she accompanied him on his reading tours, the last journey they made together being in the summer of '95 to the home of Mrs. Field's girlhood. While his wife was in the company of her old associates, instead of joining them as they expected, he took advantage of her temporary absence, hired a carriage and visited all of the old scenes of their early associations during the happy time of their love-making. His association with his fellow-workers was equally congenial. No man who had ever known him felt the slightest hesitancy in approaching him. He had the happy faculty of making them always feel welcome. It was a common happening in the Chicago newspaper office for some tramp of a fellow, who had known him in the days gone by, to walk boldly in and blurt out, as if confident in the power of the name he spoke-" Is 'Gene Field here? I knew 'Gene Field in Denver, or I worked with 'Gene Field on the 'Kansas City Times.' These were sufficient passwords and never failed to call forth the cheery voice from Field's room— "That's all right, show him in here, he's a friend of mine."

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One of Field's peculiarities with his own children was to nickname them. When his first daughter was born he called her "Trotty," and, although she is a grown-up woman now, her friends still call her "Trotty." The second daughter is called "Pinny" after the child opera "Pinafore," which was in vogue at the time she was born. Another, a son, came into the world when everybody was singing Oh My! Ain't She a Daisy." Naturally this fellow still goes by the name of Daisy." Two other of Mr. Field's children are known as Googhy" and

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"Posy."

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Eugene Field was born in St. Louis, Missouri, September 2, 1850. Part of his early life was passed in Vermont and Massachusetts. He was educated in a university in Missouri. From 1873 to 1883 he was connected with various newspapers in Missouri and Colorado. He joined the staff of the Chicago "Daily News 1883 and removed to Chicago, where he continued to reside until his death, twelve years later. Of Mr. Field's books, "The Denver Tribune Primer" was issued in 1882; "Culture Garden" (1887); "Little Book of Western Friends" (1889); and "Little Book of Profitable Tales (1889).

Mr. Field was not only a writer of child verses, but wrote some first-class Western dialectic verse, did some translating, was an excellent newspaper correspondent, and a critic of no mean ability; but he was too kind-hearted and liberal to chastise a brother severely who did not come up to the highest literary standard. He was a hard worker, contributing daily, during his later years, from one to three columns to the "Chicago News," besides writing more or less for the "Syndicate Press" and various periodicals. In addition to this, he was frequently traveling, and lectured or read from his own writings. Since his death, his oldest daughter, Miss Mary French Field ("Trotty"), has visited the leading cities throughout the country, delivering readings from her father's works. The announcement of her appearance to read selections from the writings of her genial father is always liberally responded to by an appreciative public.

OUR TWO OPINIONS.*

From "A Little Book of Western Verse" (1889). Copyrighted by Eugene Field, and published by Charles Scribner's Sons.

FROM "A LITTLE BOOK OF WESTERN VERSE" (1889).

HE sky is dark and the hills are white
As the storm-king speeds from the north
to-night,

And this is the song the storm-king sings,
As over the world his cloak he flings:

'Sleep, sleep, little one, sleep!" He rustles his wings and gruffly sings: "Sleep, little one, sleep!"

On yonder mountain-side a vine
Clings at the foot of a mother pine;
The tree bends over the trembling thing

And only the vine can hear her sing:
Sleep, sleep, little one, sleep-
What shall you fear when I am here?
Sleep, little one, sleep."

The king may sing in his bitter flight,
The tree may croon to the vine to-night,
But the little snowflake at my breast
Liketh the song I sing the best:

"Sleep, sleep, little one, sleep;
Weary thou art, anext my heart,
Sleep, little one, sleep."

* Copyright, Charles Scribner's Sons.

WILL CARLETON.

AUTHOR OF "BETSY AND I ARE OUT."

EW writers of homely verse have been more esteemed than Will Carleton. His poems are to be found in almost every book of selections for popular reading. They are well adapted to recitation and are favorites with general audiences. With few exceptions they are portraitures of the humorous side of rural life and frontier scenes; but they are executed with a vividness and truth to nature that does credit to the author and insures their preservation as faithful portraits of social conditions and frontier scenes and provincialisms which the advance of education is fast relegating to the past.

Will Carleton was born in Hudson, Michigan, October 21, 1845. His father was a pioneer settler who came from New Hampshire. Young Carleton remained at home on the farm until he was sixteen years of age, attending the district school in the winters and working on the farm during the summers. At the age of sixteen he became a teacher in a country school and for the next four years divided his time between teaching, attending school and working as a farm-hand, during which time he also contributed articles in both prose and verse to local papers. In 1865 he entered Hillsdale College, Michigan, from which he graduated in 1869. Since 1870 he has been engaged in journalistic and literary work and has also lectured frequently in the West. It was during his early experiences as a teacher in "boarding round" that he doubtless gathered the incidents which are so graphically detailed in his poems.

There is a homely pathos seldom equalled in the two selections "Betsy and I Are Out" and "How Betsy and I Made Up" that have gained for them a permanent place in the affections of the reading public. In other of his poems, like "Makin' an Editor Outen Him," "A Lightning Rod Dispenser," "The Christmas Baby," etc., there is a rich vein of humor that has given them an enduring popularity. "The First Settler's Story" is a most graphic picture of pioneer life, portraying the hardships which early settlers frequently endured and in which the depressing homesickness often felt for the scenes of their childhood and the far-away East is pathetically told.

Mr. Carleton's first volume of poems appeared in 1871, and was printed for private distribution. "Betsy and I Are Out" appeared in 1872 in the "Toledo Blade." It was copied in "Harper's Weekly," and illustrated. This was really the author's first recognition in literary circles. In 1873 appeared a collection of his

poems entitled "Farm Ballads," including the now famous selections, "Out of the Old House, Nancy," "Over the Hills to the Poorhouse," "Gone With a Handsomer Man," and "How Betsy and I Made Up." Other well-known volumes by the same author are entitled "Farm Legends," "Young Folk's Centennial Rhymes," "Farm Festivals," and "City Ballads."

In his preface to the first volume of his poems Mr. Carleton modestly apologizes for whatever imperfections they may possess in a manner which gives us some insight into his literary methods. "These poems," he writes, "have been written under various, and in some cases difficult, conditions: in the open air, with team afield; in the student's den, with ghosts of unfinished lessons hovering gloomily about; amid the rush and roar of railroad travel, which trains of thought are not prone to follow; and in the editor's sanctum, where the dainty feet of the muses do not often deign to tread."

But Mr. Carleton does not need to apologize. He has the true poetic instinct. His descriptions are vivid, and as a narrative versifier he has been excelled by few, if indeed any depicter of Western farm life.

Will Carleton has also written considerable prose, which has been collected and published in book form, but it is his poetical works which have entitled him to public esteem, and it is for these that he will be longest remembered in literature.

BETSY AND I ARE OUT.*

RAW up the papers, lawyer, and make 'em | I had my various failings, bred in the flesh and bone,
good and stout,
And Betsy, like all good women, had a temper of

For things at home are cross-ways, and
Betsy and I are out,—

We who have worked together so long as
man and wife

Must pull in single harness the rest of our
nat'ral life.

“What is the matter," says you? I swan it's hard to

tell!

her own.

The first thing, I remember, whereon we disagreed, Was somethin' concerning heaven-a difference in our creed;

We arg'ed the thing at breakfast-we arg'ed the thing at tea

And the more we arg'ed the question, the more we

couldn't agree.

And the next that I remember was when we lost a
COW;

She had kicked the bucket, for certain the question
was only-How?

I held my opinion, and Betsy another had;
And when we were done a talkin', we both of us
was mad.

And the next that I remember, it started in a joke;
But for full a week it lasted and neither of us spoke.
And the next was when I fretted because she broke
a bowl;

And she said I was mean and stingy, and hadn't any
soul.

* From "Farm Ballads." Copyright 1873, 1882, by Harper & Brothers.