"My father and mother were married in 1884 and went to live in their own house in Des Moines where three children were born: my older brothers, Samuel and Arthur, then I. The family fortunes flourished as long as my father retained his partnership with Goldman. But my father had a scapegrace brother, name of Isaac, who persuaded him that big fortunes were to be made still farther west.

"My father therefore broke his partnership with Goldman and the family moved to Sioux Falls, South Dakota, where my last and youngest brother, David, was born. The Dakota venture failed and the family moved back to Iowa, settling into the town of Ft. Dodge, where I spent my childhood and youth. At first we lived in a rented house, then built our own house. My father opened a clothing store on the main street of the town but it was never successful and we lived mainly on the rentals from the Des Moines building.

"I was brought up in a home devoid of affection and consideration. My father, an aging man constantly worried about his declining fortunes, took practically no notice of his four children. My mother regarded children as property to be ordered about as she liked and to be used for her benefit. She seemed incapable of feelings of affection. She was also thoroughly infiltrated with the European worship of the male sex. My three brothers were brought up in idleness and irresponsibility, with the result that two of them never earned more than a bare living, whereas I, as a mere child, was required to participate in the endless work of the big ten-room house. For this reason I have violently hated housework all my life.

"My father was never cut out by nature to be a businessman. He was of a scholarly disposition and was particularly interested in travels and history, having a remarkable memory for historical dates. He had accumulated a small library of oddly assorted books, some of which could hardly be expected to interest anybody—as, for instance, a documentary history of New York state in several volumes. But there was also a complete Shakespeare, a Dante's Inferno with the Doré illustrations, and a complete set of the works of Dickens. I became acquainted with the novels of Dickens at an early age and have never ceased to admire and enjoy them.

"I was conscious from an early age of a strong interest in nature. This first took the form of a love of flowers. My earliest recollections concern flowers. As a child I roamed the woods that bordered the town, hunting the spring wild flowers. I learned their scientific names from a Gray botany book that my brothers had acquired in high school, but I puzzled over the classification until one memorable day when I suddenly realized that the flowers of a little weed known as cheeses had the same construction as hollyhock flowers. Thus I came to understand the families of flowering