There was no resisting this appeal. With a profound sense of what Zulime and the children meant to him, I gave up all thought of going East and settled back into my groove. "We will remain where we are so long as father lives," I declared to my friends. My wife, who had perceived with alarm my growing discontent with Chicago, was greatly relieved by this decision. To her the thought of migration even to the North Side was disturbing, for it would break her close connection with the circle whose center was in her brother's studio. I am not seeking to excuse my recreancy to The Middle West; I am merely stating it as a phase of literary history, for my case is undoubtedly typical of many other writers who turned their faces eastward. The plain truth is I had reached an age where I no longer cared to pioneer even in a literary sense. Desirous of the acceptances proper to a writer with gray hair and a string of creditable books, I wished to go where honor waited. I craved a place as a man of letters. That my powers were deteriorating in the well-worn rut of my life in Woodlawn I knew too well, and my need of contact with my fellow craftsmen in the East sharpened. The support and inspiration which come naturally to authors in contact with their kind were being denied me. Age was bringing me no "harvest home." In short, at the very time when I should have been most honored, most recompensed, in my work, I found myself living meanly in a mean street and going about like a man of mean concerns, having little influence on my art or among my fellows. That Chicago was still on the border in a literary sense was sharply emphasized when the National Institute of Arts and Letters decided (after much debate), to hold its Annual Meeting for 1913 in the midland metropolis. "It is a long way out to Chicago," its Secretary wrote, "and I don't know how many members we can assemble, but I think we shall be able to bring twenty-five at least. You have been appointed chairman of the Committee of Arrangements, with full powers to go ahead." The honor and responsibility of this appointment spurred me to action. I decided to accept and make the meeting a literary milestone in western history. My first thought was to make the Cliff Dwellers' Club the host of the occasion, but on further consideration, I reckoned that the City's welcome would have greater weight if all its literary and artistic forces could be in some way combined. To bring this about I directed letters to the heads of seventeen clubs and educational organizations, asking them to meet with me and form a joint Reception Committee.