The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-02-01
THE BOsTONIAN CULT.
A Great Admiration Society and Its Organ,
the Atlantic Monthly.


the Atlantic Monthly.
St Paul Pioneer-Press.
In the exigencies of the still formative life of
this nation due regard seems not to have been
had to the Municipal Mutual Admiration Society
Many of our largest, richest, and most important
cities are to this day not only wholly without
properly constituted institution of this kind, but
monstrously unconscious of the blinking and
laundering hiatus thus suffered to subsist in its
encourage. Such a condition of things is the
more crying and shameless because the facilities
for the manufacture of these societies are so
easily at hand Particulars as to NJ. A societies
are distributed, and the mere labor of organizing
them is Incompatible with the state of self
satisfaction in which members Immediately
find themselves. Philanthropsts from under
the Spoon of the NJ. A. society have never
been remiss in missionary work among the UNI
converted and the gentle. The community
which, with all these facilities at hand, will still
wallow in non-M. A. depths can hardly expect
ones heartfelt OF other sympathy, since words
can poorly paint its depravity. The city of
Boston has particularly distinguished itself in
this propaganda. 1t has-even at large pecunia-
ry deficit to itself-for thirty years distributed
monthly bulletin devoted to its own NJ. A.
society; thus, by exemplary text, enforcing the
beautiful moral which detains us now. This
bulletin, known in Boston circles as the Atlantic
Monthly, is full of reports of the charm, the
sweetness, and the hght-the stained glass att-
tude in short-which mutual admiration
ism bears to the cult and civiliza-
UlOn OI-BOSUOn. LII contains evenings
with" members of the guild, written by
the members themselves, and so perfectly
reliable. Here are literary biographies of Mr.
A. by his friend b. and of Mr.. B. by his friend
A. Here are the beauties and best thoughts"
of g., edited with coplous notes by d. and the
beauties and best thoughts Of D., edited
with copious notes by G. Here are accounts of
the methods and manuscripts, the elegant hospi
tahty and warm hearts of E., F., and g., by
their friends H., l., and K. and reciprocal ac
courts of the methods, manuscripts elegant hos
pitality, warm hearts, etc, of H, L. and K,
composed by the aforesaid E., F., and G. And
here all the Boston alphabet unite to point with
pride at those who in spite of all temptations to
be born elsewhere, have been born in Boston;
and to such ladies, gentlemen, and their Off
spring as-by contributing to the Atlantic
Monthly-have earned the freedom of that costa
tic and llustrious city.
Other principles Of the guild can be better in.
Dictated from the pages of the Bulletin itself
In the February issue the reader will find set
forth anent Mr.. Crawfords recent book, ITO
Leeward," as follows IF any one asks how
Mr.. Crawford Can turn out long stories III such
rapid succession, the simplest answer is the most
conclusive: he has stories to tell" Now, if any
reader of the Pioneer-Press will procure ITO
Leeward," or any other of Mr. Crawford's books,
and search diligently through them in quest of
any vestige or trace of STORY" CT stories, he
will thereby evolve for himself one of the most
esoteric principles of this NJ. A. plan, with very
slight trouble to himself. He will signally fail,
appointment will be the capital NJ A. principle
for which he seeks-the hub. so to speak, upon
which the M A. society is fixed, and around which
its circumference ceaSelessly revolves, namely:,
Worship of that which does not exist. just as
Mr.. Crawford's novels absorbing by reason
OF the stories they do not tell. so the true
tual admirationist worships his fellow mutual
admirationist for the merit he does not find in
him, and the genius which is not creative flame
within him. Again. nobody has forgotten the
Boston attempt, via its Bulletin aforesaid. to
compel from an unrapt world confession that the
novelistc school of Messrs Howells and James,
jr.. fBostoniansl had distanced, superseded and
entirely dispensed with the methods of Dickens,
Thaekeray, George Eliot Trollope and such
lesser lights. The sang froid with which the
world sat down" Boston in that instance
was merely, of course, accidental 1t should
not, in the least, be allowed to interrupt
fdence in its prestige or i'll the ultimate suprem-
acy of the M. A. society ngis, unembaFrassed
and undiminished for fresh pasturages. '"These
our failures, said Brummel, when he crum-
pied his cravat. ''These are our failures" said
Boston, and hied her to the field once more.
This time it is pretty little Boston girl, aged
twelve, who accompanies her papa to the CONT
nent. Her papa's name is Howells, and he lives
in Boston; hence the little girl is, constructively
at least of Boston birth. This little Boston girl,
it seems, draws SO stated proposition, how
ever, is not mutual admiration society English.
Translated, it stands as folows-(See Atlantic
Monthly, January 1884, page 148E
The little girl, sojournng in Italy, found her best
friends among the early Florentine painters, and
thought their thoughts again in her sympathetic
mind, reproducing them in their childish dialect.
Her pictures recall William Blake and Kate
Greenaway, well the Florentnes. Fortunate the
old masters in finding such an interpreter.
The early Florentines"-MichaelA Angelo, who
carved the Moses; Benvenuto Cellini Andrea del
Sarto Giotto Angolotto, Leonardo da Vinci,
and poor Bake-died all unconscious of the
honor this dear little Boston miss was about to
do them in 1883 But Miss Greenaway is still
aliV nd la hon a1aar oh
proceed to make it forthwith, them we say, the
world has heard enough of Miss Greenaway.
Clearly, there is no good but Boston, and the
Atlantic Monthly is its prophet.
But seriously, ought not somebody, otherwise
than in badinage-somebody with healthy di-
gestive apparatus and masculine good nature
to indicate to Boston that cackle and chatter
about Observation-Disclosures it may have once been
in the vaginal days of these United States-has
long since ceased to be literaturel That while this
sort of thing is innocent enough sort of nui-
sance, a sort of damnum abSque injura, as law
yers say, it is, none the less. unmusical and
inharmonious nuisance! There was, indeed,
a time when Boston might have been the lit
erary center of this nation Emerson, Haw-
thorn Thoreau Longfellow Starr King
Surely the record Of their names is secure But
their mantles have never hoated down upon the
little swarm of worshipers who twitter of each
other in the Atlantic Monthhes of to-day. These
are only the Liliputians essaying to loom above
the PROSTATE giants. But the shade of one giant
will outloom the tribe. Whatever ebb of graft
tude from this people Boston and the Atlantic
Monthly may have earned in the days they held
the literary censorship of America, they have
more than collected by squeak and gibber and
caclle and chatter about themselves and their
contributors since. The debt is paid satisfied
and discharged; and the country will beware of
mourning another such.
AN INFANT-TERRIBLE