the cotton-mill business in New Bedford, but as might have been expected his love of freedom revolted at that and he spent a few months with the gas drillers, then a soldier right through from the bell tents of Camplife to the dug-outs in the war zone, he has breathed the breath of battle and suffered the hardships of actual warfare. He has heard shells whistle and crash and machine guns (his own) rattle. He has seen men killed at their guns and has had his own companions blown to pieces by the same shell that by a miracle spared him. He can talk most interestingly on the manners of the people of France & England and tell more about the cities of Germany & Great Britain than most books. He has very keen powers of observation and as he has read very little his impressions & expressions are original and unconventional as indeed are all his activities. Because of that unconventionality he is held in disrepute by the good people of Dover although I must admire him for it at least I think I do, maybe I just admire him in spite of it. Of course I can't help agreeing with people when they shake their heads and say it is too bad Quintin is content to waste his time selling ice cream and tempting the public with cupie dolls to throw at stuffed cats instead of turning his time & talents to some account and yet I would hate to take him to task about it for he would argue "Why should I forgo the pleasures & freedom I now enjoy in order to be a slave so that when I am old I could say I know a good trade and have a little money in the bank for a rainy day. As it is I have more money to spend than you have and have some in the bank too besides running the chance of making more and my time is my own." I might as an older brother should call Quint aside and say, "You know, old boy, you shouldn't knock around with that bunch of toughs you do and you should leave the liquor business alone as it is now unlawful." but Quint would smile and politely undertake to prove to me the very obvious fact that although he has consorted with toughs more or less for the last ten years and he is far from being a tough himself, and as for the liquor business, according to his code of morals it is no crime to defy a law that he considers unjust and made by a fickle democracy that doesn't know its own mind for two years hand running. I know there are answers to these arguments but Quint. has his own ideas and as far as the fundamental principles of honor are concerned