Bartlett's Book of Anecdotes

by Clifton Fadiman

  WALN, Nicholas (1742–1813), US lawyer.

  1 A Quaker meeting having detected some fault in Waln, a deputation of elders was sent to remonstrate with him. They knocked and knocked at his front door but without result. At last an upstairs window was thrown open and Waln’s head poked out. “My Friends,” he called down, “you need not come in; the Master has been here before you.”

  WALPOLE, Horace, 4th Earl of Orford (1717–97), British writer.

  1 Walpole had a stormy interview with an elderly uncle concerning a proposed marriage in the family. Departing unplacated, he wrote his relative a furious letter ending: “I am, sir, for the last time in my life, Your Humble Servant Horace Walpole.”

  WALPOLE, Sir Robert, 1st Earl of Orford (1676–1745), British statesman.

  1 Walpole’s father encouraged him to drink deep. For every time he filled his own glass he filled his son’s twice. “Come, Robert,” said the senior Walpole, “you shall drink twice while I drink once, for I cannot permit the son in his sober senses to witness the intoxication of his father.”

  2 After his arduous years in office, Walpole looked forward to retirement in his splendid mansion, Houghton Castle. Entering the library, he took down a book, perused it for a few minutes, and then returned it to the shelf. He took down another, but held that only half as long before replacing it and taking a third. This he immediately put back, and, bursting into tears, exclaimed, “I have led a life of business so long that I have lost my taste for reading, and now — what shall I do?”

  WALTER, Bruno (1876–1962), German conductor.

  1 When Bruno Walter first conducted the New York Philharmonic, Alfred Wallenstein was the first cellist. Walter noticed that Wallenstein ostentatiously ignored him during both rehearsals and concerts. Rather than make a scene in public, Walter asked Wallenstein to come and speak to him privately. “What is your ambition, Mr. Wallenstein?” Walter in- quired mildly. “Someday I’d like to be a conductor,” replied the cellist. “Well, when you are, I hope you never have Wallenstein in front of you,” said Walter.

  WALTON, Sir William [Turner] (1902–83), British composer.

  1 At the rehearsals for the first performance of Façade, the players were at first irritated, then interested, and finally delighted by the strange and difficult new sounds that the young Walton, as composer-conductor, asked them to make. During one of the pauses in the rehearsal the clarinetist looked up from his score and asked, “Excuse me, Mr. Walton, has a clarinet player ever done you an injury?”

  2 Until the success of his film score for Laurence Olivier’s Henry V in 1942 Walton was poor, and as he himself admitted in later life, lived by scrounging off the Sitwell family. Lady Aberconway, a close friend of the Sitwells and a well-known London hostess of the 1930s, recalled that Walton was known to them by the nickname “Lincrusta.” It was the tradename for a particular kind of embossed wallpaper that was extremely difficult to detach.

  WARBURTON, William (1698–1779), British clergyman and literary scholar; bishop of Gloucester (1759–79).

  1 During a debate in the House of Lords upon the Test Laws, under which those who wished to stand for public office were obliged to profess the Anglican faith, the witty and profligate Earl of Sandwich complained, “I have heard frequent use of the words ‘orthodoxy’ and ‘heterodoxy’ but I confess myself at a loss to know precisely what they mean.” Bishop Warburton enlightened him in a whisper, “Orthodoxy is my doxy; heterodoxy is another man’s doxy.”

  WARD, Artemus [Charles Farrar Browne] (1834–67), US humorist.

  1 After a successful and lucrative lecture tour of the eastern states, Ward headed west in October 1863. The manager of the San Francisco opera house sent him a telegram asking what he would take for forty nights in California. Ward wired back: “Brandy and water. A. Ward.”

  2 Artemus Ward spent Christmas Eve 1863 with Mark Twain and some other cronies at Barnum’s Restaurant in Virginia City. A great deal of liquor was consumed, and toward the end of the evening Ward proposed “a standing toast.” He made several ineffectual attempts to get to his feet, while his companions remained slumped at the table. “Well,” he said, abandoning his efforts, “consider it standing.”

  WARNER, Jack (1892–1978), US movie producer, co-founder of Warner Brothers.

  1 The actor Pat O’Brien recalls that Jack Warner bought Sinclair Lewis’s worldwide bestseller Main Street and changed the title to I Married a Doctor on the grounds that nobody “would want to see a picture about a street.” The movie died.

  2 In 1946, when British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery visited California, Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Goldwyn gave a dinner for him. Goldwyn began: “It gives me great pleasure to welcome to Hollywood a very distinguished soldier. Ladies and gentlemen, I propose a toast to Marshall Field Montgomery.” The silence was broken by Jack Warner’s voice saying, “Montgomery Ward, you mean.”

  3 Warner was in the habit of taking an afternoon nap in his office at Warner Brothers, and it was an unwritten rule of the studios that he should not be disturbed. On one occasion, however, Bette Davis burst into the office while Warner was asleep and began ranting about a script that did not meet with her approval. Without opening his eyes, Warner reached for the phone and called his secretary. “Come in and wake me up,” he said. “I’m having a nightmare.” Miss Davis could not help laughing, and the crisis over the script was resolved in a few minutes.

  WASHINGTON, George (1732–99), US general and statesman, 1st President of the United States (1789–97).

  1 Parson Weems’s Life of Washington (1800) contains many apocryphal stories about his hero and ranks more as hagiography than factual biography. His best-known fabrication (introduced into the 1806 edition) is the story of George Washington and the cherry tree. According to Weems, when he was about six, George Washington was given a hatchet. He went around his father’s farm, testing it on all manner of things, including a fine young cherry tree. His father, discovering the damage, summoned the boy and said sternly, “Do you know who killed this beautiful little cherry tree?” The child was silent for a moment but then cried out, “I cannot tell a lie; you know I cannot tell a lie. I cut it with my hatchet.” His father at once forgot his anger in his delight at the child’s truthfulness.

  2 After a skirmish in the course of the Seven Years’ War, Washington was reported to have said, “I heard the bullets whistle, and believe me, there is something charming in the sound.” When King George II of England heard of this remark, he said, “He would not say so had he been used to hear many.”

  3 During the American Revolution an officer in civilian clothes rode past a group of soldiers busy repairing a small redoubt. Their commander was shouting instructions but making no attempt to help them. Asked why, he retorted with great dignity, “Sir, I am a corporal!” The stranger apologized, dismounted, and proceeded to help the exhausted soldiers himself. When the job was completed he turned to the corporal and said, “Mr. Corporal, next time you have a job like this and not enough men to do it, go to your commander in chief, and I will come and help you again.” Too late, the corporal recognized General Washington.

  4 During the bitterly cold winter at Valley Forge, Washington constantly went the rounds of his men, encouraging and comforting them. One day he came across Private John Brantley drinking some stolen wine with his companions. Already a little drunk, Brantley cheerily invited his commander to “drink some wine with a soldier.” Replied Washington, “My boy, you have no time for drinking wine.” And he turned away. “Damn your proud soul,” exclaimed Brantley. “You’re above drinking with soldiers.” Washington turned back. “Come, I will drink with you,” he said and took a pull at the jug and handed it back. “Give it to your servants,” said Brantley, gesturing toward Washington’s aides. The jug was duly passed around. “Now,” said Brantley, when he once more had his jug, “I’ll be damned if I don’t spend the last drop of my heart’s blood for you.”

  5 Early in the Revolutionary War, Washington se
nt one of his officers to requisition horses from the local landowners. Calling at an old country mansion, the officer was received by the elderly mistress of the house. “Madam, I have come to claim your horses in the name of the government,” he began. “On whose orders?” demanded the woman sternly. “On the orders of General George Washington, commander in chief of the American army,” replied the officer. The old lady smiled. “You go back and tell General George Washington that his mother says he cannot have her horses,” she said.

  6 As Washington was sitting at dinner one evening, the heat from the fire behind him became so intense that he said he had better move farther from the hearth. Someone in the company said jokingly that it was only right and proper for a general to be able to stand fire. “But it doesn’t look good if he receives it from behind,” replied Washington.

  7 During the Constitutional Convention someone suggested that the size of the army be restricted to five thousand men at any one time. Washington saw the impracticality of this, but as chairman he was prevented from making a counterproposal. Instead he whispered to a delegate sitting near him that they ought to amend the proposal to provide that “no foreign army should invade the United States at any time with more than three thousand troops.”

  8 Walking in Philadelphia with an American acquaintance, an English visitor expressed a wish to see President Washington. A few moments later, the President happened to pass the two men on the opposite side of the street. Pointing at the solitary figure, the American said, “There he goes.” The Englishman was surprised. “Is that President Washington?” he exclaimed. “Where’s his guard?” The American struck his breast proudly. “Here,” he declared.

  9 Gilbert Stuart, who painted a famous portrait of Washington in 1795, remarked afterward to General Henry (“Light-Horse Harry”) Lee on the strong passions that he could perceive beneath the President’s dignified exterior. A few days later General Lee mentioned to the Washingtons that he had seen the portrait, adding, “Stuart says you have a tremendous temper.” Mrs. Washington’s color rose and she said sharply, “Mr. Stuart takes a great deal on himself to make such a remark.” General Lee checked her: “But he added that the President has wonderful control.” Washington said, almost smiling, “He’s right.”

  10 In 1797 the French revolutionist and freethinker Constantin Volney visited the United States and asked Washington for a letter of recommendation. Not wishing to offend the Frenchman, but also anxious to avoid controversy over the man’s opinions, Washington simply wrote: “C. Volney needs no recommendation from Geo. Washington.”

  WATERTON, Charles (1782–1865), British eccentric and naturalist.

  1 While in the United States, as Edith Sitwell describes it, Waterton sprained his ankle, and “being extremely annoyed by inquiries of other less-adventurous gentlemen, staying in the hotel, as to the progress of his ‘gout,’ he remembered that in the past, when his ankle had been badly sprained, a doctor had ordered him to hold it under the pump two or three times a day. It struck him therefore that it might be a kind of super-cure if he held his ankle under the Niagara Falls.” Which he did.

  WATSON, Richard (1737–1816), British clergyman, bishop of Llandaff (1782–1816).

  1 The landlord of the well-known Cock Inn at Windermere in northwest England wished to compliment Dr. Watson, who had a house nearby. He changed the name of the inn to “The Bishop” and hung out a sign bearing a portrait of the eminent cleric. A rival landlord of a less popular establishment across the street thereupon changed his inn sign to “The Cock,” and thus attracted a lot of the customers of the former Cock Inn. The landlord of the latter decided that he must make the identity of his inn clear to visitors to the town. When Dr. Watson next passed through Windermere, he was not at all flattered to see painted underneath his portrait on the inn sign the words: “This is the old Cock.”

  WATT, James (1736–1819), British engineer.

  1 According to tradition, the solution to the problem of preventing the loss of energy in the Newcomen engine occurred to Watt as he observed a kettle boiling on the fire at his home. His aunt came in and rebuked him for idly fiddling about with the kettle, holding a spoon over the spout, pressing it down, and so on. She suggested that he go out and do something useful.

  WAUGH, Evelyn (1903–66), British novelist.

  1 Evelyn Waugh and Harold Acton toured southern Italy together. It turned out to be one of those vacations when everything conspires to go wrong. When they got to Naples, the British consul came to pay them a courtesy call. They were both feeling rather out of sorts, and the conversation flagged. In a desperate attempt to enliven it, the consul said to Waugh, “I have a map of Mount Ararat, which I think might interest you.”

  “Why should it?” said Waugh. “Has the Ark been found?”

  2 In 1935, Waugh was sent to cover the Italian invasion of Ethiopia. While he was there, his editor heard a rumor that an English nurse had been killed in an Italian air raid and cabled: “Send two hundred words upblown nurse.” Waugh made exhaustive inquiries, but was unable to substantiate the story. He finally cabled back: “Nurse unupblown.”

  3 Waugh’s commanding officer was impressed by his courage during the battle of Crete in 1941. On the return journey, the writer was asked for his impression of the battle, his first experience of military actions. “Like German opera,” he replied, “too long and too loud.”

  4 (Joseph Epstein tells this story about Evelyn Waugh:)

  “Once, when he had behaved with particular rudeness to a young French intellectual at a dinner party in Paris at the home of Nancy Mitford, Miss Mitford, angry at his social brutality, asked him how he could behave so meanly and yet consider himself a believing and practicing Catholic. ‘You have no idea,’ Waugh returned, ‘how much nastier I would be if I was not a Catholic. Without supernatural aid I would hardly be a human being.’ ”

  5 As a captain in the British Army during World War II, he once came out of a foxhole during a bombardment by the German air force. Looking up at the sky, he said, “Like all things German, this is vastly overdone.”

  6 Waugh once declined to be interviewed by the critic Edmund Wilson. “I don’t think that Americans have much to say that is much of interest, do you?”

  WAVELL, Archibald Percival, 1st Earl (1883–1950), British field marshal; viceroy of India (1943–47).

  1 (One of the greatest disappointments of Wavell’s life came at the end of June 1941, when he was replaced by Claude Auchinleck as commander in the Middle Eastern battle zone.)

  “A signal from the prime minister [Churchill] telling him that Auchinleck and he were to change places had arrived in the small hours of the morning, and been taken to General Arthur Smith, who had at once dressed and gone round to Wavell’s house on Gezira. He found him shaving, with his face covered with lather and his razor poised. He read out the signal. Wavell showed no emotion. He merely said: ‘The prime minister’s quite right. This job wants a new eye and a new hand’; and went on shaving.”

  WAYNE, John [Marion Michael Morrison] (1907–79), US movie actor.

  1 While playing a cameo role in the biblical epic The Greatest Story Ever Told, Wayne had a line he spoke too laconically: “Truly, this was the Son of God.” The director, George Stevens, reminded him he was talking about Jesus and said, “You’ve got to deliver the line with a little more awe.” On his next take Wayne said, “Aw, truly this was the Son of God.”

  2 Wayne went to Harvard College to receive the famous, and famously satirical, Hasty Pudding Award. At the ensuing press conference he was asked, “Do you look at yourself as an American legend?” Replied Wayne, “Well, not being a Harvard man, I don’t look at myself any more than necessary.”

  WEAVER, Earl (1930–), US baseball player and executive.

  1 Outfielder and born-again Christian Pat Kelly once called out to Weaver, “You got to walk with the Lord, Skip!” “Hell,” replied Weaver, “I’d rather you walk with the bases loaded.”

  2 After a series
of bad pitches Jim Palmer headed to the dugout followed by Weaver, who was jumping up and down, visibly angry and yelling. Finally Palmer turned around and faced Weaver, saying, “Why Earl, I’ve never seen you so tall.”

  WEBB, Sidney [James], Baron Passfield (1859–1947), British socialist politician and economist.

  1 Asked to account for the harmonious front the Webbs presented on the important issues of the time, Beatrice explained that they had agreed early in their married life always to vote alike on great issues. “Sidney was to decide which way we voted. I was to decide which were the great issues.”

  WEBSTER, Daniel (1782–1852), US lawyer and statesman.

  1 Temporarily absent from home, Captain Webster left Daniel and his brother Ezekiel with specific instructions as to the work they were to do that day. On his return he found the task still unperformed, and questioned his sons severely about their idleness. “What have you been doing, Ezekiel?” he asked.

  “Nothing, sir.”

  “Well, Daniel, what have you been doing?”

  “Helping Zeke, sir.”

  2 As a boy, Daniel Webster worked in his father’s fields. One day, told to do the mowing, he made a thoroughly bad job of it; sometimes his scythe struck the ground and sometimes it swung too high and missed the grass entirely. He complained to his father that the scythe was not hung right. Various attempts were made to hang it better, but with no success. At last his father told him that he might hang it to suit himself, whereupon he hung it on a tree and said, “There, that’s just right.”

  3 As a lad at school Webster committed some peccadillo for which he was called up to the teacher’s desk to have the palm of his right hand caned. Aware that his hands were very dirty, he made an effort to rub off some of the dirt as he walked up to the desk. Nevertheless, the hand he held out was exceedingly grimy. The teacher looked at it sternly. “Daniel, if you can find another hand as dirty as that in this schoolroom, I’ll let you off.” Out from behind the boy’s back came the left hand. “Here it is, sir,” said young Webster. The teacher had to abide by his offer.