“Stanton,” he said, “you are the only newspaper man I have ever seen who is so rich he doesn’t need to draw his pay.”

But, as it turned out, Stanton was not so prosperous as Harris perhaps supposed.  He was down to his last dime, and had been wondering how he could manage to get along; for his training on the Rome paper had taught him never to ask for money lest he lose his job.

“Well,” he said to Harris, “I could use some of my salary—­if you’re sure it won’t be any inconvenience?”

Those familiar with the works of Mr. Stanton, Mr. Harris, and James Whitcomb Riley, Indiana’s great poet, will perceive that certain similar tastes and feelings inform their writings, and will not be surprised to learn, if not already aware of it, that the three were friends.  Mr. Stanton’s only absence from Atlanta since he joined the “Constitution,” was on the occasion of a visit he paid Mr. Riley at the latter’s home in Indianapolis.  The best of Stanton’s work must have appealed to Riley, for it contains not a little of the kindly, homely, humorous truthfulness, and warmth of sentiment, of which Riley was himself such a master.  Among the most widely familiar verses of the Georgia poet are those of his “Mighty Like a Rose,” set to music by Ethelbert Nevin, and “Just a-Wearying for You,” with music by Carrie Jacobs Bond.  “Money” is a verse in hilarious key, which many will remember for the comical vigor of the last three lines in its first stanza: 

    When a fellow has spent
    His last red cent
    The world looks blue, you bet! 
    But give him a dollar
    And you’ll hear him holler: 
    “There’s life in the old land yet!”

Richly humorous though Stanton is, he can also reach the heart.  The former Governor of a Western State picked up Stanton’s book, “Songs of the Soil,” and after reading “Hanging Bill Jones,” and “A Tragedy,” therein, commuted the sentence of a man who was to have been executed next day.  One hopes the man deserved to escape.  In another case an individual who was about to commit suicide chanced to see in an old newspaper Stanton’s encouraging verses called “Keep a-Goin’,” and was stimulated by them to have a fresh try at life on earth instead of elsewhere.

Joel Chandler Harris wrote the introduction to “Songs of the Soil.”  Other collections of Stanton’s works are “Songs of Dixie Land,” and “Comes One With a Song.”  The danger in starting to quote from these books—­which, by the way, are chiefly made up of measures that appeared originally in the “Constitution”—­is that one does not like to stop.  I have, however, limited myself to but one more theft, and instead of making my own choice, have left the selection to a friend of Mr. Stanton’s, who has suggested the lines entitled “A Poor Unfortunate”: