Saturday Evening Mail, Volume 28, Number 18, Terre Haute, Vigo County, 30 October 1897 — Page 6

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CAMPAIGN EXPERT.

SENATOR BILLY MASON ON STUMP SPEAKING.

He Is Still a Voting Han, bat Has Been at It a Good Many Yearn—The Use of Funny Stories and How to Tell Them.

Waterloo.

[Special Correspondence.]

CHICAGO, Oct. 20.—I caught Senator "William E. Mason—familiarly Billy Mason—between speeches a few days ago and asked him to tell me something of his campaigning experiences., Senator Mason is one of the most famous stump speakers of the Republican party, and his stories have been heard in almost every state in the Union.

I found Mr. Mason just emerging from a Masonic meeting, where he had read a paper on evolution. He was about to start for a town in Kansas to lay a cornerstone, and he was due two days later in Nashville to talk about Chicago's greatness. Mr. Mason covers a great deal of ground and a variety of subjects in a week. "I've been making campaign speeches since the second Grant campaign," said the senator. "I began in 1870 before I was of age. How did I get into It? It was born in me, I guess. I got my inspiration from my father. He was an old campaigner, and the first speech I heard was one he made at a place in Iowa about seven or eight miles from the Missouri line. It was in I860, and I was 10 years of age. I don't know bow I happened to be with him. Probably he took me along so as to prevent trouble at home in his absence. My father had 14 children of his own, and another got lonesome and adopted two more, so there were 16 of us at home. I am 4? years old now, and I have been making speeches since I was 21—no, I began before I was 21."

Two Speeches a Day.

"Isn't it hard work?" "Oh, yes. No man ought to undertake it unless he can sleep at any time and anywhere. I can sleep in a caboose oar as easy as any place. With a soft hat on and toy head against the side of the car I can sleep just 14 minutes if I have 115 minutes to spare. I usually make two speeches ia a day—an afternoon speech and an evening speech, jumping from one town to another between speeches. Sometimes my wife goes with me, and wo cover a good deal of ground. She figured one trip that we covered 1,400 miles in seven days and I made 14 npceelies. '"Jhe trouble is tlio whole campaign is condensed into two months of hard,

SENATOR WILLIAM E. MA80N,

steady work. It is like the harvest. If we could only spread it over the 12 months, it would be comparatively easy." "At the rate of two speeches a day, two months a year for, say, 20 years, senator, you have made about 24,000 speechon," I said. "Or tlie samo speeoh 24,000 times," maid' the senator, with a twinkle in his eye. "And told the same stories?" "A good many of them. Sometimes you can dress an old story up so that it will seem new. There are only a few funny stories anyway, you know. Each one hns many variations." "How did you get into story telling?" "An old friend of miue in DesMoines —Judge B. I'll call him—suggested it to me when I wa« making my first speeches. Wo were going to address the same meeting, and on the way he urged me to tell a funny story to the crowd. He said there was nothing like putting tho audience in a good humor at the beginning of your speech, I had noticed that to. So I determined to tell a story, however old it was, aud, as you will observe, I succeeded in telling them a pretty old one. I was making a Republican speech, of course, and I told my audience that I had heard the Democrats were indulging in a good deal of hilarity. I said they reminded me very much of the Irishman. Now, I'll tell this quick, so the agony will be over soon. I said the Irishman saw a bull beside a ditch, and he said to himself how funny it would be if he went up behind the bull and said, 'Booh!' and frightened him into the ditch. He laughed very hard at the idea of the fun he was going to have. But when he ran up and said 'BoohT the bull turned and tossed him into the ditch. When he had crawled out and wrung out his clothes, be said, 'It's a good thing I laughed first or I wouldn't have had anything to laugh at*

Wiser* the Ltagh Came In. "Now that's very old," said the senator.

With tours in my voice I admitted that it was. "But here's where the laugh obmee to," said the senator. "My friend, the judge, had lingered at the hotel and he did not get to the meeting till I was half through my speech. He wm to follow me. So when I sat down he got up and said, 'My friends, the rejoicing* of the Democrat# up here remind me of an Irishman who saw a boll standing ou the brink of a ditch.' There was a mar of laushter from the audience. They saw. and ao

did I, that the judge was going to tell my story. 1 reached over and plucked1 his coat, but he brushed my hfaid away, saying, 'Don't interrupt me,' and so he went on to his doom. Every time he paused the audience would let out a yell and laugh and laugh so that he had to suspend for a minute or two. After awhile I couldn't help joining in and we all sat there and laughed and laughed until the tears rolled down our cheeks. "I didn't get a chance to talk to the judge till we were on our way home. Then he turned to me and said: 'What did I tell you about stories? Did you see how that story of mine went tonight?" I was very much embarrassed, but I managed to tell him the situation. He offered me a box of cigars not to tell the Btory in Des Moines." "How can you make such a nice old story as that- acceptable to

intelli

gent audience?" I asked. j§|| "There is a good deal in the way of telling a story," said the senator, "and there is a good deal in the condition of your audience. You sit down in a congenial company of men, all ready to be amused, and almost any old story, if it is well told, will entertain them. They are in a condition of receptivity. So is the average political audience. Then you must tell your story quickly and not drag it out too long. Don't weary your audience. "To illustrate the way a story can be spoiled in the telling, I'll relate the experience of a man who is now sitting in the United States senate who was campaigning with me in New Jersey a few years ago. I had a story which I was telling on that trip about a Dutchman in my country who ran for a local office. I used to say: 'I'd like to see the old flag floating over every courthouse and every schoolhouse in New Jersey. And that reminds me'— And I'd tell them about the Dutchman. He was to make a speech under a flag which was hung between two buildings just over a platform. Some one had removed the flag unknown to him. He kept his eyes down like this, and he began: 'Fellow citizens, I speak to you tonight under de flag of our country. I lofe dot flag'— and just then he looked up and said,

Why, where de devil is dot flag?''' The Story Telling Art. The senator suited the action to the word. "Now, my friend," he continued, "asked me one night if I wouldn't lot him tell my story. I said all right, and that night he told it. But how? At the first sentence of the Dutchman's speech he raised his eyes. If the Dutchman had done that, he'd have seen the flag wasn't there. That was obviouS to the audience, and when my friend got to the climax there was no laugh. You see how easily he spoiled it all. Well, he spoke to me afterward and said the failure of that story was an illustration of the difference between audiences." "Where do you get your stock of stories, senator?" I asked. "I hear most of them as I am going around. Some of them I make up. It comes natural. One of my brothers was a great story teller, and he made a great many stories that traveled all over the country." "How do audiences in different parts of the cou utry compare?'' "Of course I like best to speak in Illinois," said the senator. "I'm at home there, aud there are always a lot of my friends in the audience. All my western audiences as a rule are cordial. I like to speak in New York, too—especially In New York city. I made 21 speeches in three weeks in New York city once, and I never had better audiences. Up in New England, of course, they're a little stiff. They're very intellectual up there, you know. When I speak in Maine, a committee waits on me. Usually it is made up of very toll men, and they look down on me and say, 'We expect to attend your lecture tonight' Then I look up at them and say: 'Am I going to lecture? I thonght I was going to make a stump speech.' It's pretty hard to make 'em laugh in Maine. They'll sit there in a row and look at each other anxiously out of the corners of their eyes, because nobody in the audience would laugh unless it was the thing to do. But when the ice is broken Maine audiences are about like any others." .......

Waterloo.

"Do you ever have trouble winning an audience?" "Yes, The worst experience lever had was in Waterloo, la., where I had a joint debate with Bryan. There was a Chautauqua crowd there, full of all the isms you ever heard of, and all of them were in sympathy with Bryan before he opened hi8 mouth. A newspaper correspondent said tome, 'Bryan's going to eat you up today,' and that put me on my mettle. I made up my mind that I'd fetch that audience. I kept putting questions to Bryan which I said he wouldn't answer, aud he didn't answer them. But when the debato was over, Bryan got a big majority of the vote of the people there. I expected that he would. "Bryan and I are good friends personally, continued the senator. "We alway? divide the gate receipts with the other fellows when we speak in joint debate, if they charge admission. I never charge anything for making a Republican speech, but where an admission fee is charged I get my share." "Do you prepare your speeches in advance?" "Yen, but I'm sure of only one tiling, and that is the way I will end. Something may divert my mind at the beginning of my speech—a falling book, a crying baby, something the chairman says in introducing me—and that way change the whole current of my speech. But 1 always wind up as I expected."

Apparently Senator Mason knows every one in Chicago and is on good terms with every one he knows. He cannol take a dese^ steps without being stopped by some one who wants to shake his good right hand. He pays the penalty of his popularity, for there is very little time he can call his own, and thai he has to steal.

G&orgb Graxtba* Baxs.

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Wm iifii

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sBSSSS

MRS. JOHXC. FREMONT

THE PATHFINDER'S WIDOW IN HER HOME AT LOS ANtjELES.

Still Physically Vigorous and Intellectu

ally

Keen at Seventy-three Years of Age. Relics of the Famous Pioneer—His Trails Throughout California.

[Special Correspondence.]

Los ANGELES, Oct. P.O.—In a charming cottage on West Twenty-eighth street, this city, resides the widow of General Fremont Furnished with a letter of introduction by a writer of national reputation, we passed the portal, which is securely guarded, and were favored with many reminiscences of the brave soldier who 50 years ago opened through the wilderness the trails that have since beoome highways of travel to California and the Pacific coast.

The cottage, which was presented to Mrs. Fremont by appreciative friends, is half hidden in vines and shrubbery. Roses clamber over roof and veranda, and the fragrance of orange blossoms pervades the adjacent garden. Within the house is as attractive as its exterior promises. It is an ideal home which Jessie Benton Fremont and her daughter have created here and in which they have decided to pass the remainder of their days.

Since Mrs. Fremont is a national character, who long ago was the heroine of many a romance, as well as an active participant in scenes that have gone to the making of history it will be betraying no secret to state that she is now 78 years of age, having been born in 1824.

Fremont, then a young and dashing lieutenant who had already won his spurs, met her in Washington in 1840, when she was but 16, and married her the following year.

The futile attempt of the great western senator, her father, to separate the young lovers by causing Lieutenant Fremont to be sent ou a perilous expedition had only resulted in cementing the more closely their affections.

Perhaps it was this taste of frontier life that shaped the soldier's future

MRS. FREMONT'S HOME.

career, for the very next

Nothing daunted, the intrepid explorer, now 85 years old, led a fourth expedition across the continent, during which, in crossing the Sierra Nevadas in winter, one-third of his men and all of his pack animals perished of cold and hunger. Reaching Sacramento in the spring of 1849, he then determined to settle in the territory he had been so influential in bringing into the Union, and tried to enforce a claim to the celebrated Mariposa tract, containing rich gold mines and of vast area, but he did not secure a title to it till 18S5.

Meanwhile, in I860, he was elected one of California's first senators, taking his seat the day aft»r her admission as a state. After the expiration of his term he visited Europe, where he was entertained everywhere by distinguished people and universally hailed as the "Pathfinder."

In 1858 he crossed the continent again fear the fifth time, and the next year made his fight for the presidency against Buchanan, who, as we know to our sorrow, wa« elected. In 1858 he was again in California, but revisited Europe in I860. His course during the civil war we are all acquainted with. In 1878-81 he was governor of Arizona, and his death occurred in 1890.

This in brief is a life sketch of one who pribably accomplished more for California than any other man, and who was instrumental in opening to

our acquisition that vast area known as the Pacific slope. It was of the exciting events of his adventurous life that we chatted with bis widow, who had lived with him through them all and who had sustained him in defeat and survived to share his triun phs.

Stfll vigorous and intellectually keen despite her burden of 78 years, Jessie Benton Fremont yet retains possession of the rare faculties that impressed the Pathfinder and drew to her side one of the most noted figures in American history.

The friend who called with me could remember the exciting events during the presidential campaign, for he marched in the procession and shouted for "Fremont and Jessie," and it may have been this reminiscence that evoked her memories of that period and caused us to protract our stay.

But before we went she and her daughter showed us every room in their delightful dwelling and the precious mementos of the past We saw the general's first daguerreotype, the revolver, companion of his travels, letters from famous men and women, and a portrait of the beautiful woman who had fascinated him when known as Jessie Benton. When we went, our hostess accompanied us to our carriage and bestowed upon us souvenirs of the visit in the shape of fragrant roses from their garden.

Thus we bade adieu to the general's widow, standing in the pathway leading to her house, surrounded by evidences of love and regard and amid the blossoming vines and trees.

.-.

#years

in 1842,

he led that famous expedition to the Rockies the report of which, when laid before congress, gave him a worldwide reputation.

In 1848 he made a third exploration, in which he brought to notice the Great Salt lake and the vast and fertile valley in which the Mormons later established their hierarchy, basing their plans upon the information he had furnished.

It was on this expedition that he finally reached Sutter's fort on the Sacramento (in March, 1844) and paved the way to the Californian conquest. Not satisfied with this, he started out the very next year, crossed the Sierras in the dead of winter, and, leaving his party in the San Joaquin valley, hastened to Monterey, then the capital of Spanish California, for permission to continue his explorations. This was at first granted, then revoked, and Spanish soldiers were sent to drive him from the country. A few days ago I saw the mountain, 80 miles from Monterey, called Hawk's peak, where be fortified himself, and, with his little command, awaited the attack of the Californian, General Castro. Extricating himself from the perils of being surrounded by an overwhelming force, Fremont retreated finally to Oregon, where he met a messenger with dispatches ordering him to proceed to the aid of American settlers. This he lost no time in doing, was elected the first American governor of California, July 4, 1846, and on the 19th entered Monterey with 160 mounted riflemen. In Monterey today is shown one of his cannon, and the remains of his fort are pointed out on a bluff overlooking the beautiful bay. In 1847 was concluded the treaty with Mexico by which California became part of the United States. That year also Fremont was arrested by order of General Kearny, tried on the charge of disobedience of order and dismissed the sorvioe.

FRED A. OBEB.

As to the Price of a Dog.

There was a dog show in a southern town several years ago, and a New York man carried a lot of setters and pointers down to compete. The dogs were the best on exhibition, and the New Yorker provided a pedigree for each of them as long as his arm. He knew how to handle them, and they took most of the prizes.

Two of the local sportsmen took a fancy to one of the dogs, and in. the end paid a large price for it—about $500, it was thought by their friends—but they would never tell what the snm was. The pointer was sent from place to place in the hope that it would take prizes, as the New Yorker had represented it to be one of the finest animals in the countiy, but it never came in for so much as "highly commended." Within a few months it died without leaving so much as a puppy to mourn at its grave in the turnip patch.

Nobody could find out what had been paid for the dog. Some months afterward one of the purchasers was at Niag ara with a friend who had been waiting for a chance to get the information. Each had taken many cocktails, and finding the roar of the river a burden they wandered away from it and sat down on a log. The friend thought his time had come. He put his arm affectionately on the othor's shoulder and steadied him.

"Say, Frank, old man," lie said, "what did you and Eustace give for that deg anyhow?"

The other rose to his feet with determination. "Well, John," he said, "I may be full* but I'm hanged if I'm drunk enough to tell you that.''

And no one knows yet.—New York Sun.

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The strong headachy which I felt that day made me somewhat epileptic in my bodily system and would hot allow me to recover my senses, which were three sheets in the wind before closing the mail, which I did anyhow 6r other.

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Pain, lassitude and weariness, inability to sleep, dreadful dreams, starting violently from sleep, are all symptoms of nerve trouble.

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