Complete Works of Ambrose Bierce (Delphi Classics)

by Ambrose Bierce

  And, if still further proof should be required of his advocacy of the romantic impulse in art, there is the significant passage in his “Collected Works” (Volume X, pages 244-5) which Mr. Wilson Follette wisely quotes in his book The Modern Novel. In this passage Bierce said: “It is to him of widest knowledge, of deepest feeling, of sharpest observation and insight, that life is most crowded with figures of heroic stature, with spirits of dream, with demons of the pit, with graves that yawn in pathways leading to the light, with existences not of this earth, both malign and benign, — ministers of grace and ministers of doom. The truest eye is that which discerns the shadow and the portent, the dead hands reaching, the light that is the heart of darkness, the sky with ‘dreadful faces thronged and fiery arms.’ The truest ear is that which hears

  ‘Celestial voices to the midnight air,

  Sole, or responsive each to the other’s note,

  Singing,’

  not ‘their great Creator,’ but not a negro melody, either; no nor the latest favorite of the drawing room. In short, he to whom life is not picturesque, enchanting, astonishing, terrible, is denied the gift and faculty divine, and being no poet can write no prose.” This reads like it was written with one eye on Bierce’s own work and as an apology. It is full of the slightly exaggerated statement of the man who would emphasize a quality to cover a deficiency. It was all right to insist that the artist look sharply at life, for, in truth, it is always picturesque and astonishing to the real creative genius. But to insist that “the objects that bear them beget the mood” is a dangerous theory, since it is but one step to the next proposition, that is, by the mere object one can conjure up a lost feeling as a ghost of the genuine impulse. This cannot be done. It was a trick that Bierce tried on himself time and again, as will be noted in the later chapters. He would visit an old battlefield and feel pleasantly sad. He would return two months later and be bored. Therefore, “nothing mattered” because the illusion was gone. The entire process was the result of a mistaken assumption that values were outward, detached, and objective facts.

  Mr. W. C. Brownell wrote of Poe that “he is distinctly so much the most, as to be almost the only, romantic figure in our literature; and his romantic interest has greatly influenced the critical estimate of his work.” He might just as well have been writing of Bierce. Bierce was, as George Sterling once remarked to me, “incurably romantic.” This fact has disturbed and excited many an otherwise calm critical pen into flurries of nonsense. His pupils, for example, were so fascinated by his romantic personality that they threw their critical senses overboard. While the ladies... but one need only read Ruth Guthrie Harding’s article....

  The inner relation of Bierce to this romanticism is easy to trace. He was an immensely sensitive man and his reaction to life was twice as quick and as violent as the man in the street. But he began to read and think only at a rather late period in his life. Hence he was past middle age when he outgrew his romantic ideas of art, which are usually among the first theories that the novice adopts. He recoiled from the utter futility and fatuousness of existence. Evidence of such futility inhered in his experience. His first great shock, the crash of his idealism that followed after the war, subverted his balance. He swung out of alignment, philosophically. He was in revolt against his environment at all times; not merely his immediate environment, the visible circus-world that he satirized in “Prattle,” but also against pain, horror, futility, chaos and death. In his revolt against death lies the germ of his interest in the supernatural. He deliberately “leads us out into an occult realm whose shapes and happenings give us ‘zero at the bone,’” as Edwin Markham once wrote. There is something of George Thurston’s steely resolve about Bierce’s determination to leave no field unexplored. He had a constant prescience of death; the real might be the unreal, for he had seen strange things; hence he wrote rather rhetorically of ghosts.

  * * *

  THE greatest formative influence on Bierce’s work was unquestionably exercised by James Watkins. It was a close, intimate, personal influence. Watkins and Bierce thrashed out the problems of aesthetics, as they saw them, and in nearly every argument Watkins gained his point. Bierce, to my knowledge, never accorded to another the deference and respect that he always showed to Watkins. Hence this excerpt from a letter of Watkins to Bierce in 1874, is of the first importance in understanding Bierce’s viewpoint:

  “The sort of sensation that waited upon Mrs. Radcliffe’s and Monk Lewis’ efforts affords some hint of the sort of career the new ‘Monk’ and ‘Castle of Udolpho’ would run. The work they did in stupid vaults you execute in the secret chambers of the soul; the poor limelight effects they worked on a painted stage, you would sear with lightning on the face of nature. Your work would expand the human mind.”

  This was written to Bierce, let it be remembered, in 1874, long before he had actually started to write any of his stories. And in a later paragraph of the same letter, Watkins said:

  “The supreme art with a pen is to-day, as it has been throughout the history of letters, the art of story-telling, — of telling a story that has no reason for its existence outside of its own interest. It must illustrate nothing, be devoid of moral, make no one think, in fact, it must paralyze the faculty of thinking: It must purely and simply entertain. That has been the character of all work that has been permanent from the ‘Arabian Nights’ to ‘Treasure Island.’ This faculty you possess in the highest degree, though you have not chosen to exercise it dissociated from the thinking faculties. A man puts himself into a novel. He puts nothing but his imagination into a story.”

  I doubt if there exists a better exposition of Bierce’s viewpoint. With these passages in mind, the inference is irresistible that Bierce deliberately sought to be the ‘newer Monk Lewis’ and to write the perfect short story. In the effort to carry out Watkins’ advice to the letter, he became involved in this anomalous situation: his inspiration was romantic, but his method was almost modern in its realism at times. He could not exercise his “gift,” as Watkins said, “dissociated from the thinking faculties.” He was a romantic who wrote like a realist; technically his work belonged to the terrorist tradition and yet personally he was an individual utterly different than Monk Lewis. The conclusion would seem to be that Bierce accepted a theory of aesthetics which did not accord with his own personality and his own vision. But so great was his energy and his divination, that a fine light shines through the shadows of his work and illuminates even the worst of his tales of horror.

  His entire life was romantic and he lived as though he were quite conscious of the fact. One of the shrewdest comments ever made about his career was made by John H. McGinnis in the Dallas News: “The incidents of his life read like a burlesque on the career of Lord Byron, and yet there is a hard, sardonic element that makes clearer and more poignant his drab romances and his essential tragedy.” This statement strikes at the facts most vigorously.

  CHAPTER XIV. “DAVID AND GOLIATH”

  DURING the period between the completion of the trans-continental railroad until 1896, the Southern Pacific Railroad had gradually acquired a stranglehold on the State of California. There had been no word of protest during the first few years after the completion of the road, as the West was so delighted to have a railroad that it was willing to overlook many disadvantages. During the eighties, however, several far-sighted individuals began to call attention to the consequences of Southern Pacific dominance. A few mass meetings were held and a little indignation was kindled, but it was ineffective. Towards the close of the decade, the feeling became more intense as the railroad squeezed harder. It was an octopus bent on the plunder of the West. Every attempt to regulate its activities or temporize its monopoly proved futile. Farmers began to haul their produce by mule teams rather than consent to the Southern Pacific’s iniquitous fares. It was thought that steam navigation might prove a remedy, but this was an idle day dream, as the railroad promptly subsidized the steamship lines.

 
The extent of the Southern Pacific’s control of the political machinery in the State of California is almost unbelievable. It dominated the courts, the municipal governments, the county governments, including such petty offices as sheriff and coroner, and practically every newspaper in the state was receiving money from its coffers. When Fremont Older launched his fight against the railroad in 1896, he was amazed to find that the newspaper which he edited, The Bulletin, had been receiving a slight douceur of $125 a month for years. There was no definite agreement as to just what the consideration was for this sum, but there it was, and Mr. Older’s investigation proved that there were few newspapers in the state that were not on the payroll of the railroad. Judges of the State Supreme Court traveled on annual passes; Assemblymen openly boasted of being kept by the railroad. The thought of a prosecution for the acceptance of a bribe was chimerical. William F. Herrin, attorney for the Southern Pacific in San Francisco, was the “boss” of the state. Applicants for positions, petitioners for governmental relief, and citizens in search of “justice,” did not go to Sacramento, for they knew that the real governor was elsewhere, and so they waited in Mr. Herrin’s reception room. The situation seemed hopeless until the question of the Funding Bill was presented to Congress. Through the lax political economy of Abraham Lincoln, the railroads had been able to borrow an enormous sum of money from the government, upon which they had never paid a cent of principal or interest. It was now proposed, with brazen insolence, that Congress extend the time of payment virtually a hundred years. In the possibility of defeating this bill, California saw a chance to force the Southern Pacific out of business, and to establish a government railroad from Omaha to San Francisco.

  Mr. Hearst, clever demagogue then as now, rushed to the attack, and launched a great campaign against the railroad. His agents circulated a petition and obtained 200,000 signatures against the Funding Bill. Mass meetings were held and thousands were turned away. The fight was on. On January 18, 1896, Hearst sent Bierce a wire, which he published in The Examiner, “Railroad combination so strong in Washington that seems almost impossible to break them, yet it is certainly the duty of all having interests of coast at heart to make most strenuous efforts. Will you please go to Washington for Examiner. I will send Davenport from here and the Journal will use whatever power it has to assist.” To this wire Bierce responded: “I shall be glad to do whatever I can toward defeating Mr. Huntington’s Funding Bill and shall start for Washington on Monday evening next.” The incident is typical of the relation between Hearst and Bierce. Here again, in a strange commingling of motives and purposes, the two were allied. Bierce once wrote: “If ever two men were born to be enemies he (Hearst) and I are they.” And yet on many questions Mr. Hearst’s self-interested journalism ran parallel with Bierce’s prejudices, as was so notably the case with the fight that ensued in Washington over the Funding Bill. Bierce left California at once, taking his son Leigh with him. He was faced east again, the first time in sixteen years. He went prepared for a great fight, backed with every facility that Mr. Hearst could command, and with instructions to lead the attack. There is little question but that he was the generalissimo of the California lobby at Washington during 1896, and how effective that lobby was will soon be apparent. Incidentally he went east armed with a letter from his physician, Dr. Cleveland, whose cousin was President of the United States.

  When Bierce went to Washington in 1896, he was at the height of his career. The well-known pencil sketch of Bierce by Miss F. Soule Campbell was drawn from a photograph taken by Prince that year in Washington. It has done as much for Bierce’s fame, perhaps, as any merit in his work. The picture used in the “Letters of Ambrose Bierce,” published by the Book Club of California is an interesting study, showing, as it does, Bierce with a newspaper clenched in his hands as a bludgeon. But Miss Campbell’s study rarefies the rather coarse features of Bierce and softens the expression. In her picture his face is brilliant, fine, poetic. Her drawing should have written under it the verses which he originally wrote for his daughter, but a copy of which he gave to Miss Campbell:

  How blind is he who, powerless to discern

  The glories that about his pathway burn,

  Walks unaware the avenues of Dream

  Nor sees the domes of paradise agleam!

  O — Golden Age, to him more nobly planned

  Thy light lies ever upon sea and land;

  From sordid scenes he lifts his eyes at will

  And sees a Grecian god on every hill.

  The portrait by Partington is more to life, but, as is so often the case, the more imaginative study divined a quality not apparent to the eye. When this drawing is compared with the best known portrait studies of Henry James, — (with his sleek complacent features), — and of Edgar Saltus, — (trying to look like an American Oscar Wilde), — something of the difference in men becomes apparent. The two most interesting faces of the period were those of Mark Twain and Ambrose Bierce, for in each case it is a face illuminated with the energy of unique personality. The matter is not altogether trivial: no one who ever saw Bierce could think him unimportant.

  In Washington the fight over the Funding Bill was attracting national attention. The excitement was at its height during January, February and March of 1896. Immediately upon his arrival at the battle front, Bierce began to send long dispatches to The Examiner, the first of which appeared on February 2nd, 1896, under the blazing headline: “Huntington Lying in His Last Ditch.” Bierce never showed more keenness than in his change of technique during this important campaign. In San Francisco he had early perceived that he must be direct and personal to be effective, for the scene would admit of no other technique. As Percival Pollard once remarked with great discernment: “The impersonal manner is impossible in our present sophistication,” referring to the America of his time. But in Washington, Bierce realized that he was writing for the country at large, and that he was assured an audience. He must be clear, forceful and persuasive about his presentation of the case against Huntington, and so he quickly abandoned the unmodulated satire of his early journalism. He did not, of course, become gentle. He started his first article as follows: “Mr. Huntington is not altogether bad. Though severe, he is merciful. He tempers invective with falsehood. He says ugly things of the enemy, but he has the tenderness to be careful that they are mostly lies.”

  If California was ably represented at Washington, it can scarcely be said that Mr. Huntington’s defense was neglected. He had established a veritable barrage of publicity and was fighting, with his customary determination, to befog the issues. One trick of his hirelings was to quote the names of prominent San Franciscans who were supposed to favor the bill, thus creating the impression that California endorsed the measure. Bierce printed all these names at the head of his dispatches and such pressure was brought to bear upon them in San Francisco that they quickly abandoned Mr. Huntington. The railroad was then virtually Mr. Huntington, as his old associates had all died previous to this time. Every day that the fight continued it became more and more apparent that the measure would be defeated. Bierce would intersperse his articles with such a remark as this: “Mr. Huntington appeared before the committee and took his hands out of all pockets long enough to be sworn.” The old Hearst squadron was functioning to perfection, and a more effective journalistic machine never existed in this country. Swinnerton and Davenport in their cartoons reached a high level of caricature and left not a vestige of pride or respect to Mr. Huntington. In San Francisco “Andy” Lawrence was shrewdly keeping the people in a frenzy of indignation and excitement, and wiring Bierce to “send some of your gems — something Biercy.” Bierce’s dispatches were featured in the Hearst newspapers and the interview which he gave some Eastern reporters at the Hotel Page was a masterpiece of effective propaganda. It was the beginning of Bierce’s vogue among Eastern newspapermen. They did not forget this very impressive and handsome Ambrose Bierce. A young reporter who was covering Washington at the time for some Pacific
Coast newspapers told about visiting Bierce one day during a lull in the fight. He closed his interview in this manner: “Be good till I see you again,” he said with one of the smiles which let one see behind the ulterior austerity of his bearing and into the real nature of the man himself, which I am sure is the kindest possible. “Be good, if you don’t care for happiness, and God will bless you, and finally kill you.”

  Bierce received the active cooperation throughout the fight of Senator Morgan of Alabama, who was being groomed for the presidency at the time. One day, coming out of a committee session, Bierce and some other men met Collis P. Huntington on the steps of the Capitol. Previously Bierce had declined Huntington’s hand in a committee session. But on this occasion Huntington approached and began to inquire as to how much Bierce wanted to withdraw from the fight. Meeting with a stony rejection of every bid, Huntington finally shouted: “Well, name your price; every man has his price.” It was then that Bierce made the famous statement that his price was the amount that Huntington owed the government, and that he might pay it to the Secretary of the Treasury. The story was sent around the world under the flamboyant caption: “The Pen is Mightier than the Sword” or, in some instances, “The Man Without a Price.” Later Huntington was asked why he tried to shake hands with Bierce in the committee room and replied, with typical callousness, “Oh, I just wanted to see how big he was,” and then added, “I know now.”