the burden of foreign criticism of the people of the united states may be expressed in the language of the vulgar by saying that we are “too fresh.” well, if we are, we have the salt that will save us, and that salt is american humor.
whatever may be the failing of any american, whether native or adopted, he may generally be depended upon for a sense of humor. if there is no other point of contact between him and the stranger who encounters him, it is quite safe to fall back upon humor as a common meeting ground.
this is the only country in the world in which everybody indulges in joking. other countries have their wits and humorists who are a special class among themselves. but here any and every man must have a sense of humor and know how to use it if he wants to get along with his fellow-citizens.
some of our most humorous men are solemn judges. others are physicians. editors are{548} humorists as a matter of course, and even the clergyman with a level head leans to the belief that his education is incomplete until he can turn a joke as well as he can preach a sermon.
we joke about everything. this does not mean that we make fun of everything, but that, as everything has its possible humorous side, we are competent to see it and call attention to it.
there is no department of american history, political, military, social or religious, in which traces of the humorist may not be found. there was considerable sense of fun among the grim old fellows who came over in the mayflower, as any one may find out for himself if he will take the trouble to look to the original records, and in the many volumes of correspondence which have appeared in genealogical history of the first families of new england. there is quite as much sense of humor manifested as in similar records of the first families of virginia. it is the custom in history to draw a sharp dividing line between these two classes of american pioneers, but the line disappears as soon as one gets beneath the surface. solemnity and seriousness, whether counterfeit or genuine, can be maintained for only a certain length of time by any one. so puritan and cavalier speedily went back to a distinguishing trait of their common ancestors in the old country, and improved upon it.{549}
in the united states no subject is too sacred to joke about; or, at least, too sacred to be examined in the light of humor. americans as a class are a reverent people. they would not for the world make fun of the deity, but many of them talk of the most sacred sentiments and personages with a familiarity and play of humor which terribly shock some of the formalists from the other side of the water. when mr. lowell wrote his earlier series of the “bigelow papers” his verses were read with much curiosity and some delight in europe, but suddenly the entire english press was horrified by his lines:
“you’ve got to get up airly
ef you want to take in god.”
this was pronounced by one high english literary authority the most irreverent and blasphemous expression that ever had appeared in print; but mr. lowell replied by saying that familiarity was not irreverence; that the early american was intimately acquainted with his god—he had to be. there was no other friend upon whom he could rely, and conscientiously he talked about him in a half playful but always affectionate manner, which was the custom regarding the earthly parents of the period.
it is impossible to go anywhere in american society, no matter how high nor how serious the subject under consideration may be, without encountering, generally to the hearer’s benefit, the{550} american spirit of humor. congress may be in session and the country almost convulsed by some grave discussion which is going on, nevertheless on the floor of the house and far more in the committee-rooms and in the lobby one is sure to hear the strongest arguments advanced in humorous form. they are called jokes, but some new word should be coined to give them the dignity which their usefulness has enabled them to attain.
the most serious man in appearance in the united states, excepting none of the early puritan divines, was probably the late president lincoln. his visage was not only earnest and solemn but positively mournful whenever it was in repose. he was a debater of high order, he was a logician whom men who had held him in contempt for his homely ways and awkward manner learned to respect as soon as they crossed verbal swords with him, but lincoln’s strongest argument was always a joke. he said and wrote many things which were grand in their day, but which seemed to have been entombed in printed pages and diplomatic papers, for one seldom hears them quoted now-a-days; yet his jokes still live. they are perennial, not merely those which were attributed to him, but those which he really made. “to clinch a point,” which was one of his own favorite expressions, he tried the patience of his cabinet severely at times by persisting{551} in joking upon serious subjects—matters of great moment at the time; and it is said upon good authority that once he opened the cabinet meeting called specially with the hope of averting great disaster to the union cause by reading the last printed letter of “petroleum v. nasby on the democratic doings at confederit x roads, state ov kentucky.” before the meeting was over, however, mr. lincoln read his emancipation proclamation. while mr. seward, as able and adroit a man as ever held the portfolio of secretary of state, would be wondering how to reply to an annoying committee or deputation which had come from some one of the northern states to instruct the government how to carry on the war, mr. lincoln was quietly constructing a little joke or recalling one from his past experiences which would be appropriate to the occasion, and after the joke was inflicted upon the committee mr. seward was sure to find that his own carefully prepared speech was entirely unnecessary.
but it is not only in political circles that humor has been made to serve the cause of good government, good morals and the highest degree of righteousness in the united states. the members of the supreme court of the united states are all practical jokers; that is, they all are fond of avoiding a long-winded argument by telling a story illustrative of the question at{552} issue. ministers do the same. a meeting of clergymen of any denomination is likely to result in some very sharp discussion which closely approaches to ill temper, but in such cases some one may always be depended upon to get up and tell a humorous story which gives point to the proceedings, and also gives them a new direction and acts like oil upon the troubled waters. humor is tolerated even in the pulpit. the late henry ward beecher frequently made his congregation laugh on sunday, and some of the newspapers criticised him severely for it, but he seldom lost a parishioner on that account, and thousands of people—who never otherwise would have heard him—were brought under his spiritual influence by appreciation of a faculty that drew them into closer sympathy with him as a man. a preacher of a very different stamp, the rev. sam jones, of georgia, never hesitates to tell funny stories, always illustrative of his subject, while delivering his talks, and sam addresses larger congregations than any other american preacher of the present time.
humor makes its way everywhere in the united states. newspapers are full of it, and the most high-toned and serious of them find it necessary to supply their readers with jokes. a new yorker recently held a neighbor to account for reading habitually a very serious and almost bilious daily newspaper. “i don’t read it much,”{553} said he, “but i buy it because its funny column contains a better assortment of jokes than any other paper in the city.” the principal editorial writer of a large new york daily paper, a paper of wide circulation and great influence, once complained to the managing editor that all the point of a leading article to which he had devoted two days of thought had been expressed in the paragraph column by a joke one line long.
the public meeting is the truest, the fairest expression of american opinion in any given locality, but in the public meeting it is always the humorist who sways the audience and carries the day. he may be one of the stated speakers, a man of great wisdom and force, for wisdom and wit are closely allied in the american nature, however the celebrated couplet of the late alexander pope about “great wit and madness” may seem to indicate the contrary. in the great political discussions, now historic, which once were conducted by abraham lincoln and senator douglas, when both were comparatively young men, and the democratic champion got his adversary into a corner, as occasionally he did, lincoln always got out of his predicament with a joke—never with an argument—and the audience never failed to see the point. this shows the universality of the american sense of humor. in any other country of the world the peasantry, who are the nearest possible parallel to the{554} farmers of america, are stupid and dull of comprehension, but an american crowd, no matter how far away from the centres of civilization, nor how solemn, and serious, and weary, and dull of comprehension their faces may seem, can always be depended upon to take the point of a joke. they are equally quick to resent an attempt at humor which is not correctly and sharply pointed. they are all humorists themselves. get a seat on the wagon of a farmer driving along a country road and engage the man in conversation, and you will hear more sharp, pithy, humorous sayings than you are apt to get from any professed wit in polite society. let the man meet a brother farmer coming from the opposite direction, and, although the conversation will naturally turn on the crops, and the taxes, and local government, and family or individual misfortunes, the conversation is sure to be spiced with humor. in other countries it seems to require a jolly fellow, a man of high spirits, to say funny things; but here, if you chance not to expect the man of solemn visage, the man bowed down with care, to break out humorously, you are sure to be agreeably disappointed.
even in stated religious meetings this quality of the american nature frequently displays itself unexpectedly, but always with effect. as solemn and religious gathering as can be seen in the united states is the camp-meeting in the far{555} west, where people come from many miles around to listen to the only form of religious service which they have the privilege of attending. the sermons and prayers are intensely earnest. the speakers have an immense sense of responsibility of the duties incumbent upon them, but in sermon, and even sometimes in prayer, expressions break forth which show that in no circumstances can the native american be free from the domination of his sense of humor. the most powerful individual influence that ever existed in the western camp-meetings, according to historians sacred and profane, was a man named peter cartright, a methodist preacher. he would move audiences to tears and sometimes to groans by the eloquence and earnestness of his preaching, yet suddenly, at the most unexpected times, he would say things that would put his entire congregation into paroxysms of laughter. the purpose of the meeting never was disturbed by these discursive efforts. they were as much to the point as the most earnest statements and exhortations which he had previously made, and were entirely in keeping with the general intentions of the service.
passing from conversation to printed utterances, it may be safely said that the humorous writings of americans have been more read than any other literature which has appeared from our press. we have many able editors in the united{556} states, but those most read are those who say the funniest things. there never was a more influential editor in the united states than the late george d. prentice, who for a long time managed the newspaper which now is the louisville courier-journal. prentice was a whig, but probably half of his readers were democrats. they didn’t like his politics, but they couldn’t get along without his fun. his paper was published in a southern state, a slave state, but more than half of its circulation was in the free states of the north. while prentice lived there was scarcely a post-office in the mississippi or ohio valley which did not receive copies of it by mail. its influence extended as far north as chicago and the north-western states, and the local paper which didn’t repeat his humorous bits was likely to be informed by its readers that there must be a reform in that direction. for many years the most popular portion of the very good editorial page of one of the most prominent daily papers of new york was its humorous editorial. the topics of the writer were seldom those of the great interests of the day, yet people read it, turned to it the first thing, talked about it to their friends, compelled them to read it, and felt lost when the writer of those articles was transferred to a different field of labor.
we have some popular poets in the united states, but it is doubtful whether the works of{557} any of them have been as much read as mr. lowell’s “bigelow papers.” mr. lowell is no mean poet himself; there are critics who insist that he has not an equal among american versifiers, but the humorous verses just alluded to have made him better known than all of his more serious efforts, and it is believed by intelligent men of all parties that it had immense effect in bringing about the political changes which immediately preceded the late civil war.
during the civil war there were many editors who used to say, with some evidence of annoyance, that they wished they could be read as much as nasby. nasby was an ohio editor who invented a scene and some characters in the south, and wrote about them so persistently and with such a realistic air that his effusions were copied regularly in almost all of the republican papers of the land. another man who was more read than any editor of the day was artemas ward. he did not go into politics to any great extent, but what he did say was so accurately satirical that nearly everybody read it and was the wiser for it. the mistakes of our generals, the blunders of our government and the crimes of many of our contractors were the subject of a great deal of vigorous editorial writing, but no one succeeded in bringing them so forcibly to the attention of the public as a wit who wrote under the nom de plume of orpheus c. kerr. during the{558} same period there were facts in the local history of new york extremely uncomplimentary to one great political party, and the opposing party lost no opportunity to disclose them and criticise them in editorial columns and news columns, but one man was more read than all others combined. it was the man who wrote the satire entitled “the new gospel of peace,” in which the doings of the alleged peace party were set forth in humorous style.
at the present time the men whose writings are most read are not the historians, editors, essayists, or even novelists. they are the humorists. bill nye is more read than any novelist in the united states. so is james whitcomb riley. in chicago there are a number of able journalists, but the one most quoted by name not only in his own city but throughout the union is eugene field, whose humor finds no subject too great or too small to dwell upon. a little while ago an edition de luxe of his humorous prose and verse was published at a very high price, and some of the later would-be subscribers found to their disgust that the list was full and no more books could be supplied. is there any poet or novelist in the united states who has had a commercial experience like this?
mr. john hay, once a secretary of president lincoln, and afterward a hard-working journalist, is also a poet, and has perpetrated some graceful{559} verses, but when any one offers to quote a bit from john hay, the hearers always understand that it will be something humorous. his dialect poems do not exceed half-a-dozen, yet they seem as popular now as when first written twenty years ago. they were not carefully elaborated; the author is said to have dashed them off in a hurry as a relief from hard editorial work, but they struck the popular heart at once, probably because, like most other american humor, there was a basis of seriousness and sense to them. the finale of his poem, “little breeches,”—a poetic story of a lost child who was saved, as his father supposed, by angels, will long be the most popular and effective protest against formal religious ideas. he says of the angels:
“i think that savin’ a little child
and bringin’ him back to his own
is a durn sight better bizness
than loafin’ round the throne.”
was there ever a greater commercial success in literature than that achieved by mark twain? the combined books of the most successful american novelist have not sold as many copies as one of mark twain’s books. why? because mark twain is funny—because he knows how to say something in a way in which nobody else has said it. scores of other men have written about the holy land and our own west, but it was not until “innocents abroad” and “roughing{560} it” appeared that people in general began to manifest a lively interest in these portions of the world. innumerable sketches have been written about life on the mississippi river in the old days before railroads and emancipation, but all of them combined did not “catch” the public as successfully as “huckleberry finn.” the latter was humorous, the others were not; there was no other point of difference.
it does not matter, to the american people, from where humor comes, so it really is humorous and has a point to it. we will take it in any shape or dialect. one of the great successes of humorous literature during the civil war was that achieved by col. charles g. halpine, who made a mythical irish soldier, “private miles o’reilly,” his mouthpiece for a lot of humorous criticisms of the government, the army and navy. during the same period there arose a southerner, signing himself “bill arp,” who made some hard hits, in humorous style, at the north; somehow they found their way through the lines and were freely reprinted at the north. in later years another southerner—the creator of “uncle remus,” put a lot of delightful stories into negro dialect, and a host of people at once began to quote them. in new york mr. julian ralph wrote a lot of humorous sketches under the general head of “the german barber,” and the newspaper press began to quote them.{561} across the ocean max o’rell began to satirize the english people and customs, and straightway his books sold better here than abroad.
on the stage and platform, as everywhere else, humor is the most popular and attractive feature. a few years ago, before the theatrical companies could easily reach any city or large town, the lecture was a favorite means of entertainment, and more than three hundred americans and foreigners were busy every winter in hurrying from town to town to deliver lectures. the three hundred have been reduced almost to three, but there is room there still for any one who has anything humorous to say. “bob” burdette, more popularly known as “the burlington hawk-eye man,” works himself almost to death every winter in going all over the united states to give his humorous recitations. he is a very religious man, and a working baptist, but people never ask him for a religious address: they always want to hear his fun. another of the few successful men remaining on the platform is a. p. burbank, a man who for ten years has determined every year to go upon the stage in legitimate comedy, but so humorous are his recitations and so effective his manner in delivering them that those who have heard him before insist upon hearing him more, and he goes again and again to towns where he has been a dozen times before, each time to find his audience{562} larger and more appreciative, and each time to receive the assurance that they will want him again the following winter. little marshal wilder, who never took a lesson in elocution in his life, and has been cruelly handicapped by nature, attempts merely to make people laugh; he succeeds, so he seldom is allowed to have an evening to himself, and when the “platform” season is ended here goes over to england and has three or four engagements a night.
everybody knows that on the stage humor takes better than anything else. there may be a great tragedy well presented on the boards of a city theatre, or a brilliant spectacle, or a so-called emotional drama which appeals to everything improper in human nature, but the theatre which is presenting a good comedy can always depend upon holding its own. no dead-head seats are to be had at such theatres. the manager can always depend upon getting money for all the room at his disposal. the fun may be very rough, sometimes it is decidedly vulgar, but people ask as few questions and make as few protests against fun, no matter what its kind, as drunkards do against the quality of their whiskey.
american appreciation of humor may be found also in the number and wide circulation of periodicals devoted entirely to fun. there used to be a theory that there was no room for a{563} humorous paper in the united states because the ordinary dailies and weeklies indulged in so much fun themselves. but after the enormous success of puck, judge, life, and some other periodicals, it is useless to argue any longer on the subject. after a political or social question has been apparently worn threadbare in editorials and essays, out comes one of these papers with a pithy saying or a good cartoon that carries more influence than all the serious talk combined. it matters little upon which side of the question, even in politics, these professional humorists are found. their hits when well made are cheerfully acknowledged even by their own enemies. during the palmy days of the new york ring, mr. nast, the cartoonist of harper’s weekly, was offered an annual allowance several times larger than his salary if he would give up work entirely and go abroad. humor and high character are often allied; one of the strongest illustrations of the fact is that mr. nast without any hesitation refused this valuable offer. some of the abuses of local government in new york have been more effectually fought by mr. keppler and his associate artists in puck than by all the work of editors, lawyers and judges. puck’s influence in politics became so great that before the last presidential campaign began it became absolutely necessary for the party which it was fighting to start a humorous pictorial journal of their own, and it{564} was quite safe to suppose that it was influential in the political results that followed.
a delightful thing about humorous writings is that no one seems jealous of their influence or afraid to give them greater prominence. the only complaint which the publishers of the humorous weeklies have to make against their brethren of the daily press is, that their own circulation might be better were not so many of their good things promptly reprinted everywhere. no sooner does one of these papers come from the press than its best sayings are scissored and reprinted in a thousand or more papers. almost any daily paper of large circulation seems to think it necessary to have a humorist of its own. they pay more for humorous contributions than for any other class of matter, and all of them are more keenly on the look-out for a new humorist than for a possible presidential candidate. the readers of the daily press quote for one another the funny sayings of their favorite paper long before they think of mentioning the other contents; indeed, most of them are so absorbed by the fun that they don’t seem to have remembered anything else.
we cannot possibly overestimate the value of our national faculty of seeing the humorous side of things. it keeps us from making ourselves ridiculous; it prevents us, both as individuals and a people, from being laughed at for anything{565} we may do in sober earnest. it is very hard, in this day and land, for any man, society, party or church to be a fool without hearing about it in a good-natured way that robs the rebuke of its sting. it is not so in other countries.
but our sense of humor does still more for us. it smooths numberless rough places in the pathway of a people whose road is not easy to travel. it averts many a quarrel, closes dangerous breaches, and is balm to wounds that otherwise would smart. it is almost always harmless. there are men and women whose fun always lingers upon incidents that are vulgar, but this is a fault of perverted minds—not of the humorous spirit. it is a better introduction, between strangers, than any letter or form of words, and it expresses much in little, doing it more effectively than any of the wise saws and proverbs of more serious races. it seems irrepressible and omnipresent; a man or woman may be too tired or sick to reason or to think, but whoever saw an american too weary to see the point of a joke or to offer another in return? we need to preserve our humor almost as carefully as if it were our character, for should we ever lose it our character will be the worse for the change.
