The presence of these personal belongings keeps alive the illusion that “Uncle Remus” has merely stepped out for a little while—­is hiding in the garden, waiting for us to go away.  It would be like him, for he was among the most modest and retiring of men, as there are many amusing anecdotes to indicate.  Once when some one had persuaded him to attend a large dinner in New York, they say, he got as far as New York, but as the dinner hour approached could not bear to face the adulation awaiting him, and incontinently fled back to Atlanta.

Frank L. Stanton, poet laureate of Georgia, and of the “Constitution,” joined the “Constitution” staff through the efforts of Mr. Harris, one of whose closest intimates he was.  Speaking of Mr. Harris’s gift for negro dialect, Mr. Stanton told me that there was one negro exclamation which “Uncle Remus” always wished to reproduce, but which he never quite felt could be expressed, in writing, to those unfamiliar with the negro at first hand:  that is the exclamation of amazement, which has the sound, “mmm—­mh!”—­the first syllable being long and the last sharp and exclamatory.

Mr. Stanton has for years conducted a column of verse and humorous paragraphic comment, under the heading “Just from Georgia,” on the editorial page of the “Constitution.”  Some idea of the high estimation in which he is held in his State is to be gathered from the fact that “Frank L. Stanton Day” is annually celebrated in the Georgia schools.

Mr. Stanton began his newspaper career as a country editor in the town of Smithville, Georgia.  Mr. Harris, then a member of the “Constitution’s” editorial staff, began reprinting in that journal verses and paragraphs written by Stanton, with the result that the Smithville paper became known all over the country.  Later Stanton moved to Rome, Georgia, becoming an editorial writer on a paper there—­the “Tribune,” edited at that time by John Temple Graves, if I am not mistaken.  Still later he removed to Atlanta, joined the staff of the “Constitution,” and started the department which has now continued for more than twenty-five years.

Joel Chandler Harris used to tell a story about Stanton’s first days in the “Constitution” office.  According to this story, the paper on which Stanton had worked in Rome had not been prosperous, and salaries were uncertain.  When the business manager went out to try to raise money in the town, he never returned without first reading the signals placed by his assistant in the office window.  If a red flag was shown, it signified that a collector was waiting in the office.  In that event the business manager would not come in, but would circle about until the collector became tired of waiting and departed—­a circumstance indicated by the withdrawal of the red flag and the substitution of a white one.  According to the story, as it was told to me, reporters on the paper were seldom paid; if one of them made bold to ask for his salary, he was likely to be discharged.  It was from this uncertain existence that Stanton was lured to the “Constitution” by an offer of $22.50 per week.  When he had been on the “Constitution” for three weeks Mr. Harris discovered that he had drawn no salary.  This surprised him—­as indeed it would any man who had had newspaper experience.