The Somerset herald. [volume] (Somerset, Pa.) 1870-1936, 1886-01-27
careful of your power" prolonged

careful of your power" lPfolongeo
applause.
After DR.. Paxtonis bristling speech
there was a comparative lull. The
chairmon then called on the poet
and critic, E. C. Stedman, to answer
for "The Author Mr.. Stedman
was received with applause and
spoke in substance as follows:
Mr.. Chairman, Gentlemen, ana
Fellouc Master Printers ?-Dr. Pax.
toms plea YVES, Hear me for my
cause and be silent that you may
hear" and that reminds me OF an
other quotation from Shakespeare
that "the words of Mercury are harsh
after the songs of Apollo y; and so
fear mine may be after the eloquence
of our friend, the clergyman. But
we are all here at the guest-table
being fattened, like Sinbadis com.
rades' in the old Arabian Nights
tale. to be offered up at last each
one in his turn. Laughter,] Gov.
Rice's praise of Boston carried me
back to my own "reminiscences Of
that delightful solidarity which is
the pride of the house of all genuine
New Enslanders, for | myself am
one of them. "Ah," said Mr.. Os-
good to me once, AS long as | live
in Boston | have some place to 60 to
but if | move to New York, where
shall | go?" He lives in New York
now, and takes it out in going to
England. [Applause.] There was
one Boston dignity, however, which
Franklin missed. Ifthe gentleman
who SO plentifully punctuates oul
remarks will not call out chestnut
| mean to say that his mother was
not a Cabot, or his father Sal
tonstall.
cannot quite agree to DIR. Pax
tons dispraise of books. The three
greatest generals of Europe have
confessed that their best reading was
in Plutarch's Lives" And Frank
Inns autobiography opens with the
sentence, From my youth up l
was great reader of books" Au-
thors have gotten up somewhat IN
the world now. In Johnsan's time
they used to have to hide behind
screens at the dinners of publishers,
bnt now they have seats at the table
of honor, even if they do write what
my friend on the left has called hog
wash Yet the greatest books, the
books that stamp themselves on
eras, are not written by professional
authors. Shakespeare wanted his
plays at the Globe to succeed and
give him a decent competency as a
country gentleman. That was all.
Bunyan was too much wrapped up
in mis- own salvation to think OF art
or reputation, and / fear Mother
Goose wrote her melodious lays with
out an expectation of literary fame.
We professional authors are looking
for spoils, and we haven't yet gotten
our iair share. The publisher takes
60 per cent. ofthe proceeds, gives ~
to the printer, and generously leaves
the author 10. The only safe plan
is .or us to tu.n publisher. like Mark
Twain. The successful authors now
a-days are the first ladies of the iand,
the anonymous writer of " Bunting
Balls" or the hollow testers We are
pleased to call American humorlsts.
| once thought my friend on my
left belonged to this latter class. No
public, certainly, was ever more de-
spicably treated than by the canvass
ers of Roughing 1t" and limo
cents Abroad" who used to sell
those wretchedly printed and bound
volumes TOR $3.50 apiece. But after
all the bad paper and type we got
our moneys worth. as | found. And
if any one is TO be mentioned In
1886 in the first century of American
it will be Mark Twain.
Mr.. Carlton was called on to re-
spond to the" Journeyman Printer, ="
and said that he felt like the gentle
man of African descent who always
used to begin everything with reli-
cious ceremony. His master told
him he was going to fog him with
in an inch of his life. Well" he
said, 1.-The congregation will now
look to the Lord and be dismissed" "
The world owes more than it thinks
to the journeyman printer. Ii Is he
who gives the orator his trumpet
tongue, the author his million-point-
ed pen. On the old farm in Michi-
gan where the speaker lived in his
the newspaper was the
only ray of light which came into
that dreary life. And there was al
old journeyman printer out there
under the snow to whom he owed,
next to God, mother and home, all
that he held dear on earth.
"The Publisher was responded
to by H. o. Houghton about l
o'clock, after several songs and cho-
ruses, the meeting broke up.