Among the various types of literature, the short story has become very popular in recent years. Numerous writers are fond of the principles involved in its construction, and are developing this form beyond many others. The short story is not new, for it has been developed in many lands throughout the past centuries. However, there has been a marked revival in its production recently and Wisconsin writers have been interested in developing this type. Among these we have already noticed Hamlin Garland. There will be several others mentioned in these selections, among whom the subject of this sketch is one of the most notable.

Zona Gale, who has made her imaginative "Friendship Village" one of the real places in Wisconsin life, was born at Portage, Wisconsin, August 26, 1874. This city continues to be her home; and the study of its home life, its school life, its social, industrial, and religious life has afforded her the basis for generalizing upon what is true of the life of our time. Her characters are not necessarily Portage people, for they are Wisconsin people and people of other states as well. However, Portage and its life has furnished her many interesting starting points for her comments upon life in general. She has attempted to repay her community for this material furnished her by becoming an integral part of its community life. In its civic improvements, in its home life, in its schools and in its churches, she has had her work and has aspired to do her best towards making her home city beautiful and wholesome.

Zona Gale remembers much of the play life and the school life in her home town during the eighties and early nineties of the last century. She has recently set forth her idealized remembrance of these early experiences in her book entitled "When I Was a Little Girl." One of these is chosen as an illustration of her work.

Besides the school training afforded her by Portage, Zona Gale attended Wayland Academy at Beaver Dam, Wisconsin, and later she entered the University of Wisconsin, from which institution she received the Bachelor of Literature degree in 1895, and four years later the Master's degree.

After graduation Miss Gale was employed for a time on staffs of Milwaukee and New York papers. Since 1904 she has devoted herself to writing for magazines. She spends some time in New York and the East, but most of her work is done at her beautiful home, which overlooks the Wisconsin river at Portage.

Miss Gale writes an occasional poem for some magazine. We give "The Holy Place," published in the Bookman some years ago, as an illustration of her poetry. However, it is not as a poet, but rather as a short story writer that we are remembering Zona Gale.

Miss Gale's stories have appeared in the Atlantic, Appleton's, the Cosmopolitan, Everybody's, the Outlook, the Bookman, and other magazines. Her first arrangement of stories in book form, "Romance Island," appeared in 1906. A year later she published "The Loves of Pelleas and Etarre." The two characters mentioned are an old couple of seventy or more, who, under the protecting care of an old servant, Nichola, live a sort of child life. Their pranks, if such they may be called, are the kindly deeds of making others happy. The stories purport to be told by Etarre, who would have us believe that there is quite as much romance in the lives of two old people busily engaged in breaking the rules of the crabbed old nurse as there is in the lives of much younger people. They are constantly on the alert for the romance in the lives of those about them, and it would seem that no love match in their neighborhood could be a success without their assistance. The spirit that pervades the book is that of thoughtful helpfulness.

We are sure to lay aside these stories with the wish that the kindly spirit and the rich enjoyment of Pelleas and Etarre might be true for all old people. We wish every aged couple might stand at the window at Christmas time and send such telegrams of bequest as these which they send to the world:

"And from my spirit to yours I bequeath the hard-won knowledge that you must be true from the beginning. But if by any chance you have not been so, then you must be true from the moment you know."

To this sentiment of Pelleas shall Etarre reply: "From my spirit to your spirit, I bequeath some understanding of the preciousness of love, and the need to keep it true."

Stories must happen somewhere, and the capital of Zona Gale's character world is "Friendship Village." Here occur the loves of her youthful romances, the gossips of the older worldly wise. Here her clubs originate and accomplish their tasks. In this village occur the struggles for social and industrial reform in which Zona Gale is so much interested, and here, too, takes place all that great conflict for civic righteousness which brings "Friendship Village" slowly nearer the goal of perfection as she understands it. "Friendship Village" is probably located nowhere, but still Miss Gale has been so successful in writing about it that we are most sure it is our town, and some one has suggested that another good name for this place would be "Our Home Town."

Two of Miss Gale's books derive their titles from this village of hers. They are "Friendship Village" and "Friendship Village Love Stories." A short description of her "Friendship Village" will follow later. Another book based upon the village life deals with the lesson of Christmas time. It shows how the older people who have come to feel that they could not afford the expense of Christmas are brought to realize the real significance of Christmas giving.

Another series of stories is linked into book form through the narrator, Calliope Marsh. It is entitled "Mothers to Men," and is an account of life at "Friendship Village."

Miss Gale writes beautiful stories of how to make the better community; but what is more, she does with her own hands many things which bring about the realization of her plans. Women's club of her own city and of many other cities enjoy her aid in their plans for better conditions. Civic federations of statewide influence have her help as member and officer. Further, her own county fair has enjoyed her presence and her efforts to advance civic improvement through her friendly counsel to those who pause to talk with her.

Her writing is here illustrated in part from her recent book, "When I Was a Little Girl." Two of the little girls of the neighborhood had been shut up in their rooms one fine summer day as punishment for the infraction of some home regulation, whereupon a discussion among the free playmates arose as to the reason for punishment. As the discussion waxed perplexing, the little girls happened upon Grandmother Beers, who took up the discussion and enlightened the children. What she had heard of their conversation caused her to break in with the statement, "Wicked? I didn't know you knew such a word." The following discussion then takes place:

WHY?

From "WHEN I WAS A LITTLE GIRL." Copyright, 1913, by the Macmillan Co.

"It's a word you learn at Sunday School," I explained importantly.

"Come over here and tell me about it," she invited, and led the way to the Eating Apple tree. And she sat down in the swing! Of course, whatever difference of condition exists between your grandmother and yourself vanishes when she sits down casually in your swing.

Well, Grandmother Beers was one who knew how to play with us, and I was always half expecting her to propose a new game. But that day, as she sat in the swing, her eyes were not twinkling at the corners.

"What does it mean?" she asked us. "What does wicked mean?"

"It's what you aren't to be."

I took the brunt of the reply, because I was the relative of the questioner.

"Why not?" asked grandmother.

"Why not?" Oh, we all knew that. We responded instantly, and out came the results of the training of all the families.

"Because your Mother and your Father say you can't," said Betty Rodman.

"Because it makes your mother feel bad," said Calista.

"Because God don't want us to," said I.

"Delie says," Betty added, "it's because, if you are, when you grow up people won't think anything of you."

Grandmother Beers held her sweet-peas to her face.

"If," she said, after a moment, "you wanted to do something wicked more than you ever wanted to do anything in the world—as much as you'd want a drink tomorrow if you hadn't had one to-day—and if nobody ever knew—would any of those reasons keep you from doing it?"

We consulted one another's look, and shifted. We knew how thirsty that would be. Already we were thirsty, in thinking about it.

"If I were in your place," grandmother said, "I'm not sure those reasons would keep me. I rather think they wouldn't—always."

We stared at her. It was true that they didn't always keep us. Were not two of us "in our rooms" even now?

Grandmother leaned forward—I know how the shadows of the apple leaves fell on her black lace cap and how the pink sweet-peas were reflected in her delicate face.

"Suppose," she said, "that instead of any of those reasons somebody gave you this reason: That the earth is a great flower—a flower that has never really blossomed yet. And that, when it blossoms, life is going to be more beautiful than we have ever dreamed, or than fairy stories have ever pretended. And suppose our doing one way, and not another, makes the flower come a little nearer to blossom. But our doing the other way puts back the time when it can blossom. Then which would you want to do?"

"Oh, make it grow, make it grow," we all cried; and I felt a secret relief: Grandmother was playing a game with us, after all.

"And suppose that everything made a difference to it," she went on, "every little thing—from telling a lie, on down to going to get a drink for somebody and drinking first yourself out in the kitchen. Suppose that everything made a difference, from hurting somebody on purpose, down to making up the bed and pulling the bedspread tight so that the wrinkles in the blanket won't show."

At this we looked at one another in some consternation. How did grandmother know?

"Until after awhile," she said, "you should find out that everything—loving, going to school, playing, working, bathing, sleeping, were all just to make this flower grow. Wouldn't it be fun to help?"

"Yes. Oh, yes." We were all agreed about that. It would be great fun to help.

"Well, then suppose," said grandmother, "that as you helped, you found out something else: that in each of you, say, where your heart is, or where your breath is, there was a flower trying to blossom through! And that only as you help the earth flower to blossom could your flower blossom. And that your doing one way would make your flower droop its head and grow dark and shrivel up. But your doing the other way would make it grow, and turn beautiful colors—so that, bye and bye, every one of your bodies would be just a sheath for this flower. Which way then would you rather do?"

"Oh, make it grow, make it grow," we said again.

And Mary Elizabeth added longingly: "Wouldn't it be fun if it was true?"

"It is true," said Grandmother Beers.

She sat there, softly smiling over her pink sweet-peas. We looked at her silently. Then I remembered that her face had always seemed to me to be somehow light within. May be it was her flower showing through!

"Grandmother!" I cried, "is it true—is it true?"

"It is true," she repeated. "And whether the earth flower and other people's flowers and your flower are to bloom or not is what living is about. And everything makes a difference. Isn't that a good reason for not being wicked?"

We all looked up in her face, something in us leaping and answering to what she said. And I know that we understood.

"Oh," Mary Elizabeth whispered presently to Betty, "hurry home and tell Margaret Amelia. It'll make it so much easier when she comes out to her supper."

That night, on the porch, alone with Mother and Father, I inquired into something that still was not clear.

"But how can you tell which things are wicked? And which ones are wrong and which things are right?"

Father put out his hand and touched my hand. He was looking at me with a look that I knew—and his smile for me is like no other smile that I have ever known.

"Something will tell you," he said, "always."

"Always?" I doubted.

"Always," he said. "There will be other voices. But if you listen, something will tell you always. And it is all you need."

I looked at Mother. And by her nod and her quiet look I perceived that all this had been known about for a long time.

"That is why Grandma Bard is coming to live with us," she said, "not just because we wanted her, but because—that said so."

In us all a flower—and something saying something! And the earth flower trying to blossom ... I looked down the street: at Mr. Branchett walking in his garden, at the light shining from windows, at the folk sauntering on the sidewalk, and toward town where the band was playing. We all knew about this together then. This was why everything was! And there were years and years to make it come through.

What if I, alone among them all, had never found out.

THE HOLY PLACE

FRIENDSHIP VILLAGE

Published by Permission of The Macmillan Co., New York.

We are one long street, rambling from sun to sun, inheriting traits of the parent country road which we unite. And we are cross streets, members of the same family, properly imitative, proving our ancestorship in a primeval genius for trees, or bursting out in inexplicable weaknesses of Court-House, Engine-House, Town Hall, and Telephone Office. Ultimately our stock dwindled out in a slaughter-house and a few detached houses of milk men. The cemetery is delicately put behind them, under a hill. There is nothing mediaeval in all this, one would say. But then see how we wear our rue:

When one of us telephones, she will scrupulously ask for the number, for it says so at the top of every page. "Give me 1-1," she will put it, with an impersonality as fine as if she were calling for four figures. And central will answer:

"Well, I just saw Mis' Holcomb go 'crost the street. I'll call you, if you want, when she comes back."

Or, "I don't think you better ring the Helman's just now. They were awake 'most all night with one o' Mis' Helman's attacks."

Or, "Doctor June's invited to Mis' Syke's for tea. Shall I give him to you there?"

The telephone is modern enough. But in our use of it, is there not a flavor as of an Elder Time, to be caught by Them of Many Years from Now? And already we may catch this flavor, as our Britain great-great-lady grandmothers, and more, may have been conscious of the old fashion of sitting in bowers. If only they were conscious like that! To be sure of it would be to touch their hands in the margin of the ballad books.

Or we telephone to the Livery Barn and Boarding Stable for the little blacks, celebrated for their self-control in encounters with the Proudfits' motor car. The stable-boy answers that the little blacks are at "the funeral." And after he has gone off to ask his employer, who in his unofficial moments is our neighbor, our church choir bass, our landlord even, comes and tells us that, after all, we may have the little blacks, and he himself brings them round at once—the same little blacks that we meant all along. And when, quite naturally, we wonder at the boy's version, we learn: "Oh, why, the blacks was standin' just acrost the street, waitin' at the church door, hitched to the hearse. I took 'em out an' put in the bays. I says to myself: 'The corpse won't care.'" Some way the Proudfits' car and the stable telephone must themselves have slipped from modernity to old fashioned before that incident shall quite come into its own.

So it is with certain of our domestic ways. For example, Mis' Postmaster Sykes—in Friendship Village every woman assumes for given name the employment of her husband—has some fine modern china and much solid silver in extremely good taste, so much, indeed, that she is wont to confess to having cleaned forty, or sixty, or seventy-five pieces—"seventy-five pieces of solid silver have I cleaned this morning. You can say what you want to, nice things are a rill care." Yet, surely this is the proper conjunction, Mis' Sykes is currently reported to rise in the night preceding the day of her house cleaning, and to take her carpets out in the back yard, and there softly to sweep and sweep them so that, at their official cleaning next day, the neighbors may witness how little dirt is whipped out on the line. Ought she not to have old-fashioned silver and egg-shell china and drop-leaf mahogany to fit the practice instead of dazzling and wild-rose patterns in "solid and art curtains, and mission chairs and a white-enameled refrigerator, and a gas range?"

We have the latest funeral equipment—black broadcloth-covered supports, a coffin carriage for up-and-down the aisles, natural palms to order, and the pulleys to "Let them down slow"; and yet our individual funeral capacity has been such that we can tell what every woman who has died in Friendship for years has "done without": Mis' Grocer Stew, her of all folks, has done without new-style flat-irons; Mis' Worth had used the bread pan to wash dishes in; Mis' Jeweler Sprague—the first Mis' Sprague—had had only six bread and butter knives, her, that could get wholesale, too ... and we have little maid-servants who answer our bells in caps and trays, so to say; but this savour of jestership is authentic, for any one of them is likely to do as of late did Mis' Holcomb—that was Mame Bliss's maid—answer at dinner-with-guests, that there were no more mashed potatoes, "or else, there won't be any left to warm up for your breakfast."... And though we have our daily newspaper, receiving Associated Press service, yet, as Mis' Amandy Toplady observed, it is "only very lately that they have mentioned in the Daily the birth of a child, or any thing that had anything of a tang to it."

We put new wine in old bottles, but also we use new bottles to hold our old wine. For, consider the name of our main street: is this Main or Clark or Cook or Grand Street, according to the register of the main streets of town? Instead, for its half-mile of village life, the Plank Road, macadamized and arc-lighted, is called Daphne Street. Daphne Street! I love to wonder why. Did our dear Doctor June's father name it when he set the five hundred elms and oaks which glorify us? Or did Daphne herself take this way on the day of her flight, so that when they came to draught the town, they recognized that it was Daphne Street, and so were spared the trouble of naming it? Or did the Future anonymously toss us back the suggestion, thinking of some day of her own when she might remember us and say, "Daphne Street!" Already some of us smile with a secret nod at something when we direct a stranger, "You will find the Telegraph and Cable Office two blocks down, on Daphne Street." "The Commercial Travelers' House, the Abigail Arnold Home Bakery, the Post Office and Armory are in the same block on Daphne Street." Or, "The Electric Light Office is at the corner of Dunn and Daphne." It is not wonderful that Daphne herself, at seeing these things, did not stay, but lifted her laurels somewhat nearer Tempe—although there are those of us who like to fancy that she is here all the time in our Daphne-Street magic: the fire bell, the tulip beds, and the twilight bonfires. For how else, in all reason, has the name persisted?

Of late a new doctor has appeared—one may say, has abounded: a surgeon who, such is his zeal, will almost perform an operation over the telephone and, we have come somewhat cynically to believe, would prefer doing so to not operating at all.

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Thus the New shoulders the Old, and our transition is still swift enough to be a spectacle, as was its earlier phase which gave our Middle West to cabins and plough horses, with a tendency away from wigwams and bob-whites. And in this local warfare between Old and New a chief figure is Calliope Marsh. She is a little rosy, wrinkled creature officially—though no other than officially—pertaining to sixty years; mender of lace, seller of extracts, and music teacher, but of the three she thinks of the last as her true vocation.

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With us all the friendship idea prevails: we accept what Progress sends, but we regard it in our own fashion. Our improvements, like our entertainments, our funerals, our holidays, and our very loves, are but Friendship-Village exponents of the modern spirit. Perhaps, in a tenderer significance than she meant, Calliope characterized us when she said:

"This town is more like a back door than a front—or, givin' it full credit, anyhow—it's no more'n a side door, with no vines."

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