There is invariably a concert for charities to help the sailors on every ship. I had many amusing experiences in presiding on these occasions. I remember once we were having a rough night of it, and one of our artists, a famous singer, who had made a successful tour of the United States, was a little woman and her husband a giant. He came to me during the performance and said: "My wife is awfully seasick, but she wants to sing, and I want her to. In the intervals of her illness she is in pretty good shape for a little while. If you will stop everything when you see me coming in with her, she will do her part."I saw him rushing into the saloon with his wife in his arms, and immediately announced her for the next number. She made a great triumph, but at the proper moment was caught up by her husband and carried again to the deck. He said to me afterwards: "My wife was not at her best last night, because there is a peculiarity about seasickness and singers; the lower notes in which she is most effective are not at such times available or in working order."Augustin Daly did a great service to the theatre by his wonderful genius as a manager. He discovered talent everywhere and encouraged it. He trained his company with the skill of a master, and produced in his theatres here and in London a series of wonderful plays. He did not permit his artists to take part, as a rule, in these concerts on the ship, but it so happened that on one occasion we celebrated the Fourth of July. I went to Mr. Daly and asked him if he would not as an American take the management of the whole celebration.
This appealed to him, and he selected the best talent from his company. Among them was Ada Rehan. I knew Miss Rehan when she was in the stock company at Albany in her early days. With Mr. Daly, who discovered her, she soon developed into a star of the first magnitude.
Mr. Daly persisted on my presiding and introducing the artists, and also delivering the Fourth of July oration. The celebration was so successful in the saloon that Mr. Daly had it repeated the next night in the second cabin, and the night after that in the steerage. The steerage did its best, and was clothed in the finest things which it was carrying back to astonish the old folks in the old country, and its enthusiasm was greater, if possible, than the welcome which had greeted the artists among the first and second cabin passengers.
After Miss Rehan had recited her part and been encored and encored, I found her in tears. I said: "Miss Rehan, your triumph has been so great that it should be laughter.""Yes," she said, "but it is so pathetic to see these people who probably never before met with the highest art."Among the many eminent English men of letters who at one time came to the United States was Matthew Arnold. The American lecture promoters were active in securing these gentlemen, and the American audiences were most appreciative. Many came with letters of introduction to me.
Mr. Arnold was a great poet, critic, and writer, and an eminent professor at Oxford University and well-known to our people.
His first address was at Chickering Hall to a crowded house.
Beyond the first few rows no one could hear him. Explaining this he said to me: "My trouble is that my lectures at the university are given in small halls and to limited audiences." I advised him that before going any farther he should secure an elocutionist and accustom himself to large halls, otherwise his tour would be a disappointment.
He gave me an amusing account of his instructor selecting Chickering Hall, where he had failed, and making him repeat his lecture, while the instructor kept a progressive movement farther and farther from the stage until he reached the rear seats, when he said he was satisfied. It is a tribute to the versatility of this great author that he learned his lesson so well that his subsequent lectures in different parts of the country were very successful.
Once Mr. Arnold said to me: "The lectures which I have prepared are for university audiences, to which I am accustomed. I have asked my American manager to put me only in university towns, but I wish you would look over my engagements."Having done this, I remarked: "Managers are looking for large and profitable audiences. There is no university or college in any of these towns, though one of them has an inebriate home and another an insane asylum. However, both of these cities have a cultured population. Your noisiest and probably most appreciative audience will be at the one which is a large railroad terminal.
Our railroad people are up-to-date."
