puddler. Grandfather Davies had been to Russia and had helped the
Russians build blast furnaces, in the days when they believed
that work would make them wealthy. Had they stuck to that truth
they would not be a ruined people to-day. Grandfather also went
to America, where his skill helped build the first blast furnace
in Maryland. The furnace fires have not ceased burning here, and
Russia is crying for our steel to patch her broken railways. Her
own hills are full of iron and her hands are as strong as ours.
Let them expect no gift from life.

Grandfather told my father that America offered a rich future
for him and his boys. "The metal is there," he said, "as it is in
Russia. Russia may never develop, but America will. A nation's
future lies not in its resources. The American mind is right. Go
to America."

And because my father believed that a good people will bring
forth good fruit, he left his ancient home in Wales and crossed
the sea to cast his lot among strangers.

I started to school in Wales when I was four years old. By the
time I was six I thought I knew more than my teachers. This shows
about how bright I was. The teachers had forbidden me to throw
paper wads, or spitballs. I thought I could go through the motion
of throwing a spitball without letting it go. But it slipped and
I threw the wad right in the teacher's eye. I told him it was an
accident, that I had merely tried to play smart and had
overreached myself.

"Being smart is a worse fault," he said, "than throwing