The eligibility clause of the constitution as experimentally drawn up by the committee, prescribed that in order to be eligible a man must be the author of "at least one book proper to literature," or—and there followed a clause covering the case of magazine editors and the like.
As a reader for a publishing house, I scented danger here. Half in play, but in earnest also, I suggested that the authorship of at least one book proper to literature would render pretty nearly the entire adult male population of the United States eligible to membership in the club, unless some requirement of publication were added. My manuscript reading had seemed to me at least to suggest that, and, as a necessary safeguard, I moved to insert the word "published" before the word "book," and the motion was carried with the laughter of the knowing for its accompaniment.
The club was very modest in its beginnings. As its constituent members were mainly persons possessed of no money, so the club had none. For a time our meetings were held at the houses of members—Lawrence Hutton's, Dr. Youmans's, Richard Grant White's, and so on. But as not all of us were possessed of homes that lent themselves to such entertainment, we presently began meeting at Sieghortner's and other restaurants. Then came a most hospitable invitation from the Tile Club, offering us the use of their quarters for our meetings. Their quarters consisted, in fact, of a kitchen in the interior of a block far down town—I forget the number of the street. The building served Edwin A. Abbey as a studio—he had not made his reputation as an artist then—and the good old Irishwoman who cared for the rooms lived above stairs with her daughter for her sole companion. This daughter was Abbey's model, and a portrait of her, painted by his hand, hung in the studio, with a presentation legend attached. The portrait represented one of the most beautiful girls I have ever seen. It was positively ravishing in its perfection. One day I had occasion to visit the place to make some club arrangement, and while there I met the young lady of the portrait. She was of sandy complexion, freckled, and otherwise commonplace in an extreme degree. Yet that exquisitely beautiful portrait that hung there in its frame was an admirably faithful likeness of the girl, when one studied the two faces closely. Abbey had not painted in the freckles; he had chosen flesh tints of a more attractive sort than the sandiness of the girl's complexion; he had put a touch of warmth into the indeterminate color of her pale red hair; and above all, he had painted intelligence and soul into her vacuous countenance. Yet the girl and the portrait were absolutely alike in every physical detail.
I have not wondered since to learn that the husbands of high-born English dames, and the fathers of English maidens have been glad to pay Abbey kings' ransoms for portraits of their womankind. Abbey has the gift of interpretation, and I do not know of any greater gift.
Dime Novels
The rear building in which we met by virtue of the Tile Club's hospitality was approached through an alleyway, or covered gallery rather, concerning which there was a tradition that two suicides and a murder had been committed within its confines.
"How inspiring all that is!" said John Hay one night after the traditions had been reported in a peculiarly prosaic fashion by a writer of learned essays in psychology and the like, who had no more imagination than an oyster brings to bear upon the tray on which it is served. "It makes one long to write romantic tragedies, and lurid dramas, and all that sort of thing," Mr. Hay went on. "I'm sorely tempted to enter upon the career of the dime novelist."
This set us talking of the dime novel, a little group of us assembled in front of the fire. Some one started the talk by saying that the dime novel was an entirely innocent and a very necessary form of literature. There John Hay broke in, and Edwin Booth, who was also present, sustained him.
"The dime novel," Mr. Hay said, "is only a rude form of the story of adventure. If Scott's novels had been sufficiently condensed to be sold at the price, they would have been dime novels of the most successful sort. Your boy wants thrill, heroics, tall talk, and deeds of derring-do, and these are what the dime novelist gives him in abundance, and even in lavish superabundance. I remember that the favorite book of my own boyhood was J. B. Jones's 'Wild Western Scenes.' His 'Sneak' was to me a hero of romance with whom Ivanhoe could in no way compare."
"But dime novels corrupt the morals of boys," suggested some one of the company.