HYDE PARK—Up at six-thirty this morning to take Miss Cook to the early train for New York. It certainly is a funny thing how lazy everybody else seems when you get started early! Twice I thought I would go over and greet my mother-in-law who got home yesterday from Fairhaven, Massachusett where she stayed for a few days on her way home from Campobello, but I had to remind myself each time I would probably find her still asleep.

I did some shopping in the village and then went over to see her and found her as usual very busy. While I was there she dashed downstairs to arrange for a card party to be given at her house for the benefit of the Hyde Park library, she had her brother and several of his grand children coming to see her and in fact her day was already planned out! Tomorrow was beginning to fill up so fast that when some one telephoned to ask if she would judge the babies as usual at the County Fair tomorrow afternoon, I was rather prepared to have her refuse. Instead of which she said with enthusiasm: "Why, of course, I will, I always do!"

The day has treated us to one or two showers and the hardest one came just as we were about to cook hot dogs on an open fire and eat them out of doors. We did the cooking as the shower ceased, but had to take refuge on the porch to eat. Mr. and Mrs. George Bye, Mr. and Mrs. Heywood Broun, and Mr. and Mrs. George Waldo came over from Connecticut; our neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Paul Garrigue and one or two others were her and before long we had to find a quiet spot where Mr. Broun could write his column. This was done and those of you who read it today will be grateful for the fact that we can at least provide a typewriter and comparative peace at this cottage of ours.

I wonder how many people have read Rachel Field's "Time Out of Mind". The New England characters are good. The unforgiving young man wrapped up in his own ambitions, and the absolutely self-forgetful woman, who became one of those village characters everybody knows has a history, but whom nobody really remembers much about, are thoroughly typical. The description of the times when she tried to be just hands and feet a mechanical automaton that moved and yet was numb, is very poignant. For one reason or another, many of us can remember times like that in our lives and therefore appreciate the understanding shown in the development of her character.