W.]
OBITUARY POETRY
ADDRESS AT THE ACTORS' FUND FAIR, PHILADELPHIA, in 1895
LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,--The--er this--er--welcome occasion gives me an
--er--opportunity to make an--er--explanation that I have long desired to
deliver myself of. I rise to the highest honors before a Philadelphia
audience. In the course of my checkered career I have, on divers
occasions, been charged--er--maliciously with a more or less serious
offence. It is in reply to one of the more--er--important of these that
I wish to speak. More than once I have been accused of writing obituary
poetry in the Philadelphia Ledger.
I wish right here to deny that dreadful assertion. I will admit that
once, when a compositor in the Ledger establishment, I did set up some of
that poetry, but for a worse offence than that no indictment can be found
against me. I did not write that poetry--at least, not all of it.
CIGARS AND TOBACCO
My friends for some years now have remarked that I am an inveterate
consumer of tobacco. That is true, but my habits with regard to tobacco
have changed. I have no doubt that you will say, when I have explained
to you what my present purpose is, that my taste has deteriorated, but I
do not so regard it.
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