gay and casual nature of our earlier friendship. Also here perhaps, more
than before, we felt the binding influence of having worked together in
the West. It was here that I first noticed the ease with which he took
hold of a city, the many-sidedness of his peculiar character which led
him to reflect so many angles of it, which a less varied temperament
would never have touched upon. For, first of all, wherever he happened
to be, he was intensely interested in the age and history of his city,
its buildings and graveyards and tombstones which pointed to its past
life, then its present physical appearance, the chief characteristics of
the region in which it lay, its rivers, lakes, parks and adjacent places
and spots of interest (what rambles we took!), as well as its newest and
finest things architecturally. Nor did any one ever take a keener
interest in the current intellectual resources of a city--any city in
which he happened to be--its museums, libraries, old bookstores,
newspapers, magazines, and I know not what else. It was he who first
took me into Leary's bookstore in Philadelphia, descanting with his
usual gusto on its merits. Then and lastly he was keenly and wisely
interested in various currents of local politics, society and finance,
although he always considered the first a low mess, an arrangement or
adjustment of many necessary things among the lower orders. He seemed to
know or sense in some occult way everything that was going on in those
various realms. His mind was so full and rich that merely to be with him
was a delight. He gushed like a fountain, and yet not polemically, of
all he knew, heard, felt, suspected. His thoughts were so rich at times
that to me they were more like a mosaic of variegated and richly colored
stones and jewels. I felt always as though I were in the presence of a
great personage, not one who was reserved or pompous but a loose
bubbling temperament, wise beyond his years or day, and so truly great
that perhaps because of the intensity and immense variety of his
interests he would never shine in a world in which the most intensive