--How few things there are that do not change their whole aspect in the course of a single generation! The landscape around us is wholly different.Even the outlines of the hills that surround us are changed by the creeping of the villages with their spires and school-houses up their sides.The sky remains the same, and the ocean.Afew old churchyards look very much as they used to, except, of course, in Boston, where the gravestones have been rooted up and planted in rows with walks between them, to the utter disgrace and ruin of our most venerated cemeteries.The Registry df Deeds and the Probate Office show us the same old folios, where we can read our grandfather's title to his estate (if we had a grandfather and he happened to own anything) and see how many pots and kettles there were in his kitchen by the inventory of his personal property.
Among living people none remain so long unchanged as the actors.Ican see the same Othello to-day, if I choose, that when I was a boy Isaw smothering Mrs.Duff-Desdemona with the pillow, under the instigations of Mr.Cooper-Iago.A few stone heavier than he was then, no doubt, but the same truculent blackamoor that took by the thr-r-r-oat the circumcised dog in Aleppo, and told us about it in the old Boston Theatre.In the course of a fortnight, if I care to cross the water, I can see Mademoiselle Dejazet in the same parts Isaw her in under Louis Philippe, and be charmed by the same grace and vivacity which delighted my grandmother (if she was in Paris, and went to see her in the part of Fanchon toute seule at the Theatre des Capucines) in the days when the great Napoleon was still only First Consul.
The graveyard and the stage are pretty much the only places where you can expect to find your friends--as you left them, five and twenty or fifty years ago.I have noticed, I may add, that old theatre-goers bring back the past with their stories more vividly than men with any other experiences.There were two old New-Yorkers that I used to love to sit talking with about the stage.One was a scholar and a writer of note; a pleasant old gentleman, with the fresh cheek of an octogenarian Cupid.The other not less noted in his way, deep in local lore, large-brained, full-blooded, of somewhat perturbing and tumultuous presence.It was good to hear them talk of George Frederic Cooke, of Kean, and the lesser stars of those earlier constellations.Better still to breakfast with old Samuel Rogers, as some of my readers have done more than once, and hear him answer to the question who was the best actor he remembered, "I think, on the whole, Garrick."If we did but know how to question these charming old people before it is too late! About ten years, more or less, after the generation in advance of our own has all died off, it occurs to us all at once, "There! I can ask my old friend what he knows of that picture, which must be a Copley; of that house and its legends about which there is such a mystery.He (or she) must know all about that." Too late!
Too late!
Still, now and then one saves a reminiscence that means a good deal by means of a casual question.I asked the first of those two old New-Yorkers the following question: "Who, on the whole, seemed to you the most considerable person you ever met?"Now it must be remembered that this was a man who had lived in a city that calls itself the metropolis, one who had been a member of the State and the National Legislature, who had come in contact with men.
of letters and men of business, with politicians and members of all the professions, during a long and distinguished public career.Ipaused for his answer with no little curiosity.Would it be one of the great Ex-Presidents whose names were known to, all the world?
Would it be the silver-tongued orator of Kentucky or the "God-like"champion of the Constitution, our New-England Jupiter Capitolinus?
Who would it be?
"Take it altogether," he answered, very deliberately, "I should say Colonel Elisha Williams was the most notable personage that I have met with."--Colonel Elisha Williams! And who might he be, forsooth? Agentleman of singular distinction, you may be well assured, even though you are not familiar with his name; but as I am not writing a biographical dictionary, I shall leave it to my reader to find out who and what he was.
--One would like to live long enough to witness certain things which will no doubt come to pass by and by.I remember that when one of our good kindhearted old millionnaires was growing very infirm, his limbs failing him, and his trunk getting packed with the infirmities which mean that one is bound on a long journey, he said very simply and sweetly, "I don't care about living a great deal longer, but Ishould like to live long enough to find out how much old (a many-millioned fellow-citizen) is worth." And without committing myself on the longevity-question, I confess I should like to live long enough to see a few things happen that are like to come, sooner or later.
I want to hold the skull of Abraham in my hand.They will go through the cave of Machpelah at Hebron, I feel sure, in the course of a few generations at the furthest, and as Dr.Robinson knows of nothing which should lead us to question the correctness of the tradition which regards this as the place of sepulture of Abraham and the other patriarchs, there is no reason why we may not find his mummied body in perfect preservation, if he was embalmed after the Egyptian fashion.I suppose the tomb of David will be explored by a commission in due time, and I should like to see the phrenological developments of that great king and divine singer and warm-blooded man.If, as seems probable, the anthropological section of society manages to get round the curse that protects the bones of Shakespeare, I should like to see the dome which rounded itself over his imperial brain.Not that I am what is called a phrenologist, but I am curious as to the physical developments of these fellow-mortals of mine, and a little in want of a sensation.
