A Womans Way Through Unknown Labrador | Page 8

many disappointments, much weariness, and a long fast which came
near to persuading him that his friends' predictions were perhaps about
to be fulfilled. But he got his opening.
Staggering with weakness, he had lived for two days in momentary
dread of arrest for drunkenness. Then just when it seemed that he could
go no farther, a former acquaintance from the West, of whose presence
in the city he was aware, met him. Among the first questions was: "Do
you need money?" and forthwith a generous fifteen dollars was placed
in his hand. That day one of his special stories was accepted, and only a
few days later he was taken on the staff of the Daily News, where soon
the best assignments of the paper were given him.
Do you know why you are getting the best work to do here?" asked one
of the new friends.

"Why?"
"It's because you're white."
This position he retained until May of the following year, meantime
contributing to the editorial page of The Saturday Evening Post. Then
an attack of typhoid lost him his position; but he had made loyal friends,
who delighted to come to his aid. Something of the quality of his own
loyalty is expressed in an entry in his diary shortly after leaving the
hospital. "Many good lessons in human nature. Learned much about
who are the real friends, who may be trusted to a finish, who are not
quitters, but it shall not be written." During the period of his
convalescence which he spent among the Shawangunk Mountains of
Sullivan County, New York, he decided that if it were possible he
would not go back to newspaper work. A friend had sent him a letter of
introduction to the editor of Outing, which in August he presented, and
was asked to bring in an article on the preservation of the Adirondack
Park as a national playground. The article proved acceptable, and
thenceforth most of his work was done for that magazine.
In September he wrote his friend, Mr. James A. Leroy.
"MY DEAR JIM,--I think that regardless of your frightful neglect I
shall be obliged to write you another note expressing sense of
under-obligationness to you for that letter. It is the best thing I've run
up against so to speak. As a result of it I am to have the pleasure of
hastening Detroitward. There I shall register at the House. I shall sit in
the window with my feet higher than my head, and wear a
one-hundred-and-fifty-dollar-a-week air of nonchalance. When the
festive Detroit reporter shys past looking hungrily at the cafe, I'll look
at my watch with a wonder-if-it's- time-to-dress-for-dinner air and fill
his soul with envy. This has been the dream that has haunted me ever
since those childhood days when you and I ate at Spaghetti's and then
went to the House to talk it over. I shall carry out the dire scheme and
then--well, then, if Fate says for me to hustle across the Great Divide,
I'll go with the feeling that life has not been in vain."
Later, January 14th of the following year, to the same friend who was

then in Manila as secretary to Dean Worcester.
"You may think it wondrous strange that I should be here in Canada in
mid-winter when I could as well be south. There is a mystery, and since
you are on the other side of the world I don't mind telling. I am here on
a filibustering expedition. I made a firm resolution some months ago
that a certain portion of Canada should be annexed to the United States.
I am here fostering annexation sentiment, and have succeeded so well
that the consent is unanimous, and the annexation will occur just as
soon as L. H., junior, is able to pay board for two, which will probably
be a matter of a few weeks. So don't be surprised if you receive a
square envelope containing an announcement which reads something
like this:
Mr. and Mrs. _____ of Bewdley, Ontario, announce the ______ of their
daughter _________ to MR. LEONIDAS HUBBARD, JR.
On his return to New York, a short time later, he was assigned a trip
through the Southern States. Hence a telegram, on January 29th, to a
quiet Canadian town. On January 31st a quiet wedding in a little
church in New York, and then five months in the mountains of Virginia,
North Carolina, Tennessee, and among the forests and cotton
plantations of Mississippi.
Besides the work done for the magazine on this trip, he gave the
Atlantic Monthly two articles, "The Moonshiner at Home," and
"Barataria: The Ruins of a Pirate Kingdom."
During the fall, winter and early spring, our home was in Wurtsboro,
Sullivan County, New York, a quaint old village