is in doing it, proving that you can, not in the rug itself." He clacked
and tied, congratulating himself vastly. In due course of time three or
four inches were finished, a soft and yet firm silky fabric, and he was
in great glee over it, showing it to all and insisting that in time (how
long? I often wondered) he would complete it and would then own a
splendid carpet.

It was at this time that he built about him in Newark a structure of
friendships and interests which, it seemed to me, promised to be for
life. He interested himself intensely in the paper with which he was
connected and although he was only the cartoonist, still it was not long
before various departments and elements in connection with it seemed to
reflect his presence and to be alive with his own good will and
enthusiasm. Publisher, editor, art director, managing editor and
business manager, were all in friendly contact with him. He took out
life insurance for the benefit of the wife and children he was later to
have! With the manager of the engraving department he was working out
problems in connection with copperplate engraving and printing; with the
official photographer, art photography; with the art director, some
scheme for enlarging the local museum in some way. With his enduring
love of the fantastic and ridiculous it was not long before he had
successfully planned and executed a hoax of the most ridiculous
character, a piece of idle drollery almost too foolish to think of, and
yet which eventually succeeded in exciting the natives of at least four
States and was telegraphed to and talked about in a Sunday feature way,
by newspapers all over the country, and finally involved Peter as an
actor and stage manager of the most vivid type imaginable. And yet it
was all done really to amuse himself, to see if he could do it, as he
often told me.