AMERICAN THUMB-PRINTS In shorter form “The New England Woman” appeared in _The Atlantic Monthly_, and under other title and form “Up-to-Date Misogyny” and “Plagiarizing Humors of Benjamin Franklin” in _The Bookman_, which periodicals have courteously allowed republication AMERICAN THUMB-PRINTS METTLE OF OUR MEN AND WOMEN BY KATE STEPHENS [Illustration] PHILADELPHIA AND LONDON J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY 1905 COPYRIGHT, 1905 BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY Published April, 1905 _Electrotyped and Printed by J. B. Lippincott Company, Philadelphia, U. S. A._ IN MOST LOVING MEMORY OF MY FATHER NELSON TIMOTHY STEPHENS WHOSE RARE KNOWLEDGE OF MEN AND OF LAW WHOSE SENSITIVENESS TO JUSTICE HUMAN KINDLINESS AND FINE DISDAIN FOR SELF-ADVERTISEMENT ARE STILL CHERISHED BY THE NOBLE FOLK AMONG WHOM HE SPENT THE LAST YEARS OF HIS LIFE AT WHOSE INSTANCE IN GREAT MEASURE AND UPON WHOSE ADVICE THE LAW SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY SKETCHED IN THIS BOOK WAS IN 1878 FOUNDED CONTENTS PAGE PURITANS OF THE WEST 11 THE UNIVERSITY OF HESPERUS 35 TWO NEIGHBORS OF ST. LOUIS 87 THE NEW ENGLAND WOMAN 127 A NEW ENGLAND ABODE OF THE BLESSED 163 UP-TO-DATE MISOGYNY 187 “THE GULLET SCIENCE” 215 PLAGIARIZING HUMORS OF BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 287 PURITANS OF THE WEST Let nouther lufe of friend nor feir of fais, Mufe zow to mank zour Message, or hald bak Ane iot of zour Commissioun, ony wayis Call ay quhite, quhite, and blak, that quhilk is blak. First he descendit bot of linage small. As commonly God usis for to call, The sempill sort his summoundis til expres. JOHN DAVIDSON If it be heroism that we require, what was Troy town to this? ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON PURITANS OF THE WEST Of local phases of the American spirit, none has incited more discussion than that developed in Kansas. The notion that the citizens of the State are somewhat phrenetic in experimental meliorism; that they more than others fall into abnormal sympathies and are led by aberrations of the crowd--intoxications the mind receives in a congregation of men pitched to an emotional key--this notion long ago startled peoples more phlegmatic and less prone to social vagaries.