* * * * *

There were my superior persons drawn to the life!

When the complaisant judge would not acknowledge the rights of the noble
Ajax, but gave to another what was due to him, the poet touched me even
more nearly:--

Thanked, and self-pleased: ay, let him wear
What to that noble breast was due;
And I, dear passionate Teucer, dare
Go through the homeless world with you.

The poem I admit does not sound very apposite in the year 1922, but it
well reflected my indignation some fifty years ago. The West might then
be regarded as the Ajax of the Nations. Nowadays, not even the youngest
of enthusiasts could think it necessary to show his devotion by wanting
to "go through the homeless world" with the richest and the most
powerful community on the face of the earth.

I am not going to make any show of false modesty by suggesting that
Americans may not care to read about the intimate details of my life and
opinions, or to follow "the adventure of living" of a journalist and a
public writer whose life, judged superficially, has been quite
uneventful. I read with pleasure the lives of American men and women
when they were not people of action, and I daresay people across the
Atlantic will pay me a similar compliment.

Yet--I should like to give a word or two of explanation as to the way in