This is a 1903 novel by Guy Wetmore Carryl. The setting of this novel is the fictional U.S. State of Alleghania, somewhere in the American South, around the beginning of the 20th century. Guy Wetmore Carryl (4 March 1873 - 1 April 1904) was an American humorist and poet. Carryl was born in New York City, the first-born of writer Charles Edward Carryl and Mary R. Wetmore. He had his first article published in The New York Times when he was 20 years old. In 1895, at the age of 22, Carryl graduated from Columbia University. During his college years he had written plays for amateur performances, including the very first Varsity Show. One of his professors was Harry Thurston Peck, who was scandalized by Carryl's famous statement, "It takes two bodies to make one seduction," which was somewhat risque for those times.