natural conclusion, and prepared the whole for publication. The author herself, had her life been spared, had undoubtedly made a better book of it; but her husband and friends were unwilling that even the unripe fruits of her toil should perish utterly, and thus, under exceptional conditions, What Came of It is submitted to a generous and sympathizing public.
It was a far call from the school readers to another book to which he gave his poetic talents. This was The Guide, published in Portland in September, 1894, as a paper-bound pamphlet of 44 pages. It is said that about 20,000 copies were sold at twenty-five cents each. Both the author and the publisher were anonymous but the former has been pretty definitely identified as Sam. L. Simpson. He supplied a preface in rhyme and eight mildly esoteric verses.
He lacked five months of being 54 when he died in Portland on June 14, 1899. "He slipped and fell when out walking, and struck the back of his head violently on the sidewalk. He was brought to his room at the St. Charles Hotel." It was only the man, prematurely old, who died on that summer day. The poet had been gone for some time—the light that had still shone at odd moments in his dreaming eyes was a gracious and lingering radiance from the past. His grave is in the Lone Fir Cemetery in Portland.
He had two sons, Eugene and Claude, both of whom are now dead, and he has no descendant living. Other men leave an affectionate and influential lineage to carry on propaganda for their fame but, with his family extinct, he has only the friends of his poetry to keep alive his memory; and these have not been diligent, for it has been singularly difficult to find
