Eugene Field, a Study in Heredity and Contradictions — Volume 1

by Slason Thompson

But Field was not through with Mr. Londoner yet. The colored brethren had to hold their ratification meeting to endorse the Republican nominations, and more especially to render thanks for the creation of watermelons, and to the man who paid for them, out of season. Of course Mr. Londoner was invited to attend, and when it came his turn to address the meeting the chairman, a colored deacon of the church where "'Possum Jim" worshipped, by the name of Williams, introduced him as follows:

"I now take great pleasure in introducing to you our friend and brother, the Honorable Mistah Wolfe Londoner, who has always been our true friend and brother, who always advises us to do the right thing, and stands ready, at all times, to help us in the good fight. Although he has a white skin, his heart is as black as any of ours. Brothers, the Honorable Wolfe Londoner."

There was no mistaking the authorship of this felicitous introduction.

Field was never tired of repeating another story at the expense of Mr. Londoner, in connection with the visit of Charles A. Dana to Denver. The arrival of "Mr. Dana of the New York Sun" was made the occasion for one of those receptions by the Press Club which made up in heartiness what they lacked in conventional ceremony. Mr. Londoner was the president of the club, and it not only fell to his lot to deliver the address of welcome to guests of the club, but to look after their comfort and welfare while they remained in the city, and often to provide them with the wherewithal to leave it. On Mr. Dana's presentation he was called on for some remarks, to which Mr. Londoner listened with the air of a man who had heard the same tale from lips less entitled to deliver a message of counsel and warning to a group of newspaper writers. When his guest had finished his remarks, Mr. Londoner, according to Field's story, walked over to Mr. Dana and asked him how much he wanted.

Mr. Dana looked at him with a puzzled air, and asked: "How much what? What do you mean?"

"Why, money," Mr. Londoner is said to have replied. "Every newspaper man who ever came to this club was introduced the same as you were, made a speech the same as you did, and then came to me to borrow money to get out of town with. Now, how much do you want?"

According to Field, he never saw a man so greatly relieved as Mr. Londoner was when Mr. Dana assured him that his hotel bill was paid and he had enough money sewed into his waistcoat to carry him back to New York, where he had a job waiting for him.

On one occasion Field accompanied the Denver Press Club on a pleasure trip to Manitou, a summer resort that nestles in a cañon at the base of Mount Rosa. Before the party was comfortably settled in the hotel, Field was approached by a poor woman who had lost her husband, and who poured into his ear a sad tale of indigence and sorrow. He became immediately interested, and at once set about devising means for her relief. As his purse was as lean as her own and his companions were not overburdened with the means to get back to Denver, he announced a grand musical and dramatic entertainment, to be given in the parlors of the hotel that evening, for the benefit of a deserving charity. Every guest in the hotel was invited, and the members of the Press Club spread the notices among the citizens of the village. When asked who would be the performers, Field answered, with the utmost nonchalance, that the Lord would provide the entertainment if Manitou would furnish the audience. The evening came, and the parlors were crowded with guests and villagers, but no performers. After waiting until expectancy and curiosity had almost toppled over from tiptoe to disgust and indignation, Field stepped to the piano with preternatural gravity and attacked it with all the grand airs of a foreign virtuoso. Critics would have denied that Field was a pianist, and, technically considered, they would have been right. But his fingers had a fondness for the ivory keys, and they responded to his touch with the sweet melody of the forest to the wind. He carried all the favorite airs of all the operas he had ever heard in his fingers' ends. He knew the popular songs of the day by heart, and, where memory failed, could improvise. He had a voice for the soft and deep chords of negro melodies I have never heard surpassed, and with all, he had a command of comedy and pathos which, up to this time, was little known beyond the circle in Denver over which he reigned as the Lord of Misrule. That night in Manitou those who were present reported that, from the moment he sat down at the piano until the last note of the good-night song died away, he held that impromptu audience fascinated by his impromptu performance. By turns he sang, played, recited poetry, mimicked actors and well-known Colorado characters, told anecdotes, and altogether gave such a single-handed entertainment that the spectators did not know whether to be more astonished at its variety or delighted with its genius. The result was a generous collection, which went far to relieve the distress of the woman who had touched Field's sympathy.

Let it not be understood that nothing more serious than some hilarious escapade or sardonic bit of humor ever crossed the life of Eugene Field in Denver. His innate hatred of humbug and sham made the Denver Tribune a terror to all public characters who considered that suddenly acquired wealth gave them a free hand to flaunt ostentatious vulgarity on all public occasions.