LITTLE 

 JOURNEYS 



They say Edmund Green made threats when his 

 mother changed her name, but all he did was to fol- 

 low her example and change his. Thereafter he was 

 plain John Fiske "I must have a name easy to take 

 hold of one that people can remember," he said. And 

 they do say that John Fiske' s reverence for John Rus- 

 kin had something to do with his choice of name. 

 Just here some curious one of the curious sex, which 

 by the way holds no monopoly on curiosity, may ask 

 if the second venture of Mrs. Green was fruitful and 

 fortunate. So I will say, yes, eminently so; and in one 

 way it seemed to serve, for John Fiske's stepfather 

 waived John's displeasure with his stepfather's wife, 

 and did something toward sending the young man to 

 Harvard University, and also supplied the funds to 

 send him on a tour around the world. 

 However, the second brood revealed no genius, at 

 sight of which the defunct Mr. Green from his seat in 

 Elysium must have chortled in glee, assuming, of 

 course, that disembodied spirits are cognizant of the 

 doings of their late partners, as John Fiske seemed to 

 think they were. 



If Alexander Humboldt's mother had not married 

 again, we would have had no Alexander Humboldt. 

 Second marriages are like first ones in this: Some- 

 times they are happy and sometimes not. In any event, 

 I occasionally think that mother-love has often been 

 much exaggerated. Love is a most beautiful thing, and 

 it does not seem to make very much difference who 

 supplies it. Stepmother love, Lincoln used to say, was 

 136 



