Chapter XXIV: Introduction: Youth--Education--Characteristics (12)

MY DEAR GARLAND,--I am going up to New York on the eleventh to talk to the moving picture people at the Waldorf-Astoria. I had them down here and had a resolution put through the Committees on Education of both House and Senate, asking the Moving Picture Industry to interest itself in Americanization, and I have been appointed at the head of a committee to take charge of this work. I have some schemes myself that I want very much to talk to you about regarding Americanization.

I do not know how much time I will be able to give to this work because I have got to make some money, but I am going to use my spare time that way. Suppose when I get to New York I telephone you and see if we can not get together. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To one of the Moving Picture Weeklies, Lane contributed this paragraph on Americanizing the foreign born:--"The one sure way to bring the foreign born to love this land of ours is to show our pride in its present, faith in its future, and interpret America to all in terms of fair play and square dealing. America gives men nothing--except a chance,"

TO HUGO K. ASHER

Rochester, Minnesota, January 3, 1920

MY DEAR HUGO,--I have not written you because my own plans must be determined by circumstances. I think, however, that I shall leave very soon. I hate to go because the work is so satisfactory. ...

Bryan has come back. What strength he will develop, no one can tell. He evidently has determined that he will not be pushed aside or disregarded. He has been, and will continue to be as long as he lives, a great force in our politics. People believe that he is honest and know he is sympathetic with the moral aspirations of the plain people. They distrust his administrative ability, but on the moral question, they recognize no one as having greater authority.

... I hear there is talk among the business people of setting up a third party and nominating Hoover. Two things the next President must know--Europe and America, European conditions and American conditions. The President of the United States must be his own Secretary of State. We need administration of our internal affairs and wise guidance economically. Hoover can give these. He has the knowledge and he has the faculty. He has the confidence of Europe and the confidence of America. He is not a Democrat, nor is he a Republican. He voted for Wilson, for Roosevelt, and McKinley. But he is sane, progressive, competent. The women are strong for him and there are fifteen million of them who will vote this year. It would not surprise me to see him nominated on either ticket, and I believe I will vote for him now as against anybody else.

But I must quit talking politics because I am going out of it entirely, completely, and I really have been out of politics ever since I left California. I have tried to take a broad non-partisan view of things which is one of the reasons I have had hard sledding. But I am going without a grouch, without a complaint or a criticism--with a great admiration for Wilson and with a thorough knowledge of his defects; and with a more sympathetic attitude toward my colleagues than any can have who do not know the circumstances as well as I do. ... Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO ADMIRAL CARY GRAYSON

Washington, January 5, 1920

MY DEAR ADMIRAL,--As you know, I am contemplating resigning. It has been my purpose to wait until such time as the President was well enough to see me and talk the matter over with him. I understand from Mr. Tumulty that the President is prepared to name my successor, and that it would not in any way add to his embarrassment to fill my place in the immediate future. I would like to know if this is the fact, for my course will be shaped accordingly. Two years ago I had an offer of fifty thousand a year which I put aside because I thought it my duty to stay while the war was on. When Mr. McAdoo resigned, this offer was renewed but I then thought that I should await the conclusion of formal peace, which all expected would come soon. While the President was West, I promised that I would take the matter up with him on his return, and since then I have been waiting for his return to strength. I need not tell you that I am delighted to know that he is in such condition now as to turn to matters that in the best of health are vexatious, if this is the fact.

My sole reason for resigning is that I feel that I am entitled to have assurance as to the future of my family and myself. I have been in public life twenty-one years and have less than nothing in the way of private means. ... And having given the better part of my life to the public, I feel that I must now regard the interest of those dependent upon me. I wish you would be perfectly frank with me, for I would do nothing that with your knowledge you would think would make against the welfare of our Chief. Cordially,

FRANKLIN K LANE

TO HERBERT C. PELL, JR. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

Washington, January 31, 1920

MY DEAR CONGRESSMAN,-- ... It is our boast and our glory that we have a form of government under which men can make their conception of society into law, if they can persuade their neighbors that their dream is one that will benefit all. There is nothing more absurd than to contend that the last word has been spoken as to any of our institutions, that all experimenting has ended and that we have come to a standstill. ... We are growing. But this does not mean that all change must be growth and that we can not test by history, especially by our own experiences and knowledge, the value of whatever is proposed as a substitute for what is. The dog that dropped the meat to get the shadow of a bigger piece is the classical warning. We are for what is, not because it is the absolute best but because it has worked well. It is sacred only because it has been useful. Until a system of government, or of economics, or of home life, can be demonstrated to be an improvement on what we have, we shall not hysterically and fancifully forsake those which have served us thus far.

Our Government is not our master but our tool, adaptable to the uses for which it was designed; our servant, responsive to our call. This makes revolution an absurdity. But it also makes a sense of responsibility a necessity. And while we may not have broken down in this regard we certainly have weakened. We have proceeded in the belief that automatically all men would come to see things as we do, have a sense of the value of our traditions and a consciousness of the deep meanings of our national experiences. The things we believed in we have not taught. Hence the need for such institutions as the Constitutional League which, however, can not do for each of us the duty that is ours of living the spirit of our Constitution. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO HON. WOODROW WILSON THE WHITE HOUSE

Washington, February 5, 1920

MY DEAR MR. PRESIDENT,--It is with deep regret that I feel compelled to resign the commission with which you saw fit to honor me, by appointing me to a place in your Cabinet, now almost seven years ago. If it will meet your convenience I would suggest that I be permitted to retire on the first of March.

With the conditions which make this step necessary you are familiar. I have served the public for twenty-one years, and that service appeals to me as none other can, but I must now think of other duties.

The program of administration and legislation looking to the development of our resources, which I have suggested from time to time, is now in large part in effect, or soon will come into effect through the action of Congress.

I return this Department into your hands with very real gratitude that you have given me the opportunity to know well a working force holding so many men and women of singular ability and rare spirit.

I trust that you may soon be so completely restored to health that the country and the world may have the benefit of the full measure of your strength in the leadership of their affairs. The discouragements of the present are, I believe, only temporary. The country knows that for America to stand outside the League of Nations will bring neither pride to us nor confidence to the world.

Believe me, my dear Mr. President, always, cordially and faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO FRANK W. MONDELL

Washington, February 13, 1920

MY DEAR MR. MONDELL,--I wish to acknowledge, with the warmest appreciation, your letter of yesterday, and to say that I am literally forced out of public life by my lack of resources. The little property that I have been able to save is all gone in an effort to make both ends meet, and I find myself at fifty-five without a dollar, in debt, and with no assurance as to the future. I assure you that it is with the deepest regret that I leave public life for I like it, and the public have treated me handsomely, especially the men in Congress with whom I have had to deal, and not the least of these, yourself.

I should like to stay, especially so, that we could put into effect some of the legislation for which we have been fighting, such as the oil bill, the power bill, and the farms-for-soldiers bill. I shall leave a set of regulations as to the oil leases ready for operation. The power bill will come into effect soon, I hope. I am responsible for the three-headed commission, but it was the only chance I saw of getting any unity as between the different branches of the government.

Letters are still coming in from the boys who want to go on farms, and I hope that we will be able to lead Congress to see that this is a farsighted measure.

I thank you very much for your many courtesies to me. I trust that your career may be one of still greater usefulness and expanding opportunity. With the warmest regards, cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Late in the year 1919, Lane wrote to James E. Gregg:--"... The soldier-farms bill has been reported favorably by the Committee on Public Lands to the House, but has not yet been taken up for consideration on the floor. ... Of course, some of the opposition has been by those who say the plan does not do something for all of the soldiers, but this is hardly a good objection, as no other constructive suggestion seems to have been made by any one that would do anything for any of the soldiers, except the cash bonus, which I believe is altogether impossible, improvident, and not in the interest either of the country or the soldier."

TO ROBERT W. DE FOREST

Washington, February, 1920

MY DEAR MR. DE FOREST,--I do not know that I have received another letter which has made me feel as conscious of the gravity of the step I have taken as has yours. I have accumulated much in twenty years of public life that ought to be forever at the service of the public, and if I were alone in the world I would not think of going out. But I must think now for a time in a narrower field. Your own career shows that without holding office a man may do a great good and give wide public service. Perhaps this opportunity may be mine.

I shall be in New York soon and I hope very much to see you and see you often. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

XII

POLITICAL COUNSEL-LINCOLN'S EYES 1920

Suggestions to Democratic Nominee for President--On Election of Senators--Lost Leaders--Lincoln's Eyes--William James's Letters

TO WILLIAM PHELPS ENO

Saugatuck, July 5, [1920]

Here I am at your desk looking out of your window into your trees, up the gentle rise of your formal garden into the brilliant crown of rambler roses above the stone gateway.

This is a very delightful picture. The sun is just beginning to pour into the garden. He is looking through the apple trees and having hard work to make even a splash of golden green upon the lawn, but the silver spruce and the tiara of roses get the full measure of his morning smile and are doing their best to show that they understand, appreciate, and are glad. Oh, it is a great morning!

And on the water side it has been even more stimulating, I have walked along the stone wall, the water is down, very low, the boat is stranded, like some sleeping animal, with its tether lying loose along the pebbly strand. The gulls are crying to each other that there is promise of a gulletfull. Nearer shore the fish are leaping--only one or two I think but they make just enough noise to make one realize that there is life in the smooth water, that it is more than a splendid silver mirror for the sun which streams across it. I disturbed a solitary king-fisher as I went out to the wharf. He rose from his perch upon the rope, circled about for a minute and then settled back, on his watch for breakfast.

It is altogether lovely, a quiet, gentle, kindly morning, such as you have often seen, no doubt, when Judah Rock is making its giant fight to rise triumphant from the sea.

But this is not a bit of geologic prophecy nor a Chapter I. to a love story, that I am writing. This is a bread-and-butter letter. I have been your guest and I am telling you that I have enjoyed myself. But you, of course, wish something more than the bald statement that I like your place and that your bread was good and your butter sweet. Yes, you deserve more, for this place is an expression of yourself. No one can be here and not see you at every turn, even though you may be right now in Paris "making the way straight." You have put your love of beauty, your restrained love for color, and your exceptional sense of balance into the whole establishment. It is a man's house--things are made for use; the chairs will stand weight; the couches are not fluff; one can lean with safety on the tables. But everywhere the eye is satisfied. My bed is beautiful, French I fancy, yet it is comfort itself. The lamp beside my bed is a dull bit of bronze which does not poke itself into your sleepy eye, yet you know that it fits the need, not only for light but for satisfaction to the eyes after the light comes. And the bath tub--may I speak of a bath tub in a bread-and-butter letter?--the bath tub is not too long--do you ever suffer from the long, long stretch into the cold water at your back and the imperfect support to the head which imperils your entire submergence?--your bath tub is not too long, and I grab it on both sides to get out. And as I dry myself I look down into that garden of precise, trimmed and varied green upon which the rambler roses smile.

It is well to have had money. No Bolshevism comes out of such a place as this. It makes no challenge to the envy of the submerged tenth. It has not ostentation. It gives off no glare, and it is all used. For men who can put money to such use, who do not over- indulge their own love for things of beauty, nor build for luxurious living, but mould a bit of seashore, some trees and a rambling house into an expression of their own dignified and balanced natures, for such men I am quite sure there is or will be, no social peril from the Red.

And may I close with a word, an inadequate and most feeble word, as to the Lady of the House who so perfectly complements the beauty and the refinement of her setting. She would make livable and lovable a shack, and she would draw to it those who think high thoughts. She has an aura of sympathy and companionability which makes her one with the healing earth and the warming, encompassing sunshine; May you and she give many more sojourners as much of the right stimulus as you have given yours affectionately,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO ROLAND COTTON SMITH

New York, July 9, [1920]

MY DEAR PADRE,--Oh, that I could reply to you in kind, but alas and alack! the gift divine has been denied me. My Nancy comes to me tomorrow--Praise be to Allah! and I shall duly, and in appropriate and prideful language, I trust, present her with your mellifluous lines.

When the spirits Good and Bad will permit me to visit Ipswich I cannot say. Are Doctors of the carnal or the spiritual? They hold me. So soon as I was given a few ducats these banditti rose to rob me. Polite, they are, these modern sons of Dick Turpin, and clever indeed, for they contrive that you shall be helpless, that you may not in good form resist their calculated, schemed, coordinated blood-drawing. And I had as lief have a Sioux Medicine man dance a one-step round my camp fire, and chant his silly incantation for my curing, as any of these blood pressure, electro-chemical, pill, powder specialists. Give me an Ipswich witch instead. Let her lay hands on me. Soft hands that turn away wrath. Have you such or did your ancestors, out of fear of their wives, burn them all?

Well, this is no way for a sober, sick, sedate citizen to be talking to a Man of the Cloth, even tho' he be on vacation. Have you read any of Leonard Merrick's novels? CONRAD IN QUEST OF HIS YOUTH, for instance? If not, do so now. They are what you literati would designate as G. S.--great stuff.

Give me another cheering line, do! For I live in a world that is not altogether lovely.

F. K. L.

TO JAMES M. COX DEMOCRATIC NOMINEE FOR PRESIDENT

New York City, July 25, 1920

MY DEAR GOVERNOR,--I shall presume upon your flattering invitation to speak frankly, not in the hope that I may in any way enlighten a man of such experience and success, but that I may possibly accentuate some point that you may recognize as important, which in the rush of things, might be overlooked. If I should appear in the least didactic, I beg that you charge it to my desire for definiteness, and my inability to give the atmosphere of a personal conversation.

A WORD AS TO GENEROSITY

The unforgivable sin in our politics is a lack of generosity. Smallness, meanness, extreme partisanship, littleness of any kind --these are not in accord with the American conception of an American leader. A clever thing may gratify a man's own immediate partisan following, but the impression on the country at large is not good. We want a FULL, adequate appreciation of the fact that there is hardly more than a film that divides Republican from Democrat; indeed, in that fact lies our hope of success. We must win FIRST VOTERS and Independents.

Let me be concrete;--The war was won by Republicans as well as Democrats. ... Therefore, I would say, give generously of appreciation to the Republicans, who raised Liberty Loans, who administered food affairs, who put their plants at the Nation's service, who directed the various activities, such as aeroplane making, and transporting and financing during the war. ...

A day has come when partisanship with its personalities and bitterness does not satisfy the public. We have seen things on too large a scale now to believe in the importance of trifles, or in the adequacy of trifling men. We must have men who are large enough to be international and national at the same time, to be politicians and yet American statesmen, to subordinate always the individual ambition and the party advantage to the national good.

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

I feel that we have not tried to interpret the League of Nations to our people in terms of America's advantage. We Democrats are looked upon as International visionaries because we have not been willing to deal practically with a practical situation.

The League is not anti-national, it is anti-war; its aim is to defer war and reduce the chances of war between nations. This is to be effected, not by creating a super-nation, or by binding us to abide by the decisions of a super-national tribunal, but by establishing the method and machinery by which the opinion of the world may become effective as against those inclined toward war.

By adopting the League, we do not pledge ourselves to any war under any circumstances, without the consent of Congress. And because we have not been willing to say this, we are now in danger of losing the one chance the world has had to get the nations together.

Loyalty to the President's principles does not mean loyalty to his methods. They have been wrong as to the League, in my opinion. You could deal with Congress, even a Republican Congress, on this matter, I believe, and come out with the essentials. ...

Don't let Bryan get away from you, if you can help it, because he really represents a great body of moral force and opinion. But don't pay the price to Bryan or Wilson or Hearst or Murphy or any one else, of being untrue to your own belief as to the wise and practicable national policy, that you may gain their support.

There couldn't be a better year in which to lose, for something real. You can not win as a Wilson man, nor as a Murphy man, nor as a Hearst man. The nation is crying out for leadership, not pussy- footing nor pandering. Be wrong strongly if you must be wrong, rather than be right weakly. You can only win as a Cox man, one who owns himself, has his own policies, is willing to go along, not with a bunch of bosses, but with any reasonable man, asks for counsel from all classes of men and women, does not fear defeat, and expects a victory that will be more a party victory than a personal one, and more a people's victory than a partisan one.

YOUR ENEMIES

Pick a few enemies and pick them with discretion. Chiefly be FOR things. But be against things and persons, too, so that the nation can visualize you as leading in a contest between the constructive forces and the destructive critical forces.

And the thing to be against is the man who is looking backward, who talks of the "good old days," meaning (a) money in politics, buying votes in blocks of five; (b) human beings as commodities, Homestead strikes, and instructions how to vote in the pay envelop; (c) privately controlled national finances as against the Federal Reserve System; (d) taxation of the poor through indirect taxes on pretext of protecting industry; (e) seventy-five cent wheat; (f) dollar a day labor; (g) the saloon-bossed city; (h) no American Merchant Marine; all goods carried abroad under foreign flags--those were the "good old days," for which the Standpat Republican is sighing.

But the world has moved in the past twenty-five years, and America not only has moved it, but has kept in the lead. ...

WHAT WE WANT

A greater America--that is our objective.

We want our unused lands put to use.

We want the farm made more attractive through better rural schools, better roads everywhere, more frequent connection between town and farm, better means of distribution of products.

We want more men with garden homes instead of tenement houses.

We want our waters, that flow idly to the sea, put to use; more stored water for irrigation, more hydroelectric plants to supply industries, railroads and home and farming activities. There should be electric lights upon the farm, and power for the sewing machine and the churn. It can be done because it is being done on the best farms of the far West.

We want our streams controlled so that they do not wash away our cities, farms, and railroads, and so as to redeem the submerged bottom lands for the next generation. ...

We want fewer boys and girls, men and women, who can not read or write the language of our laws, newspapers, and literature, ... that those who live with us may really be of us. ...

We should dignify the profession of teaching as the foundation profession of modern democratic life. ...

We want definite and continuing studies made of our great industrial fiscal and social problems. The framing of our policies should not be left to emotional caprice, or the opportunism of any group of men, but should be the result of sympathetic and deep study by the wisest men we have, irrespective of their politics. There should be industrial conferences, such as those recently inaugurated, to arrive at the ways by which those who furnish the financial arm of industry and those who furnish the working arm of industry may most profitably and productively be brought into cooperation. ... Through the study of what has been done we can give direction to our national thought and work with a will toward a condition in which labor will have recognition and be more certainly insured against the perils of non-occupation and old age, and capital become entitled to a sure return, because more constantly and productively USED.

Then, too, we need a study made of the health conditions of our children,--of the reason for the large percentage of undeveloped and subnormal children who are brought to our schools, and the larger number who do not reach maturity. ... Underfed boys and ignorant boys are the ones who turn to Bolshevism. We can not stand pat and let things drift without their drifting not to the "good old days" but to bad new days.

Why should not our system of taxation be subject for the profoundest study? ... We must find ways by which the individual may have tools for production which his skill and foresight and thrift have created and yet take for society in taxes what society itself gives. ... There must come to society an increasingly large portion of the wealth created by each generation through inheritance taxes. Thus all our boys and girls will start the race of life more nearly at the scratch. This will be for the making of the race and for the enriching of the whole of society. Yet there must be saved, surely, the call upon the man of talent for every ounce of energy that he has and every spark of imagination.

We want our soldiers and sailors to be more certain of our gratitude and to have an opportunity to realize their own ambition for themselves. We must not be driven into any foolish or impossible course by the pressure of a desire to win their votes. On the contrary, the pressure should come from us who had not the opportunity to risk our lives, that those who did take such risk shall be highly honored. For those who will identify themselves with the tilling of the soil, there should be farms, small yet complete, for which they can gradually pay on long time. For others there should be such education for professional or industrial life as they desire. For others, a home, not a speculation in real estate, but a piece of that American soil for which they fought. For these things we can pay without extra financial strain, if we dedicate to this purpose merely the interest upon the monies which other nations owe us. The extent of our willingness to help these men is not to be measured by their request but rather by our ability and their lasting welfare. ...

We are to extend our activities into all parts of the world. Our trade is to grow as never before. Our people are to resume their old place as traders on the seven seas. We are to know other peoples better and make them all more and more our friends, working with them as mutually dependent factors in the growth of the world's life. For this day a definite foreign policy must be made, one that is fair; to which none can take exception. Our people shall go abroad for their good and the good of other lands, with their skilled hands and their resourceful minds, and their energetic capital, and they must be assured of support abroad, as at home, in every honest venture.

TRUE AMERICANISM

AMERICA's ambition is to lead the world in showing what Democracy can effect. This would be my conception of the large idea of the campaign. It involves much more than the League of Nations. This is our hour of test. We must not be little in our conception of ourselves, nor yet have a conceit that is self-destructive.

America must prove herself a living thing, with policies that are adequate to new conditions. ... We wish an international settlement that will enable us to be more supremely great as nationalists. This is the significance of the League of Nations. It is a plan of hope. It is the only plan which the mind of man has evolved which any number of nations has ever been willing to accept as a buffer against devil-made war. ... It is a monumental experiment which this century and other centuries will talk of and think of and write of because it involves the lives of men and women under it, and there is the possibility of giving our full thought and energy and wealth to making life more enjoyable and finer instead of more horrible and cruel. While other nations are in the mood, we should agree with them, that we may spend our lives and money in a rivalry of progress rather than in a competition in the art of scientific boy-murder. There are times when war is the ultimate and necessary appeal, but those times should be made fewer by American genius and sacrifice.

And our prestige and power should not be wasted at this critical time, because out of some fecund mind may come an abstract and legalistic plan for some other kind of League. Let us be practical. Let us go to the fullest limit with other nations who are now willing to join hands with us, yet never yielding the Constitutional Congressional control over our war making. ... Let us take thought to-day of our opportunities else these may not exist tomorrow. ... Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO TIMOTHY SPELLACY

August 2, 1920

MY DEAR TIM,--Here you are, when you are sick yourself, worrying about me. Now, don't give any concern to any matter excepting getting thoroughly well, just as soon as possible. You are doing too much. You are not resting enough, and you are worrying. You have got enough to take care of yourself and your family for the rest of your lives, you have the respect of every one who knows you, and the affection of every one who knows you well; in fact, you have nothing to work for, and every reason to be contented. So I suggest that you learn, in your later years, how to bum. I have no doubt that Mike will come across something very good in Colombia, if he doesn't get the fever, or break his blooming neck. I have never seen so aggressive a group of old men as you fellows are. You will not admit that you are more than twenty-one. ...

With my warmest regards, as always cordially yours, FRANKLIN K. LANK

With the presentation of an Irish flag, August 10, 1920.

To Edward L. Doheny, with the cordial esteem of Franklin K. Lane.

This flag is a symbol. It stands for the finest thing in a human being--aspiration--the seed of the Divine. It represents the noblest hope of a thwarted and untiring people. It makes a call to the heart of every generous-minded man, and gives vivifying impulse to the home-loving of all faces. It is a symbol of a people to whom most of the arts were known when England and America were forest wastes, whose women have made the world beautiful by their virtue, and whose men have made the world free by their courage.

To Franklin D. Roosevelt New York, August, [1920]

DEAR OLD MAN,--This is hard work--to say that I can't be with you on this great day in your life. [Footnote: Notification ceremonies following Franklin D. Roosevelt's nomination as Vice-president by the Democratic party.] You know that only the mandate of the medical autocrats would keep me away, not that I could do you any good by being there, but that you might know that many men like myself take pride in you, rejoice in your opportunity, and keep our faith in Democracy because out of it can come men of ideals like yourself. I know/that you will not allow yourself to become cheap, undignified, or demagogical. Remember, that East and West alike, we want gentlemen to represent us, and we ask no man to be a panderer or a hypocrite to get our votes. Frankness, and largeness, and simplicity, and a fine fervor for the right, are virtues that some must preserve, and where can we look for them if not from the Roosevelts and the Delanos?

It is a great day for you and for all of us. Be wise! Don't be brilliant. Get plenty of sleep. Do not give yourself to the handshakers. For now your word carries far, and it must be a word worthy of all you stand for. I honestly, earnestly ask God's blessing on you. As always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Our love to your dear Mother,--proud happy Mother,--and to Eleanor.

To Mrs. George Ehle

Katonah, September, 1920

TO THE EHLE,--Now this is a pleasure to have a minute's talk with you in the cool under an apple tree. You are gay, with Grouitches, and other festive creatures, while I am glum, gloomy and lugubrious. You know this is a novel experience for me to be in care of two nurses and a doctor, not to speak of a wife; but I am obedient, docile, humble, tractable, and otherwise dehumanized. The plan here is to follow my boy's statement of the modern prescription for women, "Catch 'em young; treat 'em rough; tell 'em nothing." Well, they don't catch me young, but otherwise the prescription is filled. They reduced me to weakness, dependence, and a sort of sour-mash, and now they say that on this foundation they will build me up. Tho' I am still to lose some weight, being only twenty-four pounds under my average for twenty years. I will emerge from this spot, if I emerge at all, a regular Apollo, and will do Russian dances for you on that lovely lawn under the mulberry tree. And what happy memories of that spot I do have, and they cluster about you, with your soft hand and your understanding eye and your sympathetic mouth. You don't mind my making love to you in this distant fashion do you? Well, this is a charming jail, but jail it is after all, for I can't flee, though all the leisure in the world were mine--and it irks an American eagle or eaglet.

Dear Anne has been improving here. She now is jolly, tho' it has been hot. Responsibility kills her, and I thrive on it.

I believe I will take that place we went to see on the Shepaug. Ryan, my friend, is to manage it. Well, we have a place of refuge, eh? where the wicked and the boring and the ununderstanding cannot pursue.

But oh! my dreams do not come true these days, the magic touch is lost, the Fairies have been hurt in their feelings, my Daemon has deserted, and instead of beauty and joy and power, sweet content and warm friendship, I am struggling merely to live--and to what end?

Please go into my room some morning early and look out to the gate, the cobwebs must be diamond-sprinkled on the circle at the doorway, the catalpa trees must stand like stiff, prim, proper, knickerbockered footmen, on either side of the hedge, the ground must rise in a very gradual swell and culminate in the rose- covered gate. Throw it a kiss for me--(I wonder if there could be any roses left?). All of it is a lovely bit of man's handiwork, and Mr. Eno should have been born poor so that his planning mind, conceiving things of beauty in regular and balanced form, could have been used by many.

Tell him I got his nice letter and will drop him a line one day. With much love,

FRANK LANE

TO ISADORE B. DOCKWEILER

Washington, September 25, 1920

MY DEAR DOCKWEILER,--It is a great disappointment that I am not able to speak in California this year, I wished so much to say a word that might be helpful to Senator Phelan. I helped in his election six years ago, and I wanted to be able to say to those whom I then addressed, that Phelan had thoroughly made good in Washington. He has been strong, honest, courageous, loyal to California and the country, and at every minute he has been at the service of his constituents. That is much to say, isn't it? Well, every word is true. ...

These things I know, for I have watched him through the past six years and for many years before. Indeed, it is more than thirty years now since we first joined with boyish enthusiasm in the activities of the Young Men's Democratic League, and always I have wondered at his willingness to make himself the target of so much criticism because of his loyalty to convictions that have not pleased those in political or social power. He thinks; he does not take orders. And you can rely on his being superior to the partisan phase of any real issue. This self-respecting, or self- owned individual is the sort of man we need to promote in our political life, or else we will soon find ourselves back in the pre-Roosevelt days of political invertebrates. I found in Washington the secret of the exceeding great authority which the older states carry in Congress, they return their Senators and Congressmen, term after term, and give them opportunity to rise to positions of eminence in the national legislature. The usefulness of a Senator is not to be measured by the roundness of his periods, nor even by the soundness of his ideas. He must pass through a period of impatient waiting before his status is such that he can really have the opportunity to have his ideas considered seriously. By returning men who have been faithful, the State strengthens itself in Washington and eventually gains greatly in prestige, as in the case of Julius Kahn. Senator Phelan has now passed through this initial period of gaining status, and his future will be one of an assured and much strengthened position among his colleagues. Not to return Phelan will mean a loss at Washington that California can ill afford at this critical time, for in the national mind he is identified with her prime concerns.

... These are to be most momentous times ... Just where we are going no one knows, but clearly the people here, as elsewhere, are bent upon testing the value of Democracy as a cooperative organization of men and women, and are determined to make of it a fuller expression of human capacities and hopes. We must feel our way carefully at such a time, but we must act constructively, else there will surely come a dangerous radical reaction. Sympathy must be checked by wisdom, a wise knowledge of man's limitations and tendencies, that we do not take on burdens we cannot safely carry. Yet we must dare, and dare purposefully. What can this Democracy do for men and women--that is the super-question which rises like Shasta and follows one throughout the day, dominating every prospect. And the answer must be wrought out of the sober thought and the proved experience of our statesmen. ... Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

In September, 1920, he wrote,--"Things look dark to me politically. The little Wilson (as distinguished from the Great Wilson) is now having his day. Cox is making a manly fight on behalf of the President's League, but the administration is sullen, is doing nothing. Cox will be defeated not by those who dislike him but by those who dislike Wilson and his group. This seems mighty unjust."

To Hall McAllister

Katonah, September 25 [?], 1920

MY DEAR HALL,--This paper is a concession to my love for color, it is not yellow, but golden, and to make the touch truly Californian I should write with a blue pencil.

I cannot write as gaily or as bravely as you did, for I have been pretty well beaten down to my knees. My nights are so unforgivably bad--wakened up two or three times, always with this Monster squeezing my heart in his Mammoth hand--By God, it is something Dante overlooked ...

Take my advice, dear Hall, and avoid doing any of the things which the 3793 Doctors I have paid tell me cause this thing--among them are;--smoking, eating, drinking, swearing, working.

You can recover partially--not wholly under any circumstances--if you arrive at a state of Nirvana before death. ... Gay life this, my boy! I've been so wicked and fast and devilish and hoggish and gluttonous and always rotten and riotous that I needs must spend a few months in this agony by way of preliminary atonement before I may get even a chance at purgatory.

You know that sometimes in the most terrific crushing pain, I laugh, at the thought that my steady years of drive and struggle to help a lot of people to get justice, or a chance, should be gloriously crowned by an ironical God with an end that would make a sainted Christian, in Nero's time, regret his premature taking- off. ...

Tell that most charming of all women, who is your sister, that her noble man was in great good fortune; and I envy him because the Gods showed their love for him even up to the last. The wicked, torturing devils respected his gay spirit as he passed along and forgot to fill him full of arrows, poisoned arrows, as he ran the gauntlet down to the River. Her letters are beauteous reflections of her thoroughbred soul, and they give delight to Anne and myself. ... Yours as always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO MRS. GEORGE EHLE

Bethel, October [3], 1920

That is so charming and gracious a letter that it must be answered within the day, not that any word in kind can be returned, but the spirit may be echoed. We may be short in words but not in feeling. Let me tell you, Lady Ehle, about this place. It is Nirvana-in- the-Wilderness, the Sacred, Serene Spot. Beautiful, for it is a ridge surrounded by mountains--or "mountings"--of gold and green, russet and silver. Noiseless, no dogs bark or cats mew or autos honk. Peaceful--no business. Nothing offends. Isn't that Nirvana? No poverty. People independent but polite. Children smile back when you talk to them, and you do. And the sky has clouds that color and that cast shadows on purpling mountains and stretches of meadow. Yes, this is one lovely spot over which a man named Gehring presides, unofficially, modestly, gently; he has given it purpose for being, for here he does good by healing, and some of his wealthy patients have put up a handsome inn in his honor--and they have said so in a bronze tablet over the mantel.

How much good he can do me I cannot say, but he is trying, Oh, ever so hard to touch my trouble-centre, and I shall give him a full chance yet awhile.

Wouldn't it be splendid if Shepaug were assured, or any other place of simple beauty to which we could retire to commune with the things that, alas, one only discovers to be the really great things, the worth while things, late in life. Daily would we foregather beside that stream to build some kind of altar to the God of Things as we Hope they may sometime Be. ...

Give my regards to the Duke of Saugatuck and tell him that his picture on horseback is good enough to enlarge--and then I want one.

And to you, The Ehle, may the peace that gay souls need and seldom get, and the joy that good souls long for, be with you always. And do write some more!

F. K. L.

TO BENJAMIN IDE WHEELER

Bethel, [October 28, 1920]

MY DEAR B. I.,--It has been along time since your letter came, but until now I have not felt that I could write. Most of the time I have been in pain and I have also been much discouraged over the condition of my health. No one wants to hear a man talk of his aches and I haven't much else on my mind. I am beginning to crawl a bit health-wards, I think; at any rate I am moving on that assumption.

What a hell of a condition the land is in politically. Cowardice and hypocrisy are slated to win, and makeshift and the cheapest politics are to take possession of national affairs. Better even obstinacy and ego-mania! Cox, I think, has made a gallant fight. He is to be beaten because Wilson is as unpopular as he once was popular. Oh! if he had been frank as to his illness, the people would have forgotten everything, his going to Paris, his refusal to deal with the mild Reservationists--everything would have been swept away in a great wave of sympathy. But he could not be frank, he who talked so high of faith in the people distrusted them; and they will not be mastered by mystery. So he is so much less than a hero that he bears down his party to defeat.

And after election will come revolt in the Republican party, for it is too many-sided for a long popularity.

I am sorry to be out of it all, but the Gods so willed. I did want to help Phelan. The country will think that what he has stood for, as to California matters, especially oil and Japan, has been repudiated if he is not returned. He was California incarnate in Washington.

Remember me to the Lady and the Soldier. Always your friend,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To John W. Hallowell

Bethel, November 3, 1920

MY DEAR JACK,--You have so much idle time hanging, dragging, festooning on round and about your hands that I want to give you a job, something to do. Eh, what!

I have taken it into my head, caput, cranium, that I will read Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, and as the only copy here is too poorly printed to read, and furthermore as I wish to own said work myself, I would that you make purchase of same and send it to me. Now, I do not wish an expensive copy, nor a large copy, nor a heavy copy. Therefore I think it would be best to buy a good second-hand set, say in half-leather--perhaps you can get it in six or eight volumes--and it must not be heavy, because I read in bed. About the size of an ordinary novel would be very good, and pretty good sized type--leaded not solid. Yes, the more I think of a second-hand set, the better I like the idea --old binding but strong, old paper but light, old type but clear. Twelve dollars I enclose for a second-hand set. By devoting twenty dollars worth of time to the search I know you can get a second hand set for twelve dollars. That is uneconomical, but think of the fun you will have. I suggest to you that this was the very thing you needed to do to bring perfect contentment into your life. Search for Gibbon, pretty backs, good type, light in weight for twelve dollars. Oh what joy you will have! Really I should be selfish enough to do it myself but now that I have said so much about it I can't withdraw this boon. ...

Well, get Gibbon and "with all thy getting get understanding."

F. K. L.

TO JOHN W. HALLOWETT

Bethel, November 12, [1920]

MY DEAR JACK,--I said nothing of the kind to myself. This is what I said, "Now I want a Gibbon. Not a show-off set but a useful one--light and small and well bound. How can I get it? Cotter in New York? What does Cotter know of learning and books of learning? What interest does New York take in such things anyway? There are second-hand stores there but they must be filled with novels and such trumpery. No one in New York ever read Gibbon--ninety-nine percent never heard of him. So why should I send to New York? No, Boston is the place. There is the city of the Erudite, the Home of Lodge, and incidentally of Parkman, Bancroft, Thayer, Morse, Fiske, and all others who have minds to throw back into the other days, and make pictures of what has been. Every house there has its Gibbon, of course, and some must, in the course of nature, fall into the hands of the dealers. So to Boston,--and who else but Jack Hallowell who knows what a book is, how in respectability it should be bound, and what size book is a pleasure and what a burden. A man of learning, identified with scholarship, through his athletic course in Harvard, and withal a man of business who will not pay more than a thing is worth. Ideal! Hence the letter and consequent trouble to good Jack Hallowell, who as per usual "done his damnedest for a friend," as Bret Harte says, in writing a perfect epitaph. ...

The reason I sent twelve dollars needs explanation. I put that limit because a very handsome edition of eleven volumes sold for that price to a friend of mine. It was red morocco, tooled, etc., and I thought surely twelve dollars would buy something as good as I needed.

Now you have the whole mysterious story. Make the most of it as Patrick Henry suggested to George III.

I have your dear Mother's book and will write her when I have read it. I also have a letter saying that Hoover has named me as treasurer of his twenty-three million or billion fund. ...

Thank you for your kindness and write me as often as you can. ...

F. K. L.

TO ROBERT LANSING

Bethel, Maine, November 10, [1920]

MY DEAR LANSING,--It is good to see that letter-head, but aren't you afraid to enter into competition with Mr. Tumulty, who has now, I see, bought the old Shepard mansion and will settle in Washington. How do they do it with the high cost of living what it is? ... The transmutation of brass into gold is becoming a commonplace.

To-night's paper speaks of Knox as probable Secretary of State. ... Tell me where the opposition is to come from--who are to lead us? ... All possible leaders have been submerged, squelched, drowned out, in the past eight years. I wish the whole country had gone unanimously for Harding. Then we might have started on a fresh, clean footing to create two parties that represent liberal and conservative thought. As it is, I think you will see Hearst and Johnson and La Follette try to capture the radicals of both parties and make a new party of their own. Then I shall be with all the rascals I have been fighting since boyhood--the Wall Street rascals--as against the other group. But maybe the Lord cares a bit for us after all.

I mend very slowly, but I delight in your recovery and wonder at it. ... I do beg you will give me all the gossip of Washington that you can, for I am here in a wilderness, beautiful but not exciting. As always,

F. K. L.

To Carl Snyder

Bethel, November 13, [1920]

Dear Carl,--This is extremely disagreeable business, this of repairs and restoration. I suppose I am doing fairly well considering that I have been more than half a century getting my gearings askew and awry. But I am taking orders now and say "Thank you," when I get them. Just when I shall be well enough to take hold again is not yet discoverable.