Irving Bacheller

“ THAT little inn was somewhere on the road from New Amsterdam to New York—a half-way house between now and antiquity. A part was old and a part new, and it was all very shabby and simple and genuine. Its day begun at dusk and its noon was midnight. Then the red door of Morcho was one of the gates of the city opening on a strange and merry way of life. They called it the Roost because it was inhabited chiefly by the night-folk. A tall man could almost touch its eaves and had to pay a toll of reverence at its door if he entered. ”

“ I have a merry little monkey of a soul here in this body and I'm going to show you some of its tricks.” He had no thought of the evil in it all. He was born a Castilian peasant and had never heard any preaching about temperance, and thinking was out of his line. ”