The Kansas City sun. (Kansas City, Mo.) 1908-1924, 1916-09-09

wanted to get even with him, so he wrote his
imitation of Poe, and had it published in a paper
in another part of the state with an elaborate
story about the discovery of the manuscript.
,"At once it made a. great sensation all over
the country. 1t made so great a sensation that
Riley was terrified, and feared that he would be
accused of literary forgery. Meanwhile the edi-
tor of the rival paper wrote: No doubt our young
friend Riley will beIttle this poem and say it is
not the work of Poe. But it is Poe, and Poe's
best manner The sensation grew to such pro-
portions that Riley had to confess that he had
written the poem. And then the editor of the
paper discharged Riley because he had not pub
lished 1t in his paper.
'Then the indianapolis Journal gave him a job,
which he held for years. He wrote reams Of
nonsense verse, and wrote up In verse the shops
of the merchants who advertised in the Journal.
"Riley's first book was called The Old SWIM
min Hole and 'Leven More Poems.' He pub
lished it himself. 1t sold so well that it was soon
taken over by a publisher, and passed through
many editions.
"Riley's exquisite penmanship showed the care
with which he wrote. Originally he wrote a care
less and rather illegible script, but he had so
much difficulty in getting the printers to read his
writing, and printing his dialect verse correctly,
that he took up the study of penmanship. He
was careful always to get the dialect Of one
part of Indiana as distinct from the dialect of
any other part.
ANY uluu , CndTuCleT, III sdlu, Is D6SI Tt-
membered, 1 suppose, by some of his habitual
gestures and expressions l remember Riley as
very deliberate in his motions, especially in his
last years. Smooth shaver, rudy, well groomed,
he looked like a benign old English bishop more
than anything else"
Mr.. Don Marquis of the New York Sun aptly
considers Riley and his poetry from an entirely
different angle.
James Whitcomb Riley" says he, twas the
companion of fairies in Already; for the Hoosier
belongs to a race apart. And while some are
captured and broken to trade, the gentle poet
escaped and kept always the vision of hidden
things"
With these PREDATORY remarks the writer goes
on with his essay:
"There are two sorts of Indianan-the ordinary
Indianan, who is not so very different from the
Ohioan or the nlinoisan, and the Hoosier.
"The Hoosier belong not merely to a race apart,
but to a separate species. He is human, but
with a difference; he is aware of the kinship
between humanity and the so-caled lower ami
mails land even the plants and streams) on the
one side, and on the other side of the kinship of
humanity witt the elves.
"When the moon turns the mists to silver and
the owls wall and the frogs wake up along the
creeks and lakes and the fairies saddle and bride
the freflies and mount them and go whirring and
flashing off in search of airy adventures the
Hoosiers steal out of the farmhouses and ham,
lets and creep down to the bottom lands and
dance and sing and cavort under the summer
stars. They do so secretly, lodging the mere hui
mans, for secrecy is the essence of their midnight,
himsica revels.
I'm the daytime they pretend they are Just
ordinary Indianans; their own brothers and
mothers may not realize that they are Hoosiers.
"But in Indiana, as elsewhere, there is business
and the need to attend to 1t. There must have
been even In Arcady-somebody owned the focks
and herds of Already and turned them into
butchers meat and leather. and the shepherds
only piped on the sufferance Of their commercial