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It was inevitable that in my efforts to write romantic history of thegreat West I should at length come to the story of a feud. For long Ihave steered clear of this rock. But at last I have reached it andmust go over it, driven by my desire to chronicle the stirring eventsof pioneer days.
Even to-day it is not possible to travel into the remote corners of theWest without seeing the lives of people still affected by a fightingpast. How can the truth be told about the pioneering of the West ifthe struggle, the fight, the blood be left out? It cannot be done.How can a novel be stirring and thrilling, as were those times, unlessit be full of sensation? My long labors have been devoted to makingstories resemble the times they depict. I have loved the West for itsvastness, its contrast, its beauty and color and life, for its wildnessand violence, and for the fact that I have seen how it developed greatmen and women who died unknown and unsung.
In this materialistic age, this hard, practical, swift, greedy age ofrealism, it seems there is no place for writers of romance,