CHAPTER XLII.
The Origin of American Humor and Its Characteristics—The Sacred and the Profane—The Germans and American Humor—My Corpse Would “Draw,” in My Impresario’s Opinion.
Madison, Wis., April 22.
Have been lecturing during the past fortnight in about twelve places, few of which possessed any interest whatever. One of them, however—Cincinnati—I was glad to see again.
This town of Madison is the only one that has really struck me as being beautiful. From the hills the scenery is perfectly lovely, with its wooded slopes and lakes. Through the kindness of Governor Hoard, I have had a comprehensive survey of the neighborhood; for he has driven me in his carriage to all the prettiest spots, delighting me all the while with his conversation. He is one of those Americans whom you may often meet if you have a little luck: witty, humorous, hospitable, kind-hearted, the very personification of unaffected good-fellowship.
The conversation turned on humor.
I have always wondered what the origin of American humor can be; where is or was the fountain-head. You certainly find humor in England among the cultured classes, but the class of English people who emigrate cannot have imported much humor into America. Surely Germany and Scandinavia cannot have contributed to the fund, either. The Scotch have dry, quiet, pawky, unconscious humor; but their influence can hardly have been great enough to implant their quaint native “wut” in American soil. Again, the Irish bull is droll, but scarcely humorous. The Italians, the Hungarians, have never yet, that I am aware of, been suspected of even latent humor.
What then, can be the origin of American humor, as we know it, with its naïve philosophy, its mixture of the sacred and the profane, its exaggeration and that preposterousness which so completely staggers the foreigner, the French and the German especially?
The mixing of sacred with profane matter, no doubt, originated with the Puritans themselves, and is only an outcome of the cheek-by-jowl, next-door-neighbor fashion of addressing the Higher Powers, which is so common in the Scotch. Many of us have heard of the Scotch minister, whom his zeal for the welfare of missionaries moved to address Heaven in the following manner: “We commend to thy care those missionaries whose lives are in danger in the Fiji Islands ... which, Thou knowest, are situated in the Pacific Ocean.” And he is not far removed in our minds from the New England pastor, who preached on the well-known text of St. Paul, and having read: “All things are possible to me,” took a five-dollar bill out of his pocket, and placing it on the edge of the pulpit, said: “No, Paul, that is going too far. I bet you five dollars that you can’t——” But continuing the reading of the text: “Through Christ who strengtheneth me,” exclaimed, “Ah, that’s a very different matter!” and put back the five-dollar bill in his pocket.
