Series," was born at Evansville, Indiana, May 15, 1863, the daughter
of a clergyman. Miss Fellows was educated in the public schools of
Evansville, and then spent the year of 1881-1882 at the State
University of Iowa. She was married at Evansville, in 1888, to William
L. Johnston, who died four years later, leaving her a son and
daughter. Mrs. Johnston's first arrival in Kentucky as a resident
(though not as a visitor), was in 1898, and then she stayed only three
years. Her son's quest of health led her first to Walton, New York,
then to Arizona, where they spent a winter on the desert in sight of
Camelback mountain, which suggested the legend of _In the Desert of
Waiting_. From Arizona they went to California and then, in 1903,
decided to try the climate of Texas, up in the hill country, north of
San Antonio. Mrs. Johnston called her home "Penacres," and she lived
there until her son's death in the fall of 1910. She and her daughter
returned to Pewee Valley, Kentucky, in April, 1911, and purchased "The
Beeches," the old home of Mrs. Henry W. Lawton, the widow of the
famous American general. The house is situated in a six acre grove of
magnificent beech-trees, and is a place often mentioned in "The Little
Colonel" stories. Mrs. Johnston's books are: _Big Brother_ (Boston,
1893); _The Little Colonel_ (Boston, 1895); _Joel: A Boy of Galilee_
(Boston, 1895; Italian translation, 1900); _In League with Israel_
(Cincinnati, 1896), the second and last of Mrs. Johnston's books that
was not issued by L. C. Page and Company, Boston; _Ole Mammy's
Torment_ (1897); _Songs Ysame_ (1897), a book of poems, written with
her sister, Mrs. Albion Fellows Bacon, the social reformer of
Evansville, Indiana; _The Gate of the Giant Scissors_ (1898); _Two
Little Knights of Kentucky_ (1899), written in Kentucky; _The Little
Colonel's House Party_ (1900); _The Little Colonel's Holidays_ (1901);
_The Little Colonel's Hero_ (1902); _Cicely_ (1902); _Asa Holmes, or
At the Crossroads_ (1902); _Flip's Islands of Providence_ (1903); _The
Little Colonel at Boarding-School_ (1903), the children's "Order of
Hildegarde" was founded on the story of _The Three Weavers_ in this
volume; _The Little Colonel in Arizona_ (1904); _The Quilt that Jack
Built_ (1904); _The Colonel's Christmas Vacation_ (1905); _In the
Desert of Waiting_ (1905; Japanese translation, Tokio, 1906); _The
Three Weavers_ (1905), a special edition of this famous story;
_Mildred's Inheritance_ (1906); _The Little Colonel, Maid of Honor_
(1906); _The Little Colonel's Knight Comes Riding_ (1907); _Mary Ware_
(1908); _The Legend of the Bleeding Heart_ (1908); _Keeping Tryst_
(1908); _The Rescue of the Princess Winsome_ (1908); _The Jester's
Sword_ (1909; Japanese translation, Tokio, 1910); _The Little
Colonel's Good Times Book_ (1909); _Mary Ware in Texas_ (1910); and
_Travellers Five_ (1911), a collection of short-stories for grown
people, previously published in magazines, with a foreword by Bliss
Carman. The little Kentucky girl--called the "Little Colonel" because
of her resemblance to a Southern gentleman of the old school--has had
Mrs. Johnston's attention for seventeen years, and she has recently
announced that she is at work upon the twelfth and final volume of the
"Little Colonel Series," as she feels that work for grown-ups is more
worth her while. This last story of the series was published in the
fall of 1912, entitled _Mary Ware's Promised Land_; and needless to
say her "promised land" is Kentucky. There are "Little Colonel Clubs"
all over the world, as Mrs. Johnston has learned from thousands of
letters from children, and when she rings down the curtain upon her
heroine many girls and boys in this and other countries will be sad.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Current Literature_ (April, 1901); _The Century_
(September, 1903).
THE MAGIC KETTLE[37]
[From _The Little Colonel's Holidays_ (Boston, 1901)]
Once upon a time, so the story goes (you may read it yourself in the
dear old tales of Hans Christian Andersen), there was a prince who
disguised himself as a swineherd. It was to gain admittance to a
beautiful princess that he thus came in disguise to her father's
palace, and to attract her attention he made a magic caldron, hung
around with strings of silver bells. Whenever the water in the caldron
boiled and bubbled, the bells rang a little tune to remind her of him.
"Oh, thou dear Augustine,
All is lost and gone,"
they sang. Such was the power of the magic kettle, that when the water
bubbled hard enough to set the bells a-tinkling, any one holding his
hand in the steam could smell what was cooking in every kitchen in the
kingdom.
It has been many a year since the swineherd's kettle was set a-boiling
and its string of bells a-jingling to satisfy the curiosity of a
princess, but a time has come for it to be used again. Not that
anybody nowadays cares to know what his neighbor is going to have for
dinner, but all the little princes and princesses in the kingdom want
to know what happened next.
"What happened after the Little Colonel's house party?" they demand,
and they send letters to the Valley by the score, asking "Did Betty
go blind?" "Did the two little Knights of Kentucky ever meet Joyce
again or find the Gate of the Giant Scissors?" "Did the Little Colonel
ever have any more good times at Locust, or did Eugenia ever forget
that she too had started out to build a Road of the Loving Heart?"
It would be impossible to answer all these questions through the
post-office, so that is why the magic kettle has been dragged from its
hiding-place after all these years, and set a-boiling once more.
Gather in a ring around it, all you who want to know, and pass your
curious fingers through its wreaths of rising steam. Now you shall see
the Little Colonel and her guests of the house party in turn, and the
bells shall ring for each a different song.
But before they begin, for the sake of some who may happen to be in
your midst for the first time, and do not know what it is all about,
let the kettle give them a glimpse into the past, that they may be
able to understand all that is about to be shown to you. Those who
already know the story need not put their fingers into the steam,
until the bells have rung this explanation in parenthesis.
(In Lloydsboro Valley stands an old Southern mansion, known as "Locust."
The place is named for a long avenue of giant locust-trees stretching a
quarter of a mile from house to entrance gate in a great arch of green.
Here for years an old Confederate colonel lived all alone save for the
negro servants. His only child, Elizabeth, had married a Northern man
against his wishes, and gone away. From that day he would not allow her
name to be spoken in his presence. But she came back to the Valley when
her little daughter Lloyd was five years old. People began calling the
child the Little Colonel because she seemed to have inherited so many of
her grandfather's lordly ways as well as a goodly share of his high
temper. The military title seemed to suit her better than her own name
for in her fearless baby fashion she won her way into the old man's
heart and he made a complete surrender.
Afterward when she and her mother and "Papa Jack" went to live with
him at Locust, one of her favorite games was playing soldier. The old
man never tired of watching her march through the wide halls with his
spurs strapped to her tiny slipper heels, and her dark eyes flashing
out fearlessly from under the little Napoleon cap she wore.
She was eleven when she gave her house party. One of the guests was
Joyce Ware, whom some of you have met, perhaps, in "The Gate of the
Giant Scissors," a bright thirteen-year-old girl from the West.
Eugenia Forbes was another. She was a distant cousin of Lloyd's, who
had no home-life like other girls. Her winters were spent in a
fashionable New York boarding-school, and her summers at the
Waldorf-Astoria, except the few weeks when her busy father could find
time to take her to some seaside resort.
The third guest, Elizabeth Lloyd Lewis, or Betty, as every one lovingly
called her, was Mrs. Sherman's little god-daughter. She was an orphan,
boarding on a backwoods farm on Green River. She had never been on the
cars until Lloyd's invitation found its way to the Cuckoo's Nest. Only
these three came to stay in the house, but Malcolm and Keith MacIntyre
(the two little Knights of Kentucky) were there nearly every day. So was
Rob Moore, one of the Little Colonel's summer neighbors.
The four Bobs were four little foxterrier puppies named for Rob, who
had given one to each of the girls. They were so much alike they could
only be distinguished by the colour of the ribbons tied around their
necks. Tarbaby was the Little Colonel's pony, and Lad the one that
Betty rode during her visit.
After six weeks of picnics and parties, and all sorts of surprises and
good times, the house party came to a close with a grand feast of
lanterns. Joyce regretfully went home to the little brown house in
Plainsville, Kansas, taking her Bob with her. Eugenia and her father
went to New York, but not until they had promised to come back for
Betty in the fall, and take her abroad with them. It was on account of
something that had happened at the house party, but which is too long
a tale to repeat here.
Betty stayed on at Locust until the end of the summer in the House
Beautiful, as she called her god-mother's home, and here on the long
vine-covered porch, with its stately white pillars, you shall see them
first through the steam of the magic caldron).
Listen! Now the kettle boils and the bells begin the story!
FOOTNOTE:
[37] Copyright, 1901, by L. C. Page and Company.
EVA A. MADDEN
Miss Eva Anne Madden, author of a group of popular stories for children,
was born near Bedford, Kentucky, October 26, 1863, the elder sister of
Mrs. George Madden Martin, creator of _Emmy Lou_. Miss Madden was
educated in the public schools of Louisville, Kentucky, after which she
took a normal course. At the mature age of fourteen she was writing for
_The Courier-Journal_; two years later she was doing book reviews for
_The Evening Post_; and when eighteen years of age she became a teacher
in the public schools. Miss Madden taught for more than ten years, or
until 1892, when she went to New York and engaged in newspaper work. Her
first book, _Stephen, or the Little Crusaders_ (New York, 1901), was
published only a few months before she sailed for Europe, where she has
resided for the last eleven years. Miss Madden's _The I Can School_ (New
York, 1902), was followed by her other books, _The Little Queen_
(Boston, 1903); _The Soldiers of the Duke_ (Boston, 1904); and her most
recent story, _Two Royal Foes_ (New York, 1907). Miss Madden has been
the Italian representative of a London firm since 1907; and since 1908
she has been the correspondent of the Paris edition of the _New York
Herald_ for the city in which she lives, Florence, Italy. She had a very
good short-story in _The Century_ for February, 1911, entitled _The
Interrupted Pen_.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Library of Southern Literature_ (Atlanta, 1910, v.
xv); _Who's Who in America_ (1912-1913).
THE END OF "THE I CAN SCHOOL."[38]
[From _The I Can School_ (New York, 1902)]
"Good-bye, Miss Ellison," she said, putting up her little mouth to be
kissed. "I'm sorry that it's the end of the 'I Can School.'"
Then Miss Ellison was all smiles.
"You sweet little thing," she said, which was exactly what she had
done ten months before.
How long ago that seemed to Virginia. How stupid she had been about
learning to spell that easy "cat."
Now she could read a whole page about a black cat which got into the
nest of a white hen, and she could add numbers, and "write vertical."
She had painted in a book, and modeled a lovely half-apple, made real
by a stem and the seeds of a russet she had had for lunch one day. She
knew the name of all the birds about Fairview, and she could tell
about the wild flowers.
Altogether she felt very learned and scornful of a certain small
person who had thought Kentucky the name of a little girl, and who had
known nothing of George Washington, and who had called C-A-T
kitten-puss.
Virginia's mamma was very proud of all her little girl knew. She did
not wait for Virginia to get her work from the janitor. She took it
all carefully home to show her husband.
"Papa," said Virginia, the moment Mr. Barton entered the house that
evening, "it's vacation!"
"Vacation!" said her father. "My! my! I remember that there was a
time, Miss Barton, when I loved it better than school; do you?"
Virginia hesitated.
"Ten months," she said at last, "is a lot of school. Lucretia and
Catherine seem just as tired, papa. Their lessons don't interest them
now that it's so hot. I love the 'I Can School,' papa; but it's nice
to stay at home and play 'Lady come to see.'"
This was a very long speech for Virginia, the longest that she ever
had made.
Her papa laughed.
"Miss Barton," he said, "profound student that you are, I see that in
some things you are not altogether different from your parent. But let
me remind you, Miss Barton, when you feel at times a little tired of
vacation, that the 'I Can' will begin again on the tenth of
September."
"And Miss Ellison will be so glad to see me!" said Virginia
confidently.
Her papa laughed.
"As for that, Miss Barton--"
"Now don't, Edward," interrupted his wife. "I am sure, Virginia, that
Miss Ellison will be glad to see you in the fall. If I were you I
would write her a little letter in the vacation. I have her address."
"And I'll tell Billy and Carter and Harry and all the children, and
we'll all write so that she won't forget us. And she'll answer them,
mamma, won't she?"
"I think she will," answered her mother. "It will be very nice for you
to write to her."
But her husband said in a low voice, "Poor Miss Ellison."
"Good Miss Ellison, papa," said Virginia. "She's nice and I love her."
FOOTNOTE:
[38] Copyright, 1902, by Thomas Y. Crowell and Company.
JOHN FOX, Jr.
John Fox, Junior, Kentucky's master maker of mountain myths, was born
at Stony Point, near Paris, Kentucky, December 16, 1863, the son of a
schoolmaster. He was christened "John William Fox, Junior," but he
early discarded his middle name. By his father he was largely fitted
for Kentucky, now Transylvania, University, which institution he
entered at the age of fifteen, spending the two years of 1878-1880
there, when he left and went to Harvard. Mr. Fox was graduated from
Harvard in 1883, the youngest man in his class. Though he had written
nothing during his collegiate career, upon quitting Cambridge he
joined the staff of the New York _Sun_ and later entered Columbia Law
School. He soon abandoned law and went with the _New York Times_,
where he remained several months, when illness--blind and blessed
goddess in disguise!--compelled him to go south in search of health.
At length he found himself high up in the Cumberland Mountains,
associated with his father and brother in a mining venture. He also
taught school for a time, but the mountaineers of Kentucky were upon
him, and he began to weave romances about them. Mr. Fox's first story,
_A Mountain Europa_ (New York, 1894), originally appeared in two parts
in _The Century Magazine_ for September and October, 1892. It was
dedicated to James Lane Allen, whom its author had to thank for
encouragement when he stood most in need of it. _On Hell-fer-Sartain
Creek_, which followed fast upon the heels of his first book, made Mr.
Fox famous in a fortnight. Written in a day and a half, _Harper's
Weekly_ paid him the munificent sum of six dollars for it, and printed
it back with the advertisements in the issue for November 24, 1894.
The ending was transposed just a bit and a word or two discarded for
apter words before it was published in book form; and these revisions
were very fine, greatly improving the tale. In its most recent dress
it counts less than five small pages; and it may be read in as many
minutes. The mountain dialect prevails throughout. It "admits an epic
breadth," the biggest thing Mr. Fox has done hitherto, and now
generally regarded as a very great short-story.
_A Cumberland Vendetta and Other Stories_ (New York, 1895), contained,
besides the title-story, first published in _The Century_, a
reprinting of _A Mountain Europa_--which made the third time it had
been printed in three years--_The Last Stetson_, and _On
Hell-fer-Sartain Creek_. This volume was followed by Mr. Fox's finest
work, entitled _Hell-fer-Sartain and Other Stories_ (New York, 1897).
Of the ten stories in this little volume but four of them are in
correct English, the others, the best ones, being in dialect. The last
and longest story, _A Purple Rhododendron_, originally appeared in
_The Southern Magazine_, a now defunct periodical of Louisville,
Kentucky. _The Kentuckians_ (New York, 1897), was published a short
time after _Hell-fer-Sartain and Other Stories_. This novelette
pitted a man of the Blue Grass against a man of the Kentucky hills,
and the struggle was not overly severe; the reading world did little
more than remark its appearance and its passing.
When the Spanish-American war was declared Mr. Fox went to Cuba as a
Rough Rider, but left that organization to act as correspondent for
_Harper's Weekly_. He witnessed the fiercest fighting from the firing
lines, and his own experiences were largely written into his first
long novel, entitled _Crittenden_ (New York, 1900). This tale of love
with war entwined was well told; and its concluding clause: "God was
good that Christmas!" has become one of his most famous expressions.
After the war Mr. Fox returned to the South. _Bluegrass and
Rhododendron_ (New York, 1901), was a series of descriptive essays
upon life in the Kentucky mountains, in which Mr. Fox did for the
hillsmen what Mr. Allen had done for the customs and traditions of his
own section of the state in _The Bluegrass Region of Kentucky_. It
also embodied his own personal experiences as a member of the police
guard in Kentucky and Virginia. The word "rhododendron" is Mr. Fox's
shibboleth, and he seemingly never tires of writing it.
_The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come_ (New York, 1903), is his best long
novel so far. The boy, Chad, is, perhaps, his one character-contribution
to American fiction; and the boy's dog, "Jack," stands second to the
little hero in the hearts of the thousands who read the book. The
opening chapters are especially fine. The love story of _The Little
Shepherd_ is most attractive; and the Civil War is presented in a manner
not wholly laborious. After _Hell-fer-Sartain_ this novel is far and
away the best thing Mr. Fox has done.
_Christmas Eve on Lonesome and Other Stories_ (New York, 1904),
contained the title-story and five others, including _The Last
Stetson_, which had appeared many years before in _Harper's Weekly_,
and later in _A Cumberland Vendetta_. Mr. Fox attempted to reach the
theatre of the Russian-Japanese War, as a correspondent for
_Scribner's Magazine_, but he was not allowed to join the ever
advancing armies. His experiences may be read in _Following the
Sun-Flag_ (New York, 1905), with its tell-tale sub-title: "a vain
pursuit through Manchuria." His next work was a novelette, _A Knight
of the Cumberland_ (New York, 1906), first published as a serial in
_Scribner's Magazine_. It was well done and rather interesting.
Mr. Fox spent the greater part of the year of 1907 in work upon _The
Trail of the Lonesome Pine_ (New York, 1908), a story that must be
placed beside _The Little Shepherd_ when any classification of the
author's work is made. The heroine, June, is none other than Chad in
feminine garb. The book contains some of the most excellent writing
Mr. Fox has done, the descriptions being especially fine. It was
dramatized by Eugene Walter and successfully produced. A few months
after the publication of _The Trail_, the author married Fritzi
Scheff, the operatic star, to whom he had inscribed his story. They
have a home at Big Stone Gap, in the Virginia mountains.
In April, 1912, Mr. Fox's most recent novel, _The Heart of the Hills_,
began as a serial in _Scribner's_, to be concluded in the issue for
March, 1913. It is red with recent happenings in Kentucky, happenings
which are, at the present time, too hackneyed to be of very great
interest to the people of that state.[39] It must be remembered always
that Mr. Fox is a story-teller pure and simple, and that he seemingly
makes little effort to arrive at the stage of perfection in the mere
matter of writing that characterizes the work of a group of his
contemporaries. That he is a wonderful maker of short-stories in the
mountain dialect is certain; but that he is a great novelist is yet to
be established.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Current Literature Magazine_ (New York, September,
1903); _Little Pilgrimages Among the Men Who Have Written Famous
Books_, by E. F. Harkins, (Boston, 1903, Second Series); _Library
of Southern Literature_ (Atlanta, 1909, v. iv).
THE CHRISTMAS TREE ON PIGEON[40]
[From _Collier's Weekly_ (December 11, 1909)]
The sun of Christmas poured golden blessings on the head of the valley
first; it shot winged shafts of yellow light through the great Gap and
into the month of Pigeon; it darted awakening arrows into the coves
and hollows on the Head of Pigeon, between Brushy Ridge and Black
Mountain; and one searching ray flashed through the open door of the
little log schoolhouse at the forks of Pigeon and played like a smile
over the waiting cedar that stood within--alone.
Down at the mines below, the young doctor had not waited the coming of
that sun. He had sprung from his bed at dawn, had built his own fire,
had dressed hurriedly, and gone hurriedly on his rounds, leaving a
pill here, a powder there, and a word of good cheer everywhere. That
was his Christmas tree, the cedar in the little schoolhouse--his and
_hers_. And _she_ was coming up from the Gap that day to dress that
tree and spread the joy of Christmas among mountain folks, to whom the
joy of Christmas was quite unknown.
An hour later the passing mail-carrier, from over Black Mountain,
stopped with switch uplifted at his office door.
"Them fellers over the Ridge air comin' over to shoot up yo' Christmas
tree," he drawled.
The switch fell and he was gone. The young doctor dropped by his
fire--stunned; for just that thing had happened ten years before to the
only Christmas tree that had ever been heard of in those hills except
his own. From that very schoolhouse some vandals from the Crab Orchard
and from over Black Mountain had driven the Pigeon Creek people after a
short fight, and while the surprised men, frightened women and children,
and the terrified teacher scurried to safety behind rocks and trees, had
shot the tree to pieces. That was ten years before, but even now, though
there were some old men and a few old women who knew the Bible from end
to end, many grown people and nearly all of the children had never heard
of the Book, or of Christ, or knew that there was a day known as
Christmas Day. That such things were so had hurt the doctor to the
heart, and that was why, as Christmas drew near, he had gone through the
out-of-the-way hollows at the Head of Pigeon, and got the names and ages
of all the mountain children; why for a few days before Christmas there
had been such a dressing of dolls in the sweetheart's house down in the
Gap as there had not been since she herself was a little girl; and why
now the cedar tree stood in the little log schoolhouse at the forks of
Pigeon. Moreover, there was as yet enmity between the mountaineers of
Pigeon and the mountaineers over the Ridge and Black Mountain, who were
jealous and scornful of any signs of the foreign influence but recently
come into the hills. The meeting-house, courthouse, and the schoolhouse
were yet favorite places for fights among the mountaineers. There was
yet no reverence at all for Christmas, and the same vandals might yet
regard a Christmas tree as an imported frivolity to be sternly rebuked.
The news was not only not incredible, it probably was true; and with
this conclusion some very unpleasant lines came into the young doctor's
kindly face and he sprang from his horse.
Two hours later he had a burly mountaineer with a Winchester posted on
the road leading to the Crab Orchard, another on the mountainside
overlooking the little valley, several more similarly armed below,
while he and two friends, with revolvers, buckled on, waited for the
coming party, with their horses hitched in front of his office door.
This Christmas tree was to be.
It was almost noon when the doctor heard gay voices and happy
laughter high on the ridge, and he soon saw a big spring wagon drawn
by a pair of powerful bays--Major, the colored coachman, on the seat,
the radiant faces of the Christmas-giving party behind him, and a big
English setter playing in the snow alongside.
Up Pigeon then the wagon went with the doctor and his three friends on
horseback beside it, past the long batteries of coke-ovens with
grinning darkies, coke-pullers, and loaders idling about them, up the
rough road through lanes of snow-covered rhododendrons winding among
tall oaks, chestnuts, and hemlocks, and through circles and arrows of
gold with which the sun splashed the white earth--every cabin that
they passed tenantless, for the inmates had gone ahead long ago--and
on to the little schoolhouse that sat on a tiny plateau in a small
clearing, with snow-tufted bushes of laurel on every side and snowy
mountains rising on either hand.
The door was wide open and smoke was curling from the chimney. A few
horses and mules were hitched to the bushes near by. Men, boys, and
dogs were gathered around a big fire in front of the building; and in
a minute women, children, and more dogs poured out of the schoolhouse
to watch the coming cavalcade.