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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Literary Lapses, by Stephen Leacock
+
+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: Literary Lapses
+
+Author: Stephen Leacock
+
+Release Date: June 21, 2004 [EBook #6340]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LITERARY LAPSES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Gardner Buchanan
+
+
+
+
+
+LITERARY LAPSES
+
+By Stephen Leacock
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+MY FINANCIAL CAREER
+LORD OXHEAD'S SECRET
+BOARDING-HOUSE GEOMETRY
+THE AWFUL FATE OF MELPOMENUS JONES
+A CHRISTMAS LETTER
+HOW TO MAKE A MILLION DOLLARS
+HOW TO LIVE TO BE 200
+HOW TO AVOID GETTING MARRIED
+HOW TO BE A DOCTOR
+THE NEW FOOD
+A NEW PATHOLOGY
+THE POET ANSWERED
+THE FORCE OF STATISTICS
+MEN WHO HAVE SHAVED ME
+GETTING THE THREAD OF IT
+TELLING HIS FAULTS
+WINTER PASTIMES
+NUMBER FIFTY-SIX
+ARISTOCRATIC EDUCATION
+THE CONJURER'S REVENGE
+HINTS TO TRAVELLERS
+A MANUAL OF EDUCATION
+HOODOO MCFIGGIN'S CHRISTMAS
+THE LIFE OF JOHN SMITH
+ON COLLECTING THINGS
+SOCIETY CHIT-CHAT
+INSURANCE UP TO DATE
+BORROWING A MATCH
+A LESSON IN FICTION
+HELPING THE ARMENIANS
+A STUDY IN STILL LIFE: THE COUNTRY HOTEL
+AN EXPERIMENT WITH POLICEMAN HOGAN
+THE PASSING OF THE POET
+SELF-MADE MEN
+A MODEL DIALOGUE
+BACK TO THE BUSH
+REFLECTIONS ON RIDING
+SALOONIO
+HALF-HOURS WITH THE POETS--
+   I.   MR. WORDSWORTH AND THE LITTLE COTTAGE GIRL
+   II.  HOW TENNYSON KILLED THE MAY QUEEN
+   III. OLD MR. LONGFELLOW ON BOARD THE "HESPERUS"
+A. B, AND C
+
+
+
+
+LITERARY LAPSES
+
+
+
+
+My Financial Career
+
+When I go into a bank I get rattled. The clerks rattle me;
+the wickets rattle me; the sight of the money rattles me;
+everything rattles me.
+
+The moment I cross the threshold of a bank and attempt to
+transact business there, I become an irresponsible idiot.
+
+I knew this beforehand, but my salary had been raised to
+fifty dollars a month and I felt that the bank was the
+only place for it.
+
+So I shambled in and looked timidly round at the clerks.
+I had an idea that a person about to open an account must
+needs consult the manager.
+
+I went up to a wicket marked "Accountant." The accountant
+was a tall, cool devil. The very sight of him rattled me.
+My voice was sepulchral.
+
+"Can I see the manager?" I said, and added solemnly,
+"alone." I don't know why I said "alone."
+
+"Certainly," said the accountant, and fetched him.
+
+The manager was a grave, calm man. I held my fifty-six
+dollars clutched in a crumpled ball in my pocket.
+
+"Are you the manager?" I said. God knows I didn't doubt it.
+
+"Yes," he said.
+
+"Can I see you," I asked, "alone?" I didn't want to say
+"alone" again, but without it the thing seemed self-evident.
+
+The manager looked at me in some alarm. He felt that I
+had an awful secret to reveal.
+
+"Come in here," he said, and led the way to a private
+room. He turned the key in the lock.
+
+"We are safe from interruption here," he said; "sit down."
+
+We both sat down and looked at each other. I found no
+voice to speak.
+
+"You are one of Pinkerton's men, I presume," he said.
+
+He had gathered from my mysterious manner that I was a
+detective. I knew what he was thinking, and it made me
+worse.
+
+"No, not from Pinkerton's," I said, seeming to imply that
+I came from a rival agency.
+
+"To tell the truth," I went on, as if I had been prompted
+to lie about it, "I am not a detective at all. I have
+come to open an account. I intend to keep all my money
+in this bank."
+
+The manager looked relieved but still serious; he concluded
+now that I was a son of Baron Rothschild or a young Gould.
+
+"A large account, I suppose," he said.
+
+"Fairly large," I whispered. "I propose to deposit
+fifty-six dollars now and fifty dollars a month regularly."
+
+The manager got up and opened the door. He called to the
+accountant.
+
+"Mr. Montgomery," he said unkindly loud, "this gentleman
+is opening an account, he will deposit fifty-six dollars.
+Good morning."
+
+I rose.
+
+A big iron door stood open at the side of the room.
+
+"Good morning," I said, and stepped into the safe.
+
+"Come out," said the manager coldly, and showed me the
+other way.
+
+I went up to the accountant's wicket and poked the ball
+of money at him with a quick convulsive movement as if
+I were doing a conjuring trick.
+
+My face was ghastly pale.
+
+"Here," I said, "deposit it." The tone of the words seemed
+to mean, "Let us do this painful thing while the fit is
+on us."
+
+He took the money and gave it to another clerk.
+
+He made me write the sum on a slip and sign my name in
+a book. I no longer knew what I was doing. The bank swam
+before my eyes.
+
+"Is it deposited?" I asked in a hollow, vibrating voice.
+
+"It is," said the accountant.
+
+"Then I want to draw a cheque."
+
+My idea was to draw out six dollars of it for present
+use. Someone gave me a chequebook through a wicket and
+someone else began telling me how to write it out. The
+people in the bank had the impression that I was an
+invalid millionaire. I wrote something on the cheque and
+thrust it in at the clerk. He looked at it.
+
+"What! are you drawing it all out again?" he asked in
+surprise. Then I realized that I had written fifty-six
+instead of six. I was too far gone to reason now. I had
+a feeling that it was impossible to explain the thing.
+All the clerks had stopped writing to look at me.
+
+Reckless with misery, I made a plunge.
+
+"Yes, the whole thing."
+
+"You withdraw your money from the bank?"
+
+"Every cent of it."
+
+"Are you not going to deposit any more?" said the clerk,
+astonished.
+
+"Never."
+
+An idiot hope struck me that they might think something
+had insulted me while I was writing the cheque and that
+I had changed my mind. I made a wretched attempt to look
+like a man with a fearfully quick temper.
+
+The clerk prepared to pay the money.
+
+"How will you have it?" he said.
+
+"What?"
+
+"How will you have it?"
+
+"Oh"--I caught his meaning and answered without even
+trying to think--"in fifties."
+
+He gave me a fifty-dollar bill.
+
+"And the six?" he asked dryly.
+
+"In sixes," I said.
+
+He gave it me and I rushed out.
+
+As the big door swung behind me I caught the echo of a
+roar of laughter that went up to the ceiling of the bank.
+Since then I bank no more. I keep my money in cash in my
+trousers pocket and my savings in silver dollars in a
+sock.
+
+
+
+
+Lord Oxhead's Secret
+
+A ROMANCE IN ONE CHAPTER
+
+It was finished. Ruin had come. Lord Oxhead sat gazing
+fixedly at the library fire. Without, the wind soughed
+(or sogged) around the turrets of Oxhead Towers, the seat
+of the Oxhead family. But the old earl heeded not the
+sogging of the wind around his seat. He was too absorbed.
+
+Before him lay a pile of blue papers with printed headings.
+From time to time he turned them over in his hands and
+replaced them on the table with a groan. To the earl they
+meant ruin--absolute, irretrievable ruin, and with it
+the loss of his stately home that had been the pride of
+the Oxheads for generations. More than that--the world
+would now know the awful secret of his life.
+
+The earl bowed his head in the bitterness of his sorrow,
+for he came of a proud stock. About him hung the portraits
+of his ancestors. Here on the right an Oxhead who had
+broken his lance at Crecy, or immediately before it.
+There McWhinnie Oxhead who had ridden madly from the
+stricken field of Flodden to bring to the affrighted
+burghers of Edinburgh all the tidings that he had been
+able to gather in passing the battlefield. Next him hung
+the dark half Spanish face of Sir Amyas Oxhead of
+Elizabethan days whose pinnace was the first to dash to
+Plymouth with the news that the English fleet, as nearly
+as could be judged from a reasonable distance, seemed
+about to grapple with the Spanish Armada. Below this,
+the two Cavalier brothers, Giles and Everard Oxhead, who
+had sat in the oak with Charles II. Then to the right
+again the portrait of Sir Ponsonby Oxhead who had fought
+with Wellington in Spain, and been dismissed for it.
+
+Immediately before the earl as he sat was the family
+escutcheon emblazoned above the mantelpiece. A child
+might read the simplicity of its proud significance--an
+ox rampant quartered in a field of gules with a pike
+dexter and a dog intermittent in a plain parallelogram
+right centre, with the motto, "Hic, haec, hoc, hujus,
+hujus, hujus."
+
+   *   *   *   *   *
+
+"Father!"--The girl's voice rang clear through the half
+light of the wainscoted library. Gwendoline Oxhead had
+thrown herself about the earl's neck. The girl was radiant
+with happiness. Gwendoline was a beautiful girl of
+thirty-three, typically English in the freshness of her
+girlish innocence. She wore one of those charming walking
+suits of brown holland so fashionable among the aristocracy
+of England, while a rough leather belt encircled her
+waist in a single sweep. She bore herself with that sweet
+simplicity which was her greatest charm. She was probably
+more simple than any girl of her age for miles around.
+Gwendoline was the pride of her father's heart, for he
+saw reflected in her the qualities of his race.
+
+"Father," she said, a blush mantling her fair face, "I
+am so happy, oh so happy; Edwin has asked me to be his
+wife, and we have plighted our troth--at least if you
+consent. For I will never marry without my father's
+warrant," she added, raising her head proudly; "I am too
+much of an Oxhead for that."
+
+Then as she gazed into the old earl's stricken face, the
+girl's mood changed at once. "Father," she cried, "father,
+are you ill? What is it? Shall I ring?" As she spoke
+Gwendoline reached for the heavy bell-rope that hung
+beside the wall, but the earl, fearful that her frenzied
+efforts might actually make it ring, checked her hand.
+"I am, indeed, deeply troubled," said Lord Oxhead, "but
+of that anon. Tell me first what is this news you bring.
+I hope, Gwendoline, that your choice has been worthy of
+an Oxhead, and that he to whom you have plighted your
+troth will be worthy to bear our motto with his own."
+And, raising his eyes to the escutcheon before him, the
+earl murmured half unconsciously, "Hic, haec, hoc, hujus,
+hujus, hujus," breathing perhaps a prayer as many of his
+ancestors had done before him that he might never forget
+it.
+
+"Father," continued Gwendoline, half timidly, "Edwin is
+an American."
+
+"You surprise me indeed," answered Lord Oxhead; "and
+yet," he continued, turning to his daughter with the
+courtly grace that marked the nobleman of the old school,
+"why should we not respect and admire the Americans?
+Surely there have been great names among them. Indeed,
+our ancestor Sir Amyas Oxhead was, I think, married to
+Pocahontas--at least if not actually married"--the earl
+hesitated a moment.
+
+"At least they loved one another," said Gwendoline simply.
+
+"Precisely," said the earl, with relief, "they loved one
+another, yes, exactly." Then as if musing to himself,
+"Yes, there have been great Americans. Bolivar was an
+American. The two Washingtons--George and Booker--are
+both Americans. There have been others too, though for
+the moment I do not recall their names. But tell me,
+Gwendoline, this Edwin of yours--where is his family
+seat?"
+
+"It is at Oshkosh, Wisconsin, father."
+
+"Ah! say you so?" rejoined the earl, with rising interest.
+"Oshkosh is, indeed, a grand old name. The Oshkosh are
+a Russian family. An Ivan Oshkosh came to England with
+Peter the Great and married my ancestress. Their descendant
+in the second degree once removed, Mixtup Oshkosh, fought
+at the burning of Moscow and later at the sack of Salamanca
+and the treaty of Adrianople. And Wisconsin too," the
+old nobleman went on, his features kindling with animation,
+for he had a passion for heraldry, genealogy, chronology,
+and commercial geography; "the Wisconsins, or better, I
+think, the Guisconsins, are of old blood. A Guisconsin
+followed Henry I to Jerusalem and rescued my ancestor
+Hardup Oxhead from the Saracens. Another Guisconsin..."
+
+"Nay, father," said Gwendoline, gently interrupting,
+"Wisconsin is not Edwin's own name: that is, I believe,
+the name of his estate. My lover's name is Edwin Einstein."
+
+"Einstein," repeated the earl dubiously--"an Indian name
+perhaps; yet the Indians are many of them of excellent
+family. An ancestor of mine..."
+
+"Father," said Gwendoline, again interrupting, "here is
+a portrait of Edwin. Judge for yourself if he be noble."
+With this she placed in her father's hand an American
+tin-type, tinted in pink and brown. The picture represented
+a typical specimen of American manhood of that Anglo-Semitic
+type so often seen in persons of mixed English and Jewish
+extraction. The figure was well over five feet two inches
+in height and broad in proportion. The graceful sloping
+shoulders harmonized with the slender and well-poised
+waist, and with a hand pliant and yet prehensile. The
+pallor of the features was relieved by a drooping black
+moustache.
+
+Such was Edwin Einstein to whom Gwendoline's heart, if
+not her hand, was already affianced. Their love had been
+so simple and yet so strange. It seemed to Gwendoline
+that it was but a thing of yesterday, and yet in reality
+they had met three weeks ago. Love had drawn them
+irresistibly together. To Edwin the fair English girl
+with her old name and wide estates possessed a charm that
+he scarcely dared confess to himself. He determined to
+woo her. To Gwendoline there was that in Edwin's bearing,
+the rich jewels that he wore, the vast fortune that rumour
+ascribed to him, that appealed to something romantic and
+chivalrous in her nature. She loved to hear him speak of
+stocks and bonds, corners and margins, and his father's
+colossal business. It all seemed so noble and so far
+above the sordid lives of the people about her. Edwin,
+too, loved to hear the girl talk of her father's estates,
+of the diamond-hilted sword that the saladin had given,
+or had lent, to her ancestor hundreds of years ago. Her
+description of her father, the old earl, touched something
+romantic in Edwin's generous heart. He was never tired
+of asking how old he was, was he robust, did a shock, a
+sudden shock, affect him much? and so on. Then had come
+the evening that Gwendoline loved to live over and over
+again in her mind when Edwin had asked her in his
+straightforward, manly way, whether--subject to certain
+written stipulations to be considered later--she would
+be his wife: and she, putting her hand confidingly in
+his hand, answered simply, that--subject to the consent
+of her father and pending always the necessary legal
+formalities and inquiries--she would.
+
+It had all seemed like a dream: and now Edwin Einstein
+had come in person to ask her hand from the earl, her
+father. Indeed, he was at this moment in the outer hall
+testing the gold leaf in the picture-frames with his
+pen-knife while waiting for his affianced to break the
+fateful news to Lord Oxhead.
+
+Gwendoline summoned her courage for a great effort.
+"Papa," she said, "there is one other thing that it is
+fair to tell you. Edwin's father is in business."
+
+The earl started from his seat in blank amazement. "In
+business!" he repeated, "the father of the suitor of the
+daughter of an Oxhead in business! My daughter the
+step-daughter of the grandfather of my grandson! Are
+you mad, girl? It is too much, too much!"
+
+"But, father," pleaded the beautiful girl in anguish,
+"hear me. It is Edwin's father--Sarcophagus Einstein,
+senior--not Edwin himself. Edwin does nothing. He has
+never earned a penny. He is quite unable to support
+himself. You have only to see him to believe it. Indeed,
+dear father, he is just like us. He is here now, in this
+house, waiting to see you. If it were not for his great
+wealth..."
+
+"Girl," said the earl sternly, "I care not for the man's
+riches. How much has he?"
+
+"Fifteen million two hundred and fifty thousand dollars,"
+answered Gwendoline. Lord Oxhead leaned his head against
+the mantelpiece. His mind was in a whirl. He was trying
+to calculate the yearly interest on fifteen and a quarter
+million dollars at four and a half per cent reduced to
+pounds, shillings, and pence. It was bootless. His brain,
+trained by long years of high living and plain thinking,
+had become too subtle, too refined an instrument for
+arithmetic...
+
+   *   *   *   *   *
+
+At this moment the door opened and Edwin Einstein stood
+before the earl. Gwendoline never forgot what happened.
+Through her life the picture of it haunted her--her lover
+upright at the door, his fine frank gaze fixed inquiringly
+on the diamond pin in her father's necktie, and he, her
+father, raising from the mantelpiece a face of agonized
+amazement.
+
+"You! You!" he gasped. For a moment he stood to his full
+height, swaying and groping in the air, then fell prostrate
+his full length upon the floor. The lovers rushed to his
+aid. Edwin tore open his neckcloth and plucked aside his
+diamond pin to give him air. But it was too late. Earl
+Oxhead had breathed his last. Life had fled. The earl
+was extinct. That is to say, he was dead.
+
+The reason of his death was never known. Had the sight
+of Edwin killed him? It might have. The old family doctor,
+hurriedly summoned, declared his utter ignorance. This,
+too, was likely. Edwin himself could explain nothing.
+But it was observed that after the earl's death and his
+marriage with Gwendoline he was a changed man; he dressed
+better, talked much better English.
+
+The wedding itself was quiet, almost sad. At Gwendoline's
+request there was no wedding breakfast, no bridesmaids,
+and no reception, while Edwin, respecting his bride's
+bereavement, insisted that there should be no best man,
+no flowers, no presents, and no honeymoon.
+
+Thus Lord Oxhead's secret died with him. It was probably
+too complicated to be interesting anyway.
+
+
+
+
+Boarding-House Geometry
+
+DEFINITIONS AND AXIOMS
+
+All boarding-houses are the same boarding-house.
+
+Boarders in the same boarding-house and on the same flat
+are equal to one another.
+
+A single room is that which has no parts and no magnitude.
+
+The landlady of a boarding-house is a parallelogram--that
+is, an oblong angular figure, which cannot be described,
+but which is equal to anything.
+
+A wrangle is the disinclination of two boarders to each
+other that meet together but are not in the same line.
+
+All the other rooms being taken, a single room is said
+to be a double room.
+
+
+POSTULATES AND PROPOSITIONS
+
+A pie may be produced any number of times.
+
+The landlady can be reduced to her lowest terms by a
+series of propositions.
+
+A bee line may be made from any boarding-house to any
+other boarding-house.
+
+The clothes of a boarding-house bed, though produced ever
+so far both ways, will not meet.
+
+Any two meals at a boarding-house are together less than
+two square meals.
+
+If from the opposite ends of a boarding-house a line be
+drawn passing through all the rooms in turn, then the
+stovepipe which warms the boarders will lie within that
+line.
+
+On the same bill and on the same side of it there should
+not be two charges for the same thing.
+
+If there be two boarders on the same flat, and the amount
+of side of the one be equal to the amount of side of the
+other, each to each, and the wrangle between one boarder
+and the landlady be equal to the wrangle between the
+landlady and the other, then shall the weekly bills of
+the two boarders be equal also, each to each.
+
+For if not, let one bill be the greater.
+
+Then the other bill is less than it might have been--which
+is absurd.
+
+
+
+
+The Awful Fate of Melpomenus Jones
+
+Some people--not you nor I, because we are so awfully
+self-possessed--but some people, find great difficulty
+in saying good-bye when making a call or spending the
+evening. As the moment draws near when the visitor feels
+that he is fairly entitled to go away he rises and says
+abruptly, "Well, I think I..." Then the people say, "Oh,
+must you go now? Surely it's early yet!" and a pitiful
+struggle ensues.
+
+I think the saddest case of this kind of thing that I
+ever knew was that of my poor friend Melpomenus Jones,
+a curate--such a dear young man, and only twenty-three!
+He simply couldn't get away from people. He was too modest
+to tell a lie, and too religious to wish to appear rude.
+Now it happened that he went to call on some friends of
+his on the very first afternoon of his summer vacation.
+The next six weeks were entirely his own--absolutely
+nothing to do. He chatted awhile, drank two cups of tea,
+then braced himself for the effort and said suddenly:
+
+"Well, I think I..."
+
+But the lady of the house said, "Oh, no! Mr. Jones, can't
+you really stay a little longer?"
+
+Jones was always truthful. "Oh, yes," he said, "of course,
+I--er--can stay."
+
+"Then please don't go."
+
+He stayed. He drank eleven cups of tea. Night was falling.
+He rose again.
+
+"Well now," he said shyly, "I think I really..."
+
+"You must go?" said the lady politely. "I thought perhaps
+you could have stayed to dinner..."
+
+"Oh well, so I could, you know," Jones said, "if..."
+
+"Then please stay, I'm sure my husband will be delighted."
+
+"All right," he said feebly, "I'll stay," and he sank
+back into his chair, just full of tea, and miserable.
+
+Papa came home. They had dinner. All through the meal
+Jones sat planning to leave at eight-thirty. All the
+family wondered whether Mr. Jones was stupid and sulky,
+or only stupid.
+
+After dinner mamma undertook to "draw him out," and showed
+him photographs. She showed him all the family museum,
+several gross of them--photos of papa's uncle and his
+wife, and mamma's brother and his little boy, an awfully
+interesting photo of papa's uncle's friend in his Bengal
+uniform, an awfully well-taken photo of papa's grandfather's
+partner's dog, and an awfully wicked one of papa as the
+devil for a fancy-dress ball. At eight-thirty Jones had
+examined seventy-one photographs. There were about
+sixty-nine more that he hadn't. Jones rose.
+
+"I must say good night now," he pleaded.
+
+"Say good night!" they said, "why it's only half-past
+eight! Have you anything to do?"
+
+"Nothing," he admitted, and muttered something about
+staying six weeks, and then laughed miserably.
+
+Just then it turned out that the favourite child of the
+family, such a dear little romp, had hidden Mr. Jones's
+hat; so papa said that he must stay, and invited him to
+a pipe and a chat. Papa had the pipe and gave Jones the
+chat, and still he stayed. Every moment he meant to take
+the plunge, but couldn't. Then papa began to get very
+tired of Jones, and fidgeted and finally said, with
+jocular irony, that Jones had better stay all night, they
+could give him a shake-down. Jones mistook his meaning
+and thanked him with tears in his eyes, and papa put
+Jones to bed in the spare room and cursed him heartily.
+
+After breakfast next day, papa went off to his work in the
+City, and left Jones playing with the baby, broken-hearted.
+His nerve was utterly gone. He was meaning to leave all day,
+but the thing had got on his mind and he simply couldn't.
+When papa came home in the evening he was surprised and
+chagrined to find Jones still there. He thought to jockey
+him out with a jest, and said he thought he'd have to charge
+him for his board, he! he! The unhappy young man stared
+wildly for a moment, then wrung papa's hand, paid him a
+month's board in advance, and broke down and sobbed like
+a child.
+
+In the days that followed he was moody and unapproachable.
+He lived, of course, entirely in the drawing-room, and
+the lack of air and exercise began to tell sadly on his
+health. He passed his time in drinking tea and looking
+at the photographs. He would stand for hours gazing at
+the photographs of papa's uncle's friend in his Bengal
+uniform--talking to it, sometimes swearing bitterly at
+it. His mind was visibly failing.
+
+At length the crash came. They carried him upstairs in
+a raging delirium of fever. The illness that followed
+was terrible. He recognized no one, not even papa's
+uncle's friend in his Bengal uniform. At times he would
+start up from his bed and shriek, "Well, I think I..."
+and then fall back upon the pillow with a horrible laugh.
+Then, again, he would leap up and cry, "Another cup of
+tea and more photographs! More photographs! Har! Har!"
+
+At length, after a month of agony, on the last day of
+his vacation, he passed away. They say that when the last
+moment came, he sat up in bed with a beautiful smile of
+confidence playing upon his face, and said, "Well--the
+angels are calling me; I'm afraid I really must go now.
+Good afternoon."
+
+And the rushing of his spirit from its prison-house was
+as rapid as a hunted cat passing over a garden fence.
+
+
+
+
+A Christmas Letter
+
+(In answer to a young lady who has sent an invitation to
+be present at a children's party)
+
+Madamoiselle,
+
+Allow me very gratefully but firmly to refuse your kind
+invitation. You doubtless mean well; but your ideas are
+unhappily mistaken.
+
+Let us understand one another once and for all. I cannot
+at my mature age participate in the sports of children
+with such abandon as I could wish. I entertain, and have
+always entertained, the sincerest regard for such games
+as Hunt-the-Slipper and Blind-Man's Buff. But I have now
+reached a time of life, when, to have my eyes blindfolded
+and to have a powerful boy of ten hit me in the back with
+a hobby-horse and ask me to guess who hit me, provokes
+me to a fit of retaliation which could only culminate in
+reckless criminality. Nor can I cover my shoulders with
+a drawing-room rug and crawl round on my hands and knees
+under the pretence that I am a bear without a sense of
+personal insufficiency, which is painful to me.
+
+Neither can I look on with a complacent eye at the sad
+spectacle of your young clerical friend, the Reverend
+Mr. Uttermost Farthing, abandoning himself to such gambols
+and appearing in the role of life and soul of the evening.
+Such a degradation of his holy calling grieves me, and
+I cannot but suspect him of ulterior motives.
+
+You inform me that your maiden aunt intends to help you
+to entertain the party. I have not, as you know, the
+honour of your aunt's acquaintance, yet I think I may
+with reason surmise that she will organize games--guessing
+games--in which she will ask me to name a river in Asia
+beginning with a Z; on my failure to do so she will put
+a hot plate down my neck as a forfeit, and the children
+will clap their hands. These games, my dear young friend,
+involve the use of a more adaptable intellect than mine,
+and I cannot consent to be a party to them.
+
+May I say in conclusion that I do not consider a five-cent
+pen-wiper from the top branch of a Xmas tree any adequate
+compensation for the kind of evening you propose.
+
+   I have the honour
+      To subscribe myself,
+         Your obedient servant.
+
+
+
+
+How to Make a Million Dollars
+
+I mix a good deal with the Millionaires. I like them. I
+like their faces. I like the way they live. I like the
+things they eat. The more we mix together the better I
+like the things we mix.
+
+Especially I like the way they dress, their grey check
+trousers, their white check waist-coats, their heavy gold
+chains, and the signet-rings that they sign their cheques
+with. My! they look nice. Get six or seven of them sitting
+together in the club and it's a treat to see them. And
+if they get the least dust on them, men come and brush
+it off. Yes, and are glad to. I'd like to take some of
+the dust off them myself.
+
+Even more than what they eat I like their intellectual
+grasp. It is wonderful. Just watch them read. They simply
+read all the time. Go into the club at any hour and you'll
+see three or four of them at it. And the things they can
+read! You'd think that a man who'd been driving hard in
+the office from eleven o'clock until three, with only an
+hour and a half for lunch, would be too fagged. Not a
+bit. These men can sit down after office hours and read
+the Sketch and the Police Gazette and the Pink Un, and
+understand the jokes just as well as I can.
+
+What I love to do is to walk up and down among them and
+catch the little scraps of conversation. The other day
+I heard one lean forward and say, "Well, I offered him
+a million and a half and said I wouldn't give a cent
+more, he could either take it or leave it--" I just longed
+to break in and say, "What! what! a million and a half!
+Oh! say that again! Offer it to me, to either take it or
+leave it. Do try me once: I know I can: or here, make it
+a plain million and let's call it done."
+
+Not that these men are careless over money. No, sir.
+Don't think it. Of course they don't take much account
+of big money, a hundred thousand dollars at a shot or
+anything of that sort. But little money. You've no idea
+till you know them how anxious they get about a cent, or
+half a cent, or less.
+
+Why, two of them came into the club the other night just
+frantic with delight: they said wheat had risen and they'd
+cleaned up four cents each in less than half an hour.
+They bought a dinner for sixteen on the strength of it.
+I don't understand it. I've often made twice as much as
+that writing for the papers and never felt like boasting
+about it.
+
+One night I heard one man say, "Well, let's call up New
+York and offer them a quarter of a cent." Great heavens!
+Imagine paying the cost of calling up New York, nearly
+five million people, late at night and offering them a
+quarter of a cent! And yet--did New York get mad? No,
+they took it. Of course it's high finance. I don't pretend
+to understand it. I tried after that to call up Chicago
+and offer it a cent and a half, and to call up Hamilton,
+Ontario, and offer it half a dollar, and the operator
+only thought I was crazy.
+
+All this shows, of course, that I've been studying how
+the millionaires do it. I have. For years. I thought it
+might be helpful to young men just beginning to work and
+anxious to stop.
+
+You know, many a man realizes late in life that if when
+he was a boy he had known what he knows now, instead of
+being what he is he might be what he won't; but how few
+boys stop to think that if they knew what they don't know
+instead of being what they will be, they wouldn't be?
+These are awful thoughts.
+
+At any rate, I've been gathering hints on how it is they
+do it.
+
+One thing I'm sure about. If a young man wants to make
+a million dollars he's got to be mighty careful about
+his diet and his living. This may seem hard. But success
+is only achieved with pains.
+
+There is no use in a young man who hopes to make a million
+dollars thinking he's entitled to get up at 7.30, eat
+force and poached eggs, drink cold water at lunch, and
+go to bed at 10 p.m. You can't do it. I've seen too many
+millionaires for that. If you want to be a millionaire
+you mustn't get up till ten in the morning. They never
+do. They daren't. It would be as much as their business
+is worth if they were seen on the street at half-past
+nine.
+
+And the old idea of abstemiousness is all wrong. To be
+a millionaire you need champagne, lots of it and all the
+time. That and Scotch whisky and soda: you have to sit
+up nearly all night and drink buckets of it. This is what
+clears the brain for business next day. I've seen some
+of these men with their brains so clear in the morning,
+that their faces look positively boiled.
+
+To live like this requires, of course, resolution. But
+you can buy that by the pint.
+
+Therefore, my dear young man, if you want to get moved
+on from your present status in business, change your
+life. When your landlady brings your bacon and eggs for
+breakfast, throw them out of window to the dog and tell
+her to bring you some chilled asparagus and a pint of
+Moselle. Then telephone to your employer that you'll be
+down about eleven o'clock. You will get moved on. Yes,
+very quickly.
+
+Just how the millionaires make the money is a difficult
+question. But one way is this. Strike the town with five
+cents in your pocket. They nearly all do this; they've
+told me again and again (men with millions and millions)
+that the first time they struck town they had only five
+cents. That seems to have given them their start. Of
+course, it's not easy to do. I've tried it several times.
+I nearly did it once. I borrowed five cents, carried it
+away out of town, and then turned and came back at the
+town with an awful rush. If I hadn't struck a beer saloon
+in the suburbs and spent the five cents I might have been
+rich to-day.
+
+Another good plan is to start something. Something on a
+huge scale: something nobody ever thought of. For instance,
+one man I know told me that once he was down in Mexico
+without a cent (he'd lost his five in striking Central
+America) and he noticed that they had no power plants.
+So he started some and made a mint of money. Another man
+that I know was once stranded in New York, absolutely
+without a nickel. Well, it occurred to him that what was
+needed were buildings ten stories higher than any that
+had been put up. So he built two and sold them right
+away. Ever so many millionaires begin in some such simple
+way as that.
+
+There is, of course, a much easier way than any of these.
+I almost hate to tell this, because I want to do it
+myself.
+
+I learned of it just by chance one night at the club.
+There is one old man there, extremely rich, with one of
+the best faces of the lot, just like a hyena. I never
+used to know how he had got so rich. So one evening I
+asked one of the millionaires how old Bloggs had made
+all his money.
+
+"How he made it?" he answered with a sneer. "Why he made
+it by taking it out of widows and orphans."
+
+Widows and orphans! I thought, what an excellent idea.
+But who would have suspected that they had it?
+
+"And how," I asked pretty cautiously, "did he go at it
+to get it out of them?"
+
+"Why," the man answered, "he just ground them under his
+heels, that was how."
+
+Now isn't that simple? I've thought of that conversation
+often since and I mean to try it. If I can get hold of
+them, I'll grind them quick enough. But how to get them.
+Most of the widows I know look pretty solid for that sort
+of thing, and as for orphans, it must take an awful lot
+of them. Meantime I am waiting, and if I ever get a large
+bunch of orphans all together, I'll stamp on them and
+see.
+
+I find, too, on inquiry, that you can also grind it out
+of clergymen. They say they grind nicely. But perhaps
+orphans are easier.
+
+
+
+
+How to Live to be 200
+
+Twenty years ago I knew a man called Jiggins, who had
+the Health Habit.
+
+He used to take a cold plunge every morning. He said it
+opened his pores. After it he took a hot sponge. He said
+it closed the pores. He got so that he could open and
+shut his pores at will.
+
+Jiggins used to stand and breathe at an open window for
+half an hour before dressing. He said it expanded his
+lungs. He might, of course, have had it done in a shoe-store
+with a boot stretcher, but after all it cost him nothing
+this way, and what is half an hour?
+
+After he had got his undershirt on, Jiggins used to hitch
+himself up like a dog in harness and do Sandow exercises.
+He did them forwards, backwards, and hind-side up.
+
+He could have got a job as a dog anywhere. He spent all
+his time at this kind of thing. In his spare time at the
+office, he used to lie on his stomach on the floor and
+see if he could lift himself up with his knuckles. If he
+could, then he tried some other way until he found one
+that he couldn't do. Then he would spend the rest of his
+lunch hour on his stomach, perfectly happy.
+
+In the evenings in his room he used to lift iron bars,
+cannon-balls, heave dumb-bells, and haul himself up to
+the ceiling with his teeth. You could hear the thumps
+half a mile. He liked it.
+
+He spent half the night slinging himself around his room.
+He said it made his brain clear. When he got his brain
+perfectly clear, he went to bed and slept. As soon as he
+woke, he began clearing it again.
+
+Jiggins is dead. He was, of course, a pioneer, but the
+fact that he dumb-belled himself to death at an early
+age does not prevent a whole generation of young men from
+following in his path.
+
+They are ridden by the Health Mania.
+
+They make themselves a nuisance.
+
+They get up at impossible hours. They go out in silly
+little suits and run Marathon heats before breakfast.
+They chase around barefoot to get the dew on their feet.
+They hunt for ozone. They bother about pepsin. They won't
+eat meat because it has too much nitrogen. They won't
+eat fruit because it hasn't any. They prefer albumen and
+starch and nitrogen to huckleberry pie and doughnuts.
+They won't drink water out of a tap. They won't eat
+sardines out of a can. They won't use oysters out of a
+pail. They won't drink milk out of a glass. They are
+afraid of alcohol in any shape. Yes, sir, afraid. "Cowards."
+
+And after all their fuss they presently incur some simple
+old-fashioned illness and die like anybody else.
+
+Now people of this sort have no chance to attain any
+great age. They are on the wrong track.
+
+Listen. Do you want to live to be really old, to enjoy
+a grand, green, exuberant, boastful old age and to make
+yourself a nuisance to your whole neighbourhood with your
+reminiscences?
+
+Then cut out all this nonsense. Cut it out. Get up in
+the morning at a sensible hour. The time to get up is
+when you have to, not before. If your office opens at
+eleven, get up at ten-thirty. Take your chance on ozone.
+There isn't any such thing anyway. Or, if there is, you
+can buy a Thermos bottle full for five cents, and put it
+on a shelf in your cupboard. If your work begins at seven
+in the morning, get up at ten minutes to, but don't be
+liar enough to say that you like it. It isn't exhilarating,
+and you know it.
+
+Also, drop all that cold-bath business. You never did it
+when you were a boy. Don't be a fool now. If you must
+take a bath (you don't really need to), take it warm.
+The pleasure of getting out of a cold bed and creeping
+into a hot bath beats a cold plunge to death. In any
+case, stop gassing about your tub and your "shower," as
+if you were the only man who ever washed.
+
+So much for that point.
+
+Next, take the question of germs and bacilli. Don't be
+scared of them. That's all. That's the whole thing, and
+if you once get on to that you never need to worry again.
+
+If you see a bacilli, walk right up to it, and look it
+in the eye. If one flies into your room, strike at it
+with your hat or with a towel. Hit it as hard as you can
+between the neck and the thorax. It will soon get sick
+of that.
+
+But as a matter of fact, a bacilli is perfectly quiet
+and harmless if you are not afraid of it. Speak to it.
+Call out to it to "lie down." It will understand. I had
+a bacilli once, called Fido, that would come and lie at
+my feet while I was working. I never knew a more
+affectionate companion, and when it was run over by an
+automobile, I buried it in the garden with genuine sorrow.
+
+(I admit this is an exaggeration. I don't really remember
+its name; it may have been Robert.)
+
+Understand that it is only a fad of modern medicine to
+say that cholera and typhoid and diphtheria are caused
+by bacilli and germs; nonsense. Cholera is caused by a
+frightful pain in the stomach, and diphtheria is caused
+by trying to cure a sore throat.
+
+Now take the question of food.
+
+Eat what you want. Eat lots of it. Yes, eat too much of
+it. Eat till you can just stagger across the room with
+it and prop it up against a sofa cushion. Eat everything
+that you like until you can't eat any more. The only test
+is, can you pay for it? If you can't pay for it, don't
+eat it. And listen--don't worry as to whether your food
+contains starch, or albumen, or gluten, or nitrogen. If
+you are a damn fool enough to want these things, go and
+buy them and eat all you want of them. Go to a laundry
+and get a bag of starch, and eat your fill of it. Eat
+it, and take a good long drink of glue after it, and a
+spoonful of Portland cement. That will gluten you, good
+and solid.
+
+If you like nitrogen, go and get a druggist to give you
+a canful of it at the soda counter, and let you sip it
+with a straw. Only don't think that you can mix all these
+things up with your food. There isn't any nitrogen or
+phosphorus or albumen in ordinary things to eat. In any
+decent household all that sort of stuff is washed out in
+the kitchen sink before the food is put on the table.
+
+And just one word about fresh air and exercise. Don't
+bother with either of them. Get your room full of good
+air, then shut up the windows and keep it. It will keep
+for years. Anyway, don't keep using your lungs all the
+time. Let them rest. As for exercise, if you have to take
+it, take it and put up with it. But as long as you have
+the price of a hack and can hire other people to play
+baseball for you and run races and do gymnastics when
+you sit in the shade and smoke and watch them--great
+heavens, what more do you want?
+
+
+
+
+How to Avoid Getting Married
+
+Some years ago, when I was the Editor of a Correspondence
+Column, I used to receive heart-broken letters from young
+men asking for advice and sympathy. They found themselves
+the object of marked attentions from girls which they
+scarcely knew how to deal with. They did not wish to give
+pain or to seem indifferent to a love which they felt
+was as ardent as it was disinterested, and yet they felt
+that they could not bestow their hands where their hearts
+had not spoken. They wrote to me fully and frankly, and
+as one soul might write to another for relief. I accepted
+their confidences as under the pledge of a secrecy, never
+divulging their disclosures beyond the circulation of my
+newspapers, or giving any hint of their identity other
+than printing their names and addresses and their letters
+in full. But I may perhaps without dishonour reproduce
+one of these letters, and my answer to it, inasmuch as
+the date is now months ago, and the softening hand of
+Time has woven its roses--how shall I put it?--the mellow
+haze of reminiscences has--what I mean is that the young
+man has gone back to work and is all right again.
+
+Here then is a letter from a young man whose name I must
+not reveal, but whom I will designate as D. F., and whose
+address I must not divulge, but will simply indicate as
+Q. Street, West.
+
+"DEAR MR. LEACOCK,
+
+"For some time past I have been the recipient of very
+marked attentions from a young lady. She has been calling
+at the house almost every evening, and has taken me out
+in her motor, and invited me to concerts and the theatre.
+On these latter occasions I have insisted on her taking
+my father with me, and have tried as far as possible to
+prevent her saying anything to me which would be unfit
+for father to hear. But my position has become a very
+difficult one. I do not think it right to accept her
+presents when I cannot feel that my heart is hers.
+Yesterday she sent to my house a beautiful bouquet of
+American Beauty roses addressed to me, and a magnificent
+bunch of Timothy Hay for father. I do not know what to
+say. Would it be right for father to keep all this valuable
+hay? I have confided fully in father, and we have discussed
+the question of presents. He thinks that there are some
+that we can keep with propriety, and others that a sense
+of delicacy forbids us to retain. He himself is going to
+sort out the presents into the two classes. He thinks
+that as far as he can see, the Hay is in class B. Meantime
+I write to you, as I understand that Miss Laura Jean
+Libby and Miss Beatrix Fairfax are on their vacation,
+and in any case a friend of mine who follows their writings
+closely tells me that they are always full.
+
+"I enclose a dollar, because I do not think it right to
+ask you to give all your valuable time and your best
+thought without giving you back what it is worth."
+
+On receipt of this I wrote back at once a private and
+confidential letter which I printed in the following
+edition of the paper.
+
+"MY DEAR, DEAR BOY,
+
+"Your letter has touched me. As soon as I opened it and
+saw the green and blue tint of the dollar bill which you
+had so daintily and prettily folded within the pages of
+your sweet letter, I knew that the note was from someone
+that I could learn to love, if our correspondence were
+to continue as it had begun. I took the dollar from your
+letter and kissed and fondled it a dozen times. Dear
+unknown boy! I shall always keep that dollar! No matter
+how much I may need it, or how many necessaries, yes,
+absolute necessities, of life I may be wanting, I shall
+always keep THAT dollar. Do you understand, dear? I shall
+keep it. I shall not spend it. As far as the USE of it
+goes, it will be just as if you had not sent it. Even if
+you were to send me another dollar, I should still keep
+the first one, so that no matter how many you sent, the
+recollection of one first friendship would not be
+contaminated with mercenary considerations. When I say
+dollar, darling, of course an express order, or a postal
+note, or even stamps would be all the same. But in that
+case do not address me in care of this office, as I should
+not like to think of your pretty little letters lying
+round where others might handle them.
+
+"But now I must stop chatting about myself, for I know
+that you cannot be interested in a simple old fogey such
+as I am. Let me talk to you about your letter and about
+the difficult question it raises for all marriageable
+young men.
+
+"In the first place, let me tell you how glad I am that
+you confide in your father. Whatever happens, go at once
+to your father, put your arms about his neck, and have
+a good cry together. And you are right, too, about
+presents. It needs a wiser head than my poor perplexed
+boy to deal with them. Take them to your father to be
+sorted, or, if you feel that you must not overtax his
+love, address them to me in your own pretty hand.
+
+"And now let us talk, dear, as one heart to another.
+Remember always that if a girl is to have your heart she
+must be worthy of you. When you look at your own bright
+innocent face in the mirror, resolve that you will give
+your hand to no girl who is not just as innocent as you
+are and no brighter than yourself. So that you must first
+find out how innocent she is. Ask her quietly and
+frankly--remember, dear, that the days of false modesty
+are passing away--whether she has ever been in jail. If
+she has not (and if YOU have not), then you know that
+you are dealing with a dear confiding girl who will make
+you a life mate. Then you must know, too, that her mind
+is worthy of your own. So many men to-day are led astray
+by the merely superficial graces and attractions of girls
+who in reality possess no mental equipment at all. Many
+a man is bitterly disillusioned after marriage when he
+realises that his wife cannot solve a quadratic equation,
+and that he is compelled to spend all his days with a
+woman who does not know that X squared plus 2XY plus Y
+squared is the same thing, or, I think nearly the same
+thing, as X plus Y squared.
+
+"Nor should the simple domestic virtues be neglected. If
+a girl desires to woo you, before allowing her to press
+her suit, ask her if she knows how to press yours. If
+she can, let her woo; if not, tell her to whoa. But I
+see I have written quite as much as I need for this
+column. Won't you write again, just as before, dear boy?
+
+"STEPHEN LEACOCK."
+
+
+
+
+How to be a Doctor
+
+Certainly the progress of science is a wonderful thing.
+One can't help feeling proud of it. I must admit that I
+do. Whenever I get talking to anyone--that is, to anyone
+who knows even less about it than I do--about the marvellous
+development of electricity, for instance, I feel as if
+I had been personally responsible for it. As for the
+linotype and the aeroplane and the vacuum house-cleaner,
+well, I am not sure that I didn't invent them myself. I
+believe that all generous-hearted men feel just the same
+way about it.
+
+However, that is not the point I am intending to discuss.
+What I want to speak about is the progress of medicine.
+There, if you like, is something wonderful. Any lover of
+humanity (or of either sex of it) who looks back on the
+achievements of medical science must feel his heart glow
+and his right ventricle expand with the pericardiac
+stimulus of a permissible pride.
+
+Just think of it. A hundred years ago there were no
+bacilli, no ptomaine poisoning, no diphtheria, and no
+appendicitis. Rabies was but little known, and only
+imperfectly developed. All of these we owe to medical
+science. Even such things as psoriasis and parotitis and
+trypanosomiasis, which are now household names, were
+known only to the few, and were quite beyond the reach
+of the great mass of the people.
+
+Or consider the advance of the science on its practical
+side. A hundred years ago it used to be supposed that
+fever could be cured by the letting of blood; now we know
+positively that it cannot. Even seventy years ago it was
+thought that fever was curable by the administration of
+sedative drugs; now we know that it isn't. For the matter
+of that, as recently as thirty years ago, doctors thought
+that they could heal a fever by means of low diet and
+the application of ice; now they are absolutely certain
+that they cannot. This instance shows the steady progress
+made in the treatment of fever. But there has been the
+same cheering advance all along the line. Take rheumatism.
+A few generations ago people with rheumatism used to have
+to carry round potatoes in their pockets as a means of
+cure. Now the doctors allow them to carry absolutely
+anything they like. They may go round with their pockets
+full of water-melons if they wish to. It makes no
+difference. Or take the treatment of epilepsy. It used
+to be supposed that the first thing to do in sudden
+attacks of this kind was to unfasten the patient's collar
+and let him breathe; at present, on the contrary, many
+doctors consider it better to button up the patient's
+collar and let him choke.
+
+In only one respect has there been a decided lack of
+progress in the domain of medicine, that is in the time
+it takes to become a qualified practitioner. In the good
+old days a man was turned out thoroughly equipped after
+putting in two winter sessions at a college and spending
+his summers in running logs for a sawmill. Some of the
+students were turned out even sooner. Nowadays it takes
+anywhere from five to eight years to become a doctor. Of
+course, one is willing to grant that our young men are
+growing stupider and lazier every year. This fact will
+be corroborated at once by any man over fifty years of
+age. But even when this is said it seems odd that a man
+should study eight years now to learn what he used to
+acquire in eight months.
+
+However, let that go. The point I want to develop is that
+the modern doctor's business is an extremely simple one,
+which could be acquired in about two weeks. This is the
+way it is done.
+
+The patient enters the consulting-room. "Doctor," he
+says, "I have a bad pain." "Where is it?" "Here." "Stand
+up," says the doctor, "and put your arms up above your
+head." Then the doctor goes behind the patient and strikes
+him a powerful blow in the back. "Do you feel that," he
+says. "I do," says the patient. Then the doctor turns
+suddenly and lets him have a left hook under the heart.
+"Can you feel that," he says viciously, as the patient
+falls over on the sofa in a heap. "Get up," says the
+doctor, and counts ten. The patient rises. The doctor
+looks him over very carefully without speaking, and then
+suddenly fetches him a blow in the stomach that doubles
+him up speechless. The doctor walks over to the window
+and reads the morning paper for a while. Presently he
+turns and begins to mutter more to himself than the
+patient. "Hum!" he says, "there's a slight anaesthesia
+of the tympanum." "Is that so?" says the patient, in an
+agony of fear. "What can I do about it, doctor?" "Well,"
+says the doctor, "I want you to keep very quiet; you'll
+have to go to bed and stay there and keep quiet." In
+reality, of course, the doctor hasn't the least idea what
+is wrong with the man; but he DOES know that if he will
+go to bed and keep quiet, awfully quiet, he'll either
+get quietly well again or else die a quiet death. Meantime,
+if the doctor calls every morning and thumps and beats
+him, he can keep the patient submissive and perhaps force
+him to confess what is wrong with him.
+
+"What about diet, doctor?" says the patient, completely
+cowed.
+
+The answer to this question varies very much. It depends
+on how the doctor is feeling and whether it is long since
+he had a meal himself. If it is late in the morning and
+the doctor is ravenously hungry, he says: "Oh, eat plenty,
+don't be afraid of it; eat meat, vegetables, starch,
+glue, cement, anything you like." But if the doctor has
+just had lunch and if his breathing is short-circuited
+with huckleberry-pie, he says very firmly: "No, I don't
+want you to eat anything at all: absolutely not a bite;
+it won't hurt you, a little self-denial in the matter of
+eating is the best thing in the world."
+
+"And what about drinking?" Again the doctor's answer
+varies. He may say: "Oh, yes, you might drink a glass of
+lager now and then, or, if you prefer it, a gin and soda
+or a whisky and Apollinaris, and I think before going to
+bed I'd take a hot Scotch with a couple of lumps of white
+sugar and bit of lemon-peel in it and a good grating of
+nutmeg on the top." The doctor says this with real feeling,
+and his eye glistens with the pure love of his profession.
+But if, on the other hand, the doctor has spent the night
+before at a little gathering of medical friends, he is
+very apt to forbid the patient to touch alcohol in any
+shape, and to dismiss the subject with great severity.
+
+Of course, this treatment in and of itself would appear
+too transparent, and would fail to inspire the patient
+with a proper confidence. But nowadays this element is
+supplied by the work of the analytical laboratory. Whatever
+is wrong with the patient, the doctor insists on snipping
+off parts and pieces and extracts of him and sending them
+mysteriously away to be analysed. He cuts off a lock of
+the patient's hair, marks it, "Mr. Smith's Hair, October,
+1910." Then he clips off the lower part of the ear, and
+wraps it in paper, and labels it, "Part of Mr. Smith's
+Ear, October, 1910." Then he looks the patient up and
+down, with the scissors in his hand, and if he sees any
+likely part of him he clips it off and wraps it up. Now
+this, oddly enough, is the very thing that fills the
+patient up with that sense of personal importance which
+is worth paying for. "Yes," says the bandaged patient,
+later in the day to a group of friends much impressed,
+"the doctor thinks there may be a slight anaesthesia of
+the prognosis, but he's sent my ear to New York and my
+appendix to Baltimore and a lock of my hair to the editors
+of all the medical journals, and meantime I am to keep
+very quiet and not exert myself beyond drinking a hot
+Scotch with lemon and nutmeg every half-hour." With that
+he sinks back faintly on his cushions, luxuriously happy.
+
+And yet, isn't it funny?
+
+You and I and the rest of us--even if we know all this--as
+soon as we have a pain within us, rush for a doctor as
+fast as a hack can take us. Yes, personally, I even prefer
+an ambulance with a bell on it. It's more soothing.
+
+
+
+
+The New Food
+
+I see from the current columns of the daily press that
+"Professor Plumb, of the University of Chicago, has just
+invented a highly concentrated form of food. All the
+essential nutritive elements are put together in the form
+of pellets, each of which contains from one to two hundred
+times as much nourishment as an ounce of an ordinary
+article of diet. These pellets, diluted with water, will
+form all that is necessary to support life. The professor
+looks forward confidently to revolutionizing the present
+food system."
+
+Now this kind of thing may be all very well in its way,
+but it is going to have its drawbacks as well. In the
+bright future anticipated by Professor Plumb, we can
+easily imagine such incidents as the following:
+
+The smiling family were gathered round the hospitable
+board. The table was plenteously laid with a soup-plate
+in front of each beaming child, a bucket of hot water
+before the radiant mother, and at the head of the board
+the Christmas dinner of the happy home, warmly covered
+by a thimble and resting on a poker chip. The expectant
+whispers of the little ones were hushed as the father,
+rising from his chair, lifted the thimble and disclosed
+a small pill of concentrated nourishment on the chip
+before him. Christmas turkey, cranberry sauce, plum
+pudding, mince pie--it was all there, all jammed into
+that little pill and only waiting to expand. Then the
+father with deep reverence, and a devout eye alternating
+between the pill and heaven, lifted his voice in a
+benediction.
+
+At this moment there was an agonized cry from the mother.
+
+"Oh, Henry, quick! Baby has snatched the pill!" It was
+too true. Dear little Gustavus Adolphus, the golden-haired
+baby boy, had grabbed the whole Christmas dinner off the
+poker chip and bolted it. Three hundred and fifty pounds
+of concentrated nourishment passed down the oesophagus
+of the unthinking child.
+
+"Clap him on the back!" cried the distracted mother.
+"Give him water!"
+
+The idea was fatal. The water striking the pill caused
+it to expand. There was a dull rumbling sound and then,
+with an awful bang, Gustavus Adolphus exploded into
+fragments!
+
+And when they gathered the little corpse together, the
+baby lips were parted in a lingering smile that could
+only be worn by a child who had eaten thirteen Christmas
+dinners.
+
+
+
+
+A New Pathology
+
+It has long been vaguely understood that the condition
+of a man's clothes has a certain effect upon the health
+of both body and mind. The well-known proverb, "Clothes
+make the man" has its origin in a general recognition of
+the powerful influence of the habiliments in their reaction
+upon the wearer. The same truth may be observed in the
+facts of everyday life. On the one hand we remark the
+bold carriage and mental vigour of a man attired in a
+new suit of clothes; on the other hand we note the
+melancholy features of him who is conscious of a posterior
+patch, or the haunted face of one suffering from internal
+loss of buttons. But while common observation thus gives
+us a certain familiarity with a few leading facts regarding
+the ailments and influence of clothes, no attempt has as
+yet been made to reduce our knowledge to a systematic
+form. At the same time the writer feels that a valuable
+addition might be made to the science of medicine in this
+direction. The numerous diseases which are caused by this
+fatal influence should receive a scientific analysis,
+and their treatment be included among the principles of
+the healing art. The diseases of the clothes may roughly
+be divided into medical cases and surgical cases, while
+these again fall into classes according to the particular
+garment through which the sufferer is attacked.
+
+   MEDICAL CASES
+
+Probably no article of apparel is so liable to a diseased
+condition as the trousers. It may be well, therefore, to
+treat first those maladies to which they are subject.
+
+I. Contractio Pantalunae, or Shortening of the Legs of
+the Trousers, an extremely painful malady most frequently
+found in the growing youth. The first symptom is the
+appearance of a yawning space (lacuna) above the boots,
+accompanied by an acute sense of humiliation and a morbid
+anticipation of mockery. The application of treacle to
+the boots, although commonly recommended, may rightly be
+condemned as too drastic a remedy. The use of boots
+reaching to the knee, to be removed only at night, will
+afford immediate relief. In connection with Contractio
+is often found--
+
+II. Inflatio Genu, or Bagging of the Knees of the Trousers,
+a disease whose symptoms are similar to those above. The
+patient shows an aversion to the standing posture, and,
+in acute cases, if the patient be compelled to stand,
+the head is bent and the eye fixed with painful rigidity
+upon the projecting blade formed at the knee of the
+trousers.
+
+In both of the above diseases anything that can be done
+to free the mind of the patient from a morbid sense of
+his infirmity will do much to improve the general tone
+of the system.
+
+III. Oases, or Patches, are liable to break out anywhere
+on the trousers, and range in degree of gravity from
+those of a trifling nature to those of a fatal character.
+The most distressing cases are those where the patch
+assumes a different colour from that of the trousers
+(dissimilitas coloris). In this instance the mind of the
+patient is found to be in a sadly aberrated condition.
+A speedy improvement may, however, be effected by cheerful
+society, books, flowers, and, above all, by a complete
+change.
+
+IV. The overcoat is attacked by no serious disorders,
+except--
+
+Phosphorescentia, or Glistening, a malady which indeed
+may often be observed to affect the whole system. It is
+caused by decay of tissue from old age and is generally
+aggravated by repeated brushing. A peculiar feature of
+the complaint is the lack of veracity on the part of the
+patient in reference to the cause of his uneasiness.
+Another invariable symptom is his aversion to outdoor
+exercise; under various pretexts, which it is the duty
+of his medical adviser firmly to combat, he will avoid
+even a gentle walk in the streets.
+
+V. Of the waistcoat science recognizes but one disease--
+
+Porriggia, an affliction caused by repeated spilling of
+porridge. It is generally harmless, chiefly owing to the
+mental indifference of the patient. It can be successfully
+treated by repeated fomentations of benzine.
+
+VI. Mortificatio Tilis, or Greenness of the Hat, is a
+disease often found in connection with Phosphorescentia
+(mentioned above), and characterized by the same aversion
+to outdoor life.
+
+VII. Sterilitas, or Loss of Fur, is another disease of
+the hat, especially prevalent in winter. It is not
+accurately known whether this is caused by a falling out
+of the fur or by a cessation of growth. In all diseases
+of the hat the mind of the patient is greatly depressed
+and his countenance stamped with the deepest gloom. He
+is particularly sensitive in regard to questions as to
+the previous history of the hat.
+
+Want of space precludes the mention of minor diseases,
+such as--
+
+VIII. Odditus Soccorum, or oddness of the socks, a thing
+in itself trifling, but of an alarming nature if met in
+combination with Contractio Pantalunae. Cases are found
+where the patient, possibly on the public platform or at
+a social gathering, is seized with a consciousness of
+the malady so suddenly as to render medical assistance
+futile.
+
+   SURGICAL CASES
+
+It is impossible to mention more than a few of the most
+typical cases of diseases of this sort.
+
+I. Explosio, or Loss of Buttons, is the commonest malady
+demanding surgical treatment. It consists of a succession
+of minor fractures, possibly internal, which at first
+excite no alarm. A vague sense of uneasiness is presently
+felt, which often leads the patient to seek relief in
+the string habit--a habit which, if unduly indulged in,
+may assume the proportions of a ruling passion. The use
+of sealing-wax, while admirable as a temporary remedy
+for Explosio, should never be allowed to gain a permanent
+hold upon the system. There is no doubt that a persistent
+indulgence in the string habit, or the constant use of
+sealing-wax, will result in--
+
+II. Fractura Suspendorum, or Snapping of the Braces,
+which amounts to a general collapse of the system. The
+patient is usually seized with a severe attack of explosio,
+followed by a sudden sinking feeling and sense of loss.
+A sound constitution may rally from the shock, but a
+system undermined by the string habit invariably succumbs.
+
+III. Sectura Pantalunae, or Ripping of the Trousers, is
+generally caused by sitting upon warm beeswax or leaning
+against a hook. In the case of the very young it is not
+unfrequently accompanied by a distressing suppuration of
+the shirt. This, however, is not remarked in adults. The
+malady is rather mental than bodily, the mind of the
+patient being racked by a keen sense of indignity and a
+feeling of unworthiness. The only treatment is immediate
+isolation, with a careful stitching of the affected part.
+
+In conclusion, it may be stated that at the first symptom
+of disease the patient should not hesitate to put himself
+in the hands of a professional tailor. In so brief a
+compass as the present article the discussion has of
+necessity been rather suggestive than exhaustive. Much
+yet remains to be done, and the subject opens wide to
+the inquiring eye. The writer will, however, feel amply
+satisfied if this brief outline may help to direct the
+attention of medical men to what is yet an unexplored
+field.
+
+
+
+
+The Poet Answered
+
+Dear sir:
+
+In answer to your repeated questions and requests which
+have appeared for some years past in the columns of the
+rural press, I beg to submit the following solutions of
+your chief difficulties:--
+
+Topic I.--You frequently ask, where are the friends of
+your childhood, and urge that they shall be brought back
+to you. As far as I am able to learn, those of your
+friends who are not in jail are still right there in your
+native village. You point out that they were wont to
+share your gambols. If so, you are certainly entitled to
+have theirs now.
+
+Topic II.--You have taken occasion to say:
+
+   "Give me not silk, nor rich attire,
+    Nor gold, nor jewels rare."
+
+But, my dear fellow, this is preposterous. Why, these
+are the very things I had bought for you. If you won't
+take any of these, I shall have to give you factory cotton
+and cordwood.
+
+Topic III.--You also ask, "How fares my love across the
+sea?" Intermediate, I presume. She would hardly travel
+steerage.
+
+Topic IV.--"Why was I born? Why should I breathe?" Here
+I quite agree with you. I don't think you ought to breathe.
+
+Topic V.--You demand that I shall show you the man whose
+soul is dead and then mark him. I am awfully sorry; the
+man was around here all day yesterday, and if I had only
+known I could easily have marked him so that we could
+pick him out again.
+
+Topic VI.--I notice that you frequently say, "Oh, for
+the sky of your native land." Oh, for it, by all means,
+if you wish. But remember that you already owe for a
+great deal.
+
+Topic VII.--On more than one occasion you wish to be
+informed, "What boots it, that you idly dream?" Nothing
+boots it at present--a fact, sir, which ought to afford
+you the highest gratification.
+
+
+
+
+The Force of Statistics
+
+They were sitting on a seat of the car, immediately in
+front of me. I was consequently able to hear all that
+they were saying. They were evidently strangers who had
+dropped into a conversation. They both had the air of
+men who considered themselves profoundly interesting as
+minds. It was plain that each laboured under the impression
+that he was a ripe thinker.
+
+One had just been reading a book which lay in his lap.
+
+"I've been reading some very interesting statistics," he
+was saying to the other thinker.
+
+"Ah, statistics" said the other; "wonderful things, sir,
+statistics; very fond of them myself."
+
+"I find, for instance," the first man went on, "that a
+drop of water is filled with little...with little...I
+forget just what you call them...little--er--things,
+every cubic inch containing--er--containing...let me
+see..."
+
+"Say a million," said the other thinker, encouragingly.
+
+"Yes, a million, or possibly a billion...but at any
+rate, ever so many of them."
+
+"Is it possible?" said the other. "But really, you know
+there are wonderful things in the world. Now, coal...take
+coal..."
+
+"Very, good," said his friend, "let us take coal," settling
+back in his seat with the air of an intellect about to
+feed itself.
+
+"Do you know that every ton of coal burnt in an engine
+will drag a train of cars as long as...I forget the
+exact length, but say a train of cars of such and such
+a length, and weighing, say so much...from...from...hum!
+for the moment the exact distance escapes me...drag it
+from..."
+
+"From here to the moon," suggested the other.
+
+"Ah, very likely; yes, from here to the moon. Wonderful,
+isn't it?"
+
+"But the most stupendous calculation of all, sir, is in
+regard to the distance from the earth to the sun.
+Positively, sir, a cannon-ball--er--fired at the sun..."
+
+"Fired at the sun," nodded the other, approvingly, as if
+he had often seen it done.
+
+"And travelling at the rate of...of..."
+
+"Of three cents a mile," hinted the listener.
+
+"No, no, you misunderstand me,--but travelling at a fearful
+rate, simply fearful, sir, would take a hundred million--no,
+a hundred billion--in short would take a scandalously long
+time in getting there--"
+
+At this point I could stand no more. I interrupted--"Provided
+it were fired from Philadelphia," I said, and passed into the
+smoking-car.
+
+
+
+
+Men Who have Shaved Me
+
+A barber is by nature and inclination a sport. He can
+tell you at what exact hour the ball game of the day is
+to begin, can foretell its issue without losing a stroke
+of the razor, and can explain the points of inferiority
+of all the players, as compared with better men that he
+has personally seen elsewhere, with the nicety of a
+professional. He can do all this, and then stuff the
+customer's mouth with a soap-brush, and leave him while
+he goes to the other end of the shop to make a side bet
+with one of the other barbers on the outcome of the Autumn
+Handicap. In the barber-shops they knew the result of
+the Jeffries-Johnson prize-fight long before it happened.
+It is on information of this kind that they make their
+living. The performance of shaving is only incidental to
+it. Their real vocation in life is imparting information.
+To the barber the outside world is made up of customers,
+who are to be thrown into chairs, strapped, manacled,
+gagged with soap, and then given such necessary information
+on the athletic events of the moment as will carry them
+through the business hours of the day without open
+disgrace.
+
+As soon as the barber has properly filled up the customer
+with information of this sort, he rapidly removes his
+whiskers as a sign that the man is now fit to talk to,
+and lets him out of the chair.
+
+The public has grown to understand the situation. Every
+reasonable business man is willing to sit and wait half
+an hour for a shave which he could give himself in three
+minutes, because he knows that if he goes down town
+without understanding exactly why Chicago lost two games
+straight he will appear an ignoramus.
+
+At times, of course, the barber prefers to test his
+customer with a question or two. He gets him pinned in
+the chair, with his head well back, covers the customer's
+face with soap, and then planting his knee on his chest
+and holding his hand firmly across the customer's mouth,
+to prevent all utterance and to force him to swallow the
+soap, he asks: "Well, what did you think of the Detroit-St.
+Louis game yesterday?" This is not really meant for a
+question at all. It is only equivalent to saying: "Now,
+you poor fool, I'll bet you don't know anything about
+the great events of your country at all." There is a
+gurgle in the customer's throat as if he were trying to
+answer, and his eyes are seen to move sideways, but the
+barber merely thrusts the soap-brush into each eye, and
+if any motion still persists, he breathes gin and peppermint
+over the face, till all sign of life is extinct. Then he
+talks the game over in detail with the barber at the next
+chair, each leaning across an inanimate thing extended
+under steaming towels that was once a man.
+
+To know all these things barbers have to be highly
+educated. It is true that some of the greatest barbers
+that have ever lived have begun as uneducated, illiterate
+men, and by sheer energy and indomitable industry have
+forced their way to the front. But these are exceptions.
+To succeed nowadays it is practically necessary to be a
+college graduate. As the courses at Harvard and Yale have
+been found too superficial, there are now established
+regular Barbers' Colleges, where a bright young man can
+learn as much in three weeks as he would be likely to
+know after three years at Harvard. The courses at these
+colleges cover such things as: (1) Physiology, including
+Hair and its Destruction, The Origin and Growth of
+Whiskers, Soap in its Relation to Eyesight; (2) Chemistry,
+including lectures on Florida Water; and How to Make it
+out of Sardine Oil; (3) Practical Anatomy, including The
+Scalp and How to Lift it, The Ears and How to Remove
+them, and, as the Major Course for advanced students,
+The Veins of the Face and how to open and close them at
+will by the use of alum.
+
+The education of the customer is, as I have said, the
+chief part of the barber's vocation. But it must be
+remembered that the incidental function of removing his
+whiskers in order to mark him as a well-informed man is
+also of importance, and demands long practice and great
+natural aptitude. In the barbers' shops of modern cities
+shaving has been brought to a high degree of perfection.
+A good barber is not content to remove the whiskers of
+his client directly and immediately. He prefers to cook
+him first. He does this by immersing the head in hot
+water and covering the victim's face with steaming towels
+until he has him boiled to a nice pink. From time to time
+the barber removes the towels and looks at the face to
+see if it is yet boiled pink enough for his satisfaction.
+If it is not, he replaces the towels again and jams them
+down firmly with his hand until the cooking is finished.
+The final result, however, amply justifies this trouble,
+and the well-boiled customer only needs the addition of
+a few vegetables on the side to present an extremely
+appetizing appearance.
+
+During the process of the shave, it is customary for the
+barber to apply the particular kind of mental torture
+known as the third degree. This is done by terrorizing
+the patient as to the very evident and proximate loss
+of all his hair and whiskers, which the barber is enabled
+by his experience to foretell. "Your hair," he says, very
+sadly and sympathetically, "is all falling out. Better
+let me give you a shampoo?" "No." "Let me singe your hair
+to close up the follicles?" "No." "Let me plug up the
+ends of your hair with sealing-wax, it's the only thing
+that will save it for you?" "No." "Let me rub an egg
+on your scalp?" "No." "Let me squirt a lemon on your
+eyebrows?" "No."
+
+The barber sees that he is dealing with a man of
+determination, and he warms to his task. He bends low
+and whispers into the prostrate ear: "You've got a good
+many grey hairs coming in; better let me give you an
+application of Hairocene, only cost you half a dollar?"
+"No." "Your face," he whispers again, with a soft,
+caressing voice, "is all covered with wrinkles; better
+let me rub some of this Rejuvenator into the face."
+
+This process is continued until one of two things happens.
+Either the customer is obdurate, and staggers to his feet
+at last and gropes his way out of the shop with the
+knowledge that he is a wrinkled, prematurely senile man,
+whose wicked life is stamped upon his face, and whose
+unstopped hair-ends and failing follicles menace him with
+the certainty of complete baldness within twenty-four
+hours--or else, as in nearly all instances, he succumbs.
+In the latter case, immediately on his saying "yes" there
+is a shout of exultation from the barber, a roar of
+steaming water, and within a moment two barbers have
+grabbed him by the feet and thrown him under the tap,
+and, in spite of his struggles, are giving him the
+Hydro-magnetic treatment. When he emerges from their
+hands, he steps out of the shop looking as if he had been
+varnished.
+
+But even the application of the Hydro-magnetic and the
+Rejuvenator do not by any means exhaust the resources of
+the up-to-date barber. He prefers to perform on the
+customer a whole variety of subsidiary services not
+directly connected with shaving, but carried on during
+the process of the shave.
+
+In a good, up-to-date shop, while one man is shaving the
+customer, others black his boots; brush his clothes, darn
+his socks, point his nails, enamel his teeth, polish his
+eyes, and alter the shape of any of his joints which they
+think unsightly. During this operation they often stand
+seven or eight deep round a customer, fighting for a
+chance to get at him.
+
+All of these remarks apply to barber-shops in the city, and
+not to country places. In the country there is only one barber
+and one customer at a time. The thing assumes the aspect of
+a straight-out, rough-and-tumble, catch-as-catch-can fight,
+with a few spectators sitting round the shop to see fair play.
+In the city they can shave a man without removing any of his
+clothes. But in the country, where the customer insists on
+getting the full value for his money, they remove the collar
+and necktie, the coat and the waistcoat, and, for a really
+good shave and hair-cut, the customer is stripped to the
+waist. The barber can then take a rush at him from the other
+side of the room, and drive the clippers up the full length of
+the spine, so as to come at the heavier hair on the back of
+the head with the impact of a lawn-mower driven into long grass.
+
+
+
+
+Getting the Thread of It
+
+Have you ever had a man try to explain to you what happened
+in a book as far as he has read? It is a most instructive
+thing. Sinclair, the man who shares my rooms with me,
+made such an attempt the other night. I had come in cold
+and tired from a walk and found him full of excitement,
+with a bulky magazine in one hand and a paper-cutter
+gripped in the other.
+
+"Say, here's a grand story," he burst out as soon as I
+came in; "it's great! most fascinating thing I ever read.
+Wait till I read you some of it. I'll just tell you what
+has happened up to where I am--you'll easily catch the
+thread of it--and then we'll finish it together."
+
+I wasn't feeling in a very responsive mood, but I saw no
+way to stop him, so I merely said, "All right, throw me
+your thread, I'll catch it."
+
+"Well," Sinclair began with great animation, "this count
+gets this letter..."
+
+"Hold on," I interrupted, "what count gets what letter?"
+
+"Oh, the count it's about, you know. He gets this letter
+from this Porphirio."
+
+"From which Porphirio?"
+
+"Why, Porphirio sent the letter, don't you see, he sent
+it," Sinclair exclaimed a little impatiently--"sent it
+through Demonio and told him to watch for him with him,
+and kill him when he got him."
+
+"Oh, see here!" I broke in, "who is to meet who, and who
+is to get stabbed?"
+
+"They're going to stab Demonio."
+
+"And who brought the letter?"
+
+"Demonio."
+
+"Well, now, Demonio must be a clam! What did he bring it
+for?"
+
+"Oh, but he don't know what's in it, that's just the slick
+part of it," and Sinclair began to snigger to himself at
+the thought of it. "You see, this Carlo Carlotti the
+Condottiere..."
+
+"Stop right there," I said. "What's a Condottiere?"
+
+"It's a sort of brigand. He, you understand, was in league
+with this Fra Fraliccolo..."
+
+A suspicion flashed across my mind. "Look here," I said
+firmly, "if the scene of this story is laid in the
+Highlands, I refuse to listen to it. Call it off."
+
+"No, no," Sinclair answered quickly, "that's all right.
+It's laid in Italy...time of Pius the something. He
+comes in--say, but he's great! so darned crafty. It's
+him, you know, that persuades this Franciscan..."
+
+"Pause," I said, "what Franciscan?"
+
+"Fra Fraliccolo, of course," Sinclair said snappishly.
+"You see, Pio tries to..."
+
+"Whoa!" I said, "who is Pio?"
+
+"Oh, hang it all, Pio is Italian, it's short for Pius.
+He tries to get Fra Fraliccolo and Carlo Carlotti the
+Condottiere to steal the document from...let me see;
+what was he called?...Oh, yes...from the Dog of Venice,
+so that...or...no, hang it, you put me out, that's all
+wrong. It's the other way round. Pio wasn't clever at
+all; he's a regular darned fool. It's the Dog that's
+crafty. By Jove, he's fine," Sinclair went on; warming
+up to enthusiasm again, "he just does anything he wants.
+He makes this Demonio (Demonio is one of those hirelings,
+you know, he's the tool of the Dog)...makes him steal
+the document off Porphirio, and..."
+
+"But how does he get him to do that?" I asked.
+
+"Oh, the Dog has Demonio pretty well under his thumb, so
+he makes Demonio scheme round till he gets old Pio--er--gets
+him under his thumb, and then, of course, Pio thinks that
+Porphirio--I mean he thinks that he has Porphirio--er--has
+him under his thumb."
+
+"Half a minute, Sinclair," I said, "who did you say was
+under the Dog's thumb?"
+
+"Demonio."
+
+"Thanks. I was mixed in the thumbs. Go on."
+
+"Well, just when things are like this..."
+
+"Like what?"
+
+"Like I said."
+
+"All right."
+
+"Who should turn up and thwart the whole scheme, but this
+Signorina Tarara in her domino..."
+
+"Hully Gee!" I said, "you make my head ache. What the
+deuce does she come in her domino for?"
+
+"Why, to thwart it."
+
+"To thwart what?"
+
+"Thwart the whole darned thing," Sinclair exclaimed
+emphatically.
+
+"But can't she thwart it without her domino?"
+
+"I should think not! You see, if it hadn't been for the
+domino, the Dog would have spotted her quick as a wink.
+Only when he sees her in the domino with this rose in
+her hair, he thinks she must be Lucia dell' Esterolla."
+
+"Say, he fools himself, doesn't he? Who's this last girl?"
+
+"Lucia? Oh, she's great!" Sinclair said. "She's one of
+those Southern natures, you know, full of--er--full of..."
+
+"Full of fun," I suggested.
+
+"Oh, hang it all, don't make fun of it! Well, anyhow,
+she's sister, you understand, to the Contessa Carantarata,
+and that's why Fra Fraliccolo, or...hold on, that's not
+it, no, no, she's not sister to anybody. She's cousin,
+that's it; or, anyway, she thinks she is cousin to Fra
+Fraliccolo himself, and that's why Pio tries to stab Fra
+Fraliccolo."
+
+"Oh, yes," I assented, "naturally he would."
+
+"Ah," Sinclair said hopefully, getting his paper-cutter
+ready to cut the next pages, "you begin to get the thread
+now, don't you?"
+
+"Oh, fine!" I said. "The people in it are the Dog and
+Pio, and Carlo Carlotti the Condottiere, and those others
+that we spoke of."
+
+"That's right," Sinclair said. "Of course, there are more
+still that I can tell you about if..."
+
+"Oh, never mind," I said, "I'll work along with those,
+they're a pretty representative crowd. Then Porphirio is
+under Pio's thumb, and Pio is under Demonio's thumb, and
+the Dog is crafty, and Lucia is full of something all
+the time. Oh, I've got a mighty clear idea of it," I
+concluded bitterly.
+
+"Oh, you've got it," Sinclair said, "I knew you'd like
+it. Now we'll go on. I'll just finish to the bottom of
+my page and then I'll go on aloud."
+
+He ran his eyes rapidly over the lines till he came to
+the bottom of the page, then he cut the leaves and turned
+over. I saw his eye rest on the half-dozen lines that
+confronted him on the next page with an expression of
+utter consternation.
+
+"Well, I will be cursed!" he said at length.
+
+"What's the matter?" I said gently, with a great joy at
+my heart.
+
+"This infernal thing's a serial," he gasped, as he pointed
+at the words, "To be continued," "and that's all there
+is in this number."
+
+
+
+
+Telling His Faults
+
+"Oh, do, Mr. Sapling," said the beautiful girl at the
+summer hotel, "do let me read the palm of your hand! I
+can tell you all your faults."
+
+Mr. Sapling gave an inarticulate gurgle and a roseate
+flush swept over his countenance as he surrendered his
+palm to the grasp of the fair enchantress.
+
+"Oh, you're just full of faults, just full of them, Mr.
+Sapling!" she cried.
+
+Mr. Sapling looked it.
+
+"To begin with," said the beautiful girl, slowly and
+reflectingly, "you are dreadfully cynical: you hardly
+believe in anything at all, and you've utterly no faith
+in us poor women."
+
+The feeble smile that had hitherto kindled the features
+of Mr. Sapling into a ray of chastened imbecility, was
+distorted in an effort at cynicism.
+
+"Then your next fault is that you are too determined;
+much too determined. When once you have set your will on
+any object, you crush every obstacle under your feet."
+
+Mr. Sapling looked meekly down at his tennis shoes, but
+began to feel calmer, more lifted up. Perhaps he had been
+all these things without knowing it.
+
+"Then you are cold and sarcastic."
+
+Mr. Sapling attempted to look cold and sarcastic. He
+succeeded in a rude leer.
+
+"And you're horribly world-weary, you care for nothing.
+You have drained philosophy to the dregs, and scoff at
+everything."
+
+Mr. Sapling's inner feeling was that from now on he would
+simply scoff and scoff and scoff.
+
+"Your only redeeming quality is that you are generous.
+You have tried to kill even this, but cannot. Yes,"
+concluded the beautiful girl, "those are your faults,
+generous still, but cold, cynical, and relentless. Good
+night, Mr. Sapling."
+
+And resisting all entreaties the beautiful girl passed
+from the verandah of the hotel and vanished.
+
+And when later in the evening the brother of the beautiful
+girl borrowed Mr. Sapling's tennis racket, and his bicycle
+for a fortnight, and the father of the beautiful girl
+got Sapling to endorse his note for a couple of hundreds,
+and her uncle Zephas borrowed his bedroom candle and used
+his razor to cut up a plug of tobacco, Mr. Sapling felt
+proud to be acquainted with the family.
+
+
+
+
+Winter Pastimes
+
+It is in the depth of winter, when the intense cold
+renders it desirable to stay at home, that the really
+Pleasant Family is wont to serve invitations upon a few
+friends to spend a Quiet Evening.
+
+It is at these gatherings that that gay thing, the indoor
+winter game, becomes rampant. It is there that the old
+euchre deck and the staring domino become fair and
+beautiful things; that the rattle of the Loto counter
+rejoices the heart, that the old riddle feels the sap
+stirring in its limbs again, and the amusing spilikin
+completes the mental ruin of the jaded guest. Then does
+the Jolly Maiden Aunt propound the query: What is the
+difference between an elephant and a silk hat? Or declare
+that her first is a vowel, her second a preposition, and
+her third an archipelago. It is to crown such a quiet
+evening, and to give the finishing stroke to those of
+the visitors who have not escaped early, with a fierce
+purpose of getting at the saloons before they have time
+to close, that the indoor game or family reservoir of
+fun is dragged from its long sleep. It is spread out upon
+the table. Its paper of directions is unfolded. Its cards,
+its counters, its pointers and its markers are distributed
+around the table, and the visitor forces a look of reckless
+pleasure upon his face. Then the "few simple directions"
+are read aloud by the Jolly Aunt, instructing each
+player to challenge the player holding the golden letter
+corresponding to the digit next in order, to name a dead
+author beginning with X, failing which the player must
+declare himself in fault, and pay the forfeit of handing
+over to the Jolly Aunt his gold watch and all his money,
+or having a hot plate put down his neck.
+
+With a view to bringing some relief to the guests at
+entertainments of this kind, I have endeavoured to
+construct one or two little winter pastimes of a novel
+character. They are quite inexpensive, and as they need
+no background of higher arithmetic or ancient history,
+they are within reach of the humblest intellect. Here is
+one of them. It is called Indoor Football, or Football
+without a Ball.
+
+In this game any number of players, from fifteen to
+thirty, seat themselves in a heap on any one player,
+usually the player next to the dealer. They then challenge
+him to get up, while one player stands with a stop-watch
+in his hand and counts forty seconds. Should the first
+player fail to rise before forty seconds are counted,
+the player with the watch declares him suffocated. This
+is called a "Down" and counts one. The player who was
+the Down is then leant against the wall; his wind is
+supposed to be squeezed out. The player called the referee
+then blows a whistle and the players select another player
+and score a down off him. While the player is supposed
+to be down, all the rest must remain seated as before,
+and not rise from him until the referee by counting forty
+and blowing his whistle announces that in his opinion
+the other player is stifled. He is then leant against
+the wall beside the first player. When the whistle again
+blows the player nearest the referee strikes him behind
+the right ear. This is a "Touch," and counts two.
+
+It is impossible, of course, to give all the rules in
+detail. I might add, however, that while it counts TWO
+to strike the referee, to kick him counts THREE. To break
+his arm or leg counts FOUR, and to kill him outright is
+called GRAND SLAM and counts one game.
+
+Here is another little thing that I have worked out,
+which is superior to parlour games in that it combines
+their intense excitement with sound out-of-door exercise.
+
+It is easily comprehended, and can be played by any number
+of players, old and young. It requires no other apparatus
+than a trolley car of the ordinary type, a mile or two
+of track, and a few thousand volts of electricity. It is
+called:
+
+   The Suburban Trolley Car
+   A Holiday Game for Old and Young.
+
+The chief part in the game is taken by two players who
+station themselves one at each end of the car, and who
+adopt some distinctive costumes to indicate that they
+are "it." The other players occupy the body of the car,
+or take up their position at intervals along the track.
+
+The object of each player should be to enter the car as
+stealthily as possible in such a way as to escape the
+notice of the players in distinctive dress. Should he
+fail to do this he must pay the philopena or forfeit. Of
+these there are two: philopena No. 1, the payment of five
+cents, and philopena No. 2, being thrown off the car by
+the neck. Each player may elect which philopena he will
+pay. Any player who escapes paying the philopena scores
+one.
+
+The players who are in the car may elect to adopt a
+standing attitude, or to seat themselves, but no player
+may seat himself in the lap of another without the second
+player's consent. The object of those who elect to remain
+standing is to place their feet upon the toes of those
+who sit; when they do this they score. The object of
+those who elect to sit is to elude the feet of the standing
+players. Much merriment is thus occasioned.
+
+The player in distinctive costume at the front of the
+car controls a crank, by means of which he is enabled to
+bring the car to a sudden stop, or to cause it to plunge
+violently forward. His aim in so doing is to cause all
+the standing players to fall over backward. Every time
+he does this he scores. For this purpose he is generally
+in collusion with the other player in distinctive costume,
+whose business it is to let him know by a series of bells
+and signals when the players are not looking, and can be
+easily thrown down. A sharp fall of this sort gives rise
+to no end of banter and good-natured drollery, directed
+against the two players who are "it."
+
+Should a player who is thus thrown backward save himself
+from falling by sitting down in the lap of a female
+player, he scores one. Any player who scores in this
+manner is entitled to remain seated while he may count
+six, after which he must remove himself or pay philopena
+No. 2.
+
+Should the player who controls the crank perceive a player
+upon the street desirous of joining in the game by entering
+the car, his object should be: primo, to run over him
+and kill him; secundo, to kill him by any other means in
+his power; tertio, to let him into the car, but to exact
+the usual philopena.
+
+Should a player, in thus attempting to get on the car
+from without, become entangled in the machinery, the
+player controlling the crank shouts "huff!" and the car
+is supposed to pass over him. All within the car score
+one.
+
+A fine spice of the ludicrous may be added to the game
+by each player pretending that he has a destination or
+stopping-place, where he would wish to alight. It now
+becomes the aim of the two players who are "it" to carry
+him past his point. A player who is thus carried beyond
+his imaginary stopping-place must feign a violent passion,
+and imitate angry gesticulations. He may, in addition,
+feign a great age or a painful infirmity, which will be
+found to occasion the most convulsive fun for the other
+players in the game.
+
+These are the main outlines of this most amusing pastime.
+Many other agreeable features may, of course, be readily
+introduced by persons of humour and imagination.
+
+
+
+
+Number Fifty-Six
+
+What I narrate was told me one winter's evening by my
+friend Ah-Yen in the little room behind his laundry.
+Ah-Yen is a quiet little celestial with a grave and
+thoughtful face, and that melancholy contemplative
+disposition so often noticed in his countrymen. Between
+myself and Ah-Yen there exists a friendship of some years'
+standing, and we spend many a long evening in the dimly
+lighted room behind his shop, smoking a dreamy pipe
+together and plunged in silent meditation. I am chiefly
+attracted to my friend by the highly imaginative cast of
+his mind, which is, I believe, a trait of the Eastern
+character and which enables him to forget to a great
+extent the sordid cares of his calling in an inner life
+of his own creation. Of the keen, analytical side of his
+mind, I was in entire ignorance until the evening of
+which I write.
+
+The room where we sat was small and dingy, with but little
+furniture except our chairs and the little table at which
+we filled and arranged our pipes, and was lighted only
+by a tallow candle. There were a few pictures on the
+walls, for the most part rude prints cut from the columns
+of the daily press and pasted up to hide the bareness of
+the room. Only one picture was in any way noticeable, a
+portrait admirably executed in pen and ink. The face was
+that of a young man, a very beautiful face, but one of
+infinite sadness. I had long been aware, although I know
+not how, that Ah-Yen had met with a great sorrow, and
+had in some way connected the fact with this portrait.
+I had always refrained, however, from asking him about
+it, and it was not until the evening in question that I
+knew its history.
+
+We had been smoking in silence for some time when Ah-Yen
+spoke. My friend is a man of culture and wide reading,
+and his English is consequently perfect in its construction;
+his speech is, of course, marked by the lingering liquid
+accent of his country which I will not attempt to
+reproduce.
+
+"I see," he said, "that you have been examining the
+portrait of my unhappy friend, Fifty-Six. I have never
+yet told you of my bereavement, but as to-night is the
+anniversary of his death, I would fain speak of him for
+a while."
+
+Ah-Yen paused; I lighted my pipe afresh, and nodded to
+him to show that I was listening.
+
+"I do not know," he went on, "at what precise time
+Fifty-Six came into my life. I could indeed find it out
+by examining my books, but I have never troubled to do
+so. Naturally I took no more interest in him at first
+than in any other of my customers--less, perhaps, since
+he never in the course of our connection brought his
+clothes to me himself but always sent them by a boy. When
+I presently perceived that he was becoming one of my
+regular customers, I allotted to him his number, Fifty-Six,
+and began to speculate as to who and what he was. Before
+long I had reached several conclusions in regard to my
+unknown client. The quality of his linen showed me that,
+if not rich, he was at any rate fairly well off. I could
+see that he was a young man of regular Christian life,
+who went out into society to a certain extent; this I
+could tell from his sending the same number of articles
+to the laundry, from his washing always coming on Saturday
+night, and from the fact that he wore a dress shirt about
+once a week. In disposition he was a modest, unassuming
+fellow, for his collars were only two inches high."
+
+I stared at Ah-Yen in some amazement, the recent
+publications of a favourite novelist had rendered me
+familiar with this process of analytical reasoning, but
+I was prepared for no such revelations from my Eastern
+friend.
+
+"When I first knew him," Ah-Yen went on, "Fifty-Six was
+a student at the university. This, of course, I did not
+know for some time. I inferred it, however, in the course
+of time, from his absence from town during the four summer
+months, and from the fact that during the time of the
+university examinations the cuffs of his shirts came to
+me covered with dates, formulas, and propositions in
+geometry. I followed him with no little interest through
+his university career. During the four years which it
+lasted, I washed for him every week; my regular connection
+with him and the insight which my observation gave me
+into the lovable character of the man, deepened my first
+esteem into a profound affection and I became most anxious
+for his success. I helped him at each succeeding
+examination, as far as lay in my power, by starching his
+shirts half-way to the elbow, so as to leave him as much
+room as possible for annotations. My anxiety during the
+strain of his final examination I will not attempt to
+describe. That Fifty-Six was undergoing the great crisis
+of his academic career, I could infer from the state of
+his handkerchiefs which, in apparent unconsciousness, he
+used as pen-wipers during the final test. His conduct
+throughout the examination bore witness to the moral
+development which had taken place in his character during
+his career as an undergraduate; for the notes upon his
+cuffs which had been so copious at his earlier examinations
+were limited now to a few hints, and these upon topics
+so intricate as to defy an ordinary memory. It was with
+a thrill of joy that I at last received in his laundry
+bundle one Saturday early in June, a ruffled dress shirt,
+the bosom of which was thickly spattered with the spillings
+of the wine-cup, and realized that Fifty-Six had banqueted
+as a Bachelor of Arts.
+
+"In the following winter the habit of wiping his pen upon
+his handkerchief, which I had remarked during his final
+examination, became chronic with him, and I knew that he
+had entered upon the study of law. He worked hard during
+that year, and dress shirts almost disappeared from his
+weekly bundle. It was in the following winter, the second
+year of his legal studies, that the tragedy of his life
+began. I became aware that a change had come over his
+laundry; from one, or at most two a week, his dress shirts
+rose to four, and silk handkerchiefs began to replace
+his linen ones. It dawned upon me that Fifty-Six was
+abandoning the rigorous tenor of his student life and
+was going into society. I presently perceived something
+more; Fifty-Six was in love. It was soon impossible to
+doubt it. He was wearing seven shirts a week; linen
+handkerchiefs disappeared from his laundry; his collars
+rose from two inches to two and a quarter, and finally
+to two and a half. I have in my possession one of his
+laundry lists of that period; a glance at it will show
+the scrupulous care which he bestowed upon his person.
+Well do I remember the dawning hopes of those days,
+alternating with the gloomiest despair. Each Saturday I
+opened his bundle with a trembling eagerness to catch
+the first signs of a return of his love. I helped my
+friend in every way that I could. His shirts and collars
+were masterpieces of my art, though my hand often shook
+with agitation as I applied the starch. She was a brave
+noble girl, that I knew; her influence was elevating the
+whole nature of Fifty-Six; until now he had had in his
+possession a certain number of detached cuffs and false
+shirt-fronts. These he discarded now,--at first the false
+shirt-fronts, scorning the very idea of fraud, and after
+a time, in his enthusiasm, abandoning even the cuffs. I
+cannot look back upon those bright happy days of courtship
+without a sigh.
+
+"The happiness of Fifty-Six seemed to enter into and fill
+my whole life. I lived but from Saturday to Saturday.
+The appearance of false shirt-fronts would cast me to
+the lowest depths of despair; their absence raised me to
+a pinnacle of hope. It was not till winter softened into
+spring that Fifty-Six nerved himself to learn his fate.
+One Saturday he sent me a new white waistcoat, a garment
+which had hitherto been shunned by his modest nature, to
+prepare for his use. I bestowed upon it all the resources
+of my art; I read his purpose in it. On the Saturday
+following it was returned to me and, with tears of joy,
+I marked where a warm little hand had rested fondly on
+the right shoulder, and knew that Fifty-Six was the
+accepted lover of his sweetheart."
+
+Ah-Yen paused and sat for some time silent; his pipe had
+sputtered out and lay cold in the hollow of his hand;
+his eye was fixed upon the wall where the light and
+shadows shifted in the dull flickering of the candle. At
+last he spoke again:
+
+"I will not dwell upon the happy days that ensued--days
+of gaudy summer neckties and white waistcoats, of spotless
+shirts and lofty collars worn but a single day by the
+fastidious lover. Our happiness seemed complete and I
+asked no more from fate. Alas! it was not destined to
+continue! When the bright days of summer were fading into
+autumn, I was grieved to notice an occasional quarrel--only
+four shirts instead of seven, or the reappearance of the
+abandoned cuffs and shirt-fronts. Reconciliations followed,
+with tears of penitence upon the shoulder of the white
+waistcoat, and the seven shirts came back. But the quarrels
+grew more frequent and there came at times stormy scenes
+of passionate emotion that left a track of broken buttons
+down the waistcoat. The shirts went slowly down to three,
+then fell to two, and the collars of my unhappy friend
+subsided to an inch and three-quarters. In vain I lavished
+my utmost care upon Fifty-Six. It seemed to my tortured
+mind that the gloss upon his shirts and collars would
+have melted a heart of stone. Alas! my every effort at
+reconciliation seemed to fail. An awful month passed;
+the false fronts and detached cuffs were all back again;
+the unhappy lover seemed to glory in their perfidy. At
+last, one gloomy evening, I found on opening his bundle
+that he had bought a stock of celluloids, and my heart
+told me that she had abandoned him for ever. Of what my
+poor friend suffered at this time, I can give you no
+idea; suffice it to say that he passed from celluloid to
+a blue flannel shirt and from blue to grey. The sight of
+a red cotton handkerchief in his wash at length warned
+me that his disappointed love had unhinged his mind, and
+I feared the worst. Then came an agonizing interval of
+three weeks during which he sent me nothing, and after
+that came the last parcel that I ever received from him
+an enormous bundle that seemed to contain all his effects.
+In this, to my horror, I discovered one shirt the breast
+of which was stained a deep crimson with his blood, and
+pierced by a ragged hole that showed where a bullet had
+singed through into his heart.
+
+"A fortnight before, I remembered having heard the street
+boys crying the news of an appalling suicide, and I know
+now that it must have been he. After the first shock of
+my grief had passed, I sought to keep him in my memory
+by drawing the portrait which hangs beside you. I have
+some skill in the art, and I feel assured that I have
+caught the expression of his face. The picture is, of
+course, an ideal one, for, as you know, I never saw
+Fifty-Six."
+
+The bell on the door of the outer shop tinkled at the
+entrance of a customer. Ah-Yen rose with that air of
+quiet resignation that habitually marked his demeanour,
+and remained for some time in the shop. When he returned
+he seemed in no mood to continue speaking of his lost
+friend. I left him soon after and walked sorrowfully home
+to my lodgings. On my way I mused much upon my little
+Eastern friend and the sympathetic grasp of his imagination.
+But a burden lay heavy on my heart--something I would
+fain have told him but which I could not bear to mention.
+I could not find it in my heart to shatter the airy castle
+of his fancy. For my life has been secluded and lonely
+and I have known no love like that of my ideal friend.
+Yet I have a haunting recollection of a certain huge
+bundle of washing that I sent to him about a year ago.
+I had been absent from town for three weeks and my laundry
+was much larger than usual in consequence. And if I
+mistake not there was in the bundle a tattered shirt that
+had been grievously stained by the breaking of a bottle
+of red ink in my portmanteau, and burnt in one place
+where an ash fell from my cigar as I made up the bundle.
+Of all this I cannot feel absolutely certain, yet I know
+at least that until a year ago, when I transferred my
+custom to a more modern establishment, my laundry number
+with Ah-Yen was Fifty-Six.
+
+
+
+
+Aristocratic Education
+
+House of Lords, Jan. 25, 1920.--The House of Lords
+commenced to-day in Committee the consideration of Clause
+No. 52,000 of the Education Bill, dealing with the teaching
+of Geometry in the schools.
+
+The Leader of the Government in presenting the clause
+urged upon their Lordships the need of conciliation. The
+Bill, he said, had now been before their Lordships for
+sixteen years. The Government had made every concession.
+They had accepted all the amendments of their Lordships
+on the opposite side in regard to the original provisions
+of the Bill. They had consented also to insert in the
+Bill a detailed programme of studies of which the present
+clause, enunciating the fifth proposition of Euclid, was
+a part. He would therefore ask their Lordships to accept
+the clause drafted as follows:
+
+"The angles at the base of an isosceles triangle are
+equal, and if the equal sides of the triangle are produced,
+the exterior angles will also be equal."
+
+He would hasten to add that the Government had no intention
+of producing the sides. Contingencies might arise to
+render such a course necessary, but in that case their
+Lordships would receive an early intimation of the fact.
+
+The Archbishop of Canterbury spoke against the clause.
+He considered it, in its present form, too secular. He
+should wish to amend the clause so as to make it read:
+
+"The angles at the base of an isosceles triangle are, in
+every Christian community, equal, and if the sides be
+produced by a member of a Christian congregation, the
+exterior angles will be equal."
+
+He was aware, he continued, that the angles at the base
+of an isosceles triangle are extremely equal, but he must
+remind the Government that the Church had been aware of
+this for several years past. He was willing also to admit
+that the opposite sides and ends of a parallelogram are
+equal, but he thought that such admission should be
+coupled with a distinct recognition of the existence of
+a Supreme Being.
+
+The Leader of the Government accepted His Grace's amendment
+with pleasure. He considered it the brightest amendment
+His Grace had made that week. The Government, he said,
+was aware of the intimate relation in which His Grace
+stood to the bottom end of a parallelogram and was prepared
+to respect it.
+
+Lord Halifax rose to offer a further amendment. He thought
+the present case was one in which the "four-fifths"
+clause ought to apply: he should wish it stated that the
+angles are equal for two days every week, except in the
+case of schools where four-fifths of the parents are
+conscientiously opposed to the use of the isosceles
+triangle.
+
+The Leader of the Government thought the amendment a
+singularly pleasing one. He accepted it and would like
+it understood that the words isosceles triangle were not
+meant in any offensive sense.
+
+Lord Rosebery spoke at some length. He considered the
+clause unfair to Scotland, where the high state of morality
+rendered education unnecessary. Unless an amendment in
+this sense was accepted, it might be necessary to reconsider
+the Act of Union of 1707.
+
+The Leader of the Government said that Lord Rosebery's
+amendment was the best he had heard yet. The Government
+accepted it at once. They were willing to make every
+concession. They would, if need be, reconsider the Norman
+Conquest.
+
+The Duke of Devonshire took exception to the part of the
+clause relating to the production of the sides. He did
+not think the country was prepared for it. It was unfair
+to the producer. He would like the clause altered to
+read, "if the sides be produced in the home market."
+
+The Leader of the Government accepted with pleasure His
+Grace's amendment. He considered it quite sensible. He
+would now, as it was near the hour of rising, present
+the clause in its revised form. He hoped, however, that
+their Lordships would find time to think out some further
+amendments for the evening sitting.
+
+The clause was then read.
+
+His Grace of Canterbury then moved that the House, in
+all humility, adjourn for dinner.
+
+
+
+
+The Conjurer's Revenge
+
+"Now, ladies and gentlemen," said the conjurer, "having
+shown you that the cloth is absolutely empty, I will
+proceed to take from it a bowl of goldfish. Presto!"
+
+All around the hall people were saying, "Oh, how wonderful!
+How does he do it?"
+
+But the Quick Man on the front seat said in a big whisper
+to the people near him, "He-had-it-up-his-sleeve."
+
+Then the people nodded brightly at the Quick Man and
+said, "Oh, of course"; and everybody whispered round the
+hall, "He-had-it-up-his-sleeve."
+
+"My next trick," said the conjurer, "is the famous
+Hindostanee rings. You will notice that the rings are
+apparently separate; at a blow they all join (clang,
+clang, clang)--Presto!"
+
+There was a general buzz of stupefaction till the Quick
+Man was heard to whisper, "He-must-have-had-another-lot-
+up-his-sleeve."
+
+Again everybody nodded and whispered, "The-rings-were-
+up-his-sleeve."
+
+The brow of the conjurer was clouded with a gathering
+frown.
+
+"I will now," he continued, "show you a most amusing
+trick by which I am enabled to take any number of eggs
+from a hat. Will some gentleman kindly lend me his hat?
+Ah, thank you--Presto!"
+
+He extracted seventeen eggs, and for thirty-five seconds
+the audience began to think that he was wonderful. Then
+the Quick Man whispered along the front bench, "He-has-a-
+hen-up-his-sleeve," and all the people whispered it on.
+"He-has-a-lot-of-hens-up-his-sleeve."
+
+The egg trick was ruined.
+
+It went on like that all through. It transpired from the
+whispers of the Quick Man that the conjurer must have
+concealed up his sleeve, in addition to the rings, hens,
+and fish, several packs of cards, a loaf of bread, a
+doll's cradle, a live guinea-pig, a fifty-cent piece,
+and a rocking-chair.
+
+The reputation of the conjurer was rapidly sinking below
+zero. At the close of the evening he rallied for a final
+effort.
+
+"Ladies and gentlemen," he said, "I will present to you,
+in conclusion, the famous Japanese trick recently invented
+by the natives of Tipperary. Will you, sir," he continued
+turning toward the Quick Man, "will you kindly hand me
+your gold watch?"
+
+It was passed to him.
+
+"Have I your permission to put it into this mortar and
+pound it to pieces?" he asked savagely.
+
+The Quick Man nodded and smiled.
+
+The conjurer threw the watch into the mortar and grasped
+a sledge hammer from the table. There was a sound of
+violent smashing, "He's-slipped-it-up-his-sleeve,"
+whispered the Quick Man.
+
+"Now, sir," continued the conjurer, "will you allow me
+to take your handkerchief and punch holes in it? Thank
+you. You see, ladies and gentlemen, there is no deception;
+the holes are visible to the eye."
+
+The face of the Quick Man beamed. This time the real
+mystery of the thing fascinated him.
+
+"And now, sir, will you kindly pass me your silk hat and
+allow me to dance on it? Thank you."
+
+The conjurer made a few rapid passes with his feet and
+exhibited the hat crushed beyond recognition.
+
+"And will you now, sir, take off your celluloid collar
+and permit me to burn it in the candle? Thank you, sir.
+And will you allow me to smash your spectacles for you
+with my hammer? Thank you."
+
+By this time the features of the Quick Man were assuming
+a puzzled expression. "This thing beats me," he whispered,
+"I don't see through it a bit."
+
+There was a great hush upon the audience. Then the conjurer
+drew himself up to his full height and, with a withering
+look at the Quick Man, he concluded:
+
+"Ladies and gentlemen, you will observe that I have, with
+this gentleman's permission, broken his watch, burnt his
+collar, smashed his spectacles, and danced on his hat.
+If he will give me the further permission to paint green
+stripes on his overcoat, or to tie his suspenders in a
+knot, I shall be delighted to entertain you. If not, the
+performance is at an end."
+
+And amid a glorious burst of music from the orchestra
+the curtain fell, and the audience dispersed, convinced
+that there are some tricks, at any rate, that are not
+done up the conjurer's sleeve.
+
+
+
+
+Hints to Travellers
+
+The following hints and observations have occurred to me
+during a recent trip across the continent: they are
+written in no spirit of complaint against existing railroad
+methods, but merely in the hope that they may prove useful
+to those who travel, like myself, in a spirit of meek,
+observant ignorance.
+
+1. Sleeping in a Pullman car presents some difficulties
+to the novice. Care should be taken to allay all sense
+of danger. The frequent whistling of the engine during
+the night is apt to be a source of alarm. Find out,
+therefore, before travelling, the meaning of the various
+whistles. One means "station," two, "railroad crossing,"
+and so on. Five whistles, short and rapid, mean sudden
+danger. When you hear whistles in the night, sit up
+smartly in your bunk and count them. Should they reach
+five, draw on your trousers over your pyjamas and leave
+the train instantly. As a further precaution against
+accident, sleep with the feet towards the engine if you
+prefer to have the feet crushed, or with the head towards
+the engine, if you think it best to have the head crushed.
+In making this decision try to be as unselfish as possible.
+If indifferent, sleep crosswise with the head hanging
+over into the aisle.
+
+2. I have devoted some thought to the proper method of
+changing trains. The system which I have observed to be
+the most popular with travellers of my own class, is
+something as follows: Suppose that you have been told on
+leaving New York that you are to change at Kansas City.
+The evening before approaching Kansas City, stop the
+conductor in the aisle of the car (you can do this best
+by putting out your foot and tripping him), and say
+politely, "Do I change at Kansas City?" He says "Yes."
+Very good. Don't believe him. On going into the dining-car
+for supper, take a negro aside and put it to him as a
+personal matter between a white man and a black, whether
+he thinks you ought to change at Kansas City. Don't be
+satisfied with this. In the course of the evening pass
+through the entire train from time to time, and say to
+people casually, "Oh, can you tell me if I change at
+Kansas City?" Ask the conductor about it a few more times
+in the evening: a repetition of the question will ensure
+pleasant relations with him. Before falling asleep watch
+for his passage and ask him through the curtains of your
+berth, "Oh, by the way, did you say I changed at Kansas
+City?" If he refuses to stop, hook him by the neck with
+your walking-stick, and draw him gently to your bedside.
+In the morning when the train stops and a man calls,
+"Kansas City! All change!" approach the conductor again
+and say, "Is this Kansas City?" Don't be discouraged at
+his answer. Pick yourself up and go to the other end of
+the car and say to the brakesman, "Do you know, sir, if
+this is Kansas City?" Don't be too easily convinced.
+Remember that both brakesman and conductor may be in
+collusion to deceive you. Look around, therefore, for
+the name of the station on the signboard. Having found
+it, alight and ask the first man you see if this is Kansas
+City. He will answer, "Why, where in blank are your blank
+eyes? Can't you see it there, plain as blank?" When you
+hear language of this sort, ask no more. You are now in
+Kansas and this is Kansas City.
+
+3. I have observed that it is now the practice of the
+conductors to stick bits of paper in the hats of the
+passengers. They do this, I believe, to mark which ones
+they like best. The device is pretty, and adds much to
+the scenic appearance of the car. But I notice with pain
+that the system is fraught with much trouble for the
+conductors. The task of crushing two or three passengers
+together, in order to reach over them and stick a ticket
+into the chinks of a silk skull cap is embarrassing for
+a conductor of refined feelings. It would be simpler if
+the conductor should carry a small hammer and a packet
+of shingle nails and nail the paid-up passenger to the
+back of the seat. Or better still, let the conductor
+carry a small pot of paint and a brush, and mark the
+passengers in such a way that he cannot easily mistake
+them. In the case of bald-headed passengers, the hats
+might be politely removed and red crosses painted on the
+craniums. This will indicate that they are bald. Through
+passengers might be distinguished by a complete coat of
+paint. In the hands of a man of taste, much might be
+effected by a little grouping of painted passengers and
+the leisure time of the conductor agreeably occupied.
+
+4. I have observed in travelling in the West that the
+irregularity of railroad accidents is a fruitful cause
+of complaint. The frequent disappointment of the holders
+of accident policy tickets on western roads is leading
+to widespread protest. Certainly the conditions of travel
+in the West are altering rapidly and accidents can no
+longer be relied upon. This is deeply to be regretted,
+in so much as, apart from accidents, the tickets may be
+said to be practically valueless.
+
+
+
+
+A Manual of Education
+
+The few selections below are offered as a specimen page
+of a little book which I have in course of preparation.
+
+Every man has somewhere in the back of his head the wreck
+of a thing which he calls his education. My book is
+intended to embody in concise form these remnants of
+early instruction.
+
+Educations are divided into splendid educations, thorough
+classical educations, and average educations. All very
+old men have splendid educations; all men who apparently
+know nothing else have thorough classical educations;
+nobody has an average education.
+
+An education, when it is all written out on foolscap,
+covers nearly ten sheets. It takes about six years of
+severe college training to acquire it. Even then a man
+often finds that he somehow hasn't got his education just
+where he can put his thumb on it. When my little book of
+eight or ten pages has appeared, everybody may carry his
+education in his hip pocket.
+
+Those who have not had the advantage of an early training
+will be enabled, by a few hours of conscientious
+application, to put themselves on an equal footing with
+the most scholarly.
+
+The selections are chosen entirely at random.
+
+
+I.--REMAINS OF ASTRONOMY
+
+Astronomy teaches the correct use of the sun and the
+planets. These may be put on a frame of little sticks
+and turned round. This causes the tides. Those at the
+ends of the sticks are enormously far away. From time to
+time a diligent searching of the sticks reveals new
+planets. The orbit of a planet is the distance the stick
+goes round in going round. Astronomy is intensely
+interesting; it should be done at night, in a high tower
+in Spitzbergen. This is to avoid the astronomy being
+interrupted. A really good astronomer can tell when a
+comet is coming too near him by the warning buzz of the
+revolving sticks.
+
+
+II.--REMAINS OF HISTORY
+
+Aztecs: A fabulous race, half man, half horse, half
+mound-builder. They flourished at about the same time as
+the early Calithumpians. They have left some awfully
+stupendous monuments of themselves somewhere.
+
+Life of Caesar: A famous Roman general, the last who ever
+landed in Britain without being stopped at the custom
+house. On returning to his Sabine farm (to fetch something),
+he was stabbed by Brutus, and died with the words "Veni,
+vidi, tekel, upharsim" in his throat. The jury returned
+a verdict of strangulation.
+
+Life of Voltaire: A Frenchman; very bitter.
+
+Life of Schopenhauer: A German; very deep; but it was
+not really noticeable when he sat down.
+
+Life of Dante: An Italian; the first to introduce the
+banana and the class of street organ known as "Dante's
+Inferno."
+
+Peter the Great,
+Alfred the Great,
+Frederick the Great,
+John the Great,
+Tom the Great,
+Jim the Great,
+Jo the Great, etc., etc.
+
+It is impossible for a busy man to keep these apart. They
+sought a living as kings and apostles and pugilists and
+so on.
+
+
+III.--REMAINS OF BOTANY.
+
+Botany is the art of plants. Plants are divided into
+trees, flowers, and vegetables. The true botanist knows
+a tree as soon as he sees it. He learns to distinguish
+it from a vegetable by merely putting his ear to it.
+
+
+IV.--REMAINS OF NATURAL SCIENCE.
+
+Natural Science treats of motion and force. Many of its
+teachings remain as part of an educated man's permanent
+equipment in life. Such are:
+
+(a) The harder you shove a bicycle the faster it will
+go. This is because of natural science.
+
+(b) If you fall from a high tower, you fall quicker and
+quicker and quicker; a judicious selection of a tower
+will ensure any rate of speed.
+
+(c) If you put your thumb in between two cogs it will go
+on and on, until the wheels are arrested, by your
+suspenders. This is machinery.
+
+(d) Electricity is of two kinds, positive and negative.
+The difference is, I presume, that one kind comes a little
+more expensive, but is more durable; the other is a
+cheaper thing, but the moths get into it.
+
+
+
+
+Hoodoo McFiggin's Christmas
+
+This Santa Claus business is played out. It's a sneaking,
+underhand method, and the sooner it's exposed the better.
+
+For a parent to get up under cover of the darkness of
+night and palm off a ten-cent necktie on a boy who had
+been expecting a ten-dollar watch, and then say that an
+angel sent it to him, is low, undeniably low.
+
+I had a good opportunity of observing how the thing worked
+this Christmas, in the case of young Hoodoo McFiggin,
+the son and heir of the McFiggins, at whose house I board.
+
+Hoodoo McFiggin is a good boy--a religious boy. He had
+been given to understand that Santa Claus would bring
+nothing to his father and mother because grown-up people
+don't get presents from the angels. So he saved up all
+his pocket-money and bought a box of cigars for his father
+and a seventy-five-cent diamond brooch for his mother.
+His own fortunes he left in the hands of the angels. But
+he prayed. He prayed every night for weeks that Santa
+Claus would bring him a pair of skates and a puppy-dog
+and an air-gun and a bicycle and a Noah's ark and a sleigh
+and a drum--altogether about a hundred and fifty dollars'
+worth of stuff.
+
+I went into Hoodoo's room quite early Christmas morning.
+I had an idea that the scene would be interesting. I woke
+him up and he sat up in bed, his eyes glistening with
+radiant expectation, and began hauling things out of his
+stocking.
+
+The first parcel was bulky; it was done up quite loosely
+and had an odd look generally.
+
+"Ha! ha!" Hoodoo cried gleefully, as he began undoing
+it. "I'll bet it's the puppy-dog, all wrapped up in
+paper!"
+
+And was it the puppy-dog? No, by no means. It was a pair
+of nice, strong, number-four boots, laces and all,
+labelled, "Hoodoo, from Santa Claus," and underneath
+Santa Claus had written, "95 net."
+
+The boy's jaw fell with delight. "It's boots," he said,
+and plunged in his hand again.
+
+He began hauling away at another parcel with renewed hope
+on his face.
+
+This time the thing seemed like a little round box. Hoodoo
+tore the paper off it with a feverish hand. He shook it;
+something rattled inside.
+
+"It's a watch and chain! It's a watch and chain!" he
+shouted. Then he pulled the lid off.
+
+And was it a watch and chain? No. It was a box of nice,
+brand-new celluloid collars, a dozen of them all alike
+and all his own size.
+
+The boy was so pleased that you could see his face crack
+up with pleasure.
+
+He waited a few minutes until his intense joy subsided.
+Then he tried again.
+
+This time the packet was long and hard. It resisted the
+touch and had a sort of funnel shape.
+
+"It's a toy pistol!" said the boy, trembling with
+excitement. "Gee! I hope there are lots of caps with it!
+I'll fire some off now and wake up father."
+
+No, my poor child, you will not wake your father with
+that. It is a useful thing, but it needs not caps and it
+fires no bullets, and you cannot wake a sleeping man with
+a tooth-brush. Yes, it was a tooth-brush--a regular
+beauty, pure bone all through, and ticketed with a little
+paper, "Hoodoo, from Santa Claus."
+
+Again the expression of intense joy passed over the boy's
+face, and the tears of gratitude started from his eyes.
+He wiped them away with his tooth-brush and passed on.
+
+The next packet was much larger and evidently contained
+something soft and bulky. It had been too long to go into
+the stocking and was tied outside.
+
+"I wonder what this is," Hoodoo mused, half afraid to
+open it. Then his heart gave a great leap, and he forgot
+all his other presents in the anticipation of this one.
+"It's the drum!" he gasped. "It's the drum, all wrapped
+up!"
+
+Drum nothing! It was pants--a pair of the nicest little
+short pants--yellowish-brown short pants--with dear little
+stripes of colour running across both ways, and here
+again Santa Claus had written, "Hoodoo, from Santa Claus,
+one fort net."
+
+But there was something wrapped up in it. Oh, yes! There
+was a pair of braces wrapped up in it, braces with a
+little steel sliding thing so that you could slide your
+pants up to your neck, if you wanted to.
+
+The boy gave a dry sob of satisfaction. Then he took out
+his last present. "It's a book," he said, as he unwrapped
+it. "I wonder if it is fairy stories or adventures. Oh,
+I hope it's adventures! I'll read it all morning."
+
+No, Hoodoo, it was not precisely adventures. It was a
+small family Bible. Hoodoo had now seen all his presents,
+and he arose and dressed. But he still had the fun of
+playing with his toys. That is always the chief delight
+of Christmas morning.
+
+First he played with his tooth-brush. He got a whole lot
+of water and brushed all his teeth with it. This was
+huge.
+
+Then he played with his collars. He had no end of fun
+with them, taking them all out one by one and swearing
+at them, and then putting them back and swearing at the
+whole lot together.
+
+The next toy was his pants. He had immense fun there,
+putting them on and taking them off again, and then trying
+to guess which side was which by merely looking at them.
+
+After that he took his book and read some adventures
+called "Genesis" till breakfast-time.
+
+Then he went downstairs and kissed his father and mother.
+His father was smoking a cigar, and his mother had her
+new brooch on. Hoodoo's face was thoughtful, and a light
+seemed to have broken in upon his mind. Indeed, I think
+it altogether likely that next Christmas he will hang on
+to his own money and take chances on what the angels
+bring.
+
+
+
+
+The Life of John Smith
+
+The lives of great men occupy a large section of our
+literature. The great man is certainly a wonderful thing.
+He walks across his century and leaves the marks of his
+feet all over it, ripping out the dates on his goloshes
+as he passes. It is impossible to get up a revolution or
+a new religion, or a national awakening of any sort,
+without his turning up, putting himself at the head of
+it and collaring all the gate-receipts for himself. Even
+after his death he leaves a long trail of second-rate
+relations spattered over the front seats of fifty years
+of history.
+
+Now the lives of great men are doubtless infinitely
+interesting. But at times I must confess to a sense of
+reaction and an idea that the ordinary common man is
+entitled to have his biography written too. It is to
+illustrate this view that I write the life of John Smith,
+a man neither good nor great, but just the usual, everyday
+homo like you and me and the rest of us.
+
+From his earliest childhood John Smith was marked out
+from his comrades by nothing. The marvellous precocity
+of the boy did not astonish his preceptors. Books were
+not a passion for him from his youth, neither did any
+old man put his hand on Smith's head and say, mark his
+words, this boy would some day become a man. Nor yet was
+it his father's wont to gaze on him with a feeling
+amounting almost to awe. By no means! All his father did
+was to wonder whether Smith was a darn fool because he
+couldn't help it, or because he thought it smart. In
+other words, he was just like you and me and the rest of
+us.
+
+In those athletic sports which were the ornament of the
+youth of his day, Smith did not, as great men do, excel
+his fellows. He couldn't ride worth a darn. He couldn't
+skate worth a darn. He couldn't swim worth a darn. He
+couldn't shoot worth a darn. He couldn't do anything
+worth a darn. He was just like us.
+
+Nor did the bold cast of the boy's mind offset his physical
+defects, as it invariably does in the biographies. On
+the contrary. He was afraid of his father. He was afraid
+of his school-teacher. He was afraid of dogs. He was
+afraid of guns. He was afraid of lightning. He was afraid
+of hell. He was afraid of girls.
+
+In the boy's choice of a profession there was not seen
+that keen longing for a life-work that we find in the
+celebrities. He didn't want to be a lawyer, because you
+have to know law. He didn't want to be a doctor, because
+you have to know medicine. He didn't want to be a
+business-man, because you have to know business; and he
+didn't want to be a school-teacher, because he had seen
+too many of them. As far as he had any choice, it lay
+between being Robinson Crusoe and being the Prince of
+Wales. His father refused him both and put him into a
+dry goods establishment.
+
+Such was the childhood of Smith. At its close there was
+nothing in his outward appearance to mark the man of
+genius. The casual observer could have seen no genius
+concealed behind the wide face, the massive mouth, the
+long slanting forehead, and the tall ear that swept up
+to the close-cropped head. Certainly he couldn't. There
+wasn't any concealed there.
+
+It was shortly after his start in business life that
+Smith was stricken with the first of those distressing
+attacks, to which he afterwards became subject. It seized
+him late one night as he was returning home from a
+delightful evening of song and praise with a few old
+school chums. Its symptoms were a peculiar heaving of
+the sidewalk, a dancing of the street lights, and a crafty
+shifting to and fro of the houses, requiring a very nice
+discrimination in selecting his own. There was a strong
+desire not to drink water throughout the entire attack,
+which showed that the thing was evidently a form of
+hydrophobia. From this time on, these painful attacks
+became chronic with Smith. They were liable to come on
+at any time, but especially on Saturday nights, on the
+first of the month, and on Thanksgiving Day. He always
+had a very severe attack of hydrophobia on Christmas Eve,
+and after elections it was fearful.
+
+There was one incident in Smith's career which he did,
+perhaps, share with regret. He had scarcely reached
+manhood when he met the most beautiful girl in the world.
+She was different from all other women. She had a deeper
+nature than other people. Smith realized it at once. She
+could feel and understand things that ordinary people
+couldn't. She could understand him. She had a great sense
+of humour and an exquisite appreciation of a joke. He
+told her the six that he knew one night and she thought
+them great. Her mere presence made Smith feel as if he
+had swallowed a sunset: the first time that his finger
+brushed against hers, he felt a thrill all through him.
+He presently found that if he took a firm hold of her
+hand with his, he could get a fine thrill, and if he sat
+beside her on a sofa, with his head against her ear and
+his arm about once and a half round her, he could get
+what you might call a first-class, A-1 thrill. Smith
+became filled with the idea that he would like to have
+her always near him. He suggested an arrangement to her,
+by which she should come and live in the same house with
+him and take personal charge of his clothes and his meals.
+She was to receive in return her board and washing, about
+seventy-five cents a week in ready money, and Smith was
+to be her slave.
+
+After Smith had been this woman's slave for some time,
+baby fingers stole across his life, then another set of
+them, and then more and more till the house was full of
+them. The woman's mother began to steal across his life
+too, and every time she came Smith had hydrophobia
+frightfully. Strangely enough there was no little prattler
+that was taken from his life and became a saddened,
+hallowed memory to him. Oh, no! The little Smiths were
+not that kind of prattler. The whole nine grew up into
+tall, lank boys with massive mouths and great sweeping
+ears like their father's, and no talent for anything.
+
+The life of Smith never seemed to bring him to any of
+those great turning-points that occurred in the lives of
+the great. True, the passing years brought some change
+of fortune. He was moved up in his dry-goods establishment
+from the ribbon counter to the collar counter, from the
+collar counter to the gents' panting counter, and from
+the gents' panting to the gents' fancy shirting. Then,
+as he grew aged and inefficient, they moved him down
+again from the gents' fancy shirting to the gents' panting,
+and so on to the ribbon counter. And when he grew quite
+old they dismissed him and got a boy with a four-inch
+mouth and sandy-coloured hair, who did all Smith could
+do for half the money. That was John Smith's mercantile
+career: it won't stand comparison with Mr. Gladstone's,
+but it's not unlike your own.
+
+Smith lived for five years after this. His sons kept him.
+They didn't want to, but they had to. In his old age the
+brightness of his mind and his fund of anecdote were not
+the delight of all who dropped in to see him. He told
+seven stories and he knew six jokes. The stories were
+long things all about himself, and the jokes were about
+a commercial traveller and a Methodist minister. But
+nobody dropped in to see him, anyway, so it didn't matter.
+
+At sixty-five Smith was taken ill, and, receiving proper
+treatment, he died. There was a tombstone put up over
+him, with a hand pointing north-north-east.
+
+But I doubt if he ever got there. He was too like us.
+
+
+
+
+On Collecting Things
+
+Like most other men I have from time to time been stricken
+with a desire to make collections of things.
+
+It began with postage stamps. I had a letter from a friend
+of mine who had gone out to South Africa. The letter had
+a three-cornered stamp on it, and I thought as soon as
+I looked at it, "That's the thing! Stamp collecting! I'll
+devote my life to it."
+
+I bought an album with accommodation for the stamps of
+all nations, and began collecting right off. For three
+days the collection made wonderful progress. It contained:
+
+One Cape of Good Hope stamp.
+
+One one-cent stamp, United States of America.
+
+One two-cent stamp, United States of America.
+
+One five-cent stamp, United States of America.
+
+One ten-cent stamp, United States of America.
+
+After that the collection came to a dead stop. For a
+while I used to talk about it rather airily and say I
+had one or two rather valuable South African stamps. But
+I presently grew tired even of lying about it.
+
+Collecting coins is a thing that I attempt at intervals.
+Every time I am given an old half-penny or a Mexican
+quarter, I get an idea that if a fellow made a point of
+holding on to rarities of that sort, he'd soon have quite
+a valuable collection. The first time that I tried it I
+was full of enthusiasm, and before long my collection
+numbered quite a few articles of vertu. The items were
+as follows:
+
+No. 1. Ancient Roman coin. Time of Caligula. This one of
+course was the gem of the whole lot; it was given me by
+a friend, and that was what started me collecting.
+
+No. 2. Small copper coin. Value one cent. United States
+of America. Apparently modern.
+
+No. 3. Small nickel coin. Circular. United States of
+America. Value five cents.
+
+No. 4. Small silver coin. Value ten cents. United States
+of America.
+
+No. 5. Silver coin. Circular. Value twenty-five cents.
+United States of America. Very beautiful.
+
+No. 6. Large silver coin. Circular. Inscription, "One
+Dollar." United States of America. Very valuable.
+
+No. 7. Ancient British copper coin. Probably time of
+Caractacus. Very dim. Inscription, "Victoria Dei gratia
+regina." Very valuable.
+
+No. 8. Silver coin. Evidently French. Inscription, "Funf
+Mark. Kaiser Wilhelm."
+
+No. 9. Circular silver coin. Very much defaced. Part of
+inscription, "E Pluribus Unum." Probably a Russian rouble,
+but quite as likely to be a Japanese yen or a Shanghai
+rooster.
+
+That's as far as that collection got. It lasted through
+most of the winter and I was getting quite proud of it,
+but I took the coins down town one evening to show to a
+friend and we spent No. 3, No. 4, No. 5, No. 6, and No.
+7 in buying a little dinner for two. After dinner I bought
+a yen's worth of cigars and traded the relic of Caligula
+for as many hot Scotches as they cared to advance on it.
+After that I felt reckless and put No. 2 and No. 8 into
+a Children's Hospital poor box.
+
+I tried fossils next. I got two in ten years. Then I
+quit.
+
+A friend of mine once showed me a very fine collection
+of ancient and curious weapons, and for a time I was full
+of that idea. I gathered several interesting specimens,
+such as:
+
+No. 1. Old flint-lock musket, used by my grandfather.
+(He used it on the farm for years as a crowbar.)
+
+No. 2. Old raw-hide strap, used by my father.
+
+No. 3. Ancient Indian arrowhead, found by myself the very
+day after I began collecting. It resembles a three-cornered
+stone.
+
+No. 4. Ancient Indian bow, found by myself behind a
+sawmill on the second day of collecting. It resembles a
+straight stick of elm or oak. It is interesting to think
+that this very weapon may have figured in some fierce
+scene of savage warfare.
+
+No. 5. Cannibal poniard or straight-handled dagger of
+the South Sea Islands. It will give the reader almost a
+thrill of horror to learn that this atrocious weapon,
+which I bought myself on the third day of collecting,
+was actually exposed in a second-hand store as a family
+carving-knife. In gazing at it one cannot refrain from
+conjuring up the awful scenes it must have witnessed.
+
+I kept this collection for quite a long while until, in
+a moment of infatuation, I presented it to a young lady
+as a betrothal present. The gift proved too ostentatious
+and our relations subsequently ceased to be cordial.
+
+On the whole I am inclined to recommend the beginner to
+confine himself to collecting coins. At present I am
+myself making a collection of American bills (time of
+Taft preferred), a pursuit I find most absorbing.
+
+
+
+
+Society Chat-Chat
+
+AS IT SHOULD BE WRITTEN
+
+I notice that it is customary for the daily papers to
+publish a column or so of society gossip. They generally
+head it "Chit-Chat," or "On Dit," or "Le Boudoir," or
+something of the sort, and they keep it pretty full of
+French terms to give it the proper sort of swing. These
+columns may be very interesting in their way, but it
+always seems to me that they don't get hold of quite the
+right things to tell us about. They are very fond, for
+instance, of giving an account of the delightful dance
+at Mrs. De Smythe's--at which Mrs. De Smythe looked
+charming in a gown of old tulle with a stomacher of
+passementerie--or of the dinner-party at Mr. Alonzo
+Robinson's residence, or the smart pink tea given by Miss
+Carlotta Jones. No, that's all right, but it's not the
+kind of thing we want to get at; those are not the events
+which happen in our neighbours' houses that we really
+want to hear about. It is the quiet little family scenes,
+the little traits of home-life that--well, for example,
+take the case of that delightful party at the De Smythes.
+I am certain that all those who were present would much
+prefer a little paragraph like the following, which would
+give them some idea of the home-life of the De Smythes
+on the morning after the party.
+
+DEJEUNER DE LUXE AT THE DE SMYTHE RESIDENCE
+
+On Wednesday morning last at 7.15 a.m. a charming little
+breakfast was served at the home of Mr. De Smythe. The
+dejeuner was given in honour of Mr. De Smythe and his
+two sons, Master Adolphus and Master Blinks De Smythe,
+who were about to leave for their daily travail at their
+wholesale Bureau de Flour et de Feed. All the gentlemen
+were very quietly dressed in their habits de work. Miss
+Melinda De Smythe poured out tea, the domestique having
+refuse to get up so early after the partie of the night
+before. The menu was very handsome, consisting of eggs
+and bacon, demi-froid, and ice-cream. The conversation
+was sustained and lively. Mr. De Smythe sustained it and
+made it lively for his daughter and his garcons. In the
+course of the talk Mr. De Smythe stated that the next
+time he allowed the young people to turn his maison
+topsy-turvy he would see them in enfer. He wished to know
+if they were aware that some ass of the evening before
+had broken a pane of coloured glass in the hall that
+would cost him four dollars. Did they think he was made
+of argent. If so, they never made a bigger mistake in
+their vie. The meal closed with general expressions of
+good-feeling. A little bird has whispered to us that
+there will be no more parties at the De Smythes' pour
+long-temps.
+
+Here is another little paragraph that would be of general
+interest in society.
+
+DINER DE FAMEEL AT THE BOARDING-HOUSE DE MCFIGGIN
+
+Yesterday evening at half after six a pleasant little
+diner was given by Madame McFiggin of Rock Street, to
+her boarders. The salle a manger was very prettily
+decorated with texts, and the furniture upholstered with
+cheveux de horse, Louis Quinze. The boarders were all
+very quietly dressed: Mrs. McFiggin was daintily attired
+in some old clinging stuff with a corsage de Whalebone
+underneath. The ample board groaned under the bill of
+fare. The boarders groaned also. Their groaning was very
+noticeable. The piece de resistance was a hunko de boeuf
+boile, flanked with some old clinging stuff. The entrees
+were pate de pumpkin, followed by fromage McFiggin, served
+under glass. Towards the end of the first course, speeches
+became the order of the day. Mrs. McFiggin was the first
+speaker. In commencing, she expressed her surprise that
+so few of the gentlemen seemed to care for the hunko de
+boeuf; her own mind, she said, had hesitated between
+hunko de boeuf boile and a pair of roast chickens
+(sensation). She had finally decided in favour of the
+hunko de boeuf (no sensation). She referred at some length
+to the late Mr. McFiggin, who had always shown a marked
+preference for hunko de boeuf. Several other speakers
+followed. All spoke forcibly and to the point. The last
+to speak was the Reverend Mr. Whiner. The reverend
+gentleman, in rising, said that he confided himself and
+his fellow-boarders to the special interference of
+providence. For what they had eaten, he said, he hoped
+that Providence would make them truly thankful. At the
+close of the Repas several of the boarders expressed
+their intention of going down the street to a restourong
+to get quelque chose a manger.
+
+Here is another example. How interesting it would be to
+get a detailed account of that little affair at the
+Robinsons', of which the neighbours only heard indirectly!
+Thus:
+
+DELIGHTFUL EVENING AT THE RESIDENCE OF MR. ALONZO ROBINSON
+
+Yesterday the family of Mr. Alonzo Robinson spent a very
+lively evening at their home on ---th Avenue. The occasion
+was the seventeenth birthday of Master Alonzo Robinson,
+junior. It was the original intention of Master Alonzo
+Robinson to celebrate the day at home and invite a few
+of les garcons. Mr. Robinson, senior, however, having
+declared that he would be damne first, Master Alonzo
+spent the evening in visiting the salons of the town,
+which he painted rouge. Mr. Robinson, senior, spent the
+evening at home in quiet expectation of his son's return.
+He was very becomingly dressed in a pantalon quatre vingt
+treize, and had his whippe de chien laid across his knee.
+Madame Robinson and the Mademoiselles Robinson wore black.
+The guest of the evening arrived at a late hour. He wore
+his habits de spri, and had about six pouces of eau de
+vie in him. He was evidently full up to his cou. For some
+time after his arrival a very lively time was spent. Mr.
+Robinson having at length broken the whippe de chien,
+the family parted for the night with expressions of
+cordial goodwill.
+
+
+
+
+Insurance up to Date
+
+A man called on me the other day with the idea of insuring
+my life. Now, I detest life-insurance agents; they always
+argue that I shall some day die, which is not so. I have
+been insured a great many times, for about a month at a
+time, but have had no luck with it at all.
+
+So I made up my mind that I would outwit this man at his
+own game. I let him talk straight ahead and encouraged
+him all I could, until he finally left me with a sheet
+of questions which I was to answer as an applicant. Now
+this was what I was waiting for; I had decided that, if
+that company wanted information about me, they should
+have it, and have the very best quality I could supply.
+So I spread the sheet of questions before me, and drew
+up a set of answers for them, which, I hoped, would settle
+for ever all doubts as to my eligibility for insurance.
+
+Question.--What is your age?
+Answer.--I can't think.
+
+Q.--What is your chest measurement?
+A.--Nineteen inches.
+
+Q.--What is your chest expansion?
+A.--Half an inch.
+
+Q.--What is your height?
+A.--Six feet five, if erect, but less when
+    I walk on all fours.
+
+Q.--Is your grandfather dead?
+A.--Practically.
+
+Q.--Cause of death, if dead?
+A.--Dipsomania, if dead.
+
+Q.--Is your father dead?
+A.--To the world.
+
+Q.--Cause of death?
+A.--Hydrophobia.
+
+Q.--Place of father's residence?
+A.--Kentucky.
+
+Q.--What illness have you had?
+A.--As a child, consumption, leprosy, and water on
+    the knee. As a man, whooping-cough, stomach-ache,
+    and water on the brain.
+
+Q.--Have you any brothers?
+A.--Thirteen; all nearly dead.
+
+Q.--Are you aware of any habits or tendencies which
+    might be expected to shorten your life?
+A.--I am aware. I drink, I smoke, I take morphine and
+    vaseline. I swallow grape seeds and I hate exercise.
+
+I thought when I had come to the end of that list that
+I had made a dead sure thing of it, and I posted the
+paper with a cheque for three months' payment, feeling
+pretty confident of having the cheque sent back to me.
+I was a good deal surprised a few days later to receive
+the following letter from the company:
+
+"DEAR SIR,--We beg to acknowledge your letter of application
+and cheque for fifteen dollars. After a careful comparison
+of your case with the average modern standard, we are
+pleased to accept you as a first-class risk."
+
+
+
+
+Borrowing a Match
+
+You might think that borrowing a match upon the street
+is a simple thing. But any man who has ever tried it will
+assure you that it is not, and will be prepared to swear
+to the truth of my experience of the other evening.
+
+I was standing on the corner of the street with a cigar
+that I wanted to light. I had no match. I waited till a
+decent, ordinary-looking man came along. Then I said:
+
+"Excuse me, sir, but could you oblige me with the loan
+of a match?"
+
+"A match?" he said, "why certainly." Then he unbuttoned
+his overcoat and put his hand in the pocket of his
+waistcoat. "I know I have one," he went on, "and I'd
+almost swear it's in the bottom pocket--or, hold on,
+though, I guess it may be in the top--just wait till I
+put these parcels down on the sidewalk."
+
+"Oh, don't trouble," I said, "it's really of no
+consequence."
+
+"Oh, it's no trouble, I'll have it in a minute; I know
+there must be one in here somewhere"--he was digging
+his fingers into his pockets as he spoke--"but you see
+this isn't the waistcoat I generally..."
+
+I saw that the man was getting excited about it. "Well,
+never mind," I protested; "if that isn't the waistcoat
+that you generally--why, it doesn't matter."
+
+"Hold on, now, hold on!" the man said, "I've got one of
+the cursed things in here somewhere. I guess it must be
+in with my watch. No, it's not there either. Wait till
+I try my coat. If that confounded tailor only knew enough
+to make a pocket so that a man could get at it!"
+
+He was getting pretty well worked up now. He had thrown
+down his walking-stick and was plunging at his pockets
+with his teeth set. "It's that cursed young boy of mine,"
+he hissed; "this comes of his fooling in my pockets. By
+Gad! perhaps I won't warm him up when I get home. Say,
+I'll bet that it's in my hip-pocket. You just hold up
+the tail of my overcoat a second till I..."
+
+"No, no," I protested again, "please don't take all this
+trouble, it really doesn't matter. I'm sure you needn't
+take off your overcoat, and oh, pray don't throw away
+your letters and things in the snow like that, and tear
+out your pockets by the roots! Please, please don't
+trample over your overcoat and put your feet through the
+parcels. I do hate to hear you swearing at your little
+boy, with that peculiar whine in your voice. Don't--please
+don't tear your clothes so savagely."
+
+Suddenly the man gave a grunt of exultation, and drew
+his hand up from inside the lining of his coat.
+
+"I've got it," he cried. "Here you are!" Then he brought
+it out under the light.
+
+It was a toothpick.
+
+Yielding to the impulse of the moment I pushed him under
+the wheels of a trolley-car, and ran.
+
+
+
+
+A Lesson in Fiction
+
+Suppose that in the opening pages of the modern melodramatic
+novel you find some such situation as the following, in
+which is depicted the terrific combat between Gaspard de
+Vaux, the boy lieutenant, and Hairy Hank, the chief of
+the Italian banditti:
+
+"The inequality of the contest was apparent. With a
+mingled yell of rage and contempt, his sword brandished
+above his head and his dirk between his teeth, the enormous
+bandit rushed upon his intrepid opponent. De Vaux seemed
+scarce more than a stripling, but he stood his ground
+and faced his hitherto invincible assailant. 'Mong Dieu,'
+cried De Smythe, 'he is lost!'"
+
+Question. On which of the parties to the above contest
+do you honestly feel inclined to put your money?
+
+Answer. On De Vaux. He'll win. Hairy Hank will force him
+down to one knee and with a brutal cry of "Har! har!"
+will be about to dirk him, when De Vaux will make a sudden
+lunge (one he had learnt at home out of a book of lunges)
+and--
+
+Very good. You have answered correctly. Now, suppose you
+find, a little later in the book, that the killing of
+Hairy Hank has compelled De Vaux to flee from his native
+land to the East. Are you not fearful for his safety in
+the desert?
+
+Answer. Frankly, I am not. De Vaux is all right. His name
+is on the title page, and you can't kill him.
+
+Question. Listen to this, then: "The sun of Ethiopia beat
+fiercely upon the desert as De Vaux, mounted upon his
+faithful elephant, pursued his lonely way. Seated in his
+lofty hoo-doo, his eye scoured the waste. Suddenly a
+solitary horseman appeared on the horizon, then another,
+and another, and then six. In a few moments a whole crowd
+of solitary horsemen swooped down upon him. There was a
+fierce shout of 'Allah!' a rattle of firearms. De Vaux
+sank from his hoo-doo on to the sands, while the affrighted
+elephant dashed off in all directions. The bullet had
+struck him in the heart."
+
+There now, what do you think of that? Isn't De Vaux killed
+now?
+
+Answer. I am sorry. De Vaux is not dead. True, the ball
+had hit him, oh yes, it had hit him, but it had glanced
+off against a family Bible, which he carried in his
+waistcoat in case of illness, struck some hymns that he
+had in his hip-pocket, and, glancing off again, had
+flattened itself against De Vaux's diary of his life in
+the desert, which was in his knapsack.
+
+Question. But even if this doesn't kill him, you must
+admit that he is near death when he is bitten in the
+jungle by the deadly dongola?
+
+Answer. That's all right. A kindly Arab will take De Vaux
+to the Sheik's tent.
+
+Question. What will De Vaux remind the Sheik of?
+
+Answer. Too easy. Of his long-lost son, who disappeared
+years ago.
+
+Question. Was this son Hairy Hank?
+
+Answer. Of course he was. Anyone could see that, but the Sheik
+never suspects it, and heals De Vaux. He heals him with an
+herb, a thing called a simple, an amazingly simple, known only
+to the Sheik. Since using this herb, the Sheik has used no other.
+
+Question. The Sheik will recognize an overcoat that De
+Vaux is wearing, and complications will arise in the
+matter of Hairy Hank deceased. Will this result in the
+death of the boy lieutenant?
+
+Answer. No. By this time De Vaux has realized that the
+reader knows he won't die and resolves to quit the desert.
+The thought of his mother keeps recurring to him, and of
+his father, too, the grey, stooping old man--does he
+stoop still or has he stopped stooping? At times, too,
+there comes the thought of another, a fairer than his
+father; she whose--but enough, De Vaux returns to the
+old homestead in Piccadilly.
+
+Question. When De Vaux returns to England, what will
+happen?
+
+Answer. This will happen: "He who left England ten years
+before a raw boy, has returned a sunburnt soldierly man.
+But who is this that advances smilingly to meet him? Can
+the mere girl, the bright child that shared his hours of
+play, can she have grown into this peerless, graceful
+girl, at whose feet half the noble suitors of England
+are kneeling? 'Can this be her?' he asks himself in
+amazement."
+
+Question. Is it her?
+
+Answer. Oh, it's her all right. It is her, and it is him,
+and it is them. That girl hasn't waited fifty pages for
+nothing.
+
+Question. You evidently guess that a love affair will
+ensue between the boy lieutenant and the peerless girl
+with the broad feet. Do you imagine, however, that its
+course will run smoothly and leave nothing to record?
+
+Answer. Not at all. I feel certain that the scene of the
+novel having edged itself around to London, the writer
+will not feel satisfied unless he introduces the following
+famous scene:
+
+"Stunned by the cruel revelation which he had received,
+unconscious of whither his steps were taking him, Gaspard
+de Vaux wandered on in the darkness from street to street
+until he found himself upon London Bridge. He leaned over
+the parapet and looked down upon the whirling stream
+below. There was something in the still, swift rush of
+it that seemed to beckon, to allure him. After all, why
+not? What was life now that he should prize it? For a
+moment De Vaux paused irresolute."
+
+Question. Will he throw himself in?
+
+Answer. Well, say you don't know Gaspard. He will pause
+irresolute up to the limit, then, with a fierce struggle,
+will recall his courage and hasten from the Bridge.
+
+Question. This struggle not to throw oneself in must be
+dreadfully difficult?
+
+Answer. Oh! dreadfully! Most of us are so frail we should
+jump in at once. But Gaspard has the knack of it. Besides
+he still has some of the Sheik's herb; he chews it.
+
+Question. What has happened to De Vaux anyway? Is it
+anything he has eaten?
+
+Answer. No, it is nothing that he has eaten. It's about her.
+The blow has come. She has no use for sunburn, doesn't care
+for tan; she is going to marry a duke and the boy lieutenant
+is no longer in it. The real trouble is that the modern
+novelist has got beyond the happy-marriage mode of ending.
+He wants tragedy and a blighted life to wind up with.
+
+Question. How will the book conclude?
+
+Answer. Oh, De Vaux will go back to the desert, fall upon
+the Sheik's neck, and swear to be a second Hairy Hank to
+him. There will be a final panorama of the desert, the
+Sheik and his newly found son at the door of the tent,
+the sun setting behind a pyramid, and De Vaux's faithful
+elephant crouched at his feet and gazing up at him with
+dumb affection.
+
+
+
+
+Helping the Armenians
+
+The financial affairs of the parish church up at Doogalville
+have been getting rather into a tangle in the last six
+months. The people of the church were specially anxious
+to do something toward the general public subscription
+of the town on behalf of the unhappy Armenians, and to
+that purpose they determined to devote the collections
+taken up at a series of special evening services. To give
+the right sort of swing to the services and to stimulate
+generous giving, they put a new pipe organ into the
+church. In order to make a preliminary payment on the
+organ, it was decided to raise a mortgage on the parsonage.
+
+To pay the interest on the mortgage, the choir of the
+church got up a sacred concert in the town hall.
+
+To pay for the town hall, the Willing Workers' Guild held
+a social in the Sunday school. To pay the expenses of
+the social, the rector delivered a public lecture on
+"Italy and Her Past," illustrated by a magic lantern.
+To pay for the magic lantern, the curate and the ladies
+of the church got up some amateur theatricals.
+
+Finally, to pay for the costumes for the theatricals,
+the rector felt it his duty to dispense with the curate.
+
+So that is where the church stands just at present. What
+they chiefly want to do, is to raise enough money to buy
+a suitable gold watch as a testimonial to the curate.
+After that they hope to be able to do something for the
+Armenians. Meantime, of course, the Armenians, the ones
+right there in the town, are getting very troublesome.
+To begin with, there is the Armenian who rented the
+costumes for the theatricals: he has to be squared. Then
+there is the Armenian organ dealer, and the Armenian who
+owned the magic lantern. They want relief badly.
+
+The most urgent case is that of the Armenian who holds
+the mortgage on the parsonage; indeed it is generally
+felt in the congregation, when the rector makes his
+impassioned appeals at the special services on behalf of
+the suffering cause, that it is to this man that he has
+special reference.
+
+In the meanwhile the general public subscription is not
+getting along very fast; but the proprietor of the big
+saloon further down the street and the man with the short
+cigar that runs the Doogalville Midway Plaisance have
+been most liberal in their contributions.
+
+
+
+
+A Study in Still Life.--The Country Hotel
+
+The country hotel stands on the sunny side of Main Street.
+It has three entrances.
+
+There is one in front which leads into the Bar. There is
+one at the side called the Ladies' Entrance which leads
+into the Bar from the side. There is also the Main Entrance
+which leads into the Bar through the Rotunda.
+
+The Rotunda is the space between the door of the bar-room
+and the cigar-case.
+
+In it is a desk and a book. In the book are written down
+the names of the guests, together with marks indicating
+the direction of the wind and the height of the barometer.
+It is here that the newly arrived guest waits until he
+has time to open the door leading to the Bar.
+
+The bar-room forms the largest part of the hotel. It
+constitutes the hotel proper. To it are attached a series
+of bedrooms on the floor above, many of which contain
+beds.
+
+The walls of the bar-room are perforated in all directions
+with trap-doors. Through one of these drinks are passed
+into the back sitting-room. Through others drinks are
+passed into the passages. Drinks are also passed through
+the floor and through the ceiling. Drinks once passed
+never return. The Proprietor stands in the doorway of
+the bar. He weighs two hundred pounds. His face is
+immovable as putty. He is drunk. He has been drunk for
+twelve years. It makes no difference to him. Behind the
+bar stands the Bar-tender. He wears wicker-sleeves, his
+hair is curled in a hook, and his name is Charlie.
+
+Attached to the bar is a pneumatic beer-pump, by means
+of which the bar-tender can flood the bar with beer.
+Afterwards he wipes up the beer with a rag. By this means
+he polishes the bar. Some of the beer that is pumped up
+spills into glasses and has to be sold.
+
+Behind the bar-tender is a mechanism called a cash-register,
+which, on being struck a powerful blow, rings a bell,
+sticks up a card marked NO SALE, and opens a till from
+which the bar-tender distributes money.
+
+There is printed a tariff of drinks and prices on the wall.
+
+It reads thus:
+
+  Beer . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 cents.
+     Whisky. . . . . . . . . . 5 cents.
+  Whisky and Soda. . . . . . . 5 cents.
+     Beer and Soda . . . . . . 5 cents.
+  Whisky and Beer and Soda . . 5 cents.
+     Whisky and Eggs . . . . . 5 cents.
+     Beer and Eggs . . . . . . 5 cents.
+        Champagne. . . . . . . 5 cents.
+        Cigars . . . . . . . . 5 cents.
+  Cigars, extra fine . . . . . 5 cents.
+
+All calculations are made on this basis and are worked
+out to three places of decimals. Every seventh drink is
+on the house and is not followed by a distribution of
+money.
+
+The bar-room closes at midnight, provided there are enough
+people in it. If there is not a quorum the proprietor
+waits for a better chance. A careful closing of the bar
+will often catch as many as twenty-five people. The bar
+is not opened again till seven o'clock in the morning;
+after that the people may go home. There are also,
+nowadays, Local Option Hotels. These contain only one
+entrance, leading directly into the bar.
+
+
+
+
+An Experiment With Policeman Hogan
+
+Mr. Scalper sits writing in the reporters' room of The
+Daily Eclipse. The paper has gone to press and he is
+alone; a wayward talented gentleman, this Mr. Scalper,
+and employed by The Eclipse as a delineator of character
+from handwriting. Any subscriber who forwards a specimen
+of his handwriting is treated to a prompt analysis of
+his character from Mr. Scalper's facile pen. The literary
+genius has a little pile of correspondence beside him,
+and is engaged in the practice of his art. Outside the
+night is dark and rainy. The clock on the City Hall marks
+the hour of two. In front of the newspaper office Policeman
+Hogan walks drearily up and down his beat. The damp misery
+of Hogan is intense. A belated gentleman in clerical
+attire, returning home from a bed of sickness, gives him
+a side-look of timid pity and shivers past. Hogan follows
+the retreating figure with his eye; then draws forth a
+notebook and sits down on the steps of The Eclipse building
+to write in the light of the gas lamp. Gentlemen of
+nocturnal habits have often wondered what it is that
+Policeman Hogan and his brethren write in their little
+books. Here are the words that are fashioned by the big
+fist of the policeman:
+
+"Two o'clock. All is well. There is a light in Mr.
+Scalper's room above. The night is very wet and I am
+unhappy and cannot sleep--my fourth night of insomnia.
+Suspicious-looking individual just passed. Alas, how
+melancholy is my life! Will the dawn never break! Oh,
+moist, moist stone."
+
+Mr. Scalper up above is writing too, writing with the
+careless fluency of a man who draws his pay by the column.
+He is delineating with skill and rapidity. The reporters'
+room is gloomy and desolate. Mr. Scalper is a man of
+sensitive temperament and the dreariness of his surroundings
+depresses him. He opens the letter of a correspondent,
+examines the handwriting narrowly, casts his eye around
+the room for inspiration, and proceeds to delineate:
+
+"G.H. You have an unhappy, despondent nature; your
+circumstances oppress you, and your life is filled with
+an infinite sadness. You feel that you are without hope--"
+
+Mr. Scalper pauses, takes another look around the room,
+and finally lets his eye rest for some time upon a tall
+black bottle that stands on the shelf of an open cupboard.
+Then he goes on:
+
+"--and you have lost all belief in Christianity and a
+future world and human virtue. You are very weak against
+temptation, but there is an ugly vein of determination
+in your character, when you make up your mind that you
+are going to have a thing--"
+
+Here Mr. Scalper stops abruptly, pushes back his chair,
+and dashes across the room to the cupboard. He takes the
+black bottle from the shelf, applies it to his lips, and
+remains for some time motionless. He then returns to
+finish the delineation of G.H. with the hurried words:
+
+"On the whole I recommend you to persevere; you are doing
+very well." Mr. Scalper's next proceeding is peculiar.
+He takes from the cupboard a roll of twine, about fifty
+feet in length, and attaches one end of it to the neck
+of the bottle. Going then to one of the windows, he opens
+it, leans out, and whistles softly. The alert ear of
+Policeman Hogan on the pavement below catches the sound,
+and he returns it. The bottle is lowered to the end of
+the string, the guardian of the peace applies it to his
+gullet, and for some time the policeman and the man of
+letters remain attached by a cord of sympathy. Gentlemen
+who lead the variegated life of Mr. Scalper find it well
+to propitiate the arm of the law, and attachments of this
+sort are not uncommon. Mr. Scalper hauls up the bottle,
+closes the window, and returns to his task; the policeman
+resumes his walk with a glow of internal satisfaction.
+A glance at the City Hall clock causes him to enter
+another note in his book.
+
+"Half-past two. All is better. The weather is milder with
+a feeling of young summer in the air. Two lights in Mr.
+Scalper's room. Nothing has occurred which need be brought
+to the notice of the roundsman."
+
+Things are going better upstairs too. The delineator
+opens a second envelope, surveys the writing of the
+correspondent with a critical yet charitable eye, and
+writes with more complacency.
+
+"William H. Your writing shows a disposition which, though
+naturally melancholy, is capable of a temporary
+cheerfulness. You have known misfortune but have made up
+your mind to look on the bright side of things. If you
+will allow me to say so, you indulge in liquor but are
+quite moderate in your use of it. Be assured that no harm
+ever comes of this moderate use. It enlivens the intellect,
+brightens the faculties, and stimulates the dormant fancy
+into a pleasurable activity. It is only when carried to
+excess--"
+
+At this point the feelings of Mr. Scalper, who had been
+writing very rapidly, evidently become too much for him.
+He starts up from his chair, rushes two or three times
+around the room, and finally returns to finish the
+delineation thus: "it is only when carried to excess that
+this moderation becomes pernicious."
+
+Mr. Scalper succumbs to the train of thought suggested
+and gives an illustration of how moderation to excess
+may be avoided, after which he lowers the bottle to
+Policeman Hogan with a cheery exchange of greetings.
+
+The half-hours pass on. The delineator is writing busily
+and feels that he is writing well. The characters of his
+correspondents lie bare to his keen eye and flow from
+his facile pen. From time to time he pauses and appeals
+to the source of his inspiration; his humanity prompts
+him to extend the inspiration to Policeman Hogan. The
+minion of the law walks his beat with a feeling of more
+than tranquillity. A solitary Chinaman, returning home
+late from his midnight laundry, scuttles past. The literary
+instinct has risen strong in Hogan from his connection
+with the man of genius above him, and the passage of the
+lone Chinee gives him occasion to write in his book:
+
+"Four-thirty. Everything is simply great. There are four
+lights in Mr. Scalper's room. Mild, balmy weather with
+prospects of an earthquake, which may be held in check
+by walking with extreme caution. Two Chinamen have just
+passed--mandarins, I presume. Their walk was unsteady,
+but their faces so benign as to disarm suspicion."
+
+Up in the office Mr. Scalper has reached the letter of
+a correspondent which appears to give him particular
+pleasure, for he delineates the character with a beaming
+smile of satisfaction. To the unpractised eye the writing
+resembles the prim, angular hand of an elderly spinster.
+Mr. Scalper, however, seems to think otherwise, for he
+writes:
+
+"Aunt Dorothea. You have a merry, rollicking nature. At
+times you are seized with a wild, tumultuous hilarity to
+which you give ample vent in shouting and song. You are
+much addicted to profanity, and you rightly feel that
+this is part of your nature and you must not check it.
+The world is a very bright place to you, Aunt Dorothea.
+Write to me again soon. Our minds seem cast in the same
+mould."
+
+Mr. Scalper seems to think that he has not done full
+justice to the subject he is treating, for he proceeds
+to write a long private letter to Aunt Dorothea in addition
+to the printed delineation. As he finishes the City Hall
+clock points to five, and Policeman Hogan makes the last
+entry in his chronicle. Hogan has seated himself upon
+the steps of The Eclipse building for greater comfort
+and writes with a slow, leisurely fist:
+
+"The other hand of the clock points north and the second
+longest points south-east by south. I infer that it is
+five o'clock. The electric lights in Mr. Scalper's room
+defy the eye. The roundsman has passed and examined my
+notes of the night's occurrences. They are entirely
+satisfactory, and he is pleased with their literary form.
+The earthquake which I apprehended was reduced to a few
+minor oscillations which cannot reach me where I sit--"
+
+The lowering of the bottle interrupts Policeman Hogan.
+The long letter to Aunt Dorothea has cooled the ardour
+of Mr. Scalper. The generous blush has passed from his
+mind and he has been trying in vain to restore it. To
+afford Hogan a similar opportunity, he decides not to
+haul the bottle up immediately, but to leave it in his
+custody while he delineates a character. The writing of
+this correspondent would seem to the inexperienced eye
+to be that of a timid little maiden in her teens. Mr.
+Scalper is not to be deceived by appearances. He shakes
+his head mournfully at the letter and writes:
+
+"Little Emily. You have known great happiness, but it
+has passed. Despondency has driven you to seek forgetfulness
+in drink. Your writing shows the worst phase of the liquor
+habit. I apprehend that you will shortly have delirium
+tremens. Poor little Emily! Do not try to break off; it
+is too late."
+
+Mr. Scalper is visibly affected by his correspondent's
+unhappy condition. His eye becomes moist, and he decides
+to haul up the bottle while there is still time to save
+Policeman Hogan from acquiring a taste for liquor. He is
+surprised and alarmed to find the attempt to haul it up
+ineffectual. The minion of the law has fallen into a
+leaden slumber, and the bottle remains tight in his grasp.
+The baffled delineator lets fall the string and returns
+to finish his task. Only a few lines are now required to
+fill the column, but Mr. Scalper finds on examining the
+correspondence that he has exhausted the subjects. This,
+however, is quite a common occurrence and occasions no
+dilemma in the mind of the talented gentleman. It is his
+custom in such cases to fill up the space with an imaginary
+character or two, the analysis of which is a task most
+congenial to his mind. He bows his head in thought for
+a few moments, and then writes as follows:
+
+"Policeman H. Your hand shows great firmness; when once
+set upon a thing you are not easily moved. But you have
+a mean, grasping disposition and a tendency to want more
+than your share. You have formed an attachment which you
+hope will be continued throughout life, but your selfishness
+threatens to sever the bond."
+
+Having written which, Mr. Scalper arranges his manuscript
+for the printer next day, dons his hat and coat, and
+wends his way home in the morning twilight, feeling that
+his pay is earned.
+
+
+
+
+The Passing of the Poet
+
+Studies in what may be termed collective psychology are
+essentially in keeping with the spirit of the present
+century. The examination of the mental tendencies, the
+intellectual habits which we display not as individuals,
+but as members of a race, community, or crowd, is offering
+a fruitful field of speculation as yet but little exploited.
+One may, therefore, not without profit, pass in review
+the relation of the poetic instinct to the intellectual
+development of the present era.
+
+Not the least noticeable feature in the psychological
+evolution of our time is the rapid disappearance of
+poetry. The art of writing poetry, or perhaps more fairly,
+the habit of writing poetry, is passing from us. The poet
+is destined to become extinct.
+
+To a reader of trained intellect the initial difficulty
+at once suggests itself as to what is meant by poetry.
+But it is needless to quibble at a definition of the
+term. It may be designated, simply and fairly, as the
+art of expressing a simple truth in a concealed form of
+words, any number of which, at intervals greater or less,
+may or may not rhyme.
+
+The poet, it must be said, is as old as civilization.
+The Greeks had him with them, stamping out his iambics
+with the sole of his foot. The Romans, too, knew
+him--endlessly juggling his syllables together, long and
+short, short and long, to make hexameters. This can now
+be done by electricity, but the Romans did not know it.
+
+But it is not my present purpose to speak of the poets
+of an earlier and ruder time. For the subject before us
+it is enough to set our age in comparison with the era
+that preceded it. We have but to contrast ourselves with
+our early Victorian grandfathers to realize the profound
+revolution that has taken place in public feeling. It is
+only with an effort that the practical common sense of
+the twentieth century can realize the excessive
+sentimentality of the earlier generation.
+
+In those days poetry stood in high and universal esteem.
+Parents read poetry to their children. Children recited
+poetry to their parents. And he was a dullard, indeed,
+who did not at least profess, in his hours of idleness,
+to pour spontaneous rhythm from his flowing quill.
+
+Should one gather statistics of the enormous production
+of poetry some sixty or seventy years ago, they would
+scarcely appear credible. Journals and magazines teemed
+with it. Editors openly countenanced it. Even the daily
+press affected it. Love sighed in home-made stanzas.
+Patriotism rhapsodized on the hustings, or cited rolling
+hexameters to an enraptured legislature. Even melancholy
+death courted his everlasting sleep in elegant elegiacs.
+
+In that era, indeed, I know not how, polite society was
+haunted by the obstinate fiction that it was the duty of
+a man of parts to express himself from time to time in
+verse. Any special occasion of expansion or exuberance,
+of depression, torsion, or introspection, was sufficient
+to call it forth. So we have poems of dejection, of
+reflection, of deglutition, of indigestion.
+
+Any particular psychological disturbance was enough to
+provoke an excess of poetry. The character and manner of
+the verse might vary with the predisposing cause. A
+gentleman who had dined too freely might disexpand himself
+in a short fit of lyric doggerel in which "bowl" and
+"soul" were freely rhymed. The morning's indigestion
+inspired a long-drawn elegiac, with "bier" and "tear,"
+"mortal" and "portal" linked in sonorous sadness. The
+man of politics, from time to time, grateful to an
+appreciative country, sang back to it, "Ho, Albion, rising
+from the brine!" in verse whose intention at least was
+meritorious.
+
+And yet it was but a fiction, a purely fictitious
+obligation, self-imposed by a sentimental society. In
+plain truth, poetry came no more easily or naturally to
+the early Victorian than to you or me. The lover twanged
+his obdurate harp in vain for hours for the rhymes that
+would not come, and the man of politics hammered at his
+heavy hexameter long indeed before his Albion was finally
+"hoed" into shape; while the beer-besotted convivialist
+cudgelled his poor wits cold sober in rhyming the light
+little bottle-ditty that should have sprung like Aphrodite
+from the froth of the champagne.
+
+I have before me a pathetic witness of this fact. It is
+the note-book once used for the random jottings of a
+gentleman of the period. In it I read: "Fair Lydia, if
+my earthly harp." This is crossed out, and below it
+appears, "Fair Lydia, COULD my earthly harp." This again
+is erased, and under it appears, "Fair Lydia, SHOULD my
+earthly harp." This again is struck out with a despairing
+stroke, and amended to read: "Fair Lydia, DID my earthly
+harp." So that finally, when the lines appeared in the
+Gentleman's Magazine (1845) in their ultimate shape--"Fair
+Edith, when with fluent pen," etc., etc.--one can realize
+from what a desperate congelation the fluent pen had been
+so perseveringly rescued.
+
+There can be little doubt of the deleterious effect
+occasioned both to public and private morals by this
+deliberate exaltation of mental susceptibility on the
+part of the early Victorian. In many cases we can detect
+the evidences of incipient paresis. The undue access of
+emotion frequently assumed a pathological character. The
+sight of a daisy, of a withered leaf or an upturned sod,
+seemed to disturb the poet's mental equipoise. Spring
+unnerved him. The lambs distressed him. The flowers made
+him cry. The daffodils made him laugh. Day dazzled him.
+Night frightened him.
+
+This exalted mood, combined with the man's culpable
+ignorance of the plainest principles of physical science,
+made him see something out of the ordinary in the flight
+of a waterfowl or the song of a skylark. He complained
+that he could HEAR it, but not SEE it--a phenomenon too
+familiar to the scientific observer to occasion any
+comment.
+
+In such a state of mind the most inconsequential inferences
+were drawn. One said that the brightness of the dawn--a fact
+easily explained by the diurnal motion of the globe--showed
+him that his soul was immortal. He asserted further that he
+had, at an earlier period of his life, trailed bright clouds
+behind him. This was absurd.
+
+With the disturbance thus set up in the nervous system
+were coupled, in many instances, mental aberrations,
+particularly in regard to pecuniary matters. "Give me
+not silk, nor rich attire," pleaded one poet of the period
+to the British public, "nor gold nor jewels rare." Here
+was an evident hallucination that the writer was to become
+the recipient of an enormous secret subscription. Indeed,
+the earnest desire NOT to be given gold was a recurrent
+characteristic of the poetic temperament. The repugnance
+to accept even a handful of gold was generally accompanied
+by a desire for a draught of pure water or a night's rest.
+
+It is pleasing to turn from this excessive sentimentality
+of thought and speech to the practical and concise diction
+of our time. We have learned to express ourselves with
+equal force, but greater simplicity. To illustrate this
+I have gathered from the poets of the earlier generation
+and from the prose writers of to-day parallel passages
+that may be fairly set in contrast. Here, for example,
+is a passage from the poet Grey, still familiar to
+scholars:
+
+   "Can storied urn or animated bust
+   Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?
+   Can honour's voice invoke the silent dust
+   Or flattery soothe the dull cold ear of death?"
+
+Precisely similar in thought, though different in form,
+is the more modern presentation found in Huxley's
+Physiology:
+
+"Whether after the moment of death the ventricles of the
+heart can be again set in movement by the artificial
+stimulus of oxygen, is a question to which we must impose
+a decided negative."
+
+How much simpler, and yet how far superior to Grey's
+elaborate phraseology! Huxley has here seized the central
+point of the poet's thought, and expressed it with the
+dignity and precision of exact science.
+
+I cannot refrain, even at the risk of needless iteration,
+from quoting a further example. It is taken from the poet
+Burns. The original dialect being written in inverted
+hiccoughs, is rather difficult to reproduce. It describes
+the scene attendant upon the return of a cottage labourer
+to his home on Saturday night:
+
+   "The cheerfu' supper done, wi' serious face
+   They round the ingle form in a circle wide;
+   The sire turns o'er, wi' patriarchal grace,
+   The big ha' Bible, ance his father's pride:
+   His bonnet rev'rently is laid aside,
+   His lyart haffets wearing thin an' bare:
+   Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide,
+   He wales a portion wi' judeecious care."
+
+Now I find almost the same scene described in more apt
+phraseology in the police news of the Dumfries Chronicle
+(October 3, 1909), thus: "It appears that the prisoner
+had returned to his domicile at the usual hour, and,
+after partaking of a hearty meal, had seated himself on
+his oaken settle, for the ostensible purpose of reading
+the Bible. It was while so occupied that his arrest was
+effected." With the trifling exception that Burns omits
+all mention of the arrest, for which, however, the whole
+tenor of the poem gives ample warrant, the two accounts
+are almost identical.
+
+In all that I have thus said I do not wish to be
+misunderstood. Believing, as I firmly do, that the poet
+is destined to become extinct, I am not one of those who
+would accelerate his extinction. The time has not yet
+come for remedial legislation, or the application of the
+criminal law. Even in obstinate cases where pronounced
+delusions in reference to plants, animals, and natural
+phenomena are seen to exist, it is better that we should
+do nothing that might occasion a mistaken remorse. The
+inevitable natural evolution which is thus shaping the
+mould of human thought may safely be left to its own
+course.
+
+
+
+
+Self-made Men
+
+They were both what we commonly call successful business
+men--men with well-fed faces, heavy signet rings on
+fingers like sausages, and broad, comfortable waistcoats,
+a yard and a half round the equator. They were seated
+opposite each other at a table of a first-class restaurant,
+and had fallen into conversation while waiting to give
+their order to the waiter. Their talk had drifted back
+to their early days and how each had made his start in
+life when he first struck New York.
+
+"I tell you what, Jones," one of them was saying, "I
+shall never forget my first few years in this town. By
+George, it was pretty uphill work! Do you know, sir, when
+I first struck this place, I hadn't more than fifteen
+cents to my name, hadn't a rag except what I stood up
+in, and all the place I had to sleep in--you won't
+believe it, but it's a gospel fact just the same--was an
+empty tar barrel. No, sir," he went on, leaning back and
+closing up his eyes into an expression of infinite
+experience, "no, sir, a fellow accustomed to luxury like
+you has simply no idea what sleeping out in a tar barrel
+and all that kind of thing is like."
+
+"My dear Robinson," the other man rejoined briskly, "if
+you imagine I've had no experience of hardship of that
+sort, you never made a bigger mistake in your life. Why,
+when I first walked into this town I hadn't a cent, sir,
+not a cent, and as for lodging, all the place I had for
+months and months was an old piano box up a lane, behind
+a factory. Talk about hardship, I guess I had it pretty
+rough! You take a fellow that's used to a good warm tar
+barrel and put him into a piano box for a night or two,
+and you'll see mighty soon--"
+
+"My dear fellow," Robinson broke in with some irritation,
+"you merely show that you don't know what a tar barrel's
+like. Why, on winter nights, when you'd be shut in there
+in your piano box just as snug as you please, I used to
+lie awake shivering, with the draught fairly running in
+at the bunghole at the back."
+
+"Draught!" sneered the other man, with a provoking laugh,
+"draught! Don't talk to me about draughts. This box I
+speak of had a whole darned plank off it, right on the
+north side too. I used to sit there studying in the
+evenings, and the snow would blow in a foot deep. And
+yet, sir," he continued more quietly, "though I know
+you'll not believe it, I don't mind admitting that some
+of the happiest days of my life were spent in that same
+old box. Ah, those were good old times! Bright, innocent
+days, I can tell you. I'd wake up there in the mornings
+and fairly shout with high spirits. Of course, you may
+not be able to stand that kind of life--"
+
+"Not stand it!" cried Robinson fiercely; "me not stand
+it! By gad! I'm made for it. I just wish I had a taste
+of the old life again for a while. And as for innocence!
+Well, I'll bet you you weren't one-tenth as innocent as
+I was; no, nor one-fifth, nor one-third! What a grand
+old life it was! You'll swear this is a darned lie and
+refuse to believe it--but I can remember evenings when
+I'd have two or three fellows in, and we'd sit round and
+play pedro by a candle half the night."
+
+"Two or three!" laughed Jones; "why, my dear fellow, I've
+known half a dozen of us to sit down to supper in my
+piano box, and have a game of pedro afterwards; yes, and
+charades and forfeits, and every other darned thing.
+Mighty good suppers they were too! By Jove, Robinson,
+you fellows round this town who have ruined your digestions
+with high living, have no notion of the zest with which
+a man can sit down to a few potato peelings, or a bit of
+broken pie crust, or--"
+
+"Talk about hard food," interrupted the other, "I guess
+I know all about that. Many's the time I've breakfasted
+off a little cold porridge that somebody was going to
+throw away from a back-door, or that I've gone round to
+a livery stable and begged a little bran mash that they
+intended for the pigs. I'll venture to say I've eaten
+more hog's food--"
+
+"Hog's food!" shouted Robinson, striking his fist savagely
+on the table, "I tell you hog's food suits me better than--"
+
+He stopped speaking with a sudden grunt of surprise as
+the waiter appeared with the question:
+
+"What may I bring you for dinner, gentlemen?"
+
+"Dinner!" said Jones, after a moment of silence, "dinner!
+Oh, anything, nothing--I never care what I eat--give me
+a little cold porridge, if you've got it, or a chunk of
+salt pork--anything you like, it's all the same to me."
+
+The waiter turned with an impassive face to Robinson.
+
+"You can bring me some of that cold porridge too," he
+said, with a defiant look at Jones; "yesterday's, if you
+have it, and a few potato peelings and a glass of skim
+milk."
+
+There was a pause. Jones sat back in his chair and looked
+hard across at Robinson. For some moments the two men
+gazed into each other's eyes with a stern, defiant
+intensity. Then Robinson turned slowly round in his seat
+and beckoned to the waiter, who was moving off with the
+muttered order on his lips.
+
+"Here, waiter," he said with a savage scowl, "I guess
+I'll change that order a little. Instead of that cold
+porridge I'll take--um, yes--a little hot partridge. And
+you might as well bring me an oyster or two on the half
+shell, and a mouthful of soup (mock-turtle, consomme,
+anything), and perhaps you might fetch along a dab of
+fish, and a little peck of Stilton, and a grape, or a
+walnut."
+
+The waiter turned to Jones.
+
+"I guess I'll take the same," he said simply, and added;
+"and you might bring a quart of champagne at the same
+time."
+
+And nowadays, when Jones and Robinson meet, the memory
+of the tar barrel and the piano box is buried as far out
+of sight as a home for the blind under a landslide.
+
+
+
+
+A Model Dialogue
+
+In which is shown how the drawing-room juggler may be
+permanently cured of his card trick.
+
+The drawing-room juggler, having slyly got hold of the
+pack of cards at the end of the game of whist, says:
+
+"Ever see any card tricks? Here's rather a good one; pick
+a card."
+
+"Thank you, I don't want a card."
+
+"No, but just pick one, any one you like, and I'll tell
+which one you pick."
+
+"You'll tell who?"
+
+"No, no; I mean, I'll know which it is don't you see? Go
+on now, pick a card."
+
+"Any one I like?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Any colour at all?"
+
+"Yes, yes."
+
+"Any suit?"
+
+"Oh, yes; do go on."
+
+"Well, let me see, I'll--pick--the--ace of spades."
+
+"Great Caesar! I mean you are to pull a card out of the
+pack."
+
+"Oh, to pull it out of the pack! Now I understand. Hand
+me the pack. All right--I've got it."
+
+"Have you picked one?"
+
+"Yes, it's the three of hearts. Did you know it?"
+
+"Hang it! Don't tell me like that. You spoil the thing.
+Here, try again. Pick a card."
+
+"All right, I've got it."
+
+"Put it back in the pack. Thanks. (Shuffle, shuffle,
+shuffle--flip)--There, is that it?" (triumphantly).
+
+"I don't know. I lost sight of it."
+
+"Lost sight of it! Confound it, you have to look at it
+and see what it is."
+
+"Oh, you want me to look at the front of it!"
+
+"Why, of course! Now then, pick a card."
+
+"All right. I've picked it. Go ahead."
+(Shuffle, shuffle, shuffle--flip.)
+
+"Say, confound you, did you put that card back in the
+pack?"
+
+"Why, no. I kept it."
+
+"Holy Moses! Listen. Pick--a--card--just one--look at
+it--see what it is--then put it back--do you understand?"
+
+"Oh, perfectly. Only I don't see how you are ever going
+to do it. You must be awfully clever."
+
+(Shuffle, shuffle, shuffle--flip.)
+
+"There you are; that's your card, now, isn't it?" (This
+is the supreme moment.)
+
+"NO. THAT IS NOT MY CARD." (This is a flat lie, but Heaven
+will pardon you for it.)
+
+"Not that card!!!! Say--just hold on a second. Here, now,
+watch what you're at this time. I can do this cursed
+thing, mind you, every time. I've done it on father, on
+mother, and on every one that's ever come round our place.
+Pick a card. (Shuffle, shuffle, shuffle--flip, bang.)
+There, that's your card."
+
+"NO. I AM SORRY. THAT IS NOT MY CARD. But won't you try
+it again? Please do. Perhaps you are a little excited--I'm
+afraid I was rather stupid. Won't you go and sit quietly
+by yourself on the back verandah for half an hour and
+then try? You have to go home? Oh, I'm so sorry. It must
+be such an awfully clever little trick. Good night!"
+
+
+
+
+Back to the Bush
+
+I have a friend called Billy, who has the Bush Mania. By
+trade he is a doctor, but I do not think that he needs
+to sleep out of doors. In ordinary things his mind appears
+sound. Over the tops of his gold-rimmed spectacles, as
+he bends forward to speak to you, there gleams nothing
+but amiability and kindliness. Like all the rest of us
+he is, or was until he forgot it all, an extremely
+well-educated man.
+
+I am aware of no criminal strain in his blood. Yet Billy
+is in reality hopelessly unbalanced. He has the Mania of
+the Open Woods.
+
+Worse than that, he is haunted with the desire to drag
+his friends with him into the depths of the Bush.
+
+Whenever we meet he starts to talk about it.
+
+Not long ago I met him in the club.
+
+"I wish," he said, "you'd let me take you clear away up
+the Gatineau."
+
+"Yes, I wish I would, I don't think," I murmured to
+myself, but I humoured him and said:
+
+"How do we go, Billy, in a motor-car or by train?"
+
+"No, we paddle."
+
+"And is it up-stream all the way?"
+
+"Oh, yes," Billy said enthusiastically.
+
+"And how many days do we paddle all day to get up?"
+
+"Six."
+
+"Couldn't we do it in less?"
+
+"Yes," Billy answered, feeling that I was entering into
+the spirit of the thing, "if we start each morning just
+before daylight and paddle hard till moonlight, we could
+do it in five days and a half."
+
+"Glorious! and are there portages?"
+
+"Lots of them."
+
+"And at each of these do I carry two hundred pounds of
+stuff up a hill on my back?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And will there be a guide, a genuine, dirty-looking
+Indian guide?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And can I sleep next to him?"
+
+"Oh, yes, if you want to."
+
+"And when we get to the top, what is there?"
+
+"Well, we go over the height of land."
+
+"Oh, we do, do we? And is the height of land all rock
+and about three hundred yards up-hill? And do I carry a
+barrel of flour up it? And does it roll down and crush
+me on the other side? Look here, Billy, this trip is a
+great thing, but it is too luxurious for me. If you will
+have me paddled up the river in a large iron canoe with
+an awning, carried over the portages in a sedan-chair,
+taken across the height of land in a palanquin or a
+howdah, and lowered down the other side in a derrick,
+I'll go. Short of that, the thing would be too fattening."
+
+Billy was discouraged and left me. But he has since
+returned repeatedly to the attack.
+
+He offers to take me to the head-waters of the Batiscan.
+I am content at the foot.
+
+He wants us to go to the sources of the Attahwapiscat.
+I don't.
+
+He says I ought to see the grand chutes of the Kewakasis.
+Why should I?
+
+I have made Billy a counter-proposition that we strike
+through the Adirondacks (in the train) to New York, from
+there portage to Atlantic City, then to Washington,
+carrying our own grub (in the dining-car), camp there a
+few days (at the Willard), and then back, I to return by
+train and Billy on foot with the outfit.
+
+The thing is still unsettled.
+
+Billy, of course, is only one of thousands that have got
+this mania. And the autumn is the time when it rages at
+its worst.
+
+Every day there move northward trains, packed full of
+lawyers, bankers, and brokers, headed for the bush. They
+are dressed up to look like pirates. They wear slouch
+hats, flannel shirts, and leather breeches with belts.
+They could afford much better clothes than these, but
+they won't use them. I don't know where they get these
+clothes. I think the railroad lends them out. They have
+guns between their knees and big knives at their hips.
+They smoke the worst tobacco they can find, and they
+carry ten gallons of alcohol per man in the baggage car.
+
+In the intervals of telling lies to one another they read
+the railroad pamphlets about hunting. This kind of
+literature is deliberately and fiendishly contrived to
+infuriate their mania. I know all about these pamphlets
+because I write them. I once, for instance, wrote up,
+from imagination, a little place called Dog Lake at the
+end of a branch line. The place had failed as a settlement,
+and the railroad had decided to turn it into a hunting
+resort. I did the turning. I think I did it rather well,
+rechristening the lake and stocking the place with suitable
+varieties of game. The pamphlet ran like this.
+
+"The limpid waters of Lake Owatawetness (the name,
+according to the old Indian legends of the place, signifies,
+The Mirror of the Almighty) abound with every known
+variety of fish. Near to its surface, so close that the
+angler may reach out his hand and stroke them, schools
+of pike, pickerel, mackerel, doggerel, and chickerel
+jostle one another in the water. They rise instantaneously
+to the bait and swim gratefully ashore holding it in
+their mouths. In the middle depth of the waters of the
+lake, the sardine, the lobster, the kippered herring,
+the anchovy and other tinned varieties of fish disport
+themselves with evident gratification, while even lower
+in the pellucid depths the dog-fish, the hog-fish, the
+log-fish, and the sword-fish whirl about in never-ending
+circles.
+
+"Nor is Lake Owatawetness merely an Angler's Paradise.
+Vast forests of primeval pine slope to the very shores
+of the lake, to which descend great droves of bears--brown,
+green, and bear-coloured--while as the shades of evening
+fall, the air is loud with the lowing of moose, cariboo,
+antelope, cantelope, musk-oxes, musk-rats, and other
+graminivorous mammalia of the forest. These enormous
+quadrumana generally move off about 10.30 p.m., from
+which hour until 11.45 p.m. the whole shore is reserved
+for bison and buffalo.
+
+"After midnight hunters who so desire it can be chased
+through the woods, for any distance and at any speed they
+select, by jaguars, panthers, cougars, tigers, and jackals
+whose ferocity is reputed to be such that they will tear
+the breeches off a man with their teeth in their eagerness
+to sink their fangs in his palpitating flesh. Hunters,
+attention! Do not miss such attractions as these!"
+
+I have seen men--quiet, reputable, well-shaved men--
+reading that pamphlet of mine in the rotundas of hotels,
+with their eyes blazing with excitement. I think it is
+the jaguar attraction that hits them the hardest, because
+I notice them rub themselves sympathetically with their
+hands while they read.
+
+Of course, you can imagine the effect of this sort of
+literature on the brains of men fresh from their offices,
+and dressed out as pirates.
+
+They just go crazy and stay crazy.
+
+Just watch them when they get into the bush.
+
+Notice that well-to-do stockbroker crawling about on his
+stomach in the underbrush, with his spectacles shining
+like gig-lamps. What is he doing? He is after a cariboo
+that isn't there. He is "stalking" it. With his stomach.
+Of course, away down in his heart he knows that the
+cariboo isn't there and never was; but that man read my
+pamphlet and went crazy. He can't help it: he's GOT to
+stalk something. Mark him as he crawls along; see him
+crawl through a thimbleberry bush (very quietly so that
+the cariboo won't hear the noise of the prickles going
+into him), then through a bee's nest, gently and slowly,
+so that the cariboo will not take fright when the bees
+are stinging him. Sheer woodcraft! Yes, mark him. Mark
+him any way you like. Go up behind him and paint a blue
+cross on the seat of his pants as he crawls. He'll never
+notice. He thinks he's a hunting dog. Yet this is the
+man who laughs at his little son of ten for crawling
+round under the dining-room table with a mat over his
+shoulders, and pretending to be a bear.
+
+Now see these other men in camp.
+
+Someone has told them--I think I first started the idea
+in my pamphlet--that the thing is to sleep on a pile of
+hemlock branches. I think I told them to listen to the
+wind sowing (you know the word I mean), sowing and crooning
+in the giant pines. So there they are upside-down, doubled
+up on a couch of green spikes that would have killed St.
+Sebastian. They stare up at the sky with blood-shot,
+restless eyes, waiting for the crooning to begin. And
+there isn't a sow in sight.
+
+Here is another man, ragged and with a six days' growth
+of beard, frying a piece of bacon on a stick over a little
+fire. Now what does he think he is? The CHEF of the
+Waldorf Astoria? Yes, he does, and what's more he thinks
+that that miserable bit of bacon, cut with a tobacco
+knife from a chunk of meat that lay six days in the rain,
+is fit to eat. What's more, he'll eat it. So will the
+rest. They're all crazy together.
+
+There's another man, the Lord help him who thinks he has
+the "knack" of being a carpenter. He is hammering up
+shelves to a tree. Till the shelves fall down he thinks
+he is a wizard. Yet this is the same man who swore at
+his wife for asking him to put up a shelf in the back
+kitchen. "How the blazes," he asked, "could he nail the
+damn thing up? Did she think he was a plumber?"
+
+After all, never mind.
+
+Provided they are happy up there, let them stay.
+
+Personally, I wouldn't mind if they didn't come back and
+lie about it. They get back to the city dead fagged for
+want of sleep, sogged with alcohol, bitten brown by the
+bush-flies, trampled on by the moose and chased through
+the brush by bears and skunks--and they have the nerve
+to say that they like it.
+
+Sometimes I think they do.
+
+Men are only animals anyway. They like to get out into
+the woods and growl round at night and feel something
+bite them.
+
+Only why haven't they the imagination to be able to do
+the same thing with less fuss? Why not take their coats
+and collars off in the office and crawl round on the
+floor and growl at one another. It would be just as good.
+
+
+
+
+Reflections on Riding
+
+The writing of this paper has been inspired by a debate
+recently held at the literary society of my native town
+on the question, "Resolved: that the bicycle is a nobler
+animal than the horse." In order to speak for the negative
+with proper authority, I have spent some weeks in completely
+addicting myself to the use of the horse. I find that
+the difference between the horse and the bicycle is
+greater than I had supposed.
+
+The horse is entirely covered with hair; the bicycle is
+not entirely covered with hair, except the '89 model they
+are using in Idaho.
+
+In riding a horse the performer finds that the pedals in
+which he puts his feet will not allow of a good circular
+stroke. He will observe, however, that there is a saddle
+in which--especially while the horse is trotting--he is
+expected to seat himself from time to time. But it is
+simpler to ride standing up, with the feet in the pedals.
+
+There are no handles to a horse, but the 1910 model has
+a string to each side of its face for turning its head
+when there is anything you want it to see.
+
+Coasting on a good horse is superb, but should be under
+control. I have known a horse to suddenly begin to coast
+with me about two miles from home, coast down the main
+street of my native town at a terrific rate, and finally
+coast through a plantoon of the Salvation Army into its
+livery stable.
+
+I cannot honestly deny that it takes a good deal of
+physical courage to ride a horse. This, however, I have.
+I get it at about forty cents a flask, and take it as
+required.
+
+I find that in riding a horse up the long street of a
+country town, it is not well to proceed at a trot. It
+excites unkindly comment. It is better to let the horse
+walk the whole distance. This may be made to seem natural
+by turning half round in the saddle with the hand on the
+horse's back, and gazing intently about two miles up the
+road. It then appears that you are the first in of about
+fourteen men.
+
+Since learning to ride, I have taken to noticing the
+things that people do on horseback in books. Some of
+these I can manage, but most of them are entirely beyond
+me. Here, for instance, is a form of equestrian performance
+that every reader will recognize and for which I have
+only a despairing admiration:
+
+"With a hasty gesture of farewell, the rider set spurs
+to his horse and disappeared in a cloud of dust."
+
+With a little practice in the matter of adjustment, I
+think I could set spurs to any size of horse, but I could
+never disappear in a cloud of dust--at least, not with
+any guarantee of remaining disappeared when the dust
+cleared away.
+
+Here, however, is one that I certainly can do:
+
+"The bridle-rein dropped from Lord Everard's listless
+hand, and, with his head bowed upon his bosom, he suffered
+his horse to move at a foot's pace up the sombre avenue.
+Deep in thought, he heeded not the movement of the steed
+which bore him."
+
+That is, he looked as if he didn't; but in my case Lord
+Everard has his eye on the steed pretty closely, just
+the same.
+
+This next I am doubtful about:
+
+"To horse! to horse!" cried the knight, and leaped into
+the saddle.
+
+I think I could manage it if it read:
+
+"To horse!" cried the knight, and, snatching a step-ladder
+from the hands of his trusty attendant, he rushed into
+the saddle.
+
+As a concluding remark, I may mention that my experience
+of riding has thrown a very interesting sidelight upon
+a rather puzzling point in history. It is recorded of
+the famous Henry the Second that he was "almost constantly
+in the saddle, and of so restless a disposition that he
+never sat down, even at meals." I had hitherto been unable
+to understand Henry's idea about his meals, but I think
+I can appreciate it now.
+
+
+
+
+Saloonio
+
+A STUDY IN SHAKESPEAREAN CRITICISM
+
+They say that young men fresh from college are pretty
+positive about what they know. But from my own experience
+of life, I should say that if you take a comfortable,
+elderly man who hasn't been near a college for about
+twenty years, who has been pretty liberally fed and dined
+ever since, who measures about fifty inches around the
+circumference, and has a complexion like a cranberry by
+candlelight, you will find that there is a degree of
+absolute certainty about what he thinks he knows that
+will put any young man to shame. I am specially convinced
+of this from the case of my friend Colonel Hogshead, a
+portly, choleric gentleman who made a fortune in the
+cattle-trade out in Wyoming, and who, in his later days,
+has acquired a chronic idea that the plays of Shakespeare
+are the one subject upon which he is most qualified to
+speak personally.
+
+He came across me the other evening as I was sitting by
+the fire in the club sitting-room looking over the leaves
+of The Merchant of Venice, and began to hold forth to me
+about the book.
+
+"Merchant of Venice, eh? There's a play for you, sir!
+There's genius! Wonderful, sir, wonderful! You take the
+characters in that play and where will you find anything
+like them? You take Antonio, take Sherlock, take Saloonio--"
+
+"Saloonio, Colonel?" I interposed mildly, "aren't you
+making a mistake? There's a Bassanio and a Salanio in
+the play, but I don't think there's any Saloonio, is
+there?"
+
+For a moment Colonel Hogshead's eye became misty with
+doubt, but he was not the man to admit himself in error:
+
+"Tut, tut! young man," he said with a frown, "don't skim
+through your books in that way. No Saloonio? Why, of
+course there's a Saloonio!"
+
+"But I tell you, Colonel," I rejoined, "I've just been
+reading the play and studying it, and I know there's no
+such character--"
+
+"Nonsense, sir, nonsense!" said the Colonel, "why he
+comes in all through; don't tell me, young man, I've read
+that play myself. Yes, and seen it played, too, out in
+Wyoming, before you were born, by fellers, sir, that
+could act. No Saloonio, indeed! why, who is it that is
+Antonio's friend all through and won't leave him when
+Bassoonio turns against him? Who rescues Clarissa from
+Sherlock, and steals the casket of flesh from the Prince
+of Aragon? Who shouts at the Prince of Morocco, 'Out,
+out, you damned candlestick'? Who loads up the jury in
+the trial scene and fixes the doge? No Saloonio! By gad!
+in my opinion, he's the most important character in the
+play--"
+
+"Colonel Hogshead," I said very firmly, "there isn't any
+Saloonio and you know it."
+
+But the old man had got fairly started on whatever dim
+recollection had given birth to Saloonio; the character
+seemed to grow more and more luminous in the Colonel's
+mind, and he continued with increasing animation:
+
+"I'll just tell you what Saloonio is: he's a type.
+Shakespeare means him to embody the type of the perfect
+Italian gentleman. He's an idea, that's what he is, he's
+a symbol, he's a unit--"
+
+Meanwhile I had been searching among the leaves of the
+play. "Look here," I said, "here's the list of the Dramatis
+Personae. There's no Saloonio there."
+
+But this didn't dismay the Colonel one atom. "Why, of
+course there isn't," he said. "You don't suppose you'd
+find Saloonio there! That's the whole art of it! That's
+Shakespeare! That's the whole gist of it! He's kept clean
+out of the Personae--gives him scope, gives him a free
+hand, makes him more of a type than ever. Oh, it's a
+subtle thing, sir, the dramatic art!" continued the
+Colonel, subsiding into quiet reflection; "it takes a
+feller quite a time to get right into Shakespeare's mind
+and see what he's at all the time."
+
+I began to see that there was no use in arguing any
+further with the old man. I left him with the idea that
+the lapse of a little time would soften his views on
+Saloonio. But I had not reckoned on the way in which old
+men hang on to a thing. Colonel Hogshead quite took up
+Saloonio. From that time on Saloonio became the theme of
+his constant conversation. He was never tired of discussing
+the character of Saloonio, the wonderful art of the
+dramatist in creating him, Saloonio's relation to modern
+life, Saloonio's attitude toward women, the ethical
+significance of Saloonio, Saloonio as compared with
+Hamlet, Hamlet as compared with Saloonio--and so on,
+endlessly. And the more he looked into Saloonio, the more
+he saw in him.
+
+Saloonio seemed inexhaustible. There were new sides to
+him--new phases at every turn. The Colonel even read over
+the play, and finding no mention of Saloonio's name in
+it, he swore that the books were not the same books they
+had had out in Wyoming; that the whole part had been cut
+clean out to suit the book to the infernal public schools,
+Saloonio's language being--at any rate, as the Colonel
+quoted it--undoubtedly a trifle free. Then the Colonel
+took to annotating his book at the side with such remarks
+as, "Enter Saloonio," or "A tucket sounds; enter Saloonio,
+on the arm of the Prince of Morocco." When there was no
+reasonable excuse for bringing Saloonio on the stage the
+Colonel swore that he was concealed behind the arras, or
+feasting within with the doge.
+
+But he got satisfaction at last. He had found that there
+was nobody in our part of the country who knew how to
+put a play of Shakespeare on the stage, and took a trip
+to New York to see Sir Henry Irving and Miss Terry do
+the play. The Colonel sat and listened all through with
+his face just beaming with satisfaction, and when the
+curtain fell at the close of Irving's grand presentation
+of the play, he stood up in his seat, and cheered and
+yelled to his friends: "That's it! That's him! Didn't
+you see that man that came on the stage all the time and
+sort of put the whole play through, though you couldn't
+understand a word he said? Well, that's him! That's
+Saloonio!"
+
+
+
+
+Half-hours with the Poets
+
+I.--MR. WORDSWORTH AND THE LITTLE COTTAGE GIRL.
+
+   "I met a little cottage girl,
+   She was eight years old she said,
+   Her hair was thick with many a curl
+   That clustered round her head."
+
+   WORDSWORTH.
+
+This is what really happened.
+
+Over the dreary downs of his native Cumberland the aged
+laureate was wandering with bowed head and countenance
+of sorrow.
+
+Times were bad with the old man.
+
+In the south pocket of his trousers, as he set his face
+to the north, jingled but a few odd coins and a cheque
+for St. Leon water. Apparently his cup of bitterness was
+full.
+
+In the distance a child moved--a child in form, yet the
+deep lines upon her face bespoke a countenance prematurely
+old.
+
+The poet espied, pursued and overtook the infant. He
+observed that apparently she drew her breath lightly and
+felt her life in every limb, and that presumably her
+acquaintance with death was of the most superficial
+character.
+
+"I must sit awhile and ponder on that child," murmured
+the poet. So he knocked her down with his walking-stick
+and seating himself upon her, he pondered.
+
+Long he sat thus in thought. "His heart is heavy," sighed
+the child.
+
+At length he drew forth a note-book and pencil and prepared
+to write upon his knee. "Now then, my dear young friend,"
+he said, addressing the elfin creature, "I want those
+lines upon your face. Are you seven?"
+
+"Yes, we are seven," said the girl sadly, and added, "I
+know what you want. You are going to question me about
+my afflicted family. You are Mr. Wordsworth, and you are
+collecting mortuary statistics for the Cottagers' Edition
+of the Penny Encyclopaedia."
+
+"You are eight years old?" asked the bard.
+
+"I suppose so," answered she. "I have been eight years
+old for years and years."
+
+"And you know nothing of death, of course?" said the poet
+cheerfully.
+
+"How can I?" answered the child.
+
+"Now then," resumed the venerable William, "let us get
+to business. Name your brothers and sisters."
+
+"Let me see," began the child wearily; "there was Rube
+and Ike, two I can't think of, and John and Jane."
+
+"You must not count John and Jane," interrupted the bard
+reprovingly; "they're dead, you know, so that doesn't
+make seven."
+
+"I wasn't counting them, but perhaps I added up wrongly,"
+said the child; "and will you please move your overshoe
+off my neck?"
+
+"Pardon," said the old man. "A nervous trick, I have been
+absorbed; indeed, the exigency of the metre almost demands
+my doubling up my feet. To continue, however; which died
+first?"
+
+"The first to go was little Jane," said the child.
+
+"She lay moaning in bed, I presume?"
+
+"In bed she moaning lay."
+
+"What killed her?"
+
+"Insomnia," answered the girl. "The gaiety of our cottage
+life, previous to the departure of our elder brothers
+for Conway, and the constant field-sports in which she
+indulged with John, proved too much for a frame never
+too robust."
+
+"You express yourself well," said the poet. "Now, in
+regard to your unfortunate brother, what was the effect
+upon him in the following winter of the ground being
+white with snow and your being able to run and slide?"
+
+"My brother John was forced to go," answered she. "We
+have been at a loss to understand the cause of his death.
+We fear that the dazzling glare of the newly fallen snow,
+acting upon a restless brain, may have led him to a fatal
+attempt to emulate my own feats upon the ice. And, oh,
+sir," the child went on, "speak gently of poor Jane. You
+may rub it into John all you like; we always let him
+slide."
+
+"Very well," said the bard, "and allow me, in conclusion,
+one rather delicate question: Do you ever take your little
+porringer?"
+
+"Oh, yes," answered the child frankly--
+
+   "'Quite often after sunset,
+   When all is light and fair,
+   I take my little porringer'--
+
+"I can't quite remember what I do after that, but I know
+that I like it."
+
+"That is immaterial," said Wordsworth. "I can say that
+you take your little porringer neat, or with bitters, or
+in water after every meal. As long as I can state that
+you take a little porringer regularly, but never to
+excess, the public is satisfied. And now," rising from
+his seat, "I will not detain you any longer. Here is
+sixpence--or stay," he added hastily, "here is a cheque
+for St. Leon water. Your information has been most
+valuable, and I shall work it, for all I am Wordsworth."
+With these words the aged poet bowed deferentially to
+the child and sauntered off in the direction of the Duke
+of Cumberland's Arms, with his eyes on the ground, as if
+looking for the meanest flower that blows itself.
+
+
+II:--HOW TENNYSON KILLED THE MAY QUEEN
+
+"If you're waking call me early, call me early, mother dear."
+
+
+PART I
+
+As soon as the child's malady had declared itself the
+afflicted parents of the May Queen telegraphed to Tennyson,
+"Our child gone crazy on subject of early rising, could
+you come and write some poetry about her?"
+
+Alfred, always prompt to fill orders in writing from the
+country, came down on the evening train. The old cottager
+greeted the poet warmly, and began at once to speak of
+the state of his unfortunate daughter.
+
+"She was took queer in May," he said, "along of a sort
+of bee that the young folks had; she ain't been just
+right since; happen you might do summat."
+
+With these words he opened the door of an inner room.
+
+The girl lay in feverish slumber. Beside her bed was an
+alarm-clock set for half-past three. Connected with the
+clock was an ingenious arrangement of a falling brick
+with a string attached to the child's toe.
+
+At the entrance of the visitor she started up in bed.
+"Whoop," she yelled, "I am to be Queen of the May, mother,
+ye-e!"
+
+Then perceiving Tennyson in the doorway, "If that's a
+caller," she said, "tell him to call me early."
+
+The shock caused the brick to fall. In the subsequent
+confusion Alfred modestly withdrew to the sitting-room.
+
+"At this rate," he chuckled, "I shall not have long to
+wait. A few weeks of that strain will finish her."
+
+
+PART II
+
+Six months had passed.
+
+It was now mid-winter.
+
+And still the girl lived. Her vitality appeared
+inexhaustible.
+
+She got up earlier and earlier. She now rose yesterday
+afternoon.
+
+At intervals she seemed almost sane, and spoke in a most
+pathetic manner of her grave and the probability of the
+sun shining on it early in the morning, and her mother
+walking on it later in the day. At other times her malady
+would seize her, and she would snatch the brick off the
+string and throw it fiercely at Tennyson. Once, in an
+uncontrollable fit of madness, she gave her sister Effie
+a half-share in her garden tools and an interest in a
+box of mignonette.
+
+The poet stayed doggedly on. In the chill of the morning
+twilight he broke the ice in his water-basin and cursed
+the girl. But he felt that he had broken the ice and he
+stayed.
+
+On the whole, life at the cottage, though rugged, was
+not cheerless. In the long winter evenings they would
+gather around a smoking fire of peat, while Tennyson read
+aloud the Idylls of the King to the rude old cottager.
+Not to show his rudeness, the old man kept awake by
+sitting on a tin-tack. This also kept his mind on the
+right tack. The two found that they had much in common,
+especially the old cottager. They called each other
+"Alfred" and "Hezekiah" now.
+
+
+PART III
+
+Time moved on and spring came.
+
+Still the girl baffled the poet.
+
+"I thought to pass away before," she would say with a
+mocking grin, "but yet alive I am, Alfred, alive I am."
+
+Tennyson was fast losing hope.
+
+Worn out with early rising, they engaged a retired
+Pullman-car porter to take up his quarters, and being a
+negro his presence added a touch of colour to their life.
+
+The poet also engaged a neighbouring divine at fifty
+cents an evening to read to the child the best hundred
+books, with explanations. The May Queen tolerated him,
+and used to like to play with his silver hair, but
+protested that he was prosy.
+
+At the end of his resources the poet resolved upon
+desperate measures.
+
+He chose an evening when the cottager and his wife were
+out at a dinner-party.
+
+At nightfall Tennyson and his accomplices entered the
+girl's room.
+
+She defended herself savagely with her brick, but was
+overpowered.
+
+The negro seated himself upon her chest, while the
+clergyman hastily read a few verses about the comfort of
+early rising at the last day.
+
+As he concluded, the poet drove his pen into her eye.
+
+"Last call!" cried the negro porter triumphantly.
+
+
+III.--OLD MR. LONGFELLOW ON BOARD THE HESPERUS.
+
+  "It was the schooner Hesperus that sailed the wintry sea,
+  And the skipper had taken his little daughter to bear
+        him company."--LONGFELLOW.
+
+There were but three people in the cabin party of the
+Hesperus: old Mr. Longfellow, the skipper, and the
+skipper's daughter.
+
+The skipper was much attached to the child, owing to the
+singular whiteness of her skin and the exceptionally
+limpid blue of her eyes; she had hitherto remained on
+shore to fill lucrative engagements as albino lady in a
+circus.
+
+This time, however, her father had taken her with him
+for company. The girl was an endless source of amusement
+to the skipper and the crew. She constantly got up games
+of puss-in-the-corner, forfeits, and Dumb Crambo with
+her father and Mr. Longfellow, and made Scripture puzzles
+and geographical acrostics for the men.
+
+Old Mr. Longfellow was taking the voyage to restore his
+shattered nerves. From the first the captain disliked
+Henry. He was utterly unused to the sea and was nervous
+and fidgety in the extreme. He complained that at sea
+his genius had not a sufficient degree of latitude. Which
+was unparalleled presumption.
+
+On the evening of the storm there had been a little jar
+between Longfellow and the captain at dinner. The captain
+had emptied it several times, and was consequently in a
+reckless, quarrelsome humour.
+
+"I confess I feel somewhat apprehensive," said old Henry
+nervously, "of the state of the weather. I have had some
+conversation about it with an old gentleman on deck who
+professed to have sailed the Spanish main. He says you
+ought to put into yonder port."
+
+"I have," hiccoughed the skipper, eyeing the bottle, and
+added with a brutal laugh that "he could weather the
+roughest gale that ever wind did blow." A whole Gaelic
+society, he said, wouldn't fizz on him.
+
+Draining a final glass of grog, he rose from his chair,
+said grace, and staggered on deck.
+
+All the time the wind blew colder and louder.
+
+The billows frothed like yeast. It was a yeast wind.
+
+The evening wore on.
+
+Old Henry shuffled about the cabin in nervous misery.
+
+The skipper's daughter sat quietly at the table selecting
+verses from a Biblical clock to amuse the ship's bosun,
+who was suffering from toothache.
+
+At about ten Longfellow went to his bunk, requesting the
+girl to remain up in his cabin.
+
+For half an hour all was quiet, save the roaring of the
+winter wind.
+
+Then the girl heard the old gentleman start up in bed.
+
+"What's that bell, what's that bell?" he gasped.
+
+A minute later he emerged from his cabin wearing a cork
+jacket and trousers over his pyjamas.
+
+"Sissy," he said, "go up and ask your pop who rang that
+bell."
+
+The obedient child returned.
+
+"Please, Mr. Longfellow," she said, "pa says there weren't
+no bell."
+
+The old man sank into a chair and remained with his head
+buried in his hands.
+
+"Say," he exclaimed presently, "someone's firing guns
+and there's a glimmering light somewhere. You'd better
+go upstairs again."
+
+Again the child returned.
+
+"The crew are guessing at an acrostic, and occasionally
+they get a glimmering of it."
+
+Meantime the fury of the storm increased.
+
+The skipper had the hatches battered down.
+
+Presently Longfellow put his head out of a porthole and
+called out, "Look here, you may not care, but the cruel
+rocks are goring the sides of this boat like the horns
+of an angry bull."
+
+The brutal skipper heaved the log at him. A knot in it
+struck a plank and it glanced off.
+
+Too frightened to remain below, the poet raised one of
+the hatches by picking out the cotton batting and made
+his way on deck. He crawled to the wheel-house.
+
+The skipper stood lashed to the helm all stiff and stark.
+He bowed stiffly to the poet. The lantern gleamed through
+the gleaming snow on his fixed and glassy eyes. The man
+was hopelessly intoxicated.
+
+All the crew had disappeared. When the missile thrown by
+the captain had glanced off into the sea, they glanced
+after it and were lost.
+
+At this moment the final crash came.
+
+Something hit something. There was an awful click followed
+by a peculiar grating sound, and in less time than it
+takes to write it (unfortunately), the whole wreck was
+over.
+
+As the vessel sank, Longfellow's senses left him. When
+he reopened his eyes he was in his own bed at home, and
+the editor of his local paper was bending over him.
+
+"You have made a first-rate poem of it, Mr. Longfellow,"
+he was saying, unbending somewhat as he spoke, "and I am
+very happy to give you our cheque for a dollar and a
+quarter for it."
+
+"Your kindness checks my utterance," murmured Henry
+feebly, very feebly.
+
+
+
+
+A, B, and C
+
+THE HUMAN ELEMENT IN MATHEMATICS
+
+The student of arithmetic who has mastered the first four
+rules of his art, and successfully striven with money
+sums and fractions, finds himself confronted by an unbroken
+expanse of questions known as problems. These are short
+stories of adventure and industry with the end omitted,
+and though betraying a strong family resemblance, are
+not without a certain element of romance.
+
+The characters in the plot of a problem are three people
+called A, B, and C. The form of the question is generally
+of this sort:
+
+"A, B, and C do a certain piece of work. A can do as much
+work in one hour as B in two, or C in four. Find how long
+they work at it."
+
+Or thus:
+
+"A, B, and C are employed to dig a ditch. A can dig as
+much in one hour as B can dig in two, and B can dig twice
+as fast as C. Find how long, etc. etc."
+
+Or after this wise:
+
+"A lays a wager that he can walk faster than B or C. A
+can walk half as fast again as B, and C is only an
+indifferent walker. Find how far, and so forth."
+
+The occupations of A, B, and C are many and varied. In
+the older arithmetics they contented themselves with
+doing "a certain piece of work." This statement of the
+case however, was found too sly and mysterious, or possibly
+lacking in romantic charm. It became the fashion to define
+the job more clearly and to set them at walking matches,
+ditch-digging, regattas, and piling cord wood. At times,
+they became commercial and entered into partnership,
+having with their old mystery a "certain" capital. Above
+all they revel in motion. When they tire of
+walking-matches--A rides on horseback, or borrows a
+bicycle and competes with his weaker-minded associates
+on foot. Now they race on locomotives; now they row; or
+again they become historical and engage stage-coaches;
+or at times they are aquatic and swim. If their occupation
+is actual work they prefer to pump water into cisterns,
+two of which leak through holes in the bottom and one of
+which is water-tight. A, of course, has the good one; he
+also takes the bicycle, and the best locomotive, and the
+right of swimming with the current. Whatever they do they
+put money on it, being all three sports. A always wins.
+
+In the early chapters of the arithmetic, their identity
+is concealed under the names John, William, and Henry,
+and they wrangle over the division of marbles. In algebra
+they are often called X, Y, Z. But these are only their
+Christian names, and they are really the same people.
+
+Now to one who has followed the history of these men
+through countless pages of problems, watched them in
+their leisure hours dallying with cord wood, and seen
+their panting sides heave in the full frenzy of filling
+a cistern with a leak in it, they become something more
+than mere symbols. They appear as creatures of flesh and
+blood, living men with their own passions, ambitions,
+and aspirations like the rest of us. Let us view them in
+turn. A is a full-blooded blustering fellow, of energetic
+temperament, hot-headed and strong-willed. It is he who
+proposes everything, challenges B to work, makes the
+bets, and bends the others to his will. He is a man of
+great physical strength and phenomenal endurance. He has
+been known to walk forty-eight hours at a stretch, and
+to pump ninety-six. His life is arduous and full of peril.
+A mistake in the working of a sum may keep him digging
+a fortnight without sleep. A repeating decimal in the
+answer might kill him.
+
+B is a quiet, easy-going fellow, afraid of A and bullied
+by him, but very gentle and brotherly to little C, the
+weakling. He is quite in A's power, having lost all his
+money in bets.
+
+Poor C is an undersized, frail man, with a plaintive
+face. Constant walking, digging, and pumping has broken
+his health and ruined his nervous system. His joyless
+life has driven him to drink and smoke more than is good
+for him, and his hand often shakes as he digs ditches.
+He has not the strength to work as the others can, in
+fact, as Hamlin Smith has said, "A can do more work in
+one hour than C in four."
+
+The first time that ever I saw these men was one evening
+after a regatta. They had all been rowing in it, and it
+had transpired that A could row as much in one hour as
+B in two, or C in four. B and C had come in dead fagged
+and C was coughing badly. "Never mind, old fellow," I
+heard B say, "I'll fix you up on the sofa and get you
+some hot tea." Just then A came blustering in and shouted,
+"I say, you fellows, Hamlin Smith has shown me three
+cisterns in his garden and he says we can pump them until
+to-morrow night. I bet I can beat you both. Come on. You
+can pump in your rowing things, you know. Your cistern
+leaks a little, I think, C." I heard B growl that it was
+a dirty shame and that C was used up now, but they went,
+and presently I could tell from the sound of the water
+that A was pumping four times as fast as C.
+
+For years after that I used to see them constantly about
+town and always busy. I never heard of any of them eating
+or sleeping. Then owing to a long absence from home, I
+lost sight of them. On my return I was surprised to no
+longer find A, B, and C at their accustomed tasks; on
+inquiry I heard that work in this line was now done by
+N, M, and O, and that some people were employing for
+algebraica jobs four foreigners called Alpha, Beta, Gamma,
+and Delta.
+
+Now it chanced one day that I stumbled upon old D, in the little
+garden in front of his cottage, hoeing in the sun. D is an aged
+labouring man who used occasionally to be called in to help A,
+B, and C. "Did I know 'em, sir?" he answered, "why, I knowed 'em
+ever since they was little fellows in brackets. Master A, he
+were a fine lad, sir, though I always said, give me Master B for
+kind-heartedness-like. Many's the job as we've been on together,
+sir, though I never did no racing nor aught of that, but just
+the plain labour, as you might say. I'm getting a bit too old
+and stiff for it nowadays, sir--just scratch about in the
+garden here and grow a bit of a logarithm, or raise a common
+denominator or two. But Mr. Euclid he use me still for them
+propositions, he do."
+
+From the garrulous old man I learned the melancholy end of
+my former acquaintances. Soon after I left town, he told
+me, C had been taken ill. It seems that A and B had been
+rowing on the river for a wager, and C had been running
+on the bank and then sat in a draught. Of course the bank
+had refused the draught and C was taken ill. A and B came
+home and found C lying helpless in bed. A shook him
+roughly and said, "Get up, C, we're going to pile wood."
+C looked so worn and pitiful that B said, "Look here, A,
+I won't stand this, he isn't fit to pile wood to-night."
+C smiled feebly and said, "Perhaps I might pile a little
+if I sat up in bed." Then B, thoroughly alarmed, said,
+"See here, A, I'm going to fetch a doctor; he's dying."
+A flared up and answered, "You've no money to fetch a
+doctor." "I'll reduce him to his lowest terms," B said
+firmly, "that'll fetch him." C's life might even then
+have been saved but they made a mistake about the medicine.
+It stood at the head of the bed on a bracket, and the
+nurse accidentally removed it from the bracket without
+changing the sign. After the fatal blunder C seems to
+have sunk rapidly. On the evening of the next day, as
+the shadows deepened in the little room, it was clear to
+all that the end was near. I think that even A was affected
+at the last as he stood with bowed head, aimlessly offering
+to bet with the doctor on C's laboured breathing. "A,"
+whispered C, "I think I'm going fast." "How fast do you
+think you'll go, old man?" murmured A. "I don't know,"
+said C, "but I'm going at any rate."--The end came soon
+after that. C rallied for a moment and asked for a certain
+piece of work that he had left downstairs. A put it in
+his arms and he expired. As his soul sped heavenward A
+watched its flight with melancholy admiration. B burst
+into a passionate flood of tears and sobbed, "Put away
+his little cistern and the rowing clothes he used to
+wear, I feel as if I could hardly ever dig again."--The
+funeral was plain and unostentatious. It differed in
+nothing from the ordinary, except that out of deference
+to sporting men and mathematicians, A engaged two hearses.
+Both vehicles started at the same time, B driving the
+one which bore the sable parallelopiped containing the
+last remains of his ill-fated friend. A on the box of
+the empty hearse generously consented to a handicap of
+a hundred yards, but arrived first at the cemetery by
+driving four times as fast as B. (Find the distance to
+the cemetery.) As the sarcophagus was lowered, the grave
+was surrounded by the broken figures of the first book
+of Euclid.--It was noticed that after the death of C, A
+became a changed man. He lost interest in racing with B,
+and dug but languidly. He finally gave up his work and
+settled down to live on the interest of his bets.--B
+never recovered from the shock of C's death; his grief
+preyed upon his intellect and it became deranged. He grew
+moody and spoke only in monosyllables. His disease became
+rapidly aggravated, and he presently spoke only in words
+whose spelling was regular and which presented no difficulty
+to the beginner. Realizing his precarious condition he
+voluntarily submitted to be incarcerated in an asylum,
+where he abjured mathematics and devoted himself to
+writing the History of the Swiss Family Robinson in words
+of one syllable.
+
+
+
+
+Acknowledgments
+
+Many of the sketches which form the present volume have
+already appeared in print. Others of them are new. Of
+the re-printed pieces, "Melpomenus Jones," "Policeman
+Hogan," "A Lesson in Fiction," and many others were
+contributions by the author to the New York Truth. The
+"Boarding-House Geometry" first appeared in Truth, and
+was subsequently republished in the London Punch, and in
+a great many other journals. The sketches called the
+"Life of John Smith," "Society Chit-Chat," and "Aristocratic
+Education" appeared in Puck. "The New Pathology" was
+first printed in the Toronto Saturday Night, and was
+subsequently republished by the London Lancet, and by
+various German periodicals in the form of a translation.
+The story called "Number Fifty-Six" is taken from the
+Detroit Free Press. "My Financial Career" was originally
+contributed to the New York Life, and has been frequently
+reprinted. The Articles "How to Make a Million Dollars"
+and "How to Avoid Getting Married," etc. are reproduced
+by permission of the Publishers' Press Syndicate. The
+wide circulation which some of the above sketches have
+enjoyed has encouraged the author to prepare the present
+collection.
+
+The author desires to express his sense of obligation to
+the proprietors of the above journals who have kindly
+permitted him to republish the contributions which appeared
+in their columns.
+
+END
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Literary Lapses, by Stephen Leacock
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diff --git a/old/6340.zip b/old/6340.zip
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Literary Lapses, by Stephen Leacock
+#9 in our series by Stephen Leacock
+
+Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the
+copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing
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+**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971**
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+*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!*****
+
+
+Title: Literary Lapses
+
+Author: Stephen Leacock
+
+Release Date: August, 2004 [EBook #6340]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on November 29, 2002]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LITERARY LAPSES ***
+
+
+
+
+This etext was produced by Gardner Buchanan.
+
+
+
+
+
+LITERARY LAPSES
+
+By Stephen Leacock
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+MY FINANCIAL CAREER
+LORD OXHEAD'S SECRET
+BOARDING-HOUSE GEOMETRY
+THE AWFUL FATE OF MELPOMENUS JONES
+A CHRISTMAS LETTER
+HOW TO MAKE A MILLION DOLLARS
+HOW TO LIVE TO BE 200
+HOW TO AVOID GETTING MARRIED
+HOW TO BE A DOCTOR
+THE NEW FOOD
+A NEW PATHOLOGY
+THE POET ANSWERED
+THE FORCE OF STATISTICS
+MEN WHO HAVE SHAVED ME
+GETTING THE THREAD OF IT
+TELLING HIS FAULTS
+WINTER PASTIMES
+NUMBER FIFTY-SIX
+ARISTOCRATIC EDUCATION
+THE CONJURER'S REVENGE
+HINTS TO TRAVELLERS
+A MANUAL OF EDUCATION
+HOODOO MCFIGGIN'S CHRISTMAS
+THE LIFE OF JOHN SMITH
+ON COLLECTING THINGS
+SOCIETY CHIT-CHAT
+INSURANCE UP TO DATE
+BORROWING A MATCH
+A LESSON IN FICTION
+HELPING THE ARMENIANS
+A STUDY IN STILL LIFE: THE COUNTRY HOTEL
+AN EXPERIMENT WITH POLICEMAN HOGAN
+THE PASSING OF THE POET
+SELF-MADE MEN
+A MODEL DIALOGUE
+BACK TO THE BUSH
+REFLECTIONS ON RIDING
+SALOONIO
+HALF-HOURS WITH THE POETS--
+   I.   MR. WORDSWORTH AND THE LITTLE COTTAGE GIRL
+   II.  HOW TENNYSON KILLED THE MAY QUEEN
+   III. OLD MR. LONGFELLOW ON BOARD THE "HESPERUS"
+A. B, AND C
+
+
+
+
+LITERARY LAPSES
+
+
+
+
+My Financial Career
+
+When I go into a bank I get rattled. The clerks rattle me;
+the wickets rattle me; the sight of the money rattles me;
+everything rattles me.
+
+The moment I cross the threshold of a bank and attempt to
+transact business there, I become an irresponsible idiot.
+
+I knew this beforehand, but my salary had been raised to
+fifty dollars a month and I felt that the bank was the
+only place for it.
+
+So I shambled in and looked timidly round at the clerks.
+I had an idea that a person about to open an account must
+needs consult the manager. I went up to a wicket marked
+"Accountant." The accountant was a tall, cool devil. The
+very sight of him rattled me. My voice was sepulchral.
+
+"Can I see the manager?" I said, and added solemnly,
+"alone." I don't know why I said "alone."
+
+"Certainly," said the accountant, and fetched him.
+
+The manager was a grave, calm man. I held my fifty-six
+dollars clutched in a crumpled ball in my pocket.
+
+"Are you the manager?" I said. God knows I didn't doubt it.
+
+"Yes," he said.
+
+"Can I see you," I asked, "alone?" I didn't want to say
+"alone" again, but without it the thing seemed self-evident.
+
+The manager looked at me in some alarm. He felt that I
+had an awful secret to reveal.
+
+"Come in here," he said, and led the way to a private
+room. He turned the key in the lock.
+
+"We are safe from interruption here," he said; "sit down."
+
+We both sat down and looked at each other. I found no
+voice to speak.
+
+"You are one of Pinkerton's men, I presume," he said.
+
+He had gathered from my mysterious manner that I was a
+detective. I knew what he was thinking, and it made me
+worse.
+
+"No, not from Pinkerton's," I said, seeming to imply that
+I came from a rival agency.
+
+"To tell the truth," I went on, as if I had been prompted
+to lie about it," I am not a detective at all. I have
+come to open an account. I intend to keep all my money
+in this bank."
+
+The manager looked relieved but still serious; he concluded
+now that I was a son of Baron Rothschild or a young Gould.
+
+"A large account, I suppose," he said.
+
+"Fairly large," I whispered. "I propose to deposit
+fifty-six dollars now and fifty dollars a month regularly."
+
+The manager got up and opened the door. He called to the
+accountant.
+
+"Mr. Montgomery," he said unkindly loud, "this gentleman
+is opening an account, he will deposit fifty-six dollars.
+Good morning."
+
+I rose.
+
+A big iron door stood open at the side of the room.
+
+"Good morning," I said, and stepped into the safe.
+
+"Come out," said the manager coldly, and showed me the
+other way.
+
+I went up to the accountant's wicket and poked the ball
+of money at him with a quick convulsive movement as if
+I were doing a conjuring trick.
+
+My face was ghastly pale.
+
+"Here," I said, "deposit it." The tone of the words seemed
+to mean, "Let us do this painful thing while the fit is
+on us."
+
+He took the money and gave it to another clerk.
+
+He made me write the sum on a slip and sign my name in
+a book. I no longer knew what I was doing. The bank swam
+before my eyes.
+
+"Is it deposited?" I asked in a hollow, vibrating voice.
+
+"It is," said the accountant.
+
+"Then I want to draw a cheque."
+
+My idea was to draw out six dollars of it for present
+use. Someone gave me a chequebook through a wicket and
+someone else began telling me how to write it out. The
+people in the bank had the impression that I was an
+invalid millionaire. I wrote something on the cheque and
+thrust it in at the clerk. He looked at it.
+
+"What! are you drawing it all out again?" he asked in
+surprise. Then I realized that I had written fifty-six
+instead of six. I was too far gone to reason now. I had
+a feeling that it was impossible to explain the thing.
+All the clerks had stopped writing to look at me.
+
+Reckless with misery, I made a plunge.
+
+"Yes, the whole thing."
+
+"You withdraw your money from the bank?"
+
+"Every cent of it."
+
+"Are you not going to deposit any more?" said the clerk,
+astonished.
+
+"Never."
+
+An idiot hope struck me that they might think something
+had insulted me while I was writing the cheque and that
+I had changed my mind. I made a wretched attempt to look
+like a man with a fearfully quick temper.
+
+The clerk prepared to pay the money.
+
+"How will you have it?" he said.
+
+"What?"
+
+"How will you have it?"
+
+"Oh"--I caught his meaning and answered without even
+trying to think--"in fifties."
+
+He gave me a fifty-dollar bill.
+
+"And the six?" he asked dryly.
+
+"In sixes," I said.
+
+He gave it me and I rushed out.
+
+As the big door swung behind me I caught the echo of a
+roar of laughter that went up to the ceiling of the bank.
+Since then I bank no more. I keep my money in cash in my
+trousers pocket and my savings in silver dollars in a
+sock.
+
+
+
+
+Lord Oxhead's Secret
+
+A ROMANCE IN ONE CHAPTER
+
+It was finished. Ruin had come. Lord Oxhead sat gazing
+fixedly at the library fire. Without, the wind soughed
+(or sogged) around the turrets of Oxhead Towers, the seat
+of the Oxhead family. But the old earl heeded not the
+sogging of the wind around his seat. He was too absorbed.
+
+Before him lay a pile of blue papers with printed headings.
+From time to time he turned them over in his hands and
+replaced them on the table with a groan. To the earl they
+meant ruin--absolute, irretrievable ruin, and with it
+the loss of his stately home that had been the pride of
+the Oxheads for generations. More than that--the world
+would now know the awful secret of his life.
+
+The earl bowed his head in the bitterness of his sorrow,
+for he came of a proud stock. About him hung the portraits
+of his ancestors. Here on the right an Oxhead who had
+broken his lance at Crecy, or immediately before it.
+There McWhinnie Oxhead who had ridden madly from the
+stricken field of Flodden to bring to the affrighted
+burghers of Edinburgh all the tidings that he had been
+able to gather in passing the battlefield. Next him hung
+the dark half Spanish face of Sir Amyas Oxhead of
+Elizabethan days whose pinnace was the first to dash to
+Plymouth with the news that the English fleet, as nearly
+as could be judged from a reasonable distance, seemed
+about to grapple with the Spanish Armada. Below this,
+the two Cavalier brothers, Giles and Everard Oxhead, who
+had sat in the oak with Charles II. Then to the right
+again the portrait of Sir Ponsonby Oxhead who had fought
+with Wellington in Spain, and been dismissed for it.
+
+Immediately before the earl as he sat was the family
+escutcheon emblazoned above the mantelpiece. A child
+might read the simplicity of its proud significance--an
+ox rampant quartered in a field of gules with a pike
+dexter and a dog intermittent in a plain parallelogram
+right centre, with the motto, "Hic, haec, hoc, hujus,
+hujus, hujus."
+
+   *   *   *   *   *
+
+"Father!"--The girl's voice rang clear through the half
+light of the wainscoted library. Gwendoline Oxhead had
+thrown herself about the earl's neck. The girl was radiant
+with happiness. Gwendoline was a beautiful girl of
+thirty-three, typically English in the freshness of her
+girlish innocence. She wore one of those charming walking
+suits of brown holland so fashionable among the aristocracy
+of England, while a rough leather belt encircled her
+waist in a single sweep. She bore herself with that sweet
+simplicity which was her greatest charm. She was probably
+more simple than any girl of her age for miles around.
+Gwendoline was the pride of her father's heart, for he
+saw reflected in her the qualities of his race.
+
+"Father," she said, a blush mantling her fair face, "I
+am so happy, oh so happy; Edwin has asked me to be his
+wife, and we have plighted our troth--at least if you
+consent. For I will never marry without my father's
+warrant," she added, raising her head proudly; "I am too
+much of an Oxhead for that."
+
+Then as she gazed into the old earl's stricken face, the
+girl's mood changed at once. "Father," she cried, "father,
+are you ill? What is it? Shall I ring?" As she spoke
+Gwendoline reached for the heavy bell-rope that hung
+beside the wall, but the earl, fearful that her frenzied
+efforts might actually make it ring, checked her hand.
+"I am, indeed, deeply troubled," said Lord Oxhead, "but
+of that anon. Tell me first what is this news you bring.
+I hope, Gwendoline, that your choice has been worthy of
+an Oxhead, and that he to whom you have plighted your
+troth will be worthy to bear our motto with his own."
+And, raising his eyes to the escutcheon before him, the
+earl murmured half unconsciously, "Hic, haec, hoc, hujus,
+hujus, hujus," breathing perhaps a prayer as many of his
+ancestors had done before him that he might never forget
+it.
+
+"Father," continued Gwendoline, half timidly, "Edwin is
+an American."
+
+"You surprise me indeed," answered Lord Oxhead; "and
+yet," he continued, turning to his daughter with the
+courtly grace that marked the nobleman of the old school,
+"why should we not respect and admire the Americans?
+Surely there have been great names among them. Indeed,
+our ancestor Sir Amyas Oxhead was, I think, married to
+Pocahontas--at least if not actually married"--the earl
+hesitated a moment.
+
+"At least they loved one another," said Gwendoline simply.
+
+"Precisely," said the earl, with relief, "they loved one
+another, yes, exactly." Then as if musing to himself,
+"Yes, there have been great Americans. Bolivar was an
+American. The two Washingtons--George and Booker--are
+both Americans. There have been others too, though for
+the moment I do not recall their names. But tell me,
+Gwendoline, this Edwin of yours--where is his family
+seat?"
+
+"It is at Oshkosh, Wisconsin, father."
+
+"Ah! say you so?" rejoined the earl, with rising interest.
+"Oshkosh is, indeed, a grand old name. The Oshkosh are
+a Russian family. An Ivan Oshkosh came to England with
+Peter the Great and married my ancestress. Their descendant
+in the second degree once removed, Mixtup Oshkosh, fought
+at the burning of Moscow and later at the sack of Salamanca
+and the treaty of Adrianople. And Wisconsin too," the
+old nobleman went on, his features kindling with animation,
+for he had a passion for heraldry, genealogy, chronology,
+and commercial geography; "the Wisconsins, or better, I
+think, the Guisconsins, are of old blood. A Guisconsin
+followed Henry I to Jerusalem and rescued my ancestor
+Hardup Oxhead from the Saracens. Another Guisconsin..."
+
+"Nay, father," said Gwendoline, gently interrupting,
+"Wisconsin is not Edwin's own name: that is, I believe,
+the name of his estate. My lover's name is Edwin Einstein."
+
+"Einstein," repeated the earl dubiously--"an Indian name
+perhaps; yet the Indians are many of them of excellent
+family. An ancestor of mine..."
+
+"Father," said Gwendoline, again interrupting, "here is
+a portrait of Edwin. Judge for yourself if he be noble."
+With this she placed in her father's hand an American
+tin-type, tinted in pink and brown. The picture represented
+a typical specimen of American manhood of that Anglo-Semitic
+type so often seen in persons of mixed English and Jewish
+extraction. The figure was well over five feet two inches
+in height and broad in proportion. The graceful sloping
+shoulders harmonized with the slender and well-poised
+waist, and with a hand pliant and yet prehensile. The
+pallor of the features was relieved by a drooping black
+moustache.
+
+Such was Edwin Einstein to whom Gwendoline's heart, if
+not her hand, was already affianced. Their love had been
+so simple and yet so strange. It seemed to Gwendoline
+that it was but a thing of yesterday, and yet in reality
+they had met three weeks ago. Love had drawn them
+irresistibly together. To Edwin the fair English girl
+with her old name and wide estates possessed a charm that
+he scarcely dared confess to himself. He determined to
+woo her. To Gwendoline there was that in Edwin's bearing,
+the rich jewels that he wore, the vast fortune that rumour
+ascribed to him, that appealed to something romantic and
+chivalrous in her nature. She loved to hear him speak of
+stocks and bonds, corners and margins, and his father's
+colossal business. It all seemed so noble and so far
+above the sordid lives of the people about her. Edwin,
+too, loved to hear the girl talk of her father's estates,
+of the diamond-hilted sword that the saladin had given,
+or had lent, to her ancestor hundreds of years ago. Her
+description of her father, the old earl, touched something
+romantic in Edwin's generous heart. He was never tired
+of asking how old he was, was he robust, did a shock, a
+sudden shock, affect him much? and so on. Then had come
+the evening that Gwendoline loved to live over and over
+again in her mind when Edwin had asked her in his
+straightforward, manly way, whether--subject to certain
+written stipulations to be considered later--she would
+be his wife: and she, putting her hand confidingly in
+his hand, answered simply, that--subject to the consent
+of her father and pending always the necessary legal
+formalities and inquiries--she would.
+
+It had all seemed like a dream: and now Edwin Einstein
+had come in person to ask her hand from the earl, her
+father. Indeed, he was at this moment in the outer hall
+testing the gold leaf in the picture-frames with his
+pen-knife while waiting for his affianced to break the
+fateful news to Lord Oxhead.
+
+Gwendoline summoned her courage for a great effort.
+"Papa," she said, "there is one other thing that it is
+fair to tell you. Edwin's father is in business."
+
+The earl started from his seat in blank amazement. "In
+business!" he repeated, "the father of the suitor of the
+daughter of an Oxhead in business! My daughter the
+step-daughter of the grandfather of my grandson! Are
+you mad, girl? It is too much, too much!"
+
+"But, father," pleaded the beautiful girl in anguish,
+"hear me. It is Edwin's father--Sarcophagus Einstein,
+senior--not Edwin himself. Edwin does nothing. He has
+never earned a penny. He is quite unable to support
+himself. You have only to see him to believe it. Indeed,
+dear father, he is just like us. He is here now, in this
+house, waiting to see you. If it were not for his great
+wealth..."
+
+"Girl," said the earl sternly, "I care not for the man's
+riches. How much has he?"
+
+"Fifteen million two hundred and fifty thousand dollars,"
+answered Gwendoline. Lord Oxhead leaned his head against
+the mantelpiece. His mind was in a whirl. He was trying
+to calculate the yearly interest on fifteen and a quarter
+million dollars at four and a half per cent reduced to
+pounds, shillings, and pence. It was bootless. His brain,
+trained by long years of high living and plain thinking,
+had become too subtle, too refined an instrument for
+arithmetic...
+
+   *   *   *   *   *
+
+At this moment the door opened and Edwin Einstein stood
+before the earl. Gwendoline never forgot what happened.
+Through her life the picture of it haunted her--her lover
+upright at the door, his fine frank gaze fixed inquiringly
+on the diamond pin in her father's necktie, and he, her
+father, raising from the mantelpiece a face of agonized
+amazement.
+
+"You! You!" he gasped. For a moment he stood to his full
+height, swaying and groping in the air, then fell prostrate
+his full length upon the floor. The lovers rushed to his
+aid. Edwin tore open his neckcloth and plucked aside his
+diamond pin to give him air. But it was too late. Earl
+Oxhead had breathed his last. Life had fled. The earl
+was extinct. That is to say, he was dead.
+
+The reason of his death was never known. Had the sight
+of Edwin killed him? It might have. The old family doctor
+hurriedly summoned declared his utter ignorance. This,
+too, was likely. Edwin himself could explain nothing.
+But it was observed that after the earl's death and his
+marriage with Gwendoline he was a changed man; he dressed
+better, talked much better English.
+
+The wedding itself was quiet, almost sad. At Gwendoline's
+request there was no wedding breakfast, no bridesmaids,
+and no reception, while Edwin, respecting his bride's
+bereavement, insisted that there should be no best man,
+no flowers, no presents, and no honeymoon.
+
+Thus Lord Oxhead's secret died with him. It was probably
+too complicated to be interesting anyway.
+
+
+
+
+Boarding-House Geometry
+
+DEFINITIONS AND AXIOMS
+
+All boarding-houses are the same boarding-house.
+
+Boarders in the same boarding-house and on the same flat
+are equal to one another.
+
+A single room is that which has no parts and no magnitude.
+
+The landlady of a boarding-house is a parallelogram--that
+is, an oblong angular figure, which cannot be described,
+but which is equal to anything.
+
+A wrangle is the disinclination of two boarders to each
+other that meet together but are not in the same line.
+
+All the other rooms being taken, a single room is said
+to be a double room.
+
+
+POSTULATES AND PROPOSITIONS
+
+A pie may be produced any number of times.
+
+The landlady can be reduced to her lowest terms by a
+series of propositions.
+
+A bee line may be made from any boarding-house to any
+other boarding-house.
+
+The clothes of a boarding-house bed, though produced ever
+so far both ways, will not meet.
+
+Any two meals at a boarding-house are together less than
+two square meals.
+
+If from the opposite ends of a boarding-house a line be
+drawn passing through all the rooms in turn, then the
+stovepipe which warms the boarders will lie within that
+line.
+
+On the same bill and on the same side of it there should
+not be two charges for the same thing.
+
+If there be two boarders on the same flat, and the amount
+of side of the one be equal to the amount of side of the
+other, each to each, and the wrangle between one boarder
+and the landlady be equal to the wrangle between the
+landlady and the other, then shall the weekly bills of
+the two boarders be equal also, each to each.
+
+For if not, let one bill be the greater.
+
+Then the other bill is less than it might have been--which
+is absurd.
+
+
+
+
+The Awful Fate of Melpomenus Jones
+
+Some people--not you nor I, because we are so awfully
+self-possessed--but some people, find great difficulty
+in saying good-bye when making a call or spending the
+evening. As the moment draws near when the visitor feels
+that he is fairly entitled to go away he rises and says
+abruptly, "Well, I think I..." Then the people say, "Oh,
+must you go now? Surely it's early yet!" and a pitiful
+struggle ensues.
+
+I think the saddest case of this kind of thing that I
+ever knew was that of my poor friend Melpomenus Jones,
+a curate--such a dear young man, and only twenty-three!
+He simply couldn't get away from people. He was too modest
+to tell a lie, and too religious to wish to appear rude.
+Now it happened that he went to call on some friends of
+his on the very first afternoon of his summer vacation.
+The next six weeks were entirely his own--absolutely
+nothing to do. He chatted awhile, drank two cups of tea,
+then braced himself for the effort and said suddenly:
+
+"Well, I think I..."
+
+But the lady of the house said, "Oh, no! Mr. Jones, can't
+you really stay a little longer?"
+
+Jones was always truthful. "Oh, yes," he said, "of course,
+I--er--can stay."
+
+"Then please don't go."
+
+He stayed. He drank eleven cups of tea. Night was falling.
+He rose again.
+
+"Well now," he said shyly, "I think I really..."
+
+"You must go?" said the lady politely. "I thought perhaps
+you could have stayed to dinner..."
+
+"Oh well, so I could, you know," Jones said, "if..."
+
+"Then please stay, I'm sure my husband will be delighted."
+
+"All right," he said feebly, "I'll stay," and he sank
+back into his chair, just full of tea, and miserable.
+
+Papa came home. They had dinner. All through the meal
+Jones sat planning to leave at eight-thirty. All the
+family wondered whether Mr. Jones was stupid and sulky,
+or only stupid.
+
+After dinner mamma undertook to "draw him out," and showed
+him photographs. She showed him all the family museum,
+several gross of them--photos of papa's uncle and his
+wife, and mamma's brother and his little boy, an awfully
+interesting photo of papa's uncle's friend in his Bengal
+uniform, an awfully well-taken photo of papa's grandfather's
+partner's dog, and an awfully wicked one of papa as the
+devil for a fancy-dress ball. At eight-thirty Jones had
+examined seventy-one photographs. There were about
+sixty-nine more that he hadn't. Jones rose.
+
+"I must say good night now," he pleaded.
+
+"Say good night!" they said, "why it's only half-past
+eight! Have you anything to do?"
+
+"Nothing," he admitted, and muttered something about
+staying six weeks, and then laughed miserably.
+
+Just then it turned out that the favourite child of the
+family, such a dear little romp, had hidden Mr. Jones's
+hat; so papa said that he must stay, and invited him to
+a pipe and a chat. Papa had the pipe and gave Jones the
+chat, and still he stayed. Every moment he meant to take
+the plunge, but couldn't. Then papa began to get very
+tired of Jones, and fidgeted and finally said, with
+jocular irony, that Jones had better stay all night, they
+could give him a shake-down. Jones mistook his meaning
+and thanked him with tears in his eyes, and papa put
+Jones to bed in the spare room and cursed him heartily.
+
+After breakfast next day, papa went off to his work in
+the City, and left Jones playing with the baby, broken-
+hearted. His nerve was utterly gone. He was meaning to
+leave all day, but the thing had got on his mind and he
+simply couldn't. When papa came home in the evening he
+was surprised and chagrined to find Jones still there.
+He thought to jockey him out with a jest, and said he
+thought he'd have to charge him for his board, he! he!
+The unhappy young man stared wildly for a moment, then
+wrung papa's hand, paid him a month's board in advance,
+and broke down and sobbed like a child.
+
+In the days that followed he was moody and unapproachable.
+He lived, of course, entirely in the drawing-room, and
+the lack of air and exercise began to tell sadly on his
+health. He passed his time in drinking tea and looking
+at the photographs. He would stand for hours gazing at
+the photographs of papa's uncle's friend in his Bengal
+uniform--talking to it, sometimes swearing bitterly at
+it. His mind was visibly failing.
+
+At length the crash came. They carried him upstairs in
+a raging delirium of fever. The illness that followed
+was terrible. He recognized no one, not even papa's
+uncle's friend in his Bengal uniform. At times he would
+start up from his bed and shriek, "Well, I think I..."
+and then fall back upon the pillow with a horrible laugh.
+Then, again, he would leap up and cry, "Another cup of
+tea and more photographs! More photographs! Har! Har!"
+
+At length, after a month of agony, on the last day of
+his vacation, he passed away. They say that when the last
+moment came, he sat up in bed with a beautiful smile of
+confidence playing upon his face, and said, "Well--the
+angels are calling me; I'm afraid I really must go now.
+Good afternoon."
+
+And the rushing of his spirit from its prison-house was
+as rapid as a hunted cat passing over a garden fence.
+
+
+
+
+A Christmas Letter
+
+(In answer to a young lady who has sent an invitation to
+be present at a children's party)
+
+Madamoiselle,
+
+Allow me very gratefully but firmly to refuse your kind
+invitation. You doubtless mean well; but your ideas are
+unhappily mistaken.
+
+Let us understand one another once and for all. I cannot
+at my mature age participate in the sports of children
+with such abandon as I could wish. I entertain, and have
+always entertained, the sincerest regard for such games
+as Hunt-the-Slipper and Blind-Man's Buff. But I have now
+reached a time of life, when, to have my eyes blindfolded
+and to have a powerful boy of ten hit me in the back with
+a hobby-horse and ask me to guess who hit me, provokes
+me to a fit of retaliation which could only culminate in
+reckless criminality. Nor can I cover my shoulders with
+a drawing-room rug and crawl round on my hands and knees
+under the pretence that I am a bear without a sense of
+personal insufficiency, which is painful to me.
+
+Neither can I look on with a complacent eye at the sad
+spectacle of your young clerical friend, the Reverend
+Mr. Uttermost Farthing, abandoning himself to such gambols
+and appearing in the role of life and soul of the evening.
+Such a degradation of his holy calling grieves me, and
+I cannot but suspect him of ulterior motives.
+
+You inform me that your maiden aunt intends to help you
+to entertain the party. I have not, as you know, the
+honour of your aunt's acquaintance, yet I think I may
+with reason surmise that she will organize games--guessing
+games--in which she will ask me to name a river in Asia
+beginning with a Z; on my failure to do so she will put
+a hot plate down my neck as a forfeit, and the children
+will clap their hands. These games, my dear young friend,
+involve the use of a more adaptable intellect than mine,
+and I cannot consent to be a party to them.
+
+May I say in conclusion that I do not consider a five-cent
+pen-wiper from the top branch of a Xmas tree any adequate
+compensation for the kind of evening you propose.
+
+   I have the honour
+      To subscribe myself,
+         Your obedient servant.
+
+
+
+
+How to Make a Million Dollars
+
+I mix a good deal with the Millionaires. I like them. I
+like their faces. I like the way they live. I like the
+things they eat. The more we mix together the better I
+like the things we mix.
+
+Especially I like the way they dress, their grey check
+trousers, their white check waist-coats, their heavy gold
+chains, and the signet-rings that they sign their cheques
+with. My! they look nice. Get six or seven of them sitting
+together in the club and it's a treat to see them. And
+if they get the least dust on them, men come and brush
+it off. Yes, and are glad to. I'd like to take some of
+the dust off them myself.
+
+Even more than what they eat I like their intellectual
+grasp. It is wonderful. Just watch them read. They simply
+read all the time. Go into the club at any hour and you'll
+see three or four of them at it. And the things they can
+read! You'd think that a man who'd been driving hard in
+the office from eleven o'clock until three, with only an
+hour and a half for lunch, would be too fagged. Not a
+bit. These men can sit down after office hours and read
+the Sketch and the Police Gazette and the Pink Un, and
+understand the jokes just as well as I can.
+
+What I love to do is to walk up and down among them and
+catch the little scraps of conversation. The other day
+I heard one lean forward and say, "Well, I offered him
+a million and a half and said I wouldn't give a cent
+more, he could either take it or leave it--" I just longed
+to break in and say, "What! what! a million and a half!
+Oh! say that again! Offer it to me, to either take it or
+leave it. Do try me once: I know I can: or here, make it
+a plain million and let's call it done."
+
+Not that these men are careless over money. No, sir.
+Don't think it. Of course they don't take much account
+of big money, a hundred thousand dollars at a shot or
+anything of that sort. But little money. You've no idea
+till you know them how anxious they get about a cent, or
+half a cent, or less.
+
+Why, two of them came into the club the other night just
+frantic with delight: they said wheat had risen and they'd
+cleaned up four cents each in less than half an hour.
+They bought a dinner for sixteen on the strength of it.
+I don't understand it. I've often made twice as much as
+that writing for the papers and never felt like boasting
+about it.
+
+One night I heard one man say, "Well, let's call up New
+York and offer them a quarter of a cent." Great heavens!
+Imagine paying the cost of calling up New York, nearly
+five million people, late at night and offering them a
+quarter of a cent! And yet--did New York get mad? No,
+they took it. Of course it's high finance. I don't pretend
+to understand it. I tried after that to call up Chicago
+and offer it a cent and a half, and to call up Hamilton,
+Ontario, and offer it half a dollar, and the operator
+only thought I was crazy.
+
+All this shows, of course, that I've been studying how
+the millionaires do it. I have. For years. I thought it
+might be helpful to young men just beginning to work and
+anxious to stop.
+
+You know, many a man realizes late in life that if when
+he was a boy he had known what he knows now, instead of
+being what he is he might be what he won't; but how few
+boys stop to think that if they knew what they don't know
+instead of being what they will be, they wouldn't be?
+These are awful thoughts.
+
+At any rate, I've been gathering hints on how it is they
+do it.
+
+One thing I'm sure about. If a young man wants to make
+a million dollars he's got to be mighty careful about
+his diet and his living. This may seem hard. But success
+is only achieved with pains.
+
+There is no use in a young man who hopes to make a million
+dollars thinking he's entitled to get up at 7.30, eat
+force and poached eggs, drink cold water at lunch, and
+go to bed at 10 p.m. You can't do it. I've seen too many
+millionaires for that. If you want to be a millionaire
+you mustn't get up till ten in the morning. They never
+do. They daren't. It would be as much as their business
+is worth if they were seen on the street at half-past
+nine.
+
+And the old idea of abstemiousness is all wrong. To be
+a millionaire you need champagne, lots of it and all the
+time. That and Scotch whisky and soda: you have to sit
+up nearly all night and drink buckets of it. This is what
+clears the brain for business next day. I've seen some
+of these men with their brains so clear in the morning,
+that their faces look positively boiled.
+
+To live like this requires, of course, resolution. But
+you can buy that by the pint.
+
+Therefore, my dear young man, if you want to get moved
+on from your present status in business, change your
+life. When your landlady brings your bacon and eggs for
+breakfast, throw them out of window to the dog and tell
+her to bring you some chilled asparagus and a pint of
+Moselle. Then telephone to your employer that you'll be
+down about eleven o'clock. You will get moved on. Yes,
+very quickly.
+
+Just how the millionaires make the money is a difficult
+question. But one way is this. Strike the town with five
+cents in your pocket. They nearly all do this; they've
+told me again and again (men with millions and millions)
+that the first time they struck town they had only five
+cents. That seems to have given them their start. Of
+course, it's not easy to do. I've tried it several times.
+I nearly did it once. I borrowed five cents, carried it
+away out of town, and then turned and came back at the
+town with an awful rush. If I hadn't struck a beer saloon
+in the suburbs and spent the five cents I might have been
+rich to-day.
+
+Another good plan is to start something. Something on a
+huge scale: something nobody ever thought of. For instance,
+one man I know told me that once he was down in Mexico
+without a cent (he'd lost his five in striking Central
+America) and he noticed that they had no power plants.
+So he started some and made a mint of money. Another man
+that I know was once stranded in New York, absolutely
+without a nickel. Well, it occurred to him that what was
+needed were buildings ten stories higher than any that
+had been put up. So he built two and sold them right
+away. Ever so many millionaires begin in some such simple
+way as that.
+
+There is, of course, a much easier way than any of these.
+I almost hate to tell this, because I want to do it
+myself.
+
+I learned of it just by chance one night at the club.
+There is one old man there, extremely rich, with one of
+the best faces of the lot, just like a hyena. I never
+used to know how he had got so rich. So one evening I
+asked one of the millionaires how old Bloggs had made
+all his money.
+
+"How he made it?" he answered with a sneer. "Why he made
+it by taking it out of widows and orphans."
+
+Widows and orphans! I thought, what an excellent idea.
+But who would have suspected that they had it?
+
+"And how," I asked pretty cautiously, "did he go at it
+to get it out of them?"
+
+"Why," the man answered, "he just ground them under his
+heels, that was how."
+
+Now isn't that simple? I've thought of that conversation
+often since and I mean to try it. If I can get hold of
+them, I'll grind them quick enough. But how to get them.
+Most of the widows I know look pretty solid for that sort
+of thing, and as for orphans, it must take an awful lot
+of them. Meantime I am waiting, and if I ever get a large
+bunch of orphans all together, I'll stamp on them and
+see.
+
+I find, too, on inquiry, that you can also grind it out
+of clergymen. They say they grind nicely. But perhaps
+orphans are easier.
+
+
+
+
+How to Live to be 200
+
+Twenty years ago I knew a man called Jiggins, who had
+the Health Habit.
+
+He used to take a cold plunge every morning. He said it
+opened his pores. After it he took a hot sponge. He said
+it closed the pores. He got so that he could open and
+shut his pores at will.
+
+Jiggins used to stand and breathe at an open window for
+half an hour before dressing. He said it expanded his
+lungs. He might, of course, have had it done in a shoe-store
+with a boot stretcher, but after all it cost him nothing
+this way, and what is half an hour?
+
+After he had got his undershirt on, Jiggins used to hitch
+himself up like a dog in harness and do Sandow exercises.
+He did them forwards, backwards, and hind-side up.
+
+He could have got a job as a dog anywhere. He spent all
+his time at this kind of thing. In his spare time at the
+office, he used to lie on his stomach on the floor and
+see if he could lift himself up with his knuckles. If he
+could, then he tried some other way until he found one
+that he couldn't do. Then he would spend the rest of his
+lunch hour on his stomach, perfectly happy.
+
+In the evenings in his room he used to lift iron bars,
+cannon-balls, heave dumb-bells, and haul himself up to
+the ceiling with his teeth. You could hear the thumps
+half a mile. He liked it.
+
+He spent half the night slinging himself around his room.
+He said it made his brain clear. When he got his brain
+perfectly clear, he went to bed and slept. As soon as he
+woke, he began clearing it again.
+
+Jiggins is dead. He was, of course, a pioneer, but the
+fact that he dumb-belled himself to death at an early
+age does not prevent a whole generation of young men from
+following in his path.
+
+They are ridden by the Health Mania.
+
+They make themselves a nuisance.
+
+They get up at impossible hours. They go out in silly
+little suits and run Marathon heats before breakfast.
+They chase around barefoot to get the dew on their feet.
+They hunt for ozone. They bother about pepsin. They won't
+eat meat because it has too much nitrogen. They won't
+eat fruit because it hasn't any. They prefer albumen and
+starch and nitrogen to huckleberry pie and doughnuts.
+They won't drink water out of a tap. They won't eat
+sardines out of a can. They won't use oysters out of a
+pail. They won't drink milk out of a glass. They are
+afraid of alcohol in any shape. Yes, sir, afraid. "Cowards."
+
+And after all their fuss they presently incur some simple
+old-fashioned illness and die like anybody else.
+
+Now people of this sort have no chance to attain any
+great age. They are on the wrong track.
+
+Listen. Do you want to live to be really old, to enjoy
+a grand, green, exuberant, boastful old age and to make
+yourself a nuisance to your whole neighbourhood with your
+reminiscences?
+
+Then cut out all this nonsense. Cut it out. Get up in
+the morning at a sensible hour. The time to get up is
+when you have to, not before. If your office opens at
+eleven, get up at ten-thirty. Take your chance on ozone.
+There isn't any such thing anyway. Or, if there is, you
+can buy a Thermos bottle full for five cents, and put it
+on a shelf in your cupboard. If your work begins at seven
+in the morning, get up at ten minutes to, but don't be
+liar enough to say that you like it. It isn't exhilarating,
+and you know it.
+
+Also, drop all that cold-bath business. You never did it
+when you were a boy. Don't be a fool now. If you must
+take a bath (you don't really need to), take it warm.
+The pleasure of getting out of a cold bed and creeping
+into a hot bath beats a cold plunge to death. In any
+case, stop gassing about your tub and your "shower," as
+if you were the only man who ever washed.
+
+So much for that point.
+
+Next, take the question of germs and bacilli. Don't be
+scared of them. That's all. That's the whole thing, and
+if you once get on to that you never need to worry again.
+
+If you see a bacilli, walk right up to it, and look it
+in the eye. If one flies into your room, strike at it
+with your hat or with a towel. Hit it as hard as you can
+between the neck and the thorax. It will soon get sick
+of that.
+
+But as a matter of fact, a bacilli is perfectly quiet
+and harmless if you are not afraid of it. Speak to it.
+Call out to it to "lie down." It will understand. I had
+a bacilli once, called Fido, that would come and lie at
+my feet while I was working. I never knew a more
+affectionate companion, and when it was run over by an
+automobile, I buried it in the garden with genuine sorrow.
+
+(I admit this is an exaggeration. I don't really remember
+its name; it may have been Robert.)
+
+Understand that it is only a fad of modern medicine to
+say that cholera and typhoid and diphtheria are caused
+by bacilli and germs; nonsense. Cholera is caused by a
+frightful pain in the stomach, and diphtheria is caused
+by trying to cure a sore throat.
+
+Now take the question of food.
+
+Eat what you want. Eat lots of it. Yes, eat too much of
+it. Eat till you can just stagger across the room with
+it and prop it up against a sofa cushion. Eat everything
+that you like until you can't eat any more. The only test
+is, can you pay for it? If you can't pay for it, don't
+eat it. And listen--don't worry as to whether your food
+contains starch, or albumen, or gluten, or nitrogen. If
+you are a damn fool enough to want these things, go and
+buy them and eat all you want of them. Go to a laundry
+and get a bag of starch, and eat your fill of it. Eat
+it, and take a good long drink of glue after it, and a
+spoonful of Portland cement. That will gluten you, good
+and solid.
+
+If you like nitrogen, go and get a druggist to give you
+a canful of it at the soda counter, and let you sip it
+with a straw. Only don't think that you can mix all these
+things up with your food. There isn't any nitrogen or
+phosphorus or albumen in ordinary things to eat. In any
+decent household all that sort of stuff is washed out in
+the kitchen sink before the food is put on the table.
+
+And just one word about fresh air and exercise. Don't
+bother with either of them. Get your room full of good
+air, then shut up the windows and keep it. It will keep
+for years. Anyway, don't keep using your lungs all the
+time. Let them rest. As for exercise, if you have to take
+it, take it and put up with it. But as long as you have
+the price of a hack and can hire other people to play
+baseball for you and run races and do gymnastics when
+you sit in the shade and smoke and watch them--great
+heavens, what more do you want?
+
+
+
+
+How to Avoid Getting Married.
+
+Some years ago, when I was the Editor of a Correspondence
+Column, I used to receive heart-broken letters from young
+men asking for advice and sympathy. They found themselves
+the object of marked attentions from girls which they
+scarcely knew how to deal with. They did not wish to give
+pain or to seem indifferent to a love which they felt
+was as ardent as it was disinterested, and yet they felt
+that they could not bestow their hands where their hearts
+had not spoken. They wrote to me fully and frankly, and
+as one soul might write to another for relief. I accepted
+their confidences as under the pledge of a secrecy, never
+divulging their disclosures beyond the circulation of my
+newspapers, or giving any hint of their identity other
+than printing their names and addresses and their letters
+in full. But I may perhaps without dishonour reproduce
+one of these letters, and my answer to it, inasmuch as
+the date is now months ago, and the softening hand of
+Time has woven its roses--how shall I put it?--the mellow
+haze of reminiscences has--what I mean is that the young
+man has gone back to work and is all right again.
+
+Here then is a letter from a young man whose name I must
+not reveal, but whom I will designate as D. F., and whose
+address I must not divulge, but will simply indicate as
+Q. Street, West.
+
+"DEAR MR. LEACOCK,
+
+"For some time past I have been the recipient of very
+marked attentions from a young lady. She has been calling
+at the house almost every evening, and has taken me out
+in her motor, and invited me to concerts and the theatre.
+On these latter occasions I have insisted on her taking
+my father with me, and have tried as far as possible to
+prevent her saying anything to me which would be unfit
+for father to hear. But my position has become a very
+difficult one. I do not think it right to accept her
+presents when I cannot feel that my heart is hers.
+Yesterday she sent to my house a beautiful bouquet of
+American Beauty roses addressed to me, and a magnificent
+bunch of Timothy Hay for father. I do not know what to
+say. Would it be right for father to keep all this valuable
+hay? I have confided fully in father, and we have discussed
+the question of presents. He thinks that there are some
+that we can keep with propriety, and others that a sense
+of delicacy forbids us to retain. He himself is going to
+sort out the presents into the two classes. He thinks
+that as far as he can see, the Hay is in class B. Meantime
+I write to you, as I understand that Miss Laura Jean
+Libby and Miss Beatrix Fairfax are on their vacation,
+and in any case a friend of mine who follows their writings
+closely tells me that they are always full.
+
+"I enclose a dollar, because I do not think it right to
+ask you to give all your valuable time and your best
+thought without giving you back what it is worth."
+
+On receipt of this I wrote back at once a private and
+confidential letter which I printed in the following
+edition of the paper.
+
+"MY DEAR, DEAR BOY,
+
+"Your letter has touched me. As soon as I opened it and
+saw the green and blue tint of the dollar bill which you
+had so daintily and prettily folded within the pages of
+your sweet letter, I knew that the note was from someone
+that I could learn to love, if our correspondence were
+to continue as it had begun. I took the dollar from your
+letter and kissed and fondled it a dozen times. Dear
+unknown boy! I shall always keep that dollar! No matter
+how much I may need it, or how many necessaries, yes,
+absolute necessities, of life I may be wanting, I shall
+always keep THAT dollar. Do you understand, dear? I shall
+keep it. I shall not spend it. As far as the USE of it
+goes, it will be just as if you had not sent it. Even if
+you were to send me another dollar, I should still keep
+the first one, so that no matter how many you sent, the
+recollection of one first friendship would not be
+contaminated with mercenary considerations. When I say
+dollar, darling, of course an express order, or a postal
+note, or even stamps would be all the same. But in that
+case do not address me in care of this office, as I should
+not like to think of your pretty little letters lying
+round where others might handle them.
+
+"But now I must stop chatting about myself, for I know
+that you cannot be interested in a simple old fogey such
+as I am. Let me talk to you about your letter and about
+the difficult question it raises for all marriageable
+young men.
+
+"In the first place, let me tell you how glad I am that
+you confide in your father. Whatever happens, go at once
+to your father, put your arms about his neck, and have
+a good cry together. And you are right, too, about
+presents. It needs a wiser head than my poor perplexed
+boy to deal with them. Take them to your father to be
+sorted, or, if you feel that you must not overtax his
+love, address them to me in your own pretty hand.
+
+"And now let us talk, dear, as one heart to another.
+Remember always that if a girl is to have your heart she
+must be worthy of you. When you look at your own bright
+innocent face in the mirror, resolve that you will give
+your hand to no girl who is not just as innocent as you
+are and no brighter than yourself. So that you must first
+find out how innocent she is. Ask her quietly and
+frankly--remember, dear, that the days of false modesty
+are passing away--whether she has ever been in jail. If
+she has not (and if you have not), then you know that
+you are dealing with a dear confiding girl who will make
+you a life mate. Then you must know, too, that her mind
+is worthy of your own. So many men to-day are led astray
+by the merely superficial graces and attractions of girls
+who in reality possess no mental equipment at all. Many
+a man is bitterly disillusioned after marriage when he
+realises that his wife cannot solve a quadratic equation,
+and that he is compelled to spend all his days with a
+woman who does not know that X squared plus 2XY plus Y
+squared is the same thing, or, I think nearly the same
+thing, as X plus Y squared.
+
+"Nor should the simple domestic virtues be neglected. If
+a girl desires to woo you, before allowing her to press
+her suit, ask her if she knows how to press yours. If
+she can, let her woo; if not, tell her to whoa. But I
+see I have written quite as much as I need for this
+column. Won't you write again, just as before, dear boy?
+
+"STEPHEN LEACOCK."
+
+
+
+
+How to be a Doctor
+
+Certainly the progress of science is a wonderful thing.
+One can't help feeling proud of it. I must admit that I
+do. Whenever I get talking to anyone--that is, to anyone
+who knows even less about it than I do--about the marvellous
+development of electricity, for instance, I feel as if
+I had been personally responsible for it. As for the
+linotype and the aeroplane and the vacuum house-cleaner,
+well, I am not sure that I didn't invent them myself. I
+believe that all generous-hearted men feel just the same
+way about it.
+
+However, that is not the point I am intending to discuss.
+What I want to speak about is the progress of medicine.
+There, if you like, is something wonderful. Any lover of
+humanity (or of either sex of it) who looks back on the
+achievements of medical science must feel his heart glow
+and his right ventricle expand with the pericardiac
+stimulus of a permissible pride.
+
+Just think of it. A hundred years ago there were no
+bacilli, no ptomaine poisoning, no diphtheria, and no
+appendicitis. Rabies was but little known, and only
+imperfectly developed. All of these we owe to medical
+science. Even such things as psoriasis and parotitis and
+trypanosomiasis, which are now household names, were
+known only to the few, and were quite beyond the reach
+of the great mass of the people.
+
+Or consider the advance of the science on its practical
+side. A hundred years ago it used to be supposed that
+fever could be cured by the letting of blood; now we know
+positively that it cannot. Even seventy years ago it was
+thought that fever was curable by the administration of
+sedative drugs; now we know that it isn't. For the matter
+of that, as recently as thirty years ago, doctors thought
+that they could heal a fever by means of low diet and
+the application of ice; now they are absolutely certain
+that they cannot. This instance shows the steady progress
+made in the treatment of fever. But there has been the
+same cheering advance all along the line. Take rheumatism.
+A few generations ago people with rheumatism used to have
+to carry round potatoes in their pockets as a means of
+cure. Now the doctors allow them to carry absolutely
+anything they like. They may go round with their pockets
+full of water-melons if they wish to. It makes no
+difference. Or take the treatment of epilepsy. It used
+to be supposed that the first thing to do in sudden
+attacks of this kind was to unfasten the patient's collar
+and let him breathe; at present, on the contrary, many
+doctors consider it better to button up the patient's
+collar and let him choke.
+
+In only one respect has there been a decided lack of
+progress in the domain of medicine, that is in the time
+it takes to become a qualified practitioner. In the good
+old days a man was turned out thoroughly equipped after
+putting in two winter sessions at a college and spending
+his summers in running logs for a sawmill. Some of the
+students were turned out even sooner. Nowadays it takes
+anywhere from five to eight years to become a doctor. Of
+course, one is willing to grant that our young men are
+growing stupider and lazier every year. This fact will
+be corroborated at once by any man over fifty years of
+age. But even when this is said it seems odd that a man
+should study eight years now to learn what he used to
+acquire in eight months.
+
+However, let that go. The point I want to develop is that
+the modern doctor's business is an extremely simple one,
+which could be acquired in about two weeks. This is the
+way it is done.
+
+The patient enters the consulting-room. "Doctor," he
+says, "I have a bad pain." "Where is it?" "Here." "Stand
+up," says the doctor, "and put your arms up above your
+head." Then the doctor goes behind the patient and strikes
+him a powerful blow in the back. "Do you feel that," he
+says. "I do," says the patient. Then the doctor turns
+suddenly and lets him have a left hook under the heart.
+"Can you feel that," he says viciously, as the patient
+falls over on the sofa in a heap. "Get up," says the
+doctor, and counts ten. The patient rises. The doctor
+looks him over very carefully without speaking, and then
+suddenly fetches him a blow in the stomach that doubles
+him up speechless. The doctor walks over to the window
+and reads the morning paper for a while. Presently he
+turns and begins to mutter more to himself than the
+patient. "Hum!" he says, "there's a slight anaesthesia
+of the tympanum." "Is that so?" says the patient, in an
+agony of fear. "What can I do about it, doctor?" "Well,"
+says the doctor, "I want you to keep very quiet; you'll
+have to go to bed and stay there and keep quiet." In
+reality, of course, the doctor hasn't the least idea what
+is wrong with the man; but he DOES know that if he will
+go to bed and keep quiet, awfully quiet, he'll either
+get quietly well again or else die a quiet death. Meantime,
+if the doctor calls every morning and thumps and beats
+him, he can keep the patient submissive and perhaps force
+him to confess what is wrong with him.
+
+"What about diet, doctor?" says the patient, completely
+cowed.
+
+The answer to this question varies very much. It depends
+on how the doctor is feeling and whether it is long since
+he had a meal himself. If it is late in the morning and
+the doctor is ravenously hungry, he says: "Oh, eat plenty,
+don't be afraid of it; eat meat, vegetables, starch,
+glue, cement, anything you like." But if the doctor has
+just had lunch and if his breathing is short-circuited
+with huckleberry-pie, he says very firmly: "No, I don't
+want you to eat anything at all: absolutely not a bite;
+it won't hurt you, a little self-denial in the matter of
+eating is the best thing in the world."
+
+"And what about drinking?" Again the doctor's answer
+varies. He may say: "Oh, yes, you might drink a glass of
+lager now and then, or, if you prefer it, a gin and soda
+or a whisky and Apollinaris, and I think before going to
+bed I'd take a hot Scotch with a couple of lumps of white
+sugar and bit of lemon-peel in it and a good grating of
+nutmeg on the top." The doctor says this with real feeling,
+and his eye glistens with the pure love of his profession.
+But if, on the other hand, the doctor has spent the night
+before at a little gathering of medical friends, he is
+very apt to forbid the patient to touch alcohol in any
+shape, and to dismiss the subject with great severity.
+
+Of course, this treatment in and of itself would appear
+too transparent, and would fail to inspire the patient
+with a proper confidence. But nowadays this element is
+supplied by the work of the analytical laboratory. Whatever
+is wrong with the patient, the doctor insists on snipping
+off parts and pieces and extracts of him and sending them
+mysteriously away to be analysed. He cuts off a lock of
+the patient's hair, marks it, "Mr. Smith's Hair, October,
+1910." Then he clips off the lower part of the ear, and
+wraps it in paper, and labels it, "Part of Mr. Smith's
+Ear, October, 1910." Then he looks the patient up and
+down, with the scissors in his hand, and if he sees any
+likely part of him he clips it off and wraps it up. Now
+this, oddly enough, is the very thing that fills the
+patient up with that sense of personal importance which
+is worth paying for. "Yes," says the bandaged patient,
+later in the day to a group of friends much impressed,
+"the doctor thinks there may be a slight anaesthesia of
+the prognosis, but he's sent my ear to New York and my
+appendix to Baltimore and a lock of my hair to the editors
+of all the medical journals, and meantime I am to keep
+very quiet and not exert myself beyond drinking a hot
+Scotch with lemon and nutmeg every half-hour." With that
+he sinks back faintly on his cushions, luxuriously happy.
+
+And yet, isn't it funny?
+
+You and I and the rest of us--even if we know all this--as
+soon as we have a pain within us, rush for a doctor as
+fast as a hack can take us. Yes, personally, I even prefer
+an ambulance with a bell on it. It's more soothing.
+
+
+
+
+The New Food
+
+I see from the current columns of the daily press that
+"Professor Plumb, of the University of Chicago, has just
+invented a highly concentrated form of food. All the
+essential nutritive elements are put together in the form
+of pellets, each of which contains from one to two hundred
+times as much nourishment as an ounce of an ordinary
+article of diet. These pellets, diluted with water, will
+form all that is necessary to support life. The professor
+looks forward confidently to revolutionizing the present
+food system."
+
+Now this kind of thing may be all very well in its way,
+but it is going to have its drawbacks as well. In the
+bright future anticipated by Professor Plumb, we can
+easily imagine such incidents as the following:
+
+The smiling family were gathered round the hospitable
+board. The table was plenteously laid with a soup-plate
+in front of each beaming child, a bucket of hot water
+before the radiant mother, and at the head of the board
+the Christmas dinner of the happy home, warmly covered
+by a thimble and resting on a poker chip. The expectant
+whispers of the little ones were hushed as the father,
+rising from his chair, lifted the thimble and disclosed
+a small pill of concentrated nourishment on the chip
+before him. Christmas turkey, cranberry sauce, plum
+pudding, mince pie--it was all there, all jammed into
+that little pill and only waiting to expand. Then the
+father with deep reverence, and a devout eye alternating
+between the pill and heaven, lifted his voice in a
+benediction.
+
+At this moment there was an agonized cry from the mother.
+
+"Oh, Henry, quick! Baby has snatched the pill!" It was
+too true. Dear little Gustavus Adolphus, the golden-haired
+baby boy, had grabbed the whole Christmas dinner off the
+poker chip and bolted it. Three hundred and fifty pounds
+of concentrated nourishment passed down the oesophagus
+of the unthinking child.
+
+"Clap him on the back!" cried the distracted mother.
+"Give him water!"
+
+The idea was fatal. The water striking the pill caused
+it to expand. There was a dull rumbling sound and then,
+with an awful bang, Gustavus Adolphus exploded into
+fragments!
+
+And when they gathered the little corpse together, the
+baby lips were parted in a lingering smile that could
+only be worn by a child who had eaten thirteen Christmas
+dinners.
+
+
+
+
+A New Pathology
+
+It has long been vaguely understood that the condition
+of a man's clothes has a certain effect upon the health
+of both body and mind. The well-known proverb, "Clothes
+make the man" has its origin in a general recognition of
+the powerful influence of the habiliments in their reaction
+upon the wearer. The same truth may be observed in the
+facts of everyday life. On the one hand we remark the
+bold carriage and mental vigour of a man attired in a
+new suit of clothes; on the other hand we note the
+melancholy features of him who is conscious of a posterior
+patch, or the haunted face of one suffering from internal
+loss of buttons. But while common observation thus gives
+us a certain familiarity with a few leading facts regarding
+the ailments and influence of clothes, no attempt has as
+yet been made to reduce our knowledge to a systematic
+form. At the same time the writer feels that a valuable
+addition might be made to the science of medicine in this
+direction. The numerous diseases which are caused by this
+fatal influence should receive a scientific analysis,
+and their treatment be included among the principles of
+the healing art. The diseases of the clothes may roughly
+be divided into medical cases and surgical cases, while
+these again fall into classes according to the particular
+garment through which the sufferer is attacked.
+
+   MEDICAL CASES
+
+Probably no article of apparel is so liable to a diseased
+condition as the trousers. It may be well, therefore, to
+treat first those maladies to which they are subject.
+
+I. Contractio Pantalunae, or Shortening of the Legs of
+the Trousers, an extremely painful malady most frequently
+found in the growing youth. The first symptom is the
+appearance of a yawning space (lacuna) above the boots,
+accompanied by an acute sense of humiliation and a morbid
+anticipation of mockery. The application of treacle to
+the boots, although commonly recommended, may rightly be
+condemned as too drastic a remedy. The use of boots
+reaching to the knee, to be removed only at night, will
+afford immediate relief. In connection with Contractio
+is often found--
+
+II. Inflatio Genu, or Bagging of the Knees of the Trousers,
+a disease whose symptoms are similar to those above. The
+patient shows an aversion to the standing posture, and,
+in acute cases, if the patient be compelled to stand,
+the head is bent and the eye fixed with painful rigidity
+upon the projecting blade formed at the knee of the
+trousers.
+
+In both of the above diseases anything that can be done
+to free the mind of the patient from a morbid sense of
+his infirmity will do much to improve the general tone
+of the system.
+
+III. Oases, or Patches, are liable to break out anywhere
+on the trousers, and range in degree of gravity from
+those of a trifling nature to those of a fatal character.
+The most distressing cases are those where the patch
+assumes a different colour from that of the trousers
+(dissimilitas coloris). In this instance the mind of the
+patient is found to be in a sadly aberrated condition.
+A speedy improvement may, however, be effected by cheerful
+society, books, flowers, and, above all, by a complete
+change.
+
+IV. The overcoat is attacked by no serious disorders,
+except--
+
+Phosphorescentia, or Glistening, a malady which indeed
+may often be observed to affect the whole system. It is
+caused by decay of tissue from old age and is generally
+aggravated by repeated brushing. A peculiar feature of
+the complaint is the lack of veracity on the part of the
+patient in reference to the cause of his uneasiness.
+Another invariable symptom is his aversion to outdoor
+exercise; under various pretexts, which it is the duty
+of his medical adviser firmly to combat, he will avoid
+even a gentle walk in the streets.
+
+V. Of the waistcoat science recognizes but one disease--
+
+Porriggia, an affliction caused by repeated spilling of
+porridge. It is generally harmless, chiefly owing to the
+mental indifference of the patient. It can be successfully
+treated by repeated fomentations of benzine.
+
+VI. Mortificatio Tilis, or Greenness of the Hat, is a
+disease often found in connection with Phosphorescentia
+(mentioned above), and characterized by the same aversion
+to outdoor life.
+
+VII. Sterilitas, or Loss of Fur, is another disease of
+the hat, especially prevalent in winter. It is not
+accurately known whether this is caused by a falling out
+of the fur or by a cessation of growth. In all diseases
+of the hat the mind of the patient is greatly depressed
+and his countenance stamped with the deepest gloom. He
+is particularly sensitive in regard to questions as to
+the previous history of the hat.
+
+Want of space precludes the mention of minor diseases,
+such as--
+
+VIII. Odditus Soccorum, or oddness of the socks, a thing
+in itself trifling, but of an alarming nature if met in
+combination with Contractio Pantalunae. Cases are found
+where the patient, possibly on the public platform or at
+a social gathering, is seized with a consciousness of
+the malady so suddenly as to render medical assistance
+futile.
+
+   SURGICAL CASES
+
+It is impossible to mention more than a few of the most
+typical cases of diseases of this sort.
+
+I. Explosio, or Loss of Buttons, is the commonest malady
+demanding surgical treatment. It consists of a succession
+of minor fractures, possibly internal, which at first
+excite no alarm. A vague sense of uneasiness is presently
+felt, which often leads the patient to seek relief in
+the string habit--a habit which, if unduly indulged in,
+may assume the proportions of a ruling passion. The use
+of sealing-wax, while admirable as a temporary remedy
+for Explosio, should never be allowed to gain a permanent
+hold upon the system. There is no doubt that a persistent
+indulgence in the string habit, or the constant use of
+sealing-wax, will result in--
+
+II. Fractura Suspendorum, or Snapping of the Braces,
+which amounts to a general collapse of the system. The
+patient is usually seized with a severe attack of explosio,
+followed by a sudden sinking feeling and sense of loss.
+A sound constitution may rally from the shock, but a
+system undermined by the string habit invariably succumbs.
+
+III. Sectura Pantalunae, or Ripping of the Trousers, is
+generally caused by sitting upon warm beeswax or leaning
+against a hook. In the case of the very young it is not
+unfrequently accompanied by a distressing suppuration of
+the shirt. This, however, is not remarked in adults. The
+malady is rather mental than bodily, the mind of the
+patient being racked by a keen sense of indignity and a
+feeling of unworthiness. The only treatment is immediate
+isolation, with a careful stitching of the affected part.
+
+In conclusion, it may be stated that at the first symptom
+of disease the patient should not hesitate to put himself
+in the hands of a professional tailor. In so brief a
+compass as the present article the discussion has of
+necessity been rather suggestive than exhaustive. Much
+yet remains to be done, and the subject opens wide to
+the inquiring eye. The writer will, however, feel amply
+satisfied if this brief outline may help to direct the
+attention of medical men to what is yet an unexplored
+field.
+
+
+
+
+The Poet Answered.
+
+Dear sir:
+
+In answer to your repeated questions and requests which
+have appeared for some years past in the columns of the
+rural press, I beg to submit the following solutions of
+your chief difficulties:--
+
+Topic I.--You frequently ask, where are the friends of
+your childhood, and urge that they shall be brought back
+to you. As far as I am able to learn, those of your
+friends who are not in jail are still right there in your
+native village. You point out that they were wont to
+share your gambols. If so, you are certainly entitled to
+have theirs now.
+
+Topic II.--You have taken occasion to say:
+
+   "Give me not silk, nor rich attire,
+    Nor gold, nor jewels rare."
+
+But, my dear fellow, this is preposterous. Why, these
+are the very things I had bought for you. If you won't
+take any of these, I shall have to give you factory cotton
+and cordwood.
+
+Topic III.--You also ask, "How fares my love across the
+sea?" Intermediate, I presume. She would hardly travel
+steerage.
+
+Topic IV.--"Why was I born? Why should I breathe?" Here
+I quite agree with you. I don't think you ought to breathe.
+
+Topic V.--You demand that I shall show you the man whose
+soul is dead and then mark him. I am awfully sorry; the
+man was around here all day yesterday, and if I had only
+known I could easily have marked him so that we could
+pick him out again.
+
+Topic VI.--I notice that you frequently say, "Oh, for
+the sky of your native land." Oh, for it, by all means,
+if you wish. But remember that you already owe for a
+great deal.
+
+Topic VII.--On more than one occasion you wish to be
+informed, "What boots it, that you idly dream?" Nothing
+boots it at present--a fact, sir, which ought to afford
+you the highest gratification.
+
+
+
+
+The Force of Statistics
+
+They were sitting on a seat of the car, immediately in
+front of me. I was consequently able to hear all that
+they were saying. They were evidently strangers who had
+dropped into a conversation. They both had the air of
+men who considered themselves profoundly interesting as
+minds. It was plain that each laboured under the impression
+that he was a ripe thinker.
+
+One had just been reading a book which lay in his lap.
+
+"I've been reading some very interesting statistics," he
+was saying to the other thinker.
+
+"Ah, statistics" said the other; "wonderful things, sir,
+statistics; very fond of them myself."
+
+"I find, for instance," the first man went on, "that a
+drop of water is filled with little ...with little... I
+forget just what you call them... little--er--things,
+every cubic inch containing--er--containing... let me
+see..."
+
+"Say a million," said the other thinker, encouragingly.
+
+"Yes, a million, or possibly a billion... but at any
+rate, ever so many of them."
+
+"Is it possible?" said the other. "But really, you know
+there are wonderful things in the world. Now, coal...
+take coal..."
+
+"Very, good," said his friend, "let us take coal," settling
+back in his seat with the air of an intellect about to
+feed itself.
+
+"Do you know that every ton of coal burnt in an engine
+will drag a train of cars as long as... I forget the
+exact length, but say a train of cars of such and such
+a length, and weighing, say so much... from... from ...
+hum! for the moment the exact distance escapes me... drag
+it from..."
+
+"From here to the moon," suggested the other.
+
+"Ah, very likely; yes, from here to the moon. Wonderful,
+isn't it?"
+
+"But the most stupendous calculation of all, sir, is in
+regard to the distance from the earth to the sun.
+Positively, sir, a cannon-ball--er--fired at the sun..."
+
+"Fired at the sun," nodded the other, approvingly, as if
+he had often seen it done.
+
+"And travelling at the rate of... of..."
+
+"Of three cents a mile," hinted the listener.
+
+"No, no, you misunderstand me,--but travelling at a
+fearful rate, simply fearful, sir, would take a hundred
+million--no, a hundred billion--in short would take a
+scandalously long time in getting there--"
+
+At this point I could stand no more. I interrupted--
+"Provided it were fired from Philadelphia," I said, and
+passed into the smoking-car.
+
+
+
+
+Men Who have Shaved Me
+
+A barber is by nature and inclination a sport. He can
+tell you at what exact hour the ball game of the day is
+to begin, can foretell its issue without losing a stroke
+of the razor, and can explain the points of inferiority
+of all the players, as compared with better men that he
+has personally seen elsewhere, with the nicety of a
+professional. He can do all this, and then stuff the
+customer's mouth with a soap-brush, and leave him while
+he goes to the other end of the shop to make a side bet
+with one of the other barbers on the outcome of the Autumn
+Handicap. In the barber-shops they knew the result of
+the Jeffries-Johnson prize-fight long before it happened.
+It is on information of this kind that they make their
+living. The performance of shaving is only incidental to
+it. Their real vocation in life is imparting information.
+To the barber the outside world is made up of customers,
+who are to be thrown into chairs, strapped, manacled,
+gagged with soap, and then given such necessary information
+on the athletic events of the moment as will carry them
+through the business hours of the day without open
+disgrace.
+
+As soon as the barber has properly filled up the customer
+with information of this sort, he rapidly removes his
+whiskers as a sign that the man is now fit to talk to,
+and lets him out of the chair.
+
+The public has grown to understand the situation. Every
+reasonable business man is willing to sit and wait half
+an hour for a shave which he could give himself in three
+minutes, because he knows that if he goes down town
+without understanding exactly why Chicago lost two games
+straight he will appear an ignoramus.
+
+At times, of course, the barber prefers to test his
+customer with a question or two. He gets him pinned in
+the chair, with his head well back, covers the customer's
+face with soap, and then planting his knee on his chest
+and holding his hand firmly across the customer's mouth,
+to prevent all utterance and to force him to swallow the
+soap, he asks: "Well, what did you think of the Detroit-St.
+Louis game yesterday?" This is not really meant for a
+question at all. It is only equivalent to saying: "Now,
+you poor fool, I'll bet you don't know anything about
+the great events of your country at all." There is a
+gurgle in the customer's throat as if he were trying to
+answer, and his eyes are seen to move sideways, but the
+barber merely thrusts the soap-brush into each eye, and
+if any motion still persists, he breathes gin and peppermint
+over the face, till all sign of life is extinct. Then he
+talks the game over in detail with the barber at the next
+chair, each leaning across an inanimate thing extended
+under steaming towels that was once a man.
+
+To know all these things barbers have to be highly
+educated. It is true that some of the greatest barbers
+that have ever lived have begun as uneducated, illiterate
+men, and by sheer energy and indomitable industry have
+forced their way to the front. But these are exceptions.
+To succeed nowadays it is practically necessary to be a
+college graduate. As the courses at Harvard and Yale have
+been found too superficial, there are now established
+regular Barbers' Colleges, where a bright young man can
+learn as much in three weeks as he would be likely to
+know after three years at Harvard. The courses at these
+colleges cover such things as: (1) Physiology, including
+Hair and its Destruction, The Origin and Growth of
+Whiskers, Soap in its Relation to Eyesight; (2) Chemistry,
+including lectures on Florida Water; and How to Make it
+out of Sardine Oil; (3) Practical Anatomy, including The
+Scalp and How to Lift it, The Ears and How to Remove
+them, and, as the Major Course for advanced students,
+The Veins of the Face and how to open and close them at
+will by the use of alum.
+
+The education of the customer is, as I have said, the
+chief part of the barber's vocation. But it must be
+remembered that the incidental function of removing his
+whiskers in order to mark him as a well-informed man is
+also of importance, and demands long practice and great
+natural aptitude. In the barbers' shops of modern cities
+shaving has been brought to a high degree of perfection.
+A good barber is not content to remove the whiskers of
+his client directly and immediately. He prefers to cook
+him first. He does this by immersing the head in hot
+water and covering the victim's face with steaming towels
+until he has him boiled to a nice pink. From time to time
+the barber removes the towels and looks at the face to
+see if it is yet boiled pink enough for his satisfaction.
+If it is not, he replaces the towels again and jams them
+down firmly with his hand until the cooking is finished.
+The final result, however, amply justifies this trouble,
+and the well-boiled customer only needs the addition of
+a few vegetables on the side to present an extremely
+appetizing appearance.
+
+During the process of the shave, it is customary for the
+barber to apply the particular kind of mental torture
+known as the third degree. This is done by terrorizing
+the patient as to the very evident and proximate loss
+of all his hair and whiskers, which the barber is enabled
+by his experience to foretell. "Your hair," he says, very
+sadly and sympathetically, "is all falling out. Better
+let me give you a shampoo?" "No." "Let me singe your hair
+to close up the follicles?" "No." "Let me plug up the
+ends of your hair with sealing-wax, it's the only thing
+that will save it for you?" "No." "Let me rub an egg
+on your scalp?" "No." "Let me squirt a lemon on your
+eyebrows?" "No."
+
+The barber sees that he is dealing with a man of
+determination, and he warms to his task. He bends low
+and whispers into the prostrate ear: "You've got a good
+many grey hairs coming in; better let me give you an
+application of Hairocene, only cost you half a dollar?"
+"No." "Your face," he whispers again, with a soft,
+caressing voice, "is all covered with wrinkles; better
+let me rub some of this Rejuvenator into the face."
+
+This process is continued until one of two things happens.
+Either the customer is obdurate, and staggers to his feet
+at last and gropes his way out of the shop with the
+knowledge that he is a wrinkled, prematurely senile man,
+whose wicked life is stamped upon his face, and whose
+unstopped hair-ends and failing follicles menace him with
+the certainty of complete baldness within twenty-four
+hours--or else, as in nearly all instances, he succumbs.
+In the latter case, immediately on his saying "yes" there
+is a shout of exultation from the barber, a roar of
+steaming water, and within a moment two barbers have
+grabbed him by the feet and thrown him under the tap,
+and, in spite of his struggles, are giving him the
+Hydro-magnetic treatment. When he emerges from their
+hands, he steps out of the shop looking as if he had been
+varnished.
+
+But even the application of the Hydro-magnetic and the
+Rejuvenator do not by any means exhaust the resources of
+the up-to-date barber. He prefers to perform on the
+customer a whole variety of subsidiary services not
+directly connected with shaving, but carried on during
+the process of the shave.
+
+In a good, up-to-date shop, while one man is shaving the
+customer, others black his boots; brush his clothes, darn
+his socks, point his nails, enamel his teeth, polish his
+eyes, and alter the shape of any of his joints which they
+think unsightly. During this operation they often stand
+seven or eight deep round a customer, fighting for a
+chance to get at him.
+
+All of these remarks apply to barber-shops in the city,
+and not to country places. In the country there is only
+one barber and one customer at a time. The thing assumes
+the aspect of a straight-out, rough-and-tumble, catch-
+as-catch-can fight, with a few spectators sitting round
+the shop to see fair play. In the city they can shave a
+man without removing any of his clothes. But in the
+country, where the customer insists on getting the full
+value for his money, they remove the collar and necktie,
+the coat and the waistcoat, and, for a really good shave
+and hair-cut, the customer is stripped to the waist. The
+barber can then take a rush at him from the other side
+of the room, and drive the clippers up the full length
+of the spine, so as to come at the heavier hair on the
+back of the head with the impact of a lawn-mower driven
+into long grass.
+
+
+
+
+Getting the Thread of It
+
+Have you ever had a man try to explain to you what happened
+in a book as far as he has read? It is a most instructive
+thing. Sinclair, the man who shares my rooms with me,
+made such an attempt the other night. I had come in cold
+and tired from a walk and found him full of excitement,
+with a bulky magazine in one hand and a paper-cutter
+gripped in the other.
+
+"Say, here's a grand story," he burst out as soon as I
+came in; "it's great! most fascinating thing I ever read.
+Wait till I read you some of it. I'll just tell you what
+has happened up to where I am--you'll easily catch the
+thread of it--and then we'll finish it together."
+
+I wasn't feeling in a very responsive mood, but I saw no
+way to stop him, so I merely said, "All right, throw me
+your thread, I'll catch it."
+
+"Well," Sinclair began with great animation, "this count
+gets this letter..."
+
+"Hold on," I interrupted, "what count gets what letter?"
+
+"Oh, the count it's about, you know. He gets this letter
+from this Porphirio."
+
+"From which Porphirio?"
+
+"Why, Porphirio sent the letter, don't you see, he sent
+it," Sinclair exclaimed a little impatiently--"sent it
+through Demonio and told him to watch for him with him,
+and kill him when he got him."
+
+"Oh, see here!" I broke in, "who is to meet who, and who
+is to get stabbed?"
+
+"They're going to stab Demonio."
+
+"And who brought the letter?"
+
+"Demonio."
+
+"Well, now, Demonio must be a clam! What did he bring it
+for?"
+
+"Oh, but he don't know what's in it that's just the slick
+part of it," and Sinclair began to snigger to himself at
+the thought of it. "You see, this Carlo Carlotti the
+Condottiere..."
+
+"Stop right there," I said. "What's a Condottiere?"
+
+"It's a sort of brigand. He, you understand, was in league
+with this Fra Fraliccolo..."
+
+A suspicion flashed across my mind. "Look here," I said
+firmly, "if the scene of this story is laid in the
+Highlands, I refuse to listen to it. Call it off."
+
+"No, no," Sinclair answered quickly, "that's all right.
+It's laid in Italy... time of Pius the something. He
+comes in--say, but he's great! so darned crafty. It's
+him, you know, that persuades this Franciscan..."
+
+"Pause," I said, "what Franciscan?"
+
+"Fra Fraliccolo, of course," Sinclair said snappishly.
+"You see, Pio tries to..."
+
+"Whoa!" I said, "who is Pio?"
+
+"Oh, hang it all, Pio is Italian, it's short for Pius.
+He tries to get Fra Fraliccolo and Carlo Carlotti the
+Condottiere to steal the document from... let me see;
+what was he called?... Oh, yes... from the Dog of Venice,
+so that... or... no, hang it, you put me out, that's all
+wrong. It's the other way round. Pio wasn't clever at
+all; he's a regular darned fool. It's the Dog that's
+crafty. By Jove, he's fine," Sinclair went on; warming
+up to enthusiasm again, "he just does anything he wants.
+He makes this Demonio (Demonio is one of those hirelings,
+you know, he's the tool of the Dog)... makes him steal
+the document off Porphirio, and..."
+
+"But how does he get him to do that?" I asked.
+
+"Oh, the Dog has Demonio pretty well under his thumb, so
+he makes Demonio scheme round till he gets old Pio--er--gets
+him under his thumb, and then, of course, Pio thinks that
+Porphirio--I mean he thinks that he has Porphirio--er--has
+him under his thumb."
+
+"Half a minute, Sinclair," I said, "who did you say was
+under the Dog's thumb?"
+
+"Demonio."
+
+"Thanks. I was mixed in the thumbs. Go on."
+
+"Well, just when things are like this..."
+
+"Like what?"
+
+"Like I said."
+
+"All right."
+
+"Who should turn up and thwart the whole scheme, but this
+Signorina Tarara in her domino..."
+
+"Hully Gee!" I said, "you make my head ache. What the
+deuce does she come in her domino for?"
+
+"Why, to thwart it."
+
+"To thwart what?"
+
+"Thwart the whole darned thing," Sinclair exclaimed
+emphatically.
+
+"But can't she thwart it without her domino?"
+
+"I should think not! You see, if it hadn't been for the
+domino, the Dog would have spotted her quick as a wink.
+Only when he sees her in the domino with this rose in
+her hair, he thinks she must be Lucia dell' Esterolla."
+
+"Say, he fools himself, doesn't he? Who's this last girl?"
+
+"Lucia? Oh, she's great!" Sinclair said. "She's one of
+those Southern natures, you know, full of--er--full of..."
+
+"Full of fun," I suggested.
+
+"Oh, hang it all, don't make fun of it! Well, anyhow,
+she's sister, you understand, to the Contessa Carantarata,
+and that's why Fra Fraliccolo, or... hold on, that's not
+it, no, no, she's not sister to anybody. She's cousin,
+that's it; or, anyway, she thinks she is cousin to Fra
+Fraliccolo himself, and that's why Pio tries to stab Fra
+Fraliccolo."
+
+"Oh, yes," I assented, "naturally he would."
+
+"Ah," Sinclair said hopefully, getting his paper-cutter
+ready to cut the next pages, "you begin to get the thread
+now, don't you?"
+
+"Oh, fine!" I said. "The people in it are the Dog and
+Pio, and Carlo Carlotti the Condottiere, and those others
+that we spoke of."
+
+"That's right," Sinclair said. "Of course, there are more
+still that I can tell you about if..."
+
+"Oh, never mind," I said, "I'll work along with those,
+they're a pretty representative crowd. Then Porphirio is
+under Pio's thumb, and Pio is under Demonio's thumb, and
+the Dog is crafty, and Lucia is full of something all
+the time. Oh, I've got a mighty clear idea of it," I
+concluded bitterly.
+
+"Oh, you've got it," Sinclair said, "I knew you'd like
+it. Now we'll go on. I'll just finish to the bottom of
+my page and then I'll go on aloud."
+
+He ran his eyes rapidly over the lines till he came to
+the bottom of the page, then he cut the leaves and turned
+over. I saw his eye rest on the half-dozen lines that
+confronted him on the next page with an expression of
+utter consternation.
+
+"Well, I will be cursed!" he said at length.
+
+"What's the matter?" I said gently, with a great joy at
+my heart.
+
+"This infernal thing's a serial," he gasped, as he pointed
+at the words, "To be continued," "and that's all there
+is in this number."
+
+
+
+
+Telling His Faults
+
+"Oh, do, Mr. Sapling," said the beautiful girl at the
+summer hotel, "do let me read the palm of your hand! I
+can tell you all your faults."
+
+Mr. Sapling gave an inarticulate gurgle and a roseate
+flush swept over his countenance as he surrendered his
+palm to the grasp of the fair enchantress.
+
+"Oh, you're just full of faults, just full of them, Mr.
+Sapling!" she cried.
+
+Mr. Sapling looked it.
+
+"To begin with," said the beautiful girl, slowly and
+reflectingly, "you are dreadfully cynical: you hardly
+believe in anything at all, and you've utterly no faith
+in us poor women."
+
+The feeble smile that had hitherto kindled the features
+of Mr. Sapling into a ray of chastened imbecility, was
+distorted in an effort at cynicism.
+
+"Then your next fault is that you are too determined;
+much too determined. When once you have set your will on
+any object, you crush every obstacle under your feet."
+
+Mr. Sapling looked meekly down at his tennis shoes, but
+began to feel calmer, more lifted up. Perhaps he had been
+all these things without knowing it.
+
+"Then you are cold and sarcastic."
+
+Mr. Sapling attempted to look cold and sarcastic. He
+succeeded in a rude leer.
+
+"And you're horribly world-weary, you care for nothing.
+You have drained philosophy to the dregs, and scoff at
+everything."
+
+Mr. Sapling's inner feeling was that from now on he would
+simply scoff and scoff and scoff.
+
+"Your only redeeming quality is that you are generous.
+You have tried to kill even this, but cannot. Yes,"
+concluded the beautiful girl, "those are your faults,
+generous still, but cold, cynical, and relentless. Good
+night, Mr. Sapling."
+
+And resisting all entreaties the beautiful girl passed
+from the verandah of the hotel and vanished.
+
+And when later in the evening the brother of the beautiful
+girl borrowed Mr. Sapling's tennis racket, and his bicycle
+for a fortnight, and the father of the beautiful girl
+got Sapling to endorse his note for a couple of hundreds,
+and her uncle Zephas borrowed his bedroom candle and used
+his razor to cut up a plug of tobacco, Mr. Sapling felt
+proud to be acquainted with the family.
+
+
+
+
+Winter Pastimes
+
+It is in the depth of winter, when the intense cold
+renders it desirable to stay at home, that the really
+Pleasant Family is wont to serve invitations upon a few
+friends to spend a Quiet Evening.
+
+It is at these gatherings that that gay thing, the indoor
+winter game, becomes rampant. It is there that the old
+euchre deck and the staring domino become fair and
+beautiful things; that the rattle of the Loto counter
+rejoices the heart, that the old riddle feels the sap
+stirring in its limbs again, and the amusing spilikin
+completes the mental ruin of the jaded guest. Then does
+the Jolly Maiden Aunt propound the query: What is the
+difference between an elephant and a silk hat? Or declare
+that her first is a vowel, her second a preposition, and
+her third an archipelago. It is to crown such a quiet
+evening, and to give the finishing stroke to those of
+the visitors who have not escaped early, with a fierce
+purpose of getting at the saloons before they have time
+to close, that the indoor game or family reservoir of
+fun is dragged from its long sleep. it is spread out upon
+the table. Its paper of directions is unfolded. Its cards,
+its counters, its pointers and its markers are distributed
+around the table, and the visitor forces a look of reckless
+pleasure upon his face. Then the "few simple directions
+" are read aloud by the Jolly Aunt, instructing each
+player to challenge the player holding the golden letter
+corresponding to the digit next in order, to name a dead
+author beginning with X, failing which the player must
+declare himself in fault, and pay the forfeit of handing
+over to the Jolly Aunt his gold watch and all his money,
+or having a hot plate put down his neck.
+
+With a view to bringing some relief to the guests at
+entertainments of this kind, I have endeavoured to
+construct one or two little winter pastimes of a novel
+character. They are quite inexpensive, and as they need
+no background of higher arithmetic or ancient history,
+they are within reach of the humblest intellect. Here is
+one of them. It is called Indoor Football, or Football
+without a Ball.
+
+In this game any number of players, from fifteen to
+thirty, seat themselves in a heap on any one player,
+usually the player next to the dealer. They then challenge
+him to get up, while one player stands with a stop-watch
+in his hand and counts forty seconds. Should the first
+player fail to rise before forty seconds are counted,
+the player with the watch declares him suffocated. This
+is called a "Down" and counts one. The player who was
+the Down is then leant against the wall; his wind is
+supposed to be squeezed out. The player called the referee
+then blows a whistle and the players select another player
+and score a down off him. While the player is supposed
+to be down, all the rest must remain seated as before,
+and not rise from him until the referee by counting forty
+and blowing his whistle announces that in his opinion
+the other player is stifled. He is then leant against
+the wall beside the first player. When the whistle again
+blows the player nearest the referee strikes him behind
+the right ear. This is a "Touch," and counts two.
+
+It is impossible, of course, to give all the rules in
+detail. I might add, however, that while it counts TWO
+to strike the referee, to kick him counts THREE. To break
+his arm or leg counts FOUR, and to kill him outright is
+called GRAND SLAM and counts one game.
+
+Here is another little thing that I have worked out,
+which is superior to parlour games in that it combines
+their intense excitement with sound out-of-door exercise.
+
+It is easily comprehended, and can be played by any number
+of players, old and young. It requires no other apparatus
+than a trolley car of the ordinary type, a mile or two
+of track, and a few thousand volts of electricity. It is
+called:
+
+   The Suburban Trolley Car
+   A Holiday Game for Old and Young.
+
+The chief part in the game is taken by two players who
+station themselves one at each end of the car, and who
+adopt some distinctive costumes to indicate that they
+are "it." The other players occupy the body of the car,
+or take up their position at intervals along the track.
+
+The object of each player should be to enter the car as
+stealthily as possible in such a way as to escape the
+notice of the players in distinctive dress. Should he
+fail to do this he must pay the philopena or forfeit. Of
+these there are two: philopena No. 1, the payment of five
+cents, and philopena No. 2, being thrown off the car by
+the neck. Each player may elect which philopena he will
+pay. Any player who escapes paying the philopena scores
+one.
+
+The players who are in the car may elect to adopt a
+standing attitude; or to seat themselves, but no player
+may seat himself in the lap of another without the second
+player's consent. The object of those who elect to remain
+standing is to place their feet upon the toes of those
+who sit; when they do this they score. The object of
+those who elect to sit is to elude the feet of the standing
+players. Much merriment is thus occasioned.
+
+The player in distinctive costume at the front of the
+car controls a crank, by means of which he is enabled to
+bring the car to a sudden stop, or to cause it to plunge
+violently forward. His aim in so doing is to cause all
+the standing players to fall over backward. Every time
+he does this he scores. For this purpose he is generally
+in collusion with the other player in distinctive costume,
+whose business it is to let him know by a series of bells
+and signals when the players are not looking, and can be
+easily thrown down. A sharp fall of this sort gives rise
+to no end of banter and good-natured drollery, directed
+against the two players who are "it."
+
+Should a player who is thus thrown backward save himself
+from falling by sitting down in the lap of a female
+player, he scores one. Any player who scores in this
+manner is entitled to remain seated while he may count
+six, after which he must remove himself or pay philopena
+No. 2.
+
+Should the player who controls the crank perceive a player
+upon the street desirous of joining in the game by entering
+the car, his object should be: primo, to run over him
+and kill him; secundo, to kill him by any other means in
+his power; tertio, to let him into the car, but to exact
+the usual philopena.
+
+Should a player, in thus attempting to get on the car
+from without, become entangled in the machinery, the
+player controlling the crank shouts "huff!" and the car
+is supposed to pass over him. All within the car score
+one.
+
+A fine spice of the ludicrous may be added to the game
+by each player pretending that he has a destination or
+stopping-place, where he would wish to alight. It now
+becomes the aim of the two players who are "it" to carry
+him past his point. A player who is thus carried beyond
+his imaginary stopping-place must feign a violent passion,
+and imitate angry gesticulations. He may, in addition,
+feign a great age or a painful infirmity, which will be
+found to occasion the most convulsive fun for the other
+players in the game.
+
+These are the main outlines of this most amusing pastime.
+Many other agreeable features may, of course, be readily
+introduced by persons of humour and imagination.
+
+
+
+
+Number Fifty-Six
+
+What I narrate was told me one winter's evening by my
+friend Ah-Yen in the little room behind his laundry.
+Ah-Yen is a quiet little celestial with a grave and
+thoughtful face, and that melancholy contemplative
+disposition so often noticed in his countrymen. Between
+myself and Ah-Yen there exists a friendship of some years'
+standing, and we spend many a long evening in the dimly
+lighted room behind his shop, smoking a dreamy pipe
+together and plunged in silent meditation. I am chiefly
+attracted to my friend by the highly imaginative cast of
+his mind, which is, I believe, a trait of the Eastern
+character and which enables him to forget to a great
+extent the sordid cares of his calling in an inner life
+of his own creation. Of the keen, analytical side of his
+mind, I was in entire ignorance until the evening of
+which I write.
+
+The room where we sat was small and dingy, with but little
+furniture except our chairs and the little table at which
+we filled and arranged our pipes, and was lighted only
+by a tallow candle. There were a few pictures on the
+walls, for the most part rude prints cut from the columns
+of the daily press and pasted up to hide the bareness of
+the room. Only one picture was in any way noticeable, a
+portrait admirably executed in pen and ink. The face was
+that of a young man, a very beautiful face, but one of
+infinite sadness, I had long been aware, although I know
+not how, that Ah-Yen had met with a great sorrow, and
+had in some way connected the fact with this portrait.
+I had always refrained, however, from asking him about
+it, and it was not until the evening in question that I
+knew its history.
+
+We had been smoking in silence for some time when Ah-Yen
+spoke. My friend is a man of culture and wide reading,
+and his English is consequently perfect in its construction;
+his speech is, of course, marked by the lingering liquid
+accent of, his country which I will not attempt to
+reproduce.
+
+"I see," he said, "that you have been examining the
+portrait of my unhappy friend, Fifty-Six. I have never
+yet told you of my bereavement, but as to-night is the
+anniversary of his death, I would fain speak of him for
+a while."
+
+Ah-Yen paused; I lighted my pipe afresh, and nodded to
+him to show that I was listening.
+
+"I do not know," he went on, "at what precise time
+Fifty-Six came into my life. I could indeed find it out
+by examining my books, but I have never troubled to do
+so. Naturally I took no more interest in him at first
+than in any other of my customers--less, perhaps, since
+he never in the course of our connection brought his
+clothes to me himself but always sent them by a boy. When
+I presently perceived that he was becoming one of my
+regular customers, I allotted to him his number, Fifty-Six,
+and began to speculate as to who and what he was. Before
+long I had reached several conclusions in regard to my
+unknown client. The quality of his linen showed me that,
+if not rich, he was at any rate fairly well off. I could
+see that he was a young man of regular Christian life,
+who went out into society to a certain extent; this I
+could tell from his sending the same number of articles
+to the laundry, from his washing always coming on Saturday
+night, and from the fact that he wore a dress shirt about
+once a week. In disposition he was a modest, unassuming
+fellow, for his collars were only two inches high."
+
+I stared at Ah-Yen in some amazement, the recent
+publications of a favourite novelist had rendered me
+familiar with this process of analytical reasoning, but
+I was prepared for no such revelations from my Eastern
+friend.
+
+"When I first knew him," Ah-Yen went on, "Fifty-Six was
+a student at the university. This, of course, I did not
+know for some time. I inferred it, however, in the course
+of time, from his absence from town during the four summer
+months, and from the fact that during the time of the
+university examinations the cuffs. of his shirts came to
+me covered with dates, formulas, and propositions in
+geometry. I followed him with no little interest through
+his university career. During the four years which it
+lasted, I washed for him every week; my regular connection
+with him and the insight which my observation gave me
+into the lovable character of the man, deepened my first
+esteem into a profound affection and I became most anxious
+for his success. I helped him at each succeeding
+examination, as far as lay in my power, by starching his
+shirts half-way to the elbow, so as to leave him as much
+room as possible for annotations. My anxiety during the
+strain of his final examination I will not attempt to
+describe. That Fifty-Six was undergoing the great crisis
+of his academic career, I could infer from the state of
+his handkerchiefs which, in apparent unconsciousness, he
+used as pen-wipers during the final test. His conduct
+throughout the examination bore witness to the moral
+development which had taken place in his character during
+his career as an undergraduate; for the notes upon his
+cuffs which had been so copious at his earlier examinations
+were limited now to a few hints, and these upon topics
+so intricate as to defy an ordinary memory. It was with
+a thrill of joy that I at last received in his laundry
+bundle one Saturday early in June, a ruffled dress shirt,
+the bosom of which was thickly spattered with the spillings
+of the wine-cup, and realized that Fifty-Six had banqueted
+as a Bachelor of Arts.
+
+"In the following winter the habit of wiping his pen upon
+his handkerchief, which I had remarked during his final
+examination, became chronic with him, and I knew that he
+had entered upon the study of law. He worked hard during
+that year, and dress shirts almost disappeared from his
+weekly bundle. It was in the following winter, the second
+year of his legal studies, that the tragedy of his life
+began. I became aware that a change had come over his
+laundry, from one, or at most two a week, his dress shirts
+rose to four, and silk handkerchiefs began to replace
+his linen ones. It dawned upon me that Fifty-Six was
+abandoning the rigorous tenor of his student life and
+was going into society. I presently perceived something
+more; Fifty-Six was in love. It was soon impossible to
+doubt it. He was wearing seven shirts a week; linen
+handkerchiefs disappeared from his laundry; his collars
+rose from two inches to two and a quarter, and finally
+to two and a half. I have in my possession one of his
+laundry lists of that period; a glance at it will show
+the scrupulous care which he bestowed upon his person.
+Well do I remember the dawning hopes of those days,
+alternating with the gloomiest despair. Each Saturday I
+opened his bundle with a trembling eagerness to catch
+the first signs of a return of his love. I helped my
+friend in every way that I could. His shirts and collars
+were masterpieces of my art, though my hand often shook
+with agitation as I applied the starch. She was a brave
+noble girl, that I knew; her influence was elevating the
+whole nature of Fifty-Six; until now he had had in his
+possession a certain number of detached cuffs and false
+shirt-fronts. These he discarded now,--at first the false
+shirt-fronts, scorning the very idea of fraud, and after
+a time, in his enthusiasm, abandoning even the cuffs. I
+cannot look back upon those bright happy days of courtship
+without a sigh.
+
+"The happiness of Fifty-Six seemed to enter into and fill
+my whole life. I lived but from Saturday to Saturday.
+The appearance of false shirt-fronts would cast me to
+the lowest depths of despair; their absence raised me to
+a pinnacle of hope. It was not till winter softened into
+spring that Fifty-Six nerved himself to learn his fate.
+One Saturday he sent me a new white waistcoat, a garment
+which had hitherto been shunned by his modest nature, to
+prepare for his use. I bestowed upon it all the resources
+of my art; I read his purpose in it. On the Saturday
+following it was returned to me and, with tears of joy,
+I marked where a warm little hand had rested fondly on
+the right shoulder, and knew that Fifty-Six was the
+accepted lover of his sweetheart."
+
+Ah-Yen paused and sat for some time silent; his pipe had
+sputtered out and lay cold in the hollow of his hand;
+his eye was fixed upon the wall where the light and
+shadows shifted in the dull flickering of the candle. At
+last he spoke again:
+
+"I will not dwell upon the happy days that ensued--days
+of gaudy summer neckties and white waistcoats, of spotless
+shirts and lofty collars worn but a single day by the
+fastidious lover. Our happiness seemed complete and I
+asked no more from fate. Alas! it was not destined to
+continue! When the bright days of summer were fading into
+autumn, I was grieved to notice an occasional quarrel--only
+four shirts instead of seven, or the reappearance of the
+abandoned cuffs and shirt-fronts. Reconciliations followed,
+with tears of penitence upon the shoulder of the white
+waistcoat, and the seven shirts came back. But the quarrels
+grew more frequent and there came at times stormy scenes
+of passionate emotion that left a track of broken buttons
+down the waistcoat. The shirts went slowly down to three,
+then fell to two, and the collars of my unhappy friend
+subsided to an inch and three-quarters. In vain I lavished
+my utmost care upon Fifty-Six. It seemed to my tortured
+mind that the gloss upon his shirts and collars would
+have melted a heart of stone. Alas! my every effort at
+reconciliation seemed to fail. An awful month passed;
+the false fronts and detached cuffs were all back again;
+the unhappy lover seemed to glory in their perfidy. At
+last, one gloomy evening, I found on opening his bundle
+that he had bought a stock of celluloids, and my heart
+told me that she had abandoned him for ever. Of what my
+poor friend suffered at this time, I can give you no
+idea; suffice it to say that he passed from celluloid to
+a blue flannel shirt and from blue to grey. The sight of
+a red cotton handkerchief in his wash at length warned
+me that his disappointed love had unhinged his mind, and
+I feared the worst. Then came an agonizing interval of
+three weeks during which he sent me nothing, and after
+that came the last parcel that I ever received from him
+an enormous bundle that seemed to contain all his effects.
+In this, to my horror, I discovered one shirt the breast
+of which was stained a deep crimson with his blood, and
+pierced by a ragged hole that showed where a bullet had
+singed through into his heart.
+
+"A fortnight before, I remembered having heard the street
+boys crying the news of an appalling suicide, and I know
+now that it must have been he. After the first shock of
+my grief had passed, I sought to keep him in my memory
+by drawing the portrait which hangs beside you. I have
+some skill in the art, and I feel assured that I have
+caught the expression of his face. The picture is, of
+course, an ideal one, for, as you know, I never saw
+Fifty-Six."
+
+The bell on the door of the outer shop tinkled at the
+entrance of a customer. Ah-Yen rose with that air of
+quiet resignation that habitually marked his demeanour,
+and remained for some time in the shop. When he returned
+he seemed in no mood to continue speaking of his lost
+friend. I left him soon after and walked sorrowfully home
+to my lodgings. On my way I mused much upon my little
+Eastern friend and the sympathetic grasp of his imagination.
+But a burden lay heavy on my heart--something I would
+fain have told him but which I could not bear to mention.
+I could not find it in my heart to shatter the airy castle
+of his fancy. For my life has been secluded and lonely
+and I have known no love like that of my ideal friend.
+Yet I have a haunting recollection of a certain huge
+bundle of washing that I sent to him about a year ago.
+I had been absent from town for three weeks and my laundry
+was much larger than usual in consequence. And if I
+mistake not there was in the bundle a tattered shirt that
+had been grievously stained by the breaking of a bottle
+of red ink in my portmanteau, and burnt in one place
+where an ash fell from my cigar as I made up the bundle.
+Of all this I cannot feel absolutely certain, yet I know
+at least that until a year ago, when I transferred my
+custom to a more modern establishment, my laundry number
+with Ah-Yen was Fifty-Six.
+
+
+
+
+Aristocratic Education
+
+House of Lords, Jan. 25, 1920.--The House of Lords
+commenced to-day in Committee the consideration of Clause
+No. 52,000 of the Education Bill, dealing with the teaching
+of Geometry in the schools.
+
+The Leader of the Government in presenting the clause
+urged upon their Lordships the need of conciliation. The
+Bill, he said, had now been before their Lordships for
+sixteen years. The Government had made every concession.
+They had accepted all the amendments of their Lordships
+on the opposite side in regard to the original provisions
+of the Bill. They had consented also to insert in the
+Bill a detailed programme of studies of which the present
+clause, enunciating the fifth proposition of Euclid, was
+a part. He would therefore ask their Lordships to accept
+the clause drafted as follows:
+
+"The angles at the base of an isosceles triangle are
+equal, and if the equal sides of the triangle are produced,
+the exterior angles will also be equal."
+
+He would hasten to add that the Government had no intention
+of producing the sides. Contingencies might arise to
+render such a course necessary, but in that case their
+Lordships would receive an early intimation of the fact.
+
+The Archbishop of Canterbury spoke against the clause.
+He considered it, in its present form, too secular. He
+should wish to amend the clause so as to make it read:
+
+"The angles at the base of an isosceles triangle are, in
+every Christian community, equal, and if the sides be
+produced by a member of a Christian congregation, the
+exterior angles will be equal."
+
+He was aware, he continued, that the angles at the base
+of an isosceles triangle are extremely equal, but he must
+remind the Government that the Church had been aware of
+this for several years past. He was willing also to admit
+that the opposite sides and ends of a parallelogram are
+equal, but he thought that such admission should be
+coupled with a distinct recognition of the existence of
+a Supreme Being.
+
+The Leader of the Government accepted His Grace's amendment
+with pleasure. He considered it the brightest amendment
+His Grace had made that week. The Government, he said,
+was aware of the intimate relation in which His Grace
+stood to the bottom end of a parallelogram and was prepared
+to respect it.
+
+Lord Halifax rose to offer a further amendment. He thought
+the present case was one in which the "four-fifths"
+clause ought to apply: he should wish it stated that the
+angles are equal for two days every week, except in the
+case of schools where four-fifths of the parents are
+conscientiously opposed to the use of the isosceles
+triangle.
+
+The Leader of the Government thought the amendment a
+singularly pleasing one. He accepted it and would like
+it understood that the words isosceles triangle were not
+meant in any offensive sense.
+
+Lord Rosebery spoke at some length. He considered the
+clause unfair to Scotland, where the high state of morality
+rendered education unnecessary. Unless an amendment in
+this sense was accepted, it might be necessary to reconsider
+the Act of Union of 1707.
+
+The Leader of the Government said that Lord Rosebery's
+amendment was the best he had heard yet. The Government
+accepted it at once. They were willing to make every
+concession. They would, if need be, reconsider the Norman
+Conquest.
+
+The Duke of Devonshire took exception to the part of the
+clause relating to the production of the sides. He did
+not think the country was prepared for it. It was unfair
+to the producer. He would like the clause altered to
+read, "if the sides be produced in the home market."
+
+The Leader of the Government accepted with pleasure His
+Grace's amendment. He considered it quite sensible. He
+would now, as it was near the hour of rising, present
+the clause in its revised form. He hoped, however, that
+their Lordships would find time to think out some further
+amendments for the evening sitting.
+
+The clause was then read.
+
+His Grace of Canterbury then moved that the House, in
+all humility, adjourn for dinner.
+
+
+
+
+The Conjurer's Revenge
+
+"Now, ladies and gentlemen," said the conjurer, "having
+shown you that the cloth is absolutely empty, I will
+proceed to take from it a bowl of goldfish. Presto!"
+
+All around the hall people were saying, "Oh, how wonderful!
+How does he do it?"
+
+But the Quick Man on the front seat said in a big whisper
+to the people near him, "He-had-it-up-his-sleeve."
+
+Then the people nodded brightly at the Quick Man and
+said, "Oh, of course"; and everybody whispered round the
+hall, "He-had-it-up-his-sleeve."
+
+"My next trick," said the conjurer, "is the famous
+Hindostanee rings. You will notice that the rings are
+apparently separate; at a blow they all join (clang,
+clang, clang)--Presto!"
+
+There was a general buzz of stupefaction till the Quick
+Man was heard to whisper, "He-must-have-had-another-lot-
+up-his-sleeve."
+
+Again everybody nodded and whispered, "The-rings-were-
+up-his-sleeve."
+
+The brow of the conjurer was clouded with a gathering
+frown.
+
+"I will now," he continued, "show you a most amusing
+trick by which I am enabled to take any number of eggs
+from a hat. Will some gentleman kindly lend me his hat?
+Ah, thank you--Presto!"
+
+He extracted seventeen eggs, and for thirty-five seconds
+the audience began to think that he was wonderful. Then
+the Quick Man whispered along the front bench, "He-has-a-
+hen-up-his-sleeve," and all the people whispered it on.
+"He-has-a-lot-of-hens-up-his-sleeve."
+
+The egg trick was ruined.
+
+It went on like that all through. It transpired from the
+whispers of the Quick Man that the conjurer must have
+concealed up his sleeve, in addition to the rings, hens,
+and fish, several packs of cards, a loaf of bread, a
+doll's cradle, a live guinea-pig, a fifty-cent piece,
+and a rocking-chair.
+
+The reputation of the conjurer was rapidly sinking below
+zero. At the close of the evening he rallied for a final
+effort.
+
+"Ladies and gentlemen," he said, "I will present to you,
+in conclusion, the famous Japanese trick recently invented
+by the natives of Tipperary. Will you, sir," he continued
+turning toward the Quick Man, "will you kindly hand me
+your gold watch?"
+
+It was passed to him.
+
+"Have I your permission to put it into this mortar and
+pound it to pieces?" he asked savagely.
+
+The Quick Man nodded and smiled.
+
+The conjurer threw the watch into the mortar and grasped
+a sledge hammer from the table. There was a sound of
+violent smashing, "He's-slipped-it-up-his-sleeve,"
+whispered the Quick Man.
+
+"Now, sir," continued the conjurer, "will you allow me
+to take your handkerchief and punch holes in it? Thank
+you. You see, ladies and gentlemen, there is no deception;
+the holes are visible to the eye."
+
+The face of the Quick Man beamed. This time the real
+mystery of the thing fascinated him.
+
+"And now, sir, will you kindly pass me your silk hat and
+allow me to dance on it? Thank you."
+
+The conjurer made a few rapid passes with his feet and
+exhibited the hat crushed beyond recognition.
+
+"And will you now, sir, take off your celluloid collar
+and permit me to burn it in the candle? Thank you, sir.
+And will you allow me to smash your spectacles for you
+with my hammer? Thank you."
+
+By this time the features of the Quick Man were assuming
+a puzzled expression. "This thing beats me," he whispered,
+"I don't see through it a bit."
+
+There was a great hush upon the audience. Then the conjurer
+drew himself up to his full height and, with a withering
+look at the Quick Man, he concluded:
+
+"Ladies and gentlemen, you will observe that I have, with
+this gentleman's permission, broken his watch, burnt his
+collar, smashed his spectacles, and danced on his hat.
+If he will give me the further permission to paint green
+stripes on his overcoat, or to tie his suspenders in a
+knot, I shall be delighted to entertain you. If not, the
+performance is at an end."
+
+And amid a glorious burst of music from the orchestra
+the curtain fell, and the audience dispersed, convinced
+that there are some tricks, at any rate, that are not
+done up the conjurer's sleeve.
+
+
+
+
+Hints to Travellers
+
+The following hints and observations have occurred to me
+during a recent trip across the continent: they are
+written in no spirit of complaint against existing railroad
+methods, but merely in the hope that they may prove useful
+to those who travel, like myself, in a spirit of meek,
+observant ignorance.
+
+1. Sleeping in a Pullman car presents some difficulties
+to the novice. Care should be taken to allay all sense
+of danger. The frequent whistling of the engine during
+the night is apt to be a source of alarm. Find out,
+therefore, before travelling, the meaning of the various
+whistles. One means "station," two, "railroad crossing,"
+and so on. Five whistles, short and rapid, mean sudden
+danger. When you hear whistles in the night, sit up
+smartly in your bunk and count them. Should they reach
+five, draw on your trousers over your pyjamas and leave
+the train instantly. As a further precaution against
+accident, sleep with the feet towards the engine if you
+prefer to have the feet crushed, or with the head towards
+the engine, if you think it best to have the head crushed.
+In making this decision try to be as unselfish as possible.
+If indifferent, sleep crosswise with the head hanging
+over into the aisle.
+
+2. I have devoted some thought to the proper method of
+changing trains. The system which I have observed to be
+the most popular with travellers of my own class, is
+something as follows: Suppose that you have been told on
+leaving New York that you are to change at Kansas City.
+The evening before approaching Kansas City, stop the
+conductor in the aisle of the car (you can do this best
+by putting out your foot and tripping him), and say
+politely, "Do I change at Kansas City?" He says "Yes."
+Very good. Don't believe him. On going into the dining-car
+for supper, take a negro aside and put it to him as a
+personal matter between a white man and a black, whether
+he thinks you ought to change at Kansas City. Don't be
+satisfied with this. In the course of the evening pass
+through the entire train from time to time, and say to
+people casually, "Oh, can you tell me if I change at
+Kansas City?" Ask the conductor about it a few more times
+in the evening: a repetition of the question will ensure
+pleasant relations with him. Before falling asleep watch
+for his passage and ask him through the curtains of your
+berth, "Oh, by the way, did you say I changed at Kansas
+City?" If he refuses to stop, hook him by the neck with
+your walking-stick, and draw him gently to your bedside.
+In the morning when the train stops and a man calls,
+"Kansas City! All change!" approach the conductor again
+and say, "Is this Kansas City?" Don't be discouraged at
+his answer. Pick yourself up and go to the other end of
+the car and say to the brakesman, "Do you know, sir, if
+this is Kansas City?" Don't be too easily convinced.
+Remember that both brakesman and conductor may be in
+collusion to deceive you. Look around, therefore, for
+the name of the station on the signboard. Having found
+it, alight and ask the first man you see if this is Kansas
+City. He will answer, "Why, where in blank are your blank
+eyes? Can't you see it there, plain as blank?" When you
+hear language of this sort, ask no more. You are now in
+Kansas and this is Kansas City.
+
+3. I have observed that it is now the practice of the
+conductors to stick bits of paper in the hats of the
+passengers. They do this, I believe, to mark which ones
+they like best. The device is pretty, and adds much to
+the scenic appearance of the car. But I notice with pain
+that the system is fraught with much trouble for the
+conductors. The task of crushing two or three passengers
+together, in order to reach over them and stick a ticket
+into the chinks of a silk skull cap is embarrassing for
+a conductor of refined feelings. It would be simpler if
+the conductor should carry a small hammer and a packet
+of shingle nails and nail the paid-up passenger to the
+back of the seat. Or better still, let the conductor
+carry a small pot of paint and a brush, and mark the
+passengers in such a way that he cannot easily mistake
+them. In the case of bald-headed passengers, the hats
+might be politely removed and red crosses painted on the
+craniums. This will indicate that they are bald. Through
+passengers might be distinguished by a complete coat of
+paint. In the hands of a man of taste, much might be
+effected by a little grouping of painted passengers and
+the leisure time of the conductor agreeably occupied.
+
+4. I have observed in travelling in the West that the
+irregularity of railroad accidents is a fruitful cause
+of complaint. The frequent disappointment of the holders
+of accident policy tickets on western roads is leading
+to widespread protest. Certainly the conditions of travel
+in the West are altering rapidly and accidents can no
+longer be relied upon. This is deeply to be regretted,
+in so much as, apart from accidents, the tickets may be
+said to be practically valueless.
+
+
+
+
+A Manual of Education
+
+The few selections below are offered as a specimen page
+of a little book which I have in course of preparation.
+
+Every man has somewhere in the back of his head the wreck
+of a thing which he calls his education. My book is
+intended to embody in concise form these remnants of
+early instruction.
+
+Educations are divided into splendid educations, thorough
+classical educations, and average educations. All very
+old men have splendid educations; all men who apparently
+know nothing else have thorough classical educations;
+nobody has an average education.
+
+An education, when it is all written out on foolscap,
+covers nearly ten sheets. It takes about six years of
+severe college training to acquire it. Even then a man
+often finds that he somehow hasn't got his education just
+where he can put his thumb on it. When my little book of
+eight or ten pages has appeared, everybody may carry his
+education in his hip pocket.
+
+Those who have not had the advantage of an early training
+will be enabled, by a few hours of conscientious
+application, to put themselves on an equal footing with
+the most scholarly.
+
+The selections are chosen entirely at random.
+
+
+I.--REMAINS OF ASTRONOMY
+
+Astronomy teaches the correct use of the sun and the
+planets. These may be put on a frame of little sticks
+and turned round. This causes the tides. Those at the
+ends of the sticks are enormously far away. From time to
+time a diligent searching of the sticks reveals new
+planets. The orbit of a planet is the distance the stick
+goes round in going round. Astronomy is intensely
+interesting; it should be done at night, in a high tower
+in Spitzbergen. This is to avoid the astronomy being
+interrupted. A really good astronomer can tell when a
+comet is coming too near him by the warning buzz of the
+revolving sticks.
+
+
+II.--REMAINS OF HISTORY
+
+Aztecs: A fabulous race, half man, half horse, half
+mound-builder. They flourished at about the same time as
+the early Calithumpians. They have left some awfully
+stupendous monuments of themselves somewhere.
+
+Life of Caesar: A famous Roman general, the last who ever
+landed in Britain without being stopped at the custom
+house. On returning to his Sabine farm (to fetch something),
+he was stabbed by Brutus, and died with the words "Veni,
+vidi, tekel, upharsim" in his throat. The jury returned
+a verdict of strangulation.
+
+Life of Voltaire: A Frenchman; very bitter.
+
+Life of Schopenhauer: A German; very deep; but it was
+not really noticeable when he sat down.
+
+Life of Dante: An Italian; the first to introduce the
+banana and the class of street organ known as "Dante's
+Inferno."
+
+Peter the Great,
+Alfred the Great,
+Frederick the Great,
+John the Great,
+Tom the Great,
+Jim the Great,
+Jo the Great, etc., etc.
+
+It is impossible for a busy man to keep these apart. They
+sought a living as kings and apostles and pugilists and
+so on.
+
+
+III.--REMAINS OF BOTANY.
+
+Botany is the art of plants. Plants are divided into
+trees, flowers, and vegetables. The true botanist knows
+a tree as soon as he sees it. He learns to distinguish
+it from a vegetable by merely putting his ear to it.
+
+
+IV.--REMAINS OF NATURAL SCIENCE.
+
+Natural Science treats of motion and force. Many of its
+teachings remain as part of an educated man's permanent
+equipment in life. Such are:
+
+(a) The harder you shove a bicycle the faster it will
+go. This is because of natural science.
+
+(b) If you fall from a high tower, you fall quicker and
+quicker and quicker; a judicious selection of a tower
+will ensure any rate of speed.
+
+(c) If you put your thumb in between two cogs it will go
+on and on, until the wheels are arrested, by your
+suspenders. This is machinery.
+
+(d) Electricity is of two kinds, positive and negative.
+The difference is, I presume, that one kind comes a little
+more expensive, but is more durable; the other is a
+cheaper thing, but the moths get into it.
+
+
+
+
+Hoodoo McFiggin's Christmas
+
+This Santa Claus business is played out. It's a sneaking,
+underhand method, and the sooner it's exposed the better.
+
+For a parent to get up under cover of the darkness of
+night and palm off a ten-cent necktie on a boy who had
+been expecting a ten-dollar watch, and then say that an
+angel sent it to him, is low, undeniably low.
+
+I had a good opportunity of observing how the thing worked
+this Christmas, in the case of young Hoodoo McFiggin,
+the son and heir of the McFiggins, at whose house I board.
+
+Hoodoo McFiggin is a good boy--a religious boy. He had
+been given to understand that Santa Claus would bring
+nothing to his father and mother because grown-up people
+don't get presents from the angels. So he saved up all
+his pocket-money and bought a box of cigars for his father
+and a seventy-five-cent diamond brooch for his mother.
+His own fortunes he left in the hands of the angels. But
+he prayed. He prayed every night for weeks that Santa
+Claus would bring him a pair of skates and a puppy-dog
+and an air-gun and a bicycle and a Noah's ark and a sleigh
+and a drum--altogether about a hundred and fifty dollars'
+worth of stuff.
+
+I went into Hoodoo's room quite early Christmas morning.
+I had an idea that the scene would be interesting. I woke
+him up and he sat up in bed, his eyes glistening with
+radiant expectation, and began hauling things out of his
+stocking.
+
+The first parcel was bulky; it was done up quite loosely
+and had an odd look generally.
+
+"Ha! ha!" Hoodoo cried gleefully, as he began undoing
+it. "I'll bet it's the puppy-dog, all wrapped up in
+paper!"
+
+And was it the puppy-dog? No, by no means. It was a pair
+of nice, strong, number-four boots, laces and all,
+labelled, "Hoodoo, from Santa Claus," and underneath
+Santa Claus had written, "95 net."
+
+The boy's jaw fell with delight. "It's boots," he said,
+and plunged in his hand again.
+
+He began hauling away at another parcel with renewed hope
+on his face.
+
+This time the thing seemed like a little round box. Hoodoo
+tore the paper off it with a feverish hand. He shook it;
+something rattled inside.
+
+"It's a watch and chain! It's a watch and chain!" he
+shouted. Then he pulled the lid off.
+
+And was it a watch and chain? No. It was a box of nice,
+brand-new celluloid collars, a dozen of them all alike
+and all his own size.
+
+The boy was so pleased that you could see his face crack
+up with pleasure.
+
+He waited a few minutes until his intense joy subsided.
+Then he tried again.
+
+This time the packet was long and hard. It resisted the
+touch and had a sort of funnel shape.
+
+"It's a toy pistol!" said the boy, trembling with
+excitement. "Gee! I hope there are lots of caps with it!
+I'll fire some off now and wake up father."
+
+No, my poor child, you will not wake your father with
+that. It is a useful thing, but it needs not caps and it
+fires no bullets, and you cannot wake a sleeping man with
+a tooth-brush. Yes, it was a tooth-brush--a regular
+beauty, pure bone all through, and ticketed with a little
+paper, "Hoodoo, from Santa Claus."
+
+Again the expression of intense joy passed over the boy's
+face, and the tears of gratitude started from his eyes.
+He wiped them away with his tooth-brush and passed on.
+
+The next packet was much larger and evidently contained
+something soft and bulky. It had been too long to go into
+the stocking and was tied outside.
+
+"I wonder what this is," Hoodoo mused, half afraid to
+open it. Then his heart gave a great leap, and he forgot
+all his other presents in the anticipation of this one.
+"It's the drum!" he gasped. "It's the drum, all wrapped
+up!"
+
+Drum nothing! It was pants--a pair of the nicest little
+short pants--yellowish-brown short pants--with dear little
+stripes of colour running across both ways, and here
+again Santa Claus had written, "Hoodoo, from Santa Claus,
+one fort net."
+
+But there was something wrapped up in it. Oh, yes! There
+was a pair of braces wrapped up in it, braces with a
+little steel sliding thing so that you could slide your
+pants up to your neck, if you wanted to.
+
+The boy gave a dry sob of satisfaction. Then he took out
+his last present. "It's a book," he said, as he unwrapped
+it. "I wonder if it is fairy stories or adventures. Oh,
+I hope it's adventures! I'll read it all morning."
+
+No, Hoodoo, it was not precisely adventures. It was a
+small family Bible. Hoodoo had now seen all his presents,
+and he arose and dressed. But he still had the fun of
+playing with his toys. That is always the chief delight
+of Christmas morning.
+
+First he played with his tooth-brush. He got a whole lot
+of water and brushed all his teeth with it. This was
+huge.
+
+Then he played with his collars. He had no end of fun
+with them, taking them all out one by one and swearing
+at them, and then putting them back and swearing at the
+whole lot together.
+
+The next toy was his pants. He had immense fun there,
+putting them on and taking them off again, and then trying
+to guess which side was which by merely looking at them.
+
+After that he took his book and read some adventures
+called "Genesis" till breakfast-time.
+
+Then he went downstairs and kissed his father and mother.
+His father was smoking a cigar, and his mother had her
+new brooch on. Hoodoo's face was thoughtful, and a light
+seemed to have broken in upon his mind. Indeed, I think
+it altogether likely that next Christmas he will hang on
+to his own money and take chances on what the angels
+bring.
+
+
+
+
+The Life of John Smith
+
+The lives of great men occupy a large section of our
+literature. The great man is certainly a wonderful thing.
+He walks across his century and leaves the marks of his
+feet all over it, ripping out the dates on his goloshes
+as he passes. It is impossible to get up a revolution or
+a new religion, or a national awakening of any sort,
+without his turning up, putting himself at the head of
+it and collaring all the gate-receipts for himself. Even
+after his death he leaves a long trail of second-rate
+relations spattered over the front seats of fifty years
+of history.
+
+Now the lives of great men are doubtless infinitely
+interesting. But at times I must confess to a sense of
+reaction and an idea that the ordinary common man is
+entitled to have his biography written too. It is to
+illustrate this view that I write the life of John Smith,
+a man neither good nor great, but just the usual, everyday
+homo like you and me and the rest of us.
+
+From his earliest childhood John Smith was marked out
+from his comrades by nothing. The marvellous precocity
+of the boy did not astonish his preceptors. Books were
+not a passion for him from his youth, neither did any
+old man put his hand on Smith's head and say, mark his
+words, this boy would some day become a man. Nor yet was
+it his father's wont to gaze on him with a feeling
+amounting almost to awe. By no means! All his father did
+was to wonder whether Smith was a darn fool because he
+couldn't help it, or because he thought it smart. In
+other words, he was just like you and me and the rest of
+us.
+
+In those athletic sports which were the ornament of the
+youth of his day, Smith did not, as great men do, excel
+his fellows. He couldn't ride worth a darn. He couldn't
+skate worth a darn. He couldn't swim worth a darn. He
+couldn't shoot worth a darn. He couldn't do anything
+worth a darn. He was just like us.
+
+Nor did the bold cast of the boy's mind offset his physical
+defects, as it invariably does in the biographies. On
+the contrary. He was afraid of his father. He was afraid
+of his school-teacher. He was afraid of dogs. He was
+afraid of guns. He was afraid of lightning. He was afraid
+of hell. He was afraid of girls.
+
+In the boy's choice of a profession there was not seen
+that keen longing for a life-work that we find in the
+celebrities. He didn't want to be a lawyer, because you
+have to know law. He didn't want to be a doctor, because
+you have to know medicine. He didn't want to be a
+business-man, because you have to know business; and he
+didn't want to be a school-teacher, because he had seen
+too many of them. As far as he had any choice, it lay
+between being Robinson Crusoe and being the Prince of
+Wales. His father refused him both and put him into a
+dry goods establishment.
+
+Such was the childhood of Smith. At its close there was
+nothing in his outward appearance to mark the man of
+genius. The casual observer could have seen no genius
+concealed behind the wide face, the massive mouth, the
+long slanting forehead, and the tall ear that swept up
+to the close-cropped head. Certainly he couldn't. There
+wasn't any concealed there.
+
+It was shortly after his start in business life that
+Smith was stricken with the first of those distressing
+attacks, to which he afterwards became subject. It seized
+him late one night as he was returning home from a
+delightful evening of song and praise with a few old
+school chums. Its symptoms were a peculiar heaving of
+the sidewalk, a dancing of the street lights, and a crafty
+shifting to and fro of the houses, requiring a very nice
+discrimination in selecting his own. There was a strong
+desire not to drink water throughout the entire attack,
+which showed that the thing was evidently a form of
+hydrophobia. From this time on, these painful attacks
+became chronic with Smith. They were liable to come on
+at any time, but especially on Saturday nights, on the
+first of the month, and on Thanksgiving Day. He always
+had a very severe attack of hydrophobia on Christmas Eve,
+and after elections it was fearful.
+
+There was one incident in Smith's career which he did,
+perhaps, share with regret. He had scarcely reached
+manhood when he met the most beautiful girl in the world.
+She was different from all other women. She had a deeper
+nature than other people. Smith realized it at once. She
+could feel and understand things that ordinary people
+couldn't. She could understand him. She had a great sense
+of humour and an exquisite appreciation of a joke. He
+told her the six that he knew one night and she thought
+them great. Her mere presence made Smith feel as if he
+had swallowed a sunset: the first time that his finger
+brushed against hers, he felt a thrill all through him.
+He presently found that if he took a firm hold of her
+hand with his, he could get a fine thrill, and if he sat
+beside her on a sofa, with his head against her ear and
+his arm about once and a half round her, he could get
+what you might call a first-class, A-1 thrill. Smith
+became filled with the idea that he would like to have
+her always near him. He suggested an arrangement to her,
+by which she should come and live in the same house with
+him and take personal charge of his clothes and his meals.
+She was to receive in return her board and washing, about
+seventy-five cents a week in ready money, and Smith was
+to be her slave.
+
+After Smith had been this woman's slave for some time,
+baby fingers stole across his life, then another set of
+them, and then more and more till the house was full of
+them. The woman's mother began to steal across his life
+too, and every time she came Smith had hydrophobia
+frightfully. Strangely enough there was no little prattler
+that was taken from his life and became a saddened,
+hallowed memory to him. Oh, no! The little Smiths were
+not that kind of prattler. The whole nine grew up into
+tall, lank boys with massive mouths and great sweeping
+ears like their father's, and no talent for anything.
+
+The life of Smith never seemed to bring him to any of
+those great turning-points that occurred in the lives of
+the great. True, the passing years brought some change
+of fortune. He was moved up in his dry-goods establishment
+from the ribbon counter to the collar counter, from the
+collar counter to the gents' panting counter, and from
+the gents' panting to the gents' fancy shirting. Then,
+as he grew aged and inefficient, they moved him down
+again from the gents' fancy shirting to the gents' panting,
+and so on to the ribbon counter. And when he grew quite
+old they dismissed him and got a boy with a four-inch
+mouth and sandy-coloured hair, who did all Smith could
+do for half the money. That was John Smith's mercantile
+career: it won't stand comparison with Mr. Gladstone's,
+but it's not unlike your own.
+
+Smith lived for five years after this. His sons kept him.
+They didn't want to, but they had to. In his old age the
+brightness of his mind and his fund of anecdote were not
+the delight of all who dropped in to see him. He told
+seven stories and he knew six jokes. The stories were
+long things all about himself, and the jokes were about
+a commercial traveller and a Methodist minister. But
+nobody dropped in to see him, anyway, so it didn't matter.
+
+At sixty-five Smith was taken ill, and, receiving proper
+treatment, he died. There was a tombstone put up over
+him, with a hand pointing north-north-east.
+
+But I doubt if he ever got there. He was too like us.
+
+
+
+
+On Collecting Things
+
+Like most other men I have from time to time been stricken
+with a desire to make collections of things.
+
+It began with postage stamps. I had a letter from a friend
+of mine who had gone out to South Africa. The letter had
+a three-cornered stamp on it, and I thought as soon as
+I looked at it, "That's the thing! Stamp collecting! I'll
+devote my life to it."
+
+I bought an album with accommodation for the stamps of
+all nations, and began collecting right off. For three
+days the collection made wonderful progress. It contained:
+
+One Cape of Good Hope stamp.
+
+One one-cent stamp, United States of America.
+
+One two-cent stamp, United States of America.
+
+One five-cent stamp, United States of America.
+
+One ten-cent stamp, United States of America.
+
+After that the collection came to a dead stop. For a
+while I used to talk about it rather airily and say I
+had one or two rather valuable South African stamps. But
+I presently grew tired even of lying about it.
+
+Collecting coins is a thing that I attempt at intervals.
+Every time I am given an old half-penny or a Mexican
+quarter, I get an idea that if a fellow made a point of
+holding on to rarities of that sort, he'd soon have quite
+a valuable collection. The first time that I tried it I
+was full of enthusiasm, and before long my collection
+numbered quite a few articles of vertu. The items were
+as follows:
+
+No. 1. Ancient Roman coin. Time of Caligula. This one of
+course was the gem of the whole lot; it was given me by
+a friend, and that was what started me collecting.
+
+No. 2. Small copper coin. Value one cent. United States
+of America. Apparently modern.
+
+No. 3. Small nickel coin. Circular. United States of
+America. Value five cents.
+
+No. 4. Small silver coin. Value ten cents. United States
+of America.
+
+No. 5. Silver coin. Circular. Value twenty-five cents.
+United States of America. Very beautiful.
+
+No. 6. Large silver coin. Circular. Inscription, "One
+Dollar." United States of America. Very valuable.
+
+No. 7. Ancient British copper coin. Probably time of
+Caractacus. Very dim. Inscription, "Victoria Dei gratia
+regina." Very valuable.
+
+No. 8. Silver coin. Evidently French. Inscription, "Funf
+Mark. Kaiser Wilhelm."
+
+No. 9. Circular silver coin. Very much defaced. Part of
+inscription, "E Pluribus Unum." Probably a Russian rouble,
+but quite as likely to be a Japanese yen or a Shanghai
+rooster.
+
+That's as far as that collection got. It lasted through
+most of the winter and I was getting quite proud of it,
+but I took the coins down town one evening to show to a
+friend and we spent No. 3, No. 4., No. 5, No. 6, and No.
+7 in buying a little dinner for two. After dinner I bought
+a yen's worth of cigars and traded the relic of Caligula
+for as many hot Scotches as they cared to advance on it.
+After that I felt reckless and put No. 2 and No. 8 into
+a Children's Hospital poor box.
+
+I tried fossils next. I got two in ten years. Then I
+quit.
+
+A friend of mine once showed me a very fine collection
+of ancient and curious weapons, and for a time I was full
+of that idea. I gathered several interesting specimens,
+such as:
+
+No. 1. Old flint-lock musket, used by my grandfather.
+(He used it on the farm for years as a crowbar.)
+
+No. 2. Old raw-hide strap, used by my father.
+
+No. 3. Ancient Indian arrowhead, found by myself the very
+day after I began collecting. It resembles a three-cornered
+stone.
+
+No. 4. Ancient Indian bow, found by myself behind a
+sawmill on the second day of collecting. It resembles a
+straight stick of elm or oak. It is interesting to think
+that this very weapon may have figured in some fierce
+scene of savage warfare.
+
+No. 5. Cannibal poniard or straight-handled dagger of
+the South Sea Islands. It will give the reader almost a
+thrill of horror to learn that this atrocious weapon,
+which I bought myself on the third day of collecting,
+was actually exposed in a second-hand store as a family
+carving-knife. In gazing at it one cannot refrain from
+conjuring up the awful scenes it must have witnessed.
+
+I kept this collection for quite a long while until, in
+a moment of infatuation, I presented it to a young lady
+as a betrothal present. The gift proved too ostentatious
+and our relations subsequently ceased to be cordial.
+
+On the whole I am inclined to recommend the beginner to
+confine himself to collecting coins. At present I am
+myself making a collection of American bills (time of
+Taft preferred), a pursuit I find most absorbing.
+
+
+
+
+Society Chat-Chat
+
+AS IT SHOULD BE WRITTEN
+
+I notice that it is customary for the daily papers to
+publish a column or so of society gossip. They generally
+head it "Chit-Chat," or "On Dit," or "Le Boudoir," or
+something of the sort, and they keep it pretty full of
+French terms to give it the proper sort of swing. These
+columns may be very interesting in their way, but it
+always seems to me that they don't get hold of quite the
+right things to tell us about. They are very fond, for
+instance, of giving an account of the delightful dance
+at Mrs. De Smythe's--at which Mrs. De Smythe looked
+charming in a gown of old tulle with a stomacher of
+passementerie--or of the dinner-party at Mr. Alonzo
+Robinson's residence, or the smart pink tea given by Miss
+Carlotta Jones. No, that's all right, but it's not the
+kind of thing we want to get at; those are not the events
+which happen in our neighbours' houses that we really
+want to hear about. It is the quiet little family scenes,
+the little traits of home-life that--well, for example,
+take the case of that delightful party at the De Smythes.
+I am certain that all those who were present would much
+prefer a little paragraph like the following, which would
+give them some idea of the home-life of the De Smythes
+on the morning after the party.
+
+DEJEUNER DE LUXE AT THE DE SMYTHE RESIDENCE
+
+On Wednesday morning last at 7.15 a.m. a charming little
+breakfast was served at the home of Mr. De Smythe. The
+dejeuner was given in honour of Mr. De Smythe and his
+two sons, Master Adolphus and Master Blinks De Smythe,
+who were about to leave for their daily travail at their
+wholesale Bureau de Flour et de Feed. All the gentlemen
+were very quietly dressed in their habits de work. Miss
+Melinda De Smythe poured out tea, the domestique having
+refuse to get up so early after the partie of the night
+before. The menu was very handsome, consisting of eggs
+and bacon, demi-froid, and ice-cream. The conversation
+was sustained and lively. Mr. De Smythe sustained it and
+made it lively for his daughter and his garcons. In the
+course of the talk Mr. De Smythe stated that the next
+time he allowed the young people to turn his maison
+topsy-turvy he would see them in enfer. He wished to know
+if they were aware that some ass of the evening before
+had broken a pane of coloured glass in the hall that
+would cost him four dollars. Did they think he was made
+of argent. If so, they never made a bigger mistake in
+their vie. The meal closed with general expressions of
+good-feeling. A little bird has whispered to us that
+there will be no more parties at the De Smythes' pour
+long-temps.
+
+Here is another little paragraph that would be of general
+interest in society.
+
+DINER DE FAMEEL AT THE BOARDING-HOUSE DE MCFIGGIN
+
+Yesterday evening at half after six a pleasant little
+diner was given by Madame McFiggin of Rock Street, to
+her boarders. The salle a manger was very prettily
+decorated with texts, and the furniture upholstered with
+cheveux de horse, Louis Quinze. The boarders were all
+very quietly dressed: Mrs. McFiggin was daintily attired
+in some old clinging stuff with a corsage de Whalebone
+underneath. The ample board groaned under the bill of
+fare. The boarders groaned also. Their groaning was very
+noticeable. The piece de resistance was a hunko de boeuf
+boile, flanked with some old clinging stuff. The entrees
+were pate de pumpkin, followed by fromage McFiggin, served
+under glass. Towards the end of the first course, speeches
+became the order of the day. Mrs. McFiggin was the first
+speaker. In commencing, she expressed her surprise that
+so few of the gentlemen seemed to care for the hunko de
+boeuf; her own mind, she said, had hesitated between
+hunko de boeuf boile and a pair of roast chickens
+(sensation). She had finally decided in favour of the
+hunko de boeuf (no sensation). She referred at some length
+to the late Mr. McFiggin, who had always shown a marked
+preference for hunko de boeuf. Several other speakers
+followed. All spoke forcibly and to the point. The last
+to speak was the Reverend Mr. Whiner. The reverend
+gentleman, in rising, said that he confided himself and
+his fellow-boarders to the special interference of
+providence. For what they had eaten, he said, he hoped
+that Providence would make them truly thankful. At the
+close of the Repas several of the boarders expressed
+their intention of going down the street to a restourong
+to get quelque chose a manger.
+
+Here is another example. How interesting it would be to
+get a detailed account of that little affair at the
+Robinsons', of which the neighbours only heard indirectly!
+Thus:
+
+DELIGHTFUL EVENING AT THE RESIDENCE OF MR. ALONZO ROBINSON
+
+Yesterday the family of Mr. Alonzo Robinson spent a very
+lively evening at their home on ---th Avenue. The occasion
+was the seventeenth birthday of Master Alonzo Robinson,
+junior. It was the original intention of Master Alonzo
+Robinson to celebrate the day at home and invite a few
+of les garcons. Mr. Robinson, senior, however, having
+declared that he would be damne first, Master Alonzo
+spent the evening in visiting the salons of the town,
+which he painted rouge. Mr. Robinson, senior, spent the
+evening at home in quiet expectation of his son's return.
+He was very becomingly dressed in a pantalon quatre vingt
+treize, and had his whippe de chien laid across his knee.
+Madame Robinson and the Mademoiselles Robinson wore black.
+The guest of the evening arrived at a late hour. He wore
+his habits de spri, and had about six pouces of eau de
+vie in him. He was evidently full up to his cou. For some
+time after his arrival a very lively time was spent. Mr.
+Robinson having at length broken the whippe de chien,
+the family parted for the night with expressions of
+cordial goodwill.
+
+
+
+
+Insurance up to Date
+
+A man called on me the other day with the idea of insuring
+my life. Now, I detest life-insurance agents; they always
+argue that I shall some day die, which is not so. I have
+been insured a great many times, for about a month at a
+time, but have had no luck with it at all.
+
+So I made up my mind that I would outwit this man at his
+own game. I let him talk straight ahead and encouraged
+him all I could, until he finally left me with a sheet
+of questions which I was to answer as an applicant. Now
+this was what I was waiting for; I had decided that, if
+that company wanted information about me, they should
+have it, and have the very best quality I could supply.
+So I spread the sheet of questions before me, and drew
+up a set of answers for them, which, I hoped, would settle
+for ever all doubts as to my eligibility for insurance.
+
+Question.--What is your age?
+Answer.--I can't think.
+
+Q.--What is your chest measurement?
+A.--Nineteen inches.
+
+Q.--What is your chest expansion?
+A.--Half an inch.
+
+Q.--What is your height?
+A.--Six feet five, if erect, but less when
+    I walk on all fours.
+
+Q.--Is your grandfather dead?
+A.--Practically.
+
+Q.--Cause of death, if dead?
+A.--Dipsomania, if dead.
+
+Q.--Is your father dead?
+A.--To the world.
+
+Q.--Cause of death?
+A.--Hydrophobia.
+
+Q.--Place of father's residence?
+A.--Kentucky.
+
+Q.--What illness have you had?
+A.--As a child, consumption, leprosy, and water on
+    the knee. As a man, whooping-cough, stomach-ache,
+    and water on the brain.
+
+Q.--Have you any brothers?
+A.--Thirteen; all nearly dead.
+
+Q.--Are you aware of any habits or tendencies which
+    might be expected to shorten your life?
+A.--I am aware. I drink, I smoke, I take morphine and
+    vaseline. I swallow grape seeds and I hate exercise.
+
+I thought when I had come to the end of that list that
+I had made a dead sure thing of it, and I posted the
+paper with a cheque for three months' payment, feeling
+pretty confident of having the cheque sent back to me.
+I was a good deal surprised a few days later to receive
+the following letter from the company:
+
+"DEAR SIR,--We beg to acknowledge your letter of application
+and cheque for fifteen dollars. After a careful comparison
+of your case with the average modern standard, we are
+pleased to accept you as a first-class risk."
+
+
+
+
+Borrowing a Match
+
+You might think that borrowing a match upon the street
+is a simple thing. But any man who has ever tried it will
+assure you that it is not, and will be prepared to swear
+to the truth of my experience of the other evening.
+
+I was standing on the corner of the street with a cigar
+that I wanted to light. I had no match. I waited till a
+decent, ordinary-looking man came along. Then I said:
+
+"Excuse me, sir, but could you oblige me with the loan
+of a match?"
+
+"A match?" he said, "why certainly." Then he unbuttoned
+his overcoat and put his hand in the pocket of his
+waistcoat. "I know I have one," he went on, "and I'd
+almost swear it's in the bottom pocket--or, hold on,
+though, I guess it may be in the top--just wait till I
+put these parcels down on the sidewalk."
+
+"Oh, don't trouble," I said, "it's really of no
+consequence."
+
+"Oh, it's no trouble, I'll have it in a minute; I know
+there must be one in here somewhere"--he was digging
+his fingers into his pockets as he spoke--"but you see
+this isn't the waistcoat I generally..."
+
+I saw that the man was getting excited about it. "Well,
+never mind," I protested; "if that isn't the waistcoat
+that you generally--why, it doesn't matter."
+
+"Hold on, now, hold on!" the man said, "I've got one of
+the cursed things in here somewhere. I guess it must be
+in with my watch. No, it's not there either. Wait till
+I try my coat. If that confounded tailor only knew enough
+to make a pocket so that a man could get at it!"
+
+He was getting pretty well worked up now. He had thrown
+down his walking-stick and was plunging at his pockets
+with his teeth set. "It's that cursed young boy of mine,"
+he hissed; "this comes of his fooling in my pockets. By
+Gad! perhaps I won't warm him up when I get home. Say,
+I'll bet that it's in my hip-pocket. You just hold up
+the tail of my overcoat a second till I..."
+
+"No, no," I protested again, "please don't take all this
+trouble, it really doesn't matter. I'm sure you needn't
+take off your overcoat, and oh, pray don't throw away
+your letters and things in the snow like that, and tear
+out your pockets by the roots! Please, please don't
+trample over your overcoat and put your feet through the
+parcels. I do hate to hear you swearing at your little
+boy, with that peculiar whine in your voice. Don't--please
+don't tear your clothes so savagely."
+
+Suddenly the man gave a grunt of exultation, and drew
+his hand up from inside the lining of his coat.
+
+"I've got it," he cried. "Here you are!" Then he brought
+it out under the light.
+
+It was a toothpick.
+
+Yielding to the impulse of the moment I pushed him under
+the wheels of a trolley-car, and ran.
+
+
+
+
+A Lesson in Fiction
+
+Suppose that in the opening pages of the modern melodramatic
+novel you find some such situation as the following, in
+which is depicted the terrific combat between Gaspard de
+Vaux, the boy lieutenant, and Hairy Hank, the chief of
+the Italian banditti:
+
+"The inequality of the contest was apparent. With a
+mingled yell of rage and contempt, his sword brandished
+above his head and his dirk between his teeth, the enormous
+bandit rushed upon his intrepid opponent. De Vaux seemed
+scarce more than a stripling, but he stood his ground
+and faced his hitherto invincible assailant. 'Mong Dieu,'
+cried De Smythe, 'he is lost!'"
+
+Question. On which of the parties to the above contest
+do you honestly feel inclined to put your money?
+
+Answer. On De Vaux. He'll win. Hairy Hank will force him
+down to one knee and with a brutal cry of "Har! har!"
+will be about to dirk him, when De Vaux will make a sudden
+lunge (one he had learnt at home out of a book of lunges)
+and--
+
+Very good. You have answered correctly. Now, suppose you
+find, a little later in the book, that the killing of
+Hairy Hank has compelled De Vaux to flee from his native
+land to the East. Are you not fearful for his safety in
+the desert?
+
+Answer. Frankly, I am not. De Vaux is all right. His name
+is on the title page, and you can't kill him.
+
+Question. Listen to this, then: "The sun of Ethiopia beat
+fiercely upon the desert as De Vaux, mounted upon his
+faithful elephant, pursued his lonely way. Seated in his
+lofty hoo-doo, his eye scoured the waste. Suddenly a
+solitary horseman appeared on the horizon, then another,
+and another, and then six. In a few moments a whole crowd
+of solitary horsemen swooped down upon him. There was a
+fierce shout of 'Allah!' a rattle of firearms. De Vaux
+sank from his hoo-doo on to the sands, while the affrighted
+elephant dashed off in all directions. The bullet had
+struck him in the heart."
+
+There now, what do you think of that? Isn't De Vaux killed
+now?
+
+Answer. I am sorry. De Vaux is not dead. True, the ball
+had hit him, oh yes, it had hit him, but it had glanced
+off against a family Bible, which he carried in his
+waistcoat in case of illness, struck some hymns that he
+had in his hip-pocket, and, glancing off again, had
+flattened itself against De Vaux's diary of his life in
+the desert, which was in his knapsack.
+
+Question. But even if this doesn't kill him, you must
+admit that he is near death when he is bitten in the
+jungle by the deadly dongola?
+
+Answer. That's all right. A kindly Arab will take De Vaux
+to the Sheik's tent.
+
+Question. What will De Vaux remind the Sheik of?
+
+Answer. Too easy. Of his long-lost son, who disappeared
+years ago.
+
+Question. Was this son Hairy Hank? Answer. Of course he
+was. Anyone could see that, but the Sheik never suspects
+it, and heals De Vaux. He heals him with an herb, a thing
+called a simple, an amazingly simple, known only to the
+Sheik. Since using this herb, the Sheik has used no other.
+
+Question. The Sheik will recognize an overcoat that De
+Vaux is wearing, and complications will arise in the
+matter of Hairy Hank deceased. Will this result in the
+death of the boy lieutenant?
+
+Answer. No. By this time De Vaux has realized that the
+reader knows he won't die and resolves to quit the desert.
+The thought of his mother keeps recurring to him, and of
+his father, too, the grey, stooping old man--does he
+stoop still or has he stopped stooping? At times, too,
+there comes the thought of another, a fairer than his
+father; she whose--but enough, De Vaux returns to the
+old homestead in Piccadilly.
+
+Question. When De Vaux returns to England, what will
+happen?
+
+Answer. This will happen: "He who left England ten years
+before a raw boy, has returned a sunburnt soldierly man.
+But who is this that advances smilingly to meet him? Can
+the mere girl, the bright child that shared his hours of
+play, can she have grown into this peerless, graceful
+girl, at whose feet half the noble suitors of England
+are kneeling? 'Can this be her?' he asks himself in
+amazement."
+
+Question. Is it her?
+
+Answer. Oh, it's her all right. It is her, and it is him,
+and it is them. That girl hasn't waited fifty pages for
+nothing.
+
+Question. You evidently guess that a love affair will
+ensue between the boy lieutenant and the peerless girl
+with the broad feet. Do you imagine, however, that its
+course will run smoothly and leave nothing to record?
+
+Answer. Not at all. I feel certain that the scene of the
+novel having edged itself around to London, the writer
+will not feel satisfied unless he introduces the following
+famous scene:
+
+"Stunned by the cruel revelation which he had received,
+unconscious of whither his steps were taking him, Gaspard
+de Vaux wandered on in the darkness from street to street
+until he found himself upon London Bridge. He leaned over
+the parapet and looked down upon the whirling stream
+below. There was something in the still, swift rush of
+it that seemed to beckon, to allure him. After all, why
+not? What was life now that he should prize it? For a
+moment De Vaux paused irresolute."
+
+Question. Will he throw himself in?
+
+Answer. Well, say you don't know Gaspard. He will pause
+irresolute up to the limit, then, with a fierce struggle,
+will recall his courage and hasten from the Bridge.
+
+Question. This struggle not to throw oneself in must be
+dreadfully difficult?
+
+Answer. Oh! dreadfully! Most of us are so frail we should
+jump in at once. But Gaspard has the knack of it. Besides
+he still has some of the Sheik's herb; he chews it.
+
+Question. What has happened to De Vaux anyway? Is it
+anything he has eaten?
+
+Answer. No, it is nothing that he has eaten. It's about
+her. The blow has come. She has no use for sunburn,
+doesn't care for tan; she is going to marry a duke and
+the boy lieutenant is no longer in it. The real trouble
+is that the modern novelist has got beyond the happy-
+marriage mode of ending. He wants tragedy and a blighted
+life to wind up with.
+
+Question. How will the book conclude?
+
+Answer. Oh, De Vaux will go back to the desert, fall upon
+the Sheik's neck, and swear to be a second Hairy Hank to
+him. There will be a final panorama of the desert, the
+Sheik and his newly found son at the door of the tent,
+the sun setting behind a pyramid, and De Vaux's faithful
+elephant crouched at his feet and gazing up at him with
+dumb affection.
+
+
+
+
+Helping the Armenians
+
+The financial affairs of the parish church up at Doogalville
+have been getting rather into a tangle in the last six
+months. The people of the church were specially anxious
+to do something toward the general public subscription
+of the town on behalf of the unhappy Armenians, and to
+that purpose they determined to devote the collections
+taken up at a series of special evening services. To give
+the right sort of swing to the services and to stimulate
+generous giving, they put a new pipe organ into the
+church. In order to make a preliminary payment on the
+organ, it was decided to raise a mortgage on the parsonage.
+
+To pay the interest on the mortgage, the choir of the
+church got up a sacred concert in the town hall.
+
+To pay for the town hall, the Willing Workers' Guild held
+a social in the Sunday school. To pay the expenses of
+the social, the rector delivered a public lecture on
+"Italy and Her Past," illustrated by a magic lantern.
+To pay for the magic lantern, the curate and the ladies
+of the church got up some amateur theatricals.
+
+Finally, to pay for the costumes for the theatricals,
+the rector felt it his duty to dispense with the curate.
+
+So that is where the church stands just at present. What
+they chiefly want to do, is to raise enough money to buy
+a suitable gold watch as a testimonial to the curate.
+After that they hope to be able to do something for the
+Armenians. Meantime, of course, the Armenians, the ones
+right there in the town, are getting very troublesome.
+To begin with, there is the Armenian who rented the
+costumes for the theatricals: he has to be squared. Then
+there is the Armenian organ dealer, and the Armenian who
+owned the magic lantern. They want relief badly.
+
+The most urgent case is that of the Armenian who holds
+the mortgage on the parsonage; indeed it is generally
+felt in the congregation, when the rector makes his
+impassioned appeals at the special services on behalf of
+the suffering cause, that it is to this man that he has
+special reference.
+
+In the meanwhile the general public subscription is not
+getting along very fast; but the proprietor of the big
+saloon further down the street and the man with the short
+cigar that runs the Doogalville Midway Plaisance have
+been most liberal in their contributions.
+
+
+
+
+A Study in Still Life.--The Country Hotel
+
+The country hotel stands on the sunny side of Main Street.
+It has three entrances.
+
+There is one in front which leads into the Bar. There is
+one at the side called the Ladies' Entrance which leads
+into the Bar from the side. There is also the Main Entrance
+which leads into the Bar through the Rotunda.
+
+The Rotunda is the space between the door of the bar-room
+and the cigar-case.
+
+In it is a desk and a book. In the book are written down
+the names of the guests, together with marks indicating
+the direction of the wind and the height of the barometer.
+It is here that the newly arrived guest waits until he
+has time to open the door leading to the Bar.
+
+The bar-room forms the largest part of the hotel. It
+constitutes the hotel proper. To it are attached a series
+of bedrooms on the floor above, many of which contain
+beds.
+
+The walls of the bar-room are perforated in all directions
+with trap-doors. Through one of these drinks are passed
+into the back sitting-room. Through others drinks are
+passed into the passages. Drinks are also passed through
+the floor and through the ceiling. Drinks once passed
+never return. The Proprietor stands in the doorway of
+the bar. He weighs two hundred pounds. His face is
+immovable as putty. He is drunk. He has been drunk for
+twelve years. It makes no difference to him. Behind the
+bar stands the Bar-tender. He wears wicker-sleeves, his
+hair is curled in a hook, and his name is Charlie.
+
+Attached to the bar is a pneumatic beer-pump, by means
+of which the bar-tender can flood the bar with beer.
+Afterwards he wipes up the beer with a rag. By this means
+he polishes the bar. Some of the beer that is pumped up
+spills into glasses and has to be sold.
+
+Behind the bar-tender is a mechanism called a cash-register,
+which, on being struck a powerful blow, rings a bell,
+sticks up a card marked NO SALE, and opens a till from
+which the bar-tender distributes money.
+
+There is printed a tariff of drinks and prices on the
+wall.
+
+It reads thus:
+
+ Beer . . . . . . . . . . . 5 cents.
+    Whisky. . . . . . . . . 5 cents.
+ Whisky and Soda. . . . . . 5 cents.
+    Beer and Soda . . . . . 5 cents.
+ Whisky and Beer and Soda . 5 cents.
+    Whisky and Eggs . . . . 5 cents.
+    Beer and Eggs . . . . . 5 cents.
+       Champagne. . . . . . 5 cents.
+       Cigars . . . . . . . 5 cents.
+ Cigars, extra fine . . . . 5 cents.
+
+All calculations are made on this basis and are worked
+out to three places of decimals. Every seventh drink is
+on the house and is not followed by a distribution of
+money.
+
+The bar-room closes at midnight, provided there are enough
+people in it. If there is not a quorum the proprietor
+waits for a better chance. A careful closing of the bar
+will often catch as many as twenty-five people. The bar
+is not opened again till seven o'clock in the morning;
+after that the people may go home. There are also,
+nowadays, Local Option Hotels. These contain only one
+entrance, leading directly into the bar.
+
+
+
+
+An Experiment With Policeman Hogan
+
+Mr. scalper sits writing in the reporters' room of The
+Daily Eclipse. The paper has gone to press and he is
+alone; a wayward talented gentleman, this Mr. Scalper,
+and employed by The Eclipse as a delineator of character
+from handwriting. Any subscriber who forwards a specimen
+of his handwriting is treated to a prompt analysis of
+his character from Mr. Scalper's facile pen. The literary
+genius has a little pile of correspondence beside him,
+and is engaged in the practice of his art. Outside the
+night is dark and rainy. The clock on the City Hall marks
+the hour of two. In front of the newspaper office Policeman
+Hogan walks drearily up and down his beat. The damp misery
+of Hogan is intense. A belated gentleman in clerical
+attire, returning home from a bed of sickness, gives him
+a side-look of timid pity and shivers past. Hogan follows
+the retreating figure with his eye; then draws forth a
+notebook and sits down on the steps of The Eclipse building
+to write in the light of the gas lamp. Gentlemen of
+nocturnal habits have often wondered what it is that
+Policeman Hogan and his brethren write in their little
+books. Here are the words that are fashioned by the big
+fist of the policeman:
+
+"Two o'clock. All is well. There is a light in Mr.
+Scalper's room above. The night is very wet and I am
+unhappy and cannot sleep--my fourth night of insomnia.
+Suspicious-looking individual just passed. Alas, how
+melancholy is my life! Will the dawn never break! Oh,
+moist, moist stone."
+
+Mr. Scalper up above is writing too, writing with the
+careless fluency of a man who draws his pay by the column.
+He is delineating with skill and rapidity. The reporters'
+room is gloomy and desolate. Mr. Scalper is a man of
+sensitive temperament and the dreariness of his surroundings
+depresses him. He opens the letter of a correspondent,
+examines the handwriting narrowly, casts his eye around
+the room for inspiration, and proceeds to delineate:
+
+"G.H. You have an unhappy, despondent nature; your
+circumstances oppress you, and your life is filled with
+an infinite sadness. You feel that you are without hope--"
+
+Mr. Scalper pauses, takes another look around the room,
+and finally lets his eye rest for some time upon a tall
+black bottle that stands on the shelf of an open cupboard.
+Then he goes on:
+
+"--and you have lost all belief in Christianity and a
+future world and human virtue. You are very weak against
+temptation, but there is an ugly vein of determination
+in your character, when you make up your mind that you
+are going to have a thing--"
+
+Here Mr. Scalper stops abruptly, pushes back his chair,
+and dashes across the room to the cupboard. He takes the
+black bottle from the shelf, applies it to his lips, and
+remains for some time motionless. He then returns to
+finish the delineation of G.H. with the hurried words:
+
+"On the whole I recommend you to persevere; you are doing
+very well." Mr. Scalper's next proceeding is peculiar.
+He takes from the cupboard a roll of twine, about fifty
+feet in length, and attaches one end of it to the neck
+of the bottle. Going then to one of the windows, he opens
+it, leans out, and whistles softly. The alert ear of
+Policeman Hogan on the pavement below catches the sound,
+and he returns it. The bottle is lowered to the end of
+the string, the guardian of the peace applies it to his
+gullet, and for some time the policeman and the man of
+letters remain attached by a cord of sympathy. Gentlemen
+who lead the variegated life of Mr. Scalper find it well
+to propitiate the arm of the law, and attachments of this
+sort are not uncommon. Mr. Scalper hauls up the bottle,
+closes the window, and returns to his task; the policeman
+resumes his walk with a glow of internal satisfaction.
+A glance at the City Hall clock causes him to enter
+another note in his book.
+
+"Half-past two. All is better. The weather is milder with
+a feeling of young summer in the air. Two lights in Mr.
+Scalper's room. Nothing has occurred which need be brought
+to the notice of the roundsman."
+
+Things are going better upstairs too. The delineator
+opens a second envelope, surveys the writing of the
+correspondent with a critical yet charitable eye, and
+writes with more complacency.
+
+"William H. Your writing shows a disposition which, though
+naturally melancholy, is capable of a temporary
+cheerfulness. You have known misfortune but have made up
+your mind to look on the bright side of things. If you
+will allow me to say so, you indulge in liquor but are
+quite moderate in your use of it. Be assured that no harm
+ever comes of this moderate use. It enlivens the intellect,
+brightens the faculties, and stimulates the dormant fancy
+into a pleasurable activity. It is only when carried to
+excess--"
+
+At this point the feelings of Mr. Scalper, who had been
+writing very rapidly, evidently become too much for him.
+He starts up from his chair, rushes two or three times
+around the room, and finally returns to finish the
+delineation thus: "it is only when carried to excess that
+this moderation becomes pernicious."
+
+Mr. Scalper succumbs to the train of thought suggested
+and gives an illustration of how moderation to excess
+may be avoided, after which he lowers the bottle to
+Policeman Hogan with a cheery exchange of greetings.
+
+The half-hours pass on. The delineator is writing busily
+and feels that he is writing well. The characters of his
+correspondents lie bare to his keen eye and flow from
+his facile pen. From time to time he pauses and appeals
+to the source of his inspiration; his humanity prompts
+him to extend the inspiration to Policeman Hogan. The
+minion of the law walks his beat with a feeling of more
+than tranquillity. A solitary Chinaman, returning home
+late from his midnight laundry, scuttles past. The literary
+instinct has risen strong in Hogan from his connection
+with the man of genius above him, and the passage of the
+lone Chinee gives him occasion to write in his book:
+
+"Four-thirty. Everything is simply great. There are four
+lights in Mr. Scalper's room. Mild, balmy weather with
+prospects of an earthquake, which may be held in check
+by walking with extreme caution. Two Chinamen have just
+passed--mandarins, I presume. Their walk was unsteady,
+but their faces so benign as to disarm suspicion."
+
+Up in the office Mr. Scalper has reached the letter of
+a correspondent which appears to give him particular
+pleasure, for he delineates the character with a beaming
+smile of satisfaction. To the unpractised eye the writing
+resembles the prim, angular hand of an elderly spinster.
+Mr. Scalper, however, seems to think otherwise, for he
+writes:
+
+"Aunt Dorothea. You have a merry, rollicking nature. At
+times you are seized with a wild, tumultuous hilarity to
+which you give ample vent in shouting and song. You are
+much addicted to profanity, and you rightly feel that
+this is part of your nature and you must not check it.
+The world is a very bright place to you, Aunt Dorothea.
+Write to me again soon. Our minds seem cast in the same
+mould."
+
+Mr. Scalper seems to think that he has not done full
+justice to the subject he is treating, for he proceeds
+to write a long private letter to Aunt Dorothea in addition
+to the printed delineation. As he finishes the City Hall
+clock points to five, and Policeman Hogan makes the last
+entry in his chronicle. Hogan has seated himself upon
+the steps of The Eclipse building for greater comfort
+and writes with a slow, leisurely fist:
+
+"The other hand of the clock points north and the second
+longest points south-east by south. I infer that it is
+five o'clock. The electric lights in Mr. Scalper's room
+defy the eye. The roundsman has passed and examined my
+notes of the night's occurrences. They are entirely
+satisfactory, and he is pleased with their literary form.
+The earthquake which I apprehended was reduced to a few
+minor oscillations which cannot reach me where I sit--"
+
+The lowering of the bottle interrupts Policeman Hogan.
+The long letter to Aunt Dorothea has cooled the ardour
+of Mr. Scalper. The generous blush has passed from his
+mind and he has been trying in vain to restore it. To
+afford Hogan a similar opportunity, he decides not to
+haul the bottle up immediately, but to leave it in his
+custody while he delineates a character. The writing of
+this correspondent would seem to the inexperienced eye
+to be that of a timid little maiden in her teens. Mr.
+Scalper is not to be deceived by appearances. He shakes
+his head mournfully at the letter and writes:
+
+"Little Emily. You have known great happiness, but it
+has passed. Despondency has driven you to seek forgetfulness
+in drink. Your writing shows the worst phase of the liquor
+habit. I apprehend that you will shortly have delirium
+tremens. Poor little Emily! Do not try to break off; it
+is too late."
+
+Mr. Scalper is visibly affected by his correspondent's
+unhappy condition. His eye becomes moist, and he decides
+to haul up the bottle while there is still time to save
+Policeman Hogan from acquiring a taste for liquor. He is
+surprised and alarmed to find the attempt to haul it up
+ineffectual. The minion of the law has fallen into a
+leaden slumber, and the bottle remains tight in his grasp.
+The baffled delineator lets fall the string and returns
+to finish his task. Only a few lines are now required to
+fill the column, but Mr. Scalper finds on examining the
+correspondence that he has exhausted the subjects. This,
+however, is quite a common occurrence and occasions no
+dilemma in the mind of the talented gentleman. It is his
+custom in such cases to fill up the space with an imaginary
+character or two, the analysis of which is a task most
+congenial to his mind. He bows his head in thought for
+a few moments, and then writes as follows:
+
+"Policeman H. Your hand shows great firmness; when once
+set upon a thing you are not easily moved. But you have
+a mean, grasping disposition and a tendency to want more
+than your share. You have formed an attachment which you
+hope will be continued throughout life, but your selfishness
+threatens to sever the bond."
+
+Having written which, Mr. Scalper arranges his manuscript
+for the printer next day, dons his hat and coat, and
+wends his way home in the morning twilight, feeling that
+his pay is earned.
+
+
+
+
+The Passing of the Poet
+
+Studies in what may be termed collective psychology are
+essentially in keeping with the spirit of the present
+century. The examination of the mental tendencies, the
+intellectual habits which we display not as individuals,
+but as members of a race, community, or crowd, is offering
+a fruitful field of speculation as yet but little exploited.
+One may, therefore, not without profit, pass in review
+the relation of the poetic instinct to the intellectual
+development of the present era.
+
+Not the least noticeable feature in the psychological
+evolution of our time is the rapid disappearance of
+poetry. The art of writing poetry, or perhaps more fairly,
+the habit of writing poetry, is passing from us. The poet
+is destined to become extinct.
+
+To a reader of trained intellect the initial difficulty
+at once suggests itself as to what is meant by poetry.
+But it is needless to quibble at a definition of the
+term. It may be designated, simply and fairly, as the
+art of expressing a simple truth in a concealed form of
+words, any number of which, at intervals greater or less,
+may or may not rhyme.
+
+The poet, it must be said, is as old as civilization.
+The Greeks had him with them, stamping out his iambics
+with the sole of his foot. The Romans, too, knew
+him--endlessly juggling his syllables together, long and
+short, short and long, to make hexameters. This can now
+be done by electricity, but the Romans did not know it.
+
+But it is not my present purpose to speak of the poets
+of an earlier and ruder time. For the subject before us
+it is enough to set our age in comparison with the era
+that preceded it. We have but to contrast ourselves with
+our early Victorian grandfathers to realize the profound
+revolution that has taken place in public feeling. It is
+only with an effort that the practical common sense of
+the twentieth century can realize the excessive
+sentimentality of the earlier generation.
+
+In those days poetry stood in high and universal esteem.
+Parents read poetry to their children. Children recited
+poetry to their parents. And he was a dullard, indeed,
+who did not at least profess, in his hours of idleness,
+to pour spontaneous rhythm from his flowing quill.
+
+Should one gather statistics of the enormous production
+of poetry some sixty or seventy years ago, they would
+scarcely appear credible. Journals and magazines teemed
+with it. Editors openly countenanced it. Even the daily
+press affected it. Love sighed in home-made stanzas.
+Patriotism rhapsodized on the hustings, or cited rolling
+hexameters to an enraptured legislature. Even melancholy
+death courted his everlasting sleep in elegant elegiacs.
+
+In that era, indeed, I know not how, polite society was
+haunted by the obstinate fiction that it was the duty of
+a man of parts to express himself from time to time in
+verse. Any special occasion of expansion or exuberance,
+of depression, torsion, or introspection, was sufficient
+to call it forth. So we have poems of dejection, of
+reflection, of deglutition, of indigestion.
+
+Any particular psychological disturbance was enough to
+provoke an access of poetry. The character and manner of
+the verse might vary with the predisposing cause. A
+gentleman who had dined too freely might disexpand himself
+in a short fit of lyric doggerel in which "bowl" and
+"soul" were freely rhymed. The morning's indigestion
+inspired a long-drawn elegiac, with "bier" and "tear,"
+"mortal" and "portal" linked in sonorous sadness. The
+man of politics, from time to time, grateful to an
+appreciative country, sang back to it, "Ho, Albion, rising
+from the brine!" in verse whose intention at least was
+meritorious.
+
+And yet it was but a fiction, a purely fictitious
+obligation, self-imposed by a sentimental society. In
+plain truth, poetry came no more easily or naturally to
+the early Victorian than to you or me. The lover twanged
+his obdurate harp in vain for hours for the rhymes that
+would not come, and the man of politics hammered at his
+heavy hexameter long indeed before his Albion was finally
+"hoed" into shape; while the beer-besotted convivialist
+cudgelled his poor wits cold sober in rhyming the light
+little bottle-ditty that should have sprung like Aphrodite
+from the froth of the champagne.
+
+I have before me a pathetic witness of this fact. It is
+the note-book once used for the random jottings of a
+gentleman of the period. In it I read: "Fair Lydia, if
+my earthly harp." This is crossed out, and below it
+appears, "Fair Lydia, COULD my earthly harp." This again
+is erased, and under it appears, "Fair Lydia, SHOULD my
+earthly harp." This again is struck out with a despairing
+stroke, and amended to read: "Fair Lydia, DID my earthly
+harp." So that finally, when the lines appeared in the
+Gentleman's Magazine (1845) in their ultimate shape--"Fair
+Edith, when with fluent pen," etc., etc.--one can realize
+from what a desperate congelation the fluent pen had been
+so perseveringly rescued.
+
+There can be little doubt of the deleterious effect
+occasioned both to public and private morals by this
+deliberate exaltation of mental susceptibility on the
+part of the early Victorian. In many cases we can detect
+the evidences of incipient paresis. The undue access of
+emotion frequently assumed a pathological character. The
+sight of a daisy, of a withered leaf or an upturned sod,
+seemed to disturb the poet's mental equipoise. Spring
+unnerved him. The lambs distressed him. The flowers made
+him cry. The daffodils made him laugh. Day dazzled him.
+Night frightened him.
+
+This exalted mood, combined with the man's culpable
+ignorance of the plainest principles of physical science,
+made him see something out of the ordinary in the flight
+of a waterfowl or the song of a skylark. He complained
+that he could HEAR it, but not SEE it--a phenomenon too
+familiar to the scientific observer to occasion any
+comment.
+
+In such a state of mind the most inconsequential inferences
+were drawn. One said that the brightness of the dawn--a
+fact easily explained by the diurnal motion of the globe
+--showed him that his soul was immortal. He asserted
+further that he had, at an earlier period of his life,
+trailed bright clouds behind him. This was absurd.
+
+With the disturbance thus set up in the nervous system
+were coupled, in many instances, mental aberrations,
+particularly in regard to pecuniary matters. "Give me
+not silk, nor rich attire," pleaded one poet of the period
+to the British public, "nor gold nor jewels rare." Here
+was an evident hallucination that the writer was to become
+the recipient of an enormous secret subscription. Indeed,
+the earnest desire NOT to be given gold was a recurrent
+characteristic of the poetic temperament. The repugnance
+to accept even a handful of gold was generally accompanied
+by a desire for a draught of pure water or a night's
+rest.
+
+It is pleasing to turn from this excessive sentimentality
+of thought and speech to the practical and concise diction
+of our time. We have learned to express ourselves with
+equal force, but greater simplicity. To illustrate this
+I have gathered from the poets of the earlier generation
+and from the prose writers of to-day parallel passages
+that may be fairly set in contrast. Here, for example,
+is a passage from the poet Grey, still familiar to
+scholars:
+
+   "Can storied urn or animated bust
+   Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?
+   Can honour's voice invoke the silent dust
+   Or flattery soothe the dull cold ear of death?"
+
+Precisely similar in thought, though different in form,
+is the more modern presentation found in Huxley's
+Physiology:
+
+"Whether after the moment of death the ventricles of the
+heart can be again set in movement by the artificial
+stimulus of oxygen, is a question to which we must impose
+a decided negative."
+
+How much simpler, and yet how far superior to Grey's
+elaborate phraseology! Huxley has here seized the central
+point of the poet's thought, and expressed it with the
+dignity and precision of exact science.
+
+I cannot refrain, even at the risk of needless iteration,
+from quoting a further example. It is taken from the poet
+Burns. The original dialect being written in inverted
+hiccoughs, is rather difficult to reproduce. It describes
+the scene attendant upon the return of a cottage labourer
+to his home on Saturday night:
+
+   "The cheerfu' supper done, wi' serious face
+   They round the ingle form in a circle wide;
+   The sire turns o'er, wi' patriarchal grace,
+   The big ha' Bible, ance his father's pride:
+   His bonnet rev'rently is laid aside,
+   His lyart haffets wearing thin an' bare:
+   Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide,
+   He wales a portion wi' judeecious care."
+
+Now I find almost the same scene described in more apt
+phraseology in the police news of the Dumfries Chronicle
+(October 3, 1909), thus: "It appears that the prisoner
+had returned to his domicile at the usual hour, and,
+after partaking of a hearty meal, had seated himself on
+his oaken settle, for the ostensible purpose of reading
+the Bible. It was while so occupied that his arrest was
+effected." With the trifling exception that Burns omits
+all mention of the arrest, for which, however, the whole
+tenor of the poem gives ample warrant, the two accounts
+are almost identical.
+
+In all that I have thus said I do not wish to be
+misunderstood. Believing, as I firmly do, that the poet
+is destined to become extinct, I am not one of those who
+would accelerate his extinction. The time has not yet
+come for remedial legislation, or the application of the
+criminal law. Even in obstinate cases where pronounced
+delusions in reference to plants, animals, and natural
+phenomena are seen to exist, it is better that we should
+do nothing that might occasion a mistaken remorse. The
+inevitable natural evolution which is thus shaping the
+mould of human thought may safely be left to its own
+course.
+
+
+
+
+Self-made Men
+
+They were both what we commonly call successful business
+men--men with well-fed faces, heavy signet rings on
+fingers like sausages, and broad, comfortable waistcoats,
+a yard and a half round the equator. They were seated
+opposite each other at a table of a first-class restaurant,
+and had fallen into conversation while waiting to give
+their order to the waiter. Their talk had drifted back
+to their early days and how each had made his start in
+life when he first struck New York.
+
+"I tell you what, Jones," one of them was saying, "I
+shall never forget my first few years in this town. By
+George, it was pretty uphill work! Do you know, sir, when
+I first struck this place, I hadn't more than fifteen
+cents to my name, hadn't a rag except what I stood up
+in, and all the place I had to sleep in--you won't
+believe it, but it's a gospel fact just the same--was an
+empty tar barrel. No, sir," he went on, leaning back and
+closing up his eyes into an expression of infinite
+experience, "no, sir, a fellow accustomed to luxury like
+you has simply no idea what sleeping out in a tar barrel
+and all that kind of thing is like."
+
+"My dear Robinson," the other man rejoined briskly, "if
+you imagine I've had no experience of hardship of that
+sort, you never made a bigger mistake in your life. Why,
+when I first walked into this town I hadn't a cent, sir,
+not a cent, and as for lodging, all the place I had for
+months and months was an old piano box up a lane, behind
+a factory. Talk about hardship, I guess I had it pretty
+rough! You take a fellow that's used to a good warm tar
+barrel and put him into a piano box for a night or two,
+and you'll see mighty soon--"
+
+"My dear fellow," Robinson broke in with some irritation,
+"you merely show that you don't know what a tar barrel's
+like. Why, on winter nights, when you'd be shut in there
+in your piano box just as snug as you please, I used to
+lie awake shivering, with the draught fairly running in
+at the bunghole at the back."
+
+"Draught!" sneered the other man, with a provoking laugh,
+"draught! Don't talk to me about draughts. This box I
+speak of had a whole darned plank off it, right on the
+north side too. I used to sit there studying in the
+evenings, and the snow would blow in a foot deep. And
+yet, sir," he continued more quietly, "though I know
+you'll not believe it, I don't mind admitting that some
+of the happiest days of my life were spent in that same
+old box. Ah, those were good old times! Bright, innocent
+days, I can tell you. I'd wake up there in the mornings
+and fairly shout with high spirits. Of course, you may
+not be able to stand that kind of life--"
+
+"Not stand it!" cried Robinson fiercely; "me not stand
+it! By gad! I'm made for it. I just wish I had a taste
+of the old life again for a while. And as for innocence!
+Well, I'll bet you you weren't one-tenth as innocent as
+I was; no, nor one-fifth, nor one-third! What a grand
+old life it was! You'll swear this is a darned lie and
+refuse to believe it--but I can remember evenings when
+I'd have two or three fellows in, and we'd sit round and
+play pedro by a candle half the night."
+
+"Two or three!" laughed Jones; "why, my dear fellow, I've
+known half a dozen of us to sit down to supper in my
+piano box, and have a game of pedro afterwards; yes, and
+charades and forfeits, and every other darned thing.
+Mighty good suppers they were too! By Jove, Robinson,
+you fellows round this town who have ruined your digestions
+with high living, have no notion of the zest with which
+a man can sit down to a few potato peelings, or a bit of
+broken pie crust, or--"
+
+"Talk about hard food," interrupted the other, "I guess
+I know all about that. Many's the time I've breakfasted
+off a little cold porridge that somebody was going to
+throw away from a back-door, or that I've gone round to
+a livery stable and begged a little bran mash that they
+intended for the pigs. I'll venture to say I've eaten
+more hog's food--"
+
+"Hog's food!" shouted Robinson, striking his fist savagely
+on the table, "I tell you hog's food suits me better
+than--"
+
+He stopped speaking with a sudden grunt of surprise as
+the waiter appeared with the question:
+
+"What may I bring you for dinner, gentlemen?"
+
+"Dinner!" said Jones, after a moment of silence, "dinner!
+Oh, anything, nothing--I never care what I eat--give me
+a little cold porridge, if you've got it, or a chunk of
+salt pork--anything you like, it's all the same to me."
+
+The waiter turned with an impassive face to Robinson.
+
+"You can bring me some of that cold porridge too," he
+said, with a defiant look at Jones; "yesterday's, if you
+have it, and a few potato peelings and a glass of skim
+milk."
+
+There was a pause. Jones sat back in his chair and looked
+hard across at Robinson. For some moments the two men
+gazed into each other's eyes with a stern, defiant
+intensity. Then Robinson turned slowly round in his seat
+and beckoned to the waiter, who was moving off with the
+muttered order on his lips.
+
+"Here, waiter," he said with a savage scowl, "I guess
+I'll change that order a little. Instead of that cold
+porridge I'll take--um, yes--a little hot partridge. And
+you might as well bring me an oyster or two on the half
+shell, and a mouthful of soup (mock-turtle, consomme,
+anything), and perhaps you might fetch along a dab of
+fish, and a little peck of Stilton, and a grape, or a
+walnut."
+
+The waiter turned to Jones.
+
+"I guess I'll take the same," he said simply, and added;
+"and you might bring a quart of champagne at the same
+time."
+
+And nowadays, when Jones and Robinson meet, the memory
+of the tar barrel and the piano box is buried as far out
+of sight as a home for the blind under a landslide.
+
+
+
+
+A Model Dialogue
+
+In which is shown how the drawing-room juggler may be
+permanently cured of his card trick.
+
+The drawing-room juggler, having slyly got hold of the
+pack of cards at the end of the game of whist, says:
+
+"Ever see any card tricks? Here's rather a good one; pick
+a card."
+
+"Thank you, I don't want a card."
+
+"No, but just pick one, any one you like, and I'll tell
+which one you pick."
+
+"You'll tell who?"
+
+"No, no; I mean, I'll know which it is don't you see? Go
+on now, pick a card."
+
+"Any one I like?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Any colour at all?"
+
+"Yes, yes."
+
+"Any suit?"
+
+"Oh, yes; do go on."
+
+"Well, let me see, I'll--pick--the--ace of spades."
+
+"Great Caesar! I mean you are to pull a card out of the
+pack."
+
+"Oh, to pull it out of the pack! Now I understand. Hand
+me the pack. All right--I've got it."
+
+"Have you picked one?"
+
+"Yes, it's the three of hearts. Did you know it?"
+
+"Hang it! Don't tell me like that. You spoil the thing.
+Here, try again. Pick a card."
+
+"All right, I've got it."
+
+"Put it back in the pack. Thanks. (Shuffle, shuffle,
+shuffle--flip)--There, is that it?" (triumphantly).
+
+"I don't know. I lost sight of it."
+
+"Lost sight of it! Confound it, you have to look at it
+and see what it is."
+
+"Oh, you want me to look at the front of it!"
+
+"Why, of course! Now then, pick a card."
+
+"All right. I've picked it. Go ahead."
+(Shuffle, shuffle, shuffle--flip.)
+
+"Say, confound you, did you put that card back in the
+pack?"
+
+"Why, no. I kept it."
+
+"Holy Moses! Listen. Pick--a--card--just one--look at
+it--see what it is--then put it back--do you understand?"
+
+"Oh, perfectly. Only I don't see how you are ever going
+to do it. You must be awfully clever."
+
+(Shuffle, shuffle, shuffle--flip.)
+
+"There you are; that's your card, now. isn't it?" (This
+is the supreme moment.)
+
+"NO. THAT IS NOT MY CARD." (This is a flat lie, but Heaven
+will pardon you for it.)
+
+"Not that card!!!! Say--just hold on a second. Here, now,
+watch what you're at this time. I can do this cursed
+thing, mind you, every time. I've done it on father, on
+mother, and on every one that's ever come round our place.
+Pick a card. (Shuffle, shuffle, shuffle--flip, bang.)
+There, that's your card."
+
+"NO. I AM SORRY. THAT IS NOT MY CARD. But won't you try
+it again? Please do. Perhaps you are a little excited--I'm
+afraid I was rather stupid. Won't you go and sit quietly
+by yourself on the back verandah for half an hour and
+then try? You have to go home? Oh, I'm so sorry. It must
+be such an awfully clever little trick. Good night!"
+
+
+
+
+Back to the Bush
+
+I have a friend called Billy, who has the Bush Mania. By
+trade he is a doctor, but I do not think that he needs
+to sleep out of doors. In ordinary things his mind appears
+sound. Over the tops I of his gold-rimmed spectacles, as
+he bends forward to speak to you, there gleams nothing
+but amiability and kindliness. Like all the rest of us
+he is, or was until he forgot it all, an extremely
+well-educated man.
+
+I am aware of no criminal strain in his blood. Yet Billy
+is in reality hopelessly unbalanced. He has the Mania of
+the Open Woods.
+
+Worse than that, he is haunted with the desire to drag
+his friends with him into the depths of the Bush.
+
+Whenever we meet he starts to talk about it.
+
+Not long ago I met him in the club.
+
+"I wish," he said, "you'd let me take you clear away up
+the Gatineau."
+
+"Yes, I wish I would, I don't think," I murmured to
+myself, but I humoured him and said:
+
+"How do we go, Billy, in a motor-car or by train?"
+
+"No, we paddle."
+
+"And is it up-stream all the way?"
+
+"Oh, yes," Billy said enthusiastically.
+
+"And how many days do we paddle all day to get up?"
+
+"Six."
+
+"Couldn't we do it in less?"
+
+"Yes," Billy answered, feeling that I was entering into
+the spirit of the thing, "if we start each morning just
+before daylight and paddle hard till moonlight, we could
+do it in five days and a half."
+
+"Glorious! and are there portages?"
+
+"Lots of them."
+
+"And at each of these do I carry two hundred pounds of
+stuff up a hill on my back?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And will there be a guide, a genuine, dirty-looking
+Indian guide?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And can I sleep next to him?"
+
+"Oh, yes, if you want to."
+
+"And when we get to the top, what is there?"
+
+"Well, we go over the height of land."
+
+"Oh, we do, do we? And is the height of land all rock
+and about three hundred yards up-hill? And do I carry a
+barrel of flour up it? And does it roll down and crush
+me on the other side? Look here, Billy, this trip is a
+great thing, but it is too luxurious for me. If you will
+have me paddled up the river in a large iron canoe with
+an awning, carried over the portages in a sedan-chair,
+taken across the height of land in a palanquin or a
+howdah, and lowered down the other side in a derrick,
+I'll go. Short of that, the thing would be too fattening."
+
+Billy was discouraged and left me. But he has since
+returned repeatedly to the attack.
+
+He offers to take me to the head-waters of the Batiscan.
+I am content at the foot.
+
+He wants us to go to the sources of the Attahwapiscat.
+I don't.
+
+He says I ought to see the grand chutes of the Kewakasis.
+Why should I?
+
+I have made Billy a counter-proposition that we strike
+through the Adirondacks (in the train) to New York, from
+there portage to Atlantic City, then to Washington,
+carrying our own grub (in the dining-car), camp there a
+few days (at the Willard), and then back, I to return by
+train and Billy on foot with the outfit.
+
+The thing is still unsettled.
+
+Billy, of course, is only one of thousands that have got
+this mania. And the autumn is the time when it rages at
+its worst.
+
+Every day there move northward trains, packed full of
+lawyers, bankers, and brokers, headed for the bush. They
+are dressed up to look like pirates. They wear slouch
+hats, flannel shirts, and leather breeches with belts.
+They could afford much better clothes than these, but
+they won't use them. I don't know where they get these
+clothes. I think the railroad lends them out. They have
+guns between their knees and big knives at their hips.
+They smoke the worst tobacco they can find, and they
+carry ten gallons of alcohol per man in the baggage car.
+
+In the intervals of telling lies to one another they read
+the railroad pamphlets about hunting. This kind of
+literature is deliberately and fiendishly contrived to
+infuriate their mania. I know all about these pamphlets
+because I write them. I once, for instance, wrote up,
+from imagination, a little place called Dog Lake at the
+end of a branch line. The place had failed as a settlement,
+and the railroad had decided to turn it into a hunting
+resort. I did the turning. I think I did it rather well,
+rechristening the lake and stocking the place with suitable
+varieties of game. The pamphlet ran like this.
+
+"The limpid waters of Lake Owatawetness (the name,
+according to the old Indian legends of the place, signifies,
+The Mirror of the Almighty) abound with every known
+variety of fish. Near to its surface, so close that the
+angler may reach out his hand and stroke them, schools
+of pike, pickerel, mackerel, doggerel, and chickerel
+jostle one another in the water. They rise instantaneously
+to the bait and swim gratefully ashore holding it in
+their mouths. In the middle depth of the waters of the
+lake, the sardine, the lobster, the kippered herring,
+the anchovy and other tinned varieties of fish disport
+themselves with evident gratification, while even lower
+in the pellucid depths the dog-fish, the hog-fish, the
+log-fish, and the sword-fish whirl about in never-ending
+circles.
+
+"Nor is Lake Owatawetness merely an Angler's Paradise.
+Vast forests of primeval pine slope to the very shores
+of the lake, to which descend great droves of bears--brown,
+green, and bear-coloured--while as the shades of evening
+fall, the air is loud with the lowing of moose, cariboo,
+antelope, cantelope, musk-oxes, musk-rats, and other
+graminivorous mammalia of the forest. These enormous
+quadrumana generally move off about 10.30 p.m., from
+which hour until 11.45 p.m. the whole shore is reserved
+for bison and buffalo.
+
+"After midnight hunters who so desire it can be chased
+through the woods, for any distance and at any speed they
+select, by jaguars, panthers, cougars, tigers, and jackals
+whose ferocity is reputed to be such that they will tear
+the breeches off a man with their teeth in their eagerness
+to sink their fangs in his palpitating flesh. Hunters,
+attention! Do not miss such attractions as these!"
+
+I have seen men--quiet, reputable, well-shaved men--
+reading that pamphlet of mine in the rotundas of hotels,
+with their eyes blazing with excitement. I think it is
+the jaguar attraction that hits them the hardest, because
+I notice them rub themselves sympathetically with their
+hands while they read.
+
+Of course, you can imagine the effect of this sort of
+literature on the brains of men fresh from their offices,
+and dressed out as pirates.
+
+They just go crazy and stay crazy.
+
+Just watch them when they get into the bush.
+
+Notice that well-to-do stockbroker crawling about on his
+stomach in the underbrush, with his spectacles shining
+like gig-lamps. What is he doing? He is after a cariboo
+that isn't there. He is "stalking" it. With his stomach.
+Of course, away down in his heart he knows that the
+cariboo isn't there and never was; but that man read my
+pamphlet and went crazy. He can't help it: he's GOT to
+stalk something. Mark him as he crawls along; see him
+crawl through a thimbleberry bush (very quietly so that
+the cariboo won't hear the noise of the prickles going
+into him), then through a bee's nest, gently and slowly,
+so that the cariboo will not take fright when the bees
+are stinging him. Sheer woodcraft! Yes, mark him. Mark
+him any way you like. Go up behind him and paint a blue
+cross on the seat of his pants as he crawls. He'll never
+notice. He thinks he's a hunting dog. Yet this is the
+man who laughs at his little son of ten for crawling
+round under the dining-room table with a mat over his
+shoulders, and pretending to be a bear.
+
+Now see these other men in camp.
+
+Someone has told them--I think I first started the idea
+in my pamphlet--that the thing is to sleep on a pile of
+hemlock branches. I think I told them to listen to the
+wind sowing (you know the word I mean), sowing and crooning
+in the giant pines. So there they are upside-down, doubled
+up on a couch of green spikes that would have killed St.
+Sebastian. They stare up at the sky with blood-shot,
+restless eyes, waiting for the crooning to begin. And
+there isn't a sow in sight.
+
+Here is another man, ragged and with a six days' growth
+of beard, frying a piece of bacon on a stick over a little
+fire. Now what does he think he is? The CHEF of the
+Waldorf Astoria? Yes, he does, and what's more he thinks
+that that miserable bit of bacon, cut with a tobacco
+knife from a chunk of meat that lay six days in the rain,
+is fit to eat. What's more, he'll eat it. So will the
+rest. They're all crazy together.
+
+There's another man, the Lord help him who thinks he has
+the "knack" of being a carpenter. He is hammering up
+shelves to a tree. Till the shelves fall down he thinks
+he is a wizard. Yet this is the same man who swore at
+his wife for asking him to put up a shelf in the back
+kitchen. "How the blazes," he asked, "could he nail the
+damn thing up? Did she think he was a plumber?"
+
+After all, never mind.
+
+Provided they are happy up there, let them stay.
+
+Personally, I wouldn't mind if they didn't come back and
+lie about it. They get back to the city dead fagged for
+want of sleep, sogged with alcohol, bitten brown by the
+bush-flies, trampled on by the moose and chased through
+the brush by bears and skunks--and they have the nerve
+to say that they like it.
+
+Sometimes I think they do.
+
+Men are only animals anyway. They like to get out into
+the woods and growl round at night and feel something
+bite them.
+
+Only why haven't they the imagination to be able to do
+the same thing with less fuss? Why not take their coats
+and collars off in the office and crawl round on the
+floor and growl at one another. It would be just as good.
+
+
+
+
+Reflections on Riding
+
+The writing of this paper has been inspired by a debate
+recently held at the literary society of my native town
+on the question, "Resolved: that the bicycle is a nobler
+animal than the horse." In order to speak for the negative
+with proper authority, I have spent some weeks in completely
+addicting myself to the use of the horse. I find that
+the difference between the horse and the bicycle is
+greater than I had supposed.
+
+The horse is entirely covered with hair; the bicycle is
+not entirely covered with hair, except the '89 model they
+are using in Idaho.
+
+In riding a horse the performer finds that the pedals in
+which he puts his feet will not allow of a good circular
+stroke. He will observe, however, that there is a saddle
+in which--especially while the horse is trotting--he is
+expected to seat himself from time to time. But it is
+simpler to ride standing up, with the feet in the pedals.
+
+There are no handles to a horse, but the 1910 model has
+a string to each side of its face for turning its head
+when there is anything you want it to see.
+
+Coasting on a good horse is superb, but should be under
+control. I have known a horse to suddenly begin to coast
+with me about two miles from home, coast down the main
+street of my native town at a terrific rate, and finally
+coast through a plantoon of the Salvation Army into its
+livery stable.
+
+I cannot honestly deny that it takes a good deal of
+physical courage to ride a horse. This, however, I have.
+I get it at about forty cents a flask, and take it as
+required.
+
+I find that in riding a horse up the long street of a
+country town, it is not well to proceed at a trot. It
+excites unkindly comment. It is better to let the horse
+walk the whole distance. This may be made to seem natural
+by turning half round in the saddle with the hand on the
+horse's back, and gazing intently about two miles up the
+road. It then appears that you are the first in of about
+fourteen men.
+
+Since learning to ride, I have taken to noticing the
+things that people do on horseback in books. Some of
+these I can manage, but most of them are entirely beyond
+me. Here, for instance, is a form of equestrian performance
+that every reader will recognize and for which I have
+only a despairing admiration:
+
+"With a hasty gesture of farewell, the rider set spurs
+to his horse and disappeared in a cloud of dust."
+
+With a little practice in the matter of adjustment, I
+think I could set spurs to any size of horse, but I could
+never disappear in a cloud of dust--at least, not with
+any guarantee of remaining disappeared when the dust
+cleared away.
+
+Here, however, is one that I certainly can do:
+
+"The bridle-rein dropped from Lord Everard's listless
+hand, and, with his head bowed upon his bosom, he suffered
+his horse to move at a foot's pace up the sombre avenue.
+Deep in thought, he heeded not the movement of the steed
+which bore him."
+
+That is, he looked as if he didn't; but in my case Lord
+Everard has his eye on the steed pretty closely, just
+the same.
+
+This next I am doubtful about:
+
+"To horse! to horse!" cried the knight, and leaped into
+the saddle.
+
+I think I could manage it if it read:
+
+"To horse!" cried the knight, and, snatching a step-ladder
+from the hands of his trusty attendant, he rushed into
+the saddle.
+
+As a concluding remark, I may mention that my experience
+of riding has thrown a very interesting sidelight upon
+a rather puzzling point in history. It is recorded of
+the famous Henry the Second that he was "almost constantly
+in the saddle, and of so restless a disposition that he
+never sat down, even at meals." I had hitherto been unable
+to understand Henry's idea about his meals, but I think
+I can appreciate it now.
+
+
+
+
+Saloonio
+
+A STUDY IN SHAKESPEAREAN CRITICISM
+
+The say that young men fresh from college are pretty
+positive about what they know. But from my own experience
+of life, I should say that if you take a comfortable,
+elderly man who hasn't been near a college for about
+twenty years, who has been pretty liberally fed and dined
+ever since, who measures about fifty inches around the
+circumference, and has a complexion like a cranberry by
+candlelight, you will find that there is a degree of
+absolute certainty about what he thinks he knows that
+will put any young man to shame. I am specially convinced
+of this from the case of my friend Colonel Hogshead, a
+portly, choleric gentleman who made a fortune in the
+cattle-trade out in Wyoming, and who, in his later days,
+has acquired a chronic idea that the plays of Shakespeare
+are the one subject upon which he is most qualified to
+speak personally.
+
+He came across me the other evening as I was sitting by
+the fire in the club sitting-room looking over the leaves
+of The Merchant of Venice, and began to hold forth to me
+about the book.
+
+"Merchant of Venice, eh? There's a play for you, sir!
+There's genius! Wonderful, sir, wonderful! You take the
+characters in that play and where will you find anything
+like them? You take Antonio, take Sherlock, take Saloonio--"
+
+"Saloonio, Colonel?" I interposed mildly, "aren't you
+making a mistake? There's a Bassanio and a Salanio in
+the play, but I don't think there's any Saloonio, is
+there?"
+
+For a moment Colonel Hogshead's eye became misty with
+doubt, but he was not the man to admit himself in error:
+
+"Tut, tut! young man," he said with a frown, "don't skim
+through your books in that way. No Saloonio? Why, of
+course there's a Saloonio!"
+
+"But I tell you, Colonel," I rejoined, "I've just been
+reading the play and studying it, and I know there's no
+such character--"
+
+"Nonsense, sir, nonsense!" said the Colonel, "why he
+comes in all through; don't tell me, young man, I've read
+that play myself. Yes, and seen it played, too, out in
+Wyoming, before you were born, by fellers, sir, that
+could act. No Saloonio, indeed! why, who is it that is
+Antonio's friend all through and won't leave him when
+Bassoonio turns against him? Who rescues Clarissa from
+Sherlock, and steals the casket of flesh from the Prince
+of Aragon? Who shouts at the Prince of Morocco, 'Out,
+out, you damned candlestick'? Who loads up the jury in
+the trial scene and fixes the doge? No Saloonio! By gad!
+in my opinion, he's the most important character in the
+play--"
+
+"Colonel Hogshead," I said very firmly, "there isn't any
+Saloonio and you know it."
+
+But the old man had got fairly started on whatever dim
+recollection had given birth to Saloonio; the character
+seemed to grow more and more luminous in the Colonel's
+mind, and he continued with increasing animation:
+
+"I'll just tell you what Saloonio is: he's a type.
+Shakespeare means him to embody the type of the perfect
+Italian gentleman. He's an idea, that's what he is, he's
+a symbol, he's a unit--"
+
+Meanwhile I had been searching among the leaves of the
+play. "Look here," I said, "here's the list of the Dramatis
+Personae. There's no Saloonio there."
+
+But this didn't dismay the Colonel one atom. "Why, of
+course there isn't," he said. "You don't suppose you'd
+find Saloonio there! That's the whole art of it! That's
+Shakespeare! That's the whole gist of it! He's kept clean
+out of the Personae--gives him scope, gives him a free
+hand, makes him more of a type than ever. Oh, it's a
+subtle thing, sir, the dramatic art!" continued the
+Colonel, subsiding into quiet reflection; "it takes a
+feller quite a time to get right into Shakespeare's mind
+and see what he's at all the time."
+
+I began to see that there was no use in arguing any
+further with the old man. I left him with the idea that
+the lapse of a little time would soften his views on
+Saloonio. But I had not reckoned on the way in which old
+men hang on to a thing. Colonel Hogshead quite took up
+Saloonio. From that time on Saloonio became the theme of
+his constant conversation. He was never tired of discussing
+the character of Saloonio, the wonderful art of the
+dramatist in creating him, Saloonio's relation to modern
+life, Saloonio's attitude toward women, the ethical
+significance of Saloonio, Saloonio as compared with
+Hamlet, Hamlet as compared with Saloonio--and so on,
+endlessly. And the more he looked into Saloonio, the more
+he saw in him.
+
+Saloonio seemed inexhaustible. There were new sides to
+him--new phases at every turn, The Colonel even read over
+the play, and finding no mention of Saloonio's name in
+it, he swore that the books were not the same books they
+had had out in Wyoming; that the whole part had been cut
+clean out to suit the book to the infernal public schools,
+Saloonio's language being--at any rate, as the Colonel
+quoted it--undoubtedly a trifle free. Then the Colonel
+took to annotating his book at the side with such remarks
+as, "Enter Saloonio," or "A tucket sounds; enter Saloonio,
+on the arm of the Prince of Morocco." When there was no
+reasonable excuse for bringing Saloonio on the stage the
+Colonel swore that he was concealed behind the arras, or
+feasting within with the doge.
+
+But he got satisfaction at last. He had found that there
+was nobody in our part of the country who knew how to
+put a play of Shakespeare on the stage, and took a trip
+to New York to see Sir Henry Irving and Miss Terry do
+the play. The Colonel sat and listened all through with
+his face just beaming with satisfaction, and when the
+curtain fell at the close of Irving's grand presentation
+of the play, he stood up in his seat, and cheered and
+yelled to his friends: "That s it! That's him! Didn't
+you see that man that came on the stage all the time and
+sort of put the whole play through, though you couldn't
+understand a word he said? Well, that's him! That's
+Saloonio!"
+
+
+
+
+Half-hours with the Poets
+
+I.--MR. WORDSWORTH AND THE LITTLE COTTAGE GIRL.
+
+   "I met a little cottage girl,
+   She was eight years old she said,
+   Her hair was thick with many a curl
+   That clustered round her head."
+
+   WORDSWORTH.
+
+This is what really happened.
+
+Over the dreary downs of his native Cumberland the aged
+laureate was wandering with bowed head and countenance
+of sorrow.
+
+Times were bad with the old man.
+
+In the south pocket of his trousers, as he set his face
+to the north, jingled but a few odd coins and a cheque
+for St. Leon water. Apparently his cup of bitterness was
+full.
+
+In the distance a child moved--a child in form, yet the
+deep lines upon her face bespoke a countenance prematurely
+old.
+
+The poet espied, pursued and overtook the infant. He
+observed that apparently she drew her breath lightly and
+felt her life in every limb, and that presumably her
+acquaintance with death was of the most superficial
+character.
+
+"I must sit awhile and ponder on that child," murmured
+the poet. So he knocked her down with his walking-stick
+and seating himself upon her, he pondered.
+
+Long he sat thus in thought. "His heart is heavy," sighed
+the child.
+
+At length he drew forth a note-book and pencil and prepared
+to write upon his knee. "Now then, my dear young friend,"
+he said, addressing the elfin creature, "I want those
+lines upon your face. Are you seven?"
+
+"Yes, we are seven," said the girl sadly, and added, "I
+know what you want. You are going to question me about
+my afflicted family. You are Mr. Wordsworth, and you are
+collecting mortuary statistics for the Cottagers' Edition
+of the Penny Encyclopaedia."
+
+"You are eight years old?" asked the bard.
+
+"I suppose so," answered she. "I have been eight years
+old for years and years."
+
+"And you know nothing of death, of course?" said the poet
+cheerfully.
+
+"How can I?" answered the child.
+
+"Now then," resumed the venerable William, "let us get
+to business. Name your brothers and sisters."
+
+"Let me see," began the child wearily; "there was Rube
+and Ike, two I can't think of, and John and Jane."
+
+"You must not count John and Jane," interrupted the bard
+reprovingly; "they're dead, you know, so that doesn't
+make seven."
+
+"I wasn't counting them, but perhaps I added up wrongly,"
+said the child; "and will you please move your overshoe
+off my neck?"
+
+"Pardon," said the old man. "A nervous trick, I have been
+absorbed; indeed, the exigency of the metre almost demands
+my doubling up my feet. To continue, however; which died
+first?"
+
+"The first to go was little Jane," said the child.
+
+"She lay moaning in bed, I presume?"
+
+"In bed she moaning lay."
+
+"What killed her?"
+
+"Insomnia," answered the girl. "The gaiety of our cottage
+life, previous to the departure of our elder brothers
+for Conway, and the constant field-sports in which she
+indulged with John, proved too much for a frame never
+too robust."
+
+"You express yourself well," said the poet. "Now, in
+regard to your unfortunate brother, what was the effect
+upon him in the following winter of the ground being
+White with snow and your being able to run and slide?"
+
+"My brother John was forced to go," answered she. "We
+have been at a loss to understand the cause of his death.
+We fear that the dazzling glare of the newly fallen snow,
+acting upon a restless brain, may have led him to a fatal
+attempt to emulate my own feats upon the ice. And, oh,
+sir," the child went on, "speak gently of poor Jane. You
+may rub it into John all you like; we always let him
+slide."
+
+"Very well," said the bard, "and allow me, in conclusion,
+one rather delicate question: Do you ever take your little
+porringer?"
+
+"Oh, yes," answered the child frankly--
+
+   "'Quite often after sunset,
+   When all is light and fair,
+   I take my little porringer'--
+
+"I can't quite remember what I do after that, but I know
+that I like it."
+
+"That is immaterial," said Wordsworth. "I can say that
+you take your little porringer neat, or with bitters, or
+in water after every meal. As long as I can state that
+you take a little porringer regularly, but never to
+excess, the public is satisfied. And now," rising from
+his seat, "I will not detain you any longer. Here is
+sixpence--or stay," he added hastily, "here is a cheque
+for St. Leon water. Your information has been most
+valuable, and I shall work it, for all I am Wordsworth."
+With these words the aged poet bowed deferentially to
+the child and sauntered off in the direction of the Duke
+of Cumberland's Arms, with his eyes on the ground, as if
+looking for the meanest flower that blows itself.
+
+
+II:--HOW TENNYSON KILLED THE MAY QUEEN
+
+"If you're waking call me early, call me early, mother
+dear."
+
+
+PART I
+
+As soon as the child's malady had declared itself the
+afflicted parents of the May Queen telegraphed to Tennyson,
+"Our child gone crazy on subject of early rising, could
+you come and write some poetry about her?"
+
+Alfred, always prompt to fill orders in writing from the
+country, came down on the evening train. The old cottager
+greeted the poet warmly, and began at once to speak of
+the state of his unfortunate daughter.
+
+"She was took queer in May," he said, "along of a sort
+of bee that the young folks had; she ain't been just
+right since; happen you might do summat."
+
+With these words he opened the door of an inner room.
+
+The girl lay in feverish slumber. Beside her bed was an
+alarm-clock set for half-past three. Connected with the
+clock was an ingenious arrangement of a falling brick
+with a string attached to the child's toe.
+
+At the entrance of the visitor she started up in bed.
+"Whoop," she yelled, "I am to be Queen of the May, mother,
+ye-e!"
+
+Then perceiving Tennyson in the doorway, "If that's a
+caller," she said, "tell him to call me early."
+
+The shock caused the brick to fall. In the subsequent
+confusion Alfred modestly withdrew to the sitting-room.
+
+"At this rate," he chuckled, "I shall not have long to
+wait. A few weeks of that strain will finish her."
+
+
+PART II
+
+Six months had passed.
+
+It was now mid-winter.
+
+And still the girl lived. Her vitality appeared
+inexhaustible.
+
+She got up earlier and earlier. She now rose yesterday
+afternoon.
+
+At intervals she seemed almost sane, and spoke in a most
+pathetic manner of her grave and the probability of the
+sun shining on it early in the morning, and her mother
+walking on it later in the day. At other times her malady
+would seize her, and she would snatch the brick off the
+string and throw it fiercely at Tennyson. Once, in an
+uncontrollable fit of madness, she gave her sister Effie
+a half-share in her garden tools and an interest in a
+box of mignonette.
+
+The poet stayed doggedly on. In the chill of the morning
+twilight he broke the ice in his water-basin and cursed
+the girl. But he felt that he had broken the ice and he
+stayed.
+
+On the whole, life at the cottage, though rugged, was
+not cheerless. In the long winter evenings they would
+gather around a smoking fire of peat, while Tennyson read
+aloud the Idylls of the King to the rude old cottager.
+Not to show his rudeness, the old man kept awake by
+sitting on a tin-tack. This also kept his mind on the
+right tack. The two found that they had much in common,
+especially the old cottager. They called each other
+"Alfred" and "Hezekiah" now.
+
+
+PART III
+
+Time moved on and spring came.
+
+Still the girl baffled the poet.
+
+"I thought to pass away before," she would say with a
+mocking grin, "but yet alive I am, Alfred, alive I am."
+
+Tennyson was fast losing hope.
+
+Worn out with early rising, they engaged a retired
+Pullman-car porter to take up his quarters, and being a
+negro his presence added a touch of colour to their life.
+
+The poet also engaged a neighbouring divine at fifty
+cents an evening to read to the child the best hundred
+books, with explanations. The May Queen tolerated him,
+and used to like to play with his silver hair, but
+protested that he was prosy.
+
+At the end of his resources the poet resolved upon
+desperate measures.
+
+He chose an evening when the cottager and his wife were
+out at a dinner-party.
+
+At nightfall Tennyson and his accomplices entered the
+girl's room.
+
+She defended herself savagely with her brick, but was
+overpowered.
+
+The negro seated himself upon her chest, while the
+clergyman hastily read a few verses about the comfort of
+early rising at the last day.
+
+As he concluded, the poet drove his pen into her eye.
+
+"Last call!" cried the negro porter triumphantly.
+
+
+III.--OLD MR. LONGFELLOW ON BOARD THE HESPERUS.
+
+   "It was the schooner Hesperus that sailed the wintry
+   sea, And the skipper had taken his little daughter to
+   bear him company."--LONGFELLOW.
+
+There were but three people in the cabin party of the
+Hesperus: old Mr. Longfellow, the skipper, and the
+skipper's daughter.
+
+The skipper was much attached to the child, owing to the
+singular whiteness of her skin and the exceptionally
+limpid blue of her eyes; she had hitherto remained on
+shore to fill lucrative engagements as albino lady in a
+circus.
+
+This time, however, her father had taken her with him
+for company. The girl was an endless source of amusement
+to the skipper and the crew. She constantly got up games
+of puss-in-the-corner, forfeits, and Dumb Crambo with
+her father and Mr. Longfellow, and made Scripture puzzles
+and geographical acrostics for the men.
+
+Old Mr. Longfellow was taking the voyage to restore his
+shattered nerves. From the first the captain disliked
+Henry. He was utterly unused to the sea and was nervous
+and fidgety in the extreme. He complained that at sea
+his genius had not a sufficient degree of latitude. Which
+was unparalleled presumption.
+
+On the evening of the storm there had been a little jar
+between Longfellow and the captain at dinner. The captain
+had emptied it several times, and was consequently in a
+reckless, quarrelsome humour.
+
+"I confess I feel somewhat apprehensive," said old Henry
+nervously, "of the state of the weather. I have had some
+conversation about it with an old gentleman on deck who
+professed to have sailed the Spanish main. He says you
+ought to put into yonder port."
+
+"I have," hiccoughed the skipper, eyeing the bottle, and
+added with a brutal laugh that "he could weather the
+roughest gale that ever wind did blow." A whole Gaelic
+society, he said, wouldn't fizz on him.
+
+Draining a final glass of grog, he rose from his chair,
+said grace, and staggered on deck.
+
+All the time the wind blew colder and louder.
+
+The billows frothed like yeast. It was a yeast wind.
+
+The evening wore on.
+
+Old Henry shuffled about the cabin in nervous misery.
+
+The skipper's daughter sat quietly at the table selecting
+verses from a Biblical clock to amuse the ship's bosun,
+who was suffering from toothache.
+
+At about ten Longfellow went to his bunk, requesting the
+girl to remain up in his cabin.
+
+For half an hour all was quiet, save the roaring of the
+winter wind.
+
+Then the girl heard the old gentleman start up in bed.
+
+"What's that bell, what's that bell?" he gasped.
+
+A minute later he emerged from his cabin wearing a cork
+jacket and trousers over his pyjamas.
+
+"Sissy," he said, "go up and ask your pop who rang that
+bell."
+
+The obedient child returned.
+
+"Please, Mr. Longfellow," she said, "pa says there weren't
+no bell."
+
+The old man sank into a chair and remained with his head
+buried in his hands.
+
+"Say," he exclaimed presently, "someone's firing guns
+and there's a glimmering light somewhere. You'd better
+go upstairs again."
+
+Again the child returned.
+
+"The crew are guessing at an acrostic, and occasionally
+they get a glimmering of it."
+
+Meantime the fury of the storm increased.
+
+The skipper had the hatches battered down.
+
+Presently Longfellow put his head out of a porthole and
+called out, "Look here, you may not care, but the cruel
+rocks are goring the sides of this boat like the horns
+of an angry bull."
+
+The brutal skipper heaved the log at him. A knot in it
+struck a plank and it glanced off.
+
+Too frightened to remain below, the poet raised one of
+the hatches by picking out the cotton batting and made
+his way on deck. He crawled to the wheel-house.
+
+The skipper stood lashed to the helm all stiff and stark.
+He bowed stiffly to the poet. The lantern gleamed through
+the gleaming snow on his fixed and glassy eyes. The man
+was hopelessly intoxicated.
+
+All the crew had disappeared. When the missile thrown by
+the captain had glanced off into the sea, they glanced
+after it and were lost.
+
+At this moment the final crash came.
+
+Something hit something. There was an awful click followed
+by a peculiar grating sound, and in less time than it
+takes to write it (unfortunately), the whole wreck was
+over.
+
+As the vessel sank, Longfellow's senses left him. When
+he reopened his eyes he was in his own bed at home, and
+the editor of his local paper was bending over him.
+
+"You have made a first-rate poem of it, Mr. Longfellow,"
+he was saying, unbending somewhat as he spoke, "and I am
+very happy to give you our cheque for a dollar and a
+quarter for it."
+
+"Your kindness checks my utterance," murmured Henry
+feebly, very feebly.
+
+
+
+
+A, B, and C
+
+THE HUMAN ELEMENT IN MATHEMATICS
+
+The student of arithmetic who has mastered the first four
+rules of his art, and successfully striven with money
+sums and fractions, finds himself confronted by an unbroken
+expanse of questions known as problems. These are short
+stories of adventure and industry with the end omitted,
+and though betraying a strong family resemblance, are
+not without a certain element of romance.
+
+The characters in the plot of a problem are three people
+called A, B, and C. The form of the question is generally
+of this sort:
+
+"A, B, and C do a certain piece of work. A can do as much
+work in one hour as B in two, or C in four. Find how long
+they work at it."
+
+Or thus:
+
+"A, B, and C are employed to dig a ditch. A can dig as
+much in one hour as B can dig in two, and B can dig twice
+as fast as C. Find how long, etc. etc."
+
+Or after this wise:
+
+"A lays a wager that he can walk faster than B or C. A
+can walk half as fast again as B, and C is only an
+indifferent walker. Find how far, and so forth."
+
+The occupations of A, B, and C are many and varied. In
+the older arithmetics they contented themselves with
+doing "a certain piece of work," This statement of the
+case however, was found too sly and mysterious, or possibly
+lacking in romantic charm. It became the fashion to define
+the job more clearly and to set them at walking matches,
+ditch-digging, regattas, and piling cord wood. At times,
+they became commercial and entered into partnership,
+having with their old mystery a "certain" capital. Above
+all they revel in motion. When they tire of
+walking-matches--A rides on horseback, or borrows a
+bicycle and competes with his weaker-minded associates
+on foot. Now they race on locomotives; now they row; or
+again they become historical and engage stage-coaches;
+or at times they are aquatic and swim. If their occupation
+is actual work they prefer to pump water into cisterns,
+two of which leak through holes in the bottom and one of
+which is water-tight. A, of course, has the good one; he
+also takes the bicycle, and the best locomotive, and the
+right of swimming with the current. Whatever they do they
+put money on it, being all three sports. A always wins.
+
+In the early chapters of the arithmetic, their identity
+is concealed under the names John, William, and Henry,
+and they wrangle over the division of marbles. In algebra
+they are often called X, Y, Z. But these are only their
+Christian names, and they are really the same people.
+
+Now to one who has followed the history of these men
+through countless pages of problems, watched them in
+their leisure hours dallying with cord wood, and seen
+their panting sides heave in the full frenzy of filling
+a cistern with a leak in it, they become something more
+than mere symbols. They appear as creatures of flesh and
+blood, living men with their own passions, ambitions,
+and aspirations like the rest of us. Let us view them in
+turn. A is a full-blooded blustering fellow, of energetic
+temperament, hot-headed and strong-willed. It is he who
+proposes everything, challenges B to work, makes the
+bets, and bends the others to his will. He is a man of
+great physical strength and phenomenal endurance. He has
+been known to walk forty-eight hours at a stretch, and
+to pump ninety-six. His life is arduous and full of peril.
+A mistake in the working of a sum may keep him digging
+a fortnight without sleep. A repeating decimal in the
+answer might kill him.
+
+B is a quiet, easy-going fellow, afraid of A and bullied
+by him, but very gentle and brotherly to little C, the
+weakling. He is quite in A's power, having lost all his
+money in bets.
+
+Poor C is an undersized, frail man, with a plaintive
+face. Constant walking, digging, and pumping has broken
+his health and ruined his nervous system. His joyless
+life has driven him to drink and smoke more than is good
+for him, and his hand often shakes as he digs ditches.
+He has not the strength to work as the others can, in
+fact, as Hamlin Smith has said, "A can do more work in
+one hour than C in four."
+
+The first time that ever I saw these men was one evening
+after a regatta. They had all been rowing in it, and it
+had transpired that A could row as much in one hour as
+B in two, or C in four. B and C had come in dead fagged
+and C was coughing badly. "Never mind, old fellow," I
+heard B say, "I'll fix you up on the sofa and get you
+some hot tea." Just then A came blustering in and shouted,
+"I say, you fellows, Hamlin Smith has shown me three
+cisterns in his garden and he says we can pump them until
+to-morrow night. I bet I can beat you both. Come on. You
+can pump in your rowing things, you know. Your cistern
+leaks a little, I think, C." I heard B growl that it was
+a dirty shame and that C was used up now, but they went,
+and presently I could tell from the sound of the water
+that A was pumping four times as fast as C.
+
+For years after that I used to see them constantly about
+town and always busy. I never heard of any of them eating
+or sleeping. Then owing to a long absence from home, I
+lost sight of them. On my return I was surprised to no
+longer find A, B, and C at their accustomed tasks; on
+inquiry I heard that work in this line was now done by
+N, M, and O, and that some people were employing for
+algebraica jobs four foreigners called Alpha, Beta, Gamma,
+and Delta.
+
+Now it chanced one day that I stumbled upon old D, in
+the little garden in front of his cottage, hoeing in the
+sun. D is an aged labouring man who used occasionally to
+be called in to help A, B, and C. "Did I know 'em, sir?"
+he answered, "why, I knowed 'em ever since they was little
+fellows in brackets. Master A, he were a fine lad, sir,
+though I always said, give me Master B for kind-
+heartedness-like. Many's the job as we've been on together,
+sir, though I never did no racing nor aught of that, but
+just the plain labour, as you might say. I'm getting a
+bit too old and stiff for it nowadays, sir--just scratch
+about in the garden here and grow a bit of a logarithm,
+or raise a common denominator or two. But Mr. Euclid he
+use me still for them propositions, he do." From the
+garrulous old man I learned the melancholy end of my
+former acquaintances. Soon after I left town, he told
+me, C had been taken ill. It seems that A and B had been
+rowing on the river for a wager, and C had been running
+on the bank and then sat in a draught. Of course the bank
+had refused the draught and C was taken ill. A and B came
+home and found C lying helpless in bed. A shook him
+roughly and said, "Get up, C, we're going to pile wood."
+C looked so worn and pitiful that B said, "Look here, A,
+I won't stand this, he isn't fit to pile wood to-night."
+C smiled feebly and said, "Perhaps I might pile a little
+if I sat up in bed." Then B, thoroughly alarmed, said,
+"See here, A, I'm going to fetch a doctor; he's dying."
+A flared up and answered, "You've no money to fetch a
+doctor." "I'll reduce him to his lowest terms," B said
+firmly, "that'll fetch him." C's life might even then
+have been saved but they made a mistake about the medicine.
+It stood at the head of the bed on a bracket, and the
+nurse accidentally removed it from the bracket without
+changing the sign. After the fatal blunder C seems to
+have sunk rapidly. On the evening of the next day, as
+the shadows deepened in the little room, it was clear to
+all that the end was near. I think that even A was affected
+at the last as he stood with bowed head, aimlessly offering
+to bet with the doctor on C's laboured breathing. "A,"
+whispered C, "I think I'm going fast." "How fast do you
+think you'll go, old man?" murmured A. "I don't know,"
+said C, "but I'm going at any rate."--The end came soon
+after that. C rallied for a moment and asked for a certain
+piece of work that he had left downstairs. A put it in
+his arms and he expired. As his soul sped heavenward A
+watched its flight with melancholy admiration. B burst
+into a passionate flood of tears and sobbed, "Put away
+his little cistern and the rowing clothes he used to
+wear, I feel as if I could hardly ever dig again."--The
+funeral was plain and unostentatious. It differed in
+nothing from the ordinary, except that out of deference
+to sporting men and mathematicians, A engaged two hearses.
+Both vehicles started at the same time, B driving the
+one which bore the sable parallelopiped containing the
+last remains of his ill-fated friend. A on the box of
+the empty hearse generously consented to a handicap of
+a hundred yards, but arrived first at the cemetery by
+driving four times as fast as B. (Find the distance to
+the cemetery.) As the sarcophagus was lowered, the grave
+was surrounded by the broken figures of the first book
+of Euclid.--It was noticed that after the death of C, A
+became a changed man. He lost interest in racing with B,
+and dug but languidly. He finally gave up his work and
+settled down to live on the interest of his bets.--B
+never recovered from the shock of C's death; his grief
+preyed upon his intellect and it became deranged. He grew
+moody and spoke only in monosyllables. His disease became
+rapidly aggravated, and he presently spoke only in words
+whose spelling was regular and which presented no difficulty
+to the beginner. Realizing his precarious condition he
+voluntarily submitted to be incarcerated in an asylum,
+where he abjured mathematics and devoted himself to
+writing the History of the Swiss Family Robinson in words
+of one syllable.
+
+
+
+
+Acknowledgments
+
+Many of the sketches which form the present volume have
+already appeared in print. Others of them are new. Of
+the re-printed pieces, "Melpomenus Jones," "Policeman
+Hogan," "A Lesson in Fiction," and many others were
+contributions by the author to the New York Truth. The
+"Boarding-House Geometry" first appeared in Truth, and
+was subsequently republished in the London Punch, and in
+a great many other journals. The sketches called the
+"Life of John Smith," "Society Chit-Chat," and "Aristocratic
+Education" appeared in Puck. "The New Pathology" was
+first printed in the Toronto Saturday Night, and was
+subsequently republished by the London Lancet, and by
+various German periodicals in the form of a translation.
+The story called "Number Fifty-Six" is taken from the
+Detroit Free Press. "My Financial Career" was originally
+contributed to the New York Life, and has been frequently
+reprinted. The Articles "How to Make a Million Dollars"
+and "How to Avoid Getting Married," etc. are reproduced
+by permission of the Publishers' Press Syndicate. The
+wide circulation which some of the above sketches have
+enjoyed has encouraged the author to prepare the present
+collection.
+
+The author desires to express his sense of obligation to
+the proprietors of the above journals who have kindly
+permitted him to republish the contributions which appeared
+in their columns.
+
+
+
+
+END
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Literary Lapses, by Stephen Leacock
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LITERARY LAPSES ***
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