The Celina Democrat. (Celina, O. [Ohio]) 1895-1921, 1912-11-29
oHAPrER II.-contlnued


climbs in and chloroforms her
CHAPTER ll.-Continued.
So he remembered Clara Van
Camps advice, wrote the whole story
to Aleck, and cast about for the one
successful business chance In the four
thousand nine hundred and ninety
nine bad ones-as the statistics
have IL.
He actually found It in shoes. Foot
ball muscle and grit went into the lob
of putting superior shoe on inferior
/ foot II necessary-at least on some
| foot lie got a chance to try his pow
ers I'm the home branch Of q manu-
/ featuring house. and made good
When he came to fill position where
/ there was opportunity to try new
ideas, he tried them He Inspected
tanneries and stockyards. He got COM
posite measurements of all the feet
in all the women's colleges in the
year ninety-seven, he drilled statesmen
and opened a night school for the
buttonhole-malIers, he made scientitc
study Of heels, and he invented an
aristocratic arch and put 1t on the
market.
The family joked about his doings
as the harmless experiments OF a live
" boy, but presently they began to
enjoy his income. Through it all they
were affectionate and kind, with the
matter-of.course fondness which n
family gives to the members that
takes the part OF useful drudge. John,
the pet of the parents married, ana
had his own eyes opened, IT Is 10
be supposed. Donald the genius, had
tust arrived after a dozen years OF
so, at the stage where he was men
toned now and then in the literary
journals. But Jim stuck to shoes
and kept the family on fair tide OF
modest prosperity.
once, in the years of Jim's appren-
ticeship to life, there came over him
a fit Of soul-sickness that nearly
proved his ruin.
'T can't stand this" he wrote to
Aleck Van Camp; "it's too hard and
dry and sordid for any man that's
got a soul. It isn't the grind I mind,
though that is bar enough; 1t Is the
Commercial Idea that eats into q
mans innards. He forgets there are
things that money cant buy. and in
his heart he grows contemptuous Of
anything to be had without money
and without price He can't help II.
- In MI Ia he
of the time, his mind gets set that
way. I'm ready any minute to jump
the fence, like fathers old colt up
on the farm. I'm not a snob, but |
recognize now that there was some
reason for all our old Hambleton an
cestors being so finicky about trade.
DO you remember how we used to
talk. when we were kiddies, about
keeping our ideals? Well, believe
I'm bankrupt, Aleck, in my account
with ideals. l don't want to howl, and
these remarks don't go with anybody |
else, but can say to you l want them
back again"
Aleck did as a kiddie should do,
writing much advice on long sheets Of |
paper, and illustrating his points |
richly like a good Scotchman, with |
scientific instances. A month or two
later he contrived to have work to
do in Boston so that he could go out
to Lynn and look up Jimmys case.
He even devised a cure by creating,
in his mind, an Office in the biological
world which was to be offered to
James on the ground that science
needed just his abilities and training
But when Aleck arrived in Lynn he
found that Jim, in some fashion or
other had found a cure for himself
He was deeper than ever in the bust
ness, and yet, in some spiritual sense,
le had found himself He had cap
.ured his ideal again and yoked 1t to
luty-which is a great feat.
After twelve years Of ferocious la
,or, with no vacations to speak of,
lanes mind took a turn for the worse.
he was as sound as a bell,
hough of lath-like thinness; but an
in his blood lured his (
mind away from the study of lasts and ]
ccounts and Partisan models and :
ent it careering, like Satan, up and {
own the earth. Romance, which had '
een drugged during the transition {
rom youth to manhood, awoke and (
oaxed for its rights, and whispered
emptingly in an ear not yet dulled to I
IS voice. Freedom, open spaces, a