1899 EDWIN MANNERS DIARY (MDP)

(His notary public seal on first page, scribble on diary cover page)

January 2, 1899

The new year met me without much ado or vice versa. Yet so impressed is this artificial division of time, this dot in the annual circle, that I seemed to be slipping over the border into a new country and shaking hands with its strange inhabitants, and indeed this is what "Uncle Sam" just now is virtually doing. All hail to his kind offices!

January 3, 1899

Dennis B. Ryan, a young attorney who has been with me for the last year and Edward H. Hoos, recently admitted to the bar and private secretary to the present mayor, his father, have just formed a law partnership, under the firm name of Ryan + Hoos, with room in my offices. The former, though not well equipped educationally, had a familiarity with elementary law and practice, and has coached several young men in their preparation for the bar. The latter is a Princeton graduate, happily situated and if as yet some what gauche and unused, has industry and ability. They are respectively Irish-American and German-American, and thus represent two large component parts of our cosmopolitan population. They should make a good working team. One talks copiously without much sense of limitation or judgment, and sometimes in consonance with Irish cause or prejudice commits mayhem on the English by injuring their tongue; but the frank openness of both and their strong, if less refined, commercial instincts amuse me. I follow their characteristics, racial and other. At present the comedy and tragedy so near to them seem hid. Their fresh forward look is a tonic and entertaining. Never be annoyed at people for more than a moment: coming to yourself, you will have joy of them; really if one knows people profoundly, he likes them and all of them; it is only superficial knowledge or ignorance that breeds dislike or hatred.

January 9, 1899

This evening I went to the Fair of the Robert Davis Association in old Metropolitan Hall on Newark Avenue. The entrance was easy, but it proved more difficult to get out, so beset was I by an endless chain of young women, with book and pencil, soliciting the taking of chances on this, that and the other commodity from a piano to a cake-basket. And my pocket-book was very flat when at last I escaped.

January 10, 1899

To-night I saw another of those patriotic plays which we condemn critically and applaud like thunder!

January 11, 1899

Leased to-day to Edward B. Bergen some store and house property at Harlingen, New-Jersey.

January 12, 1899

Do not use fine thought on coarse material or coarse thought for subtle interpretation, or you will fail of truth. Command a somewhat loose and large view in dealing with great situations; be apt and subtle in treating of the fine. Meet like conditions with a like set of ideas. Otherwise confusion results. Note this confusion in letters and art, in politics and society. For example, how often the minority statesman or obstructionist is such because he is applying small and timid ideas to solve problems that require large and bold ones. Note how often business and legal difficulties are obviated or cleared by assuming toward them the right attitude. 'Tis not only things that need adjustment, but various classes of ideas and mental stations should be tried and adjusted to them till the central point is focused. Meet a fine fellow with a fine answer, and see the light shine. Knock a brute into the ditch, and he will come up smiling and lick your hand - not that this is agreeable, but it is at times the necessary heroic treatment that cures, the virtue of casus belli*. Meet each kind in its kind, and see how wonderfully bright and true life becomes. Discriminate and have a sense of proportion.
*

January 16, 1899

Last Saturday night at the Windsor Hotel, I heard Rear-Admiral Winfield S. Schley recount details of his famous naval battle with Admiral Cervera off Santiago harbor, last July third. The Admiral's talk was admirable, fine in temper and directly real. When he said that, at a critical moment in the chase after the Spaniard, he signaled to the Oregon's commander to "let go a railroad train", figuring the lightning-express effect of firing a thirteen-inch gun, one realized vividly the resistless, rushing destructiveness of present-day guns. Apt too and illustrative of American marksmanship was his likening the hull of one of the enemy's destroyed ships, in appearance, to the cover of a pepper-box. The chief actor in this decisive engagement, now standing quietly before us, brought home in a few simple words the hellish horror of the iron conflict. Minding the tremendous forces involved, it is doubtless tobe considered the world's greatest naval action, and certainly of world-moving significance.

January 18, 1899

Mr. Jonas F. Hare called and conferred in regard to his application for letters patent.

January 23, 1899

At the play house last week I enjoyed, in "Down in Dixie", some characteristic Southern scenes, with pickaninnies and cotton-fields and fun-making. This evening the theatre took me, with "The Village Postmaster", up to New England, with its no less interesting indigenous features conjoined with the added pathos of sternness and snow. In each the serious parts were less good than the merry + strained or false notes occurring. In the South the cavalier, a modified cavalier, still shows his jolly front and broad life, while the traits of the puritan persist in Yankeeland, notwithstanding much foreign infusion.

January 25, 1899

After the first thunder-storm of the year, it is said, the winter's back is broken. Be it so! If so, the bluff old fellow gets the dorsal dislocation early this time; for last night I was awakened by crashes of thunder and vivid flashes of lightning lit up my room fitfully. It seemed like a miracle for midwinter.

January 26, 1899

M. vs. McCarthy. M ' Gulick.

January 28, 1899

M. vs. Eidel. Paid Contractor Kelly, by his brother John, to whom he sub-let the contract, the final payment for building the two-story building, with extensions, at No. 364 First street. He gave me an affidavit against liens as an extra precaution, although the contract was duly filed, and acknowledged the receipt of the full consideration thereof, towit, $1775. The painting, decorations, fixtures, stage, and dressing-rooms, were outside of the agreement, so that the entire cost of the house and hall will reach $2500 or more. The hall is converted into a cosy theatre, christened by my tenants "Congress Music Hall", and opens to-night with a vaudeville entertainment. At the Academy of Music this evening, I saw "A Lady of Quality" played, with Eugenia Blair as Clorinda Wildaire*, the titular role, and a fair company. Mrs. Burnett's novel turns better than most recently written stories into an artistic drama, passably so. Indeed the gorgeousness of costume and setting was a show in itself, perhaps the better part of the whole. A play should attract and appeal to the eye; it is a represented story or piece of expressed life; but its main merit lies in the action of the actors and in the up-lifting power and beauty of the constructed theme.

February 1, 1899

Witnessed and heard a piece of tom-foolery at the Bijou this evening. I smiled for about an hour and a half and then withdrew. I felt tired or I should not have done so, and yet reading kept me engaged until noon of night when I retired.

February 2, 1899

Annual Bar Dinner to-night at the Hotel Washington; attended; meat and drink, middling; speaking, ordinary, unless I except Vice-Chancellor Pitney's remarks, which were in some respects extraordinary - in manner and, I suspect, unintentional frankness and humor. He compared the Supreme Court judges, several of whom were present, to bungling mechanics and the equity judges, to artificers of fine watches. He said that the law was simple and settled, and that chancery was alone filled to handle the intricate questions of our complex civilization - the two were distinct and should not be combined in one court. He praised the lawyers who had practiced before him for their improvement in recent years, and then seemed surprised when he was rallied and the improvement naturally, though jocosely, attributed to his tuition. Judge Gaynor, of Brooklyn, spoke in a complimentary and interesting strain.

February 4, 1899

Executed leases with Theresa R. Cohn for the store at No. 75 Newark Avenue and with Kolligs and Company for the adjoining store at No. 77. A Palma Club stag filled in my evening with vaudeville said tobe "high-class", but that was a matter of opinion. Counsellors Black and Condict were with me the greater part of the time.

February 6, 1899

At the theatre again to-night. The play's not the thing always. It sometimes is a bore. I left early. In much theatre-going of late, I noticed how strenuously every virtuous sentiment or act was applauded by those who are anything but virtuous themselves. The better few, I fancied, connived at the evil and half approved or condoned the villain's role. He generally knows enough to go within when it rains; the others don't. I seemed to see the human average of grief and joy - its health and complacency, and have a vext sense of the mediocrity of being amused. A man of much salt should be above that and distinct.

February 7, 1899

The funeral of a classmate Dr. William C. Campbell called me this afternoon to the West Presbyterian Church, Forty-second street, near Fifth avenue. Several prominent class men were present and as a supporting body we preceded the coffin. The Rev. Merle Smith preached an appropriate and sympathetic sermon. This exit from present life is a solemn event. The widow in her weeds, the off-spring - a boy and girl - in tears, so many people, apparently patients, taking a last look at the dead and showing genuine affection, deeply moved and impressed me as a fine tribute to the good man whose deeds "blossom in the dust". Probably he was a martyr to professional devotion, as he died of a desease in his specialty.

February 8, 1899

This afternoon James J. Higgins made a bill of sale to me of his stock of goods and chattels, to cover two months' rent.

February 10, 1899

Winter is still very vertebrate, this being, it is said, the coldest day in twenty-seven years for this vicinage. The thermometer recorded six or seven degrees below zero. One day in February, 1896, was possibly as cold. The Hackensack and Passaic rivers are frozen over, and the Hudson, say, at Nyack, where it is three miles wide, carries a complete bridge of ice. Down here it is kept open, yet wide fields of floating ice skirt and hug the New-York side, and through them the ferryboats crunch and plow their way with difficulty. I love rivers frozen or flowing.

February 14, 1899

M. vs. Martha Cox - First District Court. Adjourned to Thursday. A blizzard, that is, a storm combination of snow, wind and cold, has prevailed since Saturday evening, in some respects surpassing any in the official records for this section. The cold and velocity of wind were greater, but the actual snow-fall was a few inches less than in the great blizzard of March, 1888. Private houses proved ill-adapted to resist its searching effects, and hotels were sought for comforts, but crowded to discomfort. In the evening I indulged in a warm show at the Bon-Ton Theatre, where the abbreviated illusory dressing suggested summer skies and a tropical climate; so the high-piled snows concerned me not and I bid old Boreas blow at will.

February 16, 1899

Judgment obtained against Martha Cox.

The night was very stormy, but I went up on the hill to a concert given by the musical clubs of Columbia University, at Hasbrouck Hall. I enjoyed the boisterous music less than the sight of a beautiful blonde girl who sat near me on the left - a lovely vision! In my admiration of woman I pay tribute to the immortality of man.

(jagged scribble line drawn)

February 21, 1899

Amongst the picturesque children of the poor, in "Little Italy", I passed much of the Evening and night. I sat near the stage in their concert-hall: the proprietor had a rug, oriental, placed under my feet, and champagne and cigars on the round table at hand, while his children, sons and daughters of the citron and orange, gathered about me and smiled languidly with their dark lustrous eyes. I was tempted to catch up one of the girls and hug her, so appealing was her divinely deep look. I enjoyed the color and grace of it all. The musicians thumped out funny music, to which the soubrettes danced and sang funny songs. I was getting into a precious dream, and betook me behind the scenes, where I drank to the girls' gayety, their shapely figures and painted brows!

February 23, 1899

Dined with the University Club at the Union League Club-house on York Street. Judge Blair was toast-master. President Patton of Princeton, President Scott of Rutgers, President Morton of Stevens and Flavel McGee, Esquire, did the after-dinner talking - academic in subject, if not uniformly academic in style. Mr. Livingston Gifford sat on my right.

March 18, 1899

Health Board cases this forenoon. -Summoned before the First Criminal Court for breaches of the health code, that is, my tenants made the breaches and I referred the matter of remedy to an agent who neglected it. Respondeat superior*. A due explanation was made, yet the court imposed a small fine which I paid without protest, but with some sense of discourtesy, of ulterior motive; and yet what a contrast! If I violated technically an insignificant rule of the Health Board, certes the Health Board and the Court violated good Manners!
*

March 23, 1899

For the last three or four months I have gone to the theatre or opera almost continuously every night. Not that I uninfluenced should have spent much time or money on some of the shows seen, but by reason of acquaintance with theatrical people and giving their advertising agents privileges in store windows I had tickets thrust upon me galore, and upon the whole I enjoyed using them. If one does not stiffen and expect canaries or birds of paradise, can snap his fingers occasionally at the imp or ideality and has a fair sense of the ludicrous and the human circus, there is to be had on or off the stage no end of entertainment, a perpetual feast of wit and joy. Yet the drama at present is in too small wise imaginative and great. It lacks uplift and a noble suggestiveness; while it has enough and to spare of the latter in the rankly broad and vulgar. And amid charming grace and beauty of presentment, it caters to indecency by innuendo and indirection. Its attempts at the real result in mechanical devices and a barren tawdry imitation of the actual that is better seen on the street, behind closed doors, or in the moving pageants of the busy world.

Action's the thing, the life of truth -
O where's the buskin of Edwin Booth!

And wherefore all these fine feathers and trappings? Not that I particularly object to them, other things being equal, nor would I impress strongly any single pattern or type of play or in any wise help to stereotype the stage, which should keep developing and, nicely adjusted to the complex age, constantly vary and advance with its standard up; but with this in view and mindful of much that is praiseworthy in the methods of the present, say, that a harking or looking back to the Greek may set free the spirit from confusion and create a more spiritual drama, that the simpler the accessories and properties the better in tragedy and comedy, while I think with La Bruyere that "wings, triumphal cars and transformations" are essential parts of opera which is surely as much to make us wonder-eyed as wonder-eared.

March 30, 1899

Let us presume that everything is of human interest, a catalogue or the multiplication-table; but in a strict sense, how strange it is that authors or handicraftsman deliberately set about to make a book and fail to see the folly of it. As well manufacture a man as a book. A real book grows and in due season comes to fruitage. And thick too of debauching oneself so far as to write a book for the vulgar public. O tempura! O Mores*!

Little patience should be shown those little unoriginal people who are apt to ask of an author, where did he get it? I answer, It is his own, his peculiar own; what comes out of a man is touched with the man. I am not considering thieves, or pick-pockets, or dull wits, but if one of rare literary gifts should deliberately take what is best in our newspapers, magazines and books, and combine, concentrate and fuse it with due art into a living work, he would not be a plagiary, but a true creator, a Shakespeare! Such a result must perforce grow from the severe assimilation of material and arise anew out of the writer's inner condition and soul.
*

(Scribble over April 6)

April 7, 1899

Married men say that matrimony is a subjection and we speak of its bond. So too business is a bondage, and the holding of any kind of office compromises and lessens individual freedom that should be prized without stint. Yet a noble aloofness and liberty may be as nobly matched by the burden-bearer who shares and toils with others for the common good. The former produces the more unique work, individual creations in art, literature and act that endure for joy, diversity and edification; the latter's efforts continue the human type and are absorbed in the common race, surviving therein to modify its future concretely, as the other does abstractly.

April 11, 1899

Last April about a year ago, our war with Spain began, an April to April war, and although the actual fighting was of short duration comparatively and decisive, it was only to-day that the international exchange in Washington of copies of the ratified peace treaty, prepared at Paris, put the final period, legal and formal, to the war. The President thereupon proclaimed the executed treaty. Sharp and soon over is warfare by modern methods, but peace negotiations still drag their slow length along.

The Hispano-American war showed the power and discipline of our navy to splendid advantage, and if our army was less well organized and served, it achieved success and no small glory. The acquisition of territory in the East and West Indies was an incidental result, but vast and of inestimable value. The war no doubt looms large in consequences, but let us not exaggerate to the detriment of the immediate past. It is disproportionate to say that it placed our country in the forefront of nations - we were there already. What it did do was to draw or set the careless eyes of the world at large upon this indubitable fact. 'Twere fortunate for Spain, if hers had been so set before the war!

In regard to the Philippines; as a dreamer and poet, I deprecate the imposition of civilization on a virgin soil and its aborigines. I would not change the simple, free, naturalistic life of the natives. There is too much of romance and charm in all that. But when I consider the evolution of history, the irresistible course of events and forces, and reason statesman-like, I know what must be accepted. I would whip the yellow dogs to submission and teach them civilization even at the cannon's mouth. I have no sympathy with the unconsidered comparison between our revolutionary ancestors and the savage Filipinos. As far as the East is from the West, so far is the one set in difference from the other. There has been too much special pleading to our injury, and not enough of largeness of view and prophesy.

Doubtless some of the Filipinos show marked intelligence, especially among the leaders of the present insurrection, however mis-guided it is, and I disapprove at this point of action too aggressive. A policy of gradual occupation and conciliation would prove more winning, expedient and wise.

April 22, 1899

The afternoon was beautiful, and Marie and I went over to Wanamaker's and bought a rug for my room. Then we strolled along Broadway, into some auction rooms where they were selling pretty plates and other dishes, and on up to Twenty-third street to the American Art Galleries, where we saw the Mendouca collections of pictures, artistic furniture - some of old time and quaintly carved, with biblical inscriptions, and other interesting objects of virtue. The paintings were of uneven excellence.

April 26, 1899

At the Fourth Regiment Armory this evening I witnessed the presentation of medals to the volunteer soldiers of this city and country, who but recently returned from service in the war with Spain. Some picked companies gave a drill and made a fine showing. Altogether the occasion was happily patriotic and inspiriting. I saw the boys depart last July. The feeling was then more grave. As they marched from the Armory down Mercer street, the active attention and tearful demonstrations of relatives, mothers, sweethearts, threw their ranks into a confused mass, looking like a veritable rout instead of a brave advance on the enemy.

May 1, 1899

What is called "Dewey Day", in commemoration of ((of)) Admiral Dewey's splendid naval victory off Manila, a year ago, is being observed, but more in spirit and abundance of bunting than in civic or military demonstrations. At the Waldorf-Astoria this afternoon I had an interview with Mr. Theodore K. Pembrook, the artist. I gave him a commission to paint my late father's portrait, which I propose to present to Jersey City and have hung in its municipal building.

May 6, 1899

Mr. Jonas F. Hare called in re application for letters-patent. They were issued to him by the Government on the second instant, and, just received, I had the pleasure of handing them to him. It is always pleasant to reach a desired result whether as inventor or attorney.

May 11, 1899

Carlyle and Browning are of a cognate cast of mind, most considerable men on English thought, but not preeminently writers, save from malice aforethought. Their way is not the liquid happy way of brook and river. Their ideas seldom get so assimilated, so clear and bright as to become fluid and felicitous. They seem to be wreaking themselves somewhat clumsily on expression, with an outcome interesting, suggestive, often picturesque, but hard, awkward, amorphous. There is a show of force, vigor and sometimes flame, but their facts and fancies do not melt sufficiently to become plastic and flow naturally to perfect ends and in beautiful moulds. They are strong armor-bearers and march tremendously. They do not, however, fly aloft finely and sing there the full ravishing note that fills the heart.

Love's Hunger.

The height of joy is in the hunger of love,
That yearns and craves and wishfully desires,
To feed upon the idol of its fires,
Yet reins with fine control the courier of
What hath attainment only up above;
For soon the earthly satisfaction lives
The ideal sense, that shuns the vulgar mires
Of lust for symbols of the Spirit's dove.
Oh! what rare bloom is on the untouched fruit,
The sudden fragrance come to on the wind,
And all the sweet impalpabilities,
Which passion may not seize on branch and root
Without a loss more great than he will find
Who quaffs of life but leaves the bitter lees.

The early satisfactions, however, are not half bad!

July 8, 1899

There is in what appears before our casual gaze change, development and perhaps some advance or evolution - the motion at least seems to tend that way; but it is chiefly action and reaction: the norm is fixed, the great entity is changeless, and in the last analysis there is permanence, immutability.

July 14, 1899

Called on Chancellor McGill at his home on Barrow Street relative to some trust matters and bade him good-bye and bon voyage. He sails for Europe to-morrow. He looked worn and emaciated and scarcely able to go; yet smiles lighted his pallid face and his witty remarks sounded strangely like a jester's in a tomb. I thought of Baudelaire's colors of corruption - the phosphoric flame or hues playing over the decaying and dead, with a sense of horror and charm.

July 15, 1899

Went this afternoon to Perth Amboy to visit my sister Virginia.

July 26, 1899

In town on business I spent the evening at "The New-York" - theatre, roof-garden and promenade combination.

July 27, 1899

Transferred 297 shares of old Jersey City Gas Light Company's stock to the New-Jersey Title Guarantee and Trust Company, in trust, for a large combination or "trust" to be formed. Payment is tobe made in cash or bonds at 250 per cent., and stockholders electing to take bonds have the privilege of purchasing new stock in the "trust" at 25 per cent of par value, to the amount of their former stock holdings, or in case of consideration is taken partly in cash and partly in bonds, only to the extent the latter represents the old stock.

August 3, 1899

Met my nephew Harold M. Beekman at the Liberty street station and took him with me on the five p.m. train out to Rutland farm at Harlingen. This is Harold's first venture a-field, independent of his dear mother. He seemed tobe in the humor of it, and shows the boy's natural fondness for the farm. He was repeating in his little play, I felt with pleasure and regret, some of my own youthful experiences when the robin sang so sweetly.

August 7, 1899

Drove over to Rocky Hill with Marie and Blanche and visited Washington's Headquarters there. The house is on the hill beyond the Millstone river and has been removed a short distance from its old site, where I looked it over several years ago. It has been refurbished, and contains an interesting collection of revolutionary and patriotic relics and emblems, with colonial furnishings.

August 9, 1899

Paid off two mortgages encumbering No. 35 Hudson street. They were given by a former owner, Phisted by name, and held by The Provident Institution for Savings.

Principal, (1) $1,500
---"--- , (2) 1,000
2,500
Interest to date, 16.43
$2,516.43

August 21, 1899

Being at "the farm" over Sunday, I went from Harlingen to Trenton this morning to see the trustees of the Dutch Neck Presbyterian Church in reference to a mortgage. The mortgage had been assigned to the Church, but the trustees could not produce the assignment, and I asked them to procure it from the records. I took luncheon at the American House, and an abundant mid-day meal was served, plainly, in homely style, but at a very moderate charge. The day was close, sultry, but I strolled about to some extent, and just before train-time visited the battle monument and took the lift to its observation platform. The lift-boy handed me a field-glass, and asked whether I would like him to point out interesting features in view, as some people seemed annoyed. Not I, bright and modest boy! You talked naturally and attracted me.

August 22, 1899

Sale of chattels distrained at No. 77 Newark avenue took place. Purchased by Christian Weilkamp, co-tenant with Robert Kolligs.

August 31, 1899

Fully paid and discharged the mortgage on certain Grand street property - the bond and mortgage, given by my father in 1879, and held by Miss Frances Soper, of this city:

Principal, $4,000
Interest due 100
$4,100.

September 2, 1899

Mr. Eldred Johnson and I spent part of last evening at the roof-garden of the Waldorf-Astoria hotel and in the rooms of the Ohio and Maryland clubs of New-York.

September 6, 1899

At Trenton to-day I paid a certain old bond and mortgage, affecting the Rutland Farm property. They were given in 1851 by a former owner of the lower part of the farm, one Samuel Van Arsdale, to Elizabeth Conover, of Princeton, and later assigned by John Maclean (President of Princeton) as executor of the last will and testament of the mortgagee to the Trustees of the Dutch Neck Presbyterian Church.

Principal of the mortgage, $2,000.
Interest due, 47.
$2,047.

The removal of this lien makes the Manners Estate free and clear of all encumbrances, the first time in fifty years.

I dined at the Trenton House; went to Wood's Employment Bureau to hire a "hand" for the farm, and caught the 2:10 p. m. train for New-York.

September 9, 1899

Passed title this morning to four lots on Fifth Street, from the Christie executors to Felice Raimondo et ux and Francesco Arnone, in two parcels, two lots to each. I acted as the grantees' attorney.

September 12, 1899

I suppose there is no one who knows so much about me as I, and I, poor me! I do not know so much about me.

September 14, 1899

Incorporated the Ramos Fire-Escape Company, and took one hundred shares of its capital stock.

September 22, 1899

It was a fine bright day. I took Meg and the Surrey and drove over to Somerville, to have a mortgage recently paid cancelled of record. Marie and Blanche went along. We visited the "Wallace House", said tobe one of Washington's headquarters, and looked with interest at the Colonial and revolutionary things displayed. We dined at the "Country House", which old-time hostelry became with us something of a good-natured joke, and after strolling about a while in search of quaint doorways and houses, returned leisurely toward evening to the farm, stopping on the way at Woods' Tavern, for a drink at the well, to call up a sentiment or two of the abandoned house and glance through its windows at mantelpieces and cupboards. It was a rare good day, and as the glorious sun dipped behind the Sourland hills, I felt that the falling of the year was no less rich and joyful than its rise.

September 29, 1899

To-day was set for the naval-parade in honor of Admiral Dewey, who arrived with the "Olympia" from Manila a day or two ago - in advance of the preparations for his reception! I boarded the steamboat "Cetus" and thus formed part of the water-pageant of warships and all sorts of river craft. I can not say that I was altogether content or unskeptical, but entered into the spirit of the occasion. At night I witnessed the fireworks - a brilliant display, from the upper deck of a ferry-boat, but a rain came on to cut them short.

September 30, 1899

The military parade I viewed from the corner of Forty-fifth street and Fifth avenue. The Admiral's carriage stopped for a moment at this point, and I saw him distinctly: he looked small, slouched and fatigued - unresponsive to the acclamations. I saw Sampson and Schley, the twin heroes of Santiago, Gov. Roosevelt, now a smooth rider, who acted becomingly, Gen. Miles, indeed most of the leaders in our war with Spain. The turn-out was fine, the enthusiasm great, and the walls of humanity through which the music and marching passed were never so dense. The triumphal arch at the meeting of Broadway and Fifth avenue, though largely imitative, formed a most fit decoration and memorial. And the parade as a whole was an artistic advance upon previous efforts of the kind. It must be confessed, however, that the function or celebration was civic and not national: it lacked the stamp and presence of the Federal Government to make it entirely successful. After the show and shouting, I dined at the "Black Cat", and then went to the theatre.

October 17, 1899

Obtained judgment against Christian Weitkamp in the First District Court, for $50.40 and costs.

October 18, 1899

Promissory note of F. Giordana for $775 falls due to-day.

October 19, 1899

The back bone of a people should be moral and substantial, weighty forsooth, to hold it firmly on the earth, where it at present belongs, and balance the fancies and eccentric curves of genius which extend the reaches of human knowledge and add distinction and interest to life.

October 26, 1899

Civilization is a present fact, such as it is, but a loose, floating one, derived from antecedents, accepted for the moment, it is advanced the next day, but ever must be accepted for what it is. Yet the wise know happily how to obey and how to break its conventions, and this as well for their physical as their spiritual salvation. Civilization is an act or result of evolution. We may turn aside or revert to primitive conditions only temporarily. The push of progress and of the Spirit properly whips us into the main current of tendency and keeps us floating onward. We have the will freedom to alter our course and even back up stream; but largely considered, it is not for long; in the main we are held true to our purposed end. In touch with this, as I go on, I feel my willfulness relax; I become less inclined to the purely natural, and a stronger adherency to the restraints and differentiations of society controls.

November 13, 1899

M. v. Siggelkow.
"" Brown. (all) 10 a.m.
" " Hardiken.

November 15, 1899

Sale of chattels in the second distress proceedings instituted by me against the Kollings and Weitkamp noticed for to-day 2 o'clock p.m.

November 16, 1899

What I particularly commend in the Bible is what is usually condemned by superficial critics. I mean the exceedingly human incidents and acts of its various characters. In this it reflects more truly than any other book the life of humanity throughout the ages. It thus treats in a cosmopolitan spirit eternal types. Believing as I do that all great words records and deeds are inspired, and the lesser in proportion, I may not add much emphasis in saying that this shows its divine origin. But in reflecting so completely humanity, it reflects equally the creator of all life and hence is the most divine of all books.

December 21, 1899

When will the poor little "unco guid*" people with their ready tape measures of respectability and morality learn that the great good men and women experience, if they venture at all to judge others, some hesitancy and diffidence, knowing full well the complexity of character and situation or circumstance((.)) There are more colors in any scheme of ethics than white and black, and they who possess the most shades and distinctions are nearest the truth.
*

December 28, 1899

Intellect is the bones or anatomy of poetry; sensuousness, its flesh, color, charm, life. Matthew Arnold inveighs somewhat against the sensuousness of Keats, yet it is the latter's special value and claim, and places him with Shakespeare. Would that Matthew had more of it! He might then have been a master-poet instead of a school-master in verse.

December 30, 1899

Have some laxity and measure of uncommon sense. Take me sometimes with a grain of salt, and, if I have said or done anything very bad, make the grain of salt bigger! In this way you will preserve your own and my savor.

Cash Account. January 1899

There is a charm about being arcane. I think I can claim to be that as yet to some extent, and possibly may always be that to the philistines or evade their comprehension. And yet this should not prevent some kindly critic or editor from attempting to exploit me to advantage. The attempt might prove more fruitful. For, certes, I can put him with sympathetic eyes in a fruitful study.

Have I said or done aught I should not have said or done? Yes, or possibly yes, for I have not, in the way sacred or human, fathomed or fashioned the full mystery of it; still the dear white beauty is inviolate, unbetrayed - it shines unseen of public view. Yes, however democratic we may strive to be, there is still some aristocracy that will survive, there is still left in all that is the shadow of a great enigma.

Cash Account. March 1899

Via Vera. (How to be Great.)
Care a little, do not care,
What the world may say of you;
If to truth you're only true,
You may venture, you may dare.

Mind man's limits, do not mind;
Know how far, yet fancy more,
More than ever was before -
That's invention you will find.

Do a little as you're told;
Something must be planned and done,
Ere the fire begins to run
In creation's master mould.

Whilst illumined, unloose the gate;
Whilst you're flowing in the light,
Be as bold as any knight,
Match your powers with any fate.

Send your sword-thrust to the hilt,
Do the deed that never dies,
Speak the word so mellow wise,
That 'twill never, never wilt!

Cash Account. May 1899

Photograph of Bertha Galland.

Cash Account. July 1899

Picture of monument with caption:

"Victory"-successful design for the soldiers and sailors' monument for Jersey City, New Jersey. - by Philip Martiny. (Manners note:) See Memorial Day, May 30th, ante.

Memoranda, 1899

One may stand up against the united opinion of the world and be right, but he is generally wrong!

Happy they in whom the elements are justly mixed and incline them to be good!

Much as one flies from heaviness and should, for the spirit is light and aspires, the wisdom of the world is its weight. Gravity is its norm. Conservatism, conventions, even a degree of narrowness, the backbone of orthodoxy, custom, law, an everyday understanding,--these steady the course and conduct of life. They regulate and chain to prudence, to reason, the too loose or imperious flight of thought, of action, that not seldom beats ineffectually the void. They conduce to enlightened liberty, to true freedom, and hence majority happiness, in the absence or rarity of seasoned will-direction. Accept what is common in religion and law and the rest. Acceptance may evince more intellect than refusal or the attack destructive. It is greater to build on the better old, and the natural, creative way. For any departure you must certainly master yourself finely and think master-like, or you are apt to run counter to logic and facts and otherwise come to grief. Sometimes, therefore, when I am inclined to scorn people who are slaves to system and cowards of thought, I check myself and say, These too are of service, perhaps of the greatest service, in keeping life sound and sweet. But the air is circumambient, and birds and those who like to breathe its finer heights will fly. 'Tis their element and joy. For I know that imagination will always be king, and everything, even facts, figures, logic, must melt to meet him and rearise in shapes brighter, more distinct and graceful.

(Facing page: photograph with no intelligible image, or was it a mirror?)

June 13, 1899

(Front page of diary: letter on Manners Stationary)

To the Honorable Board of City Hall Commissioners:

Gentlemen:--

It is with civic and filial appreciation that I present to Jersey City a portrait of my father, the late Hon. David S. Manners, who for five successive terms in the fifties was the city's chief magistrate.

It may be unbecoming in me to speak of my father in a eulogistic strain, and yet I could use no other in speaking of him both as a magistrate and as a man. At this time, however, when the city has contracted for a new water supply, I may recall that his efforts were used effectively to procure for the city its first public water works, and that he was mayor when the Passaic water was introduced. Our present Executive is associated with the forthcoming supply form the Rockaway river. Thus the two water mayors are brought face to face, and I fancy their addiction to pure and wholesome water will render their names less likely to be "writ in water".

The portrait was painted by Mr. Theodore Pembrook, of Manhattan, and is an excellent work of that artist.

I commend it to the city's care.

Respectfully yours,
Edwin Manners.