



Produced by Bill Brewer





LADY BALTIMORE

By Owen Wister


     To
     S. Weir Mitchell
     With the Affection and Memories of All My Life



To the Reader


You know the great text in Burns, I am sure, where he wishes he could
see himself as others see him. Well, here lies the hitch in many a work
of art: if its maker--poet, painter, or novelist--could but have become
its audience too, for a single day, before he launched it irrevocably
upon the uncertain ocean of publicity, how much better his boat would
often sail! How many little touches to the rigging he would give, how
many little drops of oil to the engines here and there, the need of
which he had never suspected, but for that trial trip! That's where the
ship-builders and dramatists have the advantage over us others: they can
dock their productions and tinker at them. Even to the musician comes
this useful chance, and Schumann can reform the proclamation which opens
his B-flat Symphony.

Still, to publish a story in weekly numbers previously to its appearance
as a book does sometimes give to the watchful author an opportunity to
learn, before it is too late, where he has failed in clearness; and it
brings him also, through the mails, some few questions that are pleasant
and proper to answer when his story sets forth united upon its journey
of adventure among gentle readers.

How came my hero by his name?

If you will open a book more valuable than any I dare hope to write, and
more entertaining too, The Life of Paul Jones, by Mr. Buell, you will
find the real ancestor of this imaginary boy, and fall in love with John
Mayrant the First, as did his immortal captain of the Bon Homme Richard.
He came from South Carolina; and believing his seed and name were
perished there to-day, I gave him a descendant. I have learned that the
name, until recently, was in existence; I trust it will not seem taken
in vain in these pages.

Whence came such a person as Augustus?

Our happier cities produce many Augustuses, and may they long continue
to do so! If Augustus displeases any one, so much the worse for that
one, not for Augustus. To be sure, he doesn't admire over heartily
the parvenus of steel or oil, whose too sudden money takes them to the
divorce court; he calls them the 'yellow rich'; do you object to that?
Nor does he think that those Americans who prefer their pockets to their
patriotism, are good citizens. He says of such people that 'eternal
vigilance cannot watch liberty and the ticker at the same time.' Do you
object to that? Why, the young man would be perfect, did he but attend
his primaries and vote more regularly,--and who wants a perfect young
man?

What would John Mayrant have done if Hortense had not challenged him as
she did?

I have never known, and I fear we might have had a tragedy.

Would the old ladies really have spoken to Augustus about the love
difficulties of John Mayrant?

I must plead guilty. The old ladies of Kings Port, like American
gentlefolk everywhere, keep family matters sacredly inside the family
circle. But you see, had they not told Augustus, how in the world could
I have told--however, I plead guilty.

Certain passages have been interpreted most surprisingly to signify a
feeling against the <DW52> race, that is by no means mine. My only wish
regarding these people, to whom we owe an immeasurable responsibility,
is to see the best that is in them prevail. Discord over this seems on
the wane, and sane views gaining. The issue sits on all our shoulders,
but local variations call for a sliding scale of policy. So admirably
dispassionate a novel as The Elder Brother, by Mr. Jervey, forwards the
understanding of Northerners unfamiliar with the South, and also that
friendliness between the two places, which is retarded chiefly by
tactless newspapers.

Ah, tact should have been one of the cardinal virtues; and if I didn't
possess a spice of it myself, I should here thank by name certain two
members of the St. Michael family of Kings Port for their patience with
this comedy, before ever it saw the light. Tact bids us away from many
pleasures; but it can never efface the memory of kindness.




LADY BALTIMORE




I: A Word about My Aunt


Like Adam, our first conspicuous ancestor, I must begin, and lay the
blame upon a woman; I am glad to recognize that I differ from the father
of my sex in no important particular, being as manlike as most of his
sons. Therefore it is the woman, my Aunt Carola, who must bear the whole
reproach of the folly which I shall forthwith confess to you, since she
it was who put it into my head; and, as it was only to make Eve happy
that her husband ever consented to eat the disastrous apple, so I, save
to please my relative, had never aspired to become a Selected Salic
Scion. I rejoice now that I did so, that I yielded to her temptation.
Ours is a wide country, and most of us know but our own corner of it,
while, thanks to my Aunt, I have been able to add another corner. This,
among many other enlightenments of navel and education, do I owe her;
she stands on the threshold of all that is to come; therefore I were
lacking in deference did I pass her and her Scions by without due
mention,--employing no English but such as fits a theme so stately.
Although she never left the threshold, nor went to Kings Port with me,
nor saw the boy, or the girl, or any part of what befell them, she knew
quite well who the boy was. When I wrote her about him, she remembered
one of his grandmothers whom she