Helen also wrote to Walter at this time. She was not much of a letter
writer but she wanted to add her word of sympathy with the rest and
Walter felt especially pleased that she exerted herself on this
occasion.

"Dear Bub," Helen wrote, using the name she had always given him in her
childhood. "We all feel awfully sorry about the way the lamp came out.
It didn't seem fair to you and I hope you will invent something better
that will throw that lamp in the shade, so to speak. We all believe in
you and I have never for a moment doubted that in time you would be
another Edison. I'm enjoying my school this year more than ever. Since
our new gymnasium director was appointed I have found favor in her eyes
and she has turned over one of the academy classes to me by consent of
President Bruce. I did plan to study for a position as professor of
domestic science, but since this appointment work opened up I feel as if
I could like to be a physical director in a college or a Y. W. C. A. I
love the gymnasium work immensely and Miss Rhodes says I am her best
pupil.

"We are all wondering what sort of an individual your Felix Bauer is.
Does he speak broken English very badly? Will it be difficult to talk to
him without a German grammar? I have an idea I shall not like him very
well, from what you have written about him. But I don't suppose that
will make any difference to him.

"Father has got into politics all right and as he and mother have
written you, he has been elected senator and will begin his term in
January when the legislature meets. Father is very hopeful about doing
things. Mother says he will have lots of opposition from the machine. I
don't understand all this political discussion, but you know father. He
is dead in earnest as you know and now that he is elected he is going to
make the machine, whatever that is, 'sit up and take notice.' This is
what my teacher in English would call a disjointed metaphor.

"Father is working over a dozen bills calculated to reform the state.
The word 'reform' is a household word in the Douglas family. But you
know father. Isn't he the dearest man that ever lived? It makes me mad
to read what the papers have been saying about him ever since he was
nominated. Anyone who didn't know father would think from reading these
papers that he was an out and out villain. And we all know, and Milton
people know, that if ever a man lived who had a pure and earnest desire
to help make a better