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SOCIETY NOTES 
Hidden down among the great 
rocks in front of ‘‘Rockledge,’’ the 
beautiful summer residence at Mag- 
nolia of J. Harrington Walker of 
Detroit, is a swimming pool, where 
the children and guests of this fam- 
ily perform all kinds of diving and 
swimming stunts daily, under the 
watchful eyes of their parents and 
maids. This is a most novel con- 
struction and declared by the few 
favored ones who have had an op- 
portunity to inspect it to be the 
ideal of its kind. Nearly  every- 
thing about the pool is natural. 
The steps leading from the house 
have been chipped out of the rocks 
and the basin is a natural hollow 
with the exception of the fact that 
a few crevices have been cemented to 
make the pool watertight. The pool 
is triangular in shape, about 20 feet 
in length, 15 feet wide at the broad- 
est end and five feet deep. The bot- 
tom is painted white, and diving 
places have been made by chipping 
out flat pieces along the sides. Mr. 
Walker has erected a little rustic 
settee at an advantageous spot and 
has placed an iron railing along the 
steps leading into the pool. In. for- 
mer years there was no. way to draw 
off the water, but this year a 
new outlet which has been installed 
allows the pool to be cleaned as oft- 
en as necessary. At high tide, the 
water comes up and fills the pool 
and it remains filled, thus allowing 
Mr. Walker’s children and guests 
an opportunity to swim any time 
during the day regardless of the tide. 
Aside from the swimming pool, the 
Walker children have the finest ten- 
nis court to be found at Magnolia, 
Mr. Walker and his wife being es- 
pecially interested in the athletic 
training of their sons and daughters. 
““My children,’’ says Mr. Walker, 
“take great delight swimming in 
this pool constructed among the 
rocks on the shore in front of my 
summer home. The fact that I have 
this place so near to the house, 
where my sons and daughters can 
enjoy themselves in the salt water, 
relieves their mother of much worry, 
which one is sure to endure while 
children are diving and performing 
other maneuvres from a_ float off 
some beach. Although the pool is no 
novel idea on my part, since it was 
originated by the people from whom 
I bought this estate, I have made 
many improvements in it. I believe 
it is the only one of its kind along 
the North Shore, although I have 
been given to understand that there 
is a pool of somewhat the same na- 
ture further down the Shore.’’ 
NORTH SHORE BREEZE 
19 
RArPH HENRY BARBOUR Whose 
stories for boys and girls have 
delighted many thousands of the 
younger generation, is busy at his 
Manchester home, ‘‘Journey’s End.’’ 
putting the finishing touches on his 
next winter’s books. Mr. Barbour’s 
list now numbers just short of forty 
volumes, of which about thirty are 
juveniles and the balance novels and 
novelettes. While three publishing 
houses, the Appletons, The Century 
Company and J. B. Lippincott, bring 
out the bulk of the writer’s produe- 
tions, five other publishers are alsc 
represented on his list. Of Mr. Bar- 
bour’s juvenile stories perhaps the 
best known are ‘‘The Half-Back,’’ 
‘“‘The Crimson Sweater”? and ‘‘Four 
Afoot,’’ while the more popular of 
the author’s novels are ‘‘The Land 
of Joy’’ and ‘‘Kitty of the Roses,”’ 
the latter the first of a long line of 
attractively bound and _ illustrated 
books which the J. B. Lippincott 
company brings out each year just 
before the holidays. 
Mr. Barbour has not yet located 
any of his stories in Manchester, al- 
though in ‘‘The House in the Hedge’’ 
the scene is laid in Hamilton, and 
“Gloucester is undoubtedly the my- 
thical ‘‘Greenhaven”’ of ‘‘My Lady 
by way of an 
SHalphe Henry Barbour 
of the Fog.’’ Mr. Barbour doesn’t 
consider himself a hard worker, but 
nevertheless manages to turn out re- 
gularly each year two juvenile 
books and at least one novelette, be- 
sides an occasional shert story for 
the magazines. For the youngsters 
this autumn brings a brace of school 
stories, ‘‘Crofton Chums’’ . and 
‘“Change Signals,’’ the former from 
The Century Company and the lat- 
ter from D. Appleton and Company. 
For the grown-ups the Lippincotts 
will provide another of Mr. Bar- 
bour’s popular Christmas novelettes, 
‘““The Harbor of Love,’’ while, just 
“‘extra,’’ as it were, 
a Boston publisher will bring out 
‘‘Cupid en Route.”’ 
The President’s Autos. 
President Taft and family, now 
summering at Beverly, have at their 
disposal five automobiles, as three 
more have recently been registered 
with the Massachusetts State High- 
way Commission, in addition to the 
two registered when the president 
first arrived, and which are used by 
the United States Secret Service de- 
partment. The three new machines 
few 
now registered are understood to be 
more particularly for the service of 
the president and his family. These 
machines have been given the regis- 
tration plates bearing the Nos. 
36119, 36120, and 36121. The. for- 
malities in each ease have been at- 
tended to by James Sloan, Jr., of 
Danville, Ill., who is one of the secret 
service officials accompanying the 
party. 
