University of Virginia Library

14. CHAPTER XIV.
HAPS AND MISHAPS.

I ENTERED upon my new duties with enthusiasm,
and produced some editorials, for which I was
complimented by Mr. Goldstick.

“That's the kind of thing wanted!” he said; “a firm, moral
tone, and steady religious convictions; that pleases the old
standards.”

Emboldened by this I proceeded to attack a specific abuse
in New York administration, which had struck me as needing
to be at once righted. If ever a moral trumpet ought to have
its voice, it was on this subject. I read my article to Bolton;
in fact I had gradually fallen into the habit of referring myself
to his judgment.

“It is all perfectly true,” he remarked, when I had finished,
while he leaned back in his chair and stroked his cat,
“but they never will put that into the paper, in the world.”

“Why!” said I, “if ever there was an abuse that required
exposing, it is this.”

“Precisely!” he replied.

“And what is the use,” I went on, “of general moral
preaching that is never applied to any particular case?”

“The use,” he replied calmly, “is that that kind of preaching
pleases everybody, and increases subscribers, while the
other kind makes enemies, and decreases them.”

“And you really think that they won't put this article in?'
said I.

“I'm certain they won't,” he replied. “The fact is this paper
is bought up on the other side. Messrs. Goldstick and Co.
have intimate connection with Messrs. Bunkam and Chaffem,
who are part and parcel of this very affair.”

I opened my mouth with astonishment. “Then Goldstick
is a hypocrite,” I said.

“Not consciously,” he answered, calmly.

“Why!” said I, “you would have thought by the way he
talked to me that he had nothing so much at heart as the
moral progress of society, and was ready to sacrifice everything
to it.”

“Well,” said Bolton, quietly, “did you never see a woman
who thought she was handsome, when she was not? Did
you never see a man who thought he was witty, when he
was only scurrilous and impudent? Did you never see people
who flattered themselves they were frank, because they
were obtuse and impertinent? And cannot you imagine
that a man may think himself a philanthropist, when he is
only a worshiper of the golden calf? That same calf,” he
continued, stroking his cat till she purred aloud, “has the
largest Church of any on earth.”

“Well,” said I, “at any rate I'll hand it in.”

“You can do so,” he replied, “and that will be the last
you will hear of it. You see, I've been this way before you,
and I have learned to save myself time and trouble on these
subjects.”

The result was precisely as Bolton predicted.

“We must be a little careful, my young friend,” said Mr.
Goldstick, “how we handle specific matters of this kind;
they have extended relations that a young man cannot be
expected to appreciate, and I would advise you to confine
yourself to abstract moral principles; keep up a high moral
standard, sir, and things will come right of themselves.
Now, sir, if you could expose the corruptions in England it
would have an admirable moral effect, and our general line
of policy now is down on England.”

A day or two after, however, I fell into serious disgrace.
A part of my duties consisted in reviewing the current literature
of the day; Bolton, Jim, and I, took that department
among us, and I soon learned to sympathize with the tea-tasters,
who are said to ruin their digestion by an incessant

tasting of the different qualities of tea. The enormous
quantity and variety of magazines and books that I had to
“sample” in a few days brought me into such a state of
mental dyspepsia, that I began to wish every book in the
Red Sea. I really was brought to consider the usual pleasant
tone of book notices in America to be evidence of a
high degree of Christian forbearance. In looking over my
share, however, I fell upon a novel of the modern, hot, sensuous
school, in which glowing coloring and a sort of religious
sentimentalism were thrown around actions and principles
which tended directly to the dissolution of society.
Here was exactly the opportunity to stem that tide of corruption
against which Mr. Goldstick so solemnly had warned
me. I made the analysis of the book a text for exposing
the whole class of principles and practices it inculcated, and
uttering my warning against corrupt literature; I sent it
to the paper, and in it went. A day or two after Mr. Goldstick
came into the office in great disorder, with an open
letter in his hand.

“What's all this?” he said; “here's Sillery and Peacham,
blowing us up for being down on their books, and threatening
to take away their advertising from us.”

Nobody seemed to know anything about it, till finally the
matter was traced back to me.

“It was a corrupt book, Mr. Goldstick,” said I, with
firmness, “and the very object you stated to me was to
establish a just moral criticism.”

“Go to thunder! young man,” said Mr. Goldstick, in a
tone I had never heard before. “Have you no discrimination?
are you going to blow us up? The Great Democracy,
sir, is a great moral engine, and the advertising of this
publishing house gives thousands of dollars yearly towards
its support. It's an understood thing that Sillery and
Peacham's books are to be treated handsomely.”

“I say, Captain,” said Jim, who came up behind us at this
time, “let me manage this matter; I'll straighten it out; Sillery
and Peacham know me, and I'll fix it with them.”

“Come! Hal, my boy!” he said, hooking me by the arm,
and leading me out.

We walked to our lodgings together. I was gloriously
indignant all the way, but Jim laughed till the tears rolled
down his cheeks.

“You sweet babe of Eden,” said he, as we entered my
room, “do get quiet! I'll sit right down and write a letter
from the Boston correspondent on that book, saying that
your article has created a most immense sensation in the
literary circles of Boston, in regard to its moral character,
and exhort everybody to rush to the book-store and see for
themselves. Now, `hush, my dear, lie still and slumber,'
while I do it.”

“Why, do you mean to go to Boston?” said I.

“Only in spirit, my dear. Bless you! did you suppose
that the Boston correspondents, or any other correspondents,
are there, or anywhere else in fact, that they profess to be?
I told you that I was the professor of humbug. This little
affair lies strictly in my department.”

“Jim!” said I, solemnly, “I don't want to be in such a
network of chicanery.”

“Oh, come, Hal, nobody else wants to be just where they
are, and after all, it's none of your business; you and Bolton
are great moral forty-pounders. When we get you pointed
the right way for the paper you can roar and fire away at
your leisure, and the moral effect will be prodigious. I'm
your flying-artillery—all over the field everywhere, pop, and
off again; and what is it to you what I do? Now you see,
Hal, you must just have some general lines about your
work; the fact is, I ought to have told you before. There's
Sillery and Peacham's books have got to be put straight
along: you see there is no mistake about that; and when you
and Bolton find one you can't praise honestly, turn it over
to me. Then, again, there's Burill and Bangem's books
have got to be put down. They had a row with us last
year, and turned over their advertising to the Spouting
Horn. Now, if you happen to find a bad novel among their

books show it up, cut into it without mercy; it will give you
just as good a chance to preach, with your muzzle pointed
the right way, and do exactly as much good. You see there's
everything with you fellows in getting you pointed right.”

“But,” said I, “Jim, this course is utterly subversive of
all just criticism. It makes book notices good for nothing.”

“Well, they are not good for much,” said Jim reflectively.
“I sometimes pity a poor devil whose first book has
been all cut up, just because Goldstick's had a row with his
publishers. But then there's this comfort—what we run
down, the Spouting Horn will run up, so it is about as broad
as it is long. Then there's our Magazines. We're in with
the Rocky Mountains now—we've been out with them for a
a year or two and cut up all their articles. Now you see we
are in, and the rule is, to begin at the beginning and praise
them all straight through, so you'll have plain sailing there.
Then there's the Pacific—you are to pick on that all you
can. I think you had better leave that to me. I have a
talent for saying little provoking things that gall people,
and that they can't answer. The fact is, the Pacific has got
to come down a little, and come to our terms, before we are
civil to it.”

“Jim Fellows”—I began,

“Come, come, go and let off to Bolton, if you have got
anything more to say;” he added, “I want to write my
Boston letter. You see, Hal, I shall bring you out with
flying colors, and get a better sale for the book than if you
hadn't written.

“Jim,” said I, “I'm going to get out of this paper.”

“And pray, my dear Sir, what will you get into?”

“I'll get into one of the religious papers.”

Jim upon this leaned back, kicked up his heels, and
laughed aloud. “I could help you there,” he said. “I do
the literary for three religious newspapers now. These
solemn old Dons are so busy about their tweedle-dums and
tweedle-dees of justification and election, baptism and
church government, that they don't know anything about

current literature, and get us fellows to write their book
notices. I rather think that they'd stare if they should read
some of the books that we puff up. I tell you, Christy's
Minstrels are nothing to it. Think of it, Hal,—the solemn
Holy Sentinel with a laudatory criticism of Dante Rosetti's
“Jenny” in it—and the Trumpet of Zion with a commendatory
notice of Georges Sand's novels.” Here Jim laughed
with a fresh impulse. “You see the dear, good souls are
altogether too pious to know anything about it, and so we
liberalize the papers, and the publishers make us a little
consideration for getting their books started in religious
circles.”

“Well, Jim,” said I, “I want to just ask you, do you think
this sort of thing is right?”

“Bless your soul now!” said Jim, “if you are going to
begin with that, here in New York, where are you going to
end—`Where do you 'spect to die when you go to?'—as the
old darkey said.”

“Well,” said I, “would you like to have Dante Rosetti's
“Jenny” put into the hands of your sister or younger brother,
recommended by a religious newspaper?”

“Well, to tell the truth, Hal, I didn't write those notices.
Bill Jones wrote them. Bill's up to anything. You know
every person in England and this country have praised
Dante Rosetti, and particularly “Jenny,” and religious papers
may as well be out of the world as out of fashion,—and so
mother she bought a copy for a Christmas present to sister
Nell. And I tell you if I didn't get a going over about it!”

“I showed her the article in the Holy Sentinel, but it didn't
do a bit of good. She made me promise I wouldn't write it
up, and I never have. She said it was a shame. You see
mother isn't up to the talk about high art, that's got up
now a days about Dante Rosetti and Swinburne, and those.
I thought myself that “Jenny” was coming it pretty strong,—
and honest now, I never could see the sense in it. But then
you see I am not artistic. If a fellow should tell a story of
that kind to my sister, I should horsewhip him, and kick

him down the front steps. But he dresses it up in poetry,
and it lies around on pious people's tables, and nobody dares
to say a word because it's “artistic.” People are so afraid
they shall not be supposed to understand what high art is,
that they'll knuckle down under most anything. That's the
kind of world we live in. Well! I didn't make the world
and I don't govern it. But the world owes me a living, and
hang it! it shall give me one. So you go up to Bolton, and
leave me to do my work; I've got to write columns, and then
tramp out to that confounded water-color exhibition, because
I promised Snooks a puff,—I shan't get to bed till
twelve or one. I tell you it's steep on a fellow now.”

I went up to Bolton, boiling, and bubbling and seething,
with the spirit of sixteen reformers in my veins. The
scene, as I opened the door, was sufficiently tranquilizing.
Bolton sat reading by the side of his shaded study-lamp,
with his cat asleep in his lap; the ill-favored dog, before
mentioned, was planted by his side, with his nose upturned,
surveying him with a fullness of doggish adoration and
complacency, which made his rubbishly shop-worn figure
quite an affecting item in the picture. Crouched down on
the floor in the corner, was a ragged, unkempt, freckled-faced
little boy, busy doing a sum on a slate.

“Ah! old fellow,” he said, as he looked up and saw me.
“Come in; there, there, Snubby,” he said to the dog, pushing
him gently into his corner; “let the gentleman sit down.
You see you find me surrounded by my family,” he said.
“Wait one minute,” he added, turning to the boy in the
corner, and taking his slate out of his hand, and running
over the sum. “All right, Bill. Now here's your book.”
He took a volume of the Arabian Nights from the table, and
handed it to him, and Bill settled himself on the floor, and
was soon lost in “Sinbad the Sailor.” He watched him a
minute or two, and then looked round at me, with a smile.
“I wouldn't be afraid to bet that you might shout in that
fellow's ear and he wouldn't hear you, now he is fairly in
upon that book. Isn't it worth while to be able to give such

perfect bliss in this world at so small an expense? I've lost
the power of reading the Arabian Nights, but I comfort myself
in seeing this chap.”

“Who is he?” said I.

“Oh, he's my washerwoman's boy. Poor fellow. He has
hard times. I've set him up in selling newspapers. You
see, I try now and then to pick up one grain out of the heap
of misery, and put it into the heap of happiness, as John
Newton said.”

I was still bubbling with the unrest of my spirit, and
finally overflowed upon him with the whole history of my
day's misadventures, and all the troubled thoughts and
burning indignations that I had with reference to it.

“My dear fellow,” he said, “take it easy. We have to
accept this world as a fait accompli. It takes some time
for us to learn how little we can do to help or to hinder.
You cannot take a step in the business of life anywhere
without meeting just this kind of thing; and one part of
the science of living is to learn just what our own responsibility
is, and to let other people's alone. The fact is,” he
said, “the growth of current literature in our times has
been so sudden and so enormous that things are in a
sort of revolutionary state with regard to it, in which it
is very difficult to ascertain the exact right. For example,
I am connected with a paper which is simply and purely, at
bottom, a financial speculation; its owners must make
money. Now, they are not bad men as the world goes—
they are well-meaning men—amiable, patriotic, philanthropic—some
of them are religious; they, all of them,
would rather virtue would prevail than vice, and good
than evil; they, all of them, would desire every kind of
abuse to be reformed, and every good cause to be forwarded,
that could be forwarded without a sacrifice of their
main object. As for me, I am not a holder or proprietor.
I am simply a servant engaged by these people for a certain
sum. If I should sell myself to say what I do not think, or

to praise what I consider harmful, to propitiate their favor,
I should be a dastard. They understand perfectly that I
never do it, and they never ask me to. Meanwhile, they
employ persons who will do these things. I am not responsible
for it any more than I am for anything else which goes
on in the city of New York. I am allowed my choice
among notices, and I never write them without saying, to
the best of my ability, the exact truth, whether literary
or in a moral point of view. Now, that is just my stand,
and if it satisfies you, you can take the same.”

“But,” said I, “It makes me indignant, to have Goldstick
talk to me as he did about a great self-denying moral enterprise—why,
that man must know he's a liar.”

“Do you think so?” said he. “I don't imagine he does.
Goldstick has considerable sentiment. It's quite easy to
get him excited on moral subjects, and he dearly loves to
hear himself talk—he is sincerely interested in a good number
of moral reforms, so long as they cost him nothing;
and when a man is working his good faculties, he is generally
delighted with himself, and it is the most natural
thing in the world, to think that there is more of him
than there is. I am often put in mind of that enthusiastic
young ruler that came to the Saviour, who had
kept all the commandments, and seemed determined to be
on the high road to saintship. The Saviour just touched
him on this financial question, and he wilted in a minute.
I consider that to be still the test question, and there are a
good many young rulers like him, who don't keep all the
commandments.”

“Your way of talking,” said I, “seems to do away with
all moral indignation.”

He smiled, and then looked sadly into the fire—“God help
us all,” he said. “We are all struggling in the water together
and pulling one another under—our best virtues are
such a miserable muddle—and then—there's the beam in
our own eye.”

There was a depth of pathos in his dark eyes as he spoke,
and suddenly a smile flashed over his features, and looking
around, he said—