The courier. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1894-1903, 1899-02-25
THE PASSING SHOW;
VILLA GATHER


add the harsher title, adventurer who
spent the six clsaneet and happiest
yeare OF his disorderrd life in Pittsburg
have been collected and edited.
Twenty one years ago Realf's tragic
death in San Francisco attracted uni.
yereal attention. He committed suicide
Their. by drinking laudanum, driven to
desperation by domestic troubles and
pursued by the malignancy Of an almost
incredible hatred. His death was called
a tragedy; it was, however, merely tie
end of one, the falling OF the curtain on
tragedy which had lasted forty four
wears. There are men who are simply
cast for the tragic parts in lie. Such
role was assigned the man who was once
the Byronic genius Of the Pittsburg
press, and he played it fiercely and we'll,
up to the limit OF his heart and brain
and strength, played it to the death.
Though the man has not yet been dead
a quarter Of a century, the story Of his
life is 60 wild, so horrible, 81 Enthusiastically
grotesque that it reads like romance
evolved by some disordered brain.
Richard Realt was born in Sussex
county, Eng and. in 1884. He was born
one OF the heirs Of poverty and worked
at gardening to pay for his schooling.
When he was eighteen he published
volume of verses, "Guesses at the Beauti-
full" which attracted the attention Eliza
Cook, Gerald Massey, Lady Byron and
her daughter, and a nephew OF Thack-
eray's, and unfortunately secured him
their patronage. The young man be.
came the idol OF Brighton. the most
fashionable watering place in England,
at the height OF the season-and for q
season only. This untimely adulation
affected him as disastrously as it had
done Burns years before, and completely
disarmed him for the struggle before
him. For. as George Eliot remarked,
ITO be an uncommon young man is to
have an uncommon difficulty in getting
along"
He was made steward on one OF the
Byron estates and there became entan.
gled in a disastrous love affair with a
Miss Noel, relative Of Byron's. the
first of those baleful attachments which
eventually wrecked bis life. As II
prophetic Of the end. tho first love affair
was terrible in it's consequences. He
contracted large debts, wandered over
England INDUCING in freakish excesses
which called his sanity into question.
and was at laet found barefooted and in
rags in the streets Of Southampton. sing.
ing ballads for the pennies which pass
ersby threw in his hat So most OF bis
dreams Of love-and they exhausted
arithmetic-began in the clouds and
ended in the streets. The "oternal
feminine" which was to thwart him at
every turn, wait for him in every path,
despoil him OF every honor, hold his feet
forever in the mire and at last track him
to his death, was first born into his life
with madness and restitution and shame
in it's wake. And whenever and wher.
over it crossed and recrossed his life, II
left that same black stain. The intiu.
ence which has lifted other poets to the
stars, for him put out the sun and more
than once threatened to extinguish
the light OF reason itself.
y y
In 1855 Rsalt landed in New York.
In 1856 Richard Realf and literature
parted company and he went to Kansas
Aho m auaru nfrnnolc