Chapter 13

The acid bug I had put on my right hand had started to heal around the edges, but it was still an ugly-looking ulcer about two inches in diameter. It was not painful nor did it impair my ability to work, except at barbering. I tried to get a job at one of my other trades but was unsuccessful. About November 1 I hit out for Chicago, where there was plenty of work to be had at steamfitting during the winter months. I had shipped my best clothes ahead by express, and I went down to the railroad yard to see if I couldn't find some loaded and sealed box car that was billed straight through to Chicago. It was my intention to spring open the door of the car if I could find some tramp to spring it shut after I had gotten inside. I didn't relish the idea of riding blinds, decks or rods in the cold weather, and I knew a "rambler" (through freight) would land me in Chicago within four days. I carried with me enough food and water for the trip.

I was unable to locate a box car billed through, but there was a loaded cattle train in the yards which was about ready to pull out. There were several double-decker-loaded sheep cars in the train, and I was glad to note that they were billed to the stockyards in Chicago. These cars were solid-ended with slatted sides, but at each end of the car the sides were solid for about four feet, and formed a shield to anybody who might be crouched in a corner. At each end of the car there was a trapdoor on the roof through which one could enter to the upper deck, about four feet below the roof. These were used mostly for removing sick or dead animals, though I have known of tramps removing young lambs at night when a train lay in the yards. A well-cooked lamb mulligan is not to be sneezed at, no matter how much one may sneeze at the pungent odor of a lamb's body in a stock car.

There was a good-sized tool box with a sliding door slung between the gunnels of the car I intended to ride, and I planted my lunch well back in a corner of the box. I entered the upper compartment through the trapdoor at the forward end. As I settled down on my knees in a corner, a few of the sheep nearest me started bleating but soon stopped. They didn't resent my presence half as much as I resented theirs, for at close quarters the stench was terrible. However, before the night was over I had grown accustomed to it.

When the train pulled out I sat down with my knees pulled up under my chin, and would have been quite comfortable had not a large sheep beside me persisted in breathing in my face. I thought of turning the sheep end for end, but for obvious reasons decided to let well enough alone.

Though it was freezing weather outside, it was warm in my corner and my only worry was that a shack might come along, raise the trap door, and with his lantern discover my hideout. I smoked several cigarettes and blew the smoke toward my nearest companions, whereupon they started bleating again but crowded away from me, giving me more room. When we had gone about a hundred miles we passed an eastbound passenger train that had taken a siding to give us the right of way. We stopped at water tanks and division points to change crews and engines. By mid -afternoon of the next day we were in Omaha.

I was so stiff and sore from sitting in a cramped position for so long a time that I could hardly climb down the car's ladder. I walked around to limber up, washed my hands in snow, and retrieved my lunch from the tool box. I discarded what I couldn't eat, which was very little, for I was famished. It was snowing, for which I was thankful as it kept the shacks from seeing me when, with considerable effort, I climbed to the top of the car and slipped through the trap door again. The sheep didn't bleat as much this time and gave me as wide a berth as was possible under the circumstances. When we pulled out I tied a handkerchief over my face and went to sleep. I woke up whenever the train stopped, and early the next morning I was in Chicago. It was less than forty hours since I left Denver, a thousand miles away.

As soon as I could walk without tripping over my own feet, I went to the express office and got my two suitcases containing clothing and personal effects. I rented a room on South Clark Street near Monroe, patronized barber and bathhouse, had breakfast, and went to bed for a good long sleep. The next morning I registered my Steamfitters' Union traveling card with Charlely Rau, the Union's local secretary, and he sent me to a job with the Froeshell Bros. Company on the North side. I worked for them until the following spring.

During my several stays in Denver I had learned to play a little on the guitar and mandolin. I had also written a dozen or more songs and composed music for them. With the exception of two or three cakewalks, they were of the "Take Back Your Gold" or "She's Only a Bird in a Gilded Cage" type, but I was unable to sell any of them. However, when I submitted several of them to a Chicago music publisher he liked my work well enough to engage me as a lyric writer. My job was to assist his regular writer who had produced several lyrics that, while not smash hits, were fairly popular. I collaborated with him in working on an idea he had for a song and, in fact, I had done about seventy-five percent of the work that whipped the idea into acceptable form. Then I learned that the regular writer, because of his previous successes, would be given sole credit for both words and music. Inasmuch as I had composed the melody withoug ny help from him, I felt that I should at least be given half the credit; and when this was refused, I resigned.

Some time during the few weeks I worked there I met Joe Howard, a vaudeville headliner who was looking for a new number to use in his act. I had met him ten years or more before when he was singing at the Central Theatre in Denver. I don't think he remembered me.I remembered him because he had married a girl on whom I had a crush at that time, though she didn't know it. Her mother was a beautiful and very clever comedienne named Dolly Emerson, and the daughter had inherited both her mother's talent and her beauty.

They were billed at the Olympic Theatre, one of the Orpheum Circuit houses, as Howard and Emerson. Their act was a star feature in which Joe sang several songs which were illustrated on a screen by lantern slides; and he sought to improve on the technique by substituting motion pictures, but was unable to find songs containing enough action to make his plan feasible. He was an excellent song writer, with several hits to his credit, but for some reason was unable to write the type of song he wanted. He asked me if I could do so, and I agreed to try. He commissioned me to write three songs for him, for each of which--if acceptable --he agreed to pay me five hundred dollars. He had a week's billing at every theatre on the circuit, and I promised to have the songs ready for him when he returned to Chicago, three months later.

When he returned, he told me he would be unable to keep the agreement because he had gone to a great deal of expense in having moving pictures made of the then-popular song, "He Stands Between Love and Duty." He said that he had tried out his scheme at St. Louis and Kansas City, but that it was a failure because the projection machine, for which he had paid more than a thousand dollars, had the habit of breaking down at critical times. At one theatre it had caused a fire which, while doing little physical damage, had caused the owner to prohibit further use of the machine. He liked the lyrics I had written for him, and engaged me to run slides and lights for him with the old projector; but I soon tired of that, and returned to Chicago.

Probably the best of the three lyrics I wrote for him, never used or published, was the following:

Near the outskirts of a city, on a pleasant summer's day,
Playing near a railroad crossing were some children blithe and gay.
On the tracks a boy of seven, with no thought of care or pain
Heeded not the whistled warning of a fast approaching train.
Standing near, an older comrade saw the peril of his mate,
With no selfish thought of danger, sprang to save him ere too late.
Like a flash he bounded forward, clambered up the grading high.
Snatched the little lad from danger as the rushing train swept by.

Chorus*
He was a hero, fearless and brave,
No thought of danger he ever knew.
His life he periled, others to save,
For he was a hero, a hero staunch and true.

Fire bells were clanging loudly, down the street the engine came,
Stopped before a burning building that was all wrapped up in flame.
In a window, a fond mother, clasping close a little child, wild.
Cried aloud, "won't someone save me?" while the flames raged fierce and
Up the stairs a young man, springing, soon 'mid smoke had disappeared,
Quickly came out with the baby, while the people loudly cheered.
Once again he braved the danger of the flames and scorching heat,
Carried out the fainting mother as the walls crashed to the street.

Chorus

On the rockbound coast of Scotland, while a storm was raging high
Near the shore a ship was sinking; all on board seemed doomed to die.
But a sailor brave and manly, with a life line in his hand,
Dove into the foam-lashed water, swam until he reached the land.
Bruised and battered, torn and bleeding, struggling hard against the blast,
Soon he reached a place of safety, tied the lifeline hard and fast.
One by one the men crossed over, mid the breakers' angry roar,
And the ship was dashed to pieces as the last man reached the shore

Chorus

*Editor's Note:
This may well have been the original wording, but as a kid I recall Jack singing a version of the chorus that I liked better:

He was a hero, fearless and brave,
No thought of danger his hand could stay.
His life he periled, others to save,
For he was a hero -- in a motion picture play.

The assignment Joe had given me was a difficult one. It required not only perfect rythm and meter, but a gradual buildup in each verse to a smashing climax in the last line. Grammatical construction had to be thrown overboard to accomplish that objective. I think I did rather well, considering my inexperience and the difficulty of meeting Joe's requirements. I was greatly disappointed when out deal fell through.

The most popular songs of the times were typified by "On the Banks of the Wabash" and "Where the Silvery Colorado Wends its Way". I wrote several of this genre, but I succeeded in having a publisher accept only one on a royalty basis; and he went out of business a week or two after having the song published. As it received no advertising of plugging, I received nothing but five hundred copies of the song; and these I found it impossible to sell through regular channels, with which I had no connection. In any event, I wrote both the words and the music. The words went as follows:

All alone tonight I'm dreaming of my dear old Southern home
Where I first learned words of truth at Mother's knee,
And the mem'ries of those happy days steal o'er me where I roam
When I sit alone in silent reverie.
I can see the cypress swaying in the soft and scented breeze,
There's the music of the songbirds in the cane.
In my fancy I can hear the night wind sighing through the trees,
And I long for my plantation home again.

Chorus

Down in old Louisiana where the jasmine flowers bloom
And the mocking bird sings sweetly all the day,
Where the soft breeze from the woodland fills the air with sweet perfume
Round my dear old Southern home, so far away.

Many years have passed since last I saw the old church down the lane
Where the old folks on the Sabbath went to pray.
It was there I met sweet Mary, it was there the parting pain
Filled my heart with grief when she was laid away.
She is sleeping there, my darling,'neath the fan-palm's quiet shade,
From my heart there comes a soft unbidden sigh
For in fancy I can see her waiting in the forest glade
Where I told her of my love in days gone by.

Chorus

I finally concluded that there was nothing to be gotten out of song writing, and as what I had written had been composed after working hours I gave it up to devote my spare hours to more pleasurable pursuits.

I attended a masquerade ball at the Coliseum on St. Valentine's day and there I met a pretty black-haired Irish girl named Mary, with whom I fell in love. She was exceedingly jolly and good-natured, and we went to a show or dance almost every evening. I knew she loved me, but I couldn't make up my mind whether to ask her to marry me; for she was a Catholic, and I had been told that marriages between Catholics and non-Catholics would only end in disaster. I decided to take time out to think it over, so I hit the road again and returned to Denver. We wrote to each other often and in August of 1901 I proposed to her by letter. She accepted my proposal and joined me in Denver, where we were married by Judge Ben Lindsey.

We were very happy, and I was sure that at last I was cured of my wanderlust; but in the spring of 1902 I read, in the local newspaper, highly colored accounts of a rich gold strike at Thunder Mountain in Idaho. The fever possessed me again, and I was determined to go. I again became the unbidden guest of the Union Pacific R.R., and when I arrived in Boise I bought a gentled packhorse, provisions enough to last two months, and a complete prospecting outfit. I then started on the hundred and fifty-mile trek through a wilderness of mountains and snow. I had an excellent map of the country I would have to traverse to reach Roosevelt camp at Thunder Mountain; it showed all the streams and prominent landmarks I would encounter on the trip. However, it neglected to state that in May, the clearly defined trail it pictured could be followed only by one gifted with the ability to see through ten feet of snow. However, that little detail didn't deter me and I continued on.

For the first twenty miles or so there was a well-defined trail, but from there on it was nothing but snow, timber and rock. Except for the more prominent features, such as streams, peaks and general direction, my map might as well have been a cancelled postage stamp. However, I was not concerned, for I had already seen several small herds of deer which would provide food for me if my provisions gave out. As for getting lost, I knew that I had only to folow a stream downhill until it joined another, and so on until I reached civilization again. I traveled at a leisurely pace, and my chief concern was to make camp where my horse could find subsis-tence. More than once I had to shovel snow off of likely -looking spots in order to get at the past season's dead grass beneath the surface. I had been told that grizzly bears were the most dangerous animal I might encounter, but I dismissed the possibility; if there were any in those mountains, they would still be hibernating. Besides, I believed then that the only habitat of grizzlies was the Sierra Nevada. I hobbled my horse at night, and slept as soundly as if I had been in my own home.

At each of the several small creeks I crossed I caught trout, the biggest of which I guessed to weigh four pounds. They were delicious food, and I was sorry my horse was not able to share them with me. I kept plodding along, and had been on the trail for twenty-two days when I came to a small stream designated on my map as Mule Creek. The general landmarks matched except that at first I couldn't find the designated fording place. The following day I walked upstream about three miles trying to locate the ford. The going was progressively harder, and at last I could see that I was headed toward a canyon from which the stream emerged. I retraced my steps and, too tired to look further, retired early and slept for fourteen hours.

The next morning I located the ford about three miles downstream and, much to my surprise, I met a miner who was on his way out. He was the first person I had seen since leaving Boise. He painted a rather dismal picture of what I could expect to find at Roosevelt camp, and advised me to turn back with him. He told me that he had come in the previous fall and had been employed at the Roosevelt mine which, he said, was the only property there that gave any indication of being worth a whoop. When I said I was going to go on, he gave me detailed directions on how to reach the camp. I gave him a pack of tobacco and some cigarette papers, and watched him lead his packhorses out of sight.

The following day I went on again. I reached Roosevelt three days later, and a sorry-looking place it was. The only habitations were about eight or ten weather-beaten tents, and I don't believe there were more than thirty people in the camp, although I was told that there were some fifty other prospectors camped in the nearby mountains. I talked to several miners and prospectors, and they all told me that the ore bodies there wouldn't assay an average of more than two dollars to the ton. It was a strictly low-grade setup that could only be made profitable by the expenditure of large sums of money for stamp mills and a railroad to haul out the concentrates.

I stayed there ten days and then hit the back trail. On the way out I met two men going in, and tried to turn them back, but they were determined to see for themselves. Nothing would have convinced them that there wasn't a pot of gold at the end of the Thunder Mountain rainbow..

The streams I had crossed going in were much larger when I went out, especially the one nearest to Boise. I tried to find a fording place where the water was shallow and the current not too swift, but was unable to do so. It was June and the mountain snows were melting fast. I knew that if I were to wait for the water to get lower I would have to stay there for a month or two. so I decided to risk the crossing at the shallowest place I could find with a sloping bank on the other side. About three miles downstream I found such a place, where the creek widened out to about fifty feet with a fairly sandy bank on each side. The water did not appear to be more than three feet deep. I went upstream to where the stream was not more than twenty feet wide, threw my rifle across the stream into a clump of brush, and returned to my horse. When I led him into the cold water I was afraid he would balk, but he followed me meekly. We had just about reached the middle of the stream when we stepped into a deep hole. The strong current threw me off balance. I went under but came up swimming, and made the other side about seventy feet downstream from where we had started. I looked around for my horse and was overjoyed to see him standing on the bank about fifty feet upstream, but minus his pack, I must have neglected to retie the pack rope when I removed the rifle.

I recovered my rifle, dried my clothes and rode bareback the rest of the way to Boise. I sold my horse, andá gave the editor of Boise's leading newspaper a verbal lambasting for the part he had played in fostering what he knew to be a fake by publishing glowing accounts of the richness of Thunder Mountain's gold fields. I set out for home the next day.

There are two reasons why I shall remember that trip to Thunder Mountain as long as I live. One is that it killed the last vestiges of wanderlust in me, and the second, that I wantonly took the life of an inoffensive and harmless animal.

On the way out I encountered a herd of deer. I was within fifty yards of them and though they saw me, they stood still while I got my rifle from my pack. I singled out the largest buck as he faced me, and shot at his breast. He dropped, and as the others scampered away I walked over to where he lay thrashing about and put another bullet into his brain. He ceased struggling at once, but the reproachful look in his beautiful eyes seemed to say, "Why have you done this to me? Why?" I was stunned for a moment; then remorse took possession of me, and I cried. I stooped beside him, stroking his head and over and over I gave voice to a plea for forgiveness. As the tears rolled down my cheeks I looked around for a soft patch of ground in which to dig a grave for his poor body, but there was none. Finally, I returned to my horse and continued on my way with bitter regret for my wanton act.

My host, the Union Pacific R. R., returned me to Denver in a palatial boxcar, and I went to work again. I worked for a long time at the United States Mint as a steamfitter, and during that time Mary presented me with a daughter, Alice. Every-thing was lovely for a while, but for reasons I am unwilling to give, we drifted apart and Mary divorced me. The fault, I admit, was almost wholly mine. Had I been where I belonged at the time-- in the psychopathic ward of an institution-- it probably wouldn't have happened; however, from any viewpoint, my desertion of Mary was unwarranted.

To get away from it all, I went to Chicago. I worked at steamfitting and as a machinist most of the time. In the summer of 1905 I met a girl named Louise*, with whom I fell in love. She was a pretty blond of German parentage, and the attraction between us was mutual. When I told her of my previous marriages and asked her to be my wife, she refused to even consider the proposal. She told me that I had been entirely wrong in leaving Mary and that while she loved me, she could not trust her future happiness to a man of my character. After several ineffectual attempts to get her to change her mind, I told her I couldn't bear to live in the same city with her and that I would go to the coast again. She agreed that it would be best for both of us if I did so, and we parted after promising faithfully to write to each other.

There was a big fair at Portland, and as excursion rates were cheap, I bought a ticket and rode there on the cushions. I saw as much of the fair as I cared to, got a job doing sprinkler fitting at McCloud, California, and worked there until January 1906, when I suffered the foot injury mentioned previously. When I became well enough to travel my employers sent me to San Francisco to recuperate more fully before being returned to work.

On April 18, 1906, I was rooming at the American Hotel on the north side of Howard Street, just west of Third and directly across from the Hunter House. The building had a frontage of thirty feet and was seven or eight stories high. My room was on the top floor front, with windows opening onto Howard Street. I was sleeping soundly when, at about four o'clock in the morning, I was awakened by falling out of bed. As I picked myself up, the bed came crashing into the backs of my legs, knock-ing me down again. I regained my feet, and as the building swayed to and fro I started for the fire escape just outside the front window. I could see the Hunter House rocking like a small boat in a heavy sea, and as I reached the window I saw that the fire escape, and the cornice to which it had been fastened, had torn loose from the building and was swaying back and forth on its twisted steel supports about ten feet away from the building's face. There was a low rumbling noise, and I realized that I was experiencing my first earthquake. I tried to open the door of my room, but it was jammed. I despaired of ever being able to reach the street, and in desperation I threw myself upon the bed and hysterically shouted, "For Christ's sake, if you're going to fall, fall!!" I remember the words distinctly, for although I had never made a profession of religious faith I was not given to sacrilegious mouthings, and I regretted the words the moment they were spoken.

Within a few seconds the building stopped shaking. I got into my clothes quickly, kicked a panel out of the door, and limped down to the street.

*(Emilie Louise Krueger Everson, my mother. - Ed.)

By that time the Hunter House was afire, and I could see smoke rising at several points in the northern and western parts of the city. I walked up Third Street to Market, where I stood around for half an hour. I met a plumber who had roomed at the hotel I had left, and with whom I frequently played chess and checkers. Meeting him reminded me that I had left a very expensive set of carved ivory chessmen in my room, together with my guitar, mandolin, and about fifty dollars' worth of fishing tackle. We hurried back to Howard Street but were unable to get into the building, which was on fire. We saw a headless body being carried out of the adjoining firehouse, a two-story brick building, and we learned that the victim was a fireman. He had been decapitated by one of the hotel's brick chimneys which fell at the moment he put his head out of a rear window of the firehouse. We hurried away to Market Street, walked up to Ellis Street, and out Ellis for several blocks to a hotel my friend recommended, where we engaged a room. We stayed there until about nine o'clock, when another and more severe earthquake occurred, but fortunately it lasted only a few seconds. Several girls ran screaming up and down the corridor; one of them was trying to drag her heavy trunk to the stairway. We helped her get her trunk to the sidewalk and, as smoke was rising to the west of us, we decided to get out of the danger zone. We helped the girl drag her trunk uphill to Van Ness Avenue, beyond which no rising smoke could be seen.

I didn't know what the girl had in her trunk, but I thought it must have been full of bricks; it was all the plumber and I could do to drag it along the sidewalk. I was so dead tired and lame that I refused to go farther without a good rest. I sat on the trunk beside the girl for an hour or more while the plumber left to scout around for a grocery store. As I sat there resting, many people passed us carrying various articles which, in most cases, could not possibly be of service in the emergency which confronted them. Many women with babies passed us, accompanied by their husbands laden with everything under the sun except bed clothing and diapers, the things they would need the most. It was both pathetic and amusing.

When the plumber returned with two large sacks of groceries, we put them on top of the trunk and proceeded north to Jackson Street. There, we were told of a large open park a block or two west of Van Ness Avenue. We crossed Van Ness -- in those days, a very wide residential street -- and located the park, which already held several thousand people. We shared the shade of a large tree with several small families and broke out our provisions. After eating, the plumber and I walked down to Park Street, where we found an Italian grocery store open. We both had plenty of money with us, and we bought a lot of sausages, cheese, canned goods and bread. I think we spent about ten dollars each, and when our stuff was put into gunny sacks, we had about all we could carry. As we were leaving, I remembered the great number of women with babies that I had seen in the park, and asked the grocer how much canned milk he had on hand. He said he had several cases. When I explained the need of the babies at the park, he became excited and rushed to the back of his store. He returned shortly with his wife and two husky boys about eighteen years old. He spoke to them in Italian, and they went into the storeroom and returned with several cases of canned milk. The grocer told me he would donate the milk, and I could have hugged him for his generosity. The five of us each shouldered a case of milk, which we carried to the park and placed beside the girl's trunk. We returned to the store for our groceries, and the grocer told each of his sons to accompany us with an additional case of milk. When I asked him how he happened to have so much milk on hand, he led me into a large storeroom piled to the ceiling with canned goods of every description, and told me that he got a substantial discount by buying in large quantities. Ever since then I have had a warm spot in my heart for Italians.

We distributed one case of the milk to the mothers with babies who were in our immediate vicinity, and asked them to pass the word around to others. The girl opened her trunk and brought out two blankets and a heavy bedspread. We lay around on them the rest of the day and far into the night, watching the city burn. The next day we could hear explosions of the dynamite the officials were using to blow up buildings in the path of the fire, in an effort to check its spread. As the fire drew nearer that night, many large pieces of tin from the roofs of downtown buildings fell into the park, but so far as I know nobody was injured by them. There were many wild rumors in circulation, to the effect that the entire Atlantic seaboard had been engulfed by the ocean, and that Chicago had been leveled by an earth-quake. I was sick at heart for fear something had happened to Louise.

On the third day it rained, to add to our discomfort. By this time most of the refugees in the park had been given small army tents and blankets brought from the Presidio, as well as food. The fire still burned. in diminished volume, but the entire western addition of the city was safe, thanks to the width of Van Ness Avenue and the valiant efforts of the firefighters. On the fifth day I managed to get to Oakland on a North Beach fishing boat which carried about fifteen people at a time for a dollar per head. The regular ferry fare was ten cents. The owner of the boat was an Italian, but of a different breed from the generous grocer. Among all races, there are always a few skunks who will take advantage of their fellow man in adversity.

By this time, everybody knew that the Eastern cities had not been devastated. I wrote to my mother and to Louise, telling them that I was safe and well. About ten days later I received a letter from my employers telling me that the McCloud job was completed, and that I was to report to their foreman in Oakland, who had to sprinkler a planing mill. When he arrived a few days later I went to work for him, and when the job was finished we went to San Francisco, where reconstruction of the business district was under way. I worked on various large buildings as a steam- and sprinkler fitter until the following April. Louise and I had written to each other regularly and I decided to return to Chicago and try to induce her to marry me. After much persuasion I gained her consent, and to avoid the June rush we got married in May.

We spent the first ten days of our honeymoon stopping off at various cities en route to California, where we had decided to make our home. After we were comfortably settled in housekeeping rooms in Oakland, I went to work in San Francisco again. I worked there until the spring of 1909, when I took time out to build a home on three acres of hilly land we had bought across the bay in Marin County. This was in honor of our first born, a boy, with whom we were blessed the previous November. When we were settled in our home I returned to work in San Francisco, commuting daily. Mother, Mary and our daughter Alice came to San Francisco in 1909, and we saw each other from time to time. In 1910, mother came to live with us and was with us almost continuously until she passed away in 1913. During that period our house burned down, and we rebuilt on the same spot. Fortunately, we were insured for about three-quarters of the property destroyed, but we lost many irreplaceable family records and heirlooms, dating back to the seventeenth century, which to us were priceless.

From then until late 1915, when our second son was born, I worked steadily for one firm, installing oil-burning machinery. When the United States entered the first World War, I obtained a Marine Engineer's license and went to sea until 1920, when the Pacific Coast Marine Engineers went on strike. I was offered a much higher wage than I had been receiving as first assistant engineer if I would scab, but during the previous thirteen years I had acquired a sense of loyalty -- something I hadn't possessed before -- and turned down the offer. I was unable to secure a job at any of the trades I had learned and I finally decided to try selling, for I knew I had ability in that line. As I wanted something of a permanent nature, I decided on insurance. I am glad I did, for it is the most honest profession I know of, and I have been very successful in it over the past twenty-one years.

So far as my own life is concerned, there is little more to be said. I am not proud of it; neither am I ashamed of it. I have lived it according to my lights, and if they have been dimmed by environment, heredity, mental or glandular unbalance or whatnot, there has not been much I could do about it. I shall make no attempt to explain my many so-called vices or the few virtues I may possess. I leave such explanation to the sociologists and psychiatrists. To myself I have always been an enigma; and like Popeye the Sailor Man, I can only say "I yam what I yam". That the last thirty-five years of my life have been what is termed respectable, I attribute to the beneficent influence of that paragon of all the wifely virtues, Louise. She deserves all the credit for my reformation.