第31章

Lecturing every evening but Sunday, and on Sundays preaching in the town where he happens to be!

June 24 Ackley, Ia.July 11 *Brookings, S. D.

`` 25Waterloo, Ia.`` 12 Pipestone, Minn.

`` 26Decorah, Ia. `` 13 Hawarden, Ia.

`` 27*Waukon, Ia. `` 14 Canton, S. D`` 28Red Wing, Minn. `` 15 Cherokee, Ia `` 29River Falls, Wis.`` 16 Pocahontas, Ia `` 30Northfield, Minn.`` 17 Glidden, Ia.

July 1Faribault, Minn. `` 18 *Boone, Ia.

`` 2 Spring Valley, Minn. `` 19 Dexter, Ia.

`` 3 Blue Earth, Minn.`` 20 Indianola, Ia `` 4 *Fairmount, Minn.`` 21 Corydon, Ia `` 5 Lake Crystal, Minn. `` 22 Essex, Ia.

`` 6 Redwood Falls, `` 23 Sidney, Ia.

Minn.`` 24 Falls City, Nebr.

`` 7 Willmer, Minn. `` 25 *Hiawatha, Kan.

`` 8 Dawson, Minn.`` 26 Frankfort, Kan.

`` 9 Redfield, S. D. `` 27 Greenleaf, Kan.

`` 10Huron, S. D. `` 28 Osborne, Kan.

July 29 Stockton, Kan. Aug. 14 Honesdale, Pa.

`` 30Phillipsburg, Kan.`` 15 *Honesdale, Pa.

`` 31Mankato, Kan.`` 16 Carbondale, Pa.

_En route to next date on_`` 17 Montrose, Pa.

_circuit_.`` 18 Tunkhannock, Pa.

Aug. 3Westfield, Pa.`` 19 Nanticoke, Pa.

`` 4 Galston, Pa. `` 20 Stroudsburg, Pa.

`` 5 Port Alleghany, Pa. `` 21 Newton, N. J.

`` 6 Wellsville, N. Y.`` 22 *Newton, N. J.

`` 7 Bath, N. Y. `` 23 Hackettstown, N. J.

`` 8 *Bath, N. Y. `` 24 New Hope, Pa.

`` 9 Penn Yan, N. Y. `` 25 Doylestown, Pa.

`` 10Athens, N. Y.`` 26 Phnixville, Pa.

`` 11Owego, N. Y. `` 27 Kennett, Pa.

`` 12Patchogue, LI.,N.Y. `` 28 Oxford, Pa.

`` 13Port Jervis, N. Y. `` 29 *Oxford, Pa.

* Preach on Sunday.

And all these hardships, all this traveling and lecturing, which would test the endurance of the youngest and strongest, this man of over seventy assumes without receiving a particle of personal gain, for every dollar that he makes by it is given away in helping those who need helping.

That Dr. Conwell is intensely modest is one of the curious features of his character. He sincerely believes that to write his life would be, in the main, just to tell what people have done for him. He knows and admits that he works unweariedly, but in profound sincerity he ascribes the success of his plans to those who have seconded and assisted him. It is in just this way that he looks upon every phase of his life. When he is reminded of the devotion of his old soldiers, he remembers it only with a sort of pleased wonder that they gave the devotion to him, and he quite forgets that they loved him because he was always ready to sacrifice ease or risk his own life for them.

He deprecates praise; if any one likes him, the liking need not be shown in words, but in helping along a good work. That his church has succeeded has been because of the devotion of the people;that the university has succeeded is because of the splendid work of the teachers and pupils; that the hospitals have done so much has been because of the noble services of physicians and nurses.

To him, as he himself expresses it, realizing that success has come to his plans, it seems as if the realities are but dreams. He is astonished by his own success. He thinks mainly of his own shortcomings. ``God and man have ever been very patient with me.'' His depression is at times profound when he compares the actual results with what he would like them to be, for always his hopes have gone soaring far in advance of achievement. It is the ``Hitch your chariot to a star'' idea.

His modesty goes hand-in-hand with kindliness, and I have seen him let himself be introduced in his own church to his congregation, when he is going to deliver a lecture there, just because a former pupil of the university was present who, Conwell knew, was ambitious to say something inside of the Temple walls, and this seemed to be the only opportunity.

I have noticed, when he travels, that the face of the newsboy brightens as he buys a paper from him, that the porter is all happiness, that conductor and brakeman are devotedly anxious to be of aid. Everywhere the man wins love. He loves humanity and humanity responds to the love.

He has always won the affection of those who knew him, and Bayard Taylor was one of the many; he and Bayard Taylor loved each other for long acquaintance and fellow experiences as world-wide travelers, back in the years when comparatively few Americans visited the Nile and the Orient, or even Europe.

When Taylor died there was a memorial service in Boston at which Conwell was asked to preside, and, as he wished for something more than addresses, he went to Longfellow and asked him to write and read a poem for the occasion. Longfellow had not thought of writing anything, and he was too ill to be present at the services, but, there always being something contagiously inspiring about Russell Conwell when he wishes something to be done, the poet promised to do what he could. And he wrote and sent the beautiful lines beginning:

_Dead he lay among his books, The peace of God was in his looks_.

Many men of letters, including Ralph Waldo Emerson, were present at the services, and Dr.

Conwell induced Oliver Wendell Holmes to read the lines, and they were listened to amid profound silence, to their fine ending.

Conwell, in spite of his widespread hold on millions of people, has never won fame, recognition, general renown, compared with many men of minor achievements. This seems like an impossibility. Yet it is not an impossibility, but a fact. Great numbers of men of education and culture are entirely ignorant of him and his work in the world--men, these, who deem themselves in touch with world-affairs and with the ones who make and move the world. It is inexplicable, this, except that never was there a man more devoid of the faculty of self-exploitation, self-advertising, than Russell Conwell. Nor, in the mere reading of them, do his words appeal with anything like the force of the same words uttered by himself, for always, with his spoken words, is his personality.