In the course of a certain battle a soldier whose leg had been shot off appealed to another soldier who was hurrying by to carry him to the rear,informing him at the same time of the loss which he had sustained;whereupon the generous son of Mars,shouldering the unfortunate,proceeded to carry out his desire.The bullets and cannon-balls were flying in all directions,and presently one of the latter took the wounded man's head off--without,however,his deliverer being aware of it.In no-long time he was hailed by an officer,who said:
"Where are you going with that carcass?"
"To the rear,sir--he's lost his leg!"
"His leg,forsooth?"responded the astonished officer;"you mean his head,you booby."Whereupon the soldier dispossessed himself of his burden,and stood looking down upon it in great perplexity.At length he said:
"It is true,sir,just as you have said."Then after a pause he added,"But he TOLD me IT WAS HIS LEG!!!!!"Here the narrator bursts into explosion after explosion of thunderous horse-laughter,repeating that nub from time to time through his gaspings and shriekings and suffocatings.
It takes only a minute and a half to tell that in its comic-story form;and isn't worth the telling,after all.Put into the humorous-story form it takes ten minutes,and is about the funniest thing I have ever listened to--as James Whitcomb Riley tells it.
He tells it in the character of a dull-witted old farmer who has just heard it for the first time,thinks it is unspeakably funny,and is trying to repeat it to a neighbor.But he can't remember it;so he gets all mixed up and wanders helplessly round and round,putting in tedious details that don't belong in the tale and only retard it;taking them out conscientiously and putting in others that are just as useless;****** minor mistakes now and then and stopping to correct them and explain how he came to make them;remembering things which he forgot to put in in their proper place and going back to put them in there;stopping his narrative a good while in order to try to recall the name of the soldier that was hurt,and finally remembering that the soldier's name was not mentioned,and remarking placidly that the name is of no real importance,anyway--better,of course,if one knew it,but not essential,after all--and so on,and so on,and so on.
The teller is innocent and happy and pleased with himself,and has to stop every little while to hold himself in and keep from laughing outright;and does hold in,but his body quakes in a jelly-like way with interior chuckles;and at the end of the ten minutes the audience have laughed until they are exhausted,and the tears are running down their faces.
The simplicity and innocence and sincerity and unconsciousness of the old farmer are perfectly simulated,and the result is a performance which is thoroughly charming and delicious.This is art and fine and beautiful,and only a master can compass it;but a machine could tell the other story.
To string incongruities and absurdities together in a wandering and sometimes purposeless way,and seem innocently unaware that they are absurdities,is the basis of the American art,if my position is correct.
Another feature is the slurring of the point.A third is the dropping of a studied remark apparently without knowing it,as if one were thinking aloud.The fourth and last is the pause.
Artemus Ward dealt in numbers three and four a good deal.He would begin to tell with great animation something which he seemed to think was wonderful;then lose confidence,and after an apparently absent-minded pause add an incongruous remark in a soliloquizing way;and that was the remark intended to explode the mine--and it did.
For instance,he would say eagerly,excitedly,"I once knew a man in New Zealand who hadn't a tooth in his head"--here his animation would die out;a silent,reflective pause would follow,then he would say dreamily,and as if to himself,"and yet that man could beat a drum better than any man I ever saw."The pause is an exceedingly important feature in any kind of story,and a frequently recurring feature,too.It is a dainty thing,and delicate,and also uncertain and treacherous;for it must be exactly the right length--no more and no less--or it fails of its purpose and makes trouble.If the pause is too short the impressive point is passed,and [and if too long]the audience have had time to divine that a surprise is intended--and then you can't surprise them,of course.
On the platform I used to tell a negro ghost story that had a pause in front of the snapper on the end,and that pause was the most important thing in the whole story.If I got it the right length precisely,Icould spring the finishing ejaculation with effect enough to make some impressible girl deliver a startled little yelp and jump out of her seat --and that was what I was after.This story was called "The Golden Arm,"and was told in this fashion.You can practise with it yourself--and mind you look out for the pause and get it right.