This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1911. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... "SON BATHER was a person who occasionally JL just before bedtime emerged from a place called "Down Town" and interrupted Son's mental activities by inviting the latter to ride on his shoulders. Now Son was by nature polite, and hated to disappoint, but if Father had only realized the horror . . . to look down and down at those dizzying stairs. . . . "He will never be manly," said Father. Yet, the year before, when the doctor, being warned of Mother, had intimated that it would be necessary to hurt him, Son had stiffened his little frame and had let him go ahead. And the dark held for him only delight . His little room, where he slept alone, was his great pride. The light out, the photograph of Hofmann's Christ over his head seemed to merge into the colored lithographs of Venice adorning the other walls, and above the blue waters, out of blue skies, looked down the Face. Son, half asleep, was wont to rouse himself from this ecstatic vision to make poetry, which he would repeat next morning to any one who could be got to listen. There was much of starry skies, and silent night, and the majesty of God in these lines, which were in blank verse, -- for Son was only six. "He talk all de time outdoors," complained his nurse, --" so much dat before he get home he ask for a glass of water already." The family did not go to church, but Son got over this difficulty by holding service himself every Sunday morning. Baby attended regularly, but Mother found it out quite by chance when she heard "Onward, Christian Soldiers " taking its turn impartially with "When we fit for General Grant." Father, who wielded a facile pen, had brought home a dummy copy of his new book. It contained, beside title page and table of contents, untold wealth of blank pages. This treasure fe...