Mr. Daly persisted on my presiding and introducing the artists, and also delivering the Fourth of July oration. The celebration was so successful in the saloon that Mr. Daly had it repeated the next night in the second cabin, and the night after that in the steerage. The steerage did its best, and was clothed in the finest things which it was carrying back to astonish the old folks in the old country, and its enthusiasm was greater, if possible, than the welcome which had greeted the artists among the first and second cabin passengers.
After Miss Rehan had recited her part and been encored and encored, I found her in tears. I said: "Miss Rehan, your triumph has been so great that it should be laughter."
"Yes," she said, "but it is so pathetic to see these people who probably never before met with the highest art."
Among the many eminent English men of letters who at one time came to the United States was Matthew Arnold. The American lecture promoters were active in securing these gentlemen, and the American audiences were most appreciative. Many came with letters of introduction to me.
Mr. Arnold was a great poet, critic, and writer, and an eminent professor at Oxford University and well-known to our people. His first address was at Chickering Hall to a crowded house. Beyond the first few rows no one could hear him. Explaining this he said to me: "My trouble is that my lectures at the university are given in small halls and to limited audiences." I advised him that before going any farther he should secure an elocutionist and accustom himself to large halls, otherwise his tour would be a disappointment.
He gave me an amusing account of his instructor selecting Chickering Hall, where he had failed, and making him repeat his lecture, while the instructor kept a progressive movement farther and farther from the stage until he reached the rear seats, when he said he was satisfied. It is a tribute to the versatility of this great author that he learned his lesson so well that his subsequent lectures in different parts of the country were very successful.
Once Mr. Arnold said to me: "The lectures which I have prepared are for university audiences, to which I am accustomed. I have asked my American manager to put me only in university towns, but I wish you would look over my engagements."
Having done this, I remarked: "Managers are looking for large and profitable audiences. There is no university or college in any of these towns, though one of them has an inebriate home and another an insane asylum. However, both of these cities have a cultured population. Your noisiest and probably most appreciative audience will be at the one which is a large railroad terminal. Our railroad people are up-to-date."
I saw Mr. Arnold on his return from his tour. The description he gave of his adventures was very picturesque and the income had been exceedingly satisfactory and beyond expectation.
Describing the peculiarities of the chairmen who introduced him, he mentioned one of them who said: "Ladies and gentlemen, next week we will have in our course the most famous magician there is in the world, and the week after, I am happy to say, we shall be honored by the presence of a great opera-singer, a wonderful artist. For this evening it is my pleasure to introduce to you that distinguished English journalist Mr. Edwin Arnold." Mr. Arnold began his lecture with a vigorous denial that he was Edwin Arnold, whom I judged he did not consider in his class.