Literary Lapses Read online

  "All right, I've got it."

  "Put it back in the pack. Thanks. (Shuffle, shuffle,shuffle--flip)--There, is that it?" (triumphantly).

  "I don't know. I lost sight of it."

  "Lost sight of it! Confound it, you have to look at itand see what it is."

  "Oh, you want me to look at the front of it!"

  "Why, of course! Now then, pick a card."

  "All right. I've picked it. Go ahead."(Shuffle, shuffle, shuffle--flip.)

  "Say, confound you, did you put that card back in thepack?"

  "Why, no. I kept it."

  "Holy Moses! Listen. Pick--a--card--just one--look atit--see what it is--then put it back--do you understand?"

  "Oh, perfectly. Only I don't see how you are ever goingto do it. You must be awfully clever."

  (Shuffle, shuffle, shuffle--flip.)

  "There you are; that's your card, now, isn't it?" (Thisis the supreme moment.)

  "NO. THAT IS NOT MY CARD." (This is a flat lie, but Heavenwill pardon you for it.)

  "Not that card!!!! Say--just hold on a second. Here, now,watch what you're at this time. I can do this cursedthing, mind you, every time. I've done it on father, onmother, and on every one that's ever come round our place.Pick a card. (Shuffle, shuffle, shuffle--flip, bang.)There, that's your card."

  "NO. I AM SORRY. THAT IS NOT MY CARD. But won't you tryit again? Please do. Perhaps you are a little excited--I'mafraid I was rather stupid. Won't you go and sit quietlyby yourself on the back verandah for half an hour andthen try? You have to go home? Oh, I'm so sorry. It mustbe such an awfully clever little trick. Good night!"

  Back to the Bush

  I have a friend called Billy, who has the Bush Mania. Bytrade he is a doctor, but I do not think that he needsto sleep out of doors. In ordinary things his mind appearssound. Over the tops I of his gold-rimmed spectacles, ashe bends forward to speak to you, there gleams nothingbut amiability and kindliness. Like all the rest of ushe is, or was until he forgot it all, an extremelywell-educated man.

  I am aware of no criminal strain in his blood. Yet Billyis in reality hopelessly unbalanced. He has the Mania ofthe Open Woods.

  Worse than that, he is haunted with the desire to draghis friends with him into the depths of the Bush.

  Whenever we meet he starts to talk about it.

  Not long ago I met him in the club.

  "I wish," he said, "you'd let me take you clear away upthe Gatineau."

  "Yes, I wish I would, I don't think," I murmured tomyself, but I humoured him and said:

  "How do we go, Billy, in a motor-car or by train?"

  "No, we paddle."

  "And is it up-stream all the way?"

  "Oh, yes," Billy said enthusiastically.

  "And how many days do we paddle all day to get up?"

  "Six."

  "Couldn't we do it in less?"

  "Yes," Billy answered, feeling that I was entering intothe spirit of the thing, "if we start each morning justbefore daylight and paddle hard till moonlight, we coulddo it in five days and a half."

  "Glorious! and are there portages?"

  "Lots of them."

  "And at each of these do I carry two hundred pounds ofstuff up a hill on my back?"

  "Yes."

  "And will there be a guide, a genuine, dirty-lookingIndian guide?"

  "Yes."

  "And can I sleep next to him?"

  "Oh, yes, if you want to."

  "And when we get to the top, what is there?"

  "Well, we go over the height of land."

  "Oh, we do, do we? And is the height of land all rockand about three hundred yards up-hill? And do I carry abarrel of flour up it? And does it roll down and crushme on the other side? Look here, Billy, this trip is agreat thing, but it is too luxurious for me. If you willhave me paddled up the river in a large iron canoe withan awning, carried over the portages in a sedan-chair,taken across the height of land in a palanquin or ahowdah, and lowered down the other side in a derrick,I'll go. Short of that, the thing would be too fattening."

  Billy was discouraged and left me. But he has sincereturned repeatedly to the attack.

  He offers to take me to the head-waters of the Batiscan.I am content at the foot.

  He wants us to go to the sources of the Attahwapiscat.I don't.

  He says I ought to see the grand chutes of the Kewakasis.Why should I?

  I have made Billy a counter-proposition that we strikethrough the Adirondacks (in the train) to New York, fromthere portage to Atlantic City, then to Washington,carrying our own grub (in the dining-car), camp there afew days (at the Willard), and then back, I to return bytrain and Billy on foot with the outfit.

  The thing is still unsettled.

  Billy, of course, is only one of thousands that have gotthis mania. And the autumn is the time when it rages atits worst.

  Every day there move northward trains, packed full oflawyers, bankers, and brokers, headed for the bush. Theyare dressed up to look like pirates. They wear slouchhats, flannel shirts, and leather breeches with belts.They could afford much better clothes than these, butthey won't use them. I don't know where they get theseclothes. I think the railroad lends them out. They haveguns between their knees and big knives at their hips.They smoke the worst tobacco they can find, and theycarry ten gallons of alcohol per man in the baggage car.

  In the intervals of telling lies to one another they readthe railroad pamphlets about hunting. This kind ofliterature is deliberately and fiendishly contrived toinfuriate their mania. I know all about these pamphletsbecause I write them. I once, for instance, wrote up,from imagination, a little place called Dog Lake at theend of a branch line. The place had failed as a settlement,and the railroad had decided to turn it into a huntingresort. I did the turning. I think I did it rather well,rechristening the lake and stocking the place with suitablevarieties of game. The pamphlet ran like this.

  "The limpid waters of Lake Owatawetness (the name,according to the old Indian legends of the place, signifies,The Mirror of the Almighty) abound with every knownvariety of fish. Near to its surface, so close that theangler may reach out his hand and stroke them, schoolsof pike, pickerel, mackerel, doggerel, and chickereljostle one another in the water. They rise instantaneouslyto the bait and swim gratefully ashore holding it intheir mouths. In the middle depth of the waters of thelake, the sardine, the lobster, the kippered herring,the anchovy and other tinned varieties of fish disportthemselves with evident gratification, while even lowerin the pellucid depths the dog-fish, the hog-fish, thelog-fish, and the sword-fish whirl about in never-endingcircles.

  "Nor is Lake Owatawetness merely an Angler's Paradise.Vast forests of primeval pine slope to the very shoresof the lake, to which descend great droves of bears--brown,green, and bear-coloured--while as the shades of eveningfall, the air is loud with the lowing of moose, cariboo,antelope, cantelope, musk-oxes, musk-rats, and othergraminivorous mammalia of the forest. These enormousquadrumana generally move off about 10.30 p.m., fromwhich hour until 11.45 p.m. the whole shore is reservedfor bison and buffalo.

  "After midnight hunters who so desire it can be chasedthrough the woods, for any distance and at any speed theyselect, by jaguars, panthers, cougars, tigers, and jackalswhose ferocity is reputed to be such that they will tearthe breeches off a man with their teeth in their eagernessto sink their fangs in his palpitating flesh. Hunters,attention! Do not miss such attractions as these!"

  I have seen men--quiet, reputable, well-shaved men--reading that pamphlet of mine in the rotundas of hotels,with their eyes blazing with excitement. I think it isthe jaguar attraction that hits them the hardest, becauseI notice them rub themselves sympathetically with theirhands while they read.

  Of course, you can imagine the effect of this sort ofliterature on the brains of men fresh from their offices,and dressed out as pirates.

  They just go crazy and stay crazy.

  Just watch them when they get into the bush.

  Notice that well-to-do stockbrok
er crawling about on hisstomach in the underbrush, with his spectacles shininglike gig-lamps. What is he doing? He is after a cariboothat isn't there. He is "stalking" it. With his stomach.Of course, away down in his heart he knows that thecariboo isn't there and never was; but that man read mypamphlet and went crazy. He can't help it: he's GOT tostalk something. Mark him as he crawls along; see himcrawl through a thimbleberry bush (very quietly so thatthe cariboo won't hear the noise of the prickles goinginto him), then through a bee's nest, gently and slowly,so that the cariboo will not take fright when the beesare stinging him. Sheer woodcraft! Yes, mark him. Markhim any way you like. Go up behind him and paint a bluecross on the seat of his pants as he crawls. He'll nevernotice. He thinks he's a hunting dog. Yet this is theman who laughs at his little son of ten for crawlinground under the dining-room table with a mat over hisshoulders, and pretending to be a bear.

  Now see these other men in camp.

  Someone has told them--I think I first started the ideain my pamphlet--that the thing is to sleep on a pile ofhemlock branches. I think I told them to listen to thewind sowing (you know the word I mean), sowing and crooningin the giant pines. So there they are upside-down, doubledup on a couch of green spikes that would have killed St.Sebastian. They stare up at the sky with blood-shot,restless eyes, waiting for the crooning to begin. Andthere isn't a sow in sight.

  Here is another man, ragged and with a six days' growthof beard, frying a piece of bacon on a stick over a littlefire. Now what does he think he is? The CHEF of theWaldorf Astoria? Yes, he does, and what's more he thinksthat that miserable bit of bacon, cut with a tobaccoknife from a chunk of meat that lay six days in the rain,is fit to eat. What's more, he'll eat it. So will therest. They're all crazy together.

  There's another man, the Lord help him who thinks he hasthe "knack" of being a carpenter. He is hammering upshelves to a tree. Till the shelves fall down he thinkshe is a wizard. Yet this is the same man who swore athis wife for asking him to put up a shelf in the backkitchen. "How the blazes," he asked, "could he nail thedamn thing up? Did she think he was a plumber?"

  After all, never mind.

  Provided they are happy up there, let them stay.

  Personally, I wouldn't mind if they didn't come back andlie about it. They get back to the city dead fagged forwant of sleep, sogged with alcohol, bitten brown by thebush-flies, trampled on by the moose and chased throughthe brush by bears and skunks--and they have the nerveto say that they like it.

  Sometimes I think they do.

  Men are only animals anyway. They like to get out intothe woods and growl round at night and feel somethingbite them.

  Only why haven't they the imagination to be able to dothe same thing with less fuss? Why not take their coatsand collars off in the office and crawl round on thefloor and growl at one another. It would be just as good.

  Reflections on Riding

  The writing of this paper has been inspired by a debaterecently held at the literary society of my native townon the question, "Resolved: that the bicycle is a nobleranimal than the horse." In order to speak for the negativewith proper authority, I have spent some weeks in completelyaddicting myself to the use of the horse. I find thatthe difference between the horse and the bicycle isgreater than I had supposed.

  The horse is entirely covered with hair; the bicycle isnot entirely covered with hair, except the '89 model theyare using in Idaho.

  In riding a horse the performer finds that the pedals inwhich he puts his feet will not allow of a good circularstroke. He will observe, however, that there is a saddlein which--especially while the horse is trotting--he isexpected to seat himself from time to time. But it issimpler to ride standing up, with the feet in the pedals.

  There are no handles to a horse, but the 1910 model hasa string to each side of its face for turning its headwhen there is anything you want it to see.

  Coasting on a good horse is superb, but should be undercontrol. I have known a horse to suddenly begin to coastwith me about two miles from home, coast down the mainstreet of my native town at a terrific rate, and finallycoast through a plantoon of the Salvation Army into itslivery stable.

  I cannot honestly deny that it takes a good deal ofphysical courage to ride a horse. This, however, I have.I get it at about forty cents a flask, and take it asrequired.

  I find that in riding a horse up the long street of acountry town, it is not well to proceed at a trot. Itexcites unkindly comment. It is better to let the horsewalk the whole distance. This may be made to seem naturalby turning half round in the saddle with the hand on thehorse's back, and gazing intently about two miles up theroad. It then appears that you are the first in of aboutfourteen men.

  Since learning to ride, I have taken to noticing thethings that people do on horseback in books. Some ofthese I can manage, but most of them are entirely beyondme. Here, for instance, is a form of equestrian performancethat every reader will recognize and for which I haveonly a despairing admiration:

  "With a hasty gesture of farewell, the rider set spursto his horse and disappeared in a cloud of dust."

  With a little practice in the matter of adjustment, Ithink I could set spurs to any size of horse, but I couldnever disappear in a cloud of dust--at least, not withany guarantee of remaining disappeared when the dustcleared away.

  Here, however, is one that I certainly can do:

  "The bridle-rein dropped from Lord Everard's listlesshand, and, with his head bowed upon his bosom, he sufferedhis horse to move at a foot's pace up the sombre avenue.Deep in thought, he heeded not the movement of the steedwhich bore him."

  That is, he looked as if he didn't; but in my case LordEverard has his eye on the steed pretty closely, justthe same.

  This next I am doubtful about:

  "To horse! to horse!" cried the knight, and leaped intothe saddle.

  I think I could manage it if it read:

  "To horse!" cried the knight, and, snatching a step-ladderfrom the hands of his trusty attendant, he rushed intothe saddle.

  As a concluding remark, I may mention that my experienceof riding has thrown a very interesting sidelight upona rather puzzling point in history. It is recorded ofthe famous Henry the Second that he was "almost constantlyin the saddle, and of so restless a disposition that henever sat down, even at meals." I had hitherto been unableto understand Henry's idea about his meals, but I thinkI can appreciate it now.

  Saloonio

  A STUDY IN SHAKESPEAREAN CRITICISM

  They say that young men fresh from college are prettypositive about what they know. But from my own experienceof life, I should say that if you take a comfortable,elderly man who hasn't been near a college for abouttwenty years, who has been pretty liberally fed and dinedever since, who measures about fifty inches around thecircumference, and has a complexion like a cranberry bycandlelight, you will find that there is a degree ofabsolute certainty about what he thinks he knows thatwill put any young man to shame. I am specially convincedof this from the case of my friend Colonel Hogshead, aportly, choleric gentleman who made a fortune in thecattle-trade out in Wyoming, and who, in his later days,has acquired a chronic idea that the plays of Shakespeareare the one subject upon which he is most qualified tospeak personally.

  He came across me the other evening as I was sitting bythe fire in the club sitting-room looking over the leavesof The Merchant of Venice, and began to hold forth to meabout the book.

  "Merchant of Venice, eh? There's a play for you, sir!There's genius! Wonderful, sir, wonderful! You take thecharacters in that play and where will you find anythinglike them? You take Antonio, take Sherlock, take Saloonio--"

  "Saloonio, Colonel?" I interposed mildly, "aren't youmaking a mistake? There's a Bassanio and a Salanio inthe play, but I don't think there's any Saloonio, isthere?"

  For a moment Colonel Hogshead's eye became misty withdoubt, but he was not the man to admit himself in error:

  "Tut, tut! young man," he said with a frown, "don't skimthrough your books in that way. N
o Saloonio? Why, ofcourse there's a Saloonio!"

  "But I tell you, Colonel," I rejoined, "I've just beenreading the play and studying it, and I know there's nosuch character--"

  "Nonsense, sir, nonsense!" said the Colonel, "why hecomes in all through; don't tell me, young man, I've readthat play myself. Yes, and seen it played, too, out inWyoming, before you were born, by fellers, sir, thatcould act. No Saloonio, indeed! why, who is it that isAntonio's friend all through and won't leave him whenBassoonio turns against him? Who rescues Clarissa fromSherlock, and steals the casket of flesh from the Princeof Aragon? Who shouts at the Prince of Morocco, 'Out,out, you damned candlestick'? Who loads up the jury inthe trial scene and fixes the doge? No Saloonio! By gad!in my opinion, he's the most important character in theplay--"

  "Colonel Hogshead," I said very firmly, "there isn't anySaloonio and you know it."

  But the old man had got fairly started on whatever dimrecollection had given birth to Saloonio; the characterseemed to grow more and more luminous in the Colonel'smind, and he continued with increasing animation:

  "I'll just tell you what Saloonio is: he's a type.Shakespeare means him to embody the type of the perfectItalian gentleman. He's an idea, that's what he is, he'sa symbol, he's a unit--"

  Meanwhile I had been searching among the leaves of theplay. "Look here," I said, "here's the list of the DramatisPersonae. There's no Saloonio there."

  But this didn't dismay the Colonel one atom. "Why, ofcourse there isn't," he said. "You don't suppose you'dfind Saloonio there! That's the whole art of it! That'sShakespeare! That's the whole gist of it! He's kept cleanout of the Personae--gives him scope, gives him a freehand, makes him more of a type than ever. Oh, it's asubtle thing, sir, the dramatic art!" continued theColonel, subsiding into quiet reflection; "it takes afeller quite a time to get right into Shakespeare's mindand see what he's at all the time."