Fame Purely Local

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Jun 11, 1885

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 11, No. 23.

Fame Purely Local.

FAME is only local. There is no such thing as universal celebrity. When the hostler begged the bishop to shake hands with the bruiser in the stable-yard (“he’ll let yer”) the worthy man simply gave expression to the relative opinions regarding prelates and prize-fighters held in his circle. When Victor Hugo witnessed a marriage at a mairie recently the registrar nearly brought on an apoplectic fit by mildly asking the “maître” whether he spelled his name with or without a “t.” He was unconscious of the existence of the poet. A couple of pious pilgrims from New England once visited the house of Cullen Bryant, reverentially examining every hole and corner, greatly to the delight of the poet, but went away very wrathful when they discovered that they had mistaken the place. They wanted to see the home of “Billy Bryant, the negro minstrel.” None of the farmers close to Tennyson’s house could tell an American tourist anything more about him than that they “heerd as ’ow be wrote poetry-books for the queen.” When the pedestrian asked the rustic for Shakespeare’s house he was asked who he was; and so little do the Norwich innkeepers appreciate the fame of Sir Thomas Browne that when a recent visitor inquired for the house said to be his he was referred to the local directory, which “contains the names of all the resident gentry.”—London World.