HIS SOCIAL LIFE 417 



nature he joined many clubs, but he seldom attended their 

 meetings. He went perhaps more frequently than to any other 

 to the Thursday Club, where he often spoke. But he cared little 

 for cut and dried social expedients ; and as for the r61e of lion, 

 the artificiality of it was as repugnant to him as the iron cage to 

 the free-breathing animal from the jungle. He was nevertheless 

 very social, and although he growled at having to go to dinner- 

 parties, when once launched he enjoyed them exceedingly. Of 

 late years there was one house in Boston in particular where 

 he dined often its mistress the daughter of an old Kentucky 

 friend. The warm-hearted hospitality of both host and hostess 

 made him feel very much at home, and the talk about old times 

 and the friends of other days rejuvenated him. To get into 

 simple, kindly relations with people without any fanfaronade 

 was what delighted him most. Much as he enjoyed meeting his 

 friends in their houses, nothing pleased him better than to see 

 them in his own. If a stranger brought a letter of introduction 

 he was most scrupulous in his welcome. Even when the individ- 

 ual was merged in a crowd, such as a learned society and so 

 forth, he could still meet successfully the collective demand. 



The worst part of dinner-parties was the getting ready for 

 them ; he was so impatient a subject of conventional appearance, 

 or any form that failed to represent a worthy outcome of social 

 experience, that the tying of his white necktie was a serious 

 undertaking. And when several ties had wilted under his fiery 

 touch and his wife was called upon to finish the work, it was to 

 both a moment of extreme tension. When it was over he would 

 heave a sigh of relief and execrate the petty details of fashions 

 that stole a man's time from better things. He was careless about 

 his dress, but so far as his body was concerned cleanliness was 

 next to godliness, and two baths a day often were none too 

 many to meet his self-exacted requirements. He took heed for 

 a while to an admonition of President Eliot's, who, on their 

 way to chapel, good-naturedly reproached him for walking on 

 the wet grass while the morning's "shine" was fresh on his 



