WHILE I REMEMBER
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STEPHEN McKENNA
By Stephen McKenna
WHILE I REMEMBER
THE SENSATIONALISTS
Part One: LADY LILITH
Part Two: THE EDUCATION OF ERIC LANE
Part Three: THE SECRET VICTORY
SONIA MARRIED
SONIA
MIDAS AND SON
NINETY-SIX HOURS' LEAVE
THE SIXTH SENSE
SHEILA INTERVENES
New York: George H. Doran Company
BY
STEPHEN McKENNA
NEW YORK
GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY
COPYRIGHT, 1921,
BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
TO
THOSE WHO MAY FORGET
"Two men I honour, and no third. First, the toil-worn Craftsmanthat with earth-made Implement laboriously conquers the Earth,and makes her man's. Venerable to me is the hard Hand; crooked,coarse; wherein notwithstanding lies a cunning virtue, indefeasiblyroyal as of the Sceptre of this Planet. Venerable too is the ruggedface, all weather-tanned, besoiled, with its rude intelligence; for itis the face of a Man living manlike. O, but the more venerable forthy rudeness, and even because we must pity as well as love thee!Hardly-entreated Brother! For us was thy back so bent, for uswere thy straight limbs and fingers so deformed: thou wert ourConscript, on whom the lot fell, and fighting our battles wert somarred. For in thee too lay a god-created Form, but it was not to beunfolded; encrusted must it stand with the thick adhesions anddefacements of Labour: and thy body, like thy soul, was not to knowfreedom. Yet toil on, toil on: thou art in thy duty, be out of it whomay; thou toilest for the altogether indispensable, for daily bread.
"A second man I honour, and still more highly: Him who is seentoiling for the spiritually indispensable; not daily bread, but thebread of Life. Is not he too in his duty; endeavouring towardsinward Harmony; revealing this, by act or by word, through all hisoutward endeavours, be they high or low? Highest of all, when hisoutward and his inward endeavour are one: when we can name himArtist; not earthly Craftsman only, but inspired Thinker, who withheaven-made Implement conquers Heaven for us! If the poor andhumble toil that we have Food, must not the high and glorious toilfor him in return, that he have Light, have Guidance, Freedom,Immortality? These two, in all their degrees, I honour: all elseis chaff and dust, which let the wind blow whither it listeth."
Thomas Carlyle: Sartor Resartus.
"People who are old enough to write memoirs,"says my friend Shane Leslie in The End of aChapter, "have usually lost their memory." Theyhave always, he might have added, lost the enthusiasmwhich once inspired and is alone able t