The Life of Phineas T. Barnum Part 14

The steamship was sighted just before noon on Sunday, and soon afterward Mr. Barnum, who went out with the health officer, was standing on the deck where, for the first time, he met the famous singer. After they had shaken hands and uttered a few commonplace words of greeting Miss Lind asked him when and where he had heard her sing.

"I never had the pleasure of seeing you before in my life," he replied.

"How is it possible that you dared risk so much money on a person whom you never heard sing?" she asked in great surprise.

"I risked it," answered Barnum, "on your reputation, which in musical matters I would much rather trust than my own judgment."

The fact was that, although Barnum did rely largely upon Miss Lind's reputation as an artist, he also took into account her equally great reputation for benevolence, generosity and general loveliness of disposition. He knew that these traits of character would appeal with a special force to the warm-hearted and enthusiastic American public. Indeed, he afterward confessed that had it not been for this peculiarity of her disposition, he never would have ventured to make the engagement with her; and he always believed that as many people came to see and hear her on this account as on account of her skill as a singer.

Seldom has any visitor to New York received a more remarkable greeting than did the "Swedish Nightingale." Mr. Barnum's efforts to arouse public interest in her had not been in vain. The whole city was anxious to get the first possible glimpse of her. But beside this bona fide interest in her, Mr. Barnum had seen to it that her landing was made all possible use of as an advertis.e.m.e.nt. On the wharf at which she landed a bower of green trees, decorated with flags, had been prepared. There were also two handsome triumphal arches, on one of which was inscribed, "Welcome, Jenny Lind!" and on the other, "Welcome to America!"

Probably the singer thought, and possibly some of the general public also imagined, that these decorations had been erected by the city government, or at least by some committee of public-spirited citizens. Mr. Barnum, however, never found fault with any one for suspecting that he was chiefly responsible for them, and there is every reason to believe that the cost of them was to be found entered in his books, charged to the account of advertising.

Thousands of people were thronged along the water front, on the piers and on the shipping, to greet the Atlantic as it reached its dock. So great was the rush to see the ill.u.s.trious guest that one man was crowded overboard, an incident which Miss Lind herself witnessed, and at which she was much alarmed. He was rescued with no other harm than a thorough wetting. Barnum's carriage was in waiting for Miss Lind, and the great showman himself, after placing her within it, mounted the box at the driver's side. He took that seat as a legitimate advertis.e.m.e.nt, and his presence there aided those who filled the windows and sidewalks along the entire way to the Irving House, and there were many thousands of them, in coming to the conclusion that Jenny Lind had really arrived.

Five minutes after Miss Lind had entered the hotel, Barnum invited her to look out of a window opening on Broadway. When she did so she saw a throng of not less than twenty thousand persons gathered to do her honor. And there that throng remained all the rest of the afternoon and until late in the evening. At her request Barnum took dinner with her that afternoon. According to the European custom she offered to pledge his health in a gla.s.s of wine, and was doubtless much surprised at his response. He said to her: "Miss Lind, I do not think you can ask any other favor on earth which I would not gladly grant. But I am a teetotaler, and must beg to be permitted to drink to your health and happiness in a gla.s.s of cold water."

Late that night Miss Lind was serenaded by the New York Musical Fund Society, which numbered, on that occasion, two hundred musicians. They were escorted to the hotel by about three hundred firemen, clad in their picturesque uniform and bearing flaming torches. Fully thirty thousand spectators were at this hour gathered about the hotel, and in response to their vociferous calls Miss Lind stepped upon the balcony and bowed to them.

Such was the great singer's first day in America, and for several weeks thereafter the public interest in her was scarcely less demonstrative. Her rooms were thronged by visitors, among whom were the most notable people in society, in the learned professions and in public life. The street before the hotel was almost blocked day after day by the carriages of fashionable people, and Barnum's only anxiety was lest the aristocratic part of the community should monopolize her altogether, and thus mar his interest by cutting her off from the sympathy she had excited among the common people. The shop-keepers of the city showered their attentions upon her, sending her cart-loads of specimens of their most valuable wares, for which they asked no other return than her acceptance and her autograph acknowledgment. Gloves, bonnets, shawls, gowns, chairs, carriages, pianos, and almost every imaginable article of use or ornament was named for her.

Songs and musical compositions were dedicated to her, and poems were published in her honor. Day after day and week after week her doings formed the most conspicuous news in the daily journals.

Some weeks before Miss Lind's arrival in America Barnum had offered a prize of two hundred dollars for the best ode, to be set to music and sung by her at her first concert. Its topic was to be, "Greeting to America." In response several hundred poems were sent in, mostly pretty poor stuff; though several of them were very good. After a great deal of hard work in reading and considering them, the Prize Committee selected as the best the one offered by Bayard Taylor. It was set to music by Julius Benedict, and was as follows:

GREETING TO AMERICA

WORDS BY BAYARD TAYLOR--MUSIC BY JULIUS BENEDICT.

I greet with a full heart the Land of the West, Whose Banner of Stars o'er a world is unrolled; Whose empire o'ershadows Atlantic's wide breast, And opens to sunset its gateway of gold!

The land of the mountain, the land of the lake, And rivers that roll in magnificent tide-- Where the souls of the mighty from slumber awake, And hallow the soil for whose freedom they died!

Thou Cradle of empire! though wide be the foam That severs the land of my fathers and thee, I hear, from thy bosom, the welcome of home, For song has a home in the hearts of the Free!

And long as thy waters shall gleam in the sun, And long as thy heroes remember their scars, Be the hands of thy children united as one, And Peace shed her light on thy Banner of Stars!

This award gave general satisfaction, although a few disappointed compet.i.tors complained. This remarkable compet.i.tion and the other features of Miss Lind's reception in America, attracted so much attention in England that the London Times in one day devoted several columns of s.p.a.ce to the subject.

Of course the American press literally teemed with matter about Miss Lind and Barnum. The poetical compet.i.tion demanded much attention, and presently a witty pamphlet was published, ent.i.tled "Barnum's Parna.s.sus; being Confidential Disclosures of the Prize Committee on the Jenny Lind Song." It pretended to give all or most of the poems that had been offered in the compet.i.tion, though of course none of them were genuine. Many of them, however, contained fine satirical hits on the whole business; such, for example, as the following:

BARNUMOPSIS.

A RECITATIVE.

When to the common rest that crowns his days, Dusty and worn the tired pedestrian goes, What light is that whose wide o'erlooking blaze A sudden glory on his pathway throws?

'Tis not the setting sun, whose drooping lid Closed on the weary world at half-past six; 'Tis not the rising moon, whose rays are hid Behind the city's sombre piles of bricks.

It is the Drummond Light, that from the top Of Barnum's ma.s.sive pile, sky-mingling there, Dart's its quick gleam o'er every shadowed shop, And gilds Broadway with unaccustomed glare.

There o'er the sordid gloom, whose deep'ning tracks Furrow the city's brow, the front of ages, Thy loftier light descends on cabs and hacks, And on two dozen different lines of stages!

O twilight Sun, with thy far darting ray, Thou art a type of him whose tireless hands Hung thee on high to guide the stranger's way, Where, in its pride, his vast Museum stands.

Him, who in search of wonders new and strange, Grasps the wide skirts of Nature's mystic robe Explores the circles of eternal change, And the dark chambers of the central globe.

He, from the reedy sh.o.r.es of fabled Nile, Has brought, thick-ribbed and ancient as old iron, That venerable beast, the crocodile, And many a skin of many a famous lion.

Go lose thyself in those continuous halls, Where strays the fond papa with son and daughter; And all that charms or startles or appals, Thou shalt behold, and for a single quarter.

Far from the Barcan deserts now withdrawn, There, huge constrictors coil their scaly backs; There, cased in gla.s.s, malignant and unshorn, Old murderers glare in sullenness and wax.

There many a varied form the sight beguiles, In rusty broadcloth decked and shocking hat, And there the unwieldy Lambert sits and smiles, In the majestic plenitude of fat.

Or for thy gayer hours, the orang-outang Or ape salutes thee with his strange grimace, And in their shapes, stuffed as on earth they sprang, Thine individual being thou canst trace!

And joys the youth in life's green spring, who goes With the sweet babe and the gray headed nurse, To see those Cosmoramic orbs disclose The varied beauties of the universe.

And last, not least, the marvellous Ethiope, Changing his skin by preternatural skill, Whom every setting sun's diurnal slope Leaves whiter than the last, and whitening still.

All that of monstrous, scaly, strange and queer, Has come from out the womb of earliest time, Thou hast, O Barnum, in thy keeping here, Nor is this all--for triumphs more sublime

Await thee yet! I, Jenny Lind, who reigned Sublimely throned, the imperial queen of song, Wooed by thy golden harmonies, have deigned Captive to join the heterogeneous throng.

Sustained by an unfaltering trust in coin, Dealt from thy hand, O thou ill.u.s.trious man, Gladly I heard the summons come to join Myself the immeasurable caravan.

A number of complimentary greetings in verse were also sent in to Miss Lind by various writers of more or less eminence, among them being the following from Mrs. Lydia H. Sigourney:

THE SWEDISH SONGSTRESS AND HER CHARITIES.

BY MRS. L. H. SIGOURNEY.

Blest must their vocation be Who, with tones of melody, Charm the discord and the strife And the railroad rush of life,

And with Orphean magic move Souls inert to life and love.

But there's one who doth inherit Angel gift and angel spirit, Bidding tides of gladness flow Through the realms of want and woe; 'Mid lone age and misery's lot, Kindling pleasures long forgot, Seeking minds oppressed with night, And on darkness shedding light, She the seraph's speech doth know, She hath done their deeds below; So, when o'er this misty strand She shall clasp their waiting hand, They will fold her to their breast, More a sister than a guest.

The first concert was announced for the evening of September 11th, and it was to take place in the great hall of Castle Garden, afterward famous as the landing-place for emigrants at New York. The tickets for this occasion were sold at auction, and the first one was bid up to the extraordinary figure of $225.

This was bid and the ticket was secured by John N. Genin, a hatter; and the public notice which was thereby attracted to him was such a great advertis.e.m.e.nt for his business that within a few years thereafter he ama.s.sed a fortune. It was afterward stated that Mr. Genin was Barnum's brother-in-law, and that his high bid for this ticket was a pre-arranged job; but there was no truth in this whatever. The auction itself was regarded as an occasion of such public interest that the proprietors of the Garden, where it was held, charged a shilling admission fee to it. No less than 3,000 persons paid this fee and attended the auction, and the first day's sale aggregated 1,000 tickets, which brought a total sum of $10,141.

A few days after her arrival Barnum told Miss Lind that it would be desirable to make a change in the terms of their contract, if she would consent. She was startled at this, and asked him what the change was to be. "I am convinced," replied Barnum, "that this enterprise will be far more successful than either of us antic.i.p.ated. So I wish to stipulate that you shall receive not only $1,000 for each concert, beside all expenses, but also that, after taking out $5,500 per night for expenses and for my services, the balance shall be equally divided between you and me."

She looked at him in utter bewilderment, unable to understand his proposition. He repeated it, and at last made her realize what it was that he proposed to do. Then she grasped him by the hand and exclaimed: "Mr. Barnum, you are a gentleman of honor; you are generous; it is just as I was told. I will sing for you as long as you please. I will sing for you in America--in Europe--anywhere!"

The day before the first concert Mr. Barnum told Miss Lind that, judging by appearances, her portion of the proceeds of the first concert, over and above her fee of $1,000, would amount to at least $10,000. She immediately resolved to devote every dollar of it to charity, and forthwith sent for the Mayor of the city, under whose advice she acted in selecting the various inst.i.tutions among which it was to be distributed.

The amount of money actually received for tickets for the first concert was $17,864.05. So it appeared that Barnum's estimate had been a little too high, and Miss Lind's portion was too small to realize the $10,000 which she was to give to charity. Barnum therefore proposed to make a similar arrangement for the second concert, and to count neither of these first two in the regular engagement. To this she agreed. The second concert was given on September 13th, and the receipts, which amounted to $14,203.03, were disposed of as before, and she was thus enabled to give the $10,000 to charity. The third concert, which was the first of the regular series, was given on September 17th.

Barnum's arrangements of the concert-room for the singer's appearance were very complete. One hundred ushers, adorned with rosettes and carrying wands tipped with ribbons, looked after the seating of the audience. In order to prevent confusion the doors were opened at five o'clock, although the concert was not to commence until eight. The result was that the five thousand persons who attended made their entry without crowding and without confusion.