The Washington times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1902-1939, 1920-10-25
By Winston Churchill.
Author of "Hiehard Cnryei," "rhe
Crisis" and Many other Novels
OF Worldwide Popularity.
CHAPTER I.


WV It'll few exceptions the incl
M dents recorded in these
w pages take place in one OF
the largest cities of the United
States of America, and OF that por-
ton called the Middle West-a city
once conservative and provincial.
and rather proud of these quail
ties; but now outgrown them, and
linked by lightning limited trains
TO other teeming centers of the
modern world; a city overtaken In
recent years by the plague which
has swept our country from the
Atlantic to the Pacific-prosperity.
Before it's advent, the Goodriches
and Cores, the Warnings. the Pres
tons and the Atterburys lived lei
surely lives in sleepy quarter OF
shade trees and spacious yards and
muddy macadam streets, now
passed away forever.
Existence was decorous, marriage
an irrevocable step, wives were
wives. and the Authorized Version
of the Bible was true from cover
TO cover. SO DIR. Gilman preached,
and so they believed.
Sunday was then day essentially
different from other days-you
could tell it without looking at the
calendar. The sun knew it, and
changed the quality of his light.
The worry animals, dogs and cats
and horses, knew IL, and most of all
the children knew il, by Sunday
school, by DR.. Gilman's sermon, by
a dizzy afternoon connected in some
of their minds with eramics and
lack of exercise, by a cold tea and
by church bells. You were not al
lowed to forget it for one instant.
The city suddenly became full of
churches, as though they had mag
ically been let down from heaven
during Saturday night. They must
have been there on week days, but
few persons ever lnought of them.
A SANITY MAN.
Among the many church bells
that rang on those bygone Sundays
was that of st. Johns, of which DIR.
Gilman, of beloved memory, was
rector. DR.. Gilman was a saint and
if YOU had the good luck to be bap-
tizeZd or married or buried by him,
you were probably fortunate in an
earthly as we'll as heavenly sense.
One has to be careful not to deal
exclusively in superlatives, and yet
II is not an eXaggeration to say
that St Johns was the most beau
tifuI and churchly edifice in the
city, thanks chiefly to several gen
tleman OF sense. and one gentleman.
at least. of taste-Horace Bentley.
The vissitudes of civil war in
terrupted its building: hut when,
in 1868, it stood completed, its stone
unsoiled as yet by factory smoke.
it's spire delicately pointing to I'M
tainted skies. its rose window
glowing above the porch, citizens
on Tower street often stopped to
gaze at diagonally across the va
can't lot set in order by Mr.. Thur
Ston Gore. with the intent that the
view might be unobstruCted.
Little did the Goodriches and
Cores, the Warnings and Prestons
and Atterburys, and other promi-
nent people forsee the havoc that
prosperity and smoke were to play
with their residential plans! One
by one soOty commerce drove them
out westward, conservative though
they were, from the paradise they
had created; blacker and blacker
grew the Gothic facade OF St.
Johns; Thurston Gore departed,
but leased his corner first for
goodly sum, his ancestors being
from Connecticut; leased also the
vacant lot he had beautified. where
stores arose and hid the spire from
Tower street. Cable cars moved
serenely up the long hill, where a
painting third horse had been neces-
sary, cable cars resounded in Bur-
ton street between the new factory
and the church where DR.. Gilman
still preached of peace and the de-
lights OF the New Jerusalem. And
before you could draw your breath
the cable cars had become electric.
Gray hairs began to appear on the
heads of the people DR.. Gilman had
married in the SOS, and their chill
dren were going East to college.
In the first decade of the TWEEN
tieth century. Asa Waring still