How Small the World.
by E. H. Mayde.
THE letter of Mr. Robert Fairfar to the Rev. Arthur Selbourne, Innasittie, Colorado:
Right you are, Old Hoss, and no mistake. Europe was a great lark—all the better for having been as unexpected as a wedding fee in advance. I'm mighty glad I've seen it all. I used to be afraid that foreign scenery would make that of home seem tame in comparison. It has, on the contrary, been rather enhanced for me, and New England continues to stir my aged blood as nothing else does.
I stopped over a day in New York, and dined with Ellis, who told me about poor Jack Simms. Awfully sad case. Of course you know he was eager for the operation—it really was the last hope—and went into it with the greatest amount of pluck and nerve. Ellis is interne at St. Luke's hospital, and was with Jack all the time, and, up to the last day, believed he'd pull through; but it was no go. Jack's life was insured for ten thousand dollars, and his wife's uncle had just left her thirty thousand dollars. So he had the comfort of knowing she was provided for. It's a lucky thing, for she has weak lungs or something of that sort. It strikes me that women as a race are pretty delicate in spite of their modern fad for athletics.
I saw Adams and Lennox Vandewater in Boston. Van looks rather peaked. Adams says he's just made his annual proposal to the girl he's been in love with for six years (nobody knows who she is) and she has rejected him again. Van never recuperates in less than three months, so Adams has consented to go across with him, and they're going to bike about England during August
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