August 26 Sunday – In Dublin, N.H. Sam added to his Aug. 25 to Mary B. Rogers
Sunday, noon.
It is nearly time to get (temporarily) up. Jean came in at 8.30 & delivered her budget of news; Miss Lyon followed with the letters, & the rest of the news. This is a very remarkable society here & you would like it & feel at home in it. Professor Pumpelly & wife, learned people; Mr. Secretary Hitchcock, the best man in the Roosevelt cabinet, I think; several Yale & Harvard professors; two historians—Hart & Henderson; M .Cabot, explorer of the Great Lone Land; Handasyd Cabot & wife—music & art; Joe Smith, artist & playwright; George Brush, artist of high repute & an able & interesting talker; Abbott Thayer, capable artist, & discoverer of r Nature’s real color-scheme for the protection of the animals; his daughter, aged 20, a very gifted artist; Colton Greave, author—& so on. I wish you would come, & get acquainted. Say the word, Mary! At [Franklin] MacVeagh’s luncheon yesterday there was only one idiot. This average cannot be matched anywhere, perhaps.* [see starred below]
Miss Lyon told of a very remarkable exhibition of spirit & character (a duplicate of an exhibition of your own), on the part of a girl-friend of ours. And of course her name is Stewart! It does seem to me that the Stewarts have all gotten loose this year. Isn’t it curious? Finally—a minute ago—Miss Lyon opened up on Nietsche; I can’t stand Nietsche, so I dismissed her with some Don’t-Mary words suitable to the provocation, & I think there won’t be any more Nietsche to-day.
I think I will talk at the Country Club next Saturday, & in the village the following Saturday (Sept. 8). There’s a concert (the one I spoke of) on Friday the 7 in the great room at MacVeagh’s house, & it will be fine. Do come: I can easily put off both talks until October. Come along, Spontaneous Combustion; be good & don’t say no.
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* My child, you mustn’t say “Were you the one?” For that is the obvious remark. It is so obvious that it would occur to the cat. Don’t ever make the obvious remark, if you can stop yourself in time. Leave it to the dull-witted—or to the untrained, shall I say? You are not dull- witted, you are bright; & in the mouths of such the obvious remark is always a crime. And in speaking, do not permit yourself to deal in commonplace phrasing. However, you are not guilty of that, you use higher forms; & so this is not an accusation, it is only a reminder. That idiot desolated me with commonplace forms, & with the obvious remark, all through that bright (& often brilliant) luncheon-talk. She was just deadly. It was like sitting beside a persistent & unpleasant odor. Am I too officious, dear, in intruding my wisdoms and schoolings upon you? Don’t be offended, I am not meaning any harm or any discourtesy. Males, through pride in their high place, are rather too apt to play preceptor, I am aware of that. I am thankful that you have discarded slang. You have goodness in abundance, you have native frankness & sincerity; you have high ideals—qualities—these of the clean mind & the clean heart: slang has no place in the regal company [MTP].
Isabel Lyon’s journal:
Jean, 2:00 p.m. 5 p.m. Bad
Mr. Clemens wanted to send a telegram to Mr. Rogers this morning. “It is Sunday, Mr. Clemens, and the telegraph office isn’t open.”
“It isn’t? And the churches are? What a hell of an idea!”
We had such a good talk in the business hour & his presence is such an uplift. He cares a lot about having a good, big & lovely house at Redding—even though C.C. wants to whittle it down ever so much. Mrs. Rogers is going to give him a billiard table for Xmas & his plan was to put it in the library, but a word from C.C. that the library isn’t so good a room as his own bed room on the 2nd floor is enough for him. He is quick to see that perhaps his plan is the wrong one—& quick to yield, and because he is never stubborn it seems dreadful not to give him his fullest wish always. This afternoon Mr. Brush & Miss Jane Adams [sic Addams] called. We sat on the great porch over tea and the talk drifted on to the Gorky incident. Miss Adams regretted the action of Mr. Howells & Mr. Clemens & the literary men who had taken him up & who dropped him so quickly when he was thrust out of hotels because he was said to be living with an actress who could not be his wife according to Russian law. Miss Adams in her great work, sees the Russians in masses out in Chicago & she sympathizes with them & so feels that Gorky should have been supported. But Mr. Clemens waxed warm upon the subject and showed her how Gorky came over here as a diplomat & not as an individual, or as a literary man. As a diplomat he could not offend against one of our strongest customs. As an artist he could pass into our country & live here unchallenged. Successful diplomats are so, by reason of their tact in never trespassing against the customs of a country. When Mme. Gorky saw how things were going she implored Gorky to send her back to Russia or to send her away, but he refused. “As a diplomat Mme. Gorky was worth forty Maxim Gorkys.” Miss Adams pointed out that it was part of the revolution to wage war against the oppressive church which could crush out the liberties of a people & refuse divorce. And again Mr. Clemens held to his point that Gorky came here not as a revolutionist, but as a diplomat. He isn’t doing anything for his cause by escaping & coming to this country where he can live in comfort. True, he is banished from Russia & cannot wage his war there; but on the other hand he cannot wage it here where the people will not stand for a relation such as Gorky’s & Mme. Gorky’s. It makes no difference if they are living pure & beautiful lives. The Americans don’t call their lives by that name. They are readier to wink at the horrors & debaucheries of men who live as Stanford White is said to have lived; they will condone immoralities, but not illegalities. It must be the custom—that immorality—running alongside of the custom of legality, for apparently they stand for both— these same Americans.
Mr. Brush gave a gurgle of protest when Mr. Clemens said that the American people have no brains. They do not think, they feel, without taking the trouble to understand what they are feeling [MTP TS 110-113]. Note: Miss Jane Addams (1860-1935; of Hull House, Chicago) his actions in dropping sponsorship of Gorky’s visit to the U.S. after his marital scandal became known. Addams had been on the welcoming committee with Sam. She was a founder of the US Settlement House Movement.