The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-01-18

Walt Mason in the New York Evening
 Post.
 ~ a THE EDITOR: The Evening
 t(H Post of December 20 contained a
 long and plaintive story over the signature of Katherine Prence, and bear ing the title 'In Darkest Kansas TO people who know and understand Kansas it doubtless proved amusing enough, for the gifted writer is extremely adroit and dextrous in the use of words, and they would judge it by it's value as literature even as they would weigh the fables or Esop or Thompson; but there are barbarians who do not know or under stand Kansas, and to them the diatrine, with its delusive, matter-of-fact air, might seem a revelation of the manners ana cus- toms of strange tribes.
 There are probably many readers Of the Evening Post who lifted prayers or thanksgiving to Isis upon reading that article. because the gods have not made life in Kansas a part of their destiny; the narrowing tale of Arctic hotels and damp sheets and rude young men, and loafers holding high wassail in railway depots, doubtless led them to believe that Kansas people live in frozen hostelries and are uniformly boorish in their treatment Of women, and that the highest ambition Of representative citizens is to become com fortably inebriated and raise disurb- ance in the nearest railway depot.
 It would probably be considered an evil dence of Kansas boorishness if this writer asked what the lady's object was in chas- ing around Kansas at unholy hours and expecting palace accommodations at dol lar-a-day hotels. It may be assumed that she was canvassing for a woman's journal or one of those trenchant family publica- tlons which give to each subscriber "Yard of Roses chromo, or Teddy bear, or a set of hand-painted teeth; in those Kansas landladies who presented to her the frozen face" Her experiences are entirely abnormal and unprecedented. and no other woman could, by any possibility, encounter them. In no country under the sun are strangers more cordially or hos-
 
 not necessary that the stranger should wear expensive raiment, or have letter of credit A woman may travel from one end of Kansas to the other, and if she conducts herself becomingly she will meet with the truest courtesy. The Kansas va riety of courtesy isn't quite so effusive as that imported from France, and Kansas men seldom exhaust themselves in bow ing and gesticulating in the presence of a real woman, but any person who questions their chivalrous respect for her is merely trying to be ridiculous.
 The writer's story is essentially unfair. She dwells upon every disagreeable incl journey as though such an incident couldn't happen anywhere else. She met a snappish postmistress who showed a strange reluctancy to wait upon her; in a hack she found herself opposite a youthful smart aleck who had piled his grips and airshps and such things on the seats, and she had to wilt him with her eyes before he removed his junk and made room for her; in a country depot the agent answered her rudely tshe prob- ably asked him what time the 10 o'clock train came sn); she had to walk in the dark from the depot to the town, and the fact that general illumination wasn t provided jared upon her horribly; when she reached the hotel the stove was sur rounded by profane drummers. who were smoking obsolete cigars, and none of them made room for her or offered her Q smoke She was shown to room where the icicles hung on everything and a polar bear had made his lair under the bed; and so on. Everything was frlghtful, gro- tesque, impossible.
 Of course, there are no impertinent railway agents outside of Kansas; and the country roads are all illuminated with Japanese lanterns outside of Kansas; and the cheap hotels outside of Kansas fur nish guests with gorgeous apartments and with frankincense and myrrh, and spices from Araby the blest; and 1t Is only in Kansas that men wear sheepskir and feed on locusts and wild honey, ana run wild.
 The only part of her story that IS founded upon normal fact Is her crlti- cism of the railway service. There are ierlxwater roads in Kansas which are disgrace. but there are also railways which are as fine as any in the worio Since she was hunting the worst Of every thing she naturally embarked upon the worst trains, on the worst roads. The
 balance of her story is as absurd as hel | criticism of the Kansas sun, which sht | denounced as a made-in-Germany affair everybody else in the world knows tha | the Kansas sun is the bulliest old sun 1T the universe. and that 1t, in it's daily