New York has always had more than its full share of “queer ducks,” but I don’t believe a more eccentric character ever struck the great metropolis than “old Gurowski,” as everybody who knew him called him. He was a real count, and had been really of a good deal of account at one time, had been the bitter enemy and the bosom friend at different times of no less a man than Nicholas, the autocrat of all the Russians; but he had finally got played-out in Europe and so naturally came to America, where he lived upon the memory of the past, a little writin’ he got to do in the present and any quantity of hope in the future, and between the three he managed to eke out a livin’.
He was an odd man in every way–odd to begin with in his personal appearance. He may be described as a large head, a big belly and a thin body between ‘em, with spindle-shank legs terminatin’ on little feet that a woman might have been proud of. He wore a queer old cloak of the German type, very large and fantastic. This he always wrapped closely, wound it round his body. On his head he carried a curious arrangement for a hat, a high, bell-shaped broad-brimmed affair, a mixture of a Quaker and Tyrolese styles of hats. And from this hat, which was enough in itself to set everybody gapin’, he wore a long, sky-blue veil, a regular old maid’s veil, with which he covered his face and eyes, particularly his eyes, which were weak–or rather his eye–for he had lost one eye in a duel and had it replaced by a glass affair. To add to the startlin’ glory of his appearance he wore an enormous vest, or waistcoat, reachin’ from his neck nearly to his knees, and wide enough to put a fair-sized parcel in, between it and his body. This vest was a flamin’ red and would have made a bull mad at sight. And then, to crown all, he wore a pair of the most enormous goggles that ever adorned (?) the eyes of a created bein’. Altogether he was a show–a circus in himself–and although New Yorkers are cosmopolitan, and, as a rule, polite, lettin’ everybody do or dress as he pleases, yet Gurowski’s rig was too much for the average New Yorker, and he was constantly followed by a more or less crowd of small boys and idle men, who gazed at him open-mouthed–a tribute to his attractions (?) which Gurowski rather liked.
He was one of the most unpopular men personally whoever visited this country. People at first were prepared to like him, even to toady to him, for he came of undeniably good family, and Murray Hill is always ready to “receive” a count. But he was so confoundedly frank and outspoken, he was such a keen observer, and such a teller of all he observed, that the people were afraid of him, and soon came to regard him as a positive nuisance. He was specially “down on” women, couldn’t see any sense or good in ‘em, and of course the ladies resented this sort of treatment and sent the count to coventry, which was just what the count wanted. It saved him the trouble of bein’ polite. The story went that he had been jilted in some love affair at St. Petersburg, and so took his revenge in hatin’ the sex. But if so, he kept his own counsel well, and I guess there was really no foundation for the story. He was a woman-hater.
He was, however, a good talker among men, and very proud of the way he spoke the English language. How he spoke it can be imagined from the fact that he called the “slopes” of a hill the “slops” of a hill, and so on. Yet if anybody undertook to correct his pronunciation he would fly into a violent rage, and would never again speak to or associate with the person who dared to correct him. Still he was no fool; far from it. He was one of the most profound scholars who ever visited this city, so deeply learned on his special subjects that Charles A. Dana and Ripley employed him to write some of the important articles in their “American Encyclopedia.”
It was this genuine learnin’ of his that atoned with many for his rudeness and oddities. It was the only thing about him that was bearable.
His great hobby, his master passion, was argument and contradiction. If anybody said one thing, he would forthwith say just the opposite thing, to start an argument, and then he would set to work with wonderful learnin’ and energy to prove his own point and demolish his adversary. It didn’t matter a whit that one day he argued one way, and tomorrow just the opposite way. The only point he cared for was to get the best of the argument at that particular time. His arguments one day had no connection whatever with his argument the next. He agreed with Horace Greeley in one sentiment, and one only, that “consistency is the virtue of fools.”
He got arguin’ with good old Dr. Francis once, and got so mad at the way the genial doctor demolished his points that he lost his temper completely, although there were some twenty persons present, and challenged the doctor to a duel then and there, a duel to the death. Then when the company fell to laughin’ at this absurd proposition, Gurowski took his coat off, and his goggles off, opened wide his big waistcoat, and turned around and challenged the whole crowd to mortal combat. But this wasn’t a circumstance to what happened a little while after, which gave Gurowski the nickname round town of “the naked truth.”
He had been arguin’ a point in ancient history with a friend, and the argument had grown heated, the friend had glided out of it, stopped the discussion, and soon forgot all about the matter. Not so Gurowski. When his friend a week letter called on him in his rooms on Clinton Place, knockin’ at the front room door, he heard Gurowski’s voice cry “Come in.” The friend came in and saw Gurowski, to his surprise, stark naked, just havin’ rushed out from his bath. But to his still greater surprise Gurowski didn’t make any apology, nor proceed to dress, but stark naked as he was, commenced at once to dash headlong or tonguelong into the very midst of the argument that had been broken off a week before. He had been readin’ up since then, and now he began to hurl his points metaphorically at his friend’s head.
While the latter was wonderin’ and waitin’ till Gurowski would retire to dress, which he didn’t, another knock was heard at the door. “Come in,” thundered Gurowski, mad at bein’ thus interrupted in his argument, but continuin’ in his discourse more animatedly than before.
The newcomer proved to be a German neighbor of Gurowski’s who had also had an unfinished argument with him previously. Seein’ him the count at once began to carry on an argument with the German, while at the same time he kept on arguin’ with the firstcomer, keepin’ the two discussions agoin’ on two different topics at one time, and without any clothes on at that.
He seemed perfectly oblivious of his airiness and more than paradisaical simplicity of costume (for even the fig leaf was wantin’) and was in the very height of his double argument act when a third knocked was heard at the door.
“Come in,” once more roared Gurowski, and in came the servant girl of the establishment, a pretty young Irish girl, who had been sent up by her mistress on some household errand.
The girl gave a scream, and puttin’ her hands to her face vanished like the wind, but Gurowski kept on, perfectly unconscious of havin’ offended propriety or anybody else.
If his visitors hadn’t interfered he probably would have discussed matters and things in a state of nature until bedtime. But when his friends persistently threatened to leave the room unless he dressed himself he reluctantly withdrew to the adjoinin’ bedroom and put on his attire.
But he dressed and discussed by installments. He fixed his hair first, then rushed in and argued awhile; then returned and put on his flamin’ red vest, then dashed in and argued some more; then he put on his coat and came out and argued again; then he retired and donned his coat, then came in for another dash at argument, and it was over an hour before he put on his pantaloons and was really decently presentable.
Gurowski was a great smoker, and was, like Grant, seldom seen without a cigar–never, in fact, unless he was eatin’ or arguin’. As for eatin’, he was very moderate, though fastidious, and prided himself on his cookery. “God has made the American without a stomach,” he used to say, “and that accounts for his never havin’ anything fit to put into it.” He despised American cookin’–called it barbarous. Perhaps it was in his day.
With all his oddities, Gurowski was an independent sort of a chap and would never accept pecuniary favors from anybody, in which respect he differed widely from most visitin’ “noblemen.” At one time, when “hard up,” he disappeared altogether from public view and was discovered afterwards by accident under an assumed name tryin’ to be a gardener’s assistant at a gentleman’s country seat on the Hudson. Here he managed to drive the head gardener crazy, and was finally on the verge of bein’ driven off the grounds himself when the timely discovery of his identity saved him. He was afterwards entertained as a guest at the table of the gentleman whom he had vainly tried to serve as under-gardener.
At one time Gurowski wrote editorials for Horace Greeley, but soon quarreled with the philosopher. The two men were both eccentric and “two of a kind” seldom agree. So Gurowski drifted to Washington, had a place under Seward for awhile, quarreled with him of course, and finally fizzled out, leavin’ no queerer, or, after all, more genuine, man behind him.
[Editor’s notes: Gurowski, like Seward, was a firm abolitionist. He supported Lincoln, but earned the name “Lincoln’s gadfly” due to his distain for, and opposition to, several of Lincoln’s appointees, primarily Gen. George B. McClellan.
There is one episode about Gurowski in his Wikipedia article that has great immediacy in the 2020s: “In the lead-up to the inauguration of Lincoln as president, Gurowski met with pro-Union Republicans in Washington who were delegates to the “Peace Conference,” warning them of secessionist plots to disrupt the electoral college, and of Southern intentions to foment takeover of the government either at the time electoral ballots were counted or on March 4, inauguration day.”
The old misogynist saw some things clearly.]
