HYDE PARK—After my speech in River Forest, a suburb of Chicago, last Friday morning, I drove back to the Hotel Stevens and spent a few minutes at lunch with the members of the Fashion Guild. I have long belonged to this group in New York City, though of late years I have had few opportunities to meet with them.

It was interesting to see women who are responsible in such firms as Sears Roebuck and Montgomery Ward for style and fashion advice. There were many women writers present from various Chicago papers and when I left saying I had to write a column it seems to me that quite a chorus said: "So do we!"

Mrs. Scheider and I got off at five thirty and once on the train I started in at once to sign a large bundle of letters which had reached us in Chicago. The conductor came in, gave one look at the table and exclaimed: "You two ladies seem to work pretty hard." The letters are worth getting and worth answering though. Somehow I feel very close to many of my correspondents.

The trip was all too short to do all we had planned on.

It is nice to come back to one's own state and see the familiar scenes of the stations and as we came through Syracuse I looked out of the window and saw "The Onondaga" in large letters over the hotel which many state conventions has made so familiar to me.

Sometime ago I told you I had begun Fannie Hurst's book, "Great Laughter" and was much impressed by the central character, a remarkable and dominating old woman. I finished the book impressed by the variety of personalities and types that walk through its pages. There is enough material for many novels and I longed to follow many of them into their lives when the strong hand of old "Gregrannie" no longer held them in the family circle and somewhat protected from the work and from themselves.

A very interesting book and stimulating to the imagination.

Mrs. Frances Parkinson Keyes has also written a good story in "Honor Bright" with a background of Virginia, Washington and New England with all of which Mrs. Keyes is so familiar, that she draws her scenes and characters with a sure touch. She has more faith than I have however, in the old saying: "The Lord Will Provide", and so all comes out well in the end in spite of some rough sailing. Perhaps her own faith is no stronger than my own but she knows that we all like fiction at least to end happily. It makes real life seem less real!