motor lent by Mrs.
Kountze, who had invited us to stay with her in her town house, but
fearing that three of us might be embarrassing, we decided to go to the
hotel.

Omaha is a lovely city, with avenues of trees on either side of wide
boulevards, and within easy reach of stretches of wild and beautiful
country. As our hostess had been obliged to go to New York, her kind
relations conducted us to see the wonderful views surrounding the town.

After speaking in the afternoon to an encouraging audience, with Mr.
Hall, the British Consul, as my chairman, I dined with Mr. and Mrs. Ward
Burgess. They were more than hospitable, and had it not been for the
severe figure of my secretary standing in the doorway, my jolly host,
who had entertained me for two hours at dinner, would have prevented me
from catching the midnight train.

We returned to Kansas City early on the morning of the 24th.

On being informed by Mrs. Shields's butler that her maid had already
called her, I had a bath and, dressing as quickly as I could, went
downstairs.

Her sitting room was a garden of roses, lilies and antirrhinums and I
shall always remember our unforgettable _tete-a-tete_.

We started upon personality, and the difficulty of expressing what was
true without hurting anyone, or acquiring character without becoming a
character part. The difference between originality and eccentricity;
kindness and tenderness; sympathy and understanding; and the delicate
grades by which your attempts at goodness may either help or hamper your
fellow creatures.

It is an eternal problem; and the morally lenient and socially severe is
what you encounter every day of your life. I confessed how much I
resented the shortness of life and urged her to realise this, as she
appeared to me, in spite of having a genius for friendship, to be
self-contained and lonely. She was responsive, and said many encouraging
things to me. I said that somewhere or other I had read that Marcus
Aurelius had begged us to keep our colour. I was not very sure of the
correct text; but that the idea was that some of us were born red, some
yellow, and others grey, but that however this might be, the point was
to keep it; not so much by contrast or conflict with the other person,
but to complement it. Great scientists, mathematicians or philosophers
may manage to develop their personality alone, but what they write will
not have the key that the writings of men who are nearer the earth