Back-Trailers from the Middle Border | Page 4

which had been stripped off and thrown aside. The war and my small
personal perplexities had no place in their world.
The day after Christmas we took them to see the opera "Hansel and
Gretel." At the end of the first act their cheeks were blazing with
excitement. It was the embodiment of all their dreams of fairyland.
Connie was especially entranced and on the way back musingly said,
"Shall I be a dancer when I grow up?" "No, n I replied, "I think you'd
better be a musician."
"December 31. With another lecture date in the East, I am getting my
affairs in order to leave. The year is going out shadowed by a gigantic
war which has involved all Europe but my little family is untouched by
it. Tonight just before the children's bedtime, we took our Christmas
tree and burned it branch by branch in the grate, uttering a prayer to
Santa Claus to come again next year. It was a pensive moment for the
children. A sadness mingled with sweetness was in their faces as they
turned away. The smell of the burning needles still filled the house with
'Christmas smell,' as Mary Isabel from the stairway called it. 'Come
again, Santa Claus!' So our tree vanished but the good things it brought
remain behind--"
"I hate to leave you and the children," I said to Zulime, "but I must go
East if I am to earn a living. That is the worst of the situation here. I am
doing everything at long distance at a disadvantage--"
On my arrival at The Players, I learned with sorrow that our librarian,
Volney Streamer, had been taken to a sanitarium. For a year or more he
had been trying to keep up his work although it had been evident that
his usefulness was ended. He had been one of the historians of the club.
He loved the library and everything connected with it, and the older
members had a genuine affection for him In him many of the traditions
of Edwin Booth the founder of the Club had been preserved.
There is something impersonally cruel about a club. A man, any man
no matter how notable or how essential, can drop out it without leaving

a ripple In a few days he is forgotten Occasionally some one will ask,
"By the way, where's Streamer? Haven't seen him around here lately."
Another will say in a casual tone, "I hear he's down and out. What a
pityl"
Day by day my desire to have my family in New York intensified. "If
my wife and daughters were within reach of me here I should be quite
happy," I said to Irving Bacheller. "It will not be easy to cut loose from
Chicago for Zulime is deeply entangled there, but I shall never be
content till she and the children are here. I may be mistaken but I feel
safer in New York, nearer my base of supplies."
I spoke of this again while lunching with Howells who warmly urged
me to move. "I like to have you near me," he said, and his words added
to my resolution.
After we retired to his study he took from his desk a manuscript
intended for Harpers Magazine and read it to me. In the midst of it he
paused and smilingly remarked, "This is like old times, isn't it, my
reading manuscript to you?" and as he uttered this my mind filled with
memories of the many-many delightful hours we had spent in
reminiscence and discussion during the thirty years of our
acquaintance.
As I rose to go he gave me the manuscript of his new novel, The
Leatherwood God, and said, "Read it and tell me what you think of it "
This I gladly undertook to do.
Roosevelt, who had his office in the Metropolitan Magazine at this time,
asked me to look in upon him whenever I had the leisure. "I come in
every morning from Oyster Bay and spend a good part of each day in
my office," he said.
It was difficult for me to visualize this man (whose reputation was
world-wide and whose power had been greater than that of almost any
other American) coming and going on suburban trains and in the street
cars like any other citizen Notwithstanding his great distinction, he
remained entirely democratic in habit.

Several people were waiting to see him as I entered the outer office,
and I was reminded of my visits to the White House. He was still the
uncrowned king. When admitted to his room, I found him looking
distinctly older than at our previous meeting. For the first time he used
the tone of age. He alluded to his Amazon River trip and said, "I came
near to