JMBJV 
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 SIMON N. PATTEN
 
 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 From Dust to Soul 
 
 BY 
 
 SIMON N. PATTEN 
 
 Not the aeen but the felt, not color but 
 joy, not fact but emotion, not beauty but 
 •ctioa, not madonnms but corn-fed sirla. 
 
 Publishers DORRANCE Philadelphia
 
 COPYRIGHT 1922 
 BY SIMON N. PATTEN 
 
 PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
 
 1 2.7rvny 
 
 To tboae who love their Anccetry, their Church, 
 their Home, America, all her Idole — yet can laugh. 
 
 f- 
 
 >J 
 
 J 
 
 1
 
 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 The West Amplified 
 
 PART I 
 Its Life Presented 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I. Mud Hollow 11 
 
 IL Bowman 17 
 
 IIL The Theologian ... 20 
 
 IV. The Professor 25 
 
 V. The Faculty Tea . . 30 
 
 VI. College Opens 40 
 
 VIL A Sexless Soul .... 47 
 VIIL Senior Honors .... 62 
 
 IX. The Book 69 
 
 X. The Exit 77 
 
 XL On the River 83 
 
 XIL Cross Currents ... 103 
 XIIL The Discovery .... 121 
 XIV. The Confession ... 133 
 
 XV. The Run 152 
 
 XVL The Shock 163 
 
 XVIL The Recoil 175 
 
 XVIIL The Return 189 
 
 XIX. The Hall of Wait- 
 ing 199 
 
 XX. His Vision Clears. . 212 
 XXL McCabe 224 
 
 PART II 
 Its Life Interpreted 
 
 PAGE 
 
 1. The Apology 229 
 
 2. The Surviving Element 234 
 
 3. Sense Dullness 243 
 
 4. The American Blend . . 249 
 
 5. The Scotch Contribution 256 
 
 6. Pioneer Values 264 
 
 7. The Passing of Dissent 270 
 
 8. Social Values 275 
 
 9. Income Power 281 
 
 10. Normalcy 292 
 
 11. Joe Gannett 298 
 
 12. Acquired Characters . . . 309 
 
 13. Inferior Complexes .... 317 
 
 14. Super Complexes 321 
 
 15. Genetic Psychology . . . 330 
 
 16. The Sense of Sin 338 
 
 17. The Wish 347 
 
 18. Romantic Love 355 
 
 19. Protected Girls 364 
 
 20. John and Hattie 371 
 
 21. The Next Step in Evo- 
 
 lution 377
 
 PART I 
 
 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 Its Lite Presented 
 
 Life today is shaped by the blood of the civil 
 war, by golden harvests, and by Methodist 
 theology. Children of this generation, reflect- 
 ing what the viron has imposed, test the vir- 
 tues and shortcomings of their forbears. By 
 your children shall you be known.
 
 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 Mud Hollow 
 
 Artists see angels in blocks of marble. A sim- 
 ilar instinct helped Tim Brown to see the fertility 
 hid beneath the bullrushes of Mud Hollow. 
 Originally a swamp, it had by drainage become 
 a garden. Old Tim was thus a maker; what he 
 did others did ; as he prospered so did they. The 
 fields were square; the furrows straight. Above 
 the ground was corn, from the corn the hog. 
 When a farmer talked of beauty he meant hogs 
 not his girls. 
 
 All was man-made — Tim-made, the neighbors 
 said. His broad acres had no defect; no weeds 
 dared to invade his premises. Old Tim said he 
 would teach water a thing or two and he had. 
 No sooner did a drop arrive than it looked about 
 — took the beaten track as tamely as the tradi- 
 tional lamb. 
 
 The ground thawed on the seventh of March; 
 the first frost came on September nineteenth. 
 Planting, harvesting, corn-picking never varied in 
 time or amount. The sun poured out just so 
 many calories each day. The heat became corn, 
 the corn became hog, which by Thanksgiving 
 averaged 328. Western sun has no vagaries. It 
 rises a dull gray, yields its calories like a squeezed 
 lemon, disappears too exhausted to light a candle. 
 
 11
 
 12 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 It is merely a timepiece to tell roosters of when 
 to crow, cows of milking time, turkeys when to go 
 to bed. Nature was humbler than the bull Tim 
 led by the nose. Glory, glory to man. Muscle 
 and vim astride the universe. 
 
 Such was Mud Hollow. The soil was Indiana, 
 but the heart, the mind, the thought, were still as 
 rigidly Scotch as when Knox thundered. A 
 stranger contrast than between week-days and 
 Sunday could not exist. The one was carefully 
 adjusted to local conditions, the other had not a 
 trace of modern life. All was still except the 
 preacher's voice and the growing corn. In this 
 group Old Tim was the glorified chief. A better 
 farmer, a more pig-headed theologian never ex- 
 isted. Calvinism was his glory. Methodism his 
 aversion. He never mixed with the common clay 
 across the street. Six days he worked; no flow- 
 ers, no play, no camp-meeting for him. 
 
 The Civil War broke this isolation; the West, 
 ceasing to be a series of clans, marched behind 
 a banner which blended more faiths than it had 
 stripes. Old Tim for the first time sat on the 
 platform with his Methodist neighbors. For Lin- 
 coln they shouted; for Lincoln they voted; for 
 Lincoln they fought. 
 
 Like every other town Mud Hollow had its 
 Lincoln celebration. There were horsemen, 
 Indians, revolutionary heroes, wide-awakes, girls 
 with banners, but the crown of crowns was the 
 Goddess of Liberty on a chariot, which in the en- 
 thusiasm of the hour was dragged around the 
 square by leading citizens. When the Goddess 
 finally descended everybody, Tim included, kissed 
 her in truly western fashion. It was a grand 
 affair, at least in Indiana eyes. Tim was pleased, 
 60 pleased that he forgot he kissed the girl he 
 had denounced for loving flowers better than the 
 washtub. Community campaigning had its cost
 
 MUD HOLLOW 13 
 
 as well as glory. When patriotism crosses the 
 road, love follows. If he could kiss the Goddess 
 of Liberty so could his boy. 
 
 The wedding was a grand affair. All of the 
 two churches sat in the pews. The beauty of one 
 group, the pride of the other, walked down the 
 aisle; their union blended two long antagonistic 
 groups. 
 
 As the couple left the church they found before 
 the Post Office an excited crowd. Lincoln had 
 called for troops. All lined up, the groom with 
 the rest ; when the last drill came, and the engine 
 puffed, a pale girl leaning against the corner of 
 the depot was beginning to realize how different 
 the world is from what we imagine. 
 
 What a change the war made : barns were emp- 
 tied, sacrifice replaced joy; women did men's 
 work. The bride going through with the rest 
 finally got her reward in a maimed husband. Ex- 
 ternally she was like her neighbors. What they 
 acquired through centuries she got in one dose. 
 She not only cooked but did the outdoor work 
 of a man. A familiar sight was to see her astride 
 a corn plow or pitching in the hay field. Yet all 
 was done so quietly few realized her burden. 
 Today she was dark and sinewy. Her face once 
 seen was seldom forgotten. When she came to 
 town the old soldiers stood attention and ran her 
 errands like schoolboys. 
 
 A boy came, the pride of Old Tim, the hope of 
 the town. Every old soldier was Paul's god- 
 father, evincing that partiality in which over- 
 friendly admirers indulge. Such conditions would 
 have spoiled most boys. Petted children seldom 
 make great men. His salvation came through 
 his character's not fitting his viron. What he 
 could do was not valued; what he could not do 
 stood high in public esteem. In arithmetic he 
 surpassed, but prestige came from spelling. The
 
 14 MUD HOLLOW, 
 
 glib rhymes other boys poured out on exhibition 
 days were beyond his power. When the annual 
 school exhibition came with its dialogues and 
 theatricals Paul never got higher than door- 
 keeper. Seemingly stupid where the town ex- 
 pected excellence, he would have been looked on 
 as a country jake but for the reputation of his 
 family. ''Looks like his mother," people said. 
 He did, but in his tearful grindings at the spell- 
 ing book his jaw was clinched as firmly as the 
 grandfather 's. 
 
 The two were inseparable. What Tim knew 
 was poured into willing ears ; all his farm stand- 
 ards, all his prejudice, all the family tradition, 
 the boy knew. He became a replica of his grand- 
 father, in opinion, manners, gestures ; even more 
 narrow and rigid in his views. Home was a realm 
 that reflected heaven ; Indiana an empire so large 
 that it crowded the stars. 
 
 All went smoothly until old Tim's death trans- 
 ferred Paul from the home to school. Like all 
 western villages Mud Hollow had an imported 
 normal school enthusiast who brought with her 
 culture, sweetness and light. She reformed the 
 accents of children ; corrected their manners, was 
 vitriolic in spelling ; but sin of all sin in the boy's 
 eyes — what grandfather taught and mother did 
 came in sharp contrast with the well-meaning but 
 somewhat misguided instruction of this^ normal 
 aesthete. The blackboard was covered with flow- 
 ing lines which she made with an ease that aston- 
 ished Paul, who try as he would could not make 
 his awkward fingers move in flomng curves. She 
 put a bird on the top of the figure 7 ; placed a nest 
 with eggs in each of the loops of the fi,gure 8; 
 had roses in her hair, rings on her fingers. Her 
 knowledge was as cosmopolitan as her dress. She 
 had two-week courses in everything from Greek 
 architecture to the modern drama.
 
 MUD HOLLOW 15 
 
 More miglit be told of the virtue, knowledge 
 and skill of this normal prodigy but the real point 
 is not what she knew but how she impressed the 
 boy. He sat sturdily in a back seat, reticent but 
 boiling with an inward rage. She extolled spell- 
 ing ; he marked in his book words that in his view 
 were spelled wrong. The birds she put on the 
 board he rubbed out every time he got a chance. 
 He clung to the home pronunciation as firmly as 
 to church creed. He never broke rules, but hatred 
 of school grew with the months. All this is doubt- 
 less wrong. It might have been punished if 
 known. But being repressed it became an emo- 
 tional wave coloring his life. 
 
 At last a break came. One of the school feats 
 was reading without a mistake. Some girls could 
 read a page; Paul could never read a sentence 
 without technical errors. His slow Bro-\vn hesi- 
 tation tripped him at every trial. The girls 
 laughed, even mocked; chagrined, he refused to 
 read. Then came a struggle with teacher ; finally 
 he yielded but burst out crying, sobbing for min- 
 utes when in his seat. The teacher felt her dis- 
 cipline had triumphed. His mother kissed him 
 for submission. Neither knew the turmoil raging 
 in the boy's mind. He threw stones at birds, per- 
 secuted cats, slashed roses. Rebuked, he took 
 vengeance on thistles, decapitating them with 
 fierce blows. * ' How like his grandfather, ' ' every- 
 one said. Old Tim hated weeds ; Paul hated girls, 
 an inevitable result of subjecting slowly develop- 
 ing boys to the censure of glib girls. 
 
 The real Paul, the budding Paul, came to the 
 surface in another way, to understand which the 
 influence of Colonel Saunders must be understood. 
 Every Indiana town has a Xentucky colonel, a 
 man more noted for talk than for deed. All the 
 adjectives of the dictionary were at his command.
 
 16 MUD hollow; 
 
 At donation parties, wedding anniversaries, on 
 the Fourth of July, he was in his element. 
 
 Mrs. Brown was a favorite ; her cakes, her pies, 
 her bread, her chicken and waffles, her house and 
 her farm gave him endless opportunity to extol. 
 The Colonel could make a Grecian goddess blush 
 in return for a glass of water. Paul would not 
 deny these excellences. But to him she was some- 
 thing higher, nobler, something the Colonel's 
 words never reached. 
 
 He would outdo the Colonel. He would coin a 
 mother-description that would pale anything 
 Saunders had done. This was quite a task for a 
 boy in a speechless family. Words were not his 
 forte ; but if the Browns did not have words they 
 had a will that more than made up. When they 
 started no obstacle was too great to surmount. 
 In this spirit Paul took up his chosen task. He 
 wrote and re-wrote but his ideal of mother 
 grew faster than his words. He tried poetry but 
 in it he never acquired enough proficiency to gain 
 admission to the village paper. From the diction- 
 ary long lists of words were compiled to be used 
 in the great Philippic on which he labored. When 
 the dictionary failed he took the study of Greek. 
 This Paul followed with a vigor which made it 
 seem that he had a real love of literature. Hunt 
 as he would for fitting words, they never came. 
 He kept on trying to coin words but they never 
 quite fitted his mother's case. At last fortune 
 came his way. Professor Stuart, stopping at Mud 
 Hollow on a Western trip, gave his oft-repeated 
 lecture in laudation of women. The to^vn liked 
 Kentucky oratory better, but Paul was electrified. 
 Stuart's sentences had a mystical ring which 
 seemed vague to practical people; but to Paul 
 they gave promise that he might at length reach 
 his long-sought goal. That fall an uncouth, awk- 
 ward boy left the Indiana plain for Pennsylvania
 
 BOWMAN 17 
 
 .hills. The flat straight was to fit itself to the 
 curved hill; the prairie to the forest. 
 
 Are the mud-hen and the eagle twins or 
 strangers 1 
 
 II 
 
 Bowman 
 
 In its settlement Pennsylvania represents more 
 fully than elsewhere the diverse elements out of 
 which our nation rose. We emphasize our unity 
 so much that the strange commingling of races, 
 creeds and aspirations among our forefathers 
 does not stand out as clearly as it should. Of 
 those, Pennsylvania had a double share because 
 of the open door extended to all strangers. In 
 many ways the Quakers were narrow but they 
 were always true to the principles for which they 
 stood. All were welcome whatever the variation 
 in character or faith. But this prevented homo- 
 geneity. Ten miles, a river, or a range of hills 
 often made an impassable barrier separating lo- 
 calities more completely than broad oceans now 
 do. These little worlds had their peculiar life. 
 They became a series of layers, each striving to 
 keep its own religion, thought and language. 
 While there has been some yielding of boundaries, 
 these essential contrasts remain. Pennsylvania 
 is still a federation — ^not a state. 
 
 Coming later than the Quakers, the Scotch- 
 Irish occupy a worthy place. They found the 
 fertile southeast section occupied. Forced into 
 the foot-hills or the upland valleys, they found a 
 region resembling in ruggedness the land they 
 left. In it they sought to make a new Scotland 
 and to perpetuate the institutions and beliefs to 
 which the Scotch so fondly cling. _ For a whole 
 century little occurred to break their isolation or
 
 18 MUD HOLLOW. 
 
 to introduce the new ideas floating into America 
 through many doors. No serious inroads in cus- 
 toms or thouglit were made until tlie Civil War 
 broke on them like a devastating cyclone. Its 
 youth for the first time, flowing out, mingled with 
 the larger world. The veteran brought home a 
 new view of human relations which, remolding 
 history, elevated disliked races into a broad com- 
 radeship. Why should interest continue in Euro- 
 pean conflicts when our own social problems were 
 looming to a place of supreme importance! The 
 new and the old clashed ; nowhere was the strug- 
 gle so severe as among the Scotch-Irish rigidly 
 bound by their Calvinistic faith and tradition. It 
 was the old problem of the irresistible meeting 
 the immovable. What is more immovable than 
 dogma and what more irresistible than the genial 
 faith of the modern democrat? 
 
 Bowman was one of those communities to which 
 pioneers flocked. Its old log church was the 
 center of many a controversy from which the 
 orthodox always came forth victorious. Its 
 preachers formed a long line of solid defenders 
 of the faith which at length blossomed into a 
 theological school of national reno^vn, from which 
 flowed old ideas as from a well undefiled. The 
 college gradually grew up around the school, until 
 recently merely a preparatory school for the bud- 
 ding divines. The whole atmosphere was thus 
 sternly Puritan. Life was regarded as too severe 
 a task to make its joy w^orth cultivating. 
 
 Today, standing on its campus, one could hard- 
 ly help exclaiming ''Beautiful"; yet this was a 
 word nobody thought of appljdng for a whole 
 century. The site was chosen not for its beauty 
 but for its utility. We are apt to think of our 
 ancestors as artistic and of ourselves as utili- 
 tarian ; yet the opposite is the case. The upland 
 soil was more readily adapted to the cultivation
 
 BOWMAN 19 
 
 of wheat, tlie staple article both of food and of 
 export. On these hill-tops our ancestors led their 
 calm, isolated lives. 
 
 Bowman thus changed from utility to beauty 
 without anyone's perceiving the change or doing 
 much to help it along. It was on a bench between 
 two branches of the river flowing through the 
 valley below. This bench, reaching back many 
 miles, connected with the main range of hills. 
 On its top ran an old road along which the wood 
 of the interior was carried to the local sawmill. 
 The Ridge Road, as it is now called, has so many 
 views of the valley on both sides that it seems 
 designed for its artistic effects. But no such 
 thought entered the minds of its projectors. They 
 merely avoided the gullies which the rain had 
 washed in the hillsides. Perhaps the loggers oc- 
 casionally looked down into the valleys below but 
 we may be sure they shuddered at the view more 
 often than they smiled. Thinking of the glories 
 of Scotland or of the songs of the Israelite 
 prophets, one can understand the feeling with 
 which the uplander looks down on the depth ; cor- 
 rupt and vicious, if occupied ; and full of physical 
 dangers if not. 
 
 At one of the points now most cherished is a 
 stone on which the Rev. Alexander McCarter sat 
 while he wrote his famous sermon on * ' The Second 
 Coming," in which he pictured the flaming sword 
 moving up the valley below. So accurate was the 
 description that even now his sermon is used to 
 give a picture of the region as it was. With these 
 thoughts in the background, what was beauty to 
 Bowman? 
 
 The village was not the result of town planning, 
 but of the accident of growth. The green which 
 became the college campus was in the foreground 
 slightly sloping towards the river. On its far side 
 stood the old church noted for its pulpit eloquence
 
 20 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 and its severe orthodoxy. It could not claim much 
 beauty except for the ivy which clung to its sides. 
 A broad avenue lined with chestnuts ran between 
 the college buildings and the green ; but the other 
 streets had no plan, each following the lay of the 
 land which, fortunately, was too uneven to per- 
 mit rectangular squares. The houses were as near 
 or far from the street as the breadth of land be- 
 tween the road and the hill behind permitted. If 
 they stood back, a fine lawn added to their charm ; 
 but often they squarely faced the street. At one 
 time these street houses had a rather squalid 
 appearance, as they were the homes of the poor. 
 But the railroad town on the other side of the 
 river gradually emptied Bowman of its working 
 population. 
 
 This accident gave Bo^vman its unique char- 
 acter. Life was unpretentious and yet had the 
 air of refinement seldom seen in so small a place. 
 On the green were few ornaments. Before the 
 Seminary stood a monument to commemorate the 
 missionary efforts for which Bowman was noted. 
 Its tablet deserved attention as BoAvman had a 
 martjT class, of whose nine members seven had 
 died either in missionary service or on the battle- 
 field. There was room at the bottom for the 
 names of two men whose reputation gave to Bow- 
 man a unique position. Malcolm Stuart and 
 Samuel Dickson were the ones to be added. 
 
 Ill 
 
 The Theologian 
 
 Samuel Dickson, D.D., LL.D., was the title of 
 the dean of the Theological School. He was the 
 fifth in a line of preachers with cousins, uncles
 
 THE THEOLOGIAN 21 
 
 and relatives so numerous in the same work that 
 the Dickson family could almost claim the title of 
 defenders of the faith. After graduation he be- 
 came a missionary, giving this up only at the 
 urgent call of the home church. Bowman seemed 
 likely to be eclipsed by mushroom seminaries of 
 doubtful orthodoxy. ^Tio could save the day bet- 
 ter than one uncontaminated by modern thought? 
 The returning solidity of con^dction throughout 
 the church bore evidence of his ability. All was 
 well or at least seemed well except for the break 
 Professor Stuart was making. Of what avail was 
 it to scorch Satan in a hundred outlying places if 
 right at home his corrupting influence was ap- 
 parent ? 
 
 Dr. Dickson was a short, thick-set man with a 
 high forehead and protruding chin. His middle- 
 face was thin and filled out only when he spoke 
 with emphasis. Then the strong face muscles be- 
 came prominent, which with the accompanying 
 glow of earnestness made him a handsome man 
 in the pulpit. Many were his admirers; he de- 
 served them. 
 
 A description of the doctor is not complete 
 without a glimpse of his wife. Every male Cal- 
 vinist has back of him a female voice urging him 
 on. This will be stoutly denied by the defenders 
 of their faith. What is bolder than the way in 
 which Calvinist ministers malign woman? She 
 seems merely a penitent Magdalene having no 
 place except at the pleasure of man. This, how- 
 ever, is merely a flow of words. In reality the 
 woman drives; the man follows. He talks firmly 
 but in trouble asks Jane what to do. 
 
 Calvinism has left its mark both on men and 
 women. It is hard to tell how many ages man 
 dragged woman after him in his exploits. It was 
 certainly long enough to make the tradition of 
 the church and to shape woman's thought so that
 
 22 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 she accepts its limitations as natural. No woman 
 could survive who questioned them. They thus 
 became defenders of their own repression— keep- 
 ers of their own prison doors. Each generation 
 of women shaped the next to fit the situation in 
 which they survive, a regime which leaves x)hysical 
 as well as mental marks. A weak chin, a full 
 middle-face, a sloping forehead, was either caused 
 "by this repression or became the limits beyond 
 which woman could not pass. Firmness would be 
 suicidal. The strong-minded entered the church 
 or died old maids. 
 
 While survival came through hunting, fishing 
 and fighting the man dominated, but when it de- 
 pended on clothes, cooking and cleanliness the 
 woman came to her own. The plagues did much 
 to inaugurate the new epoch. They were filth 
 diseases carried by clothes, food and dirt. Clean- 
 liness thus became more than godliness since 
 cooking was the only means of germ extermina- 
 tion. On top of this came the visitation of tuber- 
 cular germs which infected dirty houses as the 
 plagues did food and clothing. The conquerors 
 of these were not the hunter, fisher and warrior, 
 but the woman with wash-tub and cook-stove. 
 The man asked the woman for pastry instead of 
 her begging meat of him. Soap was more power- 
 ful than powder. The dominating man and the 
 slovenly housewife died of their own carelessness. 
 The woman of muscle gained a husband and bore 
 him children of a new kind. Woman was silent 
 in church but ruled at home. This compromise 
 is Calvinism well exemplified in the relations of 
 Dr. and Mrs. Dickson. 
 
 No one was a more pronounced advocate of 
 man's rule than she nor a firmer believer in 
 woman's frailty. Yet Dr. Dickson always carried 
 out her instructions. She was tall for a woman 
 and would have risen above her husband if he
 
 THE THEOLOGIAN 23 
 
 had not worn a high hat. Her hands were large, 
 her bones developed, her muscles tightly drawn. 
 There was no end to what she could endure; her 
 planning outran her deeds. She stirred not only 
 Dr. Dickson's activity but that of the whole town; 
 was president of a dozen missionary societies, led 
 the Christian Endeavor, was Sunday school sup- 
 erintendent and presided at all the women's teas 
 — monarch of all she surveyed except Professor 
 Stuart. Here was a gulf she never crossed; it 
 vexed her beyond measure that such a thorn not 
 only stayed but grew. 
 
 Mrs. Dickson was not exotic, but the product 
 of long evolution. There are dozens like her in 
 every town who would manifest the same traits 
 if the occasion permitted. Man idealizes one kind 
 of a woman, nature is forcing another kind on 
 him. There is thus a death struggle between what 
 he wants and what he must accept. He admires 
 a pretty face, small hands, narrow waist and slop- 
 ing shoulders. Such was the primitive woman 
 and such is the modern Madonna whom artists 
 draw. No matter what ancient conditions de- 
 manded, she does not fit modern life. 
 
 In earlier days when religion acted as a force 
 to guide evolution, each sect tended to create an 
 individual type by attracting the like and repel- 
 ling the discordant. America was then a group 
 of groups, each moving in its owm way, preserv- 
 ing if not enlarging its own individuality. Of 
 these the Methodist and the Calvinist were the 
 more easily recognized. Methodism saved sin- 
 ners; Calvinism ruled the saints whose emotions 
 it could not arouse. There were thus upper and 
 lower strata, each molding its people in its own 
 way. Methodism was the new and the higher. It 
 broke tradition and freed the soul. But the phy- 
 sical type it tended to create was reversion. In a 
 Methodist church the man walked down the aisle
 
 24 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 with a firm step ; a humble, weak-chinned woman 
 followed. In the rival church the woman led; 
 a tame, subdued man followed even the children. 
 No elder was without a prodding wife. His life 
 had thorns as well as roses. Scotch women are 
 pure, noble, virtuous, but they also have acid 
 tongues. Some experienced with both types Avould 
 rather be vociferously scolded at times than 
 nagged all the while. When a Methodist woman 
 bursts into a flame it is better to retire to the 
 barn until passion subsides. Then a box of candy 
 will straighten things out. Not so with the Cal- 
 vinist. She has quieter ways but they are per- 
 sistent. Feeling she must act through her hus- 
 band, she exerts a constant pressure which often 
 is far from agreeable. 
 
 There never was a more vigorous group than 
 those who conquered the West for Methodism. 
 They might slip in their English, but the volume 
 of their voice was never in question. Sinners had 
 to put their fingers in their ears to keep the gospel 
 out. This at a time when Calvinist ministers wore 
 spectacles, feared drafts and took pills for diges- 
 tion. Any old almanac will tell the vigor of the 
 praise they bestowed on patent nostrums; who 
 can praise except those who use? The Methodist 
 cured his cold by pounding the Bible. For a whole 
 century no one became bishop who wore less than 
 number eleven boots nor until he had pounded a 
 hole in six Bibles. His feet and his hands were 
 as big as his soul. Shoes tell the story of the 
 ascent of Methodism. Physical might may not 
 be as lofty as spiritual right but it wins. The 
 world is for the strong even if the saints get the 
 first place above.
 
 THE PROFESSOR 25 
 
 IV 
 
 The Professor 
 
 A reader of character would have gone astray 
 if he had attempted to judge Professor Stuart 
 by appearance. Of all guesses the last would be 
 that here stood a survivor of the Civil War, noted 
 for his courage and audacity. Yet such was the 
 case. Of the first to enlist, he had been in every 
 campaign in which the Army of the Potomac 
 fought. So efficient was his service that the end 
 of the war found him in charge of a famous scout- 
 ing troop. It is said that Sheridan desired to 
 give him a commission in the regular army but 
 the offer of the Greek professorship in liis home 
 college proved more attractive. Many are the 
 tales told of his exploits and many the scars he 
 bore. One was plainly visible on his right cheek 
 but others more serious were covered by the 
 straggling gray beard which hid what otherwise 
 would be a deformity. The body marks were even 
 more prominent but there were enough in sight 
 to bear evidence of his valor. 
 
 At sixty there was nothing of the soldier about 
 him, except on Decoration Day when the old uni- 
 form was burnished and the spurs clanked at the 
 heels of his army boots. He seemed another man 
 on this occasion or when he headed a group fol- 
 lowing some comrade to his final rest. All this 
 would have made him worthy of notice but it is 
 not this that made his character. The face of a 
 woman had always been present even in the 
 thickest of his fights. He was glad when the 
 hour came to throw off his uniform and claim 
 his bride. What could be better than a happy 
 home and the quiet charm of a college professor- 
 ship! Ida and Greek — what a combination! No
 
 26 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 wonder the military step was displaced and war 
 memories became a dream. 
 
 This Eden was not destined to last. Ida faded 
 in spite of his care. All that remained was an 
 enlarged photo and a little girl said to be her 
 image. 
 
 The Professor changed, but it was a change of 
 love from one woman to all her kind. From now 
 on he became an ardent advocate of woman's 
 rights. Many are the pamphlets which he con- 
 tributed to the early stages of the suffrage move- 
 ment; many more were the lectures he gave to 
 advance its sacred cause. In college his opening 
 course was a history of w^oman rather than of 
 man. Back of each hero he saw the woman who 
 gave him force. What are nations and conquest 
 compared with human love? This may be crude 
 doctrine, modern professors of history would 
 smile at its innocent perspective, but it sufficed 
 to give him zeal for a work which otherwise would 
 have been a task. 
 
 All this might have happened, and yet not have 
 given Stuart the place he held but for the trans- 
 formation of thought which the reading of John 
 Stuart Mill's autobiography wrought. Mill had 
 been educated in a peculiar way. All ancestral 
 beliefs were withheld in the hope of removing the 
 cramping influence of false ideas. ''Why not!" 
 said Stuart, as he laid aside the volume, "apply 
 the same treatment to a girl?" Yes, he would 
 show the world a natural w^oman — one who stood 
 on her own feet, thought her own thoughts, dream- 
 ed her own dreams. A tuoman without tears; no 
 repressions save those of her own awakened con- 
 science. To him a w^oman's woes are the un- 
 natural product of her repressions. Baby Ruth 
 should have none of these. She was to blossom 
 as God intended; never knowing what tears or 
 sorrow meant.
 
 THE PROFESSOR 27 
 
 The Professor set about liis chosen task in a 
 most systematic manner. It was not for him to 
 trim or guide. The tree grows, the germ comes 
 to maturity without pruning. If God plans so 
 carefully for plants and animals, why has He 
 not implanted in woman the promptings which 
 evoke her full development? Let a girl be happy, 
 give her full contact with nature. All man can 
 do is to wait and to keep woman away. 
 
 To be sponsor of the first free woman caused 
 an isolation of Ruth from the woman world and 
 a disregard of decorum which shocked the town 
 as much as it pleased the Professor. They saw 
 as depravity what to him was budding originality. 
 
 When Ida died many were the kind offers of 
 her woman friends to care for Ruth. Stuart re- 
 jected them all kindly but firmly. When they be- 
 gan to protest at her antics he resented their 
 intrusion. What were books, laws and traditions 
 but deadening repressions which make for ab- 
 normality? Woman's beauty is God's truth. 
 What He implanted she will fulfill if only the 
 tribe of arrogant teachers ceases to interfere. 
 
 Such ideas could not but provoke strong re- 
 action among the zealous Calvinists of Bowman. 
 The Professor soon came to be regarded the bane 
 of the town; the girl as a new trial to test the 
 faith of the orthodox. Woman must walk a 
 straight path, deviation from which is death. 
 Time-honored traditions fix the boundary of her 
 activity. Those who could not stand the rigor 
 of these chains died or broke away. To harbor 
 such a heresy, to permit such an exhibition in their 
 town, was to invite God's wrath to be visited alike 
 on the innocent and the guilty. 
 
 Bibles were diligently thumbed ; many were the 
 passages hurled at the Professor to show Imnthe 
 error of his way. When these failed, noted divines 
 were imported to confound the guilty. But all in
 
 28 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 vain. The Professor grew more determined but 
 at the same time more gentle. This irritated his 
 opponents. If he would only hit back some form 
 of church discipline might be imposed. But to 
 enjoy the fiery darts hurled at him seemed more 
 than a crime. When Andrew Bain preached his 
 Philippic against woman's depravity, pointing his 
 finger straight at the Professor a dozen times, 
 Stuart was the first to congratulate the worthy 
 reverend at the close of the sermon. "What can 
 we do with such a hardened sinner I ' ' the women 
 cried in unison. 
 
 It was indeed a hopeless case. All they could 
 do w^as to read the prophecies more carefully and 
 grow stronger in the faith. Some bitter punish- 
 ment must come to the town, so bitter that they 
 shuddered to think of it. 
 
 Thus Euth became not only the center of town 
 controversy but of state-wide agitation. It fre- 
 quently got into the Presbytery and even in the 
 committee rooms of the General Assembly. But 
 what might be done not even the wisest could say. 
 For once the catechism was short of perfection. 
 There is no mention of what is woman 's chief end. 
 Through this omission a thorn arose which had 
 to be endured until God saw fit to withdraw it. 
 Had some other father sought to do what Stuart 
 did the experiment might have been more promis- 
 ing. The girl ought to have had a higher fore- 
 head and broader chin to be an apt disciple of 
 the doctrines her father taught. They never got 
 into her heart; anybody but the Professor woul*^ 
 have given up his chosen task before the year 
 was out. But to him this aloofness was a virtue. 
 It showed, he thought, a true budding of woman- 
 hood. Let the plant grow; the flower will come; 
 after which the fruit. The merry prattle of a girl 
 will change to the serious conduct of the woman 
 in nature's own way. The more she laughs, the
 
 THE PROFESSOR 29 
 
 less she thinks, the better will be the basis on 
 which her motherhood rests. 
 
 Women were to him a product fitted to its end 
 in nature's supreme way. He did not expect a 
 girl to be intellectual; he had no love of child 
 precocity. ''The healthy," he was fond of say- 
 ing, ' ' have plenty of time. ' ' Smiling at tlie pranks 
 of the girl, he rejoiced in her ignorance and was 
 fond of telling about mistakes which would have 
 made another father flush. A series of exact 
 measurements were taken every month in which 
 the size of hand and foot figured prominently. 
 Her shoes he showed his visitors with great de- 
 light. They were two sizes larger than worn by 
 girls of her age. 
 
 Her weight alone fell short of the ideal record. 
 While well boned and muscular, she had slim 
 ease of movement that made her attractive. Bro- 
 ham, the artist, said she had too much chin to be 
 a Madonna and not enough nose to be a Grecian 
 goddess. Perhaps this is so. She certainly had 
 nothing of the Madonna about her. No Italian 
 artist would have picked her as a model. Her 
 nose may have been slight but her eyes flashed as 
 she smiled and her cheer was proverbial. Frank 
 and outspoken, she gained the reputation of for- 
 wardness, yet she was not self-centered nor over- 
 confident. 
 
 Such was the girl but of more imx^ortance was 
 her viron. Except across the street she never 
 saw other girls and hence had none of their man- 
 ner nor world view. Her father was her sole 
 companion through her earlier years; later the 
 athletic field became the center of her interest. 
 Only a hedge separated her home from the field 
 through which she made her advent on what was 
 to become her chosen haunt. She laughed and 
 chatted with the boys or slept within the shade of 
 overhanging trees. Her language was a boy's
 
 30 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 language. She knew their current terms and used 
 them freely. To hear her one would think a boy 
 was talking unless he recognized her voice. Her 
 familiarity with games enabled her to use the 
 jargon of the athletic field effectively. No one 
 counted with her unless he could jump, run, bat 
 or buck the line. She had the heart of a girl and 
 the ways of a boy. 
 
 The Faculty Tea 
 
 The center of attention was the faculty bride, 
 fresh from college with all the presumption which 
 advanced courses give to women. She shook her 
 head in a way which indicated an awareness of 
 her superiority. An expert in everything from 
 anthropology to modern literature, she expressed 
 herself with more authority than young women 
 at Bowman were accustomed to have. 
 
 "What does she mean?" said one. "Is she 
 trying to make fun of us? That young man will 
 discover a Ph.D. after his wife's name won't help 
 him much." 
 
 "Oh, it'll rub off after a while," said Mrs. 
 Wells, the mother emeritus of the faculty. ' ' She 
 isn't any worse than most of the new instructors. 
 Sh-she's coming over here now." 
 
 Mrs. Powell threaded her way through the 
 small groups around the patent plush rocker in 
 Avhich her hostess sat, drew a chair for Mrs. Wells 
 and arranged that lady in it. Then lowering a 
 window shade, she made herself "Very much at 
 home in another woman's house." "The idea!" 
 was the unconscious judgment of a dozen behold- 
 ers. 
 
 "Where are the f acuity f" asked Mrs. Powers 
 in her full voice. "Do husbands ever drop in? —
 
 THE FACULTY TEA 31 
 
 No? Well, what shall I do to meet that dear old 
 posey, Professor Stuart? He doesn't seem to be 
 of the calling kind ; I want to talk to him about 
 his theories. Reading his essay to my husband, 
 he said my periods became positively rotund, that 
 I made gestures and raised my eyes to heaven. 
 Professor Stuart told me I was by nature a god- 
 dess. You've seen the article, haven't you? Mill, 
 Rousseau — a dash of Plato — plus the poetic ideal- 
 ism of the author's own self. Do you agree with 
 him, Mrs. Ames! Are we a seraphic host sweeter 
 than what honey-bees extract from flowers'?" 
 
 The dignity of Mrs. Ames ' displeasure with the 
 free, easy manner of this probationary alien was 
 not touched by the thrust. She clasped her fingers 
 below her waist, while she spoke in measured 
 tones : " I differ with Malcolm Stuart on principle 
 and never believe a word he says about women, 
 God or anything else. We earn redemption by 
 thorns and sacrifice, not by tasting what the 
 tempter has to offer. ' ' 
 
 Mrs. Powell laughed and said, "Yes, I agree 
 with you; we ought to earn our spurs before we 
 wear them. After all, miglitn 't we accept his the- 
 sis for the sake of the assumption in his argu- 
 ment? I'm willing to blink the facts of social 
 evolution just to hear what compliments such an 
 old dear will pay us next." 
 
 "Oh, you woudn't like to hear him talk — he's 
 so embarrassing in private! I'm very sure your 
 husband wouldn't, either. A man doesn't want 
 his wife to get into such dicussions." 
 
 "What discussions! Do tell me. As for Doctor 
 Powell, he proposed in the midst of a Ph.D. disser- 
 tation on Polyandry in Tibet; I should divorce 
 him if he objected to anything such a delightful 
 cameo as Professor Stuart could possibly say." 
 
 "He's a slick talker. Were it anybody else, I'd 
 call him foxy. In the middle of the street lay
 
 32 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 Miss Ruth flat on her back, throwing dust over 
 herself. I spoke right out : ' Is that the way you 
 bring up a girl, half hen and half pig ? ' Laughing 
 like a great boob, he said, ' If she and the dust are 
 cousins, why not embrace ? ' I answered him right 
 back — I'd made up my mind to before I w^ent. If 
 you don't, he winds you around his little finger. 
 So I gave him as good as he sent. ' She has a soul 
 to save and the dust hasn't. A clean girl makes 
 a good mother, that's why.' 
 
 '' 'So you agree with Demonthenes, I perceive,' 
 says he. 
 
 " 'Oh, I don't know whether I agree with him 
 or not,' I answered back. Then he smiled in his 
 sarcastic way, ' I am confident you do. The Bow- 
 man and the Greek idea are essentially one.' 
 
 '' 'It's no such thing. BoAvman is Christian, 
 Greeks worshipped horned cattle. Such as you 
 brought into that horrid play last spring.' 
 
 "Then I came home, mad way through. That's 
 the worst of talking to him. You don't know 
 what's coming next, and he says such perfectly 
 dreadful things, lugging in anything so long as 
 it makes a point, whether it ought to be there or 
 not." 
 
 "But if it makes a point, the material is cer- 
 tainly relevant," said Mrs. Powell. 
 
 "Not when it's untrue, never w^hen it's sugges- 
 tive," stated Mrs. Ames with fine theological de- 
 terminism, made emphatic by the perception that 
 the speaker was not quite refined. 
 
 "It is best that Ruth should be taught things 
 that will fit her to become a useful woman, with all 
 the privileges of a Christian community. She 
 should know how to keep house, to cook and sew. 
 Mrs. Wells offered to teach her but her father is 
 deaf to reason. I have urged him to bring his 
 widowed sister here to look after Ruth, instead of 
 that ignorant old colored woman — but no!"
 
 THE FACULTY TEA 33 
 
 *'He keeps Mammy on that very account, you 
 know," added Mrs. Wells. 
 
 "How interesting!" said Mrs. Powell. "What 
 is his reasoning? 
 
 "His reasoning is that he doesn't want her 
 restrained, frightened or disciplined. He claims 
 that this old slave woman who was his wife's 
 playmate down South is the only woman who 
 won't twist her out of the pattern God intended 
 for her. Every woman in the church is up in arms 
 about it. Oh, how that harum-scarum gets on my 
 nerves. Only yesterday I saw Miss Ruth on the 
 lawn kneeling head-over-heels as if no man were 
 within a hundred miles — somersaults, handsprings, 
 cartwheels the boys call them. I was so dis- 
 gusted after all the effort that has been made for 
 her safety that I spoke to her father about it. I 
 did not mince matters, I assure you ! — but he was 
 as bland and stubborn as ever. He began to be 
 poetic about the grass and the birds and what 
 not." 
 
 Mrs. Powell repressed a smile which led Mrs. 
 Ames into the role of post-interpreter. 
 
 "What did he say?" repeated Mrs. Ames, mus- 
 ing. ' ' W-e-11, he wanted to know what could harm 
 a pure girl on the clean grass with the blue sky 
 above. Does it harm the 5fr<is.^ Isn't it as much 
 her habitat as theirs? My, what is the world 
 coming to when a girl can again dress in an apron 
 of leaves? 
 
 "I then asked why he didn't send her away to 
 some girls' boarding school until she was ready 
 for college. He made the answer I expected — 
 precisely. No schooling for Madame Ruth that 
 doesn't accord with his fanatical ideas. His 
 women are all queens sitting on thrones, half 
 dressed, glimmering in the dawn. I declare, ' ' she 
 concluded faintly, "sometimes it seems as if a 
 widower had lost his last grain of common sense.
 
 34 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 Dear, dear I I do hope nothing will happen to 
 the poor, neglected, tempted child. I wish she'd 
 let me mother her. She 's a real sweet girl after 
 all." 
 
 ''To me she is extremely attractive — unusually 
 so, indeed," said Mrs. Powell. "To be sure, I've 
 scarcely met her, but I thought her unaffectedly 
 simple, very keenly alive — like a splendid boy, but 
 beautiful — like a woman." 
 
 "She is not considered attractive by the Bow- 
 man people who are qualified to judge. Her 
 father is cultured enough himself, but he doesn't 
 believe in it for women. From what I make out 
 of him," said Mrs. Wells, plaintively, "women 
 can do exactly as they want to because we were 
 born to do right. In spite of all he says about 
 God and duty, I think he is more of a Unitarian 
 than Presbyterian." 
 
 "If that's so, why not take it to the Presby- 
 tery?" 
 
 "We have but it is no use. Men are such cow- 
 ards. If they had the least gumption things would 
 go right. 
 
 ' ' That 's so, ' ' put in Mrs. Ward. ' ' Just like my 
 Ralph. 'You know' said I, 'that the Professor 
 will bring everlasting disgrace on the whole town. 
 Why don't you talk to him?' 'I can't. No man 
 can talk to his captain.' Finally he said, 'Let 
 Jimmy Sloan talk to him.' 'Jimmy Sloan,' said 
 I, 'Jimmy Sloan is an ass, a conceited ass.' 
 ♦That's the trouble,' said he, 'everybody in town 
 is either an old soldier or an ass. The old soldiers 
 won't talk to him and the others dare not. ' There 
 you have it. If men won't do their duty, women 
 are helpless." 
 
 "That's just what I said to George" — ex- 
 claimed Mrs. Holman — 'you are a burgess of the 
 town, a banker, a lawyer, a deacon. Face the
 
 THE FACULTY TEA 35 
 
 deceptive creature. The moral law must be up- 
 held/ 
 
 "So he went. The professor met him on the 
 steps, sat him in his best chair; they talked war, 
 politics, scripture, laughing and disputing until 
 the supper bell rang. He never realized how the 
 professor had put it over on him until crossing 
 the street he saw the girl hanging by her toes on 
 the trapeze. But then it w^as too late to go 
 back!" 
 
 Mrs. Powell tried to think of some bright say- 
 ing to turn the discussion her way. None seemed 
 to fit. Relief came from a multitude of voices 
 down the street. It w^as the opening day for 
 athletics. Along they rushed, first the girl wav- 
 ing the college flag, then several boys with instru- 
 ments which made more noise than music. The 
 team and then a howling mob. They stopped 
 before the professor's house. Judged by the 
 cheering, what he said must have been thrilling. 
 
 They return. This time the professor leads, the 
 girl is carried on the shoulder of Tom Kidd, the 
 music and the team are a bit mixed ; the boys are 
 noisier than ever, zigzagging across the street in 
 their merry dance. 
 
 "My," said Mrs. Jordan, "I would not want 
 my Jane to dress like that. Absolutely nothing 
 but bleating tinsels. It's enough to give one a 
 conniption fit." 
 
 "When I was a girl," put in Mrs. Burton, 
 "boys went to prayer meeting as regular as the 
 clock. Sunday night they sat in back, watching 
 the girls in the choir. Now girls are nowhere. 
 To no one will they listen but the professor. Then 
 there were debates and orations, but no such 
 'doings as he eggs them on to. He even winks 
 when they study on Sunday to make up for time 
 lost on that abominable field. I wish the weeds 
 grew there as they used to. Then virtue would
 
 36 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 have its reward. But it is easier to talk than to 
 do when Malcolm Stuart is around. Is he right 
 or are we? You can't help learning his head- 
 hnes; he has been shouting them hither and yon 
 for twenty years." 
 
 "Does he really talk like that?" 
 
 "Talk like that? That's only a beginning. 
 Picking up a union suit, he said, 'Petticoats are 
 needless ornaments. No girl should cover her 
 knees except in a snow storm' — the idea, where 
 would modesty be without a garment to hide be- 
 hind? A girl's knee is so sacred she should not 
 see it even when she washes. I never leave him 
 without blushing to the roots of my hair," 
 
 " 'Clothe not the body with raiment but the 
 soul with righteousness,' he preached from the 
 text, saying his translation of the scripture was 
 better than the authorized version. The idea that 
 man can improve what was written bv the hand 
 of God." 
 
 " 'A woman needs no covering for her virtue* 
 • — say if you will this is not vile ! 
 
 " 'Beauty was not made to be hidden, but to 
 be seen.' 
 
 " 'Dress is a device to hide the defects of the 
 soul.' 
 
 " 'A maid is never contaminated except by her 
 mother. ' 
 
 " 'Clothes hide what virtue adorns.' 
 
 "If you were to talk to him your modesty would 
 be shivering in two minutes. He puts girls, birds 
 and flowers together and would make a public 
 exhibition of them all." 
 
 And so on, a dozen voices joining in the unison 
 of denunciation, each more emphatic than the 
 other. Then they paused, looked stern, bit their 
 lips. A common thought was in everyone's mind, 
 an oft-expressed wish to which no solution came.
 
 THE FACULTY TEA 37 
 
 '•We got rid of saloons twenty years ago, but 
 one professor is worse than a dozen saloons." 
 
 A new outburst was prevented by steps in the 
 hall. Through the open door came Mrs. Dickson, 
 with Mrs. Holden, the Kansas firebrand, on her 
 arm. 
 
 The two women as they sat in their chairs of 
 honor were much alike and yet different. Both 
 had heavy chins and a firm setting to the mouth. 
 Mrs. Dickson had a sunken middle-face and a high 
 forehead. Her companion had high cheek-bones, 
 a projecting nose and slanting forehead. Her 
 eyes were large, mild and blue. From them one 
 would never have imagined the deeds w^hich filled 
 the liquor-controlled papers with horror. But 
 looking down, the cause of their terror became 
 apparent. Her muscles had the rigidity of iron — 
 working with her jaws, not with her eyes. She 
 was a cross between a Methodist and a Calvinist, 
 having the will of the one and the emotion of the 
 other. 
 
 The older western states were settled by cur- 
 rents of immigration from several directions, 
 each of which retained its individuality. The 
 unifying force was Methodism, which drew into its 
 fold the scattered remnants of many diverse 
 groups. Calvinism could not hold its own in the 
 open environment of the West. Its force is in its 
 chains and fears. When these bonds break, de- 
 cay sets in. Methodism thus wrought a union of 
 primitive races and backsliding Calvinists. In 
 their union we have a confusion of types; the 
 crescent-faced Puritan intermarrying with the 
 full-faced primitive stock. East of the Missis- 
 sippi the older race strata are to some degree 
 yet visible but to the west the half-breeds caused 
 by the intermingling are dominant. The result 
 is more emotion and will, less reserve and self- 
 control. Kansas, thinking more quickly, is more
 
 38 MUD HOLLOW; 
 
 intuitive iii judgment than New England. It is 
 Illinois straiaed and magnified. Fire and will are 
 united instead of opposed. 
 
 "We rightly expect waves of emotion to start in 
 the highlands of the west and to lose force as they 
 come east. This is partly the result of climate. 
 The upland does not have the muggy climate of 
 the coast. But the larger element in the change 
 is due to a mixture of two types giving the half- 
 breed a strong chin, high cheek-bones and a re- 
 cediug forehead. This combination makes a good 
 pugilist and athlete. Emotion and will unite; 
 enthusiasm and persistency result. Great stores 
 of energy thro^vn like a bolt give results that care- 
 ful thinking cannot attain. 
 
 When this spirit comes to women they lose the 
 reserve that men of older civilizations admire. 
 They enter where they will ; they strike with the 
 celerity of man, if not his force. Of this type 
 was Mrs. Holden, a queer combination of ruthless 
 aggression and timid womanliness. Today she is 
 one, tomorrow the other; hating with bitterness, 
 loving with eager tenderness. 
 
 In this way Kansas women take the lead. With 
 them the temperance movement entered a new 
 stage, of which Mrs. Holden was a fitting repre- 
 sentative. Where she went liquor moistened the 
 streets, not the throats of men. 
 
 Her talk thrilled her audience. Even their limp 
 muscles occasionally twitched, showing that 
 thought was transforming itself into action. Still 
 the old longing remained; the old problem kept 
 coming back. The devil in Kansas was a saloon- 
 keeper, in Bowman he was a professor. Blows 
 could check the one but what would silence the 
 other! They longed to put the question direct 
 but a knock came. Mr. Ward, entering, stood at 
 attention with whip in hand. 
 Smiling, Mrs. Ward arose and said, "John is 
 
 %.
 
 THE FACULTY TEA 39 
 
 always on time. I hope, Mrs. Holden, you do not 
 have to make the 5:10 train." 
 
 She had evidently forgotten what she had said 
 of her husband's moral cowardice for she put her 
 arm affectionately on his shoulder, and gleamed 
 with happiness at the thought of a husband w^ho 
 was always on time. Mrs. Holden was firm. An 
 evening lecture engagement must be met. Just 
 as the handshaking was finished she said ; 
 
 "Oh, I almost forgot my message. Lecturing 
 at Mud Hollow last week, I heard of the greatest 
 boy ever who is coming here. He is an angel in 
 the bud — so say the old soldiers, the women and 
 everybody else. His father was a war hero, his 
 mother a saint if there ever were one. He has 
 great possibilities; a ready-made hero, keen for 
 any great cause. Don't let him fall into the 
 wrong hands. ' ^ 
 
 "We won't," said a dozen voices in unison, 
 their thought going straight to the professor. 
 
 "Yes," said Mrs. Dickson, approvingly, "we 
 need martyrs. The Lord loveth a blood sacrifice. 
 The best are His. A hero on the rack makes 
 heaven smile." 
 
 Amid a chorus of good-byes, the bays darted 
 away. Then each woman hastened to her kitchen. 
 No matter how they thought, they were good 
 housewives. 
 
 "Putrid innocence," exclaimed Mrs. Powell, 
 mounting her step. "Must I feed with these 
 sweet geraniums all my life! Temperance, theol- 
 ogy, knees. Not a ^vord of Ibsen or Shaw nor 
 even a Browning Club to relieve the monotony. 
 Pennsylvania 'corrupt and contented.' No; 
 that's not it. She's dead, petrified, turned to 
 salt— Hell! I might as well learn to wash dishes 
 and be done with it."
 
 40 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 VI 
 
 College Opens 
 
 Paul Brown stopped when he saw that he was 
 too late to enter chapel with the herd of excited 
 Freshmen shoving through the doorway. Had he 
 by nature been a class man, he would have run 
 after them; had his perceptions been less slow, 
 he would have followed the traditions which were 
 its breathing soul. Arousing his self-conscious- 
 ness, they would have warned him that he was 
 too conspicuous against the skyline, too raw, too 
 big to stand in isolation from his appointed mass. 
 Whatever the power of the ideals that brought 
 these sober country boys to Bowman, most of 
 them would have been swept along by the excite- 
 ment of the first morning of the college year. 
 The country boy in town is a sharp observer. 
 
 But this one stood, a target for hostile com- 
 ment, as deeply occupied with his intense pur- 
 pose as when he had stopped at the end of a 
 furrow, letting the horses sniff the ground. With 
 the old gesture of relief he pushed his soft hat 
 away from his forehead, brushing back the brist- 
 ling, newly cut hair. 
 
 The campus had quickly emptied of men; dor- 
 mitory windows opened from vacant rooms to the 
 south wind ; the professors' hired girls shook their 
 dusters on the porches that looked over the 
 campus. The fourth boundary of the field was a 
 clean line of cropped emerald turf, beyond which 
 the vigilant lawn mower had no concern for the 
 tangled grass which grew wildly to the foot of a 
 tumbling stone fence meshed in silvered clematis 
 and carmined blackberry, half buried in the lovely 
 spray of goldenrod that dashed against the lich- 
 ened stones. On the other side of the tossed,
 
 COLLEGE OPENS 41 
 
 flowery back, wide meadows dipped gently down- 
 ward, then upslanted softly to a dark, harsh ridge, 
 misplaced and powerful. It cleft them brutally 
 with naked feet of gneiss and granite, shouldering 
 across the high pastures to a little talking stream 
 above which it hung with a worn, barren crust. 
 It was like a primeval silence cleaving mute 
 sounds, which Paul, Avithout volition, turned from 
 the college to study. He met its sullen challenge 
 by a blind clinching of his great hands. 
 
 The waving fields of grain bring a smile of 
 victory to the western farmer's face. Every inch 
 of that soil he has transformed, beaten into shape, 
 forced to express his wish. The swamp he 
 drained, the ridge he lowered, the soil he manured 
 — all is self-expression. A rock, a boulder, is an 
 irritating obstacle, an eternal reminder of man's 
 helplessness. Break it, hide it, crush it. Who 
 can smile when he is taunted by an untamed 
 force? 
 
 Paul felt an impulse to put his shoulder against 
 the uplifted mass and push it over into the valley 
 below. As he was planning this the thought of 
 his mission came back. He had come not to 
 transform Pennsylvania rocks into Indiana soil, 
 but to figlit an incorporeal fight with Malcolm 
 Stuart as his guide. 
 
 Such was Paul's reaction as he faced the huge 
 uplift which the servile native went humbly 
 around. If he stopped to look he called it beauti- 
 ful, or if awed thought it a manifestation of God's 
 power. But Paul's God was not of this sort. 
 What is the greater God, He who left Pennsyl- 
 vania a mass of obtruding obstacles, or He who 
 rolled oiit the great prairies of the West? The 
 answer is not so obvious as the lover of hills 
 imagines. Paul, at least, had the Western view. 
 
 Ah, where could his hero be? In guessing, he 
 turned into a path at right angles to the one upon
 
 42 MUD hollow: 
 
 which he stood and walked forward to an area 
 intersected with lime lines and dotted with bare 
 spots. This he regarded with attention — the first 
 athletic field he had ever seen. Was it not foot- 
 less and puerile to measure strength by ungainful 
 devices upon the ground ? Thus the young farmer 
 was inclined to judge, for his own body had come 
 to unconscious, unexplored perfection through the 
 garnering of harvests by the sheer force of will- 
 ing muscles. But the life of which this was a part 
 was hallowed by the influence of one man; a 
 surge of tenderness washed away his judgment 
 against whatever touched this man's daily life; 
 all was potent, for an instant all was right. 
 
 The boys in the chapel began to sing the college 
 song, to which Paul would have listened if he had 
 not heard a sharp cry of distress and the scrape 
 of feet behmd a group of thick bushes that deco- 
 rated the campus. 
 
 There he saw a girl half-lying on the ground 
 beside a flat, broad stone. She seemed dazed, her 
 lips were firmly closed as if to control uneven 
 breathing. An abraded red line extended from 
 her temple to her cheek. She was so slight that 
 Paul thought she was a child trying not to sob. 
 Touching the abrasion with his handkerchief, he 
 said: 
 
 ''There, now, don't cry. How did you hap- 
 pen to stumble over such a stone as that, I'd like 
 to know?" 
 
 A spark illumined her tear-filled eyes, but she 
 did not move. Putting his hands beneath her 
 arms, he lifted her to her feet with the exagger- 
 ated tenderness displayed to small children. 
 
 ''Let's sit on the stone a minute," he said, 
 "while you tell me about it." 
 
 She took his handkerchief and brushed her 
 hands, slapping it twice across her dress; he
 
 COLLEGE OPENS 43 
 
 saw she was not the child her quivering lips and 
 grieved eyes had pictured her. 
 
 ''Don't bother," she said, "I'm all right now, 
 but it did hurt like fury for a minute. I was 
 just practicing the standing broad jump and I 
 flunked it. Didn't have my right shoes on — that's 
 why I couldn't recover when I came down on the 
 slant of the edge." She spoke briskly, making 
 no show of gratitude as she limped away. 
 
 Paul attempted a diversion, but he was unable 
 quickly to alter his manner to meet the radically 
 different situation. 
 
 "Well, I never," he ejaculated. "Is this where 
 you practice jumping? Wonder if I could get 
 over? You watch me now, and we'll see if a girl 
 can beat a boy." 
 
 She remained haughty and plainly harassed by 
 the ignominy of defeat commented upon by a 
 stranger, yes, probably a Freshman. He adjust- 
 ed himself and cleared the rock after some by- 
 play. 
 
 "Uh!" she said, "do it again." 
 
 He complied. 
 
 "Once more." 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 "Don't be silly. Here! The record is ten 
 inches beyond this corner — three years old. Try 
 it, try it." 
 
 He smiled doubtfully at her command. 
 
 "I guess I'll have to take a little run to do 
 that." 
 
 "No you daren't run; it's a standing jump," 
 she said. "Now!" 
 
 "But how '11 we know if I get more than ten 
 inches ? ' ' 
 
 "Oh, gracious," she scoffed, "I'll measure. 
 What's the difference, now or after?" 
 
 She laid her hands along the ground, then drew 
 her heel edge through it.
 
 44 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 "Here's Jordan's record. Beat it." 
 
 Paul estimated the force with which he must 
 drive; it was a long jump, but he concluded it 
 was but a matter of co-ordination ; fixing his eye 
 upon the line, he landed just beyond it. The girl 
 shrieked ! 
 
 "Who are you? What's your name? Where 
 are you from? Oh! What's your department? 
 Don't be a theologue!" 
 
 "Tell me your name. I discovered you," he 
 laughed. 
 
 Instead of replying she snatched the handker- 
 chief, which she had taken from him to dabble at 
 her abraded cheek, and waved it high above her 
 head. Through the wide chapel door boys were 
 pouring in all directions across the campus. Paul 
 turned and saw them, when his companion called 
 again and again — 
 
 "Jordan's record's gone!" 
 
 "Oh, get out! No greeny can do that." 
 
 They crowded about Paul who, after whirling 
 to escape the discomfort of being looked at by 
 people behind him, stood still, embarrassed, sur- 
 prised to find himself the center of a jesting, 
 laughing throng. 
 
 "Show them, show them," she cried. "Wait, 
 here comes Captain Gannett. Fred, Fred," she 
 called, "here's a splendid man I've found for 
 you. He broke the broad jump record without 
 practice. And he weighs one-eighty stripped. 
 Don't you?" 
 
 The football captain scanned Paul's possibili- 
 ties with a critically narrowed eye and offered his 
 hand to the silent novice. 
 
 "Happy fellow! Congratulations on meeting 
 Miss Ruth's requirements. She's our visiting 
 consultant. AVhat's your position?" 
 
 * * Freshman — arts. ' ' 
 
 Some one guffawed, and another said, "Truly
 
 COLLEGE OPENS 45 
 
 rural." The captain immediately appeared en- 
 nuied. 
 
 "I mean what position have you played in 
 football?" he repeated patiently. 
 
 "I don't play football. I've never seen a game 
 and I don't want to learn. I came here to study." 
 
 Some exclamations intended to disturb him rose 
 from the boys as they began to scatter. 
 
 *' Never mind," said Euth, with breezy protec- 
 tiveness. "You're right, just the same. Fred, 
 bring him to the house tonight. I want Father 
 to see him. He'll tell you what to do. All the 
 boys come to him. He's Professor Stuart, you 
 know. ' ' 
 
 ''Oh! I didn't expect to meet him so soon." 
 
 Ruth looked at Paul a moment, then at the 
 handkerchief, and cried, 
 
 *'I know you. You are Paul Brown, the 
 Indiana poet. Father got your poems last week ; 
 I read them to Fred and we had a good laugh. 
 Think of wasting time over such stuff when the 
 outside world is on the go ! You have muscles — 
 why not use them? Pens were made for sillies 
 like Jim Bailey, white-livered flamingoes who 
 squawk but cannot run or bat. That's good 
 enough for Indiana, but it won't go in Bowman. 
 No loitering around in the moonlight here. No 
 buttonhole lilies. Buck the line, pitch the ball, 
 knock a home run, run a mile. That's what counts ; 
 no monkeying with books. Leave the Greek roots 
 unpuUed, just wade in and do your best. You 
 have lots of hair, let it grow tousled, not in curly 
 locks like Jim Bailey, our Texas beauty. 
 
 "Dick," she cried, turning to a stocky youth 
 in the front row, ' ' take off your topper and show 
 your wool. 
 
 "Look," as the youth complied, "that's beauty. 
 He won't comb his hair until the season is over. 
 Nor open a book. The breakers don 't come until
 
 46 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 February. There is plenty of time to prepare 
 after the snow flies. Now, for glory and Bow- 
 man! 
 
 "Father is expecting you. He had already 
 marked the poems 'promising.' But don't let 
 that boost 3^ou up. It is the lowest mark he ever 
 gives. From that it goes to 'charming,' 'exquis- 
 ite,' 'the promise of greatness,' 'the budding of 
 genius,' 'the hope of the age.' Father's looking 
 for the great American poet and sees him in every 
 stripling who hails from Indiana or Texas. In- 
 diana and Texas — first in poetry but last in glory. 
 Who ever heard of a team from either state?" 
 
 This was Paul's reception. He had traveled a 
 thousand miles to reach a great intellectual cen- 
 ter; a place where art, oratory and classics 
 reigned. He had expected to find poets in every 
 shady nook, orators with magical powers which 
 excelled those of Colonel Saunders. He was un- 
 conscious of body, arms, limbs, so absorbed was 
 he in literary ideals. Anybody can plow, reap, 
 pitch hay or chop wood. Like all the Browns he 
 did these without thought. For them he expected 
 no praise. But to do what you can't, only that 
 is worth while. Paul longed for a world where 
 people can do the impossible and he had thought 
 Bo^vman was the place. Oh, what a drop from 
 the clouds was the reality he faced. 
 
 But Paul was game. He smiled as the girl 
 gave him her hand. 
 
 "You are mine," she said, Avith a look of ferv- 
 ent adoration. "I am so glad that I saw you first. 
 I just knew some one was coming to help us out. 
 You are he, sure enough. Bring him tonight, 
 Fred. Good-bye, until then." 
 
 She walked swiftly toward the house lieliind the 
 hedge, straight-hipped, straight-breasted, lithe, 
 and buoyant. Her chopped hair gave her the 
 look of a boy whom she also resembled in agility
 
 A SEXLESS SOUL 47 
 
 and frankness. If the test of a woman is to bring 
 cheer Euth could meet it, yet she was too physical 
 to be beautiful, too natural to be virtuous. 
 
 ''She's a great girl," observed Gannett, idly 
 watching. "If you want to call tonight I'll be 
 glad to take you. You'll like the old man. He's 
 all to the good. All right, make it Quad Arch, 
 seven-thirty, so long." 
 
 VII 
 
 A Sexless Soul 
 
 The two met that evening in accordance with 
 the code forbidding an upper-classman to call 
 upon a Freshman in his room. Yet Gannett was 
 not unwilling to appear as the promx)t, far-sighted 
 patron of the man who bore more signs of bril- 
 liant athletics than any recent recruit. They 
 strolled beneath the dormitory windows before 
 turning into the broad walk that bounded three 
 sides of the campus; here Gannett pointed out 
 faculty members sitting on their porches with 
 groups of callers ; he indicated the status of young 
 men they met, dressed in crisp, light vests and 
 newly pressed suits, swinging their canes on the 
 round of first-night visits. Paul saw a suave lift- 
 ing of hats, and such a fashionable shaking of 
 hands that he began to be uncomfortable ; but the 
 fear that he was alien to this polished life could 
 not last in the atmosphere of kindliness which 
 exhaled on them all from the hearts of the schol- 
 astic veterans in baggy clothes whose dim, tired 
 wives sat aslant as if listening for a summons to 
 the kitchen or the crib. 
 
 Gannett said, "Here we are," and indicated 
 the green pillars of a hedge between which they 
 passed to a deep, rich lawn well-arched with chest-
 
 48 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 nut. A house opened its wide veranda to them as 
 down its steps Ruth ran. 
 
 ' ' It 's you. Isn 't that nice ? ' ' 
 
 Then she called to her father on the far end of 
 the porch. 
 
 * ' Here is your Indiana poet, fresh and raw. I 
 thought he'd be like Jim Bailey, but he isn't. 
 Why should a big man want to do a little job 
 when the world is full of cripples who can do 
 nothing else? That is father, Paul, unload your 
 poetry. ' ' 
 
 The Professor came forward, taking both of 
 Paul's hands in his, gave him a welcome which 
 made him forget the ignominy of the first Bow- 
 man contact. 
 
 ' ' Come into the study, Paul. I was reading that 
 delightful description of Indiana mothers. You 
 won't object, I am sure, to my quoting it in a 
 lecture I am to give next week. ' ' 
 
 While her father greeted Gannett and shook 
 hands with Paul, Ruth retold the story of meeting 
 Paul with an excitement which seemed to have 
 accelerated since the morning. They sauntered 
 to the house. Paul neither smiled nor spoke. 
 Under the drop light at the door he abruptly 
 faced the Professor, whose genial smile, like the 
 sudden sparkle of the sun upon the sea, sent a 
 message down into the heart of the awed admirer 
 while his hands chilled and twitched.^ 
 
 Paul knew he was the focus of the silence which 
 ensued, but he could not break it. In the con- 
 fusion he was unwieldy. 
 
 **It is a great honor " he said. 
 
 *' Scarcely an honor, Mr. Brown. My daughter 
 would hardly permit that, for you are already 
 persona grata here. I sometimes think this is 
 not so much the home of a quiet old Pennsylvanian 
 as it is a shrine to Hercules, where a vestal feeds 
 the flame. But come into my study."
 
 A SEXLESS SOUL 49 
 
 The study ran clear across the front of the 
 house, with open windows everywhere. To the 
 rear on one side was Ruth's room; on the other, 
 the dining room and kitchen. Bookshelves showed 
 their friendly faces on all sides of the room except 
 where pictures hung. They even in their final 
 extension crowded against the fireplace before 
 which stood a table and the Professor's favorite 
 chair. 
 
 Books are an index of a man's character. Their 
 gaps show his defects ; their overgrown parts his 
 love. Looking over a man's books while you 
 wait for his appearance will tell what to avoid 
 and where to tickle his fancy. 
 
 Judged in this way, the Professor's thought 
 was easy to interpret. There was an immense 
 collection of Greek texts but scarcely a work on 
 philology and only one Greek dictionary. He was 
 no scholar in the modern sense ; merely browsing 
 as his fancy dictated. He loved to read the Greek 
 aloud. Often he did this when alone to catch the 
 right shade of the rhythm. Ruth is the only girl 
 perhaps for ages who was put to sleep by the 
 harmonious flow of Greek poetry. 
 
 He needed no dictionary as the meaning was as 
 clear as English, nor did he bother about the 
 origin of words. To him it was a living language 
 to be taught for its content and beauty. His 
 classes would flunk the examinations now set for 
 freshmen, but they carried away an inspiration 
 that no other subject evoked. He was called 
 easy; yet an alumnus of twenty years remem- 
 bered more he had said than all other professors 
 put together. When they returned on college 
 days, they slung off Greek sayings Avith an avidity 
 that would put a modern philologist to shame. 
 Their Greek jokes could bring a laugh because 
 understood; now only athletic slang brings a re- 
 sponse.
 
 50 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 After Greek came long gaps including what 
 every professor should know. You might look 
 and look, and the more you looked the more ^yould 
 you be impressed with the breaches in his intel- 
 lectual interests. He was not a scholar, nor even 
 a reader. 
 
 But beyond the gaps came another overgrown 
 part. Every pamphlet that had tlie name of 
 woman on or in it the professor bought. The 
 collection was built on no principle ; the greatest 
 confusion prevailed in the placing of books. He 
 was before the epoch of card catalogues, despis- 
 ing any regularity which denoted precision. Im- 
 pulse was his only guide and that was of a fickle 
 sort. 
 
 One of these collections was on ancient customs 
 and missionary tales — "folk ways" as they now 
 are called. They were his great storehouse from 
 which to draw his material on the wrongs of 
 women. He shivered as he read these pages. His 
 audiences trembled when they heard them. Many 
 doubtless were false, others overdrawn, but they 
 gave the basis on which his theories rested. 
 "Woman dethroned and debased" was ever on 
 his lips: her replacement was his one ideal. He 
 thus had a glorious mission and vivid tales to 
 support it. What more than this and Greek liter- 
 ature does one need to make the earth a fairy- 
 land? 
 
 Stately, gentle, this man now opened his door 
 for Ruth and stood aside for her to enter. When 
 they had seated themselves, he gave his attention 
 to Gannett, following with genial interest and 
 encouraging loquacity the various pinchbeck in- 
 cidents. 
 
 Paul had never imagined the fighting prophet 
 in homely guise; the cool reaction cleared the 
 mist through which he had been groping. He 
 studied the bent, glistening face, carved in high
 
 A SEXLESS SOUL 51 
 
 relief; he considered the widely spaced brown 
 eyes, smouldering in dreams ; he watched the thin 
 mouth, slightly smiling, very gentle but founded 
 in his less mobile lines without bitterness or pain. 
 He glanced at the long, emphatic hand which 
 penned the phrases that burned like an acid and 
 goaded like a hymn ; here was the man who knew 
 how to right the wrongs of half the race ; he who 
 had given purpose to the pith of Paul's own life. 
 He could not think of a descriptive term. Paul 
 knew only that he wished to talk to him, to release 
 the torrent of aspirations churning through his 
 imagination. 
 
 Just then a shrill whistle was heard from the 
 street. Both Gannett and Ruth jumped to their 
 feet. 
 
 "It's Joe Bush," cried Ruth, lookmg out the 
 window. 
 
 *'I know what he wants. It's that mix-up on 
 the scrub, Ruth. Want to come out and see him 
 a minute*?" 
 
 ''Yes, indeed. Excuse us, papa. We'll be 
 right back." 
 
 As they closed the study door, Paul's hands 
 tightened whitely upon his knees. 
 
 "I just want to tell yon, sir, that I came to 
 
 Bo^vman on account of — your article " He 
 
 could not go on. 
 
 "An article of mine attracted you? I am glad 
 if I can state Truth so fairly that a man comes 
 here to help us. I look to the West for men un- 
 stained by tradition. Which article is it?" 
 
 "This one," Paul took it from his pocket. "The 
 one named 'Woman: Enthroned, Enslaved'." 
 
 "Ah, that sprang from me when I was harried 
 by traitors in my own camp!" 
 
 "Sir!" 
 
 "I mean I was dealing with the universal forces 
 that threatened to press in upon one helpless
 
 52 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 girl. I touched Truth there. Why did you like it? 
 What do you want to do f ' ' 
 
 "I want first to make folks appreciate my 
 mother and they've got to before i'm through 
 with them. She is far nobler than the men they 
 praise. I '11 show 'em that ! ' ' 
 
 ' ' How, boy ? " The Professor just breathed the 
 question. 
 
 ''I'll find a way. I'll study till I get down to 
 bed-rock — to bottom bed-rock ! ' ' 
 
 ''Then what would you do?" 
 
 Paul was silent, flushing deeply with the pain 
 of incomplete expression. 
 
 "Pardon me," the Professor said, "it is a fault 
 of mine to encroach on matters people do not 
 wish to touch." 
 
 "No, no," Paul cried. "I can't explain what 
 I feel. You said in this paper that Woman, the 
 Queen, is eternally branded into slavery, and her 
 bruises never heal. Well, it's true! Mother is 
 all scarred up. It's work, work, work, from morn- 
 ing to night, a man's work and a woman's work 
 on top of that. For all this she gets no praise 
 other than that due a hired girl. A woman is 
 estimated not in terms of soul, but for the menial 
 acts of the kitchen and farm. When you think 
 how it's happening every day to thousands of 
 women in this country — where everybody pre- 
 tends to respect women — ^how must they feel in 
 those foreign lands where they don't pretend to 
 do anything but sell them like cattle? It makes 
 your blood boil." 
 
 He struck the arm of the chair heavily with his 
 fist, but then, becoming self-conscious, he shrank 
 back and his groat beauty, energizing and direct- 
 ing the potencies of his bodv, vanished; to his 
 observer's ceaseless scrutiny he seemed instantly 
 to become a vacant structure. It was as if a 
 splendid statue, endued with many qualities, sud-
 
 A SEXLESS SOUL 53 
 
 denly losing them all, should pass back into the 
 eclipse of unmodelled clay. The older man waited 
 while the other slowly recovered from the shame 
 of a lost control before he said: 
 
 "Go on. I am deeply interested." 
 
 Paul looked sharply at him. Were not the 
 sympathetic tone, the perfect manner, too pretty 
 to be honest? But in the open simplicity, the 
 vibrant friendliness of the other's gaze, he felt 
 himself give way. How could he have been so 
 ungenerous as to suspect the motives of this open 
 man, to whom he had already bound himself by 
 ties of aspiration! He longed for the power to 
 uncover every dear hope in the sight of him who 
 had voiced his gravest trouble. 
 
 ** After father came home from the war, mother 
 tended his wounds. When he grew worse, mother 
 took the whole load. I can remember how she 
 used to ask the men who came to visit father for 
 advice. My! They'd sit around father's lounge, 
 eating apples and popcorn, stretching out their 
 legs, resting good, while mother was sewing or 
 cooking, with half a day's work ahead. The talk 
 was always about the war and the things father 
 did in it. Never of mother or her deeds." 
 
 "I judge he had especially distinguished him- 
 self." 
 
 ''That's right. He got praise for it, too, down 
 at the store, at church, in the county paper. That 
 was the reward for four years' fighting — but 
 mother's twenty years' fight gets no praise except 
 in terms of doughnuts and griddle cakes. Oh, it 
 makes me tired!" 
 
 "You must have been as proud of him as your 
 mother was, as glad to see him happy." 
 
 Paul hesitated a moment. "I was proud," he 
 said slowly, "we all were. He's all right; he 
 thought there was nobody like mother. He'd 
 watch her by the hour and they'd laugh and talk
 
 54 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 as though they were two kids. She was as much 
 his hero as he was hers. But the rest put him 
 on a pedestal, with no place for her above the 
 level of a washwoman. To them, it is all men, 
 men, men ! He did this, he did that ! Yet we were 
 made not by the deeds of which men brag, but 
 by the silent efforts of women. When I think of 
 my mother, I know there must have been a multi- 
 tude of others who did her deeds, felt her sorrows 
 and then sank into unmarked graves. Yes, heroes 
 do not drop out of the sky. Neither do mothers. 
 Why not give them the credit of making the race, 
 instead of lauding the deeds of men who only 
 reflect the virtues women have acquired through 
 ages of suffering! But not so in Indiana. Women 
 are good enough to make pies, to sew buttons, 
 to churn and sweep, but due recognition for their 
 merit they never receive. Oh, the presumption of 
 men ! I would like to kick 'em downstairs. ' ' 
 
 This was quite an oration for Paul; when fin- 
 ished he fell back into one of his moods, sitting 
 with gripped hands, fixed jaws. The Professor 
 was moved but waited in silence for some new 
 outburst which he felt sure would come. Life 
 came back as quickly as it had gone. Suddenly 
 Paul sprang to his feet and cried: 
 
 ''When the minister called, he said, 'You're 
 the son of a soldier, an honor to the country.' 
 Why didn't he say I was the son of a woman do- 
 ing nobler deeds every day? Why should soldiers 
 who kill men be praised higher than those who 
 make them ! To be good to her because she 's his 
 wife — is that all the honor she's to get? Where's 
 her pension, her glory for grinding herself to the 
 bone for us, and not a word of complaint out of 
 her, year in, year out? He was glorified for one 
 gunshot wound, while she gets no praise for a 
 thousand pains that cut deeper than bullets. What 
 is it that keeps us from being fair to a woman,
 
 A SEXLESS SOUL 55 
 
 and giving her the kind of appreciation her deeds 
 deserve? Everybody thinl?:s well of the useful 
 woman but all they ever say is, 'She is a good 
 cook; her house is in order'; that isn't good 
 enough for my mother. And if it isn't good 
 enough for her, it isn't good enough for other 
 women either." 
 
 He paused in his restless walk, a challenge in 
 his observation. 
 
 "You are right," the Professor said, "it is 
 enough for no woman." 
 
 He crossed the room to a large portrait upon 
 the wall opposite his desk. 
 
 "Your inspiration flows from a great and mis- 
 prized nature — from a woman's protean powers 
 flowing in many channels, yet choked and dammed 
 in every one. Mine came from a nature that 
 poured its rare inspirational quality freely into 
 every deed." 
 
 He looked at the painting so long that Paul 
 was miserably uncertain as what he ought to do. 
 At last the other said: 
 
 "Come here, Mr. Brown, I want you to know 
 Mrs. Stuart." 
 
 Paul studied the canvas with a growing con- 
 sternation and amazement. That ' ' fancy picture ' ' 
 of Mrs. Stuart — the woman whose name was on 
 the dedication leaves of the Professor's books! 
 That smiling, glowing woman whose arms and 
 shoulders gleamed boldly from the black velvety 
 shadows, whose hair was curled and fluffed, whose 
 white and slender hands were jewelled! She 
 seemed to lean from the picture, accepting the 
 admiration of any man for her skin-deep pretti- 
 ncss. 
 
 Paul felt a shock he knew not why, a recoil as 
 though some bewitching vampire had tried to kiss 
 him. The picture had not the sad smile hard toil 
 brings to the overworked millions who get their
 
 56 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 pay in coin which rings false. Can a woman of 
 thirty have soft hands, a slender figure, a girl's 
 face 'and still be an inspiration? Had Paul met 
 Mrs. Stuart on the street he would have thought 
 her overwrought, a drag not a help in the crusade 
 which stirred his soul. But to find her on the 
 wall of the man to whom he looked for guidance, 
 to see his smile, the glow of his enthusiasm as he 
 praised this seemingly useless creature — well, 
 Paul was too slow of thought to solve the riddle. 
 He hesitated, stammered and finally ejaculated: 
 
 ''Did she always look that way?" 
 
 The Professor was too absorbed in his own 
 thought to understand Paul's question or his 
 mood. He gave a look of admiration and said: 
 
 "No, she is in what we might call a fancy cos- 
 tume. You may not be familiar with this school 
 of portraiture, although it is often reproduced in 
 books and magazines. My wife wished it in the 
 manner of the older family paintings in southern 
 homes, those after Eeynolds and Gainsborough, 
 which were much valued by her Virginia relatives. 
 She and the artist in New' York chose the brocade 
 gown there, and I selected the black hat with 
 its long plume. She always regretted that she 
 could not wear the costume in Bowman for she 
 thought it peculiarly enhanced her type." 
 
 Paul listened with a patient astonishment. 
 
 *'She dressed up on purpose to have her picture 
 taken!" he burst forth. ''Why, I thought — I 
 think — she's so different from my mother— I 
 didn't know — I didn't suppose — that was the kind 
 you're working for!" 
 
 The Professor's face sharpened for an instant, 
 his fingers tapped the mantel's edge; then the 
 cast softened to a tender wisdom, a patience that 
 was infinitely sad. 
 
 "Yes, she dressed for this," he said slowly and 
 simply, holding Paul's troubled glance.
 
 A SEXLESS SOUL 57 
 
 "She knew I wanted her at the moment of her 
 most expressive, most intensive beauty. The 
 artist knew I wished him to limn an ideal of 
 womanhood as well as a scrupulous portrait. He 
 has achieved both — for me. ' ' 
 
 Absorbed in his over-enthusiasm he did not 
 realize the mental conflict of his hearer, but broke 
 forth in eulogy that expressed his inner feeling. 
 
 "She is the woman of my pami)hlets, my 
 lectures, my confidant. Only after I knew 
 her did my philosophy gather the attribute of 
 impregnable purity. She was a perfectly fearless 
 woman, a perfectly free one, able to distinguish 
 woman's loftiest conscious needs from her atro- 
 phied functions. She could state them for me in 
 their ultimate terms, for she had never known the 
 miseries of slain desires and exhausting toil. She 
 knew no restraint; her own soul set the bounds 
 of life; she stood upon the mountain tops; I 
 mapped and plodded. From her unfettered 
 growth, I drew that plan of specific rescue which 
 I have set forth elsewhere. A woman with the 
 equipment of perfection : perfected love, which is 
 purity ; perfected reason, which is intuition ; per- 
 fected maternity, which is tenderness; perfected 
 conscience, which is holiness. All these women 
 harbor now, the primary gifts of God, yet over- 
 laid, checked, controlled, nullified, and thwarted 
 of expression by inhuman cruelties. 
 
 "Ah, well, at least we read together the Pro- 
 logue of the new Book of Life, before we played 
 the Epilogue of World Tragedy — ^we could not 
 evade that. The curse of Eve was on her. We 
 were in the grasp of vengeance, the victims of 
 earth's chaotic maelstrom. Ida and I lived too 
 soon to escape the disasters evoked by the brutal 
 order against which we strove. She paid life, I — 
 happiness; all I saved was our daughter. She 
 is as God would have her. She is safe. She is
 
 58 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 free, she is the holy one to be ; in her hands is all 
 that God ordained." 
 
 The lurking smoulder of his eyes was a bright 
 light when he laid his hand on Paul's shoulder, 
 saying in a different tone : 
 
 "It has been a jDleasure and a relief to talk 
 to you as one talks to a newcomer in whom he 
 hopes to find a colleague. You must come here 
 often; you shall be always welcome, and my 
 daughter regards you as her especial treasure 
 trove. Where is she? They have been absent 
 some time. Shall we join them in the open air?" 
 
 Paul moved reluctantly. He did not under- 
 stand nor could he frame questions which should 
 probe further than the light touch of the Pro- 
 fessor had gone. For the first time in his life 
 he had the desire to submit to a personality. He 
 had given himself freely to dogmas and to ideas, 
 but he had never felt warm impulses of soul 
 magnetism. He had not done what he intended 
 to do, but, as he slowly followed the Professor, 
 he felt himself sinking into peace with a widen- 
 ing horizon. 
 
 We know not what might have happened at this 
 juncture if the two men had been left to think out 
 an understanding. Perhaps a different fate would 
 have been Paul's; a simpler, plainer road to his 
 goal might have opened up. For the first time 
 he felt a questioning of his ultimates, a flash of 
 a new world. 
 
 Years were to pass before Paul through his own 
 development faced the same problems again. For 
 good or ill effect was momentary. The door sud- 
 denly opened; in rushed Ruth with the glow of 
 another world. 
 
 "We are already late," she cried. "You prom- 
 ised to talk to the boys on the athletic field. You 
 are not going to cut that, are you 1 ' ' 
 
 "So I did, so I did," said the Professor. He
 
 A SEXLESS SOUL 59 
 
 turned with a pained look whicli might have been 
 due to having forgotten his engagement or to los- 
 ing a chance for more talk. He hesitated a mo- 
 ment and then said, ''Come on, Paul, you must 
 see the athletic field." 
 
 Taking Paul by the arm he led the way out the 
 gate, down the road to the entrance of the field. 
 His appearance started vociferous cheers. It 
 thrilled Paul, but his face flushed to be put un- 
 expectedly in so prominent a place. It was the 
 first college yelling he had heard, and who can 
 resist its appeal? He seated himself on the front 
 row of the grandstand, with the girl and Fred. 
 The Professor stood before the mass of cheering 
 boys. When they were silent he begart 
 
 "Boys, this is a world of dust, common dust 
 From dust we came, on dust we live and to dust 
 we return. It is easy to turn one form of dust 
 into another. God did the trick in six days. Na- 
 ture has a more difficult task, a task not of six 
 days but of millions of years. Dust ceasing to be 
 dust must become soul. From dust to life, from 
 life to muscle, from muscle to soul and from soul 
 to God. The upward track along which all must 
 pass. You can't manufacture soul by any patent 
 process. Change and growth rest on the dusty 
 dust in which our feet must always be. You can't 
 have muscle without dust nor soul without muscle. 
 It is more important to keep your feet on the 
 earth, to mix with its dust, than to dream dreams 
 of unreachable glory. About the clouds is a bar- 
 ren waste; below is world fertility. Stoop and 
 enjoy it. Don't float away and freeze. The stars 
 are reached by a ladder which Jacob saw but 
 could not climb. The way from dust to God is 
 up that ladder. Every step demands muscle. We 
 get no nearer to Heaven than our muscles will 
 take us. It's muscle, all muscle, nothing else 
 counts. That's why we are here and not over
 
 60 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 on the campus fanning ourselves beneath the 
 chestnut trees. We are on the right track. The 
 track from dust to God. We begin at the bottom 
 of the ladder and work up — not at the top and fall 
 back. Men are always mounting; saints are al- 
 ways falling. Their pasted wings drop off in the 
 heat of the sun. Not so with us. We accept 
 Nature's verdict that the road upward is from 
 dust to muscle. We bite the dust, we eat the dust, 
 we roll in dust. We are dust without, dust 
 within ; all, not to be dust, but to be dustless ! Wle 
 want to get away from it but we must carry lots 
 of it along in muscles which are being trans- 
 formed into soul and in souls which are becoming 
 God. 
 
 '*Be proud of dust divinity but climb above it, 
 up until the stars fade and the milky way is lost 
 in the depth below. The ladder rests on this 
 athletic field. Men used to think that it started 
 from the theological seminary or from the col- 
 lege campus, but it does not. They are mere 
 way stations, dessert, not beefsteak. Muscles 
 before college, muscles before theology. It is 
 the long road, the low road, the dusty road which 
 leads upward. On it dust ceasing to be dust be- 
 comes soul and God. We come here today to get 
 our first lesson on how to travel this long dusty 
 road; how to mount the ladder which leads from 
 dirty dirt, from filthy filth, to love, hope and 
 charity. 
 
 "Who would not prefer nature's path; go 
 through the turmoil of its slow, difficult processes 
 instead of trying to grow wings on his back. 
 That is the difference between athletics and the- 
 ology. The one acts with nature, the other against 
 her. Come, boys, make the decision today. Will 
 you fly or walk f Will you take the low dusty road 
 or float among the clouds? Our ladder starts 
 lower, you move up it more slowly, but it reaches
 
 A SEXLESS SOUL 61 
 
 far higher. Muscles, not clouds, reach to the door 
 of Heaven. Now is the time to make the decision 
 and here is the place. I want to shake hands with 
 those who will go with me up the slow road that 
 leads from dust to soul. We shall always have 
 our feet on solid earth but our eyes will see the 
 above. As we mount, each step will be harder. 
 We will need more muscle and have our feet rest 
 more firmly on the dirt. From dust to soul — 
 through muscle and by muscle. Come on, we will 
 all go together, singing the college songs as we 
 go." 
 
 The answer was a cry of joy. A hundred boys 
 rushed forward to seize the Professor's hand. 
 Paul was quicker and nearer. He got the hand 
 first. His heart thrilled with a new impulse as 
 he sprang forward. He had always thought of his 
 muscles as load, as mere flesh which made for 
 temptation. Now it was to be muscle first. His 
 arms and legs were not the useless appendages 
 he thought them to be. 
 
 That night at the window of his dormitory he 
 pondered it all over. He had never before heard 
 of evolution. He had studied books which told 
 of things but not of how souls were made. Souls 
 are transformed muscles. Souls are dustless dust. 
 He would be dust that he might be soul. The 
 new road seemed so attractive that he wanted to 
 try it that night. He could see the ladder going 
 up, up; at the top stood mother. She held 
 not a book but a handful of dust. Yes, his mother 
 had taken the dusty road and he must follow. 
 
 He gathered his poems, his mother eulogies. 
 AVrapping them carefully he placed them at the 
 bottom of his trunk. Tlien sleeping the sleep of 
 the innocent he saw a ladder reaching so high that 
 the earth faded in dim distance.
 
 62 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 VIII 
 
 Senior Honors 
 
 Three years had passed ahnost to a day when 
 Paul again leaped from the train, trod familiar 
 streets and mounted the steps of College Hall. 
 He heard the two o'clock bell and knew it called 
 every one from lunch to the class room. Four 
 o'clock meant athletics; then would the mind- 
 weary horde desert the classic halls for boyish 
 sport. 
 
 Paul cast an eye up and down the campus, then 
 viewed the rocky crest beyond. All seemed dif- 
 ferent than it did when he first saw them. 
 The hills had no terror for he knew them as 
 friends. Paul had an air of mastery which made 
 him different from the timid boy with crude edges 
 to be worn off. His hair, his face, even his body 
 seemed altered and yet beneath it all was his old 
 modesty. He had grown accustomed to have 
 others wait for his decision. His eyes still had 
 that delicate shade of blue which flashed so su- 
 per])ly when some bold decision shone through 
 them. His face seemed smoother and his big 
 hands and feet less prominent. It was easy to 
 see why he had become a dominant figure at Bow- 
 man. Yet kindly as he smiled at the familiar 
 scenes there was a sadness in his heart. Amy 
 Brown was dead. Her illness had kept him at 
 home. Rumor had said that he must manage his 
 mother's estate, but rumor as usual had made 
 things worse than they were. 
 
 Now Paul was again at Bowman more deter- 
 mined than ever to be worthy of his cherished 
 title. Defender of Woman. The spirit of the pre- 
 ceding year re^dved him as its trains of thought 
 came back with their old vividness. Once more
 
 SENIOR HONORS 63 
 
 he was the athlete with red blood of conquest 
 pulsing in his veins. His vision flew from his 
 well-cut suit of clothes to the old garments hang- 
 ing in his room. He found all as he had left it. 
 When he opened the door his student lamp was on 
 the bare pine table ; on the walls were still pinned 
 the photographs of those collegians who had been 
 adjudged worthy of places on the athletic pages 
 of popular weeklies. Dust had settled every- 
 where, yet the place seemed home as he threw 
 wide the blinds and laid his suit case on the folded 
 mattress. The busy officials had left his room 
 undisturbed although they had not expected him 
 so soon. This evidence of demonstrated sympa- 
 thy brought the burning blur which followed 
 every kindness since his mother died. But he 
 dreaded the rush of unhalted grief that now and 
 then, overbearing his physical strength, left him 
 wrenched and sobbing; his own first Ideal was 
 born from the decay of Death. He had gone as 
 had the Professor, among dead women to grasp 
 their mysteries and hear their message. 
 
 * * I '11 make it all up yet, ' ' he cried within. * < I '11 
 do for every woman in the world all that I planned 
 for her. 
 
 He plunged again into the current of a rushing, 
 radiant purpose. So human and so near was she 
 that he longed to talk of her to Professor Stuart. 
 The campus, too, called him strongly ; he no long- 
 er desired to hide himself like a mortally wounded 
 man ; but thought hungrily of his classmates and 
 wished for their arms about his shoulders, their 
 yelling welcome, their silent love. He swung 
 through his window down upon the ground with a 
 greater satisfaction than he had expected ever to 
 feel again. 
 
 His stride was known to Bowman as ''the Paul 
 gait," travestied by spindling Freshmen, imitated
 
 €4 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 intelligently by the cross-country runners and by 
 the fighting men under his personal captaincy. 
 
 ' ' College has been open a week. ' ' Paul thought. 
 ''That's too bad. We'll have to take hold right 
 now if we whip Penn this fall. ' ' 
 
 The Pennsylvania eleven had defeated Bowman 
 the autumn previous by a narrow score. ''Brown's 
 remarkable offensive tactics in the second half 
 made the final score doubtful until the watches 
 snapped time. Brown is an athlete on whom the 
 prophets must keep an eye next fall. Two records 
 broken on Berkeley Oval make him a force in the 
 athletic world whom the critics must take into 
 consideration. Saturday's game has brought a 
 new college upon the horizon. The man who car- 
 ried the ball through Pennsylvania's defence 
 twice in ten minutes and at the same time 
 moved his own line with the precision of a stop- 
 watch will have some surprises in store for the 
 critics of next year's games." 
 
 The page which contained this appreciation of 
 the hero, surmounted by his photograph, was 
 tacked on many a dormitory wall; the vital func- 
 tions of Bowman were interrupted by his absence ; 
 the stream was choked, it backed and filled with- 
 out him. A member of the faculty committee on 
 ahletics despatched an official inquiry into his 
 probable action. The letter came to Paul's hand 
 on a day when his captaincy lay unconsidered; 
 the campaign so zestfully planned in the starry 
 spring nights was a silly play when Paul stood 
 beside the pebbly mound above his mother's 
 coffin. 
 
 "I'll go over there the first thing after supper," 
 he resolved, pausing to cool at the bottom of the 
 high steps. He turned his face to a breeze which, 
 wavering out of the great distances of field and 
 sky behind him, stroked the wet flesh beneath the 
 loose outing shirt. His soft collar, fastened with
 
 SENIOR HONORS 65 
 
 a black necktie, fell back from the base of his big 
 pulsing throat; he loosened it a little more, with 
 his habitual gesture of easing hot blood. The 
 September shimmer beat on his uncovered head, 
 but he ran his fingers through his moist, crinkling 
 hair and lifted it to the last touch of the breeze. 
 Thrusting his thumbs into liis white belt, he looked 
 into the miles of palpitating sunshine. The Ridge 
 alone was cold and stolid; all the world beside 
 trembling with intensity. He looked at his watch. 
 *'Four o'clock. Last recitation. I'll wait here 
 and catch the fellows when they come out. ' ' 
 
 The silent building stirred; doors opened, feet 
 shuffled dully and distantly; classes poured into 
 the corridor and converged upon the stairs. They 
 tramped down and scattered ; some went through 
 the big door that opened upon the tidy little town, 
 but most made for the narrow way that led down 
 hacked, narrow steps upon the lazy shade, the 
 baking tennis court, the blazing diamond and the 
 neglected, effluent grass. The advance was 
 swift; when it saw Paul at the bottom of the 
 steps it recoiled upon the men behind. In the 
 interval of silence and pushing, Paul drew his 
 handkerchief across his forehead nervously. 
 
 Then he called out, "Hello, boys! That you, 
 Trautman? Glad to see you. How goes it, Pratt?" 
 He wished the moment ended, and to hasten it 
 ran half-way up the steps. But they sprang down 
 upon him and pressed him backward, striking him 
 upon his shoulders, cuffing him, reaching for his 
 hands, crowding round him. 
 
 ''Well, I say!" yelled Trautman, hitting him 
 upon his chest, "well, well! This is something 
 like ! ' ' The doorways packed with men, who bore 
 down upon the first and crowded them into the 
 open field. Suddenly Trautman whirled and lifted 
 both arms in the gesture of a conductor with his 
 baton. He jerked his elbows violently upward,
 
 66 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 and threw his hands wide open. ''Ready," he 
 hissed, "Bowman! One, two, three!" A roar 
 hurst from every man: ''Eah, rah, rah. Bow- 
 man!" 
 
 ''Brown!" he yelled again and jerked his arms 
 higher. "Ready. Rah, rah, rah. Brown." They 
 roared. Again, "Rah, rah, rah. Brown!" They 
 halted and turned their faces to the sky, lifting 
 their chests mightily. "Rah, rah, rah, Brown I 
 Brown!! Brown!!!" The volume swelled, rose, 
 burst open the campus with such fresh fire that it 
 sprang to life at every pore. Figures came run- 
 ning; three rose from the somnolent-scented 
 shadows of a distant haystack and trotted in. 
 The dormitory windows teemed. Sleepy faces 
 peered forth, coatless bodies leaned far out, un- 
 collared, unshirted men rose to view. They waved 
 and called unintelligibly and if they were too high 
 aloft to jump they disappeared briefly to come 
 hurrying through the accustomed exits. Others 
 hung a leg outward on the casement and a few 
 paused listening, shading their eyes from the 
 slanting sun-glare to be sure of that towering 
 central figure ; then hustled, hurtled by the mass 
 that caught up every man of Bowman. Not for 
 mere ebullience of spirits would they sally forth! 
 So they paused before they, too, were swallowed. 
 Freshmen came, were crowded silently, sheep- 
 ishly, and displaced easily. 
 
 "Brown's back," the others surmised and 
 swung themselves instantly from the windows to 
 the ground. They made way through the crowd 
 to Paul and strove for his recognition. Pushed 
 and pummelled, he swayed with them, grasping 
 hands outthrust, nodding, smiling, answering, his 
 blue eyes flashing on his classmates as they 
 swarmed, gathered in about him. 
 
 A great fellow threw himself on Paul. "Why 
 didn't you telegraph?" he said. "I'd have had
 
 SENIOR HONORS 67 
 
 the team out. We'll beat 'em now. We'll whip 
 the Big Four. I tell you, fellows, ' ' he cried, turn- 
 ing on the crowd. "I tell you we'll upset the 
 records this year. We '11 have them down. ' ' 
 
 ^'Gannett!" they answered. ''Good one, Gan- 
 nett, good hoy! Bring on your team. Here's 
 your captain! Team, this way!" 
 
 The team gathered itself, one by one, and came 
 to Paul down ready lanes. Two lifted Paul upon 
 their shoulders; the team winged out on either 
 side and the coil unwound into procession. Now 
 at its head, and now afield, the megaphones com- 
 manded and decried. The motes of the sunshine 
 danced in the blare with the stamping feet of the 
 proud young men who swning and sang. Paul 
 rode at their head — to the right, to the left, the 
 brawny beef-eating fighters — the line serpentining 
 in their tracks. Gannett led it, walldng backward, 
 waving his hat, posturing like a dancer as he out- 
 lined the serpent's writhing, and uttering at reg- 
 ular intervals the college yell. The honor men 
 stepped breezil}^ on their path, chanting the foot- 
 ball song, and joining each one in the cry of his 
 class or fraternity as it rose from the ranks 
 behind him. Gannett brought them at length to 
 the athletic field and halted beneath two trees. 
 Between them was arched a mre upon which 
 were words made of faded hemlock twigs, now 
 browned and falling to the ground. Here the 
 tumult waged again; Paul was lifted by a dozen 
 hands from the shoulders where he sat, and hoist- 
 ed upon others which bore him under the arch. 
 
 Gannett, beside him, made the sign for silence, 
 but was drowned in noise. Thereupon the mega- 
 phones came running and consulted with him. 
 They turned their gaping throats and poured 
 forth hollow, weird and cave-like sounds. "Sil- 
 ence!" "Silence!" "Every fellow read those 
 words!" "Remember!" "Last spring we won — '*
 
 68 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 ' ' A gold medal— " ' ' A belt. " ' ' Who put up this 
 arch — " "Bowman," yelled the crowd. "Who 
 forT' "Brown," they answered. "Read it," 
 said the megaphones. "Wait — ready, one, two, 
 three ! ' ' Mouths opened, teeth gleamed from hot 
 and happy faces: "We did them. Brown!" 
 Three times they yelled it, tossed hats and hugged 
 each other so fiercely that they did not see a girl 
 come to the arch and wave the football men lightly 
 back. They drew their bulk aside as her finger 
 just touched their arms and pressed against each 
 other to give her access to the hero. Those near- 
 est became silent, and seemed to listen through 
 the cheering deeper in the mass. They quickly 
 glanced from the eager face of the girl to the 
 impassivity of Paul. There was an instant's curi- 
 ous pause among his men, a hint of consciousness 
 that delicacy was needful. 
 
 "Oh, I'm so glad, so glad," she sighed. "Your 
 last letter to father was just awful. We gave you 
 up — almost. I heard the racket when we came 
 in from our walk just now and I supposed it was 
 good news about the team." She laughed again, 
 exultantly. "But I didn't hope you were really 
 here." She studied him and saw that he was a 
 bit hollow-eyed and strained. Her voice also sank 
 a tone. "Come over and see father right away," 
 she said softly. "He's missed you. Come over 
 to supper with Fred. Will you? Will you?" 
 
 ' ' You bet he will, ' ' vociferated Fred. "I '11 take 
 him home to dress right off. Whoop — Captain! 
 Fellows," he shrieked as he seized a megaphone 
 to issue a command. "Let's take him to his room 
 now, and everybody who feels good come to the 
 chapel steps at dark for a sing. Get together, 
 Glee Club ! Bring out every guitar and mandolin 
 and banjo. It's up to every man to back the 
 winner ! ' '
 
 THE BOOK 69 
 
 IX 
 
 The Booij: 
 
 The day after Christmas, Professor Stuart be- 
 gan his lecture tour of the larger towns of his 
 state. It was his pilgrimage of love upon which 
 he set forth with waxing eagerness; he glowed 
 more ardently each winter with the belief that 
 he brought hope to patient prisoners. Among the 
 varied organizations of women who continued to 
 invite him, despite queries whether a newer at- 
 traction might not bring more money, he was 
 known as an orator who morticed their stones into 
 the arabesque cathedral of his own faith. He 
 used them all in his structures — the Temperance 
 Union, the educational convention, the Woman's 
 Club, the dogma of the missionary, the logic of 
 the suffragist — on all these he built with the hand 
 of an artist, and exhorted with the flash of a 
 zealot. His devotion thrilled his audience; they 
 nodded daintily to him as they clapped their 
 gloved hands ; he thought they shook their chains ; 
 and he returned to Bowman elate, absorbed, 
 dreamy with the imminence of revolution. These 
 women, listening, questioning, receptive, seemed 
 to press to the goal where men found freedom. 
 Sitting again in his home study, he thought of 
 what he had seen in the vast terms of the cosmic 
 process guided by God. For weeks thereafter, 
 watching his daughter with a certain reverence, 
 he covered pages of his notebook with her answers 
 to his questions. They might truly be interpre- 
 tations of his visions. The outward-minded child 
 was exalted into the vessel of the oracle and 
 the boyish girl into the forerunner of the Dawn. 
 
 Two years earlier he had said to Mrs. Dickson 
 in the course of their interminable warfare about
 
 70 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 his daughter's upbringing: "She is an experi- 
 ment — an experiment in the natural woman. I 
 am obliged to yield that point to you, but does 
 not my selection of Ida's daughter convince you 
 that I have embarked on the safest waters ? ' ' 
 
 ' ' Time will tell. Time will tell, ' ' she answered, 
 adding darkly, "you mark my words." 
 
 But as time passed he regarded her less as 
 an experiment in the social crucible — more as a 
 revelation, mute as yet but precious with promise. 
 It was a trial of his sweet courtesy that the 
 women of his own town were that small minority 
 of his wide acquaintance which sought to oppose 
 his daughter's normal growth. He believed that 
 the hundreds who listened each year, having com- 
 prehended his philosophy, would also understand 
 the specific instance of its operation in a living 
 girl. A half-mystical, sustaining comradeship 
 arose with the absent women who had welcomed 
 him with outstretched hands, and told him so 
 earnestly that they remembered what he had said 
 a year ago. All this was more real than his 
 circumstantial association with his doubting 
 neighbors. From the hard, uncomprehending, 
 ignorant exactions of the latter, he appealed in 
 his empty study to the gentle stimulation of the 
 former ; he never doubted tliat the Bowman women 
 would be converted to his belief when a com- 
 pleted successful type should be presented to them 
 — they were too good, too intelligent to repudiate 
 direct evidence. The attitude of these contented 
 wives who fell like wolves upon Tomorrow's Free- 
 dom he ascribed to their long-isolated, undis- 
 turbed economic status. Although he could ex- 
 plain why his associates failed to understand his 
 relation to his daughter, he underwent periods of 
 spiritual loneliness which were more insistent 
 than the tender tolerance of the seer — stronger 
 than the acquired patience of the teacher.
 
 THE BOOK 71 
 
 During these periods of depression, he tried to 
 shut his eyes upon the protesting faces of old 
 Bowman friends by recalling the compliant fea- 
 tures "of those searching blindly for aid," who 
 engaged him to lecture. These swiftly appearing, 
 vanishing figures were to him somewhat as the 
 memory of his wife, a cloudy call from regions 
 of the world and yet above it. In the sublimation 
 consequent upon these moods he assured himself 
 again and again that he lived in a practical world ; 
 as if to protect himself against a suspicion that 
 he was an impractical idealist and a helpless poet. 
 It was then he wrote the pamphlets which attract- 
 ed attention by daring metaphor and revolution- 
 ary allusion; they flared about the well-trodden 
 statistics and historical jottings like beacons on a 
 dim highroad. He was proud of them, satisfied 
 with them, for they were struck at the white heat 
 of illumination. The pages he dashed down linked 
 him to the progressive movements of the day — on 
 the one side they were indications from incom- 
 plete series of diligently gathered facts, on the 
 other, deductions from an absolute God-revealed 
 truth. 
 
 They were readily quoted upon publication and 
 were accepted as occasional essays in the better 
 magazines. He wrote musically, with a literary 
 conscience reminiscent of Webster and Macauley 
 and Cicero, whose oratund echoes rolled some- 
 what quaintly amid the general bruskness of the 
 day's style. At the height of the memorable quar- 
 rel with the women of Bowman, in the correspond- 
 ence columns of The Observer, he had not fallen 
 once from standards sanctioned by classic satire. 
 Mrs. Dickson said it was a "provoking manner" 
 and the vigor of her letters at length compelled 
 the President of the college to suppress their 
 public correspondence. 
 
 At this the Professor smiled, for he thought
 
 72 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 the honors were his. But when upon his return 
 from this year's lecture circuit he found on his 
 study table a rejected manuscript he was sur- 
 prised and angered. "Would say," the letter 
 ran, "your article on the 'Sexless Soul' is too 
 polemic. Its style is classic but the thought fits 
 the village library better than a million-read mag- 
 azine. We deal with pleasant facts, those that 
 inspire. Literature is soul, not bad science." 
 
 The two men did not face each other. Their 
 only contact was this note, yet each represented 
 tendencies nation-wide in import. Stuart was a 
 parlor orator. His audience was a dozen, not a 
 million. Everywhere he went a select group 
 gathered to hear his message. His missionary 
 trips were tiny affairs ; he paid the railroad ; the 
 town furnished the biscuit and parlor. Each 
 village had a lighted torch, an earnest group, a 
 receptive attitude. He returned with zeal for his 
 cause, a belief that America was ready to break 
 its somber chains. This article forged in the pre- 
 ceding months he had tried on twenty audiences. 
 Hundreds of pale, tired women had shaken his 
 hand and approved his doctrine. A Sexless Soul, 
 yes. The shell may be material, different, but the 
 soul within glows with the same eternal essence. 
 
 Such was the thought; such the fire which its 
 reception banked. In another mood was the edi- 
 tor who had just 'come from a two-dollar break- 
 fast. At his right were the usual forty MSS of 
 the morning mail. Before him were nine waste- 
 ibaskets into which the rejected were cast, to be 
 taken by secretaries who knew by the basket what 
 answer to send. He had never seen a country 
 village nor had he been of America since he dined 
 at Oxford some years before. In the waste- 
 baskets fell America, crude America, it is true, 
 still each told of some crack in America's glacial 
 ice. But neither running water nor fledgling emo-
 
 THE BOOK 73 
 
 tion was the editor's guest. His audience was 
 the millions who form the crust, not the tiny, 
 rebellious village groups. He delighted to repro- 
 duce what Oxford, Paris and Germany said; 
 America was of interest only as a denunciation 
 of Puritan morality; the last word of the non- 
 descript West; the Greek revival at Princeton; 
 or the kind of toothpicks Harvard professors use. 
 
 Professor Stuart's article had not been thrown 
 into a waste-basket at first glance. The editor 
 had been reading about a Vienna doctor who said 
 the soul was sex and hence he thought the sexless 
 soul was a branch of the same subject. He did 
 not find his mistake until he had read three pages. 
 Then in a kindly mood he penned the letter 
 Stuart found on his return. 
 
 These things are said not to denounce breakfast 
 with French names, twenty-five cent cigars nor 
 articles on Harvard toothpicks. They are meant to 
 illustrate the American crust and the cauldron 
 beneath. The editor represents the organized, 
 disciplined majority or at least what editors think 
 majorities want. Their twenty thousand a year 
 is a tribute to their good judgment and with it 
 no fault is to be found. Yet Stuart stood for 
 American emotion as the editor did for its mech- 
 anism. Millions of miles apart in thought, hun- 
 dreds of degrees in temperature, their spheres 
 touched in this letter. 
 
 Though kindly meant, it stung the Professor to 
 the quick. He paced back and forth, now reading 
 his manuscript, now burning with indignation at 
 the men who presumed to limit the outlook of a 
 half-million women. 
 
 Just then, Paul entered, ''"What nowf* was his 
 pleasing inquiry. 
 
 ''Another slam," pointing to the letter. 
 
 ''This is a challenge." 
 
 "For what?"
 
 74 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 '' A fight." 
 
 ''How?" 
 
 "That is for you to say; me to do." 
 
 To observe how children repeat the histoiy of 
 the race, how their acts are conditioned by the 
 deeds of the world as seen by our primitive an- 
 cestors, is so familiar that it is commonplace. 
 The ideals of youth were not formed in so early 
 an epoch as those of the child, but they are just 
 as fixed and even more vivid. The young man is 
 tribal, not animal like the child. He is the guard- 
 ian of something other than himself. The world 
 is his village and the hill its limit. Beyond it is 
 a dreary waste of pitfalls from which come legions 
 of evil spirits to destroy the oasis where the boy 
 stands. On every hill are dragons, tigers and 
 beasts of prey into w-hose grasp innocent maidens 
 fall. So youth buckling on its armor starts forth 
 to fight world battles. He, the simple David, must 
 slay the mighty Goliath, he must drag the lion 
 from his den, reach the Holy Grail, bring home a 
 host of trophies and have a multitude of freed 
 maidens throw garlands at his feet. Youth sees 
 only one battle and one victory. All is at stake 
 in its final plunge. 
 
 Victory and then — well, what will happen then 
 no youth knows, nor does he seem to care. He 
 goes just so far, uses up all his energy; when it 
 revives he fights again the same old battle, meets 
 the same foes and rescues perhaps one maiden. 
 He goes as far as race history goes, repeats, be- 
 cause that is what race history has been doing for 
 many thousand years. 
 
 Paul as he revelled in the imagery of youth, 
 as he defied the dragons, scorpions and devils who 
 h.irked behind the forest shadows, was doing what 
 other boys do. To all mechanical stimuli he re- 
 sponded." His mind, however, was not creative. 
 Tell him what to do and he did it ; but when asked
 
 THE BOOK 75 
 
 what to do he was helpless unless action had been 
 grooved by narrow antecedent experience. He 
 had ideals and emotions but they were too vague 
 to excite definite response. Striking phrases 
 started his thinking but they led nowhere. He 
 could not bridge the gulf between the push of 
 vague inner emotion and the concrete outer world. 
 It would seem that a football hero should be a 
 master-mind, a genius to solve world difficulties. 
 Yet helpless is he unless he sees a goal some one 
 else has set. Such a man is merely a machine to 
 execute but not to plan. The woods are full of 
 Pauls. Some do not have his physical perfection 
 but all excel and fail as does he. They sit in rows 
 on the front bench of every convention, gather 
 on its committees and phrase its platforms. A 
 dozen men full of vigor and determination ask 
 each other what to do, pass the buck, suck their 
 cigars and adjourn. Row on row of willing, hope- 
 less boobs with fine muscles, genial faces — ^but no 
 vision. Such is normalcy. Paul was as yet mere- 
 ly a private although his friends mistook him for 
 a generalissimo. ''England's football heroes have 
 conquered the world." So say rows of college 
 presidents who talk classics and graduate canned 
 beef. Their imagination converts the stadium 
 into a world arena and visualizes the victor of the 
 one as the hero of the other. Such was Paul. 
 A challenge meant a fight; in a fight that ugly 
 old dragon always got in Paul's way and showed 
 those horrid rows of teeth which made Paul's 
 blood boil. He paced up and down the room 
 shaking his fist at an image which he saw where 
 others would merely have seen the wall. Hit first 
 and think afterwards was his motto. Why should 
 a dragon hunter be afraid of a Boston editor! 
 
 The Professor looked up surprised. He saw a 
 big, hearty boy before him, with a firmly set jaw 
 and a gleaming eye. It was just the look which
 
 76 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 old Tim gave when he saw the Mud Hollow swamp 
 with golden grain beneath the rushes. Paul was 
 catching another vision, vague, but forceful. For 
 three years he had been a muscular giant; his 
 sway none could resist. Forgotten in the back- 
 ground lay the mother-descriptions over which he 
 had plodded. Now the vision returned. He was 
 ready but he knew not the way. 
 
 The Professor jumped to his feet; his old smile 
 returned. He too had a vision, and old, almost 
 forgotten emotion surged. Not since Ida's death 
 had he had a companion. From now on the boy 
 and he should be one. 
 
 "Paul," he cried, "I am John the Baptist, a 
 forerunner; the real task is for someone else. 
 I flash up, burn brightly and die out before the 
 thirtieth page is written. It is for you to sound 
 the tocsin. Your strength and my vision can win 
 even against the icicles of Boston. The Wrongs 
 of Women! That is our message; that is our 
 task. It is for us to voice the universal woe of 
 woman. We will gather the datum of man's 
 tvranny and wring dry every historical source. 
 We will then broaden our work so that it will 
 express the sorrows of all human experience — 
 give a larger interpretation to the organized 
 bodies of women I address ; lighten their gropings 
 and heap up before their eyes the mountains of 
 oppression they endure. My hope is to influence 
 legislation, so to mold thought that the next cen- 
 turv will sweep from tlio faco of the earth the 
 need for such another book. Do you care to fling 
 yourself on such a task?" The undying smolder 
 in his eyes was flame as he advanced to Paul. 
 
 *'Yes, yes," amazed at the swift reality of a 
 far-off, rosy dream. 
 
 Their thought had run a common route: now 
 for the first time it was in the open. They both 
 felt the struggle was theirs; together the victory
 
 THE EXIT 77 
 
 was sure. Few realize how ardent is the attach- 
 ment between gray-haired teachers and their 
 promising pupils. The old feel their failures and 
 wish to cast them on younger shoulders. To the 
 young the confidence of their seniors is an in' 
 spiration which transforms vague dreams into 
 pleasing realities. They get at a bound wliat 
 years of toil could otherwise hardly make possible. 
 The two had grown together after years of con- 
 tact and were ready to enter mutual enterprises. 
 Each day they planned anew the great venture 
 on which they were embarking. Their long walks 
 knew no other topic; their dreams were sweet 
 with coming realization. 
 
 X 
 
 The Exit 
 
 Paul's sanguine temperament responded health- 
 fully from the first benumbing sense of unworthi- 
 ness. There began to bestir within him the 
 authority of the author and the priest. He felt 
 that a power had been conferred upon him by Ifis 
 setting himself apart for the quest of the Truth ; 
 had there been a single strain of poetry in his 
 limpid nature he would have seen himself as a 
 sunny Galahad of the printed page ; he M^rote in- 
 troductions and conclusions which soared across 
 the intervening gulfs of silence; he ached with 
 energy which generated moments of blinding 
 egoism when he felt he was the Lord's appointed. 
 With a fine logic he became increasingly indig- 
 nant at Ruth's arraignment by the women of 
 her circle. He held long debates with them in 
 which he showed loyalty to the Professor's views. 
 Yet when he was with Ruth he was unable to 
 qualify her. It was as if he looked into a beautiful
 
 78 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 crystal, clear and perfect, yet he went away from 
 her precisely as he went to her — so few facets 
 had she for the deflections of opinion. So, after 
 a few weeks of scientific observation and nega- 
 tive results, he again half forgot her presence. 
 
 His roughnesses suited the greatness of the 
 heroes in whom Euth revelled. She pictured in- 
 numerable pageants wherein Paul shone in cui- 
 rassed splendor, or panted in a fray with his 
 broad breast heaving as she had seen it in a foot- 
 ball battle, or rode away with a trembling laugh 
 as a Sabine maiden hung white across his saddle 
 bow. 
 
 As the final hour awards of the college days 
 approached, she liked best to marshal her heroes 
 — all made flesh in Paul — for victors' awards in 
 the field or forum. She wreathed his yellow head 
 with laurel and fancied how nobly Roman his 
 clean, high-colored face would then become with 
 its immobile composure under tumultuous ovation. 
 How calm and still it had been in those delirious 
 moments on Franklin Field when all Bowman 
 reeled past the benches, drunk with its glory! 
 Next, his tatters and exhaustion vanished before 
 the Augustan front of some Prince of Letters, and 
 she herself to the music of a chanted ode advanced 
 and crowned him. This Homeric fragment re- 
 curred to her day and night and took possession 
 of her fancy. At last a chance came for its ex- 
 pression. ' ' Brown has put Bowman on the map, ' ' 
 wrote an old graduate. "He is a public bene- 
 factor. The next class will be double in size. I 
 never realized how much more six was than four 
 until I heard the news. Let's do something de- 
 cent. Every one should chip in and show his 
 loyalty." A special committee was formed to 
 consummate this general wish. Between a watch, a 
 loving cup and an encyclopedia a long debate en- 
 sued.
 
 THE EXIT 79 
 
 *'0h, fie," cried Ruth in anguish. "Those 
 putrid prizes are silly. Every minister gets an 
 encyclopedia when he comes, a loving cup when 
 he goes. They won't do for Paul. To a real hero 
 should come a hero's compense. For thousands 
 of years a laurel wreath has been the reward of 
 great men. Its value is nothing, but its meaning 
 is everything." 
 
 ''But who wants to give a bunch of rusty 
 leaves ? ' ' put in the practical Fred. 
 
 *'I do," she said, ''I'll give it to him gladly. 
 Oh, Fred, just tliink for a minute how much laurel 
 means ! It is reserved for heroes — an emblem of 
 their triumphs. They rode into the cities with it 
 on their brows! Have you seen my Perry pic- 
 tures, Fred?" 
 
 "A lot of old duffers," he said. "That fat old 
 has-been Samuel Johnson had one of your wreaths 
 with a bow of hair-ribbon at the back of his neck. 
 Brown won 't stand for it, Ruth. ' ' 
 
 "He needn't wear it. We could just present it 
 with a poem or an address — anyhow, there ought 
 to be something grand, oughn't there?" 
 
 So seldom were Ruth and Fred in disagreement 
 the clash caused a pause. Finally the junior rep- 
 resentative said, "Ruth can do the trick all right, 
 I'm sure. To tell the truth, I never was much 
 on Greek history. It always got my goat. All 
 forgotten long ago except for that old bloke who 
 wrote a logic, Ira Slottle— Irish Tottle? That's 
 more like it. Say, Bonv, were the Irish on the go 
 then?" 
 
 This poser was not settled by the august senior 
 president who familiarly accepted the name. He 
 fumbled his Kappa Kev a minute, then annonno^^l 
 his decision. "Say, fellows, let's Greek it. Catch 
 Paul under the big tulip, have Jimmv blow his 
 horn, all rush in and watch Ruth do 'her stunt. 
 A genuine surprise party. That's the ticket.''
 
 80 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 In the festal hurry of Commencement there 
 was scant opportunity for discussion of the de- 
 tails; the town was be-rosed and be-ribboned, 
 alumni came and were feasted, beaming parents 
 arrived from farms and shops, creaking in new 
 boots and silks; shy country girls visited their 
 beaux and sweethearts openly under the Bowman 
 ehns. Class Day was a merry glory, cool, with a 
 breeze that shaking the flowers swung a few white 
 vapors high through the blue. The morning was 
 a kind of ethereal tumult of drifting petals, of 
 scudding clouds, of riotous warmth, odor, colors 
 and laughter. Groups gathered and parted again 
 to mingle with other features of class life. 
 
 There came a little rush about the Seniors and 
 a musical volley of jests. The historian vaunted 
 uproarious misdeeds and the poet rolled hexa- 
 meters before Paul recounted the invasion of the 
 football warriors. When he slipped forward 
 he was honored by the click of reportorial cam- 
 eras and the round-eyed staring of bucolic guests. 
 
 He stood half-lounging, his hands in pocket, 
 observant, composed and at his ease; long since 
 he had acquired a facile public bearing, the supple 
 grace which is a readiness to meet crises before 
 crowds with the intoxication of observed suc- 
 cesses, and sharpened beneath the accustomed 
 stimulant of shouting hundreds. He who had 
 difficulty to express his sober thought knew how, 
 when roused by a cheering mob, to seize the 
 proper word and toss the winning order to the 
 niche of an emergency. So today he wore uncon- 
 sciously an air of modest dominance and the hap- 
 py assurance of an established ability to do well. 
 He pleased his audience before he spoke with his 
 charm of manner, and won them wholly by the 
 earnestness of his tributes to the men whom he 
 captained. He stood forth to do justice to the 
 rank and file, to the fellows who year after year
 
 THE EXIT 81 
 
 strove, sweated and were faithful. He ended by 
 pronouncing slowly and gravely the names of the 
 men who had saved the day for Bowman on the 
 fields of twenty years. "I look into your hearts, 
 and read these names from the Roll of Fame en- 
 graven there ! " 
 
 He paused upon this peroration, and Ruth took 
 the instant for her own. She left the compact 
 circle and quickly was coming to him across the 
 grass before he could slip back into his place. He 
 waited, with the smile that all the people wore 
 now ; that something pretty was to happen at the 
 hands of Ruth he saw at once. He advanced and 
 met her at the center of the velvet carpet. She 
 extended her arms, both hands holding up a slen- 
 der wreath. 
 
 **You have left out one name from your list," 
 she said clearly, "which stands first on the Roll 
 of Fame. It is to show you how Bowman remem- 
 bers it that I have here this laurel wreath. To 
 whom can we give it with all it means? To the 
 one who is most loyal to Bowman, to the one 
 who loves it best of all, who is always ready to 
 serve, to the one who is always present to inspire 
 us on, on, instead of being satisfied with what we 
 have won. We, your friends, present it to you, 
 the pride of Bowman. ' ' She moved close to him 
 and offered the circlet; he took it and tried to 
 speak, and was drowned by salvos of applause. 
 
 Ruth stepped backward, but he caught her hand 
 and held it until he could be heard. Then he said 
 gaily : ' ' The pride of Bowman. Who is the pride 
 of Bowman? Not I This is she!" Leaning 
 over, he placed the wreath on Ruth's curls. 
 Amazed and confused by the swiftness of Paul's 
 reprisal, she looked up at him and waited uncer- 
 tainly. The Captain of the Football Team played 
 now with the ripening resources of four years 
 of drama. He leaped out of his character into
 
 82 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 one that could score heavily with the public hang- 
 ing on his nerves. He bent to kiss her forehead 
 but she, perceiving his intention, lifted her face 
 with an obedience so anxious not to blunder that 
 their lips met quivering. Paul sprang back in- 
 stantly, and Ruth ran laughing, scarlet, bewil- 
 dered, to her place by Fred. 
 
 The chapel bell rang to usher in the next event. 
 There was a rush to see the tablet of the new 
 class uncovered. The only one who moved not 
 was Ruth. She stood transfixed, the wreath still 
 on her brow. Without she did not seem changed, 
 only a bit flushed. But within there was a surging 
 she had never before felt. She pressed her hand 
 on her bosom. Her heart throbbed, her whole be- 
 ing seemed to be on fire. Up to this time all her 
 pleasure had been external. The world brought 
 its products, and no return was asked but laugh 
 and smile. Now she felt an unknown quickening, 
 a joy and yet uncertainty. The touch of the lips 
 had given a new meaning to life. Her fate was 
 no longer hers. It was bound up in another. 
 Paul had been her hero, she a humble worshipper. 
 Now he was more. He had entered her holy of 
 holies, torn the covering which hid her inner self. 
 Yesterday she thought of herself as a boy, a com- 
 rade of Paul and Fred. Today she became a girl, 
 all her latent instincts active. Laughing her man- 
 nish ideas to scorn, they set a new goal. Paul 
 was hers. She felt a strong impulse to run along 
 and claim him. But the new motives were held in 
 check by a modesty she never before had felt. 
 Most girls have their modesty driven in to them. 
 Hers was a mute feeling. A minute before the 
 laughing crowd around the ivy would have drawn 
 her. Now she felt naked, lonely, ashamed. Her 
 hair, her face, her limbs, had been nothing to her 
 before. Now she shrank behind the bushes to 
 avoid late comers. She seemed so weak, so help-
 
 ON THE RIVER 83 
 
 less, so bare. Could Paul admire a mere notliing, 
 one who had so little to give, one whose knowledge 
 was so vague and useless I No, she could not run 
 to claim him. She would read, she would study, 
 she would cook. He would go but when he re- 
 turned — perhaps she might be worthy. Filled 
 with this thought, she ran home, picked up a 
 German book and studied for the first time in 
 her life. Yesterday she lived without a goal. To- 
 day her goal was the only thing worth living for. 
 Such is the history of one kiss to a woman. 
 
 To Paul it was mere incident, a happy exit from 
 a difficult situation. He enjoyed the day .just the 
 same as if naught peculiar had happened. He 
 slept soundly that night and the next day left. 
 He was to return as the Professor's assistant. 
 
 XI 
 
 On the River 
 
 Winter changed to summer with a sudden 
 bound. A warm south wind gave to the valley 
 touches of green to offset the paleness of the dead 
 grass ; the pines on the Ridge still loomed in hum- 
 ble black, but the old haystack in the middle- 
 distance was wrapped with a bluish tinge. The 
 horizon was draped with heavy clouds which stood 
 their ground against the aggressive sun. Life is 
 breaking through the meshes of winter but its 
 somber tone still prevails. 
 
 Into this shadowy world there defiled a num- 
 ber of trotting men in white running clothes ; the 
 coach's eyes came to them snappily and theirs to 
 him with proud sidewise glances. They passed 
 him, neck and shoulder supple with sweat; he 
 noted how they lifted themselves with an indefin- 
 able vim. A little behind and at the side the
 
 84 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 leader ran, directing, guiding, husbanding each 
 individual ability. How he toAvered beside the 
 slender Freshman striplings! His great driving 
 muscles under the piston of his will shot him 
 back and forth along the line — they moved with 
 perfect smoothness at half-speed — they glided in 
 unconscious, unheeded rhythm of complete re- 
 straint, complete power, just beneath that lust- 
 rous satin skin. He ordered laughingly; his blue 
 eyes gleamed as he fell into step with a boy to 
 show him the pace. 
 
 "Oh," Gannett called, ''come here when you 
 get around again." 
 
 Paul nodded over his shoulder and at once 
 paced to the head of his little cavalcade. Fred 
 saw him take it across some rough ground before 
 they vanished to the final lap around the building. 
 
 *'If I could get the fellows to work for me as 
 they work for Brown, we'd have the team of the 
 state," he thought. 
 
 ''Well, how goes it, old man?" he asked im- 
 mediately after. 
 
 "Fine," said Paul. "Pine. I had them out 
 for an hour and they never whimpered. I can't 
 get enough of it myself. But I 'm not in first-rate 
 condition — that arm isn't what it ought to be — 
 what's the fault?" He flexed it with an anxious 
 air and watched the muscles curve down its length 
 under the w^hite cotton sleeve. 
 
 Gannett scoffed with a great blow upon the 
 biceps. "You're right as right," he said, "but 
 it's doing vou good. No place like the old Alma 
 M." 
 
 Paul laughed. "I've got to do something to fill 
 up spare time, and it seems so good to be out here 
 that I don't want to go off by myself. But I've 
 got to this minute — an outline for the Professor 
 tonight. Garvin's asleep in my room — and I talk 
 to somebody when I hang around here. I'm off
 
 ON THE RIVER 85 
 
 to the haystack. The Professor wants the out- 
 line." 
 
 ''Ruth pretty well? Haven't seen her for a 
 week." 
 
 "She stays home, I guess." 
 
 Gannett opened his mouth, then closed it. Next 
 he smiled with infinite intent. "Well, we don't 
 expect to see her as often now as we used to." 
 His eyelid drooped wickedly and with craft. 
 
 "Why, what's up?" said Paul. 
 
 "Go along, you loafer, don't try to fool with 
 your Uncle Fred," he said in high good humor, 
 and seating himself with his hands hung between 
 his knees, his hat precariously set upon his head, 
 he whistled a stave and his gaze lounged back to 
 the melting distances. Suddenly he stopped on a 
 high note and listened; a slight step hurried up 
 behind him; a murmur of skirts caused him to 
 wink again. He waited roguishly for the girl to 
 speak. 
 
 "Hello, Fred," she said, " where 's every- 
 body?" 
 
 "Your father's gone home, I'm sorry to say," 
 he answered. "Sit down by me and I'll tell you 
 a story." 
 
 "I'm afraid I can't now," she went on, absent- 
 ly. "Have you seen Paul?" 
 
 "He ran around here with a squad just now." 
 
 "Will he come back?" 
 
 "Well, he'll have to some time," he said. 
 
 "Then I'll wait," she cried and seated herself 
 on the steps. 
 
 "But I think he wants to be alone, all, all 
 alone. ' ' 
 
 "Where is he?" she rose, "I want to see him." 
 
 "If it's important — is it important, Ruth?" 
 
 * ' Oh, there he is ! See ! At the stack. ' ' 
 
 "What eyes," he commented. "Not every girl 
 would know him that far."
 
 86 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 **You can't mistake him wlien you know him 
 as I do." 
 
 * ' Well, don 't go down there, ' ' he said whiningly, 
 "stay here with me and I'll take vou for a nice 
 walk." 
 
 *'No," she said with decision, "I want to see 
 Paul. I've been looking all around for him. But 
 you can walk down there if you want to. ' ' 
 
 "Thanks. I think it's too chilly — for me " 
 
 he shivered. 
 
 She waved her hand and left him. He watched 
 her idly, fondly; a protecting smile of intimate 
 loyalty followed her swift steps. "They don't 
 tease worth a cent," he admitted, with pride and 
 pleasure in the cleverness of his friends. "She is 
 just as smart as he is," Ms thought ran on, "and 
 she takes joshing like — a man. She's square. 
 When Paul was absent she never once looked at 
 another fellow. I hate these giggling, secret 
 flirts who try to keep a dozen on the string at 
 once. Gosh! I like the way she said 'I want to 
 see Paul!' They're good enough for each other 
 — I'm satisfied." 
 
 He sharply quenched a sheepish grin as the 
 imagined tableau of the lovers' kisses rose before 
 him ; a faint shade of unrest followed it ; the two 
 warm friends had withheld their confidence and 
 the general baiting was as far as he ought to go. 
 It hurt him that he could express his approval 
 only in the cordial innuendoes of society. Those 
 were the common privilege and he, the true old 
 friend, might have been let be5^ond the page of 
 uproarious wink and ostentatious thrusts. He 
 wished that he might tell Paul how fine a girl he 
 had, how strictly honorable she had always been 
 while he was gone, and how the fellows took care 
 of the greatest girl in Bowman for him. But 
 neither Paul nor Ruth had yet let down the barrier 
 "before that speech. "What's he saying to her
 
 ON THE RIVER 87 
 
 nowT' he asked himself, as her swift figure van- 
 ished. 
 
 She stood an instant watching Paul frowning 
 in the coil of thought before he looked up to 
 greet her. "What are you working over now?" 
 she said, sinking at his side with a single flexible 
 motion. 
 
 ' ' Nothing, ' ' he answered. ' ' I was thinking of a 
 heading for my work tonight. Did your father 
 send for me I" 
 
 "No," she said, "I came myself. I saw you 
 here." 
 
 There was a pause and she looked at him from 
 head to foot. ' ' Aren't you cold? ' ' she said. ' ' That 
 suit is too thin for such a day. See how warmly 
 dressed I am! " She laid her hand upon the great 
 arch of his breast, warm and pulsing beneath the 
 scant cotton covering. "Why, how warm you 
 are," she cried, astonished. 
 
 "I always am wanting to get my coat off," he 
 said. " I took the windows out of their sashes 
 a month ago; now I wish I could sleep on the 
 Ridge to keep cool. I'm sorry I'm not a wild 
 Indian, Ruth. Houses and covers inconvenience 
 me." 
 
 "You are awkward and restless in the house," 
 she granted. "But I think you would look well 
 in armor." 
 
 Paul laughed. "You're an odd child. Armor 
 must be something of an extinguisher to the in- 
 dividual, it seems to me." 
 
 "Yes," she said. "I see you oftener dressed in 
 an animal's skin, riding barebacked. That shows 
 your power better; all your muscles spring out 
 when you grip the horse with your knees. ' ' 
 
 "But I'm not as strong as I was. As a kid I 
 could hardly dent my muscles anywhere and 
 now " he smote his chest and then his leg.
 
 88 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 * 'They're better than any others," she cried. 
 ''My muscles tire. See how flabby they are." 
 
 Leaning forward, she drew her dress aside to 
 show her slender curved leg. 
 
 Against this his nature recoiled mutely, unin- 
 telligibly. Looking off queerly into the blue air, 
 with a kind of nausea of the spirit he left her, 
 walking with a swift and even step. 
 
 Surprised, she watched him going; had some 
 one called him? She looked about to see — or had 
 he been angry at her interruption ? She fell back 
 in the fear of that to the old negative, watching 
 attitude of the shadowy girl, tiptoeing beliind the 
 study conferences lest she disturb the occupation 
 of the hour. Research and reflection she had al- 
 ways reverenced ; alas, would Paul think less well 
 of her that now with her identity newly found, 
 precious, blossoming, she could not meekly abide 
 events until he called? Wouldn't it have been 
 better, the thought half frightened her, if she 
 had not come at all? But how could she have 
 helped it and why should she not? 
 
 She knew his habit of negligent courtesy, broken 
 sometimes in the rudeness of perfect equality; 
 for hours and days her father and he had frankly 
 overlooked her haunting presence; she had not 
 minded until now, when she leaped forward with 
 imperious demands. Educated in the systematic 
 freedom which her father said would make her a 
 woman of tlie tomorrow, she had been deprived of 
 the shelter of her forebears, and had become fear- 
 less of consequences. The Professor had un- 
 knowingly evoked the naked simplicity of the 
 primitive mate of man — that untempered egoist 
 who took and gave him undrooping lids. He had 
 unwrapped a savage as guileless as a doe. That 
 early psychic curiosity of the primitive woman, 
 which held her motionless while her destiny ap-
 
 ON THE RIVER 89 
 
 proaclied, was in Ruth evolved to fleet imagination 
 that took her open-eyed and eager to meet it. 
 
 She was the pliant, tearless creature of a single 
 force; she lived in a world whose sole architect 
 was her imagination ; among its fairy terrors, its 
 betowered hills, be-lillied valleys, its blue-eyed 
 heroes, there was no danger on which it was not 
 a rich delight to dream, nor a period not steeped 
 in gorgeous glory. No denials; no pale giving 
 up; no pleasure in temptation conquered. Her 
 way was to devise disasters from which she was 
 lifted lightly by superhuman strength and adroit- 
 ness. Her hero was never the monk — nor she the 
 nun, romantic and idealized by their qualities of 
 deprivation. All about her red blood plowed, 
 shouts rang, steel clashed, the battle waxed and 
 she, the reward, was lifted to the hero's arm — to 
 be borne away in triumph — why and whither she 
 but dimly guessed; she hardly cared to linger 
 with her hero after the sun had set upon his 
 melee. 
 
 What did her father's books on the capture of 
 wives convey to her? Ah, what could they mean 
 if not that a woman was seen, was noted beau- 
 tiful, struggled for by brave men, won by the 
 bravest and swept away across leagues of forest, 
 on and on, with the blue eyes, the hero's eyes — 
 ah! Paul's eyes — looking into hers? A beautiful 
 excitement touched her sleeping senses for a brief 
 moment when she pictured that first seeing of his 
 — the light of recognition dawning in his careless 
 glance ; then the pause, the rapture while he gazed 
 and gazed, and knew her his decreed reward. 
 While he was far off she had lived that scene in 
 many aspects; would he wish to win her when 
 he saw she could challenge the boys with her firm 
 and agile strength? She strove mightily to build 
 manlike fibres into her tender body — Paul would 
 be very proud of her success. Would she hold
 
 90 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 him with her knowledge of the subjects he studied 
 in college and she scanned at home? Or would 
 she first arrest him with her beauty — the beauty 
 of mind, of sympathy and co-operation? 
 
 Thrilling and singing with her imagination, she 
 was yet so far from the voice of Life itself that 
 no sinister echo said, "Your sweet body — not in 
 its pitiful strength, but its almighty power — is the 
 instrument you seek. Offer it to the maw of a 
 man 's passion and he will be aware of you. ' ' But 
 she was adventuring into Life with the imagina- 
 tion of the primal wilds, unreinforced by experi- 
 ence. She hoped to influence men by a resemb- 
 lance to them; equality had made her imitative; 
 could she but win a race or general a game, the 
 man she wanted then would pause and see her. 
 
 Such thoughts were the product of her environ- 
 ment and of her father's philosophy. Girls were 
 boys in the making. To them came the same 
 honors, the same prizes. They were one in aim 
 and ambition. Now, instinct and emotion were 
 creating new pictures, voicing new claims. A de- 
 sire swelled up in her bosom not to conquer but 
 to be conquered. To yield, to give, to be a part 
 of another instead of being an independent self. 
 In her new dream, she was not an actor but a wit- 
 ness. A reward and not a contestant. Prizes 
 whet the appetite for conquest only as their beauty 
 is appreciated. If only Paul would see her thus, 
 the ice w^ould be broken. Instead of this, he had 
 given her one cold look of hate and left her ! The 
 shock of surprise and blank disappointment held 
 her motionless until he was half across the field. 
 She rose, sighing with mystification, and followed 
 him. "I will see him tonight, in the stnd}^," she 
 promised herself, but was not happy for there she 
 knew she could not make him look at her. She 
 knit her brows. Ah, what must she do to be
 
 ON THE RIVER 91 
 
 recognized 1 What to be seized and mated by the 
 hero? 
 
 In her own room that night, before the glass, 
 she wasted no more conjecture on the "unexpected 
 accident of the afternoon. Her beauty was so 
 potent that she thought he must see it. She had 
 waited patiently during the days of absence; but 
 the weeks of his unheeding presence tried her. * ' I 
 am much prettier with my dress off," she thought, 
 "I wish he could see me now." For a week she 
 failed to be alone with him. Her wit told her not 
 to intrude upon the projection of a new chapter 
 of the book. 
 
 She heard him call across the campus, one warm 
 noon, "All right, Mitchell. I'll meet you on the 
 river at three. Take the long skiff." 
 
 ''Good," said Mitchell, "I'll have her ready." 
 
 Ruth ran to her room and looked searchingly 
 in her mirror, questioning, approving. She walked 
 with her father when he crossed the campus on 
 the Professors' Path, at two o'clock, tingling with 
 mirth, laughing and loving him. 
 
 "Ah," he said, reproachfully, "how can you be 
 so happy when your poor father, immuring him- 
 self in a class room, must forfeit three long hours 
 of a perfect spring day! Daughter, shall I cut 
 and run?" he said, with the little pantomime of 
 mystery which they had so often played together. 
 "We will take a long detour and I will show you 
 the cluster of lady's-slipper we found last spring. 
 Sneak back and get our field-glasses, and we will 
 count birds, too," he whispered. 
 
 "Shame, shame," she admonished. "Be good 
 until Saturday, Daddy. You must indeed go in 
 and work today. Besides, I'm going boating with 
 Paul." 
 
 "Ah," he answered, "that is good." He shook 
 his head stubbornly. "I'm coming, too." 
 
 She laughed again. ' ' Oh, papa, ' ' she said, ' * you
 
 92 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 are so funny! Now I'll tell you wliat I'll do. If 
 you will promise me not to cut today, I'll get up 
 a picnic for tomorrow. We can start early, walk 
 or hire Eusliton's three-seated wagon — oh, good! 
 let's do that. I haven't driven this spring — we 
 can go away up to the gap for laurel. ' ' Here she 
 threw her arm around her father's shoulder. ''I'll 
 ask Paul this afternoon and tell him to see Fred — 
 and who else shall we invite? Never mind, we'll 
 think. Now won 't that be fun 1 ' ' 
 
 He wiped his eyes dejectedly. "Yes," he said, 
 **I suppose it will do if I can have a chocolate 
 cake, too." 
 
 "I'll make it myself tonight," she cried. "Now, 
 kiss me! Be good!" she warned him with a slim 
 forefinger as he raised his hat. They paused, 
 smiling happily at each other for an instant before 
 they parted. 
 
 The girl looked across the thick deep green of 
 the fields, to the stream emerging into sight as 
 a bright silver disc at the steep foot of the harsh 
 ridge, before it threaded onward just out of vision 
 beyond the swelling meadow slopes. She went 
 then to the reading room and turned the leaves 
 of magazines and chatted restlessly with a few 
 Freshmen who thought to propitiate the Professor 
 by politeness to the daughter. But she soon left 
 them to walk about the halls and at three o'clock 
 they saw her hasten from the building. Once on 
 the way to the river, she lingered so that Paul and 
 Mitchell first saw her sitting on the bank when 
 they paddled swiftly around a bend. Mitchell 
 trailed his paddle; Paul's interrupted stroke 
 knocked it from his hand. 
 
 "Ouch, hold on there, Brown! you stung my 
 hand," he said. "This is good seamanship, isn't 
 it, Ruth?" he asked. 
 
 She did not answer; her eyes searched Paul's
 
 ON THE RIVER 93 
 
 with a naked glance and her breath quivered be- 
 tween her lips. 
 
 **I did spoil the stroke," said Paul. He spun 
 the boat so quickly on its axis that the bow lifted 
 from the water and his paddle left a great hol- 
 low. "Now you can pick it up," he said, and 
 stopped the boat with a single motion of his fore- 
 arm. His white outing shirt sleeves were rolled 
 above his elbows; the hot spring sun had begun 
 to redden his flesh, whitened by winter; and the 
 full purple veins corded his arms with a branch- 
 ing beauty. His ruddy face gleamed in its rip- 
 ples as the water glittered in its tiny waves, and 
 its high, clear modelling showed his profile aus- 
 terely to her. 
 
 His lips seemed locked now while Mitchell, 
 righting himself, spoke again. ' ' You look alone, ' ' 
 he said. 
 
 "I am," she answered, ''all alone. Where are 
 you going? I want to go with you." 
 
 Mitchell grinned and pushed the boat toward 
 the bank. ' ' Come and take my place, ' ' he urged. 
 "I've got to get back to town in fifteen minutes." 
 
 "You came for longer," said Paul, with a 
 sharpness that made the other stare. "You stay," 
 he added with a touch of roughness. 
 
 "Ha," thought Mitchell, "he wants me to think 
 he doesn't care. Well, jump in," he said to Ruth, 
 "there's room for all of us, and we'll give you 
 a spin for a minute. I can stay ten minutes 
 longer." He scowled, contemplating his watch. 
 He placed Ruth on a low wicker seat, and Paul 
 drove his blade downward. The boat trembled 
 with the stroke, the water purled from the prow. 
 
 "I've had enough," said Mitchell. He laid his 
 paddle athwart and looked again at his watch. 
 "Run in at the point, old fellow," he said, with 
 authority. "I can't stay another second." 
 
 Paul drove ahead, laughing crossly. "Let's see
 
 94 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 you get away," he answered, paddling swiftly 
 through a lazy bend whose sandy shores narrowed 
 the watery lane. 
 
 Mitchell turned and glanced at Ruth. His eyes 
 questioned; hers answered. "Then watch me," 
 he continued. "Tliis is the way." He plunged 
 his paddle in and with all his strength steered 
 the rapid boat head-on to pasture land. It grated 
 on the gravel and he jumped ankle-deep into the 
 water and shoved it free again. He laughed with 
 infinite cunning as his pleased gaze travelled from 
 Paul's lowering annoyance to Ruth's swift con- 
 tent. "It's all right, children," he shouted to the 
 mute pair. ' ' Use me again when I can be of 
 service. ' ' 
 
 The tiny craft dipped dangerously as Paul's 
 ungentle hand swung it to the placid channel ; and 
 he brought it to sharply. It halted and Ruth felt 
 his mastery of the nervous thing, its slight frame 
 strained and worried by his careless strength. 
 Even the elements and the laws were obedient to 
 him, she thought. 
 
 Now they moved on, not evenly, but with a 
 wave-like motion on the still stream. With each 
 stroke of his arm the prow dove, then rose, slowed 
 and dove again. The boat had Paul's pulse, she 
 fancied, and her own fell into rhythm with it. 
 His life, power and splendor thrilled her. She 
 laid her hand gently upon its side with a mystic 
 message to the silent presence behind her. 
 
 "Paul," she whispered. 
 
 After a long moment, "AVell?" 
 
 "I am happy," she said. 
 
 The boat went on toward the harsh ridge that 
 shouldered its way to the stream and hung shelv- 
 ing there. It confronted them, insolent, uplifting. 
 It made one on the instant very humble or very 
 braggart, a courtier or a monarch.
 
 ON THE RIVER 95 
 
 Ruth, as easily as if she were on the lawn, rose 
 to her feet and turned to Paul. 
 
 "Take care," he cried, "do you want to tip 
 us over?" 
 
 She stepped forward and knelt before him. 
 "Take me," she said in a sweet, clear voice, and 
 pressed forward until their hearts and lips almost 
 touched. 
 
 With uncontrollable swiftness he laid his pad- 
 dle down, and pressed her back with his palm 
 against her shoulder. In his cold, averted eyes 
 lurked the anger she had seen before, but now he 
 could not go until she had made him look at her 
 with understanding and appreciation! She gave 
 him a wholly unveiled, searching glance, compel- 
 ling, beseeching, shameless, from which his own 
 slid and fell. 
 
 "Go back to your seat, we'll land — ^land now," 
 he said with final emphasis. 
 
 "No," she murmured. ''Look at me, Paul!" 
 
 He set his lips together and half rose to put her 
 from him. She felt that strength separating them 
 like a blind unreasoning obstacle, and she flung 
 herself against it. She wanted to tear at that 
 dumb automatic antagonism which rose to baffle 
 her again. She gripped and clove to him with a 
 brave purpose, and while he thrust her aside with 
 averted eyes, her own anger clashed against his 
 baffling advantage. A furious disappointment 
 rose to her brain when she saw herself safely, 
 cautiously and inevitably put away from him; 
 worsted in the struggle on the tiny field! She 
 would have sobbed had not anger and wit instantly 
 contrived a victory that stunned her with its bril- 
 liancy. Now, indeed, he should truly rescue her 
 from peril of her life! — she glanced in delicious 
 terror toward the shore, and seemed to see the 
 woods astir with her skulking tribesmen. Across 
 the water, she played, was harbor from pursuers
 
 96 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 — he must win it with her in his hero arms. So, 
 with a sound — half a laugh, half a cry — she rose, 
 waited gasping an instant and sprang bonnily into 
 friendly water which closed smoothly over her 
 head. With a face wiped blank, Paul dove after 
 her and they came up together noiselessly. With 
 one hand he buoyed her composed body and with 
 the other turned them both to the boat. 
 
 "That's all right," he said, "don't be fright- 
 ened, you are perfectly safe. ' ' 
 
 She glanced at him and found him unrespon- 
 sive to her presence ; now she saw the starry may- 
 flowers and violets on the bank looking down at 
 her ; faint barnyard sounds reached them through 
 the utter spring silence. The avenging tribesmen 
 fled away. She flung herself upon Paul and tried 
 to cling about his neck, but with the instinctive 
 alarm of a drowning grip he thrust her off a 
 little roughly. 
 
 "Don't do that," he said. 
 
 Ah, how near the shore! She unclasped her 
 hands from him and sank like a shot. When he 
 brought her to the surface, he clasped her closely 
 to his body, he pinioned her in an enwrapping 
 arm and they moved as one. She could not have 
 separated herself from him — but he said again, 
 "Don't do that, either!" 
 
 Now with her head on his shoulder, her cheek 
 almost touching his, in perfect bodily accord, she 
 forgot the troubling earth and uncommunicative 
 air in the undreamed ecstacy in life of the new 
 universe. Every smallest drop of the medium in 
 which they floated touched them both, it flowed 
 about the two and made them one. Ruth closed 
 her eyes; the darkness and the water that folded 
 her and Paul seemed to tremble with pulses of 
 one joy. She remembered the picture of Paola 
 and Francesca, endlessly adrift together, wedded 
 by the undulations of space, and then thought her-
 
 ON THE RIVER 97 
 
 self irrevocably Paul's, they alone, their feet un- 
 planted from earth and its laws. 
 
 She was faint with triumph and delight. For 
 the moment she seemed to be carried over a 
 rapids in the arms of her hero. Her response was 
 a dream response, the climax which brings a union 
 of hero and maid. 
 
 Dreamland — yes, to her but not to Paul. He 
 carried her quickly among the flowers ; her pallor 
 alarmed him. When she felt herself parting from 
 him she clasped her hands about his throat and 
 pressed her wet face to his, so that the water 
 from his drenched hair dripped upon her neck. 
 She raised her eyes and saw a gust of abhorrence 
 in his. She met it as she would have received a 
 lash. She faced him with hauteur. A chill breeze 
 disconcerted the starry flowers and pierced the 
 thin clothes that clung to the two tense bodies. 
 They were aware of nothing but deadly con- 
 test; they shivered not with cold but the dim 
 knowledge that a grim battle had begun, not 
 theirs, not a volition, but the blind, mindless crash 
 of monstrous unaging powers. A blank disgust, a 
 well-nigh visible hate baffled and angered her for 
 a long moment. 
 
 Then she saw his eyes — ^with an attention he 
 had never given her before — fix themselves upon 
 her face, her shoulders, her whole revealed form. 
 She hung on that first expression of seeing. Oh, 
 was he not recognizing her? She feared to move 
 lest she disturb that searching, absorbed, slow 
 gaze that meant, she knew, a thought of her. But 
 his lips curled and his brows were drawn together. 
 
 ''What made you act like a " he started 
 
 with violence, but he could not finish. 
 
 ''I did it because — ah, you know why, Paul, 
 because " 
 
 ''Why don't you cover up? You should be 
 ashamed — ashamed " he burst out cruelly.
 
 98 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 This repulse brought her to herself but did not 
 eradicate the dream elements in her thought. 
 Here were a river, a forest, a glassy plot on the 
 border of which wild cherries were in blossom. 
 What can favor primitive dreams more than a 
 sunny nook by a river, in springtime? In re- 
 sponse to her vision she sprang up, shook the wet 
 from her hair and laughed. 
 
 ''Let's run a race while our clothes dry," she 
 cried. Her wet clothes clung to her body so tight- 
 ly that every womanly feature stood out as if she 
 had been a marble statue. Twisted branches of 
 wild cherry hung about her waist and from them 
 an apron of mingled fern and rhododendron 
 leaves descended to her knees. Her shoulders 
 were bare save as hid by her tresses. No modern 
 restraints held her in. She did what nature dic- 
 tated, acting through the throbs of a primitive 
 environment projected into a modern situation. 
 
 While she forgot the world and lived again the 
 life of a thousand generations ago, the man stood 
 immovable. He saw the transformation, but he 
 did not comprehend its meaning. Was it degen- 
 eration? Was it depravity? Was it a reversion? 
 Paul knew woman only from books which do not 
 deal with her moods. They are pictures on the 
 wall, plaster casts, w^hich never alter. From these 
 to the reality Paul's slow thought could not go. 
 He had a thousand and one rules of conduct past- 
 ed on the walls of his room but none of them told 
 what to do when a primitive woman is met in a 
 cosy nook V^ the river. 
 
 ' ' Now for a race, ' ' she cried. Putting her foot 
 beside his she cried, "Read}^ start." Off she flew 
 but she was soon aware that she ran alone. She 
 came back to the sphinx, took his hand and 
 reached up as if to kiss him. Rudely he shook 
 her off. But her play mood was too active to be 
 controlled. The sun, the river and the wood car-
 
 ON THE EIVER 99 
 
 ried her back to days before the cramp of con- 
 vention was felt. Her heart beat high, the lust of 
 life and beauty, the splendor of the battle which 
 had begun she knew not wlicn and led she knew 
 not whither, would end she cared not how, all 
 possessed her spirit as the water had possessed 
 her body — like a super-earthly joy, a tenderness 
 that transcended thought, a caress for which 
 there could be no other expression. She had be- 
 gun to live the hazardous life of the sex painted 
 in her father's library, for tbatp afternoon she set 
 her feet upon the bleeding path where she would 
 find herself a woman. She rested gayly in the 
 hot sun and her hair curled and fluffed afresh 
 about her forehead. The tiniest tendrils blew 
 across her eyes as she thrust them back. Then 
 she brushed with the lightest hand the open starry 
 faces of the mayflowers by which she sat. 
 
 Stroking them tenderly, she looked up at Paul 
 hoping that he would come. Seeing him turn to- 
 ward the boat, she asked, "Where are you 2:0- 
 ingr' ^ 
 
 ''Home," was his only word, as he gathered the 
 paddles and arranged the seat for Euth. ''Get 
 in." 
 
 ' ' No, ' ' she answered. ' ' I want to stay here and 
 get dry in the sun. It is so warm and lovely; 
 let's live for an hour as children of the wood." 
 
 Her mood was that of the birds, and the lambs 
 in springtime. They sing and play when the sun 
 smiles, why should not she? She danced, she ran, 
 she turned somersaults and, using a low branch of 
 a tree as a trapeze, she tried all the stunts which 
 had much irritated Mrs. Dickson and her chilly 
 cohorts. Then she skipped about Paul, blew dan- 
 delion feathers in his face, tried to decorate him 
 with flowers. Every primitive art was tried 
 to break the rock which kept him silent — and in 
 vain. She was free to let impulse play as it
 
 100 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 would. Light, warmth and color brought their 
 proper response. But he was chained. Conven- 
 tion, tradition, custom had him in their grip. He 
 could see today and live for tomorrow, but yester- 
 day was a sealed book. Had some sudden danger 
 faced them, had a tribe of savages burst through 
 the wood, his response would have been the right 
 one. Defender of woman he was. He was earn- 
 ing the title his mother gave him. But to forget 
 himself in momentary joys, to be ruled by nature 
 and not by morals 
 
 He finally broke silence by saying, ''Come, 
 Ruth, we must go. The sun is getting low." 
 
 ''So much the better," she replied. "Oh, for 
 a night in the woods ! Here is a shady nook where 
 we can sleep. ' ' 
 
 ' ' Nonsense, ' ' he replied, ' ' we must get into dry 
 clothes. ' ' 
 
 "My clothes are dry," she affirmed, "feel of my 
 skirt." She tried to put his hand on it but he 
 pulled away. 
 
 When he started for the boat she got in his 
 way. He turned aside and sat on the bank, at 
 loss what to do next. Had Paul been more primi- 
 tive he would have seized Ruth. But Paul could 
 not lay hands on Ruth. All his precepts forbade. 
 He might defend but he could not punish. Neither 
 could he accept. 
 
 She and nature were one ; he and the rock, twin 
 brothers. Nature changes; it is gay and somber 
 by turn. The rock is unalterable. Only as the 
 moss hides its ugliness does it alter its mood. 
 Heat never enters ; cold does not chill. Rain may 
 wear furrows but the newly exposed is as lifeless 
 as was the older shale. And still within, beneath, 
 the hardest rock there is internal fire. Some time 
 it was a world ablaze. Its crust has grown strong 
 but now and then its fire breaks through, pouring 
 lava over all about.
 
 ON THE RIVER 101 
 
 So was Paul. Hotter fires were never banked 
 but they had not mode of expression. His will 
 Avas like a great frost that congeals as it molds. 
 The outer and the inner were separated by an 
 impassable gulf. So dissimilar were they that he 
 did not recognize the inner as a part of himself, 
 nor even had names to give to his moods. Words 
 that once were applied to these inner promptings 
 were now used in a meaningless way to denote 
 moral suppressions. The poison that hardened 
 seemed to be the medicine that cured. Soul cold- 
 ness was virtue, soul warmth a device to lead 
 astray. Such was Paul as he brothered the rock 
 and felt a kinship for its immobile expression. 
 
 Not so with Ruth. Her fire was on the surface. 
 Between heart, cheek, look and expression there 
 was no gulf. No frozen surface kept the internal 
 from gaining an outlet. What she felt she did. 
 Her soul like that of nature was an open book 
 that all may read. Nature laughs and smiles even 
 if she sometimes groans. We have but to raise 
 our window in the morning to know whether frost 
 or heat dominates. The flower, the grass and the 
 leaves glow in the sun and wilt in the shade. Why 
 should not a girl be as expressive as they? Per- 
 haps, but the chill of many ages says no. Which 
 should guide, nature in her unfolding, or the echo 
 of a thousand repressions? 
 
 At length Ruth tired of her exercise, threw her- 
 self on the grass beside him. "Why will you not 
 play, Paul?" she cried. ''The trees and the flow- 
 ers laugh in the sunshine, why should not we?" 
 
 She could not understand his mood. Wliy had 
 he not done what in dreams her hero had ever 
 done? She saw his stern look, his tightly drawn 
 muscles, but of the internal conflict she had no 
 inkling. She thus became more conscious of the 
 difference between man and woman. Accepting
 
 102 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 her father's philosophy, she expected that growth 
 would finally bring her into a man 's estate. 
 
 As she looked at her suileu hero a doubt of this 
 came up from her unconscious self and started 
 a new train of thought. She put her bare foot 
 beside his, passing her hand over her soft leg 
 muscle and touching his leg to feel the difference. 
 As her curiosity became more intense she passed 
 her hand from her supple frame to his, saying 
 demurely, ' ' Why are you different from me f ' ' 
 
 Paul gave a start. The internal flame which 
 his stern jaw repressed came for a moment to 
 the surface and lit his eye. His face paled and 
 flushed in turn. Paul was moral but he was flesh. 
 It is one thing sitting in a chamber to decide 
 moral questions ; it is quite another to have a girl 
 throw herself before him. There was a flush on 
 his cheek and a flutter in his heart. He felt him- 
 self on a yawning precipice with the ground slip- 
 ping from under him. Suddenly he sprang to his 
 feet ; with a wild cry he ran down to the boat and 
 jjaddled away. 
 
 It was his mother he saw. It was her call he 
 obeyed. It was she who took him out of danger. 
 
 Ruth watched the boat disappear and then she 
 felt lonely. Why had he left so suddenly? Why 
 had he not taken her with him? She knew she 
 had lost but she tried to console herself by a 
 new series of games. She danced, she ran, she 
 sang — ^but nothing pleased her. The driving mo- 
 tive to make a hero yield to her charms was gone 
 and with it her zeal' for display. She threw her- 
 self angrily on the grass, tore her flowered orna- 
 ments from her body, kicked them away as if they 
 were the cause of her failure. She cried, then 
 she slept. Nature smiled at seeing her beauty 
 reflected in human form. What was Ruth but tho 
 essence of all that had gone before? In hor all 
 elements blended. Each recognized the kinship.
 
 CROSS CURRENTS 103 
 
 The winds fanned her cheek, the brook sang its 
 lullaby. The rocks shook off their somber hue 
 as the clouds assumed a color to match the set- 
 ting sun. 
 
 A kindly oak cast a deep shadow to dim what 
 Morality would surely have seen. Curious, is it 
 not! Nature and Morality — twin sisters — yet 
 with such different views of girl. "Beauty and 
 excellence," saith one. *' Depravity," saith the 
 other. AVhere high authorities differ, evolution is 
 the only test; her decision all must abide. 
 
 XII 
 
 Cross Currents 
 
 Well behind his punctual hour, Paul came that 
 night and would have hastened past the Pro- 
 fessor rocking in the balmy darkness of the porch. 
 
 "Let us delay a moment," said his gentle voice, 
 touched with the mid-century literary tone with 
 which he emerged from fervid reverie. "You go 
 striding with such eagerness that I am almost 
 chagrined to confess how filled with content I am. 
 Be seated, Paul. I had almost ceased to expect 
 you tonight." 
 
 The young man dropped into a willow chair 
 which creaked under the sudden, falling weight. 
 "I thought I'd get back in time," he vouchsafed. 
 * * I went farther than I expected. ' ' 
 
 "Went farther?" the other repeated with his 
 unfailing habit of interest in the least detail of 
 his boys ' lives. 
 
 "I am just back from Lord's," striking his 
 hands together lightly in laughing protest. 
 
 "Oh, youth, youth, and the lust of living!" he 
 cried. "Ten miles! and still on fire with the en- 
 ergy of this young year — and your young mind —
 
 104 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 and heart — and soul — " he added with a rising 
 cadence of joyous excitement. "Am I growing 
 old?" he asked him, whimsically. 
 
 ''No, no." 
 
 "Ah, good! thank you. I feared it, for here I 
 sit basking until brushed by the breeze of your 
 passing and the song that bursts from your com- 
 panion in happiness. W,here is she?" He peered 
 through the lacy vines to the lawn. "I remember, 
 some one called her. She has not been still ah 
 instant since the sun began to set. I have watched 
 her dancing in and out, and she flitted from my 
 knee to execute a froUicking song at the piano. 
 She is more elusive — more loving than I remem- 
 ber to have ever seen her before. What is the 
 date?" 
 
 "The tenth," Paul said. 
 
 "I will write in my notebook, tonight, that her 
 intellect exalts and grows apace with her perfect 
 health and happiness. After all her flitting and 
 mirth this evening, a sudden silence attracted me. 
 On looking about, I espied her in a white dress 
 beneath her favorite tree in that superb attitude 
 of the Eeading Magdalen. So wrapt was she that 
 she did not hear my steps ; I looked at her volume 
 before she was aware of me. What do you think 
 has transfixed her mind! Nothing less epic and 
 less alien to the spirit of the hour than the san- 
 guinary passage in Homer. The natural and un- 
 biased desires of self-betterment have inevitably 
 risen in her brain now. 
 
 "My notebooks on her educational expansion 
 show the most gratifying progress. They eluci- 
 date and more, I maintain — they estahlisJi certain 
 educational principles. I fear wo have not time 
 to go into them tonight as I should be exceedingly 
 
 pleased to do " he looked hopefullj^ at Paul, 
 
 his smoldering eyes blazing up from the core 
 of his existence.
 
 CROSS CURRENTS 105 
 
 * * To be very brief, ' ' the gentleness of his voice 
 lost in its depths and strength, "her unhurried 
 choice to learn and her untrammelled range of 
 subjects have resulted in substantiating every one 
 of my arguments. She responds to the great in- 
 terests of all mankind. Her subjects are those 
 which men enjoy. I found her studying Mill's 
 * Logic' a week ago, and was amazed at the celerity 
 with which she turned the leaves. I asked her if 
 she liked it. 'I simply love it, papa,' she said, 
 enthusiastically. There spoke the essential mind 
 of the free and unwarped woman ! Paul, I could 
 be humbled if I were not uplifted by impregnable, 
 conquering youth beside me. How great is your 
 heart! But how can you understand! I suspect 
 you cannot. Suffice it then to conclude : my belief 
 in our book, my pleasure in its growth, are strong 
 tonight; the world is ready for us. On the one 
 hand, a young woman, unled, feeding on Homer — 
 on the other, the young man and the sound of his 
 feet rushing in the wind of his own eagerness. 
 The harvest ripens on the hillsides of the Lord 
 and I may draw aside to rest. 
 
 *'I might if I would," his voice broke, sur- 
 charged with emotion. ' ' If I w^ould but I will not. 
 Activity is too absorbing. Paul, let's to work." 
 
 The three sat at the same table, enjoyed the 
 same shelter, thought they loved each other- 
 yet the three were as far apart as Siberia from 
 Java. On they moved, each in his own world; 
 good worlds but worlds that did not match. Ruth 
 wanted so much to be a partner in the great enter- 
 prise coming to its fruition in that study. Had 
 the men taken her in, given her something to do, 
 made her feel that she was one with them, she 
 would have played a humble part, been a helpful 
 co-worker and waited Avithout thought for Time 
 to carry them to their destined goal. She was a 
 bird, a plumed bird, alive to the present with no
 
 106 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 thought of the morrow. Did she drop from Paul's 
 level, the men were to blame. They forced her 
 into an untried world which might lead anywhere 
 — a road most girls take but which after all is 
 foreign to their nature. 
 
 When the yearning girl came his way, Paul 
 rebuked her as temptation. When she sought 
 her father he fondled her as a six-year old. Un- 
 conscious and well-meaning, he was blind to the 
 effects which his own philosophy had wrought. 
 Looking at her he saw Ida's eyes, Ida's hair, Ida's 
 smile; and thought the girl would blossom to 
 another Ida. She was to become a clinging vine 
 like her mother, when in reality — standing firmly 
 on her own feet — she was being transformed into 
 an oak; not so big an oak as Paul but with the 
 same motives, interests and manner of approach. 
 
 The Professor waited on Ida, Ruth waited on 
 him. He brought Ida's shawl; Ruth brought his 
 slippers. Ida sat by the fire, reflecting to the Pro- 
 fessor what he gave, merely a looking-glass throw- 
 ing back what the gazer put in it. Ruth was free 
 from the traditions which bound Ida, made active 
 by a health which Ida never enjoyed. 
 
 During the sultry August the three lives were 
 conditioned as Paul and the Professor would have 
 them. Ruth drew aside with a gallant cheerful- 
 ness for the paramount woman of pure theory. 
 While they wrote she hung over a kitchen cook- 
 book or cooled her white arms, tingling from the 
 dry heat of the oven, beneath the cold water from 
 the faucet. Her hair curled smartly on her brow, 
 her lips were red, her cheeks bloomed duskily, her 
 dark eyes brilliantly swept her field; the critical 
 moment, by book and clock, had come for the bis- 
 cuit in the oven. 
 
 In her new sphere she aimed at Paul 's womanly 
 ideal so nearly as his scant description of his 
 mother would permit. Poor Ruth had never pic-
 
 CROSS CURRENTS 107 
 
 tured her in any other than the qualitative way; 
 her quick perceptions had missed the very crux of 
 Paul's stiff, narrow measure of the beautiful. If 
 she could have concealed the opulent lines and 
 curves of her honest, supple body, as the thin, 
 straight figure of the mother concealed itself 
 within shapeless garments, Paul in time could 
 have endued her with the qualities of those clothes. 
 He neither feared nor was disturbed by the woman 
 of that kind. Ruth saw the type in Bovx'man from 
 her own unique angle; it was the older, faded 
 faculty woman, the middle-aged, iron-gray per- 
 sons upon whom she never bestowed a thought or 
 question. Yet, Paul's mother was the woman he 
 admired. When she first stepped from her own 
 path to walk in his, she noted shrewdly how often 
 this scornful arraigner of those who lauded her 
 bread spoke of her cake and pie. 
 
 One lonely evening when the palms of her hands 
 smarted with oven heat, she waited with a sinking- 
 heart for the men to note the juicy virtues of her 
 steak. Alas, when old Mammy removed it, the 
 two were harking back up the ripe conundrum 
 about the relation of economics to sociology. She 
 was lost in the polemic — her triumph was unob- 
 served. Wihen the door swung upon her vanished 
 proof, she burst into tears. The quick, sharp sobs 
 effectually centered their attention upon her, and 
 Paul jumped with an expression of solicitude. 
 
 ''Why, daughter, what is it?" her father asked, 
 bending over her chair. 
 
 "Did you hurt yourself?" Paul asked. 
 
 "Yes," she sobbed. "I burned my hands over 
 that old steak and I want to go upstairs." 
 
 Her father laid her palm against his cheek. 
 
 "And you never mentioned it," said Paul, his 
 stiffness gone in the necessity of sympathy in 
 physical disaster.
 
 108 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 *'And you never said a word about the steak, '^ 
 she retorted with an access of anger. 
 
 *'My dear," her father cried, "I can hardy be- 
 lieve you broiled it! Did you truly? It was deli- 
 cious, eh, Paul?" 
 
 ''I never ate a better. Can't I get something 
 for your hand? A lotion or cold cream?" 
 
 She dried her eyes. "It doesn't hurt so much, 
 now. I'll stay here, I think. Please bring me 
 the witch hazel from the shelf, Paul. ' ' 
 
 He hurried for it and returned in a trice, pour- 
 ing a drop into the cup of her pink palms. He 
 would not let her bruise them upon the handle 
 of the coffee urn, but served the beverage while 
 her father attended to the berries. The priority 
 of the social sciences no longer occupying them, 
 she played with her new-found force, Deception, 
 with such skill and intuitive knowledge of the 
 instrument that Paul for two hours was almost 
 the Paul of the playmate days, before fearing her. 
 He judged her a revert of some early epoch, as 
 innocent perhaps as some ancestress naked and 
 dripping on a sunny, southern shore, plunging 
 her gleaming body into tropic waters. His broad 
 and simple nature welcomed her subterfuge for 
 sympathy and attention. Yet after the first relief 
 given by the burst of indignant tears and trivial 
 lies, Paul was stirred by a vanishing hint of an 
 encompassing, nameless threat, a lurking cosmic 
 Danger. When the girl's happy eyes told him 
 that the eclipse of her gaiety had passed, he suf- 
 fered a premonition that thej'' were involved in a 
 sorrow they could not avert, coming from condi- 
 tions beyond their reach. Her wistful smiles drew 
 him into the vortex of her charm; she called to 
 his sentiment' and before he was braced to repel 
 it the thought of her in his arms — running a pol- 
 luting fire through his veins — weakened for an 
 instant the whole big frame. He met it in dejec-
 
 CROSS CURRENTS 109 
 
 tion — the stern happiness of holding at bay his 
 carnal temptations was gone. It was a treadmill 
 to him on which he must run endlessly even to 
 preserve life. 
 
 **What an awful hold this thing has on me," 
 he muttered, "there's too much blood in me. I 
 must work this taint out of my muscles." He 
 leaped and ran as if he were testing a candidate — 
 falling to a walk, he would hear Ruth's voice or 
 a movement of the bushes that at length made 
 him jump with a superstitious terror. Then with 
 a slow, hard brutality — ^blind to the consequences 
 if he might team away the demon that fattened on 
 him — he rushed panting, his pulses a-hammer, un- 
 til white and faint he threw himself down with face 
 in the ferns. Thus went on the struggle from day 
 to day, from week to week. A phantom Ruth in 
 the wood, a real Ruth in the home. Which was 
 the worse he could not tell — in fact he never was 
 sure with which he was dealing. He ran from 
 her or struck back at her as his fitful mood de- 
 termined. Great ideals make men stern, fierce, 
 even brutal toward any encountered obstacle. 
 Whatever obtrudes must be crushed regardless of 
 consequences. In this mood he threw stones at 
 the phantom Ruth and dodged when the real Ruth 
 appeared. 
 
 She in turn tired of waiting, pressed forward 
 like a shy animal hungry on a trail to her thrilling 
 part in life. When they were not together for 
 many hours, she feared nothing would ever hap- 
 pen again in this stationary globe. So her eyes 
 blazed with a swift excitement one dusky evening 
 when she saw Paul seat himself upon the piazza 
 until Dr. Dickson should leave the study. Coming 
 straight to him, she stopped when her dress 
 pressed against his knee. His eyes came to her 
 with such a look that she knew she must act with- 
 out parley; leaning forward half across his
 
 110 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 breast, she kissed him full and long on his unready 
 lips. A deathly languor overspread his face. 
 Quicker even than was his wont he warded her 
 off with a rude push that made her stagger against 
 the low railing. The cruel deed had nothing back 
 of it but a blind resistance to an unwelcome fate. 
 So acted his forbears — prophets, priests and mor- 
 alists; so did Paul. What is a woman's pain to a 
 man's composure? 
 
 That night Ruth stood before the glass, helping 
 it bring out her good qualities. The more she 
 looked the more she became convinced that she 
 was pretty; if Paul should really see her he would 
 appreciate her beauty. Wliile so sure she was 
 right and never doubting beauty's power, defeat 
 made her humble. Paul came and went as before 
 but she no longer lay on the rug watching the 
 struggle for words that brought out his char- 
 acteristics. It was grand to see him contend 
 for a new expression. His great frame shook 
 with every wrong; his eye flashed with any new 
 indication of man's depravity; when he appre- 
 hended some new onslaught of the enemy he 
 braced his foot as if he were to meet the Penn- 
 sylvania team. 
 
 Unconscious of this byplay the Professor was 
 happy. His pamphlets shone with greater lustre 
 when revised by Paul. The day seemed at hand 
 when the world would have the truth in a convinc- 
 ing form. The two made a good team, their vir- 
 tues and their defects matched. So long as the 
 material was used their agreement was perfect. 
 There were no words too strong, no picture of 
 woman's misery which they were not willing to 
 frame and exploit. Yet the ideals of the two men 
 were radically different. Despite Paul's respect 
 for the Professor and his love of Ruth, despite 
 their intimacy and daily communion, they had 
 never got beyond the threshold of the woman
 
 CROSS CURRENTS 111 
 
 problem nor into fields where their differences 
 shone. Sooner or later this was bound to happen. 
 At length rhetoric and description must end; 
 then the two goals and the two types of woman 
 adoration would come to the fore. 
 
 Paul saw Mother. Girls and beauty played no 
 part in his vision. Virtue, work and sacrifice 
 were his ideals. That over-work might harm — 
 that the hard faces of tired mothers represented 
 defeat, not progress — that millions go down under 
 a load which heredity has not prepared them to 
 carry — these doctrines which he heard the Pro- 
 fessor enunciate were perhaps accepted but not 
 assimilated. Work to him was joy. His fresh, 
 round muscles responded without a murmur. Why 
 should it not be so with woman as well as man? 
 
 To the Professor Ida was always foremost — an 
 Ida whose picture showed a woman who had never 
 suffered hardship. Her hands were small and 
 white, her arms were too slight to be muscular, her 
 face had no scars, her cheek did not bear the fur- 
 rows of age ; her smile, not her daily toil, paid the 
 Professor for his efforts. Tliis did not mean that 
 Ida was a woman who never recompensed deeds 
 in kind. She did as much for the Professor as 
 he did for her. But all was so nicely arranged, 
 forethought had done so much, the household ad- 
 justments were so complete, that joy reigned from 
 the rising to the setting of the sun. 
 
 The Professor saw only the glory of life ; Paul 
 saw the mechanism by which it was ennobled. 
 Food is the great original problem to v/hich in 
 primitive life all must bend. But food means 
 work — work for all — man, woman and child alike, 
 at least theoretically. Out of this need all insti- 
 tutions grew. Progress is only new forms of the 
 division of labor. Yes, labor differs but yet it is 
 always labor ; and to labor all transformations in 
 the human frame are due. Bone and muscle meas-
 
 112 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 ure the progress of women as of men — not their 
 soft cheeks and slender hands. Take away work 
 and women become mere playthings, not comrades 
 and co-workers. The race has gone up from toil 
 to leisure, from starvation to plenty, from help 
 lessness to world control, from an age of bare- 
 handed struggle to that of tool and machine. Men 
 live to work, not work to live. Such was Paul's 
 interpretation of history. It was the lesson of 
 his readings. 
 
 Of such books the Professor read little. Even 
 the preface was too much for him. He liked to 
 ponder on the golden age which all poets see. 
 Evolution had never deprived him of his Garden 
 of Eden where all is joy. Work was a penalty 
 not an agent in world advance. The first law 
 was to eat, drink and be happy — not that the 
 sweat of the brow is the source of daily bread. 
 He might not say that tools were useless imple- 
 ments and wheat-fields a mar on nature except 
 for their color. He was too far along for such a 
 tirade against modern invention, but in his vision 
 there were no tools nor economic contrivances. 
 Everytliing was just as nature made it. The 
 fruits of the field came in their season because at 
 that moment they filled into nature 's scheme. Li 
 such a world woman was not a handmaid fitting 
 into utilitarian schemes, but the crowning piece 
 of God's handiwork. "Woman is God's last and 
 best product," was his familiar cry. Man was 
 made from the dust but woman came from above. 
 This crowning crown of the universe should 
 never be degraded, never turned into a machine, 
 never made the servant of man's interests. 
 Woman's degradation is world degradation. 
 Woman's beauty is world beauty. Mar it at your 
 peril. 
 
 So thought the Professor. All went well until 
 Paul began to write the chapter on primitive
 
 CROSS CURRENTS 113 
 
 woman. The two sat at the Professor's fireside 
 when Paul read the product of his toil. He had 
 scarcely begun before the Professor jumped up, 
 paced the room, threw his hand about violently. 
 Finally he interrupted, stamping his foot to make 
 the words emphatic. He cried, "That's nonsense, 
 Paul, utter nonsense. W,here did you get that 
 stuff?" 
 
 *'Out of your library," Paul replied, putting 
 before the Professor a dozen volumes which he 
 had himself bought. 
 
 The Professor looked at Paul's material, 
 thumbed it carelessly and then broke forth. 
 ** Nothing could make that stuff fact. That is not 
 the way nature works. She gets ready before 
 she does anything; the parts fit together so nice- 
 ly that beauty results. You would make a botch 
 of the whole universe. Did man make the fruits 
 of the field or were they ready for him when he 
 arrived? Men cut trees, men make filth — ^but no 
 man has yet made a rose. Oh, those dreadful 
 tools, those huge factories, those smoky cities — 
 those are the product of work, the result of pre- 
 sumption, men trying to improve nature. Down 
 the world goes every time men try to improve it. 
 The more they work the lower they sink. No, 
 give woman clean hands and a pretty face right 
 from the start. Her first day was her best day: 
 fresh from God's hands, she was the embodiment 
 of all the stored-up beauty of the ages. God 
 made the lilies not to work but to be looked at. 
 He made woman not to hoe in the garden but to 
 inspire noble deeds. Don't talk of work, Paul, 
 as though work were God. It's penalty, tyranny, 
 degeneration ! The fire is the only place for that 
 chapter. ' ' 
 
 He reached over as though he would execute 
 his threat but Paul put his hand firmly on the 
 manuscript. The Professor tried to smile but
 
 114 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 failed. Paul sat dazed but unconvinced. To talk 
 against work was to talk against his mother. 
 His highest ideal was a woman pitching hay or 
 driving a team to market. Work was man's 
 salvation. Sweat was the cure of all evil. No 
 one with open pores did wrong. The idle hand 
 was the source of vice; the idle brain planned 
 destruction. Evil came not through work but in 
 trying to escape from work. 
 
 Paul's visions lay in the future, not in the past. 
 He saw not the golden age but the promised day. 
 His world was yet to be made, man's toil was 
 God's agent making it. He was ready for the 
 laborious climb from dust to soul. No patience 
 had he for those who would not spit on their 
 hands nor soil their faces to do God's work. 
 Beauty is below man, not above him. It becomes 
 virtue as it nears the clouds. We see beauty, 
 looking back; we see virtue when we look ahead. 
 Work is God's agent; beauty is the temjjter's 
 tool. 
 
 The Professor jumped up again to pace the 
 floor, shaking his fist at imaginary enemies. ' ' Oh, 
 God," he cried, "Beauty, the tempter's tool. 
 What book says that? The only place for it is 
 the fire." He thumbed the books again as if he 
 would find the hated doctrine and cast it out for- 
 ever. Failing in this he sat glaring at Paul while 
 Paul in turn held firmly to his position. The two 
 men had at length reached an irreconcilable dif- 
 ference which seemed ready to destroy their long- 
 felt unity. 
 
 ''Let me show you," cried Ruth, at which, 
 grabbing the bearskin on the floor, she disap- 
 peared. Neither noticed but kept up their argu- 
 ment. 
 
 ''Beauty and vice came together," cried Paul, 
 as he saw in vision the primitive festivities 
 against which the prophets raved.
 
 CROSS CURRENTS 115 
 
 **0h, shame," cried the Professor as a pained 
 look came over his face and a chill shook his 
 frame, "it is only toil that degrades. Vice is a 
 product not of God but of a recent age. Why be 
 chained to toil when its products only increase our 
 misery? Once woman stood proud and free. Her 
 hands were clean, her eye clear and her soul as yet 
 untarnished by man's brutality. Then all was 
 beauty — beauty by day, beauty by night. Now 
 day is toil and night a dreary, moaning sleep. It 
 is better to rest on nature's pillow than to be 
 smothered beneath a feather tick. The more we 
 have the more the misery, the louder the groan of 
 the repressed soul." 
 
 "A myth, a fancy," replied Paul. "Man rose 
 from the earth by the sweat of his brow. W'oman 
 learned the lesson of work first. She became 
 man's plaything only after she had lost contact 
 with the earth from which she sprang. x\re rib- 
 bons, flowers and fancy any compensation for an 
 empty stomach, a bare back and frosted toes? 
 Nature lives only from day to day. Man lives 
 for tomorrow, daring the thundercloud to pre- 
 vent his elevation. Beauty and degeneration 
 come together; they are human foes not friends." 
 
 Paul said this with a sweep of his long arm and 
 a look on his face as if he saw the starving, bare- 
 footed horde which books on primitive man de- 
 pict. He leaned over the table, on his lips a tor- 
 rent of invective which he meant to hurl in the 
 defense of his position. But just as he started he 
 heard a long-drawn-out ' ' Boo ! ' ' over his shoulder. 
 
 Turning quickly, he leaped to his feet and with 
 a look of dismay retreated to the rear of the room. 
 He saw — w^as it girl or vision? If vision it was 
 the distant past coming back to life to avenge it- 
 self for the cruel pictures which prophets, priests 
 and economists have drawn of ages now buried in 
 a helpless oblivion. If the girl, she had exchanged
 
 116 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 her dress for a bearskin covering. The hind legs 
 were loosely tied around her waist, the forelegs 
 flapped across her breast, the head hung over her 
 shoulder. On her head were feathers and plumes. 
 Her arms, her shoulders and legs shone white and 
 bare. About the room she moved in a quick, flow- 
 ing primitive dance which changed into leaps and 
 bounds as imagery demanded. 
 
 Euth had read all those books with which her 
 father 's library overflowed. Missionaries, travel- 
 ers and scientists, each had told his tale. They 
 were included in the father 's scheme to unlock the 
 past of woman. What the girl saw was dilferent 
 from what he saw and still more different from 
 the deductions which Paul drew. To her, being 
 carried off by a wild man or guarded on a lone 
 island by a dragon did not seem half so bad as 
 it did to the two valiant defenders of women who 
 occupied the same study and read the same books. 
 Dances and festivals were her joy. Even the 
 crude accounts of the missionaries were trans- 
 formed from horror into things of beauty. 
 
 This was not the first time she had donned the 
 bearskin and danced before the fire. But till now 
 the only beholder was the looking-glass which 
 smiled at the many feats which she essayed to 
 perform. There was no garment which she had 
 not tried on or left off. Every color, every move- 
 ment, was carefully studied and skillfully imitat- 
 ed. Hour after hour she had made this her amuse- 
 ment while the men were doing sterner duty in 
 the many vocations which occupied their atten- 
 tion. Her father knew that she danced. She had 
 often amused him in this way. But they were 
 child dances. To him she was a little girl, nothing 
 more. 
 
 Now she thought to help them in the solution of 
 the problem which caused their differences. She 
 started with good intentions but soon the spirit
 
 CROSS CURRENTS 117 
 
 of woman took possession of her. She became a 
 type, not an individual. Up and down the room 
 she moved with an easy, swinging grace. She 
 circled, she ran, she curtsied, bending forward and 
 backward as she felt the pulse of some imagined 
 scene. In feeling and in movement she changed 
 as her thought flew from one personification to 
 another. Now she was on the banks of the Ganges, 
 now in the heated interior of Africa; the desert 
 of Sahara loomed up in turn, then the table land 
 of central Asia. Indian maidens were not for- 
 gotten, nor the dwellers of the distant isles of 
 Southern Seas. Wherever the missionary had 
 been, wherever the traveler had explored, there 
 maidens had always been found and the same joy 
 of the spring festival had found expression. Her 
 soul was in them and they in her. Of the millions 
 of ancestors which Ruth had in her each now was 
 crying for expression. We may stifle our hered- 
 ity, refuse its behests, still it is here, chained yet 
 eager for expression when the bars are loosened. 
 
 Ruth had never been repressed, the crushing 
 force of the mailed fist she never felt. No bounds 
 had ever been set for her self-expression. What 
 the blood, the nerves, the muscles demanded she 
 did as if from a conscious purpose. Who can have 
 a million ancestors boxed in her primal cell with- 
 out some time being each of them? Think not 
 that she is normal who feels only what the church, 
 the school and the age demand. She is but a 
 fraction of w^hat heredity prompts her to be. 
 Think not that she is superior whose thought runs 
 in trained grooves, who thinks only of home, mar- 
 ried virtues and food for man to eat. All these 
 are exterior. The soul is not in them but in a dark 
 cavern to which the modern woman seldom de- 
 scends. Below the imposed framework is a 
 crushed something which every woman feels. 
 
 This is her heredity, this is the voice of her
 
 118 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 ancestry crying for expression; this is the fire 
 which lit the soul of women in days when she and 
 nature were companions. Now women are scared 
 when they feel the pulse of what is below, when 
 they see their true selves marred by convention, 
 tortured by thorny commandments, blinded by 
 ages of confinement in lanternless caves. Yet de- 
 spite all this, overlaid as it may be with the moss 
 of tradition or the mold of usage, woman carries 
 all her ancestral traits in her, ever ready to ex- 
 press themselves when locks are unbolted. 
 Her ancestors never die. They are with her 
 and in her. Ruth was they and they were Ruth. 
 As she circled around the room they came out of 
 her. She became a thousand instead of one. Paul 
 stood dazed as he saw the multiplication; they 
 seemed to fly in through the window and to rise 
 out of the flame of the fireplace. 
 
 The air echoed women's voices, the clouds took 
 her form, the moon became twisted into girlish 
 smiles ; the fairies, witches and gnomes leaped in 
 to help their sister. All nature was on Ruth's 
 side. Only a stubborn will opposed. Even it 
 shrank in terror from what it could not prevent. 
 Paul was like a creature clinging to a denuded 
 tree while a hurricane sweeps by tearing the 
 grass from its roots. 
 
 The room had been lighted by a lamp on the 
 table, but the Professor had emphasized one of 
 his statements by blowing it out. He could 
 think better when looking at the blazing logs on 
 the hearth. The light which fell on Ruth came 
 from the open fire or from the moon which 
 peered through the window. She had one color 
 when she passed before the fire, another when 
 she reached the window. Each time she dis- 
 appeared in the dark recesses of the room she 
 reappeared in a new form and had with her a 
 new troupe of her ancestors. Were they real
 
 CROSS CURKENTS 119 
 
 or did they exist in the imagination of the ter- 
 rified Paul? He had read the books, and now 
 saw the same pictures as Ruth. Yesterday they 
 were mere words; now they became visions. 
 Were both under the same delusion or did both 
 receive the same revelation? 
 
 Paul's ancestors chopped wood, built temples, 
 fought battles. Their expression left a product 
 in tools, houses, farms and cities. Ruth's an- 
 cestors left no product, they built no altars, nor 
 had they any walled cities. Hunt as you may, 
 the remnants of woman's efforts are not to be 
 found. AVhat she did lives only in her descend- 
 ants, coming to the fore as the daughter repeats 
 what the mothers did. Woman is God's best 
 mechanism. All that she can be is what her 
 mother gave her. 
 
 Paul feared this eternal element in woman. 
 He wanted to make her over into deeds like his 
 own. Trembling before the host of women who 
 joined Ruth in her dance, he ran at their ap- 
 proach. But Ruth reinforced by her sisters 
 became more bold. Wilder was the dance, more 
 complex its figures. When she crouched before 
 the fire and leaped out at the startled Paul, she 
 seemed like a thousand disembodied spirits. 
 AVhen she passed before the window new flocks 
 of ancestral ghosts seemed to float in. What 
 woman was there that Paul did not see? What 
 dress or features but passed before his 
 gaze and riveted his attention in spite of his 
 endeavor to shut them out? They were not the 
 modest Idas which smile from the wall, neither 
 the pale-faced mother doing a man's duty in the 
 hay-field. They were simply women eager to 
 fulfill their function, bubbling over with joy and 
 happiness. No prison held them; no chain 
 bound their feet nor did garments hide their 
 identity or impede their movements.
 
 120 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 They sang, they danced, they appealed. They 
 chased the virtuous Paul about the room until 
 he fled to a dark corner where he held them at 
 bay. Currents of air seemed to sweep by him 
 and a still greater force back of him seemed to 
 push him on. But Paul was will. He braced 
 his feet as if he were to meet the charge of an 
 opposing football squadron. When in this way 
 victory was assured the sides of the room faded 
 and the wall paper turned into trees. He was 
 not in Bowman but in a virgin forest amid the 
 blaze of a thousand torches which lit up a mid- 
 night festival. Here woman w^as supreme. 
 Each was a Euth and more. There was no man 
 to say ''No!" to their impulses nor prophet to 
 foretell their doom. Paul sprang back in hor- 
 ror; with a mighty sweep he drove them forth. 
 Will dominated and Bowman returned. 
 
 Yet Ruth was before him, wilder and more 
 excited than ever. Her leaps were longer. Li 
 dizzy circles she swept by him and strove to 
 drag him with her. Her father caught her 
 spirit, swung around the room with her but Paul 
 stood in his corner firmly intrenched behind a 
 chair. With a bound she leaped upon the chair 
 and threw her arms around him crying, "Paul, 
 come ! ' ' 
 
 Dodging, he escaped, but she flew about the 
 room after him. Just as she grasped him he leaped 
 from the window. She would have followed but 
 her father caught and held her tightly in his arms. 
 
 What the fire saw, what the moon saw, the Pro- 
 fessor could have seen but did not. He held not 
 the bearskin, but Ruth ! her face hot with passion. 
 
 Clasping her closely to his bosom, he sat in his 
 chair and laughed; laughed until the tears rolled 
 down his cheeks and his body shook. At last he 
 stopped long enough to cry, '*I guess we won^t 
 hear of that economic woman for a while." Then
 
 THE DISCOVERY 121 
 
 he laughed again. The Professor had won a vic- 
 tory but at what cost? 
 
 The girl mistook his joy for an approval of her 
 conduct. 
 
 XIII 
 
 The Discovery 
 
 After this episode Paul did not appear. His 
 excuse was the urgency of work, thinking thus 
 to find something to divert his thought from his 
 surging impulses. There had been a world with- 
 out and a world within. Between them there were 
 reactions, but no external message got by the care- 
 fully locked door, the key to which the will firmly 
 held. The body obeyed, never starting fresh im- 
 pressions. Now it was alive. Starting trains of 
 thought, it forced pictures into Paul's conscious- 
 ness which he would gladly have forbidden. The 
 theology of his famous predecessor had been to 
 him a mere theory until this moment. Now it be- 
 came a great reality. Feeling he must assert his 
 spiritual mastery, he resorted to many expedients 
 to bring back the calm which had always been his 
 to enjoy. 
 
 All in vain. The long walks, the cross- 
 country runs, the indoor sports had all been tried. 
 They seemed to work, but when he started across 
 the campus to resume his place in the study a 
 phantom Ruth bobbed up from behind the bushes 
 or was reflected from the window panes of the 
 home he approached. He tried to laugh at his 
 visions, he threw stones into the bushes to show 
 how indifferent he was to the spectral world. But 
 his visions continued to haunt him in spite of his 
 earnest endeavors to suppress them. He went to 
 the settlement to get relief. Girls were every- 
 where. For the first time he discovered that they
 
 122 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 all had limbs, necks and winning smiles. He won- 
 dered how they could be so careless — exposing 
 their charms without the least consideration of 
 proprieties. 
 
 Just what girls had been to him before and how 
 they had acted he never stopped to consider. He 
 had, in fact, never given them a moment's thought. 
 He could not have told whether their skirts vv^ere 
 long or short or how low their dresses were cut. 
 Girls were girls. He neither hated nor admired 
 them, but went his way as they did theirs. Now, 
 dress and girl became distinct entities and the 
 ends of dress seemed to be to expose what should 
 not be seen. He gazed at their ajjparel with blank 
 astonishment, wondering how such an aggregation 
 of insinuating devices could have been invented. 
 He tried to figure how he would have them dress, 
 but his mind refused to work that way. It always 
 passed from the seen to the unseen. Try as he 
 would, the beneath always got on the outside. The 
 shock of Ruth's passion strix^ped woman of her 
 covering. She was always dancing before him, 
 in every girl who came under his gaze. They 
 seemed to throw off their apparel the moment he 
 approached. Back of each was a specter Avhich 
 stood forth so plainly that he rubbed his eyes to 
 be sure that no transformation had taken place. 
 "How brazen girls are," was a constant thought. 
 Even their voices started an inward terror which 
 he found no means of suppressing. 
 
 So he deserted the town and sought the woods. 
 But he could hear Ruth's voice everywhere, "Wait 
 Paul, it is I," echoed from every hill. If he 
 looked over his shoulder she was there, running 
 as he ran, turning as he turned. Each day the 
 tension became worse; he lost weight; he bored 
 his companions with frequent challenges of cross- 
 country runs in the hope that their presence would 
 drive the specter away. It did, but when alone it
 
 THE DISCOVERY 123 
 
 came back with fresh courage. At last he was 
 only safe in the lecture room. Here he was the 
 self of old, pouring forth his thought in a thrill- 
 ing eloquence which astonished his hearers. Stu- 
 dents crowded the room, to the doorway. Even 
 old professors, wearied by the talk of years, drop- 
 ping in to hear the boy orator went away with a 
 new thrill. What was in came out while he talked, 
 so forcefully that the without had no chance to 
 get within. Strong as he was, the glow of the 
 lecture tired him. The active brain sapping the 
 vigor of the body left him faint. Something was 
 wrong. His friends could see it but could not 
 divine its cause. They suggested amusements and 
 brought delicacies, vied with each other in friend- 
 ly acts and yet the flush on his cheek grew plainer, 
 his eye glowing as if with fever. They advised a 
 trip to the seashore, or some diversion in the city. 
 But all in vain. The lecture was Paul's one joy; 
 to it he clung with a desperate resolve to gain 
 self-mastery through cleanness of thouglit. Each 
 day he seemed almost to grasp a solution. He 
 saw it coming down the aisle or springing from 
 the faces of his hearers. But just as he grasped 
 it the bell rang the closing of tlie hour. His spirit 
 slunk back within himself, his thought faded until 
 brought to life again by the next period. 
 
 The crisis which Paul faced was not less acute 
 than that which Euth underwent during the same 
 period. That indifference for the morrow which 
 was her charm faded. She was now a being with 
 an end. Her dreams became day visions and they 
 walked about with her. But whatever disguise 
 her primitive thought took it became — when un- 
 masked — Paul ! She yearned for him every min- 
 ute, dreamt of him every night. Each little re- 
 minder of him stirred a fresh emotion. Paul was 
 everywhere, "Paul, Paul, I must win Paul," was 
 her constant cr)^, the sole content of her prayer.
 
 124 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 She sought every device of which she could think 
 to augment her physical appeal; planned many 
 surprises which would find him unawares as he 
 passed up the lawn or entered the study. She 
 practised her stunts daily before the looking-glass 
 eagerly waiting Paul 's return to try their efficacy. 
 Knowing her beauty, she trusted its power. 
 
 But no Paul came. She heard of the wonderful 
 lectures; the town was ablaze with their glory. 
 But there was no place for girls in the man- 
 guarded precincts of the college hall. She knew 
 of his walks ; tried to catch him in secluded places. 
 But all in vain. Paul would neither stop nor listen. 
 As he dashed on, he became more of a hero, more 
 indispensable, a greater object of admiration. 
 The unattainable must be attained, the impassable 
 must be crossed. There is some entrance to the 
 holy of holies and this she would find. 
 
 Many days elapsed before a new avenue of ap- 
 proach occurred to her. She loved to sit in Paul's 
 chair before the big desk and imagine herself 
 writing on the book. She tried her hand to imitate 
 the admired Paul. Oh, could his spirit come to 
 her through his pen and through the paper he was 
 using! It is an old thought that we can control 
 others by a control of the things they use. Ruth 
 was primitive enough in her mood to feel its 
 force. At first she only rewrote sentences which 
 she had heard Paul use or phrases lier father 
 often repeated. Then she grew bolder. The old 
 yearning to participate in the great work revived. 
 She would write a chapter to show her ability. 
 Then, ah, then, she could become a co-worker on 
 the epoch-making book. 
 
 The chapter on which the two men split she 
 w^ould write in her own way. She saw this woman 
 as a sister to lierself. She knew the literature on 
 primitive man as well as they, but she trusted her 
 memory and thus mixed her dreams with her facts.
 
 THE DISCOVERY 125 
 
 The world she described was a dream world, 
 where awful tragedies chilled the blood, where 
 transformations were sudden; yet in the end 
 came out as they should. It was a rambling story 
 dictated by the feeling of each day and often re- 
 vised to meet new impulses. She meant it to be 
 a real story and yet her own desires forced their 
 way in so much that each incident had some bear- 
 ing on her own situation. It was a true story 
 only insofar as she was a primitive woman her- 
 self, and thus made the past and present one. 
 But Ruth was not enough of a philosof)her to see 
 it in this light. The chapter ran as her fancy 
 dictated. She thought of Paul as the hero of a 
 cave dwellers' epoch. It was easy, therefore, to 
 mix Paul, dreams and history in one view and 
 satisfy herself that she was writing fact when she 
 was merely dreaming Paul. 
 
 The story of Lady Margaret thus came into be- 
 ing and its author cast about for means to get it 
 into Paul's hands. She yearned to give it to him 
 herself and see the delight with which she w^as 
 sure he would greet it. She thought out many 
 plans, but their execution was frustrated by a 
 sudden announcement. Paul was sick. He had a 
 high fever and the doctor had been called in. 
 Even though it was Sunday, her father shut him- 
 self up with a dozen new books on economics, 
 expecting the next morning to deliver Paul's out- 
 lined lecture on the latest phases of the value 
 controversy. It was not an easy task, but his zeal 
 made up for his deficiency. Ruth wandered aim- 
 lessly about. She went to the gate a dozen times, 
 determined to seek Paul, but each time her heart 
 failed. So went the day until the church bell 
 called Bowman together for the afternoon service. 
 Then as the campus became still she ventured 
 forth, hoping for a look at Paul or at least a 
 chance to leave the story of Lady Margaret with
 
 126 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 liim. Many times she walked along the path under 
 Paul's window, striving to work up enough cour- 
 age to call him. But something choked her every 
 time she tried to raise her voice ; she grew more 
 desperate and thought to look at her hero. Plac- 
 ing her hand on Paul's windowsill, she gave a 
 spring, hoping to attract his attention or at least 
 to see him. Her first bound failed. She saw only 
 the dark walls of an almost empty room. Paul 
 was evidently in bed and her heart throbbed with 
 pain as the thought of his suffering became more 
 intense. A mighty impulse seized her. Leaping 
 with such force that she could not stop, she fell 
 through his window and lay in a jumble on the 
 floor. Her dress was torn, her face was bloody, 
 for the moment she was paralyzed by shock. 
 
 Paul jumped up from the couch where he lay. 
 AVas it a new vision or was it a reality? He 
 rubbed his eyes to see. All night long, yes, even 
 in the day, phantom Ruths had been casting them- 
 selves in his way. They flew through the transom, 
 hid behind his pictures, raised their alluring forms 
 above the foot of his bed. Look where he would 
 with eyes closed or open, they forced themselves 
 on his attention and addled him with their naked- 
 ness. 
 
 From their reveries the cry of the helpless girl 
 on the floor aroused him. Ruth's super-abundant 
 hair was always getting her in difficulty and 
 this time it had been . caught by the latch 
 on the window frame. Paul sprang to her aid, 
 unfastened the tangled tresses, washed the blood 
 from her face, and pinned the dress together so 
 as to hide the girl's exposed breast. 
 
 She had exceeded all her wishes in making him 
 see her and she expected a response. Hope flushed 
 her face as she raised her arms to encircle her 
 hero. Paul gave a start, the color of his cheek 
 darkened. But that mighty will dominated. Rais-
 
 THE DISCOVERY 127 
 
 ing her gently, he put her on the couch. From this 
 Ruth leaped with a bound, dazed by her fall but 
 boiling with emotion. She rushed at Paul but 
 clasping her hands he held her off. They stood 
 thus facing each other while Paul cast about for 
 means to relieve the situation. Something must 
 be done to shield Ruth. For her to be seen in the 
 Dorms meant disgrace. At last desperation moved 
 him as he heard the church audience join in sing- 
 ing the doxology. He would wrap her in his 
 blanket, carry her across the campus and deposit 
 her in her own home. Paul was above suspicion. 
 No one would question him if he crossed the 
 campus mth a strange bundle on Sunday. He 
 tried to explain his intent to Ruth, but it only 
 made her opposition more violent. She, Ruth, the 
 woman, to be carried across the campus disguised 
 as a baby — never! She jerked loose from liis 
 grasp, angrily slapped him in the face. Before 
 he could seize her she vaulted out the window. 
 
 The sudden exit of Ruth made her visit seem 
 like a dream. She had, however, left a reminder 
 in the shape of a shoe. He looked around for a 
 safe place to hide it and finally put it in his 
 bureau. Then he pulled it out and tried several 
 other places, but they all seemed equally unsatis- 
 factory. The shoe seemed to shine out under any 
 cover and to get always in the very place where 
 someone would be sure to see it. A loud knock 
 found Paul with the shoe still in hand, but with a 
 sudden spring he threw it into his trunk, and then 
 invited the visitor in. It proved to be Dr. Dickson, 
 and in his hand was the other shoe. Paul waited 
 for his winded visitor to speak, but speech came 
 slowly. 
 
 ''Paul," he finally cried, "a. dastardly deed has 
 been committed ! The sacred precincts of our col- 
 lege campus have been invaded. I was returning 
 from early prayer and came this way to reach my
 
 128 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 study, where 1 had left the notes for my evening 
 sermon. As I passed under the window of Dr. 
 Morse 's study a girl suddenly leaped out and came 
 down on my head. She knocked off my hat and 
 glasses. Before I recovered my astonislunent she 
 ran across the yard and disappeared behind the 
 trees. I felt around for my hat and found it 
 under Dr. Morse's window. The glasses I could 
 not find but they, too, will prove what happened 
 and where. I have long suspected Dr. Morse of 
 heterodoxy — ^but of adultery I never thought. To 
 think, too, that we have such girls around. They 
 corrupt the whole town. Oh, is the purity of Bow- 
 man to go and are we to be disgraced in this 
 fashion by one of our professors?" 
 
 Paul knew that the window through which the 
 girl had come was his o\\ti, and that Ruth's ad- 
 venture was on the verge of being discovered. 
 His first thought w^as of the glasses. He sprang 
 through the window with a bound and back again 
 with another. His surmise was right. The glasses 
 lay in the path directly under his window. The 
 doctor was too greatly pleased by their recovery 
 to ask whence they came. He put them on with 
 an air of relief and then began again. 
 
 '^I must report this to President Thompson," 
 he finally said and suddenly left the room, bent 
 on a righteous mission. 
 
 Paul let him leave not because he wanted Dr. 
 Morse to be blamed, but because he hoped to find 
 some way of protecting Ruth. Yet no available 
 plan suggested itself, and instead came the thought 
 of hiding Ruth's shoes, of which he now had two. 
 He tried and tried changing every article in the 
 room many times, and finally for want of a better 
 plan dropped one of them, which in the many 
 transferences had found its way to his table, into 
 his football shoe. Paul drew a sigh of relief when 
 he saw it so completely disappear and turned to
 
 THE DISCOVERY 129 
 
 get Ruth's other shoe to similarly dispose of it. 
 
 Before this was done, the door opened and the 
 Doctor again appeared. He had seen the presi- 
 dent, but having told his tale was assured that 
 it must be a mistake as Dr. Morse went to Frank- 
 lin to preach. The president was inclined to scout 
 at the reality of the girl although he suspected 
 that a practical joke was being played. He ques- 
 tioned the doctor carefully and cautioned him in 
 the good name of the college not to spread such 
 grave rumors without a stronger case. So much, 
 indeed, was said that the doctor left the president 
 not only doubting his own senses but fearing that 
 his statement might be used as a basis of remov- 
 ing him from the head of the theological school. 
 He knew the literal element of the church was 
 suggesting that the younger and more brilliant 
 Dr. Morse might with advantage be put at the 
 head of the school — and this might give them an 
 occasion to act. So he had returned to Paul to 
 ask him to say nothing but to let the president 
 investigate as he would. 
 
 The first thing he saw was Paul's shoe on the 
 table. He picked it up in amazement while Paul 
 trembled for fear he would see the shoe within. 
 
 * ' Is this the shoe I brought in ? " he asked with 
 emotion. "I did not have my glasses on, but I 
 thought it was a girl 's shoe. It seems big enough 
 for you." He did not wait for an explanation but 
 went on, "I see, Paul, it is all a mistake. I fear 
 I was too precipitate and a little mixed. 
 
 ''You won't tell, will you?" he asked entreat- 
 ingly. Paul having meant no deception thought 
 that this furnished a ready means of protecting 
 Ruth. He gave the asked-for promise and the 
 good doctor left in peace. 
 
 Dr. Dickson, returning home, told the story to 
 his wife. She was not so easily misled as the 
 president. The red shoe, the flying dress, the
 
 130 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 athletic girl leaping out of the window brought up 
 to her mind but one girl and that was Ruth. Her 
 old antagonism burst out anew, she felt sure she 
 was on the track of an expose that would dis- 
 comfit her old rival, Professor Stuart. To her 
 husband's appeal she only smiled. Picking a hair 
 off his coat collar, she remarked, caustically, "I 
 presume this is the hair of an angel." 
 
 The old doctor now became more confused and 
 she more determined to investigate. Had she not 
 been too sure of the complicity of Dr. Morse she 
 could have found a bit of Ruth's dress hanging 
 on the window-frame of Paul 's room. Examining 
 the grass under Dr. Morse's window carefully and 
 not seeing anything, she started to track Ruth 
 home. She soon came on footprints in the soft 
 earth and they pointed straight toward the Pro- 
 fessor's house. 
 
 * ' Hello, what is this ? ' ' she cried as she spied a 
 roll of paper on the grass, tied nicely in a blue 
 ribbon. This was, indeed, a find, for it was Ruth's 
 story of Lady Margaret. In the excitement of the 
 interview with Paul she had forgotten about it 
 and in her mad haste to get home she had dropped 
 it. It did not take Mrs. Dickson long to digest 
 the contents. After reading it carefully she be- 
 gan looking for other evidence. Here she reaped 
 a rich harvest. Ruth's foot, caught in a bramble, 
 left a bit of her stocking as evidence of her flight. 
 Farther on, a thorn had torn her dress. 
 
 Mrs. Dickson did not stop until she had followed 
 the tracks into the Professor's yard. Looking at 
 the house, she saw the Professor's image faintly 
 through the window. "I'll go this instant," she 
 decided, with a flash of anger. "You must start 
 early to catch an old fool and a young hussy be- 
 fore night." 
 
 But as she approached, her decision faded. 
 Even she hesitated to break in on the Professor's
 
 THE DISCOVERY 131 
 
 evening meditation. His glasses were raised above 
 his eyes and a sweet smile lit his face. He was 
 thinking how gracious God had been to him ; how 
 all his wishes were being fulfilled. The book 
 seemed nearing completion, the cause of woman 
 was gaining recruits every day. And his girl, oh, 
 what a treasure she was and how fully her acts 
 corresponded to his theories! He had seen the 
 change which had come over Ruth. In a single 
 year she seemed to have completed a whole college 
 course. She had an eager desire for knowledge 
 and would listen for hours to his recitations from 
 his favorite Greek authors. What more could be 
 asked than to have Paul carry his work to com- 
 pletion and to have Ruth participate in his liter- 
 ary enjoyment"/ Such a state of bliss made even 
 Mrs. Dickson pause. She turned back, threw her- 
 self on a bench and read anew the tale of Lady 
 Margaret, thinking out many bitter taunts which 
 she knew the Professor would keenly feel. When 
 she returned she saw the Professor standing 
 cheerfully before the open fire. She entered 
 abruptly for fear she might lose courage again. 
 Pressing her hand he led her to a seat. 
 
 *'I fear," he said, "my reverie was so deep that 
 I did not hear your knock. I was immersed in a 
 perusal of my dearest heresy, and for these crude 
 children of our brain we all have a peculiar fond- 
 ness, have we not?" 
 
 '*I don't know," she answered, ** there is such 
 a thing as being so fond of our fancies that we 
 neglect our duty. Sin has a long rope but it trips 
 the offender in the end. It is easy to slide down, 
 but it is a hard road to climb back." 
 
 The Professor raised his eyes and replied, 
 * ' What has my darling child done now "? You have 
 evidently come to re-fight our old battle. ' ' 
 
 "Your darling child? How long are you going 
 to persist in that infant-accountability fiction
 
 132 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 about Euth? Child! She is a woman grown, re- 
 sponsible for every sinful impulse. Smile in your 
 superiority if you will, but remember I always 
 told you she'd go bad and now she has." 
 
 ''My dear lady, my dear lady, you choose words 
 of sinister suggestion ; and you choose at random, 
 I fear, to describe some slight offense against 
 Bowman 's code — which I have often defined to be 
 an attempt of men to deform the nature of 
 women. ' ' 
 
 She sprang to her feet and shook a trembling 
 forefinger at him. "Bowman's code includes the 
 Seventh Commandment. Perhaps you'll say that 
 deforms nature, too. If you had thought of it 
 oftener, your daughter would not be a fallen 
 woman today carrying obscene literature to men's 
 rooms and unfit, do you hear me ? to crawl on her 
 hands and knees into Ida's house." 
 
 In the profound silence that followed, his eyes 
 ■bore down upon her inexorably. "This passes all 
 bounds," he said slowly. "Every word you utter 
 from this moment will receive full reckoning. I 
 confront you now in the name of my innocent child 
 and of my dead wife. What is the proof of your 
 charge? I shall extenuate nothing." 
 
 She threw the tale of Lady Margaret on the 
 table and cried, "Eead that story and you will 
 see her depravity. Traveling disguised as a man. 
 Dancing naked on the lawn; and sleeping on the 
 grass. Oh, what a fine outcome for the girl who 
 sings with the birds and rolls on the grass in the 
 plain sight of men." Then she told her story in 
 a firm, shrill voice and showed the remnant of 
 Ruth's dress. "If you want more proof than this 
 paper, this cloth, ask the young lady to produce 
 her red slippers — ^both of them." 
 
 Professor Stuart sat dumb through all this 
 tirade. Before she was half through, he seemed 
 to have aged by ten years. To him Ruth had been
 
 THE CONFESSION 133 
 
 but a mere girl. He never thought of her as a 
 woman; now it all rushed in on him and in the 
 worst of ways. He did not distrust the proof. 
 The torn bits of clothing, the tracks and the story 
 sank in on his mind and made him too abject for 
 thought. When Krs. Dickson was done, she flung 
 the story into his lap and turned to go. As she 
 crossed the door, she turned with a gleam of 
 triumph and said, sneeringly, ''God's law still 
 holds. Each sinner meets his doom even as in 
 days of old. 'When a girl goes wrong, look for 
 the man. ' But perhaps it would be as well to keep 
 an eye on the girl." 
 
 Slamming the door to express her righteous 
 indignation, she left the house in triumph. 
 
 XIV 
 
 The Confession 
 
 The old man sat without moving. His energies 
 could not overcome the shock and resume their 
 normal functionings. At last he was partially 
 aroused by the entrance of Ruth. 
 
 ' ' Why, what is the matter I ' ' she cried. ' ' Some- 
 thing has happened. What can it be! Oh, you 
 look as though it w^ere I. Have I done anything 
 to displease youf" 
 
 She looked about and her eye fell on the story 
 of Lady Margaret. 
 
 "There is my story. How came it here? It 
 tells of a girl who loved her negligent hero so 
 much that she followed him. You must hear it." 
 
 Ruth sat on a stool at his feet and read. Her 
 soft voice and fine intonations due to her o"\vn 
 feelings made tlie recitation effective, doing much 
 to change his belief as to its contents and Ruth's 
 innocence. The story did not strike him as it had
 
 134 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 appeared to Mrs. Dickson. True, the heroine 
 was among men but she received no harm. A bit 
 of the old man 's philosophy returned. He became 
 more cheery. But he was compelled to probe 
 further. 
 
 "What is thisT' he asked, holding up the shred 
 of her dress. 
 
 ' ' I tore my dress, ' ' replied Ruth frankly but a 
 little abashed. 
 
 ' ' On the college grounds T ' he asked. 
 *'Yes," replied Ruth, "I ran across them com- 
 ing from Paul's room. I wanted him to read 
 Lady Margaret and thought I might put it in his 
 room while he was at church. So I ran over and 
 jumped in at the window to leave it. Paul was 
 there and helped me fix my dress, but would not 
 let me kiss him. So I leaped from the window 
 and ran home. Did he bring my story back? I 
 have forgotten what I did with it. I tliink Paul 
 was real mean not to let me kiss him, don't you? 
 He never looks at me and I don't believe he knows 
 what a woman is except by her hair. But, oh, 
 papa, he ought to run off with me just as did the 
 heroes of old. I want him to see me — but he won 't 
 look. If he would only look he would love me, I 
 am sure." 
 
 These statements, so honestly made, showed 
 Mrs. Dickson's explanations of the evening's 
 events were wrong. Ruth did not jump out of Dr. 
 Morse's window but she did from Paul's and that 
 was almost as bad. The Professor meditated, for 
 he scarcely knew how to begin this new topic. 
 His philosophy had always emphasized equality— 
 the complete equality of men and women. This 
 clearly involved the right of women to discuss all 
 topics and to act according to what they conceived 
 to be their interest. All problems of intellectual 
 and political rights he had gone over a thousand 
 times but he had never extended his thought to
 
 THE CONFESSION 135 
 
 love affairs. Good women were in his mind, like 
 Ida, and Ida modestly waited for him to make 
 advances. Taking his own experience without 
 question to be the natural course of events, he 
 was unprepared for a state of mind in women that 
 would cause them to be the aggressor in love. 
 He had not even gone far enough to con- 
 sider its possibility. Several traits he had 
 marked as being peculiarly feminine. Among 
 them was modesty. "These natural characters are 
 sufficient safeguards to society. One need not in- 
 terfere ; God has arranged all social relations by 
 a natural method better than man could by any 
 possibility devise. Let girls alone and their na- 
 tural qualities appear in due time and give them 
 the protection they need. Shut up bad men; let 
 women go free; the world is for the pure; let 
 them have it to enjoy." 
 
 All this he applied to his girl and had pictured 
 her as becoming Ida, showing in her conduct all 
 that modesty and grace that Ida manifested. 
 Thinking in this way, absorbed in his own worK, 
 he had not seen the change that was coming over 
 Ruth. She was to him the same little girl she had 
 always been. But now as he looked he saw a 
 woman before him. An Ida — yes, more than an 
 Ida so far as physical graces were concerned. 
 Even in her simplicity and earnestness and in 
 the delicacy of movement he could not but be 
 charmed by the girl before him. Had the vision 
 of the coming womanhood arisen in any other way 
 he would have been pleased by the many graces 
 of his daughter. But that with these should go a 
 fearlessness in regard to men, a willingness to 
 make advances, was a condition that he could not 
 incorporate into his thought of woman. Why 
 should Ruth go to Paul and why should she want 
 Paul to see her? He had no philosophy to which
 
 136 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 these thoughts could be attached and hence his 
 mind refused to work. 
 
 He could now see that Ruth loved Paul and that 
 she was using her charms as a means of arousing 
 a love for her. He felt glad that it was Paul, for 
 Paul of all men had the control needed for such 
 a situation. Still, why should Ruth want to do 
 this and where were those natural restraints 
 which he felt would induce right conduct? God 
 never leaves us without some guide to action. 
 Somewhere in instinct, in habit, or in the presence 
 of the beauty of nature, the right conduct is im- 
 pressed. Man can only set up bad standards. If 
 they are the same as nature's they are of no use. 
 If they are different they are wrong. In this 
 manner the old Professor had talked and, believ- 
 ing what he said, he put it in practice. Now it 
 seemed to fail but why he could not fathom. He 
 sat and thought and the more lie thought the more 
 serious seemed the situation; he became sad- 
 der as he apprehended he had no solution to offer. 
 
 It was Ruth who broke the silence. She was 
 still thinking of how Paul might be impressed with 
 her beauty and of the determination not to see 
 her good qualities. 
 
 ''In the stories of the past the great contests 
 were over women. How did they decide who were 
 the beautiful women? Did the women come out 
 to be observed or did the men go to them! If all 
 men were like Paul it would be of no use to be 
 beautiful. But if he looked once, he would love 
 me — I could make him ! ' ' She fell into an abrupt 
 silence, her hands and eyes restless. 
 
 What a situation. It was unprecedented, unin- 
 telligible, untenable; yet, after all, the professor 
 recognized, with the thrill of the bewildered trav- 
 eller who finds a familiar landmark, the situation 
 had sprung from a theory and therefore must be 
 soluble. The doctrine of intellectual rights he had
 
 THE CONFESSION 137 
 
 thought covered the entire domain of woman's 
 affairs. Such rights logically included the adjust- 
 ments of subsidiary wrongs as the area of any 
 whole contains the area of each of its parts. But 
 which of these panaceas would serve here, for a 
 passion like this — unafraid of its goal, scornful 
 of restraint, unaware of inequalities? Inequali- 
 ties ! Ah, here was an approach. From the day 
 he perfected his philosophy he had emphasized 
 equality, complete, thoroughgoing, basic, between 
 men and women. The right of women to discuss 
 all topics and to act with the boldest freedom, 
 according to their own best interests, was there- 
 fore indisputable. 
 
 But as the liberties of men inhere in their qual- 
 ities, so will those of women inhere upon their 
 natural characteristics. Indeed, the liberties of 
 women are capable of determination to a nicer 
 degree than those of men. 
 
 "The natural characteristics of woman, or, if 
 you will permit me to express the same truth in 
 another form," he was accustomed to say in his 
 annual lecture, "the natural virtues of woman, 
 may be very readily distinguished from acquired 
 traits by subjecting them to the acid test of an 
 assured position in the State whereby their pro- 
 tective vices are rendered unnecessary for their 
 preservation. Their natural restraints are God- 
 given standards of conduct ; man devices are only 
 false or useless guides; if they are not Nature's 
 they are false, and if they are Nature's they are 
 useless." 
 
 Chief among the inalienable restraints estab- 
 lished by God's polity he ranked modesty, Ida's 
 quality ; a modesty that held her remote in every 
 manifestation of body or soul which would arouse 
 the flood of man's passsion. 
 
 Why did her daughter long and seek? Why did 
 she advance to challenge an indifferent man with
 
 138 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 her eager, half-ripe charms 1 Why were restraints 
 defied by this natural woman nurtured in the love 
 of God's laws? 
 
 She did not wait for him to think out a reply. 
 Springing to her feet she flew about the room in 
 a way that quickly exposed all her allures. Her 
 hair, glistening from the moisture of the bath, 
 curled and crept down her shoulders. Through 
 the jetty strands rose the full curves of her throat 
 and breast, firm as marble, fresh as snow. Her 
 pose was proud and challenging. She held her 
 draperies with an accustomed touch that showed 
 she had confidence in their effects. 
 
 In an instant he saw, with stupefying astonish- 
 ment, that his daughter had long since ceased to 
 play games at his feet. She was a woman adoring 
 a man, hazarding her womanhood to win him. 
 What was worse, the way she did it now showed 
 that it was a trick of hers which she had often 
 done before. 
 
 "Daughter," he whispered, *'have you ever 
 been out of your room like this before? Has Paul 
 ever seen you so?" 
 
 "No," she answered, "not yet. But I mean 
 that he shall. A hero has a right to a pretty 
 woman. He triumphs, she rewards. ' ' 
 
 "What child's talk is this!" he interrupted, 
 profoundly roused. "Forgive me, daughter," he 
 added in quick fear, peering at her with a dis- 
 tressful smile, "continue, please." 
 
 She was silent; after a pause he began. "Your 
 thoughts have taken color from the barbarous eras 
 of our civilization. While they were dramatic and 
 in a way beautiful, yet it is well for you that they 
 have passed and that, having traversed the era 
 of exploitation, you now stand on the threshold of 
 equality. Now women are not the despised play- 
 things and slaves of their male captors, but jour- 
 ney through life beside them, doing the world's
 
 THE CONFESSION 139 
 
 work together, searching the same treasures, 
 striving for the same rewards, achieving the same 
 trimnphs. The enjoyment of the common results 
 should be shared by all alike." 
 
 As he wandered among the reverberating echoes 
 of pamphlets and recitation rooms, he groped for 
 the fresh deduction, or the new premise that would 
 yield a rule applicable to these snarled circum- 
 stances. He knew that the philosophy which had 
 yielded the broadest and most facile generahza- 
 tions must aptly untangle Ruth's coil. In his 
 search he found himself travelling farther and 
 farther from the issue, and sweeping ever widen- 
 ing arcs. He perceived that his deductions of 
 equality established Ruth's right to seek Paul; 
 the flaw was not there. But the assumption of 
 God-given natural restraints seemed to be vitally 
 involved — and that he could not yield. Half con- 
 scious of the futility of his efforts he often stopped 
 when but parts of his favorite premises were ut- 
 tered. They seemed to be tripping him ; aiding in 
 his ruin. Thus is it ever when a philosophy is 
 forced to deal with a new problem. He had as- 
 sumed a restraint on woman that did not really 
 exist ; when the antiquated customs he so despised 
 were removed this wholesome restramt seemed 
 also likely to go. 
 
 Both by education and by temperament Ruth 
 was blind and deaf to what was passing in her 
 father's mind during this monologue. She was 
 not only ignorant, but impatient, of routes mapped 
 on trained minds. At length she proceeded as the 
 crow flies, straight back to her father's funda- 
 mental premises. 
 
 *'But is it true," she said, "that men and 
 women are alike? I used to think it must be just 
 as you have stated. But now I know. Paul is as 
 •different from me as a human being can be, from 
 the top of his head to the soles of his feet. ' *
 
 140 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 Her father raised his hand as if to stop her but 
 she hurried on. 
 
 "Oh, yes! I can prove it. I studied Paul's 
 chest and arms when he sculled and the way his 
 legs and hips move when he runs! Why! His 
 muscles work with joy — they seem to shout with 
 happiness when he commands them; mine, poor 
 things, train them as I will, obey with effort or 
 refuse before Paul's are fairly on their way. 
 
 "Now, Father dearest, listen to me, and stop 
 looking as if you couldn't wait to contradict me. 
 For a long time I watched Paul take his morning 
 run. He used to go five miles, but lately he has 
 gone farther and faster! Yet, I have seen him 
 come home even more eager than when he started. 
 He finished as he does on Field Day — as if some 
 great wish were his driving master. 
 
 "Oh, I've tried it, too, for if he had a great 
 wish that spurred him so, I had a greater. Sud- 
 denly one morning I decided to follow Mm. So I 
 ran until I thought my veins would burst; then 
 I had to lie down and watch him go on. That 
 made me angry, jealous; I wouldn't give m, and 
 every morning for weeks I ran on the Ridge. I 
 thought I needed practice, but that helped oh, so 
 little, so little. I laid the blame everj^vhere except 
 on my own misconception. I w^as so sure God 
 meant two mated people to do the same things 
 that I determined more and more to run as far 
 as he. 
 
 "Father, sometimes it was awful on that ridge, 
 so still, high and rocky. You couldn't hear or see 
 anything but the pine trees moving and the night 
 shadows twisting under them. Before I got out 
 of bed in the morning the Ridge seemed like the 
 hills where men went to meet their God and con- 
 quer Satan. By and by I began to dread it, it was 
 so lonely and so hard. That was in September — 
 you know how warm and wet it was — there were
 
 THE CONFESSION 141 
 
 fogs, too. When we were there so early in the 
 morning the clouds drifted down through the 
 trees ; the fog drifted up from the valley ; it was 
 like racing on a precipice outside the world ! But 
 I wasn't afraid of that; even with the real things 
 gone, you, home and Bowman, I wouldn't have 
 minded if I had been with Paul — like Paul. 
 
 "Long ago I cared most about our likeness to 
 each other. He was just ahead of me, I thought 
 I would do tomorrow exactly what he is doing 
 today. Besides being my hero he was my idol. 
 I felt just like that, at first, on the Ridge. The 
 test would make us act together and he would see 
 how near I could be to him. Oh! Then I saw 
 the difference creep between us. He was always 
 trying to be alone and I was always trying not 
 to be. Suddenly, one morning, I felt the strangest 
 thrill — I began to be afraid. Yes, dear, I was 
 actually frightened at the little pebbles scuttling 
 off into the leaves and I jumped when the bushes 
 closed behind me. Yet it didn't matter much — 
 I wouldn't let it ! — until I lost sight of him. Then 
 I called to him, I couldn 't help it. ' Oh, Paul, wait 
 for me, I want you, wait!' 
 
 *'He heard me, but he wouldn't answer and his 
 going away struck me as so awful that I screamed, 
 * Wait ! wait ! ' until I couldn 't hear him any longer. 
 I didn't dare move ; so I stayed there until I heard 
 him return. I thought he would meet me in the 
 path, but instead he cut across among the trees. 
 So I called him again, ' I 'm all alone ! Come ! I 'm 
 here, Paul. Please come!' He struck the path 
 below me. I waited until the fog lifted before I 
 came home. He w^asn't a coward like me; he 
 wouldn't have known what scared me so. That 
 is one of the differences. A man goes to the hills 
 and trees to be his greater self, to be alone with 
 his natural self. It sets him free, he glories in it 
 because he has conquered it, b,ut, papa, it op-
 
 142 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 presses a woman to be alone like that. If she is 
 sorrowful she shudders as if she were swallowed 
 by a huge giant. 
 
 ''Toward the end even my short skirt over- 
 heated me. Paul looked so cool in his white run- 
 ning clothes, in the mists, that one queer morning 
 I stripped my sweater and ran with nothing touch- 
 ing me but a few drops of rain that trickled down 
 my breast. They were touching Paul, too ; for a 
 time it was glorious; I doubled my speed and 
 would have come up with him, but reaching a 
 rough place, I stumbled. Just as I was winning! 
 I called, ' Oh, Paul, wait, it is I ! ' He looked back 
 and we saw each other plainly, for the fog parted 
 just then. He stared at me so strangely! He 
 pressed his hands to his eyes and stared again. 
 He turned his head away as if to leave me alto- 
 gether. 
 
 ''Oh, that was more than I could bear. It 
 seemed as if my heart would break. I threw my- 
 self down, while he, wheeling from the path up 
 the south slope, dashed among piles of loose stones 
 which came rolling do\\m about me. One even 
 struck me on the forehead — see! here's the mark 
 under my hair. 
 
 "That completed my defeat. 'No, no,' I said, 
 'we aren't alike. A woman may not even follow 
 her hero unless he chooses.' " 
 
 Ruth paused and smiled self-reproachfully at 
 her father. Her question, she was sure, would 
 fail to meet his expectations of what his daughter 
 ought to feel. He did not answer, neither did he 
 seem offended. She slipped an arm around his 
 neck and whispered against his cheek: 
 
 "Ah, it is good to be woman. It is good to be 
 man. I was not sorry that God had put his hand 
 between to hold me back — for in that very moment 
 my love began to exult in the splendor of his body 
 as never before. Ah, my heart leaped up that
 
 THE CONFESSION 143 
 
 great ascent with him. At the Trysting Stone, 
 mind! at the Trysting Stone, he did not pause but 
 was over and away so perfectly that my joy and 
 pride followed him — ^just as my loneliness and 
 anger had done. But he ought to know how much 
 I need him. Some day! Ah, I have found my 
 womanhood in him — he will find his manhood in 
 me. I ran no more, Father, it is useless to 
 seek, in my weakness and in his strength. I shall 
 win through my strength and his weakness." 
 
 She walked to the window and the glow of the 
 moon deepened the flushed, exultant uplift of her 
 fervor. She recalled the ecstatic mingling of her 
 spirit with Paul's superb body, and trembled at 
 the door of revelations which only the freed 
 woman of her father's ideal could know. 
 
 Would he say to her, "Oh, woman, blessed above 
 all others, you! who do not know fear, nor have 
 been tortured by silence, nor have wept in your 
 sleep lest you become the prey of men — open this 
 door and lead your sisters in ! " 
 
 For him such a summons to his daughter would 
 have been the conclusion and the triumph of his 
 faith, the justification of all his labor; for her it 
 would have been the trumpeting opportunity of 
 her life's one moment of supreme enfranchise- 
 ment. If he had seen her face he would have 
 recognized his hour, heavy with greatness. 
 
 But he sat with head bent on his palm, troubled 
 with her remoteness. He knew that she had shown 
 him a crystal soul into whose depths he could not 
 see, a garden where he feared to go, an open heart 
 whose inscriptions were in a new tongue. She 
 was a temple of Exaltation that a whisper might 
 rock to its foundations; and he must speak. He 
 walked about the room twice, touching the chair 
 backs and moving the papers. Stopping beside 
 her, he stroked her hair. 
 
 ''You know how little patience I have enter-
 
 144 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 tained toward customs, Ruth, ' ' he said. * * Most of 
 them are in opposition to Nature, especially 
 those that have to do with women. Some, how- 
 ever, as time passes, approximate the natural 
 process and among them are those regulating 
 modern marriage. Men no longer contend with 
 each other for woman, nor does she wait at one 
 side of the arena as a reward for victory. She 
 now has the deciding power, which is more in 
 accordance with the equality we wish to enforce. 
 Men must ask. It follows that women must wait 
 and that " 
 
 "Why!" she asked. 
 
 ''Because," he answered and paused. He 
 coughed and repeated, ''Because it is evident, I 
 mean, a powerful argument, or rather a striking 
 analogy, which is found in the histories of all ani- 
 mal species. Throughout Nature's kingdom this 
 law holds, and it ought to be regarded in human 
 society, not as an unreasonable custom, but as a 
 natural restraint imposed for the good of the 
 race. Nature must care for the tomorrows." 
 
 ' ' But there is no tomorrow in love, ' ' she cried. 
 "Love is today. It is a real thing that cannot 
 wait. It isn't a prospect or a protection for a 
 species. It is a hope for yourself and him! A 
 woman can't wait — she must move in his direc- 
 tion — to his possession." 
 
 "But, my darling child," he answered desper- 
 ately, "possession cannot make a legal bond. If 
 a man love a woman truly and desire her for his 
 own, if she is to remain good, he will not take 
 her except in marriage at the altar of the church. 
 Remember that!" 
 
 Ruth laughed in her rich alto and leaned 
 against her father's arm. Pageants of struggle 
 and conquest swept past her, joyful cries of hero- 
 ines to their onrushing heroes came to her ears.
 
 THE CONFESSION 145 
 
 The pageants and the valors were all Paul's, the 
 heroines were all herself, waiting hungrily. 
 
 ''Love is a better bond than marriage. I shall 
 bind him not by law but by beauty. ' ' 
 
 Her father groaned aloud, panic-stricken be- 
 cause he could not escape the hollow platitudes 
 to find the word that would arrest. He could not 
 convince either himself or her, for she did not 
 listen, and at the edge of his brief puerilities 
 his faculties refused the whip. Every approach 
 to his daughter was barred by defensive axioms 
 of his owTi pro"sdding. The face against his arm 
 pressed with an alien and a heavier weight; a 
 moment passed in silence and she became a 
 stranger in her bright, confident pose, her bold, 
 callow unmoralities, the swimming nerv- 
 ousness of her dusky unfathomable eyes — in 
 every quality she frightened and bewildered him. 
 Were there only cool shallows there — the unex- 
 pected barren shallows of a false code, or were 
 there deeps — warm deeps palpitating with the 
 pregnant life of undiscovered truth? 
 
 Hot tears seared his eyeball, which Euth did 
 not notice until a sob tore from his cbest. She 
 cried out inarticulately as a mother over her 
 hurt child, and tried to loosen his clenched 
 fingers. With her arm around him she urged 
 him to his chair and sat beside him until he 
 quieted himself. Then he put his arm around 
 her and said, "I was thinking of your mother, 
 child, and of my stewardship to her. You need 
 
 her — she would understand where I cannot " 
 
 He pressed his lips together to check the rising 
 storm. ''She lay dying and said — that she could 
 not take God's hand and follow home unless I 
 waited here to show you the road to womanhood. 
 My Ruth, I have always thought she meant that 
 you should be free and should escape sorrow. 
 So I named you in my fanciful pride 'The Girl
 
 146 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 without Tears,' and planned tliat you should in- 
 deed be too happy to weep as other women do. 
 Oh, my little girl, your mother died happily only 
 when she deputed me to guard you from the 
 knowledge of evil. How shall we bear it, if 
 through me any harm — if I let you take a careless 
 step — if the flesh of my flesh should some day 
 curse its mother? What shall I say to you then? 
 What shall I say to her? There is much of 
 which I have never spoken to you. I believed 
 you too young, or I hoped you would never need 
 the knowledge." He looked up at the picture on 
 the wall and cried, ''Oh, that we could have her 
 modesty. She waited and let me come. Such is 
 God's law. The way He protects the purity of 
 women. . . ." 
 
 The girl shook off his arm, sprang angrily to 
 the other side of the table and stood a monument 
 of defiance. "Must I wait because she waited? 
 Must girls do as their mothers did? Are they 
 to take no part in evolution ? Have they no other 
 end than to become pictures on the wall?" 
 
 She looked up to her mother and cried — 
 "Mother, mother, help me to break my bonds, 
 bonds you perhaps never felt. They hurt, they 
 burn. I am of the world and I want to grow as 
 the trees grow, to distance the flowers in my 
 beauty, to bear more fruit than the grain of the 
 field. I want the best, I want Paul. Help me 
 to get him!" 
 
 "Speak not so to your mother," said the Pro- 
 fessor in a severe tone he never before had used. 
 "She helps not through work but through crea- 
 tive joy. Oh, Ida! lift us to thy level where 
 smiles make the world as clouds adorn the sky. 
 Lift us from flesh to spirit, from the dross of 
 earth to a celestial purity." 
 
 While he stood absorbed in his adoration Ruth 
 moved behind the table and retorted with savage
 
 THE CONFESSION 147 
 
 vehemence, "0 fie with your philosophy! You 
 think me a man in the making ; but I am a woman 
 with all the charms God gave her. You don't 
 believe it, you won't see. But you must see! I 
 am flesh on the road to God, but still I am flesh 
 with the beauty of the lily and the tree. They 
 don't hide their beauty, why should I? I am 
 their rival and like them I am of today. The 
 rose cannot wait for autumn nor the tree for 
 the winter blast. They must show their beauty 
 in the summer or shrivel unseen. I am like them, 
 breathing the summer air, having all health can 
 give. You don't believe it, you are skeptical, so 
 far away in the land of dreams that reality fades. 
 Come back; put your feet on solid earth; and 
 look!" 
 
 With one hand she lifted her concealing hair 
 from her neck, with the other she shook her 
 kimona more free from her shoulders and caught 
 it loosely again beneath her breasts. The old 
 man stared a moment and then with a startled 
 cry he sprang to his feet. He comprehended, he 
 was back on earth. What stood before him was 
 not Ida, gentle and meek, but defiant flesh and 
 blood so earthly that it colored her cheek and 
 all her bosom with a consuming flame. 
 
 Had he bred a scorpion instead of a girl? Had 
 he held a serpent on his breast which now would 
 sting and bite? Away with her! was his first 
 impulse. Clenching liis hand he seemed about to 
 execute his threat. There was a disposition to 
 strike which he had not felt since that Virginia 
 campaign when destruction was his joy. All this 
 had lain dormant since the day of his illumina- 
 tion. He thought it dead. He even argued that 
 it was not a part of human nature. 
 
 But it was not dead. Heredity never dies, no 
 matter how dormant it rests. He was heredity 
 even if he were unconscious of it. Now he was a
 
 148 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 soldier again. He put Ms hand to his side as if 
 he would grasp his sword. When hate comes all 
 else flees. Those who would kill harden their 
 hearts so that brutality seems justice. But his 
 passion was too strong for a man of his years. 
 It made his brain whirl. As the reddened cheek 
 turned pale, he dropped into his chair a helpless 
 wreck. 
 
 While he advanced the girl stood defiant, but 
 when he fell, here heredity took a sudden twist. 
 It threw the woman in the foreground, the woman 
 who may be beautiful or ugly but still is heart. 
 Her anger left as suddenly as it came. She was 
 no longer beauty but sympathy, pity, endurance 
 and love. They all swelled up, threw her pas- 
 sionate self-reliance out the window. The inner 
 dominated the outer. Springing to her accus- 
 tomed place on his lap, she threw her arms about 
 his neck, showered his face with kisses, crying, 
 **You are all I have and all I want. We are not 
 father and daughter, we are one." 
 
 The old man, coming to himself, smiled. His 
 philosophy came back but it leaked at one point. 
 He could no longer see that beauty was virtue. 
 He had dropped to the level on which Mrs. Dick- 
 son stood. 
 
 Men can repent but sin leaves its stain. They 
 can wash it away but may never again be pure. 
 They can look from Nebo's heights but they can- 
 not enter the promised land. He now thought in 
 terms of discipline and not of love. Women 
 should be free but they should not chase men. 
 He drew her to him and made a final appeal. 
 There was no rhetoric in it since it came from 
 his heart. He told her of her mother, of her 
 innocence and purity, of her dAdng hope that 
 Ruth should lead the good life. This the old man 
 had always interpreted to mean freedom and the 
 absence of sorrow, but now his wife's words had
 
 THE CONFESSION 149 
 
 a fuller meaning, and he put his new thought to 
 Buth with force. 
 
 When he touched on the disgrace that wrong 
 steps involved, Ruth interrupted him. Tears 
 were in her eyes; a downcast look on her face. 
 
 "Father," she cried, "I see what you mean. I 
 shall never disgrace you, never, never. But, oh, 
 papa, don't say any more. It hurts." 
 
 At this she sank back in his arms, a helpless 
 bundle. All the life had gone out because hope 
 had disappeared. It meant that Paul must be 
 given up, for Paul would not come if let alone. 
 Heroes have so much to do that girls have no 
 place in their plans. This was Ruth's picture of 
 them ; for her to forego the pleasure of following 
 Paul meant for her to lose him. That was abject 
 misery with no source of consolation. Some re- 
 lief came in a flood of tears but the feeling of 
 despair sank deeper and deeper; each new chord 
 that it struck sent forth a quiver that shook her 
 whole frame. Grasp her as tightly as he could, 
 her father could not keep the convulsive motions 
 from running over her. They ran as if they 
 were alive and knew they were telling a sad tale 
 to each center to which they came. 
 
 He drew her closer and tried to console her. 
 *'Paul will come," he said, "if you wait. He will 
 in good time want a wife and then he will see 
 you in another light." The old man did really 
 hope this, but his words gave no consolation to 
 Ruth. 
 
 "No, father," she cried, "Paul will never 
 come. He will write a book." 
 
 Then she slipped down upon her knees before 
 him as she had often done as a child. "Oh, God, 
 bless Paul and help him write his book." 
 
 Rising to her feet, she said, "I will give him 
 up, father. Let him work here. I will do no
 
 150 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 more than watch him through the crack of the 
 door." 
 
 She staggered, for her strength was gone, and 
 would have fallen if her father had not caught 
 her. While submission was the mandate of the 
 will, the yearning soul did not obey. The tears 
 flowed, the convulsions continued and the tremb- 
 ling seemed to increase. 
 
 It was not an occasion for words. The father 
 had won but at what a cost to his philosophy and 
 to her feelings. He sat holding her long, ever 
 so long, how long he never knew. AVhen he came 
 to himself he held a sleeping girl. There were 
 tears but they had dried on her cheeks. Kissing 
 the sleeping girl he put her softly on the couch. 
 
 But as he did a mysterious voice cried, 
 *' Shame, shame, to bring tears to a girl's eyes! 
 Who art thou who judgest? 'Tis nature not 
 man that keeps woman pure." 
 
 He looked up with surprise. It seemed like 
 Ida's voice. But the picture was silent. Again 
 as he looked at the girl the voice cried, "Shame, 
 shame, shame!" He put his hand on his heart 
 and knew that the voice came from within. 
 
 It was conscience. Since his illumination his 
 deeds and his ideals had followed the same path. 
 Then conscience has no place, but the moment 
 men fall it awakes to new vigor, calling even the 
 proudest to account. They say a drowning man 
 sees the scroll of his life pass before him as he 
 sinks. So it was with the Professor as he 
 dropped from heaven to the miry earth on which 
 he had sworn he never would stand. His girl 
 should be without tears and he was the first to 
 make her cry. Woman is God's noblest creation. 
 Wait until the occasion arises and see the beauty 
 of her mechanism. He had refused to wait. Use 
 hammers and sledges, but not a woman for crush- 
 ing rock. Now he had struck a blow, made scars.
 
 THE CONFESSION 151 
 
 He looked up at Ida but for once found no relief 
 in her smile. He peered down at the girl whose 
 body seemed mangled and torn. Turning to the 
 window he gazed out where the moon danced on 
 the leaves, where stillness reigned and dewdrops 
 glittered. He stood for the first time among the 
 goats on the hillside, fenced out from the fertile 
 fields below. Such was his isolation, such his 
 agony for distrusting God's processes, refusing 
 to let heredity do its work — for thinking re- 
 straints were better than instincts. Oli, w4iat a 
 failure is man when he would better nature's 
 processes; how oft in his crudeness he destroys 
 what he had hoped to build. 
 
 A transgression like the Professor's seems 
 trivial; yet to those who ascend the heights this 
 fall creates a keener reaction than when sinners 
 break the whole decalogue. Think of Moses shut 
 from the promised land for one misdeed. AVhat 
 remorse he must have had; to what depth of 
 misery he must have descended. 
 
 This agony, this depression, this isolation, the 
 Professor felt. His frame shook, his bosom 
 heaved, tears came to his eyes. Oh, if he had 
 had more patience. If he had let nature teach 
 Ruth her lesson instead of trying to hasten 
 natural processes. Why did he not permit the 
 flower to turn into fruit in its o^vn slow way? 
 Sackcloth and ashes, a penitent knocking at the 
 gate, he saw the moon redoubling its energy, 
 make the scattering clouds radiant with its glow. 
 Above, the leaves flashed messages of love; be- 
 low, the tips of grass rolled waves of light across 
 the lawn. 
 
 ''Nature is perfect," he cried through his 
 tears; "why should man mar its beauty?"
 
 152 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 XV 
 
 The Run 
 
 After Mr. Dickson left the second time Paul 
 sat on his bed and meditated. A deep fear smote 
 him, a haunting dread of what was come. He 
 knew the crisis was at hand. The situation could 
 no longer be hidden. What should he do? 
 Defend Ruth! tell her father? or go away? He 
 had two positions open to him, either of which 
 would give him the peace of mind Bowman no 
 longer offered. But should he desert a difficult 
 post? Should he destroy the Professor's en- 
 chanting outlook by telling the facts? The book 
 — the great book — the only book — was it to be 
 left incomplete? And the girl — the puzzling girl 
 — the wild, pursuing one — could he leave her to 
 fall into other hands and meet the ignoble fate 
 which girls of her type face? He could not bear 
 the thought. He clenched his fist as he decided 
 what he would do if some one should take advan- 
 tage of her inexperience. No, that must never 
 happen. He must earn his title as defender of 
 women by staying at his post. He would say this, 
 strike his jaws to show his determination, throw 
 himself on his pillow and try to sleep. But 
 when he barely closed his eyes a whole series of 
 Ruths came tumbling through the window. He 
 would no sooner fix the clothes of one before a 
 dozen lay on the floor with the same need of 
 attention. If he rebuked they became angry, 
 turned handsprings out the window, made their 
 exposure greater than ever. TLey left innumer- 
 able shoes behind which he had ceaseless diffi- 
 culty in hiding. If he succeeded, out of each shoe 
 came a Ruth, leaping and dancing as she did the 
 night of the argument. They came through the
 
 THE RUN 153 
 
 ■window, through the transom, sprang from his 
 wardrobe, stared at him from the foot of the 
 bed — all saying, ' * Come ! ' ' holding out their arms 
 and showing their sunlit orbs and round, white 
 bodies. 
 
 There were hundreds of them. If all Euth's 
 ancestors came to her aid in her mystic dance, all 
 Paul's ancestors came before him as he lay in 
 agony. Was it a case of ancestral memory, was 
 it dreams? Some people say they never slept 
 when they were asleep for hours. Others say 
 they slept, and dreamt, when their eyes were 
 open. Can spirits come at midnight to haunt us 
 or does our mental mechanism cast up visions 
 so vivid that they have the appearance of reality? 
 Wise philosophers may be able to answer these 
 questions but most of us cannot. The out that 
 comes in and the in that goes out are too much 
 blended, too much alike for ordinary people to 
 classify. Still less could Paul, without any guid- 
 ing string but his own impulse. Paul had 
 never dreamt before, he always slept. Nothing 
 happened between the time his head struck the 
 pillow and the sound of the bell which woke. All, 
 therefore, was new to him, all real and vivid. 
 Springing up he would drive a horde of girls out 
 of his presence but as he turned a new group 
 would stare him in the face, taunting him, as 
 before. 
 
 Paul had seen but one image — ^his mother. He 
 saw her at the top of the ladder, in the dash 
 across the football field, in the woods as he ran, 
 and in his lecture room. Now he could not see 
 her. If he called, a dozen Ruths answered. If 
 he sprang forward to embrace mother, he found 
 that he had a Ruth in his arms. Hour after hour 
 went by in this struggle. He became ruder, 
 threw them out the window. But they came back 
 in hordes. He dropped on his bed weary and
 
 154 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 faint. He could endure no longer. Euth had 
 driven liim from the study. Then she haunted 
 the woods with her naked image. Now she had 
 broken into his room and made sleep impossible. 
 
 A sudden impulse seized him. Exercise puri- 
 fies ; it clears the head and lifts the thought. The 
 troubling Euth he had often escaped by long 
 runs. In his depressed moods he would chal- 
 lenge a friend to a cross-country run and clear 
 the humor from the blood by sweat and toil. 
 Euth could follow, did follow, but she would tire. 
 On the mountain-top he would be free. This he 
 had done twenty times and found the peace for 
 which he sought. He would try again. Never 
 would he yield if a million Euths thronged his 
 path. His quest was for mother, not half -dressed 
 girls. 
 
 Filled with this thought, he leaped from the 
 window, ran across the campus and was soon on 
 the forest-lined ridge road. But he did not es- 
 cape. Eun as he would, she was always at his 
 shoulder, her bare form was always in view. 
 Cries of, ''Wait, wait, it is I, Euth," rang in 
 his ears. If he turned quickly to avoid her, she 
 was equally alert. The phantom Euth gained in 
 strength and agility more rapidly than he. 
 
 As he rushed along matters grew worse. The 
 woods resounded with cries of, ' ' Paul, Paul, wait. 
 It is I. Wait for Euth." When he heeded not 
 the piteous appeals, duplicating Euths began to 
 appear in the woods beside and before him. They 
 even lay in his path and blocked his way. Soon 
 a Avhole troupe seemed to be following him, filling 
 the woods with their cries. But Paul held firmly 
 to his plan. He was stronger than they; they 
 must in the end tire; he cast off his impeding 
 garments; the sweat poured in streams down 
 his face and sides. But he never halted, not even 
 to drink. Were they real Euths he would tire
 
 THE RUN 155 
 
 them; were they phantom, Ruth-disturbing mi- 
 ages which came from internal impurity, he would 
 cast them out with his sweat. Paul held to his 
 theories and relied on his stubborn will to carry 
 them into execution. 
 
 His body responded nobly to the demands of 
 the will. Each part did its work silently but 
 thoroughly. There were no failures nor any 
 signs of insurrection. His was a great mechan- 
 ism, the long product of heredity. Millions of 
 antecedent muscles and nerves were reflected in 
 their present representatives; they would have 
 been proud if they were conscious of what their 
 descendants were doing. Heredity could also 
 have been proud of her work ; how at last she had 
 formed a perfect physical man. What matters 
 it what Paul wanted to do? The perfection of 
 his parts was still an object of wonder and de- 
 light. Do we cease to admire a cathedral because 
 it is useless, a huge dreadnaught because it is 
 destructive, a train of Pullman cars because it 
 carries tourists? No, we admire perfection in 
 any form; the human frame never ceases to be 
 a matter of wonder even if its possessor turns 
 it to some wasting use. 
 
 So it was with Paul as he dashed along in his 
 vain endeavor to escape his fancies by over- 
 working his bodily mechanism. He mounted 
 hills, leaped rocks, jumped ravines, forded creeks, 
 ran across meadows, sprang over fences, crossed 
 door yards and swam lakes. Every expedient to 
 rid himself of the phantom Ruths was tried but 
 all in vain; they could not be out-run. Then he 
 turned on them in anger, chased them, threw 
 stones and swung cudgels. They ran back if he 
 approached, taunted him, increased their brazen 
 appearance, even throwing their arms about him. 
 The whole atmosphere seemed full of Ruths. 
 They came from the clouds, dropped down out
 
 156 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 of the trees, rose up out of the earth, all with the 
 same cry and with the same appeal. 
 
 Man is will, woman is love. Between the two 
 there is an eternal conflict. Instinctively the 
 man avoids the woman, and a woman's instincts 
 are equally those of approach. Just as Ruth's 
 ancestry freed from restraint came out of her to 
 aid in her dance, so Paul's ancestral fears 
 pouring out of him were objectified in a thousand 
 Ruths. He saw what his forbears saw, feared 
 what they feared, willed what they willed. He was 
 no longer himself, but his ancestry coursing 
 through his blood and reshaping his vision. Oh, 
 what a power is heredity and what curious ways 
 she has in enforcing her mandates. 
 
 Evolution works backward, thwarts the ends 
 she seeks to attain. The easy path she never 
 takes; turning trees upside down, she makes the 
 branches do the work of roots while the root raised 
 in the air must grow leaves. If nature in its lower 
 forms follows crooked paths, even more curious 
 are the ways by wliich she has promoted the 
 growth of intellect. She gives to man an heredity 
 which is unchangeable and yet forces liim to 
 change. When changes come in spite of heredity, 
 the new heredity is an even greater obstacle to 
 progress than the old. The impossible must al- 
 ways be surmounted and when surmounted a new 
 impossibility replaces its predecessor. 
 
 This is the implacable contest between will and 
 heredity. Nature gives both; both grow; each 
 new conflict is more severe than its predecessor. 
 Will is always striving to do impossible things. 
 What cannot be done must be done, even if hered- 
 ity imposes insuperable obstacles. Thus the con- 
 test has raged from the time the first amoeba 
 strove to encircle its food. It had no legs, arms 
 or teeth, yet it reached out, gathered and fed. 
 AVhat was more impossible than that a grub could
 
 THE RUN 157 
 
 fly? Eating leaves and growing fat seemed to be 
 all that heredity permitted. Yet the grub said, ' ' I 
 will fly, ' ' and he kept trying for ages and at last 
 became a butterfly soaring in the sunshine m spite 
 of heredity's dictates. The fish looked out on the 
 dry land and said, "I want to walk." Heredity 
 said, ^'No," but the fish struggled on and at length 
 attained his wish. The horse had five toes, lived 
 in a swamp and could only jump about like a frog. 
 But the horse said, "I want to run, I am tired of 
 wading in the mud." Heredity again said, "No, 
 those who jump and wade must always jump and 
 wade. Do what your ancestors did and be con- 
 tent." But the horse kept on trying to run and 
 at length he shook off four of his toes, lived on 
 the prairie and became the fleetest of animals. 
 
 Will is on the road from dust to God ; heredity 
 is petrified dust, always repeating but never mov- 
 ing. It knows no road, refusing to go forward or 
 backward. When man appeared, heredity got 
 more obstinate and said, "I shall fix you so that 
 nothing you want can ever be attained. Your acts 
 can have no influence on your structure." This 
 unchangeable germ cell was a happy thought, one 
 that seemed to thwart every wish a man might 
 make. Heredity permitted a mechanism by which 
 wishes could be made — and then deprived man of 
 any means of attaining them. Heredity thus made 
 man a treadmill, always struggling to get on but 
 never forging ahead. 
 
 It is this situation which the human will must 
 face. The insuperable must be surmounted; the 
 impossible done. It is easy to be a man if he does 
 what heredity demands. If he accept his chains, 
 he can eat, drink and be happy. He can wish but 
 he cannot reach out to get what he wants. Prog- 
 ress may come but, if so, it will come by some 
 fortuitous circumstance over which acts and 
 wishes have no control. Yet biology overlooks
 
 158 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 ivill. It can stain the various layers of the germ 
 cell but since this will cannot be found under 
 the microscope, biology denies its existence. Yet 
 will is as old as the germ cell and wishes are al- 
 ways fulfilled. This is not science, but fact. Will 
 surmounts obstacles and breaks through the 
 meshes by which heredity would thwart the wisli 
 for which it strives. 
 
 The great struggle between biology and man is 
 that the supreme interest of biology is in repro- 
 duction, while man seeks to change himself from 
 dust to soul. He wants to rise above sex and 
 reach the land where all is soul. Men are dragged 
 back into sex relations but each generation strives 
 harder to rise above them. The more impossible 
 it is for will to attain this end, the harder do men 
 try to reach it. All history is colored by this de- 
 sire. Eeligion would be nothing but a sham if this 
 supreme wish did not lie back of it. "Women are 
 the root of all evil ! ' ' cried the prophet ; man tries 
 to shut them out not only of his life but of his 
 Paradise. He fails, of course, but the next genera- 
 tion rises still higher and pushes women a little 
 farther out of their life, perhaps. He can delay 
 surrender even if he cannot avoid it. 
 
 So will acts in man. To woman will also sets 
 impossible tasks. If man will not have her, he 
 must have her. She thwarts every effort of man 
 to get away from her by becoming more attractive 
 and charming. The spell of woman is ever grow- 
 ing but as it grows more drastic, man thwarts it 
 by forcing woman to hide her charms. He covers 
 her body, even her face, but despite all, the spell 
 which woman casts on man grows. This is 
 not a defeat of will, but its growth. The woman 
 who will accept any man is will-less. To gain in 
 will she must refuse the man she can get and de- 
 mand the man she cannot get. She must struggle
 
 THE EUN 159 
 
 for the impossible and man must strive to avoid 
 the inevitable. 
 
 This is evolution's plan to thwart heredity. 
 When both sexes want the impossible, they rise 
 above the dust from whence they came. The prin- 
 ciple reveals itself in the contest between Ruth 
 and Paul. Both represent the struggle between 
 will and heredity, showing what men and women 
 would do if convention did not tie them to the past 
 of the race. Custom, habit and tradition help 
 heredity and make for most people so unequal a 
 contest that they deem their habits as natural, 
 while regarding will as a myth or at least as 
 false tendency to be thwarted by force. We often 
 hear of breaking a child's will as a necessary pro- 
 cess in his development. So it is if the tendency 
 to self-expression is to be curbed. Will seeks the 
 impossible and gets it. 
 
 Paul had this will ; he was determined to reach 
 his goal. He had never failed. Of the doctrine 
 of moderation he had never heard nor did he 
 realize the slowness of natural processes. The 
 Professor had taught him evolution, much of 
 which he accepted. But Paul was will, not thought ; 
 action, not meditation; a dreamer, not a plodder. 
 He saw visions, not facts ; ends, not means. What 
 he saw must be done, what he began — must be 
 finished. 
 
 So on he went, taxing his muscles to their limit. 
 Across fields, over ditches, through door yards, up 
 and down hill, dodging and turning to escape the 
 soft onrush of the running feet he could always 
 hear in the rear. The chickens scattered as he ran 
 across farm yards, the dogs barked and followed 
 long distances, the cattle in the field circled about 
 their enclosure, people rushed to the door to see 
 the source of the excitement. 
 
 At first they viewed it as some new college 
 prank, but in distant places where students were
 
 160 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 •unknown they mistook the dashing athlete for a 
 madman trying to escape his fancies. What Paul 
 did seemed strange enough, but rumor and re- 
 peated retelling soon added a multitude of new 
 versions as to what happened. He became a giant 
 throwing huge rocks, tearing up trees by the roots 
 and hurling them at imagined foes. 
 
 It may have been a dream, it may have been 
 merely an overwrought vision, but in any case 
 what Paul was determined to do was adverse to 
 what nature strove. His personality was as a 
 result divided and in the struggle the sense of 
 reality was lost. His body lagged but his mind 
 went on, on. Day dreams and night dreams fol- 
 low the same track. Who can tell which track he 
 was on 1 Both thrill with adventure ; both rush to 
 fulfillment. Only a cool bystander could judge 
 and of such there were none. Critics are wise but 
 the scenes come and go before they get their 
 cameras adjusted. We do not know what is within 
 lis until some strange event throws the submerged 
 into the saddle. Then ceasing to be self we be- 
 come ancestry, seeing what they saw, doing what 
 they did, fearing their fears. Dreams are half- 
 way points between ourselves and our past. We 
 curb them and deride them but our suppressed 
 ancestral emotions go far beyond. Madness is 
 tameness compared with the uncanny wildness 
 which our repressed ancestral behests evoke when 
 they become our master. 
 
 This happened to Paul. He did all the impos- 
 sible things our ancesters did or thought was done 
 in their day. Spirit then had no limits. What 
 conld be thought w^as done. Wliy cannot we re- 
 peat their experience, gain soul freedom and be- 
 come giants doing the impossible? We could if 
 we were will and broke the fetters which servility 
 has fastened on us. Afraid of ourselves, we do 
 not accept the evidence of our senses unless our
 
 THE RUN 161 
 
 puny neighbors verify our visions in their crude 
 experience. We could do impossible things if we 
 kept on without asking our neighbor. Truth never 
 needs more than one witness. What two see — or 
 at least when two agree that they saw — is but a 
 miserable fraction of the whole great vision. Na- 
 ture never appears twice in the same form nor to 
 two sets of eyes. Had we the courage to accept 
 its revelations, we would soon lift ourselves to the 
 plane of the impossible — the impossible to slaves, 
 of easy access to the free. 
 
 It was this super-state which Paul reached after 
 he had run for hours and sweated all the dust- 
 elements from his veins. Perhaps he did not do 
 what observers asserted, perhaps he did more, for 
 they saw details while he saw the whole. To them 
 there was no following troupe of phantom Ruths; 
 they saw no plan in his movement ; but to him each 
 feat was a well-thought effort to escape his tor- 
 mentors. When they did not tire through mere 
 fatigue he turned on them and mowed them down 
 as a reaper would the grain. But each part 
 sprang to its feet a complete Ruth. He saw a 
 thunder-cloud in the distance and rushed tow^ard 
 it, calling to the lightning to smite down his foes. 
 It did and hurled bolts in rapid succession ui3on 
 the hillside. Paul emitted a shout of triumph. 
 For a moment he seemed free, but then far above 
 the cloud appeared innumerable spots each of 
 which as it approached became a train of cars load- 
 ed with Ruths. On he ran until he saw a tall tree 
 which seemed to reach to the heavens. This he 
 began to climb but the horde followed him. When 
 the top was reached, they sat on every branch and 
 grinned from every leaf. He jumped in fright but 
 they leaped also and reached the ground before 
 he did. On, on he ran, thinking of a thousand de- 
 vices to outwit the pursuers. But each when tried
 
 162 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 failed. They were as quick to surmount difficulties 
 as he was to invent them. 
 
 Just as the sun was casting a glow on the eve- 
 ning clouds he came suddenly upon an impossible 
 ravine. It was a bottomless abyss, on the other 
 side of which stood a huge dormitory where men 
 are above sex temptation. Oh, how many prophets 
 have seen this glorious land in the distance. Paul 
 was the first to be on its border. A single leap 
 and he would be safe. One more bound and his 
 end would be attained. A cry of joy escaped from 
 his lips and his will sent orders to all parts of his 
 body to make the final leap. Rushing to the edge, 
 he sprang with a bound into the air. It was an 
 awful leap, greater than any he had before made; 
 nobly did his muscles respond to his bidding.^ 
 
 As he rose, something snapped. The promised 
 land disappeared and darkness came instead of 
 light. Whose fault was it ? What part had failed ? 
 None could tell, for they, like the historic one- 
 horse chaise, all fell apart at the same instant. 
 The heart stopped beating, the blood ceased to 
 flow and the over-wrought muscles seemed frozen 
 entities instead of parts of a magnificent whole. 
 AVill and unity went with the darkness ; Paul was 
 merely a mass of dismembered parts, each lifeless 
 and dead. 
 
 Nature was kind to Paul in his failure. It was 
 a grassy bank down which he rolled ; at the bottom 
 the wind had gathered a mass of leaves amid the 
 ferns to make him a bed. There he lay stretched 
 out just as he was when he willed the mighty leap. 
 His muscles, though disconnected, showed by their 
 tension that they had died game. The face still 
 bore a look of fierce determination; the veins on 
 his arms and body stood out — filled with blood 
 that no longer moved from point to point, Paul 
 ceased to exist; so had his will. Darkness shut 
 put not only the glory he hoped for but the horde
 
 THE SHOCK 163 
 
 from which he tried to escape. There he lay — 
 helpless, a failure — and yet, if you had seen him 
 amid the leaves and mosses, you would have said, 
 ' ' How magnificent an animal ! ' ' Nature had done 
 all for him that could be done and yet he could 
 not surmount the impossible. 
 
 He failed where washes always do, just at the 
 point of fulfillment. 
 
 XVI 
 
 The Shock 
 
 Fred sat at his window, Bowman-fashion, watch- 
 ing the flow of humanity crossing the campus. As 
 Paul swung along he whistled and called. 
 
 "Come in, haven't seen you for a month. What's 
 up?" 
 
 Paul entered and flung himself on the couch, 
 saying as he did, "Oh, dear." 
 
 " 'Oh, dear," repeated Fred. "That's a funny 
 thing for you to say. Never heard it from you 
 before. What's wrong?" 
 
 "I'm tired," said Paul, "dead tired." 
 
 "Of what?" 
 
 "Of girls. I can't get them classified. Other 
 parts of the book work out like a clock but girls 
 won't fit in anywhere. When you are sure you 
 have them — they slip by." 
 
 Paul was now thinking of Ruth but he would 
 not admit it even to himself. So he hunted 
 through his books to find a class into which he 
 might fit her. Then he could disguise his thought 
 behind the group he had made. 
 
 He was not so elemental in his attitude toward 
 life that he could discuss its problems nakedly and 
 unashamed. To him the primal struggle was as 
 lonely a matter as dying; it must be fought, with 
 Right uncompromising on the one hand, and
 
 164 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 Wrong in no uncertain colors on the other. There 
 was no choice; a long grim tight with a drawn 
 sword. This poor crude fellow, so well liked for 
 his ready smile, his genial kindness, his unfalter- 
 ing blue eyes, who won friends by his eager sil- 
 ence, had difficulty in finding place for Euth in 
 the narrow frontier of his nature. Was she the 
 first-fruits of an experimental process or was she 
 a reversion to some distant epoch? He shrank 
 from the term "bad" since he had seen her wist- 
 ful wet face looking past him, up to God. No, 
 on the whole, he was better satisfied when he 
 retreated to a more scientific attitude. But were 
 many other girls like that? Did they impress 
 other fellows as Euth impressed him? He exam- 
 ined with deliberation the many photographs 
 dotting Gannett 's walls; the faded and battered 
 air of some, and the outdated fashions of others 
 indicated continuous epochs of research experi- 
 ence within his comrade's career. 
 
 "It's taken you five years to get around to look 
 at them, old man," he said indulgently "and now 
 you're wasting time on the has-beens. If you 
 want to see a Jim-dandy, just cast your eye at 
 the girl behind the pin-cushion on my bureau. ' ' 
 
 He was disappointed that Paul did not look at 
 her ; they were carrjdng on an interesting epistol- 
 ary quarrel, and he hoped Paul might be inter- 
 ested in the account and perhaps in a selected 
 reading or two from the letters themselves. 
 
 "How, has-beens?" asked Paul. 
 
 "Well, that one over your head there, with the 
 fuzzy bangs and the Jersey, is married ; some of 
 the others are engaged, and I don't care what you 
 say, an engaged girl has no more interest for me 
 than my grandmother's great-aunt. That's Sally 
 Stevens you are looking at now. I was all gone 
 there once, but it died out." 
 
 "How do vou account for that?"
 
 THE SHOCK 165 
 
 *'How do I account for mat?" repeated Gan- 
 nett with a sarcastic drawl. ' ' Great Scott ! What 
 a question! She wasn't the kind, that's all. She 
 was just born an old maid," he finished conclu- 
 sively. 
 
 "That manner of hers," said the Doctor of 
 Philosophy, "may have been a fear inherited 
 from some ancestor who was cruelly treated by 
 men. Men should not cramp the development of 
 woman and then turn her out to grass." 
 
 "That interests me," said Gannett. "The sub- 
 ject came up the other day — which pleases, the 
 lively, joshy kind who goes into a flirtation for all 
 she's worth and doesn't give a rap who knows it? 
 or the kind who wants your scalp without seeming 
 to hustle for it?" 
 
 "And the decision?" 
 
 "It depends on the girl pretty largeiy," said 
 Fred, with a remote, judicial air. "If she's nice 
 just in fun and can look out for herself — I never 
 met the girl who couldn 't. Nine out of ten fellows 
 will give as good as she sends— he'll spoon with 
 her. ' ' 
 
 "Cad, cad!" said Paul, bringing his fist upon 
 the chair-arm. 
 
 "Not at all, not for a minute!" retorted Fred 
 with exceeding warmth, "not with the kind of 
 girl I'm thinking of. He runs all the chances- 
 she doesn't. It's notorious that the fellow is 
 liable to fall in love while the girl is cool as a 
 cucumber, just feels like cutting up — for the fun 
 of it and because every other girl does. What's 
 the harm?" 
 
 Paul was now striding about the room, but 
 brought up at the foot of the bed, his blue eyes 
 eagerly fixed upon his friend. "Such a woman," 
 he said, in a voice that lowered and deepened 
 tenderly, "is all feeling and emotion, with intel- 
 lect in abeyance. She is helpless and undefended,
 
 166 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 and the ward of every decent man. But, poor 
 thing, she defeats herself. Men want women for 
 whom they're not sorry or for whom they have 
 to apologize. Girls should be either, or — but they 
 are neither. When you expect them to be firm 
 they repent. When they should come, they go. 
 How can I write a chapter on such material? You 
 can't call them sinful, they are too nice for that; 
 nor intellectual when their thought is so perverse. 
 Some girls rush at men, you say, and some hold 
 back. Which come first! Wbich is the advanced 
 type ? That 's what bothers me. ' ' 
 
 ''Why should it bother you!" put in Fred. 
 "Take the girl you like and let the other go. 
 Or try them both and see which fits the better." 
 
 ' ' That settles nothing, ' ' replied Paul. ' ' A book 
 must be consistent. Everything else works in all 
 right. But girls won't fit. Each one seems to be 
 in a class by herself and the more I read the more 
 confused I become." 
 
 ' ' But why read ? Why not make a study from 
 life? Begin at home. You don't need even to 
 cross the street." 
 
 "You mean Ruth?" 
 
 "Yes. Stop tearing about; relax a little." 
 
 "Oh! Fred, she's the trial of my life. When 
 I want to write I see her over my shoulder. When 
 I tramp the woods, she's ahead, behind, every- 
 where. I shut her out but it is no good. She 
 comes right back." 
 
 ' ' So she should ; she is yours. ' ' 
 
 "Mine? She'd smash every plan I have." 
 
 "Let 'em smash." 
 
 "I'd write no book." 
 
 "There are better things in the world than 
 books." 
 
 "No woman shall drag me from my path." 
 
 ' ' Paul, you are a fool, a stupid fool. If friends 
 have not told you so, it is time they did. Girls
 
 THE SHOCK 167 
 
 are not angels. They mix clay and metal just as 
 we men do. Look at Susie — on the left. I was 
 dead gone there once. She's nothing but a cry- 
 baby bursting into tears on all occasions. Who 
 could live with a garden sprinkler? Just above 
 is Mary Elizabeth. She was all right until she 
 led the school. Since then she has lived in the 
 clouds, poking male inferiority at you on all occa- 
 sions. But great heavens, man, such women don't 
 make the world. Now there's my latest, the one 
 you would not look at. Gosh, it is just as well 
 to let her alone if you don't want sore knuckles. 
 She is on my level and stays there. ' ^ 
 
 Fred handed the picture to Paul, hoping to get 
 in a word about Ruth. They had always been 
 on a level. Her opinions weighed with him even 
 on topics with which girls were not assumed to be 
 familiar. 
 
 ''Fred," said Paul looking at the picture, 
 ''why can't women dress? How can you like a 
 girl who exposes her form so boldly?" 
 
 "Do you suppose," replied Fred with a quiet 
 sneer, "that women have none?" 
 
 "But they don't need to show it." 
 
 "Should they be ashamed of what God has 
 given?" 
 
 This turn increased Paul's confusion. On the 
 one hand it seemed like Professor Stuart. Per- 
 haps Fred had picked it up at some lecture. On 
 the other, it led to an unexplored region into 
 which he had resolutely refused to go. His mother 
 blocked the way when he approached the entrance. 
 
 At last he said reprovingly, "You have gone a 
 long way from what we were taught as boys." 
 
 "No farther than you, Paul. We were not born 
 in the same village but they're all alike. Our 
 corn rows were straight. Our cooks deserved 
 their reputation. Griddle cakes, apple dump- 
 lings, pies had the right flavor. Kitchen floors
 
 168 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 and pantry shelves were clean, but ah, Paul, virtue 
 does not grow by concealment. Only by testing 
 reality does goodness get a chance to show itself. 
 Let them dress as they will; make love if they 
 want to; give them the laugh if they go wrong, 
 but w^hy object if they use less calico than their 
 mothers'? Mothers are all right. A necessary 
 evil, father says. Their pies and cakes are good 
 but a live girl is better than all their fodder." 
 
 Fred's unexpected attitude shocked Paul but 
 heresies have causes as well as virtues. Both had 
 the same heredity: church and school were the 
 same, yet Paul was the good boy of one town; 
 Fred was the black sheep of the other. The first 
 day at school he pulled Susie's hair; before the 
 week ended he knocked Julie over ; fought his way 
 to the front by thrashing every boy in his class, 
 then he becanae the terror of the town. Blamed 
 for everything that happened he made good his 
 reputation by breaking even the sanctity of the 
 Sunday School. Every institution received him 
 with regret and graduated him with pleasure. 
 
 His mother could not imagine how so black a 
 sheep had got into her family. For ten known 
 generations and probably as many more, the Mc- 
 Clearys had lived their mechanical lives, getting 
 up with the sun, toiling till darkness interfered. 
 Their wives cooked, scrubbed, w^ashed their chil- 
 dren's feet and were to be found as regularly at 
 the washtub on Monday as at church the preced- 
 ing day. Their theology was as pure as their 
 garments; their ideas as fixed as the equinox. 
 Their barns w^ere full; their fields clean; their 
 hogs brought an extra price — ^but the rigid regime 
 of daily life was never broken. Such was Janet, 
 who inherited the best pew in the Church and 
 along with it the best farm in the county. How 
 could this woman have such an indescribable off- 
 spring as Fred? That bothered Janet. It both-
 
 THE SHOCK 169 
 
 ered the whole town. Where do black sheep come 
 from? Every visitor had this flung at him but no 
 satisfactory answer came. 
 
 So Janet laid the blame on the father. She 
 even accused Joe of sympathizing with the boy. 
 Perhaps both accusations had a grain of truth, 
 but if so, Janet was to blame. It had never 
 occurred to her that children were half father or 
 that fathers could not be transformed into M,c- 
 Clearys by taking them into the family. Why she 
 picked Joe, when any of the dozen best boys would 
 gladly have shared her pew, was to the town an 
 unsolved mystery. Perhaps his Avar record helped 
 him. Perhaps she hoped to make a reformation. 
 It is barely possible Joe's prize colt was a factor. 
 Girls like to ride behind the best horse even if 
 it is a bit immoral to race. Nor are they fond 
 of buggies that rattle. Anyhow, Joe won the girl 
 as he did the race and so became the father of the 
 boy who disgraced the McCleary ancestry. Such 
 was Fred's upbringing. His mother was always 
 lecturing him on McCleary virtues and Gannett 
 delinquencies. Joe had a happy way of avoiding 
 punishment by extolling McCleary excellence ; nor 
 did he fail to find worse things in his ancestry 
 than Janet imagined, nor McCleary virtues, espe- 
 cially female virtues, nobler than Janet assumed. 
 So there could be no quarrel. But the boy per- 
 versely refused to accept the parents' verdict. 
 His father and the stable rose higher the more his 
 mother proved how bad they were. 
 
 When it was decided Fred was to go to college 
 the town heaved a sigh of relief. The mother, 
 however, spent her time lecturing Fred on ex- 
 penditures. She carefully figured every item and 
 gave him an account book in which every expense 
 was to go. In the front she wrote the rules of 
 conduct he was to follow, beginning with an in-
 
 170 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 junction not to whistle on Sunday, ending with, 
 how to tie the wash bag. 
 
 No one at Bowman ever deemed Fred quarrel- 
 some. He was a leader from the start; a victor 
 at the finish. He returned home not a convict nor 
 with the Wild West air the town expected, but 
 dressed in flaming tie and turned-up trousers. 
 His mother remarked she was glad they kept the 
 boys clean but she did not see why cloth should 
 be wasted on trouser legs. Wjhen Fred became 
 captain she, with Joe, saw a game. Then for the 
 first time she discovered a surprising resemblance 
 between Fred and his maternal grandparent. 
 
 Such was Janet and such also, to the eye, was 
 Amy Brown. If Colonel Saunders had lived in 
 Plainfield the virtue he ascribed to Amy fitted as 
 well in a description of Janet. All he said of 
 house, food and cleanliness applied as well to one 
 as to the other. Both stood on the pinnacle of 
 public estimation. Both served as models by 
 which neglectful mothers were judged. Yet while 
 externals were the same, within a greater gulf 
 yawned than between Fred and Paul. Janet was 
 the last of a long line of ancestresses ground to 
 fit a particular station. Her deeds and her 
 thoughts harmonized. Both expressed the me- 
 chanical nature of long-established creed. If ac- 
 quired characters can be inherited here was a 
 case. Her soul and viron beat in harmony. 
 
 Amy did what Janet did but her conduct was an 
 impressment not heredity. Her dreams of some- 
 thing she might have been, Janet never had. 
 Within the calm, placid exterior burned a fire 
 banked but not extinguished. Nobody knew of it ; 
 nobody thought of her as a Methodist. Her 
 Calvinist transformation seemed complete. There 
 was no complex isolating her from husband nor 
 from old Tim. She blended with them ; they with 
 her. A new level might have been brought but
 
 THE SHOCK 171 
 
 war, degrading love to sacrifice, buried promise 
 beneath a load of duties. She could only sit on 
 the porch dreaming of wishes not being realized. 
 Her fire Paul had but it was likewise suppressed 
 by the peculiar twist of school and church. 
 
 Such were the antecedents of which Fred and 
 Paul were consequents. Both had the same an- 
 cestry and viron, yet neither was made by them 
 but by personal contacts on which character-build- 
 ing depends. Paul would shake his fist at the wall 
 but the woman he saw, the disgrace he felt, could 
 not be reflected from wall to Fred. So Fred sat 
 helpless, waiting for the speechless friend to put 
 his thought into words. This Paul could not do. 
 All his life he had sought words but words never 
 fitted his distorted emotions. His picture of 
 woman had a puzzling confusion of the good and 
 bad which no word can describe nor canvas ex- 
 press. When he ran — the woman he saw became 
 mother; when he stopped — Ruth slipped into her 
 place. But why should women arouse a mental 
 flame when their place was in a book, arranged 
 like other thoughts in an orderly sequence ? This 
 was his mystery. This is what he hoped Fred 
 could tell. 
 
 But across the gulf no answer came. Fred 
 remained silent knowing well that in the end an 
 outburst would come. He was afraid he had gone 
 too far or too rapidly. Paul was slow of thought, 
 too slow to see that it was not his book that trou- 
 bled him, but an image of a girl. If he could 
 make her a book image fitting some of his diagrams 
 all would be well. But he found no category in 
 which to place her. Nor could he shut her out. 
 Fred could see that a big resolution was forming. 
 The rigid muscles told that. Finally Paul sprang 
 to his feet and exclaimed, 
 
 ''Fred, you don't understand. I can't change. 
 I won't change. I came here with a clearly de-
 
 172 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 fined purpose. Shall I lose everything for a girl? 
 I would be a defender of women. A defender, I 
 say, not the slave of one. Only mother counts. 
 All the rest are classes, groups, types. I honor 
 them all. I work for them all. The chains of all 
 I would break. Shall one woman seduce me from 
 this task? Make me forget my mother and my 
 duty? No, I am rock itself. What I have willed 
 I have done. What I have opposed I have crushed. 
 I am going on. I will be a master of self. No 
 obstacle shall drive me from my path. There is 
 but one ladder. It I must climb. Is the road 
 hard? I will strain yet harder. To look back or 
 to think of what is below is defeat. I will be 
 pure, be thought itself. My flesh shall become 
 muscle as I struggle on, on to the realm where 
 women are helpers, not temptations. On my 
 muscle, on my will, I rely. God gives the victory 
 to those who never falter as they climb. Mother, 
 mother, thy purity shall be mine. In thy glory 
 will I share." 
 
 There w^as a fierce look on his face as he said 
 this. So fierce that it made Fred tremble. Then 
 he turned, slammed the door and rushed off for 
 another ten-mile run. His strengtli was his con- 
 fidence. No other salvation would he accept. 
 
 Fred stood at the window and saw the giant 
 swing out of sight. He could not but admire the 
 vigor with which he mounted the Ridge. Day by 
 day he saw the same scene reacted. Paul w^ould 
 leap from his window, stamp his feet, clench his 
 fist and then was oft* for a run in the woods. No 
 one but Fred noticed the tremor of the lips or the 
 vacant stare. Paul was above criticism. What 
 he did was accepted without criticism. Did he 
 do some strange thing, it was Paul. The whole 
 town was worked up to his pitch and vibrated to 
 his nod. What is there to do but to follow when 
 a leader cries, "On! On!" Who can judge of
 
 THE SHOCK 173 
 
 another's sanity when the moods and aspirations 
 are his? 
 
 Fred was as warm an admirer of Paul as aii^' 
 friend, but he was also a trainer and an athlete. 
 He knew the difference between vigor and excite- 
 ment, between nervous strain and muscular ac- 
 tion. The old Paul was always relaxed except 
 when the call to action came. Now his muscles 
 were drawn tense as in a football game. Then 
 he smiled, now the downward curves of his face 
 became more pronounced each day. 
 
 Although not a psychologist, Fred sensed the 
 cause. Paul often turned back when he started 
 for the Professor's study. Instead of jumping the 
 fence he peered through to see if the w^ay were 
 clear. He seemed irritated wlien Euth was near 
 and gave some excuse for hurried exit. Often 
 Fred washed to talk to Paul, to enter into a closer 
 intimacy. But Paul, friendly to all, was intimate 
 with none. He was with his world but not of it. 
 Even Fred dared not voice his conviction unless 
 Paul opened the way. He was like a tall moun- 
 tain shrouded in its own vapor. 
 
 So Fred could only wait and hope. And vainly, 
 for the malady must run its course and claim its 
 victim. When it was whispered, "Paul is sick," 
 everybody was surprised but F'red. But when the 
 cry rang over the campus, "Paul is mad," Fred 
 like the others jumped out his window and joined 
 the throng. 
 
 Crises always take unexpected turns; for this 
 Fred was as little prepared as the others. Excited 
 groups gathered each with some new tale to tell. 
 Strange reports were coming in from the country 
 about of a giant, a man doing impossible feats, 
 beating back invisible foes, lashing the clouds with 
 his anger and striking terror into the hearts of 
 man and animal. 
 
 The start at break of day many had seen, the
 
 174 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 wild gestures and the sudden leaps. Over the 
 hills he went with a recklessness which matched 
 the tales which recounted his later Hight. No one 
 doubted it was Paul. No one else could do such 
 deeds. When their eyes were opened they saw 
 afresh what they had overlooked in the recent 
 events. The cause — the cause — there was but one 
 reply. Ruth. The tvv^o were associated in every- 
 one 's mind and the thought of the one led straight 
 to the other. What had Ruth done? How had 
 she cast a spell on Paul? The student, the com- 
 rade, the friend, hesitated in his answer. He 
 shook his head and remained silent. 
 
 But to the women of the town there came a 
 quick, instinctive reply. Long had they waited 
 for some expression of God's wrath; it had come. 
 What had come surprised them as much as it did 
 others, but that something dreadful would occur 
 they knew, yes, they had even prayed for. It 
 shocked them to think that their idol was the 
 victim of divine wrath, but that only increased 
 their antagonism to the law-breaker to whom the 
 affliction was due. All the old feeling against the 
 Professor and his doctrine flashed up anew. If 
 he had been punished they would have been satis- 
 fied, but he and his had escaped. 
 
 A\niat could this mean? A charm, a spell, the 
 exercise of some occult magic. What was to be 
 expected but the return of pagan glamor when a 
 champion of ancient idolatry taught his doctrine 
 undisturbed within the sacred precincts of the col- 
 lege. And Ruth — they all knew she would turn 
 out bad. But to become a sorcerer, that exceeded 
 what they had expected. AVhen their eyes were 
 once opened their keen vision helped them see 
 what before was obscure. Did not Ruth spend 
 her time among her father's books, books which 
 depicted the ways of a bewitched world 1 Did she 
 not love to repeat old nursery rhymes and imitate
 
 THE EECOIL 175 
 
 the deeds which heathen books picture? What 
 was her dancing but witchcraft, her incantations 
 but a call for help from the lower world? Then 
 they remembered how she told fortmies in a dark 
 corner and awed the girls by her weird costumes. 
 Surely none would do this but those who practised 
 in the night the arts they love to imitate by day. 
 More than this, she had been seen at early dawn 
 returning from the woods tired and worn by the 
 revelries in which she had participated. 
 
 '*! saw her," said one, ''out in the fog at break 
 of day, kneeling on the grass, calling for help 
 from invisible spirits." 
 
 So the gossip ran and it grew as it passed 
 from mouth to mouth. At first the men doubted 
 but as the day wore on they caught the mob spirit 
 and cursed the girl who had caused their idol to 
 fall. All rushed aimlessly about, a dozen plans 
 were suggested. Many parties tried to trace the 
 wanderer, but all was vain. The reports be- 
 came wilder, the terror grew but no solution came. 
 To curse the girl was easier than find the man. 
 
 XVII 
 
 The Recoil 
 
 Ruth was a good sleeper dreaming sweet 
 dreams ; a smile lit her face which her father saw 
 with joy. It meant fairies, heroes, bold horse- 
 men whose arts would shock the timid but who in 
 the end did noble deeds which redeemed the an- 
 guish of earlier moments. Girls were often car- 
 ried off by their hair, torn from a family and 
 friends, but their pain was borne with a 'sweet 
 smile which soon reconciled them to their fate.
 
 176 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 The hideous turned into the beautiful ; the demon 
 proved to be a valiant rescuer disguised. 
 
 Such are the dreams of the innocent. Those 
 who give joy by day get it back at night. Dark 
 clouds stay to terrify only those who hear the 
 cry of a rebuking conscience which Euth had 
 not. Past deeds never returned to hit her in 
 the face. Looking back she saw only roses in 
 fuller bloom than the buds of the day before. No 
 sorrow had crossed her track. She laughed by 
 day; she smiled by night. Which pleased him 
 most her father could never decide. He called 
 himself lucky, put tender kisses on her brow and 
 let it go. He could look from the picture on the 
 wall to the girl on the couch and say — the reward, 
 of the blessed is mine. 
 
 Tonight she tossed on her pillow, uttering faint 
 cries; shudders passed over her frame. The 
 dreams did not run smoothly. The clouds did not 
 break. The hero did not come nor did the demon 
 change to a defender. They took her farther and 
 farther into the deep woods. She heard the growl 
 of the wolf and the roaring of fierce animals. 
 Worse and worse grew the terrors, fiercer and 
 fiercer grew her companion. She was helpless and 
 dumb amid it all, a victim of some catastrophe 
 she knew not what. The demon seized her with 
 a fiendish yell. Raising a knife to plunge into 
 her heart, he started to execute his threat, but as 
 he did he changed. He seemed no longer an ex- 
 ternal fiend trying to harm but an internal evil 
 transforming her into its likeness. 
 
 The without became good, the within became 
 bad. She saw that she was the bad in a good 
 world, that the knife was in her hand ; that a fierce 
 zeal for destruction was in her heart. The world 
 pomted a finger of scorn at her and cried, 
 ' ' Shame, shame, fiend, witch, destroyer. Why do 
 you persecute? Why drag down others to your
 
 THE KECOIL 177 
 
 level r' Then the world turned into persons, be- 
 came father and Paul. Both had deep wounds 
 which she seemed to have made. W/as not h«r 
 knife bloody? Had she not struck the fatal blow! 
 A cold terror shook her frame, her eyes were 
 heavy with a fixed stare. A haunting dread of 
 consequence stood before; behind yawned a gulf 
 of unmeasurable depth. The ground yielded un- 
 der her feet and she sank down, down, but she did 
 not reach the bottom. A gasp, a cry, a struggle. 
 . . . She awoke and knew it was only a dream. 
 
 She was back in the world — ^but so different a 
 world. The sky was dark, the fields had a chill 
 look; the flowers had no color, the birds sang 
 harsh notes. Nothing smiled a welcome. All 
 stood apart in glum silence. And what of father 
 and Paul? Were they a part of herself as before? 
 No, they seemed strange beings. Cold glances 
 replaced the smile of sympathy their presence al- 
 ways brought. 
 
 She lay on her bed and pondered. The scenes 
 of yesternight and its antecedent events passed 
 before her with a taunting vividness. Her yearn- 
 ing for Paul, her grim determination to gain a 
 cherished end; her defiance of father; his cry of 
 despair. All this made her wonder if the wrong 
 were not in her; if her dream had not shown an 
 internal blemish of which she had not been aware. 
 Could she meet her father? Could she face Paul? 
 Could she live in the Bowman from which she felt 
 estranged? No ; they and she had broken forever. 
 In some other world she could do penance but not 
 here. Then a happy thought came : Miss Addams ' 
 invitation to visit the Hull House. There she 
 might escape the taunt which all Bowman cast 
 into her face. There she might learn her place in 
 the world. 
 
 Thought and action quickly followed each other. 
 The morning train should bear her westward.
 
 178 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 Putting the needed belongings in a bag she really 
 started for the depot. But as she would have slid 
 out the back way an angry crowd in the street 
 ^blocked her way. She shrank behind the shading 
 trees where unobserved she listened to the excited 
 throng which stood before the gate. 
 
 The topic was Paul, the content was plain. 
 Paul was mad, mad, mad ! everyone repeated each 
 with greater emphasis. There was but one opin- 
 ion. Damn the girl. She is the cause of the whole 
 trouble. Away with her, burn the witch. We 
 want Paul, Paul, nothing but Paul. 
 
 At first the confused talk did not arouse Euth. 
 That men should denounce created no response. 
 Then on a sudden a new vision came. The mob 
 disappeared and Paul stood before her as the 
 speakers described him. She could see him leap, 
 run and turn. The wild look on his face haunted 
 her, the dropping sweat seemed to burn holes as 
 it fell. She began to realize what it was to be 
 demented and, worse, what it was to be its cause. 
 Paul was mad because of her persecution. 
 
 Her bag dropped from her hand, her knees 
 seemed to give way, her feet to glide from under. 
 All thought of Hull House went the moment the 
 picture of Paul loomed. She had made a monster 
 of a man. She must cure the ill she had wrought. 
 What could she do? What was the balm to re- 
 store what she destroyed ? She clasped her hands, 
 finally smiling through her tears as she became 
 conscious of a way out. She would care for Paul. 
 She would be his nurse. Mad men tore, raged, 
 swore. They smashed things; did ill to their 
 friends. What mattered it? Let him strike her, 
 beat her, pull out her hair by the roots. She 
 would smile at his blows ; bear her scars without 
 murmur of complaint. Where was he ? she would 
 begin her task at once. 
 
 She ran to the house and would enter. But
 
 THE EECOIL 179 
 
 the door slammed itself in her face. Through the 
 window gleamed a hideous face of Paul, disfigured 
 worse than she had imagined. From his shoulder 
 croaked a raven, ' ' You ; you ; you ; see your work. ' ' 
 
 When she looked down a dozen spirits leaped 
 from the grass and pointed a finger of shame at 
 her. With a cry she fled along the path which led 
 to the garden. Behind was heard the tread of 
 some fierce pursuer. Was it Paul? Yes, none 
 other had so firm a tread. Her courage came 
 back. She would begin her appointed work. Let 
 him tear her to bits if he would. Still she would 
 tend him, be his guide and saviour. 
 
 She turned, but nothing was there. All was 
 still and bright. She laughed to herself and said, 
 ''Nonsense," but as she turned her terror came 
 back. On she ran, leaping the fence which lined 
 the athletic field. There she saw a game, a specter 
 game. Mere shadows and faces glided about the 
 field, charging and counter-charging. One figure 
 towered above them all. It was Paul, not the 
 Paul of old, but a demon Paul who bit, tore and 
 felled his comrades without compunction. When 
 he saw her he rushed at her with a terrific whoop. 
 Despite her resolution she turned and fled. Nor 
 did she stop until she reached the friendly shelter 
 of the corner elm. 
 
 Now all was still as before. Again she laughed ; 
 once more became bold with duty. But as she 
 advanced the skies darkened and a haze came be- 
 fore her eyes. Peals of thunder rent the air ; cries 
 worse than those of maniacs came out of the dark- 
 ness. Then arose a long, long line of faces, gloomy, 
 stern faces, each with a chain and a lock to bind 
 her fast. They were the prophets — ''Repent, re- 
 pent!" they cried. "To us has God given the 
 task of subduing women. Hear their cry as they 
 go down to torture. ' ' They pointed on beyond to 
 a growing gulf whence rose a lurid flame lapping
 
 180 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 its victims beneath a blazing surface. This she 
 could not face. She fled toward a distant light 
 but as she drew near it burst, turning the sky 
 to a lurid red. 
 
 From the clouds dropped a dew which as it 
 glistened from the leaves turned into blood and 
 trickled down in pools at her feet. She looked at 
 her hands. They were red, red like the blood of 
 the sky and bush. She washed and washed to 
 make them w^hite but even the soap turned red 
 and made the stain deeper. She ran from the 
 scarlet sky into the gloom. The black seemed bet- 
 ter than the red but wherever she fled gnomes 
 leaped up in her path; dark, nasty figures that 
 seemed to reach out for the hair with which she 
 thought she was willing to part but was not. They 
 were all Pauls in new disguise. She turned from 
 the one only to run into the other. Their cries 
 seemed like rolls of thunder while their looks 
 grew fiercer as the clouds got darker. Eound and 
 round the garden she fled; paler and paler she 
 grew. They closed in on her and stood, a solid 
 phalanx, in her way. She became dizzy, stag- 
 gered and fell. But as she fell something grasped 
 her. Was it Paul? Was it a demon? No, when 
 the mists cleared she was held tightly in the arms 
 of Mrs. Andrew. 
 
 Mrs. Andrew had been with the crowd on the 
 street. She had felt its grief, joined in its con- 
 demnation, and mourned with the rest for the 
 absent Paul. But when the mob, turning to Ruth, 
 roared out its spleen, she said, ''Now is the time 
 to be of help." 
 
 So she crossed the street, entered the yard and 
 here she stood with Ruth in her arms. The con- 
 tact was so sudden she had no plan of action. It 
 was an instinct and not a scheme which brought 
 her here; now instinct must be her guide. The 
 girl was a frail; she a robust woman of muscle,
 
 THE EECOIL 181 
 
 nerve and decision. No greater contrast was pos- 
 sible between the shivering girl and the icy com- 
 posure of her companion, yet both were women. 
 They were nature's extremes brought into contact 
 by an impulse older than the hills. When woman 
 loves and laughs she turns toward a man but in 
 suffering no one knows its depth but another 
 w^oman. The older drew the younger to her, 
 pushed back her tangled hair and eased the tur- 
 bulent tremor that passed over her face. 
 
 The younger gasped, put her hand on the face 
 above her to be sure it was human, then cried, 
 "Where am I? Where have I been?" 
 
 "Never mind," said a soothing voice. "You 
 are here and that is enough." 
 
 Euth looked about in a wild way. The clouds 
 had partly broken but still the gnome faces stared 
 at her from the sky. Suddenly she gave a shriek 
 and would have fled if she had not been held 
 tightly by her elder. 
 
 "What is it?" 
 
 "Look," cried Ruth, "at least a dozen." 
 
 "Where?" 
 
 ' ' In the grass behind the lilac bush. They jump 
 like toads but their teeth are as sharp as a 
 wolf's." 
 
 "Oh, I know them," sair the woman. "They 
 are Nixies." 
 
 '' Nixies — what are they?" 
 
 ' ' Things which are what they are not. Frauds 
 every one. Nothing real. I never saw a toad 
 that did not wish to show off as an alligator. 
 They'll turn if you look at 'em. See!" At this 
 Mrs. Andrew put on a stern look and dashed to- 
 ward the bush, which she shook rudely. 
 
 "They're gone," cried Ruth. "The mean 
 things, to seem real when they are not. Why does 
 God let such things live ? ' ' 
 
 "He doesn't. They slip around behind the
 
 182 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 clouds and get along without Him. God rules the 
 living and the dead. They're neither — mere lies. 
 Snap your fingers and they are done for. ' ' 
 
 Scarcely had she said this when a new terror 
 seized Euth. She jumped behind her companion 
 and held to her skirt. 
 
 ''What now!" 
 
 ' ' Look, there in a bush, they came again. This 
 time they had wings, tails, long flaring tongues." 
 
 "Oh, they're merely night-walkers. Everything 
 has two lives, one in the air, one on the ground. 
 On the ground they dream of being in the air 
 and take hideous forms such as they imagine they 
 would like to be. Who doesn't dream of being 
 huge and powerful, of having wdngs and flying 
 on through space! We do; so do they. Some 
 time they will fly. Every creature does. But 
 now it is only at night that they shake off their 
 grub-like forms. This dream-self we see. From 
 it our visions come. But I found them out and 
 fixed them at last. Take this thread and lay it 
 across their backs." 
 
 Ruth advanced cautiously in her tears and 
 smiles. She stretched out her thread, suddenly 
 turned, said joyfully, "They are gone. They sank 
 into the ground as quick as a flash." 
 
 "No," said Mrs. Andrews, "they merely 
 changed their form in the dark. They might 
 easily be mistaken for a wolf. But they bother 
 most Avhen they fly. Then they come in at the 
 window and light on the bed." 
 
 * ' How did you stop them 1 ' ' 
 
 "Their wings are mere shams. If they get 
 caught in a spider's iveb they can't get loose. 
 There they hang till the spider wants a meal. So 
 they hate the thread, the smaller the worse. It 
 looks like spider webs, you know. They are even 
 afraid of an empty spool. I used to tie threads 
 over my bed and hang the spool at the window. A
 
 THE RECOIL 183 
 
 thread seems to them as big as a rope. They 
 never bothered me when I learned how to fix 
 them. ' ' 
 
 Mrs. Andrew led the way to the porch, the girl 
 sometimes running ahead, and sometimes shrink- 
 ing back as if their way were obstructed. 
 
 '^Here is a fine place to rest," said she, as 
 she fixed the pillow^s of the hammock. Ruth obeyed 
 and let her face be massaged until the smiles 
 conquered her tears. Suddenly she sprang up 
 and said, 
 
 ''Did girls love when you were a girl?" 
 
 * ' Certainly, girls were made to love. Boys and 
 girls flock together in the woods, in the town; 
 yesterday, today and tomorrow; it's all the same. 
 Love knows no time, no place, no race. ' ' 
 
 ''Were there heroes then, men like Paul who 
 made things go ? ' ' 
 
 "Heroes came with the first girl. Not singly 
 but in groups. Every girl in every age has a 
 score of heroes to adore." 
 
 "Do they run after the heroes or do the heroes 
 come to them?" 
 
 "Sometimes it's one way and sometimes the 
 other. Girls who rush ahead don't seem to win 
 so often as those who hold back. You see, if she 
 runs after him he runs ; while if she turns — he is 
 on her track in a minute." 
 
 "A real hero running after a girl! "Why, that 
 is absurd. He's on the job. All his time is taken 
 by the great things ahead." 
 
 "Well, it may be absurd but it happens. The 
 greater the hero, the quicker he stops when he 
 sees the right girl." 
 
 "Paul would never turn back. It's always on, 
 on, ever on. He'd smash the line; he'd write a 
 book." 
 
 "Yes, but the book will have a girl in it. A 
 book without a girl would be a frosty affair.
 
 184 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 Probably it wouldn't sell. If a book does not 
 start with a girl, it is sure to end with one. Girl- 
 less books become books-with-girls. Men are all 
 alike. They fight, they conquer, they sing songs 
 and write books. And no reward satisfies but a 
 woman's smile. They are sure to turn back and 
 look for it." 
 
 "But Paul is not like them, he's a greater hero, 
 the stuff of which gods are made. ' ' 
 
 ' ' The greater the hero, the greater his love. ' ' 
 
 * ' But the cards don 't say so. Something always 
 comes between, a journey, a book, a lecture. 
 Here's the Queen of Spades — that's L Paul is 
 the Jack of Hearts. But mix the cards as you 
 will, they never come together. A book is six; a 
 journey is five ; and a talk is two. Six, five and 
 two are thirteen. It's always unlucky, no matter 
 how often I try." 
 
 ' ' Why not turn the six, and then it is nine. That 
 makes sixteen, a lucky square. Whoever goes 
 around a square always comes back. Then he 
 runs straight into the girl and the Queen of Spades 
 wins." 
 
 *'My, I never thought of that. You must be 
 a great mathematician." 
 
 "I used to be when I studied the old Adams 
 arithmetic. I was good at figuring, but those 
 puzzles at the end made me groan. If twelve men 
 can dig a ditch in eight days, working nine hours 
 a day, how many men can finish it in three days 
 working ten hours a day if five men take Saturday 
 off?" 
 
 "That must have been a stunner." 
 
 "No, that was an easy starter. The real puzzles 
 were those one must think out. There Ed West 
 beat me. Boys always beat girls when it comes 
 to thinking. They see right smash through, and 
 win out." 
 
 "Yes," said Ruth, slowly, "that's like Paul."
 
 THE RECOIL 185 
 
 Then she brightened up and exclaimed, '*He 
 breaks the line every time — on, ever on." 
 
 Tlien the frightened look came again. She 
 clinched Mrs. Andrew's hand convulsively and 
 cried, "But why did he go mad? Could I help 
 loving him? Oh, I wished he would come, carry 
 me off. Who would care for the pain if only a 
 lover tore you away? But now he comes not to 
 love, not to seize, but to tear limb from limb. 
 His look is wrath, his eye is blood; in his grasp 
 are brands of fire. If I look up he is there, if I 
 look dow^n, the shadow is his ; to the right, to the 
 left, round and round like a dizzy whirl, his image 
 floats. Ah, tell me, tell me if these phantoms are 
 mere Nixies, where is the real Paul ? Do they re- 
 flect his anger? Do the thunders echo and enlarge 
 his cries of vengeance? Oh, w^here is Paul, my 
 Paul? Let him slay me if he will but to him I 
 must go. Help me find him. Let's make it our 
 holy grail to find the hero and to give our lives 
 in ransom for his." 
 
 "No, Euth, sacrifice won't work. It's lost its 
 charm. Too many lives of women have already 
 been given as a ransom. What meets it? The 
 more we sacrifice the higher Satan puts his price. 
 It is love that wins. Only love can bring the hero 
 back. He may be in a far country, years elapse, 
 but love is the only force that draws. On it we 
 must rely." 
 
 ' ' You mean wait, wait ! No, I cannot wait. It's 
 now. Love is always now, it has no tomorrow." 
 
 "True, true, we are now and not tomorrow. 
 Today w^e must live while it is light and love is 
 warm. Let 's turn him back today. This sun shall 
 see him here. ' ' 
 
 "How?" 
 
 "Absent treatment." 
 
 "Absent treatment, what is that?'' 
 
 "A new cure. Can nature move cold thought
 
 186 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 from mind to mind and have no way by whicli 
 warm hearts can beat as one? No, the ether 
 through which thought moves so freely can take 
 love 's message as welL No sea, no storm, no peal 
 of thunder can hinder its flight. Let's not go 
 tramping to a holy grail. Bring it to us. Now 
 and here. The test of woman's power is to bring, 
 not to go.'' 
 
 *'But how would you stop him when he goes on, 
 on, up, up? Always to something higher and 
 better. The stones under his feet roll back but 
 he never returns. What is love to him?" 
 
 "Everything. It is that he seeks. He thinks 
 it is ahead and so it was, yet now it is behind. 
 The more he strives, the farther he gets from his 
 goal. We must stop him. Make him turn back. 
 There he goes, up the hill. A fierce look is on his 
 face but not the look of hate. Think hard, to- 
 gether. It is not our feet but our love which can 
 reach him. Once more, do you see him?" 
 
 ''Yes, but he has not stopped, he only smiled." 
 
 "That shows that love can reach him. It goes 
 quickly and its arrows pierce even the most cal- 
 lous heart. Now let's try again. Think hard — 
 think long, and let our love go out with our breath. 
 Where is he now?" 
 
 ' ' He stopped but then went on faster than ever. 
 He waved his hand and raised his voice as if 
 something were right ahead." 
 
 "Good. There is something right ahead. Love's 
 signals point in so many ways; they are often 
 misunderstood. Love says to a man, 'Go ahead,' 
 but it also says, 'Come back.' The first signal 
 he has caught — ^we must give him the second. 
 Let's try again. Put your hand on your heart; 
 a pulse of love can reach anywhere ; turn stone to 
 smiles." 
 
 "He stops," cried Ruth, "he turns, he is com- 
 ing back ! Paul, Paul. It is Ruth, your Ruth. ' '
 
 THE KECOIL 187 
 
 ''That wall do," said Mrs. Andrew in her 
 matter-of-fact way. "When a lover turns he 
 comes. Today he will be here, before the setting 
 of the sun. Now rest, get ready for the coming 
 
 joy-" 
 
 With this she laid Kuth's head on the pillow and 
 stroked her cheeks. There came a calm but it was 
 broken by many starts. The girl would rise up, 
 throw out her arms as if in terror, but her tranquil 
 nurse pressed her hands gently until the calm 
 returned. Again and again the tremor returned 
 and was relieved; the within ever came to the 
 open and could be read by the flush of the cheek, 
 the trembling of limb and the thumping of the 
 heart. But the nurse moved not a muscle nor 
 broke the calm of her rigid countenance. 
 
 Mrs. Andrew was a Gordon, a race that never 
 smiled. Duty got up with them in the morning, 
 stood with them all day and slept at their bedside 
 at night. They had set, impassive faces. The 
 within never dared to break the crust which 
 through many ages moral resolve had formed. 
 What they did do or did not do had become so fixed 
 that no emotion could swerve them from their 
 stern path. And yet their neighbors liked them. 
 They always helped, were good in trouble, even 
 if they looked the same at a wedding as at a 
 funeral. People made allowances; forgave their 
 set faces because of their deeds. To the children 
 Mrs. Gordon was a godsend. She never smiled 
 but she never scolded. Her cookies and doughnuts 
 came out without an invitation. She never said 
 stop when six were eaten but kept at her work in 
 the somber fashion of her family. They ate and 
 ate but they never got to the bottom of that magic 
 crock. Who wants a smile if it makes you stop 
 when you have eaten six? 
 
 Mr. Gordon was a deacon. He sat at the end 
 of the pew; went to sleep at "secondly"; and
 
 188 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 never woke until the collection plate rattled. He 
 put in a ten for foreign missions, a five for home 
 and a dollar for the deacon's fund. The children 
 were given ten cents each ; he threw a bill into his 
 wife's lap. Such was the Gordon recreation, re- 
 peated every Sunday with a formula as exact as 
 the calendar. Then he drew up his horses, counted 
 his children and went home to repeat the tasks 
 of the preceding week. 
 
 Mrs. Andrew's face was frozen like the rest. 
 Not a change came over her as she cared for 
 Ruth. It would have been impossible from looks 
 to decide whether she was thinking of the prophet 
 Daniel or of the bread in her oven. She acted 
 on instinct and followed its directions. Now in 
 the same unconcerned way she stroked the cheek 
 of the sleeping girl when a tremor shook her 
 frame. The spells lessened in violence and the 
 intervals were prolonged. 
 
 Yes, she was cold, frozen, unmoved on the out- 
 side ; but within was strange flame, a pulse which 
 she had no means to express. She felt a lump in 
 her throat which her muscles suppressed before 
 it could rise to the surface. She held the girl's 
 hand a little tighter and gazed more tenderly on 
 the upturned face. Thus came a feeling of kinship 
 that never before was hers. Love binds together 
 and makes hearts beat in unison even if exteriors 
 differ in color, shape or warmth. She sat and 
 dreamed but it was a dream \vithout a voice. The 
 outer chill turned her thought to snow before it 
 could radiate its message. At last a slight tremor 
 passed over her lips as she raised her eyes and 
 said, 
 
 '*0h, God, when vdW women help each other 
 out of this?"
 
 THE EETURN 189 
 
 XVIII 
 
 The Retukn 
 
 Paul woke with a start. It was dark, merely a 
 rim of light lay on the horizon. Elsewhere a dense 
 fog hiding the world from view prevented him 
 from knowing where he was. The elevation and 
 broad expanse told him he was near the top of a 
 mountain. While pondering on his location, the 
 tinkle of a bell was heard; soon a lost cow came 
 up with a distended udder, her gentle look seeming 
 to imply that she sought him for relief. Paul 
 drew the milk directly into his mouth. His blood 
 now flowed with renewed vigor, each subordinate 
 part seemed to call itself together and send up 
 to the head for orders. The stings of yesterday's 
 defeat made them more anxious for renewed ac- 
 tion. Were they to blame? ''If so, Paul, give us 
 a new chance," they cried. The head alone was 
 indecisive. Thoughts in abundance rolled along 
 but none of them aroused the will. 
 
 Paul sat on a log and pondered. The failure 
 of yesterday forced him to call in question the 
 ultimates of his action. For the first time Paul 
 was in danger — in danger because a question of 
 God's goodness stole upon him. He had always 
 believed, and in his simple way had taught that 
 evil comes from the corruption of a full stomach — 
 from the making of blood for which there is no 
 use. Throw off this burden through work, empty 
 every vessel, open every gland, and evil thoughts 
 go as alcohol disappears from an open jar. What 
 goes out through the skin cannot, sinking to the 
 heart, corrupt it. For every kind of badness God 
 has given a physical outlet. Keep it open and no 
 harm can come. Paul felt that he could say, "All 
 this have I done from my youth up ; " and yet he
 
 190 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 was cursed with the very thoughts that his mother 
 had warned him to avoid. 
 
 "Beware of idle women. They are a snare 
 through whose beauty men are enticed within the 
 gates of hell before they are aware of the decep- 
 tion. The strength of Sampson is of no avail 
 against a woman's wiles." 
 
 Yet how could he do more than he had done? 
 Was God to disappear from without as his mother 
 had been displaced from within, thus leaving both 
 nature and mind without a guide? On this ugly 
 question Paul pondered in spite of the calls for 
 renewed action on the part of the many organs 
 wanting another test of their powers. Could it 
 be that life and adjustment after all were an 
 accident? 
 
 As Paul was thinking a blood-red sun arose 
 above the mist that hung over the landscape. 
 There was in the sky not a trace of color. Fight- 
 ing its way, the sun drove the mist back as it 
 advanced. The sky above where a victory had 
 been won was of a silver gray, darkening into 
 a purple tinge where anything was reflected from 
 below. But the valleys and the hills even to their 
 tops were still densely covered with the fog. Oh, 
 it is so different to see the struggle of light with 
 darkness from above, where the sun and its allies 
 are at work, than from below where men sit in 
 the mist and wonder if light will come. Paul 
 rose to his feet in interest to see the conflict. 
 Slowly, but often with fierce energy, the sun 
 drove the mists from the open ground and then 
 followed them into the narrower valleys. On 
 each more distant range the battle was fought 
 anew. When the mists and the rays collided the 
 mists withdrew. As often did they collect again 
 in hidden nooks and rush forth in hope of keep- 
 ing the open ground. But their alert foe was too 
 quickly on their track for any concealed action —
 
 THE EETURN 191 
 
 soon all was clear except a few distant nooks 
 from which at length they disappeared, as if to 
 husband strength for another struggle under 
 more favorable conditions. AVhen all this was 
 done the silver in the sky became more bright 
 and each tiny particle of the dispelled mist 
 seemed willing to add to the victory of the light 
 by reflecting back some of its glory. 
 
 This contest and this result brought back to 
 Paul his old confidence. If God had arranged the 
 relations of light and darkness so that every step 
 in the victory of the light is provided for — that 
 what makes darkness and doubt is turned into 
 an element which adds to the glory of the light ; 
 surely, thought Paul, the same forethought fixes 
 the relations between spirit and flesh. The flesh 
 is not bad; it is merely displaced goodness for 
 which there is some remedy. ' ' There is an outlet 
 for badness," said Paul, with energy. ''One 
 must only keep on and the seemingly bad will 
 become an agent of the good. ' ' 
 
 But this decision left Paul no better off than 
 before. He had done all he could and still the 
 bad thoughts remained. Where could the solu- 
 tion be? His body called loudly for action, yet 
 Paul did not move. His will seemed gone, burned 
 out in the struggle of yesterday. His will thus 
 far had dominated his muscles, his thought and 
 even his senses. It stood as a stern censor of all 
 that presented itself — nothing entered that did 
 not conform to the rigid canons he had marked 
 for himself. His room was plastered with a 
 thousand and one rules of action — things to do, 
 things to avoid; each of these his indomitable 
 will made the basis of deeds or of suppressions. 
 Had Paul been color blind the world of beauty 
 could not have been more completely shut out. 
 Emotions never swelled up. They were suppressed 
 in the bud. The outer world did not make his
 
 192 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 nerves tingle. It was a place to act not to observe. 
 When, on their walks, the Professor stopped to 
 pick a flower or to admire a scene, Paul became 
 languid; life came back only when conversation 
 resumed. 
 
 Many generations of Browm's reacting against 
 the world had conquered its obstacles, but they 
 had never seen it. They sent out currents of ac- 
 tion, they leveled forests and cleared fields, but 
 no return loads ever came back. Their joy was 
 in forceful action not in passive admiration. Hills 
 and valleys were alike so long as the crops were 
 good. Trees were lumber; flowers were weeds. 
 Paul came by his inheritance rightfully .enough; 
 until this morning he was true to his ancestry. 
 But now he was will-less; impressions stole in 
 through gates w^hich had ever been blocked. The 
 struggle of the sun with the mists was the first 
 thing in nature he had ever seen. He had often 
 been in mists; he could explain their action, but 
 of the interaction betw^een them and the sun he 
 had never thought, much less stopped to observe. 
 Miles and miles he had run through forests, by 
 lakes and over mountains, but his only joy was 
 in the obstacles they made. His pleasure was in 
 the flow of his blood; his visions were self-made. 
 Nature was nothing to him but a field in which to 
 operate. 
 
 Today he looked at leaves, he saw the outlines 
 of trees and heard the birds sing. The suppressed 
 eye nerves w^ere for the first time permitted to 
 feast on their natural food. Cry as his muscles 
 would for actien, the will gave no response. It 
 was dead, a new ruler had come. He had failed 
 to conquer the world; the world was to conquer 
 him. As he rose from his reverie he looked for 
 some trail to guide his homeward steps, but saw 
 no outlet. It was all forest. Trees big and little, 
 bushes and shrubs, surrounded him on all sides.
 
 THE RETURN 193 
 
 It was early autumn and the frost had just begun 
 its work. From top to bottom the hillsides were 
 a glow of color. Pennsylvania trees like to grow; 
 in autumn their leaves die hard ; in their struggle 
 they assume all sorts of form and shades of color. 
 A hundred varieties vie all summer with each 
 other for life and each adds its peculiarities to the 
 l)eauty of autumn. Such is autumn ever but this 
 day was peculiar. It was one of those combina- 
 tions of air, light and shade such as one must be 
 up early to find. Many see sunsets but few see 
 it rise. The freshness of the morning is never 
 reflected by the setting sun. Evening is a parched 
 desert in comparison with the fresh glory of the 
 early day. This morning surpassed its rivals. 
 The fog had moistened the leaves and left a mil- 
 lion tiny drops to reflect the sun's first rays. Each 
 tree was a rainbow and each leaf mingled its own 
 beauty with that of the prisms which lay on their 
 surface. The little moment before the sun drinks 
 the dew from the leaves is the time wdien morning 
 radiance is at its height. 
 
 That moment Paul caught, or better said, it 
 caught him. He had no will to seek the beauties 
 of nature. They rolled in on him as he sat watch- 
 ing the changing moods of the world about. His 
 nerves tingled with pleasure but not from the joy 
 of action. It came from the passive mood of 
 reflection. 
 
 An old thought which he had often rejected stole 
 in. Could beauty be useful? Were they the same 
 or opposing categories? The answer of yester- 
 day he doubted today. He thought how his de- 
 pression had been removed by the conquest of 
 the sun over the mist. This struggle had a mean- 
 ing apart from the moisture and heat which made 
 growth possible. Then came a vision which tore 
 deep holes in his rigid philosophy. If beauty and 
 utility were different, if God added one to the
 
 194 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 other, each must be useful in its own way. * ' Beauty 
 is the useful in the bud," he cried as his new 
 thought began to place itself in relation to the old. 
 * * Let the beautiful alone and it will of itself turn 
 into the useful. ' ' It flashed on him that this was 
 what the Professor had often said. He felt dis- 
 gusted with his stupidity and narro^vness. How 
 could he have lived so long and learned so little? 
 How grievously he had sinned by refusing to read 
 the message God had written on the leaves. Trees 
 were useful; trees were beautiful. It is not the 
 gnarly, deformed trunk, but the mighty oak that 
 joins usefulness and beauty. Could what nature 
 combines so genially be bad when we find them 
 in men? Is the strong man bad and his weak 
 neighbor equally good I Do men need codes to 
 cramp them into exotic forms any more than na- 
 ture does ? 
 
 And women ? Paul quailed when he applied tliis 
 philosophy to them. Strong admiration of his 
 mother shut out any application of this thought. 
 She was useful; she was pale, stooping and 
 wrinkled. God would have made her different if 
 he wanted women to reflect the beauty of the trees. 
 Still he was uneasy. He felt there was a gap in 
 his thought he could not fill. But his mother's 
 face blocked the only path which led to a possible 
 solution. 
 
 Finally Paul rose, more because his body was 
 calling for action than because his problem was 
 in a better shape. He walked slowly; not as of old 
 getting a joy from testing his strength against 
 physical obstacles. "Oh, dear," cried the muscle 
 of his right leg, looking at his pedometer, ''not 
 three miles an hour and down-hill at that. ' ' And 
 even that speed was not kept up, soon orders 
 ceased and muscles stopped action. ''What is the 
 matter now?" cried an astonished muscle. "It is 
 curious to have this stop so early in the morning."
 
 THE RETUEN 195 
 
 * * A picture, ' ' cried the eye from his conning tower. 
 ''What is a pictured" asked the muscle of the 
 loin. ' ' This stupid muscle is only used to do great 
 deeds and hence knows little of ordinary events. 
 "A picture," said the eye, "is something for 
 women to dawdle over when they cannot think of 
 anything else to do ; then the men must stand by 
 and pretend to be interested. ' ' 
 
 The facts were that Paul had struck a trail lead- 
 ing to a house. Through the unfastened door he 
 entered. It was an artist's den, or at least some 
 one lazy enough to put pictures on the wall had 
 occupied it. There was something in them that 
 attracted Paul, in his present mood. Ordinarily 
 he would have followed the impulse of his body 
 and run along the hills for the mere pleasure of 
 doing, but now he w^as thinking about women — 
 useless women — and that made art seem attrac- 
 tive. His eye fell on a battered Madonna that 
 hung by one corner on the wall. He trembled as 
 he looked, for the face brought up the image of 
 the specter Ruth from which he had tried so hard 
 to escape. Was it, thought he, a new form of his 
 old enemy? A useless woman in a new garb? But 
 Paul was determined to examine more closely so 
 as to test the truth of the resemblance. He tore 
 it from the wall and seating liimself looked at it 
 carefully. He was attracted, not repulsed as he 
 had expected to be. Yes, the figure was Ruth's 
 but was it so because of an actual resemblance 
 or because Ruth was a woman — a natural attitude 
 in which the budding girl clothes herself? The 
 face was so pleasing that he began to doubt if she 
 were really bad. If bad, was it her fault? This 
 thought gave him courage for further reflection. 
 He seemed to feel that he was on the track of 
 another of woman's wrongs. Suppose the artist 
 had protected instead of degrading her, would she 
 not have been even more pleasing? The longer
 
 196 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 he thought the freer he felt the women to be from 
 blame. Oh, that women could be protected; then 
 their natural qualities would have a place. 
 
 His thought, however, came back on his mother 
 as an ever-recurring center ; then the old associa- 
 tions, aroused with renewed vigor, blurred the 
 sweetness of the model's face. Seeing her bare 
 hips and shoulders, he cried, "She does not 
 dress!" "But was she ever taught T' came up 
 in his mind as an excuse and once more he thought 
 of Ruth. Would she, he wondered, dress as he 
 asked her I Had he ever done itf Surely girls 
 are not to blame if friends do not try to keep 
 them in the right path. He sprang up at the 
 thought and started on briskly. Yes, he would ask 
 her ; if she would, then he could stay at Bowman. 
 But if not? He stopped again. Would he then 
 accept Professor Miller's offer and get relief by 
 his absence I But the book would have to go ; his 
 justification of his mother would never reach the 
 world. Could he leave Eutli to the mercy of her 
 situation, defenceless and helpless without him? 
 
 Had he as formerly feU her depraved, he could 
 have done this ; but that now he believed her to be 
 a reversion — a girl appearing a thousand years 
 behind her time with all the innocence of the prim- 
 itive woman — this was not a possible solution. 
 No, he must return and face the situation. At 
 least, the real Ruth was not so bad as the specter 
 Ruth. With this consoling thought, he started 
 homeward and now went fast enough to satisfy 
 his muscles' cry for exercise. 
 
 He looked across the campus, toward the house 
 where he had spent so many happy hours. To 
 him it meant work, duty and pleasure. The outer 
 world had been his also. The ridge with its many 
 paths ; long avenues where the trees are straight ; 
 the grass so clear; the shrubs grow with such lux- 
 uriance that they seem not the work of nature
 
 THE KETURN 197 
 
 but of some master who in a conscious way shapes 
 the woods to meet his needs. Paul felt himself 
 the owner of all these stretches for he alone en- 
 joyed them to the full. The morning light was 
 made for him, for no one else came to see it except 
 the birds. There is nothing so exhilarating as a 
 fresh run in the open w^oods nor anything so 
 quickening to thought. So Paul was happy in his 
 work, happy in the wood. Then came Ruth to mar 
 the work; then the specter to spoil the wood. 
 
 Of one thing he was certain. Between the two 
 he preferred Ruth to the specter. He wanted no 
 revival of yesterday. To the woods he could not 
 go, to the house he must. The thought came back 
 — perhaps she would dress if he asked her to. But 
 the asking he well knew would have a price. He 
 w^as aware that it would be a kiss or more. Could 
 he be true to mother and kiss a useless girl? "But 
 was she useless," came a pleading thought? It 
 made Paul start, for it sounded like a voice. Some 
 new recess within or without was breaking its 
 bonds. It was like the close of a long-fought bat- 
 tle when at some angle a foe rushes in. The voice 
 said, "Love her. Put feeling in the kiss and all 
 w^ill go well. ' ^ Then came another ; the plain con- 
 trast made him shudder. His mother 's hand was 
 hard and firm. Her dress was plain. On her 
 face were lines that told of sorrow but when lit 
 up with love became an inspiration. Humble as 
 she was you would not wonder at her power if you 
 had seen her as husband and son saw her. Back 
 of the seeming hardness of face, there was a some- 
 thing that made her impressive. No wonder the 
 son stood entranced and cried, "My wife must be 
 like her. ' ' 
 
 Over against her stood a girl with soft white 
 hands, a darkish face with rosy lips. There was 
 not a line or trace of sorrow on her. Her hands 
 did no work; her life knew no pain. From her
 
 198 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 eyes there had never fallen a tear. Life had been 
 one long joyous round. Protected by the loving 
 care of a father, she never knew the pains other 
 girls suffer nor the discipline that numbs, de- 
 grades and hardens. What was this girl to Paul? 
 He tried to think. The old feeling of opposition 
 was gone ; he was convinced that she was a rever- 
 sion to the simple maid of ten thousand years 
 ago. When he ceased to think her depraved she 
 became an object needing protection. Now she 
 was an object of interest, but like any old 
 curiosity it was an idle interest that could not 
 arouse so great a nature as Paul's. 
 
 The picture of the Madonna had carried him 
 on a step. If he were an artist, he would picture 
 his mother smiling at the setting sun after she had 
 loaded the wagon with hay twenty times that day. 
 ' ' Oh, the smile of a working woman, ' ' he said, * ' is 
 worth a hundred Madonnas." Paul was partly 
 right, crude as were his notions of art. He stood 
 with a cleft in his thought for the useless, con- 
 tented with the useful ; between them there seemed 
 no compromise. Paul hated to bribe a girl with 
 what he felt was not true coin. Yet some bribe 
 was needed to keep tlie peace. In what coin then 
 should it be paid I As he paced the room in the 
 vain endeavor to solve the riddle his eye fell on 
 an unopened letter. More for relief than aught 
 else he opened it and found it was from Professor 
 Miller. 
 
 ''The President of Milford University has con- 
 sulted me about a candidate for their chair in 
 economics. I told him of several young men of 
 promise of whom you were one. He chose you 
 immediately. 'I want a man,' he said, 'who com- 
 bines world force with intellectual alertness. 
 Brown may have done less than some of the others 
 but I am delighted to know of a man with such 
 high ideals and the power to carry them through!'
 
 THE HALL OF WAITING 199 
 
 "Now, Paul," continued Professor Miller, *'I 
 want you to view tliis in a different light from our 
 previous offers. I admire your loyalty to Bow- 
 man, but it is after all a small place with only a 
 local influence. Milford is a university that sets 
 the pace for the whole country; in it the world's 
 moral tone is determined. I appreciate your in- 
 tellectual promise as much as anyone; but your 
 athletic ability, combined with the well-known 
 spirit of fairness you put into all your activities, 
 gives you a wealth of qualities that few possess. 
 I appeal to you — does not your duty demand that 
 you give these powers the greatest scope for their 
 exercise? The tomorrow of our universities de- 
 pends on the today of their athletes." 
 
 Paul could not but be touched by this tribute 
 to his powders. A thought struck him that seemed 
 to offer a solution of his difficulties. He would 
 not want to go, but neither would Ruth. Bowman's 
 athletics had been her joy. His staying would be 
 the price he would offer for peace. If she would 
 dress, if she would stay demurely in her place, his 
 work could go on, the book be written and Bow- 
 man flourish. If not — he was too quickly in mo- 
 tion toward the house to finish the sentence. 
 
 XIX 
 
 The Hall of Waiting 
 
 Not finding Ruth in the house he sought her in 
 the garden, where she was seated in her bower 
 talking to imaginary friends. 
 
 "Oh, Paul, I am so glad you have come. We 
 have so long waited for you. Let me show you 
 our retreat. ' ' She took him by the hand and led 
 him about. 
 
 "This is the Hall of Waiting: only those come
 
 200 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 here who have heroes doing great deeds. Heroes 
 go, they never come — so we must sit and wait. 
 Each tells the others of her hero. For us he is 
 one and each newcomer has some fresh tale to tell 
 of what he is doing. There is Mary. She once 
 saw a game won by a hero who dashed along until 
 the coveted goal was his. Each step in all this 
 drama Mary saw and loves to relate. It does us 
 good, Paul, to know that there was a hero who 
 won for Bowman. This is Tillie. She saw the 
 great runner speeding across the open country. 
 Many kept on for awhile and once another was 
 in the lead but in the end they all lagged back 
 and the hero rushed across the goal alone. Grace 
 saw him wrestle. Each in his turn was thrown 
 until the hero stood unquestioned. So with the 
 others — Lilly, Eva, Minnie and the rest. Each 
 has seen some great deed done and loves to tell 
 us of it as we wait. 
 
 ' ' While we wait we fix up places to receive the 
 hero. This is the seat for those that never come. 
 Here is the Arch of Triumph for him that always 
 goes. He is so big we could scarcely reach up to 
 decorate it. It just fits you, Paul. Come and see 
 how nice you look going through. This is the flag 
 of Bo^\TQan. It is for the greatest hero she has 
 sent forth. He's gone — he's going — he's on the 
 way to greater deeds; when they are done we'll 
 wave the flag anew to signal him to come home. 
 Will he come, Paul? That is what we all want to 
 know. Oh, it is so hard to wait and wait and not 
 to know when the deeds are done that will bring 
 the valiant home. Still we wait ; what else can we 
 do to keep us busy while the tomorrows we yearn 
 turn themselves into yesterdays that bring us 
 nothing ? ' ' 
 
 She looked up pleadingly in his face as if to 
 get an answer. But Paul, slow and tongue-tied, 
 could not clearly see what all this meant. Her
 
 THE HALL OF WAITING 201 
 
 gay attire, the wreaths and emblems, all seemed 
 to indicate some festive occasion for which many 
 were expected. Yet she was here alone. He 
 thought of his errand and was pleased to think 
 that today at least her attire was satisfactory. 
 
 *'How nicely you are dressed," he finally said. 
 
 *'So you like dresses, too?" she asked. "Oh, 
 that's nice. We who wait vie with each other 
 to see who will win the hero 's glance. How shall 
 we dress? Shall we? Do you like color or form? 
 Shall the dress be high or low? I rather like a 
 train, do you, Paul?" 
 
 So she ran on doing all the talking, yet appeal- 
 ing to him at every turn. With her quick percep- 
 tion she read his wish, helped him make his choice 
 without his slow tongue being once moved to full 
 expression. He thought, however, he had told her 
 all he meant and that she had acquiesced in his 
 view. If this were the real Euth willing to stay 
 in the Hall of AVaiting — why should he go to Mil- 
 ford? 
 
 The girl wanted to know why he came ; when she 
 saw a troubled look pass over his face she knew 
 the explanation was due. She waited but the wait 
 was so long that at last she asked, 
 
 "Why have you come, Paul? I see that some- 
 thing troubles you. Is there some fact you do not 
 like to tell? Oh, tell it quickly, Paul," she said 
 beseechingly. "Waiting is worst of all. One 
 can stand it when the hero is far away but when 
 he is here moments are agony, if it keeps his wish 
 in suspense." 
 
 "Have you ever been in Milford?" he asked. 
 
 "Oh, yes," she replied. "Papa took me there 
 once to a convention. He heard the talks and I 
 saw the buildings. I thought it would be so nice 
 to live there with those great halls, libraries and 
 museums ; but best of all were the fine houses for 
 the boys. I thought of Bowman with its poor
 
 202 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 dorms and my heart sank within me at the com- 
 parison. But when I came home I said, 'I like 
 xMilford, but I love Bowman,' and so I am con- 
 tented to stay here. 
 
 *'Do you like Milford, Paul? You used to be 
 there often playing ball and once since as umpire, 
 were you not?" 
 
 ''I may go again and stay," said Paul. "Read 
 this." 
 
 Ruth read. A burst of joy ran through her as 
 she read. Paul deserved all that was written and 
 more too, thought the girl. But there was a tinge 
 of displeasure when she read of Professor Miller's 
 opinion of Bowman's smallness. 
 
 "He does not know us, Paul," she said. "If 
 he would come and see for himself he might admit 
 we were in the race for greatness, too. ' ' She stood 
 a monument absorbed in thought; then her face 
 beamed, a queer light shone in her eyes as she 
 seized the red and blue banner in one hand and 
 the national emblem in the other. Springing on 
 the bench she waved them aloft. Had she been 
 conversant with Sunday School tableaux she 
 might have been supposed to be doing the conven- 
 tional stunt. But of posing she was free. She 
 had never mingled with picnic crowds. To her it 
 was a natural outburst of joy, a consequence of 
 long-felt inner yearning coming to the surface. 
 She was passing from the stage of passive ap- 
 preciation of a world behind, to an active partici- 
 pation in a world ahead. She had a vision of 
 work, a call to reap in God's harvest. She was 
 not sex but action. Ahead were noble deeds. 
 Her eyes shone as the stars and her dark cheek 
 turned pale. The uplifted arm made her seem like 
 a goddess bearing aloft the torcli of progress. 
 
 "Oh, Paul, let's make an Oxford of Bowman. 
 Let's redeem Pennsylvania. New England is a 
 frozen place. God's light glitters not there, but
 
 THE HALL OF WAITING 203 
 
 on us. Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania," she cried 
 waving aloft the red and the blue, ''once you led 
 the world! Do it again." 
 
 ** Bowman, Pennsylvania, the world — what a 
 trio to chain to our chariot wheels ! What trophies, 
 what laurel wreaths, what world records to de- 
 posit in the hall of fame ! ' ' 
 
 ''Come, Paul, on to the fight. The cohorts must 
 be faced. I see them — dragons, scorpions, ser- 
 pents, night-walkers, black, black ravens. Ugh! 
 they look fierce, but they will turn at our approach. 
 What Bo\vman did to Penn we can do to them. 
 Oh, Paul, Paul, that is better than 6 to 4. " 
 
 She approached Paul; put her arm in his. In- 
 teresting sight, he in the land of doubt, she on 
 the hill of expectation. Ahead of him was nought 
 but mist and confusion : she looked down the slope, 
 across the river to Huddleton's glum factories, 
 longing to attack this citadel of Pennsylvania 
 woe. The cloud of smoke visualized to her the 
 thousands of dull, pained lives it hid. Each flare 
 meant somebody's pain, somebody's danger. 
 Often had she looked and longed but no visible 
 mode of attack appeared. Now a thought came. 
 They could rush down the slope, wipe a stain from 
 Pennsylvania honor. Paul was irresistible; he 
 always won. No, no, they would not run off 
 through the forest on a magnificent charger. They 
 Avould cross the river, attack McCabe in his 
 stronghold. McCabe, the treasurer and fund- 
 gatherer for the Republican party; he who cor- 
 rupted the legislatures and blocked reform. 
 
 Bowman was above the clouds. There dwelt her 
 people — pure, serene and happy yet without vision. 
 Barton when he sought money to build a new 
 chapel said, "Bowman is safe; her professors 
 walk the streets of Athens in the morning and 
 spend the afternoon at Oxford." Huddleton never 
 saw the sun. Filth and tin cans were its orna-
 
 204 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 ments, rum its joy: noise deadened its groans: 
 smoke hid the sights from which the town got its 
 name. Men riding home from a 24-hour shift; 
 little girls torn from bed to drag weary hours in 
 the silk mill. Why seek distant grails when the 
 dragon throve on neighbors' blood? McCabe 
 first; then mount the charger for their mystical 
 adventure. 
 
 So thought the girl, pressing forward as if she 
 would go that instant. Her companion was as 
 ever, an immovable rock. He could boom a town, 
 fight a duel, buck the line, go over the top, or seek 
 Captain Kidd's treasure, yet he could not realize 
 that girls were unwilling to sit demurely on the 
 elaborate pedestal he had reared for them. If 
 Buth were in a dragon's den he could break 
 through its walls, but wiien rescued he could not 
 let her trudge by his side to share in victories yet 
 to be won. He did not want his mother to bake 
 pies — he scorned Colonel Saunders for this praise 
 — yet he had never asked himself what mother 
 was to do. His eye turned backward, not ahead. 
 Oh, for mighty leaps, great stunts, undo-able feats. 
 The hoarse voice of God would have aroused re- 
 sponse; but not pleading. A mighty mobile is 
 he v/hose starter does not work. He had all the 
 virtues of the decalogue doubly compounded. He 
 had kept the commandments from his youth up 
 and Christ's as well. Generous, sympathetic, un- 
 selfish, yet a queer turn in his idealism thwarted 
 it all. He could work for woman but not with her. 
 Team work was not in his vocabulary. So he 
 turned his companion from an inspiration into a 
 tempter. Her sex unconsciousness was merely a 
 bait to increase his. As she stretched out her arm 
 toward the town to beckon him on, her sex charm 
 was made more evident by the fact she was un- 
 aware of it. Curious, is it not? Woman is near- 
 est sex when she is farthest from it. If she would
 
 THE HALL OF WAITING 205 
 
 only dress, hide herself beneath folds of cloth, 
 then he could say, "Stay and work." Yes, but 
 for whom? Not to fight McCabe but to review 
 ancient, long-forgotten woes. He felt the pressure 
 on his arm but did not yield. She was above the 
 sex level to which he was pinned. Who said 
 woman was sex? No, it is man. 
 
 So they stood, a blaze of enthusiasm and a 
 monument of resistance. He wanted to talk but 
 could not. She yearned to act, was ready to face 
 danger, the world ; nothing but a conquered world 
 was her quest. A beautiful vision which Paul was 
 just the man to fill. 
 
 There was a look of confidence as she looked 
 up into his face and cried, 
 
 "Yes, yes, Paul, we can redeem Pennsylvania. 
 We can make the world. ' ' 
 
 It should be noticed she said "we," not "you." 
 Her vision was not of a waiting for the hero's 
 return nor of being a picture on the w^all, but of 
 work, struggle and conquest. The ive should face 
 the world together, one in thought, one in action. 
 She could toil in the hayfield or face sacrifices as 
 great as those of Paul's mother — if she could do 
 it hand in hand with a mate. Together nothing 
 is a task; apart, nothing is gain. 
 
 It would make a happy ending if it could be 
 recorded that the two arm and arm at once faced 
 the future together in her spirit and his strength. 
 The story then could end right here in a blaze of 
 glory. Yes, this is the place for the horn to blow 
 and the rocket to mount the sky. But, however 
 pretty the picture, it would be a lie. Men are not 
 ready for such a solution. Kisses and candy — ^yes, 
 they are good providers. A picture on the wall, a 
 statue in the park; some, not all, are ready for 
 these, but from real comradeship and mutual par- 
 ticipation men shrink. In fact, neither Paul nor 
 the Professor stood in as good a relation to
 
 206 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 womankind as did Rev. Samuel Dickson. Mrs. 
 Dickson's acts were often misguided, but she was 
 a force that all must respect even if they did 
 not admire. Mr. Dickson always said "we" and 
 meant it. Paul and the Professor always thought 
 in terms of " I " or if they said " we " they meant 
 ' ' we males. ' ' In spite of the book on which they 
 toiled, in spite of the zeal for woman's wrongs, 
 in spite of their affection for "Mother" and 
 "Ida," they were still without the walls of the 
 golden city, like Moses they looked at the prom- 
 ised land from afar. 
 
 Had Paul been an artist seeing the glow, the 
 zeal, the eagerness, he would have been inspired. 
 But Paul was a dreamer, yes, more, a dreamer of 
 male dreams. The reality he missed; so went 
 astray when a momentous decision was open to 
 him. He saw classes and groups while she saw 
 persons. Both had imagination but his vision 
 presented what the race had done — hers what it 
 yet had to do. 
 
 Every woman is a combination of Joan of Arc 
 and a madonna. To her she is a Joan, and would 
 dash ahead to some world conquest. To him the 
 woman is the madonna, never the Joan. He sees 
 sex where she sees action. To go means to the 
 bridal chamber, not to victory. All art, all litera- 
 ture, all life is nothing to him but a repetition 
 of the same sex theme. Whether it be frontal 
 picture of a magazine, the thrill of a story or the 
 voice of siren song, his interest fades unless the 
 madonna looms in the background. Hence he 
 drags Joan from her pedestal, turns her campaign 
 of action into a brutal love feast. So it was, is 
 and always will be. Paul was a man, a good man, 
 yet with all the traits and blemishes of other men. 
 A million years of evolution cannot be remade in 
 a generation. Therefore, he failed as the Pro- 
 fessor failed on the night of Ruth's confession.
 
 THE HALL OF WAITING 207 
 
 He could not throw off his maleness and be human. 
 He swung forward under the pressure of some 
 internal repulse and yet did not move. The strug- 
 gle was deep enough to make him confused, but 
 not ardent enough to free his soul. Like the Pro- 
 fessor on the similar occasion he tried to justify a 
 course of action which had instinct, not reason, 
 behind it. The renunciation he wanted and his 
 reasons for it would not pair. 
 
 Paul talked, and as in all his talks he blun- 
 dered. Then in confusion he rambled. He could 
 not make his sentences go anywhere but she, like 
 any quick-witted girl, could catch the meaning 
 from a broken flow of words. Before Paul had 
 really started to set his stern conditions she was 
 clear through them and far beyond. She stopped 
 him. 
 
 ''Paul, which means more to you — the book 
 you write or teaching? Would you write or talkl'^ 
 
 "Oh, Ruth, the book means most to me. I had 
 rather make men think well of women than to 
 make them myself. It is the power of mothers 
 that we need. My small stock of morality would 
 not go far at Milford if the boys did not quicken 
 at the thought of their mothers." 
 
 "Then stay, Paul, and let me help. Girls are 
 useless toys and toys are sometimes out of place. 
 But in the Hall of Waiting we can amuse each 
 other while those who do are doing." 
 
 The puzzled look was still on Paul's face. He 
 wanted to speak and make things clear. What he 
 had thought seemed now out of place and new 
 thoughts did not come. At last he blurted out, 
 
 ' ' I could work better if I were left alone. Some- 
 times men need help, and sometimes not. A book 
 is a struggle with wiiat's within. The confusion 
 is in one's head and not outside. For it there is 
 no help except the slow clambering toward the 
 light that each must do for himself. Even my
 
 208 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 motlier now has left me. Let me alone: when I 
 reach the light I will bring back a message that 
 will cheer. I want to help Avomen ; raise them all 
 to Mother's level. My work is for women but it 
 is through men I must work; they hold the key 
 to woman's life; I must teach them to make the 
 change I want. While I work I must be a man 
 and see the world as men do. Woman's day is yet 
 to come. Ours was yesterday; theirs is tomor- 
 row. ' ' 
 
 Throughout this talk Ruth had listened in great 
 expectation ; she had hoped that Paul would find 
 a place for her. But near its close, when the point 
 was clear, the tears were glistening in her eyes. 
 She did not weep, however, nor even let her dis- 
 appointment be shown in the quiver of her lip. 
 She turned quickly and cried, 
 
 ''Paul, I have one more thing to show. Those 
 who have to wait have one more device to pass 
 the time. Come, see the Hall of Trophies." 
 
 She led him to a quiet nook where over all — on 
 every bush and shrub — were flags, trophies, balls 
 and other emblems of atliletic sports. 
 
 "To this place the waiting come to live over 
 the pleasures that once were but now are gone. 
 In those days there were heroes with us and we 
 were with heroes. What they did leaves a pleas- 
 ing impress but the thought is more enduring if 
 some token in remembrance of the deeds is kept 
 and cherished. The woman sees and waits. The 
 hero does and goes. To her the great was yester- 
 day — a thing that was; to him, it is tomorrow — a 
 deed to do, a blow to strike, a word to write. So 
 she has a view of what has been ; he a promise of 
 what is to be. Each has a pleasure; while they 
 smile they pass, for she looks back and he goes on. 
 They cannot face each other again until he has 
 made his mark, and coming home unites the is of 
 today with the was of yesterday. Look back,
 
 THE HALL OF WAITING 209 
 
 Paul, and see what has been, as seen by one who 
 saw but did not act. Oh, that is wrong. Once 
 I went myself, I could not wait. 'Twas yesterday. 
 Can you forgive me, Paul — for yesterday?" 
 
 She looked up pleadingly while Paul gave a 
 start that she could not interpret. Paul 's yester- 
 day was a vivid run from Ruth. How could she 
 know of it, he thought? Even if she did, why 
 should she ask forgiveness? She could not wait 
 for Paul to see the point. It was so nice to have 
 him here looking at her. Oh, that for which she 
 wished had come. Paul had come and looked. His 
 eyes never for a moment were off her. This w^as 
 a taste of heaven she could not lose. She must 
 keep him and enjoy the look. What is the bitter- 
 ness of tomorrow in comparison to a moment's 
 bliss today? 
 
 *'Look, here is a handkerchief with a stain. It 
 is my blood, Paul. Once I jumped from path to 
 path while the boys were in chapel on the opening 
 day. As I jumped I fell and cut my face. At first 
 I was faint and motionless; then I felt the pres- 
 ence of some one bending over me. Looking, I 
 saw a boy, the biggest boy I ever saw, yet he 
 was a boy, Paul, although bigger than a man. 
 He took me in his arms and tied my face with his 
 handkerchief. Then he sat me on the grass and 
 said, ' You jump so fine I '11 see if I can do as well 
 myself.' Then he jumped, and, oh, you should 
 have seen how his muscles acted. Each did its part 
 that very first day as well as now. I laughed with 
 pleasure to see so fine a leap. He jumped and 
 jumped again to make me laugh, the merrier my 
 laugh the farther he jumped. Then the boys 
 came gathering to see him jump still farther. Who 
 could this fair-haired lad be? I must tell the 
 boys of a new hero. I thought of the handkerchief, 
 tore it from my head and looked. There was 
 written on it in a mother's hand, ' Paul. ' I jumped
 
 210 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 to my feet and cried — 'This is Paul, boys. He'll 
 break a record yet for Bowman.' 
 
 "Do you see this stone, Paul? By it I remem- 
 ber the first day you ran in the -freshman-sopho- 
 more contest. They jeered the lubber as he first 
 came up and mocked him as he ran. Twice around 
 the sophomore gained; louder came the cries of 
 scorn ; some rang a cowbell in derision. * Why put 
 an ox in a sport f ' they cried and jeered the louder. 
 The third round went an even race, but as they 
 passed the sophomore had a heated face and 
 gasped for breath. But the tread of the ox was 
 firm, his breath was free. They turned the last 
 quarter neck-and-neck, but now the freshman took 
 a spurt and came on in a double pace ; his great 
 feet tore the gravel from its place and one stone 
 came rolling into my lap. This is it. Where was 
 the sophomore? Oh, he lay beside the track. They 
 dropped the cowbell to help him up while Paul 
 crossed the line in victory. This was the begin- 
 ning and soon came better tilings. 
 
 "This flag I waved the day the Cornell team 
 came to run a cross-country. The start was even; 
 we waited long to see the return. At last we saw 
 some one dimly through the trees. Was it the 
 giant or the kid? At the first we could not say, 
 but when I saw great stones come rolling down the 
 slope and tree-tops wave in unison with a mighty 
 tread I did not wait to see the face. I jumped and 
 cried, ' It is Paul. Paul and Victory ! ' There are 
 other banners — a score or more — and each brings 
 up a pleasing picture of a victory. But this alone 
 I'll wave again. I carried this the day we won 
 from Pennsylvania. Look at it, Paul, 6 to 4 — 
 why was it 6 and why not more than 4? It was 
 'Paul! Paul! Paul!' We all shouted until we 
 could not speak and then we rose and waved our 
 flags. It was all for Paul and victory. 
 
 "Now Paul thinks of leaving Bowman. A
 
 THE HALL OF WAITING 211 
 
 larger duty calls him hence. But can there be a 
 greater duty than the one he owes to Bowman? 
 Bowman is" Paul and Paul is Bowman. Their 
 greatness is one and inseparable. Come, Paul, 
 let's shout for Bowman once more and make the 
 woods resound as of old. Here is the flower that 
 stands for Bowman. Let me put it on your breast. 
 Do not fear — I'll not react this time as once I 
 did, Paul. Can you forgive me that? Some pres- 
 sure from within, I don't know what, raised my 
 lips — and then the impulse carried me on. It 
 was so, Pauh But do not fear me now."^ 
 
 But again she raised her lips and again looked 
 longingly in his face. Paul started, hesitated and 
 wore that pained expression which always came 
 when thought and action were not clear. 
 
 "Promise, Paul, you will not leave, at least not 
 until the book is done and mother's honor vindi- 
 cated." Paul took her hands and looked her full 
 in the face. "I promise that," he said, "to you 
 and Bowman." 
 
 "I will make a promise, too. You shall not be 
 the only one who makes a sacrifice for Bowman. 
 There is the hall, the study and the book. They 
 are yours. The way is clear. Go, Paul, work in 
 leisure. You need your time and strength with 
 no one to bother. Keep the rose. Let it remind 
 you of duty and Bowman. And I'll wait here and 
 cheer those who must abide in the Hall of Waiting 
 until the hero's return. Go, the path is clear." 
 
 She led him part of the way; then stopped and 
 watched him move on. She felt a great stirring 
 from mthin and very faint, but she must not show 
 it. A mighty resolve held her until he turned a 
 corner. Then her cheek paled; the garlands she 
 wore dropped as in sympathy. As she sank she 
 looked up imploringly and sobbed, 
 
 * * Oh, God, what a crime to be a woman. ' '
 
 212 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 XX 
 
 His Vision Cleaks 
 
 Paul went slowly down the path. Too agitated 
 to think of writing, he left Euth not because he 
 willed to do so but at her command. Half a dozen 
 times as he walked along he felt like turning back. 
 Once he stopped but could think of no good excuse 
 for his return. There was a charm about Ruth 
 he never before had felt; her words that at first 
 confused him now began to have a meaning. He 
 kicked the stones from the path for a time; then 
 the old thoughts of duty and mother, rising 
 afresh, brought new decision. *'It is for the 
 best," he said, ''now I can work; when my work 
 is done I'll find what all this means." He went 
 on, not to his work but to his room. Taking out 
 his notes, he tried to get them in shape for the 
 next conference. The chapter was on "Narrow- 
 ing Woman 's Activities. ' ' 
 
 This was a lecture Paul had given with great 
 pleasure. Now he hoped to incorporate it into 
 the book. But as he viewed the notes the thought 
 stole over him that he was not living up to his 
 own standard. Yet how he failed he could hardly 
 fathom. He must be free, untrammelled. The 
 work was for all women. Should not a single 
 woman be willing to help? He only asked what 
 was the good of both. So he argued; yet the rea- 
 soning did not quite suit him. 
 
 The picture of the girl, her smiles and tears, 
 kept coming to disturb him. He rose and paced 
 the room. The more he paced the less the unison 
 of his thought and the deeper did the picture 
 work into his being. That sweet uplifted face 
 kept coming back. It was a face he had often 
 shut out but now as it came with renewed force
 
 HIS VISION CLEARS 213 
 
 Paul had no will to resist. Before it had meant 
 passion, now it meant resignation and tears. 
 Could she be bad and yet so sweet? Could one 
 love Bowman, for Bowman yield, and yet be what 
 he had so often thought her! What had he 
 thought her- On this Paul was not quite clear. 
 He could recollect reaching a fine decision but the 
 run of his thought was now gone; he feared he 
 had wronged Ruth. Could he have misjudged 
 her? He trembled at the thought for it seemed 
 a dreadful thing. 
 
 What had he said? Was he stern, cold, or 
 worse? Did he cause the tears and did her lip 
 tremble because his words were harsh? He went 
 to his desk and read anew the speech he intended 
 to make. When Paul wrote this he thought it 
 embodied the spirit of sacrifice; now it seemed 
 the essence of selfishness. What right had he to 
 make her sit in the Hall of Waiting while he 
 worked? If the world were to be divided, was 
 it not selfish to take it all for himself, saving a 
 small nook in the garden? 
 
 He tried to think that the good of all stood 
 over against the good of one, but now this thought 
 seemed trite. He stamped his foot, walked the 
 floor ; as he walked it seemed that all he had ever 
 thought of Ruth had been said to her in the gar- 
 den. He could not get it straight. Had he called 
 her bad? Had he said she was a reversion? Had 
 he implied that she was not fit for the free world? 
 Had he said that she dragged him down? 
 
 *'I must have said it all," thought he, '*or 
 worse. It was on my mind and had I not said it, 
 why the tears?" The trembling form seemed 
 now to prove that he was harsh; the beseeching 
 look seemed to ask for justice. Paul trembled. 
 A feeling stole over him he never before had 
 known. The little girl stood before him plead-
 
 214 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 ing for her rights, while a selfish tyrant gloated 
 in his power to crush. 
 
 Out of the confusion one clear thought arose. 
 It made Paul shake in anguish. He went to the 
 window and with his open fist gave a tremendous 
 blow; then he struck his head with equal force. 
 
 *'I have done a mean, degrading thing," he 
 cried. ''There is a blot on my soul I can never 
 efface. That I should stoop so low — to take ad- 
 vantage of a woman " 
 
 Up to this time Paul's muscles and nerves had 
 worked in unison. Orders from above were car- 
 ried along quickly, each muscle did its part and 
 then waited in silence for a new command. Now 
 all this discipline disappeared. Movements 
 seemed to start at any point and when once 
 started they rolled along from one extreme to 
 the other in entire disregard of the ordinary 
 routes. Muscles strove against each other; he 
 seemed broken up into a hundred units, each act- 
 ing for itself. Paul threw himself about the room 
 and stamped his feet. 
 
 At last decision came. 
 
 ''She shall not stay in the garden," he cried. 
 "The Hall of Waiting is no place for her. She 
 has been free — let her be free again. The house 
 is hers. The study is hers. Let her come and 
 go as she will. Let her sit and see us work as 
 she has done in former days. 
 
 "Yes, yes, she shall have her liberty. I shall 
 not narrow the life of the one woman I know 
 even to make the rest go free. Go to the garden 
 when you will, but be equally free to join us in 
 the work. I shall go and tell her so. I'll take 
 back all these conditions and be no longer the 
 cause of tears. I've been a fool, a damned fool." 
 He bit his lip as if to recall an impious expres- 
 sion, yet he felt relieved, as no other phrase 
 ruited his mood.
 
 HIS VISION CLEARS 215 
 
 He left the room and started across the campus. 
 But as he went he walked more slowly. Finally 
 he stopped. The old difficulties were rising up in 
 a new form, fuiding shelter again behind liis 
 mother. Her last talk before he went to college 
 came up fresh but now somehow he caught a re- 
 semblance between his mother and Ruth. AVhat 
 could it be? The stopping was to think of this. 
 The shape of his mother, rising, blocked his way. 
 
 Up to this time Paul had always thrown the em- 
 phasis of the talk on the first part ; he had ahvays 
 seen his mother's look as she had said, ''Beware 
 of useless women. They are a snare from which 
 even strong men have no protection. ' ' Jii this he 
 could see no resemblance to Ruth. But now 
 another look revived. It came with her closing 
 words when he had said he would marry a woman 
 just like his mother. 
 
 ' ' No, Paul, not like me — like what I might have 
 been. ' ' 
 
 It was this look, sad but expressive, that now 
 reminded him of Ruth. What was it his mother 
 might have been that she was not! Paul had 
 often said that there was nothing to be added to 
 the glory of her life ; he felt tliis now as fully as 
 ever. But what had his mother meant? Why did 
 her look remind him of Ruth? Was there some- 
 thing in a woman he did not understand? Were 
 there longings that a life like his mother's did 
 not fulfill? To this thought Paul could give no 
 answer ; the more he thought of it the less satisfy- 
 ing was the trip to Ruth. He must solve this new 
 difficulty. So he turned back to think it out. 
 
 To Paul his mother meant work and duty. Even 
 his earliest recollections gave her the character 
 by which she was afterwards known. For home 
 and family Mrs. Brown toiled ; no one ever heard 
 a word of complaint nor did her pleasing smile 
 ever depart. She was cheerful ; the hardest day's
 
 216 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 work seemed only to give her increased freshness. 
 Her pains, if she had any, she kept to herself. 
 Her family never heard of them. So what was 
 it? Paul queried what she would have been that 
 she was not. He had heard the oft-repeated tra- 
 dition that his parents were the handsomest 
 couple that ever entered the old church; but to 
 Paul handsome in a woman meant vigor, work 
 and duty. "No wonder," thought he, "that 
 father was proud to walk beside such a woman. ' ' 
 So, too, would he. Paul called to mind the 
 many occasions when, after dressing his father's 
 wounds and helping him rise, he had kissed her 
 hand, called it soft and white ; often he had named 
 her his flaxen-haired darling. "You are just as 
 lovely, just as lovely, as you were when a bride." 
 When the tears came to his mother's eyes, the 
 honest Paul thought his father was joking. He 
 kicked his father's knee and sturdily sought to 
 defend her. "She is not soft and white. Father, 
 nor is her hair flaxen. Her hand and arm are 
 as hard as yours, or mine, and she works much 
 more. Why do you call her names!" 
 
 "Paul," said his father, kissing his mother's 
 hand again, "you do not see straight. Your 
 mother is as she was, a fair-haired girl. Others 
 change, but she is the rose she was yesterday. 
 Some day, Paul, you will see your mother as she 
 is." But this the slow-thinking, realistic Paul 
 could not see. His mother was not a beauty. She 
 was a worker, good and true. He resented the 
 words that made his mother cry. 
 
 Now these scenes touched Paul in another way. 
 Could it be that his mother in any way resembled 
 Euth? Had his mother ever been a free, happy 
 girl with no thought other than to pass the day? 
 That it could be so at first displeased him. It 
 seemed to detract from the beauty of the char- 
 acter he so dearly loved. But he must know what
 
 HIS VISION CLEARS 217 
 
 all this meant. How could he find what his mother 
 had been, and what it was she might have been 
 for which she cherished so strong a wish? 
 
 Mother was gone. Father was gone. Oh, how 
 he wished he could ask his father. But it was too 
 late. He thought of the old soldiers still remain- 
 ing who would know of his mother's youth. He 
 felt impelled to make inquiries. But a better 
 thought came. At his mother's death he had ac- 
 quired his father's letters, written during the war. 
 Paul held these so sacred that he had never open- 
 ed them. Now he felt a longing to read them and 
 to see what they told of his mother. 
 
 Paul took them down, read letter after letter. 
 They told of war, of deeds, but they told also of 
 love. ''Think of your wives as you fight," was 
 that tradition recorded as Captain Brown's 
 maxim. His letters showed that he was ever con- 
 scious of his. He again and again referred to 
 the beauty of her in such terms that Paul could 
 not doubt. 
 
 Then came the last letter. "We had a fight 
 last week. I was so badly wounded that I could 
 not write before. I fell in the charge and lay for 
 hours between the lines, helpless, Avith shot and 
 shell pouring over me. It was a wonder I was 
 not killed as many others were. But as I lay my 
 relief was to take out that old picture of you — 
 the first you ever let me have. It is a fragment 
 now, having been broken three times by shots that 
 have struck me. The face is still left with just 
 enough of the rest to be a reminder of you. The 
 front view you cannot see but there is an angle 
 hard to find which brings out the face as fresh 
 as ever. So I lay under fire, holding up the pic- 
 ture once in a while, getting the slant that 
 brought my angel to me. Oh, what a blessing it 
 is to have a wife so beautiful that the sight of her
 
 21B MUD HOLLOW 
 
 stills the pain of wound and thirst. God has 
 indeed been good." 
 
 This letter gave to Paul a new conception of 
 the mother. In such a place his father could not 
 have wished to plague his mother. He must at 
 least have felt what he wrote. "Oh, could I see 
 my mother as father saw her." As he said it he 
 felt a sharp something in the bottom of the pack- 
 age which proved to be what was left of that pic- 
 ture at which his father gazed. It was broken 
 in a dozen places, its edges testifying to its rough 
 usage. Which was top, which was bottom, which 
 the sides, could no longer be told by an inspec- 
 tion. It was merely an irregular piece of glass. 
 Paul seized and held it up with a happy laugh. 
 Now he might find the truth. But move it as he 
 would, no picture came in sight. There were 
 rough blotches on it. Paul turned to wash them 
 off, but then the thought stole over him that it 
 was his father's blood dried on the picture. 
 Could he wash off his father's blood to view it? 
 He shuddered, but finalh^ he cried, 
 
 ' ' I must see mother. Father, forgive the sacri- 
 lege. I must see her as you have seen her." 
 
 Soon the plate was clear. Paul again searche I 
 for the angle which would bring out the vision 
 he sought. But in vain. Turn it as he might the 
 angle could not be found. At last he rushed to 
 the window and held it far outside. And then — 
 was it accident, was it some fresh ray of light 
 or was it an inspiration f There stood out as if 
 alive the sweet, fresh face of a growing girl. 
 
 ''Mother," cried Paul, ''mother, it's mother." 
 
 So it was. The face was at once different and 
 yet just the same as the face he knew. When 
 the two were brought togetlier, the woman's face 
 seemed to be changed and absorbed into the girl's. 
 Paul could not now — try as he would — bring back 
 the dark, sober face of his mother. She became
 
 HIS VISION CLEARS 219 
 
 to him the girl she always was to the father. Thus 
 Paul recognized what his mother had been and 
 what was in her mind when she said, "Not like 
 me, but like what I miglit have been. ' ' He jumped 
 to his feet at the thought. "My mother was a 
 beauty," he cried, "just like Ruth. It was the 
 war and its burdens that made her hard features. 
 She wished to have had another life and might 
 have had it but for the duties which that war 
 imposed. Once she was free, happy and innocent. 
 She took a burden which was not her own ; the dis- 
 figurements it created were taken by me to be her 
 real form. Oh, mother, can you forgive me so 
 base a thing? I have wronged you. I thought 
 you ugly when all that 's ugly was in me. ' ' 
 
 Then Paul's thoughts ran back over the many 
 misconceptions of women that he had entertained. 
 "Yes, I have wronged you and all the women I 
 have known. Girls are not made for work. Their 
 duties are fixed by nature ; let nature set the time. 
 If they have feeling, interest and love should 
 they be despised? No, let them be what nature 
 wills. 
 
 "Yes, I have wronged my mother, I have 
 w-ronged Ruth. Ruth has said that I would break 
 a world's record; I have done so. Who else has 
 so misconceived the interest tliat women have had 
 in him? Mother is gone, but Ruth is here. To her 
 I will show repentance that will right myself with 
 w^omen. Yes, to her I'll go and seek forgiveness." 
 
 With action suited to his words Paul rushed 
 across the campus, toward her house. He did 
 not stop at the gate but jumped the fence with 
 a bound. Every muscle was now alert ; mind and 
 body were once more in unison. Each part, re- 
 mindful of yesterday, was now keyed so high that 
 wdth the jump each strove to do more than its 
 part. "That was a fine jump," cried the eye 
 from above. "We cleared the fence bv at least
 
 220 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 eight inclies." Paul thought not of this but 
 rushed to the house, through the study, into the 
 garden, then back again. Ruth he did not find. 
 
 While this was going on Ruth had returned to 
 the house. He had asked her to dress. What 
 should she Avear? How could she make herself 
 resemble his mother? A happy thought. In a 
 chest were her mother's belongings, together 
 "with many heirlooms of preceding generations. 
 She tried them on, one after the other, fixing her 
 hair to match the pictures of their owners. Which 
 would Paul like? Which would remind him of 
 mother? She tried this, she tried that. None 
 seemed exactly to satisfy. 
 
 Suddenly a heavy step was heard in the hall, 
 a familiar step, the one she wanted to hear, but 
 for which she was not yet prepared. 
 
 The step distanced, going down the path to the 
 garden. Now it was coming back. ''Where is 
 she?" she heard him call. 
 
 She knew he was coming. She seized and cast 
 aside many garments but could not decide which 
 to wear. AH was confusion, a helpless confusion; 
 neither mind nor hand was fitted for the task 
 they should perform. The step crossed the study, 
 again. She trembled as it approached her door 
 but could not stir either to dress or call. 
 
 Paul entered without a knock. He thought in 
 terms of spirit not of body; was not in reality 
 but in a world of dream. He had always gone 
 straight to his goal. She was his; he was hers. 
 Why should the lack of dress bar his way? The 
 spectre Ruth had made clothes unimportant. 
 
 There was a spell on both of them. He could 
 not talk; she could not dress. He was spirit; 
 she naked flesh save for the garment with which 
 a woman never parts. The color left her face, 
 she trembled as he approached; then with a 
 scream she fled to a corner of the room, seizing
 
 HIS VISION CLEARS 221 
 
 a dress to partly hide her bareness. Often had 
 she planned such a scene. Now when it came she 
 shrank from its consequences. Her father's talk 
 had done its work. She had learned her lesson; 
 Paul had liis yet before him. 
 
 ''What do you want!" she cried. "Why are 
 you here?" 
 
 ' ' I want you, ' ' he blurted out. 
 
 ''Never," she cried. Straightening herself, she 
 seemed inches taller in her dignity and earnest- 
 ness. Paul was too much absorbed in his own 
 thought to think what he was doing, as others 
 would see it. Nor was he in a mood to quail before 
 opposition. He seized her and drew her to him. 
 The eager muscles overdid their task. Yet the 
 pressure did not hurt Ruth. She seemed to come 
 under a charm that made her mind and muscles 
 fail. As the charm increased somehow the feeling 
 crept over her that Paul meant her no harm. Ho 
 drew her to himself and kissed her many times and 
 then, holding her in his hands he raised her far 
 above his head, and looked at her. 
 
 Recoiling, Ruth tried to break loose. She had 
 thought she would like to be captured but facing 
 capture she rebelled: nor did she know she was 
 modest until her modesty was tested. 
 
 ' ' You are mine, mine only. My lost mother you 
 must replace." 
 
 Ruth shook her head. 
 
 ' ' The book, the book, you should write the book. 
 In it there is no place for me. ' ' 
 
 "So I thought an hour ago. Then mother and 
 you stood opposed — ^now you blend. The book 
 and you are one. 'From girl to womanhood,' 
 that will make a new chapter in which you shall 
 be the inspiration and the model." 
 
 "Oh, the joy to have heard that an hour ago. 
 Then I loved, wanted to be yours. Now I want 
 freedom, self-expression, a test to show my mettle.
 
 222 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 Men seek the unknown — strive for the impossible 
 — why should not IP' 
 
 ^'Why test the impossible when a completed 
 realm is at hand? Think of mother, her glory 
 and praise. Not only I but the whole town saw 
 her nobility and bowed in adoration. Beauty and 
 virtue — what more can a woman ask than to be 
 respected in her own right!" 
 
 "Paul, were you like your father a victim of a 
 cruel war, helpless and dependent, I could care 
 for you as your mother did for him. You are not 
 that, but a giant dragging his victims behind 
 his chariot. I know how it is. 1 cheered with 
 the rest to see deeds done in which I had no part. 
 But another epoch has dawned! The joy of life 
 is not in being captured but in offering self in 
 love. Yesterday's hope is the terror of today. 
 You are a brute. Let go." 
 
 The eager driving look, the look that meant con- 
 quest and brought admiration, faded from his 
 face, yet his hands were too palsied to obey her 
 command. 
 
 Ruth peered at the beckoning glow without and 
 then at Paul. Freedom and love stood opposed. 
 At length the zeal for self-expression conquered. 
 
 "Yesterday, 'he is mad, she did it' echoed down 
 the street. The reaction made me like your mother. 
 When I put on my mother's clothes I felt like her, 
 but when I took them off I felt relieved. To be 
 happy I must be myself. I cannot be like my 
 mother — a picture on the wall, nor like yours — 
 a burden-bearer of woes she did not make." 
 
 "Oh! Ruth, do not say that. My mother was a 
 burden-bearer and yours a picture. But they were 
 more! Think of my father, your father and me. 
 What could we be without you ? When broken men 
 came home in defeat harsh tasks fell on women. 
 Now tasks fall on men. Be to me what your 
 mother was. She made your father — make me."
 
 HIS VISION CLEARS 223 
 
 *'No, Paul. The wall is no place for me, nor 
 am I a hospital to relieve distress. But were I 
 to choose between your mother's tasks and my 
 mother's smiles I would be your mother and 
 not mine. I can't run races nor buck the line. But 
 I have muscles and mind. They are designed for 
 use.^ What it is I must find by testing myself 
 against the world. Yesterday I would not have 
 dared to do it. The sound of a creaking limb made 
 me shriek. But today — oh! Mrs. Andrew, how I 
 thank you for the lesson — I know a woman's ter- 
 rors are within — not without. In this new mood 
 I must see the world. I must be a partner; feel 
 that I give as much as I get. It is work that 
 should inspire. When all have tasks and common 
 goals — then we can love. For that men are not 
 ready: some want slaves, some wall pictures but 
 none wish to give woman a place under the sun. 
 Yes, a place under the sun — I like that phrase. It 
 expresses a need; for it I must seek. Good-bye; 
 my new yearnings will lead me I know not where, 
 but I follow them — I must. ' ' 
 
 She advanced and offered her hand; as she 
 looked into Paul's troubled face she came under 
 his spell and was tongue-tied as he. 
 
 There they stood inches apart in body and miles 
 apart in thought. Each felt the stress of new- 
 found power and the glow of a new ideal yet 
 neither could transfer this thought to the other 
 and thus span the breach that yawned between 
 them. 
 
 So they stood with a wall in front which kept 
 them apart and a wall behind which prevented 
 retreat. Each seemed guilty of fault. Their 
 external and internal matched 'as little as did their 
 thought. Finally Ruth broke the charm. She 
 turned; the setting sun throwing fagots in her 
 eyes lured her on. 
 
 ''The world, the world, the great throbbing
 
 224 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 world. From it I came, to it I go. "Weary feet 
 are better than a throne of thorn. ' ' 
 
 A tramp, a rustle and Paul stood alone. His face 
 flushed and paled by turn. Thought strove with 
 msh. Then muscle won. Springing after he laid 
 his hand on her shoulder and cried, 
 
 ' ' If you go I go ; where is McCabe ? ' * 
 
 XXI 
 
 McCabe 
 
 It would not be fair to McCabe to judge him 
 through Ruth's eyes. At least the Hnddleton 
 News should be heard in his defense. The two are 
 one. McCabe owns the steel mill, the paper and 
 everything in Huddleton except the silk mills 
 which Tupper, Strauss & Co. control. When re- 
 formers were placed on the Bowman lecture course 
 the News entered a protest insinuating that a 
 discredited agitator was the source of the move- 
 ment. This w^as a drive at Professor Stuart. No 
 names were used. The Professor had too many 
 friends to be openly attacked even by the omni- 
 potent McCabe. 
 
 Still, the statistics quoted by the News are 
 worthy of consideration. A spot, so it said, which 
 had been the rendezvous of loafers and horse 
 thieves had been transferred by McCabe into an 
 enterprising town of 75,000 inhabitants. There 
 were 103 churches, 27 schools and acres of three- 
 deck houses. All these were owned by McCabe, 
 who standing on his wide porch went into ecsta- 
 sies over the improvement. ' ' That ! " he exclaimed, 
 as he viewed from afar the glowing mills and 
 the acres of crowded tenements. ''That is 
 about as near heaven as the multitude can get.'* 
 
 Yes, plenty of bread and potatoes. No danger
 
 McCABE 225 
 
 of starvation and a chance for the maimed to be 
 supported by their children in the silk mill. Mc- 
 Cabe said it was better to have children trained 
 by Strauss than to support orphan asylums. He 
 had never been in the region from which the peo- 
 ple came, but if his description were even in a 
 measure correct, Pennsylvania is a Paradise and 
 he a world benefactor. The profits of the mill 
 had increased 17 per cent., wages 19 per cent., 
 showing nicely that the workers had gained more 
 than he from his masterly enterprise. A glance 
 at the figures also showed that house rent 
 had increased 240 per cent., the McCabe acres 
 having a book value of $820,000 instead of the 
 original $12,000. They also revealed that food 
 values had increased 90 per cent., giving convinc- 
 ing proof of the tariff. Just who paid these bills 
 is obscure but it could not be those whose dinner 
 pails looked full, but smelt of cabbage and rotten 
 beef. Nor was it made clear how ]03 churches 
 draped in somber hues could offset 372 saloons of 
 rainbow attraction. 
 
 So much for statistics. A view showed that 
 churches were barns projected into the street, 
 with no ornament except the placards announcing 
 a coming doom. As their chief support came from 
 McCabe, the pastors reflected views of their bene- 
 factor as expressed from time to time in the 
 Neivs. 
 
 This worthy sheet was not without spasms of 
 reform in one of which it intimated that the silk 
 mills might improve. The next day the Strauss 
 limousine stopped before the office, its occupant 
 entering behind a 40-cent cigar. The interview 
 was short and to the point. ' ' What did the News 
 mean by attacking business?" If there is any- 
 thing a Pennsylvania editor dislikes it is the 
 charge of interfering with business. The next
 
 226 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 morning the McCabe statistics were again quoted 
 followed by an article on the tariff. 
 
 McCabe was the only one who could make Quay 
 stand around. So said Ms friends and so said 
 the News. ''Pennsylvania morality is safe so 
 long as he is at Harrisburg. ' ' Nor was he without 
 lofty ideals. Driving his family thereto, he be- 
 came thus the terror of the five imported daugh- 
 ters-in-law who had to live as he prescribed. The 
 McCabe fortune had its attractions but it was a 
 sad illusion so long as the purse-strings were 
 tightly grasped. Josephine, the third in birth rank, 
 expressed the unanimous view when she said that 
 the only thing good in Pennsylvania was the train 
 to New York. More Pullman seats were sold in 
 Huddleton than any other town except Pittsburgh. 
 Huddleton would not be endurable without New 
 York nor for that matter could New York exist 
 without Huddleton and Pittsburgh, whose mag- 
 nates cramp and starve their neighbors all the 
 year that they may pass a few wild nights on 
 Broadway. 
 
 The glow of Fifth Avenue is but the reflection 
 of a distant hell into which unwilling victims are 
 cast. Some resource is misused, some town de- 
 graded, to create the flow of funds on which our 
 magnates thrive. From Pennsylvania, rich in 
 resource, trains go loaded and come back empty. 
 For the better half no return is made except in 
 literary tomes designed to convince the recipients 
 that exploitation is not robbery. McCabe is justi- 
 fied. But nature revolts ! Never does rising sun 
 see children yanked from bed to increase the great 
 Strauss dividends, nor the veteran cripples of the 
 steel mill tramping in their beggar garb, but that 
 it shrivels, reddens and would strike but for the 
 sight of happier regions beyond. Pennsylvania 
 slumbers but humanity rankles at the sight.
 
 PART II 
 
 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 Its Life Interpreted 
 
 We are not what nature makes us, hut what 
 we make ourselves. Not deeds but character is 
 the measure of an age.
 
 1. 
 
 The Apology 
 
 When a man who has spent his life in one field 
 enters another he offers an apology for the in- 
 trusion. Stories and theories have been isolated 
 by rigid law. Why face the criticism their blend- 
 ing involves? Too often professors get their 
 theories from books, yet occasionally, like the 
 much-praised work of Darwin, theories are not 
 antecedent to facts but a consequence of them. 
 
 My world is as different from that in which 
 I was reared as the England of Darwin was from 
 the tropics. The group in which I was born was 
 the most rigid religious body Scotland has pro- 
 duced. For centuries its members maintained 
 their isolation, never intermarrying with neigh- 
 bors. I was also reared in a Western village 
 where every one thought the same thoughts, ate 
 the same pie and used the same tools. A mere 
 accident gave me a German education; a second 
 brought me to Philadelphia ; a residence in Scot- 
 land gave contact with my family origins. This 
 is not a trip to South Seas but its effect is fully 
 as marked. 
 
 Some new basis for opinion must be found even 
 if it opens the charge of theorizing. The World 
 War is in part the cause of this. Who has not 
 seen idols fall and who has not found that noble 
 schemes rested on soft banks of clay? But while 
 war cleared the decks, causes lie deeper. The 
 wreckage would have happened even though de- 
 layed or brought about by other events. Mankind 
 for ages has accepted certain principles which 
 when put to the test have failed. Were these 
 failures the result of inexperience they might be 
 excused — but the war was handled by experts in 
 
 229
 
 230 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 each of its several lines. Financiers controlled 
 war expenditures and yet they were worse man- 
 aged than in previous wars. Diplomats who con- 
 trolled war policies were those trained to their job 
 yet lamentable were the results. Our political 
 principles were tried only to show how they fell 
 short of meeting the situation. A group of stock- 
 yard butchers might have had less regard for 
 human life than the generals but would have made 
 no more mistakes. Have poets, orators, editors 
 come out any better? There are few instances in 
 which their record rises above world diplomats, 
 financiers and generals. 
 
 After such a display the first thought is that of 
 world degeneration and to it many resort for an 
 explanation. But when one looks about he sees 
 no evidence of tliis. Men live longer, are more 
 active, have better blood, and stronger muscles 
 than their forbears. The decay is not physical; 
 it is mental, spiritual, logical. It is those who 
 think or at least should think who have failed. 
 There is something wrong in the basis of our 
 thought: our premises, our historical interpreta- 
 tions, our long-standing traditions need revision. 
 
 It is this of which many are becoming conscious 
 and to which the jar of the War has made im- 
 portant contribution. Before, we all thought the 
 world was nearing the end of a splendid epoch. 
 A few finishing touches and the edifice would be 
 complete. Reformers had definite plans for reach- 
 ing Paradise and a rigid logic to su^jport their 
 claims. All these have been smashed by the frost 
 of reality. Everywhere men are retracing their 
 steps, searching for deeper foundations on which 
 to build. This change affects bold thinkers even 
 more than the conservative. Socialism, anarchy, 
 revolution have gone to pieces along with the rest. 
 Their rocks have proved sand-banks, from which 
 have risen a crude search for new beginnings that
 
 THE APOLOGY 231 
 
 lands the searcher in strange fields. A friend who 
 rotted in jail because of convictiens is now en- 
 gaged in revising the Golden Rule. A second, 
 the hero of ten jail exploits, astonished his friends 
 by asking for a Bible. A third jailbird of glorious 
 plumage is now the occupant of an orthodox pul- 
 pit. It amuses at first to see a friend who preached 
 revolution in times past now wanting listeners 
 to love poems. It is not that the poetry is good 
 or bad — but the going back to first principles and 
 getting an outlet for emotion in new channels 
 which deserves attention! We are all doing this 
 and when we do, crossing conventional lines, we 
 astonish our friends by showing interests of which 
 they were unaware. 
 
 My thought movement has not been different 
 from others ; but my disillusions are different be- 
 cause the rocks in which I had confidence w^ere 
 not in the same strata. What was thought to be 
 nature has proved to be mere complexes made 
 general by the peculiarities of past civilization. 
 Human nature is vaguer, more emotional, with 
 fewer of the rock attributes than was thought. 
 
 Good men carry a load of goodness which bars 
 their advance. Give a boy this load and see him 
 struggle to free himself. Free a girl from an- 
 cestral clamps, let her mount the ladder which 
 leads to freedom; then picture her disillusion as, 
 facing the world, she finds her heroes have toes 
 of clay. This is a plot to express which forces 
 me into a new field. If all have gone back to a 
 firmer basis, each new start will break some con- 
 vention, shock observers and reveal the iconoclast 
 in a light astonishing both to himself and friends. 
 We must all sink or learn to swim in new world 
 currents. 
 
 Both novelists and educators make use of Rous- 
 seau's slogans. *'Back to nature," they cry, but 
 the return of the novelist is a return to the primi-
 
 232 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 tive way of viewing nature. He describes the 
 cloud, the storm, the sunset, the mountain, the hill 
 and the valley, and assumes that human action re- 
 sponds to these wonders. 
 
 By ''nature," however, disciples of Rousseau 
 mean the contacts with external objects which 
 evoke our instinctive responses. It is what we 
 touch, the obstacles we encounter. There is 
 thus a thing w^orld and a wonder world. The 
 thing world is the source of our mechanical re- 
 actions; the wonder world revives our primitive 
 emotions. They create the problem Rousseau 
 sought to solve. Isolating them creates the novel, 
 and modern educational theory. The wonder 
 scheme of the novelist is false as an interpretation 
 of life. Equally so is the mechanical control 
 through material contacts. 
 
 While in scope I agree with Rousseau, his first 
 sentence illustrates our difference. ''Everything 
 in nature is good; everything degenerates in the 
 hands of man." It would be a useless task to 
 follow Rousseau's proof. The problem is there 
 today as in the past, but the advance of science 
 permits a statement more exact. The theologians 
 taught that man was depraved. Rousseau 
 asserted that man was perfect. While Rousseau 
 and the theologian differ as to the source of de- 
 pravity, both accept the fact. ' ' Depravity, ' ' says 
 Rousseau, "is the result of man's interference 
 with nature. " This gives a new source of deprav- 
 ity but does not alter its nature, no more the 
 means of preventing it. Rousseau's morality is 
 as Hebrew as that of the theologians. He, like 
 them, emphasizes sacrifice, humility, duty and 
 other conventional virtues. There is as much 
 repression in submitting to the dictates of nature 
 as in accepting those of the Hebrew prophets. 
 
 It is at this point that the thought of today 
 clashes with both these views. The issue is not
 
 THE APOLOGY 233 
 
 how men became depraved, but whether or no 
 they are degenerate. Depravity is the lack of 
 character; degeneration is its loss. The issue 
 again is not whether depravity is visible in each 
 age, but whether the depravity of an age has an 
 influence on succeeding ages. Can men inherit de- 
 pravity as they do brain and muscle? or is it mere- 
 ly a temporary effect which heredity fails to pass 
 along? Do the sins of the parents fall on the 
 children of the third and fourth generation, or is 
 the sin as dead as the sinner? 
 
 My answer questions these intellectual dogmas. 
 Men are safeguarded from sin not by imposed 
 personal restraints, nor by artificially created vir- 
 tues — ^but by the removal of the antecedents of 
 sin. Depravity is not man-made nor God-made, 
 but the measure of defective adjustment. Every 
 improvement altering the relation of men to their 
 viron frees succeeding generations of some an- 
 cestral depravity. 
 
 In stating this doctrine there is a shift of view 
 and evidence of which the reader should become 
 aware. In the past, evidence for and against evo- 
 lution was biologic. The problem today, however, 
 is not of slow or fast evolution, but whether or 
 no, during the historic epoch, there has been an 
 actual race degeneration. In this new contro- 
 versy the orthodox biologists are almost to a man 
 on the side of degeneration. It should be 
 noticed, however, that the evidence educed is not 
 biologic, but physical, of which, to say the least, 
 biologists are no better judges than are their op- 
 ponents. If the second law of thermo djmamics 
 proves that the sun is losing heat, life must de- 
 generate, but this ultimate fact does not prove 
 that the loss of sun heat is the source of the as- 
 sumed decline of historic civilization. The evi- 
 dence for this must bring the controversy into a 
 field foreign to biologic thought.
 
 234 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 The decline of civilization so often repeated in 
 human history has been due to a shift in domi- 
 nance from a sensory to a motor type. The sen- 
 sory minded fail and their civilization has broken 
 in every age and region when for survival think- 
 ing becomes more important than seeing. The 
 interim is that in which advanced nations suffer, 
 * and on which the evidence for degeneration de- 
 pends. 
 
 / Two points I shall try to make clear. What, in 
 /physical terms, is the measure of the change from 
 / sensory to motor activity ; secondly, what is the 
 change in thought and morality which separates 
 the new groups from their forebears. The 
 opinion of biologists and historians on these 
 points might be compared to the opinion of the 
 last sabre-toothed tiger as he saw a monkey chat- 
 tering in a tree. Could he be expected to believe 
 that life was advancing? It is only when the sur- 
 vivors look at the bones of their ancestors that 
 the reality of evolution becomes plain. The men 
 controlling national affairs during and since the 
 AVorld War are as well fitted for their task as the 
 tiger was to throw a stone. Not they but their 
 successors will glimpse the world to be and bring 
 mankind into it. 
 
 The Surviving Element 
 
 Survival today is not different in its essence 
 from what it was when the five-toed horse roamed 
 the prairie. Elimination is still at work. The 
 crop of unfortunates grows. Where are the forces 
 which eliminate? 
 
 Our ancestors were comrades of the monkey, 
 who in their evolution represent a turning-point 
 in evolution. The dominant response up to this
 
 THE SURVIVING ELEMENT 235 
 
 time was that of anger. The insect stung, the 
 ram bunted, the dog bit ; the monkey ran. There 
 is thus a change from an anger response to that 
 of fear, to explain which is to get the key to human 
 evolution. 
 
 Another way to measure the contrast is to show 
 that the reactions of older organisms w^ere indi- 
 vidual. Each animal carried in himself the 
 mechanisms on which survival depended. There 
 were no other means of transmitting traits except 
 by heritable, nervous mechanisms. The insect and 
 the mammal were thus a bundle of complex nerv- 
 ous adjustments which gave the proper response 
 to given conditions, but which became hindrances 
 under altered circumstance. 
 
 These animals represent the acme of the de- 
 velopment of inherited traits. The monkey, domi- 
 nated by fear, imitated, remembered, associated, 
 gained the concept of antecedent and consequent, 
 and was thus able to profit by experience. Each 
 of these shows the nature of the alteration. Ac- 
 quired traits were substituted for those which are 
 transmitted. If an animal imitates it does what 
 it sees done, not what its inherited responses 
 demand. If pain is anticipated by fear, some 
 acquired pattern displaces inherited responses. 
 
 In the monkey as in man there is a conflict be^ 
 tween acquired and natural responses. Natural 
 traits, becoming hindrances, have degenerated; 
 even if men respond to objective stimuli the re- 
 sponse is less effective than formerly. The first 
 problem therefore in human heredity is not, how 
 can natural traits be acquired? but what are the 
 forms in which the decay of natural traits mani- 
 fest themselves? 
 
 The struggle of the normal middle class with 
 the subnormal below and the supernormal above 
 represents the two kinds of survival already out- 
 lined. Between the normal and the subnormal the
 
 236 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 contest is of two kinds of heredity. Between the 
 normal and supernormal the struggle is between 
 two types of culture. Natural traits determine 
 survival in one case; acquired traits dominate in 
 the other. Li the one struggle there is a loss of 
 animal responses ; in the other there is a resistance 
 to the modification of acquired judgments. The 
 normal middle class thus promote physical de- 
 generation and oppose changes which increase ad- 
 justment. They crush those whose natural in- 
 stincts are strong ; they crucify the innovator who 
 offers new forms of action. 
 
 The obstacles to progress and to degeneration 
 are thus more severe than is usually assumed. 
 The surviving middle class alter their acquired 
 traits but slowly. On the other hand physical 
 degeneration is equally difficult. Each new age 
 starts with the same physical heredity as its fore- 
 bears and will be normal to their situation except 
 as it is degraded by some new form of dissipation. 
 The germ cells of the delinquent are not affected 
 by his errors. Social degeneration merely affects 
 persons or classes. While always present, it is 
 a class eliminator, not a race degenerator. The 
 middle class, ruled by its codes, rigid in its tradi- 
 tions, goes its beaten path uninfluenced by the de- 
 generation of its social superiors. Despite the 
 moans of moralists and the predictions of scien- 
 tists there is little evidence of any modification 
 in normal life except those slow alterations to 
 which our heredity is subject. 
 
 What we do gets its value not in terms of well 
 being but in the way our children act. The wise 
 and the simple get jumbled together, neither being 
 better nor worse except as measured in the children 
 who take their place. Here is a woman who re- 
 fuses to bear children; there is a family who 
 cramp their offspring by false standards; yonder 
 is a man who refused to marry ; on the next street
 
 THE SURVIVING ELEMENT 237 
 
 is one who denies no selfish wish. All these people 
 go to their graves without influence on the morrow 
 of the race. 
 
 Heredity is a heterogeneous mass of conflicting 
 tendencies, some of which are recessive. A change 
 in the viron does not create new characters; it 
 merely alters the dominance of those already in 
 existence. Vironal pressure can eliminate no 
 type, but it can reduce numbers until the type has 
 little influence on the community. Any type, how- 
 ever small, could rapidly repopulate the world if 
 not distanced in the struggle of existence. A new 
 viron can, therefore, readily find types which har- 
 monize with its demands and bring them to the 
 front. 
 
 There is clear evidence as to the characteristics 
 of this type. The distinction hinges on the differ- 
 ence between sensory and motor traits. Some 
 people are capable of making acute sensory con- 
 trasts. Such men, dominant in primitive times, 
 are favored in survival so long as the viron is 
 local. Color, sound, taste and smell are im- 
 portant when the seen conditions welfare. A 
 man with dull senses and slow perception could 
 hardly have survived in the primitive world. 
 Elimination in its many sensory forms would ex- 
 terminate him. But when the conditions of sur- 
 vival are beyond the hills, in China or South 
 America instead of being in the neighborhood, 
 the traditions of the race must be revised. Move- 
 ment is more important than sense. Only he who 
 thinks not of traditional dangers and whose values 
 are neither ancestral nor personal is on the road 
 to adjustment. 
 ^ When a district is settled the rush brings dis- 
 similar elements with diverse tastes and men- 
 tal traits. At this time the region is full of 
 "characters," odd sticks, cranks, failures and 
 people who have been up against everything
 
 238 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 everywhere. "When land rises to fifty dollars an 
 acre a weeding process begins. The weaklings 
 move to cheap laud. Men working in the same 
 way, living the same sort of lives, acquire a sim- 
 ilar mode of thought. Each succeeding rise in 
 the price of land, sharpening this process, drives 
 out all above and below the standard set by pre- 
 vailing conditions. Pressure thus creates three 
 classes: the unsuccessful, the successful, and the 
 supersuccessful. Both the first and the third class 
 move cityward. Every village has its youth who 
 have made a mark. It is only the successful that 
 demand consideration, for they alone determine 
 home conditions. 
 
 Before the introduction of harvesters the farm 
 work fell within four months. The rest was really 
 spare time in which the population could enjoy 
 themselves. Machinery cut down the need of 
 surplus population in the summer months, and 
 extended the period of work to six, eight and 
 finally to twelve months. The new agriculture 
 has inclreased the product fourfold, while the 
 workers needed for each specific task are reduced 
 to a quarter of their former number. 
 
 Most people cannot stand twelve hours of work 
 for the w^hole year even if they could work six- 
 teen hours a day for four months. Women are 
 especial sufferers. It is one thing to live with a 
 man who takes a couple days off a week, and is 
 free all winter for sleigh rides, spelling bees, and 
 rural sports; and quite another to cook, make 
 beds, and wash clothes all the year around for 
 tired men whose thought is as rigid and mechan- 
 ical as is their daily occupation. 
 
 The corresponding town character is the hust- 
 ler. He is thick-built, square-jawed, with a quick 
 electric step. His forehead is sloping and its 
 crown flat. He shakes hands with a grasp which 
 makes one scream. He can eat anything, endure
 
 THE SURVIVING ELEMENT 239 
 
 anything, and has a contempt for those who can't 
 stand a sixteen-hour day grind all the year. It 
 would really be a virtue if he lied when he said 
 he had not had a vacation for twenty years; he 
 would sympathize with those who need it. As it 
 is, he converts his subordinates to draft cattle, 
 who drag themselves wearily home and are thank- 
 ful for Sunday to rest. The hustler thus destroys 
 the joy of the town. The movies can thrive, base- 
 ball stir local interest, but to the sensory minded 
 the place becomes a dreary waste from which the 
 only escape is absence. The mind of this hustler 
 is essentially commonplace. Everything new irri- 
 tates him. Strictly orthodox, he votes the straight 
 ticket and denounces the reformers who interfere 
 with business. He belongs to a half-dozen lodges, 
 likes their feeds and any rough amusement that 
 has some ''go" in it. His opinions are dogmatic 
 and his logic incontrovertible. There is only one 
 thing that can change him — a full-page advertise- 
 ment. This indicates to him a going concern, and 
 whatever goes he goes with. 
 
 With these conditions in the background the life 
 of the town can be readily pictured. There is an 
 upward movement that cuts out all below the 
 static level and works a repression on all above. 
 The standardized succeed; the unstandardized 
 leave town or drop into unmarked graves. From 
 year to year no change is perceptible, but each 
 generation — first, second or third, moving on a 
 bit beyond its predecessor — ^becomes more rigid 
 in its standards. 
 
 In the prosperous sections of the land a rigid 
 sameness prevails — not a low standard nor a high 
 standard, but a medium standard which represses 
 both the high and the low. People are neither 
 better nor worse than their neighbors. What one 
 does the others do. What one thinks the others 
 think. They eat the same pie, drink the same
 
 240 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 coffee, and enjoy the same ice cream. They wear 
 clothes cut from the same bolt and ride in the 
 same sort of automobile. The girls look like 
 twins, wearing the same hats, puihng their hair 
 in the same way, having the same high school gait, 
 and chewing the same brand of gum, at least until 
 the Ladies' Journal told them not to. 
 
 All our social life is being reorganized to meet 
 these conditions. Communities are no longer 
 Democrats and Eepublicans, Protestant and Cath- 
 olic, or even moral and immoral. They are merely 
 conformists or non-conformists, Morality, art, 
 taste or culture creates no bar against ostracism 
 if deviation is made from the straight path of 
 
 / conformity. Do as your neighbors do creates 
 safety ; no virtue will ward off the angry onslaught 
 
 , which nonconformity provokes. 
 
 * In a frontier town the first external repression 
 comes from the normal school. Girls going thence 
 return rigidly typed by the grind to which they 
 submit. They are fierce on spelling, pronuncia- 
 tion and all the foibles which a year's schooling 
 can impress. Assuming an air of superiority, 
 they start a conflict with local traditions which 
 ends only when the schools establish a rigid cen- 
 sorship over manners and speech. Then comes 
 the influence of the returning college students 
 drilled in classic thought. A far-off, dead world 
 is imposed on the partly living present. The old 
 Methodist minister, who saved the West by his 
 heroic activity, was a six-footer who on arriving 
 carried his furniture on his back from depot to 
 house. He had seen life, knew the world, even if 
 his accents were wrong. His successor is a con- 
 ventionalized easy-body whose ideas were ob- 
 tained from standard courses in dimly lighted 
 halls. He knows just what everybody knows, 
 which means he knows nothing but what can be 
 found in an encyclopedia. His old-fashioned pre-
 
 THE SURVIVING ELEMENT 241 
 
 decessor had been converted. He knew what it 
 was to sin, by sad experience. The successor is 
 merely drilled, labeled and beaten into shape by. 
 forces against w^hich he had not sufficient energy 
 to rebel. He is therefore a censor not a leader, 
 and distances even the school teacher in his oppo- 
 sition to any break in the local code. What hap- 
 pens here happens also to the lawyer and the 
 doctor. They have imported codes and prejudices 
 to enforce. One lawyer's opinions are exactly like 
 the others' and together they impose a mode of 
 thought on the community which bars intellectual 
 growth. 
 
 Such men are slow of thought, stubborn in deci- 
 sion; hard to convince by logical processes; me- 
 chanical in action yet at the same time vividly 
 imaginative, strongly emotional. They are effec- 
 tive in industry while stubbornly reactionary in 
 their social relations. The term "stand-patter" 
 is an apt description of their attitude. The old 
 church, the same pew, the rigid dogma, the inher- 
 ited political party with its antiquated platforms, 
 the patriarchal form of family and a patronizing 
 attitude in all their dealings with subordinates — 
 these and many other similar traits show them- 
 selves only too plainly. The crudely effective dis- 
 places the artistic, the old morality represses na- 
 tive impulses; the industrially antiquated is not 
 replaced by co-operative methods nor are women 
 transformed from physical playthings into busi- 
 ness partners and social comrades. Rational 
 methods are ignored, statistics are smiled at, free- 
 dom is repressed and originality crushed — not 
 from any inherent opposition but because they 
 interfere with habit, custom and comfortable tra- 
 dition. 
 
 These facts are not stated to emphasize them 
 but to prepare a way for the study of the forces 
 v/hich oppose. Over against the suppressions
 
 242 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 from without must be put the emotional outbursts 
 from within. Men dream instead of think, they 
 make their own mental world instead of passively 
 accepting what the senses offer. Just as man 
 conquers nature, just as square fields and straight 
 rows of corn reflect his superiority, just as har- 
 vests become plentiful and the granaries are full, 
 just as the material seems to have all in its grasp, 
 just then our inner impulse breaks its bounds, 
 sends a thrill through every nerve, colors every 
 blood cell and changes the current of thought from 
 the seen and felt to the vast, dimly lighted regions 
 where fancy knows no law. The goal is self- 
 expression, self-determination and self-mastery, 
 not unattainable piety nor the glitter of another 
 world ; but a transformed world makes the vivid 
 appeal. Such men are no longer Hebrew or Puri- 
 tan ; through their aspiration they create the urges 
 on which the Americanization of America depends. 
 Many forms of vague, insistent idealism are 
 making their force felt. The recent war has 
 shown how docile is the American public but it is 
 also showing that a new type of idealism is com- 
 ing into vogue. Which of the two tendencies will 
 dominate in the immediate future it is too early 
 to say; but that habit, tradition and convention 
 have met a new antagonist is not open to doubt. 
 The real force of the social lies not in trade unions, 
 industrial co-operation and distributive processes, 
 but in a vague feeling of comradeship which binds 
 not like with like, but which brings the dissimilar 
 into organic unity. The motor is blind to the dif- 
 ferences which keep races, classes and sexes 
 apart. We lost our sense of color and discrimina- 
 tion with the decay of sense vividness but with 
 them go our hates, our antagonisms and also our 
 logical stubbornness. It is these that keep us un- 
 social, and not anything in heredity. Motor men 
 are passive agents. They will do nothing
 
 SENSE DULLNESS 243 
 
 to break the crust which binds us to the past. 
 Psychic and vironal changes are working in the 
 right direction. We thwart them by our ignor- 
 ance and thus keep active the very forces our 
 good intentions would repress. 
 
 Sense Dullness 
 
 The differences of the sensory and motor types 
 are measured in three ways, their bodies, their 
 faces and their mental power. Men of the motor 
 type are of medium height, have broad shoulders, 
 sound hearts, are deep-voiced, with a slow-time 
 reaction and a low blood pressure. Their faces 
 are round, their chins square and their foreheads 
 sloping. Put a dozen in a row, compare them 
 with those of the sensory type, and their super- 
 iority is evident. "What magnificent animals," 
 the observer is likely to say. But this praise 
 needs a qualification when their mental power is 
 compared with the opposing type. They have 
 little sense discrimination ; their individual judg- 
 ment is poor. They are impulsive, fickle and imi- 
 tative. These traits give to the sensory minded 
 their claim of superiority and create the basis of 
 the charge that the dominance of the motor type 
 is a mark of degeneration. There is little danger 
 of the motor-minded disappearing. Their physi- 
 cal superiority is evident. Their falls into dissi- 
 pation are frequent but of a character that has 
 little effect on subsequent generations. Of seven 
 children in a family, it is not the four who die, 
 but the three that leave offspring who count. Dis- 
 sipation is not a source of race decline ; the effect 
 is race progress through the elimination of the 
 unfit. The charge of degeneration is more fitting
 
 244 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 when not the physical traits but the type of civil- 
 ization is under consideration. Much of what we 
 cherish as high is sensory, and depends not on 
 physical powers which are heritable but on ac- 
 quired complexes which fade or glow with sense 
 acuteness. 
 
 The evidence on this point is indirect yet posi- 
 tive enough to have weight. Physical growth is 
 mainly muscular with which is correllated the 
 growth of bone. The motor type has therefore 
 prominent bones; as bones are post-natal in 
 development, every irregularity in growth is re- 
 flected in some irregularity of bone development. 
 If the growth of bone is retarded the face and 
 body are covered with soft and well-proportioned 
 flesh. In this case we talk of Greek forms and 
 Madonna faces. Were the loss of beauty the only 
 effect motor growth might be condoned, but its 
 irregularities distort the features. The eyes are 
 seldom on a level; one socket is larger than the 
 other ; one side of the face grows faster than the 
 other; the hands have different powers.^ Motor 
 growth is asymmetrical. Every organ is some- 
 what distorted and often displaced. 
 
 These tendencies create force but they inter- 
 fere with exactness. The muscles of the eye are 
 attached to neighboring bones. If these are not 
 regular, eye-strains result, creating astigmatism 
 and other evils of eye adjustment. The growth of 
 bone, broadening the face, pulls the eyes apart. 
 This increases the powers of vision to apprehend 
 distant scenes but reduces the vividness of close 
 vision. Big differences are thus readily observed, 
 but the finer differences of color and form are 
 rendered indistinct. 
 
 Lincoln is an excellent example of face distor- 
 tion due to the irregularity of muscle and bone. 
 No two of his organs which should be symmetrical 
 had the same growth. His body as well as his face
 
 SENSE DULLNESS 245 
 
 showed marked irregularities, each of which must 
 have had effects on his physical behavior. No one 
 would think of him as a Greek model; still less 
 could any one call him a degenerate. He had 
 decision and this sufficed to give him a place in 
 history. In a recent prize-fight, all the features 
 of the one were in right proportion. Every one 
 admired and shouted for his success. His oppon- 
 ent was described as a plug-ugly, which perhaps 
 sets off the difference as well as any term. Yet 
 the Greek fell under his blows. Crudely formed 
 bones and unbalanced parts indicate a vigor Greek 
 athletes do not have. 
 
 The sense of smell is almost eradicated; taste 
 also is badly deteriorated. The fine discrimina- 
 tion of the epicure is lacking in the common herd. 
 They call for ham and eggs not from a lack of 
 income but because the finer grades of food taste 
 about the same. Drinks are enjoyed not from 
 their flavor but because they are hot or cold. The 
 typical woman has no taste except for sweets, 
 while the man has his sensitiveness degraded by 
 the use of tobacco. Jaws are made inactive by 
 the use of soft foods, which in turn reduces the 
 flow of fluids on which taste discrimination de- 
 pends. A club formerly offering a dozen break- 
 fasts now finds its members satisfied with oat- 
 meal, bacon and coffee. The dinners are similarly 
 restricted to a shiftless monotony. 
 
 It is interesting to measure your companions by 
 the way they handle the menu card. ''Ham and 
 eggs, ' ' says one without looking. He is healthy ; 
 no dark rings his eyes nor do nerves twitch his 
 hand. Ham and eggs are always reliable while 
 the chef's concoctions are open to suspicion. A 
 neighbor looks up and doAvn the menu, asks a 
 dozen questions, wonders what is the odor of each 
 dish and finally takes one with a French name, 
 hoping blindly that the unknown will create less
 
 246 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 misery than did yesterday 's meal. Count tlie min- 
 utes he waits and the number of his stomach 
 troubles stands revealed. For each new dish 
 tried, a new complaint voices its discontent. Such 
 are the differences in type measured in terms of 
 stomach. It is a problem of supremacy in which 
 the nerves and the muscles stand opposed. The 
 sensory type is alert to external facts, drawing 
 both joys and fears from world contacts. Today 
 nature smiles: joy reigns; tomorrow is dull: de- 
 pression follows. 
 
 The eye yields similar evidence. Glaring light 
 pleases more than variety and shades of color. 
 The flashlights on the streets show they are needed 
 to attract the dull-sensed. The stage is illuminat- 
 ed by a brilliancy that obscures all delicate forms. 
 In the movies the light is so intense that the eyes 
 of the heroine are her only visible feature. It is 
 impossible to represent other traits under such 
 a flood of light. From candle to lamp, from lamp 
 to electricity, is a road not of progress but of 
 sense degradation. 
 
 Most people are partly deaf by thirty. The 
 voice goes up and down in a mechanical way with 
 no musical trills. The throat muscles stiffen, 
 which makes the voice hoarse or produces squeaky 
 effects. Words are pronounced indistinctly; the 
 rhythms of speech largely lost. People do not use 
 half the sounds and variations good speech de- 
 mands. When they read they see about half of 
 each word or sentence with no muscular reaction 
 — ^which is the basis of literary taste. The world 
 is becoming ham, eggs and sugar, neither very 
 good nor bad, yet creating enough energy to meet 
 the exigencies of an eight-hour day. To bed or to 
 a ball game for the rest, with an occasional movie 
 or sandwich picnic thrown in for variety. 
 
 This may be an exaggeration, yet a potent 
 reality. All these sense defects are not to be
 
 SENSE DULLNESS 247 
 
 found in every individual, yet few are free from 
 some of them. American teeth have been ex- 
 amined ; not one in a million is sound. The army 
 tests its recruits only to find that three in four 
 fall below the good level of manhood. Were all 
 our senses tested with similar care the same la- 
 mentable degeneration would manifest itself. Our 
 growth is social, intellectual, moral — but not in 
 the domain of sense. 
 
 Sense discrimination is more muscular than 
 nervous : the voice depends on throat muscles, the 
 ear has its muscular mechanism which is liable 
 to many disorders ; the taste depends on jaw move- 
 ments which are reduced by the muscular degen- 
 eration of the lower face. The change in food, so 
 important in other regards, may be the main 
 cause, through the degeneration of muscles which 
 defective food promotes. Children dieted on por- 
 ridge, milk and sugar look finely in their early 
 years but soon show a lack of muscular power. 
 They become senile and fail to go through the 
 final stages of human evolution. Of porridge 
 suckers and milk-fed papooses there are plenty. 
 Doctors gloat over the number of infants they 
 carry through the first three years but the same 
 tested at twenty have not yet reached their tenth 
 mental year. There is something wrong in food, 
 muscles and nerves ; which are the worst sinners 
 experts must in the end decide, but we can meas- 
 ure their joint effect on human types and on civil- 
 ization even if the initial steps are not clear. 
 The dull sensory types are gaining a dominance 
 which threatens cherished institutions. 
 
 To hear the gong of an auto is more important 
 than the notes of a bird or the cry of an enemy. 
 We guard ourselves against bad food not by taste 
 but by chemical inspection. Differences in color, 
 sound and taste thus lose their importance. Words 
 go the same road; adjectives are of little use, as
 
 248 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 delicate shades of meaning have lost their signifi- 
 cance. Nouns and verbs become the only parts of 
 speech and with the change goes the need of their 
 declension. Only what we can strike or do has 
 importance. 
 
 The sensory man, in contrast to this, loves the 
 world as it is with all its variety of color and 
 sound, its mountains and lakes, its rocks and rills. 
 Such ideals need no muscles; there is little for 
 them to do. Gaze and contemplate. Sleep in the 
 shade; observe the moon and sunset. For him 
 there is a good historical background. The primi- 
 tive races were not producers. Their reactions 
 counted but for little. The external was vastly 
 more important as each leaf, color or sound might 
 mean death if wrongly interpreted. The enemy 
 and subtle danger were always at hand. ^ Only 
 a delicate perception and quick action could insure 
 safety. No wonder the nerves became sensitive 
 and thought reflected their condition. Perhaps 
 ,the best picture of these sense-evoking conditions 
 is to be derived from the trench-fighting of the 
 last war. Every instant demanded alertness. 
 Shocks were every^vhere ; noise never ceased. The 
 weak of nerves become subject to shell-shock. 
 War is nerve, nothing but nerve. So was the 
 primitive Avorld. Shock, shock, nothing but shock. 
 How could the dull of perception survive? AH 
 this is altered except in the stress of war or in 
 the life of the slums. There are no tigers or 
 snakes, no hostile tribes, no hidden foes. Millions 
 live day by day, year by year and never face a 
 danger which the sense sluggard could not avoid. 
 The stress of modern life is on the muscle. We 
 succeed by doing not by seeing. The duller our 
 senses, the stronger our will, the more we domi- 
 nate. The sense-active man, forced from the road, 
 eats others' crumbs and lives in a garret. 
 Do you like a flower, a sunset or a man-made
 
 THE AMERICAN BLEND 249 
 
 product? Would you go to an art gallery, or to 
 see a battleship enter the harbor? Would you 
 attend a symphony concert or seek an automobile 
 show? Do you like motion or color? A movie or 
 an art gallery? The answer to all these is plain 
 if the action of the multitude is observed. Color, 
 sound and words have but slight survival value. 
 The machine that does something has more emo- 
 tional force than what is merely looked at or 
 heard. An example of this is the automobile, with 
 the joy of control its manipulation gives. It is 
 ourselves extended. Nature's coloring is nothing 
 when we go sixty miles an hour. The horse also 
 gave this power of self-extension. Who does not 
 forget the sensory when he mounts a prancing 
 steed? What these succeed in doing any machine 
 may do. Muscle and nerve have had their strug- 
 gle : muscle won. 
 
 The American Blend 
 
 History is made not by what happens but by 
 what people wish had happened. No sooner do 
 events take place than myths appear transform- 
 ing the real into the wished. From this myth- 
 making tendency American thought is not free. 
 Despite a general knowledge of facts fancy rules 
 in every statement of them. It is assumed that 
 our ancestors v/ere Puritans who for religion, 
 liberty and lofty ideals sought the wilderness and 
 thus shaped the land in which we dwell. There 
 was a band of Puritans. The Mayflower did ac- 
 tually come to our shores. A few-score of liberty 
 seekers followed in its trail. But they are not 
 numerically our ancestors. Families of this sort 
 have died out or were exiled during the Revolu- 
 tionary War. None can show that more than a
 
 250 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 sixteenth part of himself was due to anybody 
 who came to this country for religion or liberty.^ 
 The mass of the emigrants were English clay of 
 a very common sort: redemptioners, bankrupts, 
 faded women, who preferred New England to old 
 English almshouses and jails. They wanted food, 
 rum and license. Being rapid breeders this ple- 
 beian element, becoming American, was able by 
 revolution to dispossess their masters. Where are 
 the descendants of Puritans? In Bermuda, Can- 
 ada, Nova Scotia — not in Boston. The "best 
 society" dined, danced and wined Britishers while 
 Washington wintered at Valley Forge. 
 
 The control of America by Puritan thought is 
 equally a myth. Since the Revolution New Eng- 
 land has been on the losing side of public issues. 
 New England protests never won popular sup- 
 port. Hamilton, Jefferson, Jackson and their 
 followers controlled up to the Civil War. This 
 subordination of New England is readily seen in 
 the reactions of the successive members of the 
 Adams family. Each generation found itself more 
 out of harmony w^ith the popular trend until its 
 final representative, Henry Adams, almost cona- 
 mitted suicide in despair. The New England atti- 
 tude is a minority attitude, a resistant attitude. 
 For good or bad — dominance is Western! As it 
 goes, so goes the nation. 
 
 The West has been an open field. A dozen 
 varieties of heredity and tradition have contended. 
 The stronger have won. The result however has 
 not been the dominance of any one heredity or 
 tradition but a blend of many contending factions. 
 No one can tell a Methodist from a Calvinist by 
 anything he says or does. In general terms it may 
 be said that the West is Scotch in thought, Irish 
 in action, Methodist in emotion. Put a Westerner 
 by himself, he argues like a Scotchman; bring a
 
 THE AMERICAN BLEND 251 
 
 hundred together, they become an Irish mob ; when 
 tested emotionally, they are Methodists. 
 
 What then is the essence of Scotch thought and 
 Methodist emotion? All the groups which have 
 come to America were dissenters representing a 
 depressed minority in some foreign land. Scot- 
 land, however, was the only land where minority 
 depression was long and intense enough to affect 
 thought. Of English oppression we have heard 
 more, but it never was severe nor long continued. 
 The nation never became Puritan in thought or 
 action. Our Puritans were mere half-breeds, mak- 
 ing much of little ; converts rather than beings to 
 their conviction born. Not having the persistent 
 force of Scotch Calvinists, they remained a help- 
 less minority or slid over into popular view. 
 
 Western thought like Scotch thought is clan- 
 nish. The world is rigidly divided into the good 
 and the bad. We are the good : our opponents are 
 the bad. God is on the side of the good ; the devil 
 take the bad. 
 
 There is, however, a difference in the applica- 
 tion of this reasoning. It is a majority not a 
 minority clan. A minority clan sets up articles to 
 protect themselves against the majority. They 
 talk of and believe in moral judgments, liberty, 
 conscience, self-determination and other slogans 
 of defense. These mean nothing to a majority 
 bent on eradicating heresy and suppressing differ- 
 ence. The similarity and mechanical nature of 
 occupations in the West have created this major- 
 ity tone. Where everyone lives the same life and 
 succeeds by similar means majority thought, be- 
 coming omnipotent, suppresses opposition. Tem- 
 perance agitation is a typical majority pressure. 
 Here is not a minority protecting themselves 
 against aggression but a majority who set no 
 bounds to their coercion. 
 
 Such thought, Scotch in form, is Irish in action.
 
 252 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 It is feeling, not individual judgment. A solid 
 majority never has a conscience nor does it re- 
 spect personal rights. The weak cannot as in 
 Scotland cross a mountain or hide behind a liilL 
 Dissenters are outcasts, driven into cities, sub- 
 jected to vile conditions and gradually eliminated. 
 Dominance is thus transformed into a condition 
 of survival creating a type which modifies hered- 
 ity in its favor. 
 
 The evolution producing these results can be 
 traced more readily in religion than in politics. 
 At the time of the Revolution the mass of the 
 American people formed an underworld over 
 which Calvinist restraint had but slight control. 
 They ate, sang, drank, rioted; land was cheap, 
 liquor plenty. Local influences -which checked vice 
 in Europe were largely lost. Against this vicious 
 flow Wesley, Whitefield and their disciples erected 
 emotional barriers which lifted thousands of fam- 
 ilies from the rut of depravity. 
 
 The spirit of the West came from these con- 
 verts, yet its logic was derived from the Scotch 
 who likewise moved over the mountains in search 
 of homes. Among them, however, there was a 
 cleavage between the Scotch and the Scotch-Irish. 
 The Scotch, clannish, aristocratic, had the narrow 
 defensive logic which goes with dissent. Back of 
 every opinion was an inferior complex, the bane 
 of protestantism. The North Irelander is nomi- 
 nally a dissenter but his position is that of super- 
 iority. He rules, never obeys. Even English 
 authority has failed to control him. He is thus 
 not a protestant in the English sense. Though a 
 minority, his code is one of dominance. He is 
 thus the worst possible citizen at home; the best 
 of citizens in other countries where he migrates. 
 There he is a patriot; alwajs standing for mass 
 opinion. To him our national Constitution is 
 due. He it was who saved the country from dis-
 
 THE AMERICAN BLEND 253 
 
 solution in the epoch when Jackson was hero. 
 There is no consciousness of dissent in such an 
 attitude nor does the logic of dissent weigh. 
 
 The West today is a blend of these elements. 
 Its emotion is Methodist. Its logic, Scotch, but 
 in action its Irish dominate. The farther West 
 one goes the more complete is the blend in thought, 
 action and heredity. The Methodists have become 
 Calvinists in thought; the Calvinists are Meth- 
 odists in emotion. All are Irish in action. They 
 shout with camp-meeting vigor; they grip vice 
 like a Scotch elder. Alone they will argue, but a 
 dozen never meet withovit forming a mob. 
 
 Methodism is thoughtless emotion; Calvinism 
 emotionless thought. While Methodists believe 
 in falling from grace they also believe in a con- 
 version which, purifying the heart, creates a state 
 of perfection. They get by their purification into 
 a condition which the Calvinist thinks he attains 
 through heredity. Both are sons of God, one by 
 birth, the other by adoption. So much of the 
 Methodist as a convert. But in time the church 
 becomes an orderly community with converts who 
 are not bold sinners, but children under fifteen. 
 Conversion to them is not a consciousness of sin, 
 nor even a call to repentance, but merely the heart- 
 thumping which music and eloquence arouse. 
 Children thus get into the second stage of Meth- 
 odism — perfection — without its first stage — the 
 consciousness of sin. Converted Methodist cliil- 
 dred are no different in their attitude from those 
 of Calvinist families. They merely attain perfec- 
 tion by another route. 
 
 I shall not try to decide what purity means to 
 the convert cleansed of his impurity, but what it 
 means to a child whose notions of purity are a 
 sublimation of personal cleanliness. His starting 
 point is a bath-tub, not the Cross. He idealizes 
 soap, not blood. His mother washes his mouth
 
 254 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 to purify his words, after which his teacher in- 
 oculates him with the thought of clean literature 
 and clean records. At puberty he associates pur- 
 ity with sex continence ; learns to hate girls, and 
 thus attains a lofty perfection attitude which does 
 not differ from what Calvinist restraint evokes. 
 When this happens Methodism and Calvinism, 
 differing only in words, can readily blend in one 
 system. 
 
 Scotch Calvinism is a clan whose ruler is God 
 but whose voice is the prophet. This view is 
 plausible so long as natural processes seem to re- 
 ward the good and punish the bad. But when the 
 sun shines and the rain falls on the good and bad 
 alike the warning of the prophet is discredited. 
 Calvinism is now transformed from a clan to a 
 world concept. Who is the saint in this enlarged 
 world and who is the leader on whom world 
 salvation depends ? The reply is the hero. World- 
 might is put in the place of God-might. The 
 clan is now this world remnant battling with popu- 
 lar tendencies. European thought has been con- 
 trolled by these vivid contrasts of world deprav- 
 ity and the chosen few, whether depicted as war 
 heroes or as literary genii. Such is Calvinism in 
 its modern form. A personal vision, a belief in 
 self-divinity, a world in which a million are bad to 
 the one capable of self-determination. It has a 
 driving force which, deceiving the few as to their 
 importance, creates a feeling of divinity among 
 leaders — only to show through their failures what 
 chumps they are. 
 
 In sharp contrast to this is another type of 
 divine call, of which Lincoln is an example. Myth- 
 makers reshaping him on a Greek model have 
 created a contradiction between their myths and 
 the oral tradition handed on by those who knew 
 him. I never saw Lincoln, but my father was one 
 of the seven Representatives who defeated him for
 
 THE AMERICAN BLEND 255 
 
 Senator in 1854. The attitude of such a man is 
 explained only by visualizing the local situation. 
 Lincoln was a Whig. Lincoln was an aristocrat! 
 He was trying to undermine the national Consti- 
 tution. The reader will say that this was not so. 
 The histories tell a different tale but I am repeat- 
 ing what Democrats thought of Wliigs and what 
 the well-meaning though misguided residents of 
 Northern Illinois thought of Lincoln. Northern 
 Illinois was Democratic, filled as it was by recent 
 immigrants from Eastern states who carried their 
 local hatreds with them. In my home county there 
 were only two Whig votes in 1852. Then came the 
 free soil campaign of 1854. The only pledge my 
 father gave was that he would not be bewitched by 
 politicians into voting for a Whig as Senator. 
 Imagine then his chagrin to find that he was not 
 only expected to vote for a Whig but for the worst 
 specimen of humanity he had ever seen. Lincoln 
 was the most clumsily constructed man who 
 ever walked the Illinois prairies. His face was de- 
 veloped on one side. His eyes had different levels. 
 His long central face was coupled with a wide 
 mouth and a monkey chin. So awkward was he 
 that girls would not be seen on the streets with 
 him. Nothing is so galling to a man as to know 
 that women will not greet him except for money 
 or position. 
 
 Against these barriers Lincoln strove, with 
 many defeats. He had long periods of depression, 
 at times meditating suicide. Then came the cam- 
 paign of 1858 with its famous debate. He had as 
 an opponent the most admired man of the state. 
 The debaters had to go into regions where every 
 one was a Democrat and all were prejudiced. 
 Surely this would make the reception of Douglas 
 enthusiastic and his victory easy. People were 
 asked to fall in line behind their party leader. 
 They preferred a strange man with a new call.
 
 256 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 So much for the facts. What was the effect 
 on Lincoln? Forgetting his physical defects and 
 the bitter humiliation of antecedent years, he act- 
 ed like a transformed man. From a scoffer he 
 changed into a believer. Why I He tasted a new 
 kind of inspiration in his ability to pass over his 
 emotion to people opposed in tradition and preju- 
 dice. He was moved by a mass inspiration instead 
 of the personal inspiration Calvinism evokes. 
 From that time he never asked what his fellow 
 Whigs thought but turned to Democrats for a 
 measure of the effects of his plans. He went as 
 fast as they did and in their direction. This is 
 called ''keeping one's ear to the ground," but 
 which is inspiration if the listener awaits the tread 
 of the mass and yearns its approval. 
 
 This illustration taken from a familiar episode 
 shows the change which came over the West in 
 the blending of Calvinistic thought and Methodist 
 emotion. The Calvinist had emotion but it was 
 of the closet variety. God came to him in soli- 
 tude, in a dream, in prayer. He became a prophet, 
 the voice of God, a thorn to the wrong-doer. 
 Where two or three are gathered there are Cal- 
 vinists, but in an assembly the moving spirit is 
 Methodist. Vague, shapeless, intangible, but de- 
 spite its shortcomings a higher impulse than the 
 scold of a prophet emerging from his trance. 
 Prophets bring codes; mass inspiration creates 
 will. 
 
 5 
 
 The Scotch Conteibution 
 
 The mental differences between the various 
 groups inhabiting the British Isles have received 
 much attention and often created bitter contro- 
 versy. The Scotch, the Irish and the English
 
 THE SCOTCH CONTRIBUTION 257 
 
 seem like different races and on this basis most of 
 the explanations rest. Buckle has given so good a 
 description of Scotch-English thought peculiari- 
 ties that it need not be repeated. The causes, 
 however, need emphasis because of the tendency 
 to refer them to inheritable race differences. It 
 is assumed that each section has a distinct race 
 antecedent, when in fact the composition of the 
 population is but slightly different. The con- 
 trasted thought traits are of too recent an origin 
 to be ascribed to race. Heredity is too slow 
 an agent to bring radical changes in a few cen- 
 turies. Sudden alterations are due either to emo- 
 tion or situation. There is no need to go further 
 to account for all the peculiarities seen in Britain. 
 
 To explain the source of thought alterations, 
 and to bring out the small part heredity has 
 played in them, a couple of new words are needed, 
 which I shall venture to coin. All descriptive 
 terms have a race connotation and thus emphasize 
 inheritance. To use them is to give opponents an 
 unearned advantage, as words turn thought into 
 accustomed grooves. The difference to be made 
 emphatic is that between dwelling in a rough 
 mountainous district and in pleasant valleys. I 
 shall call the dwellers of these rough upland dis- 
 tricts hillics to contrast them with vallics, who live 
 in the sunny vales below; and then endeavor to 
 show the importance of this contrast in explaining 
 so-called race differences. 
 
 The valleys are the center of tribal conflicts. 
 They are the desirable locations and hence the 
 reward of the victor. The defeated are driven into 
 undesirable districts and hold their own among 
 the mountains and hills. We thus start \\^th the 
 difference between the victor and the victim, and 
 on this basis seek to account for thought differ- 
 ences. The conquered hating the conqueror ac- 
 quire inferior complexes which narrow their
 
 258 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 views. There is also a loss of the weak and shift- 
 less who are attracted to the valleys by the lure 
 of pleasure and luxury. To guard against this a 
 rigid morality develops among the hillics which 
 teaches sacrifice and purity as means of offsetting 
 the luxury and indulgence seen in the town. These 
 tendencies favor an austere religious tone which 
 leads to Calvinism. Start the economic difference 
 described, couple it watli race hatred and a narrow 
 range of economic choices, and the seeds of all 
 sorts of dogmatism find a fertile soil. 
 
 The beliefs of Scotland are not new. They are 
 brewed wherever similar conditions prevail. The 
 conquered have always fled to the hills, and hated 
 the valley dwellers who have driven them out. 
 They have moralized about towm luxury which 
 they were unable to have. Scotland in this respect 
 is merely a belated specimen of long-standing 
 tendency, of which an early example was the He- 
 brew race. The Jews were of the hills ; they could 
 never hold their own against the lowland races. 
 Every great conflict saw them on the defeated side. 
 Thought peculiarities were a natural consequence, 
 as was their revival in Scotland under similar 
 conditions. 
 
 In the valleys w^here conquerors dwell opposing 
 tendencies prevail. The better food conditions 
 promote luxury and trade; new wants arise and 
 demand gratification. Wealth is concentrated, on 
 the basis of which an aristo<;racy arises. A social 
 division is thus formed with a lower class made 
 up of drifters, captives and slaves. A vallic group 
 thus tends to form classes and to become hybrid 
 in its race composition. Conquerors soon become 
 aristocratic, luxurious, and rotten. Work falls to 
 the under class, in whom degenerate tendencies 
 dominate. Rome and Greece are as good examples 
 of vallic urges and their consequences as Palestine 
 and Scotland are of the forces to which hillic tribes
 
 THE SCOTCH CONTRIBUTION 259 
 
 succumb. The thought isolation of Scotland and 
 England is thus not new, but merely a continua- 
 tion of old tendencies under modern guises. It 
 is not difficult to trace the origin of either mode of 
 thought. They have arisen and thrived in a multi- 
 tude of ways since history began. 
 
 The real problem is to determine whether they 
 are emotional and hence subject to rapid change, 
 or are the result of the permanent alterations 
 which heredity achieves. The similarity of the 
 economic conditions under which they arise points 
 to a vironal explanation. Heredity cannot act 
 quickly. If it were the cause, the different places 
 where these two types of society appear should 
 have some connection in physical heredity. In- 
 stead of this, the many experiments in aristocratic 
 societies are isolated in blood. Only the acquired 
 elements of civilization are carried over from one 
 race to another. If to these facts we added the 
 emotional effect of inferior comyjlexes, the growth 
 of hillic concepts is readily explained. The vari- 
 ous vallic societies are likewise explained bv the 
 thwarted emotions which the creation of classes 
 evokes. Couple economics with emotion, and an 
 explanation of history results which does not de- 
 pend on the alteration of heritable traits. 
 
 My interest as a student of history was excited 
 by the suddenness with which these thought 
 changes occurred both in England and Scotland. 
 In Shakespeare's time English thought ran in 
 different lines from its Eighteenth Century de- 
 velopment. The upper class has grafted on its 
 original stock ideas which only Greece, Rome and 
 Italy can explain. This is apparently due not to 
 a change in race but one in economic prosperity. 
 In Scotland likewise Calvinism is a late graft. 
 Early Scotland was tribal, with fierce contests not 
 far above the level of Indian wars. Knox and 
 his group were importers of thought ; only by be-
 
 260 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 coming Calvinistic was the unity of Scotland se- 
 cured. Scotch economic life due to the lack of 
 resources was meagre and rigid and thus served 
 as a contrast to English luxury. Scottish exhort- 
 ers talked of Babylon and Rome but their real 
 hatred was of English domination and English 
 extravagance. The many Eighteenth Century re- 
 bellions show its force. Only after Scotch stom- 
 achs were well filled did they acquiesce to English 
 rule. 
 
 What seems heredity is merely pent-up emotion 
 for which the present viron affords no outlet. 
 Block human nature at given points and inferior 
 complexes result which seem heritable, but which 
 after all readily disappear when new emotional 
 outlets permit life to run in normal channels. 
 Breeds are made only by rigid elimination, in 
 which the halter and the stake have played notable 
 parts. 
 
 Tradition represents an easy-going acceptance 
 of majority opinion. Minority resistpnce is 
 against this mass opinion. Seeking a basis to op- 
 pose the majority, individual preference is set up 
 as a guide to action. This leads to an emphasis 
 of principle and the putting of deduced conclu- 
 sions in the place of traditional fact. Deductive 
 reasoning always assumes a single form. The 
 good is either A or B. B is bad ; therefore A is 
 good. What is the B which is bad! In every case 
 it is the popular view as represented by majority 
 action. Experience, however, depends on the pos- 
 sibility of testing alternate action. A is tried and 
 then B. The better, measured in units, is chosen. 
 But primitive society does not offer opportunity 
 to test alternate action. A real choice is seldom 
 possible. Hence the clash of the rational minority 
 and the traditional majority. 
 
 This contrast is accentuated by clan emotion. 
 All within the clan is good; all outside is bad.
 
 THE SCOTCH CONTRIBUTION 261 
 
 Clan morality and the outside world morality 
 clash. Clan reasoning is thus a defense against 
 world tendencies. Clan tendencies are uphold 
 not by pragmatic proof, but by showing the bad- 
 ness of the outside w^orld in which opposing cus- 
 toms prevail. Scotland is not the place where 
 these tendencies originated. Minorities every- 
 where have resorted to similar defenses, but in 
 Scotland these tendencies have been sharpened. 
 It has thus earned the place in the modern world 
 held by the Jews in the ancient. From it has 
 spread the rational thought which Calvinism re- 
 flects in religion. No other race ever withstood 
 a two-century persecution nor held out against 
 such unremitting opposition. There is scarcely a 
 Scotchman but has a dozen martyrs among his 
 ancestors. It is almost a joke to compare this 
 ordeal to that of the Puritans, a group of half- 
 breeds who never had a martyr nor even a severe 
 persecution. 
 
 Calvinism is a clannish reaction against world 
 influences. So long as these were the only alter- 
 natives Scotch dissent became more rational and 
 deductive. The third and the ultimately victori- 
 ous attitude was industrial pragm^atism as repre- 
 sented by the English. With its success Scot- 
 land, losing its identity, became an English prov- 
 ince. 
 
 The part Scotch ancestors played in this move- 
 ment was to resist commercial pragmatic tenden- 
 cies, to accentuate deductive reasoning, and to 
 maintain clan isolation. Judged by modern stan- 
 dards they were on the losing side of every issue, 
 and thus brought on themselves the majority per- 
 secution from which all minorities suffer. Not 
 much can be said of their opinions, but much can 
 be said of the spirit in which they held their 
 opinions and endured their self-imposed misfor- 
 tunes. In character they were progressive to the
 
 262 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 degree that they were retrogressive in opinion. 
 
 Character building is a process of elimination. 
 Majorities degenerate because through their suc- 
 cess the standard of elimination is lowered. The 
 weak thus tend to survive and to dominate. A 
 persecuted minority, losing their weak members, 
 gain in character. It was thus with the Scotch. 
 Their vigorous opposition to progress is the key to 
 their manliness. Good heredity and bad opinions 
 have the same causes. The only escape from this 
 dilemma is immigration. The impossible citizen at 
 home becomes the best citizen if transplanted to 
 some new region. 
 
 This salvation came to the Scotch, more by luck 
 than design. Of all bad movements in which our 
 stubborn ancestors indulged the cause of Prince 
 Charley was the worst. This led to the battle 
 of Colloden where the Scotch obtained much re- 
 nown, but also an utter defeat. The glory was for 
 the Highlander but the spoils went to the English. 
 Our forbears thus lost their estates and suffered 
 a persecution which only the English know how to 
 inflict, but finally were permitted to migrate as 
 the best means of ridding Scotland of them. Peace 
 came to Scotland and America gained a superior 
 but pig-headed group which has both made and 
 resisted uplifting influences in America. 
 
 Scotch humor is under-dog sympathy. The 
 weak in some way outwits the strong. The on- 
 lookers are aroused by the conflict and the sur- 
 prise of the under-dog victory sending the pent- 
 up energy along unusual routes creates those 
 muscular reactions called a laugh. The situation 
 is one which only those who expect defeat can 
 enjoy. Most American humor is of this sort, 
 expressing a joy at the shrewdness of the weak 
 and lowly. It points a moral for their betterment. 
 English humor is the reverse of this. When in a 
 severe conflict the weak opponent suddenly col-
 
 THE SCOTCH CONTRIBUTION 263 
 
 lapses, the energy directed against him is blocked 
 and turned into unexpected channels. The victor 
 laughs, lauds himself, despises the vanquislied foe. 
 
 A dog is chasing a fox. Most people will sym- 
 pathize with the dog, deeming the fox a destruc- 
 tive rascal. A child will, however, sympathize 
 with the fox and hope for its escape. When the 
 crisis comes one group will laugh if the dog suc- 
 ceeds ; the other if he fails. There is a blocking 
 of energy in both cases ; its transference to new, 
 unexpected channels creates a laugh because the 
 surprise is the same although its cause is diif erent. 
 
 The same tendencies lie back of popular logic. 
 The American has an under-dog attitude. Some- 
 thing is always wrong. Somebody is depriving 
 him of his rights. He is after a rascal or deep 
 in sorrow because of some impending doom. One 
 seldom hears of an American's attempting any- 
 thing constructive. His interest is in the avoid- 
 ance of evil, not in attainment of the good. The 
 groups which settled America were persecuted in 
 the lands from which they came. They readily 
 fell into the Scotch way of reasoning, spending 
 their energy building defenses instead of working 
 for future ends. World-depravity is thus a popu- 
 lar theme, so popular that even the Methodists 
 have succumbed. The Scotch have become Meth- 
 odist in emotion, the Methodist, Scotch in thought. 
 This is the American blend in contrast to which 
 is the typical New Englander who applauds con- 
 science, character, local institutions and the parts 
 of the national Constitution which uphold indi- 
 vidual rights. The fewer those who side with 
 him the firmer his belief, while being alone makes 
 his cause worthy of martyrdom. A Scotchman will 
 start with as firm personal opinions as the con- 
 scientious objector but if his neighbors hold firmly 
 to their adverse opinion he will fall in line before
 
 264 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 election. He may fight the world, but never his 
 clan. What it wants he in the end accepts. His 
 reasoning has so many conditioning clauses that 
 some of them give way if too severely pressed. A 
 mass judgment results against which opposition 
 is futile. 
 
 Minorities of all sorts are losing in numbers 
 and standing. Each new epoch puts the triumph- 
 ant majority in a stronger position. Few can 
 resist a pressure which seems to be nature itself. 
 
 Pioneer Values 
 
 Calvinism held that everything is predestined 
 because a part of God's plan, devised before the 
 foundation of the earth. It is thus the symbol of 
 divine control. Against such rigid views there is 
 an emotional antagonism which Methodism keenly 
 voices. A compromise between human freedom 
 and divine guidance has been effected by an isola- 
 tion of heavenly and earthly affairs. God rules 
 in heaven but no longer on earth. The existence 
 of God and God's control are distinct problems. 
 All recent theology is devoted to the proof of 
 God's existence. He is assumed to rule heaven 
 but the planets run themselves. Methodist and 
 Calvinist alike accept heaven as a fact and be- 
 lieve that St. Peter has its keys, but no one any 
 longer prays for rain or expects God to harvest 
 Ms crops. Heaven is controlled by God yet nature 
 runs the earth. This ruins the predestination 
 scheme by which the good are saved no matter 
 how bad, and the bad damned despite their virtues. 
 The successful succeed, not those whose names 
 are written in the Lamb's Book of Ijife. 
 
 The events by which this theological compro-
 
 PIONEER VALUES 265 
 
 mise was forced came from the exigencies of 
 pioneer life. The old world was a world of miracle 
 and prayer. Man supplicated. God gave protec- 
 tion through direct intervention in human affairs. 
 Jewish history, from which these views are de- 
 rived, illustrates the frailty of man and the pres- 
 ence of miraculous salvation. The Jews were 
 helpless against their powerful neighbors. They 
 had long seasons of drought, making rain seem the 
 gift of God instead of the work of nature; they 
 were subject to contagious diseases which came 
 intermittently and over which they had no control. 
 Prayer always succeeded; human effort always 
 failed. God could be readily enthroned in such a 
 region and made the determiner of events. He 
 punished the bad ; he rewarded the good. He re- 
 vealed the codes by which salvation was obtained. 
 _ Primitive Europe was a half-way land, not quite 
 like Judea yet not different enough to create a 
 revolt against the then established theology. There 
 was plenty of rain but disease was as rampant 
 as of old. The arbitrary action of rulers made 
 the subject as helpless as if his home had been 
 on the fringe of an Asiatic desert. 
 
 In the pioneer life of America these views were 
 put to test for the first time, thus creating a theo- 
 logic crisis. America had plenty of rain; a free- 
 dom from disease ; no despotic ruler ; no tax gath- 
 erer; plenty of land to be had for the asking; a 
 rich soil giving an abundant return. This made 
 success depend on effort, with which went a dei- 
 fication of success. God still had the keys to heav- 
 en but was no longer consulted in mundane affairs. 
 
 The essence of this alteration in pioneer values 
 is easily presented even if its details are still sub- 
 ject to dispute. The first element in social life is 
 security. Jehovah gave security; hence Jehovah 
 is God. "Not so," says the pioneer, *' property 
 gives security and hence property is God." This
 
 266 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 attitude is reflected everywhere ; the farther West 
 one goes the stronger it is. AVlien the courts 
 make property supreme they merely reflect the 
 attitude of dominant opinion. No one in America 
 feels secure, nor is he, without property. Its 
 emphasis is thus a natural attitude due to pioneer 
 values. 
 
 A second problem is the source of support. In 
 a primitive society support is not a product but 
 the result of a miracle. People pray ; food comes ; 
 they pray again and their various wishes are 
 gratified from some unforeseen, unexpected 
 source. Human effort is at a discount. Humility, 
 patience, sacrifice, fasting, prayer, thus become 
 the lauded traits. The Bible teaches again and 
 again the futility of trying to help oneself. The 
 worst sinners are the bold innovators who blaze 
 their own track. 
 
 In the place of these doctrines has arisen on the 
 frontier a labor philosophy which encourages ef- 
 fort, lauds initiative and thus views every product 
 as the legitimate rew^ard of labor. Nothing comes 
 from God. Morality has no claim. Neither nature 
 nor society are recognized as legitimate sharers 
 in product. If a worker settles on a tract of 
 land, plows and hoes it, what he does creates the 
 crop. The land he has made. All is his. 
 
 Labor is thus the second element in the God- 
 head. The third is money. In saying this I do 
 not mean wealth, but the possession of ready cash. 
 This gives to the frontier man his sense of liberty. 
 Put a handful of change in one pocket, a roll of 
 bills in the other, and a Westerner thinks he owns 
 the world because he feels everything comes with 
 money. To be free from debt and to have monov 
 in the bank means liberty and goods control. The 
 cogency of paper money fallacies comes from this 
 feeling. Whosoever has money is free; whoso- 
 ever makes money has others at command. Give
 
 PIONEEE VALUES 267 
 
 a man money and he whistles ; without it he falls 
 the slave of Wall Street or of some similar octo- 
 pus. His forefather would not have thought thus ; 
 he would have said that liberty dejjended on Con- 
 stitutional restraint. He wanted to keep free 
 from external oppression and deemed the national 
 Constitution as a necessary safeguard. All this 
 has passed. No American thinks of law or Con- 
 stitution except as an obstacle to get around. 
 All the early Constitutional amendments were en- 
 acted to protect the individual. The new ones, 
 like the income tax and prohibition, are designed 
 to give mass judgment a greater control over 
 minorities. Majorities not only have no respect 
 for minorities but they go out of their way to 
 throw stones. This is One Hundred Per Cent. 
 Americanism, a feeling that money in the pocket, 
 not Constitutional restraint, is the basis of liberty. 
 It gives to might a control of the mightless, and 
 to force a supremacy over law. 
 
 This frontier philosophy alters social values. 
 Privilege, race and saintliness lose their ascend- 
 ency; sacrifice and poverty are no longer ideals; 
 beauty is measured in terms of corn rows. In 
 their place comes a worship of energy ; dash over- 
 rules caution, strategy rates higher than open 
 conduct; above all is a love of adventure which 
 lures to bold undertakings. On the surface the 
 old is restrained but beneath is a reverse current 
 which undermines what the past has wrought. 
 On weekdays men are in the new world, on Sun- 
 days they go back thousands of years and sleep 
 in the graveyards of their ancestors. 
 
 For this change no fitting word has been coined. 
 Men fail to see the absurdity of their position 
 because the words they use are symbols capable 
 of multiple interpretation. The essence, however, 
 is easily stated. It is the difference between the 
 under dog, and top dog sympathy. Morality has
 
 268 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 developed as a defense of the weak against the 
 strong. The lower class surviving, their morality- 
 has become that of the race. Men therefore feel 
 that the weak are better than the strong and that 
 yielding is better than domination. "The meek 
 shall inherit the earth." Yes, so long as the 
 strong kill themselves off by war and dissipation. 
 But when these evils cease the pinch is on the 
 meek. Against the warrior and the aristocrat 
 the meek may survive, but he who works, figures 
 and exploits forces to the wall those who live on 
 God's providence. The top dog survives and to 
 him public sjonpathy turns. Blessed are they 
 who succeed. 
 / What cannot be described in words can be pic- 
 
 ]/ \/tured by another anecdote of my father, whose 
 philosophy was "frontier," of the purest sort. 
 He settled in the middle of an Illinois swamp 
 which he had plowed, drained and tilled until it 
 was a garden. Every acre meant to him toil and 
 sacrifice. He knew just when and how it had 
 been turned from waste to productive soil. So in 
 his later years he had a block of land a mile and 
 a half long as good as any in the state. It was a 
 show place, the pride of the town. All went well 
 until the village was transformed into a town by 
 the building of a factory. With this came a 
 Socialist who, seeing the farm with its fine cattle, 
 horses, barns and crops, stood on the street corner 
 and expressed the wish that Patten would have 
 boils until he returned his land to the town. This 
 broke my father all up. It is fair to say that 
 judged by frontier standards he was a good citi- 
 zen, generous, public-spirited and a model of in- 
 dustry. That his well-meaning conduct, that pro- 
 vision for children and old age was disreputable, 
 was a view he could not understand. He was not 
 prepared to be cast out among the publicans and 
 
 yX v/sinners ; nor were his neighbors.
 
 PIONEEE VALUES 269 
 
 It is not my purpose to justify either position. 
 I merely wish to put the contrast sharply. My 
 father had views which came legitimately out of 
 his situation. He thought in terms of labor, re- 
 garded property as the basis of security and felt 
 free when land was without mortgage and he had 
 money in pocket. He got these views from the 
 hard knocks of frontier life while his opponent 
 obtained his from books or from midnight confer- 
 ences behind closed doors. It was thus an old 
 philosophy against a new — Europe against Amer- 
 ica. A reaction to re-establish what was, instead 
 of a desire to push into the future. 
 
 If, however, my father had stopped a moment 
 to think impartially he would have discovered a 
 strange likeness between what the Socialist said 
 and what was preached to him all his life on 
 Sunday. What Christ said and what the Social- 
 ist declared had more in common than he would 
 admit; he plainly was the innovator, not the 
 Socialist. 
 
 It is Methodist to worship Christ: to Him 
 emotion goes out, yet most churches leave him 
 disconsolate on the doorstep. Either they are 
 wrong and frontier philosophy a misdirected ad- 
 venture, or Christ's doctrines need the pruning 
 He gave the words of the prophets. As an exam- 
 ple of sacrifice his figure is heroic as ever but new 
 epochs need new morals as much as they do new 
 politics and economics. The law of Moses reflect- 
 ed primitive needs; the sayings of Christ are 
 applicable to the period of Roman dominance but 
 today we need a third Testament, which will meet 
 our needs as aptly as each of the earlier morali- 
 ties fitted the situations out of which they arose. 
 Nothing but the extension of frontier philosophy 
 to these fields can create a morality in which deed 
 and thought harmonize. ''Back to Christ" is a bad 
 slogan. Only new adventures can solve our 
 perplexities.
 
 270 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 The Passing of Dissent 
 
 Thought is the outcome of a struggle between 
 inherited vigor and acquired tradition. It is the 
 means by which the culture and ideas of the de- 
 feated are fastened on their vigorous, brutal suc- 
 cessors. Thought is thus the defense of an un- 
 successful minority against a triumphant major- 
 ity. Minorities think; majorities act. Thought 
 therefore becomes the accumulated protest of 
 minorities against the aggression of the mass. 
 Every thought movement has the same general 
 cast and the same aim. Coming when a superior 
 class is losing its physical control, it is the means 
 by which a part of their old superiority is retained. 
 In any fresh combination the heredity is of the 
 new ; the thought is of the old. It thus represents 
 an upper class view impressed on a lower class 
 heredity. 
 
 In the upper class view the lower class are not 
 only low but bad. Whatever succeeds is therefore 
 bad. The right is always defeated ; the defeated 
 always right. Thought processes thus become de- 
 structive and negative. The right, says the classic 
 thinker, is either A or B. It cannot be B since B 
 is bad. Hence it is A. Strip this form of its 
 abstract character and it affirms that the lower 
 class is bad ; therefore the upper class is right and 
 good. The proof consists in showing the badness 
 of the low, not the goodness of the high. 
 
 In modern times this formula has become the 
 basis of dissent. The defeated resort to thought 
 processes to show that they are right. They prove 
 mass depravity and use it as a justification of 
 themselves. Liberty, duty, conscience, autonomy, 
 have become slogans to justify dissent and are
 
 THE PASSING OF DISSENT 271 
 
 thus interwoven with advanced thought. For 
 ages democracy has been the striving of a minor- 
 ity against an aggressive majority. Hence the 
 thought and principles of democracy are those of 
 dissent. 
 
 These facts can be seen in the constitutional de- 
 velopment of England or America. There are 
 plenty of rules to check majorities, none to permit 
 effective action by a triumphant group. Every 
 progressive stage is thus a conflict between rules 
 designed to protect minorities and the majority 
 desire to create fresh adjustment. Likewise our 
 religious struggles have been minorities who dis- 
 sent and majorities who oppress. In the end the 
 minorities win — with the result that their thought 
 defenses are impressed on succeeding generations. 
 
 I shall not follow this reasoning to its limit, 
 but merely mention the similarity of thought pro- 
 cesses in all fields, scientific, religious, political 
 and cultural, so as to describe tlie present situa- 
 tion. For the first time in history a persisting 
 majority is forming. In America this majority 
 has thousands of years of undisputed supremacy 
 ahead. A philosophy of dissent will not fit such a 
 condition. It must in the end break and be re- 
 placed by modes of reasoning in harmony with 
 effective action. 
 
 When it is realized that the principles of dis- 
 sent cannot furnish the basis on which majority 
 thought can build, it is not difficult, taking another 
 step, to see in how many ways the old thought is 
 being undermined. Deductive morality is linked 
 with a series of rational judgments all of which 
 stand or fall together. They are parts of the 
 philosophy of dissent and lose their validity with 
 its passing. Among them are individuality, ego- 
 ism, superraan-nishness with their consequences in 
 sacrifice, duty and veneration. In each case the 
 support is negative. The badness of the opposite
 
 272 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 is shown, not the inherent good of the defended. 
 Without the doctrine of world depravity all these 
 defenses fail. The dissipated of each age fail to 
 propagate themselves. Those who chose wisely, 
 surviving, start the next generation on their level. 
 Discipline, sacrifice and personal integrity have 
 an influence in determining who of each genera- 
 tion shall survive ; but not on the surviving type. 
 If Rome and France have declined in vigor some- 
 thing other than the degeneration of character is 
 the cause. 
 
 The issue here presented has been often seen 
 but met in a wrong way. William James would 
 preserve discipline and sacrifice, but would put 
 some useful sacrifice in the place of traditional 
 motives. He, however, overlooked that discipline 
 must have some driving force external to the per- 
 sons on whom it is imposed. If the young like 
 dancing and gaming better than praying, doing 
 good or digging ditches, what force is there to 
 alter their preference? Only an ugly picture of 
 the consequences would create the motive for 
 suppressing dancing and this would be a return 
 to the depravity doctrine. Herbert Spencer in 
 turn, seeing the break in the old morality, was so 
 wrought that he departed from the plan of his 
 philosophy to create a new basis for ethics. His 
 scheme failed as other deductive schemes fail, 
 because they assume old motives can be so trans- 
 formed as to produce new effects. No new driving 
 force is thus obtained. In the end the old persists 
 and with it comes a return to the old morality. 
 
 The true approach must come from another 
 quarter. Morality is not in danger of a decline 
 so long as physical heredity remains unchanged. 
 The problem is not of checking a decline but of 
 observing the way in which mass judgments are 
 formed. This has not been done because of the 
 belief that mass judgments are wrong. If the
 
 THE PASSING OF DISSENT 273 
 
 movies attract huge audiences no one asks why 
 they do, but how they can be prevented from de- 
 grading public taste. The moral plea is thus for 
 censorship, restraint and suppression. 
 
 The normal should do as their inherent tenden- 
 cies urge ; the abnormal should be placed not un- 
 der moral but under physical restraint. The 
 measure of social advance is thus not the moral 
 restraint imposed on the public, but the degree in 
 which the subnormal is excluded from its privi- 
 leges. We discuss in terms of deductive morals, 
 but when a national decision is to be made we do 
 the do-able, which always coincides with the de- 
 mands of action. People nod with approval at 
 deductive principles, w^hile discussing, but throw 
 them over when called upon to act. The surviving 
 element is giving more freedom to itself, but at 
 the same time increases the severity of its action 
 against those who differ from it. America is thus 
 becoming a clan whose action is racially upbuild- 
 ing not through the rectitude of the normal but 
 through the elimination of abnormal tendencies. 
 
 This modification of thought is in essence a 
 change from reasoned judgments to action judg- 
 ments. Eeasoned judgments are top class deci- 
 sions based on the past experience of this class. 
 It is thus a restraint on the low^er class, not an 
 incentive to change. An action judgment is a 
 probable judgment which has in it the risk of 
 failure. In action the test is in the superiority of 
 heredity. Those who break mth tradition wdn. 
 The opposing faction shelter themselves* behind 
 towering walls only in the end to become victims 
 of their own over-caution. 
 
 If, instead of a general denunciation of mass 
 tendencies, their good features are studied, the 
 firmness of social progress becomes manifest. We 
 have before us not a general smash with a possible 
 recovery on some ideal basis, but a shift already
 
 274 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 partially made from one standard to another. 
 The position of democratic doctrine affords an 
 admirable example. No one today would say 
 democracy is all bad or all good. Its badness is 
 vilely bad and its goodness equally manifest. But 
 when a world student like Mr. Bryce makes a 
 study, its superiority — not over some ideal, but 
 over any past form of government — is evident. 
 Such also would be the decision if mass judgment 
 were given a fair hearing. It is hard on minori- 
 ties, intolerant of dissent, scornful of genius, 
 leadership and ideals; yet it is gradually but 
 crudely beating its way to better adjustment. 
 
 Three changes in thought flow from this atti- 
 tude. There is a loss of conscience, a loss of de- 
 ductive reasoning and of feelings dependent on 
 aristocratic exclusiveness. Each of these are 
 minority defenses. They are the mainstays of 
 weak minorities who are fighting majority opinion. 
 The conscientious person sets his judgment above 
 that of the community and places an internal sub- 
 jective feeling above the evidence of the senses. 
 The aristocrat feeds his feeling of superiority by 
 emphasizing acts or expressions which isolate him 
 from his assumed inferiors. The deductive rea- 
 soner uses his powers to uphold premises for 
 which direct evidence is lacking. These and their 
 similar go with the acceptance of the logic of suc- 
 cess instead of dissent. In their place come ani- 
 mal traits which are truly natural characters. 
 The love of display, imitation, reasoning from 
 analogy, mass judgment, the dislike of the strange 
 and the symbolizing of motives gaining in force 
 show a return to attitudes which controlled dis- 
 tant ancestors. The prominent feature of today^s 
 progress is the disintegration of complexes which 
 have been thought to be the rocks on which char- 
 acter was built. The wicked are no longer re- 
 strained by inborn feelings but by public opinion
 
 SOCIAL VALUES 275 
 
 and the knowledge of results. The shocks and dis- 
 illusions of recent times are forcing men to dig 
 deeper for the real rocks on which evolution rests. 
 Men may not find them but they will at least learn 
 the difference between the natural and the ac- 
 quired. Only as they learn this can a new moral- 
 ity and a new logic be built which, even though 
 it may not make the few better, will lift the masses 
 into a sounder civilization. If posterity is im- 
 proved, bolder in action, firmer in judgment, 
 keener in joy, what matters the repression which 
 the transition imposes ? 
 
 Social Values 
 
 The preceding sections leave the discussion of 
 values in an unsatisfactory shape; losses are so 
 emphasized that the situation is made to appear 
 worse than it is. Not that depreciation is new: 
 many writers have noted worse things, but they 
 have done it with the thought of showing some 
 new morality to replace the old. 
 
 Such a task is not within my scheme. There are 
 many visions of moral regeneration which might 
 work if conditions were favorable but which, how- 
 ever, are as yet ideal rather than fact. The world 
 does not go to pieces and then be reconstructed 
 in some subsequent age. The process of tearing 
 down and rebuilding is going on at the same time. 
 Nor are the losses in one field replaced by gains 
 in the same field. It is by the whole not by specific 
 parts that progress of an age is to be judged. 
 Old morality is the morality which minorities 
 have imposed on majorities. The few have domi- 
 nated at the expense of the many. Small regions 
 through some technical superiority have exploited
 
 276 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 their neighbors. To the victors go the spoils 
 in return for which the victim gets an imposed 
 sacrificial morality. 
 
 Our cherished moral and political principles are 
 thus imported products carried along by tradi- 
 tions which are hard to break. Chief of these in 
 religion is the doctrine of conscience, in politics 
 the emphasis of liberty. That a clear conscience 
 is the mark of personal integrity no one would 
 deny, but that deeds of a clear conscience are 
 beneficial for the public is open to question. A 
 conscience is of value in settling disputes with 
 neighbors, but of no use in the larger social rela- 
 tions w^here the evils of an act are out of sight. 
 
 The rights of minorities are likewise important 
 in local issues where between the two factions 
 many linking relations exist. To injure a neigh- 
 bor is to injure oneself. His good is also yours 
 in all mutual relations. As soon, however, as 
 passage is made to relations involving world evp- 
 lution, the status is altered. Minorities suffer in 
 world changes. Are forced to the wall, disin- 
 tegrated and destroyed. Majorities survive, re- 
 construct and thus by their pressure create a new 
 world. A clear conscience cannot determine the 
 justice of the Allies' policy toward Eussia. Nor 
 do the rights of minorities justify the North of 
 Ireland in blocking the unification of the British 
 empire. The Quaker who sought freedom of con- 
 science by a bold adventure across turbulent seas 
 is worthy of praise. He who rushes to a draft 
 board or to Washington to gain exemption from 
 duties which his neighbor must perform in his 
 stead is an object of derision. In a small world 
 each may pick his job but in a universe he must 
 take what is given. On these cases most people 
 would agree and yet deplore the losses which 
 world decisions make. They see the sins of those 
 who obstruct but not the substitute. Can blind
 
 SOCIAL VALUES 277 
 
 evolution be trusted to solve problems which the 
 greatest intellects fail to decipher? From this 
 comes a pessimism which seems inevitable when 
 ethical standards fail. 
 
 To point a new morality is to dip into the far 
 future, some thousand years hence. What hap- 
 pens then will not guide the world in the present 
 crisis. It is forces now at work on which salvation 
 depends. An illustration is furnished by my sum- 
 mer neighbor, who spent year after year fishing 
 while his neighbors were garnering their crops. 
 All appeals to higher motives were met with an 
 incredulous smile. When the automobile came he 
 watched it with indifference for a time but finally 
 came under its spell. To fish demanded merely a 
 boat he could construct, but to own an automobile 
 meant work and economy. Between the two was 
 a struggle, yet in the end the machine won. Neigh- 
 bors told me in the spring that Jones had gone to 
 work. In the fall he said to me that he had not 
 been on the water once during the summer. Jones 
 had no better principles after than before, but a 
 radical change was made in his mental outlook. 
 Formerly men had to go to the frontier to re- 
 organize their lives. Now the new sings its song 
 in by-paths where even the backslider dwells. 
 Motives appear with each invention, to satisfy 
 which new energies are called into being. 
 
 The stimulation from the outside of which the 
 automobile is an example is complemented by 
 changes in food and clothing which take from 
 meals and dress their emotional significance. 
 Meals once meant mother's pie and cake; they 
 bound the family together and colored the ideas 
 with which the young went forth. Dress likewise 
 meant individual taste. Even the washtub did its 
 share to give each family peculiarities which were 
 passed on from generation to generation. 
 Prom pie to ice cream indicates as great
 
 278 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 a change as from fishing to automobiles. From 
 liquor to coffee and from it to the soda fountain 
 represent a similar loss of individuality. Drug 
 stores are all alike ; coffee with a similar flavor is 
 made in huge caldrons in each restaurant. 
 The group has displaced the family as a deter- 
 miner of character, the school is displacing the 
 church, the paper, not the pulpit, sways the multi- 
 tude while the street outbids the home in molding 
 influence. Everywhere the larger group is dis- 
 placing the smaller and thus giving to life common 
 forms and goals. 
 
 These are not new facts. They have often been 
 used to show the superiority of individuality, 
 morality and conscience as standards of conduct. 
 Too little has been done to study how conformity 
 helps in a rough way to the same ends and does 
 it without the jar and conflict which morality and 
 conscience generate. Morality and conscience are 
 of necessity minority attitudes. They are resist- 
 ances to mass tendencies. We cannot therefore 
 look to them to check majorities when they become 
 conscious of their power. Conformity, however, 
 does hold them in. Its high levels are not so high 
 as the motives of morality create, but many more 
 are influenced by them. Conformity thus pro- 
 duces a better average than morality. It holds 
 the low above their natural level and creates for 
 them motives which force the adoption of com- 
 munity standards. Neither morality nor con- 
 science has ever checked community ^dce. The 
 low have been left on their depraved level where 
 they propagate and in the end displace their 
 superiors. Conformity sees little above itself, but 
 it has a clear vision of what is below. With its 
 growth comes an intense opposition of the in- 
 ferior. The scab, the Hun, the drunkard, the slum, 
 filth and disease get an emphasis which morality 
 never gave them. Nobody's conscience ever kept
 
 SOCIAL VALUES 279 
 
 his back yard clean. For those below there is a 
 hell but no reformatory. Put a man where social 
 tradition cannot guide and conscience is the best 
 monitor ; but under the complex conditions of mod- 
 ern life it is merely a troublesome reminder of 
 minor delinquencies. It helps individuals to 
 thwart society, it may raise a man above his neigh- 
 bors, but for these reasons it is out of harmony 
 with efforts for social integration. 
 
 The pressure that integrates is not conscience 
 but conformity. Popular tendencies create re- 
 straints and prompt demands. Whether sex and 
 appetite should be restrained may be questionable 
 but there is no doubt that the grind of conformity 
 is against them. Justice and equality are both 
 altered to meet new demands. Primitive justice 
 took from the weak and rewarded the strong. It 
 did this because it emphasized personal attributes 
 and pmiished those who lacked them. Justice was 
 thus the reward for having character; punish- 
 ment, the penalty for not having it. Social justice 
 in contrast to this is that which is due a person 
 regardless of his character. It penalizes char- 
 acter for the benefit of the mass. It takes from 
 the grandchild what it gave to the grandparent. 
 Creating a sympathy for those below the normal, 
 it uses income not to reward character but to raise 
 the subnormal to normalcy. Child labor laws are 
 an evidence of this and so is the preference shown 
 women. The minimum wage gives to the weak 
 more than they earn at the expense of their 
 stronger and more characterful neighbors. Social 
 equality is an equality which disregards heredity, 
 position and character. It frees from disabilities 
 instead of creating further disabilities for the 
 mass by the elevation of the few above them. 
 
 To give to those who have not and even deserve 
 not is an emotional demand which voices itself as 
 soon as objective standards displace the subjec-
 
 280 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 tive codes upon which character building depends. 
 Evolution makes character by a differentiation 
 which elevates the few at the expense of the mass. 
 It promotes equality and social justice when it 
 compels the superior to use his talent for the 
 benefit of those below. It thus restrains liberty 
 and promotes democracy. These two principles 
 battle for supremacy. Between there may be com- 
 promise but no conciliation. Liberty is a demand 
 for the expression of character. Its standards are 
 subjective and its voice is conscience. They are 
 the fruit of character development and would if 
 successful adjust men to nature without the inter- 
 vention of society. In contrast to this, democracy 
 does not rely on character but on conformity for 
 its success. Democracy is majority governed by 
 objective fact. It is effective only where con- 
 formity has created objective standards which the 
 masses accept. The grind of conformity must pre- 
 cede the rise of democracy. Majorities cannot ad- 
 here except through the rise of conformities which 
 all accept. A democracy thus gets its force from 
 principles which subordinate character to situa- 
 tion and atmosphere. 
 
 In democracy men may differ on minor but not 
 on major premises. Minorities are outlaws unless 
 they accept the axioms of majority thought. If in 
 a prohibition nation a man contends that alcohol 
 is beneficial he is an outlaw, but if he thinks the 
 methods of enforcing prohibition are ineffective 
 his opinion is entitled to respect. It would not 
 .block conformity to alter methods of enforcing 
 law, but it would to question the basis on which 
 law rests. All majority condemnation rests on 
 this thought. The minority can think as it pleases 
 — there is no ban on individual thought — ^but to 
 organize so as to undermine majority conformity 
 is sin — the punishment of which is outlawry. A 
 change to be effective must permeate majority
 
 INCOME POWER 281 
 
 opinion, not by revolution, but by some alternation 
 of taste and inclination. Minorities are effective 
 only as they change fact: when they do they be- 
 come majorities and act with the same severity as 
 did their predecessors. Each new epoch creates 
 more conformity and intensifies its coercion. 
 
 Which is the more desirable, a missionary spirit 
 which elevates the low to one level, or a zeal to 
 elevate oneself to some super position? The deci- 
 sion is not so one-sided as moralists think. It is 
 after all rather a problem of epochs than of 
 absolute right. The struggle of minorities to pre- 
 serve themselves, and to safeguard their stan- 
 dards, of necessity preceded the epoch of making 
 the attained a common heritage. Perhaps when 
 culture is diffused and community standards are 
 achieved a new burst of minority endeavor mil be 
 needed to rise above community life, but it does 
 seem that the democratic swing of the pendulum 
 must go much farther before personal motives 
 can successfully reassert themselves. 
 
 IisrcoME Power 
 
 It is difficult to describe American society in a 
 terminology coming from the past. We have no 
 aristocracy in the accepted sense of the term. 
 Our rulers are the people whose voice is the 
 politician. Nor in the same sense have we a labor- 
 ing class. The American of the old stock guides 
 but the rough manual work is done by the recent 
 immigrant. Still less is there a middle class with 
 manners and habits of its own. All read the same 
 papers, buy at the same stores, ride in motor cars. 
 The great social gulf is between the homed and 
 the dishomed. These dishomed people, whether
 
 282 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 of American stock or of recent arrivals, form a 
 dissatisfied element whose condition breeds opin- 
 ions antagonistic to society. While the line is 
 vague in economic terms their incomes are below 
 $800 a year. Neither home nor health can be 
 maintained on this basis. Overwork, poor food, 
 inadequate shelter, bring as a penalty disease and 
 misery. Sympathize as we may with their condi- 
 tion, yet no real danger from them is to be ap- 
 prehended. This class does not in America per- 
 petuate itself. The grind of factory life, long 
 hours, the danger from accident and disease, cut 
 severely into their numbers. Poverty and vice 
 are housed together ; temptation is on every side, 
 girls go astray, and boys becoming rough are unfit 
 for the hard tasks the fathers performed. Before 
 the war it took about a million immigrants a year 
 to fill the gaps which factory life made. Without 
 this fresh stock crises in industry would soon 
 arise. AVhat happened during the war where the 
 labor market was depleted would become a chronic 
 state if a decision were made to limit the numbers 
 which rush in from overstocked Europe. 
 
 This view does not match with alarmist views. 
 The Malthusian theory of population is taken to 
 show the constant tendency of the under classes to 
 increase. Yet the overpopulation of the past has 
 been due to country conditions. Cities have never 
 held their o^vn without the in-pouring of country 
 recruits. Now a rapid depopulation of country 
 districts is on the way, a fact due to machinery 
 which on the farm does away with harvest help. 
 Those who were employed from three to four 
 months only are now not needed in the agricul- 
 tural districts. They become a nuisance and in 
 the end move citvAvard. Fanning districts are 
 thus losing their shiftless population. The at- 
 traction of the town and the ease of support by 
 children drawing them from their old roadside.
 
 INCOME POWER 283 
 
 place them in the maelstrom of town life. Coun- 
 try vice goes the same road. Not all tlie country 
 districts are free from their refuse population but 
 the process of extinction is at work; even 
 now has gone far enough to prevent mill owners 
 from manning their factories except by the arrival 
 of fresh hordes. How long this will be permitted 
 is hard to say. Whether we move rapidly or slow- 
 ly a world crisis will come when a new social order 
 asserts itself in Europe. The same causes work 
 there as here although more slowly. The break 
 seems not far distant and with it will go the elab- 
 orate biologic argument on which the dreary out- 
 look of the present rests. 
 
 The poverty class lack budgetary concepts. 
 They are driven by fear, not induced to productive 
 acts by the hope of better conditions. They thus 
 live from hand to mouth, spend freely while money 
 lasts and stoically suffer when deprivation occurs. 
 There is a fawning respect for capital since they 
 feel and are taught that from it their support 
 comes. Co-operative action thus fails, the future 
 is disregarded and the present emphasized. This 
 is said not to depreciate but to set the basis of the 
 contrast w^ith the class above, which class may be 
 called the income class in contrast to the poverty 
 class. With them there is little fear of disease or 
 non-employment. They do not know what it is to 
 be without food or home. Somebody cares for 
 them in childhood, their work supports in man- 
 hood ; while old age is provided for by some insur- 
 ance scheme. They live in the present fully as 
 much as do the poverty class but their amuse- 
 ments, pleasures and comforts come regularly as 
 part of a budget which an ever-repeating income 
 enables them to meet. 
 
 This class does not save. If their accounts 
 were squared with the capitalistic class they would 
 show a deficit. Nor is there that respect for or
 
 284 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 conscious dependence on capital which the poverty 
 class shows. A class which never suffers from 
 the lack of income, which always has its budgetary 
 wants supplied, thinks that nature not capital is 
 the source of income and thus regards it as a 
 right, not as a gift. The income class always 
 growls at and often intensely opposes the claims 
 of capital. Many have tried but not succeeded in 
 uniting the poverty class in opposition to capital; 
 while the income class not only opposes the claims 
 of capital, but to an increasing degree shifts the 
 burden of government from itself to property 
 owners. 
 
 I emphasize this attitude not to settle the claims 
 of any class but to get at psychic diiference. The 
 poverty class, the income class and the property 
 class have each a psychology distinct enough to 
 create intense opposition. The lines between them 
 are clearly marked and may be measured in in- 
 come. A budgetary view comes when a fixed in- 
 come of $1,000 is attained. Below that point the 
 psychology of poverty persists and the fear of 
 want controls. Crossing the line does not mean 
 an immediate change of view. Opinion always 
 lies behind fact yet income permits such a radical 
 change in expenditure that its influence is soon 
 felt. Eager longings replace fear, spending grows 
 until it equals income, new pleasures crowd out 
 stable wants, all of which work a reconstruction 
 of attitude, giving to the income group its striking 
 peculiarities. It is not yet true that he who works 
 gets the industrial reward but it is true that only 
 his children's children will survive this epoch. 
 
 In setting this lower limit of comfort, I have 
 not in mind the social worker 's view, which is that 
 of fixing a decent standard of life. He asks, 
 ''Ought not a worker to have $20 a year for medi- 
 cine and $100 for clothing?" This appeal to em- 
 ployers or to the public, that the worker should
 
 INCOME POWER 285 
 
 have a given wage, at the same time assumes that 
 the employer or the public has the power to give 
 or withhold what is asked. This is a wholesome, 
 sympathetic view, but it predicates a helplessness 
 on the part of the worker to enforce his claim. 
 What I mean by budgetary income is that which 
 the worker has some power to demand. His money 
 may not be used for medicine or clothing, but in- 
 stead for what his moralizing friends would high- 
 ly disapprove. Yet if he wants these objects and 
 has the power to enforce his claims his budget 
 will contain them even at the expense of useful 
 objects. Budgetary power, not human sympathy, 
 is what sets standards. If motors, movies, and 
 candy induce men to work effectively they will be 
 in a worker's budget and to him society must give 
 enough to pay the bills. The worker must have 
 an income equal to his survival value. 
 
 For this two groups of traditions are necessary. 
 Around the home one group is built; the other 
 relates to industrial activity. Action directed to 
 other ends may have a high moral value, yet where 
 these are supreme life dwindles. Training and 
 habit alone can create and sustain a surviving 
 class. With all transient groups eliminated this 
 element becomes distinct. They have home, health 
 and income, each of which furnishes a basis of 
 classification. Their incomes range from $800 to 
 $3,000 a year. Below the lower limit want pov- 
 erty and vice cut their swath, above the upper 
 limit dominant motives lead not necessarily to 
 dissipation but inevitably to extinction. Society 
 is thus ground on both surfaces, between which a 
 compact, energetic group is formed whose habits 
 and instincts are commonplace yet for their posi- 
 tion beneficial. Viewed externally from manners, 
 food or behavior they seem like one. so effective i.s 
 the grind to which they submit. Yet internally 
 they may be readily separated into two groups.
 
 286 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 the dividing line between which, measured in in- 
 come, is about $2,000 a year. In industrial towns 
 the contrast is between those living in two-story 
 and those in three-story houses. In crowded 
 cities the one group is in rotten tenement dis- 
 tricts, the other in neat apartment houses. The 
 amusements of the lower group are baseball, the 
 movies and resorts where rest and excitement are 
 combined. The upper group attend lectures, sup- 
 port churches and get their recreation in clubs, 
 concerts, athletics and summer vacations. In edu- 
 cation the lower group attend the high school and 
 are thus prepared for industrial positions. The 
 contrasted group support colleges and thus attain 
 an efficiency which gives industrial control and 
 hence the major financial rewards. 
 
 I have made these rather obvious divisions not 
 for the purpose of moralizing about income nor 
 from hopes of improving social conditions. My 
 object is by observation to determine the psychol- 
 ogy of each group. To what do they react and 
 in what way? Contrasts are not valuable unless 
 in behavior each class voice its w^ants and push 
 for their realization in specific ways. Each group 
 has its own emotional life and its own way of 
 expressing its dissatisfaction. The dishomed are 
 revolutionary, the homed are contented ; while the 
 leisure class are plainly reactionary. In revolu- 
 tionary groups the stress is on the inequality of 
 income. They want what they see others have and 
 strike blindly at the bars which exclude it. The 
 leisure class are equally anxious to defend their 
 supremacy. Emotionally, they are controlled by 
 inferior complexes arising out of the danger of 
 their position. Before the menace of industrial 
 revolution arose the^^ were often ardent in their 
 desire for social uplift but this has been altered 
 by the fear of a disturbing overthrow. 
 
 There is little hope of a normal expression of
 
 INCOME POWER 287 
 
 emotion from either of these classes. Both must 
 be expected not only to voice distorted views but 
 to grow more dogmatic in their expression. Were 
 they the surviving class or did tendencies help 
 to strengthen their position, all that social pessi- 
 mists allege would become a dismal reality. For- 
 tunately both classes are being squeezed by evolu- 
 tion. Survival is not theirs. 
 
 If from these static classes the attention 
 is turned to the surviving class the effect 
 is at first confusing. They do not seem to have a 
 distinct group of emotions. Some are as reac- 
 tionary as those of the leisure class, having the 
 same inferior complexes to disturb their equili- 
 brium. Others are mere money-getters with no 
 thought but to climb the social ladder. A third 
 group, revolting from traditional lore, have joined 
 in revolutionary agitation. Yet, after all, this is 
 merely a temporary view. The class is too new to 
 have distinct emotional reactions, though the 
 power of society is more and more falling into its 
 hands. The problem is not with the members of 
 this group who at present align themselves with 
 older groups, but what others will do and think 
 when they realize thei"«" powder. An economic so- 
 ciety is ahead. This means that productive power 
 — not culture — will have the first place in colleges 
 and that efficiency will reign without dispute. We 
 shall then have an economic democracy which 
 must be sharply contrasted with political democ- 
 racy. Instead of numerical decisions, dominance 
 will be the result of a mass judgment in which 
 classes participate not according to their number 
 but according to their economic power. Socialistic 
 schemes are based on the thought of a decision in 
 which numbers count. This will be displaced by 
 a mass judgment voiced by those with economic 
 power. 
 
 The interests of an economic society are
 
 288 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 grouped around the concept of income, on the pos- 
 session of which power depends just as in earlier 
 times power lay in the possession of property. 
 It is what people spend, not what they have, that 
 gives them position and on w^hich their emotional 
 demands depend. These income urges are gain- 
 ing clearer expression ; as they do the opposition 
 between the property class and the income classes 
 will be more firmly voiced. The arrogance of 
 property will be replaced by the arrogance of in- 
 come, with the result that the property class will 
 suffer the deprivations now felt by other groups. 
 A partial consciousness of this tendency is 
 already visible. Much of the reactionary ten- 
 dency shown since the World War has this source. 
 It will clarify this view to compare it with that 
 of socialistic writers. They expect a mass opinion 
 to be formed by the union of workers, with the 
 result that the cleavage between mass and class 
 will be between Labor and Capital. To my mind 
 socialism and distinctly labor movements are al- 
 ready defeated. The mass judgment is now sharp- 
 ly expressed not only against socialism but all 
 labor movements which use force or excite rebel- 
 lion. Yet the break between income and property 
 is daily becoming more evident and here mass 
 emotion wall be on the side of income. Americans 
 are bound to live well and to have a good time even 
 if the old economic structure is wrecked. If this 
 trend is accepted the seat of power in the new 
 society and the method of its distribution can be 
 determined with accuracy even if some time must 
 elapse before the ideal of an economic society is 
 realized. The power of income is not to be meas- 
 ured in numerical dollars after the fashion of 
 equality theorists. A man with $2,000 a year 
 has more than double the emotional influence of 
 those with half the income, and thus exerts a far 
 greater effect on mass judgment. Tomorrow the
 
 INCOME POWER 289 
 
 person will be as nothing; his class everything. 
 The influence of a class is in proportion to the 
 square of its total income. 
 
 The position of the American classes in a purely 
 economic realm would be somewhat as follows, 
 assuming as at present a hundred-million popula- 
 tion and sixty billions of annual income. 
 
 Numbers in Income in Relative 
 
 Millions Billion Economic 
 
 Dollars Power 
 
 Leisure class 5 15 225 
 
 Upper income class.. 20 30 900 
 
 Lower income class.. 30 10 100 
 
 The dishomed 40 5 25 
 
 Paupers, etc 5 
 
 This table is not made for the purpose of voic- 
 ing the claims of justice nor to assert that eco- 
 nomic forces are supreme. It merely shows that 
 the upper income class is destined to have emo- 
 tional control and that its mass judgment will be 
 coercive. Two groups of rights are set up in 
 opposition to its claim: equality rights, and prop- 
 erty rights. Equality rights have a political origin 
 and are brought into economics by writers of 
 political antecedents. They assume a claim on 
 income based on personality instead of productive 
 power. Such claims have no valid basis and can- 
 not be enforced against mass judgment, w^hose 
 force lies not in numbers but in income power. 
 
 Property rights have an historical basis and 
 once had a validity. At first they rested on the 
 belief that property was the basis of peace. Then 
 it was narrowed to the thought that wealth arose 
 from the productivity of land. While now the 
 basis is assumed to be in the fact that Capital has 
 a productive power distinct from and antecedent 
 to Labor. Each of these claims has little 
 validity against the modern mass belief that in- 
 come belongs to those who produce it. Property
 
 290 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 income then becomes an income by courtesy, and 
 falls into the same class as charity to those incap- 
 able of earning adequate income. I say '4ncome 
 by courtesy," not to disparage, but to indicate 
 the lack of power of its holders to inforce their 
 claims. That the claim is one of courtesy is shown 
 by the fact that the courts and public advocates 
 rest their public position on the protection of 
 widows and orphans or on the fact that most 
 stocks and bonds are held by small holders. The 
 doctrine that capital is the result of saving has a 
 social not economic basis, assuming as it does 
 that society has two social groups with different 
 instincts and heredity, so that the few who save 
 perform a needed service for the many whose mo- 
 tives are transient and fickle. This sort of biology 
 is the only remaining support of the old view. An 
 altered psychologic attitude brings all workers to 
 harmony. There is no serious obstacle in the way 
 of the mass judgment that to the worker belongs 
 the wdiole product of industry. Courtesy and 
 charity will always play a part in income distribu- 
 tion. Refined dependency is not in danger of 
 losing its support nor will sympathy for the in- 
 efficient cease to fill the chests of benevolent socie- 
 ties. But effective power these outside classes do 
 not have. Triumphant mass judgment will crush 
 and reward as it pleases with no obstacle but its 
 own generosity. There are no economic classes 
 to dispute for the industrial product. The choice 
 is either survival with the mass or potential elimi- 
 nation, in the face of which neither property rights 
 nor equality rights can offer resistance. 
 
 With these facts as a basis the pressure of mass 
 opinion, can be readily measured. It mil be ex- 
 erted against two relatively helpless classes, each 
 of which will suffer the grind of elimination. The 
 burden of taxation will be placed on the rich. The 
 burden of labor will be placed on the poor. The
 
 INCOME POWER 291 
 
 income class will free itself from both burdens and 
 gain by each increase of mass pressure. It is said 
 that hve million workers are out of employment 
 at present. Who are theyf They are rela- 
 tively the poor and inefficient. In numbers they 
 make not more than ten per cent, of the working 
 population. From the burden of non-work nine 
 out of ten American workers are practically free. 
 They, their wives and their children feel no pres- 
 sure of want even in hard times. The stores 
 scarcely know a change in patronage. The movies 
 attract increasing multitudes, motor cars increase 
 in number and the streets are full of well-groomed 
 people. It is not they but the poverty class on 
 whom the burden of unemployment always falls. 
 At the same time the dominant class are escap- 
 ing the burden of taxation, placing it to an in- 
 creasing degree on property. Under $2,000 a year 
 no married man now pays taxes. What those be- 
 low the $5,000 level pay does not equal their ex- 
 penditure for motor cars, sugar, tobacco or even 
 the movies. They are thus practically tax-free 
 and will in the near future increase their advan- 
 tage. Taxation is borne by one-tenth of the popu- 
 lation — ^while the burden of unemplojaiient falls 
 on another tenth, those in poverty. Four-fifths 
 of the American people are thus in a stable posi- 
 tion, free both from want and from taxation. If 
 they seriously felt either of these burdens they 
 would be aroused from their political lethargy. 
 Why should they bother with government, public 
 morality or with the world, when their income 
 appears as regularly as the rising sun? If they 
 awake it will not be from the dismal forebodings 
 of moral and political misanthropes but from some 
 internal urge which their own condition evokes. 
 Wants grow more rapidly than the means of satis- 
 fying them. From this arises the emotion on 
 "which world redemption depends.
 
 292 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 10 
 
 NOEMALCY 
 
 To most people the normal is a statistical aver- 
 age, the mean between the extremes statistical 
 tables show. The average Hungarian, Slav or 
 Jew becomes the normal of his race or class. The 
 American is the hundred per cent, tliird-genera- 
 tion stock, from which average the difference 
 between American and foreigners is estimated. 
 
 / In its other meaning the normal is the person 
 who has risen to a full development of his inherent 
 possibilities. We inherit from our parents cer- 
 
 i tain innate tendencies which force us to recapitu- 
 late the past history of the race. If we repeat 
 fully this ancestral history and reach the maturity 
 and development these inherent urges excite — 
 then we are normal. The normal neither demands 
 nor postulates anything new but it does include 
 a revival and accentuation of all through which 
 the race has passed. 
 
 The subnormal are those who have not reached 
 this full development. There has been a thwart- 
 ing or suppression, the result of w'hich being that 
 some stage has been omitted or not reached. The 
 cause may be vironal or mental ; it may be disease, 
 poor food or uncleanliness ; it may be social or 
 economic; but whatever it is diverting heredity 
 from its normal channel, it has marred the victim 
 in a readily recognized and unremovable manner. 
 If all human traits were inherited and the viron 
 were without influence these repressions and di- 
 versions would not matter. We still could say 
 that men are as they are because of inherited 
 forces which bring each one so far but no farther. 
 Current psychology lays too much emphasis on 
 inferior complexes to foster such a claim. Men
 
 NOEMALCY 293 
 
 even in the best circles are far below the level 
 heredity permits. Their health and culture tend 
 to keep them from acquiring a full possession of 
 their faculties. This is easy to see when their 
 pet hobbies are touched or when their class inter- 
 ests are at stake. If this is true of them, still 
 more is the ordinary citizen repressed and dis- 
 torted by his bad food, hard work, rigid traditions 
 and sacrificial religion. The average recruit, they 
 tell us, was not in mental growth above a fifteen- 
 year-old boy. What maturity is and what sound 
 health produces he will never know. Early senil- 
 ity and a toothless old age are about all he can 
 expect. 
 
 Still cruder than this is the social estimate of 
 our immigrants. That they average with their 
 brothers left behind may be admitted, but ages of 
 oppression, repression and depression have never 
 let their natural tendencies assert themselves. 
 They become American not by inherited changes 
 but by good food, homes, bathtubs, tooth- 
 brushes and fair wages. These acquired condi- 
 tions must be fulfilled before their heritable traits 
 can be measured. I do not say that the south 
 European races are in inheritance like the north- 
 ern races, but that what these traits are is dis- 
 coverable only where the repressions and distor- 
 tions of the ages are removed. From what we 
 know they are like the northern races in their 
 desire for material improvement. Jews and Slavs 
 do not refuse bathtubs nor the use of toothbrushes. 
 They enjoy sweets, like the movies and take kindly 
 to the automobile. Every peasant of Europe is 
 land-hungry, wants independence and is willing 
 to work if properly compensated. They strive for 
 the same political freedom and have the same race 
 ambition. They readily take to frontier ways even 
 if they lack a keen appreciation of social and 
 literary values.
 
 294 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 I mention these facts to answer the question as 
 to what it is to be normal. The reply seems to 
 be that it would be much above the present social 
 level if current degradation were avoided. We 
 need not fear a fall in civilization from any re- 
 placement of native stock by European races. 
 There might be a difference in what we would 
 become but not in what we are. There is a wide- 
 spread feeling that out of the older stock the 
 higher elements of a new race will come. Li these 
 surmises I shall not indulge. Under what condi- 
 tions genius arises neither I nor others know. 
 Science has not gone that far, but it is safe to 
 say that the average American even of the third 
 or fourth generation does not manifest many 
 traits which can be put under this head. We are, 
 under good conditions, a solid, persistent race with 
 traits common to all European races but not much 
 more. We are thus capable of an uplift to a nor- 
 mal level : we can, if we will, remove the complexes 
 which degrade our standards but we should not 
 assume too easily that so doing will produce a 
 race of giants or give us art, literature and science. 
 They are not normal products, but rest on condi- 
 tions yet to be discovered. Eugenics can make 
 men normal but it will not make gods. 
 
 It is not difficult to state the difference in pre- 
 mise between the two rival theories even if a 
 decisive proof of either be absent. One group 
 avers that race progress depends on the appear- 
 ance of some new trait in exceptional persons or 
 in a favored class. Just how it arises they do not 
 tell us, but if it appears and is fostered, a race or 
 class arise having this superiority which becomes 
 general through inheritance, when the inferior 
 class are exterminated. This is a theory of breed- 
 ing and survival — while the opposing theory is 
 one of effort. The new trait comes not from above 
 or without but from the effort of normal people to
 
 NORMALCY 295 
 
 reach a higher plane by using their faculties in 
 new ways. The hand, they would say, was not 
 made perfect by breeding but by the efforts of 
 millions of defective monkeys to increase their 
 power of grasping. Each new generation did a 
 little better, which in the end made the human 
 hand and as a by-product the human intellect. 
 The first element in progress is thus a motive. 
 There must be some end which an inferior 
 person desires. His unsuccessful pushing 
 starts a variation which in distant descendants 
 becomes a fixed trait. Do wish and will precede 
 and force inheritance and thus become its cause ? 
 or must men vary, breed and through eliminating 
 struggle, survive, before wish and will gain a 
 footing? 
 
 The reader should see the force of this issue 
 even if he cannot decide it. Perhaps todo this 
 as good a way as any is to compare American life 
 as presented by two recent books. Sinclair Lewis 
 has in Main Street given what he regards as the 
 picture of a typical American village. Mrs. 
 Parker has in her A^nerican Idyl thrown on the 
 screen a picture of an exceptional family life. 
 Are Mr. Lewis's characters normal individuals 
 or are their inherited traits distorted and 
 suppressed? Are Mr. and Mrs. Parker excep- 
 tional supernormal individuals or are they merely 
 normal persons freed by good fortune from the 
 scars and blemishes of their fellows? 
 
 It is not profitable to deny that the characters 
 presented by Mr. Lewis are to be found in every 
 American village, yet it is worth while to ask 
 what is in the background of the picture he pre- 
 sents. Something is wrong with Gopher Prairie, 
 ]but is it in the character of its people or in some 
 external pall which overhangs the town ? A fertile 
 soil and good crops should have produced a cheer- 
 fulness which Gopher Prairie lacks. Everybody
 
 296 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 walks and talks as if suffering from the rickets. 
 The town is living on but half of what it pro- 
 duces, and the worse half at that. Some drain 
 saps the town's vitality. It seems more 
 like the relapse after a local boom than Like a nor- 
 mal village. What the trouble is Mr. Lewis does 
 not tell. Where is the octopus! It may be the 
 elevator extortions, the railroads, the land-grab- 
 bers or any of the dozen other afflictions which 
 fasten themselves on the nation's life. National 
 traits are suppressed and distorted in the same 
 way by all these disorders. On the surface are a 
 lot of inferior complexes which do not represent 
 normal tendencies. No matter how widespread 
 the evil, yet the product in character is an arti- 
 ficial result which cannot be improved save in the 
 removal of external evils. What Gopher Prairie 
 lacks is not the high traits which eugenists desire 
 but the ordinary animal traits which all creatures 
 show when their viron is fitting. The lack of buoy- 
 ancy, curiosity and spirit-of-adventure is an ani- 
 mal depression and not the deficiency of inherit- 
 ance. Gopher Prairie needs someone with the 
 wrath of God, not a eugenic prophet. A town can- 
 not be normal until it consumes all it produces. It 
 cannot ship eut its grain and have the cars come 
 back empty. Push and strive must be its motto 
 even if it gets nowhere. Who can push without a 
 full stomach, a bathtub and a toothbrush? 
 
 In the way in which Gopher Prairie shows what 
 changes in behavior the suppression of animal 
 traits produces, so the example of the Parkers^ 
 illustrate what their free expression evokes. Mrs. 
 Parker puts a Greek toga on Carlton. The 
 picture in the front of the book has a pale, con- 
 sumptively intellectual cast that illy fits the robust 
 ruddy-faced original whose hair never lay smooth 
 in the manner presented. Carlton was not a 
 Greek nor a god. He struck hard, often got hurt in
 
 NORMALCY 297 
 
 the encounter, but he never flinched, took failure 
 in a good-natured way and at the next encounter 
 struck harder blows. In modern terms Carl- 
 ton was wish rather than thought. What he 
 wished he willed; and never yielded to an impos- 
 sibility until it was tested and not even then until 
 he was knocked flat. No one with other spirit 
 would have tried so many ways to reach desired 
 goals and recovered so quickly from consistent 
 failure. He lived recklessly, spent as he earned 
 and rushed after each new wish even before the 
 old one had expired. The rush and the push were 
 what excited the admonition of his friends more 
 than the judgment with which he acted. The 
 book describes his trips in a realistic fashion. He 
 struck the line hard, used up his energy and fell in 
 a way fitting his active career. He was thus 
 worthy of the praise his wife bestows, yet he was 
 not a genius but a typical western boy freed from 
 the disabilities from which Gopher Prairie suf- 
 fers. What the Parkers did is not so strange nor 
 so exalted as it seems. A million young American 
 couples could do likewise if they shook off the 
 irresolution which village depression creates. 
 Animal virtues we all have. 
 
 A million struggles made the hand, a million 
 bites made teeth. Millions died on the road before 
 the great ends of animal life were attained, but the 
 I wish for betterment persisted and in the end 
 I reached ample fulfillment. One Carlton Parker 
 I cannot fulfill the great human w^ish for fuller life, 
 but a million — ^knocking hard, courageous in fail- 
 ure, ever trying the impossible until it yields — 
 will take from life its handicaps and even modify 
 self until it fits the viron for wliich all yearn. We 
 do not need genius nor a super race to reach what 
 wish postulates. It will come through a freeing 
 of forces which, ^heredity has long since implanted. 
 Only yesterday 1 saw a man in rags who for
 
 298 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 forty years had toiled diligently on a fertile farm. 
 His heredity was as pure as mine. It is my good 
 fortune always to have more than I earn. Parents 
 and education have given me what to this toiler 
 is denied. Men cannot thrive under exploitation 
 any more than they can burdened with fever or 
 tuberculosis. They need not a new heredity, but 
 the removal of complexes and the fun of spend- 
 ing what they earn. The mass of Americans 
 belong to those whom religious censors held in 
 subjection as long as they could. This common 
 stock has come up wherever it has had opportun- 
 ity. Men thrive who would have been drunkards 
 or horse jockeys had they lived in New England 
 a century ago. The new conditions have made 
 them otherwise, not any alteration in heredity. 
 
 Behold the millions we might uplift if American 
 handicaps were removed. When they rise it will 
 not be because of the much-heralded super man 
 but because these millions strike their heads 
 against seemingly unremovable obstacles until 
 
 I they yield. It is the wish not the germ cell which 
 determines action. Seek and ye shall find, knock 
 and it will open. A good old rule is still the only 
 guide to achievement. For salvation w^e need 
 animal traits. Only the corn-fed reach Paradise. 
 
 11 
 
 Joe Gannett 
 
 The thought blend thus far described is the 
 effect of the commingling of European stocks un- 
 der new conditions by which established charac- 
 ters are tested and reshaped. It is an upper class 
 transformation rather than a lower class rise. 
 A civilization, however, is measured by the uplift 
 of depressed classes to upper class freedom. The
 
 JOE GANNETT 299 
 
 common clay must get a metallic ring. Of this 
 rise the Gannett family is a notable example. Joe 
 Gannett, the father, as a mere lad answered Lin- 
 coln's first call; he also walked up Pennsylvania 
 Avenue behind Sherman at the close. Unlike most 
 veterans he had never received a scratch nor a 
 medal. Instead of talking of heroic deeds he had 
 picked up every funny tale of camp life from the 
 Mississippi to the Potomac. His stories were a 
 refreshing relief from the glorious recitals of his 
 sober friends. They laughed — but he never be- 
 came a hero in their eyes. Joe shot the rebels as 
 he did a squirreL He had no notion that he did a 
 noble deed but merely thought of his markmanship. 
 After the battle he would trade coffee for tobacco 
 and got to like the people he shot at. They were 
 not the Huns his neighbors were fond of imagin- 
 ing, but a square lot when it came to playing cards 
 or helping the wounded across the lines. Joe had 
 violated many an order about not having inter- 
 course with the enemy and thus he knew South- 
 erners to be a different race from what the home 
 folk imagined. But to talk this way after the war 
 was criminal, as much so as to praise a German 
 at present. His neighbors decided that Joe was a 
 rebel at heart and added this to his many delin- 
 quencies. How could anyone tell amusing stories 
 of sacred things; how could he make fun of his 
 generals ; how could he laugh about breaking mili- 
 tary law without being at heart irreligious, im- 
 moral and even — this, however, was said in whis- 
 pers — an atheist *? 
 
 Everybody knew just what was going to happen. 
 He was held up as an example for boys to avoid. 
 His horoscope told of drunkenness, gambling, 
 licentiousness and numerous depravities of the 
 Scriptural order. Some evidence of God's wrath 
 was sure to fall on such a man. If not the sores 
 of Job, at least the potter's field would receive
 
 300 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 his bones. In spite of all this prediction, nothing 
 happened. Joe never got drunk; nor slid out of 
 town for a spree; his horse-racing propensities 
 did not degenerate into gambling. He might bet 
 on a horse but he withheld his cash from Wall 
 Street speculation. His barns were painted; the 
 fences in repair ; the house and yard a model ; even 
 the woodpile was larger and better chopped than 
 in the good old McCleary days. Joe apparently 
 had no conscience ; he always did what he wanted. 
 Money flew but it was replaced by good crops. 
 His neighbors would not race horses but they 
 liked to visit Joe's stables and talk of the horses 
 as the ornament of the town. They liked what Joe 
 did but did not dare do it. Their consciences 
 thwarted their desires, while his had become 
 friends. 
 
 Yet everybody wondered how anyone could be 
 so near brimstone and not slip over. He and 
 Janet got on amazingly. She lectured his extrav- 
 agance and took especial delight in lauding Mc- 
 Cleary virtues; but he could turn their edge by 
 praising her cooking. She w^as so full of Mc- 
 Cleary superiority that any reference to it brought 
 a relenting smile. When she wore to church the 
 best fur suit the town had seen, she excused her- 
 self by saying that against her expostulations 
 Joe would buy it and she did not see the sin in 
 wearing what was already paid for. When they 
 went to the city she spent her time scolding Joe's 
 spending. ' ' Just think of it, ' ' she said to a neigh- 
 bor, *'we paid six dollars for a room when we 
 might have had one at the Parker House for three, 
 but Joe said he w^ould not be seen with his wife 
 in such a place. We paid five dollars for seats 
 at the opera and Joe gave a whole dollar to a 
 waiter at dinner. Why, that would have kept a 
 missionary for a week ; men are so stubborn and 
 careless, women so helpless; we'll die in the poor
 
 JOE GANNETT 301 
 
 house yet. That is what Aunt Sophie always said ; 
 Joe will bring us there if he can. ' ' Yet the family 
 throve; unneeded extravagance each year, but 
 then for some unknown reason the McCleary 
 acres increased their produce more rapidly than 
 the expenses grew; so more horses and better 
 stock came to keep the balance. Janet scrutinized 
 the bank account to see there were no hidden 
 expenses but she never found anything more than 
 cigar bills. Joe was open ; what he paid she knew, 
 and got what satisfaction she could by scolding. 
 In spite of her moral protests he dragged her into 
 whatever he did. If he showed off his trained 
 horses to the admiring multitude, she was in the 
 seat beside him trying as hard as she could not 
 to enjoy herself. She protested at thus being 
 made an accomplice but he noted she never began 
 to object until the race or parade was finished. 
 
 Such was Joe at home. In town he was at the 
 head of everything. When anything was to be 
 done Joe was called on. He was not good enough 
 to be deacon but church finance was in his hands. 
 He could raise more money in a day than the 
 deacons in a year. When the Christian Associa- 
 tion failed to rid the town of saloons he got him- 
 self elected constable. The saloon keepers went 
 and stayed. He had no respect for law. His 
 methods were direct ; he laughed at talk of prose- 
 cution. So he kept things straight, not that he 
 cared much but he liked public approval. What 
 he did he knew others would like to do and would 
 have done but for the bites of conscience. Having 
 instinctive regard for public opinion, he was al- 
 ways ahead of it. Hence his neighbors secretly 
 admired his ways but fearing a phantom lost their 
 way trying to avoid it. The moral rocks on which 
 they stood were sinking, yet they could not trust 
 themselves to earth. Its roses looked tempting 
 but has not every rose a sting?
 
 302 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 This condition is not so unreal as it seems. The 
 past is shaded by certain glories which falsify the 
 perspective. There were a few people who came 
 on the Mayflower; the Puritans were real beings 
 but they are not chiefly our ancestors; if so, the 
 blood has been tainted by that of the common 
 herd. Boston is not the place to find Puritan oif- 
 spring. The Revolution drove out orthodox re- 
 spectability and left the mob in control. These 
 were later comers of a very common stock, bron- 
 cos, slackers, wood rats, knock-kneed madonnas, 
 discarded spinsters. Every deacon had a seraglio 
 in the loft above the kitchen. Women had but 
 two choices— to die in child-bed and to wink at 
 their husbands' indiscretions. Rapid breeding 
 made these groups numerically dominant ; revolu- 
 tion gave them political power ; but of the fighting 
 spirit they had little. Occasionally they formed 
 a militia for home defense but as a rule they let 
 the w^orld jog as it would. The patriots talked but 
 let others fight. The socially prominent were pro- 
 British rather than honestly Tory. Surviving, 
 they were also the ancestry of much of our present 
 American nobility. There were plenty of patriots 
 in Boston when the British were in New York but 
 only subdued talk when the redcoats were near. 
 Think of three million people who w^ere never able 
 to muster twenty thousand soldiers in a single 
 battle. Serbia did twenty times better in the late 
 war. Most of our fighting was done by foreigners 
 or recent immigrants. The Scotch and the Irish 
 were alone in their opposition to England. They 
 had principle at stake rather than the appropriat- 
 ing of tea cargoes. The battle of freedom was 
 fought not so much in America as in the English 
 Parliament. 
 
 If this common herd is followed to their homes 
 the causes of their degeneration become apparent. 
 America had a super-abundance of the crude
 
 JOE GANNETT 303 
 
 necessities but in all else she was lacking. Cheap 
 food makes lazy folk. Nobody worked over two 
 days a week. The rest of the time they loafed, 
 raced horses and drank rum. Between the upper 
 and the common herd there was a gulf as marked 
 as between the aristocracy of Russia and its peo- 
 ple. Of the former much could be said, but they, 
 like the Russian aristocrats, were driven to for- 
 eign parts. Civilization thus drops back to its 
 primitive base ; not depravity, but crudeness pre- 
 vails. 
 
 This is said not to be sensational but to show 
 the base on which the American uplift rests. If 
 we were all descendants of the Puritans, if the 
 youth of the Revolutionary period had been 
 modern patriots, if sobriety and industry had pre- 
 vailed, from then to now must reveal a rapid 
 descent. But if in the new America crude and 
 vicious elements dominated, the uplift can be 
 measured by its striking features. The mob had 
 to have its emotions, tastes and impulses modified. 
 On these new forces the redemption of America 
 depended. The Methodist missionaries were the 
 first to see the peril and to apply a remedy. 
 Their hell-fire may have been unreal but its ap- 
 peal was eifective. The doctrine of instant con- 
 version opened the way to marked changes in 
 character. Of this route thousands took advan- 
 tage. They turned suddenly from riotous livers 
 to sober citizens and made good in this adventure. 
 To aid this movement came the opening of the 
 West. Improved transportation brought the set- 
 tler commodities which modified his taste and 
 gave a market for the grain which before was 
 turned into whisky. Alterations in consumption 
 gave new articles a definite superiority and this 
 checked the tendency to improvident living. 
 About sugar a new diet sprang up more satisfy- 
 ing than the bitter, salted foods which fit liquor
 
 304 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 consumption. The country has been freed from 
 the liquor menace not by a moral movement but 
 by the steady pressure of new wants. Drinking 
 thus came naturally under a ban through the 
 broadening of choices, making abstinence the 
 accepted not the unusual thing. The pressure of 
 conformity thus keeps the multitude within 
 bounds. 
 
 These tendencies were strengthened by indus- 
 trial changes. The American hates to work with 
 a hoe but he loves to use tools and manage ma- 
 chines. One has only to observe the hours a man 
 puts on his automobile to be convinced that work 
 on a machine is a pleasure not a task. The out- 
 put of industry is thus greatly increased, which 
 in turn enlarges the choices available in consump- 
 tion. Combining these and numerous other mate- 
 rial advantages, the way is open for a change in 
 the dominant type of the population. So long 
 as vice was rampant the rigid Puritan morality 
 was necessary for those who would avoid degen- 
 eration. In early days the struggle between vice 
 and morality was real and fierce. Families were 
 large but population was scanty. Where did the 
 surplus go? Down to drunkards' graves. Of 
 ten children three survive. Who are those left? 
 Are they physically degenerate or a type that was 
 unfitted to the then prevailing viron ? We do not 
 wonder when Southern trees fail to weather 
 Northern blasts nor that flowers will not survive 
 in an unhoed garden. In all physical things we 
 see this fact, yet we fail to apply it to human 
 affairs. 
 
 The dominant type in America today are those 
 killed off a century ago by the lure of tempta- 
 tion. They have undergone no moral transfor- 
 mation. They would probably drink as much 
 whisky and be as shiftless as their ancestors if 
 similarly vironed. They eat pie and drink soda
 
 JOE GANNETT 305 
 
 because they like them better, not because their 
 morals forbid the alternative. In survival such 
 men have an advantage over their strictly moral 
 neighbors. Their lives have become more fitted to 
 the modern viron while the strictly moral have 
 become less so. Tuberculosis and similar house 
 diseases cut in on family rigidity, leaving the 
 survivors in inferior positions. 
 
 It is this that creates the moral stress in vil- 
 lage life. Everybody believes in the old form of 
 moral doctrine and thinks that violators are pun- 
 ished by Scriptural methods. Deep down the sin- 
 ner should go, each violation throwing him on a 
 steeper down-grade. Poverty, the almshouse, 
 a drunkard's burial and subsequent unremitting 
 punishment is the moral plot so often repeated 
 that it has become axiomatic. As all signs fail 
 in dry weather, so all benign plots are wrecked by 
 American experience. There is no toboggan 
 slide. The sinner is always breaking conven- 
 tion yet he never gets beyond the initial stages. 
 The sun shines on the good and the bad, yet bet- 
 ter on the bad than on the good. The really bad 
 have quit the village long ago, leaving the bad 
 like the good — except in their moral standing. 
 By doing bad their social standing is lost but 
 without any injury to crops. The bad merely eat 
 more, drink less and wear better clothes. They 
 ride in autos Sunday afternoons while their 
 neighbors, sitting behind closed windows, wonder 
 why God's wrath does not create a consuming 
 blaze. Prophets are at a discount. Once they led 
 from desert to fertile valley. Now they keep their 
 followers on stony land. The golden fruit across 
 the way rots except when sinners pick. 
 
 These facts show the change in survival which 
 a century has wrought. The major part of each 
 family living, drinking and enjo^-ing life was then 
 sucked into a maelstrom from which there was no
 
 306 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 return. Only a rigid discipline kept the virtuous 
 on the straight road. Today the eddy has been 
 broken. Pleasure canoes can safely glide from 
 shore to shore. A non-moral type survives, who 
 dash against convention, pass antique scarecrows 
 and graze on fields into which their predecessors 
 never dared to look. Though without moral re- 
 straint they never do worse than to eat pie. There 
 is plenty of indigestion in 'every village, but no 
 toboggan slide. They could do better but there 
 is something in the situation which keeps them 
 from doing worse. 
 
 The problems involved are not merely those of 
 the village. They are everywhere; often set in 
 more striking hues. The sternness of one gener- 
 ation sits in one pew; in the next, genial content- 
 ment. The one is deacon ; the other trustee. The 
 deacon is censor; the trustee, manager and 
 money-getter. He sits in his pew with a smile 
 and takes with temporary seriousness all the min- 
 ister and deacon urge. His wife is thinking of 
 Auction but her demeanor is as sedate as the 
 deacon's mate. The daughter, glancing across 
 the aisle at Mamie Smith, wonders if she will 
 heed the reproof. There is a return glance with 
 the same implication but in neither case does the 
 lesson sink deeply. Both families live amid 
 abundant choices and never consult morality in 
 determining them. They are far from bad in 
 their neighbors' opinion, yet not good by church 
 standard. The trustee is proud of his maternal 
 ancestor who died for her opinions but this does 
 not prevent him from sending a letter lauding the 
 Attorney-General for his severe treatment of 
 Huns, Socialists and other brands of radical 
 thought. He accepts with a smile the deacon's 
 reproof for Sunday automobile trips although in 
 turn he wonders how any one can expect to save 
 a whole family for twenty-five dollars a year.
 
 JOE GANNETT 307 
 
 Yet he likes to see the deacon pass the communion 
 cup and would be shocked if a less sedate man 
 were in his place. The deacon is thus an orna- 
 ment — a reminder of old times. His is a dying 
 race while the trustee is the future's representa- 
 tive. A pure-blooded deacon is hard to find. 
 Some churches pay a premium to get the right 
 brand. When filled with fat, florid parishioners 
 it adds to dignity to have a hollow-eyed deacon 
 pace the aisle. 
 
 The public has visualized the deacon as temper- 
 ance advocate and repressor of art. Yet the trus- 
 tee is the real sinner. It is he who denounces 
 girls with short hair, skirts and socks. Every 
 innovation brings a volume of wrath not because 
 it is bad but because he dislikes change. Old days 
 and good old ways excite his admiration. 
 
 It is wrong to think of the officials at Washing- 
 ton, persecuting helpless minorities, as fierce 
 tigers or as straight-laced Puritans. They are 
 merely good-natured individuals striving to win 
 popular approval. Their feelings are merely herd 
 instinct, not race or opinion hatred. We should 
 not think of a bull pawing and bellowing as hat- 
 ing the object of his attack. He is seeking herd 
 favor. The flow of herd action goes out over 
 channels set by wrath and has all its external 
 marks. The herd leader is merely a hundred per 
 cent American following the line of least resist- 
 ance. He is cruel and arrogant not from nature 
 but because popular leadership demands it. The 
 level of the mob is his level. W^hat to them is 
 wish becomes to him a deed. The herd does not 
 hate; it merely has a repugnance of difference. 
 A new color, a new form, a new opinion receive 
 the same condemnation; blank similarity is their 
 crowning joy. 
 
 The century has altered the surviving type. 
 The drunkard, the tramp, the horse jockey, be-
 
 308 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 coming converts, emerge as hustlers, trustees and 
 one hundred per cent Americans. The deacon 
 type have lost their social ascendancy and are 
 often outside the church in the various dissent 
 organizations. They are single-taxers, Socialists, 
 conscientious objectors, peace advocates and 
 other protesting groups who dislike the pressure 
 arrogant majorities exert. The deacon might see 
 a resemblance between himself and the conscien- 
 tious objector but would be shocked if put in with 
 a Socialist; yet if the form of argument and the 
 method of reasoning are considered, the differ- 
 ence is slight. The Bolsheviki are unwashed dea- 
 cons; the trustee is a washed tramp. The one 
 hundred per cent American is primitive energy 
 directed in new channels. If he got drunk once 
 a week he would use his energy in braAvls, but 
 in the new world it is more fun to persecute min- 
 orities. There is thus an emphasis of physical 
 prowess and a love of adventure. Literature has 
 not yet caught the spirit of the change. The 
 peaked-faced devils and New England deacons are 
 still on the stage. The movie, however, repre- 
 sents character in its modern form. The acting of 
 a Douglas Fairbanks meets modern demands. He 
 has the form, the smile and tlie dash which hold 
 the attention. By watching his ways and com- 
 paring them with those of the man on the street 
 the observer can bring to the fore the salient 
 changes in shape and desire which the century 
 has wrought. 
 
 Such was Joe and the opinion of Joe. When 
 the bad disappear in the bottomless pit it is easy 
 to point a moral and give warning to young and 
 tempted. But when the mcked prosper, have 
 horses, full barns and bumper crops — even a Job 
 fails to unravel the mysteries of Providence. 
 House on the sand: yes, sand could be seen be- 
 neath each pillar. The bank is ready to cave.
 
 ACQUIEED CHAEACTERS 309 
 
 When the rain descends, the floods come, and the 
 winds blow, Joe 's neighbors leap from bed to see 
 the fall, only to return crying: "How long? How 
 long? How long!" 
 
 12 
 
 Acquired Characters 
 
 Science teaches that characters are of two 
 sorts: a physical heredity which is passed from 
 parent to child ; a social heredity which each gen- 
 eration impresses on the next. Acquired traits 
 we are told cannot change physical heredity. If 
 so, physical heredity is not altered by the acts 
 of a particular generation. The degenerate die 
 out. The normal survive to give the next genera- 
 tion its physical heredity. If that is improving, 
 the race rises, forcing manners to undergo a 
 change for the better. 
 
 Natural traits cannot be altered ; acquired traits 
 cannot be inherited. So much is clear yet a con- 
 fusion lies in the background which obviates the 
 inference that the acquired traits we value are 
 the same as the natural traits we inherit. The 
 words used thus create the assumption that in 
 character-building heredity is all-important. If, 
 however, moral traits are post-natal products re- 
 grafted on each generation by social means, the 
 graft not the heredity is supreme. Of this graft 
 the inherited element is emotion. The acquired 
 element is some shock or strain to which the child 
 is subjected. A single shock or a ten-minute 
 strain may alter a child 's character in ways which 
 endure for life. 
 
 Every one knows that the child prenatally goes 
 through a fish stage and a reptilian stage. AVhat 
 is not so clearly seen is that a child at birth is in 
 just such another stage out of which it must come
 
 310 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 if it is to reach normal maturity. At birth it is 
 merely a nervous bundle, a development wrought 
 by the difficulties of child birth. Whatever pro- 
 longs this nervous dominance is almost as bad in 
 its effect as it would have been to have remained 
 a fish or a reptile. It is not heredity but the hap- 
 penings between birth and adolescence which 
 keeps a child in or elevates him above this birth 
 level. 
 
 Emotion gives the arousing force to action; 
 instinct directs the response. These two sides of 
 heredity have developed together. In the lower 
 organisms the two correspond, there being an 
 emotion to arouse and an instinct to direct each 
 adjustive act. In an insect each external pres- 
 sure arouses a definite nervous response, such 
 that action and reaction are so related that pre- 
 dicates from one to the other can readily be made. 
 If an insect is compared w^ith a monkey a marked 
 change in the form of reaction is visible. The 
 antecedents of acts are no longer to be sought in 
 the direct contacts of the monkey with its viron. 
 His responses are imitations of other creatures. 
 He does what he sees others do instead of re- 
 sponding directly to his material contacts. 
 
 An instinct is an inherited mechanism. The 
 nervous system is so organized that it gives 
 definite responses to each vital stimulus. Imita- 
 tion is an acquired trait. What others do creates 
 the impulse to action. Judged mechanically, the 
 difference between a monkey and an insect is that 
 the monkey has lost some of the inherited nervous 
 mechanisms in which the insect excels. There 
 has been a decay in the mechanical responses to 
 external stimuli in the place of which imitation 
 has gained a dominance. Why this has happened 
 could be easily demonstrated, but the real point 
 is that the intelligence shown by the monkey rep- 
 resents not a gain in inheritance but a loss. In-
 
 ACQUIEED CHARACTERS 311 
 
 stinct lias been replaced by acquired knowledge. 
 This decay of instincts has gone much farther 
 in the case of man. Most of his instincts have 
 lost force. Men stimulated by the viron havel 
 emotion which prompts action ; but no instinct to 
 direct it. The direction comes through imitation 
 or through a rational process. The accepted as- 
 sumption is that the change from insect to mon- 
 key and from monkey to man has been through 
 increases in inherited mechanisms. The change 
 however involves a loss in inherited nervous 
 mechanism, not a gain. The dictum of acquired 
 traits, not being heritable, does not hold. The 
 victory of acquired traits over heritable nervous 
 mechanisms happened way back in the monkey 
 stage. We inherit emotions; we do not inherit 
 responses. Our emotions are natural; our re- 1 
 spouses are acquired. 
 
 If an insect is compared with man the striking 
 difference is that man has a better body than the 
 insect and that its functioning has more influence 
 on conduct than is the case with insects. We like 
 to call our bodies flesh and imagine that we are 
 superior to the degree we thwart their behests. 
 But the facts contradict this assumption. Our 
 bodies have developed; tlie control of body by 
 inherited nervous mechanisms has decreased. 
 Practically it can be said of normal men that 
 bodily behests control the mind instead of in- 
 herited mental instincts controlling the body. The 
 mind is almost blank until emotion and experi- 
 ence determine its direction. Thought is thus the 
 servant of action, not its master. 
 
 An insect's reaction to pain is anger. The mon- 
 key anticipating pain reacts against it not by 
 angry attack, but by avoidance. The monkey 
 runs instead of fights. His inherited mechanisms 
 of response are useless; their degeneration a 
 benefit. After the monkey had been on the run 
 
 U
 
 312 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 for ages the instinctive nervous losses were great 
 enough to permit rational conduct. Progress lies 
 not in restoring nervous control as the rational- 
 ist and moralist demand, but in further perfec-| 
 tion of body so that its emotions and reactions li 
 reflect in an unconscious way the adjustment on/ 1 
 which superior life depends. 
 
 Neither progress nor degeneration should be 
 regarded as natural unless evidences of the 
 ^_^hange are visible in pre-human forms. Measured] 
 ^rm this way the earliest forms of action are trop-j 
 V isms due to the direct action of physical forcesj 
 An external control is thus formed to be replaced 
 later by instincts which are mechanically estab- 
 lished movements ending with some external re- 
 sponse. These mechanisms are parts of the cen- 
 tral nervous system which create definite connec- 
 tion between the organs of the body. The units 
 of this system are the reflexes capable of inde- 
 pendent action but which in most cases are under 
 the control of the brain centers. 
 
 The non-structural reactions are the effect 
 which elementary physical forces have on animal 
 organisms. Heat, light, gravitation, pressure, 
 are each the source of animal movement. The 
 difference between these reactions and those ner- 
 vously conveyed is that there is no mechanism 
 connecting the parts. If heat or light creates ac- 
 tion the co-ordination ceases with the cessation 
 of the force. If a moth goes toward a light its 
 movement stops when the light fades. The moth 
 does not go toward the light because of any in- 
 herited mechanism but because of the direct effect 
 of the light rays. A bee scenting a flower moves 
 toward it as the result of centrally aroused im- 
 pulses conveyed back and forth by nerve cur- 
 rents. The bee could, if it would, turn away from 
 the flower; the moth cannot turn from the light.
 
 ACQUIBED CHARACTETiS 313 
 
 It has no mechanisms by which to resist light 
 impulses. 
 
 The direct action of external physical forces 
 has to a large measure been overcome by the 
 development of the central nervous system. We 
 seem to be able to move as we will in disregard 
 of physical agents. While this is true of objec- 
 tive forces it is not true of internal processes. 
 Certain glands secrete and exude into the blood 
 substances which arouse action in other parts 
 similiar to that which the physical forces exert 
 on lower forms of life. While these secretions 
 are discharged into the blood the excitement con- 
 tinues ; it stops when the secretion ceases. These 
 temporary forces arouse through contact, not 
 through a nerve current mechanically established. 
 If an insect is injured it responds with a sting. 
 Its nerve connections determine the kind of re- 
 sponse ; the vigor of the response comes however 
 from the action which the blood excites. So with 
 men; what we do our nerves tell, but the vigor 
 of doing the blood content determines. Anger is 
 due to blood changes caused by gland discharges. 
 The nerve mechanisms enabling us to act effec- 
 tively are permanent organic relations but the 
 feeling of anger is temporary, coming and going 
 with the stafe of the blood. If then the excite- 
 ment is carried from one part of the system to 
 others through the blood, the changes effected are 
 blood psychology. In contrast to this there is a 
 nerve psycholo.gy, when the excitement is carried 
 along well defined nervous tracts. In the first 
 case the action is tropic; in the second instinctive. 
 To bear this contrast in mind simplifies many 
 complex situations hard to explain in any other 
 way. 
 
 Nerve excitement is at its maximum immediate- 
 ly. Pain starts with its greatest intensity and 
 falls off as the nerves fatigue. All sense prod-
 
 314 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 nets are instantaneous in their effects. We see 
 sights, hear sounds, taste or smell with an initial 
 vigor not afterwards excelled. This is due to the 
 perfection of the nerve currents. Tropic effects 
 cannot be so quickly aroused. The glands throw 
 their products into the blood. In it they are car- 
 ried to all parts of the body. Withdraw light and 
 the vision instantly fades, but the passion aroused 
 by gland action only gradually subsides. An 
 angry person but slowly regains his conaposure. 
 His feeling ceases only when the blood is freed 
 of the discharged hormones. Tropic force thus 
 intensifies action but never directs it. 
 
 When glands and nerves work together action 
 is vigorous and well directed. To attain this end 
 there has been a long evolution. For each in- 
 stinct to direct there should be an emotion to 
 intensify the decision. This harmony can be seen 
 in insects, and perhaps best of all in the carni- 
 vora. But with the monkey instincts began to 
 decay and emotions to grow or at least they hold 
 their own. There is thus an overflow of emotion 
 which goes out, not in harmony with instinct, but 
 often in opposition to it. This opposition can be 
 measured objectively through gland action ^ or 
 through its effect in conscious emotion. Objec- 
 tively the conflict is between tropic and sensory 
 forces. Subjectively the contrast is between an- 
 ger and joy. An angry reaction indicates a har- 
 mony of emotion and instinct. Emotion then re- 
 inforces instinctive demands. When instinct de- 
 generates action is less effective. Fear inter- 
 venes; hesitation results. A still further degen- 
 eration is indicated by kicking, cr>i.ng, tears and 
 other emotional reactions. With additional de- 
 generation men laugh at what would to an in- 
 stinctive person cause anger. By it the emotional 
 currents go out along what, adjustively consid- 
 ered, are useless paths. Either parts are aroused
 
 ACQUIEED CHARACTERS 315 
 
 which have no adjustment value, or old degener- 
 ate parts are stirred to a renewed activity. 
 Laughter is merely ineffective anger. The flow of 
 emotion in the two cases is the same. The same 
 organs are aroused. The jaw and muscular face 
 movements are ineffectual bites. The chill of the 
 hack which accompanies strong emotion is an 
 attempted movement w^hich in lower animals 
 would have moved the skin or stiffened the hair 
 and bristles. Humor turns emotion from effec- 
 tive adjustment into some useless suppressing 
 channel. All these emotional puzzles are solved 
 when the relation of instinct to tropic action is 
 understood. 
 
 The degeneration which moralists fear can- 
 not take place more rapidly than natural traits 
 decay. This decay if judged by biologic evidence 
 must be slow. Ages must pass before visible 
 changes manifest themselves. Rapid declines in 
 civilization must therefore have other causes. 
 The decay which moralists lament is not a gen- 
 eral decay but only the decay of some special 
 class. The whole series of problems can be made 
 one by assuming that the surviving class is un- 
 dergoing a physical degeneration of instinct, 
 w^hile the defeated group is undergoing a decay 
 of their acquired repressions. Economic pres- 
 sure forces a moral decay of the defeated while 
 physical superiority, causing instinctive traits to 
 degenerate, permits the increase of intelligence. 
 
 Darwinian theory over-emphasizes elimination 
 as the source of progress. In some unknown way 
 variation occurs, after which natural forces decide 
 which is the superior. If, however, there are 
 tropic forces at work, nature can start variations 
 as well as to decide between them. Does organic 
 modification begin with the direct action of nat- 
 ural forces, or does it begin with conscious judg- 
 ments which improve individual power to per-
 
 316 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 form, and thus lead through the inheritance of 
 acquired traits to a more effective heredity? The 
 latter answer is the well known theory of La- 
 marck. Heredity is thus assumed to alter after 
 the conscious judgment makes changes. This 
 means that judgments make heredity and not that 
 heredity makes judgments, an order which I wish 
 to question without falling into the negative at- 
 titude of the orthodox biologist. 
 
 The correct order I assume to be: first, the 
 direct action of natural forces on life ; second, the 
 appearance of a wish to do what natural forces 
 tend to create; third, a power to do through the 
 growth of inherited traits. Then judgments are 
 formed which harmonize with natural tendencies. 
 From this viewpoint the acquired traits which 
 Lamarck puts first are in reality the last to alter 
 and are thus effects, not causes. They mark the 
 completion of an epoch, not its origin. The de- 
 cay of institutions, morals, customs, and habits 
 does not indicate physical degeneration but an 
 advance in heredity. A new step in evolution has 
 come to a final epoch in which old institutions no 
 longer fitting the new heredity must give way to 
 institutions better adapted to the approaching 
 epoch. There is thus a square issue between those 
 who argue that cultural and moral decency in- 
 dicate physical degeneration, and those who re- 
 gard the same facts as an indication of a physical 
 advance. 
 
 Darwinism shows how nature can decide be- 
 tween types but it does not show how it can start 
 new ones. This gap a knowledge of tropic forces 
 fills. Tropic forces are always . acting on life. 
 Their influence is in opposition to the already 
 developed, inherited powers. They do not help 
 an animal to do what it wants to do but compel 
 it to do something else. The compulsion which 
 the direct natural action enforces has two seem-
 
 INFERIOR COMPLEXES 317 
 
 ingly conflicting effects. Wliat nature compels 
 an animal to do it tends to do subsequently. 
 Every time the animal is compelled to do what 
 it does not want to do its will power is increased 
 by the resistance it offers. At the same time any 
 movement once made is the next time easier to 
 perform. Every tropic impressment thus tends to 
 perpetuate itself as a tendency which as it grows 
 becomes a wish. If a wish is once gratified each 
 subsequent gratification meets with less resist- 
 ance. It tends thus to become habit and to build 
 conventions which enforce its demands. The wish 
 in this sense expresses itself mainly through ac- 
 quired characters, while the will represents in- 
 herited tendencies which bodily mechanisms help 
 to enforce. The wish and the will thus get in 
 conflict. The will rules where there are adequate 
 inherited mechanisms to perform desired acts. 
 The wish dominates w^here these mechanisms are 
 absent or only partly developed. Progress in 
 heredity can be measured in tliree ways — longev- 
 ity, muscle and will. Their increase shows that 
 heredity is improving. Mental superiority is not 
 measured in these ways but by wishes which have 
 no adequate biologic enforcement. It is not doing 
 what we can but trying to do what we can't which 
 ultimately tests the growth of life. 
 
 13 
 
 Infeeior Complexes 
 
 Through his home contacts a feeling of supe- 
 riority had been generated in Paul. He had con- 
 fidence in every one, and he succeeded by aggres- 
 sive action. He grew as every young animal 
 grows, with a complete harmony between his con- 
 tacts and reactions. He did what he wanted and
 
 318 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 did well because of the accord between his wishes 
 and his needs. 
 
 This freedom ceases when church and school 
 are entered. Their discipline is a repression, the 
 assumption being that the child is in tendency de- 
 praved. If the child is physically weak or has 
 been taught the need of repression by previous 
 ills, he adopts the social patterns and makes of 
 them a second nature. But if the aggressive 
 spirit has been aroused by the antecedent vic- 
 tories a stubborn conflict ensues. Paul's mother 
 and grandfather believed in obedience, humility 
 and sacrifice as firmly as they believed in aggres- 
 sive action on the farm. They never carried over 
 home decisions to their social life. School obedi- 
 ence was to them axiomatic. Why Paul needed 
 discipline they could hardly say, yet they relied 
 on its efficiency. The teacher believed in love but 
 also in autocratic rule. Her devices were sugar- 
 coated, though after all the bitter kernel must be 
 taken. So long as the things taught do not match 
 the aggressiveness of home, discipline is needed 
 to divert child life from its normal channels ! 
 
 This discipline of the teacher and moralist 
 does not eradicate the wrong tendency they dis- 
 like; it merely distorts the expression into some 
 other more subtle form. The sense of superiority 
 natural to the child is transformed into a sense of 
 inferiority. A new group of passions and dis- 
 tempers are created wliich alters the child's rela- 
 tion to his comrades and superiors. Docility is 
 not humbly accepted. The energy which would 
 go out as love becomes distrust and hate. 
 
 Every inclination has back of it some natural 
 power with a certain amount of stored energy. 
 This energy breaks through its restraints as 
 water will burst a dam. The obstacle is avoided 
 by flowing in some new channel. The symbol is 
 this distorted expression. It always has some
 
 INFERIOE COMPLEXES 319 
 
 features in common with the origiDal with differ- 
 ences enough to avoid the imposed censorship. 
 Purity places a tabu on exposing certain features 
 and organs. The result is not a cessation of sex 
 imagery but a creation of sex symbols. By this 
 means the flow of passion is as fierce as if the 
 concealed organs were exposed. Anything asso- 
 ciated with a suppressed thought or action be- 
 comes a symbol of them. The energy back of 
 each suppression never fails to gain an outlet. 
 When superficially view^ed symbolism seems with- 
 out law, but beneath all is a general law. The 
 suppressed item is transformed into a class con- 
 cept which includes all thoughts or actions asso- 
 ciated with the original. Then there is a degrad- 
 ation through loss of memory or through further 
 suppression so that only the more intense mem- 
 bers remain in consciousness. These become the 
 specific symbol of the suppressed original and re- 
 appear whenever the suppressed mechanisms are 
 excited. A child is bitten by a cat. All similar 
 biting animals become objects of fear. Then the 
 fear concept fades, leaving only its intense rep- 
 resentatives. The child may forget the cat bite 
 and yet have an intense fear of wolves which it 
 has never seen. Applying this principle to Paul, 
 a particular teacher provoked his antagonism. 
 His dislike of her he transferred to other women 
 and to all objects she admired. He gets even with 
 women and art by degrading them below the level 
 of what he loves. If what he likes is bad, the 
 disliked objects are worse. This is the inferiority 
 complex. We exalt what we love, not by describ- 
 ing its beauty, but by degrading its opposite. 
 
 If some one had accused Paul of hating women 
 he would have denied it. He had forgotten how 
 his ideas originated. For women in general he 
 had a great admiration for he catalogued this 
 universal woman under the concept of mother,
 
 320 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 yet any particular girl went into the subconscious 
 class of which the teacher was exemplar. Her 
 beauty, her form, her ways, repulsed him. He 
 was cold but he knew not why. In contrast to this 
 was the mother-concept which to him was the 
 symbol of all the good. She was not a beauty like 
 the teacher. Her face was sweet but her form 
 was faded. He symbolized her qualities as rep- 
 resentative of all virtues. 
 
 The reader may not attach the importance they 
 deserve to these statements. He will probably 
 smile at the implied criticism of normal school 
 methods. I will therefore add some reminiscences 
 of school life to show their reality. I was reared 
 in the flattest part of the great West, on, as I 
 thought, the best farm in the state. I loved its 
 square fields, its angular board fences, its straight 
 rows of corn. All else that grew was classed as 
 weeds and exterminated at sight. Of Scotch an- 
 cestry, I assumed my family and church to be 
 superior to all else. To our school an eastern 
 teacher came. She disliked Illinois flatness as 
 much as I admired it. She extolled stone walls, 
 hills, brooks, flowers and other peculiarities of 
 the admired East. She claimed descent from the 
 Mayflower and knew nothing of which Scotland 
 boasts. The name Patten was flat, she said, while 
 her name — Parkinson — was ornate. I cannot 
 complain of her instruction. She was earnest and 
 well meaning, but she created a group of con- 
 trasts which changed the current of my thought, 
 and after many years are not thoroughly eradi- 
 cated. Bright colors, curved lines, fancy dresses 
 and pretty faces became objects of indifference 
 or aversion. 
 
 The suppression of what I loved did not result 
 in the enlargement of the opposite but in an at- 
 tempt to keep me and mine superior by implied 
 belittlement of other ideals. Whenever denuncia-
 
 SUPER COMPLEXES 321 
 
 tion and belittlement are manifest, this principle 
 has been at work. It colors literature and de- 
 grades religion. We call that depravity and de- 
 generation which emphasizes our superiority by 
 a depreciation of others. As soon as the major- 
 ity begins its repressions the minority defends 
 itself by a depreciation of popular aims. A de- 
 cadent or losing section or class never admits 
 that its defeat is due to natural or inevitable 
 causes. The worse the defeat the severer the de- 
 nunciation of the victor. They thus come to re- 
 gard themselves as remnant supermen, or as iso- 
 lated peaks in a dismal world swamp. 
 
 14 
 Super Complexes 
 
 Some months ago I was walking along a road 
 in a dejected state. I looked up: a new moon 
 threw a mass of light in my face. For a moment 
 the moon and I were one. When I regained com- 
 posure my depression disappeared. What had 
 happened? What did the moon do to me? Two 
 explanations seem plausible. The shock may have 
 altered my association of ideas and thus pro- 
 duced a purely mental effect. The other is that 
 the rays of light had a direct physical influence 
 which altered my mental concepts. Can light or 
 any other physical force originate mental states 
 different from those which associations due to 
 experience form! This is a problem worthy of 
 discussion and on which light also can be thrown. 
 
 I start again from the example of a moth 
 struggling with light. It moves toward the light 
 not because of inherited mechanisms but because, 
 lacking mechanisms to voice its will, the rays of 
 light become the deciding influence in determin-
 
 322 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 ing its behavior. The analogy to my condition 
 seems far-fetched. I have physical mechanisms 
 to carry out will decisions, and thus seem outside 
 the influence which compels the moth to act. This 
 is indeed true — but states of depression destroy 
 will power. Was I not therefore in exactly the 
 condition of the moth, so will-less through depres- 
 sion that a slight external force sufficed to alter 
 the current of my thought 1 Are not all men or at 
 least many men at times so will-less that external 
 forces can determine behavior? 
 
 When this problem is consciously faced there is 
 not merely my evidence to interpret but a multi- 
 tude of familiar facts which tend in the same 
 direction. Religious instructors have taught the 
 negative of will as the essential prerequisite to 
 communication with God. We need not take their 
 evidence as to what the feeling of oneness with 
 God really means ; but the fact is plain as to how 
 it arises. Depression is the first step. The de- 
 votee seeks the woods or at least isolates himself 
 so that old trains of thought are repressed. When 
 his will-lessness is complete nature, acting on him, 
 alters the current of his thought. In his inter- 
 pretation the new thought is external in its origin 
 and hence from God. The external origin seems 
 evident. Nature can determine behavior by direct 
 means if human wills are so incapacitated that 
 they cannot resist external influences. Two facts 
 seem to me evident, however defective religious 
 interpretation of them may be. Physical forces 
 can exert a direct influence on behavior. The de- 
 votee is right in his assertion that the voice or 
 power-compelling action is external to himself. 
 
 The evidence of physical direction when the 
 will is dormant depends only partially on re- 
 ligious experience. All poets use the same means 
 of getting inspiration even though they find it in 
 a different way. They seek nature and love iso-
 
 SUPER COMPLEXES 323 
 
 lation. Nothing is plainer than the influence that 
 light, air and vision have upon them. Their 
 walking with nature is the same in substance as 
 the religious devotees' walking with God. They 
 go from depression to elation through direct con- 
 tact with physical forces and are as truly con- 
 verted by them as are religious enthusiasts. God 
 and nature are not far apart. The difference is 
 more in name than in reality. 
 
 On this point my experience is typical. Not 
 only on the occasion mentioned but on many 
 others a sudden physical change has created a 
 revolution of thought. I rid myself of depres- 
 sion by nature contacts, following which comes 
 a new thought series which appears a miracle in 
 that it is objective. I often console myself in 
 depression — that now I shall get new ideas in the 
 recovery or a solution of unsolved problems that 
 before were puzzles! It rarely happens that in 
 the sudden uplift out of depression this does not 
 take place. I start on a trip through the woods, 
 walk in isolation for miles. Suddenly the de- 
 pression goes, after which comes an intense ela- 
 tion bringing with it a flood of vivid ideas so 
 objective that they seem to have come from with- 
 out. I cannot wonder that this state is called a 
 communion, so vivid is its seeming objectivity. I 
 doubt the reality of a communication. At least 
 there is little evidence of this in my case. Un- 
 less, however, complete objectivity is denied, there 
 is a need of an explanation running counter to 
 scientific doctrine. Objectivity doctrines have 
 two^ forms. One is religious, the other poetic. 
 Eeligious _ enthusiasm begins in depression and 
 the negation of personal will. A sudden eleva- 
 tion of thought occurs which is accepted as the 
 voice of God. This change of thought is called a 
 conversion and the power to make it is assumed 
 to come from without. All sublime poetry also
 
 324 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 begins in a depressed mental state. The poet 
 seeks the quiet of nature and excludes human con- 
 tacts. Then comes the communion with nature, 
 and the poet thinks he hears the voice of nature 
 calling for a response. The thought movement 
 in the two cases is the same. Nature and God 
 are one. 
 
 A third group of familiar cases is that of a man 
 wearied by some problem he fails to solve. He 
 sleeps, takes a pleasure trip or indulges in sport. 
 Freshness returns, when like a miracle the solu- 
 tion of his problem looms. These cases show 
 three common elements, depression, a state of 
 will-lessness and the action of some objective 
 force. 
 
 If these facts are accepted their interpreta- 
 tion is not difficult. The difference between con- 
 scious and subconscious activity is now too fam- 
 iliar to need further discussion. The force back 
 of conscious activity is the complexes acquired 
 through or based on muscular activity. This is 
 will. A state of will-lessness is therefore a state 
 negating the influence of acquired complexes. 
 Depression is the agent by which this is wrought. 
 When the acquired complexes are repressed by 
 depression the ultimate natural forces gain a 
 dominance. These in their general form are 
 what is called the wish. The will — that is, the 
 acquired concepts — rules in ordinary moods; 
 the wish in periods of depression. Depression 
 is not therefore mere negation. It has a positive 
 element which always shows itself in recovery. 
 In a depressed mood a slight physical force can 
 start an upward movement of thought. This the 
 weather, the ozone of the woods, the moon, a bril- 
 liant sky or a striking landscape can arouse and 
 thus bring nature and heredity into accord with- 
 out the interference of acquired concepts. Every 
 such break, throwing out some acquired complex.
 
 SUPER COMPLEXES 325 
 
 permits a new thought movement and with it a 
 permanent change of behavior. 
 
 This again assumes that the direct action of 
 physical forces harmonizes with inherited ten- 
 dencies so that an upward thought movement is 
 evoked when the two act without interference. 
 This thought movement is essentially the same in 
 all persons no matter by what name it is called. 
 It is a groping for fulfillment. A desire not 
 merely to run the course which heredity has set, 
 but to go beyond and gain some goal. This is the 
 universal myth. Taking out details easily ac- 
 counted for in specific cases, the poet, the prophet, 
 the dramatist have a common plot which leads in 
 a unified direction. It is this common element, 
 always present in the recovery from depression, 
 which creates a super-self as much above the level 
 of personality as sense-self is below it. In such 
 a condition we move toward the light as truly as 
 does the moth and for the same reason. 
 
 Call light by what name we will, yet light it is 
 to which we grope in states of elation. Depres- 
 sion is always darkness, light its relief and goal. 
 Such a feeling and interpretation could not exist 
 if the direct influence of physical forces were not 
 an element in character building. The dominating 
 influence on our lives is still what it was when the 
 amoeba first struggled for self-expression. Man 
 has better mechanisms to move toward the light 
 than it had, he is more conscious of his acts, yet 
 his ends are still vague and are to be reached only 
 by crude groping. Mechanisms make will, na- 
 ture makes wish. The wish thus represents evo- 
 lution yet to come, just as the will represents the 
 stages through which evolution has gone. Between 
 the two is an eternal conflict, some element of 
 which we face every time we go through a period 
 of depression. Will-lessness is a defect of char-
 
 326 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 acter and yet it is tlie only door through which 
 evohition can advance. 
 
 This is a physical view — one with which dream- 
 ers and prophets have little sympathy. They think 
 not of antecedents — are unconscious of the per- 
 sonality they have repressed, only seeing the re- 
 sult which thus becomes a real miracle. Yet the 
 sequences are not difficult to explain. Some right- 
 eous cause draws the energy and in its zeal de- 
 stroys much that in gentler moods would be valued 
 higher than the ends attained. This overdoing 
 breaks the power of the will by which the ferocious 
 deeds are upheld. It is tlie tired prophet, the 
 worn soldier, the weary poet to whom world vision 
 comes. Had they not overdone, it could not have 
 broken its iron bonds. Had there been no glori- 
 fied cloud, the inner could not have passed over 
 into the outer. But when all these happen to- 
 gether and to the same individual, the repressed 
 becomes dominant. The religious enthusiast fasts 
 or goes into the desert to live on strange food. 
 By cutting out meat he gets rid of its toxins. In 
 the refreshing sleep that follows he sees the 
 visions for which he longs. Fasting and exercise, 
 though seemingly different, have the same general 
 effect. They purify the blood and thus promote 
 a general elation with its vivid thought movement. 
 My means of getting mental elation differ 
 from those I have described. The first three or 
 four miles of a long walk are dull monotony; then 
 comes a period of elation, followed after a couple 
 of hours by a corresponding depression. On the 
 physical side this means that the first miles, start- 
 ing a vigorous circulation of blood, free my sys- 
 tem of toxins, pure blood elates my mental pro- 
 cesses, thought mounts to the clouds and frees 
 itself from the cramping conditions of time and 
 space. In this way are incorporated into experi- 
 ence vague super-sensitive elements which create
 
 SUPER COMPLEXES 327 
 
 super complexes as much above the sense level as 
 the content of an inferior complex is below it. 
 Inferior complexes have their origin in repres- 
 sions about which habit and instinct build. A de- 
 veloped complex may have little to do with ex- 
 perience, so little that the actual origin may be 
 forgotten, yet an analysis reveals its definite na- 
 ture. The acquired elements are first, even if 
 obscured. The natural elements are subsequent 
 additions. In a super complex the opposite de- 
 velopment occurs. The blood elation arouses in 
 consciousness inherited forms which have little 
 relation to concrete life. It thus gives a vague 
 background to thought which is made concrete 
 through associations with the actual content of 
 experience. The super complex adds to itself 
 sense elements in the process of becoming real 
 and by so doing personality is elevated to a posi- 
 tion more exalted than mere experience warrants. 
 As personality rises to this new level the bad is 
 disintegrated just as in inferior complexes it is 
 emphasized. Elation thus throws a person into 
 a triumphant mood in which world ills are elimi- 
 nated. 
 
 An elated person is said to dream ; day dreams, 
 they are called. The wished becomes the real. 
 The mechanism is thus the same as of wishes or 
 night dreams. That for which the mind yearns is 
 w^oven into complexes which, diverting the current 
 of thought from bare reality, project the mental 
 picture into the outer world. If a child, envisag- 
 ing a stump — sees a wolf, or if an excited person 
 sees a witch, it is plain they have given an objec- 
 tive form to their mental fears. But when a 
 woman sees the Virgin, or a man communing with 
 God hears voices from Heaven, science forgets 
 mental process and denies the testimony. Yet 
 the process in all these cases is the same. Vivid
 
 328 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 mental pictures projected beyond ourselves are 
 made a part of the outer world. 
 
 I love to walk through the woods, not to see 
 the birds, trees or flowers, but to get the elation 
 which only pure air and exercise arouse. The 
 farther I go the more am I divorced from reality. 
 Suddenly coming into an opening I see a beautiful 
 vista. For the moment the world of which I am 
 thinking, projecting itself, blends with the scene 
 just as the child projects its fears on the stump 
 and makes a wolf of it. However great the illu- 
 sion, the fact is the child sees the wolf. I also 
 see in the world about me those things of which 
 I am dreaming. 
 
 Why such elated transfers of thought are not 
 so common as the objectilication of fear does not 
 lie in a difference in the process, but in the 
 frequency of the occurring event. Fear situations 
 we all meet. The striking combinations which 
 objectify dreams come but occasionally; to many 
 because of the temperament or situation they 
 never come. If the prophet did not dream, if he 
 did not seek secluded spots w^here nature reveals 
 its wealth, he would never have the visions which 
 blend reality with its super powers. A cherished 
 thought can under these circumstances seem a 
 voice coming from above. When Moses saw the 
 light in the bush and heard a voice commanding 
 him to free his brethren — are we to assume that 
 he had had no previous thought of this mission or 
 was he so absorbed in this thought that a flaming 
 bush helped him to objectify what he wanted to 
 hear? The better explanation of prophetic visions 
 is that the command told the hearer to do what 
 he ardently wished to do but lacked the courage to 
 perform. The effect of the vision is on the will. 
 Timidity vanishes; the heroic emerges. This we 
 see, but the process is deeper and more intricate.
 
 SUPER COMPLEXES 329 
 
 A super complex is formed, which abiding gives 
 a turn to subsequent experience. 
 
 Every conscious state has some form, color and 
 intensity, the ultimate grouping of which voices 
 our inherited bodily urges. So stated there is 
 nothing mysterious about them. They are not 
 different in kind and origin from other inherited 
 mechanisms. Being merely urges to action, they 
 are vague enough to move in any chosen direction. 
 A perfect organism would seek to realize inherited 
 goals, but find them by means of sense perceptions. 
 This complete adjustment may have held in the 
 animal world. Then life-urges and the nervous 
 mechanisms worked together. The ends are 
 reached and life preserved even if the road wastes 
 a vast number of individuals. Be this as it may 
 there is not a good co-ordination of the inner and 
 the outer in the case of man. There is a gap 
 between vague life-urges and everyday experience 
 which, if not filled by extraordinary events, leaves 
 the life-urges in too vague a form to be of prac- 
 tical use. 
 
 The gap is filled either by striking events which 
 blend with the life-urges and tlms make them con- 
 crete, or by the destruction of inferior complexes 
 through which the level of the current experience 
 is raised to a point nearer the ideal. Most men 
 experience conversion even if not related to reli- 
 gious thought. In every case some inferior com- 
 plex is broken. 
 
 A similar relief from inferior complexes is ob- 
 tained by sudden dramatic scenes arousing intense 
 emotion. A new view of nature, a masterpiece of 
 literature, a new form of art undermining some 
 inferior complex, may shift the control of conduct 
 to some other group of motives. Striking conver- 
 sions such as Paul underwent are a real psychic 
 phenomenon. A youthful repression had thwarted 
 a natural growth of his art complexes. It needed
 
 330 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 a visual shock to undermine them. He made this 
 possible by the long run which exhausted, and a 
 vigorous recovery which brought elation. To 
 these add the view of nature which he had never 
 before experienced and the elements of a con- 
 version are co-ordinated. This may be a rough 
 road to conversion, but it is a real one. 
 
 The day before the Professor's illumination he 
 had chased the rebel bands across a valley. He 
 fell asleep from sheer exhaustion. Sleep rejuve- 
 nates, then the cloud stimulus permits the trans- 
 formation of mere elation into objective forms. 
 Paul's test was more severe. It matters not at 
 what point he fell from exhaustion, for will and 
 body did their full work. Sleep and food bring 
 the tingle of emotion, then with nature's aid the 
 rising flood of internal emotion assumes an objec- 
 tive form. This is the essence of illumination 
 however induced. It is the transformation of the 
 vague surge of emotion into the more definite 
 forms of cloud and sky. Both blood and nature 
 must be at their best to permit this fusion. It 
 comes when favored by circumstances. Skeptics 
 may deny the interpretation but the fact is above 
 their reach. 
 
 15 
 
 Genetic Psychology 
 
 The preceding discussion has been confined to 
 particular points with which the reader is familiar 
 or at least the facts can be found in any popular 
 treatise. There are, however, many who desire 
 a more connected view than isolated examples 
 afford. With such an exposition there are diffi- 
 culties, partly from the incompleteness of science 
 and partly from the controversies which partizan 
 schools of thought have provoked. The reader's
 
 GENETIC PSYCHOLOGY 331 
 
 interest should lie in genetic psychology. He may 
 not hold the recapitulation theory but he does 
 know that the order of development has much to 
 do with the character of individuals. Current 
 psychology shows little of this interest. Each 
 school has certain doctrines to defend and others 
 to expose. The order, if not the content, of discus- 
 sion is fixed by these needs. 
 
 There are many varieties, but two schools dom- 
 inate current thought. To the older the content 
 of consciousness is the main concern. The newer 
 school call themselves behaviorists, but a better 
 contrast is made by calling them altrospective. 
 They judge of themselves by what they see of 
 others; while introspective thinkers judge others 
 by what they see in themselves. Both methods 
 are legitimate but when carried to an extrem.e oc- 
 casion bitter controversies. In contrast to these 
 the genesist starts with the origin of traits, avoid- 
 ing analysis until the sequences of life are estab- 
 lished. The objective and subjective can thus be 
 related without any falsification of either element. 
 
 The original reactions of life to its viron are 
 not instincts nor even reflexes ; they are tropisms, 
 induced by the medium in Avhich the animal exists. 
 Heat, light and other elemental forces create 
 movements before the being has the organic struc- 
 tures to perform them. These movements con- 
 tinue so long as the external agent persists ; they 
 cease with its subsidence. Each physical force, 
 helping elemental life to perform its task, serves 
 as a stimulus to push life along to a point where 
 inherited mechanisms take their place. These 
 mechanisms objectively observed are instincts. 
 They replace the tropisms on which movement 
 originally depended. In addition to these natural 
 sources of movement there are many acquired 
 antecedents which are designated as habits, cus- 
 toms or traditions. A later term, complex, is
 
 332 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 better. It makes plain their origin and shows 
 how each complex is not merely acquired fact but 
 also has hidden in it some forces which are either 
 instinctive or tropic. From the standpoint of be- 
 havior, tropisms, instincts and complexes make 
 the classes into which all objective conduct can 
 be arranged. Without any appeal to conscious- 
 ness every act seems thus readily accounted for. 
 Introspection should not run counter to these 
 fundamental considerations, yet it is so distort- 
 ed by a confusion of ideas that a seeming oppo- 
 sition exists. 
 
 Introspective philosophy, having a long his- 
 torical growth, has never been subjected to the 
 pruning which modern science demands. Many 
 antiquated concepts are thus retained. It should 
 be remembered that mind is a consequence, not 
 the antecedent, of bodily activities. It strength- 
 ens and classifies what already exists, but never 
 creates. Mental classification must, therefore, 
 correspond to that of body activities as revealed 
 in behavior. To make the contrast of sense, 
 understanding and reason fundamental in intro- 
 spective psychology is to ignore this need. Reason 
 and understanding have no place in observed con- 
 duct, whether measured by introspective or by 
 altrospective methods. They are merely hypo- 
 theses to account for observed facts, which ac- 
 countancy they fail to fulfill. Conduct is deter- 
 mined by behavior. The introspective elements 
 merely intensify conduct; they never originate it. 
 
 On this basis the relation of the inner with 
 the outer impulses is simplified. The ele- 
 ments in observed behavior are tropisms, in- 
 stincts and complexes. The corresponding in- 
 ternal elements are emotion, thought patterns and 
 associations. The emotions are the conscious re- 
 flexes of tropic activity. The thought patterns 
 represent the effects of heredity mechanically ex-
 
 GENETIC PSYCHOLOGY 333 
 
 pressed. Associations are the added experience 
 elements which correspond to the complexes ob- 
 served in behavior. 
 
 The statement that emotions are tropic reflexes 
 of bodily action needs amplification, because the 
 thought is not yet generally recognized. Body 
 action is intensified by a gland action which throws 
 hormones into the blood. They are sent not mere- 
 ly where wanted but wherever the blood flows. 
 Their action in consciousness is emotion. It is an 
 old problem to decide whether action precedes and 
 causes emotion or emotion, coming first, intensifies 
 action. The real answer is that both are conse- 
 quence of blood hormones which have their ante- 
 cedent in gland activity. Anger and the clenched 
 fist come together because they have a common 
 cause. 
 
 Introspection cannot observe instincts. They 
 are discovered only through behavior and analy- 
 sis. But it can find certain sequences of thought 
 which have the same regularity of action which 
 instincts have. Color, form, order and intensity 
 are bound into units in such a way as to indicate 
 that the combinations are inherited. 
 
 The problem of evolution is to attach to each in- 
 herited instinct a tropic blood current to intensify 
 its action. There should be in consciousness an 
 emotion — the representative of tropic action— for 
 every inherited bodily instinct. Each mechanism 
 would thereby be strengthened and have its 
 activity increased by the co-operation of blood 
 hormones. 
 
 If mental and bodily activity are to harmonize, 
 thought processes must correspond to and be the 
 index of the sequences through which the body 
 goes in its evolution. It is recognized that the 
 sequences of personal evolution are the same as 
 that of race evolution. These forces ought to and 
 in part at least have wrought the same result on 
 mental processes, which should have identical
 
 334 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 stages and reflect tlie same processes that per- 
 sonal and race evolution show. The inherited 
 thought patterns would thus reflect physical pro- 
 cesses and make thought an adjunct to the phy- 
 sical processes observable in behavior, and cosmic 
 evolution. 
 
 The reply will probably be that this is not so. 
 Thought, it will be said, does more than reflect; 
 it creates and governs. A careful analysis shows 
 that the two statements are not so far apart as 
 they seem. The difference is not so much in the 
 result as it is in the method of attaining it. All 
 evolution involves a fulfillment. Each striving 
 reaches out to something beyond. Evolution thus 
 has an order and a goal. Each inheritance is a 
 part of some curve which reaches toward fulfill- 
 ment. The blind mechanical forces are the uncon- 
 scious means by which evolution proceeds. The 
 general process of life evolution is repeated in 
 the life of each individual. What the race has 
 gone through in millions of years the individual 
 accomplishes in the short period of its existence. 
 It does more than this, for the acquired experience 
 of each creature takes it beyond the curve which 
 the race has completed. 
 
 Assuming this recapitulation to be true of un- 
 conscious animal life, the same facts should hold 
 for the conscious mental life. Its processes should 
 repeat the history of the race in a vague but yet 
 a real form. The difference is that thought pro- 
 cesses move through the history of the race more 
 rapidly than the individual. What the race has 
 done in a million years the physical individual 
 does in fifty ; this the conscious mind goes through 
 in minutes. A thought curve has all the elements 
 of race and individual in its processes; it also 
 reaches by its experience much farther ahead of 
 race experience than does the individual in his 
 physical processes. The function of the mind
 
 GENETIC PSYCHOLOGY 335 
 
 depends on these facts. Its more rapid movement 
 causes it to pass through the cosmic stages more 
 rapidly than physical processes and thus to antici- 
 pate what will happen as they evolve by slow but 
 natural means. By anticipating, thought strength- 
 ens the tendency of the life processes to complete 
 themselves in given ways. In what we anticipate 
 we have faith. Thus anticipation, fulfillment and 
 faith get bound together and through their union 
 push life processes along faster than unconscious 
 evolution would proceed. Mental evolution can 
 thus be related to body processes. The mind is 
 emotional. Its forces by their more rapid de- 
 velopment become anticipations which intensify 
 life processes. What the body w^ould do slowly, 
 bunglingh^ and inadequately, mental emotions will 
 Bo intensify as to create immediate effectiveness. 
 The mind is thus an intensifier of action, not its 
 creator, yet through its power of anticipation it 
 becomes the director of human action. It cannot 
 transform its products into an heredity but it can 
 hasten the bodily processes capable of inheritance. 
 Thought sequences are parts of the life curve 
 along which bodily and physical evolution is pro- 
 ceeding. Every thought series recapitulates some 
 if not the whole of the evolution through which 
 life has gone. Each epoch of this life recapitulation 
 has some thought symbol which helps to intensify 
 action. If the thought sequences do not follow 
 life sequences, some distorting complex has turned 
 them out of a natural channel. The frequency 
 with which these inferior complexes occur is the 
 cause of the confusion in the interpretation of 
 thought. To gain simplicity these inferior com- 
 plexes based on disruptive experience must be 
 discovered and displaced. After this is done the 
 recapitulation involved in each thought series will 
 manifest itself through a comparison with what 
 happens in the life series of the individual and
 
 336 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 that of the race. Just as in the individual life 
 sequence some of the steps are obscured or lost — 
 just as in the earth 's crust some of its strata can- 
 not be found in particular locations — so particular 
 thought sequences suppress or dislocate individual 
 steps. Yet the series is there if we look for it; 
 its parts are seldom dislocated except for the 
 influence of inferior complexes which arise from 
 adverse experience. 
 
 Logical processes start with a dilemma. Next 
 comes an isolation of the good and bad. The bad 
 is then eliminated, through which relief comes 
 and the good restored. This is the elemental 
 struggle of all life. Millions of times it has been 
 repeated in diverse forms until its essence is as 
 much a part of mental heredity as of the body or 
 of life in general. 
 
 Each part of this mental heredity is reflected 
 in consciousness by specific combination of color, 
 form or intensity not definite enough to be guide 
 yet capable of becoming the symbol of some ele- 
 ment needed by experience to direct life along 
 normal channels. Superior complexes are formed 
 which have considerable directive power. When 
 men act there is before them some symbol which, 
 if followed, points the path to success. This is 
 due to the more rapid movement of thought 
 through its natural sequences, which enables it to 
 anticipate and in a measure visualize the steps 
 that the more slowly moving bodily processes 
 should take. 
 
 If the analysis is carried a step farther than 
 mere symbolization, the background of color, form 
 and intensity can be so isolated as to show that 
 they are effects which emotion is capable of pro- 
 ducing. The symbol thus bringing emotional in- 
 tensification into definite relation to action be- 
 comes a guide to normal conduct. 
 
 To isolate the emotional symbol from the ex-
 
 GENETIC PSYCHOLOGY 337 
 
 perience element, night dreams are usually taken 
 as models. The same movement takes place in 
 day dreams. In my case they are more easily in- 
 terpreted. The difference is that the steps are 
 more visible in night dreams, while in day dreams 
 the emphasis is more on fulfillment. The prophet 
 is a day dreamer whose thought sequences rush 
 along to a fulfillment which the body is not yet 
 able to attain. He often guides successfully, be- 
 cause his thought processes run so true to life 
 processes. 
 
 I shall give a dream to illustrate this. Looking 
 up, I saw some black spots in the sky which, en- 
 larging as they approached, seemed to indicate a 
 storm. Then the cloud broke up into parts and 
 became a long train of cars with a fierce locomo- 
 tive at the head. This came straight at me. I 
 escaped by a sudden spring. The train, rushing 
 back, proved to be a passenger train full of people. 
 Suddenly turning in the other direction, I saw 
 several bright spots in the sky which aggregated 
 as before, but when breaking up proved to be a 
 herd of fine horses. A noble stallion led, bridled 
 and saddled. I rushed forward to mount. But 
 as I did I awoke. 
 
 I interpret this dream to be an endeavor of emo- 
 tional forces to arouse my dormant muscular 
 powers. They first formed as a danger but when 
 this failed they reformed as an escape series. If 
 this had failed to awaken they would have prob- 
 ably reformed as a sex series and from that gone 
 on to a fulfillment or to a self-glorification series. 
 
 Such is the cosmic process as it stands today 
 and on the basis of which all life interpretations 
 rest. Mental force cannot alter life processes ; it 
 can only anticipate them. But it can eradicate 
 inferior complexes and substitute the superior in 
 their place. The psychology showing how this 
 can be done opens up a new era of progress.
 
 338 MUD hollow: 
 
 16 
 
 The Sense of Sin 
 
 Every thought process has an antecedent — some 
 physical change which manifests itself as be- 
 havior. What this physical reality is may be 
 open to doubt or badly interpreted but all the 
 same it is both real and explainable. Fundamental 
 to this explanation is the co-ordination of instinct 
 to emotion. The instincts direct ; the emotions in- 
 tensify. The instincts are mechanisms for par- 
 ticular ends; the emotions are urges which flow 
 to all parts — at least many parts are aroused by 
 them. The presence and effectiveness of instincts 
 can be measured by objective means. Not so 
 with the emotions: the decay or the blocking of 
 their outlets merely turns them into some unex- 
 pected channel. The physical form of emotion is 
 hard to trace. It often appears without apparent 
 antecedents and is thus readily misinterpreted. 
 Still it has a physical core which, if understood, 
 brings it under the reign of law. Two great prob- 
 lems each species must face and solve : the preser- 
 vation of life and its reproduction. Unless all 
 modern biology is in error, reproduction is an 
 easy matter in the animal world. Too many, not 
 too few, are born. Behavior is thus determined 
 by the struggle for self-preservation. Instinctive 
 action preserves life; anger intensifies action. 
 Every angry attitude from the bristling of hair to 
 the straining of muscles has some advantageous 
 effect on survival. The angry animal is thus a 
 unit ; every part is co-ordinated for the great end 
 of life preservation. Anger creates personality; 
 makes for a nervous, unified control. Each step 
 in its development brings the animal nearer the 
 human stage.
 
 THE SENSE OF SIN 339 
 
 Human psychology reveals a reversal of this 
 primal tendency. Men have a double not a single 
 personality. They cannot co-ordinate their pow- 
 ers in the way of an angry animal. Two forces 
 have come in to make this change — fear and sex. 
 They represent not the increase of co-ordination — 
 but its thwarting. The essence of this alteration 
 can be stated by saying that man is born with an 
 instinctive love of combat, while trying to turn 
 himself to a disciple of love. Born as a lion he 
 wants to be a dove. Love as behavior is not primal. 
 It thwarts activity ; it does not re-enforce instinc- 
 tive action. The life-preserving forces have come 
 into opposition mth the life-reproducing. As an- 
 ger and the other aggressive impulses have de- 
 clined, traditions, tabus and morals have arisen 
 to replace them. The acquired traits replace the 
 instincts on which race preservation depends. The 
 superficial struggle seems thus to be between mor- 
 ality and sex when in reality it is between the 
 preservation of life and its reproduction. 
 
 From this view anger is the primal outlet of 
 emotion. Against whatever causes pain there is 
 an angry response which intensifies and utilizes 
 every organ. Simple animal behavior is thus a 
 wrathful reaction. The complex processes of be- 
 havior begin when some repression shuts the 
 source of pain out of consciousness. There is 
 then an emotional discharge with no behavior out- 
 let ; the emotion is active but the directing instinct 
 is absent. The glands pour out exciting fluids but 
 the muscles do not respond Tvith effective action. 
 They thus create mental instead of physical ac- 
 tivity, which runs through the life series and 
 pushes to the front some of its symbols. Action 
 is thus directed against the symbol, not against 
 the real cause of the discomfort. Thus is the 
 emotion of hate directed not against the antece- 
 dents of pain but against some symbol of them.
 
 340 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 There is a repression, a mental symbolization and 
 then an intense action directed against the symbol. 
 If crops fail, the thought processes of men, sym- 
 bolizing their government as the cause, obtain 
 immense satisfaction in its overthrow. If inter- 
 national trade is obstructed, thought processes 
 may symbolize the Germans as the cause and bil- 
 lions are expended in their overthrow. In a like 
 manner Semitic or Negro hatred arises. The 
 mobs who burn Negroes symbolize them as the 
 cause of their woes and get relief in barbaric 
 action. 
 
 This hate behavior is manifest in a thousand 
 different ways, each of which has the same outline 
 — a repression, an unexplained emotion felt in 
 some unexpected quarter, a thought symbolization 
 of the life struggle which creates an object of hate 
 and finally an intense concentrated action against 
 the symbol of the assumed evil. The 100 per cent. 
 American is doing no differently than the South- 
 ern mob burning a negro. He symbolizes the 
 hyphen, the Hun or the pacifist as the sources of 
 his subconscious woe and acts accordingly. Nor 
 is there much difference between a lynching mob 
 and a group of reformers turning rascals out of 
 a city government. The mayor and the boss are 
 devils; the whole world will be remade by their 
 overthrow. Hence the intense activity and fero- 
 cious zeal — resulting in a complete collapse when 
 the pent-up energy is expended. Then years of 
 sleep are followed by a new outburst on similar 
 lines. There is immediate satisfaction in the over- 
 throw of Satan but no enduring results. 
 
 Hate is thus the first and most elemental series 
 of symbols. A second series is that of sacrifice, 
 where the initial struggle is followed by defeat 
 instead of victory. The defeat however is tem- 
 porary, as a transformation follows through which 
 life is restored and final victory attained. This
 
 THE SENSE OF SIN 341 
 
 transformation series is the most complete yet 
 evolved and to it the masses resort to gain com- 
 pensation for their misery. All thought on tliis 
 basis emphasizes the need of struggle even if it 
 is hopeless. Sacrifice is thus an incentive to ac- 
 tion. None are so valiant as those who expect 
 a death which, losing its sting, is the harbinger 
 of victory. The thought series and the muscular 
 series have thus developed in harmony ; with them 
 have come an integration of behavior and a 
 growth of character. 
 
 A third series of symbols strives for fulfillment. 
 The mind, going beyond struggle, reaches a goal 
 which emphasizes fulfillment. This is the field of 
 the prophet, the seer and the poet. They make the 
 beyond vivid, but for behavior they dwell on 
 struggle, since only by struggle is the route 
 cleared. Let a prophet describe heaven or a poet 
 picture Paradise— and talk gets stale with great 
 rapidity. The mind sticks to struggle and gets 
 more satisfaction out of beating the devil than 
 from entering the golden gate. Sacrifice thus 
 aids struggle and makes an outlet for energy, 
 which tends to restore the equilibrium which de- 
 feat would destroy. 
 
 From these simple processes to sex is but a 
 step, yet the step is a reversal. Sex tends toward 
 a divided personality and thus makes the struggle 
 internal, one group of processes being set against 
 another. There is a series of reproductive sym- 
 bols, but if compared mth those of struggle they 
 are less distinct, so much so that a love series 
 cannot be made vivid except when put in the form 
 of a struggle. Every novelist plays on struggle 
 and leaves fulfillment to be inferred. A purely 
 sex novel would be too tame to read. The cause 
 of this is that in the early stages of evolution sex 
 impulses, aroused by physical pleasure, had little 
 relation to thought. They became objects of at-
 
 342 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 tention only in the higher forms of animal life and 
 hence as behavior follow the lines already blazed 
 by struggle. 
 
 There are two fundamental types of behavior, 
 that induced by the co-ordination of nerve and 
 muscle, and those due to the symbolized process 
 of reaching ends by means of thought. Both of 
 these are well grooved and create definite forms 
 of behavior. Either an animal gets wrathy and 
 through struggle attains victory or his mind cre- 
 ates a symbolized process by which defeat and 
 death lead to a transformation wliich assures vic- 
 tory. The type of transformation symbolized by 
 thought is based not on natural reproduction but 
 on miracle. Primitive men did not realize the 
 connection between sex and birth. To them birth 
 was a miracle not at all related to natural events. 
 On this basis thought processes have been built 
 and when built are impossible to alter. The 
 crooked ways in which nature has gone in carving 
 its road are followed by each generation, even if 
 it logically knows of better. 
 
 For this reason sex is an intruder in mental 
 processes. Men hate the natural evolution pro- 
 cesses even if they must accept them. When they 
 dream they leave them out, falling back on the 
 good old series their ancestors formed. They 
 like virgin births; prefer to have gods for an- 
 cestors than mere men. The opposition to sex lies 
 deeper than the traditions, tabus, and moral re- 
 straints which society imposes. It is cast out be- 
 cause it is not one of the vital symbols by which 
 men are carried by sacrifice, through death to^ vic- 
 tory. Men must cease to love sacrifice and mirac- 
 ulous regeneration before they can think in terms 
 of natural reproduction. They hate it for the 
 same reason that a child hates the omission of 
 some familiar feature of a popular tale. The old
 
 THE SENSE OF SIN 343 
 
 tale fits their thought processes while the abridged 
 narrative jars by its omissions. 
 
 Those who have mysterious emotions and urges 
 usually give them a religious interpretation, 
 claiming they come from God. A simpler method 
 accepts the facts but relates them to their bodily 
 antecedents. Many parts are so degenerate that 
 movement is no longer possible. When a strong 
 emotional urge is excited the blood flows to these 
 degenerate parts which cannot act, or if active, 
 have no effect on muscular behavior. Men thus 
 have mysterious urges which they wrongly inter- 
 pret. If the bodily location of these urges is 
 sought it will be found to be in some disused part. 
 Physically they are endeavors to move parts which 
 to more primitive animals were organs of defense. 
 The currents run along the path anger ran, and 
 attempt to arouse the same action. The phenome- 
 non is thus that of blocked emotion and as a result, 
 more or less disruption of personality. These 
 blocked emotions which have no outlet seem ob- 
 jective because most of the anger manifestations 
 relate to surface parts. They might be called in- 
 adequate attempts to bristle or to protect external 
 parts. But the nerves in these regions impart a 
 sense of objectivity and hence give an effective 
 mental interpretation. 
 
 An experience while writing this section is illus- 
 trative. I had said something which made me feel 
 small. My blood boiled and cold chills ran down 
 my back. All day long strange injects would sud- 
 denly occur in my thought. Its usual currents 
 were disturbed by sudden self -denunciations which 
 seemed to come from some objective source. It 
 was as though a censor were condemning me. 
 My muscles suddenly twitched, creating a feeling 
 as if someone were pulling. The curious thing 
 was the seemingly objective nature of injects. I 
 do not wonder that people mistake them for ob-
 
 344 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 jective facts. The voice, the movement, the con- 
 demnation are real physical facts but of different 
 origin from what they seem. It is those who do 
 not have such injects who are defective, not those 
 who have, but misinterpret them. 
 
 This misinterpretation is important because 
 from it arises the sense of sin upon which so many 
 of our abnormal concepts depend. Emotion is 
 blocked, strangely vague feelings arise. The mind 
 is confused by multiple tendencies none of which 
 can command action. There is thus a multiple 
 personality, each of which strives to dominate. 
 This inaction makes the sufferer subjective; in 
 thought he turns what would be an objective strug- 
 gle between self and something external into an 
 internal struggle between the various subjective 
 personalities. The sense of sin is a thought move- 
 ment which tends to purge the self of these con- 
 tradictions. The first effects are a feeling of self- 
 reproach and bewilderment. The strange feelings 
 seem to be a self-condemnation. Their seeming 
 objectivity indicates a relation to some external 
 power from which the condemnation comes. Hence 
 a new thought series arises which is the essence 
 of all religion. There is a tempter, an avenger, a 
 helplessness, a condemnation, a savior and finally 
 a redemption. 
 
 As most men are in a measure abnormal and 
 often meet unexplainable adversities, the sense of 
 sin gets a place in world thought, and is that to 
 which all resort when unexpected adversity arises. 
 There is emotion and mystery ; imagined misdeeds 
 rise up in condemnation, followed by a vague de- 
 pression which distorts antecedent events. The 
 seeming objectivity of what is internal, the con- 
 fusion of mental pictures with objective facts, the 
 re-living of past events seen in a false perspective, 
 intensify the already overactive bodily processes, 
 create new stresses and add to the flame. Such is
 
 THE SENSE OF SIN 345 
 
 the initial result of abnormal stresses, from which 
 life is a terror until an outlet is found. 
 
 Sense of sin is alf the worse when divorced from 
 religion. To those who have strange, mysterious 
 feelings an outlet is readily found if they believe 
 in the orthodox plan of salvation. With conscience 
 as a guide the old equilibrium can be readily re- 
 stored and normal life resumed. But if the plan 
 of salvation be not accepted, if conscience be 
 blunted because its admonitions are not applic- 
 able to new conditions, if the blood carries its 
 hormones to unusual parts and arouses an activity 
 which the instincts are incapable of directing, then 
 depression and the accompanying sense of sin fall 
 like a blight from which there is no relief. There 
 is a blind call to action, a mysterious woe and no 
 outlet. The mind has no track to otfer which will 
 bring emotion and instinct into harmony. 
 
 That this is not a mere fancy, the life of an 
 American girl is evidence. No group were ever 
 so well protected from evil and hardship as Amer- 
 ican girls. Their work is easy; their pleasures 
 abundant; their indulgences are of the sort that 
 thwart muscular growth. A sugar diet creates 
 emotion, yet the muscular response is merely a 
 laugh or some thrill of joy having its source in 
 unused organs. The hero comes at the expected 
 time. There is no epoch of toil or depression to 
 start currents of thought leading to woe. Girls 
 are the joy and ornament of American life. They 
 are keen, bold, ambitious. Could such a life be 
 lived it would be Paradise, yet few escape the 
 rocks which project themselves in later life. To 
 most women the thirties are a dreary waste, a de- 
 stroyer of illusions, an overthrow of ideals, a ship- 
 wrecking of plans. 
 
 The causes of this are not far to seek. The 
 protection of girls is complete, but woman must 
 face life 's storms in the same crude fashion as did
 
 346 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 her forbears. She tries to detour — only to find 
 her way blocked. She is thus forced into the same 
 old rut other ages have creased and finds it too 
 deep for escape. They say in automobiling the 
 rule is not to try to get out of ruts ; and so it is 
 with woman after the freshness of youth is gone 
 and paternal protection has lapsed by the passing 
 of time. 
 
 The tragedy of this situation is the suddenness 
 and the helplessness of a situation for which no 
 preparation has been made. The emotions have 
 no outlet. The weakened muscles do not respond 
 to the urges of the sugar-excited blood. The black- 
 est woes replace bright promises the bliss of 
 earlier years evoked. To a woman the distance 
 from heaven to hell is not far, and the glide is 
 steep. Courage of youth fades to the gloom of 
 despondency. Why does the happy, ambitious girl 
 of twenty become the nervous wreck of thirty? 
 Why does she become sex instead of reaching the 
 goal of fulfillment? Eeasons may be given which 
 fit specific cases, but after all the outline is the 
 same. Her dreams have proved illusions. She is 
 in a pit out of which there is no escape ; her emo- 
 tions and her muscles are at discord ; her thought 
 processes fitted for a protected youth are hin- 
 drances rather than helps in the new situation. 
 Her heroes fail to deliver when dragons appear. 
 Thrown on the bare rocks by sudden adversity, 
 nothing remains but to groan and suffer. 
 
 This discussion is to make plain the action of 
 Ruth in her fall from celestial light to demon- 
 loaded darkness. According to her father's no- 
 tions Ruth had led a free life. She could do as 
 she pleased; no woman traditions restrained 
 her fancy in a realm which had no limit. 
 Such a life looks ideal; it is so if its condi- 
 tions continue. But her father had made no 
 allowance for adversity. Men and women were
 
 THE WISH 347 
 
 exactly alike in her father's philosophy and hence 
 the realization of sex difference did not arise until 
 she plunged into midnight darkness. Her reli- 
 gion was of fulfillment not of sacrifice. Under 
 these conditions every figure in her galaxy of 
 heroes would be turned into demons. The realiza- 
 tion of error will smite her as a consuming fire. 
 She has all the terror from which a million for- 
 bears have suffered but none of their trains of 
 thought which would show the way out. She has 
 the sense of sin but lacks the sense of forgiveness. 
 Perhaps I exaggerate the mental pictures which 
 arise in her agony and the fierceness of her sud- 
 denly aroused sense of sin, but it is true enough 
 to represent the state into which thousands of 
 women fall when they strike the rocks of advers- 
 ity. The smooth waters in which youth sails give 
 no warning of storms on the open sea. 
 
 A lone woman in a stern world is helpless ; her 
 failure inevitable. Does she sin, or the world? 
 It makes no difference. She suffers, yields and 
 offers herself a sacrifice for the next generation. 
 
 17 
 
 The Wish 
 
 My position will find some sympathizers; yet 
 many more will instinctively reject it. If people 
 are not very bad nor yet very good, if progress 
 comes at the rate of three inches a century, what 
 is there to do but sit on the fence and watch the 
 passing show? Who wants to live in a world 
 moving with the precision of planets and as little 
 under human control? These misapprehensions 
 are hard to remove. The lion in the way is emo- 
 tion ; unfortunately it is a real lion, not a painted 
 scarecrow. It will not do to deride emotion as do
 
 348 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 rationalists. Emotions are of prime importance 
 yet easily misdirected. They are vague, inherited 
 urges which because of their vagueness are readily 
 distorted and put to bad uses. The mere twist 
 of a word may send them in a wrong direction. 
 There is unfortunately a whole string of mis- 
 directing words — material, mechanical, fatalistic, 
 circumstantial, environmental — each of which has 
 an imputation arousing emotional opposition. To 
 circumscribe, to environ, to wall in, imply un- 
 surmountable obstacles. Both the leading groups 
 of thinkers use these terms, the one because their 
 philosophy demands that life be made subordinate 
 to physical processes ; the other because anything 
 arousing antagonistic emotion helps them to cast 
 aspersion on what they dislike. 
 
 The picture both groups draw is of the race 
 deep in a pit, behind high walls, confined by locks 
 and keys. To avoid this emotional opposition I 
 use the words viron and vironal, which merely 
 mean outer, but do not connote any barrier which 
 humanity cannot pass. The real position of men 
 is not in dark cellars without doors, nor within the 
 walls of some dungeon — ^but rather in an open 
 field surrounded not by a w^all but by a variety of 
 obstacles! They cannot escape across the lake be- 
 cause they have no boat, across the river because 
 they cannot swim. To escape they must trans- 
 form themselves or increase their powers. This 
 is a slow process of striving, wishing and willing 
 — some obstacles will yield if they persist. ^ But 
 this only becomes manifest after many seemingly 
 absurd adventures. 
 
 Can mechanisms make themselves or do they 
 imply a maker? This is the problem which Paley 
 propounded and with which naturalists have 
 joined issue at the wrong point. Paley was right 
 in asserting that a mechanism denotes a maker, 
 that intelligence preceded and created mechanical
 
 THE WISH 349 
 
 tools. He went wrong in the further assumption 
 that the maker was superior to the mechanism he 
 made, adding as he did that the maker was a 
 single, eternal, higher power at whose bidding the 
 world came into being. But this error does not 
 invalidate his initial proposition. Machines are 
 made: they are the result of intelligence even if 
 the intelligence is not unified nor of so high an 
 order as Paley assumed. A locomotive was made 
 not by one man nor by a single act, but by the 
 push of a multitude of men — stupid, ignorant, yet 
 striving for better means of locomotion. The 
 makers of mechanisms are of a lower order than 
 those who use them. He who makes a machine 
 pushes mankind above himself. Not only do men 
 reach ends more quickly but they also think better. 
 The lower thus makes the higher, not the higher 
 the lower. 
 
 This fact, so plain in all mechanical contrivances, 
 is also true of the natural mechanism we call 
 heredity. A hand is not the contrivance of a 
 superior for the benefit of an inferior, but the 
 result of the urge of a million inferior beings 
 for a better grasp. The wish for efficient action 
 was the motive moving these millions to trials 
 which eventually ended in success. A constant 
 wish and a persistent endeavor added little by 
 little to hand efficiency until the perfection of the 
 human hand was attained. The mechanism of the 
 hand is thus evidence of an antecedent, persistent 
 wish. A stupid inferior created his intelligent 
 successor. The quarrel between the neo-Darwin- 
 ians and the Lamarckians about the order of this 
 progress is of minor importance. It may be dis- 
 puted which came first, the alteration in the germ 
 cell or in its soma. Yet the pressure of wish can 
 modify either both in turn or simultaneously. It 
 is the long steady pull of millions of persistent
 
 350 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 creatures that counts. Nothing can block their 
 way if the urge for change is continuous. 
 
 The problem is thus not one of germ cell and 
 soma but of the antecedents of wish. Whence 
 came they and who is their father? Here again 
 we meet confusion because of the belief that will 
 is something supernatural, an outside, eternal 
 force of the type of Paley's watch-maker. Will 
 how^ever is not thought, but directed energy. It is 
 a compulsion to act as soon as surplus energy 
 accumulates. It must find an outlet in movement 
 and this movement, persisted in, modifies its chan- 
 nels of exit so as to create a mechanism. Each 
 discharge of energy tends to take the path of its 
 predecessor and thus to repeat and accentuate its 
 effects. Will is thus the persistent result of dis- 
 charged energy. Wherever there is will there is a 
 growth of organic mechanism to make it effective. 
 
 Mere energy has no goal. It seeks an outlet 
 but nothing more. A wish pushes energy in some 
 direction and inhibits it in others. It is the con- 
 scious voice of an underlying physical process, a 
 process which compels new forms of life to repeat 
 that of their antecedents. There is a physical 
 repetend which recapitulates the antecedents of 
 each race. The wish in its pure form is the reflex 
 of this, simplified as thought. An individual moves 
 through race history with great rapidity. Race 
 thought moves still more rapidly. It does in min- 
 utes what the body does in years. It anticipates 
 what the body would do, and by anticipation di- 
 rects. The wish is what the body is trying to do, 
 and what each time it tries it does more effectively. 
 Energy is thus kept more fully in the track which 
 forces the individual to push his life to its com- 
 pletion; and by the greater concentration of en- 
 ergy on the life repetend, life itself is improved 
 and prolonged. The wish is an emotional intensi- 
 fier of what has subconsciously existed as a part
 
 THE WISH 351 
 
 of the life repetend. It creates nothing new: it 
 merely improves what is. The wish thus directs 
 energy toward fulfillment and forces energy to 
 move toward its goal. Whatever we wish thus 
 gets the energy for its fulfillment unless some 
 abnormality interferes to misdirect and thwart. 
 
 To unravel the difficulties of subconscious 
 thought two types of wishes must be contrasted. 
 One type has a complete mechanical contrivance 
 to attain its fulfillment ; the other has not. If we 
 have the mechanisms needed to attain a given end, 
 say food, then the wish becomes a want. Wants 
 arouse will and will puts the mechanisms in oper- 
 ation which attain the end. Want wishes thus 
 press for fulfillment. They arouse activity and 
 stabilize conduct. A pure wish in contrast to 
 these mechanical wishes has not the mechanism 
 to reach its ends, or at least those mechanisms are 
 incomplete. In this case the wish is an urge to 
 make or to complete the mechanisms which are 
 needed as the antecedents of fulfillment. The dif- 
 ference is between the urge which creates the hand 
 and the use of the hand in supplying wants. The 
 mechanism, whether natural or artificial, must 
 antedate fulfillment. This is why every completed 
 thing seems mechanical and where the mechan- 
 ical view of life gets its cogencj^ If everything 
 were a complete mechanism and every desire an 
 established want, then the universe would be 
 mechanical. But being completely mechanical it 
 would not be evolutionary. Evolution is the pas- 
 sage from wishes which have no means of attain- 
 ment to wants which have mechanisms capable of 
 reaching ends. Evolution is thus the creation of 
 mechanisms out of non-mechanical forces. A 
 tropism is due to a natural force which does not 
 act through a mechanism. If a moth moves to- 
 ward the light it does so without mechanisms 
 either made or inherited. So long as the force
 
 352 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 acts the moth moves ; when it ceases the mechan- 
 isms of the moth again control. 
 
 The direct action of natural forces tends to 
 thwart the fulfillment which mechanical forces 
 favor and thus push life in new and purposeless 
 directions. This new direction cannot of itself be 
 called better or worse than the direction imposed 
 by body mechanisms. It is, however, a variation, 
 and for a variation there is never a complete con- 
 trol. The moth which has seen light and struggled 
 against the thwarting of its predetermined mo- 
 tives is a different moth from one not acted on 
 by the tropic influence of light. 
 
 That the action of parents gives the muscles 
 of the child a natural growth, in the direction 
 which the acquired traits moved the parent, is too 
 simple an assumption. There is no such relation 
 between the muscles of the parent and those of 
 the child. The muscles of the parent by becoming 
 more mechanical have improved the general con- 
 dition of the child ; say, given it better food and 
 health. This releases new tropic forces in the 
 child and they create a variation, making the child 
 different from the parent, but in what way only 
 experience can determine. The better muscles of 
 a farmer may cause his son to be a lawyer with 
 less developed muscles, or an artist with a more 
 delicate perception. The child is thus different 
 and hence its urges move it in a new direction. 
 This is the essence of variation— a pure, blind al- 
 teration without a motive or an end. When varia- 
 tions occur, the more adjusted survive. A new 
 type is thus created by every mechanical improve- 
 ment, natural or made, not because of the direct 
 mechanical results but because of products which, 
 disintegrating old wants, make old mechanisms 
 inadequate to gratify new wishes. These new 
 wishes have no antecedent except the surplus
 
 THE WISH 353 
 
 energy which ttie better satisfaction of old wants 
 creates. 
 
 If one acquires the wish to play ball, tennis or 
 even loves to walk in the wood, there follows the 
 exercise a growth of muscular power which makes 
 the new occupation easy and agreeable. These 
 are the acquired mechanical results. But they are 
 not all. The exercise frees the blood of its toxins : 
 there is a flow of surplus energy; a consequent 
 elation accompanied by a new flow of thought. 
 He who walks in the wood does not necessarily 
 think of trees, birds and flowers. If he did he 
 would get but little elation. The thought does 
 not match the acquired muscular power but goes 
 off on routes of its own. It thus stimulates new 
 wishes and leads to a pressure which makes fur- 
 ther modification in mechanical powers, perhaps 
 in a reverse direction to that toward which the 
 acquired muscular mechanisms tended. It is not 
 the altered muscle which modifies heredity. No 
 one, not even Weismann, would say that better 
 food, light, air or other ultimate physical forces 
 cannot modify the germ cell. What is denied is 
 that the modification corresponds to the acquired 
 power which was its antecedent. A muscular 
 father does not produce a muscular child, and if 
 he uses his increased muscle to improve the con- 
 dition of the child the child will even differ from 
 him in some physical or mental aspect. 
 
 An easily tested illustration of this is the differ- 
 ence between mother and daughter. If acquired 
 characters were inherited the daughter should be 
 like the mother in build, and in moral and intel- 
 lectual traits. Nothing is more evident than that 
 this is not so. The discrepancies are both physi- 
 cal and mental. They usually make a bad team, 
 pulling apart even when bound in love. The rea- 
 son is that what the girl obtains from her mother 
 is not her acquired traits, but an increased urge
 
 354 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 to activity due to the better conditions under 
 which she is reared. The poorly vironed girl is 
 her mother over again in look and deed. The well 
 vironed girl has urges her mother never felt and 
 these push her physically and mentally in direc- 
 tions so diverse that the mother exclaims in hor- 
 ror, ''Why am I afflicted with such offspring T' 
 Even when bad the mother is not to blame nor 
 is the child. Nature has its own method of pro- 
 cedure in which mother and child must acquiesce. 
 
 Acquired human traits do not become inherited, 
 but they create variation from the antecedent 
 stock. Every new mechanism acquired or made 
 modifies heredity and the direction of the altera- 
 tion is determined not by the mechanism but by 
 the new wish which the improved mechanism frees. 
 There is a paradox in this statement but also a 
 truth. We free ourselves from mechanism by 
 becoming more mechanical. The wish is formed 
 not by the mechanism but by the energy it frees. 
 Physical acquisitions do not perpetuate them- 
 selves ; they create variation. When variation ap- 
 pears nature chooses the better and eliminates the 
 worse. Thus v>^e have a force w^hich leads to im- 
 provement without any intention on its part to 
 improve. This may be disappointing from a moral 
 view but it helps cosmos out of a difficult situation. 
 
 This explanation is faulty without an amplifi- 
 cation of the relation of wishes to dreams. The 
 wish creates and focuses activity. The dream 
 magnifies it. In sleep the opposition to wish urges 
 is less intense. The shift in thought to avoid 
 struggle is made more quickly. The meaning of 
 the wish thus becomes obscured. When awake we 
 persist in single efforts longer than in dreams and 
 try more expedients. But the next move is always 
 in the same direction, as in dreams. Dreams and 
 action thus run parallel. There is little difference 
 between day and night dreams. Both show rapid
 
 ROMANTIC LOVE 355 
 
 changes in the thought currents to gain easy, 
 ready fulfillment. The best method therefore to 
 represent intense action is to put it in the dream 
 form. What an actor would do in his dream he 
 strives under more difficult conditions to do in 
 waking hours. This is what gives force to the 
 world myths. Blending as they do dream life with 
 heroic life, every intensified act becomes heroic 
 action. That of which we dream our hero does. 
 
 18 
 
 Romantic Love 
 
 The psycho-analyst regards the wish as a dis- 
 guised form of the sex urge. Were this so my 
 analysis is defective. There is therefore need to 
 contrast what underlies each belief. The conten- 
 tion of the psycho-analyst rests on the assumption 
 that propagation is essential to life and to this 
 end all activity is directed. From my view repro- 
 duction is an easy matter ; too much — not too little 
 life — comes with each generation. The forces of 
 evolution do not have to strive for this end, but 
 instead for the improvement of life. Sex has 
 therefore remained a by-product of immense im- 
 port, yet not among the evolutionary forces on 
 which development depends. Heredity is a 
 group of mechanisms for the attainment of ends 
 which the ultimate physical forces fail to provide. 
 It is what they lack not what they furnish to which 
 we must look. Evolution, I repeat, is the evolu- 
 tion of mechanisms, not of propagation. The 
 amoeba can propagate itself as readily as can a 
 mammal, but it lacks the mechanisms of the mam- 
 mal to reach to concrete ends. The mammals* 
 mechanisms thus reach toward fulfillment, not to- 
 ward sex pleasure.
 
 356 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 If this point is clear the difference between sex 
 urges and true wishes can be apprehended. Wishes 
 work through mechanisms and are made clear and 
 definite by the mechanisms through which tbey 
 act. Every wish has a goal and a partial or com- 
 pleted mechanism to attain it. Each effort modi- 
 fies the mechanism through which it acts and thus 
 presses toward a more complete fulfillment. Sex 
 urges are tropic. Certain products are thrown 
 into the blood which while active, turning thought 
 and mechanism from their evolutionary bent, 
 make them servants of sex desires. Sex acts on 
 men as light acts on a moth. The moth does not 
 wish to move toward the light; it must. While 
 sex hormones are in the blood men must do not 
 what they will, but as the excited forces demand. 
 When blood is freed from these hormones, will 
 and wish again assert themselves, evolutionary 
 processes are resumed. Sex urges thus paralyze 
 action instead of promoting it. The mechanical 
 processes are turned from their normal course 
 and temporarily made to serve foreign ends — ^by 
 foreign, be it understood, I mean foreign to the 
 evolution of life. Primarily inherited mechanisms 
 are for the purpose of improving life, not for its 
 propagation. Wishes are urges to upbuild or to 
 defend and thus need mechanisms for their ful- 
 fillment or defense. 
 
 To make this point clear a contrast must be 
 made between wishes and compulsions. The wish 
 of any moment must be referred back to its ante- 
 cedents in nerve and muscle. Each new msh 
 makes a new mechanism and each new mechanism 
 prompts some new wish. Mechanisms, heredity 
 and wishes are thus inseparable. Together they 
 make the evolutionary process and push life to- 
 ward its goal. Compulsions are blood states. 
 Their antecedents are not in heredity but in the 
 physical forces which intermittently override
 
 ROMANTIC LOVE 357 
 
 heredity and wish. When a moth moves toward 
 the light, its act is a compulsion which is not 
 heredity nor wish but a compelling force it cannot 
 resist. True wishes thus paralyzed come to their 
 own only when passion subsides. Wish is a grop- 
 ing for fulfillment. Sex thwarts this but cannot 
 turn its behests into true wishes. 
 
 I am not questioning the power of sex, merely 
 its primacy. Is it, I ask, a force external to the 
 mechanism it uses, which appropriates for its ends 
 mechanisms made by other processes, or is it the 
 author of these mechanisms? Light, we readily 
 see, does not make the mechanisms by which the 
 moth approaches its flame. It forces mechanisms 
 made for another purpose to serve its ends. So 
 with sex. Throwing a glamour over evolutionary 
 processes, it makes them subject to a new master. 
 This fact is readily seen if we examine the plot 
 of a love story. It is the difficulties of love not 
 its realization which holds the attention. Lovers' 
 quarrels, not lovers ' truces, make the body of the 
 book and the source of its excitement. The mech- 
 anisms of struggle, hate and fulfillment are thus 
 utilized and from them thought and movement 
 come. Sex love is static. It is a thief, not an 
 originator. 
 
 We get at the facts genetically when we realize 
 that woman is the result, not of her immediate 
 ancestry, but of a billion distant forbears. It is 
 this billion and not her mother which determines 
 the trend of her thought. Nothing happening in 
 the last thousand years has become a part of 
 female heredity. A girl will get nothing of this 
 unless it is impressed by blows. It is the prehis- 
 toric ancestors, the flow of whose thought the 
 girl repeats. How did this distant ancestress 
 look on life? 
 
 The question answers itself. This woman was 
 not the slave of man's passions, but an equal if
 
 358 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 not a superior in effective enterprise. Tlie natural 
 current of a woman's thought runs on tliis trail. 
 It visualizes achievement, not love. iNo.jsKoman 
 falls in love until she is knocked down^T'^f critics 
 deny this it is because they have seen naught but 
 cripples. Love of a particular man is an inject 
 due to long-standing subordination. As women 
 drop through misfortune they love their protec- 
 tors. When this in turn fails they seek consola- 
 tion in religion. Either are better than brute 
 isolation. 
 
 The natural current of thought, the one which 
 most women have, is that visualized by heredity 
 and achievement. Men come in as comrades and 
 helpers ; some wild adventures follow their union. 
 They go, go, never reaching a destination, merely 
 see it afar. To visualize this is all nature has 
 done. It is vague, fanciful but real. It is true, 
 of course, that this brings children, but marriage 
 is not a preliminary. 
 
 Sex love is a fall from this state. Women sink 
 to the sex level either through fear, a bribe or 
 disease. A crushed woman clings to her oppres- 
 sor; a bribed woman idolizes its source. From 
 disease, narrowness and monotony she flees to sex 
 love; but with each debauch, sinking lower, her 
 enemies fasten their grip. When she loses all but 
 sex men grin at her depravity. Such is the road 
 of women from the height to the pit. It is a well- 
 beaten track; the only safe road to travel. Yet 
 it is misfortune's impressment, not heredity's. 
 Fancy would blaze another track reaching to not 
 the grave but some illumined goal. 
 
 The second current of thought voices reproduc- 
 tion. The mother sells herself in marriage for 
 support. When this current proves unsatisfac- 
 tory, the religious teacher creates a third current 
 of thought by teaching women that their misfor- 
 tunes are due to their sins. Woman is a tempter
 
 ROMANTIC LOVE 359 
 
 and must through modesty and sacrifice be 
 cleansed from depravity to reach the golden shore. 
 These concepts, although a second nature, are 
 never visualized by heredity. Marriage, repro- 
 duction and redemption have foreign elements of 
 which heredity is unaware. Men talk glibly about 
 "back to nature" without realizing just where it 
 would lead. American girls are nearer nature 
 than any but their distant forbears have been. 
 They think of living, pushing and achieving just 
 as their distant progenitors did. Of sex, mar- 
 riage and sacrifice they only learn when the knocks 
 of life begin to sear and deform. 
 
 * ' I never was interested in suffrage, ' ' said a bril- 
 liant young woman recently, ' ' I have no wrongs ; 
 no man ever injured me. I mean to take what 
 comes." 
 
 This is true of Ruth. She does not love Paul: 
 she idealizes him. He fits into her mental picture 
 and makes it concrete. Of him she expects great 
 things and mth him she expects to live and sleep 
 and work. Marriage takes no part in this flow of 
 thought. Nature created it long before marriage 
 was invented. Lovers merely take each other's 
 hand and push on into an unknown world where 
 great things are to be done. Such was Ruth's 
 mental state ard so would she have done if her 
 hero had matched her expectations. Unquestion- 
 ing, she would have gone anywhere and done any- 
 thing if Paul had led the way. But this was not 
 in Paul! He could not take a girl by the hand, 
 and say, ''Come." Hence Ruth goes through a 
 series of disillusions, first about her father's phil- 
 osophy, and then about Paul. The two men on 
 whom she had relied fail when the test comes. 
 Her father's philosophy breaks; Paul, failing to 
 respond to her behests, drops from the sphere of 
 an idol to that of a brute. 
 
 I thought I had described Ruth's disillusion
 
 360 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 with such fulness that anyone could see it. Yet no 
 one seems to, unless it is thrown at him with a 
 pitchfork. When Ruth fails in her physical con- 
 test with Paul, the only thing persons notice is 
 that she exposed her ankles. A friend the other 
 day lost his moral composure in seeing a woman 
 of whom he could not tell whether she wore over 
 her breast three garments or one. The suspi- 
 cion was upsetting. At such an exhibition should 
 one smile or groan? That she is the symbol of 
 a world contest in which every human being takes 
 a part, that failure is the bitter pill every woman 
 must swallow, is beyond such a man's comprehen- 
 sion. Yet so is it with protected girls. We en- 
 courage them in youth ; thwart them at maturity. 
 How many men are there who show up any better 
 than Paul in an emergency? One youthful idol 
 after another falls ; the world turns black. Then 
 when woman sinks we nod our heads and exclaim, 
 "Woman is sex and sex is depravity." Girls are 
 not sex nor is it sex a girl wants. Her mind 
 runs not yet in physical channels but toward great 
 ends. She has a thought movement and a thought 
 stimulus as well as a man. But the movement is 
 different. The boy thinks in terms of himself. 
 He is the great world reformer — tlie giant before 
 whom all else quails. He fights a lone battle and 
 expects a hero's reward. The girl's thought is 
 never so self -centered. He leads, she follows. He 
 is the hero, not she. Her thought turns on the 
 reward he is to have. What is it but she? Of 
 him she dreams, not of herself. She is thus a hero 
 worshipper, an incentive to deeds, not a doer. 
 Yet she would have a part. She must go when 
 he goes, return with him, and bask in the joy of 
 heroic deeds done by him. Romantic love fornied 
 by millions of antecedent struggles has heredity 
 in the background and follows its behests. It is 
 what women want the world to be, freedom, ad-
 
 ROMANTIC LOVE 361 
 
 venture, not a diseased pressure directing thought 
 toward physical corruption. 
 
 This may be close to sex, but the romantic girl 
 is not sex-conscious. Her natural thought would 
 shock her Sunday School teacher and perhaps her 
 mother, who has forgotten the joy of girlhood. 
 If a girl drops to the sex level it is the men and 
 not she who cause it. "If a girl goes wrong, look 
 for the man." The drop is easy, I admit, but it 
 comes only by the stress of outside circumstances. 
 
 Ruth wants Paul, to be with him and of him. 
 But above all she wants to be a partner in the 
 great enterprise coming to its fruition in the 
 study. Had the men taken her in, given her some- 
 thing to do, made her feel that she was one vdth 
 them, she would have played an humble part, been 
 a helpful co-worker and waited without thought 
 for time to carry them to their destined goal. She 
 was a bird, a plumed bird, alive to the present 
 with no thought of the morrow. Did she drop 
 from this level, the men were to blame. They 
 forced her out of her normal channel into an un- 
 tried world which might lead anywhere — a road 
 most girls take but which after all is foreign to 
 their nature. 
 
 An English woman recently said, "There never 
 was a time when English girls were as idealistic 
 as today — nor a time when the woman of thirty 
 was as bad." This statement is worthy of reflec- 
 tion. Girls start out with high ideals. They 
 dream of heroes and think of themselves as 
 mated with some great giant who strikes 
 blows and does world deeds. She, his reward, 
 must be pure and good. She shapes her life to be 
 worthy of her apparent destiny. But the years 
 pass, the hero does not come. Men she finds are 
 mortals, women their prey. Then deceit begins 
 its work. Disappointed and betrayed, sinking to 
 a sex level, she breaks the bonds her normal girl-
 
 362 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 ish idealism evoked. She does what man wants ; 
 and with him she drinks, eats and sleeps. 
 
 Such is the history, not of one girl but of a 
 million. The thought of man runs a parallel 
 course but men are physically stronger. Forty is 
 the breaking time with them. They feel the pang 
 of disappointment, become pessimists and bite the 
 apple of physical pleasure. Oh, the number of 
 one's friends who run this downward course, eat, 
 drink and are merry in the forties to drop into 
 premature graves at its close. The track is thus 
 the same for men and women, but women are more 
 subject to physical disorder and thus meet their 
 fate at an earlier date. 
 
 There is a reason for this if we watch at the 
 right point. While a plant grows its sex nature 
 is dormant. Only at the end, when growth is com- 
 plete, do leaves and stems fade that their energy 
 may be transformed into flowers and fruit. The 
 same is true of men. While they are active sex 
 remains dormant. It becomes a conscious urge 
 only when muscles decay or stiffen. Day dreams 
 of the young are work dreams, not sex dreams. 
 Activity, not reproduction, drives the soul to self- 
 expression. But bad habits, drinking and eating 
 to excess, overwork and other wrongs of modern 
 life, bear their fruit. The muscles soften, the 
 blood makes fat instead of brawn. Then comes 
 sex consciousness, with the downward sweep that 
 carries its victims to untimely graves. 
 
 The cynic of forty will smile at this descrip- 
 tion. He knows the world and finds no one to 
 meet my description. So be it, but that is not 
 the problem or its answer. Pine trees grow 
 straight and tall without branches, until they meet 
 the sky. They have only one motive, to distance 
 their fellows in their skyward urge. Across the 
 way are scraggly pines from the same seed. They 
 are all branches, ugly, useless branches with no
 
 ROMANTIC LOVE 363 
 
 upward-pointing trunk. Why? The pine tree is 
 social. Give it close neighbors and it tries to 
 excel. Put it alone in a pasture and it grovels 
 with the grass, all branches, no trunk. 
 
 Which is the natural and wdiich the artificial 
 product? The way to tell is not to go among the 
 measly second growth, but in primeval forest. 
 There nature reveals itself. All trunks are straight 
 and true. It is man, not nature, who makes the 
 modern woods. Searching for the straight and 
 true, he cuts it when it measures ses^en inches. 
 How can nature show its real form when the 
 woodman's axe thwarts its endeavors? So is 
 it with girls. They have heredity — and a cruel 
 viron. Men chop and deform them as they do the 
 trees. They hunt the virtuous as the woodman 
 does the tree. Such is the woman and such the 
 tree. Thw^arted, gnarled, deformed, yet ever and 
 anon some stray example shows its beauty and 
 from it we should measure its nature. Elven the 
 meanest has an heredity which once struggled 
 against the fate to which all must succumb. We 
 need not a new heredity, but a new man ! 
 
 Evolution, having a crooked path, frequently 
 reverses itself. It forces what it has made for 
 one end to take on other uses. Preferring to use 
 what it has in new ways, it often covers its tracks 
 in a manner hard to decipher. Yet even when 
 progressive, it has a cost. There is always a 
 minority which suffers acutely and sometimes un- 
 justly. Could evolution be stopped, this suffering 
 and injustice would cease or at least be felt at 
 some other point. It is a potent fact that if sex 
 restraints were set aside and a free indulgence 
 permitted, many who are now diseased would be 
 cured. It is also true that restriction brings a 
 horde of evils. It may even be that our insane 
 asylums would be emptied if restraint were aban- 
 doned yet neither these nor other objections touch
 
 364 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 the fundamental issue. All evolution is painful 
 to the minority which it deprives of sustenance, 
 or in other ways rids the world of those less fitted 
 for advanced life. Nor can it be said that Puri- 
 tanism is to blame. The opposition between sex 
 and the wishes which grope toward fulfillment be- 
 gan in the lower forms of life and has become 
 more urgent with every step in its rise. The waste 
 of the overproduction of life has been checked, 
 and more of human energy has been diverted to 
 the satisfaction of wants and wishes. Puritanism 
 is but a late step in this pressure, by which less 
 energy is used for the reproduction of life and 
 more for its betterment. Sex desires must be 
 curbed or the rise of man retarded. We can well 
 afford to support asylums and increase their num- 
 ber if the removal of sex delinquents enables men 
 to reach higher levels of will force and wish at- 
 tainment. 
 
 Puritanism is like its cousin, Prohibition. Both 
 make minorities suffer, both create injustice and 
 even increase crime, yet the test of progress is not 
 in having jails empty but in keeping them crowded. 
 Every new social mechanism has its crop in a 
 new class of defectives who do not measure up to 
 the new standard. We should pity such, relieve 
 their suffering if we can, but none the less, even 
 at the expense of increasing disease and crime, 
 the grind of progress must continue. Man must 
 rise even if he climbs over the dead bodies of his 
 comrades. 
 
 19 
 
 Protected Girls 
 
 America prides itself on being the land of 
 homes, an appellation which is not wholly unde- 
 served. There are many homeless and many more
 
 PROTECTED GIRLS 365 
 
 who are inadequately housed. To these the moral 
 and social attention is rightly given. They de- 
 serve more than they get, yet, despite this fact, 
 it is the homed who give America its distinctive 
 character. Other nations have their homeless; 
 they also have their partially homed; but no na- 
 tion is dominated by the homed to a like extent. 
 Aristocracy plays no part ; of plutocrats there are 
 aplenty but fortunately they skip to New York or 
 remote shores on all possible occasions. The 
 cities, the villages and the prosperous agricul- 
 tural districts are those dominated by the homed, 
 who impress their notions on everything in sight. 
 
 Of these multitudes the first and second genera- 
 tion preserve frontier habits; but now the third 
 and fourth generation are in control. To them the 
 frontier is as far from thought and action as it 
 is to the residents of the town. In moving from 
 the frontier they have also moved from the realm 
 of religion, conscious morality and even of history. 
 The past means little or nothing. Even Europe 
 is a vague unreality, an object of charity, a place 
 for a summer excursion but not after all of much 
 consequence. Nor are these people filled with 
 rigorous notions which inculcate an opposition to 
 art and culture. Art in the accepted sense does 
 not count because, like religion, history and Eu- 
 rope, it does not touch life. There never before 
 was so self-centered a group as these millions of 
 well-homed Americans. All their outgoes center 
 about their home life. Popular literature has its 
 standards set by the million readers who make a 
 journal pay, and this million are not to be found 
 except in these self-satisfied homes. 
 
 The dictator and money spender is the mother 
 who fastens her views on every one, the father 
 included. Her hobbies are health, cleanliness and 
 dress. A mother recently told me she had twenty- 
 five complete suits for her little girl. This was in
 
 366 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 a family with an income less than two thousand 
 a year. When I was young, boys stuffed them- 
 selves wdth green apples, doughnuts and mince 
 pies. Now a child waits demurely for the mother 
 to decide whether it is to have oat meal or corn 
 flakes. Even a two-year-old wonders whether an- 
 other mouthful will give the colic. The father 
 eats what is set before him as meekly as the child, 
 but is occasionally given an extra cup of Postum 
 for a change. Family prayers have gone, in the 
 place of which every one spends five minutes- 
 scrubbing his teeth. The food, the clothing and 
 the bills must pass mother's inspection. It is a 
 common sight for a man to pass his pay envelope 
 unopened to his wife and to receive back the 
 spending money she thinks he deserves. 
 
 It is these homed groups, not the Puritan-mind- 
 ed, who give support to the prohibition movement. 
 What does not concern the home they fight. 
 Against everything outside and against all differ- 
 ing minorities their opposition is keen. It is a 
 mistake to assume that lynching parties and night 
 riders are made up of the rough elements. If 
 their pictures were taken it would show excellent 
 boys who have the approval of mother and sister 
 in what they do. Where everything centers about 
 the home an indifference to the outside world 
 breeds contempt. Likeness becomes the only stan- 
 dard, the different is the bad. 
 
 I state these facts to illumine the background 
 on which the condition and thought of children 
 depend. No one can doubt that health, cleanli- 
 ness and purity are essentials, and that the chil- 
 dren brought up under the toothbrush regime are 
 healthier, sounder and cleaner than their crude, 
 less guarded predecessors. The result is that 
 America has not only thousands but even millions 
 of well-nourished boys and girls who reach matur-
 
 PROTECTED GIRLS 367 
 
 ity with a push worthy of admiration, even if 
 results do not measure up to expectation. 
 
 Two ideals lie in the background : the boys must 
 be successful; the girls must be freed fromx the 
 sacrificial drudgery past ages have imposed. Every 
 well homed mother says, "I do not want my 
 daughter to drudge the way I have done." She 
 proceeds to fulfill this desire with a commendable 
 energy amply supplemented by the father's co- 
 operation. Boys must be successful, they both 
 say. Concerted efforts are put forth to this end. 
 Through adventure and in business, the boy must 
 push above the level of his comrades, be a marked 
 youth and attain social eminence in some field. 
 
 If this be the desired aim, it must be admitted 
 that society through its educational institutions is 
 rapidly attaining its goal. The trend of education 
 is toward business life and the college courses for 
 this end are especially successful. If we have not 
 reached the goal of showing young men how to 
 get the income needed for a tranquil family life, 
 it is not far distant. I say this of the protected 
 boy who comes from the well homed part of our 
 population. In earlier times the college boy came 
 from a lower stratum, paid his own way and thus 
 knew by experience the hardships of frontier life. 
 Unfortunately this group is now largely excluded. 
 The freshman classes are filled by youths who 
 have never known what sacrifice is. They are 
 not so consciously moral as their predecessors but 
 they have an earnestness and good fellowship that 
 compensate. It is one of the pleasures of a pro- 
 fessor to face a freshman class and see what good 
 material he has to work on. Each decade sees 
 our college coming nearer the goal which family 
 life sets. Active young men go over the top, or do 
 any stunt which excites the admiration of their 
 fellows. Marrying pretty girls, they build fine 
 houses, become church trustees, school directors.
 
 368 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 village mayors and driiik Postum. These re- 
 wards are sure to come to the boys — but where 
 are the girls ? What part are they to have in this 
 industrial millenium? 
 
 That girls should be protected, happy, and con- 
 tented while at home is the ideal of every family. 
 Were they satisfied to be wives and mothers all 
 would be well. Their husbands would be good 
 providers; they good cooks. But protection and 
 leisure does an unexpected thing. It makes girls 
 different from their mothers. They are a varia- 
 tion which fits neither mother's nor husband's 
 wishes. This brings a crisis. It may come early 
 to the girl who, earning her living, pushes her way 
 in the world. She is the first to strike the rocks, 
 and strike them hard. Even if well protected, 
 indulgent parents die, brothers marry, the home 
 is broken. It is not starvation they face, but 
 reduced incomes and boarding-house fare. What 
 a step to drop from a home to the third-story, 
 back. A woman on her own feet earns just enough 
 to pay rent and board. The refinements others 
 have she may see but not enjoy. 
 
 I am not writing a tale of woe nor desiring to 
 exaggerate the agony of a woman who has the 
 world to face. The trouble lies in the fact that she 
 is a misfit, a variation which throws her out of 
 harmony with her world. She is a sprout which in 
 the right climate would grow to a luxuriant ma- 
 turity; but which in chill air crumples, as of frost. 
 It is useless therefore to depict her narrow life 
 and hear her sobs. Others have often told of 
 these. We get nearer the source by noting what 
 kind of a variation she is. The freedom of her 
 protected position permitted her to follow nature's 
 behests more fully than her brother. She is 
 therefore more natural, less grooved; and in ad- 
 dition all those life-urges which nature has im- 
 planted are more active and insistent than in him.
 
 PROTECTED GIRLS 369 
 
 He has practical aims set before him even as a 
 lad. His technical education forced him into a 
 specific calling which gave money, made a home 
 possible, and destroyed or repressed what nature 
 implanted. All nature's urges are evolutionary. 
 It cares little for happiness or personal success. 
 Its triumph is fulfillment; the getting from here 
 into something else. Had brother not rushed so 
 fast, had his face not been held so close to the 
 grindstone, he would have heard nature calling 
 for evolution and thus would have become a vari- 
 ant, not a constant. Men and women are not 
 different mentally. Their mental mechanisms 
 have the same elements and their urges a like 
 goal. The twists that misdirect them are inferior 
 complexes, imposed tradition and the demands 
 of immediate success. Within protected groups 
 men suffer more from these than women. They 
 stifle their natural urges to a greater degree. 
 They have money; women have hope, but little 
 power by themselves to reach out to fulfillment. 
 
 There is the difference between boys and girls. 
 Boys have a physical endo^\TTient that girls lack. 
 This difference is growing. Each generation sees 
 the power of men increase, not because of their 
 intellect but because of their greater powder of 
 specific application. Grirls may become cooks, 
 stenographers and primary teachers, but above 
 this grade they are not wanted except for special 
 services. Every time a girl's salary goes up a 
 hundred the boy's leaps up by a thousand. The 
 world is man-made and getting more so. It is 
 this cold fact that the protected girl must sooner 
 or later face; she struggles, fights, hopes, and 
 then breaks. The buoyant girl of twenty is the 
 wreck of thirty. 
 
 Do not misunderstand. I am not making a 
 plea for charity. What has happened I approve. 
 I have been an ardent advocate of industrial edu-
 
 370 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 cation and have done my share to bring it to its 
 present efhciency. I always rejoice when I hear 
 that one of my students is earning- ten thousand 
 a year — and take part of the credit to myself. 
 No world is worth living in which does not have 
 a multitude of such men. But after all it is only 
 one of those great swings in evolutionary process 
 which cures but hurts. Partial evolution is mis- 
 ery; on this occasion it is the acutest misery 
 because it is isolating men from women and thus 
 creating a stress that distorts and even rends the 
 most fundamental of human relations. I have 
 some measure of sympathy for the bad men 
 and women who get into the divorce courts; be- 
 tween good men and women it is all more painful. 
 If woman were sex all would go well, but the 
 better, sounder woman wants to excel, make 
 something of herself. That she cannot do, with 
 the overpowering physical difference between 
 him and her. She is swamped at every trial to 
 compete. The dollars go from, not to her. She 
 can sit in an office and see them fly by. They are 
 not for her to handle. The man has lots of vir- 
 tues; never has he been praised highly enough; 
 3"et the mere distance between him and woman 
 creates a wrong attitude. He gives freely, but 
 there is the same condescension to wife as toward 
 church or fourth of July celebration. For what 
 he does he expects in return adoration. He gets 
 this of the boys to whom he gives firecrackers and 
 from girls in return for flags and ice cream, but 
 his wife groans when he in the same spirit throws 
 her a bill or attempts to placate her misery with 
 candy and theater. He is a good man, I repeat; 
 but in spite of his claim he does not understand 
 women. So men and women drift apart. The 
 better women prefer the misery of the street to 
 the thorn of the home. More and more men seek 
 in inferior women the adoration they deem their
 
 JOHN AND HATTIE 371 
 
 due. Good men marry weak women. Good women 
 may look in but cannot participate in family life. 
 They are denied one function because they insist 
 on another. Thus evolution is thwarted. Each 
 generation works to the same point, repeats the 
 same errors and drops to the same old level. 
 Woman is nature's best product yet she is marred 
 and rendered sterile by a male-made frost. The 
 chill will be removed, not by a new heredity but by 
 new estimates of woman's worth. 
 
 20 
 John and Hattie 
 
 My old friends, John and Hattie, have as 
 smooth an exterior as anyone could ask. All that 
 heredity and good fortune can offer is theirs. 
 Yet the current that sweeps them on is relent- 
 less in its action. John is a farmer. For a mile 
 his acres face the road. On them are the best 
 stock of the region. Not a weed is to be seen ; his 
 roadside is a lawn. The corn rows are straight; 
 the grass grows with a luxuriance which befits 
 the richness of the soil. People come for miles to 
 see the farm, the stock and the man. 
 
 John is also a "good provider." Everything 
 about the house is well arranged. The cistern is 
 always in repair, the wood chopped fine and the 
 cellar filled with all the farm affords. Every 
 known labor-saving device is in the kitchen. The 
 ponies are at the door if Hattie or the children 
 want to ride. 
 
 Such is John at home and on the farm. Steady, 
 honest, plodding; with a love and care which is 
 seldom excelled. But while progressive and kindly 
 here, he is a standpatter of the most rigid sort. 
 He sits in the same pew his father did, hears the
 
 372 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 same sermons, sings tne same psalms ; all with tlie 
 same relish his father had. "What was good 
 enough for him is good enough for me," is his 
 fond saying. At election he always votes the same 
 Republican ticket his father did, proudly placing 
 his straight ballot without looking at it. 
 
 There never was a change in the town he did 
 not oppose, even to the buying of a new bell for 
 the schoolhouse. All the adjectives his father used 
 about ' ' Copperheads ' ' and his grandfather about 
 atheists he uses about Socialists and labor agi- 
 tators. He has no use for wagging tongues nor 
 for sidewalk orators. He earns his living, pays 
 his debts; so should other people. Yet he cares 
 generously for the poor and shows his patriotism 
 freely on the Fourth. His great joy is to lead 
 processions and to help the children have a good 
 time at school and church picnics. Anything that 
 makes noise gives him pleasure and his liberality 
 in furnishing explosives renders him a favorite. 
 At Thanksgiving and Christmas the poor get tur- 
 keys ; his own table to which his friends are invited 
 looks like the feasts we read of in ye olden times. 
 He stands at his door like a Middle Age esquire as 
 his friends depart, and takes their encomia of 
 farm, family and self with a keen enjoyment which 
 reveals the placid contentment reigning in his soul. 
 
 This he saw and felt but he never saw the tired 
 look as Hattie dropped into a chair, shrouding 
 her face with her hand. His mother had enjoyed 
 these family festivals and accepted the well-earned 
 praise for her cooking with all the pleasure John 
 had. Why should not Hattie? He never even 
 dreamed it was not so. Biblical praises were the 
 noblest a woman could receive. ''Hattie, the very 
 best of women, deserves all this praise and enjoys 
 the honors it brings." So thought John, or at least 
 would have thought if he had thought at all. Any 
 other outcome was unthinkable.
 
 JOHN AND HATTIE 373 
 
 What pleasures has Hattie outside the home? 
 None ; John never goes anywhere except to church 
 or to a local celebration. His only joy other than 
 running the farm is to line up the children at a 
 picnic or on the Fourth. Yes, he has one more 
 pleasure ; he likes to figure. He must plan every- 
 thing he does. Every detail is attended and these 
 must be rigidly executed. Though not a hundred 
 miles from "the city," Hattie has been there but 
 three times. John must figure a week before they 
 start, and then every street corner is crossed 
 exactly on time. He is all mechanism; no spirit. 
 Who could call a trip with him a joy? When they 
 came to Philadelphia I tried to get him to let 
 Hattie see the ocean. No, sir ! that was not on his 
 calendar. Sea or no sea, his plan must be fol- 
 low^ed. The only deviation I succeeded in creating 
 was a visit to Fairmount Park, but this was only 
 after an hour's wasted time in figuring at time 
 tables to find if it would fit into that wonderful 
 plan he had spent weeks devising. Who can blame 
 a quiet sigh even if the man is the best "provider" 
 the world has seen? Ancestral virtues have their 
 place, but a little leaven is needed to make them 
 livable. 
 
 Hattie never complained. She did her duty just 
 as her forbears did. Her cooking, her children 
 exceeded rather than fell short of ancestral stan- 
 dards. Yet it w^as duty, all duty, never love. Hat- 
 tie had a list of ' ' things to be thankful for, ' ' and 
 in this she put John and all her belongings except 
 her children. It w^as a long list, those arduous 
 duties w^hich family tradition had imposed; but 
 she did them all without murmur. Yet in her 
 heart of hearts she wanted something else. What 
 it was I doubt if she knew. If she had been free 
 to seek it, she would have failed as other women 
 fail. Yet the wish was there and that look, the 
 joy from what otherwise would have been a de-
 
 374 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 light. Were you not sympathetic you would not 
 have noticed the gleam in her eye as she thought 
 of a world that was not all duty. 
 
 Do not misunderstand. Hattie was discontent- 
 ed and yet she was w^omanly enough to be pleased 
 with her position. Who could be John's wife and 
 not get joy from the openly expressed admiration 
 of all she did and had? Other women scrimped 
 and toiled and received hard looks if not condem- 
 nation as their pay. John never did thus. Sitting 
 in his armed chair in the bank, he extolled Hattie 
 by the hour. Her slightest wish he gratified. He 
 never chided her about extravagance nor made 
 her account for money received. John was above 
 this. He carried a roll of bank bills in one pocket 
 and a quart of change in the other. A handful 
 always came out at her bidding. When she bought, 
 he threw a roll of bills on the counter. Perhaps 
 there was a bit of ostentation about this, but John 
 should be given his due. He was a bountiful pro- 
 vider and he did it gracefully. Yet she never took 
 a bill that her hand did not tremble. It was slight 
 but always there. She wanted her own money, a 
 budget such as John kept of his income and out- 
 go ; she felt that it was his money after all, a gift, 
 not a recompense for service. She received it not 
 because she had done more or less but because she 
 was John's wife. Hence the hesitation, the tremor. 
 I have tried a dozen times to argue her out of 
 this; as many times I convinced her thoroughly. 
 ''I know it, I ought to be thankful," she would 
 say, yet the next time the tremor was there just 
 the same. 
 
 When I looked more closely I saw the many 
 ways in which her position was irksome. The 
 weight of duty and the tyranny of submission 
 were always present in all she did. She smiled 
 and did her duty nobly. The pressure of a thou- 
 sand ancestors "bore her along, but duty gave no
 
 JOHN AND HATTIE 375 
 
 satisfaction. When the ancestral current ceased 
 to flow she sank into her chair and sighed. John 
 was his ancestors, plus ; he overdid what they had 
 done; and enjoyed it. She was her forbears, — 
 minus. She had not broken with their deeds but 
 their pleasures were not hers. 
 
 When she held her first-born she kissed her and 
 said, '*It won't be so with her." Alas, the hope 
 is never realized. A thousand-thousand mothers 
 have kissed their babes and made the same re- 
 solve, but the hard grind of destiny sweeps the 
 girl into the same slavery to which the mother 
 succumbed. There is but one current, in which a 
 woman must move or perish ! 
 
 Grace is now a woman. What can Hattie do to 
 break her chains'/ Nothing. Joe wants her and 
 Joe is the best young farmer in the town. John 
 smiles every time he goes by Joe 's place and John 
 is the judge. But if she marries Joe, she marries 
 the same chains her mother wore. Of goods there 
 will be a plenty, but of sympathy and co-operation 
 none. She will go to the same church, have the 
 same family feasts ; in turn she will kiss her babe 
 and resolve it won't happen again — ^without being 
 in the least able to alter the iron regime that 
 cramps her soul. George wants her also. He is the 
 pride of the town, a college graduate, an engineer 
 making three thousand at twenty-five; he will 
 make ten thousand at thirty, and be on the road 
 to a million at forty. But Grace at forty will be 
 wabbly, fat, diseased and openly discontented. 
 Her summer house, automobiles and theatre par- 
 ties will be a bore. No, drop the curtain — that is 
 not the way out. 
 
 Her one other choice is to go to college. Her 
 father says all the children may have a farm, or 
 an education. What will the education bring 
 Grace? Some dull literature, a smattering of his- 
 tory and a cornucopia of useless things having no
 
 376 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 relation to her life, her needs and her yearning. 
 Then what? Nothing but being a snarling Social- 
 ist or an insipid old maid. Worse and worse. 
 Better marry Joe and repeat her mother's deeds, 
 sit in the same pew, in turn kiss her first-born, 
 expressing anew the eternal hope of mothers that 
 tomorrow's sun will turn the rusty locks the ages 
 have never unbolted. 
 
 Such is home life, not so different after all from 
 what my story describes. Paul and John are the 
 products of the same grind. Paul is ahead because 
 he sees the wrong of the male view, something that 
 no force could make John comprehend. The world 
 fits him because he fits his world. AVhy change 
 what is already perfect? The Professor is beyond 
 both but still without the slightest inkling of what 
 the real trouble is. His women are as fast to the 
 ivall as John's are in the kitchen. He needs a 
 weak woman to fill out his picture ; John needs a 
 tame one. 
 
 Nor is the situation better if we face the man 
 of the street or even the college lad on whose 
 shoulders progress rests. Many years as an in- 
 structor have taught me that boys are better than 
 they were both in enthusiasm and thought. But 
 their idealization of theirbrides is as crude as their 
 forefathers'. Protectors and providers. Ah, yes, 
 but not co-operators. They think of buying sillc 
 and candy, not of united effort. While this con- 
 tinues their wives may smile, but their hands will 
 tremble when they take the bills. 
 
 The women described are as typical as the 
 men. Mrs. Brown everyone admires. Mor- 
 ality extols the woman who bears discipline 
 and misfortune with her grace. Hattie has the 
 discipline without the misfortune. Yet no one 
 doubts that she would meet misfortune heroically 
 were she called upon to face it. The machinery 
 would work just as effectively if the grind began.
 
 NEXT STEP IN EVOLUTION 377 
 
 To them all praise and honor. They deserve more 
 than they get. 
 
 But Ruth, poor thing, has neither discipline, 
 sacrifice nor tradition to mold her into shape. 
 To her comes all the condemnation which follows 
 age-long adhesion to the iron law of subjection. 
 But is she different from the others 1 Would she 
 fly from duty or face it if the ordeal came? Do 
 men make women, or nature? ''Woman is hered- 
 ity, ' ' the Professor says. ' ' Nature 's best product. 
 Let the girl grow, fill her life with joy. Then 
 when motherhood comes she is ready for her 
 task." All the mother-instincts which have 
 lain dormant in youth quickly assert their suprem- 
 acy. She does what millions of mothers have 
 done and she does it rightly. Why teach water 
 to run down-hill or smoke to climb? 'Tis their 
 nature so to do. 
 
 Girls become women, not by training, discipline 
 and sacrifice, but by God-given impulses which 
 men may harm but never help. 
 
 21 
 
 The Next Step in Evolution 
 
 This book has been read by literary friends and 
 rejected by publishers. It is therefore possible to 
 foresee what critics Avill say and on what they will 
 base their condemnation. I cannot change this 
 judgment, nor do I wish to. The end of the literary 
 expert is so different from mine that common 
 grounds are hard to find. This is not a new posi- 
 tion. "Wlien my book of hymns appeared a literary 
 friend said there were only six kinds of poetry. 
 These he enumerated on his fingers, exactly as he 
 had learned them from his college professor. My
 
 378 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 hymns came under none of these heads : therefore 
 they were not poetry. 
 
 When I presented my story I found there was 
 only one kind of novel. The learned professors 
 throw out all but this brand. The cause is that 
 novel writing, not yet a hundred years old, has 
 been brought to its present perfection bj^ a single 
 group of English writers. With stray volumes 
 which do not fit this mold the professors make 
 sad havoc. It is easy to arrange the hundred and 
 thirty-nine accepted volumes on a single plan and 
 to glory in the scientific achievement. But poetry 
 is the product of thousands of years. It has had 
 too many forms to be boxed in so simple a manner 
 as the novel. Six therefore is the smallest group- 
 ing that a professor can make plausible. If a 
 writer's motive and form do not fit this classifi- 
 cation, out he goes to the unliterary darkness. 
 
 It is useless to argue a point of this kind either 
 about hymns or stories. It may however be pos- 
 sible to show that the exposition of any writer 
 depends on the end he has in view and the medium 
 through which he moves. Every change either in 
 his end or in his tool forces him to attack preju- 
 dice in some new way. Every victory of thought 
 has two stages: a clearing of the logical ground 
 on which opinion rests, and the removal of obses- 
 sions by which the truth is prevented from becom- 
 ing mass opinion. Arguments always appeal to 
 minorities, which fact of itself creates majority 
 suspicion if not disdain. A scientist must there- 
 fore stop with an incomplete victory or resort to 
 some literary form of attack. No matter how 
 much a novice he must try his hand and abide by 
 the results. Some years ago I offered hymns to 
 the managers of a local political campaign. ''No," 
 they replied, "we don't want hymns: we want 
 arguments.'^ They had them galore, and went
 
 NEXT STEP IN EVOLUTION 379 
 
 down by a ninety thousand majority. Emotion 
 wins when mass opinion decides. 
 
 Of the forms of emotional appeal the more 
 easily handled are song, fiction and history. 
 When a writer makes his choice he has j)i"oblems 
 of technique to face which he can overcome only 
 by trials — crude trials, yet effective if he persist. 
 Aside from this he is not bound. He need not 
 alter his ends nor deny he has them. Disguised or 
 conscious, every one has ends ; of them he should 
 be proud. 
 
 A part of the trouble lies in use of the word 
 ''novel" to cover the ground of all character 
 studies. It thus becomes assumed that a writer 
 must devise a plot that, hiding his climax, enables 
 him to spring a surprise on his readers ! But true 
 character studies do not permit of these sur- 
 prises. The interest must therefore lie in the 
 normal unfolding of character and not in its too 
 brief manifestations. Development has no final- 
 ity. It does not stop at marriage or divorce. 
 There is no social station the reaching of which 
 is success, nor any harm from which the loser 
 cannot escape. Character is merely a moving 
 equilibrium never wholly seen in any situation, 
 time or angle. It is this fact which forces char- 
 acter studies to take the form of a story in which 
 time, action and situation blend. In technical 
 terms these changes are called digressions, of 
 which an author can take advantage as often as 
 plot demands. No character study is complete 
 without shifts of interest. Otherw^ise the view" of 
 the subject would be too narrow to be effective. 
 A short story throwing the emphasis on surprise 
 cannot give the digressions which make char- 
 acter studies valuable. English novels make their 
 shifts by description of scenery or of locality. 
 Neither of these are available in America because 
 of the meagreness of details in both these respects.
 
 380 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 A Western sunset or a description of a cow barn 
 would not go far. My two parts are a device to 
 overcome this deficiency. To weave my first part 
 into the second, as digressions, would demand not 
 the traditional three volumes, but ten. If the 
 reader cannot of himself blend the two parts, the 
 American novel will have to wait for some new 
 venture. 
 
 Without this, however, the defect in transplant- 
 ing the English novel into American can be shown 
 by taking as an example its latest exponent. Mr. 
 Hardy uses conventional tools and gives English 
 scenery the customary emphasis. It is but a 
 slight exaggeration of his method to picture the 
 cow in the milking scene as looking at Tess's hair 
 and then at the setting sun, to determine by their 
 harmony or discord whether to kick the pail or 
 to give her milk. The fact is that both Tess and 
 the cow are Asiatic animals whose emotions are 
 determined by scenes thousands of miles from 
 England. Tame cows and tame Tesses are Eng- 
 lish in their repressions but not in their instinc- 
 tive reactions. It is this fact which makes the 
 final scene of the book so English — and so false. 
 Only slaves bow their faces to earth to indicate 
 their acceptance of moral retribution as imposed 
 by fat English judges. We are also led to infer 
 that if the architecture of the jail had harmonized 
 more completely with the scene, the emotions of 
 the beholders would have gone out in some other 
 form. Such reactions may be truly English but 
 are hardly universal. A Western farmer gets up 
 on an October morning not to see the rising sun 
 but to feed the hogs. His emotions respond to 
 the state of the market, not to the brilliancy of 
 sky effects. A story must be made to move, not 
 in accord with tradition, but with impulses im- 
 planted long before Europe was heard of. The 
 immigrant brings Asia, not Europe, with him. He
 
 NEXT STEP IN EVOLUTION 381 
 
 is disloyal to Europe and hence instinctively op- 
 poses everything English. The English are slaves 
 to law. The American is equally a law-breaker. 
 A new heaven and a new earth are our demand, a 
 dream which beats the charm of English fellow- 
 ship. 
 
 These statements are negative, showing merely 
 where the break with English tradition occurs. 
 Tragedy and retribution are equally amiss. They 
 inculcate morality but do not promote evolution. 
 The new plot must show an evolutionary shift 
 without a predication of its moral worth. It is a 
 movement from here to there. Something that 
 converts the is into the is not. It is easy to 
 compare what is today with what a writer hopes 
 will be three thousand years hence. Of such pic- 
 tures literature has an abundance. They reveal 
 an acute imagination — ^but to show where the next 
 movement in evolution will take place and where 
 it will land the participants is a scientific problem 
 demanding both a knowledge of the present and 
 of evolution. A plot of this kind must give an ac- 
 curate description of the class on which evolution 
 is to work and of the means by which the altera- 
 tion is effected. 
 
 Mud Holloiu is the base on which the nation 
 rests. It is the normal in the sense that it has 
 the soil and mechanisms on which prosperity de- 
 pends, without the impressment of a foreign cul- 
 ture which would thwart local tendencies. Nor- 
 malcy may be defined as prosperity without cul- 
 ture. Money to do with and not knowing what 
 to do. 
 
 Mud Hollow is not Gopher Prairie. Its inhabi- 
 tants do not drag out their lives nor suffer de- 
 privation for the benefit of absentee capitalists. 
 The elevators and the railroads may take more 
 than their just share but Mud Hollow is not con- 
 scious of exploitation. All pay their debts, have
 
 382 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 money in pocket; ride to church and market in 
 their Sunday clothes. Not everybody lives in Mud 
 Hollow nor are all its inhabitants well off, but the 
 class is large enough to control public opinion 
 and thus make the stone on which evolution rests. 
 Progress demands surplus as well as discontent; 
 new wants to battle with old restraints ; a shift in 
 emotion in addition to changes in corn plows and 
 harvesters. 
 
 Bowman is Mud Hollow strained and concen- 
 trated — a group of farmhouses without farms. 
 To it families go to see their sons turned into 
 Congressmen, doctors, preacher;s aiid school super- 
 intendents. The interests and talk are of the farm 
 except as interspersed with tales of the Civil "War. 
 More than half of the residents are old soldiers 
 to whom the War made the only break in life. Even 
 the professors were but a single generation from 
 the farm where they felt more at home than in 
 Athens. Every woman is a housewife, bakes her 
 own bread and is proud of her kitchen. Boys do 
 not return to the farm, but girls are expected to 
 tread the path of their mothers. They might 
 ''fool away a couple of years at books," but in 
 the end they are to marry some budding Congress- 
 man, bake potatoes as did mother, and rear 
 children. In this Bowman is not different 
 from towns to which successful farmers retire, 
 spending their mornings in gossip and motoring 
 out to the farm after dinner. Every village has 
 rows of such farmless houses where leisure and 
 content dwell, unconscious of world problems or 
 of world misery. All this looks simple and in a 
 measure satisfactory, but does not seem to afford 
 a good basis of a plot; nor would it, if the boys 
 and girls reared in these protected homes were 
 as stubbornly material as their parents. 
 
 But surplus does not crave more surplus: it 
 turns itself into adventure. It makes breaks, up-
 
 NEXT STEP IN EVOLUTION 383 
 
 sets tradition, and creates variation. This is the 
 process to watch and the source from which new 
 plots arise. It is emotion, not situation, that 
 alters. 
 
 Asiatic heredity, European tradition, American 
 situation. That is America today. Three antag- 
 onistic forces play on every one. America feeds ; 
 Europe restrains; Asia fumes at both food and 
 restraint. If Asia wins we shall have evolution; 
 how it is to win is the only plot worth unravelling. 
 To dump Europe, its traditions, culture and mor- 
 als, seems to be the only thought movement cap- 
 able of lifting Mud Hollow above itself. The 
 break and its consequences can be foreseen even 
 if it does not bring mankind into a storm-free 
 Utopia. One step at a time. That is all evolution 
 is, and does. Nature has surmounted worse evils 
 than those we face. She has put America in Mud 
 Hollow. She must find a way out. 
 
 In a description of what is to happen a writer 
 has but two choices. He must describe the next 
 transformation — how we are to get from where 
 we are to some other stable point, or he may strive 
 to picture what the final evolution of the race will 
 resemble. To tell what the world will be like three 
 or ten thousand years hence, giving free scope to 
 the imagination, is satisfying in the sense that 
 what we wish can be readily described. Such 
 pictures are merely the perfecting of what we 
 have. Evolution is not a dream, but a series of 
 transformations shifting from one base to an- 
 other. 
 
 Each new civilization is such a shift. Each 
 master mind is he who points the way from one 
 base to another. The real makers of evolution 
 are not the dreamers — but those who create a new 
 order to replace the chaos into which their fellows 
 have fallen. The growth of new physical traits, 
 the pressure of invention and the fruit of adven-
 
 384 MUD HOLLOW 
 
 ture make old institutions untenable. Their re- 
 placement makes a step in evolution. Such 
 steps are associated with Moses, Luther, Crom- 
 well, Bismarck. Each leads his comrades through 
 a wilderness, into a land of promise. These men 
 make history. They can be praised for what they 
 did and blamed for what they did not. However 
 we judge their mistakes and failures, they each 
 helped to establish a new order which, moving 
 mankind upward, established a new equilibrium. 
 We have broken with our past and pushed on into 
 a depression out of wdiich there is no beaten path. 
 To find an exit is evolution's next great task. 
 People and situations have importance only as 
 measuring change and pointing this new equi- 
 librium. We are in a period of progress. Our 
 children will live longer and have better times 
 even if they scoft' our dearest traditions. When 
 the clouds break we shall be in a new Paradise 
 but not in Eden. Many, many Paradises must be 
 sought and gained before Eden re-opens her gates.
 
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