Until this time I have been deterred from setting forth my complaint by a variety of good and sufficient reasons, which I enumerate:
Firstly—To me it appeared inevitable that this open letter, on its reaching your hands, would result in a breach between Your Excellency and your late Secretary of State, Mr. William Jennings Bryan. I purposely refrained, therefore, from approaching you on the subject while he remained a member of your official family. In this connection I may state that I would be the last to hamper and embarrass the National Administration. I feel the force of this remark will be all the more deeply appreciated when I tell you that, though never actively concerned in politics, I have invariably voted the Republican ticket on each and every occasion when the fact that election day had arrived was directed to my attention.
Secondly—Through similar motives of consideration I studiously refrained from bringing this recital of events before you during your correspondence with a certain foreign Power—to wit, Germany—touching on the course and conduct of hostilities on the high seas. With myself I frequently reasoned, saying, in substance, this: "Who am I that I should intrude my own grievances, considerable though they may be, on our President at this crucial hour when he is harassed by issues of even greater moment? In the unsettled and feverish state of the public mind, who can foretell what new complications may ensue should I thrust my own affairs forward? Shall I do this? No, no; a thousand times no! I shall restrain myself. I shall stay my hand. I shall wait." You will understand that I did not go so far as audibly to utter these sentiments. I merely thought them.
Thirdly—No little difficulty has been experienced in ascertaining the exact whereabouts of my chief fellow sufferer and co-witness; also in ferreting out the identities of the principal offenders against us. In these matters I am able to report progress, but not entirely satisfactory results. Zeno the Great, it would appear, is a person of unsettled habitation, being found now here, now there, now elsewhere. At last accounts he was connected with a travelling aggregation known as De Garmo Brothers' Ten-Million-Dollar Railroad Show; but since that organisation fell into the hands of the sheriff at Red Oak Junction, Iowa, I have been unsuccessful in tracing his movements. Nor can I at this time furnish you with the names and exact addresses of the bearded ruffian in the long blue blouse, the porter of the hotel, the warder of the dungeons, or the others implicated in those culminating outrages of which I was the innocent victim. Repeatedly have I written the mayor of the town of Abbevilliers, to the general commanding the French military forces, and to the President of the Republic of France, demanding the desired information; but—believe it or not, Mister President—to date I have had not a single word in reply.
Accordingly, until this moment, I have contained myself with all due restraint; but feeling, as I do feel, that patience has finally ceased to be a virtue, I am now constrained to address you in the first person singular, being further emboldened by the reflection that already a bond of sympathy and understanding exists between us, you for years having been connected with one of our largest educational institutions and fonts of learning, namely, Princeton, New Jersey, while I for some eighteen months have occupied the chair of astronomy and ancient and modern history at Fernbridge Seminary for Young Ladies, an institution that in all modesty I may say is also well and favourably known.
If you find opportunity in the press of your undoubtedly extensive and exacting duties for occasional perusal of the lay-press I think it but fair to assume that you are more or less familiar with the causes which actuated me in resigning my place as assistant rector of the parish of St. Barnabas' at Springhaven and accepting the position which I now occupy.
I regret to inform you that a number of newspaper editors in a mood of mistaken and ill-advised jocularity saw fit at the time to comment upon what was to me a serious and most painful memory. However, I mention this circumstance only in passing, preferring by my dignified silence to relegate the authors of these screeds to the obscurity which their attitude so richly merits. Suffice it to state that having left Saint Barnabas', within the short scope of one week thereafter I assumed the duties which I have since continued to discharge to the best of my talents, finding in the refined, the cultured and the peaceful precincts of Fernbridge Seminary for Young Ladies that soothing restfulness of atmosphere which is so essential to one of my temperament.
In such employment I busied myself, giving my days to the classroom and my evenings to the congenial company of the Victorian poets and to my botanical collection, until the summer solstice of 1914 impended, when, in an unthinking moment, I was moved by attractive considerations to accept the post of travelling companion, guide and mentor to a group of eight of our young lady seniors desirous of rounding out their acquaintance with the classics, languages, arts and history of the Olden World by a short tour on an adjacent continent. I need hardly add that I refer to the continent of Europe.
Having long cherished a secret longing to visit foreign parts, I the more gladly entertained the suggestion when our principal, Miss Waddleton, broached it to me. As outlined by Miss Waddleton, the prospect at first blush seemed an inviting one—one might even venture so far as to call it an alluring one. All my actual travelling expenses were to be paid; the itinerary would be pursued in accordance with a plan previously laid out, and finally, I was to have for my aide, for my chief of staff as it were, Miss Charlotte Primleigh, a member of our faculty of long standing and a lady in whom firmness of character is agreeably united with indubitable qualities of the mind, particularly in the fields of algebra, geometry and trigonometry. Miss Primleigh is our mathematics teacher.
Though gratified and flattered by the trust imposed in me, and welcoming the opportunity for helpful service in a new and as yet untried realm, I, nevertheless, strove to comply with such conventionalities as are ordained by organised society. Indeed, I trust that a fitting and proper sense of propriety is never entirely banished from my mind at any time whatsoever.