e had any choice, it lay
between being Robinson Crusoe and being the Prince of
Wales. His father refused him both and put him into a
dry goods establishment.

Such was the childhood of Smith. At its close there was
nothing in his outward appearance to mark the man of
genius. The casual observer could have seen no genius
concealed behind the wide face, the massive mouth, the
long slanting forehead, and the tall ear that swept up
to the close-cropped head. Certainly he couldn't. There
wasn't any concealed there.

It was shortly after his start in business life that
Smith was stricken with the first of those distressing
attacks, to which he afterwards became subject. It seized
him late one night as he was returning home from a
delightful evening of song and praise with a few old
school chums. Its symptoms were a peculiar heaving of
the sidewalk, a dancing of the street lights, and a crafty
shifting to and fro of the houses, requiring a very nice
discrimination in selecting his own. There was a strong
desire not to drink water throughout the entire attack,
which showed that the thing was evidently a form of
hydrophobia. From this time on, these painful attacks
became chronic with Smith. They were liable to come on
at any time, but especially on Saturday nights, on the
first of the month, and on Thanksgiving Day. He always
had a very severe attack of hydrophobia on Christmas Eve,
and after elections it was fearful.

There was one incident in Smith's career which he did,
perhaps, share with regret. He had scarcely reached
manhood when he met the most beautiful girl in the world.
She was different from all other women. She had a deeper
nature than other people. Smith realized it at once. She
could feel and understand things that ordinary people
couldn't. She could understand him. She had a great sense
of humour and an exquisite appreciation of a joke. He
told her the six that he knew one night and she thought
them great. Her mere presence made Smith feel as if he
had swallowed a sunset: the first time that his finger
brushed against hers, he felt a thrill all through him.
He presently found that if he took a firm hold of her
hand with his, he could get a fine thrill, and if he sat
beside her on a sofa, with his head against her ear and
his arm about once and a half round her, he could get
what you might call a first-class, A-1 thrill. Smith
became filled with the idea that he would like to have
her always near him.