Did you ever travel with a dog?  We came down through Lake George, and the Secretary of the Interior sat on a beer box in the prow of the steamship, surrounded by automobiles and kerosine oil cans and cooks and roustabouts, because they would not let a dog go on the salon deck.  Only my sense of humor saved me from beating my wife and child, and throwing the dog overboard.  On the train some member of the family had to stay with the dog and hold his paw while he was in the baggage car.  The trouble with you and me is that we are not ugly enough to receive such attention.  If we had undershot jaws and projecting teeth and no nose, we probably would be regarded with greater tenderness and attention.

Ned is at Phillips-Exeter and is the most homesick kid you ever heard of.  He writes two letters a day and has sent for his Bible, and tells us he is going to church.  If that is no evidence, then I am no judge of a psychological state.

Come on down.  Faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Hon. Woodrow Wilson

The White House

Washington, October 1, 1914

Dear Mr. President,—­Mother Jones called on me yesterday and I had a very interesting and enjoyable chat with her.  During our talk some reference was made to the sterling qualities of your Secretary of Labor, for whom she entertains the highest regard.  She told me this little story about him:—­

One evening sometime ago, when there was a strike of some workmen in Secretary Wilson’s town, she was in the Secretary’s home waiting to see him.  The Secretary was engaged in another room with representatives of those opposed to the strikers, and she overheard their talk.  One of the men said, “Mr. Wilson, you have a mortgage on this house, I believe.”

The reply was in the affirmative.

“Then,” said the speaker, “if you will see that this strike is called away from our neighborhood—­we don’t ask you to terminate it, but merely to see that the strikers leave our town—­if you will do this, we will take pleasure in presenting you with a large purse and also in wiping off the mortgage on your home.”

Mr. Wilson arose, his voice trembling and his arm lifted, and said, “You gentlemen are in my house.  If you come as friends and as gentlemen, all of the hospitalities that this home has to offer are yours.  But if you come here to bribe me to break faith with my people, who trust me and whom I represent, there is the door, and I wish you to leave immediately.”

Mother Jones concluded by saying, “Mr. Wilson never tells this story, but I heard it with my own ears, and I know what a real man he is.”

I wish that you could have heard the story yourself.  I am telling it to you now, for I know how pleased you will be to hear of it, even in this indirect way.  Faithfully yours, Franklin K. Lane