With all her excellent and even extraordinarily good qualities, however, Jenny Lind was human, though the reputation she bore in Europe for her many charitable acts led me to believe, till I knew her, that she was nearly perfect. I think now that her natural impulses were more simple, childlike, pure and generous than those of almost any other person I ever met. But she had been petted, almost worshipped, so long, that it would have been strange indeed if her unbounded popularity had not in some degree affected her to her hurt, and it must not be thought extraordinary if she now and then exhibited some phase of human weakness.
Like most persons of uncommon talent, she had a strong will which, at times, she found ungovernable; but if she was ever betrayed into a display of ill-temper she was sure to apologize and express her regret afterwards. Le Grand Smith, who was quite intimate with her, and who was my right-hand man during the entire Lind engagement, used sometimes to say to me:
“Well, Mr. Barnum, you have managed wonderfully in always keeping Jenny’s ‘angel’ side outside with the public.”
More than one Englishman—I may instance Mr. Dolby, Mr. Dickens’s agent during his last visit to America—expressed surprise at the confirmed impression of “perfection” entertained by the general American public in regard to the Swedish Nightingale. These things are written with none but the kindest feelings towards the sweet songstress, and only to modify the too current ideas of superhuman excellence which cannot be characteristic of any mortal being.
As I have before intimated in giving details of my management of the enterprise, believing, as I did when I engaged her, in her “angelic” reputation, I am frank enough to confess that I considered her private character a valuable adjunct, even in a business point of view, to her renown as a singer. I admit that I took her charities into account as part of my “stock in trade.” Whenever she sang for a public or private charity, she gave her voice, which was worth a thousand dollars to her every evening. At such times, I always insisted upon paying for the hall, orchestra, printing, and other expenses, because I felt able and willing to contribute my full share towards the worthy objects which prompted these benefits.
This narration would be incomplete if I did not add the following:
We were in Havana when I showed to Miss Lind a paper containing the conundrum on “for-getting” and “for-giving,” at which she laughed heartily, but immediately checked herself and said:
“O! Mr. Barnum, this is not fair; you know that you really give more than I do from the proceeds of every one of these charity concerts.”
And it is but just to her to say that she frequently remonstrated with me and declared that the actual expenses should be deducted and the thus lessened sum devoted to the charity for which the concert might be given; but I always laughingly told her that I must do my part, give my share, and that if it was purely a business operation, “bread cast upon the waters,” it would return, perhaps, buttered; for the larger her reputation for liberality, the more liberal the public would surely be to us and to our enterprise.
I have no wish to conceal these facts; and I certainly have no desire to receive a larger meed of praise than my qualified generosity merits. Justice to myself and to my management, as well as to Miss Lind, seems to permit, if not to demand, this explanation.