It is the contrast and apparent contradiction between the individual and the author that makes the character of Eugene Field interesting to the student. If the man were simply any prosaic person possessed of the gift of telling tales, writing stories, and singing lullabies, this study of his life would have been left unwritten. Many authors have I known who put all there was of them into their work, who were personally a disappointment to the intellect and a trial to the flesh. With Eugene Field the man was always a bundle of delightful surprises, an ever unconventional personality of which only the merest suggestion is given in his works.

In the study I have made of the life of Eugene Field in the following pages I have received assistance from many sources, but none has been of so great value as that from his father's friend, Melvin L. Gray, in whose home Field found the counsel of a father and the loving sympathy of a mother. The letters Mr. Gray placed at my disposal, whether quoted herein or not, have been invaluable in filling in the portrait of his beloved ward.

To Edward D. Cowen, whose intimate friendship with Field covered a period of nearly fifteen years in three cities and under varying circumstances, these pages owe very much. From his brother, Roswell Field, I have had the best sort of sympathetic aid and counsel in filling out biographical detail without in any way committing himself to the views or statements of this study.

Dr. Frank W. Reilly, to whom Field not only owed his vitalized familiarity with Horace, "Prout," and "Kit North," but that superficial knowledge of medical terms of which he made such constant and effective use throughout his writings, has also placed me under many obligations for data and advice.

To these and the others whose names are freely sprinkled through this study I wish to make fitting acknowledgment of my many obligations, and I trust the reader will share my grateful sentiments wherever the faithful quotation marks remind him that such is their due.

SLASON THOMPSON.

CHICAGO, September 30th, 1901.

CONTENTS

Chapter Page
I. PEDIGREE [ 1 ]
II. HIS FATHER'S FIRST LOVE-AFFAIR [ 13 ]
III. THE DRED SCOTT CASE [ 36 ]
IV. BIRTH AND EARLY YOUTH [ 49 ]
V. EDUCATION [ 73 ]
VI. CHOICE OF A PROFESSION [ 91 ]
VII. MARRIAGE AND EARLY DOMESTIC LIFE [ 103 ]
VIII. EARLY EXPERIENCES IN JOURNALISM [ 126 ]
IX. IN DENVER, 1881-1883 [ 143 ]
X. ANECDOTES OF LIFE IN DENVER [ 158 ]
XI. COMING TO CHICAGO [ 183 ]
XII. PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS [ 206 ]
XIII. RELATIONS WITH STAGE FOLK [ 224 ]
XIV. BEGINNING OF HIS LITERARY EDUCATION [ 271 ]
XV. METHOD OF WORK [ 294 ]
XVI. NATURE OF HIS DAILY WORK [ 314 ]