The Arkansaw traveler., 1885-02-28
EDMUND YATES IN 1888.
lwinthrop, in New York Gssps;e.

twinthrOp, in New York GsaPs;e.I In London Z6wR zssIk of the date oi June I2, 1858, was an article descriptive of Thackerav, quite in the style of the London Word of today. That the reason to doubt. Had 1t not been the work of an artist clever with his pen tt could not have so reused the lesentmen. of its subject. This single extract will explain why the publication was, to say the least, very distastefui:
 "No one meeting him (rhackeray) could fail to recognize iD him a gentle man his bearing is cold and uninviting, his style of conversation either openly cynical or affectedly good-natured and benevolent; his bonhommie is forced. his wit is biting, his pride easily touched, but his appearance is invariably that of the cool, suave, well-bred gentleman, who, whatever may be ranking within, suffers no surface display of his emotion. Our own opinion is that his sue cess is on the wane Moreover. there is a want of heart in all he writes, which is not to be balanced by the most brilliant sarcasm and the most perfect knowledge of the workings 1.-the human beart."
 The strangest and bitterest part of the article by implication accused Thackeray of insincerity in his relations with the reading and lecture room public, assert ins that " No one succeeds better than MT. Thackeray in cutting his coat ac- cording to his cloth" Thackeray, two days after the article appeared, wrote Mir. Yates long letter in which, among other things, he said:
 "We meet at a club (the C. .rrick) where, before you were born, believe, and other gentlemen have been in the habit of talking without any idea tn t our conversation should supply para graphs for professional vendors of Lit erary Talk and don't believe that out of that club l have ever exchanged six words with you. Allow me to inform you that the talk which you have heard there is not intended for newspaper re- mark and to beg-as have a right to do o- that you will refrain from printing comments upon my private conversa- tiens; that you will forego discussion, ho wever blundering, on my private at- fairs, and that you will henceforth please to consider any question of my personal truth out of the province of your criti- cism."
 Poor Thackeray! To begin with, he was mad" "mad as a March hare" There can be no doubt of that One could guess it from knowledge of the man and the provocation, even if his letter was not ia evidence. But whatever would he do were he to fall into the hands of the enterprising Chicago re- porter of today? Even if Thackeray had talked with gentlemen in the Garrick before Yates was born, it is still painfully evident that the latter was too soon and too enterprising for his latitude and his generation.
 Finally. Thackeray submitted t. his club whether the publication of such articles would not be "fatal to the com fort of the club and intolerable in a so- ciety of gentlemen" The committee to whom the question was relegated de- cided that Yates must apologize or leave the club. And the identity of the Yates of 1885 with the Yates of 1858 is easily established by the fact that he vigorously contested the right of the club, through this committee, to concern itself with the matter at all As all sorts of suits at law and no end o! further bother were threatened, Charles Dickens came to the front as a peacemaker, appearing as Yates friend in a letter to rhackeray, with the hope and purpose of some quiet accommodation of this deplorable matter which will satisfy the feelings of all concerned" Of Yates personally Dickens wrote: "He had recently done me manly service can never forget in some private distress of mine." At the end of his communication Dickens wrote, "You will burn this letter and will burn your answer" thus showing that MT. I'laine in his "Dear Fisher" epistle of fatal political notoriety was plagiarist from England's greatest novelist. Fur ther correspondence followed between Dickens and Thackeray, the final result of which was an inevitable coolness, although the letters of the one began "My Dear Thackeray," and the other, Dear Dickens" A full reconciliation took place only brief time before Thackeray was found in his last sleep on December "A, 1863. of which coming together again Richard H. S.oddard says in his delightful "Anecdotal Biogra- phies of the two men:
 "The two great authors met by acci- dent in the lobby of a club. They sud- denly turned and saw each other and the unrestrained impulse of both was to hold out the hand of forgiveness and fellow ship. With that hearty grasp the differ