Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-05-28

Good Lord! groaned Bobby
incidentally. there was a sculptor and
man who wrote problem stories"
And I've been abroad only two months"
TT your going abroad that did it,
Bobby. 1t awakened longing for travel.
| couldn't go to Europe We were too
poor even to go to the country. That Wall
street fracas complicated our summer plans
dreadfully. / said to myself, I really must
travel, but it must be journey without
money and without price. Then L shut
myself in my room and concentrated my
mind upon a purple iris in a glass vase.
(BS the way, Bobby, there has also been
yogi, but that's quite another story.)
Did you ever concentrate your mind on a
purple iris in a glass vase?"
Bobby shook his head emphatically
We'll. of course, l really ought to choose
something yellow, but l prefer purple L
get just as many ideas when l mediate
upon purple, and the ideas are much live
lfer After | had put in about fifteen min
utes the iris, 1 said. Go to. / will
travel in Bohemia | got my tickets from
Mrs. Wallace. l was to be personally con-
Quoted. When Mrs. Wallace couldn't do
the conducting. she was to provide sub
stitute; but 1 didn't bother her much about
substitutes. | furnished them myself. Do
you know Mrs. Walace?"
Bobby didn't.
What does Wallace do?" he asked.
HE stays at home
What does Mrs. Wallace do?'
she travels in Bohemia"
Bobby sat up very straight.
Now, Nancy. see here
But she's all right. Bobby. She was
Schua ~, but she has taste for bear lead
ing. She doesn't have to live in Bohemia.
but she worships at the shrine of genius.
She has at least one rabd enthusiasm each
fortnight.
You seem to have hit her pace" said
Bobby rather grimly.
Exactly; only I doubled up. Sometimes
I drove my enthusiasm tandem. You see
my time short"
''Why?''
Nancy blushed; and when Nancy bushes
she is adorable. Then she looked embar-
raised. Bobby knows she never is embar
raised, but he always finds the exhibition
entertaining.
well, knew that after August couldn't
be happy outside the Philistine camp" the
young woman said vaguely.
Bobby returned the last day of August.
1t was too transparent. He laughed, so
did Nancy.
Tell me all about it," he said taking
cigars, and good ones. Even the most
casual observer would never expect him
to be guilty of a cigarette.
Nancy put an ash tray at his elbow, and
offered him sofa cushion.
1T will probably make you very tired"
she said sweetly, and he took the cushion.
Mrs. Wallace gave a dinner" Nancy be-
gan.
"a good dinner?"
Yes
That's not Bohemia
No; but introduced me to Bohemians.
They did the rest. I've been where verses
and hair and vim ordinaFe flowed like wa
ter Bobby, but that came later. Mrs. Wal
lace's. wines are distinctly Philistine'
Where was Walace?"
He had important business engage
ment at his club
My heart warns toward Wallace muir
INJURED the man who came often.
Il went out to dinner with Mrs. Wal
laees latest enthusiasm. Wasn't that noble
of her, Bobby? He's a poet, and she had
told me that he was the most fascinating
being she had ever known. She said he was
like the angel ISRAELI, whose heart-strings
We're a lutte.
I'll bet you made the lutte play rag
time said Bobby.
Not at all You evidently don't know
Bohemia. There aren't any Ten Command
ments in Bohemia. There is only one but
that one is, Thou shalt not drop thy pose
It's fairly inspiring. Bobby, to see how de-
vouty they follow that law ISRAELI
might covet his neighbours wife and run
amuck through the Decalogue. but never.
never would he play rag time. It's this
way. Everybody in Bohemia falls in love
early and often, but good Bohemian
ever forgets himself in loving An egoist
rampant on field purple. There you have
bUileUld COAT Ol dFUlS.
But he did tune his lutte to sing thy
praise?" urged Bobby.
Nancy smiled.
He wrote twenty-six sonnets to me-"
Suffering Moses
I've never been called out of my name
as l was in those sonnets Bobby MY
worst enemy wouldn't have recognized me.
Now. Bobby tell me seriously. Do you
think have sinuous, serpentine smile?"
Bobby grinned
And would you like to be n pomegranate
flower and a marble sphinx and an old
world melody, all in fourteen lines?'
We'll, it's a good thing to hurry through
stunt like that" suggested Bobby con-
solngly.
He found out before we were half
through the soup that my nearness troubled
him strangely. He asked if l ever felt a
haunting premonition of approaching PAIN
told him l seldom felt that until after
the salad. Then talked about the Cos
pei of Pain. Don't ask me what it is,
Bobby. don't know; but it's very beauti-
full 1 almost wept over it during the
entree.
I'VE had Materlinck with the salad, No.
1t isn't cheese. It's a who writes
make one squirm Either process is a de-
lirium of exquisite pain. The poet said
so. Would you rather yearn or squirm, if
you had your choice, Bobby"
Il don't think I've ever squirmed and
we don't yearn in Philistia. We just want
things"
For no apparent reason Nancy blushed.
Then she returned hastily to her poet.
1--WE reached Swnburne by dessert time.
You see the agony of protest ended with
Maeterlinck and salad. With the nessel-
rode and Swnburne we resigned ourselves
to indigestion, physical and moral. On the
whole. l think l liked 1t better It's more
restful. Still didn't like sanguine grapes
of sorrow. and purple blood of pain, and
dead sheaves, and ruined fruit, and all that
sort of thing with nesselrode 1t seemed so
messy. 1 bore up for a while. and then I
asked him il he hadn't a nice, clean little
Felicia Hemans bit of verse, by way of
cordial.
He wasn't offended. He smiled beau
tiful, wistful, far-off smile. and said that a
star-eyed. dewy-souled child like me could
not be expected to find in her heart an
echo to the sob of world agony.
1T made me feel very young. Bobby He
looked at me across a great gulf of years
and experience, and yearned for the SHOWS
of yester-year. Anybody could see him
yearn. There was no mistaking the fact
that, personally, he had been stepped in
sobbng agony. 1t was very impressive. 1t
was calculated to make any girl long to be
a healing spirit. / quite understood why
women called him fascinating.
Bobby. why do women find an unsavory