A great day for Ireland. Everybody aboard and up the river to 152nd Street and then to the Polo Grounds. Baseball Game as benefit for the 69th, between Giants and Cincinnatis, thanks to the generosity of our good friends, Harry Hempstead, John Whalen, Herbert Vreeland, and John J. McGraw. A fine game—plenty of people, plenty of fun, and best of all, plenty of money for the exchequer, which, after an ancient venerable custom, is going to have an ecclesiastical chancellor. Mr. Daniel M. Brady, the Godfather of the regiment, had procured the signature of President Wilson on a baseball which he auctioned off during the game. I asked him if he had arranged for a purchaser. “I have selected one,” he said. “Is he aware that he is going to buy it?” I asked. “He will be informed at the proper time,” said Mr. Brady with a smile. “How much is he going to pay for it?” “Well, I don’t consider $500.00 too much to pay for the privilege.” So after a certain number of bids, real or fictitious, the ball was knocked down at $500.00 to Mr. James Butler, who accepted the verdict smilingly and was allowed the privilege of handing the ball back to me. I am to auction it in Paris for the French Orphans’ Fund. So Mr. Brady says, though I wish I had his confidence that we shall ever get to Paris. ARMORY _August_ 5th, 1917 Father John Kelly had me meet Joyce Kilmer this evening. Nothing of the long-haired variety about him—a sturdy fellow, manly, humorous, interesting. He was a little shame-faced at first, for he had told Father Kelly that he was going to join up with the 69th and he is now in the 7th. “I went to the Armory twice,” he said, “but failed to find the recruiting officer.” I told him that if we could not have him in the 69th the next best place was the 7th, but he still wants to return to his first love, so I shall be glad to arrange it. If he left the whole matter up to my decision he would stay home and look after his large family and let men with fewer responsibilities undertake this task, at least until such time as the country would have need of every man. But he is bound to do his share and do it at once, so there is no use taking off the fine edge of his enthusiasm. He is going about this thing in exactly the same spirit that led him to enter the Church. He sees what he considers a plain duty, and he is going ahead to perform it, calm and clear eyed and without the slightest regard to what the consequences may be.