XVII. THE JENNY LIND ENTERPRISE
GRAND SCHEME--CONGRESS OF ALL NATIONS--A BOLD AND BRILLIANT ENTERPRISE--THE JENNY LIND ENGAGEMENT--MY AGENT IN EUROPE--HIS INSTRUCTIONS--CORRESPONDENCE WITH MISS LIND--BENEDICT AND BELLETTI--JOSHUA BATES--CHEVALIER WYCKOFF--THE CONTRACT SIGNED--MY RECEPTION OF THE NEWS--THE ENTIRE SUM OF MONEY FOR THE ENGAGEMENT SENT TO LONDON--MY FIRST LIND LETTER TO THE PUBLIC--A POOR PORTRAIT--MUSICAL NOTES IN WALL STREET--A FRIEND IN NEED.
Many of my most fortunate enterprises have fairly startled me by the magnitude of their success. When my sanguine hopes predicted a steady flow of fortune, I have been inundated; when I calculated upon making a curious public pay me liberally for a meritorious article, I have often found the same public eager to deluge me with compensation. Yet, I never believed in mere luck and I always pitied the simpleton who relies on luck for his success. Luck is in no sense the foundation of my fortune; from the beginning of my career I planned and worked for my success. To be sure, my schemes often amazed me with the affluence of their results, and, arriving at the very best, I sometimes “builded better” than “I knew.”
For a long time I had been incubating a plan for an extraordinary exhibition which I was sure would be a success and would excite universal attention and commendation in America and abroad. This was nothing less than a “Congress of Nations”--an assemblage of representatives of all the nations that could be reached by land or sea. I meant to secure a man and woman, as perfect as could be procured, from every accessible people, civilized and barbarous, on the face of the globe. I had actually contracted with an agent to go to Europe to make arrangements to secure “specimens” for such a show. Even now, I can conceive of no exhibition which would be more interesting and which would appeal more generally to all classes of patrons. As it was, and while positively preparing for such a congress, it occurred to me that another great enterprise could be undertaken at less risk, with far less real trouble, and with more remunerative results.
And now I come to speak of an undertaking which my worst enemy will admit was bold in its conception, complete in its development, and astounding in its success. It was an enterprise never before or since equalled in managerial annals. As I recall it now, I almost tremble at the seeming temerity of the attempt. That I am proud of it I freely confess. It placed me before the world in a new light; it gained me many warm friends in new circles; it was in itself a fortune to me--I risked much but I made more.
It was in October 1849, that I conceived the idea of bringing Jenny Lind to this country. I had never heard her sing, inasmuch as she arrived in London a few weeks after I left that city with General Tom Thumb. Her reputation, however, was sufficient for me. I usually jump at conclusions, and almost invariably find that my first impressions are correct. It struck me, when I first thought of this speculation, that if properly managed it must prove immensely profitable, provided I could engage the “Swedish Nightingale” on any terms within the range of reason. As it was a great undertaking, I considered the matter seriously for several days, and all my “cipherings” and calculations gave but one result--immense success.
Reflecting that very much would depend upon the manner in which she should be brought before the public, I saw that my task would be an exceedingly arduous one. It was possible, I knew, that circumstances might occur which would make the enterprise disastrous. “The public” is a very strange animal, and although a good knowledge of human nature will generally lead a caterer of amusements to hit the people, they are fickle, and ofttimes perverse. A slight misstep in the management of a public entertainment, frequently wrecks the most promising enterprise. But I had marked the “divine Jenny” as a sure card, and to secure the prize I began to cast about for a competent agent.
I found in Mr. John Hall Wilton, an Englishman who had visited this country with the Sax-Horn Players, the best man whom I knew for that purpose. A few minutes sufficed to make the arrangement with him, by which I was to pay but little more than his expenses if he failed in his mission, but by which also he was to be paid a large sum if he succeeded in bringing Jenny Lind to our shores, on any terms within a liberal schedule which I set forth to him in writing.
On the 6th of November, 1849, I furnished Wilton with the necessary documents, including a letter of general instructions which he was at liberty to exhibit to Jenny Lind and to any other musical notables whom he thought proper, and a private letter, containing hints and suggestions not embodied in the former. I also gave him letters of introduction to my bankers, Messrs. Baring Brothers & Co., of London, as well as to many friends in England and France.
The sum of all my instructions, public and private, to Wilton amounted to this: He was to engage her on shares, if possible. I, however, authorized him to engage her at any rate, not exceeding one thousand dollars a night, for any number of nights up to one hundred and fifty, with all her expenses, including servants, carriages, secretary, etc., besides also engaging such musical assistants, not exceeding three in number, as she should select, let the terms be what they might. If necessary, I should place the entire amount of money named in the engagement in the hands of London bankers before she sailed. Wilton’s compensation was arranged on a kind of sliding scale, to be governed by the terms which he made for me--so that the farther he kept below my utmost limits, the better he should be paid for making the engagements. He proceeded to London, and opened a correspondence with Miss Lind, who was then on the Continent. He learned from the tenor of her letters, that if she could be induced to visit America at all, she must be accompanied by Mr. Julius Benedict, the accomplished composer, pianist, and musical director, and also she was impressed with the belief that Signor Belletti, the fine baritone, would be of essential service. Wilton therefore at once called upon Mr. Benedict and also Signor Belletti, who were both then in London, and in numerous interviews was enabled to learn the terms on which they would consent to engage to visit this country with Miss Lind. Having obtained the information desired, he proceeded to Lubeck, in Germany, to seek an interview with Miss Lind herself. Upon arriving at her hotel, he sent his card, requesting her to specify an hour for an interview. She named the following morning, and he was punctual to the appointment.
In the course of the first conversation, she frankly told him that during the time occupied by their correspondence, she had written to friends in London, including my friend Mr. Joshua Bates, of the house of Baring Brothers, and had informed herself respecting my character, capacity, and responsibility, which she assured him were quite satisfactory. She informed him, however, that at that time there were four persons anxious to negotiate with her for an American tour. One of these gentlemen was a well-known opera manager in London; another, a theatrical manager in Manchester; a third, a musical composer and conductor of the orchestra of Her Majesty’s Opera in London; and the fourth, Chevalier Wyckoff, a person who had conducted a successful speculation some years previously by visiting America in charge of the celebrated danseuse, Fanny Ellsler. Several of these parties had called upon her personally, and Wyckoff upon hearing my name, attempted to deter her from making any engagement with me, by assuring her that I was a mere showman, and that, for the sake of making money by the speculation, I would not scruple to put her into a box and exhibit her through the country at twenty-five cents a head.
This, she confessed, somewhat alarmed her, and she wrote to Mr. Bates on the subject. He entirely disabused her mind, by assuring her that he knew me personally, and that in treating with me she was not dealing with an “adventurer” who might make her remuneration depend entirely upon the success of the enterprise, but I was able to carry out all my engagements, let them prove never so unprofitable, and she could place the fullest reliance upon my honor and integrity.
“Now,” said she to Mr. Wilton, “I am perfectly satisfied on that point, for I know the world pretty well, and am aware how far jealousy and envy will sometimes carry persons; and as those who are trying to treat with me are all anxious that I should participate in the profits or losses of the enterprise, I much prefer treating with you, since your principal is willing to assume all the responsibility, and take the entire management and chances of the result upon himself.”
Several interviews ensued, during which she learned from Wilton that he had settled with Messrs. Benedict and Belletti, in regard to the amount of their salaries, provided the engagement was concluded, and in the course of a week, Mr. Wilton and Miss Lind had arranged the terms and conditions on which she was ready to conclude the negotiations. As these terms were within the limits fixed in my private letter of instructions, the following agreement was duly drawn in triplicate, and signed by herself and Wilton, at Lubeck, January 9, 1850; and the signatures of Messrs. Benedict and Belletti were affixed in London a few days afterwards:
MEMORANDUM of an agreement entered into this ninth day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and fifty, between John Hall Wilton, as agent for PHINEAS T. BARNUM, of New York, in the United States of North America, of the one part, and Mademoiselle JENNY LIND, Vocalist, of Stockholm in Sweden, of the other part, wherein the said Jenny Lind doth agree:
1st. To sing for the said Phineas T. Barnum in one hundred and fifty concerts, including oratorios, within (if possible) one year, or eighteen months from the date of her arrival in the City of New York--the said concerts to be given in the United States of North America and Havana. She, the said Jenny Lind, having full control as to the number of nights or concerts in each week, and the number of pieces in which she will sing in each concert, to be regulated conditionally with her health and safety of voice, but the former never less than one or two, nor the latter less than four; but in no case to appear in operas.
2d. In consideration of said services, the said John Hall Wilton, as agent for the said Phineas T. Barnum, of New York, agrees to furnish the said Jenny Lind with a servant as waiting-maid, and a male servant to and for the sole service of her and her party; to pay the travelling and hotel expenses of a friend to accompany her as a companion; to pay also a secretary to superintend her finances; to pay all her and her party’s travelling expenses from Europe, and during the tour in the United States of North America and Havana; to pay all hotel expenses for board and lodging during the same period; to place at her disposal in each city a carriage and horses with their necessary attendants, and to give her in addition, the sum of two hundred pounds sterling, or one thousand dollars, for each concert or oratorio in which the said Jenny Lind shall sing.
3d. And the said John Hall Wilton, as agent for the said Phineas T. Barnum, doth further agree to give the said Jenny Lind the most satisfactory security and assurance for the full amount of her engagement, which shall be placed in the hands of Messrs. Baring Brothers, of London, previous to the departure and subject to the order of the said Jenny Lind, with its interest due on its current reduction, by her services in the concerts or oratorios.
4th. And the said John Hall Wilton, on the part of the said Phineas T. Barnum, further agrees, that should the said Phineas T. Barnum, after seventy-five concerts, have realized so much as shall, after paying all current expenses, have returned to him all the sums disbursed, either as deposits at interest, for securities of salaries, preliminary outlay, or moneys in any way expended consequent on this engagement, and in addition, have gained a clear profit of at least fifteen thousand pounds sterling, then the said Phineas T. Barnum will give the said Jenny Lind, in addition to the former sum of one thousand dollars current money of the United States of North America, nightly, one fifth part of the profits arising from the remaining seventy-five concerts or oratorios, after deducting every expense current and appertaining thereto; or the said Jenny Lind agrees to try with the said Phineas T. Barnum fifty concerts or oratorios on the aforesaid and first-named terms, and if then found to fall short of the expectations of the said Phineas T. Barnum, then the said Jenny Lind agrees to reorganize this agreement, on terms quoted in his first proposal, as set forth in the annexed copy of his letter; but should such be found unnecessary, then the engagement continues up to seventy-five concerts or oratorios, at the end of which, should the aforesaid profit of fifteen thousand pounds sterling have not been realized, then the engagement shall continue as at first--the sums herein, after expenses for Julius Benedict and Giovanni Belletti, to remain unaltered except for advancement.
5th. And the said John Hall Wilton, agent for the said Phineas T. Barnum, at the request of the said Jenny Lind, agrees to pay to Julius Benedict, of London, to accompany the said Jenny Lind as musical director, pianist, and superintendent of the musical department, also to assist the said Jenny Lind in one hundred and fifty concerts or oratorios, to be given in the United States of North America and Havana, the sum of five thousand pounds (£5,000) sterling, to be satisfactorily secured to him with Messrs. Baring Brothers, of London, previous to his departure from Europe; and the said John Hall Wilton agrees further, for the said Phineas T. Barnum, to pay all his travelling expenses from Europe, together with his hotel and travelling expenses during the time occupied in giving the aforesaid one hundred and fifty concerts or oratorios--he, the said Julius Benedict, to superintend the organization of oratorios, if required.
6th. And the said John Hall Wilton, at the request, selection, and for the aid of the said Jenny Lind, agrees to pay to Giovanni Belletti, baritone vocalist, to accompany the said Jenny Lind during her tour and in one hundred and fifty concerts or oratorios in the United States of North America and Havana, and in conjunction with the aforesaid Julius Benedict, the sum of two thousand five hundred pounds (£2,500) sterling, to be satisfactorily secured to him previous to his departure from Europe, in addition to all his hotel and travelling expenses.
7th. And it is further agreed that the said Jenny Lind shall be at full liberty to sing at any time she may think fit for charitable institutions or purposes independent of the engagement with the said Phineas T. Barnum, she, the said Jenny Lind, consulting with the said Phineas T. Barnum with a view to mutually agreeing as to the time and its propriety, it being understood that in no case shall the first or second concert in any city selected for the tour be for such purpose, or whereever it shall appear against the interests of the said Phineas T. Barnum.
8th. It is further agreed that should the said Jenny Lind by any act of God be incapacitated to fulfil the entire engagement before mentioned, that an equal proportion of the terms agreed upon shall be given to the said Jenny Lind, Julius Benedict, and Giovanni Belletti, for services rendered to that time.
9th. It is further agreed and understood, that the said Phineas T. Barnum shall pay every expense appertaining to the concerts or oratorios before mentioned, excepting those for charitable purposes, and that all accounts shall be settled and rendered by all parties weekly.
10th. And the said Jenny Lind further agrees that she will not engage to sing for any other person during the progress of this said engagement with the said Phineas T. Barnum, of New York, for one hundred and fifty concerts or oratorios, excepting for charitable purposes as before mentioned; and all travelling to be first and best class.
In witness hereof to the within written memorandum of agreement we set hereunto our hand and seal.
[L. S.] JOHN HALL WILTON, Agent for PHINEAS T. BARNUM, of New York, U. S.
[L. S.] JENNY LIND.
[L. S.] JULIUS BENEDICT.
[L. S.] GIOVANNI BELLETTI.
In the presence of C. ACHILLING, Consul of His Majesty the King of Sweden and Norway.
Extract from a Letter addressed to John Hall Wilton by PHINEAS T. BARNUM, and referred to in paragraph No. 4 of the annexed agreement.
NEW YORK, November 6, 1849.
MR. J. HALL WILTON:
SIR:--In reply to your proposal to attempt a negotiation with Mlle. Jenny Lind to visit the United States professionally, I propose to enter into an arrangement with her to the following effect: I will engage to pay all her expenses from Europe, provide for and pay for one principal tenor and one pianist, their salaries not exceeding together one hundred and fifty dollars per night; to support for her a carriage, two servants, and a friend to accompany her and superintend her finances. I will furthermore pay all and every expense appertaining to her appearance before the public, and give her half of the gross receipts arising from concerts or operas. I will engage to travel with her personally and attend to the arrangements, provided she will undertake to give not less than eighty nor more than one hundred and fifty concerts, or nights’ performances.
PHINEAS T. BARNUM.
I certify the above to be a true extract from the letter.
J. H. WILTON.
I was at my Museum in Philadelphia when Wilton arrived in New York, February 19, 1850. He immediately telegraphed to me, in the cipher we had agreed upon, that he had signed an engagement with Jenny Lind, by which she was to commence her concerts in America in the following September. I was somewhat startled by this sudden announcement; and feeling that the time to elapse before her arrival was so long that it would be policy to keep the engagement private for a few months, I immediately telegraphed him not to mention it to any person, and that I would meet him the next day in New York.
When we reflect how thoroughly Jenny Lind, her musical powers, her character, and wonderful successes, were subsequently known by all classes in this country as well as throughout the civilized world, it is difficult to realize that, at the time this engagement was made, she was comparatively unknown on this side the water. We can hardly credit the fact, that millions of persons in America had never heard of her, that other millions had merely read her name, but had no distinct idea of who or what she was. Only a small portion of the public were really aware of her great musical triumphs in the Old World, and this portion was confined almost entirely to musical people, travellers who had visited the Old World, and the conductors of the press.
The next morning I started for New York. On arriving at Princeton we met the New York cars, and purchasing the morning papers, I was surprised to find in them a full account of my engagement with Jenny Lind. However, this premature announcement could not be recalled, and I put the best face on the matter. Anxious to learn how this communication would strike the public mind, I informed the conductor, whom I well knew, that I had made an engagement with Jenny Lind, and that she would surely visit this country in the following August.
“Jenny Lind! Is she a dancer?” asked the conductor.
I informed him who and what she was, but his question had chilled me as if his words were ice. Really, thought I, if this is all that a man in the capacity of a railroad conductor between Philadelphia and New York knows of the greatest songstress in the world, I am not sure that six months will be too long a time for me to occupy in enlightening the public in regard to her merits.
I had an interview with Wilton, and learned from him that, in accordance with the agreement, it would be requisite for me to place the entire amount stipulated, $187,500, in the hands of the London bankers. I at once resolved to ratify the agreement, and immediately sent the necessary documents to Miss Lind and Messrs. Benedict and Belletti.
I then began to prepare the public mind, through the newspapers, for the reception of the great songstress. How effectually this was done, is still within the remembrance of the American public. As a sample of the manner in which I accomplished my purpose, I present the following extract from my first letter, which appeared in the New York papers of February 22, 1850:
“Perhaps I may not make any money by this enterprise; but I assure you that if I knew I should not make a farthing profit, I would ratify the engagement, so anxious am I that the United States should be visited by a lady whose vocal powers have never been approached by any other human being, and whose character is charity, simplicity, and goodness personified.
“Miss Lind has great anxiety to visit America. She speaks of this country and its institutions in the highest terms of praise. In her engagement with me (which includes Havana), she expressly reserves the right to give charitable concerts whenever she thinks proper.
“Since her débût in England, she has given to the poor from her own private purse more than the whole amount which I have engaged to pay her, and the proceeds of concerts for charitable purposes in Great Britain, where she has sung gratuitously, have realized more than ten times that amount.”
The people soon began to talk about Jenny Lind, and I was particularly anxious to obtain a good portrait of her. Fortunately, a fine opportunity occurred. One day, while I was sitting in the office of the Museum, a foreigner approached me with a small package under his arm. He informed me in broken English that he was a Swede, and said he was an artist, who had just arrived from Stockholm, where Jenny Lind had kindly given him a number of sittings, and he now had with him the portrait of her which he had painted upon copper. He unwrapped the package, and showed me a beautiful picture of the Swedish Nightingale, inclosed in an elegant gilt frame, about fourteen by twenty inches. It was just the thing I wanted; the price was fifty dollars, and I purchased it at once. Upon showing it to an artist friend the same day, he quietly assured me that it was a cheap lithograph pasted on a tin back, neatly varnished, and made to appear like a fine oil painting. The intrinsic value of the picture did not exceed thirty-seven and one half cents!
After getting together all my available funds for the purpose of transmitting them to London in the shape of United States bonds, I found a considerable sum still lacking to make up the amount. I had some second mortgages which were perfectly good, but I could not negotiate them in Wall Street. Nothing would answer there short of first mortgages on New York or Brooklyn city property.
I went to the president of the bank where I had done all my business for eight years. I offered him, as security for a loan, my second mortgages, and as an additional inducement, I proposed to make over to him my contract with Jenny Lind, with a written guaranty that he should appoint a receiver, who, at my expense, should take charge of all the receipts over and above three thousand dollars per night, and appropriate them towards the payment of my loan. He laughed in my face, and said: “Mr. Barnum, it is generally believed in Wall Street, that your engagement with Jenny Lind will ruin you. I do not think you will ever receive so much as three thousand dollars at a single concert.” I was indignant at his want of appreciation, and answered him that I would not at that moment take $150,000 for my contract; nor would I. I found, upon further inquiry, that it was useless in Wall Street to offer the “Nightingale” in exchange for Goldfinches. I finally was introduced to Mr. John L. Aspinwall, of the firm of Messrs. Howland & Aspinwall, and he gave me a letter of credit from his firm on Baring Brothers, for a large sum on collateral securities, which a spirit of genuine respect for my enterprise induced him to accept.
After disposing of several pieces of property for cash, I footed up the various amounts, and still discovered myself five thousand dollars short. I felt that it was indeed “the last feather that breaks the camel’s back.” Happening casually to state my desperate case to the Rev. Abel C. Thomas, of Philadelphia, for many years a friend of mine, he promptly placed the requisite amount at my disposal. I gladly accepted his proffered friendship, and felt that he had removed a mountain-weight from my shoulders.
XVIII. THE NIGHTINGALE IN NEW YORK
FINAL CONCERTS IN LIVERPOOL--DEPARTURE FOR AMERICA--ARRIVAL OFF STATEN ISLAND--MY FIRST INTERVIEW WITH JENNY LIND--THE TREMENDOUS THRONG AT THE WHARF--TRIUMPHAL ARCHES--“WELCOME TO AMERICA”--EXCITEMENT IN THE CITY--SERENADE AT THE IRVING HOUSE--THE PRIZE ODE--BAYARD TAYLOR THE PRIZEMAN--“BARNUM’S PARNASSUS”--“BARNUMOPSIS”--FIRST CONCERT IN CASTLE GARDEN--A NEW AGREEMENT--RECEPTION OF JENNY LIND--UNBOUNDED ENTHUSIASM--BARNUM CALLED OUT--JULIUS BENEDICT--THE SUCCESS OF THE ENTERPRISE ESTABLISHED--TWO GRAND CHARITY CONCERTS IN NEW YORK--DATE OF THE FIRST REGULAR CONCERT.
After the engagement with Miss Lind was consummated, she declined several liberal offers to sing in London, but, at my solicitation, gave two concerts in Liverpool, on the eve of her departure for America. My object in making this request was, to add the éclat of that side to the excitement on this side of the Atlantic, which was already nearly up to fever heat.
The first of the two Liverpool concerts was given the night previous to the departure of the Saturday steamer for America. My agent had procured the services of a musical critic from London, who finished his account of this concert at half past one o’clock the following morning, and at two o’clock my agent was overseeing its insertion in a Liverpool morning paper, numbers of which he forwarded to me by the steamer of the same day. The republication of the criticism in the American papers, including an account of the enthusiasm which attended and followed this concert,--her trans-Atlantic,--had the desired effect.
On Wednesday morning, August 21, 1850, Jenny Lind and Messrs. Benedict and Belletti, set sail from Liverpool in the steamship Atlantic, in which I had long before engaged the necessary accommodations, and on board of which I had shipped a piano for their use. They were accompanied by my agent, Mr. Wilton, and also by Miss Ahmansen and Mr. Max Hjortzberg, cousins of Miss Lind, the latter being her Secretary; also by her two servants, and the valet of Messrs. Benedict and Belletti.
It was expected that the steamer would arrive on Sunday, September 1, but, determined to meet the songstress on her arrival whenever it might be, I went to Staten Island on Saturday, and slept at the hospitable residence of my friend, Dr. A. Sidney Doane, who was at that time the Health Officer of the Port of New York. A few minutes before twelve o’clock, on Sunday morning, the Atlantic hove in sight, and immediately afterwards, through the kindness of my friend Doane, I was on board the ship, and had taken Jenny Lind by the hand.
After a few moments’ conversation, she asked me when and where I had heard her sing.
“I never had the pleasure of seeing you before in my life,” I replied.
“How is it possible that you dared risk so much money on a person whom you never heard sing?” she asked in surprise.
“I risked it on your reputation, which in musical matters I would much rather trust than my own judgment,” I replied.
I may as well state, that although I relied prominently upon Jenny Lind’s reputation as a great musical artiste, I also took largely into my estimate of her success with all classes of the American public, her character for extraordinary benevolence and generosity. Without this peculiarity in her disposition, I never would have dared make the engagement which I did, as I felt sure that there were multitudes of individuals in America who would be prompted to attend her concerts by this feeling alone.
Thousands of persons covered the shipping and piers, and other thousands had congregated on the wharf at Canal Street, to see her. The wildest enthusiasm prevailed as the steamer approached the dock. So great was the rush on a sloop near the steamer’s berth, that one man, in his zeal to obtain a good view, accidentally tumbled overboard, amid the shouts of those near him. Miss Lind witnessed this incident, and was much alarmed. He was, however, soon rescued, after taking to himself a cold duck instead of securing a view of the Nightingale. A bower of green trees, decorated with beautiful flags, was discovered on the wharf, together with two triumphal arches, on one of which was inscribed, “Welcome, Jenny Lind!” The second was surmounted by the American eagle, and bore the inscription, “Welcome to America!” These decorations were not produced by magic, and I do not know that I can reasonably find fault with those who suspected I had a hand in their erection. My private carriage was in waiting, and Jenny Lind was escorted to it by Captain West. The rest of the musical party entered the carriage, and mounting the box at the driver’s side, I directed him to the Irving House. I took that seat as a legitimate advertisement, and my presence on the outside of the carriage aided those who filled the windows and sidewalks along the whole route, in coming to the conclusion that Jenny Lind had arrived.
A reference to the journals of that day will show, that never before had there been such enthusiasm in the City of New York, or indeed in America. Within ten minutes after our arrival at the Irving House, not less than twenty thousand persons had congregated around the entrance in Broadway, nor was the number diminished before nine o’clock in the evening. At her request, I dined with her that afternoon, and when, according to European custom, she prepared to pledge me in a glass of wine, she was somewhat surprised at my saying, “Miss Lind, I do not think you can ask any other favor on earth which I would not gladly grant; but I am a teetotaler, and must beg to be permitted to drink your health and happiness in a glass of cold water.”
At twelve o’clock that night, she was serenaded by the New York Musical Fund Society, numbering, on that occasion, two hundred musicians. They were escorted to the Irving House by about three hundred firemen, in their red shirts, bearing torches. There was a far greater throng in the streets than there was even during the day. The calls for Jenny Lind were so vehement that I led her through a window to the balcony. The loud cheers from the crowds lasted for several minutes, before the serenade was permitted to proceed again.
I have given the merest sketch of but a portion of the incidents of Jenny Lind’s first day in America. For weeks afterwards the excitement was unabated. Her rooms were thronged by visitors, including the magnates of the land in both Church and State. The carriages of the wealthiest citizens could be seen in front of her hotel at nearly all hours of the day, and it was with some difficulty that I prevented the “fashionables” from monopolizing her altogether, and thus, as I believed, sadly marring my interests by cutting her off from the warm sympathies she had awakened among the masses. Presents of all sorts were showered upon her. Milliners, mantua-makers, and shopkeepers vied with each other in calling her attention to their wares, of which they sent her many valuable specimens, delighted if, in return, they could receive her autograph acknowledgment. Songs, quadrilles and polkas were dedicated to her, and poets sung in her praise. We had Jenny Lind gloves, Jenny Lind bonnets, Jenny Lind riding hats, Jenny Lind shawls, mantillas, robes, chairs, sofas, pianos--in fact, every thing was Jenny Lind. Her movements were constantly watched, and the moment her carriage appeared at the door, it was surrounded by multitudes, eager to catch a glimpse of the Swedish Nightingale.
In looking over my “scrap-books” of extracts from the New York papers of that day, in which all accessible details concerning her were duly chronicled, it seems almost incredible that such a degree of enthusiasm should have existed. An abstract of the “sayings and doings” in regard to the Jenny Lind mania for the first ten days after her arrival, appeared in the London Times of Sept. 23, 1850, and although it was an ironical “showing up” of the American enthusiasm, filling several columns, it was nevertheless a faithful condensation of facts which at this late day seem even to myself more like a dream than reality.
Before her arrival I had offered $200 for a prize ode, “Greeting to America,” to be sung by Jenny Lind at her first concert. Several hundred “poems” were sent in from all parts of the United States and the Canadas. The duties of the Prize Committee, in reading these effusions and making choice of the one most worthy the prize, were truly arduous. The “offerings,” with perhaps a dozen exceptions, were the merest doggerel trash. The prize was awarded to Bayard Taylor for the following ode:
GREETING TO AMERICA.
WORDS BY BAYARD TAYLOR--MUSIC BY JULIUS BENEDICT.
I greet with a full heart the Land of the West, Whose Banner of Stars o’er a world is unrolled; Whose empire o’ershadows Atlantic’s wide breast, And opens to sunset its gateway of gold! The land of the mountain, the land of the lake, And rivers that roll in magnificent tide-- Where the souls of the mighty from slumber awake, And hallow the soil for whose freedom they died!
Thou Cradle of Empire! though wide be the foam That severs the land of my fathers and thee, I hear, from thy bosom, the welcome of home, For Song has a home in the hearts of the Free! And long as thy waters shall gleam in the sun, And long as thy heroes remember their scars, Be the hands of thy children united as one, And Peace shed her light on thy Banner of Stars!
This award, although it gave general satisfaction, yet was met with disfavor by several disappointed poets, who, notwithstanding the decision of the committee, persisted in believing and declaring their own productions to be the best. This state of feeling was doubtless, in part, the cause which led to the publication, about this time, of a witty pamphlet entitled “Barnum’s Parnassus; being Confidential Disclosures of the Prize Committee on the Jenny Lind song.”
It gave some capital hits in which the committee, the enthusiastic public, the Nightingale, and myself, were roundly ridiculed. The following is a fair specimen from the work in question:
BARNUMOPSIS.
A RECITATIVE.
When to the common rest that crowns his days, Dusty and worn the tired pedestrian goes, What light is that whose wide o’erlooking blaze A sudden glory on his pathway throws?
’Tis not the setting sun, whose drooping lid Closed on the weary world at half-past six; ’Tis not the rising moon, whose rays are hid Behind the city’s sombre piles of bricks.
It is the Drummond Light, that from the top Of Barnum’s massive pile, sky-mingling there, Darts its quick gleam o’er every shadowed shop, And gilds Broadway with unaccustomed glare.
There o’er the sordid gloom, whose deep’ning tracks Furrow the city’s brow, the front of ages, Thy loftier light descends on cabs and hacks, And on two dozen different lines of stages!
O twilight Sun, with thy far darting ray, Thou art a type of him whose tireless hands Hung thee on high to guide the stranger’s way, Where, in its pride, his vast Museum stands.
Him, who in search of wonders new and strange, Grasps the wide skirts of Nature’s mystic robe Explores the circles of eternal change, And the dark chambers of the central globe.
He, from the reedy shores of fabled Nile, Has brought, thick-ribbed and ancient as old iron, That venerable beast the crocodile, And many a skin of many a famous lion.
Go lose thyself in those continuous halls, Where strays the fond papa with son and daughter And all that charms or startles or appals, Thou shalt behold, and for a single quarter!
Far from the Barcan deserts now withdrawn, There huge constrictors coil their scaly backs; There, cased in glass, malignant and unshorn, Old murderers glare in sullenness and wax.
There many a varied form the sight beguiles, In rusty broadcloth decked and shocking hat, And there the unwieldy Lambert sits and smiles, In the majestic plenitude of fat.
Or for thy gayer hours, the orang-outang Or ape salutes thee with his strange grimace, And in their shapes, stuffed as on earth they sprang, Thine individual being thou canst trace!
And joys the youth in life’s green spring, who goes With the sweet babe and the gray-headed nurse, To see those Cosmoramic orbs disclose The varied beauties of the universe.
And last, not least, the marvellous Ethiope, Changing his skin by preternatural skill, Whom every setting sun’s diurnal slope Leaves whiter than the last, and whitening still.
All that of monstrous, scaly, strange and queer, Has come from out the womb of earliest time, Thou hast, O Barnum, in thy keeping here, Nor is this all--for triumphs more sublime
Await thee yet! I, Jenny Lind, who reigned Sublimely throned, the imperial queen of song, Wooed by thy golden harmonies, have deigned Captive to join the heterogeneous throng.
Sustained by an unfaltering trust in coin, Dealt from thy hand, O thou illustrious man, Gladly I heard the summons come to join Myself the innumerable caravan.
Besides the foregoing, this pamphlet contained eleven poems, most of which abounded in wit. I have room for but a single stanza. The poet speaks of the various curiosities in the Museum, and representing me as still searching for further novelties, makes me address the Swedish Nightingale as follows:
“So Jenny, come along! you’re just the card for me, And quit these kings and queens, for the country of the free; They’ll welcome you with speeches, and serenades, and rockets, And you will touch their hearts, and I will tap their pockets; And if between us both the public isn’t skinned, Why, my name isn’t Barnum, nor your name Jenny Lind!”
Various extracts from this brochure were copied in the papers daily, and my agents scattered the work as widely as possible, thus efficiently aiding and advertising my enterprise and serving to keep up the public excitement.
Among the many complimentary poems sent in, was the following, by Mrs. L. H. SIGOURNEY, which that distinguished writer enclosed in a letter to me, with the request that I should hand it to Miss Lind:
THE SWEDISH SONGSTRESS AND HER CHARITIES.
BY MRS. L. H. SIGOURNEY.
Blest must their vocation be Who, with tones of melody, Charm the discord and the strife And the railroad rush of life, And with Orphean magic move Souls inert to life and love. But there’s one who doth inherit Angel gift and angel spirit, Bidding tides of gladness flow Through the realms of want and woe; ’Mid lone age and misery’s lot, Kindling pleasures long forgot, Seeking minds oppressed with night, And on darkness shedding light. She the seraph’s speech doth know, She hath done their deeds below: So, when o’er this misty strand She shall clasp their waiting hand, They will fold her to their breast, More a sister than a guest.
Jenny Lind’s first concert was fixed to come off at Castle Garden, on Wednesday evening, September 11th, and most of the tickets were sold at auction on the Saturday and Monday previous to the concert. John N. Genin, the hatter, laid the foundation of his fortune by purchasing the first ticket at $225. It has been extensively reported that Mr. Genin and I are brothers-in-law, but our only relations are those of business and friendship. The proprietors of the Garden saw fit to make the usual charge of one shilling to all persons who entered the premises, yet three thousand people were present at the auction. One thousand tickets were sold on the first day for an aggregate sum of $10,141.
On the Tuesday after her arrival I informed Miss Lind that I wished to make a slight alteration in our agreement. “What is it?” she asked in surprise.
“I am convinced,” I replied, “that our enterprise will be much more successful than either of us anticipated. I wish, therefore, to stipulate that you shall receive not only $1,000 for each concert, besides all the expenses, as heretofore agreed on, but after taking $5,500 per night for expenses and my services, the balance shall be equally divided between us.”
Jenny looked at me with astonishment. She could not comprehend my proposition. After I had repeated it, and she fully understood its import, she cordially grasped me by the hand, and exclaimed, “Mr. Barnum, you are a gentleman of honor: you are generous; it is just as Mr. Bates told me; I will sing for you as long as you please; I will sing for you in America--in Europe--anywhere!”
Upon drawing the new contract which was to include this entirely voluntary and liberal advance on my part, beyond the terms of the original agreement, Miss Lind’s lawyer, Mr. John Jay, who was present solely to put in writing the new arrangement between Miss Lind and myself, insisted upon intruding the suggestion that she should have the right to terminate the engagement at the end of the sixtieth concert, if she should choose to do so. This proposition was so persistently and annoyingly pressed that Miss Lind was finally induced to entertain it, at the same time offering, if she did so, to refund to me all moneys paid her up to that time, excepting the $1,000 per concert according to the original agreement. This was agreed to, and it was also arranged that she might terminate the engagement at the one-hundredth concert, if she desired, upon paying me $25,000 for the loss of the additional fifty nights.
After this new arrangement was completed, I said: “Now, Miss Lind, as you are directly interested, you must have an agent to assist in taking and counting the tickets”; to which she replied, “Oh, no! Mr. Barnum; I have every confidence in you and I must decline to act upon your suggestion”; but I continued:
“I never allow myself, if it can be avoided, when I have associates in the same interests, to be placed in a position where I must assume the sole responsibility. I never even permitted an actor to take a benefit at my Museum, unless he placed a ticket-taker of his own at the door.”
Thus urged, Miss Lind engaged Mr. Seton to act as her ticket-taker, and after we had satisfactorily arranged the matter, Jay, knowing the whole affair, had the impudence to come to me with a package of blank printed affidavits, which he demanded that I should fill out, from day to day, with the receipts of each concert, and swear to their correctness before a magistrate!
I told him that I would see him on the subject at Miss Lind’s hotel that afternoon, and going there a few moments before the appointed hour, I narrated the circumstances to Mr. Benedict and showed him an affidavit which I had made that morning to the effect that I would never directly or indirectly take any advantage whatever of Miss Lind. This I had made oath to, for I thought if there was any swearing of that kind to be done I would do it “in a lump” rather than in detail. Mr. Benedict was very much opposed to it, and arriving during the interview, Jay was made to see the matter in such a light that he was thoroughly ashamed of his proposition, and, requesting that the affair might not be mentioned to Miss Lind, he begged me to destroy the affidavit. I heard no more about swearing to our receipts.
On Tuesday, September 10th, I informed Miss Lind that, judging by present appearances, her portion of the proceeds of the first concert would amount to $10,000. She immediately resolved to devote every dollar of it to charity; and, sending for Mayor Woodhull, she acted under his and my advice in selecting the various institutions among which she wished the amount to be distributed.
My arrangements of the concert room were very complete. The great parterre and gallery of Castle Garden were divided by imaginary lines into four compartments, each of which was designated by a lamp of a different color. The tickets were printed in colors corresponding with the location which the holders were to occupy, and one hundred ushers, with rosettes and bearing wands tipped with ribbons of the several hues, enabled every individual to find his or her seat without the slightest difficulty. Every seat was of course numbered in color to correspond with the check, which each person retained after giving up an entrance ticket at the door. Thus, tickets, checks, lamps, rosettes, wands, and even the seat numbers were all in the appropriate colors to designate the different departments. These arrangements were duly advertised, and every particular was also printed upon each ticket. In order to prevent confusion, the doors were opened at five o’clock, while the concert did not commence until eight. The consequence was, that although about five thousand persons were present at the first concert, their entrance was marked with as much order and quiet as was ever witnessed in the assembling of a congregation at church. These precautions were observed at all the concerts given throughout the country under my administration, and the good order which always prevailed was the subject of numberless encomiums from the public and the press.
The reception of Jenny Lind on her first appearance, in point of enthusiasm, was probably never before equalled in the world. As Mr. Benedict led her towards the foot-lights, the entire audience rose to their feet and welcomed her with three cheers, accompanied by the waving of thousands of hats and handkerchiefs. This was by far the largest audience to which Jenny Lind had ever sung. She was evidently much agitated, but the orchestra commenced, and before she had sung a dozen notes of “Casta Diva,” she began to recover her self-possession, and long before the scena was concluded, she was as calm as if she was in her own drawing-room. Towards the last portion of the cavatina, the audience were so completely carried away by their feelings, that the remainder of the air was drowned in a perfect tempest of acclamation. Enthusiasm had been wrought to its highest pitch, but the musical powers of Jenny Lind exceeded all the brilliant anticipations which had been formed, and her triumph was complete. At the conclusion of the concert Jenny Lind was loudly called for, and was obliged to appear three times before the audience could be satisfied. They then called vociferously for “Barnum,” and I reluctantly responded to their demand.
On this first night, Mr. Julius Benedict firmly established with the American people his European reputation, as a most accomplished conductor and musical composer; while Signor Belletti inspired an admiration which grew warmer and deeper in the minds of the American people, to the end of his career in this country.
It would seem as if the Jenny Lind mania had reached its culminating point before she appeared, and I confess that I feared the anticipations of the public were too high to be realized, and hence that there would be a reaction after the first concert; but I was happily disappointed. The transcendent musical genius of the Swedish Nightingale was superior to all that fancy could paint, and the furor did not attain its highest point until she had been heard. The people were in ecstasies; the powers of editorial acumen, types and ink, were inadequate to sound her praises. The Rubicon was passed. The successful issue of the Jenny Lind enterprise was established. I think there were a hundred men in New York, the day after her first concert, who would have willingly paid me $200,000 for my contract. I received repeated offers for an eighth, a tenth, or a sixteenth, equivalent to that price. But mine had been the risk, and I was determined mine should be the triumph. So elated was I with my success, in spite of all obstacles and false prophets, that I do not think half a million of dollars would have tempted me to relinquish the enterprise.
Upon settling the receipts of the first concert, they were found to be somewhat less than I anticipated. The sums bid at the auction sales, together with the tickets purchased at private sale, amounted to more than $20,000. It proved, however, that several of the tickets bid off at from $12 to $25 each, were not called for. In some instances, probably the zeal of the bidders cooled down when they came out from the scene of excitement, and once more breathed the fresh sea-breeze which came sweeping up from “the Narrows,” while perhaps, in other instances, bids were made by parties who never intended to take the tickets. I can only say, once for all, that I was never privy to a false bid, and was so particular upon that point, that I would not permit one of my employees to bid on, or purchase a ticket at auction, though requested to do so for especial friends.
The amount of money received for tickets to the first concert was $17,864.05. As this made Miss Lind’s portion too small to realize the $10,000 which had been announced as devoted to charity, I proposed to divide equally with her the proceeds of the first two concerts, and not count them at all in our regular engagement. Accordingly, the second concert was given September 13th, and the receipts, amounting to $14,203.03, were, like those of the first concert, equally divided. Our third concert, but which, as between ourselves, we called the “first regular concert,” was given Tuesday September 17, 1850.
XIX. SUCCESSFUL MANAGEMENT
HEAD-WORK AND HAND-WORK--MANAGING PUBLIC OPINION--CREATING A FUROR--THE NEW YORK HERALD--JENNY LIND’S EVIL ADVISERS--JOHN JAY--MISS LIND’S CHARITIES--A POOR GIRL IN BOSTON--THE NIGHTINGALE AT IRANISTAN--RUMOR OF HER MARRIAGE TO P. T. BARNUM--THE STORY BASED ON OUR “ENGAGEMENT”--WHAT IRANISTAN DID FOR ME--AVOIDING CROWDS--IN PHILADELPHIA AND BALTIMORE--A SUBSTITUTE FOR MISS LIND--OUR ORCHESTRA--PRESIDENT FILLMORE, CLAY, FOOTE, BENTON, SCOTT, CASS, AND WEBSTER--VISIT TO MT. VERNON--CHRISTMAS PRESENTS--NEW YEAR’S EVE--WE GO TO HAVANA--PLAYING BALL--FREDERIKA BREMER--A HAPPY MONTH IN CUBA.
No one can imagine the amount of head-work and hand-work which I performed during the first four weeks after Jenny Lind’s arrival. Anticipating much of this, I had spent some time in August at the White Mountains to recruit my energies. Of course I had not been idle during the summer. I had put innumerable means and appliances into operation for the furtherance of my object, and little did the public see of the hand that indirectly pulled at their heart-strings, preparatory to a relaxation of their purse-strings; and these means and appliances were continued and enlarged throughout the whole of that triumphal musical campaign.
The first great assembly at Castle Garden was not gathered by Jenny Lind’s musical genius and powers alone. She was effectually introduced to the public before they had seen or heard her. She appeared in the presence of a jury already excited to enthusiasm in her behalf. She more than met their expectations, and all the means I had adopted to prepare the way were thus abundantly justified.
As a manager, I worked by setting others to work. Biographies of the Swedish Nightingale were largely circulated; “Foreign Correspondence” glorified her talents and triumphs by narratives of her benevolence; and “printer’s ink” was invoked in every possible form, to put and keep Jenny Lind before the people. I am happy to say that the press generally echoed the voice of her praise from first to last. I could fill many volumes with printed extracts which are nearly all of a similar tenor to the following unbought, unsolicited editorial article, which appeared in the New York Herald of Sept. 10, 1850 (the day before the first concert given by Miss Lind in the United States):
“JENNY LIND AND THE AMERICAN PEOPLE.--What ancient monarch was he, either in history or in fable, who offered half his kingdom (the price of box tickets and choice seats in those days) for the invention of an original sensation, or the discovery of a fresh pleasure? That sensation--that pleasure which royal power in the old world failed to discover--has been called into existence at a less price, by Mr. Barnum, a plain republican, and is now about to be enjoyed by the sovereigns of the new world.
“Jenny Lind, the most remarkable phenomenon in musical art which has for the last century flashed across the horizon of the old world, is now among us, and will make her début to-morrow night to a house of nearly ten thousand listeners, yielding in proceeds by auction, a sum of forty or fifty thousand dollars. For the last ten days our musical reporters have furnished our readers with every matter connected with her arrival in this metropolis, and the steps adopted by Mr. Barnum in preparation for her first appearance. The proceedings of yesterday, consisting of the sale of the remainder of the tickets, and the astonishing, the wonderful sensation produced at her first rehearsal on the few persons, critics in musical art, who were admitted on the occasion, will be found elsewhere in our columns.
“We concur in everything that has been said by our musical reporter, describing her extraordinary genius--her unrivalled combination of power and art. Nothing has been exaggerated, not an iota. Three years ago, more or less, we heard Jenny Lind on many occasions when she made the first great sensation in Europe, by her début at the London Opera House. Then she was great in power--in art--in genius; now she is greater in all. We speak from experience and conviction. Then she astonished, and pleased, and fascinated the thousands of the British aristocracy; now she will fascinate, and please, and delight, and almost make mad with musical excitement, the millions of the American democracy. To-morrow night, this new sensation--this fresh movement--this excitement excelling all former excitements--will be called into existence, when she pours out the notes of Casta Diva, and exhibits her astonishing powers--her wonderful peculiarities, that seem more of heaven than of earth--more of a voice from eternity, than from the lips of a human being.
“We speak soberly--seriously--calmly. The public expectation has run very high for the last week--higher than at any former period of our past musical annals. But high as it has risen, the reality--the fact--the concert--the voice and power of Jenny Lind--will far surpass all past expectation. Jenny Lind is a wonder, and a prodigy in song--and no mistake.”
As usual, however, the Herald very soon “took it all back” and roundly abused Miss Lind and persistently attacked her manager. As usual, too, the public paid no attention to the Herald and doubled their patronage of the Jenny Lind concerts.
After the first month the business became thoroughly systematized, and by the help of such agents as my faithful treasurer, L. C. Stewart, and the indefatigable Le Grand Smith, my personal labors were materially relieved; but from the first concert on the 11th of September, 1850, until the ninety-third concert on the 9th of June, 1851, a space of nine months, I did not know a waking moment that was entirely free from anxiety.
I could not hope to be exempted from trouble and perplexity in managing an enterprise which depended altogether on popular favor, and which involved great consequences to myself; but I did not expect the numerous petty annoyances which beset me, especially in the early period of the concerts. Miss Lind did not dream, nor did any one else, of the unparalleled enthusiasm that would greet her; and the first immense assembly at Castle Garden somewhat prepared her, I suspect, to listen to evil advisers. It would seem that the terms of our revised contract were sufficiently liberal to her and sufficiently hazardous to myself, to justify the expectation of perfectly honorable treatment; but certain envious intermeddlers appeared to think differently. “Do you not see, Miss Lind, that Mr. Barnum is coining money out of your genius?” said they; of course she saw it, but the high-minded Swede despised and spurned the advisers who recommended her to repudiate her contract with me at all hazards, and take the enterprise into her own hands--possibly to put it into theirs. I, however, suffered much from the unreasonable interference of her lawyer, Mr. John Jay. Benedict and Belletti behaved like men, and Jenny afterwards expressed to me her regret that she had for a moment listened to the vexatious exactions of her legal counsellor.
To show the difficulties with which I had to contend thus early in my enterprise, I copy a letter which I wrote, a little more than one month after Miss Lind commenced her engagement with me, to my friend Mr. Joshua Bates, of Messrs. Baring, Brothers & Co., London:
NEW YORK, Oct. 23, 1850.
JOSHUA BATES ESQ.:
DEAR SIR,--I take the liberty to write you a few lines, merely to say that we are getting along as well as could reasonably be expected. In this country you are aware that the rapid accumulation of wealth always creates much envy, and envy soon augments to malice. Such are the elements at work to a limited degree against myself, and although Miss Lind, Benedict and myself have never, as yet, had the slightest feelings between us, to my knowledge, except those of friendship, yet I cannot well see how this can long continue in face of the fact that, nearly every day, they allow persons (some moving in the first classes of society) to approach them, and spend hours in traducing me; even her attorney, Mr. John Jay, has been so blind to her interests, as to aid in poisoning her mind against me, by pouring into her ears the most silly twaddle, all of which amounts to nothing and less than nothing--such as the regret that I was a ‘showman,’ exhibitor of Tom Thumb, etc., etc.
Without the elements which I possess for business, as well as my knowledge of human nature, acquired in catering for the public, the result of her concerts here would not have been pecuniarily one half as much as at present--and such men as the Hon. Edward Everett, G. G. Howland, and others will tell you that there is no charlatanism or lack of dignity in my management of these concerts. I know as well as any person that the merits of Jenny Lind are the best capital to depend upon to secure public favor, and I have thus far acted on this knowledge. Everything which money and attention can procure for their comfort, they have, and I am glad to know that they are satisfied on this score. All I fear is, that these continual backbitings, if listened to by her, will, by and by, produce a feeling of distrust or regret, which will lead to unpleasant results.
The fact is, her mind ought to be as free as air, and she herself as free as a bird, and, being satisfied of my probity and ability, she should turn a deaf ear to all envious and malevolent attacks on me. I have hoped that by thus briefly stating to you the facts in the case, you might be induced for her interests as well as mine to drop a line of advice to Mr. Benedict and another to Mr. Jay on this subject. If I am asking or expecting too much, I pray you to not give it a thought, for I feel myself fully able to carry through my rights alone, although I should deplore nothing so much as to be obliged to do so in a feeling of unfriendliness. I have risked much money on the issue of this speculation--it has proved successful. I am full of perplexity and anxiety, and labor continually for success, and I cannot allow ignorance or envy to rob me of the fruits of my enterprise.
Sincerely and gratefully, yours, P. T. BARNUM.
It is not my purpose to enter into full details of all of the Lind concerts, though I have given elsewhere a transcript from the account books of my treasurer, presenting a table of the place and exact receipts of each concert. This will gratify curiosity, and at the same time indicate our route of travel. Meanwhile, I devote a few pages to interesting incidents connected with Miss Lind’s visit to America.
Jenny Lind’s character for benevolence became so generally known, that her door was beset by persons asking charity, and she was in the receipt, while in the principal cities, of numerous letters, all on the same subject. Her secretary examined and responded favorably to some of them. He undertook at first to answer them all, but finally abandoned that course in despair. I knew of many instances in which she gave sums of money to applicants, varying in amount from $20, $50, $500, to $1,000, and in one instance she gave $5,000 to a Swedish friend.
One night, while giving a concert in Boston, a girl approached the ticket-office, and laying down $3 for a ticket, remarked, “There goes half a month’s earnings, but I am determined to hear Jenny Lind.” Miss Lind’s secretary heard the remark, and a few minutes afterwards coming into her room, he laughingly related the circumstance. “Would you know the girl again?” asked Jenny, with an earnest look. Upon receiving an affirmative reply, she instantly placed a $20 gold-piece in his hand, and said, “Poor girl! give her that with my best compliments.” He at once found the girl, who cried with joy when she received the gold-piece, and heard the kind words with which the gift was accompanied.
The night after Jenny’s arrival in Boston, a display of fireworks was given in her honor, in front of the Revere House, after which followed a beautiful torchlight procession by the Germans of that city.
On her return from Boston to New York, Jenny, her companion, and Messrs. Benedict and Belletti, stopped at Iranistan, my residence in Bridgeport, where they remained until the following day. The morning after her arrival, she took my arm and proposed a promenade through the grounds. She seemed much pleased, and said, “I am astonished that you should have left such a beautiful place for the sake of travelling through the country with me.”
The same day she told me in a playful mood, that she had heard a most extraordinary report. “I have heard that you and I are about to be married,” said she; “now how could such an absurd report ever have originated?”
“Probably from the fact that we are ‘engaged,’” I replied. She enjoyed a joke, and laughed heartily.
“Do you know, Mr. Barnum,” said she, “that if you had not built Iranistan, I should never have come to America for you?”
I expressed my surprise, and asked her to explain.
“I had received several applications to visit the United States,” she continued, “but I did not much like the appearance of the applicants, nor did I relish the idea of crossing 3,000 miles of ocean; so I declined them all. But the first letter which Mr. Wilton, your agent, addressed me, was written upon a sheet headed with a beautiful engraving of Iranistan. It attracted my attention. I said to myself, a gentleman who has been so successful in his business as to be able to build and reside in such a palace cannot be a mere ‘adventurer.’ So I wrote to your agent, and consented to an interview, which I should have declined, if I had not seen the picture of Iranistan!”
“That, then, fully pays me for building it,” I replied; “for I intend and expect to make more by this musical enterprise than Iranistan cost me.”
“I really hope so,” she replied; “but you must not be too sanguine, you know, ‘man proposes but God disposes.’”
Jenny Lind always desired to reach a place in which she was to sing, without having the time of her arrival known, thus avoiding the excitement of promiscuous crowds. As a manager, however, I knew that the interests of the enterprise depended in a great degree upon these excitements. Although it frequently seemed inconceivable to her how so many thousands should have discovered her secret and consequently gathered together to receive her, I was not so much astonished, inasmuch as my agent always had early telegraphic intelligence of the time of her anticipated arrival, and was not slow in communicating the information to the public.
On reaching Philadelphia, a large concourse of persons awaited the approach of the steamer which conveyed her. With difficulty we pressed through the crowd, and were followed by many thousands to Jones’s Hotel. The street in front of the building was densely packed by the populace, and poor Jenny, who was suffering from a severe headache, retired to her apartments. I tried to induce the crowd to disperse, but they declared they would not do so until Jenny Lind should appear on the balcony. I would not disturb her, and knowing that the tumult might prove an annoyance to her, I placed her bonnet and shawl upon her companion, Miss Ahmansen, and led her out on the balcony. She bowed gracefully to the multitude, who gave her three hearty cheers and quietly dispersed. Miss Lind was so utterly averse to any thing like deception, that we never ventured to tell her the part which her bonnet and shawl had played in the absence of their owner.
Jenny was in the habit of attending church whenever she could do so without attracting notice. She always preserved her nationality, also, by inquiring out and attending Swedish churches wherever they could be found. She gave $1,000 to a Swedish church in Chicago.
While in Boston, a poor Swedish girl, a domestic in a family at Roxbury, called on Jenny. She detained her visitor several hours, talking about home, and other matters, and in the evening took her in her carriage to the concert, gave her a seat, and sent her back to Roxbury in a carriage, at the close of the performances. I have no doubt the poor girl carried with her substantial evidences of her countrywoman’s bounty.
My eldest daughter, Caroline, and her friend, Mrs. Lyman, of Bridgeport, accompanied me on the tour from New York to Havana, and thence home, via New Orleans and the Mississippi.
We were at Baltimore on the Sabbath, and my daughter, accompanying a friend, who resided in the city, to church, took a seat with her in the choir, and joined in the singing. A number of the congregation, who had seen Caroline with me the day previous, and supposed her to be Jenny Lind, were yet laboring under the same mistake, and it was soon whispered through the church that Jenny Lind was in the choir! The excitement was worked to its highest pitch when my daughter rose as one of the musical group. Every ear was on the alert to catch the first notes of her voice, and when she sang, glances of satisfaction passed through the assembly. Caroline, quite unconscious of the attention she attracted, continued to sing to the end of the hymn. Not a note was lost upon the ears of the attentive congregation. “What an exquisite singer!” “Heavenly sounds!” “I never heard the like!” and similar expressions were whispered through the church.
At the conclusion of the services, my daughter and her friend found the passage way to their carriage blocked by a crowd who were anxious to obtain a nearer view of the “Swedish Nightingale,” and many persons that afternoon boasted, in good faith, that they had listened to the extraordinary singing of the great songstress. The pith of the joke is that we have never discovered that my daughter has any extraordinary claims as a vocalist.
Our orchestra in New York consisted of sixty. When we started on our southern tour, we took with us permanently as the orchestra, twelve of the best musicians we could select, and in New Orleans augmented the force to sixteen. We increased the number to thirty-five, forty or fifty, as the case might be, by choice of musicians residing where the concerts were given. On our return to New York from Havana, we enlarged the orchestra to one hundred performers.
The morning after our arrival in Washington, President Fillmore called, and left his card, Jenny being out. When she returned and found the token of his attention, she was in something of a flurry. “Come,” said she, “we must call on the President immediately.”
“Why so?” I inquired.
“Because he has called on me, and of course that is equivalent to a command for me to go to his house.”
I assured her that she might make her mind at ease, for whatever might be the custom with crowned heads, our Presidents were not wont to “command” the movements of strangers, and that she would be quite in time if she returned his call the next day. She did so, and was charmed with the unaffected bearing of the President, and the warm kindnesses expressed by his amiable wife and daughter, and consented to spend the evening with them in conformity with their request. She was accompanied to the “White House” by Messrs Benedict, Belletti and myself, and several happy hours were spent in the private circle of the President’s family.
Mr. Benedict, who engaged in a long quiet conversation with Mr. Fillmore, was highly pleased with the interview. A foreigner, accustomed to court etiquette, is generally surprised at the simplicity which characterizes the Chief Magistrate of this Union. In 1852 I called on the President with my friend the late Mr. Brettell, of London, who resided in St. James Palace, and was quite a worshipper of the Queen, and an ardent admirer of all the dignities and ceremonies of royalty. He expected something of the kind in visiting the President of the United States, and was highly pleased with his disappointment.
Both concerts in Washington were attended by the President and his family, and every member of the Cabinet. I noticed, also, among the audience, Henry Clay, Benton, Foote, Cass and General Scott, and nearly every member of Congress. On the following morning, Miss Lind was called upon by Mr. Webster, Mr. Clay, General Cass, and Colonel Benton, and all parties were evidently gratified. I had introduced Mr. Webster to her in Boston. Upon hearing one of her wild mountain songs in New York, and also in Washington, Mr. Webster signified his approval by rising, drawing himself up to his full height, and making a profound bow. Jenny was delighted by this expression of praise from the great statesman. When I first introduced Miss Lind to Mr. Webster, at the Revere House, in Boston, she was greatly impressed with his manners and conversation, and after his departure, walked up and down the room in great excitement, exclaiming: “Ah! Mr. Barnum, that is a man; I have never before seen such a man!”
We visited the Capitol while both Houses were in session. Miss Lind took the arm of Hon. C. F. Cleveland, representative from Connecticut, and was by him escorted into various parts of the Capitol and the grounds, with all of which she was much pleased.
While I was in Washington an odd reminiscence of my old show-days in the South came back to me in a curious way. Some years before, in 1836, my travelling show company had stopped at a hotel in Jackson, Mississippi, and, as the house was crowded, soon after I went to bed five or six men came into the room with cards and a candle and asked permission, as there was no other place, to sit down and play a quiet game of “brag.” I consented on condition that I might get up and participate, which was permitted and in a very little while, as I knew nothing whatever of the game, I lost fifty dollars. Good “hands” and good fortune soon enabled me to win back my money, at which point one of the players who had been introduced to me as “Lawyer Foote” said:
“Now the best thing you can do is to go back to bed; you don’t know anything about the game, and these fellows do, and they’ll skin you.”
I acted upon his advice. And now, years afterwards, when Senator Foote called upon Miss Lind the story came back to me, and while I was talking with him I remarked:
“Fifteen years ago, when I was in the South, I became acquainted with a lawyer named Foote, at Jackson, Mississippi.”
“It must have been me,” said the Senator, “I am the only ‘lawyer Foote, of Jackson, Mississippi.’”
“Oh! no, it could not have been you,” and I told him the story.
“It was me,” he whispered in my ear, and added, “I used to gamble like h--l in those days.”
During the week I was invited with Miss Lind and her immediate friends, to visit Mount Vernon, with Colonel Washington, the then proprietor, and Mr. Seaton, ex-Mayor of Washington, and Editor of the Intelligencer. Colonel Washington chartered a steamboat for the purpose. We were landed a short distance from the tomb, which we first visited. Proceeding to the house, we were introduced to Mrs. Washington, and several other ladies. Much interest was manifested by Miss Lind in examining the mementoes of the great man whose home it had been. A beautiful collation was spread out and arranged in fine taste. Before leaving, Mrs. Washington presented Jenny with a book from the library, with the name of Washington written by his own hand. She was much overcome at receiving this present, called me aside, and expressed her desire to give something in return. “I have nothing with me,” she said, “excepting this watch and chain, and I will give that if you think it will be acceptable.” I knew the watch was very valuable, and told her that so costly a present would not be expected, nor would it be proper. “The expense is nothing, compared to the value of that book,” she replied, with deep emotion; “but as the watch was a present from a dear friend, perhaps I should not give it away.” Jenny Lind, I am sure, never forgot the pleasurable emotions of that day.
At Richmond, half an hour previous to her departure, hundreds of young ladies and gentlemen had crowded into the halls of the house to secure a glimpse of her at parting. I informed her that she would find difficulty in passing out. “How long is it before we must start?” she asked. “Half an hour,” I replied. “Oh, I will clear the passages before that time,” said she, with a smile; whereupon she went into the upper hall, and informed the people that she wished to take the hands of every one of them, upon one condition, viz: they should pass by her in rotation, and as fast as they had shaken hands, proceed down stairs, and not block up the passages. They joyfully consented to the arrangement, and in fifteen minutes the course was clear. Poor Jenny had shaken hands with every person in the crowd, and I presume she had a feeling remembrance of the incident for an hour or two at least. She was waited on by many members of the Legislature while in Richmond, that body being in session while we were there.
The voyage from Wilmington to Charleston was an exceedingly rough and perilous one. We were about thirty-six hours in making the passage, the usual time being seventeen. There was really great danger of our steamer being swamped, and we were all apprehensive that we should never reach the Port of Charleston alive. Some of the passengers were in great terror. Jenny Lind exhibited more calmness upon this occasion than any other person, the crew excepted. We arrived safely at last, and I was grieved to learn that for twelve hours the loss of the steamer had been considered certain, and had even been announced by telegraph in the Northern cities.
We remained at Charleston about ten days, to take the steamer “Isabella” on her regular trip to Havana. Jenny had been through so much excitement at the North, that she determined to have quiet here, and therefore declined receiving any calls. This disappointed many ladies and gentlemen. One young lady, the daughter of a wealthy planter near Augusta, was so determined upon seeing her in private, that she paid one of the servants to allow her to put on a cap and white apron, and carry in the tray for Jenny’s tea. I afterwards told Miss Lind of the joke, and suggested that after such an evidence of admiration, she should receive a call from the young lady.
“It is not admiration--it is only curiosity,” replied Jenny, “and I will not encourage such folly.”
Christmas was at hand, and Jenny Lind determined to honor it in the way she had often done in Sweden. She had a beautiful Christmas tree privately prepared, and from its boughs depended a variety of presents for members of the company. These gifts were encased in paper, with the names of the recipients written on each.
After spending a pleasant evening in her drawing-room, she invited us into the parlor, where the “surprise” awaited us. Each person commenced opening the packages bearing his or her address, and although every individual had one or more pretty presents, she had prepared a joke for each. Mr. Benedict, for instance, took off wrapper after wrapper from one of his packages, which at first was as large as his head, but after having removed some forty coverings of paper, it was reduced to a size smaller than his hand, and the removal of the last envelope exposed to view a piece of cavendish tobacco. One of my presents, choicely wrapped in a dozen coverings, was a jolly young Bacchus in Parian marble, intended as a pleasant hit at my temperance principles!
The night before New Year’s day was spent in her apartment with great hilarity. Enlivened by music, singing, dancing and story-telling, the hours glided swiftly away. Miss Lind asked me if I would dance with her. I told her my education had been neglected in that line, and that I had never danced in my life, “That is all the better,” said she; “now dance with me in a cotillion. I am sure you can do it.” She was a beautiful dancer, and I never saw her laugh more heartily than she did at my awkwardness. She said she would give me the credit of being the poorest dancer she ever saw!
About a quarter before twelve, Jenny suddenly checked Mr. Burke,--formerly celebrated as the musical prodigy, “Master Burke,”--who was playing on the piano, by saying, “Pray let us have quiet; do you see, in fifteen minutes more, this year will be gone forever!”
She immediately took a seat, and rested her head upon her hand in silence. We all sat down, and for a quarter of an hour the most profound quiet reigned in the apartment. The remainder of the scene I transcribe from a description written the next day by Mrs. Lyman, who was present on the occasion:
“The clock of a neighboring church struck the knell of the dying year. All were silent--each heart was left to its own communings, and the bowed head and tearful eye told that memory was busy with the Past. It was a brief moment, but thoughts and feelings were crowded into it, which render it one never to be forgotten. A moment more--the last stroke of the clock had fallen upon the ear--the last faint vibration ceased; another period of time had passed forever away--a new one had dawned, in which each felt that they were to live and act. This thought recalled them to a full consciousness of the present, and all arose and quietly, but cordially, presented to each other the kind wishes of the season. As the lovely hostess pressed the hands of her guests, it was evident that she, too, had wept,--she, the gifted, the admired, the almost idolized one. Had she, too, cause for tears? Whence were they?--from the overflowings of a grateful heart, from tender associations, or from sad remembrances? None knew, none could ask, though they awakened deep and peculiar sympathy. And from one heart, at least, arose the prayer, that when the dial of time should mark the last hour of her earthly existence, she should greet its approach with joy and not with grief--that to her soul spirit-voices might whisper, ‘Come, sweet sister! come to the realms of unfading light and love--come, join your seraphic tones with ours, in singing the praises of Him who loved us, and gave himself for us’--while she, with meekly-folded hands and faith-uplifted eye, should answer, ‘Yes, gladly and without fear I come, for I know that my Redeemer liveth.’”
I had arranged with a man in New York to transport furniture to Havana, provide a house, and board Jenny Lind and our immediate party during our stay. When we arrived, we found the building converted into a semi-hotel, and the apartments were any thing but comfortable. Jenny was vexed. Soon after dinner, she took a volante and an interpreter, and drove into the suburbs. She was absent four hours. Whither or why she had gone, none of us knew. At length she returned and informed us that she had hired a commodious furnished house in a delightful location outside the walls of the city, and invited us all to go and live with her during our stay in Havana, and we accepted the invitation. She was now freed from all annoyances; her time was her own, she received no calls, went and came when she pleased, had no meddlesome advisers about her, legal or otherwise, and was as merry as a cricket. We had a large court-yard in the rear of the house, and here she would come and romp and run, sing and laugh, like a young school-girl. “Now, Mr. Barnum, for another game of ball,” she would say half a dozen times a day; whereupon, she would take an india-rubber ball, (of which she had two or three,) and commence a game of throwing and catching, which would be kept up until, being completely tired out, I would say, “I give it up.” Then her rich, musical laugh would be heard ringing through the house, as she exclaimed, “Oh, Mr. Barnum, you are too fat and too lazy; you cannot stand it to play ball with me!”
Her celebrated countrywoman, Miss Frederika Bremer, spent a few days with us very pleasantly, and it is difficult to conceive of a more delightful month than was passed by the entire party at Jenny Lind’s house in the outskirts of Havana.
XX. INCIDENTS OF THE TOUR
PROTEST AGAINST PRICES IN HAVANA--THE CUBANS SUCCUMB--JENNY LIND TAKES THE CITY BY STORM--A MAGNIFICENT TRIUMPH--COUNT PENALVER--A SPLENDID OFFER--MR. BRINCKERHOFF--BENEFIT FOR THE HOSPITALS--REFUSING TO RECEIVE THANKS--VIVALLA AND HIS DOG--HENRY BENNETT--HIS PARTIAL INSANITY--OUR VOYAGE TO NEW ORLEANS--THE EDITOR OF THE NEW YORK HERALD ON BOARD--I SAVE THE LIFE OF JAMES GORDON BENNETT--ARRIVAL AT THE CRESCENT CITY--CHEATING THE CROWD--A DUPLICATE MISS LIND--A BOY IN RAPTURES--A MAMMOTH HOG--UP THE MISSISSIPPI--AMUSEMENTS ON BOARD--IN LEAGUE WITH THE EVIL ONE--AN AMAZED MULATTO.
Soon after arriving in Havana, I discovered that a strong prejudice existed against our musical enterprise. I might rather say that the Habaneros, not accustomed to the high figure which tickets had commanded in the States, were determined on forcing me to adopt their opera prices, whereas I paid one thousand dollars per night for the Tacon Opera House, and other expenses being in proportion, I was determined to receive remunerating prices, or give no concerts. This determination on my part annoyed the Habaneros, who did not wish to be thought penurious, though they really were so. Their principal spite, therefore, was against me; and one of their papers politely termed me a “Yankee pirate,” who cared for nothing except their doubloons. They attended the concert, but were determined to show the great songstress no favor. I perfectly understood this feeling in advance, but studiously kept all knowledge of it from Miss Lind. I went to the first concert, therefore, with some misgivings in regard to her reception. The following, which I copy from the Havana correspondence of the New York Tribune, gives a correct account of it:
* * * * *
“Jenny Lind soon appeared, led on by Signor Belletti. Some three or four hundred persons clapped their hands at her appearance, but this token of approbation was instantly silenced by at least two thousand five hundred decided hisses. Thus, having settled the matter that there should be no forestalling of public opinion, and that if applause was given to Jenny Lind in that house it should first be incontestably earned, the most solemn silence prevailed. I have heard the Swedish Nightingale often in Europe as well as in America and have ever noticed a distinct tremulousness attending her first appearance in any city. Indeed this feeling was plainly manifested in her countenance as she neared the foot-lights; but when she witnessed the kind of reception in store for her--so different from anything she had reason to expect--her countenance changed in an instant to a haughty self-possession, her eye flashed defiance, and, becoming immovable as a statue, she stood there, perfectly calm and beautiful. She was satisfied that she now had an ordeal to pass and a victory to gain worthy of her powers. In a moment her eye scanned the immense audience, the music began and then followed--how can I describe it?--such heavenly strains as I verily believe mortal never breathed except Jenny Lind, and mortal never heard except from her lips. Some of the oldest Castilians kept a frown upon their brow and a curling sneer upon their lip; their ladies, however, and most of the audience began to look surprised. The gushing melody flowed on increasing in beauty and glory. The caballeros, the senoras and senoritas began to look at each other; nearly all, however, kept their teeth clenched and their lips closed, evidently determined to resist to the last. The torrent flowed deeper and faster, the lark flew higher and higher, the melody grew richer and grander; still every lip was compressed. By and by, as the rich notes came dashing in rivers upon our enraptured ears, one poor critic involuntarily whispered a ‘brava.’ This outbursting of the soul was instantly hissed down. The stream of harmony rolled on till, at the close, it made a clean sweep of every obstacle, and carried all before it. Not a vestige of opposition remained, but such a tremendous shout of applause as went up I never before heard.
“The triumph was most complete. And how was Jenny Lind affected? She who stood a few moments previous like adamant, now trembled like a reed in the wind before the storm of enthusiasm which her own simple notes had produced. Tremblingly, slowly, and almost bowing her face to the ground, she withdrew. The roar and applause of victory increased. ‘Encore! encore! encore!’ came from every lip. She again appeared, and, courtesying low, again withdrew, but again, again, and again did they call her out and at every appearance the thunders of applause rang louder and louder. Thus five times was Jenny Lind called out to receive their unanimous and deafening plaudits.”
I cannot express what my feelings were as I watched this scene from the dress circle. Poor Jenny! I deeply sympathized with her when I heard that first hiss. I indeed observed the resolute bearing which she assumed, but was apprehensive of the result. When I witnessed her triumph, I could not restrain the tears of joy that rolled down my cheeks; and rushing through a private box, I reached the stage just as she was withdrawing after the fifth encore. “God bless you, Jenny, you have settled them!” I exclaimed.
“Are you satisfied?” said she, throwing her arms around my neck. She, too, was crying with joy, and never before did she look so beautiful in my eyes as on that evening.
One of the Havana papers, notwithstanding the great triumph, continued to cry out for low prices. This induced many to absent themselves, expecting soon to see a reduction. It had been understood that we would give twelve concerts in Havana; but when they saw, after the fourth concert, which was devoted to charity, that no more were announced, they became uneasy. Committees waited upon us requesting more concerts, but we peremptorily declined. Some of the leading Dons, among whom was Count Penalver, then offered to guarantee us $25,000 for three concerts. My reply was, that there was not money enough on the island of Cuba to induce me to consent to it. That settled the matter, and gave us a pleasant opportunity for recreation.
We visited, by invitation, Mr. Brinckerhoff, the eminent American merchant at Matanzas, whom I had met at the same place three years previously, and who subsequently had visited my family in Connecticut. The gentlemanly host did everything in his power to render our stay agreeable; and Miss Lind was so delighted with his attentions and the interesting details of sugar and coffee plantations which we visited through his kindness, that as soon as she returned to Havana, she sent on the same tour of pleasure Mr. Benedict, who had been prevented by illness from accompanying us.
I found my little Italian plate-dancer, Vivalla, in Havana. He called on me frequently. He was in great distress, having lost the use of his limbs on the left side of his body by paralysis. He was thus unable to earn a livelihood, although he still kept a performing dog, which turned a spinning-wheel and performed some curious tricks. One day, as I was passing him out of the front gate, Miss Lind inquired who he was. I briefly recounted to her his history. She expressed deep interest in his case, and said something should be set apart for him in the benefit which she was about to give for charity. Accordingly, when the benefit came off, Miss Lind appropriated $500 to him, and I made the necessary arrangements for his return to his friends in Italy. At the same benefit $4,000 were distributed between two hospitals and a convent.
A few mornings after the benefit our bell was rung, and the servant announced that I was wanted. I went to the door and found a large procession of children, neatly dressed and bearing banners, attended by ten or twelve priests, arrayed in their rich and flowing robes. I inquired their business, and was informed that they had come to see Miss Lind, to thank her in person for her benevolence. I took their message, and informed Miss Lind that the leading priests of the convent had come in great state to see and thank her. “I will not see them,” she replied; “they have nothing to thank me for. If I have done good, it is no more than my duty, and it is my pleasure. I do not deserve their thanks, and I will not see them.” I returned her answer, and the leaders of the grand procession went away in disappointment.
The same day Vivalla called, and brought her a basket of the most luscious fruit that he could procure. The little fellow was very happy and extremely grateful. Miss Lind had gone out for a ride.
“God bless her! I am so happy; she is such a good lady. I shall see my brothers and sisters again. Oh, she is a very good lady,” said poor Vivalla, overcome by his feelings. He begged me to thank her for him, and give her the fruit. As he was passing out of the door, he hesitated a moment, and then said, “Mr. Barnum, I should like so much to have the good lady see my dog turn a wheel; it is very nice; he can spin very good. Shall I bring the dog and wheel for her? She is such a good lady, I wish to please her very much.” I smiled, and told him she would not care for the dog; that he was quite welcome to the money, and that she refused to see the priests from the convent that morning, because she never received thanks for favors.
When Jenny came in I gave her the fruit, and laughingly told her that Vivalla wished to show her how his performing dog could turn a spinning-wheel.
“Poor man, poor man, do let him come; it is all the good creature can do for me,” exclaimed Jenny, and the tears flowed thick and fast down her cheeks. “I like that, I like that,” she continued; “do let the poor creature come and bring his dog. It will make him so happy.”
I confess it made me happy, and I exclaimed, for my heart was full, “God bless you, it will make him cry for joy; he shall come to-morrow.”
I saw Vivalla the same evening, and delighted him with the intelligence that Jenny would see his dog perform the next day, at four o’clock precisely.
“I will be punctual,” said Vivalla, in a voice trembling with emotion; “but I was sure she would like to see my dog perform.”
For full half an hour before the time appointed did Jenny Lind sit in her window on the second floor and watch for Vivalla and his dog. A few minutes before the appointed hour, she saw him coming. “Ah, here he comes! here he comes!” she exclaimed in delight, as she ran down stairs and opened the door to admit him. A negro boy was bringing the small spinning-wheel, while Vivalla led the dog. Handing the boy a silver coin, she motioned him away, and taking the wheel in her arms, she said, “This is very kind of you to come with your dog. Follow me. I will carry the wheel up stairs.” Her servant offered to take the wheel, but no, she would let no one carry it but herself. She called us all up to her parlor, and for one full hour did she devote herself to the happy Italian. She went down on her knees to pet the dog and to ask Vivalla all sorts of questions about his performances, his former course of life, his friends in Italy, and his present hopes and determinations. Then she sang and played for him, gave him some refreshments, finally insisted on carrying his wheel to the door, and her servant accompanied Vivalla to his boarding-house.
Poor Vivalla! He was probably never so happy before, but his enjoyment did not exceed that of Miss Lind. That scene alone would have paid me for all my labors during the entire musical campaign. A few months later, however, the Havana correspondent of the New York Herald announced the death of Vivalla and stated that the poor Italian’s last words were about Jenny Lind and Mr. Barnum.
When Captain Rawlings, of the Steamer “Isabella” made his next return trip from Charleston, he brought a fine lot of game and invited Messrs. Benedict, Belletti and myself to a breakfast on board, where we met Mr. John Howard, of the Irving House, New York, Mr. J. B. Monnot, of the New York Hotel, Mr. Mixer, of the Charleston Hotel, and Mr. Monroe of one of the Havana hotels. The breakfast was a very nice one, and was accompanied by some “very fine old Madeira,” which received the highest encomiums of the company.
“Now,” said Captain Rawlings, “you must break your rule once, Mr. Barnum, and wash down your game with a glass or two of this choice Madeira. It is very old and fine, as smooth as oil, and the game is hardly game without it. Do take some.”
I positively declined, saying I did not doubt that he had the genuine article for once, but that most of what was offered and sold as wine did not contain a single drop of the juice of the grape. This led to a general talk about the impositions practised, even in the best hotels, in serving customers with “fine old wines and liquors” at the bar and at the table, and some very curious and amusing stories were told and confessions made. But there could be no mistake about this Madeira; it was rich, rare, old, oily, and genuine in flavor and quality; all the connoisseurs at the table were unanimous in their verdict.
But when the breakfast was over and we were going ashore, as I was sitting next the captain in his own boat, he said to me:
“Barnum, that fine old Madeira is the real ‘game’ of my game breakfast; I wanted to test those experienced tasters, and I gave them some wine which I bought for a dollar and a half a gallon at a corner grocery in Charleston.”
In the party which accompanied me to Havana, was Mr. Henry Bennett, who formerly kept Peale’s Museum in New York, afterwards managing the same establishment for me when I purchased it, and he was now with me in the capacity of a ticket-taker. He was as honest a man as ever lived, and a good deal of a wag. I remember his going through the market once and running across a decayed actor who was reduced to tending a market stand; Bennett hailed him with “Hallo! what are you doing here; what are you keeping that old turkey for?”
“O! for a profit,” replied the actor.
“Prophet, prophet!” exclaimed Bennett, “patriarch, you mean!”
With all his waggery he was subject at times to moods of the deepest despondency, bordering on insanity. Madness ran in his family. His brother, in a fit of frenzy, had blown his brains out. Henry himself had twice attempted his own life while in my employ in New York. Some time after our present journey to Havana, I sent him to London. He conducted my business precisely as I directed, writing up his account with me correctly to a penny. Then handing it to a mutual friend with directions to give it to me when I arrived in London the following week, he went to his lodgings and committed suicide.
While we were in Havana, Bennett was so despondent at times that we were obliged to watch him carefully, lest he should do some damage to himself or others. When we left Havana for New Orleans, on board the steamer “Falcon,” Mr. James Gordon Bennett, editor of the New York Herald, and his wife were also passengers. After permitting one favorable notice in his paper, Bennett had turned around, as usual, and had abused Jenny Lind and bitterly attacked me. There was an estrangement, no new thing, between the editor and myself. The Herald, in its desire to excite attention, has a habit of attacking public men and I had not escaped. I was always glad to get such notices, for they served as inexpensive advertisements to my Museum, and brought custom to me free of charge.
Ticket-taker Bennett, however, took much to heart the attacks of Editor Bennett upon Jenny Lind, and while in New York he threatened to cowhide his namesake, as so many men have actually done in days gone by, but I restrained him. When Editor Bennett came on board the “Falcon,” he had in his arms a small pet monkey belonging to his wife, and the animal was placed in a safe place on the forward deck. When Henry Bennett saw the editor he said to a bystander:
“I would willingly be drowned if I could see that old scoundrel go to the bottom of the sea.”
Several of our party overheard the remark and I turned laughingly to Bennett and said: “Nonsense; he can’t harm any one and there is an old proverb about the impossibility of drowning those who are born to another fate.”
That very night, however, as I stood near the cabin door, conversing with my treasurer and other members of my company, Henry Bennett came up to me with a wild air, and hoarsely whispered:
“Old Bennett has gone forward alone in the dark to feed his monkey, and d--n him, I am going to throw him overboard.”
We were all startled, for we knew the man and he seemed terribly in earnest. Knowing how most effectively to address him at such times, I exclaimed.
“Ridiculous! you would not do such a thing.”
“I swear I will,” was his savage reply. I expostulated with him, and several of our party joined me.
“Nobody will know it,” muttered the maniac, “and I shall be doing the world a favor.”
I endeavored to awaken him to a sense of the crime he contemplated, assuring him that it could not possibly benefit any one, and that from the fact of the relations existing between the editor and myself, I should be the first to be accused of his murder. I implored him to go to his stateroom, and he finally did so, accompanied by some of the gentlemen of our party. I took pains to see that he was carefully watched that night, and, indeed, for several days, till he became calm again. He was a large, athletic man, quite able to pick up his namesake and drop him overboard. The matter was too serious for a joke, and we made little mention of it; but more than one of my party said then, and has said since, what I really believe to be true, that “James Gordon Bennett would have been drowned that night had it not been for P. T. Barnum.”
This incident has long been known to several of my intimate friends, and when Mr. Bennett learns the fact from this volume, he may possibly be somewhat mollified over his payment to me, fifteen years later, of $200,000 for the unexpired lease of my Museum, concerning which some particulars will be given anon.
In New Orleans the wharf was crowded by a great concourse of persons, as the steamer “Falcon” approached. Jenny Lind had enjoyed a month of quiet, and dreaded the excitement which she must now again encounter.
“Mr. Barnum, I am sure I can never get through that crowd,” said she, in despair.
“Leave that to me. Remain quiet for ten minutes, and there shall be no crowd here,” I replied.
Taking my daughter on my arm, she threw her veil over her face, and we descended the gangway to the dock. The crowd pressed around. I had beckoned for a carriage before leaving the ship.
“That’s Barnum, I know him,” called out several persons at the top of their voices.
“Open the way, if you please, for Mr. Barnum and Miss Lind!” cried Le Grand Smith over the railing of the ship, the deck of which he had just reached from the wharf.
“Don’t crowd her, if you please, gentlemen,” I exclaimed, and by dint of pushing, squeezing and coaxing, we reached the carriage, and drove for the Montalba buildings, where Miss Lind’s apartments had been prepared, and the whole crowd came following at our heels. In a few minutes afterwards, Jenny and her companion came quietly in a carriage, and were in the house before the ruse was discovered. In answer to incessant calls, she appeared a moment upon the balcony, waved her handkerchief, received three hearty cheers, and the crowd dispersed.
A poor blind boy, residing in the interior of Mississippi, a flute-player, and an ardent lover of music, visited New Orleans expressly to hear Jenny Lind. A subscription had been taken up among his neighbors to defray the expenses. This fact coming to the ears of Jenny, she sent for him, played and sang for him, gave him many words of joy and comfort, took him to her concerts, and sent him away considerably richer than he had ever been before.
A funny incident occurred at New Orleans. Our concerts were given in the St. Charles Theatre, then managed by my good friend, the late Sol. Smith. In the open lots near the theatre were exhibitions of mammoth hogs, five-footed horses, grizzly bears, and other animals.
A gentleman had a son about twelve years old, who had a wonderful ear for music. He could whistle or sing any tune after hearing it once. His father did not know nor care for a single note, but so anxious was he to please his son, that he paid thirty dollars for two tickets to the concert.
“I liked the music better than I expected,” said he to me the next day, “but my son was in raptures. He was so perfectly enchanted that he scarcely spoke the whole evening and I would on no account disturb his delightful reveries. When the concert was finished we came out of the theatre. Not a word was spoken. I knew that my musical prodigy was happy among the clouds, and I said nothing. I could not help envying him his love of music, and considered my thirty dollars as nothing, compared to the bliss which it secured to him. Indeed, I was seriously thinking of taking him to the next concert, when he spoke. We were just passing the numerous shows upon the vacant lots. One of the signs attracted him, and he said, ‘Father, let us go in and see the big hog!’ The little scamp! I could have horse-whipped him!” said the father, who, loving a joke, could not help laughing at the ludicrous incident.
Some months afterwards, I was relating this story at my own table to several guests, among whom was a very matter-of-fact man who had not the faintest conception of humor. After the whole party had laughed heartily at the anecdote, my matter-of-fact friend gravely asked:
“And was it a very large hog, Mr. Barnum?”
I made arrangements with the captain of the splendid steamer “Magnolia,” of Louisville, to take our party as far as Cairo, the junction of the Mississippi and Ohio rivers, stipulating for sufficient delay in Natchez, Mississippi, and in Memphis, Tennessee, to give a concert in each place. It was no unusual thing for me to charter a steamboat or a special train of cars for our party. With such an enterprise as that, time and comfort were paramount to money.
The time on board the steamer was whiled away in reading, viewing the scenery of the Mississippi, and other diversions. One day we had a pleasant musical festival in the ladies’ saloon for the gratification of the passengers, at which Jenny volunteered to sing without ceremony. It seemed to us she never sang so sweetly before. I also did my best to amuse my fellow passengers with anecdotes and the exhibition of sundry legerdemain tricks which I had been obliged to learn and use in the South years before and under far different circumstances than those which attended the performance now. Among other tricks, I caused a quarter of a dollar to disappear so mysteriously from beneath a card, that the mulatto barber on board came to the conclusion that I was in league with the devil.
The next morning I seated myself for the operation of shaving, and the colored gentleman ventured to dip into the mystery. “Beg pardon, Mr. Barnum, but I have heard a great deal about you, and I saw more than I wanted to see last night. Is it true that you have sold yourself to the devil, so that you can do what you’ve a mind to?”
“Oh, yes,” was my reply, “that is the bargain between us.”
“How long did you agree for?” was the question next in order.
“Only nine years,” said I. “I have had three of them already. Before the other six are out, I shall find a way to nonplus the old gentleman, and I have told him so to his face.”
At this avowal, a larger space of white than usual was seen in the darkey’s eyes, and he inquired, “Is it by this bargain that you get so much money?”
“Certainly. No matter who has money, nor where he keeps it, in his box or till, or anywhere about him, I have only to speak the words, and it comes.”
The shaving was completed in silence, but thought had been busy in the barber’s mind, and he embraced the speediest opportunity to transfer his bag of coin to the iron safe in charge of the clerk.
The movement did not escape me, and immediately a joke was afoot. I had barely time to make two or three details of arrangement with the clerk, and resume my seat in the cabin, ere the barber sought a second interview, bent on testing the alleged powers of Beelzebub’s colleague.
“Beg pardon, Mr. Barnum, but where is my money? Can you get it?”
“I do not want your money,” was the quiet answer. “It is safe.”
“Yes, I know it is safe--ha! ha!--it is in the iron safe in the clerk’s office--safe enough from you!”
“It is not in the iron safe!” said I. This was said so quietly, yet positively, that the colored gentleman ran to the office, and inquired if all was safe. “All right,” said the clerk. “Open, and let me see,” replied the barber. The safe was unlocked and lo! the money was gone!
In mystified terror the loser applied to me for relief. “You will find the bag in your drawer,” said I, and there it was found!
Of course, I had a confederate, but the mystification of that mulatto was immense.
XXI. JENNY LIND
ARRIVAL AT ST. LOUIS--SURPRISING PROPOSITION OF MISS LIND’S SECRETARY--HOW THE MANAGER MANAGED--READINESS TO CANCEL THE CONTRACT--CONSULTATION WITH “UNCLE SOL.”--BARNUM NOT TO BE HIRED--A “JOKE”--TEMPERANCE LECTURE IN THE THEATRE--SOL. SMITH--A COMEDIAN, AUTHOR, AND LAWYER--UNIQUE DEDICATION--JENNY LIND’S CHARACTER AND CHARITIES--SHARP WORDS FROM THE WEST--SELFISH ADVISERS--MISS LIND’S GENEROUS IMPULSES--HER SIMPLE AND CHILDLIKE CHARACTER--CONFESSIONS OF A MANAGER--PRIVATE REPUTATION AND PUBLIC RENOWN--CHARACTER AS A STOCK IN TRADE--LE GRAND SMITH--MR. DOLBY--THE ANGELIC SIDE KEPT OUTSIDE--MY OWN SHARE IN THE PUBLIC BENEFITS--JUSTICE TO MISS LIND AND MYSELF.
According to agreement, the “Magnolia” waited for us at Natchez and Memphis, and we gave profitable concerts at both places. The concert at Memphis was the sixtieth in the list since Miss Lind’s arrival in America, and the first concert in St. Louis would be the sixty-first. When we reached that city, on the morning of the day when our first concert was to be given, Miss Lind’s secretary came to me, commissioned, he said, by her, and announced that as sixty concerts had already taken place, she proposed to avail herself of one of the conditions of our contract, and cancel the engagement next morning. As this was the first intimation of the kind I had received, I was somewhat startled, though I assumed an entirely placid demeanor, and asked:
“Does Miss Lind authorize you to give me this notice?”
“I so understand it,” was the reply.
I immediately reflected that if our contract was thus suddenly cancelled, Miss Lind was bound to repay to me all I had paid her over the stipulated $1,000 for each concert, and a little calculation showed that the sum thus to be paid back was $77,000, since she had already received from me $137,000 for sixty concerts. In this view, I could not but think that this was a ruse of some of her advisers, and, possibly, that she might know nothing of the matter. So I told her secretary that I would see him again in an hour, and meanwhile I went to my old friend Mr. Sol. Smith for his legal and friendly advice.
I showed him my contract and told him how much I had been annoyed by the selfish and greedy hangers-on and advisers, legal and otherwise, of Jenny Lind. I talked to him about the “wheels within wheels” which moved this great musical enterprise, and asked and gladly accepted his advice, which mainly coincided with my own views of the situation. I then went back to the secretary and quietly told him that I was ready to settle with Miss Lind and to close the engagement.
“But,” said he, manifestly “taken aback,” “you have already advertised concerts in Louisville and Cincinnati, I believe.”
“Yes,” I replied; “but you may take my contracts for halls and printing off my hands at cost.” I further said that he was welcome to the assistance of my agent who had made these arrangements, and, moreover, that I would cheerfully give my own services to help them through with these concerts, thus giving them a good start “on their own hook.”
My liberality, which he acknowledged, emboldened him to make an extraordinary proposition:
“Now suppose,” he asked, “Miss Lind should wish to give some fifty concerts in this country, what would you charge as manager, per concert?”
“A million dollars each, not one cent less,” I replied. I was now thoroughly aroused; the whole thing was as clear as daylight, and I continued:
“Now we might as well understand each other; I don’t believe Miss Lind has authorized you to propose to me to cancel our contract; but if she has, just bring me a line to that effect over her signature and her check for the amount due me by the terms of that contract, some $77,000, and we will close our business connections at once.”
“But why not make a new arrangement,” persisted the Secretary, “for fifty concerts more, by which Miss Lind shall pay you liberally, say $1,000 per concert?”
“Simply because I hired Miss Lind, and not she me,” I replied, “and because I never ought to take a farthing less for my risk and trouble than the contract gives me. I have voluntarily paid Miss Lind more than twice as much as I originally contracted to pay her, or as she expected to receive when she first engaged with me. Now, if she is not satisfied, I wish to settle instantly and finally. If you do not bring me her decision to-day, I shall go to her for it to-morrow morning.”
I met the secretary soon after breakfast next morning and asked him if he had a written communication for me from Miss Lind? He said he had not and that the whole thing was a “joke.” He merely wanted, he added, to see what I would say to the proposition. I asked him if Miss Lind was in the “joke,” as he called it? He hoped I would not inquire, but would let the matter drop. I went on, as usual, and gave four more concerts in St. Louis, and followed out my programme as arranged in other cities for many weeks following; nor at that time, nor at any time afterwards, did Miss Lind give me the slightest intimation that she had any knowledge of the proposition of her secretary to cancel our agreement or to employ me as her manager.
During our stay at St. Louis, I delivered a temperance lecture in the theatre, and at the close, among other signers, of the pledge, was my friend and adviser, Sol. Smith. “Uncle Sol,” as every one called him, was a famous character in his time. He was an excellent comedian, an author, a manager and a lawyer. For a considerable period of his life, he was largely concerned in theatricals in St. Louis, New Orleans and other cities, and acquired a handsome property. He died at a ripe old age, in 1869, respected and lamented by all who knew him. I esteem it an honor to have been one of his intimate friends.
A year or two before he died, he published a very interesting volume, giving a full account of the leading incidents in his long and varied career as an actor and manager. He had previously, in 1854, published an autobiographical work, comprising an account of the “second seven years of his professional life,” together with sketches of adventure in after years, and entitled “The Theatrical Journey-Work and Anecdotical Recollections of Sol. Smith, Comedian, Attorney at Law,” etc. This unique work was preceded by a dedication which I venture to copy. It was as follows:
“TO PHINEAS T. BARNUM, PROPRIETOR OF THE AMERICAN MUSEUM, ETC.
“Great Impressario: Whilst you were engaged in your grand Jenny Lind speculation, the following conundrum went the rounds of the American newspapers:
“‘Why is it that Jenny Lind and Barnum will never fall out?’ Answer: ‘Because he is always for-getting, and she is always for-giving.’
“I have never asked you the question directly, whether you, Mr. Barnum, started that conundrum, or not; but I strongly suspect that you did. At all events, I noticed that your whole policy was concentrated into one idea--to make an angel of Jenny, and depreciate yourself in contrast.
“You may remember that in this city (St. Louis), I acted in one instance as your ‘legal adviser,’ and as such, necessarily became acquainted with all the particulars of your contract with the so-called Swedish Nightingale, as well as the various modifications claimed by that charitable lady, and submitted to by you after her arrival in this country; which modifications (I suppose it need no longer be a secret) secured to her--besides the original stipulation of one thousand dollars for every concert, attendants, carriages, assistant artists, and a pompous and extravagant retinue, fit (only) for a European princess--one half of the profits of each performance. You may also remember the legal advice I gave you on the occasion referred to, and the salutary effect of your following it. You must remember the extravagant joy you felt afterwards, in Philadelphia, when the ‘Angel’ made up her mind to avail herself of one of the stipulations in her contract, to break off at the end of a hundred nights, and even bought out seven of that hundred--supposing that she could go on without your aid as well as with it. And you cannot but remember, how, like a rocket-stick she dropped, when your business connection with her ended, and how she ‘fizzed out’ the remainder of her concert nights in this part of the world, and soon afterwards retired to her domestic blissitude in Sweden.
“You know, Mr. Barnum, if you would only tell, which of the two it was that was ‘for-getting,’ and which ‘for-giving’; and you also know who actually gave the larger portion of those sums which you heralded to the world as the sole gifts of the ‘divine Jenny.’
“Of all your speculations--from the negro centenarina, who didn’t nurse General Washington, down to the Bearded Woman of Genoa--there was not one which required the exercise of so much humbuggery as the Jenny Lind concerts; and I verily believe there is no man living, other than yourself, who could, or would, have risked the enormous expenditure of money necessary to carry them through successfully--travelling, with sixty artists, four thousand miles, and giving ninety-three concerts, at an actual cost of forty-five hundred dollars each, is what no other man would have undertaken--you accomplished this, and pocketed by the operation but little less than two hundred thousand dollars! Mr. Barnum, you are yourself, alone!
“I honor you, oh! Great Impressario, as the most successful manager in America or any other country. Democrat, as you are, you can give a practical lesson to the aristocrats of Europe how to live. At your beautiful and tasteful residence, ‘Iranistan’ (I don’t like the name, though,) you can and do entertain your friends with a warmth of hospitality, only equalled by that of the great landed proprietors of the old country, or of our own ‘sunny South.’ Whilst riches are pouring into your coffers from your various ‘ventures’ in all parts of the world, you do not hoard your immense means, but continually ‘cast them forth upon the waters,’ rewarding labor, encouraging the arts, and lending a helping hand to industry in all its branches. Not content with doing all this, you deal telling blows, whenever opportunity offers, upon the monster Intemperance. Your labors in this great cause alone, should entitle you to the thanks of all good men, women and children in the land. Mr. Barnum, you deserve all your good fortune, and I hope you may long live to enjoy your wealth and honor.
“As a small instalment towards the debt, I, as one of the community, owe you, and with the hope of affording you an hour’s amusement (if you can spare that amount of time from your numerous avocations to read it), I present you with this little volume, containing a very brief account of some of my ‘journey-work’ in the south and west; and remain, very respectfully,
“Your friend, and affectionate uncle,
“SOL. SMITH.
HANG “CHOUTEAU AVENUE, ST. LOUIS, “Nov. 1, 1854.”
“Uncle” Sol. Smith must be held solely responsible for his extravagant estimate of P. T. Barnum, and for his somewhat deprecatory view of the attributes of the “divine Jenny.” It is true that he derived many of his impressions of Miss Lind from the annoying circumstances that compelled me to seek his professional advice and assistance in St. Louis, when Jenny Lind’s secretary came to me with an assumed authorization from her to abruptly close our engagement. But when Sol. Smith’s dedication was first published, there were plenty of people and papers throughout the land that were eager to catch up and indorse this new view of Miss Lind’s character. The Athenians were sometimes sick, no doubt, of hearing Aristides always called “the Just.” Yet, some of the sharp things which Sol. Smith means to say about Miss Lind, apply rather to the selfish persons who, unfortunately, were more in her confidence than I ever aspired to be, and who assumed to advise her and thus easily perverted her better judgment.
With all her excellent and even extraordinarily good qualities, however, Jenny Lind was human, though the reputation she bore in Europe for her many charitable acts led me to believe, till I knew her, that she was nearly perfect. I think now that her natural impulses were more simple, childlike, pure and generous than those of almost any other person I ever met. But she had been petted, almost worshipped, so long, that it would have been strange indeed if her unbounded popularity had not in some degree affected her to her hurt, and it must not be thought extraordinary if she now and then exhibited some phase of human weakness.
Like most persons of uncommon talent, she had a strong will which, at times, she found ungovernable; but if she was ever betrayed into a display of ill-temper she was sure to apologize and express her regret afterwards. Le Grand Smith, who was quite intimate with her, and who was my right-hand man during the entire Lind engagement, used sometimes to say to me:
“Well, Mr. Barnum, you have managed wonderfully in always keeping Jenny’s ‘angel’ side outside with the public.”
More than one Englishman--I may instance Mr. Dolby, Mr. Dickens’s agent during his last visit to America--expressed surprise at the confirmed impression of “perfection” entertained by the general American public in regard to the Swedish Nightingale. These things are written with none but the kindest feelings towards the sweet songstress, and only to modify the too current ideas of superhuman excellence which cannot be characteristic of any mortal being.
As I have before intimated in giving details of my management of the enterprise, believing, as I did when I engaged her, in her “angelic” reputation, I am frank enough to confess that I considered her private character a valuable adjunct, even in a business point of view, to her renown as a singer. I admit that I took her charities into account as part of my “stock in trade.” Whenever she sang for a public or private charity, she gave her voice, which was worth a thousand dollars to her every evening. At such times, I always insisted upon paying for the hall, orchestra, printing, and other expenses, because I felt able and willing to contribute my full share towards the worthy objects which prompted these benefits.
This narration would be incomplete if I did not add the following:
We were in Havana when I showed to Miss Lind a paper containing the conundrum on “for-getting” and “for-giving,” at which she laughed heartily, but immediately checked herself and said:
“O! Mr. Barnum, this is not fair; you know that you really give more than I do from the proceeds of every one of these charity concerts.”
And it is but just to her to say that she frequently remonstrated with me and declared that the actual expenses should be deducted and the thus lessened sum devoted to the charity for which the concert might be given; but I always laughingly told her that I must do my part, give my share, and that if it was purely a business operation, “bread cast upon the waters,” it would return, perhaps, buttered; for the larger her reputation for liberality, the more liberal the public would surely be to us and to our enterprise.
I have no wish to conceal these facts; and I certainly have no desire to receive a larger meed of praise than my qualified generosity merits. Justice to myself and to my management, as well as to Miss Lind, seems to permit, if not to demand, this explanation.
XXII. CLOSE OF THE CAMPAIGN
PENITENT TICKET PURCHASERS--VISIT TO THE “HERMITAGE”--“APRIL FOOL” FUN--THE MAMMOTH CAVE--SIGNOR SALVI--GEORGE D. PRENTICE--PERFORMANCE IN A PORK HOUSE--RUSE AT CINCINNATI--ANNOYANCES AT PITTSBURG--LE GRAND SMITH’S GRAND JOKE--RETURN TO NEW YORK--THE FINAL CONCERTS IN CASTLE GARDEN AND METROPOLITAN HALL--THE ADVISERS APPEAR--THE NINETY-THIRD CONCERT--MY OFFER TO CLOSE THE ENGAGEMENT--MISS LIND’S LETTER ACCEPTING MY PROPOSITION--STORY ABOUT AN “IMPROPER PLACE”--JENNY’S CONCERTS ON HER OWN ACCOUNT--HER MARRIAGE TO MR. OTTO GOLDSCHMIDT--CORDIAL RELATIONS BETWEEN MRS. LIND GOLDSCHMIDT AND MYSELF--AT HOME AGAIN--STATEMENT OF THE TOTAL RECEIPTS OF THE CONCERTS.
After five concerts in St. Louis, we went to Nashville, Tennessee, where we gave our sixty-sixth and sixty-seventh concerts in this country. At the first ticket auction in that city, the excitement was considerable and the bidding spirited, as was generally the case. After the auction was over, one of my men, happening in at a dry-goods store in the town, heard the proprietor say, “I’ll give five dollars to any man who will take me out and give me a good horse-whipping! I deserve it, and am willing to pay for having it done. To think that I should have been such a fool as to have paid forty-eight dollars for four tickets for my wife, two daughters, and myself, to listen to music for only two hours, makes me mad with myself, and I want to pay somebody for giving me a thundering good horse-whipping!” I am not sure that others have not experienced a somewhat similar feeling, when they became cool and rational, and the excitement of novelty and competition had passed away.
While at Nashville, Jenny Lind, accompanied by my daughter, Mrs. Lyman, and myself, visited “the Hermitage,” the late residence of General Jackson. On that occasion, for the first time that season, we heard the wild mocking-birds singing in the trees. This gave Jenny Lind great delight, as she had never before heard them sing except in their wire-bound cages.
The first of April occurred while we were in Nashville. I was considerably annoyed during the forenoon by the calls of members of the company who came to me under the belief that I had sent for them. After dinner I concluded to give them all a touch of “April fool.” The following article, which appeared the next morning in the Nashville Daily American, my amanuensis having imparted the secret to the editor, will show how it was done:
“A series of laughable jokes came off yesterday at the Veranda in honor of All Fools’ Day. Mr. Barnum was at the bottom of the mischief. He managed in some mysterious manner to obtain a lot of blank telegraphic despatches and envelopes from one of the offices in this city, and then went to work and manufactured ‘astounding intelligence’ for most of the parties composing the Jenny Lind suite. Almost every person in the company received a telegraphic despatch written under the direction of Barnum. Mr. Barnum’s daughter was informed that her mother, her cousin, and several other relatives were waiting for her in Louisville, and various other important and extraordinary items of domestic intelligence were communicated to her. Mr. Le Grand Smith was told by a despatch from his father that his native village in Connecticut was in ashes, including his own homestead, etc. Several of Barnum’s employees had most liberal offers of engagements from banks and other institutions at the North. Burke, and others of the musical professors, were offered princely salaries by opera managers, and many of them received most tempting inducements to proceed immediately to the World’s Fair in London.
“One married gentleman in Mr. Barnum’s suite received the gratifying intelligence that he had for two days been the father of a pair of bouncing boys (mother and children doing well), an event which he had been anxiously looking for during the week, though on a somewhat more limited scale. In fact, nearly every person in the party engaged by Barnum received some extraordinary telegraphic intelligence, and as the great impressario managed to have the despatches delivered simultaneously, each recipient was for some time busily occupied with his own personal news.
“By and by each began to tell his neighbor his good or bad tidings; and each was, of course, rejoiced or grieved according to circumstances. Several gave Mr. Barnum notice of their intention to leave him, in consequence of better offers; and a number of them sent off telegraphic despatches and letters by mail, in answer to those received.
“The man who had so suddenly become the father of twins, telegraphed to his wife to ‘be of good cheer,’ and that he would ‘start for home to-morrow.’ At a late hour last night the secret had not got out, and we presume that many of the victims will first learn from our columns that they have been taken in by BARNUM and All Fools’ Day!”
From Nashville, Jenny Lind and a few friends went by way of the Mammoth Cave to Louisville, while the rest of the party proceeded by steamboat.
While in Havana, I engaged Signor Salvi for a few months, to begin about the 10th of April. He joined us at Louisville, and sang in the three concerts there, with great satisfaction to the public. Mr. George D. Prentice, of the Louisville Journal, and his beautiful and accomplished lady, who had contributed much to the pleasure of Miss Lind and our party, accompanied us to Cincinnati.
A citizen of Madison had applied to me on our first arrival in Louisville, for a concert in that place. I replied that the town was too small to afford it, whereupon he offered to take the management of it into his own hands, and pay me $5,000 for the receipts. The last concert at Louisville, and the concerts at Natchez and Wheeling were given under a similar agreement, though with better pecuniary results than at Madison. As the steamer from Louisville to Cincinnati would arrive at Madison about sundown, and would wait long enough for us to give a concert, I agreed to his proposition.
We were not a little surprised to learn upon arriving, that the concert must be given in a “pork house”--a capacious shed which had been fitted up and decorated for the occasion. We concluded, however, that if the inhabitants were satisfied with the accommodations, we ought not to object. The person who had contracted for the concert came $1,300 short of his agreement, which I consequently lost, and at ten o’clock we were again on board the fine steamer “Ben Franklin” bound for Cincinnati.
The next morning the crowd upon the wharf was immense. I was fearful that an attempt to repeat the New Orleans ruse with my daughter would be of no avail, as the joke had been published in the Cincinnati papers; so I gave my arm to Miss Lind, and begged her to have no fears, for I had hit upon an expedient which would save her from annoyance. We then descended the plank to the shore, and as soon as we had touched it, Le Grand Smith called out from the boat, as if he had been one of the passengers, “That’s no go, Mr. Barnum; you can’t pass your daughter off for Jenny Lind this time.”
The remark elicited a peal of merriment from the crowd, several persons calling out, “That won’t do, Barnum! you may fool the New Orleans folks, but you can’t come it over the ‘Buckeyes.’ We intend to stay here until you bring out Jenny Lind!” They readily allowed me to pass with the lady whom they supposed to be my daughter, and in five minutes afterwards the Nightingale was complimenting Mr. Coleman upon the beautiful and commodious apartments which were devoted to her in the Burnett House. The crowd remained an hour on the wharf before they would be convinced that the person whom they took for my daughter was in fact the veritable Swede. When this was discovered, a general laugh followed the exclamation from one of the victims, “Well, Barnum has humbugged us after all!”
In passing up the river to Pittsburg, the boat waited four hours to enable us to give a concert in Wheeling. It was managed by a couple of gentlemen in that city, who purchased it for five thousand dollars in advance, by which they made a handsome profit for their trouble. The concert was given in a church.
At Pittsburg, the open space surrounding the concert room became crowded with thousands of persons, who, foolishly refusing to accommodate each other by listening to the music, disturbed the concert and determined us to leave the next morning for Baltimore, instead of giving a second concert that had been advertised.
Le Grand Smith here paid me off for my “April fool” joke. He induced a female of his acquaintance to call on me and reveal an arrangement which she pretended accidentally to have overheard between some scoundrels, who were resolved to stop our stage coach on the Alleghany mountains and commit highway robbery. The story seemed incredible, and yet the woman related it with so much apparent sincerity, that I swallowed the bait, and remitting to New York all the money I had, except barely enough to defray our expenses to Baltimore, I purchased several revolvers for such members of the company as were not already provided, and we left Pittsburg armed to the teeth! Fortunately, Jenny Lind and several of the company had left before I made this grand discovery, and hence she was saved any apprehensions on the subject. It is needless to say we found no use for our firearms.
We reached New York early in May, 1851, and gave fourteen concerts in Castle Garden and Metropolitan Hall. The last of these made the ninety-second regular concert under our engagement. Jenny Lind had now again reached the atmosphere of her legal and other “advisers,” and I soon discovered the effects of their influence. I, however, cared little what course they advised her to pursue. I indeed wished they would prevail upon her to close with her hundredth concert, for I had become weary with constant excitement and unremitting exertions. I was confident that if she undertook to give concerts on her own account, she would be imposed upon and harassed in a thousand ways; yet I felt it would be well for her to have a trial at it, if she saw fit to credit her advisers’ assurance that I had not managed the enterprise as successfully as it might have been done.
At about the eighty-fifth concert, therefore, I was most happy to learn from her lips that she had concluded to pay the forfeiture of twenty-five thousand dollars, and terminate the concerts with the one hundredth.
We went to Philadelphia, where I had advertised the ninety-second, ninety-third, and ninety-fourth concerts, and had engaged the large National Theatre on Chestnut Street. It had been used for equestrian and theatrical entertainments, but was now thoroughly cleansed and fitted up by Max Maretzek for Italian opera. It was a convenient place for our purpose. One of her “advisers,” a subordinate in her employ, who was already itching for the position of manager, made the selection of this building a pretext for creating dissatisfaction in the mind of Miss Lind. I saw the influences which were at work, and not caring enough for the profits of the remaining seven concerts, to continue the engagement at the risk of disturbing the friendly feelings which had hitherto uninterruptedly existed between that lady and myself, I wrote her a letter offering to relinquish the engagement, if she desired it, at the termination of the concert which was to take place that evening, upon her simply allowing me a thousand dollars per concert for the seven which would yet remain to make up the hundred, besides paying me the sum stipulated as a forfeiture for closing the engagement at the one-hundredth concert. Towards evening I received the following reply:
“TO P. T. BARNUM, ESQ.
“MY DEAR SIR:--I accept your proposition to close our contract to-night, at the end of the ninety-third concert, on condition of my paying you seven thousand dollars, in addition to the sum I forfeit under the condition of finishing the engagement at the end of one hundred concerts.
“I am, dear Sir, yours truly,
“JENNY LIND,
“PHILADELPHIA, 9th of June, 1851.”
I met her at the concert in the evening, and she was polite and friendly as ever. Between the first and second parts of the concert, I introduced General Welch, the lessee of the National Theatre, who informed her that he was quite willing to release me from my engagement of the building, if she did not desire it longer. She replied, that upon trial, she found it much better than she expected, and she would therefore retain it for the remainder of the concerts.
In the mean time, her advisers had been circulating the story that I had compelled her to sing in an improper place, and when they heard she had concluded to remain there, they beset her with arguments against it, until at last she consented to remove her concerts to a smaller hall.
I had thoroughly advertised the three concerts, in the newspapers within a radius of one hundred miles from Philadelphia, and had sent admission tickets to the editors. On the day of the second concert, one of the new agents, who had indirectly aided in bringing about the dissolution of our engagement, refused to recognize these tickets. I urged upon him the injustice of such a course, but received no satisfaction. I then stated the fact to Miss Lind, and she gave immediate orders that these tickets should be received. Country editors’ tickets, which were offered after I left Philadelphia, were however refused by her agents (contrary to Miss Lind’s wish and knowledge), and the editors, having come from a distance with their wives, purchased tickets, and I subsequently remitted the money to numerous gentlemen, whose complimentary tickets were thus repudiated.
Jenny Lind gave several concerts with varied success, and then retired to Niagara Falls, and afterwards to Northampton, Massachusetts. While sojourning at the latter place, she visited Boston and was married to Mr. Otto Goldschmidt, a German composer and pianist, to whom she was much attached, and who had studied music with her in Germany. He played several times in our concerts. He was a very quiet, inoffensive gentleman, and an accomplished musician.
I met her several times after our engagement terminated. She was always affable. On one occasion, while passing through Bridgeport, she told me that she had been sadly harassed in giving her concerts. “People cheat me and swindle me very much,” said she, “and I find it very annoying to give concerts on my own account.”
I was always supplied with complimentary tickets when she gave concerts in New York, and on the occasion of her last appearance in America, I visited her in her room back of the stage, and bade her and her husband adieu, with my best wishes. She expressed the same feeling to me in return. She told me she should never sing much, if any more, in public; but I reminded her that a good Providence had endowed her with a voice which enabled her to contribute in an eminent degree to the enjoyment of her fellow beings, and if she no longer needed the large sums of money which they were willing to pay for this elevating and delightful entertainment, she knew by experience what a genuine pleasure she would receive by devoting the money to the alleviation of the wants and sorrows of those who needed it.
“Ah! Mr. Barnum,” she replied, “that is very true, and it would be ungrateful in me to not continue to use for the benefit of the poor and lowly, that gift which our kind Heavenly Father has so graciously bestowed upon me. Yes, I will continue to sing so long as my voice lasts, but it will be mostly for charitable objects, for I am thankful to say I have all the money which I shall ever need.” Pursuant to this resolution, the larger portion of the concerts which this noble lady has given since her return to Europe, have been for objects of benevolence.
If she consents to sing for a charitable object in London, for instance, the fact is not advertised at all, but the tickets are readily disposed of in a private quiet way, at a guinea and half a guinea each.
After so many months of anxiety, labor and excitement, in the Jenny Lind enterprise, it will readily be believed that I desired tranquility. I spent a week at Cape May, and then came home to Iranistan, where I remained during the entire summer.
JENNY LIND CONCERTS.
TOTAL RECEIPTS, EXCEPTING OF CONCERTS DEVOTED TO CHARITY.
---- New York, $17,864 05 No. 46. Havana, $2,931 95 ---- “ 14,203 03 47. New Orleans, 12,599 85 ---------- 48. “ 10,210 42 No. 1. “ 12,519 59 49. “ 8,131 15 2. “ 14,266 09 50. “ 6,019 85 3. “ 12,174 74 51. “ 6,644 00 4. “ 16,028 39 52. “ 9,720 80 5. Boston, 16,479 50 53. “ 7,545 50 6. “ 11,848 62 54. “ 6,053 50 7. “ 8,639 92 55. “ 4,850 25 8. “ 10,169 25 56. “ 4,495 35 9. Providence, 6,525 54 57. “ 6,630 35 10. Boston, 10,524 87 58. “ 4,745 10 11. “ 5,240 00 59. Natchez, 5,000 00 12. “ 7,586 00 60. Memphis, 4,539 56 13. Philadelphia, 9,291 25 61. St. Louis, 7,811 85 14. “ 7,547 00 62. “ 7,961 92 15. “ 8,458 65 63. “ 7,708 70 16. New York, 6,415 90 64. “ 4,086 50 17. “ 4,009 70 65. “ 3,044 70 18. “ 5,982 00 66. Nashville, 7,786 30 19. “ 8,007 10 67. “ 4,248 00 20. “ 6,334 20 68. Louisville, 7,833 90 21. “ 9,429 15 69. “ 6,595 60 22. “ 9,912 17 70. “ 5,000 00 23. “ 5,773 40 71. Madison, 3,693 25 24. “ 4,993 50 72. Cincinnati, 9,339 75 25. “ 6,670 15 73. “ 11,001 50 26. “ 9,840 33 74. “ 8,446 30 27. “ 7,097 15 75. “ 8,954 18 28. “ 8,263 30 76. “ 6,500 40 29. “ 10,570 25 77. Wheeling, 5,000 00 30. “ 10,646 45 78. Pittsburg, 7,210 58 31. Philadelphia, 5,480 75 79. New York, 6,858 42 32. “ 5,728 65 80. “ 5,453 00 33. “ 3,709 88 81. “ 5,463 70 34. “ 4,815 48 82. “ 7,378 35 35. Baltimore, 7,117 00 83. “ 7,179 27 36. “ 8,357 05 84. “ 6,641 00 37. “ 8,406 50 85. “ 6,917 13 38. “ 8,121 33 86. “ 6,642 04 39. Washington City, 6,878 55 87. “ 3,738 75 40. “ 8,507 05 88. “ 4,335 28 41. Richmond, 12,385 21 89. “ 5,339 23 42. Charleston, 6,775 00 90. “ 4,087 03 43. “ 3,653 75 91. “ 5,717 00 44. Havana, 4,666 17 92. “ 9,525 80 45. “ 2,837 92 93. Philadelphia, 3,852 75
CHARITY CONCERTS.--Of Miss Lind’s half receipts of the first two Concerts, she devoted $10,000 to charity in New York. She afterwards gave Charity Concerts in Boston, Baltimore, Charleston, Havana, New Orleans, New York, and Philadelphia, and donated large sums for the like purposes in Richmond, Cincinnati, and elsewhere. There were also several Benefit Concerts, for the Orchestra, Le Grand Smith, and other persons and objects.
RECAPITULATION.
NEW YORK 35 Concerts. Receipts, $286,216 64 Average, $8,177 50 PHILADELPHIA 8 “ “ 48,884 41 “ 6,110 55 BOSTON 7 “ “ 70,388 16 “ 10,055 45 PROVIDENCE 1 “ “ 6,525 54 “ 6,525 54 BALTIMORE 4 “ “ 32,101 88 “ 8,000 47 WASHINGTON 2 “ “ 15,385 60 “ 7,692 80 RICHMOND 1 “ “ 12,385 21 “ 12,385 21 CHARLESTON 2 “ “ 10,428 75 “ 5,214 37 HAVANA 3 “ “ 10,436 04 “ 3,478 68 NEW ORLEANS 12 “ “ 87,646 12 “ 7,303 84 NATCHEZ 1 “ “ 5,000 00 “ 5,000 00 MEMPHIS 1 “ “ 4,539 56 “ 4,539 56 ST. LOUIS 5 “ “ 30,613 67 “ 6,122 73 NASHVILLE 2 “ “ 12,034 30 “ 6,017 15 LOUISVILLE 3 “ “ 19,429 50 “ 6,476 50 MADISON 1 “ “ 3,693 25 “ 3,693 25 CINCINNATI 5 “ “ 44,242 13 “ 8,848 43 WHEELING 1 “ “ 5,000 00 “ 5,000 00 PITTSBURG 1 “ “ 7,210 58 “ 7,210 58 -- ----------- --------- TOTAL 95 CONCERTS. RECEIPTS, $712,161 34 AVERAGE, $7,496 43
JENNY LIND’S RECEIPTS.
From the Total Receipts of Ninety-five Concerts $712,161 34 Deduct the receipts of the first two, which, as between P. T. Barnum and Jenny Lind, were aside from the contract, and are not numbered in the Table 32,067 08 ----------- Total Receipts of Concerts from No. 1 to No. 93 $680,094 26 Deduct the receipts of the 28 Concerts, each of which fell short of $5,500 $123,311 15 Also deduct $5,500 for each of the remaining 65 Concerts 357,500 00 480,811 15 ----------- ---------- Leaving the total excess, as above $199,283 11 Being equally divided, Miss Lind’s portion was $99,641 55 I paid her $1,000 for each of the 93 Concerts 93,000 00 Also one half the receipts of the first two Concerts 16,033 54 ----------- Amount paid to Jenny Lind $208,675 09 She refunded to me as forfeiture, per contract, in case she withdrew after the 100th Concert $25,000 She also paid me $1,000 each for the seven Concerts relinquished 7,000 32,000 00 ------- ----------- JENNY LIND’S net avails of 95 Concerts $176,675 09 P. T. BARNUM’S gross receipts, after paying Miss Lind 535,486 25 ----------- TOTAL RECEIPTS of 95 Concerts $712,161 34
PRICE OF TICKETS.--The highest prices paid for tickets were at auction as follows:--John N. Genin, in New York, $225; Ossian E. Dodge, in Boston, $625; Col. William C. Ross, in Providence, $650; M. A. Root, in Philadelphia, $625; Mr. D’Arcy, in New Orleans, $240; a keeper of a refreshment saloon in St. Louis, $150; a Daguerrotypist, in Baltimore, $100. I cannot now recall the names of the last two. After the sale of the first ticket, the premium usually fell to $20, and so downward in the scale of figures. The fixed price of tickets ranged from $7 to $3. Promenade tickets were from $2 to $1 each.
XXIII. OTHER ENTERPRISES
ANOTHER VENTURE--“BARNUM’S GREAT ASIATIC CARAVAN, MUSEUM AND MENAGERIE”--HUNTING ELEPHANTS--GENERAL TOM THUMB--ELEPHANT PLOWING IN CONNECTICUT--CURIOUS QUESTIONS FROM ALL QUARTERS--THE PUBLIC INTEREST IN MY NOVEL FARMING--HOW MUCH AN ELEPHANT CAN REALLY “DRAW”--COMMODORE VANDERBILT--DAN DREW--SIDE SHOWS AND VARIOUS ENTERPRISES--OBSEQUIES OF NAPOLEON--THE CRYSTAL PALACE--CAMPANALOGIANS--AMERICAN INDIANS IN LONDON--AUTOMATON SPEAKER--THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON--ATTEMPT TO BUY SHAKESPEARE’S HOUSE--DISSOLVING VIEWS--THE CHINESE COLLECTION--WONDERFUL SCOTCH BOYS--SOLVING THE MYSTERY OF DOUBLE SIGHT--THE BATEMAN CHILDREN--CATHERINE HAYES--IRANISTAN ON FIRE--MY ELDEST DAUGHTER’S MARRIAGE--BENEFITS FOR THE BRIDGEPORT LIBRARY AND THE MOUNTAIN GROVE CEMETERY.
While I was managing the Lind concerts, in addition to the American Museum I had other business matters in operation which were more than enough to engross my entire attention and which, of course, I was compelled to commit to the hands of associates and agents.
In 1849 I had projected a great travelling museum and menagerie, and, as I had neither time nor inclination to manage such a concern, I induced Mr. Seth B. Howes, justly celebrated as a “showman,” to join me, and take the sole charge. Mr. Sherwood E. Stratton, father of General Tom Thumb, was also admitted to partnership, the interest being in thirds.
In carrying out a portion of the plan, we chartered the ship “Regatta,” Captain Pratt, and despatched her, together with our agents, Messrs. June and Nutter, to Ceylon. The ship left New York in May, 1850, and was absent one year. Their mission was to procure, either by capture or purchase, twelve or more living elephants, besides such other wild animals as they could secure. In order to provide sufficient drink and provender for a cargo of these huge animals, we purchased a large quantity of hay in New York. Five hundred tons were left at the Island of St. Helena, to be taken on the return trip of the ship, and staves and hoops of water-casks were also left at the same place.
As our agents were unable to purchase the required number of elephants, either in Columbo or Kandy, the principal towns of the island, (Ceylon,) they took one hundred and sixty native assistants, and plunged into the jungles, where, after many most exciting adventures, they succeeded in securing thirteen elephants of a suitable size for their purpose, with a female and her calf, or “baby” elephant, only six months old. In the course of the expedition, Messrs. Nutter and June killed large numbers of the huge beasts, and had numerous encounters of the most terrific description with the formidable animals, one of the most fearful of which took place near Anarajah Poora, while they were endeavoring, by the aid of the natives and trained elephants, to drive the wild herd of beasts into an Indian kraal.
They arrived in New York in 1851 with ten of the elephants, and these, harnessed in pairs to a chariot, paraded up Broadway past the Irving House, while Jenny Lind was staying at that hotel, on the occasion of her second visit to New York. Messrs. Nutter and June also brought with the elephants a native who was competent to manage and control them. We added a caravan of wild animals and many museum curiosities, the entire outfit, including horses, vans, carriages, tent, etc., costing $109,000, and commenced operations, with the presence and under the “patronage” of General Tom Thumb, who travelled nearly four years as one of the attractions of “Barnum’s Great Asiatic Caravan, Museum and Menagerie,” returning us immense profits.
At the end of that time, after exhibiting in all sections of the country, we sold out the entire establishment--animals, cages, chariots and paraphernalia, excepting one elephant, which I retained in my own possession two months for agricultural purposes. It occurred to me that if I could put an elephant to plowing for a while on my farm at Bridgeport, it would be a capital advertisement for the American Museum, which was then, and always during my proprietorship of that establishment, foremost in my thoughts.
So I sent him to Connecticut in charge of his keeper, whom I dressed in Oriental costume, and keeper and elephant were stationed on a six-acre lot which lay close beside the track of the New York and New Haven Railroad. The keeper was furnished with a time-table of the road, with special instructions to be busily engaged in his work whenever passenger trains from either way were passing through. Of course, the matter soon appeared in the papers and went the entire rounds of the press in this country and even in Europe, and it was everywhere announced that P. T. Barnum, “Proprietor of the celebrated American Museum in New York”--and here is where the advertisement came in--had introduced elephants upon his farm, to do his plowing and heavy draft work. Hundreds of people came many miles to witness the novel spectacle. Letters poured in upon me from the secretaries of hundreds of State and County agricultural societies throughout the Union, stating that the presidents and directors of such societies had requested them to propound to me a series of questions in regard to the new power I had put in operation on my farm. These questions were greatly diversified, but the “general run” of them were something like the following:
1. “Is the elephant a profitable agricultural animal?”
2. “How much can an elephant plow in a day?”
3. “How much can he draw?”
4. “How much does he eat?”--this question was invariably asked, and was a very important one.
5. “Will elephants make themselves generally useful on a farm?” I suppose some of my inquirers thought the elephant would pick up chips, or even pins as they have been taught to do, and would rock the baby and do all the chores, including the occasional carrying of a trunk, other than his own, to the depot.
6. “What is the price of an elephant?”
7. “Where can elephants be purchased?”
Then would follow a score of other inquiries, such as, whether elephants were easily managed; if they would quarrel with cattle; if it was possible to breed them; how old calf elephants must be before they would earn their own living; and so on indefinitely. I began to be alarmed lest some one should buy an elephant, and so share the fate of the man who drew one in a lottery, and did not know what to do with him. I accordingly had a general letter printed, which I mailed to all my anxious inquirers. It was headed “strictly confidential,” and I then stated, begging my correspondents “not to mention it,” that to me the elephant was a valuable agricultural animal, because he was an excellent advertisement to my Museum; but that to other farmers he would prove very unprofitable for many reasons. In the first place, such an animal would cost from $3,000 to $10,000; in cold weather he could not work at all; in any weather he could not earn even half his living; he would eat up the value of his own head, trunk, and body every year; and I begged my correspondents not to do so foolish a thing as to undertake elephant farming.
Newspaper reporters came from far and near, and wrote glowing accounts of the elephantine performances. One of them, taking a political view of the matter, stated that the elephant’s sagacity showed that he knew more than did any laborer on the farm, and yet, shameful to say, he was not allowed to vote. Another said that Barnum’s elephant built all the stone wall on the farm; made all the rail fences; planted corn with his trunk, and covered it with his foot; washed my windows and sprinkled the walks and lawns, by taking water from the fountain-basin with his trunk; carried all the children to school, and put them to bed at night, tucking them up with his trunk; fed the pigs; picked fruit from branches that could not otherwise be reached; turned the fanning mill and corn-sheller; drew the mowing machine, and turned and cocked the hay with his trunk; carried and brought my letters to and from the post-office (it was a male elephant); and did all the chores about the house, including milking the cows, and bringing in eggs. Pictures of Barnum’s plowing elephant appeared in illustrated papers at home and abroad, and as the cars passed the scene of the performance, passengers’ heads were out of every window, and among many and varied exclamations, I heard of one man’s saying:
“Well, I declare! That is certainly a real elephant and any man who has so many elephants that he can afford to work them on his farm, must have lots of wild animals and curious ‘critters’ in his Museum, and I am bound to go there the first thing after my arrival in New York.”
The six acres were plowed over at least sixty times before I thought the advertisement sufficiently circulated, and I then sold the elephant to Van Amburgh’s Menagerie.
A substantial farmer friend of mine, Mr. Gideon Thompson, called at Iranistan during the elephant excitement and asked me to accompany him to the field to let him see “how the big animal worked.” I knew him to be a shrewd, sharp man and a good farmer, and I tried to excuse myself, as I did not wish to be too closely questioned. Indeed, for the same reason, I made it a point at all times to avoid being present when the plowing was going on. But the old farmer was a particular friend and he refused to take “no” for an answer; so I went with him “to see the elephant.”
Arriving at the field, Mr. Thompson said nothing, but stood with folded arms and sedately watched the elephant for at least fifteen minutes. Then he walked out on to the plowed ground, and found it so mellow that he sank nearly up to his knees; for it had already been plowed over and over many times. As usual, several spectators were present. Mr. Thompson walked up to where I was standing, and, looking me squarely in the eyes, he asked with much earnestness:
“What is your object, sir, in bringing that great Asiatic animal on to a New England farm?”
“To plow,” I replied very demurely.
“To plow!” said Thompson; “don’t talk to me about plowing! I have been out where he has plowed, and the ground is so soft I thought I should go through and come out in China. No, sir! You can’t humbug me. You have got some other object in bringing that elephant up here; now what is it?”
“Don’t you see for yourself that I am plowing with him?” I asked.
“Nonsense,” said Thompson “that would never pay; I have no doubt he eats more than he earns every day; you have some other purpose in view, I am sure you have.”
“Perhaps he does not eat so much as you think,” I replied; “and you see he draws nobly--in fact, I expect he will be just the animal by and by, to draw saw logs to mill, and do other heavy work.”
But Uncle Gid., was not to be put aside so easily so he asked very sharply:
“How much does he eat in a day?”
“Oh,” I replied carelessly, “not more than a quarter of a ton of hay and three or four bushels of oats.”
“Exactly,” said Thompson, his eyes glistening with delight; “that is just about what I expected. He can’t draw so much as two pair of my oxen can, and he costs more than a dozen pair.”
“You are mistaken, friend Thompson,” I replied with much gravity; “that elephant is a powerful animal; he can draw more than forty yoke of oxen, and he pays me well for bringing him here.”
“Forty yoke of oxen!” contemptuously replied the old farmer; “I don’t want to tell you I doubt your word, but I would just like to know what he can draw.”
“He can draw the attention of twenty millions of American citizens to Barnum’s Museum,” I replied.
“Oh, you can make him pay in that way, of course,” responded the old farmer.
“None but a greenhorn could ever have expected he would pay in any other way,” I replied.
The old man gave a hearty laugh, and said, “Well, I give it up. I have been a farmer thirty-five years, and I have only just discovered that an elephant is a very useful and profitable animal on a farm--provided the farmer also owns a museum.”
In 1851 I became a part owner of the steamship “North America.” Our intention in buying it was to run it to Ireland as a passenger and freight ship. The project was, however, abandoned, and Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt bought one half of the steamer, while the other half was owned by three persons, of whom I was one. The steamer was sent around Cape Horn to San Francisco, and was put into the Vanderbilt line.
After she had made several trips I called upon Mr. Vanderbilt, at his office, and introduced myself, as this was the first time we had met.
“Is it possible you are Barnum?” exclaimed the Commodore, in surprise, “why, I expected to see a monster, part lion, part elephant, and a mixture of rhinoceros and tiger! Is it possible,” he continued, “that you are the showman who has made so much noise in the world?”
I laughingly replied that I was, and added that if I too had been governed in my anticipation of his personal appearance by the fame he had achieved in his line, I should have expected to have been saluted by a steam whistle, and to have seen him dressed in a pea jacket, blowing off steam, and crying out “all aboard that’s going.”
“Instead of which,” replied Mr. Vanderbilt, “I suppose you have come to ask me, ‘to walk up to the Captain’s office and settle.’”
After this interchange of civilities, we talked about the success of the “North America” in having got safely around the Horn, and of the acceptable manner in which she was doing her duty on the Pacific side.
“We have received no statement of her earnings yet,” said the Commodore, “but if you want money, give your receipt to our treasurer, and take some.”
A few months subsequent to this, I sold out my share in the steamship to Mr. Daniel Drew. The day after closing with Mr. Drew, I discovered an error of several hundred dollars (a matter of interest on some portion of the purchase money, which had been overlooked). I called on Mr. Drew, and asked him to correct it, but could get no satisfaction. I then wrote him a threatening letter, but received no response. I was on the eve of suing him for the amount due me, when the news came that the steamship “North America” was lying at the bottom of the Pacific. It turned out that she was sunk several days before I sold out, and as the owners were mulcted in the sum of many thousands of dollars damages by their passengers, besides suffering a great loss in their steamship, I said no more to the millionnaire Drew about the few hundreds which he had withheld from the showman.
Some reference to the various enterprises and “side shows” connected with and disconnected from my Museum, is necessary to show how industriously I have catered for the public’s amusement, not only in America but abroad. When I was in Paris in 1844, in addition to the purchase of Robert Houdin’s ingenious automaton writer, and many other costly curiosities for the Museum, I ordered, at an expense of $3,000, a panoramic diorama of the obsequies of Napoleon. Every event of that grand pageant, from the embarkation of the body at St. Helena, to its entombment at the Hotel des Invalides, amid the most gorgeous parade ever witnessed in France, was wonderfully depicted. This exhibition, after having had its day at the American Museum, was sold, and extensively and profitably exhibited elsewhere. While I was in London, during the same year, I engaged a company of “Campanalogians, or Lancashire Bell Ringers,” then performing in Ireland, to make an American tour. They were really admirable performers, and by means of their numerous bells, of various sizes, they produced the most delightful music. They attracted much attention in various parts of the United States, in Canada, and in Cuba.
As a compensation to England for the loss of the Bell Ringers, I despatched an agent to America for a party of Indians, including squaws. He proceeded to Iowa, and returned to London with a company of sixteen. They were exhibited by Mr. Catlin on our joint account, and were finally left in his sole charge.
On my first return visit to America from Europe, I engaged Mr. Faber, an elderly and ingenious German, who had constructed an automaton speaker. It was of life-size, and when worked with keys similar to those of a piano, it really articulated words and sentences with surprising distinctness. My agent exhibited it for several months in Egyptian Hall, London, and also in the provinces. This was a marvellous piece of mechanism, though for some unaccountable reason it did not prove a success. The Duke of Wellington visited it several times, and at first he thought that the “voice” proceeded from the exhibitor, whom he assumed to be a skillful ventriloquist. He was asked to touch the keys with his own fingers, and after some instruction in the method of operating, he was able to make the machine speak, not only in English but also in German, with which language the Duke seemed familiar. Thereafter, he entered his name on the exhibitor’s autograph book, and certified that the “Automaton Speaker” was an extraordinary production of mechanical genius.
During my first visit to England I obtained, verbally, through a friend, the refusal of the house in which Shakespeare was born, designing to remove it in sections to my Museum in New York; but the project leaked out, British pride was touched, and several English gentlemen interfered and purchased the premises for a Shakespearian Association. Had they slept a few days longer, I should have made a rare speculation, for I was subsequently assured that the British people, rather than suffer that house to be removed to America, would have bought me off with twenty thousand pounds. I did not hesitate to engage, or attempt to secure anything, at any expense, to please my patrons in the United States, and I made an effort to transfer Madame Tussaud’s world-wide celebrated wax-work collection entire to New York. The papers were actually drawn up for this engagement, but the enterprise finally fell through.
The models of machinery exhibited in the Royal Polytechnic Institution in London, pleased me so well that I procured a duplicate; also duplicates of the “Dissolving Views,” the Chromatrope and Physioscope, including many American scenes painted expressly to my order, at an aggregate cost of $7,000. After they had been exhibited in my Museum, they were sold to itinerant showmen, and some of them were afterwards on exhibition in various parts of the United States.
In June 1850, I added the celebrated Chinese Collection to the attractions of the American Museum. I also engaged the Chinese Family, consisting of two men, two “small-footed” women and two children. My agent exhibited them in London during the World’s Fair. It may be stated here, that I subsequently sent to London the celebrated artist De Lamano to paint a panorama of the Crystal Palace, in which the World’s Fair was held, and Colonel John S. Dusolle, an able and accomplished editor, whom I sent with De Lamano, wrote an accompanying descriptive lecture. Like most panoramas, however, the exhibition proved a failure.
The giants whom I sent to America were not the greatest of my curiosities, though the dwarfs might have been the least. The “Scotch Boys” were interesting, not so much on account of their weight, as for the mysterious method by which one of them, though blindfolded, answered questions put by the other respecting objects presented by persons who attended the surprising exhibition. The mystery, which was merely the result of patient practice, consisted wholly in the manner in which the question was propounded; in fact, the question invariably carried its own answer; for instance:
“What is this?” meant gold; “Now what is this?” silver; “Say what is this?” copper; “Tell me what this is,” iron; “What is the shape?” long; “Now what shape?” round; “Say what shape,” square; “Please say what this is,” a watch; “Can you tell what is in this lady’s hand?” a purse; “Now please say what this is?” a key; “Come now, what is this?” money; “How much?” a penny; “Now how much?” sixpence; “Say how much,” a quarter of a dollar; “What color is this?” black; “Now what color is this?” red; “Say what color,” green; and so on, ad infinitum. To such perfection was this brought that it was almost impossible to present any object that could not be quite closely described by the blindfolded boy. This is the key to all exhibitions of what is called “second sight.”
In 1850, the celebrated Bateman children acted for several weeks at the American Museum and in June of that year I sent them to London with their father and Mr. Le Grand Smith, where they played in the St. James Theatre, and afterwards in the principal provincial theatres. The elder of these children, Miss Kate Bateman, subsequently attained the highest histrionic distinction in America and abroad, and reached the very head of her profession.
In October, 1852, having stipulated with Mr. George A. Wells and Mr. Bushnell that they should share in the enterprise and take the entire charge, I engaged Miss Catherine Hayes and Herr Begnis to give a series of sixty concerts in California, and the engagement was fulfilled to our entire satisfaction. Mr. Bushnell afterwards went to Australia with Miss Hayes and they were subsequently married. Both of them are dead.
Before setting out for California, Miss Catherine Hayes, her mother and sister spent several days at Iranistan and were present at the marriage of my eldest daughter, Caroline, to Mr. David W. Thompson. The wedding was to take place in the evening, and in the afternoon I was getting shaved in a barber-shop in Bridgeport, when Mr. Thompson drove up to the door in great haste and exclaimed:
“Mr. Barnum, Iranistan is in flames!”
I ran out half-shaved, with the lather on my face, jumped into his wagon and bade him drive home with all speed. I was greatly alarmed, for the house was full of visitors who had come from a distance to attend the wedding, and all the costly presents, dresses, refreshments, and everything prepared for a marriage celebration to which nearly a thousand guests had been invited, were already in my house. Mr. Thompson told me that he had seen the flames bursting from the roof and it seemed to me that there was little hope of saving the building.
My mind was distressed, not so much at the great pecuniary loss which the destruction of Iranistan would involve as at the possibility that some of my family or visitors would be killed or seriously injured in attempting to save something from the fire. Then I thought of the sore disappointment this calamity would cause to the young couple, as well as to those who were invited to the wedding. I saw that Mr. Thompson looked pale and anxious.
“Never mind!” said I; “we can’t help these things; the house will probably be burned; but if no one is killed or injured, you shall be married to-night, if we are obliged to perform the ceremony in the coach-house.”
On our way, we overtook a fire-company and I implored them to “hurry up their machine.” Arriving in sight of Iranistan we saw huge volumes of smoke rolling out from the roof and many men on the top of the house were passing buckets of water to pour upon the fire. Fortunately, several men had been engaged during the day in repairing the roof, and their ladders were against the house. By these means and with the assistance of the men employed upon my grounds, water was passed very rapidly and the flames were soon subdued without serious damage. The inmates of Iranistan were thoroughly frightened; Catherine Hayes and other visitors packed their trunks and had them carried out on the lawn; and the house came as near destruction as it well could, and escape.
While Miss Hayes was in Bridgeport I induced her to give a concert for the benefit of the “Mountain Grove Cemetery,” and the large proceeds were devoted to the erection of the beautiful stone tower and gateway at the entrance of that charming ground. The land for this cemetery, about eighty acres, had been bought by me, years before, from several farmers. I had often shot over the ground while hunting a year or two before, and had then seen its admirable capabilities for the purpose to which it was eventually devoted. After deeds for the property were secured, it was offered for a cemetery, and at a meeting of citizens several lots were subscribed for, enough, indeed, to cover the amount of the purchase money. Thus was begun the “Mountain Grove Cemetery,” which is now beautifully laid out and adorned with many tasteful and costly monuments. Among these are my own substantial granite monument, the family monuments of Harral, Bishop, Hubbell, Lyon, Wood, Loomis, Wordin, Hyde, and others, and General Tom Thumb has erected a tall marble shaft which is surmounted by a life-size statue of himself. There is no more charming burial ground in the whole country; yet when the project was suggested, many persons preferred an intermural cemetery to this rural resting-place for their departed friends; though now, all concur in considering it fortunate that this adjunct was secured to Bridgeport before the land could be permanently devoted to other purposes.
Some time afterwards, when Mr. Dion Boucicault visited me at Bridgeport, at my solicitation he gave a lecture for the benefit of this cemetery. I may add that on several occasions I have secured the services of General Tom Thumb and others for this and equally worthy objects in Bridgeport. When the General first returned with me from England, he gave exhibitions for the benefit of the Bridgeport Charitable Society. September 28, 1867, I induced him and his wife, with Commodore Nutt and Minnie Warren to give their entertainment for the benefit of the Bridgeport Library, thus adding $475 to the funds of that institution; and on one occasion I lectured to a full house in the Methodist Church, and the entire receipts were given to the library, of which I was already a life member, on account of previous subscriptions and contributions.
XXIV. WORK AND PLAY
ALFRED BUNN, OF DRURY LANE THEATRE--AMUSING INTERVIEW--MR. LEVY, OF THE LONDON DAILY TELEGRAPH--VACATIONS AT HOME--MY PRESIDENCY OF THE FAIRFIELD COUNTY AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY--EXHIBITING A PICKPOCKET--PHILOSOPHY OF HUMBUG--A CHOP-FALLEN TICKET-SELLER--A PROMPT PAYMASTER--BARNUM IN BOSTON--A DELUDED HACK DRIVER--PHILLIPS’S FIRE ANNIHILATOR--HONORABLE ELISHA WHITTLESEY--TRIAL OF THE ANNIHILATOR IN NEW YORK--PEQUONNOCK BANK OF BRIDGEPORT--THE ILLUSTRATED NEWS--THE WORLD’S FAIR IN NEW YORK--MY PRESIDENCY OF THE ASSOCIATION--ATTEMPT TO EXCITE PUBLIC INTEREST--MONSTER JULLIEN CONCERTS--RESIGNATION OF THE CRYSTAL PALACE PRESIDENCY--FAILURE OF THE CONCERN.
In the summer, I think, of 1853, I saw it announced in the newspapers that Mr. Alfred Bunn, the great ex-manager of Drury Lane Theatre, in London, had arrived in Boston. Of course, I knew Mr. Bunn by reputation, not only from his managerial career, but from the fact that he made the first engagement with Jenny Lind to appear in London. This engagement, however, Mr. Lumley, of Her Majesty’s Theatre, induced her to break, he standing a lawsuit with Mr. Bunn, and paying heavy damages. I had never met Mr. Bunn, but he took it for granted that I had seen him, for one day after his arrival in this country, a burly Englishman abruptly stepped into my private office in the Museum, and assuming a theatrical attitude, addressed me:
“Barnum, do you remember me?”
I was confident I had never seen the man before, but it struck me at once that no Englishman I ever heard of would be likely to exhibit more presumption or assumption than the ex-manager of Drury Lane, and I jumped at the conclusion:
“Is not this Mr. Bunn?”
“Ah! Ah! my boy!” he exclaimed, slapping me familiarly on the back, “I thought you would remember me. Well, Barnum, how have you been since I last saw you?”
I replied in a manner that would humor his impression that we were old acquaintances, and during his two hours’ visit we had much gossip about men and things in London. He called upon me several times, and it probably never entered into his mind that I could possibly have been in London two or three years without having made the personal acquaintance of so great a lion as Alfred Bunn.
I met Mr. Bunn again in 1858, in London, at a dinner party of a mutual friend, Mr. Levy, proprietor of the London Daily Telegraph. Of course, Bunn and I were great chums and very old and intimate acquaintances. At the same dinner, I met several literary and dramatic gentlemen.
In 1851, 1852, and 1853, I spent much of my time at my beautiful home in Bridgeport, going very frequently to New York, to attend to matters in the Museum, but remaining in the city only a day or two at a time. I resigned the office of President of the Fairfield County Agricultural Society in 1853, but the members accepted my resignation, only on condition that it should not go into effect until after the fair of 1854. During my administration, the society held six fairs and cattle-shows,--four in Bridgeport and two in Stamford,--and the interest in these gatherings increased from year to year.
Pickpockets are always present at these country fairs, and every year there were loud complaints of the depredations of these operators. In 1853 a man was caught in the act of taking a pocket-book from a country farmer, nor was this farmer the only one who had suffered in the same way. The scamp was arrested, and proved to be a celebrated English pickpocket. As the Fair would close the next day, and as most persons had already visited it, we expected our receipts would be light.
Early in the morning the detected party was legally examined, plead guilty, and was bound over for trial. I obtained consent from the sheriff that the culprit should be put in the Fair room for the purpose of giving those who had been robbed an opportunity to identify him. For this purpose he was handcuffed, and placed in a conspicuous position, where of course he was “the observed of all observers.” I then issued handbills, stating that as it was the last day of the Fair, the managers were happy to announce that they had secured extra attractions for the occasion, and would accordingly exhibit, safely handcuffed, and without extra charge, a live pickpocket, who had been caught in the act of robbing an honest farmer the day previous. Crowds of people rushed in “to see the show.” Some good mothers brought their children ten miles for that purpose, and our treasury was materially benefited by the operation.
At the close of my presidency in 1854, I was requested to deliver the opening speech at our County Fair, which was held at Stamford. As I was not able to give agricultural advice, I delivered a portion of my lecture on the “Philosophy of Humbug.” The next morning, as I was being shaved in the village barber’s shop, which was at the time crowded with customers, the ticket-seller to the Fair came in.
“What kind of a house did you have last night?” asked one of the gentlemen in waiting.
“Oh, first-rate, of course. Barnum always draws a crowd,” was the reply of the ticket-seller, to whom I was not known.
Most of the gentlemen present, however, knew me, and they found much difficulty in restraining their laughter.
“Did Barnum make a good speech?” I asked.
“I did not hear it. I was out in the ticket-office. I guess it was pretty good, for I never heard so much laughing as there was all through his speech. But it makes no difference whether it was good or not,” continued the ticket-seller, “the people will go to see Barnum.”
“Barnum must be a curious chap,” I remarked.
“Well, I guess he is up to all the dodges.”
“Do you know him?” I asked.
“Not personally,” he replied; “but I always get into the Museum for nothing. I know the doorkeeper, and he slips me in free.”
“Barnum would not like that, probably, if he knew it,” I remarked.
“But it happens he don’t know it,” replied the ticket-seller, in great glee.
“Barnum was on the cars the other day, on his way to Bridgeport,” said I, “and I heard one of the passengers blowing him up terribly as a humbug. He was addressing Barnum at the time, but did not know him. Barnum joined in lustily, and indorsed everything the man said. When the passenger learned whom he had been addressing, I should think he must have felt rather flat.”
“I should think so, too,” said the ticket-seller.
This was too much, and we all indulged in a burst of laughter; still the ticket-seller suspected nothing. After I had left the shop, the barber told him who I was. I called into the ticket-office on business several times during the day, but the poor ticket-seller kept his face turned from me, and appeared so chap-fallen that I did not pretend to recognize him as the hero of the joke in the barber’s shop.
This incident reminds me of numerous similar ones which have occurred at various times. On one occasion--it was in 1847--I was on board the steamboat from New York to Bridgeport. As we approached the harbor of the latter city, a stranger desired me to point out “Barnum’s house” from the upper deck. I did so, whereupon a bystander remarked, “I know all about that house, for I was engaged in painting there for several months while Barnum was in Europe.” He then proceeded to say that it was the meanest and most ill-contrived house he ever saw. “It will cost old Barnum a mint of money, and not be worth two cents after it is finished,” he added.
“I suppose old Barnum don’t pay very punctually,” I remarked.
“Oh, yes, he pays punctually every Saturday night--there’s no trouble about that; he has made half a million by exhibiting a little boy whom he took from Bridgeport, and whom we never considered any great shakes till Barnum took him and trained him.”
Soon afterwards one of the passengers told him who I was, whereupon he secreted himself, and was not seen again while I remained on the boat.
On another occasion, I went to Boston by the Fall River route. Arriving before sunrise, I found but one carriage at the depot. I immediately engaged it, and giving the driver the check for my baggage, told him to take me directly to the Revere House, as I was in great haste, and enjoined him to take in no other passengers, and I would pay his demands. He promised compliance with my wishes, but soon afterwards appeared with a gentleman, two ladies, and several children, whom he crowded into the carriage with me, and placing their trunks on the baggage rack, started off. I thought there was no use in grumbling, and consoled myself with the reflection that the Revere House was not far away. He drove up one street and down another, for what seemed to me a very long time, but I was wedged in so closely that I could not see what route he was taking.
After half an hour’s drive he halted, and I found we were at the Lowell Railway depot. Here my fellow-passengers alighted, and after a long delay the driver delivered their baggage, received his fare, and was about closing the carriage door preparatory to starting again. I was so thoroughly vexed at the shameful manner in which he had treated me, that I remarked;
“Perhaps you had better wait till the Lowell train arrives; you may possibly get another load of passengers. Of course my convenience is of no consequence. I suppose if you land me at the Revere House any time this week, it will be as much as I have a right to expect.”
“I beg your pardon,” he replied, “but that was Barnum and his family. He was very anxious to get here in time for the first train, so I stuck him for $2, and now I’ll carry you to the Revere House free.”
“What Barnum is it?” I asked.
“The Museum and Jenny Lind man,” he replied.
The compliment and the shave both having been intended for me, I was of course mollified, and replied, “You are mistaken, my friend, I am Barnum.”
“Coachee” was thunderstruck, and offered all sorts of apologies.
“A friend at the other depot told me that I had Mr. Barnum on board,” said he, “and I really supposed he meant the other man. When I come to notice you, I perceive my mistake, but I hope you will forgive me. I have carried you frequently before, and hope you will give me your custom while you are in Boston. I never will make such a mistake again.” I had to be satisfied.
Late in August, 1851, I was visited at Bridgeport by a gentleman who was interested in an English invention patented in this country, and known as Phillips’ Fire Annihilator. He showed me a number of certificates from men of eminence and trustworthiness in England, setting forth the merits of the invention in the highest terms. The principal value of the machine seemed to consist in its power to extinguish flame, and thus prevent the spread of fire when it once broke out. Besides, the steam or vapor generated in the Annihilator was not prejudicial to human life. Now, as water has no effect whatever upon flame, it was obvious that the Annihilator would at the least prove a great assistant in extinguishing conflagrations, and that, especially in the incipient stage of a fire, it would extinguish it altogether, without damage to goods or other property, as is usually the case with water.
Hon. Elisha Whittlesey, First Comptroller of the United States Treasury at Washington, was interested in the American patent, and the gentleman that called upon me desired that I should also take an interest in it. I had no disposition to engage in any speculation; but, believing this might prove a beneficent invention, and be the means of saving a vast amount of human life as well as property, I visited Washington City for the purpose of conferring with Mr. Whittlesey, Hon. J. W. Allen and other parties interested.
I was there shown numerous certificates of fires having been extinguished by the machine in Great Britain, and property to the amount of many thousands of pounds saved. I also saw that Lord Brougham had proposed in Parliament that every Government vessel should be compelled to have the Fire Annihilator on board. Mr. Whittlesey expressed his belief in writing, that “if there is any reliance to be placed on human testimony, it is one of the greatest discoveries of this most extraordinary age.” I fully agreed with him, and have never yet seen occasion to change that opinion.
I agreed to join in the enterprise. Mr. Whittlesey was elected President, and I was appointed Secretary and General Agent of the Company. I opened the office of the Company in New York, and sold and engaged machines and territory in a few months to the amount of $180,000. I refused to receive more than a small portion of the purchase money until a public experiment had tested the powers of the machine, and I voluntarily delivered to every purchaser an agreement, signed by myself, in the following words:
“If the public test and demonstration are not perfectly successful, I will at any time when demanded, within ten days after the public trial, refund and pay back every shilling that has been paid into this office for machines or territory for the sale of the patent.”
The public trial came off in Hamilton Square on the 18th December, 1851. It was an exceedingly cold and inclement day. Mr. Phillips, who conducted the experiment, was interfered with and knocked down by some rowdies who were opposed to the invention, and the building was ignited and consumed after he had extinguished the previous fire. Subsequently to this unexpected and unjust opposition, I refunded every cent which I had received, sometimes against the wishes of those who had purchased, for they were willing to wait the result of further experiments; but I was utterly disgusted with the course of a large portion of the public upon a subject in which they were much more deeply interested than I was.
The arrangements of the Annihilator Company with Mr. Phillips, the inventor, predicated all payments which he was to receive on bona fide sales which we should actually make; therefore he really received nothing, and the entire losses of the American Company, which were merely for advertising and the expense of trying the experiments, hire of an office, etc., amounted to nearly $30,000, of which my portion was less than $10,000.
In the spring of 1851 the Connecticut Legislature chartered the Pequonnock Bank of Bridgeport, with a capital of two hundred thousand dollars. I had no interest whatever in the charter, and did not even know that an application was to be made for it. More banking capital was needed in Bridgeport in consequence of the great increase of trade and manufactures in that growing and prosperous city, and this fact appearing in evidence, the charter was granted as a public benefit. The stock-books were opened under the direction of State Commissioners, according to the laws of the Commonwealth, and nearly double the amount of capital was subscribed on the first day. The stock was distributed by the Commissioners among several hundred applicants. Circumstances unexpectedly occurred which induced me to accept the presidency of the bank, in compliance with the unanimous vote of its directors. Feeling that I could not, from my many avocations, devote the requisite personal attention to the duties of the office, C. B. Hubbell, Esq., then Mayor of Bridgeport, was at my request appointed Vice-President of the institution.
In the fall of 1852 a proposition was made by certain parties to commence the publication of an illustrated weekly newspaper in the City of New York. The field seemed to be open for such an enterprise, and I invested twenty thousand dollars in the concern, as special partner, in connection with two other gentlemen, who each contributed twenty thousand dollars, as general partners. Within a month after the publication of the first number of the Illustrated News, which was issued on the first day of January, 1853, our weekly circulation had reached seventy thousand. Numerous and almost insurmountable difficulties, for novices in the business, continued however to arise, and my partners becoming weary and disheartened with constant over-exertion, were anxious to wind up the enterprise at the end of the first year. The good-will and the engravings were sold to Gleasons Pictorial, in Boston, and the concern was closed without loss.
In 1851, when the idea of opening a World’s Fair in New York was first broached, I was waited upon by Mr. Riddell and the other originators of the scheme, and invited to join in getting it up. I declined, giving as a reason that such a project was, in my opinion, premature. I felt that it was following quite too closely upon its London prototype, and assured the projectors that I could see in it nothing but certain loss. The plan, however, was carried out, and a charter obtained from the New York Legislature. The building was erected on a plot of ground upon Reservoir Square, leased to the association, by the City of New York, for one dollar per annum. The location, being four miles distant from the City Hall, was enough of itself to kill the enterprise. The stock was readily taken up, however, and the Crystal Palace opened to the public in July, 1853. Many thousands of strangers were brought to New York, and however disastrous the enterprise may have proved to the stockholders, it is evident that the general prosperity of the city has been promoted far beyond the entire cost of the whole speculation.
In February, 1854, numerous stockholders applied to me to accept the Presidency of the Crystal Palace, or, as it was termed, “The Association for the Exhibition of the Industry of all Nations.” I utterly declined listening to such a project, as I felt confident that the novelty had passed away, and that it would be difficult to revive public interest in the affair.
Shortly afterwards, however, I was waited upon by numerous influential gentlemen, and strongly urged to allow my name to be used. I repeatedly objected to this, and at last consented, much against my own judgment. Having been elected one of the directors, I was by that body chosen President. I accepted the office conditionally, reserving the right to decline if I thought, upon investigation, that there was no vitality left in the institution. Upon examining the accounts said to exist against the Association, many were pronounced indefensible by those who I supposed knew the facts in the case, while various debts existing against the concern were not exhibited when called for, and I knew nothing of their existence until after I accepted the office of President. I finally accepted it, only because no suitable person could be found who was willing to devote his entire time and services to the enterprise, and because I was frequently urged by directors and stockholders to take hold of it for the benefit of the city at large, inasmuch as it was well settled that the Palace would be permanently closed early in April, 1854, if I did not take the helm.
These considerations moved me, and I entered upon my duties with all the vigor which I could command. To save it from bankruptcy, I advanced large sums of money for the payment of debts, and tried by every legitimate means to create an excitement and bring it into life. By extraneous efforts, such as the Re-inauguration, the Monster Concerts of Jullien, the Celebration of Independence, etc., it was temporarily galvanized, and gave several life-like kicks, generally without material results, except prostrating those who handled it too familiarly; but it was a corpse long before I touched it, and I found, after a thorough trial, that my first impression was correct, and that so far as my ability was concerned, “the dead could not be raised.” I therefore resigned the presidency and the concern soon went into liquidation.
In 1854, my esteemed friend, Reverend Moses Ballou, wrote, and Redfield, of New York, published a volume entitled “The Divine Character Vindicated” in which he reviewed some of the principal features of a work by the Rev. E. Beecher, brother of Henry Ward Beecher, “The Conflict of Ages; or, the Great Debate on the Moral Relations of God and Man.” The dedication in Rev. Mr. Ballou s volume was as follows:
To P. T. BARNUM, ESQ., IRANISTAN.
My Dear B.:--I am more deeply indebted to you for personal favors than to any other living man, and I feel that it is but a poor acknowledgment to beg your acceptance of this volume. Still, I know that you will value it somewhat, not only for the sake of our personal friendship, but because it is an advocate of that interpretation of Christianity of which you have ever been a most generous and devoted patron. With renewed assurances of my best regards,
I am, yours, always,
M. B.
BRIDGEPORT, January 22, 1854.
The following trifling incident which occurred at Iranistan in the winter of 1852, has been called to my mind by a lady friend from Philadelphia, who was visiting us at the time. The poem was sent to me soon after the occurrence, but was lost and the subject forgotten until my Philadelphia friend recently sent it to me with the wish that I should insert it in the present volume:
WINTER BOUQUETS.
AN INCIDENT IN THE LIFE OF AN AMERICAN CITIZEN.
THE poor man’s garden lifeless lay Beneath a fall of snow; But Art in costly greenhouses, Keeps Summer in full glow. And Taste paid gold for bright bouquets, The parlor vase that drest, That scented Fashion’s gay boudoir, Or bloomed on Beauty’s breast.
A rich man sat beside the fire, Within his sculptured halls; Brave heart, clear head, and busy hand, Had reared those stately walls. He to his gardener spake, and said In tone of quiet glee-- “I want a hundred fine bouquets-- Canst make them, John, for me?”
John’s eyes became exceeding round, This question when he heard; He gazed upon his master, And he answered not a word. “Well, John,” the rich man laughing said, “If these too many be, What sayest to half the number, man? Canst fifty make for me?”
Now John prized every flower, as ’twere A daughter or a son; And thought, like Regan--“what the need Of fifty, or of one?” But keeping back the thought, he said, “I think, sir, that I might; But it would leave my lady’s flowers In very ragged plight.”
“Well, John, thy vegetable pets Must needs respected be; We’ll halve the number once again-- Make twenty-five for me. And hark ye, John, when they are made Come up and let me know; And I’ll give thee a list of those To whom the flowers must go.”
The twenty-five bouquets were made, And round the village sent; And to whom thinkest thou, my friend, These floral jewels went? Not to the beautiful and proud-- Not to the rich and gay-- Who, Dives-like, at Luxury’s feast Are seated every day.
An aged Pastor, on his desk Saw those fair preachers stand; A Widow wept upon the gift, And blessed the giver’s hand. Where Poverty bent o’er her task, They cheered the lonely room; And round the bed where Sickness lay, They breathed Health’s fresh perfume.
Oh! kindly heart and open hand-- Those flowers in dust are trod, But they bloom to weave a wreath for thee, In the Paradise of God. Sweet is the Minstrel’s task, whose song Of deeds like these may tell; And long may he have power to give, Who wields that power so well!
MRS. ANNA BACHE.
PHILADELPHIA.
XXV. THE JEROME CLOCK COMPANY ENTANGLEMENT
THE EAST BRIDGEPORT ENTERPRISE--W. H. NOBLE--PLANS FOR A NEW CITY--DR. TIMOTHY DWIGHT’S TESTIMONY--INVESTING A FORTUNE--SELLING CITY LOTS--MONEY MAKING A SECONDARY CONSIDERATION--CLOCK COMPANY IN LITCHFIELD--THE “TERRY AND BARNUM MANUFACTURING COMPANY”--THE JEROME CLOCK COMPANY--BAITING FOR BITES--FALSE REPRESENTATIONS--HOW I WAS DELUDED--WHAT I AGREED TO DO--THE COUNTER AGREEMENT--NOTES WITH BLANK DATES--THE LIMIT OF MY RESPONSIBILITY--HOW IT WAS EXCEEDED--STARTLING DISCOVERIES--A RUINED MAN--PAYING MY OWN HONEST DEBTS--BARNUM DUPED--MY FAILURE--THE BARNUM AND JEROME CLOCK BUBBLE--MORALISTS MAKING USE OF MY MISFORTUNES--WHAT PREACHERS, PAPERS, AND PEOPLE SAID ABOUT ME--DOWN IN THE DEPTHS.
I now come to a series of events which, all things considered, constitute one of the most remarkable experiences of my life--an experience which brought me much pain and many trials; which humbled my pride and threatened me with hopeless financial ruin; and yet, nevertheless, put new blood in my veins, fresh vigor in my action, warding off all temptation to rust in the repose which affluence induces, and developed, I trust, new and better elements of manliness in my character. This trial carried me through a severe and costly discipline, and now that I have passed through it and have triumphed over it, I can thank God for sending it upon me, though I feel no special obligations to the human instruments employed in the severe chastening.
When the blow fell upon me, I thought that I could never recover; the event has shown, however, that I have gained both in character and fortune, and what threatened, for years, to be my ruin, has proved one of the most fortunate happenings of my career. The “Bull Run” of my life’s battle was a crushing defeat, which, unknown to me at the time, only presaged the victories which were to follow.
In my general plan of presenting the facts and incidents of my life in chronological order, I shall necessarily introduce in the history of the next seven years, an account of my entanglement in the “Jerome Clock Company,”--how I was drawn into it, how I got out of it, and what it did to me and for me. The great notoriety given to my connection with this concern--the fact that the journals throughout the country made it the subject of news, gossip, sympathy, abuse, and advice to and about me, my friends, my persecutors, and the public generally--seems to demand that the story should be briefly but plainly told. The event itself has passed away and with it the passions and excitements that were born of it; and I certainly have no desire now to deal in personalities or to go into the question of the motives which influenced those who were interested, any farther than may be strictly essential to a fair and candid statement of the case.
It is vital to the narrative that I should give some account of the new city, East Bridgeport, and my interests therein, which led directly to my subsequent complications with the Jerome Clock Company.
In 1851, I purchased from Mr. William H. Noble, of Bridgeport, the undivided half of his late father’s homestead, consisting of fifty acres of land; lying on the east side of the river, opposite the City of Bridgeport. We intended this as the nucleus of a new city, which we concluded could soon be built up, in consequence of many natural advantages that it possesses.
Before giving publicity to our plans, however, we purchased one hundred and seventy-four acres contiguous to that which we already owned, and laid out the entire property in regular streets, and lined them with trees, reserving a beautiful grove of six or eight acres, which we inclosed, and converted into a public park. We then commenced selling alternate lots, at the same price which the land cost us by the acre. Our sales were always made on the condition that a suitable dwelling-house, store, or manufactory should be erected upon the land, within one year from the date of purchase; that every building should be placed at a certain distance from the street, in a style of architecture approved by us; that the grounds should be enclosed with acceptable fences, and kept clean and neat, with other conditions which would render the locality a desirable one for respectable residents, and operate for the mutual benefit of all persons who should become settlers in the new city.
This entire property consists of a beautiful plateau of ground, lying within less than half a mile of the centre of Bridgeport city. Considering the superiority of the situation, it is a wonder that the City of Bridgeport was not originally founded upon that side of the river. The late Dr. Timothy Dwight, for a long time President of Yale College, in his “Travels in New England in 1815,” says of the locality:
“There is not in the State a prettier village than the borough of Bridgeport. In the year 1783, there were scarcely half a dozen houses in this place. It now contains probably more than one hundred, built on both sides of Pughquonnuck (Pequonnock) river, a beautiful mill-stream, forming at its mouth the harbor of Bridgeport. The situation of this village is very handsome, particularly on the eastern side of the river. A more cheerful and elegant piece of ground can scarcely be imagined than the point which stretches between the Pughquonnuck and the old mill-brook; and the prospects presented by the harbors at the mouths of these streams, the Sound, and the surrounding country, are, in a fine season, gay and brilliant, perhaps without a parallel.”
This “cheerful and elegant piece of ground,” as Dr. Dwight so truly describes it, had only been kept from market by the want of means of access. A new foot-bridge was built, connecting this place with the City of Bridgeport, and a public toll-bridge which belonged to us was thrown open to the public free. We also obtained from the State Legislature a charter for erecting a toll-bridge between the two bridges already existing, and under that charter we put up a fine covered draw-bridge at a cost of $16,000 which also we made free to the public for several years. We built and leased to a union company of young coach makers a large and elegant coach manufactory, which was one of the first buildings erected there, and which went into operation on the first of January, 1852, and was the beginning of the extensive manufactories which were subsequently built in East Bridgeport.
Besides the inducement which we held out to purchasers to obtain their lots at a merely nominal price, we advanced one half, two-thirds, and frequently all the funds necessary to erect their buildings, permitting them to repay us in sums as small as five dollars, at their own convenience. This arrangement enabled many persons to secure and ultimately pay for homes which they could not otherwise have obtained. We looked for our profits solely to the rise in the value of the reserved lots, which we were confident must ensue. Of course, these extraordinary inducements led many persons to build in the new city, and it began to develop and increase with a rapidity rarely witnessed in this section of the country. Indeed, our speculation, which might be termed a profitable philanthropy, soon promised to be so remunerative, that I offered Mr. Noble for his interest in the estate, $60,000 more than the prime cost, which offer he declined.
It will thus be seen that, in 1851, my pet scheme was to build up a city in East Bridgeport. I had made a large fortune and was anxious to be released from the harassing cares of active business. But I could not be idle, and if I could be instrumental in giving value to land comparatively worthless; if I could by the judicious investment of a portion of my capital open the way for new industries and new homes, I should be of service to my fellow men and find grateful employment for my energies and time. I saw that in case of success there was profit in my project, and I was enough like mankind in general to look upon the enlargement of my means as a consummation devoutly and legitimately to be wished.
Yet, I can truly say that mere money-making was a secondary consideration in my scheme. I wanted to build a city on the beautiful plateau across the river; in the expressive phrase of the day, I “had East Bridgeport on the brain.” Whoever approached me with a project which looked to the advancement of my new city, touched my weak side and found me an eager listener. The serpent that beguiled me was any plausible proposition that promised prosperity to East Bridgeport, and it was in this way that the coming city connected me with that source of so many annoyances and woes, the Jerome Clock Company.
There was a small clock manufactory in the town of Litchfield, Connecticut, in which I became a stockholder to the amount of six or seven thousand dollars, and my duties as a director in the company called me occasionally to Litchfield and made me somewhat acquainted with the clock business. Thinking of plans to forward my pet East Bridgeport enterprise, it occurred to me that if the Litchfield clock concern could be transferred to my prospective new city, it would necessarily bring many families, thus increasing the growth of the place and the value of the property. Negotiations were at once commenced and the desired transfer of the business was the result. A new stock company was formed under the name of the “Terry & Barnum Manufacturing Company,” and in 1852 a factory was built in East Bridgeport.
In 1855, I received a suggestion from a citizen of New Haven, that the Jerome Clock Company, then reputed to be a wealthy concern, should be removed to East Bridgeport, and shortly afterwards I was visited at Iranistan by Mr. Chauncey Jerome, the President of that company. The result of this visit was a proposition from the agent of the company, who also held power of attorney for the president, that I should lend my name as security for $110,000 in aid of the Jerome Clock Company, and the proffered compensation was the transfer of this great manufacturing concern, with its seven hundred to one thousand operatives, to my beloved East Bridgeport. It was just the bait for the fish; I was all attention; yet I must do my judgment the justice to say that I called for proofs, strong and ample, that the great company deserved its reputation as a substantial enterprise that might safely be trusted.
Accordingly, I was shown an official report of the directors of the company, exhibiting a capital of $400,000, and a surplus of $187,000, in all, $587,000. The need for $110,000 more, was on account of a dull season, and the market glutted with the goods, and immediate money demands which must be met. I was also impressed with the pathetic tale that the company was exceedingly loth to dismiss any of the operatives, who would suffer greatly if their only dependence for their daily food was taken away.
The official statement seemed satisfactory, and I cordially sympathized with the philanthropic purpose of keeping the workmen employed, even in the dull season. The company was reputed to be rich; the President, Mr. Chauncey Jerome, had built a church in New Haven, at a cost of $40,000, and proposed to present it to a congregation; he had given a clock to a church in Bridgeport, and these things showed that he, at least, thought he was wealthy. The Jerome clocks were for sale all over the world, even in China, where the Celestials were said to take out the “movements,” and use the cases for little temples for their idols, thus proving that faith was possible without “works.” So wealthy and so widely-known a company would surely be a grand acquisition to my city.
Further testimony came in the form of a letter from the cashier of one of the New Haven banks, expressing the highest confidence in the financial strength of the concern, and much satisfaction that I contemplated giving temporary aid which would keep so many workmen and their families from suffering, and perhaps starvation. I had not, at the time, the slightest suspicion that my voluntary correspondent had any interest in the transfer of the Jerome Company from New Haven to East Bridgeport, though I was subsequently informed that the bank, of which my correspondent was the cashier, was almost the largest, if not the largest, creditor of the clock company.
Under all the circumstances, and influenced by the rose-colored representations made to me, not less than by my mania to push the growth of my new city, I finally accepted the proposition and consented to an agreement that I would lend the clock company my notes for a sum not to exceed $50,000, and accept drafts to an amount not to exceed $60,000. It was thoroughly understood that I was in no case to be responsible for one cent in excess of $110,000. I also received the written guaranty of Chauncey Jerome that in no event should I lose by the loan, as he would become personally responsible for the repayment. I was willing that my notes, when taken up, should be renewed, I cared not how often, provided the stipulated maximum of $110,000 should never be exceeded. I was weak enough, however, under the representation that it was impossible to say exactly when it would be necessary to use the notes, to put my name to several notes for $3,000, $5,000, and $10,000, leaving the date of payment blank; but it was agreed that the blanks should be filled to make the notes payable in five, ten, or even sixty days from date, according to the exigencies of the case, and I was careful to keep a memorandum of the several amounts of the notes.
On the other side it was agreed that the Jerome Company should exchange its stock with the Terry & Barnum stockholders and thus absorb that company and unite the entire business in East Bridgeport. It was scarcely a month before the secretary wrote me that the company would soon be in condition to “snap its fingers at the banks.”
Nevertheless, three months after the consolidation of the companies, a reference to my memoranda showed that I had already become responsible for the stipulated sum of $110,000. I was then called upon in New York by the agent who wanted five notes of $5,000 each and I declined to furnish them, unless I should receive in return an equal amount in my own cancelled notes, since he assured me they were cancelling these “every week.” The cancelled notes were brought to me next day and I renewed them. This I did frequently, always receiving cancelled notes, till finally my confidence in the company became so established that I did not ask to see the notes that had been taken up, but furnished new accommodation paper as it was called for.
By and by I heard that the banks began to hesitate about discounting my paper, and knowing that I was good for $110,000 several times over, I wondered what was the matter, till the discovery came at last that my notes had not been taken up as was represented, and that some of the blank date notes had been made payable in twelve, eighteen, and twenty-four months. Further investigation revealed the frightful fact that I had endorsed for the clock company to the extent of more than half a million dollars, and most of the notes had been exchanged for old Jerome Company notes due to the banks and other creditors. My agent who made these startling discoveries came back to me with the refreshing intelligence that I was a ruined man!
Not quite; I had the mountain of Jerome debts on my back, but I found means to pay every claim against me at my bank, all my store and shop debts, notes to the amount of $40,000, which banks in my neighborhood, relying upon my personal integrity, had discounted for the Clock Company, and then I--failed!
What a dupe had I been! Here was a great company pretending to be worth $587,000, asking temporary assistance to the amount of $110,000, coming down with a crash, so soon as my helping hand was removed, and sweeping me down with it. It failed; and even after absorbing my fortune, it paid but from twelve to fifteen per cent of its obligations, while, to cap the climax, it never removed to East Bridgeport at all, notwithstanding this was the only condition which ever prompted me to advance one dollar to the rotten concern!
If at any time my vanity had been chilled by the fear that after my retirement from the Jenny Lind enterprise the world would forget me, this affair speedily reassured me; I had notice enough to satisfy the most inordinate craving for notoriety. All over the country, and even across the ocean, “Barnum and the Jerome Clock Bubble” was the great newspaper theme. I was taken to pieces, analyzed, put together again, kicked, “pitched into,” tumbled about, preached to, preached about, and made to serve every purpose to which a sensation-loving world could put me. Well! I was now in training, in a new school, and was learning new and strange lessons.
Yet, these new lessons conveyed the old, old story. There were those who had fawned upon me in my prosperity, who now jeered at my adversity; people whom I had specially favored, made special efforts to show their ingratitude; papers which, when I had the means to make it an object for them to be on good terms with me, overloaded me with adulation, now attempted to overwhelm me with abuse; and then the immense amount of moralizing over the “instability of human fortunes,” and especially the retributive justice that is sure to follow “ill-gotten gains,” which my censors assumed to be the sum and substance of my honorably acquired and industriously worked for property. I have no doubt that much of this kind of twaddle was believed by the twaddlers to be sincere; and thus my case was actual capital to certain preachers and religious editors who were in want of fresh illustrations wherewith to point their morals.
As for myself, I was in the depths, but I did not despond. I was confident that with energetic purpose and divine assistance I should, if my health and life were spared, get on my feet again; and events have since fully justified and verified the expectation and the effort.