David Harum; a story of American life

Front matter

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Book_

COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT

Foreword

“The’s as much human nature in some folks as th' is in others, if not more.”—D avid Harum.

Twenty-five years ago a new character in American letters was created; a type so true, so vital, that to¬ day David Harum is a part of our language—a common possession with Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn and Mrs. Stowe’s Uncle Tom.

Books come and books go. Many arrive, but few survive the acid test of time.

David Harum is known and loved by thousands who have forgotten the very names of their neighbors of long ago.

Literary fashions change and we have seen many con¬ trasts in these past years. For a time historical romance held the center of the stage. We had stories dealing with religious faith and doubt. Then came from-thecradle-to-the-grave novels bv writers who turned their hearts and souls inside out, like school boys emptying pockets stuffed with trash. Others gave solemn imita¬ tions of Russian gloom—sordid pictures of unimportant little lives, stories photographic and pornographic, s-tr’ained studies of psychoanalysis and sham adoles¬ cence. And some gave glorious pictures, too, of honest childhood—praise be to Booth Tarkington’s Penrod and George Madden Martin’s Emmy Lou.

The flood of books, good and bad, has poured forth, yet still David Harum remains the best known example of the popular simon-pure American novel.

Late in the vear 1896, Edward Noves Westcott finished his story and sent the manuscript to a pub¬ lisher. It was returned. The author then sent it to eight

FOREWORD or more publishers before it was accepted. Late in December, 1897, it was received by D. Appleton & Com¬ pany with the following letter:

“I have taken the liberty of sending you, by the American Express to-day, the typewritten manuscript of a story of American life which I have recently completed, entitled David Hamm. I desire to submit this to you for examination, with a view to its publication, and trust you will find it suited to your requirements.”

The manuscript was read and recommended strongly, in spite of certain need for editorial revision. In its original form, David Harum played but a minor role in the novel. The editors suggested to the author that it would be wise to introduce his old horse-trading banker into the opening chapter and to develop the character more richly throughout the story.

The author, although desperately ill, cheerfully un¬ dertook the revision, completed the work, and returned the storv in the form in which it was finally ffiven to the

• n

public.

The following extracts are from a letter dictated by Mr. Westcott to his publishers on January 19, 1898:

“I feel very grateful to you. I have lived with and among the people I have written about. My father was born and ‘raised’ on Buxton Hill, and a great many of David’s peculiar figures and savings were constantly cropping out in my father’s diction. The district which is the scene of my storv should be described as being in Northern Central New York rather than Northern New York.”

In another part of the same letter Mr. Westcott says:

“If David Harum were to be published, even without

FOREWORD much delay, it would, in all probability, be posthumous. I have had the fun of writing it, anyway, and nobody will ever laugh over it more than I have. I never could tell what David was going to say next.”

Edward Westcott died the spring before his novel was published. David Harum was issued in Septem¬ ber, 1898.

Fifteen hundred copies were printed for the first edition, a usual number at that time for a first book bv an unknown author. There was no beating of drums, no special advance notification to the trade. The ad¬ vertising was such as was usually done in those days. It was some time before there were re-orders for the book and the reviews were not very encouraging. After several months the interest in the book quickened in certain parts of New York State and there was a par¬ ticular demand from the Wall Street district of New York City. Later it was learned that a number of prominent men who came from the central and western part of the state were very much interested in the book and said they had known people who reminded them strongly of David Harum. Many a Wall Street mil¬ lionaire knew from experience in boyhood what David meant when he said, “The’ wa’n’t but two seasons o’ the year with me—them of chilblains an’ stun-bruises.”

Towards the end of 1898, the year of publication, the total sale was about 12,000 copies. In 1899 the sale leaped month by month, reaching a total for that year of 388,665 copies—an enormous sale for those days. During this period special advertising was taken—par¬ ticularly in the County newspapers. The million mark in total sales was passed many years ago.

The book slowly became known in England, but the sale was not large until Lord Randolph Churchill re-

vii

FOREWORD ferred to David Harum in a speech in the House of Commons. Editions have appeared in England, Australia, and Canada, and the English sale has con¬ tinued to be large up to the present day. The book has been sold in six-pence or one-shilling editions, as well as in the regular editions. The present sale in Eng¬ land is nearly as large as in the United States; in some years it has exceeded the American sales. The sale is due entirely to the interest of the public in the book and the word-of-mouth advertising of the reader who has enjoyed it.

It would be pleasing to our sense of efficiency could we claim that the success of this book was due to su¬ perior ability on our part. As a matter of fact, sales management, publicity agents, advertising, and reviews had little to do with it. The book scored on its merit as an honest piece of work.

And a fine score it is! This sound, w holesome novel of American life has been read by millions in every quarter of the globe. It is as true a picture of its section of our country as are Joseph Lincoln’s descrip¬ tions of life on Cape Cod, or those rare stories of the South by Thomas Nelson Page and Joel Chandler Harris.

Not such a mad world, my masters, after all, but one in which clean books win success and even become “best sellers.”

New r times come, new customs arise, and a new gen¬ eration which knows not Joseph. To these we par¬ ticularly recommend David Harum, with his native wit, droll humor, pithy sayings, homely philosophy, and his big tender heart concealed under a hard shell.

In the vernacular of the road “Meet David Harum.” He makes life more worth while.

The Publishers

via

The interest which is always felt in the life and per¬ sonality of the writer of a successful book originates, it would seem, in the sympathetic and kindly desire of his readers for a more intimate acquaintance with him than they can attain through the medium of his fictitious characters. This is surely not mere curiosity, but rather an expression of genuine affection, and therefore the few lines of biography which appeared with the earlier editions of this book may now quite properly be somewhat extended, since the author has achieved a great, though unhappily a posthumous, fame.

For it may reasonably be doubted if any work of American fiction has ever had such a wide-spread and in¬ stantaneous success as David Harum. As these lines are being written the report comes that the number of copies issued during the twenty months that have passed since its publication is but a few short of half a million. Editions of it have appeared in England, Australia, and Canada, and negotiations are now in progress for the publication of a German translation. It has been the theme for many poems and parodies; the text for homilies ; the inspiration for the cartoonist; the source

IX of the orator’s wit; and an astrologer has asked in all seriousness for full details of the history of the book and its author, so that he may cast the horoscopes of novels yet unpublished, and thereby foretell success or failure.

Many people, hitherto quite unknown, have unblush - ingly set forth their claims to be the “originals” of one or another character of the book ; and while these foolish attempts to acquire a little unearned importance are more absurd than serious, yet it may not be out of place here to state that all such claims are absolutely without foundation. The characters are all drawn from life, it is true, in the sense that they are lifelike, but not from individuals. Each one is entirely the creation of the author’s imagination, and this fact he asserted with much earnestness, over and over again. “I should not dare put real people, just as I see them, into my book,” he once characteristically said ; “they’d spoil it.”

The author of David Hamm was born in Syracuse, New York, September 27, 184G, and died there of pul¬ monary consumption, March 31,1898, in his fifty-second year. He was married in 1874 to Jane Dows of Buf¬ falo, and she, dying in 1890, left three children, Harold, "V iolet, and Philip. His father was Doctor AmosWestcott, once one of the conspicuous citizens of Syracuse, and during part of the Civil War its mayor.

Edward was educated in the public schools of the city, finishing with the High School when about six¬ teen. Even at that age he had clearly developed the temperament and mind of the student. But instead of continuing his studies in college, as he greatly desired to do, he found it necessary to enter at once upon a business career. It is, of course, quite futile now to imagine what other results would have followed had he been allowed to pursue his inclination in this matter ; but it is certain that the discipline of a university training, and particularly the stimulating effect of in¬ tellectual competition and the necessary mental con¬ centration, would have produced a great and valuable impression upon his sensitive, artistic temperament. For if ever a man was endowed too richly, it was the author of David Harum. Besides being a novelist and a man of business, he was a musician, a painter, a poet, and a conversationalist of conspicuous powers. He did well all that he undertook, but because he could do so many things easily he did not often feel impelled to concentrate his efforts upon one thing. It was not until his long and fatal illness took from him the power thus variously to occupy himself that he began the work that has made him famous.

Being deprived by circumstances of the education he longed for he became his own teacher; and in this his inherent good taste, receptive mind, and retentive memory enabled him to select and rapidly acquire a great store of useful and ready knowledge. Through¬ out his life he was a voluminous reader; and while fic¬ tion and poetry were his favorite branches of literature, yet his tastes were catholic enough to cover all the sciences, and he was particularly interested in ques¬ tions of finance. The drudgery and monotony of a commercial life were always very irksome to him, but being compelled to disregard his tastes, he did so com¬ pletely. His active years were wholly devoted to busi¬ ness, in which he started as a junior clerk in the Mechanics’ Bank of Syracuse. Then followed two years in the New York office of the Mutual Life Insurance Company; after which, returning to Syracuse, he

XI again became a junior bank clerk, then teller, and then cashier. About 1880 he founded the firm of Westcott and Abbott, bankers and brokers; and when this part¬ nership was dissolved he became the registrar and financial expert of the Syracuse Water Commission, which was at that time installing a new and costly system of water-supply throughout the city. Over three million dollars passed through his hands in the execution of this work ; and his management of these great financial interests was distinguished by absolute fidelity and accuracy.

In personal appearance Mr. Westcott was tall, slen¬ der, and graceful ; and his handsome, intellectual face would light up in greeting a friend with a smile that was extremely attractive and magnetic. It was un¬ doubtedly in music that he found his greatest pleasure ; for though in business hours he always subordinated the artistic side of his nature to the requirements of the moment, yet these duties being ended for the day, he let the other talents appear. He was endowed with a fine barytone voice, and having received most excellent professional training, he became a conspicuous figure in the musical circles of central New York. His knowl¬ edge of music as well as his acquaintance with bank¬ ing have benefited the readers of David Harum ; for in describing the trials of a church choir director, and the methods of a country bank, the author has clearly drawn upon his memory for his facts. He possessed also a considerable talent for musical composition, and several songs, of which he wrote not only the words and air, but the harmony as well, have been published, and sung by those who may never know the author’s name.

Those who knew Mr. Westcott in the years when he was an intellectual leader in his native city—and his

XU I house was a center for musical and artistic men and women—may still recall some of his wise and witty sayings. Yet, with all his quickness and keenness, he never intentionally uttered a word that hurt, and his fine courtesy was invariably a most conspicuous part of his bearing. The genial humor which he lias so successfully infused into his book was actually his own, and was constantly exhibited in every-day affairs.

It was not until he retired from all business occupa¬ tions because of the collapse of his health and the cer¬ tain knowledge that he could not recover, that Mr. Westcott seriously thought of doing any literary work for publication. He had written much in the past, and doubtless realized that he possessed unusual literary powers; but, with the exception of a series of letters upon financial and political topics, very little had ever reached the public. At the outset his chief hope was not to win fame or reward,—these, indeed, he seemed not to think of,—but rather to find an occupation that should busy his mind and hands. “I have been so closely tied to a routine all my life,’ 7 he once said, “that, now I am free, I find I have lost all power of self-em¬ ployment.” The failure of his voice about this time, which was due to the progress of his disease, caused him the greatest distress, and, more than anything, impressed him with the seriousness of his condition.

Little by little, however, he grew accustomed to the changed conditions of his life ; the artistic side was now having a chance to develop along an unobstructed path ; the limitations which his failing health placed upon him were combining his efforts in one or two direc¬ tions, instead of the five or six along which he had pre¬ viously allowed his talents to stray ; and presently he had made a tentative start on David Harum. This xin was in the summer of 1895, while he was living at Lake Meacham in the Adirondacks, where he had gone in the vain hope that the climate would stay the progress of his disease.

The first work thus done by him produced what are now substantially Chapters XIX-XXIV ; that is, the scenes between David, John, and the Widow Cullom, and the Christmas dinner that follows them ; and these pages constitute the nucleus about which the others were eventually assembled. When the author returned to Syracuse late in the fall of 1895, he diffidently showed his work to some of his friends, and was urged by them to complete it. He really needed little urging, for he hadalreadv become interested in his characters, and as he went on he found the work becoming a real pleasure.

His method of composition was first to prepare a rough sketch or outline of a chapter with a lead-pencil on ordi¬ nary copy paper. He was unable to use a pen freely, as he suffered from scrivener’s palsy. These notes being finished, he rewrote them on a type-writer, enlarging or deleting as he went along; and this work was again revised or reconstructed until the author was satisfied. In most cases the chapters were completed in their present order, the exceptions being those just men¬ tioned (XIX—XXIV), and those which are now Chapters I and II, these being written last of all and prefixed to the story as it then stood, in order to intro¬ duce David and Aunt Polly to the reader at the very beginning. In all the author occupied about fifteeu months of actual time in writing his book, though a somewhat greater interval than this elapsed between the start and the finish, since there were often days, and even weeks, together when he was unable to write

xiv a line because of his physical prostration. Often, too, he would become discouraged as to the value of his labors, a discouragement his friends laughed out of him ; yet in the main his progress was steady, and the story was completed about the end of 1896.

The question has been asked, Did not Mr. Westcott leave his book unfinished*? ^so ; every line and word of the story are his own, and two complete type-written copies of it were made by his own hand nearly a year before his death. Even in this mechanical part of the work his lifelong habits of neatness and accuracy were conspicuous, and it is doubtful if “cleaner copy” were ever given to the printer.

The book was read and recommended by Mr. Ripley Hitchcock, and accepted by D. Appleton & Co. early in January, 1898; and the cordial words of com¬ mendation which were then sent to the author by Mr. Hitchcock were “more welcome,” so he said, “than any gift I could have received.” His health actually rallied a little at this time in response to the mental exhilara¬ tion, but only temporarily, and never sufficiently to permit him to leave his bed. He was able to conduct the preliminary business negotiations himself, however ; but he died without knowing, and perhaps without suspecting, the extraordinary welcome that was to be given his book. Yet when we read in Chapter XLYII his own words, “Many of the disappointments of life, if not the greater part, come because events are un¬ punctual. They have a way of arriving sometimes too early, or worse, too late,” their prophetic significance is now profoundly impressive.

Forbes Heermans.

TV

LIST OF FULL-PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS

FACING

PAGE

“I tolcl ye he’d stand ’ithout hitchin’ ” . Frontispiece

Photogravure

Portrait of Edward N. Westcott

The exit of Bill Montaig.

‘‘Mis’ Cullom, I want to tell ye a little story”

“ We sneaked up the aisle ”.

"You look f’m behind like a red-headed snappin’ bug"

“She made a grab at the lines” ....

“An’ flung it slap in ray face” ....

. 182 . 233

. 201

. 288 . 349 xvii

DAVID HARUM A Story of American Life s

CHAPTER I cup of tea into his saucer to lower its temperature to the drinking-point, and helped himself to a second cut of ham and a third egg. What-

AVID poured half of his second ever was on his mind to have kept him unusually silent during the evening meal, and to cause certain wrinkles in his forehead suggestive of perplexity or misgiving, had not impaired his appetite. David was what he called “a good feeder.”

Mrs. Bixbee, known to most of those who enjoyed the privilege of her acquaintance as “Aunt Polly,” though nieces and nephews of her blood there were none in Homeville, Freeland County, looked curiously at her brother, as, in fact, she had done at intervals during the repast; and concluding at last that further forbearance was uncalled for, relieved the pressure of her curiosity thus :

“Guess ye got somethin’ on your mind, hain’t ye?

DAVIl) HARUM

You liain’t hardly said aye, yes, ner no senee you set down. Anythin’ gone ’skew?’’

David lifted his saucer, gave the contents a precau¬ tionary blow, and emptied it with sundry windy suspi rations.

“No,” he said, “nothin’ hain’t gone exac’ly wrong, ’s ye might say—not yet $ blit I done that thing I was tell in’ ye of ter-day.”

“Done what thing?” she asked perplexedly.

“I telegraphed ter New York,” he replied, “fer that young feller to come on — the young man Gen’ral Wolsey wrote me about. I got a letter from him to-day, an’ I made up my mind 4 the sooner the quicker,’ an’ I tele¬ graphed him to come’s soon’s he could.”

“I fergit what you said his name was,” said Aunt Polly.

“There’s his letter,” said David, handing it across the table. “Read it out ’loud.”

“You read it,” she said, passing it back after a search in her pocket; “I must ’a’ left my specs in the settin’- room.”

The letter was as follows :

Dear Sir: I take the liberty of addressing you at the instance of General Wolsey, who spoke to me of the mat¬ ter of your communication to him, and was kind enough to say that he would write you in my behalf. My ac¬ quaintance with him has been in the nature of a social rather than a business one, and I fancy that he can only recommend me on general grounds. I will say, therefore, that I have had some experience with accounts, but not much practice in them for nearly three years. Neverthe¬ less, unless the work you wish done is of an intricate nature, I think I shall be able to accomplish it with such posting at the outset as most strangers would require. General Wolsey told me that you wanted some one as soon as possible. I have nothing to prevent me from starting at once if you desire to have me. A telegram addressed to me at the office of the Trust Company will reach me promptly. Yours very truly,

John K. Lenox.

“Wa’al,” said David, looking over his glasses at his sister, “what do you think on’t?”

“The’ ain’t much brag in’t,” she replied thoughtfully.

“No,” said David, putting his eye-glasses back in their case, “th’ ain’t no brag ner no promises; he don’t even say he’ll do his best, like most fellers would. He seems to have took it fer granted that I’ll take it fer granted, an’ that’s what I like about it. Wa’al,” he added, “the thing’s done, an’ I’ll be lookin’ fer him to¬ morrow mornin’, or evenin’ at latest.”

Mrs. Bixbee sat for a moment with her large, light blue and rather prominent eyes fixed on her brother’s face, and then she said, with a slight undertone of anxi¬ ety, “Was you cal’latin’ to have that young man from New Y"ork come here?”

“I hadn’t no such idee,” he replied, with a slight smile, aware of what was passing in her mind. “What put that in your head?”

“Wa’al,” she answered, “you know the’ ain’t scarcely anybody in the village tliet takes boarders in the win¬ ter, an’ I was wonderin’ what he would do.'’

“I s’pose he’ll go to the Eagle,” said David. “I dunno where else, ’nless it’s to the Lake House.”

“The Eagil! ” she exclaimed contemptuously. “Land sakes ! Coinin’ here from New Y^ork ! He won’t stan’ it there a week.”

“Wa’al,” replied David, “mebbe he will an’ mebbe he won’t, but I don’t see what else the’ is for it, an’ I guess ’twon’t kill him fer a spell. The fact is—” he was proceeding when Mrs. Bixbee interrupted him.

“I guess we’d better adjourn t’ the settin’-room an’ let Sairy clear off the tea-things,” she said, rising and going into the kitchen.

“What was you sayin’?” she asked, as she presently found her brother in the apartment designated, and

seated herself with her mend¬ ing-basket in her lap.

“The fact is, I was sayin’,” he resumed, sitting with hand and forearm resting on a round table, in the center of which was a large kerosene lamp, “that my notion was, fust off, to have him come here, but when I come to think on’t I changed my mind. In the fust place, except that he’s well recom¬ mended, I don’t know nothin’ about him; an’ in the second, you an’ I are putty well set in our ways, an’ git along all right jest as we be. I may want the young feller to stay, an’ then agin I may not—we’ll see. It’s a good sight easier to git a fishhook in ’n ’tis to git it out. I expect he’ll find it putty tough at fust, but if he’s a feller that c’n be drove out of bus’nis by a spell of the Eagle Tavern, he ain’t the feller I’m lookin’ fer— though I will allow,” he added with a grimace, “that it’ll be a putty hard test. But if I want to say to him, after tryin’ him a spell, that I guess me an’ him don’t seem likely to hitch, we’ll both take it easier if we ain’t livin’ in the same house. I guess I’ll take a look at the Trybune,” said David, unfolding that paper.

Mrs. Bixbee went on with her needlework, with an occasional side glance at her brother, who was immersed in the gospel of his politics. Twice or thrice she opened her lips as if to address him, but apparently some re¬ straining thought interposed. Finally the impulse to utter her mind culminated. “Dave,” she said, “d’you know what Deakin Perkins is sayin’ about ye?”

David opened his paper so as to hide his face, and the corners of his mouth twitched as he asked in return, “Wa’al, what’s the deakin sayin’ now?”

“He’s sayin’,” she replied, in a voice mixed of indig¬ nation and apprehension, “thet you sold him a balky horse, an’ he’s goin’ to hev the law on ye.”

David’s shoulders shook behind the sheltering page, and his mouth expanded in a grin.

“Wa’al,” he replied after a moment, lowering the paper and looking gravely at his companion over his glasses, “next to the deakin’s religious experience, them of lawin’ an’ horse-tradin’ air his strongest p’ints, an’ he works the hull on ’em to once sometimes.”

The evasiveness of this generality was not lost on Mrs. Bixbee, and she pressed the point with, “Did ye? an’ will he ? ”

“Yes, an’ no, an’ mebbe, an’ mebbe not,” was the cate¬ gorical reply.

“Wa’al,” she answered with a snap, “mebbe you call thet an answer. I s’pose if you don’t want to let on you won’t, but I do believe you’ve ben playin’ some trick on the deakin, an’ won’t own up. I do wish,” she added, “thet if you hed to git rid of a balky horse onto somebody you’d hev picked out somebody else.”

“When you got a balker to dispose of,” said David t gravely, “you can’t alwus pick an’ choose. Fust come, fust served.” Then he went on more seriously : “Now I’ll tell ye. Quite a while ago—in fact, not long after I come to enj’y the priv’lidge of the deakin’s acquaint¬ ance—we lied a deal. I wa’n’t jest on my guard, knowin’ him to be a deakiu an’ all that, an’ he lied to me so splendid that I was took in, clean over my head. He done me so brown I was burnt in places, an’ you c’d smell smoke round me fer some time.”

“Was it a horse?” asked Mrs. Bixbee gratuitously.

“Wa’al,” David replied, “mebbe it hed ben some time, but at that particular time the only thing to determine that fact was that it wa’n’t nothin’ else.”

“Wa’al, I declare !” exclaimed Mrs. Bixbee, wonder¬ ing not more at the deacon’s turpitude than at the lapse in David’s acuteness, of which she had an immense opinion, but commenting only on the former. “I’m ’mazed at the deakin.”

“Yes’m,” said David with a grin, “I’m quite a liar myself when it comes right down to the hoss bus’nis, but the deakin c ’11 give me both bowers ev’ry hand. He done it so slick that I had to laugh w hen I come to think it over—an’ I had witnesses to the hull confab, too, that he didn’t know' of, an’ I c’d ’ve showed him up in great shape if I’d had a mind to.”

“Why didn’t ye?” said Aunt Polly, whose feelings about the deacon were undergoing a revulsion.

“Wa’al, to tell ye the truth, I was so completely skunked that I hadn’t a word to say. I got rid o’ the thing fer what it was w uth fer hide an’ taller, an’ ’stid of squealin’ round the way you say he’s doin’, like a stuck pig, I kep’ my tongue between my teeth an’ laid to git even some time.”

“You ort to’ve hed the law on him,” declared Mrs. Bixbee, now fully converted. “The old scamp !”

“Wa’al,” was the reply, “I gen’ally prefer to settle out of court, an’ in this particular case, while I might ’a’ ben willin’ t’ admit that I hed ben did up, I didn’t feel much like swearin’ to it. I reckoned the time’d come when mebbe I’d git the laugh on the deakin, an’ it did, an’ we’re putty well settled now in full.”