rule no one shows up.

This was the exception. For on this occasion everybody did turn up. And it started off like most parties; everybody was stiff and formal; I felt a terrible failure as a host. But in spite of Mr. Volstead there was a bit of "golden water" to be had, and it saved the day. What a blessing at times!

I had been worried since sending the invitations. I wondered how Max Eastman would mix with the others, but I was soon put at my ease, because Max is clever and is just as desirous of having a good time as anyone, in spite of intellectual differences. That night he seemed the necessary ingredient to make the party.

The fizz water must have something of the sort of thing that old Ponce de Leon sought. Certainly it made us feel very young. Back to children we leaped for the night. There were games, music, dancing. And no wallflowers. Everyone participated.

We began playing charades, and Doug and Mary showed us some clever acting. They both got on top of a table and made believe he was the conductor of a trolley car and she was a passenger. After an orgy of calling out stations en route the conductor came along to the passenger and collected her fare. Then they both began dancing around the floor, explaining that they were a couple of fairies dancing along the side of a brook, picking flowers. Soon Mary fell in and Douglas plunged in after her and pulled her up on the banks of the brook.

That was their problem, and, guess though we would, we could not solve it.

They gave the answer finally. It was "Fairbanks."

Then we sang, and in Italian—at least it passed for that. I acted with Mme. Maeterlinck. We played a burlesque on the great dying scene of "Camille." But we gave it a touch that Dumas overlooked.

When she coughed, I got the disease immediately, and was soon taken with convulsions and died instead of Camille.

We sang some more, we danced, we got up and made impromptu speeches on any given subject. None were about the party, but on subjects like "political economy," "the fur trade," "feminism."

Each one would try to talk intelligently and seriously on a given subject for one minute. My subject was the "fur trade."

I prefaced my talk by references to cats, rabbits, etc., and finished up by diagnosing the political situation in Russia.

For me the party was a great success. I succeeded in forgetting myself for a while. I hope the rest of them managed to do the same thing. From the café the party went over to a little girl's house—she was a friend of Mr. Woolcott—and again we burst forth in music and dancing. We made a complete evening of it and I went to bed tired and exhausted about five in the morning.

I want a long sleep, but am awakened by my lawyer at nine. He has packages of legal documents and papers for me to sign, my orders about certain personal things of great importance. I have a splitting headache. My boat is sailing at noon, and altogether, with a lawyer for a companion, it is a hideous day.

All through the morning the telephone bell is ringing. Reporters. I listen several times, but it never varies.

"Mr. Chaplin, why are you going to Europe?"

"To get rid of interviews," I finally shout, and hang up the 'phone.

Somehow, with invaluable assistance, we get away from the hotel and are on our way to the dock. My lawyer meets me there. He has come to see me off. I tremble, though, for fear he has more business with me.

I am criticised by my lawyer for talking so sharply the first thing in the morning. That's just it. He always sees me the first thing in the morning. That's what makes me short.

But it is too big a moment. Something is stirring within me. I am anxious and reluctant about leaving. My emotions are all mixed.

It is a beautiful morning. New York looks much finer and nicer because I am leaving it. I am terribly troubled about passports and the usual procedure about declaring income tax, but my lawyer reassures me that he has fixed everything O.K. and that my name will work a lot of influence with the American officials; but I am very dubious about it when I am met by the American officials at the port.

I am terrified by American officials. I am extra nice to the officials, and to my amazement they are extra nice to me. Everything passes off very easily.

As usual, my lawyer was right. He had fixed everything. He is a good lawyer.

We could be such intimate friends if he wasn't.

But I am too thrilled to give much time to pitying lawyers.

I am going to Europe.

The crowds of reporters, photographers, all sorts of traffic, pushing, shoving, opening passports, visés O.K.'d, stamped, in perfect, almost clocklike precision, I am shoved aboard.

The newspaper battery pictorial and reportorial. There is no original note.

"Mr. Chaplin, why are you going to Europe?"

I feel that in this last moment I should be a bit more tolerant and pleasant, no matter how difficult. I bring forth the "prop" smile again.

"For a vacation," I answer.

Then they go through the standard interview form and I try to be obliging.

Mrs. John Carpenter is on the boat—was also invited to my party, but couldn't attend—with her charming daughter, who has the face of an angel, also Mr. Edward Knoblock. We are all photographed. Doug and Mary are there. Lots of people to see me off. Somehow I don't seem interested in them very much. My mind is pretty well occupied. I am trying to make conversation, but am more interested in the people and the boat and those who are going to travel with me.

Many of the passengers on the boat are bringing their children that I may be introduced. I don't mind children.

"I have seen you so many times in the pictures."

I find myself smiling at them graciously and pleasantly, especially the children.

I doubt if I am really sincere in this, as it is too early in the morning. Despite the fact that I love children, I find them difficult to meet. I feel rather inferior to them. Most of them have assurance, have not yet been cursed with self-consciousness.

And one has to be very much on his best behaviour with children because they detect our insincerity. I find there are quite a lot of children on board.

Everyone is so pleasant, especially those left behind. Handkerchiefs are waving. The boat is off. We start to move, the waters are churning. Am feeling very sad, rather regretful—think what a nice man my lawyer is.

We turn around the bend and get into the channel. The crowds are but little flies now. In this fleeting dramatic moment there comes the feeling of leaving something very dear behind.

The camera man and many of his brothers are aboard. I discover him as I turn around. I did not want to discover anyone just then. I wanted to be alone with sky and water. But I am still Charlie Chaplin. I must be photographed—and am.

We are passing the Statue of Liberty. He asks me to wave and throw kisses, which rather annoys me.

The thing is too obvious. It offends my sense of sincerity.

The Statue of Liberty is thrilling, dramatic, a glorious symbol. I would feel self-conscious and cheap in deliberately waving and throwing kisses at it. I will be myself.

I refuse.

The incident of the photographic seeker before the Statue of Liberty upset me. I felt that he was trying to capitalise the statue. His request was deliberate, insincere. It offended me. It would have been like calling an audience to witness the placing of flowers upon a grave. Patriotism is too deep a feeling to depict in the posing for a photograph. Why are attempts made to parade such emotions? I feel glad