... I'd help
The poor who try to help themselves,
Who have to work so hard for bread
They can't get very far ahead.

When James Lane Allen's novel, _The Reign of Law_, came out (1900), a
little quatrain by Lampton that appeared in _The Bookman_ (September,
1900) swept like wildfire across the country, and was read by a
hundred times as many people as the book itself:

"The Reign of Law"?
Well, Allen, you're lucky;
It's the first time it ever
Rained law in Kentucky!

The reader need not be reminded that at that period Kentucky family
feuds were well to the fore. As Lampton had started as a poet, the
editors were bound to keep him pigeon-holed as far as they could, and
his ambition to write short stories was not at first much encouraged
by them. His predicament was something like that of the chief
character of Frank R. Stockton's story, "_His Wife's Deceased Sister_"
(January, 1884, _Century_), who had written a story so good that
whenever he brought the editors another story they invariably answered
in substance, "We're afraid it won't do. Can't you give us something
like '_His Wife's Deceased Sister_'?" This was merely Stockton's
turning to account his own somewhat similar experience with the
editors after his story, _The Lady or the Tiger_? (November, 1882,
_Century_) appeared. Likewise the editors didn't want Lampton's short
stories for a while because they liked his poems so well.