Bartlett's Book of Anecdotes

by Clifton Fadiman

  “At Your Eminence’s wedding,” came the prompt reply.

  AESCHYLUS (525–456 BC), Greek poet. Some of his tragedies are the earliest complete plays surviving from ancient Greece.

  1 Aeschylus died and was buried at Gela in Sicily. Ancient biographies record the tradition that his death came about when an eagle, which had seized a tortoise and was looking to smash the reptile’s shell, mistook the poet’s bald head for a stone and dropped the tortoise upon him.

  AGASSIZ, Jean Louis Rodolphe (1807–73), Swiss naturalist and paleontologist.

  1 An emissary from a learned society came to invite Agassiz to address its members. Agassiz refused on the grounds that lectures of this sort took up too much time that should be devoted to research and writing. The man persisted, saying that they were prepared to pay handsomely for the talk. “That’s no inducement to me,” Agassiz replied. “I can’t afford to waste my time making money.”

  AGRIPPINA (AD 15–59), mother of Emperor Nero by her first husband. Her third marriage was to her uncle, Emperor Claudius, whom she later poisoned.

  1 Agrippina was consumed by her ambition to place her son Nero on the imperial throne. She consulted the soothsayers, who told her, “Nero will reign, but he will kill his mother.”

  “Let him kill me, then,” said Agrippina.

  2 Agrippina proved less easy to eliminate than Nero expected. According to Suetonius, he tried poison three times (she had taken the antidote beforehand), a collapsible ceiling in her bedchamber (someone warned her), and an unseaworthy boat (she swam to safety). Finally he sent a centurion with orders to kill her. The centurion struck her first on the head, as he had been ordered, but she bared her breasts, crying out, “Strike rather these, which have nurtured so great a monster as Nero.”

  AIDAN, Saint (d. 651), Irish monk who became bishop of Northumbria (635) and founded the monastery at Lindisfarne.

  1 King Oswin, ruler of the former British province of Deira and a friend of Aidan’s, gave the bishop a fine horse. Soon afterward Bishop Aidan met a beggar who asked him for alms; he at once dismounted and gave the horse, with all its costly trappings, to the poor man. When this charitable deed came to the king’s ears, he taxed Aidan: “Why did you give away the horse that we specially chose for your personal use when we knew that you had need of one for your journeys? We have many less valuable horses that would have been suitable for beggars.” Replied Aidan, “Is this foal of a mare more valuable to you than a child of God?” The king pondered, then, suddenly casting his sword aside, knelt at Aidan’s feet and begged his forgiveness. Aidan, greatly moved, begged the king to go to his dinner and be merry.

  As Aidan watched the king go, he became very melancholy. When the bishop’s chaplain asked why, Aidan replied, “I know that the king will not live long, for I have never seen a king so humble as he is. He will be taken from us as the country is not worthy to have such a king.”

  The foreboding was proved correct: King Oswin was treacherously killed by his northern neighbor, King Oswy.

  ALBEMARLE, William Anne Keppel, 2d Earl of (1702–54), British soldier and ambassador.

  1 Sent as plenipotentiary to Paris in 1748, Albemarle took with him his mistress Lolotte Gaucher, an actress described by contemporaries as cunning and rapacious. One evening, seeing her gazing pensively at a star, the earl remarked, “It’s no good, my dear, I can’t buy it for you.”

  ALBERT, Prince (1819–61), prince consort of Great Britain; husband of Queen Victoria.

  1 Prince Albert had a chronic inability to stay awake late at night. At a concert given at Buckingham Palace and attended by various distinguished guests, Queen Victoria noticed that her husband was asleep. Half-smiling, half-vexed, she prodded him with her elbow. He woke up, nodded approval of the piece being performed, and fell asleep again, still nodding. The queen had to wake him up all over again. A guest at the concert reported, “The queen was charmed, and cousin Albert looked beautiful, and slept quietly as usual.”

  2 A picture at Balmoral portrayed all the royal children and various birds and animals. Someone asked which was Princess Helena. “There, with the kingfisher,” said Albert, adding, “a very proper bird for a princess.”

  ALBERT, Eugène d’ (1864–1932), German pianist and composer.

  1 D’Albert was married six times. At an evening reception which he attended with his fifth wife shortly after their wedding, he presented the lady to a friend who said politely, “Congratulations, Herr d’Albert; you have rarely introduced me to so charming a wife.”

  ALCIBIADES (c. 450–404 BC), Greek general and politician.

  1 Alcibiades was telling Pericles, forty years his senior, how best to govern Athens. This did not amuse Pericles. “Alcibiades,” he said, “when I was your age, I talked just as you do now.”

  “How I should like to have known you, Pericles,” replied Alcibiades, “when you were at your best.”

  ALCOTT, [Amos] Bronson (1799–1888), US educator and writer, father of the writer Louisa May Alcott.

  1 The Alcott family finances were very low, but they placed great hopes on Bronson Alcott’s latest lecture tour. When he arrived home one night in February, the family gathered around to welcome him, offer him food and drink, and rejoice in his homecoming. Then a little silence fell, and it was daughter May who asked the question in all their minds: “Did they pay you?” Slowly Bronson Alcott drew out his pocketbook and displayed its contents — a single dollar. “Another year I shall do better,” he said. There was a stunned hush in the group around him. Then Mrs. Alcott flung her arms around his neck and said stoutly, “I call that doing very well.”

  ALCOTT, Louisa May (1832–88), US novelist, author of Little Women (1869).

  1 When Louisa Alcott became a celebrity, she often found her fame tiresome. A supporter of the fight for women’s suffrage, she attended the Women’s Congress in Syracuse, where she was accosted by an effusive admirer. “If you ever come to Oshkosh,” said the lady, “your feet will not be allowed to touch the ground: you will be borne in the arms of the people. Will you come?”

  “Never,” replied Miss Alcott.

  ALEMBERT, Jean le Rond d’ (1717–83), French mathematician.

  1 The illegitimate son of an aristocrat, d’Alembert was abandoned by his mother soon after his birth and was brought up by a glazier named Rousseau and his wife. When d’Alembert’s extraordinary talents became known, his mother attempted to claim him. D’Alembert rejected her, saying, “My mother is the wife of the glazier.”

  ALENÇON, Sophie-Charlotte, Duchesse d’ (d. 1897), Bavarian-born duchess who married the Duc d’Alençon in 1868.

  1 On May 4, 1897, the duchess was presiding over a charity bazaar in Paris when the hall accidentally caught fire. Flames spread to the paper decorations and flimsy walls of the booths and in seconds the place was an inferno. In the hideous panic that followed, many women and children were trampled as they rushed for the exits, while workmen from a nearby site performed incredible acts of heroism, rushing into the blaze to carry out the trapped women. Some rescuers reached the duchess, who had remained calmly seated behind her booth. “Because of my title, I was the first to enter here. I shall be the last to go out,” she said, rejecting their offer of help. She stayed and was burned to death, along with more than 120 others, mainly women and children.

  ALEXANDER, Sir George (1858–1919), British actor.

  1 “On the first night of that unfortunate play [Henry James’s] Guy Domville, produced by George Alexander, it was soon evident from the attitude of the gallery that the play was not going to be a success, but the seal of failure was set on it when Sir George uttered the line, ‘I am the last of the Domvilles.’ Scarcely were the words out of his mouth than a voice came from the gallery, ‘Well at any rate, that’s a comfort to know.’”

  ALEXANDER, Grover Cleveland (1887–1950), US baseball pitcher.

  1 Although he became an alcoholic during his twenty-year career, Alexander remained one of the best pitchers u
ntil the end. At thirty-five he pitched superbly in the World Series of 1926 between his St. Louis Cardinals and the New York Yankees. After winning the full sixth game of the best-of-seven set and tying the series at three games each, Alexander spent that night celebrating. Since pitchers usually rested three days between starts, he went out to the bull pen next day, with the relief pitchers, and snoozed away the final game until he was, surprisingly, summoned to pitch the seventh of the nine innings. There were three men on base, one out needed to end the inning, and a one-run lead. Alexander faced the feared Tony Lazzeri and struck him out, ending the inning to the cheers of the crowd. He then stopped the Yankees in their last two innings to win the game and give his team the title.

  Afterward Alexander was asked how he felt. “I feel fine,” he said. “It’s Lazzeri you should ask how he feels,” and added, “I owe it all to clean living.” And he went out and got drunk.

  ALEXANDER, Harold, 1st Earl [Alexander of Tunis] (1891–1969), British field marshal.

  1 Alexander’s assistant once commented on his habit of tipping into his Out tray any letters remaining in his In tray at the end of the working day. “Excuse me, sir,” he asked. “Why do you do that?”

  “It saves time,” explained Alexander. “You’d be surprised how little of it comes back.”

  ALEXANDER, Samuel (1859–1938), Australian-born philosopher and university professor who lived most of his life in England.

  1 The professor of philosophy on his beloved bicycle was a familiar sight around Manchester. On one occasion he rode over to Liverpool to dine and spend the night at the house of a wealthy shipowner. The host’s valet noticed that the professor had arrived without luggage and reported the fact to his employer, who courteously said that he would not dress for dinner that evening. He also instructed the valet to put out a spare pair of pajamas in the professor’s room. A short time later, however, the valet rushed into his master’s dressing room with the message: “I have just seen Professor Alexander going downstairs and he’s wearing a dinner jacket.” The host made a rapid change. The following morning the valet returned the spare pajamas, unused, to his master, remarking: “The professor had his own, after all.” Curiosity finally overcame the shipowner. As he was seeing his guest off on his bicycle, he asked, “Do you not have any luggage?”

  “I’m wearing it,” replied the professor.

  ALEXANDER I (1777–1825), czar of Russia (1801–25).

  1 The way for Alexander’s accession to the throne was cleared through the murder of his savage, megalomaniac father, Czar Paul I, by a group of aristocratic conspirators. Thus in two generations history repeated itself, for Alexander’s grandmother, Catherine the Great, had connived at the murder of her husband, Peter III, in order to seize power herself less than forty years before. The youthful archduke had had prior warning of the plot against Czar Paul, but had preferred to think that the conspirators’ intention was merely to depose and imprison his father. When news of the murder was brought to him, he almost collapsed with horror. This incident haunted him for the remainder of his life, but the strongest proof of his complicity was in his treatment of the conspirators; they all continued in his favor and some became his closest counselors. A French spy, the Countess de Bonneuil, reported to her master Fouché on the situation in St. Petersburg: “The young emperor goes about preceded by the murderers of his grandfather, followed by the murderers of his father, quite surrounded by his friends.”

  2 When Alexander was in Paris, following the defeat of Napoleon, he attended anniversary celebrations at one of the hospitals. The ladies who had organized the affair passed plates around for contributions. An extremely pretty girl was delegated to take a plate to the czar. Alexander dropped in a handful of gold and whispered, “That’s for your beautiful bright eyes.” The young lady curtsied and immediately presented the plate again. “What? More?” said the czar. “Yes, sire,” she replied, “now I want something for the poor.”

  3 The czar heard of a new invention, a calculating machine, that could apparently work faster than any person. He summoned the inventor, Abraham Stern, to his court to demonstrate the device. After inspecting it, Alexander challenged Stern to an arithmetic contest. A prearranged list of calculations was read out, and both Stern and the czar, who worked the numbers with a quill pen, set to. As Alexander was completing the first calculation, Stern announced that his machine had finished. The czar read over the results, looked at Stern and his machine, then said to his attendant, “The machine is good, but the Jew is bad.”

  ALEXANDER III [Alexander the Great] (356–323 BC), king of Macedon (336–323).

  1 Gossip surrounded the birth of Alexander. Doubt as to whether Philip was really his father later allowed Alexander to declare that he was a god and the son of Jupiter. Alexander’s mother, Olympias, preferred to leave the matter obscure. When news was brought to her of Alexander’s claim to divine paternity, she said, “Please — I don’t want to get into any trouble with Juno.”

  2 A Thessalian brought an exceptionally beautiful horse, named Bucephalus, to the Macedonian court, offering to sell it to King Philip. However, when the royal grooms tried to test its paces, it proved wild and unmanageable. The young Alexander asked his father for permission to try his skill. Philip reluctantly agreed, saying that if the prince failed to ride Bucephalus he was to pay his father a forfeit equal to its price. Alexander walked quickly to the horse’s head and turned it to face into the sun, for he had noticed that the horse’s own shadow was upsetting it. He calmed it, then mounted it, and Bucephalus obediently showed off his paces.

  The court, which had feared for the prince’s safety, broke into loud applause. Philip was overjoyed. He kissed his son, saying, “Seek another kingdom that may be worthy of your abilities, for Macedonia is too small for you.”

  3 Alexander, setting out on his conquest of Asia, inquired into the finances of his followers. To ensure that they should not be troubled over the welfare of their dependents during their absence, he distributed crown estates and revenues among them. When he had thus disposed of nearly all the royal resources, his friend General Perdiccas asked Alexander what he had reserved for himself. “Hope,” answered the king. “In that case,” said Perdiccas, “we who share in your labors will also take part in your hopes.” Thereupon he refused the estate allocated to him, and several other of the king’s friends did the same.

  4 At Gordium in Phrygia (Asia Minor) a chariot was fastened with cords made from the bark of a cornel tree. The knot was so cunningly tied that no ends were visible, and the tradition was that the empire of the world should fall to the man who could untie it. When Alexander conquered Gordium, he confronted the famous puzzle. Unable to untie the knot, he drew his sword and with one slash severed it.

  {Hence the phrase “cut the Gordian knot” for finding a quick and drastic solution to an intricate problem.}

  5 On his march through Asia Minor, Alexander fell dangerously ill. His physicians were afraid to treat him because if they did not succeed, the Macedonian army would suspect them of malpractice. Only one, Philip the Acarnanian, was willing to take the risk, as he had confidence in both the king’s friendship and his own drugs.

  While the medicine was being prepared, Alexander received a letter from an enemy of Philip’s that accused the physician of having been bribed by the Persian king to poison his master. Alexander read the letter and slipped it under his pillow without showing it to anyone. When Philip entered the tent with the medicine, Alexander took the cup from him, at the same time handing Philip the letter. While the physician was reading it, Alexander calmly drank the contents of the cup. Horrified and indignant at the calumny, Philip threw himself down at the king’s bedside, but Alexander assured him that he had complete confidence in his honor. After three days the king was well enough to appear again before his army.

  6 After Alexander had conquered Egypt, the Persian king, Darius, sent a letter offering generous terms for peace and future friendship with the Macedoni
an king: 10,000 talents to be paid in ransom for Persian prisoners, all the countries west of the Euphrates to be ceded to Alexander, and Darius’s daughter to be given to him in marriage. Alexander consulted his friends about how he should respond. His general Parmenion said, “If I were Alexander, I would accept these offers.”

  “So would I,” retorted Alexander, “if I were Parmenion.”

  7 The captured Indian king Porus was brought before Alexander, who asked how he wished to be treated. “Like a king,” was the reply. Alexander asked if he had anything else to request. “Nothing,” said Porus, “for everything is comprehended in the word ‘king.’” Alexander restored Porus’s lands to him.

  8 Alexander’s final command before a certain battle was that the beards of his soldiers should be shaved off. “There is nothing like a beard to get hold of in a fight,” he explained.

  9 Alexander the Great was marching across the desert with a thirsty army. A soldier came up to him, knelt down, and offered him a helmet full of water. “Is there enough for ten thousand men?” asked Alexander. When the soldier shook his head, Alexander poured the water out on the ground.

  ALEXANDER VI (c. 1431–1503), pope (1492–1503) who used his office to advance the prospects of his illegitimate children, especially his son Cesare Borgia.

  1 Alexander VI’s illegitimate daughter Lucrezia was married in 1502 to her third husband, Alfonso d’Este, son and heir of the Duke of Ferrara. Not long after the marriage the Ferrarese envoy to the papal court reassured Pope Alexander that all was well with the newlyweds; Alfonso, he reported, made love to Lucrezia nightly. Alfonso, the envoy added, also made love with equal regularity to other women during the day, but that was unimportant. “Well, he is young,” said the pope, “and that is how it should be.”