hese lusty young sons of the East contended for
supremacy in the field. "None of us had an extra dollar," explained
Stevens, "but each of us had what was better, good health and a faith in
the future. Not one of us had any intention of growing old."

"Old! There _weren't_ any old people in those days," asserted Lottridge.

Along about the middle of the evening they all turned in on a game of
"Rummy," finding in cards a welcome relief from the unexpressed torment
of the contrast between their decrepit, hopeless present and the
glowing, glorious past.

My departure on a lecture trip at ten o'clock disturbed their game only
for a moment, and as I rode away I contrasted the noble sanity and the
high courage of those white-haired veterans of the Border, with the
attitude of certain types of city men I knew. Facing death at something
less than arm's length, my father and his fellows nevertheless remained
wholesomely interested in life. None of them were pious, some of them
were not even religious, but they all had a sturdy faith in the
essential justice of the universe. They were still playing the game as
best they knew.

Like Eugene Ware they could say--

"Standing by life's river, deep and broad,
I take my chances, ignorant but unawed."

As I sat among my fellow members at the Club, three days later, I again
recalled my father and his group. Here, too, I was in the Zone of Age.
A. M. Palmer, a feeble and melancholy old man, came in and wandered
about with none to do him reverence, and St. Gaudens, who was in the
city for medical treatment, shared his dry toast and his cereal coffee
with me of a morning. George Warner, who kept a cheerful countenance,
admitted that he did so by effort. "I don't like the thought of leaving
this good old earth," he confessed one afternoon. "It gives me a pang
every time I consider it." None of these men faced death with finer
courage than my sire.

As I had a good deal of free time in the afternoon, and as I also had a
room at the Club, I saw much of St. Gaudens. We really became
acquainted. One morning as we met at breakfast he replied to my question
with a groan and a mild cuss word: "Worse, thank you! I've just been to
Washington, and on the train last night I ate ice-cream for dinner. I
knew I'd regret it, but ice-cream is my weakness." He was at once
humorous and savage for, as he explained, "the doctor will not let me
work and there is nothing for me to do but sit around