McClure's Magazine, Vol. 6, No. 5, April, 1896 by Various

V >> Various >> McClure\'s Magazine, Vol. 6, No. 5, April, 1896

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13

In the course of two or three years spent in exceptional solitude,
I had read a good deal in the direction of my ruling thoughts and
feeling, and came to the writing of my little book, not ignorant of
what had been written for and by the mourning. The results of this
reading, of course, went into the book, and seemed to me, at the time,
by far the most useful part of it.

How the book grew, who can say? More of nature than of purpose,
surely. It moved like a tear or a sigh or a prayer. In a sense I
scarcely knew that I wrote it. Yet it signified labor and time, crude
and young as it looks to me now; and often as I have wondered, from
my soul, why it has known the history that it has, I have at least
a certain respect for it, myself, in that it did not represent
shiftlessness or sloth, but steady and conscientious toil. There was
not a page in it which had not been subjected to such study as the
writer then knew how to offer to her manuscripts.

Every sentence had received the best attention which it was in the
power of my inexperience and youth to give. I wrote and rewrote. The
book was revised so many times that I could have said it by heart.
The process of forming and writing "The Gates Ajar" lasted, I think,
nearly two years.

I had no study or place to myself in those days; only the little room
whose one window looked upon the garden cross, and which it was not
expected would be warmed in winter.

The room contained no chimney, and, until I was sixteen, no fire for
any purpose. At that time, it being supposed that some delicacy of the
lungs had threatened serious results, my father, who always moved the
sods beneath him and the skies above him to care for a sick child, had
managed to insert a little stove into the room, to soften its chill
when needed. But I did not have consumption, only life; and one was
not expected to burn wood all day for private convenience in our
furnace-heated house. Was there not the great dining-room where the
children studied?

It was not so long since I, too, had learned my lessons off the
dining-room table, or in the corner by the register, that it should
occur to any member of the family that these opportunities for privacy
could not answer my needs.

Equally, it did not occur to me to ask for any abnormal luxuries. I
therefore made the best of my conditions, though I do remember sorely
longing for quiet.

This, at that time, in that house, it was impossible for me to
compass. There was a growing family of noisy boys--four of them--of
whom I was the only sister, as I was the oldest child. When the baby
did not cry (I have always maintained that the baby cried pretty
steadily both day and night, but this is a point upon which their
mother and I have affectionately agreed to differ), the boys were
shouting about the grounds, chasing each other through the large
house, up and down the cellar stairs, and through the wide halls,
a whirlwind of vigor and fun. They were merry, healthy boys, and
everything was done to keep them so. I sometimes doubt if there are
any happier children growing anywhere than the boys and girls of
Andover used to be. I was very fond of the boys, and cherished no
objection to their privileges in the house. But when one went down, on
a cold day, to the register, to write one's chapter on the nature of
amusements in the life to come, and found the dining-room neatly
laid out in the form of a church congregation, to which a certain
proportion of brothers were enthusiastically performing the duties of
an active pastor and parish, the environment was a definite check to
inspiration.

I wonder if all Andover boys played at preaching? It certainly was the
one sport in our house which never satiated.

Coming in one day, I remember, struggling with certain hopeless
purposes of my own, for an afternoon's work, I found the dining-room
chairs all nicely set in the order of pews; a table, ornamented
with Bible and hymn-books, confronted them; behind it, on a cricket,
towered the bigger brother, loudly holding forth. The little brother
represented the audience--it was usually the little one who was forced
to play this duller _role_--and, with open mouth, and with wriggling
feet turned in on the rounds of the chair, absorbed as much
exhortation as he could suffer.

"My text, brethren," said the little minister, "is, 'Suffer the little
children to come unto me.'

"My subject is, _God; Joseph; and Moses in the bulrushes_!"

Discouraged by the alarming breadth of the little preacher's topic, I
fled up-stairs again. There an inspiration did, indeed, strike me;
for I remembered an old fur cape, or _pelisse_, of my mother's, out
of fashion, but the warmer for that; and straightway I got me into it,
and curled up, with my papers, on the chilly bed in the cold room, and
went to work.

It seems to me that a good part of "The Gates Ajar" was written in
that old fur cape. Often I stole up into the attic, or into some
unfrequented closet, to escape the noise of the house, while at work.
I remember, too, writing sometimes in the barn, on the haymow. The
book extended over a wide domestic topography.

I hasten to say that no person was to blame for inconveniences of
whose existence I had never complained. Doubtless something would have
been done to relieve them had I asked for it; or if the idea that my
work could ever be of any consequence had occurred to any of us. Why
should it? The girl who is never "domestic" is trial enough at her
best. She cannot cook; she will not sew. She washes dishes Mondays and
Tuesdays under protest, while the nurse and parlor maid are called
off from their natural avocations, and dusts the drawing-room with
obedient resentment. She sits cutting out underclothes in the March
vacations, when all the schools are closed, and when the heavy wagons
from the distant farming region stick in the bottomless Andover mud in
front of the professor's house. The big front door is opened, and the
dismal, creaking sounds come in.

The kind and conscientious new mother, to whom I owe many other gentle
lessons more valuable than this, teaches how necessary to a lady's
education is a neat needle. The girl does not deny this elemental
fact; but her eyes wander away to the cold sky above the Andover
mud, with passionate entreaty. To this day I cannot hear the thick
chu-chunk! of heavy wheels on March mud without a sudden mechanical
echo of that wild, young outcry: "Must I cut out underclothes forever?
Must I go on tucking the broken end of the thread into the nick in the
spool? Is _this_ LIFE?"

I am more than conscious that I could not have been an easy girl to
"bring up," and am sure that for whatever little difficulties beset
the earlier time of my ventures as a writer, no person was in any
fault. They were doubtless good for me, in their way. We all know that
some of the greatest of brain-workers have selected the poorest and
barest of spots in which to study. Luxury and bric-a-brac come to easy
natures or in easy years. The energy that very early learns to conquer
difficulty is always worth its price.

I used, later, to hear in Boston the story of the gentleman who once
took a friend to see the room of his son at Harvard College. The
friend was a man of plain life, but of rich mental achievement. He
glanced at the Persian rugs and costly draperies of the boy's quarters
in silence.

"Well," cried the fond father, "don't you think my son has a pretty
room?"

"Sir," said the visitor, with gentle candor, "_you'll never raise a
scholar on that carpet._"

Out of my discomforts, which were small enough, grew one thing for
which I have all my life been grateful--the formation of fixed habits
of work.

I have seldom waited for inspiration before setting about a task to
be done. Life is too short for that. Broken health has too often
interrupted a regimen of study which ought to have been more
continuous; but, so far as I may venture to offer an opinion from
personal experience, I should say that the writers who would be wise
to play hide and seek with their own moods are few.

According to my custom, I said nothing (so far as I can remember) to
any person about the book.

It cannot be said that I had any hope of success with it; or that,
in my most irrational dreams, anything like the consequences of its
publication ever occurred to my fancy. But I did distinctly understand
that I had set forth upon a venture totally dissimilar to the safe and
respectable careers of my dozen Sunday-school books.

I was asked only the other day why it was that, having such a rare
critic at first hand as my father, I did not more often submit my
manuscripts to his judgment. It would be difficult to say precisely
why. The professor of rhetoric was a very busy man; and at that time
the illness which condemned him to thirty years of invalid suffering
was beginning to make itself manifest. I can remember more often
throwing down my pen to fly out and beg the children to be quiet in
the garden while the sleepless man struggled for a few moments' rest
in the daytime; or stealing on tiptoe to his locked door, at any hour
of the night, to listen for signs of sudden illness or need of help;
these things come back more easily than the desire to burden him with
what I wrote.

Yet perhaps that abnormal pride, whose existence I have admitted, had
quite as much to do with this restraint.

When a thing was published, then quickly to him with it! His sympathy
and interest were unfailing, and his criticism only too gentle; though
it could be a sword of flame when he chose to smite.

Unknown to himself I had dedicated "The Gates Ajar" to him. In this
dedication there was a slip in good English, or, at least, in such
English as the professor wrote and spoke. I had used the word "nears"
as a verb, instead of its proper synonym, "approaches." He read the
dedication quietly, thanked me tenderly for it, and said nothing. It
was left for me to find out my blunder for myself, as I did, in due
time. He had not the heart to tell me of it then. Nor did he insinuate
his consciousness that the dedication might seem to involve him--as it
did in certain citadels of stupidity--in the views of the book.

The story was sent to its publishers, Messrs. Ticknor and Fields, and
leisurely awaited their verdict. As I had written somewhat for their
magazines, "The Atlantic" and "Our Young Folks," I did not come as
quite a stranger. Still, the fate of the book hung upon a delicate
scale. It was two years from the time the story went to its publishers
before it appeared between covers. How much of this period the author
was kept in suspense I cannot remember; but, I think, some time.

I have the impression that the disposal of the book, so far as that
firm went, wavered for a while upon the decision of one man, whose
wife shared the reading of the manuscript. "Take it," she said at
last, decidedly; and the fiat went forth. The lady afterwards became
a personal friend, and I hope I may not forfeit the treasure of her
affection by this late and public recognition of the pleasant part she
bore in the fortunes of my life.

The book was accepted, and still this piece of good luck did not make
my head spin. I had lived among book-makers too much to expect
the miracle. I went soberly back to my hack work, and on with my
Sunday-school books.

One autumn day the customary package of gift copies of the new book
made its way to Andover Hill; but: I opened it without elation, the
experience being so far from my first of its kind. The usual note
of thanks was returned to the publishers, and quiet fell again.
Unconscious of either hope or fear, I kept on about my business,
and the new book was the last thing on earth with which I concerned
myself.

One morning, not many weeks after its publication, I received a letter
from Mr. James T. Fields. He, who was the quickest of men to do a
kindness, and surest to give to young writers the encouraging word for
which they had not hope enough to listen, had hurried himself to break
to me the news.

"Your book is moving grandly," so he wrote. "It has already reached
a sale of four thousand copies. We take pleasure in sending you--" He
enclosed a check for six hundred dollars, the largest sum on which I
had ever set my startled eyes. It would not, by my contract, have been
due me for six months or more to come.

The little act was like him, and like the courteous and generous house
on whose list I have worked for thirty years.

[Illustration]

EDITORIAL NOTES.

TWENTY THOUSAND DOLLARS FOR SHORT STORIES.

We find considerable difficulty in getting the two hundred first-class
short stories that we require each year. We are delighted to be able
to publish so many stories by eminent authors, but we should like to
get more good stories from writers whose fame is yet to be made. We
therefore announce a liberal policy in regard to payment, and invite
contributions from every one who can write a good story. The scale
of payment will be such as to please every contributor, whether he is
famous or not.

We need every year about fifty stories of from four to six thousand
words in length; about one hundred stories of from two to three
thousand words in length, and not less than fifty stories a year for
young people, about two thousand words in length. Of these stories
thirty or forty are for McCLURE'S MAGAZINE, and the remainder are
for the newspaper syndicates controlled by the publishers of this
magazine.

A regular manuscript department has been established by the editors,
and it is the intention to report upon every manuscript within a week
after it is received. We also welcome contributions to every branch of
literature represented in the magazine.

THE McCLURE'S "EARLY LIFE OF LINCOLN."

This volume contains all the articles published in the first
four Lincoln numbers of McCLURE'S MAGAZINE (November to February,
inclusive). These numbers, although repeatedly reprinted, are now out
of print, and the "Early Life of Lincoln" was published mainly to meet
a demand we could not fill with the magazine. It contains a great deal
more, both in text and pictures, than appeared in the magazine. It is
mailed to any address for fifty cents; or for one dollar, if bound
in cloth. We intend having our own plant, to reprint the March and
subsequent numbers whenever necessary.

THE McCLURE'S NEW "LIFE OF GRANT."

We have been greatly surprised, in preparing our new "Life of Grant,"
to find so much new and valuable material, especially about Grant's
earlier life. No more fascinating and dramatic story has ever been
lived. We have been especially fortunate in securing the collaboration
of Mr. Hamlin Garland to write this life of Grant. Mr. Garland was
selected for this work for two reasons--first, he has always loved and
admired Grant; second, he is familiar in general with the conditions
of life in the middle West, and is especially qualified to tell the
truth both in color and fact. The tastes and training of a realistic
novelist are an admirable equipment for a biographer, provided the
hero of his story and his environment appeal to the novelist.

_We propose to publish the best Life of Grant ever written._

We have collected a great quantity of pictures and other
illustrations, and we ask our friends to help us as they are helping
us in our "Life of Lincoln." Every one who has a contribution, either
in picture or incident, to our knowledge of this great man ought to
bring it before the two or three million readers that McCLURE'S will
have when we begin to publish the "Life of Grant" next November.

NEW PICTURES OF LINCOLN.

Almost every week we add to our collection of Lincoln pictures. Many
of these ambrotypes and photographs are of the greatest value in
adding to our knowledge of Lincoln. We hope to reach one hundred
before the end of the year. We had only fifty portraits last November.
We have eighty now.

THE ABRAHAM LINCOLN SCHOOL OF SCIENCE AND PRACTICAL ARTS.

Knox College, Galesburg, Illinois, was the scene of one of the most
important of the debates between Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Douglas. The
debate took place on a platform at the east end of the main college
building. At this memorable debate the students carried a banner on
which was inscribed "Knox for Lincoln." In April, 1860, before he was
nominated for the Presidency, Knox College conferred the degree of
LL.D. on Abraham Lincoln. At their recent midwinter meeting, the board
of trustees unanimously voted to establish a memorial to Lincoln; and
this memorial will be the scientific department of Knox College, and
will be called "The Abraham Lincoln School of Science and Practical
Arts."

The founders of this magazine are all alumni of Knox College, and are
particularly pleased at this action of their alma mater. Knox College
affords a splendid opportunity to young men and women of limited
means. The editors of this magazine can afford to pay the living
expenses and tuition for one year at this college of any young man or
woman who secures five hundred subscribers, as proposed and explained
on the second advertising page of this number of the magazine.

The editors of McCLURE'S MAGAZINE are thoroughly acquainted with Knox
College, and can recommend it, knowing that students who go there will
live under the best possible influences and receive a sound education.
All inquiries should be addressed to the president, John Finley, Knox
College, Galesburg, Illinois.

THE HOUSE IN WHICH LINCOLN'S PARENTS WERE MARRIED.--A CORRECTION.

The picture of the house in which Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks
were married, printed in McCLURE'S MAGAZINE for November, 1895, was
credited by mistake to the Oldroyd collection. The photograph from
which the reproduction was made came from the Oldroyd collection;
but this photograph is, we are informed, from a negative now in
the possession of Mr. A.D. Miller of Brazil, Indiana, and credit is
therefore due to Mr. Miller.

[Note: The Table of Contents and the list of illustrations were added
by the transcriber.]

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13