xt70vt1gj31n https://exploreuk.uky.edu/dips/xt70vt1gj31n/data/mets.xml Fitch, Clyde, 1865-1909. 19201915  books b92-267-31959121v1 English Little, Brown, : Boston : Contact the Special Collections Research Center for information regarding rights and use of this collection. Brummell, Beau, 1778-1840 Drama. Hale, Nathan, 1755-1776 Drama. Frietchie, Barbara, 1766-1862 Drama.Moses, Montrose Jonas, 1878-1934. Gerson, Virginia. Plays  / by Clyde Fitch ; edited, with an introd., by Montrose J. Moses and Virginia Gerson. (vol. 1) text Plays  / by Clyde Fitch ; edited, with an introd., by Montrose J. Moses and Virginia Gerson. (vol. 1) 1920 2002 true xt70vt1gj31n section xt70vt1gj31n 


















      [tmorial Ebition

PLAYS BY CLYDE FITCH

     iN FOUR VOLUMES
        VOLUME ONE

 



4 4 7\

 




IMcmorial E1bition



PLAYS BY CLYDE FITCH

       IN FOUR VOLUMES

            VOLUME ONE
   BEAU BRUMMELL, LOVERS' LANE
          NATHAN HALE

      EDITED, WITH AN INTRODUCTION
      By MONTROSE J. MOSES
      AND VIRGINIA GERSON



          BOSTON
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY
            1I926

 
























        Copyright, 91S5,

By LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY.

 


INTRODUCTION



  SIR FRANcIs BACON has written that " Frend-
ship maketh indeed a faire day in the Affections ",
and it is because of the many fair days awakened
in our memory of Clyde Fitch, that we are at-
tempting, in this foreword to a Memorial Edition
of some of his plays, to re-create the flavor of his
personality which was dear to us. In the writing
of biography, there is no better course to fol-
low, no better philosophy to maintain, than the
inner beauty of little things, - those quotidian
moments which strike sparks from the spirit,
yet are not thought of at the time, because they
do not represent crises in a life. Maeterlinck's
contribution to modem thinking is that the
exalted is ever near us, even in the silence; and,
when he came to write essays on Emerson and
Novalis, he brought into high light those moral
qualities underlying the small act, the casual
thought, - and made nothing of the event.
                       V

 


INTRODUCTION



  Thinking over our association with Clyde
Fitch, we find that what we remember most about
him are those acts and services which were done
largely through moral forces in his character.
Under such conditions it is difficult to separate
the man from the act, difficult to dissociate the
locality from the personality, difficult to assume
an impersonal judgment without paying a per-
sonal tribute. He was one of the best of friends,
one of the most loyal of associates. His genius
for friendship was not merely the ability to at-
tract to him the love of others, but the gift of
drawing from others the best that was in them.
In all of his activities, he was ever generous, ever
courteous, ever anxious to spare the trouble
and to share the gain. His life was a busy one,
filled with the obligations of an ever-increasing
profession. In one respect it may be said that
from the time Clyde Fitch began to be regarded
as America's most popular playwright, each year
found him externally doing the same things, -
fulfilling contracts, selecting casts, arranging
rehearsals, and attending "openings."  Faster
and faster grew this whirl of routine until, during
the last year of his life, he was attempting suffi-
cient to undermine the health of the strongest
man. Every year found him abroad, noting
with the quick eye of the trained expert what was



vi

 



INTRODUCTION.



best in the Continental theatres, and meeting
Charles Frohman or some other American man-
ager, in order to read a manuscript or to talk
over an embryo comedy. It was the life of a
successful literary man of the theatre, and was
filled with interesting associations, correspond-
ences, and travels.
  All of this may be brought to light some day
in another form, yet we cannot but feel that,
after all is said, after the last word has been ut-
tered, the true significance of Clyde Fitch lay in
the spirit rather than in the letter of what he
did. The mere story-element in his plays is
something an inventive mind other than his
might be able to duplicate; the technique of his
drama is a matter many clever playwrights might
be able to explain. But the Fitchean flavor of the
various pieces, the Fitchean humor, observation,
and verbal twist, are characteristics no one has
been able to emulate. Such literary elusiveness
is what is meant when we say that the style is
the man. Since the death of Clyde Fitch, the
New York stage-and that means the stage of
the entire country -has missed his distinctive
contributions to a dramatic season. Without
exactly analyzing why, we believe that the Fitch
theatregoing public miss him for exactly the
same reason - though not so intimate a one -



vii

 



INTRODUCTION



as his friends miss him. The personal equation
is gone, and all that is left of him is the rich
memory of his presence, - and his plays which
must ever be regarded as healthy contributions
to American drama. We who knew him see in
those plays a large part of the man himself, -
sympathy for human problems, quick observa-
tion of minute details, interest in moral actions
and their consequences, the love of beautiful
things, and a refreshing approach toward life.
Those are the qualities which no artifice can
create, - those are the inner beauties which are
unconsciously born of the character of thought
and expression. And that is why the personality
of Clyde Fitch is bound up in his work.
  If his life were to be told in brief, we should
point to his childhood in Schenectady, New
York; his college days at Amherst; his struggles
to maintain himself in New York with his short
stories; his writing of "Beau Brummell;"
and then the open but slow road toward
success. We remember one of his anecdotes
about a reading he gave in Schenectady, where
he returned in after years. The account was
scribbled on a train as he was going to Chicago
where "Nathan Hale" was to be rehearsed.
The reading at Schenectady was to be from this
play, and from his "Smart Set" sketches. In



viii

 


INTRODUCTION



the large audience that turned out to greet him,
he recognized the familiar face of his little, fat
music teacher whose sense of humor got the better
of her as she listened to the story. She had
hysterics, he said in the letter, and looked so
funny that he dropped his book on the floor
and laughed for five whole minutes, keeping the
audience waiting meanwhile. Clyde Fitch never
lost that hearty, natural, boyish laugh of his;
there was a contagious " funniness " about it that
was good to hear.
  He was always proud of his Amherst connec-
tion; always proud of the college pride in him.
Those who are fortunate enough to look back
on undergraduate days with him will recollect
a certain reticence, a certain shyness which at
times misled people as to the firmness beneath.
This latter characteristic is exemplified by a
story told in retrospect by one of Mr. Fitch's
professors. "I remember," he said, " that when
Clyde first appeared upon the campus, he wore
a suit of a peculiar blue - sufficiently blue and
peculiar to call down upon him the ruthless jibing
of the upper classmen. For days he persisted
in his attire, and faced the music. So I was
not surprised when, one evening, he put in his
appearance at my house. He explained the
situation and asked my advice. I felt that



x

 


INTRODUCTION



whatevrer decision he might make must come from
him, and I told him so. Then in a perfectly
quiet voice he said, as he turned to go, 'I guess
I'll stick it out.'"
  We have vividly in mind a picture of the col-
lege graduate launched upon a career of his own
choosing. For if Clyde Fitch had followed his
father's choice he would have been an architect.
He always possessed a strong art taste, manifest
in his collecting of antiques, and asserting itself
in the three homes he came to build. But, at
the beginning, his art taste and his literary in-
come were incompatible. Those who saw him
in his studio days, saw the real artist - always
eager for some objet d'art, and spending his small
checks - paid him for his stories - in some
much-coveted prize.
  Mr. Fitch was ever eager to enjoy these hu-
morous anecdotes about himself. He never re-
garded himself as anything more than the average
man, endowed with a gift which he used to the
very best of his ability. And we suppose the
incidents that went to make up his life were
not extraordinary, despite the special atmosphere
which his calling created around him. But his
significance rests in his achievement, and in the
manner in which he responded to the daily hap-
penings in his life. Like all boys, there came a



X

 


INTRODUCTION



time when he had to break from his youthful sur-
roundings in order to develop himself, but this
break left him with an affectionate feeling for
those faces that looked out at him from faded tin-
types. There is no telling how much of those
associations slipped into his plays. He never,
however, broke from those early ties. There was
a tremendous element of pride in the make-up
of Clyde Fitch; he was thoroughly conscious
of his family position, and his reverence for rela-
tionship was only another evidence of that
loyalty we have spoken of. There was likewise a
pride in his friendship, shown whenever someone
close to him met with deserved recognition. With
this pride went a dignity which began to assert
itself in some of his earliest business relations.
  One cannot read the plays included in this
Memorial Edition without feeling how evident
was the spiritual development of Clyde Fitch.
In a copy of "Beau Brummell," sent to a friend,
he wrote, "I send this as a curiosity. It was
my Alpha Beta. But how well the theatre has
progressed beyond the bric-4brac stage." He
had his brc-a-brac expression - a youthful
exuberance that never left him, -a decorative-
ness which is a part of fresh rather than of staid
vision. In four of his dramas this unusual color
found dominant expression. Mr. Fitch took



xi

 


INTRODUCTION



peculiar personal pleasure in the "period" story.
To the details of writing he gave special care;
and when the time came to externalize them, he
was untiring in his efforts. Even in such a
simple comedy as "Lovers' Lane," during re-
hearsals, he spent hours fastening apples and
pinning blossoms in the orchard scene. In
"Beau Brummell," at the very outset of his
career, he manifested a characteristic care, while
in " Barbara Frietchie " and "Nathan Hale " his
correspondence shows a particularity which was
thorough and searching. His special expert-
ness in feminine psychology, as exemplified in a
series of plays culminating in "The Girl with the
Green Eyes" and "The Truth," became in later
years his greatest bone of contention with the
critics, who denied that he would ever be able
to depict a man's character. As an answer to
this charge he gave to the public one of his
most vivid stage personages-Sam Coast, in
"Her Great Match,"-and this vigor on his
part was but the beginning of that decisiveness
and sharpness uppermost in "The City." In
some of his very earliest comedies, Clyde Fitch
likewise won for himself the title of the play-
wright of New York city, and no one has as yet
been able to surpass him in catching the evanes-
cent peculiarities of the town. "Captain Jinks



mr

 


INTRODUCTION



of the Horse Marines" had all the flavor of old-
time personal experience; it was not something
Mr. Fitch had read about, but something he
seemed to have felt. Here was his old love for a
"period" cropping out. But between that and
"Girls" -his most realistic and detailed treat-
ment of apartment-house life in its externals -
there are a great many of his dramas that are
excellent Kodak films of the city, subject to his
sensitized impression.
  Looking on these plays from their outside,
there is a superabundance of cleverness which in
itself would have won for him a name. Mr.
Fitch had the fictionist's feeling of character for
its own sake to such a superabundant degree
that, as in the case of "The Happy Marriage"
- which he always seemed to treasure as a good
piece of work - he would throw away in casual
reference whole ideas and situations capable
of serious development. It was this ease of
technique that sometimes belied the deeper pene-
tration beneath, which he possessed and which
dominated his conversation. When the actual
time came for writing, the rapidity of his mere
recording was no measure of the many years
he may have pondered over a subject for his
play. How often-long before he put pen to
paper-would he exclaim that he was anxious



.i..

 


INTRODUCTION



to get at his " jealousy piece ", meaning, of course,
"The Girl with the Green Eyes." Often we have
seen him, seated on a stone by the country-
side, writing with a rapidity comparable to an
artist sketching. Many of his friends remember
his temptation, while at the Opera, to jot down
bits of dialogue - for music always set his imag-
ination astir. Yet he would never obtrude his
inventive vagaries upon others. When the cur-
tain was down, he was always the centre of con-
versation, always the life of the party. But
we have a feeling that he regarded his attendance
as a member of the Opera Club simply as a means
toward an end.
  It was that quality of mental arrangement
which enabled him to set down on paper whole
situations with a rapidity which critics called
haste. He once wrote from Italy, ". . . I don't
think the writing them [the two plays on which
he was at work] made me ill; I knew so well
what I wanted to write - it was copying some-
thing that one knows by heart." And from
London, on May 24th, 1902, about "The Girl
with the Green Eyes," he wrote, "I have also
just finished to-day Act i of Mrs. Bloodgood's
play. Of course it seems as if I were doing an
awful lot of work. And I suppose it would be
better if I didn't do so much, but I can't help



xv

 


INTRODUCTION



it! I limit my writing to three hours a day.
However, the point about these plays is that I
know them almost by heart. I've been plan-
ning the Mannering piece since a year ago last
Winter. I know it all; it only wanted to be writ-
ten down, and the same with the Bloodgood piece.
It isn't as if I had to think up plot and situations.
I've had them for a long time."
  In other words, his method of workmanship
revealed Clyde Fitch's intense nervous vitality;
his was a type of mind to take quickly, to hold
tenaciously, and to communicate to others,
through association, that same subtle unrest
which stimulates rather than wears out. Suc-
cess never brought to him a self-satisfied outlook
upon his work; his deepening view of life was too
vital for that. What it did seem to do to the
very day of his death was to stir him to better
effort. He was one of those rare workers who
took criticism with a bigness and eagerness
which only accentuated more fully his keenness to
his defects. Writing from Paris, in July, 1905,
he made this confession: ". . . I still am working
like a horse, but I hope like one of those trained,
intelligent horses! Now, on the changes neces-
sary in 'Her Great Match' for London; next
on my Blanche Walsh play ["The Woman in the
Case"]; and to-morrow I go to London to cast



XV

 


INTRODUCTION



the Frohman play, etc., etc., etc. And altogether
more than I can do, or more than I want to do!
But if I can only do it well! I am trying. I
think each year I try better to do better."
  Such pressure which came with success was
what always beset Clyde Fitch, the workman.
It was not what he wanted, but what theatrical
condition imposed on him. He had little time
to do things leisurely. His morning mail was
read rapidly and appreciatively; his letters
were answered out of the fulness of the moment,
- often prompted, not by the immediate neces-
sity of the occasion, but because of some purely
human quality discovered in a phrase or sentence.
While abroad he would scribble notes on trains
or in motor-cars, flowing over into the margins
of the paper with an unchecked love of recording
impressions. These letters - often postcards -
were weighted down with personal flashes, show-
ing humor, pathos, appreciation; recording
plans in naive declarations; describing people
and places with that surface irony which critics
always took at its surface value, never giving
Mr. Fitch credit for something deeper behind
it all. These communications were significant
in their revelation of the man. A letter from
Florence, I902, came to its destination laden with
the joyful appreciation of beauty, but, he con-



xvi

 


INTRODUCTION



fesses, "while I can look at pictures alone, I hate
to eat alone. Just to eat bores me." Yet his
sociable instincts did not take from him an abid.
ing love for the silence.
  This rush of -work which followed him to town
whenever he left his country place; which trailed
him across continent, making his progress a hasty
circuit of live observations and rapid business
negotiations -did not deprive him of a very
serious attitude toward his work. If there was
one quality uppermost in Clyde Fitch, the crafts-
man, it was his never-failing belief in what he had
done. He wrote from Berlin, in April, x908, "I
wish you dear -, who have always taken me and
my work seriously, and know what I put into it,
and from what a standard I wrote, could have
shared my joy and satisfaction at Hamburg
[over the reception of 'The Truth']."  With
that tendency of his to underscore and double
underscore his emphasis in letters, he declared,
in August, irgoo, from St. Enogat, France, "I
have had a disappointment. Frohman decides
not to do 'The Climbers.' It is a real bitter
disappointment, for I believe so much in the play."
  This belief led him to spend as much energy
nurturing a play after it was launched, as he
expended in the actual composition. Convic-
tion brought out a dogged persistence which was



WU

 


INTRODUCTION



often needed in the face of failure. But while
maintaining a bold front to the public, his letters
showed continually how much criticism discouraged
him. Though we recognize in "The Truth"
some of his best and most characteristic work-
manship - it having attained Continental dis-
tinction - its initial production in New York
was a failure. It was a play he believed in, and
he slaved to keep it on the stage. In this in-
stance, criticism nearly killed him, "convincing
me," so he wrote, "that it is impossible for me
to succeed in New York with the present press,
- which will mean my laying down my pen."
  This press served to accentuate two dominant
traits in Clyde Fitch: his sensitiveness, and his
patience. From the time of "Beau Brummell,'"
he was constantly repudiated by the dramatic
critic. Yet we know from experience that no
more open-minded man could be found than he
in his eagerness to welcome suggestion and in his
readiness to accept advice. We have seen a
lengthy letter of his analyzing, with some justi-
fication, the stereotyped view of him held in
America; whereas abroad his recognition was
based on qualities never attributed to him at
home. I fear, he said in substance, the press
has crystallized toward me. On another occa-
sion he asked a critic to see one of his plays over



. M

 


INTRODUCTION



again, valuing his opinion, and personally dis-
tressed that his opinion was a negative one.
There was no vainglory about this; there was
an earnest desire to have his work as right as he
could see it and make it.
  In other words, there was nothing external
after all in the representative plays of Clyde
Fitch; they were all closely evolved out of his
own personality; representative of his relation-
ships, his outlook on life. He may have excelled
in external detail, but the literary value of his
work lies in the truth of his observation, and in
the sincerity of his feeling for character. His
thought was subservient to these, and sometimes
overclouded by the cleverness of theatrical effect.
  Those who knew Clyde Fitch were at first
drawn to him through a brilliancy of conversa-
tion which, however sparkling in his dialogue,
was brought within bounds as soon as set down
in words. He had a great dislike for the medi-
ocre. He had many worldly interests, and his
quick action, coupled with these, gave the im-
pression that he lacked the powers of contempla-
tion, of concentration. Yet soon, association
with Mr. Fitch revealed a reverence and an
humbleness which brought into play a certain
calm reflection of his religious life. We remember
him being enthralled by the reading of Renan's

 

INTRODUCTION



"Life of Christ;" referring time and time again
to the mystical devoutness of Maeterlinck.
Some might disbelieve that he had deep-founded
principles of faith; yet he was almost old-fash-
ioned in his moral acceptances, though welcom-
ing and intellectually tolerant of the broadness
of others. In people near him he required per-
manent rightness of thought, and reverence for
the Real Thing, as his tradition taught him.
He was once heard to say, "I can tell those that
pray and those that do not."
  It was impressed very strongly upon Mr.
Fitch's friends that he had other interests in
life besides the theatre. Those things were
necessary to him that developed the essential
humanness of his nature. Slow to give his
friendship, - though ever willing to give plenti-
fully of his interest, -he clung to his permanent
friends, even in the country, and less and less
found satisfaction in the promiscuous associa-
tions of social life. Even to his valet he was a
hero, though nothing pleased him more than to
" get a rise," as he would laughingly put it,
out of his valet's implacable presence.  We
remember, after Mr. Fitch's death, the grief
of his man - an old-fashioned type of French
servant, whose devotion had been tested in
many ways. "We shall never forget what you



XI

 

INTRODUCTION



have done," a member of the family said, out
of the fulness of the moment. And he replied
simply: "A good master makes a good servant."
Such was his tribute!
  Loyalty was deeply ingrained in Mr. Fitch's
character, nor was it a heedless offering of his
friendship. There are many pictures of Clyde
Fitch to conjure up in mind, the rarest being that
of friend. We have noticed his letters signed
"loyally yours," and they were addressed only
to those who had been proven. He had great
patience with the people he trusted, - and when
he trusted, he did so unreservedly, even up to
the very verge of doubt. His gratitude was
abounding, and was called forth unexpectedly
by the most insignificant thing. Many actors
will remember how quick he was to detect in
them the slightest evidence of generosity, accen-
tuating it beyond its due proportion, and recall-
ing it on all occasions. How well we understood
that response in him which prompted him to add
a postscript to one of his letters, " Give my love
to those who remember me, and to those who
don't, - if I love them."
  One could never quite forget the companion-
ableness of the man. We remember once on a
visit to him, hearing him call to us, "Don't you
want to come down and have a cookie" And



Xxi

 

INTRODUCTION



when we came to the Terrace where he was
working, there would be no cookie, and he would
go on writing! But he knew that we were feel-
ing the beauty of the country with him - were
understanding beyond the mere necessity for
interchange of words.
  This dramatist of city life was a great lover
of nature; he revelled in the out-of-doors; and
his garden was humanized for him. It was very
characteristic of him that even in the simple
things of life his dramatic eye saw every detail
with freshness, and he expressed what he saw
with a vivacity, an unusualness, that gave life
to the picture. When he was moving from " Quiet
Corner" to "The Other House," he wrote to a
friend:
  "We are moving! ! The study is empty!
There is hardly a picture left! The walls show
thin wounds!
  "I go daily to 'T. 0. H.', buried in a heap of
Old Masters, inside Pauline (Panhard).
  "Ed. is planting trees, and I am planting pic-
tures, and Monday we hope the curtains will
sprout in the windows; and Friday of next week
I think the Katonah katydids will be singing my
lullaby!!
  "Awful scandal at 'Q. C.'! In the Spring we
put nine goldfish in the pool, and, when Bridge
emptied it out this morning, there were sixty-
five!!! "



. .

 

INTRODUCTION



  And, with that never-failing hospitality of his,
he added:
  "Why can't you make a real visit . . . and not
just play 'tag' with the trains"
  "Quiet Corner," in Greenwich, was built so
that Mr. Fitch might live most of the time out
in the open; "The Other House," at Katonah,
gave him joy because it brought within reach
all the beauties of a car country. The latter
house, it is our impression, offered him greater
peace, and here he would turn with relief after
hard work in the city. In May, his East For-
tieth Street house lost its holding power on him.
"It mortifies me," he writes, "to imagine what
the lilacs must be thinking of us for not coming
out. When I left, they had their little buds
all ready to unpack! and the syringa bush was
giggling with little leaves!! "
  On one of his very last rides around KEatonah,
before going abroad on his final trip, he spoke
of the glories of the Fall, and the burning red of
the trees. And his heart seemed to go out to an
old countryman on the road, who, all smiles,
passed us with a nosegay in his ragged button-
hole. "Behind that flower is love," exclaimed
Mr. Fitch.
  This spirit in him often found expression in his



xxiii

 

INTRODUCTION



correspondence. "I love the world," he wrote.
And this expansion came over him not suddenly
but by slow process of spiritual deepening.
For there was a time when Clyde Fitch might
easily have fallen into the ways of dilettantism -
those Sherwood Studio days on Fifty-seventh
Street, when social life was trying to overcome
his desires to work. And the exactions of a suc-
cessful career imposed upon him many of the
surface responsibilities, until that deepening of
the spiritual side of him began to alter his entire
approach toward life, -an altering that meant
a clearer assertion of his philosophy. This is
seen in flashes of his later dialogue, and was
strongly marked in "The City," which was not
only uttered in strength of conviction, but was
physically written with defined intention of
purpose. His handwriting seemed to have gained
a firmer stroke.
  More and more he began to value, above all
other experiences, the Real Things in life. This
is very apparent in his work - the increasing
maturity of which can be detected from play
to play along the entire course of his writing.
Though he may have dealt, as a satirist, with
the shams of social life, the thing that struck
most people who came in contact with Clyde
Fitch was that he was eminently sincere. And



Xxiv

 

INTRODUCTION



that sincerity he looked, for in the approach of
others. We do not recollect that he was given
to retort unless it was called for by some insin-
cerity of a friend, or some false statement of a
critic. And when that was the case, the occasion
brought from him characteristic touches of un-
derstanding, and a true measure of the Real
Thing.
  An Editor once sent him the first three num-
bers of a new magazine, in which some reference
had been made to him and his work. We quote
his acknowledgment intact, for it exemplifies an
originality of phrase, a generous interest in
current literary matters, and, above all, an
outspoken expression of belief as regards himself.
  "Since writing you," [it runs] " I've been able
to take up your three numbers, and with much
interest. I congratulate you on an individual
tone which you have certainly attained. The
magazine has character. . . . In my own field,
however -! Your writer is in earnest, and
evidently deserves a good end, but I regret to
find he is not working on new lines, or with new
thoughts. He is not of the early Victorian
Period, but I should say of the early McKinley.
He repeats the old theories, the old formulas, of
what is good and what isn't, the point of view
about our drama of over a dozen years ago,
when the whole thing was stereotyped. Your
writer does not feel the new current. I mean



XX2V

 

INTRODUCTION



just that, exactly, -he floats on the surface,
and sees only the surface. Clothes are not the
man, though they may be characteristic of him.
Your writer does not seem to me to realize what
is underneath, which is the Real Thing. The
Real Thing exists without a surface, but the sur-
face adds to it one more note of value, besides
its own personal value of being an individual
characteristic. Wherefore: when your writer
says of my work that it is 'still chiefly a display
of dramatic millinery,' then, for me, whatever
he may say of the drama is worthless. No one
knows better than I that my work is full of faults;
that's why I go on writing, - to correct them, -
at least it's one reason why. But your man
hasn't hit the right faults - not by a long shot!
At least, I think that; I may be wrong. All this
because I had a few moments, and the tele-
phone bell hasn't rung since I began."

  When Mr. Fitch moved to Katonah from
Greenwich, he seemed to take a different hold
on life; the negatives of existence were halted.
His health had been almost undermined by the
exactions of a busy career, and now he was
beginning to hate all things that suggested vac-
illation, weakness, or ill-health. We have met
him often on the East Terrace of "The Other
House," seeing with an eye as profoundly simple
as Wordsworth's, when he wrote his simplest
lyric. "It was a lovely day, to-day," he declares

 
INTRODUCTION



in a note, dated May, igo9, ". . . All afternoon
I've been out on the Terrace. The swans be-
haved like angels ! Even a white pond lily
spread her wings on the pool. The peacock
spread his tail-and you weren't there! I
couldn't bear your not seeing all the poetry and
beauty in the day - and now (it is seven o'clock)
there is that divine murmuring sunset-light
everywhere about! "
  Again in June of that year, there is this spon-
taneous expression of himself: "I've just come
in from a walk with Buck, Betsy, and Fiametta
[his dogs]. We walked across the meadow in the
moonlight. The swans sailed softly mirrored,
like Narcissus in the pool, and up in the rose
garden it was thick with fireflies! ! It was ex-
quisitely beautiful."
  This poetic quality was ever alive, and made
of him a splendid companion on a journey. Noth-
ing seemed to escape his quick observation, and
he was able to convert the impression almost
simultaneously into terms of human value.
Travelling extensively, he picked up here and
there chance acquaintances, from whom he gained
a transitory enjoyment which was delightfully
described in his letters. On such occasions his
humor was never-failing in its assertion. There
was a home quality about Clyde Fitch that few



xxvii

 

INTRODUCTION



people believed he had, simply because his work
kept him so constantly on the go. A jotting,
dated January, i9o6, expressed eloquently his
feelings on the subject. "Had a hotelly dinner
in a hotelly hotel. Rehearsals going well-
but what a life for a man who isn't in the drummer
business!! "
  On the steamer, on the railroad train, he was
ever alert in the study of his companions. When
he saw one, seemingly in lonely mood, he was
drawn to him through a sympathy which he was
ever ready to show. Sometimes, these impul-
sive moves on his part rewarded him beyond his
expectations. It was on an ocean liner that
chance brought him in contact with an elderly
lady of the Old School, whose friendship he always
held in deepest consideration, and whose corre-
spondence with him was a constant source of
inspiration. On the other hand, in carriage
compartments he would often meet with con-
versationalists who amused him up to the mo-
ment of unsought-for advice. "Don't stop off
at Pisa," one of these chance acquaintances
pleaded, "there's nothing to see there but the
tower," and then he added, in the spirit of the
perfect utilitarian, "You can see that from the
train." Yet "I got out," adds Mr. Fitch in a
letter, "and have been here for three days."



Xviii

 

INTRODUCTION



How the beauty must have steeped his soul is
detected in the mood of what follows: "The
nights in these beautiful towns are all sad nights.
One feels the need of some one to sit in silence
with."
  It was characteristic of Mr. Fitch that quick-
ness of humor went side by side with a heart
quality which made his humor all the more lov-
able. This gave a brilliant flash to his corre-
spondence