te
of the old stage-horn, brought to the lad his first realization of the
inadequacies of modern improvements.

Ascending the James the traveller had a view of the best of the old
Virginia life, its wealth of beauty, its home comfort, its atmosphere
of serenity, of old memories, rich and vivid, like the wine that lay
cob-webbed in ancestral cellars, of gracious hospitality, of a softly
tinted life like the color in old pictures and the soul in old books.
The gentle humorist lived to see that life pass away from the Old
Dominion and all too soon he vanished into another world where, like
all true Virginians, he expected to find the old home-life again.

These canal days were in the early Dickens period, and occasionally
the youthful traveller could not resist the temptation to go below and
lose himself in those pages which had then almost as potent a charm in
their novelty as they have now in their friendly familiarity. But the
river-isle, which held an interest in futurity for him because of his
intention to found a romance there when he should be "big enough to
write for the papers," would draw him back to the deck. There was a
path across the hills that the passengers must follow, disembarking
for that purpose. Near Manchester was a haunted house which he looked
upon with those ghostly shivers that made a person so delightfully
uncomfortable, for he, like the rest of us, did believe in ghosts,
whatever he might say to the contrary. There was the ruined mill and,
best of all, the Three-Mile Lock, inspiring him with the highest
ambition of his life, to be a lock-keeper. Then came Richmond; the
metropolis of the world, to the young voyager.

[Illustration: DR. GEORGE W. BAGBY
From the portrait in the possession of the family]

Dr. Bagby studied for his profession at the Medical College of the
University of Pennsylvania and from there went to Lynchburg, opening
an office where now stands the opera house. Unfortunately for his
professional career but happily for the cause of the literature of
Virginia life, the office of the _Lynchburg Virginian_ was near, and
its editor, Mr. James McDonald, proved a kindred soul to the young
physician. In the absences of the editor, Dr. Bagby filled his chair
and fell a victim to the fascination with which the Demon of the
Fourth Estate lures his chosen to their doom. In Lynchburg he first
found his true calling and there, too, he met with his first failure,
the demise of the _Lynchb