Don Marquis - Danny's Own Story

Danny is the proverbial basket-on-the-doorstep baby, found by Hank and Elmira Walters, a childless couple who welcome him into their home because they need a new topic over which to bicker. Bicker they do, and fight just as often, from the day they attempt to settle on a name, to the day eighteen years later, when Danny and Hank come to blows and Danny leaves home in company with Dr. Kirby, bottler and supplier of the miracle elixir, Siwash Indian Sagraw. For years Danny wanders aimlessly--from Illinois to Indiana to Ohio, back to Illinois, then into Tennessee and points south--sometimes in company with Dr. Kirby, sometimes alone; sometimes working as a circus roustabout, wild man from Borneo, or Patagonian cannibal; sometimes only bumming around, but always feeling inextricably bound to Dr. Kirby, as though by fate. At last, as in most comedies, all problems are resolved when Danny finds contentment with his true parents, and Dr. Kirby is helped to find the lost love after which he has quested for the greater portion of his life. --Book Review Digest, 1912