Judge — March 31, 1906 — page 10: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

WILLIAM J. LAMPTON, ORIGINATOR AND SOLE PROPRIETOR OF THE “YAWP.” ‘Third of series introducing to Joocx readers the artists and writers who are entertaining them in his pages. ASA special dispensation, and because we felt our utter inability to cope with the subject, we authorized Mr. Lampton to interview himself, with the following result : W. J. LAMPTON by W. J. LAMPTON. I approached Mr. Lampton for an interview through the intervention of a note, to which I received the following reply: “My Dear Boy—Notwithstanding my Super-sensitive soul shrinks from the vulgar publicity of print, and I abhor coarse contact with the common herd, I am willing to sacri- fice my sensibilities rather than that you should lose the four dollars which you are to receive for interviewing me. I must insist, however, that if I make this sacrifice, which I do wholly for your sake, that you have the interview occupy a cunspicuous place in the paper, with attractive head-lines and striking border decorations. + Come early and avoid the night air. “Very sincerely. “ Yawpera-on-the-Sound. Armed with this authority, tened out to Mr. Lampton’s magnificent country-place overlooking the sound and was met at the train by the master himself in his 60 HP Hardpan, with two chauffeurs. “T carry two,” he explained, + because other millionaires around here have only one. As soon as any one of them takes on two I'll make mine three. If this is coppered I'll simply load the auto with chauffeurs and stay at home myself. What's the good of having money if you're to be outdone by your neighbors ?" As this was my first meeting with the distinguished writer, I will confess to a certain trepidation ; but before I had been with him five minutes I was in thrall to his charming personality. Mr. Lampton is handsome, though bald; graceful, though lanky; affable, though wealthy ; debonair, though dignified ; youthful, though elderly, “How is it?" T exclaimed in amazed admiration, *+that you are yet a bachelor? How did you ever escape ? + Easy,” he replied ; + easy as getting rich in life-insurance. You see, I hypnotize ‘em, and they simply can't reach out and grab me. See?" «But surely," I persisted, + there must have been some one among them whom you wished to marry 2?” . “Oh, yes, several,” he admitted generously; ‘but they fasci- nated me so that I was helpless to prevent their sacrificing themselves elsewhere. You see, this hypnotizing business works both ways.” By this time we had reached the grounds of Yawpera, The scene beggared description. It was a landscape-gardener’s fairy-dream come true; and rising above the waving trees, the rippling lakes and the murmuring fountains, the towers of Yawpera, in gleaming marble and burnished gold, pointed upward toward the heavens. “It isa poem!" I cried in rapture. “It’s a good many," he said calmly. ** You may not be aware of the fact, but it takes more than one poem | Behold AN AvropiocRariic vawer, He's got the geewhizitis, on breakfast. | Aft 0ld— food, or soap, As if he'd rassled sin or complexion. | For years and years. But have no fears ; powder, or rail- | He hasn't. What he’s done roads, or min- Has been to manufacture fun 3 For the reading pul eral-waters, OF | Atco other things pills, or corsets, | That a poet sings, or patent medi- In lading yawps. cines to pay for | ‘thoes is ajoint like this, | What makes the wrinkles that you see, is not for pub- | ‘The fuzzy whiskers on his chin, lication; but [| The long. gaunt neck may say to you | Test rises from his wreck asa friend that, notwithstand ing I never get less than a hundred dollars a line for my brand of poetry, either pills. or Parnassus, corsets or classics, it kept me busy paying for this proposition, But I was bound to have it. I had lived in New York flats till Thad become desperate. That was one reason for the origin of my well-known and popular Yawp,” he continued reminiscently. ++I found that even at a hundred per I was not accu- mulating with sufficient speed, so I cut down the lines, evolving there- by the Yawp. Like this, for example: “Oh, say! Ain't it gay To write this way For pay? Gee whizz, What a snap it ist Sce?? “You observe, I hope, the obvious advantage of this style over the previous long measure.” We moved slowly on into the house, and there imagination dropped her wings and refused to soar in the useless flight for words to portray the bewildering beauty on every hand. Between walls of jasper and chalcedony and sardonyx and myrrh and frankincense we trod upon floors of lacquer and velvet and hyssop and wormwood until we reached his library. Here, on a beautiful table of carved helga- mite, stood a washtubful of mint-julep with old-fashioned Kentucky gourd dippers hanging from its rim by hooks of silver, while in a cor- ner sat a barrel of choice assorted Havanas. “With me,” he said, handing me a brimming gourd. Twas with him promptly. “Do you work here?” I inquired, gazing around me in a daze and passing back the gourd for another helping. “Yes,” he replied simply; ‘+in these humble surroundings I grind out my fancies. Twice a week, every Tuesday and Thursday, I send a wagon-load into town, which returns in the gloaming with a back-load of cheques. Thus do we maintain the entente cordiale be tween editor and writer—the slave and his master.” “Truly, truly,” assented murmurously, and handed up the gourd for more. + Do you never write prose ?"'I inquired when we had lighted our (his) cigars and sat down. Oh, yes; stories and skits and jokes and interviews and books and essays, and a few other little jeu de sprits of that sort. Some of these have appeared in print, and others are waiting for a change in the editorial heart and the rush that follows an author's ten-strike. That is one of the advantages of being wealthy—one can wait for his market.” «You love your work ?” I asked. «+ Passionately !"" he cried, clutching at a volume on the table. Observing that it was the one book he had had published, and fearing that he might do something desperate, I quickly changed the subject to get his mind off of himself. + Have you any fads ?” I inquired. Tt is a fad of the great to have fads,” he answered, **and Iam no stronger than my kind. My fad is "— he hesitated.“ But I shall not tell you. There are some subjects too sacred to be knocked about by a cold, unfeeling world. Let this remain to me alone. Insistence under the circumstances would have been cruel, and I forbore. +“ What is your age, Mr. Lampton ?” L asked with delicate deftness. “Keep off the grass," he And When the poet pen Tespondediwith Gets that, charming na- My scat Wweté. It's time for him to climb a tree i Beyond the reach of minstrelsy. Or hay nd when he's got up good and ‘To shine there like a blazing star Which he is doing at the present moment In great shape. I ventured with a bravery born of the julep. But his ‘Twinkle. twinkle, brilliant star, good-nature How they wonder what you are, Up above the rest so high, was proof It makes them look like bugs in the grass; against my wit, And the editors ca and the figures were not forth- es more at present. coming. Soars eralys “Bache- lors have some rights that are bound to be suspected," he laughed ; and I tried another gourd. + Have you ever written a play?" I asked presently. «+ Everything else but that,” he said ; «and some day I'll try that. I don't see how I could do much worse than some I wot of which (Continued on next page.) An An and the : Rec