CHARLES BAT J 
 
CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 BEQUEST 
 
 OF 
 
 STEWART HENRY BURNHAM 
 1943 
 
Cornell University Library 
 PS 3523.05888M8 
 
 More cheerful Americans 
 
 3 1924 021 765 619 
 
The original of tliis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/cletails/cu31924021765619 
 
MORE 
 CHEERFUL AMERICANS 
 
7th printing 
 
 Cheerful Americans 
 
 By CHARLES BATTELL LOOMIS. 
 
 WitU 34 Illustrations by FLORENCE SCOVEL SHINN, 
 
 FANNY Y. cdRY, F. L. FITblAN, and 
 
 F. R. GRUGER. i2mo, $1.25. 
 
 Seventeen humorous tales, including^ three quaint auto- 
 mobile stories, and the "Americans Abroad ^' series, *'The 
 Man of Putty," "Too Much Boy," "The Men Who 
 Swapped Languages," " Veritable Quidors," etc, 
 
 N. V. Times Saturday Review says of one of the 
 stories: "It is worthy of Frank Stockton." The rest of 
 the notice praises the^ook. 
 
 iV. Y, Tribune: "^e is un^ectedly funny, and enter- 
 tains us from beginning- to end." 
 
 Nation: " The mere name and the very cover are full 
 of hope. , . . This small volume is a safe one to lend to a 
 (.ambler, an invalid, a hypochondriac, or an old lady; more 
 than safe for the normal man. , . , The book should fulfil 
 a useful mission on rainy days, and on kerosene-steeped 
 evenings in those spots of earth where men and women do 
 congregate." 
 
 Boston Transcript: " A new and very interesting col- 
 lection. ... Of the seventeen stories in the book there is 
 scarcely one not marked by an originality of plot and an 
 abundance of healthful humor. . . . He who reads the 
 lirst story will read them all and wish for more." 
 
 Chicago Tribune: " The title is a stroke of genius. 
 The book is sanely American and one of the cheeriest books 
 published in a long time. . . . The humor is natural, the 
 characters well drawn, and the style simple and unaffected. 
 . . . The Automobile stories, while distinctly original, 
 suggest Stockton in their serious absurdity. , . . When 
 Mr, Loomis has written another volume or two like it we 
 will treat him like the other immortal and drop the Mr." 
 
 Henry Holt and Company 
 
 PUBLISHERS N£ W YORK 
 
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MORE 
 CHEERFUL AMERICANS 
 
 BY 
 
 CHARLES BATTELL LOOMIS 
 
 AUTHOR OF ** CHEERFUL AMERICANS/' ETC, 
 
 H^itb nbtstrations hy Florence Scomel Shinn, Faumy Y. Coxy, 
 F. R. Gruger and May Wilson WalUns 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 
 1904 
 
Copyright, 1904, by henry holt and company 
 
 The stories in this volume were copy- 
 righted separately as follows: 
 
 Foe's Raven in An Elevator, 1903, by the 
 Ladies' Home Journal. — A West Point 
 Startj copyright, 1903, by the Saturday 
 Evening Post. — The Song that Sold, copy- 
 right, 1903, by the Saturday Evening Post. 
 — The $3,000 Skates, copyright, 1903, by the 
 Saturday Evening Post. — The Widow Calla- 
 han's Christmas Dinner, copjrright, looi, by 
 the National Press Association. — Why the 
 Delegate Walked, copyright, 1903, by the 
 Saturday Evening Post. — 'Dam White, 
 copyright, 1903, by the Saturday Evening 
 Post. — How the Cricket Cricks, copyright, 
 
 1902, by the Delineator. — The Education 
 of a Butterfly, copyright, 1904, by the Cen- 
 tury Co. — Their Wedding Day, copyright, 
 
 1903, by the Saturday Evening Post. — 
 Mrs. Smith's Husband, copyright, 1900, by 
 
 Half 
 
 Harper's Weekly. — The Bottle, the Hal] 
 Brick and the Lump of Chalk, copyright, 
 1901, by the Independent. — For Divers 
 Reasons, copyright, 1901, by the Saturday 
 Evening Post. — Little Miss Flutterly on 
 What is Doing, copyright, 1904, by Leslie's 
 Mcithly. — Little Miss Flutterly on Poli- 
 tics, copyright, 1904, by Leslie s Monthly, 
 — My Golf, copyright, 1902^ by the Cen- 
 tury Co. — Mrs. Bidwell's Tea, copyright, 
 ic)02, by Ainslee's Magazine. — A Suburban 
 Christmas, copyright, 1902, by Ainslee's 
 Magazine. — How to Write a Novel for thg 
 Masses, copyright, 1901, by the Atlantic 
 
TO 
 
 MARY FULLERTON LOOMIS 
 
FOREWORD 
 
 Blessed be the man who first thought of 
 Foreword as the title of the little chords 
 one strikes before settling down to the per- 
 formance of the great work that is to fol- 
 low. Preface was a very good word in 
 itself, but it connoted things that one had 
 read and wished he hadn't, and at last the 
 label PREFACE on a collection of initia- 
 tory phrases insured their not being read by 
 the unthinking. Now the unthinking read 
 books just as much as the thinking do — 
 nay, more; for where there is one thinking 
 person there are of course ten unthinking 
 ones : and so writers tried to get hold of a 
 word that would mean as much (or as little) 
 as " Preface," but that should hold no un- 
 pleasant associations in its content, and 
 finally one bright fellow hit on Foreword 
 and it leaped into favor. 
 
Foreword 
 
 I have been asked whether the title of this 
 book means that the Americans in it are 
 More Cheerful than you would expect them 
 to be or that they are more cheerful than 
 those in " Cheerful Americans," or whether 
 it is just a title. 
 
 The last would be the correct guess. The 
 6ook had to be named ; for whereas it would 
 doubtless be an excellent thing to get up a 
 book that had no name, a great deal of time 
 would be wasted in calling attention to it. 
 
 Fancy saying " Have you read ? " 
 
 And then, too, hoardings completely cov- 
 ered with 
 
 FOR SALE AT ALL 
 BOOK STORES 
 
 would simply perplex a great many people, 
 and the first rule of advertising is " Be 
 lucid." So as it was conceded to be a ne- 
 
Foreword 
 
 cessity that the book have a title, it was de- 
 cided to use the title of the former book and 
 merely add More to it. More in itself con- 
 notes something literary. Remember Han- 
 nah? Also Sir Thomas? 
 
 I have said that it connotes something lit- 
 erary because I like the word connote. For 
 years I did not know what it meant, al- 
 though I saw it used every day by writers- 
 under twenty-five years of age. Of course 
 I knew when to use it (one uses lots of 
 words he can't define), but I didn't quite 
 know what it meant until one day, long after 
 I began to use it, when its meaning dawned 
 on me ; and then I realized what a fine word 
 it was, and how likely it was to give " stren- 
 uous " a run for first place. What a lottery 
 the chance of the popular use of words is! 
 Little and big words lie in the dictionary, 
 veritable violets of modesty and retirement, 
 until some man in search of a new way to 
 
Foreword 
 
 express an oM, old thought, reaches in and 
 picks one up, and it is bandied about and is 
 flaunted in the face of the public until it 
 becomes actually brazen — and violet would 
 be its last connotation. (I am not sure but 
 that I like " connotation " even better than 
 "connote.") 
 
 And that explains how we came to call 
 the book More Cheerful Americans. 
 
 C. B. L. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Poe's Raven in an Elevator ...... i 
 
 A West Point Start . . . , i8 
 
 The Song That Sold 45 
 
 The Thousand Dollar Skates 67 
 
 The Widow Callahan's Christmas Dinner . 88 
 
 Why the Delegate Walked 99 
 
 'Dam White iii 
 
 The Education of a Butterfly 138 
 
 How the Cricket Cricks 139 
 
 Their Wedding Day . . . . ^ . . . 147 
 
 Mrs. Smith's Husband 166 
 
 The Bottle, the Half Brick and the Lump 
 
 of Chalk 173 
 
 For Divers Reasons 188 
 
 Miss Flutterly on What is Doing . . . 19S 
 
 Miss Flutterly on Politics and the Drama . 204 
 
 My Golf ,.213 
 
 Mrs. Bidweix's Tea 233 
 
 A Suburban Christmas 247 
 
 How to Write a Novel for the Masses . . 273 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 "We Joined Hands and Circled Around the 
 
 Furnace." By Florence Scovel Shinn .... 
 
 Frontispiece 
 
 "Being, as it were, in a Cage." By Florence 
 
 Scovel Shinn II 
 
 "I Used to Spend Hours in Front of the 
 
 Looking-glass." By F. R. Gruger 23 
 
 "The Little Composer Found that among the 
 
 Furniture was a Grand Piano." By F. R. 
 
 Gruger 65 
 
 "He Said I'd Double Him up if He Thought 
 
 Much About Me," By F. R. Gruger .... 83 
 "You've Got to Stop Paintin' that Door or 
 
 I'll Call a Sympathetic Strike of all the 
 
 Cooks in Town." By Florence Scovel Shinn . . 106 
 "He Says He's Just Going to Close the Store 
 
 to Go to Your Wedding." By Florence Scovel 
 
 Shinn 155 
 
 "Why are You not Working?" By Florence 
 
 Scovel Shinn 173 
 
 " Wasn't Cecilia Loftus' Ophelia Sad ? " By 
 
 May Wilson Wat kins 212 
 
 "He Was an Old Golfer Himself." By 
 
 Fanny V. Cory 215 
 
 "My Son Saw Him Drop." "Ry Fanny Y. Cory . 224 
 "'Airy Park,' said Tom, with a Shiver." By 
 
 Florence Scovel Shinn 254 
 
MORE 
 CHEERFUL AMERICANS 
 
 Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 
 
 THE reading was to be in the apartment 
 of Mrs. Atwater, who had done so 
 much for the Sunshine Day Nursery, and 
 had sold two hundred dollars' worth of 
 tickets. 
 
 Mrs. Atwater lives on the fifth floor of 
 "The Waterloo," and one has a choice of 
 ways to her rooms. For those who are fond 
 of Alpine exercise there are five flights of 
 stairs, but for those who prefer to exercise 
 in other ways there is an elevator. If there 
 had been no elevator there would have been 
 no story to tell. You see, the elevator was 
 put in at least twenty years ago, and it is 
 neither so swift nor so accurate as those of 
 
2 Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 
 
 to-day. Old age affects elevators as it does 
 people, and this one would be content to go 
 up two floors instead of six, arid it often 
 gives out when half-way up and flatly re- 
 fuses to go any farther. Then there is noth- 
 ing to do but to get out and continue the 
 journey on foot. 
 
 It was a little after three-thirty in the aft- 
 ernoon. Most of the audience had assem- 
 bled, and most of them had walked up, be- 
 cause it was one of the elevator's balky days. 
 Those who lived in " The Waterloo " had 
 often commented on the fact that on days 
 of receptions, when an elevator was most 
 needed, this elevator found difficulty in 
 mounting higher than the second or third 
 floor. 
 
 But to-day it was not the elevator that was 
 causing the buzz of excitement in Mrs. At- 
 water's parlours; it was the fact that the 
 reader who was to entertain the assembled 
 audience had not come. 
 
 It is now time to divulge the fact that I, 
 
Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 3 
 
 Bertram Harland, was the reader, and al- 
 though I am generally the soul of punc- 
 tuality I was at half-past three nearly a mile 
 away from Mrs. Atwater's on an Elevated 
 train that was delayed, owing to trouble 
 with the third rail. Two is company and 
 three is a crowd, and the Elevated never had 
 any trouble until it introduced the third rail 
 — to the other two. 
 
 But at last the train pulled into my sta- 
 tion, and I raced down the steps and made 
 my way through slippery streets to " The 
 Waterloo." 
 
 The hall man who opened the door for 
 me is also the elevator man, and as I am a 
 frequent visitor to the apartment and know 
 the ways of the elevator I asked if it was 
 running. 
 
 " Creepin' 'd be better," was his answer. 
 " There's a reception upstairs, an' it has the 
 heaves." 
 
 I was winded by my hurry from the sta- 
 tion, so I asked him to " creep me up," and 
 
4 Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 
 
 we entered the cage together at a quarter to 
 four. 
 
 Up, up, up we went. After a time I 
 looked out at the landing and discovered that 
 we were passing the second floor. 
 
 " Slow but sure," said I to the attendant. 
 
 " It's slow, all right, but ye can't be sure 
 till ye'r up," said he. 
 
 Then I heard a voice from above. It was 
 that of Mrs. Atwater. 
 
 "Is that you, Mr. Harland?" 
 
 " It is I. I beg a thousand pardons. I 
 was detained by a block on the Elevated." 
 
 " Oh ! I thought maybe it was the elevator 
 that was detaining you. Every one is here, 
 and we're only waiting for you." 
 
 " Well, tell them that I am in the build- 
 ing. I'd walk up, but it would put me out 
 of breath. Can't read when I'm out of 
 breath." 
 
 " No, of course not," said Mrs. Atwater. 
 " Well, I'm awfully glad you're here. 
 Thought something dreadful had happened 
 to you. I'll go in and announce you." 
 
Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 5 
 
 I thought it a trifle premature, for we 
 were only passing the third floor; however, 
 she left and I said to the elevator man: 
 " What sort of an elevator is this ? " 
 
 " A highdrawlick," said he, as if it were 
 spelled that way. 
 
 I told him I thought I recognised the 
 drawl perfectly, but I was somewhat afraid 
 we shouldn't go very high. " She seems to 
 be stopping now," said I. 
 
 Michael coaxed her, and at last we passed 
 the fourth floor; then, after an agony of 
 suspense, as the phrase is, I saw the sign 
 " Fifth Floor." 
 
 But it was like Moses's view of the prom- 
 ised land — I got no farther. The elevator 
 bobbed and bumped and then came to a dead 
 stop, like Mahomet's coffin mid heaven and 
 earth — or, to be more literal, between the 
 fourth and fifth floors. 
 
 "What's up? "said I. 
 
 " Not the elevator," said Michael with ill- 
 timed levity. 
 
6 Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 
 
 " Water given out ? " 
 
 " No, I'm afear'd somethin's broke." 
 
 "Well, let me out," said I, picking up 
 my little satchel containing Shakespeare's 
 plays and the poems of Tennyson, Poe and 
 Browning — for it was on such fare that I 
 was to regale my hearers. 
 
 Michael was willing enough. He took 
 my umbrella, and, standing on the seat, 
 tried to reach the latch of the door above. 
 But he could not do it. 
 
 " Let me down, and I'll go out at the 
 fourth floor." 
 
 " Can't do that, either," said he. " We're 
 caged all right." 
 
 " That's a pretty how-de-do. I've got to 
 read to all those people up there." 
 
 This plainly interested Michael, and hav- 
 ing nothing else to do he proceeded to ques- 
 tion me. 
 
 "Is it rade to them? What'll you rade 
 to them for?" 
 
 " Because they've come to hear me." 
 
Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 7 
 
 "And can't they rade for themsilves? 
 Sure, my Nelly is only eight, and she can 
 rade." 
 
 He was plainly surprised that in this en- 
 lightened age such people as he had seen 
 climb the stairs needed to be read to. While 
 he was revolving it in his mind Mrs. At- 
 water came into the hall again. 
 
 " For mercy sakes ! What are you do- 
 ing?" 
 
 " We're stuck. I'm afraid I can't get 
 out." 
 
 " Oh, goodness, but you must come out. 
 Michael, can't you squeeze a little higher and 
 let Mr. Harland out ? It's awfully late, and 
 so many of the people are suburbanites, and 
 they are fidgeting." 
 
 Michael now seemed to realise for the 
 first time that the case was important. He 
 scratched his head vigorously and finally 
 seemed on the point of saying something, 
 when there came a voice from below. 
 
 "Mike!" 
 
8 Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 
 
 "What is it?" 
 
 " Stay up there. There's something 
 broke, and I've telephoned for a man. Don't 
 bring her down." 
 
 " I won't," said Michael with a wink at 
 me. It was plain to be seen that he did 
 not mind sitting in the cage doing nothing, 
 earning his wages just the same. 
 
 Mrs. Atwater had come down to the half 
 landing, and she looked in at me much as if I 
 were a rare bird that she wished but had 
 not money enough to buy. 
 
 " What shall I do, Mr. Harland? All the 
 tickets are bought and paid for, and I hate to 
 give the money back, because the Sunshine 
 Day Nursery needs it so. Could you give 
 the reading to-morrow ? " 
 
 " You mean if I get out in time? No; I 
 go West to-morrow to be gone until the end 
 of the season. I might give it in here," 
 said I, jokingly. 
 
 "Why, to be sure," said matter-of-fact 
 Mrs. Atwater. 
 
Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 9 
 
 Mrs. Atwater is one of those people who 
 hate to give up a thing once they have de- 
 cided to do it, and for her a marred ceremony 
 is better than none at all. Better a marriage 
 without a minister or a bride than a post- 
 ponement of a wedding. Better Hamlet 
 with the hero miles away than no perform- 
 ance ; and before I could protest she had run 
 upstairs and disappeared. But I could hear 
 her saying in her earnest voice : " Mr. Har- 
 land is stuck between floors on that miserable 
 elevator and he can't get out. How many 
 are willing to listen to him in the hall? All 
 those in favour of it will please signify it in 
 the usual manner." 
 
 There was a perfect shout of " ayes." 
 
 " Contrary minded." 
 
 There were a few feeble " noes," but the 
 question was carried, and out came Mrs. 
 Atwater, her face wreathed in smiles, and 
 said : " It's all right. They can sit on the 
 stairs and in the two halls and they'll hear 
 you perfectly well." 
 
lo Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 
 
 Something seemed to strike Michael as 
 funny, and I can guess what it was; but 
 Mrs. Atwater, like all very earnest persons, 
 has a very limited sense of the ridiculous, 
 and to her the affair was delightfully uncon- 
 ventional and charming, with nothing incon- 
 gruous in it. 
 
 I suppose if I had been doing it merely 
 to oblige I would have refused to become 
 ridiculous for any one; but the seventy-five 
 dollars that was to become mine at the end 
 of the reading was — well, it was seventy- 
 five dollars, and let those who can, throw 
 seventy-five dollars away. I have never 
 formed the habit of doing so. 
 
 So the people poured out with camp-stools 
 — most of them women, with a sprinkling 
 of girls, and here and there a man who wore 
 upon his face the foolish look that lone men 
 in mobs of women habitually carry. 
 
 It took them some minutes to get seated, 
 and then they had to make way for a stout 
 man who lived on the sixth floor, and who 
 
Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 1 1 
 
 looked an astonishment that was too deep 
 for words as he made his slow way up 
 through the chattering bevy of femininity. 
 
 " Ladies and — gentlemen," said I, " I 
 want you to feel that this is quite informal. 
 Platforms, pulpits and soap-boxes, but never 
 an elevator for a rostrum in all my experi- 
 ence, and yet I've had my share of ups and 
 downs." 
 
 This provoked a few smiles from the 
 thoughtless, and having broken what ice re- 
 mained unbroken I said : " Being, as it 
 were, in a cage, there will be a certain ap- 
 propriateness in my first number, Poe's ' Ra- 
 ven.' " 
 
 There was a kid-gloved clapping of hands, 
 
 a unanimous squeak of camp-stools, and 
 
 then I began, while Michael sat at my side 
 
 and stared at me : 
 
 "'Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, 
 weak and weary, 
 Over many a quaint and curious volume of for- 
 gotten lore, — 
 While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there 
 caine 5 tapping ' " 
 
1 2 Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 
 
 (Voice from main hall: "Mike, what 
 are you doing up there?") 
 
 This was followed by the ringing of the 
 elevator bell and giggles from some of the 
 younger women. 
 
 Michael (in a whisper) : 
 
 " I'd like to answer him, sir ; that's Mr. 
 Hunt, the agent." 
 
 " Go ahead," said I, resolved to make a 
 new start when this interruption should have 
 ceased. 
 
 " Mr, Hunt," said Michael, calling down 
 the shaft, "we're stuck between the fourt' 
 and fift' floors, and a gentleman is radin' to 
 the people." 
 
 " What's that ? " came back in stentorian 
 tones. Michael repeated his information, 
 and then we heard a heavy tread and Mr. 
 Hunt came up. I never shall forget the ex- 
 pression of his face when he saw the crowd 
 of women sitting in the halls and on the 
 stairs. 
 
 " What in — time is the matter ? " 
 
Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 1 3 
 
 I should have liked to sink down the 
 shaft, — in the elevator, — but Mrs. Atwater 
 explained to him in her tense, important way 
 that the reading had been booked for that 
 hour in aid of the Sunshine Day Nursery, 
 and that as Mahomet couldn't come to the 
 mountain the mountain had come to Ma- 
 homet. 
 
 " Well, I'll be swiggled," was all that Mr. 
 Hunt said. Then he went down, while we 
 heard queer grunts issuing from his throat. 
 
 I sat down beside Michael and idly fin- 
 gered the pretty volume of Poe's poems. 
 
 " I think you'd better begin again," said 
 Mrs. Atwater, smiling sweetly at me. " I 
 don't believe there will be any more inter- 
 ruptions, now that Mr. Hunt knows what's 
 the matter." 
 
 I was not so sure of that, for I heard ham- 
 mering in the basement and judged that the 
 machinists had come. 
 
 I began again and read along swimmingly 
 for several verses. Although it is highly 
 
14 Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 
 
 improbable that Michael understood the 
 
 meaning of the poem, he was alive to the 
 
 rhythm of the thing, for he kept audible time 
 
 with his heavy foot until I brought one of 
 
 mine down on it with decision, and then he 
 
 stopped, while I went on: 
 
 " ' Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there 
 wondering, fearing '" 
 
 " Wishing that the door they'd ope and let 
 me out upon the floor." 
 
 This interpolated line, as I afterward 
 learned, came from a young Harvard man 
 who was home for the Easter vacation. He 
 was listening at a half-opened door, and 
 his ready wit nearly ended my usefulness as 
 a reader, for not only was his metre perfect, 
 but he " sensed " my wishes exactly. How- 
 ever, I affected not to hear him and went on : 
 
 " ' Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortals ever dared 
 to dream before; 
 But the silence was unbroken '" 
 
 Only it wasn't, for here a voice from 'way 
 
 below called out : " Mike, where's that 
 
 monkey-wrench ? " 
 
Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 15 
 
 " Oh, for the love of heaven, will ye never 
 stop ? Kin I answer him, sir ? " 
 " Yes, answer him, Michael." 
 " Be the furnace door, I told ye before. 
 
 Shut up. A gentleman's radin' a story to 
 me. 
 
 " Chase yerself," was the derisive message 
 from below, and then I cut in with : 
 
 " ' And the only word there spoken was the whispered 
 word, "Lenore?"'" 
 
 Suddenly the impossibility of the whole 
 thing came over me and I looked appealingly 
 at Mrs. Atwater, hoping that she would re- 
 lieve me; but she was evidently for seeing 
 the thing through to its end, so I continued : 
 
 "'This I whispered '" 
 
 " Did you say the wrench was by the fur- 
 nace door?" 
 
 This chimed so perfectly with the rhythm 
 that every one noticed it, and I could hear 
 the young collegian chortling in his room; 
 but now I was angry and determined to go 
 on, no matter what happened. 
 
1 6 Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 
 
 " ' This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the 
 word, " Lenore : " 
 Merely this and nothing more.' " 
 
 As if to give me the lie at this juncture a 
 noise like that of a newly opened boiler 
 factory came up the shaft. The workmen 
 were hammering on metal of some kind, and 
 the din came to us as if our ears were at 
 a speaking tube. Hammer ! hammer ! ham- 
 mer! 
 
 One line was rendered inaudible, so I 
 shouted the next: 
 
 " ' Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder 
 than before.' " 
 
 This was too much even for Mrs. At- 
 water, and she dissolved in smiles behind her 
 fan. As for the rest of the audience, they 
 represented every form of laugh. 
 
 " Mrs. Atwater," said I, " this has degen- 
 erated into a farce and is no longer a read- 
 ing. I simply can't do anything more until 
 we are released from this. Do you suppose 
 we ever shall get out of here? " 
 
Poe's "Raven" in an Elevator 17 
 
 ^tf 9 99 
 
 " ' Quoth the raven, " Nevermore.' 
 (This from the collegian.) 
 
 But at this moment there was a cry from 
 below : " All right up there." And Michael, 
 pulling the wire cable, we began to ascend, 
 and a minute later I stepped out upon the 
 fifth floor. I was followed by my audience, 
 excepting Michael, who went to the regions 
 below. 
 
 " Now, Mrs. Atwater," I said, " we will 
 continue the reading without further inter- 
 ruptions." 
 
 When I left the apartments an hour later 
 I walked down the stairs. An elevator can 
 depress as well as elevate. 
 
A West Point Start 
 
 IT was in the wintertime and a special 
 train was bearing a company of men up 
 to Syracuse to attend the T. M. A. dinner. 
 Whether T, M. A. stands for Tired Men's 
 Association or Trinitarian Ministers' Alli- 
 ance or Travelling Men's Amalgamation is 
 not vital to the purposes of this tale. The 
 special had been chartered for pleasure and 
 the host was Tom Chandler, advertising 
 man, who is responsible for the pictures of 
 pretty girls that serve to enliven the adver- 
 tising pages of the present-day periodicals. 
 He had gathered together a congenial crowd 
 to accompany him, have a good time on the 
 way and make speeches at the dinner. 
 
 There were men of business who were 
 glad to take their noses from the grindstone 
 for a few hours.; a clever draughtsman who 
 kept up his business even on the train, for 
 
 he drew caricatures of every one in the 
 i8 
 
A West Point Start 19 
 
 party; a clergyman to leaven the lump and 
 an actor to offset him — if he needed offset- 
 ting; and in the whole company there was 
 not a man whose life had been plain sailing 
 from the time he had begun to shift for him- 
 self. 
 
 Why, the clergyman had begun life as a 
 canal boy with a ttiephitic vocabulary of 
 which it had taken him several years to rid 
 himself, and the actor had studied for the 
 priesthood, but had been seized with doubts 
 of his fitness just about the time the first 
 Pinafore company struck his town, and hav- 
 ing a good bass voice he had changed from 
 candles to limelight and a career of varying 
 success. One of the business men had hoped 
 to become a great painter, and had led the 
 struggling, buffeted life of an artist for ten 
 years until it was brought home to him that 
 he had no real talent for the brush; and 
 then he had gone into the real-estate busi- 
 ness and made a fortune in five years. On 
 the othef hand, the artist had tried business 
 
20 A West Point Start 
 
 after business with never a thought of art 
 and never a ghost of success until one day 
 his left arm was broken, and while he was 
 lying idle in bed he had drawn to amuse 
 himself and had discovered that he had the 
 talent that the other man had lacked. And 
 to-day his name is known wherever New 
 York papers penetrate, and jealous artists 
 say he has commercialised his art, and his 
 wife is glad of it because — well, aren't his 
 sons going through college ? 
 
 Only one, the advertising man, had begun 
 in the line in which he had continued, but he 
 had amassed the biggest fortune, which is 
 perhaps proof that concentrative force along 
 one channel leads a man higher sooner than 
 energies poured into various channels — and 
 perhaps it's only a mixed metaphor. 
 
 It took the members of the party an hour 
 really to warm up to the pleasures of the 
 day, but by the time luncheon had been dis- 
 cussed and the fact that it was a pleasure 
 party had dawned on every one they fell to 
 
A West Point Start 21 
 
 telling stories, and after several anecdotes 
 with snappers of wit at their tail-end had 
 been perpetrated, and the clergyman had told 
 a capital story of a best man who stole his 
 fee, the man with the curly and extremely red 
 hair and the mobile mouth, who had hitherto 
 kept silence, overcame his diffidence and told 
 a tale of West Point. 
 
 " Your story of the dishonest best man," 
 said Robert Green, he of the auburn hair, 
 " reminds me of the turning point in my 
 career which, by a curious coincidence, was 
 also West Point. You said that the scene 
 of your story was laid near Cornwall-on- 
 the-Hudson, which is the next station be- 
 yond West Point. Rather far-fetched, but 
 I want to tell my story, and one beginning's 
 as good as another." 
 
 " Say," said Tom Chandler at this point, 
 " let's get together so we can hear you bet- 
 ter." 
 
 After they had formed a semicircle of 
 rattan easy-chairs with Robert Verplanck 
 
22 A West Point Start 
 
 Green, the red-headed raconteur, facing 
 them, they all lighted cigars and stretched 
 themselves out comfortably and he began. 
 
 " This story begins with me on my up- 
 pers, to speak somewhat metaphorically. 
 As a matter of fact, I did have a decent busi- 
 ness suit on my back, but only sixty-eight 
 cents between me and bankruptcy. Have 
 any of you ever been as nearly penniless as 
 that?" 
 
 The cartoonist, who was something of a 
 character observer, said in his big bluff 
 voice, " Run along, honey. We've all been 
 there more than once." 
 
 " Sure," said the actor, looking up the 
 river toward Troy, and nearly every man in 
 the party nodded assent. 
 
 "Well, I had tried hotel clerking and 
 three or four businesses that did not call for 
 any great amount of training, but I was not 
 a success at any of them. In fact, at that 
 time the only thing I could do better than 
 most people was to mimic and impersonate. 
 
■I USED TO SPLi\D HOURS IN FRONT OF THI. LOOKING-GLASS." 
 
 P. 23. 
 
A West Point Start 23 
 
 When I was a kid and ought to have been 
 studying my arithmetic I used to spend 
 hours in front of the looking-glass trying to 
 look like a miser or a madman or a minister, 
 and when I wasn't doing that I was apt to 
 be imitating the cries of all the animals I 
 had ever heard and all the dialects I had 
 ever read. I slid through school somehow, 
 but the day I left I could give old Elijah 
 Kellogg's flamboyant speech of Spartacus 
 to the gladiators at Capua, 'Ye call me 
 chief/ and ye do well — to call him chief// 
 etc., with much more spirit and understand- 
 ing than I could give the various rules of 
 grammar and arithmetic. 
 
 " Pretty poor equipment for life, and so I 
 had found it. In the intervals of making 
 stabs at different occupations I tried reciting 
 at Sunday-school and lodge entertainments, 
 but there wasn't much money in it, and I 
 had to satisfy myself for the most part with 
 the thought that here at least there was 
 something I could do without breaking 
 down. 
 
24 A West Point Start 
 
 " Well, one day in December I found my- 
 self out of a position in the neighbourhood 
 of West Point with, as I said, just sixty- 
 eight cents in my pocket, a moderately de- 
 cent suit of clothes on my back, and the rest 
 of the winter before me. 
 
 " I didn't know a soul from whom I could 
 borrow money, but I did want to get to New 
 York the worst way because I felt that I 
 could easily get something to do there. I'd 
 never been in New York or I might not have 
 been so sanguine. 
 
 " It was snowing hard when I got to West 
 Point and night had settled down. I had 
 intended to go as far as I could and then 
 to try to get a lodging for the night, and 
 the next day I hoped to strike New York, 
 for I was a good walker and sixty-eight 
 cents ought to pay for bed and breakfast 
 somewhere. 
 
 " I don't know what it was that impelled 
 me to leave the railroad track at West Point 
 and to mount up the steep hill that leads 
 
A West Point Start 25 
 
 to the hotel and the Academy buildings, but 
 I did toil up there, and when I was half- 
 way up I knew I was going to seek shelter 
 at the hotel. 
 
 " When I passed the buildings of the Mili- 
 tary Academy and thought of the youngsters 
 who were learning something that would 
 give them life positions I felt pretty bitter 
 toward them and looked on them as a fa- 
 voured class. Why hadn't I been entered 
 at West Point? I was strong, my grand- 
 father had fought in the Rebellion; I really 
 deserved something of my country. Cer- 
 tainly I deserved better than to be on the 
 verge of starvation, with nothing doing and 
 nothing in sight except the winter snow that 
 was very much in evidence and very damp 
 and chilling. 
 
 " I reached the hotel in course of time, 
 and going up to the desk I asked the old 
 gentleman who was standing behind it 
 whether he could give me a position as clerk. 
 I think he was the proprietor — or maybe 
 
26 A West Point Start 
 
 he was the clerk himself. At any rate he 
 gave me the laugh and said there wasn't 
 enough doing to keep half a man busy ; that 
 there were only two guests in the hotel and 
 that they were both going away in a day 
 or two. 
 
 " Now I had never begged, because I had 
 never got down quite so low before, but the 
 old chap had a sort of a kindly look about 
 his eyes and I wanted to make that sixty- 
 eight cents last a little longer, so I was just 
 going to ask him for the loan of a dinner 
 when something inside of me said, * Regis- 
 ter, you fool,' and I turned the register 
 around and registered my name and — my 
 birthplace. That was as near home as any- 
 thing I had, having been an orphan for ten 
 years with a different abiding place for every 
 year. 
 
 " When I had trailed out my signature he 
 looked up at the clock and said, ' Supper is 
 ready. Will you go up to your room now 
 or wait until after supper ? ' 
 
A West Point Start 27 
 
 " My stomach said ' Get your supper 
 quick ! ' but I looked at my hands and said 
 I guessed I'd go and wash them. I've heard 
 of fellows that always dress for dinner, even 
 when they are dining alone in a desert or on 
 a raft in mid-ocean, but I only had one suit, 
 so I limited my preparations to a good wash, 
 and while I was doing it I was asking my- 
 self how in the world I was going to pay my 
 board bill. 
 
 " You can imagine that supper tasted 
 good, because I had not had a bite since the 
 night before, being anxious to preserve my 
 little hoard of pennies. I won't tell you the 
 names of the things that I ate, because it 
 wasn't so much what they were as the way I 
 felt at getting them inside of me. An empty 
 stomach never asks questions. 
 
 "I lingered long and lovingly over that 
 supper, and the good-natured darky who 
 waited on me helped me twice to roast beef 
 just because I asked him where he was born 
 and gave him a chance to reminisce, and I 
 
28 A West Point Start 
 
 felt that he had earned the dime I gave him 
 when he had finished, although I really 
 didn't see how I could afford it. It isn't 
 every waiter that gets one-seventh of a man's 
 capital as a tip. 
 
 " When I went back to the office I said to 
 the proprietor, ' Guess it's warmer here than 
 it is in my room, so I'll keep you company if 
 you don't mind.' 
 
 " The hotel man was a genial soul with a 
 drawling, comfortable voice, and we sat up 
 to the stove and talked hotel business. I 
 knew a good many of the ins and outs of it, 
 of course, although I wasn't in any danger 
 of becoming a Leland. 
 
 " While we were sitting there a young 
 cadet came in to call on his father, who was 
 one of the two guests, and after he left the 
 office I said, ' They're an ugly lot, aren't 
 they ? Give you trouble with their pranks ? ' 
 Oh, no,' said he in his easy, lazy voice, 
 'they're all right. They're the same stuff 
 that gave us Grant and Sherman and Sheri- 
 dan, you know. Pretty nice boys.' 
 
A West Point Start 29 
 
 " Then I vented what was left of my 
 spleen against West Point, but there really 
 wasn't much. It's hard work to be cross 
 when your stomach is full, I have an idea 
 that the stomach is the most ill-tempered 
 member of the body, and when he's busy he 
 has no time to be cross and the rest of you 
 doesn't want to be. 
 
 " While we were sitting there talking 
 there came a ring at the telephone bell and 
 the old man stepped to the 'phone. 
 
 " The one-sided conversation ran some- 
 thing like this : 
 
 " ' Hello ! — hellohello ! — yes, this is the 
 West Point Plotel. 
 
 " ' What ? — I didn't get that. You can't 
 get the West Point Mills — oh, you can't 
 get West Point Military Academy. Their 
 telephone's out of order? Yes, I know it. 
 I understand. What do you want ? What- 
 do-you-want? Hello! hello! 
 
 " * Oh, you're Percival Ingraham, the lec- 
 turer. You're to give a lecture there ? 
 
30 A West Point Start 
 
 "'Oh, you caught cold? What's that? 
 Hellohello! You caught cold? Oh, you 
 can't come! Yes 
 
 (" ' Wait a minute, Central. No, no, I'm 
 not through.) Where are you? 
 
 " ' At Schenectady ? Train delayed ? 
 Oh, I understand. Want me to send word 
 to the Academy? Sorry for you. Hard 
 lines. 
 
 "'Yes, I'll send word. What's that? 
 Oh, goo'-bye.' " 
 
 Mr. Green had given a very excellent imi- 
 tation of the attitude and speech of a man 
 at the telephone — eyes closed, voice steady 
 and low at the beginning, but rising and 
 irascible at the end owing to the interrup- 
 tions of Central, and when he was through 
 the little pleasure party gave him a round of 
 applause which he took very much as if he 
 were used to it, merely inclining his head 
 and then going on with his story. 
 
 " Gentlemen, I don't know whether you 
 see what I saw, but I want to tell you that 
 
A West Point Start 31 
 
 Opportunity was ringing that bell as hard 
 as could be, and just as soon as I gathered 
 from the old man's repetitions that some one 
 was to have lectured at West Point that 
 night I determined to take his place if such 
 a thing were possible. I knew enough about 
 such things to be sure that as far as West 
 Point was concerned the lecturer was minus 
 a fee, but that as far as the cadets were con- 
 cerned they were hungry for amusement of 
 some kind — and if t could please them at 
 all I stood to win out. 
 
 " The old man hung up the receiver and 
 ' rung off,' and then he stepped over to the 
 desk and was just going to ring a bell for 
 the hall boy when I said, 'What's the 
 trouble? ' and stayed his hand. He was one 
 of those men who can't do more than one 
 thing at a time, and it never occurred to his 
 hand to bang the bell because his tongue was 
 talking. 
 
 " ' Why, this man Percival Ingraham,' 
 said he, < \yas going to give a lecture over 
 
32 A West Point Start 
 
 in Memorial Hall, and he's stuck beyond 
 Schenectady and can't make it. Too bad all 
 'round. He's done out of his fee and the 
 boys will miss his talk. Telephone's out of 
 order at the Academy and he had to call me 
 up. I could have told him the other tele- 
 phone was out of order because I tried to get 
 Colonel Miller this afternoon and couldn't.' 
 
 " While the old man was talking I was 
 making up my mind. I asked him whether 
 the lecturer was known at West Point and 
 he said he knew he'd never appeared there, 
 but that old General Malet, of St. Louis, 
 who was stopping there, had heard him at 
 home and had said he was a splendid lec- 
 turer. 
 
 " If he was not personally known to the 
 people at West Point I stood some chance of 
 successfully carrying out the scheme that 
 had popped full grown into my head. 
 
 "'When was the lecture to begin?' I 
 asked. 
 
 " The old man looked at the clock. ' It's 
 due to begin now,' said he. 
 
A West Point Start 33 
 
 " ' Well, let me take the message over to 
 the Academy. I'd like to see something of 
 the buildings.' 
 
 " * Oh, dear, no,' said he ; ' it's a wild, 
 stormy night. I'll send the porter.' 
 
 " ' Yes, but I'd like to go,' said I, getting 
 up and feeling pretty nervous. I felt I mtist 
 go and I didn't want any misunderstanding 
 of my motive to prevent it. 
 
 " The upshot was that I ran to my room 
 and got on my overcoat and then I came 
 down and learned all I was able to learn 
 from the hotel man. It wasn't much, but at 
 least I ought to be able to play my part all 
 right. Of course, you've tumbled to the 
 fact that I intended to give them a show 
 myself. You know in my business anything 
 is a lecture that isn't a concert or a sleight- 
 of-hand performance. 
 
 " I turned up my coat collar, put on my 
 gloves, which were not any too warm, and 
 faced the storm. It was a tedious walk in 
 the face of the wind and snow, but I was 
 
34 A West Point Start 
 
 urged forward by a desire to do my prettiest 
 before an audience that I felt would be stern- 
 ly critical and perhaps antagonistic. 
 
 " Just as I reached the hall a sleigh drove 
 up to it. It flashed through my mind that 
 it had been down to the station to meet the 
 lecturer, and that in a minute or less the 
 driver would go in and tell the authorities 
 that the lecturer had not arrived unless I 
 could prevent him, so I hurried up to him 
 and said as nonchalantly as I could with my 
 heart doing double time, ' Did you go down 
 to meet me ? ' 
 
 " * Are you the lecturer, sir ? ' said he. 
 
 " ' Yes,' said I shortly. 
 
 " * Yes, sir. I don't see how I missed 
 you,' said the driver with a good deal of 
 chagrin, and casting an anxious glance at 
 the entrance to the hall as if he expected 
 some one in command to come out and be- 
 rate him. 
 
 You were late,' said I, summoning my 
 nerve, and I could see by his face that I had 
 hit it. 
 
A West Point Start 35 
 
 " I was feeling tiptop now. So I handed 
 him a quarter, thereby cutting me down to 
 something like thirty cents. 
 
 " The fellow touched his hat and wheel- 
 ing around he drove off hurriedly and I 
 made my way into the brilliantly lighted 
 building. 
 
 " If you've never seen Memorial Hall you 
 ought to run up to West Point some day 
 just to see it. It is a beautiful piece of 
 architecture, worthy of the cause it stands 
 for. It would be beautiful in any land, but 
 it looked particularly beautiful to me, for I 
 was half-frozen from my walk and it was 
 warm inside, and warmth and beauty are 
 the same thing when you're very cold, I 
 was met at the door by a handsome young 
 officer, plainly a Southerner both by his ac- 
 cent and his appearance. 
 
 "He was evidently expecting me for he 
 held out his hand and murmured the name 
 of the lecturer. As for me, I plucked up a 
 double handful of courage and said, 'I'm 
 
36 A West Point Start 
 
 sorry to be so late and I'm awfully sorry 
 there is no time for me to change to evening 
 clothes. Accident on the road, and I 
 thought I'd better come at once without 
 going to the hotel. Couldn't get you on the 
 telephone.' 
 
 " ' No,' said he, ' the telephone has been 
 out of order all day.' 
 
 " As he spoke we walked toward the stairs 
 that led to the auditorium and he was in too 
 much of a hurry to notice that I had abso- 
 lutely no baggage. 
 
 " * Your audience is waiting for you,' said 
 he, ' and the boys are beginning to get a 
 little impatient. I think if you tell them 
 why you're late it will make a good begin- 
 ning; although I suppose you don't need to 
 be told the proper thing.' 
 
 " He led me through the hallway and up 
 a noble staircase decorated with bronze tab- 
 lets and with portraits, some of them notable 
 by virtue of their painters and others notable 
 solely on account of the subjects, until we 
 
A West Point Start 37 
 
 came on one of the most brilliantly lighted 
 halls I was ever in. It did me good to see 
 the light because a great light is one of the 
 best things a lecturer or an actor can have. 
 There were at least three hundred incandes- 
 cent lights set in the ceiling and they gave a 
 gala air to the stunning-looking audience 
 that was waiting for — waiting for Bob 
 Green, ex-hotel clerk and potential tramp. 
 
 "Of course, they thought they were wait- 
 ing for Percival Ingraham, brilliant lecturer. 
 If they had known the truth then I think 
 there would have been a general exodus, for 
 five feet five surmounted by a mop of red 
 does not ordinarily carry conviction." 
 
 " Were you nervous ? " asked Tom Chan- 
 dler, making the first interruption since 
 Green had begun his story. 
 
 " Yes, of course I was, but I was not half 
 so nervous as I had been just after I made up 
 my mind to undertake the deception. In 
 fact, when I actually faced my big audience 
 I was scarcely nervous at all. I couldn't 
 afford to be. 
 
38 A West Point Start 
 
 " Captain Randolph — that was the name 
 of the young officer who had met me — 
 asked me if I cared to be introduced. 
 ' You're so well known it won't be necessary, 
 will it ? ' he said. I could see that he was 
 nervous, and so I said laughingly ( and with 
 a great deal of truth), 'I'm not so well 
 known as you think, but it really won't be 
 necessary. I'll introduce myself and break 
 my own ice.' And then I mounted the steps 
 that led to the stage and advanced to the 
 table with the inevitable pitcher of water on 
 it, and bowed to my audience. 
 
 " And it was an audience to do a fellow's 
 heart good and to make even a tyro do good 
 work. In the middle seats were five hun- 
 dred splendid-looking cadets. I tell you as 
 soon as I saw them all antagonism vanished. 
 They were so erect, so stalwart, so natty, so 
 alert. They were flanked on their right by 
 a number of the officers with their wives, the 
 latter in full evening costume to pay honour 
 to the man with thirty cents in his pocket. 
 
A West Point Start 
 
 39 
 
 On the left of the cadets were the members 
 of the garrison, including the band — minus 
 their instruments. All three classes out for 
 a good time and absolutely depending upon 
 me to give it to them. And me innocent of 
 any sort of lecture. 
 
 " I don't remember just how I opened my 
 remarks, but I do know that when my lack 
 of evening dress was noticed there were sev- 
 eral covert glances of surprise, and so I 
 made the most of my predicament, as you 
 may imagine. Whatever I may have said, 
 it seemed to strike the cadets just right, for 
 they burst out into laughter and applause 
 that gave me a boost toward success. 
 
 " It wouldn't interest you if I told all I 
 did, but among other things I imitated Dan- 
 iel Webster, and not a cadet there could say 
 from personal knowledge that my imitation 
 was a bad one. I had gotten it from my 
 grandfather, who was a born mimic and 
 who happened to be a Member of Congress 
 for several terms while Dan'l was casting 
 
40 A West Point Start 
 
 that magnificent eye of his around the cham- 
 ber and endangering the chandeher's integ- 
 rity with the thunders of his voice. 
 
 " Then I came down to imitations of peo- 
 ple I had seen and heard, and told stories, 
 and those boys applauded everything that 
 was worth applauding and I don't know but 
 some things that weren't worth it. 
 
 " Well, when I went off and Captain Ran- 
 dolph came around to congratulate me I felt 
 that little Bob Green, ex-hotel clerk and 
 man-in-want-of-a-job, had found it, all 
 right. 
 
 " Why, I felt as if I were seven feet high, 
 and as if the United States were Heaven and 
 the cadets were angels, and that it was per- 
 petual summer outside, and that dates were 
 growing on all the trees irrespective of the 
 kind of tree, and that if Daniel Webster 
 could have looked in on my triumph he 
 would have said, ' Never in my life, young 
 man, did I er^r enthrall an audience as you 
 have enthralled this one.' Consider what I 
 
A West Point Start 41 
 
 had been before supper and you won't blame 
 me for getting the big head. 
 
 " The boys went trooping out with their 
 military stride, imitating my imitations, and 
 followed by the officers and their wives and 
 last of all the soldiers of the post, and then 
 the business man of the combine came into 
 the little room and said, 'Well, I suppose 
 that now you'd like me to do a little business 
 with you. It was a good show.' 
 
 "And then, for the first time, it struck 
 me that I was in a fair way to become dis- 
 honest. Whoever that money belonged to 
 it didn't belong to me and I said impulsively, 
 ' I want to see Colonel Miller.' 
 
 " Colonel Miller is the high muckamuck 
 of West Point, and I suppose it was a little 
 like saying to a man in front of the White 
 House, * Say, will you run in and tell the 
 President that I want to see him out here 
 for about five minutes?' But I got the 
 Colonel and he was a very unassuming, 
 agreeable gentleman, too. I didn't give him 
 
42 A West Point Start 
 
 a military salute, but I gave him an ex-hotel 
 clerk's bow and then I said, ' Colonel Miller, 
 were you satisfied with the entertainment 
 this evening ? ' 
 
 " He expressed himself as having been 
 very much delighted and said that it would 
 do the boys good, and when he was through 
 I said : 
 
 " ' Thank you, I feel repaid ; but I want 
 to say that I can't accept the money that this 
 gentleman wants to give me because — well, 
 you see, I've played a trick on you all.' 
 
 " The Colonel stared at me in surprise. 
 
 " As hastily and as briefly as I could I told 
 him all about myself and the events of the 
 evening and the temptation to which I had 
 yielded, and I wound up by saying, ' If you 
 think I have earned a fee, all right, but, of 
 course, the money this gentleman has was 
 intended for Mr. Ingraham, and does not 
 belong to me.' 
 
 "The Colonel thought a minute, plump- 
 ing his right fist into his left palm and then 
 reversing the process, and at last he said : 
 
A West Point Start 43 
 
 " * Your course was a little unconven- 
 tional, but you certainly succeeded in amus- 
 ing the boys, and that's what they came here 
 for to-night, and although you don't seem 
 to be a regular but only a volunteer, still 
 there's no doubt but you're the hero of this 
 occasion, and to the victor belong the spoils.' 
 Then he offered me his hand, waved me 
 toward the treasurer and left the room. 
 
 " But just then I had a new thought, al- 
 most as brilliant as the first one. I said, 
 ' Wait a minute ' to the treasurer and I fol- 
 lowed the Colonel out into the auditorium. 
 • Colonel Miller,' said I, * would it be out of 
 the ordinary run for me to ask for a testi- 
 , monial that I can use in a circular? I feel 
 that this is a turning point in my career. If 
 I can entertain West Point cadets I suppose 
 I'll do for 'most anybody.' 
 
 " The Colonel elevated his brows prodig- 
 iously, coughed deeply and pursed up his 
 lips, and then he said, * Young man, I won- 
 der why you never succeeded before.' 
 
44 A West Point Start 
 
 "That was all. Then he left me with the 
 treasurer." 
 
 The train slackened up as it ran into Al- 
 bany. The little group began to say appre- 
 ciative things to Mr. Green, but the most 
 eminently practical one of the lot, the one 
 who was engineering the excursion, said : 
 
 " I'd like to know, if it's a fair question, 
 how much the treasurer had in his pocket 
 for Mr. Ingraham?" 
 
 " Two hundred dollars in crisp tens." 
 
 "And the owner of the thirty cents got 
 it?" 
 
 " He did." 
 
The Song That Sold 
 
 IT was on the return trip from the T. M. 
 A. dinner at Syracuse that a demand 
 for a story was made on Tom Chandler. 
 Why it is that when grown men are travel- 
 ling together and want to have a good time 
 they turn to story telling I do not know, 
 unless it is to prove that at heart they are 
 nothing but children. But that really 
 doesn't need proof, because we all know 
 that the biggest kid at a game of baseball is 
 the old gentleman with the close-clipped 
 siders who howls his head off with delight 
 at a three-bagger. Despite our average 
 solemnity we Americans are children, and 
 children of a pretty decent sort, too, which 
 naturally brings us back to that big child 
 and thorough-going good fellow, Tom 
 Chandler. 
 
 After ministering to the necessities of the 
 
 45 
 
46 The Song That Sold 
 
 crowd that sat around him in the easy wicker 
 chairs and assuring Isaac, the ebon-headed 
 darky, that nothing more was needed of 
 him, Tom made himself comfortable in the 
 swiftly but smoothly moving car and struck 
 a few preliminary chords on his organ of 
 speech. 
 
 "I don't know anything you haven't 
 heard — unless it's about myself," said he. 
 
 The actor looked as if he would like to de- 
 liver a discourse on the same topic, but he 
 said nothing, being a man with a strong grip 
 on himself—" reserve force " the critics call 
 it — and Tom plunged into his story with- 
 out further delay. 
 
 " I believe most of you know," said he, 
 " that I began as errand boy in the office of 
 which I am now the Whole Thing and most 
 of my money has been made in advertising, 
 but I once took a flyer in music that — well 
 I might as well tell you all about it, because 
 it goes to show that once in a while a Happy 
 Fluke will net a man more of the Needful 
 
The Song That Sold 47 
 
 than months of Honest Toil, and it also 
 shows that Little Tommy knew too much 
 to follow the Will-o'-the-Wisp any farther 
 after he had succeeded in grabbing the gold 
 off her wings. 
 
 " About five years ago, when I first began 
 really to realise that there was big money in 
 the advertising business, there was a poor 
 little chap who lived in the same apartment 
 house that sheltered me. I used to meet him 
 climbing up to his room near the clothes- 
 lines, and he had such a sad face that he in- 
 terested me and I struck up an acquaintance 
 with him. He was an Artist with a capital 
 A and no mistake — wedded to his Art and 
 pledged against divorce, as my friend 
 George Ade would say. Now, I'm not an 
 authority on music, but that little chap could 
 certainly knock some very fetching tones out 
 of that rattletrap piano of his, and when he 
 was playing' you forgot that it only cost him 
 about two dollars per month in the way of 
 rent. Upon my word, if you had shut your 
 
48 The Song That Sold 
 
 eyes you would have imagined that it was 
 that Alma-Tadema piano that Henry Mar- 
 quand paid $60,000 for. 
 
 " It was a rattlebox, all right, for when- 
 ever I tried to knock harmony out of it chaos 
 resulted, and I used to think it wasn't worth 
 thirty cents. Possibly it was I who made 
 it look like thirty cents, for I am not a Pad- 
 erewski a single day in the week. 
 
 " The melancholy-eyed musician was not 
 only a pianist but a composer as well, and, 
 as near as I can make out, he believed that 
 he was in the same line as some of the old 
 Harmony Kings who ruled in Europe in the 
 last century, and I am dead sure that as far 
 as externals went he was leading the same 
 kind of life they led. He was up against it 
 morning, noon and night except when he 
 was composing, and then I really believe he 
 was in a suburb of Heaven — just about six 
 miles out and going in as soon as the draw- 
 bridge closed. 
 
 " He told me that there were four or five 
 
The Song That Sold 49 
 
 musicians in town who believed in him, and 
 who knew that after the sod was nicely knit- 
 ted over him people would be getting gay 
 with his music, but that for the present every 
 publisher turned down his music so quick 
 that he had given up showing it at all, and 
 just went on composing to keep himself 
 from being miserable. 
 
 " Once or twice I staked him to a dinner 
 because he seemed lonesome eating by him- 
 self, and anyway, bread isn't half so inter- 
 esting as a table d'hote dinner with music. 
 However, I want to say that after the first 
 table d'hote with music my sad-eyed friend 
 suggested that if there was to be a repetition 
 of the festive affair I cut out the music, as it 
 gave him the Willies to hear it. 
 
 " Of course you understand that the lan- 
 guages I am using are my own and not the 
 composer's. He could understand me all 
 right because he came of Proper Americans 
 in the vicinity of Hartford, and in his boy- 
 hood — before he became engaged to Music 
 
so The Song That Sold 
 
 — he had indulged in slang, but now, the 
 boy — he wasn't over twenty-five — was 
 generally too miserable to use anything but 
 the best English and he left the slang to me. 
 But he was on to my curves all right and 
 had a kind of humanness about him that 
 made me sorrier than ever for him. Some 
 of these musicians are dead to the world and 
 to everything but themselves and music, but 
 this chap would laugh when I read him a 
 bit out of Dooley, and I understand he had 
 Stevenson by heart, and he knew good archi- 
 tecture from bad, and used to tell me that 
 some day people would wake up and find 
 that we have buildings right here in New 
 York that would have made a Greek happy 
 for a fortnight. 
 
 "One day I took one of little Seventh- 
 Floor-Back's compositions to a musician 
 who is way up in G and I handed it to him 
 to play, telling him that it was a song that 
 my grandmother used to sing when she first 
 landed from Warsaw in 1802, and that I 
 
The Song That Sold 51 
 
 thought it was rubbish, but that maybe he'd 
 like it because it was so old. 
 
 "Well, that musician — he was a real 
 lover of music and not a professional critic 
 at all — he played that thing over and over 
 and over, and he said that it might have 
 been composed by a modern of the moderns, 
 that Richard Strauss would have been glad 
 to father it." 
 
 " Don't you mean Johann Strauss ? " said 
 the actor with a wise look, 
 
 " No, I don't I asked him that, and he 
 looked at me kind of tired with a Went- 
 Away-Willy look and said, * Tom, Richard 
 Strauss is the chief apostle of the music of 
 the future,' and then he said that he didn't 
 believe it possible that my grandmother 
 could ever have sung this in 1802. 
 
 " So then I told him that, come to think 
 of it, my grandmother wasn't bom until 
 1830 and that she didn't know Old Dan 
 Tucker from Marching Through Georgia, 
 and that this music was by a little starving 
 
52 The Song That Sold 
 
 American composer with a face that would 
 make Russell Sage burst out crying, and a 
 knack with a piano that would make a con- 
 cert grand out of a melodeon. 
 
 "Well, his enthusiasm cooled somewhat, 
 but he still said that it was a very notable 
 piece of music, and that if the young man 
 kept at it long enough he might do some- 
 thing very much worth while, and that if it 
 had really been by Richard Strauss he 
 should be glad to play it in public, but that 
 no one would stand for it as the work of a 
 man living between Third and Fourth Ave- 
 nues, Borough of Manhattan." 
 
 " Hadn't the courage of his convictions, 
 eh ? " said the cartoonist, who was the only 
 free silver man in his particular suburb and 
 was proud of his backbone. 
 
 "No; few people have," said Tom, flick- 
 ing the ashes of his cigar all over the waist- 
 coat of the man on his right and then apolo- 
 gising for it. 
 
 "Well, now, I've got to side-track the 
 
The Song That Sold 53 
 
 Dope-Eyed Musician and talk about myself 
 again, and that's always a pleasant task. 
 One day I took it into my head that I could 
 compose a song myself because it seemed to 
 come so easy to my friend. I have a pretty 
 good ear and I can pick out a tune on the 
 piano with any one finger of either hand, 
 including both thumbs, and I found a piece 
 of verse with a catchy line in it and just 
 picked out a tune to it. As soon as I had 
 got it so that I could play it the same three 
 times running I went up six flights and 
 knocked at the door of the composer's room. 
 As good luck would have it he had just fin- 
 ished a piano composition or I might have 
 knocked until I had fox bites on all my 
 knuckles and never got a response. But 
 having got rid of his idea he was lying down 
 on the haircloth-granite sofa that took the 
 place of three chairs and a bed, and when 
 I knocked he said * Come in.' 
 
 "He looked as pale as a ghost and as 
 hungry as a rat, and I found out that he 
 
54 The Song That Sold 
 
 had been at work on his composition for ten 
 hours straight away, and, when you realise 
 that he knew that not a publisher in New 
 York City would touch it and that it was 
 all done to the Glory of God, as my old 
 mother used to say, you'll believe that I felt 
 the little Tone Hitter was something of a 
 hero. And I also thought some thinks 
 about the publishers that would have taken 
 up all the dashes in the font to express. 
 
 " But quick, before the wonderful air 
 could escape me, I went to the piano and I 
 said, ' Say, Theodore, you're not the only 
 Beethoven on the block and I want you to 
 hear me make Chopin look like thirty cents.' 
 
 " Theodore was always a good-natured 
 chap. (By the way, he was named Theo- 
 dore Thomas after the orchestra leader; his 
 mother had been a great admirer of Thomas 
 when he had an orchestra in New York and 
 so she saddled his name on her first-born, 
 and was tickled to death when he decided 
 to starve to slow music.) Well, as I say. 
 
The Song That Sold 55 
 
 he was a good-natured chap, and he actually 
 sat still and let me play my abomination on 
 the piano, and when it was finished he said, 
 with a sort of second-hand smile, * That is 
 different from both Chopin and Beethoven. 
 It wouldn't have entered their heads to do 
 that.' 
 
 " And I told him that I knew that was 
 no bouquet from the way it was put up, 
 but if he would set the notes down on paper 
 and then harmonise them so that a no- 
 handed deaf and blind man could play them 
 on sight I'd give him ten dollars. 
 
 " Say, boys, it was honest pathetic to see 
 the way his eyes widened when he heard the 
 words Ten Dollars. Gee, the poor chap 
 hadn't supposed there was that much left in 
 the world. In a twinkling he had pushed 
 me from the piano and had played my tune 
 all through without making a mistake, and 
 when he'd finished I said to myself, ' You're 
 all right, Tom Chandler. Conried will 
 want you to write an opera for Caruso and 
 
56 The Song That Sold 
 
 Sembrich before the winter is over, and 
 you'll have Harry B. Smith begging your 
 music for his four hundred and fifty-fifth 
 libretto. Oh, I tell you I felt like a con- 
 servatory, I was throwing so many bouquets 
 at myself. And it was all in his touch, you 
 see. 
 
 "Of course I had a scheme in my head. 
 I wasn't really such a loo-loo as to suppose 
 that I was marching ahead of Mendelssohn, 
 Wagner and Victor Herbert, the sidewalks 
 lined with the populace, and plutocrats in the 
 .Waldorf-Astoria waving thousand-dollar 
 bills and crying ' Hurrah for Tom Chandler, 
 the World's Greatest Composer.' I was 
 simply an advertising man with a scheme. 
 I believe that you can place anything from a 
 Uneeda firecracker to a fake actor if you 
 advertise enough. I asked Theodore about 
 how many days it would take him to har- 
 monise my immortal work, and he gave me 
 another of his shopworn smiles, and taking 
 out a pencil and paper he began work at 
 
The Song That Sold t^^ 
 
 once. Talk about musicians being unbusi- 
 nesslike! I never saw a man who attended 
 to business like him. Why, the whistle blew 
 six while he was at work, but he never 
 turned a hair, but kept right on, and inside of 
 half an hour he had produced the entire line 
 of goods and spread them out on the key- 
 board for me. Oh, Motherdearjerusalem, 
 that tune of mine was glorified ! It was as 
 if you picked up a bit of dirty, mouse-col- 
 oured cloud and allowed the escaping sun to 
 saturate it with its rays for a few seconds 
 until it was turned into a rainbow-coloured 
 palace. I could hear Wagner splashing 
 over the River Styx on his way to tell me 
 that the Chandler-Theodore combine was 
 the best ever, and that if we wouldn't mind 
 taking Tristan and Isolde and not doing a 
 thing to it he would return late that after- 
 noon perfectly happy. 
 
 "As soon as the thing was on paper I 
 handed Theodore a ten-dollar bill and then 
 I blew him off to a dinner without music. 
 He gave me the address of a music copyist 
 
58 The Song That Sold 
 
 to whom I took the music and the verses and 
 asked him to make me a fair copy. 
 
 " He was an old, long-haired Grerman on 
 Second Avenue, with a collar that he had 
 begun to wear when Wilhelm moved into 
 that Berlin residence of his, and he had never 
 taken it off out of respect to the Emperor — 
 but he knew good music, all right 
 
 " ' Dot iss de vairst tune I effer heered, 
 but you haf harmoniced it noply,' he said. 
 
 " The next day I took the music down to 
 Sternmeyer & Meyerstern, the eminent pub- 
 lishers of coon songs. 
 
 " There was a long line of people waiting 
 to get their songs published, and at every 
 desk in the establishment there sat a broad- 
 jawed tough. I am not much of a heel 
 cooler — one can't afford to be in my busi- 
 ness — and so I passed beyond some of 
 those who had been waiting since early 
 morning for an interview, and I beckoned 
 with authority to one of the toughs. He 
 came up, rolling his head from side to side 
 
The Song That Sold 59 
 
 with a * wotderhell ' swagger, and I said, 
 ' I'm a very busy man and I want this piece 
 of music tried by your pianist as soon as 
 possible.' 
 
 " Yoii see, I knew a little about their ways 
 of doing things, as I helped advertise * Baby 
 Pulled the Cat to Pieces.' 
 
 " * Come in ter-morrer,' said the tough, 
 reaching out for the manuscript. 
 
 " ' Not on your immortal Sarony,' said I, 
 pulling the music out of his reach. * In my 
 business there is no such day as ter-morrer.' 
 Then, to prevent delay, I showed him my 
 card and it fetched him. Even a publisher 
 of coon songs had heard of my firm, and he 
 said to a younger tough, not over ten, 
 ' Petey, take dis gent's card into Mr. Meyer- 
 stern an' see dat he gits it, see ? ' 
 
 " In not more than a minute Mr. Meyer- 
 stem came out and bowed oilily to me and I 
 returned the bow as quick as I could. I told 
 him straight from the shoulder what was 
 the matter with me and that I was an adver- 
 
6o The Song That Sold 
 
 tising man who was prepared to co-operate 
 with him in the floating of a song. ' Never 
 mind who wrote it,' I said, * but let's have 
 your Paderewski entice it from the piano ! ' 
 
 "The only way to get along with these 
 men is to meet them on their own ground. 
 I saw that I had made a hit with him from 
 the way that he kept repeating 'Entice it 
 from the piano.' 
 
 " We went into a little room partitioned 
 off from the private office of the firm and 
 containing two or three chairs, an upright 
 piano and portraits of celebrated people that 
 you never heard of unless you are interested 
 in coon songs. A short-haired young man 
 in a loud suit was playing the raggedest rag- 
 time march I ever heard. He played as well 
 as a mechanical piano, and no matter where 
 he lands he'll be able to earn a living as long 
 as he has those accurate fingers and the mus- 
 cles in his arms and his sense of rhythm. 
 Rapidity and muscle and a correct ear spell 
 a good salary to any man who is tough 
 
The Song That Sold 6i 
 
 enough to take with the patrons of the 
 Coney Island resorts, and this young man 
 was tough enough. 
 
 " He played my tune through without a 
 mistake, but it did not sound as good as 
 when Theodore had played. Meyerstern 
 kept his head swinging to it, and when the 
 young man had finished he called in Stern- 
 meyer, saying, * Otto, this is for us, sure.' 
 
 " The young man at the piano said, ' Der 
 tune's catchy, all right, but der harmony's 
 all wrong.' A conflict of authorities. The 
 German copyist had thought the harmony 
 all right, but the air needed ventilating in his 
 opinion. Well, I wasn't unduly elated, as I 
 really hadn't much opinion of the ivory 
 thumper's taste, and I stood ready to back 
 my little composer as against myself every 
 day in the week. 
 
 "We soon came to terms, and as I am 
 something of a hustler I had them get that 
 song on the market before the end of the 
 next week. When it comes to hustling 
 
62 The Song That Sold 
 
 Sternmeyer & Meyerstern are supposed to 
 be pretty quick, but, if I do say it, I had 
 them gasping. I made them get out an 
 edition of fifty thousand at the start with a 
 cover design made by one of my own artists 
 — the fellow who did those stunning posters 
 for the Block Island Road that I showed 
 some of you the other day in my office — 
 and owing to my influence as an advertising 
 man I induced some of the old-line houses 
 to handle the song. I also hired through 
 my representatives small boys who belonged 
 to church choirs in the various big cities of 
 the country. They were trained to stand 
 outside of the theatres just about the close 
 of the matinees and sing the song as a quar- 
 tette and also to distribute handbills at the 
 same time — and it caught the caramel 
 chewers on the first bounce. Of course the 
 little choristers were voted too sweet for any 
 use and the song sold like hot cakes. Then 
 I took up a column in every one of the lead- 
 ing papers all over the country asking the 
 
The Song That Sold 63 
 
 question, ' Do you sing ( never mind what 
 song it was)? If not, why not? It is good 
 for the voice. Indorsed by every one with 
 a throat. For sale at all music stores.' 
 
 " Not only that, but I induced every or- 
 chestra leader in New York to play my song 
 at least twice every evening, and in one fash- 
 ionable uptown church it was sung as an 
 offertory with religious words, and that 
 started up a rumpus that was worth good 
 money to me. And of course I got them to 
 sing it at Feber and Wields. 
 
 " Well, most of you knew at the time 
 how the song took hold, although I haven't 
 mentioned its name, purposely. It went 
 like wild-fire all over the country, and Sousa, 
 who was at the Paris Exposition, played it 
 in that city, and it made quite an impression 
 on the Boulevardiers as being pretty good 
 music for Indians. I also secured a 
 French edition of it, and three months from 
 the day I sat down to outdo old Beethoven. 
 I had ck?^red $50,000. I had outdone him. 
 
64 The Song That Sold 
 
 " It goes to show what advertising will 
 do," concluded Tom as he rose from his 
 chair and cleared his throat. 
 
 But his auditors did not seem satisfied. 
 " You're not through," said the actor. 
 " What became of the sad-eyed composer ? " 
 
 Chandler sat down in his chair again and 
 cast his eye around the expectant ones. 
 
 " Well, honest," said he, " I attempted to 
 make him accept half of the money but he 
 wouldn't hear of it. And what's more, 
 he wouldn't allow me to advertise his own 
 music as being by the author of the other 
 thing. He acted a good deal like an ass, I 
 thought. He said, * I must be true to my 
 feelings, Mr. Chandler. Money is a nice 
 thing to have and I wish I could make such 
 a sum by my music, but I would debase my 
 art if I allowed myself to be advertised 
 through such a song as that. You paid me 
 liberally for my hack work and that ends 
 it' " 
 
 "And did that end it?" persisted the 
 3ctor, 
 
n 
 
 7U 
 
 « 
 
 < 
 
 P 
 H 
 
 S 
 
 & 
 
 H 
 H 
 O w 
 
 2 f^ 
 s I 
 
 ^E 
 
 q 
 
 P 
 o 
 
 H 
 
 CO 
 
 O 
 
 a. 
 
 o 
 o 
 
 H 
 H 
 
 w 
 
 Eh 
 
The Song That Sold 65 
 
 " You bet it didn't. I happened to have 
 a little house up near New Rochelle that was 
 without a tenant. I told Theodore that if 
 he didn't want to make me his enemy for 
 life that he'd have to be its caretaker, and 
 he finally accepted. But that was a good 
 deal to make out of a single song, wasn't 
 it?" 
 
 " Chandler, why don't you finish your 
 story," asked the clergyman, who was a 
 next-door neighbour of the advertising man 
 and knew him intimately. 
 
 " No more to tell," said Chandler. 
 
 " Nonsense," said the clergyman. " You 
 haven't any idea of an artistic finish. Well, 
 then, I'll tell it." 
 
 All eyes were now turned on the clergy- 
 man and he went on: "When the little 
 composer moved up to the cottage at New 
 Rochelle he found that among the furniture 
 was a grand piano and a music cabinet for 
 his manuscripts. 
 
 "And the Parisian house recognised the 
 
66 The Song That Sold 
 
 musical worth in the harmonisation of the 
 song and asked Mr. Chandler if they might 
 see more of his work, and he sent in one of 
 Theodore's sonatas for piano and violin, and 
 it was immediately published and performed 
 at one of the Colonne concerts. And of 
 course the Parisian cachet gave Theodore a 
 start in America and the publishers tumbled 
 over each other to get hold of his work." 
 
 "Yes, but that's Theodore's story; that's 
 not my story," said Tom. 
 
 " Well, the whole thing sounds like a fairy 
 story," said the actor, "one of the too- 
 good-to-be-true kind." 
 
 " But it is true," said Tom; " every word 
 of it except the name of the publishing firm. 
 But what jars me is that I've never had 
 another inspiration." 
 
The Thousand-Dollar Skates 
 
 THE company of good fellows were re- 
 turning in a special car from the din- 
 ner that they had attended in Syracuse. 
 They were the guests of that well-known ad- 
 vertising man, Tom Chandler, and they had 
 whiled away the time both going and com- 
 ing with stories of personal adventure for 
 the most part, and there was no man in the 
 party who was allowed to escape story-tell- 
 ing, although it did not fall to every man 
 to possess the charm of speech or manner of 
 the actor or the cartoonist. With the latter 
 it was not so much what he said as the de- 
 lightful way he said it, whereas in the case 
 of some of the others it was more the in- 
 trinsic interest of the story told than the 
 manner of the telling that made it memor- 
 able. The animal painter, the dry-goods 
 man, Tom Chandler himself; in fact 
 
 each man in the party of twelve had told a 
 67 
 
68 The Thousand-Dollar Skates 
 
 story, and it now fell to the clergyman to tell 
 his second. His first had been an anecdote 
 of a best man who stole the wedding fee 
 intrusted to him by the groom. 
 
 " Doctor Stringer, it's up to you again," 
 said Tom when the laughter following one 
 of his own jokes had subsided. Chandler 
 was just as slangy when addressing the 
 clergyman as he would have been in talking 
 to a man in his own line of endeavour, but 
 for the matter of that Doctor Stringer him- 
 self dropped into slang when occasion 
 offered, feeling that a bit of slang was often 
 merely an immigrant to the shores of lan- 
 guage and that it might be a matter of but 
 few years when it would hold perhaps an 
 aldermanic position in the body verbal. 
 
 Mr. Stringer waved his hands deprecat- 
 ingly. " I'm a better listener than talker," 
 said he. 
 
 " Now you know that's an exaggeration," 
 said Tom, " for I've stood on the outskirts 
 of a Sunday and you did all the talking. 
 
The Thousand-Dollar Skates 69 
 
 Tell us a church story. It will surely be 
 good." 
 
 " Well, then, I'll tell you about little Ar- 
 thur Boswell and the raising of our church 
 debt. It is a story that I should have la- 
 belled ' fiction ' if I had read it in a news- 
 paper, but to me its chief interest lies in its 
 being absolutely true down to the last word. 
 I have merely taken the usual prerogative of 
 changing names in order to avoid action for 
 libel in case this ever gets into print." 
 
 Here he looked at the special correspond- 
 ent, who actually winked at him. 
 
 "When I became rector of St. Cephas 
 (which was my first charge, by the way) I 
 didn't know that the little church overlook- 
 ing the Hudson was saddled with a mort- 
 gage of fifteen hundred dollars or I shouldn't 
 have accepted the call: I dislike debt as 
 much as some people dislike cats. But as 
 soon as I learned of its existence I deter- 
 mined to wipe it out if such a thing were 
 possible. 
 
JO The Thousand-Dollar Skates 
 
 " I will pass over my efforts with my ves- 
 try, as they amounted to nothing. If there 
 is anything more ineffectual than the aver- 
 age vestry meeting I have yet to learn of it." 
 
 " All business meetings are the same," 
 said the actor, who belonged to the Order 
 of Elks and was a member of his local fire 
 department. " Shakespeare had business 
 meetings in mind when he spoke of ' Words, 
 words, words.' " 
 
 The clergyman laughed approvingly and 
 continued : " After my non-success with 
 my vestry I attended a meeting of the 
 Woman's Auxiliary and, knowing that they 
 had the good of the church at heart, I asked 
 them if they did not think it would be a 
 good thing to wipe out the debt, and " (the 
 clergyman laughed softly at the recollection) 
 "one little woman said she thought it 
 would, and that she would embroider initials 
 on handkerchiefs that could afterward be 
 sold for fifty cents apiece at a church fair, 
 and that she would willingly do six of them 
 
The Thousand-Dollar Skates 71 
 
 to help along the cause. And another very 
 sporty woman whose husband kept a hotel 
 in the village suggested that we have a tur- 
 key raffle at her husband's. 
 
 " Of course I sat down promptly on that, 
 for when I became a minister I put aside 
 raffles and all games of chance and many 
 other things that I had indulged in when a 
 boy on the Erie Canal. 
 
 " Well, the women did show a good deal 
 of interest in the matter and were much more 
 businesslike than their husbands, but, after 
 all, it was a young lad who had come into 
 the room (in direct disobedience to his 
 mother) to ask where his skates were who 
 eventually extinguished the debt. 
 
 " ' Mommer,' said he, looking at me out 
 of the corner of his eyes and picking at the 
 buttons on her waist, ' Mommer.' 
 
 " Of course ' Mommer ' told him to run 
 along, and equally, of course, he stood stock 
 still, being a boy of average disobedience, 
 and said, ' Mommer, I know a way to pay 
 
72 The Thousand-Dollar Skates 
 
 the debt. Sell something to a man for a 
 certain price and then make him sell it to 
 some one else for twice as much, and so on 
 until its sold for what the debt was.' 
 
 " This not very lucid exposition was not 
 well received by his mother, who felt that he 
 was disturbing the meeting (although I am 
 sure that she was the only one annoyed). 
 But I called the boy over to me — he was a 
 manly, sturdy, erect little chap of about 
 twelve or thirteen — and I asked him how 
 he came to think of such a thing. 
 
 " ' Why,' said he in quick, nervous tones, 
 ' I read the other day about a boy who found 
 a mouse and traded it for a sick cat that he 
 cured, and then swapped her for a lame 
 dog that got over it, and swapped the dog 
 for a pony with the distemper, and the pony 
 got well and he swapped her for a horse, 
 and at last sold the horse for several hun- 
 dred dollars, and the mouse hadn't cost him 
 a thing. Now if you could get richer and 
 richer or generouser and generouser men,' 
 
The Thousand-Dollar Skates 73 
 
 said he, *to buy a pair of skates or most 
 anything, and they knew they were helping 
 the church, then we'd get a lot, and at last 
 you could go to some of these rich men that 
 they make fun of in the papers — I mean 
 men that feel wicked at having so much 
 money and who want to get right — you 
 know — why maybe we could get one of 
 those men to buy the skates for a large sum 
 and that would pay the debt, and maybe 
 there'd be money over so's we could build a 
 bigger church than ever. That would be 
 bully, wouldn't it?' said the boy. 
 
 " ' Perfectly bully, my son,' said I ; ' and 
 I will appoint a committee consisting of you 
 and some of your chums to sell those skates 
 over and over again.' 
 
 " Of course, every one thought I was jok- 
 ing excepting Master Arthur. And then tea 
 and cakes were served and Arthur was sent 
 out of the room by his overnervous mother 
 after he had secured a handful of cakes and 
 trod one into the rug, and every one sup- 
 
74 The Thousand-Dollar Skates 
 
 posed that the proposal was one of my jokes. 
 For I regret to say that at the outset of my 
 ministry I was inclined to be jocose and it 
 was several years before I lived down my 
 reputation." 
 
 " All the same, that was a bright idea of 
 the kid's," said Tom Chandler, whose busi- 
 ness mind at once scented possibilities in it. 
 
 "It was," said Doctor Stringer, "and 
 Arthur was one of the brightest boys I ever 
 knew. He was a great newspaper reader 
 and really knew more of what was going 
 on in the world than many a man of three 
 times his age. I dare say that more than 
 one of you have read some of his Monday 
 morning surveys of the money market in one 
 of the New York dailies, for Arthur is now 
 a financial reporter at the early age of 
 twenty-two. A brilliant boy. 
 
 " However, I don't want to get ahead of 
 my story. At first I had thought to have 
 Arthur and two or three of his chums go 
 around together with a pair of skates that I 
 
The Thousand-Dollar Skates y^ 
 
 donated to the cause, but I soon realised that 
 a man was needed to inspire confidence ; and 
 so I asked the clerk of the vestry, a Mr. Tur- 
 ner, as meek as Moses, but a perfect watch- 
 dog for integrity, and he and Arthur had a 
 good many amusing experiences, although 
 they were more amusing to Arthur than they 
 were to Mr. Turner, who was totally lacking 
 in a sense of humour. I don't want to make 
 this story too long or I should tell you about 
 his various receptions as he went from 
 parishioner to parishioner. There were 
 several very rich men in my parish but it 
 was not the richest who gave the most, and 
 Arthur sometimes had to try several houses 
 before he could get the subscription next in 
 order. Some would not double the amount 
 but did give sums like twenty or fifty dol- 
 lars, and that worried the boy a good deal, 
 as he had hoped to double it right along. 
 He had a piece of paper with the problem 
 all worked out. He was aiming at $1500, 
 the amount of the debt. 
 
jd The Thousand-Dollar Skates 
 
 " He told me that he went first to the 
 stingiest man he knew, who happened to be 
 a parishioner, and he explained his plan 
 while Mr. Turner stood by and nodded his 
 head solemnly — so the boy told me — and 
 then Arthur offered to sell him the skates 
 for ten cents — for in these doubling propo- 
 sitions you have to begin with a small 
 amount or you'll get into millions in no time. 
 The stingy man bought the skates on sight, 
 and then Arthur said it looked as if the 
 whole thing was spoiled because Mr. Stingy 
 wanted to keep the skates for. his son, who, 
 it seems, had been clamouring for a pair for' 
 over a month — in fact ever since cold 
 weather had set in — and the old man 
 thought that if he could get a pair of stand- 
 ard make for ten cents he would be foolish 
 to let them go ; but Arthur pierced his cuticle 
 in some way known to boyhood and came 
 away with the dime and the skates. The 
 first day of his quest he visited six men in 
 moderate circumstances and got money 
 amounting to $6.30." 
 
The Thousand-Dollar Skates 'j'j 
 
 " Slow work," said the cartoonist, who 
 was in the habit of receiving fifty dollars for 
 a cartoon and whose mind worked in big 
 numbers. 
 
 " Yes, the first day was slow, but the sec- 
 ond day Arthur and Mr. Turner visited 
 some ten of the richer members of my flock, 
 but only five put their names down for the 
 regular subscription, which was thereby ad- 
 vanced to something like $200. I've, told 
 this story before and I recall the figures. 
 Ah, Chandler's figuring it out." 
 
 Tom Chandler had been absent-mindedly 
 calculating what the tenth progression would 
 be, and he now announced it as $102.40, or 
 $204.80 for the total. 
 
 The clergyman did not seem to like the 
 interruption and drummed with his fingers 
 on the frost-covered pane. 
 
 " Some of those who refused to double the 
 amount already given promised to contribute 
 something to bring it to the required sum; 
 some denounced the whole proceeding as 
 
78 The Thousand-Dollar Skates 
 
 savouring of bunco, but most of them were 
 pleased at Arthur's straightforward manner 
 and rather enjoyed the fun of buying skates 
 that were doubling in value every few hours. 
 
 " But the next day Arthur found it a 
 thankless task. The amount was now in the 
 vicinity of $100, and, although there were 
 half a dozen millionaires who had villas on 
 the Hudson and who attended my church, 
 Arthur found but one who was willing to 
 give — How much is it ? " said Dr. Stringer 
 with just a suspicion of irritation. 
 
 " Two hundred and four dollars and 
 eighty cents," said Tom, totally unconscious 
 that he was worrying the good rector. 
 
 " That's it. When Arthur came to me 
 that evening he was very non-committal as 
 to his future plans. He said he could 
 count on an even $500 but he would not tell 
 me where he expected to get the thousand, 
 having totally exhausted our domestic mil- 
 lionaires. My whole congregation did not 
 amount to over one hundred communicants. 
 
The Thousand-Dollar Skates 79 
 
 which meant that there were not over twenty 
 heads of families. 
 
 " The rest of my story will have to be read 
 to you, as it is in the form of a letter. I 
 thought I might be called upon for a story 
 so I provided myself with material." 
 
 Doctor Stringer laughed genially (Tom 
 Chandler had stopped figuring) and took 
 from the inside pocket of his frock coat a 
 letter written in a boyish hand on some ten 
 hotel letter-heads. 
 
 " I did not hear from Arthur for a day or 
 two and in the last mail one Saturday night I 
 received this letter from him bearing a New 
 York date of the same day and fully ex- 
 plaining why he had not been to see me. 
 Next morning I saw him in church and he 
 told me the story again, but his written ac- 
 count is better than my memory of his verbal 
 one, although that was very picturesque. 
 
 " 'Dear Mr. Stringer, I thought I would 
 not say anything to you about what I meant 
 to do until it was done because I was afraid 
 
8o The Thousand-Dollar Skates 
 
 that I might fail. But I didn't and Mr. 
 Turner is going to take me to see " Ben 
 Hur " (I wish it were " Babes in Toy- 
 land ") to-night, so I won't see you till to- 
 morrow, which is the reason for my writing. 
 And anyhow I am glad of the chance because 
 Miss True said that we might write a letter 
 instead of a composition to hand in next 
 Wednesday and that it might be about some- 
 thing that really happened, and this really 
 did. I'm glad it did, for I can't make up.' " 
 
 Here Doctor Stringer looked up from the 
 letter to say, " I'm not going to mention the 
 name of the millionaire who figures in this 
 letter otherwise than as Mr. Blank, for I 
 understand that he does not court newspaper 
 publicity." 
 
 " ' Mr. Stringer I went down to the office 
 of Mr, Blank with Mr. Turner because I 
 knew he had crowds of money and they say 
 he is generous with it and I thought that 
 $1000 wouldn't be any more to him than a 
 cent would be to me and you. Mr. Turner 
 
The Thousand-Dollar Skates 8l 
 
 says to write smaller or I'll use up too much 
 hotel paper. We had lunch here and I am 
 writing in the office at a nice little desk wish 
 I had one like it.' (Arthur's punctuation is 
 not impeccable, but he's only misspelled two 
 or three words in the whole letter. ) * I 
 went down to the office of Mr. Blank and I 
 told a man at a gate that was inside of the 
 office that I wanted to see him and he 
 laughed at me and that made me mad and I 
 said that it was a matter that affected the 
 whole future of St. Cepha's I thought big 
 words would be good and I guess he didn't 
 understand what I meant for he looked kind 
 of astonished, so then I called Mr. Turner 
 and he came up and said what I'd said only 
 kind of bashful. Say, I'll bet Mr, Turner 
 hasn't been in New York much for he acted 
 kind of scared and afterwards I asked him if 
 it was Mr. Blank's money that made him 
 scared. My, I wouldn't be scared of a man 
 just because he had money. So then a door 
 in the back opened and a big man came out 
 
82 The Thousand-Dollar Skates 
 
 in a hurry and talked very loud and I kind 
 of guessed he was Mr. Blank the way the 
 clerk acted so I said out loud to him " Mr. 
 Blank I want to see you as soon as it's con- 
 venient." 
 
 " ' Mr. Turner says he expected that we'd 
 both he turned out of the place Because he 
 says that Mr. Blank has a quick temper but 
 I'll bet he likes boys for as soon as he heard 
 me he looked around at everybody in sight 
 and kind of chuckled deep down in his throat 
 and then he said " I can see you now sir." 
 
 " * Imagine, he said Sir to me but I think 
 he was only joking. Well Mr. Turner was 
 coming in too but he hasn't much nerve and 
 I told him to stay out. Sometimes when a 
 man shows he's frightened it makes teasers 
 pitch on to him same as a dog will and I 
 think Mr. Blank is a teaser. So I went in 
 alone and Mr. Blank he said as kind as could 
 be " What do you want ? " and I said " Mr. 
 Blank I want to sell you a pair of skates for 
 $1000 for St. Cephas Church " and he just 
 
O-ROtiiff 
 
 'HE SAID I'D DOUBLE HIM UP IF HE THOUGHT MUCH ABOUT 
 ME."— P 83. 
 
The Thousand-Dollar Skates 83 
 
 brought his two fists down on his desk with 
 a bang and he threw his head back and just 
 bellered like a bull. And when he had 
 stopped bellering and I saw he was only- 
 laughing his way I began to open the box to 
 show him that the skates were all right and 
 that I had them with me. And he wanted 
 to know if I had been long at that sort of 
 business because he didn't know but there 
 might be something in it for him and then 
 I saw he wasn't any one to be afraid of any 
 more than if he hadn't a cent so I told him 
 all about the debt and how people had dou- 
 bled the money until now we had $500 and 
 all we needed was just $1000 and then he 
 bellered some more and he made a joke then. 
 He said I'd double him up if he thought 
 much about me and then he asked me if I 
 was American born and I told him I was and 
 glad of it — and I am, you bet — I told him 
 I wouldn't be an Englishman for a good deal 
 because I'd got to them in my history and he 
 told me that when I was older I'd like them 
 
84 The Thousand-Dollar Skates 
 
 better and that Bunker Hill was a long time 
 ago and that the English were sorry for it 
 and then I thought that talk about history 
 wouldn't raise any money so I said " Well, 
 will you buy the skates? You're the last 
 one on the list and you may keep them." 
 
 " ' And then he bellered again and said 
 that if he did buy the skates he'd put them in 
 a glass case. And then he asked me a lot of 
 questions about what I learned and what I 
 played and what I wanted to be when I grew 
 up — and say, Mr. Stringer he says that if I 
 decide to go into business and not be a sol- 
 dier that he'll give me a place in his ofRce 
 and then he told me that he was an Episco- 
 palian himself and that surprised me because 
 I didn't suppose those very rich men had any 
 religion and he didn't seem to be giving me 
 the money because he was afraid at all but 
 just because he felt like it. I liked him, Mr. 
 Stringer, because he seemed real and because 
 I'll bet he was a regulyer of a boy when he 
 was young. I told him all about the time 
 
The Thousand-Dollar Skates 85 
 
 we went camping last summer at the lake 
 and while I was telling him the clerk brought 
 in a lot of cards to him but he just put them 
 on his desk without looking at them and 
 asked me a lot of questions that showed he 
 was interested in boats and Mr. Turner said 
 I had no business to take up his time that 
 way but he kept asking me questions and he 
 said — honest, Mr. Stringer, he said that 
 next summer if I reminded him of it he'd 
 take me to sail on his steam yacht' 
 (y-o-c-h-t). 'And then he took up his 
 check book and he made out a check for a 
 thousand dollars and gave it to me and I 
 gave him a receipt and then he bellered 
 again although I don't see why he did that 
 time and then he walked all the way to the 
 front door with me and shook hands with 
 me and the fellers at the desks stared good 
 and hard and so did Mr. Turner and I told 
 Mr. Blank that it was Mr. Turner and he 
 shook hands with him but not the same way 
 he did with me. Anyhow Mr. Turner 
 
86 The Thousand-Dollar Skates 
 
 seemed afraid to shake hands and I think the 
 reason is that he wasn't ever a real boy. He 
 can't swim ! But he was awful glad to see 
 the check and he felt so good that he's going 
 to take me to the theatre this evening. No 
 more now as I will see you to-morrow but I 
 don't see why they didn't stop that debt 
 years ago as long as it was so easy to do. 
 " ' Yours very truly, 
 
 " ' Arthur Boswell.' 
 
 " Well, you may imagine that I read the 
 letter with delight, and when Mr. Turner 
 came around to my rooms at midnight and 
 handed me the check with the signature of 
 the great man on it I felt like doing some- 
 thing substantial for Arthur." 
 
 "What became of the boy?" "Who 
 was the millionaire? " were the questions put 
 to the rector at this point. 
 
 "Arthur finished his course at the High 
 School and graduated without honours, as 
 he never was much of a student, but I had no 
 fears for his future, and the millionaire was 
 
The Thousand-Dollar Skates 87 
 
 as good as his word and took him into his 
 employ." 
 
 " Who was the millionaire ; was it Rocke- 
 feller ? " asked a man who ought to have 
 known better. 
 
 "I guess it was Pierpont Morgan," said 
 Robert Green, the hero of The West Point 
 Start. 
 
 " I'm not at liberty to say which of you 
 is right if either is, but as I said a while ago 
 the millionaire saw something in Arthur 
 and to this day he is the friend and ad- 
 viser of the boy. I met him not long since 
 at a Chamber of Commerce dinner and re- 
 called the story to him, and he told me that 
 he never paid a thousand dollars for any- 
 thing with more pleasure than when he 
 bought those skates. And then, as Arthur 
 would have said, ' he bellered.' " 
 
The Widow Callahan's 
 Christmas Dinner 
 
 VAN TWILLER CARHART never put 
 his hand into his pocket to relieve the 
 necessities of the poor. This was not so 
 much because he did not believe that the poor 
 were worthy of assistance as it was that he 
 hated to give something for nothing. He 
 would willingly pay fifty cents for a cigar 
 that ended in smoke, but as for giving even a 
 quarter to a beggar, why, the beggar might 
 end in smoke before it would occur to him. 
 I don't want to have you think that he was 
 a bit hard-hearted. If you told him a hard- 
 luck tale at the club he always listened at- 
 tentively, and on its conclusion he would 
 say : " Dear me ! But that's bad, ye know. 
 Awfully sorry to hear that," and then, be- 
 fore you could make an appeal on behalf of 
 88 
 
Christmas Dinner 89 
 
 the unfortunate one, he would rise languidly 
 from the divan and go down into the billiard 
 room and try to forget the sorrows of the 
 poor in a game or two. 
 
 But the Sunday before Christmas he had 
 attended divine service with that pretty Cart- 
 wright girl — one of the Baltimore Cart- 
 wrights — and the bishop, who often 
 preaches at St. Yseult's, delivered a short, 
 pithy sermon to the effect that we ought not 
 to be purse-proud and snobbish, but, after 
 the manner of the modern Greeks, we should 
 mingle freely with the poor, and if we can- 
 not help them in other ways, we should at 
 least help them in sympathy and kind words. 
 He finished by saying that, while kind words 
 in themselves went a long way, yet that sub- 
 stantial " pocket help " (as he called it) was 
 apt to make the kind words more memor- 
 able. However, that part of the sermon did 
 not appeal to Carhart — that hit his ada- 
 mantine side and glanced off. 
 
 Miss Cartwright was deeply moved by the 
 
90 The Widow Callahan's 
 
 bishop's words, and on the way down the 
 avenue she told Carhart that she supposed 
 there was no one in the congregation who 
 was not the better for having listened to the 
 sermon, and Carhart assented heartily. He 
 did not know that Miss Cartwright put all 
 her allowance for that month on the plate. 
 He himself, while deeply moved, had been 
 unable to contribute because he had nothing 
 smaller than a dollar bill with him, but he 
 made up his mind to make some one happy 
 on Christmas, if kind words and companion- 
 ship would do it. 
 
 He left Miss Cartwright in quite a glow 
 of feeling by his comments on the bishop's 
 sermon, and he entered the club a few min- 
 utes later so thoroughly softened himself 
 that when he heard Abernethy talking about 
 getting up a subscription for the widow of 
 Broker Haviland, who had suffered reverses 
 on Wall street and then shot himself, he 
 deeply regretted once more that a dollar was 
 the smallest bit of change he had, and hur- 
 
Christmas Dinner 91 
 
 ried into the reading room, where he im- 
 mediately busied himself in writing a letter, 
 and was dead to the world until Abernethy 
 left the club. 
 
 Carhart is a bachelor, and lives in the 
 Albert Edward, up near Seventieth street, 
 on Central Park West, That evening, as he 
 sat in his pleasant smoking room, he re- 
 flected once more on the words of the bishop. 
 Who was there to whom he could be com- 
 panionable on Christmas ? He knew so few 
 poor people. His man had his wages, and 
 he really did not know a soul who needed 
 kind words from a rich man. 
 
 Ah, but there was one, and luckily he re- 
 membered her. [Bridget Callahan, who had 
 done his washing for years, and who had 
 been their only servant in the old days when 
 his mother did a good share of the household 
 work herself, before his father was lucky 
 enough to buy Bell Telephone stock at 
 twenty-five cents a share. 
 
 " Bridget is the very one. I'm sure she 
 
92 The Widow Callahan's 
 
 must be poor, because she once told me that 
 she depended on my patronage and that of 
 Mrs. Harkins to keep her above water. I'll 
 go down and dine with her. I'm glad of an 
 excuse for declining the Vangelts' invitation, 
 I'll just go down to Bridget and make her 
 happy, as the bishop advised. Probably she 
 will have nothing more than turkey and 
 simple vegetables, wholesomely cooked, 
 and ice cream for a top-off, while the Van- 
 gelts' chef simply kills me with dyspepsia 
 whenever I go there." 
 
 Christmas dawned, frosty and glittering. 
 It had snowed the day before, and the air 
 was full of the tinkle of sleigh bells. Car- 
 hart spent the morning at the club, and then 
 he bent his steps toward the humble home of 
 Mrs. Callahan. His man had given him the 
 address, nor had he betrayed any emotion 
 at learning that Mr. Carhart expected to 
 dine there. Carhart was rather disap- 
 pointed. He would have liked It if Stacy 
 had said : " Oh, sir, but that's just like you 
 
Christmas Dinner 93 
 
 to carry Christmas joy to a poor wash- 
 woman." 
 
 The air was crisp and the walk invigourat- 
 ing, and by the time Carhart had reached 
 the neighbourhood of Mrs. Callahan's he felt 
 at peace with not only the whole world, but 
 the whole universe as well. He could have 
 wished that the part of Tenth avenue where 
 she lived was a little less savoury looking 
 and smelling, but probably Mrs. Callahan 
 was not a creature of exquisite sensibilities, 
 and she might have felt out of place in a 
 more prosperous neighbourhood, 
 f He finally paused at the number given. 
 A dirty-faced child was blowing a tin horn 
 on the pavement and Carhart asked him 
 where Mrs. Callahan lived. 
 
 " T'roo dat hallway in der rear. On der 
 foist floor." 
 
 Mrs. Callahan was just about sitting down 
 to a humble dinner of cow's liver and pota- 
 toes when the knock came, and seeing Van 
 Twiller, faultlessly attired, she uttered a 
 
94 The Widow Callahan's 
 
 " Glory be to God ! " of astonishment, not 
 praise, and then opened the door. 
 
 " Merry Christmas an' the saints be kind 
 to ye, an' what are ye doin' down here the 
 day? Sure I tuck your wash home last 
 evenin'." 
 
 "Merry Christmas to you, Bridget, and 
 many of them. Excuse my glove. I've 
 been thinkin' that maybe I don't do enough 
 to make people happy, don't ye know? 
 Bishop Cotta's nice sort of man. Been 
 preachin' 'bout it. Heard him, you know, 
 and here I am goin' to eat Christmas dinner 
 with you, er — for the sake of mother — 
 don't you know ? " 
 
 Tough and healthy as she was, for a mo- 
 ment Mrs. Callahan felt faint. She had 
 known Van Twiller ever since he was a baby, 
 and she knew that he was as mean as his 
 mother had been before him ; but Christmas 
 is a mellowing season, and she herself was 
 dining on liver because she had sent two dol- 
 lars to the little Shannon orphans around in 
 
Christinas Dinner 95 
 
 Forty-sixth street. And the season must 
 have softened him. 
 
 " Indade, an' it's the kind man y'are, but 
 it's little I have t' ate, widout yoursilf 
 has " 
 
 " Oh, dear, no, Bridget, I haven't any- 
 thing up my sleeve. Not customary for 
 guests to take their own provisions, you 
 know. Just goin' to be neighbourly, you 
 know, for the sake of the day." 
 
 Mrs. Callahan rested her fat red chin in 
 her fatter red fingers and looked sideways at 
 the table. " Oh, dear, oh, dear ! Barely 
 enuff for wan, an' liver at that. The saints 
 be kin' to yoo, but I think yoo mane well. 
 Sit down, sir, an' ate be yoosilf. It's not for 
 the likes of me to ate wid yoo. Wait an' I'll 
 make a little tay to warm yoo. But, sure, 
 yoo're jokin' ? " 
 
 " Why, I'm not above jokin', but if you 
 think I don't mean to eat with you, you're 
 mistaken. I may be snobbish, but I'm not 
 as snobbish as |hat — to-day, at least. My 
 
96 The Widow Callahan's 
 
 grandfather always ate with his hired man, 
 and what are you but my hired girl ? " 
 
 " Gerrul is it ! an' me gran'chil' dead. 
 Well, 'tis a quare Christmas dinner fer the 
 likes of ye, that is used to Dillymoniker's ; 
 but, at anny rate, nothin' was ivver sp'iled be 
 me cukin', an' barrin' it's cow's liver instead 
 of calf's, it might be worst." 
 
 Carhart afterward said that he never en- 
 joyed a dinner so much in his life. Bridget 
 was a born cook, and, as he said, " if it was 
 cow's liver, it must have been a very young 
 cow, don't you know? And the potatoes 
 could not have been flakier if Mr. Sherry 
 himself had boiled them in a gold saucepan." 
 
 As for Mrs. Callahan, although she sat 
 down to the table after the tea was drawn, 
 she could not eat a mouthful. She expected 
 the man with the basket up to the last mo- 
 ment. She was not much of a reader — in 
 fact, she did not know how to read, to be 
 quite frank abbut her, but she divined that 
 Somewhere in New York rich men were cele- 
 
Christmas Dinner 
 
 97 
 
 brating Christmas by giving repasts to the 
 poor, and that she should have to share her 
 dinner with a man who could have bought 
 out Fulton Market took away her appetite. 
 
 But Carhart never for an instant forgot 
 that he was making a humble fellow creature 
 happy by his condescension, and his spirits 
 rose as the food went down until he became 
 almost hilarious. 
 
 " How neat your place is, Bridget ! " said 
 he, looking around the room. " And I'm 
 glad to see you are economical. Now, you 
 might have had turkey and duck and salmon 
 and strawberries, but they wouldn't have 
 tasted a bit better than this liver, which is 
 simply delicious." 
 
 But the longest dinners have an end, and 
 at last Carhart rose to go. He would have 
 sat for awhile after dinner, but he was afraid 
 of overwhelming the poor woman with his 
 kindness. He put his hand into his breast 
 pocket, and said, impressively: 
 
 " My dear Bridget, we have had a very 
 
98 The Widow Callahan's 
 
 joyful time together, and I am sure that you 
 will like a little souvenir to show to your 
 friends who may have thought me snobbish 
 in the past." 
 
 Here the woman's heart grew big with 
 hope again. What a lot of good she could 
 do with his parting gift ! She would share 
 it with the Clancys, who had gone to bed 
 supperless the night before. 
 
 The hand came out of the breast pocket, 
 and in the fingers thereof was — a visiting 
 card ! 
 
Why the Delegate Walked 
 
 A STORMY TALE OF A STORM DOOR. 
 
 THE Storm door needed putting up. It 
 also needed to be painted. I never 
 studied carpentering nor have I ever done 
 any very earnest work at painting, although 
 I did take a few drawing lessons in the 
 Brooklyn Institute in the winter of '75. But 
 that was from casts, and the subject of paint 
 never came up. 
 
 To go back to the beginning, the storm 
 door needed to be put up, and every morn- 
 ing, on my departure for the 8 105 train, Mrs. 
 Acton would remind me of it. At last one 
 morning she said : " Henry, we'll have a 
 real cold snap soon and then you'll wish you 
 had engaged some one to put up that door. 
 It saves half a ton of coal a month, I'm 
 
 sure." 
 
 99 
 
loo Why the Delegate Walked 
 
 " I don't doubt it a minute, my dear," said 
 I ; " but will you tell me where I am going to 
 get any one who will stoop to such a 
 picayune business as putting up a storm door 
 and painting it? You know very well that 
 Mr. Dahlberg, the carpenter, has told me 
 that I must wait my turn, and that he hoped 
 to get here before spring, but even he 
 couldn't do any more than put it up. We've 
 got to such a state in this country that he 
 couldn't paint it without bringing about 
 sympathetic strikes all over Union County." 
 
 " Shall I get a tramp to do it? " 
 
 I laughed in Mrs. Acton's face. It was 
 not polite, but when I remembered the 
 tramps that have come to our house and 
 the various disabilities under which they 
 have laboured (or refrained from labour- 
 ing), it struck me as the height of humour 
 to try to imagine one putting up a storm 
 door or painting it. 
 
 There was the tramp that came to me 
 last Tuesday and asked me for the loan of 
 
Why the Delegate Walked loi 
 
 a pair of suspenders until he could get a 
 pair of tighter-fitting trousers. He could 
 not have put up the door, because he had 
 injured his foot in a railway collision in 
 Nebraska and wanted to get to Rahway, 
 where he believed he had a wife who would 
 take care of him, and he had been unable to 
 get there owing to the suspicious nature of 
 most people who doubted his story, but if 
 I didn't believe him he would show me his 
 foot. I say that, of course, I could not ask 
 such a man to put up a heavy vestibuled 
 door, so I loaned him the suspenders — in 
 fact I gave them to him — they had lost 
 their pristine resiliency — and I also gave 
 him the fare one way to Rahway, and I hope 
 he found his wife, although I am bound to 
 say that he walked in the wrong direction 
 after he left the house. But that might have 
 been due to his defective foot. 
 
 Over at Peawood, the county seat, there 
 are always husky-looking fellows standing 
 on the corners out of work, but I have 
 
I02 Why the Delegate Walked 
 
 kafried from experience that it is lio good to 
 ask them to come and do odd jobs, for the 
 reason that if they did they would no longer 
 fee out of work. An out-of-door life has 
 'its advantages and so has an out-of-work 
 life. 
 
 There are various negroes that I have at 
 different times employed to do odd jobs, 
 and one whom I engaged by postal in Pea- 
 pack to put up the door walked all the six 
 miles to my town to say that he should be 
 unable to do the work as his sister had a 
 cold. He also asked me if I would give him 
 a quarter for his sister's cold. Now, I had 
 absolutely no use for his sister's cold, but 
 I gave him the quarter, and he also walked 
 away in the opposite direction to where his 
 relative lived. But he must soon have dis- 
 covered that he had made a mistake, for 
 he stopped in at a saloon to ask the direction. 
 And I guess he found the directions on the 
 bottle. 
 
 All of which goes to show how little hope 
 
Why the Delegate Walked 103 
 
 I had of getting my storm door on before 
 summer. 
 
 My grandmother used to say that if you 
 want a thing done, the best way is to do it 
 yourself, and so I bought a gallon of paint 
 in Fulton Street, New York, and, the next 
 day being Thanksgiving Day, I set to work 
 to paint the door, meaning to let it dry be- 
 fore night and to put it up after dinner. 
 
 While I was at work giving everything 
 in sight a coat of green, a well-dressed man, 
 with a nose for paint and a lip that reminded 
 me of one of the most beautiful parts of 
 Ireland, came down the carriage way to 
 where I was at work and said : 
 
 "Do you belong to the union?" 
 
 " WelJ, wh^t a thing to ask me? " said I, 
 somewhat puzzled at the question. " My 
 father fought to preserve the Union ancj 
 I was born in Massachusetts. Of course I 
 belong to the Union. Long may it wave," 
 said I. 
 
 You ought to have seen the contemptuous 
 look that came over his Milesian features. 
 
I04 Why the Delegate Walked 
 
 " Oh, I don't mean that Union ; I mean 
 the painters' union." 
 
 I looked at him and I laughed. Then I 
 laughed again. Then a third time I laughed 
 and spilled paint all down my waistcoat, 
 which was in itself a pretty good answer in 
 the negative. 
 
 " Do I look like a * union ' man? " said I. 
 " I live in the house there, and this is my 
 barn, and this is my storm door, and this is 
 my paint, and this is my brush, and this is 
 my own hand, and the work is all mine." 
 
 He puffed himself up and said : 
 
 " My name's O'Shaugnessy and I'm walk- 
 ing delegate for" (so-and-so. I've really 
 forgotten the numSer or the official name), 
 " and I want you to understand that you 
 have no right to paint unless you're a mem- 
 ber of the ' union.' " 
 
 I stared at him in amazement and again 
 I told him that it was my house, my barn, 
 my vestibuled door, my paint, my brush and 
 my own hand, and the work was all mine; 
 
Why the Delegate Walked 105 
 
 and this time I spattered a little paint on his 
 shoe — quite by accident. 
 
 At this he became angry and said, " You 
 understand that you've got to stop." 
 
 Now, I suppose it was his intention to 
 anger me at that early stage of the game, 
 but it was Thanksgiving Day, and I was ex- 
 pecting a brother that I hadn't seen for a 
 year and who used to be my best chum when 
 we were boys together, and I didn't feel in 
 the mood to get angry, so I said jocosely : 
 
 " Look here, Mr. O'Shaughessy, I feel it 
 my duty to tell you that my boy is up in his 
 room running a jig-saw and, to the best of 
 my knowledge and belief, he doesn't belong 
 to the jig-sawyers' union, and as I know his 
 mother wants him to get dressed in time for 
 dinner I wish you'd go in there and tell 
 him to stop work or join the union." 
 
 But Mr. O'Shaugnessy was a very serious 
 Irishman, who had not been in this country 
 long enough to get used to our jocular way 
 of looking at serious things, and he said very 
 sternly: 
 
io6 Why the Delegate Walked 
 
 " I don't want no rag-chewin'. You've 
 got to stop paintin' that door or I'll call a 
 sympathetic strike of all the cooks in town." 
 
 "Well," said I, "that wouldn't hurt me 
 personally at all, as we lost our cook last 
 week and Mrs. Acton is doing her own cook- 
 ing, worse luck." 
 
 Then I was sorry I had said it, because, 
 of course, she doesn't belong to the cooks' 
 union, and I was afraid that Mr. O'Shaugn- 
 essy would feel it incumbent on himself to 
 go in and stop her from cooking our Thanks- 
 giving dinner, and that would have been a 
 calamity, for I'll never get too old to enjoy 
 the turkey-cranberry-pumpkin-cider mix-up. 
 
 But O'Shaugnessy was a man of set pur- 
 pose and I was in no danger of sidetracking 
 him. 
 
 He said : " You're a very funny man — " 
 
 "Am I?" said I. (Heaven save the 
 mark! I have to write jokes for a daily 
 paper.) "Am I? Well, I'll have you un- 
 derstand that I have a perfect right to be 
 
'YOU'\E GOT TO STOP PAINTIN' THAT DOOR OR I'LL CALL A 
 S'i^IPATHETIC STRIKE OF ALL THE COOKS IN TOWN."— P. 106. 
 
Why the Delegate Walked 107 
 
 funny, because I belong to Humourists' 
 Union, New Jersey Branch, No. 678, and 
 we are pledged to keep up the price of jokes 
 and be sparing of our humour. You can't 
 stop me from having my joke, although I'm 
 perfectly willing to sell it if I can find the 
 right purchaser." 
 
 Mr. O'Shaugnessy turned a deaf ear to 
 all I had to say. He was not a good listener, 
 and when I had stopped talking and had 
 inadvertently painted the doorknob green, 
 he said : 
 
 " I forbid you to do another stroke of 
 work in the name of our union." 
 
 " That sounds like Ethan Allen's alleged 
 rq)ly to the British, but I don't acknowledge 
 your authority, and if you haven't anything 
 better to do you will please stroll down the 
 street." 
 
 " Do you defy me ? " said he, bristling 
 wjth anger and looking like a turkey-cock 
 — and on Thanksgiving Day, too. 
 
 " I don't propose to give you a definition 
 
io8 Why the Delegate Walked 
 
 of my actions. If you are quick-witted you 
 will understand without a glossary. My 
 name is Acton and I live in that house, and 
 this is my barn and my vestibuled door and 
 my 
 
 " Here, give up that brush," said he with 
 a new note in his voice. 
 
 " Harry ! Oh, Harry ! " I shouted, seeing 
 my son at the back window. He heard me 
 and opened it. 
 
 " Telephone for Hank Smith to come here 
 as fast as he can and tell him to bring his 
 handcuffs." 
 
 " Hank Smith is deputy sheriff of my 
 town and he was born and brought up in 
 inner New England, and he hasn't a very 
 enlightened view as to the uses of " unions." 
 In fact you have only to tell him a tale of 
 a striker stopping an honest man from work- 
 ing and he is all aflame in an instant. 
 
 Mr. O'Shaugnessy refused to take my 
 well-meant hints and continued to threaten 
 me with all sorts of woes, but all the time 
 
Why the Delegate Walked 109 
 
 I went on distributing paint impartially over 
 everything in sight, and at last I saw Smith 
 coming across lots at good speed. 
 
 "Now," said I, "Mr. O'Shaugnessy, I 
 am nothing but a plain citizen, and owing to 
 early defects in my training I never learned 
 to handle a brush with the freedom of a 
 Sargent, but I think I can handle it with the 
 freedom of an American, and you will kindly 
 oblige me by going to any place you may 
 elect. Our interview is finished." 
 
 And then Mr. O'Shaugnessy put up a 
 fight and before I knew what he intended 
 doing he had permitted his fist to find tem- 
 porary lodgment on my jaw. I am not a 
 fighter — do not belong to the "fighters' 
 union " — but I did manage to give him a 
 slight blood-drawing clip on that part of his 
 face where he keeps his nose, and then Hank 
 Smith came up and seized him. Hank is a 
 giant in strength and O'Shaugnessy was like 
 a baby in his arms. 
 
 " What's the matter? " said Hank. 
 
no Why the Delegate Walked 
 
 " Well, it's a walking delegate that refuses 
 to walk in the first place, and it's a breach of 
 the peace in the second, and you saw for 
 yourself that it was assault and battery," 
 said I, rubbing my jaw sympathetically. 
 " He claims that I can't spoil the looks of 
 my own storm door as I don't bjelong to the 
 painters' union. I claim that I can do what 
 I please on my own land as long as I am 
 not a nuisance to my neighbour. "What's 
 your opinion ? " 
 
 " Well, it's my opinion that this country 
 has come to a pretty pass " 
 
 " Good enough ; then run him in and we'll 
 talk it over at the drug store to-night, Mr. 
 Smith. I've got to wash the paint off of me, 
 and then this afternoon I'll put in an applica- 
 tion for membership in the carpenters' union 
 and the screwdrivers' union, and I'll put up 
 that storm door myself and with all the indi- 
 viduality I can put into it. Hope you'll en- 
 joy your walk, Mr. O'Shaugnessy." 
 
'Dam White, 
 A Parable of the Open Door 
 
 SUYDAM WHITE was his name. His 
 intimate friends called him 'Dam 
 White. And he was. He was one of those 
 men who, going their way quietly and with- 
 out any seeming effort to please, draw all 
 men unto them. His clerks would do more 
 for him at a word than some employers are 
 able to compass by threats and rewards. He 
 had no enemies and yet he was by no means 
 a colorless man. ' He had convictions and 
 was not afraid of voicing them, and he had a 
 temper that could be heated in short order, 
 but there were those who had known him 
 for years and who had never seen his temper 
 hot. 
 
 He was in the real-estate business, and his 
 office was just at the head of that broad 
 flight of stairs that is such a feature of the 
 
 entrance to the Hudson Building. 
 Ill 
 
112 'Dam White 
 
 August Montmorency made his living by 
 selling table wines, and it was said that in 
 fifteen minutes by the clock he could make a 
 total abstainer buy a case of Bordeaux, so 
 great were his powers of persuasion. Be 
 that as it may, he certainly dressed as if his 
 house considered him a valuable man, and 
 his manner was such that if he had been 
 attired in a bathing suit the casual observer 
 would have said, " That man must be a Beau 
 Brummel between baths." And the casual 
 observer would have been quite right. 
 
 Suydam White was quiet, reserved, a gen- 
 tleman by instinct : Montmorency was loud, 
 pompous, swaggering — one who would in- 
 sist upon the appellation of gentleman if he 
 had to fight for it. 
 
 I was present when Suydam White and 
 August Montmorency first met each other, 
 because Mr. White was lunching with me 
 at the Ollapodrida Club uptown, and Mr. 
 Montmorency sat down at our little table 
 with the air of honouring our feast and with- 
 
'Dam White 113 
 
 out a word of apology. I had seen the 
 wine agent before, and I did not like him, 
 but I did not feel like asking him to remove 
 his two hundred pounds to another table, so 
 I introduced him to Mr. White, and after 
 that our duologue resolved Itself into a loud- 
 voiced monologue — for Montmorency talked 
 shop — wine shop — incessantly. 
 
 There is no denying the fact that Mont- 
 morency was handsome, and I have no doubt 
 but that the average woman would vote him 
 charming before he began to talk. Let us 
 hope that the average woman would not like 
 his brassy voice. 
 
 Wine was the burden of his song, and who 
 loved not his employer's brand of wine was 
 a fool his whole life long. I wondered how 
 he had ever managed to become a member 
 of the Ollapodrida Club, and I was sorry 
 that I had not chosen a different day for 
 inviting Mr. White to lunch there with me. 
 
 It is a fact that can be easily proved that 
 before luncheon was over Mr. White had 
 
114 'Dam White 
 
 ordered a case of Bordeaux sent out to his 
 Mamaroneck home. He told me afterward 
 that he was generally able to say " no " to 
 book agents, and that he could even resist 
 the blandishments of dictionary sellers, but 
 he felt compelled to buy this man's wine al- 
 though it would take him several years to 
 use it up, as he had found that milk agreed 
 with him better than any other beverage. 
 
 " I wish I had had him put out of the 
 room," said I, iannoyed that my friend had 
 been buncoed. 
 
 " No, it's all right. I'll donate the whole 
 case to our local hospital, so it's all for the 
 best. The man's personality pleased me; it 
 was so full of character " 
 
 " Bad character." 
 
 "Yes, but interesting, nevertheless." 
 
 I told him that I thought Montmorency 
 was an infernal nuisance, and that I hoped 
 he would neglect to pay his dues so that he 
 might be dropped from the club. 
 
 We had been sitting in the library enjoy- 
 
'Dam White 115 
 
 ing a smoke, and as we passed the pool room 
 on our way out we encountered Montmor- 
 ency, who was about to begin a game of 
 pool. He waved his hand airily to us and 
 said in that bull-of-Bashan voice of his, 
 " Glad to have met you, Mr, White. Come 
 up any time you feel like it and lunch on 
 me. Whenever you feel hungry about meal- 
 time just telephone to 518 Spring, and Mon- 
 tie will meet you at the club, and blow you 
 ofif to something really worth while. Our 
 friend Acton is a stuff, between you and me 
 and the post." 
 
 He winked prodigiously and smiled with 
 every wrinkle in his face as he said this last 
 to show that it was mere banter, but I pre- 
 sume that every man in the room felt like 
 kicking him, I know I did. 
 
 " Well, I hope we'll never see him again," 
 said I as we came down the steps of the 
 club. 
 
 " Why, I don't know," said White with 
 his amiable smile. " He's good fun. He's 
 
ii6 'Dam White 
 
 such an out-and-outer that he amounts to a 
 human document, and I hope I'll run across 
 him again." 
 
 Mr. White had his wish. He told me 
 about it himself, and his telling will form act 
 second of this simple little comedy. 
 
 It was about two weeks later that I met 
 him downtown by appointment and went to 
 luncheon with him, and while he was wait- 
 ing for a busy waiter to take his order I 
 asked him if he had seen anything more of 
 Montmorency. 
 
 He looked at me in a curious Sort of way 
 and said: 
 
 " Yes, Acton, I have seen him again and I 
 know more about human nature than I did 
 before. By the way, he came into my ofifice 
 the very next day. I did not see him then 
 and he had no idea that it was my office. 
 It was just in the course of his business, but 
 I recognized that blatant voice from where 
 I was sitting in my private office, and I was 
 intensely amused when he sold my book- 
 
'Dam White i \j 
 
 keeper a case of Bordeaux, because my 
 bookkeeper loves to hold on to his money. 
 But Montmorency would charm Captain 
 Kidd's treasure right out of the deep where 
 it lies. Of course the whole office had the 
 laugh on the bookkeeper, and the personality 
 of the handsome August was impressed 
 upon all of them. 
 
 "About a week ago I went to Indian- 
 apolis on business, and while I was there a 
 most distressing thing happened to me. My 
 pocket was picked while I was on my way 
 to the railroad station, and I was left with 
 twenty-five cents — no more than enough 
 for a tip. 
 
 " I had a return ticket and my sleeping 
 accommodations, but nothing else except the 
 quarter, and there was not time to hunt any 
 one up as the train would leave in about ten 
 minutes. I had pictured myself eating a 
 very comfortable dinner on the train and I 
 was hungry enough to eat three of them in 
 succession, as I had been so busy all day that 
 
ii8 'Dam White 
 
 I had not stopped for luncheon. I might 
 have waited over a train, sold my ticket to a 
 scalper and telegraphed to New York for 
 money, but I had to hurry on to meet a man, 
 so I had no alternative but a ride of nearly 
 twenty-eight hours with nothing to eat ex- 
 cept as much as a quarter of a dollar would 
 buy, and a quarter is less than thirty cents. 
 
 " I paced up and down that platform re- 
 volving schemes by which I could get a 
 dollar. I didn't like to brace a total stranger, 
 but I finally picked out a benevolent looking 
 man, evidently a Southerner, who was 
 standing near the gate, and made up my 
 mind to explain my predicament, give him 
 my card and borrow five dollars. 
 
 " I approached him and then my courage 
 failed me, and I walked the length of the 
 platform again and when I came back he was 
 not in sight. It now lacked but five minutes 
 of train time and so I rushed out and spent 
 my money on half a dozen bananas. I 
 wouldn't be entirely without food. 
 
'Dam White 119 
 
 " As I turned to go back I heard a loud 
 voice that sounded hke the heavenly choir, 
 for it was the voice of an acquaintance. It 
 was Montmorency in a vest like Joseph's 
 coat and with a top coat of the style of 
 season after next, and his face seemed to be 
 shining with friendliness. I was so glad to 
 see him that I rushed at him and shook 
 hands almost as effusively as he would do it 
 by nature. As for him, he nearly squeezed 
 the flesh off my fingers when he shook 
 hands, and he told me that it was good for 
 sore eyes to see me and what was I doing so 
 far from mother, and it was a pity there 
 wasn't time to blow me off to the finest 
 Hinner to be had in Indianapolis, but he was 
 going to New York right now and where 
 was I going? 
 
 " When I could stem the tide I talked at 
 a Eou Dillon gait myself and with a tone of 
 gladness in my voice that it did me good to 
 hear, for I was saved. I shouldn't have to 
 make six bananas do me for dinner, break- 
 
I20 'Dam White 
 
 fast, luncheon and dinner, and I should have 
 a picturesque companion for the journey 
 home. Acton, I blessed the little case of 
 wine that I had bought, for it had created 
 for me a friend in need." 
 
 " H-mn," said 1, remembering my im- 
 pressions of Montmorency. 
 
 " Well, I told him that he had saved my 
 life; that I, too, was going to New York 
 and that my pocket had been picked and I 
 was penniless, and would he please lend me 
 five dollars ? " 
 
 "Yes," said I, interrupting White for a 
 moment, " and he put his large hand down 
 into his large pocket and he pulled out a 
 large roll of bills and said in a large way, 
 * Leave me enough to get home with.' 
 Didn't he?" 
 
 " Yes, he didn't," said Mr. White. " He 
 3idn't with a big D. He seemed to grow 
 small right before my eyes and he said, 
 ' Really, Mr. White, I'm awfully sorry, but 
 I've made it a rule never to lend money.' 
 
'Dam White 121 
 
 " Well, Acton, you can imagine how mean 
 I felt. 1 felt as if I were a badly dressed 
 beggar on Union Square in a rainstorm, put- 
 ting up a lie about a dying wife and money 
 for medicine. Oh, I could have crawled 
 into the keyhole of my watch, I felt so small. 
 He walked along silently toward the train 
 and I fell back a step or two but kept mov- 
 ing, for the train was about to start. At 
 last I pulled myself together and instead of 
 punching him as I felt like doing, I said, 
 * Will you lend me two dollars until we get 
 to New York? I'm quite certain I'm good 
 for it.' 
 
 "'Haven't the slightest doubt in the 
 world,' said he in a hard voice several de- 
 grees quieter than usual, 'but it's against 
 my principles.' 
 
 " Well, by this time I felt as if I was a, 
 tramp who was getting ready to steal a ride 
 to New York. I dropped back and stepped 
 aboard the train at once, and only hoped that 
 we were in different cars." 
 
122 'Dam White 
 
 "Were you?" 
 
 " We were, but Acton, if you'll believe it, 
 that despicably mean fellow had the impu- 
 dence to seek me out and try to sit down by 
 me before we'd got as far as Cumberland." 
 
 "What did you do?" 
 
 " I ? Oh, I was so hot under the collar 
 that I said to him, ' Mr. Montmorency, there 
 isn't room enough in this car for you and 
 me, small as you are, and either you'll 
 change cars or I will.' " 
 
 "And what did he do?" 
 
 " He laughed kind of uncomfortably and 
 said he didn't mean to be unfriendly, but 
 principles were principles, and then he went 
 forward and I went into the reading-room 
 so mad I couldn't see straight, and I wrote 
 out a telegram that went something like 
 this : ' If Montmorency, wine agent, comes 
 into office I'll give one hundred dollars to the 
 man who throws him downstairs. Suydam 
 White.' That relieved me somewhat." 
 
 " How did you send it ? " 
 
'Dam White 123 
 
 " Oh, I handed it in when we stopped at 
 Greenfield and had it sent ' collect.' I was 
 afraid if I waited until I got home my anger 
 would cool off. Oh, but I was mad. I ate 
 three of my bananas, thinking of the mean- 
 ness of that man, and that left me only three 
 for the next three meals. But while I was 
 stretching my legs at Pittsburg next morn- 
 ing at about half past seven I saw the be- 
 nevolent-looking old man I haH noticed at 
 Indianapolis, and I went up to him boldly 
 arid handed him my card and told my story, 
 and he drawled, 'Why certainly, my son,' 
 and the Southern accent never sounded 
 sweeter than it did just then. He was a 
 Missourian and a credit to his State, for he 
 offered me fifty if I wanted it, but I took five 
 and ate all the breakfast I could, and we 
 travelled the rest of the way together and I 
 never enjoyed a trip more. He'd fought on 
 the Confederate side in the Civil War and 
 had known Grant and Buckner and Lee and 
 a lot of generals on both sides, and told me 
 
124 'Dam White 
 
 things about them that I never read in any 
 biographies. A nice old man. His soul 
 would make a million of the size of Mont- 
 morency's." 
 
 "Well, what about Montmorency and 
 your liberal offer to your clerks?" 
 
 " Well, do you know I've forgotten to say 
 anything about it to them, I've been very- 
 busy since I got back. I'll have to tell them 
 it was a joke, although I boil whenever I 
 think of that man's meanness." 
 
 I was much disappointed at the ending; of 
 his story because I had always hated Mont- 
 morency, and I hoped to hear that he had 
 received his deserts, and I told White so. 
 
 " But it's only in books that such men get 
 caught up with," said I as we threaded our 
 way through Broad Street to his building. 
 
 I had a little business to transact with him 
 and we went into his inner office, and while 
 we were talking the outer door opened and 
 we heard the unmistakable voice of Mont- 
 morency. 
 
'Dam White 125 
 
 I have said that White is 4 man who in- 
 spires loyalty, and we wefe to be treated 
 to an exhibition of it. As soon as he heard 
 the sound of the man's voice he opened the 
 door to Caution his clerks against taking that 
 telegram literally. But he was too late. 
 
 Mr. Montmorency had not finished his 
 opening sentence when the bookkeeper slid 
 from his high stool, came through the gate 
 and stood in the place accorded to customers. 
 Then he said, as he advanced quietly toward 
 the wondering wine agent, " Get out of this 
 office ! " The office boy pulled off his coat 
 and hastened to the centre of the stage> and 
 the cashier, a stocky man, vaulted over the 
 counter and approached the beefy Mont- 
 morency with fire in his eye. 
 
 "One at a time, boys," said the bdok- 
 keeper, while Montmorency* plainly at a loss 
 to understand what was happening, retreated 
 a step and looked perplexed. White, sud- 
 denly overcome with a desire to laugh, 
 stepped back Jtito his room and pressed his 
 buzzer, but no one noticed the call. 
 
126 'Dam White 
 
 " [Will you get out ? " said the bookkeeper. 
 
 " Not till you put me out. What have I 
 done?" 
 
 " Beggars and pedlars aren't admitted 
 into this building, and that wine you sold 
 me puts you in the pedlar class." 
 
 So it seemed that the bookkeeper had a 
 private grievance also. 
 
 " Here boys, stop," said Mr. White, but 
 he spoke too late. There was a rough and 
 tumble scramble between Montmorency and 
 the small but lithe bookkeeper, and while the 
 office boy was trying to land a shot on him 
 he placed it on the ear of the cashier, who 
 knocked him over backward in a jiffy. But 
 the bookkeeper, though half the size of the 
 mountain of beef, was very strong and the 
 wine agent was unceremoniously hastened to 
 the door, and his passage downstairs was 
 accelerated in quite the comic paper fashion. 
 Nothing but good luck saved him from a 
 broken leg. 
 
 He pulled himself together at the foot and 
 
'Dam White 127 
 
 was about to come up again when Mr. 
 White stepped to the door. When Mont- 
 morency saw White he must have under- 
 stood the Whyness of the How, for he 
 whipped out of the doorway like a small boy 
 caught stealing apples from a blind vender. 
 
 Suydam White came back trying to keep 
 down the laugh that was struggling for 
 egress. He pulled out a roll of bills, and 
 handed a hundred dollars to the bookkeeper. 
 Then he said : 
 
 " George, if you ever have another fight 
 in this office I'll discharge you." He 
 stepped into the inner office for a moment 
 and then coming out he said : 
 
 " George, if he ever comes in again, order 
 a case of wine and have it sent to The Jane- 
 way Home at Mamaroneck." 
 
 But Montmorency has cut the Hudson 
 Building from hi? list 
 
The Education of a Butterfly 
 
 FOR years I had read the animal stories 
 of the various writers who gain their 
 bread and butter from the beasts and birds 
 of the forest and field, even as Elisha of old 
 was fed by ravens, but I did not really be- 
 lieve all they told me until I came to know 
 Papillon. 
 
 Papillon was the name I gave to a small 
 yellow butterfly who one day emerged bash- 
 fully from a cocoon that was hanging on one 
 of the slats of my window-blind. 
 
 I had never seen a butterfly come into 
 being before, and I was lost in admiration 
 as the little thing crawled out of her case 
 like an ocean voyager from his travelling- 
 rug. After gently waving her wings to and 
 fro to get the wrinkles out of them, she gave 
 a pretty little yawn, opened her scarlet eyes, 
 
 and gazed in rapture on the world before 
 128 
 
Education of a Butterfly 129 
 
 her — a world that consisted of city back 
 yards. 
 
 I had no idea just what to feed the beau- 
 tiful creature that had come to cheer my 
 bachelorhood, but I felt that milk would not 
 be out of the way, so I put a few drops on 
 the window-sill, and the intelligent insect, 
 scarce ten minutes old, began to lap the milk 
 with a sucking noise that I could not have 
 heard if the air had not been strangely still. 
 I remember it was about noon of a July day, 
 and the stillness that precedes a thunder- 
 storm held all the air mute. 
 
 I do not know what put it into my head, — 
 perhaps the fact that I had that morning 
 been reading a delightful account of how a 
 naturalist had taught a grizzly bear to wait 
 on table and carve the roasts for him,— but 
 certain it is that I determined to see what I 
 could do in the way of educating my little 
 butterfly. 
 
 Across the way from my apartments was 
 the home of Rosalie, a young lady who in- 
 
130 Education of a Butterfly 
 
 terested me greatly. I had met her in so- 
 ciety and I knew her parents, and I hoped 
 for the day to come when I could woo and 
 win her ; but I was recovering from typhoid, 
 and it would be weeks before I could leave 
 my room. Every morning she came to her 
 window and bowed cheeringly to me, and 
 every morning I waved my hand to her ; but 
 there it rested. If we had been ten years 
 younger, we would have rigged up a thread 
 telegraph wire and sent notes to each other; 
 but even had I felt like doing such a boyish 
 thing, I should have lacked the ability, for I 
 could do no more than move feebly about 
 my room. 
 
 But when, on the second day in the life of 
 little Papillon, I discovered that the creature 
 knew me and would eat from no hand but 
 mine, — as was proved conclusively when 
 my landlady attempted to give her a drop of 
 honey and the graceful little fleck of sun- 
 shine fluttered away from it in affright, — I 
 determined to teach her to be my carrier- 
 
Education of a Butterfly 131 
 
 pigeon, that she might convey messages to 
 Rosalie in the house across the yards. 
 
 It was wonderful how intelligent Papillon 
 showed herself. She soon learned to under- 
 stand a number of simple words. For in- 
 stance, I held a sweet pea blossom to her 
 little nose and said softly, " Flower, flower, 
 flower." I never held it to her without say- 
 ing the word, and after a time she under- 
 stood that the sweet pea was a flower and a 
 very fragrant one. My next step was to 
 carry the sweet pea to the mantelpiece, and 
 then, as the butterfly poised and swayed on 
 the leaf of a honeysuckle that climbed near 
 my window, I said to her : 
 
 " Go to the flower, Papillon." 
 
 I had to repeat the phrase many times, 
 but each time I went over to the sweet pea, 
 and at last her little scarlet eyes gleamed 
 with intelligence, and she left the honey- 
 suckle-leaf and flew to the flower. 
 
 I then believed the story of the grizzly 
 bear who had acted as waiter. 
 
1 32 Education of a Butterfly 
 
 My next step in little Papillon's education 
 was to take the sweet pea to the window and 
 throw it into the yard below. 
 
 " Go and smell it, Papillon," said I, " go 
 and smell it, Papillon," at the same time 
 sniffing vigorously myself and pointing 
 down to where the sweet pea lay on a bed 
 of violets. 
 
 Little Papillon was plainly troubled. 
 Her expression showed it. She knew I 
 wanted her to do something, she felt that it 
 , was to me that she owed the continuance 
 of her existence, but she did not quite under- 
 stand my gesture. 
 
 So I took another sweet pea, held it to her 
 nostrils, told her to smell it, cast it out of 
 the casement, and said, " Go and smell the 
 flower, Papillon," and the intelligent little 
 beauty flew down into the yard (an absolute 
 terra incognita to her) and smelled the sweet 
 pea. Not only that ; she tried to pick it up 
 in her little paws and bring it back to me; 
 but it was beyond her strength, and she soon 
 
Education of a Butterfly 133 
 
 returned to her human friend in the window. 
 
 Rosalie was plainly interested in my en- 
 deavours, and smiled from her window. 
 " Ah," thought I, " if your smiles were sole- 
 ly for me, and not merely a betokening of 
 interest in what I am doing, how happy 
 should I be!" 
 
 But I felt that if she did not care for me 
 at all she would not sit in the window with 
 her embroidery, watching every step of my 
 education of Papillon. 
 
 There was one peculiar thing about the 
 little butterfly. I never could get her to 
 make her home with me. I prepared a little 
 nest in an abandoned bird-cage, but she 
 would never enter its doors. Her nights 
 were spent in a maple-tree in the neighbour- 
 ing back yard. ^ She made herself a nest out 
 of bits of grass, some threads which she 
 stole from my landlady, and a little horse- 
 hair that a kindly wind had blown to the 
 
 tree. 
 
 That butterflies built nests was a revela- 
 
134 Education of a Butterfly 
 
 tion to me. If I had been asked about it 
 before her advent, I should have said that 
 they slept at the place where they took their 
 last meal; but Papillon built a nest some- 
 thing like that of a mud-swallow, but more 
 like that of an oriole. 
 
 Honey she liked, but milk even more, and 
 no matter how far away she might be, if I 
 cried out, " Papillon, come and get your 
 milk," she would flutter through the air to 
 the window-sill and sip the tasty fluid with 
 avidity and with an expression of gratitude 
 on her face that many a human might emu- 
 late. 
 
 It was noised abroad that I was educating 
 a butterfly, and for six or seven houses 
 around on both sides of the yards people 
 used to watch me and my little pet. 
 
 Butterflies are notoriously volatile, but I 
 taught Papillon to stay in one position for 
 half an hour together by holding up a warn- 
 ing finger whenever she showed signs of 
 flying ofif. I never punished her in any 
 
Education of a Butterfly 135 
 
 way, as I do not believe in harsh educational 
 methods. 
 
 One day I noticed that Rosalie had a glass 
 of sweet peas on her window-sill, and I 
 seized the opportunity at once. I said to 
 Papillon, " Go to the sweet peas at Rosa- 
 lie's." She knew who Rosalie was, for 
 every morning when I sent my love a greet- 
 ing, I pointed to her and said her name, so 
 that the butterfly might associate the two 
 ideas. So when I told her to go to Rosalie, 
 she went over on as straight a course as a 
 bee would have taken; and as she fluttered 
 over the flowers or buried her nose in their 
 sweet convolutions, Rosalie offered her milk 
 on the end of her finger, and the gentle 
 Papillon sipped it fearlessly. 
 
 Animals know who are their friends. 
 
 In a few minutes the little creature winged 
 its yellow flight back to the lonely bachelor, 
 who in the meantime had written an ardent 
 message of love and a declaration in the 
 smallest characters readable on the finest 
 tissue-paper. 
 
136 Education of a Butterfly 
 
 The day was a golden one in July. All 
 the breezes sang of love. The time was pro- 
 pitious. None of my neighbours was at his 
 window save Rosalie. I folded my love- 
 letter up into smallest compass, tied it with a 
 thread, and then, talking softly to the butter- 
 fly that she might not be alarmed, I said : 
 
 "Bear this message to Rosalie and the 
 sweet peas." 
 
 I tied a loop in the thread and carefully 
 yoked it over the head of the delicate Pap- 
 illon, half fearing that the thread would 
 abrade her. Still the paper weighed but the 
 fraction of a grain, and Papillon had been 
 well nurtured. 
 
 Over the abyss she flew to the fair one in 
 the house beyond. She had accomplished 
 four-fifths of her journey when she wavered, 
 and I thought she would have fallen to 
 earth; but Rosalie said something cheering, 
 and Papillon made the rest of the way in 
 safety. I saw the fair girl take the yoke 
 from where it rested, open the paper, and 
 read the message. 
 
Education of a Butterfly 137 
 
 Then she stooped over and whispered 
 something in the ear of my little butterfly. 
 I hastily caught up a pair of field-glasses, 
 and through them I saw the little creature 
 wave her wings — with her, a gesture of 
 assent. Then I saw Rosalie give her a drop 
 of refreshing milk, and the brave Papillon 
 flew back across the low-lying yards to my 
 window. Why had she not waited for an 
 answer ? Why had my love not sent a mes- 
 sage to me? 
 
 I was soon to receive a proof that butter- 
 flies are almost human, for Papillon, after 
 resting a moment, flew up to my lips and 
 touched them delicately with her antennae 
 three times. She had understood what 
 Rosalie had whispered to her. She had 
 brought me love's message. 
 
 But that was not all. Papillon felt that 
 her mission was not yet accomplished. 
 What followed would have been marvellous 
 in an ordinary butterfly. I hesitate to give 
 this final proof of her sagacity, yet it is bet- 
 
138 Education of a Butterfly 
 
 ter to tell the whole truth and be doubted 
 than to hold back any facts important to 
 natural history. 
 
 Little Papillon had often watchefd me 
 writing letters, and she knew that the black 
 fluid in my writing-case made marks on 
 paper that were full of meaning. I say she 
 knew it. How else can I account for her 
 flying to the ink-well, dipping one tiny foot 
 in the vessel, and slowly and laboriously 
 drawing upon the window-sill the crude rep- 
 resentation of a heart ? As a drawing it had 
 nothing to commend it ; as the work of an 
 insect not two months old it was remark- 
 able. 
 
 When I thought of its purport, I threw a 
 kiss to Rosalie at the window. 
 
How the Cricket Cricks 
 
 T USED to have an aunt who always in- 
 -»- sisted that naturalists were simply 
 lazy men who wanted an excuse for their 
 laziness and, not caring for fishing, pre- 
 tended to be watching the ways and works 
 of ants and bees when half the time they 
 were dozing on the ground, and that they 
 afterward invented wonderful stories which 
 they put forth as the result of their keen 
 observation and tireless patience. 
 
 So much by way of preamble. A little 
 preambling is a pleasant gait to adopt while 
 people are getting to their seats and remov- 
 ing their wraps and making up their minds 
 whether they care to listen or not. Now for 
 the essay on the musical habits of the cricket. 
 
 The other day I sat at my desk, wishing 
 
 that I had a good excuse to lay down my 
 
 pen and bemoaning the fact that the nearest 
 
 fishing grounds were far away. 
 139 
 
140 How the Cricket Cricks 
 
 As I sat making meaningless marks with 
 a reluctant pen my nephew came into the 
 room and said : " Oh, Uncle, come and see 
 a cricket making music. He's got a kind of 
 tent on his back, and he keeps rubbing the 
 flaps together and the music comes. I hid 
 behind a footstool and watched him." 
 
 Here was my excuse for neglecting the 
 pen, and I arose with alacrity and followed 
 him. Just then he was called away on an 
 errand by my sister, so I went into the sit- 
 ting-room alone. The air was full of music, 
 but at first I could not locate the little fellow, 
 who in his best blacks was practising like 
 a Paganini. I stood still and looked 
 around, and at last I discovered him near 
 the window. 
 
 The clock struck nine. The day was 
 comparatively young, and I would watch 
 him and send the result of my observations 
 to some scientific paper. 
 
 I could see from where I stood, some ten 
 feet distant, that he was large and fat and 
 
How the Cricket Cricks 141 
 
 sober looking, but he was evidently; cheerful 
 or else he would not have found time in his 
 busy life to make music for himself. 
 
 By the way, I wonder why it is that when 
 the grand concert of crickets and katydids 
 and locusts begins the birds stop singing. 
 Is it for envy of the more sustained tones of 
 the long-legged folk in the grass, or is it 
 because the birds honestly admire that which 
 in June and July was the music of the future 
 but in August is the veriest commonplace? 
 Here is a question for John Burroughs or 
 some other capable authority to settle. Per- 
 sonally I regret that the birds see fit to stop, 
 because there is surely room for the song 
 of the bobolink with a cricket obligato. 
 
 As I was saying, this cricket was large 
 and fat and sober, and yet his song was 
 much above the ordinary cheeping of his fel- 
 lows. But as soon as I stepped a little 
 nearer he showed he had temperament by 
 immediately stopping. 
 
 It is a universal habit with crickets and 
 
142 How the Cricket Cricks 
 
 with peepers. Peepers particularly have 
 lots of temperament. Their peeping is real- 
 ly not so wonderful, but they guard it jeal- 
 ously, and if in your walks abroad you ap- 
 proach their immediate vicinity they lay 
 aside their violins or flageolets or accordeons 
 or whatever it is that they fill the air with — 
 or fill with air — and their song is no more 
 heard until you have passed on. 
 
 A man who has no temperament and who 
 is playing the piano when you knock will 
 continue playing as he asks you to open the 
 door and will say, " Hallo, Harry, sit down. 
 Isn't this a lovely thing I'm trying over?" 
 and he wilt go on to the perhaps bitter end. 
 But a temperamental performer on voice or 
 instrument may have been pouring forth, 
 or hitting or scraping divine tones, but as 
 your step is heard he will stop as if he had 
 been shot and will tell you that he is out of 
 practice or has a horried cold or ate too 
 much lobster salad the night before and so 
 cannot play the violin in good form. That's 
 temperament, and my cricket had it hard. 
 
How the Cricket Cricks 143 
 
 I was too far off to see what he had been 
 playing, but if it was a violin probably he 
 wrapped it up in a red bandanna and put 
 it reverently into its case. Then, taking out 
 an invisible whisk, he began to brush him- 
 self vigorously. 
 
 I walked a-tiptoe over to where he stood 
 in the sun and laid myself down upon the 
 hard floor with my cheek in my hand, and, 
 saying, " Patience be with me," began to 
 watch him. I thought that if I didn't say 
 a word he would finally conclude that I was 
 a new-fangled piece of automatic furniture 
 without ears and would begin to tune up 
 once more. 
 
 But he was a foxy cricket. He had evi- 
 dently lived in the house for some time, and 
 he knew furniture by sight and was sure 
 that it stayed put, and he was not going to 
 sing for a human audience if he knew it. 
 He brushed himself off, working very hard 
 at an invisible spot of dust on his coat-tail, 
 but his fiddle was laid to rest. 
 
144 How the Cricket Cricks 
 
 A naturalist was certainly spoiled in me, 
 for I assure you that I lay there for a good 
 half-hour as immovable as the stocks, and 
 all that time the cricket stood there and dis- 
 covered new flecks of dust on his immacu- 
 late coat-tails. And now and then he would 
 stop long enough in his work to give me a 
 sidelong glance as much as to say, " Music 
 isn't necessary for my existence and I object 
 to being spied on, but if you want to know 
 how to clean clothes, watch me." 
 
 As I lay there I remembered that I had 
 read somewhere that Henry Drummond 
 once lay beside an ant-hill for a period of 
 seventy-two hours, watching the busy citi- 
 zens, without stirring once or taking nour- 
 ishment other than an occasional ant. 
 
 And at last my patience was rewarded 
 even as his had been. The cricket began to 
 grow until he had attained to mammoth 
 proportions. I should say that he was 
 something between an elephant and an ex- 
 tinct mastodon in size, and he now lived in 
 a wood. 
 
How the Cricket Cricks 145 
 
 I lay perfectly still, afraid to breathe lest 
 he should step on me. His form had not 
 changed at all, but he had stopped brushing 
 himself ; and I was glad of that, for it would 
 have raised such a cloud of dust that I had 
 surely suffocated. He raised huge wings 
 and began to scrape them, and a tremendous 
 drone resulted, so deep in its vibrations that 
 Brooklyn Bridge, which somehow lay just 
 north of the jungle, parted its cables and 
 went into the East River with an awful 
 splash. I was much interested- in this veri- 
 fication of a scientific allegation, yet at the 
 same time I was afraid that my turn would 
 come next and that my members would part 
 company to slow music, so I awoke. 
 
 The music went up about seventeen oc- 
 taves, but it continued vigorously ; and there 
 was the cricket sitting on my cheekbone just 
 out of vision but not more than an inch from 
 my ear and playing for dear life. He had 
 finally decided that I was a settle and, as he 
 thought, he was practising in retirement. 
 
146 How the Cricket Cricks 
 
 Now had I been a Lubbock or a Drum- 
 mond I would have lain there until he had 
 lugged his Stradivarius over to the bridge 
 of ray nose and tried to part it by his vibra- 
 tions, but I had had enough. Besides, the 
 clock was striking twelve. 
 
 I worked my facial muscles until he de- 
 cided there was a seismic disturbance in his 
 vicinity and, putting his oboe — if it was 
 an oboe — into its case, he leaped from my 
 cheek clean out of the window and I saw 
 him no more. 
 
 But I no longer hold with my aunt's 
 views on naturalists. If three hours in the 
 sun on a hard floor will make a man as logy 
 and as cross and as uncomfortable as I be- 
 came, no lazy man (who is generally a com- 
 fortable man) would lie on an anthill in 
 South Africa beneath the tropic sun under 
 the delusion that he was loafing. 
 
Their Wedding Day 
 
 I WAS travelling last summer up through 
 Vermont on the sort of journey that 
 it pleases me to make now and then. That 
 is, I did not really know my destination, but 
 relied on my instinct to indicate a good stop- 
 ping-place. I had a mileage book and the 
 conductor seemed amused because I had 
 twice decided to stay on the train a little 
 longer. A certain village had attracted me, 
 but just as I was about getting off the train 
 I saw the big chimney of a factory and conr 
 eluded to go to a place where it was abso- 
 lutely " country." 
 
 At Rutland a young man of some twenty- 
 four years came aboard and sat down beside 
 me. As a general thing I do not invite con- 
 fidences, perhaps because of a certain aus- 
 terity of demeanour, an inheritance from my 
 grandfather, but quite belying my natural 
 disposition. I never hold aloof from people 
 147 
 
148 Their Wedding Day 
 
 and I am always glad if a seat-mate will 
 talk to me, but he rarely will. 
 
 This man, however, would have talked to 
 a graven image. He was one of those 
 whose hearts are worn upon the sleeves of 
 any garment they may happen to be in, and 
 after the usual weather imbecilities had 
 passed he said : 
 
 " I'll bet I'm the happiest man on this 
 train." 
 
 Now I was feeling rather happy myself, 
 inasmuch as it was my first day of a well- 
 earned vacation, and I questioned his asser- 
 tion, saying: 
 
 " You must have an extra good reason if 
 you're any happier than I am. A man who 
 can't be happy in such weather as this in a 
 countryside like this must be a pessimist." 
 
 "Well, I'm a Methodist myself, but it 
 ain't religion that makes me happy. Fact 
 is," said he, after a pause in which he seemed 
 to be waiting for me to ask the cause of his 
 content, "the fact is that I'm going to be 
 
Their Wedding Day 149 
 
 married to-day to the prettiest girl in the 
 county." 
 
 I would have resented it if some people 
 had exposed their hearts so shamelessly, as 
 it were, but this young fellow was so simple, 
 so perfectly ingenuous that I was no more 
 abashed than if a child had given me a sim- 
 ilar bit of news about a playmate. 
 
 I congratulated him and he smiled as if at 
 pleasant thoughts, and went on: 
 
 " Yes, half a dozen fellers were after her, 
 but me and Cy Allen came in ahead. She 
 said she didn't care a rap which one of us 
 she married, and if I didn't get to the house 
 in time she'd marry Cy anyway. Cy's to be 
 my best man — that is," said he, with a sly 
 chuckle, "if he gets there in time." 
 
 " Do you mean to tell me that this Cy 
 wanted to marry the young lady and yet 
 consents to be your best man ? " 
 
 " Why not ? We've be'n friends all our 
 lives. If she'd taken Cy I was go'n' to be 
 best man for him. You see ther's lots of 
 
150 Their Wedding Day 
 
 pretty girls around and if I didn't get jenny 
 I'd get some other." 
 
 I was a bit disgusted. "Oh, then, it 
 wouldn't disappoint you if you didn't marry 
 her?" 
 
 "Yes it would," said he earnestly, "yes 
 it would, now, seein' she's chose me. She 
 was my first choice among all the girls and 
 I'd rather lose my job than lose her." 
 
 " What is your job? " asked I. 
 
 " I'm foreman in a machine shop in Rut- 
 land." 
 
 This suggested some questions quite ir- 
 relevant to the subject we had been pursu- 
 ing, but interesting to me and so interesting 
 to him that we became absorbed in our talk. 
 My subconsciousness told me that we 
 stopped at a flag station; indeed I read its 
 name as we pulled out, but I never would 
 have thought of it again if our passing a 
 g'ig'antic elm, evidently a landmark for miles 
 around, had not caused my friend to say 
 with an oath, "Why, we've passed Grant- 
 ley!" 
 
Their Wedding Day 151 
 
 " Yes, that was the last station. I no- 
 ticed the name as we passed." 
 
 "Jumpin' Judas! That's where I was 
 go'n' to get off. That's where Jenny lives." 
 
 He pulled out his watch and looked at it. 
 " Half-past ten and we're to be married at 
 eleven." 
 
 I became sympathetic at once. "Can't 
 you go back on the next train ? " said I. 
 
 "Ain't no passenger train until twelve." 
 
 "Can't you walk back?" 
 
 He shook his head. " Not in time. It's 
 four miles." 
 
 "Well, she'll wait, won't she?" 
 
 " That's the pesky part of it. She won't 
 wait, not if Cy gets to her before I do." 
 
 " Oh, Cy isn't there, then? " 
 
 Again the sly smile. "Well, I rather 
 guess not. I think he missed this train." 
 
 A picture of a man getting off from the 
 car ahead at Grantley came to me and I said : 
 
 " There was a man jumped off at Grant- 
 ley." 
 
152 Their Wedding Day 
 
 " Jumpin' Ju What sort of lookin' 
 
 man was he ? " 
 
 • What a curious thing the mind is. I had 
 
 hardly been conscious of the descent of the 
 
 passenger but now I was able to recollect his 
 
 appearance. 
 
 " He was red-headed and he had a flaring 
 moustache — a fierce one." 
 
 "Cy! He caught it, after all. I 
 watched the platform till the train came in 
 at Rutland and I didn't see him, and I was 
 the last to swing on. He must ha' got on 
 on the other side. Ye see, I had a friend 
 of mine in Rutland delay him a little because 
 he's a little bit tricky, and although I asked 
 him to be best man I intended gettin' the 
 bindin' part of the ceremony over before he 
 come. I didn't mind his bein' best man 
 with Jenny my better half. Lost her, by 
 thunder! I can't get there by eleven." 
 
 I endeavoured to console him, although he 
 really seemed like a comic opera figure and 
 not to be taken seriously. 
 
Their Wedding Day 153 
 
 " But you say there are lots of other ones 
 to be had for the mere asking." 
 
 " Yes, but they ain't Jenny, after all. I'd 
 sort of set my heart on marryin' her to-day, 
 and it's disappointin'." 
 
 We were slowing up for the next station. 
 
 " Maybe you're not too late yet. Why 
 don't you telephone from here ? " 
 
 "By George, I hadn't thought of that. 
 You get of? here ? " 
 
 " Yes, I might as well as not," said I, get- 
 ting my suit-case out of the rack. My mile- 
 age had been torn off for twenty miles 
 farther, but I made up my mind to stop off 
 and see this comedy through. 
 
 " If I can help you any way, I'd like to," 
 said I. 
 
 " You might telephone," said he as we 
 stepped off the car. "I ain't used to the 
 pesky things." 
 
 We went toward a pay-station which was 
 in the general store opposite the station and 
 I said, "What's Miss Jenny's number?" 
 
154 Their Wedding Day 
 
 " By — ginger ! " said he, " she ain't got 
 a telephone." 
 
 I could have kicked him for an imSecile. 
 There were perhaps seven houses in the 
 place and they were painfully plain. Noth- 
 ing picturesque ahout them. Was it for 
 this I had got oflf the train ? The marriage 
 incident closed and I set down at Nowhere. 
 
 The blunderer looked the picture of de- 
 spair for a minute and then his eye lighted 
 up and he said, "Ther's a telephone in 
 Grantley's feed store. Maybe Jim Grantley 
 would carry a message to Jenny. It ain't 
 more'n an eighth of a mile." 
 
 We were standing on the steps of the gen- 
 eral store. 
 
 "To be sure," said I. "Hurry, man." 
 I looked at my own watch. " It's a quarter 
 to eleven." 
 
 "Tremblin' Moses!" said he. "Only 
 fifteen minutes. Cy won't wait a minute 
 after eleven." 
 
 He was so flustered that I took matters 
 
^^»i^i„«^ ,St«i«jz— , S;'&.-:w> 
 
 ".HE SAYS HE'S JUST GOING TO CLOSE THE STOKE TO GO TO YOUR 
 WEDDING."— P. 155. 
 
Their Wedding Day 155 
 
 into my own hands. We entered the store 
 and I said briskly, " I'd like to use your tele- 
 phone." 
 
 " Help yourself/' said the pleasant-faced 
 storekeeper ; " automatic." 
 
 I opened the telephone book and easily 
 found the number I wanted, as it was the 
 only telephone in Grantley. 
 
 " Give me 108-1," said I. 
 
 In a minute " Central " told me to drop 
 in the toll and I did so, and heard the mu- 
 sical "ding" that told her I had done so. 
 
 " Go ahead," said " Central." 
 
 "IsthisGrantley's?" 
 
 "Yes, what do you want? Hurry up, 
 for I'm just shuttin' up the store." 
 
 I don't know what prompted me, but I 
 said: 
 
 " Going to the wedding? " 
 
 "Yes. Who be you?" 
 
 I turned to the disconsolate bridegroom. 
 " It's the feed store. What do you want to 
 say? He says he's just going to close the 
 store to go to your wedding." 
 
156 Their Wedding Day 
 
 " Tell him I want to speak to Jenny Fos- 
 dick." 
 
 " Hold on a minute," said I to the feed 
 store. Then I turned to the bridegroom. 
 " It isn't likely that Miss Fosdick will come 
 to the store in all her wedding finery. 
 Where is she being married ? " 
 
 " Gosh, I hope nowher'/' said he with a 
 sickly grin ; " but it's to be in her boarding- 
 house — at Mrs. Sefton's. Jenny's an or- 
 phan." 
 
 "Hello! hello!" came impatiently from 
 the feed store. 
 
 " You'd better call for your friend Cy." 
 
 He hesitated and again the question came 
 from Grantley, " Who be you? Git a gait 
 on." 
 
 I ignored the feed man's question as to 
 who was calling him up, and taking, matters 
 into my own hands once more I said : 
 
 "Tell Cyrus (What's his name?) " 
 
 " Allen. Cy Allen," said the bridegroom. 
 
 " Tell Cy Allen to come to the 'phone and 
 
Their Wedding Day 157 
 
 call up — call up 107-1 as soon as he can. 
 Very important." 
 
 " Why, he's to be best man at the wed- 
 din'," said the feed man. 
 
 " I know it," said I ; " but it's very im- 
 portant." 
 
 "All right, good-by," and as he forgot 
 to ring oflf I heard him running out of the 
 store. 
 
 So far so good, but now suppose Cyrua 
 did not come to the telephone until he had 
 married Jenny? And when he did come, 
 what could I say ? I was not going to lie to 
 oblige my friend, and he did not seem to 
 have a great deal of initiative himself. 
 
 " By the way, what's your name ? " 
 said I. 
 
 "Alonzo Buckingham." 
 
 Now, my grandmother on the maternal 
 side was a Buckingham, of Manchester, 
 Vermont, and as I am interested in geneal- 
 ogical matters we compared notes, and I 
 found to my astonishment that this raw- 
 
158 Their Wedding Day- 
 boned, simple-minded youth was my fourth 
 cousin once removed. This gave him a new 
 hold on my allegiance and I determined to 
 help him even to the point of stretching the 
 truth, for the attitude of Cyrus was, you 
 might almost say, criminal, and — circum- 
 stances alter cases. 
 
 *' What'll I tell him when he comes? " said 
 I, when I judged it was time for Cyrus to 
 have reached the store. 
 
 " Tell him I got carried by and that I'm 
 coming back at noon. Ask him to wait. 
 Tell him I'd do as much for him." 
 
 " Look here," said I with amused disgust. 
 " You can't expect him to wait if matters 
 stand the way they do. You've lost a point 
 by missing your station, and if he doesn't 
 take advantage of it he doesn't deserve Miss 
 Fosdick either." 
 
 "Why; don't you think I deserve her?" 
 
 " Never mind that — what are you going 
 16 say?" 
 
 He hesitated. I looked at my watch. It 
 was five minutes to eleven. 
 
Their Wedding Day 159 
 
 " I'm sorry I didn't insist on Miss Fos- 
 dick's coming," said I. " She could have , 
 chosen between you." I was as keenly in- 
 terested in this game now as if I had been 
 about to marry her myself. 
 
 The telephone bell rang. 
 
 "Hello, who's that?" said I. 
 
 "Cy Allen. Who wants me?" 
 
 Alonzo, who was standing at the door of 
 the booth, looked inspired. " Tell him to 
 come to his uncle's house on the freight. 
 There's a freight leaves Grantley just after 
 eleven." 
 
 " Did you say his uncle is sick ? " said I 
 to Alonzo, with a lack of straightforward- 
 ness that was reprehensible. I also held my 
 mouth to the transmitter so that Cy could 
 hear me. 
 
 " Is Uncle Will sick? " said Cyrus, a note 
 of alarm in his voice. Evidently -ihe young 
 man was fond of his unde. 
 
 I feigned not to understand. 
 
 " Come at once. Bub-bub-bub-bub-bub. 
 Has the freight pagsed ? " 
 
i6o Their Wedding Day 
 
 He heard the last part all right. 
 
 " No, the freight is here now." 
 
 "Take it," said I; " buh-bub-bub-bub- 
 bub." 
 
 " I don't get that last. What's the mat- 
 ter with Uncle Will ? " 
 
 " What did you say ? Don't miss the 
 freight." 
 
 " I say, what is the matter with Uncle 
 Will? " 
 
 " Say that again," said I, although I felt 
 sorry for him. Alonzo, who could hear 
 Cyrus almost as plainly as I, was doubled 
 up with mirth. 
 
 " I'll take the train. What do you say 
 is the matter with Uncle Will. I get every- 
 thing but that? Won't the two o'clock 
 do?" 
 
 " Your Uncle Will bub-bub-bub-bub-bub." 
 
 " Burst a blood vessel ? " 
 
 " Don't delay," said I, and with a sudden 
 inspiration I rang off. 
 
 "Will he take the train?" said I as I 
 came out of the box. 
 
Their Wedding Day i6i 
 
 " Yes, he will. He thinks a heap of his 
 Uncle Will. You know Cyrus lives here 
 with his uncle but he works in Rutland in 
 the same shop I do. He introduced me to 
 Jenny." 
 
 " Oh, that's it? Well, I guess you've got 
 him away from her now. But how are you 
 going to get back there? Can you hire a 
 team ? " 
 
 Alonzo's eyes brightened. " That freight 
 meets one here ! I'll go back on it and ex- 
 plain how it happened to Jenny, and then 
 we'll get married." 
 
 " Suppose Cyrus sees you when he gets 
 off the train. He'll suspect something and 
 may follow you back." 
 
 Alonzo thought a minute. Then he 
 turned to the storekeeper who had been 
 waiting on a little girl all through our collo- 
 quy. "Has the down-freight come in?" 
 
 " Just this minute," was the answer. 
 
 " It waits here for the up one, doesn't it ? " 
 
 " Yes, unless the other's late? Then they 
 pass at Grantley." 
 
1 62 Their Wedding Day 
 
 " Thank you. Good-day." 
 
 We crossed over to the station and there 
 stood the train about a hundred yards below 
 on a siding. 
 
 " Now you want to keep out of sight of 
 your friend." 
 
 " I know it, but I'd love to see him get off 
 the train. He never was so badly fooled as 
 he will be when he gets here and finds his 
 Uncle Will all right." 
 
 "How do you know he's all fight? 
 Maybe something has happened to him." 
 
 " Don't look much like it," said Alonzo, 
 pointing to a very tall, stout man who was 
 unloading milk cans. " He's waiting for 
 empties on the up-freight and Cy'll see him 
 the first thing." 
 
 " I think it's a shame to play on a fellow's 
 feelings that way," said I. 
 
 Alonzo grinned. He was not real hand- 
 some. " Yes," said he, " but it had to be 
 or else I'd be courting some girl not half as 
 nice as Jenny." 
 
Their Wedding Day 163 
 
 Alonzo was just about the stature that 
 thinks itself irresistible — short, but stretch- 
 ing upward all the time in order to make the 
 most of his inches. 
 
 " You needn't buy a ticket. I have mile- 
 age," said I. 
 
 We walked down to the caboose and 
 boarded it and sat down in a corner well out 
 of sight. It was not at all likely that Cyrus 
 would see Alonzo. 
 
 It was a good quarter of an hour before 
 we heard the whistle of the up-freight.. 
 
 Alonzo began to chuckle. " It'll be a 
 wedding without a best man, but Uncle 
 Will'll be glad to see Cy." 
 
 The freight pulled slowly in and came to 
 a stop and a minute later we pulled out. 
 
 I walked to the car platform, for being 
 unknown it would make no difference if Cy 
 did see me. 
 
 I did not see him get off, but I did see him 
 talking to his uncle in the doorway of the 
 station and I half expected him to start and 
 
164 Their Wedding Day 
 
 run for our train, for Uncle Will was cer- 
 tainly the picture of health. On the con- 
 trary, Cy seemed to be amused at something, 
 and just before we ran out of sight Uncle 
 Will slapped him on the back. 
 
 He had evidently determined to make the 
 best of it. 
 
 We made the journey to Grantley in high 
 spirits. I was most anxious to see " Jen- 
 ny " and find out what sort of a looking girl 
 she was. 
 
 At last we pulled up at the station. As 
 we alighted I noticed that the platform was 
 covered with rice. 
 
 " Hello, they're preparing for you," said I. 
 
 A man who turned out to be Mr. Grantley 
 was talking to the station agent. He turned 
 and saw Alonzo and said, " Well, you're a 
 nice feller. I thought this was your wed- 
 din'day?" 
 
 " So it is," said Alonzo, somewhat sheep- 
 ishly. " I missed the station, that was all." 
 
 " You missed the bride, you mean." 
 
Their Wedding Day 165 
 
 " Why, Where's Jenny Fosdick ? " 
 " There ain't no such person. She waited 
 until eleven for you, and then the minister 
 married her to Cy Allen on the platform 
 right here and they've gone to Hillston on 
 the freight. Cy's Uncle Will had a stroke, 
 or suthin' happened to him. He couldn't 
 quite make out. Kind of sad beginnin' for 
 their honeymoon." 
 
"Mrs. Smith's Husband" 
 
 IT is a well-known fact that some men 
 have wives and some women have hus- 
 bands. For your own peace of mind, O 
 woman, when you are marrying, see that 
 you become a wife and do not merely get a 
 husband. When a man is known as " Mrs. 
 Smith's husband," his character is published 
 to the world by his title and the lines of Mrs. 
 Smith are not cast in pleasant places. He 
 may be capable in his own way, he may even 
 be the bread-winner of the family, but de- 
 pend upon it, he will be content to win the 
 mere loaf — any butter that is needed will 
 come by Mrs. Smith's tact and manageiAent. 
 " Mrs. Smith's husband " cannot drive a 
 nail any more than he can drive a horse. 
 He cannot draw a tack any more than he can 
 draw a prize in a lottery. When he goes 
 
 away for the summer it is Mrs. Smith who 
 i66 
 
"Mrs. Smith's Husband" 167 
 
 does the packing, buys the tickets, sees that 
 none of the children are left behind. " Mrs. 
 Smith's husband " is a willing enough soul ; 
 he hates to see Mrs. Smith vex her mind 
 with odious details ; he says again and again, 
 "Why don't you hire the packing done?" 
 But his salary is eighteen dollars a week, 
 which does not leave a great margin for the 
 luxury of extra " help." 
 
 And what a roaring farce he makes of 
 carpet-beating. He is asked by Mrs. Smith 
 to beat the parlour rug, and with her help he 
 gets it over the line. And then what play- 
 ful taps he gives it ! A curlew's wing would 
 expel far more dust than do his ineffectual 
 thwacks. Goaded to action by his inertia, 
 Mrs. Smith at last comes out, and with ab- 
 solutely no muscle, but any amount of will 
 power, she makes the dust fly until the back 
 yard resembles Sahara during a simoon. 
 
 " Mrs. Smith's husband " learns nothing 
 by experience. Wakened suddenly in the 
 night by his wife and told to get the pare- 
 
1 68 "Mrs. Smith's Husband" 
 
 goric, quickly, he always asks in a dazed 
 and injured way, " Where is it ? " This in 
 spite of the fact that James is their fifth 
 baby, and the paregoric is always put in the 
 same place in the cupboard by the careful 
 and methodical Mrs. Sinith. He finds the 
 paregoric at last after the usual knee-knock- 
 ings and toe-torturings and shin-scrapings, 
 and then Mrs. Smith, who is trying to quiet 
 screaming James by all the ways known to 
 a mother, says, " Drop some into a tumbler. 
 Quick!" 
 
 "Where is the tumbler?" asks "Mrs. 
 Smith's husband," helplessly. 
 
 Oh, Johnny, you will be the death of 
 me. There's a whole bargain sale of tum- 
 blers in the kitchen cupboard, and the spoons 
 are where they've always been since we were 
 married — in the left-hand drawer of the 
 dresser, and the water is in the faucet if the 
 pipes aren't frozen. Do hurry, the poor 
 child is suffering so." And " Mrs. Smith's 
 husband " hurries in his incompetent way 
 
"Mrs. Smith's Husband" 169 
 
 and breaks a tumbler and drops the spoon 
 long before he begins to drop the medicine. 
 At last, the spoon poised and the bottle in 
 mid-air, " How many drops ? " Then Mrs. 
 Smith, being of a sarcastic turn, cannot for- 
 bear saying, even though it delay the drop- 
 ping, " John Smith, we've had five children, 
 and they've all needed paregoric about once 
 in so often, and you've always had to drop 
 it, and if you don't know how many drops 
 you'd better call in Dr. Hall to-morrow, be- 
 cause you've probably got incipient paresis." 
 
 And " Mrs. Smith's husband," being a 
 mild-mannered man, says pleasantly, but 
 drowsily, " So you always say, my dear, but 
 it doesn't answer my question. I want to 
 help, you know, and I do want to get back 
 to bed. James kept us up last night and the 
 night be " 
 
 " I don't see how you ever remember how 
 many cents there are in a dollar, or how to 
 find your car fare. Ten drops is the dose 
 you've given every child since Gustavus 
 
lyo "Mrs, Smith's Husband" 
 
 Adolphus was first taken sick twelve or 
 thirteen years ago, tut you will ask how 
 many drops, when our fifth child is writhing 
 in agony and waiting for the medicine that 
 doesn't come." 
 
 Which is the strict truth. " Mrs, Smith's 
 husband " — and his other name is legion — 
 cannot think at all without his wife's help. 
 
 Thinking for two, she grows old twice as 
 fast as he does, and when he is thirty she is 
 about sixty — although she wouldn't admit 
 it. Growing old so much faster than he, she 
 at last comes to look upon him as her eldest 
 child. He generally calls her " mother," 
 because he hears the children do it, but she 
 never calls him " father." She sticks to the 
 ante-nuptial diminutive, and he is " Johnny " 
 to her to the end of the chapter. 
 
 His children do not take him seriously. 
 They see that it is Mrs. Smith who stands 
 at the motor. He, like them, is only a pas- 
 senger, and he gets the scant courtesy ac- 
 corded passengers by their fellows. 
 
"Mrs. Smith's Husband" 171 
 
 How much better it would have been for 
 all concerned if Mrs. Smith had taken his 
 position in business, put him in a day nur- 
 sery and hired nurses for the children. 
 
 And yet " Mrs. Smith's husband " is a 
 nice sort of fellow. On the veranda of a 
 summer hotel he can tell a good story, smoke 
 a good cigar — if you give him one — and 
 as long as you don't take him a-fishing with 
 you you will think him a decent sort of chap. 
 But if he goes fishing with you, then the in- 
 competence that has made him a non-success 
 as master of the household crops out in all 
 its strength, or weakness. He will tangle 
 his line in every branch and bush he passes. 
 When he catches an under-sized minnow — 
 by an unlucky fluke — you must lay down 
 the trout you have just landed in order to 
 get his fish off the hook for him, and ten to 
 one your fish — the biggest you ever pulled 
 out of the water — will return to its con- 
 genial element in the interim. He loses 
 more hooks and breaks more lines than you 
 
172 "Mrs. Smith's Husband" 
 
 ever did in your life, and yet, when he reach- 
 es home with one pin-fish he is as proud as if 
 he had filled his basket with the slipperiest 
 mess of trout that ever lurked in the shadow 
 of a rock. 
 
 " Mrs. Smith's husband " will be sincere- 
 ly mourned when he steps out. The chil- 
 dren will miss the pleasant fellow who told 
 them stories, and when they were hurt sent 
 them to their mother for witch hazel (be- 
 cause he couldn't remember where it was 
 kept), and Mrs. Smith will say a dozen 
 times a day, " How can I ever get along 
 without your dear father ? " when the won- 
 der is how she ever accomplished anything 
 with such a lovable old incompetent around. 
 
The Bottle, the Half Brick 
 and the Lump of Chalk 
 
 ONCE upon a time, three men, who, not 
 to put too fine a point upon it, were 
 in a fair way to become tramps, owing to 
 lack of opportunity, coupled with a lack of 
 ambition, met in their journeyings and con- 
 tinued together until they were approached 
 by a philosopher who saw in them food for 
 experiments. 
 
 It was noon of a hot summer's day and 
 the three had halted under an apple tree 
 which, in addition to its shade, offered the 
 most inviting looking apples for the mere 
 picking. 
 
 The philosopher greeted them and said: 
 ** Why are you not working? " 
 
 And the three replied as one man, " Be- 
 cause it is the noon hour." 
 
 Seeing through their reply* the philoso- 
 173 
 
1/4 Bottle, Brick and Chalk 
 
 pher paused, smiled and helped himself to 
 an apple. " The world is full of opportuni- 
 ties," he said, " for those who know enough 
 to take them. You three men are likely to 
 become tramps because your ambition is 
 asleep. Now I am so fond of the pictur- 
 esque that I am going to make a proposition 
 to you which will not waste your time, as I 
 see you have plenty of that, but which will 
 bring to the most ingenious of your trio a 
 substantial reward." 
 
 There was something that piqued curiosity 
 in his manner and the stoutest of the three, 
 who said his name was Jonas, asked him to 
 unfold his scheme. 
 
 " Tell us what proposition our appearance 
 has suggested to you ? " 
 
 " First, what are your names ? " asked the 
 philosopher, 
 
 " I am Jonas, this thin one is Ralph and 
 the tall one is Obadiah." 
 
 "You may call me Xerxes," said the 
 philosopher, " for the same reason that I am 
 to call you by the names you have given." 
 
Bottle, Brick and Chalk 175 
 
 " Why is that? " asked Obadiah, who had 
 a dull eye. 
 
 " Because it is not my real name. A few 
 rods back I passed by a grass grown cellar- 
 way whose house had been a ruin these hun- 
 dred years. In the cellar was a heap of rub- 
 bish. I will go back and get from it three 
 things which must constitute the instruments 
 by which you are to earn some money." 
 
 As he spoke he went back to the cellar and 
 the three talked about him in his absence. 
 
 " He is a lunatic," said Obadiah. 
 
 " He is a poet," said Ralph. 
 
 " No, he is a wise man," said Jonas, who 
 did not care for poetry. 
 
 The philosopher now returned, bearing in 
 his arms three half bricks, three lumps of 
 chalk and three corked but empty bottles. 
 
 While the men wondered he gave to each 
 a bottle, a lump of chalk and a half brick. 
 
 "Here are three things that are intrin- 
 sically almost worthless. In order to test 
 your ingenuity I send you forth with them 
 
176 Bottle, Brick and Chalk 
 
 and give you twenty-four hours in which to 
 dispose of them to advantage. The one 
 who gains the most I will reward in a fitting 
 manner and I will pay you all for your time. 
 Start at once, and to-morrow at this time 
 meet me here and recount your adventures." 
 
 Obadiah was about to cast his material 
 away, but Jonas said : 
 
 " Don't be foolish. If you get no more 
 than payment for your time you will be bet- 
 ter off than usual." 
 
 " For me it is a lark," said Ralph, blithe- 
 ly, " and I am eager to begin." 
 
 " That's a good mood in which to woo 
 success," said the philosopher, and with that 
 the three departed together. 
 
 After they had gone the philosopher took 
 notes of their raiment and of their manner 
 of speech for his forthcoming book, and then 
 he hired lodging for the night at a neigh- 
 bouring farmhouse and picked up nearly a 
 chapter for his new book from the conver- 
 sation of the hired man, who took for his 
 
Bottle, Brick and Chalk 177 
 
 topic the conduct of the Boer War by the 
 British. " The Intelligence of Hired Men " 
 is the title that he gave to the chapter, but he 
 did not know that the fellow was an under- 
 graduate who was working his way through 
 college by hiring out by the day. 
 
 The next day, a little before noon, the 
 philosopher repaired to the apple tree and 
 waited for the coming of the three. 
 
 The first to arrive was the tall one, Oba- 
 diah. He came with a downcast expression 
 on his face and flung himself upon the grass. 
 
 " Hello," said the philosopher, " where 
 are your companions ? " 
 
 " That's more than I know, but as for me 
 I do not want any more foolish adventures 
 of this kind. I have walked many miles and 
 I have nothing to show for it." 
 
 Now this was an absurd speech, for, being 
 the next thing to a tramp, each day was 
 filled with much walking and scant accom- 
 plishment. 
 
 As he was speaking Jonas appeared above 
 
1/8 Bottle, Brick and Chalk 
 
 the crest of the hill and a minute later he 
 joined the two with a hang-dog expression 
 upon his face. 
 
 He had scarcely cast himself upon the 
 ground when Ralph came over the hill on 
 horseback and, vaulting lightly from the 
 saddle, allowed his horse to crop the grass 
 that was ripe for the second sickle. He 
 wore a galliard air and was well pleased 
 with the outcome of his adventure. 
 
 "Well, you are all on time, and before 
 doing anything else let me pay you for your 
 day's tramping," said the philosopher. 
 
 So saying, he gave each one an order on 
 his publisher for a copy of his book, " The 
 Wrongs of Labor." 
 
 Obadiah was manifestly displeased, but 
 Jonas was beyond doubt glad to be acquaint- 
 ed with an author, and Ralph's smile of 
 thanks was full of meaning. 
 
 " And now to the adventures. Obadiah 
 came back first and he must tell what befell 
 him," said the philosopher. 
 
Bottle, Brick and Chalk 179 
 
 Obadiah cast away an apple into which he 
 had sunk his teeth, and said : 
 
 " I had no idea what to do with such un- 
 promising materials, for the chalk had been 
 used and was soiled into the bargain, the 
 bottle was empty, and what earthly use is a 
 broken brick? However, I walked along 
 bearing them faithfully and in the middle 
 of the afternoon I met a schoolboy on his 
 way from school. ' Do you want to buy a 
 piece of chalk? ' said I. ' Let's see it,' said 
 he. So I showed it to him and he offered 
 me a cent for it, which I accepted at once, 
 as I knew that I would never have another 
 such offer. It was not worth half that." 
 
 " That's what it is to lack imagination," 
 said the philosopher. 
 
 " A little further on I met a rag man and 
 I asked him what he would give me for the 
 bottle. * It's worth no more than a cent to 
 me,' said he, and for that sum I sold it." 
 
 " And what became of the brick? " asked 
 the philosopher, compassionately. 
 
i8o Bottle, Brick and Chalk 
 
 " Why, I came across a farmer who was 
 feeding his hens, and struck with a happy 
 thought, I asked him if he had plenty of grit 
 for them, and he told me he had not, so I 
 offered him the half brick for what it was 
 worth " 
 
 " And what did he think it worth? " 
 
 "A pullet's first egg, which, the small, 
 is worth eating. Here it is." Saying 
 which Obadiah put his hand into his coat- 
 tail pocket and drew it forth again, smeared 
 with a broken egg. 
 
 " Did you not know," said the philoso- 
 pher, " that a pullet's egg cannot withstand 
 the weight of a man? Your assets then are 
 two cents and a ruined egg. I fear that you 
 have not earned the reward." 
 
 Obadiah pulled a sour face, and Jonas 
 rose to a sitting posture and began his tale. 
 
 " I," said Jonas, " made up my mind that 
 for making money quickly, deceit was neces- 
 sary, so I went to a brook and there on a flat 
 rock I ground both the brick and the chalk to 
 
Bottle, Brick and Chalk i8i 
 
 powder. Then I mixed them and put the 
 mixture into the bottle, after which I filled 
 it with water and shook it, and there I had 
 an attractive looking liquid which I esti- 
 mated to be worth one dollar the bottle." 
 
 The philosopher shook his head. " Oba- 
 diah lacked imagination, but yours was too 
 active." 
 
 "At the first farmhouse at which I 
 stopped I saw a feeble looking man at work 
 chopping wood. I went up to him and said, 
 ' Friend, you have rheumatism, and what 
 would be exercise for me is work for you.' 
 Then he asked me if I wanted to exercise, 
 and I told him that walking was all the exer- 
 cise I needed to give me a fine appetite, but 
 I did want to recommend a medicine which, 
 if used as a liniment, would break up his 
 rheumatism. Just then the horn blew for 
 dinner and he invited me in, and while I did 
 justice to the simple fare he set before me 
 I also sounded the praises of the liniment. 
 ' Where can I buy it? ' he asked at last, and 
 
1 82 Bottle, Brick and Chalk 
 
 then I told him that I would part with my 
 own bottle at just half price, or one dollar, 
 as I had already used some. ' Rub yourself 
 from head to foot with it,' said I, ' and you 
 will find your rheumatism go. Keep it in 
 a cool place or there will be no chalky de- 
 posit, which is a mark of its genuineness.' 
 So I passed the bottle over to the simple old 
 man and he paid me a dollar so quickly that 
 when I took up my journey I wished that I 
 had made my money more legitimately, but 
 as it could do him no harm and as he had 
 imagination I look to it to cure him for a 
 time at least. So, whereas Obadiah made 
 but two cents and a miniature egg, I have 
 made a hundred cents, and here they are." 
 
 And he jingled the coins in his pockets. 
 
 " Yet you have not secured the reward," 
 said the philosopher. " Imagination and 
 deceit form a strong partnership, but I do 
 not reward the results they bring about. Be- 
 sides, your method lacked originality. What 
 are patent medicines made of generally? 
 
Bottle, Brick and Chalk 183 
 
 Ofttimes of ingredients more harmful than 
 chalk and brick dust. And now for Ralph's 
 story." 
 
 Ralph ran his hands through his hair 
 gracefully and said : " I have to admit at 
 the start that I was handicapped, for, like 
 Obadiah and his egg, I broke the bottle in 
 my pocket before I had gone a half mile, 
 and that left me only the half brick and the 
 chalk. Still I journeyed along with a light 
 heart, for the day was delightful and, after 
 all, while the weather may be a poor topic of 
 conversation, it has a great effect on one's 
 spirits. I had gone about a mile from here 
 when I was disturbed by the cry of ' Mad 
 dog!' I read only last week a very able 
 article by a Boston physician that proved 
 there was no such thing as hydrophobia, but 
 when I saw that dog coming straight at me 
 with foaming jaws and gleaming, bloodshot 
 eyes, I felt that it was a counterfeit of mad- 
 ness that merited escaping from, and I flung 
 the half brick at him with such force that it 
 
184 Bottle, Brick and Chalk 
 
 turned him in a new direction, and I leaped 
 over a fence and pursued my way through 
 the fields with nothing of my capital left but 
 the piece of chalk." 
 
 Here Obadiah sniffed and Jonas looked as 
 if he thought the prize might yet come to 
 him in default of a more worthy man. 
 
 " In course of time I came to the city, and 
 as the sky had clouded over I began to feel 
 that life had its drawbacks after all and if 
 something did not turn up soon I would 
 come back penniless." 
 
 A shade passed over Ralph's expressive 
 features as he looked at his companions for a 
 sympathy that from two of them was not 
 forthcoming. The philosopher, however, 
 nodded gracefully, and Ralph said : 
 
 "As I walked along the crowded street 
 that forms the main artery of the great city 
 I came upon a furniture store, the owner of 
 which had placed many of his most tempting 
 bits of furniture upon the sidewalk. Among 
 the sofas and chairs was a blackboard that. 
 
Bottle, Brick and Chalk 185 
 
 however out of place it looked among the 
 other kinds of furniture, provided my chalk 
 with an inspiration, for instantly my fingers 
 felt inspired to seize it, and with a glance at 
 the name of the proprietor of the shop I 
 stepped to the blackboard and wrote a triolet 
 commending the wares within to the passers 
 by. A prosperous and intellectual looking 
 man came up to see what I was doing, and 
 when he read ray effusion he said, ' A mod- 
 ern Villon. Not bad, truly. On my word, 
 your employer deserves to profit by your 
 cleverness,' and he went into the store and 
 bought an old fashioned bureau, paying a 
 good round price for it on the spot. Not 
 only that, but he commended me to the pro- 
 prietor, saying (as I heard through the open 
 door), that if Commerce called Poesy to her 
 aid she did well to provide her with enough 
 feet to enable her to stand properly before 
 the world and that my verse was worthy of 
 almost any anthology. 
 
 " It's a wonder you understood him," said 
 Obadiah, with staring eyes. 
 
1 86 Bottle, Brick and Chalk 
 
 Ralph, disdaining the interruption, went, 
 on : " In the meantime others had read the 
 verse and were impelled by its great merit to 
 go within, so that the dealer did a Christmas 
 trade all that afternoon. He found time, 
 however, to invite me to come in, and bade 
 his wife set food and drink before me, and 
 then he proposed that I write four verses 
 more and he would pay me fifty dollars for 
 the five, ' For,' said he, ' I have sold so much 
 old fashioned furniture, thanks to your in- 
 spiring verses, that I hav€ got to order more 
 from the factory this evening.' And I, 
 spurred by the talk of so much money, wrote 
 with my chalk, on the spot, four verses that 
 he vowed were even better than the first. 
 Then he gave me ten half eagles and housed 
 me for the night," 
 
 " You have gained the reward," said the 
 philosopher, rapturously. 
 
 " I suppose so," said Ralph, with no af- 
 fectation of modesty, " but I am not the one 
 to wait for better times when my purse has a 
 
Bottle, Brick and Chalk 187 
 
 tolerable lining, I believe in bettering the 
 times myself, so this morning, after bidding 
 him farewell and giving him what was left 
 of the piece of chalk that he might in future 
 write his own verses, I hired a horse for five 
 dollars so as to come to you without fatigue, 
 and here I am " 
 
 " Hold," said Jonas, enviously, " if you 
 spent so much we have only your word that 
 you got so much." 
 
 "Friend," said Ralph, taking out nine 
 glistening half eagles, "are not forty-five dol- 
 lars more than either one dollar, or yet two 
 cents and an egg that is fractured? " 
 
 Then the philosopher once more said, 
 " The reward is yours." 
 
 " And what is the reward? " asked Ralph, 
 suspiciously. 
 
 " I make you my amanuensis " 
 
 "Come," said Ralph to Jonas and Oba- 
 diah, " let us resume our journey." 
 
For Divers Reasons 
 
 1 SAILED from England last summer 
 on the Mid-Ocean Line. I shall call 
 the steamer the Bathtubbe. The fare to 
 New York was sixty dollars for an inside 
 berth in an inside room and that was the 
 kind of room that I selected. 
 
 The passengers were sociable, amiable and 
 interesting, and I formed many agreeable 
 "ocean friendships." But all seemed lack- 
 ing in one quality. 
 
 For instance, I approached a sporty-look- 
 ing man with a red necktie and a diamond in 
 his shirt-bosom. He was leaning over the 
 rail, gazing at the last bit of green that we 
 should see for eleven days. 
 
 I began a conversation with that confi- 
 dence that he would reply pleasantly which 
 strangers on a steamer always have — nor is 
 
 that confidence ever abused. 
 i88 
 
For Divers Reasons 189 
 
 " Easy motion, isn't it ? You come over 
 on this line?" 
 
 " No. I came over on the Furst Bis- 
 marck, but I had a touch of the gout in Paris 
 and the doctor recommended a slow ocean 
 voyage, and so I chose this line. It's the 
 slowest ever." 
 
 I was too polite to wink at him and he 
 immediately turned the conversation into 
 other channels. 
 
 Later in the day I met a lady from Boston. 
 It is perhaps unnecessary to say that I was 
 introduced to this lady; also to every Bos- 
 tonian on board. 
 
 " Easy motion, isn't it? " said I, as I drew 
 my chair into the shadow of one of the boats. 
 
 " Yes," said the Boston lady ; " the motion 
 is easy, as you say, but I prefer a faster boat 
 myself. We were coming home on the St. 
 Louis, but Mr. Adams was cabled to come 
 home at once and this was the only line that 
 we could secure passage on at such short 
 notice." 
 
19© For Divers Reasons 
 
 " You were very lucky," said I, mentally 
 figuring that if they had taken the St. Louis 
 they would have reached home two days 
 sooner than the Bathtubbe would dock it. 
 
 "Well, I don't know as we can call it 
 lucky ; the table is so inferior — at least to 
 Back Bay cooking." 
 
 I think it was on the same day that I fell 
 into conversation with a well-put-up young 
 man of New York. I fell into it in my 
 usual way by saying : 
 
 " Nice, easy motion, isn't it ? " We were 
 standing in the bow watching a school of 
 porpoises out for their noon recess. 
 
 " You may call it easy but I call it blamed 
 hard. Ten days more of it. I don't see 
 why I was foolish enough to give up my 
 passage on the Oceanic, but a chap in Lon- 
 don told me that if I wanted an absolutely 
 novel experience I'd better take one of these 
 tubs." 
 
 " Yes," said I, " and they have the advan- 
 tage of being cheap. Table not so bad, 
 either." 
 
For Divers Reasons 191 
 
 " Well, the cheapness didn't appeal to me. 
 In fact, I tried to get a whole stateroom for 
 $240 so that I'd have plenty of room to my- 
 self, don't you know, but the confounded 
 boat was so crowded that I could only get 
 an inside berth, lower one at that. If I 
 hadn't foolishly cabled my return home to 
 the governor, I'd have waited and taken a 
 Cunarder." 
 
 I met a Southern woman that same day in 
 the ladies' saloon. We were both writing 
 letters and neither one of us could think of 
 a thing to say, so I looked up and smiled and 
 uttered my formula : 
 
 " Easy motion, isn't it ? " 
 
 " Oh, y^s ; I wish it would roll a little. It 
 is so monotonous. They say the sister 
 Steamer, the Washtubbe, is much more of a 
 roller." 
 
 " Fine line, though, isn't it ? " 
 
 " Do you think so ? I've always been ac- 
 customed to take the White Star Line, but 
 my husband'5 brother's cousin, whom we 
 
192 For Divers Reasons 
 
 met at Bingen, told us if we wanted to be 
 perfectly comfortable we'd better take a 
 Mid-Ocean Liner." 
 
 " Cheaper, too," said I, wickedly. 
 
 She coloured and went on. " I really 
 don't know about that part of it. My hus- 
 band always attends to the buying of tick- 
 ets." 
 
 I had heard that there was a stowaway, 
 who had been discovered the third day out. 
 I went to him. He was peeling potatoes in 
 a dismal room off the kitchen, 
 
 " Hello, my boy," said I ; " that's right. 
 I see you're helpful. I used to do that for 
 my mother when I was a boy. Easy mo- 
 tion, isn't it? Did you expect to come by 
 this line?" 
 
 He was flattered at not being taken for 
 one of the crew. 
 
 " No, I wanted to take the Bremen, but 
 she was burned at Hoboken, so I came on 
 this. It's kinder fun to peel potatoes. The 
 skins slip off so easy." 
 
For Divers Reasons 193 
 
 With a sad heart I left this insincere 
 young man peeling potatoes and went up on 
 the upper deck. There I saw a dignified 
 and a handsome old gentleman, the best- 
 dressed man on board, reading Aristophanes 
 in the original. He had spoken to no one 
 and people thought him offish. I wondered 
 what tale he would give me, and I stopped 
 alongside of him, and when he looked up I 
 said: 
 
 "Easy motion, isn't it?" 
 
 "Yes, luckily for me it is. I'm a poor 
 sailor. But easy or not easy I had to come 
 by this line, as I practically went broke in 
 London, and just had enough to buy a pass- 
 age by this cheap line. I'll have to touch the 
 friends who come to meet me for the money 
 to tip the stewards. I don't rave over the 
 table, and I know lots of ways in which the 
 service could be improved, but I'm practi- 
 cally broke and that's why I'm here, so I 
 don't complain." Here he cast a compre- 
 hensive glance at such of the passengers as 
 
194 For Divers Reasons 
 
 were in sight. " Yes, I'm broke, and I 
 fancy we're all in the same boat." 
 " Shake," said I. 
 
Miss Flutterly on What is 
 Doing 
 
 I WAS waiting for a cross town car at 
 Fifth avenue and Thirty-fourth street, 
 that point where the fashionables and the 
 mercantiles weave endless mats as they cross 
 and recross and wind in and out. Above 
 me towered the Waldorf, that meeting place 
 of the disgustingly rich, which some one 
 (was it not Herford?) said was designed to 
 furnish exclusiveness to the masses. When 
 I saw a vision of loveliness coming down 
 the street I lingered in its shade, and forgot 
 that I wished to take a car, for the vision 
 was no other than pretty Miss Flutterly, 
 whom I first met on an ocean steamer and 
 whose face has a way of popping into my 
 consciousness about once in so often. She 
 was just as swagger as ever and her voice — 
 when I heard it — had still the soft southern 
 IPS 
 
196 Miss Flutterly 
 
 quality that with her is cultivated — for she 
 was born in New Bedford. 
 
 I am sure she will pardon me if I report 
 our conversation, because it touched on so 
 many very much alive topics, and it was so 
 characteristic of us both. 
 
 " Why, how do you do ? " said she, giving 
 me her hand with an impulsiveness that had 
 no society chill in it. Little Miss Flutterly 
 is very genuine and that's why I like her. 
 
 " I'm awfully glad to see you again," she 
 went on. " Why, I haven't seen you since 
 we had such pleasant talks on the dear old 
 steamer coming back from Europe. Have 
 you been over since ? No ? — neither have 
 I, but every spring it seems as if I'd just 
 have to, don't you know. Do you have that 
 feeling? I suppose it's because so many of 
 our ancestors, hundreds of years back, were 
 Europeans. I've had eight ancestors in this 
 country and each one was just a little nearer 
 being an Englishman until the eighth, and 
 he was an Englishman and so I suppose 
 
On What is Doing 197 
 
 that's why I want to go to the continent 
 again — and Africa. Ever since the Boer 
 War I have felt that I must see Africa and 
 find out if the Dutch down there look like 
 the Dutch in Holland. Did you know that 
 the Dutch don't like to be called Dutchmen ? 
 No ; they say they're Hollanders. And the 
 Germans hate to be called Dutch. I don't 
 really suppose anybody in the wide world 
 likes to be called Dutch, because we use the 
 word to denote bad taste in dressing and 
 colors. Oh, I'll never forget my trip to 
 Holland. I couldn't help thinking of it this 
 summer because we went up to the White 
 Mountains, and you know there aren't any 
 mountains in Holland at all. Every time I 
 looked at Mount Washington and the rest 
 of them, I used to think what would they 
 do with it in those flat little meadows full 
 of cows and windmills. I suppose that's one 
 reason why Holland is so small — because 
 she's so flat. Now New Hampshire isn't 
 such a big State, but it's so up-and-down- 
 
198 Miss Flutterly 
 
 hilly that there's lots more room in it. I 
 should think that that would have occurred 
 to the Dutch — I mean the Hollanders — 
 and they would have built up hills so as to 
 have more room. You know at Waterloo, 
 wasn't it Waterloo where Napoleon was 
 killed — no, Wellington — well, anyhow I 
 know it was Waterloo where they had an 
 enormous hill that seven hundred women 
 made out of just earth and wheelbarrows. 
 Now if women could do it once it could be 
 done by men, and if the Dutch would do it 
 it would increase their country and make it 
 less liable to be flooded. Isn't it awful the 
 floods we're having nowadays? Papa says 
 it's because they cut down so many trees. I 
 suppose trees stop the springs from coming 
 t0o fast by absorbing their moisture, and 
 when they cut down whole forests why 
 there's nothing to do but let the floods come. 
 But it's awful for the people that get washed 
 away. Papa was reading the other day 
 about some Russian immigrants that had 
 
On What is Doing 199 
 
 just settled on the banks of a river out west 
 when the floods came and they were carried 
 into Kansas and they had no means of tell- 
 ing what State they had come from. One 
 of the youngest had been born there and he 
 will never know what State he is a native 
 of because those Russians are so ignorant. 
 Doesn't it seem awful our allowing so many 
 ignorant people to come to this beautiful 
 country? I think they ought to have put a 
 stop to it just as soon as we were declared 
 independent. Because we're not really 
 Americans now, except the negroes, and 
 they're Africans. But I do think they ought 
 to let the Chinese in, because our soldiers 
 treated the Chinese so nicely during those 
 Boxer troubles, and it must have raised 
 hopes that we'd let them in, and then we 
 don't any more than we did, and yet we go 
 to China and they don't say a word. I sup- 
 pose their knowledge of English is very ele- 
 mentary, being heathens, so they're not much 
 on conversation. Don't you think conversa- 
 
200 Miss Flutterly 
 
 tion awfully pleasant? Mamma says it's 
 the breath of life to me. I really think that 
 it's one of the most delightful things a per- 
 son can do. Now there isn't any one in the 
 wide world, no matter how wise he is, can 
 guess what's going on in my mind until I 
 speak, and so if I didn't say a word — I sup- 
 pose I'd keep them guessing — but that's 
 slang, and I'm trying not to use slang. 
 Mamma says that the excessive use of slang 
 indicates a vacant mind. I used to be 
 awfully slangy, but that brought me up with 
 a round turn. 
 
 " Isn't this an age of marvels ? I really 
 don't know what will be discovered next — 
 do you ? Really, it would take a strictly sci- 
 entific person to tell, because just as you 
 think it's going to be airships it turns out to 
 be radium or something else just as wonder- 
 ful. 
 
 "Papa says it was a woman invented 
 radium, and it seems as if the manufacture 
 of it ought to be stopped, because if a single 
 
On What is Doing 201 
 
 pound of it was — what is it they do with 
 it, turn it on or explode it, or what ? — well, 
 any way, if a single pound of it did what it 
 does do, whatever that is, it would annihilate 
 the world. Just think of the danger of hav- 
 ing even a little of it. They say it's dimin- 
 ishing at the rate of a certain number of 
 grains a second, and it's going so fast it 
 would reach the sun inside of a minute, and 
 yet, after watching a heap of it for I don't 
 know how many thousands of years, it 
 doesn't look any smaller — so I don't see 
 how we're going to get rid of it now it's 
 here. And they say it will make anything 
 shine, except imitation diamonds. I should 
 think that people wouldn't dare wear paste 
 after this, because if they suddenly stopped 
 shining it would be so mortifying, and then 
 there's the danger of burning, for they say 
 that a single grain of it, if spread out in the 
 right way, would furnish enough heat to 
 heat all the office buildings in New York be- 
 low Twenty-third street — or maybe it was 
 
202 Miss Flutter ly 
 
 Fourteenth street. Perhaps they could dis- 
 solve it in water and then run pipes, like 
 steam pipes. I know papa said that the per- 
 son who could solve the problem of how to 
 do without coal wouldn't need to do with- 
 out it — he'd be so rich that he could buy 
 it at any price. Doesn't it seem unfair? 
 The very man who could afford to do with- 
 out it would be the man who had it to burn. 
 
 "And then there's wireless telegraphy. 
 Brother Tom says that the manufacturers of 
 wire went to Marconi and offered him, I 
 think it was, ten thousand dollars or else a 
 hundred thousand if he would stop invent- 
 ing wireless telegraphy, because it would 
 ruin them, and Tom said that Marconi was 
 such a scientist that he said no money could 
 stop him as he was sure that he'd make a 
 fortune out of his invention. And all those 
 wire people will be ruined. 
 
 "Well, I must really be running on" 
 (just as if she hadn't been). "Do come 
 and call on mamma and me. We'd love to 
 hear you talk about what you've done." 
 
On What is Doing 203 
 
 So I left her pretty face and, feeling as 
 if I had just absorbed a whole Sunday sup- 
 plement, I boarded the tenth car that had 
 passed me. 
 
Miss Flutterly on Politics and 
 the Drama 
 
 I SEEM to be always meeting little Miss 
 Flutterly and having conversations with 
 her. The other day I clambered up to the 
 top of a Fifth Avenue stage, in emulation of 
 the example of the late Walt Whitman, and 
 I was no sooner seated than a sweet voice 
 came to me from the seat behind : — 
 
 "I'm so glad to be kept in countenance 
 by you. I never rode this way before. 
 Isn't it fun?" 
 
 I looked behind me, instinctively raising 
 my hat as I did so, and there sat Miss Flut- 
 terly, all by herself and looking prettier than 
 ever in a — well, it was in very good taste 
 and I presume it had been made by a tailor, 
 but I cannot describe it. That's why I was 
 never able to write fashion letters. 
 
 I climbed to the seat beside her, and as 
 204 
 
On Politics and the Drama 205 
 
 I sat down her eye caught a headline in the 
 newspaper of a man beside the driver. 
 
 "WILL ROOSEVELT BUST THE 
 TRUSTS?" said she, half to herself, and 
 then in a louder tone, " I do hope he will. I 
 haven't anything against the Trusts person- 
 ally, although I do think they must be horrid 
 things judging from the cartoons I see — 
 over people's shoulders, you know. I never 
 buy those papers myself. But really, I ad- 
 mire his courage in trying to demolish any- 
 thing so big and horrid. Brother Tom says 
 that he's sure he will either be renominated 
 or else he won't and all on account of his 
 fighting the Trusts. Now some men 
 wouldn't dare fight the Trusts on account of 
 the politicians. You see a great many of the 
 Trusts are Democrats and they don't like the 
 way Roosevelt is interfering with them, and 
 brother Tom says that Roosevelt doesn't 
 stand a ghost of a chance of being nominated 
 by the Democrats. I think it would be an 
 awful pity if he wasn't elected again because 
 
2o6 Miss Flutterly 
 
 it is so interesting to read what his children 
 are doing. 
 
 " He isn't a bit handsome, but I think He 
 would have made a splendid actor, because 
 he's always doing something that makes 
 people admire him, and his being a cowboy 
 that way during the Spanish War — al- 
 though a gentleman born — I think it was 
 just splendid. 
 
 " Pa says people like him in spite of his 
 grand stand play, but I think that's the best 
 part of him. Now some presidents don't 
 look or act the part at all. I saw Loubet 
 when we were in Paris and he didn't look the 
 least bit wicked: the way you'd expect a 
 French president to look. He didn't have a 
 fierce moustache and they say he never does 
 anything dashing. I believe in a man's 
 doing what he's paid for, and the French are 
 so dashing and unconventional that I should 
 think they'd just hate to think that they had 
 a man there who looks so like a kind pussy 
 cat. 
 
On Politics and the Drama 207 
 
 " Speaking of cats, don't you love them? 
 I perfectly adore them, myself. The first 
 thing I say when I'm thinking of making 
 friends with a man or a woman is : * Do you 
 like cats ? ' and if they don't I never go a 
 bit out of my way to be pleasant. Tom 
 says that I'm just like Shakespeare in that.- 
 He says that Shakespeare said that a man 
 who did not have the love of cats in his soul 
 was fit for treason, stratagems and spoils. 
 Those are the very words. 
 
 " Do you remember the cats they had in 
 Paris, those lovely Angoras? And I will 
 say that the French are very kind to their 
 cats. They are awfully cruel to their 
 horses, but cats and little dogs they adore, 
 and I think that that shows they have some 
 good qualities. 
 
 " Don't you hate to come across a per- 
 son without any good qualities? Imagine 
 waking up in the night and realizing that 
 you hadn't any good qualities at all. It 
 must be awful. 
 
2o8 Miss Flutterly 
 
 "Did you see that picture of Hanna in 
 that man's paper. I don't suppose he can 
 look like that all the time. I tell Pa that 
 if I was a politician I'd be sure to have all 
 my features straightened before I ran for 
 office, because the cartoonists do notice any- 
 thing the least bit queer in the hang of a lip 
 or the tilt or bend of a nose. Tom says 
 he heard of a politician who liked the car- 
 toons of himself better than he liked his 
 own looks, and so he tried to look like them 
 and his wife was so mortified that she got 
 a divorce. 
 
 " Isn't it queer how shocked some people 
 are if you talk about divorce. Mamma says 
 that when she was a girl it wasn't consid- 
 ered respectable to even mention the word, 
 much less to be divorced, and if people had 
 to be they sank right out of society. I think 
 people are much broader now. Mind you, 
 I don't think it's nice and I don't know any 
 people who have ever done more than 
 thought of getting one, but it doesn't seem 
 
On Politics and the Drama 209 
 
 half as bad as heavy drinking, because you 
 can be divorced and nobody would know It 
 at all, but if you drink heavily it's sure to 
 show. 
 
 " Speaking of drinking reminds me of the 
 perfectly delicious soda water I had the other 
 day at the French place on Fifth Avenue — 
 I'm perfectly terrible about names. It was 
 called orange flower and it tasted just like 
 Mendelssohn's Wedding March — don't 
 you know what I mean? I told Pa that 
 when I got married I'd have the guests drink 
 libations — wasn't that what the old Rom- 
 ans used to do — in this soda water. Now 
 there's something the Romans never had. 
 Just fancy Caesar ordering a vanilla ice 
 cream soda with a straw and a spoon ! 
 Wouldn't it be weird? I wonder what it 
 would be in Latin. I don't suppose I ever 
 will know, for Latin is something I never 
 could grasp, I fell panting by the wayside 
 at the end of the first book of Caesar and 
 Pa said it would be cruel to have me go on. 
 
21 o Miss Flutterly 
 
 How in the world Csesar, with all the other 
 things he had to do, could write a book in 
 such horribly beautiful and difficult Latin I 
 3on't see. I was so glad that when Richard 
 Mansfield gave 'Julius Csesar' last season 
 he did it in English. Wasn't he perfectly 
 beautiful as Brutus, when he saw those 
 ghosts in the last act? It must have been 
 awfully depressing — almost as bad as 
 Ibsen's Ghosts. I saw that and I was de- 
 pressed for as much as a half hour after- 
 ward. I simply adore Ibsen. I know it's 
 unusual, but it seems so intellectual, and I 
 adore intellectuality. I saw his Hedda Gah- 
 ler and I couldn't help wondering why he 
 gives his characters such outlandish names. 
 Hedda Gabler! But she did talk a good 
 deal. Mrs. Fiske, you know. I went to see 
 her one afternoon and then I went to see 
 ' Babes in Toyland,' and it was just as dif- 
 ferent. I don't think Ibsen's plays are a 
 bit American, but ' Babes in Toyland ' is. 
 " Mamma's awfully funny about the 
 
On Politics and the Drama 211 
 
 stage. She's always afraid of being shocked 
 ever since we went to see ' Du Barry ' — or 
 that red-headed woman. Of course there 
 are lots of things you hear an actor say on 
 the stage that you wouldn't think of letting a 
 gentleman say in your parlour, no matter 
 how well behaved he was, but I think that 
 that's what makes up the fascination of the 
 stage — you never quite know what's com- 
 ing next. When I go with Mamma we 
 always have seats near the door so that she 
 can slip out when she's shocked, and I don't 
 like it a bit, for she is so old-fashioned that 
 she hardly ever stays through the first act 
 and it seems a wicked waste of money. It's 
 an awful waste, anyhow, the prices they 
 charge for a good seat, and half the time it's 
 to see some book acted that you've had out 
 of the library, so you know how it's going to 
 end. 
 
 " Mamma did sit out one play ; that was 
 Sothern — I mean in 'Hamlet' She said 
 he couldn't hold a candle to Booth, but of 
 
2T2 Miss Flutterly 
 
 course that's what all elderly people say- 
 about actors that are dead. I thought he 
 was perfectly fine, so spirituelle, and the way 
 he kills Polonius through a portiere is thrill- 
 ing. I don't see how he knows where to 
 stab. It seems wonderful that Shakespeare 
 was able to write a part that Sothern could 
 play, for you always associate Shakespeare 
 with all those old English literary people you 
 read of at school. 
 
 " And wasn't Cecilia Loftus' Ophelia sad ? 
 And those shrieks when she's going mad. It 
 was exactly as if she was imitating some- 
 thing. 
 
 " A friend of mine saw her buying candy 
 in Huyler's at just the very time Sothern 
 was killing Laertes. When I heard it at 
 first I was just sick. I'd thought of her in 
 the damp, cold earth — and to have her buy- 
 ing candy. 
 
 " How do you get off these dreadful 
 things? Oh, thanks, awfully." 
 
• WASN'T CECILIA LOFTUS' OPHELIA SAD?"— P. 212. 
 
My Golf 
 
 I AM naturally very nervous. All my 
 friends say that I lack repose, that I am 
 too strenuous. " Take up golf, old man," 
 said one. " It is what you need. It will 
 keep you out in the open, it will teach you 
 the value of deliberation, and it will cure 
 your nervousness, and give you a repose of 
 manner that you can get in no other way." 
 
 I am spending the summer in the country, 
 and although there is no course near us, the 
 country-side is full of natural advantages 
 for the pursuit of the game, and I deter- 
 mined to take it up. 
 
 I did not care to go to the expense of a 
 
 whole outfit, as I might not like the game 
 
 after I had learned it, but the next time I 
 
 went down to New York I bought a driver, 
 
 thinking to practise repose with it. 
 213 
 
214 My Golf 
 
 I bought a particularly stout one that cost 
 me five dollars, as I figured that if I put a 
 little more into tfte ptircha'sef price I'd gain in 
 the end. But now I'm sorry that I did not 
 buy a very cheap one, because then, when I 
 had tripped up the old gentleman in the 
 Fourth Avenue car on my way to the Grand 
 Central, it would have broken the club, and 
 that would have ended my golf. But the 
 stick was stout, and the old gentleman fell 
 and broke his leg instead, and also dropped a 
 bottle of wine that he was taking home, hav- 
 ing just received it from a returning sea- 
 captain. 
 
 He told me that he did not mind the 
 break in his leg, because he had broken it 
 before in the same place, and he knew just 
 how long it would take to mend it, and he 
 needed a rest from business cares, anyway, 
 which he never would h'aye taken if he had 
 not been forced to it in some such way ; but 
 he was all broken up over the spilt wine, as 
 it was a very rare vintage, and he never 
 expected to receive any more. 
 
My Golf 215 
 
 I apologised all I could and offered to put 
 him up at any hospital he might select, but 
 he wouldn't hear of it, and as the wine was 
 priceless, there was nothing left for me to 
 do except to feel miserable and show it 
 plainly, which I did. 
 
 He was an eld golfer himself, and after I 
 had helped him out of the car (and lo&t 
 my train by so doing) he showed me the 
 proper way to hold my stick so that I 
 shouldn't trip up anybody else. The pleasant- 
 est part of my golf experience was while we 
 were waiting for an ambulance — for I had 
 rtelephoned for one at my own expense. We 
 sat on the curbstone, and he wouldn't hear 
 of my accompanying him; said he believed 
 in the rigour of the game, like Sarah Battle, 
 and he ought to have seen that I was a be- 
 ginner and kept out of the way of my club. 
 
 He was so entertaining that I was really 
 sorry when the ambulance came and he 
 rolled off toward his home. 
 
 As for me, I had missed the last train for 
 
21 6 My Golf 
 
 the day, so there was nothing to do but to 
 put up overnight at a hotel, and that with 
 dinner and breakfast cost me four dollars 
 more. So far, the game had come to nine 
 dollars, and I had yet to make my first 
 inning. 
 
 I will hastily pass over the broken car 
 window on the way up in the train next 
 morning, I might have pushed an umbrella 
 or a cane through it, and I contend that it 
 was not because it was a golf-stick, but be- 
 cause I lacked repose, that I did break the 
 glass. Of course I had to settle with the 
 conductor, but I think that three dollars 
 was too much to charge me for the glass. 
 The car was ventilated after I had opened 
 the window in this artificial way, and thou- 
 sands rose up and called me blessed in differ- 
 ent parts of the car, for, needless to say, the 
 car was warm and the other windows were 
 too tightly wedged to open, even with super- 
 human efforts. I should like to recommend 
 to the Consolidated Company a judicious 
 
My Golf 217 
 
 use of golf-sticks on their windows; then 
 there would not be so much smothered pro- 
 fanity on the part of men, and overstrained 
 muscles on the part of women who foolishly 
 attempt the impossible. 
 
 I hold that the London way is preferable 
 to ours. There you know that the bus win- 
 dows cannot be opened, that they were man- 
 ufactured shut ; but in this country you know 
 that a car window may be opened in a per- 
 fectly normal way under proper conditions. 
 The fact that the conditions never are prop- 
 er, coupled with the knowledge that the 
 windows were meant to open, is what makes 
 travel in summer in America so absolutely 
 unendurable. 
 
 But I digress. 
 
 I was unable to do any golfing after I had 
 reached my abiding-place in the country, as 
 I found in the mail an order for a Christmas' 
 story, and as it was July the affair cried 
 haste and kept me busy all day. But next 
 morning I awoke early, aware that the golf 
 
2i8 My Golf 
 
 fever had seized me, and I was up before 
 any one else in the house, as every one else 
 knevir, for my lack of repose caused me to 
 express my exuberance of spirits in merry 
 roundelays — that is, they were merry to 
 me, but disastrous to the dozers. 
 
 My youngest son soon joined me, and was 
 delighted at my request that he act as my 
 caddy. He prepared my tee — I had had 
 coffee in bed: I never take exercise with 
 stomach empty. 
 
 I adjusted the ball, gazed earnestly at the 
 object I desired to approximate, swung my 
 club in the air, made several false starts in 
 the most approved fashion, and then I let 
 drive. 
 
 My next-door neighbour, a wealthy gen- 
 tleman from New York, was awakened by 
 the crash of glass, and came running down- 
 stairs in his pajamas. I tried to cultivate 
 repose as I reflected that I had disturbed his, 
 and while cultivating it I went over to see 
 just what damage I had inflicted. I had 
 
My Golf 219 
 
 put quite a curve on the ball, for it was fifty- 
 feet to the left of its intended destination. 
 
 I walked over and gazed at the ten-dollar 
 opening I had made in his plate-glass win- 
 dow. My son was overjoyed both at the 
 crash and at the jagged opening. That is 
 youth. / felt no joy. 
 
 My neighbour was not gazing at the open- 
 ing I had effected, but at a little faience vase 
 which had tried in its ineffectual way to stop 
 •the rapid progress of the ball. 
 
 Even as the old gentleman of two days 
 before had overlooked the damage to his leg, 
 but had grieved at the spilt wine, so my 
 friend could have overlooked the broken 
 glass, but the vase was an heirloom and vir- 
 tually priceless. 
 
 Here let me stop long enough to ask why 
 it IS that people will load up their summer 
 houses with priceless treasures. I never yet 
 bought anything that was priceless ; in fact, 
 I always insist on having the price plainly 
 .marked. And when people give me price- 
 
220 My Golf 
 
 less things I do not put them in my summer 
 house. I go even further than that. The 
 place where I spend my winters I regard 
 simply as a house of detention until I can 
 return to my summer place, so I never load 
 it up with priceless treasures; therefore at 
 no season of the year could such an accident 
 have befallen me as I had caused to fall upon 
 my neighbour. 
 
 He would not hear of my buying him an- 
 other vase, — he is a little deaf, — and I was 
 glad he would not, nor did I raise my yoice. 
 My golfing had cost me enough already, and 
 when I buy faience I want it for myself. 
 
 But he was somewhat sarcastic at my ex- 
 pense, and that I did not like. I like sar- 
 casm to be prepaid, although I like to do the 
 shipping myself. He said that I was not 
 cut out for an athlete, and that at my time 
 of life if I did want to take up games of 
 skill I'd better go out to the Bad Lands, 
 that couldn't be damaged, or to the Desert of 
 Sahara. Altogether he made me feel very 
 
My Golf 221 
 
 sorry that I had not bought a putter instead 
 of a driver. Putting is wholly innocuous 
 and innocent. Those who made a name for 
 themselves in the late sixties at croquet, as 
 I did, should be able to putt with ease, while 
 driving of all kinds is and always has been 
 dangerous and difficult. 
 
 Still, there is too much of the sportsman 
 in my make-up to allow me to submit tamely 
 to setbacks. It was now breakfast-time, and 
 I had had a little ten-dollar practice, — for 
 of course I insisted on paying for the pane I 
 had caused to be broken, — and, like Dewey 
 at Manila, I felt that breakfast was neces- 
 sary ; but afterward I would go on with the 
 fight and master driving. 
 
 The morning mail brought me an order 
 for a hundred-dollar story that an editoi- 
 wanted written while he waited in his office ; 
 that is to say, he wanted it within twenty- 
 four hours. 
 
 I generally pay immediate heed to such 
 orders, because I think that editors who take 
 
222 My Golf 
 
 the trouble to order things in this world, 
 where so much is forced upon the unwilling, 
 ought to be encouraged; but the golfing 
 fever was on me, and after breakfast, instead 
 of going into my workroom, I secured my 
 son once more and sallied forth to try a little 
 more driving. 
 
 This time I went farther from the haunts 
 of men, and took up my station in a very 
 wild field full of shrubs and weeds, and, as I 
 supposed, containing nothing valuable — 
 certainly no vases or rare wines. 
 
 I have heard people say that they found 
 it hard to hit the ball squarely; that they 
 generally dug up earth, or chipped slices of 
 gutta-percha from the cross-hatched sphere, 
 or fanned the circumambient air. But my 
 troubles were of a different nature. I hit 
 the ball every time I strove to, and the first 
 time I hit it in that field I seemed to conceal 
 it in a lusty whortleberry-bush some fifty 
 feet distant. 
 
 My son and I consumed nearly the whole 
 
My Golf 223 
 
 of a pleasant morning looking for that ball. 
 Wfe visited every bush and shrub that was 
 big enough to harbour a ball, but we could 
 not find it, and at last, after several hours' 
 search, I reluctantly gave up and sent my 
 boy home after another one. While he was 
 gone I threw myself down upon the grass 
 to rest, and I found the ball, or, to speak 
 more accurately, my hip found it. And it 
 wasn't ten feet from the place where I had 
 stood when driving. I can account for this 
 in only one way. When people lose their 
 way in the great woods they circle round 
 and round, and at last bring up where they 
 started from. I dare say that lost balls do 
 the same, and that this one was on its way 
 back when I found it. 
 
 While yet my son was gone, I placed the. 
 new-found ball on a little tee of my own 
 making, and with a strength bom of long 
 waiting I whirled my club through the soft 
 July &ir and smote the ball. 
 
 Will S9m?1?0<iy tell me why fa,rmers in 
 
224 My Golf 
 
 New England should raise Angora goats, 
 and if so, why they select wild and scrubby 
 pastures to raise them ? I am told that it is 
 a profitable industry, and that in a few years, 
 instead of the cattle upon a thousand hills, 
 it will be the thousand Angoras on a single 
 hill, so prolific and so useful are they. But 
 they are inimical to golf, and hard as their 
 heads are, they are not so hard as a ball 
 driven by a strong man with a five-dollar 
 club. 
 
 There were little kids in that field not 
 worth more than twenty-five dollars apiece, 
 and they went scot-free after my terrible 
 drive. They bleated and leaped and cropped 
 the rank herbage, all unaware of the fact 
 that the father of the herd, imported from 
 Turkey, had been laid low by a golf-ball. 
 My son saw him drop, and my son found 
 the ball on the ground in front of him. 
 
 I did not know that he was highly valu- 
 able, but small boys have a way of picking 
 up information, and my son told me that Mr. 
 
Ph 
 
 o 
 
 O 
 
My Golf 225 
 
 Hermance, a gentleman farmer and a neigh- 
 bour of mine, who had just gone into the 
 industry, had paid one thousand dollars for 
 this miserable animal that was now worth 
 no more than its wool and its hide and its 
 carcass would bring. It did not interest me 
 to recall, as I did immediately, that I had 
 read in an afternoon paper that Angora 
 leather made the best golf-bags in the mar- 
 ket. I did not care to buy a golf-bag just 
 then. 
 
 I decide quickly. I took the next train 
 for New York and proceeded to get insured 
 for one thousand dollars in favor of Mr. 
 Hermance. Then I registered an oath to 
 play no outdoor games more dangerous than 
 puss-in-the-corner. 
 
 Then I returned to my summer home to 
 write the story that the editor was waiting 
 for so patiently, and nothing better coming 
 into my head, I wrote up my experiences at 
 golf under the foregoing title. While they 
 were not written by an expert golfer, they 
 
226 My Golf 
 
 should hold much of interest to the average 
 beginner, and if the reading of them shall 
 save to the world a few pieces of faience, a 
 few rare vintages, a few legs, and a few 
 Angora rams and other cattle, I shall not 
 have written in vain. 
 
At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 
 
 I HAVE always been one of those who 
 decried as childish the tendency of the 
 average man to laugh at the slap-stick style 
 of humour so prevalent on the variety stage 
 and in the pages of the comic weeklies. 
 
 I have said that it was not the highest 
 form of wit to " swat " a man in the face 
 with a bag of flour, or to cause him to slide 
 down a flight of steps when in the act of 
 making a dignified bow of departure, and I 
 find that when such things as those I have 
 described happen in real life those of us who 
 are sympathetic do not laugh. 
 
 Why, take the series of most wildly im- 
 probable and farcical things that actually 
 happened at Mrs. Bidwell's tea the other 
 afternoon, and which were an3^hing but 
 laughable to me. 
 
 I am Mr. Bidwell and — yes, you have 
 227 . 
 
228 At Mrs, Bid well's Tea 
 
 guessed it — Mrs. Bidwell is the partner of 
 my joys and sorrows, and we divided a 
 plenty of the latter last Thursday. 
 
 We have lived in Brantford, New Jersey, 
 for three years, and during that time Mrs. 
 Bidwell has repeatedly said that she ought to 
 give a tea and invite her New York friends, 
 for she is always going to " cobweb parties " 
 and private concerts and exhibitions of pic- 
 tures at their various apartments and stu- 
 dios, while we have never made any return 
 for these civilities. 
 
 I was pretty certain that few of our 
 friends in New York would care to venture 
 cut as far into the suburbs as Brantford, be- 
 cause the comic papers have drawn such 
 pictures of the sections outlying New York 
 that many people to the city born think New 
 Jersey and Long Island perfectly impossible 
 places, and then a trip there, in the fall or 
 winter, is not one to be lightly undertaken. 
 
 However, Mrs. Bidwell dispatched about 
 a hundred invitations, and while she was 
 writing the notes she said to me : 
 
At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 229 
 
 " Thursday week is the seventeenth, isn't 
 it ? " and I, immersed in my morning paper, 
 said, without thinking: 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 But it wasn't. Thursday week was the 
 twenty-fourth. 
 
 However, the invitations all went out set- 
 ting apart the seventeenth as the day for the 
 tea, while all the time Mrs. Bidwell intended 
 having it a week later. 
 
 I was surprised at the number who ac- 
 cepted. There were upward of thirty-five. 
 As trains do not run frequently on the D. P. 
 & J. road, Mrs. Bidwell advised all to take 
 the one arriving at Brantford at three-five, 
 and most of them said they would take it. 
 
 This much of explanation has been neces- 
 sary. After this it is to be hoped that the 
 action will be more rapid, although anything 
 but pleasant. 
 
 Mrs. Bidwell is an absent-minded sort of 
 body, and the morning of the seventeenth 
 dawned without her once thinking that this 
 
230 At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 
 
 was the day she had set for her tea. She 
 still thought that the festivities were yet a 
 week off, and, of course, had not begun to 
 make any preparations whateyer for it, be- 
 yond stripping the paper from the parlour 
 walls, because we intended celebrating the 
 event with new paper and a new ceiling, sev- 
 eral pieces of fallen plaster having given us 
 warning that the old ceiling was tired of 
 maintaining its position. 
 
 As for me, I never interfere with my 
 wife's doings, and I gave no thought to the 
 tea. I intended to be present at it, and I 
 considered that an act of devotion, as any- 
 thing more wishy-washy than a tea or even 
 tea itself I cannot imagine. An afternoon 
 "beer" would have some tone, but a 
 tea 
 
 At two o'clock of the day Miss Haskell, 
 one of our near neighbours, and a very 
 pretty girl, came to the house. I was home 
 with a clinging cold, and I was also helping 
 my wife make ready for the plasterers, so I 
 
At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 231 
 
 went to the door. Miss Haskell was dressed 
 in a beauty pink silk, with roses in her hair, 
 and a " kissmequick " over her head and 
 shoulders, and she looked like an orchid for 
 delicacy. Much astonished, I said: 
 
 " How de do ? I hardly feel like asking 
 any one of such magnificence in, because the 
 house is upside down, and Eleanor looks 
 like a fright with her dusting cap on. She's 
 on the rampage." 
 
 But Miss Haskell came right in, laughing 
 gaily and saying. 
 
 " Well, as I am going to help pour tea, 
 I guess she expects me. And she hasn't 
 much time. They'll be here in half an 
 hour." 
 
 "They? Who?" said I, thoroughly be- 
 wildered, as I helped Miss Haskell over a 
 pail of water and a fallen stepladder that 
 blocked the way to the parlour. 
 
 " Why, the guests. Mercy on us ! What 
 have you been doing? " 
 
 She had seen the wreck of the parlour. 
 
232 At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 
 
 Shreds of paper here and there, nothing on 
 the mantel, a stack of pictures standing in 
 the corner, a sheet over the piano, and no 
 other furniture in the room. 
 
 " Do you mean to say that any one is com- 
 ing to this house to-day?" asked I in con- 
 sternation ait the thought. 
 
 " Why, this is the day for your wife's tea, 
 and the guests will be here on the three- 
 five." 
 
 Just then Mrs. Bidwell came up from the 
 cellar, where she had been burning some of 
 the wall paper in the furnace and having a 
 beautiful time. She was a sight. She is 
 my wife, but I repeat it, she was a sight. 
 A dusting cap on her head very much awry, 
 a pair of unbecoming spectacles which she 
 always wears when she is housecleaning, for 
 nobody knows what hygienic reason, a 
 smudge of ashes on her cheekbone ; she did 
 not look much like a divinity who was soon 
 to preside over a Russian samovar and say 
 with a bewitching smile : " Which shall it 
 be — cream or lemons ? " 
 
At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 233 
 
 She advanced, and, smudge and all, kissed 
 Miss Haskell affectionately, and never 
 noticed that her lovely nelghSour was 
 dressed in her best. Mrs. Bidwell is one of 
 the most absent-minded women I ever knew. 
 
 " Eleanor, do you intend having a tea to- 
 day?" I said. 
 
 " No, dear." And then, with a realizing 
 smile: "What an absurd question. Does 
 this look like a tea house? It's next week." 
 
 " That's what I thought," said I, in re- 
 lieved tones. " Miss Haskell was trying to 
 frighten me with the statement that gfuests 
 were coming to this wreck of a house to- 
 day." 
 
 "And they are," said Miss Haskell, 
 stoutly, her colour rising. "Eleanor Bid- 
 well, this is the seventeenth, and you told me 
 that the tea was to be on the seventeenth. 
 I've come in to pour." 
 
 Mrs. Bidwell ran out into the hall and 
 consulted a calendar. Then she gave a lit- 
 tle hysterical shriek. 
 
234 At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 
 
 " Edward, it isl They are! What shall 
 I do ? Not a thing in the house." 
 
 " I think there's a great deal in the house," 
 said I, surveying the chaos that surrounded 
 me. " It might be exposed to better advan- 
 tage, but it's all here." 
 
 "Oh, don't joke," said Mrs. Bidwell, 
 wringing her hands. " What shall we do ? 
 We haven't time to do more than make tea." 
 
 " Well, that's what they're coming for," 
 said I, consolingly. " Coming thirty miles 
 for a small cup of tea and a lady-finger." 
 
 " But there aren't any lady-fingers, and 
 there's no time to go to Passaic, and how 
 ■will they get here? I haven't said a word 
 to the hackman, and he has only that ram- 
 shackle depot hack." 
 
 "They'll have to walk. It won't kill 
 'em to walk half a mile. The ground is hard 
 to-day. And that will give you time to get 
 something on that is a little less like a scare- 
 crow." 
 
 I regret to say that Mrs. Bidwell is never 
 
At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 235 
 
 able to cope with unusual conditions. I am 
 the executive of the family in all emerg- 
 encies, and I now sent Eleanor out to the 
 kitchen to tell the cook to make tea in the 
 wash-boiler, as we were expecting a house- 
 ful of people on the three-five. Then I sent 
 her upstairs to put on her handsome habili- 
 ments, while Miss Haskell, donning the 
 kitchen apron that my wife had discarded, 
 helped me to move the furniture into some- 
 thing resembling order. We could not hang 
 the pictures, as the .nails had all been pulled 
 out and the moulding ripped off. At best, 
 our parlour was en de shabilU. 
 
 Of course it was too late to turn back our 
 guests. And the " tea " — or " reception " 
 (if anything happened to the wash-boiler) — 
 must be held in our house, as it was much too 
 late to requisition the house of a neighbour. 
 
 Mrs. Bidwell may not have much execu- 
 tive ability, but she can dress like a hurri- 
 cane, and by the time that Miss Haskell and 
 I had put parlour, dining-room and hall 
 
236 At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 
 
 (which is nothing more than a large room) 
 into something like order, Eleanor came 
 downstairs looking just as pretty as she did 
 the day I married her, and that's saying a 
 good deal. 
 
 "When Leonard comes home from 
 school," said Miss Haskell, "you can send 
 him over to our house for all the cake that 
 mother made to-day. We can spare it just 
 as well as not, and it's those iced sponge 
 cakes that you like so." 
 
 Eleanor's gratitude was pathetic. She 
 saw herself being miraculously dragged out 
 of the pit which her absent-mindedness had 
 digged for her, and felt that she was blessed 
 beyond her deserts. 
 
 School is nearby, and Leonard came home 
 before the whistle of the three-five an- 
 nounced the approach of the dread train with 
 its bevy of unwelcome guests. 
 
 He was at once dispatched to the Has- 
 kells' for the sponge cakes, and then I real- 
 ised that I was in my dressing-gown and 
 
At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 237 
 
 slippers, and I was sent upstairs to don a 
 frock coat. 
 
 The house still looked like Goldsmith's 
 " Deserted Village," but most of our guests 
 knew how absent-minded Eleanor is, and 
 they would make allowances. 
 
 I was nearly dressed when I heard the 
 creak of wheels and saw the depot hack com- 
 ing toward the house. 
 
 For some months I have supposed that 
 each day it would follow the example of 
 the one hoss shay and drop to pieces, and its 
 staying powers have been the wonder of all 
 Brantford, but to-day its hours were num- 
 bered. 
 
 As I watched it begin to turn in at our 
 driveway, I saw the most singular sight that 
 I ever witnessed outside of the "Voyage 
 ■en Suisse " of the Hanlons. 
 
 The bottom of it suddenly dropped out, 
 and two well-turned but sturdy ankles en- 
 cased in black gaiters and white stockings 
 fell through to the ground, where the feet 
 
238 At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 
 
 on the end of them, moved by an instinct of 
 self-preservation, began to pad along the 
 road in an effort to keep up with the hack, 
 which the hare-brained driver had not sense 
 enough to stop. Perhaps he did not know 
 what had happened. 
 
 Now I swear to you that the spectacle did 
 not strike me as funny, but, as showing the 
 different ways in which different people view 
 the same thing, I heard shrieks of laughter 
 from Eleanor and Miss Haskell, who hap- 
 pened to be looking out of the parlour win- 
 dow. 
 
 I flung open the window and yelled : 
 
 " Stop, you fool ! " 
 
 And he stopped, and then I beheld at the 
 carriage casement the sweet and rubicund 
 face of dear old Mrs. MacAllister, whose 
 only fault is that there is something too 
 much of her. There was also something too 
 much for the hack, hence the refusal of the 
 floor to bear her any farther. 
 
 I jumped out of my bedroom, literally 
 
At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 239 
 
 jumped out of it, shaking the stairs in my 
 headlong descent, and without a scarf, but 
 otherwise arrayed for the tea, I ran to the 
 assistance of my dear old friend. 
 
 She was unable to climb out of the cage in 
 which she was imprisoned, and I had to 
 smash the threshold of the door with my 
 feet, an easy and a grateful task, and then 
 I led the blushing old lady forth from her 
 queer retreat — or perhaps I should call it 
 her queer advance — and brought her to the 
 house. 
 
 A glass of sherry revived her, but she 
 elected to go upstairs to our room, which 
 is over the parlour, thinking that by lying 
 down she could restore her nerves to their 
 wonted calm. 
 
 And thus began our " tea" ; the first guest 
 incapacitated from attending, owing to the 
 inadequate transportation facilities afforded 
 by the town. 
 
 The rest of our guests arrived in a sort 
 of mob, some of them, I am sure, inwardly 
 
240 At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 
 
 cursing the day that had made them leave 
 good old New York to come to the other side 
 of the horizon. Of course, I refer to the 
 men, of whom there were three or four, most 
 of them artists. 
 
 I know that they were astonished when 
 they gained admittance to our house and 
 viewed the wreckage — for our efforts could 
 not restore wall-paper in an instant, and to 
 see great segments of green paper like the 
 division lines in a backgammon board, re- 
 lieved by copious masses of dirty white, was 
 to make one wonder whether this was an 
 ordinary suburban effect or only a case of 
 Eleanor's absent-mindedness. However, 
 the beauty of social forms is that by them 
 we are enabled to cover up our real feelings 
 and, save by very covert glances of wonder 
 given by careful housewives at the palpable 
 evidences of much and disturbed dust, there 
 was no sign vouchsafed that ours was not 
 a very regular tea. 
 
 There was a heterogeneous collection of 
 
At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 241 
 
 musicians, artists, bookish people, and so- 
 ciety folk, and the hum that arose was a 
 veritable tea hum. 
 
 And yet there was no tea. Miss Haskell, 
 looking as pretty as two peaches, was sitting 
 at a little table containing sliced lemons and 
 loaf sugar and cream and tea cups, but inno- 
 cent of tea. Rangeley, the purple snow 
 man, was making himself agreeable to her, 
 and she was taking an immense interest in 
 something that would not have interested her 
 five minutes before, nor ever would again, 
 that being the real test of small talk; but 
 she was destitute of tea. I went to Eleanor, 
 who, entirely forgetting that she had more 
 than one guest, was talking to Mrs. Birchen 
 in the corner about Wagner's " Quiet Life." 
 
 I interrupted her to talk about the tea, and 
 she immediately excused herself to Mrs. 
 Birchen and went out into the kitchen, 
 where, as she afterward told me, she found 
 Jane wringing her hands quite impotently. 
 She had attempted to empty all the tea there 
 
242 At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 
 
 was in the house into the tea kettle (she had 
 scorned the wash-boiler) and she had spilled 
 every grain of it into the coal scuttle instead 
 and so that settled it — before it was made. 
 It never occurred to either her or to my de- 
 voted but absent-minded wife to borrow 
 some from a neighbour, and there are no 
 stores in Brantford. (That is one of the 
 charms of the place — to those who are used 
 to it.) 
 
 Eleanor came to me, and without going 
 into details whispered what had happened. 
 I was talking at the time to a very swagger 
 young woman who sings at St. Swithin's, 
 and so I merely said : 
 
 " Never mind. It was very poor tea. 
 They wouldn't have liked it. It is better 
 so. Besides, there will be cake." 
 
 Just then, Miss De Kaven, the animal 
 painter, said in her orotund voice : 
 
 " Where's Leonard ? I haven't seen him 
 in an age. I suppose he's grown out of all 
 remembrance." 
 
At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 243 
 
 And I, looking out of the window, said : 
 
 " Here he comes. He's been on an er- 
 rand." 
 
 All who heard me looked out of the win- 
 dow, for Leonard is a general favorite, and 
 has often accompanied his mother to New 
 York teas and things, so most of us saw him 
 demolish our last hope of a collation. He 
 slipped on a bit of ice and fell, scattering the 
 sponge cakes far and wide, and sitting down 
 on as many of them as his small body could 
 cover. 
 
 I groaned. 
 
 " Oh, he isn't hurt," said the St. Swithin 
 soprano. 
 
 " No, it was the cake I was thinking of. 
 These are maimed ceremonies." 
 
 And then the beautiful soprano in a way 
 forcing the words out, said: 
 
 " Did you mean to be without a cravat ? " 
 
 And Eleanor had never noticed it. I 
 started to go upstairs and get it, but just 
 then something happened that put all 
 thought of neckties out of my mind. 
 
244 At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 
 
 Just about this time dear old Mrs. Mac- 
 Allister, thinking that she had lain long 
 enough, resolved to get up. As I have said, 
 my flight down the staircase had been a very- 
 jarring one, and when she set her two solid 
 feet upon the bedroom floor and followed 
 them up with the weight of her body, it was 
 too much for the weak parlour ceiling, and it 
 fell with a deafening crash and a choking 
 smell of plaster dust. 
 
 Luckily our rooms are low-ceiled and the 
 plaster had not far to come, but I had not 
 anticipated any such vaudeville attraction, 
 nor had any of my guests, and they were not 
 prepared for it. 
 
 In a farce comedy a syphon of soda would 
 have given pith to the next joke. We were 
 spared that, but there was a climax just the 
 same for poor Mrs. MacAllister, who had 
 heard the commotion and the stifled shrieks 
 and had seen the tremendous cloud of dust 
 which penetrated everywhere, and whose 
 nerves were on edge, attempted to run down- 
 stairs and fell down insitead. 
 
At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 
 
 245 
 
 Those who saw her say it was very funny. 
 I did not see her, as I was trying to get the 
 dust out of both of my eyes, and besides, 
 a fall at her time of life — she is nearly 
 fifty-five — is not to be laughed at by any- 
 body. Bartley, the water colourist, helped 
 her to her feet with all the gallantry that has 
 made him a much courted man, and escorted 
 her back to bed again, and I am pleased to 
 say that the superabundance of flesh on her 
 bones saved them and her from any lasting 
 injury. 
 
 What followed is more or less mixed in 
 my mind, but I do know that it was found 
 that no one was really hurt, although several 
 dresses were ruined. In fact, I have only 
 recited the events of the afternoon, in order 
 to show that what would have been very 
 funny upon the stage and would have been 
 certain to tickle the ears of the groundlings 
 was not regarded by me as being in the 
 slightest degree funny, having occurred in 
 real life and in my own house. 
 
246 At Mrs. Bidwell's Tea 
 
 The next train to town bore a crowd of 
 dusty travellers, and I have no doubt but 
 that they passed resolutions to the effect that 
 living in the suburbs was always attended 
 by the most direful results, whereas it was 
 simply a case of absent-mindedness on the 
 part of Mrs. Bidwell that had laid the train 
 for all these catastrophes. 
 
 Mrs. MacAllister was too shaken up to re- 
 turn on the four-thirty, so she spent the 
 night with us, to our great delight, and in 
 course of time Mrs. Bidwell, Miss Haskell, 
 Mrs. MacAllister, Leonard and myself sat 
 down to a satisfying dinner. 
 
 " I think we have done all we can for our 
 city friends," said Eleanor in her absent- 
 minded way. 
 
 Leonard giggled. 
 
A Suburban Christmas 
 
 WHEN the Raynors lived in the Franz 
 Hals in New York there was no one 
 in all the artist colony more popular than 
 they. 
 
 Raynor will never jostle Velasquez for 
 first place as a painter, but I doubt if Velas- 
 quez was as fine a man as Raynor, and even 
 those who smile at the latter's figure work 
 and screech at his landscapes, cheerfully en- 
 dorse the general verdict that " Billy is all 
 right." 
 
 And Mrs. Raynor — well, there's no use 
 trying to describe her to an apathetic world, 
 because if you don't know her you can't 
 begin to imagine how nice she is. 
 
 As a general thing in a family made up 
 
 of an artist and his wife, it is the artist who 
 247 
 
248 A Suburban Christmas 
 
 does the heavy hoping, while the wife, look- 
 ing at life in the light of bitter experience, 
 wishes that her husband had a good job in 
 the ferryhouse at so much a week, and if he 
 lives in roomy air castles she is very apt to 
 live in the small rooms for which they strug- 
 gle to pay rent. I refer to the early years 
 of successful artists and all the years of un- 
 successful ones. 
 
 But Raynor and his wife are the original 
 packages as far as hope is concerned. He 
 is always sure that monumental success is 
 coming to him week after week; she is just 
 as sure that it will arrive early next week, 
 and between the two of them they manufac- 
 ture cheerfulness in large quantities and 
 hand it out to their friends with prodigal 
 generosity. No tea or lunch or supper of a 
 bohemian nature ever took place in the 
 Franz Hals without finding the Raynors 
 among the guests. 
 
 So when they decided to leave New York 
 and take up a residence " way out in Jersey," 
 
A Suburban Christmas 249 
 
 gloom fell upon their friends among the 
 artists, and although I am not an artist, 
 gloom fell upon me. For I have numbered 
 Mr. and Mrs. Billy Raynor among my 
 friends, lo! these many years. 
 
 They moved into their new house in Oc- 
 tober, and a few days afterward I received 
 a letter from Billy, which ran as follows : 
 
 Dear Hubert : I always hoped that heaven would 
 be my home eventually, but I never supposed it would 
 be located here. Yet such is the fact. We are only 
 two minutes from the train, and to make it better 
 yet, I only have to go to town once a week. The 
 real country is five minutes from us on foot, two 
 minutes on a wheel. We have gas, electricity and 
 a furnace, and we think we are going to get coal. 
 
 This last is quite heavenly, because our next door 
 neighbours on either side think they are not going 
 to get any, owing to its scarcity and a little trouble 
 they have had with their coal dealer. Never quarrel 
 with a coal dealer. 
 
 I can get more paintable views in a morning than 
 I can paint in a week, and Anna says she feels 
 better here than she ever imagined anybody could' 
 feel anywhere short of Paradise. 
 
 You ought to come out here and settle. Only forty 
 dollars for eight rooms and a bath, i stable and 
 half an acre of ground with roses and honeysuckle 
 in the summer and hens if we want them — and I 
 
250 A Suburban Christinas 
 
 think we will. Twenty-five miles from New York, 
 and they tell me that mosquitoes are only trouble- 
 some for a certain length of time. 
 
 If you don't hear from me again, come out to 
 spend Christmas day with us. We will invite some 
 of the boys from the Franz Hals, and we'll have a 
 good time — Christmas tree and all the fixings. 
 
 Have gained five pounds since I left New York, 
 and I'm afraid to have Anna weighed, as I have a 
 feeling that a perfect wife should not weigh more 
 than one hundred and twenty-five pounds, and she 
 weighed one hundred and twenty-four before we 
 came out. 
 
 How any one can live in the city who has had a 
 taste of suburban life I don't see. And to think that 
 I have spent thirty years in New York. 
 
 Come out any time and spend Sunday, but be sure 
 to save Christmas, anyway. 
 
 Yours, way up in G, 
 
 William Raynor. 
 
 A very characteristic letter, and it made 
 me want to go out and see him, but I had 
 an unusually busy fall, and I was unable to 
 think of it until Christmas time. 
 
 Then I inquired among the Franz Halsers 
 and found that although a number of them 
 had received the same general invitation, 
 only one was going out. The country in 
 winter has terrors for the average city man. 
 
A Suburban Christmas 251 
 
 But Tom Somers, whose " Winter Even- 
 ing " gained him the Hallgarten prize in — 
 I forget the date — and who paints out of 
 doors in weather that would freeze the fin- 
 gers of most men, said he was going and we 
 planned to go together. 
 
 We had expected to go out Christmas 
 morning, but a business matter requiring in- 
 stant attention came up, and as Tom did not 
 want to go out alone he waited for me, and 
 it was four o'clock before we started and 
 twilight was beginning to fall. 
 
 We bore packages of a Christmas charac- 
 ter, and I took the precaution to carry along 
 a bottle of whiskey, because if there's any- 
 thing the matter with a furnace in a country 
 house and you don't care to wear your over- 
 coat indoors, a judicious use of hot water 
 with the proper flavour is sometimes a pre- 
 venter of doctor's visits. 
 
 Tom and I are not what you'd call drink- 
 ing men, but we did stop in at a cafe on our 
 way down Cortlandt Street to the station. 
 
252 A Suburban Christmas 
 
 and had a glass of Christmas cheer. Only- 
 one, but it made us both feel well disposed 
 toward the world, and I think that the news- 
 boy on the corner was glad that we used 
 that particular ferry. And he didn't forget 
 to say " Thank you " either. 
 
 " I'm sorry more of the fellows didn't 
 come out with us," said Tom, as we lighted 
 our cigars in a warm corner of the men's 
 cabin. " Billy is always good company, but 
 in his own house he will surpass himself, and 
 his wife is a born housekeeper. The dinner 
 will be something just a little different from 
 any other. She has a knack that' way. 
 You know Billy's always wanted to live out 
 of town, and I got a letter from him in No- 
 vember that told me he was as happy as he 
 was the day Anna accepted him, and that 
 Anna was happier. I've been meaning to 
 go out, but one thing or another has pre- 
 vented me." 
 
 "Same here," said I. "Yes, the boys 
 missed it not going out. If Billy had as 
 
A Suburban Christmas 253 
 
 much talent as he has good feeling, he'd be 
 one of our leading painters." 
 
 " Poor Billy," said Tom, shaking his head 
 compassionately. " He can't paint a little 
 bit, and yet he contrives to sell something 
 every once in a while, and I guess that Anna 
 has a little coming to her from her mother's 
 estate, so there's no danger of their starving. 
 They're the salt of the earth, and they de- 
 serve more than they get." 
 
 We reached Airy Park in good season, 
 but there was no one to meet us. A mo- 
 ment's reflection showed me that it was un- 
 reasonable to expect to be met, as Billy 
 didn't even know we were coming. I had 
 meant to write him, but I'd forgotten it, and 
 Tom never writes a letter from one year's 
 end to another. 
 
 There was no sleigh at the station, but the 
 agent told us that it was the second house 
 straight ahead. 
 
 It seemed a long two minutes from the 
 station, but perhaps that was because the 
 
254 -A- Suburban Christmas 
 
 snow was so deep and the wind so piercing. 
 The cars had been very cold, and the good 
 cheer we had imbibed in Cortlandt Street 
 had not sufficed to keep us warm for more 
 than halfway, and we did not take the 
 roseate view of the world that had been ours 
 when we started. 
 
 " Airy Park," said Tom, with a shiver. 
 " I don't see the park, but it's airy all right. 
 I feel as if my overcoat was made of mos- 
 quito netting." 
 
 " But there aren't any mosquitoes," said 
 I. " First time I ever found them absent 
 from their posts." 
 
 " Boy, what's the matter with the electric 
 lights ? " asked Tom of a small boy just as 
 we passed a globe that was shrouded in 
 gloom. 
 
 " There was an accident at the power 
 house in Rahway this afternoon, and they're 
 cut off." 
 
 " Oh, that's all," said Tom. 
 
 " Billy wrote me he had gas as well," said 
 
AlliV PARK,' SAID TOM, WITH A SHIVEK."— !>. 254. 
 
A Suburban Christmas 255 
 
 I, " so he's all right. Electric lights are a 
 luxury, anyway." 
 
 We now arrived at Billy's house. At 
 least it was the second house from the sta- 
 tion. The snow lay deep all around it, and 
 no track led to or from it. Billy and his 
 wife had evidently spent the day indoors. 
 We plowed our way to the piazza and then 
 noticed that there was no light inside, and 
 the frost on the parlour windows looked arc- 
 tic in its construction. 
 
 " Must be pretty cold inside," said I. " I 
 wonder if this is Billy's. Maybe it's a va- 
 cant house." 
 
 The wind wheeued and wheeued and we 
 shivered and shivered as we walked to the 
 door and pressed the electric bell. 
 
 " Did that ring ? " asked Tom. " I didn't 
 hear it." 
 
 " Neither did I, but probably it's in the 
 kitchen. Try it again." 
 
 He pressed it with a lingering touch and 
 we listened for the sound of it, but heard 
 nothing except the howling of the storm.. 
 
256 A Suburban Christmas 
 
 " Brrbrrhh !" shivered Tom, " I'm going 
 to have a chill in the most comfortable chair 
 in the house as soon as Billy opens the door. 
 This is the coldest ever. We'd make good 
 models for a Puck artist" 
 
 A thermometer hung by the door, and just 
 for curiosity I illuminated the evening's 
 blackness with a match and learned that we 
 were in a zero temperature. 
 
 " It's Billy's thermometer," said Tom. 
 " He's had it ever since I knew him, so this 
 is the house, but maybe they've gone to a 
 neighbour's to dinner." 
 
 " That's a beautiful thought. What will 
 poor Robin do then, poor thing? " 
 
 " I thought I heard voices. Probably the 
 bell's out of order. They always are." 
 
 As he spoke he pounded with both fists on 
 the glass of the door, and in a minute we 
 heard steps in the house, and then a glimmer 
 of light and then Billy's well-known voice 
 cried out to some one at a distance. 
 
 " Some one has come. Hurrah ! " 
 
A Suburban Christmas 257 
 
 And then Billy opened the door, and as 
 he did so the wind blew out his candle, and 
 we were in darkness again, but in a dark- 
 ness that was not as chilly as the darkness of 
 outdoors. That is, not quite as chilly. 
 There was no wind after the door was shut, 
 but we did not feel any warmth that could 
 be called stimulating. 
 
 " Merry Christmas, boys ! I saw Tom, 
 but I don't know who the other man was. 
 Wait till I light the candle. Come down, 
 Anna, we've got company. Awfully glad 
 to see you — or I will be when I get a light." 
 
 The candle lighted, Billy — the same old 
 happy-faced Billy, set it down on the hall 
 table and shook hands heartily, and in a mo- 
 ment Anna, her face wreathed in smiles, and 
 her voice laden with Christmas greetings, 
 came downstairs bearing another candle. 
 
 " Why, you poor things, you must be 
 frozen. It must be awful in New York," 
 said Anna, as she got a good look at us. 
 " Come into the kitchen." 
 
258 A Suburban Christmas 
 
 " Had the gas taken out only yesterday, 
 and to-day the electric light has gone out for 
 the first time since we moved in," said Billy, 
 as cheerily as if he had announced that his 
 uncle had left him a fortune. 
 
 " Only two candles in the house, so if you 
 can get along with one until we can send 
 for others " 
 
 " Billy, what makes it so cold ? " blurted 
 out Tom. 
 
 " The same thing that makes every house 
 in town cold — except Butcher's boarding 
 house. The coal famine has struck us." 
 
 When Billy said this he used just the tone 
 that a man uses when he points out the big- 
 gest building in town to you. Billy was 
 evidently proud to belong to a town that 
 boasted but one forehanded man. 
 
 We had followed the Raynors into the 
 kitchen, which was a little warmer than the 
 rest of the house. Still it would have been 
 a good place to keep meat in if a man didn't 
 have a cold cellar or a refrigerator. 
 
A Suburban Christmas 259 
 
 " Keep your things on and we'll have a 
 jolly time in spite of the cold. I'll put on 
 my overcoat just to be in the fashion. Do 
 you feel cold, Anna ? " 
 
 " No, dearie; it takes a good deal to make 
 me cold," said Anna, pulling her golf cape a 
 little closer. 
 
 As for me I began to wish that I had not 
 left my snug apartments. 
 
 " Anna," said Billy, " we ought to have a 
 grate fire in the parlour to celebrate Christ- 
 mas with, and do hurry up the dinner. 
 
 " I'm cook to-day," said Anna, with a 
 cheery laugh. " All the cooks in town are 
 Slavs, and they've all gone to Newark to a 
 Christmas celebration." 
 
 This seemed a fairy story until it was ex- 
 plained that, all the Slavs were from the 
 same village and most of them were cousins, 
 and they had a loving habit of taking their 
 holidays together. So every house in Airy 
 Park, with the exception of the boarding 
 house where they employed coloured serv- 
 
26o A Suburban Christmas 
 
 ants, was cookless on this glad Christmas 
 day. 
 
 " Don't you want some beer ? " asked 
 Billy, as we followed him to the cellar to get 
 some wood to make a fire with. 
 
 We felt it was a little cool for beer, and 
 so it proved, for the bottles were frozen solid . 
 and two of them had burst. 
 
 We found a broken chair in the " wine 
 cellar," and also a box that had contained 
 oranges. These were borne upstairs in tri- 
 umph, and in a few minutes the chair and 
 box were giving themselves up to make it 
 look warm. That was all it did — look 
 warm. The flames were red and burny- 
 looking, but they gave out no heat in that 
 polar parlour. But I had the presence of 
 mind to open the bottle of whiskey, and then 
 we were in a better case. 
 
 "After dinner we'll light the Christmas 
 tree," said Billy. " We half expected some 
 one, and so we made preparations ; but when 
 no one came on the three o'clock we gave 
 you up and went out for a long walk, and 
 
A Suburban Christmas 261 
 
 we have just enjoyed the bracing weather 
 outdoors." 
 
 " A little of it has leaked in, Billy," said 
 Tom, spreading his hands to the blaze and 
 trying to bring his shoulder blades together 
 for warmth. 
 
 " It's too bad, old man," said I, " to have 
 anything like this happen to you on Christ- 
 mas day." 
 
 " Why, we like it," said Billy, with every 
 evidence of sincerity. " It adds a spice of 
 excitement to life. Now if we hadn't any 
 chairs to burn it might be different. Aw- 
 fully thoughtful of you to bring that whis- 
 key. Hadn't a drop in the house." 
 
 Tom had given up trying to warm his 
 hands, and he looked pretty glum. I imag- 
 ine he was thinking of a snug little dinner 
 to which he had been invited. 
 
 " How are you going to get dinner if you 
 haven't any coal?" I asked. 
 
 " Oh, we've got a quarter of a ton, and 
 Anna is using some of it to get dinner with. 
 
262 A Suburban Christmas 
 
 We were going to Butcher's if you hadn't 
 come, but this will be a heap better " 
 
 "Look here," said Tom, "this open fire 
 looks cheery and very Christmassy, but if 
 you want to warm the house, why not burn 
 the wood in the furnace ? It'll go ten times 
 as far. I'm really afraid of pneumonia, you 
 know. No end jolly and unusual and all 
 that, but the Franz Hals keeps us so infer- 
 nally warm that I've sort of got into the 
 foolish habit of expecting it, and if you 
 haven't any wood for the furnace I'll have 
 to go to bed to keep warm." 
 
 "No, no," said Billy, his face clouding. 
 " Don't think of doing such a thing before 
 dinner. I've got a lot of boxes down cellar 
 and some planks that the men used when 
 they were shingling the roof. We'll have a 
 fire that will make the house seem like mid- 
 summer. Come down and help me start it. 
 We'll just picnic, you know. You take me 
 as you find me and we'll have the best time 
 ever." 
 
A Suburban Christmas 263 
 
 His cheery good nature was infectious. 
 He poked his head into the kitchen on the 
 way down and said : " Anna, we're going 
 to build a wood fire in the furnace. Hurry 
 up with your dinner and we'll have a jollier 
 time than any Franz Halsers could possibly 
 have." 
 
 He continued as we followed him down: 
 " Isn't this a roomy little house ? Finely 
 ventilated and everything convenient. Of 
 course this is unusual weather, and this coal 
 famine is unusual, too, but if I had plenty 
 of coal and the weather was warmer it 
 wouldn't be any trouble at all to keep com- 
 fortable. We spend most of our time out- 
 doors to save fuel, and it's doing us a world 
 of good. I think we're going to live very 
 economically when we really get down to it. 
 Next month's January, you know, and Feb- 
 ruary's always short, and after March you're 
 well into spring. Oh, we haven't regretted 
 it a minute since we came out here. Aw- 
 fully glad you came to-night. People here 
 
264 A Suburban Christmas 
 
 are rather clannish, and I think they don't 
 . quite know what to make of an artist, so we 
 haven't gone out much, but I have my paint- 
 ing, and Anna her books and housekeeping, 
 and half the time dinner to busy herself 
 with, and you know she likes nothing better 
 than cooking. If she were stronger we 
 wouldn't have a cook at all. Sometimes I 
 say that all we really have her for is so we 
 can pay her her wages the first of the 
 month." 
 
 "Billy," came a voice from above, 
 " Where's the turkey. Do you suppose Dag- 
 ma took it ? " 
 
 "Why, I don't know, dear. Isn't it in 
 the pantry ? " 
 
 My heart sank. I was getting hungry in 
 spite of the cold, and my exercise in helping 
 break wood for the fire was adding to my 
 appetite. Pray Heaven they find the tur- 
 key. Tom and I exchanged glances. 
 These were two children with their house- 
 keeping, and we were in a fair way to freeze 
 
A Suburban Christmas 265 
 
 to death and then starve afterward. The 
 wind roared outside with a noise like a heav- 
 ily-laden freight train on a down grade and 
 full steam on. No, there was no suggestion 
 of steam in the noise. Rapid congealment, 
 but no steam. Still, I was beginning to en- 
 joy myself now that I knew the worst, and 
 I think Tom was. You see, Billy was so 
 human, and he was so manifestly happy that 
 it would have been downright treacherous to 
 remain gloomy. 
 
 A few quick steps on the pantry floor 
 above us and then : " Oh, I've found it, 
 dear. It was behind the refrigerator, and 
 it's frozen solid. What shall I do with it? " 
 
 " Bring it down here and we'll thaw it 
 out in the furnace," said Tom. 
 
 There was to be a turkey, after all! 
 
 We had been chopping wood, or, rather, 
 breaking it by jumping on it, and all by the 
 light of the furnace fire, for Billy had started 
 it as soon as he had broken the first box, 
 and now Anna came down, singing a little 
 
266 A Suburban Christmas 
 
 Christmas tune, and put the turkey in the 
 open door, and then went upstairs to find 
 some of the other things that were to make 
 up our Christmas feast. 
 
 "Isn't it jolly to picnic this way?" said 
 she, with as much ardour as Billy had dis- 
 played. "I think there are some cans of 
 soup somewhere, and there's a plum pudding 
 and sweet potatoes, only they're very much 
 frozen." 
 
 The reader may not believe it, but we were 
 really enjoying ourselves. Our exertions 
 had warmed us, and Billy's imperturbable 
 good spirits were so contagious that nothing 
 could have made us immune. 
 
 " God rest you, merry gentlemen," sang 
 Tom as he jumped into a box and nearly dis- 
 located an ankle. " This is really living, 
 Billy. I'm all aglow." 
 
 As for me, I found an old sofa by falling 
 headlong across it, and we demolished it like 
 three boys breaking windows in an unused 
 house. The furnace poker was long and 
 
A Suburban Christmas 267 
 
 strong, and we gave thwacking blows with 
 that and the coal shovel. 
 
 " Ram her in," shouted Tom, as the three 
 of us bore the back of the sofa up to the 
 furnace door. 
 
 We rammed her in and then ran off for 
 another piece. 
 
 " What are you men doing down there? " 
 called out Anna, breaking off in the middle 
 of a song. 
 
 " Getting up an appetite ! " yelled Tom, 
 and started another Christmas song, in 
 which we all joined. It was " Gather 
 Around the Christmas Tree," and we joined 
 hands and circled around the furnace, roar- 
 ing it out until Anna came down to see what 
 we were doing, and laughed at us for a par- 
 cel of boys. 
 
 "That turkey must be thawed by this 
 time," said she. 
 
 Tom was in front of the furnace when she 
 spoke, and he let go of our hands and yelled : 
 "Thunder and Mars! Who pushed that 
 turkey in ? " 
 
268 A Suburban Christmas 
 
 The turkey had been forgotten. We had 
 shoved it into the fiery furnace, and it was 
 even now too far gone to help out our 
 Christmas feast, 
 
 Tom began another song of childhood: 
 
 "Where, oh where is the Christmas turkey? 
 Where, oh where is the Christmas turkey? 
 It has gone to the fiery furnace " 
 
 He broke off and grabbed our hands and 
 again we circled around the furnace, while 
 Anna sat on the cellar stairs and laughed to 
 the verge of hysterics. The mainstay of our 
 dinner was helping heat the house, but we 
 didn't any of us care. We were four chil- 
 dren once more, and we gave ourselves up 
 to a wild abandon. 
 
 " Stop, stop ! " cried Anna, " I'm weak 
 from laughing. You ought to be scolded 
 for burning up that lovely turkey, but we'll 
 get along without it. Come up and help me 
 forage." 
 
 Now the destruction of the turkey was a 
 
,'; A Suburban Christmas 269 
 
 real calamity to me. It was not so much 
 the loss of that much nutriment as the senti- 
 ment of the thing.' Turkey is as much a 
 part of Christmas as Christmas greens or a 
 tree or presents. But I am man enough to 
 stand even a calamity without blinking, and 
 I joined in the foraging with gusto and tried 
 to forget the incinerated fowl which must 
 have weighed a good twelve pounds and 
 looked to be uncommonly good before it 
 was cremated. 
 
 We found half a cold ham and two cans 
 of Kennebec salmon and three cans of soup 
 — bouillon, vegetable and mock turtle. 
 
 Tom said : " Combine the three and it 
 will make a rich soup." 
 
 I know nothing of the secrets of the 
 kitchen, and the idea was distasteful to me, 
 but Anna is a born cook, and it sounded all 
 right to her. She even added something 
 else to the combination, and I am bound to 
 say that the soup was delicious. We all 
 helped in the operations. Nine women out 
 
270 A Suburban Christmas 
 
 of ten hate to have any one in the kitchen 
 when they are cooking, but Anna was de- 
 lighted to have company. She warmed to 
 her work, and at last threw oiif her golf cape, 
 although I thought it imprudent. Now that 
 my dancing was over I was none too warm, 
 particularly when I heard that long roar of 
 the wind outside. 
 
 The dinner, when it was served, was plain 
 and unconventional, but it had a Christmas 
 flavour that all the boarding-house turkeys 
 in the world would not have had. 
 
 We ate it right there in the kitchen, and 
 Tom told stories, and Billy sang songs in 
 which the only thing lacking was a voice, 
 and Anna bustled around and waited on us 
 and prepared a brandy sauce for the canned 
 pudding that took it right out of the canned 
 goods class and made it something distinc- 
 tive. 
 
 After dinner we lighted the tree, and I 
 suppose we acted like a pack of children, but 
 we certainly had a good time, and I never 
 
A Suburban Christmas 271 
 
 thought of the cold weather from the time 
 Anna announced that dinner was ready until 
 it was time to go to bed, somewhere about 
 two o'clock. 
 
 Billy had lots of blankets, and he told us 
 to imagine that we were on a Peary expedi- 
 tion, and that was no strain on the imagina- 
 tion at all. I am almost certain that if it 
 had been any other people but Billy and 
 Anna we would have taken the earliest train 
 back to town. 
 
 And if the inhabitants of Airy Park don't 
 take up Billy because he is an artist, why so 
 much the worse for the Airy Parkers, for 
 the Raynors can give anybody that Christ- 
 mas feeling right in the middle of July. 
 
How to Write a Novel for 
 the Masses 
 
 THE one thing necessary in a novel of 
 romance is romance. The ordinary 
 novel-reader is a dull bird, who knows 
 little, and cares less, about the facts of 
 history, the cut of a cloak, or the geog- 
 raphy of a particular country. To him 
 anachronisms do not exist, because he 
 would not know one if he saw it in 
 a cage. Of course I don't mean you, dear 
 reader ; but you must admit that the vast ma- 
 jority of the reading public is made up of 
 dull, unthinking people, so why should 
 writers spend so much time substantiating 
 facts, studying costumes and scenery and 
 other details that do not affect the real in- 
 terest of the story, which is and must be the . 
 romantic portion of it? 
 
 Let me show you how it ought to be done : 
 273 
 
274 -^ Novel for the Masses 
 
 " It was dawn of a clear spring morning. 
 Guy le Cormorant set forth from his father's 
 castle with never a sou in his pocket, a large 
 credit at his banker's, and the whole world 
 before him." 
 
 Here chuck in some reference to the 
 " ' Proven9al robins ' that during the reign 
 ,of the good Louis sang with such surpassing 
 sweetness." If you wish to, run in a few 
 Breton peasants, and dot the meadow with 
 sheep, and fill the fields with Lyonnaise po- 
 tatoes. The public won't know or care 
 whether you are right or not. 
 
 Now it's time for your first adventure, 
 for you are nearing the end of the second 
 page, and a successful romantic novel should 
 yield an adventure to every ten pages, and 
 stop at the 300th page. 
 
 "Around the corner of the Louvre" 
 (never mind what or where the Louvre is; 
 the public will think it is a river or a field) 
 " came the wicked seneschal, Vignon de 
 Morimont. His fat horse jogged along 
 
A Novel for the Masses 275 
 
 lazily, and from the corners of his treacher- 
 ous eyes he looked at the brave young Guy." 
 
 Now have Guy accuse him of having mur- 
 dered his (Guy's) grandmother in 1560. 
 
 " When my father told me that my gran- 
 dam " ( " grandam " has a good sound al- 
 ways, like a great oath) " had been mur- 
 dered by de Morimont of Morimont Castle, 
 I swore that the murder should not go un- 
 avenged. All this morning have I sought 
 thee; now have I found thee. Prepare for 
 an awful doom." 
 
 Now let them draw their broadswords, 
 and then say something about Richelieu 
 having issued an edict against the carrying 
 of broadswords by gentlemen. Start in as 
 if you were going to be very dry over it, 
 but cut it short quickly. That will make 
 the reader like you. Then have Guy fly at 
 the wicked seneschal, and spit him on the 
 broadsword, and toss him into a plane tree. 
 A plane tree is better than the most ornate 
 tree that your reader is likely to know about. 
 
276 A Novel for the Masses 
 
 If a man thinks that you know something 
 that he doesn't know, he suspects you of 
 knowing other things of which he is igno- 
 rant, and his respect increases. 
 
 Having tossed the seneschal into the plane 
 tree, let Guy mount his horse and continue 
 on his way. Adventure number one is over, 
 and he has won out easily; but it will be a 
 mistake to let him win every round with as 
 little effort. In a story, a dead-sure thing 
 is not exciting. 
 
 It is now time to bring in more singing 
 of birds, as a sort of contrast. If a shep- 
 herd is handy, let him pipe up a little, so as 
 to put Guy into good spirits, as the stabbing 
 of the seneschal is on his nerves a bit. Guy 
 might toss the shepherd a sequin or a groat. 
 The public has heard of both coins, but 
 doesn't know where they grow. 
 
 Refer briefly to the clouds, and carry him 
 on horseback past the place " where in 1493, 
 the year after Columbus discovered Amer- 
 ica, two monks of St. Bernard were mur- 
 
A Novel for the Masses 277 
 
 dered by Villon, the poet scamp, A shrine 
 still marts the spot, — a shrine erected by 
 Villon's daughter." That will make the 
 public say, " My, don't he know a lot ! " 
 
 Now it is high time to bring Blanche de 
 Boisgobey upon the scene. You may have 
 her poor, but of good family, or you may 
 make her a rich runaway, fleeing from the 
 unpleasant attentions of Prince de Joinville ; 
 but have her family good, by all means, and 
 she herself must be absolutely unspotted. 
 The great public will not stand for a tar- 
 nished woman in the role of heroine of one 
 of these romantic novels. 
 
 Describe her clothes, but in this you'll 
 have to be careful ; for while the men won't 
 know anything about it, the women will 
 catch on if you make any flagrant error. I 
 guess you'll have to take the trouble to read 
 up the clothes, unless you have a sister who 
 is up on garments. You might dress 
 Blanche in the fashion of to-day, and say 
 that she was fond of being ahead of her 
 time. 
 
2/8 A Novel for the Masses 
 
 But if you drop a hint of aiiothef adven- 
 ture, not far off, you 'can draw it mild on 
 the <:Iothes business. Make her just as 
 pretty as you know how, and that without 
 describing her features ; because no two per- 
 sons agree on a woman's beauty, particularly 
 no man and woman. Just say tihat she was 
 as beautiful as " that fair queen of Greece 
 whose husband swam the Hellespont to 
 rescue her from the clutches of King Xerx- 
 es." There's more ancient history, and the 
 dear public is left to its own imagination to 
 conjure up proper features for her. 
 
 Now bring on your second adventure. 
 People have a dim idea that wolves once 
 overran France. You can speak of the 
 great she-wolf that in 1343 ate up an entire 
 village in the department of the Loire or sthe 
 Soir; never mind how you spell it,^-the 
 public won't know the difference. Have 
 that she-wolf, grown old and hungry, come 
 out of a copse (by all means, a copse) and 
 Spring upon poor Blanche, who is on her 
 way to a nunnery. 
 
A Novel for the Masses 279 
 
 " While the terrible wolf was yet in mid- 
 air, Guy pushed his horse to a mad gallop, 
 ami, raising his arms. above his head, he 
 caught the famished beast in his Herculean 
 grasp, diverting her for a moment from her 
 purpose." 
 
 Now you can give 'em a pretty good fig^t. 
 Have the wolf and Guy and the horse go 
 down together in a grand mixup. Let 
 Blanche pinch the wolfs tail, and have that 
 so anger the " vulpine beast " that she tears 
 a hole in Guy's doublet. It is a little early 
 in the game to spoil his face, but if you give 
 the reader a hint that it will heal up before 
 they are married, I think you are safe to 
 scratch him- pretty hard. Of course, as soon 
 as Blanche sees the scratches she will fall in 
 love with him, and then faint. 
 ' Make the combat long, and have Guy 
 pretty nearly done for, when, by an oppor- 
 tune stab, he punctures the heart of the mon- 
 ster. 
 
 He can come in for the big bounty that is 
 
28o A Novel for the Masses 
 
 on the wolf, if you want; but as he is rich 
 alreg-dy, that won't amount to much, except 
 as it gives him a chance to bestow it on a 
 group of poor villagers who have been at- 
 tracted to the scene of the fight. Be sure 
 to call it " largess " if he scatters it among 
 them. 
 
 Now you see why you have provided a 
 stout horse. It is so that Blanche may sit 
 behind Guy, and continue on her way to the 
 nunnery, he having gallantly offered to set 
 her down at her corner. 
 
 Now it is time for the real villain to ap- 
 pear. The seneschal Guy treed on the sec- 
 ond page was only for early seasoning. The 
 real villain is, of course. Prince Henri Mille- 
 dieudetonnefleurs de Joinville, and you 
 would do well to place him on a stallion, 
 and have him ride for two days and two 
 nights in pursuit of Blanche. 
 
 It's really necessary to bring in a little 
 more scenery. A novel would seem bare 
 without it. You might set out a double 
 
A Novel for the Masses 281 
 
 row of Lombardy poplars that were planted 
 in honor of the victory of Magna Charta 
 over Count de Blois in loio. Never mind 
 the public; they won't know. It'll look all 
 right in type. Mention a dense flock of 
 Marseillaise blackbirds that obscured the 
 light of the sun, and let it be as a portent 
 against the' success of the wicked Henri. 
 Mention other flights, casually, and speak of 
 the Children's Crusade in search of the 
 Northwest Passage, that was near to having 
 been discontinued owing to a flight of sea 
 gulls from John o' Groat's to Land's End. 
 This last will establish you as a master of 
 curious knowledge. 
 
 Let Guy go to sleep, weak from loss of 
 blood, and while the horse crops at the grass, 
 and Blanche plucks ox-heart daisies, bring 
 on the villain at an easy gallop, and have 
 him pick up Blanche and ride off with her. 
 Keep Guy asleep for a half hour, so that he 
 will deserve the more credit when he, on his 
 fat old horse, chases and overtakes the fleet 
 
282 A Novel for the Masses 
 
 stallion. For of course he overtakes the 
 villain. The stallion has peculiarly shaped 
 hoofs, having lost a portion of each one in 
 the battle of Cressy or Sedan, — either one 
 will do, — and Guy is ahle to track Henri in 
 this way. Otherwise, the hero not being a 
 woodsman, Henri would have escaped with 
 his prey, and it would have caused" a bad 
 break in the story. 
 
 Let Guy come on Henri in a narrow defile, 
 — a characteristically French one. If you 
 don't happen to know any French defile, de- 
 scribe an American one, and it will go all 
 right. 
 
 Of course this won't be the final fight, 
 because you've got to fill at least three hun- 
 dred pages, and Guy will have adventures 
 with the pickpockets of Paris, and in the 
 Bay of Biscay and the Swiss Alps; but I 
 can't write the whole book for you, so we'll 
 suppose it is the final fight. 
 
 Let Henri have the advantage at the start, 
 but give Guy great staying powers. Make 
 
A Novel for the Masses 283 
 
 him fatigue Henri, aad make Henri say, 
 " Je suis fatigue." That's real French, and 
 you can find a lot more like it where that 
 came from. Make Henri in need of rest 
 and refreshment, and then let Giity come 
 some celebrated thrust on him. You can 
 name the thrust, if you wish; invent it and 
 describe it in detail out of your own head. 
 No one will ever show you up; and if any 
 one does, it will advertise the book. 
 
 Make Guy smile at Blanche, who by this 
 time is loving him tremendously, and then, 
 "with a sudden turn of the wrist, — that 
 wrist that ten years later was to save the life 
 of the great Mirabeau, — Guy gave Henri 
 the conge, and the wicked prince turned and 
 reeled in his tracks." 
 
 Now make Guy say, " Honi soit qui mal 
 y pense," or " Dum vivimus, vivamus ; " and 
 then, to conclude the book, make the old 
 seneschal of page 2 crawl up, filled with re- 
 morse. He had dropped out of the plane 
 tree, and the fall had brought him to. Make 
 
284 A Novel for the Masses 
 
 him ask forgiveness of Guy; and then, 
 " while little French birds were singing ron- 
 dels, and as peasants bent over their hoes in 
 clod-like attitudes, or leaned upon their 
 spades to listen to the Angelus, the monk 
 pronounced the words that made Blanche 
 and Guy husband and wife, — or rather, 
 wife and husband." 
 , There you are. It's a seller. 
 
N. 
 
 A Romance of the Building of the Middle "West 
 
 Aladdin & Co. 
 
 By HERBERT QUICK 
 $1.50. 
 N. Y. Sun:— "a story of fcuisfnass and love full of the 
 Ameriean flavor. ... We have liked t>ie business 
 part ; it has entertained us to read of the quick and 
 migd^ development «f the city of l.at«6more; we 
 have followed with interest and wonder the Napole- 
 onic doines )f Ji.mnfiie akinsi the boomer. . . . But 
 particularly, and more than for^hese, we find that we 
 must be thankful for Josie Trescott, the hei-oine, 
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 is adorable, and we thank goodness that she had the 
 good traditional American ability to take care of 
 herself. ... An unusual and admirable story. If the 
 reader is wise h^ will hasten him and get it.* 
 Y. Times Review:— "|t Is a story very much out of 
 the ordinary in both matter,«tyle and spirit ... an 
 unhackneyed subject, develaped with skiN and 
 humor . . , delightfully realistic. ... Mr. Quick is a 
 
 wizard who realizes the dramatic posstbilrtie 
 
 For sheer excitement and breathless Interest it 
 would be hard to match in v«ry recent literature the 
 wild rjde through flood and storm of the special 
 train. . . . The minor charaoters have wonderfully 
 distinct personalities." 
 
 N. Y. Tribune: — "Jt is surprisingly well done. . . . Nothing dry 
 about Mr. Quick's telling of the story." 
 
 N. y. -Evening Post: — ■" The story of the town and its promoters is 
 well worth reading. . . Tim Elkins, with his rudimentary sense of 
 honor, is the best drawn character in the book, a hearty, humorous 
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 Outlook: — "The best of this book is not its picture of 'a IW-estem 'boom 
 town, good as that is, nor its really interesting story, 'but the portrait 
 it presents of the chief promoter, a rare whimsical genius." 
 
 Chicago InTBR-OcEAN: — "Gives a vivid picture of a phase of 
 commiercial ^development 'that is excuse enough 'for the book, if 
 . excuse were needed for so readable a tale." 
 
 San Francisco Argonaut: — "A lively, up-to-date novel .of 
 
 modern methods of business speculation. Jim Elkins, 'the promoter, 
 is capitally drawn. ... A humorous turn to the narrative. 
 
 ;^2SIS22SISS5SS5E5I^SSSSI^^^SSSSSS^^^SSSSSS3SSI3S 
 
 Henry Holt and Company 
 
 «P W. sgd Si. (<w '04) NBW YORK 
 
4tli printing of " A novel In tlie better sense of a word mneh 
 sinned arainst. . ,. .. It Is decidedly a book worth while." — L4fe. 
 
 The Transgression of 
 Andrew Vane 
 
 By GUY WETMORE CARRYL 
 
 i2mo. $1.50. 
 
 -Times' Saturday Review: — "A strong and original story; . . . 
 
 the descriptions of conditions in the American colony [in Paris] are 
 convincingly clever. The story from the prologue — one 01 ex- 
 ceptional promise in point of interest — to the climax ... is full 
 of action and dramatic surprise." 
 
 N, Y. Tribune: — " The surprising developments we must leave the 
 reader to find out for himself. He will find it a pleasant task; . . . 
 the surprise is not brought forward until precisely the right moment, 
 and one is carried from the first chapter to the last with curiosity, 
 and concern for the hero's fate kept well alive." 
 
 N. Y. Evening Sun : — " Everybody who likes clever fiction should 
 read it," 
 
 Literary World: — "The prologue is as skilful a handling of a 
 repellent theme as has ever been presented. The book is distinctly 
 not one for the youn^ person, but neither is it for the seeker after 
 the risqu^ or the erotic. ... In this novel are poured into a con- 
 sistent and satisfying whole more of those vivid phases of I^arisat 
 which the author has shown himself a master hand." 
 
 Chicago Evening Post: — "The reader stops with regret in ;his 
 mind that Guy Wetmore Carryl's story-telling work is done," 
 
 Chicago Tribune: — '* A brilliant piece of work." 
 
 Washington Star: — " A more engaging villain has seldom entered 
 the pages of modem fiction; . . . sparklbs with quotable epigrams." 
 
 Buffalo Express; — " The sort of a story which one is very apt to 
 read with interest from beginning to end. And, moreover, . . . 
 very bright and clever," 
 
 New Haven Journal: — ** By far the most ambitious work he 
 undertook, and likewise the most brilliant." 
 
 Henry Holt and Company 
 
 IQ W. yd St. (vi '04) JVifiW yoxjc 
 
M printing of " a book of eztraordlnary Interest as a study 
 from the inside of tlie 'inwardness' of a eenlns." 
 
 — Times Saturday Review, 
 
 The Diary of a 
 Musician 
 
 Edited by DOLORES M. BACON 
 
 With decorations and illustrations by Charles 
 Edward Hooper and H. Latimer Brown 
 
 I2mo. $1.50 net. (By mail, $1.62.) 
 
 A picture of the soul of a genius, naively unconscious of the 
 limitations imposed upon life by some of us who are not geniuses 
 — and probably by some who are. A vivid picture is given of 
 the grinding poverty of his youth on the Hungarian farm, his 
 struggle for education, and his strange success. His last en- 
 tries are touching, and somewhat in the nature of a surprise. 
 The book runs over with marked humor. 
 
 "Much of that exquisite egotism, the huge, artistic Me and 
 the tiny universe, that gluttony of the emotions, of the whole 
 peculiar compound of hysteria, inspiration, vanity, insight and 
 fidgets which goes to make up that delightful but somewhat 
 rickety thing which we call the artistic temperament is repro- 
 duced. . . . ' The Diary of a Musician ' does what most actual 
 diaries fail to do — writes down a man in full. It is an entertain- 
 ing study in naivete and nerves, art-pains and genius-conscious- 
 ness." — Bookman, 
 
 " Especially interesting; , . . many amusing situations." 
 — Public Opinion. 
 
 " The naVvet^ of the book is inimitable. . . . That marve- 
 lous, appalling, mad thing named genius, at once the despair 
 of those who do and those who do not possess it, is here pictured 
 with extraordinary fascination and power." — Chicago Tribune. 
 
 "Uncommon power distinguishes it; ... a curiously 
 interesting book." — Chicago Record-Herald. 
 
 "A work of usual character; . . . entirely original in its 
 scope." — San Francisco Chronicle. 
 
 "Take it how you will, 'The Diary of a Musician' is 
 wonderful." — Lucille Wetherell in Powers' Reviews of the 
 New Books, Minneapolis. 
 
 Henry Holt and Company 
 
 20 W. 23d Si. (vm '04) NEW YORK 
 
"TTnnsnal and dellglitftil."— WojAm^/M star. 
 
 Daphne and 
 Her Lad 
 
 By M. J. LAGEN and CALLY RYLAND 
 
 With Frontispiece by Eliot KtEN 
 
 i2mo. ;$i.25. 
 
 The scenes of this affecting little love story are Philadelphia 
 and a Southern City, possibly suggested by Richmond. The 
 diief characters are journalists, and there is a picturesque atmos- 
 phere of Bohemianism. The hero and the heroine are first 
 attracted, each by the contributions of the other to their respec- 
 tive periodicals. What thereafter fell out, and its surprising 
 conclusion, the reader must find out for himself. It is a tale 
 of surprises, grave and gay. 
 
 " Passionate, very brisk, full of well-edited self-revealings." 
 — JV. Y. Times Saturday Review. 
 
 "Rarely does one read between the covers of a book 
 quite so natural a correspondence." — N. Y. Globe. 
 
 "Strikingly original;-. . . a charming novelette." — 
 Philadelphia Ledger. 
 
 "A departure in modem story-telling. ... A book •of 
 temperaments, and an entertaining one." — Pfaladelphia 
 Inquirer. 
 
 " Such epistles must be of extraordinary interest to hold the 
 attention of unsentimental readers. These have that interest, 
 and are very compelling. " — Philadelphia Evening Telegraph. 
 
 " Entertaining throughout; . . . the most commendable 
 feature is the artistic workmanship that has successfully made 
 each writer reveal his or her personality. . . . Will prove most 
 welcome to the average reader." — Baltimore Sun, 
 
 ""Vividly awakened tenderness . . . the chatiu of the 
 letters. " — Richmond Times-Despatch. 
 
 Henry Holt and Company 
 
 ID W. ^d St. (vil '04) NEW YORK