The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-02-04
DeLEON'S NEW BOOK
BLIND AUTHOR AT WORK IN
 MOBILE
"For God and St. Louis,'' the Title, and Jean Baptiste Le Moyne,
 Sieur de Rienville, Being the Hero,

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 Like a romance is the story that comes from Mobile of Alabamas famous au- thor, T. c. DeLeon, writes Miss Annie Hendricks Walker in The Birmingham Age-Herald.
 Mir. DeLeon, playwright, historian, sat- irist, poet of whom Chauldron wrote he had sounded literature from philosophy to burlesque. is now wholly blind. He is spending the winter at his old home and with the assistance of a friend is com- pleting his new romance, For God and St. Louis; the Cradle of the Louisiana Purchase" He is at "Oakleigh," the homestead of the Irwins, and there with the aid of Mrs. Alfred Clisby of Bir- minghan, who is spending the winter
 with her family, he Is at work upon his story amid tho very scenes from which it draws it's local color.
 How difficult 1t will be to the readers of -Four Years in Rebel Capitals" to re- concile the blindness of It's author They have pictured him at work upon his Memoirs" The papers had i. that he was writing a mountain idyl with such university details that gave new charm to Sewanee, where the author passed so
 much of his time.
 Some years ago Mir. DeLeon lost one of his eyes, but he has gone on writing, continuing his lecture work, in fact kept so in touch with things literary that those who know him only through hts works will be surprised to hear that hc Is quito blind. To his personal friends this knowledge will cause inexpresslble sor- row.
 "Oakleigh," the old Irwin homestead. at Mobile, where Mrs. Clisby and Mir DeLeon arc hard at work upon the re- vision and completion of For God and St. Louis,'' Is an ideal spot for just such work. 1t is a typical old Southern home, a4. full of pleasant memories of the good old days; a ten-acre demesne, heavily wooded with the grand old oaks that give it's namo, and other trees that almost shut in its flower surrounded house. That is a quaint and picturesque erection of another day. so essentially of the old school that its great parlors might well stare In disdain at later introduced cleo tricity and modern innovation
 Sixty years ago, MT. and Mrs. Alfred Irwin sat under these old oa,s watching the play of their children, who are now grandparents. These younger branches Of the family tree have all played in child hood and met in maturity under the same oaks, and there Is tradition that the same families of mocking birds have nested year after year. and sung their same matin songs to the sleeperS under the broad caves.
 In the days of the first of the four gem erations "Oalleigh' was on the outskirts of Mobile. To-day the batteries that once drowned about it have been levelied; the great groves of pines behind 1t have fai- len under the axe, and the wide moors, where even the present proprietor made full bags of game on frosty dawns, are full of handsome dwellings, and gleam with patent sidewalks. ut amid the spic- and-span newness around 1t, the old homestead looms up stately and dignified, as befits a representative of yesterday.
 One thing about the old mansion has never known change: the case with which its massive doors swung to hospitality. In its ample parlors, about it's ever ready board. and on its broad veranda, there have gathered always the choicest spirits of Mobile and the most notable of those who came to 1t from afar. Men and wo- men famous for social worth, lttterateurs, artists, Journalists and musical and the atrical celebrities have there met appre- ciative Mobilians. And the frank, cordial hospitality was ever toned with a gentle courtliness that descended from father to son, and inheres in the present head Of the house, Colonel T. Kilshaw Irwin. His wife, as Miss Mary Ketchum, was for mer belle of her home city and many another, and who Is still q beautiful wo- man; and her daughter, now Mrs. Alfred Clisby, have done the honors of the Oak leigh home. And here the latter is now doing her first serious literary work, in acting as eyes and helper for the blind Alabama author, who himself has been for years a guest of Oakleigh, from time to time.
 It wouNl be difficult to select section of this country possessing greater histor- lc interest than Mobile. Its early history Is connected with that of the principal nations of the world and the special study of local history aroused at the erec- ton of. the bieentennial monument at Twenty Seven Mile Bluff adds to the his torical value of MT. DeLeon's present re- search. He has selected the most roman tic period of Mobile-the French times.
 Mir. DeLeon himself declares that:
 ''The greatest difficulty in writing of that time, in such surroundings, was not what to set down, but what to omit. It has been a marvel to me for years and long before I essayed any romance of my own, that this ripe, lush field had laid fallow so long. The soft breezes of the Gulf, laden with pilfered scents or nagnoliaa, tessamine and shrub; It's waters and marvellous sun sets; its dense forests and dark bayous, with their star petaled creeperS and fun sreal. swaying moss-all these make en- Icing stage setting. And the actors white and dusky-male and female-sav- age and tender-and ready cast to their parts by the greatest of stage managers History herself.
 In a recent interview, which appeared in The Mobile Register, Mir. DeLeon out lined his new romance.
 ''Yes, call 1t For God and St. Louis!' a somewhat apochryphal war cry of the ,eNfoynes; Pierre of that ilk, Sieur l iIterville and four of his adventurous brothers appearing in it-Jean Baptiste [,eMoyne, Sieur de Bienville being the hero The heroines are two-if not more; 8 royalty descended lady of France ard Hoshi-Hoxt (the White Moon) queen of the PAscagouIas. Through the action pass nobles. adventurers Indians of many tribes, paladIns, priests, Spaniards and as they appeared in history, and as needed to bear the movements and aid tho miSe-en-scene. There are love- adventure, sin, sorrow and laughter Gl It, but hope no cheap sentlrnentality ana little red fire"
 ''The subtitle of The Cradle of the Louisiana Purchase was intended to con yey that the story Is an episode ana does not strive to write the history or human error in one volume, It comes, with the first ship, into this bay; accompanies the French on their dramatic discovery ol