LVI
JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY
Irving, like all who have ever known him, loved the “Hoosier” poet. We saw a great deal of him when he was in London; and whenever we were in Indianapolis, to meet him was one of the expected pleasures. Riley is one of the most dramatic reciters that live, and when he gives one of his own poems it is an intellectual delight. I remember two specially delightful occasions in which he was a participant. Once in Indianapolis when he came and supped on the car with us whilst we were waiting after the play for the luggage to be loaded. He was in great form, and Irving sat all the time with an expectant smile whilst Riley told us of some of his experiences amongst the hill folk of Indiana where conditions of life are almost primitive. One tale gave Irving intense pleasure—that in which he told of how he had asked a mountaineer who was going down to the nearest town to bring him back some tobacco. This the man had done gladly; but when Riley went to pay him the cost of it he drew his gun on him. When the other asked the cause of offence, which he did not intend or even understand, the mountaineer answered:
“Didn’t I do what ye asked me! Then why do you go for to insult me. I ain’t a tobacker dealer. I bought it for ye, an’ I give it to ye free and glad. I ain’t sellin’ it!”
The other occasion was a dinner at the Savoy Hotel, July 29, 1891, to which Irving had asked some friends to meet him. “Jamesy”—for so his friends call him—recited several of his poems, most exquisitely. His rendering of the powerful little poem, “Good-bye, Jim,” made every one of the other eight men at the table weep.