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Show . I i4rrVhi rw2k -J i Jen i Krvirx B TAKES A KBS j juvgr cures 01 jeuDen, tn-reward. i H- H kili!' l?.EAri UNCLE SILAS: I am srcnt- j B ly pleased to receive y6ur letter H 'j'J U saying that you will soon be in ' New York. But Its tenor rather H ' l than it 51 explicit statements puzzles me. H Ji1 You express lively interest In all that I jj1- said about my declaration of love to Mirs Frances Lacquerre and her de- '; clslvc refusal of my hand, but nowhere j .; ' In your letter do I perceive a hint even fl j that I may count upon your help in H, I j ! changing the young lady's unreasonable Hj ! ' ' state of jnlnd. You.' do, to be cure, tell H j lr,e tnat you much admire her charac- j; ler I recall that she lias expressed , 1 - equally approving opinions of yours , and perhaps I should consider that your approval of her is tantamount to an as- 'U1: uurance that you will atsist me In my '.". suit, lor if you approve her and I want h j her thus you may have unconsciously r A argued I can therefore count upon your 1 j, . help. To inform you of the precise status , here, that you may act Intelligently in , j. respect to It, I find nfysslf In unchanged i " relations to the Lacquerre household, :l j and that 1h. In essence, as if I should ! ay that I am treated as a. member of '. 'l- i it- I often have informed you that I de- 1 ,i rive delight from discussing mv plans , j!'! with Mrs. Lacquerre. She is sympa- .; ;. thctic, and while she does not agree I S j with, my political ambitions, as I wrote- 1 '! i jt you, she does agreo and greatly help in L ijiji iy determination to devote a reason- ' ;! able amount of my energies to society Hj '' 'j affairs. fl ' ) In this respect I must, aa I do In all 1 . jf subjects, speal; to you without conceaJ- , !'- ment. Whllo I am not yet convinced 1 l that there Is material grave enough for H. ', 'J j; y constant attention in the affairs of .' M- lhe social world, my views on the gen- 1 , ral subject have been much moditlcd i i ' ' I "y rzcGnt experiences, as well as by the Hj i; advice and counsel of Mrs. Lacquerre. 1 I ! fh Sne has patently pointed out to me the 1 ' ' m advantage one of my wealth arid lntel- L !; jipj lest gains by intimate association with i'B k Jl,s equals, and I have come not only ! f o agree with her but to enjoy my life 1 'Ml fts 11 la directed by her. I can without ;! fit l conceit atsert that under her wise and l ' friendly guidance I have acquired a ' pleasant aptitude In the art of enter- P 1 lainlng the men and women I meet in ,W her in my world. , rAl The life of a man of the world Is not ' fi , ' Ep tlle, so lacking in profitable actlvl- ties, ns I somewhat dogmaticallv have 1 ' Li! 5 been prone to adjudge It. I llnd that en- ' ;fm tertolnlng and being entertained by ;! 3 S agreeable people, having common intcr- , ' M "ts and pastimes, has a charm wholly m unsuspected by me heretofore. 1 am 1 W even to admit that In the earlier ' A days-of my Intercourse with such peo- 1 1 m Pie I nay have displayed a determlna-. a! j tln amounting almost to uncouthness 1 'W. to make them consider my pet themes to L i I t thf enforced exclusion of theirs. I am 1 .!H ; now cognizant that social intercourse m T , ,s fr,ee Crom annylne friction ii 1m largely results from an accommodation Hl : m J act8' ot vlwe of manner, even of M dress, to the end that an agreeable a- , (i mosphere of repose may prevail, rather m nan an aJr dIsturoed by petty cross m currents of alms and standards 3!;i: As 1 read over what Is Just here set 'i m'J , wn 1 am consclouy that it mav. ad- 'M( drees-you as Indicating a radical change W !nmJ IdcaJs- Tt may bc to but I must 'Hi- tell frankly these things though they excite apprehension at what you mav jjQ consider a-"backelidlng. Hl 3 , 1 spoke of this to Mrs. Lacquerre be- ji.j fore I wrote It, and she replied: "True 1 ! : Reuben, your Uncle Silas may not agree J with your views, but he will not blame you for holding them. He Is a man who is content only when engaged in big and strenuous affairs, yet he accommodates himself to the smaller things of our eo-cial eo-cial world and makes himself agreeable therein as well as the most devoted man of society. When he visit? us, he Is quite a beau to Frances and me, yef Is rushing all over the lot. carrying deals through the street, as If he held that the chief task of man Is to give the llnan-clal llnan-clal world the willies. That is why Frances is so chummy with him." "Indeed!" I exclaimed. "Is Frances, then, so chummy with my Uncle Silas?" "The best ever!" declared Mrs. Lacquerre. Lac-querre. "You see that, while Frances is not yet 19, and your Uncle SI Is my age. 35. she Is his elder In soberness of mind and severity of standards. Oh. they are great pals' In one way he is your Junior. By the way, Reuben, Just how old are you? some one was asking me." "I am approaching my 29th birthday," T replied. "You can remember the number num-ber as being ten less than the age of my uncle, and' ten more than that of Frances." Fran-ces." . "Ten more than mine, loo," commented comment-ed Mrs. Lacquerre thoughtfully. Then she smiled and abruptly changed the subject I reminded her that she had promised to matronlze an entertainment for me at my apartment, .md as I had an accumulation accumu-lation of social debts to discharge I urged an early date for the affair. She named a convenient day, and promised to fulfill her agreement to have a number num-ber of handsome young ladles present, and fewer mammas who would endeavor endeav-or to carry my heart by direct assault. Having acquired some knowledge In the matter of social entertainment, I determined to arrange the programme for my afternoon at home without calling call-ing on Aunt Sarah for help. I had, as a mere exercise In composition, written a trifling comedy, based upon some troubles trou-bles in the Samoan islands, when the diplomats of Germany, England, and America, assisted by the officers of come war ships of those three countries, were all deeply Involved In an effort to untangle un-tangle and adjust the rival claims to the Samoan throne made by a couple of barefooted native whose poslngs before be-fore the world were In themselves farcical, far-cical, yet brought throe great nations to the verge of war. Thinking that suel' a light comedy as I had written wouh1 afford a suitable vehicle for an amateir performance, I submitted it to Mrs Lacquerre for her Judgment When sYo had read it she said: "This Is pretty good tragedy for the professional stage Reuben, but for our purpose it must 1 adapted to. make a satire on the rival claims of certain women In the bras' band set In New York. Their doings an much In print, but have no more to' do with fcwell society than your Samoans had to do with weltpoUtlk." "Excellent!" I cried, "but I am nol enough Informed as to the bras3 banr' set's social politics to adapt my play to such satire." "Oh, I'll do that for you," she klndlv replied. i And Uncle Silas, 3he did, and with such wit that I wap amazed, and frankly frank-ly said so; the more amazed because her writing Is daintily vItty, whereas her SReech, a you recall, is calculated to Impress hearers with the belief that her vocabulary is as limited as It Is brusque "You are dcucedly bright, Polly." i said, and then blushed to hear myself call her by her first name. She overlooked over-looked that, or seemed to, but laughed heartily at my use of the word "deuced-ly. "deuced-ly. ' 'You are a transformed man!" she declared, laushlng. "Your use of 'deu- celly' tells more than all your tailor's extravagances, your horses, clubs, pet-Its pet-Its soupres, than anything else. Bravo, Reuben!" ' Mrs. Laequerre's arrangement of my I modest little play changed tho rival j kings into queens: and thry. with th-Mr following: of native girls, fumih?d tho feminine portion o" the cat. and diplomats diplo-mats nnd naval oillcers called for the services of a number of my men friends. Mrs. Lncquerrc played one of the queens and Aimb Sarah the other. ' and their witty hits at tho brass band set rivals kept my audience in merry mood. My part in the play was the German Consul, whose duty It Is to make a final decision as to the rival claims to the throne. Mrs. Lacqtierro was the queen In whoae favor I was to decide, and the action required that queen and consul rub noses, as is tho custom among the natives, as a sign of amicable relations. Mrs. Laequerrc looked bewitching, having given rein to her pretty fancy n costume besides being a person of notable loveliness so, at the moment our faces approached to rub noses, a sudden spirit of mischief, mis-chief, which a few months ago I would have considered mysrtf Incapable of harboring, made me salute her Hps with mine. In lieu of the nose rubbing. The audience saw, and laughed heartily at my daring, but Aunt Sarah severely reproached me for the act as soon as chance afforded her undisturbed opportunity. oppor-tunity. Aunt Sarah reminded me that such an act was most unbecoming at any time, but in her presence It cxime near being an Insult, not alone to her, but to her daughter, my charming cousin cou-sin Josephine. My dear aunt was emphatic em-phatic in expressing her hope that my indecorous act did not portend any return re-turn of my warmth of affection for Mrs. Lacquerre and was appeased only when I assured her of the unemotional nature na-ture of our friendship. Mrs. Lacquerre laughed the incident away, as the others oth-ers did in public, but later took me to task about it in term3 which proves her possessed of still another unexpected vocabulary. "It was a darn fool trick of you to do," she said to me. "Not that I am objecting to being kissed in public tho more public the less harm. That's not the point. You are queering your own prospects, and that Is evidence of a lack of wit I hate to see In you." "My own prospects!" I exclaimed. "Surely." she replied. "Here you are, trying to get my gal-to marry you. and, i knowing what a crank she Is about the j conventionalities, you get gay in Just , the way which will tnke you months to square. For a man who Is In love with Frances you seem to know precious little lit-tle about her make-up." For some reason this view of the situation sit-uation vexed me, but I politely responded re-sponded to Mrs. Lacquerre: "It Is true that I hope to Induce Frances to change her mind about my proposal. I appreciate appre-ciate that with her for my wife I will ! have a guiding light to lead me toward tho goal of my political ambition; that In Frances I will have a companion who will appreciate and help my Intellectual Intel-lectual strivings and spiritual yearnings; yearn-ings; with her to approve my efforts I know I can make my fellow man admit my superior gifts for the political uplifting" up-lifting" "Fudge!" interrupted Mrs. Lacquerre. ' "You are In love with . Frances and want her to be in love with you. That's about all there is to that situation. Frances isn't hankering after spiritual- . Ity or any other fuddy-duddyism; she wants you to make a big success of something outsido of society. It Isn't mat sne uoesn i iiKe sutmi.v, uui, uiiv- ing been born Into it, she can't see that ! It requires wit. wisdom, strugglo and , : capacity for doing things on the part I i of those not In to butt in. Your success I in that line doesn't count in your favor ! with her. Now, I'm not blushing be- hind my fan because you had the cheek to kiss me when I couldn't help myself; I'm only telling you that such an aot suggests to Frances that you are, under un-der your funny pretence of liking a hair shirt, mighty fond of a silk one. I'm dlrtorept from Frances; I'm satis-fled satis-fled with my world as T find It. Vm not lecturing you to make you a good man as I see goodness, for you're coming on my way, pretty strong as It Is; but as to Frances if you flon't get busy along her line of light somo man who is will land her and marry her allvo before , our eyes." J I could not but laugh at her quaint views. I hinted that If I had shown somo of the worldly Improvement aha saw In me now upon a certain senti-mentnl senti-mentnl occasion when I did myself tho honor of asking a charming widow who was still my good friend to marry mo I mlGht have had better luck She received this personal sally seriously, and aft'er a pause responded: "Perhaps "Per-haps you are right, Reuben. I'm not sworn not to remarry, and it might have been that with your Income, with your presentable looks you are less gllllfied since jou've taken your mind off politics and put it 'on the world I say, if you had then shown a sign that you would turn out a perfect man of the world, who knows what might havo happened. Wlddlca get awfully lonely sometimes. Reuben. Now, run away, hunt up Frances, and try to square yourself with her for having kissed her mamma." I came away. Uncle Silas, hut did not hunt up Frances. Of course I love her, but an odd feeling comes over mo when T contemplate marriage with Tier that here again I am a victim of an unintended unin-tended confidence game played on me by my own emotions For what, In brief, Is falling a victim to a confidence game? It 13 the beguiling of us through out best feelings. AbTI7K the ekles, for a Avorla of"!1 visionary, fanciful clrl 11 would lie the Ideal, C V 43 mere human brlnew, n 4 WI world, too, and the onlv 1 we have any positive - nt txM application of a poH'o owl&!!P conduct rouia Inevunblv ui!2 'HM marsh of misunderstanding fl 1 of ennui from which wSj8""4 worlding must ever ston l AtM L But this la merely SSlM not seek Frances today k,,, 1 B morrow. Affectionately! |