She and I Volume II Part 22

Supposing a journalist belongs to a Conservative organ, he must back up the party, don't you see, at all hazards; and, although in his inmost heart he may have a faint suspicion that Mr Disraeli's popularity is on the wane, it will not do for him to write his leading articles to that effect exactly, eh? Oh, dear no! He has to a.s.sert, on the contrary, that "the ma.s.ses" are loudly calling on _Punch's_ friend "Dizzy" to save England from the utter extinguishment predicted by our dear Bismarck the other day at Versailles! While, should your potent pressman, on the other hand, wield the goose-quill of any ponderous or lively daily paper that may advocate "Liberalism," and support the elect of Greenwich through thick and thin, do you think he gives you his candid opinion anent "the people's William" then in power, or respecting that bamboozling Alabama business?

Not he!

Why, he knows, as well as you do, of the tergiversation that has distinguished the entire political career of the Risque-tout Prime Minister; and yet, he has to speak of him as if he were the greatest statesman England has ever seen--hanging on his words as silver, when knowing them all the while to be but clap-trap Dutch metal! Convinced, as he must be, that the Was.h.i.+ngton Treaty is one of the tras.h.i.+est pieces of diplomacy that has ever disgraced a government, and that the whole community has been dissatisfied at having to make the Americans a nice little present of three millions of money--in settlement of a claim for which neither the law of nations nor moral opinion held us responsible-- he is obliged to argue that it is "a splendid triumph for the ministry,"

and that the "public is overjoyed" to grease Uncle Sam's outstretched palm!

You know, the deeds of "our William" _must be_ bolstered up; lest "waverers" should waver off to the ranks of the "Const.i.tutionalists,"

and the "great Liberal party" come to grief at the next general election!

So, how can a journalist have a conscience? You see I'm right, and that I had some excuse for my foreign correspondence of American origin.

I lay the whole blame of the transaction, however, on the narrow shoulders of my lanky "down-east" proprietor:--_he_ is the man to blame in the matter, not I!

After a time, I got tired of this work. I then left the journal on which I had been first engaged--with no hard feelings on either side, let it be mentioned--to join the literary staff of the _Aurora Borealis_, an organ of quite a different complexion, and of considerable notoriety in the empire city, as it was famed for its bizarre sensations and teeming news.

Here my labours became much more extended--my experiences and knowledge of all shades of American life and character the more varied and complete in consequence.

Years before, when at school in England, I had made some acquaintance with shorthand, in order to save me trouble in noting down lectures--for the purpose of afterwards writing themes thereon, as we had to do at Queen's College, under "old Jack's" rule; and, having kept up the acquisition, I found it now of considerable use, for, it caused me to be sent about much more than might otherwise have been the case--to report the speeches of prominent public men, whether they were "stumping the provinces" throughout the Union, or basking in the blazing "bunk.u.m" of the capital at Was.h.i.+ngton.

What an enormous amount of empty talk have I not had to attend to, noting it down carefully, as if it were of the most vital importance that not a syllable should be lost!

I have listened, with amused ears often, and busy pencil, to the diabolical denunciations of our poor ill-used country, which have long since made famous Senator Sumner--the greatest Anglophobist in the States; hearkened to Horace Greeley's eager utterances, delivered in thin falsetto voice, wherein he urged, as he urged to the last, universal brotherhood and reconciliation between the North and South; heard Andrew Johnson, the whilom president and one of the ablest who ever occupied that position for ages, defend himself against impeachment--that had been promoted through the bitter animosity of a hostile faction--with the eloquence and legal ability of a Cicero and the fearlessness of a Catiline:--

Reported Ben Butler, the ex-general, and now lawyer, of New Orleans, where he attached to himself an infamous notoriety, that will never desert him--"The Beast," as Brick Pomeroy, the western wit, calls him-- pelting his prosy plat.i.tudes and muddy language at the New York "rowdies," who responded with a more practical shower, of dead cats, and eggs that had seen their better days:--reported Frederick Douglas, the tinted expounder of "advanced Ethiopianism," who regularly tells his audiences--of sympathising abolitioners--that he had been "bought for three thousand dollars when a slave"--a precious deal more than he was worth, to judge by his appearance--although, he somehow always forgets to speak of the present price he asks, for his "vote and interest!"

Reported Miss Anna d.i.c.kenson, the female champion, of whom report says that she loveth the forementioned negro advocate even more as "a man"

than as "a brother," and who blinks her eyes and rolls out her sentences at such a rate that the one dazzle while the other appal the poor stenographer who may have to "follow" her:--reported Mesdames Susan B Anthony--please notice the "B"--and Cady Stanton, besides a host of other strenuous a.s.sertors of "woman's rights" and male wrongs--in respect of petticoat government, "free love," and various similar amiable, progressional theories that mark the advancement of our Transatlantic sisterhood!--Yes, I have reported each and all of these as they declaimed to their glory and satisfaction--and my disgust and impatience, when their loquacity has extended to such a length that I have had to sit up all night in order to write out my shorthand notes in time for the waiting press--confound them!

Beyond this, I have "interviewed" politicians of every school and temper--from Fernando Wood, the chief "wire puller" of swindling Tammany Hall, up to doughty, tongue-tied General Grant, the "useless slaughtering" commander of the northern forces during the civil war-- having had the pleasure of learning from the former how "logs" are "rolled" in the furtherance of party ends; and, from the latter, although the information only came out in dribbled monosyllables in answer to gently disguised questions, for the reticent warrior can hardly put two words of a sentence together, that he had been "bred up a farmer," and, considered himself "more fit" for "that state of life"

than any other--in which opinion, as he has never been publicly tried in the calling, I cordially agree with him.

I have, likewise, "interviewed" prize-fighters, before they proceeded to take action in some "merry little mill;" Mormon prophets' wives, who had come east to purchase Parisian finery for the after delectation of Utah eyes, and the envy of other polygamous families not so favoured as they; Chinese missions, under the escort of a Burlinghame; condemned criminals, awaiting the fatal noose, and who wished to give their "last speech and confession" to the world; j.a.panese jugglers, who expressed their opinion of the States--the main object of every reporter's cross- examination generally--in a sort of phonographic language, too, in which the signs were feats of legerdemain and the "arbitrary characters," the b.u.t.terfly and basket tricks!

In fact, I "interviewed" everybody that was worth "interviewing," and who could be got at to be "interviewed."

Seen life?

I should just think I had. I would not dream of fancying myself in a position to give any trustworthy opinion on the subject of America and its people, unless I had thus mixed amongst all cla.s.ses of the community during a lengthened stay in the country--although, mind you, your "working-man's friend," and "trades' union delegate," and "Alliance"

teetotaller, and "liberal" peer, and disestablis.h.i.+ng Nonconformist-- tourists all of only three weeks' experience--think they can take in, in one glance, the whole extent of a continent embracing some hundred million square miles, understanding the entire working of the "inst.i.tutions," of the "great republic" through travelling on a railroad from New York to Chicago!

As you will have noticed, reporters over there are set to very varied work instead of being fixed in any one especial groove as in England.

On the paper, for instance, to which I was attached, all the staff used, regularly in turn, to do the dramatic criticism at the various theatres.

We, also, had to report the sermons at all the many churches of various religious denominations on Sunday--whether they were Methodist, Episcopalian, Baptist, Lutheran, Roman Catholic, Unitarian, Universalist, or other which would tire you to even hear named; not omitting the "Spiritualists," "Agapemonites," and the "Peculiar People"--so, as was pointed out in an opposition paper at the time, we "took the devil and the deity on week days and Sundays alternately!"

On the whole, putting the higher cla.s.s of Americans on one side--I refer to those who mostly belong to the older families, in some instances tracing back their descent to the days of the Puritan Fathers, and who, having learnt culture and refinement abroad, rarely mix in public life in the States--the general faith and morality of our Yankee "cousins"

have never been so tersely described as in the "Pious Editor's Creed" of the _Biglow Papers_, which were written, as you are doubtless aware, by an American, too:--

"I du believe in special ways O' prayin' an' convartin'; The bread comes back in many days, An' b.u.t.tered, tu, for sartin; I mean in preyin' till one busts On wut the party chooses, An' in convartin' public trusts To very privit uses!"

In one speciality, the New York journals, otherwise so inferior, set an example which might be imitated to advantage by their London contemporaries;--and, that is, in their news, the back-bone of an ostensible "news"-paper.

I say nothing for their tone, which is essentially low--exhibiting, as it does, a tendency of rather pandering to the vitiated appet.i.tes of the mob than seeking to raise the standard of public taste and public manners; nor, for their literary power and status, as their leading articles are mostly a collection of loose sentences, strung loosely together without method or reasoning, and they frequently display such cra.s.s ignorance in the way of blunders in history and geography, as would shock an English school-boy.

But then, their variety of intelligence from all parts of the world, telegraphic and specially written, in one morning's issue, is greater than you would gather in any one of our dailies in the consecutive numbers of a week!

Take away the leading articles, foreign correspondence, and parliamentary intelligence of our Jupiters of the press; and what have you got left? Only some police reports and an attenuated column of telegrams--solely from France and Germany, or some other part of Europe.

We have an Atlantic cable; what news of America do our newspapers publish through its means? Simply the rise or fall in the value of gold, and the price of Erie and other shares! We have a telegraph line to India:--of course, we get general intelligence, of interest to all people, respecting our great eastern, empire? No, we only hear what "s.h.i.+rtings" and cotton goods generally realise at Calcutta; and, the current rupee exchange of Bombay!

It is the same case with regard to Australia and elsewhere.

Although we have ample means of communication, the reading public know no more now about what is going on in "Greater Britain" than it did before the days of steam and telegraphs--comparatively-speaking. The Americans, on the contrary, learn every morning the least incident that has occurred in their remotest territory; besides, having European news in abundance--the Atlantic cable being used to an extent which would, judging by their slight patronage of it, send an English newspaper proprietor into a fit!

We in London hardly keep pace with the the doings of our provincials within easy railway distance of the metropolis, much less take notice of our dependencies:--the existence of places without the London radius is seldom brought home to the readers of our daily metropolitan papers, except some "Frightful Murder," or "Painful Accident," or "Dreadful Calamity" occurs, to fasten ephemeral attention on them for awhile!

Why, cannot we have such general news as the Americans have every day, in our papers, from all parts of the British empire, as well as that "foreign" intelligence, which is limited mostly to the adjacent continent?

The expense, you say?

Rubbish, my dear sir! Why, in the case of a war, no pains are spared to send out good correspondents of position and ability; no money grudged to bring home information, even if special modes of conveyance have to be organised. Surely, in times of peace, a t.i.the of this expenditure would not be wasted in making our colonies and the "mother" country better acquainted with each other--to the future benefit of both?

I may be wrong, certainly, for we are all of us liable to error. You know--

"Different peoples has different opinions-- Some likes apples and some likes inions!"

Still, I think that English readers are probably just as anxious to know what is going on in India, in Australia, the West Indies, and others of our outlying settlements--where their relatives and friends, and our country-men, are spreading our nation, our language, and our civilisation--as to hear that Monsieur Thiers has gone to Switzerland, or that Prince Esselkopf is taking "the waters" at Dullberg on the Rhine! Such, is my opinion--at all events.

But, Min's letters, eh?

I'm just coming to them.

CHAPTER TWELVE.

"HOMEWARD BOUND."

There's Jack has made a wondrous marriage; There's laughing Tom is laughing yet; There's brave Augustus drives his carriage; There's poor old Fred in the "Gazette;"

On James's head the gra.s.s is growing; Good Lord! the world has wagged apace Since here we set the claret flowing, And drank, and ate the Bouillabaisse.

Min's letters! Ah, how I expected them, awaited them, devoured them!-- from the first tender response that came in answer to mine, to the last little darling oblong-enveloped, dainty hand-written missive I received--ere I shook off the dust of the "Empire City" from my New- World-wearied feet, and left Sandy Hook behind me!

It would be a vain task, should I attempt to describe to you the agony of suspense in which I watched every week for the arrival of the European mail; for, I'm sure, that Sir Samuel Cunard himself could not have evinced so deep an interest in the safety of his steamers as I did; no, not even if they had been uninsured, and the underwriters declined all offers of "risk" premiums, be they never so high and tempting!

Long before the regular _Scotia_, the _Java_, or the _Russia_ could, in their several turns, possibly have achieved the ocean pa.s.sage, I was on the look out for them; prophesying all manner of disasters in the event of their being delayed; and overjoyed, with a frenzied rapture, should they be signalled in advance of their antic.i.p.ated time! And then, when they had glided up New York Bay and anch.o.r.ed in the Hudson, how rapidly would my eager impatience bear me to the dingy old Post office "down town," where I would sometimes have to wait for hours before the letters were sorted and delivered!

Should there be none for me, I was in despair--imagining all the various calamities, probable and improbable, that might have happened--although I might have heard from England only a few days previously; while, should I obtain a dearly-prized note from my darling, I was in ecstasy-- only to be on the look out for the next mail a moment afterwards!