rked in secret, sent in my material, and
kept as quiet about it as possible. On Outing I had graduated from the
camera department to an illustrated article each month, and as this
kept up the year round, and few illustrations could be made in winter,
it meant that I must secure enough photographs of wild life in summer
to last during the part of the year when few were to be had.

"Every fair day I spent afield, and my little black horse and load of
cameras, ropes, and ladders became a familiar sight to the country folk
of the Limberlost, in Rainbow Bottom, the Canoper, on the banks of the
Wabash, in woods and thickets and beside the roads; but few people
understood what I was trying to do, none of them what it would mean
were I to succeed. Being so afraid of failure and the inevitable
ridicule in a community where I was already severly criticised on
account of my ideas of housekeeping, dress, and social customs, I
purposely kept everything I did as quiet as possible. It had to be
known that I was interested in everything afield, and making pictures;
also that I was writing field sketches for nature publications, but
little was thought of it, save as one more, peculiarity, in me. So when
my little story was finished I went to our store and looked over the
magazines. I chose one to which we did not subscribe, having an
attractive cover, good type, and paper, and on the back of an old
envelope, behind the counter, I scribbled: Perriton Maxwell, 116 Nassau
Street, New York, and sent my story on its way.

"Then I took a bold step, the first in my self-emancipation. Money was
beginning to come in, and I had some in my purse of my very own that I
had earned when no one even knew I was working. I argued that if I kept
my family so comfortable that they missed nothing from their usual
routine, it was my right to do what I could toward furthering my
personal ambitions in what time I could save from my housework. And
until I could earn enough to hire capable people to take my place, I
held rigidly to that rule. I who waded morass, fought quicksands,
crept, worked from ladders high in air, and crossed water on improvised
rafts without a tremor, slipped with many misgivings into the
postoffice and rented a box for myself, so that if I met with failure
my husband and the men in the bank need not know what I had attempted.
That was early May; all summer I waited. I had heard that it required a
long time for an editor to read and to p