The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1894-12-18
-IE POET AT HOME.

.aE POET AT HOME.
mingled win the pathos of the dy;ne
grasshopper sufferer, which has ever
won the approval of English bards anG
wrung with sympathetic anguish the
! sluggish pulse Of their tough ole
briskets.
Yet Mr.. Peacock at times rebels al
fate and says that slow and niggardly
/ public will one day hate itself for not
helping him pay his rent, and that when
his wild thrush song is still in death
many tardy reader of his Looping verse
! will come to shed the scalding and the
unavailing over the wind swept grave
of the silent bard, or in uncomfortable
remorse to kick loose the moss agates
that border the lowly mound.
Perchance he is right. Publics are IN
grateful Out of $50 admirers who have
come to gaze on me at my country home
and stay to dinner this summer only
eight had read my new history of the
United States, and of that number six
! had borrowed the book of other people.
One admirer tied his horse to japanese
maple, which cost me 50, and the beast
ate the bark all off, not having been fed
since Lent
Mr.. Peacock is self made poet and
composes better with the window open
and his tongue out little way on the
left hand side. He likes the breeze to
blow against his hot temples, and Jug
Of hot water at his feet. with which he
mixes little reddish liquor from the
drug stores of Kansas. Then the warm
Peruvian bark blood will mantle in his
cheek and the long, graceful verses come
boiling out like the graceful links OF
rosy sausage at Mr.. Armour's great
abattoirs in Chicago.
l admire Thomas Brewer Peacock be-
cause he does not get irritated over my
free criticisms. He comes to me with
the old warm grasp of the honest hand
and the old twinkle in his eye, no mat.
ter how untrammeled my remarks on
his verse may be. That shows sweet
disposition not usual with the average
poet.
This leads me to refer to James Whit
comb Riley, my old partner and comrade
in the show business. / notice that some
warm admirer gives Riley the place left
vacant by DIR. Holmes. This is surely
unqualified praise, yet we must pause to
think how different the two men were
While the Hoosier poet may easily COM
pare the size of their audiences, DR.
Holmes humor was of different and
more strictly Massachusetts character.
He did not care so much for practical
humor as Riley does. He would be con-
tent with pun or conundrum, while
Riley enjoys practical humor.
For instance, | remember one night
when our manager thought that any
thing in the line of ale, wine or most
any kind of alcoholic or malt liquors
would cast a gloom over theperformance
on the following day, SO he spoke TO the
hotel people about it, and convention
of bell boys and barkeepers was instruct
ed to send nothing but clean shirts and
farinaceous food TO No. 1872.
Mr.. Riley has a keen sense of humor,
and finding that his room communicated
with $50. and that the man who had
$50 had gone out 10 make night of IL,
Mr.. Riley stepped in there and at odd
times used the bell of $50 with great
skill, thereby irritating the manager so
that he returned TO New York on the
following day.
Holmes had none Of this dry. crisp
humor, but cared more for subtle and
delicate play upon words than a play
upon lecture manager or hotel pro-
prietor.
Yesterday met an old citizen of
Hudson, Wis, who asked me all about
Mr.. Riley. He seemed 70 feel a great in
he read our books.
NO, he said. Il never read much
after cry one Of We, but / saw We when
Riley visited We here at Hudson for
few weeks, and both Of We was out on
the lawn with an umbrella apiece. and
a plug hat, playin two old cat with
yarn ball IN pOurin rain, and ! SAYS To
myself surely Hudson is 4 favored spot,
fer never saw two such id fools
in one Enclosure, and no charge for ad-
mission.
But we were then less than 40 years
OF age. We are more serious now
Sull Riley Is different from Holmes
Once on the state fair grounds at IN
dianapolis Al elderly Hoosier came up
TO our manager and said:
Excuse me, but amt that little
bench leg feller over there the Hoosier
poet:'
Yes" says NJ Walker. but he
can't hear muoh of anything in one ear.
and the other is plum gone On that
side he hasn't heard his own loudest
thoughts for years II you speak to him.
you must LEI your voice out -
So the man with the copperas hair
and solfeyipo wh,skers stole I'D 70 him