scarcely entertained the thought of constructing one.  The burning
of Chicago impressed me powerfully, and obedient to an impulse I
spent several days among its smoking ruins.  As a result, my first
novel, "Barriers Burned Away," gradually took possession of my mind.
I did not manufacture the story at all, for it grew as naturally
as do the plants--weeds, some may suggest--on my farm.  In the
intervals of a busy and practical life, and also when I ought to
have been sleeping, my imagination, unspurred, and almost undirected,
spun the warp and woof of the tale, and wove them together.  At first
I supposed it would be but a brief story, which might speedily find
its way into my own waste-basket, and I was on the point of burning
it more than once.  One wintry afternoon I read the few chapters then
written to a friend in whose literary taste I had much confidence,
and had her verdict been adverse they probably would have perished
as surely as a callow germ exposed to the bitter storm then raging
without.  I am not sure, however, but that the impulse to write would
have carried me forward, and that I would have found ample return
for all the labor in the free play of my fancy, even though editors
and publishers scoffed at the result.