Chapter XXX: , pp. 241-247 (1)

I knew that I had not yet been weaned from the spokes, and doubted if I ever should be. I said that I would try, and I did. I filed an application for the first leave of absence I had ever asked for from the railroad company, and it was granted. I found a man to assist the "devil" in getting out my paper, he doing the editing for pure love of editing, if not from love of the editor. We set our house in order, packed our trunk and grips, and when the specified fortnight was ended, we (my wife, my daughter, and myself) were comfortably bestowed in adjoining staterooms in the ladies' cabin of the "Mary Morton," and I was fidgeting about the boat, watching men "do things" as I had been taught, or had seen others do, twenty years ago or more.

The big Irish mate bullied his crew of forty "niggers," driving them with familiar oaths, to redoubled efforts in getting in the "last" packages of freight, which never reached the last. Among the rest, in that half hour, I saw barrels of mess pork--a whole car load of it, which the "nigger" engine was striking down into the hold. Shades of Abraham! pork _out_ of St. Paul! Twenty years before, I had checked out a whole barge load (three hundred barrels) through from Cincinnati, by way of Cairo. Cincinnati was the great porkopolis of the world, while Chicago was yet keeping its pigs in each back yard, and every freeholder "made" his own winter's supply of pork for himself. The steward in charge of the baggage was always in the way with a big trunk on the gangway, just as of old. The engineers were trying their steam, and slowly turning the wheel over, with the waste cocks open, to clear the cylinders of water. The firemen were coaxing the beds of coal into the fiercer heats. The chief clerk compared the tickets which were presented by hurrying passengers with the reservation sheet, and assigned rooms, all "the best," to others who had no reservations. The "mud" clerk checked his barrels and boxes and scribbled his name fiercely and with many flourishes to the last receipts. The pilot on watch, Mr. Burns, sat on the window ledge in the pilot house, and waited. The captain stood by the big bell, and listened for the "All ready, Sir!" of the mate. As the words were spoken, the great bell boomed out one stroke, the lines slacked away and were thrown off the snubbing posts. A wave of the captain's hand, a pull at once of the knobs of the wheel-frame, the jingle of a bell far below, the shiver of the boat as the great wheel began its work, and the bow of the "Mary Morton" swung to the south; a couple of pulls at the bell-rope, and the wheel was revolving ahead; in a minute more the escape pipes told us that she was "hooked up," and with full steam ahead we were on our way to St. Louis. And I was again in the pilot house with my old chief, who bade me "show us what sort of an education you had when a youngster."

Despite my forty years I was a boy again, and Tom Burns was the critical chief, sitting back on the bench with his pipe alight, a comical smile oozing out of the corners of mouth and eyes, for all the world like the teacher of old.

The very first minute I met the swing of the gangplank derrick (there is no jack staff on the modern steamboat, more's the pity), with two or three strokes when one would have been a plenty, yawing the boat around "like a toad in a hailstorm," as I was advised. I could feel the hot blood rushing to my cheeks, just as it did twenty years before under similar provocation, when the eye of the master was upon me. I turned around and found that Mr. Burns had taken it in, and we both laughed like boys--as I fancy both of us were for the time.

But I got used to it very soon, getting the "feel of it," and as the "Mary Morton" steered like a daisy I lined out a very respectable wake; though Tom tried to puzzle me a good deal with questions as to the landmarks, most of which I had forgotten save in a general way....

A mile or two below Hastings I saw the "break" on the surface of the water which marked the resting-place of the "Fanny Harris," on which I had spent so many months of hard work, but which, looked back upon through the haze of twenty years, now seemed to have been nothing but holiday excursions.

At Prescott I looked on the familiar water front, and into the attic windows where with my brother I had so often in the night watches studied the characteristics of boats landing at the levee. Going ashore I met many old-time friends, among whom was Charles Barnes, agent of the Diamond Jo Line, who had occupied the same office on the levee since 1858, and had met every steam boat touching the landing during all those years. He was the Nestor of the profession, and was one of the very few agents still doing business on the water front who had begun such work prior to 1860. Since then, within a few years past, he also has gone, and that by an accident, while still in the performance of duties connected with the steamboat business.

Dropping rapidly down the river, we passed Diamond Bluff without stopping, but rounded to at Red Wing for passengers and freight, and afterward headed into a big sea on Lake Pepin, kicked up by the high south wind that was still blowing. We landed under the lee of the sandpit at Lake City, and after getting away spent the better part of an hour in picking up a barge load of wheat, that was anchored out in the lake....

I turned in at an early hour, and lay in the upper berth, listening to the cinders skating over the roof a couple of feet above my face, and translating the familiar sounds that reached me from the engine-room and roof--the call for the draw at the railroad bridge, below the landing; the signal for landing at Wabasha; the slow bell, the stopping-bell, the backing bell, and a dozen or twenty unclassified bells, before the landing was fully accomplished; the engineer trying the water in the boilers; the rattle of the slice-bars on the sides of the furnace doors as the firemen trimmed their fires; and one new and unfamiliar sound from the engine-room--the rapid exhaust of the little engine driving the electric generator, the only intruder among the otherwise familiar noises, all of which came to my sleepy senses as a lullaby.

MRS. HATTIE TYNG GRISWOLD.

Hattie Tyng was born in Boston in 1840, and came with her
parents to Columbus, Wisconsin, in 1850, where, in course of
time, she was married to Mr. Griswold, and it was in this
delightful village that much of her work as an author was
done. Here she died in 1909.

The books by which she is best-known are: "Apple Blossoms,"
"Waiting on Destiny," "Lucile and Her Friends," and "The Home
Life of Great Authors." It is from the last named book that
our selection is taken. As its title would indicate, the book
aimed to give a more personal and intimate view of men and
women well-known to fame than is to be found in most
reference works. The young readers of this volume will know
that mere dates and statistics do not enable them to know
people; they like to have some personal details as to the
habits and daily lives of the people about whom they read.
Mrs. Griswold was so filled with the true teaching instinct
that she realized this. She says in one of her works that
since she had such a hard time when she was a little girl
getting any picture in her mind of the great people about
whom she read, that she determined to make it easier for
other boys and girls to get these mental pictures; that is
why she wrote "The Home Life of Great Authors."

JOHN G. WHITTIER

From "HOME LIFE OF GREAT AUTHORS." Copyright, 1886, A. C.
McClurg & Co.

The poet Whittier always calls to mind the prophet-bards of the olden time. There is much of the old Semetic fire about him, and ethical and religious subjects seem to occupy his entire mind. Like his own Tauler, he walks abroad, constantly

"Pondering the solemn Miracle of Life;
As one who, wandering in a starless night,
Feels momently the jar of unseen waves,
And hears the thunder of an unknown sea
Breaking along an unimagined shore."

His poems are so thoroughly imbued with this religious spirit that they seem to us almost like the sacred writings of the different times and nations of the world. They come to the lips upon all occasions of deep feeling almost as naturally as the Scriptures do. They are current coin with reformers the world over. They are the Alpha and Omega of deep, strong religious faith. Whoever would best express his entire confidence in the triumph of the right, and his reliance upon God's power against the devices of men, finds the words of Whittier upon his lips; and to those who mourn and seek for consolation, how naturally and involuntarily come back lines from his poems they have long treasured, but which perhaps never had a personal application until now! To the wronged, the down-trodden, and the suffering they appeal as strongly as the Psalms of David. He is the great High Priest of Literature. But few priests at any time have had such an audience and such influence as he. The moral and religious value of his work can scarcely be overstated. Who can ever estimate the power which his strong words have had throughout his whole career in freeing the minds of other millions from the shackles of unworthy old beliefs? His blows have been strong, steady, persistent. He has never had the fear of man before his eyes. No man has done more for freedom, fellowship and character in religion than he. Hypocrisy and falsehood and cant have been his dearest foes, and he has ridden at them early and late with his lance poised and his steed at full tilt. Indeed, for a Quaker, Mr. Whittier must be said to have a great deal of the martial spirit. The fiery, fighting zeal of the old reformers is in his blood. You can imagine him as upon occasion enjoying the imprecatory Psalms. In his anti-slavery poems there is a depth of passionate earnestness which shows that he could have gone to the stake for his opinions had he lived in an earlier age than ours. That he did risk his life for them, even in our own day, is well known. During the intense heat of the anti-slavery conflict he was mobbed once and again by excited crowds; but he was not to be intimidated by all the powers of evil, and continued to speak his strong words and to sing his inspiring songs, whether men would hear or whether they would forbear. And those Voices of Freedom, whatever may be thought of them by mere critics and litterateurs, will outlast any poems of their day, and sound "down the ringing grooves of Time" when much that is now honored has been forgotten. He will be known as the Poet of a great Cause, the Bard of Freedom, as long as the great anti-slavery conflict is remembered. He is a part, and an important part, of the history of his country, a central figure in the battalions of the brave. Those wild, stirring bugle-calls of his cheered the little army, and held it together many a time when the cause was only a forlorn hope, and they came with their stern defiance into the camp of the enemy with such masterful power that some gallant enemies deserted to his side. They were afraid to be found fighting against God, as Whittier had convinced them they were doing. There is the roll of drums and the clash of spears in these stirring strains; there are echoes from Thermopylae and Marathon, and the breath of the old Greek heroes is in the air; there is a hint of the old Border battle-cries from Scotland's hills and tarns; from Jura's rocky wall we can catch the cheers of Tell; and the voice of Cromwell can often be distinguished in the strain.

There is also the sweep of the winds through the pine woods, and the mountain blasts of New England, and the strong, fresh breath of the salt sea; all tonic influences, in short, which braced up the minds of the men of those days to a fixed and heroic purpose, from which they never receded until their end was achieved. It has become the fashion in these days of dilettanteism to say that earnestness and moral purpose have no place in poetry, and small critics have arisen who claim that Mr. Whittier has been spoiled as a poet by his moral teachings. To these critics it is only necessary to point to the estimation in which Mr. Whittier's poetry is held by the world, and to the daily widening of his popularity among scholars and men of letters, as well as among the people, to teach them that this ruined poetry is likely to live when all the merely pretty poetry they so much admire is forgotten forever. The small poets who are afraid of touching a moral question for fear of ruining their poems would do well to compare Poe, who is the leader of their school and its best exponent, with Mr. Whittier, and to ask themselves which is the more likely to survive the test of time. Let them also ponder the words of Principal Shairp, one of the finest critics of the day, when he says of the true mission of the poet, that "it is to awaken men to the divine side of things; to bear witness to the beauty that clothes the outer world, the nobility that lies hid, often obscured, in human souls; to call forth sympathy for neglected truths, for noble and oppressed persons, for down-trodden causes; and to make men feel that through all outward beauty and all pure inward affection God himself is addressing them." They would do well also to ponder the words of Ruskin, who believes that only in as far as it has a distinct moral purpose is a literary work of value to the world.

ALBERT H. SANFORD.

Professor Albert H. Sanford, of the La Crosse State Normal
School, is best known as an author of text books and
pamphlets on history and related subjects. But he is, like
all the other school men whose works are represented here,
interested in other fields besides his specialty.

Born in the southwestern part of Wisconsin, he naturally
became interested in farming, and in the development of
agriculture in the agricultural section. From this interest
and his natural bent toward anything historical grew his
desire to picture briefly and attractively the development of
this most important industry of our country from its early
beginnings in colonial times to the present day. His book is
filled with narratives and expositions which will hold the
interest of any boy or girl who likes to read stories of
adventure or trial, of hardship, and of final success.

The most noteworthy feature of Professor Sanford's style is
clarity, coupled with logical sequence and organization. The
brief selection here given illustrates these qualities, and
represents very fairly the remainder of the book.

THE STORY OF AGRICULTURE IN THE UNITED STATES

Copyright, 1916, by D. C. Heath & Co. From Chapter X.

When farms were scattered, life became lonely and monotonous; the people therefore took advantage of every possible occasion to have social gatherings. House raisings and log-rollings gave opportunity for such meetings. The women met in sewing and quilting bees and apple-parings; the men came for the evening meal and remained for the country dance. The husking-bee was the most exciting of these events. The long pile of corn was divided equally between two leaders, who first "chose sides" for the contest. Then the men fell to the work with a will, each side determined to finish its portion first. Sometimes the rivalry ran into rough play and even fighting; but the spirit of good nature prevailed at the supper that had been prepared by the women in the meantime.

To these "frolics" were added, in later years, the spelling matches and singing schools, attended by both old and young. The coming of the backwoods "circuit rider" to hold a religious service in some log cabin or in the schoolhouse was an event of importance. The summer "camp meetings" were attended by hundreds of families, and here a chance was given for those who had forgotten the ways of civilized life in the midst of the rough frontier conditions to be "converted" and to return to better ways. The preaching, singing, and praying were all done by main strength, both of voice and of muscle.

The frontier farmer boy had no lack of occupation. He split the kindling and the wood for the fire-place and gathered the chips used for lighting the cabin when tallow dips were scarce. He fed and drove the cows, but let his sister do the milking. He took part in the work of washing and shearing the sheep. He helped in churning and soap-making, and ran the melted tallow into the tin candle-molds. He looked forward to butchering day as to a celebration. In the fall he chopped the sausage meat and the various ingredients of mince pies. On stormy days and winter evenings he might help his mother clean and card the wool, wind the yarn, and hetchel flax. Later she might call upon him for help in dyeing the homespun and bleaching the linen.

The boy was useful to his father when he searched the woods for good trees from which special articles were to be made, such as ax-helves and ox-yokes. From hickory saplings he could make splint brooms and cut out the splints used in making chair bottoms and baskets. He guarded the corn fields from squirrels and crows and set traps for wolves. He went on horse-back to the grist mill, which was generally some miles away, and waited there for his turn to have his sack of corn ground into meal. Along with these duties were some pleasures, such as going nutting and berrying and hunting for grapes. Bee-hunting gave its rich reward in the hollow trunk full of honey. "Sugaring off" twice in the spring was a special time of delight, though it brought its tasks in the making of wooden spouts, the carrying of buckets of sap and water, and the tending of fires.

CHARLES D. STEWART

Charles D. Stewart was born at Zanesville, Ohio, in 1868, and
came with his people to Wisconsin when but a young boy. He
received his elementary education in the public schools of
Milwaukee, after which he attended Wayland Academy at Beaver
Dam. Like many others of our authors, Mr. Stewart has had
considerable connection with newspapers, but it is as an
author of stories, poems, and critical articles, both in
magazines and in published volumes, that he is best known.
Perhaps the readers of this book are already familiar with
his "The Fugitive Blacksmith," "Partners of Providence,"
"Essays on the Spot," "The Wrong Woman," etc. He is now
executive clerk in Governor Philipp's office.

Mr. Stewart is an author with whom the reader frequently
finds himself in disagreement. This is particularly true of
his critical work, which has itself received severe criticism
at the hands of some other critics, while in the opinion of
still others Mr. Stewart has made distinct contributions to
the field of English criticism, particularly with respect to
Shakespeare. His style is rich and at times diffuse. He has a
wealth of illustrative material at hand, and one might be
inclined to say that at times Mr. Stewart allows himself to
stray too far from his main theme in drawing upon these
resources. On the other hand, the reader is constantly
interested and frequently challenged, so that his
intelligence is always brought into play in reading this
author's work; and it is well to remember, as Ruskin says,
that if we never read anything with which we disagreed we
should never grow. It is the author who makes us think who
does us the greatest service.

The selection here given is from "On a Moraine." It
illustrates all the points of which we have spoken. To the
editors it appeals as a piece of useful, patriotic Wisconsin
literature. The whole article will well repay reading for
anyone who loves the Badger state and wishes to know it
better. It shows a keen appreciation of the beautiful, and
ready imagination in making comparisons where one least
expects to find them, as in the suggestion of likeness
between the freshly exposed surfaces of a newly split rock,
on the one hand, and the wings of a moth on the other.

The article also well illustrates the treatment of a somewhat
technical and supposedly dry subject in a delightful and
imaginative manner.

ON A MORAINE

Upon the shoulder of a terminal moraine was a barley-field whose fence was to furnish me with stone; and I prospected its beauties with a six-pound sledge. "Hardheads" many of them [the stones] were called, and they let fly enough sparks that summer to light the fire for a thousand years. They were igneous rocks, and they responded in terms of fire.

Such rocks! Rag-carpets woven in garnet and topaz; petrified Oriental rugs; granites in endless designs of Scotch mixture, as if each bowlder were wearing the plaid of its clan; big, uncouth, scabiose, ignorant-looking hardheads that opened with a heart of rose,--each one a separate album opening to a sample from a different quarry. I have seen cloven field-stone that deserved a hinge and a gold clasp; I have one in sight now which is such a delicate contrast of faintest rose and mere spiritual green that it is like the first blush of dawn. Imagine smiting a rock until the fragments sting you in the face, and then seeing it calmly unfold the two wings of a moth! I have broken into a rock which pleased me so well that I held it in mind in order to match it; but though I had the pick of a hundred and sixty loads that summer I never found another. There is "individuality" for you.

Some of them are "niggerheads." These are the hardest rock known to practical experience. There are those that have refused to succumb to the strongest hitters in the country. Some of them will break and others will not; the only way is to try. Fortunately I had had some early training as a blacksmith; but this was as if the smith were trying to break his anvil. I have seen the steel face of a hammer chip off without making a mark on one. And yet the glaciers wore them off to make soil and left them rounded like big pebbles! I never realized what ground is, till I became acquainted with the stones that did the grinding.

My fence was eight to ten feet in thickness and shoulder high; and similar windrows of rock ran over the moraine in all directions, like a range upon a range. It is, of course, valuable land that warrants a wall like that. The barley-field might easily have defied a siege-gun on all four sides, for it had had so many bowlders on it that they had been built up into more of a rampart than a windrow. On a near-by field from which the timber had been removed, but which, notwithstanding, was far from "cleared," it looked as if it had hailed bowlders. You could have forded your way across it without putting a foot to ground. I have seen places where the glaciers had deposited rocks in surprising uniformity of size, and as thick as the heads of an audience (a comparison that means no harm, I trust).

Because of my encounters with "niggerheads," and other layerless or massive rock, I had difficulty in getting a handle which would not give out. Not that I broke them with mislicks, but the sudden bounce of the steel jolts the grain of the wood apart, and then a split begins to work its way up the handle. After this happens a man will not try to crack many bowlders, for the split hickory vibrates in a way that hurts. That sudden sting and numbing of the arm is the only sensation I ever came across that resembles the sting of a Texas scorpion; and that is an injection of liquid lighting that suffuses the membranes from hand to shoulder, and dwells a while and fades away. I might say here that the sting of the dreaded scorpion is harmless, like that of the tarantula, as any one with a few experiences knows. A wrong-headed bowlder that has kept itself intact for ages and spits fire at you, and then takes measures to protect itself, is far more dangerous. One of them shot off a piece with such force that it went through my clothing and made a respectable wound. This, however, is just what is needed to rouse you up and make you hit back; and when you have had success with this one you are sure to pass on to another.

There is an enticement in their secret, locked-up beauty that lures you on from rock to rock till nightfall. Thus you are kept at it, till some day you find you have become a slave of the exercise habit; you are addicted to sunshine and sweat and cool spring water; your nose, so long a disadvantage to you, comes to life and discovers so many varieties of fresh air that every breath has a different flavor to it. As for myself, I rather prefer to take wild plum or clover in my atmosphere--or a good whiff of must off the barley-field. Along in July it is excellent to work somewhere in the jurisdiction of a basswood tree. Compare this with the office-building or the street-car, where the only obtainable breath is second-hand. Nobody could now coax you back to where people have eyes that see not, tongues that taste not, and noses that smell not unless they have to. I _have_ experienced smells in a city that would make a baby cry....

And this reminds me to conclude--where possibly I should have begun--with the remarkable pedigree of the state itself. Stretching across Canada, north of the St. Lawrence, and ending in the regions about the source of the Mississippi, is a range of low granite hills called the Laurentian Highlands. These hills are really mountains that are almost worn out, for they are the oldest land in America, and, according to Agassiz, the oldest in the world. In the days when there was nothing but water on the face of the globe, these mountains came up--a long island of primitive rock with universal ocean chafing against its shores. None of the other continents had put in their appearance at the time America was thus looking up. The United States began to come to light by the gradual uplifting of this land to the north and the appearance of the tops of the Alleghanies, which were the next in order. Later, the Rockies started up. The United States grew southward from Wisconsin and westward from Blue Ridge. An early view of the country would have shown a large island which is now northern Wisconsin, and a long, thin tongue of this primitive rock sticking down from Canada into Minnesota, and these two growing states looking out over the waters at the mere beginnings of mountain-ranges east and west. They were waiting for the rest of the United States to appear.

As the heated interior of the earth continued to cool and contract, and the water-covered crust sank in some places, and kept bulging up higher in others, the island of northern Wisconsin continued to grow, and the Alleghanies came up with quite a strip of territory at their base. The western mountains made no progress whatever; it was as if they had some doubt about the matter. A view at another stage of progress would have shown Wisconsin and Minnesota entirely out, and pulling up with them the edges of adjoining states, and a strip along the Atlantic about half as wide as New York or Pennsylvania. Still no United States. There was water between these two sections and some islands scattered about in the south. The western mountains had not been progressing at all; they lagged behind for aeons. These two sections, beginning with Wisconsin and Minnesota in the west and the Alleghanies in the east, kept reaching out till they made continuous land; and thus Ohio and all those states between are some ages younger. But they are much older than the west; for at a time when the whole eastern half of the continent had long appeared, the Gulf Stream was flowing across the west, and the waters were depositing the small sea-shells which make the calcareous matter under Kansas loam. All that country is much younger, and the western mountains are as big as they are simply because they have not had time to become worn down. As to Florida, it was a mere afterthought, an addition built on by coral insects.

The whole story of those east-central and southern states--how Pennsylvania and Ohio and Illinois got their coal, and Michigan her salt--would make a lengthy narrative; I have mentioned just enough to show the age of Wisconsin and the still greater age of some of that glacial matter that came down from the direction of the Laurentian Highlands. It is the oldest land in the world; and the other states, I am sure, will not resent my taking out the state's pedigree and showing it. Wisconsin took part with the east in what geologists call the Appalachian Revolution,--is a veritable Daughter of the Revolution. I mention it merely because I think it greatly to the credit of a dairy state that, at a time so early in the world's morning, she was up and doing.

ELLIOTT FLOWER

Elliott Flower is another of Wisconsin's writers who came
into the field of literature through newspaper work. He was
born at Madison in 1863, and after receiving a common school
education there, he went to Phillips Academy at
Massachusetts. He was editor of the Rambler in 1885 and 1886,
and after that he was for some years engaged in editorial
work on Chicago papers. Since 1899, however, most of his work
has been of a purely literary nature, and his residence has
been in Madison for some time. He is the author of "Policeman
Flynn," "The Spoilsman," "Nurse Norah," "Delightful Dog," and
other books.

The story from which we quote is "The Impractical Man." It is
fairly representative of a considerable portion of his work.
It shows a keen sense of humor, a skillful handling of
conversation, and considerable knowledge of human nature. Our
selection embraces the first and last portions of the story.
Between these selections many experiences fall to the lot of
the "impractical man." There is an adventure in the woods, in
which the men are lost, and there are many laughable
experiences in a canoe. In this story, as is frequently the
case in Mr. Flower's work, the unexpected happens, and the
character whom the reader has been inclined to pity because
of his inability to take care of himself suddenly proves to
be shrewd enough to outwit those with whom he is dealing.

THE IMPRACTICAL MAN

From the Century Magazine, Vol. 64, p. 549.

"I am sorry to inform you," said Shackelford, the lawyer, "that you have been to some trouble and expense to secure a bit of worthless paper. This--" and he held up the document he had been examining--"is about as valuable as a copy of last week's newspaper."

It is possible that Shackelford really regretted the necessity of conveying this unpleasant information to Peter J. Connorton, Cyrus Talbot, and Samuel D. Peyton; but, if so, his looks belied him, for he smiled very much as if he found something gratifying in the situation.

Connorton was the first to recover from the shock.

"Then it's a swindle!" he declared hotly. "We'll get that fellow Hartley! He's a crook! We'll make him--"

"Oh, no," interrupted Shackelford, quietly, "it's no swindle. According to your own story, you prepared the paper yourself and paid him for his signature to it."

"We paid him twenty-five thousand dollars for his patent," asserted Connorton.

"But you didn't get the patent," returned Shackelford. "He has assigned to you, for a consideration of twenty-five thousand dollars, all his rights, title, and interest in something or other, but the assignment doesn't clearly show what. There are a thousand things that it might be, but nothing that it definitely and positively _is_. Very likely he doesn't know this, but very likely somebody will tell him. Anyhow, you've got to clear an unquestioned title before you can do anything with the patent without danger of unpleasant consequences."

Deeper gloom settled upon the faces of the three, and especially upon the face of Connorton, who was primarily responsible for their present predicament.

"What would you advise?" asked Connorton at last.

"Well," returned the lawyer, after a moment of thought, "you'd better find him. As near as I can make out, he had no thought of tricking you."

"Oh, no, I don't believe he had," confessed Connorton. "I spoke hastily when I charged that. He's too impractical for anything of the sort."

"Much too impractical, I should say," added Talbot, and Peyton nodded approval.

"In that case," pursued the lawyer, "you can still clinch the deal easily and quickly--if you get to him first. I see nothing particularly disturbing in the situation, except the possibility that somebody who _is_ practical may get hold of him before you do, or that he may learn in some other way of the value of his invention. Do you know where he is?"

"No," answered Connorton. "That's the trouble."

"Not so troublesome as it might be," returned the lawyer. "He is not trying to hide, if we are correct in our surmise, and his eccentricities of dress and deportment would attract attention to him anywhere. I have a young man here in the office who will get track of him in no time, if you have nothing better to suggest."

They had nothing better to suggest, so Byron Paulson was called in, given a description of Ira Hartley, together with such information as to his associates and haunts as it was possible to give, and sent in quest of news of him.

"Meanwhile," observed the lawyer, "I'll prepare something for his signature, when we find him, that will have no loopholes in it."

* * * * *

Connorton and Paulson had no difficulty in securing permission to talk with Hartley, and they approached with considerable confidence the cell in which he was detained. It had occurred to them, upon reflection, that they were now in a most advantageous position in the matter of their business relations with the inventor. He was friendless in a strange city. He was believed to be of unsound mind, and his actions had been erratic enough to give color to that belief. He could hardly hope to secure his release without their help, and if so, they could impose their own terms before extending that help.

To their surprise, they found him quite cheerful and apparently indifferent or blind to the seriousness of his predicament.

"Hullo, Connorton!" he cried, when he saw them approaching. "Any other proposition to make now?"

"Why, no, certainly not," replied Connorton. "We came to see about you."

"Awfully good of you," laughed Hartley. "How you do love me, Connorton!"

Connorton's face reddened, but he ignored the thrust. "You've got yourself in a nice fix, Hartley," he remarked.

"Oh, it's of no consequence," exclaimed Paulson.

"Not to me," asserted Hartley. "It may be to you, of course."

The impractical man appeared to be able to take a very practical view of some matters, and Connorton was the more perturbed and uneasy in consequence.

"They say you're crazy," suggested Connorton.

"And I guess they can prove it, too," rejoined Hartley, cheerfully. "You've said the same thing yourself, and I know you wouldn't lie about a mere trifle like that. Then, the conductor, the engineer, and the fireman of the train we came down on will swear to it ... not to mention the cooper, the hotel clerk, a few bell-boys, and the policeman who arrested me. Yes, I guess I'm crazy, Connorton. Too bad, isn't it?"

"It's likely to be bad for you," said Connorton.

"Oh, no," returned Hartley, easily, "I'm not violent, you know, just mentally defective; unable to transact business, as you might say. They'll find that out and let me go; but there will be the taint, the suspicion, the doubt. Very likely a conservator will be appointed when I get back home--some shrewd, sharp fellow, with a practical mind."

Such a very impractical man was the inventor, and so very troublesome in his impracticality! Connorton could only begin at the beginning again, and go slow.

"Suppose we get you out," he ventured, "what would you be willing to do?"

"What would you be willing to do?" retorted Hartley.

"What do you mean by that?" demanded Connorton.

"I'm sure I don't know," replied Hartley, with an air of the utmost frankness. "I seldom mean anything, of course, and it is such a lot of trouble to find out what I do mean when I mean anything that I usually give it up. But you are so deeply interested in me--so much more interested in me than I am in myself--that I thought you might want to keep me sane; that you might not like to feel that you had driven me crazy."

Paulson was about to interrupt, but Connorton motioned to him to be silent. Connorton was in the habit of handling his own business matters, and he wanted his lawyer to speak only when a legal proposition was put directly up to him. It may be admitted that he was sorely perplexed now; but he found nothing in the inventor's face but a bland smile, and he did not think Paulson could help him to interpret that.

"Hartley," he said at last, "I'll get you out of here and add five thousand to what you've already had the moment that patent is properly transferred to me."

"Connorton," returned the inventor, "I believe I'm crazy. When I think of the events of the last few days--of your more than brotherly interest in me, which I have pleasurably exploited during our delightful association--I believe I am crazy enough to say, come again!"

Connorton drew a long breath and conceded another point. "Hartley," he proposed, "you may keep the money I have already given you--"

"Thank you," said Hartley; "I shall."

"--and you may also have a quarter interest in the patent," concluded Connorton.

"It's all mine now," suggested Hartley.

"If so," argued Connorton, who well knew that much of the money had been spent, "you owe me twenty-five thousand dollars."

"If so," returned Hartley, the impractical man, "I infer from your anxiety and extraordinary generosity that I can sell it for enough to pay you and make a little margin for myself. Besides, you can't collect from a crazy man, Connorton; and I'm getting crazier every minute. Business always goes to my head, Connorton. You must have noticed that up in the woods. I'm really becoming alarmed about myself. But perhaps, you'd rather do business with a conservator, Connorton."

"A half interest," urged Connorton, desperately, as he mentally reviewed the weakness of his own position in view of the unsuspected perspicacity of the inventor. "Consider that I have paid you twenty-five thousand dollars for a half interest, and the other half is yours. I'll defray whatever expense is incurred in marketing the invention, too."

Hartley reflected, seeming in doubt. "Connorton," he said at last, "I think I am still getting the worst of it somewhere, but an impractical fellow like me deserves to get the worst of it. Go ahead! Have that agreement put in legal form, and then you may get me out while there is yet time to save my reason."

* * * * *

Connorton had finished his appeal for the release of Hartley. "Of course," he was told, "if you and Mr. Paulson will assume the responsibility and will immediately take him away, we shall be glad to let you have him; but he is undoubtedly demented."

"Demented!" snorted Connorton. "Say! you try to do business with him, and you'll think he's the sanest man that ever lived!"

JENKIN LLOYD JONES.

Jenkin Lloyd Jones is one of the best-known Wisconsin
ministers. We say "Wisconsin," for, though he is now a
resident of Chicago, his parents moved from South Wales to
Wisconsin in 1843 when Jenkin Lloyd Jones was an infant.
During his boyhood he worked on the home farm; then in 1862
he enlisted, and served for three years in the Sixth
Wisconsin Battery in the Civil War. He is a graduate of the
Meadville, Pennsylvania, theological seminary of the class of
1870. He holds an honorary degree of LL. D. granted by the
University of Wisconsin in 1909. He was pastor of All Souls
Church, Janesville, from 1871 to 1880. He established, with
others, "Unity," a weekly paper, now organ of the Congress of
Religion, and has been its editor since 1879. He organized
All Souls Church in Chicago, and has been its pastor since
1882. He is the author of almost countless pamphlets and
several books, among the latter being "Love and Loyalty,"
"What Does Christmas Really Mean," "On the Firing Line in the
Battle for Sobriety," and his creative instinct has shown
itself in the organization of many societies and institutions
for the uplift of mankind.

NUGGETS FROM A WELSH MINE

Copyrighted by Olive E. Weston, 1902.

THE HOME (Page 14).

Love is the only safe and justifiable basis for a home. All Bibles, as well as all stories, all philosophy and all experience assert this.

Go to housekeeping, and, if possible, to house-building. Do not be outdone by the beaver. Do not sink lower than the bird, who builds its own nest, making it strong without and beautiful within.

That home alone is home where love generates generous impulses, noble purposes. True love will breed heavenly plans, nurse world-redeeming schemes, and enlist all the forces of earth in the interests of heaven.

There is no home where there is no common toil.

The world is the larger home. The child must early learn to feel its dependence on and its obligation to this larger home circle if it is to grow noble.

There are no furnishings to a house that really convert it into a home, which have not won their places, one by one, in the heart and brain of the housewife.

Civilization rests, not primarily on the court-house, or the college, or the public school building, or the post-office, or the railway station, or yet in the club, but in the home.

The trouble with our young people is not that they are too poor in material things to make for themselves a home, but that they are too poor in spiritual things to confess the poverty which might enable them to lay the foundations of a home, humble but altogether holy....

The beautiful heron, mad with a maternal love, blind to all dangers from without, bent only on protecting her brood, giving her life to her little ones, was killed by the woman who wears the graceful aigrette--that marvel of Nature's embroidery woven for a nuptial robe to the gracious bird. She, and none other, is responsible for that life, for it was for her sake that the bloody deed was done.

THE SCHOOL (Page 29).

The highest task that life holds for men and women is the choosing of an ideal to grow toward. It should be sufficiently far away to require a whole lifetime to pursue it.

It has taken a hundred years of agony and study to prove even in advanced America a man's right to his own body; a woman's right to her old soul; and the child's right to the development of his mind as of his muscle.

I plead for the true perspective in the training of your children. I believe, of course, in good bodies, comfortable and beautiful clothing, generous houses, and all the learning of the schools; I believe in intellectual joy and all the powers of thought, but only when they are subordinated to high affections and strong wills.

There is a power at work in the world that estimates gifts, not by the amount, but by the purpose that dictated them.

The kindergarten contains the seed of the gospel for children in its terminology when it seeks to develop the child by its "occupations."...

WORK (Page 111).

There can be no development, mental, spiritual, or physical, except by exercise.

Through labor we became creators, co-workers with God. Labor can be transfigured into a habit.

In the scales of the universe, a day's work will always weigh more than the dollar that pays for that day's work.

The tradesman who strives to know all about his own business and cares but little about any other, will not have much business of his own to absorb his attention after a while.

Blessed word is that,--"occupation." The new education is bound up in it. The health of the child is contained in it. The safety of the saint is represented by it, and the progress of humanity is dependent upon it.

When labor becomes the pride of the laborer, then he becomes fit object for the envy of kings.

The most disordered explosions of pent-up passions and unreleased power follow in the wake of enforced idleness.

There is no release from toil, and the only escape from the burdens of labor must come, not by its cessation, but by its glorification.

There is an overwork that is killing, but the danger from work, any work, all work, is trifling compared to the greater dangers of indolence.

There is always a large physical element in distances. It is always farther from the breakfast table to the field than it is from the field to the dinner table.

When the wheels of life bear me down for the last time, I ask for no higher compliment, I seek no truer statement of the work I have tried to do, than that which the white-headed old negress gave the beardless boy on the hot Corinth cornfield in 1862. Then, if I deserve it, let some one who loves me say, "Here is a Linkum soldier who has done got run over," one who, like his leader, tried to "pluck a thistle and plant a flower wherever a flower would grow."

EVERETT McNEIL.

MOTHER'S WOLF STORY

By Everett McNeil, for many years a resident of Stoughton,
Wis., now living in New York. Taken from St. Nicholas, Vol.
XXX, p. 387. Copyright by The Century Co.

(For many years a resident of Stoughton; now living in New
York. Author of The Cave of Gold, In Texas with Davy
Crockett, The Totem of Black Hawk, Fighting with Fremont, The
Boy Forty-Niners, etc.)

When I was a boy there was one story which my sisters and brothers and I were never tired of hearing mother tell; for our own mother was its heroine and the scene of the thrilling chase was not more than a mile and a half from our own door. Indeed, we often went coasting on the very hill down which she took her fearful ride, and skated on the pond which was the scene of her adventure. I can still distinctly remember how, when the long winter evenings came and the snow lay deep on the ground and the wind whistled stormily without, we children would gather around the great sheet-iron stove in the sitting-room of the old farm-house and beg mother to tell us stories of the perils and hardships of her pioneer days; and how, invariably, before the evening was over some one of us would ask: "Now, mother, please do tell us, just once more, how you escaped from the wolves, when a girl, by coasting down Peek's Hill."

Mother would pause in her knitting, and, with a smile, declare that she had already told us the story "forty-eleven times"; but, just to please so attentive an audience, she would tell it even once more. Then, while we children crowded closer around her chair, she would resume her knitting and begin:

"When your grandfather settled in this part of Wisconsin I was a little girl thirteen years old. We moved into the log house father had prepared for us early in the spring, and by fall we had things fixed quite comfortable. The winter which followed was one of unusual severity. The snow fell, early in November, to the depth of three feet on the level; and the greater part of it remained on the ground all winter. This, of course, made grand coasting. Father made for me a sled with strong, hard, smooth hickory runners, and big enough for two to ride on. I declare, I don't believe there ever was such another sled for speed"; and mother's eyes would sparkle at the memories the thought of her faithful sled recalled.

"At this time the country was very thinly populated. Our nearest neighbor was Abner Jones, who lived some three miles away, over on the other side of Peek's Hill. Abner Jones had a little girl, named Amanda, about my own age, and we two children soon became great chums. After a big snow-storm, Amanda and I would go coasting on Peek's Hill whenever we could gain the permission of our parents. She would come over to my house, or I would go over to her house, and together we would go to the hill. Amanda had no sled; but we could both ride down on my sled, and then take turns pulling it up the hill.

"The first week in January there was a two-days' thaw, followed by a sharp freeze. This caused a thick, icy crust to form on top of the remaining snow, which, by the next day, became so hard and strong that it would bear the weight of a man. The water from the melted snow ran into the hollow at the foot of Peek's Hill, and made a large, deep pond, which was soon covered over with a sheet of gleaming ice. So, you see, Peek's Hill had become an ideal coasting-place; for we could slide down its steep side at lightning speed, and out upon the ice, and even clear across the pond, a good three-quarters of a mile from the top of the hill.

"On one Saturday afternoon following a thaw and a freeze-up, I secured the permission of my parents to go over to Amanda's and get her to come sliding with me down the hill. Father cautioned me to be sure and be home early, because the wolves, which at that time infested all this section of the country, were said to be getting very bold and fierce, especially at night time; and they had been known, when driven by hunger, to run down and kill horses and cattle and even human beings. Doubtless the cold and the deep snow had forced many southward from the great woods in the northern part of the State. But the caution fell on idle ears. I considered all wolves cowards; besides, I was not going to hunt wolves; I was bent upon coasting down-hill; and I did not believe any wolf would be foolish enough to take the trouble to run down a little girl when there were plenty of chickens and cattle to be had.

"I bundled up warmly, and, drawing my sled behind me, started 'cross lots over Peek's Hill to Amanda's house. Peek's Hill stood about half-way between our two homes. I left the heavy sled at the top of the hill to wait our return. When I reached the house I found Amanda laid up with a bad cold, and of course her mother would not allow her to go coasting; so I took off my things to stay in the house and play with her. Amanda had two rubber dolls, and we had such a jolly time playing with them that I did not notice how fast the time was passing until Mrs. Jones said, 'Come, my dear; it is time you were going!' Then she helped to bundle me up, gave me a doughnut hot from the kettle, and saw me safely started on my way home.