Oscar Wilde Part 4

" " p. 36. "A penny Plain--But Oscar Coloured."

February 2, p. 54. A Wilde "Ideal Husband."

" " p. 60. A G.o.d in the Os-Car.

" 23, p. 85. The O. W. Vade Mec.u.m.

March 2, p. 106. "The Rivals" at the A.D.C.

" " p. 107. The Advisability of Not Being Born in a Handbag.

" 16, p. 121. The Advantage of Being Consistent.

April 6, p. 157. April Foolosophy. (_By One of Them._)

" 13, p. 171. The Long and Short of It.

" " p. 177. Concerning a Misused Term; _viz._ _Art_, as recently applied to a certain form of Literature.

1906

January 3, p. 18. Our Booking-Office. (R. H.

Sherard's "_Twenty Years in Paris_.")

This list at least spells, and spelt, celebrity and a recognition of the importance of the aesthetic movement.

Especially did the American lecturing tour of Oscar Wilde excite the comment and ridicule of _Punch_.

I quote some paragraphs from a pretended despatch from an "American correspondent."

A POET'S DAY

(_From an American Correspondent_)

OSCAR AT BREAKFAST! OSCAR AT LUNCHEON!!

OSCAR AT DINNER!!! OSCAR AT SUPPER!!!!

"You see I am, after all, but mortal," remarked the Poet, with an ineffable affable smile, as he looked up from an elegant but substantial dish of ham and eggs. Pa.s.sing a long, willowy hand through his waving hair, he swept away a stray curl-paper with the _nonchalance_ of a D'ORSAY.

After this effort, Mr WILDE expressed himself as feeling somewhat faint; and, with a half-apologetic smile, ordered another portion of

HAM AND EGGS

in the evident enjoyment of which, after a brief interchange of international courtesies, I left the Poet.

The irresponsible but not ungenial and quite legitimate fun of this is a fairly representative indication of the way in which the young "Apostle of Beauty" was thought of in England during his American visit.

The writer goes on to tell how, later in the day, he once more encountered the "young patron of Culture." It is astonis.h.i.+ng to us now to realise how even the word "culture" was distorted from its real meaning and made into the badge of a certain set. At anyrate, Mr Punch's contributor goes on to say that "Oscar" was found at the business premises of the

CO-OPERATIVE DRESS a.s.sOCIATION.

On this occasion the Poet, by special request, appeared in the uniform of an English Officer of the Dragoon Guards, the dress, I understand, being supplied for the occasion from the elegant wardrobe of Mr D'OYLEY CARTE'S "Patience" Company.

Several ladies expressed their disappointment at the "insufficient leanness" of the Poet's figure, whereupon his Business Manager explained that he belonged to the fleshy school.

To accommodate Mr WILDE, the ordinary lay-figures were removed from the showroom, and, after a sumptuous luncheon, to which the _elite_ of Miss ----'s customers were invited, the distinguished guest posed with his fair hostess in an allegorical tableau, representing _English Poetry extending the right hand to American Commerce_.

"This is indeed Fair Trade," remarked Mr Wilde lightly, and immediately improvised a testimonial advertis.e.m.e.nt (in verse) in praise of Miss ----'s patent dress-improver.

At a dinner given by "JEMMY" CROWDER (as we familiarly call him), the Apologist of Art had discarded his military garb for the ordinary dress of an

ENGLISH GENTLEMAN

in which his now world-famed knee-breeches form a conspicuous item, suggesting indeed the Admiral's uniform in Mr D'OYLEY CARTE'S "Pinafore" combination.

"I think," said the Poet, in a pause between courses, "one cannot dine too well"--placing everyone at his ease by his admirable tact in partaking of the thirty-six items of the _menu_.

The skit continues wittily enough, but it is not necessary to quote more of it. The paragraphs sufficiently explain the att.i.tude of Mr Punch, which was the general att.i.tude at the time.

It was hammered in persistently. "Oscar Interviewed" appeared under the date of January 1882, and again, in the following extracts the reader will recognise the same note.

"DETERMINED to antic.i.p.ate the rabble of penny-a-liners ready to pounce upon any distinguished foreigner who approaches our sh.o.r.es, and eager to a.s.sist a sensitive Poet in avoiding the impertinent curiosity and ill-bred insolence of the Professional Reporter, I took the fastest pilot-boat on the station, and boarded the splendid Cunard steamer, the _Boshnia_, in the shucking of a peanut."

HIS aeSTHETIC APPEARANCE

He stood, with his large hand pa.s.sed through his long hair, against a high chimney-piece--which had been painted pea-green, with panels of peac.o.c.k-blue pottery let in at uneven intervals--one elbow on the high ledge, the other hand on his hip. He was dressed in a long, snuff-coloured, single-breasted coat, which reached to his heels, and was relieved with a sealskin collar and cuffs rather the worse for wear. Frayed linen, and an orange silk handkerchief, gave a note to the generally artistic colouring of the _ensemble_, while one small daisy drooped despondently in his b.u.t.tonhole.... We may state that the chimney-piece, as well as the sealskin collar, is the property of OSCAR, and will appear in his Lectures "on the Growth of Artistic Taste in England."

HE SPEAKS FOR HIMSELF

"Yes; I should have been astonished had I not been interviewed!

Indeed, I have not been well on board this Cunard _Argosy_. I have wrestled with the glaukous-haired Poseidon, and feared his ravishment. Quite: I have been too ill, too utterly ill.

Exactly--seasick in fact, if I must descend to so trivial an expression. I fear the clean beauty of my strong limbs is somewhat waned. I am scarcely myself--my nerves are thrilling like throbbing violins--in exquisite pulsation.

"You are right. I believe I was the first to devote my subtle brain-chords to the wors.h.i.+p of the Sunflower, and the apotheosis of the delicate Tea-pot. I have ever been jasmine-cradled from my youth. Eons ago, I might say centuries, in '78, when a student at Oxford, I had trampled the vintage of my babyhood, and trod the thorn-spread heights of Poesy. I had stood in the Arena and torn the bays from the expiring athletes, my compet.i.tors."

LECTURE PROSPECTS

"Yes; I expect my Lecture will be a success. So does DOLLAR CARTE--I mean D'OYLEY CARTE. Too-Toothless Senility may jeer, and poor, positive Propriety may shake her rusty curls; but I am here in my creamy l.u.s.tihood, to pipe of Pa.s.sion's venturous Poesy, and reap the scorching harvest of Self-Love! I am not quite sure what I mean. The true Poet never is. In fact, true Poetry is nothing if it is intelligible. She is only to be compared to SALMACIS, who is not a boy or girl, but yet is both."

And so forth, and so forth.

About the conversation and superficial manner of Oscar Wilde there must have been something strangely according to formula. Among intimate friends, friends who were sympathetic to his real ideals, his talk was wonderful. That fact is vouched for in a hundred quarters, it is not to be denied.

As I write I have dozens of undeniable testimonies to the fact, I myself can bear witness to it on at least one occasion. But when Wilde was not with people for whose opinion of him he cared much--really cared--his odd perversity of phrase, his persistent wish to astonish the fools, his extraordinary carelessness of average opinion often compelled him to talk the most frantic nonsense which was only redeemed from mere childish inversion of phrase by the air and manner with which it was said, and the merest tinsel pretence of wit. The wittiest talker of his generation, certainly the wittiest writer, gave the very worst of his wit to the pressmen who pestered him but who, and this was the thing he was unable to appreciate at its true value, represented him to the world during this "first period."