olks ... folks read my stuff when they
ain't got time to read the real poets."

Instead of flattering him, I gave him, frankly but gently, my opinion
of the cornfed school of literature, easing the sting by inferring that
he without doubt had bigger things up his sleeve than his so-called
prose poems.

What I said struck the right chord.

"Of course a fellow has to make a living first."

(But, in my heart, I thought--it is just as vile for a man to send his
wife out as a street-walker, and allege the excuse about having to live,
as it is for a poet to prostitute his Muse.)

* * * * *

Nevertheless, Mackworth, Uncle Bill and I stood together, in the sunny
street outside, posing for the photographer. And I swelled with
inordinate pride. Though I knew I was bigger than both of them put
together, yet, in the eyes of the world, these men were big men--and
having my photograph taken with them was an indication to me, that I was
beginning to come into my own.

Perhaps our picture would be reproduced in some Eastern paper or
magazine ... perhaps even in the _Bookman_.

* * * * *

"Uncle Bill Struthers is an example of what Kansas can do for a man...."
said Mackworth, when we were alone. "Bill, in the old days, was a sort
of tramp printer ... clever, but with all his ability in him unexpressed
... he was always down and out ... and drink! It verged on dipsomania.
He never held a job long ... though he was a good compositor, he was
always on the move from place to place....

"Then he came to Kansas where we have prohibition ... and it has panned
out in Uncle Bill's case pretty fine.

"He came to work for me ... fell by chance into his prose-poetry vein.
It took; was instantly copied in all the newspapers ... of course, I
could do it as well, or anyone else with a rhyming turn ... but he was
the originator ... and people liked his sturdy common sense, his
wholesome optimism.

"Now Bill is happy; his stuff's syndicated--in thousands of households
wherever English is spoken his name is a familiar word. He gives whole
communities strength to go on with the common duties of life."

"And his drinking?"

"He has conquered that entirely ... once every so often the fit comes
over him--the craving for it--then, when Uncle Bill turns up missing, as
the Irishman puts it, none of us worries....

"We all know he has hitched up his horse and buggy and is off, drivi