Part 3 - Men in War and the Death of Society

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Ernest Hemingway, Torrents of Spring, American literature, Novella, Hemingway's early work, Parody, Satire, Romantic relationships, Artistic ambition, Springtime setting, Midwest, Literary criticism, Hemingway's writing style, Themes in Hemingway's works, Coming-of-age, Critique of society, Cultural criticism, Midwestern characters, Influences on Hemingway, Interwar period

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Part three, Men in War andthe Death of Society. It may be
likewise noted that affectation does not implyan absolute negation of those qualities which are
affected. And therefore, though whenit proceeds from hypocrisy it be nearly allied
to deceit, yet when it comesfrom vanity only it partakes of the nature

(00:24):
of ostentation. For instance, theaffectation of liberality in a vain man differs
visibly from the same affectation and theavaricious. For though the vain man is
not what he would appear, orhath not the virtually effects to the degree
he would be thought to have it, yet it sits less awkwardly on him

(00:46):
than on the avaricious man, whois the very reverse of what he would
seem to be. Henry Fielding,Chapter eleven. Jogi Johnson walked out of
the workmen's and so the pump factoryand down the street. Spring was in
the air, the snow was melting, and the gutters were running with snow

(01:07):
water. Yogi Johnson walked down themiddle of the street, keeping on the
as yet unmelted ice. He turnedto the left and crossed the bridge over
Bear River. The ice had alreadymelted into the river, and he watched
the swirling brown current below beside thestream. What's on the willow brush were
coming out green. It the realchinook wind. Yogi thought the foreman did

(01:33):
right to let the men go.It wouldn't be safe keeping them in a
day like this. Anything might happen. The owner of the factory knew a
thing or two when the chinook blew. The thing to do was to get
the man out of the factory.Then if any of them were injured,
it was not on him. Itdidn't get caught under the Employer's Liability Act.

(01:53):
They knew a thing or two,these big pump manufacturers. They were
smart all right. Yogi was worried. There was something on his mind.
Who was spring. There was nodoubt of that now. And he did
not want a woman. He hadworried about it a lot lately. There
was no question about it. Hedid not want a woman. He couldn't

(02:14):
explain it to himself. He hadgone to the public library and asked for
a book the night before. Helooked at the librarian did not want her.
Somehow, she meant nothing to him. At the restaurant where at a
meal ticket. He looked hard atthe waitress who brought him his meals.
He did not want her either.He passed a group of girls on their

(02:35):
way home from high school. Helooked carefully at all of them. He
did not want a single one.Decidedly, something was wrong. Was he
going to pieces? Was this theend? Well? Yogi thought, women
are gone, perhaps, though Ihope not, But I still have my
love of horses. He was walkingup the steep hill that leads up from

(02:55):
the Bear River out onto the CharlevoixRoad. The road was not really so
steep, but it felt steep toYogi, his legs heavy with the spring.
In front of him was a grainand feed store. A team of
beautiful horses were hitched in front ofthe feed store. Yogi went up to
them, who wanted to touch them, to reassure himself that there was something

(03:19):
left. The nie horse looked athim as he came nearer. Yogi put
his hand in his pocket for alump of sugar. He had no sugar.
The horse put its ears back andshowed its teeth. The other horse
jerked his head away. Was thissaw that his glove of horses had brought
him? After all. Perhaps therewas something wrong with these horses. Perhaps
they had glanders or spavin. Perhapssomething had been caught in the tender frog

(03:44):
of their hoof. Perhaps they werelovers. Yogi walked on up the hill
and turned to the left onto theCharlevois Road. He passed the last houses
of the outskirts of Pitashki and cameout on to the open country road.
On his right was a field thatstretched a little traverse Bay, the blue
of the bay opening up into thebig Lake Michigan. Across the bay the

(04:08):
pine hills behind Harbor Springs. Beyondwhere you could not see it, cross
Village, where the Indians lived.Even further beyond these straits of Mackinac with
Saint Ignas, where a strange andbeautiful thing had once happened to Oscar Gardner,
who worked beside Yogi in the pumpfactory. Further beyond the Sioux,

(04:30):
both Canadian and American. There thewilder spirits of Pataski sometimes went to drink
beer. They were happy. Then. Way way beyond and in the other
direction, at the foot of thelake was Chicago, where scripts O'Neill had
started for on that eventful night whenhis first marriage had become a marriage no
longer Near there, Gary, Indiana, where were the great steel mills near

(04:54):
their Hammond, Indiana. Near thereMichigan City, Indiana. Further beyond there
would Indianapolis, Indiana, where BoothTarkington lived. He had the wrong dope,
that fellow. Further down there wouldbe Cincinnati, Ohio. Beyond that
Vicksburg, Mississippi. Beyond that Waco, Texas. There was a grand sweep

(05:15):
to this America of ours. Jogiwalked across the road and sat down on
a pile of logs where he couldlook out over the lake. After all,
the war was over and he wasstill alive. There was a chapman
that fellow Anderson's book that the librarianhad given him at the library last night.
Why hadn't he wanted the librarian anyway? Could it be because he thought

(05:38):
she might have false teeth? Couldit be something else? Would a little
child ever tell her? He didn'tknow what was the librarian to him?
Anyway? This chap in the bookby Anderson. He had been a soldier
too, He had been up thefront two years. Anderson said, what
was his name? Fred? Something? This Fred had thoughts dancing and his

(06:00):
brain horror. One night, inthe time of the fighting, he went
out on parade, no it waspatrol in no man's land, and saw
another man stumbling along in the darknessand shot him. The man pitched forward
dead. It had been the onlytime Fred consciously killed a man. You
don't kill men in war much,the book said, The hell you don't,
Yogi thought. Here two years inthe infantry at the front, they

(06:25):
just die. Indeed they do,Yogi thought. Anderson said. The act
was rather hysterical on Fred's part.He and the men with him might have
made the fellow surrender. They hadall got the jim jams. After it
happened, they all ran away together. Where the hell did they run to?
Yogi wondered Paris afterward. Killing thisman haunted Fred. It's got to

(06:47):
be sweet and true. That wasthe way the soldiers thought, Anderson said,
the hell it was this. Fredwas supposed to have been two years
in an infantry regiment at the front. Couple of Indians were passing along the
road, grunting to themselves and toeach other. Yogi called to them.
The Indians came over. Big Whitechief got chew of tobacco, asked the

(07:11):
first Indian White Chief carry liquor.The second Indian asked. Yogi handed them
a package of Peerless and his pocketflask. White Chief he big medicine.
The Indians grunted, listen. YogiJohnson said, I am about to address
to you a few remarks about thewar, the subject on which I feel

(07:32):
very deeply. The Indians sat downon the logs. One of the Indians
pointed out the sky up there.Getchi manitou the mighty, he said.
The other Indian winked at Yogi WhiteChief. No believe every goddamn thing he
here, he grunted. Listen,Yogi Johnson said, And he told them
about the war. War hadn't beenthat way to Yogi, he told the

(07:56):
Indians. War had been to himlike football. Work in football, but
they play at the colleges Carlisle IndianSchool. Both the Indians nodded they had
been to Carlisle. Jogi had playedcenter at football, and wore had been
much the same thing, intensely unpleasant. When you played football and had the
ball, you were down with yourlegs spread out and the ball held out

(08:18):
in front of you on the ground. You had to listen for the signal
decoded. Make the proper pass.You had to think about it all the
time. While your hands were onthe ball. The opposing center stood in
front of you, and when youpassed the ball, he brought his hand
up smash into your face, andgrabbed you with the other hand under the
chin or under your armpit, andtried to pull you forward or shove you

(08:41):
back to make a hole he couldgo through and break up the plate.
You were supposed to charge forward sohard you banged him out of the play
with your body and put you bothon the ground. He had all the
advantage. That was not what youwould call fun. When you had the
ball, he had all the advantage. The only good thing was that when
he had the poll you could roughhouse him. In this way, things

(09:03):
evened up, and sometimes even acertain tolerance was achieved. Football, like
the war, was unpleasant, stimulating, and exciting after you had attained a
certain hardness, and the chief difficultyhad been that of remembering the signals.
Yogi was thinking about the war,not the army. He meant combat.

(09:24):
The army was something different. Youcould take it and ride with it,
or you could buck the tiger andlet it smash you. The army was
a silly business, but the warwas different. Yogi was not haunted by
man he had killed. He knewhe had killed five men, probably he
had killed more. He didn't believemen you killed haunt at you, not

(09:45):
if you had been two years atthe front. Most of the men he
had known had been excited as hellwhen they had first killed. The trouble
was to keep them from killing toomuch. It was hard to get prisoners
back to the people that wanted themfor identification. You sent a man back
with two prisoners, maybe you senttwo men back with four prisoners. What

(10:05):
happened The men came back and saidthe prisoners were knocked out by the barrage.
They would give the prisoner a pokein the seat of the pants with
a bayonet, and when the prisonerjumped, they would say you run,
you son of a bitch, andlet their gun off in the back of
his head. They wanted to besure they had killed. Also, they
didn't want to go back through anydamned barrage, No, sir, They

(10:26):
learned those kind of manners from theAustralians. After all, what were those
jerries, bunch of god damned huns? Huns sounded like a funny word.
Now, all this sweetness and truth. Not if you were in there two
years in the end they would havesoftened. God sorry for excesses, and
who gun to store up good deedsagainst getting killed themselves. But that was

(10:48):
the fourth phase of soldiern he gentlingdown and a good soldier In the war
it went like this. First,you were brave because you didn't think anything
could hit you, because you yourselfwere something special and you knew that you
could never die. Then you foundout different. You were really scared then,
but if you were a good soldier, you functioned the same as before.

(11:11):
Then, after you were wounded andnot killed, with new men coming
on and going through your old processes, you hardened and became a good,
hard boiled soldier. Then came thesecond crack, which is much worse than
the first. And then you begandoing good deeds and being the boy Sir
Philip Sidney, and storing up treasuresin heaven. At the same time,

(11:33):
of course, functioning always the sameas before, as if it were a
football game. Nobody had any damnedbusiness to write about it, though they
didn't at least know about it fromhearsay. Literature has too strong an effect
on people's minds, like this Americanwriter Willa Cather, who wrote a book
about the war where all the lastpart of it was taken from the action

(11:56):
and the birth of a nation.An ex servicemen wrote to her from all
over America to tell her how muchthey liked it. One of the Indians
was asleep. He had been chewingtobacco and his mouth was pursed up in
sleep. He was leaning on theother indians shoulder. The Indian who was
awake, pointed to the other Indianwho was asleep and shook his head.

(12:18):
Well, how did you like thespeech, Yogi asked the Indian who was
awake. White Chief have heaped muchsound ideas, The Indians said, White
Chief educated like hell. Thank you, Yogi said, he felt touched here
among the simple Aborigines, the onlyreal Americans. He had found that true
communion. The Indian looked at him, holding the sleeping Indian carefully that his

(12:43):
head might not fall back upon thesnow covered logs. Was White Chief and
the war? The Indian asked.I landed in France in May nineteen seventeen.
Yogi began, I thought maybe WhiteChief was in the war. From
the way he talked, the Indianssaid him. He raised the head of
his sleeping companion up so the lastrays of the sunset shone on the sleeping

(13:05):
Indian's face. He got VC,ME, I got DSO and MC with
bar. I was major in thefourth cmrs. I'm glad to meet you,
Yogi said. He felt strangely humiliated. It was growing dark. There
was a single line of sunset wherethe sky and water met way out on

(13:28):
Lake Michigan. Yogi watched the narrowline of the sunset grow darker, red,
then to a mere slip, andthen fade. The sun was down
behind the lake. Yogi stood upfrom the pile of logs. The Indian
stood up too. He awakened hiscompanion, and the Indian who had been
sleeping, stood up and looked atYogi. Johnson. We go to Pataski

(13:50):
to join salvation army. The largerand more wakeful Indians said, White Chief.
Come too, said the smaller Indianwho had been asleep. I'll walk
in with you. Yogi replied,who were these Indians? What did they
mean to him? With the sundown, the slushy road was stiffening. It
was freezing again. After all,maybe spring was not coming. Maybe it

(14:11):
did not make a difference that hedid not want a woman now that the
spring was perhaps not coming. Therewas a question about that he would walk
into town with the Indians and lookfor a beautiful woman and try and water.
He turned down the now frozen road. The two Indians walked by his
side. They were all bound inthe same direction. Chapter twelve. Through

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the night, down the frozen road, the three walked into Pataski. They
had been silent walking along the frozenroad. Their shoes broke the new form
crusts of ice. Sometimes Yoki Johnsonstepped through a thin film of ice into
a pool of water. The Indiansavoided the pools of water. They came
down the hill past the feedstore,crossed the bridge over the bare river,

(15:00):
their boots ringing hollowly on the frozenplanks of the bridge, and climbed the
hill that led past doctor Rumsey's houseand the home tea room up to the
pool room. In front of thepool room, the two Indians stopped White
Chief shoot pool. The big Indianasked, no, Yogi Johnson said,
my right arm was crippled in thewar. White Chief had hard luck.

(15:22):
The small Indian said, shoot onegame, Kelly pool. He got both
arms and both legs shot off atWhite HER's the big Indian said, and
then aside to Yogi and very sensitive. All right, Yogi Johnson said,
I'll shoot one game. They wentinto the hot, smoke filled warmth of
the pool room. They obtained atable and took down ques from a wall.

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As the little Indian reached up totake down his queue, Yogi noticed
that he had two artificial arms.They were brown leather and were both buckled
on at the elbow on the smoothgreen cloth. Under the bright electric lights,
they played pool. At the endof an hour and a half,
Yogi Johnson found that he owed thelittle Indian four dollars and thirty cents.

(16:08):
You shoot a pretty nice stick,he remarked to the small Indian. May
not shoot so good since the war. The small Indian replied, White Chief
liked to drink a little, askedthe larger Indian. Where do you get
it? Asked Yogi, I'll haveto go to Cheboygan for mine. White
Chief, come with red brothers,the big Indian said. They left the

(16:30):
pool table placed their cues in therack on the wall, paid at the
counter, and went out into thenight. Along the dark streets, men
were sneaking home. The frost hadcome and frozen everything stiff and cold.
The chinook had not been a realchinook after all. Spring had not yet
come, and the men who hadcommenced their orgies were halted by the chill

(16:51):
in the air that told them thechinook wind had been a fake. That
foreman, Yogi thought he'll catch helltomorrow. Perhaps it had all been engineered
by the pump manufacturers to get theforeman out of his job. Such things
were done through the dark of thenight. Men were sneaking home in little
groups. The two Indians walked oneither side of Yogi. They turned down

(17:12):
a side street, and all threehalted before a building that looked something like
a stable. It was a stable. The two Indians opened the door and
Yogi followed them inside. A ladderled upstairs to the floor above. Was
dark inside the stable, but oneof the Indians lit a match to show
Yogi the ladder. The little Indianclimbed up first, the metal hinges of

(17:37):
his artificial limbs, squeaking as heclimbed. Yogi followed him, and the
other Indian climbed last. Lighting Yogi'sway with matches. The little Indian knocked
on the roof where the ladder stoppedagainst the wall. There was an answering
knock. The little Indian knocked ananswer, three sharp knocks on the roof
above his head. The trap dooron the roof was raised and they climbed

(18:00):
up through into the lighted room.In one corner of the room, there
was a bar with a brass railand tall spittoons. Behind the bar was
a mirror. Easy chairs were allaround the room. There was a pool
table, magazines on sticks hung ina line on the wall. There was
a framed autograph portrait of Henry WadsworthLongfellow on the wall, draped in the

(18:22):
American flag. Several Indians were sittingin the easy chairs reading. A little
group stood at the bar. Nicelittle club eh. An Indian came up
and shook hands with Yogi. Isee almost every day at the pump factory.
He was a man who worked atone of the machines near Yogi in
the factory. Another Indian came upand shook hands with Yogi. He also

(18:44):
worked in the pump factory rotten luckabout the chinook, he said, yes,
Yogi said, just to false alarm. Come and have a drink.
The first Indian said, I'm witha party. Yogi answered, who were
these Indians anyway? Bring them alongtoo. The first Indian said, always
room for one more. Yogi lookedaround him. The two Indians who had

(19:07):
brought him were gone. Where werethey? Then he saw them? They
were over at the pool table.The tall refined Indian to whom Yogi was
talking followed his glance. He noddedhis head and understanding, there are woods
Indians, he explained apologetically. We'remost of us town Indians here. Yes,
of course, Yogi agreed. Thelittle chap has a very good war

(19:30):
record. The tall refined Indian remark, the other chap was a major too,
I believe. Yogi was guided overto the bar by the tall refined
Indian. Behind the bar was thebartender. He was a Negro. How
would some dogs head, ale go, asked the Indian. Fine. Yogi
said, two dogs heads, Bruce, the Indian remarked to the bartender.

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The bartender broke into a chuckle.What are you laughing at? Bruce?
The Indian asked, the neat arebroke into a shrill, haunting laugh.
I knowed it, massive, RedDog, he said, I knowed you'd
ordered that. Dog said all thetime. He is a merry fellow.
The Indian remarked to Yogi, Imust introduce myself. Red Dog's the name.

(20:15):
Johnson's the name, Yogi said,Yogi Johnson, Oh, we're all
quite familiar with your name. MisterJohnson, Red Duck smiled. I would
like you to meet my friends,mister Sitting Bull, mister Poison Buffalo,
and Chief running Skunk Backwards. Sittingbowls A name I know, Yogi remarked,
shaking hands. Oh, I'm notone of those sitting bowls, Mister

(20:36):
sitting Bull, said, Chief runningSkunk Backwards. Great grandfather once sold the
entire island of Manhattan for a fewstrings of wampum. Red Dog explained,
how very interesting. Yogi said,that was a costly bit of wampum for
our family. Chief running Skunk Backwardssmiled ruefully. Chief running Skunk backwards is
some of that wampum? Would youlike to see it? Red asked,

(21:00):
indeed, I would. It's reallyno different from any other wampum. Skunk
Backwards explained deprecatingly. He pulled thechain of wampum out of his pocket and
handed it to Yogi Johnson. Yogilooked at it curiously. What a part
that string of wampum had played inthis America of ours? Would you like

(21:21):
to have one or two wompums fora keepsake, Skunk Backwards asked, I
wouldn't like to take your wampum.Yogi demurred, they have no intrinsic value,
really, Skunk Backwards explained, detachingone or two wampums from the string,
their value is really a sentimental one. To Skunk backwards family, red
Dog said, damn decent of you, mister Skunk Backwards, Yogi said,

(21:45):
it's nothing. Skunk Backwards said,you do the same for me in a
moment, it's decent of you.Behind the bar, Bruce, the Negro
bartender, had been leaning forward andwatching the wampums pass from hand to hand.
His dark face shown sharply, withoutexplanation, he broke into high pitched,
uncontrolled laughter. The dark laughter ofthe negro. Red Dog looked at

(22:08):
him sharply, I say, Bruce, he spoke, sharply. Your mirth
is a little ill timed. Brucestopped laughing and wiped his face on a
towel. He rolled his eyes apologetically. I can't help it, Massa Red
Dog. When I've seen mister SkunkBackhouse passing dem wopams around, I just
couldn't stand it no longer. Whatdo you want to sell a big town

(22:30):
like New York for dem whappams forwopums? Take away your wampums. Bruce
is an eccentric, Red Dog explained, But he's a quirking bartender in a
good hearted chap. You're right there, Massa Red Dog. The bartender leaned
forward. I's got a heart ofpure gold. He is an eccentric,
though, Red Dog apologized. TheHouse committee are always after me to get

(22:53):
another bartender. But I liked thechap oddly enough, I'm all right,
Boss, Bruce said. It's justthat when I see something funny, I
just have to laugh. You know, I don't mean the harm. Boss,
right enough, Bruce, Red Dogagreed, you are an honest chap.
Yogi Johnson looked about the room.The other Indians had gone away from

(23:15):
the bar, and Skunk Backwards wereshowing the wampum to a little group of
Indians and dinner dress, who hadjust come in. At the pool table,
the two Woods Indians were still playing. They had removed their coats,
and the light above the pool tableglinted on the metal joints in the Little
Woods Indians artificial arms. He'd justrun the table for the eleventh consecutive time.

(23:37):
That little chap would have made apool player if he hadn't had a
bit of hard luck, and warRed Dog remark, would you like to
have a look about the club?He took the check from Bruce, signed
it, and Yogi followed him intothe next room, Our committee room,
Red Dog said. On the wallswere framed autographed photographs of Chief Vender,
Francis Parkman, D H. Lawrence, Chief Myers, Stuart Edward White,

(24:03):
Mary Austin, Jim Thorpe, GeneralCuster, Glenn Warner, Mabel Dodge,
and a full length oil painting ofHenry Wadsworth Longfellow. Beyond the committee room
was a locker room with a smallplunge bath or a swimming pool. It's
really ridiculously small for a club,Red Dog said, but it makes a
comfortable little hole to pop into whenthe evenings they're dull. He smiled,

(24:26):
we call it the wigwam. Youknow that's a little conceit of my own.
It's a damn nice club, Yogisaid, enthusiastically. Put you up
if you like. Red Dog offered, what's your tribe? What do you
mean your tribe? What are you? Sack and fox, jipway cree?
I imagine, oh, said Yogi, my parents come from Sweden. Red

(24:48):
Dog looked at him closely, hiseyes narrowed. You're not having me on.
No, they either came from Swedenor Norway. Yogi said, I'd
have sworn you look to bid onthe white side. Red Dog said,
damn good things came out in time, there'd have been no end of his
scandle. He put his hand tohis head and pursed his lips. Hear

(25:10):
you. He turned suddenly and grippedYogi by the vest. Yogi felt the
barrel of an automatic pushed hard againsthis stomach. You'll go quietly through the
club room, get your coat andhat, and leave as though nothing had
happened. Say polite goodbye to anyonewho happens to speak to you, and
never come back. Get that youswede, yes, said Yoki. Put

(25:32):
up your gun. I'm not afraidof your gun. Do as I say,
Red Dog ordered. As for thosetwo pool players who brought you here,
I'll soon have them out of this. Yogi went into the bright room,
looked at the bar where Bruce,the bartender was regarding him, got
his hat and coat, said goodnight to Skunk backwards, who asked him
why he was leaving so early.And the outside trapdoor was swung up by

(25:56):
Bruce. As Yogi started down theladder, the Negro burst out laughing.
I noted, he laughed. Inoted all the time, no swede gun
a fool, Old Bruce. Yogilooked back and saw the laughing black face
of the Negro framed in the oblongsquare of light. They came through the
raised trap door. Once on thestable floor, Yogi looked around him.

(26:18):
He was alone. The straw ofthe old stable was stiff and frozen under
his feet. Where had he been? Had he been in an Indian club?
What was it all about? Wasthis? The end? Above him?
A slit of light came in theroof, then it was blacked by
two black figures. There was thesound of a kick, a blow,

(26:38):
a series of thuds, some dull, some sharp, and two human forms
came crashing down the ladder. Fromabove floated the dark, haunting sound of
black Negro laughter. The two woodsIndians picked themselves up from the straw and
limped toward the door. One ofthem, the little one, was crying.
Yogi followed them out into the coldnight. It was cold, the

(27:00):
night was clear, the stars wereout. Club No damn good, the
big Indian said, club heap,no damn good. The little Indian was
crying. Yogi, in the starlight, saw that he had lost one of
his artificial arms. Me no playpoolno more. The little Indian sobbed.
He shook his one arm at thewindow of the club, from which a

(27:22):
thin split of light came. Clubheap, God, damn hell, no
good, never mind, Yogi said, I'll get you a job in the
pump factory. Pump factory held.A big Indian said, we all go
joined Salvation army. Don't cry,Yogi said to the little Indian, I'll
buy you a new arm. Thelittle Indian went on crying. He sat

(27:42):
down in the snowy road. Nocan play pool, me no care about
nothing, he said. From abovethem, out of the window of the
club came the haunting sound of aNegro laughing. Author's note to the reader,
in case it may have any historicracle value. I'm glad to state
that I wrote the foregoing chapter intwo hours directly on the typewriter, and

(28:06):
then went out to lunch with Johndos Passos, whom I consider a very
forceful writer and an exceedingly pleasant fellow. Besides, this is what is known
in the provinces as log rolling.We lunched on roll mops sault munier,
sive du yefa, a la chescocote, macmalad du poem, and washed

(28:29):
it all down, as we usedto say, a reader with a bottle
of Monrachet nineteen nineteen with the soul, and a bottle of Aspice du Bonna
nineteen nineteen, a piece with ajugged hare. Mister dos Passos, I
believe, shared a bottle of chambarteinwith me over the Marmalade du poems English

(28:51):
apple sauce. We drank two viewmarks, and after deciding not to go
to the Cafe d dom and talkabout art, we both went to our
respective homes and I wrote the followingchapter. I would like the reader to
particularly remark the way the complicated threadsof the lives the various characters in the
book are gathered together and then heldthere in that memorable scene in the beanery.

(29:15):
It was when I read this chapterallowed to him that mister Dospassus exclaimed,
hendyway, you have wrought a masterpiecep s. From the author to
the reader. It is at thispoint, reader, that I am going
to try and get that sweep andmovement into the book that shows that the
book is really a great book.I know you hope just as much as

(29:36):
I do, reader, that Iwill get this sweep and movement, because
think what it will mean to bothof us. Mister H. G.
Wells, who has been visiting atour home, we're getting along in the
littery again. A reader asked usthe other day if perhaps our reader,
that's you reader, just think ofit H. G. Wells talking about
you write in our home anyway.H. G. Wells asked us if

(30:00):
perhaps our reader would not think toomuch of this story was autobiographical, Please,
reader, just get that idea outof your head. We have lived
in Petoskey, Michigan. It istrue, and naturally many of the characters
are drawn from life as we livedit. Then, but they are other
people, not the author. Theauthor only comes into the story in these

(30:21):
little notes. It is true thatbefore starting the story we spent twelve years
studying the various Indian dialects of theNorth, and they are still preserved in
the museum at Cross Village. Ourtranslation of the New Testament into a jibway.
But you would have done the samething in our place, reader,
and I think if you think itover, you will agree with us on
this. Now to get back tothe story. It is meant in the

(30:45):
best spirit of friendship when I saythat you have no idea, reader,
what a hard chapter this is goingto be to write. It's a matter
of fact, and I try tobe frank about these things. We will
not even try and write it untiltomorrow, and apart three