that there were no more gorgeous cardinal's carriages 
 or papal processions; but, instead, the Royal Guard of 
 Prince Humbert, mostly Roman nobles, in their gay uni- 
 forms and mounted on splendid horses, or troops of ber- 
 saglieri, with their great black hats plumed with cocks' 
 feathers, trotting along at double quick — as the old song says: 
 
 "Vol altri bersaglieri, 
 Ch'avete le gambe buone, 
 Andiamo pigliar Roma!" 
 
 Yes, Rome had changed. It had jumped from the mid- 
 dle ages into the present and, alas ! lost much of its pic- 
 turesqueness. But there is no doubt that the people were 
 delighted at the change. The vote for the Italian Govern- 
 ment was forty-five thousand for and forty-five against. 
 
 177 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 With the advent of the Italians the population was 
 soon increased by sixty thousand and it was difficult to 
 house the newcomers; so much so, that there was a wild 
 speculation in land and building. New shops were opened 
 and remained open on Sunday — Papal Rome was the most 
 moral city, in appearance, that I have ever known — in- 
 deed, ultimately so many houses were built that the supply 
 outran the demand, land decreased in value, and some of 
 the new buildings were never completed. In this specu- 
 lation many of the nobility were involved with disastrous 
 results, among them the Borghese, who, I understand, 
 were almost ruined. 
 
 Rome was not actually made the capital of Italy until 
 the next summer, and then there were great rejoicings 
 throughout the country. We were in Venice at the time. 
 Flags were hung from every window, meeting and crossing 
 in an archway over the narrow streets, San Marco was 
 wonderfully illuminated, and everywhere little printed 
 bills were stuck up expressing sympathy with Victor Em- 
 manuel. One of these read: ''Glory to God for having 
 given such long life to Pius IX that he is able to see Rome 
 made the capital of Italy." 
 
 After the taking of Rome the Vatican was closed to 
 sightseers, and only a few permits were given me by Car- 
 dinal Antonelli; so few that it made it rather awkward 
 for me having to discriminate among all the Americans 
 who clamored for them. 
 
 An old prophecy had foretold the destruction of Rome 
 by an earthquake on the tenth of November, 1870, and a 
 good many people were really anxious until that day had 
 passed with nothing worse than a very bad thunder-storm. 
 Another prophecy declared that no Pope could rule longer 
 than St. Peter's twenty-five years, so although Pio Nono 
 
 178 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 was Pope much longer than that, they said that it did not 
 really count, as he had lost his temporal power. 
 
 King Victor Emmanuel never came to live in Rome, but 
 merely visited it for a short time, when he had an uproari- 
 ously enthusiastic reception. I saw him drive through the 
 Via Sistina, accompanied by a military guard. He was a 
 very fat, red-faced man, of regal manner, bowing grandly 
 right and left as he passed. 
 
 Shortly after Rome was taken, I was promoted from 
 being Consul to the Papal States to be Consul-General for 
 Italy at Rome. This increased my work a great deal, as 
 the consul-general has charge of all communications from 
 the consuls, including the forwarding of all accounts of 
 their offices to the department of state at Washington, 
 and he has to see that all such reports are correct before 
 forwarding them — at least that was the way in my time. 
 Mr. Marsh, the American Minister, resided in Florence 
 and did not come to Rome until the following year; so I 
 still remained in charge of the Legation and attended to 
 any business connected therewith, both with the Vatican 
 and the Italian Government. 
 
 One of these extra duties of mine, usually performed 
 by an accredited minister, was presenting Americans to 
 Prince Humbert and Princess Margherita, who had come 
 at once to Rome and established their court at the Quirinal. 
 I presented a great many that winter, and I also continued 
 to present my countrymen to the Pope. Both Prince Hum- 
 bert and Princess Margherita were simple and gracious at 
 their receptions; she struck me as especially charming — 
 young and handsome, with a most sweet expression. 
 
 I had a private audience with Prince Humbert, going 
 one afternoon by appointment to the Quirinal. After regis- 
 tering my name in an anteroom, an attendant took me to 
 
 179 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 the prince's library, where the prince was sitting alone; 
 he immediately got up and shook hands with me and asked 
 me to take a seat, and, as he was smoking, offered me a cigar. 
 We talked about twenty minutes before I got up to go, when 
 he walked with me to the open fireplace, where we warmed 
 ourselves and he continued to smoke and talk, and when 
 I left he went ahead of me to the door and opened it him- 
 self. It was just like any pleasant call of one American 
 gentleman on another. Outside a single attendant was 
 waiting and walked with me to the gate. I often saw Prince 
 Humbert riding at the Hunt on the Campagna. The horse 
 that he habitually rode was an immense animal, seventeen 
 hands high, that looked as if it could, jump anything, but 
 I heard that he was not allowed to take any chances and 
 that he was obliged to ride with circumspection, so royalty 
 has its drawbacks in this as in many other ways. 
 
 The opening of the first Parliament in Rome was an 
 important event which many grandees attended. The Em- 
 peror of Brazil was present in the royal box. He was a 
 fine-looking man in civilian dress set off* by a pair of bright 
 green gloves with immensely long fingers. 
 
 Mrs, Armstrong to Her Mother 
 
 Rome, April 17, 1871. 
 ". . . Last Thursday I was presented to the Pope. I 
 went with the Wetherills and took little Margaret. A great 
 many persons were presented; we all waited in a large 
 hall, and the Pope came in and went around the room, 
 saying a few words to each person as their names were told 
 him. He took little Margaret right up in his arms, and 
 then she kissed his hand. Then he went to one end of the 
 room and made a little address and blessed us all, and all 
 the rosaries, crosses, etc., that we had with us, and our 
 
 180 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 families and our travels. I had a number of rosaries, which 
 the servants at home will value. He is a very fine-looking 
 old man, sweet and pleasant in his manner. His eye is 
 bright and keen still and he does not look at all infirm or 
 broken-down. 
 
 The next evening Maitland and I went to a party at 
 the Quirinal. When we first went in we were received by 
 the Princess, and after a little while she led the way, through 
 a handsome suite of rooms, to a pretty little theatre where 
 we had private theatricals, a little Italian play and two 
 in French. The acting was very good indeed, and between 
 the acts ices were handed. When the play was over the 
 Princess went first and we all followed her through some 
 other handsome rooms to the supper-room, an immense 
 place with a table all around three sides, so that we could 
 all sit down. We had a dehcious supper, the waiters were 
 all behind the tables and handed everything. After supper 
 the Princess bid good evening and left first, then we all 
 came away. 
 
 The other morning, before I was up, Mrs. Wilcoxen 
 rushed over to ask me to come at once to see her baby as 
 it was very ill. I hurried, but before I got there the baby 
 was better. I don't know what they would do if they were 
 to lose that baby." 
 
 Mrs. Wilcoxen and Miss Niles were Americans, the 
 daughters of Doctor Niles, who left them an enormous 
 fortune, but only for life unless they had children. Mrs. 
 Wilcoxen had been married for many years when the child 
 of whom my wife speaks was born. If this little heir had 
 not appeared on the scene, the property would have been 
 inherited by a cousin, a young man who was with them in 
 Rome. My wife once laughingly said to Miss Niles: "I 
 
 i8i 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 should think you would be afraid your cousin would want 
 to poison the baby." But she answered quite seriously, 
 "Oh, no, he is Jar too good!" 
 
 Miss Niles afterward married General Badeau, and her 
 wedding in New York was a tremendous affair. She and 
 her sister were twins and were supposed to be the originals 
 of the twins in Eugene Sue's ''Wandering Jew." 
 
 The Reverend Robert J. Nevin was appointed rector of 
 the American Church in Rome about the same time that I 
 went there in 1869, and remained there until his death, in 
 1906. He was about thirty, having lately entered the minis- 
 try, his ordination being delayed by his service in the Civil 
 War as captain of a battery in the United States army, 
 where he distinguished himself. He was a charming and 
 interesting gentleman, a gallant, manly fellow, full of enthu- 
 siasm and energy. 
 
 The Papal government did not allow any Protestant 
 services to be held inside the walls of Rome, except at some 
 of the foreign legations, so the American Chapel was out- 
 side the walls, very near the Porta del Popolo and opposite 
 the entrance to the Villa Borghese. It was a large upper 
 room, furnished with chancel and altar, always well filled 
 and in the season thronged with Americans. When the 
 Italian Government came to Rome, Doctor Nevin decided 
 to raise funds to purchase land and build a church within 
 the walls, to be called St. Paul's. There is no church inside 
 the walls of Rome dedicated to St. Paul, and Pere Hya- 
 cinthe remarked that it was strange that the apostle should 
 have found his way back into the Eternal City ''via Amer- 
 ica." When it came to buying the land in Rome and a 
 site on the Via Nazionale was selected, it was found neces- 
 sary to buy a much larger plot than was needed for the 
 church alone; so several of the American residents clubbed 
 
 182 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 together, myself among the number, and took a deed for 
 the rest of the plot. I remained an owner of this bit of 
 the Eternal City for several years, but on leaving Rome 
 I sold my share to William Haseltine, another of the orig- 
 inal purchasers. In digging the foundation of the church 
 many interesting objects were discovered, among them some 
 very large amphorse, one of which was presented to Grace 
 Church, New York, I believe by Miss Wolfe, and now stands 
 in the rectory grounds. It is a curious change of scene for 
 this old jar, that once heard the rumble of Roman chariot 
 wheels and now echoes to the jangling bells of Broadway's 
 cable-cars. 
 
 Miss Catherine Lorillard Wolfe was a liberal friend 
 of St. Paul's and also of Grace Church, when Bishop Henry 
 C. Potter was rector. Doctor Nevin and Doctor Potter 
 were very intimate and in Rome were seen together con- 
 stantly. The Romans nicknamed them "Romulus and 
 Remus," because they were both **suckled by a Wolf." 
 
 I held every position in the American Church at Rome 
 except that of rector. I was clerk of the vestry, treasurer, 
 senior warden, and vestryman, and in Doctor Nevin's ab- 
 sence had to hunt up stray clergymen to officiate in his place. 
 
 Nevin had hosts of warm friends and a large acquaint- 
 ance among distinguished people throughout Europe. Not 
 only was he celebrated for his genial hospitality — always 
 giving his guests the choicest vintages, for he was one of 
 the best judges of wine in Italy — but no man was ever more 
 kind-hearted and generous to the poor of all denominations. 
 There was a great deal of typhoid one winter in Rome and 
 Mr. Nevin spent night after night sitting up with sick people, 
 for we had no trained nurses in those days; not long after 
 this, he raised some money to get trained nurses in Rome, 
 such as they already had in England. 
 
 183 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 He was a discriminating collector of objects of art in 
 a large way, making the most of the great opportunities 
 he had during his long residence in Italy, which he knew 
 from end to end, and bringing together many fine pictures 
 of the primitive school, as well as books, marbles, china, 
 glass — anything that caught his fancy. I believe that for 
 a Bellini of his, inherited by a relation in America, he was 
 offered two hundred thousand dollars. He was a fine horse- 
 man and together we explored the Campagna pretty thor- 
 oughly, but he did not think it expedient for a clergyman 
 to ride at the hunt and never did so. He was a mighty 
 hunter and traveller throughout Europe, in India, and the 
 wilds of America and Mexico, spending several vacations 
 hunting grizzlies in the Rocky Mountains. In South Africa 
 he knew Cecil Rhodes, who gave him every facility for 
 hunting big game, and one fine summer he spent in the 
 Olympic Mountains with Waldo Story. As a result his 
 collection of heads and hunting trophies was nearly un- 
 equalled. 
 
 I have many pleasant associations with Doctor Nevin. 
 One summer we took a long walk, with Henry Van Schaick 
 of New York, through the mountains from IschI, starting 
 at daylight and getting back to IschI at eleven at night, 
 having accomplished forty-two miles. We visited the beau- 
 tiful Konigsee together, and saw a chamois far up the moun- 
 tainside, and we went to Munich and Augsburg and picked 
 up some nice bits of old stained glass. The Franco-Prus- 
 sian War was just breaking out and we found all the pic- 
 tures and statues in the art galleries of Munich had been 
 moved away and hidden, for fear that the French would 
 imitate the great Napoleon and carry them off" to France — 
 the Germans were not then so sure of the conquest that 
 they afterward achieved. 
 
 184 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 Doctor Nevin to D, M, A,, Rome 
 
 New York, June, 1872. 
 . • . Oh my dear fellow, you cannot imagine how 
 infinitely flat N. Y. society is after Rome. No lions, no 
 distinguished literati, artists, or soldiers. All young people 
 who talk about the same things and are apt to give you 
 their impressions of the Rhine and the Colosseum, as a 
 novelty in conversation, if they happen to have been across 
 the Atlantic. Be careful. Do nothing that will precipitate 
 you rashly into this city. 
 
 Doctor Nevin to D. M. A., New York 
 
 Rome, March, 1874. 
 
 "... Last Sunday I was forced into a controversial 
 attitude by a series of miserably evasive and disingenuous 
 sermons which M'gr Capel has been preaching. I think 
 I have brought around to their bearings two or three women 
 whom CapeFs eyes had been unsettling in their faith, and 
 General McCIellan came in to-day to thank me. I met 
 Capel at Mrs. Bruce's that evening — a large party, M'gr 
 Howard, now Archb'p, being present. They being two to 
 one, and Bishops at that, they undertook to put me down, 
 the more so as they were trying to capture two of the guests 
 present. After they got tired of firing bombs at me I felt 
 free to prick them with uncomfortable questions. 
 
 As soon as the soup was off, Mrs. Bruce began by say- 
 ing that she heard M'gr Capel hadn't done much this trip, 
 that it had hardly paid him for coming. But he assured 
 her he had seven persons under instruction, one an impor- 
 tant man, a member of the Gov't, and turned to me with: 
 
 *I really think, my dear Mr. Nevin, the wisest thing 
 you could do would be to become the eighth.' 
 
 185 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 I contented myself with saying that I hoped, in the 
 interests of Christianity, all the seven were Unitarians 
 or Quakers, (in allusion to Mrs. Hicks, who is reported to 
 have entered our Church and to be on the point of marry- 
 ing Dr. Howland,) which he took perfectly and seemed to 
 enjoy in private, no one else understanding it. 
 
 Theodore Roosevelt has promised us $500. Crownin- 
 shield is my staunchest friend; there is something very 
 manly and true about him. Ticknor runs the Union Chapel 
 under Mrs. Gould. No one married here since Miss Craw- 
 ford, though at one time we had some hopes of Wurts. Miss 
 Annie, that was, is said to be keeping up a perpetual cooing 
 with her young man in a cottage by the sea near Naples." 
 
 Via Napoli 58, Rome, Match, 1898. 
 
 "... Pierpont Morgan is here and has been with me 
 the last hour. It is wonderful the certainty of his think- 
 ing in business matters. He is chairman of our trustees. 
 We have had no meeting for three years, and a lot of ques- 
 tions had come up that perplexed me; he settled every- 
 thing at sight, hitting instantly conclusions which it had 
 taken me much thinking to reach. It is discouraging. How- 
 ever, I can ride a horse or shoot a rifle better than he can. 
 
 Ward is mounting my S. African heads in London, stein- 
 bock, roan and sable antelope, hartebeeste, wildebeeste, 
 and giraff'e; I foohshly did not bring back any zebra skins. 
 Do come and spend next winter in Rome." 
 
 Rome, July 4, 1900. 
 "... When the glass was put in Grace Church Dr. 
 
 had conceived the idea of having each window by a diff'er- 
 ent artist, and in a diff'erent style, 'so as to represent in 
 a Catholic way the art of the ages.' I am afraid he has 
 
 186 
 
ROME— CHURCH AND STATE 
 
 not grown much beyond this; like many great men he sticks 
 to his ideals though they might better be relegated to the 
 past. 
 
 I have the Fourth of July dinner — ^the German Am- 
 bassador, the Ministers of England, France, Belgium, etc., 
 and Baron Blanc, the Italian sec. of foreign affairs. I hope 
 they will all keep the peace. The Chinese business has 
 made things very sensitive over here. England begins 
 to see how heavy will be her bill for the Chamberlain raid 
 on the Transvaal, and Russia and Germany are sailing 
 ahead, delighted to see England in a back seat, and awak- 
 ening mistrust all along the line. Don't invest in foreign 
 securities just now, and keep our Government out of any 
 combined war on China. 
 
 Haseltine's death has caused a sad gap here. Give my 
 love to Marshall and cheer him up, and greet all the good 
 *Centurians.' 
 
 Affectionately yours, R. J. Nevin." 
 
 St. Paul's is a fine Gothic edifice, built from Street's 
 designs, the stained glass by Clayton & Bell, and the mosaics 
 by Salviati of Venice from the designs of Burne-Jones — 
 altogether a noble monument to the memory of Doctor 
 Nevin its founder. He died alone in Mexico, where he was 
 travelling when his end came; I do not even know where 
 he is buried. It was sad that he could not lie in Rome, 
 the scene of his long, useful, and happy life, in the lovely 
 spot hallowed by the ashes of Shelley and Keats, under 
 the shadow of the dark cypress trees and the pyramid of 
 Caius Cestius. 
 
 187 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 SOME ROMAN FRIENDS 
 
 E le campane si sentono sonare, 
 
 E si sente sonare in cielo e in Roma. 
 
 One of my first duties on reaching Rome in October, 
 1869, was to care for the effects of Thomas H. Hotchkiss, 
 an American artist who had lately died in Sicily. I had 
 never known Hotchkiss but he had many warm friends, 
 among them Coleman and Vedder, who spoke of him with 
 admiration and affection. He was a landscape painter, 
 and his pictures of the Roman Campagna, to which he 
 devoted years of study, are not only true to nature but 
 wonderful in drawing and color and filled with the most 
 delightful feeling and sentiment. Even his important pic- 
 tures were painted, I believe, entirely out of doors. He 
 was quiet and retiring and but little known, because he 
 was absorbed in study from nature, and he painted few 
 large pictures; indeed, he produced little in that way until 
 a year or two before his death. When he was just on the 
 threshold of fame he died suddenly, leaving literally thou- 
 sands of sketches. He had a great future before him and was 
 one of the most promising artists America has produced. 
 
 I know little of his life and learned that little from the 
 friends who loved him. He was born at Hudson, New York, 
 of very poor and very ignorant parents, and his childhood 
 was not a happy one. Even when very young he showed 
 talent for painting, in which it is needless to say he had 
 no encouragement. He once went to a country fair and 
 
 188 
 
SOME ROMAN FRIENDS 
 
 bought some paints and brushes, but when he took them 
 home his family destroyed them, thinking that they were 
 implements for gambling. He was still a little boy when 
 they put him to work in a brick-yard, and being a delicate 
 child the hard work and exposure, and perhaps insufficient 
 food, planted the seeds of the malady that ultimately caused 
 his death. As soon as he was able to escape from this slavery 
 he fled to New York in opposition to the wishes of his family, 
 who cut him off and never had anything more to do with 
 him. He was friendless, but happening to know the pic- 
 tures of the late A. B. Durand, he appealed to him, and 
 Mr. Durand befriended him and allowed him to work in 
 his studio. How and why he came to Rome, which thence- 
 forward was his home, I do not know. One of his first- 
 rate things, a view of the Tor degli Schiavi in the Campagna, 
 was bought by the late Charles H. Marshall, of New York; 
 and another, a mountain view near Perugia, is owned by 
 William H. Herriman, of Rome. But his chief fame was 
 among artists. 
 
 Some of his finest work was done at Taormina, where 
 a favorite subject was that most beautiful ruin in the world, 
 the Greek Theatre. A few of its marble columns are still 
 standing in front of the great amphitheatre, but its chief 
 glory is the wonderful view seen through and beyond its 
 gigantic red brick arches and walls, relieved against the 
 turquoise sea and sky. The lovely coast-line of the straits 
 of Messina winds away for miles; Point Naxos of the Greeks 
 is in the foreground; and beyond lies the broad undulating 
 plain, variegated with the many-tinted verdure of almond 
 orchards and vineyards; and still beyond are the slopes 
 and peaks of Mount Etna, rising ten thousand feet above 
 the sea, shining white with snow like Mont Blanc, with 
 wreaths of smoke from the crater drifting across the sky — 
 
 189 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 altogether, one of the most entrancing and romantic views 
 on earth, never the same, always changing, always beau- 
 tiful. 
 
 It was here that Hotchkiss was spending the summer 
 of 1869 with John RoIIin Tilton, the artist, when he died 
 of a hemorrhage of the lungs. It was at night, Tilton heard 
 a slight sound and went to him, and he died in a few mo- 
 ments in his arms. When I was in Taormina a few years 
 ago I asked the old ''custode" if he remembered Thomas 
 Hotchkiss. His face lighted when he said that he well re- 
 membered **Signor Tommaso," and also "il signor inglese," 
 meaning Tilton. Saying, **I will show you where he lived 
 and died," he led me to a small stone house that stands on 
 the highest point of the theatre, and showed me the room, 
 now used as a museum for art objects found in the place and 
 filled with delicate broken bas-rehefs, fragments of statues 
 and marbles, jars and other ancient bits — all quiet and 
 peaceful, the winjdows looking out over the wide landscape 
 that he knew so well, a fit setting for the spot where that 
 fine soul passed away. He fills a nameless grave at Mes- 
 sina, for it was never marked by a stone and the earth- 
 quake has probably obliterated the cemetery, but his body 
 has mingled with the soil of the Italy that he loved and 
 depicted so beautifully. He was a great painter and it is 
 pathetic that so few know anything about him, not even 
 his name. 
 
 When I came to look into his afi'airs I found that he 
 had some debts in Rome, so I had an auction sale to which 
 all the artists flocked, for he had collected many valuable 
 things during his long residence in Rome. The prices ob- 
 tained were so high that a sufficient sum was soon realized 
 to pay all his debts, and the rest of his things were sent to 
 New York and sold by the public administrator. As Hotch- 
 
 190 
 
SOME ROMAN FRIENDS 
 
 kiss was little known there, they sold for trifling sums, but 
 this made no diff^erence, as I believe his family felt so bitterly 
 toward his memory that they declined to receive the money 
 and it went to the State. 
 
 Among his eff'ects were two most interesting pictures, 
 attributed to Piero di Cosimo. The National Gallery had 
 off'ered Hotchkiss a large price for them, which he had re- 
 fused, and when his sale was held in Rome many of the 
 artists hoped to buy them, and were much disappointed 
 to find that they were, to be sent to New York. I wrote 
 to my friend Robert Gordon to look out for them and buy 
 them, which he did, and presented them to the Metropolitan 
 Museum. This was during the reign of General di Cesnola, 
 who appreciated them so little that he put them in the 
 cellar, where they remained for more than thirty years en- 
 tirely forgotten, until about ten years ago, when they were 
 discovered and brought to hght, being heralded as a re- 
 markable discovery and making quite a sensation. No 
 one knew where they had come from. As I was familiar 
 with them — they had hung in my office in Rome for nearly 
 a year — I wrote an account of them in the New York Times, 
 and they were pronounced by experts to be certainly by 
 Piero di Cosimo. They may now be seen in the Museum, 
 and are in excellent preservation, never having been re- 
 stored. They are painted on wooden panels each about 
 eight feet long; one a woodland scene, with satyrs and 
 monkeys, and the other a rocky shore, with figures landing 
 from galleys. Browning lived in the Palazzo Barberini 
 when Hotchkiss had his studio there, so that he doubtless 
 knew Hotchkiss, and I have amused myself by thinking 
 that his poem, "Over the sea our galleys went," might have 
 been inspired by one of these interesting pictures. 
 
 Among other valuable things in Hotchkiss's studio were 
 
 191 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 several very large and beautiful Etruscan vases, which had 
 been acquired by him in a curious way. He happened to 
 be sketching on the Campagna one day, near where some 
 men were digging out an old tomb, looking for buried 
 treasure. When they left in the evening, he entered the 
 tomb and chanced to lean against the wall, which gave way 
 and disclosed another chamber containing these magnificent 
 vases. He immediately returned to Rome, got a cab, drove 
 out there and secured them. These vases were also sent to 
 New York and what became of them I do not know ; they 
 were probably bought by some one who did not realize their 
 value, which was a pity, as they were museum pieces. 
 
 Speaking of the MetropoHtan Museum reminds me 
 of a peaceful Sunday morning in Rome, when I was sitting 
 in the garden of the Palazzo Zuccari, my little children 
 playing about me — a garden surrounded by high moss- 
 grown walls, over which hung orange trees covered with 
 fruit, with beds of purple violets under them. From the 
 garden some steps led down into the Via Gregoriana, through 
 a green door set in the open mouth of a huge rococo head; 
 any one famihar with Rome will remember it. 
 
 I had been thinking for some time that an art museum 
 in New York was a sorely needed thing, and on this lovely 
 morning the idea came to me that it would be a good plan 
 to write to Robert Gordon, in New York, and tell him what 
 I thought a museum ought to be and urge him to take the 
 matter up; so I inflicted on him about twenty pages. Not 
 long after, I heard from him that the good work was really 
 to be begun, and when I returned to New York I found 
 the Museum already established in the old Douglas Cruger 
 house in Fourteenth Street. Of course, when I wrote to 
 Gordon the project was already in the air, but it is a pleasure 
 to feel that I was one of the first to suggest it. 
 
 192 
 
SOME ROMAN FRIENDS 
 
 It was a pity that a scheme I had at that time could 
 not have been carried out. I suggested that a room in the 
 new Museum should be decorated and furnished like a real 
 "cinque cento" room, where various articles of that period 
 could be arranged as if they were actually in use. As I 
 wrote to Mr. Gordon: *'The ordinary museum displays 
 its treasures in a white-walled room, with huge windows 
 letting in a blaze of light; here in a row of prosaic glass 
 cases the poor antiques lie and shine like flowers torn up 
 by the roots." 
 
 Such rooms as I had in mind, showing the every-day 
 life of a period, are to be seen in many museums now; but 
 if the Metropolitan had taken up my idea then, and bought 
 the necessary fittings, such as woodwork, stained glass, 
 tapestry, etc., many rare and wonderful things could have 
 been secured — such objets d'art were cheap fifty years ago. 
 
 Mr. Gordon was one of the founders of the Metropolitan 
 Museum and the treasurer for many years. He is one of 
 my oldest friends. In a letter I got from him two or three 
 years ago. he mentions that *Hhe first dollar ever given to 
 the Museum" had been given by him. Not long ago he 
 gave the Museum a fine picture by Wyant, at the same 
 time presenting a beautiful picture by Sanford Giff'ord to 
 the Century Club, of which he is a member. Mr. Gordon, 
 Joseph H. Choate, and Theodore Weston are the only ones 
 left of the original founders of the Museum. 
 
 In 1869, Rome was the Mecca of American artists and 
 there was a large colony of them there, many of whom were 
 very successful, as American art was then the fashion. 
 Among the painters were Elihu Vedder, Charles Caryl 
 Coleman, William Haseltine, Charles Dix, George H. Yewell, 
 George Inness, T. Buchanan Read, Frederick Crownin- 
 shield, William Graham, William Gedney Bunce, John 
 
 193 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 RoIIin Tflton, George Healy, and Messrs. Freeman, Terry, 
 and Chapman, about most of whom I shall have something 
 to say in detail. The two last named were members of 
 the old Sketch Club of New York, out of which grew the 
 Century Club. 
 
 Healy painted a nice portrait of my little Margaret 
 in Rome, more successful than his portraits of children 
 usually were, though he painted men well. She did not 
 mind sitting, for he kept her amused in all sorts of funny 
 ways, such as wearing a pen-wiper in the shape of a doll 
 on top of his head all the time he was painting. Healy 
 painted any number of celebrities, among others Pio Nono. 
 I got Mrs. Freeman to take a cast of little Margaret's hand 
 in plaster and I have it still — a dear little hand. 
 
 The sculptors included William W. Story, Randolph 
 Rogers, Franklin Simmons, Miss Harriet Hosmer, and many 
 others — the late lamented Rhinehart being the most promis- 
 ing and talented of them all. In fact, there were so many 
 of them that we thought there was to be a great revival 
 of sculpture in America, but none of it came to much. 
 Mozier, the American sculptor, who lived in Rome for about 
 twenty years, died while he was crossing the St. Gothard 
 Pass and was buried in Rome while I was there. 
 
 Miss Hosmer was a pupil of Gibson, the famous Eng- 
 lish sculptor. In 1859 ^ went to his studio in Rome to see 
 his ** Tinted Venus," that everybody was talking about. 
 It was making a great sensation in the art world and as 
 I was too young not to be influenced by the general opinion 
 I was much impressed. It was colored so like life that when 
 the man took off' the cloth the creature really seemed to 
 be alive — it must have been an awful thing! Gibson, I 
 fancy, made stacks of money out of it, for he charged seven 
 hundred pounds for cutting a copy. 
 
 Randolph Rogers was in his glory in 1869, a handsome, 
 
 194 
 
SOME ROMAN FRIENDS 
 
 shaggy man with a leonine head. He had lately made a 
 statue of Nydia, the blind girl of Pompeii, which had a 
 great popular success, particularly among Americans, who 
 ordered many replicas for their houses. She was depicted 
 as listening intently, groping her way with a staff. I once 
 went to his studio and saw seven Nydias, all in a row, all 
 listening, all groping, and seven Italian marble-cutters at 
 work cutting them out. It was a gruesome sight. 
 
 But Rogers's most profitable trade was in soldiers' monu- 
 ments; after the Civil War he had orders from towns all 
 over the United States. These monuments were all pretty 
 much alike, usually consisting of a shaft in the centre with 
 realistic military figures at the four corners, and as they 
 were situated far apart and were not likely to be compared 
 with one another the figures also were generally "much 
 of a muchness," but could always be distinguished from 
 each other by the weapons they carried. Infantry, for 
 instance, was armed with a rifle; cavalry with a sabre; 
 artillery with a rammer; while a naval hero was supported 
 by an anchor, or some other nautical emblem. It was part 
 of my duty, when a monument was finished, to examine 
 it and give a consular certificate, stating that it was the 
 work of an American artist resident abroad, in order that 
 it might pass through the United States Custom House 
 free of duty. So Rogers would show me the work and give 
 me the necessary description; but even he himself was 
 sometimes confused as to the rank or calling of the various 
 figures, particularly if they were not yet armed with their 
 distinctive weapons. I remember his once being in doubt 
 and calling to his attendant, "Giuseppe, what is this?" 
 Whereupon Giuseppe promptly supplied the vacant hand 
 with a rammer and Rogers said: "Ah, I see, it is artillery, 
 it is all right." 
 
 But he was a good fellow, perfectly frank and straight- 
 
 195 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 forward about his work, with so many pleasant qualities 
 that one readily pardoned him for treating his work rather 
 as a trade than an art. He was, I think, entirely devoid 
 of artistic feeling in regard to antique things and freely ex- 
 pressed his pity for all of us who were wasting our time and 
 money in collecting such "objets d'art." I remember once 
 showing him a fifteenth century plaque, decorated with a 
 graceful little figure, beautifully posed and freely drawn 
 by some old painter, and he criticised it mercilessly, seeing 
 no beauty in it. 
 
 "Look at that leg!" he said. "How badly drawn it 
 is !" — and, in a way, he was right, but to one with the eye 
 of an artist it was charming. 
 
 Once at Perugia, where Rogers was spending the sum- 
 mer with a little colony of American artists, Coleman, 
 Yewell, Vedder, and others, all of whom were enthusiastic 
 collectors of "roba antica," he and George Inness picked 
 up what they considered the most hideous piece of old pot- 
 tery imaginable and with much formality presented it, 
 as a joke, to one of the ladies of the party; but it turned 
 out quite the other way — she was delighted to have it. 
 
 Many of my friends had studios in the Via Margutta, 
 a little street running along the foot of the Pincian Hill, 
 where there was a settlement of artists from all parts of 
 the world. I painted at times in the studios of Coleman 
 and Vedder and worked in the evenings in the life school, 
 called "Gigi's Academy," which was a good-sized, semi- 
 circular amphitheatre, seating about a hundred students. 
 Gigi was the proprietor — I never knew his surname — but 
 all he did was to exact his fee each month and provide a 
 good light, heat, and a model, and also — for two soldi — 
 large hunks of coarse bread, called "moulika," for rubbing 
 out marks. The model was sometimes a young woman 
 
 196 
 
SOME ROMAN FRIENDS 
 
 clothed only in a mask, or sometimes without it; sometimes 
 a naked Arab, or a peasant boy. We had no regular ar- 
 tistic criticism, but worked out our own salvation as best 
 we could, except that we profited by the very frank opinions 
 of our neighbors, usually more wholesome than compli- 
 mentary. We had, however, the very real advantage of 
 seeing the work of others, some of it very fine. Many great 
 painters had worked there, among them Fortuny and Vil- 
 legas. Fred Crowninshield was usually my companion 
 on these occasions; he would stop at my house in the eve- 
 ning and we would go off to Gigi's together. I remember 
 a pleasant party that Mrs. Crowninshield gave one winter, 
 with a puppet show and "Jarley's Waxworks," in which 
 the part of Mrs. Jarley was taken by Miss Louisa Alcott, 
 who made most amusing impromptu speeches about the 
 different characters. Crowninshield was Director of the 
 American Academy in Rome for some years. 
 
 Elihu Vedder, whose studio was at 33 Via Margutta, 
 was then as always a most delightful companion — witty, 
 unusual, and interesting. When an American visitor to 
 his studio was guilty of the usual trite remark, "I don't 
 know anything about art, but I know what I like," Vedder 
 replied, "So do the beasts that perish !" Mrs. Vedder was 
 an exceedingly nice woman and they were a devoted couple, 
 she being very capable and taking excellent care of his af- 
 fairs, but at the same time giving him the utmost freedom 
 of action. When he visited New York he sometimes left 
 his family in Rome, and he told me that once when he was 
 about to leave for America his wife said: 
 
 "Now, Ved, you are going to New York; do just as 
 you like there, but please don't come home and boast about 
 it!" 
 
 In New York his headquarters were always at the Cen- 
 
 197 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 tury Club and almost any evening he could be seen there, 
 surrounded by a circle of friends far into the night. Some- 
 one asked him to have a drink — his answer was a conun- 
 drum, **Why am I like a Kleinert's dress-shield? Because 
 I am always dry and absorbent." 
 
 Charles Caryl Coleman with his curling hair and hand- 
 some face, was a striking figure. He was a good friend, 
 always generous to any one ill or in trouble. His brother 
 Caryl belonged for a year or two to the Trappists, that 
 strictest of orders that lives in perpetual silence. 
 
 As Charles Coleman was a great collector of **oggetti 
 di antichita," his studio was a perfect museum of beautiful 
 things — tapestries, rich stuffs, china, carved furniture, 
 Roman and Grecian glass, rare marbles, and old pictures. 
 They said that if he sold a picture for a thousand dollars, on 
 the strength of it he immediately salhed out to an antiquity 
 shop, where he had already coveted some object or other, 
 and spent two thousand dollars on account of the one he 
 had on hand. His studio was also in the Via Margutta, 
 high up, with an outdoor gallery leading to it and with 
 windows on the one side looking out on the Pincian Hill, 
 with its lovely umbrella pines and its winding marble steps 
 and balustrades, the Church of Santa Maria del Popolo 
 and the Porta del Popolo, designed by Michael Angelo; 
 while from the other there was the lovely distant view of 
 the Campagna, gay with poppies and pink almond trees, 
 interspersed with picturesque bits of ruin. 
 
 I was one day sketching one of these ruins, a small tem- 
 ple or tomb, the stucco a delicious yellowish tint, with a 
 bright spot of white in the centre of the apse-hke top. An 
 almond-tree in bloom hung over it, and beyond was a jum- 
 ble of delicate flowers and a touch of tender blue sky. I 
 was busily absorbed when I looked up and saw George 
 
 198 
 
SOME ROMAN FRIENDS 
 
 Inness and T. Buchanan Read. They had just finished 
 lunching together and were in good spirits. Inness re- 
 marked, '* Your high light in the arch is not bright enough." 
 So, handing him my palette and brush, I said, *'Do it your- 
 self then," and without taking off his kid gloves he took 
 the brush, mixed up some NapIes-yellow and white, steadied 
 himself and gave one dab just in the right spot. I sold 
 that sketch later for a hundred dollars, but whether it was 
 because of Inness's master touch I never knew. He was 
 a small, nervous man, with ragged hair and beard, and a 
 vivacious, intense manner, an excellent talker and much 
 occupied with theories and methods of painting, and also 
 of religion. I once met him in the White Mountains and 
 we spent several hours talking together, or rather he talked 
 and I listened, about a theory he had of color intertwined in 
 a most ingenious way with Swedenborgianism, in which he 
 was a devout believer. Toward the latter part of the eve- 
 ning I became quite dizzy, and which was color and which 
 religion I could hardly tell! But, on the whole, he was 
 an interesting man and undoubtedly one of the first of Amer- 
 ican painters. Unlike many great artists he was amenable 
 to criticism, and when some friend suggested that he might 
 change a sky he would promptly scrape out a gray one and 
 try a blue. Crowninshield said that when Inness painted 
 according to his theories the result was sometimes queer, 
 but when he trusted altogether to his feeling his work was 
 wonderfully fine. 
 
 T. Buchanan Read, the "painter poet," author of 
 "Sheridan's Ride," was another picturesque figure who 
 led a gay and varied Roman life and amused himself by 
 doing a good many unusual things; for instance, on Queen 
 Victoria's birthday he sent her a long congratulatory tele- 
 gram in poetical language, and received a gracious acknowl- 
 
 199 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 edgment from the master of her household, who of course 
 did not know T. B. R., but wanted to be on the safe side. 
 Another time he was fishing with a gay party at Tivoli 
 and sent Prince Humbert a basket of trout, for which he 
 got the same sort of royal thanks. 
 
 Read had painted a portrait of General Sheridan on 
 his black charger, and when the general, accompanied by 
 Colonel Forsythe, visited Rome we gave them a dinner 
 which was attended by most of the Americans in Rome 
 and several English army officers. General Sheridan was 
 a man of few words but they were brisk and to the point. 
 He had grown stout and rather breathless; indeed, his 
 clothes seemed too tight for him. Forsythe was a fine, dash- 
 ing fellow and made quite an amusing speech at the dinner. 
 After complimenting the British officers, he spoke of being 
 once stationed on the Canadian frontier near a British out- 
 post. "Their officers," he said, ** would come to see us 
 and we would give them mint juleps and knock 'em higher 
 than a kite; then we would go over to them and they would 
 give us double-headed ale and brandy mixed and knock 
 us higher than a kite. It was grand!" 
 
 General Sherman also came to Rome while I was there, 
 with Fred Grant, General Grant's son, who had lately 
 graduated at West Point. I invited Grant to go to the 
 hunt and offered him a horse, but he asked what sort of 
 saddle he would have to ride and when I told him that we 
 only had English saddles, he suggested that he might ride 
 bareback. I said that I didn't think it would do for the 
 son of the President of the United States to appear in that 
 bucolic fashion. It seemed strange to me that a West Point 
 man had not been trained to ride on any kind of saddle. 
 
 We saw a good deal of General Sherman, a fine old fel- 
 low and very charming in a bluff, quaint way; he often 
 
 200 
 
SOME ROMAN FRIENDS 
 
 came to our house. Augustus Saint Gaudens had a favorite 
 story about the general. When he was modelling the gen- 
 eral's bust he was also making a bas-relief of Robert Louis 
 Stevenson, and he told the general that he would like to 
 introduce him, whereupon the general asked: 
 
 "Was he one of my boys?" 
 
 "No," said Saint Gaudens; "he is a celebrated writer, 
 the author of 'Jekyll and Hyde.' " 
 
 "Oh!" said the general, "he's no fool then; I'd like to 
 meet him," and when Stevenson came in he shook him 
 warmly by the hand and said: "Glad to meet you, sir! 
 Were you one of my boys?" 
 
 General Robert Anderson, "the hero of Fort Sumter," 
 was another military celebrity who was in Rome one winter 
 with his family. The general was declining rapidly in health, 
 but I saw a good deal of him and found him a most lovable 
 man, simple, honest, and straightforward. I went to the 
 railway station to bid him good-by and that was the last 
 I saw of him, as he died shortly afterward. Among the 
 many fine things that he did for his country, and not the 
 least, was the founding of the Soldiers' Home in Wash- 
 ington, which was chiefly due to his efl'orts. 
 
 One of the best books that have ever been written about 
 the every-day life of Rome is the "Roba di Roma" of Wil- 
 liam Wetmore Story, giving as it does the history of many 
 ancient customs, festivals, and traits of the people which 
 were still prevalent in the Rome of his day and mine, but 
 which have now entirely disappeared. He was a man of 
 varied talents, none of them buried in a napkin. His 
 statue of Cleopatra may be seen in the Metropolitan Mu- 
 seum; he was a painter and a poet; but he had begun hfe 
 as a lawyer and wrote law books that are still quoted as 
 authority, and I have heard that he was once a disciple of 
 
 201 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 transcendental philosophy at Brook Farm. To be sure, if 
 one spoke to a sculptor about Story's work, he was apt to 
 praise his writing or painting, while if you mentioned his 
 verse to a poet he fought shy of the subject and talked of 
 his sculpture instead — but taking him all in all, he was un- 
 doubtedly a many-sided man of talent, though I think that 
 his fame will rest more on the admirable **Roba di Roma" 
 than on all his other works. I remember, many years after 
 the time of which I am writing, I was in Paris and happened 
 to be calhng on Mrs. McCormick — a very charming woman, 
 by the way, the wife of the McCormick of reaper fame — 
 when Cabanel came in. He had painted a portrait of Mr. 
 McCormick, who had subsequently been decorated by the 
 French Government with the Legion of Honor, so the por- 
 trait had been sent to Paris from America in order that 
 the artist might paint the red ribbon in the buttonhole of 
 the coat. Cabanel was now calling to discuss the matter 
 with Mrs. McCormick. By way of making conversation, 
 she told Cabanel that her distinguished countryman, Mr. 
 W. W. Story, was then in Paris and asked if he had met 
 him. Cabanel, with many apologies, was compelled to 
 acknowledge that he had never heard of him. 
 
 "Not heard of him!" exclaimed Mrs. McCormick. 
 "Why he is a wonderful sculptor, a great painter, a poet, 
 a lawyer of distinction!" etc., etc. 
 
 Cabanel listened attentively until she had closed her 
 panegyric, then throwing up both hands exclaimed, "Trop 
 de choses, madame, trop de choses!" 
 
 George Butler was a good painter of portraits — and, 
 incidentally, of cats. An athletic fellow, with a beautiful 
 figure and handsome face, he was a remarkably fine fencer, 
 although he had lost his right arm at Gettysburg. He used 
 to fence in some resort frequented by Italian officers and 
 
 202 
 
SOME ROMAN FRIENDS 
 
 was generally regarded as one of the best swordsmen in 
 Rome. Now it happened that his friend, Charles Caryl 
 Coleman, had an enemy — why, I need not mention — and 
 this enemy and his friends formed a conspiracy against 
 Coleman, planning to get him involved in a duel so that 
 they might take his life. One evening Coleman and Butler 
 were at the opera with some ladies and, in leaving, the man 
 jostled Coleman in an insulting way. Coleman said to 
 him: 
 
 "I cannot see you now, as I am with ladies, but I will 
 see you later." 
 
 After taking the ladies home, Butler and Coleman went 
 to the Caffe di Roma, on the Corso, and the enemy was 
 there. As they left the caffe he followed and they turned 
 and met him. It was a dark night, and mistaking Butler 
 for Coleman he slapped his face, whereupon Butler im- 
 mediately knocked him down. The fellow jumped up and 
 demanded satisfaction, but when they got into the light and 
 he saw his mistake, and found that he had to deal with the 
 best fencer in Rome, he wanted to apologize and get out of 
 it, but Butler said: 
 
 "No, you don't! I have received a deadly insult, and 
 we must fight; our weapons are swords." 
 
 So they fought. Butler soon saw that he had his 
 antagonist at his mercy, but he did not want to kill him, 
 and as the man wore glasses he thought it would be a good 
 idea to pick them off without hurting him; but in doing 
 this he did not quite calculate his distance and almost ran 
 his sword through his opponent's skull, though it did not 
 wound him mortally. Coleman was troubled no more. 
 
 One time in Paris Butler was insulted in some way by 
 a Frenchman, and in the row which followed he was ar- 
 rested and taken to court. As soon as the judge saw this 
 
 203 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 splendid-looking man, before he allowed the complainant 
 to offer any evidence whatever, he said to him: 
 
 ''Sir, I see that you have lost your arm — how did it 
 happen?" 
 
 "In battle," replied Butler. 
 
 **That is enough, sir," the judge said. "You are dis- 
 charged, honorably discharged. The case is closed." 
 
 Butler had great ability as a portrait-painter, but it 
 was difficult to pin him down to work; though he began 
 a portrait with much enthusiasm, he seldom finished it. 
 On one occasion he went to paint a gentleman's portrait 
 at his country place and the summer passed very pleasantly, 
 but the picture was never done. 
 
 He married a Capri girl, a dark beauty. They came to 
 America and settled on a farm in Westchester County, 
 where they made Italian cheese; and I am told that Butler 
 was to be seen there, pottering about the place, followed 
 by a large brood of handsome black-eyed children. He 
 became a Romanist, to please his wife I suppose; resigned 
 from all his clubs, including the Century, and from the 
 Academy of Design; gave up painting, and retired to his 
 farm. 
 
 He once stayed with us at Danskammer, my place on 
 the Hudson; he arrived without any baggage; he had not 
 been shaved for a week, and wore a yellow flannel shirt. 
 We enjoyed his society immensely, for he was most enter- 
 taining, and his absence of luggage did not embarrass him 
 in the least — I provided him with a razor, a night-shirt, 
 and a tooth-brush, and he was perfectly content. In short, 
 he was a real Bohemian and entirely irresponsible, and if 
 one hinted at any want of forethought on his part he was 
 so amused, and looked at one with such a frank and 
 sweet expression on his handsome face, that one could 
 
 204 
 
SOME ROMAN FRIENDS 
 
 not but forgive him at once. Every one liked George 
 Butler. 
 
 It was in the winter of 1871 that I first heard the name 
 of Augustus Saint Gaudens, to my mind the greatest of 
 American sculptors; he was then very young and quite un- 
 known. I shall tell in another chapter of our first meeting 
 and our lifelong friendship. 
 
 John RoIIin Tilton was one of the best-known painters 
 in Rome at that time. He was an admirer of Turner and 
 his pictures reminded one of that great artist's manner, 
 that has been irreverently described as 
 
 "A foreground all of golden dirt, 
 The sunshine painted with a squirt.'* 
 
 Tilton's pictures were very popular and he admired 
 them greatly himself. 
 
 "Why," he said to me, "my pictures are so luminous 
 that they shine in the dark," and I think that he really 
 believed it. Meeting him in the street on his return from 
 Egypt, I asked him what it was like. " Do you love cream ? " 
 he asked — I confessed that I did. "Then you know what 
 Egypt is," he said, "it is like cream!" 
 
 His studio, overlooking the beautiful Villa Ludovisi, had 
 windows opening on a long veranda through which the 
 passers-by could see into his studio. Some visitors hap- 
 pened to glance in and spied Tilton with his coat off", look- 
 ing rather dishevelled, sweeping out his room. They 
 knocked at the door, there was a perceptible pause and 
 a "Come in," and there he was, lying on a sofa, dressed 
 in a velvet coat and reading a volume of Browning. 
 
 Once during the carnival, Arthur Dexter, of Boston, 
 a good deal of a wag and a delightful man, disguised him- 
 
 205 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 self in domino and mask and, accompanied by a lady well 
 known in Rome and also masked, paid several surprise 
 visits to his friends. One of these friends was Tilton, whose 
 apartment in the Palazzo Barberini was on an upper floor 
 and reached by a beautiful broad, winding marble stair- 
 way, that seemed almost endless, and with steps so low 
 that it was nearly an inclined plane. Dexter rang the bell 
 at the door and Tilton opened it, clothed only in dressing- 
 gown and slippers, but without a word they seized him, 
 one on each side, and rushed him like lightning all the way 
 down the winding stairs and left him shivering in the cold 
 courtyard. He did not recognize them and never knew 
 who they were. 
 
 Like several other European rivers, the Tiber has a bad 
 habit of overflowing its banks, and flooding afl the lower 
 part of the city with its yellow tide. One of the worst floods 
 that ever visited Rome was in the last days of 1870, just 
 after Christmas. 
 
 Mrs, Armstrong to her mother, Mrs, Neilson, New York 
 
 Rome, December 28, 1870. 
 ". . . We have had a great deal of rain and the day 
 before yesterday the Tiber rose and began to overflow the 
 Ripetta, the street that lies right on the shore of the river, 
 and today the Corso and the Via Condotti look like streets 
 in Venice. All day the line of water has been creeping nearer 
 to the Piazza di Spagna. The Piazza del Popolo is an im- 
 mense lake, the water must be eight feet deep, and the 
 plain about the city is all covered with water. We are for- 
 tunate in being high and dry, and as our street door is on 
 a level with the tops of the houses at the foot of the hill 
 we are in no danger, even if the Piazza di Spagna should 
 
 206 
 
SOME ROMAN FRIENDS 
 
 be covered up. This morning ft is storming again! We 
 have bought meat for today and tomorrow, and as much 
 macaroni, rice and potatoes as we could get, and we can 
 live on that for a few days, but the suffering in the lower 
 part of the city is dreadful. The poor people shut up in 
 their houses are crying at the windows, and boats are going 
 about carrying food for them from the Government. In 
 some places the water is up to the second stories, and they 
 say many persons have been drowned. Nearly all the shops 
 are ruined, — imagine Broadway with six feet of water in 
 it and all the shops soaked! The American gentlemen, 
 Maitland, Mr. Nevin and others, are raising money and 
 forming a committee for immediate relief. The road be- 
 tween Rome and Florence is broken up and poor Henrietta 
 King, who was on her way here to make a visit to Mrs. 
 Van Schaick, has I suppose had to go back to Florence. 
 The priests are in a great state of exultation, and tell the 
 people it is a judgment for the King having taken the city." 
 
 The lions that crouch at the base of the Egyptian obelisk 
 in the Piazza del Popolo, spouting water in long streams 
 from their mouths into the basins beneath, looked comical 
 during the flood, for the spouting streams fell into the sur- 
 rounding waste of water only a few inches below their 
 mouths. Some friends of ours — I think they were Mr. 
 and Mrs. Benjamin Morris, she was Sally Post, — staying 
 at the Hotel de Russie which fronted on the Piazza del 
 Popolo, came to lunch with us and when they returned 
 to their hotel the water had risen so high that they were 
 unable to enter the front door, but had to get ladders and 
 go in from the slope of the Pincian Hill through the rear 
 windows. 
 
 207 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Mrs. Armstrong to Her Mother 
 
 Rome, January 2, 1871. 
 
 *^ . . A great event happened last week, the King 
 has actually made his entry into Rome. He came down 
 without preparation or ceremony, and brought a large 
 sum, I believe two hundred thousand francs, for the suf- 
 ferers from the flood. His coming at this time produced 
 a very good impression on the people, showing as it did 
 his sympathy and interest in them. He arrived on Satur- 
 day morning and returned that same night to Florence. 
 He drove through the streets and went to church. We 
 had an excellent view of him, but the procession was very 
 little, only his body-guard on horseback and a few car- 
 riages; but the historical event is a great one, and he is 
 the first crowned head I have ever seen. He is even uglier 
 than his pictures make him. — I was interrupted by a visit 
 from Prince George of Sohms, who although a prince is 
 in no other way different from any other fat amiable Dutch- 
 man. 
 
 The city is in the most dreadful state you can imagine, 
 with an immense quantity of mud all over the streets. In 
 the Ghetto several houses fell, and nearly everything there 
 is destroyed. In Doctor Valery's house the water came 
 up seven steps of the stairs — you know the front door here 
 is on a level with the pavement and the hall and stairs are 
 almost like the street. The Americans have contributed 
 nearly twelve thousand francs for the suff'erers. Bessie 
 Field, a daughter of Hickson Field, who married an Italian, 
 had a baby born on the day of the flood. They live in a 
 palace on the Corso and it was with great difficulty that 
 Dr. Valery could get there, taking a boat first from his 
 own house and then a cart to reach her. The nurse would 
 
 208 
 
SOME ROMAN FRIENDS 
 
 not go to her. It was an inconvenient time, was it not, 
 for the little stranger to make its appearance in the world ! 
 Our washerwoman's assistant was shut in her house for 
 two days without food, the children crying for bread. The 
 water came into their rooms in the night and they had only 
 time to escape up-stairs. Everything they had was de- 
 stroyed. 
 
 We had a pleasant New Year's Eve, though not like 
 our delightful old ones at home, with the dining room table 
 covered with presents. We dined at Mrs. Haseltine's, 
 a party of fourteen, and Dr. Nevin came in afterwards. We 
 had a very elegant dinner which lasted late, and we all 
 waited to see the old year out. Just before twelve hot punch 
 was handed and we all stood glass in hand until the stroke 
 of midnight, when we all drank our punch and wished each 
 other a Happy New Year. 
 
 You speak of the three old ladies, Mrs. Anthon, Mrs. 
 Baker, and Aunt Helen Stuyvesant coming upstairs to 
 see Lillie, what would you think of going up to the fourth 
 story to see a friend! Mrs. Haseltine, for instance, lives 
 on the fourth story, up a hundred and four steps, and Mrs. 
 Tilton up a hundred and fifty, on a large circular stairway, 
 and Mrs. Chapman has about ninety. 
 
 General Sheridan called here the other day, and we 
 went to a reception given for him. A number of American 
 gentlemen are to give him a dinner this week at the club. 
 Poor Mr. Coleman, the artist, has smallpox. Little Mar- 
 garet has named her new rocking horse Umberto, after 
 Prince Humbert." 
 
 In order to help the Relief Fund for which I was 
 treasurer, we decided to give a fancy ball, the tickets to 
 be sold and the proceeds to go to the fund. A committee 
 
 209 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 was formed to manage the ball, and I was made chairman. 
 The other managers were Frederick Crowninshield, Charles 
 Caryl Coleman, Captain Danyell, an ex-British officer, 
 and another Englishman whose name I cannot recall. 
 
 A certain Count Ajasso and his lady had lately come 
 to Rome, and had made themselves conspicuous in un- 
 pleasant ways. He was reported to be a professional duellist 
 and a great bully, who had been engaged in many "affairs 
 of honor," and had killed his man more than once. His 
 wife and he were not ''personse gratse" in society and as 
 several American ladies who were going to the ball did not 
 wish to meet these people, they asked the managers to de- 
 cline to give them tickets if they applied. 
 
 Now Count Ajasso had stated that he was an intimate 
 friend of Prince Humbert, and that at a certain entertain- 
 ment he had walked arm in arm with the prince; but we 
 investigated these statements and found them false, so 
 we thought this would be a sufficient ostensible reason to 
 give for refusing the tickets. Though the man was un- 
 doubtedly a bounder, the real reason was the reputation 
 of the countess; but although every one knew this, of course, 
 we were debarred from mentioning her at all, so the situa- 
 tion was a rather delicate one for the committee. We hoped 
 that the Ajassos would not want to come to the ball, but 
 in any case we decided not to give them tickets, although 
 we foresaw that there might be trouble. 
 
 There was another person in Rome that winter who 
 was also supposed to be objectionable, and whom we were 
 asked not to favor; this was an Englishman named Oliver, 
 whose wife was said to be a daughter of Madame Tussaud — 
 a large showy young man, handsome in a common way, 
 of very pronounced style and extravagantly dressed. He 
 had curling black hair and a ruddy countenance, height- 
 
 210 
 
SOME ROMAN FRIENDS 
 
 ened by rouge, and such a very thin waist and efFeminate 
 figure that the rumor that he wore corsets had every ap- 
 pearance of truth. He hunted and was conspicuous at 
 the hunts because he rode what is known in circus par- 
 lance as a "calico horse," that is, a black horse with large 
 white blotches on him, four white legs, and a white blaze 
 on his nose. Altogether, Mr. Oliver was very conspicuous. 
 I never heard that there was anything against the char- 
 acter of either Mr. or Mrs. Oliver — we simply did not want 
 them. 
 
 So it was settled that these two groups were to be 
 eliminated. 
 
 It was decided to have the ball at the Sala Dante and 
 we all set about preparing our costumes. 
 
 A few days before the great event. Count Ajasso ap- 
 peared at my apartment and asked me for tickets for him- 
 self and his lady. He was a tall, gaunt, saturnine individual, 
 very sure of himself in manner, and was decidedly taken 
 aback when I declined to give him the tickets. He de- 
 manded my reason for this action and I told him that I 
 did not feel obliged to give any reason; so he departed. 
 That evening he called, accompanied by Captain Danyell, 
 a member of our committee, who came as his friend and 
 urged me to give him the tickets. Danyell did this on his 
 own hook and without authority from the other members 
 of our committee, and in thus appearing and espousing 
 Ajasso's cause he was let out of all responsibility. As the 
 other Englishman on the committee also backed squarely 
 out, Coleman, Crowninshield, and I had to shoulder the 
 whole affair; but we agreed to stand together. 
 
 When Danyell and Ajasso came to see me, they both 
 exhausted arguments and appeals. The count assured 
 me that every one knew he intended to go to the ball, and 
 
 211 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 that if we declined to have him the insult would ruin his 
 position in society. Indeed, he begged me with tears in 
 his eyes not to deny him, but I was firm in declining and 
 they left, and I thought that the incident was closed; but 
 the next day three gorgeous visiting-cards, bearing the 
 titles and coronets of well-known Italian officers, were 
 handed to me with a letter, and I went into my parlor to 
 see the gentlemen. They told me that they were Count 
 Ajasso's seconds and that they were instructed to inform 
 me that he felt I had insulted him and demanded satis- 
 faction, unless I would either apologize, give him the tickets, 
 or explain the reason for my action. As I declined all three 
 propositions, they said that they had no alternative but to 
 demand satisfaction and asked me to name my seconds, 
 so that they might arrange preliminaries. This also I de- 
 clined and told them that a duel was quite out of the ques- 
 tion — that I was the sole representative of my government 
 in Rome, that duelling was not only against the law and 
 custom of my country, but if I engaged in one I should ex- 
 pose myself to ridicule and disgrace. Getting no satis- 
 faction, they retired. 
 
 Danyell and our other English associates, having made 
 themselves safe, were out of it; so Ajasso turned his at- 
 tention to Coleman and Crowninshield, but without much 
 success. The seconds first called on Coleman at his studio, 
 who declined to talk the matter over or discuss it in any 
 way, ridiculed the idea of fighting a duel about it, firmly 
 upheld my action in the matter, and, in short, declined all 
 tickets, explanations, or duels. Crowninshield's studio 
 was next door to Coleman's, so the trio then applied there, 
 and as soon as he learned their mission he slammed his 
 door, without any remark, in their faces. 
 
 By this time every gossip in Rome was busy with the 
 
 212 
 
SOME ROMAN FRIENDS 
 
 affair, and that evening some of Ajasso's friends met Crown- 
 inshield at the opera and told him that if Count Ajasso 
 could not get satisfaction otherwise, he would cane Mr. 
 Armstrong in the street, and asked what Mr. Armstrong 
 would do in that event. Crowninshield replied that if Mr. 
 Armstrong were attacked he would doubtless defend him- 
 self "in the usual American fashion." This cryptic answer 
 they did not relish, as it contained a dark and sinister sug- 
 gestion of revolvers and bowie knives, popularly supposed 
 to be the usual American weapons of defense. Thus the 
 matter rested for some time. 
 
 As far as Mr. Oliver was concerned, the affair was easily 
 settled. He came clattering up to my door one day, on 
 his calico horse, and when he was announced asked for 
 tickets for the ball. I declined as politely as possible, with- 
 out giving any reason and without his demanding any. 
 Not long afterward I met him in the barber's shop where 
 he was getting shaved and he said to me: 
 
 "What an ass that fellow Ajasso made of himself about 
 those tickets — every one in Rome knows about it after 
 the advertising he's done ! I had more sense. I haven't 
 mentioned it to a soul and no one knows I was turned 
 down!" 
 
 Well, we had our ball — without the Ajassos and Olivers 
 — and it was a great success. There were many really fine 
 costumes. Among the most beautiful American women 
 were Mrs. Frederick Crowninshield and Mrs. Edward Boyt 
 of Boston. All the artists were there in force. Vedder 
 wore a fifteenth century dress — a scarlet doublet and tights 
 — and his fine figure combined with his wonderful dancing 
 was very effective. I wore a Venetian dress, copied from 
 a figure in one of Carpaccio's pictures in Venice — "The Eng- 
 lish Ambassadors visiting the Doge" — a doublet of stamped 
 
 213 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 yellow Genoese velvet, scarlet tights, with an old em- 
 broidered coat-of-arms on my breast and another on the 
 calf of my leg, and a jewelled girdle in which I carried an 
 ivory-handled poniard said to have belonged to Vittoria 
 Colonna. I have worn the same array since at the Twelfth 
 Night celebrations at the Century Club. My wife wore 
 an Italian dress of the fifteenth century. The ball was 
 successful financially and yielded a good sum to the Relief 
 Fund. 
 
 The ball was over, but I still heard rumors that Ajasso 
 was going to cane me in the street and I was determined, 
 if he tried it, to do my best to thrash him in the '* Amer- 
 ican fashion." From my boyhood I had been interested 
 in sparring, and I had been taking lots of exercise, riding 
 and hunting every day, so I was really rather disappointed 
 that nothing had happened. Finally I met Ajasso one 
 day on the Spanish Steps. I was walking home after a ride 
 and had started up the left flight of steps when, glancing 
 up, I saw Ajasso at the top on the right. So I retraced my 
 steps and went up the right side. I hoped that the caning 
 was about to begin, as he had a stick in his hand, and I 
 shifted my riding-crop ffom my left hand to my right and 
 swung it thoughtfully. But it was not to be — and a glare 
 was his only revenge. A year later he was killed in a duel. 
 
 214 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 THE CAMPAGNA 
 
 "The champaign with its endless fleece 
 Of feathery grasses everywhere I 
 Silence and passion, joy and peace, 
 
 An everlasting wash of air — 
 Rome's ghost since her decease." 
 
 -Browning. 
 
 Some of the pleasantest days of my life were spent in 
 the Campagna, w^here the endless variety of subjects lured 
 one to an endless number of sketches. I would often take 
 my lunch with me and stay all day, going in a cab as far 
 out as I wanted, and then walking about the fields until 
 I found a picturesque bit. Once I struck out through a 
 lonely valley and when I had gone some distance I met 
 a fox. A little later, having settled down to my work, I 
 saw approaching a tall, rough-looking peasant, with a long 
 flintlock gun, who came and stood behind me watching me 
 sketch. I did not like his looks much and, to use the ex- 
 pression of a Cape Codder, the captain of the Celestia, I 
 "kept my eye well skinned back." To make conversation, 
 I told him that I had seen a fox. 
 
 "Didn't you have anything to shoot it with?" he asked. 
 
 "Well," I said, "nothing but this," and I reached back 
 and took from my pistol-pocket a Smith and Wesson revolver 
 and cocked it. 
 
 "Ah!" he said, "buon giorno!" and stalked away. I 
 think, if I had not been so brisk with my pistol, he might 
 have put his old gun at my head and made me hold up my 
 
 215 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 hands and relieved me of my watch and pocketbook. Al- 
 most any one of these peasants would, on occasion, lapse 
 into a bandit, for the trade of highwayman is not one that 
 they dislike, in fact it rather excites their admiration. In 
 1859 when I drove from Rome to Lake Thrasymene, the 
 danger from brigands was very real. Only the week be- 
 fore our trip, the diligence had been stopped on the road 
 up Monte Somma and every one had been robbed, even 
 the ladies being despoiled of their dresses. In those days 
 the banditti came in large bands and resistance was use- 
 less, especially on the long hills, where oxen had to be har- 
 nessed to the carriages and progress was necessarily slow. 
 
 I was once sketching the Tor degli Schiavi and there 
 were several men excavating for treasure near me all day. 
 They dug a long trench right in front of the tower, in which 
 they found a lot of vipers, but also some bits of old jars, 
 iridescent glass, etc., which they turned over to me. They 
 dug one hole about twelve feet square and six feet deep, 
 about one hundred feet from the Tor degli Schiavi, on the 
 side toward Rome, and uncovered part of a fine Roman 
 pavement, in perfect condition, decorated with white pea- 
 cocks on a black ground. I asked the men what they were 
 going to do with it, and they said it was no use to them, 
 so they filled it up and went away. I remember the exact 
 spot, and I have often thought that I should like to revisit 
 it and dig up the pavement. 
 
 Beggars abounded in Rome, indeed theirs was a well- 
 organized trade. At the top of the Spanish Steps a favorite 
 of ours used to sit, a handsome, black-eyed, friendly youth, 
 who held out his hat with such an engaging and appealing 
 smile that you could not help putting something into it. 
 He had but one leg and carried a crutch, but he could skip 
 around on it with great facility. I once saw him chasing 
 
 216 
 
THE CAMPAGNA 
 
 a rival who had trespassed on his preserve, whom he finally 
 overtook and beat over the head with his crutch. Every 
 beggar has his own hunting-ground and woe to any other 
 who invades it. On the occasion of any festival on the 
 Campagna, or the meet of the hunt, on every hill where 
 the carriages had to go slowly the beggars gathered in 
 swarms, and the lame, the halt, and the blind would way- 
 lay us, with piteous cries of "Carita per amor di Dio!" 
 holding out their withered hands or exposing their other 
 deformities in a most harrowing way. 
 
 They had a curious custom in the shops in Rome. 
 Every Saturday one would see a long row of coppers laid 
 out on the counter near the door. Each shop evidently 
 had its special clientele of beggars; a member would ap- 
 pear, open the door, pick up a single copper, no more, mur- 
 mur, "Grazie!" and depart without further remark. The 
 beggars had a funny way of addressing or speaking of each 
 other, as "quel gobbo," **quel cieco," or "quella vecchia" 
 as the case might be. But then, all Italians more often 
 use nicknames for each other than real names. 
 
 In those days Roman society consisted chiefly of the 
 nobility, or members of the diplomatic corps, and hardly 
 any one else was admitted. There were literally only two 
 exceptions — Volpicelli, the son of a professor, and Gu- 
 glielmo Grant, a partner in the firm of Maquay, Hooker, 
 and Company, the American bankers. They were both 
 charming and agreeable young men, but there were many 
 others just as much so that did not figure in the best so- 
 ciety, so called. At a ball at the Palazzo Doria I once saw 
 Grant dancing with the Princess Margherita, an honor 
 which was accorded to few young men. He was fond of 
 rowing, so he and Fred Crowninshield, who had been on 
 the crew at Harvard, sent to America for a race-boat, a 
 
 217 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 four-oared shell, and were often to be seen darting up and 
 down the Tiber at racing speed, an unusual sight in sleepy 
 Rome. Of course, the American women who had married 
 distinguished Romans were naturally in society, and in 
 addition there were a number of other Americans, among 
 them Mrs. Charles King and her family. Her son Rufus 
 King had been American Minister there, which gave them 
 a diplomatic position. From their long residence in Rome 
 they knew all the Italians, and they entertained very 
 pleasantly; five o'clock tea, a new institution in those days, 
 was delightful at their house, particularly on Saturdays 
 when one met lots of agreeable people there — Romans, 
 Americans, and English. 
 
 Among the nice young Roman friends of the Kings was 
 Guido Bourbon, Marchese del Monte, a scion of the noble 
 house of Bourbon, a handsome young man and a member of 
 the Pope's Noble Guard — at a salary, if I remember rightly, 
 of some six hundred francs a year, but nevertheless he 
 was always beautifully dressed and apparently enjoyed the 
 best of everything. It is customary for the cadets of noble 
 families in Rome to be supported by their rich relations, 
 at whose tables they always have a seat and to whom they 
 may send their tailor's bills. In fact, as it is not allowable 
 for them to engage in any business whatever without losing 
 caste, they really cannot support themselves. They may 
 be in the diplomatic or military service, but almost every- 
 thing else is beneath their dignity. Well, this young man 
 was of that class — he had nothing whatever to do, and the 
 Kings were sorry for him and fond of him, and were suf- 
 ficiently intimate — at least they thought so — to give him 
 some advice; so they suggested that he should give up 
 his hfe in Rome and go to New York, where they would 
 give him letters to friends with whom he could go into the 
 
 218 
 
THE CAMPAGNA 
 
 banking business, and where with his undoubted abilities 
 he might make a fortune. But far from being grateful for 
 their offer, he was furious and felt deeply insulted at the 
 idea that a del Monte would degrade himself so far as to 
 go into trade. Indeed, he was so mortally offended that 
 they did not see him for a long while, though he did finally 
 consent to forgive them. (By the way, the Roman princes 
 are not above marrying a rich American girl and living 
 on her money !) 
 
 I think it was that same winter that Prince Pignatelli 
 became very devoted to Miss Pussy Strong, afterward 
 Mrs. Wellman. Mrs. Strong, however, did not fancy an 
 Italian suitor, nor was he approved by their stern Amer- 
 ican maid; in fact, everybody said that it was she who 
 drove him away in the end, always avowing whenever he 
 came to call: "No, prince, Miss Pussy can't see you." I 
 remember hearing an American declare, speaking of a beau- 
 tiful countrywoman of his who had married a Cenci, that 
 the husband was a lineal descendant of Beatrice Cenci I 
 
 Mrs. Terry, and her daughters, the Crawfords, were 
 very pleasant people, living in the Palazzo Odescalchi. 
 The son, Marion Crawford, was a shy gawky boy, who 
 gave no promise of any sort of genius, and was rather kept 
 in the background by his family. Somehow or other Doc- 
 tor Nevin found that he had a talent for writing and en- 
 couraged him to take up literature as a profession. I fancy 
 his novel, "The Three Fates," describes something of his 
 own experience with his first novel, "Mr. Isaacs," which 
 had a most extraordinary success for an unknown author. 
 It sold by thousands, and was even parodied in a little 
 volume with the same cover only very small, called "Dr. 
 Jacobs." His sister, Mimoli Crawford, afterward Mrs. 
 Hugh Fraser, is also a good novelist. 
 
 219 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 In 1870, J. Bloomfield Wetherill, a cousin of mine 
 through the Macombs, was Doctor Nevin's curate. While 
 he was in Rome he inherited a large fortune from his father, 
 Doctor Wetherill, of Philadelphia, who left no will. For 
 many years Doctor Wetherill had done nothing for his 
 family, leaving his wife, who was a fine woman, to bring 
 up their fifteen children. In fact, some of his children did 
 not know him by sight, though Bloomfield said he knew 
 his father slightly and sometimes met him in the street 
 and had a little chat. Bloomfield had always been de- 
 pendent on his salary as a clergyman, and you may imagine 
 how surprised and pleased he was at receiving this large 
 fortune. He married a sister of Mrs. Stanford White and 
 Mrs. Prescott Hall Butler. 
 
 I think it was that winter that we knew the Connollys 
 in Rome. Young Connolly was a sculptor. His father 
 was a convert to Roman Cathohcism, and after inducing 
 his wife also to change her faith, he became a priest and 
 she went into a convent. A httle later he changed his mind 
 again and gave up his new beliefs and wanted his wife to 
 come back to him, but she was either less volatile, or less 
 constant, than he, as you choose to look at it, and would 
 not consent to desert her convent for her home. So in the 
 shuffle he lost her altogether. 
 
 Doctor Valery was the fashionable doctor in Rome in 
 those days; he was a dear old man and we all loved him. 
 His Enghsh, although he spoke it fluently, was decidedly 
 pecuhar. I remember his asking one of the children, when 
 he came to vaccinate her, to "kindly discover your arm." 
 When he visited Mrs. John Jacob Astor, who was just re- 
 covering after a long illness, she told my wife that he said: 
 "You may sit by the fire and suckle a pear," and she added: 
 "What a charming domestic scene the words call up!" 
 
 220 
 
THE CAMPAGNA 
 
 The Astors and Van Schaicks went on an excursion to 
 Paestum together, and as there were a good many brigands 
 about there at that time and they thought some rumor of 
 the Astors* wealth might have preceded them, they took 
 a guard of two soldiers, which would not have been of much 
 use if they had been attacked by a couple of hundred 
 brigands, as was common enough in those days. A party 
 of English people had been killed by brigands in Greece 
 only a short time before, so our friends had something of 
 a shock when they suddenly saw a band of men approach- 
 ing across the plain; however, they proved to be only sur- 
 veyors. Willie Astor had a turn for sculpture and studied 
 with Tadolini that winter. His statue of "The Wounded 
 Amazon" showed some promise. 
 
 Doctor Valery once told me that it was safe to sleep 
 in Rome with one's window open provided that it was forty 
 feet above the street, as the malaria did not rise above that 
 point. The real reason was, I suppose, that mosquitoes 
 did not usually fly up to that height. That the mosquitoes 
 were responsible for malaria was not then recognized, al- 
 though, I believe, the Italians were the first to study them 
 from the standpoint of disease. The scientific people pur- 
 sued their investigations by sleeping in the Pontine Marshes 
 with and without mosquito nets — a pretty sure way of 
 finding out, I should think. 
 
 Some of the old theories whereby men tried to account 
 for the poisoning of the Campagna by malaria are exceed- 
 ingly interesting. Every one was agreed that it had not 
 always been so; that when the Campagna was a highly 
 cultivated country, dotted by the villas and gardens of 
 wealthy Romans, it had not been unhealthy — indeed it 
 was known to have had a perfect climate — and it was be- 
 lieved that if the marshes could be drained the malaria 
 
 221 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 would disappear. In 1867 ^ doctor got pretty close to the 
 mosquito theory. He thought malaria came from a minute 
 fungus, propagated in the swamps, which got into the hu- 
 man system, particularly at night; for he had observed 
 that a thin veil over a sleeping person was sufficient pro- 
 tection. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. William H. Herriman, of New York, great 
 friends of ours, have lived in Rome from about 1865 ^^ 
 the present time. They exercised a quiet and generous 
 hospitality in their delightful apartment, and were among 
 the best friends the American artists had, for they bought 
 their pictures, befriended them in their need, nursed them 
 in sickness, and lent them money when they were hard 
 up. Mr. Herriman was a wise collector, not only of pic- 
 tures but of all sorts of rare objects of art. 
 
 I once took a pleasant trip as his guest through the 
 hill towns back of Tivoli, together with Vedder and Gris- 
 wold, another artist, driving in a carriage holding four. 
 We began by lunching at Tivoli in the little pavilion on 
 the hill above the waterfalls, then wandered about making 
 sketches of an old mediaeval tower below, and spent the 
 first night at Saracenesca. The Saracen type, strongly 
 marked among all the inhabitants there, is particularly 
 noticeable among the beautiful women. I was once sitting 
 with my wife in a pleasant leafy valley near Albano, in 
 May, when a woman of this type came and stood near us 
 silently watching the sketch I was making. She had a 
 child in her arms and balanced on her head was a tall, slim, 
 green-and-white water jar. She stood perfectly motionless 
 for a long while and I have never seen a lovefier group, 
 posed in such sweet surroundings. 
 
 After Saracenesca we spent a night at Subiaco, with 
 its monastery overhung by a great rock. There is a tradi- 
 
 222 
 
THE CAMPAGNA 
 
 tion, I believe, that some day the rock will fall and over- 
 whelm the wonderful old subterranean church with its 
 fine frescoes, but the monks dwell there undisturbed. Our 
 next stop was at Olevano, most beautifully situated over- 
 looking a vast view of the Campagna — from all these hills 
 Rome is visible, the dome of St. Peter's shining white and 
 dominating the distance. Everything was primitive at 
 Olevano. Most of the houses had outside steps and the 
 little black pigs were to be seen walking up them, even 
 to the second stories, seeming quite at home. In the deep 
 valley below the village there was a fountain, whence in 
 the evenings long files of women carried water to their homes 
 on the hill, in brightly polished copper vessels and gayly 
 painted jars. Here they all wore the fine old Roman cos- 
 tume, so rapidly disappearing elsewhere — the beautifully 
 embroidered aprons, waists, and jackets, with folded white 
 napkins on their heads on which to balance the jars. The 
 entrance to the hotel at Olevano is by a long, straight path, 
 and as we walked up this we were confronted by a little 
 girl, about ten years old, who did not have on a stitch of 
 clothing but who seemed not in the least embarrassed. At 
 the hotel we met William and Mary Howitt, a charming 
 elderly couple, interesting to talk to. 
 
 It was altogether a delightful trip with but one draw- 
 back, the ever-present drawback in Italy — the fleas. We 
 were well prepared for them with a good stock of Persian 
 insect powder, and at night we took all the coverings off 
 the beds, replaced a sheet, saw that all fleas were outside, 
 put a wall of insect powder all around the outer edges, and 
 then stepped carefully over this barrier and covered our- 
 selves with the clothing that had been well searched in 
 advance; but even then we were not immune. 
 
 Ostia was the objective of another pleasant trip taken 
 
 223 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 by Crowninshield, Haseltine, and myself. It was expressly 
 a sketching trip, for the carnival season was approaching, 
 and we had all seen as much as we wanted of other carni- 
 vals. A better choice for a contrast could not have been 
 made. There is a well-preserved mediaeval castle at Ostia, 
 built by Pope Julius II, and its courtyard is the unusual 
 site chosen for a quaint little stone-paved inn. The fire- 
 place was so huge that there was room for seats all around 
 the inside of the chimneypiece and space still left between 
 for an immense fire, and the only furniture was an enormous 
 table on a raised platform which occupied the whole of 
 one side of the room. At the courtyard door was tethered 
 a mule, that at intervals dragged in logs and branching 
 trunks and gnarled roots of trees, wherewith to replenish 
 the fire, which was always kept gayly burning. Here in 
 the evening the peasants would gather and partake of their 
 nightly meal of macaroni, which was served in vessels the 
 size of wash-basins, unaccompanied by forks. It was mar- 
 vellous how much they could eat. Each one had his bottle 
 of red wine, and after the macaroni was gone they sat in 
 a long row behind their dining-table and smoked their pipes. 
 Every now and then one of their number would stoop to 
 the fire, fill his horny hand with live, glowing embers, and 
 beginning at one end of the row each man would light his 
 pipe and pass the coal to his neighbor. 
 
 In my bedroom on the second floor, the window and 
 only light was an uncovered loophole in the wall, evidently 
 made for gun-fire in the middle ages ; the floor was of stone 
 and the only furniture a tiny bedstead and a small three- 
 legged wash-stand with a pitcher and basin, the latter much 
 smaller than those used down-stairs for the macaroni. There 
 were no chairs; one was supposed to sit on the bed. 
 
 In. the picturesque castle, shaded by an enormous stone- 
 
 224 
 
THE CAMPAGNA 
 
 pine, everything was just as it had been in the fifteenth 
 century. As it was surrounded by marshes and wild waste 
 lands, the principal occupation was hunting — though now 
 it may be cultivated for all I know. In the evening the 
 hunters brought in strings of wild duck; when their talk 
 was not of eating or money, the usual topics of a peasant, 
 it was of exploits and adventures in shooting. Close around 
 the castle and running down to the sea were open fields, 
 parts of which had once been cultivated; while in other 
 parts the site of the ancient city of Ostia was indicated 
 by mounds covering its former streets and palaces. What 
 a place for excavating! Walking along the trace of one 
 of these buried streets, I picked up an old Roman coin — 
 
 "All passes. Art alone 
 Enduring stays to us; 
 The Bust outlasts the throne. 
 The Coin Tiberius." 
 
 The neighborhood is very paintable, with its great 
 groves of stone-pines, and its ancient chateau and towers 
 along the sea, built for protection against pirates. One 
 morning I was seated in a field not far from the road when 
 I was hailed from a carriage filled with masked figures — 
 you must remember that it was carnival time. One of 
 the ladies jumped out of the carriage, came over to me, and 
 started a series of remarks, in a high, squeaky carnival voice, 
 very derogatory to me and my sketch, followed by im- 
 pertinent questions, which I answered as best I could. 
 Finally I said: 
 
 "You are doubtless a charming creature, but I wish 
 you would go away !" 
 
 Whereupon she took off her mask and behold it was 
 my wife ! She was accompanied by a party of friends, among 
 
 225 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 them Mrs. Haseltine and Nevin. As they had brought a 
 basket of excellent lunch, we adjourned to the top of the 
 round tower of the castle and had a delightful time. 
 
 We had a little club in Rome to which most of us be- 
 longed, a pleasant meeting-place for residents and visitors, 
 where cigars and spirituous refreshments were to be had 
 but no food. One of the frequenters was a man whom we 
 
 will call X , who sometimes stayed rather late and was 
 
 apt to be hilarious. He was a slight, feeble, little person, 
 but his wife was robust and handsome. One evening she 
 called at the club, went in without ceremony although 
 ladies were not admitted, took her husband by the ear, and 
 led him forth. Their apartment was in the Vicolo San 
 Nicolo da Tolentino — I give its full name because it amuses 
 me — just opposite that of the Crowninshields. Crownin- 
 shield happened to glance across the way and, much to 
 
 his astonishment, he saw little X prostrate on the floor 
 
 and Mrs. X pounding him on the head ! Except among 
 
 the visitors, the consumption of strong drink, however, was 
 not usual in Rome; indeed, I scarcely ever saw a drunken 
 native Italian in the whole of Italy while I lived there, al- 
 though they all drink wine and feed it copiously to the babies. 
 
 My brother-in-law, Mr. Howard, died in Providence 
 while we were in Rome, and I found in an old letter the 
 account of a curious dream that my wife had at the time — 
 only a coincidence, of course, but striking nevertheless. 
 About ten days before he died, my wife told me one morn- 
 ing that she had dreamed she had taken up a newspaper 
 and seen Howard's death in it, aged fifty-two. We talked 
 about it a little, for we did not know his exact age. In the 
 next mail from home we heard of his death, aged fifty-two, 
 and strangely enough my wife read of it first in the paper, 
 not in a letter. 
 
 226 
 
THE CAMPAGNA 
 
 Governor Fenton, ex-Governor of New York, came to 
 Rome one winter with his handsome daughter, and, of 
 course, I had to be polite to them and show them around. 
 Happening to learn the amount of my salary as consul, 
 the governor averred that ft ought to be raised and volun- 
 teered to use his influence with the government to that 
 end. Of course I expressed myself as grateful to him. A 
 few days afterward I showed him a book of mine, "From 
 Rome to Thrasymene," and he said he would take it home 
 to look it over. After keeping it for some time, he asked 
 me if I intended to make him a present of it. I told him 
 that unfortunately I had already given it to my brother; 
 but still the book did not come back, and it was only after 
 a good deal of difficulty and delay that he finally reluctantly 
 returned it. I concluded he needed a little watching. 
 
 Later on he told me he would like to buy a copy of the 
 Young Augustus in bronze, so I took him to some of the 
 shops and found a statuette that he liked. He asked me 
 if I advised him to buy it, and I said I did; but nothing 
 happened, though he kept on talking about it. By the 
 time he left Rome I had about made up my mind that he 
 expected me to present it to him (which, of course, I could 
 not do) and that his influence would be used in proportion 
 to what he got out of me. Even after he left Rome, the 
 old fox wrote to me and said that if I still thought that 
 bronze would look well on his library table at home to 
 buy it. 
 
 Some years later I was in the banking house of Monroe 
 and Company in Paris, and Governor Fenton was sitting 
 there, also two Englishmen. Some friend of the governor 
 came in and said to him: 
 
 "Good morning, governor. I'm glad it's a fine day at 
 last !" or something of the sort. 
 
 227 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 "So be I ! So be I !" replied the governor. 
 
 One of the Englishmen, hearing this bucolic phrase, 
 turned to his friend and whispered in an awe-struck voice: 
 
 "He called him governor /" 
 
 "From Rome to Thrasymene," the book which the 
 governor took a fancy to, was in manuscript, the account 
 of a trip I had taken during my first visit to Italy, which 
 I copied and illustrated in the winter evenings at Dans- 
 kammer. It is beautifully bound, and the neatness of the 
 handwriting fills me with astonishment, but neither text 
 nor drawing is good — particularly the decorative drawings 
 are not at all such as I do now, or should like to have con- 
 sidered samples of my work — and at times I have heen 
 tempted to burn the old thing. But then I have remem- 
 bered those pleasant winter evenings, with my brothers 
 alive and young, sitting there reading or chatting, the dogs 
 curled up before the cosey open fire, the shining mahogany 
 table covered with my drawing things — life, too, spread 
 out all before me. When I realize that all these things 
 are passed away never to return, and no one living can 
 recall them except myself, then I refrain from putting the 
 book in the fire, and let it go for what it is worth, as the 
 fruit of early youth. 
 
 The hunt was a delightful feature of the winter life in 
 Rome. The club was chiefly made up from the Roman 
 nobility, who controlled it; but foreigners were allowed 
 to subscribe and enjoy all its privileges. The Romans were 
 most of them handsome young men and rode fine English 
 horses. The Marquis Calabrini was master of the hunt, 
 and among the usual riders whose names I remember were 
 the two Princes Grazzioli, Prince Doria, and Prince Marc 
 Antonio Colonna; the latter was dark, with beautiful 
 features, while the Dorias and Grazziolis were ruddy-faced, 
 
 228 
 
THE CAMPAGNA 
 
 Iight-haired men, more like English than Italians — the 
 Dorias are half English anyway, and take after their Eng- 
 lish ancestors in appearance. 
 
 The club owned a fine pack of hounds that had to be 
 frequently recruited from England, because, strange to 
 say, the hounds bred in Italy lose their scent and are of 
 no use. There was always a tent pitched at the meet, where 
 we went when the run was over for a collation and to talk 
 over the events of the day. The meets were usually at 
 a considerable distance from Rome, in any and every part 
 of the Campagna, and the long rides gave a fine chance 
 to study the country, for one went to all sorts of out-of- 
 the-way spots which the ordinary traveller would never 
 discover. In this way I often saw beautiful subjects for 
 sketching, which I afterward went back to paint, and this 
 part of the hunting I enjoyed as much as the riding. 
 
 One of the favorite meets was on the high ground at 
 the tomb of Ceciha Metella on the Appian Way. All the 
 jumps there are over stone walls, and one day I calculated 
 that I had taken my horse over at least fifty walls. On 
 the high ground the obstacles are usually stone, but in 
 the lower part of the Campagna you meet rail fences, five 
 or six feet high, spiked together firmly in order to keep 
 in the herds of buff'alo and long-horned oxen. Unless one 
 has a good horse, they are difficult to negotiate. The walls 
 are much safer riding and there are few falls, as a horse 
 soon learns that he can strike a wall as he jumps and knock 
 off" a few stones with safety, but they do not like the fences, 
 because if they hit a fence and the rails do not break they 
 either stick there and the rider goes over his horse's head 
 or both horse and rider go headlong together. And then, 
 for some reason, a horse is apt to be more afraid of some- 
 thing he can see through than he is of a sohd obstacle like 
 
 229 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 a wall. The Campagna provides all sorts of pitfalls for 
 the unwary horseman — unfathomable ditches, old wells and 
 broken ruins everywhere. Needless to say, there were lots 
 of chances in Roman hunting, as the country was generally 
 one you had never seen before and you never knew what 
 was ahead of you. They told of a man coming to a very 
 bad spot and dismounting to lead his horse, when he felt 
 a pull on the reins and turned to see his horse slide out of 
 sight into a deep hidden excavation, from which he never 
 reappeared alive. 
 
 Another popular meet was at the Tor degli ScPiiavi, 
 beyond the Porta Maggiore, the old tower that was either 
 an ancient Roman temple or a tomb, as there are niches 
 in the walls that might have held either statues or vases 
 for the ashes of the dead. Built of very rich red brick, one 
 side has been shattered by an explosion and reveals the 
 brilhant white cement of the inner arched ceiling, but ex- 
 cept for this huge rent it is almost as perfect as when it was 
 built, although mellowed by time to a soft and delightful 
 beauty. It stands on an elevation backed by the roUing 
 Campagna and the blue Alban hills, and of course I made 
 sketches of it, as every artist does who goes to Rome. Here 
 the Campagna was varied by hills and valleys, brooks and 
 watercourses, broken rocky hillsides studded with olives, 
 and gorges filled with knotted ilex-trees. Occasionally the 
 hunt would go over one of the broad fields of green winter 
 wheat — then the owner was paid for any damage that had 
 been done. It was a perfect delight to ride through this 
 country on delicious winter days, following the hounds 
 speckled over the landscape making music dear to every 
 hunter's heart, the red coats giving spots of color and gayety 
 to the scene. 
 
 The hunt was always accompanied by a man on a 
 
 230 
 
THE CAMPAGNA 
 
 shaggy horse, armed with an axe, and after the huntsmen 
 and best riders had jumped the intact fence, if they had 
 not in so doing broken a rail or two, he would chop down 
 some more bars and let the timid riders think that they were 
 really hunting when they scrambled over the reduced ob- 
 stacles. 
 
 Some of the best riders were women, among them Miss 
 Antoinette Polk, daughter of Bishop Polk, who was after- 
 ward the wife of General Charette of the Pope's Noble 
 Guard. She was a beautiful woman, as well as a beautiful 
 rider, with an abundance of lovely brown hair that did not 
 need a switch — a hair switch, I mean — but it was the cus- 
 tom to wear these articles and one day, much to her morti- 
 fication, her switch dropped off and one of the Roman princes 
 leaped to the ground to restore it to her. The Misses King, 
 daughters of Charles King, were also first-rate riders. (One 
 of them became Mrs. Eugene Schuyler; and the youngest, 
 afterward Madame Waddington, wife of the premier and 
 minister of foreign aff*airs in Paris, has written some in- 
 teresting reminiscences of her hfe in various courts of Eu- 
 rope.) Miss Harriet Hosmer, the sculptor, rode in fine 
 style on a tall brown horse and jumped everything in sight. 
 One year in the steeplechases on the Campagna after Easter, 
 Miss Hosmer's horse won. As her jockey was dressed in 
 the "Stars and Stripes," the Americans felt it a great na- 
 tional triumph. 
 
 A Doctor Burrage, the American dentist in Rome, was 
 among those who rode to hounds. His Italian was sketchy, 
 and once when his horse had had a hard day and was very 
 warm he said to his groom: "Rubate bene!" meaning 
 "Rub him well!" which the groom answered cheerfully 
 with a broad grin and a quick "Si, signore! Si, signore!" 
 for ruhate is the imperative of rubare, to rob, and the groom 
 
 231 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 was more than willing to carry out his master's instruc- 
 tions. 
 
 The beautiful young Austrian Empress rode in Rome 
 for two winters; she was a graceful rider, mounted on the 
 best of horses, and always at the front. I remember one 
 meet we had at the tomb of Cecilia Metella, when the Em- 
 press was riding; in addition to the usual tent where there 
 were refreshments for all the hunt, a special place was set 
 apart for her and her suite and decorated with flowers. 
 Every one in Rome drove out there that day — there must 
 have been a hundred and fifty riders, and although it rained 
 a little in the morning it was very gay. The Empress rode 
 all day; she had a pretty horse belonging to the Queen of 
 Naples and wore a black habit, a little round cap, and black 
 stockings, which covered a very neat ankle — black stock- 
 ings were considered very odd in those days, when women 
 all wore white. On account of the rain, the ground was 
 slippery and there were a good many falls, but no one was 
 hurt. 
 
 Red coats were for the most part confined to the 
 Romans, but there were occasionally English or Americans 
 who sported red, and all wore high hats, which were a pro- 
 tection if you happened to fall on your head, as I did once 
 in riding through a field where low bushes covered the 
 obstacles underneath. We came to two ditches lying side 
 by side, and my horse cleared the first, but not seeing the 
 second landed in the middle of it and actually stood on 
 his head, so that his forehead was covered with mud. I 
 followed suit and stood on my head, or rather on my high 
 hat, which was split in two and driven down over my eyes, 
 and my neck was so stiff" afterward that I could hardly 
 move it for some time. Had it not been for my high hat 
 I should probably have broken my neck. This and one 
 
 232 
 
THE CAMPAGNA 
 
 other were the only falls I had in Rome during all my hunt- 
 ing experience. I was very fortunate. 
 
 My exemption from accidents was chiefly due to my 
 horse, Lungarino, which was one of the best and most 
 reliable animals I have ever known. He was probably of 
 Arab blood, beautifully turned, brown, fifteen hands high 
 and clean-limbed, with a long neck, small head, sloping 
 shoulders, and large hquid soft eyes. An old vet, who for 
 many years attended the four hundred horses of Barnum's 
 circus, once told me that in examining a horse he always 
 looked first at his "countenance," as he expressed it, partic- 
 ularly his eye, "because no good horse ever had a bad eye." 
 Lungarino had been raised on the rough ground of the 
 Campagna, and was the most sure-footed beast I have ever 
 ridden. I never had him refuse a jump of any sort, and 
 although my light weight was a help to him in this — I once 
 rode a race at Jerome Park, a mile in i .48, weighing, with 
 my saddle, one hundred and fifteen pounds — the real reason, 
 beyond his great agility, was that we had mutual confidence 
 in each other, and when I turned his head to a fence he 
 knew that I intended him to jump it, and he never disap- 
 pointed me. There was a Spaniard named Heredia who 
 was one of our best riders and had an excellent horse some- 
 thing like mine. Wherever he went I always followed, or 
 if I led he followed me. We made this a rule, and although 
 I say it, who should not, we were always among the first 
 in the field. One day the hounds were thrown out and 
 we were all riding across a big open field, with a high rail 
 fence in front of us and a gate further up, through which 
 the whole hunt filed. I kept on alone, however, and jumped 
 my horse over the fence. Pretty soon we rode back again 
 and all went through the gate except myself, for I thought 
 that I might as well take the fence again, so I put Lun- 
 
 233 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 garino at ft, but he swerved a little just before he reached 
 it and jumped right over the gate-post itself — it must have 
 been more than six feet. When Calabrini, the M. F. H., 
 saw it, he said to one of his friends, "That young man will 
 break his neck some time ! " 
 
 Another time there was a large gathering at the hunt 
 — I never saw so many, perhaps two hundred — and we had 
 one or two short runs. One fox took to a cane-brake and 
 was killed, after which we had a long run across a level 
 sort of country with a great many rail fences. F. Augustus 
 Schermerhorn on his brown horse Barone, Baring of 
 the British Legation, and I were riding side by side; pres- 
 ently we noticed that there was no one else in sight. The 
 hounds were running right in front of us, when they sud- 
 denly stopped and began baying around the ruins of some 
 old buildings where the fox had evidently run to earth. 
 We were there several minutes before any others of the 
 hunt came up — Schermerhorn remarked that it spoke pretty 
 well for America and England. 
 
 Lungarino was such a wonderful little horse that 
 I must be forgiven if I recall some trifling incidents just to 
 show what a cathke creature he was and how level-headed. 
 I was alone following Miss Hosmer, on her tall brown horse, 
 and she crossed a ditch which I tried in another place lower 
 down. At the edge, hidden by low bushes, I struck a round- 
 topped rock, just large enough to hold my horse's feet; 
 he touched it lightly, sprang from it across a deep muddy 
 brook, landed on another rock, and then scrambled up an 
 almost perpendicular broken bank on the other side — all 
 in the time that it takes to tell about it. 
 
 Another time, having been thrown out of the hunt, 
 I found myself entirely alone, with no one in sight, riding 
 along a sloping stony hillside sparsely clothed with olive- 
 
 234 
 
THE CAMPAGNA 
 
 trees. I was galloping pretty fast, as it was late and I wanted 
 to catch up to the others, when suddenly under our noses 
 I saw one of those Roman watercourses edged with brick 
 on both sides, so I spoke to Lungarino and he took it 
 in his stride — it looked very wide and deep as I glimpsed 
 it below me in passing and I thanked my stars when I was 
 over. I never would have taken it dehberately, because 
 if Lungarino had not jumped it clean, or had trodden 
 on either edge, we should have been done for, horse and all, 
 for no one would ever have found us in that lonely spot. 
 
 A dashing rider at the hunt whom I have not mentioned 
 before was Miss Elizabeth Balch, a famous beauty. She 
 went abroad with us to visit relations in Rome; we realized 
 that her chaperonage though only for the journey was some- 
 thing of a responsibihty. Lizzie, as she was usually called, 
 was not only exceedingly pretty, but she had a sympathetic 
 and highly cultivated voice and was a fearless rider. Her 
 father. Doctor Balch, had been at one time canon of the 
 cathedral in Montreal, but when we first knew them the 
 Balches were living in Newport, near the second beach at 
 Purgatory. Lizzie's admirers were legion. They had begun 
 with the British officers stationed at Montreal when she 
 was living there, and with one of these. Lord George Hamil- 
 ton, a charming man and very handsome, we all went to 
 tea at his house in London. In Rome she was supposed 
 to be engaged to the Marquis of Bute — that would have 
 been a brilliant match — and another winter the Spanish 
 ambassador, who lived in the Villa Farnesina, was very 
 attentive. She was living with her uncle, Mr. Mobray, 
 who had an apartment in the Via Sistina just across the 
 way from us, and we used often to see the ambassador's 
 fine equipage, with its smart cobs, drawn up in front of her 
 door for hours. 
 
 335 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 But in spite of all this admiration, she never married — 
 she had a quick tongue and perhaps this had something to 
 do with it. At one time the Prince of Wales was a great 
 friend of hers, and used to call on her often in London. She 
 once said to him: 
 
 "How's your wife?" 
 
 "Her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales is very 
 well," he answered stiffly. 
 
 "Well, she is your wife, isn't she?" she remarked, a 
 pleasantry which he hked so Kttle that, I believe, he never 
 called on her again — he drew the line at jokes about the 
 princess. 
 
 Among my pleasantest companions at the hunt was 
 Theodore Roosevelt, father of T. R., who was spending 
 the winter in Rome with his family. Mrs. Roosevelt was 
 charming, and he an agreeable man and an enthusiastic 
 horseman. We had many delightful rides together, not 
 only at the hunt, but exploring many out-of-the-way places 
 in the Campagna, he mounted on his fine horse that we 
 always called the Gallant Gray and I on Lungarino. 
 
 Theodore Roosevelt to D, M, A, Rome 
 
 g4. Maiden Lane, N. Y., Sept., 1870. 
 "... I have taken a place at Riverdale for the sum- 
 mer, but there is no Campagna, with its lovely ruins, sur- 
 rounded by snow clad mountains and interspersed by those 
 charming stone fences. I cannot say so much for the wooden 
 fences, as they brought my nice old gray horse so sadly to 
 grief. I have a good saddle horse but am reduced to nothing 
 but style now. The four horses that I drive might as well 
 be oxen, they are nearly seventeen hands high, hold up 
 their heads and tails and go with their feet just hke ma- 
 chines, and as you may imagine give me no pleasure, though 
 
 236 
 
THE CAMPAGNA 
 
 I suppose the boys I pass on the road feel I am much to 
 be envied. An Englishman the other day had the coolness 
 to congratulate me on their training. 
 
 At the rate at which Europe is travelling, before this 
 reaches you you will probably be consul to a defunct gov- 
 ernment, much to the delight of the American people; their 
 sympathies were at first with Prussia, and now they do 
 not know whether or not they should desert her for a French 
 Republic." 
 
 There were plenty of foxes on the Campagna, so we 
 never had to resort to drag hunts; indeed, there were some- 
 times too many, as the pack would then divide and take 
 up a fresh scent of some other fox who had crossed the trail 
 of the first one. I was once riding close to the hounds and 
 we came to cross-roads where two foxes were sitting, ap- 
 parently talking to each other. As we surprised them, 
 one took the right hand and the other the left and the 
 pack separated, one-half of them after each fox. 
 
 I trust that I may be pardoned for telling so much about 
 my riding. I really do not do it from vanity, but because 
 I remember those days so vividly, so pleasantly, that they 
 insist on being recorded. Riding has been one of the chief 
 dehghts of a long fife — indeed, as I have already told you, 
 the most thrilling of all my early recollections is my first 
 ride on Commodore Salter's large bay horse, in the orchard 
 at Danskammer. 
 
 I have been told by Englishmen that the hunting in 
 Rome is much rougher and more dangerous than that over 
 the average Enghsh country, being more like that of Ire- 
 land. Occasionally there were accidents. One very sad 
 one in 1870, though not in hunting, was that of Hartmann 
 Kuhn, of Philadelphia, an awfully nice fellow, handsome 
 
 237 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 and dashing. He hunted and had several fine horses, but 
 though a fair rider had a bad habit of checking his horse 
 just as he was rising to a jump, which was dangerous, as 
 it threw the horse out of his stride. He was trying to cor- 
 rect this habit and went out on the Campagna with his 
 groom to practise, but he pulled on his horse so suddenly 
 that it fell on him and injured him internally. The Em- 
 peror's doctor happened to be in Rome and went to see 
 him, but said there was no hope, and Kuhn died in a few 
 days. He left a wife, who had been a Miss Gary of New 
 York, and a little child. After the accident it was remem- 
 bered that at a party at the Terrys' the evening before he 
 had talked a great deal about a recent hunting disaster 
 in England, remarking that to have a horse fall on you 
 was the worst thing that could happen. I was riding with 
 him the evening before his accident. We dismounted at 
 the Porta Pia, and while walking home through the Via 
 Babuino we got talking about the various floods caused 
 by the overflowing of the Tiber, and he showed me a wafl 
 in a little side street on which the height of floods in Rome 
 was marked. 
 
 Everybody knows the tradition about the fountain of 
 Trevi — how if you drink of its waters the night before your 
 departure you will surely return once more to the Eternal 
 City before you die. So the evening before I left I went 
 to the fountain, and kneeling at its basin I took a draught. 
 I don't remember whether or no I uttered a prayer that 
 I might return, but I certainly had a strong hope that the 
 prophecy might be fulfilled. Alas ! it never has been — and 
 now there is no probability that it ever will be. Twice since 
 I left I have been back to Italy, as near to Rome as Naples. 
 But to Rome I have never returned. My wife went there 
 in 1906, but thirty-four years of absence had so changed 
 
 238 
 
THE CAMPAGNA 
 
 everything that it made her very sad and homesick. Most 
 of her old friends were dead, and when she went to look 
 at our old house in the Via Sistina she found that the ancient 
 walls had been refmished like a modern French apartment- 
 house and not a vestige remained of the former beauty 
 wrought by three centuries of time and decay. 
 
 239 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 VENICE 
 
 "Star-crowned citadels, golden isles in a violet sea." 
 
 — Palgrave. 
 
 One should always arrive in Venice in the early morn- 
 ing, as I did that summer day in 1872, when I stepped out 
 of the stuffy train, and saw the gondolas swimming on the 
 lagoon in the flush of dawn, all so gay and beautiful. A 
 few days before, my wife had sailed for America with my 
 two little children and a Roman nurse, and after seeing 
 them off at Havre I started on the Fourth of July to spend 
 the summer in Venice. Just after my family left me, I went 
 through a pretty **bad quarter of an hour," for there came 
 a report that a French liner had been lost, and for some 
 time I could not be sure that it was not the ship that car- 
 ried all I had in the world. 
 
 But after that, everything was perfect, except the mos- 
 quitoes — "zanzari" as the Italians aptly call them. Every- 
 where were signs, "Try our Fidibus !" a pastile one burned 
 in the room at night, paralyzing to the mosquito but to 
 humans almost as noxious as the pest himself. My wife 
 lamented the heat I should have to endure, but it proved 
 nothing to what America went through that summer. I 
 never saw the thermometer higher than eighty-three, and 
 at Fishkill-on-the-Hudson, where she was, it went up to a 
 hundred and stayed there. The bathing at the Lido was 
 delightful, especially the return across the water in the 
 cool of the evening. I agree with the Italians in thinking 
 
 240 
 
VENICE 
 
 Venice an ideal watering-place — except for fleas and mos- 
 quitoes. 
 
 They said in Venice that Phillips Brooks, Willie Mc- 
 Vickar — both afterward bishops — and Richardson the archi- 
 tect, all enormously tall men, once went to the Lido together 
 to bathe. Beginning with Richardson, one after the other 
 applied to the bathing-house man for bathing suits; he 
 managed to squeeze Richardson into one of the httle gar- 
 ments adapted to his Itahan customers, but was appalled 
 when PhiHips Brooks made the same demand, and actually 
 turned tail and ran away in horror when the giant McVickar 
 appeared before his astonished eyes. Willie McVickar was 
 the biggest man I ever saw out of a circus. 
 
 I stayed at Venturini's, a small hotel overlooking the 
 harbor near the Bridge of Sighs, where I had stopped the 
 summer before with my family. Venturini was a persistent, 
 bustling little man — much like one of his own mosquitoes — 
 who lighted on you whenever he got a chance and buzzed 
 you to death with the glories of his hotel. Distinguished 
 visitors are the breath of hfe to Itahan landlords and they 
 dehght in spreading their names and titles on the bulletin 
 board in the front hall, so of course I figured as "Console 
 Generale degh Stati Uniti d' America," and when my brother 
 Gouverneur came we were amused to find him posted as 
 Signor Armstrong " Gouvernatore de New York." 
 
 The Haseltines were at Venturini's, and so was George 
 Yewell, who was painting a fine interior of the ducal palace. 
 Later on Yewell painted a good deal in Egypt. When he 
 first worked there, he got rather discouraged — he couldn't 
 seem to get the right eff*ect of atmosphere. He was com- 
 plaining of this one day to several other painters, when he 
 was interrupted by a stranger wearing a fez, who turned 
 out to be the brother of Edouard Frere. "You must re- 
 
 241. 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 member," he said, "that you have never before painted 
 in a country that is absolutely dry. In Europe on a bright 
 day the air is clean, here it is full of dust. Never forget 
 that the sunshine here is always thickened with dust." 
 Yewell found this advice was just what he needed. 
 
 Another friend at Venturini's was John Bunney, an 
 Englishman who made most delightful water-colors, beau- 
 tiful in drawing, and in color minutely true to nature. He 
 was a charming man as well as an enthusiastic painter; 
 so pleasant was our friendship that it lived through a cor- 
 respondence of years. The illustrations for "The Stones 
 of Venice" were his work, and at this time he was occupied 
 with some more drawings for Ruskin, whom he knew inti- 
 mately. I remember once speaking of Ruskin's advice 
 to young draftsmen, "Always have in your pocket a well- 
 sharpened pencil in a sheath, ready for any emergency," 
 and I asked Bunney if Ruskin practised his own precept, 
 
 "On the contrary," he said, "he never had any pencil 
 or paper with him and always borrowed mine!" 
 
 Bunney's many years in Venice had shown him every 
 nook and corner; no street was too tortuous, no palazzo 
 or picture too out of the way, for him to discover. He and 
 I would sally out very early on delicious summer Sunday 
 mornings, just as the church doors were opening for early 
 service, and after a cup of coffee at a neighboring trattoria 
 we would take a long ramble. Our favorite haunts were 
 the old courtyards, surrounded by gray palace walls, with 
 their wonderful marble wells, the sculptured curbs furrowed 
 inside by the ropes and chains of countless years and bear- 
 ing on their sides the coat of arms of the former knightly 
 owner. The wrought-iron gratings which covered them, 
 works of art in themselves, used to be kept locked, as the 
 water-supply was limited in those days, and we never tired 
 
 242 
 
VENICE 
 
 of the busy scene in the early morning when the wells were 
 opened, the flocks of women hurrying to get water and 
 carrying it away on their heads in beautiful old jars and 
 copper repousse vessels, gesticulating, gossiping, and clam- 
 oring, in gayly colored groups. 
 
 Sundays were Bunney's holidays, but all the week- 
 days he painted industriously, usually keeping four differ- 
 ent subjects going at the same time, for the four different 
 periods of the day. Bystanders bothered him intensely 
 while he worked in the streets, so he contrived an ingenious 
 device, a raised platform, just above the height of an on- 
 looker's eye; standing this out in the square, he would mount 
 it by some little folding steps that he would draw up after 
 him, and there he would sit secure from annoyance. Bun- 
 ney's palette was very limited. Even in representing gold 
 he confined himself to yellow ochre, and eschewed cadmium 
 because, he said, it would fade in time. Vedder remarked 
 when I mentioned this: "That's all very well, but what 
 would he do if he had to paint a fellow perfectly covered 
 with cadmium?" 
 
 I know another painter who says that he uses only white, 
 black, vermilion, and yellow ochre, and avers that he can 
 paint anything with these colors. Some one asked him 
 what he would do if a sitter insisted on wearing a blue coat. 
 
 "Why, I suppose," he said with a shudder, "I should 
 have to get some blue !" 
 
 "What kind of blue would you use?" 
 
 "I don't know, I'd ask the color man." 
 
 Bunney and I went out to Murano to see the cathedral 
 and were shocked to find that it had recently been restored. 
 The fine old carved woodwork was gone; the stone walls, 
 mellowed and stained by time, refinished to a glaring new- 
 ness; the whole thing put in excellent repair, and simply 
 
 243 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 ruined! It looked like a perfectly modern building. Al- 
 most all restoration works havoc with beauty, but of all 
 such sinners modern Italians are the worst. 
 
 It goes without saying that I spent most of my summer 
 in painting. San Marco absorbed me for a month, a mirac- 
 ulous old place — indeed, it is hard to believe that great 
 cathedrals like San Marco have been made with hands; 
 they seem rather like great trees to have grown more beau- 
 tiful year by year. In San Marco the artists were privileged; 
 we could sit and paint wherever we pleased, no one ever 
 interfering with us; we were allowed to store our easels 
 and canvases in the sacristy — there were so many of them 
 that it looked more like a studio than the robing-room of 
 a church — and hberal fees for caring for our things made 
 the sacristans our good friends. Never was there a more 
 delightful place to work in. Not an hour passed without 
 its picturesque incident — a procession of monks with ban- 
 ners and crucifixes chanting the litany of the saints; boys 
 with swinging censers, the pale smoke rising among the por- 
 phyry columns and statues, and half veiling the giant gold 
 mosaic figures of saints and prophets on the walls above; 
 or perhaps, in a side chapel, a baby being christened and 
 anointed with the holy oil. One day I saw two little girls 
 playing hide and seek for a long time in the confessional 
 boxes along each side of the nave. Nobody interfered, for 
 the kneehng people in Italian churches are usually ready 
 for a little outside diversion, and after a while they went 
 into one of the boxes and confessed to an old white-haired 
 priest. 
 
 Among the painters in San Marco, B. C. Porter was 
 my particular friend. His color was rich and fine, but, 
 strange to say, he was color-blind, and often had to ask 
 me whether the mosaic saint he was painting was garbed 
 
 244 
 
VENICE 
 
 in red or green. But when he put it on his canvas it was 
 all right. Sanford Gifford was also color-blind, but he did 
 not attempt strongly contrasted colors in his beautiful 
 landscapes, but rather took refuge in monotones. 
 
 William Gedney Bunce was a man of whom we were 
 all very fond, so fond that we guyed him a good deal, al- 
 ways calling him "Old Bunce," why I don't know, for even 
 now he is still vigorous and cheerful. His painting is full 
 of feeling and beautiful in color, but his drawing has always 
 heen his weak point. We were breakfasting one day in a 
 Kttle cafe near the Bridge of Sighs when some one began 
 chaffing Bunce about this. 
 
 *'Why don't you learn to draw, Bunce?" he said. 
 
 "Well, you see it's this way," he answered: "the trouble 
 with my learning to draw is that as soon as I begin to draw 
 any object it straightway begins to wiggle ! Now if I were 
 really to try to draw that anchor," pointing to an old rusty 
 anchor lying on the quay, "it would immediately begin 
 to wiggle, and before I knew it would be off in a seasick 
 whirl!" 
 
 At this time Bunce was having a great success with 
 his pictures in England, for Queen Victoria had set the 
 fashion by buying several of them. Bunce told me he met 
 Ziem in Venice that same summer, but didn't recognize 
 him. In talking over various artists, Bunce remarked that, 
 after all, there was only one man who had ever painted 
 the true Venice — that man he said was Ziem. Whereupon 
 Ziem smote his breast delightedly and shouted: "C'est 
 moi — c'est moi. Je suis le Ziem!" 
 
 Eugene Benson painted an interesting picture in Venice 
 that year. The scene is laid in a corner of the Doge's Palace, 
 in the gray fight of very early morning. Some revefiers — 
 clowns, harlequins, and other gay masques — returning 
 
 245 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 from a ball, come suddenly upon a corpse laid out for burial. 
 It is a gruesome but dramatic subject, treated with skill. 
 Benson was the stepfather of Miss Dudu Fletcher, the 
 author of "Kismet," a well-known novel in its day, but I 
 tried to read it over again not long ago and found it pretty 
 dull. I fancy most "best sellers" grow flat in forty years. 
 About this time William Graham, an American painter 
 whom I had known very well in Rome, married his Italian 
 landlady and settled in Venice, in a little house on a canal 
 near the church of Santi Giovanni e Paolo, in front of which 
 stands one of the grandest statues in the world, Verrocchio's 
 CoIIeone. Graham's things were fine in feeling and color, 
 but he painted few finished pictures, contenting himself 
 with making numberless careful sketches from nature 
 which he was never concerned about selling. He was so 
 modest and retiring that he let clients hunt him up, and 
 was therefore more appreciated among his fellow artists 
 than by the general public. He had such a hard time getting 
 along that his friends were much pleased when he married 
 the lady, as she was well-to-do, an excellent cook, and made 
 him very comfortable. They thought he was well provided 
 for for life. But, alas ! she only lived for a few years and 
 "poor old Graham," as everybody afi'ectionately called him, 
 was again drifting about. During the regime of his efficient 
 wife he became trim and well set up, with neat collars and 
 cuff's and well-brushed clothes, but he soon lapsed into his 
 old threadbare ways. He was a tall, thin, solemn-looking 
 man, with a dry sense of humor. Before he became a painter 
 he had been in the gold diggings of California, a "forty- 
 niner," and kept a grocery store at one end of a little vil- 
 lage. At the other end of the street lived a jealous enemy, 
 a rival grocer, who threatened to shoot him on sight. 
 Graham had a headstrong mule, that sometimes ran away 
 
 246 
 
VENICE 
 
 and was generally unruly. One day as he mounted his 
 mule, it took the bit between its teeth and ran with him pell- 
 mell, right through the village and straight into his rival's 
 shop. His startled enemy, revolver in hand, was about 
 to shoot, when Graham with great presence of mind thrust 
 his hand into his pocket, pulled out a dollar, and said: "Give 
 me a pound of sugar!" When the enemy found a rival 
 transformed into a customer before his eyes, his wrath was 
 appeased and they became firm friends. 
 
 When Graham started out from Rome on a sketching 
 tour for the summer, he never decided beforehand where 
 he was going, but would board a train and whenever they 
 stopped he would take a look at the landscape, and if it 
 seemed paintable he would get out and perhaps spend the 
 whole summer there. In the course of time he turned up 
 in New York and brought with him all his art accumula- 
 tions of many years — pictures, tapestries, rugs, and what 
 not, all for sale. He had many good things, among them 
 a small and excellent example of Tiepolo, who was just 
 then being discovered by connoisseurs, after a long sleep, 
 and becoming the fashion. As I wanted to help Graham 
 along, I told him that I might find him a purchaser for this 
 picture, for which he asked a hundred dollars. I mentioned 
 it to Francis Lathrop and told him that Graham would 
 take two hundred and fifty for it. Lathrop was delighted 
 with it, thought it very cheap, and took it at that price; 
 so I felt I had done pretty well for Graham. C. C. Cole- 
 man bought one of his rugs for a small price and sold it 
 for thousands, but with his usual generosity he shared his 
 profit with Graham. 
 
 Having sold his "roba," Graham could no longer keep 
 away from Italy. The last I heard of him was in Capri, 
 where his old friends Vedder and Coleman looked out for 
 
 247 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 him at the last. He was a dear old fellow, gentle as a child. 
 Fortunately his lovable qualities endeared him to his friends, 
 who never failed him in hard places, and he floated through 
 hfe, as Disraeli says, "like lihes on the stream." He had 
 few wants, and if he had enough of painting from nature 
 he cared for nothing more. He had a happy life. 
 
 Venice is filled with little stands for the sale of fruit 
 and miscellaneous articles, one favorite dish being strips 
 of fried pumpkin. Snails are also in demand, not the large 
 snail of commerce which we all know, but a httle thing the 
 size of a small pea, which I have never seen except in Venice. 
 They are very cheap, a centime buying a quantity. When 
 a purchaser buys a handful, they are handed out to him 
 on a large vine-leaf with a small piece of wood like a tooth- 
 pick, with which he extracts them from their shells and 
 consumes them as he idles along the street. While I was 
 sitting painting one day, I observed two wayfarers stop 
 at one of these stands. One spent a centime for a vine-leaf 
 of snails. He did not off'er any to his friend, who watched 
 him feast with hungry eyes until they were almost gone, 
 when he could stand it no longer and timidly asked for 
 one, but the glutton dechned — it seemed to me about the 
 meanest thing I had ever seen. Centimes were used in 
 Venice a great deal because of the extreme poverty of the 
 people. You know, at every landing-place for gondolas 
 there is always an old fellow bearing a hooked stick to hold 
 the gondola in place, who helps the passenger to alight 
 and, of course, expects a gratuity, usually a ten-centime 
 piece, equal to one cent of our money. I once meanly 
 dropped a centime in the old man's cap, and he felt so in- 
 sulted at the smallness of the gift that he turned his cap 
 over and dropped the coin into the water; but I think it 
 was only bluff' — no one in Venice would throw away even 
 
 248 
 
VENICE 
 
 a centime, and I am certain that when I had gone he dived 
 in after it. 
 
 Haseltine and I spent a great deal of time in the antiquity 
 shops, very keen about finding good things cheap. And 
 what splendid chances for picking up "roba antica" there 
 were in those days ! Not once have I regretted anything 
 that I bought, saving all my regrets for not buying many 
 things that I coveted but did not think I could afford. The 
 dealers always asked much more than they were willing 
 to take, often three or four times as much, and they despised 
 you for a green "forestiere," if you immediately gave them 
 their price. Brass plates of the fifteenth century were much 
 prized and were plentiful in those days, when few people 
 except artists were collectors of bric-a-brac. Whenever 
 one of their numerous festas came along, all the people took 
 a hohday and thronged the streets in their best clothes; 
 booths would be erected along the pavement, decorated 
 with green boughs; those for the sale of fried fish invariably 
 displayed a row of these brightly polished brass plates, 
 about eighteen inches across, usually with a scriptural sub- 
 ject in the middle and Gothic lettering around the edge. 
 Most of them were cheap modern imitations, but among 
 them would generally be one or two choice old ones which 
 were always for sale at some price or other, generally about 
 twenty-five francs. I acquired several on these occasions, 
 and Haseltine bought two or three dozen for his fine palazzo 
 in Rome. One of Haseltine's most cherished possessions 
 was a splendid tapestry that he had bought from the great 
 Fortuny. I happened to learn that it was probably one 
 of a set belonging to the Spanish royal family, one of which 
 was missing and was supposed to have been stolen. Hasel- 
 tine was a good deal disturbed by this report, fearing that 
 it might be claimed, but I don't think it ever was. 
 
 249 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 In Venice, the summer before, I heard of some old tapes- 
 tries in a private house; the owner threw them down from 
 an upper-story window into a courtyard and spread them 
 out there for me to see. I was fascinated by one of the 
 smaller ones showing a pretty garden scene, with many 
 small figures, charming little knights and ladies, strolling 
 about under the trees — always designated by its owner, 
 who spoke broken English, as the one with the "small 
 fidgers." I liked it immensely, but the price was six thou- 
 sand francs, so I did not consider it. 
 
 When I came back the following summer, the owner 
 would turn up every now and then when I was painting 
 in the streets and ask me how much I would give for the 
 tapestry with the "small fidgers." He always refused my 
 offers, but finally, when the summer had passed and "fore- 
 stieri" were few, he began reducing his price and at last 
 came down to three thousand francs. A few days before 
 I left, I told him that it was his last chance, and offered 
 him five hundred francs, which to my surprise he promptly 
 accepted and threw the tapestry down to me out of the 
 window. I have it now and have refused a good price for 
 it. 
 
 It was in Venice that I bought, for a hundred francs, 
 one of my best things, a very fine marriage chest carved 
 with a lovely design in low relief. There is an exact duplicate 
 of it in Perugia, the design attributed to Perugino. It had 
 dolphins at the corners, but as their heads were gone I had 
 a little Roman wood-carver make some heads which matched 
 the old work exactly. This man in the Via Capo le Case 
 had a genius for imitating the old carving. With a few 
 rude tools — a saw, a chisel, and a mallet — not following any 
 design, he cut things right from his own head that were 
 really fine — not the sandpapered stuff glued on a flat back- 
 
 250 
 
VENICE 
 
 ground that the carvers do in Florence, but solid work, 
 the design melting into the flat surface but showing the 
 sharp marks of the chisel, like the modelling of the Italian 
 sculptors of the fifteenth century or the work of Augustus 
 Saint Gaudens. 
 
 I was once driving in a cab in the outskirts of Paris 
 with Saint Gaudens when we espied in a little shop two 
 old Gothic carved oak panels. We immediately jumped 
 out and bought them for a trifle, each of us taking one. 
 Afterward in New York, I lent mine to McKim and he used 
 it as a motive and as a model for the carver, in the style 
 of cutting, for the panels of the beautiful pulpit in the 
 Church of the Ascension which he designed and had car- 
 ried out under his own eye. It was also in Paris, in a car- 
 penter's shop, that I discovered a splendid chest, covered 
 with pigskin and profusely studded with ornamental copper 
 nails in intricate designs, with bronze handles and lock 
 in the form of lovely dolphins. It is of about the time of 
 Louis XIV, and may have belonged to the Dauphin. Stan- 
 ford White admired it so much that he took a rubbing of 
 it for some leather work which he was then doing. It was 
 in another carpenter's shop, this one on the Via Sistina 
 in Rome, that I found two small bronze portrait medallions 
 of the fifteenth century, and worthy of the period, of which 
 I have never seen any reproductions. 
 
 A terra-cotta bas-relief for a shrine, which I discovered 
 in Florence in 1872, is of the time of Donatello, a Madonna 
 and Child, most delicately colored and with lovely faces. 
 There is one in Turin by Donatello with figures exactly 
 like mine, but where mine has a flat background with a 
 sort of arabesque or tapestry design, that in Turin has two 
 wreaths interlaced. I bought this for thirty-five francs. 
 
 One of the best antiquity dealers in Venice had his shop 
 
 251 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 in a splendid old palace on the Grand Canal, its ceilings 
 covered with fine old faded frescoes and everything about 
 it just as it had been in the fifteenth century. Strange to 
 relate, though he was quite up on all phases of ancient art, 
 he had another and very diff'erent calhng — he was a butcher ! 
 It is hard to understand how he could reconcile himself to 
 occupations so incongruous. His daughter usually sat in 
 the shop and did the selling, and as I wanted badly a re- 
 pousse brass plate which they had, I would off'er her twenty- 
 five francs for it whenever I happened in, but she always 
 declined. The day before I left Venice I walked in — the 
 daughter was sitting there — I put down twenty-five francs 
 on the counter and walked off with the plate under my arm. 
 She threw up both hands and exclaimed: 
 
 "ManodiDio! Mano di Dio!" 
 
 I also bought in Venice a very unusual marriage-chest 
 front, of the fourteenth century. It is made of walnut, 
 carved in low relief with figures of huntsmen and horses 
 returning from a boar-hunt, black with age, but brightened 
 with the remains of gilding in spots here and there. De- 
 ciding to treat it as a shelf, I got the Capo le Case wood- 
 carver to add a grotesque head at each end and a shelf above, 
 and later I had it built into a mantelpiece at Danskammer 
 with good eff^ect. 
 
 One day, wandering into an ancient Venetian palazzo, 
 I saw hanging in the hall an etching by Albert Diirer — 
 the horse with a mailed figure walking by its side — and 
 bought it for ten francs. I don't know whether it is an 
 original or not but it is good enough to be. Perhaps it is 
 by Marc Antonio, who engraved Diirer's things in Venice. 
 I remember in Padua asking an antiquity dealer if he had 
 any old books. He said, yes, that he would show me a 
 few, and took me to an old palace where the garret was 
 
 252 
 
VENICE 
 
 filled with at least a thousand volumes, most of them of 
 very early printing, with vellum bindings and many with 
 metal clasps. He told me I could help myself to any book 
 in the collection at a franc each, but I had no means of 
 carrying them. I bought only one, a treatise on some Latin 
 particle, with a stamped leather binding, classic heads and 
 ornaments, and brass clasps. 
 
 When I went to a new place in travelling, I often sought 
 out the antiquity shops before I visited the great sights, 
 and now when I look at my little collection at home each 
 object has a history and recalls some delightful hunt in 
 out-of-the-way corners of many an old city. But I must 
 not let my love for "roba antica" run away with me, al- 
 though I am mentioning all these acquisitions partly to 
 show how cheaply in those days one could pick up really 
 good things. What treasures I could have secured for the 
 Metropolitan Museum if they had let me buy for them ! 
 
 I once had an adventure in an antiquity shop that might 
 have been more serious than amusing. One afternoon I 
 visited Innocenti's, in the Via Frattina in Rome, and ex- 
 amined some coins that Innocenti himself showed me, one 
 of them gold, about the size of a twenty-dollar gold piece. 
 I thought that I returned it to him, but the next morning 
 while shaving I took up my waistcoat and to my horror 
 found this coin in the pocket! With the lather still on 
 my face I hurried into my coat and rushed down to In- 
 nocenti's and found him just taking down his shutters, 
 for it was not yet eight o'clock. I gave him the coin with 
 breathless apologies. He was not disturbed — he said that 
 he had seen me put it in my pocket, but knew that it would 
 be all right. 
 
 That summer in Venice most of the artists and writers 
 would meet at Florian's celebrated restaurant under the 
 
 ^53 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 colonnade of the Square of San Marco, and there, grouped 
 around little tables, we would listen to the band, eat ices, 
 drink coffee, and consume "caramelli" that men brought 
 around on trays — candied fruits of every description, grapes, 
 plums, and apricots, speared on bits of wood like tooth- 
 picks. In those days, living in Venice was extraordinarily 
 cheap, and two people could dine at a good restaurant for 
 sixty cents. The doors of Florian's were never closed day 
 or night — had not been, it is said, in a hundred years. Alas, 
 they are closed to-day, in 191 7! 
 
 When the Austrians were in possession in 1869, their 
 smart light-blue and white uniforms were everywhere, and 
 I thought these elaborately gotten-up officers were the 
 handsomest men I had ever seen. And when I first sat 
 under the arches at Florian's listening to the music, it was 
 the Austrian band that played for us. But in 1872 they 
 had given way to the Italians. The strains of the band 
 floated across to us from the opposite corner of the square, 
 bathed in silver moonfight; every hour the two Moors on 
 the clock-tower would beat out the time with clanging 
 strokes; flower-girls would saunter by and pin little bouquets 
 in our buttonholes. We had pleasant times at Florian's, 
 under the arches. 
 
 There was a foolish little game we used to play at 
 Florian's — some one would throw a half-smoked cigar out 
 on the pavement and we would proceed to bet as to whether 
 a passer-by from the right or from the left would pick it 
 up; the loser would pay for the ices or caramelli. Hasel- 
 tine Kked more substantial fodder than ices, however, and 
 he would often slip away for half an hour and adjourn to 
 the Hotel Baur for one of their famous beefsteaks, and 
 come back to us redolent of onions. 
 
 Henry James was one of the most interesting of the 
 
 254 
 
VENICE 
 
 men one met at Florfan's. My first acquaintance with 
 him was at a picture gallery in Bologna in 1869, where we 
 fraternized in discussing the pictures, and he was then a 
 handsome young man, not yet famous. At this time in 
 Venice he had "arrived," and had already done much of 
 his best work. Another literary man I met in Venice was 
 T. Adolphus TroIIope, accompanied by his lovely daughter 
 Beatrice. He looked a good deal like his brother Anthony, 
 a bluff, hearty man, rather stout and red. 
 
 You never paint in the streets of Venice without some- 
 thing amusing happening. As I was making a sketch one 
 day of a marble column with a cross on the top and steps 
 around the base, I casually put in the figure of a pretty 
 young girl who happened to sit knitting on one of the steps. 
 I had just got her in to my satisfaction when she strolled 
 round behind me, and reaching deftly forward, before I 
 could stop her, with one sweep ©f her thumb wiped the 
 whole figure out of the picture. Like the Indians in the 
 West, the peasants hate to be sketched, thinking it sub- 
 jects them to the power of the evil eye. Another time I 
 was painting the window of a church from a gondola moored 
 quietly under the wall; in the stern lay the gondolier, 
 stretched flat on his back with his mouth wide open, en- 
 joying the usual siesta. Suddenly, without warning, a pail- 
 ful of slops was cast from an upper window, directly into 
 his peaceful face. He was deluged. With a shriek the 
 poor fellow dived headlong into the canal, clothes and all. 
 
 I wonder if the fishing-boats in Venice are still as beau- 
 tiful as they were in those days : their colored sails, usually 
 a rich amber, adorned with some device — the more am- 
 bitious with a Madonna, a crucifix, or some such religious 
 emblem — the nets a warm brown, strung up to dry on the 
 masts and rigging and hanging in graceful folds; the black 
 
 255 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 hulls painted on the prow with quaint names, such as 
 " Honora Fatica " or ** Rene di Mari/' The time to see them 
 in their glory was the early morning, when they returned 
 in great fleets with their catch of the night before to their 
 chief rendezvous, the quay back of the Public Garden. 
 I spent many happy mornings in the comfortable seat of 
 a gondola, painting these charming little vessels grouped 
 along the shore or dotting a distant lagoon. Those were 
 ideal days ! 
 
 John W. Bunney to D, M. A., New York 
 
 Fondamenta San Biagio, Venice. Jan., 1874. 
 
 "... I have not forgotten the pleasant companion- 
 ship we had in Venice. I heard from Graham that you 
 had gone in for art at last and set up a studio in New York. 
 May your fullest hopes and liveliest anticipations be fully 
 realized, and when love is the foundation-stone can one 
 desire a better wish for a fellow worker ! 
 
 Last summer we had cholera from June to October, 
 close quarantine by way of the sea, and no bathers. I could 
 look across from my balcony to the Salute and the Giudecca 
 and not see a single vessel. Nearly all the gaiety in Venice 
 was confined to the artists, who kept up a constant run of 
 dissipation in the way of dancing at the Lido and picnics 
 at Sant' Elena. Some of them admitted to me that they 
 felt no disposition to work, and thought it might be the 
 scirocco or the bad air of Venice, at which I grinned and 
 said nothing! Yewell was here and worked hard; he went 
 to Cadore for a month and the sketches he did there pleased 
 me much. His things in the church here have in them such 
 a look of marble and truth of colour that I feel he is going 
 on fast, by steady indomitable courage in not turning 
 aside either to fashion on the one hand or tricks of clever 
 
 256 
 
VENICE 
 
 execution on the other. Grahani showed me a delicious 
 bit outside one of the gates of Rome, such sweet feeling 
 and quiet subdued colour, not naturahstic, but very poetic, 
 such a picture as one could turn to in anxious irritable mo- 
 ments and get peace and strength. Then we had some 
 Spaniards from Paris, whose work gave me food for thought; 
 I don't say they were entirely satisfactory, but they had 
 a fascination that was not only attractive but satisfactory. 
 
 Well, about my own work — I think, or rather I know, 
 that I can do things now that I could not when you were 
 here. But it is a hard fight to keep pace with clever exe- 
 cution on the one hand, and French feeling on the other, — 
 not that I despise clever execution or French feehng. I 
 look on with a great desire, when I see how freely men do 
 that which I cannot, how much they get with scarcely any 
 effort or means; and my reverence is great for that lovely 
 feeling which the French and Spaniards get into their work. 
 
 Now when are you coming back to Italy and Venice? 
 We often talk of you all, and Maggie and Pippo would be 
 glad to see their pretty little golden-haired playfellow 
 again." 
 
 Every morning for years after I left Italy, with my first 
 waking thoughts I would begin to plan how I could return, 
 and often I regretted that because of the inadequate salary 
 I had resigned my position as consul-general. But as I 
 look back now I am satisfied. I am glad that my children 
 were brought up Americans. 
 
 237 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 "Youth is a house that has no stairs at all, 
 And like a ship at sea is manhood's prime." 
 
 The Falcone was an ancient Roman trattoria, opening 
 its hospitable doors just back of the Pantheon on one of 
 the crooked streets that tie themselves into a dozen bow- 
 knots in an effort to wriggle somehow into a respectable 
 part of town. To those familiar with modern Rome the 
 vicinity of the Pantheon will seem an unexpected spot in 
 which to discover a favorite cafe, but in the early seventies 
 the Falcone was much patronized by the artistic fraternity. 
 The billowy primitive stone floor and the tables furrowed 
 and black with age could not detract a whit from the fra- 
 grance of the macaroni sizzling in the next room, while the 
 heads of old wine-casks that studded the walls but reminded 
 us that there still remained much chianti to be met and 
 conquered. The American and English artists who en- 
 joyed the Falcone's savory meals were not always famous, 
 but they satisfactorily enough made up for the lack of ap- 
 preciation in others by at any rate unreservedly admitting 
 to each other that they were far and away the best. 
 
 Here it was that the sculptor Rhinehart (or "Rhiny," 
 as he was known to his fellows, a man "of infinite wit") 
 was host at a jolly dinner one sultry July night in 1872 — 
 the 3d of the month it was, for I remember how patriotic 
 we became as morning drew near. And it had drawn dis- 
 gracefully near before all the tales were told and all the 
 
 258 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 songs sung by the convivial crowd, among whom I remember 
 Vedder and Coleman. At the long table also sat George 
 Simmons, the English sculptor whose "Falconer" adorns 
 a rocky knoll in Central Park. The name of my next neigh- 
 bor was Augustus Saint Gaudens. His personality strongly 
 impressed me, and there and then began a friendship 
 destined to last till the day of his death. 
 
 When my new-found friend and I sallied out after dinner, 
 we came upon Vedder sitting on one of the large stones at 
 the corner of the Via Frattina and the Piazza di Spagna, 
 gazing with solemn attention at the moon as it hung in 
 quiet glory over the Pincian Hill. Dawn was just touching 
 the skies and the chill of early morning was in the air. But 
 from that position not all the expostulations of Saint Gau- 
 dens and myself could budge Vedder, and after a time we 
 forbore and left him still sitting on his stone in silent con- 
 templation. The next day I departed for Venice, and a 
 year passed before I could renew my acquaintance with 
 Saint Gaudens. 
 
 The end of a year saw us both on this side of the At- 
 lantic, and many were the experiences we had in New York 
 in the old building on the corner of Fourth Avenue and 
 Fourteenth Street. It still is occupied by the German Sav- 
 ings Bank, but in those days there were a number of vacant 
 up-stairs rooms used as studios. We each rented one of 
 these, and for several years I saw him almost daily; dis- 
 couraging and depressing years they were for him, although 
 maybe not really so hard as the earlier ones he had spent 
 as a student at the Beaux Arts. 
 
 Saint Gaudens had been working for some time on a 
 small recumbent female figure, which was finally cast in 
 plaster and sent to the Academy of Design. It was re- 
 jected. He had also before this, in Rome, made a marble 
 
 259 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 figure of "Silence" for a Masonic temple, but the Masons, 
 knowing little of art, didn't like it and were prevailed upon 
 to accept it only after he had spent weary weeks at work, 
 himself cutting and chipping the marble after it was already 
 in place. They now congratulate themselves, it is said, on 
 having known enough to secure the work of a great sculptor ! 
 
 The father of Saint Gaudens was a shoemaker who 
 kept his shop next to the old Academy of Design in Fourth 
 Avenue. I often met him. He was an erect old French- 
 man with a fine leonine head, an aristocratic bearing, and 
 good blood in his veins, I am sure. Saint Gaudens had 
 no regular education to speak of, though his active mind 
 readily acquired bits of knowledge, and later on in life he 
 was a very well-educated man. At the time of which I 
 speak, however, he was innocent of even an acquaintance 
 with many of the masterpieces of literature. He once asked 
 me where he could find an accurate story of Moses. Rather 
 amused, I lent him the obvious book. Late that night he 
 came back into my studio in a great state of excitement, 
 carrying in his hand the Bible I had lent him. 
 
 "I've never read this before," he exclaimed. "It's 
 the most remarkable thing I have ever seen." 
 
 Saint Gaudens often told me of the trials he had suf- 
 fered as an apprentice to a cameo-cutter, a Frenchman, 
 who spent his holidays and Sundays in shooting snipe on 
 the Weehawken Flats. The young craftsman was com- 
 pelled to walk all day, lugging his master's game-bag and 
 running after the snipe he shot. Never would he admit, 
 even in confidence, that the bag was a heavy one, so loath 
 was he to give "that fellow" credit for anything; but there 
 is not much hazard in the guess that snipe were then in a 
 more flourishing condition on the "Flats" than is the case 
 to-day, and that the sport was pretty good — for the master. 
 
 260 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 Cameo-cutting was soon abandoned, but not before 
 Saint Gaudens had become very skilful at the trade. This 
 training I have no doubt greatly influenced his whole ar- 
 tistic career. Upon returning to America after his first 
 trip abroad he was desperately poor, and during most of 
 one winter he and the sculptor Palmer slept in a storeroom 
 on the same floor as our studios, using as beds the great 
 empty packing-boxes of some furniture that had come to 
 me from Italy. 
 
 In those days Mr. Robert Gordon's house was a 
 rendezvous of artists and their friends, and every winter 
 Mr. Gordon gave a large reception, with a splendid spread, 
 to which the artists considered it quite the thing to be in- 
 vited. Entirely diff*erent from any of the present-day func- 
 tions, they were a distinct feature of New York life, and 
 were looked forward to from year to year. To one of these 
 I obtained an invitation for Saint Gaudens, and while we 
 were there introduced him to Doctor Noyes, the famous 
 surgeon and oculist. The conversation having turned upon 
 hospitals. Saint Gaudens related to Doctor Noyes how 
 once as a child, while playing in his father's workshop, he 
 had cut a long gash in his arm and as a result had been 
 carried to a hospital near by. Pulling up his sleeve, he 
 showed the scar. Doctor Noyes said: "I remember the 
 wound as distinctly as I do the brave little boy. I was 
 the doctor who sewed it up !" 
 
 In his younger days Saint Gaudens was shy and avoided 
 somewhat the company of the great, and he described to 
 me as one of his early trials his modelling of a bust of a 
 distinguished diplomat. This gentleman's doctor had or- 
 dered him to soak his feet, so when he posed for my friend 
 he sat wrapped up in a blanket on a high chair, his feet 
 stuck in a tub of water which it was part of Saint Gaudens's 
 
 261 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 duty to keep hot. When the bust was well under way, Saint 
 Gaudens noticed that the distinguished diplomat kept 
 bringing the conversation around to Socrates and Seneca, 
 Marcus Aurelius and Plato. The reason for this was not 
 long obscure. 
 
 "I find," said the D. D., "after a careful examination, 
 that all these distinguished men had very broad foreheads 
 — just broaden mine a bit." So Saint Gaudens, afraid to 
 object, meekly complied. Repeated urgings and the re- 
 sultant broadenings brought the forehead finally to the 
 point where it seemed to be aff'ected with some dreadful 
 swelling disease. But this did not bring complete satis- 
 faction to the heart of the sitter. He suggested that these 
 same great forerunners of his were also notable for having 
 had very deep-set eyes. So poor Saint Gaudens was forced 
 to bore and bore, deeper and deeper, until he almost pierced 
 through to the back. He told me this story with great 
 excitement, interspersing in the narrative many uncom- 
 plimentary remarks on celebrities in general, and illustrat- 
 ing it all by puffing out his cheeks and making violent bor- 
 ing gestures with his forefinger. He said he'd give any- 
 thing to get hold of that bust and smash it to atoms. 
 
 By nature modest and retiring, nothing bored him more 
 than to be thrust forward, especially if the particular kind 
 of torture happened to be public speaking. His literary 
 style was terse and vivid, and he showed it to advantage 
 in his letters, frequently illustrating them, too, with humor- 
 ous scraps of drawings and using for signature a caricature 
 of his own long profile. His manners were always most 
 attractive, but he cared little for dress and despised all its 
 aff*ectations. I remember that he bore a particular grudge 
 against the pointed shoes that used to be fashionable, and 
 was continually making fun of mine. But this lack of in- 
 
 262 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 terest in clothes did not hinder him from admirably de- 
 picting them, as witness the Farragut and Lincoln statues. 
 La Farge told me he thought Saint Gaudens in his Lin- 
 coln had obtained the most successful result that he had 
 ever seen in the struggle of dealing artistically with the 
 problem of modern dress. 
 
 In 1877 I found that Mrs. Edward King thought of 
 erecting a monument at Newport in memory of her hus- 
 band, and it occurred to me that Saint Gaudens and La 
 Farge would be an excellent pair to execute the work, so 
 I introduced my two friends to each other with this in view, 
 and spoke of them to Mrs. King. They were promptly 
 engaged, and this was the first really successful order secured 
 by Saint Gaudens. Soon after their first meeting, La Farge 
 asked Saint Gaudens and me to dine with him in his studio 
 in the old Tenth Street building, and the beautiful King 
 monument resulted from their discussion that evening. 
 Another of the joint work of these two friends of mine was 
 the reredos in St. Thomas's Church, afterward destroyed 
 by fire, of which I shall speak when I set down my impres- 
 sions of La Farge. Saint Gaudens alludes to both the monu- 
 ment and the angels in the following letter, in which he 
 also speaks of the bas-relief he had made of me while we 
 were together in New York. This was the first of the in- 
 teresting medallions he afterward often made. The letter 
 is signed, as was his custom, with an outline of his own 
 most characteristic profile. 
 
 Augustus Saint Gaudens to D. M, A., Danskammer 
 
 Rome, 1878. 
 ". . . Such a time I had as you never saw. I did it 
 because Dr. Morgan gave me to understand that La Farge 
 would be ready in time. I was sure he would not be, but 
 
 263 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 as I did not care to bear the responsibility of the delay, 
 I did the work. That was last October, La Farge has not yet 
 finished ! I regret very much he did not tell me he would 
 not be ready for then I would have passed a great deal more 
 time, studied up the Renaissance and produced a better 
 thing. It was not a money affair, I spent more than I got 
 for it, and I regret I was not allowed at least to do as well 
 as I could. *J'ai pris mon parti,' as they say in French. 
 I said something has got to be sacrificed so Til go in for 
 the general character. 
 
 After that was over I finished the tomb, and within 
 a week or so it will be on its way to America. On New 
 Year's day I left Paris for Rome. We had a splendid trip, 
 stopping tho' only at Pisa. Do you know I believe my 
 stay in America has done me no harm. I appreciate all 
 the grand works more than ever. On arriving in Rome I 
 had a hard time getting a studio, but am finally settled in 
 Simmons', the Englishman's studio. I have half of it and 
 am hard at work; the shawls are hung on the wall, and 
 on them the colored medallions as of old, the reclining figure 
 in front as usual, and on a piece of wood hung on the shawl, 
 a small medallion in bronze which is the portrait of one of 
 my best friends of whom I have the fondest recollections; 
 I modelled it in New York just before I left. Rather a 
 short man, a heavy moustache, an open eye — Mr. La Farge 
 said that his face looked in parts as if it was 'tied up in a 
 knot' — notwithstanding that he's a pretty good kind of a 
 fellow. I have sent that medallion in a box, with a plaster 
 bust of Admiral Farragut, both of which are to be exhibited 
 at Kurtz gallery in March. When the exhibition is over, 
 Mr. Walter Shirlaw, the President of the Association, will 
 according to my authorization, remit the medallion to Sig- 
 ner Bracciaforte in English — Bracciajorte in English, not 
 
 264 
 
 I 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 the medallion — The gentleman I mean is not two steps 
 from where you now stand, and I give it to him as a slight 
 token of esteem and friendship. I hope it will be exhibited 
 and delivered in the way I sent it, on a plain piece of oiled 
 walnut, held on by six tacks, with a screw nail to hang it 
 on the wall, so — [drawing by St. G.] 
 
 Vedder is still here and complaining somewhat. He 
 has a great deal of talent. Coleman I have visited but 
 have not seen his work. I like some of Graham's work a 
 great deal, — after this year he is going to live in Venice. 
 Griswold is still the same. All complain more or less, but 
 say this year has been a little better than the last two or 
 three. My brother Louis who disappeared from Paris in 
 June '76 wrote me a letter a few days ago and you can imag- 
 ine my joy. I had almost given him up. Simmons, in whose 
 studio I am, has left Rome indefinitely, married a young 
 American lady and is now settled in London. There, I am 
 at the end of my news for you. I have told you a lot about 
 myself, knowing it would interest you. I trust you will 
 do likewise, but much as I would like to hear from you, 
 yet I want you to feel that if I don't get news I won't feel 
 a bit neglected. I have never thought that a person's friend- 
 ship could be measured by the regularity of his correspon- 
 dence. 
 
 I suppose by this time that you are settled down in 
 Newburgh and that you have been painting away hard with- 
 out any interruption. That — interruption, I mean — is the 
 bane of cities. So as to work I have to lock my door and 
 answer no one. I hope Mrs. Armstrong is well; also your 
 little ones. Please give her my kindest regards and with 
 best wishes from Mrs. St. Gaudens, believe me sincerely 
 your friend. Aug. St. Gaudens. If you desire anything 
 here *je suis a vos ordres.' Mr. MacMillan the Consul 
 
 265 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 seems to be a great favorite. I have not seen him yet, but 
 to-day Mrs. St. G. goes there." 
 
 Saint Gaudens finished the King monument in Paris, 
 whither I went in the spring of 1878 just in time to see him 
 giving it the final touches. I had been appointed Director 
 of American Fine Arts at the Exposition of that year, and 
 during the time it lasted I Kved in the Saint Gaudens apart- 
 ment at 3 Rue Herschel, in the Latin Quarter. 
 
 His studio was close by in the Rue Notre Dame des 
 Champs, in a huge old dance-hall, and high up in the gal- 
 lery there a couple of other artists and I often painted, 
 much amused by the alternate waves of exultation and 
 despair that swept over Saint Gaudens as he worked. That 
 summer Augustus started his brother Louis at work, and 
 it was in the old dance-hall that the latter modelled his 
 first head. Saint Gaudens made for me a bas-relief portrait 
 of my little daughter Helen, besides finishing some other 
 small pieces of work, but his best eff*orts that summer were 
 spent on the Farragut statue, which kept him busy for 
 some time to come. 
 
 His Farragut working model was set up in the centre 
 of the room, while the rest of us painted in the gallery, once 
 occupied, I suppose, by the orchestra. Thence at odd times 
 were wafted snatches of song that might have startled even 
 the waltzing Parisians of the old days; from one corner 
 would resound a mellow bass: 
 
 "You secure the old man; 
 rn bind the gur-r-I." 
 
 And the couplet would be completed antiphonally from 
 another remote quarter : 
 
 ** Once aboard the lugger she is mine." 
 
 266 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 Saint Gaudens always made it ** lubber," and we could 
 not laugh him out of this unnautical substitution. 
 
 One of our lively circle was young Bloomer, always 
 amusing and very talkative. He insisted upon singing 
 whenever he painted — and he painted steadily. One day 
 somebody called out, "Fm all through. Come on, fellows: 
 let's go out to Fontainebleau and hear Bloomer paint." 
 Various bets were chalked up as to whether or not we should 
 find Bloomer performing to his usual accompaniment; of 
 course he was. 
 
 I asked Saint Gaudens to help me hang the American 
 pictures in the Exposition, and had him appointed by the 
 commissioner-general. This work, as he afterward de- 
 scribed it, was "something hke a battle." A large number 
 of these pictures had been selected in New York by a dis- 
 tinguished committee of American connoisseurs. All these 
 gentlemen, being amateurs and patrons of art but none 
 of them actual painters, wanted only pictures by "leading 
 artists." So I, who acted as a sort of adviser and bufi'er 
 between the artists and the committee, had difficulty in 
 persuading them to accept pictures by some men who had 
 not the reputation they afterward acquired, but who even 
 then unquestionably were worthy of representing the United 
 States at the Paris Exposition — notably Winslow Homer 
 and John La Farge. (The latter's picture, "Paradise Val- 
 ley," received an honorable mention.) Even at the end, 
 there were still a number of the younger and best artists 
 who were left unrepresented. 
 
 The following letter is interesting as showing the work 
 that was admired at the time by a good artist, and recom- 
 mended for the Exposition. 
 
 267 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 R. Swain Gifford to D. M. A., N. Y. 
 
 Association Building, N. Y. Feb. 19, 1878. 
 "... I consider these as good as anything these 
 painters have done. Eastman Johnson, 'The Husking 
 Bee,' owner Sarony; Charles Miller, 'The Sheep-fold,' 
 owner, I think, Robert Gordon; Samuel Colman, *The 
 Alhambra,' in oil, and his water-color, 'Tower at Florence,' 
 owned by one of the Astors. William Sartain has painted 
 some small figure subjects and some street scenes in Algiers 
 that I think better than any other American painter's. 
 There is a man by the name of Dewing in Boston that does 
 charming figure subjects, a new man and little known, but 
 I believe him to be a remarkably fine painter. I am con- 
 vinced you will not be able to find a representative pic- 
 ture by John La Farge here in New York. The large New- 
 port picture that he considers his best landscape, exhibited 
 at the Academy about three years ago, is owned by a Bos- 
 ton lady. I heartily hope the committee have been able 
 to see Mr. Clark and secure the 'Cedars of New England.'" 
 
 Some pictures were selected by Saint Gaudens and 
 myself in Paris, these mainly being the work of the students 
 there. Thus our duties and responsibilities were very mixed 
 and it naturally followed that we got the criticism for all 
 the sins of omission, though in reality we were responsible 
 only for those pictures accepted in Paris and for the hang- 
 ing. The third man on our committee was Mr. , always 
 
 referred to by the newspapers as "The Great American 
 Connoisseur," a name he never afterward succeeded in 
 getting rid of. He soon became rather terrified, I imagine, 
 at having to do anything, and refused to come to the meet- 
 ings or to countenance any of our actions, saying that we 
 
 268 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 were too young and too radical — ''perfect iconoclasts/' as 
 he expressed it. 
 
 It must be admitted that we partly earned this title, 
 for when we came to hang the pictures we placed those we 
 considered best on the line and the worst near the ceiling, 
 entirely irrespective of the names or reputations of the 
 various artists concerned; there, Saint Gaudens remarked, 
 the latter would do the least harm. This was unprece- 
 dented. Result: we displeased a great many of the artists, 
 for some of the great were *' skied." For example. Bloomer, 
 who had never before had a picture exhibited, sent a very 
 nice landscape and we hung it on the line. This sort of 
 thing upset some people, and of course we came in for our 
 share of criticism, but on the whole the exhibit made a 
 good impression, and unprejudiced people, especially for- 
 eigners, said it was the best made by the United States 
 up to that time. Later on, Russell Sturgis saw our com- 
 pleted work and expressed his entire approval. But for 
 the purpose of showing that even the ordinary American 
 criticism was not all adverse, the following quotations from 
 an editorial in the New York Times seem amusing enough 
 not to be out of place: 
 
 "These young persons have struck terror to the heart 
 of the American colony by judging pictures on the ground 
 of artistic merit displayed in them, regarded by such Kghts 
 as they possess. Carried away by their mistaken enthu- 
 siasm for pure art, they have rejected pictures of great 
 size, which show, almost as faithfully as a colored photo- 
 graph, miles and miles of our unequalled Western landscape. 
 They have failed to appreciate the genius of a man who 
 samples a large tract of country, and condenses his samples 
 into a 'Heart of or 'Soul of this or that country. They 
 have made the pitiable mistake of supposing the size of, 
 
 269 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 and length of time occupied fn the painting of, a picture, 
 has little or nothing to do with its artistic merit. Pride 
 of intellect and vainglory of the artistic temperament can 
 go no further. Their downfall is certain. 
 
 "On the other hand, it may be urged that an expurgated 
 show of American art is a novel and refreshing thing, which 
 cannot fail to impress well those Europeans whose good 
 opinion is of value. It may be said that the academical 
 American painter is a nuisance at which the judges in Eu- 
 rope laugh heartily; and also that many absurd pictures 
 are every year admitted to the Salon. But if things are 
 sifted to the bottom, it will readily be seen how hollow all 
 such arguments are. 
 
 "What was this committee appointed for? To select 
 and hang a collection of paintings representative of the 
 present state of American art. Mark that word, repre- 
 sentative. How have they done it? By neglecting the 
 bad and taking the good. Now, American art is mostly 
 bad. Ergo, the exhibition is not representative of the pres- 
 ent state of American art. They ought to be taught that 
 America never puts her best foot forward, and does not 
 want to be represented otherwise than by mediocrities. 
 As it is, we may leave them to the results of their ignorance 
 and temerity. The American colony in Paris has plenty 
 of time on its hands, and will probably make the lives of 
 the committee a burden to them." 
 
 Saint Gaudens was always frank; he made it a point 
 of honor when asked about any work of art to answer ex- 
 actly as he thought. One day we had been in the Russian 
 gallery, where hung a gaudy and thoroughly bad picture 
 which we both agreed in disliking. As we were coming 
 out, some people whom Saint Gaudens knew slightly but- 
 
 270 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 tonholed him and asked him about that particular picture, 
 whether he didn't admire it immensely. He briefly ad- 
 mitted that he did, and escaped. 
 
 "Saint Gaudens," I said as we walked along, "you're 
 not living up to your principles. That's a bad picture and 
 you know it." 
 
 Turning abruptly around, without a word, he hurried 
 after the people, and called out: 
 
 "I beg your pardon, sir, I shouldn't have said that was 
 a good picture: I know for a fact that it's dreadful!" 
 
 We had the naming of the juror for the United States 
 on the International Board of Awards, and after some con- 
 sideration it seemed to us that no man could be better fitted 
 for the place than Frank D. Millet. We accordingly recom- 
 mended him, and most acceptable he proved to the other 
 jurors because of his engaging personality and varied talents. 
 The chairman of the jury was Sir Frederick Leighton, a 
 handsome and attractive gentleman, well qualified for the 
 difficult position that he held, not only on account of his 
 ability as an artist but also through the wonderful linguistic 
 powers he possessed. I heard that at the meetings he spoke 
 to the jurors of the many different nations each in his own 
 tongue. 
 
 One amusing incident connected with the exhibition 
 sticks in my memory. On the day that it opened, all the 
 officials assembled in state before their respective buildings 
 while President MacMahon, accompanied by his magnif- 
 icent suite, walked down the Avenue of Nations, stopping 
 before the different houses in turn and congratulating the 
 commissioners. Young Captain Rogers, in charge of the 
 United States marines at the exposition, was standing in 
 a brilliant uniform with Commissioner-General McCormick 
 and other American officials in the space before our build- 
 
 271 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 ing. To Marshal MacMahon it seemed that Captain Rogers, 
 the only man in uniform, must be by far the most important 
 member of the group, and accordingly it was he whom he 
 greeted elaborately. Every one was quite taken aback 
 and young Rogers stood in silent amazement until the mar- 
 shal had briefly congratulated him and passed on, won- 
 dering to himself, no doubt, at the embarrassment with 
 which the "director" had received his speech of welcome. 
 
 About this time Saint Gaudens introduced me to his 
 good friend Bastien-Lepage, with a view to my studying 
 with him, but nothing came of it except a number of in- 
 teresting conversations with the famous French artist. 
 He once said to me that there was no more mystery about 
 painting a head than about painting a bottle and that this 
 was one trouble with beginners — they never were willing 
 to paint just what they saw. He was then at work on 
 "Joan of Arc," the magnificent picture now in the Metro- 
 politan Museum, and one day the great Gerome dropped 
 in to see and criticise it. He advised him to put in a dis- 
 tant view behind the little peasant house with which we 
 now are all familiar. Bastien listened politely. Then when 
 Gerome had gone. Saint Gaudens asked him if he intended 
 to follow the advice. "Not at all," he said. "I know just 
 what I want, and it may take me years, but I'm going to 
 get that and nothing else." No one, now, denies that he 
 did. 
 
 Lepage always was immensely, almost extravagantly, 
 admired by Saint Gaudens. But then we must remember 
 that it was one of the latter's characteristics to be extremely 
 generous in his praise of any work that he considered good, 
 no matter by whom or according to what method it was 
 executed. Although he of course always liked best the 
 works of the Italian Renaissance, he never bound himself 
 
 272 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 to any one school, liberally praising, I recollect, artists 
 as different as Pelouse, the brilliant Fortuny, Jules Breton, 
 and Daubigny, all of whom had pictures in the Exposition. 
 Among American artists I think Saint Gaudens most ad- 
 mired La Farge; at any rate, he often spoke of him as **a 
 very big man," reiterating how much indebted he was to 
 him for criticisms and suggestions made while they were 
 working together. 
 
 Saint Gaudens ranked very high Paul Dubois, one of 
 his student friends in the Beaux Arts days, and he never 
 lost an opportunity of seeing and praising his work. At 
 the Exposition Dubois had a striking monument of General 
 Lamoriciere, and of the figure of "Faith" on this Saint 
 Gaudens drew a charming pen-and-ink sketch for an Ex- 
 position article in Scribners. This drawing is interesting 
 as being perhaps the only one ever made by him for pub- 
 lication. Mercie was another favorite. Saint Gaudens con- 
 sidering his "David," in the '78 Exposition, one of the most 
 successful of modern sculptural works. 
 
 But he was just as unsparing in his condemnation of 
 bad work. Once at an exhibition in New York we together 
 had tried to find a single passably good picture. At last 
 Saint Gaudens burst out in fury with: "Let's get out of 
 this. These pictures are so bad they're positively in- 
 decent." 
 
 It was Saint Gaudens who introduced me to his dear 
 friend Luc-Olivier Merson, one of the most charming men 
 it has ever been my fortune to know. He was good enough 
 to take me into his studio as his first pupil. While I was 
 painting there, Merson was at work on his "Flight into 
 Egypt," the now familiar picture of the Virgin and Child 
 asleep in the desert between the feet of the Sphinx. Great 
 was the indecision as to whether or not he should put a 
 
 273 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 moon in the picture, and he must have changed it a dozen 
 times before he finally decided to finish it without the 
 moon itself but with a charming effect of diff'used moon- 
 light. 
 
 Merson did not use living models much, but preferred 
 to make miniature wax figures, clothing them in floating 
 garments of vari-tinted tissue-paper. Little angels with 
 paper wings askew, and scantily clothed bambinos, were 
 forever littering his studio. I think I am at liberty by now 
 to relate the story of a beautiful little picture (or rather, 
 the remains of a beautiful little picture) that hung in a 
 closet off this studio. Merson told me how one afternoon 
 in Rome, shortly after he had won the coveted **Prix de 
 Rome," having been at work all day in his studio putting 
 the finishing touches to this picture, in walked Carolus 
 Duran. A friend of Merson's father, the famous art critic, 
 it seems he imagined he ought to show some interest in the 
 young man's work. So he stopped in for a visit. Merson 
 exhibited his little picture and awaited the artist's crit- 
 icism. With deliberation Duran walked over to the easel, 
 seized a large brush, mixed some colors together, and before 
 the young man could prevent him had rapidly smeared 
 it all over the picture — long yellow and green swipes, hori- 
 zontally across. Then without a word, he turned slowly 
 and walked out, leaving Merson in doubt whether to be 
 amused or furious. At all events, he kept the remains as 
 a memento of the great artist's first visit, praying only 
 that his humble studio might not be again honored. 
 
 At the Exposition, an entire room was in some cases de- 
 voted to the works of one artist. One morning Saint Gau- 
 dens, Bunce, and I were in the Salle de Jules Breton when 
 the artist himself came in. We were introduced, but for 
 some reason or other Augustus and I were called away 
 
 274 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 almost immediately. Knowing the limitations of Bunce's 
 French, I felt, after a time, that I ought to hurry back and 
 rescue him. But on re-entering the gallery I found my 
 anxiety had been needless. Bunce's ingenuity surpassed 
 his linguistic ability. He had picked out Breton's picture 
 of a peasant girl lying asleep under the apple-trees, had 
 folded his hands on the back of the chair, laid his head on 
 them in imitation of the girl, half closed his eyes, and was 
 murmuring between sighs **Tres, tres joli!" Jules Breton 
 meantime was walking around the room, quite content not 
 to interrupt with mere conversation so intense a contem- 
 plation of his work. 
 
 With Saint Gaudens I used often to go out to Frank 
 Millet's place at Montmartre, where we were always sure 
 of meeting Maynard or Bunce or some of the others in 
 our little Paris circle. A queer and picturesque place it 
 was and full of oddities, the accumulation of years of 
 travel and adventure. There were innumerable divans 
 and hanging lamps, while quantities of strange weapons 
 and musical instruments cluttered the corners. Foremost 
 I remember, and by no means indistinctly, the weird bashi- 
 bazouk in gorgeous Oriental dress whom Millet stationed 
 as majordomo at his front door, thus succeeding in fright- 
 ening nearly every one who came to the house for the 
 first time. He had picked him up somewhere during his 
 travels in the East, and had brought him along with the 
 rest of the collection when he returned to Paris. 
 
 Saint Gaudens was always in rather poor health as a 
 result of his early hardships. Many times while walking 
 through dingy little streets in the Quarter he pointed out 
 the wretched cabarets where he had been accustomed to 
 get his food during his sojourn in Paris. He said he had 
 never recovered and never expected to recover from the 
 
 275 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 effects of the messes he had been forced to eat while a stu- 
 dent there. 
 
 An especially intimate friend of Saint Gaudens was 
 a French artist named Garnier, a number of whose beau- 
 tiful enamels on copper are preserved in the Luxembourg. 
 He not merely designed them, but like the enamellers of 
 old he also did the firing, and a heavenly coloring resulted 
 from his thorough workmanship. Garnier had seen service 
 in the Franco-Prussian War, and many and thrilling were 
 his accounts of the time when the French army was shut 
 up in Paris to starve. Cat meat was considered a luxury, 
 and stalking cats came to be his favorite amusement. In 
 particular he told (with vivid French gesticulation) of one 
 moonlight night when, on the outskirts of the city, he went 
 crawling along the dark edge of some deserted houses fring- 
 ing an open square, on the outlook for a late supper. Sud- 
 denly he spied a lone cat scurrying across the desolate square, 
 its long shadow weirdly distorted on the uneven cobble- 
 stones. As he softly raised his pistol to take aim, he be- 
 came aware of another and a bulkier shadow. It was a 
 German intent on the same cat. Simultaneously each 
 recognized the other as an enemy, and turned his weapon 
 upon the bigger game. After an exchange of shots the 
 German was silent, and Garnier could never be sure just 
 what had been his fate. At any rate, when he looked around 
 the cat had fled, and he went supperless back to his bar- 
 racks. 
 
 I never was more surprised in my life than when I found 
 that the French Government was going to give me the 
 decoration of the Legion of Honor for my services at the 
 Exposition. About ten o'clock one night, after I had gone 
 to bed, while I was living with the Saint Gaudenses, a little 
 fellow named Ellis, an artist, came with a message from Mr. 
 
 276 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 McCormick saying I was expected at one of the Ministries; 
 so I got up and dressed while he waited for me, and we went 
 there together. There had been a lot of wire-pulling for 
 decorations, but it had never entered my head that I was 
 to get one, so it was a complete surprise when on reaching 
 the Ministry, where a number of others were waiting, I 
 found that I was to be decorated. With no ceremony what- 
 ever we were all given our red ribbons, crosses, and diplomas. 
 Several other Americans were given decorations for their 
 exhibits, among others Edison for his phonograph. I learned 
 afterward that I owed this honor to Mr. Waddington, the 
 minister of foreign affairs, to whom the names of all 
 those considered eligible for decorations were submitted 
 for approval. He told me that when the list was sent to 
 him my name was there, but that it had been scratched 
 off. He replaced it, and mine was the only person con- 
 nected with the Exposition for whom he asked a decoration. 
 
 Mr. Waddington was a delightful man, an Oxford grad- 
 uate, and the only man I have ever known who spoke two 
 languages so perfectly that both Frenchmen and Englishmen 
 believed him a compatriot. He was afterward Ambassador 
 to Russia and to England. His wife was Mary AIsop King. 
 As I have said in a previous chapter, my wife and I had 
 known the Kings very well in Rome, and I enjoyed seeing 
 them again the year I was in Paris. Mrs. Charles King 
 was a most lovely old lady and when I came to call I was 
 always pleased that she welcomed me with a kiss as if I 
 had been a son. 
 
 It was at a dinner given by the Waddingtons for Gen- 
 eral Grant that Henrietta King told me that I owed the 
 decoration to Mr. Waddington. This dinner was the grand- 
 est affair of the kind I ever went to. There were seventy- 
 eight guests seated in an enormous dining-room, at a table 
 
 277 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 about fifteen feet wide, the whole lighted by wax candles 
 in chandeliers and in candelabra along the table, alternat- 
 ing with magnificent vases of flowers. In spite of the num- 
 ber of guests, the dinner was perfectly served. Henrietta 
 King told me before dinner that she had asked if I might 
 take her in, but had been told that I was not nearly 
 swell enough for the sister of madame; so I sat between 
 two Frenchmen and did the best I could with my bad 
 French. 
 
 General Grant was at this time on his trip around the 
 world, admired and feted wherever he went. I am reminded 
 of a little incident in connection with an entertainment, 
 at which I was an inconspicuous guest, given by the minis- 
 ter of agriculture in one of the great palaces belonging to 
 the government. On this occasion we were first enter- 
 tained by a play given by the company of the Theatre 
 Frangais, followed by dancing and a supper. I was hand- 
 ing in my invitation and my visiting card, and writing my 
 name in a book in an anteroom, as we were requested to 
 do, when I heard a voice behind me saying disconsolately 
 in English: 
 
 "Fve left my invitation at home and I haven't got any 
 visiting-card." 
 
 I turned and found that it was General Grant. Of 
 course, as soon as I explained that this was the ex-President 
 of the United States, he was politely invited to enter and 
 we went in together, but at the head of the aisle we were 
 stopped again by two guards and again I had to vouch 
 for my illustrious companion. Instantly, with many ob- 
 sequious gestures he was snatched away from my side and 
 wafted far away to the very front row of velvet chairs, 
 where he sat next to the Marechale McMahon, wife of the 
 President of the French Republic, flanked on his other side 
 
 278 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 by SIX Corean Ambassadors, quaintly costumed, with wing- 
 like decorations in their hair. 
 
 When I saw the general afterward at supper, he said 
 to me: " I'm not a bit grateful to you for your help. I can't 
 speak a word of French, so I couldn't talk to the duchess 
 or understand a word the actors said, and as for those other 
 fellows they couldn't speak anything.'' 
 
 The general came quite often to the Exposition, and 
 when I showed him around he was friendly and cordial, 
 partly because of his great affection and admiration for 
 Mr. Hamilton Fish. He often said how he owed more to 
 his advice and sympathy when he was his secretary of 
 state than to every one else in the cabinet put together. 
 Grant was said to be a reticent, sulky sort of man, but I 
 found him, on the contrary, talkative and kind. 
 
 Merson, with whom I was studying, was awfully pleased 
 at my getting the decoration. I remember his exclamation 
 of delight, "Voila le pic de rouge!" when I first went to 
 his studio wearing the ribbon in my buttonhole. I got 
 an amusing letter about it from Picknell, a brother painter 
 whom I had gotten to know very well at Pont Aven, when 
 I went to Brittany to paint that summer, after my part 
 of the Exposition was in order and I could get away from 
 Paris for a while. He and a lot of other good fellows were 
 staying at the Hotel des Voyageurs, a picturesque old place 
 where the dining-room walls are covered with the sketches 
 of any number of grateful painters who had sojourned there. 
 I believe it has since been overrun by tourists, and I fear 
 the redoubtable Julia is no longer the hostess. I remember 
 her taking some fellow who chanced to ofi'end her by the 
 nape of the neck, and sending him flying through the open 
 door with one turn of her powerful wrist. But to us, her 
 artist friends, she was hospitality itself. 
 
 279 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 W. L. Picknell to D. M. A., Paris 
 
 H6tel des Voyageurs, Pont Aven, Finisterre. 
 Oct. 31, 1878. 
 
 ". . . Have pity on the sorrows of a poor old man, 
 and if this paper should be covered with blotches know 
 that they each and every one represent tears, bitter tears, 
 at your departure! You well know, dear friend, how de- 
 lighted I am at your good fortune and how sincerely I con- 
 gratulate you. It will be a bitter pill to your enemies, but 
 all the more sweet to yourself and friends. Your letter 
 did indeed have good news for me, for I had begun to feel 
 blue at the prospect of ye frame bills, and the expenses 
 my two large pictures were drawing me into. My picture 
 of the 'White Road' is at GoupiFs. They wrote me a 
 flattering letter off'ering to take my pictures on sale, but 
 I must not lose a moment from my Salon at present. The 
 Garden came out very well and I have sent it to the Dud- 
 ley and put £500 on it. Hope I may sell. 
 
 There has been a glorious addition to our little colony. 
 An English General, wife and two daughters, 21 and 23 — 
 figures representing daughters — charming, beautiful and 
 talented. You, knowing the old chick, can imagine the 
 feelings of his innermost heart. The Baron still haunts 
 his old haunts and blesses us his children with good advice. 
 
 Now when you read the following awe-inspiring con- 
 fession do not exclaim, * What a fool ! ' Your humble servant 
 has builded him a house out on ye lande, and yesterday did 
 begin to rub charcoal in a most wonderful manner on to 
 ye canvas. Eight feet by §)4, how is that for size? 
 for cheek? for future headaches? and sleepless nights? 
 Pelouse told me to paint an important picture this year. 
 So thought the best way to get out of the scrape was to 
 
 280 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 make it important in size. Walked about one thousand 
 miles before finding subject, wore out two pairs of shoes, 
 ten pairs of good nature ! Subject once found, got permis- 
 sion to build on ye peasant's land. Had said peasant to 
 dinner, gave him good wine, good cigars, and about ten 
 p. M. he went staggering home, a happy if not a wiser man. 
 Result of dinner, jolly good friends with peasant. He laughs 
 at my jokes in French — very appreciative fellow. Two 
 cartloads of colors sent to chateau yesterday, 800 doz. 
 brushes, 4 shovels, and small cannon, American flag ex- 
 pected tomorrow, cider bottle hid in one corner. All crea- 
 tion thinking of working in my part of world, the hut ap- 
 pearing to be a good place to leave pictures in. Shall have 
 newspapers, etc. and charge regular London club prices. 
 
 Having exhausted your good nature by this tirade, will 
 shut up on that line, *if it takes all summer.' The Sher- 
 mans are enjoying their stay at Blois very much. I have 
 Sherman's two pictures well under way. I envy you the 
 glorious opportunity you have of studying the Exposition. 
 I should like to have seen it again but could not aff*ord it 
 as frames for my Giant and Royal Academy loom up like 
 a nightmare in the near future. Jones's Salon is getting on 
 well. Swift is going to paint his from the sketch you liked, 
 Bretons loading mast on old boat. Am frightfully tired 
 tonight, having been at work all day on big toile. 
 
 My friends all treat me with so much kindness, * always 
 more than I deserve,' that I hardly know how to thank 
 them. You shall be best man when I come to grief ! Please 
 kiss St. Gaudens for me, and remember me most kindly 
 to Mrs. St. Gaudens, and accept a whole flood of good wishes 
 from your Pont Aven friends, and a brother's hearty shake 
 of the hand from your sincere friend, 
 
 Pick." 
 281 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Picknell was a splendid painter. Robert Gordon bought 
 a beautiful picture of his, a scene on the Concarneau road, 
 and Picknell wrote me afterward a little apologetically 
 that he was going to paint another of the same place — this 
 picture is the ** Route de Concarneau" now in the Corcoran 
 Gallery in Washington — and explained that the figures 
 would make the two canvases entirely unlike. 
 
 While I was at Pont Aven, I went with Picknell and 
 Sherman to Quimper to stay with Mr. Gourland, a fine old 
 English gentleman who had a wonderful place there with 
 everything in it that heart could desire — a studio for times 
 when he felt like painting, a stable full of good horses and 
 fine hunting dogs in his kennels, seventeen hundred bottles 
 of rare wine in his cellars, and his house crammed with 
 beautiful and interesting bibelots. While we were there 
 a peasant brought him some bronze hatchets that he had 
 dug up among the Druid remains which are strewn about 
 that country, and as Mr. Gourland had a lot of that sort 
 of thing already, he bought a couple for a franc and a half 
 and gave them to me. 
 
 Vedder had a charming picture in the Exposition, the 
 "Young Marsyas" playing on his pipes to a group of at- 
 tentive rabbits. In the following letter he alludes to a 
 strange experience he had with UAri, They asked him 
 for a photograph of the picture to put in the magazine, and 
 he had one taken for the purpose which they published, 
 but abused it frightfully, adding that if the picture had 
 any merit it was owing to the engraver ! No wonder Ved- 
 der thought it a pretty cheeky performance. 
 
 Elxbu Vedder to D. M. A., Paris 
 
 Villa Ansidei, Perugia. July 23, 1878. 
 "... I am at last back in Perugia and glad to be here 
 after my giro. I must say that each time that I get into 
 
 282 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 the cars I vow that it will be the last time except under 
 dire necessity. The small streets of Venice gave me an 
 entirely new conception of heat. Here in Perugia one des- 
 sicates gradually in a fine dry heat at least, but in Venice 
 one boils. 
 
 Saw Duveneck in Venice, who had painted a good 
 portrait of Bronson, wonderfully touched in the lights, 
 but sinking into bitumen, not color, in the shadows — in 
 fact not really colorist's work. Saw Chase also ; he had 
 painted a splendid portrait of Duveneck, or picture rather, 
 the head beautifully painted. Nice fellows both. Saw 
 Bunce, who has become very frank in his criticisms — told 
 Bunny to his face that his painting made him 'sick.' Du- 
 bois looks well but I could not get to see his work. Graham 
 is doing good things as usual. In Florence stopped with 
 Launt Thompson. Had good times but hot. Saw the 
 youthful Louis Lang, hair blacker than ever and he younger. 
 
 At home found family all well. Griswold had come up 
 from Rome a few days before, very weak from an attack 
 of fever, sends regards. Yesterday I sent an answer to 
 Mons. A. Ballou of L'Art. Carrie, or in other words Mrs. 
 v., sends best regards. Give my best love to St. Gaudens 
 and wife and of course to yourself I send all that is 'new 
 and gymnastic' 
 
 As ever your very much obliged friend, 
 
 Elihu Vedder." 
 
 The end of the Exposition was a celebration signal for 
 all of us. Especially fondly do I think of the jolly time we 
 had at a little supper I gave at famous old Foyot's to mark 
 the event. Besides Saint Gaudens, at the long table sat 
 McKim, Stanford White, Russell Sturgis, Fred Crownin- 
 shield, Alfred Greenough, Frank Millet, and Frank Hasel- 
 tine. Of all those brilliant souls only Crowninshield is 
 
 283 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 J 
 
 Still alive to-day, and the deaths of two of them were too 
 tragic for words. 
 
 Soon after the Exposition closed, Saint Gaudens and 
 Garnier set off together on a trip to Italy, on which it has 
 always been a regret to me that I was unable to go. While 
 on the trip Saint Gaudens made a small sketch of a street 
 scene in some Italian town which showed beautiful tones 
 of color and was remarkable for the reason that he almost 
 never made sketches from nature. But though I did not 
 see Saint Gaudens I heard from him, for he always kept 
 up a lively correspondence — that it was really lively the 
 following letter, written soon after his return to Paris, proves 
 conclusively: 
 
 Augustus Saint Gaudens to D, M. A,, New York 
 
 49 Rue N. D. des C. Sept. 24, '79. 
 
 "Dear Armstrong — I'm going to surprise you by an- 
 swering so soon, but the only way I can keep my conscience 
 clear in regard to letter-writing now is to answer imme- 
 diately. When last I wrote you I had two years* corre- 
 spondence to clear up. I did so and don't mean to do it 
 again — so here goes 
 
 Farragut is finished, or nearly so — at least it will be 
 cast on Saturday — and then the enlarging will take but 
 a short time. The weather is simply 'gorgeous' for the 
 last 20 days, and it is a relief after the wetting we have 
 had. Mrs. St. G. comes home to-night. Old Fossil D. 
 must be in a showcase in some provincial museum where 
 he belongs, for I never see him; that other friend of ours 
 is such a 'scallywag' that whatever he has said has, like 
 Keats, (poor Palmer's quotation) been as if written in water. 
 On the contrary, I have heard more good of you from the 
 artists, now that the fight is over, than I heard harm while 
 the row was on — truly ! 
 
 284 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 Fm sorry you don't feel more encouraged with your 
 work, but I guess it's a good sign. I'm completely and 
 thoroughly befuddled and disgusted with Farragut; there- 
 fore it must be very good — eh? Hope you saw White. 
 He is one of the 'Biggest Bricks' I ever met. (Slang enough 
 in this letter: it must recall the famous exhibition letter 
 I wrote Cook or Gilder.) Saw a drawing of La Farge's in 
 Harper's, Christ and Nicodemus, that I think is simply 
 'big.' If Miss Homer goes over soon I'll send that knife, 
 if not I'll bring it in April. 
 
 Gamier has made a lovely enamel for you of your 
 daughter, and it's hanging up in my studio waiting for 
 somebody to bring it over to you — if you let me know of 
 someone I'll send it. When it goes he will write you a note. 
 I think C. E. ought to go in a Botanical showcase in the 
 same museum with D. There now it's dark and I must 
 
 ^* Your friend, . o r> » 
 
 Aug. St. Gaudens. 
 
 Always the best of good friends. Saint Gaudens and I 
 yet naturally saw less of each other during the following 
 busy years in America than in the stirring Paris times. 
 He and McKim and Stanford White several times came 
 up together to Danskammer, my place on the Hudson, 
 when we invariably talked over the Exposition and as in- 
 variably decided that in a similar case we would do exactly 
 as before — if given the chance ! 
 
 In the spring of '92 McKim had for some time been 
 slaving at the designs for his buildings at the World's Fair, 
 and so when the work was well under way, collecting a 
 number of his friends, he took us out to Chicago in a special 
 car — Saint Gaudens, Millet, Maynard, La Farge, Richard 
 M. Hunt, George B. Post, William Laffan the editor of 
 the Sun, and Mrs. Millet, Mrs. Laffan and Miss Lockwood. 
 
 285 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Numerous artists had been employed on the different build- 
 ings, my share of the work consisting in decorating the ex- 
 terior of Machinery Hall, which I frescoed in the Renais- 
 sance style. We were wined and dined by the Chicagoans 
 and had an excellent sight of the skeleton of the Exposi- 
 tion, which opened in all its glory some months later. 
 
 Saint Gaudens was always making up little suppers, 
 and on these occasions his manner was as warm and his 
 quiet humor as charming as ever it was the first time I met 
 him at the old Falcone. Above all, I delight in the remem- 
 brance of the bachelor dinner that a number of us gave 
 Stanford White on the eve of his marriage. A lot of things 
 happened before that evening ended becomingly with a 
 Spanish dance by Hopkinson Smith and Loyall Farragut, 
 neither of whom could be persuaded to stop until they had 
 entangled themselves and every one else in long wreaths 
 of smilax. Great were the preparations for this dinner, 
 and Saint Gaudens got a great deal of fun out of designing 
 the menu, on which caricatures of White were interspersed 
 with the more important items of the evening. Here was 
 sketched White about to launch forth into one of the after- 
 dinner speeches that he loathed; here we saw him pulling 
 at his eternal moustache; and here appeared nothing but 
 the moustache — but we recognized the likenesses as readily 
 as we should if in these days we saw but a double row of 
 teeth and a pair of spectacles on the cartoon page of a New 
 York newspaper. 
 
 The most remarkable and original of all Saint Gaudens's 
 works seems to me to be the Adams monument in Wash- 
 ington. When I went for the first time to look for it in 
 the Rock Creek Cemetery, I made up my mind not to have 
 it shown to me but to find it for myself. It was an after- 
 noon in March, a grayish, sad day. Snow spotted the ground 
 
 286 
 
SAINT GAUDENS AND OTHERS 
 
 here and there, trying to obliterate the first signs of spring. 
 I was alone, and the only sound was a slight rustling or 
 sighing in the pine-trees above the tomb. I sat for a long 
 time on the curved bench facing the figure, and I will not 
 attempt to describe the supernatural effect it had upon 
 me. The impressiveness, the solemnity of this thing, which 
 seemed actually alive, I can never forget. 
 
 And here is a part of a letter I got from Saint Gaudens 
 in 1886. It will serve to bring to a close these disjointed 
 recollections of my friend. It brings back even now to 
 me the "thirst for it" that he speaks of — the wish (almost) 
 that we had gone over again in '89: 
 
 Augustus Saint Gaudens to D. M, A, 
 
 New York, 1886. 
 ". . . Heigh, Ho! We now know that we are both 
 alive. We might as well be in separate planets as be in 
 New York so far as seeing one another goes. Perhaps some 
 day you will go to Europe and I will too, and then we will 
 renew our friendship as of yore. We may go over as com- 
 missioners to the '89 exhibit! and make another batch of 
 enemies. Don't you thirst for it? I trust that thee and 
 thine are well and strong; I can say that much for my side. 
 Ever your friend, 
 
 Augustus SAI^fT Gaudens.'* 
 
 287 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 SOME PLEASANT SUMMERS 
 
 "I see, far southward, this quiet day, the hills of Newbury rolling away. 
 Dreamily blending in autumn mist 
 Crimson, and gold, and amethyst. 
 And, where north and south the coast lines run, 
 The blink of the sea in breeze and sun." 
 
 — Whittier. 
 
 It was by the merest chance that we spent one of the 
 pleasantest summers that I remember at Curson's Mills 
 on the Merrimac River. We made no definite plans that 
 spring of 1875 ^^ New York, but simply packed our trunks 
 with such things as we thought we might need during the 
 summer and started off, going first to Newport for a visit 
 to my sister-in-law, Mrs. Howard, and trusting to luck 
 for what was to come after. 
 
 We stayed for a while in Mrs. Howard's cottage on 
 the chfFs, and managed to pick up there a gray kitten that 
 henceforth accompanied us on our voyages. Besides the 
 kitten, we had the three children, Margaret, Helen, and 
 Maitland, and their nurse, Annie Martin. From Newport 
 we made for Gloucester, but somehow we did not fancy 
 it particularly — it smelt so fishy — so with all our impedi- 
 menta we took the train for Newburyport. We did not 
 know a soul in Newburyport, and the hotel was poor, but 
 we discovered a nice hbrary founded by George Peabody, 
 and a nice lady librarian to whom we appealed for advice 
 — did she know any pleasant place in the neighborhood 
 where we could spend the summer? She enthusiastically 
 
 288 
 
SOME PLEASANT SUMMERS 
 
 recommended Curson's Mills, four miles out in the country; 
 so we immediately hired a trap and drove out there. It 
 seemed attractive and Mr. and Mrs. Hoxie were willing 
 to take us, so we moved out the next day and spent the 
 entire summer. 
 
 The old tide-water mill belonging to the Cursons, a 
 quaint old building, stands at the mouth of the Artichoke 
 River where it runs into the Merrimac. The little Arti- 
 choke meanders along through a varied expanse of pretty, 
 English-looking country, amid thick woods and wide fields, 
 under an old bridge and out into the broad waters of the 
 Merrimac. Near the mill was the Cursons' house, next 
 door was the Hoxies', and this was the whole of the little 
 settlement. 
 
 When we arrived at the Hoxies' with all our bags and 
 baggage, of course the kitten was included, but when Mrs. 
 Hoxie saw it she almost backed out of her bargain, for it 
 seems she had made a vow never to have a cat in her house. 
 However, after some persuasion she consented to accept 
 us, cat and all. We brought so many trunks and other 
 luggage that I dare say Mrs. Hoxie thought that we should 
 turn out to be fashionable and fussy people, but she soon 
 found that we were simple in our tastes and gave her no 
 trouble. There were no other boarders, and everything 
 was very clean, but the food was exceedingly plain; break- 
 fast consisted invariably of coffee, toast, and boiled eggs, 
 while the other meals were of a like simplicity, but as we 
 never asked for any extras and took gratefully whatever 
 was provided we got along very comfortably. I had a nice 
 httle room up-stairs with an open fire in it which served 
 for a studio and sitting-room, but as I was out in the fields 
 painting all day long we seldom used it except in rainy 
 weather. 
 
 289 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 There was a sort of sand-barren near by, where yellow 
 sand, beautiful in color, had drifted into picturesque lines 
 and banks, varied by scattered clumps of scrub-oak, with 
 the Artichoke running through it and broadening in one 
 corner into a deep and shady swimming-pool. There had 
 been an ancient Indian encampment at this spot, and the 
 arrow-heads and other Indian remains which we often found 
 there were always occasions of great excitement for the chil- 
 dren, who played and dug in the sand. There was also 
 a lovely pine grove along the Merrimac, just above the 
 beach where we all used to bathe. Near by, we gathered 
 a profusion of delicious blueberries, and in the autumn the 
 nutting was great fun. Never have I seen more beautiful 
 foliage than we had that fall. I painted out-of-doors every 
 day, my wife usually sitting with me and reading aloud. 
 Among our books was a life of Goethe and some of Dar- 
 win's works. The Hoxies had an excellent apple-orchard 
 with quantities of particularly fine Porter apples, a conical 
 yellow summer apple, most delicious. One of the children 
 says she remembers creeping under the orchard fence and 
 eating five of these enormous apples one right after the 
 other, and creeping back feeling rather heavy — she was 
 only five! When we moved back to Danskammer in 1877 
 I planted two Porter apple-trees that grew and flourished 
 for many years and bore large crops, but they never seemed 
 to me to be quite equal in size, lusciousness, and beauty 
 to the Hoxie fruit. They had a nice poultry-yard of parti- 
 colored fowls of no particular breed, but picturesque, and 
 I liked to paint them. For many years there was a sketch 
 of some of these cocks and hens tacked up in Maitland's 
 little room at Danskammer where we used to keep a list 
 of the eggs gathered from our own fowls. 
 
 Newburyport is an old town and there are some ancient 
 
 290 
 
SOME PLEASANT SUMMERS 
 
 houses in the neighborhood. Happening to hear of oi.. 
 not far away where they had some fine old furniture, and 
 being always interested in such things, I made an excuse 
 to go over there and got the owner to let me see it. She 
 showed me all over it very politely, and I longed to buy 
 some of the lovely old things she had, but there did not 
 seem to be any delicate way of approaching the subject 
 and I had almost made up my mind that it couldn't be 
 done and was coming away without suggesting anything 
 so vulgar as a purchase, when she remarked coyly: 
 
 "Folks most usually buy something when they come 
 here, just as a sort of souvenir." 
 
 I was only too delighted, and immediately acquired a 
 Hepplewhite sideboard, a graceful and charming piece, 
 some pretty little Lowestoft cups and saucers sprigged 
 with roses,* and several other nice things. I only paid thir- 
 teen dollars for the sideboard, which we have used in our 
 dining-room ever since. 
 
 There was a boom in land that year at Newburyport, 
 for silver had been found there in considerable quantities 
 and there was great excitement; mines were started all 
 over; speculators and prospectors thronged the place; 
 shafts were dug in the most unlikely places and farms were 
 sold for marvellous prices. But I think it all came to noth- 
 ing and a good deal of money was lost, for although silver 
 could be found almost anywhere it was not in sufficient 
 quantities to pay. 
 
 Both of the Hoxies had been at Brook Farm, in fact 
 they had first met there and been married in consequence, 
 and they knew all the celebrated members of that tran- 
 scendental adventure, Hawthorne and all the others, and 
 many of these worthies visited them from time to time. 
 As a result Mr. Hoxie was extremely interesting, besides 
 
 291 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 ueing such, a really fine man that he inspired respect. I 
 became much attached to him. He had been a carpenter 
 originally, but he was well educated and agreeable, one 
 of the school trustees of Newburyport and a fine-looking, 
 gray-haired old gentleman of very courteous manners. 
 We became great cronies and in the end real friends. 
 
 Mrs. Hoxie was a Miss Curson, of an old and respect- 
 able family, and her sister Mrs. Marquand lived in the old 
 Curson house near by, a rather nice country house. Mrs. 
 Hoxie was an educated woman and well-read. But she 
 was an independent person and did most of her own work, 
 dressed in the plainest and ughest of clothing. She habitu- 
 ally wore a short gown of brownish calico, tied around the 
 waist with a white string; she had a "hermit tooth" and 
 was very plain in every way, but she was a good and inter- 
 esting talker and would stop at any time in the midst of 
 her housework, with broom and dust-pan in hand, to dis- 
 cuss philosophy, education, "Shakespeare and the musical 
 glasses," or any public question of the day. Her views 
 in general were most advanced and she professed extreme 
 democratic principles; she hated cats and was a prohi- 
 bitionist of the deepest dye — anything to drink was an- 
 athema to her — and in these days I suppose she would have 
 been a suff*ragist, but at that time this was not a subject of 
 discussion. She and her husband expressed like views as to 
 democracy, but in reality I think she was rather ashamed 
 of his humble origin although she never admitted it; but he 
 had all the ear-marks of an aristocrat while she, in appear- 
 ance at least, was much the reverse. 
 
 William Hunt, the celebrated painter, spent most of 
 that summer in the neighborhood, and so did Saulisbury 
 Tuckerman, Robertson, and J. Appleton Brown, a delight- 
 ful man who was an inveterate painter of apple-trees. Hunt, 
 
 292 
 
SOME PLEASANT SUMMERS 
 
 who had been a favorite pupil of Couture, was an enthu- 
 siastic painter and a charming companion. He had a large 
 class of ladies who came out from Boston at intervals and 
 painted from nature. He had a painting van, drawn by 
 a pair of horses, which was arranged with movable sides 
 and curtains so that he could get the light in any way he 
 wished, and fitted up with all the canvases, paints, and other 
 appliances that he needed. In this he travelled all about 
 the country, stopping wherever he found a paintable spot. 
 
 Celia Thaxter was a friend of the Hoxies and used to 
 visit them, and Susan Hale stayed most of the summer at 
 Mrs. Marquand's. She was a sister of Edward Everett 
 Hale and of Lucretia Hale, the author of the "Peterkin 
 Papers." Besides being a most agreeable woman and a de- 
 lightful companion, she was a good water-color painter 
 and gave my little girl Margaret her first painting lessons. 
 As the Marquands had a fine old barn with a swing in it, 
 our children were over there all the time playing with all 
 the little Marquands, the youngest of whom, Greta, after- 
 ward married a nephew of Susan Hale. Miss Hale was 
 very fond of swimming, and every morning was to be seen 
 stalking through the pine grove on her way to the shore; 
 dressed in a bathing suit with her black hair streaming 
 down her back, she looked a good deal like an Indian. 
 
 I often rowed down the river to Newburyport, in a pretty 
 little light skiff I bought that summer, and made studies 
 of the huge ships which were being built in the shipyards 
 there. These were the yards which were so famous in the 
 War of 1812, when American privateers were fitted out there. 
 I made many studies of the great ships propped up on the 
 stocks before they were launched, intending to make pic- 
 tures of them, but I never did although they were fine sub- 
 jects, looking enormous and quite splendid towering above 
 
 293 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 one. They could be launched here and, while they were 
 still light, could pass over the bar at the mouth of the har- 
 bor on their way to India or some other far-off port, but 
 they never could return to their home again. 
 
 Altogether this was one of the pleasantest summers I 
 ever spent, although it was the most simple life possible, 
 entirely devoid of luxury. We all made the Hoxies a little 
 visit in 1876. It was late in the autumn and there had 
 been an early snow while the trees still wore their autumn 
 tints and the effects were wonderful. I kept up a corre- 
 spondence with Mr. Hoxie for many years, but he has long 
 been dead. 
 
 John A, Hoxie to D. M. A. 
 
 Warwick, Mass. March, 1886. 
 
 "... I made a visit last summer to the old home in 
 Newburyport. As I stood upon the old bridge one evening 
 you and Mrs. Armstrong were very forcibly brought to 
 my mind again. It was just such an evening as when we 
 watched the newly risen moon appearing and disappearing 
 behind the strata of clouds and throwing her bright reflec- 
 tions in the peaceful waters of the upper Artichoke. Your 
 absence made me feel quite lonely. I went to Newbury- 
 port with my own horse, taking my granddaughter with 
 me, and we had a very pleasant journey. The old place 
 has been altered a good deal, that is, the house and barn. 
 They have quite an elegant barn, and keep several nice 
 horses for riding and driving, but they can't spoil the beau- 
 tiful views of woods and waters. 
 
 I have just returned from attending the funeral of an 
 old neighbor, a man of eighty-five, who was born and 
 always lived in this town. Another old gentleman, well 
 along in the nineties, made an eloquent prayer. I never 
 could be contented to spend so many years in such a town 
 
 .294 
 
SOME PLEASANT SUMMERS 
 
 as this, and yet it is a healthy town with many intelligent 
 inhabitants; but it is too rough and too much to one side 
 of the attractive places of business and civilization and 
 intelligence for me to spend a whole life in. 
 
 I have not been able to do as much work this winter 
 as I did a year ago. I fear that old age is having an effect 
 upon me. I tire when I take hold of any real work, and I 
 am becoming forgetful. I can't keep track of my tools, 
 and often the plans that I have formed for the next day 
 vanish with the night. I had a fearful fright in the woods 
 one day. I was sawing up a tree that had been turned over 
 by the roots, and the top had all been cut away but one 
 twelve foot log which was attached to the root. As I was 
 sawing that off and had got it nearly cut through — with 
 a light or cut saw, which I could use alone — the root began 
 to settle into its place, which raised the end of the log where 
 I was cutting. I thought it would break off and drop in 
 place, and turned to step away from it, caught my foot 
 and fell on my hands, and as I did so caught sight of the 
 log directly over my head about ten feet above me, and 
 thought it was falling upon me, imagine the sensation! 
 But it was only for a breath of time, and it fell beyond me, 
 full 32 feet from where it originally lay. Old choppers here 
 say they never saw such an instance in all their experience. 
 But I did not think it would take so much space to relate 
 this little affair. 
 
 I think I shall have to give up peaches here, the trees 
 grow well, but late or early frosts kill the buds or fruit. 
 I have good plums. I get the upper hand of cuculios by 
 jarring them off on sheets and killing them. Write when 
 you can." 
 
 While we were at Newburyport I took a little trip to 
 Bar Harbor and liked it so much that we all went there 
 
 295 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 the next summer. The journey to Mount Desert was not 
 an easy one in 1876, as you had to take a steamer either 
 from Rockland or Portland, and they were both wretched 
 old tubs. The Le wist on plied between Bar Harbor and 
 Portland, but I once came back the Rockland way in the 
 Ulysses — the Useless, as she was commonly called — through 
 a dense fog that lasted till we neared Rockland, when the 
 fog lifted just in time for us to see the countless islands 
 all about us. But, fog or no fog, the captain, according to 
 his custom, ran his boat full speed all the morning as if 
 we were in open water; he did not appear to regard the 
 islands at all, but steered partly by the echo that came 
 from them and partly by instinct; it was extraordinary 
 that he could do it without accident. At Rockland, where 
 we made the connection with the railroad, we were sup- 
 posed to get lunch at the station, but I found that the meal 
 in the waiting-room consisted entirely of pies and cakes — 
 we had reached what Charles Dudley Warner calls *'the 
 region of perpetual pie." I asked the waitress if I could 
 have some bread and cheese; she said I might, but added: 
 "You can't eat it here, you'll have to eat it in the kitchen." 
 So I retired to the kitchen with my vulgar fare. 
 
 In those days Bar Harbor was still pretty primitive, 
 though there were several large hotels, Rodick's being the 
 most important, and a few cottages, but there were only 
 two real country places — the Lyons' and the Gouverneur 
 Ogdens'. The Atlantic House was the next in importance 
 to Rodick's and we rented a small cottage near by and 
 took our meals there — ''mealers" we were called by the 
 natives. Living was delightfully inexpensive then. I re- 
 member that lobsters cost three cents apiece in the village. 
 There was not much to be bought in the village store, for 
 the proprietor did not often renew his stock, remarking 
 
 296 
 
SOME PLEASANT SUMMERS 
 
 In a grumbling tone that ft wasn't any use, "because as 
 soon as he got anything somebody came and bought it." 
 Along the road between Rodick's and the country school 
 there were a few scattered cottages, and there was a saw- 
 mill near the turn of the road that led to Mount Kebo, 
 but there were no important dwellings, only a farmhouse 
 or so. 
 
 There were a lot of lovely young girls at the Atlantic — 
 I remember a cheerful song of theirs, "Oh that bell, that 
 Sunday morning bell!" — and there were any number of 
 pleasant people in the little colony, but the life was very 
 simple, entirely different from what it is now. Gayety, 
 such as it was, was chiefly to be found at Rodick's. Mr. 
 and Mrs. George Rives stayed there; she was his first wife. 
 Miss Carrie Kean, rather an impulsive sort of girl. I re- 
 member we were all standing talking one Sunday morning 
 around the little fountain at Rodick's. Little Barclay 
 Rives was running around and climbing about, in such im- 
 minent danger of falling into the water that at last his 
 mother picked him up and ducked him in — white suit, 
 silk stockings and all — and then handed him to his nurse 
 to be dried. The Miss Severs from Boston, whom we liked 
 immensely, had a cottage, and so did the Minots. Miss 
 Sever was very fond of poetry and shared my enthusiasm 
 for "The Golden Treasury," which she knew from end to 
 end; but oddly enough she could not recite a single poem 
 word for word; she had such a poetical ear that she could 
 not help putting in any word that sounded all right, and 
 often her substitutes were an improvement on the original. 
 
 We had a good deal of fun getting up a play, "Poor 
 Pillicoddy," which finally was produced with great excite- 
 ment in the schoolhouse, the only place at that time for 
 any performance of the kind. Frank Haseltine and I 
 
 297 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 painted the scenery and used up pounds of our best oil 
 colors and most of our other painting materials. I painted 
 quite an effective seed store, Pillicoddy being a seedsman. 
 Miss Mary Beach, Rufus King, Frank Macauley, Doctor 
 Richee, and my wife were in the cast, and it went off very 
 well. "Poor Pillicoddy" was a favorite play at that time. 
 The Beeches gave it at their house in Second Avenue in 
 New York — Henry Satterlee, afterward the bishop, was 
 one of the performers — and my wife took part in it another 
 time at the Waterburys' place in Westchester. 
 
 I spent most of my time at Bar Harbor painting with 
 Frank Haseltine, who was a cousin of the Haseltines in 
 Rome. We became great friends — he used to stay with 
 us afterward at Danskammer. One of our favorite sub- 
 jects was the Bar, where the fish-nets for catching herring, 
 a great industry in those days, were picturesque; and there 
 were paintable bits about the Indian encampment close 
 by. Haseltine and I also amused ourselves painting 
 "plaques," as it was the fashion to call them — the aesthetic 
 revival was just beginning. We used to buy yellow earthen- 
 ware pie-dishes in the village and decorate them in oil with 
 irises and large full moons, and such poetic things, and 
 hang them on the walls of our cottage, much to our satis- 
 faction and the astonishment of the natives. Haseltine 
 afterward became seriously interested in china painting, 
 a revived art in those days, particularly in underglaze and 
 majolica. 
 
 Charles Howe was another pleasant man. I remember 
 giving him some mushrooms which we had picked, but he 
 had no faith in our mushroom lore and suspected them of 
 being toadstools; so although he bravely determined to 
 eat them he first wrote a farewell note to his sister, telling 
 her he was doubtful as to the result of the rash meal, but 
 
 298 
 
SOME PLEASANT SUMMERS 
 
 hoped for the best. We knew all about mushrooms, so his 
 fears were groundless. 
 
 We stayed at Bar Harbor until late into the autumn. 
 When we left in October every one had gone except Charles 
 Howe; he came down to see us off and the last we saw of 
 him was his figure crouched on the dock, completely cov- 
 ered by his umbrella. I have never seen him since. 
 
 This was the year of the Centennial, so from Bar Har- 
 bor we went for a few weeks to Chestnut Hill near Phila- 
 delphia, stopping on our way at Curson's Mills. The Cen- 
 tennial Exhibition was a splendid thing for the country, 
 a vast contribution to its development, and on the whole 
 we enjoyed it, especially the Japanese exhibit; perhaps 
 we should have been more thrilled if we had never been 
 abroad. The crowd was terrific and sometimes amusing. 
 The country people were forever losing each other. I re- 
 member being asked by a distracted man whether I had 
 seen anything of his family. 
 
 "First I lost my wife," he cried, "then I lost my child, 
 and now I've lost my mother-in-law — not that I mind that 
 so much!" 
 
 It was amusing, too, to see the people gaping at most 
 ordinary things. A statue made out of butter was a favor- 
 ite sight — every one was crazy to see the "Butter Woman." 
 I remember hearing a woman asking what "chickarroo" 
 was; she meant "chiar' oscuro." And looking over the 
 shoulder of a girl who was busily taking notes of the Rus- 
 sian exhibit of malachite, I saw she had written, "Some- 
 thing Green." 
 
 A pleasant interlude in the summer of 1880 was an un- 
 usual sort of trip I took, with a lot of other artists, in a boat 
 on the Erie Canal. The expedition was planned by Mr. 
 W. J. Arkell, of Canajoharie, who invited the Artists' Fund 
 
 299 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 Society to be his guests from start to finish — twenty of 
 us in all, among them Wordsworth Thompson, Clarence 
 Luce, A. T. Bricher, Herbert McCord, and Edward Gay. 
 
 The Chauncey Vibbard took us as far as Albany, where 
 we spent a not unprofitable morning looking at William 
 Hunt's mural paintings in the Capitol, and then got under 
 way for Schenectady in a pretty steam-launch that Mr. 
 Arkell had chartered for the occasion. From there we made 
 our pleasant way along the canal to Lockport. Steam- 
 boats were not usually allowed in the canal, as they washed 
 the banks, but Mr. Arkell had a special dispensation. The 
 boat was a delightful lodging — comfortable cabins below; 
 awnings shading the deck, where a string band discoursed 
 sweet music and signalled our arrivals and departures from 
 important places with lively airs. We lunched on board, 
 but hotels and private houses along the way provided our 
 breakfasts and dinners, and as our advent had been heralded 
 abroad we were welcomed with enthusiastic hospitality. I 
 must confess that this may have been due to Mr. Arkell, 
 who was an expert advertiser, not disposed to hide his light 
 under a bushel. Be that as it may, the kind public ap- 
 parently saw hovering over our heads an aesthetic halo 
 never perceived by our friends at home. 
 
 At Schenectady some of the Union professors showed 
 us about the college; and at Canajoharie Mr. ArkelFs father, 
 an agreeable man, laid himself out to entertain us, not only 
 by initiating us into the mysteries of paper-bag making 
 in his up-to-date factory, but treating us to a picnic in a 
 lovely wood, where we found a lot of pretty girls and all 
 the elite of the neighborhood gathered to do us honor. There 
 were some picturesque old mills there which we enjoyed 
 sketching. The good people of Rochester gave us a big 
 evening reception, with dancing at the town hall, where 
 
 300 
 
SOME PLEASANT SUMMERS 
 
 we were presented to all the leading citizens — altogether 
 we came in for any number of pleasant little affairs as we 
 made our triumphal progress along the canal. 
 
 But all this junketing was really a side issue. It was 
 the delightful scenery of the Mohawk Valley, the pictur- 
 esque locks set in a cluster of old houses and flanked by the 
 inevitable country store, often a picture in itself, that was 
 the chief charm of our journey. Every turn of the blue 
 canal brought us something new, and whenever we saw a 
 paintable bit we would hail the captain and he would tie 
 up to the shore. In a moment, like mushrooms, the meadows 
 would be dotted with the white tops of our sketching um- 
 brellas. Indeed, we accumulated so many sketches that 
 we were able to make several exhibitions of sorts at the 
 towns along the way. The canal-boats were a characteris- 
 tic feature of the landscape, the old horses ambling along 
 the tow-path with small urchins perched on their broad 
 backs. The barges were often nicely furnished and shaded 
 by gay colored awnings, and we passed happy families sway- 
 ing to and fro in their rocking-chairs around their well-spread 
 dinner-tables, or cooking at their portable stoves and send- 
 ing appetizing odors and slender trails of delicate smoke 
 across the water; laughing children played about the decks, 
 and altogether everybody seemed to be having a pleasant 
 time, watching the green meadows slip by them as they 
 made their quiet progress through the long summer days. 
 It was an ideal life — if you did not happen to be in a hurry. 
 
 But the canal men were extraordinarily expert in pro- 
 fanity. I have never heard anything to equal it. When- 
 ever they were at a loss for a word they filled in with some- 
 thing expressive. Sketching one day near two men who 
 were shovelling manure, I heard one say to the other: 
 
 "Are you going by the cars?" 
 
 301 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 "No," he answered quietly, "Tm going by G by 
 
 boat," leaving one uncertain as to whether the transporta- 
 tion was to be by an earthly or a celestial conveyance. 
 
 Utica did us honor, entertaining us at Bagg's Hotel; 
 then we took in Trenton Falls, and wound up with two 
 pleasant days at Niagara before returning to New York. 
 It was a fine trip, the artists were a lot of good fellows, and 
 we enjoyed every minute. 
 
 The only one of the party who did not seem to have a 
 good time was a little old German (I don't remember his 
 name), who had a studio at 51 West Tenth Street. We 
 wondered why he had come. He never sketched, hardly 
 ever spoke, and never appeared to notice the beautiful 
 country we were passing through. Only once was he roused 
 to enthusiasm. Turning to me, he pointed to a weather- 
 vane, a little wooden hen, on the roof of a bare rectangular 
 barn, and remarked with a slow smile: 
 
 "Zat is pretty." 
 
 After we got back, each of us painted a picture for Mr. 
 Arkell as a souvenir, and the lot made an interesting little 
 collection. Mine was done from a sketch of one of the locks 
 and an old house adjoining it, a woman with a baby in her 
 arms looking out of the door and a flock of pigeons on the 
 roof. In the foreground I put a pair of waiting horses, 
 from a study I made of our own old farm horses, Norman 
 and Nelly. 
 
 302 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 THE CENTURY CLUB 
 
 "O, the comrades that gossiped and painted and sung ! 
 Centuria!" 
 
 — Stedman. 
 
 I doubt if there is another club in the world with as 
 many pleasant men in it as the Century. Some of my hap- 
 piest memories are connected with the evenings I have 
 spent there and my many good old friends. Thackeray's 
 remark that the Century was the nicest club he had ever 
 been in has had an echo in the hearts of many less distin- 
 guished people. The chafing-dish Thackeray used when 
 he was our guest was for years a valued relic of the club, 
 but somehow or other it disappeared a few years ago, much 
 to our distress. 
 
 I was already a member of the Century when I went 
 to Paris, in '78, having been elected in 1874, nominated 
 by Robert Gordon and seconded by Rutherfurd Stuyvesant 
 — luckily for me, as it was some time before Saint Gaudens 
 and I were forgiven for our zeal at the Exposition. In fact, 
 Saint Gaudens didn't get in when he was proposed the fol- 
 lowing year, because of the enemies he had made in my 
 company; though, of course, a year or so later the club wel- 
 comed him with open arms. 
 
 It was really only the old fogies that objected to the 
 way Saint Gaudens and I had hung the pictures at the 
 Exposition. The younger men were perfectly satisfied — 
 for instance, La Farge, whose beautiful "Paradise Valley" 
 
 303 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 got an honorable mention, as I have said, and was greatly 
 admired by the French painters. It shows one of those 
 long valleys near the second beach at Newport looking 
 down on the ocean, a fresh-water pond with rocks rising 
 on each side, and clumps of gnarled cedar-trees, a wide 
 meadow in the foreground. 
 
 La Farge was painting in this same neighborhood when 
 I first met him many years ago. This occurred about 1865, 
 while I was staying at my brother-in-law John Neilson's 
 house at Purgatory, and he was boarding at Peckham's 
 near by and working on some of his best landscapes. La 
 Farge used to come over to John Neilson's a good deal that 
 summer to play croquet. John was the best croquet player 
 I have ever seen — it was a scientific game in those days — 
 and La Farge was absolutely the worst. We used to call 
 him **Johnny Croquet." Old Peckham, a regular Down 
 East Yankee, long, thin, with an inimitable drawl and a 
 lot of dry humor, used to take La Farge and John Neilson 
 out fishing. John, who liked a good story, said that one 
 day when they were fishing with drop lines and sport was 
 dull, as La Farge's line floated close to Peckham — La Farge 
 all the time intent upon some distant eff*ect of atmosphere 
 or light — Peckham gave the line a tremendous pull. Sud- 
 denly recalled to mundane things. La Farge pulled in his 
 line in great excitement and could not understand why 
 there was nothing on it. John said that for years after La 
 Farge used to speak of that whale he almost caught. 
 
 We once stayed at Newport for a few weeks at Peck- 
 ham's old house, soon after we came home from abroad. 
 One day the children were playing by the gate when'^Miss 
 Charlotte Cushman, the great actress, happened to pass 
 by and talked to them very sweetly in Itahan until my wife 
 came out and Miss Cushman found out who she was. Ap- 
 
 304 
 
THE CENTURY CLUB 
 
 parently she thought I was to blame for having succeeded 
 her nephew as Consul at Rome, for she drew herself up to 
 her full height and uttering the words "Maitland Arm- 
 strong" in a terrible "Meg Merrilies" voice, she made a 
 most magnificent exit worthy of a better cue. 
 
 Although La Farge was such a great artist, he was most 
 inept with his hands. One Varnishing Day at the Academy 
 I saw him trying to fasten a small gilt label with a couple 
 of tacks to the frame of a picture. He hammered away, 
 bruising his fingers and getting the label in an awful state, 
 and at last gave it up in despair. 
 
 La Farge was highly educated, I don't know where, but 
 I think by private masters, chiefly abroad : he spoke French 
 like a native. He studied painting with Couture, who doubt- 
 less influenced La Farge's color; and color was his strong 
 point, particularly his blues, for he drew with difficulty — 
 though he produced some fine drawings, notably those 
 engraved on wood by Marsh for "The Pied Piper of Ham- 
 elin," and a beautiful one cafled "Silence" for "Enoch Ar- 
 den," which I believe was a study of Mrs. La Farge. 
 Marsh's engravings of drawings by La Farge, Mary Hal- 
 leck Foote and Helena de Kay, afterward Mrs. Gilder, 
 were exhibited at Paris in 1878 and were highly thought 
 of; he was one of our best engravers. 
 
 La Farge's father was a man of fortune, a Frenchman 
 who came to America, I believe, as an agent for Louis 
 Philippe. He owned the La Farge House on Broadway, 
 between Bleecker and Amity Streets where the Broadway 
 Central Hotel is now, a site formerly occupied by the Winter 
 Garden — I once saw Booth there as Shylock. This property 
 sold for a large price and La Farge inherited a good deal 
 of money; but he never could keep money, and though he 
 received large sums for his paintings and stained glass he 
 
 305 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 died poor. But he always lived well, you never saw him 
 on foot, and he kept cabs waiting in front of his studio or 
 the glass shop for hours at a time. Awoki, his valet, a nice 
 little fellow, I believe of good position in Japan, was his 
 devoted servant for years and his faithful nurse in sickness. 
 When La Farge died, he seemed to feel lost without him. 
 La Farge told very amusing stories of his experiences in 
 Japan, where he once found himself required by etiquette 
 to take a bath in the courtyard of a Japanese house, while 
 all the family politely stood around in a circle patiently 
 waiting until he was through, only hoping that the water 
 would not be entirely cold. I think it was that same year 
 that he went to Samoa, and called on the Robert Louis 
 Stevenson family: Mrs. Stevenson welcomed him clad 
 only in a '*hoIiko" — a large piece of cloth with a hole for 
 the neck to go through, and the lunch consisted solely of 
 bananas — La Farge was accustomed to better lunches than 
 that! 
 
 He was not only a great painter but a remarkable writer. 
 A charming article on Japanese art which he wrote for a 
 book of Pumpelly's, a trip around the world, was done 
 after the book was set up in type, so that La Farge was 
 restricted to an exact space, no more and no less. It is 
 short but admirable. 
 
 The reredos in old St. Thomas's Church, the work of 
 La Farge and Saint Gaudens, was one of the finest things 
 of the kind in the country, and it was a tragedy that it 
 should have been destroyed when the church was burned, 
 though of course in every other way Mr. Cram's beautiful 
 new church is a vast improvement on the old. Saint 
 Gaudens finished modelling his part of the work — a cross 
 in the centre with adoring angels on either side — while we 
 were in Paris together, in 1878. La Farge had, of course, 
 
 306 
 
THE CENTURY CLUB 
 
 the artist's usual struggle with the clerical point of view — 
 you know the clergy often appear to think that they receive 
 a special knowledge of art together with the other gifts of 
 ordination — the worthy rector condemning the figure of 
 Mary Magdalen as too ascetic and suggesting "a trifle more 
 rotundity." It is hardly necessary to say that the advice 
 was not followed and the saint was portrayed with the 
 exquisite religious feeling and refinement always found in 
 La Farge's earlier work, which often had a wonderful solem- 
 nity as well. 
 
 The rector of St. Thomas's must have considered him- 
 self an expert on Mary Magdalen. Saint Gaudens told me 
 he was once wandering around the church, trying to decide 
 some knotty point by studying his work from different an- 
 gles, while the doctor was preaching on "coporeal delights," 
 with this saint as his text. Saint Gaudens said that as he 
 went from gallery to gallery — the old church had any num- 
 ber of them — the resounding warning against "coporeal 
 delights" came to him again and again in sonorous tones, 
 and that he left the edifice with "co-po-real de-lights" still 
 ringing in his ears. 
 
 La Farge's "Ascension" above the reredos in the Church 
 of the Ascension at Fifth Avenue and Tenth Street is, to 
 my mind, the finest mural painting in America. He worked 
 on it for several years; in fact, Stanford White, who was 
 the architect of the reredos, got in perfect despair over it; 
 it seemed as if La Farge would never get it done, and natu- 
 rally Doctor Donald, the rector, wanted to have the work 
 finished and the scaff*oIding taken down. As White said 
 to Donald one day: 
 
 **This delay is perfectly hellish!" 
 
 To which Donald answered, *' I am a clergyman. White, 
 but you exactly express my sentiments." 
 
 307 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 However, the reredos was finished at last. Louis Saint 
 Gaudens made some lovely angels for it and I did the 
 mosaics. 
 
 Louis Saint Gaudens was a strange fellow, none of your 
 Greenwich Village Bohemians, but a true example of the 
 artistic temperament, and with very nearly as much genius 
 as his famous brother. He was never bound by any con- 
 vention as such. Saint Gaudens told me that once he turned 
 up after a long absence, and remarked: 
 
 "Gus, Vm married." Saint Gaudens looked at him in 
 astonishment, but before he could speak, Louis added: 
 
 "She's dead." And that was all Augustus ever knew 
 about it. 
 
 When Doctor E. Winchester Donald became rector of 
 the Ascension, it was one of the ugliest churches inside 
 that were to be found in New York, which is saying a good 
 deal, but Doctor Donald had a great love of beauty, and 
 he raised the money and chose the artists who made it what 
 it is to-day. He found it not only extremely shabby, with 
 holes in the carpet and stains on the walls, but everything 
 about it was ugly — the imitation chancel window with its 
 quarries of crude glass set slap up against the wall so that 
 no light came through it, the dreary wooden "Tables of 
 the Law" over the altar, the square platform with a rail- 
 ing round it that they called a pulpit, no stained glass 
 worthy the name in any of the windows, and all architec- 
 tural effect marred by the clumsy galleries at either side 
 of the nave. As I said, when speaking of Bishop Eastburn 
 in another chapter, Upjohn the architect had not been al- 
 lowed to design a proper chancel when he built the church, 
 and White considered for some time whether it would be 
 possible to put in a Gothic chancel, but this would have 
 involved so much that he finally decided to treat the wall 
 simply as a space for decoration. 
 
 308 
 
THE CENTURY CLUB 
 
 The first stained-glass window to be put in the Ascension 
 was La Farge's "Christ and Nicodemus," one of the finest 
 things he ever did. Mine next to it, the "Annunciation," 
 was almost my first figure window. At that time La Farge 
 and Louis Tiff*any were still making interesting experi- 
 ments in the manufacture of opal glass and there was far 
 more variety to be had then than now, when the manu- 
 facture of the actual glass itself is reduced to a formula. 
 There are bits in both these windows that could not be 
 found in any glass shop to-day. 
 
 Another very fine altar-piece of LaFarge's is the paint- 
 ing in the Church of the Incarnation on Madison Avenue. 
 It is unfortunate that when the church was redecorated a 
 few years ago so little regard was paid to the eff'ect on this 
 picture, which should have influenced the entire color 
 scheme. The dazzle of white paint which has brought the 
 church to so immaculate a cleanliness, but not, to my mind, 
 to godliness, has sucked all the life out of La Farge's color 
 and dulled it to a muddy shadow of its former self. It would 
 have been quite possible to redecorate the interior and 
 change the former rather ugly coloring, and yet keep it in 
 harmony with the picture. How seldom people seem to 
 realize that color is chiefly beautiful in its relation to other 
 color — to surround La Farge's wonderful coloring with 
 dead white was as presumptuous as to alter a note in any 
 other great harmony. If La Farge had painted his picture 
 for a white church, he would have made it entirely diff'erent. 
 
 When Boldini was in this country. La Farge told me 
 that he said to him: 
 
 "How does it happen, Mr. La Farge, that you are the 
 president of so many societies — American Artists, Archi- 
 tectural League, Society of Mural Painters, etc., etc.?" 
 
 La Farge replied, "Oh, well, you see there are not 
 enough old men to go round." 
 
 309 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 He once told me an amusing anecdote of Manet. It 
 seems a young artist, a flagrant imitator of Manet's style, 
 came into Manet's studio in Paris when La Farge was there, 
 bringing some sketches he wanted criticised. Manet said 
 to him: 
 
 "My young friend, do you see nature in this way?" 
 
 "Yes," said the young man, "I do." 
 
 "No, you do not !" said Manet. "/ see nature in that 
 way but nobody else does." 
 
 John La Farge to Theodore Marburg, 
 The Municipal Art Society of Baltimore 
 
 §1 West Tenth Street. May 31st, 1906. 
 
 ". . . The list of French painters, of any triumphant 
 superiority in mural painting, is small. There are many 
 good men whose forte is not that of mural decoration, and 
 who are more properly easel painters; so that their work 
 on walls or ceilings does not do them justice, and is usually 
 rather unpleasant to look at, however meritorious in knowl- 
 edge. We cannot command at will the poetic feeling which 
 illustrates Puvis de Chavannes or my friend, Mr. Besnard. 
 
 "You seem to wish only French painters, but if you 
 desire to make cosmopolitan representation, are you not 
 abandoning some respectable artists in Belgium, in Ger- 
 many, in Spain, also in England? I do not know the artists 
 of Holland or of Northern Europe, nor am I sufficiently 
 acquainted with the Italians who have, of late, developed 
 enormously. 
 
 "But I should not wish to have my name in any way 
 associated with the idea of bringing over foreign artists, 
 unless their superiority was so marked that we could not 
 aff'ord to do without them. I should prefer to see at any 
 time, an American, of moderate capacity — provided he 
 
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THE CENTURY CLUB 
 
 were properly a mural painter — do the work in preference 
 to a foreigner of no greater rank. I should even go further, 
 I should go very far in encouraging American Art. My 
 reasons would be based on the experience of Europe. The 
 French have developed their work by asking Frenchmen 
 to do it, and in-so-far as each nationality has followed this 
 rule, they have developed the Art of their country. 
 
 "This seems to me a fundamental law, and if there have 
 been a few exceptions, they have usually occurred at such 
 times as the Civil Wars in France, when every form of Art 
 suffered, when manufactures were absolutely wiped out, 
 and when Rubens was called in of necessity. I have al- 
 ways admired the action of Louis XIV of France, in his 
 decision to return even the illustrious Bernini to Italy, and 
 to give to famous Frenchmen the work which should illus- 
 trate his reign. 
 
 "I should even disagree with regard to the influence 
 upon our development here of such noble work as that of 
 Puvis. No one that I know is old enough to have admired 
 him as long as I have, so that I can speak with a degree 
 of confidence quite as great as that of any Frenchman. 
 
 "You allow with your usual intelligent frankness, which 
 I fully appreciate, that the course you speak of takes away 
 a commission from some American artist. Well, this I 
 regret. I should like to see more of Mr. Turner's work in 
 Baltimore, and the same for Mr. Blashfield. They will be 
 honors to us all, and there are half a dozen Americans be- 
 sides who are quite capable of such efforts. 
 
 "I believe that our American artists should have work 
 in our buildings in preference to the foreigner under almost 
 any circumstances and I believe that when that view is 
 firmly anchored in the minds of our architects and lovers 
 of Art, we shall be launched into the full sea of American 
 
 311 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 mural painting. We already see the advantage of this in 
 sculpture. The American architect does not bring over 
 even the excellent French sculptors who are there at hand. 
 And the American architect is, in so far, right. 
 
 "Finally, please understand that I appreciate entirely 
 your point of view, that of an educational influence. But 
 I consider my own view the better, from long experience 
 and, I believe, an adequate acquaintance with the art of 
 a great part of Europe and that of our own men." 
 
 No doubt La Farge is right in his convictions expressed 
 in the letter above and yet I have always regretted that 
 there was none of my friend Merson's beautiful work to 
 be seen in this country. He and I kept in touch with each 
 other for some time. The following letter — interesting 
 because he expresses a feeling shared by all decorators that 
 too wide a scope is as bad as too small a one — was written 
 just after Doctor Nevin had decided not to employ him, 
 as I had suggested, to decorate the new church in Rome, 
 and when I was hoping to get him an order here. 
 
 Luc Olivier Merson to D. M. A., New York 
 
 119 Boulevard St. Michel, Paris. 
 4 Septembre, 1881. 
 
 "Mon cher ami. En revenant d'une petite excursion au 
 
 bord de la mer, je trouve votre aimable lettre et je m'em- 
 
 presse de vous repondre. Et d'abord excusez-moi de ne 
 
 pas vous avoir repondu plus tot au subjet de la visite que 
 
 m'a faite le Dr. Nevin. Je vous suis tres reconnaissant 
 
 d'avoir pense a moi, et je ne regrette qu'une chose, c'est 
 
 que Faff'aire n'ait pas eu de suite. Le travail a ete confie 
 
 a un artiste anglais, que vous connaissez sans doute, Burne 
 
 Jones. 
 
 3^2 
 
THE CENTURY CLUB 
 
 "Et malntenant causons de TafFaire que vous me pro- 
 posez. J'accepte volontiers de faire les cartons que vous 
 me demandez comme essais. . . . Je vous serais tres oblige 
 de vouloir bien me preciser davantage les sujets. Que 
 doit representer Fange; est-ce Tange de la douleur, de la 
 priere, de la redemption? Ou bien est-ce un ange chantant 
 ou jouant d'un instrument quelconque? De meme pour le 
 groupe de deux ou trois figures, que doit-il representer? 
 Les Arts ou F Industrie, F Etude ou le Repos? L'esperance 
 ou la Charite, la Comedie ou la Musique? Cette liberte 
 que vous me laissez me gene beaucoup plus qu'elle me 
 sert. 
 
 "Voila tout. II ne me reste plus qu'a vous remercier 
 de nouveau de votre bon souvenir. Je cause souvent de 
 vous avec M. Haseltine, qui est a Paris depuis quelque 
 temps et qui travaille dans Fatelier que vous connaissez. 
 J'espere que plus heureuses avec vous qu' avec Monsieur 
 Nevin nos relations artistiques ne seront pas interrompues 
 avant meme d'avoir commence. Pour ma part, je ferai 
 mon possible pour vous satisfaire, etant tres desireux 
 d'abord de continuer avec vous d'agreables relations, en- 
 suite de travailler pour I'Amerique qui est vraiment le seul 
 pays qui encourage les arts et qui appelle et cherche a 
 retenir les artistes qui chez eux dans leur propre pays ne 
 peuvent pas, malgre leur travail et leur peine, arriver a se 
 faire une situation meme modeste. 
 
 'Recevez, mon cher ami, mes meilleurs remerciements 
 et croyez a mes meilleurs sentiments de bonne sympathie. 
 "Votre tout devoue, 
 
 * Luc-Olivier Merson." 
 
 A very old friend of our family — a member of the Cen- 
 tury by the way — was Doctor E. Winchester Donald. We 
 
 313 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 had known him ever since he first came to the Church of 
 the Ascension as Doctor John Cotton Smith's curate, a 
 very young man, and we missed him when he left New 
 York to become rector of Trinity Church, Boston. I do 
 not think they appreciated him there, the point of view 
 was too local. He once said that living in Boston after 
 the rush of life in New York was like "being drowned in 
 a park fountain." I have aheady spoken of his interest 
 in art in connection with the decoration of the Church of 
 the Ascension. The following letters show how intense 
 and how sincere was his love of beauty. 
 
 Rev, E. Winchester Donald to Miss Meta Neilson 
 
 Mont-Saint-Michel. Aug. 31, 1895 
 ". . . This is a fine place from which to see the summer 
 die. It reminds me of Amherst ! save that the white gleam- 
 ing sand takes the place of meadows. I mean the long 
 view is here the only one and you can see the sun set be- 
 hind the hills — low to be sure, twenty miles away. The 
 same Amherst stillness pervades everything at ten o'clock 
 at night, and as I watched the moon riding through white 
 transparent clouds, and making the ribbon of water, which 
 runs at low tide through the long sand reaches, shine like a 
 lazy silver serpent, I could imagine myself at Amherst, yet 
 always recalled by the long, exciting, sad history which the 
 vast pile of stone above my head records. Nothing one 
 can read, nothing one can imagine from Haig's etching, 
 gives the slightest idea of this marvelous pile. It is far 
 more exciting than anything or everything I have seen. 
 Free of history and poetry, free of art and beauty, it is the 
 very peak of human achievement, daring, and imagination. 
 I am simply insane with wonder and delight. But we can 
 talk of it next winter at 233 — in the firehght." 
 
 314 
 
THE CENTURY CLUB 
 
 Washington, Jan. i8, 1899. 
 
 ". . . Foremost among the things I have seen is St. 
 Gaudens' figure over the grave of Henry Adams' wife. Take 
 it all in all, I know nothing which is comparable to it. It 
 haunts one. Out of the human being has gone hope, love, 
 interest, and longing. Not alone is the face of the figure 
 declarative of the extinction of all that so much as makes 
 death bearable — the shoulders, the back, the arms, tell 
 the same story. The infinite refinement of the woman 
 accents her lapse into nothingness. The power of it all 
 is tremendous, startling, alarming. The cleanhness of the 
 bronze led me to ask the keeper if there were no birds. 
 He said no birds ever came near it. 
 
 " I think I should not wish often to see it. It so obsesses 
 one that he finds himself asking as he turns away, * Is She 
 right? Is She wise?' She has no secret, that is clear, but 
 the calm inarticulate misery of hopelessness is spread, like 
 a dull sheen, over every feature. And when one has re- 
 covered himself, he finds She retains his respect, as certain 
 biythe figures, meant to represent hope and faith, do not. 
 I should like to be a genius." 
 
 Trinity Church in the City of Boston. 
 April 29, 1 90 1. 
 
 ". . . They have a beautiful chapel at Wellesley. How 
 our tastes have changed since 1872 when the mildest ritual- 
 ism seemed born of the Evil One of Rome. I don't think 
 it is a clearer intellectual view of either history or ecclesi- 
 ology which has wrought it, but an increased sensitiveness 
 to form. I like to believe that our early training in the 
 paramount importance of personal religion will keep our 
 love of ordered beauty from degeneration. At any rate, I 
 doubt if people can achieve culture and sensitiveness to 
 
 315 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 form and still be content with or helped by barrenness in 
 
 worship. I rather dread going back to Trinity's empty 
 
 chancel." 
 
 London, Aug., 1903. 
 
 ". . . France never seemed so prosperous or so bright. 
 The vast plains stretching from Orleans beyond Chartres were 
 one prairie of golden grain. Already the reapers are busy. 
 
 "At Rouen I started for the train early enough to drive 
 through the little square behind the Cathedral, and received 
 the benediction of that exquisitely beautiful brown apse. 
 My three hours in Paris I spent in going to see the chapel 
 built in memory of those who perished in the memorable 
 Charity Bazaar fire four or five years ago. It's no better 
 than a gilded paganism. There's not a holy line or a rever- 
 ent curve or a bit of solemn decoration in it. It was evi- 
 dently designed by some one who had never prayed, never 
 suff*ered, and never allowed his heart to share in another's 
 woe. It seems to say as one enters, *See! how clever is 
 man, how unnecessary and fleeting is God.' And yet there 
 was one tender touch. Behind the altar screen the sisters 
 were chanting htanies. Perhaps a dozen of them — they 
 were hidden from sight — made the appeals on a low tone, 
 as low as D, I should say. When they ceased, a single voice, 
 a full octave higher, took up the appeal with a heart-broken 
 despair, so unwilling to cease petitioning yet so unable to 
 spread wide the wings of faith. Those prayers added a 
 new ugliness to the garish surroundings furnished the holy 
 sisters by some cafe-haunting architect. If the sisters had 
 not been there I should have cried out, 'This is all Tophet 
 let loose!' and fled." 
 
 Homer Martin was a most amusing Centurian. He 
 had a vast fund of dry humor. Like all true Bohemians, 
 
 316 
 
I 
 
 THE CENTURY CLUB 
 
 his ideas of domestic life were eccentric, and sometimes his 
 home would not see him for weeks at a time. Meeting him 
 on the street one day, a friend told Martin an amusing 
 story, adding that Mrs. Martin — a fine woman, I believe, 
 and witty as well — had told it to him. 
 
 '* Indeed," said Martin. "Why I think I shall have 
 to go home and make her acquaintance." 
 
 The Century Club has two of Martin's pictures, "Lake 
 Sanford" in the Adirondacks and "The Honfleur Light." 
 Martin was a great painter, a man of exquisite artistic feel- 
 ing, but the public did not find it out until he was dead. 
 When the public woke up, pictures he had sold for hundreds 
 brought thousands, and eventually commanded fabulous 
 prices. A friend of his told me that Martin had once of- 
 fered him any picture in his studio for two hundred dol- 
 lars. Martin said: "Don't you want to buy a picture? 
 I have about three hundred I can't sell; some of them have 
 frames, too." 
 
 Martin was a friend of Whistler's and stayed with him 
 in his luxurious house in London. Whistler said he came 
 down-stairs one morning and found Martin looking vaguely 
 about the room, and asked him what he was looking for. 
 
 "A pair of scissors," said Martin. "You don't seem 
 to have any. What in the world do you do when you want 
 to trim your cuff's?" 
 
 Hopkinson Smith was about the best all-round man I 
 ever knew. He did many things and all of them well, and 
 was withal a most engaging companion and a distinguished- 
 looking man, a true type of the progressive American. As 
 engineer, he built the hghthouse at Race Rock, where many 
 others had failed. As painter, he did good work in water- 
 colors and in black and white; every year he brought home 
 from abroad a great portfolio of charming drawings that 
 
 317 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 sold like hot cakes. Perhaps his best work as a writer was 
 "Colonel Carter of Carters ville." The scene of this story 
 is laid in the rooms of the old Tile Club, of which he 
 was a member, at 58 West Tenth Street — now my own 
 house — or rather at 58}^, as its door was numbered, for the 
 club was reached by a passageway through the house in 
 front. Most of the best-known artists and architects in 
 New York belonged to the Tile Club — Charles F. McKim, 
 Frank Millet, Abbey, Stanford White, Dielman, William 
 Gedney Bunce, and a lot of others. I once dined there 
 as McKim's guest, and I little dreamed as I sat in that 
 quaint room that it would one day belong to me. 
 
 When I bought the house, in 1890, there were two build- 
 ings. The one that had been occupied by the Tile Club 
 was a small house in the centre of the block. In old times 
 it had had a garden in front, but the garden was afterward 
 obliterated by the erection of another house directly on 
 the street, with a funny little passageway to the rear house 
 running through its basement. I bought both houses and 
 connected them by building another room between, and 
 made some other improvements, with Tom Nash's valuable 
 help as architect, which made it an attractive house — there 
 is certainly no other house anywhere in the least like it. 
 We have hved there ever since. One thing we like about 
 it is our studio, built by Abbey, and occupied by both him 
 and Freer. Our dining-room, except for the shelves of 
 china, is not very different from when it was the Tile Club's 
 meeting-place, the two white-tiled fireplaces that Stanford 
 White designed being unchanged. In view of the recent 
 irruption of odd-looking houses in the neighborhood, it is 
 amusing to remember that when I painted the woodwork 
 outside white it was considered extraordinarily conspicuous. 
 I remember Dielman saying laughingly that we ought to 
 
 318 
 
THE CENTURY CLUB 
 
 be indicted for making ourselves so prominent a feature 
 in the street. I have always been sorry that I was not al- 
 lowed by the Building Department to bow my large front 
 window very slightly, as one sees the windows in some Eng- 
 lish houses. The man who came from the department 
 told me quite plainly that he could '*fix it up" for me for 
 twenty-five dollars, but I didn't care to give a bribe. 
 
 Hopkinson Smith gave me two pretty drawings of the 
 door and yard of the old house which show how it looked 
 before I altered it. He was quite sentimental about the 
 old house, having used it as the scene of one of his first 
 stories. He showed us "where Chad stood and where the 
 colonel sat," quite as if they had been real people. Just 
 before his death a moving-picture concern arranged to 
 take some pictures of our house for a play of "Colonel Car- 
 ter," but it fell through owing to Mr. Smith's death. I 
 fancy he had arranged to superintend it. 
 
 On the occasion of that first visit of mine to the Tile 
 Club, Doctor Richard Derby and my nephew Tom Howard 
 were also guests. Hop Smith recounted some of his tales 
 and we had a very jolly time. He had the rare faculty of 
 reciting both comic and pathetic things with good eff*ect — 
 pathos, is usually sickening in recitation, but his was the 
 real thing; he almost made one weep. 
 
 The last time I saw Hopkinson Smith was at the Cen- 
 tury Club where he was holding forth to a crowd of men 
 on the German atrocities. He ended by saying that he 
 had been abroad nineteen times and had never yet met 
 a German gentleman. 
 
 "It's what they eat," he said, "that makes them such 
 brutes. Why, not long ago I was breakfasting in the Arcade 
 in Milan and a German bride and groom came in. He was 
 a handsome young officer, and I knew she was a bride be- 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 cause everything she had on was brand-new. And what 
 do you think he ordered for breakfast — a piece of ham a 
 foot long and two steins of beer!" 
 
 Clarence King was another many-sided man. He was 
 a mining engineer of distinction, and had degrees not only 
 from Yale but from Leipsic and many other universities, 
 but I think that his personal charm and delightful con- 
 versation had as much to do with his success in hfe as his 
 mental ability. Of all the arts, the great art of conversa- 
 tion is the most transitory — it leaves only a vague tradi- 
 tion behind it. So it is hard to do Clarence King justice, 
 but I am sure no better talker ever hved, nor any with a 
 readier wit. One day at the club some one spoke of having 
 caught a glimpse of a strange-looking woman in the window 
 of a house in Amity Street, as he flashed by in the elevated. 
 He said she was a stout Cuban-looking creature dressed 
 in a gaudy flowered gown, and then, as he hesitated for a 
 phrase in which to describe her. King broke in with: 
 
 "Why not caH her a Havana filler in a Connecticut 
 wrapper?" 
 
 I once spoke of a girl on the bathing beach at New Lon- 
 don, who could stand on one heel and make a perfect circle 
 in the sand with the other. 
 
 "Oh, yes," said King. "A radius of two feet." 
 
 Another first-rate conversationalist, one of my more 
 recent friends at the Century of whom I became exceed- 
 ingly fond, was Charles E. Grinnell, of Boston. President 
 of his class at Harvard, an accomphshed linguist, a traveller, 
 and an author, he was not only a citizen of the world in 
 its best sense and a representative American, but above 
 all a man of character and a gentleman. He was an au- 
 thority on music and the drama, and for many months 
 never missed a performance at the Theatre Fran^ais, for, 
 
 320 
 
THE CENTURY CLUB 
 
 as a Frenchman said to him: ''If you go there you will 
 know more about France than if you visited every town 
 in the country." Not only was he one of the best of talkers, 
 but he possessed that rare quality of being a good listener 
 as well. His love of life was intense up to the last; he en- 
 joyed every moment with the cheerful outlook of youth 
 mellowed by the wisdom of age, and was so modest, sweet- 
 tempered, and simple that every one loved him. 
 
 Launt Thompson, a brother-in-law of Bishop Potter, 
 was a sculptor of fine artistic and technical ability who 
 ought to have gone farther than he did. The Century owns 
 two of his best works, the noble portrait of Edwin Booth 
 and the fine bronze eagle with outspread wings that stands 
 on the stairway. 
 
 Speaking of Booth recalls a slip of Richard Harding 
 Davis — one of those remarks one afterward regrets. Davis 
 had just seen a very fine death mask of Lincoln, and when 
 Booth came in he described it to him in detail, much to 
 the horror of the bystanders, who were old enough to re- 
 member that the assassination had poisoned all Booth's 
 earlier life. But Booth took it very calmly and when Davis 
 had left the room turned to a friend and said: 
 
 "After the first moment, I was glad he spoke as he did. 
 It shows that the younger generation do not connect my 
 name with the tragedy." 
 
 Mr. A. Rodney Macdonough was an honored member 
 of the Century and for many years its secretary. He was 
 the son of the celebrated commodore, whose fine portrait 
 by Gilbert Stuart hung on the wall of the dining-room at 
 the club until after Mr. Macdonough's death, when it was 
 removed by his family. In a logbook kept by my uncle 
 Charles, I found an account of a voyage he once took in 
 the old frigate Constitution as a midshipman when Com- 
 
 321 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 modore Macdonough was captain. He mentions that the 
 ship ran aground at Smyrna, and Mr. Macdonough told 
 me that he well remembered the excitement of the event; 
 he must have had a pretty good memory, for he was only 
 a little boy of four when he took that voyage with his 
 father. 
 
 I had the honor of knowing Mr. John Bigelow well. 
 He was president of the club for many years, and up to 
 the time of his death at ninety-four presided at the 
 monthly meetings with grace and ability. Mr. Bigelow 
 was an ardent Swedenborgian and used to present me every 
 now and then with a little book of his own composition 
 on that faith, but I regret to say I never could read 
 them. 
 
 There is a round table in the corner of the dining-room 
 at the Century Club, where Nadal, Loyall Farragut, Theo- 
 dore Thomas, William Alexander, and others usually dine, 
 and here it is my good fortune to sit whenever I happen 
 to be at the club at the dinner hour. 
 
 Alas, poor Farragut is gone ! He was perhaps the most 
 popular man in the club. He and I were said to look a 
 good deal alike. He told me he once met Walter Crosby 
 on Madison Avenue, and met him a second time a few min- 
 utes later. Crosby said: "It is strange, Mr. Armstrong, 
 that we should meet again so soon," and Farragut answered: 
 "But it is stranger still that I am not Mr. Armstrong!" 
 
 I was riding with McKim at Lenox a few years ago 
 when we saw George Folsom in his garden, who came out 
 to speak to us. I had known him intimately for years, 
 but his first remark to me was: 
 
 "Is Mrs. Farragut with you?" 
 
 Among my friends at the Century, E. S. Nadal is one 
 of whom I am most fond. He was born in Virginia, in Green- 
 
 322 
 
THE CENTURY CLUB 
 
 brier County, and as his father was a Methodist clergyman, 
 and after the manner of their clergy had a new cure nearly 
 every year, NadaFs experiences of Virginia life were un- 
 usually varied. He has embodied them in a most delight- 
 ful book, "A Virginia Village." He is a graduate of Yale, 
 and was secretary of legation in London under Motley and 
 Lowell for many years, and he has met many distinguished 
 people, Lincoln among others, and his essays on a variety of 
 subjects are very charming. But above all he is a lovable 
 man. I know it would be impossible for him to do an un- 
 kind or an ungentlemanly thing. He is a fine judge of a 
 horse — I tell him he is the only man I know who has suc- 
 cessfully combined horse-dealing and literature — and has 
 the remarkable faculty of being able to sell people horses 
 and yet retain their friendship. 
 
 Robert Gordon is one of the oldest members of the Cen- 
 tury Club, which he joined in 1867, my oldest living friend 
 (he is my daughter Marion's godfather), and one of the 
 finest men I have ever known. He came to this country 
 from Scotland in 1849 when he was a very young man, 
 soon becoming a partner in the old firm of Maitland Phelps 
 and Company of which I have already spoken in connec- 
 tion with my godfather, Mr. David Maitland. Gordon 
 came often to stay with us at Danskammer and ours has 
 been a faithful and uninterrupted friendship ever since, 
 kept up of late years by a pretty regular correspondence. 
 
 I have spoken in a previous chapter of the pleasant 
 artists' receptions that Mr. Gordon gave every winter while 
 he lived in New York. When the Astors built the houses 
 in West Thirty-third Street where the Waldorf now stands, 
 Mr. Gordon moved into Number i, and later bought Num- 
 ber 7 East Thirty-eighth Street from Harvey Fisk, which 
 he remodelled to make room for his numerous pictures. 
 
 323 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 For he was a liberal patron of art, especially of American 
 painters, and a good friend to the young and strugghng. 
 I went once with him to George Boughton's studio in the 
 old Tenth Street building, and we found him engaged in 
 painting a picture which Gordon immediately bought. 
 Boughton was then almost unknown. After living a re- 
 markably agreeable life here for thirty-five years, he retired 
 from Maitland Phelps and returned to England to live, 
 where he was immediately sought out by Mr. Junius S. 
 Morgan, and induced after some persuasion to become a 
 member of the British firm of J. S. Morgan and Company, 
 with whom he was associated for fifteen years — in fact, 
 until he reached the age of seventy, which he had long be- 
 fore decided was the proper age for a man to retire. Thence- 
 forth he settled down to a pleasant country life, only dis- 
 turbed of very late years by the war. 
 
 The artists gave Mr. Gordon a farewell dinner at Del- 
 monico's before his return to England. I have the menu, 
 which, much condensed, runs as follows, beginning with a 
 quotation from Burns — 
 
 "There ne'er was a coward o' Kenmure's blude, 
 Nor yet o' Gordon's line," 
 
 and going on with — 
 
 ''Prepare your surface with — Huitres. Sketch in the 
 design with a thin wash of — Potages. Strengthen the out- 
 line with crisp touches of — Poisson. Now dash in the lights 
 boldly with — Releve. And fill up shadows carefully with 
 — Entrees. Glaze the necessary parts with a cool — Sorbet. 
 Carefully scumble the loaded masses with — Roti. Touch 
 up the details and harmonize the whole composition with 
 — Sucres. And finally varnish with a warm mixture of 
 
 324 
 
THE CENTURY CLUB 
 
 caf6 and nicotine." A generous use of "mediums" — Cham- 
 pagne, etc. — was recommended, and the whole ended with 
 another stanza from Burns, slightly improved 
 
 "Wherever he go, where'er he walk. 
 May Heaven be his warden, 
 Return him soon to fair New York, 
 Our honest Robert Gordon." 
 
 Robert Gordon to D, M. A., Rome 
 
 New York, March, 1870. 
 ". . . Gifford is now painting for me a splendid pic- 
 ture (as large as my Mansfield Mountain), the result of 
 his recent visit to Italy. It is a view near Tivoli, looking 
 toward Rome, the town of Tivoli perched up on the heights 
 to the left, numerous small streams rushing down the sides 
 of the cliff's into the river, which in a gorge below rushes 
 off" through a beautiful valley. It is, I believe, literally 
 true to nature, except in the foreground, where a little 
 license has been taken for artistic eff'ect. McEntee has 
 not been quite so much improved by his trip abroad and 
 I selected an American autumn scene in preference to any 
 of his Italian sketches." 
 
 22 Old Broad St., London. 9 April, 1886. 
 "... I am beginning to find that I made no mistake 
 in investing as I did in American pictures. They attract 
 a great deal of attention in my house, few good pictures 
 by Americans having found their way to this side. In my 
 dining-room, which is large, I have Wy ant's *OId Clear- 
 ing' over the fireplace, with Giff'ord's 'Tivoli' and 'Mans- 
 field Mountain' flanking it, all three being cleverly lighted 
 by lamps with reflectors. At the end of the room over the 
 
 325 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 sideboard I have J. G. Brown's * Curling' picture and in 
 the centre of the wall, opposite the Wyant, Ward's 'Brit- 
 tany Washerwoman,' both similarly lighted. We had the 
 American Minister, Mr. Phelps, dining with us on Tues- 
 day and he greatly enjoyed the Gifford and Wyant which 
 faced him. I got a lot of etchings through Avery which 
 I have had hung on my corridor walls. What an advance 
 the American artists have made in the art in a few years ! 
 Last Sunday was 'Picture Sunday' of the Academicians, 
 the outsiders having had the Sunday before, but I only 
 went to the studio of Boughton and CoUn Hunter. The 
 former exhibits in both the Academy and Grosvenor. 
 
 " I was much interested in your detailed report of your 
 young people in whom you seem to have a deal of com- 
 fort." 
 
 Little Park, Brimpton, Berks. 
 24 Jan. 1915. 
 
 "It is very gratifying to all the better classes in this coun- 
 try to find that you are all so thoroughly in sympathy with 
 us in our great fight. It is a clear case of a Tight to the 
 finish.' I have been greatly excited over the part taken 
 by the London Scottish. 
 
 "I am glad to hear that you are still up to your work 
 and doing well with it. How dehghtful to have an accom- 
 plished daughter as a business partner — it is an ideal ar- 
 rangement and you have reason to be proud of your family. 
 Your picture of a 'Baker's Shop in Brittany' with an old 
 white horse in the foreground hangs just behind me on 
 the wall of the dining-room here; it was allotted to Mrs. 
 Langford when the contents of Breckham Park were divided. 
 I kept the St. Mark. 
 
 "I am looking forward to getting the annual report 
 
 326 
 
THE CENTURY CLUB 
 
 of the Century before long. They call to mind many of 
 my old friends who have passed away. Like Colhns I am 
 now one of the Old Guard, as I also am of the Museum,— 
 and of the St. Andrews Society, I am the very oldest mem- 
 ber, having been elected in 1852." 
 
 Chewton Glen, 17 July, 191 7. 
 
 ". . . Your letter did me a lot of good and cheered 
 me up when I was rather in the dumps. I can do little in 
 the way of walking, and petrol can no longer be had for 
 what they are pleased to call 'joy riding.' The adhesion 
 of America to our cause has given immense satisfaction 
 and for the moment your Sammies enjoy even greater pop- 
 ularity than our Colonials. 
 
 "I find myself dwelling a good deal on my early experi- 
 ences in New York, where I spent so many happy days. 
 Nothing can ever take the place of the dear old Century, 
 which I found most appreciatively mentioned in an Enghsh 
 book the other day. I was very grieved to hear of dear 
 old Choate's death. I was never what you would call very- 
 intimate with him, but greatly appreciated his high char- 
 acter and friendly way. I am curious to hear who is to suc- 
 ceed him in the Presidency. I have treasured up a nice 
 letter from him in which he employs terms of real affec- 
 tion in speaking of our early association in Museum 
 matters. I am proud of my participation in the start of 
 what has proved a greater success than the most sanguine 
 of the Founders ever anticipated. 
 
 "You are my oldest friend, our friendship dating back 
 from the time in 1849 when I entered the office of M. and 
 P., when Gouv was a clerk there and got your mother to 
 invite me to Danskammer for the first time, which led to 
 
 327 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 many other visits. It is strange how Danskammer and 
 its associations live in my memory. I particularly remem- 
 ber one visit at least at your place when grapes were ripe 
 and free picking was permitted. 
 
 "Yours ever affectionately, 
 
 "Rob Gordon." 
 
 328 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 MY FARM AT DANSKAMMER 
 
 "The breath of distant fields upon my brow 
 Blows through that open door. 
 The sound of wind-borne bells, more sweet and low. 
 And sadder than of yore." 
 
 — William Wetmore Story. 
 
 It was in the spring of 1877 that we decided to make 
 our home at Danskammer; for though the old house built 
 by my father had been sold while I was in Italy, we had 
 kept the northern part of the place, originally the old 
 Bloomer farm, including a rather nice house — not much 
 more than a farmhouse but beautifully situated, with a wide 
 view across Newburgh bay to the Highlands. The house 
 had possibilities and, first and last, I did a good deal to it 
 and made it into a pretty pleasant old place. It has not all 
 been wasted even now, for, although the brickyards have 
 greatly injured the view, my son Noel and his family live 
 there and are as fond of it as I was. 
 
 My early ideas of decoration seem to me rather amus- 
 ing to-day; it is hard to believe that tiles and Morris wall- 
 papers were ever considered new and beautiful. But, after 
 all, Oscar Wilde was right in averring that sunflowers and 
 lilies were more satisfying than the black walnut and green 
 rep of our predecessors. There may have been too much 
 of the aesthetic in these youthful decorations of mine, but 
 the fine old things I had brought back from Italy would 
 have made any house interesting. Anyhow, everybody 
 thought our little house was not only the latest thing in 
 
 329 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 decoration but charming as well, and looking back I con- 
 fess I think so too. Later on I made more substantial ad- 
 ditions to it, helped a good deal by the advice of Stanford 
 White and McKim. In fact, at one time McKim got so 
 intensely interested in my improvements that, being con- 
 vinced that we needed a new and larger dining-room, as 
 we certainly did, he urged me to let him lend me the money 
 to build it and said he would "make me something quite 
 stunning" — as no doubt he would have done if I had been 
 willing. 
 
 McKim and I had lots of good rides together; he was 
 fond of riding and, of course, horses were an important 
 feature of our life at Danskammer. But I have talked 
 more than enough about horses already. The praises of 
 my little chestnut mare Madge, with all her wicked 
 charms, or good old Virginius, the thoroughbred that 
 Robert Gordon gave my daughter when he went to live 
 in England, must remain unsung. 
 
 Many friendships of which I have already spoken were 
 revived in those pleasant Danskammer days. Vedder 
 came once, and so did Nevin and Saint Gaudens, and May- 
 nard often stayed with us — a good friend and a good painter, 
 we are all fond of him. McKim came again and again. 
 Stanford White and I had lots of fun one time, staining 
 plaster casts with tobacco juice and coloring some por- 
 trait medallions that I had brought from Italy. We rubbed 
 them with all sorts of weird mixtures of our own invention, 
 and waxed them, and touched them up with gold, so that 
 they were quite effective. 
 
 Saint Gaudens liked our place, but he was never crazy 
 about violent exercise, and I remember when, to see the 
 view, we made him climb to the top of Beacon Hill — so 
 called because they used to light beacon fires there during 
 
 S30 
 
MY FARM AT DANSKAMMER 
 
 the Revolution — he told us a story of a Frenchman who, 
 after a similar experience, remarked breathlessly to a 
 friend: 
 
 "Aimez-vous les beautes de la nature? — Moi, je les ab- 
 horre!" 
 
 I had gone to Danskammer with the idea of making 
 a living out of fruit farming, and I went in for peaches on 
 quite a large scale; at one time I had a peach orchard of 
 over three thousand trees and several acres of grapes. There 
 is no more beautiful crop than fruit. The great wagon 
 that went up to the Marlborough dock loaded with baskets 
 was something to be proud of — even the air along the road 
 on those warm summer evenings was sweet with the scent — 
 and only those who have lived on a fruit farm know what 
 really good fruit is. When fruit is absolutely perfect it is 
 just a little too ripe for shipping, and that perfect fruit we 
 used to eat ourselves — such huge strawberries, such melt- 
 ing peaches, such bunches of purple and white grapes — I 
 never expect to see their like again. But before long the 
 "yellows" played havoc with my trees, for there was little 
 expert agricultural knowledge to be had in those days, and 
 although, take it all in all, I made a good deal of money 
 out of my fruit, I am inclined to agree on the whole with 
 the farmer who told an inquiring friend: "Why, yes, you 
 can make money off a farm — the farther off the better." 
 
 So after a while I took up the making of stained-glass 
 windows in addition to my farming, and in time it became 
 my real lifework. No man was ever happier in his choice 
 of work; the years have gone only too fast. They have 
 been crowded with hard work but all the happier for that 
 — I have always liked hard work — and for some years I 
 have had my daughter Helen as my partner. I think our 
 work together has been good work, and in this, as in every 
 
 331 
 
DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY 
 
 other relation of our lives, no two people have ever been 
 happier together than she and I. 
 
 The story of our twenty years at Danskammer would 
 be too long to tell here and, I am afraid, too simple to in- 
 terest any one but ourselves. So we will leave the old place 
 with a kindly letter of farewell from an old friend who loved 
 it. When Doctor Donald wrote in 1902 we were no longer 
 living at Danskammer, only spending a few weeks there 
 one September. 
 
 ". . . Just how long ago it is that I first saw Dans- 
 kammer, I cannot accurately say. The first vivid remem- 
 brance is of my entering the library and being arrested 
 by the fire-place mantel, never having seen its like or, for 
 that matter, its equal. All else fades away from that first 
 visit. Then I went up on Margaret's birthday, in Sep- 
 tember, of course, and McKim was there, and we had a 
 picnic on the Point and a queer dog — whose name was 
 something like Tabbo. Ah! he was so attractively weird 
 a creature that his name should live with that of George 
 Bowow or the Vicar of Morwenstow — walked the long 
 way round, while Lance — yes, that was the setter's name 
 — swam over the little bay. And in the evening we sang, 
 McKim and I — and played games, made bad verses; and 
 then to bed. How it all stands out and how cosy and snug 
 and happy one's venerable memory is as it unveils its sim- 
 ple and beautiful treasures. 
 
 **Many times thereafter I went to Danskammer; when 
 the sweet peas in the garden were at their best, and the 
 cherries were ripe and when the grapes were purple and 
 perfumed. Once, when the snow was over all. Then Alex- 
 ander's big hands and broad a's — he was a magnificent 
 type of fidelity, common sense and self-respect. And the 
 
 332 
 
MY FARM AT DANSKAMMER 
 
 leisurely, human, companionable, lively, peaceable bread- 
 breakings in the dining-room, (my seat was always toward 
 Albany). There were strawberries dropped into our plates 
 direct from the hand of God, which never knew the ex- 
 haustion of travel or the impudent soihng fingers of grocers, 
 on which no price had ever been set and — as Maitland 
 knows — no profit ever made. And the morning sun glanced 
 on the shining water of the river and bounded up into our 
 laps. And the turf and the trees whispered, chattered and 
 slept. We were the first folk on the first day — all being 
 poets. 
 
 "And one day I went with the children and stood be- 
 side the place in the Churchyard where little Bayard sleeps, 
 and heard a voice assuring us of immortality, since what 
 has once really lived never dies. 
 
 "And then came the last time — now nine years ago — 
 when I christened Hamilton. That was the end, I fear. 
 But so long as I keep a memory it will possess dear Dans- 
 kammer, and the dearer people who made it dear to me. 
 Happy innocent days ! An old man thanks God for them. 
 And he puts on paper — just why, he knows not — his 
 thoughts, knowing how foolish they will seem to-morrow 
 at Danskammer, yet willing they should so seem, if they 
 shall serve to keep him just a little alive to the kind hearts 
 who watch the glowing logs." 
 
 And so these memories of mine come to an end where 
 they began — at Danskammer. 
 
 333 
 
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