The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1883-07-24
OSCAR WILDE's LECTURE.
Views of the Esthete on His Wanderings
in America.

views of the Asthete on His Wanderings
in America.
Report in London News.
Stating that he had very little useful in
formation to give, ne described his first ex-
perience of the interviewer, 1.-THE literary
pirate of the States" who sprang on board
in the midst of storm off New York, and
asked his opinion of America Not having
seen it, he found it easy to give an unbiased
opinion, which was very favorable as far as
it went. Now il was more difficult The
first thing that struck him On landing was
the prosperity of the people and the absence
of rags. He saw millions of chimney-pot
hats in all their dreadful proportions, but no
rags. The second thing was that every one
seemed to be in hurry, and this made him
think it could not be a co untry of great
romance, for romance was difficult where it
was vital necessity to catch train. The
beautiful he found where the Americans had
least striven for it, in their great bridges and
their perfectly beautiful use of the electric
light
The travelling, when one got into q Pull
man car, was the perfection of luxury but
had no more privacy than if one sat in an
arm chair at the Hamilton street corner of
L lCCdullly. DOyS ran up anu uOWn Selling
literature, good and bad, and everything one
could eat or not eat, but what narrowed his
feelings most acutely was to see a pirated
copy of his own poems selling for ten cents.
He explained to the boy that he got no profit
out OF this edition of his work, but the boy
said he got some, and seemed to think
that settled the question. He had never
been called Stranger" but had received the
title of Captain" and Colonel" the latter
in Texas, but he had been very much dis
tressed by being called Professor" Niagara
like the Atlantic ocean, was extremely dis
appointing, principally, ne believed, because
it was ordinarily seen under conditions eX-
tremely unfair. In order to appreciate its
splendor and strength it was necessary to go
under the fall itself in a suit of yellow oil
skin so ugly that he should never have con-
scented TO wear it but that he was informed
that similar dress had been worn by the
great artistAGme. Sarah Bernhardt.
Of America itself the most beautiful part
was the West, and California most of all;
and the most depressing the alkali plains
through which the trains travelled for days.
stopping occasionally at small stations
where what by some curious process of
reasoning was called a meal was served.
Here he met the Indians, who were very
picturesque and charming as long as they
wore their own clothes, and very ugly when
they put on European dress. Their Ian
guage struck him as resembling German
metaphysics-v fine as long as it was not
understood. When it was interpreted he
generally found it to convey a request for
half dollar or some tobacco. One of the
great features of America was the advertiser,
who defaced the most beautiful parts of the
Rocky mountains with his advertisements
generally of some horrible medicine
The names of American towns where
they were French or Spanish, were often
beautiful, but the English names were very
often ugly. He was asked to lecture on art
at Griggsvlle, but he refused unless they
consented to change the name of the town,
which they declined to do. How dreadful it
would have been if he had founded a Griggs-
vile school of artl
American children did not seem to be nu-
merous and were not as healthy or as joy
Gus as in England, but very precocious.
They grow up, some of them into girls who
were the prettiest despots in the world. Each
American girl seemed to be an oasis of pic
turesque unreasonableness in a desert of
common sense, able to talk on every sub
ject, whether she knew anything of it or not,
with lovely hands and feet and the
prettiest boots in the world. There were
no idle men. Every man had something
to do and very few took any interest in
politics. One career they won't into extern
sively was journalism for the first thing a
baby did in America when he was able to
read and write was to start newspaper. 1t
seemed strange to English people their in
trusion INTO private life. He was asked by
an interviewer at Chicago for some details
of his private life but he told him he had
not got one-it was stopped at the custom
house in New York Their humor was, he
thought, sort of philosophy, and one thing
he admired about the American journalist
was that he could write about the price of
wool without referring to Jason and the
Golden Fleece. The lecturer also referred to
the distinguished actors of America and
concluded with some remarks on American
art.