Eugene Field, a Study in Heredity and Contradictions Volume I Part 17

I have read Judge Cooley's poems with a good deal of interest. I am somewhat of a poet myself, having written sonnets and things now and then for the last twenty years. My opinion is that Judge Cooley's translations, paraphrases, and imitations, are much worthier than his original work. I hold that no poet can be a true poet unless he is at the same time somewhat of a naturalist. If Judge Cooley had been anything of a naturalist he would never have made such a serious blunder as he has made in his poem ent.i.tled "Lines to a Blue Jay." The idea of putting a blue jay into a plum-tree is simply shocking! I don't know when I've had anything grate so harshly upon my feelings as did this mistake when I discovered it this morning. It is as awful as the blunder made by one of the modern British poets (I forget his name) in referring to the alligators paddling about in Lake Erie. The blue jay (Cyanurus cristatus) does not eat plums, and therefore does not infest plum-trees.

Yours truly,

CADMON E. BATES.

Upon which Field, in his editorial plurality, commented:

To Professor Bates's criticism we shall venture no reply. We think, however, that allowance should be made for the youth of the poet when he committed the offence which so grievously torments our correspondent. It might be argued, too, that the jay of which the poet treats is no ordinary bird, but is one of those omnivorous creatures which greedily pounce upon everything coming within their predatory reach.

And two days later he made bold to crush the judge's critics with letters from the same versatile pen that never failed to aid in the furtherance of its master's hoaxes:

To the Editor: Prof. Bates may be a good taxidermist, but he knows little of ornithology. Never before he spoke was it denied that the Cyanurus cristatus (blue jay) fed upon plums. All the insect-eating birds also eat of the small fruits. It is plain that the poet knew this, even though the taxidermist didn't.

Yours truly,

L.R. COWPERTHWAITE.

To the Editor: Isn't Prof. Bates too severe in his claim that genius like that of the poetic Judge Cooley should be bound down by the prosaic facts of ornithology? Milton scorned fidelity to nature, especially when it came to ornithological details, and poets, as a cla.s.s, have been singularly wayward in this respect. My impression is that Judge Cooley has simply made use of a poetic license which any fair-minded person should be willing to concede the votaries of the muse.

Yours truly,

J.G.K.

The echoes of Judge Cooley's youthful verse were never permitted to die wholly out of Field's column, but were frequently given renewed life by casual references. Even the publication of "The Divine Lullaby" in his "Little Book of Western Verse" did not prevent Field from speaking of Judge Cooley's poetical diversions.

On another occasion he spent his odd time for weeks in preparing a humorous hoax upon the critics of Chicago. It consisted of a number of close imitations of the typical verses of Dr. Watts, in which he was a master. The fruits of his congenial labor on this occasion are preserved in his collected works. But the purpose for which they were prepared adds to their interest. They were incorporated in a prose article which gave a plausible account of how they had been exhumed from the correspondence of a sentimental friend of Watts. When the last strokes had been put upon the story, whose tone of genuineness was calculated to deceive the elect, it was mailed to Charles A. Dana, who was thoroughly in sympathy with Field in all such enterprises, and on the following Sunday it appeared in the New York Sun as an extract from a London paper. As soon as the publication reached Chicago a number of the cleverest reporters on the News staff were sent out to interview the local literary authorities. They were all carefully coached by Field what questions to ask and what points to avoid, and their reports were all turned over to him to prepare for publication. Next morning the better part of a page of the News was surrendered to quotations from the fict.i.tious article, with learned dissertations on the value of the discovery, coupled with careful comparisons of the style and sentiments of the verse with the acknowledged work of Watts. In the whole city only one of those interviewed was saved, by a sceptical a.n.a.lysis, from falling into the pit so adroitly prepared by Field.

Loyal to Chicago, to a degree incomprehensible by those who judged his sentiments by his unsparing comments on its crudities in social and literary ways, he never ceased to get pleasure out of serio-comic confounding of its business activities and artistic aspirations. Its business men and enterprises were constantly referred to in his column as equally strenuous in the pursuit of the almighty dollar and of the higher intellectual life. In his view "Culture's Garland," from the Chicago stand-point, was, indeed, a string of sausages. Of this spirit the following, printed in December, 1890, is a good example:

A DANGER THAT THREATENS

The rivalry between the trade and the literary interests in Chicago has been wondrously keen this year.

Prof. Potwins, the most eminent of our statisticians, figures that we now have in the midst of us either a poet or an author to every square yard within the corporate limits, and he estimates that in ten years' time we shall have a literary output large enough to keep all the rest of the world reading all the time.

Our trade has been increasing, too. Last September 382,098 cattle were received, against 330,994 in September of 1889. So far this year the increase over 1889 in the receipts of hogs is 2,000,000.

Last year not more than 2,700 young authors contributed stories to the Christmas number of the Daily News: this year the number of contributors reached 6,125.

Hitherto the rivalry between our trade and our literature has been friendly to a degree. The packer has patronized the poet; metaphorically speaking, the hog and the epic have lain down together and wallowed in the same Parna.s.san pool. The censers that have swung continually in the temple of the muses have been replenished with lard oil, and to our grateful olfactories has the joyous Lake breezes wafted the refres.h.i.+ng odors of sonnets and of slaughter pens commingled.

But how long is this sort of thing going to last? It surely cannot be the millennium. These twin giants will some day-alas, too soon-learn their powers and be greedy to test them against one another. A fatal jealousy seems to be inevitable; it may be fended off, but how?

The world's fair will be likely to precipitate a conflict between the interests of which we speak. Each interest is already claiming precedence, and we hear with alarm that less than a week ago one of our most respected packers threatened to withdraw his support of the international copyright bill unless the Chicago Literary Society united in an indors.e.m.e.nt of his sugar-cured hams.

When we think of the horrors that will attend and follow a set-to between Chicago trade and Chicago literature, we are p.r.o.ne to cry out, in the words of the immortal Moore-not Tom-but Mrs. Julia A., of Michigan:

An awful tremor quakes the soul!

And makes the heart to quiver, While up and down the spine doth roll A melancholy s.h.i.+ver.

In December, 1895, Edmund Clarence Stedman contributed to the "Souvenir Book" of the New York Hebrew Fair a charmingly appreciative, yet justly critical, tribute to Eugene Field, whom he likened to Shakespeare's Yorick, whose "motley covered the sweetest nature and tenderest heart." Mr. Stedman there speaks of Field as a "complex American with the obstreperous bizarrerie of the frontier and the artistic delicacy of our oldest culture always at odds within him-but he was above all a child of nature, a frolic incarnate, and just as he would have been in any time or country." He also tells how Field put their friends.h.i.+p to one of those tests which sooner or later he applied to all-the test of linking their names with something utterly ludicrous and impossible, but published with all the solemn earmarks of verity. It was on the occasion of Mr. Stedman's visit to Chicago on its invitation to lecture before the Twentieth Century Club. This gave Field the cue to announce the coming event in a way to fill the visitor with consternation. About two weeks before the poet-critic was expected, Field's column contained the following innocent paragraph:

Mr. Edmund Clarence Stedman, the poet, and the foremost of American critics, is about to visit Chicago. He comes as the guest of the Twentieth Century Club, and on the evening of Tuesday, the 28th inst., he will deliver before that discriminating body an address upon the subject of "Poetry," this address being one of the notable series which Mr. Stedman prepared for and read before the undergraduates of Johns Hopkins University last winter. These discourses are, as we judge from epitomes published in the New York Tribune, marvels of scholars.h.i.+p and of criticism.

Twenty years have elapsed, as we understand, since Mr. Stedman last visited Chicago. He will find amazing changes, all in the nature of improvements. He will be delighted with the beauty of our city and with the appreciation, the intelligence, and the culture of our society. But what should and will please him most will be the cordiality of that reception which Chicago will give him, and the enthusiasm with which she will entertain this charming prince of American letters, this eminent poet, this mighty good fellow!

I doubt if Mr. Stedman ever saw this item, which Field merely inserted, as was his wont, as a prelude to the whimsical announcement which followed in two days, and which was eagerly copied in the New York papers in time to make Mr. Stedman cast about for some excuse for being somewhere else than in Chicago on the 29th of April, 1891. This second notice is too good an instance of the liberty Field took with the name of a friend in his delectable vocation of laying "the knotted lash of sarcasm" about the shoulders of wealth and fas.h.i.+on of Chicago, not to be quoted in full. It was given with all the precision of typographical arrangement that is considered proper in printing a veritable programme of some public procession, in the following terms:

Chicago literary circles are all agog over the prospective visit of Mr. Edmund Clarence Stedman, the eminent poet-critic. At the regular monthly conclave of the Robert Browning Benevolent and Patriotical a.s.sociation of Cook County, night before last, it was resolved to invite Mr. Stedman to a grand complimentary banquet at the Kinsley's on Wednesday evening, the 29th. Prof. William Morton Payne, grand marshal of the parade which is to conduct the famous guest from the railway station the morning he arrives, tells us that the procession will be in this order:

Twenty police officers afoot.

The grand marshal, horseback, accompanied by ten male members of the Twentieth Century Club, also horseback.

Mr. Stedman in a landau drawn by four horses, two black and two white.

The Twentieth Century Club in carriages.

A bra.s.s band afoot.

The Robert Browning Club in Frank Parmelee's 'buses.

The Homer Clubs afoot, preceded by a fife-and-drum corps and a real Greek philosopher attired in a tunic.

Another bra.s.s band.

A beautiful young woman playing the guitar, symbolizing Apollo and his lute in a car drawn by nine milk-white stallions, impersonating the muses.

Two Hundred Chicago poets afoot.

The Chicago Literary Club in carriages.

A splendid gilded chariot bearing Gunther's Shakespeare autograph and Mr. Ellsworth's first printed book.

Another bra.s.s band.

Magnificent advertising car of Armour and Co., ill.u.s.trating the progress of civilization.

The Fishbladder Brigade and the Blue Island Avenue Sh.e.l.ley Club.

The fire department.

Another bra.s.s band.

Citizens in carriages, afoot and horseback.

Advertising cars and wagons.

The line of march will be an extensive one, taking in the packing-houses and other notable points. At Mr. Armour's interesting professional establishment the process of slaughtering will be ill.u.s.trated for the delectation of the honored guest, after which an appropriate poem will be read by Decatur Jones, President of the Lake View Elite Club. Then Mr. Armour will entertain a select few at a champagne luncheon in the scalding-room.