Introducing the Most Important Citizen in the World

"HOW do you like babies?" some woman asked Charles Lamb.

"B-b-oiled, madam," stuttered Lamb.

In the beginning of the race nobody except mothers liked babies.

The records of civilization's slow progress are written in babies' blood.

Babies had no rights: they were a necessary evil.

In the South Sea Islands, when either parent died, the children were slain and buried also, to wait on the parent in the other world.

In China it is estimated that 40 per cent. of the girl babies in the provinces of the interior were drowned.

In India, when a girl baby was born, time mother put opium on her breasts, and the baby, inhaling it with the mother's milk, died.

Inside the great iron statue of Moloch a roaring fire was built on holy days. And into the white-hot arms of the god women hurled their screaming infants.

Even the Greeks, who established a civilization higher than that of any other ancient people, regularly "exposed" their undesired infants on the mountain-sides.

And Socrates, their greatest man, saw nothing in the practice to condemn.

Little by little, through the succeeding centuries, the baby has been coming into his own.

Romulus, who founded Rome, took the first forward step; the Emperor Hadrian made another advance.

But it was Christianity that discovered the baby.

All motherhood became sanctified in the worship paid to Mary, the mother of Jesus.

All childhood was ennobled by the birth in the manger. To-day we measure the civilization of a nation by the question: How does it treat its babies?

And the civilization of an individual can be measured by the same test.

Do you consider babies a nuisance? Do you dislike them? Do they fear you?

Then—though your culture may belong to the twentieth century—your heart still lingers in the first.

It's a question how much any one man influences the world through his business life or his public acts.

Alexander conquered the world. And, before his ashes were cold, his kingdom began to break up.

But one little section of the human race is given into your care irrevocably:

Your babies.

What you make them they will be. Through them and their descendants you can perpetuate your influence to the end of time.

If there is a baby in your home, nursing-bottles ought to be more important to you than stocks and bonds.

You ought to know more about the various kinds of baby foods than you know about golf.

Your business is important because it makes your living. But your home is all-important because there you make lives.

This is our Babies' Number. Our hats are off to him—and her—the future proprietors of the earth: the most important citizens in the world.

Bruce Barton, Editor.

Mr. Richard's Fianceé

By MEREDITH NICHOLSON

Illustrations by Frank Snapp

AS Miss Abigail Vincent followed with a confident air a highway on the North Shore of Massachusetts, there was nothing in her appearance to justify a suspicion that she was a book agent. While her only visible impedimenta were a blue parasol and a purse, she carried, secreted in her blue cloth skirt (whence it could be extracted with ease between her admission to a house and the appearance of its lord or lady), a morocco-bound dummy of "The History of a Thousand Years," containing sample pages of that monumental work, with testimonials from many persons whose names are household words in every part of America.

The head of the subscription department of the publishing house had suggested to Gail this manner of hiding the incriminating dummy, and as she glanced down at her skirt she was satisfied that the most critical observer would not have noticed the slight sag on the left side, where the volume was tucked away in a pocket of her own fashioning.

This was early in July. In June Gail had received from the University of Nebraska a document which recited that she was entitled to all the credit and glory that appertain to the degree of a bachelor of arts in every part of the world. And not without much ingenious financiering, and many hours devoted to tutoring, typewriting for the faculty, and other labor, had she won this boon.

But, far from being satisfied, she had fixed her eyes (which were blue) upon a course in pedagogy at Columbia. As her parents had died leaving her with only a paltry two hundred dollars a year, this further ambition obviously was not easily to be attained. But Gail supplemented a resolute and venturesome spirit with mental qualities to which the Phi Beta Kappa key attached to her watch-chain bore ample testimony.

THE advertisement of the subscription agent had called for "young women of good address and neat appearance, capable of presenting the merits of a standard work to educated people." Any one would have said that Gail answered all these requirements. A blue-eyed girl with fair hair, irreproachable complexion, and a winning smile, it was inconceivable that the least hospitable of doors would ever slam in her face. And yet already this morning the doors of three handsome villas had closed upon her with discouraging finality.

Her next attack was upon the handsomest estate she had yet seen, a big Georgian house planted well back from the road, with a formal garden in front and the twinkling sea beyond. Here, certainly, must be domiciled persons of wealth and culture awaiting the glad tidings of the singular merits of "The History of a Thousand Years," illustrated by the great masters, and with ten off for cash.

She boldly sounded the knocker, and glanced casually at the label on the wrapper of a newspaper that lay on a stand in the entry. The name was Maybury—Mrs. Giles J. Maybury. By exercising a little ingenuity she could usually acquaint herself in advance with the names of house-holders. Her hopes rose. She played with her parasol, and assumed the air of a young lady abroad solely for social pleasure.

As she waited she thrust out her foot to assure herself that the dummy lay in its hidden pocket, easily accessible. In her room at the Beverly boarding-house she had practised extracting it. The feat could be accomplished in an instant, and any one observing her would have thought she was tying her shoe.

A white-haired butler opened the door and blinked in the strong sunlight.

"Is Mrs. Maybury at home?" she asked, with her most engaging smile.

"Yes, mum."

"I should like—" she began.

"Are you—you must be the young lady she's expecting?"

HE surveyed her critically, and yet without the hostility against which she had steeled herself. His shift from an inquiry to an affirmation was encouraging. He was a benevolent-looking person, and in assuming that she was the expected young lady his manner became, she thought, slightly confidential. She was not the young lady Mrs. Maybury was expecting, but she determined to broaden her experience immediately by learning just how persons of wealth and culture receive young ladies who practise deceit in gaining entrance to their houses.

"You may come into the living-room, miss. Mrs. Maybury hasn't been down yet. I'll tell her you've come."

Again the confidential, slightly patronizing, reassuring air. He held back the light summer portieres, and she entered a long living-room, with broad windows through which she caught a glimpse of the sea. The room satisfied in every particular her ideal of a seaside villa: the scene could not have been more fittingly set for her first presentation of the wonders of "The History of a Thousand Years." As the man left her, her hand stole cautiously to the edge of her skirt; but he reappeared instantly and walked toward her on tiptoe.

"Pardon me, miss; but you will understand if Mrs. Maybury seems a bit nervous. It's all so unexpected, she's been quite upset."

He glanced toward the door furtively, and then whispered, with the back of his hand to shield his mouth:

"The missis is very fond of Mr. Richard; it's bound to come out all right. We're all that fond of Mr. Richard—"

A noise in the hall caused him to start; then he bent closer and whispered huskily:

"Most unfortunate thing has occurred, miss. The Bishop and Mrs. Barton arrived this morning; it's most deplorable." He seemed at the point of tears. "Mr. Richard has been to town to meet you. He must have missed your train. Perhaps you'd rather see him first. It might make it easier for you, miss."

Gail was fully persuaded that she had committed a serious error in attempting to palm herself off as the young lady who was expected. Still, she was in a house, and its mistress was at home, and sometime, somewhere, she must begin her business career. The butler waited deferentially for her answer. She determined to see the thing through at any hazard.

"I don't know that it's necessary," she murmured uncertainly.

He retired, bowing a meek acceptance of her wishes.

FIVE minutes passed. She extracted the dummy from its pocket, and then in a sudden panic restored it to its hiding-place. She had barely disposed of it when, with startling abruptness, a short, stocky man in clerical dress appeared, paused an instant, and then advanced resolutely.

"My dear young lady," he began, "you will pardon my presumption, but it seemed best that I should see you before you meet Mrs. Maybury. I trust that you will understand fully what this means to Richard's mother. My poor sister-in-law has been deeply shocked—as, indeed, we have all been. It was a great blow to my dear wife; she was quite prostrated when we arrived an hour ago and learned of Richard's—er—intentions."

He glanced down at the gloved hand he had been holding, relinquished it slowly, and resumed:

"Please understand that personally, being in a sense an outsider and not really a Maybury,—and not, I assure you, quite sharing their traditional ideas in social matters,—I merely wish to act the part of a good friend to one and all."

He sank into a chair and began polishing his glasses.

Gail chilled as she realized that she was becoming deeply enmeshed in the domestic affairs of this home of wealth and culture. The Bishop was inspecting her with care, and yet with something akin to the tolerance the butler had manifested.

His back was to the door; and, as Gail planned a hasty exit to escape the further consequences of her temerariousness, the curtains swayed and a young man thrust in his head and gesticulated wildly. As near as she could interpret his use of the sign language, he wished her to remain; she even read into his communications his earnest desire that she should not disturb the Bishop in his misapprehension as to her identity.

He was a deeply tanned young man, clad in white ducks and a blue serge coat, and from the expression of his countenance he was experiencing emotions of the most poignant nature. As his mad gesturing continued, Gail sat back in her chair and fixed her attention upon the Bishop.

"All my life," the Bishop continued, with an ingratiating smile, "I have been deeply sympathetic with the theater. The people of the stage have always seemed to me deserving of our sympathy and—er—gratitude. But you must understand, my dear Miss—er—Gilmore—that people like the Mayburys and Eatons—Mrs.

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Maybury was an Eaton—with their severe social standards, look askance at the thought of one of their sons forming an—er—alliance with a young woman of the theater."

Gail's eyes opened wide with mystification, and her lips parted. Once more the eavesdropper became visible and resumed his frantic' signaling. Clearly, he was urging her to permit and encourage the Bishop in the belief that she was a certain Miss Gilmore, an actress, who was about to marry into the august house of Maybury. A slight agitation of the curtains indicated that the young gentleman clung to his post as if prepared to resist by force any effort on her part to escape.

"I wish you to know, my dear child, that I feel for you very deeply, and that I am entirely at your service if I can be of any help to you in this most unusual situation. Pardon me if I suggest a certain sobriety of tone as most likely to help you through these first trying hours. I am sure you will not take it amiss that I volunteer these suggestions. Richard is a charming boy—my favorite nephew, in fact, as he is my dear wife's. We have the strongest hopes of his success in life, and in that we may, I am sure, rely upon your—er—fullest coöperation."

As Richard was mentioned, the curtain parted and the young lunatic tapped his broad chest idiotically in what Gail took to be an effort to identify himself with the Richard under discussion.

"You will grant me the privilege of an old man if I say—if I may make bold to say—that my own first impressions are wholly—er—gratifying."

He beamed upon her, patted her hand gently, and left the room.

GAIL was stealing cautiously toward the door, when the agile young man suddenly confronted her. He drew a handkerchief across his face, and shook his head with relief.

"Don't go! For heaven's sake, don't leave me!" he entreated. "You've got to go through with it now."

Awed by his menacing attitude, Gail jumped behind the chair she had just vacated, and thus barricaded flourished her parasol threateningly. Instead of being expelled from the first home of wealth and culture she had invaded, there seemed a strong possibility that she would spend her life there unless she effected an immediate escape.

"Just a moment, please!" pleaded the young man, who seemed at the verge of tears. "It's a great favor, but, really, you can help me out of an awful scrape. My mother's gone all to pieces—even after she said I might ask 'Toinette down here and let me think she was going to stand for it all right. And now Aunt Peggy and the Bishop have blown in, and 'Toinette's lost! If you'll just spend the day here it'll help a lot, and I'll think up some way of getting rid of Aunt Peggy. You can see for yourself that if 'Toinette doesn't show up when she's expected that will have a rotten look. Mother won't understand it; it—"

"Would you mind telling me," interrupted Gail, "just what all this is about? I'm a book agent, and got into the house by mistake. Unless you can control yourself long enough to look at my prospectus, I must leave immediately."

"Splendid!" cried the young man hoarsely. "Stay, and I'll take a carload of your books—stay till after lunch anyway, and you'll never regret it!"

Gail pondered. If she let this opportunity pass, she might continue her tramp to the Maine border without effecting a sale. The son of Mrs. Giles J. Maybury was doubtless financially responsible for any contracts he might make. No harm could come of eating the Mayburys' food, particularly when it seemed likely that she could save this young man's life by masquerading as the missing 'Toinette.

"If you'll subscribe for the India-paper edition of The History of a Thousand Years," she said in a crisp, businesslike tone, "I'll stay—for lunch."

"Done!" he assented greedily.

"It's ten off for cash," she suggested.

"We'll waive the discount; just stay, that's all!"

"If you'll turn your back a moment—"

He stared, thinking she meditated flight through the nearest window, then swung round. She bent down and deftly extracted the dummy.

"Now," she said, extending it opened to the space for signatures, "sign there."

He grabbed a pen from the table, and wrote his name in a wild scrawl.

She blew upon it to dry the ink, and read carefully: Richard G. Maybury.

"I'll just add that it's the India-paper edition," she remarked calmly.

He danced about restlessly as she made the notation.

"I'll give you a check—I'll give you anything you want!"

"One hundred dollars," she remarked succinctly.

He nodded an impatient acquiescence and glanced toward the door.

"Now that's all settled, and I'm to give your family the pleasure of my company at luncheon as part of the bargain. Suppose you coach me a little," she added, "as to the part I'm to play."

"You see," he began hurriedly, resting his hands on the long table and bending toward her, "'Toinette—Miss Gilmore—is the girl. I'm engaged to. She's an actress—only in the chorus now, you know, but that's where they all begin. I got acquainted with her last winter when she was playing in Boston in 'The Little Billikin'—a month's run. It was my last year in the law school, you know."

"I suppose you got your degree?" she asked practically.

"Oh, yes; and I'm going into one of the best offices in Boston in October," he replied impatiently. "But about Miss Gilmore—I want you to know that mother's acted fine about it. When I told her of my engagement she said she would have 'Toinette down, and when she said that I knew it would be all right."

"And after she said that, your mother went to bed and your aunt and her husband appeared?"

"Well, mother has never been strong since father died two years ago. That was a great shock to her," he said defensively.

THE book agent's manner of receiving his confession struck him as deficient in sympathy. She was a self-possessed person, disconcertingly direct in her statements; and she was a pretty girl. It was a new and unwelcome experience to be humiliating himself before a pretty girl. 'Toinette—the third one from the left in "The Little Billikin"—was not, he reflected, a greater delight to the eye than this book agent. Both were fair, but the book agent's nose was straighter than 'Toinette's, and the girl before him would have nothing to fear in a complexion contest with his fiancée.

"It's not mother I'm afraid of so much as Aunt Peggy," he continued. "You know, she's always been mighty fond of me, and I'm—well, it's been understood that she's always said she meant to do the handsome thing by me."

"And, being a far-seeing man, you're afraid of spoiling your expectations?"

"That's not fair!" he pleaded. "I mentioned the money merely to show you how delicate the situation is. Aunt Peggy has been a particular pal of mine, and her coming here now complicates the whole business with mother. I wanted to have it out with mother, and get her to help pull Aunt Peggy over. There's no question of money—I'd go out without a dollar and fight the world for 'Toinette. She's the truest, squarest little girl that ever lived, and never had a mercenary idea in her life. Her people are poor," he ran on glibly, "but respectable in every way, and it isn't her fault that she had to go out to earn her living."

"Certainly not," Gail agreed.

A cough in the hall caused Maybury to stand at attention. The butler appeared, his broad face twitching.

"Pardon me, Mr. Richard, but Mrs. Maybury says she will see Miss Gilmore at once. Your trunk has come, miss; the maid will show you your room."

When his step had died away, Gail bent a look of dismay upon the young lord of the household.

"My trunk?"

Again Richard mopped his face, and beat the air with his fists.

"It's 'Toinette's trunk. God knows what's become of her! She wired me she'd be down on the ten-forty; and now her trunk's come, and—"

He stared at her helplessly.

"Something terrible must have happened to 'Toinette," he moaned.

"Something terrible may happen to me before I get out of this! If I were you I'd cheer up. If the girl is the nice girl. I assume her to be, you needn't be afraid your family won't like her. From the way you act, one might get the impression you're not so keen about her yourself."

"Oh, no; it's not that! I'm thinking of 'Toinette—of her ordeal in coming into a strange house, and being looked over—and the servants—"

He gave his collar an impatient twitch.

"I suppose it hasn't occurred to you that I may have some feelings," Gail suggested sweetly. "And when they find out that I'm a fraud, what are they going to say to you? It occurs to me that you are merely postponing the day of wrath. You've still got them to deal with."

"Oh, I know all that, but I can't face it to-day; I simply couldn't! Oh, you won't go—you will stand by me!"

"For lunch, thank you! And when Miss Gilmore comes, please have the decency to get me out of the house before you introduce her. I want safe conduct through the lines!"

IN the upper hall a white-capped maid met Gail and led the way to a bedroom that expressed the last word in taste and comfort. A silver tray containing a pitcher of milk and slices of bread and butter spoke for a well ordered and hospitable household. Even as the butler had viewed Gail with interest, the maid inspected her with guarded curiosity.

"May I open your trunk for you, miss?" she asked, indicating a badly worn steamer-trunk with the initials A. G. painted on the end.

"I'm afraid I've lost my key," Gail replied, opening her purse. "But don't trouble now. We'll attend to it after luncheon. By the way, what's the luncheon hour?"

"One-thirty, miss."

She took Gail's hat and jacket, and while she was depositing them with ceremonial care in a closet, Gail refreshed herself with a glass of milk.

"Mrs. Maybury is quite ready to see you," the maid volunteered, after carefully brushing Gail's skirt. "Pardon me, miss, but it's better not to keep her waiting. She's quite nervous this morning."

Gail expressed her regret at Mrs. Maybury's indisposition, and gave a touch to her hair.

"I'm ready," she announced.

The maid led the way down the hall, knocked on a door, and left in haste.

"Come!" called a faint voice.

Gail stepped into a dimly lighted room, and hesitated, clinging to the door. Her panic passed quickly, and she found herself walking toward a small, white-haired woman in a dressing-wrapper, with a silk shawl drawn over her shoulders.

"My dear child, so you've come!"

Gail felt a small hand clutching hers, and a pair of brown eyes in which tears glistened regarded her eagerly, bravely.

"It's very nice that you let me come," said Gail, picking up a pillow that had tumbled from the invalid's chair. "But I'm so sorry you are not well. I'm afraid you've been troubled—troubled about Richard—and me."

"He's all I have," said the little woman, drawing a handkerchief from the sleeve of her dressing-wrapper. "Of course, I've been deeply anxious; but now—" She smiled as she peered into Gail's face.

"I think I understand your feeling, Mrs. Maybury. And I want to say," Gail continued, deeply touched by the woman's frailty, "that if you don't approve—if you have misgivings, there must be an end to everything."

She paused, alarmed at her volubility. She realized that she was acting and speaking for a person whose bearing in the difficult situation might have been wholly different—to whom, indeed, for all she knew, Mrs. Maybury might have capitulated at sight.

"That is generous; that is very sweet of you! I have nothing to live for but my boy's happiness, and yours too, of course. And now," she added, with a wistful smile, "we must get acquainted!

"Please throw up the shades," she said, sinking into her chair. "I haven't even had a good look at you yet! That's right; thank you. You've seen Richard? He meant to meet you, of course. I thought I'd rather see you alone first. I hope you find your room comfortable. My servants have been with me for, years—all except the cook, who came yesterday and won't do at all. Servants are a great problem; I haven't the strength to fight them. I suppose you have all such experiences ahead of you.

"My dear child, you are quite tall! I wasn't prepared for that; Richard has spoken of you as a little girl. But you are fair, as he described you—there's the photograph he brought me. You won't mind my saying that I'm glad you don't wear your hair all the time as the photograph shows it. You have lovely hair. Sit down there, won't you; and you won't mind if I stare a bit? That picture was taken for professional purposes, I suppose. I met Ellen Terry once at a luncheon—my only encounter with stage folk.

"Please hand me the salts, dear. My old head is very troublesome sometimes. Yes, that's the one. Were your people French? Richard didn't know. Antoinette suggested it. I've lived in France a great deal, and I read a good many French books. Perhaps you speak French?"

"I can read it a little, but I don't vouch for my accent," Gail admitted.

"We shall test that after a while," remarked Mrs. Maybury, indicating a table littered with books.

Gail's eye fell upon copies of the Revue des Deux Mondes and L'Illustration. She must exercise caution; if Miss Gilmore was unfamiliar with the French language, it was not decent for her to flourish her own accomplishments, gained by three years' study at Lincoln, Nebraska.

Her qualms of conscience at deceiving Mrs. Maybury yielded to a feeling of resentment toward her son. It was brutally unfilial in Richard Maybury to have given his mother cause for anxiety. And Gail was moved to pity for the unknown 'Toinette, whose head, saucily uplifted in the photograph, was not without a certain charm in spite of the tangle of fluffy hair of which Mrs. Maybury had mildly disapproved. "To Dicky from 'Toinette," was written over the lower half of the card.

MRS. MAYBURY was undoubtedly making a supreme effort to maintain her composure; several times she knit her brows and pressed her hand to her head. She continued to talk—of the Shore, of past summers, avoiding the questions which Gail surmised must be thronging through her mind.

"Please don't talk any more now," said Gail; "there'll be plenty of time later."

She stepped behind the chair and began passing her hands gently across Mrs. Maybury's forehead.

"Sometimes this helps. Tell me if I bother you."

Mrs. Maybury touched Gail's hands in sign of gratitude, and closed her eyes.

A clock on the mantel struck twelve, and Gail's spirits rose. In three hours, at most, she would be free to continue her march up the coast. She let down her patient's hair, and brushed it with slow, evenly timed strokes. In a few minutes the tiny figure relaxed. She satisfied herself that Mrs. Maybury was asleep, and sat down in the window-seat.

A light tap disturbed her reverie. She crossed the room noiselessly and stepped into the hall, where the maid presented a scared face.

"If you please, miss, Mrs. Barton wishes to see you. She thinks maybe you'd

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better not stay longer with. Mrs. Maybury. I hope—"

"Mrs. Maybury is asleep," said Gail, "and not to be disturbed. Which is Mrs. Barton's room?"

"The last one on the left, miss."

On the stairway leading to the third floor, Gail saw Mr. Richard Maybury peering down at her, and wigwagging energetically, with the evident purpose of warning her to avoid Mrs. Barton's room.

Gail lifted her head scornfully.

"Well?" she said, as the maid lingered.

"She's a bit peppery, miss."

"Thank you," said Gail. "What else is troubling you?"

"It's the new cook, miss," the maid faltered. "She's making an awful fuss in the kitchen. Mr. Richard's that upset, he can't do anything. I ought to tell Mrs. Maybury. Cook is swearing and saying she won't leave, and Grimes wants to send for the police."

"I'll see her," said Gail. "Say to Mrs. Barton I'll be in in a moment."

"Yes, miss."

A BIG middle-aged Irishwoman turned from the larding of a filet and scowled as Gail entered the kitchen. In a corner a young girl bent over a table, peeling potatoes and washing them with tears.

"Cook," said Gail briskly, "Mrs. Maybury has decided that you won't do. You will please pack your things and leave the house immediately. By the time you're ready I'll have your money—two weeks added—is that right?"

Cook gripped her knife and drew herself up like a queen of tragedy.

"And who be you," she bellowed, "to come down here dischargin' o' me! It's a high time o' day when a gur-rul from the the-a-ter and God knows what else comes dancin' into me kitchin and tellin' me—a decent workin'-woman—to begone! I'll be after tellin' ye I gave up a good place to come here, thinkin' th' wages was better and th' sea air good for me health—"

"We're not discussing this matter. You're discharged. I want you to leave the house in half an hour. I'll have the chauffeur take you into town."

"I'll not do ut—I'll not—"

"If you're not off the place in thirty minutes I'll call the Beverly police." Gail swung round upon the blubbering girl:

"I suppose you know how to cook. Go ahead the best you can with luncheon, and if you get into trouble, call me."

The cook threw the carving knife into the sink with a loud clatter, and crossed the kitchen with a majestic stride.

"They tould me it was a respectible house; if they'd tould me th' likes o' you, a meddlesome stage actor-ess—"

Gail took a step toward her; the door closed upon cook with a bang.

"Don't be silly!" Gail admonished the weeping potato-parer. "That woman wouldn't hurt a fly. Boil an onion and get the smell of whisky out of the place."

She passed through the pantry to the dining-room and on to the second floor. The butler thrust his head out of a door, and was in the act of withdrawing it hastily, when Gail arrested him.

"Please find Mr. Maybury and tell him to give cook a check for her wages. And if there's a machine on the place, have it ready in half an hour to take her to town. And you might see what you can do toward finding a new cook."

"Yes, miss," said Grimes brokenly, regarding Gail with deference and admiration. "And, if you please, the plumber has come, and Mrs. Maybury wished most partickler to see 'im. It's about the hot water, miss. It's a question, if you please, of repairin' the old boiler or puttin' in a new style heater. He's from the city, miss, and been waitin' an hour."

Gail pondered this momentous matter judicially, with her head slightly tilted in the manner of one given to cautious judgment.

"Tell him to repair the old boiler and send an estimate for a new heater. Mrs. Maybury will see no one till after luncheon."

"Thank ye, miss. And, if you please, miss, Mr. Richard wished me to say it would be better not to see Mrs. Barton."

"You may tell Mr. Richard,," said Gail tartly, "that I shall use my own judgment in the matter. Show me Mrs. Barton's door."

The Bishop opened the door to her tap.

"Margaret, Miss Gilmore," he announced to a lady who lay in a heavily blanketed bed; and then, as if seized with mortal fear, he hurried from the room.

Mrs. Barton sat up in bed, groaned, glared, and fell back upon her pillows.

"So you're the girl, are you?"

"I'm a girl!" Gail retorted.

Mrs. Barton was a large woman, with a masculine face, iron-gray hair, and a pair of particularly keen dark eyes. The eyes bored through Gail for a moment. When she had finished her scrutiny, she pointed to a chair.

"SO you're the young woman who's been making a fool of my nephew!—and sending his poor mother to her grave! I always supposed Dick had more sense than to go dancing after a chorus girl. But there's no accounting for men. You must have some peculiar fascination for the sex; my husband came in here and bragged about you to me—to me—just as if I didn't have eyes in my own head to judge people with! I suppose you don't understand that this means ruin to the boy—the absolute blasting of all our hopes for him. Why don't you come right out with it and tell me how much you want? You and I can arrange this whole matter quietly, without bothering my poor sister with it. I'll agree to anything reasonable. Be sensible now, and let's get through with this foolishness. I'm a frank person; let's have no beating about the bush."

"I'm a frank person myself," remarked Gail hotly, "and I'm sorry to have to remind you that I'm a guest in this house, and that while I'm here I don't propose to be insulted by you or anybody else. If you had a spark of womanliness in you—or mercy, or charity—you wouldn't talk this way to another woman, no matter how little you trusted her. As for taking your money, I'll settle that right now by telling you that I'm not for sale—not for all the money in the family. I hope we understand each other!"

With considerable difficulty and much groaning, Mrs. Barton raised herself in her bed.

"Humph! So that's the tune, is it?"

"It is," Gail affirmed. "And I'll say to you further that, as far as your nephew's concerned, the world is pretty full of decent, self-respecting, industrious young men, and that I'm not so sure it's to my best interests to marry a young man who has never earned a dollar in his life and may settle down to being a loafer, for all I know."

A deep groan was Mrs. Barton's answer. Gail asked politely if she was suffering.

"Suffering! What do you know about suffering? You don't look as if you ever had an ache or pain in your life! Don't people suffer when they have lumbago? I knew it was a mistake, going out on the Cape; and the sheets at the Livingstons' were damp—I knew they were damp! And to come up here for peace and find this house all upset! And that maid had the effrontery to tell me there isn't a mustard plaster on the place. To keep house without mustard plasters! I've warned my sister time and again to have mustard plasters on hand when I come."

"If you'll calm yourself for a few minutes, I'll make you a mustard plaster."

"You—you!" cried Mrs. Barton. "Well, see what you can do and hurry back."

Gail found the five servants of the household in executive session in the kitchen. They were discussing Gail, as she knew instantly from their precipitate exits. The potato-parer had ceased whimpering; she produced mustard and flour, and went in search of linen.

IN ten minutes Gail was back in Mrs. Barton's chamber. The sufferer sniffed the plaster critically, groaned, and gave directions for its application.

"I must say that you have more sense than I expected to find in a theater girl," she panted, after the plaster had been put to work and Gail had turned the patient upon her back. "Why didn't you learn trained nursing and keep away from the stage? Some very nice girls go into nursing."

"Of course only very naughty girls go on the stage," Gail returned with spirit. "Just for politeness' sake, let's agree that your nephew is a gentleman and not likely to take up with a girl he wouldn't be proud to introduce to his mother and her family. I think we'll all be happier if you will see it that way."

"Are you trying to be impertinent to me?" Mrs. Barton demanded.

"That's as you please to look at it," Gail answered, walking to the window.

She stood dreamily watching a sail stealing along the horizon until a moan from the bed aroused her. The mustard had begun to assert its power.

"I really believe that thing's going to help me," Mrs. Barton announced.

"Tell me when it gets too hot and I'll take it off," said Gail amiably.

With grim stoicism Mrs. Barton endured it for twenty minutes, diverting herself with questions as to Gail's ancestors, education, and outlook on life.

Being without data as to Miss 'Toinette Gilmore's history, Gail gave rein to her imagination. The Gilmores were an old Vermont family. Miss Gilmore, as Gail depicted her, was a person of highly respectable, even distinguished antecedents. After shaking a box of talcum over time area rubricated by the mustard, she said:

"I'll go now, unless there's something else I can do for you."

"Well," Mrs. Barton assented grudgingly, "I suppose that silly Richard is waiting for you. You may send Marie in. I'll be down for luncheon. I never take my meals in bed, young woman."

"I rather prefer taking nourishment in an upright position myself," Gail replied.

"What's that?" demanded Mrs. Barton, a grim, reluctant smile crossing her face.

"I said I didn't like eating in bed."

WHEN Gail, having been summoned for luncheon, entered the living-room, Mr. Richard Maybury sprang up hastily.

"Well!" he ejaculated anxiously.

"Well!" Gail mocked.

"How's mother?" he asked.

"Very comfortable—thank you."

"And Aunt Peggy? I'm not responsible for what she may have said to you: I tried to warn you to keep away from her. I'd like to have saved you from anything remotely disagreeable," he added, with honest contrition.

Continued on page 19

A Statement About Every Week On Its First Birthday

A YEAR ago, while Americans were still paralyzed by the sudden horror of the war, we launched this magazine.

Probably there had never been a less auspicious period in the history of publishing.

Men were still uncertain how the war would affect the business of the United States. Bankers were pessimistic.

Advertisers had either canceled or greatly curtailed their advertising appropriations.

"No new magazine can live in these troubled days," said some.

Others, more eager to save our money than to spare our feelings, added: "And no three-cent magazine can succeed, now—or ever."

In the face of so much well intentioned discouragement we prepared our first modest number and sent it forth.

That was a year ago.

Without great pressure the magazine has forged ahead, gathering readers to itself one by one, and their number is increasing with most gratifying steadiness.

We have determined on this, our first birthday to adopt a mark of distinction for Every Week—a kind of household god to be set regularly at the head of our editorial column as the embodiment of our ideal.

With due reverence, we have chosen the head of Abraham Lincoln.

As we have set down the purposes for which we should like to have this weekly stand, we have been more, and more conscious that they are the purposes for which he stood.

"God must love the plain people," he said, "or He would not have made so many of them."

The great American middle class, the backbone of the nation—that is our chosen constituency. Neither our purpose nor our price excludes any one.

We stand for the people who, as Lincoln did, win their education through their reading. We stand with him—and them—for thrift, for a better national health, for more outdoor living, for better homes, clean amusements, for progress through self-help, for devotion to an ideal.

And with him, also, for a finer, more efficient patriotism than America has yet known.

A patriotism that shall prove to the world that free men can yet be efficient men in their business, their social relationships, and their government.

We can imagine no nobler business than this—to build a weekly that shall, week by week, build women and men in the spirit of Abraham Lincoln.

Such a purpose is not quickly attained. It calls for steadfastness, and patience, and money.

We recognize the requirements: we have counted the cost.

We enter on our second year joyously, conscious that there are a great many people who wish us well, eager to justify their faith, and the faith of the other thousands and hundred thousands whom the year will bring to us.

THE EDITORS.

"My Dear King"

By WILLIAM NELSON TAFT

"MY dear Czar," you or I would write, if we wanted to congratulate Nicholas II on having reached his forty-ninth birthday without being blown up by a bomb, poisoned with a cream tart, or strangled with the sash of a Circassian spy. "My dear Czar: This finds me well and hoping you are the same." But if the President of the United States should happen to want to exchange a few friendly words with a fellow ruler, would he be allowed to do it in this easy, informal fashion? No, he would not. In the first place, this is how he would have to begin his letter:

To His Majesty, Czar Nicholas, Emperor and Autocrat of all the Russias, of Moscow, Klow, Vladimir, Novgorod, Czar of Kasan, Czar of Astrakhan, Czar of Siberia, Czar of the Charsonese, Czar of Georgia, Lord of Ploscow, and Grand Duke of Smolensk, Lithuania, Volynia, of Courland and Semigalle, of Bialostock, Viatka, and other provinces, Lord and Grand Duke of Lower Novgorod, of Czernigo, Polatzk, Rostow, Iaroslow, Bolosersk, Oudor, Obdor and Widopsk, Ruler of All the Country of the North, Lord of Armenia, Hereditary Prince and Sovereign of all the Princes of the Highlands and Lord of Turkestan: Greetings.

And, in the second place, he would not be allowed to begin it at all: for Mr. Sidney Y. Smith, Chief of the Diplomatic Bureau of the State Department, is especially charged with seeing after all this; and whenever there is a royal marriage, a royal birth, or a royal death anywhere in the world—it being the duty of the President to send a letter of congratulation or condolence, as the case may be, on all such occasions—Sidney Smith is the man who sees that it is done in the proper manner.

There is a set and proscribed form for each of these communications. Each is transcribed in the finest copper-plate handwriting by a pen expert of the Department of State upon specially prepared gilt-edged paper. The letter is then sent to the White House, where the President signs it, and it is carried back to the State Department for the counter-signature of Secretary Lansing. Having been placed, without folding, in a large envelop, and sealed with the Great Seal of the United States, it is sent, together with a copy, in a special letter pouch to the proper Ambassador or Minister, with instructions to deliver the copy to the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the original to the monarch "in such fashion as may be most agreeable."

He Never Knows He Got a Letter

IT is interesting to note, however, that the ruler to whom the letter is sent never receives the document, and probably never learns that it has been written. That is taken care of by the'under secretaries, who, in turn, prepare a formal reply. The ruler signs this reply, and it is sent to President Wilson. As the President never sees this communication, everybody is even.

It is probably fortunate for the health of the nation's Chief Executive that he is not expected to write, by hand, the missives he sends to foreign rulers—though not all rulers have as long or as formal a title as has the Czar.

The President's letters of this nature always begin: "Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States, To His Majesty," etc.; and the accepted form for the closing is: "May God have your Majesty in His wise keeping. Your every good friend, Woodrow Wilson."

In incoming letters the form of, opening and closing varies according to the country from which the President's mail comes. From the Court of St. James, for example, there will arrive a "personal" letter beginning: "George, By the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith, Emperor of India [etc., etc.], To the President of the United States of America—Greetings"; and concludes: "Your very good friend, George, R. and I." The last initials stand for "Rex and Imperator," and only the signature is written by the King himself.

King Albert of Belgium is the most democratic of the rulers, beginning his letters to the President without any flamboyant flourish and simply writing: Tres cher et grand ami (Very dear and great friend") and closing with: Votre sincere ami (Your sincere friend).

While French is the language generally used in diplomatic correspondence, it is the custom for each ruler to use his own tongue in these theoretically personal communications. The letters from Petrograd and from Tokio, however, are always accompanied by a translation into French. Apparently the Russians and Japanese fear that we could not read their queer writing, so they plan to be on the safe side. The Chinese, on the other hand, never bother with a translation, and one of their official communications resembles a magnified laundry ticket.

A Letter from the Fijian King

THE Algerian and Moroccan letters are like wise very cryptic; but the gem of the State Department's collection is a letter written to the President by the King of the Fiji Islands a number of years ago. It is inscribed' on a very large whale's tooth, to which is attached a plait of some kind of vegetable fiber. The "writing" is in the native alphabet, and it took the State Department a long time to find out what it was all about. It was finally discovered that the King desired to announce his marriage to wife number ten.

The Man in the Stone House

By FREEMAN TILDEN

Illustrations by George E. Wolfe

THE Mudges had just sat down to breakfast—which was always early in that house—when the telephone rang. Louise answered, but the call was for Ezra.

"What?" cracked out the old man, immediately he had put the receiver to his ear. What's that? . . . You don't tell me! . . . How much? . . . No! . . . You don't tell me, now! . . . And the other money too, eh? Well, well!"

"That's the end of that," announced Ezra triumphantly to the women at the table. "Now I guess he'll wish he'd taken a little advice."

"Who? What is it?" asked the women. "Eadbrook," replied Ezra.

"What—has happened, dad?" said Louise, going white and half rising.

"Nothing, except that they blew open the safe in his store last night or this morning sometime, and cleaned him out."

"Oh—is that all?" said the girl, sinking back into her chair.

"Is that all! Isn't that enough? Cleaned him right up dry. Didn't leave a postage stamp. What did ye think it might be, anyway?"

"I thought it might be an accident," replied Louise. "If it's only money—"

"Only money!" cried Ezra, not intending to have the luster of his information tarnished. "Only money! It wasn't only his money. Every cent belonging to the Lunatics' Association has gone with his. The young fool drawed all the money that was to boost Boxton, and make a bigger 'n' better 'n' busier 'n' what-not Boxton—and put it into his safe. And it's gone."

Aunt Lyddy shivered. "That's terrible, Ezra," she said.

"Well, he wouldn't mind what I told him—and now look where he is," Ezra replied, attacking his breakfast.

"Did they say—where he is?" asked Louise.

"He's disappeared—flew the coop. He waited just long enough to tell Joel Tibb that he's put his shoe store in the hands of the Lunatics' Club to be sold at auction and turn everything he owns over to 'em, and then he went—and they're looking for him now."

LOUISE said nothing. Suddenly she rose from the table and left the room. They heard her running upstairs.

"Now what's the matter with her?" said Ezra.

Aunt Lyddy looked at her husband a moment before she replied. Finally she said calmly: "Perhaps 'twould have been just as well to have broken it more gently, Ezra."

Ezra had dashed down his coffee and risen, and was pacing up and down the floor, hands behind his back, shaking his head and indulging in muttered remarks of gratification. He stopped to reply:

"Nonsense! Didn't I give 'em both a chance? Didn't I tell young Eadbrook how it stood? He might have had everything his own way. He might have been the biggest man in these parts if he showed the head for it. Now look at him. Busted! Worse'n busted!"

Fifteen minutes passed. Aunt Lyddy carried the dishes out to the kitchen and washed them hurriedly. As soon as she found the opportunity, she went upstairs and knocked gently at the door of Louise's room. The girl opened it. She was in her riding habit.

"Why, Louise, where are you going?"

"I don't know. I'm going to find Walter. Now, please, Aunt Lyddy, don't make a fuss about it."

"I don't mean to make a fuss," replied the little old woman. "I say go ahead. That's what I'd do, if I were as young as you. Wait a minute, Louise. Have you got any money?"

"I've got a little. I won't need much."

"You don't know," replied Aunt Lyddy, dashing into her own room. She came back with several bank-notes. "Put these away where you won't lose them," she ordered. "Give me a kiss. Now go along. If Ezra says anything, tell him you're going out for a ride. That's true. And don't forget to telephone me if—"

"I won't," promised Louise, putting her arms around the old woman's neck and hugging her wildly.

ONCE on the back of her little bay mare and out of sight of the big stone house, Louise began to consider.

"First I'd better go up to the station," she thought, "and see if he has taken a train. If he has, it won't be any use."

The station agent shook his head. "No; I'd have seen him if he'd been here."

For a moment she halted.

"Walter isn't running away," she told herself. "He isn't that sort. He's all broken up and nervous, and he's gone out somewhere to think it over. It isn't likely he would hire a horse and carriage. He must be walking. But which road?"

Roads ran out from Boxton in a dozen directions. Not only that: there were cross-roads, that formed a network like a spider's web. Louise remembered reading in one of the town reports that there were 158 miles of road, altogether, in the town. It seemed quite hopeless.

Yet—there was one road that was different from all the rest. That was the one that she and Walter had so often walked on Sunday afternoons. They had told each other many times that it was the most beautiful place in the world. Grass had grown up in the middle, between the deep ruts, except for long stretches that ran through the woods. Few carriages ever passed over it in these days.

Something came out of the girl's intuition—out of that storehouse of intimate woman-knowledge that has never been plumbed—and told her the way to go.

Once on the old road, Louise flicked the mare gently with the whip. A half-grown rabbit darted out from the underbrush, bobbed along in front of the horse for a hundred feet, and vanished. A woodchuck squealed, unseen, somewhere on the roadside, and rattled noisily away. The sky was pure overhead. It was still so early that the sun had not parched the freshness of the air. On the grass-grown middle of the highway the mare's feet made so little noise that only the lonesome note of a hermit-thrush seemed to travel along with them.

Suddenly Louise reined in the mare so quickly that she nearly lost her balance. Dismounting, she led her horse into a little bower of shrubs, patted the moist flank soothingly a moment, and then stepped out into the road again.

A FEW hundred feet ahead, a man was sitting on a log. His elbows were resting on his knees, and his chin was supported by his hands. He seemed not to have heard the approach of the horse. She was not near enough to see the man's face. It was not necessary.

She came near enough almost to reach out and touch him on the shoulder, and he had not looked up.

"Walter!" she said softly. Her breath was coming fast.

He raised his head and took off his hat, and the first thing she noticed was a red brand along his forehead where the hatband had been pressed too tightly. He spoke:

"I heard you coming. I knew it was you. You've heard?"

Louise did not reply at once. She sat down upon the log beside him and took his hand.

"I knew you'd be here—out on our road," she whispered.

Then there was a silence.

"Your father knows?" Eadbrook asked finally.

"Yes. Some one telephoned the first thing this morning. That's how I happened to come here. I thought you might—need me. I knew you hadn't run away. I knew you just wanted to get out somewhere and think. And so I came."

She rose and stood before him, and put both her hands on his shoulders. As he looked up, she bent over and looked deep into his eyes.

"I sha'n't let her have you!" she said, between her teeth.

"'Her have me,'" repeated Eadbrook, with an expression that indicated his surprise. Then he understood that her mind was far from the robbery, and that she was referring to the scene in the doorway the night before.

"Lou," he said, standing up and facing her, "there won't be any misunderstanding about her when I tell you what I'm going to tell. You heard that everything is gone—the Boosters' money and all? Yes, it's all gone. Perhaps you thought it was hard luck for me, Lou, or something like that? It wasn't. It's just the way they punish fools. Sit down, Lou, and I'll tell you."

SHE heard him to the end without an interruption or even a change of expression, save that a deeper sympathy was reflected on her face. There was a pause, and then she said to him:

"Walter, I'm almost glad she turned out bad." She smiled as she said it. "Isn't that like a woman?"

"I'm not thinking of her," said the man. "I've been wondering—I've had wild notions that they might get Catorno or her. They must have been working together. But our county officers don't amount to much, and the chances are a hundred to one against finding the money on them, anyway. No; it's my finish, so far as the store is concerned, Lou. I can say that coldly, because I've had time to think."

"What shall we do?" asked the girl. "We?" he replied. "We'll do nothing. Lou. I'm going to—"

"Walter," she cried, sensing his meaning instantly, "what do you mean? Aren't we going to stand together in this? Aren't we—"

"In God's name, Lou," he replied, "don't make it any harder for me now. I love you a thousand times more than I

---

was capable of loving you yesterday. I'm a new man, Louise. It wasn't that I was a fool; it's that I was a self-satisfied fool. Perhaps you don't see what I mean. I don't know as I see clearly myself. I know there's something new and determined inside here, and I feel different. I can love now, Louise. I know what it is—it's different than it was—and I'm big enough to—let you go."

"Let me go?" she repeated dully.

"Let you go—yes. I'm going to start all over again. My store's going to be sold at auction. It won't bring what I owe, at a forced sale, but I can pretty nearly make it up. It'll take everything. Then I'm going to work. And I'm not going to leave town, either. I'm going to stay here and take my medicine. I think Joel Tibb will give me a job. He was saying last week he needed a delivery clerk. Well, that's what I mean by letting you go, Lou. I mean I want you to be free."

"Oh, this is all crazy—crazy!" she cried. "You can't do anything like that, Walter. There must be some way out. But if there isn't—"

"Yes?" he asked breathlessly.

"I'll marry you next year, and live anywhere, if we have to. I mean it."

She came to him now, put her face close to his. He let his lips brush against her cheek, and then jumped up.

"No," he said; "that's the sort of thing I might have done yesterday. But I'm a new man, Lou. It wouldn't do at all—we know it wouldn't, and there's no use in deceiving ourselves. Particularly there's no use in my dragging you down with me. You know what your father would say. What's the use, Lou?"

"You don't care enough for me," was her sweetly reasonable reply. "You don't. I know what you'll say; but you don't—you don't. If you did you couldn't talk that way. You couldn't be—couldn't be—sensible."

He laughed at that, but it was a laugh tinged with bitterness.

"I'm not going to be charged with having too much sense," he told her quietly—"not when I get back to the village."

THE mare, hearing Eadbrook's laugh, had raised her head from the brush at the side of the road, and whinnied. It reminded Eadbrook that the time was passing. He glanced at the girl beside him. She was standing, with her hands clasped, looking down. He had the impulse to take her in his arms, and he obeyed it. He held her tightly—more tightly than there was need, for she was clinging to him like a frightened child.

"Do as I say," he told her. "Go back to the village now. I'll come along later. You might, if there was some way you could, get word to Starr that I'll see him this afternoon—or as soon as I get there. We can talk about—the other things later. Good-by."

She did not move. She looked up into Eadbrook's face, and there was something now shining in her eyes. "Go on! Go on," she murmured. "You never used to talk to me like that. You have changed, Walter; and I love it. Tell me something to do; give me orders, dear. Speak in just that tone you did then. I came out here to help you. But oh, how glad I am you've got to help me! What shall I do? Tell me!"

He held her out at arm's length a moment, turned her around, and walked up the road toward the horse.

"I want you to go back," he said, with a wan smile. "That's all now."

"You have changed—you have!" she whispered. "It's wonderful."

"Good-by," he said.

She looked at him wistfully a moment. He helped her to her seat, pressed her hand, and she was gone.

Eadbrook thrust his hands in his pockets and went back to get his hat.

"Changed!" he repeated grimly. "Changed! I'm afraid it came a little late."

Joel Tibb was whisking back and forth in Starr's room at the Commercial Hotel, like a trapped squirrel.

At every turn he was wringing his hands and saying: "What ye going to do? What ye going to do? We got to do something. What ye going to do?"

"Sit down and take it easier, Joel," replied Starr, for the tenth time. "You're getting in a bad state. Sit down."

Joel sat down, remained seated for half a minute, then bobbed up again.

"I can't sit down!" he cried. "How's anybody going to sit down, with things this way? Oh, this'll be nuts for Ezra. I can see him up there, rubbing his hands and cackling—"

"You're thinking too much about Ezra," warned Starr. "Fact, I wouldn't wonder if that's been the trouble with all of us, all along. Thinking too much about Ezra, I mean. There's no use getting excited, Joel. It's done. And we don't know but it'll be all right yet. If Eadbrook does what he says he'll do—and he can't very well get away from it—the Association will come out whole. Poor Eadbrook! I can't get it through my head why he drew that money—"

"Well," said Joel bitterly, "you haven't heard the way the merchants are talking about it. They're all ready to throw up the sponge. Dud Gillette is flying around hollering 'I told ye so' in everybody's ear. The boost has busted."

AFTER Joel was gone, there came a knock at the door.

"Lady to see you, Mr. Starr," said the boy. "Here's her card."

Starr glanced at the name:

Miss Katherine Burbridge.

"In the parlor?" asked Starr. "All right; I'll be right down."

"I hope you'll forgive me for bothering you, Mr. Starr," began Katherine, when Starr entered the parlor. "But I couldn't go to any one but you. I want to ask you about Walter."

"Well, it's simple enough, so far as Eadbrook is concerned," the man replied. "The poor fellow, for some reason or other, withdrew the Association's money from the Eastfield National Bank and put it in his safe. One of the fakirs that was here last week, who seems to have been a sort of cracksman in addition to being a showman, got wind of it—and the rest of the story is in plain sight down at Eadbrook's store. The safe was blown last night. How they knew he had the money is something we're trying to find out. The constable says he was around the Square during the night, and didn't see anything. It was clever work—some old hand at the business, no doubt. And there you are."

"Naturally it's going to make things hard for—your work," she said thoughtfully.

"You're right. Things are breaking badly, as it is. Several of the men have fallen out of line, and the rest of the merchants are up in the air. But I'm going to stick. This town's going to be boosted, if there's any boost in it."

She looked at him curiously.

"If there's any boost in it," she repeated. Starr caught the expression. He came over and sat down beside her.

"You know a lot about this town and the people," he said to her earnestly. "I wish I knew you well enough to—well, to be able to talk frankly."

"Please do," she replied quickly. "Please let me talk frankly with you, Mr. Starr. I've wanted to tell you how much I admired your pluck and your cleverness, and how sorry I am—"

For the first time since he had been in Boxton, Starr felt uncomfortable on his own account.

"Yes?" he interjected nervously. "Sorry for what, Miss Burbridge?"

"I don't know that I ought to say it."

"Please tell me. Don't be afraid of hurting my feelings."

"Mr. Starr," she said, "you're wasting your time. It's a shame. You're working so hard, and so sincerely—and you're bound to fail. I was born in Boxton, and I know my people."

"I've met some mighty nice men and women here," said Starr.

"Of course you have. You've met some of the best people in the world. But haven't you noticed that they sort of like to stick to their own ways?"

Starr's face was reddened with recollections.

"Well," he said, almost in a tone of self-defense, "they seemed to enjoy the Carnival week."

"Why, they're perfectly human, Mr. Starr. They enjoy a free show, or even a show that costs money, once in a while. Did many old New Englanders come home for Old Home Week?"

"Why, not so very many—not of the class we wanted."

She shook her head.

"No," she said. "When it happens that these people do get away, almost the first thing they do is to join the Vermont Club, or the Maine Club, or the Massachusetts Club, wherever they go. Every year after that they go to the banquet of their club, and everybody makes a speech saying what a grand old place it was where they came from, and bless the old town's heart, and all that sort of thing. But you never see them going back again to live, do you? Why, Mr. Starr, I've seen tears—honest tears—running down their cheeks as they described the old farm; but they're not on the farm. They're still in New York. That's why they came home last week, to look it all over—but they're all gone now."

"All the same," declared Starr stubbornly, "I believe this town can be boosted. I've got some fine cards up my sleeve yet. This Carnival business was just the froth, you know. I've been working night and day. I've got letters—"

"I mustn't look at them," she interrupted.

"Oh, I didn't think of bothering you with them," he explained.

"Bothering? I'd be delighted to look at them," she replied. "But you want to keep them for the boosters. I am not a booster."

Starr looked at her in surprise.

"I thought—I thought you were with us, Miss Burbridge," he said, flushing heavily. Disappointment was painfully apparent on his face.

THEY were sitting side by side. She leaned over, her face resting on her elbow, on the arm of the chair, and looked up at him sympathetically.

"I am with you—and Eadbrook—and Louise," she said softly. "I believe in you all. I'd never in the world let the antis know how I feel. I'd never breathe a word that could hurt your plans, Mr. Starr. But I must tell you, down deep in my soul, I'm against the boost."

"But why?" he insisted. "Why, I never dreamed—"

"Because," she said, measuring her words carefully, "I don't think I really believe in boosting. Somehow, I wonder if there isn't, after all, something rather cheap and shoddy and a little bit mean about what's commonly called boosting a town or an enterprise. Doesn't it usually mean that you want people to think you've got something better than you have? Don't you sort of lose your sense of proportion, Mr. Starr? And how could one place be shouted into prominence except at the expense of some other place that may have just as much merit? I don't know that I'm right, but it does seem that way to me. And when it comes to Boxton, I don't believe in it at all. I'd rather see Boxton Boxton, and I think Boxton would be much happier to be just Boxton. And now, how you must hate me!"

"Hate you?" he replied. "Don't say that. I don't agree with you, but—may I say it?—you're like a breath of fresh air. I'm going to show you that you are wrong, and I want you to be my friend."

She looked at him with unmistakable admiration.

"Courage!" she said. "You've got it! I like it so much! If only you'd put it into something really big and worth while, what wonders you could do! But I came to speak about poor Walter Eadbrook, and we've hardly thought of him at all. Don't you think it would be possible—"

Starr gave her at the moment a meaning look, and turned toward the door.

Walter Eadbrook was standing there.

Ezra Mudge was in high spirits. His weather-worn face was beaming with satisfaction. He strode up and down the sitting-room, stopping once in a while to throw his shoulders a little farther back and give a vigorous and well pleased pull at the bottom of his waistcoat.

Aunt Lyddy Mudge and Louise sat quietly watching him. For a quarter of an hour Ezra had been doing the talking. They had made no answer to his complacent self-appreciation, and Ezra seemed to expect none. He was in that blissful frame of mind where all he needed was a receptive audience.

"You see!" he cried, throwing out his arm with an oratorical flourish. "You see now, don't you! Where are they now, the great boosters? They were going to honk the old man out of town, were they? They were going to show the old man a few things he didn't know! Well, who's on top of the heap, I want to know?"

Aunt Lyddy gave Louise a meaningful look, as if to say, "Not just yet. But stand by, Louise; I'm getting ready."

"Busted!" continued Ezra. "Busted! That's what they are. I told you they wouldn't have any luck. And they thought they were tarnation clever, didn't they? Most popular man in Boxton! He, he! Who's the most popular man in Boxton? Well, I've got the cup. It must be me. Old Home Week! Going to put up the first comer at the expense of the town, were they? Well, they did! Joe Tinker! He, he!"

Ezra rubbed his hands gleefully, and warmed up to the subject more and more.

"Busted!" he went on. "Couldn't keep the money in the bank, because old Ezra Mudge sort of had a little quiet interest there. So they started their own bank. He, he! And now the bank's wrecked! I've shown 'em, I guess. Haven't I shown 'em?"

"You've made a fool of yourself, if that's any satisfaction to you," said Aunt Lyddy quietly.

"Eh? What's that?" asked Ezra, dazed. His face showed that he couldn't believe that he had caught the words rightly.

"You've made a fool of yourself, if that's any satisfaction to you," repeated the little old woman, still in a mild tone, but with her fingers clenched in determination.

Words that might have expressed Ezra's feelings somehow escaped him. Or perhaps they were not in the English language. The old man stared at his wife incredulously. His mouth remained open. He raised one hand to enforce discipline or to accompany a retort; and then, as the retort did not come, he observed that his hand was in the air, and seemed to be wondering how it came there. Then, evidently considering it absurd for a man to be maintaining one hand in the air without adequate reason, he let it fall, and followed suit by letting the rest of his body fall into a chair. Finally he hoarsed out: "What d'ye mean? What d'ye mean?"

"I mean what I say, Ezra."

"Louise," cried Ezra in a choking voice, turning to the girl at Aunt Lyddy's side (their hands were clasped between the chairs), "your ma has gone out of her head."

"No, she hasn't, dad," replied Louise. "I—I think just as she does."

"You think as she does?" Ezra almost screamed. "What d'ye mean by that?"

"I'll tell you what we mean," said Aunt Lyddy, taking up the burden of explanation. "We mean that you haven't been near so smart as you think you have—and we know it, don't we, Louise? And we don't intend to be bamboozled any more, do we, Louise? If you want everybody to hate you and despise you and revile you, you go ahead, Ezra; but you're not going to drag Louise and me into it."

"You're crazy!" Ezra shouted. "I won't have such talk! I won't listen to it!"

They heard him rush into the hallway and go pounding upstairs.

"You sit right where you are, Louise," said Aunt Lyddy, as the girl started to

Continued on page 15

We Nominate for the Trenches

With All Their Past Before Them

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Still in the Ring

The Child Who Kills Himself

By H. ADDINGTON BRUCE

ELLEN H. was ten years old, and an only child. From infancy she had been given her own way; was, in fact, a typical "spoiled child." Naturally enough, she regarded the house, hold as established to minister to her whims.

Conceive her astonishment, then, on being told one morning that she could not be granted her desire to accompany her parents on a shopping expedition. They had an excellent reason for leaving her at home, and for not telling her why they did so. It was Christmas time. But little Ellen flew into a rage at their refusal. She wept, she implored. When finally the door closed behind them she wept more bitterly than before, and—poor, foolish child!—said to herself:

"I'll make them sorry for this! They'll never have another chance to treat me this way!"

Then she went to the bath-room, took from the medicine cupboard a bottle labeled "Carbolic Acid—Poison," and drank from it enough to doom her to a painful death.

Frank W., twelve years old, was not an only child. On the contrary, he was one in a large family of children, whose parents were hard-working people. Frank, even as a small child, was inclined to be wild and unruly. He made trouble in school, frequently played truant, and eventually took to thieving.

This soon brought him into the grasp of the law, and earned for him a sentence to an industrial school. Bitterly he declared he would never go there.

"I would rather be dead," he cried, "than be sent to the Industrial!"

Thinking nothing of his words, the police locked him in a cell. When they next visited him they found he had made a rope from bed sheeting, and hanged himself to a stovepipe.

Joseph B. was an attendant in a departmental library connected with one of the large Eastern universities. He was between sixteen and seventeen years old, but looked younger: a quiet, earnest lad, capably attentive to his duties.

The only peculiarity I noticed in him on my occasional visits to the library was that I never saw on his face the faintest semblance of a smile. But, despite his habitual grimness of appearance, there was nothing really queer in his behavior.

One morning toward the close of the college year he ate his breakfast as usual, said good-by to his mother, and started, as she thought, for the library. Two hours later, happening to go into the cellar of their house, she was horrified to find him hanging lifeless from a gas-pipe.

To this day the mystery of his suicide remains unsolved. So far as is known it was absolutely without a motive.

This whole problem of "child suicide" is indeed a puzzling one to psychologists and educators. And—especially if we include in it, as most investigators do, all suicides occurring before the age of twenty—it is a far more serious problem than most people imagine. Many persons have an impression that children never commit suicide. It was only yesterday that an official of Massachusetts, to whom I spoke on the subject, said scornfully:

"Child suicide? There is no such thing!"

Yet at that very moment, not five miles away, men were dragging a pond for the body of a twelve-year-old self-slayer.

In this case the little victim had been hurried to his sad end

by the unconscious cruelty of other children. Disfigured by a birthmark that had caused one of his lips to swell, he had been laughed and jeered at from the day he first went to school. The climax to his misery came when a teacher reprimanded him for some fault. Promptly he disappeared, and the first inkling of his fate was had when his cap was found floating at the edge of the near-by pond from which his body was afterward recovered.

Largest Number in Prussia

NOT only is child suicide of more frequent occurrence than is generally supposed, but it seems to be increasing in all civilized countries. Of particular interest at the present time is the fact that statistics indicate that it has increased most rapidly in France, Russia, and Germany; and that in Germany its greatest increase is in Prussia, the land of the Hohenzollerns.

In France children under sixteen years of age are committing suicide at the rate of 150 a year. In Prussia, we are told by one authority, "suicide has become so common among school children that the State Department of Education has been forced to take cognizance of the evil by requiring careful investigation by the local authorities of every school suicide, and a detailed report of the case to the National Department of Instruction."

In Prussia thirty years ago the average yearly number of suicides of children under fifteen was 35. Now it is between 85 and 90. The total for 1911 (the latest year for which I have statistics) was 87. And in that same year nearly 700 young Prussians between fifteen and twenty years old killed themselves.

Fewer Child Suicides in This Country

IN our own country, according to available figures, the situation is much better. The latest mortality statistics of the Census Bureau show that in 1913 no children under ten killed themselves in the United States, that there were only 32 suicides less than fifteen years old, and that the total for the ages of fifteen to nineteen was 375. This, however, indicates a marked increase in recent years; for in the census year 1900 there were only 226 suicides of fifteen to nineteen.

It must also be remembered that for various reasons many juvenile suicides are not reported as such. This of course means considerable under-enumeration, and may even justify the estimate of one statistician (Lewis M. Terman) who, dismissing the official statistics as quite unreliable, gives 500 as the probable yearly total of American suicides under fifteen.

Whatever the accuracy of this latter figure, child suicide is sufficiently prevalent in the United States to make the question of its prevention urgently important.

Child suicide differs from the suicide of adults in one significant respect—it usually is the result of a momentary impulse. Moreover, in a great majority of cases it is clearly traceable, not to any inherited "brain taint," but to faulty upbringing in the matter of self-control.

That a certain proportion of child suicides are the victims of an organic brain defect, inherited or acquired, can not be denied. In such cases the suicide is the outcome of an irresistible impulsion originating in the diseased brain, and depends on no external cause whatever. To this class

probably belongs the suicide of the young library attendant.

This, however, is a distinctly exceptional case. The case of Ellen H., given in my opening paragraphs, is, on the contrary, typical of most suicides of young children. There is no deliberation, but an instantaneous resolution, followed by immediate execution of the act. The reason is often absurdly trivial.

I know of one case in which a little boy killed himself because his mother refused to buy him a squirrel he had seen in a store window. Another committed suicide because his pet bird had died. A third ended his life in a fit of rage at having been sent to bed without his supper.

In this third case a rankling sense of injustice was an additional factor, it being the mother's custom to deal harshly with the boy for any misconduct, while she usually overlooked his sisters' faults.

The Youngest Suicide

SOMETHING of the same sort was in evidence in the case of the youngest child suicide that has come to my knowledge.

Here the little victim was a boy only three years old. He had been playing on the floor with a younger brother, and the two started quarreling. At this moment their mother came into the room, carrying a foot-bath tub filled with boiling water. She set this down, lifted the younger boy in her arms, kissed away his tears, and rebuked his brother severely.

The latter, in a sudden frenzy of rage, did not hesitate an instant, but flung himself into the tub of boiling water. He was so badly scalded that he soon died.

Rage, grief, jealousy, desire for revenge—these, then, are motives conspicuously operative in causing child suicide. Even more frequent, however, are fear of punishment and a feeling of humiliation. In an analysis of the suicides of 1100 German school children, Professor Eulenberg of Berlin found that nearly 400 were due either to fear of punishment, or to humiliation at inability to keep up with the school work.

"College Suicides"

THE feeling of humiliation at mental backwardness becomes an increasingly frequent cause of suicide among the young in proportion as the age increases. Most "college suicides," it is safe to say, have this as their cause. Consequently investigators are almost a unit in indicating the school system as exacting too much, and dealing too severely with laggards.

Personally, I must confess to a belief that this throwing of the blame on the schools is not wholly justified. In the last analysis it surely is a question, not so much of modifying school methods in favor of weaklings, as of equipping the weaklings to do better work in school; and, what is fully as important, stiffening their moral fiber so that they will not seek the coward's haven of suicide.

This, I can not insist too emphatically, is a task that should be undertaken long before they reach school age.

Bearing in mind that, at an outside estimate, not more than ten per cent. of child suicides are associated with some irremediable brain defect, bearing in mind also that emotional impulsiveness and over-excitability account for virtually all the rest, it is obvious that the first step in prevention is the establishment of emotional control.

It is a cardinal principle of modern educational

psychology that the influences to which a child is exposed during his first years count for much in the making or mares ring of his whole career.

For this reason the modern psychologist of the most progressive school urges all parents to lose not a moment in providing their children with an environment that will, on the one hand, stimulate them to think clearly and energetically, and on the other hand that will develop in them the virtues of courage, calmness, and self-reliance.

But it is not primarily a matter of exhorting and instructing them: it is a matter, rather, of educating them through a subtle appeal to that most powerful of all their instincts, the instinct of imitation, which is grounded in their extreme suggestibility. Because this instinct is so strong in children, and is known in some cases to be directly responsible for child suicide, authorities like Eulenberg and Terman advocate safeguarding the child from suggestive stories and pictures of self-murder. But this negative precaution is not enough. In fact, it is much more important to utilize the instinct of imitation to establish settled modes of conduct that will render such a precaution entirely unnecessary.

To this end the one essential thing is for parents, through their own behavior, to set before their children an example of the qualities they wish them to acquire.

Do they wish their children to acquire emotional control? Then they must show themselves masters of their own emotions,

restraining anger, impatience, worry, discordant thinking of all kinds. Do they wish their children to be intellectually strong, alert, and industrious? Then they must give them the example of effective diligence. Always they must keep in mind that, in the words of a wise old pedagogue of a hundred years ago, "Though instruction begins, it is example that accomplishes."

In a statement that ought to be taken to heart by every parent, Dr. Paul Dubois, the famous psychologist and philosopher, says:

"Example is the means of education par excellence. You, madam, who complain of the irritability of your little girl, could you not suppress your own, which I have seen break out in a few words, exchanged with your dear husband immediately afterward? You, sir, who bitterly reproach your son for his impulsiveness and instability of temper, have you not these faults yourself? He so much resembles you in the face that I would be astonished if you had not transmitted your weaknesses to him. Where, indeed, would he get them, if not from you, from his ancestors, and from the education which he has received? Remember the proverb, The fruit does not fall far from the tree.'"

Always, too, parents must reckon not only with the extreme suggestibility of childhood, but with its extreme sensitiveness. They must govern their children through love, not through fear. Fear is by far the greatest source of nervous instability, and it is only the nervously unstable child who becomes a suicide. But the love shown must never be excessive or partial. When there are several children in a family, there must be no favoritism. When, on the opposite, it is a question of dealing with an only child, good sense must moderate the natural tendency to indulgence.

Mother, May I Hunt Moths To-night?

MR. and Mrs. Floyd Hiser of Nevada, Iowa, cleared between $400 and $500 last year by collecting, mounting, and selling various specimens of moths. They began collecting some four years ago, chiefly as a pastime; and I heir customers now are scattered all over the world.

Their method of stalking their prey is simple. In the evening they drive out into the country and anoint a number of I roes with a coating of sugar and stale hoer, marking the spots with white cloth to attract the moths. A little later the return, and find their victims gorged and ready for the net. The market value of the moths varies from 5 to 75 cents. Sometimes a female moth of a rare variety is found, and is carefully laid away in a paper bag, with a plentiful supply of dried fruit. During the season she will lay 400 or 500 eggs, which are worth from a cent to ten cents each to other collectors. The Hisers had on hand last Thanksgiving more than 18,000 eggs ready for hatching.

There Is a Price on His Head

JIM'S trouble is that he killed a man. But he might have got away with that, because the sympathy of all his Southern neighbors was with him. The other man was the aggressor, a persistent, nagging aggressor, and one day he overstepped the bounds.

Jim's mistake was that he waited a day before he shot. Shooting in hot blood is forgivable in Jim's part of the South, where roost of the laws are unwritten laws and far more hard and fast than any laws written in books. But Jim's delay made his act look like cold, deliberate murder, and it was not to the taste of the community. So it handed him over to the mills of the written laws, and the written laws gave Jim ten years in a Florida chain gang.

Jim stood two of the ten years, and then took French leave. He betook himself to the Everglades. Somehow or other his family were notified.

This is the story of a twentieth-century American outlaw, told by the journalist who chanced upon them, won their confidence, and made this picture:

"How do you live out here?" I asked Baker.

"'Gator hides, plumes, and whyome," he replied. "The Indians are good to me and take things to the store. I can't raise stuff, for I have to move too often."

"What do you do with the whyome?"

"Sell it to the Indians or the settlements. It goes fast enough. I'll show you how we make it. It's honest. Who says I haven't a right to use my cane any way I wish?"

He led me to a small circular clearing in the, thick undergrowth of the island. Our flaring light showed the faces of the merrlounging about the fire. Every man in the group had a price head.

Over the fire hung a big iron kettle. The cover was cunningly fashioned from a log of cypress, and fitted so-tightly as to make a retort. From the top of this a small lead pipe was carried to a box at the side of the fire, and in a series of rude coils made its way to the farther end. The box was kept filled with water, thus condensing the distilled product. Under the outlet end of the pipe was a tobacco tin into which trickled the home- made rum of the Seminoles.

"Where'll you put your camera?" asked Baker. At the word two men seized their rifles.

"Sit down," commanded Baker. "It won't bite, and they can't jug a picture."

As we talked before the fire, a Seminole approached quietly and handed Baker a slip of paper. "George Carter, he gave me. Say, 'Find Baker quick.'"

Baker read the message and passed it on to me. It contained one word: "Hiepus." "My moving orders," said my host.

The next morning the Jim Bakers had folded their tents and silently stolen away.

The Man in the Stone House

Continued from page 8

rise. "Sit right where you are. Don't move. He'll be back here in a minute. I know him. He never in the world could let it go at that."

Aunt Lyddy was shrewdly accurate. It was little more than a minute before they heard the beating of angry feet down the stairs. The door was flung open, and Ezra shot into the room.

"I want an explanation of this! I want to know what's got into you women!"

"I'll explain, if you'll calm down and listen to me," said Aunt Lyddy. "Do you know what you've done, Ezra Mudge? You've got everybody in this town down on you, and they hate you like a viper. You've got yourself elected 'the most popular man in Boxton' by fraud—"

"Fraud!" shouted Ezra. "Don't you say that, Lyddy Mudge!"

"I said fraud, and I mean fraud," was the reply, though the thin hand trembled violently in that of Louise. "And what's the result? You know as well as I do—"

"I won't hear it! You've all gone crazy!" Ezra barked, and slammed out of the room again.

Again they heard him pound upstairs.

It may have been two minutes this time before they heard his descending feet. This time, when he entered the room, Aunt Lyddy went on with her interrupted sentence, as if nothing had happened.

"You know as well as I do that it wasn't right; it wasn't honest," she said. "Oh, yes, it was clever, maybe. You had your way. You've always had your way. We've been nothing but echoes, Louise and I. And just so you've lorded over everybody else outside. But there's one thing you haven't done. You haven't made anybody like you. They didn't like you before—and they hate you now!"

EZRA stood staring through the indictment. He made motions of interruption, but they came to nothing. He seemed like a man from beneath whose feet the solid earth was crumbling.

Finally he looked at Louise.

"How long—how long has she been like this?" he questioned.

The girl pulled herself together and replied: "She's speaking for both of us, dad."

"Yes, I can see you've had your heads together," the old man snapped. "But you won't get far. What do I care whether they hate me or not? What difference does it make to me?"

"All the difference in the world, Ezra," replied Aunt Lyddy, reaching out toward him. "I want to tell you what I know."

"I don't want to hear it!" said Ezra sharply; but he sank into a chair.

Aunt Lyddy took courage.

"Oh, Ezra," she cried, "I know you'll listen! Do you think I've lived all these years with you not to know anything about what's going on in your heart? Do you think I don't know that deep down, deep down, you've got—you've always had—one of the kindest of souls? You and I know, Ezra, what changed you; and nobody else knows. We ought to have fought it. I ought to have helped you fight it. But I guess I wasn't big enough and brave enough. Don't I know that, above everything else, you've always wanted to be liked—"

"Nonsense!" rasped the old man. "I'm the most popular man in Boxton. I've got the cup. That says so."

"It's a miserable lie—that cup! You needn't try to tell me that every time you look at the horrible thing it doesn't send a shudder right into your heart. Because you know—"

"What do I know?"

"You know that there isn't a man, woman, or child in Boxton—no, not the meanest nor the poorest of them—that you don't envy. Some of them haven't any money at all, and some of them are dirty and ragged; but you'd give anything, Ezra Mudge, if you could go down the street in the morning and get some of the pleasant smiles and words that come to them. You didn't start out that way. You weren't that way when you used to

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come around to my folks' house, or when you got together the money to buy the mill. You weren't that way till—"

"Be careful what you say," broke in Ezra, but he was not unkindly this time. He looked in the direction of Louise.

"I won't say too much," went on Aunt Lyddy. "Ezra, can't you see things the way they are? Can't you see that to satisfy your own pride you've set hate in people's hearts, and made other people unhappy, and ruined a decent young man—"

"If you mean that young Eadbrook," interrupted Ezra, "don't you try to blame his foolishness on to me, Lyddy. I'm not responsible. He had his chance—"

"I don't say he acted wisely, Ezra," the old woman replied. "But what kind of a chance was it you gave him? What kind of a chance did you give Walter—and the girl that cares for him—our little girl?"

AUNT LYDDY could go no further. She had made her supreme effort of revolt. She burst into tears and fled from the room.

Ezra saw her go. He would have followed, but his good sense retained him. His face twitched with unuttered emotions. His hands trembled. It seemed to Louise that he was near collapse himself. But he recovered himself, and said to the girl throatily: "This won't be good for her, Louise, at her age."

That was what Louise was thinking. But she felt the need of her utmost poise now. She answered:

"I'll go to her in a minute, dad. Don't worry."

Ezra chewed upon quick reflections. "She bore pretty hard on me, Louise," he muttered. "She made me out pretty bad."

There was a pause. Then the old man continued:

"And you're against me, too."

"We're neither of us against you, dad," replied the girl quickly. "We both love you."

Ezra rested his hands upon his stomach and twirled his thumbs nervously. Finally he rose and said: "You go see your ma, Louise, I've got to think it over."

When Louise had seated herself on the bed beside Aunt Lyddy, and had taken the thin cold hand in hers that was warm with youth, and was patting the wrinkled forehead, soothingly, they heard Ezra creaking back and forth downstairs:

"I feel sorry for him, Aunt Lyddy," whispered Louise.

"He's just what I've always said," returned the old woman. "He's a good man at heart: Wait till he thinks it over."

"Shh!" said Louise suddenly. "He's coining up the stairs."

THERE was a knock on the door, and Ezra entered. His face had cleared somewhat; as if he had arrived at some new determination. But he began in his old vein:

"There's always trouble when women begin to tell the truth."

There was no answer.

Ezra wavered.

"Lyddy," he added, "s'pose all this is true—what do you want me to do?"

Aunt Lyddy did not look at him. She replied:

"Just what you think you ought to do, Ezra."

"Maybe I was wrong—about some things," he went on. "Maybe I was a little mite hard on—on Eadbrook."

Aunt Lyddy sat up abruptly. It was the first time she had ever heard him confess that he was wrong about anything. She stared at her husband almost incredulously.

"I'd do—whatever you thought was the right thing. I sort—of need advice, Lyddy."

"No," said Aunt Lyddy decidedly. "You've always done the thinking for us, Ezra, and you can't stop now. You know what's best to be done. I wouldn't have you do anything you didn't believe in."

"I don't believe in tinkering with Boxton," said Ezra stubbornly. "I couldn't join in any such scheme, Lyddy."

"I don't ask you to, Ezra. I know how you felt about this boosting business. I never asked you to be any different about that. Don't you see, Ezra, it's something altogether different? Don't you see—"

"If it was a matter of helping Eadbrook out in this mess, I don't know but I'd be willing to put him on his feet again," Ezra announced thoughtfully. "If it's a matter of a few thousand dollars—"

"But it isn't, and you know it," was the quick reply. "You've got to do something that money won't do, Ezra. Money will help. A rich man can afford to be generous as well as just. No; you haven't considered it enough yet, Ezra."

And so Ezra went downstairs again.

They heard him ring the telephone. They strained to catch some hint of what he was saying; but, although the floor boards of the ancient house would creak in answer to his step, they let no words get through them.

"I wonder—" began Aunt Lyddy.

"I was wondering," replied Louise. They looked at each other, the two women, and smiled.

"We can't be, up here while things are going on," said Aunt Lyddy, with a businesslike air. "We've got to see it through to the end, Louise."

When they came downstairs, Ezra was sitting in his accustomed chair. He knew what they wanted to ask. In the old days—even yesterday—it would have given him some pleasure to know that they were wanting to know—and he would not have satisfied them. Now he said simply:

"I telephoned Walter Eadbrook. I'm going downtown to see him."

WHEN Ezra returned, the two women studied his face, and their hearts fell. He had left the house with a queer, unusual gleam of hopefulness and expectation, and he returned tired and disappointed. They said nothing, however.

Supper went on the table. They ate as a matter of habit.

They had nearly finished when Ezra dropped his fork, hitched back his chair, and said:

"You're wanting to know what happened. I went down to see Eadbrook. I didn't waste words—you know, I don't mince, Lyddy. I had to tell him I thought he'd been as silly as a school-boy."

The two women looked at him helplessly. This was what he had done, then: merely another quarrel!

But Ezra went on:

"And what do you think? The young scamp admitted I told the truth!"

"But you didn't have to tell the truth. You didn't have to jump on him when he was down," crisped out Aunt Lyddy.

"Wait a minute," said Ezra. "I told Eadbrook I'd square up his losses. I said I'd put him on his feet again. I meant it, too. And I didn't make any conditions, either."

"What did he say?" asked both women in the same breath.

"He said he was much obliged, but he guessed he'd go it alone," replied Ezra succinctly. "He said the only kind of help he wanted now was a chance to help himself."

"Good for him!" cried Louise.

"I think it's just another piece of his foolishness," objected the old man.

"You don't think anything of the kind," put in Aunt Lyddy. "You think he's showing the manly spirit."

Ezra looked out the window a moment. Then he expressed his real thoughts.

"How am I going to do anything for anybody, if they won't let me?" he grumbled. But his grumble had something of pleading in it.

"Don't you think Eadbrook was right?" persisted Aunt Lyddy. "Isn't that what you'd have had him say if he—was your son?"

Ezra took thought. He replied slowly: "By thunderation, Lyddy, I don't know but 'tis!"

To be continued next week

King Baby

By EDWIN F. BOWERS, M.D. Author of "Side-Stepping Ill Health," etc.

THERE is nothing in the world so beautiful and interesting as a baby—unless it is the baby's mother. Yet there is nothing that humanity is responsible for that has been so subjected to the shocks of incompetence.

For there is hardly a science, except hydraulics or mechanical engineering, that a girl or a young mother knows less about than she does about baby care. Until very recently she took grandmother's word for it. Now, however, thanks to the indefatigable visiting nurse, the constant and painstaking educational efforts of our magazines and public prints, and the general advance in intelligence, the death rate among infants has been reduced by more than half.

Young mothers are taught that, while cow's milk is admirable food for calves, mother's milk is the ideal food for babies; that, for every breast-fed baby that dies in the first twelve months of its existence, ten children, similarly situated and artificially fed, fail to survive.

Mothers are also learning that if this is not possible or desirable, the milk supplied must be modified so as to approximate as closely as may be the natural brand; and, above all, that scrupulous cleanliness in the matter of its preparation, preservation, and method of administration is imperative. They are discon- tinuing the use of the abominable long nursing-tube, and also of the small-necked nursing-bottle, so difficult to keep clean, and are using, instead, straight-sided hygienic jars with large nipples.

Don't Coddle Him

YOUNG mothers are also gradually learning that a certain amount of crying is a splendid lung-developer, and that rocking and dandling, jumping and coddling provoke hysteria and nervousness.

This does not mean that the child should not receive a judicious amount of "mothering." Nothing in the wide world—not even the most highly specialized scientific care—can take the place of love nonsense. No institution can supply the affection which is breath of its breath and blood of its blood to a baby. If it could and did, the death rate in institutions would not be so frightfully high as it is.

There are some things, however, not yet generally understood. One is that constipation, and the locking up in the child's bowels of toxic products of decay, is the most common cause of baby ills. It predisposes to infections that children might otherwise escape. It lowers the tone of the entire nervous and physical system, and is a menace infinitely more to be dreaded than smallpox or accident.

Yet, very frequently, the methods used for overcoming costiveness are quite as bad as the condition itself; for they tend to produce an actual paralysis of the intestinal muscles. This is particularly true of suppositories and enemas, which should be used only by the doctor's advice.

A teaspoonful of milk of magnesia instead, added to the last feeding at night or given in a little water, will usually produce the results required without weakening the delicate nerves and muscles.

Butter is also admirable, not only in assisting to overcome constipation, but also because it is one of the most readily assimilated of all fats, and can be completely utilized by the child. Try a small lump of butter two or three times a day for the baby that is undernourished or sluggish in its bowel action.

Give Him Plenty of Water

NEVER give a baby water in homeopathic doses. Give it to him in good allopathic amounts—early and often. For 67 per cent. of him is water, and what he loses through the pores, kidneys, bowels, and lungs must be made up to him. Add a little for good measure.

Remember also to "pat"—never rub—a baby dry. His skin is thin and delicate, and won't stand strong-arm work.

It is good practice also, and may save a lot of trouble, to cleanse the eyes daily with a little boracic solution—a teaspoonful to a pint of tepid water. This should be squeezed into each eye from a bit of absorbent cotton, so that the water will run freely to the outer corner of the eye.

The care of a baby is really a simple enough matter—if it be mixed with a reasonable amount of brains. Plenty of sunshine and fresh air, an adequate amount of rest—say about nine tenths of its time—and only a moderate amount of nourishing food, and a fair amount of clothes, and baby can be trusted to do the rest.

This "rest" consists in eating, sleeping, and growing—growing into robust, healthy childhood, a joy to itself, and an ineffable source of pleasure and profit to everybody who is privileged to associate with it.

John D. Can't Get Credit in This Town

ONE afternoon a year ago, H. C. Lomax, bank president, locked up $100,000 worth of cash and bonds in the vault, closed the bank, and strolled down the street. Remembering that his wife had telephoned him to get a box of matches, he dropped into a grocery store.

"Just charge it," he nodded to the clerk. The clerk hesitated, and did not hand over the matches. "I know you fellows are on a cash system"—and the banker fumbled hastily in his pocket for change. "But, the fact is, I haven't a cent with me. I'll stop in the morning and pay."

"Sorry," smiled the clerk, "but I can't do it."

"Perhaps I might make up the loan of a nickel," grinned a section boss, digging down into his overalls.

And then the richest man in town, who could borrow twenty thousand dollars on his mere signature, fully realized that his home town was actually on a cash basis.

Laclede had been a credit town since even before the war. Sons had inherited their fathers' credits—and debits.

While it was bad form locally to present a bill, this system of etiquette did not pre-rail with distant wholesale houses. So the merchants had to borrow money to meet out-of-town debts. Had it not been for a few cash customers, they could hardly have managed at all.

Finally the storekeepers began having heart-to-heart talks, in which it was discovered that no one was carrying less than $3000 worth of credits—this in a town of fewer than 1000 inhabitants.

"Oh, yes, the accounts are good," groaned the hardware dealer; "but we don't know whether they will be paid in

this generation or the next."

"I ain't no futurist," announced the senior grocer. "What I want is some 1914 currency. Let's try cash."

Shortly afterward there appeared in the local paper a polite but firm announcement that the undersigned had adopted the cash system. Following were the names of every man and woman in town who did any sort of business, from the dry-goods merchant to the home dressmaker, and including the local editor.

At first there was a flurry of protests. But the signers stood pat and the public began to adapt itself.

The Reading Circle dropped Browning and took up "family budgets," and "home economics." Sudden calls were made upon "rainy-day" bank accounts. Of course, some farmers threatened to change their trading point, but only one actually carried out his threat. It didn't pay. A flat 10 per cent. cut was made on ail merchandise.

A year has passed. There are no "slow-pay" reputations left. Everybody has a 100 per cent. rating; and the high cost of living has come down 10 per cent. The customers are happy, and so are the storekeepers. The latter had figured that, with a loss of one fourth of their trade, they would still be better off than in the best credit years. But they have not lost one fourth of their trade. For, while the public buys more cautiously, new customers from outside Laclede territory, attracted by the low prices, have made up the shortage. Fewer clerks are needed under the cash system. The merchants are running their business on their own capital—and sleeping nights.

"O. K."—K. M. Giles

MISS GILES corresponds regularly with more than 2000 Southern gentlemen, from her snug office on Broad Street, within hearing of the sounds that beat up from New York's curb. But her letters will never be published in pink vellum as "The Throbs of a Woman's Heart." The Southern gentlemen who receive them do not have to hide them from their wives in the linings of their carpet slippers, or bury them from their children in the mint patch. No; her letters are all on one theme: cotton. And the men she writes to are all cotton planters. For Miss K. M. Giles knows all about the cotton market. She began work in Washington in the Agricultural Department, ruling sheets that wise crop experts filled and pondered over. Then she came to New York with a cotton expert. "And sixteen years ago," she says, "I struck out for myself."

She is now a confidential clearing-house

for ideas about cotton, with an army of responsible correspondents enlisted from the cotton-growing South. Some of these farmers have written her every two weeks for twelveyears. From these individual reports she takes out the specific information and tabulates it; then, taking into consideration the weather reports and everything else that hears on cotton production, she works out her confidential deductions. These she sells to a regular clientéle of men who want to know all there is to know about cotton.

One reason that Miss Giles' reports are considered so reliable is that she herself never speculates. She is notoriously indifferent to the market, and does not know or care whether cotton is going up or down.

"Half the time," she says, "I haven't any idea whether my report is bullish or bearish. I suppose I ought to be worth millions—but, really, I haven't time."

Mr. Richard's Fiancée

Continued from page 5

"Oh, Mrs. Barton's feeling better now. I put a mustard plaster on her back, and that helped to soothe her feelings. She'll be down for luncheon. I did my best to persuade her that Miss Gilmore is an eminently proper person to add to the family circle. I suppose you've heard from your fiancée by this time?"

"I've just had a wire from her," he replied. "She's in trouble. Oh, it's rotten, ghastly! You didn't see the morning paper? I hope nobody on the place saw it. I've torn it up. He indicated a pocket from which fragments of a newspaper protruded. He jammed them out of sights, and advanced upon Gail, whispering:

"A woman in her boarding-house lost her pocket-book, and 'Toinette's suspected— My God, it's awful—horrible!"

Not—not arrested?" Gail gasped.

"Heavens, no! To make it all the worse, she skipped. My telegram came from Lowell—just 'Don't worry': not a word about where she's going!"

He crossed and recrossed the room with long strides, then paused before Gail.

"If mother hears that—"

"It would be rather nice of you," said Gail, "to think a little more about Miss Gilmore—of ways of helping her—a girl you've thought enough of to ask to marry you! I should think you'd go right up to Boston and see what you could do.

"Why should I go up to Boston, when she sends me a silly telegram from Lowell? For all I know, she may turn up here any minute! You haven't got any answer to that, have you? You don't known what to do about it now, do you?" he ended.

"It isn't my business to know; but I'll suggest that before you aunt and uncle you'd better pretend to be extremely cheerful. It's all right for you to bluster at me privately, but as my affianced husband something quite different will be expected. It's nothing to me, you understand, but before the others it would be better not to act as if you hated me."

"My God! I hate myself—I hate everybody!" he moaned.

"Don't do it, Mr. Maybury; it's bad for the nerves!"

"I think I'm losing my mind! I can't go through with it—I simply can't!"

"You ought to be able to stand it, if I can. If you'll be decent through luncheon, I'll see what can be done toward finding Miss Gilmore."

The appearance of the Bishop and Mrs. Barton ended what seemed likely to prove and unprofitable dialogue, and they went in to luncheon.

GAIL sat between Mrs. Barton and the Bishop, with Richard opposite. Mrs. Barton launched at once upon the miraculous diminution of her pains by the mustard plaster. When she ceased her praise of mustard as an invincible panacea, to demand of Grimes what brand of tea had been placed before her, the Bishop took heart to lift the conversation to a higher plane. The presence of a member of the theatrical profession quite naturally suggested the drama as a topic. Nothing, he declared, in the whole range of dramatic literature, had ever equaled the works of the Greek masters. He still found time to read his Euripides once a year. It was a pity that Greek tragedy was so little known in these time; Richard, he hoped, would not entirely drop the classics.

Richard mumbled that he knew no Greek—a confession that the Bishop deplored. Richard, himself the protagonist [?] a tragedy as a poignant as any known to the Greek theater, frowned upon a bit of sea bass which the substitute, all things considered, had prepared very passably.

"And you, Miss Gilmore," said the Bishop kindly, "I suppose Greek hasn't entered into your—er—study of the drama? I realize that on the stage of to-day it is —er—quite impossible."

"I appeared once as Electra," Gail replied, ignoring a warning jerk of the unhappy Richard's head, and smiling upon the Bishop, whose disposition to be kind had won her gratitude.

"Where was that?" he asked, beaming.

"In Nebraska—at the University."

"Really! How delightful! Then you are familiar with those great literary monuments. Richard, this is the happiest of surprises."

"Miss Gilmore," Mrs. Barton intervened accusingly, "I thought you told me you were from Vermont How did you come to go to school in Nebraska?"

"My father moved there when I was a child," Gail answered easily. "You will have to admit, Bishop Barton, that the Greek drama has been coming into its own. Every year the plays are given somewhere. Even—even at Harvard," she added, with an ironic glance at the dejected Richard,—"even at Harvard they haven't wholly scorned those old fellows."

"Neatly done; a bull's-eye!" the Bishop chortled, who, it appeared, was a Yale man.

Mrs. Barton was neglecting her food to bring her keen eyes to bear upon this chorus girl who had appeared as Electra. Conscious of this, Gail amused herself by entering into a discussion of the respective merits of Euripides and Sophocles. The Bishop quoted lines in the sonorous original; Gail translated them—haltingly, to encourage his prompting. He was enjoying himself tremendously; but a puzzled frown settled upon his spouse's face.

THE moment luncheon was concluded, Gail said she must go up to see Mrs. Maybury. The Bishop went off to write letters, first shaking hands with Gail and declaring that they must have many more talks on a subject dear to both their hearts. Richard, seeing that Mrs. Barton lingered behind with the obvious purpose of detaining Gail, immediately became invisible.

"Just a moment, Miss Gilmore!"

Mrs. Barton planted her hands upon Gail's shoulders.

"Young woman, don't try to deceive me—you're not a stage girl any more than I am. Just what is this joke you're playing here?"

"I'm very, very sorry," Gail began uneasily. "If I'd had time to think it over I should never have done it. I'm sorry—very sorry. You see—"

She gave a succinct account of her arrival at the house, and of her agreement to play the part of the expected fiancée in exchange for a subscription to her book.

I thought at first it would be a lark, but after I saw Mrs. Maybury it wasn't funny any more. No one would want to play tricks on her—she's so kind and gentle. I'm ashamed to see her again."

"That Richard!" Mrs. Barton exclaimed. "So he's afraid of me, is he? Well, he has reason to be! And to think of imposing on you, to say nothing of the rest of us! But"—a merry twinkle danced in her eyes—"just how does he propose explaining this to his mother? I saw her a moment—just before I came down—and she was immensely relieved; she said you were adorable! If that other girls turns up, it will kill my sister!"

Mrs. Barton bent toward Gail threateningly.

"Young woman, you can't go! You can't leave us in this mess!"

"I was to leave right after the luncheon; that was the bargain," said Gail firmly. "But of course I'll look in on Mrs. Maybury again; I promised to read to her. She wants to test my French!"

"So she told me. But after you passed my husband's examination in Greek, I'll trust you to get through it. Run along now, but don't you dare leave the house till I've seen you again—not"—she smiled broadly—"till I've subscribed for that book—the India-paper edition! And now," she announced grimly, "I'm going to find Richard!"

To be concluded next week