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[Illustration: Book Cover]




[Illustration: "COME RIGHT UP"--Page 47]




PEEPS AT
PEOPLE
_Being Certain Papers
from the Writings of_
ANNE WARRINGTON
WITHERUP. _Collected, by_
JOHN KENDRICK BANGS
_With Illustrations by_
EDWARD PENFIELD


[Illustration]


NEW YORK AND LONDON
HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
1899




BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

       *       *       *       *       *

GHOSTS I HAVE MET, AND SOME OTHERS. With Illustrations by NEWELL, FROST,
and RICHARDS. 16mo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1.25.

PASTE JEWELS. Being Seven Tales of Domestic Woe. 16mo, Cloth,
Ornamental, $1.00.

THE PURSUIT OF THE HOUSE BOAT. Being Some Further Account of the Doings
of the Associated Shades, under the Leadership of Sherlock Holmes, Esq.
Illustrated by PETER NEWELL. 16mo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1.25.

A HOUSE-BOAT ON THE STYX. Being Some Account of the Divers Doings of the
Associated Shades. Illustrated by PETER NEWELL. 16mo, Cloth, Ornamental,
$1.25.

THE BICYCLERS, AND THREE OTHER FARCES. Illustrated. 16mo, Cloth,
Ornamental, $1.25.

A REBELLIOUS HEROINE. A Story. Illustrated by W. T. SMEDLEY. 16mo,
Cloth, Ornamental, Uncut Edges, $1.25.

MR. BONAPARTE OF CORSICA. Illustrated by H. W. MCVICKAR. 16mo, Cloth,
Ornamental, $1.25.

THE WATER GHOST, AND OTHERS. Illustrated. 16mo, Cloth, Ornamental,
$1.25.

THE IDIOT. Illustrated. 16mo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1.00.

THREE WEEKS IN POLITICS. Illustrated. 32mo, Cloth, Ornamental, 50 cents.

COFFEE AND REPARTEE. Illustrated. 32mo, Cloth, Ornamental, 50 cents.

       *       *       *       *       *

NEW YORK AND LONDON
HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS.

       *       *       *       *       *

Copyright, 1898, by HARPER & BROTHERS.




CONTENTS


                                                                    PAGE
  NANSEN                                                               3
  MR. HALL CAINE                                                      17
  EMPEROR WILLIAM                                                     33
  MR. ALFRED AUSTIN                                                   45
  ANDREW LANG                                                         59
  ZOLA                                                                75
  SIR HENRY IRVING                                                    89
  IAN MACLAREN                                                       107
  RUDYARD KIPLING                                                    123
  THE DE RESZKES                                                     139
  HENRYK SIENKIEWICZ                                                 155
  GENERAL WEYLER                                                     171




ILLUSTRATIONS


  "COME RIGHT UP"                                         _Frontispiece_
  "I BOARDED A PJINE RJAFT"                                _Facing p._ 6
  "'MR. NANSEN?' SAID I"                                               8
  "DINED WITH THE CABINET"                                            12
  "'IS THIS GLOOMSTER ABBEY?' I ASKED"                                18
  HE APPEARED!                                                        20
  IN THE WORKSHOP                                                     22
  EXAMINING HIMSELF                                                   36
  THE IMPERIAL BAND                                                   40
  "'WE ARE HAVING OUR PORTRAITS PAINTED'"                             42
  "'A BEAUTIFUL WORKSHOP,' SAID I"                                    50
  CONSULTING HIS CHINOMETER                                           54
  TRADE-MARK. NONE GENUINE WITHOUT IT                                 60
  IN THE MEREDITH SHOP                                                66
  EDITING "HERRICK"                                                   68
  SEEKING ZOLA                                                        76
  CONSULTING "LA PATRIE"                                              78
  "'SAVE ME!' SHE CRIED"                                              80
  "I SAT QUIETLY IN THE BOX"                                          94
  "'SEND THE PROPERTY-MAN HERE!' HE CRIED"                            98
  "'IT WAS ALL ARRANGED BEFOREHAND, MISS'"                           102
  DRESSED FOR THE PART                                               110
  THE PURSUIT                                                        112
  AT HOME                                                            116
  INTERCEPTED THE STEAMER                                            124
  ON THE LANYARD DECK                                                126
  "HE WAS ERECTING A GRAND-STAND"                                    134
  IT WAS A SUPERB BUILDING                                           142
  READY FOR THE STORM                                                146
  MELBA, THE DAIRY-MAID                                              148
  ASKED A POLICEMAN                                                  160
  THE AUTHOR IN HIS STUDY                                            162
  "ONE MUST BE INTRODUCED"                                           166
  "A RATHER STUNNING BANDERILLO OPENED THE DOOR"                     172
  IN HIDING                                                          174
  "I AM TOO OLD A SPANIARD TO BE CAUGHT LIKE THAT"                   178




PEEPS AT PEOPLE




NANSEN


It was in the early part of February last that, acting under
instructions from headquarters, I set forth from my office in London
upon my pilgrimage to the shrines of the world's illustrious. Readers
everywhere are interested in the home life of men who have made
themselves factors in art, science, letters, and history, and to these
people I was commissioned to go. But one restriction was placed upon me
in the pursuit of the golden Notoriety, and that was that I should spare
no expense whatever to attain my ends. At first this was embarrassing.
Wealth suddenly acquired always is. But in time I overcame such
difficulties as beset me, and soon learned to spend thousands of
dollars with comparative ease.

And first of all I decided to visit Nansen. To see him at home, if by
any possibility Nansen could be at home anywhere, would enable me to
open my series interestingly. I remembered distinctly that upon his
return from the North Pole he had found my own people too cold for
comfort. I called to mind that, having travelled for months seeking the
Pole, he had accused my fellow-countrymen of coming to see him out of
"mere curiosity," and I recalled at the same time that with remarkable
originality he had declared that we heated our railway trains to an
extent which suggested his future rather than his past. Wherefore I
decided to visit Nansen to hear what else he might have to say, while
some of the incidents of his visit were fresh in our minds.

The next thing to discover, the decision having been reached, was as to
Nansen's whereabouts. Nobody in London seemed to know exactly where he
might be found. I asked the manager of the house in which I dwelt, and
he hadn't an idea--he never had, for that matter. Then I asked a
policeman, and he said he thought he was dancing at the Empire, but he
wasn't sure. Next I sought his publishers and asked for his banker's
address. The reply included every bank in London, with several trust
companies in France and Spain. To my regret, I learned that we Americans
hold none of his surplus.

"But where do you send his letters?" I demanded of his publisher, in
despair.

"Dr. Nansen has authorized us to destroy them unopened," was the reply.
"They contain nothing but requests for his autograph."

"But your letters to him containing his royalties--where do they go?" I
demanded.

"We address them to him in our own care," was the answer.

"And then?" I queried.

"According to his instructions, they are destroyed unopened," said the
publisher, twisting his thumbs meditatively.

It seemed hopeless.

Suddenly an idea flashed across my mind. I will go, I thought, to the
coldest railway station in London and ask for a ticket for Nansen. A man
so fastidious as he is in the matter of temperature, I reasoned, cannot
have left London at any one of their moderately warm stations. Where the
temperature is most frigid, there Nansen must have gone when leaving, he
is such a stickler for temperature. Wherefore I went to the Waterloo
Station--it is the coldest railway station I know--and I asked the agent
for a ticket for Nansen.

He seemed nonplussed for a moment, and, to cover his embarrassment,
asked:

"Second or third class?"

"First," said I, putting down a five-pound note.

"Certainly," said he, handing me a ticket to Southampton. "Do you
think you people in the States will really have war with Spain?"

I will not dilate upon this incident. Suffice it to say that the ticket
man sent me to Southampton, where, he said, I'd be most likely to find a
boat that would carry me to Nansen. And he was right. I reached
Sjwjcktcwjch within twenty-four hours, and holding, as I did, letters of
introduction from President McKinley and her Majesty Queen Victoria,
from Richard Croker and Major Pond, Mr. Nansen consented to receive me.

[Illustration: "I BOARDED A PJINE RJAFT"]

He lived in an Esquimau hut on an ice-floe which was passing the winter
in the far-famed Maelstrom. How I reached it Heaven only knows. I
frankly confess that I do not. I only know that under the guidance of
Svenskjold Bjonstjon I boarded a plain pjine rjaft, such as the
Norwegians use, and was pjaddjled out into the seething whirlpool, in
the midst of which was Nansen's more or less portable cottage.

When I recovered I found myself seated inside the cottage, which, like
everything else in the Maelstrom, was waltzing about as if at a military
ball or Westchester County dance.

"Well," said my host, looking at me coldly. "You are here. _Why_ are you
here?"

[Illustration: "'MR. NANSEN?' SAID I"]

"Mr. Nansen?" said I.

"The very same," said he, taking an icicle out of his vest pocket and
biting off the end of it.

"The Polar Explorer?" I added.

"There is but one Nansen," said he, brushing the rime from his eyebrows.
"Why ask foolish questions? If I am Nansen, then it goes without saying
that I am the Polar Explorer."

"Excuse me," I replied. "I merely wished to know." And then I took a
one-dollar bill from my purse. "Here, Mr. Nansen, is my dollar. That is,
I understand, the regular fee for seeing you. I should like now to
converse with you. What is your price per word?"

"Have you spoken to my agents?" he asked.

"No," said I.

"Then it will only cost you $160 a word. Had you arranged through them,
I should have had to charge you $200. You see," he added,
apologetically, "I have to pay them a commission of twenty per cent."

"I understand that," said I. "I have given public readings myself, and
after paying the agent's commission and travelling expenses I have
invariably been compelled to go back and live with my mother for six
months."

"Miss Witherup," said Nansen, rising, "you did not intend to do it, and
I therefore forgive you, but for the moment you have made me feel warmly
towards you. Please do not do it again. Frigidity is necessary to my
business. What can I do for you?"

"Talk to me," said I.

He immediately froze up again. "What about?" said he. "The Pole?"

"No," said I. "About America."

"I cannot!" he cried, despairingly. "I do not wish to dwell upon my
sufferings. If I told about my American experience, people would not
believe; they would rank me with Munchausen, my sufferings were so
intense. Let me tell of how I lived on Esquimau dog-chops and ice-cream
for nineteen weeks."

"Pardon me, Mr. Nansen," said I, "but I can't do that. We Americans know
all about the North Pole. Few of us, on the other hand, know anything
about America, and we wish to be enlightened. What did you think of
Chicago?"

"Chicago? H'm! Let me see," said Nansen, tapping his forehead gently
with an ice-pick. "Chicago! Oh yes, I remember; it was a charmingly cold
city, full of trolley-cars, and having a newly acquired subway and a
public library. I found it a beautiful city, madam, and the view from
the Bunker Hill Statue of Liberty was superb, looking down over
Blackwell's Island through the Golden Gate out into the vast, trackless
waste of Lake Superior. Yes, I thought well of it. If I remember
rightly, we took in $1869 at the door."

I was surprised at his command of details, and resolved further to test
his memory.

"And Philadelphia, Mr. Nansen?"

[Illustration: "DINED WITH THE CABINET"]

"A superb city, considering its recency, as you say in English. I met
many delightful people there. Senator Tom Reed received me at his palace
on Euclid Avenue, if I remember the street aright; the Mayor of the
city, Mr. McKinley, gave me a dinner, at which I sat down with Mr.
Cleveland and Mr. Van Wyck, and Mr. Bryan and Mr. Pulitzer, and other
members of his cabinet; and in my leisure hours I found the theatres of
Philadelphia most pleasing, with Mr. Jefferson singing his <DW65> songs,
Mr. Mansfield in his inimitable skirt-dancing, and, best of all, Mr.
Daly's Shakespearian revivals of 'Hamlet' and 'Othello,' with Miss Rehan
in the title-roles. Oh yes, Miss Witherdown--"

"Witherup!" I snapped, coldly.

"Excuse me, Witherup," said the great explorer. "Oh yes, Miss Witherup,
I found America a most delightful country, especially your capital city
of Philadelphia."

"Herr Nansen," said I, "are you as accurate in your observations of the
North Pole as in your notes of the States, as expressed to me?"

"Neither more nor less so," said he, somewhat uneasily, I thought.

"But you have drawn a most delightful picture of the States," said I. "I
think all Americans will be pleased by your reference to the Bunker Hill
Monument at Chicago, and Mayor McKinley's cabinet at Philadelphia. On
the other hand, you spoke of intense suffering while with us."

"Yes," said he, "I did--because I suffered. Have you ever travelled in
your own country, madam?"

"I am an American," said I. "Therefore when I travel I travel abroad."

"Then you do not know of the privations of American travel," he cried.
"Consider me, Nansen, compelled, after the delightful discomfort of the
_Fram_, to have to endure the horrid excellence of your Pullman service.
Consider me, Nansen, after having subsisted on dogs and kerosene oil for
months, having to eat a breakfast costing a dollar at one of your
American hotels, consisting of porridge, broiled chicken, deviled
kidney, four kinds of potatoes, eggs in every style, real coffee, and
buckwheat cakes! Consider me--"

"Nansen?" I inquired.

"Yes, Nansen," said he. "Consider me, Nansen, used to the cold of the
Arctic regions, the Arctic perils, having to wake up every morning in an
American hotel or an American parlor-car, warm, without peril,
comfortable, _without anything whatsoever to growl about_."

"It must have been devilish," said I.

"It was," said he.

"Well, Mr. Nansen," I put in, rising, "you can stand it. You are cold
enough to stay in Hades for forty-seven years without losing your
outside garments. How much do I owe you?"

"Fifteen thousand dollars, please," said he.

I gave him the money and swam away.

"Good-bye," he cried, as I reached the outer edge of the Maelstrom. "I
hope, next time I go to America, that I shall meet you."

"Many thanks," said I. "When do you expect to come?"

"Never," he replied, "Deo volente!"

Charming chap, that Nansen. So warm, you know.




MR. HALL CAINE


I do not know why it should have happened so, but it did happen that
after my interview with Nansen I felt gloomy in my soul, and hence
naturally sought congenial company. My first inclination was to run down
to Greece and take luncheon with King George, but when I came to look
over my languages, the only bit of Greek I could speak fluently turned
out to be hoi polloi, and from private advices I gather that that is the
only bit of Greek that his honor the King has no use for. Therefore I
bought a ticket straight through to Gloomster Abbey, Isle of Man--the
residence of Hall Caine.

Appropriately enough, it was midnight when I arrived. It was a
moonlight night, but there were a dozen clouds on the horizon and
directly in the wake of the moon's rays, so that all was dark. From the
abbey itself no single ray of light gleamed, and all was still, save the
croaking of the tree-toads in the moat, and the crickets on the roof of
the parapet.

Any one else would have been chilled to the marrow; but I, having
visited Nansen, had to use a fan to overcome the extreme cordiality of
the scene. With the thermometer at 32 deg. I nearly swooned with the heat.

[Illustration: "'IS THIS GLOOMSTER ABBEY?' I ASK