traits of Will Lillibridge's personality. Markedly
reserved, silent, forceful, he was seldom found in the places where
men congregate, but loved rather the company of books and of the great
out-doors. Living practically his entire life on the prairies it is
undoubtedly true that he was greatly influenced by his environment.
And certain it is that he could never have so successfully painted the
various phases of prairie-life without a sympathetic, personal
knowledge.

The story of his life is characteristically told in this brief
autobiographical sketch, written at the request of an interested
magazine.

"I was born on a farm in Union County, Iowa, near the boundary of the
then Dakota Territory. Like most boys bred and raised in an atmosphere
of eighteen hours of work out of twenty-four, I matured early. At
twelve I was a useful citizen, at fifteen I was to all practical
purposes a man,--did a man's work whatever the need. In this capacity
I was alternately farmer, rancher, cattleman. Something prompted me to
explore a university and I went to Iowa, where for six years I
vibrated between the collegiate, dental, and medical departments.
After graduating from the dental in 1898 I drifted to Sioux Falls and
began to practise my profession. As the years passed the roots sank
deeper and I am still here.

"Work? My writing is done entirely at night. The waiting-room,--the
plum-tree,--requires vigorous shaking in the daytime. After dinner,--I
have a den, telephone-proof, piano-proof, friend-proof. What
transpires therein no one knows because no one has ever seen.

"Recreation? I have a mania, by no means always gratified,--to be out
of doors. Once each summer 'the Lady' and I go somewhere for a
time,--and forget it absolutely. In this way we've been able to travel
a bit. We,--again 'the Lady' and I,--steal an hour when we can, and
drive a gasoline car, keeping within the speed laws when necessary.
Once each Fall, when the first frost shrivels the corn-stalk and when,
if you chance to be out of doors after dark you hear, away up
overhead, invisible, the accelerating, throbbing, diminishing purr of
wings that drives the sportsman mad,--the town knows me no more."

Every novel may have a happy close, but a real life's story has but
one inevitable ending,--Death.

And to "the Lady" has been left the sorrowful task of writing "Finis"
across the final page.

January 29, 1909, he died at his home in Sioux Falls after a brief