138-142 
THE GARDEN MAGAZINE 
April, 1915 
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THE WORLD’S WORK IN THE LINCOLN 
MEMORIAL 
T HE World’s Work being a magazine 
for people who are very much alive to- 
day, is written and edited with the pre- 
sent, and the immediate future in view, rather 
than those dim and misty years when the ques- 
tions which vex us now shall have been settled 
for many generations. 
There is, however, a thrill comparable to noth- 
ing else in knowing that one is handing on to 
posterity something of the sum of total knowl- 
edge, and such a thrill did we have recently 
when we were asked to furnish six copies of the 
World’s Work to be placed in the corner stone 
of the Lincoln Memorial now under construc- 
tion in Washington. 
Mr. James Baird, Vice-President of the 
George A. Fuller Co., in charge of the con- 
struction, wrote to the publishers of the 
World’s Work for copies of that magazine 
from September 1914, to February 1915, for 
the purpose explained: 
“The officials are cooperating to install in the corner 
stone box such articles as they deem will carry the 
most historical message to posterity. The World’s 
Work gives a splendid idea of our views at this time 
as to the causes and progress of the great War, and the 
various articles might be of great interest if found in 
the long distant future. It is to be hoped that the 
Lincoln Memorial may exist for at least one thousand 
years, unless destroyed sooner by artificial means.” 
Following the placing of the corner stone 
this letter was received: 
World’s Work, New York. 
Gentlemen: We received the six numbers of 
World’s Work, containing the war articles, and same 
were deposited in the box in the corner stone of the 
Lincoln Memorial Building yesterday. 
The only other magazines placed in the corner stone 
box were three copies of the National Geographic Mag- 
azine. There were also daily papers, maps, and other 
historical data placed in the box. We secured a very 
remarkable document, that is, autographs, on parch- 
ment, written in India ink, of the President and his Cabi- 
net, every member of the United States Senate, and 
about ninety per cent, of the membership of the House 
of Representatives, also all members of the Supreme 
Court, thus comprising the Executive, Legislative, and 
Judicial Departments of the Government. We also 
had signatures, on parchment, of the entire Lincoln Me- 
morial Commission, of about one hundred and eighty 
members of the Grand Army of the Republic, including 
all of the high officials and many of the past officials; 
also signatures of many of the workmen and officers of 
the company constructing and building. 
We thank you very much for your contribution. 
Very truly yours, 
(Signed) James Baird, 
penrod’s vitality 
Growing boys are always obstreperous. If 
they are not, to some extent at least, there is 
something the matter, and therefore we can 
find it in our hearts to bear with fortitude the 
abounding vitality of “Penrod.” At the 
moment of writing, “Penrod” is selling 
as well as it did in the first five or six 
months after publication. Instead of drop- 
ping off, sales have increased steadily, and the 
sales of “Penrod” for the month of December 
last year, were only one hundred copies less 
than the total sale of the book in advance of 
publication. To us this is a most significant 
fact, as the major part of the sale of a great 
many novels comes in advance of publication. 
It means that for every person of the many 
thousands who read “Penrod” the first two or 
three months after publication, five persons are 
reading it now. And this means that a large 
majority of the persons who read “Penrod ” like 
it well enough to talk about it to their friends. 
VICTORY 
We have had a great deal to say 
in this column about the admirable 
books of Mr. Joseph Conrad, but 
on the happy occasion of the publi- 
cation of his new novel “Victory,” 
we are sure that our readers will be 
glad to hear sotnething about the 
new book. 
Perhaps to most people “Victory” will be 
more typical of Mr. Conrad’s work than was 
his previous novel “Chance.” It is especially 
notable for the directness of the narrative, and 
therefore in manner of telling quite the anti- 
thesis of “Chance.” Unlike “Chance” the 
story is independent of the interlocutory powers 
of a number of different narrators; but like 
“Chance,” it breathes a compassionate affec- 
tion and a consummate percipience of two souls 
ever seeking, but ever missing the fullness of 
understanding. 
In “Victory” we read the story of Axel 
Heyst, the courtly Swede, manager in the isl- 
ands of the Tropical Belt Coal Co., idealist who 
once sought “facts,” had done with them; 
who once tried action and found it futile; and 
who, having retired to his island hermitage, was 
called back to the hazards of life through his 
meeting and elopement with Lena, the orches- 
tra girl. 
Of the story we need say nothing, but from 
every page it breathes the brooding atmosphere 
of the Islands and the deadly stagnation of the 
Tropics. 
O. HENRY EOR THE BLIND 
Two very bulky volumes, almost as large as 
the old time complete Webster dictionaries 
were brought into the office not long ago, and 
after some anxiety lest they turn out to be two 
more war books that simply must be read in 
order to keep up with the times, they finally 
were opened and turned out to be the first two 
volumes of O. Henry’s stories done in the raised 
point system for the blind. The same day came 
a letter from Dr. John C. Finley, Commissioner 
of Education at Albany, enclosing a letter from 
Mrs. Sara Coleman Porter, widow of the late 
Sidney Porter (O. Henry), saying: 
My dear Dr. Finley: 
It was very good of you to send me the O. Henry 
volumes for the blind, and I appreciate them. Recently 
I was in Durham, N. C., and I met an old woman who 
was blind. She said: “I am very, very old and I’m 
blind, and I’m nearly dead, but I love O. Henry’s 
stories.” It touched me more than anything I’ve ever 
heard one say about him. 
With thanks to you, 
(Signed) Sara Coleman Porter. 
At the New York Public Library reading 
room for the blind the O. Henry stories are 
equally well appreciated, and the volumes are 
always in great demand. This is just one more 
sign of the universal love of O. Henry stories, 
but it is especially gratifying to know that 
these tales, which continue year in and year 
out to give such genuine pleasure to so many 
thousands of people, are at last available for 
those who five in the world of darkness. 
