I knew that them magic words, “Refreshments” and “Souvenirs,” would hit ’em hard. In order to whet the public interest, I asked the papers where I advertised to give the thing some editorial or other reference. But they was very cold and said the best they could do was to send their dramatic critics to criticise the show afterward. A lot of good that would do me! So I took more space in advertising.
In a day or two I was visited at the hotel by one of the most imperent young fellows I ever met up with. He sent up a card, “James J. James, Publicity Expert,” I said to show him in, and he sort of oozed through the door—he was that oily. He looked about to see if we was alone; then winked slow and important, and says:
“What’s your game, Colonel? It looks pretty slick, but I can’t quite make it out. It’s a new bunco, all right, but slick as it looks, it ain’t quite so slick as it ought to be.”
“Look here, you cub,” I roared, “if you imply that I have any evil motives in this, I’ll shoot you so full of holes you’ll look like a mosquito net!”
He wasn’t a bit scared; he simply winked the other eye, and said in a kind of foreign-sounding language:
“Forget it, Colonel! Cut it out! Back to the alfalfa with your Buffalo Bill vocabulary! If you are really on the level, you don’t need to prove it with artillery. But it makes no diff. to me about that. My business is producing fame, not merit. Once more I ask, what’s your lay?”
I overcame a desire to kick him through the ceiling, and told him I proposed to entertain the strangers in New York.
“Strangers in New York?—Why, that means everybody! There’s been only one man born in New York since the war, and he’s kept in alcohol at a dime muzhum. Your idea is really to give old New York a Christmas party, eh? Very pretty! Very pretty, indeed! But if you insist on exploding money all over the place, I don’t see why you shouldn’t get a run for it. Besides, I need a bit of it myself. What you want is a press agent. You’re starting all wrong. People in New York can’t understand or believe anything except through the language of the press agent. You take one on your staff, and in three days you’ll be so famous that, if a child in a kindergarten is asked who is the Queen of Holland, it will answer: ‘Colonel Crockett, of Waco.’”
Well, he poured out the most remarkable string of talk I ever heard, and before I knew it he had made me promise to trust my soul and my scheme to him; to be surprised at nothing that might appear in the papers, and to refer all reporters to him. The next morning I found my name on the front page of every journal, with my picture in most of them. It seems I had held at bay two hundred angry Italians who were trying to mob a Chinese laundryman. The evening papers said that I had stopped a runaway coach-and-four on Fifth Avenue, that morning, by lassoing the leader. On the coach were Mrs. Aster, Mrs. Fitch, Reggie Vanderbuilt, George Goold, Harry Leer and a passel of other “Among those presents.” That night I went to a music-hall—according to the next morning’s papers—and broke up the show by throwing a pocketful of solitaires to the chorus girls. The next day three burglars got into my room; I held them up in a corner, took away their masks, spanked them, and gave them each a hundred-dollar bill to help them to avoid temptation. That afternoon the three big life-insurance companies asked me to be president. And so on—you can read for yourself in the clippings—only for Heaven’s sake don’t believe any of it. In every article was a neat allusion to my Christmas party.
I wanted to kill James J. James, and I scoured the town for him, but he dodged me. He kept his word, though. For the last few days I’ve been the most talked-of man in town. Looks like I’d been the Only man in New York.
And now to tell about my little party. For two days a regiment of men was working in the Garden under my direction—and at my expense. It was like paying the war appropriation of Russia. But it was worth it.
At six o’clock Christmas night the crowd began to line up at the Garden doors. At 6:30 a platoon of police arrived. At 6:40 the line reached twice around the Garden. At 6:45 they sent for more police. At 7:15 every street was solid with people. They called out the police reserves and clubbed about four hundred innocent bystanders insensible. At 7:45 the fire department was called and played the hose on the crowd.
This thinned ’em off a bit on the outsquirts. Then the ambulances give out and the fainting women was carried home in express wagons and wheelbarrows. The subway was the only line that could run cars.
At 8:30 the doors opened. You should of seen the rush. The Galveston flood wasn’t in it. At 8:45 the Garden was so full they closed the doors. That sent some of the outside crowd home.
The Garden was a beautiful sight. On the tower outside, in big electric letters, there was a sign, “Merry Christmas to you and yours.”
Inside it was decorated with holly leaves and berries—tons and tons of it. At one end was built a big house with a chimbly and an old-fashioned fireplace. The roof of the house was covered with snow (cotton), and the sky back of it was full of electric stars that twinkled something beautiful. And there was a moon that looked like the real thing.
There was four bands in the balconies and a chorus of angels with real wings and electric halos. They sang “Peace on Earth, Good Will to Men,” written for the occasion by Mr. De Koven.
By and by all the bands bust out gorgeous, and then Santy Claus appeared in a sleigh drawed by six real live stuffed reindeers. He run along the sky on unseen grooves and drove up to the roof of the house, and slid down the chimbly with a pack of presents. He filled all the stockings with candy cornycopies and toys, and a lot of attendants passed ’em out to the childern. You should of heard them squeal with joy—poor little tots, living in hotels and apartment places where Santy Claus would of had to come up the steam radiator or the gas-log pipe to get in. Well, my Santy Claus had to make sixteen trips to satisfy the childern.
The Garden was divided into sections, one for every State and Territory, with its own shield in electric lights and colors. There was a native of every State in charge, and every State had its own big Christmas tree, and reception-room and refreshments. Some of the people I noticed seemed to of been born in several States at once, the way they passed from one booth to another fillin’ up their pockets and stummicks. I reckon they paid for it the next day in doctors’ bills.
But there was nary a sign of rowdyism. That dollar admission was a regular sieve for straining out the toughs. Then there were policemen everywhere, and every other man nearly was a plain-clothes man or a detective. Besides, after sober consideration, and on advice from the Gardeners, I cut out all drinks, except soft stuff. So there were no jags, except what some people brought with them from their Christmas dinners and loaded plum puddings.
And then, of course, that peculiar something we get into us at Christmas time filled everybody with a sort of loving fellowship and a hankering to hug their neighbors and divvy up their funds like a Mutual Life Insurance Company prospectus says it’s a-going to do some day.
In the centre of the hall there was a big sign in electric letters:
EVERYBODY IS HEREBY INTRODUCED TO EVERYBODY ELSE—FOR TONIGHT ONLY
At every State booth you’d see people gathering and recognizing old friends or introducing theirselves to new ones. It was surprising how each State had its gathering.
At the Texas booth there was a big, immense crowd. A lot of them turned out to be old friends of ours; school friends of yours, ranch friends of mine, people I had worked for, people who had worked me—or for me. A lot of them sent their love and a Merry Christmas to you. I remember especially— [Here we omit a list of names, somewhat lacking in universal interest.]
I had advertised that people who wanted to give each other Christmas presents could have them hung on the State trees. My attendants gave them checks for their gifts and there wasn’t many mix-ups. Old Miss Samanthy Clay got a box of cigars meant for Judge Randolph, and he got a pair of silver-buckle garters meant for her. But most of them come out right, and several of them was so surprised
at getting presents in New York that they bust out crying. Major Calhoun’s whiskers was soaking wet with tears when he got a bottle of old Bourbon from Judge Payton.
Rich folks who had been poor men met charter-members of the “I’m on to your origin” association. But the Christmas spirit made them forget to be snobs. You’d hear millionaires telling plain people how they used to play Hallowe’en jokes, how they scraped up to buy their mothers little Christmas gifts—what ridiculous things they used to get and give!
All evening as fast as anybody went out they’d let somebody else in. Along about eleven o’clock a lot of the people began to go home. Then a new crowd come in. People who had taken their childern home and put them to bed would come back for more fun. Others, who had spent the evening dining, began to dribble in.
All the actor-people and singers came. It was good to see them. Some of them told me what a god-send such a thing was to them, homeless by profession. A lot of them brought their wives and babies. One father was playing Romeo in Newark, his wife was playing Little Eva in Harlem, and their daughter was playing Camille on Broadway. You should of seen them rejoicing round the Kansas tree!
About midnight the big refreshment hall was opened and everybody that could squeeze in set down to long tables where I had supper served. I had some of the best after-dinner speakers in town come in, and you should of heard some of the funny stories—it would of brought back dear old childhood memories. Mayor McClellan gave us all a welcome, and then there was Chauncey Depew, of course, and Simeon Ford, and Augustus Thomas, and Wilton Lackaye, and Job Hedges, and Lemuel Ely Quigg, and General Horace Porter, and a passel of others.
They all made the most surprising allusions to your poor old husband. They called me Daddy and sang about me being a jolly good fellow. And one of them christened me “Santy Crockett.” Why, my ears burned so hot I near set my collar on fire! It sure was worth all I spent, and I had a terrible time to keep from blubbering. I must of swallowed about four hundred and eleven Adam’s apples.
Finally they called on me for a speech. I just kind o’ gibbered—I don’t know what. The papers say I said: “Merry Christmas, my childern! This old world sure is some comfortable, after all. The only trouble is that the right people can’t seem to get together at the right time often enough. But this here Christmas supper tastes to me terrible much like More. I’m going to try it again. And I hereby invite you all that ain’t in any better place or any better world to meet me here a year from tonight. And so God bless you all, and—and God bless everybody!”
Then after a lot of song-singing and hand-wringing we all went home, tears in every eye and smiles on every mouth. The remnants of food and toys made more than the twelve baskets full of Scripture. I sent them round to the Hospitals and Orphant Asylums. I’ve engaged the Garden again for next Christmas and paid a deposit down. It ain’t the extravagance it looks, either, for while the expenses was high—twelve thousand-odd dollars—they took in at the door nearly eighteen thousand dollars. I sent the profit to the Salvation Army and the Volunteers, and now I’m being prayed for and hallelooyied for everywhere there’s a bass drum. But I’d do it again if it cost me twenty thousand. It’s worth that and more to have your heart nearly break wide open with joy and fellowship.
It was broad daylight when I got to bed, all wore out with happiness. I cuddled up, like I was a little boy once more in the days when I used to get up Christmas morning, cold and early, and look at my presents and then crawl back under the covers again with a double armful of toys, to keep warm and sleep some more.
If only you and the chicks had of been there! Next time you shall be.
Your loving
AUSTIN
THE BIRDS’ CHRISTMAS CAROL, by Kate Douglas Wiggin
To the three dearest children in the world:
BERTHA, LUCY, AND HORATIO
I. A LITTLE SNOW BIRD
It was very early Christmas morning, and in the stillness of the dawn, with the soft snow falling on the house-tops, a little child was born in the Bird household.
They had intended to name the baby Lucy, if it were a girl; but they had not expected her on Christmas morning, and a real Christmas baby was not to be lightly named—the whole family agreed in that.
They were consulting about it in the nursery. Mr. Bird said that he had assisted in naming the three boys, and that he should leave this matter entirely to Mrs. Bird; Donald wanted the child called “Dorothy,” after a pretty, curly-haired girl who sat next him in school; Paul choose “Luella,” for Luella was the nurse who had been with him during his whole babyhood, up to the time of his first trousers, and the name suggested all sorts of comfortable things. Uncle Jack said that the first girl should always be named for her mother, no matter how hideous the name happened to be.
Grandma said that she would prefer not to take any part in the discussion, and everybody suddenly remembered that Mrs. Bird had thought of naming the baby Lucy, for Grandma herself; and, while it would be indelicate for her to favor that name, it would be against human nature for her to suggest any other, under the circumstances.
Hugh, the “hitherto baby,” if that is a possible term, sat in one corner and said nothing, but felt, in some mysterious way, that his nose was out of joint; for there was a newer baby now, a possibility he had never taken into consideration; and the “first girl,” too—a still higher development of treason, which made him actually green with jealousy.
But it was too profound a subject to be settled then and there, on the spot; besides, Mamma had not been asked, and everybody felt it rather absurd, after all, to forestall a decree that was certain to be absolutely wise, just, and perfect.
The reason that the subject had been brought up at all so early in the day lay in the fact that Mrs. Bird never allowed her babies to go over night unnamed. She was a person of so great decision of character that she would have blushed at such a thing; she said that to let blessed babies go dangling and dawdling about without names, for months and months, was enough to ruin them for life. She also said that if one could not make up one’s mind in twenty-four hours it was a sign that—But I will not repeat the rest, as it might prejudice you against the most charming woman in the world.
So Donald took his new velocipede and went out to ride up and down the stone pavement and notch the shins of innocent people as they passed by, while Paul spun his musical top on the front steps.
But Hugh refused to leave the scene of action. He seated himself on the top stair in the hall, banged his head against the railing a few times, just by way of uncorking the vials of his wrath, and then subsided into gloomy silence, waiting to declare war if more “first girl babies” were thrust upon a family already surfeited with that unnecessary article.
Meanwhile dear Mrs. Bird lay in her room, weak, but safe and happy, with her sweet girl baby by her side and the heaven of motherhood opening again before her. Nurse was making gruel in the kitchen, and the room was dim and quiet. There was a cheerful open fire in the grate, but though the shutters were closed, the side windows that looked out on the Church of Our Savior, next door, were a little open.
Suddenly a sound of music poured out into the bright air and drifted into the chamber. It was the boy choir singing Christmas anthems. Higher and higher rose the clear, fresh voices, full of hope and cheer, as children’s voices always are. Fuller and fuller grew the burst of melody as one glad strain fell upon another in joyful harmony:
“Carol, brothers, carol, Carol joyfully, Carol the good tidings, Carol merrily! And pray a gladsome Christmas For all your fellow-men: Carol, brothers, carol, Christmas Day again.”
One verse followed another, always with the same sweet refrain:
“And pray a gladsome Christmas For all your fellow-men: Carol, brothers, carol, Christmas Day again.”
Mrs. Bird thought, as the music floated in upon her gentle sleep, that she had slipped into heaven with her new baby, and that the angels were bidding them welcome. But the tiny bundle by her si
de stirred a little, and though it was scarcely more than the ruffling of a feather, she awoke; for the mother-ear is so close to the heart that it can hear the faintest whisper of a child.
She opened her eyes and drew the baby closer. It looked like a rose dipped in milk, she thought, this pink and white blossom of girlhood, or like a pink cherub, with its halo of pale yellow hair, finer than floss silk.
“Carol, brothers, carol, Carol joyfully, Carol the good tidings, Carol merrily!”
The voices were brimming over with joy.
“Why, my baby,” whispered Mrs. Bird in soft surprise, “I had forgotten what day it was. You are a little Christmas child, and we will name you ‘Carol’—mother’s Christmas Carol!”
“What!” said Mr. Bird, coming in softly and closing the door behind him.
“Why, Donald, don’t you think ‘Carol’ is a sweet name for a Christmas baby? It came to me just a moment ago in the singing, as I was lying here half asleep and half awake.”
“I think it is a charming name, dear heart, and sounds just like you, and I hope that, being a girl, this baby has some chance of being as lovely as her mother”—at which speech from the baby’s papa Mrs. Bird, though she was as weak and tired as she could be, blushed with happiness.
And so Carol came by her name.
Of course, it was thought foolish by many people, though Uncle Jack declared laughingly that it was very strange if a whole family of Birds could not be indulged in a single Carol; and Grandma, who adored the child, thought the name much more appropriate than Lucy, but was glad that people would probably think it short for Caroline.
Perhaps because she was born in holiday time, Carol was a very happy baby. Of course, she was too tiny to understand the joy of Christmas-tide, but people say there is everything in a good beginning, and she may have breathed in unconsciously the fragrance of evergreens and holiday dinners; while the peals of sleigh-bells and the laughter of happy children may have fallen upon her baby ears and wakened in them a glad surprise at the merry world she had come to live in.
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