The Gentleman from Everywhere


The Gentleman from Everywhere

Project Gutenberg's The Gentleman from Everywhere, by James Henry Foss This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net
Title: The Gentleman from Everywhere
Author: James Henry Foss
Release Date: April 29, 2004 [EBook #12193]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GENTLEMAN FROM EVERYWHERE ***

Produced by Ted Garvin, Josephine Paolucci and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.

THE GENTLEMAN FROM EVERYWHERE
BY
JAMES HENRY FOSS
ILLUSTRATED
1903
TO
MY BELOVED, ON EARTH AND IN HEAVEN,
THIS BOOK IS
MOST AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED
IN THE EARNEST HOPE THAT
BY ITS PERUSAL
Many sailing o'er life's solemn main, Forlorn and shipwrecked brothers, may take heart again.

Contents

CHAPTER
I. Launching of My Life Boat II. My First Voyage III. Near to Nature's Heart IV. Joys and Sorrows of School-Days V. Career of a Dominie-Pedagogue VI. Dreams of My Youth VII. A Disenchanted Collegian-Preacher VIII. In Shadow Land IX. Sunlight and Darkness in Palace and Cottage XI. Adventures in Mosquito Land XI. In Arcadie XII. From Philistine to Benedict and a Honeymoon XIII. The Angels of Life and Death XIV. Tribulations of a Widower XV. Faith Sees a Star XVI. On the Political Stump XVII. That Eddyfying Christian Science XVIII. In the Land of Flowers XIX. Sunbeam, The Seminole XX. A Founder of Towns and Clubs XXI. A Million Dollar Business with a One Dollar Capital XXII. Pendulum 'twixt Smiles and Tears XXIII. Monarch of all He Surveyed: Then Deposed, XXIV. Foregleams of Immortality XXV. A Practical Socialist and Colonizer XXVI. Hand in Hand with Angels XXVII. Among the Law-Sharks XXVIII. Campaigning in Wonderland XXIX. Among the Clouds XXX. Disenchanted: Home Again XXXI. The Florida Crackers XXXII. Looking Forward
[Illustration: [cursive] Your friend, the Author James H. Foss]

CHAPTER I.
LAUNCHING OF MY LIFE-BOAT.
Wild was the night, yet a wilder night Hung around o'er the mother's pillow; In her bosom there waged a fiercer fight Than the fight on the wrathful billow.
Already there were more children than potatoes in her hut of logs, and yet, another unwelcome guest was coming, to whom fate had ordained that it would have been money in his pocket had he never been born.
A sympathizing neighbor held over the suffering woman an umbrella to shield her from the rain which poured through the dilapidated roof, and when the dreary light of that Sunday morning dawned, my frail bark was launched on the stormy, sullen sea of life.
My father, a good man, but a ne'er-do-well financially, had loaned his best clothes, watch and pocketbook to a friend to enable him to call on his best girl in captivating style, and said friend expressed his gratitude by eloping with the girl and all the borrowed finery.
That same night the boom broke, and allowed all the savings of our family invested in logs, cut by my father and his lumbermen, to float down the river and be lost in the sea.
Thus storm, flood, calamity and sorrow, far in advance heralded the future of myself, the fourth son of a fourth son who, on that Sunday, in the dog-days of 1841, reluctantly came into this world.
The howling of the wolves in the surrounding wild-woods, the screaming of the catamounts in the near-by tree-tops, the sterile dog-star drying up the crops, the marching of my father to fight in the threatened Aroostook war, all conspired for months before this fateful night to awaken a restlessness, discontent, and gloomy forebodings in the lonely mother's heart which prenatal influences impressed upon the mind of the baby yet unborn.
All through that wretched summer, scorching drought alternating with cloud-bursts vied with each other in blasting the hopes of the farmers, and premature frost destroyed the few remaining stalks of corn, so that when the winter snows came, gaunt famine stared our family fiercely in the face.
My father and three brothers faced the withering storms bravely, unpacking their internal stores of sunshine, as the camel in the desert draws refreshment from his inner tank when outward water fails.
We were isolated from human companionship, except when occasionally the doctor came on the tops of the fences and branches of the pine-trees to soothe the pains of my sickly mother. At this time the snow was so deep that a tunnel was cut to the neighboring hovel where shivered our ancient horse and cow.
My father and brothers tramped with snare and gun on snow-shoes through the woods, securing occasionally a partridge or squirrel, and semi-occasionally a deer, or pickerel from the lake. On one of these occasions, two of my brothers and the dog met with an adventure which nearly gave them deliverance from all earthly sorrows. As they faced the terrible cold of a January morning, the wailing of