with a chain,
The wild gazelle with its silvery feet
I'll give to thee as a playmate sweet.
Then come with me in my light canoe,
While the sea is calm and the sky is blue,
For I'll not linger another day
For storms may rise and love decay._

Well, this was a snatch that lingered in his memory from the old days
in Adams Street, St. Louis, where he first caught it from the lips of
Mr. Buskett, in whose family it was an heirloom. Field finally traced
it to its source through persistent letters written to himself in his
"Sharps and Flats" column in the Chicago Record.

The glad wild days of which Mr. Buskett testifies were passed in St.
Louis after Field's return from a brief experience as city editor of
the St. Joseph Gazette in 1875-76. The time is fixed by the presence
of "Trotty" in the gypsy circle, who was the best bit of news he
"managed to acquire" in the days whereof he wrote:

_Oh, many a peck of apples and of peaches did I get
When I helped 'em run the local on the "St. Jo Gazette."_

Judge Henry W. Burke, of St. Joseph, is authority for this story of
the time when he was associated with Field on the Gazette: Burke had
been sent out to report a "swell society event" in the eastern part of
the city. Nearly all the prominent people of St. Joseph were present
and the names of all were published. Burke's story of the affair was a
column long, and after it was written Field got hold of the copy and
at the end of the list of those present added, "and last but not least
the handsome and talented society editor of the Gazette, H.W. Burke."
The feelings of the young reporter and embryo judge may be imagined.

But a few months of "whooping up locals on the St. Jo Gazette" were
enough for Eugene, who pined for the broader field and more congenial
associations of St. Louis. Thither he returned in the spring of 1876,
and the Evening Journal, being by this time consolidated with the
Times, he became an editorial writer and paragrapher on the hyphenated
publication. He also resumed the eccentric semi-bohemian life which
Mr. Buskett has rather suggested than described. He had little or no
business ability, had no use for money except to spend it, and
therefore early adopted the plan of leaving to Mrs. Field the
management of their household expenditures. To her, then, as
throughout his life, was paid his weekly stipend--often depleted by
the drafts for the "usual V" or the "necessary X" which he was wont