travelling through the forest, of being bitten by a wolf. Then, too,
it is just the same of men, for the men of the cities are much more
quarrelsome, dishonest, and evil-minded than are those of the
wilderness, and that, no doubt, accounts for the endless slandering of
the wilderness dwellers by fiction writers who live in towns, for those
authors--never having lived in the wilderness--form their judgment of
life, either as they have experienced it in cities or as they imagine
it to be in the wilderness.


THE OUTLAW AND NEW YORKER

Now, in order to confirm my statement, I shall go to the very extreme
and quote what Al Jennings, the notorious outlaw, says upon this very
subject. The quotation is taken from Jennings' reminiscences of his
prison days, when he and the late lamented William Sydney Porter--the
afterward famous author O. Henry--formed such a strong friendship. In
the following dialogue Jennings is in New York City visiting
Porter--whom he calls "Bill"--and Porter is speaking:

"I have accepted an invitation for you, Colonel." He was in one of his
gently sparkling moods. "Get into your armor asinorum, for we fare
forth to make contest with tinsel and gauze. In other words, we mingle
with the proletariat. We go to see Margaret Anglin and Henry Miller in
that superb and realistic Western libel, 'The Great Divide.'"

After the play the great actress, Porter, and I, and one or two others
were to have supper at the Breslin Hotel. I think Porter took me there
that he might sit back and enjoy my unabashed criticisms to the young
lady's face.