“Save me a spare-rib.”
His readiness in an emergency was shown at Flint, Michigan, when he was before an unresponsive audience. As luck would have it, the gas suddenly went out.
“Never mind the gas,” he called to the stage manager. “They can see the points just as well in the dark.” After that he was en rapport.
The greatest gift God ever made to man, he admitted to me in strict confidence, is the ability to laugh and to make his fellowmen laugh. This more than compensates, he adds, for the reception he gets from some of the cold audiences in New Jersey.
I asked him what was the funniest experience he had ever had.
“In a lodge room one night with Nat Goodwin,” he replied. “It was, or ought to have been, a solemn occasion, but there was a German present who couldn’t repeat the obligation backward. Nat stuffed his handkerchief into his mouth. I bit my lip trying to keep from laughing. I knew what an awful breach of decorum it would be if we ever gave way to our feelings. We had almost gained perfect control of ourselves, and the beautiful and impressive ceremony was half over, when that confounded Dutchman was asked once more to repeat the oath backward. He made such work of it that I yelled right out, while Nat had a spasm and rolled on the floor. Did they put us out? Well, I guess they did. It took seven or eight apologies to get us back into that lodge.”
Equally funny was his experience in London. It was on the occasion of the visit of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery, of Boston. A big dinner was to be given, and the American ambassador and the Prince of Wales were to be there. I asked Wilder to tell me the story of his visit.
“I received an invitation,” he began, “through my friend, B. F. Keith, who was a member of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery, and who happened to be in London. The uniforms were something gorgeous. The members stood in two long lines, awaiting the coming of the prince, who is always punctual. I was dressed in my usual boy-size clothes, a small American flag stuck in my Tuxedo coat. I walked around restlessly. The major-domo was a very grand personage, with a bearskin hat on one end and long boots on the other. He must have been eight or ten feet high. He chased me to the rear of the room several times,—evidently not knowing who I was,—but every time he turned his back I would bob out again, sometimes between his legs. The prince came, and almost the first thing he did was to walk across the floor to me and say: ‘Hullo, little chap. I am very glad to see you.’ I had met him before. Then Henry Irving bore down on me and shook my hand, and so did Mr. Depew and others. By this time the major-domo had shrunk in size.
“Who the Dickens is that little chap, anyway?” he asked.
“‘Sh! He belongs to the American army,’ was the answer. ‘He’s a great marshal or something over there!’”