Eugene Field, a Study in Heredity and Contradictions - Volume 2

would remain much to write of Eugene Field after his return from abroad. Much came to him in fame, in fortune, in his friendships, and in h

ge of a vowel to suit his sex; the younger, his second daughter, was christened Ruth, after Mrs. Gray, in whose home Field had f

. Mankind continued to interest him as much as ever, but books wearied him less, and in his home were more easily within reach. This home was now at 420 Fullerton Avenue, an old-fashioned house on the northern limit of old Chicago, rather o

eded the words of a mentor to warn him, he could have found them in the brief memoir his uncle, Charles Kellogg, had written of his father. In that I find this remarkable anticipation of what befell his so

d his physical frame. He was averse to active exercise, and for some years before his death he lived a life of studious seclusion which would have been philosophical had he not violated, in the little care he took of his health, one of the most important lessons which philosophy teaches. At a comparatively early age he died of physical exhaustion, a deterioration of the bodily organs,

re beginning to yield. He could write, as he did, that he expected to do his best literary work when a grandfather, but he had no belief that he would live to enjoy that happy Indian summer of paternity. He was tired of being moved from rented flat to rent

al relations nor in his daily task was there observable any trace of the tax he was putting upon his over-strained energy. He could not afford to make the study of classics a delightful pastime, as his father did, but he made it contribute a constant and delightful fund of reference and allusion in his column. His first books were selling steadily, and he worked assiduous

the exertion fagged him. But in the later years of his life they came at him again, with the promise of more pay per night than he could get by writing in a week, and he reluctantly made occasional engagements, which were a drain on his vitality as well as an offence to his peculiar notions of personal dignity. After each of these excursions

ime it looked as if he had been weaned from the circle of collectors, and never had his column held up to ridicule so fiercely the humbug and hypocricy of political methods as during that summer. One d

raph beginning, "This is a beautiful world, and life herein is very sweet," a note theretofore seldom heard in his paragraphs, though often struck in his "Profi

ble lake of ours lies under the cloudless sky! It is simply ideal weather. Who does not rejoice in the change from th

is that man, old or young, who hath not a sweetheart to share with him the poetic g

ery beautiful, and we are gl

gerness of a twelve-year-old lad at a country circus. Everything that happened down at Jackson Park that memorable season, especially the social rivalries of the different managing bodies, was fair gam

f night were

e world's fai

n Adlai

ike eyes wer

Mi

e very fa

immortal B

ing for for

whoop up w

Mi

e fakes," a s

re hankering

words were a

more fervor

Mi

divers gam

Street in

vain, the

ped, as he

Mid

sue this ha

we should d

ecy bef

s in that V

Mi

esides having the convenience of a trolley connection with the centre of the city, had the incalculable advantage of o

er in B

s a fam

d and in

the Wal

dren play

rs strol

goodliest t

Buena

looked out upon a truly sylvan scene, the gates to which were always invitingly open, southern fashion, to congenial wayfarers. The more Field saw of the Waller lot, the more completely did the old New England hankering after a homestead, with acres instead of square feet of lawn and trees, take possessio

Julia has been at me for a year to ask this of you. I have hesitated to do so in the fear that the application might seem to be an attempt to take advantage of your friendship for me-a friendship manifested in many ways and covering a period of many years. Perhaps, however, we can now look at the matter more as a business proposition than would have been possible a year or tw

y heart upon any locality, or upon any particular spot, it is wise that I should know whether and where the assistance I need can be had. My first application is to you, and I make it timidly, for, as I have said, it is

ell. With every

ffectio

NE F

September

er took tangible shape, however, he was laid on his back by a severe cold, which developed into pneumonia. On his recovery, the doctor advised that he should go to California; and on November 8th he wrote to Mr. Gray, asking him if he and his niece could not be ready to accompany him about the 1st of December. Concluding a very brief note, he said: "Writing

ated ten miles from the railway, half-way between San Diego and Los Angeles. It is a large ranch-1,000 acres. Madame Modjeska has put it at my disposal, and Lynch and you must help me bear the responsibility thereof. Later in the winter we will go up to San Francisco and visit Henry Field awhile. I will let you know when we start, and if you can't join us at Kansas City, suppose you co

tely yours, wit

NE F

f his physicians had led him to expect. His going up to San Francisco in winter to vi

is unpleasant condition here. I am told that in six months or a year the new-comer becomes acclimated; I do not regard that as encouraging. So I am heading for New Orleans. But we drop off at Los Angeles to admit of my being with you long enough to write the memoi

onately

NE F

eda,

1894, Satur

"environments," as he wrote, "conducive to the sincerity and the enthusiasm which should characterize such a noble task

es, lilies, heliotropes, carnations, marigolds, nasturtiums, marguerites, and geraniums are a-bloom; and as far as the eye can reach, the green velvet of billowing acres is blended with the passion of wild poppies; the olive, the orange, and the

he din of busy humanity; but upon this faraway hillside, with the sweetest gifts of Nature about me, I care not for these things. I am soothed by the melodies of

of the technical skill in expression to which Field arrived through arduous years, softened and refined by the emotions of affection and gratitude which swept over him as he thought of her who had been a mother to hi

ng his return with characteristic gayety in "Lyrics of a Convalescent." But his contributions to the paper through the winter and early spring of 1894 were confined to occasional verse. After

eatly when he could playfully embarrass her. One day I found him in his room busy on the floor pasting large sheets of brown paper together. He had written a poem to Miss Jeffries in the centre of a large sheet of this wrapping paper in his characteristic small hand-indeed, much smaller than usual. On the edges of this sheet I found him pasting others of equal size, so that the whole when complete made a single sheet about eight feet square. This he carefully folded up to fit an improvised envelope about the size of a Mardi Gras souvenir, then being distributed about the city. With the joyousness of a boy about to play a prank, he chased down-stairs at the noon hour when

nd had once more taken up the project of acquiring a home. What Field was doing, as well as thi

Sunday night. I am pained to hear of Dr. Johnson's illness; pray, give him my love and tell him that he ought to be less frisky if he hopes to keep his limbs sound. I am not surprised that you have got to go South. And I am glad of it. Yes, I am glad to know that you will get away from business and that implacable crowd who are constantly trying to bleed you of money. I want to see you enjoying life as far as you can, and I want to see you getting actual benefit from the money which you have earned by your many years of conscientious industry. To me there is no other spectacle in the world so humiliating as that of people laying themselves out to extort money from others. Do tear yourself away from the sponges. You and Miss Eva ought to have a quiet winter in a congenial climate. I hope you will go to Florida, and, after doing Jacksonville and St. Augustine, why not rent a little furnished cottage and keep house for the winter? Along in February I will run down and make you a visit. Now, think this over, and let me know what you think of it. Mr. Gray, there is no need of there being any sentimentality between us; there never has been. Yet there is every reason why the bond of affection should be a very strong one. My father and you were associates many years, and at his death he very wisely constituted you the guardian (to a great extent) of his two boys. I feel that you have more than executed his wishes; I feel that you have fulfilled those hopes which he surely had that you would be a kind of second father to us, counselling us prud

NE F

Ave., Statio

r 25th

gh it the reader is taken into the confidence which existed between the writer and his constant friend-a c

in. We shall do nothing about a heating apparatus until late in the summer. This will enable us not to borrow any money until August; by that time we shall be able to see our way clearer than we do now. Mr. Stone wants to help us somewhat, and he has told us to send the bill for house-painting to him. We shall be compelled to go to the expense of a new cooking range, and I have enough balance at the Record office to pay for that. I am hoping that we shall be able to move into the new quarters by May 1. The children are well. Pinny comes home next Monday for a fortnight's vacation, and we sh

onately

NE F

Ave., Statio

9th,

rd with flower-beds and a kitchen garden furnished light employment and a never-failing subject for quips and bucolic absurdities to its owner, to whom land ownership seemed to give a new grip on life. The story of the remaking of this building into a comfortable modern house and of converting the sandy soil surrounding it into a land of horticulture promise is told by Field in whimsical style in "The House," a work unfinished at the time of his death. The first instalment of this

into our new home the first of June, although the place may not be in complete trim at that time. I cannot tell you how pleasurably I anticipate life in the house which I can call a permanent home. I expect to do better work now than ever before. And I want

NE F

n inditing this, he substituted the serviceable typewriter for the pen, that had been his companion for so many years, and that had served him "so diligently," as he so beautifully acknowledged in the apostrophe t

, July

against us. First it was one thing to delay our removal, then it was another, and finally everything. Here it is the first of the month, and we are still in our rented quarters. We intended to begin moving yest

ey could get through in two days. The work that remains for the carpenters and for the plumbers to do is of a pottering character, just enough and of just such a character as to be slow, and, consequently, exasperating. I presume to say that we will be in the house at the en

nce is that I have a fine lot of flowers, roses, nasturtiums, and poppies. I have devoted about five square feet of ground to pop-corn, and, not knowing anything about the habits of the creature, planted it in a bunch. I have now enough pop-corn to do the whole State of Illinois for the next two years. It grows so fast that I seem almost to hear it grow. I

oor is a very imposing affair. It is of solid oak, very tasteful in design and very imposing in appearance. We are going to hang our best brass knocker upon it, and this ornamentation will enhance its beauty. The front hall is completed, and so is the parlor, through which you go to enter your room. The large front room on the ground floor, which we call the library, is now in the hands of the cabinetmaker. By this you are to understand that we are having the oak trimming stained very dark so as to match the permanent book-cases which the cabinetmaker ha

covered with fine gravel. This kind of road in private grounds is, I understand, practically everlasting. Then, we have got to have a front gate, the old affair having gone all to pieces. It is not at all necessary to have a new fence for some time to come. I am told

do you, that if we had the same work to do over again doubtless we could do it cheaper, if not better. There are also changes which have suggested themselves as we went al

d Miss Eva to come, and we shall try to make your stay pleasant. You asked me in your letter what plans I had for a summer trip. I have no plans at all. It is so cool her

th come here, and from here make such excursions into Wisconsin and Michigan as may suggest themselves to you from week to week as pleasant

wever, about the middle of July, and devoting a fortnight to getting settled in quarters of some kind or another, and perhaps taking a

e will be home in a day or two accompanied by her Aunt

unaccustomed to the contrary ways of workmen. I am feeling better now than I have felt for five years, which fact I impute very largely

ery great kindness, and that we are very grateful for it. Let us hear from you very soon,

fectionat

NE F

e held $200 for him on account, for which a draft would be

he entertainments that followed from this happy arrangement was a luncheon at the Union League Club, in honor of Edward Everett Hale. The company invited to meet the liberal divine consisted of a few Saints, more Sinners, and a fair proportion of the daughters of Eve. Field prepared the menu with infinite care, and to the carnal eye it read like a dinner fit for the gods. But in reality it consisted of typical New England dishes, in honor of our New England guest, masquerading in the gay and frivolous lingo of the French capital. Codfish-balls, with huge rashers of bacon, boiled corned beef and cabbage, pork and beans, with slices of soggy Boston brown-bread, corn-bread and doughnuts, the whole topped off with apple-pie and cheese, were served with

ed as luscious a dessert of strawberries as the tooth of epicure ever watered over. They were the first of the season, and fragrant with the fragrance that has given the berry premiership in the estimation of others besides Isaac Walton. While everybody was pr

ly adore strawberries! They are

you eat yours?

aver in his voice, "b-because I'm afraid it

mbined. But he had begun to weary of the somewhat forced play of such gatherings, and found more pleasure watching the children romping in the Waller lot, or pottering about and overseeing the planting in his own new fro

e very hot, the ve

s' vitality and brow

d languishes, one c

arket-place, and d

of the year, when m

go rippling and t

e a season from th

s Auer to his Lak

eclivity that q

t-trees observe the

a goodly distance

pebbly beach with

to and fro, and f

the pike or bass or pi

ting, fishing, you ca

s Auer at his La

nd rangey, with bun

he trophies of the f

moose, the skins of

bove the horde that

yarns we tell and

teful viands or we q

song we sing and m

f Louis Auer at his

o swiftly speed t

Silverman and Un

ten, Kipp, Peck, Lus

in action, but n

l spirits to be met

never chilly and

been there always

Louis Auer's in that

d city for the non

the lake of Pew

s down to dreams of

and Kipp make solemn

of satisfying, big

rince of cooks frie

m sweet dreams despi

with Auer to his