Ernest Seton-Thompson, 515 William Henry Drummond, D.D., 519 Thomas Nelson Page, 521 John Fox. Jr., 523 Rudyard Kipling, 525 James Redpath, 533 Ole Bull and His Wife, 545 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS. I want to acknowledge, with thanks, the kind permission of _The Cosmopolitan Magazine_ and _The Saturday Evening Post_ to reprint in this book parts of articles originally published in those periodicals; also the kind permission of the photographers, Rockwood and Falk, of New York; Gutekunst, of Philadelphia; Wood, of Chicago; Taber, of San Francisco; Elliott & Fry, Lombardi & Co., Alfred A. Ellis, Barraud, and Window & Grove, of London, to reproduce several of their copyrighted photographs for this book. J. B. POND. PREFACE There are over 3,000 prefaces in my library. None of them suit me. They are all better and more appropriate than I can write, so I extract from different ones as many as I think are needed for this book of mine. * * * * * “If the perusal of these pages should cheer some fainting wanderer on the world’s highway, and lead him far from the haunts of evil, by the still waters of temperance, my labor will have been well repaid.”--_Autobiography and Personal Recollections of John B. Gough._ “The author has taken the liberty to dedicate this book to certain enterprising gentlemen in London, who have displayed their devotion to a sentiment now widely prevailing in the music halls, by republishing an American book without solicitation on the author’s part.”--_Mr, Dooley, “In the Hearts of His Countrymen.”_ “Yes, take it all around, there is quite a good deal of information in this book. Information seems to stew out of me naturally, like the precious ottar of roses out of the otter. Sometimes it seems to me that I would give worlds if I could retain my facts; but it cannot be. The more I calk up the sources, and the tighter I get, the more I leak wisdom. Therefore, I only claim indulgence at the hands of the reader, not justification.”--_“Roughing It,” Mark Twain._ “A blaze of splendor is the pictorial part of this book, an art gallery on the wing. You need not visit New York, or Dresden, or Berlin, or Rome, to see the masterpieces, for the best part of them is now, my dear reader, _between your forefinger and thumb_! The publishers of this book have ransacked the earth for these three, hundred and thirteen gems (313).”