THE HUMAN DRIFTby Jack London Contents: The Human DriftSmall-Boat SailingFour Horses and a SailorNothing that Ever Came to AnythingThat Dead Men Rise up NeverA Classic of the Sea A Wicked Woman (Curtain Raiser) The Birth Mark (Sketch) THE HUMAN DRIFT "The Revelations of Devout and Learn'd Who rose before us, and as Prophets Burn'd, Are all but stories, which, awoke from Sleep, They told their comrades, and to Sleep return'd. " The history of civilisation is a history of wandering, sword in hand, insearch of food. In the misty younger world we catch glimpses of phantomraces, rising, slaying, finding food, building rude civilisations, decaying, falling under the swords of stronger hands, and passing utterlyaway. Man, like any other animal, has roved over the earth seeking whathe might devour; and not romance and adventure, but the hunger-need, hasurged him on his vast adventures. Whether a bankrupt gentleman sailingto colonise Virginia or a lean Cantonese contracting to labour on thesugar plantations of Hawaii, in each case, gentleman and coolie, it is adesperate attempt to get something to eat, to get more to eat than he canget at home. It has always been so, from the time of the first pre-human anthropoidcrossing a mountain-divide in quest of better berry-bushes beyond, downto the latest Slovak, arriving on our shores to-day, to go to work in thecoal-mines of Pennsylvania. These migratory movements of peoples havebeen called drifts, and the word is apposite. Unplanned, blind, automatic, spurred on by the pain of hunger, man has literally driftedhis way around the planet. There have been drifts in the past, innumerable and forgotten, and so remote that no records have been left, or composed of such low-typed humans or pre-humans that they made noscratchings on stone or bone and left no monuments to show that they hadbeen. These early drifts we conjecture and know must have occurred, just as weknow that the first upright-walking brutes were descended from some kinof the quadrumana through having developed "a pair of great toes out oftwo opposable thumbs. " Dominated by fear, and by their very fearaccelerating their development, these early ancestors of ours, sufferinghunger-pangs very like the ones we experience to-day, drifted on, huntingand being hunted, eating and being eaten, wandering through thousand-year-long odysseys of screaming primordial savagery, until they left theirskeletons in glacial gravels, some of them, and their bone-scratchings incave-men's lairs. There have been drifts from east to west and west to east, from north tosouth and back again, drifts that have criss-crossed one another, anddrifts colliding and recoiling and caroming off in new directions. FromCentral Europe the Aryans have drifted into Asia, and from Central Asiathe Turanians have drifted across Europe. Asia has thrown forth greatwaves of hungry humans from the prehistoric "round-barrow" "broad-heads"who overran Europe and penetrated to Scandinavia and England, downthrough the hordes of Attila and Tamerlane, to the present immigration ofChinese and Japanese that threatens America. The Phoenicians and theGreeks, with unremembered drifts behind them, colonised theMediterranean. Rome was engulfed in the torrent of Germanic tribesdrifting down from the north before a flood of drifting Asiatics. TheAngles, Saxons, and Jutes, after having drifted whence no man knows, poured into Britain, and the English have carried this drift on aroundthe world. Retreating before stronger breeds, hungry and voracious, theEskimo has drifted to the inhospitable polar regions, the Pigmy to thefever-rotten jungles of Africa. And in this day the drift of the racescontinues, whether it be of Chinese into the Philippines and the MalayPeninsula, of Europeans to the United States or of Americans to the wheat-lands of Manitoba and the Northwest. Perhaps most amazing has been the South Sea Drift. Blind, fortuitous, precarious as no other drift has been, nevertheless the islands in thatwaste of ocean have received drift after drift of the races. Down fromthe mainland of Asia poured an Aryan drift that built civilisations inCeylon, Java, and Sumatra. Only the monuments of these Aryans remain. They themselves have perished utterly, though not until after leavingevidences of their drift clear across the great South Pacific to farEaster Island. And on that drift they encountered races who hadaccomplished the drift before them, and they, the Aryans, passed, inturn, before the drift of other and subsequent races whom we to-day callthe Polynesian and the Melanesian. Man early discovered death. As soon as his evolution permitted, he madehimself better devices for killing than the old natural ones of fang andclaw. He devoted himself to the invention of killing devices before hediscovered fire or manufactured for himself religion. And to this day, his finest creative energy and technical skill are devoted to the sameold task of making better and ever better killing weapons. All his days, down all the past, have been spent in killing. And from thefear-stricken, jungle-lurking, cave-haunting creature of long ago, he wonto empery over the whole animal world because he developed into the mostterrible and awful killer of all the animals. He found himself crowded. He killed to make room, and as he made room ever he increased and foundhimself crowded, and ever he went on killing to make more room. Like asettler clearing land of its weeds and forest bushes in order to plantcorn, so man was compelled to clear all manner of life away in order toplant himself. And, sword in hand, he has literally hewn his way throughthe vast masses of life that occupied the earth space he coveted forhimself. And ever he has carried the battle wider and wider, until to-day not only is he a far more capable killer of men and animals than everbefore, but he has pressed the battle home to the infinite and invisiblehosts of menacing lives in the world of micro-organisms. It is true, that they that rose by the sword perished by the sword. Andyet, not only did they not all perish, but more rose by the sword thanperished by it, else man would not to-day be over-running the world insuch huge swarms. Also, it must not be forgotten that they who did notrise by the sword did not rise at all. They were not. In view of this, there is something wrong with Doctor Jordan's war-theory, which is to theeffect that the best being sent out to war, only the second best, the menwho are left, remain to breed a second-best race, and that, therefore, the human race deteriorates under war. If this be so, if we have sentforth the best we bred and gone on breeding from the men who were left, and since we have done this for ten thousand millenniums and are what wesplendidly are to-day, then what unthinkably splendid and god-like beingsmust have been our forebears those ten thousand millenniums ago!Unfortunately for Doctor Jordan's theory, those ancient forebears cannotlive up to this fine reputation. We know them for what they were, andbefore the monkey cage of any menagerie we catch truer glimpses and hintsand resemblances of what our ancestors really were long and long ago. Andby killing, incessant killing, by making a shambles of the planet, thoseape-like creatures have developed even into you and me. As Henley hassaid in "The Song of the Sword": "_The Sword Singing_-- Driving the darkness, Even as the banners And spear of the Morning; Sifting the nations, The Slag from the metal, The waste and the weak From the fit and the strong; Fighting the brute, The abysmal Fecundity; Checking the gross Multitudinous blunders, The groping, the purblind Excesses in service Of the Womb universal, The absolute drudge. " As time passed and man increased, he drifted ever farther afield insearch of room. He encountered other drifts of men, and the killing ofmen became prodigious. The weak and the decadent fell under the sword. Nations that faltered, that waxed prosperous in fat valleys and richriver deltas, were swept away by the drifts of stronger men who werenourished on the hardships of deserts and mountains and who were morecapable with the sword. Unknown and unnumbered billions of men have beenso destroyed in prehistoric times. Draper says that in the twenty yearsof the Gothic war, Italy lost 15, 000, 000 of her population; "and that thewars, famines, and pestilences of the reign of Justinian diminished thehuman species by the almost incredible number of 100, 000, 000. " Germany, in the Thirty Years' War, lost 6, 000, 000 inhabitants. The record of ourown American Civil War need scarcely be recalled. And man has been destroyed in other ways than by the sword. Flood, famine, pestilence and murder are potent factors in reducingpopulation--in making room. As Mr. Charles Woodruff, in his "Expansionof Races, " has instanced: In 1886, when the dikes of the Yellow Riverburst, 7, 000, 000 people were drowned. The failure of crops in Ireland, in 1848, caused 1, 000, 000 deaths. The famines in India of 1896-7 and1899-1900 lessened the population by 21, 000, 000. The T'ai'ping rebellionand the Mohammedan rebellion, combined with the famine of 1877-78, destroyed scores of millions of Chinese. Europe has been sweptrepeatedly by great plagues. In India, for the period of 1903 to 1907, the plague deaths averaged between one and two millions a year. Mr. Woodruff is responsible for the assertion that 10, 000, 000 persons nowliving in the United States are doomed to die of tuberculosis. And inthis same country ten thousand persons a year are directly murdered. InChina, between three and six millions of infants are annually destroyed, while the total infanticide record of the whole world is appalling. InAfrica, now, human beings are dying by millions of the sleeping sickness. More destructive of life than war, is industry. In all civilisedcountries great masses of people are crowded into slums andlabour-ghettos, where disease festers, vice corrodes, and famine ischronic, and where they die more swiftly and in greater numbers than dothe soldiers in our modern wars. The very infant mortality of a slumparish in the East End of London is three times that of a middle-classparish in the West End. In the United States, in the last fourteenyears, a total of coal-miners, greater than our entire standing army, hasbeen killed and injured. The United States Bureau of Labour states thatduring the year 1908, there were between 30, 000 and 35, 000 deaths ofworkers by accidents, while 200, 000 more were injured. In fact, thesafest place for a working-man is in the army. And even if that army beat the front, fighting in Cuba or South Africa, the soldier in the rankshas a better chance for life than the working-man at home. And yet, despite this terrible roll of death, despite the enormouskilling of the past and the enormous killing of the present, there are to-day alive on the planet a billion and three quarters of human beings. Ourimmediate conclusion is that man is exceedingly fecund and very tough. Never before have there been so many people in the world. In the pastcenturies the world's population has been smaller; in the futurecenturies it is destined to be larger. And this brings us to that oldbugbear that has been so frequently laughed away and that still persistsin raising its grisly head--namely, the doctrine of Malthus. While man'sincreasing efficiency of food-production, combined with colonisation ofwhole virgin continents, has for generations given the apparent lie toMalthus' mathematical statement of the Law of Population, neverthelessthe essential significance of his doctrine remains and cannot bechallenged. Population _does_ press against subsistence. And no matterhow rapidly subsistence increases, population is certain to catch up withit. When man was in the hunting stage of development, wide areas werenecessary for the maintenance of scant populations. With the shepherdstages, the means of subsistence being increased, a larger population wassupported on the same territory. The agricultural stage gave support toa still larger population; and, to-day, with the increased food-gettingefficiency of a machine civilisation, an even larger population is madepossible. Nor is this theoretical. The population is here, a billionand three quarters of men, women, and children, and this vast populationis increasing on itself by leaps and bounds. A heavy European drift to the New World has gone on and is going on; yetEurope, whose population a century ago was 170, 000, 000, has to-day500, 000, 000. At this rate of increase, provided that subsistence is notovertaken, a century from now the population of Europe will be1, 500, 000, 000. And be it noted of the present rate of increase in theUnited States that only one-third is due to immigration, while two-thirdsis due to excess of births over deaths. And at this present rate ofincrease, the population of the United States will be 500, 000, 000 in lessthan a century from now. Man, the hungry one, the killer, has always suffered for lack of room. The world has been chronically overcrowded. Belgium with her 572 personsto the square mile is no more crowded than was Denmark when it supportedonly 500 palaeolithic people. According to Mr. Woodruff, cultivated landwill produce 1600 times as much food as hunting land. From the time ofthe Norman Conquest, for centuries Europe could support no more than 25to the square mile. To-day Europe supports 81 to the square mile. Theexplanation of this is that for the several centuries after the NormanConquest her population was saturated. Then, with the development oftrading and capitalism, of exploration and exploitation of new lands, andwith the invention of labour-saving machinery and the discovery andapplication of scientific principles, was brought about a tremendousincrease in Europe's food-getting efficiency. And immediately herpopulation sprang up. According to the census of Ireland, of 1659, that country had apopulation of 500, 000. One hundred and fifty years later, her populationwas 8, 000, 000. For many centuries the population of Japan wasstationary. There seemed no way of increasing her food-gettingefficiency. Then, sixty years ago, came Commodore Perry, knocking downher doors and letting in the knowledge and machinery of the superior food-getting efficiency of the Western world. Immediately upon this rise insubsistence began the rise of population; and it is only the other daythat Japan, finding her population once again pressing againstsubsistence, embarked, sword in hand, on a westward drift in search ofmore room. And, sword in hand, killing and being killed, she has carvedout for herself Formosa and Korea, and driven the vanguard of her driftfar into the rich interior of Manchuria. For an immense period of time China's population has remained at400, 000, 000--the saturation point. The only reason that the Yellow Riverperiodically drowns millions of Chinese is that there is no other landfor those millions to farm. And after every such catastrophe the wave ofhuman life rolls up and now millions flood out upon that precariousterritory. They are driven to it, because they are pressed remorselesslyagainst subsistence. It is inevitable that China, sooner or later, likeJapan, will learn and put into application our own superior food-gettingefficiency. And when that time comes, it is likewise inevitable that herpopulation will increase by unguessed millions until it again reaches thesaturation point. And then, inoculated with Western ideas, may she not, like Japan, take sword in hand and start forth colossally on a drift ofher own for more room? This is another reputed bogie--the Yellow Peril;yet the men of China are only men, like any other race of men, and allmen, down all history, have drifted hungrily, here, there and everywhereover the planet, seeking for something to eat. What other men do, maynot the Chinese do? But a change has long been coming in the affairs of man. The more recentdrifts of the stronger races, carving their way through the lesser breedsto more earth-space, has led to peace, ever to wider and more lastingpeace. The lesser breeds, under penalty of being killed, have beencompelled to lay down their weapons and cease killing among themselves. The scalp-talking Indian and the head-hunting Melanesian have been eitherdestroyed or converted to a belief in the superior efficacy of civilsuits and criminal prosecutions. The planet is being subdued. The wildand the hurtful are either tamed or eliminated. From the beasts of preyand the cannibal humans down to the death-dealing microbes, no quarter isgiven; and daily, wider and wider areas of hostile territory, whether ofa warring desert-tribe in Africa or a pestilential fever-hole likePanama, are made peaceable and habitable for mankind. As for the greatmass of stay-at-home folk, what percentage of the present generation inthe United States, England, or Germany, has seen war or knows anything ofwar at first hand? There was never so much peace in the world as thereis to-day. War itself, the old red anarch, is passing. It is safer to be a soldierthan a working-man. The chance for life is greater in an active campaignthan in a factory or a coal-mine. In the matter of killing, war isgrowing impotent, and this in face of the fact that the machinery of warwas never so expensive in the past nor so dreadful. War-equipment to-day, in time of peace, is more expensive than of old in time of war. Astanding army costs more to maintain than it used to cost to conquer anempire. It is more expensive to be ready to kill, than it used to be todo the killing. The price of a Dreadnought would furnish the whole armyof Xerxes with killing weapons. And, in spite of its magnificentequipment, war no longer kills as it used to when its methods weresimpler. A bombardment by a modern fleet has been known to result in thekilling of one mule. The casualties of a twentieth century war betweentwo world-powers are such as to make a worker in an iron-foundry turngreen with envy. War has become a joke. Men have made for themselvesmonsters of battle which they cannot face in battle. Subsistence isgenerous these days, life is not cheap, and it is not in the nature offlesh and blood to indulge in the carnage made possible by present-daymachinery. This is not theoretical, as will be shown by a comparison ofdeaths in battle and men involved, in the South African War and theSpanish-American War on the one hand, and the Civil War or the NapoleonicWars on the other. Not only has war, by its own evolution, rendered itself futile, but manhimself, with greater wisdom and higher ethics, is opposed to war. Hehas learned too much. War is repugnant to his common sense. Heconceives it to be wrong, to be absurd, and to be very expensive. Forthe damage wrought and the results accomplished, it is not worth theprice. Just as in the disputes of individuals the arbitration of a civilcourt instead of a blood feud is more practical, so, man decides, isarbitration more practical in the disputes of nations. War is passing, disease is being conquered, and man's food-gettingefficiency is increasing. It is because of these factors that there area billion and three quarters of people alive to-day instead of a billion, or three-quarters of a billion. And it is because of these factors thatthe world's population will very soon be two billions and climbingrapidly toward three billions. The lifetime of the generation isincreasing steadily. Men live longer these days. Life is not soprecarious. The newborn infant has a greater chance for survival than atany time in the past. Surgery and sanitation reduce the fatalities thataccompany the mischances of life and the ravages of disease. Men andwomen, with deficiencies and weaknesses that in the past would haveeffected their rapid extinction, live to-day and father and mother anumerous progeny. And high as the food-getting efficiency may soar, population is bound to soar after it. "The abysmal fecundity" of lifehas not altered. Given the food, and life will increase. A smallpercentage of the billion and three-quarters that live to-day may hushthe clamour of life to be born, but it is only a small percentage. Inthis particular, the life in the man-animal is very like the life in theother animals. And still another change is coming in human affairs. Though politiciansgnash their teeth and cry anathema, and man, whose superficialbook-learning is vitiated by crystallised prejudice, assures us thatcivilisation will go to smash, the trend of society, to-day, the worldover, is toward socialism. The old individualism is passing. The stateinterferes more and more in affairs that hitherto have been consideredsacredly private. And socialism, when the last word is said, is merely anew economic and political system whereby more men can get food to eat. In short, socialism is an improved food-getting efficiency. Furthermore, not only will socialism get food more easily and in greaterquantity, but it will achieve a more equitable distribution of that food. Socialism promises, for a time, to give all men, women, and children allthey want to eat, and to enable them to eat all they want as often asthey want. Subsistence will be pushed back, temporarily, an exceedinglylong way. In consequence, the flood of life will rise like a tidal wave. There will be more marriages and more children born. The enforcedsterility that obtains to-day for many millions, will no longer obtain. Nor will the fecund millions in the slums and labour-ghettos, who to-daydie of all the ills due to chronic underfeeding and overcrowding, and whodie with their fecundity largely unrealised, die in that future day whenthe increased food-getting efficiency of socialism will give them allthey want to eat. It is undeniable that population will increase prodigiously-just as ithas increased prodigiously during the last few centuries, following uponthe increase in food-getting efficiency. The magnitude of population inthat future day is well nigh unthinkable. But there is only so much landand water on the surface of the earth. Man, despite his marvellousaccomplishments, will never be able to increase the diameter of theplanet. The old days of virgin continents will be gone. The habitableplanet, from ice-cap to ice-cap, will be inhabited. And in the matter offood-getting, as in everything else, man is only finite. Undreamed-ofefficiencies in food-getting may be achieved, but, soon or late, man willfind himself face to face with Malthus' grim law. Not only willpopulation catch up with subsistence, but it will press againstsubsistence, and the pressure will be pitiless and savage. Somewhere inthe future is a date when man will face, consciously, the bitter factthat there is not food enough for all of him to eat. When this day comes, what then? Will there be a recrudescence of oldobsolete war? In a saturated population life is always cheap, as it ischeap in China, in India, to-day. Will new human drifts take place, questing for room, carving earth-space out of crowded life. Will theSword again sing: "Follow, O follow, then, Heroes, my harvesters! Where the tall grain is ripe Thrust in your sickles! Stripped and adust In a stubble of empire Scything and binding The full sheaves of sovereignty. " Even if, as of old, man should wander hungrily, sword in hand, slayingand being slain, the relief would be only temporary. Even if one racealone should hew down the last survivor of all the other races, that onerace, drifting the world around, would saturate the planet with its ownlife and again press against subsistence. And in that day, the deathrate and the birth rate will have to balance. Men will have to die, orbe prevented from being born. Undoubtedly a higher quality of life willobtain, and also a slowly decreasing fecundity. But this decrease willbe so slow that the pressure against subsistence will remain. Thecontrol of progeny will be one of the most important problems of man andone of the most important functions of the state. Men will simply be notpermitted to be born. Disease, from time to time, will ease the pressure. Diseases areparasites, and it must not be forgotten that just as there are drifts inthe world of man, so are there drifts in the world of micro-organisms--hunger-quests for food. Little is known of the micro-organic world, but that little is appalling; and no census of it will ever be taken, for there is the true, literal "abysmal fecundity. " Multitudinous asman is, all his totality of individuals is as nothing in comparisonwith the inconceivable vastness of numbers of the micro-organisms. Inyour body, or in mine, right now, are swarming more individual entitiesthan there are human beings in the world to-day. It is to us aninvisible world. We only guess its nearest confines. With our powerfulmicroscopes and ultramicroscopes, enlarging diameters twentythousand times, we catch but the slightest glimpses of that profundity ofinfinitesimal life. Little is known of that world, save in a general way. We know that outof it arise diseases, new to us, that afflict and destroy man. We do notknow whether these diseases are merely the drifts, in a fresh direction, of already-existing breeds of micro-organisms, or whether they are new, absolutely new, breeds themselves just spontaneously generated. Thelatter hypothesis is tenable, for we theorise that if spontaneousgeneration still occurs on the earth, it is far more likely to occur inthe form of simple organisms than of complicated organisms. Another thing we know, and that is that it is in crowded populations thatnew diseases arise. They have done so in the past. They do so to-day. And no matter how wise are our physicians and bacteriologists, no matterhow successfully they cope with these invaders, new invaders continue toarise--new drifts of hungry life seeking to devour us. And so we arejustified in believing that in the saturated populations of the future, when life is suffocating in the pressure against subsistence, that new, and ever new, hosts of destroying micro-organisms will continue to ariseand fling themselves upon earth-crowded man to give him room. There mayeven be plagues of unprecedented ferocity that will depopulate greatareas before the wit of man can overcome them. And this we know: that nomatter how often these invisible hosts may be overcome by man's becomingimmune to them through a cruel and terrible selection, new hosts willever arise of these micro-organisms that were in the world before he cameand that will be here after he is gone. After he is gone? Will he then some day be gone, and this planet knowhim no more? Is it thither that the human drift in all its totality istrending? God Himself is silent on this point, though some of Hisprophets have given us vivid representations of that last day when theearth shall pass into nothingness. Nor does science, despite its radiumspeculations and its attempted analyses of the ultimate nature of matter, give us any other word than that man will pass. So far as man'sknowledge goes, law is universal. Elements react under certainunchangeable conditions. One of these conditions is temperature. Whetherit be in the test tube of the laboratory or the workshop of nature, allorganic chemical reactions take place only within a restricted range ofheat. Man, the latest of the ephemera, is pitifully a creature oftemperature, strutting his brief day on the thermometer. Behind him is apast wherein it was too warm for him to exist. Ahead of him is a futurewherein it will be too cold for him to exist. He cannot adjust himselfto that future, because he cannot alter universal law, because he cannotalter his own construction nor the molecules that compose him. It would be well to ponder these lines of Herbert Spencer's which follow, and which embody, possibly, the wildest vision the scientific mind hasever achieved: "Motion as well as Matter being fixed in quantity, it would seem that the change in the distribution of Matter which Motion effects, coming to a limit in whichever direction it is carried, the indestructible Motion thereupon necessitates a reverse distribution. Apparently, the universally-co-existent forces of attraction and repulsion, which, as we have seen, necessitate rhythm in all minor changes throughout the Universe, also necessitate rhythm in the totality of its changes--produce now an immeasurable period during which the attractive forces predominating, cause universal concentration, and then an immeasurable period during which the repulsive forces predominating, cause universal diffusion--alternate eras of Evolution and Dissolution. _And thus there is suggested the conception of a past during which there have been successive Evolutions analogous to that which is now going on; a future during which successive other Evolutions may go on--ever the same in principle but never the same in concrete result_. " That is it--the most we know--alternate eras of evolution anddissolution. In the past there have been other evolutions similar tothat one in which we live, and in the future there may be other similarevolutions--that is all. The principle of all these evolutions remains, but the concrete results are never twice alike. Man was not; he was; andagain he will not be. In eternity which is beyond our comprehension, theparticular evolution of that solar satellite we call the "Earth" occupiedbut a slight fraction of time. And of that fraction of time man occupiesbut a small portion. All the whole human drift, from the first ape-manto the last savant, is but a phantom, a flash of light and a flutter ofmovement across the infinite face of the starry night. When the thermometer drops, man ceases--with all his lusts and wrestlingsand achievements; with all his race-adventures and race-tragedies; andwith all his red killings, billions upon billions of human livesmultiplied by as many billions more. This is the last word of Science, unless there be some further, unguessed word which Science will some dayfind and utter. In the meantime it sees no farther than the starry void, where the "fleeting systems lapse like foam. " Of what ledger-account isthe tiny life of man in a vastness where stars snuff out like candles andgreat suns blaze for a time-tick of eternity and are gone? And for us who live, no worse can happen than has happened to theearliest drifts of man, marked to-day by ruined cities of forgottencivilisation--ruined cities, which, on excavation, are found to rest onruins of earlier cities, city upon city, and fourteen cities, down to astratum where, still earlier, wandering herdsmen drove their flocks, andwhere, even preceding them, wild hunters chased their prey long after thecave-man and the man of the squatting-place cracked the knuckle-bones ofwild animals and vanished from the earth. There is nothing terribleabout it. With Richard Hovey, when he faced his death, we can say:"Behold! I have lived!" And with another and greater one, we can layourselves down with a will. The one drop of living, the one taste ofbeing, has been good; and perhaps our greatest achievement will be thatwe dreamed immortality, even though we failed to realise it. SMALL-BOAT SAILING A sailor is born, not made. And by "sailor" is meant, not the averageefficient and hopeless creature who is found to-day in the forecastle ofdeepwater ships, but the man who will take a fabric compounded of woodand iron and rope and canvas and compel it to obey his will on thesurface of the sea. Barring captains and mates of big ships, the small-boat sailor is the real sailor. He knows--he must know--how to make thewind carry his craft from one given point to another given point. Hemust know about tides and rips and eddies, bar and channel markings, andday and night signals; he must be wise in weather-lore; and he must besympathetically familiar with the peculiar qualities of his boat whichdifferentiate it from every other boat that was ever built and rigged. Hemust know how to gentle her about, as one instance of a myriad, and tofill her on the other tack without deadening her way or allowing her tofall off too far. The deepwater sailor of to-day needs know none of these things. And hedoesn't. He pulls and hauls as he is ordered, swabs decks, washes paint, and chips iron-rust. He knows nothing, and cares less. Put him in asmall boat and he is helpless. He will cut an even better figure on thehurricane deck of a horse. I shall never forget my child-astonishment when I first encountered oneof these strange beings. He was a runaway English sailor. I was a ladof twelve, with a decked-over, fourteen-foot, centre-board skiff which Ihad taught myself to sail. I sat at his feet as at the feet of a god, while he discoursed of strange lands and peoples, deeds of violence, andhair-raising gales at sea. Then, one day, I took him for a sail. Withall the trepidation of the veriest little amateur, I hoisted sail and gotunder way. Here was a man, looking on critically, I was sure, who knewmore in one second about boats and the water than I could ever know. After an interval, in which I exceeded myself, he took the tiller and thesheet. I sat on the little thwart amidships, open-mouthed, prepared tolearn what real sailing was. My mouth remained open, for I learned whata real sailor was in a small boat. He couldn't trim the sheet to savehimself, he nearly capsized several times in squalls, and, once again, byblunderingly jibing over; he didn't know what a centre-board was for, nordid he know that in running a boat before the wind one must sit in themiddle instead of on the side; and finally, when we came back to thewharf, he ran the skiff in full tilt, shattering her nose and carryingaway the mast-step. And yet he was a really truly sailor fresh from thevasty deep. Which points my moral. A man can sail in the forecastles of big shipsall his life and never know what real sailing is. From the time I wastwelve, I listened to the lure of the sea. When I was fifteen I wascaptain and owner of an oyster-pirate sloop. By the time I was sixteen Iwas sailing in scow-schooners, fishing salmon with the Greeks up theSacramento River, and serving as sailor on the Fish Patrol. And I was agood sailor, too, though all my cruising had been on San Francisco Bayand the rivers tributary to it. I had never been on the ocean in mylife. Then, the month I was seventeen, I signed before the mast as an ableseaman on a three-top-mast schooner bound on a seven-months' cruiseacross the Pacific and back again. As my shipmates promptly informed me, I had had my nerve with me to sign on as able seaman. Yet behold, I_was_ an able seaman. I had graduated from the right school. It took nomore than minutes to learn the names and uses of the few new ropes. Itwas simple. I did not do things blindly. As a small-boat sailor I hadlearned to reason out and know the _why_ of everything. It is true, Ihad to learn how to steer by compass, which took maybe half a minute; butwhen it came to steering "full-and-by" and "close-and-by, " I could beatthe average of my shipmates, because that was the very way I had alwayssailed. Inside fifteen minutes I could box the compass around and backagain. And there was little else to learn during that seven-months'cruise, except fancy rope-sailorising, such as the more complicatedlanyard knots and the making of various kinds of sennit and rope-mats. The point of all of which is that it is by means of small-boat sailingthat the real sailor is best schooled. And if a man is a born sailor, and has gone to the school of the sea, never in all his life can he get away from the sea again. The salt of itis in his bones as well as his nostrils, and the sea will call to himuntil he dies. Of late years, I have found easier ways of earning aliving. I have quit the forecastle for keeps, but always I come back tothe sea. In my case it is usually San Francisco Bay, than which nolustier, tougher, sheet of water can be found for small-boat sailing. It really blows on San Francisco Bay. During the winter, which is thebest cruising season, we have southeasters, southwesters, and occasionalhowling northers. Throughout the summer we have what we call the "sea-breeze, " an unfailing wind off the Pacific that on most afternoons in theweek blows what the Atlantic Coast yachtsmen would name a gale. They arealways surprised by the small spread of canvas our yachts carry. Some ofthem, with schooners they have sailed around the Horn, have lookedproudly at their own lofty sticks and huge spreads, then patronisinglyand even pityingly at ours. Then, perchance, they have joined in a clubcruise from San Francisco to Mare Island. They found the morning run upthe Bay delightful. In the afternoon, when the brave west wind rampedacross San Pablo Bay and they faced it on the long beat home, things weresomewhat different. One by one, like a flight of swallows, our moremeagrely sparred and canvassed yachts went by, leaving them wallowing anddead and shortening down in what they called a gale but which we called adandy sailing breeze. The next time they came out, we would notice theirsticks cut down, their booms shortened, and their after-leeches nearerthe luffs by whole cloths. As for excitement, there is all the difference in the world between aship in trouble at sea, and a small boat in trouble on land-locked water. Yet for genuine excitement and thrill, give me the small boat. Thingshappen so quickly, and there are always so few to do the work--and hardwork, too, as the small-boat sailor knows. I have toiled all night, bothwatches on deck, in a typhoon off the coast of Japan, and been lessexhausted than by two hours' work at reefing down a thirty-foot sloop andheaving up two anchors on a lee shore in a screaming southeaster. Hard work and excitement? Let the wind baffle and drop in a heavy tide-way just as you are sailing your little sloop through a narrowdraw-bridge. Behold your sails, upon which you are depending, flap withsudden emptiness, and then see the impish wind, with a haul of eightpoints, fill your jib aback with a gusty puff. Around she goes, andsweeps, not through the open draw, but broadside on against the solidpiles. Hear the roar of the tide, sucking through the trestle. And hearand see your pretty, fresh-painted boat crash against the piles. Feelher stout little hull give to the impact. See the rail actually pinchin. Hear your canvas tearing, and see the black, square-ended timbersthrusting holes through it. Smash! There goes your topmast stay, andthe topmast reels over drunkenly above you. There is a ripping andcrunching. If it continues, your starboard shrouds will be torn out. Grab a rope--any rope--and take a turn around a pile. But the free endof the rope is too short. You can't make it fast, and you hold on andwildly yell for your one companion to get a turn with another and longerrope. Hold on! You hold on till you are purple in the face, till itseems your arms are dragging out of their sockets, till the blood burstsfrom the ends of your fingers. But you hold, and your partner gets thelonger rope and makes it fast. You straighten up and look at your hands. They are ruined. You can scarcely relax the crooks of the fingers. Thepain is sickening. But there is no time. The skiff, which is alwaysperverse, is pounding against the barnacles on the piles which threatento scrape its gunwale off. It's drop the peak! Down jib! Then you runlines, and pull and haul and heave, and exchange unpleasant remarks withthe bridge-tender who is always willing to meet you more than half way insuch repartee. And finally, at the end of an hour, with aching back, sweat-soaked shirt, and slaughtered hands, you are through and swingingalong on the placid, beneficent tide between narrow banks where thecattle stand knee-deep and gaze wonderingly at you. Excitement! Work!Can you beat it in a calm day on the deep sea? I've tried it both ways. I remember labouring in a fourteen days' galeoff the coast of New Zealand. We were a tramp collier, rusty andbattered, with six thousand tons of coal in our hold. Life lines werestretched fore and aft; and on our weather side, attached to smokestackguys and rigging, were huge rope-nettings, hung there for the purpose ofbreaking the force of the seas and so saving our mess-room doors. Butthe doors were smashed and the mess-rooms washed out just the same. Andyet, out of it all, arose but the one feeling, namely, of monotony. In contrast with the foregoing, about the liveliest eight days of my lifewere spent in a small boat on the west coast of Korea. Never mind why Iwas thus voyaging up the Yellow Sea during the month of February in below-zero weather. The point is that I was in an open boat, a _sampan_, on arocky coast where there were no light-houses and where the tides ran fromthirty to sixty feet. My crew were Japanese fishermen. We did not speakeach other's language. Yet there was nothing monotonous about that trip. Never shall I forget one particular cold bitter dawn, when, in the thickof driving snow, we took in sail and dropped our small anchor. The windwas howling out of the northwest, and we were on a lee shore. Ahead andastern, all escape was cut off by rocky headlands, against whose basesburst the unbroken seas. To windward a short distance, seen only betweenthe snow-squalls, was a low rocky reef. It was this that inadequatelyprotected us from the whole Yellow Sea that thundered in upon us. The Japanese crawled under a communal rice mat and went to sleep. Ijoined them, and for several hours we dozed fitfully. Then a sea delugedus out with icy water, and we found several inches of snow on top themat. The reef to windward was disappearing under the rising tide, andmoment by moment the seas broke more strongly over the rocks. Thefishermen studied the shore anxiously. So did I, and with a sailor'seye, though I could see little chance for a swimmer to gain that surf-hammered line of rocks. I made signs toward the headlands on eitherflank. The Japanese shook their heads. I indicated that dreadful leeshore. Still they shook their heads and did nothing. My conclusion wasthat they were paralysed by the hopelessness of the situation. Yet ourextremity increased with every minute, for the rising tide was robbing usof the reef that served as buffer. It soon became a case of swamping atour anchor. Seas were splashing on board in growing volume, and we baledconstantly. And still my fishermen crew eyed the surf-battered shore anddid nothing. At last, after many narrow escapes from complete swamping, the fishermengot into action. All hands tailed on to the anchor and hove it up. For'ard, as the boat's head paid off, we set a patch of sail about thesize of a flour-sack. And we headed straight for shore. I unlaced myshoes, unbottoned my great-coat and coat, and was ready to make a quickpartial strip a minute or so before we struck. But we didn't strike, and, as we rushed in, I saw the beauty of the situation. Before usopened a narrow channel, frilled at its mouth with breaking seas. Yet, long before, when I had scanned the shore closely, there had been no suchchannel. _I had forgotten the thirty-foot tide_. And it was for thistide that the Japanese had so precariously waited. We ran the frill ofbreakers, curved into a tiny sheltered bay where the water was scarcelyflawed by the gale, and landed on a beach where the salt sea of the lasttide lay frozen in long curving lines. And this was one gale of three inthe course of those eight days in the _sampan_. Would it have beenbeaten on a ship? I fear me the ship would have gone aground on theoutlying reef and that its people would have been incontinently andmonotonously drowned. There are enough surprises and mishaps in a three-days' cruise in a smallboat to supply a great ship on the ocean for a full year. I remember, once, taking out on her trial trip a little thirty-footer I had justbought. In six days we had two stiff blows, and, in addition, one propersouthwester and one rip-snorting southeaster. The slight intervalsbetween these blows were dead calms. Also, in the six days, we wereaground three times. Then, too, we tied up to the bank in the SacramentoRiver, and, grounding by an accident on the steep slope on a fallingtide, nearly turned a side somersault down the bank. In a stark calm andheavy tide in the Carquinez Straits, where anchors skate on the channel-scoured bottom, we were sucked against a big dock and smashed and bumpeddown a quarter of a mile of its length before we could get clear. Twohours afterward, on San Pablo Bay, the wind was piping up and we werereefing down. It is no fun to pick up a skiff adrift in a heavy sea andgale. That was our next task, for our skiff, swamping, parted bothtowing painters we had bent on. Before we recovered it we had nearlykilled ourselves with exhaustion, and we certainly had strained the sloopin every part from keelson to truck. And to cap it all, coming into ourhome port, beating up the narrowest part of the San Antonio Estuary, wehad a shave of inches from collision with a big ship in tow of a tug. Ihave sailed the ocean in far larger craft a year at a time, in whichperiod occurred no such chapter of moving incident. After all, the mishaps are almost the best part of small-boat sailing. Looking back, they prove to be punctuations of joy. At the time they tryyour mettle and your vocabulary, and may make you so pessimistic as tobelieve that God has a grudge against you--but afterward, ah, afterward, with what pleasure you remember them and with what gusto do you relatethem to your brother skippers in the fellowhood of small-boat sailing! A narrow, winding slough; a half tide, exposing mud surfaced withgangrenous slime; the water itself filthy and discoloured by the wastefrom the vats of a near-by tannery; the marsh grass on either sidemottled with all the shades of a decaying orchid; a crazy, ramshackled, ancient wharf; and at the end of the wharf a small, white-painted sloop. Nothing romantic about it. No hint of adventure. A splendid pictorialargument against the alleged joys of small-boat sailing. Possibly thatis what Cloudesley and I thought, that sombre, leaden morning as weturned out to cook breakfast and wash decks. The latter was my stunt, but one look at the dirty water overside and another at my fresh-painteddeck, deterred me. After breakfast, we started a game of chess. Thetide continued to fall, and we felt the sloop begin to list. We playedon until the chess men began to fall over. The list increased, and wewent on deck. Bow-line and stern-line were drawn taut. As we looked theboat listed still farther with an abrupt jerk. The lines were now verytaut. "As soon as her belly touches the bottom she will stop, " I said. Cloudesley sounded with a boat-hook along the outside. "Seven feet of water, " he announced. "The bank is almost up and down. The first thing that touches will be her mast when she turns bottom up. " An ominous, minute snapping noise came from the stern-line. Even as welooked, we saw a strand fray and part. Then we jumped. Scarcely had webent another line between the stern and the wharf, when the original lineparted. As we bent another line for'ard, the original one there crackledand parted. After that, it was an inferno of work and excitement. We ran more and more lines, and more and more lines continued to part, and more and more the pretty boat went over on her side. We bent all ourspare lines; we unrove sheets and halyards; we used our two-inch hawser;we fastened lines part way up the mast, half way up, and everywhere else. We toiled and sweated and enounced our mutual and sincere conviction thatGod's grudge still held against us. Country yokels came down on thewharf and sniggered at us. When Cloudesley let a coil of rope slip downthe inclined deck into the vile slime and fished it out with seasickcountenance, the yokels sniggered louder and it was all I could do toprevent him from climbing up on the wharf and committing murder. By the time the sloop's deck was perpendicular, we had unbent the boom-lift from below, made it fast to the wharf, and, with the other end fastnearly to the mast-head, heaved it taut with block and tackle. The liftwas of steel wire. We were confident that it could stand the strain, butwe doubted the holding-power of the stays that held the mast. The tide had two more hours to ebb (and it was the big run-out), whichmeant that five hours must elapse ere the returning tide would give us achance to learn whether or not the sloop would rise to it and rightherself. The bank was almost up and down, and at the bottom, directly beneath us, the fast-ebbing tide left a pit of the vilest, illest-smelling, illest-appearing muck to be seen in many a day's ride. Said Cloudesley to megazing down into it: "I love you as a brother. I'd fight for you. I'd face roaring lions, and sudden death by field and flood. But just the same, don't you fallinto that. " He shuddered nauseously. "For if you do, I haven't the gritto pull you out. I simply couldn't. You'd be awful. The best I coulddo would be to take a boat-hook and shove you down out of sight. " We sat on the upper side-wall of the cabin, dangled our legs down the topof the cabin, leaned our backs against the deck, and played chess untilthe rising tide and the block and tackle on the boom-lift enabled us toget her on a respectable keel again. Years afterward, down in the SouthSeas, on the island of Ysabel, I was caught in a similar predicament. Inorder to clean her copper, I had careened the _Snark_ broadside on to thebeach and outward. When the tide rose, she refused to rise. The watercrept in through the scuppers, mounted over the rail, and the level ofthe ocean slowly crawled up the slant of the deck. We battened down theengine-room hatch, and the sea rose to it and over it and climbedperilously near to the cabin companion-way and skylight. We were allsick with fever, but we turned out in the blazing tropic sun and toiledmadly for several hours. We carried our heaviest lines ashore from ourmast-heads and heaved with our heaviest purchase until everythingcrackled including ourselves. We would spell off and lie down like deadmen, then get up and heave and crackle again. And in the end, our lowerrail five feet under water and the wavelets lapping the companion-waycombing, the sturdy little craft shivered and shook herself and pointedher masts once more to the zenith. There is never lack of exercise in small-boat sailing, and the hard workis not only part of the fun of it, but it beats the doctors. SanFrancisco Bay is no mill pond. It is a large and draughty and variegatedpiece of water. I remember, one winter evening, trying to enter themouth of the Sacramento. There was a freshet on the river, the floodtide from the bay had been beaten back into a strong ebb, and the lustywest wind died down with the sun. It was just sunset, and with a fair tomiddling breeze, dead aft, we stood still in the rapid current. We weresquarely in the mouth of the river; but there was no anchorage and wedrifted backward, faster and faster, and dropped anchor outside as thelast breath of wind left us. The night came on, beautiful and warm andstarry. My one companion cooked supper, while on deck I put everythingin shape Bristol fashion. When we turned in at nine o'clock the weather-promise was excellent. (If I had carried a barometer I'd have knownbetter. ) By two in the morning our shrouds were thrumming in a pipingbreeze, and I got up and gave her more scope on her hawser. Insideanother hour there was no doubt that we were in for a southeaster. It is not nice to leave a warm bed and get out of a bad anchorage in ablack blowy night, but we arose to the occasion, put in two reefs, andstarted to heave up. The winch was old, and the strain of the jumpinghead sea was too much for it. With the winch out of commission, it wasimpossible to heave up by hand. We knew, because we tried it andslaughtered our hands. Now a sailor hates to lose an anchor. It is amatter of pride. Of course, we could have buoyed ours and slipped it. Instead, however, I gave her still more hawser, veered her, and droppedthe second anchor. There was little sleep after that, for first one and then the other of uswould be rolled out of our bunks. The increasing size of the seas toldus we were dragging, and when we struck the scoured channel we could tellby the feel of it that our two anchors were fairly skating across. Itwas a deep channel, the farther edge of it rising steeply like the wallof a canyon, and when our anchors started up that wall they hit in andheld. Yet, when we fetched up, through the darkness we could hear the seasbreaking on the solid shore astern, and so near was it that we shortenedthe skiff's painter. Daylight showed us that between the stern of the skiff and destructionwas no more than a score of feet. And how it did blow! There weretimes, in the gusts, when the wind must have approached a velocity ofseventy or eighty miles an hour. But the anchors held, and so nobly thatour final anxiety was that the for'ard bitts would be jerked clean out ofthe boat. All day the sloop alternately ducked her nose under and satdown on her stern; and it was not till late afternoon that the stormbroke in one last and worst mad gust. For a full five minutes anabsolute dead calm prevailed, and then, with the suddenness of athunderclap, the wind snorted out of the southwest--a shift of eightpoints and a boisterous gale. Another night of it was too much for us, and we hove up by hand in a cross head-sea. It was not stiff work. Itwas heart-breaking. And I know we were both near to crying from the hurtand the exhaustion. And when we did get the first anchor up-and-down wecouldn't break it out. Between seas we snubbed her nose down to it, tookplenty of turns, and stood clear as she jumped. Almost everythingsmashed and parted except the anchor-hold. The chocks were jerked out, the rail torn off, and the very covering-board splintered, and still theanchor held. At last, hoisting the reefed mainsail and slacking off afew of the hard-won feet of the chain, we sailed the anchor out. It wasnip and tuck, though, and there were times when the boat was knocked downflat. We repeated the manoeuvre with the remaining anchor, and in thegathering darkness fled into the shelter of the river's mouth. I was born so long ago that I grew up before the era of gasolene. As aresult, I am old-fashioned. I prefer a sail-boat to a motor-boat, and itis my belief that boat-sailing is a finer, more difficult, and sturdierart than running a motor. Gasolene engines are becoming fool-proof, andwhile it is unfair to say that any fool can run an engine, it is fair tosay that almost any one can. Not so, when it comes to sailing a boat. More skill, more intelligence, and a vast deal more training arenecessary. It is the finest training in the world for boy and youth andman. If the boy is very small, equip him with a small, comfortableskiff. He will do the rest. He won't need to be taught. Shortly hewill be setting a tiny leg-of-mutton and steering with an oar. Then hewill begin to talk keels and centreboards and want to take his blanketsout and stop aboard all night. But don't be afraid for him. He is bound to run risks and encounteraccidents. Remember, there are accidents in the nursery as well as outon the water. More boys have died from hot-house culture than have diedon boats large and small; and more boys have been made into strong andreliant men by boat-sailing than by lawn-croquet and dancing-school. And once a sailor, always a sailor. The savour of the salt never stales. The sailor never grows so old that he does not care to go back for onemore wrestling bout with wind and wave. I know it of myself. I haveturned rancher, and live beyond sight of the sea. Yet I can stay awayfrom it only so long. After several months have passed, I begin to growrestless. I find myself day-dreaming over incidents of the last cruise, or wondering if the striped bass are running on Wingo Slough, or eagerlyreading the newspapers for reports of the first northern flights ofducks. And then, suddenly, there is a hurried pack of suit-cases andoverhauling of gear, and we are off for Vallejo where the little _Roamer_lies, waiting, always waiting, for the skiff to come alongside, for thelighting of the fire in the galley-stove, for the pulling off of gaskets, the swinging up of the mainsail, and the rat-tat-tat of the reef-points, for the heaving short and the breaking out, and for the twirling of thewheel as she fills away and heads up Bay or down. JACK LONDONOn Board _Roamer_, Sonoma Creek, April 15, 1911 FOUR HORSES AND A SAILOR "Huh! Drive four horses! I wouldn't sit behind you--not for a thousanddollars--over them mountain roads. " So said Henry, and he ought to have known, for he drives four horseshimself. Said another Glen Ellen friend: "What? London? He drive four horses?Can't drive one!" And the best of it is that he was right. Even after managing to get afew hundred miles with my four horses, I don't know how to drive one. Just the other day, swinging down a steep mountain road and rounding anabrupt turn, I came full tilt on a horse and buggy being driven by awoman up the hill. We could not pass on the narrow road, where was onlya foot to spare, and my horses did not know how to back, especially up-hill. About two hundred yards down the hill was a spot where we couldpass. The driver of the buggy said she didn't dare back down because shewas not sure of the brake. And as I didn't know how to tackle one horse, I didn't try it. So we unhitched her horse and backed down by hand. Which was very well, till it came to hitching the horse to the buggyagain. She didn't know how. I didn't either, and I had depended on herknowledge. It took us about half an hour, with frequent debates andconsultations, though it is an absolute certainty that never in its lifewas that horse hitched in that particular way. No; I can't harness up one horse. But I can four, which compels me toback up again to get to my beginning. Having selected Sonoma Valley forour abiding place, Charmian and I decided it was about time we knew whatwe had in our own county and the neighbouring ones. How to do it, wasthe first question. Among our many weaknesses is the one of being old-fashioned. We don't mix with gasolene very well. And, as true sailorsshould, we naturally gravitate toward horses. Being one of those luckyindividuals who carries his office under his hat, I should have to take atypewriter and a load of books along. This put saddle-horses out of therunning. Charmian suggested driving a span. She had faith in me;besides, she could drive a span herself. But when I thought of the manymountains to cross, and of crossing them for three months with a poortired span, I vetoed the proposition and said we'd have to come back togasolene after all. This she vetoed just as emphatically, and a deadlockobtained until I received inspiration. "Why not drive four horses?" I said. "But you don't know how to drive four horses, " was her objection. I threw my chest out and my shoulders back. "What man has done, I cando, " I proclaimed grandly. "And please don't forget that when we sailedon the _Snark_ I knew nothing of navigation, and that I taught myself asI sailed. " "Very well, " she said. (And there's faith for you! ) "They shall befour saddle horses, and we'll strap our saddles on behind the rig. " It was my turn to object. "Our saddle horses are not broken to harness. " "Then break them. " And what I knew about horses, much less about breaking them, was justabout as much as any sailor knows. Having been kicked, bucked off, fallen over backward upon, and thrown out and run over, on very numerousoccasions, I had a mighty vigorous respect for horses; but a wife's faithmust be lived up to, and I went at it. King was a polo pony from St. Louis, and Prince a many-gaited love-horsefrom Pasadena. The hardest thing was to get them to dig in and pull. They rollicked along on the levels and galloped down the hills, but whenthey struck an up-grade and felt the weight of the breaking-cart, theystopped and turned around and looked at me. But I passed them, and mytroubles began. Milda was fourteen years old, an unadulterated broncho, and in temperament was a combination of mule and jack-rabbit blendedequally. If you pressed your hand on her flank and told her to get over, she lay down on you. If you got her by the head and told her to back, she walked forward over you. And if you got behind her and shoved andtold her to "Giddap!" she sat down on you. Also, she wouldn't walk. Forendless weary miles I strove with her, but never could I get her to walka step. Finally, she was a manger-glutton. No matter how near or farfrom the stable, when six o'clock came around she bolted for home andnever missed the directest cross-road. Many times I rejected her. The fourth and most rejected horse of all was the Outlaw. From the ageof three to seven she had defied all horse-breakers and broken a numberof them. Then a long, lanky cowboy, with a fifty-pound saddle and aMexican bit had got her proud goat. I was the next owner. She was myfavourite riding horse. Charmian said I'd have to put her in as awheeler where I would have more control over her. Now Charmian had afavourite riding mare called Maid. I suggested Maid as a substitute. Charmian pointed out that my mare was a branded range horse, while herswas a near-thoroughbred, and that the legs of her mare would be ruinedforever if she were driven for three months. I acknowledged her mare'sthoroughbredness, and at the same time defied her to find anythoroughbred with as small and delicately-viciously pointed ears as myOutlaw. She indicated Maid's exquisitely thin shinbone. I measured theOutlaw's. It was equally thin, although, I insinuated, possibly moredurable. This stabbed Charmian's pride. Of course her near-thoroughbredMaid, carrying the blood of "old" Lexington, Morella, and a streak of thesuper-enduring Morgan, could run, walk, and work my unregistered Outlawinto the ground; and that was the very precise reason why such a paragonof a saddle animal should not be degraded by harness. So it was that Charmian remained obdurate, until, one day, I got herbehind the Outlaw for a forty-mile drive. For every inch of those fortymiles the Outlaw kicked and jumped, in between the kicks and jumpsfinding time and space in which to seize its team-mate by the back of theneck and attempt to drag it to the ground. Another trick the Outlawdeveloped during that drive was suddenly to turn at right angles in thetraces and endeavour to butt its team-mate over the grade. Reluctantlyand nobly did Charmian give in and consent to the use of Maid. TheOutlaw's shoes were pulled off, and she was turned out on range. Finally, the four horses were hooked to the rig--a light Studebaker trap. With two hours and a half of practice, in which the excitement was notabated by several jack-poles and numerous kicking matches, I announcedmyself as ready for the start. Came the morning, and Prince, who was tohave been a wheeler with Maid, showed up with a badly kicked shoulder. Hedid not exactly show up; we had to find him, for he was unable to walk. His leg swelled and continually swelled during the several days we waitedfor him. Remained only the Outlaw. In from pasture she came, shoes werenailed on, and she was harnessed into the wheel. Friends and relativesstrove to press accident policies on me, but Charmian climbed upalongside, and Nakata got into the rear seat with the typewriter--Nakata, who sailed cabin-boy on the Snark for two years and who had shown himselfafraid of nothing, not even of me and my amateur jamborees inexperimenting with new modes of locomotion. And we did very nicely, thank you, especially after the first hour or so, during which time theOutlaw had kicked about fifty various times, chiefly to the damage of herown legs and the paintwork, and after she had bitten a couple of hundredtimes, to the damage of Maid's neck and Charmian's temper. It was hardenough to have her favourite mare in the harness without also enduringthe spectacle of its being eaten alive. Our leaders were joys. King being a polo pony and Milda a rabbit, theyrounded curves beautifully and darted ahead like coyotes out of the wayof the wheelers. Milda's besetting weakness was a frantic desire not tohave the lead-bar strike her hocks. When this happened, one of threethings occurred: either she sat down on the lead-bar, kicked it up in theair until she got her back under it, or exploded in a straight-ahead, harness-disrupting jump. Not until she carried the lead-bar clean awayand danced a break-down on it and the traces, did she behave decently. Nakata and I made the repairs with good old-fashioned bale-rope, which isstronger than wrought-iron any time, and we went on our way. In the meantime I was learning--I shall not say to tool afour-in-hand--but just simply to drive four horses. Now it is all rightenough to begin with four work-horses pulling a load of several tons. Butto begin with four light horses, all running, and a light rig that seemsto outrun them--well, when things happen they happen quickly. Myweakness was total ignorance. In particular, my fingers lacked training, and I made the mistake of depending on my eyes to handle the reins. Thisbrought me up against a disastrous optical illusion. The bight of theoff head-line, being longer and heavier than that of the off wheel-line, hung lower. In a moment requiring quick action, I invariably mistook thetwo lines. Pulling on what I thought was the wheel-line, in order tostraighten the team, I would see the leaders swing abruptly around into ajack-pole. Now for sensations of sheer impotence, nothing can comparewith a jack-pole, when the horrified driver beholds his leaders prancinggaily up the road and his wheelers jogging steadily down the road, all atthe same time and all harnessed together and to the same rig. I no longer jack-pole, and I don't mind admitting how I got out of thehabit. It was my eyes that enslaved my fingers into ill practices. So Ishut my eyes and let the fingers go it alone. To-day my fingers areindependent of my eyes and work automatically. I do not see what myfingers do. They just do it. All I see is the satisfactory result. Still we managed to get over the ground that first day--down sunny SonomaValley to the old town of Sonoma, founded by General Vallejo as theremotest outpost on the northern frontier for the purpose of holding backthe Gentiles, as the wild Indians of those days were called. Herehistory was made. Here the last Spanish mission was reared; here theBear flag was raised; and here Kit Carson, and Fremont, and all our earlyadventurers came and rested in the days before the days of gold. We swung on over the low, rolling hills, through miles of dairy farms andchicken ranches where every blessed hen is white, and down the slopes toPetaluma Valley. Here, in 1776, Captain Quiros came up Petaluma Creekfrom San Pablo Bay in quest of an outlet to Bodega Bay on the coast. Andhere, later, the Russians, with Alaskan hunters, carried skin boatsacross from Fort Ross to poach for sea-otters on the Spanish preserve ofSan Francisco Bay. Here, too, still later, General Vallejo built a fort, which still stands--one of the finest examples of Spanish adobe thatremain to us. And here, at the old fort, to bring the chronicle up todate, our horses proceeded to make peculiarly personal history withastonishing success and dispatch. King, our peerless, polo-pony leader, went lame. So hopelessly lame did he go that no expert, then andafterward, could determine whether the lameness was in his frogs, hoofs, legs, shoulders, or head. Maid picked up a nail and began to limp. Milda, figuring the day already sufficiently spent and maniacal withmanger-gluttony, began to rabbit-jump. All that held her was the bale-rope. And the Outlaw, game to the last, exceeded all previousexhibitions of skin-removing, paint-marring, and horse-eating. At Petaluma we rested over while King was returned to the ranch andPrince sent to us. Now Prince had proved himself an excellent wheeler, yet he had to go into the lead and let the Outlaw retain his old place. There is an axiom that a good wheeler is a poor leader. I object to thelast adjective. A good wheeler makes an infinitely worse kind of aleader than that. I know . . . Now. I ought to know. Since that day Ihave driven Prince a few hundred miles in the lead. He is neither anybetter nor any worse than the first mile he ran in the lead; and hisworst is even extremely worse than what you are thinking. Not that he isvicious. He is merely a good-natured rogue who shakes hands for sugar, steps on your toes out of sheer excessive friendliness, and just goes onloving you in your harshest moments. But he won't get out of the way. Also, whenever he is reproved for beingin the wrong, he accuses Milda of it and bites the back of her neck. Sobad has this become that whenever I yell "Prince!" in a loud voice, Mildaimmediately rabbit-jumps to the side, straight ahead, or sits down on thelead-bar. All of which is quite disconcerting. Picture it yourself. Youare swinging round a sharp, down-grade, mountain curve, at a fast trot. The rock wall is the outside of the curve. The inside of the curve is aprecipice. The continuance of the curve is a narrow, unrailed bridge. You hit the curve, throwing the leaders in against the wall and makingthe polo-horse do the work. All is lovely. The leaders are hugging thewall like nestling doves. But the moment comes in the evolution when theleaders must shoot out ahead. They really must shoot, or else they'llhit the wall and miss the bridge. Also, behind them are the wheelers, and the rig, and you have just eased the brake in order to put sufficientsnap into the manoeuvre. If ever team-work is required, now is the time. Milda tries to shoot. She does her best, but Prince, bubbling over withroguishness, lags behind. He knows the trick. Milda is half a lengthahead of him. He times it to the fraction of a second. Maid, in thewheel, over-running him, naturally bites him. This disturbs the Outlaw, who has been behaving beautifully, and she immediately reaches across forMaid. Simultaneously, with a fine display of firm conviction that it'sall Milda's fault, Prince sinks his teeth into the back of Milda'sdefenceless neck. The whole thing has occurred in less than a second. Under the surprise and pain of the bite, Milda either jumps ahead to theimminent peril of harness and lead-bar, or smashes into the wall, stopsshort with the lead-bar over her back, and emits a couple of hystericalkicks. The Outlaw invariably selects this moment to remove paint. Andafter things are untangled and you have had time to appreciate the closeshave, you go up to Prince and reprove him with your choicest vocabulary. And Prince, gazelle-eyed and tender, offers to shake hands with you forsugar. I leave it to any one: a boat would never act that way. We have some history north of the Bay. Nearly three centuries and a halfago, that doughty pirate and explorer, Sir Francis Drake, combing thePacific for Spanish galleons, anchored in the bight formed by PointReyes, on which to-day is one of the richest dairy regions in the world. Here, less than two decades after Drake, Sebastien Carmenon piled up onthe rocks with a silk-laden galleon from the Philippines. And in thissame bay of Drake, long afterward, the Russian fur-poachers rendezvous'dtheir _bidarkas_ and stole in through the Golden Gate to the forbiddenwaters of San Francisco Bay. Farther up the coast, in Sonoma County, we pilgrimaged to the sites ofthe Russian settlements. At Bodega Bay, south of what to-day is calledRussian River, was their anchorage, while north of the river they builttheir fort. And much of Fort Ross still stands. Log-bastions, church, and stables hold their own, and so well, with rusty hinges creaking, thatwe warmed ourselves at the hundred-years-old double fireplace and sleptunder the hand-hewn roof beams still held together by spikes ofhand-wrought iron. We went to see where history had been made, and we saw scenery as well. One of our stretches in a day's drive was from beautiful Inverness onTomales Bay, down the Olema Valley to Bolinas Bay, along the easternshore of that body of water to Willow Camp, and up over the sea-bluffs, around the bastions of Tamalpais, and down to Sausalito. From the headof Bolinas Bay to Willow Camp the drive on the edge of the beach, andactually, for half-mile stretches, in the waters of the bay itself, was adelightful experience. The wonderful part was to come. Very few SanFranciscans, much less Californians, know of that drive from Willow Camp, to the south and east, along the poppy-blown cliffs, with the seathundering in the sheer depths hundreds of feet below and the Golden Gateopening up ahead, disclosing smoky San Francisco on her many hills. Faroff, blurred on the breast of the sea, can be seen the Farallones, whichSir Francis Drake passed on a S. W. Course in the thick of what hedescribes as a "stynking fog. " Well might he call it that, and a fewother names, for it was the fog that robbed him of the glory ofdiscovering San Francisco Bay. It was on this part of the drive that I decided at last I was learningreal mountain-driving. To confess the truth, for delicious titillationof one's nerve, I have since driven over no mountain road that was worse, or better, rather, than that piece. And then the contrast! From Sausalito, over excellent, park-likeboulevards, through the splendid redwoods and homes of Mill Valley, across the blossomed hills of Marin County, along the knoll-studdedpicturesque marshes, past San Rafael resting warmly among her hills, overthe divide and up the Petaluma Valley, and on to the grassy feet ofSonoma Mountain and home. We covered fifty-five miles that day. Not sobad, eh, for Prince the Rogue, the paint-removing Outlaw, thethin-shanked thoroughbred, and the rabbit-jumper? And they came in cooland dry, ready for their mangers and the straw. Oh, we didn't stop. We considered we were just starting, and that wasmany weeks ago. We have kept on going over six counties which arecomfortably large, even for California, and we are still going. We havetwisted and tabled, criss-crossed our tracks, made fascinating andlengthy dives into the interior valleys in the hearts of Napa and LakeCounties, travelled the coast for hundreds of miles on end, and are nowin Eureka, on Humboldt Bay, which was discovered by accident by the gold-seekers, who were trying to find their way to and from the Trinitydiggings. Even here, the white man's history preceded them, for dimtradition says that the Russians once anchored here and hunted sea-otterbefore the first Yankee trader rounded the Horn, or the first RockyMountain trapper thirsted across the "Great American Desert" and trickleddown the snowy Sierras to the sun-kissed land. No; we are not restingour horses here on Humboldt Bay. We are writing this article, gorging onabalones and mussels, digging clams, and catching record-breaking sea-trout and rock-cod in the intervals in which we are not sailing, motor-boating, and swimming in the most temperately equable climate we haveever experienced. These comfortably large counties! They are veritable empires. TakeHumboldt, for instance. It is three times as large as Rhode Island, oneand a half times as large as Delaware, almost as large as Connecticut, and half as large as Massachusetts. The pioneer has done his work inthis north of the bay region, the foundations are laid, and all is readyfor the inevitable inrush of population and adequate development ofresources which so far have been no more than skimmed, and casually andcarelessly skimmed at that. This region of the six counties alone willsome day support a population of millions. In the meanwhile, O you home-seekers, you wealth-seekers, and, above all, you climate-seekers, now isthe time to get in on the ground floor. Robert Ingersoll once said that the genial climate of California would ina fairly brief time evolve a race resembling the Mexicans, and that intwo or three generations the Californians would be seen of a Sundaymorning on their way to a cockfight with a rooster under each arm. Neverwas made a rasher generalisation, based on so absolute an ignorance offacts. It is to laugh. Here is a climate that breeds vigour, with justsufficient geniality to prevent the expenditure of most of that vigour infighting the elements. Here is a climate where a man can work threehundred and sixty-five days in the year without the slightest hint ofenervation, and where for three hundred and sixty-five nights he mustperforce sleep under blankets. What more can one say? I consider myselfsomewhat of climate expert, having adventured among most of the climatesof five out of the six zones. I have not yet been in the Antarctic, butwhatever climate obtains there will not deter me from drawing theconclusion that nowhere is there a climate to compare with that of thisregion. Maybe I am as wrong as Ingersoll was. Nevertheless I take mymedicine by continuing to live in this climate. Also, it is the onlymedicine I ever take. But to return to the horses. There is some improvement. Milda hasactually learned to walk. Maid has proved her thoroughbredness by nevertiring on the longest days, and, while being the strongest and highestspirited of all, by never causing any trouble save for an occasional kickat the Outlaw. And the Outlaw rarely gallops, no longer butts, onlyperiodically kicks, comes in to the pole and does her work withoutattempting to vivisect Maid's medulla oblongata, and--marvel ofmarvels--is really and truly getting lazy. But Prince remains the sameincorrigible, loving and lovable rogue he has always been. And the country we've been over! The drives through Napa and LakeCounties! One, from Sonoma Valley, via Santa Rosa, we could not refrainfrom taking several ways, and on all the ways we found the roadsexcellent for machines as well as horses. One route, and a moredelightful one for an automobile cannot be found, is out from Santa Rosa, past old Altruria and Mark West Springs, then to the right and across toCalistoga in Napa Valley. By keeping to the left, the drive holds on upthe Russian River Valley, through the miles of the noted Asti Vineyardsto Cloverdale, and then by way of Pieta, Witter, and Highland Springs toLakeport. Still another way we took, was down Sonoma Valley, skirtingSan Pablo Bay, and up the lovely Napa Valley. From Napa were sideexcursions through Pope and Berryessa Valleys, on to AEtna Springs, andstill on, into Lake County, crossing the famous Langtry Ranch. Continuing up the Napa Valley, walled on either hand by great rockpalisades and redwood forests and carpeted with endless vineyards, andcrossing the many stone bridges for which the County is noted and whichare a joy to the beauty-loving eyes as well as to the four-horse tyrodriver, past Calistoga with its old mud-baths and chicken-soup springs, with St. Helena and its giant saddle ever towering before us, we climbedthe mountains on a good grade and dropped down past the quicksilver minesto the canyon of the Geysers. After a stop over night and an explorationof the miniature-grand volcanic scene, we pulled on across the canyon andtook the grade where the cicadas simmered audibly in the noon sunshineamong the hillside manzanitas. Then, higher, came the big cattle-dottedupland pastures, and the rocky summit. And here on the summit, abruptly, we caught a vision, or what seemed a mirage. The ocean we had left longdays before, yet far down and away shimmered a blue sea, framed on thefarther shore by rugged mountains, on the near shore by fat and rollingfarm lands. Clear Lake was before us, and like proper sailors wereturned to our sea, going for a sail, a fish, and a swim ere the day wasdone and turning into tired Lakeport blankets in the early evening. Wellhas Lake County been called the Walled-in County. But the railroad iscoming. They say the approach we made to Clear Lake is similar to theapproach to Lake Lucerne. Be that as it may, the scenery, with itsdistant snow-capped peaks, can well be called Alpine. And what can be more exquisite than the drive out from Clear Lake toUkiah by way of the Blue Lakes chain!--every turn bringing into view apicture of breathless beauty; every glance backward revealing someperfect composition in line and colour, the intense blue of the watermargined with splendid oaks, green fields, and swaths of orange poppies. But those side glances and backward glances were provocative of trouble. Charmian and I disagreed as to which way the connecting stream of waterran. We still disagree, for at the hotel, where we submitted the affairto arbitration, the hotel manager and the clerk likewise disagreed. Iassume, now, that we never will know which way that stream runs. Charmiansuggests "both ways. " I refuse such a compromise. No stream of water Iever saw could accomplish that feat at one and the same time. Thegreatest concession I can make is that sometimes it may run one way andsometimes the other, and that in the meantime we should both consult anoculist. More valley from Ukiah to Willits, and then we turned westward throughthe virgin Sherwood Forest of magnificent redwood, stopping at Alpine forthe night and continuing on through Mendocino County to Fort Bragg and"salt water. " We also came to Fort Bragg up the coast from Fort Ross, keeping our coast journey intact from the Golden Gate. The coast weatherwas cool and delightful, the coast driving superb. Especially in theFort Ross section did we find the roads thrilling, while all the wayalong we followed the sea. At every stream, the road skirted dizzy cliff-edges, dived down into lush growths of forest and ferns and climbed outalong the cliff-edges again. The way was lined with flowers--wild lilac, wild roses, poppies, and lupins. Such lupins!--giant clumps of them, ofevery lupin-shade and--colour. And it was along the Mendocino roads thatCharmian caused many delays by insisting on getting out to pick the wildblackberries, strawberries, and thimble-berries which grew so profusely. And ever we caught peeps, far down, of steam schooners loading lumber inthe rocky coves; ever we skirted the cliffs, day after day, crossingstretches of rolling farm lands and passing through thriving villages andsaw-mill towns. Memorable was our launch-trip from Mendocino City up BigRiver, where the steering gears of the launches work the reverse ofanywhere else in the world; where we saw a stream of logs, of six totwelve and fifteen feet in diameter, which filled the river bed for milesto the obliteration of any sign of water; and where we were told of awhite or albino redwood tree. We did not see this last, so cannot vouchfor it. All the streams were filled with trout, and more than once we saw theside-hill salmon on the slopes. No, side-hill salmon is not aperipatetic fish; it is a deer out of season. But the trout! At GualalaCharmian caught her first one. Once before in my life I had caught two. . . On angleworms. On occasion I had tried fly and spinner and never gota strike, and I had come to believe that all this talk of fly-fishing wasjust so much nature-faking. But on the Gualala River I caught trout--alot of them--on fly and spinners; and I was beginning to feel quite anexpert, until Nakata, fishing on bottom with a pellet of bread for bait, caught the biggest trout of all. I now affirm there is nothing inscience nor in art. Nevertheless, since that day poles and baskets havebeen added to our baggage, we tackle every stream we come to, and we nolonger are able to remember the grand total of our catch. At Usal, many hilly and picturesque miles north of Fort Bragg, we turnedagain into the interior of Mendocino, crossing the ranges and coming outin Humboldt County on the south fork of Eel River at Garberville. Throughout the trip, from Marin County north, we had been warned of "badroads ahead. " Yet we never found those bad roads. We seemed always tobe just ahead of them or behind them. The farther we came the better theroads seemed, though this was probably due to the fact that we werelearning more and more what four horses and a light rig could do on aroad. And thus do I save my face with all the counties. I refuse tomake invidious road comparisons. I can add that while, save in rareinstances on steep pitches, I have trotted my horses down all the grades, I have never had one horse fall down nor have I had to send the rig to ablacksmith shop for repairs. Also, I am learning to throw leather. If any tyro thinks it is easy totake a short-handled, long-lashed whip, and throw the end of that lashjust where he wants it, let him put on automobile goggles and try it. Onreconsideration, I would suggest the substitution of a wire fencing-maskfor the goggles. For days I looked at that whip. It fascinated me, andthe fascination was composed mostly of fear. At my first attempt, Charmian and Nakata became afflicted with the same sort of fascination, and for a long time afterward, whenever they saw me reach for the whip, they closed their eyes and shielded their heads with their arms. Here's the problem. Instead of pulling honestly, Prince is lagging backand manoeuvring for a bite at Milda's neck. I have four reins in myhands. I must put these four reins into my left hand, properly gatherthe whip handle and the bight of the lash in my right hand, and throwthat lash past Maid without striking her and into Prince. If the lashstrikes Maid, her thoroughbredness will go up in the air, and I'll have acase of horse hysteria on my hands for the next half hour. But follow. The whole problem is not yet stated. Suppose that I miss Maid and reachthe intended target. The instant the lash cracks, the four horses jump, Prince most of all, and his jump, with spread wicked teeth, is for theback of Milda's neck. She jumps to escape--which is her second jump, forthe first one came when the lash exploded. The Outlaw reaches for Maid'sneck, and Maid, who has already jumped and tried to bolt, tries to boltharder. And all this infinitesimal fraction of time I am trying to holdthe four animals with my left hand, while my whip-lash, writhing throughthe air, is coming back to me. Three simultaneous things I must do: keephold of the four reins with my left hand; slam on the brake with my foot;and on the rebound catch that flying lash in the hollow of my right armand get the bight of it safely into my right hand. Then I must get twoof the four lines back into my right hand and keep the horses fromrunning away or going over the grade. Try it some time. You will findlife anything but wearisome. Why, the first time I hit the mark and madethe lash go off like a revolver shot, I was so astounded and delightedthat I was paralysed. I forgot to do any of the multitudinous otherthings, tangled the whip lash in Maid's harness, and was forced to callupon Charmian for assistance. And now, confession. I carry a fewpebbles handy. They're great for reaching Prince in a tight place. Butjust the same I'm learning that whip every day, and before I get home Ihope to discard the pebbles. And as long as I rely on pebbles, I cannottruthfully speak of myself as "tooling a four-in-hand. " From Garberville, where we ate eel to repletion and got acquainted withthe aborigines, we drove down the Eel River Valley for two days throughthe most unthinkably glorious body of redwood timber to be seen anywherein California. From Dyerville on to Eureka, we caught glimpses ofrailroad construction and of great concrete bridges in the course ofbuilding, which advertised that at least Humboldt County was going to belinked to the rest of the world. We still consider our trip is just begun. As soon as this is mailed fromEureka, it's heigh ho! for the horses and pull on. We shall continue upthe coast, turn in for Hoopa Reservation and the gold mines, and shootdown the Trinity and Klamath rivers in Indian canoes to Requa. Afterthat, we shall go on through Del Norte County and into Oregon. The tripso far has justified us in taking the attitude that we won't go homeuntil the winter rains drive us in. And, finally, I am going to try theexperiment of putting the Outlaw in the lead and relegating Prince to hisold position in the near wheel. I won't need any pebbles then. NOTHING THAT EVER CAME TO ANYTHING It was at Quito, the mountain capital of Ecuador, that the followingpassage at correspondence took place. Having occasion to buy a pair ofshoes in a shop six feet by eight in size and with walls three feetthick, I noticed a mangy leopard skin on the floor. I had no Spanish. The shop-keeper had no English. But I was an adept at sign language. Iwanted to know where I should go to buy leopard skins. On my scribble-pad I drew the interesting streets of a city. Then I drew a small shop, which, after much effort, I persuaded the proprietor into recognising ashis shop. Next, I indicated in my drawing that on the many streets therewere many shops. And, finally, I made myself into a living interrogationmark, pointing all the while from the mangy leopard skin to the manyshops I had sketched. But the proprietor failed to follow me. So did his assistant. Thestreet came in to help--that is, as many as could crowd into the six-by-eight shop; while those that could not force their way in held anoverflow meeting on the sidewalk. The proprietor and the rest took turnsat talking to me in rapid-fire Spanish, and, from the expressions ontheir faces, all concluded that I was remarkably stupid. Again I wentthrough my programme, pointing on the sketch from the one shop to themany shops, pointing out that in this particular shop was one leopardskin, and then questing interrogatively with my pencil among all theshops. All regarded me in blank silence, until I saw comprehensionsuddenly dawn on the face of a small boy. "Tigres montanya!" he cried. This appealed to me as mountain tigers, namely, leopards; and in tokenthat he understood, the boy made signs for me to follow him, which Iobeyed. He led me for a quarter of a mile, and paused before the doorwayof a large building where soldiers slouched on sentry duty and in and outof which went other soldiers. Motioning for me to remain, he ran inside. Fifteen minutes later he was out again, without leopard skins, but fullof information. By means of my card, of my hotel card, of my watch, andof the boy's fingers, I learned the following: that at six o'clock thatevening he would arrive at my hotel with ten leopard skins for myinspection. Further, I learned that the skins were the property of oneCaptain Ernesto Becucci. Also, I learned that the boy's name was Eliceo. The boy was prompt. At six o'clock he was at my room. In his hand was asmall roll addressed to me. On opening it I found it to be manuscriptpiano music, the _Hora Tranquila Valse_, or "Tranquil Hour Waltz, " byErnesto Becucci. I came for leopard skins, thought I, and the ownersends me sheet music instead. But the boy assured me that he would havethe skins at the hotel at nine next morning, and I entrusted to him thefollowing letter of acknowledgment: "DEAR CAPTAIN BECUCCI: "A thousand thanks for your kind presentation of _Hora Tranquila Valse_. Mrs. London will play it for me this evening. "Sincerely yours, "Jack London. " Next morning Eliceo was back, but without the skins. Instead, he gave mea letter, written in Spanish, of which the following is a freetranslation: "To my dearest and always appreciated friend, I submit myself-- "DEAR SIR: "I sent you last night an offering by the bearer of this note, and you returned me a letter which I translated. "Be it known to you, sir, that I am giving this waltz away in the best society, and therefore to your honoured self. Therefore it is beholden to you to recognise the attention, I mean by a tangible return, as this composition was made by myself. You will therefore send by your humble servant, the bearer, any offering, however minute, that you may be prompted to make. Send it under cover of an envelope. The bearer may be trusted. "I did not indulge in the pleasure of visiting your honourable self this morning, as I find my body not to be enjoying the normal exercise of its functions. "As regards the skins from the mountain, you shall be waited on by a small boy at seven o'clock at night with ten skins from which you may select those which most satisfy your aspirations. "In the hope that you will look upon this in the same light as myself, I beg to be allowed to remain, "Your most faithful servant, "CAPTAIN ERNESTO BECUCCI. " Well, thought I, this Captain Ernesto Becucci has shown himself to besuch an undependable person, that, while I don't mind rewarding him forhis composition, I fear me if I do I never shall lay eyes on thoseleopard skins. So to Eliceo I gave this letter for the Captain: "MY DEAR CAPTAIN BECUCCI: "Have the boy bring the skins at seven o'clock this evening, when I shall be glad to look at them. This evening when the boy brings the skins, I shall be pleased to give him, in an envelope, for you, a tangible return for your musical composition. "Please put the price on each skin, and also let me know for what sum all the skins will sell together. "Sincerely yours, "JACK LONDON. " Now, thought I, I have him. No skins, no tangible return; and evidentlyhe is set on receiving that tangible return. At seven o'clock Eliceo was back, but without leopard skins. He handedme this letter: "SENOR LONDON: "I wish to instil in you the belief that I lost to-day, at half past three in the afternoon, the key to my cubicle. While distributing rations to the soldiers I dropped it. I see in this loss the act of God. "I received a letter from your honourable self, delivered by the one who bears you this poor response of mine. To-morrow I will burst open the door to permit me to keep my word with you. I feel myself eternally shamed not to be able to dominate the evils that afflict colonial mankind. Please send me the trifle that you offered me. Send me this proof of your appreciation by the bearer, who is to be trusted. Also give to him a small sum of money for himself, and earn the undying gratitude of "Your most faithful servant, "CAPTAIN ERNESTO BECUCCI. " Also, inclosed in the foregoing letter was the following original poem, apropos neither of leopard skins nor tangible returns, so far as I canmake out: EFFUSION Thou canst not weep; Nor ask I for a year To rid me of my woes Or make my life more dear. The mystic chains that bound Thy all-fond heart to mine, Alas! asundered are For now and for all time. In vain you strove to hide, From vulgar gaze of man, The burning glance of love That none but Love can scan. Go on thy starlit way And leave me to my fate; Our souls must needs unite-- But, God! 'twill be too late. To all and sundry of which I replied: "MY DEAR CAPTAIN BECUCCI: "I regret exceedingly to hear that by act of God, at half past three this afternoon, you lost the key to your cubicle. Please have the boy bring the skins at seven o'clock to-morrow morning, at which time, when he brings the skins, I shall be glad to make you that tangible return for your 'Tranquil Hour Waltz. ' "Sincerely yours, "JACK LONDON. " At seven o'clock came no skins, but the following: "SIR: "After offering you my most sincere respects, I beg to continue by telling you that no one, up to the time of writing, has treated me with such lack of attention. It was a present to _gentlemen_ who were to retain the piece of music, and who have all, without exception, made me a present of five dollars. It is beyond my humble capacity to believe that you, after having offered to send me money in an envelope, should fail to do so. "Send me, I pray of you, the money to remunerate the small boy for his repeated visits to you. Please be discreet and send it in an envelope by the bearer. "Last night I came to the hotel with the boy. You were dining. I waited more than an hour for you and then went to the theatre. Give the boy some small amount, and send me a like offering of larger proportions. "Awaiting incessantly a slight attention on your part, "CAPTAIN ERNESTO BECUCCI. " And here, like one of George Moore's realistic studies, ends thisintercourse with Captain Ernesto Becucci. Nothing happened. Nothingever came to anything. He got no tangible return, and I got no leopardskins. The tangible return he might have got, I presented to Eliceo, whopromptly invested it in a pair of trousers and a ticket to thebull-fight. (NOTE TO EDITOR. --This is a faithful narration of what actually happenedin Quito, Ecuador. ) THAT DEAD MEN RISE UP NEVER The month in which my seventeenth birthday arrived I signed on before themast on the _Sophie Sutherland_, a three-topmast schooner bound on aseven-months' seal-hunting cruise to the coast of Japan. We sailed fromSan Francisco, and immediately I found confronting me a problem of noinconsiderable proportions. There were twelve men of us in theforecastle, ten of whom were hardened, tarry-thumbed sailors. Not alonewas I a youth and on my first voyage, but I had for shipmates men who hadcome through the hard school of the merchant service of Europe. As boys, they had had to perform their ship's duty, and, in addition, byimmemorial sea custom, they had had to be the slaves of the ordinary andable-bodied seamen. When they became ordinary seamen they were still theslaves of the able-bodied. Thus, in the forecastle, with the watchbelow, an able seaman, lying in his bunk, will order an ordinary seamanto fetch him his shoes or bring him a drink of water. Now the ordinaryseaman may be lying in _his_ bunk. He is just as tired as the ableseaman. Yet he must get out of his bunk and fetch and carry. If herefuses, he will be beaten. If, perchance, he is so strong that he canwhip the able seaman, then all the able seamen, or as many as may benecessary, pitch upon the luckless devil and administer the beating. My problem now becomes apparent. These hard-bit Scandinavian sailors hadcome through a hard school. As boys they had served their mates, and asable seamen they looked to be served by other boys. I was a boy--withalwith a man's body. I had never been to sea before--withal I was a goodsailor and knew my business. It was either a case of holding my own withthem or of going under. I had signed on as an equal, and an equal I mustmaintain myself, or else endure seven months of hell at their hands. Andit was this very equality they resented. By what right was I an equal? Ihad not earned that high privilege. I had not endured the miseries theyhad endured as maltreated boys or bullied ordinaries. Worse than that, Iwas a land-lubber making his first voyage. And yet, by the injustice offate, on the ship's articles I was their equal. My method was deliberate, and simple, and drastic. In the first place, Iresolved to do my work, no matter how hard or dangerous it might be, sowell that no man would be called upon to do it for me. Further, I putginger in my muscles. I never malingered when pulling on a rope, for Iknew the eagle eyes of my forecastle mates were squinting for just suchevidences of my inferiority. I made it a point to be among the first ofthe watch going on deck, among the last going below, never leaving asheet or tackle for some one else to coil over a pin. I was always eagerfor the run aloft for the shifting of topsail sheets and tacks, or forthe setting or taking in of topsails; and in these matters I did morethan my share. Furthermore, I was on a hair-trigger of resentment myself. I knew betterthan to accept any abuse or the slightest patronizing. At the first hintof such, I went off--I exploded. I might be beaten in the subsequentfight, but I left the impression that I was a wild-cat and that I wouldjust as willingly fight again. My intention was to demonstrate that Iwould tolerate no imposition. I proved that the man who imposed on memust have a fight on his hands. And doing my work well, the innatejustice of the men, assisted by their wholesome dislike for a clawing andrending wild-cat ruction, soon led them to give over their hectoring. After a bit of strife, my attitude was accepted, and it was my pride thatI was taken in as an equal in spirit as well as in fact. From then on, everything was beautiful, and the voyage promised to be a happy one. But there was one other man in the forecastle. Counting theScandinavians as ten, and myself as the eleventh, this man was thetwelfth and last. We never knew his name, contenting ourselves withcalling him the "Bricklayer. " He was from Missouri--at least he soinformed us in the one meagre confidence he was guilty of in the earlydays of the voyage. Also, at that time, we learned several other things. He was a bricklayer by trade. He had never even seen salt water untilthe week before he joined us, at which time he had arrived in SanFrancisco and looked upon San Francisco Bay. Why he, of all men, atforty years of age, should have felt the prod to go to sea, was beyondall of us; for it was our unanimous conviction that no man less fittedfor the sea had ever embarked on it. But to sea he had come. After aweek's stay in a sailors' boarding-house, he had been shoved aboard of usas an able seaman. All hands had to do his work for him. Not only did he know nothing, buthe proved himself unable to learn anything. Try as they would, theycould never teach him to steer. To him the compass must have been aprofound and awful whirligig. He never mastered its cardinal points, much less the checking and steadying of the ship on her course. He neverdid come to know whether ropes should be coiled from left to right orfrom right to left. It was mentally impossible for him to learn the easymuscular trick of throwing his weight on a rope in pulling and hauling. The simplest knots and turns were beyond his comprehension, while he wasmortally afraid of going aloft. Bullied by captain and mate, he was oneday forced aloft. He managed to get underneath the crosstrees, and therehe froze to the ratlines. Two sailors had to go after him to help himdown. All of which was bad enough had there been no worse. But he was vicious, malignant, dirty, and without common decency. He was a tall, powerfulman, and he fought with everybody. And there was no fairness in hisfighting. His first fight on board, the first day out, was with me, whenhe, desiring to cut a plug of chewing tobacco, took my personal table-knife for the purpose, and whereupon, I, on a hair-trigger, promptlyexploded. After that he fought with nearly every member of the crew. When his clothing became too filthy to be bearable by the rest of us, weput it to soak and stood over him while he washed it. In short, theBricklayer was one of those horrible and monstrous things that one mustsee in order to be convinced that they exist. I will only say that he was a beast, and that we treated him like abeast. It is only by looking back through the years that I realise howheartless we were to him. He was without sin. He could not, by the verynature of things, have been anything else than he was. He had not madehimself, and for his making he was not responsible. Yet we treated himas a free agent and held him personally responsible for all that he wasand that he should not have been. As a result, our treatment of him wasas terrible as he was himself terrible. Finally we gave him the silenttreatment, and for weeks before he died we neither spoke to him nor didhe speak to us. And for weeks he moved among us, or lay in his bunk inour crowded house, grinning at us his hatred and malignancy. He was adying man, and he knew it, and we knew it. And furthermore, he knew thatwe wanted him to die. He cumbered our life with his presence, and ourswas a rough life that made rough men of us. And so he died, in a smallspace crowded by twelve men and as much alone as if he had died on somedesolate mountain peak. No kindly word, no last word, was passedbetween. He died as he had lived, a beast, and he died hating us andhated by us. And now I come to the most startling moment of my life. No sooner was hedead than he was flung overboard. He died in a night of wind, drawinghis last breath as the men tumbled into their oilskins to the cry of "Allhands!" And he was flung overboard, several hours later, on a day ofwind. Not even a canvas wrapping graced his mortal remains; nor was hedeemed worthy of bars of iron at his feet. We sewed him up in theblankets in which he died and laid him on a hatch-cover for'ard of themain-hatch on the port side. A gunnysack, half full of galley coal, wasfastened to his feet. It was bitter cold. The weather-side of every rope, spar, and stay wascoated with ice, while all the rigging was a harp, singing and shoutingunder the fierce hand of the wind. The schooner, hove to, lurched andfloundered through the sea, rolling her scuppers under and perpetuallyflooding the deck with icy salt water. We of the forecastle stood in sea-boots and oilskins. Our hands were mittened, but our heads were bared inthe presence of the death we did not respect. Our ears stung and numbedand whitened, and we yearned for the body to be gone. But theinterminable reading of the burial service went on. The captain hadmistaken his place, and while he read on without purpose we froze ourears and resented this final hardship thrust upon us by the helplesscadaver. As from the beginning, so to the end, everything had gone wrongwith the Bricklayer. Finally, the captain's son, irritated beyondmeasure, jerked the book from the palsied fingers of the old man andfound the place. Again the quavering voice of the captain arose. Thencame the cue: "And the body shall be cast into the sea. " We elevated oneend of the hatch-cover, and the Bricklayer plunged outboard and was gone. Back into the forecastle we cleaned house, washing out the dead man'sbunk and removing every vestige of him. By sea law and sea custom, weshould have gathered his effects together and turned them over to thecaptain, who, later, would have held an auction in which we should havebid for the various articles. But no man wanted them, so we tossed themup on deck and overboard in the wake of the departed body--the last ill-treatment we could devise to wreak upon the one we had hated so. Oh, itwas raw, believe me; but the life we lived was raw, and we were as raw asthe life. The Bricklayer's bunk was better than mine. Less sea water leaked downthrough the deck into it, and the light was better for lying in bed andreading. Partly for this reason I proceeded to move into his bunk. Myother reason was pride. I saw the sailors were superstitious, and bythis act I determined to show that I was braver than they. I would capmy proved equality by a deed that would compel their recognition of mysuperiority. Oh, the arrogance of youth! But let that pass. Thesailors were appalled by my intention. One and all, they warned me thatin the history of the sea no man had taken a dead man's bunk and lived tothe end of the voyage. They instanced case after case in their personalexperience. I was obdurate. Then they begged and pleaded with me, andmy pride was tickled in that they showed they really liked me and wereconcerned about me. This but served to confirm me in my madness. Imoved in, and, lying in the dead man's bunk, all afternoon and eveninglistened to dire prophecies of my future. Also were told stories ofawful deaths and gruesome ghosts that secretly shivered the hearts of allof us. Saturated with this, yet scoffing at it, I rolled over at the endof the second dog-watch and went to sleep. At ten minutes to twelve I was called, and at twelve I was dressed and ondeck, relieving the man who had called me. On the sealing grounds, whenhove to, a watch of only a single man is kept through the night, each manholding the deck for an hour. It was a dark night, though not a blackone. The gale was breaking up, and the clouds were thinning. Thereshould have been a moon, and, though invisible, in some way a dim, suffused radiance came from it. I paced back and forth across the deckamidships. My mind was filled with the event of the day and with thehorrible tales my shipmates had told, and yet I dare to say, here andnow, that I was not afraid. I was a healthy animal, and furthermore, intellectually, I agreed with Swinburne that dead men rise up never. TheBricklayer was dead, and that was the end of it. He would rise upnever--at least, never on the deck of the _Sophie Sutherland_. Even thenhe was in the ocean depths miles to windward of our leeward drift, andthe likelihood was that he was already portioned out in the maws of manysharks. Still, my mind pondered on the tales of the ghosts of dead men Ihad heard, and I speculated on the spirit world. My conclusion was thatif the spirits of the dead still roamed the world they carried thegoodness or the malignancy of the earth-life with them. Therefore, granting the hypothesis (which I didn't grant at all), the ghost of theBricklayer was bound to be as hateful and malignant as he in life hadbeen. But there wasn't any Bricklayer's ghost--that I insisted upon. A few minutes, thinking thus, I paced up and down. Then, glancingcasually for'ard, along the port side, I leaped like a startled deer andin a blind madness of terror rushed aft along the poop, heading for thecabin. Gone was all my arrogance of youth and my intellectual calm. Ihad seen a ghost. There, in the dim light, where we had flung the deadman overboard, I had seen a faint and wavering form. Six-feet in lengthit was, slender, and of substance so attenuated that I had distinctlyseen through it the tracery of the fore-rigging. As for me, I was as panic-stricken as a frightened horse. I, as I, hadceased to exist. Through me were vibrating the fibre-instincts of tenthousand generations of superstitious forebears who had been afraid ofthe dark and the things of the dark. I was not I. I was, in truth, those ten thousand forebears. I was the race, the whole human race, inits superstitious infancy. Not until part way down thecabin-companionway did my identity return to me. I checked my flight andclung to the steep ladder, suffocating, trembling, and dizzy. Never, before nor since, have I had such a shock. I clung to the ladder andconsidered. I could not doubt my senses. That I had seen somethingthere was no discussion. But what was it? Either a ghost or a joke. There could be nothing else. If a ghost, the question was: would itappear again? If it did not, and I aroused the ship's officers, I wouldmake myself the laughing stock of all on board. And by the same token, if it were a joke, my position would be still more ridiculous. If I wereto retain my hard-won place of equality, it would never do to arouse anyone until I ascertained the nature of the thing. I am a brave man. I dare to say so; for in fear and trembling I crept upthe companion-way and went back to the spot from which I had first seenthe thing. It had vanished. My bravery was qualified, however. ThoughI could see nothing, I was afraid to go for'ard to the spot where I hadseen the thing. I resumed my pacing up and down, and though I cast manyan anxious glance toward the dread spot, nothing manifested itself. Asmy equanimity returned to me, I concluded that the whole affair had beena trick of the imagination and that I had got what I deserved forallowing my mind to dwell on such matters. Once more my glances for'ard were casual, and not anxious; and then, suddenly, I was a madman, rushing wildly aft. I had seen the thingagain, the long, wavering attenuated substance through which could beseen the fore-rigging. This time I had reached only the break of thepoop when I checked myself. Again I reasoned over the situation, and itwas pride that counselled strongest. I could not afford to make myself alaughing-stock. This thing, whatever it was, I must face alone. I mustwork it out myself. I looked back to the spot where we had tilted theBricklayer. It was vacant. Nothing moved. And for a third time Iresumed my amidships pacing. In the absence of the thing my fear died away and my intellectual poisereturned. Of course it was not a ghost. Dead men did not rise up. Itwas a joke, a cruel joke. My mates of the forecastle, by some unknownmeans, were frightening me. Twice already must they have seen me runaft. My cheeks burned with shame. In fancy I could hear the smotheredchuckling and laughter even then going on in the forecastle. I began togrow angry. Jokes were all very well, but this was carrying the thingtoo far. I was the youngest on board, only a youth, and they had noright to play tricks on me of the order that I well knew in the past hadmade raving maniacs of men and women. I grew angrier and angrier, andresolved to show them that I was made of sterner stuff and at the sametime to wreak my resentment upon them. If the thing appeared again, Imade my mind up that I would go up to it--furthermore, that I would go upto it knife in hand. When within striking distance, I would strike. Ifa man, he would get the knife-thrust he deserved. If a ghost, well, itwouldn't hurt the ghost any, while I would have learned that dead men didrise up. Now I was very angry, and I was quite sure the thing was a trick; butwhen the thing appeared a third time, in the same spot, long, attenuated, and wavering, fear surged up in me and drove most of my anger away. ButI did not run. Nor did I take my eyes from the thing. Both timesbefore, it had vanished while I was running away, so I had not seen themanner of its going. I drew my sheath-knife from my belt and began myadvance. Step by step, nearer and nearer, the effort to control myselfgrew more severe. The struggle was between my will, my identity, my veryself, on the one hand, and on the other, the ten thousand ancestors whowere twisted into the fibres of me and whose ghostly voices werewhispering of the dark and the fear of the dark that had been theirs inthe time when the world was dark and full of terror. I advanced more slowly, and still the thing wavered and flitted withstrange eerie lurches. And then, right before my eyes, it vanished. Isaw it vanish. Neither to the right nor left did it go, nor backward. Right there, while I gazed upon it, it faded away, ceased to be. Ididn't die, but I swear, from what I experienced in those few succeedingmoments, that I know full well that men can die of fright. I stoodthere, knife in hand, swaying automatically to the roll of the ship, paralysed with fear. Had the Bricklayer suddenly seized my throat withcorporeal fingers and proceeded to throttle me, it would have been nomore than I expected. Dead men did rise up, and that would be the mostlikely thing the malignant Bricklayer would do. But he didn't seize my throat. Nothing happened. And, since natureabhors a status, I could not remain there in the one place foreverparalysed. I turned and started aft. I did not run. What was the use?What chance had I against the malevolent world of ghosts? Flight, withme, was the swiftness of my legs. The pursuit, with a ghost, was theswiftness of thought. And there were ghosts. I had seen one. And so, stumbling slowly aft, I discovered the explanation of theseeming. I saw the mizzen topmast lurching across a faint radiance ofcloud behind which was the moon. The idea leaped in my brain. Iextended the line between the cloudy radiance and the mizzen-topmast andfound that it must strike somewhere near the fore-rigging on the portside. Even as I did this, the radiance vanished. The driving clouds ofthe breaking gale were alternately thickening and thinning before theface of the moon, but never exposing the face of the moon. And when theclouds were at their thinnest, it was a very dim radiance that the moonwas able to make. I watched and waited. The next time the cloudsthinned I looked for'ard, and there was the shadow of the topmast, longand attenuated, wavering and lurching on the deck and against therigging. This was my first ghost. Once again have I seen a ghost. It proved tobe a Newfoundland dog, and I don't know which of us was the morefrightened, for I hit that Newfoundland a full right-arm swing to thejaw. Regarding the Bricklayer's ghost, I will say that I never mentionedit to a soul on board. Also, I will say that in all my life I never wentthrough more torment and mental suffering than on that lonely night-watchon the _Sophie Sutherland_. (TO THE EDITOR. --This is not a fiction. It is a true page out of mylife. ) A CLASSIC OF THE SEA Introduction to "_Two Years before the Mast_. " Once in a hundred years is a book written that lives not alone for itsown century but which becomes a document for the future centuries. Sucha book is Dana's. When Marryat's and Cooper's sea novels are gone todust, stimulating and joyful as they have been to generations of men, still will remain "Two Years Before the Mast. " Paradoxical as it may seem, Dana's book is the classic of the sea, notbecause there was anything extraordinary about Dana, but for the precisecontrary reason that he was just an ordinary, normal man, clear-seeing, hard-headed, controlled, fitted with adequate education to go about thework. He brought a trained mind to put down with untroubled vision whathe saw of a certain phase of work-a-day life. There was nothingbrilliant nor fly-away about him. He was not a genius. His heart neverrode his head. He was neither overlorded by sentiment nor hag-ridden byimagination. Otherwise he might have been guilty of the beautifulexaggerations in Melville's "Typee" or the imaginative orgies in thelatter's "Moby Dick. " It was Dana's cool poise that saved him from beingspread-eagled and flogged when two of his mates were so treated; it washis lack of abandon that prevented him from taking up permanently withthe sea, that prevented him from seeing more than one poetical spot, andmore than one romantic spot on all the coast of Old California. Yetthese apparent defects were his strength. They enabled him magnificentlyto write, and for all time, the picture of the sea-life of his time. Written close to the middle of the last century, such has been therevolution worked in man's method of trafficking with the sea, that thelife and conditions described in Dana's book have passed utterly away. Gone are the crack clippers, the driving captains, the hard-bitten butefficient foremast hands. Remain only crawling cargo tanks, dirtytramps, greyhound liners, and a sombre, sordid type of sailing ship. Theonly records broken to-day by sailing vessels are those for slowness. They are no longer built for speed, nor are they manned before the mastby as sturdy a sailor stock, nor aft the mast are they officered by sail-carrying captains and driving mates. Speed is left to the liners, who run the silk, and tea, and spices. Admiralty courts, boards of trade, and underwriters frown upon drivingand sail-carrying. No more are the free-and-easy, dare-devil days, whenfortunes were made in fast runs and lucky ventures, not alone for owners, but for captains as well. Nothing is ventured now. The risks of swiftpassages cannot be abided. Freights are calculated to the last leastfraction of per cent. The captains do no speculating, no bargain-makingfor the owners. The latter attend to all this, and by wire and cablerake the ports of the seven seas in quest of cargoes, and through theiragents make all business arrangements. It has been learned that small crews only, and large carriers only, canreturn a decent interest on the investment. The inevitable corollary isthat speed and spirit are at a discount. There is no discussion of thefact that in the sailing merchant marine the seamen, as a class, havesadly deteriorated. Men no longer sell farms to go to sea. But the timeof which Dana writes was the heyday of fortune-making and adventure onthe sea--with the full connotation of hardship and peril alwaysattendant. It was Dana's fortune, for the sake of the picture, that the _Pilgrim_was an average ship, with an average crew and officers, and managed withaverage discipline. Even the _hazing_ that took place after theCalifornia coast was reached, was of the average sort. The _Pilgrim_savoured not in any way of a hell-ship. The captain, while not thesweetest-natured man in the world, was only an average down-east driver, neither brilliant nor slovenly in his seamanship, neither cruel norsentimental in the treatment of his men. While, on the one hand, therewere no extra liberty days, no delicacies added to the meagre forecastlefare, nor grog or hot coffee on double watches, on the other hand thecrew were not chronically crippled by the continual play ofknuckle-dusters and belaying pins. Once, and once only, were men floggedor ironed--a very fair average for the year 1834, for at that timeflogging on board merchant vessels was already well on the decline. The difference between the sea-life then and now can be no betterepitomised than in Dana's description of the dress of the sailor of hisday: "The trousers tight around the hips, and thence hanging long and loosearound the feet, a superabundance of checked shirt, a low-crowned, well-varnished black hat, worn on the back of the head, with half a fathom ofblack ribbon hanging over the left eye, and a peculiar tie to the blacksilk neckerchief. " Though Dana sailed from Boston only three-quarters of a century ago, muchthat is at present obsolete was then in full sway. For instance, the oldword _larboard_ was still in use. He was a member of the _larboard_watch. The vessel was on the _larboard_ tack. It was only the otherday, because of its similarity in sound to starboard, that _larboard_ waschanged to _port_. Try to imagine "All larboard bowlines on deck!" beingshouted down into the forecastle of a present day ship. Yet that was thecall used on the _Pilgrim_ to fetch Dana and the rest of his watch ondeck. The chronometer, which is merely the least imperfect time-piece man hasdevised, makes possible the surest and easiest method by far ofascertaining longitude. Yet the _Pilgrim_ sailed in a day when thechronometer was just coming into general use. So little was it dependedupon that the _Pilgrim_ carried only one, and that one, going wrong atthe outset, was never used again. A navigator of the present would beaghast if asked to voyage for two years, from Boston, around the Horn toCalifornia, and back again, without a chronometer. In those days such aproceeding was a matter of course, for those were the days when deadreckoning was indeed something to reckon on, when running down thelatitude was a common way of finding a place, and when lunar observationswere direly necessary. It may be fairly asserted that very few merchantofficers of to-day ever make a lunar observation, and that a largepercentage are unable to do it. "Sept. 22nd. , upon coming on deck at seven bells in the morning we foundthe other watch aloft throwing water upon the sails, and looking asternwe saw a small, clipper-built brig with a black hull heading directlyafter us. We went to work immediately, and put all the canvas upon thebrig which we could get upon her, rigging out oars for studding-sailyards; and contined wetting down the sails by buckets of water whipped upto the mast-head . . . She was armed, and full of men, and showed nocolours. " The foregoing sounds like a paragraph from "Midshipman Easy" or the"Water Witch, " rather than a paragraph from the soberest, faithfullest, and most literal chronicle of the sea ever written. And yet the chase bya pirate occurred, on board the brig _Pilgrim_, on September 22nd, 1834--something like only two generations ago. Dana was the thorough-going type of man, not overbalanced and erratic, without quirk or quibble of temperament. He was efficient, but notbrilliant. His was a general all-round efficiency. He was efficient atthe law; he was efficient at college; he was efficient as a sailor; hewas efficient in the matter of pride, when that pride was no more thanthe pride of a forecastle hand, at twelve dollars a month, in hisseaman's task well done, in the smart sailing of his captain, in theclearness and trimness of his ship. There is no sailor whose cockles of the heart will not warm to Dana'sdescription of the first time he sent down a royal yard. Once or twicehe had seen it done. He got an old hand in the crew to coach him. Andthen, the first anchorage at Monterey, being pretty _thick_ with thesecond mate, he got him to ask the mate to be sent up the first time theroyal yards were struck. "Fortunately, " as Dana describes it, "I gotthrough without any word from the officer; and heard the 'well done' ofthe mate, when the yard reached the deck, with as much satisfaction as Iever felt at Cambridge on seeing a 'bene' at the foot of a Latinexercise. " "This was the first time I had taken a weather ear-ring, and I felt not alittle proud to sit astride of the weather yard-arm, past the ear-ring, and sing out 'Haul out to leeward!'" He had been over a year at seabefore he essayed this able seaman's task, but he did it, and he did itwith pride. And with pride, he went down a four-hundred foot cliff, on apair of top-gallant studding-sail halyards bent together, to dislodgeseveral dollars worth of stranded bullock hides, though all the acclaimhe got from his mates was: "What a d-d fool you were to risk your lifefor half a dozen hides!" In brief, it was just this efficiency in pride, as well as work, thatenabled Dana to set down, not merely the photograph detail of life beforethe mast and hide-droghing on the coast of California, but of theuntarnished simple psychology and ethics of the forecastle hands whodroghed the hides, stood at the wheel, made and took in sail, tarred downthe rigging, holystoned the decks, turned in all-standing, grumbled asthey cut about the kid, criticised the seamanship of their officers, andestimated the duration of their exile from the cubic space of the hide-house. JACK LONDONGlen Ellen, California, August 13, 1911. A WICKED WOMAN(Curtain Raiser)BY JACK LONDON Scene--California. Time--Afternoon of a summer day. CHARACTERS LORETTA, A sweet, young thing. Frightfully innocent. About nineteenyears old. Slender, delicate, a fragile flower. Ingenuous. NED BASHFORD, A jaded young man of the world, who has philosophised hisexperiences and who is without faith in the veracity or purity of women. BILLY MARSH, A boy from a country town who is just about as innocent asLoretta. Awkward. Positive. Raw and callow youth. ALICE HEMINGWAY, A society woman, good-hearted, and a match-maker. JACK HEMINGWAY, Her husband. MAID. A WICKED WOMAN [Curtain rises on a conventional living room of a country house inCalifornia. It is the Hemingway house at Santa Clara. The room isremarkable for magnificent stone fireplace at rear centre. On eitherside of fireplace are generous, diamond-paned windows. Wide, curtaineddoorways to right and left. To left, front, table, with vase of flowersand chairs. To right, front, grand piano. ] [Curtain discovers LORETTA seated at piano, not playing, her back to it, facing NED BASHFORD, who is standing. ] LORETTA. [Petulantly, fanning herself with sheet of music. ] No, I won'tgo fishing. It's too warm. Besides, the fish won't bite so early in theafternoon. NED. Oh, come on. It's not warm at all. And anyway, we won't reallyfish. I want to tell you something. LORETTA. [Still petulantly. ] You are always wanting to tell mesomething. NED. Yes, but only in fun. This is different. This is serious. Our. . . My happiness depends upon it. LORETTA. [Speaking eagerly, no longer petulant, looking, serious anddelighted, divining a proposal. ] Then don't wait. Tell me right here. NED. [Almost threateningly. ] Shall I? LORETTA. [Challenging. ] Yes. [He looks around apprehensively as though fearing interruption, clearshis throat, takes resolution, also takes LORETTA's hand. ] [LORETTA is startled, timid, yet willing to hear, naively unable toconceal her love for him. ] NED. [Speaking softly. ] Loretta . . . I, . . . Ever since I met you Ihave-- [JACK HEMINGWAY appears in the doorway to the left, just entering. ] [NED suddenly drops LORETTA's hand. He shows exasperation. ] [LORETTA shows disappointment at interruption. ] NED. Confound it LORETTA. [Shocked. ] Ned! Why will you swear so? NED. [Testily. ] That isn't swearing. LORETTA. What is it, pray? NED. Displeasuring. JACK HEMINGWAY. [Who is crossing over to right. ] Squabbling again? LORETTA. [Indignantly and with dignity. ] No, we're not. NED. [Gruffly. ] What do you want now? JACK HEMINGWAY. [Enthusiastically. ] Come on fishing. NED. [Snappily. ] No. It's too warm. JACK HEMINGWAY. [Resignedly, going out right. ] You needn't take afellow's head off. LORETTA. I thought you wanted to go fishing. NED. Not with Jack. LORETTA. [Accusingly, fanning herself vigorously. ] And you told me itwasn't warm at all. NED. [Speaking softly. ] That isn't what I wanted to tell you, Loretta. [He takes her hand. ] Dear Loretta-- [Enter abruptly ALICE HEMINGWAY from right. ] [LORETTA sharply jerks her hand away, and looks put out. ] [NED tries not to look awkward. ] ALICE HEMINGWAY. Goodness! I thought you'd both gone fishing! LORETTA. [Sweetly. ] Is there anything you want, Alice? NED. [Trying to be courteous. ] Anything I can do? ALICE HEMINGWAY. [Speaking quickly, and trying to withdraw. ] No, no. Ionly came to see if the mail had arrived. LORETTA AND NED [Speaking together. ] No, it hasn't arrived. LORETTA. [Suddenly moving toward door to right. ] I am going to see. [NED looks at her reproachfully. ] [LORETTA looks back tantalisingly from doorway and disappears. ] [NED flings himself disgustedly into Morris chair. ] ALICE HEMINGWAY. [Moving over and standing in front of him. Speaksaccusingly. ] What have you been saying to her? NED. [Disgruntled. ] Nothing. ALICE HEMINGWAY. [Threateningly. ] Now listen to me, Ned. NED. [Earnestly. ] On my word, Alice, I've been saying nothing to her. ALICE HEMINGWAY. [With sudden change of front. ] Then you ought to havebeen saying something to her. NED. [Irritably. Getting chair for her, seating her, and seatinghimself again. ] Look here, Alice, I know your game. You invited me downhere to make a fool of me. ALICE HEMINGWAY. Nothing of the sort, sir. I asked you down to meet asweet and unsullied girl--the sweetest, most innocent and ingenuous girlin the world. NED. [Dryly. ] That's what you said in your letter. ALICE HEMINGWAY. And that's why you came. Jack had been trying for ayear to get you to come. He did not know what kind of a letter to write. NED. If you think I came because of a line in a letter about a girl I'dnever seen-- ALICE HEMINGWAY. [Mockingly. ] The poor, jaded, world-worn man, who isno longer interested in women . . . And girls! The poor, tired pessimistwho has lost all faith in the goodness of women-- NED. For which you are responsible. ALICE HEMINGWAY. [Incredulously. ] I? NED. You are responsible. Why did you throw me over and marry Jack? ALICE HEMINGWAY. Do you want to know? NED. Yes. ALICE HEMINGWAY. [Judiciously. ] First, because I did not love you. Second, because you did not love me. [She smiles at his protesting handand at the protesting expression on his face. ] And third, because therewere just about twenty-seven other women at that time that you loved, orthought you loved. That is why I married Jack. And that is why you lostfaith in the goodness of women. You have only yourself to blame. NED. [Admiringly. ] You talk so convincingly. I almost believe you as Ilisten to you. And yet I know all the time that you are like all therest of your sex--faithless, unveracious, and . . . [He glares at her, but does not proceed. ] ALICE HEMINGWAY. Go on. I'm not afraid. NED. [With finality. ] And immoral. ALICE HEMINGWAY. Oh! You wretch! NED. [Gloatingly. ] That's right. Get angry. You may break thefurniture if you wish. I don't mind. ALICE HEMINGWAY. [With sudden change of front, softly. ] And how aboutLoretta? [NED gasps and remains silent. ] ALICE HEMINGWAY. The depths of duplicity that must lurk under that sweetand innocent exterior . . . According to your philosophy! NED. [Earnestly. ] Loretta is an exception, I confess. She is all thatyou said in your letter. She is a little fairy, an angel. I neverdreamed of anything like her. It is remarkable to find such a woman inthis age. ALICE HEMINGWAY. [Encouragingly. ] She is so naive. NED. [Taking the bait. ] Yes, isn't she? Her face and her tongue betrayall her secrets. ALICE HEMINGWAY. [Nodding her head. ] Yes, I have noticed it. NED. [Delightedly. ] Have you? ALICE HEMINGWAY. She cannot conceal anything. Do you know that sheloves you? NED. [Falling into the trap, eagerly. ] Do you think so? ALICE HEMINGWAY. [Laughing and rising. ] And to think I once permittedyou to make love to me for three weeks! [NED rises. ] [MAID enters from left with letters, which she brings to ALICEHEMINGWAY. ] ALICE HEMINGWAY. [Running over letters. ] None for you, Ned. [Selectingtwo letters for herself. ] Tradesmen. [Handing remainder of letters toMAID. ] And three for Loretta. [Speaking to MAID. ] Put them on thetable, Josie. [MAID puts letters on table to left front, and makes exit to left. ] NED. [With shade of jealousy. ] Loretta seems to have quite acorrespondence. ALICE HEMINGWAY. [With a sigh. ] Yes, as I used to when I was a girl. NED. But hers are family letters. ALICE HEMINGWAY. Yes, I did not notice any from Billy. NED. [Faintly. ] Billy? ALICE HEMINGWAY. [Nodding. ] Of course she has told you about him? NED. [Gasping. ] She has had lovers . . . Already? ALICE HEMINGWAY. And why not? She is nineteen. NED. [Haltingly. ] This . . . Er . . . This Billy . . . ? ALICE HEMINGWAY. [Laughing and putting her hand reassuringly on hisarm. ] Now don't be alarmed, poor, tired philosopher. She doesn't loveBilly at all. [LORETTA enters from right. ] ALICE HEMINGWAY. [To LORETTA, nodding toward table. ] Three letters foryou. LORETTA. [Delightedly. ] Oh! Thank you. [LORETTA trips swiftly across to table, looks at letters, sits down, opens letters, and begins to read. ] NED. [Suspiciously. ] But Billy? ALICE HEMINGWAY. I am afraid he loves her very hard. That is why she ishere. They had to send her away. Billy was making life miserable forher. They were little children together--playmates. And Billy has been, well, importunate. And Loretta, poor child, does not know anything aboutmarriage. That is all. NED. [Reassured. ] Oh, I see. [ALICE HEMINGWAY starts slowly toward right exit, continuing conversationand accompanied by NED. ] ALICE HEMINGWAY. [Calling to LORETTA. ] Are you going fishing, Loretta? [LORETTA looks up from letter and shakes head. ] ALICE HEMINGWAY. [To NED. ] Then you're not, I suppose? NED. No, it's too warm. ALICE HEMINGWAY. Then I know the place for you. NED. Where? ALICE HEMINGWAY. Right here. [Looks significantly in direction ofLORETTA. ] Now is your opportunity to say what you ought to say. [ALICE HEMINGWAY laughs teasingly and goes out to right. ] [NED hesitates, starts to follow her, looks at LORETTA, and stops. Hetwists his moustache and continues to look at her meditatively. ] [LORETTA is unaware of his presence and goes on reading. Finishesletter, folds it, replaces in envelope, looks up, and discovers NED. ] LORETTA. [Startled. ] Oh! I thought you were gone. NED. [Walking across to her. ] I thought I'd stay and finish ourconversation. LORETTA. [Willingly, settling herself to listen. ] Yes, you were goingto . . . [Drops eyes and ceases talking. ] NED. [Taking her hand, tenderly. ] I little dreamed when I came downhere visiting that I was to meet my destiny in--[Abruptly releasesLORETTA's hand. ] [MAID enters from left with tray. ] [LORETTA glances into tray and discovers that it is empty. She looksinquiringly at MAID. ] MAID. A gentleman to see you. He hasn't any card. He said for me totell you that it was Billy. LORETTA. [Starting, looking with dismay and appeal to NED. ] Oh! . . . Ned! NED [Gracefully and courteously, rising to his feet and preparing togo. ] If you'll excuse me now, I'll wait till afterward to tell you whatI wanted. LORETTA. [In dismay. ] What shall I do? NED. [Pausing. ] Don't you want to see him? [LORETTA shakes her head. ]Then don't. LORETTA. [Slowly. ] I can't do that. We are old friends. We . . . Werechildren together. [To the MAID. ] Send him in. [To NED, who hasstarted to go out toward right. ] Don't go, Ned. [MAID makes exit to left. ] NED. [Hesitating a moment. ] I'll come back. [NED makes exit to right. ] [LORETTA, left alone on stage, shows perturbation and dismay. ] [BILLY enters from left. Stands in doorway a moment. His shoes aredusty. He looks overheated. His eyes and face brighten at sight ofLORETTA. ] BILLY. [Stepping forward, ardently. ] Loretta! LORETTA. [Not exactly enthusiastic in her reception, going slowly tomeet him. ] You never said you were coming. [BILLY shows that he expects to kiss her, but she merely shakes hishand. ] BILLY. [Looking down at his very dusty shoes. ] I walked from thestation. LORETTA. If you had let me know, the carriage would have been sent foryou. BILLY. [With expression of shrewdness. ] If I had let you know, youwouldn't have let me come. [BILLY looks around stage cautiously, then tries to kiss her. ] LORETTA. [Refusing to be kissed. ] Won't you sit down? BILLY. [Coaxingly. ] Go on, just one. [LORETTA shakes head and holdshim off. ] Why not? We're engaged. LORETTA. [With decision. ] We're not. You know we're not. You know Ibroke it off the day before I came away. And . . . And . . . You'dbetter sit down. [BILLY sits down on edge of chair. LORETTA seats herself by table. Billy, without rising, jerks his chair forward till they are facing eachother, his knees touching hers. He yearns toward her. She moves backher chair slightly. ] BILLY. [With supreme confidence. ] That's what I came to see you for--toget engaged over again. [BILLY hudges chair forward and tries to take her hand. ] [LORETTA hudges her chair back. ] BILLY. [Drawing out large silver watch and looking at it. ] Now lookhere, Loretta, I haven't any time to lose. I've got to leave for thattrain in ten minutes. And I want you to set the day. LORETTA. But we're not engaged, Billy. So there can't be any setting ofthe day. BILLY. [With confidence. ] But we're going to be. [Suddenly breakingout. ] Oh, Loretta, if you only knew how I've suffered. That first nightI didn't sleep a wink. I haven't slept much ever since. [Hudges chairforward. ] I walk the floor all night. [Solemnly. ] Loretta, I don't eatenough to keep a canary bird alive. Loretta . . . [Hudges chairforward. ] LORETTA. [Hudging her chair back maternally. ] Billy, what you need is atonic. Have you seen Doctor Haskins? BILLY. [Looking at watch and evincing signs of haste. ] Loretta, when agirl kisses a man, it means she is going to marry him. LORETTA. I know it, Billy. But . . . [She glances toward letters ontable. ] Captain Kitt doesn't want me to marry you. He says . . . [Shetakes letter and begins to open it. ] BILLY. Never mind what Captain Kitt says. He wants you to stay and becompany for your sister. He doesn't want you to marry me because heknows she wants to keep you. LORETTA. Daisy doesn't want to keep me. She wants nothing but my ownhappiness. She says--[She takes second letter from table and begins toopen it. ] BILLY. Never mind what Daisy says-- LORETTA. [Taking third letter from table and beginning to open it. ] AndMartha says-- BILLY. [Angrily. ] Darn Martha and the whole boiling of them! LORETTA. [Reprovingly. ] Oh, Billy! BILLY. [Defensively. ] Darn isn't swearing, and you know it isn't. [There is an awkward pause. Billy has lost the thread of theconversation and has vacant expression. ] BILLY. [Suddenly recollecting. ] Never mind Captain Kitt, and Daisy, andMartha, and what they want. The question is, what do you want? LORETTA. [Appealingly. ] Oh, Billy, I'm so unhappy. BILLY. [Ignoring the appeal and pressing home the point. ] The thing is, do you want to marry me? [He looks at his watch. ] Just answer that. LORETTA. Aren't you afraid you'll miss that train? BILLY. Darn the train! LORETTA. [Reprovingly. ] Oh, Billy! BILLY. [Most irascibly. ] Darn isn't swearing. [Plaintively. ] That'sthe way you always put me off. I didn't come all the way here for atrain. I came for you. Now just answer me one thing. Do you want tomarry me? LORETTA. [Firmly. ] No, I don't want to marry you. BILLY. [With assurance. ] But you've got to, just the same. LORETTA. [With defiance. ] Got to? BILLY. [With unshaken assurance. ] That's what I said--got to. And I'llsee that you do. LORETTA. [Blazing with anger. ] I am no longer a child. You can't bullyme, Billy Marsh! BILLY. [Coolly. ] I'm not trying to bully you. I'm trying to save yourreputation. LORETTA. [Faintly. ] Reputation? BILLY. [Nodding. ] Yes, reputation. [He pauses for a moment, thenspeaks very solemnly. ] Loretta, when a woman kisses a man, she's got tomarry him. LORETTA. [Appalled, faintly. ] Got to? BILLY. [Dogmatically. ] It is the custom. LORETTA. [Brokenly. ] And when . . . A . . . A woman kisses a man anddoesn't . . . Marry him . . . ? BILLY. Then there is a scandal. That's where all the scandals you seein the papers come from. [BILLY looks at watch. ] [LORETTA in silent despair. ] LORETTA. [In abasement. ] You are a good man, Billy. [Billy shows thathe believes it. ] And I am a very wicked woman. BILLY. No, you're not, Loretta. You just didn't know. LORETTA. [With a gleam of hope. ] But you kissed me first. BILLY. It doesn't matter. You let me kiss you. LORETTA. [Hope dying down. ] But not at first. BILLY. But you did afterward and that's what counts. You let me you inthe grape-arbour. You let me-- LORETTA. [With anguish] Don't! Don't! BILLY. [Relentlessly. ]--kiss you when you were playing the piano. Youlet me kiss you that day of the picnic. And I can't remember all thetimes you let me kiss you good night. LORETTA. [Beginning to weep. ] Not more than five. BILLY. [With conviction. ] Eight at least. LORETTA. [Reproachfully, still weeping. ] You told me it was all right. BILLY. [Emphatically. ] So it was all right--until you said you wouldn'tmarry me after all. Then it was a scandal--only no one knows it yet. Ifyou marry me no one ever will know it. [Looks at watch. ] I've got togo. [Stands up. ] Where's my hat? LORETTA. [Sobbing. ] This is awful. BILLY. [Approvingly. ] You bet it's awful. And there's only one wayout. [Looks anxiously about for hat. ] What do you say? LORETTA. [Brokenly. ] I must think. I'll write to you. [Faintly. ] Thetrain? Your hat's in the hall. BILLY. [Looks at watch, hastily tries to kiss her, succeeds only inshaking hand, starts across stage toward left. ] All right. You write tome. Write to-morrow. [Stops for a moment in doorway and speaks verysolemnly. ] Remember, Loretta, there must be no scandal. [Billy goes out. ] [LORETTA sits in chair quietly weeping. Slowly dries eyes, rises fromchair, and stands, undecided as to what she will do next. ] [NED enters from right, peeping. Discovers that LORETTA is alone, andcomes quietly across stage to her. When NED comes up to her she beginsweeping again and tries to turn her head away. NED catches both herhands in his and compels her to look at him. She weeps harder. ] NED. [Putting one arm protectingly around her shoulder and drawing hertoward him. ] There, there, little one, don't cry. LORETTA. [Turning her face to his shoulder like a tired child, sobbing. ]Oh, Ned, if you only knew how wicked I am. NED. [Smiling indulgently. ] What is the matter, little one? Has yourdearly beloved sister failed to write to you? [LORETTA shakes head. ] HasHemingway been bullying you? [LORETTA shakes head. ] Then it must havebeen that caller of yours? [Long pause, during which LORETTA's weepinggrows more violent. ] Tell me what's the matter, and we'll see what I cando. [He lightly kisses her hair--so lightly that she does not know. ] LORETTA. [Sobbing. ] I can't. You will despise me. Oh, Ned, I am soashamed. NED. [Laughing incredulously. ] Let us forget all about it. I want totell you something that may make me very happy. My fondest hope is thatit will make you happy, too. Loretta, I love you-- LORETTA. [Uttering a sharp cry of delight, then moaning. ] Too late! NED. [Surprised. ] Too late? LORETTA. [Still moaning. ] Oh, why did I? [NED somewhat stiffens. ] Iwas so young. I did not know the world then. NED. What is it all about anyway? LORETTA. Oh, I . . . He . . . Billy . . . I am a wicked woman, Ned. Iknow you will never speak to me again. NED. This . . . Er . . . This Billy--what has he been doing? LORETTA. I . . . He . . . I didn't know. I was so young. I could nothelp it. Oh, I shall go mad, I shall go mad! [NED's encircling arm goes limp. He gently disengages her and depositsher in big chair. ] [LORETTA buries her face and sobs afresh. ] NED. [Twisting moustache fiercely, regarding her dubiously, hesitating amoment, then drawing up chair and sitting down. ] I . . . I do notunderstand. LORETTA. [Wailing. ] I am so unhappy! NED. [Inquisitorially. ] Why unhappy? LORETTA. Because . . . He . . . He wants to marry me. NED. [His face brightening instantly, leaning forward and laying a handsoothingly on hers. ] That should not make any girl unhappy. Because youdon't love him is no reason--[Abruptly breaking off. ] Of course youdon't love him? [LORETTA shakes her head and shoulders vigorously. ]What? LORETTA. [Explosively. ] No, I don't love Billy! I don't want to loveBilly! NED. [With confidence. ] Because you don't love him is no reason thatyou should be unhappy just because he has proposed to you. LORETTA. [Sobbing. ] That's the trouble. I wish I did love him. Oh, Iwish I were dead. NED. [Growing complacent. ] Now my dear child, you are worrying yourselfover trifles. [His second hand joins the first in holding her hands. ]Women do it every day. Because you have changed your mind, or did notknow you mind, because you have--to use an unnecessarily harshword--jilted a man-- LORETTA. [Interrupting, raising her head and looking at him. ] Jilted?Oh Ned, if that were a all! NED. [Hollow voice. ] All! [NED's hands slowly retreat from hers. He opens his mouth as though tospeak further, then changes his mind and remains silent. ] LORETTA. [Protestingly. ] But I don't want to marry him! NED. Then I shouldn't. LORETTA. But I ought to marry him. NED. _Ought_ to marry him? [LORETTA nods. ] That is a strong word. LORETTA. [Nodding. ] I know it is. [Her lips are trembling, but shestrives for control and manages to speak more calmly. ] I am a wickedwoman. A terrible wicked woman. No one knows how wicked I am . . . Except Billy. NED. [Starting, looking at her queerly. ] He . . . Billy knows? [LORETTAnods. He debates with himself a moment. ] Tell me about it. You musttell me all of it. LORETTA. [Faintly, as though about to weep again. ] All of it? NED. [Firmly. ] Yes, all of it. LORETTA. [Haltingly. ] And . . . Will . . . You . . . Ever . . . Forgive. . . Me? NED. [Drawing a long, breath, desperately. ] Yes, I'll forgive you. Goahead. LORETTA. There was no one to tell me. We were with each other so much. I did not know anything of the world . . . Then. [Pauses. ] NED. [Impatiently. ] Go on. LORETTA. If I had only known. [Pauses. ] NED. [Biting his lip and clenching his hands. ] Yes, yes. Go on. LORETTA. We were together almost every evening. NED. [Savagely. ] Billy? LORETTA. Yes, of course, Billy. We were with each other so much . . . If I had only known . . . There was no one to tell me . . . I was soyoung . . . [Breaks down crying. ] NED. [Leaping to his feet, explosively. ] The scoundrel! LORETTA. [Lifting her head. ] Billy is not a scoundrel . . . He . . . He. . . Is a good man. NED. [Sarcastically. ] I suppose you'll be telling me next that it wasall your fault. [LORETTA nods. ] What! LORETTA. [Steadily. ] It was all my fault. I should never have let him. I was to blame. NED. [Paces up and down for a minute, stops in front of her, and speakswith resignation. ] All right. I don't blame you in the least, Loretta. And you have been very honest. It is . . . Er . . . Commendable. ButBilly is right, and you are wrong. You must get married. LORETTA. [In dim, far-away voice. ] To Billy? NED. Yes, to Billy. I'll see to it. Where does he live? I'll makehim. If he won't I'll . . . I'll shoot him! LORETTA. [Crying out with alarm. ] Oh, Ned, you won't do that? NED. [Sternly. ] I shall. LORETTA. But I don't want to marry Billy. NED. [Sternly. ] You must. And Billy must. Do you understand? It isthe only thing. LORETTA. That's what Billy said. NED. [Triumphantly. ] You see, I am right. LORETTA. And if . . . If I don't marry him . . . There will be . . . Scandal? NED. [Calmly. ] Yes, there will be scandal. LORETTA. That's what Billy said. Oh, I am so unhappy! [LORETTA breaks down into violent weeping. ] [NED paces grimly up and down, now and again fiercely twisting hismoustache. ] LORETTA. [Face buried, sobbing and crying all the time. ] I don't want to leave Daisy! I don't want to leave Daisy! What shall Ido? What shall I do? How was I to know? He didn't tell me. Nobodyelse ever kissed me. [NED stops curiously to listen. As he listens hisface brightens. ] I never dreamed a kiss could be so terrible . . . Until. . . Until he told me. He only told me this morning. NED. [Abruptly. ] Is that what you are crying about? LORETTA. [Reluctantly. ] N-no. NED. [In hopeless voice, the brightness gone out of his face, about tobegin pacing again. ] Then what are you crying about? LORETTA. Because you said I had to marry Billy. I don't want to marryBilly. I don't want to leave Daisy. I don't know what I want. I wish Iwere dead. NED. [Nerving himself for another effort. ] Now look here, Loretta, besensible. What is this about kisses? You haven't told me everythingafter all. LORETTA. I . . . I don't want to tell you everything. NED. [Imperatively. ] You must. LORETTA. [Surrendering. ] Well, then . . . Must I? NED. You must. LORETTA. [Floundering. ] He . . . I . . . We . . . I let him, and hekissed me. NED. [Desperately, controlling himself. ] Go on. LORETTA. He says eight, but I can't think of more than five times. NED. Yes, go on. LORETTA. That's all. NED. [With vast incredulity. ] All? LORETTA. [Puzzled. ] All? NED. [Awkwardly. ] I mean . . . Er . . . Nothing worse? LORETTA. [Puzzled. ] Worse? As though there could be. Billy said-- NED. [Interrupting. ] When? LORETTA. This afternoon. Just now. Billy said that my . . . Our . . . Our . . . Our kisses were terrible if we didn't get married. NED. What else did he say? LORETTA. He said that when a woman permitted a man to kiss her shealways married him. That it was awful if she didn't. It was the custom, he said; and I say it is a bad, wicked custom, and it has broken myheart. I shall never be happy again. I know I am terrible, but I can'thelp it. I must have been born wicked. NED. [Absent-mindedly bringing out a cigarette and striking a match. ] Doyou mind if I smoke? [Coming to himself again, and flinging away matchand cigarette. ] I beg your pardon. I don't want to smoke. I didn'tmean that at all. What I mean is . . . [He bends over LORETTA, catchesher hands in his, then sits on arm of chair, softly puts one arm aroundher, and is about to kiss her. ] LORETTA. [With horror, repulsing him. ] No! No! NED. [Surprised. ] What's the matter? LORETTA. [Agitatedly. ] Would you make me a wickeder woman than I am? NED. A kiss? LORETTA. There will be another scandal. That would make two scandals. NED. To kiss the woman I love . . . A scandal? LORETTA. Billy loves me, and he said so. NED. Billy is a joker . . . Or else he is as innocent as you. LORETTA. But you said so yourself. NED. [Taken aback. ] I? LORETTA. Yes, you said it yourself, with your own lips, not ten minutesago. I shall never believe you again. NED. [Masterfully putting arm around her and drawing her toward him. ]And I am a joker, too, and a very wicked man. Nevertheless, you musttrust me. There will be nothing wrong. LORETTA. [Preparing to yield. ] And no . . . Scandal? NED. Scandal fiddlesticks. Loretta, I want you to be my wife. [Hewaits anxiously. ] [JACK HEMINGWAY, in fishing costume, appears in doorway to right andlooks on. ] NED. You might say something. LORETTA. I will . . . If . . . [ALICE HEMINGWAY appears in doorway to left and looks on. ] NED. [In suspense. ] Yes, go on. LORETTA. If I don't have to marry Billy. NED. [Almost shouting. ] You can't marry both of us! LORETTA. [Sadly, repulsing him with her hands. ] Then, Ned, I cannotmarry you. NED. [Dumbfounded. ] W-what? LORETTA. [Sadly. ] Because I can't marry both of you. NED. Bosh and nonsense! LORETTA. I'd like to marry you, but . . . NED. There is nothing to prevent you. LORETTA. [With sad conviction. ] Oh, yes, there is. You said yourselfthat I had to marry Billy. You said you would s-s-shoot him if hedidn't. NED. [Drawing her toward him. ] Nevertheless . . . LORETTA. [Slightly holding him off. ] And it isn't the custom . . . What. . . Billy said? NED. No, it isn't the custom. Now, Loretta, will you marry me? LORETTA. [Pouting demurely. ] Don't be angry with me, Ned. [He gathersher into his arms and kisses her. She partially frees herself, gasping. ]I wish it were the custom, because now I'd have to marry you, Ned, wouldn't I? [NED and LORETTA kiss a second time and profoundly. ] [JACK HEMINGWAY chuckles. ] [NED and LORETTA, startled, but still in each other's arms, look around. NED looks sillily at ALICE HEMINGWAY. LORETTA looks at JACK HEMINGWAY. ] LORETTA. I don't care. CURTAIN THE BIRTH MARKSKETCH BY JACK LONDON written for Robert and Julia Fitzsimmons SCENE--One of the club rooms of the West Bay Athletic Club. Near centrefront is a large table covered with newspapers and magazines. At left apunching-bag apparatus. At right, against wall, a desk, on which rests adesk-telephone. Door at rear toward left. On walls are framed picturesof pugilists, conspicuous among which is one of Robert Fitzsimmons. Appropriate furnishings, etc. , such as foils, clubs, dumb-bells andtrophies. [Enter MAUD SYLVESTER. ] [She is dressed as a man, in evening clothes, preferably a Tuxedo. Inher hand is a card, and under her arm a paper-wrapped parcel. She peepsabout curiously and advances to table. She is timorous and excited, elated and at the same time frightened. Her eyes are dancing withexcitement. ] MAUD. [Pausing by table. ] Not a soul saw me. I wonder where everybodyis. And that big brother of mine said I could not get in. [She readsback of card. ] "Here is my card, Maudie. If you can use it, go ahead. But you will never get inside the door. I consider my bet as good aswon. " [Looking up, triumphantly. ] You do, do you? Oh, if you could seeyour little sister now. Here she is, inside. [Pauses, and looks about. ]So this is the West Bay Athletic Club. No women allowed. Well, here Iam, if I don't look like one. [Stretches out one leg and then the other, and looks at them. Leaving card and parcel on table, she struts aroundlike a man, looks at pictures of pugilists on walls, reading aloud theirnames and making appropriate remarks. But she stops before the portraitof Fitzsimmons and reads aloud. ] "Robert Fitzsimmons, the greatestwarrior of them all. " [Clasps hands, and looking up at portraitmurmurs. ] Oh, you dear! [Continues strutting around, imitating what she considers are a man'sstride and swagger, returns to table and proceeds to unwrap parcel. ]Well, I'll go out like a girl, if I did come in like a man. [Dropswrapping paper on table and holds up a woman's long automobile cloak anda motor bonnet. Is suddenly startled by sound of approaching footstepsand glances in a frightened way toward door. ] Mercy! Here comessomebody now! [Glances about her in alarm, drops cloak and bonnet onfloor close to table, seizes a handful of newspapers, and runs to largeleather chair to right of table, where she seats herself hurriedly. Onepaper she holds up before her, hiding her face as she pretends to read. Unfortunately the paper is upside down. The other papers lie on herlap. ] [Enter ROBERT FITZSIMMONS. ] [He looks about, advances to table, takes out cigarette case and is aboutto select one, when he notices motor cloak and bonnet on floor. He layscigarette case on table and picks them up. They strike him as profoundlycurious things to be in a club room. He looks at MAUD, then sees card ontable. He picks it up and reach it to himself, then looks at her withcomprehension. Hidden by her newspaper, she sees nothing. He looks atcard again and reads and speaks in an aside. ] FITZSIMMONS. "Maudie. John H. Sylvester. " That must be JackSylvester's sister Maud. [FITZSIMMONS shows by his expression that he isgoing to play a joke. Tossing cloak and bonnet under the table he placescard in his vest pocket, selects a chair, sits down, and looks at MAUD. He notes paper is upside down, is hugely tickled, and laughs silently. ]Hello! [Newspaper is agitated by slight tremor. He speaks more loudly. ]Hello! [Newspaper shakes badly. He speaks very loudly. ] Hello! MAUD. [Peeping at him over top of paper and speaking hesitatingly. ] H-h-hello! FITZSIMMONS. [Gruffly. ] You are a queer one, reading a paper upsidedown. MAUD. [Lowering newspaper and trying to appear at ease. ] It's quite atrick, isn't it? I often practise it. I'm real clever at it, you know. FITZSIMMONS. [Grunts, then adds. ] Seems to me I have seen you before. MAUD. [Glancing quickly from his face to portrait and back again. ] Yes, and I know you--You are Robert Fitzsimmons. FITZSIMMONS. I thought I knew you. MAUD. Yes, it was out in San Francisco. My people still live there. I'mjust--ahem--doing New York. FITZSIMMONS. But I don't quite remember the name. MAUD. Jones--Harry Jones. FITZSIMMONS. [Hugely delighted, leaping from chair and striding over toher. ] Sure. [Slaps her resoundingly on shoulder. ] [She is nearly crushed by the weight of the blow, and at the same timeshocked. She scrambles to her feet. ] FITZSIMMONS. Glad to see you, Harry. [He wrings her hand, so that ithurts. ] Glad to see you again, Harry. [He continues wringing her handand pumping her arm. ] MAUD. [Struggling to withdraw her hand and finally succeeding. Hervoice is rather faint. ] Ye-es, er . . . Bob . . . Er . . . Glad to seeyou again. [She looks ruefully at her bruised fingers and sinks intochair. Then, recollecting her part, she crosses her legs in a mannishway. ] FITZSIMMONS. [Crossing to desk at right, against which he leans, facingher. ] You were a wild young rascal in those San Francisco days. [Chuckling. ] Lord, Lord, how it all comes back to me. MAUD. [Boastfully. ] I was wild--some. FITZSIMMONS. [Grinning. ] I should say! Remember that night I put youto bed? MAUD. [Forgetting herself, indignantly. ] Sir! FITZSIMMONS. You were . . . Er . . . Drunk. MAUD. I never was! FITZSIMMONS. Surely you haven't forgotten that night! You began withdropping champagne bottles out of the club windows on the heads of thepeople on the sidewalk, and you wound up by assaulting a cabman. And letme tell you I saved you from a good licking right there, and squared itwith the police. Don't you remember? MAUD. [Nodding hesitatingly. ] Yes, it is beginning to come back to me. I was a bit tight that night. FITZSIMMONS. [Exultantly. ] A bit tight! Why, before I could get you tobed you insisted on telling me the story of your life. MAUD. Did I? I don't remember that. FITZSIMMONS. I should say not. You were past remembering anything bythat time. You had your arms around my neck-- MAUD. [Interrupting. ] Oh! FITZSIMMONS. And you kept repeating over and over, "Bob, dear Bob. " MAUD. [Springing to her feet. ] Oh! I never did! [Recollectingherself. ] Perhaps I must have. I was a trifle wild in those days, Iadmit. But I'm wise now. I've sowed my wild oats and steadied down. FITZSIMMONS. I'm glad to hear that, Harry. You were tearing off apretty fast pace in those days. [Pause, in which MAUD nods. ] Stillpunch the bag? MAUD. [In quick alarm, glancing at punching bag. ] No, I've got out ofthe hang of it. FITZSIMMONS. [Reproachfully. ] You haven't forgotten thatright-and-left, arm, elbow and shoulder movement I taught you? MAUD. [With hesitation. ] N-o-o. FITZSIMMONS. [Moving toward bag to left. ] Then, come on. MAUD. [Rising reluctantly and following. ] I'd rather see you punch thebag. I'd just love to. FITZSIMMONS. I will, afterward. You go to it first. MAUD. [Eyeing the bag in alarm. ] No; you. I'm out of practice. FITZSIMMONS. [Looking at her sharply. ] How many drinks have you had to-night? MAUD. Not a one. I don't drink--that is--er--only occasionally. FITZSIMMONS. [Indicating bag. ] Then go to it. MAUD. No; I tell you I am out of practice. I've forgotten it all. Yousee, I made a discovery. [Pauses. ] FITZSIMMONS. Yes? MAUD. I--I--you remember what a light voice I always had--almostsoprano? [FITZSIMMONS nods. ] MAUD. Well, I discovered it was a perfect falsetto. [FITZSIMMONS nods. ] MAUD. I've been practising it ever since. Experts, in another room, would swear it was a woman's voice. So would you, if you turned yourback and I sang. FITZSIMMONS. [Who has been laughing incredulously, now becomessuspicious. ] Look here, kid, I think you are an impostor. You are notHarry Jones at all. MAUD. I am, too. FITZSIMMONS. I don't believe it. He was heavier than you. MAUD. I had the fever last summer and lost a lot of weight. FITZSIMMONS. You are the Harry Jones that got sousesd and had to be putto bed? MAUD. Y-e-s. FITZSIMMONS. There is one thing I remember very distinctly. Harry Joneshad a birth mark on his knee. [He looks at her legs searchingly. ] MAUD. [Embarrassed, then resolving to carry it out. ] Yes, right here. [She advances right leg and touches it. ] FITZSIMMONS. [Triumphantly. ] Wrong. It was the other knee. MAUD. I ought to know. FITZSIMMONS. You haven't any birth mark at all. MAUD. I have, too. FITZSIMMONS. [Suddenly springing to her and attempting to seize herleg. ] Then we'll prove it. Let me see. MAUD. [In a panic backs away from him and resists his attempts, untilgrinning in an aside to the audience, he gives over. She, in an aside toaudience. ] Fancy his wanting to see my birth mark. FITZSIMMONS. [Bullying. ] Then take a go at the bag. [She shakes herhead. ] You're not Harry Jones. MAUD. [Approaching punching bag. ] I am, too. FITZSIMMONS. Then hit it. MAUD. [Resolving to attempt it, hits bag several nice blows, and then isstruck on the nose by it. ] Oh! [Recovering herself and rubbing her nose. ] I told you I was out ofpractice. You punch the bag, Bob. FITZSIMMONS. I will, if you will show me what you can do with thatwonderful soprano voice of yours. MAUD. I don't dare. Everybody would think there was a woman in theclub. FITZSIMMONS. [Shaking his head. ] No, they won't. They've all gone tothe fight. There's not a soul in the building. MAUD. [Alarmed, in a weak voice. ] Not--a--soul--in--the building? FITZSIMMONS. Not a soul. Only you and I. MAUD. [Starting hurriedly toward door. ] Then I must go. FITZSIMMONS. What's your hurry? Sing. MAUD. [Turning back with new resolve. ] Let me see you punch thebag, --er--Bob. FITZSIMMONS. You sing first. MAUD. No; you punch first. FITZSIMMONS. I don't believe you are Harry-- MAUD. [Hastily. ] All right, I'll sing. You sit down over there andturn your back. [FITZSIMMONS obeys. ] [MAUD walks over to the table toward right. She is about to sing, whenshe notices FITZSIMMONS' cigarette case, picks it up, and in an asidereads his name on it and speaks. ] MAUD. "Robert Fitzsimmons. " That will prove to my brother that I havebeen here. FITZSIMMONS. Hurry up. [MAUD hastily puts cigarette case in her pocket and begins to sing. ] SONG [During the song FITZSIMMONS turns his head slowly and looks at her withgrowing admiration. ] MAUD. How did you like it? FITZSIMMONS. [Gruffly. ] Rotten. Anybody could tell it was a boy'svoice-- MAUD. Oh! FITZSIMMONS. It is rough and coarse and it cracked on every high note. MAUD. Oh! Oh! [Recollecting herself and shrugging her shoulders. ] Oh, very well. Nowlet's see if you can do any better with the bag. [FITZSIMMONS takes off coat and gives exhibition. ] [MAUD looks on in an ecstasy of admiration. ] MAUD. [As he finishes. ] Beautiful! Beautiful! [FITZSIMMONS puts on coat and goes over and sits down near table. ]Nothing like the bag to limber one up. I feel like a fighting cock. Harry, let's go out on a toot, you and I. MAUD. Wh-a-a-t? FITZSIMMONS. A toot. You know--one of those rip-snorting nights youused to make. MAUD. [Emphatically, as she picks up newspapers from leather chair, sitsdown, and places them on her lap. ] I'll do nothing of the sort. I've--I've reformed. FITZSIMMONS. You used to joy-ride like the very devil. MAUD. I know it. FITZSIMMONS. And you always had a pretty girl or two along. MAUD. [Boastfully, in mannish, fashion. ] Oh, I still have my fling. Doyou know any--well, --er, --nice girls? FITZSIMMONS. Sure. MAUD. Put me wise. FITZSIMMONS. Sure. You know Jack Sylvester? MAUD. [Forgetting herself. ] He's my brother-- FITZSIMMONS. [Exploding. ] What! MAUD. --In-law's first cousin. FITZSIMMONS. Oh! MAUD. So you see I don't know him very well. I only met him once--atthe club. We had a drink together. FITZSIMMONS. Then you don't know his sister? MAUD. [Starting. ] His sister? I--I didn't know he had a sister. FITZSIMMONS. [Enthusiastically. ] She's a peach. A queen. A little bitof all right. A--a loo-loo. MAUD. [Flattered. ] She is, is she? FITZSIMMONS. She's a scream. You ought to get acquainted with her. MAUD. [Slyly. ] You know her, then? FITZSIMMONS. You bet. MAUD. [Aside. ] Oh, ho! [To FITZSIMMONS. ] Know her very well? FITZSIMMONS. I've taken her out more times than I can remember. You'lllike her, I'm sure. MAUD. Thanks. Tell me some more about her. FITZSIMMONS. She dresses a bit loud. But you won't mind that. Andwhatever you do, don't take her to eat. MAUD. [Hiding her chagrin. ] Why not? FITZSIMMONS. I never saw such an appetite-- MAUD. Oh! FITZSIMMONS. It's fair sickening. She must have a tapeworm. And shethinks she can sing. MAUD. Yes? FITZSIMMONS. Rotten. You can do better yourself, and that's not sayingmuch. She's a nice girl, really she is, but she is the black sheep ofthe family. Funny, isn't it? MAUD. [Weak voice. ] Yes, funny. FITZSIMMONS. Her brother Jack is all right. But he can't do anythingwith her. She's a--a-- MAUD. [Grimly. ] Yes. Go on. FITZSIMMONS. A holy terror. She ought to be in a reform school. MAUD. [Springing to her feet and slamming newspapers in his face. ] Oh!Oh! Oh! You liar! She isn't anything of the sort! FITZSIMMONS. [Recovering from the onslaught and making believe he isangry, advancing threateningly on her. ] Now I'm going to put a head onyou. You young hoodlum. MAUD. [All alarm and contrition, backing away from him. ] Don't! Pleasedon't! I'm sorry! I apologise. I--I beg your pardon, Bob. Only Idon't like to hear girls talked about that way, even--even if it is true. And you ought to know. FITZSIMMONS. [Subsiding and resuming seat. ] You've changed a lot, Imust say. MAUD. [Sitting down in leather chair. ] I told you I'd reformed. Let ustalk about something else. Why is it girls like prize-fighters? Ishould think--ahem--I mean it seems to me that girls would think prize-fighters horrid. FITZSIMMONS. They are men. MAUD. But there is so much crookedness in the game. One hears about itall the time. FITZSIMMONS. There are crooked men in every business and profession. Thebest fighters are not crooked. MAUD. I--er--I thought they all faked fights when there was enough init. FITZSIMMONS. Not the best ones. MAUD. Did you--er--ever fake a fight? FITZSIMMONS. [Looking at her sharply, then speaking solemnly. ] Yes. Once. MAUD. [Shocked, speaking sadly. ] And I always heard of you and thoughtof you as the one clean champion who never faked. FITZSIMMONS. [Gently and seriously. ] Let me tell you about it. It wasdown in Australia. I had just begun to fight my way up. It was with oldBill Hobart out at Rushcutters Bay. I threw the fight to him. MAUD. [Repelled, disgusted. ] Oh! I could not have believed it of you. FITZSIMMONS. Let me tell you about it. Bill was an old fighter. Not anold man, you know, but he'd been in the fighting game a long time. Hewas about thirty-eight and a gamer man never entered the ring. But hewas in hard luck. Younger fighters were coming up, and he was beingcrowded out. At that time it wasn't often he got a fight and the purseswere small. Besides it was a drought year in Australia. You don't knowwhat that means. It means that the rangers are starved. It means thatthe sheep are starved and die by the millions. It means that there is nomoney and no work, and that the men and women and kiddies starve. Bill Hobart had a missus and three kids and at the time of his fight withme they were all starving. They did not have enough to eat. Do youunderstand? They did not have enough to eat. And Bill did not haveenough to eat. He trained on an empty stomach, which is no way to trainyou'll admit. During that drought year there was little enough money inthe ring, but he had failed to get any fights. He had worked at long-shoring, ditch-digging, coal-shovelling--anything, to keep the life inthe missus and the kiddies. The trouble was the jobs didn't hold out. And there he was, matched to fight with me, behind in his rent, a toughold chopping-block, but weak from lack of food. If he did not win thefight, the landlord was going to put them into the street. MAUD. But why would you want to fight with him in such weak condition? FITZSIMMONS. I did not know. I did not learn till at the ringside justbefore the fight. It was in the dressing rooms, waiting our turn to goon. Bill came out of his room, ready for the ring. "Bill, " I said--infun, you know. "Bill, I've got to do you to-night. " He said nothing, but he looked at me with the saddest and most pitiful face I have everseen. He went back into his dressing room and sat down. "Poor Bill!" one of my seconds said. "He's been fair starving these lastweeks. And I've got it straight, the landlord chucks him out if he losesto-night. " Then the call came and we went into the ring. Bill was desperate. Hefought like a tiger, a madman. He was fair crazy. He was fighting formore than I was fighting for. I was a rising fighter, and I was fightingfor the money and the recognition. But Bill was fighting for life--forthe life of his loved ones. Well, condition told. The strength went out of him, and I was fresh as adaisy. "What's the matter, Bill?" I said to him in a clinch. "You'reweak. " "I ain't had a bit to eat this day, " he answered. That was all. By the seventh round he was about all in, hanging on and panting andsobbing for breath in the clinches, and I knew I could put him out anytime. I drew back my right for the short-arm jab that would do thebusiness. He knew it was coming, and he was powerless to prevent it. "For the love of God, Bob, " he said; and--[Pause. ] MAUD. Yes? Yes? FITZSIMMONS. I held back the blow. We were in a clinch. "For the love of God, Bob, " he said again, "the misses and the kiddies!" And right there I saw and knew it all. I saw the hungry children asleep, and the missus sitting up and waiting for Bill to come home, waiting toknow whether they were to have food to eat or be thrown out in thestreet. "Bill, " I said, in the next clinch, so low only he could hear. "Bill, remember the La Blanche swing. Give it to me, hard. " We broke away, and he was tottering and groggy. He staggered away andstarted to whirl the swing. I saw it coming. I made believe I didn'tand started after him in a rush. Biff! It caught me on the jaw, and Iwent down. I was young and strong. I could eat punishment. I couldhave got up the first second. But I lay there and let them count me out. And making believe I was still dazed, I let them carry me to my cornerand work to bring me to. [Pause. ] Well, I faked that fight. MAUD. [Springing to him and shaking his hand. ] Thank God! Oh! You area man! A--a--a hero! FITZSIMMONS. [Dryly, feeling in his pocket. ] Let's have a smoke. [Hefails to find cigarette case. ] MAUD. I can't tell you how glad I am you told me that. FITZSIMMONS. [Gruffly. ] Forget it. [He looks on table, and fails tofind cigarette case. Looks at her suspiciously, then crosses to desk atright and reaches for telephone. ] MAUD. [Curiously. ] What are you going to do? FITZSIMMONS. Call the police. MAUD. What for? FITZSIMMONS. For you. MAUD. For me? FITZSIMMONS. You are not Harry Jones. And not only are you an impostor, but you are a thief. MAUD. [Indignantly. ] How dare you? FITZSIMMONS. You have stolen my cigarette case. MAUD. [Remembering and taken aback, pulls out cigarette case. ] Here itis. FITZSIMMONS. Too late. It won't save you. This club must be keptrespectable. Thieves cannot be tolerated. MAUD. [Growing alarm. ] But you won't have me arrested? FITZSIMMONS. I certainly will. MAUD. [Pleadingly. ] Please! Please! FITZSIMMONS. [Obdurately. ] I see no reason why I should not. MAUD. [Hurriedly, in a panic. ] I'll give you a reason--a--a good one. I--I--am not Harry Jones. FITZSIMMONS. [Grimly. ] A good reason in itself to call in the police. MAUD. That isn't the reason. I'm--a--Oh! I'm so ashamed. FITZSIMMONS. [Sternly. ] I should say you ought to be. [Reaches fortelephone receiver. ] MAUD. [In rush of desperation. ] Stop! I'm a--I'm a--a girl. There![Sinks down in chair, burying her face in her hands. ] [FITZSIMMONS, hanging up receiver, grunts. ] [MAUD removes hands and looks at him indignantly. As she speaks herindignation grows. ] MAUD. I only wanted your cigarette case to prove to my brother that Ihad been here. I--I'm Maud Sylvester, and you never took me out once. And I'm not a black sheep. And I don't dress loudly, and I haven't a--atapeworm. FITZSIMMONS. [Grinning and pulling out card from vest pocket. ] I knewyou were Miss Sylvester all the time. MAUD. Oh! You brute! I'll never speak to you again. FITZSIMMONS. [Gently. ] You'll let me see you safely out of here. MAUD. [Relenting. ] Ye-e-s. [She rises, crosses to table, and is aboutto stoop for motor cloak and bonnet, but he forestall her, holds cloakand helps her into it. ] Thank you. [She takes off wig, fluffs her ownhair becomingly, and puts on bonnet, looking every inch a pretty younggirl, ready for an automobile ride. ] FITZSIMMONS. [Who, all the time, watching her transformation, has beengrowing bashful, now handing her the cigarette case. ] Here's thecigarette case. You may k-k-keep it. MAUD. [Looking at him, hesitates, then takes it. ] I thank you--er--Bob. I shall treasure it all my life. [He is very embarrassed. ] Why, I dobelieve you're bashful. What is the matter? FITZSIMMONS. [Stammering. ] Why--I--you--You are a girl--and--a--a--deucedpretty one. MAUD. [Taking his arm, ready to start for door. ] But you knew it allalong. FITZSIMMONS. But it's somehow different now when you've got your girl'sclothes on. MAUD. But you weren't a bit bashful--or nice, when--you--you--[Blurtingit out. ] Were so anxious about birth marks. [They start to make exit. ] CURTAIN