Show t t PENURY AND RAGS The Mistress of Dog Hollow t Brooklyn i FRIEND OF CHARLES DICKENS IhrilUnj Story of Two Continents Interesting Interest-ing Bemnlscences of the Great Novcllit BROOKLTS NY June 17 189L Special Correspondence of tne HERALD Snug ged warmly down in a south looking gulch > at the foot of the last rango of outlying i hills that rise back of Brooklyn there lies a little hut To the traveler as he crosses over the crest of the bluff it is entirely F aidden from view but as he proceeds down the southern declivity a slender thread of smoke curls up out of the cleft suggesting tho smouldering revories of a subterranean gnome As you descend the slope however a small frrey hut gradually peers out at tho bottom of the bluff in front of which spreads a large pond All around this quaint lonely little hut in the hollow show C the sods of the squatters against the tides of the steep interspersed hero and there with small wooden structures of amore a-more pretentious character owned by the aiore aristocratic of the plob who have put their money into property rather than punch The precise property on which this dwarfed dilapidated little haberdashery haberdash-ery stands on unsurveyed grounds would If laid out be known geographically as Park Place corner Saratoga avenue Formerly Form-erly that whole section was verminiously infested with tho very worst characters I whoso shades in a sort of stubborn heredity of habit invariably haunt the suburbs of a great city As the writer of this article wound round the steep in front of Snug Lake Shanty JL STRANGE SPECTACLE MET HIS nOn n-On the dark preen water of the pond a fleet of fine geese sailed dofling their regards re-gards obsequiously to some one near the hut All about the hut itself lay piles of driftwood huge cages Ulltd with garrulous parrots revolving squirrels and sobered birds All sorts of shaggy dogs ran out at J us as we approached the spot and barked lustily as if to inform us tnat the name by which tho shanty was known viz The Hounds Retreat was something more than a mere fanciful nomenclature The environs of the hut were a strnge con gene of confusions At tne loose sagging gate sat a man on a box smoking a pipe and dreamily following follow-ing with his eye the slowly ascending vapor as the reveries of the smokerings diu and undid their fantastic querls curiously curi-ously in the air that jealously wiped them out one by one as fast as they formed At the door of the hut sat an asGd woman wo-man nursing her face with her hands as the bent obliviously over some manuscripts which she held on her lap Her face as she raised it at length looked the very opposite oppo-site of that of the man at the gate It was strong striding and dashed with haggard gleams of what had once been an expressive expres-sive but what was now a crucial countenance counten-ance Suffering had left its lines in every look and care had caserned eyebranded her brow and bitten her cheek A spider cancer on her neck was on its way up to her brain and flashes of pain shot their hot twinges through her face intermittently To one skilled at charactery her visage was a peculiarly interesting one Sarcasm lay witheringly curled about her lips A cold icy defiance lurked around her firm mouth that MELTED AWAY AT A KIXD WORD The hut itself was a truly idiosyncratic specimen of architecture It was built by the husband of the woman about twelve years ago It contained one room only which served as kitchen bedroom dining room sitting room reception room washroom wash-room storeroom spare room pantry and parlor Two or three onelegged chairs a tipsy table a bed that nearly blacked tho whole dormitory a miniature stove an old hairy trunk a writing desk and a few sundries sun-dries were the furnitures that graced Snug Lake Shanty The floor was bare Indeed until lately it was earth The walls were stuccoed with ingenious caricatures The only screen that interposed between the occupants oc-cupants of the but and the storms of winter win-ter or the scorching flaunts of summer wash was-h single siding of weatherboards with Traotholes as ventilators It has only one window I is only 12x12 feet but it holds a history of two continents Accosting the oracle at the little gate the 1 writer ventured some tranquilizing remark to him suited to the peculiarly aerial at pcaceofmindwithalltheworld mood that he was in Gradually as he spoke in profound pro-found platitude the clucking chickens one by one gathered silently and reverently around him queering their heads ominously as if fearful they might lose a word The furious Bernard stopped barking and lay down at his feet The pigeons settled near him en the old rookery in eavesdropping silence The run round squirrel stooc stock still on his hind legs in mute astonishment astonish-ment witn one leg laid like a linger on his lip The old woman at the door who had looked up for an instant a the writer spoke buried her face once more in her hands apparently lost thought a before At length the sage turned reflectively tipped his Peter Tony out on the gate post and said IV A HOLLOW SEPULCHRAL TOXE as he emptied the sparkless contents of tho pipe on the flaps A Ashes to ashes dust to dust Thats all there is in it from last t first Suddenly the woman looked up 4 Pray be seated sir she said risingnnd pointing to the old chair which ho had just occupied with a peculiarly graceful ant courteous gesture of the hand Dont I beg of you stand for the sake of any uncomfortable un-comfortable politeness We looked at the woman in amazement Uncomfortable politeness Remarkably good phrase certainly And then I pray you and I beg No pleb about that And then too that tine Delsartean wave of the hand with which suiting the action to the word she gestured to that empty chairTake Take your seat my good madam said the writer as the woman halt reluctantly resumed her infirm chair Fine poultry and pigeons madam I remarked The woman laid aside her old laded manuscripts man-uscripts and fixing her gray eyes on me talked with remarkable intelligence and polite intonation about her fowls and pets p Here was a woman in a hut who as she sat on that old rheumatic chair creaking with pain in every joint was evidently a person I of great cultivation whose every word betrayed be-trayed refinement and a story of better days A WOMAN IS SQUALOR yet even in her unpremeditated delineations delinea-tions of a rookory a woman whose fine seizures of diction whose play and sparkle of wit whose knowledge of natural history whose whole ensemble instantly and incontestibly betrayed the fact that she was no ordinary individual J And all this long continued conversation 1 without so much a the slightest suspicion ofungrammar ungammar Before proceeding with this strange story of two continents let us anticipate in natural res People will read the story and say with a shrug of the shoulders and a shake of the head headImprobable h Improbable to say tne least To all such the answer is simply this The adventure was purely accidental Tho picture is a fact drawn true to life at every touch and carefully verified by trustworthy witnesses The hut stands tustworthy wtnesses just in the place described The woman answers for herself The cuts that appear in these columns are drawn by her own bad for cleverer caricaturist there i not in Brooklyn The marriage certificate rot is in her possession and ha been seen and may be seen again by anybody who goes to that hut The manuscripts in her own i I awt which U that of a bJehlv p r a I I eductcd woman have been in a score of hands handsMy My good madam said the writer thoroughly convinced of her cleverness by this time will you pardon me i I ask you what that pile of manuscript at your side means What are you writing I Turning contemplatively toward the heap of old yellow MSS mingled with papers of a more recent date sho mused reflectively reflect-ively upon them for a moment and then exclaimed ex-claimed caimed CHAT3 WITH CHARLES DIOKEXS The writer started Snug Lake Stranby The Hounds Retreat Re-treat Brooklyn Liverpool street London Lon-don Charles Dickens I I VICTORIA TEEGEARS OTISDAKD ASLEEP As seen by our artist Just gods What a gap 1 What long covered cov-ered bridge had this woman come over What sad secret lay hid in her history What strange story was locked beneath those iron lips What yellowing years had turned thoso papers I What weird thrilling romance dad been so long mysteriously buried in that little hut in the bellow Have you never been approached by newspaper men continued the writer when he had sufficiently recovered his senses Plenty of tncm I have been a character charac-ter in tho courts Have you never sid anything to anyone about those manuscripts before i Never Why Because nobody ever happened to see them before You are the first one sir to whom I have ever spoken on the subject except to William she replied pointing as she spoke to her husband who with the same unspeakably imperturablo expression of countenance sat reclining at case against the post of the gate fast asleep WILL TOU TLKl What about rejoined the woman quizzically quiz-zically and what ior For print And what about About yourself about Dickens and especially about your relations to Dickens as disclosed dis-closed in your chats with him The woman hesitated reflected a moment meet and finally said ment tnal I I can so as to say anything that will interest anybody concerning my early relations re-lations with Mr Dickens and at the same time not encroach too much upon my forthcoming forth-coming ook I will do so You may do just that Please tell what you are willing in your own way Very well said she Write down just what I bay Ill talk print Gathering up her pile of yellow papers at the door of the little hut she told this startling start-ling story refreshing her memory as to dates places names from time to time bj referring to her manuscript I was born in the heart of busy bustling London at 0 Cheapside opposite Old Bow church corner cor-ner of Lawrence lane in the year 1S3L My father was Gabriel Shire Tregear the famous fa-mous metropolitan picture merchant of London formerly alderman of the city My mother was Ann McLean the sister of the four McLean brothers Thomas Edward Ed-ward Charles and Hector so well known il London They were married in 1S27 The name Tre ear is a noole one The Treirears orininallv came from a town named after themselves in Normandy France The full name of the fawily was Raymondo ae la Tregair the word Tregair at that time being spelt with an air instead of an ear a it afterwards was Even after ater Queen Elizabeths reign the name a not Tregair but RATMOXD DE LA TREGAIR as stated by several historians When the family first came from Normandy they settled set-tled in Cornwall on a tract of land which they called Tregear about five miles from Tenro The great London emporium was a perfect per-fect exhibition in itself My father sir was a famous publisher Sir Edwin Land seer was a great friend of my father and a frequent visitor to his house I was a noted rendezvous of all the great wits artists art-ists and authors of London Thackeray Tennyson Mark Lemmon Hood ThorntOE Hunt Edmund Yates Brontaire OBrien i Ernest Jones Carlyle and men of that literary I lit-erary ilk My father was a very clever caricaturist caricatur-ist himself and I inherit his faculty for drawing have always been in the habit of instantly sketching all the peculiar peo plo I meet My father was rich and reared j us all in Effluence I have often seen him come into my mothers room and fling a thousand pound note into my mothers lap exclaiming a ho kissed her that is for you I have just made i out 01 a sale of a picture I was born on the anniversary of the Queens birthday and named after her royal Highness Victoria 1 was one of thirteen children I was educated as were my sisters by private masters During certain invervals of masters certn invcra my life I also attended certain celebrated schools notably that of Miss Wilmhurts at Kalden and afterward at Cromwell house I learned to dance draw paint poetize and play piano organ and violin I was educated in all the roman tic arts I was especially fond of poetry Here said she drawing out of the manuscripts an old sheet of yellow yel-low paper tanned by time here is one of my sonnets if you want it I have many more The writer took it read it hurriedly hur-riedly and then transcribed it as follows A DREAM IN EPPING FOREST cuARrrr O charity sweet charity divine I Greatest of all the gUt of heaven tis thins To pour thy healing balm on human leA le-A calm this sea of wild tempestuous strife To bid the storm of gusty passion cease And whisper to the troubled spirit peace How prone alas is man in erring pride His own sin In another to deride I Doth it become forsooth the Christians name Harshly to censure darkly to defame Alas sweet chart how great how grand Acd yet how little heeded thy command Carved by thy truth i one immortal leo le-o err i human t forgive divine The woman who wrote that sonnet would command to say the least the respect re-spect of all true poets had she never written writ-ten another word That sonnet will immortalize mortalize her My father and mother lived a most happy life If ever a couple deserved tho Flitch of Bacon they did He was an esteemed es-teemed officer in old Bow Church Alas for tho day when those celebrated chimes rang out for his funeral Tho great business busi-ness went to pieces after that Changes came Consequent upon tho unhappy dissipation dis-sipation of a great estate squandered by unscrupulous persons a loving wife and mother a consigned to the indignity of had wish want and children who never a beyond a theater box or a carriage found themselves suddenly thrown out into tho cold world to survive and struggle fur themselves Then it was that I realized the power of education I was for a time governess t the family of the Duke of Norfolk and my sisters were governesses in the houses of Russian princes At length I married the man who you see asleep against that post Kind soul I dont think ho has ever really waked up once since he first married me But all honor t him he has tried t support me at least in away I awayWill claimed you look at that man she ex caucdI I LOOKED AT THAT MAX He was hardly visible Tho dog had laid his neck on his boot The chickens had gone t roost on bis knees Tho pigeons had settled on his shoulders The cat lay in his lap said He i so fond of pets you know she saidReverting onco more to the woman somewhat some-what impatiently be it confessed in view of the fact that before my very eyes all this time had been one who had according I I to her own account been on familiar terms with Dickens ate with him rambled with him rollicked with him discoursed with him sympathised with him known him as few ever knew him intimately the writer pressed tho question My good madam will you state right here just when and where you first met Dickens how well you knew him and some of your recollections of him Certainly said the woman I first met Charles Dickens when amore a-more child of nine years of ape at my fathers house Tho interview save t my happy little heart was utterly inconsequent inconse-quent He tossed mo up in the air his I sad me told me stories and finally gave mea me-a copy of Old Curiosity Shop because he said I had long curls like little Nell and the organ grinder had dogs and he knew I was fond of animals and would rather play with a puppy than a dol The next time tme I MET DICKENS was when I was a gay impulsive facetious girl of sixteen 1 met him at my Uncle Hector McLeans house Hector McLean and Dickens a everybody know in London Lon-don were great friends Dickens was constant stantly at my uncles house I also was constantly at my uncles house for I was his favorite niece so you see Dickens ana I were continually thrown together My Uncle Hector lived in a splendid mansion upon Bloomsbury square That house was famous for its fine libraries librar-ies it imported furnitures and above alit al-it multiplying pier mirrors I played whist with Dickens there often I remember a set of chessmen with which I played chess with Dickens and which he particularly particu-larly admired The tosselated table across which we played was made of carved mahogany ma-hogany with the chessboard let in in variegated are gated squares The chess men wcro carved out of solid ivory onehalf scarlet the other white Tho kings queens bishops and castles were ten inches high The pawns a little lower were warriors on horseback They were kept under glasses They were subsequently disposed of at my uncles death for a fabulous sum I frequently played chess with Dickens across this rare Indian table for hours at a time and occasionally sionally till midnight Ia very fond of chess and had made a study of the gambits and variations I was also fond of problems prob-lems chestnuts as Dickens used to call them I think wa played a pretty even j4 0 2 a1j14411 I I I 4i1j ii I t ± J THE TREGEAR SISTERS 1 VICTORIA 2KATE J SARAH 41 XT 5 SEPTIMA ame Perhaps ho footed up tho most to his score in the long run He was always annoyed when I beat him and invariably wanted to play another panic I shall never forget how onco at midnight CHARLES DICKENS FACED IP across the board at the end of a play The game was drawn Well said Dickens somewhat resignedly edly why not Man and woman represent rep-resent an equation after alL Discriminate n you will in favor of either they are when their mutual trails come to be considered con-sidered equals That is certainly a very ingenious way of defining a draw I said A little of Uncle Hectors choice port soon put him into a loquacious mood and he chatted over the chess board merrily Dickens moved very deliberately and only after careful thought I moved a a general rule quickly Then when a hard more came as it often did I added up all I the spare time to my credit and moved slowly Yes continued Dickens tho woman who grows up with the idea that she is simply to be an amiable animal t be caressed and coaxed is invariably bitterly disappointed woman A game of chess will cure such a conceit forever The woman that knows the most thinks the most feels the most is the most Intel most most lectual affection said Dickens is the only lasting love Love that has a game of chess in it can checkmate any man and solve the problem of life There was one peculiarity about Dickens Dick-ens as a chess player He always wanted me to move first He followed my play and accepted all my variations I was just son so-n his novels He lets a character take a lead and then he simply follows it studies it exhausts it He never created a character AH ME WAIT A MINUTE said tho woman as rising slowly from her scat and entering the door of the hut she groped her way to an old chest and reaching reach-ing her hand down Into it drew out some thing that visibly affected her a she r sumed her place Holding it up in her hand as the light hone on it I saw that it was a beautiful little watch That was a philopena from Dickens Ho never would eat almonds with me after that she said Through those girlish I years of my life from sixteen up ho made mo many a kindly little present though ho was not as a rule in the habit of making present > to people But then he said ut ir who can play chess with me Hector as Vic candeserves all the signs of appreciation that a man can give her uI have kept that little gold watch continued tho women brokenly through a the agony of my life I clutched it from my breast when the bull tossed mot mo-t Brixton I held it in my mouth when I was overboard in the British channel in a shipwreck I sewed it up in my dress seams when I slept alone in Epping forest I saved it when everything else went to the pawnshop I still refused to part with it when I landed at Castle Gardonand was obliged to sacrifice n I had in order to get my menagerio through the pates but I ball always keep that dear littlo Dickens watch said tho woman lifting the tiny gold sphere to her lips with much emotion as a sonvenir of other days when I was happy and unsuspecting andrichwhen I wore clothes that made people look round and rode in a carriage like a countess to Buckingham Palace many a time for my mothers father was jeweler to the royal family famiy Yes she added with a sigh those I were rare old days in my Uncle Hectors house and now hero I a in this little hnt little bit of bread and no cheese There was something inexpressibly sad in it alL Desiring to change tho conversation and comfort the miserably clad woman the writer asked In your chats with Charles Dickens did you ever say anythidg that made him laugh I DICKENS AS A HUMORIST 1 Many and many a time sir Tell us some of thee things I remember once how lat at night told him in answer to several inquiries about my school dan of tho old fat lady vrba took a header in the snow drift when the stage coach on the way to Maiden upset and came dangerously near being lost sight of 4hd buried in the snow andhow nothing could be seen of her but a pair of lops sticking stick-ing up out of the snow and how angry she was when they dragged her out because they took hold of her by the feet upside down and dragged her out and she a decent drgg out woman when there was nothing else to take hold of the way she was stuck And then everybody went and looked dow great hole she had made a i it had been a crater and then looked at the crater tat had come out of it Although he seldom laughed save when exhilarated by convivial hilarity he did lie back in his chair at that story and laugh out loud again and again Waggy Alter that story be always called me VICTORIA TRBGEARS PRESENT HOUSE From an Instantaneous Photograph Dickens was fonder of a funny story than anything else on earth I shall never forgot how ho seemed to enjoy an answer of mine once when ho asked mo what I had found tile most difficult diffi-cult thing hi painting I said the management of chiaroscuro in some instances Give an instance said Dickens A stale piece of boarding school bread scratched faintly with a shadow of butter Dickens appreciated tho limo distinction and laughed heartily I remember too that ho laughed when I I told him how when Sir Edwin Landseer was first presented the king of Portugal he the king acknowledged the introduction introduc-tion and shaking hands with Sir Edwin said in his half broken English I am mOt happy to make your acquaintance Sir Edwin Landseer I a so fond of beasts But Dickens as a rule was not a laughing laugh-ing man Ho was a stern cold formal man who had a cynical curl of dry humor about his mouth but whose sense of an excessively funny situation in my judgment was not at all remarkable Ho was not fine enough t bo exquisitely sensitive and not sensitive sensi-tive enough often to get beyond dry drollery When Dickens was first introduced t me by Uncle Hector he tried to be cold to me but I wouldnt have it I remorselessly joke him at every angle till at last whenever when-ever he saw me his stern face would invariably in-variably relax into a broad smile because I take it ho liked tho tiiango from grave bores to a rolickinp schoolgirls fun DICKENS PECULIARITIES Had Dickens any peculiarities that you remember that struck you as being particularly partic-ularly interesting Decidedly said the Tregear There never waI The sentence at this point was suddenly interrupted by a loud clatter above our heads that sounded a i the devil and his imps were dancing a hornpipe or Highland fling on the old looso shingles of the little thatched hut that ran down on ono side to a low shod Catching up a broom a she threw down the Dickens MSS she ran out from under the shed whero we had been sitting and looking up at the ridged roof of tho shanty exclaimed Whoosh you silly rig and get away at the same time furiously brandishing her broomstick as i to bewitch the air My curiosity being aroused to tho highest pitch I stepped out to where the woman stood and looked up Imagine my amazement when I behold on I top of the roof two frisky billy goats one whito and tho other black standing on I cither side of the ridge pole with their horns locked over it executing a series ol bolts and breaks that served plainly in my mind to make the doctrine of evolution utterly hopeless and at tho same time that of involution so far a the roof was concerned con-cerned highly probable At every sharp I rap of their hoofs as the unseemly satyrs danced on tho old brown shingles the loose thatch flew in every direction It is needless to say that during this performance perform-ance the whole menagerie had waked up and pandemonium choked the air ar In vain tho broomstick was frantically hurled at the aeronauts The more they were stormed at the harder they danced and the thicker flew the shingles William 1 William cried the woman Jot up get up I say the goat are tearing off the roof THE SAGE OF SNUG LAKE SHASTT after a protracted apple tres shaking sad started only up As he did so ho put his hands t his back and stiffening in his position exclaimed Oh Oh my 1 Whats the matter said the woman Does it hurt you to wake upI up-I I 1vo got a crick in my back gasped the oracle gpe Wel if you dont drive those goats away roof theyll be tumbling through the roofCarline Carlne said the sage never do that again Never wake anybody up suddenly Its liable t give em t Always wake a man up gradually But look at those goats Just hear them I Quick William quick Carlins rigidly rejoined the oracle you say quick and I say crick I tell you you dont understand the nature of a goat You cant scare a oat Youve pot to reason rea-son with him seo Just then a thatch with a rusty nail sticking stick-ing in it few off the roof from under a sharp rap of a hoof and took William right in the eye He came very near never seeing see-ing again Whether due to a sense of suddenly awakened pride or whether smarting under the slinc of sain that dissipated Un 1 gently the idea of optical delusion or I whotner as is still more probable on the theory of counter irritants the blow had cured the crick i is due to the imperturbable impertur-bable stoic of the porch to say that thereupon there-upon with a muttered imprecation on those pesky critters as he styled them ho rose from his box mounted the dog kennel surmounted sur-mounted the chicken coop climbed the cowshed I cow-shed ascended the roof and with a long clothes pole scattered the goats at ono prodigious pro-digious sweeping stroke down tho sides tote to-te round Descending to the ground with all the air of a victorious hero he sat down and sad as he sopped bis bleeding eyelid with his variegated kerchief ruly Umph A peculiar coincidence ter rulyYes quoth his tart spouse Dickens never had any peculiarities a marked as that Disorderly order once more settled on the environs of SnugLako Shanty Tne woman resumed her seat by the door and after consulting her manuscript said Poor William he spoke more truly than he knew after all A peculiar coincidence indeed I See these sir Just rad I read The story of an English gentlewoman gentle-woman being a thread broken from the lifo of Charles Dickens That was as you see sir the original title of my book 1 have changed it several times Now let us take up the thread once more where it was so abruptly broken NIBBLING AND BROWSING I strolled out into the country on several sev-eral occasions with Dickens Ho took me with him as he said because I bad a faculty fac-ulty for seeing everything at a ridiculous angle Dickens wanted to mae the world laugh to make it happy not miserable miser-able I noted this invariable peculiarity him Ho never let wagon loaded with fresh hay pass by him on a country read without going up to it and pulling out apiece a-piece of hay and nibbling at it It was tho same way with shrubs trees barks and roots Hechewed them browsed on them Ho loved naturo and took a good many lessons les-sons from her Ho loved water in a its forms He talked to me most exquisitely about water He loved to skirt along by the edge of a cool gurgling stream and eat cresses and chew mint and thyme He was particularly fond of the sassafras root He loved these natural objects for themselves them-selves but sought them largely for fresh touches for his books You bee them snrinkled all throuch Ho was inordi nately fond of tresI shall never forget his remark to me once about a tree The wind touched it and a single leaf quivered He Sad Seo that tree smile Tno wind stirred It and all its leaves contagiously shook He said again Just see that tree laugh The wind rose in it and a it writhed in a gust he said Waggy that was positively u convulsion I used to take a little book wit me and jot down whatever he said that struck me and these manuscripts are full of them I once said to him 11 Dickens I have enough bright thinirs jotted down that you have said to make a most interesting book Make them said Dickens you have certainly furnished me Waggy witti MORE THAN ONE HUMOROUS CHARACTER for my books And he used them too I can pick them all out I little thought then that I should ever carry out my literary threat but I have made up my mind that I can write I book of recollection about the great novelist that nobody else can I have said he loved water in all its forms So he did but most of all when it miror some object Ho loved to lookdown look-down into some clear transparent spring at the pebbles lying on the bottom 1 remember remem-ber such a spring I remember hew he pointed down to it and saidThere Waggy that is what I mean by clearness I insist upon it a the first trait of style Speech is only a transparent medium through which you should be able to seo the thought clearly that under ics it as you see those pebbles in the spring I told him afterward that I had often thought of that remark and that I bad done me a great deal of Iood Well Wagpy he replied I am glad for once that I nave done you good in something some-thing that I have said to you for I must confess you are a pretty incorrigible girl On the same principle was his passion for mirrors He loved them like lucent water for what they clearly showed He was always raving about clearness He used to say that glass was only frozen water and water only fluent glass He contracted his first passion for mirrors in my Uncle Hectors house as he himself told me Be used to walk about those spacious rooms whose walls were lined here and there from top t bottom with multiplying pier mirrors And a ho saw himself rejected re-jected severally in each glass he would turn to me and say See in each mirror I am tho same man and yet at the same lima in each a totally different man And so I am the same individual in-dividual all my different moods and yet as many times different DICKENS HAD ANOTHER PECULIARITT He would spend whole days in minutely and microscopically studying some nppar ently insignificant object i once saw him sit in my Uncle Hectors garden for hours watch a toad catch flies It seemed to amuse him beyond description On another occasion I found him on his hands and kness bending over a bug in a spiders web that had just been caught Dickens watched the whole subsequent movement of that spider for two consecutive days till the bug was eaten The process as ho afterward described it to me was wonderful fulI I trust I shall not be considered presumptuous pre-sumptuous if I say here continued tho Tregoar that Mr Dickens and I never agreed about genius Dickens swore by Buffon I by Ruskin Dickens said with the great Frenchman Genius is Patience I said and I still say with Ruskin in that great sentenco of his Genius does a great thIng and does It witnout an effect Dickens Dick-ens had tho genius ot industry not the genius of spontaneity He went over andover and-over his work again and attain and it was only by accretion that bis best works rose up like coral islands Dickens onco said tome to-me What would you rather be than any thing else I replied A great musician And what would you rather be than any thng else Mr Dickens pray I asked A great poet ho replied disappointedly disappoint-edly edlyWell ey Well you never will be I said That was tho only time I think that Dickens was over annoyed by me or angry with me Ho looked at me sharply and said Waggy youre the sauciest girl that I ever knew But bis good sense came back t him almost instantly and ho said But I suspect very likely youro right about it after all and changed the subject sub-ject immediately THE BREACH INTERPOSES Thats what I sayinterposed the sago of Snug Lake shanty Dickens wasnt no poet in a crickhichiccrickical sense Why hes away off Just take that line he thought so fine see I cant help rhym inK said the sage just take that line on which they say his reputation rests I guess itll rest there A rare old plant is the Ivy green Rr why bless my soul its tho commonest com-monest plant that grows Just stick it down in the middle of winter and itl prow anywhere from ono of his slips Thats one of his slips William gently retorted the old lady of the lakovicw house them Slips I guess yes and heres another of They told him gently she was dead How in thunder would they tell him Tell at him Whats the use of putting gently there Im speaking crickhlchick ally of course Why I can beat that In these chats with Mr Dickens I asked of the lady did he ever disclose to you any of his methods of getting information informa-tion tionOften tonOlen Hero is a remarkable occur which ho told of He rence once me happened hap-pened to be at tho Euston station just u a group of sailors with their kits in their hands got aboard the car He bad no over coat on although it was in the deep of I winter but tat group of jolly tars till pitching about not having shaken their sos legs l off hold for him a lifo study that was his capital and go he could and go he did though the coach was a third lass one all the way t Now Castle on Lyne a distance of two hundred miles and more where they all together with other migrants got out He drank with them smoked with them talked with them and got their little secret and came home I know his account was correct for I afterward after-ward met gentleman who was a entema unexpectedly unex-pectedly obliged t take the same train and a rode in his company a the way That i only one instance Dickens once said to me at Unole Hectors Old curiosity shop Is London And it meant a great deal It meant that he bad gat cxclored and that a he once told me often at the risk of his life every nook and crook in tho city and DRAWS HIS PICTURES FROM LIFE His life as a reporter taught him that He was very fond of coing to Benhams place the great sculptor and drinking his pot of stout He often went to Chalk farm so famous for Us cock fights and sprinting matches He often might be seen with a crowd of noted literary men at the Elephant and Castle or Hen and Chickens as the famous old coach inn was called that stood at the fork of the seven roads He didnt often go to church He hated ministers a a general rule and despised both their bigotry and their methods Yet he respected the church and revered sacred sa-cred things Ho was everywhere said the Tregear what he was in that car a shadower ado tectlve Nothing escaped him He was subtle in his observation and often a looking at you when ho va looking away from you He brought those traits with trat wih him from below not above He was a man of ordinary birth with little of the sympathy sym-pathy of which he talked spoiled a to his simplicity somewhat by flattery though not corrupted by it enough be it said to his honor to take a proffered title How often I have seen that little old woman in Bleak House with the retlcalo walking up and down Chancery Court square and how often I had studied elocution elocu-tion with the famous Graham of Scotland I used to imitate her walk and gestures and mumbling absent uilndedness and grotesquerie gro-tesquerie till Dickens laughed and said THERE is ONLY ONE WAGGT Ah mo 1 sho signed how little did ho dream a I use to play the piano for him and dance round thos spacious parlors and tell him funny stories that a day would como in this faroff land when his once gay i and rollicking Waggy would say I have wept far moro than I have laughed since then I Dickens could seo mo now continued contin-ued the Tre ear how long do you think hed lot me live in this hut J The woman had hardly finished this pathetic pa-thetic remark when suddenly crack crack went a volley of sounds asrain on the roof of the hut that ann up tho menagerIe and aroused the fury of the mistress mis-tress of Snug Lake shanty whose liege lord reclined against the gate post fast asleep once more Its those goats again tho pests On going out however what was her astonishment to see a group of boys stand Ing on the buiff deliberately throwing stones at the shanty gear Stop that you brats shrieked the Tre gearEnglish Mary English Mary I English Mary rang out of a score of throats Just at this juncture a fat Irish woman the mother of the catapultists appeared on the scene shaking nor fists violently at tho old woman as she spoke disparagingly of HER TIPPERART NEIGHBOR and shrieking out to tho consternation of consternaton the whole neighborhood Ive ad a better brungin up than you arve I wuz brought up for ter tend the I lure and swapo the flu re and sich and not to play on the pieany I you lays a finger on thim byes Ill rid the hill of the likes of I i yea I will so I will ye spalpeen ye This classic effdsion encouraged the boys I who much to tho enjoyment of the mother shanty threw a fresh volley of stones at tho little At that moment the Tregeararew a pistol from her pocket loaded with rock salt and pointing it at the boys said Scatter or Ill shoot I They scattered Thats a sample of the dolns of Dog Hollow said the woman resuming her seat seatHow How do you support yourself my good woman I asked My husband does sll he can to help me said the lady and I do all I can to heip us both I teach music and have quite a sprinkling of scholars You know she said archly hits so I easy to please country people To be sure Williams poetry has never paid as yot but then theres no telling she sighed and bowed and went into the hut hutThanking Thanking this remarkable denizen of Dog Hollow for her bookshadowingsthewriter left the hnt threaded his way out through the huddled yard escaped the iro of the watted turkey ccck climbed the orest of the bluff and took off his way toward the city cityAs As he went he turned and looking backsaw back-saw the two goats gone t roost on the ridgo pole side by side on top of The Hounds Retreat MILLER HAGEMAN |