Hot Time in the Old Town - Edward Kohn [68]
After the fiasco in Jersey City, it was a relief to the arriving party that police arrangements were more satisfactory on the New York side. Police held the crowd back until Bryan left the boat, and he was taken out a side door to the entrance of the neighboring ferry slip. Three carriages drove the party two miles to the St. John home, where a small crowd of about 150 people waited. In fact the crowd seemed drawn more by the large police presence than any foreknowledge that Bryan was soon to arrive.
One cabman driving by suddenly brought his horse up with a jerk and asked, “Wat t’ell’s goin’ on here?” “Bryan’s coming,” called out a policeman. “The devil he is,” the cabman replied, as he whipped his horses and drove off. “Just tell him that you saw me.” The Bryans’ carriage soon arrived, and the party walked rapidly into the house, ignoring the cheers from the street. After the door had closed, a loud voice across the street tried to revive the enthusiasm of the disappointed crowd by calling out the first part of the old campaign chant, “What’s the matter with Bryan?”
At that very moment Bryan emerged from the house again and walked out on the steps. A hush fell on the crowd, and the broad base of the stone steps lit by the electric lamps gave the impression of an actor stepping onto the stage. “His pale face was outlined by the electric glare,” one witness described, “his tangled hair fell down over his shoulders, and his eyes seemed to flash in the light, and, as he drew himself erect the audience caught just for an instant a fleeting glimpse of a magnetic pose, such as he might have brought into play when he carried the hysterical and emotional Convention at Chicago along with him.”
Bryan stood on the step and looked both ways down the street, perhaps looking for more people, as the situation in the street below was one to which he was unaccustomed: Here he was in the largest American city, faced with a small and completely quiet crowd of fewer than two hundred people. Unlike his reception in other cities, the crowds that had greeted his arrival in New York, both at the ferryboat and at St. John’s house, numbered under three hundred total. What hope did he have, then, of filling the 15,000-seat auditorium of Madison Square Garden? Bryan turned back toward the house as if to go back inside, and now the crowd erupted into applause and cries of “Speech!” But Bryan only shook his head and stepped back into the house.
By prior arrangement, Bryan had agreed to meet with newspapermen at 10:00 PM, but as the train had been delayed, this meeting did not take place until nearly 11:00. It promised to be a short meeting, since before Bryan appeared, St. John lectured the newspapermen, “Now, with Mr. Bryan, this is going to be ‘How-de-do,’ and ‘Goodby,’” one of the reporters present recounted. “The man is thoroughly tired out. You must not ask him a question. If you have any questions to ask, you may ask them of me, and I will answer so far as I can, or get the answer from him.”
“Now,” said St. John, with a hint of theatricality, “you may see Mr. Bryan.” He then opened a set of sliding doors, revealing Bryan, washed, smiling, and perfectly attired in evening dress, standing amid a bower of flowers sent by well-wishers. To proffered hands Bryan held up his, showing them to be badly discolored and swollen. “You see,” Bryan said in a whisper, “I have had a hard time of it shaking hands from the rear of the cars. They would give me a hearty