New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-11-27
LITERARY CRITICISM
AND BOOK NEWS
Two American Wonen's Pictures and Inn
pressions of the War in France-A Good
History of the Cridiron Club.
THE GRIDIRON CLUB.

GRDRoN NIGHTS: flgmorgu. and sanh -.ii
/ Views q Politics and Statesmen - fIssei.ed
| by tho Famous Dining club By Arthur Nslla,c
Dunn Illustrated svo. pp. nj. 81 Pred
erck A. stokes Company.
To write a history Of the Gridiron
Club the most famous dining club in
| the United States--is of necessity 20
| furnish a record Of the changes which
one Of our cherished social institutions
the public dinner-hss undergone
and is still undergoing. We used to
live in the era of after-dinner oratory;
now we live In the era of after-dinner
vaudeville. The cabaret performer has
crowded out the post-prandal star OF
other days, who had to get his efforts
across the guest table without the aid
/ Of makeup, costume, musical accom-
/ peniment or other helpful stage acces-
series. Formerly the guest paid his
score by giving the hosts what he had
in the way of wit, humor, fancy, Joe
Miller anecdotes or serious eloquence.
At dinners of the sportive sort he had
10 pay In other ways. The Glover Club,
Of Philadelphia, after which the Grid
iron Club was modelled used TO haze
its speakers numerically. Interrupt
tions-pertinent or Experimentation
uses to drown out his voice, boisterous
| horseplay at his expense, were thought
to be the height Of after-dinner humor
The Gridiron Club pursued this method
for a while, but, TO its credit, soon
dropped it for a humaner form Of
satirical entertainment Burlesques in
which the members of the club took
part formed the basis of the evenings
fun, and the guests were asked to laugh
at impersonations deftly ridiculing
them and their fobles.
Mr. Dunn's book tells the story Of
the Gridiron Club from its first dinner,
in May, 1885, TO its thirtieth anniver-
sary, in 1915. What intelligence, tact
and good taste can do toward creating
q reputation such as the club now en-
joys would make an interesting ex-
hibit, even if the club had had its local
habitaton in some minor inland city
and the purveyor of amusement had
been obliged to deal with scanty local
material. But il has been the Grid
iron Clubs good fortune to make its
career at the national capital, to bur-
lesque events and situations which
were Of universal interest, and to put
on its skits under the eyes of the
chief actors in those events and situa-
tons. Presidents, Cabinet officers,
Ambassadors, Senators, Representatives
in Congress, men in the limelight in
all professions, have been its guests
and have suffered in person from its
raillery. A complete record of the
doings at the dinners for thirty years
back would be a historical document
of the greatest value. Since the first
rule Of the club is that reporters are
never present such document will
be beyond the reach of future his
torians. 1t is a pity. For in the un-
restrained intercourse of such occa-
sions the true character of public
man flashes out, and a better judg-
ment of what he really is can be OBJ
tanned than through any of his more
guarded public acts and utterances.
The clubs rule has been broken in one
or two instances, and with all his
discretion Mr.. Dunn occasionally gives
the reader that more intimate view OF
public personages which the outside
public and historian crave for.
There is the paradox. for instance.
which will always worry the student
who tries to explain the character of
Benjamin Harrison. No President was
ever personally more unpopular in
Washington than he was. In his per-
sonal dealings with politicians, with
journalists, with all who were brought
into contact with him in an official ca
pacity he was q man of ice-curt, sus-
picious, unresponsive. He lacked abso-
lutely the capacity for personal inter
course. Yet his speeches were models
of graceful and tactful expression. His
first Gridiron speech astonished those
who had thought of him only as hu-
man icicle. At its conclusion a member
Of the club, violently partisan in his
Democracy, rushed over to Perry s.
Heath, the Washington correspondent
of "The Indianapolis Journal and
quasi press agent of the administra-
ton, and said:
Perry, your man Harrison is
wonder. / didn't think it was In
him"
ooh, he's all right on his feet"
replied Perry ITS only when he
sits down that he falls down.
There was the riddle Of Harrison,
illuminated by an Irish bull. Seated at
his desk at the White House and in
ordinary intercourse with others, the
President seemed to lose all power to
convince or to please. He rubbed every
body the wrong way.
Yet he had wit and unbounded ora
torical felicity. A few days before he
spoke at the Gridiron dinner he had
made a speech to Congress Of In
ventors and patent lawyers. He capt
ured his audience by beginning: "This
is the second time that | have been
called upon this week to open con-
gress Of American inventors"
President Cleveland never attended
a Gridiron dinner. He did not get on
well with the Washington correspond
ents and had only the faintest appre-
citation of the use which could be made
of the newspapers for political pur-
poses. lie was not at ease on such in
/ formal occasions, could not exchange
banter with his critics, as Harrison and
| Roosevelt could and also felt that the