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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/19359-8.txt b/19359-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..99e1d77 --- /dev/null +++ b/19359-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5514 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Patient Observer, by Simeon Strunsky + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Patient Observer + And His Friends + + +Author: Simeon Strunsky + + + +Release Date: September 22, 2006 [eBook #19359] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PATIENT OBSERVER*** + + +E-text prepared by Stacy Brown and the Project Gutenberg Online +Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net/) from page images +generously made available by Internet Archive/American Libraries +(http://www.archive.org/details/americana) + + + +Note: Images of the original pages are available through + Internet Archive/American Libraries. See + http://www.archive.org/details/patientobserver00strurich + + + + + +THE PATIENT OBSERVER + +And His Friends + +by + +SIMEON STRUNSKY + + + + + + + +New York +Dodd, Mead and Company +1911 +Copyright, 1910, by The Evening Post Company +Copyright, 1910, by P. F. Collier & Son +Copyright, 1910, by Harper & Brothers +Copyright, 1910, by The Atlantic Monthly Co. +Copyright, 1911, by Dodd, Mead and Company + + + + +To + +_M. G. S._ + + + + +CONTENTS + + +I Cowards Page 1 + +II The Church Universal 10 + +III The Doctors 19 + +IV Interrogation 29 + +V The Mind Triumphant 37 + +VI On Calling White Black 45 + +VII The Solid Flesh 57 + +VIII Some Newspaper Traits 67 + +IX A Fledgling 80 + +X The Complete Collector--I 92 + +XI The Everlasting Feminine 100 + +XII The Fantastic Toe 111 + +XIII On Living in Brooklyn 119 + +XIV Palladino Outdone 130 + +XV The Cadence of the Crowd 138 + +XVI What We Forget 147 + +XVII The Children That Lead Us 159 + +XVIII The Martians 179 + +XIX The Complete Collector--II 189 + +XX When a Friend Marries 198 + +XXI The Perfect Union of the Arts 209 + +XXII An Eminent American 216 + +XXIII Behind the Times 227 + +XXIV Public Liars 238 + +XXV The Complete Collector--III 249 + +XXVI The Commuter 257 + +XXVII Headlines 270 + +XXVIII Usage 278 + +XXIX 60 H.P. 285 + +XXX The Sample Life 296 + +XXXI The Complete Collector--IV 313 + +XXXII Chopin's Successors 320 + +XXXIII The Irrepressible Conflict 327 + +XXXIV The Germs of Culture 336 + + + + +NOTE + + +Of the papers that go to make up the present volume, the greater number +were published as a series in the columns of the New York _Evening Post_ +for 1910, under the general title of The Patient Observer. For the +eminently laudable purpose of making a fairly thick book, the Patient +Observer's frequently recurrent "I," "me," and "mine" have now been +supplemented with the experiences and reflections of his friends +Harrington, Cooper, and Harding as recorded on other occasions in the +New York _Evening Post_, as well as in the _Atlantic Monthly_, the +_Bookman_, _Collier's_, and _Harper's Weekly_. + + + + +I + +COWARDS + + +It was Harrington who brought forward the topic that men take up in +their most cheerful moments. I mean, of course, the subject of death. +Harrington quoted a great scientist as saying that death is the one +great fear that, consciously or not, always hovers over us. But the five +men who were at table with Harrington that night immediately and sharply +disagreed with him. + +Harding was the first to protest. He said the belief that all men are +afraid of death is just as false as the belief that all women are afraid +of mice. It is not the big facts that humanity is afraid of, but the +little things. For himself, he could honestly say that he was not +afraid of death. He defied it every morning when he ran for his train, +although he knew that he thereby weakened his heart. He defied it when +he smoked too much and read too late at night, and refused to take +exercise or to wear rubbers when it rained. All men, he repeated, are +afraid of little things. Personally, what he was most intensely and most +enduringly afraid of was a revolving storm-door. + +Harding confessed that he approaches a revolving door in a state of +absolute terror. To see him falter before the rotating wings, rush +forward, halt, and retreat with knees trembling, is to witness a +shattering spectacle of complete physical disorganisation. Harding said +that he enters a revolving door with no serious hope of coming out +alive. By anticipation he feels his face driven through the glass +partition in front of him, and the crash of the panel behind him upon +his skull. Some day, Harding believed, he would be caught fast in one +of those compartments and stick. Axes and crowbars would be +requisitioned to retrieve his lifeless form. + +Bowman agreed with Harding. His own life, Bowman was inclined to +believe, is typical of most civilised men, in that it is passed in +constant terror of his inferiors. The people whom he hires to serve him +strike fear into Bowman's soul. He is habitually afraid of janitors, +train-guards, elevator-boys, barbers, bootblacks, telephone-girls, and +saleswomen. But his particular dread is of waiters. There have been +times when Bowman thought that to punish poor service and set an example +to others, he would omit the customary tip. But such a resolution, +embraced with the soup, has never lasted beyond the entrée. And, as a +matter of fact, Bowman said, such a resolution always spoils his dinner. +As long as he entertains it, he dares not look his man in the eye. He +stirs his coffee with shaking fingers. He is cravenly, horribly afraid. + +Bowman is afraid even of new waiters and of waiters he never expects to +see again. Surely, it must be safe not to tip a waiter one never +expected to see again. "But no," said Bowman, "I should feel his +contemptuous gaze in the marrow of my backbone as I walked out. I could +not keep from shaking, and I should rush from that place in agony, with +the man's derisive laughter ringing in my ears." + +The only one of the company who was not afraid of something concrete, +something tangible, was Williams. Now Williams is notoriously, +hopelessly shy; and when he took up the subject where Bowman had left +it, he poured out his soul with all the fervour and abandon of which +only the shy are capable. Williams was afraid of his own past. It was +not a hideously criminal one, for his life had been that of a bookworm +and recluse. But out of that past Williams would conjure up the +slightest incident--a trifling breach of manners, a mere word out of +place, a moment in which he had lost control of his emotions, and the +memory of it would put him into a cold sweat of horror and shame. + +Years ago, at a small dinner party, Williams had overturned a glass of +water on the table-cloth; and whenever he thinks of that glass of water, +his heart beats furiously, his palate goes dry, and there is a horribly +empty feeling in his stomach. Once, on some similar occasion, Williams +fell into animated talk with a beautiful young woman. He spoke so +rapidly and so well that the rest of the company dropped their chat and +gathered about him. It was five minutes, perhaps, before he was aware of +what was going on. That night Williams walked the streets in an agony +of remorse. The recollection of the incident comes back to him every now +and then, and, whether he is alone at his desk, or in the theatre, or in +a Broadway crowd, he groans with pain. Take away such memories of the +past, Williams told us, and he knew of nothing in life that he is afraid +of. + +Gordon's was quite a different case. The group about the table burst out +laughing when Gordon assured us that above all things else in this world +he is afraid of elephants. He agreed with Bowman that in the latitude of +New York City and under the zoölogic conditions prevailing here, it was +a preposterous fear to entertain. Gordon lives in Harlem, and he +recognises clearly enough that the only elephant-bearing jungle in the +neighbourhood is Central Park, whence an animal would be compelled to +take a Subway train to One Hundred and Twenty-fifth Street, and lie in +wait for him as he came home in the twilight. But irrational or no, +there was the fact. To be quashed into pulp under one of those +girder-like front legs, Gordon felt must be abominable. To make matters +worse, Gordon has a young son who insists on being taken every Sunday +morning to see the animals; and of all attractions in the menagerie, the +child prefers the elephant house. He loves to feed the biggest of the +elephants, and to watch him place pennies in a little wooden box and +register the deposits on a bell. What Gordon suffers at such times, he +told us, can be neither imagined nor described. + +My own story was received with sympathetic attention. I told them that +the one great terror of my life is a certain man who owes me a fairly +large sum of money, borrowed some years ago. Whenever we meet he insists +on recalling the debt and reminding me of how much the favour meant to +him at the time, and how he never ceases to think of it. Meeting him has +become a torture. I do my best to avoid him, and frequently succeed. But +often he will catch sight of me across the street and run over and grasp +me by the hand and inquire after my health in so hearty, so honest a +fashion that I cannot bear to look him in the face. And as he beams on +me and throws his arm over my shoulder, I can only blush and shift from +one foot to the other and stammer out some excuse for hurrying away. +Passers-by stop and admire the man's affection and concern for one who +is evidently some poor devil of a relation from the country. One Sunday +he waylaid me on Riverside Drive and introduced me to his wife as one of +his dearest friends. I mumbled something about its not having rained the +entire week, and his wife, who was a stately person in silks, looked at +me out of a cold eye. Then and there I knew she decided that I was a +person who had something to conceal and probably took advantage of her +husband. + +No; the more I think of it, the more convinced am I that very few men +pass their time in contemplating death, which is the end of all things. +Only those people do it who have nothing else to be afraid of, or who, +like undertakers and bacteriologists, make a living out of it. + + + + +II + +THE CHURCH UNIVERSAL + + +Harding declares that a solid thought before going to bed sets him +dreaming just like a bit of solid food. One night, Harding and I +discussed modern tendencies in the Church. As a result Harding dreamt +that night that he was reading a review in the _Theological Weekly_ of +November 12, 2009. + +"Seldom," wrote the reviewer, "has it been our good fortune to meet with +as perfect a piece of work as James Brown Ducey's 'The American +Clergyman in the Early Twentieth Century.' The book consists of exactly +half a hundred biographies of eminent churchmen; in these fifty brief +sketches is mirrored faithfully the entire religious life, external and +internal, of the American people eighty or ninety years ago. We can do +our readers no better service than to reproduce from Mr. Ducey's pages, +in condensed form, the lives of half a dozen typical clergymen, leaving +the reader to frame his own conception of the magnificent activity which +the Church of that early day brought to the service of religion. + +"The Rev. Pelatiah W. Jenks, who was called to the richest pulpit in New +York in 1912, succeeded within less than three years in building up an +unrivalled system of dancing academies and roller-skating rinks for +young people. Under him the attendance at the Sunday afternoon sparring +exhibitions in the vestry rooms of the church increased from an average +of 54 to an average of 650. In spite of the nominal fee charged for the +use of the congregation's bowling alleys, the income from that source +alone was sufficient to defray the cost of missionary work in all +Africa, south of the Zambesi River. Dr. Jenks's highest ambition was +attained in 1923 when the Onyx Church's football team won the +championship of the Ecclesiastical League of Greater New York. It was in +the same year that Dr. Jenks took the novel step of abandoning services +in St. Basil's Chapel, now situated in a slum district, and substituting +a moving-picture show with vaudeville features. Thereafter the empty +chapel was filled to overcrowding on Sundays. To encourage church +attendance at Sunday morning services, Dr. Jenks established a tipless +barber shop. Two years later, in spite of the murmured protests of the +conservative element in his congregation, he erected one of the finest +Turkish baths in New York City. + +"The Rev. Coningsby Botts, Ph.D., LL.D., D.D., was regarded as the +greatest pulpit orator of his day. His Sunday evening sermons drew +thousands of auditors. Of Dr. Botts's polished sermons, our author gives +a complete list, together with short extracts. We should have to go far +to discover a specimen of richer eloquence than the sermon delivered on +the afternoon of the third Sunday after Epiphany, in the year 1911, on +'Dr. Cook and the Discovery of the North Pole.' On the second Sunday in +Lent, Dr. Botts moved an immense congregation to tears with his sermon, +'Does Radium Cure Cancer?' Trinity Sunday he spoke on 'Zola and His +Place in Literature.' The second Sunday in Advent he discussed 'The +Position of Woman in the Fiji Islands.' We can only pick a subject here +and there out of his other numerous pastoral speeches: 'Is Aviation an +Established Fact?' 'The Influence of Blake Upon Dante Gabriel Rossetti,' +'Dalmatia as a Health Resort,' and 'Amatory Poetry Among the Primitive +Races.' + +"The Rev. Cadwallader Abiel Jones has earned a pre-eminent place in +Church history as the man who did most to endow Pittsburg with a +permanent Opera House. Our author relates how in the winter of 1916, +when the noted impresario Silverman threatened to sell his Opera House +for a horse exchange unless 100 Pittsburg citizens would guarantee +$5,000 each for a season of twenty weeks, Dr. Jones made a +house-to-house canvass in his automobile and went without sleep till the +half-million dollars was pledged. He fell seriously ill of pneumonia, +but recovered in time to be present at the signing of the contract. Dr. +Jones used to assert that there was more moral uplift in a single +performance of the 'Mikado' than in the entire book of Psalms. One of +his notable achievements was a Christmas Eve service consisting of some +magnificent kinetoscope pictures of the Day of Judgment with music by +Richard Strauss. Tradition also ascribes to Dr. Jones a saying that the +two most powerful influences for good in New York City were Miss Mary +Garden and the Eden Musée. But our author thinks the story is +apocryphal. He is rather inclined to believe, from the collocation of +the two names, that we have here a distorted version of the Biblical +creation myth. + +"The Fourteenth Avenue Church of Cleveland, Ohio, under its famous +pastor, the Rev. Henry Marcellus Stokes, exercised a preponderant +influence in city politics from 1917 to 1925. Dr. Stokes was remorseless +in flaying the bosses and their henchmen. At least a dozen candidates +for Congress could trace their defeat directly to the efforts of the +Fourteenth Avenue Church. The successful candidates profited by the +lesson, and, during the three years' fight over tariff revision, from +1919 to 1922, they voted strictly in accordance with telegraphic +instructions from Dr. Stokes. In the fall of 1921 Dr. Stokes's +congregation voted almost unanimously to devote the funds hitherto used +for home mission work to the maintenance of a legislative bureau at the +State capital. The influence of the bureau was plainly perceptible in +the Legislature's favourable action on such measures as the Cleveland +Two-Cent Fare bill and the bill abolishing the bicycle and traffic +squads in all cities with a population of more than 50,000. + +"Our author lays particular stress on the career of the Rev. Dr. Brooks +Powderly of New York, who, at the age of thirty-five, was recognized as +America's leading authority on slum life. Dr. Powderly's numerous books +and magazine articles on the subject speak for themselves. Our author +mentions among others, 'The Bowery From the Inside,' 'At What Age Do +Stevedores Marry?' 'The Relative Consumption of Meat, Pastry, and +Vegetables Among Our Foreign Population,' 'How Soon Does the Average +Immigrant Cast His First Vote?' 'The Proper Lighting for Recreation +Piers,' and, what was perhaps his most popular book, 'Burglar's Tools +and How to Use Them.' + +"In running through the appendix to Mr. Ducey's volume," concludes the +reviewer, "we come across an interesting paragraph headed, 'A Curious +Survival.' It is a reprint of an obituary from the New York _Evening +Post_ of August, 1911, dealing with the minister of a small church far +up in the Bronx, who died at the age of eighty-one, after serving in the +same pulpit for fifty-three years. The _Evening Post_ notice states that +while the Rev. Mr. Smith was quite unknown below the Harlem, he had won +a certain prestige in his own neighbourhood through his old-fashioned +homilies, delivered twice every Sunday in the year, on love, charity, +pure living, clean thinking, early marriage, and the mutual duties of +parents towards their children and of children towards their parents. +'In the Rev. Mr. Smith,' remarks our author, 'we have a striking +vestigial specimen of an almost extinct type.'" + + + + +III + +THE DOCTORS + + +The quarrels of the doctors do not concern me. I have worked out a +classification of my own which holds good for the entire profession. All +doctors, I believe, may be divided into those who go clean-shaven and +those who wear beards. The difference is more than one of appearance. It +is a difference of temperament and conduct. The smooth-faced physician +represents the buoyant, the romantic, what one might almost call the +impressionistic strain in the medical profession. The other is the +conservative, the classicist. My personal likings are all for the newer +type, but I do not mind admitting that if I were very ill indeed, I +should be tempted to send for the physician who wears a Vandyke and +smiles only at long intervals. + +The reason is that when I am really ill I want some one who believes me. +That is something which the clean-shaven doctor seldom does. He is of +the breezy, modern school which maintains that nine patients out of ten +are only the victims of their own imagination. He greets you in a jolly, +brotherly fashion, takes your pulse, and says: "Oh, well, I guess you're +not going to die this trip," and he roars, as if it were the greatest +joke in the world to call up the picture of such dreadful possibilities. +When he prescribes, it is in a half-apologetic, half-quizzical manner, +and almost with a wink, as if he were to say, "This is a game, old man, +but I suppose it's as honest a way of earning one's living as most +ways." While he writes out his directions, he comments: "There is +nothing the matter with you, and you will take this powder three times a +day with your meals. It is just a case of too much tobacco supplemented +by a fertile fancy. Rub your chest with this before you go to bed and +avoid draughts. And what you need is not medicine but the active +agitation for two hours every day of the two legs which the Lord gave +you, and which you now employ exclusively for making your way to and +from the railway station. This is for your digestion, and you can have +it put up in pills or in liquid form, according to taste. And the next +time you feel inclined to call me in, think it over in the course of a +ten-mile walk." + +Now this may be cheering if somewhat mixed treatment, but it has nothing +of that sympathy which the ailing body craves. The case is much worse if +your smooth-faced physician happens to be a personal friend. The +indifference with which such a man will listen to the most pitiful +recital of physical suffering is extraordinary. You may be out on the +golf links together, and he has just made an exceptionally fine iron +shot from a bad lie and in the face of a lively breeze. He is naturally +pleased, and you take courage from the situation. "By the way, Smith," +you say, "I have been feeling rather queer for a day or two. There is a +gnawing sensation right here, and when I stoop----" "That must have been +180 yards," he says, "but not quite on the green. You don't chew your +food enough. Take a glass of hot water before your breakfast--and you +had better try your mashie!" Of course, no one likes to talk shop, +especially on the golf links. Still you think, if you were a physician +and you had a friend who had a gnawing sensation, you would be more +considerate. After the game he lights his cigar and orders you not to +smoke if the pain in your chest is really what you have described it. +"In me," he says, cheerfully, "you get a physician and a horrible +example for one price." + +But there is one thing that this impressionistic school of medicine has +in common with the other kind. Both types are faithful to the funereal +type of waiting-room which is one of the signs of the trade. It is a +room in which all the arts of the undertaker have seemingly been called +upon to bring out the full possibilities of the average New York +brownstone "front-parlour." I have often tried to decide whether, in a +doctor's waiting-room, night or day was more conducive to thoughts of +the grave. At night a lamp flickers dimly in one corner of the long +room, and the shadows only deepen those other shadows which lie on the +ailing spirit. But this same darkness mercifully conceals the long line +of ash-coloured family portraits in gold frames, the ash-coloured carpet +and chandelier, and the hideous aggregation of ash-coloured couches and +chairs which make up the daylight picture. Why doctors' reception rooms +should always so strongly combine the attractiveness of a popular +lunch-room on a rainy day with the quiet domestic atmosphere of a county +jail, I have never been able to find out, unless the object is to reduce +the patient to such a horrible state of depression that the mere summons +to enter the doctor's presence makes one feel very much better already. +There are times when to be told that one has pneumonia or an incipient +case of tuberculosis must be a relief after an hour spent in one of +those dreadful ante-chambers. + +The literature in a physician's waiting-room is not exhilarating. +Usually, there is an extensive collection of periodicals four months old +and over. From this I gather that physicians' wives and daughters are +persistent but somewhat deliberate readers of current literature. The +sense of age about the magazines on a doctor's table is heightened by +the absence of the front and back covers. The only way of ascertaining +the date of publication is to hunt for the table of contents. That, +however, is a task which few able-bodied men in the prime of life are +equal to, not to say a roomful of sick people, nervous with +anticipation. Most patients under such circumstances set out +courageously, but only to lose themselves in the first half-dozen pages +of the advertising section. Yet the result is by no means harmful. There +is something about the advertising agent's buoyant, insinuating, +sympathetic tone that is very restful to the invalid nerves. Harrington +tells me that the small suburban house in which he lives, the paint and +roofing with which he protects it against the weather, the lawn-mower +which he has secured in anticipation of a good crop of grass, and the +small stock of poultry he experiments with, were all acquired through +advertisements read in doctors' waiting-rooms. Some physicians take in +the illustrated weeklies as well as the monthly magazines. In one of the +former I found the other day an excellent panoramic view of the second +inauguration of President McKinley. + +But I am afraid I have wandered somewhat from what I set out to say. I +meant to show how different from your clean-shaven doctor is the +physician of the conventional beard. There is no trifling with him. He +takes himself seriously, and he takes you seriously. His examination is +as thorough as the stethoscope can make it; in fact, he listens to your +heart-action long enough to make you fear the worst. This is in marked +contrast with the smooth-faced doctor, who, as a rule, asks you to show +your tongue, and when you obey he does not look at it, but begins to go +through his mail, whistling cheerfully. He puts such vital questions as, +how far up is your bedroom window at night, and do you ever have a +sense of eye-strain after reading too long, and when you reply, he pays +no attention. His entire attitude expresses the conviction that either +you are not ill at all, or that if you are, you are not in a position to +give an intelligent account of yourself. That is not the case with the +other physician. He asks precise questions and insists on detailed +replies. Nothing escapes him. While you are describing the sensations in +the vicinity of your left lung, he will ask quietly whether you have +always had the habit of biting your nails. + +Under such sympathetic attention the patient's spirits rise. From an +apologetic state of mind he passes to a sense of his own importance. +Instead of being ashamed of his ailments he tries to describe as many as +he can think of. His specific complaint may be a touch of sciatica, but +he takes pleasure in recalling a bad habit of breathing through the +mouth in moments of excitement, and a tricky memory which often leads +him to carry about his wife's letters an entire week before mailing +them. The need for a certain amount of self-castigation is implanted in +all of us, and it is satisfied in the form of confession. Many people do +it as part of their religious beliefs. Others belabour themselves in the +physician's office. Men who in the bosom of the family will deny that +they read too late at night and smoke too many cigars will call such +transgressions to the doctor's attention if he should happen to overlook +them. I know of one man suffering from neuralgia of the arm who insisted +on telling his doctor that it made him ill to read the advertisements in +the subway cars. But the doctor who wears no beard does not invite such +confidences. + + + + +IV + +INTERROGATION + + +One day a census enumerator in the employ of the United States +government knocked at my door and left a printed list of questions for +me to answer. The United States government wished me to state how many +sons and daughters I had and whether my sons were males and my daughters +females. I was further required to state that not only was I of white +descent and that my wife (if I had one) was of white descent, but that +our children (if we had any) were also of white descent. I was also +called upon to state whether any of my sons under the age of five (if I +had any) had ever been in the military or naval service of the United +States, and whether my grandfather (if I had one) was attending school +on September 30 last. There were other questions of a like nature, but +these are all I can recall at present. + +Halfway through the schedule I was in a high state of irritation. The +census enumerator's visit in itself I do not consider a nuisance. Like +most Americans who sniff at the privileges of citizenship, I secretly +delight in them. I speak cynically of boss-rule and demagogues, but I +cast my vote on Election Day in a state of solemn and somewhat nervous +exaltation that frequently interferes with my folding the ballot in the +prescribed way. I have never been summoned for jury duty, but if I ever +should be, I shall accept with pride and in the hope that I shall not be +peremptorily challenged. It needs some such official document as a +census schedule to bring home the feeling that government and state +exist for me and my own welfare. Filling out the answers in the list +was one of the pleasant manifestations of democracy, of which paying +taxes is the unpleasant side. The printed form before me embodied a +solemn function. I was aware that many important problems depended upon +my answering the questions properly. Only then, for instance, could the +government decide how many Congressmen should go to Washington, and what +my share was of the total wealth of the country, and how I contributed +to the drift from the farm to the city, and what was the average income +of Methodist clergymen in cities of over 100,000 population. + +What, then, if so many of the questions put to me by the United States +government seemed superfluous to the point of being absurd? The process +may involve a certain waste of paper and ink and time, but it is the +kind of waste without which the business of life would be impossible. +The questions that really shape human happiness are those to which the +reply is obvious. The answers that count are those the questioner knew +he would get and was prepared to insist upon getting. Harrington tells +me that when he was married he could not help smiling when the minister +asked him whether he would take the woman by his side to be his wedded +wife. "What," said Harrington, "did he think I was there for? Or did he +detect any sign of wavering at the last moment?" What reply does the +clergyman await when he asks the rejoicing parents whether they are +willing to have their child baptized into the community of the redeemed? +What is all ritual, as it has been framed to meet the needs of the human +heart, but a preordained order of question and response? In birth and in +burial, in joy and in sorrow, for those who have escaped shipwreck and +those who have escaped the plague, the practice of the ages has laid +down formulæ which the soul does not find the less adequate because they +are ready-made. + +Consider the multiplication-table. I don't know who first hit upon the +absurd idea that questions are intended to elicit information. In so +many laboratories are students putting questions to their microscope. In +so many lawyers' offices are clients putting questions to their +attorneys. In so many other offices are haggard men and women putting +questions to their doctors. But the number of all these is quite +insignificant when compared with the number of questions that are framed +every day in the schoolrooms of the world. Wherefore, I say, consider +the multiplication-table. A greater sum of human interest has centred +about the multiplication-table than about all doctors' and lawyers' and +biologists' offices since the beginning of time. Millions of +schoolmasters have asked what is seven times eleven and myriads of +children's brains have toiled for the answer that all the time has been +reposing in the teacher's mind. What is seven times eleven? What is the +capital of Dahomey? When did the Americans beat the British at +Lexington? What is the meaning of the universe? We shall never escape +the feeling that these questions are put only to vex us by those who +know the answer. + +I said that I am looking forward to be summoned for jury-duty. But I +know that the solemn business of justice, like most of the world's +business, is made up of the mumbled question that is seldom heard and +the fixed reply that is never listened to. The clerk of the court stares +at the wall and drones out the ancient formula which begins +"Jusolimlyswear," and ends "Swelpyugod," and the witness on the stand +blurts out "I do." The Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court +asks the President-elect whether he will be faithful to the Constitution +and the laws of the United States, and the President-elect invariably +says that he will. The candidate for American citizenship is asked +whether he hereby renounces allegiance to foreign kings, emperors, and +potentates, and fervently responds that he does. When I took my medical +examination for a life-insurance policy, the physician asked me whether +I suffered from asthma, bronchitis, calculus, dementia, erysipelas, and +several score other afflictions, and, without waiting for an answer, he +wrote "No" opposite every disease. + +Whenever I think of the world and the world's opinion, I think of Mrs. +Harrington in whom I see the world typified. Now Mrs. Harrington is +inconceivable in a scheme where the proper reply to every question is +not as thoroughly established as the rule for the proper use of forks +at dinner. In the presence of an unfamiliar reply to a familiar question +Mrs. Harrington is suspicious and uneasy. She scents either a joke or an +insult; and we are all Mrs. Harrington. If you were to ask a stranger +whom did he consider the greatest playwright of all times and, instead +of Shakespeare or Molière, he were to say Racine, it would be as if one +were to ask him whether he took tea or coffee for breakfast and he said +arsenic. It would be as though you asked your neighbour what he thought +of a beautiful sunset and he said he did not like it. It would be as if +I were to say to Mrs. Harrington, "Well, I suppose I have stayed quite +long enough," and she were to say, "Yes, I think you had better be +going." + + + + +V + +THE MIND TRIUMPHANT + + +One night after dinner I quoted for Harding the following sentence from +an address by President Lowell of Harvard: "The most painful defect in +the American College at the present time is the lack of esteem for +excellence in scholarship." Thereupon Harding recalled what some one had +said on a related subject: "Athleticism is rooted in an exaggerated +spirit of intercollegiate rivalry and a publicity run mad." + +That night Harding dreamt the following: + +_From the Harvard "Crimson" for October 8, 1937:_ + + "Twenty-five thousand men, women, and children in the Stadium yesterday + broke into a delirium of cheers when the Cambridge team in Early + English Literature won its fourth successive victory over Yale. Both + sides were trained to the minute, however different the methods of the + two head coaches. The Harvard team during the last two weeks had been + put on a course of desultory reading from Bede to the closing of the + theatres by the Puritans in 1642, while Yale had concentrated on the + Elizabethan dramatists and signal practice. + + "Harvard won the toss, and Captain Hartley led off with a question on + the mediæval prototypes of Thomas More's 'Utopia.' Brooks of Yale made + a snappy reply, and by a dashing string of three questions on the + authorship of 'Ralph Roister-Doister,' the sources of Chaucer's + 'Nonne's Preeste's Tale,' and the exact site of the Globe Theatre, + carried the fight into the enemy's territory. But Harvard held well, + and the contest was a fairly even one for twenty minutes. There was an + anxious moment towards the end, when Gosse, for Harvard, muffed on the + date of the first production of 'The Tempest,' but before Yale could + frame another question the whistle blew. + + "In the second half, Yale perceptibly weakened. It still showed + brilliant flashes of attack, but its defence was poor, especially + against Brooks's smashing questions on the Italian influences in + Milton's shorter poems. Harvard made its principal gains against + Burckhardt, who simply could not solve Winship's posers from Ben Jonson + and Beaumont and Fletcher. The Yale coaches finally took him out and + sent in Skinner, the best Elizabethan on the scrub team, but it was too + late to save the day. There were rumours after the game that Burckhardt + had broken training after the Princeton contest by going on a three + days' canoe trip up the Merrimac. That, however, does not detract from + the glory of Harvard's magnificent triumph." + +_From the Boston "Herald" of October 9, 1937:_ + + "William J. Burns and Douglas Mitchell, sophomores at Harvard, were + arrested last night for creating a disturbance in the dining-room of + the Mayflower Hotel by letting loose a South American baboon with a + pack of firecrackers attached to its tail. When arraigned before + Magistrate Conroy, they declared that they were celebrating Harvard's + Early English victory over Yale, and were discharged." + +_From the Yale "News" of June 12, 1940:_ + + "In the presence of twenty thousand spectators, including the President + of the United States, the greater part of his Cabinet, and several + foreign ambassadors, Yale's 'varsity eight simply ran away from + Harvard in the tenth annual competition in Romance languages and + philology. Yale took the lead from the start, and at the end of fifteen + minutes was ahead by 16 points to 7.... This splendid victory is due in + part to the general superiority of the New Haven eight, but too much + credit cannot be given to little Howells, who steered a flawless + contest. The Blue made use of the short, snappy English style of + text-book, while Harvard pinned its faith to the more deliberate German + seminar system. After the contest captains for the following year were + elected. Yale chose Bridgman, who did splendid work on Corneille and + the poets of the Pléiade, while Harvard's choice fell on Butterworth, + probably the best intercollegiate expert on Cervantes. In the evening + all the contestants attended a performance of 'The Prince and the + Peach' at the Gaiety. It is reported that no less than nine out of the + sixteen men have received flattering offers to coach Romance language + teams in the leading Western universities." + +_From the "Daily Princetonian" of February 13, 1933:_ + + "Princeton won the intercollegiate championship yesterday with 63 + points to Harvard's 37, Yale's 18, and 7 each for Brown, Williams, and + Pennsylvania. Princeton won by her brilliant work in the classics and + biology. Firsts were made by Bentley, who did the 220 lines of Homer in + 29-3/5 minutes, scanned 100 Alcaics from Horace in 62 seconds flat, and + hurdled over nine doubtful readings and seven lacunæ in the text of + Aristotle's 'Poetics' in 17-1/2 minutes. Two firsts went to Ramsdell, + who made only two errors in Protective Colouration and one error in + explaining the mutations of the Evening Primrose." + +_From the editorial columns of the New York "Evening Post" for July 7, +1933, and October 11, 1938:_ + + (1) "Scholastic competitions have ceased to be the means to an end and + have become an end in themselves. The passion to win has swept away + every other consideration. Professionalism has laid its tainted hand on + the sports of our college youth. High-priced professors from the + University of Leipzig and the École des Hautes Études are engaged to + drill our teams to victory. Men who should have long ago taken their + Ph.D. have been known deliberately to flunk examinations so as to be + eligible for the 'varsity contests. Promising students in the + preparatory schools are bribed to enroll with this or that college. The + whole problem of summer mathematics reeks to heaven. It is not enough + that a student during eight months of the year will put in all his + time on invariants and the theory of numbers. Vacation time finds him + at some fashionable resort, tutoring the sons of millionaires in + multiplication and quadratic equations." + + (2) "Thus our so-called student 'activities' are neither active in the + true sense, nor fit for students. There has grown up a small clan of + intellectual athletes who win victories while thousands of mediocre + students, six feet and over and having an average weight of 195 pounds, + stand around and cheer. Our student-managers have become men of + business, purely. The receipts at the last Harvard-Yale debate on the + popular election of United States senators amounted to more than + $50,000. The Greek philology team spends three-quarters of its time in + touring the country. The _Evening Howl_ prints the pictures of the + [Greek: Phi Beta Kappa] members every other day. It is time to call a + halt." + + + + +VI + +ON CALLING WHITE BLACK + + +If it were not for the deadly hatred that exists between Bob, who will +be four years old very soon, and Abdul Hamid II, late Sultan of Turkey, +I hardly know what would become of my moral standards. Whenever my sense +of right and wrong grows blunted; whenever the inextricable confusion of +good and bad in everything about us becomes unusually depressing, I have +only to recall how virulent, how inflexible, how certain is Bob's +judgment on the character and career of the deposed Ottoman despot. + +Bob is Harrington's youngest son. He and Abdul Hamid II first met in the +pages of a fat new history of the Turkish Revolution having a white +star and crescent on the cover and perhaps half a hundred pictures +inside. The book immediately supplanted the encyclopædia and General +Kuropatkin's illustrated memoirs of the Russo-Japanese War, in Bob's +affections. Who, he wanted to know, was the swarthy, lean, hook-nosed +gentleman in a tasselled cap, who stood up in a carriage to acknowledge +the cheers of the crowd. That, Harrington told him, was a bad Sultan, +and tried to turn to the next picture, which showed an unhappy-looking +Armenian priest casting his first vote for a member of Parliament. + +But the boy has for some years been in the stage where every fact laid +before him must be backed up with an adequate reason. What does a bad +Sultan do, he wished to know. Harrington was puzzled. It seemed a pity +to bring Bob into touch with the cruelties and pains of life. But on the +other hand here was a chance to inoculate Bob at a very early age with +a hatred for tyranny and oppression, and a love for the principles of +representative government; and on the whole I am inclined to think +Harrington did right. In any case Harrington told the boy that the bad +Sultan was in the habit of sending his soldiers to shoot people, and +burn down their homes, and take away everything they had to eat, and put +all the women into jail. He hesitated over the children. It was out of +the question to tell Bob how, by order of the bad Sultan, little +children were ripped open before their mothers' eyes, or had their +brains dashed out against the walls. The little children, Harrington +finally told Bob, were whipped by the bad Sultan's bad soldiers, and had +all their toys confiscated. + +But that apparently was not enough. Bob wanted to know what else the bad +Sultan did to the little children. What else? Harrington's criminal +imagination had exhausted itself. He didn't know, and he called upon Bob +for suggestions. + +"He gives them medicine," said Bob, "and sprays their throats with +peroxide, and they cry." Was there any after-thought in that remark, +Harrington wondered. Could it be that he had only succeeded in arousing +in that active young mind the recognition of a certain family +resemblance between himself and Abdul the Damned? For that matter, was +it fair to the late Commander of the Faithful to charge his name with a +crime he was probably innocent of? But then again, if that particular +crime was necessary to the lesson borne in on Bob, why hesitate? So +Harrington ponders a moment and decides; yes, even to that level of +iniquity had Abdul Hamid II sunk. The atomiser was one of the +instruments of torture he made use of. And when the bad Sultan is +finally checked in his nefarious career, and dragged off to prison, +where he gets nothing but hard bread to eat and filthy water to drink, +Bob retains the impression that all this came about because the Young +Turks grew tired of having their throats washed with peroxide solutions. + +"When I see the bad Sultan," says Bob, "I will punch him, like this," +and his fist, shooting out and up, knocks the pipe from Harrington's +mouth. + +"But aren't you afraid he will hurt you?" his father asks. + +"No," says Bob; "I'll run away." + +And the boy has been steadfast in his hatred. He meets the Sultan every +night just before supper, when he insists on being taken right through +the fat, red volume with the star and crescent on the cover; and every +time the Sultan's face appears in the pictures, the boy smites it with +his fist. Bob goes to his meals with an excellent appetite engendered by +his violent encounters with that disreputable monarch. + +Abdul Hamid II is in very bad shape from the punishment. Bob has caught +him in the act of addressing the English members of the Balkan +Committee, and left him only a pair of shoulders and one leg. Of the +Sultan driving to the Selamlik every Friday there is visible now only +one of the carriage horses and the fragments of a cavalryman. Nor is the +physical presentment of Abdul Hamid the only thing that has gone to +pieces under Bob's unrelenting hostility. The Sultan's character has +been growing worse and worse as night after night the boy insists upon +new examples of what bad Sultans do. + +To satisfy that inexhaustible demand, Harrington has shouldered Abdul +Hamid with all the sins of all the epochs in history. He has made him +steep unhappy Christian prisoners in pitch and burn them for torches, +and send innocent Frenchmen to the guillotine, and tomahawk the Puritan +settlers as they worked in the fields. He has made him responsible for +St. Bartholomew's Day, and Andersonville prison. He has robbed the Czar +of his just credit by making Abdul Hamid the hero of Bloody Sunday in +St. Petersburg. I am not sure but that Harrington has not laid the +abnormally high price of meat and eggs at the Sultan's door. There are +times when I really feel that Harrington should ask Abdul Hamid's +pardon. + +But no; he should _not_ beg his pardon. For that is just the point I set +out to make. It is a moral tonic to be brought into touch with Bob's +opinion of Abdul Hamid, and to get to feel that things are not all a +hodge-podge, indifferently good or indifferently bad, as you choose to +look at it. In Bob's world there are good things and bad things, and the +good is good and the bad is bad. Bob knows nothing of the cant which +makes the robber monopolist only the sad victim of forces outside his +control. Bob knows nothing of the sentimental twaddle about that +interesting class of people who are more sinned against than sinning. +Bob, like Nature, indulges in no fine distinctions. When he meets a bad +Sultan he punches his head. When he meets a good Sultan, nothing is too +good to believe concerning him. + +And he accepts the one as naturally as he does the other. He has no +moral enthusiasms or enthusiasms of any kind. It is merely an obvious +thing to him that right should triumph and wrong should fail. He does +not play with his emotions. I remember how, one night, in relating the +fall of Abdul Hamid, Harrington had worked himself up to an +extraordinary pitch of excitement. Never had that despot been painted in +such horrid colours; and after he had told how the palace guards rose +against the Constitution, and how the Young Turks marched upon +Constantinople, and how the craven tyrant, crying "Don't hurt me, don't +hurt me," was dragged from his bed by the good soldiers and clapped into +prison, Harrington turned, all aglow, to Bob, and waited for the boy to +echo his enthusiasm. But Bob waited till the cell-door clanged behind +the Unspeakable Turk, and said: "Now tell me about the giraffe that fell +into the water." + +I spoke of the good Sultan. Of course there had to be one, and +Harrington found him in the same book with the bad Sultan. And when he +had studied the somewhat stolid features of Mohammed V for a little +while, it was inevitable that Bob should ask what a good Sultan did. +Harrington was in difficulties again. It was impossible to explain that +at bottom there really is no such thing as a good Sultan; that they are +as a rule cruel and immoral, and always expensive; and that at best they +are harmless, if somewhat stupid, survivals. But since the very idea of +a bad Sultan demands a good one, Harrington tried to satisfy Bob by +investing Mohammed V with a large number of negative virtues. "A good +Sultan does not shoot people, or burn down houses or throw women into +jail or whip little children." The portrait failed to please. Bob's +faith demanded something robust to cling to; and in the end he compelled +his father to do for the good Sultan the opposite of what he had done +for the bad one. Mohammed V stands to-day invested with all the virtues +that have been manifested on earth from Enoch to Florence Nightingale. + +And yet of the two, Bob and his father, I must say again that it is Bob +who has the more truthful and healthy outlook upon life, and it is good +for Harrington to rehearse with him the history of the fall of Abdul +Hamid II three or four times a week. Bob has no flabby standards. He +wastes no time in looking for lighter shades in what is black or dark +spots in the white. Bob holds, for instance, that bad soldiers shoot +down good people, and that good soldiers shoot down bad people. He is +quite as close to the truth as I am, who believe that there is no such +thing as a good soldier and that the business of shooting down people, +whether good or bad, is a wretched one. For all that, I know there come +times when a man must take human life, and in such cases Bob has the +advantage over Hamlet and me. Where we falter and speculate and end by +making a mess of it all, Bob just punches the bad Sultan's head and +passes on to the giraffe that fell into the water. + + + + +VII + +THE SOLID FLESH + + +Physical culture as pursued in the home probably benefits a man's body; +but the strain on his moral nature is terrific. I go through my morning +exercise with hatred for all the world and contempt for myself. Why, for +instance, should every system of gymnastics require that a man place +himself in the most ridiculous and unnatural postures? A stout, +middle-aged man who struggles to touch the floor with the palms of his +hands is not a beautiful sight. Equally preposterous is the practice of +standing on one leg and stretching the other toward the nape of one's +neck. In the confines of a city bedroom such evolutions are not only +ungraceful but frequently dangerous. Harrington tells me that every +morning when he lunges forward he scrapes the tips of his fingers +against the edge of the bed and the tears come into his eyes. When he +throws his arms back he hits the gas jet. Harrington's young son, who +insists on being present during the ordeal, believes that the entire +performance is intended for his amusement, and laughs immoderately. I +cannot blame him. Morning exercise is incompatible with the maintenance +of parental dignity. Were I a child again I could neither love nor +respect a father who placed two chairs at a considerable distance from +each other and mounted them horizontally like the human bridge in a +melodrama. + +I admit, of course, that home exercises have the merit of being cheap. +No special apparatus is required. The ordinary household furniture and +such heirlooms as are readily available will usually suffice. An onyx +clock will do instead of chest weights. Any two volumes of the +Encyclopædia Britannica will take the place of dumb-bells or Indian +clubs. Many a time I have stood still and held a bronze lamp in my +outstretched right hand for a minute and then held it in my left hand +for half a minute. I know of one man who skipped the rope one hundred +times every morning. Within four months he had lost three and a half +pounds, and driven the family in the flat below into nervous +prostration. I have even been told that there are systems of exercise +which show how physical perfection may be attained by scientifically +manipulating, for fifteen minutes every day, a couple of fountain pens +and a paper cutter. But I cannot reconcile myself to such methods +because of the confusion they introduce into the world of common things. +A table is no longer something to write upon or to eat upon, but +something to lie down upon while one flings out his arms and legs fifty +times in four contrary directions. A broom-stick is an instrument for +strengthening the shoulder muscles. When I see a transom, I find myself +estimating the number of times I could chin it. + +The intimate connection between the hygienic life and the temptation to +tell lies is a delicate subject to touch upon; but the facts may as well +be brought out now as later. People of otherwise irreproachable conduct +will lose all sense of truthfulness when they speak of physical culture +and fresh air. They will exaggerate the number of inches they keep their +bedroom windows raised in midwinter; they will quote ridiculous +estimates of the doctors' bills they have saved; they will represent +themselves as being in the most incredibly perfect health. I know one +sober, intelligent business-man who not only habitually understates, by +ten degrees, the temperature of his morning tub, but gives an +altogether distorted impression of the alacrity with which he leaps into +his bath every morning, and the reluctance with which he leaves it. This +same man asserts that he can now walk from the Chambers Street ferry to +his office in Wall Street in astonishing time. And not only that, but +since he took to walking as much as he could, he has cut down his daily +number of cigars to one-fourth (which is untrue). And not only that, but +since he has gone in for exercise and fresh air and has given up +smoking, his income has increased by at least 50 per cent., owing to his +improved health and clearer mental vision. But that again, as I happen +to know, is untrue. + +But there is another, much more subtle form of prevarication. Smith +meets you in the street and remarks upon your flabby appearance. He +argues that you ought to weigh twenty-five pounds less than you do, and +that a long daily walk will do the trick. "Look at me," he says, "I walk +ten miles every day and there isn't an ounce of superfluous flesh on +me." And so saying, he slaps his chest and offers to let you feel how +hard the muscles are about his diaphragm. Of course, there is no +superfluous flesh on Smith. And if he abstained entirely from physical +exertion and guzzled heavy German beer all day and dined on turtle soup +and roast goose every day, and ate unlimited quantities of pastry, he +would still be what he describes as free from superfluous flesh. _I_ +call it scraggy. Smith is one of the men set apart by nature to +perpetuate the Don Quixote type of beauty, just as I am doomed with the +lapse of time to approximate the Falstaffian type. Smith's five sisters +and brothers are thin. His father was slight and neurasthenic. His +mother was spare and angular. Little wonder the Smith family is fond of +walking. Friction and air-resistance in their case are practically +nonexistent. + +I do not, of course, mean to deny the ancient tradition that a sound +body makes a sound mind. But I would only point out that we are just +beginning to wake to the truth of the converse proposition, that a sane, +equable, easy-going mind keeps the body well. Hence there are really two +kinds of exercise, and two kinds of hygiene, a physical kind and a +spiritual kind. Which one a man will choose should be left entirely to +himself. It is only a question of approaching the same goal from two +different directions. Smith is welcome to make himself a better man by +exercising his legs three hours a day. But I prefer to sit in an +armchair and exercise my soul. Smith comes in refreshed from a +half-day's sojourn in the open air, and I come away refreshed from a +roomful of old friends talking three at a time amidst clouds of tobacco +smoke. + +The trouble with so many of the physical-culture devotees is that they +tire out the soul in trying to serve it. I am inclined to believe that +the beneficent effects of the regular quarter-hour's exercise before +breakfast, is more than offset by the mental wear and tear involved in +getting out of bed fifteen minutes earlier than one otherwise would. +Some one has calculated that the amount of moral resolution expended in +New York City every winter day in getting up to take one's cold bath +would be enough to decide a dozen municipal elections in favour of the +decent candidate, or to send fifty grafting legislators to jail for an +average term of three and a half years. The same specialist has worked +out the formula that the average married man's usefulness about the +house varies inversely with his fondness for violent exercise. Smith's +dumb-bell practice, for instance, leaves him no time for hanging up the +pictures. After his long Sunday's walk he is invariably too tired to +answer his wife's questions concerning the influence of the tariff on +high prices. + +By this time it will be plain that I am no passionate admirer of the +gospel of salvation by hygiene. So many things that the world holds +precious have been developed under the most unhygienic conditions. +Revolutions for the liberation of mankind have been plotted in +unsanitary cellars and dungeons. Religions have taken root and prospered +in catacombs. Great poems have been written in stuffy garrets. Great +orations have been spoken before sweating crowds in the foul air of +overheated legislative chambers. Lovers are said to be fond of dark +corners and out-of-the-way places. It is not by accident that children, +said to be the most beautiful thing in the world, are so inordinately +fond of dirt. Every great truth on its first appearance has been +declared a menace to morals and society; in other words, unhygienic. And +yet one would imagine that truth, from its habit of going naked, would +appeal strongly to the ardent fresh-air practitioner. + + + + +VIII + +SOME NEWSPAPER TRAITS + + +At Cooper's house last winter I met Professor Grundschnitt of Berlin, +who has been making a study of American newspaper methods in behalf of +the German government. For some time after the professor's arrival in +this country, he told me, he found himself completely at sea. American +newspapers, it appeared to him, were written in two languages. One was +the English language as he had studied it in the writings of Oliver +Goldsmith, John Ruskin, and Ralph Waldo Emerson. In America it seemed to +be used chiefly by auctioneers, art critics, and immigrants. The other +was a dialect, evidently English in origin, but sufficiently removed +from the parent stock to be quite unintelligible. The professor spent +many painful hours over such sentences as "Jeffries annexes the Brunette +Beauty's Angora," and "Sugar Barons hand Uncle Sam a lemon." This +dialect, he found, was extensively employed by truck-drivers, +playwrights, and college students. + +It did not take the professor very long, however, to overcome this +initial difficulty. His education proceeded rapidly. One of the first +things he learned, so he told me, is that some American newspapers are +printed in black ink and some in red. As a rule, the former tell more of +the truth, but the latter sell many more copies. On Sunday, which in +America is observed much more rigorously than in Europe, the red ink +predominates. The professor suggested that this might be a survival of +primitive times when the British ancestors of the present-day Americans +tattooed themselves in honour of their gods. It is universally accepted +that the American business man reads so many papers because he has +neither the time nor the energy to read books. But this would seem to be +contradicted on Sundays, when every American business man reads two or +three times the equivalent of the entire works of William Shakespeare. +Herr Grundschnitt was inclined to believe that carrying home the Sunday +paper is the most popular form of physical exercise among our people. + +A very curious circumstance about the press in all the great American +cities, the professor thought, is that every newspaper has a larger +circulation than any other three newspapers combined. According to the +arithmetical system in use among all civilised peoples, that would be +manifestly impossible. But the professor imagines that the methods of +calculation by which such results are obtained are the same as those +employed by politicians in estimating their majorities on the eve of +election day, by millionaires in paying their personal taxes, and by +operatic sopranos in figuring out their age. The influence of a +newspaper depends, of course, upon its circulation. Such influence is +exercised directly in the form of news and editorial comment, and +indirectly in the form of wrapping paper. + +Still another curious trait about all American newspapers, this learned +German found, is that they tell a story backward. This arises from the +desire to put the most important thing first; and in this country it is +the rule that the thing which happens last is the most important. As an +illustration Herr Grundschnitt read the following brief account clipped +from one of the principal newspapers in New York city: + +"Arthur Wellesley Jones died in the municipal hospital last night as the +result of injuries sustained in an automobile accident. The end was +peaceful. Mr. Jones was driving his own machine down Fifth Avenue when +he ran into a laundry-wagon at Twenty-first Street. He had left his home +in New Rochelle an hour before. Mr. Jones was an enthusiastic motorist. +In 1905 he won the Smithson cup for heavy cars. In 1903 he was second in +the Westchester hill-climbing contest. In 1899 he helped to organise the +first road race in New York State. He was in Congress from 1894 to 1898, +and was elected to the Legislature in 1889, the same year that his +eldest son was born. Two years before that event he married a daughter +of Henry K. Smith of Philadelphia. He was graduated from Yale, having +prepared for that institution at Andover, where he played right tackle +on the football team. As a child he showed a decided taste for +mechanics. He was born in 1861." + +The daily press in America, the professor went on to say, takes +extraordinary interest in visitors from abroad. He referred, as an +instance in point, to the recent arrival in New York of a nephew of the +Dalai Lama of Tibet. As the ship was being warped into the dock, a young +man with a notebook asked the distinguished visitor if it was true that +his Holiness, the Dalai Lama, had been found guilty of converting the +temple treasures at Lhassa to his own use. Upon receiving a reply in the +negative, the young man asked what progress the suffrage movement had +made in Tibet. He was told that inasmuch as every woman in Tibet must +take care of several husbands instead of one, as among the more +civilised nations, women there were not interested in the question of +votes. Thereupon the young man asked whether Tibet offered a promising +market for automobiles. He was pleased to learn that Tibet, with its +extremely sparse population and its very precipitous cliffs, was an +ideal place for the automobilist. + +These, however, were superficial characteristics. What the professor was +anxious to learn was just how the newspapers influence the national life +to the remarkable extent they undoubtedly do. He knew, of course, that +the Americans are a free people, and that they select their own +lawmakers and magistrates. He soon discovered that when the people +desire to choose some one to rule over them, they name two, three, or +more men for the same office. The newspapers then proceed to accuse +these men of the vilest crimes, and the one who comes out least +besmirched is declared to be elected. After he has been put into office +the people no longer pay attention to him, leaving it to the newspapers +to see that he conducts himself properly. When a high official is caught +stealing the people rejoice, because it shows that the newspapers are +doing their duty. + +In the sphere of social relations, Herr Grundschnitt learned, the +newspapers are mainly concerned with safeguarding the purity and +integrity of the home. Most of them do this by printing full accounts of +all murder and divorce trials. The professor told me that he could +recall nothing in literature that quite equals the white heat of +indignation with which the editor of the _Star_ once spoke of "the +festering national sore revealed in the proceedings of the Dives divorce +suit, the nauseous details of which the reader will find in all their +hideous completeness on the first three pages of the present issue, +together with all the photographs ruled out of evidence on the grounds +of decency." The press also serves the cause of public morals by holding +up to scorn the vices and extravagances of the vulgar rich, whose +ill-used millions, as they hasten to point out elsewhere, are nothing +more than what any American may look forward to, provided he has courage +and energy. + +The same ingenious method of promoting virtue by holding up vice to +obloquy is pursued in every other field, the learned German told me. The +newspapers do not print the names of men who support their wives, but +they print the names of men who do not, or who support more than one. +They do not publish the photographs of honest bank clerks, but of +dishonest ones, and of these only when they have stolen a very large +sum. They pay no attention to a clergyman as long as he advocates the +brotherhood of man, but they have large headlines about the minister who +believes in the moderate use of the Scotch highball. They overlook a +college professor's epoch-making researches in American history, and +take him up when he comes out in favour of an exclusive diet of raw +spinach. From the newspaper point of view, a college professor counts +less than a professional gambler; a gambler counts less than an actress; +a good actress counts less than a bad one; a bad actress counts less +than a prize-fighter; a prize-fighter counts less than a chimpanzee that +has been taught to smoke cigarettes; and an educated chimpanzee counts +less than a millionaire who suffers from paranoia. By continuously +pondering on the horrors of crime and vice as depicted in the +newspapers, the American people are roused to such a hatred of evil that +some editors receive a salary of $100,000 a year. + +Oddly enough, the American people freely criticise their newspapers. One +of the commonest charges is that their editors write with great haste +and little accurate information. But, Herr Grundschnitt argued, it is +unfair to insist that newspapers shall be both forceful and accurate. +It is true that the editors who supply the American people with their +opinions think fast and write fast, but it is absurd to maintain that as +a class they are unreasonably set in their own beliefs. Editors, as a +matter of fact, change their opinions every little while. In such cases +they usually have no difficulty in proving that, while their present +views are right, their previous views were also right. This makes for +consistency. Nor is there any reason for maintaining, as is often done, +that editors are restive under criticism. The professor declared that +there are very few newspapers in the United States that will refuse to +print a letter from any one who believes that the paper in question is +the only one in town with courage and honesty enough to tell the truth +and that it is the best newspaper in the country at the price. + +As for the old-fashioned critics who maintain that not even the best +newspaper tells more than half the truth, my informant pointed out that +every town and village in the United States has at least two daily +publications. The conscientious reader who buys both is thus saved from +error. + +When I rose to say good-night the professor accompanied me to the door, +and would not let me go till he had pronounced a final eulogy on the +press in general, and the American newspaper in particular. He +expatiated on its omnipresence. The printed sheet is with a man when he +wakes in the morning, and when he falls asleep at night, and when he is +at the breakfast table with his wife. The newspaper breaks up families +and reunites other families, though it usually misspells their names. It +chastises the rascal, and worries the honest man. It can make a +reputation in a day, and destroy a reputation in ten minutes, sending +its owner into the grave or upon the vaudeville stage. It teaches +Presidents how to rule, women how to win husbands, the Church how to +save souls, and middle-aged gentlemen how to reduce weight by exercising +ten minutes every day. It knows nearly everything and guesses at the +rest. It will say almost anything and publish the rest at advertising +rates. Without it, democratic government would be difficult and +travelling in the Subway quite impossible. The newspaper is the only +institution since the world began that succeeds in being all things to +all men for the moderate sum of one cent a day. The only universal +things that come cheaper, the professor told me, are birth and death. + + + + +IX + +A FLEDGLING + + +A sophomore's soul is not the simple thing that most people imagine. I +am thinking now of my nephew Philip and of our last meeting. This time, +he was more than usually welcome. I was lonely. The family had just left +town for the summer and the house was fearfully empty. I sat there, +smoking a cigarette amid the first traces of domestic uncleanliness, +when I heard him on the stairs. The dear boy had not changed. Dropping +his heavy suitcase anyways, he seized my hand within his own huge paw +and squeezed it till the tears came to my eyes. His voice was a young +roar. He threw his hat upon the table, thereby scattering a large number +of papers about the room, and then sat down upon my own hat, which was +lying on the armchair, on top of several July magazines. I had put my +hat down on the chair instead of hanging it up, as I should have done, +because the family was away and I was alone in the house. + +Might he smoke? He was busy with his bull-dog pipe and my tobacco jar +before I could say yes. He explained that he was sorry, but he found he +could neither read, write, nor think nowadays without his pipe. He +admitted that he was the slave of a noxious habit, but it was too late, +and he might as well get all the solace he could out of a pretty bad +situation. But, as I look at Philip, I cannot help feeling that his fine +colour and the sparkle in his blue eyes and his full count of nineteen +years make the situation far less desperate than he portrays it. Philip +is not a handsome lad, but he will be a year from now. At present he is +mostly hands and feet, and his face shows a marked nasal development. +Before Philip has completed his junior year, the rest of his features +will have reasserted themselves, and the harmony of lineament which was +his when he was an infant, as his mother never tires of regretfully +recalling, will be restored. Until that time Philip must be content to +carry the suggestion of an attractive and eager young bird of prey. + +Philip lights pipe after pipe as he dilates on his experiences since +last I saw him. The moralising instinct is very weak in me. I cannot +find it in my heart to censure Philip's constant mouthing of the pipe. +I, too, smoke, and I am not foolish enough to risk my standing with +Philip by preaching where I do not practise. Besides, I observe that the +boy does not inhale, that his pipe goes out frequently, and that his +consumption of matches is much greater than his consumption of tobacco. +So I say nothing in reproof of his pipe. + +But it is different with his language. Philip, I observe regretfully, is +profane. I am not mealy-mouthed myself. There are moments of high +emotional tension when silence is the worst form of blasphemy. But +Philip is profane without discrimination. His supply of unobjectionable +adjectives would be insufficient to meet the needs of the ordinary +kindergarten conversation. He uses the same swift epithet to describe +certain brands of tobacco, the weather on commencement day, the food at +his eating-house, his professors of French and of mathematics, the +spirit of the incoming freshman class, and the outlook for "snap" +courses during the coming year. + +It is not my moral but my æsthetic sense that takes offence, so I ask +Philip whether it is the intensity of his feelings that makes it +impossible for him to discuss his work or his play without continual +reference to the process of perdition and the realm of lost souls; or +whether it is habit. No sooner have I put my question than I am sorry. +There is nothing the young soul is so afraid of as of satire. It can +understand being petted and it can understand being whipped; but the +sting behind the smile, the lash beneath the caress, throws the young +soul into helpless panic. It feels itself baited and knows not whither +it may flee. I have always thought that the worst type of bully is the +teacher in school or in college who indulges a pretty talent for satire +at the expense of his pupils. It is a cowardly and a demoralising +practice. It means not only hitting some one who is powerless to retort, +it means confusing the sense of truth in the adolescent mind. Here is +some one quite grown up who smiles and means to hurt you, who says good +and means bad, who says yes and means no. The young soul stares at you +and sees the standards of the universe in chaos about itself. + +And I feel all the more guilty in Philip's case because I know that the +lad speaks only a mechanical lingo which goes with his bull-dog pipe and +the aggressive shade of his neckwear and his socks. The very pain and +alarm my question raises in him shows well enough that his soul has kept +young and clear amid his world of "muckers" and "grinds" and "cads" and +"rotten sneaks," and all the men and things and conditions he is in the +habit of depicting in various stages of damnation. "Now, you're making +fun of me," says Philip. "We fellows don't know how to pick out words +that sound nice, but mean a--I beg your pardon--a good deal more than +they say. Anyhow, I suppose, if I try from now on till doomsday I shall +never be able to speak like you." + +Bless his young sophomore's soul! With that last sentence Philip has +seized me hip and thigh and hurled me into an emotional whirlpool, where +chills and thrills rapidly succeed each other. Because I am fifteen +years older than Philip the boy invests me with a halo and bathes me in +adoration. I am fifteen years older than he, I am bald, obscure, and far +from prosperous, and there is unmistakably nothing about me to dazzle +the youthful imagination. Yet the facts are as I have stated them. +Philip likes to be with me, copies me without apparently trying to, and +has chosen my profession--so he has often told me--for his own. I am +pretty sure that he has made up his mind when he is as old as I am to +smoke the same brand of rather mediocre tobacco which I have adopted for +practical reasons. I am sometimes tempted to think that Philip, at my +age, intends to be as bald as I am. + +Hence the alternate thrills and chills. I am by nature restless under +worship. The sense of my own inconsequence grows positively painful in +the face of Philip's outspoken veneration. There are people to whom such +tribute is as incense and honey. But I am not one of them. I have tried +to be and have failed. I have argued with myself that, after all, it is +the outsider who is the best judge; that we are most often severest upon +ourselves; that if Philip finds certain high qualities in me, perhaps +there is in me something exceptional. I even go so far as to draw up a +little catalogue of my acts and achievements. I can recall men who have +said much sillier things than I have ever said, and published much worse +stuff than I have ever written. I repeat to myself the rather striking +epigram I made at Smith's house last week, and I go back to the old +gentleman from Andover who two years ago told me that there was +something about me that reminded him of Oliver Wendell Holmes. By dint +of much trying I work myself up into something of a glow; but it is all +artificial, cerebral, incubated. The exaltation is momentary, the cold +chill of fact overtakes me. There is no use in deceiving one's self. +Philip is mistaken. I am not worthy. + +But that day Philip rallied nobly to the situation. My little remark on +strong language had hurt him, but he saw also that I was sorry to have +hurt him, and he was sorry for me in turn. "I don't in the least mind +your telling me what you think about the way we fellows talk," he said. +"That's the advantage of having a man for one's friend, he is not afraid +of telling you the truth even if it hurts. And then, if you wish to, you +can fight back. You can't do that with a woman." + +"Have you found that out for yourself!" I asked him. + +He looked at me to see if again I was resorting to irony. But this time +he found me sincere. + +"Women!" Philip sniffed. "I have found it doesn't pay to talk seriously +to a woman. There is really only one way of getting on with them, and +that's jollying them. And the thicker you lay it on, the better." He put +away his pipe and proffered me a cigarette. "I like to change off now +and then. I have these made for me in a little Russian shop I discovered +some time ago. They draw better than any cigarette I have ever smoked. +Of course, there are women who are serious and all that. There are a lot +in the postgraduate department and some in the optional literature +courses. But you ought to see them! And such grinds. None of us fellows +stands a ghost of a chance with them. They take notes all the time and +read all the references and learn them by heart. You can't jolly +_them_. They wouldn't know a joke if you led them up to one and told +them what it meant. I think coeducation is all played out, don't you? +Home is the only place for women, anyhow. Do you like your cigarette?" + +The Patient Observer, it may possibly have been gathered before this, is +somewhat of a sentimentalist. He liked his cigarette very well, but +through the blue haze he looked at Philip and could not help thinking of +the time--only two short years ago--when he, the Patient Observer, with +his own eyes saw Philip borrow a dollar from his mother before setting +out for an ice-cream parlour in the company of two girl cousins. The +Patient Observer has changed little in the last two years; his hair may +be a little thinner and his knowledge of doctors' bills a little more +complete. But in Philip of to-day he found it hard to recognise the +Philip of two years ago. And the marvels of the law of growth which he +thus saw exemplified moved the Patient Observer to throw open the gates +of pent-up eloquence. He lit his pipe and began to discourse to Philip +on the world, on life, and on a few things besides. + +And when it was time for both of us to go to bed, Philip stood up and +said, "I wish I came every day. You don't know what a bore it is, +listening to that drool the 'profs' hand you out up there." His fervent +young spirit would not be silent until, with one magnificent gesture, he +had swept the tobacco jar to the floor and shattered two electric lamps. +Then he went to his room and left me wondering at the vast mysteries +that underlie the rough surface of the sophomore's soul. + + + + +X + +THE COMPLETE COLLECTOR--I + + +"I have given up books and pictures," said Cooper. "I now devote myself +entirely to collecting samples of the world's wisdom." + +"Proverbs, do you mean?" I asked. + +"No, but the facts on which proverbs are based. You see, I grew tired of +pictures when it got to be a question of bidding against millionaires +for the possession of spurious old masters. The break came when Downes +proved that my Velasquez was painted in 1896. His own, it turned out, +was done in 1820; but even then, you see, he had the advantage over me. +So I concentrated on books. But I could not resist the temptation of +glancing through my first editions now and then, and the pages began to +give way. Then I tried Chinese porcelains. There, again, I had to +compete against Downes, who ordered his agent to buy two hundred +thousand dollars' worth of Chinese antiquities for the Louis XIV. room +in his new Tudor palace. And, besides, this rather disconcerting thing +happened: I had as my guest a mandarin who was passing through New York +on his way to Europe, and I showed him my collection of jades. 'There +was only one collection like this in China some years ago,' I told him. +'Yes,' he replied, 'it was in my house when the foreign troops entered +Peking in 1900.' So I decided to sell my porcelains. + +"But of course I had, as you say, to collect something, and for a long +time I could think of no field in which a cultivated taste and personal +effort could make way against the competition of mere brute millions. +And then, all at once, I hit upon proverbs. The suggestion came in a +rather peculiar fashion. It seems that there was an eccentric old poet +on Long Island who spent many years in collecting all sorts of inanimate +freaks, odds and ends, and rubbish. When he died they found among his +treasures a purse made out of a sow's ear and a whistle made from a +pig's tail. I saw my opportunity at once. The eccentric old man, by +acquiring two such extraordinary _objets d'art_ had indulged himself in +a sneer at the world's proverbial wisdom. I would come to the rescue of +our threatened stock of experience by gathering the facts that upheld +it. I would make it, besides, more than the selfish hobby of the private +collector who gives the world only a very little share of the pleasure +he tastes. I would make my collection a museum and a laboratory. Instead +of reading about the wise ant and the busy bee people should come and +see them in the life. It was the difference between reading about +animals in a book and seeing them in the life." + +"And have you succeeded?" I asked. + +"Beyond all expectations," he replied. "Come, I will take you through my +galleries," and he showed the way into the queerest garden I have ever +seen. It was as if a menagerie and a museum had been brought together in +the open air. Between enclosures and cages which harboured animals of +all species, ran long tables supporting glass cases like those used for +exhibiting coins or rare manuscripts. + +"Now here," he said, stopping before a small chest with a glass top, +"here is my collection of straws." + +"Straws?" I said. + +"Yes. It is small but select. Here, for instance, is the last straw that +broke the camel's back. Some one suggests that it must have been a Merry +Widow hat, but that's jesting, of course. This again is the straw that +showed which way the wind blew and enabled a politician to change sides +and get a reputation as a reformer. We will see the politician further +on." I noticed then for the first time that the iron-barred cages +contained human beings as well as beasts. "Here is a handful of straws +which an entire conference of theologians spent three months in +splitting. This," pointing to a little mannikin about four inches high, +"is the man of straw whose defeat in debate gave one of our United +States Senators his brilliant reputation. And this, finally, is a +handful of straws out of the pile on which Jack Daw slept when he gave +up his bed to buy his wife a looking-glass, or, as some one has +suggested, an automobile. + +"And now observe the advantages of my method. The student, having been +shown the straw that broke the camel's back, will, if he is a cautious +student, well drilled in the methods of modern research, demand to see +the camel. Well, here it is," and Cooper turned toward a large enclosure +where several members of the family _Camelidæ_ were peacefully browsing, +with the exception of one that lay in a corner with drooping head and +closed eyes, apparently lifeless. "It's been hard work, of course, and +expensive, keeping a broken-backed camel alive, but, encouraged by such +examples of the remarkable vitality of animals as may be seen for +instance in the Democratic donkey, I have persisted and succeeded. This +rather thin-legged creature near the fence is the camel that tried to +pass through the needle's eye, and the one close beside him is the one +swallowed by the man who strained at a gnat. Harrington asserts that he +has never been able to see how either phenomenon is possible, but the +problem is only half as difficult as it appears. For it is evident that +if a camel were small enough to pass through the eye of a needle, there +would be comparatively little trouble in swallowing him. And, speaking +of needles, it has been a constant regret that my collection is still +without a needle found in a haystack." + +I have not the space to enumerate one tithe of what Cooper showed me. As +we hurried past the cages containing numerous specimens of _Homo +Sapiens_, he contented himself with pointing out a physician who had +failed to cure himself by psycho-therapeutics; a shoemaker who by +sticking to his last failed to become a railroad president, though in +the course of time he could tell where every man's shoe pinched; an +importer who, in defiance of the Pure Food law, put new wine into old +bottles, and labelled them Bordeaux; and a harmless-looking man of +middle age, who continued to smile and smile, and had played Iago, +Macbeth, and Hamlet's uncle. Before a sturdy-looking man dressed in +working-clothes Cooper stopped for a moment and said, "Mr. C. W. Post +and Mr. James Farley assure me that this is the rarest item in my +collection." + +"Who is he?" I asked. + +"It is a union labourer who is worthy of his hire," Cooper said. + + + + +XI + +THE EVERLASTING FEMININE + + +I am convinced that the easiest business in the world must be the +writing of epigrams on Woman. I have been reading, of late, in a new +volume of "Maxims and Fables." It came to me with the compliments of the +author, in lieu of a small debt which he has kept outstanding for +several years. Although the writer contradicts himself on every third or +fourth page, I am justified in calling the book a very able bit of work +for the reason that the ordinary book on this subject contradicts itself +on every other page. No one who glances through this volume will fail to +understand why the psychology of Woman should be a favourite subject +with very young and very light thinkers. It is the only form of +literature that calls for absolutely no equipment in the author. Writing +a play, for instance, presupposes some acquaintance with a few plays +already written. No one can succeed as a novelist without a fair +knowledge of the technique of millinery or a tolerable mastery of stock +exchange slang. The writer of scientific articles for the magazines must +have fancy, and the writer of advertisements must have poetry and wit. +But to produce a book of epigrams on Woman requires nothing but an +elementary knowledge of spelling and the courage necessary to put the +product on the market. + +The secret of the thing is so simple that it would be a pity to keep it +from the comparatively few persons who have failed to discover it. It +consists entirely in the fact that whatever one says about Woman is +true. And not only that, but every statement that can possibly be made +on the subject is sure to ring true, which is much better even than +being true. On every other subject under the sun there is always one +opinion which sounds a little more convincing than every other opinion. +There are, for example, people who insist that birds of a feather do not +necessarily flock together more frequently than birds of a different +feather do; and they will assert that if you step on a worm with real +firmness the chances of his turning are much less than if you did not +step on him at all. Nevertheless, there is undeniably a truer ring about +the assertion that birds do flock together than about the assertion that +they do not, and we accept more readily the worm that turns than the +worm that remains peaceful under any provocation. But this is not the +case with aphorisms about the gentler sex. There, everything sounds as +plausible as everything else. + +Let me be specific. Right at the beginning of the volume to which I have +alluded, I came across the following apothegm: "Long after Woman has +obtained the right to vote she will continue to face the wrong way when +she steps from a street-car." "How true," I said to myself. Well, a few +days later, while glancing through the pages at the end of the volume, +my eye fell on the following lines: "Now that Woman is learning to face +the right way when she steps from a street-car, she has demonstrated her +right to the ballot." "How true." But I had scarcely expressed my +approval when it occurred to me that I had read the same thing elsewhere +in the book. And when I searched out the earlier passage and compared +the two and found that they did not say the same thing, but quite the +opposite thing, it did not seem to make a very great difference after +all. They both sounded plausible. I recited one sentence aloud and then +the other, and they rang equally true; and the more I repeated them the +truer they rang. + +Delighted with my chance discovery I proceeded to make a thorough study +of "Maxims and Fables" with the object of bringing together the author's +widely scattered observations on the same topic under their appropriate +heads. The work went slowly at first; but after a little while I found I +could pick out a maxim and turn almost instinctively to one that +directly contradicted it. The occupation is fascinating as well as +instructive. It sheds a new light on the conditions of human knowledge +and the workings of the human mind. Consider, if you will, the following +half-dozen sentences that I succeeded in compiling in less than ten +minutes. They all deal with the question of a woman's age: + +"A woman is as old as she looks. + +"A woman is as old as she says. + +"A woman is as old as she would like to be. + +"A woman is as old as the only man that counts would have her be. + +"A woman is as old as any particular situation requires. + +"A woman is as old as her dearest woman friends say she is." + +Let any one read these maxims to himself quietly, and admit that not +only would each of them impress him as true if found standing by itself, +but that they all ring quite as true when taken together. But that is by +no means all. It may be shown that if all these propositions are true, +taken singly or together, the negative of each and all of these +propositions is also true. Thus: + +"A woman is seldom as old as she looks. + +"A woman is never as old as she says. + +"No woman is just the age she would like to be. + +"A woman is rarely as old or as young as the one man that counts would +have her be. + +"Few women are ever of the age that a particular situation requires. + +"No woman is as old as her dearest woman friends say she is." + +How all these opposites can be equally true, I will not undertake to +explain. It is probably inherent in the very nature of the subject. The +French, a people wise in experience, knew what they were about when they +laid it down that if you have a mystery to solve, you must look for the +woman. What they meant was, that, having found a woman, you may make any +statements you please about her; the world will accept them +unquestioningly and your puzzle will consequently be solved. + +Sometimes, however, it has seemed to me that a possible reason for this +very curious fact may be found in the established fashion of speaking +about men as individuals and about women as a class and a type. And that +class or type we saddle with all the faults and virtues of all its +individual members. When Smith tells me that his automobile cost him +three times as much as I know he has paid for it, I record my +impressions by telling Jones as soon as I meet him that the man Smith is +an incorrigible liar. But when Mrs. Smith tells me that her family is +one of the oldest in Massachusetts, which I have every reason to believe +is not so, I invariably say to myself or to some one else, "A woman's +appreciation of the truth is like her appreciation of music; she likes +it best when she closes her eyes to it." + +Or Smith may be a very straightforward man, given to plain-speaking, and +when you ask him how he liked your last dinner he may say that in his +opinion the wine was better than the conversation. In that case you will +probably tell your wife that Smith has shown himself to be an +insufferable ass, and that you have decided to cut his acquaintance. But +when Mrs. Smith tells you that your expensive dinners are rather beyond +what a man of your modest income should go in for, you merely writhe and +smile; only on the train the next day you will say to Harrington, "Has +it ever occurred to you that a woman loves the truth, not because it is +the truth, but because it hurts? Take a cigarette." + +For these reasons I would urge every one who can possibly find time, to +write a book of maxims about Woman, provided he has not done so already. +In the first place, as I have shown, it is an easy and delightful +occupation, which, for that very reason, is in danger of becoming +overcrowded. But there is another reason for losing no time in the +matter. Now and then I have the foreboding that some day in the near +future the world may suddenly lose its habit of believing that, where +women are concerned, two and two are four and are not four at the same +time. And then there will be no more writing of epigrams on Woman. For +it is evident that there can be no point to an epigram if its assertions +must be qualified. The situation will become impossible when students of +psychology, instead of writing, "Woman likes the truth for the same +reason that she likes olives--to satisfy a momentary craving," will be +compelled to write, "Some women tell the truth, and some women do not," +"Some women mean yes when they say no, and some women mean no," "Some +women think with their hearts, and some think with their minds." That +little word "some" will settle the epigram writer's business, and an +interesting form of literature will disappear. + +Not that in some respects its disappearance will fail to arouse regret. +These books amused very many people in the writing, and they never did +very much harm. And it is something to have a universal topic that every +one can write on, just as it is stimulating to have a universal appetite +like eating, or a universal accomplishment like walking. How many other +subjects besides Woman have we on which the schoolboy and the sage can +write with equal confidence, fluency, and approach to the truth? +Possibly even women will regret that they are no longer the subject of +universal comment. Who knows? A woman will forgive injury, but never +indifference. + + + + +XII + +THE FANTASTIC TOE + + +When we reach the year 1910 [Harding dreamt he was reading in the +_Weekly Review_ for 1952], we find the art of dancing well on its way +toward establishing itself as the predominant mode of expression. The +next few years marked a tremendous advance. The graceful _danseuses_ who +interpreted Mendelssohn's "Spring Song," Tchaikovsky's Sixth Symphony, +and Shakespeare's "Tempest" were the pioneers of a vast movement. We can +do nothing better than recall a few typical public performances given in +New York during the season of 1912-13. + +In a splendid series of matinées extending over two months, Professor +William P. Jones danced the whole of Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the +Roman Empire." The first two volumes were danced in slow time, to the +accompaniment of two flutes and a lyre. The poses were statuesque rather +than graceful, and the gestures had in them a great deal of the antique. +But, beginning with the story of the barbarian invasions in the third +volume, Professor Jones's interpretation took on a fury that was almost +bacchantic. The sack of Rome by the Vandals in the year 451 was pictured +in a veritable tempest of gyrations, leaps, and somersaults. The subtle +and hidden meanings of the text called for all the resources of the +Professor's eloquent legs, arms, shoulders, lips, and eyes. A certain +obscure passage in the life of Attila the Hun, which had long been a +puzzle to students of Gibbon, was for the first time made clear to the +average man when Professor Jones, standing on one foot, whirled around +rapidly in one direction for five minutes, and then, instantly reversing +himself, spun around for ten minutes in the opposite direction. + +In the ballroom of the Hotel Taftoftia, during Christmas week, William +K. Spriggs, Ph.D., held a number of fashionable audiences spellbound +with his marvellously lucid dances in Euclid and Algebra up to +Quadratics. Perhaps the very acme of the Terpsichorean art was attained +in the masterly fluency of body and limbs with which Mr. Spriggs +demonstrated that the sum of the angles in any triangle is equal +to two right angles. In Pittsburg Mr. Spriggs is said to have moved +an audience to tears when, by an original combination of the Virginia +reel, the two-step, and the Navajo snake dance, he showed that if +_x^{2}+y^{2}_ = 25 and _x^{2}-y^{2}_ = 25, _x_ equals 5 and _y_ equals +zero. All the pride and selfishness of _x_, all the despair of _y_, were +mirrored in the dancer's play of features. The spectators could not help +pondering over the seeming law of injustice that rules the world. Why +should _x_ be everything in the equations and _y_ nothing? Why should +_y_'s nonentity be used even to set off the all importance of _x_? But +they found no answer. On the other hand, a large number of college +freshmen who had failed on their entrance mathematics found no +difficulty in passing off their conditions after attending three +performances of Mr. Spriggs's dance. + +We can give only the briefest mention to an entire school of experts and +scientists who helped to make the season of 1912-13 memorable in the +annals of the greatest of all arts. For a solitary illustration we may +take Mr. Boom, who, at the annual meeting of the American Zoölogical +Association, danced his monumental two-volume work entitled, "The +Variations of the Alimentary Canal in the Frogs and Toads." This dance +was subsequently repeated before several crowned heads of Europe. + +An event of more than ordinary interest was the debate between Senators +Green and Hammond on the question whether the United States should +establish a protectorate over Central America. Senator Green danced for +the affirmative and Senator Hammond danced for the negative. Both +gentlemen had an international reputation. Senator Green's war-dance in +the Senate on the Standard Oil Company is still spoken of in Washington +as the most striking rough-and-tumble exhibition of recent years. +Senator Hammond is an exponent of a style which lays greater stress on +finesse than on vigour. In a single session of the Senate he is said to +have sidestepped nearly a dozen troublesome roll-calls without arousing +any appreciable dissatisfaction among his constituents. Before a popular +jury, however, Senator Green's Cossack methods were likely to carry +greater conviction. And that is what happened in the great debate we +have referred to. Senator Hammond appeared on the platform in a filmy +costume made up of alternate strips of the Constitution of the United +States and the Monroe Doctrine. Wit, sarcasm, irony followed one another +in quick succession over his mobile features and fairly oozed from his +fingers and toes. Yet it was evident that while he could appeal to the +minds of the spectators he had no power to sway their emotions. It was +different with Senator Green. A thunderous volume of applause went up +the moment he appeared on the stage, booted and spurred and heavily +swathed in American flags. His triumph was a foregone conclusion. The +scene that ensued when Senator Green concluded his argument by leaping +right over the table and pouring himself out a glass of ice-water on the +way, simply beggars description. + +No one to-day can possibly foresee [wrote the critic of the _Weekly +Review_] to what heights the dance, as the expression of all life, will +be carried. We can only call attention to the plans recently formulated +by one of our leading publishers for a library of the world's best +thought, to be issued at a price that will bring it within the reach of +people of very moderate means. The library will consist of bound volumes +of photographs showing the world's greatest dancers in their +interpretation of famous authors. Twenty young women from the Paris and +St. Petersburg conservatories of dancing have already been engaged. +Among other works they will dance the Psalms and Ecclesiastes, the +second book of the Iliad, "Oedipus the King," the fifth Canto of +Dante's "Inferno," Spinoza's "Ethics," "Hamlet," Rousseau's +"Confessions," "Mother Goose," Tennyson's "Brook" and the "Charge of the +Light Brigade," Burke's "Speech on Conciliation," "Alice in Wonderland," +the "Pickwick Papers," the Gettysburg Address, Darwin's "Origin of +Species," and Mr. Dooley. + + + + +XIII + +ON LIVING IN BROOKLYN + + +Perhaps the principal charm about living in Brooklyn lies in the fact +that strangers can find their way there only with extreme difficulty. +The streets in Brooklyn are to me a perpetual source of joy and +wonderment. Like the city itself, they have kept the slow-paced habits +of a former age. No city is more easy to be lost in, and Brooklyn is at +all times full of people from across the river, who ask the way to +Borough Hall. For that matter, one may easily be lost on Staten Island, +where the inhabitants are reputed to pass the pleasant summer evenings +in guiding strangers to the trolley lines. But a person naturally +expects to lose his bearings on Staten Island. On the other hand, to be +lost in Brooklyn irritates as well as confuses. It is like starving in +the midst of plenty. One always has the choice of half a dozen surface +cars, but one is always sure to be directed to the wrong one. + +So I repeat: Brooklyn's tangled streets serve their highest purpose in +safeguarding its inhabitants against the unwelcome visitor. Because of +our American good nature we are always inviting people to call; and when +they accept we immediately feel sorry. It is a law with us that if two +utterly unsympathetic persons meet by chance at the house of a common +friend, they shall insist on having each other to dinner on the +following two Sundays. Or, again, you may be shaking hands with a very +dear friend in the presence of a third person whom you dislike. And you +are extremely anxious to have your friend come up for tea on Sunday, +and you cannot do it without asking the other man. + +Under such circumstances, it is well to live in Brooklyn. All you need +say then to the person you have an aversion for is: "I should be +delighted to have you call on us Sunday afternoon. We live in Brooklyn, +you know, at No. 125 Bowdoin Place." You may then go home in peace, +confident that your undesired visitor will never find you. At eight +o'clock on Sunday night he will be wearily asking a policeman on +Flatbush Avenue what the shortest way is to Borough Hall. Long before +that he will have given up hope of finding No. 125 Bowdoin Place. His +only object is to get home before midnight. Now it is plain that such an +excellent defence against unpleasant people is unavailable in Manhattan. +Ask a man to look you up at No. 952 West One Hundred and Twelfth Street, +and though your heart loathes him, you shall not escape. But in +Brooklyn you are safe until the moment your doorbell actually rings. For +even if your visitor should find Bowdoin Place, many streets in Brooklyn +have two, three, or four systems of numbering. Some will maintain that +it is not rigidly honest to give a stranger your Brooklyn address +without giving him detailed directions for finding his way from the +station, illustrating your argument with a sketch map. But there will +always be Puritan consciences. + +As a matter of fact, some of the kindest and most enlightened people I +know live in Brooklyn. And I cannot see why that in itself should make +them a subject for general satire. I have been told that a professor at +Harvard has recently made the calculation that the drama and the art of +conversation in America would be poorer by 33-1/3 per cent. if the joke +about living in Brooklyn were to disappear. When a visitor from +Brooklyn drops in unexpectedly at a Harlem flat, the proper thing for +the host to say is, "Well, well, what a task it must have been to find +your way out," and when the visitor starts for home his host remarks, +"Sorry you can't stay; but we all know how it is--in the midst of life +you are in Brooklyn. Goodnight." + +Of course I don't mean to deny that the people who live in Brooklyn are +themselves largely responsible for the perpetuation of the silly jest. +They subscribe to it in a spirit of meekness that is characteristically +local. Ask a man from Cherry Springs or Binghamton where is his home and +he will quietly say, Cherry Springs or Binghamton, as the case may be. +But the resident of Brooklyn is apologetic from the start. He +anticipates criticism by saying, "Well, you know, _I_ live in Brooklyn," +and he looks at you in tremulous expectation of the usual condolences. +If by any chance one should omit the traditional reply, the man from +Brooklyn begins to fear the worst. On both sides of the East River the +principle seems to be accepted that inasmuch as there are places like +Cherry Springs or Binghamton there must be people who live in them, but +that it is by definition impossible to bring forward a valid reason why +one should live in Brooklyn. + +The question is really a complicated one. Harlem's disapproval of +Brooklyn is not of a piece with Harlem's disapproval of localities +outside itself. Living in Brooklyn is something utterly different from +living in New Jersey or the Bronx. New Jersey and the Bronx are so +entirely out of the ordinary that they call for no explanation. Living +there has at least the merit of originality. A great poet might choose +to live in the Bronx. Minor poets have been known to commute across the +Hudson. But Brooklyn cannot be dismissed so easily. She is too big, too +close, and, for all her timidity, too contented. Her people come under +the head of those who ought to know better and do not try. Thus, while +living in New Jersey is a matter of taste, and living in the Bronx is a +matter of necessity, living in Brooklyn is a matter of habit. + +And a fine, rich, ripe old habit it is, and a precious thing in a +modern, shouting world that has no habits but only impulses and vices. +Let me confess: I like Brooklyn, and I like to dream of going to live +there some day. And possibly I would go if it were not for the desire of +keeping the project before me as one of the few ideals I have retained +in life. I like Brooklyn's shapeless rotundity as contrasted with our +abominable rectangular distances in Manhattan. I like it because it +sprawls low against the ground instead of clawing up into the sky. +Manhattan is solid with brick and steel from river to river. Brooklyn +ambles on peacefully till it comes to a region of sand lots or a marsh +or a creek, and stops. Half a mile further on it resumes its gentle +dreams of progress and wanders north, or south, or east, as the fancy +seizes it. It runs into blind corners, it debouches upon ravines and +woodland strips, it hears the echoes of ocean on the beaches. It is +leisure; it is peace; it is Brooklyn. + +At the same time it is well to remember that Brooklyn is something more +than a geographical fact. Brooklyn describes a scheme of life and a +condition of the mind. The life there is like a page from yesterday. +People who live in Brooklyn organise reading circles. They attend +lectures on the Wagnerian music drama. They have retained progressive +euchre and the strawberry festival as essential ingredients of religion. +They are extremely fond of going on long excursions into the country in +early spring. They make it a habit to walk across the bridge on their +way home in the evening, and they speak with great feeling of the +beautiful effect when New York's high buildings flash into banked masses +of flame in the falling dusk. People who live in Brooklyn take pride in +keeping up old friendships and in dressing without ostentation. There +are old gentlemen who use only the ferries in coming to New York, +because they regard the bridges as a novelty open to the suspicion of +being unsafe. + +And yet, as I have said, Brooklyn is rather a condition than a concrete +fact. I believe every great Babylon has its neighbouring Brooklyn. +London has it; Boston has it; Paris has it; even Chicago has it. And the +line of demarcation between what is Brooklyn and what is not Brooklyn is +not always a sharp one. There are many people in Manhattan who at heart +are residents of Brooklyn. Such people, though they live in Harlem, +avoid the express trains in the Subway on account of the crush. They +visit the Museum of Natural History on Sunday and the Metropolitan +Museum of Art on legal holidays and extraordinary occasions. They cross +the Hudson and walk on the Palisades. They bring librettos to the opera +and read them in the dark, thus missing a great deal of what passes on +the stage. On the other hand, you will find people in Brooklyn whose +spirit is totally alien to the place. They want to boost Brooklyn and +boom it and push it and make it the most important borough in Greater +New York, and develop its harbour facilities, and establish a great +university, and double the assessed value of real estate within five +years. Such people are in Brooklyn, but not of it. + +And that is why Brooklyn has so strong a hold on me. I like it because +it has so many wonderful, valuable, common things in it. In Brooklyn +there are people, churches, baby-carriages, bay-windows, butchers' boys +carrying baskets and whistling, policemen who misdirect strangers, +vacant lots where boys play baseball, small tradesmen, overhead +trolleys, quiet streets tucked away between parallel lines of clanging +elevated railway, an Institute of Arts, and old gentlemen who write +letters to the newspapers. I like Brooklyn because it hasn't the highest +anything, or the biggest anything, or the richest anything in the +world. + + + + +XIV + +PALLADINO OUTDONE + + +Harding spent one long winter night in reading the report of a select +committee of the Society for Psychical Recreation which placed on record +no less than half a dozen absolutely authenticated cases of material +objects being moved through space by some mysterious agency other than +physical. The report, as it took shape in Harding's dreams that night, +was as follows: + +In the first experiment the medium was an ordinary American citizen. The +precautions against the slightest bodily movement on his part were +perfect. Mr. Joseph G. Cannon planted both of his feet on the medium's +left foot and seized his left hand in both his own. Senator Aldrich did +the same on the other side. The Honourable Sereno E. Payne grasped the +medium by the throat, the Honourable John Dalzell straddled on his +chest, Senator Burrows of Michigan strapped his ankles to the chair, and +Senator Scott of West Virginia thrust a gag into his mouth. As a further +precaution, before the séance began, a representative of the Sugar Trust +went through the medium's pockets. The medium struggled and groaned and +made other signs of distress, but at all times remained under absolute +control. Yet it is a fact that, in spite of all restraints imposed upon +him, this ordinary American citizen did succeed in raising a family of +two sons and a daughter and even in sending the eldest child to college. +At various times one even caught sight of a loaf of bread or a pair of +shoes sailing through the air, and once, for a moment, the Committee +distinctly smelt roast turkey with cranberry sauce. At the end of the +séance the medium was in a pitiful state of exhaustion, but declared +that he was quite ready to go on. + +In the second experiment the Committee made use of the Mayor of one of +our large cities and of the boss of the party to which the Mayor +belonged. The boss acted as medium, being securely strapped into a chair +about three feet away from another chair, on which the Mayor was +sitting, blindfolded. Again the standard precautions against fraud were +gone through, but this time the medium's efforts met with almost +immediate response. At the merest droop of the boss's right eyelid, the +Mayor leaped up from his chair and turned completely around. The boss +smiled faintly, whereupon the Mayor balanced himself for 3 minutes and +42 seconds on his right foot and for 2 minutes and 35 seconds on his +left foot, and then began to run about the room on all-fours in an +amusing imitation of a spaniel fetching and carrying for his master. The +boss inserted the point of his tongue into his cheek and withdrew it +again, repeating the process several times in rapid succession. In +response, the Mayor's face went into a series of spasmodic smiles and +frowns that aroused general laughter. At the conclusion of the +performance, the boss gently clicked his tongue against his palate, and +the Mayor promptly stood on his head in the middle of the floor. + +A somewhat similar experiment was concerned with a magazine editor and a +life-size mannikin made up to resemble a muckraker. The editor and the +lay figure sat facing in opposite directions at a distance of about ten +feet. The editor, who acted as medium, was holding the telephone +receiver with one hand and signing checks with the other, so that there +could be no question of manual manipulation on his part. Neither could +his feet come into play, because they were in full view on his desk. The +telepathy hypothesis was eliminated because, in the first place, the +mannikin had no mind, of course, and in the second place, the editor +changed his own mind so fast that no external mind could possibly keep +up with it. The results were gratifying. The editor took a slip of paper +and wrote a few words upon it. Immediately the stuffed figure began to +shout, "Murder! Fire! Thieves! Help! Murder! Fire! Thieves! Help! +Murder!" at intervals of two seconds. The editor wrote something on +another slip of paper, and the mechanical figure went through a most +complex series of movements. First it seized a pair of paint brushes and +began to paint all the white objects in the room black and all the black +objects white. Then it went through the motions of playing, for a few +minutes, upon a typewriter. Then it seized a pair of shears and set to +work clipping solid pages from books and magazines. Then it copied a +long column of figures from an almanac and added them up wrong. Then it +drew a memory sketch of an English statesman, and put the wrong name +under it. The editor assured the Committee that he could continue the +process for hours at will. + +An excellent séance was one in which the medium was a man very near the +top in American finance. The rest of the group forming the circle around +the table were plain American citizens of the type described in the +first experiment. The medium was securely roped in his chair with +anti-Trust laws, anti-rebating laws, insurance laws, banking laws, +franchise laws, etc. Yet no sooner were the lights turned down than the +phenomena began. John Smith, on the right of the medium, suddenly felt a +sharp blow on the neck. As he turned around instinctively a ghostly +hand snatched away his pocket-book and the sound of mocking laughter +could be plainly heard from the dark cabinet. Another weird hand pulled +Thomas Jones's insurance policy out of his breastpocket, dangled it in +the air just out of his reach, and then flung it back at him. Later when +Jones looked at his policy he found that its face value had been cut +down one-half. James Robinson all at once began to feel his shoe pinch, +and could not discover the reason until he, too, caught sight of a +ghostly hand hovering in the vicinity of his pocket. Soon the room was +filled with a veritable chaos of flying objects. Railroads, steamship +lines, national banks, trust companies, insurance companies, went +hurtling through the air, but all the time our financier sat motionless +in his chair. It was suggested that the force which set such ponderous +objects into motion was the mysterious element known as "executive +ability." + +In the final experiment the subject was a popular novelist, who gave a +most interesting exhibition of how a nation-wide reputation can be +raised and supported without the slightest apparent reason. A +painstaking examination by the Committee showed that he had concealed +about him neither talent, nor imagination, nor knowledge of human +nature, nor insight into life, nor an intimate acquaintance with the +elements of English grammar. Nevertheless, before the eyes of the amazed +observers, novel after novel went humming through the air in a direction +away from the writer, while a steady stream of bank-books, automobiles, +and country houses flowed in the opposite direction. + + + + +XV + +THE CADENCE OF THE CROWD + + +I have always been peculiarly susceptible to the music of marching feet. +I know of no sound in nature or in Wagner that stirs the heart like the +footsteps of the crowd on the board platform of the Third Avenue "L" at +City Hall every late afternoon. The human tread is always eloquent in +chorus, but it is at its best upon a wooden flooring. Stone and asphalt +will often degrade the march of a crowd to a shuffle. It needs the +living wood to give full dignity to the spirit of human resolution that +speaks in a thousand pair of feet simultaneously moving in the same +direction; and particularly when the moving mass is not an army, but a +crowd advancing without rank or order. I am exceedingly fond of military +parades; so fond that I repeatedly find myself standing in front of +ladies of medium height who pathetically inquire at frequent intervals +what regiment is passing at that moment. But it is not the blare of the +brass bands I care for, or the clatter of cavalry, which I find +exceedingly stupid, or even the rattle of the heavy guns, but the men on +foot. Only when the infantry comes swinging by do I grow wild with the +desire to wear a conspicuous uniform and die for my country. +Saint-Gaudens's man on horseback in the Shaw memorial is beautiful, but +it is the forward-lunging line of negro faces and the line of muskets on +shoulder that threaten to bring the tears to my eyes. + +This, I suppose, is rank sentimentality; but I cannot help it. Any +procession, no matter how humble, puts me into a state of mingled +exaltation and tearfulness. It is in part the sound of human footsteps +and in part the solemn idea behind them. I am not thinking of stately +processions moving up the aisles of churches to the sound of music. I +have in mind, rather, a band of, say, a thousand working girls on Labour +Day, or of an Italian fraternal organisation heavy with plumes and +banners, or even a Tammany political club on its annual outing; wherever +the idea of human dependence and human brotherhood is testified to in +the mere act of moving along the pavement shoulder to shoulder. Above +all things, it is a line of marching children that takes me quite out of +myself. I was a visitor not long ago at one of the public schools, and I +sat in state on the principal's platform. When the bell rang for +dismissal, and the sliding doors were pushed apart so as to form one +huge assembly room, and the children began to file out to the sound of +the piano, the splendour and the pathos of it overpowered me. I did not +know which I wanted to be then, the principal in his magnificent chair +of office, or one of those two thousand children keeping step in their +march towards freedom. + +Pathos? Why pathos in a little army of children marching out in fire +drill, or the same children marching in for their morning's Bible +reading and singing? I find it difficult to say why. Perhaps it is +consciousness of that law which has raised man from the brute, and which +I see embodied when we take a thousand children and range them in order +and induce them to keep step. Perhaps the pathos is in the recognition +of our isolated weakness and our need to make painful progress by +getting close together and moving forward in close formation. In any +case, the pathos is there. Consider a children's May party, on its way +to Central Park. A fife-and-drum corps of three little boys in uniform +leads the way. The Queen of the May, all in white, walks with her +consort under a canopy of ribbons and flowers, a little stiffly, +perhaps, and self-consciously, but not more so than older queens and +kings on parade. A long line of boys and girls in many-coloured caps +moves between flying detachments of mothers carrying baskets. The +confectioner's wagon, laden with its precious commissariat of ice cream +and cake, moves leisurely behind; for the confectioner's horse this is +evidently a holiday. Is pathos conceivable in so delightful, so smiling, +an event? Alas, I have watched May parties go by, and the serious little +faces under the red and white caps have given me a heavier case of +_Weltschmerz_ than I have ever experienced at a performance of "Tristan +und Isolde." It was the fact of those little children advancing in +unison; that is the word. If they had trudged or scurried along, +pell-mell, I should not have minded. But May parties move forward in +procession, and the movement of a compact crowd is, to me, always heavy +with pathos. + +But no crowd is like the afternoon crowd upon the wooden platform of the +"L" station at City Hall. I don't mean to be sentimental when I say that +the sound is to me like the march of human civilisation and human +history. Outwardly there is little to justify my grandiose comparison. +You see only a heaving mass of men and women who are not very well clad. +The men are unshaven, the women awry with a day's labour. They move on +with that beautiful optimism of an American crowd which has been trained +in the belief that there is always plenty of room ahead. There is very +little pushing. Occasionally a band of young boys hustle their way +through the crowd; but a New York crowd seems always to be mindful of +the days when we were all of us boys. It is a reading public. The men +carry newspapers whose flaring headlines of red and green give a touch +of almost Italian colour. The women carry cloth-bound novels in paper +wrappers. But it is not an assemblage of poets or scholars or thinkers, +or whatever class it is that is supposed to keep the world moving. It is +that most solemn of all things--a city crowd on its way home from the +day's work. + +The footsteps keep up the tramp, tramp, on the board flooring, while +train after train pulls out jammed within and without. The influx from +the street allows no vacuum to be formed upon the platform. The patience +of the modern man shows wonderfully. The tired workers face the hour's +ride that lies between them and home with beautiful self-restraint and +courage. And in their weariness and their patience lies the full +solemnity of the scene. The morning crowd, even on the same wooden +platform at City Hall, is different. The morning crowd is not so firmly +knit together. You catch individual and local peculiarities. You feel +that there are men and women here from Harlem, and others from Long +Island, and others from Westchester and the Bronx. They are still fresh +from their separate homes, with their separate atmospheres about them. +Some are brisk from the morning's exercise and the cold bath; some are +still a bit sleepy from last night's pleasures; some go to the day's +task with eager anticipation; some move forward indifferent and +resigned. But when these same men and women surge homeward in the +evening, they are one in spirit; they are all equally tired. The city +and the day's task have seized upon them and passed them through the +same set of rollers and pressed out their differences and transformed +them into a single mass of weary human material. The city has had its +day's work out of them and now sends them home to recruit the new +supply of energy that it will demand to-morrow. The unshaven men with +their newspapers and the listless women with their paper-covered novels +show ascetically tight-drawn faces, as if the day had been passed in +prayer and supplication. I need not see those faces; I know they are +there from the steady footfalls on the board platform. I overhear a +young girl recounting what a perfectly lovely time she had last night, +and how she simply couldn't stop dancing; but her foot drags a bit +heavily and there sounds in her chatter and her vehemence the +ground-tone of weariness. + +It is not often that I hear the tramp of the late afternoon crowd upon +the wooden platforms at City Hall. I find the sound of the crowd too +solemn to be endured every day, and there is no comfort in the crush. I +usually take pains to travel at an early hour when there are few people, +and one is sure of a seat. + + + + +XVI + +WHAT WE FORGET + + +The importance of knowing who my Congressman is had never occurred to me +until Professor Wilson Stubbs brought up the subject at a luncheon in +the Reform Club. Professor Stubbs spoke on Civic Obligations. He argued +that at the bottom of all political corruption lay the average citizen's +personal indifference. "For instance," he said, "how many of those +present know the name of the man who represents their district at +Washington?" And as it happened, while he waited for a reply, his eye +rested thoughtfully on me. + +I grew red under his scrutiny. I tried my best to remember and failed. I +did vaguely recall the lithographed presentment of a large, +clean-shaven man, with a heavy jaw. It hung in a barber-shop window +between a blue-and-red poster announcing a grand masquerade and civic +ball, and a papier-maché trout under a glass case. I could not bring +back the man's name, although I was sure that his picture was inscribed +on the top "Our Choice," and at the bottom he was characterised as +somebody's friend--I could not recall whether he was the People's +friend, or the Workingman's, or the Bronx's. I could not even make out +his features, although, oddly enough, I could see the trout very +distinctly. The fish, I recollected, had a peculiarly ferocious scowl, +as if it resented the absurd blotches of green and gold with which the +artist had attempted to imitate Nature's colour scheme. Gradually I +found myself thinking of the trout as a member of Congress. Had I +continued much longer, I should have visualised that fish in the act of +addressing the Speaker of the House on the tariff bill. + +Yet I could not help taking the professor's implied criticism to heart. +It would have been something even, to be able to tell whether I lived in +the Eleventh Congressional District or the Fifteenth; but I didn't know. +For how long a term was the man elected? I didn't know. Was it required +that he should be able to read and write? I didn't know. + +That was the beginning. When luncheon was over, I sat before the fire +and tried to find out how much I did know of the things I should. I +found myself staring into bottomless depths of ignorance. I tried to +draw up a list of State Governors. I knew there must be between forty +and fifty, but I could remember only three Governors, including our own; +and later I recalled that one of the three was dead. + +From death my mind leaped, oddly enough, to drownings. How should one +go about resuscitating a man who has been pulled out of the river? He +must be rolled on a barrel, of course; that much I remembered. But was +it face down or face upward? And should his arms be pumped vertically up +and down, or horizontally away from the body and back? Yes, and how if +some intelligent foreigner were to ask me what our five principal cities +were, in the order of population? It would be easy enough to begin, New +York, Chicago, Philadelphia--and then? Was it Boston, or Baltimore, or +San Francisco? I did not know. + +There was no stopping now. I was fast in my own clutches. I bit at my +cigar, and tried to call the roll of the seven wise men of Greece. I +stopped at the first, Solon. He, I remembered, rescued the Athenians +from misgovernment and slavery, and left the city before they could +experience a change of heart and hang him. + +Who were the nine muses? Well, there was Terpsichore--her disciples are +spoken of every day in the newspapers. And then there was the muse of +History, whose name possibly was Thalia, and the muse of Poetry, whose +name I could not recall. I fared much better with the apostles: Peter +and Paul, of course, and John and James, and Judas and Matthew, and Mark +and Luke; eight out of twelve. + +But of the seven wonders of the world I could cite with certainty only +one, the Colossus of Rhodes. I was doubtful about Mount Vesuvius. I +remembered not a single one of the seven deadly sins, and, at first, +could place only two of the ten commandments--the ones on filial +obedience and on the Sabbath. Later I thought of the newest realistic +hit at the Park Theatre; that brought back one more commandment. On the +other hand, it was a relief to call the three Graces straight +off--Faith, Hope, and Charity. + +I grew humble. I began to doubt if, after all, it is true that a modern +schoolboy knows more than Aristotle did. In any case, whether +Harrington's boy who is still in the grammar grades knows more than +Aristotle, he certainly knows more than his father. They have a +new-fashioned branch of study in the modern schools, which they call +training the powers of observation. And that boy comes home with +mischief in his soul, and asks Harrington which way do the seeds in an +apple point. Harrington stares at the boy, and the boy smiles +quizzically at Harrington, and the father grows suspicious. Are there +seeds in an apple? There are seedless oranges, of course, which +presupposes oranges not destitute of seeds; but an apple? Harrington +tries to call up the image of the last apple he has eaten and he thinks +of sweet and sour apples, apples of a waxen yellow and apples of a +purple red, but he cannot visualise the seeds. + +As Harrington sits there dumb, Jack asks him which shoe does he put on +first when he dresses in the morning. Jack knows, the rascal. He can +trace every process through which the cotton fibre passes from the plant +to the finished cloth. He knows why factory chimneys are built high. He +knows how a boat tacks against the wind. And he knows that his father +knows nothing of these things. + +But I would rather have Harrington's boy quiz me on things that I can +pretend are not worth knowing, like the seeds in an apple, than on +things that cannot be waved aside. I tried to explain one day how the +revolution of the earth about the sun produces the seasons, and I +succeeded only in proving that when it is winter in New York it is +daylight in Buenos Ayres. Thereupon, Jack asked me what an unearned +increment was. When I finished he said his teacher had told them that +views like those I had just expressed were common among ill-informed +people. The following day he came in and said to Harrington, "Papa, name +six female characters in Dickens, in three minutes." Well, Harrington +did, but it was a strain, and in order to make up the total he had to +count in the anonymous, elderly, single woman whom Mr. Pickwick +surprised in her bedroom. Jack insisted that, as she was nameless, it +was not fair to call her a character, but Harrington put his foot down +and refused to argue the matter. + +And as I sit there before the fire, smiling over Harrington and Jack and +myself, my cigar goes out, and I signal Thomas to bring me another. +Thomas has the ascetic countenance of a tragedian, and the repose of an +archbishop. Now, Thomas--and it comes to me with a shock--what do I +know about Thomas, the man, as distinguished from the hired servant whom +I have been aware of this year and more? Is he married or single? And if +he is married, do his children resent their father's wearing livery? +Does Thomas himself like to be a servant? Are there ideals and +speculations behind that close-shaven mask? Has he any views on the +future life? Has he ever thought on the subject of vivisection? Does he +vote the Republican ticket? Does he earn a decent wage? + +I could only answer, with an aching sense of isolation, with the wistful +longing of one who looks into unfathomable depths, that I didn't know. +Oh, Thomas, fellow man, brother! We have rubbed elbows for months and I +do not know whether you are a man or only a lackey; whether you drink +all night, or pray; whether you love me or hate me. How can you hold the +cigar box so impassively, so single-mindedly? + +I said to myself that I would make amends to Thomas, that it was never +too late. And, quietly, genially, I asked him, "How do you like your +place here, Thomas?" Thomas grew uneasy, and smiled in a sickish +fashion, and entreated me with his eyes to pick my cigar and let him go. +But I was in the full swing of new-found righteousness. "There's nothing +wrong, is there, Thomas?" And he replied, "I beg pardon, sir; but +Henry's my name. Thomas was my predecessor. He left, you will remember, +sir, a year ago last May." "But everybody calls you Thomas." "The +gentlemen were used to the other name, sir." + +Might Professor Wilson Stubbs be wrong, after all, I thought. Perhaps no +one is really expected to know what everybody ought to know. I don't +know the name of my Congressman. But neither do I know the name of my +butcher and my grocer; and my butcher and my grocer can slay me with +typhoid or ptomaines, whereas the utmost my Congressman can do is to +misrepresent me. I don't know the man who makes my cigars; he may be +consumptive. I don't know the critic who supplies me with literary +opinions, and the scholar who gives me my outlook upon life. I don't +know the man who lives next door. From the decent silence that reigns in +his apartment, I gather that he does not beat his wife; but that is all. +Yet he and I are supposed to be bound up in a community of interests. We +both belong to the class whose income ranges from $2,000 to $4,000 a +year, of which we spend 38 per cent. on food; and we raise an average of +2-2/3 children to the family, and are both responsible for the wide +prevalence of musical comedy on the American stage. But I have seen my +neighbour twice in the last three years. + +So that was the end of it. And because it was late in the afternoon, I +thought I would telephone to the office that I was not coming back. But +for the life of me, I could not think of my telephone number; and Henry +looked me up in the directory. + + + + +XVII + +THE CHILDREN THAT LEAD US + + +The mayor sat before his library fire and shivered, and kept wondering +why there was no clause in the city charter prescribing a minimum of +common sense for presidents of the Board of Education. A man thus +qualified would know more than to suggest an increase of three million +dollars for school sittings. The city's comptroller was crying +bankruptcy; the newspapers were asserting that the mayor's nephew was +head of a favoured contracting firm not entirely for his health; and the +Board of Education wanted three million dollars. The mayor had a touch +of fever. The steep rows of figures in the Education Board's memorandum +curled up into little arabesques under his eyes, which were closing +with fatigue. Only he did not wish to sleep. In the perfect stillness he +could hear his own rapid heartbeat. The clatter of sleety rain against +the windows made him restless. + +If only O'Brien were here, O'Brien, who was a good chief of police, and +a matchless personal aide-de-camp. They would then put on boots and +oilskins and go out into the night on one of their frequent +Harun-Al-Rashid expeditions. The mayor's wife? Yes, it is true that +before leaving for the theatre she had cautioned him not to stir from +the house. But she could not possibly have known how great was his need +of a breath of air. But O'Brien was not here. Was it because he had just +been appointed president of the Board of Education and comptroller in +one and was a busy man? Perhaps. And yet a person might step to the +telephone and ring up O'Brien if it were not that one's legs were +weighted down with the weight of centuries and of dozens of new school +buildings all in reinforced concrete. Was it concrete? The mayor was not +quite sure, and he turned to ask O'Brien, who stood there at one side of +the fireplace, erect and attentive. + +"Do we go out to-night?" said the mayor. + +"I should not advise it, your Honour," answered O'Brien. "You are not +well enough. If it is adventure you would go in search of, I have here +quite an extraordinary delegation of citizens who desire an interview +with your Honour." + +"Let us hear them, by all means," replied the mayor. + +O'Brien drew aside the curtain which divided the library from the +general reception room and there marched in, two abreast and maintaining +precise step, a solemn line of children, who saluted the mayor gravely +and ranged themselves in a semicircle across the room. As the mayor +veered in his chair to face his visitors, a girl of some fifteen years +stepped out of the line. She was still in her schoolgirl's dresses, but +tall, with features of a fine, pensive cut and earnest eyes that were +already peering from out the child's life into the opening doors of +womanhood. + +"May it please your Honour," she began, "we are a committee from the +Central Bureau of Federated Children's Organisations and we have come +here to protest against certain intolerable conditions of which our +members are the victims." + +Had they come in behalf of those additional three million dollars, the +mayor wondered uneasily. "State the nature of your grievance," he said. + +The leader of the delegation came a step nearer. "Your Honour, I can +only attempt the merest outline of our general position. Several of my +associates will take turns in acquainting you with the details of our +case. Our complaint is that we, the children of this country, are being +overworked. Formerly it was supposed to be the inalienable right of +children to remain free from the cares of life. That theory has long +been abandoned. The task of solving the gravest problems of existence +has been thrust upon us, and every day that passes leaves us saddled +with new responsibilities. But the limit of endurance has been reached +at last. We feel that unless we protest now the whole structure of +society--its economics, politics, art, and religion--will be shifted +from the shoulders of the world's men and women to the shoulders of us +children. I hope your Honour is willing to hear us." + +"Of course, my dear," the mayor answered softly. He said, "My dear," and +he said it tenderly because he had recognised in the speaker his own +daughter Helen, whom he had supposed with her mother at the theatre. + +"Step forward, Flora Binns," said Helen, and Flora Binns, who was only +eight, blue-eyed, and with ringlets of gold, approached and curtsied +prettily. "May it please your Honour," she said, "I am the delegate from +Local No. 16 Children of Weak and Tempted Stage Mothers' Union. We wish +to place on record our opposition to the modern society drama, which so +frequently throws the duty of supporting the climax of a play upon +children under the age of ten. Although the playwrights are fond of +showing that our papa is a brute and that our mamma is an angel, they +invariably shrink from the logical conclusion that our mamma is right in +planning to run away with the man who has offered her years of silent +devotion. So the playwrights make one or two of us appear on the stage +just in time to arouse in our mamma a sense of duty to her children and +to prevent the elopement. Now we submit that the office of justifying +our entire modern marriage fabric is too burdensome for us. Don't you +think so, Mr. Mayor?" + +"Why, yes," replied the mayor, thoughtfully. + +"And they make use of us in other ways, sir. In fact, whenever the grown +up persons in a play are in difficulties and the audience is beginning +to yawn, the author sends us to the rescue. Why, only the other day we +children saved a Wild West melodrama from utter failure. It took three +of us to do it, but we succeeded." Flora curtsied, started back and +returned. "And when I utter these sentiments, sir, I speak also for the +Union of Precocious Magazine Children, which is represented here by Mary +Sparks." Mary Sparks, a dark-haired miss with dancing eyes, bowed +saucily. + +"Step out, Fritz Hackenschneider," said Helen, and flaxen-haired Fritz, +radiantly holiday-like in his lustrously washed face and large, blue +polka-dot tie, approached the mayor's chair. + +"I don't have much to say, sir," he recited in a nervous, jerky voice. +"I have been sent by the Fraternal Association of Comic Supplement +Children. We wish to raise our voice against the almost universal +conception that people can be made to laugh only when one of us hides a +pin on the seat of grandpa's chair. The burden of an entire nation's +humour is more than we can sustain. Thank you, sir," and he retired into +the background, giving, as he passed, just one tug at Mary Sparks's hair +and eliciting a suppressed scream. + +"Mamie O'Farrell," called out Helen. The mayor found it impossible to +decide whether Mamie was thirteen or twenty-five. She was very short +and flat-chested, and the colour of her face in the firelight was like a +dull cardboard. She wore a long, faded automobile cloak and an enormous +black hat with a trailing green feather. On a gilt chain about her neck +hung a locket in the form of a heart half as large as the one that beat +uneasily within her. Mamie came forward reluctantly and saluted. Then +she began to squirm from side to side and to shift from foot to foot, +giggling in unfathomable embarrassment. + +"Well," said Helen, in a voice that was not at all unkind. + +Mamie's giggle grew worse. She seemed bent on snapping the massive gilt +chain with twisting it back and forth, and finally gave up the whole +case. "You tell it, Helen," she begged. "I forgot wot I was goin' t' +say. I'm scared poifectly stiff." + +Helen complied. "May it please your Honour, Mamie O'Farrell wants me to +say that she represents the Amalgamated Union of Cash Girls and Juvenile +Cotton Mill and Glass Factory Operatives. Mamie is fifteen. She works +eleven hours a day and receives three and a half dollars a week. She +passes two hours every day clinging to a strap in a crowded surface car. +She carries her lunch in a paper bundle together with a copy of Laura M. +Clay's novel entitled 'Irma's Ducal Lover.' Saturday nights, if her +father has been strong enough to pass Murphy's saloon without opening +his pay envelope, she goes to the theatre where the play is 'The Queen +of the Opium Fiends.' Sometimes she attends a dance of the Friendship +Circle, but as a rule she spends her nights at home reading the _Evening +Yell_, which tells her that beauty is often a fatal gift and that there +is danger in the first glass of champagne a young girl drinks. Am I +telling your story in the right way, Mamie?" asked Helen. + +"Goodness, yes. You're awful kind, Helen," said Mamie. + +"Thus far, Mamie has nothing to complain of," continued Helen. "But she +has read somewhere that the slaughter of the poor negroes in the Congo +and of the Chinese in Manchuria, and of the Zulus in Natal, and of the +Moros in the Philippines, arises from the necessity under which the +civilised nations labour to find foreign markets for their increasing +output of cotton goods, brass jewelry, and coloured beads. Now the +members of Mamie's union are engaged in producing precisely those +commodities, and they have come to feel in consequence, that they are +directly responsible for the innocent blood that is being shed in +various parts of the world. It cannot be their employers who are at +fault, because the press and the clergy are unanimous in declaring that +the heads of our great industries are the benefactors of humankind. That +is why the girls protest. They are quite content with their own fate, +but they cannot bear the entire responsibility for the march of +civilisation. Mamie tells me that she cannot sleep of nights for +thinking of the poor little Moorish babies whose mothers were killed by +the French guns. That is the position taken by your union, isn't it, +Mamie?" + +Mamie giggled, went through a final contortion of ill-ease and returned +to her place, in the half-circle. She was succeeded by a brown-haired +little maiden, who for some minutes had been showing a strained anxiety +to break into speech. + +"Please, Helen," she entreated, "may I say something?" + +"Of course, dear," said Helen. + +The little maid bowed to the mayor. "Please, sir," she said, "my papa +was thirty-eight years of age when he married mamma. He was an old +bachelor. He was not anxious to be married, but they put a tax on him +because they were afraid of depopulation. And he loves me very dearly. +But sometimes when he thinks of his old freedom he looks so sadly at me. +I feel very sorry for him then. I don't want him to be unhappy on my +account----" + +She withdrew and Helen stepped forward to sum up the case. "You must not +think, your Honour, that it is our desire to embarrass your +administration. Bad as conditions are, we would have continued to suffer +in silence, because, you see, there are still little flashes of freedom +left to us children. But we have learned that there is now on foot in +England a movement which threatens to reduce us to unmitigated slavery. +We understand that Mr. Sidney Webb, Mr. Francis Galton, Professor Karl +Pearson, and Mr. Bernard Shaw are advocating a scheme of state endowment +for motherhood. Now you can see for yourself what that would mean. In +politics it would mean the establishment of a motherhood suffrage with +plural voting based on the size of the family. In the economic sphere it +would mean that we shall be supporting our papas and mammas. In art, +which must reflect the actualities of life, it would mean almost the +elimination of the element of love, since the world is to be a +children's world. In other words, as I have already said, the entire +social fabric will come to press on our shoulders alone. It is against +the mere possibility of such an unnatural state of affairs that we are +here to protest." + +"But what is it you want?" asked the mayor, somewhat nettled because +O'Brien, instead of backing him up, was busy piling three million +golden dollars on the floor in stacks two and a half feet high. + +"We want to be left alone!" The reply came in a chorus of trebles, +pipings, quavers, and adolescent falsettos that caused the mayor to lift +his hands to his forehead entreating silence. "We want our old +privileges again. We want to be allowed just to grow up." + +"Yassir," shrilled one voice above the others, "jist to grow up." + +The mayor raised himself in his chair and his eyes lit up with surprise +at the sight of a well-known black little face at the very end of the +second row. + +"What, Topsy, you here?" he called out. "Haven't you done growing all +these sixty years, nearly?" + +"Yassir," answered Topsy, inserting an index finger into her mouth. "Ah +was shure growin' fas'; but Massa Booker Washin'ton he says that ah and +the likes of me was charged with th' future of the negro race. An' that +skyeered me so ah made up mah mind ah wouldn' grow no further." + +The mayor turned to Helen. "You understand of course, my dear, that I +cannot lay a proposition of so vague a nature before the Board of +Aldermen. They are a rather unimaginative set of men." + +"We have drawn up a list of demands, your Honour, in terms precise +enough to make it a sufficient basis for practical legislation. May I +read the list to you, papa?" + +"Yes, my dear," he replied, and rising from his chair he put his arms +about her and kissed her. Her forehead was cool to his burning lips. +"Pray proceed, Miss Chairman." + +And Helen read in her high-pitched, petulantly graceful soprano: +"Resolutions adopted at a special meeting of the Central Bureau of the +Federated Children's Organisations of the United States: + +"1. Henceforth the proportion of child fiction in any magazine shall be +restricted to ten per cent. of the total contents of such publication; +and no magazine fiction child under the age of twelve shall be +represented as possessing an amount of intelligence greater than the +combined wisdom of its parents. + +"2. The married heroine of a society drama who has consistently +preferred yachting trips, bridge, and the opera to the company of her +children shall be precluded from calling upon them for aid to save +herself from the dangers of a mad infatuation. + +"3. Children under the age of eighteen shall be employed in no form of +industry whatsoever. If there are not enough hands to produce piece +goods for the Congo and the Philippines, let them draft all adult +motor-car chauffeurs, diamond polishers, wine agents, amateur coach +drivers, settlement workers, preachers of the simple life, and writers +of musical comedy. + +"4. In the public schools there shall be no talks or lessons dealing +with the duties of citizenship. The time now given to that subject shall +be devoted to the reading of dime novels and fairy tales, so that on +graduating, children shall not be confronted with so startling a +contrast between the realities of life and what they have learned at +school. + +"5. Cooking and other branches of domestic science shall no longer be +taught in the schools. One-half of us expect to live in family hotels +and the other half will probably be in no position to afford the +expensive ingredients employed in scientific cookery. + +"6. Mr. Francis Galton, who invented Eugenics, and Messrs. Karl Pearson +and Sidney Webb, who helped to popularise it, shall be executed. Mr. +Bernard Shaw shall be banished to a desert island." + +And the mayor all the while kept thinking how like her mother Helen was: +her voice, her hair, her eyes, but especially her voice. It filled the +room with many-coloured vibrations of the consistency of building +concrete and hid completely from the mayor's sight the crowd of young +faces, O'Brien, the Board of Aldermen, and the three million presidents +of the Board of Education. Only Helen remained and she came close to him +and laid her cool fingers on his aching head. + +The mayor started up to find his wife bending over him. + +"Edward," she was saying, "you promised me you would go to bed early." + +"My dear," he replied, "I would have if I had not fallen asleep in my +chair. Have you had a pleasant evening at the theatre?" + +"It is dreadful weather," she said, "and I have a bit of cold. I suppose +I shouldn't have gone out to-night, but it was the last chance, and you +know the children _would_ see 'Peter Pan.'" + + + + +XVIII + +THE MARTIANS + + +The saddest thing about the recent announcement that there are no canals +on Mars is that Robert and I will now have so little to talk about. +Robert is my favourite waiter, and when he found out that I am what the +newspapers call a literary worker, he made up his mind that the ordinary +topics of light conversation would not do at all for me. After prolonged +resistance on my part he has succeeded in reducing our common interests +to two: the canals on Mars and French depopulation. Now and then I +venture to bring up the weather or the higher cost of living. Once I +asked him what he thought about the need of football reform. Once I +tried to drag in Mme. Steinheil. But Robert listens patiently, and when +I have concluded he calls my attention to the fact that in 1908 the +number of deaths in France exceeded the number of births by 12,000. When +the French population fails to stir me, he wonders whether the +inhabitants of Mars are really as intelligent as they are supposed to +be. + +And yet it must have been I that first suggested Mars to him. Let me +confess. I do not love the Martian canals with the devouring passion +they have aroused in susceptible souls like Robert. But in a quieter way +the canals have been very dear to me. Their threatened loss comes like +the loss of an old friend; a distant friend whose face one has almost +forgotten and never hopes to see again, from whom one never hopes to +borrow, and to whom one never expects to lend, but who all the more +lives in the mind a remote, impersonal, and gentle influence. I am not +ashamed to admit that I have learned to care more for the Martian +canals than for any canals much closer to us. The Panama Canal will +probably cut in two the distance to China, and give us a monopoly of the +cotton goods trade in the Pacific; but I think cotton goods are +unhealthful, and I don't want to go to China. The Suez Canal may be the +mainstay of the British Empire, but I have no doubt that it would make +just as satisfactory a mainstay for some other empire. My interest in +the Erie Canal is connected entirely with the fact that when it was +opened somebody said, "What hath God wrought!" or "There is no more +North and no more South"--I have forgotten which. + +I have always had a softer spot in my heart for the inhabitants of Mars +than for any other alien people. They have always impressed me as more +unassuming than the English, fonder of outdoor exercise than the +Germans, and less addicted to garrulity than the French. They lead +simple, laborious lives, digging away at their canals every morning, and +filling them up every night, for reasons best known to themselves and +certain professors at Harvard. I am attracted by their quaint +appearance. Mr. H. G. Wells, for instance, has depicted them with +cylindrical bodies of sheet iron, long legs like a tripod, heads like an +enormous diver's helmet, and arms like the tentacles of an octopus--as +odd a sight in their way as the latest woman's fashions from Paris. +Others have described the Martians as pot-bellied and hairless, with +goggle eyes, powerful arms, and curly, gelatinous legs, the result of +millions of years of universal culture and Subway congestion. A race so +unattractive could not but be virtuous. One feels instinctively that +there is no graft bound up with the digging of the Martian canals. + +No, anything but graft. One of the principal reasons why I am so fond of +the canals on Mars is that they are the most cheaply built system of +public works on record. A professor of astronomy in Italy or Arizona +finds a few dim lines on the plate of his camera, and immediately Mars +is equipped with a splendid network of artificial waterways. Am I wrong +in thinking of the Martian canals as one of the greatest triumphs of the +human mind? An African savage might find an elephant's skeleton and from +that reconstruct the animal in life. Only science can reconstruct an +elephant from a half-inch fragment of the bone of his hind leg. Only a +scientist could have reconstructed the Martian canals from a few +photographic scratches. Of such reconstructions our civilisation is +largely made up. We build up a statesman out of a bit of buncombe and a +frock coat; a genius out of two sonnets and half a dozen cocktails; a +dramatic "star" out of a lisp and a giggle; a two-column news story out +of the fragment of a fact; a multitude out of three men and a band; a +crusade out of one man and a press agent; a novel out of the trimmings +of earlier novels; a reputation out of an accident; a captain of +industry out of an itching palm; a philanthropist out of a beneficent +smile and a platitude; a critic out of a wise look and a fountain pen; +and a social prophet out of pretty small potatoes. I need not allude +here to the process of making mountains out of molehills, beams out of +motes, and entire summers out of single swallows. + +But mind, I do not mean that I was ever sceptical about the canals. +Indeed, I have always admired the way in which their existence was +demonstrated. There have always been two ways of proving that something +is true. One way is to bring forward sixteen reasons why, let us say, +the moon is made of green cheese. The other way is to assume that the +moon is made of green cheese and to answer sixteen objections brought +forward against the theory. I have always preferred the second method, +because it throws the burden of proof on your opponent. There is no +argument under the sun that cannot be refuted. Obviously, then, it is an +advantage to let your opponents supply the argument while you supply the +refutation. + +Neglect this precaution, and you are in difficulties from the start. You +contend, for instance, that the moon must be made of cheese because the +moon and cheese are both round, as a rule. True, says your opponent, but +so are doughnuts, women's arguments, and, occasionally, the wheels on a +trolley car. The moon and cheese, you go on, both come after dinner. +Yes, says your opponent, but so do unwelcome visitors, musical +comedies, and indigestion. Then, you say, there is the cow who jumped +over the moon. Would she have resorted to such extraordinary procedure +if she had not perceived that the moon was made of cheese from her own +milk? Well (says your opponent), the cow might merely have been trying +to gain a broader outlook upon life. And here you are thirteen reasons +from the end, and your hands hopelessly full. + +Now compare the advantages of the other method. You adopt a resolute +bearing and declare: "The moon is made of green cheese." It is now for +your opponent to speak. He argues: "But that would make the moon's +ingredients different from those of the earth and other celestial +bodies." "Not at all," you say; "the earth is made up largely of chalk, +and what is the difference between chalk and cheese, except in the +price?" "But, if it's green cheese the moon is made of," asks your +opponent, "why does it look yellow?" "Only the natural effect of +atmospheric refraction," you reply calmly; "remember how a politician's +badly soiled reputation will shine out a brilliant white, through the +favourable atmosphere that surrounds a Congressional investigating +committee. Recall how a lady who is green with envy at her neighbour's +new hat will turn pink with delight when the two meet in the street and +kiss. Recall how the same lady's complexion of roses and milk will +assume its natural yellow under the candid dissection of her dearest +friends." Your opponent might go on marshalling his objections forever, +and you would have no difficulty in knocking them on the head. + +So I used to believe. But if the method breaks down in the case of Mars +and its canals, it breaks down everywhere else. If there are no canals +on Mars, what about the blessings of the tariff, which are based on +exactly the same kind of reasoning? What about the efficacy of mental +healing? What about the advantages of giving up coffee? What about the +impending invasion of California by the Japanese? What about the +Kaiser's qualifications as an art critic? What about the restraining +influence of publicity on corporations? What about the connection +between easy divorce and the higher life? What about the divine right of +railroad presidents? What about the theatrical manager's passion for a +purified stage? What about the value of all anti-fat medicines? All of +these things have been shown to be true by assuming that they are true. +If the canals on Mars go, all these have to go. And that makes me almost +as sad as the fact that I shall have nothing to talk about with my +favourite waiter. + + + + +XIX + +THE COMPLETE COLLECTOR--II + + +"The idea of this exquisite little collection of frauds and forgeries," +said Cooper, "--and I don't believe I am boasting when I speak of my few +treasures as exquisite--came to me in a natural enough way. One of the +bitterest trials the connoisseur has to contend with, is the +consciousness that no amount of care and expense can guarantee him an +absolutely flawless collection. The suspicion of the experts has fallen +upon not a single picture, brass, marble or iron in his galleries; and +yet as he walks those galleries the unhappy owner groans under the moral +conviction that there are spurious pictures on his walls, spurious +marbles in his halls, spurious carvings and coins under his glass +cases, and that there they must stay until discovered and exposed. + +"A perfect collection, therefore, in the sense of a collection in which +every object can be traced back with absolute certainty to its author +and its place of origin, is impossible. Unless, and that is how the +inspiration came," said Cooper, "unless one set to collecting objects of +art which have been proved to be fraudulent. Then and only then, could +one be sure that one's treasures were just what one believed them to be. +And that is just what I set out to do. I began buying objects of art, +which, after masquerading under a great name, had been exposed and given +up to scorn. I have kept at it for twenty years, and I can now point to +what no American multi-millionaire can ever boast of, a collection made +up _entirely_ of 'fakes.' When I stroll through _my_ little museum I am +obsessed by no doubts. I am as certain as I am of being alive that no +genuine Leonardo or Holbein or Manet or Cellini has found its way under +my roof. + +"I must admit," Cooper went on, "that the question of economy has been +an important factor in the case. When we first set up housekeeping, a +year after our marriage, our means were not unlimited and our tastes +were of the very highest. Buying the best work or even the second-best +work of the best painters was out of the question. But buying cheap +copies of the masters, replicas, casts, photogravures, was equally +impossible. The idea of owning anything that some one else may own at +the same time is abhorrent to the true collector. On the other hand, if +we went in for spurious masterpieces, we were sure of securing unique +specimens at very small expense. And I will not deny that the bargain +element appealed very strongly to Mrs. Cooper. Most of our things we +got at really fabulous reductions. There was the crown of an Assyrian +princess of the twenty-fourth century B.C., for which one of the leading +European museums paid $75,000, and which, after it was shown that it had +been made by a Copenhagen jeweller in 1907, I purchased from the museum +for something like fifty-five dollars, plus the freight. This charming +little landscape with sheep and a shepherd boy brought $23,000 in a +Fifth Avenue auction room two years ago. Three months after it was sold, +a certain Mrs. Smith on Staten Island sued her husband for desertion and +non-support, and in the course of the proceedings it was brought out +that Smith made $10,000 a year painting Corots and Daubignys, and that +the $23,000 picture was one of his latest achievements. I got it for a +little over one hundred dollars. I am really proud of the picture, +because Smith has put into it enough of the Corot quality to deceive +many an expert observer. If I were not in possession of the documentary +proof that Smith painted the picture in 1908, I should myself be tempted +at times to believe that Smith and his wife lied in court and that the +picture is really a Corot. + +"But these are the chances," said Cooper, "that every art-lover must +take. I have said that at present I feel perfectly sure that not a +single genuine work has crept in to vitiate my collection. And that is +true. But only a few weeks ago I had a very bad quarter of an hour +indeed over this spurious Tanagra figurine. It had been bought for a +museum not one hundred miles from here by a patron who was a good friend +of mine, and who had paid several thousand dollars for the statuette. I +was in the room with Hawley when Stimson, our very greatest Greek +archæologist and art-expert, entered, and, catching sight of the little +figure, picked it up, studied it for a few moments, smelt it, licked it +with his tongue, pressed it to his cheek, and handed it back to my +friend with a single, blasting comment--'fake.' We two were incredulous, +but within fifteen minutes Stimson had convinced us that the thing was a +palpable fraud. Quite beside himself with vexation, Hawley lifted up the +statuette and was about to dash it into fragments on the ground, when I +caught his arm. 'Let me have it,' I said; and I carried it home in great +glee. + +"Well, a few weeks later I was showing my collection to Dr. Friedheimer +of Berlin, who is a much greater man even than Stimson. The German +savant stopped in fascination before the Tanagra figurine. 'A pretty +good imitation,' I said. He seized the statuette with trembling fingers. +'Imidation!' he shouted. 'Chenuine, chenuine as de hairs on your het. +Himmel, wat a find!' And he proceeded to do what Stimson had done, and +he smelt it and licked it, and rubbed it against his beard, and I am not +sure but that he knocked it against his forehead to test its texture. +And then in his agitation he let the figure fall, and it broke in two on +the floor, and inside we found a bit of newspaper dated Naples, January +27, 1903. Dr. Friedheimer could only say, 'Unerhört!' but I was nearly +frantic with delight. I repaired the statuette, and it now holds, as you +see, the place of honour in my collection." + +As we sat over our coffee and cigars, Cooper grew reflective. "After +all," he said, "is not the fabricator of frauds fully as great an artist +as the man whose work he imitates? Take the famous marble Aphrodite of a +few years ago, which was attributed by some critics to Praxiteles, and +by some critics to Scopas, until proof came that it had been made in +Hoboken. Consider the labour that went into the fraud. For years, +probably, the dishonest sculptor was engaged in preliminary studies for +the work. He spent months in libraries, museums, and the lecture-rooms +of learned professors. He impregnated himself with the spirit of Greek +art. He devoted months to searching for a suitable piece of antique +marble. How long he was in carving it, I can only guess. When it was +completed, he boiled it in oil; then he boiled it in milk; then he +boiled it in soap; then he boiled it in a concoction of molasses and +wine; then he buried it in moist soil, and let it age for three years. + +"Now, suppose the statue had been really carved by Praxiteles. That +joyous master and genius might have put two weeks' work, three weeks' +work, a month's work, upon it, and there you were. What was the labour +of a lifetime to the other man was to Praxiteles just an easy bit of +routine. If art is a man's soul and hopes and brain and sweat and blood +put into concrete form, who produced the truer work of art, Praxiteles +or the unknown sculptor of Hoboken? I speak only of the comparative +expenditure of effort. So far as the artistic result is concerned, it is +evident, from the ease with which we were taken in, that there is no +great difference between the school of Hoboken and the school of +Praxiteles." + + + + +XX + +WHEN A FRIEND MARRIES + + +Taking dinner with an old friend who has just been married is an +experience I regard with apprehension. In the first place, it is always +awkward to be introduced to a woman who begins by being jealous of you +because you knew her husband long before she did. She may be a nice +woman; in fact, from the air of almost imbecile happiness that invests +young Hobson, you are sure she is. But since it is natural to hate those +whom we have injured, it is natural for young wives to dislike their +husband's friends. + +People say that a woman begins to prepare for marriage at the age of +five. Judging from the absolutely spontaneous way in which the Hobsons +have taken to it, marriage is a career that calls for no preparation +whatever. I am not referring, of course, to the outward aspects of early +housekeeping. The little difficulties that beset the newly married are +there. I can see that my hostess is more anxious about the creamed +potatoes than she will be five years hence. Her attitude to the maid who +waits on us is by turns excessively severe and excessively timid. I +learn that the dining-room table has been sent back twice to the store, +and is still not the one originally ordered. But these are trifles. It +is with the Hobsons' souls I am concerned; and their souls are perfectly +at ease in their new estate. + +The first few minutes, like all introductions, go stiffly. The bride +smiles and says that Jack has often spoken to her about you. Whereupon +you remember that there are not many secrets a young husband keeps from +his wife. Jack is no sieve, but he would be more than human if he has +failed to dissect your little weaknesses and humours for his new wife. +He has probably emphasized the two or three particular little failings +of character which have prevented you from realising the brilliant +promise you showed at college. At bottom, Jack thinks, you have the +capacity for being almost as happy as he, Jack, is. But then, again, if +Mrs. Hobson does know you thoroughly well, it strikes you that there is +that much trouble saved, and you sit down to chat with a fair sense of +intimacy. + +Toward such conversation you and the man of the house are the principal +contributors. You speak of college days and contemporary politics, and +other things that the wife is not interested in, but she smiles +graciously, and now and then takes sides with you against her husband. +At one point in the conversation you look up and find her quietly +scrutinising you. And you recall what you have heard concerning the +match-making propensities of young wives, and you wonder uneasily if to +herself she is running over a list of girl friends and trying to decide +which one will suit you best. You even suspect that she inclined toward +a Marjorie or an Edith, who is plain, but clever, a good manager, and of +an affectionate disposition. Happily, at that moment the bride thanks +you for your handsome wedding gift. + +At table the visitor begins to be more at ease. For one thing, there is +the traditional hazing process to which the bride must be subjected. +Jack takes the lead. Admitting that to-night's repast is an unqualified +success, he hints that there have been occasions when, if he only would, +there might be a different tale to tell. The visitor protests; yet in +the extravagant praise he resorts to there is a suggestion of mild +banter which is considered the proper thing. The wife professes to +enter into the joke; but in her heart she laughs to see the two men go +solemnly through the stupid and outworn ceremonial. Young wives nowadays +are excellent cooks. This one has secretly pursued a three months' +course in domestic science and has a diploma hidden away somewhere. But +she pretends to be properly outraged by our foolish satire, and insists +on both being helped a second time to the custard. Jack, in fact, eats +all that remains. It makes dish-washing easier, he says. + +And as the visitor steers his way pleasantly through the meal, he makes +the acquaintance of an extraordinary number of relatives. The spoons, he +finds, are from Aunt Amy. Aunt Amy lives in Syracuse and at first +objected to the match. The salt cellar is from a male cousin who (you +learn this from Jack), it was thought at one time, would be the +fortunate man himself--that is, until Jack appeared on the scene. Poor +fellow, he sought consolation by marrying, only two months later, a nice +girl from Alexandria, Va. The cut-glass salad dish is from the bride's +dearest friend at boarding-school, a charming girl, who paints and sings +and is now studying music in Berlin. + +When the coffee is brought in, Jack asks if you will smoke. This is, in +a way, the most dangerous situation of the entire evening. If you say +yes, Jack is apt to pass the cigars and and say, "Go right ahead. _I_ +have given it up, you know, and I feel all the better for it." But if +you are expert in reading faces, and decide that the bride probably has +conscientious scruples against the habit, and you reply "No," Jack is +likely to say, "Sorry, but Alice allows _me_ one cigar a day after +dinner," and you are left to suffer the torments of the lost, and have +lied into the bargain. Nor is it possible to lay down any rule for +arriving at the correct reply under such circumstances. A hurried glance +about the house will not help one. A handsome bronze ash-tray may be +only a paperweight. Young wives are in the habit of buying their +husbands the most ornate smoking apparatus, with the understanding that +it shall never be used. + +It is after dinner that reflection comes; and with it comes a touch of +sorrowful wonder. Jack bears himself with great equanimity in his new +condition; but it is apparent, nevertheless, that he has changed from +what you knew him. In the first place, he has built up a comprehensive +system of domestic serfdom to which he cheerfully submits. He glories in +his enslavement; he rattles his chains. He actually boasts of the habit +he has acquired of dropping in at the grocer's every morning on his way +to the office. When it is the maid's day out, Jack insists on helping +with the dishes and he tells you with pride that, given plenty of hot +water, there is nothing in that line which he would hesitate to +undertake. He makes it a point to visit Washington Market at least twice +a week, and he comes home with cuts, joints, steaks, rounds, poultry, +fish, game, and fruits in dazzling variety. He carries these things +conspicuously in the Subway. And Jack's wife is appreciative of his kind +intentions, and lets him bring, from long distances, meats which she can +purchase at several cents a pound less from her butcher two blocks away. + +The passion for acquiring food commodities is only one phase of Jack's +new character. You begin to see now that all these years you have never +suspected what capacities for home-building he had in him. In the +presence of any kind of article offered for sale his overmastering +passion is to buy the thing and take it home. Instinct apparently +impels him to store up quite useless supplies against a future +emergency. He haunts hardware stores, he rummages in antique furniture +shops, and you may see him any day during the lunch hour flattening his +nose against windowfuls of copper and brass ware. He buys patent hammers +by the quarter dozen, as well as nails, tacks, screws, bolts, casters, +brackets, and curtain poles. He brings home Japanese vases from the +auction rooms. One day he acquired a step-ladder; it came by wagon +because they refused to let him take it into the Subway. + +And Jack's wife acquiesces in his self-imposed servitude. She does not +demand it; she is even a good deal incommoded by it. But her woman's +instinct tells her that the thing is a disease, which a man must catch, +like the measles. Until the husband's passion for home-building quiets +down, she is content to accept the unnatural situation; she is even +proud to have inspired it. + +But as Jack prattles on, and Jack's wife smiles over her embroidery +frame, it comes over you that, despite all the kindly communion of the +evening, you are an outsider there. You ask yourself bitterly whether +there is such a thing as constancy in man, whether there is such a thing +as true comradeship or affection. For fifteen years, from your freshman +year at high school, you and Jack have been what the world calls +friends. What are you now? Jack still calls you friend; apparently that +is the reason why you have just dined with him and his wife. But in +reality you are not there as his friend. You are there as the guest of +this newly-constituted social unit, this new family. You are there not +as a person, but as part of an institution. + +And just when you are ready to accept the new situation you are swept +away by the unreality of the entire arrangement. It is inconceivable +that Jack should have thrown you over for this alien person whom he +calls wife. Your habits and Jack's are so much alike; your tastes, your +outlook upon life. You used to play the same games at college, sing the +same songs, smoke the same tobacco, wear each other's clothes, and now +Jack has thrown you over for one with whom in the nature of things he +can have none of those habits in common. It is not merely puzzling; it +grows almost absurd. You shake your head over it some time after you +have said good-night, and the bride has told you that as a dear friend +of Jack's, they always will be pleased to have you call. + + + + +XXI + +THE PERFECT UNION OF THE ARTS + + +I have never had the slightest reason to doubt Harding's truthfulness. +The following episode, I remember, was told with more than Harding's +usual gravity. I can do nothing better than to give it here in Harding's +own words so far as I can recall them: + +On the third day after his arrival, my guest, Muhammad Abu Nozeyr, said +to me, "O Harding Effendi, I desire greatly to witness a presentation of +what you and the wife of your bosom, on whom both be peace, have often +referred to as Grand Opera." + +I replied, with involuntary astonishment. "Son of a hundred sheiks, +forgive my seemingly derelict hospitality. But I should have asked you +before this to go to the opera with us, if I had not thought that the +principles of your faith were opposed thereto. For you must know, O +Father of the Defenceless, that our women go there unveiled even as the +women of the people that you see on our streets, and that on the stage, +singers of both sexes indulge in open exaltation of that thing called +love, which your prophet has confined within the walls of the +_haremlik_." + +Abu Nozeyr laughed. "Your knowledge of our customs, Harding Effendi, is +fifty years behind the times. True, I come from the desert, and have +never heard your singing women of the stage. But did not one of the +learned muftis at yesterday's evening repast declare that 'Aïda' was +written for the Khedewi Ismail Pasha, may his soul rest in peace?" + +"Yes," I said; "but you will understand, Dispenser of a Thousand +Mercies, why at first blush Islam and the lyric stage should strike me +as somewhat incompatible." + +"Not modern Islam," he replied. "Take us not too literally. I am told +that your people, like others of the Feringhi, have succeeded in +building battleships which are really instruments of peace; that you +have trust companies in which you place no confidence, and Open Doors +which you close against people from my part of the world; you have +legislators who speak but do not legislate, and a Speaker who legislates +but does not speak; you have had men in your White House who always saw +red, and you have red-emblazoned newspapers which are yellow; you call +your politicians public servants who are your masters, and you call your +women the masters, but will not let them vote. Why, then, should you be +so surprised at any seeming incongruity in others?" + +"I am convinced, Abu Nozeyr," I said, "and to-morrow we will go to see +'Tristan und Isolde.' But shall I attempt to describe for you, in a few +words, just what Grand Opera is?" + +"My ear is open to your words, Harding Effendi." + +"Know, then, Protector of the Fatherless, that the music-drama is a +perfect blending of all the arts. It calls to its aid the resources of +sculpture, painting, dancing, together with numerous mechanical +agencies, and to a minor extent, music and the drama. For observe, O Abu +Nozeyr, that each art aims to awake its own specific emotion. Sculpture +appeals to our sense of form, painting to our delight in colour, dancing +to the pleasure of rhythmic motion, the mechanic arts to our liking for +sudden action, while music and the uttered word represent the union of +the clearest and vaguest modes of expressing thought. It follows +therefore that the highest phase of human emotion can only be expressed +by that art which gives us simultaneously the living form of a Venus de +Milo with the colouring of a Titian, the grace of a Nautch girl, the +miracle-working powers of a Hindu fakir, the elocution of a Demosthenes, +and the voice of a Malibran." + +"By the beard of the Prophet," exclaimed Abu Nozeyr, "I thought such +bliss was to be had only in the Paradise of the Faithful; and that is +Grand Opera, Harding Effendi?" + +"With certain modifications," I replied. "Nothing human is perfect, Abu +Nozeyr. It is a regrettable circumstance that the human voice attains +its perfect development many years after the human form. Hence our +heroes on the lyric stage are all middle-aged and our heroines somewhat +heavy in movement. I have seen a pair of starving lovers in an operatic +garret, who would surely not have passed the scrutiny of a United +Charities investigator. It is also to be regretted that adequate +voice-production leaves no breath for dancing or other forms of active +effort. Hence the dance with which Carmen fascinates poor Don José, +argues an intense readiness to be pleased on the part of the latter, and +Telramund's defeat at the hands of Lohengrin is never quite free from a +certain degree of contributory negligence." + +"But tell me this, Harding Effendi, are there composers who have carried +the union of the arts to a higher point than others?" + +"There are, O Grandson of the Wild Ass. There are operas in which at +certain moments the libretto speaks of a leaping fire, the music plays +leaping fire, and the fire actually leaps and blazes on the stage. But +unfortunately it always happens that the words cannot be heard because +of the orchestra, and the fire sinks when the orchestral swell rises, +and rises when the orchestral surge subsides. I have caught the +orchestral sound of hammer on anvil long before the two have come into +contact, and have heard Spring described as entering through a door +which persists in staying closed. I have seen boats being pushed by +human hands, Rhine maidens suspended on a wire, and harvest moons moving +in orbits unknown to Herschel and Pickering." + +"And are there people who still persist in taking their sculpture, +painting, drama, and music separately, Harding Effendi?" + +"There are; but that is because they fail to recognise that opera is a +perfect union of all the arts. To-morrow, Abu Nozeyr, we go to hear +'Tristan und Isolde.' It appeals to every one of our senses. To enjoy it +completely, however, it is often wise to close one's eyes and just hear +the singer sing." + + + + +XXII + +AN EMINENT AMERICAN + + +After dinner I asked Herr Grundschnitt what headway he was making in his +studies of American life. The professor was in more than his usually +mellow mood. He had enjoyed his dinner. He liked his cigar. He confided +to me that he was hard at work on a volume of sketches dealing with the +career of representative successful Americans, and he offered to read me +one of his early chapters. If the following summary of Herr +Grundschnitt's account of the life of Wallabout Smith can even suggest +the extraordinary impression which the original produced upon me, I am +content. + +Wallabout Smith did not attain recognition until late in life. I gather +that he must have been well over fifty when a former President of the +United States declared that Wallabout Smith, by raising a family of four +sons and two daughters, had done more for his country than all the laws +enacted by the Legislatures of all the New England and Middle Atlantic +States since the Spanish-American War. Fame came rapidly after this. The +college professors repeated what the former President said. The +newspapers repeated what the college professors said. The playwrights +repeated what the newspapers said. The pulpit repeated what the +playwrights said. Interviewers descended upon Wallabout Smith. They wore +out his front lawn, the hall carpet, and the maid-servant's temper; but +they always found Smith himself patient, affable, ready to say whatever +they wished him to say. + +The reporters would usually begin by asking Wallabout Smith what were +his lighter interests in life. "I find my greatest pleasure," Smith +would reply, "in common things. For instance, I have never ceased to be +intensely interested in the cost of shoes and stockings. The subject is +fascinating and inexhaustible. One gets tired of most things, but there +has never been a time in which the cost of shoes and stockings has +failed to appeal with peculiar force to me. My odd moments on the train +have as a rule been taken up with that question. If you have ever +thought upon this subject, you must have been struck with the fact that, +putting food aside, shoes and stockings constitute the most permanent +and persistent human need. They begin with the first few weeks of our +life, and they continue to the end; the size alone changes. It is a +subject, too, that opens up such wide horizons. For while a man of +comparatively little leisure can confine himself to the simple topic of +shoes and stockings, he may, if he so desires, widen the field of his +interests so as to include the allied subjects of frocks, jackets, +blouses, caps, and collars, until he has covered the entire range of +children's apparel. Nor is that all. I have spent many an absorbing hour +figuring out the annual rate of increase in servants' wages and rent. Of +late years I have been in the habit of putting in part of my lunch hour +in a study of college fees and tailors' bills. In moments of extreme +physical lassitude, when nothing else appeals to me, I think about the +next quarterly premium on my insurance policy." + +How well-known men do their work has always interested the public. Few +newspaper men omitted to question Wallabout Smith on this subject. From +the large number of interviews cited by Herr Grundschnitt we may build +up a very fair picture of Wallabout Smith's daily routine. It was his +habit to spend a good part of his day in New York City. He would rise +about six o'clock every week-day in the year, and, snatching a hasty +breakfast, would make his way to the railroad station, pausing now and +then in perplexity as he tried to recall what it was his wife had asked +him to bring home from town. Sometimes he would catch his train and +sometimes he would not. Arrived at his office, he would remove his coat, +and, putting on a black alpaca jacket to which he was greatly attached, +he would proceed to glance over, check, and transcribe the contents of a +large number of bills and vouchers representing the daily transactions +of a very prosperous commercial enterprise in which he had no +proprietary interest. The day's work would be pleasantly broken up by +frequent inquiries from the general manager's office. Every now and then +a fellow-worker would take a moment from his duties to ask Wallabout +Smith how his lawn was getting on. Sometimes he would be summoned to +the telephone, only to learn that Central had called the wrong number. +Lunch was a matter of a few minutes. At 5.30 every afternoon Wallabout +Smith exchanged his alpaca jacket for his street coat with a fine sense +of weariness, and the secure conviction that the next morning would find +the same task waiting for him on his table. "I have no hesitation in +stating," Smith would frequently say, "that some of the busiest hours of +my life have been spent at my office desk." + +Walking was his favourite form of exercise. When he lived in the city +during the first few years after his marriage, he used to walk the floor +with the baby. Later when the children began to grow up and he moved out +into the country, he walked to and from the station. His gait was a +free, manly stride, bordering close upon a run, in the morning, and a +more deliberate, sliding pace, somewhat suggestive of a shuffle, in the +evening. He was at his best when tramping the country roads with a +congenial companion or two on a Sunday afternoon. On such occasions he +would pour forth a continuous stream of light-hearted talk on everything +under the sun--the new board of village trustees, the shameful condition +of the village streets, the prospects of a new roof for the railway +station. Good-nature was the keynote of his character, but he would +frequently sum up a situation or a person with a sly touch of irony or a +trenchant word or two. He once described the village streets as being +paved chiefly with good intentions. Another time he characterised the +minister of a rival church as having the courage of his wife's +convictions. But such flashes of satire went and left no rancour behind +them. His high spirits were proof against everything but automobiles. +These he detested, not because they made walking unpleasant and even +dangerous, but because they were run by men who mortgaged their homes to +buy motor cars, and thus threatened the stability of business +conditions. + +Wallabout Smith would often be asked to lay down a few rules for those +who wished to emulate his success. He would invariably reply that the +secret of bringing up children was the same double secret that underlay +success in every other field--enthusiasm and patience. "It has always +been my belief," he would say, "that the head of a family should spend +at least as much time with his children as he does at his barber's or +his lodge, and, if possible, a little more. Children undoubtedly stand +in need of supervision. In the beginning, it is a question largely of +keeping them away from the matches and the laudanum. Fortunately, we +live at some distance from a trolley-line and there is no well in our +back-yard. As my children grew up, I made it a point to know what books +they were reading out of school and whether the boys were addicted to +the filthy cigarette habit. On the subjects of breakfast foods and +corporal punishment, I have always kept an open mind." + +The experiment of living upon a basis of comradeship with one's children +which we see so frequently recommended was not a success in the case of +Wallabout Smith. "Although my boys are fond of me," he once told a +reporter, "they usually regard my presence as a bore. When I find time +to go out walking with them, they do their best to lose me, and whenever +we divide off into teams for a game of ball, each side insists on my +going with the other side. I have made up my mind that there is a time +for being with one's children and a time for letting them alone, and +that the proper time for being with them is when they are in trouble +and want you, and the proper time for letting them alone is when they +are happy and wish to be let alone. This I admit is the reverse of the +common practice, and probably there is something to be said for parents +who grow fond of their children's society when they, the parents, have +nothing else to do. As a rule, I have never obtruded myself on my boys, +being confident that natural affection and the recurrent need of +pocket-money would constitute a sufficient bond between us." + +There was, in conclusion, one factor in his success upon which Wallabout +Smith would never fail to lay the most emphatic stress, and to which +Herr Grundschnitt attached equal importance. "Such fame," he would say, +"as has fallen to my share must be attributed in the very largest +measure to my wife. Many is the time she gave up her meetings at the +Browning Club to watch with me beside the sick-bed of one of our little +ones. And she would do this so uncomplainingly, so cheerfully, that it +almost made one oblivious to the extent of her sacrifice. There must +have been occasions, I feel sure, when it cost her a pang to find her +photograph omitted from the local paper's account of a club meeting or a +church bazaar; but if she ever suffered on that score, she never let it +be known. I can truly say that, without her, my life work would have +spelt failure." + + + + +XXIII + +BEHIND THE TIMES + + +I had scarcely exchanged a half-dozen sentences with Howard King before +we knew ourselves for kindred spirits. I was in a roomful of people who +were talking about new books I had not read, new plays I had not seen, +and new singers I had not heard, and I was exceedingly lonesome. There +was one youngish middle-aged lady in pink, who asked me what was the +best novel I had read of late, and when I said "Robert Elsmere," she +looked at me rather grimly and asked whether I lived in New York. When I +said yes, she turned away and began chatting with a young man on her +right, who looked like the advertisement for a new linen collar. It was +this reply of mine that attracted Howard King's attention. He had been +sitting in one corner of the room quite as disconsolate as I was. But +now he walked over and shook hands and told me that in his opinion +"Robert Elsmere" was not so good a book as "Trilby," which he was just +reading. + +Howard King and I belong to the comparatively small class of men whom +nature, or fate, or whatever you please, has decreed to be always a +certain interval behind the times; it might be years or months or days, +according to the rate of speed at which a particular fashion happened to +be moving forward. King told me, for instance, that of late he has been +possessed with a passionate desire to learn the game of ping-pong. When +all the world was playing table-tennis eight or ten years ago, King +viewed the game with disgust. He thought it utterly childish, +uninteresting, and admirably illustrative of all the idiotic qualities +that go to make up a fad. But for the last six months, King said, he +frequently wakes at night and sits up in bed and yearns with all his +soul for a ping-pong set. He was, of course, ashamed to speak to others +about it. But if he could find some one who shared his feelings on the +subject, he had a large library with a square table in it. Would I come +to-morrow night? I said I should be very glad, indeed. + +I told Howard King what my attitude is toward clothes. It is my fate +always to grow fond of a fashion just as it is passing out. I recalled +the exaggerated military styles for men that came in with the +Spanish-American and the South African wars. Those enormously padded +shoulders and tight-shaped waists and swelling trouser legs, and the +strut and the stoop that went with the whole ugly _ensemble_, roused my +anger. My feelings remained unchanged until some time after the +Russo-Japanese War, and then one day it came to me that I must have a +suit of military cut. It was like the sudden awakening of the +unregenerate to grace, it was as irresistible as first love. And when +the tailor said that only sloping shoulders were now being worn, that +what I wanted was hopelessly out of date, the sense of loss was +overpowering. I confessed to King that in my opinion nothing uglier in +men's apparel was conceivable than the green plush hats that are just +beginning to go out of style. And I told him that I was as certain as I +am certain of anything in this world that some day in the very near +future I shall be seized with an uncontrollable longing to wear a green +plush hat, and I shall enter a shop and ask for one, and the man behind +the counter will look at me quizzically, and, after a long search, bring +me the only plush hat in his shop, and I shall carry it home in shame, +and put it away in my closet, and mourn over the resolution that came +too late. + +You must not imagine that Howard King and I are conservatives. We do not +hold fast to one thing, or even hold fast to the old. We move forward, +but at a pace so curiously regulated as to bring us to the front door +just when most people are leaving by the back. I have worn every shape +of linen collar that the best-dressed men have worn during the last +fifteen years; but I have worn them from three to six months late. I +became passionately fond of bicycling shortly after all the bicycle +factories began the exclusive production of automobiles. I am not very +fond of automobiles, but I shall be, I know, when aëroplanes come into +extensive use. It is only in the last few months that I have discovered +how amusing a toy the Teddy bear makes. And this is true of fashions in +games and of fashions in language. I have no fundamental objections to +slang, but I always pick up the bit of slang that most people are just +discarding. + +I recall, for instance, how, up in the hills last summer, the woods and +glens were echoing to the sound, half a howl and half a screech, of "Oh, +you!" addressed at quarter-minute intervals to every object, animate or +inanimate, that came within the howler's vision or thought. This +particular bit of gutter-slang induced a peculiar irritation. It seemed +to me utter desecration that this quickening beauty of hill and sky and +river and green woods, which should have stirred young hearts to +madrigals and chorals, should resound to the blatant, shrieking +vulgarity of Lobster Square. I do not mind confessing that at times my +feelings towards the innocent young barbarians bordered close on murder. +Until--until, alas! one September morning, after all the guests were +gone and I alone remained; that morning I woke with the poison in my +soul, and I walked down to the river for my bath, and, coming across the +farmer's herd of cows halfway down the hillside, saluted them, before I +knew what I was doing, with that horrid, that unspeakable--I blush now +to think of it. When I told Howard King, he admitted humbly that after +holding out for years he has just begun to say, "It's me," and that he +feels morally convinced that within the next year or two he will be +saying "Between you and I." + +But you must not think that this peculiarity in Howard King and myself +is an acquired habit or a pose in which we take any measure of pride. +Our attitude towards those happy people who are always in fashion is one +of sincere and profound envy. I think there is nothing more wonderful +under the sun than the unknown force that impels the great majority to +begin doing the same new thing at the same time. It must be a precious +gift to feel instinctively what the right new thing is to do. A +mysterious fiat goes forth and a million women simultaneously put on +black straw hats surmounted by a cock in his pride. Another mysterious +order goes forth and two million women simultaneously begin reading the +latest novel by Robert W. Chambers. Pitiable are those in whom this +instinct is wanting and who must tag timidly behind, venturing only +where a million others have gone before. Perhaps it is, with such +people, a case of arrested development. Boys of sixteen and girls of +fourteen have supplied the poets with their greatest love stories and +direst tragedies. And there are men and women well gone into middle age +who balk and stammer in the presence of the most elementary sensation. +Perhaps at bottom it is simply a question of courage and cowardice. + +In any case, being behind the times is a peculiarly unfortunate trait in +a man, who, like myself, is condemned to earn his bread in the sweat of +his fountain-pen. In what other profession must a man be so emphatically +up to the minute as in this scribbling profession of ours? Only +yesterday I walked into an editor's office and suggested a +three-thousand word review of "The Rise of Silas Lapham," which I told +him was one of the greatest novels in any language. He stared at me and +asked if I hadn't some fresher book in mind, and I, somewhat taken +aback, told him that I was just finishing Frank Norris's "McTeague" and +was about to begin on Mrs. Wharton's "House of Mirth." With a brutality +characteristic of editors he asked me whether I didn't care to write a +review of Homer's Iliad and the book of Deuteronomy. I told him that I +might very well do so if it were a question of writing something he +would find personally instructive, and rose to go, with the intention of +slamming the door behind me. + +But he called me back and insisted that he meant no offence, that he +simply must have live, up-to-date copy or nothing at all. He proposed a +popular article on art, and wondered if I could write something about +the Dutch masters, with special reference to the recent notable +exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum. I was obliged to confess that I +had missed the exhibition by two weeks. "Well," he said, patiently, +"there is opera. You might do something about the singers. You have +heard Mary Garden, of course?" I told him no. Only the other day I had +irrevocably decided to hear Mary Garden in "Thaïs" next season; and the +next morning I learned that Mr. Hammerstein had gone out of business. + +He continued to be patient with me. "There's 'Chantecler,' to be sure, +although that is ancient history by this time. Have you read the play?" +I had not, but just here an inspiration came. "You sneered at Homer just +now," I said. "Well, there was another Greek who wrote a bird play 2,300 +years before Rostand. I mean Aristophanes----" The editor leaped from +his chair. "Great, great!" he cried. "We'll call it 'Chantecler 400 +B.C.'" I caught the infection of his enthusiasm. "And Aristophanes had +another play on woman's rights," I told him. "You might call it 'An +Athenian Suffragette.'" "Splendid!" he cried; "splendid; we can make a +whole series, and Goulden will do the pictures in colours. It's the most +novel thing I have heard of for a long time. It will beat the others by +a mile." And he sent me away happy. + + + + +XXIV + +PUBLIC LIARS + + +There are three things that puzzle me; yes, four things that I cannot +explain: Why street clocks never show the right time; why thermometers +hanging outside of drug stores never indicate the right temperature; why +slot machines on a railway platform never give the right weight; and why +weather-vanes always point in the wrong direction. At bottom, I imagine, +these are really not four things, but one. For it must be the same +mysterious and malicious principle that takes each of these +contrivances, set up to be a public guide to truth, and turns it into an +instrument for the dissemination of error. + +What makes me think that there is some animate principle behind such +clocks is that they are so like a good many people one meets. There are +persons who are packed with the most curiously inaccurate information on +the most abstruse subjects, and they insist on imparting it to you. I +have no ground to complain if I ask Jones what is the capital of +Illinois and he says Chicago. The initiative was mine, and taken at my +own peril, and it is fair that I should pay the penalty. But frequently +Jones will break in upon me in the middle of a column of figures and +tell me that the largest ranch in the world is situated in the State of +Sonora, Mexico. "Yes?" I say, hoping that he will go away. "Yes," he +assures me. "It is so large that the proprietor can ride 200 days on +horseback without leaving his own grounds. He has 2,000,000 men working +for him and he lives in a marble palace of 700 rooms. No one can be +elected President of Mexico against his will." + +Now obviously it would have been better for me to remain altogether +unacquainted with Mexican conditions than to share Jones's distorted +view of affairs in that interesting republic. But Jones insists on +taking the innocent blank spaces in my knowledge of the world and +filling them up with the most incorrect data. He tells me, for instance, +that Mme. Finisterra once sang the mad scene from "Lucia" before the +late Sultan of Morocco, who wept so bitterly that the performance was +interrupted lest the monarch should go into convulsions. At the age of +eight Mme. Finisterra knew twelve operatic soprano rôles by heart, and +when she was ten she played Juliet to Tamagno's Romeo. She now gets +$10,000 a night, in addition to the service of a maid, a chef, and two +private secretaries. In private life she is very stout. All this, +needless to say, is not true. + +But I must not forget the clocks. The worst of the class, oddly enough, +are those found in front of watchmakers' and opticians' shops. I +sometimes think that such clocks are purposely put out of order by the +shop-keeper. The object is apparently to induce irascible old gentlemen +to enter the store, watch in hand, in order to protest against the +maintenance of a public nuisance. It is then a comparatively easy task +to sell them a pair of solid gold spectacles with double lenses at a +handsome profit. I, for one, would not blame the old gentleman who +should pick up a stone and hurl it at one of these Tartuffes and +Chadbands of the street-corner with their chubby, gilded hands reposing +on their prosperous stomachs, sleek and smug and ultra-respectable, but +unconscionable liars for all that. They are not content with their own +success in cheating, they throw discredit upon honest folk. How many a +faithful pocket-piece has been pulled out by its disappointed owner and +actually set wrong to make it agree with one of these rubicund old +sinners? Such is the overpowering effect of impudent assurance on the +ordinary man. + +The difference between the typical public clock and a watch out of order +is obvious. Every prudent man knows the peculiarities of his own watch, +just as he knows the peculiarities of his own wife and children; and he +is consequently prepared to make allowances. But the clock on the street +corner persists in thrusting false information upon you. The man who +consults his watch does so with a purpose, and is naturally on the +alert. But the cheating clock confronts him in moments of unsuspecting +security, and throws him into a condition of the wildest alarm. It is +peculiarly active on bright spring days, when people rise early and look +forward to being at their desks half an hour before their usual time. On +such occasions they invariably come upon a clock which points to a +quarter of ten, and sends them scurrying breathless up four flights of +stairs, to find the janitor engaged in cleaning out the baskets. + +Church clocks are not so bad as jewellers' clocks; but they are bad +enough, and, in the nature of things, we have a right to expect more +from a church clock than from any other kind. For the same reason the +weathercock on a church steeple is to be judged by a higher standard +than the one over a carpenter's shop or the ordinary dwelling. I cannot, +for instance, imagine a more dangerous moral _ensemble_ than a church +with a clergyman preaching bad doctrine in the pulpit, a clock +indicating the wrong time on the tower, and, over all, a clogged weather +vane pointing to the south when the wind blows from the east. + +With reference to denominations I have observed that Presbyterian clocks +are apt to be more reliable than any other kind, although the truest +clock I have ever come across is on a little Dutch Reformed Church in +Orange County. One of the most unprincipled clocks I can think of is +just outside my window. I use unprincipled with intention, for this +clock is not vicious, but giddy. If it were consistently late or +consistently early, one might get used to it. But to look out of the +window at 9:30 and find this clock pointing to eleven, and to look out +ten minutes later and find it pointing to 9:35, is extremely +disconcerting. One is inclined to expect something more restrained in a +clock connected with the most prosperous parish of one of our most +conservative denominations. + +What I have said of clocks is largely true of the weighing-machine. Like +the public clock, it thrusts itself upon us, and like the clock it +betrays the confidence which it invites. I feel convinced that no one +would ever think of using a weighing-machine if it did not constitute +the most characteristically national piece of furniture in our railway +stations. All weighing-machines cheat, but, if cheat they must, give me +the machine that flatly refuses to budge from zero after it has +swallowed your coin. I prefer that kind to the spasmodic machine on +which the indicator moves forward one hundred pounds every two minutes +and leaves a person utterly uncertain as to whether he should +immediately begin dieting or purchase a bottle of codliver oil. Yet even +this mockery of a weighing-machine is preferable to the emotional type +of scales which simultaneously gives you a false weight, tells your +fortune in utter disregard of age and sex, and plays a tune that cannot +be recognised. When such a machine has registered a German matron's +weight at 115 pounds and informed her that she will some day be +President of the United States, it is ludicrous to have it break into a +tinkle of self-appreciation, like a spaniel barking his own approval +after walking across the room on his hind legs. + +As for the ordinary street thermometer, there is this to be said for it: +It may deceive, but it gives pleasure in deceiving. When a person is +sagging beneath the heat of an August midday, it is a distinct source of +comfort and pride to have the thermometer register 98 degrees. Even when +we are fully aware that the mercury is too high by three or four +degrees, it is easy enough to make one's self believe for the moment in +the higher figure. If it were not for this spiritual stimulus, I should +be inclined to regard all thermometers as a nuisance. Translating +Fahrenheit into Centigrade and _vice versa_, is one of the most painful +mental processes I can think of. I know that I cannot perform the +operation, and I cannot help trying. I remember how a certain European +monarch once lay seriously ill and my evening newspaper reported that +his temperature was 38.3 degrees C. On my way home I attempted to put +38.3 degrees C. into terms of F., and it speaks well for the +constitution of that European monarch that he should have survived the +violent fluctuations of temperature to which I subjected him. At Grand +Central Station he was literally burning up under a blazing heat of 142 +degrees. At Ninety-sixth Street he was down to 74. As I walked home from +the station I was forced to admit that I was not sure whether one should +multiply by five-ninths or nine-fifths. + +I would not be misunderstood. I am no enemy of the public institutions I +have criticised. Far from it; clocks, thermometers, weather-vanes, and +weighing-machines--they are but the remnants of the fine old communal +life of which our urban and Anglo-Saxon civilisation has kept only too +little. We do not lounge about and take our meals in the public squares +as people used to do in Athens and still do in Sicily. We no longer fill +our pitchers at a common fountain or dance on the village green or +regulate the life of an entire city to the same signal from a campanile. +Ours is an age of exaggerated privacy, where every one works behind +closed doors and glances furtively at his watch. But precisely because +it is a precious survival the public clock ought to keep itself above +reproach and above suspicion. + + + + +XXV + +THE COMPLETE COLLECTOR--III + + +Cooper's museum of Proverbial Realities had proven such a source of +delight to himself and his friends that the news of its destruction by +fire came with a shock to all who knew him. Of all his treasures he +succeeded in saving only part of his priceless collection of straws--the +straw that showed which way the wind blew, the straw grasped at by a +drowning man, the straw that does not enter into the manufacture of +bricks, and the last straw that broke the camel's back. How would Cooper +stand the blow, his friends wondered. He took it very well. Within a +week he had set to work on a new fad, the collection of Statistical +Realities, and in a half-year he had filled three good-sized lofts and +a large back-yard with his treasures. Yesterday he took me through his +galleries. + +"What do you make of this?" he said, stopping before a glass jar some +four feet high, in which, to the peril of one's nerves, you could +distinctly see the upper two-thirds of a child's body. Head, trunk, and +arms were beautifully fashioned, but there was no vestige of growth +below the knee-caps. I could only show my astonishment. "Well," he went +on, "you must have seen the statement by the president of Bryn Mawr that +the average number of children among college-bred mothers is 3-6/10. +This is the six-tenths of a child. Here," he said, pointing to another +and somewhat larger jar, "you see three-fifths of a woman; 1-3/5 women +to one man is the ratio in some parts of Ireland. Here, in adjoining +bottles, are three-tenths of a physician, seven-eighths of a lawyer, +and four-fifths of a clergyman, the latest census having shown that we +have 23-3/10 physicians, 29-7/8 lawyers, and 17-4/5 physicians for every +1,000 of our population." + +Stopping before a glass case containing little heaps of ordinary copper +coins, Harrington pointed out that these were the odd cents which the +scrupulous science of statistics insists on leaving attached to vast +sums of money. He showed me the 27 cents which, added to $3,469,746,854 +represented the value of the foreign commerce of the United States in +1910; he showed me the twopence ha'penny which, increased by +£788,990,187, constitutes the total funded debt of Great Britain; and he +laid special emphasis on the eleven pennies which Tammany's most +vigorous efforts at economy could not pare off from New York City's +budget of $166,246,729.11 for the year 1909. + +Another row of glass cases contained what appeared at first sight a +collection of comic dolls. Cooper pointed to a sturdy little mannikin in +boots and a Russian blouse, who, with mouth fearfully distended, was +endeavouring to swallow an iron bar four or five times his own size. +"You may have read," said Cooper, "that the annual consumption of +pig-iron in Russia is 3.7 tons per capita. This figure shows the fact +concretely. Here," indicating the figure of an infant apparently a week +or two old, "is a French baby. You may observe that she is engaged in +counting her share of the national wealth, which is estimated in France +at 1,254 francs 63 centimes for every man, woman, and child. She is +wondering whether she ought to invest her capital in Russian treasury +bonds or in Steel Common. This," pointing to a group of seven or eight +dolls riding on a perfectly modelled brindled cow, "represents the +proportions of domesticated cattle to the total population of the +United States." + +The fire which flashes up in the eye of every amateur when he +contemplates the gem of his collection, was visible as Cooper led the +way to a good-sized platform of polished mahogany and brass on which was +set up what I took to be a beautiful reproduction of the planetary +system in miniature. I was right. "But observe," said Cooper, "the +details of construction. The sun is made up of infinitely small eggs, +since we know that the weight of all the hen's eggs consumed by the +human race since the beginning of the Christian era is equal to +one-billionth the weight of the sun. The planets are fashioned in the +same way. Jupiter you see is made up of little, squirming animal-like +units; that is because Jupiter occupies the same amount of space that +would be filled by the descendants of a single pair of Australian +rabbits in five hundred years, if left unchecked. Observe the orbit of +the earth. It is marked out in twopenny postage stamps, for +statisticians assure us that the path of the earth around the sun is +equivalent in length to all the postage stamps consumed since the +beginning of the nineteenth century, if laid end to end. In the same way +the seven rings of Saturn are made up of copper pennies, obtained by +reducing the world's annual output of gold to coins of that +denomination." + +We passed into a cosy little alcove lined to the ceiling with books. +There seemed nothing out of the ordinary about them at first sight, but +my host soon undeceived me. "These," he said, "are the books that might +have been written in the last hundred years, if the time and energy that +are spent on smoking, drinking, whist, bridge, and out-door games were +devoted to the cultivation of literature. Here, for instance, are three +plays quite as good as 'Hamlet,' written by two million men named Smith, +who gave up the use of tobacco. Here is a philosophical poem which shows +on every page an inspiration higher than Goethe ever attained; it +embodies the concentrated ideas produced by twenty-five thousand former +golf players, thinking half an hour a day for three days in the week. +Here is a poetic version of the future life which completely outclasses +the 'Divina Commedia.' It is compounded out of the experiences of +forty-three thousand moderate drinkers who became total abstainers, +seventy disbanded croquet associations, and 1,125 obsolete euchre clubs. + +"Perhaps," concluded Cooper, "you should see this before you go," and he +pointed to a single shelf of books with a curious mechanical arrangement +at one side. "This shelf," he said, "is exactly five feet long. This +little electric motor at the side is so constructed that it gets into +motion every day for twenty minutes, and stops. By a system of cogs and +levers the motor propels a fine steel needle straight through the five +feet of books. A glance at this brass dial shows at once how far the +needle point has reached. At the present moment, for instance, it is +halfway through the front cover of the 'Journal of John Woolman.' And +while the dial is recording the distance covered on the five-foot shelf, +the blue liquid in this glass tube measures the rising level of culture. +It is a very ingenious application of President Eliot's idea, don't you +think?" + + + + +XXVI + +THE COMMUTER + + +Whenever Harrington urges me to go to live in the country, his place is +only forty-three minutes from City Hall. But when he asked me last week +to spend Saturday afternoon with him, he told me that some trains are +slower than others and that I had better allow ten minutes for the +ferry. I have never known a commuter who told the truth about the time +it takes him to cover the distance from his office-door to his front +lawn. If he is exceptionally conscientious he will take into account the +preliminary ride on the Subway and possibly even the walk from his +office to the Subway station. But no commuter ever alludes to the +fifteen minutes' walk at the other end. I did know one man who never +under-estimated the length of his daily trips, but he was a cynic who +hated the country and lived there because his wife's mother owned the +house, and he multiplied by two the time it really took him to get into +town. The exact truth I have never had. + +As a matter of fact, sitting there in a rather stuffy car which made its +way through much unlovely landscape, I reflected that there are really +three different schedules on which suburban traffic is conducted. One is +the time it takes a commuter's friends to come out to see him. Another +is the time he claims it takes him to come into town every day. The +third, and incomparably the shortest of the three, is the time your +friend says it will take him to come into town after the completion of +some very extensive railway improvements which, in practice, I have +found are never completed. I am quite aware that great bridges have +been built, and that railway tunnels have been opened into Long Island +and other railway tunnels into New Jersey, and that steam is being +rapidly replaced by electricity. But it is my firm belief that such of +my suburban friends as live within the zone affected by these +improvements will move away before the change for the better actually +comes. I am no pessimist. I base this expectation on the simple fact +that every commuter I know, for as long a period as I have known him, +has been looking forward to the completion of railway improvements +involving the expenditure of tens of millions of dollars. The march of +progress apparently finds the suburban resident always a little in +advance. + +Harrington met me at the station and asked me if that was not a very +good train I had come down on. The suburban virus was in me. I lied and +said yes. As we sat at our luncheon I felt how peculiarly a vital factor +in out-of-town existence the railroad constitutes. Both Harrington and +his wife spoke of trains as of living, breathing people. Some trains, +with all their faults, the Harringtons evidently loved. Others they +detested, and made no attempt to conceal the fact. I had just finished +telling Mrs. Harrington about the latest woman's suffrage parade when +Harrington said: "Do you know, my dear, the 8.13 is getting worse all +the time." I was still thinking of my own story, and I failed to catch +just who or what it was that was getting worse all the time to an extent +so inimical to Harrington's peace of mind. But Mrs. Harrington looked +up, frowning slightly, and said: "Can't anything be done?" Harrington +shook his head. "It's hopeless." By this time I was convinced that it +must be some family skeleton that Harrington had rather oddly chosen to +bring out before a stranger; some scapegrace cousin, I suspected, who +probably got drunk and came to Harrington's office and demanded money. I +looked discreetly into my plate as Mrs. Harrington suggested: "You might +write to the superintendent." "We have," replied Harrington, "and he +threatened to take it off altogether. Not that it would mean any loss. I +can make just as good time now by the 8:35." + +After luncheon we walked. I have never found the walking in the suburbs +very good. There is a regrettable lack of elbow-room. A short stroll +brings one either to a railway-siding, which is bad enough, or to a +promising growth of trees, which is worse. From the road these trees +look like the beginning of a primeval jungle sweeping on to far +horizons. Plunge into that timber growth and in five minutes you emerge +on a sewered road with concrete sidewalks and ornamental lamp posts and +a crew of Italian labourers drinking beer in the shadow of a +steam-roller. It is a gash of civilisation across the face of the +wilderness, and, like most deformities, it is displeasing to the eye. +Walking under such conditions is not stimulative. I miss the sense of +space and freedom I get in the streets of New York, where I know that I +can walk twenty miles north or twenty miles east without interference or +inconvenience. Give me either a mountain-top or Broadway. Suburban +vistas are pitifully cramped. + +That day it had rained, and I should have been additionally glad to stay +indoors. But Mrs. Harrington is a fervent naturalist, and she insisted +on taking me out to look at the wild flowers and listen to the +bird-calls. Both of these branches of nature-study, I am convinced, call +for an intensity of sympathetic imagination that I am incapable of +developing; and especially the bird-calls. Concerning the latter, I +feel sure that a great deal of humbug is being said and written. I mean +to cast no reflections upon Harrington or his wife. The only occasions +on which I have known Harrington to deviate from the truth have been, as +I have already pointed out, in connection with his train-schedules. And +as Mrs. Harrington does not travel to the city, even this charge will +not hold against her. And yet I cannot help feeling that neither of the +two really hears the catbird say "miaow" or the robin "cheer up," as +they pretend to. At the first twitter or chirp from some invisible +source Mrs. Harrington stops and with radiant face asks me whether I do +not distinctly catch the "pit-pit-pity-me" of the meadow-lark. I say +yes; but I really don't, and I don't believe she does. My explanation is +that Mrs. Harrington is a woman and consequently ready to hear what she +has been led to expect she would hear. As for Harrington, he is a +devoted husband. + +For let us look at the matter with an open mind. Our alphabetical +representations of animal sounds are at best only rough approximations. +Most often they are not even that. They are mere arbitrary symbols. We +use consonants where the bird uses none, as when we give the name cuckoo +to a bird whose cry is really "ooh, ooh." Or else we put in the wrong +consonants, which is shown by the fact that different nations assign +different consonantal sounds to the same bird. We do not even agree on +the vowel sounds. What is there in common between our English +"Cock-a-doodle-doo" and M. Rostand's "cocorico"? And we need not go as +far as the animal world. See how the nations differ in spelling out that +elementary human sound which is the expression of pain or surprise, and +which in this country we hear as "Oh," and the Germans hear as "Ach," +and the Greeks heard as "Ai, Ai." If the human vocal chords can be so +imperfectly imitated, what shall we say of birds speaking after a manner +all their own? For myself I confess that in congenial company I can hear +birds say anything, but that left to myself I am sometimes puzzled by a +parrot. And that is the reason why I am sceptical concerning Mrs. +Harrington's accomplishments in this field. + +But while the birds about the Harringtons' home simply offend my regard +for the truth, the Harringtons' dog causes me acute bodily and mental +discomfort. He is of a spotted white, with a disreputable black patch +over one eye, and weighs, I should imagine, between eighty and ninety +pounds. During luncheon he takes his place under the table, and from +there emits blood-curdling howls with sufficient frequency to make +conversation extremely difficult. This he varies by nosing about the +visitor's legs and growling. I am not fond of dogs under the best of +circumstances. I always labour under the presumption that they will +bite. Their habit of suddenly dashing across the floor, in furious +pursuit of nothing in particular, upsets me. But an invisible dog under +a dining-room table is a dreadful experience. It is true that I managed +to give Mrs. Harrington a fairly rational account of the woman's +suffrage parade. But was she aware, as I sat there smiling +spasmodically, what agonies of fear were mine as I waited for those +white fangs under the table to sink into my flesh? If, under the +circumstances, I confused Harriet Beecher Stowe with Julia Ward Howe, +and made a bad blunder about woman's rights in Finland, am I so very +much to blame? + +Not that the Harringtons are the worst offenders in this respect. There +is an old classmate, and a very dear friend, indeed, who lives on +Flushing Bay, and has a pair of hopelessly ferocious dogs that hold the +neighbourhood in terror. The only occasion on which they have been known +to show indifference to strangers was one night when burglars broke in +and stole some silver and a revolver. When I go out to Flushing, I +stipulate that the dogs shall be locked up in the cellar from ten +minutes before my train is due until ten minutes after I have left the +house. But it would be foolhardy to omit additional precautions. Hence I +always carry an umbrella with the ferrule sharpened to a point, and when +I am within a block of the house I stoop and pick up a large stone, and +go on my way, with all my senses acute, whistling cheerfully. It is odd +how people will put themselves out to keep a harmless, poor relation out +of the way of visitors, and never think of the much greater discomfort +attendant upon the constant presence of an active bull-terrier. + +I may have produced the impression that life in the country makes no +appeal to me. Nothing could be further from my intentions. Whatever +doubts I may have entertained on this point vanish completely as the +Harringtons escort me to the station in the cool of the evening, the dog +having been left at home at my request. We pass by low, white-pillared +houses behind hedges, and the scent of hay comes up from the lawns, and +laughter comes from the dark of the verandas. The city at such a time +seems a very undesirable place to return to; a place to lose one's self +in--yes, and that is all. The Harringtons never were in the city what +they are here. They have taken root, they have developed local pride +which is only the sense of home. As we walk they point out the +residences of the leading citizens. Here lives the owner of one of the +largest factories of mechanical pianos in the country. This Japanese +temple belongs to a man who writes for some of the best-known magazines. +That colonial dwelling is occupied by the lawyer who defended Mrs. Dower +when she was tried for poisoning her husband. I reflect, in genuine +humility, that in the city I never think of taking strangers to see Mr. +William Dean Howells's house or Mr. Joseph H. Choate's. And with real +regret and admiration, I say good-night to the Harringtons. + + + + +XXVII + +HEADLINES + + +After Stephane Dubost, editor of the Paris _Réveil_, had been ten days +in this country, and had collected all his material for a series of +volumes on the American Woman, Yankee and Yellow Peril, Democracy +Décolleté, and Football _versus_ the Fine Arts--to name only a few--he +was asked what single feature of our life had impressed him as most +characteristically American. He replied, "The headlines in your daily +press." Just what M. Dubost did think of our achievements in that +department of journalism may be gathered from a letter he addressed the +very same day to his friend, Marcel Complans, director of the Bureau of +Cipher Codes in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs: + +"In nothing, my dear Marcel, is the American genius for saving time so +strikingly exemplified as in their newspaper headlines. Think of our +_Figaro_ or _Temps_ with its dreary columns of solid type introduced by +a minute solitary heading, and then pick up one of Uncle Sam's great +dailies. It may be only an item of four or five inches, what they call +here a stickful or two, but are you left to make your way unassisted +through the brief account? No. Your eye immediately catches a +time-saving headline like this: + +DESERTED GIRL WIFE + TO HOLD UP MAN. + +Having that concise legend before you, all you need to do, my dear +Marcel, is simply to decide for yourself whether our story deals with an +unscrupulous wretch who abandons his young wife to engage on a career of +highway robbery; or whether it is the history of a deserted girl who +becomes the wife of a professional outlaw; or whether it is a betrayed +young wife who gives herself up to the cause of elevating the human +race. A French reader, under the circumstances, would be compelled to go +through as much as thirty or forty lines of small print before he +secured the desired information. Thus it requires but a brief experience +with American headlines to recognise that when the Chicago _Evening +Post_ says + +FINDS ENGLISH FOOD +FOR LAND TAX FAITH + +it means that an American single-taxer, who has just returned from Great +Britain, believes that the English people is ready to listen to the +principles of the single-tax theory. And when the New York _Sun_ says + +LA FOLLETTE TALKING BOLT + +it does not mean that the Senator from Wisconsin is a manifestation of +crashing, celestial eloquence, but that he is advocating a secession +from the Republican party. Can you not see, my friend, what magnificent +economies of time are effected by headlines like + +WATCH SPRINGS TRAP + FOR JAPANESE SPY + +over a story dealing with the capture of an Oriental suspect by a +sentinel at one of the Pacific Coast forts, or + +SCREAMING FRIARS TORTURED +CHILD MOTHER FAINTS + +which does not mean that a society of howling friars have been guilty of +an atrocious crime upon an infant in the presence of its mother; or that +a band of religionists are driven by torture to cries of pain, while a +young mother faints at the sight. It only means that a poor mother, who +has suddenly gone insane, breaks into a house of refuge, where her +little boy is being cared for by a religious fraternity, accuses, +without warrant, the brothers of torturing her child, and faints. Or +take + +FRENCH RACE WORN OUT + ENGLISH TO TRIUMPH. + +These lines are not the summary of a study in national growth and decay, +but expressive of the fact that a French bicycle team wins a signal +victory over a group of exhausted English competitors. Do you see now +how far towards the art of simplified story-telling these Americans have +gone? + +"I can only express my profound admiration, as I pass, for the genius of +those men who almost automatically will dig the heart out of a 'story,' +and blazon it before the reader not only with marvellous brevity and +meaning, but with extraordinary appropriateness of characterisation. +Can you seize, for instance, the full relevancy of a headline like + +PRESBYTERIAN FALLS + TWENTY FEET + +or, + +PROFESSOR THRICE MARRIED + DENIES AUTHENTICITY OF BIBLE + +or see how the essential point is caught when a 'head' writer places + +FLORODORA GIRL EXPELLED +FROM CZAR'S CAPITAL + +over an account of the latest ukase which banishes from St. Petersburg +two hundred members of the Duma, twelve professors, fifty-five Jewish +bankers and artists, all the labour delegates, as well as the agent of +the American Plough Corporation, whose wife was one of the original +sextette? + +"I will conclude with what to me is an example of the art of headline +writing carried almost to perfection. Suppose that at Paris a +long-distance foot-race between one of our countrymen and a foreign +athlete had been won by our compatriot. The _Réveil_ would probably say, +'Armand Wins at Auteuil,' and go on to give the details. But observe +what they do here. I cite the article complete, headline and text: + +HAYES WINS + +VICTOR IN DUAL MATCH OVER DORANDO + +AMERICAN LEADS ITALIAN TO THE TAPE, + AND CARRIES OFF PRIZE + +DORANDO CAN DO NOTHING BETTER THAN + SECOND + +ONE MORE VICTORY ADDED TO GREAT + RUNNER'S STRING + +TEN THOUSAND CHEERING SPECTATORS +SEE THE AMERICAN RUNNER REPEAT +HIS VICTORY AT THE OLYMPIC GAMES + +"New York, November 26.--The race between Hayes and Dorando this +afternoon was won by the former." + + + + +XXVIII + +USAGE + + + ... _a certain class of verbal critics who can never free themselves + from the impression that man was made for language and not language for + man._--Professor Lounsbury. + +From a large number of readers we have received requests for a ruling on +disputed cases of English usage. We now proceed to answer these +inquiries in accordance with the liberal standard for which Professor +Lounsbury pleads. One man writes: + +_Question:_ Which is right, "To-morrow is Sunday and we are going out," +or "To-morrow will be Sunday and we shall go out?" _Answer:_ Both forms +are right, but as a matter of fact, if to-morrow is like other Sundays, +it will probably rain all day, and your chances of going out are not +bright. + +_Q._ Must a sentence always have coherence? What is the practice of our +great writers on this point? _A._ Coherence is not essential. Thus: +"Conquests! Thousands! Don Bolaro Fizzgig--Grandee--only daughter--Donna +Christina--Splendid creature--loved me to distraction--jealous +father--high-souled daughter--handsome Englishman--Donna Christina in +despair--prussic acid--stomach pump in my portmanteau--operation +performed--old Bolaro in ecstasies--consent to our union--join hands and +floods of tears--romantic story--very." (Charles Dickens.) + +_Q._ Must a sentence always have a predicate? _A._ No. For example: (1) +"The Universe smiles to me. The World smiles to me. Everything. Man. +Woman. Children. Presidential Candidates. Trolley Cars. Everything +smiles to me." (_The Complete Whitmanite_) (2) "From the frowning tower +of Babel on which the insectile impotence of man dared to contend with +the awful wrath of the Almighty, through the granite bulk of the +beetling Pyramids lifting their audacious crests to the star-meshed +skies that bend down to kiss the blue waters of Father Nile and the +gracious nymphs laving their blithesome limbs in the pools that stud the +sides of Pentelicus, down to our own Washington, throned like an empress +on the banks of the beautiful Potomac, waiting for the end which we +trust may never come." (From the _Congressional Record_.) + +_Q._ Is "ivrybody" a permissible variant for "everybody"? _A._ It is. +For instance, "His dinners [our ambassador's at St. Petersburg] were th' +most sumchuse ever known in that ancient capital; th' carredge of state +that bore him fr'm his stately palace to th' comparatively squalid +quarters of th' Czar was such that _ivrybody_ expicted to hear th' +sthrains iv a calliope burst fr'm it at anny moment." (Mr. Dooley.) + +_Q._ Is there good authority for saying, "He was given a hat," "He was +shown the door," etc.? _A._ The form is common, and therefore correct. +As, "The Senator _was paid_ twenty thousand dollars for voting against +the Governor"; "He _was offered_ a third term, but declined"; "The +coloured delegates _were handed_ a lemon." (From the contemporary +press.) + +_Q._ The use of "who" and "whom" puzzles me. Must "who" always be used +in the nominative case and "whom" in the objective? _A._ Not +necessarily. Thus, "I told him who I wanted to see and that it wasn't +none of his business" (W. S. Devery); "That's the first guy whom he said +put him into the cooler." (Battery Dan Finn.) + +_Q._ I am told that it is wrong to place a preposition at the end of a +sentence. Why can't I say, "Mr. Roosevelt is a man whom I should enjoy +talking _with_"? _A._ Your example is unfortunate. You should say, "Mr. +Roosevelt is a man whom I should enjoy talking _after_." + +_Q._ Is it wrong to split infinitives? Is a phrase like "to seriously +complain" really objectionable? _A._ We hasten to most emphatically say +"Yes!" + +_Q._ Is there a rigid rule with regard to the use of the preterite +tense? When do you say "hung" and when do you say "hanged"? _A._ Two +examples from a universally recognised authority will illustrate the +flexibility of our language in the general use of tenses: (1) "'I know a +gen'l'man, sir,' said Mr. Weller, 'as did that, and _begun_ at two +yards; but he never tried it on ag'in; for he _blowed_ the bird right +clean away at the first fire, and nobody ever _seed_ a feather on him +arterwards.'" (2) "So I take the privilidge of the day, Mary, my +dear--as the gen'lem'n in difficulties did, ven he valked out of a +Sunday--to tell you that the first and only time I _see_ you your +likeness was _took_ on my hart in much quicker time and brighter colours +than ever a likeness was took by the profeel macheens (wich p'r'aps you +may have _heerd_ on Mary my dear) altho it does finish a portrait and +put the frame and glass on complete with a hook at the end to hang it up +by and all in two minutes and a quarter." (Charles Dickens.) + +_Q._ What is "elegance" in style? I know it does not mean long words and +many of them; but just what does it mean? _A._ Elegance is +appropriateness. Long and circumlocutory terms are just as elegant in +the mouth of a fashionable preacher as shorter and uglier words in the +mouth of some one else. Hamlet's "Angels and ministers of grace defend +us!" and Chuck Connors's "Wouldn't it bend your Merry Widow?" are +equally elegant. + +_Q._ What is force in style? _A._ We may illustrate with a quotation +from Hall Caine's unannounced book: "He drew her to him and kissed her +as men and women have kissed through the æons, since the first star +hymned to the first moonrise." Now, as a matter of fact, kissing is only +about two thousand years old, and is still unknown to the Chinese, the +native Africans, the Hindus, the Australians, the Indians of South +America, the Polynesians, and the Eskimos; but the sentence is +nevertheless a very forcible one. + + + + +XXIX + +60 H.P. + + +For the purpose of getting one's name into the papers, the acquisition +of a high-powered automobile may be recommended to the man who has never +given a monkey dinner; whose son was never married to a show-girl in a +balloon at 2.30 A.M.; whose son-in-law is neither a count, a duke, nor a +prince, and does not beat his wife; who has never paid $100,000 for a +Velasquez painted in 1897, or for a mediæval Florentine altar-piece made +in Dayton, Ohio. The press, like the public, does not brim over with +affection for the motorist. From the newspapers it may be gathered that +when a man has been seen in the front seat of an automobile his family +prefers not to allude to the subject. Good men occasionally ride, but +as a rule only on errands of mercy, and always in a friend's machine. A +candidate for mayor will laugh when you accuse him of owning an opium +den, taking $10,000 a month from Mr. Morgan, or experimenting freely in +polygamy; but he throws up his hands when some one proves that he has +been seen in a garage. + +To me this seems absurd. If people admit that the automobile is here to +stay, they must also admit that it is here to move from place to place +occasionally. Automobiles that did nothing but stay would obviously fail +in one of their principal aims. Not that the auto has no other important +functions. It is evident that motor-cars were intended for little boys +who squeeze the signal bulb and stick nails into the tires; for +Republican orators to cite as evidence that the American farmer does not +want the tariff revised; for foreign observers to prove that we are +developing an aristocracy; and for Tammany office-holders to snatch a +bit of relaxation after the day's long grind. + +Motoring is not unmitigated bliss. The common belief that a body may be +in only one place at one time can be easily refuted by a woman with a +baby-carriage. Experience shows that such a woman, if she be put five +feet from a sidewalk, with forty feet of open road behind her for an +auto to pass through, will cover the forty feet backward with incredible +speed and propel herself right in front of the car. What would happen if +two cars came in opposite directions on opposite sides of a hundred-foot +avenue cannot be predicted. Either the woman would be accompanied by +another woman with a baby-carriage, or else, having propelled her own +carriage in front of the machine going north, she would proceed to give +her personal attention to the car going south. + +It is difficult to start on a short spin in town, under doctor's orders, +without immediately beginning to wonder why house rents and office rents +should be going up steadily in face of the fact that the population of +New York transacts its business and pursues its pleasures entirely in +the middle of the road. German citizens, as a rule, stop to light their +pipes on a street crossing. When you give them the horn, they are seized +with the belief that you are trying to play the prelude to "Lohengrin," +and they run up and down in front of the car in extreme agitation. You +frustrate their plans for a beautiful death by rasping your tires +against the curb, together with your nerves. At Seventy-second Street +two women are saying good-bye in the middle of the street. You swerve to +one side and they pursue. You snap your spinal column as you shoot the +car straight about, but when you get there they are there. "Ladies," +you say, "I am not leading a cotillion. I am an old man out for a bit of +fresh air." Thereupon one calls you a brute and the other discerns from +the colour of your nose that you have been drinking. At Forty-second +Street you catch sight of your doctor. "Have you killed any one?" he +says, after the cheerful manner of doctors. "No," you say, "but if you +will kindly step into the car, I will." + +Of the American farmer it may be said that, Mr. Roosevelt to the +contrary notwithstanding, he is not an unimaginative, overworked being. +It can be demonstrated that the contemplative life is on the increase in +the rural districts. Apparently, there is nothing more peaceful, nothing +more restful, nothing more soothing, nothing more permeated with the +spirit of _dolce far niente_, than the American farmer on his wagon in a +narrow road with an auto behind him. The grunt of the horn invariably +stirs in him memories of his aged grandmother, dead these twenty years, +and he falls a wondering whether he was really as kind to her as he +might have been. If the road is just wide enough for one vehicle, he +moves along pensively. If it is wide enough for two vehicles, he throws +his horses straight across the road and enters upon a prolonged +examination of his rear axle. If the road is wide enough for three +vehicles, he drives zigzag. The necessity of conserving our natural +resources would seem to be a meaningless phrase when we consider the +natural resources of an American farmer in front of an automobile. + +The law and the courts press hard on the autoist. Since the invention of +the automobile fine, the position of justice of the peace has become one +of the highest offices in the gift of the nation. The city magistrate is +a kindred soul. "Your Honour," says the prosecuting officer, "the +question is whether the city's boulevards shall be given over to the +owners of these destructive vehicles or whether they shall be held clear +for the use of Marathon runners, suffragette meetings, baseball teams, +and 'crap' games. The streets, your Honour, are for the benefit of the +majority; yet only the other day on Fifth Avenue I saw two ash-carts and +an ice wagon held up by a continuous stream of automobiles." "Right," +says the judge, and he turns to the victim: "What were you doing in the +middle of the street when defendant ran you down wantonly and without +cause?" "I was sleeping, your Honour," says the complainant, "having +been overtaken with drowsiness on my way home from a select social +affair." "Outrageous," says the magistrate. "Think of running into a +sleeping man. One hundred dollars." + +Such incidents make it clear that the automobile as an annihilator of +space has established its reputation. In the days before the auto a +drive of fifteen or twenty miles constituted a good Sunday's outing. +To-day a man can leave New Rochelle at eight o'clock in the morning and +pay a fine at Poughkeepsie at one in the afternoon, or he can leave +Poughkeepsie at eight in the morning and at one in the afternoon be in +the lock-up at New Rochelle. + +What hurts the motorist's feelings most of all, however, is to be +regarded by the public as a sort of licensed assassin. Yet almost any +one can think of people who drive a car and take no pleasure in spilling +blood. The common belief that automobile killing is a favourite sport +among our best families seems to be based on the fact that in nine cases +out of ten the occupants of a man-slaying automobile bear such +well-known Knickerbocker names as Mr. William Moriarty, chauffeur; his +friend, Mr. James Dugan, who is prominent in coal-heaving circles; and +their friends, the Misses Mayme Schultz and Bessie Goldstein. At bottom, +it would seem, most of the criticism directed against the automobile is +based on its failure to take a hog and turn him into a gentleman. But in +this respect automobiles are like many of our colleges. The comforting +thing is that the life of the automobile hog is an uncertain one. Sooner +or later he runs down a steep place into the sea, like certain of his +species mentioned in the Bible, and the question adjusts itself. + +Meanwhile, however, the decent motorist must suffer for the other's +sins. A friend says: "The only time I dare be seen in my machine is +between 11 A.M. and 4 P.M. Before that time people point me out as a +'joy-rider' returning from a night's debauch. After that time I am a +'joy-rider' bound for a night of it." The complaint rings true. The +exhilaration aroused by a punctured tire in the open country gathers +strength from the remarks of the spectators who wonder if you made your +money honestly. In town a defective sparkplug brings the close attention +of a crowd which exchanges opinions as to whether the lady in the +tonneau is your wife. All agree that you must have mortgaged your home +to buy the machine. + +And yet it is evident that much misunderstanding could be avoided if we +had a simple code of rules for people who cross the street just as there +are regulations for the autoist. A few such rules suggest themselves: 1. +If one is about to cross the street in front of an auto, one should do +so either before the man in the car succumbs to heart failure or after, +but not while the driver is wrestling with death; it is in such cases +that one is apt to get hurt. 2. If one is in the middle of the road and +sees a car approaching, one should move either (_a_) away from the car, +(_b_) towards the car, (_c_) to the right, (_d_) to the left, or (_e_) +stand still; under no circumstances should one attempt to combine (_a_), +(_b_), (_c_), (_d_), and (_e_). 3. The safest place from which to +ascertain the make of an automobile or to estimate its cost is the +sidewalk. + + + + +XXX + +THE SAMPLE LIFE + + +The hour, the occasion, and the scene were conducive to melancholy. We +had walked a good fifteen miles into the open country and back again +under chilly clouds, and were now paying for it with an empty sense of +weariness and disenchantment. There is nothing so depressing as a bare +room lit up by flaring gas-jets against the gloom of a late afternoon of +rain; and the lights in Scipione's little cellar restaurant flared away +in the most outrageous manner. Harding, across the table from me, +wretchedly fluttered the pages of a popular magazine and looked +ill-natured and horribly unkempt. The new table-cloths had not yet been +laid for dinner. The sawdust on the floor was mostly mire. Angelina, +the cook, was screaming at Paolo and Francesca, who were trying to boil +the cat. It was very dreary. + +"Harding," I said, "you were insisting only a little while ago that life +is always beautiful." + +"So it is," he replied, too listless to be defiant. "To some people." + +"To whom?" + +"Well, to the two here, for instance," and he pointed to a pair of +handsome lovers playing golf all over a double page in the advertising +section of his magazine. "Do you mean to say these two ever know what +ugliness is, or pain, or want? Or ever grow old? Or cease to love? Here +is the perfect life for you." + +"Are you so sure of that?" said some one over my shoulder, and I turned +about sharply to look into the most entrancing face I have ever beheld +in man or woman. It was Apollo standing there above me, or if not he, at +least one of the divine youths that the Greeks have left for us in +undying marble. He made Scipione's grimy cellar luminous with beauty. + +"I beg your pardon for intruding," he said, seating himself at our table +as joyously confident and as simple as an immortal should be. "But I +feel myself competent to speak on the point you have raised because the +Advertising Supplement you refer to is my own home. This very young man +playing golf is, as you will observe, no other than myself." + +There was no denying the amazing resemblance. + +"You say the Advertising Supplement is your home," I collected myself +sufficiently to ask, "but just how do you mean that?" + +"Literally," he replied. "My whole life, and for that matter my parents' +life before me, has been spent in the pages you are now fingering. My +name is Pinckney, Walter Pinckney, and if you are sufficiently +interested in my career I should be glad to describe it." + +"Go ahead," cried Harding, with almost ferocious earnestness. + +"If I begin a bit back before my birth," said Pinckney, "you will be +patient with me. I will not detain you very long." + +"Begin where you please," said Harding in the same grim manner; "only +begin." + +"My father," commenced young Pinckney, "at eighteen, was a sickly +country lad with less than the usual elementary education and no other +prospects than a life of drudgery on the old farm. But there was in him +an elemental strength of will that was sufficient, as it turned out, to +master fate. You have read his life again and again in the Advertising +Pages of our magazines. On his nineteenth birthday, as I have heard him +tell many a time, he began the reshaping of his life by investing the +small sum of fifty cents in a manual of home exercise and enrolling +himself at the same time with one of our best-known correspondence +schools, which offered an attractive course in engineering and +scientific irrigation. Simultaneously, from that day he carried on the +work of his bodily and intellectual redemption. We still have at home a +collection of the various domestic utensils which he employed in his +daily training--an old armchair; a broom; a large gilt portrait frame +through which he would leap twenty-five times every morning; a marble +clock; a pair of water buckets; an old trunk lid, and other articles of +the kind. Close beside his gymnastic apparatus we keep three trunkfuls +of note-books and reports representing as many years devoted labour at +his studies. At the age of twenty-six my father was a veritable Hercules +and held the position of assistant to the chief engineer of an +important Eastern railroad. It was shortly after he had won this place +that he met my mother." + +The caressing fondness with which he uttered the last word imparted to +his seemingly supreme beauty an added warmth of appeal. + +"Her, too, you have met in the Advertising Columns. She had begun to +teach school when a mere girl; but when her father's death threw upon +her young shoulders the burden of three little children and a helpless +mother, she had risen to her greater needs. She succeeded in quadrupling +her income by learning to write short stories, criticism, and verse, +from a literary bureau which charged her a nominal fee for instruction +and purchased her output at extremely generous rates for disposal among +the leading magazines. When my father first saw her--it was in the +course of a Fourth of July excursion to Niagara Falls which, including a +three days' stay at the best hotels, was offered to the public at half +the usual cost--she had sent the eldest boy through college, her younger +sister was teaching school, and she was free to follow the inclinations +of her heart." + +"You were fortunate in the selection of your immediate ancestry," said +Harding. + +"Was I not?" Pinckney responded in a flush of grateful recognition. "But +that is not all. The house in which I was born, though generally +recognized as one of the finest examples of Queen Anne architecture in +reinforced concrete, was put up by my father, unassisted, from plans +which he purchased for a ridiculously small sum. Its every nook was the +abiding-place of love, of quiet content, and of nurturing comfort. The +furnace was equipped with the latest automatic devices so that it had to +be started only once a year. It was then left to the care of my mother, +who used to give it only a few minutes' attention every day without +going to the trouble of divesting herself of the gown of fine white lawn +which she always wore." + +"My dear fellow," I could not keep from exclaiming, "you have almost +explained yourself. In such surroundings how could you help growing up +into what you are?" + +"That is what I say, sir," he came back at me eagerly. "But you must +call to mind, also, the fostering personal care that was bestowed upon +us children. Take the matter of diet. Coffee, cocoa, excessive sweets, +every food-element tending to narcotise or over-stimulate the system was +rigorously excluded. Instead we had the numerous grain preparations that +assist nature by contributing directly to the development of our +particular faculties. In my case, for instance, it had been decided some +time before I was born that in the course of time I should enter West +Point. With that end in view Farinette, because of its muscle-building +powers, was made the principal constituent of my bill of fare. Later, +when my parents thought that the pulpit offered better chances of a +successful career, Farinette was replaced by Panema, which is notably +efficacious in the production of cerebral tissue. Just as I was taking +my examinations for college it was finally determined that the sphere of +corporation finance held out unrivalled facilities for advancement, and +Panema gave way to Hydronuxia, which acts particularly on the +imaginative faculties. As for my sisters, they fared no worse than I. +You surely have seen them in the Advertising Pages in all their splendid +bloom. Saved from overwork by soaps that make heavy washing a pleasure, +eternally youthful through the use of electric massage, they smile at +you through the reticulations of the tennis racket which the champion +played with at Newport, or recline under parasols in the bow of canoes +that will neither sink nor upset. They are very fond of playing Chopin +on a mechanical piano while the moonlight streams over the floor of the +open veranda." + +Here Harding broke in sharply. "You began by differing with me on the +possibility of finding complete happiness in life, and you have done +nothing but refute your own position from the very first. I admit there +are certain essentials toward the perfect life that you have not +mentioned, but I haven't the least doubt that you already possess them +or that they will come to you in time. I mean such things as riches or +love." + +"Ah, love," Pinckney murmured, and the shadow of a cloud passed over his +divine brow. + +"Surely," I said, "_you_ have not sought for what love has to give and +sought in vain?" + +"No," he replied thoughtfully, "I have not failed to win love. But does +love bring with it untouched felicity; that is what I ask." He +hesitated. "I will not attempt to describe her. I really could not, you +know, except in a feeble way, by saying that even to other eyes than +mine she is a woman more wonderful than any of my sisters, if that is at +all possible. We loved at first sight. I had run down for a Sunday +afternoon to Garden Towers-by-the-Sea, a beautiful suburb which a number +of enterprising citizens had built up out of a sand waste to meet the +needs of the tired urban worker who, in his expensive and uncomfortable +city flat, finds himself longing for the life-giving breeze of the ocean +and the sight of a bit of God's open country. I was walking down the +main street of the village, wearing the loosely shaped and well-padded +garments that were then popular with young men, and carrying a set of +golf-sticks in my right hand and a bull terrier under my arm. Then I saw +her. She was sitting on the porch of the house which her father had +purchased for one-third of what its value became when the completion of +extensive rapid-transit improvements brought it within thirty-five +minutes of the New York City Hall. We loved and told each other. My +father, at first, insisted that before assuming the responsibilities of +marriage a man should be in receipt of a larger independent income than +I could boast of. But when Alice pleaded that she could be of help by +raising high-grade poultry for the urban market and organising +subscribers' clubs for the magazines, my father yielded. We are to be +married in two months, sir." + +Harding spoke up impatiently. "Still I fail to see where your +unhappiness lies." + +"Did I say unhappiness? That is not at all the word, sir. It is rather +a sense of awe that seizes us both at times, when we are together, as +though we were in the presence of unseen influences; as though, rather, +a world not our own were projecting itself into our well-defined lives. +I have shown you that Alice and I belong to a very real, very +matter-of-fact world. But there are times when we seem to be walking in +a land of strange sounds and sights and of shadows that fan our cheeks +as they flit by." + +"Oh, well," I said, "when two fond young people are together the limits +of the visible world are apt to undergo undue extension." + +"Let me be specific," said Pinckney. "We first became aware of this +state of things some weeks ago. We were walking one afternoon at +twilight through a stretch of woods not far from the shore when all at +once we were conscious that the familiar aspect of things had vanished. +The park had become a virgin forest. Two savage figures girded with +skins were panting in deadly combat. One had sunk his thumbs into the +eye-sockets of his opponent, who, in turn, had buried his teeth in the +flesh of the other's arm. A wild creature, almost hidden in the long +tangle of her hair, crouched there, the only spectator of the battle, +chanting in weird tones: 'Ai! Ai! the call of the wild summons you to +the death-grapple, oh Men, and me to sing who am Woman! Fight on, oh +Men; for it is Good! The Race, the Sons of your strong loins through the +dizzy whirl-dance of all time, are watching you. Match man-strength +against man-strength, breath-rhythm against breath-rhythm, and +knee-thrust against knee-thrust!' And then one of the combatants fell, +and the victor with a yell of triumph seized the woman by the hair and, +flinging her over his shoulder, staggered off, and we heard them call +to each other, 'Oh, my Male!' 'Oh, my Female!' Then we were in our own +grove by the beach and Alice whispered dreamily, 'Dearest, how tame are +our lives.'" + +"I think I begin to understand," said I. "What happened was simply that +you had walked right out of the Advertising Supplement into the Fiction +pages; and that was Jack London. Had you other experiences of the kind?" + +"On another occasion," he resumed, "we were walking on the beach and +again in a flash we had lost our footing in the world we knew. We were +in a magnificent ballroom. The chandeliers were Venetian, the orchestra +was Hungarian, the decorations were priceless orchids. Every woman wore +a tiara with chains of pearls. There were stout dowagers, callow youths, +gamblers, and blacklegs, and, among the many handsome men, one of about +five-and-thirty, with a wonderfully cut chin, bending sedulously over a +glorious, slender girl whose eyes attested the purity of her soul and +fidelity unto death. 'Dearest,' she was saying, 'what does it matter +that my father was the greatest Greek scholar in America and my mother +the most beautiful woman south of Mason and Dixon's line? What that I +have ten million dollars and can ride, shoot, swim, golf, tennis, dance, +sing, compose, cook, and interpret the Irish sagas? I love you though +you have only twelve thousand a year.' And all over the hall we caught +such phrases as, 'Yes, he dropped 25,000 on Non Sequitur at Bennings.' +'Oh, just down for three weeks at Palm Beach, you know.' 'Two millions +in three weeks, they say, mostly out of Copper and Q.C.B.' 'Yes, just +back from South Dakota on the best of terms.' Then the room vanished, we +were by the sea, and Alice said wistfully, 'How limited our lives are, +dear.'" + +I said: "My theory holds good. That was Robert Chambers, I am sure. Go +on." + +"I have told you enough," said Pinckney, "to show what I mean by the +shadow over our happiness. It will pass away, of course. In the meantime +I try to explain to Alice that these are phantoms we vision, of no +relation to the practical life that we must lead on our side of the +boundary line; I tell her that these things we see are not, and never +have been and never will be. Am I right, do you think, sir?" + +"Quite right," I told him. + + + + +XXXI + +THE COMPLETE COLLECTOR--IV + + +"My latest fad," said Cooper, "is this little library of the greatest +names in literature. It is by no means complete, but the nucleus is +there." + +When Cooper speaks of his fads he does himself injustice. The world +might think them fads, or worse. But I, who know the man, know that his +fondness for the insignificant or the extraordinary is something more +than eccentricity, something more than a collector's appetite run amuck. +In reality, Cooper's soul goes out to the worthless objects he +frequently brings together into odd little museums. He loves them +precisely because they are insignificant. His whole life has been a +silent protest against the arrogance of success, of high merit, of rare +value. His heart is always on the side of the _Untermensch_, a name +given by the Germans, a learned people, to what we call the under-dog. + +"My collection," said Cooper, "is as yet confined almost entirely to +authors in the English language. Here is my Shakespeare, a first +edition, I believe, though undated. The year, I presume, was about 1875. +The title, you see, is comprehensive: 'The Nature of Evaporating +Inflammations in Arteries After Ligature, Accupressure, and Torsion.' +Edward O. Shakespeare, who wrote the book, is not a debated personality. +His authorship of the book is unquestioned, and I assure you it is a +comfort to handle a text which you know left its author's mind exactly +as it now confronts you in the page. + +"Next to the Shakespeare you find my Dickens volumes, two in number. +Albert Dickens published, in 1904, his 'Tests of Forest Trees.' It has +been praised in authoritative quarters as an excellent work of its kind. +An older book is 'Dickens's Continental A B C,' a railway guide which I +am fond of thinking of as the probable instrument of a vast amount of +human happiness. Imagine the happy meetings and reunions which this +chubby little book has made possible--husbands and wives, fathers and +children, lovers, who from the most distant corners of the earth have +sought and found each other by means of the Dickens railway time-tables. +To how many beds of illness has it brought a comforter, to how many +habitations of despair--but I must not preach. I call your attention to +the next volume, Byron. From the title, 'A Handbook of Lake Minnetonka,' +you will perceive that it is in the same class as my Dickens." + +Cooper drew his handkerchief to flip the dust from a thin octavo in +sheepskin. "This Emerson," he said, "is the earliest in date of my +Americana. William Emerson's 'A Sermon on the Decease of the Rev. Peter +Thacher' appeared in 1802, at a time when people still thought it worth +while to utilise the death of a good man by putting him into a book for +the edification of the living. The adjoining two volumes are by Spencer. +Charles E. Spencer's 'Rue, Thyme, and Myrtle' is a sheaf of dainty +poetry which was very popular in Philadelphia during the second decade +after the Civil War. Do we still write poetry as single-heartedly as +people did? It may be. Perhaps we might find out by comparing this other +volume by Edwin Spencer, 'Cakes and Ale,' published in 1897, with the +Philadelphia Spencer of forty years ago. + +"I must hurry you through the rest of my books," said Cooper. "Thomas +James Thackeray's 'The Soldier's Manual of Rifle-Firing' appeared in +1858, and undoubtedly had its day of usefulness. Thomas Kipling was +professor of divinity at Cambridge University toward the end of the +eighteenth century. In 1793 he edited the volume I now hold in my hand, +'Codex Bezæ,' one of the most precious of our extant MSS. of the New +Testament. I like to think of that fine old Cambridge professor's name +as bound up with patient, self-effacing scholarship and a highly +developed spirituality. But I digress. Cast your eye over this little +group of foreign writers. Here is Dumas,--Jean Baptiste Dumas,--whose +'Leçons sur la philosophic chimique,' delivered in 1835, were considered +worthy of being published thirty years later. The quaint volume that +comes next is by Du Maurier, who was French ambassador to the Hague +about 1620. The title, in the Dutch, is 'Propositie gedan door den +Heere van Maurier,' etc.--'Propositions Advanced by the Sieur du +Maurier,' one of the Regent's able and merry-hearted diplomats, I take +it. And here is Goethe; he would repay your reading. Rudolf Goethe's +'Mitteilungen ueber Obst- und Gartenbau' is one of the standard works on +horticulture. + +"And finally," said Cooper with a flash of pride quite unusual in him, +"the treasure of my little library--Homer; again a first edition." + +"Homer!" I cried. "An _editio princeps_!" + +"Nearly one hundred and fifty years old," he said. "The Rev. Henry Homer +deserved well of his British countrymen when he gave to the world--it +was in 1767--his 'Inquiry Into the Measures of Preserving and Improving +the Publick Roads of this Kingdom.'" + +Cooper sat down and eyed me doubtfully, as if awaiting an unfavourable +opinion. His face quite lit up when I hastened to assure him that his +library was one of the most impressive collections it had ever been my +good fortune to know. + +"Very few collections," I told him, "bear the impress of a personality. +As a rule they are shopfuls of costly masterpieces such as any +multi-millionaire may have if he doesn't prefer horses or monkey +dinners. But how often does one find a treasure-house like yours, +Cooper, revealing an exquisitely discriminating taste in co-operation +with the bold originality of the true amateur?" + + + + +XXXII + +CHOPIN'S SUCCESSORS + + +"It is his own composition, the final word in modern music," I had been +told. "He does not merely play the concerto; he lives it. Be sure to +watch his face." It was not a very impressive face as artists go. It was +rather heavy, rather sullen, and seemingly incapable of mirroring more +than the elementary passions. The great pianist entered the hall almost +unwillingly, and wound his way among the musicians with consummate +indifference to the roar of applause that greeted him. You might have +said that he was once more a little boy being scourged to his piano day +after day by parents who had been told that they had brought forth a +genius. He half-dropped into his seat, glanced wearily about him, then +let his eyes sink expressionless on the keyboard and his hands fall flat +on his knees, nerveless, heavy, apathetic. + +The orchestra leader poised his baton and the two-score strings under +his command swung into a noble andante. The artist at the piano slowly +raised his eyes to a level with the top of his instrument, his lips just +parted as if in halting wonder at something he alone in the great hall +could see, the hands made as if to lift themselves from his knees. "Look +at his face," my neighbour said. I looked and saw that the dull mask was +slightly changing, that some emotion at last was rising to the surface +of that stolid countenance, striking its cloudy aspect with the first +anticipations of breaking light. Would that cloud dissolve? Would the +light completely break and irradiate player, piano, and audience, all +equally keyed up to the delayed climax? Would those massive hands rise +slowly, slowly, and hanging aloft an instant crash down in a rage of +harmony upon keyboard and auditors' hearts? No. The clouds once more +swept over that massive face. The player moistened his lips with his +tongue, half-turned on his chair, and slowly swept the hall with an +indifferent, almost a disdainful eye. Then he sank into his former +lassitude. His hands dropped to his side without striking the keys. +Evidently the time had not come. The violins in the orchestra sang on. + +My neighbour was not the only one to fall under the spell of such +masterly musicianship. Twenty-four ladies in the parquette shrank back +into their seats with a half-sob of brimming emotion, and implored their +escorts to look at the artist's face. Eleven ladies in the lower boxes +interrupted their conversation to remark that it was wonderful what soul +those Slavs managed to put into their playing. In the upper balconies +listeners strained forward in their seats so that from below it seemed +as if they were about to precipitate themselves over the railings. What +expert opinion had described as the sublimest ten minutes in the great +pianist's greatest concerto had just begun. The conductor slightly +raised himself on his toes. Instantly through the weaving of the violins +the voices of the wood instruments began to break out. The contest +between the two came quickly to its climax. The strings were forced back +and back, wailing an ineffective protest against the shrilling advance +of the woods. A solitary 'cello made dogged resistance, knowing its +cause hopeless, but determined to sell life as dearly as possible. But +the 'cello, too, went down and for a bar or two the flutes and oboes +sang a pæan of victory. Too soon. Upon them, like a tidal wave, swept +down a hurricane of brasses and shook the hall with its resonant +thunders. + +That was the moment our artist at the piano had been waiting for. His +heavy figure straightened up; it seemed to swell to monstrous +proportions, forcing orchestra and leader out of the vision and +consciousness of his listeners. His face now was all eloquence. A divine +wrath almost made his eyes blaze as he prepared to hurl himself at the +silent, yet quivering instrument. His huge hands hovered over the +keyboard ready to fall and destroy. His eyes ran over the keys as if +searching for the vulnerable, for the vital spot. Back and forth his +eyes ran, and his outstretched fingers kept pace with them in the air. +But those fingers could find no resting-place. Still the piano remained +silent. And then came the inevitable reaction. Such passion could not +last without crushing player and audience alike. Seven ladies in the +parquette were grasping the arms of their chairs, and three women in the +upper balcony had seized the arms of their escorts, as the brasses +crashed once and died out. The flutes for an instant reappeared, to make +way in turn for the violins, which now began timidly to peep out from +their hiding-places. They grew bolder; they joined hands, and once more +their insistent story quivered and sang throughout the house. And as +they sang, the player at the piano, exhausted by his supreme effort, +sank more and more into his indifferent former self. His form collapsed, +the fire in his eyes died out, and the powerful hands wearily drooped +and drooped till they rested once more on the player's knees. A sigh of +relief swept over the hall. Human emotion could stand no more. The +audience could hardly wait for the last throb of the violins, to break +out in rapturous applause. The master rose, bowed sorrowfully towards +nobody in particular, and walked off. + +"Did you watch his face?" asked my neighbour. "Have you ever come across +such utterly overpowering individuality? I have played for fifteen +years, but if I played for fifty years I could never even approach art +like this." + + + + +XXXIII + +THE IRREPRESSIBLE CONFLICT + + +"The arguments for and against woman suffrage," said Harding, "seem to +me very evenly balanced. I agree with Dr. Biddle of the Society for the +Promotion of Beautiful Manners, that it is unseemly for a woman to climb +a truck and demand the ballot. Dr. Biddle maintains that if woman wants +the ballot she should wait until every one is asleep and then go through +somebody's pockets for it. Woman, Dr. Biddle thinks, has her own +peculiar sphere, which, as the latest Census figures show, includes the +nursery, the kitchen, the vaudeville stage, college teaching, +stenography, the law, medicine, the ministry, as well as the manufacture +of agricultural implements, ammunition, artificial feathers and limbs, +automobiles, axle-grease, boots and shoes, bread-knives, brooms, +brushes, buttons, carriages and wagons, charcoal, cheese, cigars, +clocks, clothing and so on to x, y, and z. + +"Can anything be more fatal to our ideals of true womanliness, Dr. +Biddle asks, than a suffragette who throws stones? In reply to this, +Miss Annabelle Bloodthurst asserts that if we count the number of +successful suffragette hits woman is never so true to her sex as when +she is heaving bricks at a British prime minister. + +"Professor Tumbler lays particular stress on the outrageous conduct of +the English suffragettes. He recalls how the Secretary for Foreign +Affairs, while eating a charlotte russe, felt his teeth strike against a +hard object, which turned out to be a cardboard cylinder inscribed +'Votes for Women.' The chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster was about to +light his after-dinner cigar the other day when the cigar suddenly +expanded into a paper fan bearing the legend, 'Tyrants, beware!' The +newest Dreadnought with the First Lord of the Admiralty on board was +preparing to set out on her trial trip when it was discovered that the +boilers were not making steam. When the furnace doors were opened two +dozen suffragettes, concealed within, began to shout, 'We want votes!' +The leader of the Opposition is known to have walked all the way down +Piccadilly with a tag tied to his coattails inscribed: 'I see no reason +for bestowing the suffrage on women.' + +"But perhaps the most dastardly outrage occurred at the baptism of the +youngest child of a prominent treasury official. It seems that the +nurse, who was a suffragette in disguise, had removed the child, a girl, +and substituted a mechanical doll, with a phonographic attachment. The +clergyman was in the middle of his discourse when the doll began to +scream, 'Votes for women.' The father gasped, 'What! So early?' and +fainted. + +"The more you weigh the reasons pro and con," continued Harding, as he +lit one of my cigars, "the harder it is to decide. Mrs. Cadgers has +pointed out that under our present system the wife of a college +professor is not allowed to vote, whereas an illiterate Greek fruit +peddler may. But Mr. Rattler replies that the college professor, too, +seldom votes, and if he does he spoils his ballot by trying to split his +ticket. Why, demands Mrs. Cadgers, should women who pay taxes be refused +a voice in the management of public affairs? Because, replies Mr. +Rattler, the suffrage and taxes do not necessarily go together. In our +country at the present day many millionaires who regularly cast their +votes never pay their taxes. + +"Mr. Rattler is particularly afraid that woman suffrage will break up +the family. 'Imagine,' he says, 'a family in which the husband is a +Democrat and the wife a Cannon Republican. Imagine them constantly +fighting out the subject of tariff revision over the supper-table, and +conceive the dreadful effect on the children, who at present are +accustomed to see father light his cigar after supper and fall asleep. +Or suppose the wife develops a passion for political meetings. That +means that the husband will have to stay at home with the baby.' 'Well,' +replies Mrs. Cadgers, 'such an arrangement has its advantages. It would +not only give the wife a chance to learn the meaning of citizenship, but +it would give the husband a chance to get acquainted with the baby.' And +besides, Mrs. Cadgers goes on to argue, a woman's political duties need +not take up more than a small fraction of her time. That, retorts Mr. +Rattler, with a sneer, is because woman derives her ideas on the subject +from seeing her husband fulfil his duties as a citizen once every two +years when he forgets to register. + +"An excellent debate on the subject was the one between Mrs. Excelsior, +who spoke in favour of the ballot for women, and Professor Van Doodle, +who upheld the negative. Professor Van Doodle maintained that women are +incapable of taking a genuine interest in public affairs. What is it +that appeals to a woman when she reads a newspaper? A Presidential +election may be impending, a great war is raging in the Far East, an +explorer has just returned from the South Pole, and, woman, picking up +the Sunday paper, plunges straight into the fashion columns! She hardly +finds time to answer her husband's petulant inquiry as to what she has +done with the comic supplement. Can woman take an impersonal view of +things? No, says Professor Van Doodle. In a critical Presidential +election, one in which the fate of the country is at stake, she will +vote for the candidate from whom she thinks she can get most for her +husband and her children, whereas, her husband under the same +circumstances will cast aside all personal interests and vote the same +ticket his father voted for. Woman, concluded the professor, is +constitutionally incapable of distinguishing between right and wrong, +between truth and falsehood. + +"Mrs. Excelsior made a spirited defence. She showed that woman's +undeveloped sense of what truth and honesty are, would not handicap her +in the pursuit of practical politics. She argued that the complicated +problems of municipal finance are no easier for the man who sets out to +raise a family on fifteen dollars a week than for the woman who succeeds +in doing so. She declared that a person who can travel thirty miles by +subway and surface car, price $500 worth of dressgoods, and buy her +lunch, all on fifteen cents in cash and a transfer ticket, would make a +good comptroller for New York City. + +"Professor Van Doodle claimed that under woman suffrage only a +good-looking candidate would stand a chance of being elected. Mrs. +Excelsior replied that there was no reason for believing that women +would be more particular in choosing a State Senator than in selecting a +husband. The professor was foolish when he asserted that if women went +to the polls they would vote for the aldermen and the sheriffs, and +would forget to vote for the President of the United States, and would +insist on doing so in a postscript. This was of a piece with the other +ancient jest that women are sure to vote for a Democrat when at heart +they prefer a Republican, and _vice versa_. + +"The whole case," concluded Harding, "was summed up by the Rev. Dr. +Hollow when he said that in theory there is no objection to the present +arrangement by which man rules the earth through his reason, and woman +rules man through his stomach; but unfortunately, the human reason and +the average man's stomach are apt to get out of order." + + + + +XXXIV + +THE GERMS OF CULTURE + + +In my afternoon paper there was a letter by Veritas who tried to prove +something about the Trusts by quoting from the third volume of +Macaulay's history. After dinner I took the book from the shelf and as I +struck it against the table to let the dust fly up, I thought of what +Mrs. Harrington said. The Harringtons had spent an evening with me. As +they rose to go Mrs. Harrington ran the tip of her gloved finger across +half a dozen dingy volumes and sniffed. "Why don't you put glass doors +on your bookshelves?" she asked. It was a raw point with me and she knew +it. "The pretty kind, perhaps," I sneered, "with leaded panes and an +antique iron lock?" "Exactly," she replied. "The dust here is +abominable. You must be just steeped in all sorts of infection; and +perhaps if you kept your books under lock and key people wouldn't run +away with them." I was a fool to have tried irony upon Mrs. Harrington. +Her outlook upon life is literal and domestic. Books are to her +primarily part of a scheme of interior decoration. Harrington's views +come closer to my own, but Harrington is an indulgent husband. + +The incident was now a week old, but something of the original fury came +back to me. It was exasperating that the world should be so afraid of +dust in the only place where dust has meaning and beauty. People who +will go abroad in motor cars and veneer themselves with the germ-laden +dust of the highway, find it impossible to endure the silent deposit of +the years on the covers of an old book. And the dust of the gutter that +is swept up by trailing skirts? And the dust of soggy theatre-chairs? +And the dust of old beliefs in which we live, my friend? And the dust +that statesmen and prophets are always throwing into our eyes? None of +these interfere with Mrs. Harrington's peace of mind. But when it comes +to the dust on the gilt tops of my red-buckrammed Molière she fears +infection. + +And yet Harrington is a man of exceptional intelligence. He would agree +with me that infection from book-dust is not an ignoble form of death. I +sit there and plot obituaries. "Mr. H. Wellington Jones," says the +_Evening Star_, "died yesterday afternoon from ptomaine poisoning, after +a very brief illness. Friday night he was with a merry group of diners +in one of our best-known and most brilliantly lighted Broadway +restaurants. He partook heartily of lobster salad, of which, his closest +friends declare, he was inordinately fond. Almost immediately he +complained of being ill and was taken home in a taxicab." If I were H. +Wellington Jones and it were my fate to die of poison I could frame a +nobler end for myself. "Mr. H. Wellington Jones," I would have it read, +"died yesterday of some mysterious form of bacterial poisoning +contracted while turning over the pages of an old family Bible which he +was accustomed to consult at frequent intervals. Mr. Smith had a cut +finger which was not quite healed and it is supposed that a dust-speck +from the pages of the old book must have entered the wound and induced +sepsis. He was found unconscious in his chair with the book open at the +thirtieth chapter of Proverbs." Yes, I sometimes find it hard to +understand what Harrington, a man of really fine sensibilities, sees in +Mrs. Harrington. The very suggestion of locking up books to prevent +their being carried away hurts like the screech of a pencil upon a +slate. I think of Mrs. Harrington and then I think of Cooper. Cooper's +shelves are continuously being denuded by his friends. But if you think +of Cooper as a helpless victim you are sadly mistaken. There is an +elaborate scheme behind it all, a scheme of such transcendent ingenuity +as only simple-hearted, sweet-natured, unpractised, purblind visionaries +like Cooper are capable of. + +He let me into the secret one day when he saw that I was about to find +it out for myself. "I know very many dear people," he said, "who are too +busy to read books or too little in the habit of it. You know them, too; +they are men and women in whom the pulse of life beats too rapidly for +the calm pleasures of reading. They are not insensible to fine ideas, +but they must see these ideas in concrete form. If I, for instance, wish +to know something about Spain, I get one of Martin Hume's books, but +these people take a steamer and go to Spain. I have read everything of +Meredith's and they have read almost nothing, but they saw Meredith in +London and spent a week-end with him at a country-house in Sussex. I +avoid celebrities in the flesh. I don't want to minister to them and I +want still less to patronise them. I am afraid I should be disappointed +in them and I am sure they would be disappointed in me. + +"However, that's not the point," says Cooper. "The problem is to make a +man read who won't read of his own accord. I do it by asking such a man +to dinner. I pull out a volume of Marriott's and remark, without +emphasis, that after infinite exertion I have just got it back from +Woolsey, who is wild over the book. The fires of envy and acquisition +flash in my visitor's eye. Might he have the book for a day or two? Yes, +I say after some hesitation, but he must promise to bring it back. He +grows fervent. Of course he will bring it back, by Saturday at the very +latest and in person. And he is my man from that moment. I have lost the +book, of course, but I have smuggled my troops within the fort, I have +laid the train, I have transmitted the infection. The serpent is in the +garden. Time will do the work." The allusion was to Cooper's bookplate, +a red serpent about a golden staff. + +"Not that I leave it altogether to time," says Cooper. "Once I have +handed over the book to Hobson, I make it a point to call on him at +least once a week. Do you see why? Left to himself, Hobson might soon +outlive the first flush of his enthusiasm for that book. But if Hobson +expects me to drop in at any moment, he is afraid I may find the book on +his library table and ask him whether he has read it. So he hides the +book in his bedroom. Then he is indeed mine. Some night he will be out +of sorts and find it hard to go to sleep. His eye will fall on the book +lying there on his table, and he will pick it up, at the same time +lighting a cigar. I shall never see that book again. But, I leave it to +you, who needs that book more, I or Hobson?" + +But Cooper did not tell all. I know he has made use of shrewder tactics. +Ask any one of his acquaintances why Cooper is never seen without a +half-dozen magazines under his arm, an odd volume or two of French +criticism, and a couple of operatic scores. They will reply that it is +just Cooper's way. It goes with his black slouch hat, his badly-creased +trousers, his flowing cravat, and his general air of pre-Raphaelite +ineptitude. It goes with his comprehensive ignorance of present-day +politics and science, and everything else in the present that +well-informed people are supposed to know. It goes with his total +inability to be on time for dinners, and his habit of getting lost in +the subway. But Cooper is not as often in the clouds as some imagine. + +How many of Cooper's friends, for example, have ever found peculiar +significance in his talent for forgetting things in other people's +houses? Beneath that apparently characteristic trait there is a +Machiavellian motive which I alone have found out. Hobson, let us say, +has been taking dinner with Cooper, who gently pulls a copy of "Monna +Vanna" from the shelf. Hobson does not rise to the bait. He may have +heard that Maeterlinck is a "highbrow" and it frightens him. Or Hobson +may not be going home that night, or he may object to carrying a parcel +in the subway, or for any other reason he will omit to take the book +with him. "The next day," says Cooper, "I pay Hobson a return visit, and +forget the book on his hall-table. Frequently Hobson may be too busy to +take notice of the accident. In that case I call him up on the telephone +as soon as I leave his house and ask in great agitation whether by any +chance I have left a volume of Maeterlinck on his hall-table. Sometimes +I add that Woolsey has been after that volume for weeks. That night, I +feel sure, Hobson will carry the book up to his bedroom." + +And as Cooper spoke I thought of the Smith family, whom, by methods like +those I have described, Cooper succeeded in saving from themselves. +Nerves in the Smith family were badly rasped. The mother was not making +great headway in her social campaigns. Her husband chafed at his +children's idleness and extravagance. The children went in sullen +fashion about their own business. They had no resources of their own. +There was gloom in that household and stifled rancour, and the danger +of worse things to come, until the day when Cooper called and forgot at +one blow a copy of "Richard Feverel," the "Bab Ballads," and the third +volume of Ferrero's "Rome." + +As I have said, Cooper was not blind to the good he was doing. False +modesty was not one of his failings. He would continually have me admire +his bookshelves. The books he was proudest of were those he had lent or +given away.... "I have a larger number of books missing," he would +boast, "than any man of my acquaintance. This big hole here is my +Gibbon. I sent it to an interesting old chap I met at a public dinner +some years ago. He was a prosperous hardware merchant, self-made, and, +like all self-made men, a bit unfinished. He had read very little. I +don't recall how I happened to mention Gibbon or to send him the set. I +think I may have forgotten the first volume at his office the next +morning. He devoured Gibbon. From him he went to Tacitus. He has since +read hundreds of books on the Roman empire and he has other hundreds of +volumes waiting to be read. But somehow he has never thought of sending +me back my shabby old Gibbon. And that was the way with my +Montaigne--gone. And here were two editions of Gulliver. I lent one to a +nephew of the Harringtons and the other to a rather prim young lady from +Boston who impressed me as having had too much Emerson. My Shelley is +gone. My 'Rousseau's Confessions' is also gone." And Cooper smiled at me +beatifically. + +That was Cooper. But Mrs. Harrington that night saw things in quite a +different light. She grumbled and sniffed, and finally grew vehement. I +am not a saint like Cooper, but here and there my shelves, too, show the +visitations of friends. "Not a single complete set," wailed Mrs. +Harrington, "everything lugged away by people who should be taught to +know better. Browning, volumes I, II, V, and VII--four volumes gone. +Middlemarch, volume II, first volume gone. Morley's Gladstone, volumes I +and III, one volume gone. I wager you don't even know who has the second +volume of your Gladstone. Do you, now?" + +To tell the truth, I did not for the moment know. And as I hesitated she +thrust one of the volumes in triumph at me and mechanically I opened the +book and saw a red serpent about a golden staff. "I remember now," I +told Mrs. Harrington. "I'll get the second volume the next time I call +on Cooper." + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PATIENT OBSERVER*** + + +******* This file should be named 19359-8.txt or 19359-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/9/3/5/19359 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre> +<p>Title: The Patient Observer</p> +<p> And His Friends</p> +<p>Author: Simeon Strunsky</p> +<p>Release Date: September 22, 2006 [eBook #19359]</p> +<p>Language: English</p> +<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p> +<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PATIENT OBSERVER***</p> +<p> </p> +<h3>E-text prepared by Stacy Brown<br /> + and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br /> + (<a href="http://www.pgdp.net/">http://www.pgdp.net/</a>)<br /> + from page images generously made available by<br /> + Internet Archive/American Libraries<br /> + (<a href="http://www.archive.org/details/americana">http://www.archive.org/details/americana</a>)</h3> +<p> </p> +<table border="0" style="background-color: #ccccff;" cellpadding="10"> + <tr> + <td valign="top"> + Note: + </td> + <td> + Images of the original pages are available through + Internet Archive/American Libraries. See + <a href="http://www.archive.org/details/patientobserver00strurich"> + http://www.archive.org/details/patientobserver00strurich</a> + </td> + </tr> +</table> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p> </p> + + +<h1>THE PATIENT OBSERVER<br /> +AND HIS FRIENDS</h1> + + + + + +<h3>By</h3> + +<h2>SIMEON STRUNSKY</h2> + + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 100px;"> +<img src="images/coe.jpg" width="100" height="90" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + +<p class="center padtop"><b>NEW YORK<br /> +DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY<br /> +1911</b></p> + + + + + + +<p class="center padtop"> +Copyright, 1910, by <span class="smcap">The Evening Post Company</span><br /> +Copyright, 1910, by <span class="smcap">P. F. Collier & Son</span><br /> +Copyright, 1910, by <span class="smcap">Harper & Brothers</span><br /> +Copyright, 1910, by <span class="smcap">The Atlantic Monthly Co.</span><br /> +Copyright, 1911, by <span class="smcap">Dodd, Mead and Company</span><br /> +</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p class="center"><b>To<br /> +<i>M. G. S.</i></b></p> + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></a>CONTENTS</h2> + + +<table summary="contents" style="width: 60%;"><tbody> +<tr> +<td class="tl">I</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">Cowards</span></td> <td class="tr">Page <a href="#Page_1">1</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">II</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Church Universal</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_10">10</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">III</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Doctors</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_19">19</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">IV</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">Interrogation</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_29">29</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">V</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Mind Triumphant</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_37">37</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">VI</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">On Calling White Black</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_45">45</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">VII</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Solid Flesh</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_57">57</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">VIII</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">Some Newspaper Traits</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_67">67</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">IX</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">A Fledgling </span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_80">80</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">X</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Complete Collector—I</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_92">92</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XI</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Everlasting Feminine</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_100">100</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XII</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Fantastic Toe</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_111">111</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XIII</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">On Living in Brooklyn</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_119">119</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XIV</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap"> Palladino Outdone</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_130">130</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XV</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Cadence of the Crowd</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_138">138</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XVI</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">What We Forget</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_147">147</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XVII</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Children That Lead Us</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_159">159</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XVIII</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Martians</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_179">179</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XIX</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Complete Collector</span>—II</td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_189">189</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XX</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">When a Friend Marries</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_198">198</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XXI</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Perfect Union of the Arts</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_209">209</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XXII</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">An Eminent American</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_216">216</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XXIII</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">Behind the Times</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_227">227</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XXIV</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">Public Liars</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_238">238</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XXV</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Complete Collector—III</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_249">249</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XXVI</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Commuter</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_257">257</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XXVII</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">Headlines</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_270">270</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XXVIII</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">Usage</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_278">278</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XXIX</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">60 H.P.</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_285">285</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XXX</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Sample Life</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_296">296</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XXXI</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Complete Collector—IV</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_313">313</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XXXII</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">Chopin's Successors</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_320">320</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XXXIII</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Irrepressible Conflict</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_327">327</a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td class="tl">XXXIV</td> <td class="tl"><span class="smcap">The Germs of Culture</span></td> <td class="tr"><a href="#Page_336">336</a></td> +</tr> +</tbody></table> + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="NOTE" id="NOTE"></a>NOTE</h3> + + +<p>Of the papers that go to make up the present volume, the greater number +were published as a series in the columns of the New York <i>Evening Post</i> +for 1910, under the general title of The Patient Observer. For the +eminently laudable purpose of making a fairly thick book, the Patient +Observer's frequently recurrent "I," "me," and "mine" have now been +supplemented with the experiences and reflections of his friends +Harrington, Cooper, and Harding as recorded on other occasions in the +New York <i>Evening Post</i>, as well as in the <i>Atlantic Monthly</i>, the +<i>Bookman</i>, <i>Collier's</i>, and <i>Harper's Weekly</i>.</p> + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="I" id="I"></a>I</h2> + +<h3>COWARDS</h3> + + +<p>It was Harrington who brought forward the topic that men take up in +their most cheerful moments. I mean, of course, the subject of death. +Harrington quoted a great scientist as saying that death is the one +great fear that, consciously or not, always hovers over us. But the five +men who were at table with Harrington that night immediately and sharply +disagreed with him.</p> + +<p>Harding was the first to protest. He said the belief that all men are +afraid of death is just as false as the belief that all women are afraid +of mice. It is not the big facts that humanity is afraid of, but the +little things. For himself, he could honestly say that he was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span> not +afraid of death. He defied it every morning when he ran for his train, +although he knew that he thereby weakened his heart. He defied it when +he smoked too much and read too late at night, and refused to take +exercise or to wear rubbers when it rained. All men, he repeated, are +afraid of little things. Personally, what he was most intensely and most +enduringly afraid of was a revolving storm-door.</p> + +<p>Harding confessed that he approaches a revolving door in a state of +absolute terror. To see him falter before the rotating wings, rush +forward, halt, and retreat with knees trembling, is to witness a +shattering spectacle of complete physical disorganisation. Harding said +that he enters a revolving door with no serious hope of coming out +alive. By anticipation he feels his face driven through the glass +partition in front of him, and the crash of the panel behind him upon +his skull. Some day, Harding<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span> believed, he would be caught fast in one +of those compartments and stick. Axes and crowbars would be +requisitioned to retrieve his lifeless form.</p> + +<p>Bowman agreed with Harding. His own life, Bowman was inclined to +believe, is typical of most civilised men, in that it is passed in +constant terror of his inferiors. The people whom he hires to serve him +strike fear into Bowman's soul. He is habitually afraid of janitors, +train-guards, elevator-boys, barbers, bootblacks, telephone-girls, and +saleswomen. But his particular dread is of waiters. There have been +times when Bowman thought that to punish poor service and set an example +to others, he would omit the customary tip. But such a resolution, +embraced with the soup, has never lasted beyond the entrée. And, as a +matter of fact, Bowman said, such a resolution always spoils his dinner. +As long as he entertains <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span> it, he dares not look his man in the eye. He +stirs his coffee with shaking fingers. He is cravenly, horribly afraid.</p> + +<p>Bowman is afraid even of new waiters and of waiters he never expects to +see again. Surely, it must be safe not to tip a waiter one never +expected to see again. "But no," said Bowman, "I should feel his +contemptuous gaze in the marrow of my backbone as I walked out. I could +not keep from shaking, and I should rush from that place in agony, with +the man's derisive laughter ringing in my ears."</p> + +<p>The only one of the company who was not afraid of something concrete, +something tangible, was Williams. Now Williams is notoriously, +hopelessly shy; and when he took up the subject where Bowman had left +it, he poured out his soul with all the fervour and abandon of which +only the shy are capable. Williams was afraid of his own past. It was +not a hideously <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> criminal one, for his life had been that of a bookworm +and recluse. But out of that past Williams would conjure up the +slightest incident—a trifling breach of manners, a mere word out of +place, a moment in which he had lost control of his emotions, and the +memory of it would put him into a cold sweat of horror and shame.</p> + +<p>Years ago, at a small dinner party, Williams had overturned a glass of +water on the table-cloth; and whenever he thinks of that glass of water, +his heart beats furiously, his palate goes dry, and there is a horribly +empty feeling in his stomach. Once, on some similar occasion, Williams +fell into animated talk with a beautiful young woman. He spoke so +rapidly and so well that the rest of the company dropped their chat and +gathered about him. It was five minutes, perhaps, before he was aware of +what was going on. That night Williams walked<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span> the streets in an agony +of remorse. The recollection of the incident comes back to him every now +and then, and, whether he is alone at his desk, or in the theatre, or in +a Broadway crowd, he groans with pain. Take away such memories of the +past, Williams told us, and he knew of nothing in life that he is afraid +of.</p> + +<p>Gordon's was quite a different case. The group about the table burst out +laughing when Gordon assured us that above all things else in this world +he is afraid of elephants. He agreed with Bowman that in the latitude of +New York City and under the zoölogic conditions prevailing here, it was +a preposterous fear to entertain. Gordon lives in Harlem, and he +recognises clearly enough that the only elephant-bearing jungle in the +neighbourhood is Central Park, whence an animal would be compelled to +take a Subway train to One Hundred and Twenty-fifth Street, and lie in +wait for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> him as he came home in the twilight. But irrational or no, +there was the fact. To be quashed into pulp under one of those +girder-like front legs, Gordon felt must be abominable. To make matters +worse, Gordon has a young son who insists on being taken every Sunday +morning to see the animals; and of all attractions in the menagerie, the +child prefers the elephant house. He loves to feed the biggest of the +elephants, and to watch him place pennies in a little wooden box and +register the deposits on a bell. What Gordon suffers at such times, he +told us, can be neither imagined nor described.</p> + +<p>My own story was received with sympathetic attention. I told them that +the one great terror of my life is a certain man who owes me a fairly +large sum of money, borrowed some years ago. Whenever we meet he insists +on recalling the debt and reminding me of how<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> much the favour meant to +him at the time, and how he never ceases to think of it. Meeting him has +become a torture. I do my best to avoid him, and frequently succeed. But +often he will catch sight of me across the street and run over and grasp +me by the hand and inquire after my health in so hearty, so honest a +fashion that I cannot bear to look him in the face. And as he beams on +me and throws his arm over my shoulder, I can only blush and shift from +one foot to the other and stammer out some excuse for hurrying away. +Passers-by stop and admire the man's affection and concern for one who +is evidently some poor devil of a relation from the country. One Sunday +he waylaid me on Riverside Drive and introduced me to his wife as one of +his dearest friends. I mumbled something about its not having rained the +entire week, and his wife, who was a stately person in silks, looked at +me<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> out of a cold eye. Then and there I knew she decided that I was a +person who had something to conceal and probably took advantage of her +husband.</p> + +<p>No; the more I think of it, the more convinced am I that very few men +pass their time in contemplating death, which is the end of all things. +Only those people do it who have nothing else to be afraid of, or who, +like undertakers and bacteriologists, make a living out of it.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="II" id="II"></a>II</h2> + +<h3>THE CHURCH UNIVERSAL</h3> + + +<p>Harding declares that a solid thought before going to bed sets him +dreaming just like a bit of solid food. One night, Harding and I +discussed modern tendencies in the Church. As a result Harding dreamt +that night that he was reading a review in the <i>Theological Weekly</i> of +November 12, 2009.</p> + +<p>"Seldom," wrote the reviewer, "has it been our good fortune to meet with +as perfect a piece of work as James Brown Ducey's 'The American +Clergyman in the Early Twentieth Century.' The book consists of exactly +half a hundred biographies of eminent churchmen; in these fifty brief +sketches is mirrored faithfully the entire religious life, external and +internal,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> of the American people eighty or ninety years ago. We can do +our readers no better service than to reproduce from Mr. Ducey's pages, +in condensed form, the lives of half a dozen typical clergymen, leaving +the reader to frame his own conception of the magnificent activity which +the Church of that early day brought to the service of religion.</p> + +<p>"The Rev. Pelatiah W. Jenks, who was called to the richest pulpit in New +York in 1912, succeeded within less than three years in building up an +unrivalled system of dancing academies and roller-skating rinks for +young people. Under him the attendance at the Sunday afternoon sparring +exhibitions in the vestry rooms of the church increased from an average +of 54 to an average of 650. In spite of the nominal fee charged for the +use of the congregation's bowling alleys, the income from that source +alone was sufficient to defray the cost of missionary<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> work in all +Africa, south of the Zambesi River. Dr. Jenks's highest ambition was +attained in 1923 when the Onyx Church's football team won the +championship of the Ecclesiastical League of Greater New York. It was in +the same year that Dr. Jenks took the novel step of abandoning services +in St. Basil's Chapel, now situated in a slum district, and substituting +a moving-picture show with vaudeville features. Thereafter the empty +chapel was filled to overcrowding on Sundays. To encourage church +attendance at Sunday morning services, Dr. Jenks established a tipless +barber shop. Two years later, in spite of the murmured protests of the +conservative element in his congregation, he erected one of the finest +Turkish baths in New York City.</p> + +<p>"The Rev. Coningsby Botts, Ph.D., LL.D., D.D., was regarded as the +greatest pulpit orator of his day. His Sunday evening sermons drew<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> +thousands of auditors. Of Dr. Botts's polished sermons, our author gives +a complete list, together with short extracts. We should have to go far +to discover a specimen of richer eloquence than the sermon delivered on +the afternoon of the third Sunday after Epiphany, in the year 1911, on +'Dr. Cook and the Discovery of the North Pole.' On the second Sunday in +Lent, Dr. Botts moved an immense congregation to tears with his sermon, +'Does Radium Cure Cancer?' Trinity Sunday he spoke on 'Zola and His +Place in Literature.' The second Sunday in Advent he discussed 'The +Position of Woman in the Fiji Islands.' We can only pick a subject here +and there out of his other numerous pastoral speeches: 'Is Aviation an +Established Fact?' 'The Influence of Blake Upon Dante Gabriel Rossetti,' +'Dalmatia as a Health Resort,' and 'Amatory Poetry Among the Primitive +Races.'<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span></p> + +<p>"The Rev. Cadwallader Abiel Jones has earned a pre-eminent place in +Church history as the man who did most to endow Pittsburg with a +permanent Opera House. Our author relates how in the winter of 1916, +when the noted impresario Silverman threatened to sell his Opera House +for a horse exchange unless 100 Pittsburg citizens would guarantee +$5,000 each for a season of twenty weeks, Dr. Jones made a +house-to-house canvass in his automobile and went without sleep till the +half-million dollars was pledged. He fell seriously ill of pneumonia, +but recovered in time to be present at the signing of the contract. Dr. +Jones used to assert that there was more moral uplift in a single +performance of the 'Mikado' than in the entire book of Psalms. One of +his notable achievements was a Christmas Eve service consisting of some +magnificent kinetoscope pictures of the Day of Judgment with music by +Richard<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> Strauss. Tradition also ascribes to Dr. Jones a saying that the +two most powerful influences for good in New York City were Miss Mary +Garden and the Eden Musée. But our author thinks the story is +apocryphal. He is rather inclined to believe, from the collocation of +the two names, that we have here a distorted version of the Biblical +creation myth.</p> + +<p>"The Fourteenth Avenue Church of Cleveland, Ohio, under its famous +pastor, the Rev. Henry Marcellus Stokes, exercised a preponderant +influence in city politics from 1917 to 1925. Dr. Stokes was remorseless +in flaying the bosses and their henchmen. At least a dozen candidates +for Congress could trace their defeat directly to the efforts of the +Fourteenth Avenue Church. The successful candidates profited by the +lesson, and, during the three years' fight over tariff revision, from +1919 to 1922, they voted strictly in accordance with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> telegraphic +instructions from Dr. Stokes. In the fall of 1921 Dr. Stokes's +congregation voted almost unanimously to devote the funds hitherto used +for home mission work to the maintenance of a legislative bureau at the +State capital. The influence of the bureau was plainly perceptible in +the Legislature's favourable action on such measures as the Cleveland +Two-Cent Fare bill and the bill abolishing the bicycle and traffic +squads in all cities with a population of more than 50,000.</p> + +<p>"Our author lays particular stress on the career of the Rev. Dr. Brooks +Powderly of New York, who, at the age of thirty-five, was recognized as +America's leading authority on slum life. Dr. Powderly's numerous books +and magazine articles on the subject speak for themselves. Our author +mentions among others, 'The Bowery From the Inside,' 'At What Age Do +Stevedores Marry?' 'The Relative Consumption <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> of Meat, Pastry, and +Vegetables Among Our Foreign Population,' 'How Soon Does the Average +Immigrant Cast His First Vote?' 'The Proper Lighting for Recreation +Piers,' and, what was perhaps his most popular book, 'Burglar's Tools +and How to Use Them.'</p> + +<p>"In running through the appendix to Mr. Ducey's volume," concludes the +reviewer, "we come across an interesting paragraph headed, 'A Curious +Survival.' It is a reprint of an obituary from the New York <i>Evening +Post</i> of August, 1911, dealing with the minister of a small church far +up in the Bronx, who died at the age of eighty-one, after serving in the +same pulpit for fifty-three years. The <i>Evening Post</i> notice states that +while the Rev. Mr. Smith was quite unknown below the Harlem, he had won +a certain prestige in his own neighbourhood through his old-fashioned +homilies, delivered twice every Sunday in the year, on love,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> charity, +pure living, clean thinking, early marriage, and the mutual duties of +parents towards their children and of children towards their parents. +'In the Rev. Mr. Smith,' remarks our author, 'we have a striking +vestigial specimen of an almost extinct type.'"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="III" id="III"></a>III</h2> + +<h3>THE DOCTORS</h3> + + +<p>The quarrels of the doctors do not concern me. I have worked out a +classification of my own which holds good for the entire profession. All +doctors, I believe, may be divided into those who go clean-shaven and +those who wear beards. The difference is more than one of appearance. It +is a difference of temperament and conduct. The smooth-faced physician +represents the buoyant, the romantic, what one might almost call the +impressionistic strain in the medical profession. The other is the +conservative, the classicist. My personal likings are all for the newer +type, but I do not mind admitting that if I were very ill indeed, I +should be tempted to send for the physician who wears a Vandyke and +smiles only at long intervals.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span></p> + +<p>The reason is that when I am really ill I want some one who believes me. +That is something which the clean-shaven doctor seldom does. He is of +the breezy, modern school which maintains that nine patients out of ten +are only the victims of their own imagination. He greets you in a jolly, +brotherly fashion, takes your pulse, and says: "Oh, well, I guess you're +not going to die this trip," and he roars, as if it were the greatest +joke in the world to call up the picture of such dreadful possibilities. +When he prescribes, it is in a half-apologetic, half-quizzical manner, +and almost with a wink, as if he were to say, "This is a game, old man, +but I suppose it's as honest a way of earning one's living as most +ways." While he writes out his directions, he comments: "There is +nothing the matter with you, and you will take this powder three times a +day with your meals. It is just a case of too much tobacco supple<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span>mented +by a fertile fancy. Rub your chest with this before you go to bed and +avoid draughts. And what you need is not medicine but the active +agitation for two hours every day of the two legs which the Lord gave +you, and which you now employ exclusively for making your way to and +from the railway station. This is for your digestion, and you can have +it put up in pills or in liquid form, according to taste. And the next +time you feel inclined to call me in, think it over in the course of a +ten-mile walk."</p> + +<p>Now this may be cheering if somewhat mixed treatment, but it has nothing +of that sympathy which the ailing body craves. The case is much worse if +your smooth-faced physician happens to be a personal friend. The +indifference with which such a man will listen to the most pitiful +recital of physical suffering is extraordinary. You may be out on the +golf links together, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> he has just made an exceptionally fine iron +shot from a bad lie and in the face of a lively breeze. He is naturally +pleased, and you take courage from the situation. "By the way, Smith," +you say, "I have been feeling rather queer for a day or two. There is a +gnawing sensation right here, and when I stoop——" "That must have been +180 yards," he says, "but not quite on the green. You don't chew your +food enough. Take a glass of hot water before your breakfast—and you +had better try your mashie!" Of course, no one likes to talk shop, +especially on the golf links. Still you think, if you were a physician +and you had a friend who had a gnawing sensation, you would be more +considerate. After the game he lights his cigar and orders you not to +smoke if the pain in your chest is really what you have described it. +"In me," he says, cheerfully, "you get a physician and a horrible +example for one price."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span></p> + +<p>But there is one thing that this impressionistic school of medicine has +in common with the other kind. Both types are faithful to the funereal +type of waiting-room which is one of the signs of the trade. It is a +room in which all the arts of the undertaker have seemingly been called +upon to bring out the full possibilities of the average New York +brownstone "front-parlour." I have often tried to decide whether, in a +doctor's waiting-room, night or day was more conducive to thoughts of +the grave. At night a lamp flickers dimly in one corner of the long +room, and the shadows only deepen those other shadows which lie on the +ailing spirit. But this same darkness mercifully conceals the long line +of ash-coloured family portraits in gold frames, the ash-coloured carpet +and chandelier, and the hideous aggregation of ash-coloured couches and +chairs which make up the daylight picture. Why doctors' reception <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> rooms +should always so strongly combine the attractiveness of a popular +lunch-room on a rainy day with the quiet domestic atmosphere of a county +jail, I have never been able to find out, unless the object is to reduce +the patient to such a horrible state of depression that the mere summons +to enter the doctor's presence makes one feel very much better already. +There are times when to be told that one has pneumonia or an incipient +case of tuberculosis must be a relief after an hour spent in one of +those dreadful ante-chambers.</p> + +<p>The literature in a physician's waiting-room is not exhilarating. +Usually, there is an extensive collection of periodicals four months old +and over. From this I gather that physicians' wives and daughters are +persistent but somewhat deliberate readers of current literature. The +sense of age about the magazines on a doctor's table is heightened by +the absence of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> front and back covers. The only way of ascertaining +the date of publication is to hunt for the table of contents. That, +however, is a task which few able-bodied men in the prime of life are +equal to, not to say a roomful of sick people, nervous with +anticipation. Most patients under such circumstances set out +courageously, but only to lose themselves in the first half-dozen pages +of the advertising section. Yet the result is by no means harmful. There +is something about the advertising agent's buoyant, insinuating, +sympathetic tone that is very restful to the invalid nerves. Harrington +tells me that the small suburban house in which he lives, the paint and +roofing with which he protects it against the weather, the lawn-mower +which he has secured in anticipation of a good crop of grass, and the +small stock of poultry he experiments with, were all acquired through +advertisements read in doctors' waiting-rooms.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> Some physicians take in +the illustrated weeklies as well as the monthly magazines. In one of the +former I found the other day an excellent panoramic view of the second +inauguration of President McKinley.</p> + +<p>But I am afraid I have wandered somewhat from what I set out to say. I +meant to show how different from your clean-shaven doctor is the +physician of the conventional beard. There is no trifling with him. He +takes himself seriously, and he takes you seriously. His examination is +as thorough as the stethoscope can make it; in fact, he listens to your +heart-action long enough to make you fear the worst. This is in marked +contrast with the smooth-faced doctor, who, as a rule, asks you to show +your tongue, and when you obey he does not look at it, but begins to go +through his mail, whistling cheerfully. He puts such vital questions as, +how far up is your bedroom window<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> at night, and do you ever have a +sense of eye-strain after reading too long, and when you reply, he pays +no attention. His entire attitude expresses the conviction that either +you are not ill at all, or that if you are, you are not in a position to +give an intelligent account of yourself. That is not the case with the +other physician. He asks precise questions and insists on detailed +replies. Nothing escapes him. While you are describing the sensations in +the vicinity of your left lung, he will ask quietly whether you have +always had the habit of biting your nails.</p> + +<p>Under such sympathetic attention the patient's spirits rise. From an +apologetic state of mind he passes to a sense of his own importance. +Instead of being ashamed of his ailments he tries to describe as many as +he can think of. His specific complaint may be a touch of sciatica, but +he takes pleasure in recalling <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> a bad habit of breathing through the +mouth in moments of excitement, and a tricky memory which often leads +him to carry about his wife's letters an entire week before mailing +them. The need for a certain amount of self-castigation is implanted in +all of us, and it is satisfied in the form of confession. Many people do +it as part of their religious beliefs. Others belabour themselves in the +physician's office. Men who in the bosom of the family will deny that +they read too late at night and smoke too many cigars will call such +transgressions to the doctor's attention if he should happen to overlook +them. I know of one man suffering from neuralgia of the arm who insisted +on telling his doctor that it made him ill to read the advertisements in +the subway cars. But the doctor who wears no beard does not invite such +confidences.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV</h2> + +<h3>INTERROGATION</h3> + + +<p>One day a census enumerator in the employ of the United States +government knocked at my door and left a printed list of questions for +me to answer. The United States government wished me to state how many +sons and daughters I had and whether my sons were males and my daughters +females. I was further required to state that not only was I of white +descent and that my wife (if I had one) was of white descent, but that +our children (if we had any) were also of white descent. I was also +called upon to state whether any of my sons under the age of five (if I +had any) had ever been in the military or naval service of the United +States, and whether my grandfather (if I had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> one) was attending school +on September 30 last. There were other questions of a like nature, but +these are all I can recall at present.</p> + +<p>Halfway through the schedule I was in a high state of irritation. The +census enumerator's visit in itself I do not consider a nuisance. Like +most Americans who sniff at the privileges of citizenship, I secretly +delight in them. I speak cynically of boss-rule and demagogues, but I +cast my vote on Election Day in a state of solemn and somewhat nervous +exaltation that frequently interferes with my folding the ballot in the +prescribed way. I have never been summoned for jury duty, but if I ever +should be, I shall accept with pride and in the hope that I shall not be +peremptorily challenged. It needs some such official document as a +census schedule to bring home the feeling that government and state +exist for me and my own welfare. Filling out the answers<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> in the list +was one of the pleasant manifestations of democracy, of which paying +taxes is the unpleasant side. The printed form before me embodied a +solemn function. I was aware that many important problems depended upon +my answering the questions properly. Only then, for instance, could the +government decide how many Congressmen should go to Washington, and what +my share was of the total wealth of the country, and how I contributed +to the drift from the farm to the city, and what was the average income +of Methodist clergymen in cities of over 100,000 population.</p> + +<p>What, then, if so many of the questions put to me by the United States +government seemed superfluous to the point of being absurd? The process +may involve a certain waste of paper and ink and time, but it is the +kind of waste without which the business of life would be im<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span>possible. +The questions that really shape human happiness are those to which the +reply is obvious. The answers that count are those the questioner knew +he would get and was prepared to insist upon getting. Harrington tells +me that when he was married he could not help smiling when the minister +asked him whether he would take the woman by his side to be his wedded +wife. "What," said Harrington, "did he think I was there for? Or did he +detect any sign of wavering at the last moment?" What reply does the +clergyman await when he asks the rejoicing parents whether they are +willing to have their child baptized into the community of the redeemed? +What is all ritual, as it has been framed to meet the needs of the human +heart, but a preordained order of question and response? In birth and in +burial, in joy and in sorrow, for those who have escaped shipwreck and +those who have escaped the plague, the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> practice of the ages has laid +down formulæ which the soul does not find the less adequate because they +are ready-made.</p> + +<p>Consider the multiplication-table. I don't know who first hit upon the +absurd idea that questions are intended to elicit information. In so +many laboratories are students putting questions to their microscope. In +so many lawyers' offices are clients putting questions to their +attorneys. In so many other offices are haggard men and women putting +questions to their doctors. But the number of all these is quite +insignificant when compared with the number of questions that are framed +every day in the schoolrooms of the world. Wherefore, I say, consider +the multiplication-table. A greater sum of human interest has centred +about the multiplication-table than about all doctors' and lawyers' and +biologists' offices since the beginning of time. Millions of +schoolmasters have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> asked what is seven times eleven and myriads of +children's brains have toiled for the answer that all the time has been +reposing in the teacher's mind. What is seven times eleven? What is the +capital of Dahomey? When did the Americans beat the British at +Lexington? What is the meaning of the universe? We shall never escape +the feeling that these questions are put only to vex us by those who +know the answer.</p> + +<p>I said that I am looking forward to be summoned for jury-duty. But I +know that the solemn business of justice, like most of the world's +business, is made up of the mumbled question that is seldom heard and +the fixed reply that is never listened to. The clerk of the court stares +at the wall and drones out the ancient formula which begins +"Jusolimlyswear," and ends "Swelpyugod," and the witness on the stand +blurts out "I do." The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court +asks the President-elect whether he will be faithful to the Constitution +and the laws of the United States, and the President-elect invariably +says that he will. The candidate for American citizenship is asked +whether he hereby renounces allegiance to foreign kings, emperors, and +potentates, and fervently responds that he does. When I took my medical +examination for a life-insurance policy, the physician asked me whether +I suffered from asthma, bronchitis, calculus, dementia, erysipelas, and +several score other afflictions, and, without waiting for an answer, he +wrote "No" opposite every disease.</p> + +<p>Whenever I think of the world and the world's opinion, I think of Mrs. +Harrington in whom I see the world typified. Now Mrs. Harrington is +inconceivable in a scheme where the proper reply to every question is +not as thoroughly established as the rule for the proper<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> use of forks +at dinner. In the presence of an unfamiliar reply to a familiar question +Mrs. Harrington is suspicious and uneasy. She scents either a joke or an +insult; and we are all Mrs. Harrington. If you were to ask a stranger +whom did he consider the greatest playwright of all times and, instead +of Shakespeare or Molière, he were to say Racine, it would be as if one +were to ask him whether he took tea or coffee for breakfast and he said +arsenic. It would be as though you asked your neighbour what he thought +of a beautiful sunset and he said he did not like it. It would be as if +I were to say to Mrs. Harrington, "Well, I suppose I have stayed quite +long enough," and she were to say, "Yes, I think you had better be +going."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="V" id="V"></a>V</h2> + +<h3>THE MIND TRIUMPHANT</h3> + + +<p>One night after dinner I quoted for Harding the following sentence from +an address by President Lowell of Harvard: "The most painful defect in +the American College at the present time is the lack of esteem for +excellence in scholarship." Thereupon Harding recalled what some one had +said on a related subject: "Athleticism is rooted in an exaggerated +spirit of intercollegiate rivalry and a publicity run mad."</p> + +<p>That night Harding dreamt the following:</p> + +<p><i>From the Harvard "Crimson" for October 8, 1937:</i></p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"Twenty-five thousand men, women, and children in the Stadium yesterday +broke into a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> delirium of cheers when the Cambridge team in Early +English Literature won its fourth successive victory over Yale. Both +sides were trained to the minute, however different the methods of the +two head coaches. The Harvard team during the last two weeks had been +put on a course of desultory reading from Bede to the closing of the +theatres by the Puritans in 1642, while Yale had concentrated on the +Elizabethan dramatists and signal practice.</p> + +<p>"Harvard won the toss, and Captain Hartley led off with a question on +the mediæval prototypes of Thomas More's 'Utopia.' Brooks of Yale made +a snappy reply, and by a dashing string of three questions on the +authorship of 'Ralph Roister-Doister,' the sources of Chaucer's +'Nonne's Preeste's Tale,' and the exact site of the Globe Theatre, +carried the fight into the enemy's territory. But Harvard held<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> well, +and the contest was a fairly even one for twenty minutes. There was an +anxious moment towards the end, when Gosse, for Harvard, muffed on the +date of the first production of 'The Tempest,' but before Yale could +frame another question the whistle blew.</p> + +<p>"In the second half, Yale perceptibly weakened. It still showed +brilliant flashes of attack, but its defence was poor, especially +against Brooks's smashing questions on the Italian influences in +Milton's shorter poems. Harvard made its principal gains against +Burckhardt, who simply could not solve Winship's posers from Ben Jonson +and Beaumont and Fletcher. The Yale coaches finally took him out and +sent in Skinner, the best Elizabethan on the scrub team, but it was too +late to save the day. There were rumours after the game that Burckhardt +had broken training after the Princeton contest by going on a three +days'<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> canoe trip up the Merrimac. That, however, does not detract from +the glory of Harvard's magnificent triumph." </p></div> + +<p><i>From the Boston "Herald" of October 9, 1937:</i></p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"William J. Burns and Douglas Mitchell, sophomores at Harvard, were +arrested last night for creating a disturbance in the dining-room of +the Mayflower Hotel by letting loose a South American baboon with a +pack of firecrackers attached to its tail. When arraigned before +Magistrate Conroy, they declared that they were celebrating Harvard's +Early English victory over Yale, and were discharged." </p></div> + +<p><i>From the Yale "News" of June 12, 1940:</i></p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"In the presence of twenty thousand spectators, including the President +of the United States, the greater part of his Cabinet, and several +foreign ambassadors, Yale's 'varsity eight<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> simply ran away from +Harvard in the tenth annual competition in Romance languages and +philology. Yale took the lead from the start, and at the end of fifteen +minutes was ahead by 16 points to 7.... This splendid victory is due in +part to the general superiority of the New Haven eight, but too much +credit cannot be given to little Howells, who steered a flawless +contest. The Blue made use of the short, snappy English style of +text-book, while Harvard pinned its faith to the more deliberate German +seminar system. After the contest captains for the following year were +elected. Yale chose Bridgman, who did splendid work on Corneille and +the poets of the Pléiade, while Harvard's choice fell on Butterworth, +probably the best intercollegiate expert on Cervantes. In the evening +all the contestants attended a performance of 'The Prince and the +Peach' at the Gaiety. It is reported that no less than<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> nine out of the +sixteen men have received flattering offers to coach Romance language +teams in the leading Western universities." </p></div> + +<p><i>From the "Daily Princetonian" of February 13, 1933:</i></p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"Princeton won the intercollegiate championship yesterday with 63 +points to Harvard's 37, Yale's 18, and 7 each for Brown, Williams, and +Pennsylvania. Princeton won by her brilliant work in the classics and +biology. Firsts were made by Bentley, who did the 220 lines of Homer in +29-3/5 minutes, scanned 100 Alcaics from Horace in 62 seconds flat, and +hurdled over nine doubtful readings and seven lacunæ in the text of +Aristotle's 'Poetics' in 17-1/2 minutes. Two firsts went to Ramsdell, +who made only two errors in Protective Colouration and one error in +explaining the mutations of the Evening Primrose." </p></div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span></p> + +<p><i>From the editorial columns of the New York "Evening Post" for July 7, +1933, and October 11, 1938:</i></p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>(1) "Scholastic competitions have ceased to be the means to an end and +have become an end in themselves. The passion to win has swept away +every other consideration. Professionalism has laid its tainted hand on +the sports of our college youth. High-priced professors from the +University of Leipzig and the École des Hautes Études are engaged to +drill our teams to victory. Men who should have long ago taken their +Ph.D. have been known deliberately to flunk examinations so as to be +eligible for the 'varsity contests. Promising students in the +preparatory schools are bribed to enroll with this or that college. The +whole problem of summer mathematics reeks to heaven. It is not enough +that a student during eight months of the year will put in all his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> +time on invariants and the theory of numbers. Vacation time finds him +at some fashionable resort, tutoring the sons of millionaires in +multiplication and quadratic equations."</p> + +<p>(2) "Thus our so-called student 'activities' are neither active in the +true sense, nor fit for students. There has grown up a small clan of +intellectual athletes who win victories while thousands of mediocre +students, six feet and over and having an average weight of 195 pounds, +stand around and cheer. Our student-managers have become men of +business, purely. The receipts at the last Harvard-Yale debate on the +popular election of United States senators amounted to more than +$50,000. The Greek philology team spends three-quarters of its time in +touring the country. The <i>Evening Howl</i> prints the pictures of the +<span title="Phi Beta Kappa"><i>Φ Β Κ</i></span> members every other day. It is time to call a +halt." </p></div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VI" id="VI"></a>VI</h2> + +<h3>ON CALLING WHITE BLACK</h3> + + +<p>If it were not for the deadly hatred that exists between Bob, who will +be four years old very soon, and Abdul Hamid II, late Sultan of Turkey, +I hardly know what would become of my moral standards. Whenever my sense +of right and wrong grows blunted; whenever the inextricable confusion of +good and bad in everything about us becomes unusually depressing, I have +only to recall how virulent, how inflexible, how certain is Bob's +judgment on the character and career of the deposed Ottoman despot.</p> + +<p>Bob is Harrington's youngest son. He and Abdul Hamid II first met in the +pages of a fat new history of the Turkish Revolution having <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> a white +star and crescent on the cover and perhaps half a hundred pictures +inside. The book immediately supplanted the encyclopædia and General +Kuropatkin's illustrated memoirs of the Russo-Japanese War, in Bob's +affections. Who, he wanted to know, was the swarthy, lean, hook-nosed +gentleman in a tasselled cap, who stood up in a carriage to acknowledge +the cheers of the crowd. That, Harrington told him, was a bad Sultan, +and tried to turn to the next picture, which showed an unhappy-looking +Armenian priest casting his first vote for a member of Parliament.</p> + +<p>But the boy has for some years been in the stage where every fact laid +before him must be backed up with an adequate reason. What does a bad +Sultan do, he wished to know. Harrington was puzzled. It seemed a pity +to bring Bob into touch with the cruelties and pains of life. But on the +other hand here<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> was a chance to inoculate Bob at a very early age with +a hatred for tyranny and oppression, and a love for the principles of +representative government; and on the whole I am inclined to think +Harrington did right. In any case Harrington told the boy that the bad +Sultan was in the habit of sending his soldiers to shoot people, and +burn down their homes, and take away everything they had to eat, and put +all the women into jail. He hesitated over the children. It was out of +the question to tell Bob how, by order of the bad Sultan, little +children were ripped open before their mothers' eyes, or had their +brains dashed out against the walls. The little children, Harrington +finally told Bob, were whipped by the bad Sultan's bad soldiers, and had +all their toys confiscated.</p> + +<p>But that apparently was not enough. Bob wanted to know what else the bad +Sultan did<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> to the little children. What else? Harrington's criminal +imagination had exhausted itself. He didn't know, and he called upon Bob +for suggestions.</p> + +<p>"He gives them medicine," said Bob, "and sprays their throats with +peroxide, and they cry." Was there any after-thought in that remark, +Harrington wondered. Could it be that he had only succeeded in arousing +in that active young mind the recognition of a certain family +resemblance between himself and Abdul the Damned? For that matter, was +it fair to the late Commander of the Faithful to charge his name with a +crime he was probably innocent of? But then again, if that particular +crime was necessary to the lesson borne in on Bob, why hesitate? So +Harrington ponders a moment and decides; yes, even to that level of +iniquity had Abdul Hamid II sunk. The atomiser was one of the +instruments of torture <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> he made use of. And when the bad Sultan is +finally checked in his nefarious career, and dragged off to prison, +where he gets nothing but hard bread to eat and filthy water to drink, +Bob retains the impression that all this came about because the Young +Turks grew tired of having their throats washed with peroxide solutions.</p> + +<p>"When I see the bad Sultan," says Bob, "I will punch him, like this," +and his fist, shooting out and up, knocks the pipe from Harrington's +mouth.</p> + +<p>"But aren't you afraid he will hurt you?" his father asks.</p> + +<p>"No," says Bob; "I'll run away."</p> + +<p>And the boy has been steadfast in his hatred. He meets the Sultan every +night just before supper, when he insists on being taken right through +the fat, red volume with the star and crescent on the cover; and every +time the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> Sultan's face appears in the pictures, the boy smites it with +his fist. Bob goes to his meals with an excellent appetite engendered by +his violent encounters with that disreputable monarch.</p> + +<p>Abdul Hamid II is in very bad shape from the punishment. Bob has caught +him in the act of addressing the English members of the Balkan +Committee, and left him only a pair of shoulders and one leg. Of the +Sultan driving to the Selamlik every Friday there is visible now only +one of the carriage horses and the fragments of a cavalryman. Nor is the +physical presentment of Abdul Hamid the only thing that has gone to +pieces under Bob's unrelenting hostility. The Sultan's character has +been growing worse and worse as night after night the boy insists upon +new examples of what bad Sultans do.</p> + +<p>To satisfy that inexhaustible demand, Harrington has shouldered Abdul +Hamid with all<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> the sins of all the epochs in history. He has made him +steep unhappy Christian prisoners in pitch and burn them for torches, +and send innocent Frenchmen to the guillotine, and tomahawk the Puritan +settlers as they worked in the fields. He has made him responsible for +St. Bartholomew's Day, and Andersonville prison. He has robbed the Czar +of his just credit by making Abdul Hamid the hero of Bloody Sunday in +St. Petersburg. I am not sure but that Harrington has not laid the +abnormally high price of meat and eggs at the Sultan's door. There are +times when I really feel that Harrington should ask Abdul Hamid's +pardon.</p> + +<p>But no; he should <i>not</i> beg his pardon. For that is just the point I set +out to make. It is a moral tonic to be brought into touch with Bob's +opinion of Abdul Hamid, and to get to feel that things are not all a +hodge-podge, indifferently <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> good or indifferently bad, as you choose to +look at it. In Bob's world there are good things and bad things, and the +good is good and the bad is bad. Bob knows nothing of the cant which +makes the robber monopolist only the sad victim of forces outside his +control. Bob knows nothing of the sentimental twaddle about that +interesting class of people who are more sinned against than sinning. +Bob, like Nature, indulges in no fine distinctions. When he meets a bad +Sultan he punches his head. When he meets a good Sultan, nothing is too +good to believe concerning him.</p> + +<p>And he accepts the one as naturally as he does the other. He has no +moral enthusiasms or enthusiasms of any kind. It is merely an obvious +thing to him that right should triumph and wrong should fail. He does +not play with his emotions. I remember how, one<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> night, in relating the +fall of Abdul Hamid, Harrington had worked himself up to an +extraordinary pitch of excitement. Never had that despot been painted in +such horrid colours; and after he had told how the palace guards rose +against the Constitution, and how the Young Turks marched upon +Constantinople, and how the craven tyrant, crying "Don't hurt me, don't +hurt me," was dragged from his bed by the good soldiers and clapped into +prison, Harrington turned, all aglow, to Bob, and waited for the boy to +echo his enthusiasm. But Bob waited till the cell-door clanged behind +the Unspeakable Turk, and said: "Now tell me about the giraffe that fell +into the water."</p> + +<p>I spoke of the good Sultan. Of course there had to be one, and +Harrington found him in the same book with the bad Sultan. And when he +had studied the somewhat stolid features of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> Mohammed V for a little +while, it was inevitable that Bob should ask what a good Sultan did. +Harrington was in difficulties again. It was impossible to explain that +at bottom there really is no such thing as a good Sultan; that they are +as a rule cruel and immoral, and always expensive; and that at best they +are harmless, if somewhat stupid, survivals. But since the very idea of +a bad Sultan demands a good one, Harrington tried to satisfy Bob by +investing Mohammed V with a large number of negative virtues. "A good +Sultan does not shoot people, or burn down houses or throw women into +jail or whip little children." The portrait failed to please. Bob's +faith demanded something robust to cling to; and in the end he compelled +his father to do for the good Sultan the opposite of what he had done +for the bad one. Mohammed V stands to-day invested with all the virtues +that have been<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> manifested on earth from Enoch to Florence Nightingale.</p> + +<p>And yet of the two, Bob and his father, I must say again that it is Bob +who has the more truthful and healthy outlook upon life, and it is good +for Harrington to rehearse with him the history of the fall of Abdul +Hamid II three or four times a week. Bob has no flabby standards. He +wastes no time in looking for lighter shades in what is black or dark +spots in the white. Bob holds, for instance, that bad soldiers shoot +down good people, and that good soldiers shoot down bad people. He is +quite as close to the truth as I am, who believe that there is no such +thing as a good soldier and that the business of shooting down people, +whether good or bad, is a wretched one. For all that, I know there come +times when a man must take human life, and in such cases Bob has the +advantage over Hamlet and me. Where<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> we falter and speculate and end by +making a mess of it all, Bob just punches the bad Sultan's head and +passes on to the giraffe that fell into the water.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VII" id="VII"></a>VII</h2> + +<h3>THE SOLID FLESH</h3> + + +<p>Physical culture as pursued in the home probably benefits a man's body; +but the strain on his moral nature is terrific. I go through my morning +exercise with hatred for all the world and contempt for myself. Why, for +instance, should every system of gymnastics require that a man place +himself in the most ridiculous and unnatural postures? A stout, +middle-aged man who struggles to touch the floor with the palms of his +hands is not a beautiful sight. Equally preposterous is the practice of +standing on one leg and stretching the other toward the nape of one's +neck. In the confines of a city bedroom such evolutions are not only +ungraceful but frequently dangerous.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> Harrington tells me that every +morning when he lunges forward he scrapes the tips of his fingers +against the edge of the bed and the tears come into his eyes. When he +throws his arms back he hits the gas jet. Harrington's young son, who +insists on being present during the ordeal, believes that the entire +performance is intended for his amusement, and laughs immoderately. I +cannot blame him. Morning exercise is incompatible with the maintenance +of parental dignity. Were I a child again I could neither love nor +respect a father who placed two chairs at a considerable distance from +each other and mounted them horizontally like the human bridge in a +melodrama.</p> + +<p>I admit, of course, that home exercises have the merit of being cheap. +No special apparatus is required. The ordinary household furniture and +such heirlooms as are readily available will usually suffice. An onyx +clock will do instead<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> of chest weights. Any two volumes of the +Encyclopædia Britannica will take the place of dumb-bells or Indian +clubs. Many a time I have stood still and held a bronze lamp in my +outstretched right hand for a minute and then held it in my left hand +for half a minute. I know of one man who skipped the rope one hundred +times every morning. Within four months he had lost three and a half +pounds, and driven the family in the flat below into nervous +prostration. I have even been told that there are systems of exercise +which show how physical perfection may be attained by scientifically +manipulating, for fifteen minutes every day, a couple of fountain pens +and a paper cutter. But I cannot reconcile myself to such methods +because of the confusion they introduce into the world of common things. +A table is no longer something to write upon or to eat upon, but +something to lie down upon while one flings<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> out his arms and legs fifty +times in four contrary directions. A broom-stick is an instrument for +strengthening the shoulder muscles. When I see a transom, I find myself +estimating the number of times I could chin it.</p> + +<p>The intimate connection between the hygienic life and the temptation to +tell lies is a delicate subject to touch upon; but the facts may as well +be brought out now as later. People of otherwise irreproachable conduct +will lose all sense of truthfulness when they speak of physical culture +and fresh air. They will exaggerate the number of inches they keep their +bedroom windows raised in midwinter; they will quote ridiculous +estimates of the doctors' bills they have saved; they will represent +themselves as being in the most incredibly perfect health. I know one +sober, intelligent business-man who not only habitually understates, by +ten degrees,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> the temperature of his morning tub, but gives an +altogether distorted impression of the alacrity with which he leaps into +his bath every morning, and the reluctance with which he leaves it. This +same man asserts that he can now walk from the Chambers Street ferry to +his office in Wall Street in astonishing time. And not only that, but +since he took to walking as much as he could, he has cut down his daily +number of cigars to one-fourth (which is untrue). And not only that, but +since he has gone in for exercise and fresh air and has given up +smoking, his income has increased by at least 50 per cent., owing to his +improved health and clearer mental vision. But that again, as I happen +to know, is untrue.</p> + +<p>But there is another, much more subtle form of prevarication. Smith +meets you in the street and remarks upon your flabby appearance. He +argues that you ought to weigh twenty-five<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> pounds less than you do, and +that a long daily walk will do the trick. "Look at me," he says, "I walk +ten miles every day and there isn't an ounce of superfluous flesh on +me." And so saying, he slaps his chest and offers to let you feel how +hard the muscles are about his diaphragm. Of course, there is no +superfluous flesh on Smith. And if he abstained entirely from physical +exertion and guzzled heavy German beer all day and dined on turtle soup +and roast goose every day, and ate unlimited quantities of pastry, he +would still be what he describes as free from superfluous flesh. <i>I</i> +call it scraggy. Smith is one of the men set apart by nature to +perpetuate the Don Quixote type of beauty, just as I am doomed with the +lapse of time to approximate the Falstaffian type. Smith's five sisters +and brothers are thin. His father was slight and neurasthenic. His +mother was spare and angular. Little wonder the Smith<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> family is fond of +walking. Friction and air-resistance in their case are practically +nonexistent.</p> + +<p>I do not, of course, mean to deny the ancient tradition that a sound +body makes a sound mind. But I would only point out that we are just +beginning to wake to the truth of the converse proposition, that a sane, +equable, easy-going mind keeps the body well. Hence there are really two +kinds of exercise, and two kinds of hygiene, a physical kind and a +spiritual kind. Which one a man will choose should be left entirely to +himself. It is only a question of approaching the same goal from two +different directions. Smith is welcome to make himself a better man by +exercising his legs three hours a day. But I prefer to sit in an +armchair and exercise my soul. Smith comes in refreshed from a +half-day's sojourn in the open air, and I come away refreshed from a +roomful of old<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> friends talking three at a time amidst clouds of tobacco +smoke.</p> + +<p>The trouble with so many of the physical-culture devotees is that they +tire out the soul in trying to serve it. I am inclined to believe that +the beneficent effects of the regular quarter-hour's exercise before +breakfast, is more than offset by the mental wear and tear involved in +getting out of bed fifteen minutes earlier than one otherwise would. +Some one has calculated that the amount of moral resolution expended in +New York City every winter day in getting up to take one's cold bath +would be enough to decide a dozen municipal elections in favour of the +decent candidate, or to send fifty grafting legislators to jail for an +average term of three and a half years. The same specialist has worked +out the formula that the average married man's usefulness about the +house varies inversely with his fondness for violent <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> exercise. Smith's +dumb-bell practice, for instance, leaves him no time for hanging up the +pictures. After his long Sunday's walk he is invariably too tired to +answer his wife's questions concerning the influence of the tariff on +high prices.</p> + +<p>By this time it will be plain that I am no passionate admirer of the +gospel of salvation by hygiene. So many things that the world holds +precious have been developed under the most unhygienic conditions. +Revolutions for the liberation of mankind have been plotted in +unsanitary cellars and dungeons. Religions have taken root and prospered +in catacombs. Great poems have been written in stuffy garrets. Great +orations have been spoken before sweating crowds in the foul air of +overheated legislative chambers. Lovers are said to be fond of dark +corners and out-of-the-way places. It is not by accident that children, +said to be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> the most beautiful thing in the world, are so inordinately +fond of dirt. Every great truth on its first appearance has been +declared a menace to morals and society; in other words, unhygienic. And +yet one would imagine that truth, from its habit of going naked, would +appeal strongly to the ardent fresh-air practitioner.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VIII" id="VIII"></a>VIII</h2> + +<h3>SOME NEWSPAPER TRAITS</h3> + + +<p>At Cooper's house last winter I met Professor Grundschnitt of Berlin, +who has been making a study of American newspaper methods in behalf of +the German government. For some time after the professor's arrival in +this country, he told me, he found himself completely at sea. American +newspapers, it appeared to him, were written in two languages. One was +the English language as he had studied it in the writings of Oliver +Goldsmith, John Ruskin, and Ralph Waldo Emerson. In America it seemed to +be used chiefly by auctioneers, art critics, and immigrants. The other +was a dialect, evidently English in origin, but sufficiently removed +from the parent stock to be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> quite unintelligible. The professor spent +many painful hours over such sentences as "Jeffries annexes the Brunette +Beauty's Angora," and "Sugar Barons hand Uncle Sam a lemon." This +dialect, he found, was extensively employed by truck-drivers, +playwrights, and college students.</p> + +<p>It did not take the professor very long, however, to overcome this +initial difficulty. His education proceeded rapidly. One of the first +things he learned, so he told me, is that some American newspapers are +printed in black ink and some in red. As a rule, the former tell more of +the truth, but the latter sell many more copies. On Sunday, which in +America is observed much more rigorously than in Europe, the red ink +predominates. The professor suggested that this might be a survival of +primitive times when the British ancestors of the present-day Americans +tattooed themselves in honour of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> their gods. It is universally accepted +that the American business man reads so many papers because he has +neither the time nor the energy to read books. But this would seem to be +contradicted on Sundays, when every American business man reads two or +three times the equivalent of the entire works of William Shakespeare. +Herr Grundschnitt was inclined to believe that carrying home the Sunday +paper is the most popular form of physical exercise among our people.</p> + +<p>A very curious circumstance about the press in all the great American +cities, the professor thought, is that every newspaper has a larger +circulation than any other three newspapers combined. According to the +arithmetical system in use among all civilised peoples, that would be +manifestly impossible. But the professor imagines that the methods of +calculation by which such results are obtained are the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> same as those +employed by politicians in estimating their majorities on the eve of +election day, by millionaires in paying their personal taxes, and by +operatic sopranos in figuring out their age. The influence of a +newspaper depends, of course, upon its circulation. Such influence is +exercised directly in the form of news and editorial comment, and +indirectly in the form of wrapping paper.</p> + +<p>Still another curious trait about all American newspapers, this learned +German found, is that they tell a story backward. This arises from the +desire to put the most important thing first; and in this country it is +the rule that the thing which happens last is the most important. As an +illustration Herr Grundschnitt read the following brief account clipped +from one of the principal newspapers in New York city:</p> + +<p>"Arthur Wellesley Jones died in the municipal hospital last night as the +result of injuries<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> sustained in an automobile accident. The end was +peaceful. Mr. Jones was driving his own machine down Fifth Avenue when +he ran into a laundry-wagon at Twenty-first Street. He had left his home +in New Rochelle an hour before. Mr. Jones was an enthusiastic motorist. +In 1905 he won the Smithson cup for heavy cars. In 1903 he was second in +the Westchester hill-climbing contest. In 1899 he helped to organise the +first road race in New York State. He was in Congress from 1894 to 1898, +and was elected to the Legislature in 1889, the same year that his +eldest son was born. Two years before that event he married a daughter +of Henry K. Smith of Philadelphia. He was graduated from Yale, having +prepared for that institution at Andover, where he played right tackle +on the football team. As a child he showed a decided taste for +mechanics. He was born in 1861."</p> + +<p>The daily press in America, the professor<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> went on to say, takes +extraordinary interest in visitors from abroad. He referred, as an +instance in point, to the recent arrival in New York of a nephew of the +Dalai Lama of Tibet. As the ship was being warped into the dock, a young +man with a notebook asked the distinguished visitor if it was true that +his Holiness, the Dalai Lama, had been found guilty of converting the +temple treasures at Lhassa to his own use. Upon receiving a reply in the +negative, the young man asked what progress the suffrage movement had +made in Tibet. He was told that inasmuch as every woman in Tibet must +take care of several husbands instead of one, as among the more +civilised nations, women there were not interested in the question of +votes. Thereupon the young man asked whether Tibet offered a promising +market for automobiles. He was pleased to learn that Tibet, with its +extremely sparse population and its very precipitous <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> cliffs, was an +ideal place for the automobilist.</p> + +<p>These, however, were superficial characteristics. What the professor was +anxious to learn was just how the newspapers influence the national life +to the remarkable extent they undoubtedly do. He knew, of course, that +the Americans are a free people, and that they select their own +lawmakers and magistrates. He soon discovered that when the people +desire to choose some one to rule over them, they name two, three, or +more men for the same office. The newspapers then proceed to accuse +these men of the vilest crimes, and the one who comes out least +besmirched is declared to be elected. After he has been put into office +the people no longer pay attention to him, leaving it to the newspapers +to see that he conducts himself properly. When a high official is caught +stealing the people rejoice, because it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> shows that the newspapers are +doing their duty.</p> + +<p>In the sphere of social relations, Herr Grundschnitt learned, the +newspapers are mainly concerned with safeguarding the purity and +integrity of the home. Most of them do this by printing full accounts of +all murder and divorce trials. The professor told me that he could +recall nothing in literature that quite equals the white heat of +indignation with which the editor of the <i>Star</i> once spoke of "the +festering national sore revealed in the proceedings of the Dives divorce +suit, the nauseous details of which the reader will find in all their +hideous completeness on the first three pages of the present issue, +together with all the photographs ruled out of evidence on the grounds +of decency." The press also serves the cause of public morals by holding +up to scorn the vices and extravagances of the vulgar rich, whose +ill-<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span>used millions, as they hasten to point out elsewhere, are nothing +more than what any American may look forward to, provided he has courage +and energy.</p> + +<p>The same ingenious method of promoting virtue by holding up vice to +obloquy is pursued in every other field, the learned German told me. The +newspapers do not print the names of men who support their wives, but +they print the names of men who do not, or who support more than one. +They do not publish the photographs of honest bank clerks, but of +dishonest ones, and of these only when they have stolen a very large +sum. They pay no attention to a clergyman as long as he advocates the +brotherhood of man, but they have large headlines about the minister who +believes in the moderate use of the Scotch highball. They overlook a +college professor's epoch-making researches in American history, and +take him up when he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> comes out in favour of an exclusive diet of raw +spinach. From the newspaper point of view, a college professor counts +less than a professional gambler; a gambler counts less than an actress; +a good actress counts less than a bad one; a bad actress counts less +than a prize-fighter; a prize-fighter counts less than a chimpanzee that +has been taught to smoke cigarettes; and an educated chimpanzee counts +less than a millionaire who suffers from paranoia. By continuously +pondering on the horrors of crime and vice as depicted in the +newspapers, the American people are roused to such a hatred of evil that +some editors receive a salary of $100,000 a year.</p> + +<p>Oddly enough, the American people freely criticise their newspapers. One +of the commonest charges is that their editors write with great haste +and little accurate information. But, Herr Grundschnitt argued, it is +unfair to insist that newspapers shall be both forceful and ac<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span>curate. +It is true that the editors who supply the American people with their +opinions think fast and write fast, but it is absurd to maintain that as +a class they are unreasonably set in their own beliefs. Editors, as a +matter of fact, change their opinions every little while. In such cases +they usually have no difficulty in proving that, while their present +views are right, their previous views were also right. This makes for +consistency. Nor is there any reason for maintaining, as is often done, +that editors are restive under criticism. The professor declared that +there are very few newspapers in the United States that will refuse to +print a letter from any one who believes that the paper in question is +the only one in town with courage and honesty enough to tell the truth +and that it is the best newspaper in the country at the price.</p> + +<p>As for the old-fashioned critics who maintain <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> that not even the best +newspaper tells more than half the truth, my informant pointed out that +every town and village in the United States has at least two daily +publications. The conscientious reader who buys both is thus saved from +error.</p> + +<p>When I rose to say good-night the professor accompanied me to the door, +and would not let me go till he had pronounced a final eulogy on the +press in general, and the American newspaper in particular. He +expatiated on its omnipresence. The printed sheet is with a man when he +wakes in the morning, and when he falls asleep at night, and when he is +at the breakfast table with his wife. The newspaper breaks up families +and reunites other families, though it usually misspells their names. It +chastises the rascal, and worries the honest man. It can make a +reputation in a day, and destroy a reputation in ten minutes, sending +its owner into the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> grave or upon the vaudeville stage. It teaches +Presidents how to rule, women how to win husbands, the Church how to +save souls, and middle-aged gentlemen how to reduce weight by exercising +ten minutes every day. It knows nearly everything and guesses at the +rest. It will say almost anything and publish the rest at advertising +rates. Without it, democratic government would be difficult and +travelling in the Subway quite impossible. The newspaper is the only +institution since the world began that succeeds in being all things to +all men for the moderate sum of one cent a day. The only universal +things that come cheaper, the professor told me, are birth and death.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IX" id="IX"></a>IX</h2> + +<h3>A FLEDGLING</h3> + + +<p>A sophomore's soul is not the simple thing that most people imagine. I +am thinking now of my nephew Philip and of our last meeting. This time, +he was more than usually welcome. I was lonely. The family had just left +town for the summer and the house was fearfully empty. I sat there, +smoking a cigarette amid the first traces of domestic uncleanliness, +when I heard him on the stairs. The dear boy had not changed. Dropping +his heavy suitcase anyways, he seized my hand within his own huge paw +and squeezed it till the tears came to my eyes. His voice was a young +roar. He threw his hat upon the table, thereby scattering a large number +of papers about the room, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> then sat down upon my own hat, which was +lying on the armchair, on top of several July magazines. I had put my +hat down on the chair instead of hanging it up, as I should have done, +because the family was away and I was alone in the house.</p> + +<p>Might he smoke? He was busy with his bull-dog pipe and my tobacco jar +before I could say yes. He explained that he was sorry, but he found he +could neither read, write, nor think nowadays without his pipe. He +admitted that he was the slave of a noxious habit, but it was too late, +and he might as well get all the solace he could out of a pretty bad +situation. But, as I look at Philip, I cannot help feeling that his fine +colour and the sparkle in his blue eyes and his full count of nineteen +years make the situation far less desperate than he portrays it. Philip +is not a handsome lad, but he will be a year from now. At present he is +mostly hands<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> and feet, and his face shows a marked nasal development. +Before Philip has completed his junior year, the rest of his features +will have reasserted themselves, and the harmony of lineament which was +his when he was an infant, as his mother never tires of regretfully +recalling, will be restored. Until that time Philip must be content to +carry the suggestion of an attractive and eager young bird of prey.</p> + +<p>Philip lights pipe after pipe as he dilates on his experiences since +last I saw him. The moralising instinct is very weak in me. I cannot +find it in my heart to censure Philip's constant mouthing of the pipe. +I, too, smoke, and I am not foolish enough to risk my standing with +Philip by preaching where I do not practise. Besides, I observe that the +boy does not inhale, that his pipe goes out frequently, and that his +consumption of matches is much greater than his consumption of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> tobacco. +So I say nothing in reproof of his pipe.</p> + +<p>But it is different with his language. Philip, I observe regretfully, is +profane. I am not mealy-mouthed myself. There are moments of high +emotional tension when silence is the worst form of blasphemy. But +Philip is profane without discrimination. His supply of unobjectionable +adjectives would be insufficient to meet the needs of the ordinary +kindergarten conversation. He uses the same swift epithet to describe +certain brands of tobacco, the weather on commencement day, the food at +his eating-house, his professors of French and of mathematics, the +spirit of the incoming freshman class, and the outlook for "snap" +courses during the coming year.</p> + +<p>It is not my moral but my æsthetic sense that takes offence, so I ask +Philip whether it is the intensity of his feelings that makes it +impossible<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> for him to discuss his work or his play without continual +reference to the process of perdition and the realm of lost souls; or +whether it is habit. No sooner have I put my question than I am sorry. +There is nothing the young soul is so afraid of as of satire. It can +understand being petted and it can understand being whipped; but the +sting behind the smile, the lash beneath the caress, throws the young +soul into helpless panic. It feels itself baited and knows not whither +it may flee. I have always thought that the worst type of bully is the +teacher in school or in college who indulges a pretty talent for satire +at the expense of his pupils. It is a cowardly and a demoralising +practice. It means not only hitting some one who is powerless to retort, +it means confusing the sense of truth in the adolescent mind. Here is +some one quite grown up who smiles and means to hurt you, who says good +and means bad, who<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> says yes and means no. The young soul stares at you +and sees the standards of the universe in chaos about itself.</p> + +<p>And I feel all the more guilty in Philip's case because I know that the +lad speaks only a mechanical lingo which goes with his bull-dog pipe and +the aggressive shade of his neckwear and his socks. The very pain and +alarm my question raises in him shows well enough that his soul has kept +young and clear amid his world of "muckers" and "grinds" and "cads" and +"rotten sneaks," and all the men and things and conditions he is in the +habit of depicting in various stages of damnation. "Now, you're making +fun of me," says Philip. "We fellows don't know how to pick out words +that sound nice, but mean a—I beg your pardon—a good deal more than +they say. Anyhow, I suppose, if I try from now on till doomsday I shall +never be able to speak like you."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span></p> + +<p>Bless his young sophomore's soul! With that last sentence Philip has +seized me hip and thigh and hurled me into an emotional whirlpool, where +chills and thrills rapidly succeed each other. Because I am fifteen +years older than Philip the boy invests me with a halo and bathes me in +adoration. I am fifteen years older than he, I am bald, obscure, and far +from prosperous, and there is unmistakably nothing about me to dazzle +the youthful imagination. Yet the facts are as I have stated them. +Philip likes to be with me, copies me without apparently trying to, and +has chosen my profession—so he has often told me—for his own. I am +pretty sure that he has made up his mind when he is as old as I am to +smoke the same brand of rather mediocre tobacco which I have adopted for +practical reasons. I am sometimes tempted to think that Philip, at my +age, intends to be as bald as I am.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span></p> + +<p>Hence the alternate thrills and chills. I am by nature restless under +worship. The sense of my own inconsequence grows positively painful in +the face of Philip's outspoken veneration. There are people to whom such +tribute is as incense and honey. But I am not one of them. I have tried +to be and have failed. I have argued with myself that, after all, it is +the outsider who is the best judge; that we are most often severest upon +ourselves; that if Philip finds certain high qualities in me, perhaps +there is in me something exceptional. I even go so far as to draw up a +little catalogue of my acts and achievements. I can recall men who have +said much sillier things than I have ever said, and published much worse +stuff than I have ever written. I repeat to myself the rather striking +epigram I made at Smith's house last week, and I go back to the old +gentleman from Andover who two years ago told me that there<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> was +something about me that reminded him of Oliver Wendell Holmes. By dint +of much trying I work myself up into something of a glow; but it is all +artificial, cerebral, incubated. The exaltation is momentary, the cold +chill of fact overtakes me. There is no use in deceiving one's self. +Philip is mistaken. I am not worthy.</p> + +<p>But that day Philip rallied nobly to the situation. My little remark on +strong language had hurt him, but he saw also that I was sorry to have +hurt him, and he was sorry for me in turn. "I don't in the least mind +your telling me what you think about the way we fellows talk," he said. +"That's the advantage of having a man for one's friend, he is not afraid +of telling you the truth even if it hurts. And then, if you wish to, you +can fight back. You can't do that with a woman."</p> + +<p>"Have you found that out for yourself!" I asked him.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span></p> + +<p>He looked at me to see if again I was resorting to irony. But this time +he found me sincere.</p> + +<p>"Women!" Philip sniffed. "I have found it doesn't pay to talk seriously +to a woman. There is really only one way of getting on with them, and +that's jollying them. And the thicker you lay it on, the better." He put +away his pipe and proffered me a cigarette. "I like to change off now +and then. I have these made for me in a little Russian shop I discovered +some time ago. They draw better than any cigarette I have ever smoked. +Of course, there are women who are serious and all that. There are a lot +in the postgraduate department and some in the optional literature +courses. But you ought to see them! And such grinds. None of us fellows +stands a ghost of a chance with them. They take notes all the time and +read all the references and learn them by heart. You<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> can't jolly +<i>them</i>. They wouldn't know a joke if you led them up to one and told +them what it meant. I think coeducation is all played out, don't you? +Home is the only place for women, anyhow. Do you like your cigarette?"</p> + +<p>The Patient Observer, it may possibly have been gathered before this, is +somewhat of a sentimentalist. He liked his cigarette very well, but +through the blue haze he looked at Philip and could not help thinking of +the time—only two short years ago—when he, the Patient Observer, with +his own eyes saw Philip borrow a dollar from his mother before setting +out for an ice-cream parlour in the company of two girl cousins. The +Patient Observer has changed little in the last two years; his hair may +be a little thinner and his knowledge of doctors' bills a little more +complete. But in Philip of to-day he found it hard to recognise the +Philip of two years ago. And the marvels of the law<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> of growth which he +thus saw exemplified moved the Patient Observer to throw open the gates +of pent-up eloquence. He lit his pipe and began to discourse to Philip +on the world, on life, and on a few things besides.</p> + +<p>And when it was time for both of us to go to bed, Philip stood up and +said, "I wish I came every day. You don't know what a bore it is, +listening to that drool the 'profs' hand you out up there." His fervent +young spirit would not be silent until, with one magnificent gesture, he +had swept the tobacco jar to the floor and shattered two electric lamps. +Then he went to his room and left me wondering at the vast mysteries +that underlie the rough surface of the sophomore's soul.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="X" id="X"></a>X</h2> + +<h3>THE COMPLETE COLLECTOR—I</h3> + + +<p>"I have given up books and pictures," said Cooper. "I now devote myself +entirely to collecting samples of the world's wisdom."</p> + +<p>"Proverbs, do you mean?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"No, but the facts on which proverbs are based. You see, I grew tired of +pictures when it got to be a question of bidding against millionaires +for the possession of spurious old masters. The break came when Downes +proved that my Velasquez was painted in 1896. His own, it turned out, +was done in 1820; but even then, you see, he had the advantage over me. +So I concentrated on books. But I could not resist the temptation of +glancing through my first editions now and then, and the pages began <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> to +give way. Then I tried Chinese porcelains. There, again, I had to +compete against Downes, who ordered his agent to buy two hundred +thousand dollars' worth of Chinese antiquities for the Louis XIV. room +in his new Tudor palace. And, besides, this rather disconcerting thing +happened: I had as my guest a mandarin who was passing through New York +on his way to Europe, and I showed him my collection of jades. 'There +was only one collection like this in China some years ago,' I told him. +'Yes,' he replied, 'it was in my house when the foreign troops entered +Peking in 1900.' So I decided to sell my porcelains.</p> + +<p>"But of course I had, as you say, to collect something, and for a long +time I could think of no field in which a cultivated taste and personal +effort could make way against the competition of mere brute millions. +And then, all at once, I hit upon proverbs. The suggestion came in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> a +rather peculiar fashion. It seems that there was an eccentric old poet +on Long Island who spent many years in collecting all sorts of inanimate +freaks, odds and ends, and rubbish. When he died they found among his +treasures a purse made out of a sow's ear and a whistle made from a +pig's tail. I saw my opportunity at once. The eccentric old man, by +acquiring two such extraordinary <i>objets d'art</i> had indulged himself in +a sneer at the world's proverbial wisdom. I would come to the rescue of +our threatened stock of experience by gathering the facts that upheld +it. I would make it, besides, more than the selfish hobby of the private +collector who gives the world only a very little share of the pleasure +he tastes. I would make my collection a museum and a laboratory. Instead +of reading about the wise ant and the busy bee people should come and +see them in the life. It was the difference between reading<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> about +animals in a book and seeing them in the life."</p> + +<p>"And have you succeeded?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"Beyond all expectations," he replied. "Come, I will take you through my +galleries," and he showed the way into the queerest garden I have ever +seen. It was as if a menagerie and a museum had been brought together in +the open air. Between enclosures and cages which harboured animals of +all species, ran long tables supporting glass cases like those used for +exhibiting coins or rare manuscripts.</p> + +<p>"Now here," he said, stopping before a small chest with a glass top, +"here is my collection of straws."</p> + +<p>"Straws?" I said.</p> + +<p>"Yes. It is small but select. Here, for instance, is the last straw that +broke the camel's back. Some one suggests that it must have been a Merry +Widow hat, but that's jesting, of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> course. This again is the straw that +showed which way the wind blew and enabled a politician to change sides +and get a reputation as a reformer. We will see the politician further +on." I noticed then for the first time that the iron-barred cages +contained human beings as well as beasts. "Here is a handful of straws +which an entire conference of theologians spent three months in +splitting. This," pointing to a little mannikin about four inches high, +"is the man of straw whose defeat in debate gave one of our United +States Senators his brilliant reputation. And this, finally, is a +handful of straws out of the pile on which Jack Daw slept when he gave +up his bed to buy his wife a looking-glass, or, as some one has +suggested, an automobile.</p> + +<p>"And now observe the advantages of my method. The student, having been +shown the straw that broke the camel's back, will, if he is a cautious +student, well drilled in the methods<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> of modern research, demand to see +the camel. Well, here it is," and Cooper turned toward a large enclosure +where several members of the family <i>Camelidæ</i> were peacefully browsing, +with the exception of one that lay in a corner with drooping head and +closed eyes, apparently lifeless. "It's been hard work, of course, and +expensive, keeping a broken-backed camel alive, but, encouraged by such +examples of the remarkable vitality of animals as may be seen for +instance in the Democratic donkey, I have persisted and succeeded. This +rather thin-legged creature near the fence is the camel that tried to +pass through the needle's eye, and the one close beside him is the one +swallowed by the man who strained at a gnat. Harrington asserts that he +has never been able to see how either phenomenon is possible, but the +problem is only half as difficult as it appears. For it is evident that +if a camel were small enough to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> pass through the eye of a needle, there +would be comparatively little trouble in swallowing him. And, speaking +of needles, it has been a constant regret that my collection is still +without a needle found in a haystack."</p> + +<p>I have not the space to enumerate one tithe of what Cooper showed me. As +we hurried past the cages containing numerous specimens of <i>Homo +Sapiens</i>, he contented himself with pointing out a physician who had +failed to cure himself by psycho-therapeutics; a shoemaker who by +sticking to his last failed to become a railroad president, though in +the course of time he could tell where every man's shoe pinched; an +importer who, in defiance of the Pure Food law, put new wine into old +bottles, and labelled them Bordeaux; and a harmless-looking man of +middle age, who continued to smile and smile, and had played Iago, +Macbeth, and Hamlet's uncle. Before a sturdy-looking man dressed in +working-<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span>clothes Cooper stopped for a moment and said, "Mr. C. W. Post +and Mr. James Farley assure me that this is the rarest item in my +collection."</p> + +<p>"Who is he?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"It is a union labourer who is worthy of his hire," Cooper said.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XI" id="XI"></a>XI</h2> + +<h3>THE EVERLASTING FEMININE</h3> + + +<p>I am convinced that the easiest business in the world must be the +writing of epigrams on Woman. I have been reading, of late, in a new +volume of "Maxims and Fables." It came to me with the compliments of the +author, in lieu of a small debt which he has kept outstanding for +several years. Although the writer contradicts himself on every third or +fourth page, I am justified in calling the book a very able bit of work +for the reason that the ordinary book on this subject contradicts itself +on every other page. No one who glances through this volume will fail to +understand why the psychology of Woman should be a favourite subject +with very young and very light thinkers. It is the only<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> form of +literature that calls for absolutely no equipment in the author. Writing +a play, for instance, presupposes some acquaintance with a few plays +already written. No one can succeed as a novelist without a fair +knowledge of the technique of millinery or a tolerable mastery of stock +exchange slang. The writer of scientific articles for the magazines must +have fancy, and the writer of advertisements must have poetry and wit. +But to produce a book of epigrams on Woman requires nothing but an +elementary knowledge of spelling and the courage necessary to put the +product on the market.</p> + +<p>The secret of the thing is so simple that it would be a pity to keep it +from the comparatively few persons who have failed to discover it. It +consists entirely in the fact that whatever one says about Woman is +true. And not only that, but every statement that can possibly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> be made +on the subject is sure to ring true, which is much better even than +being true. On every other subject under the sun there is always one +opinion which sounds a little more convincing than every other opinion. +There are, for example, people who insist that birds of a feather do not +necessarily flock together more frequently than birds of a different +feather do; and they will assert that if you step on a worm with real +firmness the chances of his turning are much less than if you did not +step on him at all. Nevertheless, there is undeniably a truer ring about +the assertion that birds do flock together than about the assertion that +they do not, and we accept more readily the worm that turns than the +worm that remains peaceful under any provocation. But this is not the +case with aphorisms about the gentler sex. There, everything sounds as +plausible as everything else.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span></p> + +<p>Let me be specific. Right at the beginning of the volume to which I have +alluded, I came across the following apothegm: "Long after Woman has +obtained the right to vote she will continue to face the wrong way when +she steps from a street-car." "How true," I said to myself. Well, a few +days later, while glancing through the pages at the end of the volume, +my eye fell on the following lines: "Now that Woman is learning to face +the right way when she steps from a street-car, she has demonstrated her +right to the ballot." "How true." But I had scarcely expressed my +approval when it occurred to me that I had read the same thing elsewhere +in the book. And when I searched out the earlier passage and compared +the two and found that they did not say the same thing, but quite the +opposite thing, it did not seem to make a very great difference after +all. They both sounded plausible. I recited one sentence<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> aloud and then +the other, and they rang equally true; and the more I repeated them the +truer they rang.</p> + +<p>Delighted with my chance discovery I proceeded to make a thorough study +of "Maxims and Fables" with the object of bringing together the author's +widely scattered observations on the same topic under their appropriate +heads. The work went slowly at first; but after a little while I found I +could pick out a maxim and turn almost instinctively to one that +directly contradicted it. The occupation is fascinating as well as +instructive. It sheds a new light on the conditions of human knowledge +and the workings of the human mind. Consider, if you will, the following +half-dozen sentences that I succeeded in compiling in less than ten +minutes. They all deal with the question of a woman's age:</p> + +<p>"A woman is as old as she looks.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span></p> + +<p>"A woman is as old as she says.</p> + +<p>"A woman is as old as she would like to be.</p> + +<p>"A woman is as old as the only man that counts would have her be.</p> + +<p>"A woman is as old as any particular situation requires.</p> + +<p>"A woman is as old as her dearest woman friends say she is."</p> + +<p>Let any one read these maxims to himself quietly, and admit that not +only would each of them impress him as true if found standing by itself, +but that they all ring quite as true when taken together. But that is by +no means all. It may be shown that if all these propositions are true, +taken singly or together, the negative of each and all of these +propositions is also true. Thus:</p> + +<p>"A woman is seldom as old as she looks.</p> + +<p>"A woman is never as old as she says.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span></p> + +<p>"No woman is just the age she would like to be.</p> + +<p>"A woman is rarely as old or as young as the one man that counts would +have her be.</p> + +<p>"Few women are ever of the age that a particular situation requires.</p> + +<p>"No woman is as old as her dearest woman friends say she is."</p> + +<p>How all these opposites can be equally true, I will not undertake to +explain. It is probably inherent in the very nature of the subject. The +French, a people wise in experience, knew what they were about when they +laid it down that if you have a mystery to solve, you must look for the +woman. What they meant was, that, having found a woman, you may make any +statements you please about her; the world will accept them +unquestioningly and your puzzle will consequently be solved.</p> + +<p>Sometimes, however, it has seemed to me<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> that a possible reason for this +very curious fact may be found in the established fashion of speaking +about men as individuals and about women as a class and a type. And that +class or type we saddle with all the faults and virtues of all its +individual members. When Smith tells me that his automobile cost him +three times as much as I know he has paid for it, I record my +impressions by telling Jones as soon as I meet him that the man Smith is +an incorrigible liar. But when Mrs. Smith tells me that her family is +one of the oldest in Massachusetts, which I have every reason to believe +is not so, I invariably say to myself or to some one else, "A woman's +appreciation of the truth is like her appreciation of music; she likes +it best when she closes her eyes to it."</p> + +<p>Or Smith may be a very straightforward man, given to plain-speaking, and +when you ask him how he liked your last dinner he may say<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> that in his +opinion the wine was better than the conversation. In that case you will +probably tell your wife that Smith has shown himself to be an +insufferable ass, and that you have decided to cut his acquaintance. But +when Mrs. Smith tells you that your expensive dinners are rather beyond +what a man of your modest income should go in for, you merely writhe and +smile; only on the train the next day you will say to Harrington, "Has +it ever occurred to you that a woman loves the truth, not because it is +the truth, but because it hurts? Take a cigarette."</p> + +<p>For these reasons I would urge every one who can possibly find time, to +write a book of maxims about Woman, provided he has not done so already. +In the first place, as I have shown, it is an easy and delightful +occupation, which, for that very reason, is in danger of becoming +overcrowded. But there is another reason for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> losing no time in the +matter. Now and then I have the foreboding that some day in the near +future the world may suddenly lose its habit of believing that, where +women are concerned, two and two are four and are not four at the same +time. And then there will be no more writing of epigrams on Woman. For +it is evident that there can be no point to an epigram if its assertions +must be qualified. The situation will become impossible when students of +psychology, instead of writing, "Woman likes the truth for the same +reason that she likes olives—to satisfy a momentary craving," will be +compelled to write, "Some women tell the truth, and some women do not," +"Some women mean yes when they say no, and some women mean no," "Some +women think with their hearts, and some think with their minds." That +little word "some" will settle the epigram writer's business, and an +interesting form of literature will disappear.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span></p> + +<p>Not that in some respects its disappearance will fail to arouse regret. +These books amused very many people in the writing, and they never did +very much harm. And it is something to have a universal topic that every +one can write on, just as it is stimulating to have a universal appetite +like eating, or a universal accomplishment like walking. How many other +subjects besides Woman have we on which the schoolboy and the sage can +write with equal confidence, fluency, and approach to the truth? +Possibly even women will regret that they are no longer the subject of +universal comment. Who knows? A woman will forgive injury, but never +indifference.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XII" id="XII"></a>XII</h2> + +<h3>THE FANTASTIC TOE</h3> + + +<p>When we reach the year 1910 [Harding dreamt he was reading in the +<i>Weekly Review</i> for 1952], we find the art of dancing well on its way +toward establishing itself as the predominant mode of expression. The +next few years marked a tremendous advance. The graceful <i>danseuses</i> who +interpreted Mendelssohn's "Spring Song," Tchaikovsky's Sixth Symphony, +and Shakespeare's "Tempest" were the pioneers of a vast movement. We can +do nothing better than recall a few typical public performances given in +New York during the season of 1912-13.</p> + +<p>In a splendid series of matinées extending over two months, Professor +William P. Jones<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> danced the whole of Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the +Roman Empire." The first two volumes were danced in slow time, to the +accompaniment of two flutes and a lyre. The poses were statuesque rather +than graceful, and the gestures had in them a great deal of the antique. +But, beginning with the story of the barbarian invasions in the third +volume, Professor Jones's interpretation took on a fury that was almost +bacchantic. The sack of Rome by the Vandals in the year 451 was pictured +in a veritable tempest of gyrations, leaps, and somersaults. The subtle +and hidden meanings of the text called for all the resources of the +Professor's eloquent legs, arms, shoulders, lips, and eyes. A certain +obscure passage in the life of Attila the Hun, which had long been a +puzzle to students of Gibbon, was for the first time made clear to the +average man when Professor Jones, standing on one foot,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> whirled around +rapidly in one direction for five minutes, and then, instantly reversing +himself, spun around for ten minutes in the opposite direction.</p> + +<p>In the ballroom of the Hotel Taftoftia, during Christmas week, William +K. Spriggs, Ph.D., held a number of fashionable audiences spellbound +with his marvellously lucid dances in Euclid and Algebra up to +Quadratics. Perhaps the very acme of the Terpsichorean art was attained +in the masterly fluency of body and limbs with which Mr. Spriggs +demonstrated that the sum of the angles in any triangle is equal to two +right angles. In Pittsburg Mr. Spriggs is said to have moved an audience +to tears when, by an original combination of the Virginia reel, the +two-step, and the Navajo snake dance, he showed that if <i>x<sup>2</sup> + y<sup>2</sup></i> += 25 and <i>x<sup>2</sup> - y<sup>2</sup></i> = 25, <i>x</i> equals 5 and <i>y</i> equals zero. All the +pride and selfishness of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> <i>x</i>, all the despair of <i>y</i>, were mirrored in +the dancer's play of features. The spectators could not help pondering +over the seeming law of injustice that rules the world. Why should <i>x</i> +be everything in the equations and <i>y</i> nothing? Why should <i>y</i>'s +nonentity be used even to set off the all importance of <i>x</i>? But they +found no answer. On the other hand, a large number of college freshmen +who had failed on their entrance mathematics found no difficulty in +passing off their conditions after attending three performances of Mr. +Spriggs's dance.</p> + +<p>We can give only the briefest mention to an entire school of experts and +scientists who helped to make the season of 1912-13 memorable in the +annals of the greatest of all arts. For a solitary illustration we may +take Mr. Boom, who, at the annual meeting of the American Zoölogical +Association, danced his monumental two-volume work entitled, "The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> +Variations of the Alimentary Canal in the Frogs and Toads." This dance +was subsequently repeated before several crowned heads of Europe.</p> + +<p>An event of more than ordinary interest was the debate between Senators +Green and Hammond on the question whether the United States should +establish a protectorate over Central America. Senator Green danced for +the affirmative and Senator Hammond danced for the negative. Both +gentlemen had an international reputation. Senator Green's war-dance in +the Senate on the Standard Oil Company is still spoken of in Washington +as the most striking rough-and-tumble exhibition of recent years. +Senator Hammond is an exponent of a style which lays greater stress on +finesse than on vigour. In a single session of the Senate he is said to +have sidestepped nearly a dozen troublesome roll-calls without arous<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span>ing +any appreciable dissatisfaction among his constituents. Before a popular +jury, however, Senator Green's Cossack methods were likely to carry +greater conviction. And that is what happened in the great debate we +have referred to. Senator Hammond appeared on the platform in a filmy +costume made up of alternate strips of the Constitution of the United +States and the Monroe Doctrine. Wit, sarcasm, irony followed one another +in quick succession over his mobile features and fairly oozed from his +fingers and toes. Yet it was evident that while he could appeal to the +minds of the spectators he had no power to sway their emotions. It was +different with Senator Green. A thunderous volume of applause went up +the moment he appeared on the stage, booted and spurred and heavily +swathed in American flags. His triumph was a foregone conclusion. The +scene that ensued when Senator Green concluded his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> argument by leaping +right over the table and pouring himself out a glass of ice-water on the +way, simply beggars description.</p> + +<p>No one to-day can possibly foresee [wrote the critic of the <i>Weekly +Review</i>] to what heights the dance, as the expression of all life, will +be carried. We can only call attention to the plans recently formulated +by one of our leading publishers for a library of the world's best +thought, to be issued at a price that will bring it within the reach of +people of very moderate means. The library will consist of bound volumes +of photographs showing the world's greatest dancers in their +interpretation of famous authors. Twenty young women from the Paris and +St. Petersburg conservatories of dancing have already been engaged. +Among other works they will dance the Psalms and Ecclesiastes, the +second book of the Iliad, "Œdipus the King," the fifth Canto of +Dante's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> "Inferno," Spinoza's "Ethics," "Hamlet," Rousseau's +"Confessions," "Mother Goose," Tennyson's "Brook" and the "Charge of the +Light Brigade," Burke's "Speech on Conciliation," "Alice in Wonderland," +the "Pickwick Papers," the Gettysburg Address, Darwin's "Origin of +Species," and Mr. Dooley.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XIII" id="XIII"></a>XIII</h2> + +<h3>ON LIVING IN BROOKLYN</h3> + + +<p>Perhaps the principal charm about living in Brooklyn lies in the fact +that strangers can find their way there only with extreme difficulty. +The streets in Brooklyn are to me a perpetual source of joy and +wonderment. Like the city itself, they have kept the slow-paced habits +of a former age. No city is more easy to be lost in, and Brooklyn is at +all times full of people from across the river, who ask the way to +Borough Hall. For that matter, one may easily be lost on Staten Island, +where the inhabitants are reputed to pass the pleasant summer evenings +in guiding strangers to the trolley lines. But a person naturally +expects to lose his bearings on Staten Island. On the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> other hand, to be +lost in Brooklyn irritates as well as confuses. It is like starving in +the midst of plenty. One always has the choice of half a dozen surface +cars, but one is always sure to be directed to the wrong one.</p> + +<p>So I repeat: Brooklyn's tangled streets serve their highest purpose in +safeguarding its inhabitants against the unwelcome visitor. Because of +our American good nature we are always inviting people to call; and when +they accept we immediately feel sorry. It is a law with us that if two +utterly unsympathetic persons meet by chance at the house of a common +friend, they shall insist on having each other to dinner on the +following two Sundays. Or, again, you may be shaking hands with a very +dear friend in the presence of a third person whom you dislike. And you +are extremely anxious to have your friend come up for tea<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> on Sunday, +and you cannot do it without asking the other man.</p> + +<p>Under such circumstances, it is well to live in Brooklyn. All you need +say then to the person you have an aversion for is: "I should be +delighted to have you call on us Sunday afternoon. We live in Brooklyn, +you know, at No. 125 Bowdoin Place." You may then go home in peace, +confident that your undesired visitor will never find you. At eight +o'clock on Sunday night he will be wearily asking a policeman on +Flatbush Avenue what the shortest way is to Borough Hall. Long before +that he will have given up hope of finding No. 125 Bowdoin Place. His +only object is to get home before midnight. Now it is plain that such an +excellent defence against unpleasant people is unavailable in Manhattan. +Ask a man to look you up at No. 952 West One Hundred and Twelfth Street, +and though your heart<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> loathes him, you shall not escape. But in +Brooklyn you are safe until the moment your doorbell actually rings. For +even if your visitor should find Bowdoin Place, many streets in Brooklyn +have two, three, or four systems of numbering. Some will maintain that +it is not rigidly honest to give a stranger your Brooklyn address +without giving him detailed directions for finding his way from the +station, illustrating your argument with a sketch map. But there will +always be Puritan consciences.</p> + +<p>As a matter of fact, some of the kindest and most enlightened people I +know live in Brooklyn. And I cannot see why that in itself should make +them a subject for general satire. I have been told that a professor at +Harvard has recently made the calculation that the drama and the art of +conversation in America would be poorer by 33-1/3 per cent. if the joke +about living in Brooklyn were to disappear. When a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> visitor from +Brooklyn drops in unexpectedly at a Harlem flat, the proper thing for +the host to say is, "Well, well, what a task it must have been to find +your way out," and when the visitor starts for home his host remarks, +"Sorry you can't stay; but we all know how it is—in the midst of life +you are in Brooklyn. Goodnight."</p> + +<p>Of course I don't mean to deny that the people who live in Brooklyn are +themselves largely responsible for the perpetuation of the silly jest. +They subscribe to it in a spirit of meekness that is characteristically +local. Ask a man from Cherry Springs or Binghamton where is his home and +he will quietly say, Cherry Springs or Binghamton, as the case may be. +But the resident of Brooklyn is apologetic from the start. He +anticipates criticism by saying, "Well, you know, <i>I</i> live in Brooklyn," +and he looks at you in tremulous expectation of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> the usual condolences. +If by any chance one should omit the traditional reply, the man from +Brooklyn begins to fear the worst. On both sides of the East River the +principle seems to be accepted that inasmuch as there are places like +Cherry Springs or Binghamton there must be people who live in them, but +that it is by definition impossible to bring forward a valid reason why +one should live in Brooklyn.</p> + +<p>The question is really a complicated one. Harlem's disapproval of +Brooklyn is not of a piece with Harlem's disapproval of localities +outside itself. Living in Brooklyn is something utterly different from +living in New Jersey or the Bronx. New Jersey and the Bronx are so +entirely out of the ordinary that they call for no explanation. Living +there has at least the merit of originality. A great poet might choose +to live in the Bronx. Minor poets have been known to commute across the +Hudson.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> But Brooklyn cannot be dismissed so easily. She is too big, too +close, and, for all her timidity, too contented. Her people come under +the head of those who ought to know better and do not try. Thus, while +living in New Jersey is a matter of taste, and living in the Bronx is a +matter of necessity, living in Brooklyn is a matter of habit.</p> + +<p>And a fine, rich, ripe old habit it is, and a precious thing in a +modern, shouting world that has no habits but only impulses and vices. +Let me confess: I like Brooklyn, and I like to dream of going to live +there some day. And possibly I would go if it were not for the desire of +keeping the project before me as one of the few ideals I have retained +in life. I like Brooklyn's shapeless rotundity as contrasted with our +abominable rectangular distances in Manhattan. I like it because it +sprawls low against the ground instead of clawing up into the sky.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> +Manhattan is solid with brick and steel from river to river. Brooklyn +ambles on peacefully till it comes to a region of sand lots or a marsh +or a creek, and stops. Half a mile further on it resumes its gentle +dreams of progress and wanders north, or south, or east, as the fancy +seizes it. It runs into blind corners, it debouches upon ravines and +woodland strips, it hears the echoes of ocean on the beaches. It is +leisure; it is peace; it is Brooklyn.</p> + +<p>At the same time it is well to remember that Brooklyn is something more +than a geographical fact. Brooklyn describes a scheme of life and a +condition of the mind. The life there is like a page from yesterday. +People who live in Brooklyn organise reading circles. They attend +lectures on the Wagnerian music drama. They have retained progressive +euchre and the strawberry festival as essential ingredients of religion. +They are extremely fond of going<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> on long excursions into the country in +early spring. They make it a habit to walk across the bridge on their +way home in the evening, and they speak with great feeling of the +beautiful effect when New York's high buildings flash into banked masses +of flame in the falling dusk. People who live in Brooklyn take pride in +keeping up old friendships and in dressing without ostentation. There +are old gentlemen who use only the ferries in coming to New York, +because they regard the bridges as a novelty open to the suspicion of +being unsafe.</p> + +<p>And yet, as I have said, Brooklyn is rather a condition than a concrete +fact. I believe every great Babylon has its neighbouring Brooklyn. +London has it; Boston has it; Paris has it; even Chicago has it. And the +line of demarcation between what is Brooklyn and what is not Brooklyn is +not always a sharp one. There are many people in Manhattan who<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> at heart +are residents of Brooklyn. Such people, though they live in Harlem, +avoid the express trains in the Subway on account of the crush. They +visit the Museum of Natural History on Sunday and the Metropolitan +Museum of Art on legal holidays and extraordinary occasions. They cross +the Hudson and walk on the Palisades. They bring librettos to the opera +and read them in the dark, thus missing a great deal of what passes on +the stage. On the other hand, you will find people in Brooklyn whose +spirit is totally alien to the place. They want to boost Brooklyn and +boom it and push it and make it the most important borough in Greater +New York, and develop its harbour facilities, and establish a great +university, and double the assessed value of real estate within five +years. Such people are in Brooklyn, but not of it.</p> + +<p>And that is why Brooklyn has so strong a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> hold on me. I like it because +it has so many wonderful, valuable, common things in it. In Brooklyn +there are people, churches, baby-carriages, bay-windows, butchers' boys +carrying baskets and whistling, policemen who misdirect strangers, +vacant lots where boys play baseball, small tradesmen, overhead +trolleys, quiet streets tucked away between parallel lines of clanging +elevated railway, an Institute of Arts, and old gentlemen who write +letters to the newspapers. I like Brooklyn because it hasn't the highest +anything, or the biggest anything, or the richest anything in the +world.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XIV" id="XIV"></a>XIV</h2> + +<h3>PALLADINO OUTDONE</h3> + + +<p>Harding spent one long winter night in reading the report of a select +committee of the Society for Psychical Recreation which placed on record +no less than half a dozen absolutely authenticated cases of material +objects being moved through space by some mysterious agency other than +physical. The report, as it took shape in Harding's dreams that night, +was as follows:</p> + +<p>In the first experiment the medium was an ordinary American citizen. The +precautions against the slightest bodily movement on his part were +perfect. Mr. Joseph G. Cannon planted both of his feet on the medium's +left foot and seized his left hand in both his own. Senator Aldrich did +the same on the other side.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> The Honourable Sereno E. Payne grasped the +medium by the throat, the Honourable John Dalzell straddled on his +chest, Senator Burrows of Michigan strapped his ankles to the chair, and +Senator Scott of West Virginia thrust a gag into his mouth. As a further +precaution, before the séance began, a representative of the Sugar Trust +went through the medium's pockets. The medium struggled and groaned and +made other signs of distress, but at all times remained under absolute +control. Yet it is a fact that, in spite of all restraints imposed upon +him, this ordinary American citizen did succeed in raising a family of +two sons and a daughter and even in sending the eldest child to college. +At various times one even caught sight of a loaf of bread or a pair of +shoes sailing through the air, and once, for a moment, the Committee +distinctly smelt roast turkey with cranberry sauce. At the end of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> +séance the medium was in a pitiful state of exhaustion, but declared +that he was quite ready to go on.</p> + +<p>In the second experiment the Committee made use of the Mayor of one of +our large cities and of the boss of the party to which the Mayor +belonged. The boss acted as medium, being securely strapped into a chair +about three feet away from another chair, on which the Mayor was +sitting, blindfolded. Again the standard precautions against fraud were +gone through, but this time the medium's efforts met with almost +immediate response. At the merest droop of the boss's right eyelid, the +Mayor leaped up from his chair and turned completely around. The boss +smiled faintly, whereupon the Mayor balanced himself for 3 minutes and +42 seconds on his right foot and for 2 minutes and 35 seconds on his +left foot, and then began to run about the room on all-fours in an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> +amusing imitation of a spaniel fetching and carrying for his master. The +boss inserted the point of his tongue into his cheek and withdrew it +again, repeating the process several times in rapid succession. In +response, the Mayor's face went into a series of spasmodic smiles and +frowns that aroused general laughter. At the conclusion of the +performance, the boss gently clicked his tongue against his palate, and +the Mayor promptly stood on his head in the middle of the floor.</p> + +<p>A somewhat similar experiment was concerned with a magazine editor and a +life-size mannikin made up to resemble a muckraker. The editor and the +lay figure sat facing in opposite directions at a distance of about ten +feet. The editor, who acted as medium, was holding the telephone +receiver with one hand and signing checks with the other, so that there +could be no question of manual manipulation on his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> part. Neither could +his feet come into play, because they were in full view on his desk. The +telepathy hypothesis was eliminated because, in the first place, the +mannikin had no mind, of course, and in the second place, the editor +changed his own mind so fast that no external mind could possibly keep +up with it. The results were gratifying. The editor took a slip of paper +and wrote a few words upon it. Immediately the stuffed figure began to +shout, "Murder! Fire! Thieves! Help! Murder! Fire! Thieves! Help! +Murder!" at intervals of two seconds. The editor wrote something on +another slip of paper, and the mechanical figure went through a most +complex series of movements. First it seized a pair of paint brushes and +began to paint all the white objects in the room black and all the black +objects white. Then it went through the motions of playing, for a few +minutes, upon a typewriter. Then it seized a pair<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> of shears and set to +work clipping solid pages from books and magazines. Then it copied a +long column of figures from an almanac and added them up wrong. Then it +drew a memory sketch of an English statesman, and put the wrong name +under it. The editor assured the Committee that he could continue the +process for hours at will.</p> + +<p>An excellent séance was one in which the medium was a man very near the +top in American finance. The rest of the group forming the circle around +the table were plain American citizens of the type described in the +first experiment. The medium was securely roped in his chair with +anti-Trust laws, anti-rebating laws, insurance laws, banking laws, +franchise laws, etc. Yet no sooner were the lights turned down than the +phenomena began. John Smith, on the right of the medium, suddenly felt a +sharp blow on the neck. As he turned around<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> instinctively a ghostly +hand snatched away his pocket-book and the sound of mocking laughter +could be plainly heard from the dark cabinet. Another weird hand pulled +Thomas Jones's insurance policy out of his breastpocket, dangled it in +the air just out of his reach, and then flung it back at him. Later when +Jones looked at his policy he found that its face value had been cut +down one-half. James Robinson all at once began to feel his shoe pinch, +and could not discover the reason until he, too, caught sight of a +ghostly hand hovering in the vicinity of his pocket. Soon the room was +filled with a veritable chaos of flying objects. Railroads, steamship +lines, national banks, trust companies, insurance companies, went +hurtling through the air, but all the time our financier sat motionless +in his chair. It was suggested that the force which set such ponderous +objects into motion was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> the mysterious element known as "executive +ability."</p> + +<p>In the final experiment the subject was a popular novelist, who gave a +most interesting exhibition of how a nation-wide reputation can be +raised and supported without the slightest apparent reason. A +painstaking examination by the Committee showed that he had concealed +about him neither talent, nor imagination, nor knowledge of human +nature, nor insight into life, nor an intimate acquaintance with the +elements of English grammar. Nevertheless, before the eyes of the amazed +observers, novel after novel went humming through the air in a direction +away from the writer, while a steady stream of bank-books, automobiles, +and country houses flowed in the opposite direction.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XV" id="XV"></a>XV</h2> + +<h3>THE CADENCE OF THE CROWD</h3> + + +<p>I have always been peculiarly susceptible to the music of marching feet. +I know of no sound in nature or in Wagner that stirs the heart like the +footsteps of the crowd on the board platform of the Third Avenue "L" at +City Hall every late afternoon. The human tread is always eloquent in +chorus, but it is at its best upon a wooden flooring. Stone and asphalt +will often degrade the march of a crowd to a shuffle. It needs the +living wood to give full dignity to the spirit of human resolution that +speaks in a thousand pair of feet simultaneously moving in the same +direction; and particularly when the moving mass is not an army, but a +crowd advancing without rank or order. I am exceedingly fond of military +parades; so fond that I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> repeatedly find myself standing in front of +ladies of medium height who pathetically inquire at frequent intervals +what regiment is passing at that moment. But it is not the blare of the +brass bands I care for, or the clatter of cavalry, which I find +exceedingly stupid, or even the rattle of the heavy guns, but the men on +foot. Only when the infantry comes swinging by do I grow wild with the +desire to wear a conspicuous uniform and die for my country. +Saint-Gaudens's man on horseback in the Shaw memorial is beautiful, but +it is the forward-lunging line of negro faces and the line of muskets on +shoulder that threaten to bring the tears to my eyes.</p> + +<p>This, I suppose, is rank sentimentality; but I cannot help it. Any +procession, no matter how humble, puts me into a state of mingled +exaltation and tearfulness. It is in part the sound of human footsteps +and in part the solemn idea<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> behind them. I am not thinking of stately +processions moving up the aisles of churches to the sound of music. I +have in mind, rather, a band of, say, a thousand working girls on Labour +Day, or of an Italian fraternal organisation heavy with plumes and +banners, or even a Tammany political club on its annual outing; wherever +the idea of human dependence and human brotherhood is testified to in +the mere act of moving along the pavement shoulder to shoulder. Above +all things, it is a line of marching children that takes me quite out of +myself. I was a visitor not long ago at one of the public schools, and I +sat in state on the principal's platform. When the bell rang for +dismissal, and the sliding doors were pushed apart so as to form one +huge assembly room, and the children began to file out to the sound of +the piano, the splendour and the pathos of it overpowered me. I did not +know which I wanted to be then,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> the principal in his magnificent chair +of office, or one of those two thousand children keeping step in their +march towards freedom.</p> + +<p>Pathos? Why pathos in a little army of children marching out in fire +drill, or the same children marching in for their morning's Bible +reading and singing? I find it difficult to say why. Perhaps it is +consciousness of that law which has raised man from the brute, and which +I see embodied when we take a thousand children and range them in order +and induce them to keep step. Perhaps the pathos is in the recognition +of our isolated weakness and our need to make painful progress by +getting close together and moving forward in close formation. In any +case, the pathos is there. Consider a children's May party, on its way +to Central Park. A fife-and-drum corps of three little boys in uniform +leads the way. The Queen of the May, all in white, walks with her +consort<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> under a canopy of ribbons and flowers, a little stiffly, +perhaps, and self-consciously, but not more so than older queens and +kings on parade. A long line of boys and girls in many-coloured caps +moves between flying detachments of mothers carrying baskets. The +confectioner's wagon, laden with its precious commissariat of ice cream +and cake, moves leisurely behind; for the confectioner's horse this is +evidently a holiday. Is pathos conceivable in so delightful, so smiling, +an event? Alas, I have watched May parties go by, and the serious little +faces under the red and white caps have given me a heavier case of +<i>Weltschmerz</i> than I have ever experienced at a performance of "Tristan +und Isolde." It was the fact of those little children advancing in +unison; that is the word. If they had trudged or scurried along, +pell-mell, I should not have minded. But May parties move forward in +procession, and the movement of a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> compact crowd is, to me, always heavy +with pathos.</p> + +<p>But no crowd is like the afternoon crowd upon the wooden platform of the +"L" station at City Hall. I don't mean to be sentimental when I say that +the sound is to me like the march of human civilisation and human +history. Outwardly there is little to justify my grandiose comparison. +You see only a heaving mass of men and women who are not very well clad. +The men are unshaven, the women awry with a day's labour. They move on +with that beautiful optimism of an American crowd which has been trained +in the belief that there is always plenty of room ahead. There is very +little pushing. Occasionally a band of young boys hustle their way +through the crowd; but a New York crowd seems always to be mindful of +the days when we were all of us boys. It is a reading public. The men +carry newspapers whose flaring headlines <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> of red and green give a touch +of almost Italian colour. The women carry cloth-bound novels in paper +wrappers. But it is not an assemblage of poets or scholars or thinkers, +or whatever class it is that is supposed to keep the world moving. It is +that most solemn of all things—a city crowd on its way home from the +day's work.</p> + +<p>The footsteps keep up the tramp, tramp, on the board flooring, while +train after train pulls out jammed within and without. The influx from +the street allows no vacuum to be formed upon the platform. The patience +of the modern man shows wonderfully. The tired workers face the hour's +ride that lies between them and home with beautiful self-restraint and +courage. And in their weariness and their patience lies the full +solemnity of the scene. The morning crowd, even on the same wooden +platform at City Hall, is different. The morning crowd is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> not so firmly +knit together. You catch individual and local peculiarities. You feel +that there are men and women here from Harlem, and others from Long +Island, and others from Westchester and the Bronx. They are still fresh +from their separate homes, with their separate atmospheres about them. +Some are brisk from the morning's exercise and the cold bath; some are +still a bit sleepy from last night's pleasures; some go to the day's +task with eager anticipation; some move forward indifferent and +resigned. But when these same men and women surge homeward in the +evening, they are one in spirit; they are all equally tired. The city +and the day's task have seized upon them and passed them through the +same set of rollers and pressed out their differences and transformed +them into a single mass of weary human material. The city has had its +day's work out of them and now sends them home to recruit the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> new +supply of energy that it will demand to-morrow. The unshaven men with +their newspapers and the listless women with their paper-covered novels +show ascetically tight-drawn faces, as if the day had been passed in +prayer and supplication. I need not see those faces; I know they are +there from the steady footfalls on the board platform. I overhear a +young girl recounting what a perfectly lovely time she had last night, +and how she simply couldn't stop dancing; but her foot drags a bit +heavily and there sounds in her chatter and her vehemence the +ground-tone of weariness.</p> + +<p>It is not often that I hear the tramp of the late afternoon crowd upon +the wooden platforms at City Hall. I find the sound of the crowd too +solemn to be endured every day, and there is no comfort in the crush. I +usually take pains to travel at an early hour when there are few people, +and one is sure of a seat.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XVI" id="XVI"></a>XVI</h2> + +<h3>WHAT WE FORGET</h3> + + +<p>The importance of knowing who my Congressman is had never occurred to me +until Professor Wilson Stubbs brought up the subject at a luncheon in +the Reform Club. Professor Stubbs spoke on Civic Obligations. He argued +that at the bottom of all political corruption lay the average citizen's +personal indifference. "For instance," he said, "how many of those +present know the name of the man who represents their district at +Washington?" And as it happened, while he waited for a reply, his eye +rested thoughtfully on me.</p> + +<p>I grew red under his scrutiny. I tried my best to remember and failed. I +did vaguely recall the lithographed presentment of a large,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> +clean-shaven man, with a heavy jaw. It hung in a barber-shop window +between a blue-and-red poster announcing a grand masquerade and civic +ball, and a papier-maché trout under a glass case. I could not bring +back the man's name, although I was sure that his picture was inscribed +on the top "Our Choice," and at the bottom he was characterised as +somebody's friend—I could not recall whether he was the People's +friend, or the Workingman's, or the Bronx's. I could not even make out +his features, although, oddly enough, I could see the trout very +distinctly. The fish, I recollected, had a peculiarly ferocious scowl, +as if it resented the absurd blotches of green and gold with which the +artist had attempted to imitate Nature's colour scheme. Gradually I +found myself thinking of the trout as a member of Congress. Had I +continued much longer, I should have visualised that fish in the act of +address<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span>ing the Speaker of the House on the tariff bill.</p> + +<p>Yet I could not help taking the professor's implied criticism to heart. +It would have been something even, to be able to tell whether I lived in +the Eleventh Congressional District or the Fifteenth; but I didn't know. +For how long a term was the man elected? I didn't know. Was it required +that he should be able to read and write? I didn't know.</p> + +<p>That was the beginning. When luncheon was over, I sat before the fire +and tried to find out how much I did know of the things I should. I +found myself staring into bottomless depths of ignorance. I tried to +draw up a list of State Governors. I knew there must be between forty +and fifty, but I could remember only three Governors, including our own; +and later I recalled that one of the three was dead.</p> + +<p>From death my mind leaped, oddly enough,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> to drownings. How should one +go about resuscitating a man who has been pulled out of the river? He +must be rolled on a barrel, of course; that much I remembered. But was +it face down or face upward? And should his arms be pumped vertically up +and down, or horizontally away from the body and back? Yes, and how if +some intelligent foreigner were to ask me what our five principal cities +were, in the order of population? It would be easy enough to begin, New +York, Chicago, Philadelphia—and then? Was it Boston, or Baltimore, or +San Francisco? I did not know.</p> + +<p>There was no stopping now. I was fast in my own clutches. I bit at my +cigar, and tried to call the roll of the seven wise men of Greece. I +stopped at the first, Solon. He, I remembered, rescued the Athenians +from misgovernment and slavery, and left the city before they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> could +experience a change of heart and hang him.</p> + +<p>Who were the nine muses? Well, there was Terpsichore—her disciples are +spoken of every day in the newspapers. And then there was the muse of +History, whose name possibly was Thalia, and the muse of Poetry, whose +name I could not recall. I fared much better with the apostles: Peter +and Paul, of course, and John and James, and Judas and Matthew, and Mark +and Luke; eight out of twelve.</p> + +<p>But of the seven wonders of the world I could cite with certainty only +one, the Colossus of Rhodes. I was doubtful about Mount Vesuvius. I +remembered not a single one of the seven deadly sins, and, at first, +could place only two of the ten commandments—the ones on filial +obedience and on the Sabbath. Later I thought of the newest realistic +hit at the Park Theatre; that brought back one more commandment. On<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span> the +other hand, it was a relief to call the three Graces straight +off—Faith, Hope, and Charity.</p> + +<p>I grew humble. I began to doubt if, after all, it is true that a modern +schoolboy knows more than Aristotle did. In any case, whether +Harrington's boy who is still in the grammar grades knows more than +Aristotle, he certainly knows more than his father. They have a +new-fashioned branch of study in the modern schools, which they call +training the powers of observation. And that boy comes home with +mischief in his soul, and asks Harrington which way do the seeds in an +apple point. Harrington stares at the boy, and the boy smiles +quizzically at Harrington, and the father grows suspicious. Are there +seeds in an apple? There are seedless oranges, of course, which +presupposes oranges not destitute of seeds; but an apple? Harrington +tries to call up the image of the last apple he has eaten and he thinks<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span> +of sweet and sour apples, apples of a waxen yellow and apples of a +purple red, but he cannot visualise the seeds.</p> + +<p>As Harrington sits there dumb, Jack asks him which shoe does he put on +first when he dresses in the morning. Jack knows, the rascal. He can +trace every process through which the cotton fibre passes from the plant +to the finished cloth. He knows why factory chimneys are built high. He +knows how a boat tacks against the wind. And he knows that his father +knows nothing of these things.</p> + +<p>But I would rather have Harrington's boy quiz me on things that I can +pretend are not worth knowing, like the seeds in an apple, than on +things that cannot be waved aside. I tried to explain one day how the +revolution of the earth about the sun produces the seasons, and I +succeeded only in proving that when it is winter in New York it is +daylight in Buenos Ayres.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span> Thereupon, Jack asked me what an unearned +increment was. When I finished he said his teacher had told them that +views like those I had just expressed were common among ill-informed +people. The following day he came in and said to Harrington, "Papa, name +six female characters in Dickens, in three minutes." Well, Harrington +did, but it was a strain, and in order to make up the total he had to +count in the anonymous, elderly, single woman whom Mr. Pickwick +surprised in her bedroom. Jack insisted that, as she was nameless, it +was not fair to call her a character, but Harrington put his foot down +and refused to argue the matter.</p> + +<p>And as I sit there before the fire, smiling over Harrington and Jack and +myself, my cigar goes out, and I signal Thomas to bring me another. +Thomas has the ascetic countenance of a tragedian, and the repose of an +archbishop. Now, Thomas—and it comes to me with a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span> shock—what do I +know about Thomas, the man, as distinguished from the hired servant whom +I have been aware of this year and more? Is he married or single? And if +he is married, do his children resent their father's wearing livery? +Does Thomas himself like to be a servant? Are there ideals and +speculations behind that close-shaven mask? Has he any views on the +future life? Has he ever thought on the subject of vivisection? Does he +vote the Republican ticket? Does he earn a decent wage?</p> + +<p>I could only answer, with an aching sense of isolation, with the wistful +longing of one who looks into unfathomable depths, that I didn't know. +Oh, Thomas, fellow man, brother! We have rubbed elbows for months and I +do not know whether you are a man or only a lackey; whether you drink +all night, or pray; whether you love me or hate me. How can you hold the +cigar box so impassively, so single-mindedly?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span></p> + +<p>I said to myself that I would make amends to Thomas, that it was never +too late. And, quietly, genially, I asked him, "How do you like your +place here, Thomas?" Thomas grew uneasy, and smiled in a sickish +fashion, and entreated me with his eyes to pick my cigar and let him go. +But I was in the full swing of new-found righteousness. "There's nothing +wrong, is there, Thomas?" And he replied, "I beg pardon, sir; but +Henry's my name. Thomas was my predecessor. He left, you will remember, +sir, a year ago last May." "But everybody calls you Thomas." "The +gentlemen were used to the other name, sir."</p> + +<p>Might Professor Wilson Stubbs be wrong, after all, I thought. Perhaps no +one is really expected to know what everybody ought to know. I don't +know the name of my Congressman. But neither do I know the name of my +butcher and my grocer; and my butcher and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span> my grocer can slay me with +typhoid or ptomaines, whereas the utmost my Congressman can do is to +misrepresent me. I don't know the man who makes my cigars; he may be +consumptive. I don't know the critic who supplies me with literary +opinions, and the scholar who gives me my outlook upon life. I don't +know the man who lives next door. From the decent silence that reigns in +his apartment, I gather that he does not beat his wife; but that is all. +Yet he and I are supposed to be bound up in a community of interests. We +both belong to the class whose income ranges from $2,000 to $4,000 a +year, of which we spend 38 per cent. on food; and we raise an average of +2-2/3 children to the family, and are both responsible for the wide +prevalence of musical comedy on the American stage. But I have seen my +neighbour twice in the last three years.</p> + +<p>So that was the end of it. And because it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> was late in the afternoon, I +thought I would telephone to the office that I was not coming back. But +for the life of me, I could not think of my telephone number; and Henry +looked me up in the directory.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XVII" id="XVII"></a>XVII</h2> + +<h3>THE CHILDREN THAT LEAD US</h3> + + +<p>The mayor sat before his library fire and shivered, and kept wondering +why there was no clause in the city charter prescribing a minimum of +common sense for presidents of the Board of Education. A man thus +qualified would know more than to suggest an increase of three million +dollars for school sittings. The city's comptroller was crying +bankruptcy; the newspapers were asserting that the mayor's nephew was +head of a favoured contracting firm not entirely for his health; and the +Board of Education wanted three million dollars. The mayor had a touch +of fever. The steep rows of figures in the Education Board's memorandum +curled up into little arabesques under his eyes,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> which were closing +with fatigue. Only he did not wish to sleep. In the perfect stillness he +could hear his own rapid heartbeat. The clatter of sleety rain against +the windows made him restless.</p> + +<p>If only O'Brien were here, O'Brien, who was a good chief of police, and +a matchless personal aide-de-camp. They would then put on boots and +oilskins and go out into the night on one of their frequent +Harun-Al-Rashid expeditions. The mayor's wife? Yes, it is true that +before leaving for the theatre she had cautioned him not to stir from +the house. But she could not possibly have known how great was his need +of a breath of air. But O'Brien was not here. Was it because he had just +been appointed president of the Board of Education and comptroller in +one and was a busy man? Perhaps. And yet a person might step to the +telephone and ring up O'Brien if it were not that one's legs<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> were +weighted down with the weight of centuries and of dozens of new school +buildings all in reinforced concrete. Was it concrete? The mayor was not +quite sure, and he turned to ask O'Brien, who stood there at one side of +the fireplace, erect and attentive.</p> + +<p>"Do we go out to-night?" said the mayor.</p> + +<p>"I should not advise it, your Honour," answered O'Brien. "You are not +well enough. If it is adventure you would go in search of, I have here +quite an extraordinary delegation of citizens who desire an interview +with your Honour."</p> + +<p>"Let us hear them, by all means," replied the mayor.</p> + +<p>O'Brien drew aside the curtain which divided the library from the +general reception room and there marched in, two abreast and maintaining +precise step, a solemn line of children, who saluted the mayor gravely +and ranged<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> themselves in a semicircle across the room. As the mayor +veered in his chair to face his visitors, a girl of some fifteen years +stepped out of the line. She was still in her schoolgirl's dresses, but +tall, with features of a fine, pensive cut and earnest eyes that were +already peering from out the child's life into the opening doors of +womanhood.</p> + +<p>"May it please your Honour," she began, "we are a committee from the +Central Bureau of Federated Children's Organisations and we have come +here to protest against certain intolerable conditions of which our +members are the victims."</p> + +<p>Had they come in behalf of those additional three million dollars, the +mayor wondered uneasily. "State the nature of your grievance," he said.</p> + +<p>The leader of the delegation came a step nearer. "Your Honour, I can +only attempt<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> the merest outline of our general position. Several of my +associates will take turns in acquainting you with the details of our +case. Our complaint is that we, the children of this country, are being +overworked. Formerly it was supposed to be the inalienable right of +children to remain free from the cares of life. That theory has long +been abandoned. The task of solving the gravest problems of existence +has been thrust upon us, and every day that passes leaves us saddled +with new responsibilities. But the limit of endurance has been reached +at last. We feel that unless we protest now the whole structure of +society—its economics, politics, art, and religion—will be shifted +from the shoulders of the world's men and women to the shoulders of us +children. I hope your Honour is willing to hear us."</p> + +<p>"Of course, my dear," the mayor answered softly. He said, "My dear," and +he said it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> tenderly because he had recognised in the speaker his own +daughter Helen, whom he had supposed with her mother at the theatre.</p> + +<p>"Step forward, Flora Binns," said Helen, and Flora Binns, who was only +eight, blue-eyed, and with ringlets of gold, approached and curtsied +prettily. "May it please your Honour," she said, "I am the delegate from +Local No. 16 Children of Weak and Tempted Stage Mothers' Union. We wish +to place on record our opposition to the modern society drama, which so +frequently throws the duty of supporting the climax of a play upon +children under the age of ten. Although the playwrights are fond of +showing that our papa is a brute and that our mamma is an angel, they +invariably shrink from the logical conclusion that our mamma is right in +planning to run away with the man who has offered her years of silent +devotion. So the playwrights make one or two of us appear<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> on the stage +just in time to arouse in our mamma a sense of duty to her children and +to prevent the elopement. Now we submit that the office of justifying +our entire modern marriage fabric is too burdensome for us. Don't you +think so, Mr. Mayor?"</p> + +<p>"Why, yes," replied the mayor, thoughtfully.</p> + +<p>"And they make use of us in other ways, sir. In fact, whenever the grown +up persons in a play are in difficulties and the audience is beginning +to yawn, the author sends us to the rescue. Why, only the other day we +children saved a Wild West melodrama from utter failure. It took three +of us to do it, but we succeeded." Flora curtsied, started back and +returned. "And when I utter these sentiments, sir, I speak also for the +Union of Precocious Magazine Children, which is represented here by Mary +Sparks." Mary Sparks, a dark-haired miss with dancing eyes, bowed +saucily.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Step out, Fritz Hackenschneider," said Helen, and flaxen-haired Fritz, +radiantly holiday-like in his lustrously washed face and large, blue +polka-dot tie, approached the mayor's chair.</p> + +<p>"I don't have much to say, sir," he recited in a nervous, jerky voice. +"I have been sent by the Fraternal Association of Comic Supplement +Children. We wish to raise our voice against the almost universal +conception that people can be made to laugh only when one of us hides a +pin on the seat of grandpa's chair. The burden of an entire nation's +humour is more than we can sustain. Thank you, sir," and he retired into +the background, giving, as he passed, just one tug at Mary Sparks's hair +and eliciting a suppressed scream.</p> + +<p>"Mamie O'Farrell," called out Helen. The mayor found it impossible to +decide whether Mamie was thirteen or twenty-five. She was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> very short +and flat-chested, and the colour of her face in the firelight was like a +dull cardboard. She wore a long, faded automobile cloak and an enormous +black hat with a trailing green feather. On a gilt chain about her neck +hung a locket in the form of a heart half as large as the one that beat +uneasily within her. Mamie came forward reluctantly and saluted. Then +she began to squirm from side to side and to shift from foot to foot, +giggling in unfathomable embarrassment.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Helen, in a voice that was not at all unkind.</p> + +<p>Mamie's giggle grew worse. She seemed bent on snapping the massive gilt +chain with twisting it back and forth, and finally gave up the whole +case. "You tell it, Helen," she begged. "I forgot wot I was goin' t' +say. I'm scared poifectly stiff."</p> + +<p>Helen complied. "May it please your<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> Honour, Mamie O'Farrell wants me to +say that she represents the Amalgamated Union of Cash Girls and Juvenile +Cotton Mill and Glass Factory Operatives. Mamie is fifteen. She works +eleven hours a day and receives three and a half dollars a week. She +passes two hours every day clinging to a strap in a crowded surface car. +She carries her lunch in a paper bundle together with a copy of Laura M. +Clay's novel entitled 'Irma's Ducal Lover.' Saturday nights, if her +father has been strong enough to pass Murphy's saloon without opening +his pay envelope, she goes to the theatre where the play is 'The Queen +of the Opium Fiends.' Sometimes she attends a dance of the Friendship +Circle, but as a rule she spends her nights at home reading the <i>Evening +Yell</i>, which tells her that beauty is often a fatal gift and that there +is danger in the first glass of champagne a young girl drinks. Am I +telling your<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> story in the right way, Mamie?" asked Helen.</p> + +<p>"Goodness, yes. You're awful kind, Helen," said Mamie.</p> + +<p>"Thus far, Mamie has nothing to complain of," continued Helen. "But she +has read somewhere that the slaughter of the poor negroes in the Congo +and of the Chinese in Manchuria, and of the Zulus in Natal, and of the +Moros in the Philippines, arises from the necessity under which the +civilised nations labour to find foreign markets for their increasing +output of cotton goods, brass jewelry, and coloured beads. Now the +members of Mamie's union are engaged in producing precisely those +commodities, and they have come to feel in consequence, that they are +directly responsible for the innocent blood that is being shed in +various parts of the world. It cannot be their employers who are at +fault, because the press and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> the clergy are unanimous in declaring that +the heads of our great industries are the benefactors of humankind. That +is why the girls protest. They are quite content with their own fate, +but they cannot bear the entire responsibility for the march of +civilisation. Mamie tells me that she cannot sleep of nights for +thinking of the poor little Moorish babies whose mothers were killed by +the French guns. That is the position taken by your union, isn't it, +Mamie?"</p> + +<p>Mamie giggled, went through a final contortion of ill-ease and returned +to her place, in the half-circle. She was succeeded by a brown-haired +little maiden, who for some minutes had been showing a strained anxiety +to break into speech.</p> + +<p>"Please, Helen," she entreated, "may I say something?"</p> + +<p>"Of course, dear," said Helen.</p> + +<p>The little maid bowed to the mayor. "Please,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> sir," she said, "my papa +was thirty-eight years of age when he married mamma. He was an old +bachelor. He was not anxious to be married, but they put a tax on him +because they were afraid of depopulation. And he loves me very dearly. +But sometimes when he thinks of his old freedom he looks so sadly at me. +I feel very sorry for him then. I don't want him to be unhappy on my +account——"</p> + +<p>She withdrew and Helen stepped forward to sum up the case. "You must not +think, your Honour, that it is our desire to embarrass your +administration. Bad as conditions are, we would have continued to suffer +in silence, because, you see, there are still little flashes of freedom +left to us children. But we have learned that there is now on foot in +England a movement which threatens to reduce us to unmitigated slavery. +We understand that Mr. Sidney Webb, Mr. Francis Galton, Professor<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> Karl +Pearson, and Mr. Bernard Shaw are advocating a scheme of state endowment +for motherhood. Now you can see for yourself what that would mean. In +politics it would mean the establishment of a motherhood suffrage with +plural voting based on the size of the family. In the economic sphere it +would mean that we shall be supporting our papas and mammas. In art, +which must reflect the actualities of life, it would mean almost the +elimination of the element of love, since the world is to be a +children's world. In other words, as I have already said, the entire +social fabric will come to press on our shoulders alone. It is against +the mere possibility of such an unnatural state of affairs that we are +here to protest."</p> + +<p>"But what is it you want?" asked the mayor, somewhat nettled because +O'Brien, instead of backing him up, was busy piling three million<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> +golden dollars on the floor in stacks two and a half feet high.</p> + +<p>"We want to be left alone!" The reply came in a chorus of trebles, +pipings, quavers, and adolescent falsettos that caused the mayor to lift +his hands to his forehead entreating silence. "We want our old +privileges again. We want to be allowed just to grow up."</p> + +<p>"Yassir," shrilled one voice above the others, "jist to grow up."</p> + +<p>The mayor raised himself in his chair and his eyes lit up with surprise +at the sight of a well-known black little face at the very end of the +second row.</p> + +<p>"What, Topsy, you here?" he called out. "Haven't you done growing all +these sixty years, nearly?"</p> + +<p>"Yassir," answered Topsy, inserting an index finger into her mouth. "Ah +was shure growin' fas'; but Massa Booker Washin'ton<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> he says that ah and +the likes of me was charged with th' future of the negro race. An' that +skyeered me so ah made up mah mind ah wouldn' grow no further."</p> + +<p>The mayor turned to Helen. "You understand of course, my dear, that I +cannot lay a proposition of so vague a nature before the Board of +Aldermen. They are a rather unimaginative set of men."</p> + +<p>"We have drawn up a list of demands, your Honour, in terms precise +enough to make it a sufficient basis for practical legislation. May I +read the list to you, papa?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, my dear," he replied, and rising from his chair he put his arms +about her and kissed her. Her forehead was cool to his burning lips. +"Pray proceed, Miss Chairman."</p> + +<p>And Helen read in her high-pitched, petulantly graceful soprano: +"Resolutions adopted at a special meeting of the Central Bureau of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> the +Federated Children's Organisations of the United States:</p> + +<p>"1. Henceforth the proportion of child fiction in any magazine shall be +restricted to ten per cent. of the total contents of such publication; +and no magazine fiction child under the age of twelve shall be +represented as possessing an amount of intelligence greater than the +combined wisdom of its parents.</p> + +<p>"2. The married heroine of a society drama who has consistently +preferred yachting trips, bridge, and the opera to the company of her +children shall be precluded from calling upon them for aid to save +herself from the dangers of a mad infatuation.</p> + +<p>"3. Children under the age of eighteen shall be employed in no form of +industry whatsoever. If there are not enough hands to produce piece +goods for the Congo and the Philippines, let them draft all adult +motor-car chauffeurs, diamond <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span> polishers, wine agents, amateur coach +drivers, settlement workers, preachers of the simple life, and writers +of musical comedy.</p> + +<p>"4. In the public schools there shall be no talks or lessons dealing +with the duties of citizenship. The time now given to that subject shall +be devoted to the reading of dime novels and fairy tales, so that on +graduating, children shall not be confronted with so startling a +contrast between the realities of life and what they have learned at +school.</p> + +<p>"5. Cooking and other branches of domestic science shall no longer be +taught in the schools. One-half of us expect to live in family hotels +and the other half will probably be in no position to afford the +expensive ingredients employed in scientific cookery.</p> + +<p>"6. Mr. Francis Galton, who invented Eugenics, and Messrs. Karl Pearson +and Sidney Webb, who helped to popularise it, shall be executed. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> Mr. +Bernard Shaw shall be banished to a desert island."</p> + +<p>And the mayor all the while kept thinking how like her mother Helen was: +her voice, her hair, her eyes, but especially her voice. It filled the +room with many-coloured vibrations of the consistency of building +concrete and hid completely from the mayor's sight the crowd of young +faces, O'Brien, the Board of Aldermen, and the three million presidents +of the Board of Education. Only Helen remained and she came close to him +and laid her cool fingers on his aching head.</p> + +<p>The mayor started up to find his wife bending over him.</p> + +<p>"Edward," she was saying, "you promised me you would go to bed early."</p> + +<p>"My dear," he replied, "I would have if I had not fallen asleep in my +chair. Have you had a pleasant evening at the theatre?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span></p> + +<p>"It is dreadful weather," she said, "and I have a bit of cold. I suppose +I shouldn't have gone out to-night, but it was the last chance, and you +know the children <i>would</i> see 'Peter Pan.'"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XVIII" id="XVIII"></a>XVIII</h2> + +<h3>THE MARTIANS</h3> + + +<p>The saddest thing about the recent announcement that there are no canals +on Mars is that Robert and I will now have so little to talk about. +Robert is my favourite waiter, and when he found out that I am what the +newspapers call a literary worker, he made up his mind that the ordinary +topics of light conversation would not do at all for me. After prolonged +resistance on my part he has succeeded in reducing our common interests +to two: the canals on Mars and French depopulation. Now and then I +venture to bring up the weather or the higher cost of living. Once I +asked him what he thought about the need of football reform. Once I +tried to drag in Mme. Steinheil. But<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> Robert listens patiently, and when +I have concluded he calls my attention to the fact that in 1908 the +number of deaths in France exceeded the number of births by 12,000. When +the French population fails to stir me, he wonders whether the +inhabitants of Mars are really as intelligent as they are supposed to +be.</p> + +<p>And yet it must have been I that first suggested Mars to him. Let me +confess. I do not love the Martian canals with the devouring passion +they have aroused in susceptible souls like Robert. But in a quieter way +the canals have been very dear to me. Their threatened loss comes like +the loss of an old friend; a distant friend whose face one has almost +forgotten and never hopes to see again, from whom one never hopes to +borrow, and to whom one never expects to lend, but who all the more +lives in the mind a remote, impersonal, and gentle influence. I am not +ashamed to admit that I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> have learned to care more for the Martian +canals than for any canals much closer to us. The Panama Canal will +probably cut in two the distance to China, and give us a monopoly of the +cotton goods trade in the Pacific; but I think cotton goods are +unhealthful, and I don't want to go to China. The Suez Canal may be the +mainstay of the British Empire, but I have no doubt that it would make +just as satisfactory a mainstay for some other empire. My interest in +the Erie Canal is connected entirely with the fact that when it was +opened somebody said, "What hath God wrought!" or "There is no more +North and no more South"—I have forgotten which.</p> + +<p>I have always had a softer spot in my heart for the inhabitants of Mars +than for any other alien people. They have always impressed me as more +unassuming than the English, fonder of outdoor exercise than the +Germans, and less<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> addicted to garrulity than the French. They lead +simple, laborious lives, digging away at their canals every morning, and +filling them up every night, for reasons best known to themselves and +certain professors at Harvard. I am attracted by their quaint +appearance. Mr. H. G. Wells, for instance, has depicted them with +cylindrical bodies of sheet iron, long legs like a tripod, heads like an +enormous diver's helmet, and arms like the tentacles of an octopus—as +odd a sight in their way as the latest woman's fashions from Paris. +Others have described the Martians as pot-bellied and hairless, with +goggle eyes, powerful arms, and curly, gelatinous legs, the result of +millions of years of universal culture and Subway congestion. A race so +unattractive could not but be virtuous. One feels instinctively that +there is no graft bound up with the digging of the Martian canals.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span></p> + +<p>No, anything but graft. One of the principal reasons why I am so fond of +the canals on Mars is that they are the most cheaply built system of +public works on record. A professor of astronomy in Italy or Arizona +finds a few dim lines on the plate of his camera, and immediately Mars +is equipped with a splendid network of artificial waterways. Am I wrong +in thinking of the Martian canals as one of the greatest triumphs of the +human mind? An African savage might find an elephant's skeleton and from +that reconstruct the animal in life. Only science can reconstruct an +elephant from a half-inch fragment of the bone of his hind leg. Only a +scientist could have reconstructed the Martian canals from a few +photographic scratches. Of such reconstructions our civilisation is +largely made up. We build up a statesman out of a bit of buncombe and a +frock coat; a genius out of two sonnets and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> half a dozen cocktails; a +dramatic "star" out of a lisp and a giggle; a two-column news story out +of the fragment of a fact; a multitude out of three men and a band; a +crusade out of one man and a press agent; a novel out of the trimmings +of earlier novels; a reputation out of an accident; a captain of +industry out of an itching palm; a philanthropist out of a beneficent +smile and a platitude; a critic out of a wise look and a fountain pen; +and a social prophet out of pretty small potatoes. I need not allude +here to the process of making mountains out of molehills, beams out of +motes, and entire summers out of single swallows.</p> + +<p>But mind, I do not mean that I was ever sceptical about the canals. +Indeed, I have always admired the way in which their existence was +demonstrated. There have always been two ways of proving that something +is true. One way is to bring forward sixteen reasons <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> why, let us say, +the moon is made of green cheese. The other way is to assume that the +moon is made of green cheese and to answer sixteen objections brought +forward against the theory. I have always preferred the second method, +because it throws the burden of proof on your opponent. There is no +argument under the sun that cannot be refuted. Obviously, then, it is an +advantage to let your opponents supply the argument while you supply the +refutation.</p> + +<p>Neglect this precaution, and you are in difficulties from the start. You +contend, for instance, that the moon must be made of cheese because the +moon and cheese are both round, as a rule. True, says your opponent, but +so are doughnuts, women's arguments, and, occasionally, the wheels on a +trolley car. The moon and cheese, you go on, both come after dinner. +Yes, says your opponent, but so do unwelcome<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> visitors, musical +comedies, and indigestion. Then, you say, there is the cow who jumped +over the moon. Would she have resorted to such extraordinary procedure +if she had not perceived that the moon was made of cheese from her own +milk? Well (says your opponent), the cow might merely have been trying +to gain a broader outlook upon life. And here you are thirteen reasons +from the end, and your hands hopelessly full.</p> + +<p>Now compare the advantages of the other method. You adopt a resolute +bearing and declare: "The moon is made of green cheese." It is now for +your opponent to speak. He argues: "But that would make the moon's +ingredients different from those of the earth and other celestial +bodies." "Not at all," you say; "the earth is made up largely of chalk, +and what is the difference between chalk and cheese, except in the +price?" "But, if it's green<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> cheese the moon is made of," asks your +opponent, "why does it look yellow?" "Only the natural effect of +atmospheric refraction," you reply calmly; "remember how a politician's +badly soiled reputation will shine out a brilliant white, through the +favourable atmosphere that surrounds a Congressional investigating +committee. Recall how a lady who is green with envy at her neighbour's +new hat will turn pink with delight when the two meet in the street and +kiss. Recall how the same lady's complexion of roses and milk will +assume its natural yellow under the candid dissection of her dearest +friends." Your opponent might go on marshalling his objections forever, +and you would have no difficulty in knocking them on the head.</p> + +<p>So I used to believe. But if the method breaks down in the case of Mars +and its canals, it breaks down everywhere else. If there<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span> are no canals +on Mars, what about the blessings of the tariff, which are based on +exactly the same kind of reasoning? What about the efficacy of mental +healing? What about the advantages of giving up coffee? What about the +impending invasion of California by the Japanese? What about the +Kaiser's qualifications as an art critic? What about the restraining +influence of publicity on corporations? What about the connection +between easy divorce and the higher life? What about the divine right of +railroad presidents? What about the theatrical manager's passion for a +purified stage? What about the value of all anti-fat medicines? All of +these things have been shown to be true by assuming that they are true. +If the canals on Mars go, all these have to go. And that makes me almost +as sad as the fact that I shall have nothing to talk about with my +favourite waiter.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XIX" id="XIX"></a>XIX</h2> + +<h3>THE COMPLETE COLLECTOR—II</h3> + + +<p>"The idea of this exquisite little collection of frauds and forgeries," +said Cooper, "—and I don't believe I am boasting when I speak of my few +treasures as exquisite—came to me in a natural enough way. One of the +bitterest trials the connoisseur has to contend with, is the +consciousness that no amount of care and expense can guarantee him an +absolutely flawless collection. The suspicion of the experts has fallen +upon not a single picture, brass, marble or iron in his galleries; and +yet as he walks those galleries the unhappy owner groans under the moral +conviction that there are spurious pictures on his walls, spurious +marbles in his halls, spurious carvings and coins under his glass<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> +cases, and that there they must stay until discovered and exposed.</p> + +<p>"A perfect collection, therefore, in the sense of a collection in which +every object can be traced back with absolute certainty to its author +and its place of origin, is impossible. Unless, and that is how the +inspiration came," said Cooper, "unless one set to collecting objects of +art which have been proved to be fraudulent. Then and only then, could +one be sure that one's treasures were just what one believed them to be. +And that is just what I set out to do. I began buying objects of art, +which, after masquerading under a great name, had been exposed and given +up to scorn. I have kept at it for twenty years, and I can now point to +what no American multi-millionaire can ever boast of, a collection made +up <i>entirely</i> of 'fakes.' When I stroll through <i>my</i> little museum I am +obsessed by no doubts.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> I am as certain as I am of being alive that no +genuine Leonardo or Holbein or Manet or Cellini has found its way under +my roof.</p> + +<p>"I must admit," Cooper went on, "that the question of economy has been +an important factor in the case. When we first set up housekeeping, a +year after our marriage, our means were not unlimited and our tastes +were of the very highest. Buying the best work or even the second-best +work of the best painters was out of the question. But buying cheap +copies of the masters, replicas, casts, photogravures, was equally +impossible. The idea of owning anything that some one else may own at +the same time is abhorrent to the true collector. On the other hand, if +we went in for spurious masterpieces, we were sure of securing unique +specimens at very small expense. And I will not deny that the bargain +element appealed very strongly to Mrs. Cooper. Most of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> our things we +got at really fabulous reductions. There was the crown of an Assyrian +princess of the twenty-fourth century <span class="smcap">b.c.</span>, for which one of the leading +European museums paid $75,000, and which, after it was shown that it had +been made by a Copenhagen jeweller in 1907, I purchased from the museum +for something like fifty-five dollars, plus the freight. This charming +little landscape with sheep and a shepherd boy brought $23,000 in a +Fifth Avenue auction room two years ago. Three months after it was sold, +a certain Mrs. Smith on Staten Island sued her husband for desertion and +non-support, and in the course of the proceedings it was brought out +that Smith made $10,000 a year painting Corots and Daubignys, and that +the $23,000 picture was one of his latest achievements. I got it for a +little over one hundred dollars. I am really proud of the picture, +because Smith has put into it enough<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> of the Corot quality to deceive +many an expert observer. If I were not in possession of the documentary +proof that Smith painted the picture in 1908, I should myself be tempted +at times to believe that Smith and his wife lied in court and that the +picture is really a Corot.</p> + +<p>"But these are the chances," said Cooper, "that every art-lover must +take. I have said that at present I feel perfectly sure that not a +single genuine work has crept in to vitiate my collection. And that is +true. But only a few weeks ago I had a very bad quarter of an hour +indeed over this spurious Tanagra figurine. It had been bought for a +museum not one hundred miles from here by a patron who was a good friend +of mine, and who had paid several thousand dollars for the statuette. I +was in the room with Hawley when Stimson, our very greatest Greek +archæologist and art-expert, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> entered, and, catching sight of the little +figure, picked it up, studied it for a few moments, smelt it, licked it +with his tongue, pressed it to his cheek, and handed it back to my +friend with a single, blasting comment—'fake.' We two were incredulous, +but within fifteen minutes Stimson had convinced us that the thing was a +palpable fraud. Quite beside himself with vexation, Hawley lifted up the +statuette and was about to dash it into fragments on the ground, when I +caught his arm. 'Let me have it,' I said; and I carried it home in great +glee.</p> + +<p>"Well, a few weeks later I was showing my collection to Dr. Friedheimer +of Berlin, who is a much greater man even than Stimson. The German +savant stopped in fascination before the Tanagra figurine. 'A pretty +good imitation,' I said. He seized the statuette with trembling fingers. +'Imidation!' he shouted. 'Chen<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span>uine, chenuine as de hairs on your het. +Himmel, wat a find!' And he proceeded to do what Stimson had done, and +he smelt it and licked it, and rubbed it against his beard, and I am not +sure but that he knocked it against his forehead to test its texture. +And then in his agitation he let the figure fall, and it broke in two on +the floor, and inside we found a bit of newspaper dated Naples, January +27, 1903. Dr. Friedheimer could only say, 'Unerhört!' but I was nearly +frantic with delight. I repaired the statuette, and it now holds, as you +see, the place of honour in my collection."</p> + +<p>As we sat over our coffee and cigars, Cooper grew reflective. "After +all," he said, "is not the fabricator of frauds fully as great an artist +as the man whose work he imitates? Take the famous marble Aphrodite of a +few years ago, which was attributed by some critics to Praxiteles, and +by some critics to Scopas, until<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span> proof came that it had been made in +Hoboken. Consider the labour that went into the fraud. For years, +probably, the dishonest sculptor was engaged in preliminary studies for +the work. He spent months in libraries, museums, and the lecture-rooms +of learned professors. He impregnated himself with the spirit of Greek +art. He devoted months to searching for a suitable piece of antique +marble. How long he was in carving it, I can only guess. When it was +completed, he boiled it in oil; then he boiled it in milk; then he +boiled it in soap; then he boiled it in a concoction of molasses and +wine; then he buried it in moist soil, and let it age for three years.</p> + +<p>"Now, suppose the statue had been really carved by Praxiteles. That +joyous master and genius might have put two weeks' work, three weeks' +work, a month's work, upon it, and there you were. What was the labour +of a lifetime to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span> the other man was to Praxiteles just an easy bit of +routine. If art is a man's soul and hopes and brain and sweat and blood +put into concrete form, who produced the truer work of art, Praxiteles +or the unknown sculptor of Hoboken? I speak only of the comparative +expenditure of effort. So far as the artistic result is concerned, it is +evident, from the ease with which we were taken in, that there is no +great difference between the school of Hoboken and the school of +Praxiteles."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XX" id="XX"></a>XX</h2> + +<h3>WHEN A FRIEND MARRIES</h3> + + +<p>Taking dinner with an old friend who has just been married is an +experience I regard with apprehension. In the first place, it is always +awkward to be introduced to a woman who begins by being jealous of you +because you knew her husband long before she did. She may be a nice +woman; in fact, from the air of almost imbecile happiness that invests +young Hobson, you are sure she is. But since it is natural to hate those +whom we have injured, it is natural for young wives to dislike their +husband's friends.</p> + +<p>People say that a woman begins to prepare for marriage at the age of +five. Judging from the absolutely spontaneous way in which the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> Hobsons +have taken to it, marriage is a career that calls for no preparation +whatever. I am not referring, of course, to the outward aspects of early +housekeeping. The little difficulties that beset the newly married are +there. I can see that my hostess is more anxious about the creamed +potatoes than she will be five years hence. Her attitude to the maid who +waits on us is by turns excessively severe and excessively timid. I +learn that the dining-room table has been sent back twice to the store, +and is still not the one originally ordered. But these are trifles. It +is with the Hobsons' souls I am concerned; and their souls are perfectly +at ease in their new estate.</p> + +<p>The first few minutes, like all introductions, go stiffly. The bride +smiles and says that Jack has often spoken to her about you. Whereupon +you remember that there are not many secrets a young husband keeps from +his wife.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> Jack is no sieve, but he would be more than human if he has +failed to dissect your little weaknesses and humours for his new wife. +He has probably emphasized the two or three particular little failings +of character which have prevented you from realising the brilliant +promise you showed at college. At bottom, Jack thinks, you have the +capacity for being almost as happy as he, Jack, is. But then, again, if +Mrs. Hobson does know you thoroughly well, it strikes you that there is +that much trouble saved, and you sit down to chat with a fair sense of +intimacy.</p> + +<p>Toward such conversation you and the man of the house are the principal +contributors. You speak of college days and contemporary politics, and +other things that the wife is not interested in, but she smiles +graciously, and now and then takes sides with you against her husband. +At one point in the conversation you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> look up and find her quietly +scrutinising you. And you recall what you have heard concerning the +match-making propensities of young wives, and you wonder uneasily if to +herself she is running over a list of girl friends and trying to decide +which one will suit you best. You even suspect that she inclined toward +a Marjorie or an Edith, who is plain, but clever, a good manager, and of +an affectionate disposition. Happily, at that moment the bride thanks +you for your handsome wedding gift.</p> + +<p>At table the visitor begins to be more at ease. For one thing, there is +the traditional hazing process to which the bride must be subjected. +Jack takes the lead. Admitting that to-night's repast is an unqualified +success, he hints that there have been occasions when, if he only would, +there might be a different tale to tell. The visitor protests; yet in +the extravagant praise he resorts to there is a suggestion of mild +banter<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> which is considered the proper thing. The wife professes to +enter into the joke; but in her heart she laughs to see the two men go +solemnly through the stupid and outworn ceremonial. Young wives nowadays +are excellent cooks. This one has secretly pursued a three months' +course in domestic science and has a diploma hidden away somewhere. But +she pretends to be properly outraged by our foolish satire, and insists +on both being helped a second time to the custard. Jack, in fact, eats +all that remains. It makes dish-washing easier, he says.</p> + +<p>And as the visitor steers his way pleasantly through the meal, he makes +the acquaintance of an extraordinary number of relatives. The spoons, he +finds, are from Aunt Amy. Aunt Amy lives in Syracuse and at first +objected to the match. The salt cellar is from a male cousin who (you +learn this from Jack), it was thought at one time, would be the +fortunate<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span> man himself—that is, until Jack appeared on the scene. Poor +fellow, he sought consolation by marrying, only two months later, a nice +girl from Alexandria, Va. The cut-glass salad dish is from the bride's +dearest friend at boarding-school, a charming girl, who paints and sings +and is now studying music in Berlin.</p> + +<p>When the coffee is brought in, Jack asks if you will smoke. This is, in +a way, the most dangerous situation of the entire evening. If you say +yes, Jack is apt to pass the cigars and and say, "Go right ahead. <i>I</i> +have given it up, you know, and I feel all the better for it." But if +you are expert in reading faces, and decide that the bride probably has +conscientious scruples against the habit, and you reply "No," Jack is +likely to say, "Sorry, but Alice allows <i>me</i> one cigar a day after +dinner," and you are left to suffer the torments of the lost, and have +lied into the bargain. Nor is it possible <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> to lay down any rule for +arriving at the correct reply under such circumstances. A hurried glance +about the house will not help one. A handsome bronze ash-tray may be +only a paperweight. Young wives are in the habit of buying their +husbands the most ornate smoking apparatus, with the understanding that +it shall never be used.</p> + +<p>It is after dinner that reflection comes; and with it comes a touch of +sorrowful wonder. Jack bears himself with great equanimity in his new +condition; but it is apparent, nevertheless, that he has changed from +what you knew him. In the first place, he has built up a comprehensive +system of domestic serfdom to which he cheerfully submits. He glories in +his enslavement; he rattles his chains. He actually boasts of the habit +he has acquired of dropping in at the grocer's every morning on his way +to the office. When it is the maid's day out, Jack insists <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> on helping +with the dishes and he tells you with pride that, given plenty of hot +water, there is nothing in that line which he would hesitate to +undertake. He makes it a point to visit Washington Market at least twice +a week, and he comes home with cuts, joints, steaks, rounds, poultry, +fish, game, and fruits in dazzling variety. He carries these things +conspicuously in the Subway. And Jack's wife is appreciative of his kind +intentions, and lets him bring, from long distances, meats which she can +purchase at several cents a pound less from her butcher two blocks away.</p> + +<p>The passion for acquiring food commodities is only one phase of Jack's +new character. You begin to see now that all these years you have never +suspected what capacities for home-building he had in him. In the +presence of any kind of article offered for sale his overmastering +passion is to buy the thing and take it home.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> Instinct apparently +impels him to store up quite useless supplies against a future +emergency. He haunts hardware stores, he rummages in antique furniture +shops, and you may see him any day during the lunch hour flattening his +nose against windowfuls of copper and brass ware. He buys patent hammers +by the quarter dozen, as well as nails, tacks, screws, bolts, casters, +brackets, and curtain poles. He brings home Japanese vases from the +auction rooms. One day he acquired a step-ladder; it came by wagon +because they refused to let him take it into the Subway.</p> + +<p>And Jack's wife acquiesces in his self-imposed servitude. She does not +demand it; she is even a good deal incommoded by it. But her woman's +instinct tells her that the thing is a disease, which a man must catch, +like the measles. Until the husband's passion for home-building quiets +down, she is content to accept<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> the unnatural situation; she is even +proud to have inspired it.</p> + +<p>But as Jack prattles on, and Jack's wife smiles over her embroidery +frame, it comes over you that, despite all the kindly communion of the +evening, you are an outsider there. You ask yourself bitterly whether +there is such a thing as constancy in man, whether there is such a thing +as true comradeship or affection. For fifteen years, from your freshman +year at high school, you and Jack have been what the world calls +friends. What are you now? Jack still calls you friend; apparently that +is the reason why you have just dined with him and his wife. But in +reality you are not there as his friend. You are there as the guest of +this newly-constituted social unit, this new family. You are there not +as a person, but as part of an institution.</p> + +<p>And just when you are ready to accept the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> new situation you are swept +away by the unreality of the entire arrangement. It is inconceivable +that Jack should have thrown you over for this alien person whom he +calls wife. Your habits and Jack's are so much alike; your tastes, your +outlook upon life. You used to play the same games at college, sing the +same songs, smoke the same tobacco, wear each other's clothes, and now +Jack has thrown you over for one with whom in the nature of things he +can have none of those habits in common. It is not merely puzzling; it +grows almost absurd. You shake your head over it some time after you +have said good-night, and the bride has told you that as a dear friend +of Jack's, they always will be pleased to have you call.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXI" id="XXI"></a>XXI</h2> + +<h3>THE PERFECT UNION OF THE ARTS</h3> + + +<p>I have never had the slightest reason to doubt Harding's truthfulness. +The following episode, I remember, was told with more than Harding's +usual gravity. I can do nothing better than to give it here in Harding's +own words so far as I can recall them:</p> + +<p>On the third day after his arrival, my guest, Muhammad Abu Nozeyr, said +to me, "O Harding Effendi, I desire greatly to witness a presentation of +what you and the wife of your bosom, on whom both be peace, have often +referred to as Grand Opera."</p> + +<p>I replied, with involuntary astonishment. "Son of a hundred sheiks, +forgive my seemingly derelict hospitality. But I should have asked<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> you +before this to go to the opera with us, if I had not thought that the +principles of your faith were opposed thereto. For you must know, O +Father of the Defenceless, that our women go there unveiled even as the +women of the people that you see on our streets, and that on the stage, +singers of both sexes indulge in open exaltation of that thing called +love, which your prophet has confined within the walls of the +<i>haremlik</i>."</p> + +<p>Abu Nozeyr laughed. "Your knowledge of our customs, Harding Effendi, is +fifty years behind the times. True, I come from the desert, and have +never heard your singing women of the stage. But did not one of the +learned muftis at yesterday's evening repast declare that 'Aïda' was +written for the Khedewi Ismail Pasha, may his soul rest in peace?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," I said; "but you will understand, Dispenser of a Thousand +Mercies, why at first<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> blush Islam and the lyric stage should strike me +as somewhat incompatible."</p> + +<p>"Not modern Islam," he replied. "Take us not too literally. I am told +that your people, like others of the Feringhi, have succeeded in +building battleships which are really instruments of peace; that you +have trust companies in which you place no confidence, and Open Doors +which you close against people from my part of the world; you have +legislators who speak but do not legislate, and a Speaker who legislates +but does not speak; you have had men in your White House who always saw +red, and you have red-emblazoned newspapers which are yellow; you call +your politicians public servants who are your masters, and you call your +women the masters, but will not let them vote. Why, then, should you be +so surprised at any seeming incongruity in others?"</p> + +<p>"I am convinced, Abu Nozeyr," I said, "and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span> to-morrow we will go to see +'Tristan und Isolde.' But shall I attempt to describe for you, in a few +words, just what Grand Opera is?"</p> + +<p>"My ear is open to your words, Harding Effendi."</p> + +<p>"Know, then, Protector of the Fatherless, that the music-drama is a +perfect blending of all the arts. It calls to its aid the resources of +sculpture, painting, dancing, together with numerous mechanical +agencies, and to a minor extent, music and the drama. For observe, O Abu +Nozeyr, that each art aims to awake its own specific emotion. Sculpture +appeals to our sense of form, painting to our delight in colour, dancing +to the pleasure of rhythmic motion, the mechanic arts to our liking for +sudden action, while music and the uttered word represent the union of +the clearest and vaguest modes of expressing thought. It follows +therefore<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> that the highest phase of human emotion can only be expressed +by that art which gives us simultaneously the living form of a Venus de +Milo with the colouring of a Titian, the grace of a Nautch girl, the +miracle-working powers of a Hindu fakir, the elocution of a Demosthenes, +and the voice of a Malibran."</p> + +<p>"By the beard of the Prophet," exclaimed Abu Nozeyr, "I thought such +bliss was to be had only in the Paradise of the Faithful; and that is +Grand Opera, Harding Effendi?"</p> + +<p>"With certain modifications," I replied. "Nothing human is perfect, Abu +Nozeyr. It is a regrettable circumstance that the human voice attains +its perfect development many years after the human form. Hence our +heroes on the lyric stage are all middle-aged and our heroines somewhat +heavy in movement. I have seen a pair of starving lovers in an operatic +garret, who would surely not have passed the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> scrutiny of a United +Charities investigator. It is also to be regretted that adequate +voice-production leaves no breath for dancing or other forms of active +effort. Hence the dance with which Carmen fascinates poor Don José, +argues an intense readiness to be pleased on the part of the latter, and +Telramund's defeat at the hands of Lohengrin is never quite free from a +certain degree of contributory negligence."</p> + +<p>"But tell me this, Harding Effendi, are there composers who have carried +the union of the arts to a higher point than others?"</p> + +<p>"There are, O Grandson of the Wild Ass. There are operas in which at +certain moments the libretto speaks of a leaping fire, the music plays +leaping fire, and the fire actually leaps and blazes on the stage. But +unfortunately it always happens that the words cannot be heard because +of the orchestra, and the fire sinks when the orchestral swell rises, +and rises when<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> the orchestral surge subsides. I have caught the +orchestral sound of hammer on anvil long before the two have come into +contact, and have heard Spring described as entering through a door +which persists in staying closed. I have seen boats being pushed by +human hands, Rhine maidens suspended on a wire, and harvest moons moving +in orbits unknown to Herschel and Pickering."</p> + +<p>"And are there people who still persist in taking their sculpture, +painting, drama, and music separately, Harding Effendi?"</p> + +<p>"There are; but that is because they fail to recognise that opera is a +perfect union of all the arts. To-morrow, Abu Nozeyr, we go to hear +'Tristan und Isolde.' It appeals to every one of our senses. To enjoy it +completely, however, it is often wise to close one's eyes and just hear +the singer sing."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXII" id="XXII"></a>XXII</h2> + +<h3>AN EMINENT AMERICAN</h3> + + +<p>After dinner I asked Herr Grundschnitt what headway he was making in his +studies of American life. The professor was in more than his usually +mellow mood. He had enjoyed his dinner. He liked his cigar. He confided +to me that he was hard at work on a volume of sketches dealing with the +career of representative successful Americans, and he offered to read me +one of his early chapters. If the following summary of Herr +Grundschnitt's account of the life of Wallabout Smith can even suggest +the extraordinary impression which the original produced upon me, I am +content.</p> + +<p>Wallabout Smith did not attain recognition until late in life. I gather +that he must have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span> been well over fifty when a former President of the +United States declared that Wallabout Smith, by raising a family of four +sons and two daughters, had done more for his country than all the laws +enacted by the Legislatures of all the New England and Middle Atlantic +States since the Spanish-American War. Fame came rapidly after this. The +college professors repeated what the former President said. The +newspapers repeated what the college professors said. The playwrights +repeated what the newspapers said. The pulpit repeated what the +playwrights said. Interviewers descended upon Wallabout Smith. They wore +out his front lawn, the hall carpet, and the maid-servant's temper; but +they always found Smith himself patient, affable, ready to say whatever +they wished him to say.</p> + +<p>The reporters would usually begin by asking Wallabout Smith what were +his lighter interests <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> in life. "I find my greatest pleasure," Smith +would reply, "in common things. For instance, I have never ceased to be +intensely interested in the cost of shoes and stockings. The subject is +fascinating and inexhaustible. One gets tired of most things, but there +has never been a time in which the cost of shoes and stockings has +failed to appeal with peculiar force to me. My odd moments on the train +have as a rule been taken up with that question. If you have ever +thought upon this subject, you must have been struck with the fact that, +putting food aside, shoes and stockings constitute the most permanent +and persistent human need. They begin with the first few weeks of our +life, and they continue to the end; the size alone changes. It is a +subject, too, that opens up such wide horizons. For while a man of +comparatively little leisure can confine himself to the simple topic of +shoes and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> stockings, he may, if he so desires, widen the field of his +interests so as to include the allied subjects of frocks, jackets, +blouses, caps, and collars, until he has covered the entire range of +children's apparel. Nor is that all. I have spent many an absorbing hour +figuring out the annual rate of increase in servants' wages and rent. Of +late years I have been in the habit of putting in part of my lunch hour +in a study of college fees and tailors' bills. In moments of extreme +physical lassitude, when nothing else appeals to me, I think about the +next quarterly premium on my insurance policy."</p> + +<p>How well-known men do their work has always interested the public. Few +newspaper men omitted to question Wallabout Smith on this subject. From +the large number of interviews cited by Herr Grundschnitt we may build +up a very fair picture of Wallabout Smith's daily routine. It was his +habit to spend a good<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> part of his day in New York City. He would rise +about six o'clock every week-day in the year, and, snatching a hasty +breakfast, would make his way to the railroad station, pausing now and +then in perplexity as he tried to recall what it was his wife had asked +him to bring home from town. Sometimes he would catch his train and +sometimes he would not. Arrived at his office, he would remove his coat, +and, putting on a black alpaca jacket to which he was greatly attached, +he would proceed to glance over, check, and transcribe the contents of a +large number of bills and vouchers representing the daily transactions +of a very prosperous commercial enterprise in which he had no +proprietary interest. The day's work would be pleasantly broken up by +frequent inquiries from the general manager's office. Every now and then +a fellow-worker would take a moment from his duties to ask Wallabout +Smith how<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> his lawn was getting on. Sometimes he would be summoned to +the telephone, only to learn that Central had called the wrong number. +Lunch was a matter of a few minutes. At 5.30 every afternoon Wallabout +Smith exchanged his alpaca jacket for his street coat with a fine sense +of weariness, and the secure conviction that the next morning would find +the same task waiting for him on his table. "I have no hesitation in +stating," Smith would frequently say, "that some of the busiest hours of +my life have been spent at my office desk."</p> + +<p>Walking was his favourite form of exercise. When he lived in the city +during the first few years after his marriage, he used to walk the floor +with the baby. Later when the children began to grow up and he moved out +into the country, he walked to and from the station. His gait was a +free, manly stride, bordering close upon a run, in the morning, and a +more<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span> deliberate, sliding pace, somewhat suggestive of a shuffle, in the +evening. He was at his best when tramping the country roads with a +congenial companion or two on a Sunday afternoon. On such occasions he +would pour forth a continuous stream of light-hearted talk on everything +under the sun—the new board of village trustees, the shameful condition +of the village streets, the prospects of a new roof for the railway +station. Good-nature was the keynote of his character, but he would +frequently sum up a situation or a person with a sly touch of irony or a +trenchant word or two. He once described the village streets as being +paved chiefly with good intentions. Another time he characterised the +minister of a rival church as having the courage of his wife's +convictions. But such flashes of satire went and left no rancour behind +them. His high spirits were proof against everything but automobiles.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> +These he detested, not because they made walking unpleasant and even +dangerous, but because they were run by men who mortgaged their homes to +buy motor cars, and thus threatened the stability of business +conditions.</p> + +<p>Wallabout Smith would often be asked to lay down a few rules for those +who wished to emulate his success. He would invariably reply that the +secret of bringing up children was the same double secret that underlay +success in every other field—enthusiasm and patience. "It has always +been my belief," he would say, "that the head of a family should spend +at least as much time with his children as he does at his barber's or +his lodge, and, if possible, a little more. Children undoubtedly stand +in need of supervision. In the beginning, it is a question largely of +keeping them away from the matches and the laudanum. Fortunately, we +live at some distance from a trolley-line and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> there is no well in our +back-yard. As my children grew up, I made it a point to know what books +they were reading out of school and whether the boys were addicted to +the filthy cigarette habit. On the subjects of breakfast foods and +corporal punishment, I have always kept an open mind."</p> + +<p>The experiment of living upon a basis of comradeship with one's children +which we see so frequently recommended was not a success in the case of +Wallabout Smith. "Although my boys are fond of me," he once told a +reporter, "they usually regard my presence as a bore. When I find time +to go out walking with them, they do their best to lose me, and whenever +we divide off into teams for a game of ball, each side insists on my +going with the other side. I have made up my mind that there is a time +for being with one's children and a time for letting them alone, and +that the proper<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> time for being with them is when they are in trouble +and want you, and the proper time for letting them alone is when they +are happy and wish to be let alone. This I admit is the reverse of the +common practice, and probably there is something to be said for parents +who grow fond of their children's society when they, the parents, have +nothing else to do. As a rule, I have never obtruded myself on my boys, +being confident that natural affection and the recurrent need of +pocket-money would constitute a sufficient bond between us."</p> + +<p>There was, in conclusion, one factor in his success upon which Wallabout +Smith would never fail to lay the most emphatic stress, and to which +Herr Grundschnitt attached equal importance. "Such fame," he would say, +"as has fallen to my share must be attributed in the very largest +measure to my wife. Many is the time she gave up her meetings at the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span> +Browning Club to watch with me beside the sick-bed of one of our little +ones. And she would do this so uncomplainingly, so cheerfully, that it +almost made one oblivious to the extent of her sacrifice. There must +have been occasions, I feel sure, when it cost her a pang to find her +photograph omitted from the local paper's account of a club meeting or a +church bazaar; but if she ever suffered on that score, she never let it +be known. I can truly say that, without her, my life work would have +spelt failure."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXIII" id="XXIII"></a>XXIII</h2> + +<h3>BEHIND THE TIMES</h3> + + +<p>I had scarcely exchanged a half-dozen sentences with Howard King before +we knew ourselves for kindred spirits. I was in a roomful of people who +were talking about new books I had not read, new plays I had not seen, +and new singers I had not heard, and I was exceedingly lonesome. There +was one youngish middle-aged lady in pink, who asked me what was the +best novel I had read of late, and when I said "Robert Elsmere," she +looked at me rather grimly and asked whether I lived in New York. When I +said yes, she turned away and began chatting with a young man on her +right, who looked like the advertisement for a new linen collar. It was +this reply of mine that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span> attracted Howard King's attention. He had been +sitting in one corner of the room quite as disconsolate as I was. But +now he walked over and shook hands and told me that in his opinion +"Robert Elsmere" was not so good a book as "Trilby," which he was just +reading.</p> + +<p>Howard King and I belong to the comparatively small class of men whom +nature, or fate, or whatever you please, has decreed to be always a +certain interval behind the times; it might be years or months or days, +according to the rate of speed at which a particular fashion happened to +be moving forward. King told me, for instance, that of late he has been +possessed with a passionate desire to learn the game of ping-pong. When +all the world was playing table-tennis eight or ten years ago, King +viewed the game with disgust. He thought it utterly childish, +uninteresting, and admirably illustrative of all the idiotic quali<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span>ties +that go to make up a fad. But for the last six months, King said, he +frequently wakes at night and sits up in bed and yearns with all his +soul for a ping-pong set. He was, of course, ashamed to speak to others +about it. But if he could find some one who shared his feelings on the +subject, he had a large library with a square table in it. Would I come +to-morrow night? I said I should be very glad, indeed.</p> + +<p>I told Howard King what my attitude is toward clothes. It is my fate +always to grow fond of a fashion just as it is passing out. I recalled +the exaggerated military styles for men that came in with the +Spanish-American and the South African wars. Those enormously padded +shoulders and tight-shaped waists and swelling trouser legs, and the +strut and the stoop that went with the whole ugly <i>ensemble</i>, roused my +anger. My feelings remained unchanged <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span> until some time after the +Russo-Japanese War, and then one day it came to me that I must have a +suit of military cut. It was like the sudden awakening of the +unregenerate to grace, it was as irresistible as first love. And when +the tailor said that only sloping shoulders were now being worn, that +what I wanted was hopelessly out of date, the sense of loss was +overpowering. I confessed to King that in my opinion nothing uglier in +men's apparel was conceivable than the green plush hats that are just +beginning to go out of style. And I told him that I was as certain as I +am certain of anything in this world that some day in the very near +future I shall be seized with an uncontrollable longing to wear a green +plush hat, and I shall enter a shop and ask for one, and the man behind +the counter will look at me quizzically, and, after a long search, bring +me the only plush hat in his shop, and I shall carry<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> it home in shame, +and put it away in my closet, and mourn over the resolution that came +too late.</p> + +<p>You must not imagine that Howard King and I are conservatives. We do not +hold fast to one thing, or even hold fast to the old. We move forward, +but at a pace so curiously regulated as to bring us to the front door +just when most people are leaving by the back. I have worn every shape +of linen collar that the best-dressed men have worn during the last +fifteen years; but I have worn them from three to six months late. I +became passionately fond of bicycling shortly after all the bicycle +factories began the exclusive production of automobiles. I am not very +fond of automobiles, but I shall be, I know, when aëroplanes come into +extensive use. It is only in the last few months that I have discovered +how amusing a toy the Teddy bear makes. And this is true of fashions in +games and of fashions in language.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span> I have no fundamental objections to +slang, but I always pick up the bit of slang that most people are just +discarding.</p> + +<p>I recall, for instance, how, up in the hills last summer, the woods and +glens were echoing to the sound, half a howl and half a screech, of "Oh, +you!" addressed at quarter-minute intervals to every object, animate or +inanimate, that came within the howler's vision or thought. This +particular bit of gutter-slang induced a peculiar irritation. It seemed +to me utter desecration that this quickening beauty of hill and sky and +river and green woods, which should have stirred young hearts to +madrigals and chorals, should resound to the blatant, shrieking +vulgarity of Lobster Square. I do not mind confessing that at times my +feelings towards the innocent young barbarians bordered close on murder. +Until—until, alas! one September morning, after all the guests were +gone<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span> and I alone remained; that morning I woke with the poison in my +soul, and I walked down to the river for my bath, and, coming across the +farmer's herd of cows halfway down the hillside, saluted them, before I +knew what I was doing, with that horrid, that unspeakable—I blush now +to think of it. When I told Howard King, he admitted humbly that after +holding out for years he has just begun to say, "It's me," and that he +feels morally convinced that within the next year or two he will be +saying "Between you and I."</p> + +<p>But you must not think that this peculiarity in Howard King and myself +is an acquired habit or a pose in which we take any measure of pride. +Our attitude towards those happy people who are always in fashion is one +of sincere and profound envy. I think there is nothing more wonderful +under the sun than the unknown force that impels the great majority to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span> +begin doing the same new thing at the same time. It must be a precious +gift to feel instinctively what the right new thing is to do. A +mysterious fiat goes forth and a million women simultaneously put on +black straw hats surmounted by a cock in his pride. Another mysterious +order goes forth and two million women simultaneously begin reading the +latest novel by Robert W. Chambers. Pitiable are those in whom this +instinct is wanting and who must tag timidly behind, venturing only +where a million others have gone before. Perhaps it is, with such +people, a case of arrested development. Boys of sixteen and girls of +fourteen have supplied the poets with their greatest love stories and +direst tragedies. And there are men and women well gone into middle age +who balk and stammer in the presence of the most elementary sensation. +Perhaps at bottom it is simply a question of courage and cowardice.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span></p> + +<p>In any case, being behind the times is a peculiarly unfortunate trait in +a man, who, like myself, is condemned to earn his bread in the sweat of +his fountain-pen. In what other profession must a man be so emphatically +up to the minute as in this scribbling profession of ours? Only +yesterday I walked into an editor's office and suggested a +three-thousand word review of "The Rise of Silas Lapham," which I told +him was one of the greatest novels in any language. He stared at me and +asked if I hadn't some fresher book in mind, and I, somewhat taken +aback, told him that I was just finishing Frank Norris's "McTeague" and +was about to begin on Mrs. Wharton's "House of Mirth." With a brutality +characteristic of editors he asked me whether I didn't care to write a +review of Homer's Iliad and the book of Deuteronomy. I told him that I +might very well do so if it were a question of writing something<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> he +would find personally instructive, and rose to go, with the intention of +slamming the door behind me.</p> + +<p>But he called me back and insisted that he meant no offence, that he +simply must have live, up-to-date copy or nothing at all. He proposed a +popular article on art, and wondered if I could write something about +the Dutch masters, with special reference to the recent notable +exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum. I was obliged to confess that I +had missed the exhibition by two weeks. "Well," he said, patiently, +"there is opera. You might do something about the singers. You have +heard Mary Garden, of course?" I told him no. Only the other day I had +irrevocably decided to hear Mary Garden in "Thaïs" next season; and the +next morning I learned that Mr. Hammerstein had gone out of business.</p> + +<p>He continued to be patient with me.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> "There's 'Chantecler,' to be sure, +although that is ancient history by this time. Have you read the play?" +I had not, but just here an inspiration came. "You sneered at Homer just +now," I said. "Well, there was another Greek who wrote a bird play 2,300 +years before Rostand. I mean Aristophanes——" The editor leaped from +his chair. "Great, great!" he cried. "We'll call it 'Chantecler 400 +<span class="smcap">b.c.</span>'" I caught the infection of his enthusiasm. "And Aristophanes had +another play on woman's rights," I told him. "You might call it 'An +Athenian Suffragette.'" "Splendid!" he cried; "splendid; we can make a +whole series, and Goulden will do the pictures in colours. It's the most +novel thing I have heard of for a long time. It will beat the others by +a mile." And he sent me away happy.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXIV" id="XXIV"></a>XXIV</h2> + +<h3>PUBLIC LIARS</h3> + + +<p>There are three things that puzzle me; yes, four things that I cannot +explain: Why street clocks never show the right time; why thermometers +hanging outside of drug stores never indicate the right temperature; why +slot machines on a railway platform never give the right weight; and why +weather-vanes always point in the wrong direction. At bottom, I imagine, +these are really not four things, but one. For it must be the same +mysterious and malicious principle that takes each of these +contrivances, set up to be a public guide to truth, and turns it into an +instrument for the dissemination of error.</p> + +<p>What makes me think that there is some animate <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span> principle behind such +clocks is that they are so like a good many people one meets. There are +persons who are packed with the most curiously inaccurate information on +the most abstruse subjects, and they insist on imparting it to you. I +have no ground to complain if I ask Jones what is the capital of +Illinois and he says Chicago. The initiative was mine, and taken at my +own peril, and it is fair that I should pay the penalty. But frequently +Jones will break in upon me in the middle of a column of figures and +tell me that the largest ranch in the world is situated in the State of +Sonora, Mexico. "Yes?" I say, hoping that he will go away. "Yes," he +assures me. "It is so large that the proprietor can ride 200 days on +horseback without leaving his own grounds. He has 2,000,000 men working +for him and he lives in a marble palace of 700 rooms. No one can be +elected President of Mexico against his will."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span></p> + +<p>Now obviously it would have been better for me to remain altogether +unacquainted with Mexican conditions than to share Jones's distorted +view of affairs in that interesting republic. But Jones insists on +taking the innocent blank spaces in my knowledge of the world and +filling them up with the most incorrect data. He tells me, for instance, +that Mme. Finisterra once sang the mad scene from "Lucia" before the +late Sultan of Morocco, who wept so bitterly that the performance was +interrupted lest the monarch should go into convulsions. At the age of +eight Mme. Finisterra knew twelve operatic soprano rôles by heart, and +when she was ten she played Juliet to Tamagno's Romeo. She now gets +$10,000 a night, in addition to the service of a maid, a chef, and two +private secretaries. In private life she is very stout. All this, +needless to say, is not true.</p> + +<p>But I must not forget the clocks. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span> worst of the class, oddly enough, +are those found in front of watchmakers' and opticians' shops. I +sometimes think that such clocks are purposely put out of order by the +shop-keeper. The object is apparently to induce irascible old gentlemen +to enter the store, watch in hand, in order to protest against the +maintenance of a public nuisance. It is then a comparatively easy task +to sell them a pair of solid gold spectacles with double lenses at a +handsome profit. I, for one, would not blame the old gentleman who +should pick up a stone and hurl it at one of these Tartuffes and +Chadbands of the street-corner with their chubby, gilded hands reposing +on their prosperous stomachs, sleek and smug and ultra-respectable, but +unconscionable liars for all that. They are not content with their own +success in cheating, they throw discredit upon honest folk. How many a +faithful pocket-piece has been pulled out by its disappointed <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> owner and +actually set wrong to make it agree with one of these rubicund old +sinners? Such is the overpowering effect of impudent assurance on the +ordinary man.</p> + +<p>The difference between the typical public clock and a watch out of order +is obvious. Every prudent man knows the peculiarities of his own watch, +just as he knows the peculiarities of his own wife and children; and he +is consequently prepared to make allowances. But the clock on the street +corner persists in thrusting false information upon you. The man who +consults his watch does so with a purpose, and is naturally on the +alert. But the cheating clock confronts him in moments of unsuspecting +security, and throws him into a condition of the wildest alarm. It is +peculiarly active on bright spring days, when people rise early and look +forward to being at their desks half an hour before their usual time. On +such occasions they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span> invariably come upon a clock which points to a +quarter of ten, and sends them scurrying breathless up four flights of +stairs, to find the janitor engaged in cleaning out the baskets.</p> + +<p>Church clocks are not so bad as jewellers' clocks; but they are bad +enough, and, in the nature of things, we have a right to expect more +from a church clock than from any other kind. For the same reason the +weathercock on a church steeple is to be judged by a higher standard +than the one over a carpenter's shop or the ordinary dwelling. I cannot, +for instance, imagine a more dangerous moral <i>ensemble</i> than a church +with a clergyman preaching bad doctrine in the pulpit, a clock +indicating the wrong time on the tower, and, over all, a clogged weather +vane pointing to the south when the wind blows from the east.</p> + +<p>With reference to denominations I have observed that Presbyterian clocks +are apt to be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> more reliable than any other kind, although the truest +clock I have ever come across is on a little Dutch Reformed Church in +Orange County. One of the most unprincipled clocks I can think of is +just outside my window. I use unprincipled with intention, for this +clock is not vicious, but giddy. If it were consistently late or +consistently early, one might get used to it. But to look out of the +window at 9:30 and find this clock pointing to eleven, and to look out +ten minutes later and find it pointing to 9:35, is extremely +disconcerting. One is inclined to expect something more restrained in a +clock connected with the most prosperous parish of one of our most +conservative denominations.</p> + +<p>What I have said of clocks is largely true of the weighing-machine. Like +the public clock, it thrusts itself upon us, and like the clock it +betrays the confidence which it invites. I feel convinced that no one +would ever think of using<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span> a weighing-machine if it did not constitute +the most characteristically national piece of furniture in our railway +stations. All weighing-machines cheat, but, if cheat they must, give me +the machine that flatly refuses to budge from zero after it has +swallowed your coin. I prefer that kind to the spasmodic machine on +which the indicator moves forward one hundred pounds every two minutes +and leaves a person utterly uncertain as to whether he should +immediately begin dieting or purchase a bottle of codliver oil. Yet even +this mockery of a weighing-machine is preferable to the emotional type +of scales which simultaneously gives you a false weight, tells your +fortune in utter disregard of age and sex, and plays a tune that cannot +be recognised. When such a machine has registered a German matron's +weight at 115 pounds and informed her that she will some day be +President of the United States, it is ludicrous to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> have it break into a +tinkle of self-appreciation, like a spaniel barking his own approval +after walking across the room on his hind legs.</p> + +<p>As for the ordinary street thermometer, there is this to be said for it: +It may deceive, but it gives pleasure in deceiving. When a person is +sagging beneath the heat of an August midday, it is a distinct source of +comfort and pride to have the thermometer register 98 degrees. Even when +we are fully aware that the mercury is too high by three or four +degrees, it is easy enough to make one's self believe for the moment in +the higher figure. If it were not for this spiritual stimulus, I should +be inclined to regard all thermometers as a nuisance. Translating +Fahrenheit into Centigrade and <i>vice versa</i>, is one of the most painful +mental processes I can think of. I know that I cannot perform the +operation, and I cannot help trying. I remember how a certain European +monarch once lay seriously <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span> ill and my evening newspaper reported that +his temperature was 38.3 degrees C. On my way home I attempted to put +38.3 degrees C. into terms of F., and it speaks well for the +constitution of that European monarch that he should have survived the +violent fluctuations of temperature to which I subjected him. At Grand +Central Station he was literally burning up under a blazing heat of 142 +degrees. At Ninety-sixth Street he was down to 74. As I walked home from +the station I was forced to admit that I was not sure whether one should +multiply by five-ninths or nine-fifths.</p> + +<p>I would not be misunderstood. I am no enemy of the public institutions I +have criticised. Far from it; clocks, thermometers, weather-vanes, and +weighing-machines—they are but the remnants of the fine old communal +life of which our urban and Anglo-Saxon civilisation has kept only too +little. We do not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span> lounge about and take our meals in the public squares +as people used to do in Athens and still do in Sicily. We no longer fill +our pitchers at a common fountain or dance on the village green or +regulate the life of an entire city to the same signal from a campanile. +Ours is an age of exaggerated privacy, where every one works behind +closed doors and glances furtively at his watch. But precisely because +it is a precious survival the public clock ought to keep itself above +reproach and above suspicion.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXV" id="XXV"></a>XXV</h2> + +<h3>THE COMPLETE COLLECTOR—III</h3> + + +<p>Cooper's museum of Proverbial Realities had proven such a source of +delight to himself and his friends that the news of its destruction by +fire came with a shock to all who knew him. Of all his treasures he +succeeded in saving only part of his priceless collection of straws—the +straw that showed which way the wind blew, the straw grasped at by a +drowning man, the straw that does not enter into the manufacture of +bricks, and the last straw that broke the camel's back. How would Cooper +stand the blow, his friends wondered. He took it very well. Within a +week he had set to work on a new fad, the collection of Statistical +Realities, and in a half-year he had filled three good-sized <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span> lofts and +a large back-yard with his treasures. Yesterday he took me through his +galleries.</p> + +<p>"What do you make of this?" he said, stopping before a glass jar some +four feet high, in which, to the peril of one's nerves, you could +distinctly see the upper two-thirds of a child's body. Head, trunk, and +arms were beautifully fashioned, but there was no vestige of growth +below the knee-caps. I could only show my astonishment. "Well," he went +on, "you must have seen the statement by the president of Bryn Mawr that +the average number of children among college-bred mothers is 3-6/10. +This is the six-tenths of a child. Here," he said, pointing to another +and somewhat larger jar, "you see three-fifths of a woman; 1-3/5 women +to one man is the ratio in some parts of Ireland. Here, in adjoining +bottles, are three-tenths of a physician, seven-eighths of a law<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span>yer, +and four-fifths of a clergyman, the latest census having shown that we +have 23-3/10 physicians, 29-7/8 lawyers, and 17-4/5 physicians for every +1,000 of our population."</p> + +<p>Stopping before a glass case containing little heaps of ordinary copper +coins, Harrington pointed out that these were the odd cents which the +scrupulous science of statistics insists on leaving attached to vast +sums of money. He showed me the 27 cents which, added to $3,469,746,854 +represented the value of the foreign commerce of the United States in +1910; he showed me the twopence ha'penny which, increased by +£788,990,187, constitutes the total funded debt of Great Britain; and he +laid special emphasis on the eleven pennies which Tammany's most +vigorous efforts at economy could not pare off from New York City's +budget of $166,246,729.11 for the year 1909.</p> + +<p>Another row of glass cases contained what<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span> appeared at first sight a +collection of comic dolls. Cooper pointed to a sturdy little mannikin in +boots and a Russian blouse, who, with mouth fearfully distended, was +endeavouring to swallow an iron bar four or five times his own size. +"You may have read," said Cooper, "that the annual consumption of +pig-iron in Russia is 3.7 tons per capita. This figure shows the fact +concretely. Here," indicating the figure of an infant apparently a week +or two old, "is a French baby. You may observe that she is engaged in +counting her share of the national wealth, which is estimated in France +at 1,254 francs 63 centimes for every man, woman, and child. She is +wondering whether she ought to invest her capital in Russian treasury +bonds or in Steel Common. This," pointing to a group of seven or eight +dolls riding on a perfectly modelled brindled cow, "represents the +proportions of domesticated<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span> cattle to the total population of the +United States."</p> + +<p>The fire which flashes up in the eye of every amateur when he +contemplates the gem of his collection, was visible as Cooper led the +way to a good-sized platform of polished mahogany and brass on which was +set up what I took to be a beautiful reproduction of the planetary +system in miniature. I was right. "But observe," said Cooper, "the +details of construction. The sun is made up of infinitely small eggs, +since we know that the weight of all the hen's eggs consumed by the +human race since the beginning of the Christian era is equal to +one-billionth the weight of the sun. The planets are fashioned in the +same way. Jupiter you see is made up of little, squirming animal-like +units; that is because Jupiter occupies the same amount of space that +would be filled by the descendants of a single pair of Australian +rabbits<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span> in five hundred years, if left unchecked. Observe the orbit of +the earth. It is marked out in twopenny postage stamps, for +statisticians assure us that the path of the earth around the sun is +equivalent in length to all the postage stamps consumed since the +beginning of the nineteenth century, if laid end to end. In the same way +the seven rings of Saturn are made up of copper pennies, obtained by +reducing the world's annual output of gold to coins of that +denomination."</p> + +<p>We passed into a cosy little alcove lined to the ceiling with books. +There seemed nothing out of the ordinary about them at first sight, but +my host soon undeceived me. "These," he said, "are the books that might +have been written in the last hundred years, if the time and energy that +are spent on smoking, drinking, whist, bridge, and out-door games were +devoted to the cultivation of literature. Here, for instance, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span> are three +plays quite as good as 'Hamlet,' written by two million men named Smith, +who gave up the use of tobacco. Here is a philosophical poem which shows +on every page an inspiration higher than Goethe ever attained; it +embodies the concentrated ideas produced by twenty-five thousand former +golf players, thinking half an hour a day for three days in the week. +Here is a poetic version of the future life which completely outclasses +the 'Divina Commedia.' It is compounded out of the experiences of +forty-three thousand moderate drinkers who became total abstainers, +seventy disbanded croquet associations, and 1,125 obsolete euchre clubs.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," concluded Cooper, "you should see this before you go," and he +pointed to a single shelf of books with a curious mechanical arrangement +at one side. "This shelf," he said, "is exactly five feet long. This +little<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span> electric motor at the side is so constructed that it gets into +motion every day for twenty minutes, and stops. By a system of cogs and +levers the motor propels a fine steel needle straight through the five +feet of books. A glance at this brass dial shows at once how far the +needle point has reached. At the present moment, for instance, it is +halfway through the front cover of the 'Journal of John Woolman.' And +while the dial is recording the distance covered on the five-foot shelf, +the blue liquid in this glass tube measures the rising level of culture. +It is a very ingenious application of President Eliot's idea, don't you +think?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXVI" id="XXVI"></a>XXVI</h2> + +<h3>THE COMMUTER</h3> + + +<p>Whenever Harrington urges me to go to live in the country, his place is +only forty-three minutes from City Hall. But when he asked me last week +to spend Saturday afternoon with him, he told me that some trains are +slower than others and that I had better allow ten minutes for the +ferry. I have never known a commuter who told the truth about the time +it takes him to cover the distance from his office-door to his front +lawn. If he is exceptionally conscientious he will take into account the +preliminary ride on the Subway and possibly even the walk from his +office to the Subway station. But no commuter ever alludes to the +fifteen minutes' walk at the other<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span> end. I did know one man who never +under-estimated the length of his daily trips, but he was a cynic who +hated the country and lived there because his wife's mother owned the +house, and he multiplied by two the time it really took him to get into +town. The exact truth I have never had.</p> + +<p>As a matter of fact, sitting there in a rather stuffy car which made its +way through much unlovely landscape, I reflected that there are really +three different schedules on which suburban traffic is conducted. One is +the time it takes a commuter's friends to come out to see him. Another +is the time he claims it takes him to come into town every day. The +third, and incomparably the shortest of the three, is the time your +friend says it will take him to come into town after the completion of +some very extensive railway improvements which, in practice, I have +found are never completed. I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> am quite aware that great bridges have +been built, and that railway tunnels have been opened into Long Island +and other railway tunnels into New Jersey, and that steam is being +rapidly replaced by electricity. But it is my firm belief that such of +my suburban friends as live within the zone affected by these +improvements will move away before the change for the better actually +comes. I am no pessimist. I base this expectation on the simple fact +that every commuter I know, for as long a period as I have known him, +has been looking forward to the completion of railway improvements +involving the expenditure of tens of millions of dollars. The march of +progress apparently finds the suburban resident always a little in +advance.</p> + +<p>Harrington met me at the station and asked me if that was not a very +good train I had come down on. The suburban virus was in me.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> I lied and +said yes. As we sat at our luncheon I felt how peculiarly a vital factor +in out-of-town existence the railroad constitutes. Both Harrington and +his wife spoke of trains as of living, breathing people. Some trains, +with all their faults, the Harringtons evidently loved. Others they +detested, and made no attempt to conceal the fact. I had just finished +telling Mrs. Harrington about the latest woman's suffrage parade when +Harrington said: "Do you know, my dear, the 8.13 is getting worse all +the time." I was still thinking of my own story, and I failed to catch +just who or what it was that was getting worse all the time to an extent +so inimical to Harrington's peace of mind. But Mrs. Harrington looked +up, frowning slightly, and said: "Can't anything be done?" Harrington +shook his head. "It's hopeless." By this time I was convinced that it +must be some family skeleton that Harrington <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> had rather oddly chosen to +bring out before a stranger; some scapegrace cousin, I suspected, who +probably got drunk and came to Harrington's office and demanded money. I +looked discreetly into my plate as Mrs. Harrington suggested: "You might +write to the superintendent." "We have," replied Harrington, "and he +threatened to take it off altogether. Not that it would mean any loss. I +can make just as good time now by the 8:35."</p> + +<p>After luncheon we walked. I have never found the walking in the suburbs +very good. There is a regrettable lack of elbow-room. A short stroll +brings one either to a railway-siding, which is bad enough, or to a +promising growth of trees, which is worse. From the road these trees +look like the beginning of a primeval jungle sweeping on to far +horizons. Plunge into that timber growth and in five minutes you emerge +on a sewered road with concrete sidewalks <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span> and ornamental lamp posts and +a crew of Italian labourers drinking beer in the shadow of a +steam-roller. It is a gash of civilisation across the face of the +wilderness, and, like most deformities, it is displeasing to the eye. +Walking under such conditions is not stimulative. I miss the sense of +space and freedom I get in the streets of New York, where I know that I +can walk twenty miles north or twenty miles east without interference or +inconvenience. Give me either a mountain-top or Broadway. Suburban +vistas are pitifully cramped.</p> + +<p>That day it had rained, and I should have been additionally glad to stay +indoors. But Mrs. Harrington is a fervent naturalist, and she insisted +on taking me out to look at the wild flowers and listen to the +bird-calls. Both of these branches of nature-study, I am convinced, call +for an intensity of sympathetic imagination that I am incapable of +developing;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span> and especially the bird-calls. Concerning the latter, I +feel sure that a great deal of humbug is being said and written. I mean +to cast no reflections upon Harrington or his wife. The only occasions +on which I have known Harrington to deviate from the truth have been, as +I have already pointed out, in connection with his train-schedules. And +as Mrs. Harrington does not travel to the city, even this charge will +not hold against her. And yet I cannot help feeling that neither of the +two really hears the catbird say "miaow" or the robin "cheer up," as +they pretend to. At the first twitter or chirp from some invisible +source Mrs. Harrington stops and with radiant face asks me whether I do +not distinctly catch the "pit-pit-pity-me" of the meadow-lark. I say +yes; but I really don't, and I don't believe she does. My explanation is +that Mrs. Harrington is a woman and consequently ready to hear what she +has<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span> been led to expect she would hear. As for Harrington, he is a +devoted husband.</p> + +<p>For let us look at the matter with an open mind. Our alphabetical +representations of animal sounds are at best only rough approximations. +Most often they are not even that. They are mere arbitrary symbols. We +use consonants where the bird uses none, as when we give the name cuckoo +to a bird whose cry is really "ooh, ooh." Or else we put in the wrong +consonants, which is shown by the fact that different nations assign +different consonantal sounds to the same bird. We do not even agree on +the vowel sounds. What is there in common between our English +"Cock-a-doodle-doo" and M. Rostand's "cocorico"? And we need not go as +far as the animal world. See how the nations differ in spelling out that +elementary human sound which is the expression of pain or surprise, and +which in this country we hear<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span> as "Oh," and the Germans hear as "Ach," +and the Greeks heard as "Ai, Ai." If the human vocal chords can be so +imperfectly imitated, what shall we say of birds speaking after a manner +all their own? For myself I confess that in congenial company I can hear +birds say anything, but that left to myself I am sometimes puzzled by a +parrot. And that is the reason why I am sceptical concerning Mrs. +Harrington's accomplishments in this field.</p> + +<p>But while the birds about the Harringtons' home simply offend my regard +for the truth, the Harringtons' dog causes me acute bodily and mental +discomfort. He is of a spotted white, with a disreputable black patch +over one eye, and weighs, I should imagine, between eighty and ninety +pounds. During luncheon he takes his place under the table, and from +there emits blood-curdling howls with sufficient frequency to make +conversation extremely difficult. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span> This he varies by nosing about the +visitor's legs and growling. I am not fond of dogs under the best of +circumstances. I always labour under the presumption that they will +bite. Their habit of suddenly dashing across the floor, in furious +pursuit of nothing in particular, upsets me. But an invisible dog under +a dining-room table is a dreadful experience. It is true that I managed +to give Mrs. Harrington a fairly rational account of the woman's +suffrage parade. But was she aware, as I sat there smiling +spasmodically, what agonies of fear were mine as I waited for those +white fangs under the table to sink into my flesh? If, under the +circumstances, I confused Harriet Beecher Stowe with Julia Ward Howe, +and made a bad blunder about woman's rights in Finland, am I so very +much to blame?</p> + +<p>Not that the Harringtons are the worst offenders in this respect. There +is an old classmate, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span> and a very dear friend, indeed, who lives on +Flushing Bay, and has a pair of hopelessly ferocious dogs that hold the +neighbourhood in terror. The only occasion on which they have been known +to show indifference to strangers was one night when burglars broke in +and stole some silver and a revolver. When I go out to Flushing, I +stipulate that the dogs shall be locked up in the cellar from ten +minutes before my train is due until ten minutes after I have left the +house. But it would be foolhardy to omit additional precautions. Hence I +always carry an umbrella with the ferrule sharpened to a point, and when +I am within a block of the house I stoop and pick up a large stone, and +go on my way, with all my senses acute, whistling cheerfully. It is odd +how people will put themselves out to keep a harmless, poor relation out +of the way of visitors, and never think of the much greater discomfort +attendant<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span> upon the constant presence of an active bull-terrier.</p> + +<p>I may have produced the impression that life in the country makes no +appeal to me. Nothing could be further from my intentions. Whatever +doubts I may have entertained on this point vanish completely as the +Harringtons escort me to the station in the cool of the evening, the dog +having been left at home at my request. We pass by low, white-pillared +houses behind hedges, and the scent of hay comes up from the lawns, and +laughter comes from the dark of the verandas. The city at such a time +seems a very undesirable place to return to; a place to lose one's self +in—yes, and that is all. The Harringtons never were in the city what +they are here. They have taken root, they have developed local pride +which is only the sense of home. As we walk they point out the +residences of the leading citizens. Here lives the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span> owner of one of the +largest factories of mechanical pianos in the country. This Japanese +temple belongs to a man who writes for some of the best-known magazines. +That colonial dwelling is occupied by the lawyer who defended Mrs. Dower +when she was tried for poisoning her husband. I reflect, in genuine +humility, that in the city I never think of taking strangers to see Mr. +William Dean Howells's house or Mr. Joseph H. Choate's. And with real +regret and admiration, I say good-night to the Harringtons.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXVII" id="XXVII"></a>XXVII</h2> + +<h3>HEADLINES</h3> + + +<p>After Stephane Dubost, editor of the Paris <i>Réveil</i>, had been ten days +in this country, and had collected all his material for a series of +volumes on the American Woman, Yankee and Yellow Peril, Democracy +Décolleté, and Football <i>versus</i> the Fine Arts—to name only a few—he +was asked what single feature of our life had impressed him as most +characteristically American. He replied, "The headlines in your daily +press." Just what M. Dubost did think of our achievements in that +department of journalism may be gathered from a letter he addressed the +very same day to his friend, Marcel Complans, director of the Bureau of +Cipher Codes in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span></p> + +<p>"In nothing, my dear Marcel, is the American genius for saving time so +strikingly exemplified as in their newspaper headlines. Think of our +<i>Figaro</i> or <i>Temps</i> with its dreary columns of solid type introduced by +a minute solitary heading, and then pick up one of Uncle Sam's great +dailies. It may be only an item of four or five inches, what they call +here a stickful or two, but are you left to make your way unassisted +through the brief account? No. Your eye immediately catches a +time-saving headline like this:</p> + +<p><b> +DESERTED GIRL WIFE<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">TO HOLD UP MAN.</span></b><br /> +</p> + +<p>Having that concise legend before you, all you need to do, my dear +Marcel, is simply to decide for yourself whether our story deals with an +unscrupulous wretch who abandons his young wife to engage on a career of +highway robbery;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span> or whether it is the history of a deserted girl who +becomes the wife of a professional outlaw; or whether it is a betrayed +young wife who gives herself up to the cause of elevating the human +race. A French reader, under the circumstances, would be compelled to go +through as much as thirty or forty lines of small print before he +secured the desired information. Thus it requires but a brief experience +with American headlines to recognise that when the Chicago <i>Evening +Post</i> says</p> + +<p><b> +FINDS ENGLISH FOOD<br /> +FOR LAND TAX FAITH<br /></b> +</p> + +<p>it means that an American single-taxer, who has just returned from Great +Britain, believes that the English people is ready to listen to the +principles of the single-tax theory. And when the New York <i>Sun</i> says</p> + +<p><b> +LA FOLLETTE TALKING BOLT<br /></b> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span></p> + +<p>it does not mean that the Senator from Wisconsin is a manifestation of +crashing, celestial eloquence, but that he is advocating a secession +from the Republican party. Can you not see, my friend, what magnificent +economies of time are effected by headlines like</p> + +<p><b> +WATCH SPRINGS TRAP<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">FOR JAPANESE SPY</span><br /></b> +</p> + +<p>over a story dealing with the capture of an Oriental suspect by a +sentinel at one of the Pacific Coast forts, or</p> + +<p><b> +SCREAMING FRIARS TORTURED<br /> +CHILD MOTHER FAINTS<br /></b> +</p> + +<p>which does not mean that a society of howling friars have been guilty of +an atrocious crime upon an infant in the presence of its mother; or that +a band of religionists are driven by torture to cries of pain, while a +young mother faints at the sight. It only means that a poor<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span> mother, who +has suddenly gone insane, breaks into a house of refuge, where her +little boy is being cared for by a religious fraternity, accuses, +without warrant, the brothers of torturing her child, and faints. Or +take</p> + +<p><b> +FRENCH RACE WORN OUT<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">ENGLISH TO TRIUMPH.</span><br /></b> +</p> + +<p>These lines are not the summary of a study in national growth and decay, +but expressive of the fact that a French bicycle team wins a signal +victory over a group of exhausted English competitors. Do you see now +how far towards the art of simplified story-telling these Americans have +gone?</p> + +<p>"I can only express my profound admiration, as I pass, for the genius of +those men who almost automatically will dig the heart out of a 'story,' +and blazon it before the reader not only with marvellous brevity and +meaning,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span> but with extraordinary appropriateness of characterisation. +Can you seize, for instance, the full relevancy of a headline like</p> + +<p><b> +PRESBYTERIAN FALLS<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">TWENTY FEET</span><br /></b> +</p> + +<p>or,</p> + +<p><b> +PROFESSOR THRICE MARRIED<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">DENIES AUTHENTICITY OF BIBLE</span><br /></b> +</p> + +<p>or see how the essential point is caught when a 'head' writer places</p> + +<p><b> +FLORODORA GIRL EXPELLED<br /> +FROM CZAR'S CAPITAL<br /></b> +</p> + +<p>over an account of the latest ukase which banishes from St. Petersburg +two hundred members of the Duma, twelve professors, fifty-five Jewish +bankers and artists, all the labour delegates, as well as the agent of +the American Plough Corporation, whose wife was one of the original +sextette?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I will conclude with what to me is an example of the art of headline +writing carried almost to perfection. Suppose that at Paris a +long-distance foot-race between one of our countrymen and a foreign +athlete had been won by our compatriot. The <i>Réveil</i> would probably say, +'Armand Wins at Auteuil,' and go on to give the details. But observe +what they do here. I cite the article complete, headline and text:</p> + +<p><b> +HAYES WINS<br /></b> +</p> + +<p><b> +VICTOR IN DUAL MATCH OVER DORANDO<br /></b> +</p> + +<p><b> +AMERICAN LEADS ITALIAN TO THE TAPE,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">AND CARRIES OFF PRIZE</span><br /></b> +</p> + +<p><b> +DORANDO CAN DO NOTHING BETTER THAN<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">SECOND</span><br /></b> +</p> + +<p><b> +ONE MORE VICTORY ADDED TO GREAT<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">RUNNER'S STRING</span><br /></b> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span></p> + +<p><b> +TEN THOUSAND CHEERING SPECTATORS<br /> +SEE THE AMERICAN RUNNER REPEAT<br /> +HIS VICTORY AT THE OLYMPIC GAMES<br /></b> +</p> + +<p>"New York, November 26.—The race between Hayes and Dorando this +afternoon was won by the former."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[Pg 278]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXVIII" id="XXVIII"></a>XXVIII</h2> + +<h3>USAGE</h3> + + +<div class="blockquot"><p>... <i>a certain class of verbal critics who can never free themselves +from the impression that man was made for language and not language for +man.</i>—Professor Lounsbury. </p></div> + +<p>From a large number of readers we have received requests for a ruling on +disputed cases of English usage. We now proceed to answer these +inquiries in accordance with the liberal standard for which Professor +Lounsbury pleads. One man writes:</p> + +<p><i>Question:</i> Which is right, "To-morrow is Sunday and we are going out," +or "To-morrow will be Sunday and we shall go out?" <i>Answer:</i> Both forms +are right, but as a matter of fact, if to-morrow is like other Sundays, +it will probably <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span> rain all day, and your chances of going out are not +bright.</p> + +<p><i>Q.</i> Must a sentence always have coherence? What is the practice of our +great writers on this point? <i>A.</i> Coherence is not essential. Thus: +"Conquests! Thousands! Don Bolaro Fizzgig—Grandee—only daughter—Donna +Christina—Splendid creature—loved me to distraction—jealous +father—high-souled daughter—handsome Englishman—Donna Christina in +despair—prussic acid—stomach pump in my portmanteau—operation +performed—old Bolaro in ecstasies—consent to our union—join hands and +floods of tears—romantic story—very." (Charles Dickens.)</p> + +<p><i>Q.</i> Must a sentence always have a predicate? <i>A.</i> No. For example: (1) +"The Universe smiles to me. The World smiles to me. Everything. Man. +Woman. Children. Presidential Candidates. Trolley Cars. Everything +smiles<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[Pg 280]</a></span> to me." (<i>The Complete Whitmanite</i>) (2) "From the frowning tower +of Babel on which the insectile impotence of man dared to contend with +the awful wrath of the Almighty, through the granite bulk of the +beetling Pyramids lifting their audacious crests to the star-meshed +skies that bend down to kiss the blue waters of Father Nile and the +gracious nymphs laving their blithesome limbs in the pools that stud the +sides of Pentelicus, down to our own Washington, throned like an empress +on the banks of the beautiful Potomac, waiting for the end which we +trust may never come." (From the <i>Congressional Record</i>.)</p> + +<p><i>Q.</i> Is "ivrybody" a permissible variant for "everybody"? <i>A.</i> It is. +For instance, "His dinners [our ambassador's at St. Petersburg] were th' +most sumchuse ever known in that ancient capital; th' carredge of state +that bore him fr'm his stately palace to th' comparatively<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span> squalid +quarters of th' Czar was such that <i>ivrybody</i> expicted to hear th' +sthrains iv a calliope burst fr'm it at anny moment." (Mr. Dooley.)</p> + +<p><i>Q.</i> Is there good authority for saying, "He was given a hat," "He was +shown the door," etc.? <i>A.</i> The form is common, and therefore correct. +As, "The Senator <i>was paid</i> twenty thousand dollars for voting against +the Governor"; "He <i>was offered</i> a third term, but declined"; "The +coloured delegates <i>were handed</i> a lemon." (From the contemporary +press.)</p> + +<p><i>Q.</i> The use of "who" and "whom" puzzles me. Must "who" always be used +in the nominative case and "whom" in the objective? <i>A.</i> Not +necessarily. Thus, "I told him who I wanted to see and that it wasn't +none of his business" (W. S. Devery); "That's the first guy whom he said +put him into the cooler." (Battery Dan Finn.)</p> + +<p><i>Q.</i> I am told that it is wrong to place a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span> preposition at the end of a +sentence. Why can't I say, "Mr. Roosevelt is a man whom I should enjoy +talking <i>with</i>"? <i>A.</i> Your example is unfortunate. You should say, "Mr. +Roosevelt is a man whom I should enjoy talking <i>after</i>."</p> + +<p><i>Q.</i> Is it wrong to split infinitives? Is a phrase like "to seriously +complain" really objectionable? <i>A.</i> We hasten to most emphatically say +"Yes!"</p> + +<p><i>Q.</i> Is there a rigid rule with regard to the use of the preterite +tense? When do you say "hung" and when do you say "hanged"? <i>A.</i> Two +examples from a universally recognised authority will illustrate the +flexibility of our language in the general use of tenses: (1) "'I know a +gen'l'man, sir,' said Mr. Weller, 'as did that, and <i>begun</i> at two +yards; but he never tried it on ag'in; for he <i>blowed</i> the bird right +clean away at the first fire, and nobody ever<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span> <i>seed</i> a feather on him +arterwards.'" (2) "So I take the privilidge of the day, Mary, my +dear—as the gen'lem'n in difficulties did, ven he valked out of a +Sunday—to tell you that the first and only time I <i>see</i> you your +likeness was <i>took</i> on my hart in much quicker time and brighter colours +than ever a likeness was took by the profeel macheens (wich p'r'aps you +may have <i>heerd</i> on Mary my dear) altho it does finish a portrait and +put the frame and glass on complete with a hook at the end to hang it up +by and all in two minutes and a quarter." (Charles Dickens.)</p> + +<p><i>Q.</i> What is "elegance" in style? I know it does not mean long words and +many of them; but just what does it mean? <i>A.</i> Elegance is +appropriateness. Long and circumlocutory terms are just as elegant in +the mouth of a fashionable preacher as shorter and uglier words in the +mouth of some one else. Hamlet's "Angels<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span> and ministers of grace defend +us!" and Chuck Connors's "Wouldn't it bend your Merry Widow?" are +equally elegant.</p> + +<p><i>Q.</i> What is force in style? <i>A.</i> We may illustrate with a quotation +from Hall Caine's unannounced book: "He drew her to him and kissed her +as men and women have kissed through the æons, since the first star +hymned to the first moonrise." Now, as a matter of fact, kissing is only +about two thousand years old, and is still unknown to the Chinese, the +native Africans, the Hindus, the Australians, the Indians of South +America, the Polynesians, and the Eskimos; but the sentence is +nevertheless a very forcible one.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXIX" id="XXIX"></a>XXIX</h2> + +<h3>60 H.P.</h3> + + +<p>For the purpose of getting one's name into the papers, the acquisition +of a high-powered automobile may be recommended to the man who has never +given a monkey dinner; whose son was never married to a show-girl in a +balloon at 2.30 <span class="smcap">a.m.</span>; whose son-in-law is neither a count, a duke, nor a +prince, and does not beat his wife; who has never paid $100,000 for a +Velasquez painted in 1897, or for a mediæval Florentine altar-piece made +in Dayton, Ohio. The press, like the public, does not brim over with +affection for the motorist. From the newspapers it may be gathered that +when a man has been seen in the front seat of an automobile his family +prefers not to allude to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span> subject. Good men occasionally ride, but +as a rule only on errands of mercy, and always in a friend's machine. A +candidate for mayor will laugh when you accuse him of owning an opium +den, taking $10,000 a month from Mr. Morgan, or experimenting freely in +polygamy; but he throws up his hands when some one proves that he has +been seen in a garage.</p> + +<p>To me this seems absurd. If people admit that the automobile is here to +stay, they must also admit that it is here to move from place to place +occasionally. Automobiles that did nothing but stay would obviously fail +in one of their principal aims. Not that the auto has no other important +functions. It is evident that motor-cars were intended for little boys +who squeeze the signal bulb and stick nails into the tires; for +Republican orators to cite as evidence that the American farmer does not +want the tariff revised; for foreign observers<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span> to prove that we are +developing an aristocracy; and for Tammany office-holders to snatch a +bit of relaxation after the day's long grind.</p> + +<p>Motoring is not unmitigated bliss. The common belief that a body may be +in only one place at one time can be easily refuted by a woman with a +baby-carriage. Experience shows that such a woman, if she be put five +feet from a sidewalk, with forty feet of open road behind her for an +auto to pass through, will cover the forty feet backward with incredible +speed and propel herself right in front of the car. What would happen if +two cars came in opposite directions on opposite sides of a hundred-foot +avenue cannot be predicted. Either the woman would be accompanied by +another woman with a baby-carriage, or else, having propelled her own +carriage in front of the machine going north, she would proceed to give +her personal attention to the car going south.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span></p> + +<p>It is difficult to start on a short spin in town, under doctor's orders, +without immediately beginning to wonder why house rents and office rents +should be going up steadily in face of the fact that the population of +New York transacts its business and pursues its pleasures entirely in +the middle of the road. German citizens, as a rule, stop to light their +pipes on a street crossing. When you give them the horn, they are seized +with the belief that you are trying to play the prelude to "Lohengrin," +and they run up and down in front of the car in extreme agitation. You +frustrate their plans for a beautiful death by rasping your tires +against the curb, together with your nerves. At Seventy-second Street +two women are saying good-bye in the middle of the street. You swerve to +one side and they pursue. You snap your spinal column as you shoot the +car straight about, but when you get there they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span> are there. "Ladies," +you say, "I am not leading a cotillion. I am an old man out for a bit of +fresh air." Thereupon one calls you a brute and the other discerns from +the colour of your nose that you have been drinking. At Forty-second +Street you catch sight of your doctor. "Have you killed any one?" he +says, after the cheerful manner of doctors. "No," you say, "but if you +will kindly step into the car, I will."</p> + +<p>Of the American farmer it may be said that, Mr. Roosevelt to the +contrary notwithstanding, he is not an unimaginative, overworked being. +It can be demonstrated that the contemplative life is on the increase in +the rural districts. Apparently, there is nothing more peaceful, nothing +more restful, nothing more soothing, nothing more permeated with the +spirit of <i>dolce far niente</i>, than the American farmer on his wagon in a +narrow road with an auto behind <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span> him. The grunt of the horn invariably +stirs in him memories of his aged grandmother, dead these twenty years, +and he falls a wondering whether he was really as kind to her as he +might have been. If the road is just wide enough for one vehicle, he +moves along pensively. If it is wide enough for two vehicles, he throws +his horses straight across the road and enters upon a prolonged +examination of his rear axle. If the road is wide enough for three +vehicles, he drives zigzag. The necessity of conserving our natural +resources would seem to be a meaningless phrase when we consider the +natural resources of an American farmer in front of an automobile.</p> + +<p>The law and the courts press hard on the autoist. Since the invention of +the automobile fine, the position of justice of the peace has become one +of the highest offices in the gift of the nation. The city magistrate is +a kindred<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span> soul. "Your Honour," says the prosecuting officer, "the +question is whether the city's boulevards shall be given over to the +owners of these destructive vehicles or whether they shall be held clear +for the use of Marathon runners, suffragette meetings, baseball teams, +and 'crap' games. The streets, your Honour, are for the benefit of the +majority; yet only the other day on Fifth Avenue I saw two ash-carts and +an ice wagon held up by a continuous stream of automobiles." "Right," +says the judge, and he turns to the victim: "What were you doing in the +middle of the street when defendant ran you down wantonly and without +cause?" "I was sleeping, your Honour," says the complainant, "having +been overtaken with drowsiness on my way home from a select social +affair." "Outrageous," says the magistrate. "Think of running into a +sleeping man. One hundred dollars."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[Pg 292]</a></span></p> + +<p>Such incidents make it clear that the automobile as an annihilator of +space has established its reputation. In the days before the auto a +drive of fifteen or twenty miles constituted a good Sunday's outing. +To-day a man can leave New Rochelle at eight o'clock in the morning and +pay a fine at Poughkeepsie at one in the afternoon, or he can leave +Poughkeepsie at eight in the morning and at one in the afternoon be in +the lock-up at New Rochelle.</p> + +<p>What hurts the motorist's feelings most of all, however, is to be +regarded by the public as a sort of licensed assassin. Yet almost any +one can think of people who drive a car and take no pleasure in spilling +blood. The common belief that automobile killing is a favourite sport +among our best families seems to be based on the fact that in nine cases +out of ten the occupants of a man-slaying automobile <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[Pg 293]</a></span> bear such +well-known Knickerbocker names as Mr. William Moriarty, chauffeur; his +friend, Mr. James Dugan, who is prominent in coal-heaving circles; and +their friends, the Misses Mayme Schultz and Bessie Goldstein. At bottom, +it would seem, most of the criticism directed against the automobile is +based on its failure to take a hog and turn him into a gentleman. But in +this respect automobiles are like many of our colleges. The comforting +thing is that the life of the automobile hog is an uncertain one. Sooner +or later he runs down a steep place into the sea, like certain of his +species mentioned in the Bible, and the question adjusts itself.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, however, the decent motorist must suffer for the other's +sins. A friend says: "The only time I dare be seen in my machine is +between 11 <span class="smcap">a.m.</span> and 4 <span class="smcap">p.m.</span> Before that time people point me out as a +'joy-rider' returning <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[Pg 294]</a></span> from a night's debauch. After that time I am a +'joy-rider' bound for a night of it." The complaint rings true. The +exhilaration aroused by a punctured tire in the open country gathers +strength from the remarks of the spectators who wonder if you made your +money honestly. In town a defective sparkplug brings the close attention +of a crowd which exchanges opinions as to whether the lady in the +tonneau is your wife. All agree that you must have mortgaged your home +to buy the machine.</p> + +<p>And yet it is evident that much misunderstanding could be avoided if we +had a simple code of rules for people who cross the street just as there +are regulations for the autoist. A few such rules suggest themselves: 1. +If one is about to cross the street in front of an auto, one should do +so either before the man in the car succumbs to heart failure or after, +but not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[Pg 295]</a></span> while the driver is wrestling with death; it is in such cases +that one is apt to get hurt. 2. If one is in the middle of the road and +sees a car approaching, one should move either (<i>a</i>) away from the car, +(<i>b</i>) towards the car, (<i>c</i>) to the right, (<i>d</i>) to the left, or (<i>e</i>) +stand still; under no circumstances should one attempt to combine (<i>a</i>), +(<i>b</i>), (<i>c</i>), (<i>d</i>), and (<i>e</i>). 3. The safest place from which to +ascertain the make of an automobile or to estimate its cost is the +sidewalk.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[Pg 296]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXX" id="XXX"></a>XXX</h2> + +<h3>THE SAMPLE LIFE</h3> + + +<p>The hour, the occasion, and the scene were conducive to melancholy. We +had walked a good fifteen miles into the open country and back again +under chilly clouds, and were now paying for it with an empty sense of +weariness and disenchantment. There is nothing so depressing as a bare +room lit up by flaring gas-jets against the gloom of a late afternoon of +rain; and the lights in Scipione's little cellar restaurant flared away +in the most outrageous manner. Harding, across the table from me, +wretchedly fluttered the pages of a popular magazine and looked +ill-natured and horribly unkempt. The new table-cloths had not yet been +laid for dinner. The sawdust on the floor<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[Pg 297]</a></span> was mostly mire. Angelina, +the cook, was screaming at Paolo and Francesca, who were trying to boil +the cat. It was very dreary.</p> + +<p>"Harding," I said, "you were insisting only a little while ago that life +is always beautiful."</p> + +<p>"So it is," he replied, too listless to be defiant. "To some people."</p> + +<p>"To whom?"</p> + +<p>"Well, to the two here, for instance," and he pointed to a pair of +handsome lovers playing golf all over a double page in the advertising +section of his magazine. "Do you mean to say these two ever know what +ugliness is, or pain, or want? Or ever grow old? Or cease to love? Here +is the perfect life for you."</p> + +<p>"Are you so sure of that?" said some one over my shoulder, and I turned +about sharply to look into the most entrancing face I have ever beheld +in man or woman. It was Apollo standing there above me, or if not he, at +least<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[Pg 298]</a></span> one of the divine youths that the Greeks have left for us in +undying marble. He made Scipione's grimy cellar luminous with beauty.</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon for intruding," he said, seating himself at our table +as joyously confident and as simple as an immortal should be. "But I +feel myself competent to speak on the point you have raised because the +Advertising Supplement you refer to is my own home. This very young man +playing golf is, as you will observe, no other than myself."</p> + +<p>There was no denying the amazing resemblance.</p> + +<p>"You say the Advertising Supplement is your home," I collected myself +sufficiently to ask, "but just how do you mean that?"</p> + +<p>"Literally," he replied. "My whole life, and for that matter my parents' +life before me, has been spent in the pages you are now fingering. My +name is Pinckney, Walter Pinckney,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[Pg 299]</a></span> and if you are sufficiently +interested in my career I should be glad to describe it."</p> + +<p>"Go ahead," cried Harding, with almost ferocious earnestness.</p> + +<p>"If I begin a bit back before my birth," said Pinckney, "you will be +patient with me. I will not detain you very long."</p> + +<p>"Begin where you please," said Harding in the same grim manner; "only +begin."</p> + +<p>"My father," commenced young Pinckney, "at eighteen, was a sickly +country lad with less than the usual elementary education and no other +prospects than a life of drudgery on the old farm. But there was in him +an elemental strength of will that was sufficient, as it turned out, to +master fate. You have read his life again and again in the Advertising +Pages of our magazines. On his nineteenth birthday, as I have heard him +tell many a time, he began the reshaping of his life by investing the +small<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[Pg 300]</a></span> sum of fifty cents in a manual of home exercise and enrolling +himself at the same time with one of our best-known correspondence +schools, which offered an attractive course in engineering and +scientific irrigation. Simultaneously, from that day he carried on the +work of his bodily and intellectual redemption. We still have at home a +collection of the various domestic utensils which he employed in his +daily training—an old armchair; a broom; a large gilt portrait frame +through which he would leap twenty-five times every morning; a marble +clock; a pair of water buckets; an old trunk lid, and other articles of +the kind. Close beside his gymnastic apparatus we keep three trunkfuls +of note-books and reports representing as many years devoted labour at +his studies. At the age of twenty-six my father was a veritable Hercules +and held the position of assistant to the chief engineer of an +im<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[Pg 301]</a></span>portant Eastern railroad. It was shortly after he had won this place +that he met my mother."</p> + +<p>The caressing fondness with which he uttered the last word imparted to +his seemingly supreme beauty an added warmth of appeal.</p> + +<p>"Her, too, you have met in the Advertising Columns. She had begun to +teach school when a mere girl; but when her father's death threw upon +her young shoulders the burden of three little children and a helpless +mother, she had risen to her greater needs. She succeeded in quadrupling +her income by learning to write short stories, criticism, and verse, +from a literary bureau which charged her a nominal fee for instruction +and purchased her output at extremely generous rates for disposal among +the leading magazines. When my father first saw her—it was in the +course of a Fourth of July excursion to Niagara Falls which, including a +three days' stay at the best hotels, was offered<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[Pg 302]</a></span> to the public at half +the usual cost—she had sent the eldest boy through college, her younger +sister was teaching school, and she was free to follow the inclinations +of her heart."</p> + +<p>"You were fortunate in the selection of your immediate ancestry," said +Harding.</p> + +<p>"Was I not?" Pinckney responded in a flush of grateful recognition. "But +that is not all. The house in which I was born, though generally +recognized as one of the finest examples of Queen Anne architecture in +reinforced concrete, was put up by my father, unassisted, from plans +which he purchased for a ridiculously small sum. Its every nook was the +abiding-place of love, of quiet content, and of nurturing comfort. The +furnace was equipped with the latest automatic devices so that it had to +be started only once a year. It was then left to the care of my mother, +who used to give it only a few minutes' attention every day with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[Pg 303]</a></span>out +going to the trouble of divesting herself of the gown of fine white lawn +which she always wore."</p> + +<p>"My dear fellow," I could not keep from exclaiming, "you have almost +explained yourself. In such surroundings how could you help growing up +into what you are?"</p> + +<p>"That is what I say, sir," he came back at me eagerly. "But you must +call to mind, also, the fostering personal care that was bestowed upon +us children. Take the matter of diet. Coffee, cocoa, excessive sweets, +every food-element tending to narcotise or over-stimulate the system was +rigorously excluded. Instead we had the numerous grain preparations that +assist nature by contributing directly to the development of our +particular faculties. In my case, for instance, it had been decided some +time before I was born that in the course of time I should enter West +Point. With that end in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[Pg 304]</a></span> view Farinette, because of its muscle-building +powers, was made the principal constituent of my bill of fare. Later, +when my parents thought that the pulpit offered better chances of a +successful career, Farinette was replaced by Panema, which is notably +efficacious in the production of cerebral tissue. Just as I was taking +my examinations for college it was finally determined that the sphere of +corporation finance held out unrivalled facilities for advancement, and +Panema gave way to Hydronuxia, which acts particularly on the +imaginative faculties. As for my sisters, they fared no worse than I. +You surely have seen them in the Advertising Pages in all their splendid +bloom. Saved from overwork by soaps that make heavy washing a pleasure, +eternally youthful through the use of electric massage, they smile at +you through the reticulations of the tennis racket which the champion +played<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[Pg 305]</a></span> with at Newport, or recline under parasols in the bow of canoes +that will neither sink nor upset. They are very fond of playing Chopin +on a mechanical piano while the moonlight streams over the floor of the +open veranda."</p> + +<p>Here Harding broke in sharply. "You began by differing with me on the +possibility of finding complete happiness in life, and you have done +nothing but refute your own position from the very first. I admit there +are certain essentials toward the perfect life that you have not +mentioned, but I haven't the least doubt that you already possess them +or that they will come to you in time. I mean such things as riches or +love."</p> + +<p>"Ah, love," Pinckney murmured, and the shadow of a cloud passed over his +divine brow.</p> + +<p>"Surely," I said, "<i>you</i> have not sought for what love has to give and +sought in vain?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[Pg 306]</a></span></p> + +<p>"No," he replied thoughtfully, "I have not failed to win love. But does +love bring with it untouched felicity; that is what I ask." He +hesitated. "I will not attempt to describe her. I really could not, you +know, except in a feeble way, by saying that even to other eyes than +mine she is a woman more wonderful than any of my sisters, if that is at +all possible. We loved at first sight. I had run down for a Sunday +afternoon to Garden Towers-by-the-Sea, a beautiful suburb which a number +of enterprising citizens had built up out of a sand waste to meet the +needs of the tired urban worker who, in his expensive and uncomfortable +city flat, finds himself longing for the life-giving breeze of the ocean +and the sight of a bit of God's open country. I was walking down the +main street of the village, wearing the loosely shaped and well-padded +garments that were then popular with young men, and carrying<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[Pg 307]</a></span> a set of +golf-sticks in my right hand and a bull terrier under my arm. Then I saw +her. She was sitting on the porch of the house which her father had +purchased for one-third of what its value became when the completion of +extensive rapid-transit improvements brought it within thirty-five +minutes of the New York City Hall. We loved and told each other. My +father, at first, insisted that before assuming the responsibilities of +marriage a man should be in receipt of a larger independent income than +I could boast of. But when Alice pleaded that she could be of help by +raising high-grade poultry for the urban market and organising +subscribers' clubs for the magazines, my father yielded. We are to be +married in two months, sir."</p> + +<p>Harding spoke up impatiently. "Still I fail to see where your +unhappiness lies."</p> + +<p>"Did I say unhappiness? That is not at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[Pg 308]</a></span> all the word, sir. It is rather +a sense of awe that seizes us both at times, when we are together, as +though we were in the presence of unseen influences; as though, rather, +a world not our own were projecting itself into our well-defined lives. +I have shown you that Alice and I belong to a very real, very +matter-of-fact world. But there are times when we seem to be walking in +a land of strange sounds and sights and of shadows that fan our cheeks +as they flit by."</p> + +<p>"Oh, well," I said, "when two fond young people are together the limits +of the visible world are apt to undergo undue extension."</p> + +<p>"Let me be specific," said Pinckney. "We first became aware of this +state of things some weeks ago. We were walking one afternoon at +twilight through a stretch of woods not far from the shore when all at +once we were conscious that the familiar aspect of things had van<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[Pg 309]</a></span>ished. +The park had become a virgin forest. Two savage figures girded with +skins were panting in deadly combat. One had sunk his thumbs into the +eye-sockets of his opponent, who, in turn, had buried his teeth in the +flesh of the other's arm. A wild creature, almost hidden in the long +tangle of her hair, crouched there, the only spectator of the battle, +chanting in weird tones: 'Ai! Ai! the call of the wild summons you to +the death-grapple, oh Men, and me to sing who am Woman! Fight on, oh +Men; for it is Good! The Race, the Sons of your strong loins through the +dizzy whirl-dance of all time, are watching you. Match man-strength +against man-strength, breath-rhythm against breath-rhythm, and +knee-thrust against knee-thrust!' And then one of the combatants fell, +and the victor with a yell of triumph seized the woman by the hair and, +flinging her over his shoulder, staggered off,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[Pg 310]</a></span> and we heard them call +to each other, 'Oh, my Male!' 'Oh, my Female!' Then we were in our own +grove by the beach and Alice whispered dreamily, 'Dearest, how tame are +our lives.'"</p> + +<p>"I think I begin to understand," said I. "What happened was simply that +you had walked right out of the Advertising Supplement into the Fiction +pages; and that was Jack London. Had you other experiences of the kind?"</p> + +<p>"On another occasion," he resumed, "we were walking on the beach and +again in a flash we had lost our footing in the world we knew. We were +in a magnificent ballroom. The chandeliers were Venetian, the orchestra +was Hungarian, the decorations were priceless orchids. Every woman wore +a tiara with chains of pearls. There were stout dowagers, callow youths, +gamblers, and blacklegs, and, among<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[Pg 311]</a></span> the many handsome men, one of about +five-and-thirty, with a wonderfully cut chin, bending sedulously over a +glorious, slender girl whose eyes attested the purity of her soul and +fidelity unto death. 'Dearest,' she was saying, 'what does it matter +that my father was the greatest Greek scholar in America and my mother +the most beautiful woman south of Mason and Dixon's line? What that I +have ten million dollars and can ride, shoot, swim, golf, tennis, dance, +sing, compose, cook, and interpret the Irish sagas? I love you though +you have only twelve thousand a year.' And all over the hall we caught +such phrases as, 'Yes, he dropped 25,000 on Non Sequitur at Bennings.' +'Oh, just down for three weeks at Palm Beach, you know.' 'Two millions +in three weeks, they say, mostly out of Copper and Q.C.B.' 'Yes, just +back from South Dakota on the best of terms.' Then the room vanished, we +were by the sea,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[Pg 312]</a></span> and Alice said wistfully, 'How limited our lives are, +dear.'"</p> + +<p>I said: "My theory holds good. That was Robert Chambers, I am sure. Go +on."</p> + +<p>"I have told you enough," said Pinckney, "to show what I mean by the +shadow over our happiness. It will pass away, of course. In the meantime +I try to explain to Alice that these are phantoms we vision, of no +relation to the practical life that we must lead on our side of the +boundary line; I tell her that these things we see are not, and never +have been and never will be. Am I right, do you think, sir?"</p> + +<p>"Quite right," I told him.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[Pg 313]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXXI" id="XXXI"></a>XXXI</h2> + +<h3>THE COMPLETE COLLECTOR—IV</h3> + + +<p>"My latest fad," said Cooper, "is this little library of the greatest +names in literature. It is by no means complete, but the nucleus is +there."</p> + +<p>When Cooper speaks of his fads he does himself injustice. The world +might think them fads, or worse. But I, who know the man, know that his +fondness for the insignificant or the extraordinary is something more +than eccentricity, something more than a collector's appetite run amuck. +In reality, Cooper's soul goes out to the worthless objects he +frequently brings together into odd little museums. He loves them +precisely because they are insignificant. His whole life has been a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[Pg 314]</a></span> +silent protest against the arrogance of success, of high merit, of rare +value. His heart is always on the side of the <i>Untermensch</i>, a name +given by the Germans, a learned people, to what we call the under-dog.</p> + +<p>"My collection," said Cooper, "is as yet confined almost entirely to +authors in the English language. Here is my Shakespeare, a first +edition, I believe, though undated. The year, I presume, was about 1875. +The title, you see, is comprehensive: 'The Nature of Evaporating +Inflammations in Arteries After Ligature, Accupressure, and Torsion.' +Edward O. Shakespeare, who wrote the book, is not a debated personality. +His authorship of the book is unquestioned, and I assure you it is a +comfort to handle a text which you know left its author's mind exactly +as it now confronts you in the page.</p> + +<p>"Next to the Shakespeare you find my Dickens <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[Pg 315]</a></span> volumes, two in number. +Albert Dickens published, in 1904, his 'Tests of Forest Trees.' It has +been praised in authoritative quarters as an excellent work of its kind. +An older book is 'Dickens's Continental A B C,' a railway guide which I +am fond of thinking of as the probable instrument of a vast amount of +human happiness. Imagine the happy meetings and reunions which this +chubby little book has made possible—husbands and wives, fathers and +children, lovers, who from the most distant corners of the earth have +sought and found each other by means of the Dickens railway time-tables. +To how many beds of illness has it brought a comforter, to how many +habitations of despair—but I must not preach. I call your attention to +the next volume, Byron. From the title, 'A Handbook of Lake Minnetonka,' +you will perceive that it is in the same class as my Dickens."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[Pg 316]</a></span></p> + +<p>Cooper drew his handkerchief to flip the dust from a thin octavo in +sheepskin. "This Emerson," he said, "is the earliest in date of my +Americana. William Emerson's 'A Sermon on the Decease of the Rev. Peter +Thacher' appeared in 1802, at a time when people still thought it worth +while to utilise the death of a good man by putting him into a book for +the edification of the living. The adjoining two volumes are by Spencer. +Charles E. Spencer's 'Rue, Thyme, and Myrtle' is a sheaf of dainty +poetry which was very popular in Philadelphia during the second decade +after the Civil War. Do we still write poetry as single-heartedly as +people did? It may be. Perhaps we might find out by comparing this other +volume by Edwin Spencer, 'Cakes and Ale,' published in 1897, with the +Philadelphia Spencer of forty years ago.</p> + +<p>"I must hurry you through the rest of my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[Pg 317]</a></span> books," said Cooper. "Thomas +James Thackeray's 'The Soldier's Manual of Rifle-Firing' appeared in +1858, and undoubtedly had its day of usefulness. Thomas Kipling was +professor of divinity at Cambridge University toward the end of the +eighteenth century. In 1793 he edited the volume I now hold in my hand, +'Codex Bezæ,' one of the most precious of our extant MSS. of the New +Testament. I like to think of that fine old Cambridge professor's name +as bound up with patient, self-effacing scholarship and a highly +developed spirituality. But I digress. Cast your eye over this little +group of foreign writers. Here is Dumas,—Jean Baptiste Dumas,—whose +'Leçons sur la philosophic chimique,' delivered in 1835, were considered +worthy of being published thirty years later. The quaint volume that +comes next is by Du Maurier, who was French ambassador to the Hague +about 1620. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[Pg 318]</a></span> title, in the Dutch, is 'Propositie gedan door den +Heere van Maurier,' etc.—'Propositions Advanced by the Sieur du +Maurier,' one of the Regent's able and merry-hearted diplomats, I take +it. And here is Goethe; he would repay your reading. Rudolf Goethe's +'Mitteilungen ueber Obst- und Gartenbau' is one of the standard works on +horticulture.</p> + +<p>"And finally," said Cooper with a flash of pride quite unusual in him, +"the treasure of my little library—Homer; again a first edition."</p> + +<p>"Homer!" I cried. "An <i>editio princeps</i>!"</p> + +<p>"Nearly one hundred and fifty years old," he said. "The Rev. Henry Homer +deserved well of his British countrymen when he gave to the world—it +was in 1767—his 'Inquiry Into the Measures of Preserving and Improving +the Publick Roads of this Kingdom.'"</p> + +<p>Cooper sat down and eyed me doubtfully, as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[Pg 319]</a></span> if awaiting an unfavourable +opinion. His face quite lit up when I hastened to assure him that his +library was one of the most impressive collections it had ever been my +good fortune to know.</p> + +<p>"Very few collections," I told him, "bear the impress of a personality. +As a rule they are shopfuls of costly masterpieces such as any +multi-millionaire may have if he doesn't prefer horses or monkey +dinners. But how often does one find a treasure-house like yours, +Cooper, revealing an exquisitely discriminating taste in co-operation +with the bold originality of the true amateur?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[Pg 320]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXXII" id="XXXII"></a>XXXII</h2> + +<h3>CHOPIN'S SUCCESSORS</h3> + + +<p>"It is his own composition, the final word in modern music," I had been +told. "He does not merely play the concerto; he lives it. Be sure to +watch his face." It was not a very impressive face as artists go. It was +rather heavy, rather sullen, and seemingly incapable of mirroring more +than the elementary passions. The great pianist entered the hall almost +unwillingly, and wound his way among the musicians with consummate +indifference to the roar of applause that greeted him. You might have +said that he was once more a little boy being scourged to his piano day +after day by parents who had been told that they had brought forth a +genius. He half-dropped into<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[Pg 321]</a></span> his seat, glanced wearily about him, then +let his eyes sink expressionless on the keyboard and his hands fall flat +on his knees, nerveless, heavy, apathetic.</p> + +<p>The orchestra leader poised his baton and the two-score strings under +his command swung into a noble andante. The artist at the piano slowly +raised his eyes to a level with the top of his instrument, his lips just +parted as if in halting wonder at something he alone in the great hall +could see, the hands made as if to lift themselves from his knees. "Look +at his face," my neighbour said. I looked and saw that the dull mask was +slightly changing, that some emotion at last was rising to the surface +of that stolid countenance, striking its cloudy aspect with the first +anticipations of breaking light. Would that cloud dissolve? Would the +light completely break and irradiate player, piano, and audience, all +equally keyed up to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">[Pg 322]</a></span> the delayed climax? Would those massive hands rise +slowly, slowly, and hanging aloft an instant crash down in a rage of +harmony upon keyboard and auditors' hearts? No. The clouds once more +swept over that massive face. The player moistened his lips with his +tongue, half-turned on his chair, and slowly swept the hall with an +indifferent, almost a disdainful eye. Then he sank into his former +lassitude. His hands dropped to his side without striking the keys. +Evidently the time had not come. The violins in the orchestra sang on.</p> + +<p>My neighbour was not the only one to fall under the spell of such +masterly musicianship. Twenty-four ladies in the parquette shrank back +into their seats with a half-sob of brimming emotion, and implored their +escorts to look at the artist's face. Eleven ladies in the lower boxes +interrupted their conversation to remark that it was wonderful what soul +those<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">[Pg 323]</a></span> Slavs managed to put into their playing. In the upper balconies +listeners strained forward in their seats so that from below it seemed +as if they were about to precipitate themselves over the railings. What +expert opinion had described as the sublimest ten minutes in the great +pianist's greatest concerto had just begun. The conductor slightly +raised himself on his toes. Instantly through the weaving of the violins +the voices of the wood instruments began to break out. The contest +between the two came quickly to its climax. The strings were forced back +and back, wailing an ineffective protest against the shrilling advance +of the woods. A solitary 'cello made dogged resistance, knowing its +cause hopeless, but determined to sell life as dearly as possible. But +the 'cello, too, went down and for a bar or two the flutes and oboes +sang a pæan of victory. Too soon. Upon them, like a tidal wave, swept<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[Pg 324]</a></span> +down a hurricane of brasses and shook the hall with its resonant +thunders.</p> + +<p>That was the moment our artist at the piano had been waiting for. His +heavy figure straightened up; it seemed to swell to monstrous +proportions, forcing orchestra and leader out of the vision and +consciousness of his listeners. His face now was all eloquence. A divine +wrath almost made his eyes blaze as he prepared to hurl himself at the +silent, yet quivering instrument. His huge hands hovered over the +keyboard ready to fall and destroy. His eyes ran over the keys as if +searching for the vulnerable, for the vital spot. Back and forth his +eyes ran, and his outstretched fingers kept pace with them in the air. +But those fingers could find no resting-place. Still the piano remained +silent. And then came the inevitable reaction. Such passion could not +last without crushing player and audience alike. Seven ladies in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">[Pg 325]</a></span> +parquette were grasping the arms of their chairs, and three women in the +upper balcony had seized the arms of their escorts, as the brasses +crashed once and died out. The flutes for an instant reappeared, to make +way in turn for the violins, which now began timidly to peep out from +their hiding-places. They grew bolder; they joined hands, and once more +their insistent story quivered and sang throughout the house. And as +they sang, the player at the piano, exhausted by his supreme effort, +sank more and more into his indifferent former self. His form collapsed, +the fire in his eyes died out, and the powerful hands wearily drooped +and drooped till they rested once more on the player's knees. A sigh of +relief swept over the hall. Human emotion could stand no more. The +audience could hardly wait for the last throb of the violins, to break +out in rapturous applause. The master rose, bowed sorrowfully<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_326" id="Page_326">[Pg 326]</a></span> towards +nobody in particular, and walked off.</p> + +<p>"Did you watch his face?" asked my neighbour. "Have you ever come across +such utterly overpowering individuality? I have played for fifteen +years, but if I played for fifty years I could never even approach art +like this."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">[Pg 327]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXXIII" id="XXXIII"></a>XXXIII</h2> + +<h3>THE IRREPRESSIBLE CONFLICT</h3> + + +<p>"The arguments for and against woman suffrage," said Harding, "seem to +me very evenly balanced. I agree with Dr. Biddle of the Society for the +Promotion of Beautiful Manners, that it is unseemly for a woman to climb +a truck and demand the ballot. Dr. Biddle maintains that if woman wants +the ballot she should wait until every one is asleep and then go through +somebody's pockets for it. Woman, Dr. Biddle thinks, has her own +peculiar sphere, which, as the latest Census figures show, includes the +nursery, the kitchen, the vaudeville stage, college teaching, +stenography, the law, medicine, the ministry, as well as the manufacture +of agricultural implements, ammunition, artificial<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_328" id="Page_328">[Pg 328]</a></span> feathers and limbs, +automobiles, axle-grease, boots and shoes, bread-knives, brooms, +brushes, buttons, carriages and wagons, charcoal, cheese, cigars, +clocks, clothing and so on to x, y, and z.</p> + +<p>"Can anything be more fatal to our ideals of true womanliness, Dr. +Biddle asks, than a suffragette who throws stones? In reply to this, +Miss Annabelle Bloodthurst asserts that if we count the number of +successful suffragette hits woman is never so true to her sex as when +she is heaving bricks at a British prime minister.</p> + +<p>"Professor Tumbler lays particular stress on the outrageous conduct of +the English suffragettes. He recalls how the Secretary for Foreign +Affairs, while eating a charlotte russe, felt his teeth strike against a +hard object, which turned out to be a cardboard cylinder inscribed +'Votes for Women.' The chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster was about to +light his after-dinner cigar the other day when the cigar<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[Pg 329]</a></span> suddenly +expanded into a paper fan bearing the legend, 'Tyrants, beware!' The +newest Dreadnought with the First Lord of the Admiralty on board was +preparing to set out on her trial trip when it was discovered that the +boilers were not making steam. When the furnace doors were opened two +dozen suffragettes, concealed within, began to shout, 'We want votes!' +The leader of the Opposition is known to have walked all the way down +Piccadilly with a tag tied to his coattails inscribed: 'I see no reason +for bestowing the suffrage on women.'</p> + +<p>"But perhaps the most dastardly outrage occurred at the baptism of the +youngest child of a prominent treasury official. It seems that the +nurse, who was a suffragette in disguise, had removed the child, a girl, +and substituted a mechanical doll, with a phonographic attachment. The +clergyman was in the middle of his discourse when the doll began to +scream, 'Votes<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">[Pg 330]</a></span> for women.' The father gasped, 'What! So early?' and +fainted.</p> + +<p>"The more you weigh the reasons pro and con," continued Harding, as he +lit one of my cigars, "the harder it is to decide. Mrs. Cadgers has +pointed out that under our present system the wife of a college +professor is not allowed to vote, whereas an illiterate Greek fruit +peddler may. But Mr. Rattler replies that the college professor, too, +seldom votes, and if he does he spoils his ballot by trying to split his +ticket. Why, demands Mrs. Cadgers, should women who pay taxes be refused +a voice in the management of public affairs? Because, replies Mr. +Rattler, the suffrage and taxes do not necessarily go together. In our +country at the present day many millionaires who regularly cast their +votes never pay their taxes.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Rattler is particularly afraid that woman suffrage will break up +the family.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">[Pg 331]</a></span> 'Imagine,' he says, 'a family in which the husband is a +Democrat and the wife a Cannon Republican. Imagine them constantly +fighting out the subject of tariff revision over the supper-table, and +conceive the dreadful effect on the children, who at present are +accustomed to see father light his cigar after supper and fall asleep. +Or suppose the wife develops a passion for political meetings. That +means that the husband will have to stay at home with the baby.' 'Well,' +replies Mrs. Cadgers, 'such an arrangement has its advantages. It would +not only give the wife a chance to learn the meaning of citizenship, but +it would give the husband a chance to get acquainted with the baby.' And +besides, Mrs. Cadgers goes on to argue, a woman's political duties need +not take up more than a small fraction of her time. That, retorts Mr. +Rattler, with a sneer, is because woman derives her ideas on the subject +from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">[Pg 332]</a></span> seeing her husband fulfil his duties as a citizen once every two +years when he forgets to register.</p> + +<p>"An excellent debate on the subject was the one between Mrs. Excelsior, +who spoke in favour of the ballot for women, and Professor Van Doodle, +who upheld the negative. Professor Van Doodle maintained that women are +incapable of taking a genuine interest in public affairs. What is it +that appeals to a woman when she reads a newspaper? A Presidential +election may be impending, a great war is raging in the Far East, an +explorer has just returned from the South Pole, and, woman, picking up +the Sunday paper, plunges straight into the fashion columns! She hardly +finds time to answer her husband's petulant inquiry as to what she has +done with the comic supplement. Can woman take an impersonal view of +things? No, says Professor Van Doodle. In a critical Presidential +election, one in which the fate of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">[Pg 333]</a></span> the country is at stake, she will +vote for the candidate from whom she thinks she can get most for her +husband and her children, whereas, her husband under the same +circumstances will cast aside all personal interests and vote the same +ticket his father voted for. Woman, concluded the professor, is +constitutionally incapable of distinguishing between right and wrong, +between truth and falsehood.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Excelsior made a spirited defence. She showed that woman's +undeveloped sense of what truth and honesty are, would not handicap her +in the pursuit of practical politics. She argued that the complicated +problems of municipal finance are no easier for the man who sets out to +raise a family on fifteen dollars a week than for the woman who succeeds +in doing so. She declared that a person who can travel thirty miles by +subway and surface car, price $500 worth of dressgoods, and buy her +lunch, all on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">[Pg 334]</a></span> fifteen cents in cash and a transfer ticket, would make a +good comptroller for New York City.</p> + +<p>"Professor Van Doodle claimed that under woman suffrage only a +good-looking candidate would stand a chance of being elected. Mrs. +Excelsior replied that there was no reason for believing that women +would be more particular in choosing a State Senator than in selecting a +husband. The professor was foolish when he asserted that if women went +to the polls they would vote for the aldermen and the sheriffs, and +would forget to vote for the President of the United States, and would +insist on doing so in a postscript. This was of a piece with the other +ancient jest that women are sure to vote for a Democrat when at heart +they prefer a Republican, and <i>vice versa</i>.</p> + +<p>"The whole case," concluded Harding, "was summed up by the Rev. Dr. +Hollow when he said<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">[Pg 335]</a></span> that in theory there is no objection to the present +arrangement by which man rules the earth through his reason, and woman +rules man through his stomach; but unfortunately, the human reason and +the average man's stomach are apt to get out of order."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">[Pg 336]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXXIV" id="XXXIV"></a>XXXIV</h2> + +<h3>THE GERMS OF CULTURE</h3> + + +<p>In my afternoon paper there was a letter by Veritas who tried to prove +something about the Trusts by quoting from the third volume of +Macaulay's history. After dinner I took the book from the shelf and as I +struck it against the table to let the dust fly up, I thought of what +Mrs. Harrington said. The Harringtons had spent an evening with me. As +they rose to go Mrs. Harrington ran the tip of her gloved finger across +half a dozen dingy volumes and sniffed. "Why don't you put glass doors +on your bookshelves?" she asked. It was a raw point with me and she knew +it. "The pretty kind, perhaps," I sneered, "with leaded panes and an +antique iron lock?" "Exactly,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">[Pg 337]</a></span> she replied. "The dust here is +abominable. You must be just steeped in all sorts of infection; and +perhaps if you kept your books under lock and key people wouldn't run +away with them." I was a fool to have tried irony upon Mrs. Harrington. +Her outlook upon life is literal and domestic. Books are to her +primarily part of a scheme of interior decoration. Harrington's views +come closer to my own, but Harrington is an indulgent husband.</p> + +<p>The incident was now a week old, but something of the original fury came +back to me. It was exasperating that the world should be so afraid of +dust in the only place where dust has meaning and beauty. People who +will go abroad in motor cars and veneer themselves with the germ-laden +dust of the highway, find it impossible to endure the silent deposit of +the years on the covers of an old book. And the dust of the gutter that +is swept up by trailing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">[Pg 338]</a></span> skirts? And the dust of soggy theatre-chairs? +And the dust of old beliefs in which we live, my friend? And the dust +that statesmen and prophets are always throwing into our eyes? None of +these interfere with Mrs. Harrington's peace of mind. But when it comes +to the dust on the gilt tops of my red-buckrammed Molière she fears +infection.</p> + +<p>And yet Harrington is a man of exceptional intelligence. He would agree +with me that infection from book-dust is not an ignoble form of death. I +sit there and plot obituaries. "Mr. H. Wellington Jones," says the +<i>Evening Star</i>, "died yesterday afternoon from ptomaine poisoning, after +a very brief illness. Friday night he was with a merry group of diners +in one of our best-known and most brilliantly lighted Broadway +restaurants. He partook heartily of lobster salad, of which, his closest +friends declare, he was inordinately fond. Almost immediately<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">[Pg 339]</a></span> he +complained of being ill and was taken home in a taxicab." If I were H. +Wellington Jones and it were my fate to die of poison I could frame a +nobler end for myself. "Mr. H. Wellington Jones," I would have it read, +"died yesterday of some mysterious form of bacterial poisoning +contracted while turning over the pages of an old family Bible which he +was accustomed to consult at frequent intervals. Mr. Smith had a cut +finger which was not quite healed and it is supposed that a dust-speck +from the pages of the old book must have entered the wound and induced +sepsis. He was found unconscious in his chair with the book open at the +thirtieth chapter of Proverbs." Yes, I sometimes find it hard to +understand what Harrington, a man of really fine sensibilities, sees in +Mrs. Harrington. The very suggestion of locking up books to prevent +their being carried away hurts like the screech of a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">[Pg 340]</a></span> pencil upon a +slate. I think of Mrs. Harrington and then I think of Cooper. Cooper's +shelves are continuously being denuded by his friends. But if you think +of Cooper as a helpless victim you are sadly mistaken. There is an +elaborate scheme behind it all, a scheme of such transcendent ingenuity +as only simple-hearted, sweet-natured, unpractised, purblind visionaries +like Cooper are capable of.</p> + +<p>He let me into the secret one day when he saw that I was about to find +it out for myself. "I know very many dear people," he said, "who are too +busy to read books or too little in the habit of it. You know them, too; +they are men and women in whom the pulse of life beats too rapidly for +the calm pleasures of reading. They are not insensible to fine ideas, +but they must see these ideas in concrete form. If I, for instance, wish +to know something about Spain, I get one of Martin Hume's books, but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">[Pg 341]</a></span> +these people take a steamer and go to Spain. I have read everything of +Meredith's and they have read almost nothing, but they saw Meredith in +London and spent a week-end with him at a country-house in Sussex. I +avoid celebrities in the flesh. I don't want to minister to them and I +want still less to patronise them. I am afraid I should be disappointed +in them and I am sure they would be disappointed in me.</p> + +<p>"However, that's not the point," says Cooper. "The problem is to make a +man read who won't read of his own accord. I do it by asking such a man +to dinner. I pull out a volume of Marriott's and remark, without +emphasis, that after infinite exertion I have just got it back from +Woolsey, who is wild over the book. The fires of envy and acquisition +flash in my visitor's eye. Might he have the book for a day or two? Yes, +I say after some hesitation,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_342" id="Page_342">[Pg 342]</a></span> but he must promise to bring it back. He +grows fervent. Of course he will bring it back, by Saturday at the very +latest and in person. And he is my man from that moment. I have lost the +book, of course, but I have smuggled my troops within the fort, I have +laid the train, I have transmitted the infection. The serpent is in the +garden. Time will do the work." The allusion was to Cooper's bookplate, +a red serpent about a golden staff.</p> + +<p>"Not that I leave it altogether to time," says Cooper. "Once I have +handed over the book to Hobson, I make it a point to call on him at +least once a week. Do you see why? Left to himself, Hobson might soon +outlive the first flush of his enthusiasm for that book. But if Hobson +expects me to drop in at any moment, he is afraid I may find the book on +his library table and ask him whether he has read it. So he hides the +book in his bedroom. Then<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_343" id="Page_343">[Pg 343]</a></span> he is indeed mine. Some night he will be out +of sorts and find it hard to go to sleep. His eye will fall on the book +lying there on his table, and he will pick it up, at the same time +lighting a cigar. I shall never see that book again. But, I leave it to +you, who needs that book more, I or Hobson?"</p> + +<p>But Cooper did not tell all. I know he has made use of shrewder tactics. +Ask any one of his acquaintances why Cooper is never seen without a +half-dozen magazines under his arm, an odd volume or two of French +criticism, and a couple of operatic scores. They will reply that it is +just Cooper's way. It goes with his black slouch hat, his badly-creased +trousers, his flowing cravat, and his general air of pre-Raphaelite +ineptitude. It goes with his comprehensive ignorance of present-day +politics and science, and everything else in the present that +well-informed people are supposed to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_344" id="Page_344">[Pg 344]</a></span> know. It goes with his total +inability to be on time for dinners, and his habit of getting lost in +the subway. But Cooper is not as often in the clouds as some imagine.</p> + +<p>How many of Cooper's friends, for example, have ever found peculiar +significance in his talent for forgetting things in other people's +houses? Beneath that apparently characteristic trait there is a +Machiavellian motive which I alone have found out. Hobson, let us say, +has been taking dinner with Cooper, who gently pulls a copy of "Monna +Vanna" from the shelf. Hobson does not rise to the bait. He may have +heard that Maeterlinck is a "highbrow" and it frightens him. Or Hobson +may not be going home that night, or he may object to carrying a parcel +in the subway, or for any other reason he will omit to take the book +with him. "The next day," says Cooper, "I pay Hobson a return visit, and +forget the book on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_345" id="Page_345">[Pg 345]</a></span> his hall-table. Frequently Hobson may be too busy to +take notice of the accident. In that case I call him up on the telephone +as soon as I leave his house and ask in great agitation whether by any +chance I have left a volume of Maeterlinck on his hall-table. Sometimes +I add that Woolsey has been after that volume for weeks. That night, I +feel sure, Hobson will carry the book up to his bedroom."</p> + +<p>And as Cooper spoke I thought of the Smith family, whom, by methods like +those I have described, Cooper succeeded in saving from themselves. +Nerves in the Smith family were badly rasped. The mother was not making +great headway in her social campaigns. Her husband chafed at his +children's idleness and extravagance. The children went in sullen +fashion about their own business. They had no resources of their own. +There was gloom in that household and stifled rancour, and the danger<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_346" id="Page_346">[Pg 346]</a></span> +of worse things to come, until the day when Cooper called and forgot at +one blow a copy of "Richard Feverel," the "Bab Ballads," and the third +volume of Ferrero's "Rome."</p> + +<p>As I have said, Cooper was not blind to the good he was doing. False +modesty was not one of his failings. He would continually have me admire +his bookshelves. The books he was proudest of were those he had lent or +given away.... "I have a larger number of books missing," he would +boast, "than any man of my acquaintance. This big hole here is my +Gibbon. I sent it to an interesting old chap I met at a public dinner +some years ago. He was a prosperous hardware merchant, self-made, and, +like all self-made men, a bit unfinished. He had read very little. I +don't recall how I happened to mention Gibbon or to send him the set. I +think I may have forgotten the first volume at his office the next +morning. He devoured<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_347" id="Page_347">[Pg 347]</a></span> Gibbon. From him he went to Tacitus. He has since +read hundreds of books on the Roman empire and he has other hundreds of +volumes waiting to be read. But somehow he has never thought of sending +me back my shabby old Gibbon. And that was the way with my +Montaigne—gone. And here were two editions of Gulliver. I lent one to a +nephew of the Harringtons and the other to a rather prim young lady from +Boston who impressed me as having had too much Emerson. My Shelley is +gone. My 'Rousseau's Confessions' is also gone." And Cooper smiled at me +beatifically.</p> + +<p>That was Cooper. But Mrs. Harrington that night saw things in quite a +different light. She grumbled and sniffed, and finally grew vehement. I +am not a saint like Cooper, but here and there my shelves, too, show the +visitations of friends. "Not a single complete set," wailed Mrs. +Harrington, "everything<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_348" id="Page_348">[Pg 348]</a></span> lugged away by people who should be taught to +know better. Browning, volumes I, II, V, and VII—four volumes gone. +Middlemarch, volume II, first volume gone. Morley's Gladstone, volumes I +and III, one volume gone. I wager you don't even know who has the second +volume of your Gladstone. Do you, now?"</p> + +<p>To tell the truth, I did not for the moment know. And as I hesitated she +thrust one of the volumes in triumph at me and mechanically I opened the +book and saw a red serpent about a golden staff. "I remember now," I +told Mrs. Harrington. "I'll get the second volume the next time I call +on Cooper."</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PATIENT OBSERVER***</p> +<p>******* This file should be named 19359-h.txt or 19359-h.zip *******</p> +<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br /> +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/9/3/5/19359">http://www.gutenberg.org/1/9/3/5/19359</a></p> +<p>Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed.</p> + +<p>Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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For +example an eBook of filename 10234 would be found at: + +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/0/2/3/10234 + +or filename 24689 would be found at: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/4/6/8/24689 + +An alternative method of locating eBooks: +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/GUTINDEX.ALL">http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/GUTINDEX.ALL</a> + +*** END: FULL LICENSE *** +</pre> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/19359-h/images/coe.jpg b/19359-h/images/coe.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..1bb2476 --- /dev/null +++ b/19359-h/images/coe.jpg diff --git a/19359.txt b/19359.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b9dedb4 --- /dev/null +++ b/19359.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5514 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Patient Observer, by Simeon Strunsky + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Patient Observer + And His Friends + + +Author: Simeon Strunsky + + + +Release Date: September 22, 2006 [eBook #19359] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PATIENT OBSERVER*** + + +E-text prepared by Stacy Brown and the Project Gutenberg Online +Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net/) from page images +generously made available by Internet Archive/American Libraries +(http://www.archive.org/details/americana) + + + +Note: Images of the original pages are available through + Internet Archive/American Libraries. See + http://www.archive.org/details/patientobserver00strurich + + + + + +THE PATIENT OBSERVER + +And His Friends + +by + +SIMEON STRUNSKY + + + + + + + +New York +Dodd, Mead and Company +1911 +Copyright, 1910, by The Evening Post Company +Copyright, 1910, by P. F. Collier & Son +Copyright, 1910, by Harper & Brothers +Copyright, 1910, by The Atlantic Monthly Co. +Copyright, 1911, by Dodd, Mead and Company + + + + +To + +_M. G. S._ + + + + +CONTENTS + + +I Cowards Page 1 + +II The Church Universal 10 + +III The Doctors 19 + +IV Interrogation 29 + +V The Mind Triumphant 37 + +VI On Calling White Black 45 + +VII The Solid Flesh 57 + +VIII Some Newspaper Traits 67 + +IX A Fledgling 80 + +X The Complete Collector--I 92 + +XI The Everlasting Feminine 100 + +XII The Fantastic Toe 111 + +XIII On Living in Brooklyn 119 + +XIV Palladino Outdone 130 + +XV The Cadence of the Crowd 138 + +XVI What We Forget 147 + +XVII The Children That Lead Us 159 + +XVIII The Martians 179 + +XIX The Complete Collector--II 189 + +XX When a Friend Marries 198 + +XXI The Perfect Union of the Arts 209 + +XXII An Eminent American 216 + +XXIII Behind the Times 227 + +XXIV Public Liars 238 + +XXV The Complete Collector--III 249 + +XXVI The Commuter 257 + +XXVII Headlines 270 + +XXVIII Usage 278 + +XXIX 60 H.P. 285 + +XXX The Sample Life 296 + +XXXI The Complete Collector--IV 313 + +XXXII Chopin's Successors 320 + +XXXIII The Irrepressible Conflict 327 + +XXXIV The Germs of Culture 336 + + + + +NOTE + + +Of the papers that go to make up the present volume, the greater number +were published as a series in the columns of the New York _Evening Post_ +for 1910, under the general title of The Patient Observer. For the +eminently laudable purpose of making a fairly thick book, the Patient +Observer's frequently recurrent "I," "me," and "mine" have now been +supplemented with the experiences and reflections of his friends +Harrington, Cooper, and Harding as recorded on other occasions in the +New York _Evening Post_, as well as in the _Atlantic Monthly_, the +_Bookman_, _Collier's_, and _Harper's Weekly_. + + + + +I + +COWARDS + + +It was Harrington who brought forward the topic that men take up in +their most cheerful moments. I mean, of course, the subject of death. +Harrington quoted a great scientist as saying that death is the one +great fear that, consciously or not, always hovers over us. But the five +men who were at table with Harrington that night immediately and sharply +disagreed with him. + +Harding was the first to protest. He said the belief that all men are +afraid of death is just as false as the belief that all women are afraid +of mice. It is not the big facts that humanity is afraid of, but the +little things. For himself, he could honestly say that he was not +afraid of death. He defied it every morning when he ran for his train, +although he knew that he thereby weakened his heart. He defied it when +he smoked too much and read too late at night, and refused to take +exercise or to wear rubbers when it rained. All men, he repeated, are +afraid of little things. Personally, what he was most intensely and most +enduringly afraid of was a revolving storm-door. + +Harding confessed that he approaches a revolving door in a state of +absolute terror. To see him falter before the rotating wings, rush +forward, halt, and retreat with knees trembling, is to witness a +shattering spectacle of complete physical disorganisation. Harding said +that he enters a revolving door with no serious hope of coming out +alive. By anticipation he feels his face driven through the glass +partition in front of him, and the crash of the panel behind him upon +his skull. Some day, Harding believed, he would be caught fast in one +of those compartments and stick. Axes and crowbars would be +requisitioned to retrieve his lifeless form. + +Bowman agreed with Harding. His own life, Bowman was inclined to +believe, is typical of most civilised men, in that it is passed in +constant terror of his inferiors. The people whom he hires to serve him +strike fear into Bowman's soul. He is habitually afraid of janitors, +train-guards, elevator-boys, barbers, bootblacks, telephone-girls, and +saleswomen. But his particular dread is of waiters. There have been +times when Bowman thought that to punish poor service and set an example +to others, he would omit the customary tip. But such a resolution, +embraced with the soup, has never lasted beyond the entree. And, as a +matter of fact, Bowman said, such a resolution always spoils his dinner. +As long as he entertains it, he dares not look his man in the eye. He +stirs his coffee with shaking fingers. He is cravenly, horribly afraid. + +Bowman is afraid even of new waiters and of waiters he never expects to +see again. Surely, it must be safe not to tip a waiter one never +expected to see again. "But no," said Bowman, "I should feel his +contemptuous gaze in the marrow of my backbone as I walked out. I could +not keep from shaking, and I should rush from that place in agony, with +the man's derisive laughter ringing in my ears." + +The only one of the company who was not afraid of something concrete, +something tangible, was Williams. Now Williams is notoriously, +hopelessly shy; and when he took up the subject where Bowman had left +it, he poured out his soul with all the fervour and abandon of which +only the shy are capable. Williams was afraid of his own past. It was +not a hideously criminal one, for his life had been that of a bookworm +and recluse. But out of that past Williams would conjure up the +slightest incident--a trifling breach of manners, a mere word out of +place, a moment in which he had lost control of his emotions, and the +memory of it would put him into a cold sweat of horror and shame. + +Years ago, at a small dinner party, Williams had overturned a glass of +water on the table-cloth; and whenever he thinks of that glass of water, +his heart beats furiously, his palate goes dry, and there is a horribly +empty feeling in his stomach. Once, on some similar occasion, Williams +fell into animated talk with a beautiful young woman. He spoke so +rapidly and so well that the rest of the company dropped their chat and +gathered about him. It was five minutes, perhaps, before he was aware of +what was going on. That night Williams walked the streets in an agony +of remorse. The recollection of the incident comes back to him every now +and then, and, whether he is alone at his desk, or in the theatre, or in +a Broadway crowd, he groans with pain. Take away such memories of the +past, Williams told us, and he knew of nothing in life that he is afraid +of. + +Gordon's was quite a different case. The group about the table burst out +laughing when Gordon assured us that above all things else in this world +he is afraid of elephants. He agreed with Bowman that in the latitude of +New York City and under the zooelogic conditions prevailing here, it was +a preposterous fear to entertain. Gordon lives in Harlem, and he +recognises clearly enough that the only elephant-bearing jungle in the +neighbourhood is Central Park, whence an animal would be compelled to +take a Subway train to One Hundred and Twenty-fifth Street, and lie in +wait for him as he came home in the twilight. But irrational or no, +there was the fact. To be quashed into pulp under one of those +girder-like front legs, Gordon felt must be abominable. To make matters +worse, Gordon has a young son who insists on being taken every Sunday +morning to see the animals; and of all attractions in the menagerie, the +child prefers the elephant house. He loves to feed the biggest of the +elephants, and to watch him place pennies in a little wooden box and +register the deposits on a bell. What Gordon suffers at such times, he +told us, can be neither imagined nor described. + +My own story was received with sympathetic attention. I told them that +the one great terror of my life is a certain man who owes me a fairly +large sum of money, borrowed some years ago. Whenever we meet he insists +on recalling the debt and reminding me of how much the favour meant to +him at the time, and how he never ceases to think of it. Meeting him has +become a torture. I do my best to avoid him, and frequently succeed. But +often he will catch sight of me across the street and run over and grasp +me by the hand and inquire after my health in so hearty, so honest a +fashion that I cannot bear to look him in the face. And as he beams on +me and throws his arm over my shoulder, I can only blush and shift from +one foot to the other and stammer out some excuse for hurrying away. +Passers-by stop and admire the man's affection and concern for one who +is evidently some poor devil of a relation from the country. One Sunday +he waylaid me on Riverside Drive and introduced me to his wife as one of +his dearest friends. I mumbled something about its not having rained the +entire week, and his wife, who was a stately person in silks, looked at +me out of a cold eye. Then and there I knew she decided that I was a +person who had something to conceal and probably took advantage of her +husband. + +No; the more I think of it, the more convinced am I that very few men +pass their time in contemplating death, which is the end of all things. +Only those people do it who have nothing else to be afraid of, or who, +like undertakers and bacteriologists, make a living out of it. + + + + +II + +THE CHURCH UNIVERSAL + + +Harding declares that a solid thought before going to bed sets him +dreaming just like a bit of solid food. One night, Harding and I +discussed modern tendencies in the Church. As a result Harding dreamt +that night that he was reading a review in the _Theological Weekly_ of +November 12, 2009. + +"Seldom," wrote the reviewer, "has it been our good fortune to meet with +as perfect a piece of work as James Brown Ducey's 'The American +Clergyman in the Early Twentieth Century.' The book consists of exactly +half a hundred biographies of eminent churchmen; in these fifty brief +sketches is mirrored faithfully the entire religious life, external and +internal, of the American people eighty or ninety years ago. We can do +our readers no better service than to reproduce from Mr. Ducey's pages, +in condensed form, the lives of half a dozen typical clergymen, leaving +the reader to frame his own conception of the magnificent activity which +the Church of that early day brought to the service of religion. + +"The Rev. Pelatiah W. Jenks, who was called to the richest pulpit in New +York in 1912, succeeded within less than three years in building up an +unrivalled system of dancing academies and roller-skating rinks for +young people. Under him the attendance at the Sunday afternoon sparring +exhibitions in the vestry rooms of the church increased from an average +of 54 to an average of 650. In spite of the nominal fee charged for the +use of the congregation's bowling alleys, the income from that source +alone was sufficient to defray the cost of missionary work in all +Africa, south of the Zambesi River. Dr. Jenks's highest ambition was +attained in 1923 when the Onyx Church's football team won the +championship of the Ecclesiastical League of Greater New York. It was in +the same year that Dr. Jenks took the novel step of abandoning services +in St. Basil's Chapel, now situated in a slum district, and substituting +a moving-picture show with vaudeville features. Thereafter the empty +chapel was filled to overcrowding on Sundays. To encourage church +attendance at Sunday morning services, Dr. Jenks established a tipless +barber shop. Two years later, in spite of the murmured protests of the +conservative element in his congregation, he erected one of the finest +Turkish baths in New York City. + +"The Rev. Coningsby Botts, Ph.D., LL.D., D.D., was regarded as the +greatest pulpit orator of his day. His Sunday evening sermons drew +thousands of auditors. Of Dr. Botts's polished sermons, our author gives +a complete list, together with short extracts. We should have to go far +to discover a specimen of richer eloquence than the sermon delivered on +the afternoon of the third Sunday after Epiphany, in the year 1911, on +'Dr. Cook and the Discovery of the North Pole.' On the second Sunday in +Lent, Dr. Botts moved an immense congregation to tears with his sermon, +'Does Radium Cure Cancer?' Trinity Sunday he spoke on 'Zola and His +Place in Literature.' The second Sunday in Advent he discussed 'The +Position of Woman in the Fiji Islands.' We can only pick a subject here +and there out of his other numerous pastoral speeches: 'Is Aviation an +Established Fact?' 'The Influence of Blake Upon Dante Gabriel Rossetti,' +'Dalmatia as a Health Resort,' and 'Amatory Poetry Among the Primitive +Races.' + +"The Rev. Cadwallader Abiel Jones has earned a pre-eminent place in +Church history as the man who did most to endow Pittsburg with a +permanent Opera House. Our author relates how in the winter of 1916, +when the noted impresario Silverman threatened to sell his Opera House +for a horse exchange unless 100 Pittsburg citizens would guarantee +$5,000 each for a season of twenty weeks, Dr. Jones made a +house-to-house canvass in his automobile and went without sleep till the +half-million dollars was pledged. He fell seriously ill of pneumonia, +but recovered in time to be present at the signing of the contract. Dr. +Jones used to assert that there was more moral uplift in a single +performance of the 'Mikado' than in the entire book of Psalms. One of +his notable achievements was a Christmas Eve service consisting of some +magnificent kinetoscope pictures of the Day of Judgment with music by +Richard Strauss. Tradition also ascribes to Dr. Jones a saying that the +two most powerful influences for good in New York City were Miss Mary +Garden and the Eden Musee. But our author thinks the story is +apocryphal. He is rather inclined to believe, from the collocation of +the two names, that we have here a distorted version of the Biblical +creation myth. + +"The Fourteenth Avenue Church of Cleveland, Ohio, under its famous +pastor, the Rev. Henry Marcellus Stokes, exercised a preponderant +influence in city politics from 1917 to 1925. Dr. Stokes was remorseless +in flaying the bosses and their henchmen. At least a dozen candidates +for Congress could trace their defeat directly to the efforts of the +Fourteenth Avenue Church. The successful candidates profited by the +lesson, and, during the three years' fight over tariff revision, from +1919 to 1922, they voted strictly in accordance with telegraphic +instructions from Dr. Stokes. In the fall of 1921 Dr. Stokes's +congregation voted almost unanimously to devote the funds hitherto used +for home mission work to the maintenance of a legislative bureau at the +State capital. The influence of the bureau was plainly perceptible in +the Legislature's favourable action on such measures as the Cleveland +Two-Cent Fare bill and the bill abolishing the bicycle and traffic +squads in all cities with a population of more than 50,000. + +"Our author lays particular stress on the career of the Rev. Dr. Brooks +Powderly of New York, who, at the age of thirty-five, was recognized as +America's leading authority on slum life. Dr. Powderly's numerous books +and magazine articles on the subject speak for themselves. Our author +mentions among others, 'The Bowery From the Inside,' 'At What Age Do +Stevedores Marry?' 'The Relative Consumption of Meat, Pastry, and +Vegetables Among Our Foreign Population,' 'How Soon Does the Average +Immigrant Cast His First Vote?' 'The Proper Lighting for Recreation +Piers,' and, what was perhaps his most popular book, 'Burglar's Tools +and How to Use Them.' + +"In running through the appendix to Mr. Ducey's volume," concludes the +reviewer, "we come across an interesting paragraph headed, 'A Curious +Survival.' It is a reprint of an obituary from the New York _Evening +Post_ of August, 1911, dealing with the minister of a small church far +up in the Bronx, who died at the age of eighty-one, after serving in the +same pulpit for fifty-three years. The _Evening Post_ notice states that +while the Rev. Mr. Smith was quite unknown below the Harlem, he had won +a certain prestige in his own neighbourhood through his old-fashioned +homilies, delivered twice every Sunday in the year, on love, charity, +pure living, clean thinking, early marriage, and the mutual duties of +parents towards their children and of children towards their parents. +'In the Rev. Mr. Smith,' remarks our author, 'we have a striking +vestigial specimen of an almost extinct type.'" + + + + +III + +THE DOCTORS + + +The quarrels of the doctors do not concern me. I have worked out a +classification of my own which holds good for the entire profession. All +doctors, I believe, may be divided into those who go clean-shaven and +those who wear beards. The difference is more than one of appearance. It +is a difference of temperament and conduct. The smooth-faced physician +represents the buoyant, the romantic, what one might almost call the +impressionistic strain in the medical profession. The other is the +conservative, the classicist. My personal likings are all for the newer +type, but I do not mind admitting that if I were very ill indeed, I +should be tempted to send for the physician who wears a Vandyke and +smiles only at long intervals. + +The reason is that when I am really ill I want some one who believes me. +That is something which the clean-shaven doctor seldom does. He is of +the breezy, modern school which maintains that nine patients out of ten +are only the victims of their own imagination. He greets you in a jolly, +brotherly fashion, takes your pulse, and says: "Oh, well, I guess you're +not going to die this trip," and he roars, as if it were the greatest +joke in the world to call up the picture of such dreadful possibilities. +When he prescribes, it is in a half-apologetic, half-quizzical manner, +and almost with a wink, as if he were to say, "This is a game, old man, +but I suppose it's as honest a way of earning one's living as most +ways." While he writes out his directions, he comments: "There is +nothing the matter with you, and you will take this powder three times a +day with your meals. It is just a case of too much tobacco supplemented +by a fertile fancy. Rub your chest with this before you go to bed and +avoid draughts. And what you need is not medicine but the active +agitation for two hours every day of the two legs which the Lord gave +you, and which you now employ exclusively for making your way to and +from the railway station. This is for your digestion, and you can have +it put up in pills or in liquid form, according to taste. And the next +time you feel inclined to call me in, think it over in the course of a +ten-mile walk." + +Now this may be cheering if somewhat mixed treatment, but it has nothing +of that sympathy which the ailing body craves. The case is much worse if +your smooth-faced physician happens to be a personal friend. The +indifference with which such a man will listen to the most pitiful +recital of physical suffering is extraordinary. You may be out on the +golf links together, and he has just made an exceptionally fine iron +shot from a bad lie and in the face of a lively breeze. He is naturally +pleased, and you take courage from the situation. "By the way, Smith," +you say, "I have been feeling rather queer for a day or two. There is a +gnawing sensation right here, and when I stoop----" "That must have been +180 yards," he says, "but not quite on the green. You don't chew your +food enough. Take a glass of hot water before your breakfast--and you +had better try your mashie!" Of course, no one likes to talk shop, +especially on the golf links. Still you think, if you were a physician +and you had a friend who had a gnawing sensation, you would be more +considerate. After the game he lights his cigar and orders you not to +smoke if the pain in your chest is really what you have described it. +"In me," he says, cheerfully, "you get a physician and a horrible +example for one price." + +But there is one thing that this impressionistic school of medicine has +in common with the other kind. Both types are faithful to the funereal +type of waiting-room which is one of the signs of the trade. It is a +room in which all the arts of the undertaker have seemingly been called +upon to bring out the full possibilities of the average New York +brownstone "front-parlour." I have often tried to decide whether, in a +doctor's waiting-room, night or day was more conducive to thoughts of +the grave. At night a lamp flickers dimly in one corner of the long +room, and the shadows only deepen those other shadows which lie on the +ailing spirit. But this same darkness mercifully conceals the long line +of ash-coloured family portraits in gold frames, the ash-coloured carpet +and chandelier, and the hideous aggregation of ash-coloured couches and +chairs which make up the daylight picture. Why doctors' reception rooms +should always so strongly combine the attractiveness of a popular +lunch-room on a rainy day with the quiet domestic atmosphere of a county +jail, I have never been able to find out, unless the object is to reduce +the patient to such a horrible state of depression that the mere summons +to enter the doctor's presence makes one feel very much better already. +There are times when to be told that one has pneumonia or an incipient +case of tuberculosis must be a relief after an hour spent in one of +those dreadful ante-chambers. + +The literature in a physician's waiting-room is not exhilarating. +Usually, there is an extensive collection of periodicals four months old +and over. From this I gather that physicians' wives and daughters are +persistent but somewhat deliberate readers of current literature. The +sense of age about the magazines on a doctor's table is heightened by +the absence of the front and back covers. The only way of ascertaining +the date of publication is to hunt for the table of contents. That, +however, is a task which few able-bodied men in the prime of life are +equal to, not to say a roomful of sick people, nervous with +anticipation. Most patients under such circumstances set out +courageously, but only to lose themselves in the first half-dozen pages +of the advertising section. Yet the result is by no means harmful. There +is something about the advertising agent's buoyant, insinuating, +sympathetic tone that is very restful to the invalid nerves. Harrington +tells me that the small suburban house in which he lives, the paint and +roofing with which he protects it against the weather, the lawn-mower +which he has secured in anticipation of a good crop of grass, and the +small stock of poultry he experiments with, were all acquired through +advertisements read in doctors' waiting-rooms. Some physicians take in +the illustrated weeklies as well as the monthly magazines. In one of the +former I found the other day an excellent panoramic view of the second +inauguration of President McKinley. + +But I am afraid I have wandered somewhat from what I set out to say. I +meant to show how different from your clean-shaven doctor is the +physician of the conventional beard. There is no trifling with him. He +takes himself seriously, and he takes you seriously. His examination is +as thorough as the stethoscope can make it; in fact, he listens to your +heart-action long enough to make you fear the worst. This is in marked +contrast with the smooth-faced doctor, who, as a rule, asks you to show +your tongue, and when you obey he does not look at it, but begins to go +through his mail, whistling cheerfully. He puts such vital questions as, +how far up is your bedroom window at night, and do you ever have a +sense of eye-strain after reading too long, and when you reply, he pays +no attention. His entire attitude expresses the conviction that either +you are not ill at all, or that if you are, you are not in a position to +give an intelligent account of yourself. That is not the case with the +other physician. He asks precise questions and insists on detailed +replies. Nothing escapes him. While you are describing the sensations in +the vicinity of your left lung, he will ask quietly whether you have +always had the habit of biting your nails. + +Under such sympathetic attention the patient's spirits rise. From an +apologetic state of mind he passes to a sense of his own importance. +Instead of being ashamed of his ailments he tries to describe as many as +he can think of. His specific complaint may be a touch of sciatica, but +he takes pleasure in recalling a bad habit of breathing through the +mouth in moments of excitement, and a tricky memory which often leads +him to carry about his wife's letters an entire week before mailing +them. The need for a certain amount of self-castigation is implanted in +all of us, and it is satisfied in the form of confession. Many people do +it as part of their religious beliefs. Others belabour themselves in the +physician's office. Men who in the bosom of the family will deny that +they read too late at night and smoke too many cigars will call such +transgressions to the doctor's attention if he should happen to overlook +them. I know of one man suffering from neuralgia of the arm who insisted +on telling his doctor that it made him ill to read the advertisements in +the subway cars. But the doctor who wears no beard does not invite such +confidences. + + + + +IV + +INTERROGATION + + +One day a census enumerator in the employ of the United States +government knocked at my door and left a printed list of questions for +me to answer. The United States government wished me to state how many +sons and daughters I had and whether my sons were males and my daughters +females. I was further required to state that not only was I of white +descent and that my wife (if I had one) was of white descent, but that +our children (if we had any) were also of white descent. I was also +called upon to state whether any of my sons under the age of five (if I +had any) had ever been in the military or naval service of the United +States, and whether my grandfather (if I had one) was attending school +on September 30 last. There were other questions of a like nature, but +these are all I can recall at present. + +Halfway through the schedule I was in a high state of irritation. The +census enumerator's visit in itself I do not consider a nuisance. Like +most Americans who sniff at the privileges of citizenship, I secretly +delight in them. I speak cynically of boss-rule and demagogues, but I +cast my vote on Election Day in a state of solemn and somewhat nervous +exaltation that frequently interferes with my folding the ballot in the +prescribed way. I have never been summoned for jury duty, but if I ever +should be, I shall accept with pride and in the hope that I shall not be +peremptorily challenged. It needs some such official document as a +census schedule to bring home the feeling that government and state +exist for me and my own welfare. Filling out the answers in the list +was one of the pleasant manifestations of democracy, of which paying +taxes is the unpleasant side. The printed form before me embodied a +solemn function. I was aware that many important problems depended upon +my answering the questions properly. Only then, for instance, could the +government decide how many Congressmen should go to Washington, and what +my share was of the total wealth of the country, and how I contributed +to the drift from the farm to the city, and what was the average income +of Methodist clergymen in cities of over 100,000 population. + +What, then, if so many of the questions put to me by the United States +government seemed superfluous to the point of being absurd? The process +may involve a certain waste of paper and ink and time, but it is the +kind of waste without which the business of life would be impossible. +The questions that really shape human happiness are those to which the +reply is obvious. The answers that count are those the questioner knew +he would get and was prepared to insist upon getting. Harrington tells +me that when he was married he could not help smiling when the minister +asked him whether he would take the woman by his side to be his wedded +wife. "What," said Harrington, "did he think I was there for? Or did he +detect any sign of wavering at the last moment?" What reply does the +clergyman await when he asks the rejoicing parents whether they are +willing to have their child baptized into the community of the redeemed? +What is all ritual, as it has been framed to meet the needs of the human +heart, but a preordained order of question and response? In birth and in +burial, in joy and in sorrow, for those who have escaped shipwreck and +those who have escaped the plague, the practice of the ages has laid +down formulae which the soul does not find the less adequate because they +are ready-made. + +Consider the multiplication-table. I don't know who first hit upon the +absurd idea that questions are intended to elicit information. In so +many laboratories are students putting questions to their microscope. In +so many lawyers' offices are clients putting questions to their +attorneys. In so many other offices are haggard men and women putting +questions to their doctors. But the number of all these is quite +insignificant when compared with the number of questions that are framed +every day in the schoolrooms of the world. Wherefore, I say, consider +the multiplication-table. A greater sum of human interest has centred +about the multiplication-table than about all doctors' and lawyers' and +biologists' offices since the beginning of time. Millions of +schoolmasters have asked what is seven times eleven and myriads of +children's brains have toiled for the answer that all the time has been +reposing in the teacher's mind. What is seven times eleven? What is the +capital of Dahomey? When did the Americans beat the British at +Lexington? What is the meaning of the universe? We shall never escape +the feeling that these questions are put only to vex us by those who +know the answer. + +I said that I am looking forward to be summoned for jury-duty. But I +know that the solemn business of justice, like most of the world's +business, is made up of the mumbled question that is seldom heard and +the fixed reply that is never listened to. The clerk of the court stares +at the wall and drones out the ancient formula which begins +"Jusolimlyswear," and ends "Swelpyugod," and the witness on the stand +blurts out "I do." The Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court +asks the President-elect whether he will be faithful to the Constitution +and the laws of the United States, and the President-elect invariably +says that he will. The candidate for American citizenship is asked +whether he hereby renounces allegiance to foreign kings, emperors, and +potentates, and fervently responds that he does. When I took my medical +examination for a life-insurance policy, the physician asked me whether +I suffered from asthma, bronchitis, calculus, dementia, erysipelas, and +several score other afflictions, and, without waiting for an answer, he +wrote "No" opposite every disease. + +Whenever I think of the world and the world's opinion, I think of Mrs. +Harrington in whom I see the world typified. Now Mrs. Harrington is +inconceivable in a scheme where the proper reply to every question is +not as thoroughly established as the rule for the proper use of forks +at dinner. In the presence of an unfamiliar reply to a familiar question +Mrs. Harrington is suspicious and uneasy. She scents either a joke or an +insult; and we are all Mrs. Harrington. If you were to ask a stranger +whom did he consider the greatest playwright of all times and, instead +of Shakespeare or Moliere, he were to say Racine, it would be as if one +were to ask him whether he took tea or coffee for breakfast and he said +arsenic. It would be as though you asked your neighbour what he thought +of a beautiful sunset and he said he did not like it. It would be as if +I were to say to Mrs. Harrington, "Well, I suppose I have stayed quite +long enough," and she were to say, "Yes, I think you had better be +going." + + + + +V + +THE MIND TRIUMPHANT + + +One night after dinner I quoted for Harding the following sentence from +an address by President Lowell of Harvard: "The most painful defect in +the American College at the present time is the lack of esteem for +excellence in scholarship." Thereupon Harding recalled what some one had +said on a related subject: "Athleticism is rooted in an exaggerated +spirit of intercollegiate rivalry and a publicity run mad." + +That night Harding dreamt the following: + +_From the Harvard "Crimson" for October 8, 1937:_ + + "Twenty-five thousand men, women, and children in the Stadium yesterday + broke into a delirium of cheers when the Cambridge team in Early + English Literature won its fourth successive victory over Yale. Both + sides were trained to the minute, however different the methods of the + two head coaches. The Harvard team during the last two weeks had been + put on a course of desultory reading from Bede to the closing of the + theatres by the Puritans in 1642, while Yale had concentrated on the + Elizabethan dramatists and signal practice. + + "Harvard won the toss, and Captain Hartley led off with a question on + the mediaeval prototypes of Thomas More's 'Utopia.' Brooks of Yale made + a snappy reply, and by a dashing string of three questions on the + authorship of 'Ralph Roister-Doister,' the sources of Chaucer's + 'Nonne's Preeste's Tale,' and the exact site of the Globe Theatre, + carried the fight into the enemy's territory. But Harvard held well, + and the contest was a fairly even one for twenty minutes. There was an + anxious moment towards the end, when Gosse, for Harvard, muffed on the + date of the first production of 'The Tempest,' but before Yale could + frame another question the whistle blew. + + "In the second half, Yale perceptibly weakened. It still showed + brilliant flashes of attack, but its defence was poor, especially + against Brooks's smashing questions on the Italian influences in + Milton's shorter poems. Harvard made its principal gains against + Burckhardt, who simply could not solve Winship's posers from Ben Jonson + and Beaumont and Fletcher. The Yale coaches finally took him out and + sent in Skinner, the best Elizabethan on the scrub team, but it was too + late to save the day. There were rumours after the game that Burckhardt + had broken training after the Princeton contest by going on a three + days' canoe trip up the Merrimac. That, however, does not detract from + the glory of Harvard's magnificent triumph." + +_From the Boston "Herald" of October 9, 1937:_ + + "William J. Burns and Douglas Mitchell, sophomores at Harvard, were + arrested last night for creating a disturbance in the dining-room of + the Mayflower Hotel by letting loose a South American baboon with a + pack of firecrackers attached to its tail. When arraigned before + Magistrate Conroy, they declared that they were celebrating Harvard's + Early English victory over Yale, and were discharged." + +_From the Yale "News" of June 12, 1940:_ + + "In the presence of twenty thousand spectators, including the President + of the United States, the greater part of his Cabinet, and several + foreign ambassadors, Yale's 'varsity eight simply ran away from + Harvard in the tenth annual competition in Romance languages and + philology. Yale took the lead from the start, and at the end of fifteen + minutes was ahead by 16 points to 7.... This splendid victory is due in + part to the general superiority of the New Haven eight, but too much + credit cannot be given to little Howells, who steered a flawless + contest. The Blue made use of the short, snappy English style of + text-book, while Harvard pinned its faith to the more deliberate German + seminar system. After the contest captains for the following year were + elected. Yale chose Bridgman, who did splendid work on Corneille and + the poets of the Pleiade, while Harvard's choice fell on Butterworth, + probably the best intercollegiate expert on Cervantes. In the evening + all the contestants attended a performance of 'The Prince and the + Peach' at the Gaiety. It is reported that no less than nine out of the + sixteen men have received flattering offers to coach Romance language + teams in the leading Western universities." + +_From the "Daily Princetonian" of February 13, 1933:_ + + "Princeton won the intercollegiate championship yesterday with 63 + points to Harvard's 37, Yale's 18, and 7 each for Brown, Williams, and + Pennsylvania. Princeton won by her brilliant work in the classics and + biology. Firsts were made by Bentley, who did the 220 lines of Homer in + 29-3/5 minutes, scanned 100 Alcaics from Horace in 62 seconds flat, and + hurdled over nine doubtful readings and seven lacunae in the text of + Aristotle's 'Poetics' in 17-1/2 minutes. Two firsts went to Ramsdell, + who made only two errors in Protective Colouration and one error in + explaining the mutations of the Evening Primrose." + +_From the editorial columns of the New York "Evening Post" for July 7, +1933, and October 11, 1938:_ + + (1) "Scholastic competitions have ceased to be the means to an end and + have become an end in themselves. The passion to win has swept away + every other consideration. Professionalism has laid its tainted hand on + the sports of our college youth. High-priced professors from the + University of Leipzig and the Ecole des Hautes Etudes are engaged to + drill our teams to victory. Men who should have long ago taken their + Ph.D. have been known deliberately to flunk examinations so as to be + eligible for the 'varsity contests. Promising students in the + preparatory schools are bribed to enroll with this or that college. The + whole problem of summer mathematics reeks to heaven. It is not enough + that a student during eight months of the year will put in all his + time on invariants and the theory of numbers. Vacation time finds him + at some fashionable resort, tutoring the sons of millionaires in + multiplication and quadratic equations." + + (2) "Thus our so-called student 'activities' are neither active in the + true sense, nor fit for students. There has grown up a small clan of + intellectual athletes who win victories while thousands of mediocre + students, six feet and over and having an average weight of 195 pounds, + stand around and cheer. Our student-managers have become men of + business, purely. The receipts at the last Harvard-Yale debate on the + popular election of United States senators amounted to more than + $50,000. The Greek philology team spends three-quarters of its time in + touring the country. The _Evening Howl_ prints the pictures of the + [Greek: Phi Beta Kappa] members every other day. It is time to call a + halt." + + + + +VI + +ON CALLING WHITE BLACK + + +If it were not for the deadly hatred that exists between Bob, who will +be four years old very soon, and Abdul Hamid II, late Sultan of Turkey, +I hardly know what would become of my moral standards. Whenever my sense +of right and wrong grows blunted; whenever the inextricable confusion of +good and bad in everything about us becomes unusually depressing, I have +only to recall how virulent, how inflexible, how certain is Bob's +judgment on the character and career of the deposed Ottoman despot. + +Bob is Harrington's youngest son. He and Abdul Hamid II first met in the +pages of a fat new history of the Turkish Revolution having a white +star and crescent on the cover and perhaps half a hundred pictures +inside. The book immediately supplanted the encyclopaedia and General +Kuropatkin's illustrated memoirs of the Russo-Japanese War, in Bob's +affections. Who, he wanted to know, was the swarthy, lean, hook-nosed +gentleman in a tasselled cap, who stood up in a carriage to acknowledge +the cheers of the crowd. That, Harrington told him, was a bad Sultan, +and tried to turn to the next picture, which showed an unhappy-looking +Armenian priest casting his first vote for a member of Parliament. + +But the boy has for some years been in the stage where every fact laid +before him must be backed up with an adequate reason. What does a bad +Sultan do, he wished to know. Harrington was puzzled. It seemed a pity +to bring Bob into touch with the cruelties and pains of life. But on the +other hand here was a chance to inoculate Bob at a very early age with +a hatred for tyranny and oppression, and a love for the principles of +representative government; and on the whole I am inclined to think +Harrington did right. In any case Harrington told the boy that the bad +Sultan was in the habit of sending his soldiers to shoot people, and +burn down their homes, and take away everything they had to eat, and put +all the women into jail. He hesitated over the children. It was out of +the question to tell Bob how, by order of the bad Sultan, little +children were ripped open before their mothers' eyes, or had their +brains dashed out against the walls. The little children, Harrington +finally told Bob, were whipped by the bad Sultan's bad soldiers, and had +all their toys confiscated. + +But that apparently was not enough. Bob wanted to know what else the bad +Sultan did to the little children. What else? Harrington's criminal +imagination had exhausted itself. He didn't know, and he called upon Bob +for suggestions. + +"He gives them medicine," said Bob, "and sprays their throats with +peroxide, and they cry." Was there any after-thought in that remark, +Harrington wondered. Could it be that he had only succeeded in arousing +in that active young mind the recognition of a certain family +resemblance between himself and Abdul the Damned? For that matter, was +it fair to the late Commander of the Faithful to charge his name with a +crime he was probably innocent of? But then again, if that particular +crime was necessary to the lesson borne in on Bob, why hesitate? So +Harrington ponders a moment and decides; yes, even to that level of +iniquity had Abdul Hamid II sunk. The atomiser was one of the +instruments of torture he made use of. And when the bad Sultan is +finally checked in his nefarious career, and dragged off to prison, +where he gets nothing but hard bread to eat and filthy water to drink, +Bob retains the impression that all this came about because the Young +Turks grew tired of having their throats washed with peroxide solutions. + +"When I see the bad Sultan," says Bob, "I will punch him, like this," +and his fist, shooting out and up, knocks the pipe from Harrington's +mouth. + +"But aren't you afraid he will hurt you?" his father asks. + +"No," says Bob; "I'll run away." + +And the boy has been steadfast in his hatred. He meets the Sultan every +night just before supper, when he insists on being taken right through +the fat, red volume with the star and crescent on the cover; and every +time the Sultan's face appears in the pictures, the boy smites it with +his fist. Bob goes to his meals with an excellent appetite engendered by +his violent encounters with that disreputable monarch. + +Abdul Hamid II is in very bad shape from the punishment. Bob has caught +him in the act of addressing the English members of the Balkan +Committee, and left him only a pair of shoulders and one leg. Of the +Sultan driving to the Selamlik every Friday there is visible now only +one of the carriage horses and the fragments of a cavalryman. Nor is the +physical presentment of Abdul Hamid the only thing that has gone to +pieces under Bob's unrelenting hostility. The Sultan's character has +been growing worse and worse as night after night the boy insists upon +new examples of what bad Sultans do. + +To satisfy that inexhaustible demand, Harrington has shouldered Abdul +Hamid with all the sins of all the epochs in history. He has made him +steep unhappy Christian prisoners in pitch and burn them for torches, +and send innocent Frenchmen to the guillotine, and tomahawk the Puritan +settlers as they worked in the fields. He has made him responsible for +St. Bartholomew's Day, and Andersonville prison. He has robbed the Czar +of his just credit by making Abdul Hamid the hero of Bloody Sunday in +St. Petersburg. I am not sure but that Harrington has not laid the +abnormally high price of meat and eggs at the Sultan's door. There are +times when I really feel that Harrington should ask Abdul Hamid's +pardon. + +But no; he should _not_ beg his pardon. For that is just the point I set +out to make. It is a moral tonic to be brought into touch with Bob's +opinion of Abdul Hamid, and to get to feel that things are not all a +hodge-podge, indifferently good or indifferently bad, as you choose to +look at it. In Bob's world there are good things and bad things, and the +good is good and the bad is bad. Bob knows nothing of the cant which +makes the robber monopolist only the sad victim of forces outside his +control. Bob knows nothing of the sentimental twaddle about that +interesting class of people who are more sinned against than sinning. +Bob, like Nature, indulges in no fine distinctions. When he meets a bad +Sultan he punches his head. When he meets a good Sultan, nothing is too +good to believe concerning him. + +And he accepts the one as naturally as he does the other. He has no +moral enthusiasms or enthusiasms of any kind. It is merely an obvious +thing to him that right should triumph and wrong should fail. He does +not play with his emotions. I remember how, one night, in relating the +fall of Abdul Hamid, Harrington had worked himself up to an +extraordinary pitch of excitement. Never had that despot been painted in +such horrid colours; and after he had told how the palace guards rose +against the Constitution, and how the Young Turks marched upon +Constantinople, and how the craven tyrant, crying "Don't hurt me, don't +hurt me," was dragged from his bed by the good soldiers and clapped into +prison, Harrington turned, all aglow, to Bob, and waited for the boy to +echo his enthusiasm. But Bob waited till the cell-door clanged behind +the Unspeakable Turk, and said: "Now tell me about the giraffe that fell +into the water." + +I spoke of the good Sultan. Of course there had to be one, and +Harrington found him in the same book with the bad Sultan. And when he +had studied the somewhat stolid features of Mohammed V for a little +while, it was inevitable that Bob should ask what a good Sultan did. +Harrington was in difficulties again. It was impossible to explain that +at bottom there really is no such thing as a good Sultan; that they are +as a rule cruel and immoral, and always expensive; and that at best they +are harmless, if somewhat stupid, survivals. But since the very idea of +a bad Sultan demands a good one, Harrington tried to satisfy Bob by +investing Mohammed V with a large number of negative virtues. "A good +Sultan does not shoot people, or burn down houses or throw women into +jail or whip little children." The portrait failed to please. Bob's +faith demanded something robust to cling to; and in the end he compelled +his father to do for the good Sultan the opposite of what he had done +for the bad one. Mohammed V stands to-day invested with all the virtues +that have been manifested on earth from Enoch to Florence Nightingale. + +And yet of the two, Bob and his father, I must say again that it is Bob +who has the more truthful and healthy outlook upon life, and it is good +for Harrington to rehearse with him the history of the fall of Abdul +Hamid II three or four times a week. Bob has no flabby standards. He +wastes no time in looking for lighter shades in what is black or dark +spots in the white. Bob holds, for instance, that bad soldiers shoot +down good people, and that good soldiers shoot down bad people. He is +quite as close to the truth as I am, who believe that there is no such +thing as a good soldier and that the business of shooting down people, +whether good or bad, is a wretched one. For all that, I know there come +times when a man must take human life, and in such cases Bob has the +advantage over Hamlet and me. Where we falter and speculate and end by +making a mess of it all, Bob just punches the bad Sultan's head and +passes on to the giraffe that fell into the water. + + + + +VII + +THE SOLID FLESH + + +Physical culture as pursued in the home probably benefits a man's body; +but the strain on his moral nature is terrific. I go through my morning +exercise with hatred for all the world and contempt for myself. Why, for +instance, should every system of gymnastics require that a man place +himself in the most ridiculous and unnatural postures? A stout, +middle-aged man who struggles to touch the floor with the palms of his +hands is not a beautiful sight. Equally preposterous is the practice of +standing on one leg and stretching the other toward the nape of one's +neck. In the confines of a city bedroom such evolutions are not only +ungraceful but frequently dangerous. Harrington tells me that every +morning when he lunges forward he scrapes the tips of his fingers +against the edge of the bed and the tears come into his eyes. When he +throws his arms back he hits the gas jet. Harrington's young son, who +insists on being present during the ordeal, believes that the entire +performance is intended for his amusement, and laughs immoderately. I +cannot blame him. Morning exercise is incompatible with the maintenance +of parental dignity. Were I a child again I could neither love nor +respect a father who placed two chairs at a considerable distance from +each other and mounted them horizontally like the human bridge in a +melodrama. + +I admit, of course, that home exercises have the merit of being cheap. +No special apparatus is required. The ordinary household furniture and +such heirlooms as are readily available will usually suffice. An onyx +clock will do instead of chest weights. Any two volumes of the +Encyclopaedia Britannica will take the place of dumb-bells or Indian +clubs. Many a time I have stood still and held a bronze lamp in my +outstretched right hand for a minute and then held it in my left hand +for half a minute. I know of one man who skipped the rope one hundred +times every morning. Within four months he had lost three and a half +pounds, and driven the family in the flat below into nervous +prostration. I have even been told that there are systems of exercise +which show how physical perfection may be attained by scientifically +manipulating, for fifteen minutes every day, a couple of fountain pens +and a paper cutter. But I cannot reconcile myself to such methods +because of the confusion they introduce into the world of common things. +A table is no longer something to write upon or to eat upon, but +something to lie down upon while one flings out his arms and legs fifty +times in four contrary directions. A broom-stick is an instrument for +strengthening the shoulder muscles. When I see a transom, I find myself +estimating the number of times I could chin it. + +The intimate connection between the hygienic life and the temptation to +tell lies is a delicate subject to touch upon; but the facts may as well +be brought out now as later. People of otherwise irreproachable conduct +will lose all sense of truthfulness when they speak of physical culture +and fresh air. They will exaggerate the number of inches they keep their +bedroom windows raised in midwinter; they will quote ridiculous +estimates of the doctors' bills they have saved; they will represent +themselves as being in the most incredibly perfect health. I know one +sober, intelligent business-man who not only habitually understates, by +ten degrees, the temperature of his morning tub, but gives an +altogether distorted impression of the alacrity with which he leaps into +his bath every morning, and the reluctance with which he leaves it. This +same man asserts that he can now walk from the Chambers Street ferry to +his office in Wall Street in astonishing time. And not only that, but +since he took to walking as much as he could, he has cut down his daily +number of cigars to one-fourth (which is untrue). And not only that, but +since he has gone in for exercise and fresh air and has given up +smoking, his income has increased by at least 50 per cent., owing to his +improved health and clearer mental vision. But that again, as I happen +to know, is untrue. + +But there is another, much more subtle form of prevarication. Smith +meets you in the street and remarks upon your flabby appearance. He +argues that you ought to weigh twenty-five pounds less than you do, and +that a long daily walk will do the trick. "Look at me," he says, "I walk +ten miles every day and there isn't an ounce of superfluous flesh on +me." And so saying, he slaps his chest and offers to let you feel how +hard the muscles are about his diaphragm. Of course, there is no +superfluous flesh on Smith. And if he abstained entirely from physical +exertion and guzzled heavy German beer all day and dined on turtle soup +and roast goose every day, and ate unlimited quantities of pastry, he +would still be what he describes as free from superfluous flesh. _I_ +call it scraggy. Smith is one of the men set apart by nature to +perpetuate the Don Quixote type of beauty, just as I am doomed with the +lapse of time to approximate the Falstaffian type. Smith's five sisters +and brothers are thin. His father was slight and neurasthenic. His +mother was spare and angular. Little wonder the Smith family is fond of +walking. Friction and air-resistance in their case are practically +nonexistent. + +I do not, of course, mean to deny the ancient tradition that a sound +body makes a sound mind. But I would only point out that we are just +beginning to wake to the truth of the converse proposition, that a sane, +equable, easy-going mind keeps the body well. Hence there are really two +kinds of exercise, and two kinds of hygiene, a physical kind and a +spiritual kind. Which one a man will choose should be left entirely to +himself. It is only a question of approaching the same goal from two +different directions. Smith is welcome to make himself a better man by +exercising his legs three hours a day. But I prefer to sit in an +armchair and exercise my soul. Smith comes in refreshed from a +half-day's sojourn in the open air, and I come away refreshed from a +roomful of old friends talking three at a time amidst clouds of tobacco +smoke. + +The trouble with so many of the physical-culture devotees is that they +tire out the soul in trying to serve it. I am inclined to believe that +the beneficent effects of the regular quarter-hour's exercise before +breakfast, is more than offset by the mental wear and tear involved in +getting out of bed fifteen minutes earlier than one otherwise would. +Some one has calculated that the amount of moral resolution expended in +New York City every winter day in getting up to take one's cold bath +would be enough to decide a dozen municipal elections in favour of the +decent candidate, or to send fifty grafting legislators to jail for an +average term of three and a half years. The same specialist has worked +out the formula that the average married man's usefulness about the +house varies inversely with his fondness for violent exercise. Smith's +dumb-bell practice, for instance, leaves him no time for hanging up the +pictures. After his long Sunday's walk he is invariably too tired to +answer his wife's questions concerning the influence of the tariff on +high prices. + +By this time it will be plain that I am no passionate admirer of the +gospel of salvation by hygiene. So many things that the world holds +precious have been developed under the most unhygienic conditions. +Revolutions for the liberation of mankind have been plotted in +unsanitary cellars and dungeons. Religions have taken root and prospered +in catacombs. Great poems have been written in stuffy garrets. Great +orations have been spoken before sweating crowds in the foul air of +overheated legislative chambers. Lovers are said to be fond of dark +corners and out-of-the-way places. It is not by accident that children, +said to be the most beautiful thing in the world, are so inordinately +fond of dirt. Every great truth on its first appearance has been +declared a menace to morals and society; in other words, unhygienic. And +yet one would imagine that truth, from its habit of going naked, would +appeal strongly to the ardent fresh-air practitioner. + + + + +VIII + +SOME NEWSPAPER TRAITS + + +At Cooper's house last winter I met Professor Grundschnitt of Berlin, +who has been making a study of American newspaper methods in behalf of +the German government. For some time after the professor's arrival in +this country, he told me, he found himself completely at sea. American +newspapers, it appeared to him, were written in two languages. One was +the English language as he had studied it in the writings of Oliver +Goldsmith, John Ruskin, and Ralph Waldo Emerson. In America it seemed to +be used chiefly by auctioneers, art critics, and immigrants. The other +was a dialect, evidently English in origin, but sufficiently removed +from the parent stock to be quite unintelligible. The professor spent +many painful hours over such sentences as "Jeffries annexes the Brunette +Beauty's Angora," and "Sugar Barons hand Uncle Sam a lemon." This +dialect, he found, was extensively employed by truck-drivers, +playwrights, and college students. + +It did not take the professor very long, however, to overcome this +initial difficulty. His education proceeded rapidly. One of the first +things he learned, so he told me, is that some American newspapers are +printed in black ink and some in red. As a rule, the former tell more of +the truth, but the latter sell many more copies. On Sunday, which in +America is observed much more rigorously than in Europe, the red ink +predominates. The professor suggested that this might be a survival of +primitive times when the British ancestors of the present-day Americans +tattooed themselves in honour of their gods. It is universally accepted +that the American business man reads so many papers because he has +neither the time nor the energy to read books. But this would seem to be +contradicted on Sundays, when every American business man reads two or +three times the equivalent of the entire works of William Shakespeare. +Herr Grundschnitt was inclined to believe that carrying home the Sunday +paper is the most popular form of physical exercise among our people. + +A very curious circumstance about the press in all the great American +cities, the professor thought, is that every newspaper has a larger +circulation than any other three newspapers combined. According to the +arithmetical system in use among all civilised peoples, that would be +manifestly impossible. But the professor imagines that the methods of +calculation by which such results are obtained are the same as those +employed by politicians in estimating their majorities on the eve of +election day, by millionaires in paying their personal taxes, and by +operatic sopranos in figuring out their age. The influence of a +newspaper depends, of course, upon its circulation. Such influence is +exercised directly in the form of news and editorial comment, and +indirectly in the form of wrapping paper. + +Still another curious trait about all American newspapers, this learned +German found, is that they tell a story backward. This arises from the +desire to put the most important thing first; and in this country it is +the rule that the thing which happens last is the most important. As an +illustration Herr Grundschnitt read the following brief account clipped +from one of the principal newspapers in New York city: + +"Arthur Wellesley Jones died in the municipal hospital last night as the +result of injuries sustained in an automobile accident. The end was +peaceful. Mr. Jones was driving his own machine down Fifth Avenue when +he ran into a laundry-wagon at Twenty-first Street. He had left his home +in New Rochelle an hour before. Mr. Jones was an enthusiastic motorist. +In 1905 he won the Smithson cup for heavy cars. In 1903 he was second in +the Westchester hill-climbing contest. In 1899 he helped to organise the +first road race in New York State. He was in Congress from 1894 to 1898, +and was elected to the Legislature in 1889, the same year that his +eldest son was born. Two years before that event he married a daughter +of Henry K. Smith of Philadelphia. He was graduated from Yale, having +prepared for that institution at Andover, where he played right tackle +on the football team. As a child he showed a decided taste for +mechanics. He was born in 1861." + +The daily press in America, the professor went on to say, takes +extraordinary interest in visitors from abroad. He referred, as an +instance in point, to the recent arrival in New York of a nephew of the +Dalai Lama of Tibet. As the ship was being warped into the dock, a young +man with a notebook asked the distinguished visitor if it was true that +his Holiness, the Dalai Lama, had been found guilty of converting the +temple treasures at Lhassa to his own use. Upon receiving a reply in the +negative, the young man asked what progress the suffrage movement had +made in Tibet. He was told that inasmuch as every woman in Tibet must +take care of several husbands instead of one, as among the more +civilised nations, women there were not interested in the question of +votes. Thereupon the young man asked whether Tibet offered a promising +market for automobiles. He was pleased to learn that Tibet, with its +extremely sparse population and its very precipitous cliffs, was an +ideal place for the automobilist. + +These, however, were superficial characteristics. What the professor was +anxious to learn was just how the newspapers influence the national life +to the remarkable extent they undoubtedly do. He knew, of course, that +the Americans are a free people, and that they select their own +lawmakers and magistrates. He soon discovered that when the people +desire to choose some one to rule over them, they name two, three, or +more men for the same office. The newspapers then proceed to accuse +these men of the vilest crimes, and the one who comes out least +besmirched is declared to be elected. After he has been put into office +the people no longer pay attention to him, leaving it to the newspapers +to see that he conducts himself properly. When a high official is caught +stealing the people rejoice, because it shows that the newspapers are +doing their duty. + +In the sphere of social relations, Herr Grundschnitt learned, the +newspapers are mainly concerned with safeguarding the purity and +integrity of the home. Most of them do this by printing full accounts of +all murder and divorce trials. The professor told me that he could +recall nothing in literature that quite equals the white heat of +indignation with which the editor of the _Star_ once spoke of "the +festering national sore revealed in the proceedings of the Dives divorce +suit, the nauseous details of which the reader will find in all their +hideous completeness on the first three pages of the present issue, +together with all the photographs ruled out of evidence on the grounds +of decency." The press also serves the cause of public morals by holding +up to scorn the vices and extravagances of the vulgar rich, whose +ill-used millions, as they hasten to point out elsewhere, are nothing +more than what any American may look forward to, provided he has courage +and energy. + +The same ingenious method of promoting virtue by holding up vice to +obloquy is pursued in every other field, the learned German told me. The +newspapers do not print the names of men who support their wives, but +they print the names of men who do not, or who support more than one. +They do not publish the photographs of honest bank clerks, but of +dishonest ones, and of these only when they have stolen a very large +sum. They pay no attention to a clergyman as long as he advocates the +brotherhood of man, but they have large headlines about the minister who +believes in the moderate use of the Scotch highball. They overlook a +college professor's epoch-making researches in American history, and +take him up when he comes out in favour of an exclusive diet of raw +spinach. From the newspaper point of view, a college professor counts +less than a professional gambler; a gambler counts less than an actress; +a good actress counts less than a bad one; a bad actress counts less +than a prize-fighter; a prize-fighter counts less than a chimpanzee that +has been taught to smoke cigarettes; and an educated chimpanzee counts +less than a millionaire who suffers from paranoia. By continuously +pondering on the horrors of crime and vice as depicted in the +newspapers, the American people are roused to such a hatred of evil that +some editors receive a salary of $100,000 a year. + +Oddly enough, the American people freely criticise their newspapers. One +of the commonest charges is that their editors write with great haste +and little accurate information. But, Herr Grundschnitt argued, it is +unfair to insist that newspapers shall be both forceful and accurate. +It is true that the editors who supply the American people with their +opinions think fast and write fast, but it is absurd to maintain that as +a class they are unreasonably set in their own beliefs. Editors, as a +matter of fact, change their opinions every little while. In such cases +they usually have no difficulty in proving that, while their present +views are right, their previous views were also right. This makes for +consistency. Nor is there any reason for maintaining, as is often done, +that editors are restive under criticism. The professor declared that +there are very few newspapers in the United States that will refuse to +print a letter from any one who believes that the paper in question is +the only one in town with courage and honesty enough to tell the truth +and that it is the best newspaper in the country at the price. + +As for the old-fashioned critics who maintain that not even the best +newspaper tells more than half the truth, my informant pointed out that +every town and village in the United States has at least two daily +publications. The conscientious reader who buys both is thus saved from +error. + +When I rose to say good-night the professor accompanied me to the door, +and would not let me go till he had pronounced a final eulogy on the +press in general, and the American newspaper in particular. He +expatiated on its omnipresence. The printed sheet is with a man when he +wakes in the morning, and when he falls asleep at night, and when he is +at the breakfast table with his wife. The newspaper breaks up families +and reunites other families, though it usually misspells their names. It +chastises the rascal, and worries the honest man. It can make a +reputation in a day, and destroy a reputation in ten minutes, sending +its owner into the grave or upon the vaudeville stage. It teaches +Presidents how to rule, women how to win husbands, the Church how to +save souls, and middle-aged gentlemen how to reduce weight by exercising +ten minutes every day. It knows nearly everything and guesses at the +rest. It will say almost anything and publish the rest at advertising +rates. Without it, democratic government would be difficult and +travelling in the Subway quite impossible. The newspaper is the only +institution since the world began that succeeds in being all things to +all men for the moderate sum of one cent a day. The only universal +things that come cheaper, the professor told me, are birth and death. + + + + +IX + +A FLEDGLING + + +A sophomore's soul is not the simple thing that most people imagine. I +am thinking now of my nephew Philip and of our last meeting. This time, +he was more than usually welcome. I was lonely. The family had just left +town for the summer and the house was fearfully empty. I sat there, +smoking a cigarette amid the first traces of domestic uncleanliness, +when I heard him on the stairs. The dear boy had not changed. Dropping +his heavy suitcase anyways, he seized my hand within his own huge paw +and squeezed it till the tears came to my eyes. His voice was a young +roar. He threw his hat upon the table, thereby scattering a large number +of papers about the room, and then sat down upon my own hat, which was +lying on the armchair, on top of several July magazines. I had put my +hat down on the chair instead of hanging it up, as I should have done, +because the family was away and I was alone in the house. + +Might he smoke? He was busy with his bull-dog pipe and my tobacco jar +before I could say yes. He explained that he was sorry, but he found he +could neither read, write, nor think nowadays without his pipe. He +admitted that he was the slave of a noxious habit, but it was too late, +and he might as well get all the solace he could out of a pretty bad +situation. But, as I look at Philip, I cannot help feeling that his fine +colour and the sparkle in his blue eyes and his full count of nineteen +years make the situation far less desperate than he portrays it. Philip +is not a handsome lad, but he will be a year from now. At present he is +mostly hands and feet, and his face shows a marked nasal development. +Before Philip has completed his junior year, the rest of his features +will have reasserted themselves, and the harmony of lineament which was +his when he was an infant, as his mother never tires of regretfully +recalling, will be restored. Until that time Philip must be content to +carry the suggestion of an attractive and eager young bird of prey. + +Philip lights pipe after pipe as he dilates on his experiences since +last I saw him. The moralising instinct is very weak in me. I cannot +find it in my heart to censure Philip's constant mouthing of the pipe. +I, too, smoke, and I am not foolish enough to risk my standing with +Philip by preaching where I do not practise. Besides, I observe that the +boy does not inhale, that his pipe goes out frequently, and that his +consumption of matches is much greater than his consumption of tobacco. +So I say nothing in reproof of his pipe. + +But it is different with his language. Philip, I observe regretfully, is +profane. I am not mealy-mouthed myself. There are moments of high +emotional tension when silence is the worst form of blasphemy. But +Philip is profane without discrimination. His supply of unobjectionable +adjectives would be insufficient to meet the needs of the ordinary +kindergarten conversation. He uses the same swift epithet to describe +certain brands of tobacco, the weather on commencement day, the food at +his eating-house, his professors of French and of mathematics, the +spirit of the incoming freshman class, and the outlook for "snap" +courses during the coming year. + +It is not my moral but my aesthetic sense that takes offence, so I ask +Philip whether it is the intensity of his feelings that makes it +impossible for him to discuss his work or his play without continual +reference to the process of perdition and the realm of lost souls; or +whether it is habit. No sooner have I put my question than I am sorry. +There is nothing the young soul is so afraid of as of satire. It can +understand being petted and it can understand being whipped; but the +sting behind the smile, the lash beneath the caress, throws the young +soul into helpless panic. It feels itself baited and knows not whither +it may flee. I have always thought that the worst type of bully is the +teacher in school or in college who indulges a pretty talent for satire +at the expense of his pupils. It is a cowardly and a demoralising +practice. It means not only hitting some one who is powerless to retort, +it means confusing the sense of truth in the adolescent mind. Here is +some one quite grown up who smiles and means to hurt you, who says good +and means bad, who says yes and means no. The young soul stares at you +and sees the standards of the universe in chaos about itself. + +And I feel all the more guilty in Philip's case because I know that the +lad speaks only a mechanical lingo which goes with his bull-dog pipe and +the aggressive shade of his neckwear and his socks. The very pain and +alarm my question raises in him shows well enough that his soul has kept +young and clear amid his world of "muckers" and "grinds" and "cads" and +"rotten sneaks," and all the men and things and conditions he is in the +habit of depicting in various stages of damnation. "Now, you're making +fun of me," says Philip. "We fellows don't know how to pick out words +that sound nice, but mean a--I beg your pardon--a good deal more than +they say. Anyhow, I suppose, if I try from now on till doomsday I shall +never be able to speak like you." + +Bless his young sophomore's soul! With that last sentence Philip has +seized me hip and thigh and hurled me into an emotional whirlpool, where +chills and thrills rapidly succeed each other. Because I am fifteen +years older than Philip the boy invests me with a halo and bathes me in +adoration. I am fifteen years older than he, I am bald, obscure, and far +from prosperous, and there is unmistakably nothing about me to dazzle +the youthful imagination. Yet the facts are as I have stated them. +Philip likes to be with me, copies me without apparently trying to, and +has chosen my profession--so he has often told me--for his own. I am +pretty sure that he has made up his mind when he is as old as I am to +smoke the same brand of rather mediocre tobacco which I have adopted for +practical reasons. I am sometimes tempted to think that Philip, at my +age, intends to be as bald as I am. + +Hence the alternate thrills and chills. I am by nature restless under +worship. The sense of my own inconsequence grows positively painful in +the face of Philip's outspoken veneration. There are people to whom such +tribute is as incense and honey. But I am not one of them. I have tried +to be and have failed. I have argued with myself that, after all, it is +the outsider who is the best judge; that we are most often severest upon +ourselves; that if Philip finds certain high qualities in me, perhaps +there is in me something exceptional. I even go so far as to draw up a +little catalogue of my acts and achievements. I can recall men who have +said much sillier things than I have ever said, and published much worse +stuff than I have ever written. I repeat to myself the rather striking +epigram I made at Smith's house last week, and I go back to the old +gentleman from Andover who two years ago told me that there was +something about me that reminded him of Oliver Wendell Holmes. By dint +of much trying I work myself up into something of a glow; but it is all +artificial, cerebral, incubated. The exaltation is momentary, the cold +chill of fact overtakes me. There is no use in deceiving one's self. +Philip is mistaken. I am not worthy. + +But that day Philip rallied nobly to the situation. My little remark on +strong language had hurt him, but he saw also that I was sorry to have +hurt him, and he was sorry for me in turn. "I don't in the least mind +your telling me what you think about the way we fellows talk," he said. +"That's the advantage of having a man for one's friend, he is not afraid +of telling you the truth even if it hurts. And then, if you wish to, you +can fight back. You can't do that with a woman." + +"Have you found that out for yourself!" I asked him. + +He looked at me to see if again I was resorting to irony. But this time +he found me sincere. + +"Women!" Philip sniffed. "I have found it doesn't pay to talk seriously +to a woman. There is really only one way of getting on with them, and +that's jollying them. And the thicker you lay it on, the better." He put +away his pipe and proffered me a cigarette. "I like to change off now +and then. I have these made for me in a little Russian shop I discovered +some time ago. They draw better than any cigarette I have ever smoked. +Of course, there are women who are serious and all that. There are a lot +in the postgraduate department and some in the optional literature +courses. But you ought to see them! And such grinds. None of us fellows +stands a ghost of a chance with them. They take notes all the time and +read all the references and learn them by heart. You can't jolly +_them_. They wouldn't know a joke if you led them up to one and told +them what it meant. I think coeducation is all played out, don't you? +Home is the only place for women, anyhow. Do you like your cigarette?" + +The Patient Observer, it may possibly have been gathered before this, is +somewhat of a sentimentalist. He liked his cigarette very well, but +through the blue haze he looked at Philip and could not help thinking of +the time--only two short years ago--when he, the Patient Observer, with +his own eyes saw Philip borrow a dollar from his mother before setting +out for an ice-cream parlour in the company of two girl cousins. The +Patient Observer has changed little in the last two years; his hair may +be a little thinner and his knowledge of doctors' bills a little more +complete. But in Philip of to-day he found it hard to recognise the +Philip of two years ago. And the marvels of the law of growth which he +thus saw exemplified moved the Patient Observer to throw open the gates +of pent-up eloquence. He lit his pipe and began to discourse to Philip +on the world, on life, and on a few things besides. + +And when it was time for both of us to go to bed, Philip stood up and +said, "I wish I came every day. You don't know what a bore it is, +listening to that drool the 'profs' hand you out up there." His fervent +young spirit would not be silent until, with one magnificent gesture, he +had swept the tobacco jar to the floor and shattered two electric lamps. +Then he went to his room and left me wondering at the vast mysteries +that underlie the rough surface of the sophomore's soul. + + + + +X + +THE COMPLETE COLLECTOR--I + + +"I have given up books and pictures," said Cooper. "I now devote myself +entirely to collecting samples of the world's wisdom." + +"Proverbs, do you mean?" I asked. + +"No, but the facts on which proverbs are based. You see, I grew tired of +pictures when it got to be a question of bidding against millionaires +for the possession of spurious old masters. The break came when Downes +proved that my Velasquez was painted in 1896. His own, it turned out, +was done in 1820; but even then, you see, he had the advantage over me. +So I concentrated on books. But I could not resist the temptation of +glancing through my first editions now and then, and the pages began to +give way. Then I tried Chinese porcelains. There, again, I had to +compete against Downes, who ordered his agent to buy two hundred +thousand dollars' worth of Chinese antiquities for the Louis XIV. room +in his new Tudor palace. And, besides, this rather disconcerting thing +happened: I had as my guest a mandarin who was passing through New York +on his way to Europe, and I showed him my collection of jades. 'There +was only one collection like this in China some years ago,' I told him. +'Yes,' he replied, 'it was in my house when the foreign troops entered +Peking in 1900.' So I decided to sell my porcelains. + +"But of course I had, as you say, to collect something, and for a long +time I could think of no field in which a cultivated taste and personal +effort could make way against the competition of mere brute millions. +And then, all at once, I hit upon proverbs. The suggestion came in a +rather peculiar fashion. It seems that there was an eccentric old poet +on Long Island who spent many years in collecting all sorts of inanimate +freaks, odds and ends, and rubbish. When he died they found among his +treasures a purse made out of a sow's ear and a whistle made from a +pig's tail. I saw my opportunity at once. The eccentric old man, by +acquiring two such extraordinary _objets d'art_ had indulged himself in +a sneer at the world's proverbial wisdom. I would come to the rescue of +our threatened stock of experience by gathering the facts that upheld +it. I would make it, besides, more than the selfish hobby of the private +collector who gives the world only a very little share of the pleasure +he tastes. I would make my collection a museum and a laboratory. Instead +of reading about the wise ant and the busy bee people should come and +see them in the life. It was the difference between reading about +animals in a book and seeing them in the life." + +"And have you succeeded?" I asked. + +"Beyond all expectations," he replied. "Come, I will take you through my +galleries," and he showed the way into the queerest garden I have ever +seen. It was as if a menagerie and a museum had been brought together in +the open air. Between enclosures and cages which harboured animals of +all species, ran long tables supporting glass cases like those used for +exhibiting coins or rare manuscripts. + +"Now here," he said, stopping before a small chest with a glass top, +"here is my collection of straws." + +"Straws?" I said. + +"Yes. It is small but select. Here, for instance, is the last straw that +broke the camel's back. Some one suggests that it must have been a Merry +Widow hat, but that's jesting, of course. This again is the straw that +showed which way the wind blew and enabled a politician to change sides +and get a reputation as a reformer. We will see the politician further +on." I noticed then for the first time that the iron-barred cages +contained human beings as well as beasts. "Here is a handful of straws +which an entire conference of theologians spent three months in +splitting. This," pointing to a little mannikin about four inches high, +"is the man of straw whose defeat in debate gave one of our United +States Senators his brilliant reputation. And this, finally, is a +handful of straws out of the pile on which Jack Daw slept when he gave +up his bed to buy his wife a looking-glass, or, as some one has +suggested, an automobile. + +"And now observe the advantages of my method. The student, having been +shown the straw that broke the camel's back, will, if he is a cautious +student, well drilled in the methods of modern research, demand to see +the camel. Well, here it is," and Cooper turned toward a large enclosure +where several members of the family _Camelidae_ were peacefully browsing, +with the exception of one that lay in a corner with drooping head and +closed eyes, apparently lifeless. "It's been hard work, of course, and +expensive, keeping a broken-backed camel alive, but, encouraged by such +examples of the remarkable vitality of animals as may be seen for +instance in the Democratic donkey, I have persisted and succeeded. This +rather thin-legged creature near the fence is the camel that tried to +pass through the needle's eye, and the one close beside him is the one +swallowed by the man who strained at a gnat. Harrington asserts that he +has never been able to see how either phenomenon is possible, but the +problem is only half as difficult as it appears. For it is evident that +if a camel were small enough to pass through the eye of a needle, there +would be comparatively little trouble in swallowing him. And, speaking +of needles, it has been a constant regret that my collection is still +without a needle found in a haystack." + +I have not the space to enumerate one tithe of what Cooper showed me. As +we hurried past the cages containing numerous specimens of _Homo +Sapiens_, he contented himself with pointing out a physician who had +failed to cure himself by psycho-therapeutics; a shoemaker who by +sticking to his last failed to become a railroad president, though in +the course of time he could tell where every man's shoe pinched; an +importer who, in defiance of the Pure Food law, put new wine into old +bottles, and labelled them Bordeaux; and a harmless-looking man of +middle age, who continued to smile and smile, and had played Iago, +Macbeth, and Hamlet's uncle. Before a sturdy-looking man dressed in +working-clothes Cooper stopped for a moment and said, "Mr. C. W. Post +and Mr. James Farley assure me that this is the rarest item in my +collection." + +"Who is he?" I asked. + +"It is a union labourer who is worthy of his hire," Cooper said. + + + + +XI + +THE EVERLASTING FEMININE + + +I am convinced that the easiest business in the world must be the +writing of epigrams on Woman. I have been reading, of late, in a new +volume of "Maxims and Fables." It came to me with the compliments of the +author, in lieu of a small debt which he has kept outstanding for +several years. Although the writer contradicts himself on every third or +fourth page, I am justified in calling the book a very able bit of work +for the reason that the ordinary book on this subject contradicts itself +on every other page. No one who glances through this volume will fail to +understand why the psychology of Woman should be a favourite subject +with very young and very light thinkers. It is the only form of +literature that calls for absolutely no equipment in the author. Writing +a play, for instance, presupposes some acquaintance with a few plays +already written. No one can succeed as a novelist without a fair +knowledge of the technique of millinery or a tolerable mastery of stock +exchange slang. The writer of scientific articles for the magazines must +have fancy, and the writer of advertisements must have poetry and wit. +But to produce a book of epigrams on Woman requires nothing but an +elementary knowledge of spelling and the courage necessary to put the +product on the market. + +The secret of the thing is so simple that it would be a pity to keep it +from the comparatively few persons who have failed to discover it. It +consists entirely in the fact that whatever one says about Woman is +true. And not only that, but every statement that can possibly be made +on the subject is sure to ring true, which is much better even than +being true. On every other subject under the sun there is always one +opinion which sounds a little more convincing than every other opinion. +There are, for example, people who insist that birds of a feather do not +necessarily flock together more frequently than birds of a different +feather do; and they will assert that if you step on a worm with real +firmness the chances of his turning are much less than if you did not +step on him at all. Nevertheless, there is undeniably a truer ring about +the assertion that birds do flock together than about the assertion that +they do not, and we accept more readily the worm that turns than the +worm that remains peaceful under any provocation. But this is not the +case with aphorisms about the gentler sex. There, everything sounds as +plausible as everything else. + +Let me be specific. Right at the beginning of the volume to which I have +alluded, I came across the following apothegm: "Long after Woman has +obtained the right to vote she will continue to face the wrong way when +she steps from a street-car." "How true," I said to myself. Well, a few +days later, while glancing through the pages at the end of the volume, +my eye fell on the following lines: "Now that Woman is learning to face +the right way when she steps from a street-car, she has demonstrated her +right to the ballot." "How true." But I had scarcely expressed my +approval when it occurred to me that I had read the same thing elsewhere +in the book. And when I searched out the earlier passage and compared +the two and found that they did not say the same thing, but quite the +opposite thing, it did not seem to make a very great difference after +all. They both sounded plausible. I recited one sentence aloud and then +the other, and they rang equally true; and the more I repeated them the +truer they rang. + +Delighted with my chance discovery I proceeded to make a thorough study +of "Maxims and Fables" with the object of bringing together the author's +widely scattered observations on the same topic under their appropriate +heads. The work went slowly at first; but after a little while I found I +could pick out a maxim and turn almost instinctively to one that +directly contradicted it. The occupation is fascinating as well as +instructive. It sheds a new light on the conditions of human knowledge +and the workings of the human mind. Consider, if you will, the following +half-dozen sentences that I succeeded in compiling in less than ten +minutes. They all deal with the question of a woman's age: + +"A woman is as old as she looks. + +"A woman is as old as she says. + +"A woman is as old as she would like to be. + +"A woman is as old as the only man that counts would have her be. + +"A woman is as old as any particular situation requires. + +"A woman is as old as her dearest woman friends say she is." + +Let any one read these maxims to himself quietly, and admit that not +only would each of them impress him as true if found standing by itself, +but that they all ring quite as true when taken together. But that is by +no means all. It may be shown that if all these propositions are true, +taken singly or together, the negative of each and all of these +propositions is also true. Thus: + +"A woman is seldom as old as she looks. + +"A woman is never as old as she says. + +"No woman is just the age she would like to be. + +"A woman is rarely as old or as young as the one man that counts would +have her be. + +"Few women are ever of the age that a particular situation requires. + +"No woman is as old as her dearest woman friends say she is." + +How all these opposites can be equally true, I will not undertake to +explain. It is probably inherent in the very nature of the subject. The +French, a people wise in experience, knew what they were about when they +laid it down that if you have a mystery to solve, you must look for the +woman. What they meant was, that, having found a woman, you may make any +statements you please about her; the world will accept them +unquestioningly and your puzzle will consequently be solved. + +Sometimes, however, it has seemed to me that a possible reason for this +very curious fact may be found in the established fashion of speaking +about men as individuals and about women as a class and a type. And that +class or type we saddle with all the faults and virtues of all its +individual members. When Smith tells me that his automobile cost him +three times as much as I know he has paid for it, I record my +impressions by telling Jones as soon as I meet him that the man Smith is +an incorrigible liar. But when Mrs. Smith tells me that her family is +one of the oldest in Massachusetts, which I have every reason to believe +is not so, I invariably say to myself or to some one else, "A woman's +appreciation of the truth is like her appreciation of music; she likes +it best when she closes her eyes to it." + +Or Smith may be a very straightforward man, given to plain-speaking, and +when you ask him how he liked your last dinner he may say that in his +opinion the wine was better than the conversation. In that case you will +probably tell your wife that Smith has shown himself to be an +insufferable ass, and that you have decided to cut his acquaintance. But +when Mrs. Smith tells you that your expensive dinners are rather beyond +what a man of your modest income should go in for, you merely writhe and +smile; only on the train the next day you will say to Harrington, "Has +it ever occurred to you that a woman loves the truth, not because it is +the truth, but because it hurts? Take a cigarette." + +For these reasons I would urge every one who can possibly find time, to +write a book of maxims about Woman, provided he has not done so already. +In the first place, as I have shown, it is an easy and delightful +occupation, which, for that very reason, is in danger of becoming +overcrowded. But there is another reason for losing no time in the +matter. Now and then I have the foreboding that some day in the near +future the world may suddenly lose its habit of believing that, where +women are concerned, two and two are four and are not four at the same +time. And then there will be no more writing of epigrams on Woman. For +it is evident that there can be no point to an epigram if its assertions +must be qualified. The situation will become impossible when students of +psychology, instead of writing, "Woman likes the truth for the same +reason that she likes olives--to satisfy a momentary craving," will be +compelled to write, "Some women tell the truth, and some women do not," +"Some women mean yes when they say no, and some women mean no," "Some +women think with their hearts, and some think with their minds." That +little word "some" will settle the epigram writer's business, and an +interesting form of literature will disappear. + +Not that in some respects its disappearance will fail to arouse regret. +These books amused very many people in the writing, and they never did +very much harm. And it is something to have a universal topic that every +one can write on, just as it is stimulating to have a universal appetite +like eating, or a universal accomplishment like walking. How many other +subjects besides Woman have we on which the schoolboy and the sage can +write with equal confidence, fluency, and approach to the truth? +Possibly even women will regret that they are no longer the subject of +universal comment. Who knows? A woman will forgive injury, but never +indifference. + + + + +XII + +THE FANTASTIC TOE + + +When we reach the year 1910 [Harding dreamt he was reading in the +_Weekly Review_ for 1952], we find the art of dancing well on its way +toward establishing itself as the predominant mode of expression. The +next few years marked a tremendous advance. The graceful _danseuses_ who +interpreted Mendelssohn's "Spring Song," Tchaikovsky's Sixth Symphony, +and Shakespeare's "Tempest" were the pioneers of a vast movement. We can +do nothing better than recall a few typical public performances given in +New York during the season of 1912-13. + +In a splendid series of matinees extending over two months, Professor +William P. Jones danced the whole of Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the +Roman Empire." The first two volumes were danced in slow time, to the +accompaniment of two flutes and a lyre. The poses were statuesque rather +than graceful, and the gestures had in them a great deal of the antique. +But, beginning with the story of the barbarian invasions in the third +volume, Professor Jones's interpretation took on a fury that was almost +bacchantic. The sack of Rome by the Vandals in the year 451 was pictured +in a veritable tempest of gyrations, leaps, and somersaults. The subtle +and hidden meanings of the text called for all the resources of the +Professor's eloquent legs, arms, shoulders, lips, and eyes. A certain +obscure passage in the life of Attila the Hun, which had long been a +puzzle to students of Gibbon, was for the first time made clear to the +average man when Professor Jones, standing on one foot, whirled around +rapidly in one direction for five minutes, and then, instantly reversing +himself, spun around for ten minutes in the opposite direction. + +In the ballroom of the Hotel Taftoftia, during Christmas week, William +K. Spriggs, Ph.D., held a number of fashionable audiences spellbound +with his marvellously lucid dances in Euclid and Algebra up to +Quadratics. Perhaps the very acme of the Terpsichorean art was attained +in the masterly fluency of body and limbs with which Mr. Spriggs +demonstrated that the sum of the angles in any triangle is equal +to two right angles. In Pittsburg Mr. Spriggs is said to have moved +an audience to tears when, by an original combination of the Virginia +reel, the two-step, and the Navajo snake dance, he showed that if +_x^{2}+y^{2}_ = 25 and _x^{2}-y^{2}_ = 25, _x_ equals 5 and _y_ equals +zero. All the pride and selfishness of _x_, all the despair of _y_, were +mirrored in the dancer's play of features. The spectators could not help +pondering over the seeming law of injustice that rules the world. Why +should _x_ be everything in the equations and _y_ nothing? Why should +_y_'s nonentity be used even to set off the all importance of _x_? But +they found no answer. On the other hand, a large number of college +freshmen who had failed on their entrance mathematics found no +difficulty in passing off their conditions after attending three +performances of Mr. Spriggs's dance. + +We can give only the briefest mention to an entire school of experts and +scientists who helped to make the season of 1912-13 memorable in the +annals of the greatest of all arts. For a solitary illustration we may +take Mr. Boom, who, at the annual meeting of the American Zooelogical +Association, danced his monumental two-volume work entitled, "The +Variations of the Alimentary Canal in the Frogs and Toads." This dance +was subsequently repeated before several crowned heads of Europe. + +An event of more than ordinary interest was the debate between Senators +Green and Hammond on the question whether the United States should +establish a protectorate over Central America. Senator Green danced for +the affirmative and Senator Hammond danced for the negative. Both +gentlemen had an international reputation. Senator Green's war-dance in +the Senate on the Standard Oil Company is still spoken of in Washington +as the most striking rough-and-tumble exhibition of recent years. +Senator Hammond is an exponent of a style which lays greater stress on +finesse than on vigour. In a single session of the Senate he is said to +have sidestepped nearly a dozen troublesome roll-calls without arousing +any appreciable dissatisfaction among his constituents. Before a popular +jury, however, Senator Green's Cossack methods were likely to carry +greater conviction. And that is what happened in the great debate we +have referred to. Senator Hammond appeared on the platform in a filmy +costume made up of alternate strips of the Constitution of the United +States and the Monroe Doctrine. Wit, sarcasm, irony followed one another +in quick succession over his mobile features and fairly oozed from his +fingers and toes. Yet it was evident that while he could appeal to the +minds of the spectators he had no power to sway their emotions. It was +different with Senator Green. A thunderous volume of applause went up +the moment he appeared on the stage, booted and spurred and heavily +swathed in American flags. His triumph was a foregone conclusion. The +scene that ensued when Senator Green concluded his argument by leaping +right over the table and pouring himself out a glass of ice-water on the +way, simply beggars description. + +No one to-day can possibly foresee [wrote the critic of the _Weekly +Review_] to what heights the dance, as the expression of all life, will +be carried. We can only call attention to the plans recently formulated +by one of our leading publishers for a library of the world's best +thought, to be issued at a price that will bring it within the reach of +people of very moderate means. The library will consist of bound volumes +of photographs showing the world's greatest dancers in their +interpretation of famous authors. Twenty young women from the Paris and +St. Petersburg conservatories of dancing have already been engaged. +Among other works they will dance the Psalms and Ecclesiastes, the +second book of the Iliad, "Oedipus the King," the fifth Canto of +Dante's "Inferno," Spinoza's "Ethics," "Hamlet," Rousseau's +"Confessions," "Mother Goose," Tennyson's "Brook" and the "Charge of the +Light Brigade," Burke's "Speech on Conciliation," "Alice in Wonderland," +the "Pickwick Papers," the Gettysburg Address, Darwin's "Origin of +Species," and Mr. Dooley. + + + + +XIII + +ON LIVING IN BROOKLYN + + +Perhaps the principal charm about living in Brooklyn lies in the fact +that strangers can find their way there only with extreme difficulty. +The streets in Brooklyn are to me a perpetual source of joy and +wonderment. Like the city itself, they have kept the slow-paced habits +of a former age. No city is more easy to be lost in, and Brooklyn is at +all times full of people from across the river, who ask the way to +Borough Hall. For that matter, one may easily be lost on Staten Island, +where the inhabitants are reputed to pass the pleasant summer evenings +in guiding strangers to the trolley lines. But a person naturally +expects to lose his bearings on Staten Island. On the other hand, to be +lost in Brooklyn irritates as well as confuses. It is like starving in +the midst of plenty. One always has the choice of half a dozen surface +cars, but one is always sure to be directed to the wrong one. + +So I repeat: Brooklyn's tangled streets serve their highest purpose in +safeguarding its inhabitants against the unwelcome visitor. Because of +our American good nature we are always inviting people to call; and when +they accept we immediately feel sorry. It is a law with us that if two +utterly unsympathetic persons meet by chance at the house of a common +friend, they shall insist on having each other to dinner on the +following two Sundays. Or, again, you may be shaking hands with a very +dear friend in the presence of a third person whom you dislike. And you +are extremely anxious to have your friend come up for tea on Sunday, +and you cannot do it without asking the other man. + +Under such circumstances, it is well to live in Brooklyn. All you need +say then to the person you have an aversion for is: "I should be +delighted to have you call on us Sunday afternoon. We live in Brooklyn, +you know, at No. 125 Bowdoin Place." You may then go home in peace, +confident that your undesired visitor will never find you. At eight +o'clock on Sunday night he will be wearily asking a policeman on +Flatbush Avenue what the shortest way is to Borough Hall. Long before +that he will have given up hope of finding No. 125 Bowdoin Place. His +only object is to get home before midnight. Now it is plain that such an +excellent defence against unpleasant people is unavailable in Manhattan. +Ask a man to look you up at No. 952 West One Hundred and Twelfth Street, +and though your heart loathes him, you shall not escape. But in +Brooklyn you are safe until the moment your doorbell actually rings. For +even if your visitor should find Bowdoin Place, many streets in Brooklyn +have two, three, or four systems of numbering. Some will maintain that +it is not rigidly honest to give a stranger your Brooklyn address +without giving him detailed directions for finding his way from the +station, illustrating your argument with a sketch map. But there will +always be Puritan consciences. + +As a matter of fact, some of the kindest and most enlightened people I +know live in Brooklyn. And I cannot see why that in itself should make +them a subject for general satire. I have been told that a professor at +Harvard has recently made the calculation that the drama and the art of +conversation in America would be poorer by 33-1/3 per cent. if the joke +about living in Brooklyn were to disappear. When a visitor from +Brooklyn drops in unexpectedly at a Harlem flat, the proper thing for +the host to say is, "Well, well, what a task it must have been to find +your way out," and when the visitor starts for home his host remarks, +"Sorry you can't stay; but we all know how it is--in the midst of life +you are in Brooklyn. Goodnight." + +Of course I don't mean to deny that the people who live in Brooklyn are +themselves largely responsible for the perpetuation of the silly jest. +They subscribe to it in a spirit of meekness that is characteristically +local. Ask a man from Cherry Springs or Binghamton where is his home and +he will quietly say, Cherry Springs or Binghamton, as the case may be. +But the resident of Brooklyn is apologetic from the start. He +anticipates criticism by saying, "Well, you know, _I_ live in Brooklyn," +and he looks at you in tremulous expectation of the usual condolences. +If by any chance one should omit the traditional reply, the man from +Brooklyn begins to fear the worst. On both sides of the East River the +principle seems to be accepted that inasmuch as there are places like +Cherry Springs or Binghamton there must be people who live in them, but +that it is by definition impossible to bring forward a valid reason why +one should live in Brooklyn. + +The question is really a complicated one. Harlem's disapproval of +Brooklyn is not of a piece with Harlem's disapproval of localities +outside itself. Living in Brooklyn is something utterly different from +living in New Jersey or the Bronx. New Jersey and the Bronx are so +entirely out of the ordinary that they call for no explanation. Living +there has at least the merit of originality. A great poet might choose +to live in the Bronx. Minor poets have been known to commute across the +Hudson. But Brooklyn cannot be dismissed so easily. She is too big, too +close, and, for all her timidity, too contented. Her people come under +the head of those who ought to know better and do not try. Thus, while +living in New Jersey is a matter of taste, and living in the Bronx is a +matter of necessity, living in Brooklyn is a matter of habit. + +And a fine, rich, ripe old habit it is, and a precious thing in a +modern, shouting world that has no habits but only impulses and vices. +Let me confess: I like Brooklyn, and I like to dream of going to live +there some day. And possibly I would go if it were not for the desire of +keeping the project before me as one of the few ideals I have retained +in life. I like Brooklyn's shapeless rotundity as contrasted with our +abominable rectangular distances in Manhattan. I like it because it +sprawls low against the ground instead of clawing up into the sky. +Manhattan is solid with brick and steel from river to river. Brooklyn +ambles on peacefully till it comes to a region of sand lots or a marsh +or a creek, and stops. Half a mile further on it resumes its gentle +dreams of progress and wanders north, or south, or east, as the fancy +seizes it. It runs into blind corners, it debouches upon ravines and +woodland strips, it hears the echoes of ocean on the beaches. It is +leisure; it is peace; it is Brooklyn. + +At the same time it is well to remember that Brooklyn is something more +than a geographical fact. Brooklyn describes a scheme of life and a +condition of the mind. The life there is like a page from yesterday. +People who live in Brooklyn organise reading circles. They attend +lectures on the Wagnerian music drama. They have retained progressive +euchre and the strawberry festival as essential ingredients of religion. +They are extremely fond of going on long excursions into the country in +early spring. They make it a habit to walk across the bridge on their +way home in the evening, and they speak with great feeling of the +beautiful effect when New York's high buildings flash into banked masses +of flame in the falling dusk. People who live in Brooklyn take pride in +keeping up old friendships and in dressing without ostentation. There +are old gentlemen who use only the ferries in coming to New York, +because they regard the bridges as a novelty open to the suspicion of +being unsafe. + +And yet, as I have said, Brooklyn is rather a condition than a concrete +fact. I believe every great Babylon has its neighbouring Brooklyn. +London has it; Boston has it; Paris has it; even Chicago has it. And the +line of demarcation between what is Brooklyn and what is not Brooklyn is +not always a sharp one. There are many people in Manhattan who at heart +are residents of Brooklyn. Such people, though they live in Harlem, +avoid the express trains in the Subway on account of the crush. They +visit the Museum of Natural History on Sunday and the Metropolitan +Museum of Art on legal holidays and extraordinary occasions. They cross +the Hudson and walk on the Palisades. They bring librettos to the opera +and read them in the dark, thus missing a great deal of what passes on +the stage. On the other hand, you will find people in Brooklyn whose +spirit is totally alien to the place. They want to boost Brooklyn and +boom it and push it and make it the most important borough in Greater +New York, and develop its harbour facilities, and establish a great +university, and double the assessed value of real estate within five +years. Such people are in Brooklyn, but not of it. + +And that is why Brooklyn has so strong a hold on me. I like it because +it has so many wonderful, valuable, common things in it. In Brooklyn +there are people, churches, baby-carriages, bay-windows, butchers' boys +carrying baskets and whistling, policemen who misdirect strangers, +vacant lots where boys play baseball, small tradesmen, overhead +trolleys, quiet streets tucked away between parallel lines of clanging +elevated railway, an Institute of Arts, and old gentlemen who write +letters to the newspapers. I like Brooklyn because it hasn't the highest +anything, or the biggest anything, or the richest anything in the +world. + + + + +XIV + +PALLADINO OUTDONE + + +Harding spent one long winter night in reading the report of a select +committee of the Society for Psychical Recreation which placed on record +no less than half a dozen absolutely authenticated cases of material +objects being moved through space by some mysterious agency other than +physical. The report, as it took shape in Harding's dreams that night, +was as follows: + +In the first experiment the medium was an ordinary American citizen. The +precautions against the slightest bodily movement on his part were +perfect. Mr. Joseph G. Cannon planted both of his feet on the medium's +left foot and seized his left hand in both his own. Senator Aldrich did +the same on the other side. The Honourable Sereno E. Payne grasped the +medium by the throat, the Honourable John Dalzell straddled on his +chest, Senator Burrows of Michigan strapped his ankles to the chair, and +Senator Scott of West Virginia thrust a gag into his mouth. As a further +precaution, before the seance began, a representative of the Sugar Trust +went through the medium's pockets. The medium struggled and groaned and +made other signs of distress, but at all times remained under absolute +control. Yet it is a fact that, in spite of all restraints imposed upon +him, this ordinary American citizen did succeed in raising a family of +two sons and a daughter and even in sending the eldest child to college. +At various times one even caught sight of a loaf of bread or a pair of +shoes sailing through the air, and once, for a moment, the Committee +distinctly smelt roast turkey with cranberry sauce. At the end of the +seance the medium was in a pitiful state of exhaustion, but declared +that he was quite ready to go on. + +In the second experiment the Committee made use of the Mayor of one of +our large cities and of the boss of the party to which the Mayor +belonged. The boss acted as medium, being securely strapped into a chair +about three feet away from another chair, on which the Mayor was +sitting, blindfolded. Again the standard precautions against fraud were +gone through, but this time the medium's efforts met with almost +immediate response. At the merest droop of the boss's right eyelid, the +Mayor leaped up from his chair and turned completely around. The boss +smiled faintly, whereupon the Mayor balanced himself for 3 minutes and +42 seconds on his right foot and for 2 minutes and 35 seconds on his +left foot, and then began to run about the room on all-fours in an +amusing imitation of a spaniel fetching and carrying for his master. The +boss inserted the point of his tongue into his cheek and withdrew it +again, repeating the process several times in rapid succession. In +response, the Mayor's face went into a series of spasmodic smiles and +frowns that aroused general laughter. At the conclusion of the +performance, the boss gently clicked his tongue against his palate, and +the Mayor promptly stood on his head in the middle of the floor. + +A somewhat similar experiment was concerned with a magazine editor and a +life-size mannikin made up to resemble a muckraker. The editor and the +lay figure sat facing in opposite directions at a distance of about ten +feet. The editor, who acted as medium, was holding the telephone +receiver with one hand and signing checks with the other, so that there +could be no question of manual manipulation on his part. Neither could +his feet come into play, because they were in full view on his desk. The +telepathy hypothesis was eliminated because, in the first place, the +mannikin had no mind, of course, and in the second place, the editor +changed his own mind so fast that no external mind could possibly keep +up with it. The results were gratifying. The editor took a slip of paper +and wrote a few words upon it. Immediately the stuffed figure began to +shout, "Murder! Fire! Thieves! Help! Murder! Fire! Thieves! Help! +Murder!" at intervals of two seconds. The editor wrote something on +another slip of paper, and the mechanical figure went through a most +complex series of movements. First it seized a pair of paint brushes and +began to paint all the white objects in the room black and all the black +objects white. Then it went through the motions of playing, for a few +minutes, upon a typewriter. Then it seized a pair of shears and set to +work clipping solid pages from books and magazines. Then it copied a +long column of figures from an almanac and added them up wrong. Then it +drew a memory sketch of an English statesman, and put the wrong name +under it. The editor assured the Committee that he could continue the +process for hours at will. + +An excellent seance was one in which the medium was a man very near the +top in American finance. The rest of the group forming the circle around +the table were plain American citizens of the type described in the +first experiment. The medium was securely roped in his chair with +anti-Trust laws, anti-rebating laws, insurance laws, banking laws, +franchise laws, etc. Yet no sooner were the lights turned down than the +phenomena began. John Smith, on the right of the medium, suddenly felt a +sharp blow on the neck. As he turned around instinctively a ghostly +hand snatched away his pocket-book and the sound of mocking laughter +could be plainly heard from the dark cabinet. Another weird hand pulled +Thomas Jones's insurance policy out of his breastpocket, dangled it in +the air just out of his reach, and then flung it back at him. Later when +Jones looked at his policy he found that its face value had been cut +down one-half. James Robinson all at once began to feel his shoe pinch, +and could not discover the reason until he, too, caught sight of a +ghostly hand hovering in the vicinity of his pocket. Soon the room was +filled with a veritable chaos of flying objects. Railroads, steamship +lines, national banks, trust companies, insurance companies, went +hurtling through the air, but all the time our financier sat motionless +in his chair. It was suggested that the force which set such ponderous +objects into motion was the mysterious element known as "executive +ability." + +In the final experiment the subject was a popular novelist, who gave a +most interesting exhibition of how a nation-wide reputation can be +raised and supported without the slightest apparent reason. A +painstaking examination by the Committee showed that he had concealed +about him neither talent, nor imagination, nor knowledge of human +nature, nor insight into life, nor an intimate acquaintance with the +elements of English grammar. Nevertheless, before the eyes of the amazed +observers, novel after novel went humming through the air in a direction +away from the writer, while a steady stream of bank-books, automobiles, +and country houses flowed in the opposite direction. + + + + +XV + +THE CADENCE OF THE CROWD + + +I have always been peculiarly susceptible to the music of marching feet. +I know of no sound in nature or in Wagner that stirs the heart like the +footsteps of the crowd on the board platform of the Third Avenue "L" at +City Hall every late afternoon. The human tread is always eloquent in +chorus, but it is at its best upon a wooden flooring. Stone and asphalt +will often degrade the march of a crowd to a shuffle. It needs the +living wood to give full dignity to the spirit of human resolution that +speaks in a thousand pair of feet simultaneously moving in the same +direction; and particularly when the moving mass is not an army, but a +crowd advancing without rank or order. I am exceedingly fond of military +parades; so fond that I repeatedly find myself standing in front of +ladies of medium height who pathetically inquire at frequent intervals +what regiment is passing at that moment. But it is not the blare of the +brass bands I care for, or the clatter of cavalry, which I find +exceedingly stupid, or even the rattle of the heavy guns, but the men on +foot. Only when the infantry comes swinging by do I grow wild with the +desire to wear a conspicuous uniform and die for my country. +Saint-Gaudens's man on horseback in the Shaw memorial is beautiful, but +it is the forward-lunging line of negro faces and the line of muskets on +shoulder that threaten to bring the tears to my eyes. + +This, I suppose, is rank sentimentality; but I cannot help it. Any +procession, no matter how humble, puts me into a state of mingled +exaltation and tearfulness. It is in part the sound of human footsteps +and in part the solemn idea behind them. I am not thinking of stately +processions moving up the aisles of churches to the sound of music. I +have in mind, rather, a band of, say, a thousand working girls on Labour +Day, or of an Italian fraternal organisation heavy with plumes and +banners, or even a Tammany political club on its annual outing; wherever +the idea of human dependence and human brotherhood is testified to in +the mere act of moving along the pavement shoulder to shoulder. Above +all things, it is a line of marching children that takes me quite out of +myself. I was a visitor not long ago at one of the public schools, and I +sat in state on the principal's platform. When the bell rang for +dismissal, and the sliding doors were pushed apart so as to form one +huge assembly room, and the children began to file out to the sound of +the piano, the splendour and the pathos of it overpowered me. I did not +know which I wanted to be then, the principal in his magnificent chair +of office, or one of those two thousand children keeping step in their +march towards freedom. + +Pathos? Why pathos in a little army of children marching out in fire +drill, or the same children marching in for their morning's Bible +reading and singing? I find it difficult to say why. Perhaps it is +consciousness of that law which has raised man from the brute, and which +I see embodied when we take a thousand children and range them in order +and induce them to keep step. Perhaps the pathos is in the recognition +of our isolated weakness and our need to make painful progress by +getting close together and moving forward in close formation. In any +case, the pathos is there. Consider a children's May party, on its way +to Central Park. A fife-and-drum corps of three little boys in uniform +leads the way. The Queen of the May, all in white, walks with her +consort under a canopy of ribbons and flowers, a little stiffly, +perhaps, and self-consciously, but not more so than older queens and +kings on parade. A long line of boys and girls in many-coloured caps +moves between flying detachments of mothers carrying baskets. The +confectioner's wagon, laden with its precious commissariat of ice cream +and cake, moves leisurely behind; for the confectioner's horse this is +evidently a holiday. Is pathos conceivable in so delightful, so smiling, +an event? Alas, I have watched May parties go by, and the serious little +faces under the red and white caps have given me a heavier case of +_Weltschmerz_ than I have ever experienced at a performance of "Tristan +und Isolde." It was the fact of those little children advancing in +unison; that is the word. If they had trudged or scurried along, +pell-mell, I should not have minded. But May parties move forward in +procession, and the movement of a compact crowd is, to me, always heavy +with pathos. + +But no crowd is like the afternoon crowd upon the wooden platform of the +"L" station at City Hall. I don't mean to be sentimental when I say that +the sound is to me like the march of human civilisation and human +history. Outwardly there is little to justify my grandiose comparison. +You see only a heaving mass of men and women who are not very well clad. +The men are unshaven, the women awry with a day's labour. They move on +with that beautiful optimism of an American crowd which has been trained +in the belief that there is always plenty of room ahead. There is very +little pushing. Occasionally a band of young boys hustle their way +through the crowd; but a New York crowd seems always to be mindful of +the days when we were all of us boys. It is a reading public. The men +carry newspapers whose flaring headlines of red and green give a touch +of almost Italian colour. The women carry cloth-bound novels in paper +wrappers. But it is not an assemblage of poets or scholars or thinkers, +or whatever class it is that is supposed to keep the world moving. It is +that most solemn of all things--a city crowd on its way home from the +day's work. + +The footsteps keep up the tramp, tramp, on the board flooring, while +train after train pulls out jammed within and without. The influx from +the street allows no vacuum to be formed upon the platform. The patience +of the modern man shows wonderfully. The tired workers face the hour's +ride that lies between them and home with beautiful self-restraint and +courage. And in their weariness and their patience lies the full +solemnity of the scene. The morning crowd, even on the same wooden +platform at City Hall, is different. The morning crowd is not so firmly +knit together. You catch individual and local peculiarities. You feel +that there are men and women here from Harlem, and others from Long +Island, and others from Westchester and the Bronx. They are still fresh +from their separate homes, with their separate atmospheres about them. +Some are brisk from the morning's exercise and the cold bath; some are +still a bit sleepy from last night's pleasures; some go to the day's +task with eager anticipation; some move forward indifferent and +resigned. But when these same men and women surge homeward in the +evening, they are one in spirit; they are all equally tired. The city +and the day's task have seized upon them and passed them through the +same set of rollers and pressed out their differences and transformed +them into a single mass of weary human material. The city has had its +day's work out of them and now sends them home to recruit the new +supply of energy that it will demand to-morrow. The unshaven men with +their newspapers and the listless women with their paper-covered novels +show ascetically tight-drawn faces, as if the day had been passed in +prayer and supplication. I need not see those faces; I know they are +there from the steady footfalls on the board platform. I overhear a +young girl recounting what a perfectly lovely time she had last night, +and how she simply couldn't stop dancing; but her foot drags a bit +heavily and there sounds in her chatter and her vehemence the +ground-tone of weariness. + +It is not often that I hear the tramp of the late afternoon crowd upon +the wooden platforms at City Hall. I find the sound of the crowd too +solemn to be endured every day, and there is no comfort in the crush. I +usually take pains to travel at an early hour when there are few people, +and one is sure of a seat. + + + + +XVI + +WHAT WE FORGET + + +The importance of knowing who my Congressman is had never occurred to me +until Professor Wilson Stubbs brought up the subject at a luncheon in +the Reform Club. Professor Stubbs spoke on Civic Obligations. He argued +that at the bottom of all political corruption lay the average citizen's +personal indifference. "For instance," he said, "how many of those +present know the name of the man who represents their district at +Washington?" And as it happened, while he waited for a reply, his eye +rested thoughtfully on me. + +I grew red under his scrutiny. I tried my best to remember and failed. I +did vaguely recall the lithographed presentment of a large, +clean-shaven man, with a heavy jaw. It hung in a barber-shop window +between a blue-and-red poster announcing a grand masquerade and civic +ball, and a papier-mache trout under a glass case. I could not bring +back the man's name, although I was sure that his picture was inscribed +on the top "Our Choice," and at the bottom he was characterised as +somebody's friend--I could not recall whether he was the People's +friend, or the Workingman's, or the Bronx's. I could not even make out +his features, although, oddly enough, I could see the trout very +distinctly. The fish, I recollected, had a peculiarly ferocious scowl, +as if it resented the absurd blotches of green and gold with which the +artist had attempted to imitate Nature's colour scheme. Gradually I +found myself thinking of the trout as a member of Congress. Had I +continued much longer, I should have visualised that fish in the act of +addressing the Speaker of the House on the tariff bill. + +Yet I could not help taking the professor's implied criticism to heart. +It would have been something even, to be able to tell whether I lived in +the Eleventh Congressional District or the Fifteenth; but I didn't know. +For how long a term was the man elected? I didn't know. Was it required +that he should be able to read and write? I didn't know. + +That was the beginning. When luncheon was over, I sat before the fire +and tried to find out how much I did know of the things I should. I +found myself staring into bottomless depths of ignorance. I tried to +draw up a list of State Governors. I knew there must be between forty +and fifty, but I could remember only three Governors, including our own; +and later I recalled that one of the three was dead. + +From death my mind leaped, oddly enough, to drownings. How should one +go about resuscitating a man who has been pulled out of the river? He +must be rolled on a barrel, of course; that much I remembered. But was +it face down or face upward? And should his arms be pumped vertically up +and down, or horizontally away from the body and back? Yes, and how if +some intelligent foreigner were to ask me what our five principal cities +were, in the order of population? It would be easy enough to begin, New +York, Chicago, Philadelphia--and then? Was it Boston, or Baltimore, or +San Francisco? I did not know. + +There was no stopping now. I was fast in my own clutches. I bit at my +cigar, and tried to call the roll of the seven wise men of Greece. I +stopped at the first, Solon. He, I remembered, rescued the Athenians +from misgovernment and slavery, and left the city before they could +experience a change of heart and hang him. + +Who were the nine muses? Well, there was Terpsichore--her disciples are +spoken of every day in the newspapers. And then there was the muse of +History, whose name possibly was Thalia, and the muse of Poetry, whose +name I could not recall. I fared much better with the apostles: Peter +and Paul, of course, and John and James, and Judas and Matthew, and Mark +and Luke; eight out of twelve. + +But of the seven wonders of the world I could cite with certainty only +one, the Colossus of Rhodes. I was doubtful about Mount Vesuvius. I +remembered not a single one of the seven deadly sins, and, at first, +could place only two of the ten commandments--the ones on filial +obedience and on the Sabbath. Later I thought of the newest realistic +hit at the Park Theatre; that brought back one more commandment. On the +other hand, it was a relief to call the three Graces straight +off--Faith, Hope, and Charity. + +I grew humble. I began to doubt if, after all, it is true that a modern +schoolboy knows more than Aristotle did. In any case, whether +Harrington's boy who is still in the grammar grades knows more than +Aristotle, he certainly knows more than his father. They have a +new-fashioned branch of study in the modern schools, which they call +training the powers of observation. And that boy comes home with +mischief in his soul, and asks Harrington which way do the seeds in an +apple point. Harrington stares at the boy, and the boy smiles +quizzically at Harrington, and the father grows suspicious. Are there +seeds in an apple? There are seedless oranges, of course, which +presupposes oranges not destitute of seeds; but an apple? Harrington +tries to call up the image of the last apple he has eaten and he thinks +of sweet and sour apples, apples of a waxen yellow and apples of a +purple red, but he cannot visualise the seeds. + +As Harrington sits there dumb, Jack asks him which shoe does he put on +first when he dresses in the morning. Jack knows, the rascal. He can +trace every process through which the cotton fibre passes from the plant +to the finished cloth. He knows why factory chimneys are built high. He +knows how a boat tacks against the wind. And he knows that his father +knows nothing of these things. + +But I would rather have Harrington's boy quiz me on things that I can +pretend are not worth knowing, like the seeds in an apple, than on +things that cannot be waved aside. I tried to explain one day how the +revolution of the earth about the sun produces the seasons, and I +succeeded only in proving that when it is winter in New York it is +daylight in Buenos Ayres. Thereupon, Jack asked me what an unearned +increment was. When I finished he said his teacher had told them that +views like those I had just expressed were common among ill-informed +people. The following day he came in and said to Harrington, "Papa, name +six female characters in Dickens, in three minutes." Well, Harrington +did, but it was a strain, and in order to make up the total he had to +count in the anonymous, elderly, single woman whom Mr. Pickwick +surprised in her bedroom. Jack insisted that, as she was nameless, it +was not fair to call her a character, but Harrington put his foot down +and refused to argue the matter. + +And as I sit there before the fire, smiling over Harrington and Jack and +myself, my cigar goes out, and I signal Thomas to bring me another. +Thomas has the ascetic countenance of a tragedian, and the repose of an +archbishop. Now, Thomas--and it comes to me with a shock--what do I +know about Thomas, the man, as distinguished from the hired servant whom +I have been aware of this year and more? Is he married or single? And if +he is married, do his children resent their father's wearing livery? +Does Thomas himself like to be a servant? Are there ideals and +speculations behind that close-shaven mask? Has he any views on the +future life? Has he ever thought on the subject of vivisection? Does he +vote the Republican ticket? Does he earn a decent wage? + +I could only answer, with an aching sense of isolation, with the wistful +longing of one who looks into unfathomable depths, that I didn't know. +Oh, Thomas, fellow man, brother! We have rubbed elbows for months and I +do not know whether you are a man or only a lackey; whether you drink +all night, or pray; whether you love me or hate me. How can you hold the +cigar box so impassively, so single-mindedly? + +I said to myself that I would make amends to Thomas, that it was never +too late. And, quietly, genially, I asked him, "How do you like your +place here, Thomas?" Thomas grew uneasy, and smiled in a sickish +fashion, and entreated me with his eyes to pick my cigar and let him go. +But I was in the full swing of new-found righteousness. "There's nothing +wrong, is there, Thomas?" And he replied, "I beg pardon, sir; but +Henry's my name. Thomas was my predecessor. He left, you will remember, +sir, a year ago last May." "But everybody calls you Thomas." "The +gentlemen were used to the other name, sir." + +Might Professor Wilson Stubbs be wrong, after all, I thought. Perhaps no +one is really expected to know what everybody ought to know. I don't +know the name of my Congressman. But neither do I know the name of my +butcher and my grocer; and my butcher and my grocer can slay me with +typhoid or ptomaines, whereas the utmost my Congressman can do is to +misrepresent me. I don't know the man who makes my cigars; he may be +consumptive. I don't know the critic who supplies me with literary +opinions, and the scholar who gives me my outlook upon life. I don't +know the man who lives next door. From the decent silence that reigns in +his apartment, I gather that he does not beat his wife; but that is all. +Yet he and I are supposed to be bound up in a community of interests. We +both belong to the class whose income ranges from $2,000 to $4,000 a +year, of which we spend 38 per cent. on food; and we raise an average of +2-2/3 children to the family, and are both responsible for the wide +prevalence of musical comedy on the American stage. But I have seen my +neighbour twice in the last three years. + +So that was the end of it. And because it was late in the afternoon, I +thought I would telephone to the office that I was not coming back. But +for the life of me, I could not think of my telephone number; and Henry +looked me up in the directory. + + + + +XVII + +THE CHILDREN THAT LEAD US + + +The mayor sat before his library fire and shivered, and kept wondering +why there was no clause in the city charter prescribing a minimum of +common sense for presidents of the Board of Education. A man thus +qualified would know more than to suggest an increase of three million +dollars for school sittings. The city's comptroller was crying +bankruptcy; the newspapers were asserting that the mayor's nephew was +head of a favoured contracting firm not entirely for his health; and the +Board of Education wanted three million dollars. The mayor had a touch +of fever. The steep rows of figures in the Education Board's memorandum +curled up into little arabesques under his eyes, which were closing +with fatigue. Only he did not wish to sleep. In the perfect stillness he +could hear his own rapid heartbeat. The clatter of sleety rain against +the windows made him restless. + +If only O'Brien were here, O'Brien, who was a good chief of police, and +a matchless personal aide-de-camp. They would then put on boots and +oilskins and go out into the night on one of their frequent +Harun-Al-Rashid expeditions. The mayor's wife? Yes, it is true that +before leaving for the theatre she had cautioned him not to stir from +the house. But she could not possibly have known how great was his need +of a breath of air. But O'Brien was not here. Was it because he had just +been appointed president of the Board of Education and comptroller in +one and was a busy man? Perhaps. And yet a person might step to the +telephone and ring up O'Brien if it were not that one's legs were +weighted down with the weight of centuries and of dozens of new school +buildings all in reinforced concrete. Was it concrete? The mayor was not +quite sure, and he turned to ask O'Brien, who stood there at one side of +the fireplace, erect and attentive. + +"Do we go out to-night?" said the mayor. + +"I should not advise it, your Honour," answered O'Brien. "You are not +well enough. If it is adventure you would go in search of, I have here +quite an extraordinary delegation of citizens who desire an interview +with your Honour." + +"Let us hear them, by all means," replied the mayor. + +O'Brien drew aside the curtain which divided the library from the +general reception room and there marched in, two abreast and maintaining +precise step, a solemn line of children, who saluted the mayor gravely +and ranged themselves in a semicircle across the room. As the mayor +veered in his chair to face his visitors, a girl of some fifteen years +stepped out of the line. She was still in her schoolgirl's dresses, but +tall, with features of a fine, pensive cut and earnest eyes that were +already peering from out the child's life into the opening doors of +womanhood. + +"May it please your Honour," she began, "we are a committee from the +Central Bureau of Federated Children's Organisations and we have come +here to protest against certain intolerable conditions of which our +members are the victims." + +Had they come in behalf of those additional three million dollars, the +mayor wondered uneasily. "State the nature of your grievance," he said. + +The leader of the delegation came a step nearer. "Your Honour, I can +only attempt the merest outline of our general position. Several of my +associates will take turns in acquainting you with the details of our +case. Our complaint is that we, the children of this country, are being +overworked. Formerly it was supposed to be the inalienable right of +children to remain free from the cares of life. That theory has long +been abandoned. The task of solving the gravest problems of existence +has been thrust upon us, and every day that passes leaves us saddled +with new responsibilities. But the limit of endurance has been reached +at last. We feel that unless we protest now the whole structure of +society--its economics, politics, art, and religion--will be shifted +from the shoulders of the world's men and women to the shoulders of us +children. I hope your Honour is willing to hear us." + +"Of course, my dear," the mayor answered softly. He said, "My dear," and +he said it tenderly because he had recognised in the speaker his own +daughter Helen, whom he had supposed with her mother at the theatre. + +"Step forward, Flora Binns," said Helen, and Flora Binns, who was only +eight, blue-eyed, and with ringlets of gold, approached and curtsied +prettily. "May it please your Honour," she said, "I am the delegate from +Local No. 16 Children of Weak and Tempted Stage Mothers' Union. We wish +to place on record our opposition to the modern society drama, which so +frequently throws the duty of supporting the climax of a play upon +children under the age of ten. Although the playwrights are fond of +showing that our papa is a brute and that our mamma is an angel, they +invariably shrink from the logical conclusion that our mamma is right in +planning to run away with the man who has offered her years of silent +devotion. So the playwrights make one or two of us appear on the stage +just in time to arouse in our mamma a sense of duty to her children and +to prevent the elopement. Now we submit that the office of justifying +our entire modern marriage fabric is too burdensome for us. Don't you +think so, Mr. Mayor?" + +"Why, yes," replied the mayor, thoughtfully. + +"And they make use of us in other ways, sir. In fact, whenever the grown +up persons in a play are in difficulties and the audience is beginning +to yawn, the author sends us to the rescue. Why, only the other day we +children saved a Wild West melodrama from utter failure. It took three +of us to do it, but we succeeded." Flora curtsied, started back and +returned. "And when I utter these sentiments, sir, I speak also for the +Union of Precocious Magazine Children, which is represented here by Mary +Sparks." Mary Sparks, a dark-haired miss with dancing eyes, bowed +saucily. + +"Step out, Fritz Hackenschneider," said Helen, and flaxen-haired Fritz, +radiantly holiday-like in his lustrously washed face and large, blue +polka-dot tie, approached the mayor's chair. + +"I don't have much to say, sir," he recited in a nervous, jerky voice. +"I have been sent by the Fraternal Association of Comic Supplement +Children. We wish to raise our voice against the almost universal +conception that people can be made to laugh only when one of us hides a +pin on the seat of grandpa's chair. The burden of an entire nation's +humour is more than we can sustain. Thank you, sir," and he retired into +the background, giving, as he passed, just one tug at Mary Sparks's hair +and eliciting a suppressed scream. + +"Mamie O'Farrell," called out Helen. The mayor found it impossible to +decide whether Mamie was thirteen or twenty-five. She was very short +and flat-chested, and the colour of her face in the firelight was like a +dull cardboard. She wore a long, faded automobile cloak and an enormous +black hat with a trailing green feather. On a gilt chain about her neck +hung a locket in the form of a heart half as large as the one that beat +uneasily within her. Mamie came forward reluctantly and saluted. Then +she began to squirm from side to side and to shift from foot to foot, +giggling in unfathomable embarrassment. + +"Well," said Helen, in a voice that was not at all unkind. + +Mamie's giggle grew worse. She seemed bent on snapping the massive gilt +chain with twisting it back and forth, and finally gave up the whole +case. "You tell it, Helen," she begged. "I forgot wot I was goin' t' +say. I'm scared poifectly stiff." + +Helen complied. "May it please your Honour, Mamie O'Farrell wants me to +say that she represents the Amalgamated Union of Cash Girls and Juvenile +Cotton Mill and Glass Factory Operatives. Mamie is fifteen. She works +eleven hours a day and receives three and a half dollars a week. She +passes two hours every day clinging to a strap in a crowded surface car. +She carries her lunch in a paper bundle together with a copy of Laura M. +Clay's novel entitled 'Irma's Ducal Lover.' Saturday nights, if her +father has been strong enough to pass Murphy's saloon without opening +his pay envelope, she goes to the theatre where the play is 'The Queen +of the Opium Fiends.' Sometimes she attends a dance of the Friendship +Circle, but as a rule she spends her nights at home reading the _Evening +Yell_, which tells her that beauty is often a fatal gift and that there +is danger in the first glass of champagne a young girl drinks. Am I +telling your story in the right way, Mamie?" asked Helen. + +"Goodness, yes. You're awful kind, Helen," said Mamie. + +"Thus far, Mamie has nothing to complain of," continued Helen. "But she +has read somewhere that the slaughter of the poor negroes in the Congo +and of the Chinese in Manchuria, and of the Zulus in Natal, and of the +Moros in the Philippines, arises from the necessity under which the +civilised nations labour to find foreign markets for their increasing +output of cotton goods, brass jewelry, and coloured beads. Now the +members of Mamie's union are engaged in producing precisely those +commodities, and they have come to feel in consequence, that they are +directly responsible for the innocent blood that is being shed in +various parts of the world. It cannot be their employers who are at +fault, because the press and the clergy are unanimous in declaring that +the heads of our great industries are the benefactors of humankind. That +is why the girls protest. They are quite content with their own fate, +but they cannot bear the entire responsibility for the march of +civilisation. Mamie tells me that she cannot sleep of nights for +thinking of the poor little Moorish babies whose mothers were killed by +the French guns. That is the position taken by your union, isn't it, +Mamie?" + +Mamie giggled, went through a final contortion of ill-ease and returned +to her place, in the half-circle. She was succeeded by a brown-haired +little maiden, who for some minutes had been showing a strained anxiety +to break into speech. + +"Please, Helen," she entreated, "may I say something?" + +"Of course, dear," said Helen. + +The little maid bowed to the mayor. "Please, sir," she said, "my papa +was thirty-eight years of age when he married mamma. He was an old +bachelor. He was not anxious to be married, but they put a tax on him +because they were afraid of depopulation. And he loves me very dearly. +But sometimes when he thinks of his old freedom he looks so sadly at me. +I feel very sorry for him then. I don't want him to be unhappy on my +account----" + +She withdrew and Helen stepped forward to sum up the case. "You must not +think, your Honour, that it is our desire to embarrass your +administration. Bad as conditions are, we would have continued to suffer +in silence, because, you see, there are still little flashes of freedom +left to us children. But we have learned that there is now on foot in +England a movement which threatens to reduce us to unmitigated slavery. +We understand that Mr. Sidney Webb, Mr. Francis Galton, Professor Karl +Pearson, and Mr. Bernard Shaw are advocating a scheme of state endowment +for motherhood. Now you can see for yourself what that would mean. In +politics it would mean the establishment of a motherhood suffrage with +plural voting based on the size of the family. In the economic sphere it +would mean that we shall be supporting our papas and mammas. In art, +which must reflect the actualities of life, it would mean almost the +elimination of the element of love, since the world is to be a +children's world. In other words, as I have already said, the entire +social fabric will come to press on our shoulders alone. It is against +the mere possibility of such an unnatural state of affairs that we are +here to protest." + +"But what is it you want?" asked the mayor, somewhat nettled because +O'Brien, instead of backing him up, was busy piling three million +golden dollars on the floor in stacks two and a half feet high. + +"We want to be left alone!" The reply came in a chorus of trebles, +pipings, quavers, and adolescent falsettos that caused the mayor to lift +his hands to his forehead entreating silence. "We want our old +privileges again. We want to be allowed just to grow up." + +"Yassir," shrilled one voice above the others, "jist to grow up." + +The mayor raised himself in his chair and his eyes lit up with surprise +at the sight of a well-known black little face at the very end of the +second row. + +"What, Topsy, you here?" he called out. "Haven't you done growing all +these sixty years, nearly?" + +"Yassir," answered Topsy, inserting an index finger into her mouth. "Ah +was shure growin' fas'; but Massa Booker Washin'ton he says that ah and +the likes of me was charged with th' future of the negro race. An' that +skyeered me so ah made up mah mind ah wouldn' grow no further." + +The mayor turned to Helen. "You understand of course, my dear, that I +cannot lay a proposition of so vague a nature before the Board of +Aldermen. They are a rather unimaginative set of men." + +"We have drawn up a list of demands, your Honour, in terms precise +enough to make it a sufficient basis for practical legislation. May I +read the list to you, papa?" + +"Yes, my dear," he replied, and rising from his chair he put his arms +about her and kissed her. Her forehead was cool to his burning lips. +"Pray proceed, Miss Chairman." + +And Helen read in her high-pitched, petulantly graceful soprano: +"Resolutions adopted at a special meeting of the Central Bureau of the +Federated Children's Organisations of the United States: + +"1. Henceforth the proportion of child fiction in any magazine shall be +restricted to ten per cent. of the total contents of such publication; +and no magazine fiction child under the age of twelve shall be +represented as possessing an amount of intelligence greater than the +combined wisdom of its parents. + +"2. The married heroine of a society drama who has consistently +preferred yachting trips, bridge, and the opera to the company of her +children shall be precluded from calling upon them for aid to save +herself from the dangers of a mad infatuation. + +"3. Children under the age of eighteen shall be employed in no form of +industry whatsoever. If there are not enough hands to produce piece +goods for the Congo and the Philippines, let them draft all adult +motor-car chauffeurs, diamond polishers, wine agents, amateur coach +drivers, settlement workers, preachers of the simple life, and writers +of musical comedy. + +"4. In the public schools there shall be no talks or lessons dealing +with the duties of citizenship. The time now given to that subject shall +be devoted to the reading of dime novels and fairy tales, so that on +graduating, children shall not be confronted with so startling a +contrast between the realities of life and what they have learned at +school. + +"5. Cooking and other branches of domestic science shall no longer be +taught in the schools. One-half of us expect to live in family hotels +and the other half will probably be in no position to afford the +expensive ingredients employed in scientific cookery. + +"6. Mr. Francis Galton, who invented Eugenics, and Messrs. Karl Pearson +and Sidney Webb, who helped to popularise it, shall be executed. Mr. +Bernard Shaw shall be banished to a desert island." + +And the mayor all the while kept thinking how like her mother Helen was: +her voice, her hair, her eyes, but especially her voice. It filled the +room with many-coloured vibrations of the consistency of building +concrete and hid completely from the mayor's sight the crowd of young +faces, O'Brien, the Board of Aldermen, and the three million presidents +of the Board of Education. Only Helen remained and she came close to him +and laid her cool fingers on his aching head. + +The mayor started up to find his wife bending over him. + +"Edward," she was saying, "you promised me you would go to bed early." + +"My dear," he replied, "I would have if I had not fallen asleep in my +chair. Have you had a pleasant evening at the theatre?" + +"It is dreadful weather," she said, "and I have a bit of cold. I suppose +I shouldn't have gone out to-night, but it was the last chance, and you +know the children _would_ see 'Peter Pan.'" + + + + +XVIII + +THE MARTIANS + + +The saddest thing about the recent announcement that there are no canals +on Mars is that Robert and I will now have so little to talk about. +Robert is my favourite waiter, and when he found out that I am what the +newspapers call a literary worker, he made up his mind that the ordinary +topics of light conversation would not do at all for me. After prolonged +resistance on my part he has succeeded in reducing our common interests +to two: the canals on Mars and French depopulation. Now and then I +venture to bring up the weather or the higher cost of living. Once I +asked him what he thought about the need of football reform. Once I +tried to drag in Mme. Steinheil. But Robert listens patiently, and when +I have concluded he calls my attention to the fact that in 1908 the +number of deaths in France exceeded the number of births by 12,000. When +the French population fails to stir me, he wonders whether the +inhabitants of Mars are really as intelligent as they are supposed to +be. + +And yet it must have been I that first suggested Mars to him. Let me +confess. I do not love the Martian canals with the devouring passion +they have aroused in susceptible souls like Robert. But in a quieter way +the canals have been very dear to me. Their threatened loss comes like +the loss of an old friend; a distant friend whose face one has almost +forgotten and never hopes to see again, from whom one never hopes to +borrow, and to whom one never expects to lend, but who all the more +lives in the mind a remote, impersonal, and gentle influence. I am not +ashamed to admit that I have learned to care more for the Martian +canals than for any canals much closer to us. The Panama Canal will +probably cut in two the distance to China, and give us a monopoly of the +cotton goods trade in the Pacific; but I think cotton goods are +unhealthful, and I don't want to go to China. The Suez Canal may be the +mainstay of the British Empire, but I have no doubt that it would make +just as satisfactory a mainstay for some other empire. My interest in +the Erie Canal is connected entirely with the fact that when it was +opened somebody said, "What hath God wrought!" or "There is no more +North and no more South"--I have forgotten which. + +I have always had a softer spot in my heart for the inhabitants of Mars +than for any other alien people. They have always impressed me as more +unassuming than the English, fonder of outdoor exercise than the +Germans, and less addicted to garrulity than the French. They lead +simple, laborious lives, digging away at their canals every morning, and +filling them up every night, for reasons best known to themselves and +certain professors at Harvard. I am attracted by their quaint +appearance. Mr. H. G. Wells, for instance, has depicted them with +cylindrical bodies of sheet iron, long legs like a tripod, heads like an +enormous diver's helmet, and arms like the tentacles of an octopus--as +odd a sight in their way as the latest woman's fashions from Paris. +Others have described the Martians as pot-bellied and hairless, with +goggle eyes, powerful arms, and curly, gelatinous legs, the result of +millions of years of universal culture and Subway congestion. A race so +unattractive could not but be virtuous. One feels instinctively that +there is no graft bound up with the digging of the Martian canals. + +No, anything but graft. One of the principal reasons why I am so fond of +the canals on Mars is that they are the most cheaply built system of +public works on record. A professor of astronomy in Italy or Arizona +finds a few dim lines on the plate of his camera, and immediately Mars +is equipped with a splendid network of artificial waterways. Am I wrong +in thinking of the Martian canals as one of the greatest triumphs of the +human mind? An African savage might find an elephant's skeleton and from +that reconstruct the animal in life. Only science can reconstruct an +elephant from a half-inch fragment of the bone of his hind leg. Only a +scientist could have reconstructed the Martian canals from a few +photographic scratches. Of such reconstructions our civilisation is +largely made up. We build up a statesman out of a bit of buncombe and a +frock coat; a genius out of two sonnets and half a dozen cocktails; a +dramatic "star" out of a lisp and a giggle; a two-column news story out +of the fragment of a fact; a multitude out of three men and a band; a +crusade out of one man and a press agent; a novel out of the trimmings +of earlier novels; a reputation out of an accident; a captain of +industry out of an itching palm; a philanthropist out of a beneficent +smile and a platitude; a critic out of a wise look and a fountain pen; +and a social prophet out of pretty small potatoes. I need not allude +here to the process of making mountains out of molehills, beams out of +motes, and entire summers out of single swallows. + +But mind, I do not mean that I was ever sceptical about the canals. +Indeed, I have always admired the way in which their existence was +demonstrated. There have always been two ways of proving that something +is true. One way is to bring forward sixteen reasons why, let us say, +the moon is made of green cheese. The other way is to assume that the +moon is made of green cheese and to answer sixteen objections brought +forward against the theory. I have always preferred the second method, +because it throws the burden of proof on your opponent. There is no +argument under the sun that cannot be refuted. Obviously, then, it is an +advantage to let your opponents supply the argument while you supply the +refutation. + +Neglect this precaution, and you are in difficulties from the start. You +contend, for instance, that the moon must be made of cheese because the +moon and cheese are both round, as a rule. True, says your opponent, but +so are doughnuts, women's arguments, and, occasionally, the wheels on a +trolley car. The moon and cheese, you go on, both come after dinner. +Yes, says your opponent, but so do unwelcome visitors, musical +comedies, and indigestion. Then, you say, there is the cow who jumped +over the moon. Would she have resorted to such extraordinary procedure +if she had not perceived that the moon was made of cheese from her own +milk? Well (says your opponent), the cow might merely have been trying +to gain a broader outlook upon life. And here you are thirteen reasons +from the end, and your hands hopelessly full. + +Now compare the advantages of the other method. You adopt a resolute +bearing and declare: "The moon is made of green cheese." It is now for +your opponent to speak. He argues: "But that would make the moon's +ingredients different from those of the earth and other celestial +bodies." "Not at all," you say; "the earth is made up largely of chalk, +and what is the difference between chalk and cheese, except in the +price?" "But, if it's green cheese the moon is made of," asks your +opponent, "why does it look yellow?" "Only the natural effect of +atmospheric refraction," you reply calmly; "remember how a politician's +badly soiled reputation will shine out a brilliant white, through the +favourable atmosphere that surrounds a Congressional investigating +committee. Recall how a lady who is green with envy at her neighbour's +new hat will turn pink with delight when the two meet in the street and +kiss. Recall how the same lady's complexion of roses and milk will +assume its natural yellow under the candid dissection of her dearest +friends." Your opponent might go on marshalling his objections forever, +and you would have no difficulty in knocking them on the head. + +So I used to believe. But if the method breaks down in the case of Mars +and its canals, it breaks down everywhere else. If there are no canals +on Mars, what about the blessings of the tariff, which are based on +exactly the same kind of reasoning? What about the efficacy of mental +healing? What about the advantages of giving up coffee? What about the +impending invasion of California by the Japanese? What about the +Kaiser's qualifications as an art critic? What about the restraining +influence of publicity on corporations? What about the connection +between easy divorce and the higher life? What about the divine right of +railroad presidents? What about the theatrical manager's passion for a +purified stage? What about the value of all anti-fat medicines? All of +these things have been shown to be true by assuming that they are true. +If the canals on Mars go, all these have to go. And that makes me almost +as sad as the fact that I shall have nothing to talk about with my +favourite waiter. + + + + +XIX + +THE COMPLETE COLLECTOR--II + + +"The idea of this exquisite little collection of frauds and forgeries," +said Cooper, "--and I don't believe I am boasting when I speak of my few +treasures as exquisite--came to me in a natural enough way. One of the +bitterest trials the connoisseur has to contend with, is the +consciousness that no amount of care and expense can guarantee him an +absolutely flawless collection. The suspicion of the experts has fallen +upon not a single picture, brass, marble or iron in his galleries; and +yet as he walks those galleries the unhappy owner groans under the moral +conviction that there are spurious pictures on his walls, spurious +marbles in his halls, spurious carvings and coins under his glass +cases, and that there they must stay until discovered and exposed. + +"A perfect collection, therefore, in the sense of a collection in which +every object can be traced back with absolute certainty to its author +and its place of origin, is impossible. Unless, and that is how the +inspiration came," said Cooper, "unless one set to collecting objects of +art which have been proved to be fraudulent. Then and only then, could +one be sure that one's treasures were just what one believed them to be. +And that is just what I set out to do. I began buying objects of art, +which, after masquerading under a great name, had been exposed and given +up to scorn. I have kept at it for twenty years, and I can now point to +what no American multi-millionaire can ever boast of, a collection made +up _entirely_ of 'fakes.' When I stroll through _my_ little museum I am +obsessed by no doubts. I am as certain as I am of being alive that no +genuine Leonardo or Holbein or Manet or Cellini has found its way under +my roof. + +"I must admit," Cooper went on, "that the question of economy has been +an important factor in the case. When we first set up housekeeping, a +year after our marriage, our means were not unlimited and our tastes +were of the very highest. Buying the best work or even the second-best +work of the best painters was out of the question. But buying cheap +copies of the masters, replicas, casts, photogravures, was equally +impossible. The idea of owning anything that some one else may own at +the same time is abhorrent to the true collector. On the other hand, if +we went in for spurious masterpieces, we were sure of securing unique +specimens at very small expense. And I will not deny that the bargain +element appealed very strongly to Mrs. Cooper. Most of our things we +got at really fabulous reductions. There was the crown of an Assyrian +princess of the twenty-fourth century B.C., for which one of the leading +European museums paid $75,000, and which, after it was shown that it had +been made by a Copenhagen jeweller in 1907, I purchased from the museum +for something like fifty-five dollars, plus the freight. This charming +little landscape with sheep and a shepherd boy brought $23,000 in a +Fifth Avenue auction room two years ago. Three months after it was sold, +a certain Mrs. Smith on Staten Island sued her husband for desertion and +non-support, and in the course of the proceedings it was brought out +that Smith made $10,000 a year painting Corots and Daubignys, and that +the $23,000 picture was one of his latest achievements. I got it for a +little over one hundred dollars. I am really proud of the picture, +because Smith has put into it enough of the Corot quality to deceive +many an expert observer. If I were not in possession of the documentary +proof that Smith painted the picture in 1908, I should myself be tempted +at times to believe that Smith and his wife lied in court and that the +picture is really a Corot. + +"But these are the chances," said Cooper, "that every art-lover must +take. I have said that at present I feel perfectly sure that not a +single genuine work has crept in to vitiate my collection. And that is +true. But only a few weeks ago I had a very bad quarter of an hour +indeed over this spurious Tanagra figurine. It had been bought for a +museum not one hundred miles from here by a patron who was a good friend +of mine, and who had paid several thousand dollars for the statuette. I +was in the room with Hawley when Stimson, our very greatest Greek +archaeologist and art-expert, entered, and, catching sight of the little +figure, picked it up, studied it for a few moments, smelt it, licked it +with his tongue, pressed it to his cheek, and handed it back to my +friend with a single, blasting comment--'fake.' We two were incredulous, +but within fifteen minutes Stimson had convinced us that the thing was a +palpable fraud. Quite beside himself with vexation, Hawley lifted up the +statuette and was about to dash it into fragments on the ground, when I +caught his arm. 'Let me have it,' I said; and I carried it home in great +glee. + +"Well, a few weeks later I was showing my collection to Dr. Friedheimer +of Berlin, who is a much greater man even than Stimson. The German +savant stopped in fascination before the Tanagra figurine. 'A pretty +good imitation,' I said. He seized the statuette with trembling fingers. +'Imidation!' he shouted. 'Chenuine, chenuine as de hairs on your het. +Himmel, wat a find!' And he proceeded to do what Stimson had done, and +he smelt it and licked it, and rubbed it against his beard, and I am not +sure but that he knocked it against his forehead to test its texture. +And then in his agitation he let the figure fall, and it broke in two on +the floor, and inside we found a bit of newspaper dated Naples, January +27, 1903. Dr. Friedheimer could only say, 'Unerhoert!' but I was nearly +frantic with delight. I repaired the statuette, and it now holds, as you +see, the place of honour in my collection." + +As we sat over our coffee and cigars, Cooper grew reflective. "After +all," he said, "is not the fabricator of frauds fully as great an artist +as the man whose work he imitates? Take the famous marble Aphrodite of a +few years ago, which was attributed by some critics to Praxiteles, and +by some critics to Scopas, until proof came that it had been made in +Hoboken. Consider the labour that went into the fraud. For years, +probably, the dishonest sculptor was engaged in preliminary studies for +the work. He spent months in libraries, museums, and the lecture-rooms +of learned professors. He impregnated himself with the spirit of Greek +art. He devoted months to searching for a suitable piece of antique +marble. How long he was in carving it, I can only guess. When it was +completed, he boiled it in oil; then he boiled it in milk; then he +boiled it in soap; then he boiled it in a concoction of molasses and +wine; then he buried it in moist soil, and let it age for three years. + +"Now, suppose the statue had been really carved by Praxiteles. That +joyous master and genius might have put two weeks' work, three weeks' +work, a month's work, upon it, and there you were. What was the labour +of a lifetime to the other man was to Praxiteles just an easy bit of +routine. If art is a man's soul and hopes and brain and sweat and blood +put into concrete form, who produced the truer work of art, Praxiteles +or the unknown sculptor of Hoboken? I speak only of the comparative +expenditure of effort. So far as the artistic result is concerned, it is +evident, from the ease with which we were taken in, that there is no +great difference between the school of Hoboken and the school of +Praxiteles." + + + + +XX + +WHEN A FRIEND MARRIES + + +Taking dinner with an old friend who has just been married is an +experience I regard with apprehension. In the first place, it is always +awkward to be introduced to a woman who begins by being jealous of you +because you knew her husband long before she did. She may be a nice +woman; in fact, from the air of almost imbecile happiness that invests +young Hobson, you are sure she is. But since it is natural to hate those +whom we have injured, it is natural for young wives to dislike their +husband's friends. + +People say that a woman begins to prepare for marriage at the age of +five. Judging from the absolutely spontaneous way in which the Hobsons +have taken to it, marriage is a career that calls for no preparation +whatever. I am not referring, of course, to the outward aspects of early +housekeeping. The little difficulties that beset the newly married are +there. I can see that my hostess is more anxious about the creamed +potatoes than she will be five years hence. Her attitude to the maid who +waits on us is by turns excessively severe and excessively timid. I +learn that the dining-room table has been sent back twice to the store, +and is still not the one originally ordered. But these are trifles. It +is with the Hobsons' souls I am concerned; and their souls are perfectly +at ease in their new estate. + +The first few minutes, like all introductions, go stiffly. The bride +smiles and says that Jack has often spoken to her about you. Whereupon +you remember that there are not many secrets a young husband keeps from +his wife. Jack is no sieve, but he would be more than human if he has +failed to dissect your little weaknesses and humours for his new wife. +He has probably emphasized the two or three particular little failings +of character which have prevented you from realising the brilliant +promise you showed at college. At bottom, Jack thinks, you have the +capacity for being almost as happy as he, Jack, is. But then, again, if +Mrs. Hobson does know you thoroughly well, it strikes you that there is +that much trouble saved, and you sit down to chat with a fair sense of +intimacy. + +Toward such conversation you and the man of the house are the principal +contributors. You speak of college days and contemporary politics, and +other things that the wife is not interested in, but she smiles +graciously, and now and then takes sides with you against her husband. +At one point in the conversation you look up and find her quietly +scrutinising you. And you recall what you have heard concerning the +match-making propensities of young wives, and you wonder uneasily if to +herself she is running over a list of girl friends and trying to decide +which one will suit you best. You even suspect that she inclined toward +a Marjorie or an Edith, who is plain, but clever, a good manager, and of +an affectionate disposition. Happily, at that moment the bride thanks +you for your handsome wedding gift. + +At table the visitor begins to be more at ease. For one thing, there is +the traditional hazing process to which the bride must be subjected. +Jack takes the lead. Admitting that to-night's repast is an unqualified +success, he hints that there have been occasions when, if he only would, +there might be a different tale to tell. The visitor protests; yet in +the extravagant praise he resorts to there is a suggestion of mild +banter which is considered the proper thing. The wife professes to +enter into the joke; but in her heart she laughs to see the two men go +solemnly through the stupid and outworn ceremonial. Young wives nowadays +are excellent cooks. This one has secretly pursued a three months' +course in domestic science and has a diploma hidden away somewhere. But +she pretends to be properly outraged by our foolish satire, and insists +on both being helped a second time to the custard. Jack, in fact, eats +all that remains. It makes dish-washing easier, he says. + +And as the visitor steers his way pleasantly through the meal, he makes +the acquaintance of an extraordinary number of relatives. The spoons, he +finds, are from Aunt Amy. Aunt Amy lives in Syracuse and at first +objected to the match. The salt cellar is from a male cousin who (you +learn this from Jack), it was thought at one time, would be the +fortunate man himself--that is, until Jack appeared on the scene. Poor +fellow, he sought consolation by marrying, only two months later, a nice +girl from Alexandria, Va. The cut-glass salad dish is from the bride's +dearest friend at boarding-school, a charming girl, who paints and sings +and is now studying music in Berlin. + +When the coffee is brought in, Jack asks if you will smoke. This is, in +a way, the most dangerous situation of the entire evening. If you say +yes, Jack is apt to pass the cigars and and say, "Go right ahead. _I_ +have given it up, you know, and I feel all the better for it." But if +you are expert in reading faces, and decide that the bride probably has +conscientious scruples against the habit, and you reply "No," Jack is +likely to say, "Sorry, but Alice allows _me_ one cigar a day after +dinner," and you are left to suffer the torments of the lost, and have +lied into the bargain. Nor is it possible to lay down any rule for +arriving at the correct reply under such circumstances. A hurried glance +about the house will not help one. A handsome bronze ash-tray may be +only a paperweight. Young wives are in the habit of buying their +husbands the most ornate smoking apparatus, with the understanding that +it shall never be used. + +It is after dinner that reflection comes; and with it comes a touch of +sorrowful wonder. Jack bears himself with great equanimity in his new +condition; but it is apparent, nevertheless, that he has changed from +what you knew him. In the first place, he has built up a comprehensive +system of domestic serfdom to which he cheerfully submits. He glories in +his enslavement; he rattles his chains. He actually boasts of the habit +he has acquired of dropping in at the grocer's every morning on his way +to the office. When it is the maid's day out, Jack insists on helping +with the dishes and he tells you with pride that, given plenty of hot +water, there is nothing in that line which he would hesitate to +undertake. He makes it a point to visit Washington Market at least twice +a week, and he comes home with cuts, joints, steaks, rounds, poultry, +fish, game, and fruits in dazzling variety. He carries these things +conspicuously in the Subway. And Jack's wife is appreciative of his kind +intentions, and lets him bring, from long distances, meats which she can +purchase at several cents a pound less from her butcher two blocks away. + +The passion for acquiring food commodities is only one phase of Jack's +new character. You begin to see now that all these years you have never +suspected what capacities for home-building he had in him. In the +presence of any kind of article offered for sale his overmastering +passion is to buy the thing and take it home. Instinct apparently +impels him to store up quite useless supplies against a future +emergency. He haunts hardware stores, he rummages in antique furniture +shops, and you may see him any day during the lunch hour flattening his +nose against windowfuls of copper and brass ware. He buys patent hammers +by the quarter dozen, as well as nails, tacks, screws, bolts, casters, +brackets, and curtain poles. He brings home Japanese vases from the +auction rooms. One day he acquired a step-ladder; it came by wagon +because they refused to let him take it into the Subway. + +And Jack's wife acquiesces in his self-imposed servitude. She does not +demand it; she is even a good deal incommoded by it. But her woman's +instinct tells her that the thing is a disease, which a man must catch, +like the measles. Until the husband's passion for home-building quiets +down, she is content to accept the unnatural situation; she is even +proud to have inspired it. + +But as Jack prattles on, and Jack's wife smiles over her embroidery +frame, it comes over you that, despite all the kindly communion of the +evening, you are an outsider there. You ask yourself bitterly whether +there is such a thing as constancy in man, whether there is such a thing +as true comradeship or affection. For fifteen years, from your freshman +year at high school, you and Jack have been what the world calls +friends. What are you now? Jack still calls you friend; apparently that +is the reason why you have just dined with him and his wife. But in +reality you are not there as his friend. You are there as the guest of +this newly-constituted social unit, this new family. You are there not +as a person, but as part of an institution. + +And just when you are ready to accept the new situation you are swept +away by the unreality of the entire arrangement. It is inconceivable +that Jack should have thrown you over for this alien person whom he +calls wife. Your habits and Jack's are so much alike; your tastes, your +outlook upon life. You used to play the same games at college, sing the +same songs, smoke the same tobacco, wear each other's clothes, and now +Jack has thrown you over for one with whom in the nature of things he +can have none of those habits in common. It is not merely puzzling; it +grows almost absurd. You shake your head over it some time after you +have said good-night, and the bride has told you that as a dear friend +of Jack's, they always will be pleased to have you call. + + + + +XXI + +THE PERFECT UNION OF THE ARTS + + +I have never had the slightest reason to doubt Harding's truthfulness. +The following episode, I remember, was told with more than Harding's +usual gravity. I can do nothing better than to give it here in Harding's +own words so far as I can recall them: + +On the third day after his arrival, my guest, Muhammad Abu Nozeyr, said +to me, "O Harding Effendi, I desire greatly to witness a presentation of +what you and the wife of your bosom, on whom both be peace, have often +referred to as Grand Opera." + +I replied, with involuntary astonishment. "Son of a hundred sheiks, +forgive my seemingly derelict hospitality. But I should have asked you +before this to go to the opera with us, if I had not thought that the +principles of your faith were opposed thereto. For you must know, O +Father of the Defenceless, that our women go there unveiled even as the +women of the people that you see on our streets, and that on the stage, +singers of both sexes indulge in open exaltation of that thing called +love, which your prophet has confined within the walls of the +_haremlik_." + +Abu Nozeyr laughed. "Your knowledge of our customs, Harding Effendi, is +fifty years behind the times. True, I come from the desert, and have +never heard your singing women of the stage. But did not one of the +learned muftis at yesterday's evening repast declare that 'Aida' was +written for the Khedewi Ismail Pasha, may his soul rest in peace?" + +"Yes," I said; "but you will understand, Dispenser of a Thousand +Mercies, why at first blush Islam and the lyric stage should strike me +as somewhat incompatible." + +"Not modern Islam," he replied. "Take us not too literally. I am told +that your people, like others of the Feringhi, have succeeded in +building battleships which are really instruments of peace; that you +have trust companies in which you place no confidence, and Open Doors +which you close against people from my part of the world; you have +legislators who speak but do not legislate, and a Speaker who legislates +but does not speak; you have had men in your White House who always saw +red, and you have red-emblazoned newspapers which are yellow; you call +your politicians public servants who are your masters, and you call your +women the masters, but will not let them vote. Why, then, should you be +so surprised at any seeming incongruity in others?" + +"I am convinced, Abu Nozeyr," I said, "and to-morrow we will go to see +'Tristan und Isolde.' But shall I attempt to describe for you, in a few +words, just what Grand Opera is?" + +"My ear is open to your words, Harding Effendi." + +"Know, then, Protector of the Fatherless, that the music-drama is a +perfect blending of all the arts. It calls to its aid the resources of +sculpture, painting, dancing, together with numerous mechanical +agencies, and to a minor extent, music and the drama. For observe, O Abu +Nozeyr, that each art aims to awake its own specific emotion. Sculpture +appeals to our sense of form, painting to our delight in colour, dancing +to the pleasure of rhythmic motion, the mechanic arts to our liking for +sudden action, while music and the uttered word represent the union of +the clearest and vaguest modes of expressing thought. It follows +therefore that the highest phase of human emotion can only be expressed +by that art which gives us simultaneously the living form of a Venus de +Milo with the colouring of a Titian, the grace of a Nautch girl, the +miracle-working powers of a Hindu fakir, the elocution of a Demosthenes, +and the voice of a Malibran." + +"By the beard of the Prophet," exclaimed Abu Nozeyr, "I thought such +bliss was to be had only in the Paradise of the Faithful; and that is +Grand Opera, Harding Effendi?" + +"With certain modifications," I replied. "Nothing human is perfect, Abu +Nozeyr. It is a regrettable circumstance that the human voice attains +its perfect development many years after the human form. Hence our +heroes on the lyric stage are all middle-aged and our heroines somewhat +heavy in movement. I have seen a pair of starving lovers in an operatic +garret, who would surely not have passed the scrutiny of a United +Charities investigator. It is also to be regretted that adequate +voice-production leaves no breath for dancing or other forms of active +effort. Hence the dance with which Carmen fascinates poor Don Jose, +argues an intense readiness to be pleased on the part of the latter, and +Telramund's defeat at the hands of Lohengrin is never quite free from a +certain degree of contributory negligence." + +"But tell me this, Harding Effendi, are there composers who have carried +the union of the arts to a higher point than others?" + +"There are, O Grandson of the Wild Ass. There are operas in which at +certain moments the libretto speaks of a leaping fire, the music plays +leaping fire, and the fire actually leaps and blazes on the stage. But +unfortunately it always happens that the words cannot be heard because +of the orchestra, and the fire sinks when the orchestral swell rises, +and rises when the orchestral surge subsides. I have caught the +orchestral sound of hammer on anvil long before the two have come into +contact, and have heard Spring described as entering through a door +which persists in staying closed. I have seen boats being pushed by +human hands, Rhine maidens suspended on a wire, and harvest moons moving +in orbits unknown to Herschel and Pickering." + +"And are there people who still persist in taking their sculpture, +painting, drama, and music separately, Harding Effendi?" + +"There are; but that is because they fail to recognise that opera is a +perfect union of all the arts. To-morrow, Abu Nozeyr, we go to hear +'Tristan und Isolde.' It appeals to every one of our senses. To enjoy it +completely, however, it is often wise to close one's eyes and just hear +the singer sing." + + + + +XXII + +AN EMINENT AMERICAN + + +After dinner I asked Herr Grundschnitt what headway he was making in his +studies of American life. The professor was in more than his usually +mellow mood. He had enjoyed his dinner. He liked his cigar. He confided +to me that he was hard at work on a volume of sketches dealing with the +career of representative successful Americans, and he offered to read me +one of his early chapters. If the following summary of Herr +Grundschnitt's account of the life of Wallabout Smith can even suggest +the extraordinary impression which the original produced upon me, I am +content. + +Wallabout Smith did not attain recognition until late in life. I gather +that he must have been well over fifty when a former President of the +United States declared that Wallabout Smith, by raising a family of four +sons and two daughters, had done more for his country than all the laws +enacted by the Legislatures of all the New England and Middle Atlantic +States since the Spanish-American War. Fame came rapidly after this. The +college professors repeated what the former President said. The +newspapers repeated what the college professors said. The playwrights +repeated what the newspapers said. The pulpit repeated what the +playwrights said. Interviewers descended upon Wallabout Smith. They wore +out his front lawn, the hall carpet, and the maid-servant's temper; but +they always found Smith himself patient, affable, ready to say whatever +they wished him to say. + +The reporters would usually begin by asking Wallabout Smith what were +his lighter interests in life. "I find my greatest pleasure," Smith +would reply, "in common things. For instance, I have never ceased to be +intensely interested in the cost of shoes and stockings. The subject is +fascinating and inexhaustible. One gets tired of most things, but there +has never been a time in which the cost of shoes and stockings has +failed to appeal with peculiar force to me. My odd moments on the train +have as a rule been taken up with that question. If you have ever +thought upon this subject, you must have been struck with the fact that, +putting food aside, shoes and stockings constitute the most permanent +and persistent human need. They begin with the first few weeks of our +life, and they continue to the end; the size alone changes. It is a +subject, too, that opens up such wide horizons. For while a man of +comparatively little leisure can confine himself to the simple topic of +shoes and stockings, he may, if he so desires, widen the field of his +interests so as to include the allied subjects of frocks, jackets, +blouses, caps, and collars, until he has covered the entire range of +children's apparel. Nor is that all. I have spent many an absorbing hour +figuring out the annual rate of increase in servants' wages and rent. Of +late years I have been in the habit of putting in part of my lunch hour +in a study of college fees and tailors' bills. In moments of extreme +physical lassitude, when nothing else appeals to me, I think about the +next quarterly premium on my insurance policy." + +How well-known men do their work has always interested the public. Few +newspaper men omitted to question Wallabout Smith on this subject. From +the large number of interviews cited by Herr Grundschnitt we may build +up a very fair picture of Wallabout Smith's daily routine. It was his +habit to spend a good part of his day in New York City. He would rise +about six o'clock every week-day in the year, and, snatching a hasty +breakfast, would make his way to the railroad station, pausing now and +then in perplexity as he tried to recall what it was his wife had asked +him to bring home from town. Sometimes he would catch his train and +sometimes he would not. Arrived at his office, he would remove his coat, +and, putting on a black alpaca jacket to which he was greatly attached, +he would proceed to glance over, check, and transcribe the contents of a +large number of bills and vouchers representing the daily transactions +of a very prosperous commercial enterprise in which he had no +proprietary interest. The day's work would be pleasantly broken up by +frequent inquiries from the general manager's office. Every now and then +a fellow-worker would take a moment from his duties to ask Wallabout +Smith how his lawn was getting on. Sometimes he would be summoned to +the telephone, only to learn that Central had called the wrong number. +Lunch was a matter of a few minutes. At 5.30 every afternoon Wallabout +Smith exchanged his alpaca jacket for his street coat with a fine sense +of weariness, and the secure conviction that the next morning would find +the same task waiting for him on his table. "I have no hesitation in +stating," Smith would frequently say, "that some of the busiest hours of +my life have been spent at my office desk." + +Walking was his favourite form of exercise. When he lived in the city +during the first few years after his marriage, he used to walk the floor +with the baby. Later when the children began to grow up and he moved out +into the country, he walked to and from the station. His gait was a +free, manly stride, bordering close upon a run, in the morning, and a +more deliberate, sliding pace, somewhat suggestive of a shuffle, in the +evening. He was at his best when tramping the country roads with a +congenial companion or two on a Sunday afternoon. On such occasions he +would pour forth a continuous stream of light-hearted talk on everything +under the sun--the new board of village trustees, the shameful condition +of the village streets, the prospects of a new roof for the railway +station. Good-nature was the keynote of his character, but he would +frequently sum up a situation or a person with a sly touch of irony or a +trenchant word or two. He once described the village streets as being +paved chiefly with good intentions. Another time he characterised the +minister of a rival church as having the courage of his wife's +convictions. But such flashes of satire went and left no rancour behind +them. His high spirits were proof against everything but automobiles. +These he detested, not because they made walking unpleasant and even +dangerous, but because they were run by men who mortgaged their homes to +buy motor cars, and thus threatened the stability of business +conditions. + +Wallabout Smith would often be asked to lay down a few rules for those +who wished to emulate his success. He would invariably reply that the +secret of bringing up children was the same double secret that underlay +success in every other field--enthusiasm and patience. "It has always +been my belief," he would say, "that the head of a family should spend +at least as much time with his children as he does at his barber's or +his lodge, and, if possible, a little more. Children undoubtedly stand +in need of supervision. In the beginning, it is a question largely of +keeping them away from the matches and the laudanum. Fortunately, we +live at some distance from a trolley-line and there is no well in our +back-yard. As my children grew up, I made it a point to know what books +they were reading out of school and whether the boys were addicted to +the filthy cigarette habit. On the subjects of breakfast foods and +corporal punishment, I have always kept an open mind." + +The experiment of living upon a basis of comradeship with one's children +which we see so frequently recommended was not a success in the case of +Wallabout Smith. "Although my boys are fond of me," he once told a +reporter, "they usually regard my presence as a bore. When I find time +to go out walking with them, they do their best to lose me, and whenever +we divide off into teams for a game of ball, each side insists on my +going with the other side. I have made up my mind that there is a time +for being with one's children and a time for letting them alone, and +that the proper time for being with them is when they are in trouble +and want you, and the proper time for letting them alone is when they +are happy and wish to be let alone. This I admit is the reverse of the +common practice, and probably there is something to be said for parents +who grow fond of their children's society when they, the parents, have +nothing else to do. As a rule, I have never obtruded myself on my boys, +being confident that natural affection and the recurrent need of +pocket-money would constitute a sufficient bond between us." + +There was, in conclusion, one factor in his success upon which Wallabout +Smith would never fail to lay the most emphatic stress, and to which +Herr Grundschnitt attached equal importance. "Such fame," he would say, +"as has fallen to my share must be attributed in the very largest +measure to my wife. Many is the time she gave up her meetings at the +Browning Club to watch with me beside the sick-bed of one of our little +ones. And she would do this so uncomplainingly, so cheerfully, that it +almost made one oblivious to the extent of her sacrifice. There must +have been occasions, I feel sure, when it cost her a pang to find her +photograph omitted from the local paper's account of a club meeting or a +church bazaar; but if she ever suffered on that score, she never let it +be known. I can truly say that, without her, my life work would have +spelt failure." + + + + +XXIII + +BEHIND THE TIMES + + +I had scarcely exchanged a half-dozen sentences with Howard King before +we knew ourselves for kindred spirits. I was in a roomful of people who +were talking about new books I had not read, new plays I had not seen, +and new singers I had not heard, and I was exceedingly lonesome. There +was one youngish middle-aged lady in pink, who asked me what was the +best novel I had read of late, and when I said "Robert Elsmere," she +looked at me rather grimly and asked whether I lived in New York. When I +said yes, she turned away and began chatting with a young man on her +right, who looked like the advertisement for a new linen collar. It was +this reply of mine that attracted Howard King's attention. He had been +sitting in one corner of the room quite as disconsolate as I was. But +now he walked over and shook hands and told me that in his opinion +"Robert Elsmere" was not so good a book as "Trilby," which he was just +reading. + +Howard King and I belong to the comparatively small class of men whom +nature, or fate, or whatever you please, has decreed to be always a +certain interval behind the times; it might be years or months or days, +according to the rate of speed at which a particular fashion happened to +be moving forward. King told me, for instance, that of late he has been +possessed with a passionate desire to learn the game of ping-pong. When +all the world was playing table-tennis eight or ten years ago, King +viewed the game with disgust. He thought it utterly childish, +uninteresting, and admirably illustrative of all the idiotic qualities +that go to make up a fad. But for the last six months, King said, he +frequently wakes at night and sits up in bed and yearns with all his +soul for a ping-pong set. He was, of course, ashamed to speak to others +about it. But if he could find some one who shared his feelings on the +subject, he had a large library with a square table in it. Would I come +to-morrow night? I said I should be very glad, indeed. + +I told Howard King what my attitude is toward clothes. It is my fate +always to grow fond of a fashion just as it is passing out. I recalled +the exaggerated military styles for men that came in with the +Spanish-American and the South African wars. Those enormously padded +shoulders and tight-shaped waists and swelling trouser legs, and the +strut and the stoop that went with the whole ugly _ensemble_, roused my +anger. My feelings remained unchanged until some time after the +Russo-Japanese War, and then one day it came to me that I must have a +suit of military cut. It was like the sudden awakening of the +unregenerate to grace, it was as irresistible as first love. And when +the tailor said that only sloping shoulders were now being worn, that +what I wanted was hopelessly out of date, the sense of loss was +overpowering. I confessed to King that in my opinion nothing uglier in +men's apparel was conceivable than the green plush hats that are just +beginning to go out of style. And I told him that I was as certain as I +am certain of anything in this world that some day in the very near +future I shall be seized with an uncontrollable longing to wear a green +plush hat, and I shall enter a shop and ask for one, and the man behind +the counter will look at me quizzically, and, after a long search, bring +me the only plush hat in his shop, and I shall carry it home in shame, +and put it away in my closet, and mourn over the resolution that came +too late. + +You must not imagine that Howard King and I are conservatives. We do not +hold fast to one thing, or even hold fast to the old. We move forward, +but at a pace so curiously regulated as to bring us to the front door +just when most people are leaving by the back. I have worn every shape +of linen collar that the best-dressed men have worn during the last +fifteen years; but I have worn them from three to six months late. I +became passionately fond of bicycling shortly after all the bicycle +factories began the exclusive production of automobiles. I am not very +fond of automobiles, but I shall be, I know, when aeroplanes come into +extensive use. It is only in the last few months that I have discovered +how amusing a toy the Teddy bear makes. And this is true of fashions in +games and of fashions in language. I have no fundamental objections to +slang, but I always pick up the bit of slang that most people are just +discarding. + +I recall, for instance, how, up in the hills last summer, the woods and +glens were echoing to the sound, half a howl and half a screech, of "Oh, +you!" addressed at quarter-minute intervals to every object, animate or +inanimate, that came within the howler's vision or thought. This +particular bit of gutter-slang induced a peculiar irritation. It seemed +to me utter desecration that this quickening beauty of hill and sky and +river and green woods, which should have stirred young hearts to +madrigals and chorals, should resound to the blatant, shrieking +vulgarity of Lobster Square. I do not mind confessing that at times my +feelings towards the innocent young barbarians bordered close on murder. +Until--until, alas! one September morning, after all the guests were +gone and I alone remained; that morning I woke with the poison in my +soul, and I walked down to the river for my bath, and, coming across the +farmer's herd of cows halfway down the hillside, saluted them, before I +knew what I was doing, with that horrid, that unspeakable--I blush now +to think of it. When I told Howard King, he admitted humbly that after +holding out for years he has just begun to say, "It's me," and that he +feels morally convinced that within the next year or two he will be +saying "Between you and I." + +But you must not think that this peculiarity in Howard King and myself +is an acquired habit or a pose in which we take any measure of pride. +Our attitude towards those happy people who are always in fashion is one +of sincere and profound envy. I think there is nothing more wonderful +under the sun than the unknown force that impels the great majority to +begin doing the same new thing at the same time. It must be a precious +gift to feel instinctively what the right new thing is to do. A +mysterious fiat goes forth and a million women simultaneously put on +black straw hats surmounted by a cock in his pride. Another mysterious +order goes forth and two million women simultaneously begin reading the +latest novel by Robert W. Chambers. Pitiable are those in whom this +instinct is wanting and who must tag timidly behind, venturing only +where a million others have gone before. Perhaps it is, with such +people, a case of arrested development. Boys of sixteen and girls of +fourteen have supplied the poets with their greatest love stories and +direst tragedies. And there are men and women well gone into middle age +who balk and stammer in the presence of the most elementary sensation. +Perhaps at bottom it is simply a question of courage and cowardice. + +In any case, being behind the times is a peculiarly unfortunate trait in +a man, who, like myself, is condemned to earn his bread in the sweat of +his fountain-pen. In what other profession must a man be so emphatically +up to the minute as in this scribbling profession of ours? Only +yesterday I walked into an editor's office and suggested a +three-thousand word review of "The Rise of Silas Lapham," which I told +him was one of the greatest novels in any language. He stared at me and +asked if I hadn't some fresher book in mind, and I, somewhat taken +aback, told him that I was just finishing Frank Norris's "McTeague" and +was about to begin on Mrs. Wharton's "House of Mirth." With a brutality +characteristic of editors he asked me whether I didn't care to write a +review of Homer's Iliad and the book of Deuteronomy. I told him that I +might very well do so if it were a question of writing something he +would find personally instructive, and rose to go, with the intention of +slamming the door behind me. + +But he called me back and insisted that he meant no offence, that he +simply must have live, up-to-date copy or nothing at all. He proposed a +popular article on art, and wondered if I could write something about +the Dutch masters, with special reference to the recent notable +exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum. I was obliged to confess that I +had missed the exhibition by two weeks. "Well," he said, patiently, +"there is opera. You might do something about the singers. You have +heard Mary Garden, of course?" I told him no. Only the other day I had +irrevocably decided to hear Mary Garden in "Thais" next season; and the +next morning I learned that Mr. Hammerstein had gone out of business. + +He continued to be patient with me. "There's 'Chantecler,' to be sure, +although that is ancient history by this time. Have you read the play?" +I had not, but just here an inspiration came. "You sneered at Homer just +now," I said. "Well, there was another Greek who wrote a bird play 2,300 +years before Rostand. I mean Aristophanes----" The editor leaped from +his chair. "Great, great!" he cried. "We'll call it 'Chantecler 400 +B.C.'" I caught the infection of his enthusiasm. "And Aristophanes had +another play on woman's rights," I told him. "You might call it 'An +Athenian Suffragette.'" "Splendid!" he cried; "splendid; we can make a +whole series, and Goulden will do the pictures in colours. It's the most +novel thing I have heard of for a long time. It will beat the others by +a mile." And he sent me away happy. + + + + +XXIV + +PUBLIC LIARS + + +There are three things that puzzle me; yes, four things that I cannot +explain: Why street clocks never show the right time; why thermometers +hanging outside of drug stores never indicate the right temperature; why +slot machines on a railway platform never give the right weight; and why +weather-vanes always point in the wrong direction. At bottom, I imagine, +these are really not four things, but one. For it must be the same +mysterious and malicious principle that takes each of these +contrivances, set up to be a public guide to truth, and turns it into an +instrument for the dissemination of error. + +What makes me think that there is some animate principle behind such +clocks is that they are so like a good many people one meets. There are +persons who are packed with the most curiously inaccurate information on +the most abstruse subjects, and they insist on imparting it to you. I +have no ground to complain if I ask Jones what is the capital of +Illinois and he says Chicago. The initiative was mine, and taken at my +own peril, and it is fair that I should pay the penalty. But frequently +Jones will break in upon me in the middle of a column of figures and +tell me that the largest ranch in the world is situated in the State of +Sonora, Mexico. "Yes?" I say, hoping that he will go away. "Yes," he +assures me. "It is so large that the proprietor can ride 200 days on +horseback without leaving his own grounds. He has 2,000,000 men working +for him and he lives in a marble palace of 700 rooms. No one can be +elected President of Mexico against his will." + +Now obviously it would have been better for me to remain altogether +unacquainted with Mexican conditions than to share Jones's distorted +view of affairs in that interesting republic. But Jones insists on +taking the innocent blank spaces in my knowledge of the world and +filling them up with the most incorrect data. He tells me, for instance, +that Mme. Finisterra once sang the mad scene from "Lucia" before the +late Sultan of Morocco, who wept so bitterly that the performance was +interrupted lest the monarch should go into convulsions. At the age of +eight Mme. Finisterra knew twelve operatic soprano roles by heart, and +when she was ten she played Juliet to Tamagno's Romeo. She now gets +$10,000 a night, in addition to the service of a maid, a chef, and two +private secretaries. In private life she is very stout. All this, +needless to say, is not true. + +But I must not forget the clocks. The worst of the class, oddly enough, +are those found in front of watchmakers' and opticians' shops. I +sometimes think that such clocks are purposely put out of order by the +shop-keeper. The object is apparently to induce irascible old gentlemen +to enter the store, watch in hand, in order to protest against the +maintenance of a public nuisance. It is then a comparatively easy task +to sell them a pair of solid gold spectacles with double lenses at a +handsome profit. I, for one, would not blame the old gentleman who +should pick up a stone and hurl it at one of these Tartuffes and +Chadbands of the street-corner with their chubby, gilded hands reposing +on their prosperous stomachs, sleek and smug and ultra-respectable, but +unconscionable liars for all that. They are not content with their own +success in cheating, they throw discredit upon honest folk. How many a +faithful pocket-piece has been pulled out by its disappointed owner and +actually set wrong to make it agree with one of these rubicund old +sinners? Such is the overpowering effect of impudent assurance on the +ordinary man. + +The difference between the typical public clock and a watch out of order +is obvious. Every prudent man knows the peculiarities of his own watch, +just as he knows the peculiarities of his own wife and children; and he +is consequently prepared to make allowances. But the clock on the street +corner persists in thrusting false information upon you. The man who +consults his watch does so with a purpose, and is naturally on the +alert. But the cheating clock confronts him in moments of unsuspecting +security, and throws him into a condition of the wildest alarm. It is +peculiarly active on bright spring days, when people rise early and look +forward to being at their desks half an hour before their usual time. On +such occasions they invariably come upon a clock which points to a +quarter of ten, and sends them scurrying breathless up four flights of +stairs, to find the janitor engaged in cleaning out the baskets. + +Church clocks are not so bad as jewellers' clocks; but they are bad +enough, and, in the nature of things, we have a right to expect more +from a church clock than from any other kind. For the same reason the +weathercock on a church steeple is to be judged by a higher standard +than the one over a carpenter's shop or the ordinary dwelling. I cannot, +for instance, imagine a more dangerous moral _ensemble_ than a church +with a clergyman preaching bad doctrine in the pulpit, a clock +indicating the wrong time on the tower, and, over all, a clogged weather +vane pointing to the south when the wind blows from the east. + +With reference to denominations I have observed that Presbyterian clocks +are apt to be more reliable than any other kind, although the truest +clock I have ever come across is on a little Dutch Reformed Church in +Orange County. One of the most unprincipled clocks I can think of is +just outside my window. I use unprincipled with intention, for this +clock is not vicious, but giddy. If it were consistently late or +consistently early, one might get used to it. But to look out of the +window at 9:30 and find this clock pointing to eleven, and to look out +ten minutes later and find it pointing to 9:35, is extremely +disconcerting. One is inclined to expect something more restrained in a +clock connected with the most prosperous parish of one of our most +conservative denominations. + +What I have said of clocks is largely true of the weighing-machine. Like +the public clock, it thrusts itself upon us, and like the clock it +betrays the confidence which it invites. I feel convinced that no one +would ever think of using a weighing-machine if it did not constitute +the most characteristically national piece of furniture in our railway +stations. All weighing-machines cheat, but, if cheat they must, give me +the machine that flatly refuses to budge from zero after it has +swallowed your coin. I prefer that kind to the spasmodic machine on +which the indicator moves forward one hundred pounds every two minutes +and leaves a person utterly uncertain as to whether he should +immediately begin dieting or purchase a bottle of codliver oil. Yet even +this mockery of a weighing-machine is preferable to the emotional type +of scales which simultaneously gives you a false weight, tells your +fortune in utter disregard of age and sex, and plays a tune that cannot +be recognised. When such a machine has registered a German matron's +weight at 115 pounds and informed her that she will some day be +President of the United States, it is ludicrous to have it break into a +tinkle of self-appreciation, like a spaniel barking his own approval +after walking across the room on his hind legs. + +As for the ordinary street thermometer, there is this to be said for it: +It may deceive, but it gives pleasure in deceiving. When a person is +sagging beneath the heat of an August midday, it is a distinct source of +comfort and pride to have the thermometer register 98 degrees. Even when +we are fully aware that the mercury is too high by three or four +degrees, it is easy enough to make one's self believe for the moment in +the higher figure. If it were not for this spiritual stimulus, I should +be inclined to regard all thermometers as a nuisance. Translating +Fahrenheit into Centigrade and _vice versa_, is one of the most painful +mental processes I can think of. I know that I cannot perform the +operation, and I cannot help trying. I remember how a certain European +monarch once lay seriously ill and my evening newspaper reported that +his temperature was 38.3 degrees C. On my way home I attempted to put +38.3 degrees C. into terms of F., and it speaks well for the +constitution of that European monarch that he should have survived the +violent fluctuations of temperature to which I subjected him. At Grand +Central Station he was literally burning up under a blazing heat of 142 +degrees. At Ninety-sixth Street he was down to 74. As I walked home from +the station I was forced to admit that I was not sure whether one should +multiply by five-ninths or nine-fifths. + +I would not be misunderstood. I am no enemy of the public institutions I +have criticised. Far from it; clocks, thermometers, weather-vanes, and +weighing-machines--they are but the remnants of the fine old communal +life of which our urban and Anglo-Saxon civilisation has kept only too +little. We do not lounge about and take our meals in the public squares +as people used to do in Athens and still do in Sicily. We no longer fill +our pitchers at a common fountain or dance on the village green or +regulate the life of an entire city to the same signal from a campanile. +Ours is an age of exaggerated privacy, where every one works behind +closed doors and glances furtively at his watch. But precisely because +it is a precious survival the public clock ought to keep itself above +reproach and above suspicion. + + + + +XXV + +THE COMPLETE COLLECTOR--III + + +Cooper's museum of Proverbial Realities had proven such a source of +delight to himself and his friends that the news of its destruction by +fire came with a shock to all who knew him. Of all his treasures he +succeeded in saving only part of his priceless collection of straws--the +straw that showed which way the wind blew, the straw grasped at by a +drowning man, the straw that does not enter into the manufacture of +bricks, and the last straw that broke the camel's back. How would Cooper +stand the blow, his friends wondered. He took it very well. Within a +week he had set to work on a new fad, the collection of Statistical +Realities, and in a half-year he had filled three good-sized lofts and +a large back-yard with his treasures. Yesterday he took me through his +galleries. + +"What do you make of this?" he said, stopping before a glass jar some +four feet high, in which, to the peril of one's nerves, you could +distinctly see the upper two-thirds of a child's body. Head, trunk, and +arms were beautifully fashioned, but there was no vestige of growth +below the knee-caps. I could only show my astonishment. "Well," he went +on, "you must have seen the statement by the president of Bryn Mawr that +the average number of children among college-bred mothers is 3-6/10. +This is the six-tenths of a child. Here," he said, pointing to another +and somewhat larger jar, "you see three-fifths of a woman; 1-3/5 women +to one man is the ratio in some parts of Ireland. Here, in adjoining +bottles, are three-tenths of a physician, seven-eighths of a lawyer, +and four-fifths of a clergyman, the latest census having shown that we +have 23-3/10 physicians, 29-7/8 lawyers, and 17-4/5 physicians for every +1,000 of our population." + +Stopping before a glass case containing little heaps of ordinary copper +coins, Harrington pointed out that these were the odd cents which the +scrupulous science of statistics insists on leaving attached to vast +sums of money. He showed me the 27 cents which, added to $3,469,746,854 +represented the value of the foreign commerce of the United States in +1910; he showed me the twopence ha'penny which, increased by +L788,990,187, constitutes the total funded debt of Great Britain; and he +laid special emphasis on the eleven pennies which Tammany's most +vigorous efforts at economy could not pare off from New York City's +budget of $166,246,729.11 for the year 1909. + +Another row of glass cases contained what appeared at first sight a +collection of comic dolls. Cooper pointed to a sturdy little mannikin in +boots and a Russian blouse, who, with mouth fearfully distended, was +endeavouring to swallow an iron bar four or five times his own size. +"You may have read," said Cooper, "that the annual consumption of +pig-iron in Russia is 3.7 tons per capita. This figure shows the fact +concretely. Here," indicating the figure of an infant apparently a week +or two old, "is a French baby. You may observe that she is engaged in +counting her share of the national wealth, which is estimated in France +at 1,254 francs 63 centimes for every man, woman, and child. She is +wondering whether she ought to invest her capital in Russian treasury +bonds or in Steel Common. This," pointing to a group of seven or eight +dolls riding on a perfectly modelled brindled cow, "represents the +proportions of domesticated cattle to the total population of the +United States." + +The fire which flashes up in the eye of every amateur when he +contemplates the gem of his collection, was visible as Cooper led the +way to a good-sized platform of polished mahogany and brass on which was +set up what I took to be a beautiful reproduction of the planetary +system in miniature. I was right. "But observe," said Cooper, "the +details of construction. The sun is made up of infinitely small eggs, +since we know that the weight of all the hen's eggs consumed by the +human race since the beginning of the Christian era is equal to +one-billionth the weight of the sun. The planets are fashioned in the +same way. Jupiter you see is made up of little, squirming animal-like +units; that is because Jupiter occupies the same amount of space that +would be filled by the descendants of a single pair of Australian +rabbits in five hundred years, if left unchecked. Observe the orbit of +the earth. It is marked out in twopenny postage stamps, for +statisticians assure us that the path of the earth around the sun is +equivalent in length to all the postage stamps consumed since the +beginning of the nineteenth century, if laid end to end. In the same way +the seven rings of Saturn are made up of copper pennies, obtained by +reducing the world's annual output of gold to coins of that +denomination." + +We passed into a cosy little alcove lined to the ceiling with books. +There seemed nothing out of the ordinary about them at first sight, but +my host soon undeceived me. "These," he said, "are the books that might +have been written in the last hundred years, if the time and energy that +are spent on smoking, drinking, whist, bridge, and out-door games were +devoted to the cultivation of literature. Here, for instance, are three +plays quite as good as 'Hamlet,' written by two million men named Smith, +who gave up the use of tobacco. Here is a philosophical poem which shows +on every page an inspiration higher than Goethe ever attained; it +embodies the concentrated ideas produced by twenty-five thousand former +golf players, thinking half an hour a day for three days in the week. +Here is a poetic version of the future life which completely outclasses +the 'Divina Commedia.' It is compounded out of the experiences of +forty-three thousand moderate drinkers who became total abstainers, +seventy disbanded croquet associations, and 1,125 obsolete euchre clubs. + +"Perhaps," concluded Cooper, "you should see this before you go," and he +pointed to a single shelf of books with a curious mechanical arrangement +at one side. "This shelf," he said, "is exactly five feet long. This +little electric motor at the side is so constructed that it gets into +motion every day for twenty minutes, and stops. By a system of cogs and +levers the motor propels a fine steel needle straight through the five +feet of books. A glance at this brass dial shows at once how far the +needle point has reached. At the present moment, for instance, it is +halfway through the front cover of the 'Journal of John Woolman.' And +while the dial is recording the distance covered on the five-foot shelf, +the blue liquid in this glass tube measures the rising level of culture. +It is a very ingenious application of President Eliot's idea, don't you +think?" + + + + +XXVI + +THE COMMUTER + + +Whenever Harrington urges me to go to live in the country, his place is +only forty-three minutes from City Hall. But when he asked me last week +to spend Saturday afternoon with him, he told me that some trains are +slower than others and that I had better allow ten minutes for the +ferry. I have never known a commuter who told the truth about the time +it takes him to cover the distance from his office-door to his front +lawn. If he is exceptionally conscientious he will take into account the +preliminary ride on the Subway and possibly even the walk from his +office to the Subway station. But no commuter ever alludes to the +fifteen minutes' walk at the other end. I did know one man who never +under-estimated the length of his daily trips, but he was a cynic who +hated the country and lived there because his wife's mother owned the +house, and he multiplied by two the time it really took him to get into +town. The exact truth I have never had. + +As a matter of fact, sitting there in a rather stuffy car which made its +way through much unlovely landscape, I reflected that there are really +three different schedules on which suburban traffic is conducted. One is +the time it takes a commuter's friends to come out to see him. Another +is the time he claims it takes him to come into town every day. The +third, and incomparably the shortest of the three, is the time your +friend says it will take him to come into town after the completion of +some very extensive railway improvements which, in practice, I have +found are never completed. I am quite aware that great bridges have +been built, and that railway tunnels have been opened into Long Island +and other railway tunnels into New Jersey, and that steam is being +rapidly replaced by electricity. But it is my firm belief that such of +my suburban friends as live within the zone affected by these +improvements will move away before the change for the better actually +comes. I am no pessimist. I base this expectation on the simple fact +that every commuter I know, for as long a period as I have known him, +has been looking forward to the completion of railway improvements +involving the expenditure of tens of millions of dollars. The march of +progress apparently finds the suburban resident always a little in +advance. + +Harrington met me at the station and asked me if that was not a very +good train I had come down on. The suburban virus was in me. I lied and +said yes. As we sat at our luncheon I felt how peculiarly a vital factor +in out-of-town existence the railroad constitutes. Both Harrington and +his wife spoke of trains as of living, breathing people. Some trains, +with all their faults, the Harringtons evidently loved. Others they +detested, and made no attempt to conceal the fact. I had just finished +telling Mrs. Harrington about the latest woman's suffrage parade when +Harrington said: "Do you know, my dear, the 8.13 is getting worse all +the time." I was still thinking of my own story, and I failed to catch +just who or what it was that was getting worse all the time to an extent +so inimical to Harrington's peace of mind. But Mrs. Harrington looked +up, frowning slightly, and said: "Can't anything be done?" Harrington +shook his head. "It's hopeless." By this time I was convinced that it +must be some family skeleton that Harrington had rather oddly chosen to +bring out before a stranger; some scapegrace cousin, I suspected, who +probably got drunk and came to Harrington's office and demanded money. I +looked discreetly into my plate as Mrs. Harrington suggested: "You might +write to the superintendent." "We have," replied Harrington, "and he +threatened to take it off altogether. Not that it would mean any loss. I +can make just as good time now by the 8:35." + +After luncheon we walked. I have never found the walking in the suburbs +very good. There is a regrettable lack of elbow-room. A short stroll +brings one either to a railway-siding, which is bad enough, or to a +promising growth of trees, which is worse. From the road these trees +look like the beginning of a primeval jungle sweeping on to far +horizons. Plunge into that timber growth and in five minutes you emerge +on a sewered road with concrete sidewalks and ornamental lamp posts and +a crew of Italian labourers drinking beer in the shadow of a +steam-roller. It is a gash of civilisation across the face of the +wilderness, and, like most deformities, it is displeasing to the eye. +Walking under such conditions is not stimulative. I miss the sense of +space and freedom I get in the streets of New York, where I know that I +can walk twenty miles north or twenty miles east without interference or +inconvenience. Give me either a mountain-top or Broadway. Suburban +vistas are pitifully cramped. + +That day it had rained, and I should have been additionally glad to stay +indoors. But Mrs. Harrington is a fervent naturalist, and she insisted +on taking me out to look at the wild flowers and listen to the +bird-calls. Both of these branches of nature-study, I am convinced, call +for an intensity of sympathetic imagination that I am incapable of +developing; and especially the bird-calls. Concerning the latter, I +feel sure that a great deal of humbug is being said and written. I mean +to cast no reflections upon Harrington or his wife. The only occasions +on which I have known Harrington to deviate from the truth have been, as +I have already pointed out, in connection with his train-schedules. And +as Mrs. Harrington does not travel to the city, even this charge will +not hold against her. And yet I cannot help feeling that neither of the +two really hears the catbird say "miaow" or the robin "cheer up," as +they pretend to. At the first twitter or chirp from some invisible +source Mrs. Harrington stops and with radiant face asks me whether I do +not distinctly catch the "pit-pit-pity-me" of the meadow-lark. I say +yes; but I really don't, and I don't believe she does. My explanation is +that Mrs. Harrington is a woman and consequently ready to hear what she +has been led to expect she would hear. As for Harrington, he is a +devoted husband. + +For let us look at the matter with an open mind. Our alphabetical +representations of animal sounds are at best only rough approximations. +Most often they are not even that. They are mere arbitrary symbols. We +use consonants where the bird uses none, as when we give the name cuckoo +to a bird whose cry is really "ooh, ooh." Or else we put in the wrong +consonants, which is shown by the fact that different nations assign +different consonantal sounds to the same bird. We do not even agree on +the vowel sounds. What is there in common between our English +"Cock-a-doodle-doo" and M. Rostand's "cocorico"? And we need not go as +far as the animal world. See how the nations differ in spelling out that +elementary human sound which is the expression of pain or surprise, and +which in this country we hear as "Oh," and the Germans hear as "Ach," +and the Greeks heard as "Ai, Ai." If the human vocal chords can be so +imperfectly imitated, what shall we say of birds speaking after a manner +all their own? For myself I confess that in congenial company I can hear +birds say anything, but that left to myself I am sometimes puzzled by a +parrot. And that is the reason why I am sceptical concerning Mrs. +Harrington's accomplishments in this field. + +But while the birds about the Harringtons' home simply offend my regard +for the truth, the Harringtons' dog causes me acute bodily and mental +discomfort. He is of a spotted white, with a disreputable black patch +over one eye, and weighs, I should imagine, between eighty and ninety +pounds. During luncheon he takes his place under the table, and from +there emits blood-curdling howls with sufficient frequency to make +conversation extremely difficult. This he varies by nosing about the +visitor's legs and growling. I am not fond of dogs under the best of +circumstances. I always labour under the presumption that they will +bite. Their habit of suddenly dashing across the floor, in furious +pursuit of nothing in particular, upsets me. But an invisible dog under +a dining-room table is a dreadful experience. It is true that I managed +to give Mrs. Harrington a fairly rational account of the woman's +suffrage parade. But was she aware, as I sat there smiling +spasmodically, what agonies of fear were mine as I waited for those +white fangs under the table to sink into my flesh? If, under the +circumstances, I confused Harriet Beecher Stowe with Julia Ward Howe, +and made a bad blunder about woman's rights in Finland, am I so very +much to blame? + +Not that the Harringtons are the worst offenders in this respect. There +is an old classmate, and a very dear friend, indeed, who lives on +Flushing Bay, and has a pair of hopelessly ferocious dogs that hold the +neighbourhood in terror. The only occasion on which they have been known +to show indifference to strangers was one night when burglars broke in +and stole some silver and a revolver. When I go out to Flushing, I +stipulate that the dogs shall be locked up in the cellar from ten +minutes before my train is due until ten minutes after I have left the +house. But it would be foolhardy to omit additional precautions. Hence I +always carry an umbrella with the ferrule sharpened to a point, and when +I am within a block of the house I stoop and pick up a large stone, and +go on my way, with all my senses acute, whistling cheerfully. It is odd +how people will put themselves out to keep a harmless, poor relation out +of the way of visitors, and never think of the much greater discomfort +attendant upon the constant presence of an active bull-terrier. + +I may have produced the impression that life in the country makes no +appeal to me. Nothing could be further from my intentions. Whatever +doubts I may have entertained on this point vanish completely as the +Harringtons escort me to the station in the cool of the evening, the dog +having been left at home at my request. We pass by low, white-pillared +houses behind hedges, and the scent of hay comes up from the lawns, and +laughter comes from the dark of the verandas. The city at such a time +seems a very undesirable place to return to; a place to lose one's self +in--yes, and that is all. The Harringtons never were in the city what +they are here. They have taken root, they have developed local pride +which is only the sense of home. As we walk they point out the +residences of the leading citizens. Here lives the owner of one of the +largest factories of mechanical pianos in the country. This Japanese +temple belongs to a man who writes for some of the best-known magazines. +That colonial dwelling is occupied by the lawyer who defended Mrs. Dower +when she was tried for poisoning her husband. I reflect, in genuine +humility, that in the city I never think of taking strangers to see Mr. +William Dean Howells's house or Mr. Joseph H. Choate's. And with real +regret and admiration, I say good-night to the Harringtons. + + + + +XXVII + +HEADLINES + + +After Stephane Dubost, editor of the Paris _Reveil_, had been ten days +in this country, and had collected all his material for a series of +volumes on the American Woman, Yankee and Yellow Peril, Democracy +Decollete, and Football _versus_ the Fine Arts--to name only a few--he +was asked what single feature of our life had impressed him as most +characteristically American. He replied, "The headlines in your daily +press." Just what M. Dubost did think of our achievements in that +department of journalism may be gathered from a letter he addressed the +very same day to his friend, Marcel Complans, director of the Bureau of +Cipher Codes in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs: + +"In nothing, my dear Marcel, is the American genius for saving time so +strikingly exemplified as in their newspaper headlines. Think of our +_Figaro_ or _Temps_ with its dreary columns of solid type introduced by +a minute solitary heading, and then pick up one of Uncle Sam's great +dailies. It may be only an item of four or five inches, what they call +here a stickful or two, but are you left to make your way unassisted +through the brief account? No. Your eye immediately catches a +time-saving headline like this: + +DESERTED GIRL WIFE + TO HOLD UP MAN. + +Having that concise legend before you, all you need to do, my dear +Marcel, is simply to decide for yourself whether our story deals with an +unscrupulous wretch who abandons his young wife to engage on a career of +highway robbery; or whether it is the history of a deserted girl who +becomes the wife of a professional outlaw; or whether it is a betrayed +young wife who gives herself up to the cause of elevating the human +race. A French reader, under the circumstances, would be compelled to go +through as much as thirty or forty lines of small print before he +secured the desired information. Thus it requires but a brief experience +with American headlines to recognise that when the Chicago _Evening +Post_ says + +FINDS ENGLISH FOOD +FOR LAND TAX FAITH + +it means that an American single-taxer, who has just returned from Great +Britain, believes that the English people is ready to listen to the +principles of the single-tax theory. And when the New York _Sun_ says + +LA FOLLETTE TALKING BOLT + +it does not mean that the Senator from Wisconsin is a manifestation of +crashing, celestial eloquence, but that he is advocating a secession +from the Republican party. Can you not see, my friend, what magnificent +economies of time are effected by headlines like + +WATCH SPRINGS TRAP + FOR JAPANESE SPY + +over a story dealing with the capture of an Oriental suspect by a +sentinel at one of the Pacific Coast forts, or + +SCREAMING FRIARS TORTURED +CHILD MOTHER FAINTS + +which does not mean that a society of howling friars have been guilty of +an atrocious crime upon an infant in the presence of its mother; or that +a band of religionists are driven by torture to cries of pain, while a +young mother faints at the sight. It only means that a poor mother, who +has suddenly gone insane, breaks into a house of refuge, where her +little boy is being cared for by a religious fraternity, accuses, +without warrant, the brothers of torturing her child, and faints. Or +take + +FRENCH RACE WORN OUT + ENGLISH TO TRIUMPH. + +These lines are not the summary of a study in national growth and decay, +but expressive of the fact that a French bicycle team wins a signal +victory over a group of exhausted English competitors. Do you see now +how far towards the art of simplified story-telling these Americans have +gone? + +"I can only express my profound admiration, as I pass, for the genius of +those men who almost automatically will dig the heart out of a 'story,' +and blazon it before the reader not only with marvellous brevity and +meaning, but with extraordinary appropriateness of characterisation. +Can you seize, for instance, the full relevancy of a headline like + +PRESBYTERIAN FALLS + TWENTY FEET + +or, + +PROFESSOR THRICE MARRIED + DENIES AUTHENTICITY OF BIBLE + +or see how the essential point is caught when a 'head' writer places + +FLORODORA GIRL EXPELLED +FROM CZAR'S CAPITAL + +over an account of the latest ukase which banishes from St. Petersburg +two hundred members of the Duma, twelve professors, fifty-five Jewish +bankers and artists, all the labour delegates, as well as the agent of +the American Plough Corporation, whose wife was one of the original +sextette? + +"I will conclude with what to me is an example of the art of headline +writing carried almost to perfection. Suppose that at Paris a +long-distance foot-race between one of our countrymen and a foreign +athlete had been won by our compatriot. The _Reveil_ would probably say, +'Armand Wins at Auteuil,' and go on to give the details. But observe +what they do here. I cite the article complete, headline and text: + +HAYES WINS + +VICTOR IN DUAL MATCH OVER DORANDO + +AMERICAN LEADS ITALIAN TO THE TAPE, + AND CARRIES OFF PRIZE + +DORANDO CAN DO NOTHING BETTER THAN + SECOND + +ONE MORE VICTORY ADDED TO GREAT + RUNNER'S STRING + +TEN THOUSAND CHEERING SPECTATORS +SEE THE AMERICAN RUNNER REPEAT +HIS VICTORY AT THE OLYMPIC GAMES + +"New York, November 26.--The race between Hayes and Dorando this +afternoon was won by the former." + + + + +XXVIII + +USAGE + + + ... _a certain class of verbal critics who can never free themselves + from the impression that man was made for language and not language for + man._--Professor Lounsbury. + +From a large number of readers we have received requests for a ruling on +disputed cases of English usage. We now proceed to answer these +inquiries in accordance with the liberal standard for which Professor +Lounsbury pleads. One man writes: + +_Question:_ Which is right, "To-morrow is Sunday and we are going out," +or "To-morrow will be Sunday and we shall go out?" _Answer:_ Both forms +are right, but as a matter of fact, if to-morrow is like other Sundays, +it will probably rain all day, and your chances of going out are not +bright. + +_Q._ Must a sentence always have coherence? What is the practice of our +great writers on this point? _A._ Coherence is not essential. Thus: +"Conquests! Thousands! Don Bolaro Fizzgig--Grandee--only daughter--Donna +Christina--Splendid creature--loved me to distraction--jealous +father--high-souled daughter--handsome Englishman--Donna Christina in +despair--prussic acid--stomach pump in my portmanteau--operation +performed--old Bolaro in ecstasies--consent to our union--join hands and +floods of tears--romantic story--very." (Charles Dickens.) + +_Q._ Must a sentence always have a predicate? _A._ No. For example: (1) +"The Universe smiles to me. The World smiles to me. Everything. Man. +Woman. Children. Presidential Candidates. Trolley Cars. Everything +smiles to me." (_The Complete Whitmanite_) (2) "From the frowning tower +of Babel on which the insectile impotence of man dared to contend with +the awful wrath of the Almighty, through the granite bulk of the +beetling Pyramids lifting their audacious crests to the star-meshed +skies that bend down to kiss the blue waters of Father Nile and the +gracious nymphs laving their blithesome limbs in the pools that stud the +sides of Pentelicus, down to our own Washington, throned like an empress +on the banks of the beautiful Potomac, waiting for the end which we +trust may never come." (From the _Congressional Record_.) + +_Q._ Is "ivrybody" a permissible variant for "everybody"? _A._ It is. +For instance, "His dinners [our ambassador's at St. Petersburg] were th' +most sumchuse ever known in that ancient capital; th' carredge of state +that bore him fr'm his stately palace to th' comparatively squalid +quarters of th' Czar was such that _ivrybody_ expicted to hear th' +sthrains iv a calliope burst fr'm it at anny moment." (Mr. Dooley.) + +_Q._ Is there good authority for saying, "He was given a hat," "He was +shown the door," etc.? _A._ The form is common, and therefore correct. +As, "The Senator _was paid_ twenty thousand dollars for voting against +the Governor"; "He _was offered_ a third term, but declined"; "The +coloured delegates _were handed_ a lemon." (From the contemporary +press.) + +_Q._ The use of "who" and "whom" puzzles me. Must "who" always be used +in the nominative case and "whom" in the objective? _A._ Not +necessarily. Thus, "I told him who I wanted to see and that it wasn't +none of his business" (W. S. Devery); "That's the first guy whom he said +put him into the cooler." (Battery Dan Finn.) + +_Q._ I am told that it is wrong to place a preposition at the end of a +sentence. Why can't I say, "Mr. Roosevelt is a man whom I should enjoy +talking _with_"? _A._ Your example is unfortunate. You should say, "Mr. +Roosevelt is a man whom I should enjoy talking _after_." + +_Q._ Is it wrong to split infinitives? Is a phrase like "to seriously +complain" really objectionable? _A._ We hasten to most emphatically say +"Yes!" + +_Q._ Is there a rigid rule with regard to the use of the preterite +tense? When do you say "hung" and when do you say "hanged"? _A._ Two +examples from a universally recognised authority will illustrate the +flexibility of our language in the general use of tenses: (1) "'I know a +gen'l'man, sir,' said Mr. Weller, 'as did that, and _begun_ at two +yards; but he never tried it on ag'in; for he _blowed_ the bird right +clean away at the first fire, and nobody ever _seed_ a feather on him +arterwards.'" (2) "So I take the privilidge of the day, Mary, my +dear--as the gen'lem'n in difficulties did, ven he valked out of a +Sunday--to tell you that the first and only time I _see_ you your +likeness was _took_ on my hart in much quicker time and brighter colours +than ever a likeness was took by the profeel macheens (wich p'r'aps you +may have _heerd_ on Mary my dear) altho it does finish a portrait and +put the frame and glass on complete with a hook at the end to hang it up +by and all in two minutes and a quarter." (Charles Dickens.) + +_Q._ What is "elegance" in style? I know it does not mean long words and +many of them; but just what does it mean? _A._ Elegance is +appropriateness. Long and circumlocutory terms are just as elegant in +the mouth of a fashionable preacher as shorter and uglier words in the +mouth of some one else. Hamlet's "Angels and ministers of grace defend +us!" and Chuck Connors's "Wouldn't it bend your Merry Widow?" are +equally elegant. + +_Q._ What is force in style? _A._ We may illustrate with a quotation +from Hall Caine's unannounced book: "He drew her to him and kissed her +as men and women have kissed through the aeons, since the first star +hymned to the first moonrise." Now, as a matter of fact, kissing is only +about two thousand years old, and is still unknown to the Chinese, the +native Africans, the Hindus, the Australians, the Indians of South +America, the Polynesians, and the Eskimos; but the sentence is +nevertheless a very forcible one. + + + + +XXIX + +60 H.P. + + +For the purpose of getting one's name into the papers, the acquisition +of a high-powered automobile may be recommended to the man who has never +given a monkey dinner; whose son was never married to a show-girl in a +balloon at 2.30 A.M.; whose son-in-law is neither a count, a duke, nor a +prince, and does not beat his wife; who has never paid $100,000 for a +Velasquez painted in 1897, or for a mediaeval Florentine altar-piece made +in Dayton, Ohio. The press, like the public, does not brim over with +affection for the motorist. From the newspapers it may be gathered that +when a man has been seen in the front seat of an automobile his family +prefers not to allude to the subject. Good men occasionally ride, but +as a rule only on errands of mercy, and always in a friend's machine. A +candidate for mayor will laugh when you accuse him of owning an opium +den, taking $10,000 a month from Mr. Morgan, or experimenting freely in +polygamy; but he throws up his hands when some one proves that he has +been seen in a garage. + +To me this seems absurd. If people admit that the automobile is here to +stay, they must also admit that it is here to move from place to place +occasionally. Automobiles that did nothing but stay would obviously fail +in one of their principal aims. Not that the auto has no other important +functions. It is evident that motor-cars were intended for little boys +who squeeze the signal bulb and stick nails into the tires; for +Republican orators to cite as evidence that the American farmer does not +want the tariff revised; for foreign observers to prove that we are +developing an aristocracy; and for Tammany office-holders to snatch a +bit of relaxation after the day's long grind. + +Motoring is not unmitigated bliss. The common belief that a body may be +in only one place at one time can be easily refuted by a woman with a +baby-carriage. Experience shows that such a woman, if she be put five +feet from a sidewalk, with forty feet of open road behind her for an +auto to pass through, will cover the forty feet backward with incredible +speed and propel herself right in front of the car. What would happen if +two cars came in opposite directions on opposite sides of a hundred-foot +avenue cannot be predicted. Either the woman would be accompanied by +another woman with a baby-carriage, or else, having propelled her own +carriage in front of the machine going north, she would proceed to give +her personal attention to the car going south. + +It is difficult to start on a short spin in town, under doctor's orders, +without immediately beginning to wonder why house rents and office rents +should be going up steadily in face of the fact that the population of +New York transacts its business and pursues its pleasures entirely in +the middle of the road. German citizens, as a rule, stop to light their +pipes on a street crossing. When you give them the horn, they are seized +with the belief that you are trying to play the prelude to "Lohengrin," +and they run up and down in front of the car in extreme agitation. You +frustrate their plans for a beautiful death by rasping your tires +against the curb, together with your nerves. At Seventy-second Street +two women are saying good-bye in the middle of the street. You swerve to +one side and they pursue. You snap your spinal column as you shoot the +car straight about, but when you get there they are there. "Ladies," +you say, "I am not leading a cotillion. I am an old man out for a bit of +fresh air." Thereupon one calls you a brute and the other discerns from +the colour of your nose that you have been drinking. At Forty-second +Street you catch sight of your doctor. "Have you killed any one?" he +says, after the cheerful manner of doctors. "No," you say, "but if you +will kindly step into the car, I will." + +Of the American farmer it may be said that, Mr. Roosevelt to the +contrary notwithstanding, he is not an unimaginative, overworked being. +It can be demonstrated that the contemplative life is on the increase in +the rural districts. Apparently, there is nothing more peaceful, nothing +more restful, nothing more soothing, nothing more permeated with the +spirit of _dolce far niente_, than the American farmer on his wagon in a +narrow road with an auto behind him. The grunt of the horn invariably +stirs in him memories of his aged grandmother, dead these twenty years, +and he falls a wondering whether he was really as kind to her as he +might have been. If the road is just wide enough for one vehicle, he +moves along pensively. If it is wide enough for two vehicles, he throws +his horses straight across the road and enters upon a prolonged +examination of his rear axle. If the road is wide enough for three +vehicles, he drives zigzag. The necessity of conserving our natural +resources would seem to be a meaningless phrase when we consider the +natural resources of an American farmer in front of an automobile. + +The law and the courts press hard on the autoist. Since the invention of +the automobile fine, the position of justice of the peace has become one +of the highest offices in the gift of the nation. The city magistrate is +a kindred soul. "Your Honour," says the prosecuting officer, "the +question is whether the city's boulevards shall be given over to the +owners of these destructive vehicles or whether they shall be held clear +for the use of Marathon runners, suffragette meetings, baseball teams, +and 'crap' games. The streets, your Honour, are for the benefit of the +majority; yet only the other day on Fifth Avenue I saw two ash-carts and +an ice wagon held up by a continuous stream of automobiles." "Right," +says the judge, and he turns to the victim: "What were you doing in the +middle of the street when defendant ran you down wantonly and without +cause?" "I was sleeping, your Honour," says the complainant, "having +been overtaken with drowsiness on my way home from a select social +affair." "Outrageous," says the magistrate. "Think of running into a +sleeping man. One hundred dollars." + +Such incidents make it clear that the automobile as an annihilator of +space has established its reputation. In the days before the auto a +drive of fifteen or twenty miles constituted a good Sunday's outing. +To-day a man can leave New Rochelle at eight o'clock in the morning and +pay a fine at Poughkeepsie at one in the afternoon, or he can leave +Poughkeepsie at eight in the morning and at one in the afternoon be in +the lock-up at New Rochelle. + +What hurts the motorist's feelings most of all, however, is to be +regarded by the public as a sort of licensed assassin. Yet almost any +one can think of people who drive a car and take no pleasure in spilling +blood. The common belief that automobile killing is a favourite sport +among our best families seems to be based on the fact that in nine cases +out of ten the occupants of a man-slaying automobile bear such +well-known Knickerbocker names as Mr. William Moriarty, chauffeur; his +friend, Mr. James Dugan, who is prominent in coal-heaving circles; and +their friends, the Misses Mayme Schultz and Bessie Goldstein. At bottom, +it would seem, most of the criticism directed against the automobile is +based on its failure to take a hog and turn him into a gentleman. But in +this respect automobiles are like many of our colleges. The comforting +thing is that the life of the automobile hog is an uncertain one. Sooner +or later he runs down a steep place into the sea, like certain of his +species mentioned in the Bible, and the question adjusts itself. + +Meanwhile, however, the decent motorist must suffer for the other's +sins. A friend says: "The only time I dare be seen in my machine is +between 11 A.M. and 4 P.M. Before that time people point me out as a +'joy-rider' returning from a night's debauch. After that time I am a +'joy-rider' bound for a night of it." The complaint rings true. The +exhilaration aroused by a punctured tire in the open country gathers +strength from the remarks of the spectators who wonder if you made your +money honestly. In town a defective sparkplug brings the close attention +of a crowd which exchanges opinions as to whether the lady in the +tonneau is your wife. All agree that you must have mortgaged your home +to buy the machine. + +And yet it is evident that much misunderstanding could be avoided if we +had a simple code of rules for people who cross the street just as there +are regulations for the autoist. A few such rules suggest themselves: 1. +If one is about to cross the street in front of an auto, one should do +so either before the man in the car succumbs to heart failure or after, +but not while the driver is wrestling with death; it is in such cases +that one is apt to get hurt. 2. If one is in the middle of the road and +sees a car approaching, one should move either (_a_) away from the car, +(_b_) towards the car, (_c_) to the right, (_d_) to the left, or (_e_) +stand still; under no circumstances should one attempt to combine (_a_), +(_b_), (_c_), (_d_), and (_e_). 3. The safest place from which to +ascertain the make of an automobile or to estimate its cost is the +sidewalk. + + + + +XXX + +THE SAMPLE LIFE + + +The hour, the occasion, and the scene were conducive to melancholy. We +had walked a good fifteen miles into the open country and back again +under chilly clouds, and were now paying for it with an empty sense of +weariness and disenchantment. There is nothing so depressing as a bare +room lit up by flaring gas-jets against the gloom of a late afternoon of +rain; and the lights in Scipione's little cellar restaurant flared away +in the most outrageous manner. Harding, across the table from me, +wretchedly fluttered the pages of a popular magazine and looked +ill-natured and horribly unkempt. The new table-cloths had not yet been +laid for dinner. The sawdust on the floor was mostly mire. Angelina, +the cook, was screaming at Paolo and Francesca, who were trying to boil +the cat. It was very dreary. + +"Harding," I said, "you were insisting only a little while ago that life +is always beautiful." + +"So it is," he replied, too listless to be defiant. "To some people." + +"To whom?" + +"Well, to the two here, for instance," and he pointed to a pair of +handsome lovers playing golf all over a double page in the advertising +section of his magazine. "Do you mean to say these two ever know what +ugliness is, or pain, or want? Or ever grow old? Or cease to love? Here +is the perfect life for you." + +"Are you so sure of that?" said some one over my shoulder, and I turned +about sharply to look into the most entrancing face I have ever beheld +in man or woman. It was Apollo standing there above me, or if not he, at +least one of the divine youths that the Greeks have left for us in +undying marble. He made Scipione's grimy cellar luminous with beauty. + +"I beg your pardon for intruding," he said, seating himself at our table +as joyously confident and as simple as an immortal should be. "But I +feel myself competent to speak on the point you have raised because the +Advertising Supplement you refer to is my own home. This very young man +playing golf is, as you will observe, no other than myself." + +There was no denying the amazing resemblance. + +"You say the Advertising Supplement is your home," I collected myself +sufficiently to ask, "but just how do you mean that?" + +"Literally," he replied. "My whole life, and for that matter my parents' +life before me, has been spent in the pages you are now fingering. My +name is Pinckney, Walter Pinckney, and if you are sufficiently +interested in my career I should be glad to describe it." + +"Go ahead," cried Harding, with almost ferocious earnestness. + +"If I begin a bit back before my birth," said Pinckney, "you will be +patient with me. I will not detain you very long." + +"Begin where you please," said Harding in the same grim manner; "only +begin." + +"My father," commenced young Pinckney, "at eighteen, was a sickly +country lad with less than the usual elementary education and no other +prospects than a life of drudgery on the old farm. But there was in him +an elemental strength of will that was sufficient, as it turned out, to +master fate. You have read his life again and again in the Advertising +Pages of our magazines. On his nineteenth birthday, as I have heard him +tell many a time, he began the reshaping of his life by investing the +small sum of fifty cents in a manual of home exercise and enrolling +himself at the same time with one of our best-known correspondence +schools, which offered an attractive course in engineering and +scientific irrigation. Simultaneously, from that day he carried on the +work of his bodily and intellectual redemption. We still have at home a +collection of the various domestic utensils which he employed in his +daily training--an old armchair; a broom; a large gilt portrait frame +through which he would leap twenty-five times every morning; a marble +clock; a pair of water buckets; an old trunk lid, and other articles of +the kind. Close beside his gymnastic apparatus we keep three trunkfuls +of note-books and reports representing as many years devoted labour at +his studies. At the age of twenty-six my father was a veritable Hercules +and held the position of assistant to the chief engineer of an +important Eastern railroad. It was shortly after he had won this place +that he met my mother." + +The caressing fondness with which he uttered the last word imparted to +his seemingly supreme beauty an added warmth of appeal. + +"Her, too, you have met in the Advertising Columns. She had begun to +teach school when a mere girl; but when her father's death threw upon +her young shoulders the burden of three little children and a helpless +mother, she had risen to her greater needs. She succeeded in quadrupling +her income by learning to write short stories, criticism, and verse, +from a literary bureau which charged her a nominal fee for instruction +and purchased her output at extremely generous rates for disposal among +the leading magazines. When my father first saw her--it was in the +course of a Fourth of July excursion to Niagara Falls which, including a +three days' stay at the best hotels, was offered to the public at half +the usual cost--she had sent the eldest boy through college, her younger +sister was teaching school, and she was free to follow the inclinations +of her heart." + +"You were fortunate in the selection of your immediate ancestry," said +Harding. + +"Was I not?" Pinckney responded in a flush of grateful recognition. "But +that is not all. The house in which I was born, though generally +recognized as one of the finest examples of Queen Anne architecture in +reinforced concrete, was put up by my father, unassisted, from plans +which he purchased for a ridiculously small sum. Its every nook was the +abiding-place of love, of quiet content, and of nurturing comfort. The +furnace was equipped with the latest automatic devices so that it had to +be started only once a year. It was then left to the care of my mother, +who used to give it only a few minutes' attention every day without +going to the trouble of divesting herself of the gown of fine white lawn +which she always wore." + +"My dear fellow," I could not keep from exclaiming, "you have almost +explained yourself. In such surroundings how could you help growing up +into what you are?" + +"That is what I say, sir," he came back at me eagerly. "But you must +call to mind, also, the fostering personal care that was bestowed upon +us children. Take the matter of diet. Coffee, cocoa, excessive sweets, +every food-element tending to narcotise or over-stimulate the system was +rigorously excluded. Instead we had the numerous grain preparations that +assist nature by contributing directly to the development of our +particular faculties. In my case, for instance, it had been decided some +time before I was born that in the course of time I should enter West +Point. With that end in view Farinette, because of its muscle-building +powers, was made the principal constituent of my bill of fare. Later, +when my parents thought that the pulpit offered better chances of a +successful career, Farinette was replaced by Panema, which is notably +efficacious in the production of cerebral tissue. Just as I was taking +my examinations for college it was finally determined that the sphere of +corporation finance held out unrivalled facilities for advancement, and +Panema gave way to Hydronuxia, which acts particularly on the +imaginative faculties. As for my sisters, they fared no worse than I. +You surely have seen them in the Advertising Pages in all their splendid +bloom. Saved from overwork by soaps that make heavy washing a pleasure, +eternally youthful through the use of electric massage, they smile at +you through the reticulations of the tennis racket which the champion +played with at Newport, or recline under parasols in the bow of canoes +that will neither sink nor upset. They are very fond of playing Chopin +on a mechanical piano while the moonlight streams over the floor of the +open veranda." + +Here Harding broke in sharply. "You began by differing with me on the +possibility of finding complete happiness in life, and you have done +nothing but refute your own position from the very first. I admit there +are certain essentials toward the perfect life that you have not +mentioned, but I haven't the least doubt that you already possess them +or that they will come to you in time. I mean such things as riches or +love." + +"Ah, love," Pinckney murmured, and the shadow of a cloud passed over his +divine brow. + +"Surely," I said, "_you_ have not sought for what love has to give and +sought in vain?" + +"No," he replied thoughtfully, "I have not failed to win love. But does +love bring with it untouched felicity; that is what I ask." He +hesitated. "I will not attempt to describe her. I really could not, you +know, except in a feeble way, by saying that even to other eyes than +mine she is a woman more wonderful than any of my sisters, if that is at +all possible. We loved at first sight. I had run down for a Sunday +afternoon to Garden Towers-by-the-Sea, a beautiful suburb which a number +of enterprising citizens had built up out of a sand waste to meet the +needs of the tired urban worker who, in his expensive and uncomfortable +city flat, finds himself longing for the life-giving breeze of the ocean +and the sight of a bit of God's open country. I was walking down the +main street of the village, wearing the loosely shaped and well-padded +garments that were then popular with young men, and carrying a set of +golf-sticks in my right hand and a bull terrier under my arm. Then I saw +her. She was sitting on the porch of the house which her father had +purchased for one-third of what its value became when the completion of +extensive rapid-transit improvements brought it within thirty-five +minutes of the New York City Hall. We loved and told each other. My +father, at first, insisted that before assuming the responsibilities of +marriage a man should be in receipt of a larger independent income than +I could boast of. But when Alice pleaded that she could be of help by +raising high-grade poultry for the urban market and organising +subscribers' clubs for the magazines, my father yielded. We are to be +married in two months, sir." + +Harding spoke up impatiently. "Still I fail to see where your +unhappiness lies." + +"Did I say unhappiness? That is not at all the word, sir. It is rather +a sense of awe that seizes us both at times, when we are together, as +though we were in the presence of unseen influences; as though, rather, +a world not our own were projecting itself into our well-defined lives. +I have shown you that Alice and I belong to a very real, very +matter-of-fact world. But there are times when we seem to be walking in +a land of strange sounds and sights and of shadows that fan our cheeks +as they flit by." + +"Oh, well," I said, "when two fond young people are together the limits +of the visible world are apt to undergo undue extension." + +"Let me be specific," said Pinckney. "We first became aware of this +state of things some weeks ago. We were walking one afternoon at +twilight through a stretch of woods not far from the shore when all at +once we were conscious that the familiar aspect of things had vanished. +The park had become a virgin forest. Two savage figures girded with +skins were panting in deadly combat. One had sunk his thumbs into the +eye-sockets of his opponent, who, in turn, had buried his teeth in the +flesh of the other's arm. A wild creature, almost hidden in the long +tangle of her hair, crouched there, the only spectator of the battle, +chanting in weird tones: 'Ai! Ai! the call of the wild summons you to +the death-grapple, oh Men, and me to sing who am Woman! Fight on, oh +Men; for it is Good! The Race, the Sons of your strong loins through the +dizzy whirl-dance of all time, are watching you. Match man-strength +against man-strength, breath-rhythm against breath-rhythm, and +knee-thrust against knee-thrust!' And then one of the combatants fell, +and the victor with a yell of triumph seized the woman by the hair and, +flinging her over his shoulder, staggered off, and we heard them call +to each other, 'Oh, my Male!' 'Oh, my Female!' Then we were in our own +grove by the beach and Alice whispered dreamily, 'Dearest, how tame are +our lives.'" + +"I think I begin to understand," said I. "What happened was simply that +you had walked right out of the Advertising Supplement into the Fiction +pages; and that was Jack London. Had you other experiences of the kind?" + +"On another occasion," he resumed, "we were walking on the beach and +again in a flash we had lost our footing in the world we knew. We were +in a magnificent ballroom. The chandeliers were Venetian, the orchestra +was Hungarian, the decorations were priceless orchids. Every woman wore +a tiara with chains of pearls. There were stout dowagers, callow youths, +gamblers, and blacklegs, and, among the many handsome men, one of about +five-and-thirty, with a wonderfully cut chin, bending sedulously over a +glorious, slender girl whose eyes attested the purity of her soul and +fidelity unto death. 'Dearest,' she was saying, 'what does it matter +that my father was the greatest Greek scholar in America and my mother +the most beautiful woman south of Mason and Dixon's line? What that I +have ten million dollars and can ride, shoot, swim, golf, tennis, dance, +sing, compose, cook, and interpret the Irish sagas? I love you though +you have only twelve thousand a year.' And all over the hall we caught +such phrases as, 'Yes, he dropped 25,000 on Non Sequitur at Bennings.' +'Oh, just down for three weeks at Palm Beach, you know.' 'Two millions +in three weeks, they say, mostly out of Copper and Q.C.B.' 'Yes, just +back from South Dakota on the best of terms.' Then the room vanished, we +were by the sea, and Alice said wistfully, 'How limited our lives are, +dear.'" + +I said: "My theory holds good. That was Robert Chambers, I am sure. Go +on." + +"I have told you enough," said Pinckney, "to show what I mean by the +shadow over our happiness. It will pass away, of course. In the meantime +I try to explain to Alice that these are phantoms we vision, of no +relation to the practical life that we must lead on our side of the +boundary line; I tell her that these things we see are not, and never +have been and never will be. Am I right, do you think, sir?" + +"Quite right," I told him. + + + + +XXXI + +THE COMPLETE COLLECTOR--IV + + +"My latest fad," said Cooper, "is this little library of the greatest +names in literature. It is by no means complete, but the nucleus is +there." + +When Cooper speaks of his fads he does himself injustice. The world +might think them fads, or worse. But I, who know the man, know that his +fondness for the insignificant or the extraordinary is something more +than eccentricity, something more than a collector's appetite run amuck. +In reality, Cooper's soul goes out to the worthless objects he +frequently brings together into odd little museums. He loves them +precisely because they are insignificant. His whole life has been a +silent protest against the arrogance of success, of high merit, of rare +value. His heart is always on the side of the _Untermensch_, a name +given by the Germans, a learned people, to what we call the under-dog. + +"My collection," said Cooper, "is as yet confined almost entirely to +authors in the English language. Here is my Shakespeare, a first +edition, I believe, though undated. The year, I presume, was about 1875. +The title, you see, is comprehensive: 'The Nature of Evaporating +Inflammations in Arteries After Ligature, Accupressure, and Torsion.' +Edward O. Shakespeare, who wrote the book, is not a debated personality. +His authorship of the book is unquestioned, and I assure you it is a +comfort to handle a text which you know left its author's mind exactly +as it now confronts you in the page. + +"Next to the Shakespeare you find my Dickens volumes, two in number. +Albert Dickens published, in 1904, his 'Tests of Forest Trees.' It has +been praised in authoritative quarters as an excellent work of its kind. +An older book is 'Dickens's Continental A B C,' a railway guide which I +am fond of thinking of as the probable instrument of a vast amount of +human happiness. Imagine the happy meetings and reunions which this +chubby little book has made possible--husbands and wives, fathers and +children, lovers, who from the most distant corners of the earth have +sought and found each other by means of the Dickens railway time-tables. +To how many beds of illness has it brought a comforter, to how many +habitations of despair--but I must not preach. I call your attention to +the next volume, Byron. From the title, 'A Handbook of Lake Minnetonka,' +you will perceive that it is in the same class as my Dickens." + +Cooper drew his handkerchief to flip the dust from a thin octavo in +sheepskin. "This Emerson," he said, "is the earliest in date of my +Americana. William Emerson's 'A Sermon on the Decease of the Rev. Peter +Thacher' appeared in 1802, at a time when people still thought it worth +while to utilise the death of a good man by putting him into a book for +the edification of the living. The adjoining two volumes are by Spencer. +Charles E. Spencer's 'Rue, Thyme, and Myrtle' is a sheaf of dainty +poetry which was very popular in Philadelphia during the second decade +after the Civil War. Do we still write poetry as single-heartedly as +people did? It may be. Perhaps we might find out by comparing this other +volume by Edwin Spencer, 'Cakes and Ale,' published in 1897, with the +Philadelphia Spencer of forty years ago. + +"I must hurry you through the rest of my books," said Cooper. "Thomas +James Thackeray's 'The Soldier's Manual of Rifle-Firing' appeared in +1858, and undoubtedly had its day of usefulness. Thomas Kipling was +professor of divinity at Cambridge University toward the end of the +eighteenth century. In 1793 he edited the volume I now hold in my hand, +'Codex Bezae,' one of the most precious of our extant MSS. of the New +Testament. I like to think of that fine old Cambridge professor's name +as bound up with patient, self-effacing scholarship and a highly +developed spirituality. But I digress. Cast your eye over this little +group of foreign writers. Here is Dumas,--Jean Baptiste Dumas,--whose +'Lecons sur la philosophic chimique,' delivered in 1835, were considered +worthy of being published thirty years later. The quaint volume that +comes next is by Du Maurier, who was French ambassador to the Hague +about 1620. The title, in the Dutch, is 'Propositie gedan door den +Heere van Maurier,' etc.--'Propositions Advanced by the Sieur du +Maurier,' one of the Regent's able and merry-hearted diplomats, I take +it. And here is Goethe; he would repay your reading. Rudolf Goethe's +'Mitteilungen ueber Obst- und Gartenbau' is one of the standard works on +horticulture. + +"And finally," said Cooper with a flash of pride quite unusual in him, +"the treasure of my little library--Homer; again a first edition." + +"Homer!" I cried. "An _editio princeps_!" + +"Nearly one hundred and fifty years old," he said. "The Rev. Henry Homer +deserved well of his British countrymen when he gave to the world--it +was in 1767--his 'Inquiry Into the Measures of Preserving and Improving +the Publick Roads of this Kingdom.'" + +Cooper sat down and eyed me doubtfully, as if awaiting an unfavourable +opinion. His face quite lit up when I hastened to assure him that his +library was one of the most impressive collections it had ever been my +good fortune to know. + +"Very few collections," I told him, "bear the impress of a personality. +As a rule they are shopfuls of costly masterpieces such as any +multi-millionaire may have if he doesn't prefer horses or monkey +dinners. But how often does one find a treasure-house like yours, +Cooper, revealing an exquisitely discriminating taste in co-operation +with the bold originality of the true amateur?" + + + + +XXXII + +CHOPIN'S SUCCESSORS + + +"It is his own composition, the final word in modern music," I had been +told. "He does not merely play the concerto; he lives it. Be sure to +watch his face." It was not a very impressive face as artists go. It was +rather heavy, rather sullen, and seemingly incapable of mirroring more +than the elementary passions. The great pianist entered the hall almost +unwillingly, and wound his way among the musicians with consummate +indifference to the roar of applause that greeted him. You might have +said that he was once more a little boy being scourged to his piano day +after day by parents who had been told that they had brought forth a +genius. He half-dropped into his seat, glanced wearily about him, then +let his eyes sink expressionless on the keyboard and his hands fall flat +on his knees, nerveless, heavy, apathetic. + +The orchestra leader poised his baton and the two-score strings under +his command swung into a noble andante. The artist at the piano slowly +raised his eyes to a level with the top of his instrument, his lips just +parted as if in halting wonder at something he alone in the great hall +could see, the hands made as if to lift themselves from his knees. "Look +at his face," my neighbour said. I looked and saw that the dull mask was +slightly changing, that some emotion at last was rising to the surface +of that stolid countenance, striking its cloudy aspect with the first +anticipations of breaking light. Would that cloud dissolve? Would the +light completely break and irradiate player, piano, and audience, all +equally keyed up to the delayed climax? Would those massive hands rise +slowly, slowly, and hanging aloft an instant crash down in a rage of +harmony upon keyboard and auditors' hearts? No. The clouds once more +swept over that massive face. The player moistened his lips with his +tongue, half-turned on his chair, and slowly swept the hall with an +indifferent, almost a disdainful eye. Then he sank into his former +lassitude. His hands dropped to his side without striking the keys. +Evidently the time had not come. The violins in the orchestra sang on. + +My neighbour was not the only one to fall under the spell of such +masterly musicianship. Twenty-four ladies in the parquette shrank back +into their seats with a half-sob of brimming emotion, and implored their +escorts to look at the artist's face. Eleven ladies in the lower boxes +interrupted their conversation to remark that it was wonderful what soul +those Slavs managed to put into their playing. In the upper balconies +listeners strained forward in their seats so that from below it seemed +as if they were about to precipitate themselves over the railings. What +expert opinion had described as the sublimest ten minutes in the great +pianist's greatest concerto had just begun. The conductor slightly +raised himself on his toes. Instantly through the weaving of the violins +the voices of the wood instruments began to break out. The contest +between the two came quickly to its climax. The strings were forced back +and back, wailing an ineffective protest against the shrilling advance +of the woods. A solitary 'cello made dogged resistance, knowing its +cause hopeless, but determined to sell life as dearly as possible. But +the 'cello, too, went down and for a bar or two the flutes and oboes +sang a paean of victory. Too soon. Upon them, like a tidal wave, swept +down a hurricane of brasses and shook the hall with its resonant +thunders. + +That was the moment our artist at the piano had been waiting for. His +heavy figure straightened up; it seemed to swell to monstrous +proportions, forcing orchestra and leader out of the vision and +consciousness of his listeners. His face now was all eloquence. A divine +wrath almost made his eyes blaze as he prepared to hurl himself at the +silent, yet quivering instrument. His huge hands hovered over the +keyboard ready to fall and destroy. His eyes ran over the keys as if +searching for the vulnerable, for the vital spot. Back and forth his +eyes ran, and his outstretched fingers kept pace with them in the air. +But those fingers could find no resting-place. Still the piano remained +silent. And then came the inevitable reaction. Such passion could not +last without crushing player and audience alike. Seven ladies in the +parquette were grasping the arms of their chairs, and three women in the +upper balcony had seized the arms of their escorts, as the brasses +crashed once and died out. The flutes for an instant reappeared, to make +way in turn for the violins, which now began timidly to peep out from +their hiding-places. They grew bolder; they joined hands, and once more +their insistent story quivered and sang throughout the house. And as +they sang, the player at the piano, exhausted by his supreme effort, +sank more and more into his indifferent former self. His form collapsed, +the fire in his eyes died out, and the powerful hands wearily drooped +and drooped till they rested once more on the player's knees. A sigh of +relief swept over the hall. Human emotion could stand no more. The +audience could hardly wait for the last throb of the violins, to break +out in rapturous applause. The master rose, bowed sorrowfully towards +nobody in particular, and walked off. + +"Did you watch his face?" asked my neighbour. "Have you ever come across +such utterly overpowering individuality? I have played for fifteen +years, but if I played for fifty years I could never even approach art +like this." + + + + +XXXIII + +THE IRREPRESSIBLE CONFLICT + + +"The arguments for and against woman suffrage," said Harding, "seem to +me very evenly balanced. I agree with Dr. Biddle of the Society for the +Promotion of Beautiful Manners, that it is unseemly for a woman to climb +a truck and demand the ballot. Dr. Biddle maintains that if woman wants +the ballot she should wait until every one is asleep and then go through +somebody's pockets for it. Woman, Dr. Biddle thinks, has her own +peculiar sphere, which, as the latest Census figures show, includes the +nursery, the kitchen, the vaudeville stage, college teaching, +stenography, the law, medicine, the ministry, as well as the manufacture +of agricultural implements, ammunition, artificial feathers and limbs, +automobiles, axle-grease, boots and shoes, bread-knives, brooms, +brushes, buttons, carriages and wagons, charcoal, cheese, cigars, +clocks, clothing and so on to x, y, and z. + +"Can anything be more fatal to our ideals of true womanliness, Dr. +Biddle asks, than a suffragette who throws stones? In reply to this, +Miss Annabelle Bloodthurst asserts that if we count the number of +successful suffragette hits woman is never so true to her sex as when +she is heaving bricks at a British prime minister. + +"Professor Tumbler lays particular stress on the outrageous conduct of +the English suffragettes. He recalls how the Secretary for Foreign +Affairs, while eating a charlotte russe, felt his teeth strike against a +hard object, which turned out to be a cardboard cylinder inscribed +'Votes for Women.' The chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster was about to +light his after-dinner cigar the other day when the cigar suddenly +expanded into a paper fan bearing the legend, 'Tyrants, beware!' The +newest Dreadnought with the First Lord of the Admiralty on board was +preparing to set out on her trial trip when it was discovered that the +boilers were not making steam. When the furnace doors were opened two +dozen suffragettes, concealed within, began to shout, 'We want votes!' +The leader of the Opposition is known to have walked all the way down +Piccadilly with a tag tied to his coattails inscribed: 'I see no reason +for bestowing the suffrage on women.' + +"But perhaps the most dastardly outrage occurred at the baptism of the +youngest child of a prominent treasury official. It seems that the +nurse, who was a suffragette in disguise, had removed the child, a girl, +and substituted a mechanical doll, with a phonographic attachment. The +clergyman was in the middle of his discourse when the doll began to +scream, 'Votes for women.' The father gasped, 'What! So early?' and +fainted. + +"The more you weigh the reasons pro and con," continued Harding, as he +lit one of my cigars, "the harder it is to decide. Mrs. Cadgers has +pointed out that under our present system the wife of a college +professor is not allowed to vote, whereas an illiterate Greek fruit +peddler may. But Mr. Rattler replies that the college professor, too, +seldom votes, and if he does he spoils his ballot by trying to split his +ticket. Why, demands Mrs. Cadgers, should women who pay taxes be refused +a voice in the management of public affairs? Because, replies Mr. +Rattler, the suffrage and taxes do not necessarily go together. In our +country at the present day many millionaires who regularly cast their +votes never pay their taxes. + +"Mr. Rattler is particularly afraid that woman suffrage will break up +the family. 'Imagine,' he says, 'a family in which the husband is a +Democrat and the wife a Cannon Republican. Imagine them constantly +fighting out the subject of tariff revision over the supper-table, and +conceive the dreadful effect on the children, who at present are +accustomed to see father light his cigar after supper and fall asleep. +Or suppose the wife develops a passion for political meetings. That +means that the husband will have to stay at home with the baby.' 'Well,' +replies Mrs. Cadgers, 'such an arrangement has its advantages. It would +not only give the wife a chance to learn the meaning of citizenship, but +it would give the husband a chance to get acquainted with the baby.' And +besides, Mrs. Cadgers goes on to argue, a woman's political duties need +not take up more than a small fraction of her time. That, retorts Mr. +Rattler, with a sneer, is because woman derives her ideas on the subject +from seeing her husband fulfil his duties as a citizen once every two +years when he forgets to register. + +"An excellent debate on the subject was the one between Mrs. Excelsior, +who spoke in favour of the ballot for women, and Professor Van Doodle, +who upheld the negative. Professor Van Doodle maintained that women are +incapable of taking a genuine interest in public affairs. What is it +that appeals to a woman when she reads a newspaper? A Presidential +election may be impending, a great war is raging in the Far East, an +explorer has just returned from the South Pole, and, woman, picking up +the Sunday paper, plunges straight into the fashion columns! She hardly +finds time to answer her husband's petulant inquiry as to what she has +done with the comic supplement. Can woman take an impersonal view of +things? No, says Professor Van Doodle. In a critical Presidential +election, one in which the fate of the country is at stake, she will +vote for the candidate from whom she thinks she can get most for her +husband and her children, whereas, her husband under the same +circumstances will cast aside all personal interests and vote the same +ticket his father voted for. Woman, concluded the professor, is +constitutionally incapable of distinguishing between right and wrong, +between truth and falsehood. + +"Mrs. Excelsior made a spirited defence. She showed that woman's +undeveloped sense of what truth and honesty are, would not handicap her +in the pursuit of practical politics. She argued that the complicated +problems of municipal finance are no easier for the man who sets out to +raise a family on fifteen dollars a week than for the woman who succeeds +in doing so. She declared that a person who can travel thirty miles by +subway and surface car, price $500 worth of dressgoods, and buy her +lunch, all on fifteen cents in cash and a transfer ticket, would make a +good comptroller for New York City. + +"Professor Van Doodle claimed that under woman suffrage only a +good-looking candidate would stand a chance of being elected. Mrs. +Excelsior replied that there was no reason for believing that women +would be more particular in choosing a State Senator than in selecting a +husband. The professor was foolish when he asserted that if women went +to the polls they would vote for the aldermen and the sheriffs, and +would forget to vote for the President of the United States, and would +insist on doing so in a postscript. This was of a piece with the other +ancient jest that women are sure to vote for a Democrat when at heart +they prefer a Republican, and _vice versa_. + +"The whole case," concluded Harding, "was summed up by the Rev. Dr. +Hollow when he said that in theory there is no objection to the present +arrangement by which man rules the earth through his reason, and woman +rules man through his stomach; but unfortunately, the human reason and +the average man's stomach are apt to get out of order." + + + + +XXXIV + +THE GERMS OF CULTURE + + +In my afternoon paper there was a letter by Veritas who tried to prove +something about the Trusts by quoting from the third volume of +Macaulay's history. After dinner I took the book from the shelf and as I +struck it against the table to let the dust fly up, I thought of what +Mrs. Harrington said. The Harringtons had spent an evening with me. As +they rose to go Mrs. Harrington ran the tip of her gloved finger across +half a dozen dingy volumes and sniffed. "Why don't you put glass doors +on your bookshelves?" she asked. It was a raw point with me and she knew +it. "The pretty kind, perhaps," I sneered, "with leaded panes and an +antique iron lock?" "Exactly," she replied. "The dust here is +abominable. You must be just steeped in all sorts of infection; and +perhaps if you kept your books under lock and key people wouldn't run +away with them." I was a fool to have tried irony upon Mrs. Harrington. +Her outlook upon life is literal and domestic. Books are to her +primarily part of a scheme of interior decoration. Harrington's views +come closer to my own, but Harrington is an indulgent husband. + +The incident was now a week old, but something of the original fury came +back to me. It was exasperating that the world should be so afraid of +dust in the only place where dust has meaning and beauty. People who +will go abroad in motor cars and veneer themselves with the germ-laden +dust of the highway, find it impossible to endure the silent deposit of +the years on the covers of an old book. And the dust of the gutter that +is swept up by trailing skirts? And the dust of soggy theatre-chairs? +And the dust of old beliefs in which we live, my friend? And the dust +that statesmen and prophets are always throwing into our eyes? None of +these interfere with Mrs. Harrington's peace of mind. But when it comes +to the dust on the gilt tops of my red-buckrammed Moliere she fears +infection. + +And yet Harrington is a man of exceptional intelligence. He would agree +with me that infection from book-dust is not an ignoble form of death. I +sit there and plot obituaries. "Mr. H. Wellington Jones," says the +_Evening Star_, "died yesterday afternoon from ptomaine poisoning, after +a very brief illness. Friday night he was with a merry group of diners +in one of our best-known and most brilliantly lighted Broadway +restaurants. He partook heartily of lobster salad, of which, his closest +friends declare, he was inordinately fond. Almost immediately he +complained of being ill and was taken home in a taxicab." If I were H. +Wellington Jones and it were my fate to die of poison I could frame a +nobler end for myself. "Mr. H. Wellington Jones," I would have it read, +"died yesterday of some mysterious form of bacterial poisoning +contracted while turning over the pages of an old family Bible which he +was accustomed to consult at frequent intervals. Mr. Smith had a cut +finger which was not quite healed and it is supposed that a dust-speck +from the pages of the old book must have entered the wound and induced +sepsis. He was found unconscious in his chair with the book open at the +thirtieth chapter of Proverbs." Yes, I sometimes find it hard to +understand what Harrington, a man of really fine sensibilities, sees in +Mrs. Harrington. The very suggestion of locking up books to prevent +their being carried away hurts like the screech of a pencil upon a +slate. I think of Mrs. Harrington and then I think of Cooper. Cooper's +shelves are continuously being denuded by his friends. But if you think +of Cooper as a helpless victim you are sadly mistaken. There is an +elaborate scheme behind it all, a scheme of such transcendent ingenuity +as only simple-hearted, sweet-natured, unpractised, purblind visionaries +like Cooper are capable of. + +He let me into the secret one day when he saw that I was about to find +it out for myself. "I know very many dear people," he said, "who are too +busy to read books or too little in the habit of it. You know them, too; +they are men and women in whom the pulse of life beats too rapidly for +the calm pleasures of reading. They are not insensible to fine ideas, +but they must see these ideas in concrete form. If I, for instance, wish +to know something about Spain, I get one of Martin Hume's books, but +these people take a steamer and go to Spain. I have read everything of +Meredith's and they have read almost nothing, but they saw Meredith in +London and spent a week-end with him at a country-house in Sussex. I +avoid celebrities in the flesh. I don't want to minister to them and I +want still less to patronise them. I am afraid I should be disappointed +in them and I am sure they would be disappointed in me. + +"However, that's not the point," says Cooper. "The problem is to make a +man read who won't read of his own accord. I do it by asking such a man +to dinner. I pull out a volume of Marriott's and remark, without +emphasis, that after infinite exertion I have just got it back from +Woolsey, who is wild over the book. The fires of envy and acquisition +flash in my visitor's eye. Might he have the book for a day or two? Yes, +I say after some hesitation, but he must promise to bring it back. He +grows fervent. Of course he will bring it back, by Saturday at the very +latest and in person. And he is my man from that moment. I have lost the +book, of course, but I have smuggled my troops within the fort, I have +laid the train, I have transmitted the infection. The serpent is in the +garden. Time will do the work." The allusion was to Cooper's bookplate, +a red serpent about a golden staff. + +"Not that I leave it altogether to time," says Cooper. "Once I have +handed over the book to Hobson, I make it a point to call on him at +least once a week. Do you see why? Left to himself, Hobson might soon +outlive the first flush of his enthusiasm for that book. But if Hobson +expects me to drop in at any moment, he is afraid I may find the book on +his library table and ask him whether he has read it. So he hides the +book in his bedroom. Then he is indeed mine. Some night he will be out +of sorts and find it hard to go to sleep. His eye will fall on the book +lying there on his table, and he will pick it up, at the same time +lighting a cigar. I shall never see that book again. But, I leave it to +you, who needs that book more, I or Hobson?" + +But Cooper did not tell all. I know he has made use of shrewder tactics. +Ask any one of his acquaintances why Cooper is never seen without a +half-dozen magazines under his arm, an odd volume or two of French +criticism, and a couple of operatic scores. They will reply that it is +just Cooper's way. It goes with his black slouch hat, his badly-creased +trousers, his flowing cravat, and his general air of pre-Raphaelite +ineptitude. It goes with his comprehensive ignorance of present-day +politics and science, and everything else in the present that +well-informed people are supposed to know. It goes with his total +inability to be on time for dinners, and his habit of getting lost in +the subway. But Cooper is not as often in the clouds as some imagine. + +How many of Cooper's friends, for example, have ever found peculiar +significance in his talent for forgetting things in other people's +houses? Beneath that apparently characteristic trait there is a +Machiavellian motive which I alone have found out. Hobson, let us say, +has been taking dinner with Cooper, who gently pulls a copy of "Monna +Vanna" from the shelf. Hobson does not rise to the bait. He may have +heard that Maeterlinck is a "highbrow" and it frightens him. Or Hobson +may not be going home that night, or he may object to carrying a parcel +in the subway, or for any other reason he will omit to take the book +with him. "The next day," says Cooper, "I pay Hobson a return visit, and +forget the book on his hall-table. Frequently Hobson may be too busy to +take notice of the accident. In that case I call him up on the telephone +as soon as I leave his house and ask in great agitation whether by any +chance I have left a volume of Maeterlinck on his hall-table. Sometimes +I add that Woolsey has been after that volume for weeks. That night, I +feel sure, Hobson will carry the book up to his bedroom." + +And as Cooper spoke I thought of the Smith family, whom, by methods like +those I have described, Cooper succeeded in saving from themselves. +Nerves in the Smith family were badly rasped. The mother was not making +great headway in her social campaigns. Her husband chafed at his +children's idleness and extravagance. The children went in sullen +fashion about their own business. They had no resources of their own. +There was gloom in that household and stifled rancour, and the danger +of worse things to come, until the day when Cooper called and forgot at +one blow a copy of "Richard Feverel," the "Bab Ballads," and the third +volume of Ferrero's "Rome." + +As I have said, Cooper was not blind to the good he was doing. False +modesty was not one of his failings. He would continually have me admire +his bookshelves. The books he was proudest of were those he had lent or +given away.... "I have a larger number of books missing," he would +boast, "than any man of my acquaintance. This big hole here is my +Gibbon. I sent it to an interesting old chap I met at a public dinner +some years ago. He was a prosperous hardware merchant, self-made, and, +like all self-made men, a bit unfinished. He had read very little. I +don't recall how I happened to mention Gibbon or to send him the set. I +think I may have forgotten the first volume at his office the next +morning. He devoured Gibbon. From him he went to Tacitus. He has since +read hundreds of books on the Roman empire and he has other hundreds of +volumes waiting to be read. But somehow he has never thought of sending +me back my shabby old Gibbon. And that was the way with my +Montaigne--gone. And here were two editions of Gulliver. I lent one to a +nephew of the Harringtons and the other to a rather prim young lady from +Boston who impressed me as having had too much Emerson. My Shelley is +gone. My 'Rousseau's Confessions' is also gone." And Cooper smiled at me +beatifically. + +That was Cooper. But Mrs. Harrington that night saw things in quite a +different light. She grumbled and sniffed, and finally grew vehement. I +am not a saint like Cooper, but here and there my shelves, too, show the +visitations of friends. "Not a single complete set," wailed Mrs. +Harrington, "everything lugged away by people who should be taught to +know better. Browning, volumes I, II, V, and VII--four volumes gone. +Middlemarch, volume II, first volume gone. Morley's Gladstone, volumes I +and III, one volume gone. I wager you don't even know who has the second +volume of your Gladstone. Do you, now?" + +To tell the truth, I did not for the moment know. And as I hesitated she +thrust one of the volumes in triumph at me and mechanically I opened the +book and saw a red serpent about a golden staff. "I remember now," I +told Mrs. Harrington. "I'll get the second volume the next time I call +on Cooper." + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PATIENT OBSERVER*** + + +******* This file should be named 19359.txt or 19359.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/9/3/5/19359 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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