CHAPTER XVII.
A Lively Sunday in Boston—Lecture in the Boston Theater—Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes—The Booth-Modjeska Combination.
Boston, January 26.
“Max Eliot” devotes a charming and most flattering article to me in this morning’s Herald, embodying the conversation we had together yesterday in the Boston Herald’s office. Many thanks, Max.
A reception was given to me this afternoon by Citizen George Francis Train, and I met many artists, journalists, and a galaxy of charming women.
The Citizen is pronounced to be the greatest crank on earth. I found him decidedly eccentric, but entertaining, witty, and a first-rate raconteur. He shakes hands with you in the Chinese fashion—he shakes his own. He has taken a solemn oath that his body shall never come in contact with the body of any one.
A charming programme of music and recitations was gone through.
The invitation cards issued for the occasion speak for themselves.
THE CITIZEN SHAKES HANDS.
CITIZEN
GEORGE FRANCIS TRAIN’S
RECEPTION
To
CITOYEN MAX O’RELL.
P.S.—“Demons” have checkmated “Psychos”! Invitations canceled! “Hub” Boycotts Sunday Receptions! Boston half century behind New York and Europe’s Elite Society. (Ancient Athens still Ancient!) Regrets and Regards! Good-by, Tremont! (The Proprietors not to blame.)
Vide some of his “Apothegmic Works”! (Reviewed in Pulitzer’s New York World and Cosmos Press!)
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John Bull et Son Ile! Les Filles de John Bull! Les Chers Voisins! L’Ami Macdonald! John Bull, Junior! Jonathan et Son Continent! L’Eloquence Française! etc.
YOU ARE INVITED TO MEET
this distinguished French Traveler, Author, and Lecturer (From the land of Lafayette, Rochambeau, and De Grasse),
AT MY SIXTH “POP-CORN RECEPTION”!
Sunday, January Twenty-Sixth, From 2 to 7 P. M. (Tremont House!)
Private Banquet Hall! Fifty “Notables”!
Talent from Dozen Operas and Theaters! All Stars! No Airs! No “Wall Flowers”! No Amens! No Selahs! But “MUTUAL ADMIRATION CLUB OF GOOD FELLOWSHIP”! No Boredom! No Formality! (Dress as you like!) No Programme! (Pianos! Cellos! Guitars! Mandolins! Banjos! Violins! Harmonicas! Zithers!) Opera, Theater and Press Represented!
Succeeding Receptions: To Steele Mackaye! Nat Goodwin! Count Zubof (St. Petersburg)! Prima Donna Clementina De Vere (Italy)! Albany Press Club! (Duly announced printed invitations!)
GEORGE FRANCIS TRAIN,
Tremont House for Winter!
Psychic Press thanks for friendly
notices of Sunday Musicales!
It will be seen from the “P. S.” that the reception could not be held at the Tremont House; but the plucky Citizen did not allow himself to be beaten, and the reception took place at the house of a friend.
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In the evening I lectured in the Boston Theater to a beautiful audience.
If there is a horrible fascination about “the man who won’t smile,” as I mentioned in a foregoing chapter, there is a lovely fascination about the lady who seems to enjoy your lecture thoroughly. You watch the effects of your remarks on her face, and her bright, intellectual eyes keep you in good form the whole evening; in fact, you give the lecture to her. I perhaps never felt the influence of that face more powerfully than to-night. I had spoken for a few minutes, when Madame Modjeska, accompanied by her husband, arrived and took a seat on the first row of the orchestra stalls. To be able to entertain the great tragédienne became my sole aim, and as soon as I perceived that I was successful, I felt perfectly proud and happy. I lectured to her the whole evening. Her laughter and applause encouraged me, her beautiful, intellectual face cheered me up, and I was able to introduce a little more acting and by-play than usual.
I had had the pleasure of making Madame Modjeska’s acquaintance two years ago, during my first visit to the United States, and it was a great pleasure to be able to renew it after the lecture.
I will go and see her Ophelia to-morrow night.
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January 27.
Spent the whole morning wandering about Boston, and visiting a few interesting places. Beacon Street, the public gardens, and Commonwealth Avenue are among the finest thoroughfares I know. What enormous wealth is contained in those miles of huge mansions!
The more I see Boston, the more it strikes me as a great English city. It has a character of its own, as no other American city has, excepting perhaps Washington and Philadelphia. The solidity of the buildings, the parks, the quietness of the women’s dresses, the absence of the twang in most of the voices, all remind you of England.
After lunch I called on Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes. The “Autocrat of the Breakfast Table” is now over eighty, but he is as young as ever, and will die with a kind smile on his face and a merry twinkle in his eyes. I know no more delightful talker than this delightful man. You may say of him that every time he talks he says something. When he asked me what it was I had found most interesting in America, I wished I could have answered: “Why, my dear doctor, to see and to hear such a man as you, to be sure!” But the doctor is so simple, so unaffected, that I felt an answer of that kind, though perfectly sincere, would not have been one calculated to please him. The articles “Over the Tea Cups,” which he writes every month for the Atlantic Monthly, and which will soon appear in book form, are as bright, witty, humorous, and philosophic as anything he ever wrote. Long may he live to delight his native land!
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In the evening I went to see Mr. Edwin Booth and Madame Modjeska in “Hamlet.” By far the two greatest tragedians of America in Shakespeare’s greatest tragedy. I expected great things. I had seen Mounet-Sully in the part, Henry Irving, Wilson Barrett; and I remembered the witty French quatrain, published on the occasion of Mounet-Sully attempting the part:
| Sans Fechter ni Rivière Le cas était hasardeux; Jamais, non jamais sur terre, On n’a fait d’Hamlet sans eux. |
I had seen Mr. Booth three times before. As Brutus, I thought he was excellent. As Richelieu he was certainly magnificent; as Iago ideally superb.
His Hamlet was a revelation to me. After seeing the raving Hamlet of Mounet-Sully, the somber Hamlet of Irving, and the dreamy Hamlet of Wilson Barrett, I saw this evening Hamlet the philosopher, the rhetorician.
Mr. Booth is too old to play Hamlet as he does, that is to say, without any attempt at making-up. He puts on a black wig, and that is all, absolutely all. It is, however, a most remarkable, subtle piece of acting in his hands.
Madame Modjeska was beautiful as Ophelia. No tragédienne that I have ever seen weeps more naturally. In all sad situations she makes the chords of one’s heart vibrate, and that without any trick or artifice, but simply by the modulations of her singularly sympathetic voice and such like natural means.
It is very seldom that you can see in America, outside of New York, more than one very good actor or actress playing together. So you may imagine the success of such a combination as Booth-Modjeska.
Every night the theater is packed from floor to ceiling, although the prices of admission are doubled.
