Professor Lowell in Chicago.

The presence of Mr. James Russell Lowell has given Chicago a tremendous boom as a literary centre. In literary circles this boom is not spoken of as a boom, but as an impetus—impetus being a word of such classic pedigree as to render it preferable to the lowly and vulgar word boom. This impetus first became apparent last Saturday afternoon, when one of the distinguished members of the Chicago Literary Club—a manufacturer of linseed-oil—happened to call at the business office of another distinguished member of the club, a wholesale dealer in hides and pelts.

“I see by the papers,” said the first littérateur, “that James Russell Lowell is going to be in town next week.”

“Lowell? Lowell?” queried the second littérateur, as if he were trying to place the name. “Oh, yes! I remember—the author of ‘The One-Hoss Shay’!”

“Yes: he’s going to read a poem in Central Music Hall next Tuesday,” explained the first littérateur, “and it has occurred to me that we ought to elect him an honorary member of the club.”

“Well,” said the second littérateur, “we’ll think about that—there’s no special hurry. You know, we have to be a little careful about taking up with every stranger that comes along: however, we’ll 114talk it over at the next meeting. Here, you Jim, go up on the back roof, and drag in them calf-pelts out of the rain!”

Since Mr. Lowell’s address last Tuesday afternoon, we have taken pains to mingle pretty freely with the recognized literary folk of the town, and we have been mightily interested in the opinions that are expressed of Mr. Lowell and his work. We are told at the house of A. C. McClurg & Co., that during the last forty-eight hours there has been a terrific demand for Lowell’s books. One order came from a wealthy pork-packer, and was for “Lowell’s works in binding to match my ‘Vues de Paris.’” Another order was for Lowell’s books, provided the whole set cost more than a hundred dollars. These little incidents pleased us greatly, because they evidence that there is springing up among our people a choice, a discriminating, an exacting taste, which demands only the best works of an author.

“Last evening,” said two board-of-trade men, “we had the pleasure of a long talk with Mr. Lowell. We were fully prepared to create a favorable impression; for in anticipation of meeting him, and following the example of our other fellow-townsmen, we had secured a complete line of Mr. Lowell’s poems and essays, and had been feeding upon them for a fortnight. Much to our disappointment, however, Mr. Lowell appeared disinclined to traverse the poetic and misty vistas of 115the past with us; and when we contrived—with consummate art and ineffable subtilty, as we fondly imagined—to introduce into our introductory remarks an apt quotation from ‘Hosea Biglow,’ he dampened our ardor by adverting to the location of Chicago, its salubrious climate, and the immense volume of its trade. Mr. Lowell said that he had driven about the city a good deal, had been charmed with the beauty of our avenues, the extent and embellishments of our commons, the magnitude of our pond, and hospitality of our citizens. He said that he had visited the packing-houses on the South Side, and that he was convinced that the Western methods of flaying and disembowelling live-stock had its advantages over the conventional New-England way of removing the bristles of a pig with an iron candlestick. At one of the rendering-establishments the proprietor received the distinguished poet with great cordiality. After escorting him about the place, and acquainting him with the delicate details of the art, this hospitable host conducted Mr. Lowell to the private office, and insisted upon opening a case of champagne. To make the situation all the more comfortable for his guest, the host remarked pleasantly, ‘We always whoop it up to you newspaper men; for, like as not, when you get back home, you’ll write us up.’”

Another gentleman who called on Mr. Lowell was a Mr. Elisha K. Robbins, who represented that 116he was organizing a club which he wanted to call the James Russell Lowell Literary and Debating Lyceum. He sought Mr. Lowell’s sympathy with the enterprise to the extent of a donation of twenty-five dollars. Mr. Lowell was really very much embarrassed; he sympathized heartily with the scheme suggested, and he appreciated very keenly the compliment which Mr. Robbins and his associates were ambitious to confer; but he was compelled to inform Mr. Robbins in the most delicate manner possible, that, in the hurry and excitement of starting upon his Western tour, he had carelessly left his wallet on the escritoire in his room at home. Mr. Robbins so heartily shared Mr. Lowell’s regret at this awkward occurrence, that, at a meeting of his accomplices last evening, he formally moved that “this organization be, and hereby is, named the Julian Hawthorne Literary Club.”

It were useless to deny that many of our citizens were much disappointed at the change which substituted a lecture on “Richard III.” for a political address. We heard several of our most cultured fellow-townsmen say that Dick Oglesby could talk all around Lowell: one of our most influential citizens—a wholesale liquor-dealer—remarked, “I have heard ’em all now,—Lowell and Logan, and Gin’ral Palmer and all of ’em; but for real eloquence and scholarship, give me Carter H. Harrison in a spring campaign, every time!”

117Austin Fisher, the well-known art-connoisseur, and dealer in leaf-lard, said, “This man Lowell is a scholar and a nice gentleman—there’s no denying that; but, do you know, after all, I think I prefer Bill Nye.”

Col. Ben Higgins, the owner of Prairie Belle, Sly Boots, and other noted flyers, thought that Mr. Lowell’s address was an outrage. “The club is very indignant,” he said. “We were all there in our best harness, and we expected that the race would come off as advertised. Of course, we were mad when we found that the programme had been changed. The event was billed as a mile-and-a-quarter dash; and it was, in fact, only a best-three-in-five trot, and slow at that!” Col. Higgins went on to say that Mr. Lowell had offended all the leading turfmen in Chicago by choosing to talk about Shakespeare when he had agreed to come here and make an oration on the Washington Park Club.

The theatrical people, too, are berating Mr. Lowell for having maintained that Shakespeare did not write “Richard III.” “If the governor were here,” said Mr. Horace McVicker yesterday, “you can just bet he’d have a card in all the papers, doing Mr. Lowell up in great shape! The governor is a great admirer of Shakespeare: when he was but four years old, he played one of the little princes in ‘Richard III.’”

Manager R. M. Hooley was the only theatrical 118man who approved the Lowell theory. “I remember having experimented with ‘Richard III.’ once on a time,” said he. “It was about three years ago that George Edgar brought a company to my theatre, and tried to convince me that Shakespeare wrote ‘Richard III.’ After he had tried it for two weeks, I paid railroad-fares for the whole crowd back East. After Mr. Lowell’s lecture the other afternoon, I walked up to the platform, and grasped Mr. Lowell’s hand. ‘You have told the truth,’ said I: ‘I know how it is myself, for I have been there.’”

Mr. T. Percy Bottom-Jones, one of our wealthiest and most cultured citizens, tells us that he entertained Mr. Lowell at dinner the other evening; and, from the description Mr. Bottom-Jones gives, we judge that the entertainment was in every way worthy of Chicago’s reputation. “We had eighteen courses,” says Mr. Bottom-Jones, “and the whole spread cost me in the neighborhood of seven thousand dollars. Lowell seemed to be particularly pleased with the sherry. ‘I must compliment you,’ he said, ‘upon the nice discrimination you have evinced in your choice of sherries: this is simply delicious.’—‘Well, it ought to be,’ says I; ‘for I paid sixteen dollars a bottle for it!’”

“What did Mr. Lowell say to that?” we asked.

“Say?” echoed Mr. Bottom-Jones. “He didn’t say any thing; but you never saw a more surprised-looking man in all your born days.”

119This brought to mind very vividly the lines of Paulinas Varro, the Latin poet:—

“Mæcenas is a model host,

Who, o’er his viands nice,

Is wont to name each dish, and boast

Its quality and price.”

We do not know how this epigram will impress others; but, taking it with the results of our daily observations, it goes a long way toward convincing us that (to indulge in a pardonable metaphor) the mantle of the most luxurious, the most fastidious, and the most refined, of grand old Roman times has fallen, so to speak, upon the shoulders of the representatives of Chicago wealth and culture.

Writing to us upon one of his bill-heads, a prominent member of the Chicago Literary Club takes us severely to task for “indulging in unseemly sarcasm and untimely levity at the expense of Mr. Lowell and those cultured Chicagoans who are seeking to create a healthy literary atmosphere in the West.” Our correspondent goes on to set up a defence of Mr. Lowell’s lecture last Tuesday afternoon, as if a defence were necessary! He says that we should remember that any utterance coming from Mr. Lowell is worth listening to; that to the study of the subject which he treated last Tuesday, Mr. Lowell devoted much time, and that 120Chicago ought to regard it as a high compliment that Mr. Lowell had prepared especially for her edification a discourse at once so scholarly and so eloquent, and necessarily involving so much time, patience, and discrimination in its preparation.

Our correspondent’s burning words would have great weight with us did they not come to us written upon a sheet whose prefatory printed matter informs us that the writer is the proprietor of a soap-manufactory. We decline to take kindly to that atmosphere, literary or otherwise, which a soap-factory is likely to create. As far as regards the suggestion that we have aimed sarcasms at Mr. Lowell, we will say that there is no truth in it; and touching the allegation that Mr. Lowell wrote his Shakespeare lecture especially for the edification of the Chicagoans, we will say that there is no truth in that, either.

We have before us a copy of “The Boston Evening Transcript” of last Wednesday; and in it we find a scholarly, thoughtful, and elegant editorial, entitled “Mr. Lowell in Chicago.” We quote a few lines:—

“While Mr. Lowell’s praises were being sounded here yesterday, Mr. Lowell himself was creating a great deal of discussion at Chicago by suddenly changing the topic of his address before the Union League Club from a political to a literary one, and talking about the authorship of ‘Richard III.,’ instead of American politics. No doubt, it is quite 121natural that there should be a good deal of disappointment expressed at the change of programme, since, in lieu of a piquant and healthy political sensation, Mr. Lowell gave his audience a critical address, which had already been delivered at Edinburgh; but he had looked the ground over, and doubtless had reason to believe that he did wisely in altering his programme.”

This is startling information: it gives us to understand, as distinctly as if we had been hit with a club, that, so far from serving up to us a specially prepared discourse, Mr. Lowell regaled us with a chestnut—and a Scotch one, at that! We regard it as the severest joke ever played upon our community.

Speaking of jokes reminds us of a little incident that is being told of the experience Mr. Lowell had at a dinner given in his honor the other evening. A wealthy patron of the arts and sciences wanted to entertain the distinguished poet in fine style, and he invited in all his rich neighbors to help him do the hospitable act. As soon as Mr. Lowell entered the parlors, and was presented to the company, one of the ladies, giggling and gushing, said, in those tones peculiar to giddy female idiocy, “O Mr. Lowell! we’ve been anticipating this pleasure so much; for we’ve all read your poetry, and we know you can be ever so funny when you try!”

Another genial imbecile, who wore about twenty 122thousand dollars’ worth of big, vulgar diamonds, smilingly assured Mr. Lowell, that, although she had never met him before, she had always felt as if she were well acquainted with him; “for,” she added, “my maiden name was Bigelow.”

In its editorial discussion of Mr. Lowell’s lecture, “The Boston Transcript” says that the distinguished critic has obtained his heterodox opinions touching the genuineness of “Richard III.” from a study of the folio edition. This strikes us as a plausible explanation of the instigation of the melancholy heresy which Mr. Lowell has disseminated in the midst of us. From a scholarly gentleman who is regarded hereabouts as an authority in literary quotations, we learn that the so-called folio edition of Shakespeare’s works is the most palpable fraud ever put upon the market. Its proof-reading alone, so says our informant, is so loose and incorrect as to render the work a bane to admirers of proper orthography and correct punctuation. Among the Chicago people, the most popular edition of Shakespeare is that sold on our trains and at all news-stands for fifty-five cents net. The folio edition costs eight dollars; and we agree with this scholarly gentleman who tells us about it, that a man must be a pitiful idiot indeed to pay eight dollars for a volume of Shakespeare when he can get a great deal better edition for fifty-five cents net. One of the beauties of the Chicago edition of Shakespeare’s works is the numerous elegant 123engravings, made from designs of local artists. The picture of “Margaret Mather in the Tomb of the Capulets under the Management of J. M. Hill” is said by local art connoisseurs and critics to be a chef d’œuvre; and one of the finest iambic tetrameter poems we ever read was inspired by a view of that superb engraving representing that distinguished member of the Citizens’ Association, Col. J. H. McVicker, disguised as the first grave-digger. We have heard the pictures of Tom Keene as “Hamlet,” Master Walker Whitesides as “Richard III.,” George C. Miln as “Romeo,” and N. S. Wood, the boy-actor, as “Lear,”—these portraitures we have heard spoken of as masterpieces. It is impossible, we think, that an edition embellished with such works of art should be supplanted by an edition whose typographical incorrectness is so violent as to be the surest and quickest cause of ophthalmia.

We have not said any thing about it before, because we surmised that Col. James Russell Lowell’s cup of bitterness was quite full enough without having any more rue and gall poured into it. The fact remains, however, that the Union League Club is not the only Chicago club that feels aggrieved at Col. Lowell. The Chicago Literary Club has a grievance against Lowell,—at least we infer so from divers and sundry bitter 124invectives which we have heard fired at Col. Lowell by certain distinguished members of that organization. It seems that a formal invitation to visit the club was sent to Lowell some time before he came to Chicago. It was supposed, that, being a literary man himself, he would naturally feel like identifying himself to a degree with the literary characters of this metropolis. It was believed that an association, however brief, with the intellect and culture of our Literary Club, would reinvigorate, refresh, and re-inspire the Boston poet,—in a word, it was, if we mistake not, purely a charitable motive that prompted the Chicago Literary Club to signify to Col. Lowell its willingness to have him commingle with it while he was in this city. Instead of viewing this dainty boon in the proper light, Col. Lowell appears to have regarded it much as he would the cheap effort of a country debating-club, or a commonplace literary lyceum, to get some notoriety out of his patronage. At any rate, he returned a very prompt and equally decisive negative answer to the invitation; and this is why the giant literary intellects of Chicago are so very hostile to Col. Lowell just now. It is far from our intention to be drawn into this unhappy complication; but we cannot forbear giving it as our opinion, that, without the co-operation of the Chicago Literary Club, Col. Lowell will find a literary life hardly worth living.

125In our most refined society circles, Col. James Russell Lowell’s recent visit to Chicago is still being discussed with a good deal of relish; and a number of amusing stories are leaking out concerning the eminent Boston littérateur’s experiences in this city. One of our most beautiful and accomplished belles (the eighteen-year-old daughter of a wealthy distiller) is assuring the large circle of her admirers that she doesn’t think Col. Lowell is half as bright a man as he has the credit of being. “I wath introduthed to him at the rethepthion,” says she, “and he indulged in a few commonplatheth until he found out that I uthed to live in Kentucky. Then he thaid, ‘I wonder whether you ever knew my friend Baker of Kentucky: he uthed to be a particular friend of mine, and I’ve often wondered what ever became of him.’—‘Baker?’ thays I, ‘let me thee,—I am acquainted with theveral gentlemen named Baker: what ith hith firtht name?’—‘It ithn’t pothible you could have known him,’ thaid Mr. Lowell: ‘I hadn’t thought of it before, but he’th been dead thirty-theven yearth.’ Now, did you ever hear any thing quite tho thilly ath that? I’d have been real provoked if I’d thought he wath quithing me, but he looked tho theriouth that I made up my mind he wathn’t very thmart; and, ath thoon ath I could get away, I went off to the thupper-room with Tham Thawyer.”

One of the most cultured gentlemen in Chicago 126society was invited to meet Col. Lowell at a dinner given by a South-Side friend. He arrived very late, and was so profuse and so persistent in his apologies as to make himself really offensive.

“Oh! never mind, my dear sir,” said the genial host in a consoling tone; “it is all right; you’ve arrived in time for the sal-lad.”

The host’s patronizing tone and air deeply offended the tardy guest. Telling his club-friends about the circumstance next day, he exclaimed, in a voice full of contempt and scorn, “The idea of that —— bowlegged Michigan farmer’s ‘sal-lading’ me!”

To the Lowell literature that is flooding the Western country at the present time, Col. Horace Rublee, the distinguished editor of “The Milwaukee Sentinel,” contributes an interesting page, reminiscent in character. “It was in 1855,” says Col. Rublee, “that Col. Lowell visited Milwaukee: he was then in the prime of his intellectual and physical manhood, and to this day I can remember with what pride I introduced him to the large and enthusiastic audience which had assembled in Turner Hall to hear his eloquent and thoughtful address on Early English ballads. This lecture was conducted under the auspices of the Milwaukee Lecture Lyceum Bureau. In those days, lectures were all the rage, and none but the very best talent was employed. The week after Lowell’s appearance 127here, Bayard Taylor came with his lecture on ‘The Rhine;’ and Lowell remained in town just for the sake of having a visit with his bright young friend. Taylor must have been about thirty years of age, and he was as brilliant and as companionable a fellow as you could expect to meet. Well, Lowell and Taylor had a great time together; and as I knew the town pretty well, and was inclined to be somewhat coltish myself in those days, it was my good fortune to be chosen as the third member of the party. Every night we would go around to Schimpfermann’s Hall, and sit there, drinking beer, and telling stories, until nearly morning. Lowell was a great hand for Yankee stories, and Taylor could mimic the German dialect and Irish brogue most artistically. As for me, I did most of the singing,—for I had a fine baritone voice in those days; and when it came to the chorus, Taylor would help me out with his deep, mellow bass, and Lowell would chip in with his clear, ringing, bird-like tenor. The last night they were in town (ah, how distinctly I remember it!), we all met at Schimpfermann’s; and—how it came about, I don’t know—we got into a game of ten-pins. I was an old hand at it, and so was Taylor; but Lowell had never played before. Well, Taylor beat the first game with 215 pins, I followed with 187, and Lowell brought up the rear with 96. He was a preposterously bad player, but he was so earnest and so solemn about it that we 128didn’t dare laugh at him. We played away until eight o’clock in the morning. In six hours Taylor had rolled 3,136 pins, my score was 2,944, and Lowell’s was 1,082. I am able to give the figures, because I wrote them on the back of a daguerrotype that Lowell had made of himself that morning before he started away on the train. It lacked an hour of train-time; and we went up into Bumblegarten’s gallery, and had our pictures taken just as we looked when we got through that five hours’ bowling-match. I have the daguerrotype still, and would not part with it for the wealth of a Midas. Lowell was pretty well played out, poor fellow! but he did not make any complaint. When he reached St. Louis, however, he wrote me a pathetic letter, full of scholarly reference and classical allusion. ‘I am as sore,’ said he, ‘as if I had engaged with the Pythian monster, or had been drawn on the Procrustean bed: not a muscle in all my anatomy that does not ache, nor a joint that is not as stiff as the senile Anchises. What Simothean balm is there for me, and where is there a Mnestheus to restore me? I am, in short, reduced to such a condition that neither Pisistratus nor the afflicted son of Ægeus would envy me; and I have changed the subject of my St. Louis lecture from that of ‘Italian Literature’ to that of ‘The Fall of Ilium.’”’

When Col. Lowell lectured on “The American Richard of Politics III.,” in this city last month, 129Col. Rublee came down from Milwaukee to renew acquaintance with him. They got together one evening in Col. Wirt Dexter’s back parlor, and talked about the old Grecian and Latin poets until daylight. Neither gentleman could sing as well as he used to; but in his travels abroad, Col. Lowell had picked up a number of jocose Horatian odes and mirthful classic stories, which he recited with exceeding zest; and Col. Rublee kept up his end of the conversation by narrating the many humorous tales and sketches he had heard at Madison during the sessions of the Wisconsin Legislature,—all which Col. Lowell enjoyed mightily, and made memoranda of, that he might repeat them to his family physician, a Dr. Holmes, whom he credited with being a fellow of hearty appreciation and keen wit.

The Chicago Literary Club is still feeling very unkindly toward Col. James Russell Lowell because that eminent Bostonian declined to visit the club during his sojourn in Chicago. Every preparation had been made to give the poet a cordial welcome; and several of the most eloquent members had prepared speeches abounding in quotations from the old Greek, Latin, and Hindoo poets, and full of that classic allusion and mythological lore so pleasing to Col. Lowell’s cultured taste. One of the most scholarly members had written an essay on “The Pork Industry in Ancient Athens,” 130and another had prepared a poem, “Dante:” in short, Col. Lowell would have been astonished at the learning and the culture that would have manifested themselves had he but accepted the club’s invitation. It is said that Col. Lowell took an unjust prejudice against the club, because, having met and having engaged in conversation with one of the members thereof, he was shocked to hear him say that he had always supposed that Sappho was a kind of tooth-paste. But, be this as it may, the club is hostile to Col. Lowell now; and upon the colonel’s picture in the club-room, some sarcastic linseed-oil littérateur has scribbled the following venomous quotation from an ancient satire:—

“Oh! when I think of what I am,

And what I used to was,

I think I gave myself away

Without sufficient cause.”

Col. James Russell Lowell tells the story that one of the gentlemen he met in Chicago had a great deal to say of his travels in Europe. Col. Lowell remarked that he greatly enjoyed the French literature, and that George Sand was one of his favorite authors.

“Oh, yes!” exclaimed the Chicago gentleman: “I have had many a happy hour with Sand.”

“You knew George Sand, then?” asked Col. Lowell, with an expression of surprise.

131“Knew him? Well, I should rather say I did,” cried the Chicago man; and then he added as a clincher, “I roomed with him when I was in Paris.”

It is understood that the private dinners given to Mr. Lowell during his stay here have called for an expenditure of not less than forty thousand dollars. Yet there are carping critics who say that Chicago is not a great literary centre.