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diff --git a/33623.txt b/33623.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..0a3fca9 --- /dev/null +++ b/33623.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3338 @@ +Project Gutenberg's The Inventions of the Idiot, by John Kendrick Bangs + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Inventions of the Idiot + +Author: John Kendrick Bangs + +Release Date: September 3, 2010 [EBook #33623] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE INVENTIONS OF THE IDIOT *** + + + + +Produced by Clarity, Suzanne Shell and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) + + + + + + + + + TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: Apart from a few punctuation corrections, no + other changes have been made in the text. + + + + + THE INVENTIONS OF THE IDIOT + + by + + JOHN KENDRICK BANGS + + Author of "A House-Boat on the Styx" + "The Pursuit of the House-Boat" + "Olympian Nights" Etc. Etc. + + + New York and London + Harper & Brothers Publishers + 1904 + + + + Copyright, 1903, by HARPER & BROTHERS. + + _All rights reserved._ + + Published April, 1904 + + + + TO + + YOU + + + + Contents + + + CHAPTER PAGE + I. THE CULINARY GUILD 1 + II. A SUGGESTION FOR THE CABLE-CARS 16 + III. THE TRANSATLANTIC TROLLEY COMPANY 31 + IV. THE INCORPORATION OF THE IDIOT 47 + V. UNIVERSITY EXTENSION 64 + VI. SOCIAL EXPANSION 79 + VII. A BEGGAR'S HAND-BOOK 96 + VIII. PROGRESSIVE WAFFLES 112 + IX. A CLEARING-HOUSE FOR POETS 127 + X. SOME ELECTRICAL SUGGESTIONS 142 + XI. CONCERNING CHILDREN 158 + XII. DREAMALINE 172 + + + + +THE INVENTIONS OF THE IDIOT + + + + +I + +The Culinary Guild + + +It was before the Idiot's marriage, and in the days when he was nothing +more than a plain boarder in Mrs. Smithers-Pedagog's High-class Home for +Single Gentlemen, that he put what the School-master termed his "alleged +mind" on plans for the amelioration of the condition of the civilized. + +"The trials of the barbarian are really nothing as compared with the +tribulations of civilized man," he said, as the waitress passed him a +piece of steak that had been burned to a crisp. "In the Cannibal Islands +a cook who would send a piece of broiled missionary to her employer's +table in this condition would herself be roasted before another day had +dawned. We, however, must grin and bear it, because our esteemed +landlady cannot find anywhere in this town a woman better suited for the +labors of the kitchen than the blank she has had the misfortune to draw +in the culinary lottery, familiarly known to us, her victims, as +Bridget." + +"This is an exceptional case," said Mr. Pedagog. "We haven't had a steak +like this before in several weeks." + +"True," returned the Idiot. "This is a sirloin, I believe. The last +steak we had was a rump steak, and it was not burned to a crisp, I +admit. It was only boiled, if I remember rightly, by mistake; Bridget +having lost her fifth consecutive cousin in ten days the night before, +and being in consequence so prostrated that she could not tell a +gridiron from a lawn-mower." + +"Well, you know the popular superstition, Mr. Idiot," said the Poet. +"The devil sends the cooks." + +"I don't believe it," retorted the Idiot. "That's one of those proverbs +that haven't a particle of truth in 'em--nor a foundation in reason +either, like 'Never look a gift horse in the mouth.' Of all absurd +advice ever given to man by a thoughtless thinker, that, I think, bears +the palm. I know a man who didn't look a gift horse in the mouth, and +the consequence was that he accepted a horse that was twenty-eight years +old. The beast died in his stables three days later, and the beneficiary +had to pay five dollars to have him carted away. As for the devil +sending the cooks, I haven't any faith in the theory. Any person who had +come from the devil would know how to manage a fire better than +ninety-nine per cent. of the cooks ever born. It would be a good thing +if every one of 'em were forced to serve an apprenticeship with the +Prince of Darkness. However, steak like this serves a good purpose. It +serves to bind our little circle more firmly together. There's nothing +like mutual suffering to increase the sympathy that should exist between +men situated as we are; and as for Mrs. Smithers-Pedagog, I wish her to +understand distinctly that I am criticising the cook and not herself. If +this particular dainty had been prepared by her own fair hand, I doubt +not I should want more of it." + +"I thank you," returned the landlady, somewhat mollified by this remark. +"If I had more time I should occasionally do the cooking myself, but, +as it is, I am overwhelmed with work." + +"I can bear witness to that," observed Mr. Whitechoker. "Mrs. +Smithers-Pedagog is one of the most useful ladies in my congregation. If +it were not for her, many a heathen would be going without garments +to-day." + +"Well, I don't like to criticise," said the Idiot, "but I think the +heathen at home should be considered before the heathen abroad. If your +congregation would have a guild to look after such heathen as the Poet +and the Doctor and myself, I am convinced it would be more appreciated +by those who benefited by its labors than it is at present by the +barbarians who try to wear the misfits it sends out. A Christian whose +plain but honest breakfast is well cooked is apt to be far more grateful +than a barbarian who is wearing a pair of trousers made of calico and a +coat three sizes too small in the body and nine sizes too large in the +arms. I will go further. I believe that if the domestic heathen were +cared for they would do much better work, would earn better pay, and +would, out of mere gratitude, set apart a sufficiently large portion of +their increased earnings to be devoted to the purchase of tailor-made +costumes, which would please the cannibals better, far better, than the +amateur creations they now get. I know I'd contribute some of my +surplus." + +"What would you have such a guild do?" queried Mr. Whitechoker. + +"Do? There'd be so much for it to do that the members could hardly find +time to rest," returned the Idiot. "Do? Why, my dear sir, take this +house, for instance, and see what it could do here. What a boon it would +be for me if some kind-hearted person would come here once a week and +sew buttons on my clothes, darn my socks--in short, keep me mended. What +better work for one who desires to make the world brighter, happier, and +less sinful!" + +"I fail to see how the world would be brighter, happier, or less sinful +if your suspender-buttons were kept firm, and your stockings darned, and +your wardrobe generally mended," said Mr. Pedagog. "I grant that such a +guild would be doing a noble work if it would take you in hand and +correct many of your impressions, revise your well-known facts so as to +bring them more in accord with indubitable truths, and impart to your +customs some of that polish which you so earnestly strive for in your +dress." + +"Thank you," said the Idiot, suavely. "But I don't wish to overburden +the kind ladies to whom I refer. If my costumes could be looked after I +might find time to look after my customs, and, I assure you, Mr. +Pedagog, if at any time you will undertake to deliver a course of +lectures on Etiquette, I will gladly subscribe for two orchestra-chairs +and endeavor to occupy both of them. At any rate, to return to the main +point, I claim that the world would be happier and brighter and less +sinful if the domestic heathen were kept mended by such a guild, and I +challenge any one here to deny, even on so slight a basis as the loose +suspender-button, the truth of what I say. When I arise in the morning +and find a button gone, do I make genial remarks about the joys of life? +I do not. I use words. Sometimes one word, which need not be repeated +here. I am unhappy, and, being unhappy, the world seems dark and dreary, +and in speaking impatiently, though very much to the point, as I do, I +am guilty of an offence that is sinful. With such a start in the +morning, I come here to the table. Mr. Pedagog sees that I am not quite +myself. He asks me if I am not feeling well, an irritating question at +any time, but particularly so to a man with a suspender-button gone. I +retort. He re-retorts, until our converse is warmer than the coffee, and +our relations colder than the waffles. Finally I leave the house, +slamming the door behind me, structurally weakening the house, and go to +business, where I wreak my vengeance upon the second clerk, who takes it +out of the office-boy, who goes home and vents his wrath on his little +sister, who, goaded into recklessness, teases the baby until he yells +and gets spanked by his mother for being noisy. Now, why should a loose +suspender-button be allowed to subject that baby to such humiliation, +and who can deny that, if it had been properly sewed on by a guild, such +as I have mentioned, the baby never would have been spanked for the +causes mentioned? What is _your_ answer, Mr. Whitechoker?" + +"Truly, I am so breathless at your logic that I cannot reason," said the +Minister. "But haven't we digressed a little? We were speaking of cooks, +and we conclude with a pathetic little allegory about a suspender-button +and a baby that is not only teased but spanked." + +"The baby could get the same spanking for reasons based on the +shortcomings of the cooks," said the Idiot. "I am irritated when I am +served with green pease hard enough to batter down Gibraltar if properly +aimed; when my coffee is a warmed-over reminiscence of last night's +demi-tasse, I leave the house in a frame of mind that bodes ill for the +junior clerk, and the effect on the baby is ultimately the same." + +"And--er--you'd have the ladies whose energies are now devoted towards +the clothing of the heathen come here and do the cooking?" queried the +School-master. + +"I leave if they do," said the Doctor. "I have seen too much of the +effects of amateur cookery in my profession to want any of it. They are +good cooks in theory, but not in practice." + +"There you have it!" said the Idiot, triumphantly. "Right in a nutshell. +That's where the cooks are always weak. They have none of the theory and +all of the practice. If they based practice on theory, they'd cook +better. Wherefore let your theoretical cooks seek out the practical and +instruct them in the principles of the culinary art. Think of what +twelve ladies could do; twelve ladies trained in the sewing-circle to +talk rapidly, working five hours a day apiece, could devote an hour a +week to three hundred and sixty cooks, and tell them practically all +they themselves know in that time; and if, in addition to this, twelve +other ladies, forming an auxiliary guild, would make dresses and bonnets +and things for the same cooks, instead of for the cannibals, it would +keep them good-natured." + +"Splendid scheme!" said the Doctor. "So practical. Your brain must weigh +half an ounce." + +"I've never had it weighed," said the Idiot, "but, I fancy, it's a good +one. It's the only one I have, anyhow, and it's done me good service, +and shows no signs of softening. But, returning to the cooks, +good-nature is as essential to the making of a good cook as are apples +to the making of a dumpling. You can't associate the word dumpling with +ill-nature, and just as the poet throws himself into his work, and as +he is of a cheerful or a mournful disposition, so does his work appear +cheerful or mournful, so do the productions of a cook take on the +attributes of their maker. A dyspeptic cook will prepare food in a +manner so indigestible that it were ruin to partake of it. A +light-hearted cook will make light bread; a pessimistic cook will serve +flour bricks in lieu thereof." + +"I think possibly you are right when you say that," said the Doctor. "I +have myself observed that the people who sing at their work do the best +work." + +"But the worst singing," growled the School-master. + +"That may be true," put in the Idiot; "but you cannot expect a cook on +sixteen dollars a month to be a prima-donna. Now, if Mr. Whitechoker +will undertake to start a sewing-circle in his church for people who +don't care to wear clothing, but to sow the seeds of concord and good +cookery throughout the kitchens of this land, I am prepared to prophesy +that at the end of the year there will be more happiness and less +depression in this part of the world; and once eliminate dyspepsia from +our midst, and get civilization and happiness controvertible terms, then +you will find your foreign missionary funds waxing so fat that instead +of the amateur garments for the heathen you now send them, you will be +able to open an account at Worth's and Poole's for every barbarian in +creation. The scheme for the sewing on of suspender-buttons and the +miscellaneous mending that needs to be done for lone-lorn savages like +myself might be left in abeyance until the culinary scheme has been +established. Bachelors constitute a class, a small class only, of +humanity, but the regeneration of cooks is a universal need." + +"I think your scheme is certainly a picturesque one and novel," said Mr. +Whitechoker. "There seems to be a good deal in it. Don't you think so, +Mr. Pedagog?" + +"Yes--I do," said Mr. Pedagog, wearily. "A great deal--of language." + +And amid the laugh at his expense which followed, the Idiot, joining in, +departed. + + + + +II + +A Suggestion for the Cable-cars + + +"Heigh-ho!" sighed the Idiot, rubbing his eyes sleepily. "This is a +weary world." + +"What? This from you?" smiled the Poet. "I never expected to hear that +plaint from a man of your cheerful disposition." + +"Humph!" said the Idiot, with difficulty repressing a yawn. "Humph! and +I may add, likewise, tut! What do you take me for--an insulated +sun-beam? I can't help it if shadows camp across my horizon +occasionally. I wouldn't give a cent for the man who never had his +moments of misery. It takes night to enable us to appreciate daytime. +Misery is a foil necessary to the full appreciation of joy. I'm glad I +am sort of down in the mouth to-day. I'll be all right to-morrow, and +I'll enjoy to-morrow all the more for to-day's megrim. But for the +present, I repeat, this is a weary world." + +"Oh, I don't think so," observed the School-master. "The world doesn't +seem to me to betray any signs of weariness. It got to work at the usual +hour this morning, and, as far as I can judge, has been revolving at the +usual rate of speed ever since." + +"The Idiot's mistake is a common one," put in the Doctor. "I find it +frequently in my practice." + +"That's a confession," retorted the Idiot. "Do you find out these +mistakes in your practice before or after the death of the patient?" + +"That mistake," continued the Doctor, paying apparently little heed to +the Idiot's remark--"that mistake lies in the Idiot's assumption that +he is himself the world. He regards himself as the earth, as all of +life, and, because he happens to be weary, the world is a weary one." + +"It isn't a fatal disease, is it?" queried the Idiot, anxiously. "I am +not likely to become so impressed with that idea, for instance, that I +shall have to be put in a padded cell and manacled so that I may not +turn perpetual handsprings under the hallucination that, being the +world, it is my duty to revolve?" + +"No," replied the Doctor, with a laugh. "No, indeed. That is not at all +likely to happen, but I think it would be a good idea if you were to +carry the hallucination out far enough to put a cake of ice on your +head, assuming that to be the north pole, and cool off that brain of +yours." + +"That is a good idea," returned the Idiot; "and if Mary will bring me +the ice that was used to cool the coffee this morning, I shall be +pleased to try the experiment. Meanwhile, this is a weary world." + +"Then why under the canopy don't you leave it and go to some other +world?" snapped Mr. Pedagog. "You are under no obligation to remain +here. With a river on either side of the city, and a New York Juggernaut +Company, Unlimited, running trolley-cars up and down two of our more +prominent highways, suicide is within the reach of all. Of course, we +should be sorry to lose you, in a way, but I have known men to recover +from even greater afflictions than that." + +"Thank you for the suggestion," replied the Idiot, transferring four +large, porous buckwheat-cakes to his plate. "Thank you very much, but I +have a pleasanter and more lingering method of suicide right here. Death +by buckwheat-cakes is like being pierced by a Toledo blade. You do not +realize the terrors of your situation until you cease to be susceptible +to them. Furthermore, I do not believe in suicide. It is, in my +judgment, the worst crime a man can commit, and I cannot but admire the +remarkable discernment evinced by the Fates in making of it its own +inevitable capital punishment. A man may commit murder and escape death, +but in the commission of suicide he is sure of execution. Just as Virtue +is its own reward, so is Suicide its own amercement." + +"Been reading the dictionary again?" asked the Poet. + +"No, not exactly," said the Idiot, with a smile, "but--it's a kind of +joke on me, I suppose--I have just been stuck, to use a polite term, on +a book called Roget's _Thesaurus_, and, if I want to get hold of a new +word that will increase my seeming importance to the community, I turn +to it. That's where I got 'amercement.' I don't hold that its use in +this especial case is beyond cavil--that's another Thesaurian term--but +I don't suppose any one here would notice that fact. It goes here, and I +shall not use it elsewhere." + +"I am interested to know how _you_ ever came to be the owner of a +_Thesaurus_," said the School-master, with a grim smile at the idea of +the Idiot having such a book in his possession. "Except on the score of +affinities. You are both very wordy." + +"Meaning pleonastic, I presume," retorted the Idiot. + +"I beg your pardon?" said the School-master. + +"Never mind," said the Idiot. "I won't press the analogy, but I will say +that those who are themselves periphrastic should avoid criticising +others for being ambaginous." + +"I think you mean ambiguous," said the School-master, elevating his +eyebrows in triumph. + +"I thought you'd think that," retorted the Idiot. "That's why I used the +word 'ambaginous.' I'll lend you my dictionary to freshen up your +phraseology. Meanwhile, I'll tell you how I happened to get a +_Thesaurus_. I thought it was an animal, and when I saw that a New York +bookseller had a lot of them marked down from two dollars to one, I sent +and got one. I thought it was strange for a bookseller to be selling +rare animals, but that was his business, not mine; and as I was anxious +to see what kind of a creature a _Thesaurus_ was, I invested. When I +found out it was a book and not a tame relic of the antediluvian animal +kingdom, I thought I wouldn't say anything about it, but you people here +are so inquisitive you've learned my secret." + +"And wasn't it an animal?" asked Mrs. Smithers-Pedagog. + +"My dear--my _dear_!" ejaculated Mr. Pedagog. "Pray--ah--I beg of you, +do not enter into this discussion." + +"No, Mrs. Pedagog," observed the Idiot, "it was not. It was nothing more +than a book, which, when once you have read it, you would not be +without, since it gives your vocabulary a twist which makes you proof +against ninety-nine out of every one hundred conversationalists in the +world, no matter how weak your cause." + +"I am beginning to understand the causes of your weariness," observed +Mr. Pedagog, acridly. "You have been memorizing syllables. Really, I +should think you were in danger of phonetic prostration." + +"Not a bit of it," said the Idiot. "Those words are stimulating, not +depressing. I begin to feel better already, now that I have spoken them. +I am not half so weary as I was, but for my weariness I had good cause. +I suffered all night from a most frightful nightmare. It utterly +destroyed my rest." + +"Welsh-rarebit?" queried the Genial Old Gentleman who occasionally +imbibed, with a tone of reproach. "If so, why was I not with you?" + +"That question should be its own answer," replied the Idiot. "A man who +will eat a Welsh-rarebit alone is not only a person of a sullen +disposition, but of reckless mould as well. I would no sooner think of +braving a Welsh-rarebit unaccompanied than I would think of trying to +swim across the British Channel without a lifesaving boat following in +my wake." + +"I question if so light a body as you could have a wake!" said Mr. +Pedagog, coldly. + +"I am sorry, but I can't agree with you, Mr. Pedagog," said the +Bibliomaniac. "A tugboat, most insignificant of crafts, roils up the +surface of the sea more than an ocean steamer does. Fuss goes with +feathers more than with large bodies." + +"Well, they're neither of 'em in it with a cake of soap for real, +bona-fide suds," said the Idiot, complacently, as he helped himself to +his thirteenth buckwheat-cake. "However, wakes have nothing to do with +the case. I had a most frightful dream, and it was not due to +Welsh-rarebits, but to my fatal weakness, which, not having my +_Thesaurus_ at hand, I must identify by the commonplace term of +courtesy. You may not have noticed it, but courtesy is my strong point." + +"We haven't observed the fact," said Mr. Pedagog; "but what of it? Have +you been courteous to any one?" + +"I have," replied the Idiot, "and a nightmare is what it brought me. I +rode up-town on a trolley-car last night, and I gave up my seat to +sixteen ladies, two of whom, by-the-way, thanked me." + +"I don't see why more than one of them should thank you," sniffed the +landlady. "If a man gives up a trolley-car seat to sixteen ladies, only +one of them can occupy it." + +"I stand corrected," said the Idiot. "I gave up a seat to ladies sixteen +times between City Hall and Twenty-third Street. I can't bring myself to +sit down while a woman stands, and every time I'd get a seat some woman +would get on the car. Hence it was that I gave up my seat to sixteen +ladies. Why two of them should thank me, considering the rules, I do not +know. It certainly is not the custom. At any rate, if I had walked +up-town, I should not have had more exercise than I got on that car, +bobbing up and down so many times, and lurching here and lurching there +every time the car stopped, started, or turned a corner. Whether it was +the thanks or the lurching I got, I don't know, but the incidents of +the ride were so strongly impressed upon me that I dreamed all night, +only in my dreams I was not giving up car seats. The first seat I gave +up to a woman in the dream was an eighty-thousand-dollar seat in the +Stock Exchange. It was expensive courtesy, but I did it, and mourned so +over the result that I waked up and discovered that it was but a dream. +Then I went to sleep again. This time I was at the opera. I had the best +seat in the house, when in came a woman who hadn't a chair. Same result. +I got up. She sat down, and I had to stand behind a pillar where I could +neither see nor hear. More grief; waked up again, more tired than when I +went to bed. In ten minutes I dozed off. Found myself an ambitious +statesman running for the Presidency. Was elected and inaugurated. Up +comes a Woman's Rights candidate. More courtesy. Gave up the +Presidential chair to her and went home to obscurity, when again I +awoke tireder than ever. Clock struck four. Fell asleep again. This time +I was prepared for anything that might happen. I found myself in a +trolley-car, but with me I had a perforated chair-bottom, such as the +street peddlers sell. Lady got aboard. I put the perforated chair-bottom +on my lap and invited her to sit down. She thanked me and did so. Then +another lady got on. The lady on my lap moved up and made room for the +second lady. She sat down. Between them they must have weighed three +hundred pounds. I could have stood that, but as time went on more ladies +got aboard, and every time that happened these first-comers would move +up and make room for them. How they did it I can't say, any more than I +can say how in real life three women can find room in a car-seat vacated +by a little child. They did the former just as they do the latter, +until finally I found myself flattened into the original bench like the +pattern figure of a carpet. I felt like an entaglio; thirty women by +actual count were pressing me to remain, as it were, but the worst of it +all was they none of them seemed to live anywhere. We rode on and on and +on, but nobody got off. I tried to move--and couldn't. We passed my +corner, but there I was fixed. I couldn't breathe, and so couldn't call +out, and I verily believe that if I hadn't finally waked up I should by +this time have reached Hong-Kong, for I have a distinct recollection of +passing through Chicago, Denver, San Francisco, and Honolulu. Finally, I +did wake, however, simply worn out with my night's rest, which, +gentlemen, is why I say, as I have already said, this is a weary world." + +"Well, I don't blame you," said Mr. Whitechoker, kindly. "That was a +most remarkable dream." + +"Yes," assented Mr. Pedagog. "But quite in line with his waking +thoughts." + +"Very likely," said the Idiot, rising and preparing to depart. "It was +absurd in most of its features, but in one of them it was excellent. I +am going to see the president of the Electric Juggernaut Company, as you +call it, in regard to it to-day. I think there is money in that idea of +having an extra chair-seat for every passenger to hold in his lap. In +that way twice as many seated passengers can be accommodated, and +countless people with tender feet will be spared the pain of having +other wayfarers standing upon them." + + + + +III + +The Transatlantic Trolley Company + + +"If I were a millionaire," began the Idiot one Sunday morning, as he and +his friends took their accustomed seats at the breakfast-table, "I would +devote a tenth of my income to the poor, a tenth to children's fresh-air +funds, and the balance to the education through travel of a dear and +intimate friend of mine." + +"That would be a generous distribution of your wealth," said Mr. +Whitechoker, graciously. "But upon what would you live yourself?" + +"I should stipulate in the bargain with my dear and intimate friend +that we should be inseparable; that wherever he should go I should go, +and that, of the funds devoted to his education through travel, one-half +should be paid to me as my commission for letting him into a good +thing." + +"You certainly have good business sense," put in the Bibliomaniac. "I +wish I had had when I was collecting rare editions." + +"Collecting rare books and a good business sense seldom go together, I +fancy," said the Idiot. "I began collecting books once, but I gave it up +and took to collecting coins. I chose my coin and devoted my time to +getting in that variety alone, and it has paid me." + +"I don't exactly gather your meaning," said Mr. Whitechoker. "You chose +your coin?" + +"Precisely. I said, 'Here! Most coin collectors spend their time looking +for one or two rare coins, for which, when they are found, they pay +fabulous prices. The result is oftentimes penury. I, on the other hand, +will look for coins of a common sort which do not command fabulous +prices.' So I chose United States five-dollar gold pieces, irrespective +of dates, for my collection, and the result is moderate affluence. I +have between sixty and a hundred of them at my savings-bank, and when I +have found it necessary to realize on them I have not experienced the +slightest difficulty in forcing them back into circulation at cost." + +"You are a wise Idiot," said the Bibliomaniac, settling back in his +chair in a disgusted, tired sort of way. He had expected some sympathy +from the Idiot as a fellow-collector, even though their aims were +different. It is always difficult for a man whose ten-thousand-dollar +library has brought six hundred dollars in the auction-room to find, +even in the ranks of collectors, one who understands his woes and helps +him bear the burden thereof by expressions of confidence in his sanity. + +"Then you believe in travel, do you?" asked the Doctor. + +"I believe there is nothing broadens the mind so much," returned the +Idiot. + +"But do you believe it will develop a mind where there isn't one?" asked +the School-master, unpleasantly. "Or, to put it more favorably, don't +you think there would be danger in taking the germ of a mind in a small +head and broadening it until it runs the risk of finding itself confined +to cramped quarters?" + +"That is a question for a physician to answer," said the Idiot. "But, if +I were you, I wouldn't travel if I thought there was any such danger." + +"_Tu quoque_," retorted the School-master, "is _not_ true repartee." + +"I shall have to take your word for that," returned the Idiot, "since I +have not a Latin dictionary with me, and all the Latin I know is to be +found in the quotations in the back of my dictionary, like '_Status quo +ante_,' '_In vino veritas_,' and '_Et tu, Brute_.' However, as I said +before, I'd like to travel, and I would if it were not that the sea and +I are not on very good terms with each other. It makes me ill to cross +the East River on the bridge, I'm so susceptible to sea-sickness." + +"You'd get over that in a very few days," said the Genial Old Gentleman +who occasionally imbibed. "I have crossed the ocean a dozen times, and +I'm never sea-sick after the third day out." + +"Ah, but those three days!" said the Idiot. "They must resemble the +three days of grace on a note that you know you couldn't pay if you had +three years of grace. I couldn't stand them, I am afraid. Why, only +last summer I took a drive off in the country, and the motion of the +wagon going over the thank-ye-marms in the road made me so sea-sick +before I'd gone a mile that I wanted to lie down and die. I think I +should have done so if the horse hadn't run away and forced me to ride +back home whether I wanted to or not." + +"You ought to fight that," said the Doctor. "By-and-by, if you give way +to a weakness of that sort, the creases in your morning newspaper will +affect you similarly as you read it. If you ever have a birthday, let us +know, and we'll help you to overcome the tendency by buying you a +baby-jumper for you to swing around in every morning until you get used +to the motion." + +"It would be more to the purpose," replied the Idiot, "if you as a +physician would invent a preventive of sea-sickness. I'd buy a bottle +and go abroad at once on my coin collection if you would guarantee it +to kill or to cure instantaneously." + +"There is such a nostrum," said the Doctor. + +"There is, indeed," put in the Genial Old Gentleman who occasionally +imbibes. "I've tried it." + +"And were you sea-sick?" asked the Doctor. + +"I never knew," replied the Genial Old Gentleman. "It made me so ill +that I never thought to inquire what was the matter with me. But one +thing is certain, I'll take my sea-voyages straight after this." + +"I'd like to go by rail," said the Idiot, after a moment's thought. + +"That is a desire quite characteristic of you," said the School-master. +"It is so probable that you could. Why not say that you'd like to cross +the Atlantic on a tight-rope?" + +"Because I have no such ambition," replied the Idiot. "Though it might +be fun if the tight-rope were a trolley-wire, and one could sit +comfortably in a spacious cab while speeding over the water. I should +think that would be exhilarating enough. Just imagine how fine it would +be on a stormy day to sit looking out of your cab-window far above the +surface of the raging and impotent sea, skipping along at electric +speed, and daring the waves to do their worst--that would be bliss." + +"And so practical," growled the Bibliomaniac. + +"Bliss rarely is practical," said the Idiot. "Bliss is a sort of mugwump +blessing--too full of the ideal and too barren in practicability." + +"Well," said Mr. Whitechoker. "I don't know why we should say that +trolley-cars between New York and London never can be. If we had told +our grandfathers a hundred years ago that a cable for the transmission +of news could be laid under the sea, they would have laughed us to +scorn." + +"That's true," said the School-master. "But we know more than our +grandfathers did." + +"Well, rather," interrupted the Idiot. "My great-grandfather, who died +in 1799, had never even heard of Andrew Jackson, and if you had asked +him what he thought of Darwin, he'd have thought you were guying him." + +"Respect for age, sir," retorted Mr. Pedagog, "restrains me from +characterizing your great-grandfather, if, as you intimate, he knew less +than you do. However, apart from the comparative lack of knowledge in +the Idiot's family, Mr. Whitechoker, you must remember that with the +advance of the centuries we have ourselves developed a certain amount of +brains--enough, at least, to understand that there is a limit even to +the possibilities of electricity. Now, when you say that just because +an Atlantic cable would have been regarded as an object of derision in +the eighteenth century, we should not deride one who suggests the +possibility of a marine trolley-road between London and New York in the +twentieth century, it appears to me that you are talking--er--talking--I +don't like to say nonsense to one of your cloth, but--" + +"Through his hat is the idiom you are trying to recall, I think, Mr. +Pedagog," said the Idiot. "Mr. Whitechoker is talking through his hat is +what you mean to say?" + +"I beg your pardon, Mr. Idiot," said the School-master; "but when I find +that I need your assistance in framing my conversation, I shall--er--I +shall give up talking. I mean to say that I do not think Mr. Whitechoker +can justify his conclusions, and talks without having given the subject +concerning which he has spoken due reflection. The cable runs along the +solid foundation of the bed of the sea. It is a simple matter, +comparatively, but a trolley-wire stretched across the ocean by the +simplest rules of gravitation could not be made to stay up." + +"No doubt you are correct," said Mr. Whitechoker, meekly. "I did not +mean that I expected ever to see a trolley-road across the sea, but I +did mean to say that man has made such wonderful advances in the past +hundred years that we cannot really state the limit of his +possibilities. It is manifest that no one to-day can devise a plan by +means of which such a wire could be carried, but--" + +"I fear you gentlemen would starve as inventors," said the Idiot. +"What's the matter with balloons?" + +"Balloons for what?" retorted Mr. Pedagog. + +"For holding up the trolley-wires," replied the Idiot. "It is perfectly +feasible. Fasten the ends of your wire in London and New York, and from +coast to coast station two lines of sufficient strength to keep the wire +raised as far above the level of the sea as you require. That's simple +enough." + +"And what, pray, in this frenzy of the elements, this raging storm of +which you have spoken," said Mr. Pedagog, impatiently--"what would then +keep your balloons from blowing away?" + +"The trolley-wire, of course," said the Idiot. Mr. Pedagog lapsed into a +hopelessly wrathful silence for a moment, and then he said: + +"Well, I sincerely hope your plan is adopted, and that the promoters +will make you superintendent, with an office in the mid-ocean balloon." + +"Thanks for your good wishes, Mr. Pedagog," the Idiot answered. "If they +are realized I shall remember them, and show my gratitude to you by +using my influence to have you put in charge of the gas service. +Meantime, however, it seems to me that our ocean steamships could be +developed along logical lines so that the trip from New York to +Liverpool could be made in a very much shorter period of time than is +now required." + +"We are getting back to the common-sense again," said the Bibliomaniac. +"That is a proposition to which I agree. Ten years ago eight days was +considered a good trip. With the development of the twin-screw steamer +the time has been reduced to approximately six days." + +"Or a saving, really, of two days because of the extra screw," said the +Idiot. + +"Precisely," observed the Bibliomaniac. + +"So that, provided there are extra screws enough, there isn't any reason +why the trip should not be made in two or three hours." + +"Ah--what was that?" said the Bibliomaniac. "I don't exactly follow +you." + +"One extra screw, you say, has saved two days?" + +"Yes." + +"Then two extra screws would save four days, three would save six days, +and five extra screws would send the boat over in approximately no +time," said the Idiot. "So, if it takes a man two hours to succumb to +sea-sickness, a boat going over in less than that time would eliminate +sea-sickness; more people would go; boats could run every hour, and Mr. +Whitechoker could have a European trip every week without deserting his +congregation." + +"Inestimable boon!" cried Mr. Whitechoker, with a laugh. + +"Wouldn't it be!" said the Idiot. "Unless I change my mind, I think I +shall stay in this country until this style of greyhound is perfected. +Then, gentlemen, I shall tear myself away from you, and seek knowledge +in foreign pastures." + +"Well, I am sure," said Mr. Pedagog--"I am sure that we all hope you +will change your mind." + +"Then you want me to go abroad?" said the Idiot. + +"No," said Mr. Pedagog. "No--not so much that as that we feel if you +were to change your mind the change could not fail to be for the better. +A mind like yours ought to be changed." + +"Well, I don't know," said the Idiot. "I suppose it would be a good +thing if I broke it up into smaller denominations, but I've had it so +long that I have become attached to it; but there is one thing about it, +there is plenty of it, so that in case any of you gentlemen find your +own insufficient I shall be only too happy to give you a piece of it +without charge. Meanwhile, if Mrs. Pedagog will kindly let me have my +bill for last week, I'll be obliged." + +"It won't be ready until to-morrow, Mr. Idiot," said the landlady, in +surprise. + +"I'm sorry," said the Idiot, rising. "My scribbling-paper has run out. I +wanted to put in this morning writing a poem on the back of it." + +"A poem? What about?" said Mr. Pedagog, with an irritating chuckle. + +"It was to be a triolet on Omniscience," said the Idiot. "And, strange +to say, sir, you were to be the hero, if by any possibility I could +squeeze you into a French form." + + + + +IV + +The Incorporation of the Idiot + + +"How is business these days, Mr. Idiot?" asked the Poet, as the one +addressed laid down the morning paper with a careworn expression on his +face. "Good, I hope?" + +"Fair, only," replied the Idiot. "My honored employer was quite blue +about things yesterday, and if I hadn't staved him off I think he'd have +proposed swapping places with me. He has said quite often of late that I +had the best of it, because all I had to earn was my salary, whereas he +had to earn my salary and his own living besides. I offered to give him +ten per cent. of my salary for ten per cent. of his living, but he said +he guessed he wouldn't, adding that I seemed to be as great an Idiot as +ever." + +"I fancy he was right there," said Mr. Pedagog. "I should really like to +know how a man of your peculiar mental construction can be of the +slightest practical value to a banker. I ask the question in all +kindness, too, meaning to cast no reflections whatever upon either you +or your employer. You are a roaring success in your own line, which is +all any one could ask of you." + +"There's hominy for you, as the darky said to the hotel guest," returned +the Idiot. "Any person who says that discord exists at this table +doesn't know what he is talking about. Even the oil and the vinegar mix +in the caster--that is, I judge they do from the oleaginous appearance +of the vinegar. But I am very useful to my employer, Mr. Pedagog. He +says frequently that he wouldn't know what not to do if it were not for +me." + +"Aren't you losing control of your tongue?" queried the Bibliomaniac, +looking at the Idiot in wonderment. "Don't you mean that he says he +wouldn't know what to do if it were not for you?" + +"No, I don't," said the Idiot. "I never lose control of my tongue. I +meant exactly what I said. Mr. Barlow told me, in so many words, that if +it were not for me he wouldn't know what _not_ to do. He calls me his +Back Action Patent Reversible Counsellor. If he is puzzled over an +intricate point he sends for me and says: 'Such and such a thing being +the case, Mr. Idiot, what would you do? Don't think about it, but tell +me on impulse. Your thoughtless opinions are worth more to me than I can +tell you.' So I tell him on impulse just what I should do, whereupon he +does the other thing, and comes out ahead in nine cases out of ten." + +"And you confess it, eh?" said the Doctor, with a curve on his lip. + +"I certainly do," said the Idiot. "The world must take me for what I am. +I'm not going to be one thing for myself, and build up a fictitious +Idiot for the world. The world calls you men of pretence conceited, +whereas, by pretending to be something that you are not, you give to the +world what I should call convincing evidence that you are not at all +conceited, but rather somewhat ashamed of what you know yourselves to +be. Now, I rather believe in conceit--real honest pride in yourself as +you know yourself to be. I am an Idiot, and it is my ambition to be a +perfect Idiot. If I had been born a jackass, I should have endeavored to +be a perfect jackass." + +"You'd have found it easy," said Mr. Pedagog, dryly. + +"Would I?" said the Idiot. "I'll have to take your word for it, sir, for +_I_ have never been a jackass, and so cannot form an opinion on the +subject." + +"Pride goeth before a fall," said Mr. Whitechoker, seeing a chance to +work in a moral reflection. + +"Exactly," said the Idiot. "Wherefore I admire pride. It is a +danger-signal that enables man to avoid the fall. If Adam had had any +pride he'd never have fallen--but speaking about my controlling my +tongue, it is not entirely out of the range of possibilities that I +shall lose control of myself." + +"I expected that, sooner or later," said the Doctor. "Is it to be +Bloomingdale or a private mad-house you are going to?" + +"Neither," replied the Idiot, calmly. "I shall stay here. For, as the +poet says, + + "''Tis best to bear the ills we hov + Nor fly to those we know not of.'" + +"Ho!" jeered the Poet. "I must confess, my dear Idiot, that I do not +think you are a success in quotation. Hamlet spoke those lines +differently." + +"Shakespeare's Hamlet did. My little personal Shakespeare makes his +Hamlet an entirely different, less stilted sort of person," said the +Idiot. + +"You have a personal Shakespeare, have you?" queried the Bibliomaniac. + +"Of course I have," the Idiot answered. "Haven't you?" + +"I have not," said the Bibliomaniac, shortly. + +"Well, I'm sorry for you then," sighed the Idiot, putting a fried potato +in his mouth. "Very sorry. I wouldn't give a cent for another man's +ideals. I want my own ideals, and I have my own ideal of Shakespeare. In +fancy, Shakespeare and I have roamed over the fields of Warwickshire +together, and I've had more fun imagining the kind of things he and I +would have said to each other than I ever got out of his published +plays, few of which have escaped the ungentle hands of the devastators." + +"You mean commentators, I imagine," said Mr. Pedagog. + +"I do," said the Idiot. "It's all the same, whether you call them +commentors or devastators. The result is the same. New editions of +Shakespeare are issued every year, and people buy them to see not what +Shakespeare has written, but what new quip some opinionated devastator +has tried to fasten on his memory. In a hundred years from now the works +of Shakespeare will differ as much from what they are to-day as to-day's +versions differ from what they were when Shakespeare wrote them. It's +mighty discouraging to one like myself who would like to write works." + +"You are convicted out of your own mouth," said the Bibliomaniac. "A +moment since you wasted your pity on me because I didn't mutilate +Shakespeare so as to make him my own, and now you attack the +commentators for doing precisely the same thing. They're as much +entitled to their opinions as you are to yours." + +"Did you ever learn to draw parallels when you were in school?" asked +the Idiot. + +"I did, and I think I've made a perfect parallel in this case. You +attack people in one breath for what you commiserate me for not doing in +another," said the Bibliomaniac. + +"Not exactly," said the Idiot. "I don't object to the commentators for +commentating, but I do object to their putting out their versions of +Shakespeare as Shakespeare. I might as well have my edition published. +It certainly would be popular, especially where, in 'Julius Caesar,' I +introduce five Cassiuses and have them all fall on their swords +together with military precision, like a 'Florodora' sextette, for +instance." + +"Well, I hope you'll never print such an atrocity as that," cried the +Bibliomaniac, hotly. "If there's one thing in literature without excuse +and utterly contemptible it is the comic version, the parody of a +masterpiece." + +"You need have no fear on that score," returned the Idiot. "I haven't +time to rewrite Shakespeare, and, since I try never to stop short of +absolute completeness, I shall not embark on the enterprise. If I do, +however, I shall not do as the commentators do, and put on my title-page +'Shakespeare. Edited by Willie Wilkins,' but 'Shakespeare As He Might +Have Been, Had His Plays Been Written By An Idiot.'" + +"I have no doubt that you could do great work with 'Hamlet,'" observed +the Poet. + +"I think so myself," said the Idiot. "But I shall never write 'Hamlet.' +I don't want to have my fair fame exposed to the merciless hands of the +devastators." + +"I shall never cease to regret," said Mr. Pedagog, after a moment's +thought, "that you are so timid. I should very much like to see 'The +Works of the Idiot.' I admit that my desire is more or less a morbid +one. It is quite on a plane with the feeling that prompts me to wish to +see that unfortunate man on the Bowery who exhibits his forehead, which +is sixteen inches high, beginning with his eyebrows, for a dime. The +strange, the bizarre in nature, has always interested me. The more +unnatural the nature, the more I gloat upon it. From that point of view +I do most earnestly hope that when you are inspired with a work you will +let me at least see it." + +"Very well," answered the Idiot. "I shall put your name down as a +subscriber to the _Idiot Monthly Magazine_, which some of my friends +contemplate publishing. That is what I mean when I say I may shortly +lose control of myself. These friends of mine profess to have been so +impressed by my dicta that they have asked me if I would allow myself to +be incorporated into a stock company, the object of which should be to +transform my personality into printed pages. Hardly a day goes by but I +devote a portion of my time to a poem in which the thought is +conspicuous either by its absence or its presence. My schemes for the +amelioration of the condition of the civilized are notorious among those +who know me; my views on current topics are eagerly sought for; my +business instinct, as I have already told you, is invaluable to my +employer, and my fiction is unsurpassed in its fictitiousness. What more +is needed for a magazine? You have the poetry, the philanthropy, the +man of to-day, the fictitiousness, and the business instinct necessary +for the successful modern magazine all concentrated in one person. Why +not publish that person, say my friends, and I, feeling as I do that no +man has a right to the selfish enjoyment of the great gifts nature has +bestowed upon him, of course can only agree. I am to be incorporated +with a capital stock of five hundred thousand dollars. One hundred +thousand dollars' worth of myself I am to be permitted to retain; the +rest my friends will subscribe for at fifty cents on the dollar. If any +of you want shares in the enterprise I have no doubt you can be +accommodated." + +"I'm obliged to you for the opportunity," said the Doctor. "But I have +to be very careful about things I take stock in, and in general I +regard you as a thing in which I should prefer not to take stock." + +"And I," observed Mr. Pedagog--"I have never up to this time taken any +stock in you, and I make it a rule to be guided in life by precedent. +Therefore I must be counted out." + +"I'll wait until you are listed at the Stock Exchange," put in the +Bibliomaniac, "while thanking you just the same for the chance." + +"You can put me down for one share, to be paid for in poetry," said the +Poet, with a wink at the Idiot. + +"You'll never make good," said the Idiot, slyly. + +"And I," said the Genial Old Gentleman who occasionally imbibes, "shall +be most happy to take five shares to be paid for in advice and +high-balls. Moreover, if your company needs good-will to establish its +enterprise, you may count upon me for unlimited credit." + +"Oh, as for that," said the Idiot, "I have plenty of good-will. Even +Mr. Pedagog supplies me with more of it than I deserve, though by no +means with all that I desire." + +"That good-will is yours as an individual, Mr. Idiot," returned the +School-master. "As a corporation, however, I cannot permit you to trade +upon me even for that. Your value is, in my eyes, entirely too +fluctuating." + +"And it is in the fluctuating stock that the great fortunes are made, +Mr. Pedagog," said the Idiot. "As an individual I appreciate your +good-will. As a corporation I am soulless, without emotions, and so +cherish no disappointments over your refusal. I think if the scheme goes +through it will be successful, and I fully expect to see the day when +Idiot Preferred will be selling as high, if not higher, than Steel, and +leaving utterly behind any other industrial that ever was known, copper +or rope." + +"If, like the railways, you could issue betterment bonds you might do +very well," said the Doctor. "I think ten million dollars spent in +bettering you might bring you up to par." + +"Or a consolidated first-mortgage bond," remarked the Bibliomaniac. +"Consolidate the Idiot with a man like Chamberlain or the German +Emperor, and issue a five-million-dollar mortgage on the result, and you +might find people who'd take those bonds at seventy-five." + +"You might if they were a dollar bond printed on cartridge-paper," said +Mr. Pedagog. "Then purchasers could paper their walls with them." + +"Rail on," said the Idiot. "I can stand it. When I begin paying +quarterly dividends at a ten-per-cent. rate you'll wish you had come +in." + +"I don't know about that," said Mr. Pedagog. "It would entirely +depend." + +"On what?" queried the Idiot, unwarily. + +"On whether that ten per cent. was declared upon your own estimate of +your value or upon ours. On yours it would be fabulous; on ours--oh, +well, what is the use of saying anything more about it. We are not going +in it, and that's an end to it." + +"Well, I'll go in it if you change your scheme," said the Doctor. "If +instead of an Idiot Publishing Company you will try to float yourself as +a Consolidated Gas Company you may count on me to take a controlling +interest." + +"I will submit the proposition to my friends," said the Idiot, calmly. +"It would be something to turn out an honest gas company, which I +should, of course, try to be, but I am afraid the public will not accept +it. There is little demand for laughing-gas, and, besides, they would +fear to intrust you with a controlling interest for fear that you might +blow the product out and the bills up--coining millions by mere +inflation. They've heard of you, Doctor, and they know that is the sort +of thing you'd be likely to do." + + + + +V + +University Extension + + +"I was surprised and gratified last evening, Mr. Idiot," observed the +School-master as breakfast was served, "to see you at the University +Extension Lecture. I did not know that you admitted the necessity of +further instruction in any matter pertaining to human knowledge." + +"I don't know that I do admit the necessity," returned the Idiot. +"Sometimes when I take an inventory of the contents of my mind it seems +to me that about everything I need is there." + +"There you go again!" said the Bibliomaniac. "Why do you persist in your +refusal to allow any one to get a favorable impression concerning you? +Mr. Pedagog unbends sufficiently to tell you that you have at last done +something which he can commend, and you greet him with an Idiotism which +is practically a rebuff." + +"Very well said," observed the School-master, with an acquiescent nod. +"I came to this table this morning encouraged to believe that this young +man was beginning to see the error of his ways, and I must confess to a +great enough interest in him to say that I was pleased at that +encouragement. I saw him at a lecture on literature at the Lyceum Hall +last evening, and he appeared to be interested, and yet this morning he +seems to show that he is utterly incorrigible. May I ask, sir, why you +attended that lecture if, as you say, your mind is already sufficiently +well furnished?" + +"Certainly you may ask that question," replied the Idiot. "I went to +that lecture to have my impressions confirmed, that is all. I have +certain well-defined notions concerning University Extension, and I +wished to see if they were correct. I found that they were." + +"The lecture was not upon University Extension, but upon Romanticism, +and it was a most able discourse," retorted Mr. Pedagog. + +"Very likely," said the Idiot. "I did not hear it. I did not want to +hear it. I have my own ideas concerning Romanticism, which do not need +confirmation or correction. I have already confirmed and corrected them. +I went to see the audience and not to hear Professor Peterkin exploding +theories." + +"It is a pity the chair you occupied was wasted upon you," snapped Mr. +Pedagog. + +"I agree with you," said the Idiot. "I could have got a much better view +of the audience if I had been permitted to sit on the stage, but +Professor Peterkin needed all that for his gestures. However, I saw +enough from where I sat to confirm my impression that University +Extension is not so much of a public benefit as a social fad. There was +hardly a soul in the audience who could not have got all that Professor +Peterkin had to tell him out of his books; there was hardly a soul in +the audience who could not have afforded to pay one dollar at least for +the seat he occupied; there was not a soul in the audience who had paid +more than ten cents for his seat or her seat, and those for whose +benefit the lecture was presumably given, the ten-cent people, were +crowded out. The lectures themselves are not instructive--Professor +Peterkin's particularly--except in so far as it is instructive to hear +what Professor Peterkin thinks on this or that subject, and his desire +to be original forces him to cook up views which no one else ever held, +with the result that what he says is most interesting and proper to be +presented to the attention of a discriminating audience, but not proper +to be presented to an audience that is supposed to come there to receive +instruction." + +"You have just said that you did not listen to the lecture. How do you +know that what you say is true?" put in the Bibliomaniac. + +"I know Professor Peterkin," said the Idiot. + +"Does he know you?" sneered Mr. Pedagog. + +"I don't think he would remember me if you should speak my name in his +presence," observed the Idiot, calmly. "But that is easily accounted +for. The Professor never remembers anybody but himself." + +"Well, I admit," said Mr. Pedagog, "that the Professor's lectures were +rather advanced for the comprehension of a person like the Idiot, +nevertheless it was an enjoyable occasion, and I doubt if the +fulminations of our friend here will avail against University +Extension." + +"You speak a sad truth," said the Idiot. "Social fads are impervious to +fulmination, as Solomon might have said had he thought of it. As long as +a thing is a social fad it will thrive, and, on the whole, perhaps it +ought to thrive. Anything which gives society something to think about +has its value, and the mere fact that it makes society _think_ is proof +of that value." + +"We seem to be in a philosophic frame of mind this morning," said Mr. +Whitechoker. + +"We are," returned the Idiot. "That's one thing about University +Extension. It makes us philosophic. It has made a stoic of my dear old +daddy." + +"Oh yes!" cried Mr. Pedagog. "You _have_ a father, haven't you? I had +forgotten that." + +"Wherein," said the Idiot, "we differ. _I_ haven't forgotten that I have +one, and, by-the-way, it is from him that I first heard of University +Extension. He lives in a small manufacturing town not many miles from +here, and is distinguished in the town because, without being stingy, he +lives within his means. He has a way of paying his grocer's bills which +makes of him a marked man. He hasn't much more money than he needs, but +when the University Extension movement reached the town he was +interested. The prime movers in the enterprise went to him and asked him +if he wouldn't help it along, dilating upon the benefits which would +accrue to those whose education stopped short with graduation from the +high-schools. It was most plausible. The notion that for ten cents a +lecture the working masses could learn something about art, history, +and letters, could gather in something about the sciences, and all that, +appealed to him, and while he could afford it much more ill than the +smart people, the four hundred of the town, he chipped in. He paid fifty +dollars and was made an honorary manager. He was proud enough of it, +too, and he wrote a long, enthusiastic letter to me about it. It was a +great thing, and he hoped the State, which had been appealed to to help +the movement along, would take a hand in it. 'If we educate the masses +to understand and to appreciate the artistic, the beautiful,' he wrote, +'we need have little fear for the future. Ignorance is the greatest foe +we have to contend against in our national development, and it is the +only thing that can overthrow a nation such as ours is.' And then what +happened? Professor Peterkin came along and delivered ten or a dozen +lectures. The masses went once or twice and found the platform occupied +by a man who talked to them about Romanticism and Realism; who told them +that Dickens was trash; who exalted Tolstoi and Ibsen; but who never let +them into the secret of what Romanticism was, and who kept them equally +in the dark as to the significance of Realism. They also found the best +seats in the lecture-hall occupied by the smart set in full +evening-dress, who talked almost as much and as loudly as did Professor +Peterkin. The masses did not even learn manners at Professor Peterkin's +first and second lectures, and the third and fourth found them +conspicuous by their absence. All they learned was that they were +ignorant, and that other people were better than they, and what my +father learned was that he had subscribed fifty dollars to promote a +series of social functions for the diversion of the four hundred and the +aggrandizement of Professor Peterkin. He started in for what might be +called Romanticism, and he got a Realism that he did not like in less +time than it takes to tell of it, and to-day in that town University +Extension is such a fad that when, some weeks ago, the swell club of +that place talked of appointing Thursday evening as its club night, it +was found to be impossible, for the reason that it might interfere with +the attendance upon the University Extension lectures. That, Mr. +Pedagog, is a matter of history and can be proven, and last night's +audience confirmed the impression which I had formed from what my father +had told me. Professor Peterkin's lectures are interesting to you, a +school-master, but they are pure Greek to me, who would like to know +more about letters. I would gather more instruction from your table-talk +in an hour than I could from Professor Peterkin's whole course." + +"You flatter me," said Mr. Pedagog. + +"No," returned the Idiot. "If you knew how little the ignorant gain from +Peterkin you would not necessarily call it flattery if one should say he +learned more from your conversation over a griddle-cake." + +"You misconceive the whole situation, I think, nevertheless," said Mr. +Whitechoker. "As I understand it, supplementary lectures, and +examinations based on them, are held after the lectures, when the +practical instruction is given with great thoroughness." + +"I'm glad you spoke of that," said the Idiot. "I had forgotten that part +of it. Professor Peterkin received pay for his lectures, which dealt in +theories only; plain Mr. Barton, who delivered the supplementary +lectures, got nothing. Professor Peterkin taught nothing, but he +represented University Extension. Plain Mr. Barton did the work and +represented nothing. Both reached society. Neither reached the masses. +In my native town plain Mr. Barton's supplementary lectures, which were +simply an effort to unravel the Peterkin complications, were attended by +the same people in smaller crowds--people of social standing who were +curious enough to devote an hour a week to an endeavor to find out the +meaning of what Professor Peterkin had told them at the function the +week before. The students examined were mostly ladies, and I happen to +know that in a large proportion they were ladies whose husbands could +have afforded to pay Professor Peterkin his salary ten times over as a +private tutor." + +"As I look at it," said Mr. Pedagog, gravely, "it does not make much +difference to whom your instruction is given, so long as it instructs. +What if these lectures do interest those who are comparatively well +off? Your society woman may be as much in need of an extended education +as your factory girl. The University Extension idea is to convey +knowledge to people who would not otherwise get it. It simply sets out +to improve minds. If the social mind needs improvement, why not improve +it? Why condemn a system because it does not discriminate in the minds +selected for improvement?" + +"I don't condemn a system which sets out to improve minds irrespective +of conditions," replied the Idiot. "But I should most assuredly condemn +a man, or a set of men, who induced me to subscribe to a bread fund for +the poor and who afterwards expended that money on cream-cakes for the +Czar of Russia. The fact that the Czar of Russia wanted the cream-cakes +and was willing to accept them would not affect my feelings in the +matter, though I have no doubt the people in charge of the fund would +find themselves far more conspicuous for having departed from the +original idea. Some of them might be knighted for it if the Czar +happened to be passionately fond of cream-cakes." + +"Then, having attacked this system, what would you have? Would you have +University Extension stop?" asked the Bibliomaniac. + +"Not at all," returned the Idiot. "Anything which can educate society is +a good thing, but I should change the name of it from University +Extension to Social Expansion, and I should compel those whose minds +were broadened by it to pay the bills." + +"But as yet you have failed to hit the nail on the head," persisted the +Bibliomaniac. "The masses can attend these lectures if they wish to, and +on your own statement they don't. You don't seem to consider that point, +or, if you do, you don't meet it." + +"I don't think it necessary to meet it," said the Idiot. "Though I will +say that if you were one of the masses--a girl, say, with one dress, +threadbare, poor, and ill-fitting, and possessed of a natural bit of +pride--you would find little pleasure in attending a lecture your +previous education does not permit of your comprehending, and sitting +through an evening with a lot of finely dressed, smart folk, with their +backs turned towards you. The plebeians have _some_ pride, my dear +Bibliomaniac, and they are decidedly averse to mixing with the swells. +They would like to be educated, but they don't care to be snubbed for +the privilege of being mystified by a man like Professor Peterkin, even +for so small a sum as ten cents an evening." + + + + +VI + +Social Expansion + + +"We were talking about University Extension the other day, Mr. Pedagog," +said the Idiot, as the School-master folded up the newspaper and put it +in his pocket, "and I, as you remember, suggested that it might better +be called Social Expansion." + +"Did you?" said Mr. Pedagog, coldly. "I don't remember much about it. I +rarely make a note of anything you may say." + +"Well, I did suggest the change of name, whether your memory is +retentive or not, and I have been thinking the matter over a good deal +since, and I think I've got hold of an idea," returned the Idiot. + +"In that case," said the Bibliomaniac, "we would better lock the door. +If you have really got hold of an idea you should be very careful not to +let it get away from you." + +"No danger of that," said the Idiot, with a smile. "I have it securely +locked up here," tapping his forehead. + +"It must be lonesome," said Mr. Pedagog. + +"And rather uncomfortable--if it is a real idea," observed the Doctor. +"An idea in the Idiot's mind must feel somewhat as a tall, stout Irish +maid feels when she goes to her bedroom in one of those Harlem +flat-houses." + +"You men are losing a great opportunity," said the Idiot, with a +scornful glance at the three professional gentlemen. "The idea of your +following the professions of pedagogy, medicine, and literature, when +the three of you combined could make a fortune as an incarnate comic +paper. I don't see why you don't make a combination like those German +bands that play on the street corners, and go about from door to door, +and crack your jokes just as they crack their music. I am sure you'd +take, particularly in front of barber-shops." + +"It would be hard on the comic papers," said the Poet, who was getting a +little unpopular with his fellow-boarders because of his tendency, +recently developed, to take the Idiot's part in the breakfast-table +discussions. "They might be so successful that the barber-shops, instead +of taking the comic papers for their customers to read, would employ one +or more of them to sit in the middle of the room and crack jokes aloud." + +"We couldn't rival the comic papers though," said the Doctor, wishing to +save his dignity by taking the bull by the horns. "We might do the +jokes well enough, but the comic papers are chiefly pictorial." + +"You'd be pictorial enough," said the Idiot. "Wasn't it you, Mr. +Pedagog, that said the Doctor here looked like one of Cruikshank's +physicians, or as if he had stepped out of Dickens's pages, or something +like it?" + +"I never said anything of the sort!" cried the School-master, +wrathfully; "and you know I didn't." + +"Who was it said that?" asked the Idiot, innocently, looking about the +table. "It couldn't have been Mr. Whitechoker, and I know it wasn't the +Poet or my Genial Friend who occasionally imbibes. Mr. Pedagog denies +it; I didn't say it; Mrs. Pedagog wouldn't say it. That leaves only two +of us--the Bibliomaniac and the Doctor himself. I don't think the Doctor +would make a personal remark of that kind, and--well, there is but one +conclusion. Mr. Bibliomaniac, I am surprised." + +"What?" roared the Bibliomaniac, glaring at the Idiot. "Do you mean to +fasten the impertinence on me?" + +"Far from it," returned the Idiot, meekly. "Very far from it. It is +fate, sir, that has done that--the circumstantial evidence against you +is strong; but then, mercifully enough, circumstantial evidence is not +permitted to hang a man." + +"Now see here, Mr. Idiot," said the Bibliomaniac, firmly and +impressively, "I want you to distinctly understand that I am not going +to have you put words into my mouth that I never uttered. I--" + +"Pray, don't attack me," said the Idiot. "I haven't made any charge +against you. I only asked who could have said that the Doctor looked +like a creation of Cruikshank. I couldn't have said it, because I don't +think it. Mr. Pedagog denies it. In fact, every one here has a clear +case of innocence excepting yourself, and I don't believe _you_ said +it, only the chain of circumstance--" + +"Oh, hang your chain of circumstance!" interrupted the Bibliomaniac. + +"It is hung," said the Idiot, "and it appears to make you very +uncomfortable. However, as I was saying, I think I have got hold of an +idea involving a truly philanthropic and by no means selfish scheme of +Social Expansion." + +"Heigho!" sighed Mr. Pedagog. "I sometimes think that if I had not the +honor to be the husband of our landlady I'd move away from here. Your +views, sir, are undermining my constitution." + +"You only think so, Mr. Pedagog," replied the Idiot. "You are simply +going through a process of intellectual reconstruction at my hands. You +feel exactly as a man feels who has been shut up in the dark for years +and suddenly finds himself in a flood of sunlight. I am doing with you +as an individual what I would have society do for mankind at large--in +other words, while I am working for individual expansion upon the raw +material I find here, I would have society buckle down to the +enlargement of itself by the improvement of those outside of itself." + +"If you swim in water as well as you do in verbiage," said the +Bibliomaniac, "you must be able to go three or four strokes without +sinking." + +"Oh, as for that, I can swim like a duck," said the Idiot. "You can't +sink me." + +"I fancied not," observed Mr. Pedagog, with a smile at his own joke. +"You are so light I wonder, indeed, that you don't rise up into space, +anyhow." + +"What a delightful condition of affairs that suggestion opens up!" said +the Idiot, turning to the Poet. "If I were you I'd make a poem on that. +Something like this, for instance: + + "I am so very, very light + That gravitation curbs not me. + I rise up through the atmosphere + Till all the world I plainly see. + + "I dance about among the clouds, + An airy, happy, human kite. + The breezes toss me here and there, + To my exceeding great delight. + + "And when I would return to sup, + To breakfast, or perchance to dine, + I haul myself once more to earth + By tugging on a piece of twine." + +Mr. Pedagog grinned broadly at this. + +"You aren't entirely without your good points," he said. "If we ever +accept your comic-paper idea we'll have to rely on you for the nonsense +poetry." + +"Thank you," said the Idiot. "I'll help. If I had a man like you to give +me the suggestions I could make a fortune out of poetry. The only +trouble is I have to quarrel with you before I can get you to give me a +suggestion, and I despise bickering." + +"So do I," returned Mr. Pedagog. "Let's give up bickering and turn our +attention to--er--Social Extension, is it?" + +"Yes--or Social Expansion," said the Idiot. "Some years ago the world +was startled to hear that in the city of New York there were not more +than four hundred people who were entitled to social position, and, as I +understand it, as time has progressed the number has still further +diminished. Last year the number was only one hundred and fifty, and, as +I read the social news of to-day, not more than twenty-five people are +now beyond all question in the swim. At dinners, balls, functions of all +sorts, you read the names of these same twenty-five over and over again +as having been present. Apparently no others attended--or, if they did, +they were not so indisputably entitled to be present that their names +could be printed in the published accounts. Now all of this shows that +society is dying out, and that if things keep on as they are now going +it will not be many years before we shall become a people without +society, a nation of plebeians." + +"Your statement so far is lucid and logical," said Mr. Pedagog, who did +not admire society--so called--and who did not object to the goring of +an ox in which he was not personally interested. + +"Well, why is this social contraction going on?" asked the Idiot. +"Clearly because Social Expansion is not an accepted fact. If it were, +society would grow. Why does it not grow? Why are its ranks not +augmented? There is raw material enough. You would like to get into the +swim; so would I. But we don't know how. We read books of etiquette, +but they are far from being complete. I think I make no mistake when I +say they are utterly valueless. They tell us no more than the funny +journal tells us when it says: + + "'Never eat pease with a spoon; + Never eat pie with a knife; + Never put salt on a prune; + Never throw crumbs at your wife.'" + +They tell most of us what we all knew before. They tell us not to wear +our hats in the house; they tell us all the obvious things, but the +subtleties of how to get into society they do not tell us. The comic +papers give us some idea of how to behave in society. We know from +reading the funny papers that a really swell young man always leans +against a mantel-piece when he is calling; that the swell girl sits on a +comfortable divan with her feet on a tiger-skin rug, and they converse +in epigram. Sometimes the epigram is positively rude; when it is not +rude it is so dull that no one wonders that the tiger's head on the rug +represents the tiger as yawning. But, while this is instructive, it +teaches us how to behave on special occasions only. You or I might call +upon a young woman who did not sit on a divan, who had no tiger-skin rug +to put her feet on, and whose parlor had a mantel-piece against which we +could not lean comfortably. What are we to do then? As far as they go, +the funny papers are excellent, but they don't go far enough. They give +us attractive pictures of fashionable dinners, but it is always of the +dinner after the game course. Some of us would like to know how society +behaves while the soup is being served. We know that after the game +course society girls reach across the table and clink wine-glasses with +young men, but we do not know what they do before they get to the clink +stage. Nowhere is this information given. Etiquette books are silent on +the subject, and though I have sought everywhere for information, I do +not know to this day how many salted almonds one may consume at dinner +without embarrassing one's hostess. Now, if I can't find out, the +million can't find out. Wherefore, instead of shutting themselves +selfishly up and, by so doing, forcing society finally into dissolution, +why cannot some of these people who know what is what give +object-lessons to the million; educate them in _savoir-faire_? + +"Last summer there was a play put on at one of our theatres in which +there was a scene at a race-track. At one side was a tally-ho coach. For +the first week the coach was an utterly valueless accessory, because the +people on it were the ordinary supers in the employ of the theatre. They +did not know how to behave on a coach, and nobody was interested. The +management were suddenly seized with a bright idea. They invited several +swell young men who knew how things were done on coaches to come and do +these things on their coach. The young men came and imparted a realism +to the scene that made that coach the centre of attraction. People who +went to that play departed educated in coach etiquette. Now there lies +my scheme in a nutshell. If these twenty-five, the Old Guard of society, +which dines but never surrenders, will give once a week a social +function in some place like Madison Square Garden, to which the million +may go merely as spectators, not as participators, is there any doubt +that they would fail to be instructed? The Garden will seat eight or ten +thousand people. Suppose, for an instance, that a dozen of your best +exponents of what is what were to give a dinner in the middle of the +arena, with ten thousand people looking on. Do you mean to say that of +all that vast audience no one would learn thereby how to behave at a +dinner?" + +"It is a great scheme," said the Doctor. + +"It is!" said the Idiot, "and I venture to say that a course of, say, +twelve social functions given in that way would prove so popular that +the Garden would turn away every night twice as many people as it could +accommodate." + +"It would be instructive, no doubt," said the Bibliomaniac; "but how +would it expand society? Would you have examinations?" + +"Most assuredly," said the Idiot. "At the end of the season I should +have a rigid examination of all who chose to apply. I would make them +dine in the presence of a committee of expert diners, I would have them +pass a searching examination in the Art of Wearing a Dress Suit, in the +Science of Entering a Drawing-room, in the Art of Behavior at Afternoon +Teas, and all the men who applied should also be compelled to pass a +physical examination as an assurance that they were equal to the task of +getting an ice for a young lady at a ball." + +"Society would get to be too inclusive and would cease to be exclusive," +suggested Mr. Whitechoker. + +"I think not," said the Idiot. "I should not give a man or a woman the +degree of B.S. unless he or she had passed an examination of one hundred +per cent." + +"B.S.?" queried Mr. Pedagog. + +"Yes," returned the Idiot. "Bachelor of Society--a degree which, once +earned, should entitle one to recognition as a member of the upper ten +anywhere in Christendom." + +"It is superb!" cried Mr. Pedagog, enthusiastically. + +"Yes," said the Idiot. "At ten cents a function it would beat University +Extension out of sight, and, further, it would preserve society. If we +lose society we lose caste, and, worse than all, our funny men would +have to go out of business, for there would be no fads or Willieboys +left to ridicule." + + + + +VII + +A Beggar's Hand-book + + +"Mr. Idiot," said the Poet one morning, as the waffles were served, "you +are an inventive genius. Why don't you invent an easy way to make a +fortune? The trouble with most methods of making money is that they +involve too much labor." + +"I have thought of that," said the Idiot. "And yet the great fortunes +have been made in a way which involved very little labor, comparatively +speaking. You, for instance, probably work harder over a yard of poetry +that brings you in ten dollars than any of our great railroad magnates +have over a mile of railroad which has brought them in a million." + +"Which simply proves that it is ideas that count rather than labor," +said the Poet. + +"Not exactly," said the Idiot. "If you put a hundred ideas into a +quatrain you will get less money for it than you would for a two-volume +epic in which you have possibly only half an idea. It isn't idea so much +as nerve that counts. The man who builds railroads doesn't advance any +particular idea, but he shows lots of nerve, and it is nerve that makes +wealth. I believe that if you literary men would show more nerve force +and spare the public the infliction of what you call your ideas, you +would make more money." + +"How would you show nerve in writing?" queried the Bibliomaniac. + +"If I knew I'd write and make my fortune," said the Idiot. +"Unfortunately, I don't know how one can show nerve in writing, unless +it be in taking hold of some particularly popular idiosyncrasy of +mankind and treating it so contemptuously that every one would want to +mob you. If you could get the public mad enough at you to want to mob +you they'd read everything you'd write, simply to nourish their wrath, +and you'd soon be cutting coupons for a living, and could then afford to +take up more ideas--coupon-cutters can afford theories. For my own part, +one reason why I do not myself take up literature for a profession is +that I have neither the nerve nor the coupons. I'd probably run along in +the rut like a majority of the writers of to-day, and wouldn't have the +grit to strike out in a new line of my own. Men say, and perhaps very +properly, this is the thing that has succeeded in the past. I'll do +this. Something else that appears alluring enough in the abstract has +never been done, and for that reason I won't do it. There have been +clever men before me, men clever enough to think of this something that +I fondly imagine is original, and they haven't done it. Doubtless they +refrained from doing it for good and sufficient reasons, and I am not +going to be fool enough to set my judgment up against theirs. In other +words, I lack the nerve to go ahead and write as I feel. I prefer to +study past successes, with the result that I am moderately successful +only. It's the same way in every line of business. Precedent guides in +all things, but where occasionally you find a man courageous enough to +cast precedent to the winds, one of two things happens. Either fortune +or ruin follows. Hence, the thing to do if you want to make a fortune is +to eliminate the possibility of ruin as far as may be. You cannot ruin a +man who has nothing. He is down on bed-rock, anyhow; so for a receipt +for fortune I should say, start a pauper, show your nerve, and you'll +make a pile, or you won't make a pile. If you make it you are fortunate. +If you fail to make it you are no more unfortunate than you were before +you started." + +"For plausibility, Mr. Idiot," said Mr. Pedagog, "you are to me a +perfect wonder. I do not think that any one can deny, with confidence +born of certainty, the truth of your premises, and it must be admitted +that your conclusions are based properly upon those premises, and yet +your conclusions are almost invariably utterly absurd, if not absolutely +grotesque. Here is a man who says, to make a fortune become a beggar!" + +"Precisely," said the Idiot. "There is nothing like having a clean slate +to work on. If you are not a beggar you have something, and having +something promotes caution and tends to destroy nerve. As a beggar you +have everything to gain and nothing to lose, so you can plunge. You can +swim better in deep water than in the shallow." + +"Well," said the Doctor, "enlighten us on this point. You may not know +how to show nerve as a writer--in fact, you confess that you don't. How +would you show nerve as a beggar? Would you strive to enforce your +demands and degenerate into a common highwayman, or would you simply go +in for big profits, and ask passers-by for ten dollars instead of ten +cents?" + +"He'd probably take a bag of dynamite into a millionaire's office and +threaten to blow him to pieces if he didn't give him a house and lot," +sneered the Bibliomaniac. + +"Not at all," said the Idiot. "That's cowardice, not nerve. If I went +into a millionaire's office and demanded a million--or a house and lot +even--armed with a bag full of newspapers, pretending it held dynamite, +it might be more like nerve; but my beggar would do nothing contrary to +the law. He'd simply be nervy, that's all--cheeky, perhaps you'd call +it. For instance, I believe that if I were to hire in the elevated cars +one of those advertising spaces above the windows, and were to place in +that space a placard saying that I was by nature too lazy to work, too +fond of life to starve, too poor to live, and too honest to steal, and +would be placed in affluence if every man and woman who saw that sign +would send me ten cents a week in two-cent postage-stamps for five weeks +running, I should receive enough money to enable me to live at the most +expensive hotel in town during that period. By living at that hotel and +paying my bills regularly I could get credit enough to set myself up in +business, and with credit there is practically no limit to the +possibilities of fortune. It is simply honest nerve that counts. The +beggar who asks you on the street for five cents to keep his family from +starving is rebuffed. You don't believe his story, and you know that +five cents wouldn't keep a family from starving very long. But the +fellow who accosts you frankly for a dime because he is thirsty, and +hasn't had a drink for two hours, in nine cases out of ten properly +selected ones will get a quarter for his nerve." + +"You ought to write a _Manual for Beggars_," said the Bibliomaniac. "I +have no doubt that the Idiot Publishing Company would publish it." + +"Yes," said Mr. Pedagog. "A sort of beggar's _Don't_, for instance. It +would be a benefit to all men, as well as a boon to the beggars. That +mendicancy is a profession to-day there is no denying, and anything +which could make of it a polite calling would be of inestimable value." + +"I have had it in mind for some time," said the Idiot, blandly. "I +intended to call it _Mendicancy Made Easy_, or _the Beggar's Don't: With +Two Chapters on Etiquette for Tramps_." + +"The chief trouble with such a book I should think," said the Poet, +"would be that your beggars and tramps could not afford to buy it." + +"That wouldn't interfere with its circulation," returned the Idiot. +"It's a poor tramp who can't steal. Every suburban resident in creation +would buy a copy of the book out of sheer curiosity. I'd get my +royalties from them; the tramps could get the books by helping +themselves to the suburbanites' copies as they do to chickens, +fire-wood, and pies put out to cool. As for the beggars, I'd have it put +into their hands by the people they beg from. When a man comes up to a +wayfarer, for instance, and says, 'Excuse me, sir, but could you spare +a nickel to a hungry man?' I'd have the wayfarer say, 'Excuse _me_, sir, +but unfortunately I have left my nickels in my other vest; but here is a +copy of the Idiot's _Mendicancy Made Easy, or the Beggar's Don't_.'" + +"And you think the beggar would read it, do you?" asked the +Bibliomaniac. + +"I don't know whether he would or not. He'd probably either read it or +pawn it," the Idiot answered. "In either event he would be better off, +and I would have got my ten per cent. royalty on the book. After the +_Beggars' Manual_ I should continue my good work if I found the class +for whom it was written had benefited by my first effort. I should +compile as my contribution to the literature of mendicancy for the +following season what I should call _The Beggar's Elite Directory_. This +would enlarge my sphere a trifle. It would contain as complete lists as +could be obtained of persons who give to street beggars, with their +addresses, so that the beggars, instead of infesting the streets at +night might go to the houses of these people and collect their incomes +in a more business-like and less undignified fashion. Added to this +would be two lists, one for tramps, stating what families in the suburbs +kept dogs, what families gave, whether what they gave was digestible or +not, rounding up with a list of those who do not give, and who have +telephone connection with the police station. This would enable them to +avoid dogs and rebuffs, would save the tramp the time he expends on +futile efforts to find work he doesn't want, and as for the people who +have to keep the dogs to ward off the tramps, they, too, would be +benefited, because the tramps would begin to avoid them, and in a short +while they would be able to dispense with the dogs. The other list +would be for organ-grinders, who are, after all, only beggars of a +different type. This list would comprise the names of persons who are +musical and who would rather pay a quarter than listen to a hand-organ. +By a judicious arrangement with these people, carried on by +correspondence, the organ-grinder would be able to collect a large +revenue without venturing out, except occasionally to play before the +house of a delinquent subscriber in order to remind him that he had let +his contract expire. So, by slow degrees, we should find beggars doing +their work privately and not publicly, tramps circulating only among +those whose sympathies they have aroused, and organ-grinding only a +memory." + +"The last, I think, would not come about," said Mr. Pedagog. "For there +are people who like the music of hand-organs." + +"True--I'm one of 'em. I'd hire a hansom to follow a piano-organ about +the city if I could afford it, but as a rule the hand-organ lovers are +of the one-cent class," returned the Idiot. "The quarter class are +people who would rather not hear the hand-organ, and it is to them that +a grinder of business capacity would naturally address himself. It is +far pleasanter to stay at home and be paid large money for doing nothing +than to undertake a weary march through the city to receive small sums +for doing something. That's human nature, Mr. Pedagog." + +"I presume it is," said Mr. Pedagog; "but I don't think your scheme is. +Human nature works, but your plan wouldn't." + +"Well, of course," said the Idiot, "you never can tell about ideals. The +fact that an ideal is ideal is the chief argument against its amounting +to much. But I am confident that if my _Beggar's Don't_ and _Elite +Directory_ fail, my other book will go." + +"You appear to have the writing of a library in mind," sneered the +Bibliomaniac. + +"I have," said the Idiot. "If I write all the books I have in mind, the +public library will be a small affair beside mine." + +"And your other book is to be what?" queried Mr. Whitechoker. + +"_Plausible Tales for Beggars to Tell_," said the Idiot. "If the beggar +could only tell an interesting story he'd be surer of an ear in which to +whisper it. The usual beggar's tale is commonplace. There's no art in +it. There are no complications of absorbing interest. There is not a +soul in creation, I venture to say, but would be willing to have a +beggar stop right in the middle of his story. The tales I'd write for +them would be so interesting that the attention of the wayfarer would be +arrested at once. His mind would be riveted on the situation at once, +and, instead of hurrying along and trying to leave the beggar behind, he +would stop, button-hole him, and ask him to sit down on a convenient +doorstep and continue. If a beggar could have such a story to tell as +would enable him in the midst of one of its most exciting episodes to +whisper hoarsely into the ear of the man whose nickel he was seeking, +'The rest of this interesting story I will tell you in Central Park at +nine o'clock to-morrow night,' in such a manner as would impel the +listener to meet him in the Park the following evening, his fortune +would be made. Such a book I hope some day to write." + +"I have no doubt," said Mr. Whitechoker, "that it will be an +entertaining addition to fiction." + +"Nor have I," said the Idiot. "It will make the writers of to-day green +with envy, and, as for the beggars, if it is not generally known that +it is I and not they who are responsible for the work, the beggars will +shortly find themselves in demand as writers of fiction for the +magazines." + +"And you?" suggested the Poet. + +"I shall be content. Mere gratitude will force the beggars to send me +the magazine orders, and _I'll_ write their articles and be glad of the +opportunity, giving them ten per cent. of the profits. I know a man who +makes fifty dollars a year at magazine work, and one of my ambitions is +to rival the Banker-Poets and Dry Goods Essayists by achieving fame as +the Boarding-house Dickens." + + + + +VIII + +Progressive Waffles + + +"I am afraid," said Mr. Pedagog, in a loud whisper to the Bibliomaniac, +"that the Idiot isn't feeling well this morning. He has eaten three +fish-cakes and a waffle without opening his mouth." + +The Idiot looked up, and, gazing wearily at Mr. Pedagog for a moment, +shrugged his shoulders and ejaculated, "Tutt!" + +"He's off," said the Bibliomaniac. "Whenever he says 'Tutt!' you can +make up your mind that his vocabulary is about to be loosed." + +"If my vocabulary were as warped as some other vocabularies I might +mention," said the Idiot, helping himself to another waffle modelled +after the six of hearts, "I'd keep it in a cage. A man who observes that +I have eaten three fish-cakes and a waffle without opening my mouth +hasn't a very good command of language. He simply states as a fact what +is in reality an impossibility, granting that I eat with my mouth, which +I am told I do." + +"You know what I mean," retorted Mr. Pedagog, impatiently. "I am so much +in your society that I have acquired the very bad habit of speaking in +the vernacular. When I say you haven't opened your mouth I do not refer +to the opening you make for the receipt of waffles and fish-cakes, but +for those massive openings which you require for your exuberant +loquacity. In other words, I mean that you haven't spoken a word for at +least three minutes, which is naturally an indication to us that you +aren't feeling well. You and talk are synonymous as far as we are +concerned." + +"I _have_ been known to speak--that is true," said the Idiot. "That I am +not feeling very well this morning is also true. I have a headache." + +"A what ache?" asked the Doctor, scornfully. + +"A very bad headache," returned the Idiot, looking about him for a third +waffle. + +"How singular!" said the Bibliomaniac. "Reminds me of a story I heard of +a man who had lost his foot. He'd had his foot shot off at Gettysburg, +and yet for years after he could feel the pangs of rheumatism in that +foot from which he had previously suffered." + +"Pardon me for repeating," observed the Idiot. "But, as I have already +said, and as I expect often to have to say again, Tutt! I can't blame +you for thinking that I have no head, however. I find so little use for +one here that in most instances I do not obtrude it upon you." + +"I haven't noticed any lack of head in the Idiot," put in the +School-master. "As a rule, I can agree to almost anything my friend the +Bibliomaniac says, but in this case I cannot accept his views. You have +a head. I have always said you had a head--in fact, that is what I +complain about chiefly, it is such a big head." + +"Thank you," said the Idiot, ignoring the shaft. "I shall never forget +your kindness in coming to my aid, though I can't say that I think I +needed it. Even with a racking headache sustained by these delicious +waffles, I believe I can handle the Doctor and my bookish friend without +assistance. I am what the mathematicians would call an arithmetical +absurdity--I am the one that is equal to the two they represent. At +present, however, I prefer to let them talk on. I am too much absorbed +in thought and waffles to bandy words." + +"If I had a headache," said Mrs. Smithers-Pedagog, without, it must be +said, in any way desiring to stem the waffle tide which was slowly but +surely eating into the profits of the week--"if I had a headache I +should not eat so many waffles, Mr. Idiot." + +"I suppose I ought not to," replied the Idiot, "but I can't help it, +ma'am. Waffles are my weakness. Some men take to drink, some to gaming; +I seek forgetfulness of woe in waffles. Mr. Whitechoker, will you kindly +pass me that steaming ten of diamonds that is wasting its warmth upon +the desert air before you?" + +Mr. Whitechoker, with a sigh which indicated that he had had his eye on +the ten of diamonds himself, did as he was requested. + +"Many thanks," said the Idiot, transferring the waffle to his plate. +"Let me see--that is how many?" + +"Five," said Mr. Pedagog. + +"Eight," said the Bibliomaniac. + +"Dear me!" ejaculated the Idiot. "Why can't you agree? I never eat less +than twelve waffles, and now that you have failed to keep tab I shall +have to begin all over again. Mary, bring me one dozen fresh waffles in +squads of four. This is an ideal breakfast, Mrs. Smithers-Pedagog." + +"I am glad you are pleased," said the landlady, graciously. "My one aim +is to satisfy." + +"You are a better shot than most women," said the Idiot. "I wonder why +it is," he added, "that waffles are so generally modelled after +playing-cards, and also why, having been modelled after playing-cards, +there is not a full pack?" + +"Fifty-two waffles," said Mr. Whitechoker, "would be too many." + +"Fifty-three, including the joker," said Mr. Pedagog. + +"What do _you_ know about cards, John?" asked Mrs. Pedagog, severely. + +The Idiot laughed. + +"Did you ever hear that pretty little song of Gilbert and Sullivan's, +Mr. Poet, 'Things are seldom what they seem'?" he asked. + +"Why shouldn't I know about playing-cards?" said Mr. Pedagog, acridly. +"Mr. Whitechoker seems to be aware that a pack holds fifty-two cards--if +he, why not I?" + +"I--ah--I of course have to acquaint myself with many vicious things +with which I have very little sympathy," observed Mr. Whitechoker, +blandly. "I regard cards as an abomination." + +"So do I," said Mr. Pedagog--"so do I. But even then I know a full +house--I should say a full pack from a--er--a--er--" + +"Bob-tail flush," suggested the Idiot. + +"Sir," said Mr. Pedagog, "I am not well up in poker terms." + +"Then you ought to play," said the Idiot. "The man who doesn't know the +game has usually great luck. But I am sorry, Mrs. Pedagog, that you are +so strongly opposed to cards, for I was going to make a suggestion which +I think would promote harmony in our little circle on waffle days. If +you regard cards as wholly immoral, of course the suggestion is without +value, since it involves two complete packs of cards--one cardboard pack +and one waffle pack." + +"I don't object to cards as cards, Mr. Idiot," said the landlady. "It is +the games people play with cards that I object to. They bring a great +deal of unnecessary misery into the world, and for that reason I think +it is better to avoid them altogether." + +"That is quite true," said the Idiot. "They do bring about much +unhappiness. I know a young woman who became a victim of insomnia once +because in a series of ten games of old maid she got the odd card seven +times. Of course it wasn't entirely the cards' fault. Superstition had +something to do with it. In fact, I sometimes think the fault lies with +the people who play, and not with the cards. I owe much to the game of +whist. It taught me to control my tongue. I should have been a regular +talk-fiend if it hadn't been for whist." + +Mr. Pedagog looked unutterable things at the Idiot. + +"Are you laboring under the delusion that you have any control over your +tongue?" he asked, savagely. + +"Most certainly," said the Idiot. + +"Well, I'll have to make a note of that," said Mr. Pedagog. "I have a +friend who is making a collection of hallucinations." + +"If you'll give me his address," said the Idiot, "I'll send him +thousands. For five dollars a dozen I'll invent hallucinations for him +that people ought to have but haven't." + +"No," returned the School-master. "In his behalf, however, I thank you. +He collects only real hallucinations, and he finds there are plenty of +them without retaining a professional lunatic to supply him." + +"Very well," said the Idiot, returning to his waffles. "If at any time +he finds the supply running short, I shall be glad to renew my offer." + +"You haven't unfolded your Harmony Promoting Scheme for Waffle Days," +suggested the Poet. "It has aroused my interest." + +"Oh, it is simple," said the Idiot. "I have noticed that on waffle days +here most of us leave the table more or less dissatisfied. We find +ourselves plunged into acrimonious discussions, which, to my mind, +arise entirely from the waffles. Mr. Pedagog is a most amiable +gentleman, and yet we find him this morning full of acerbity. On the +surface of things I seem to be the cause of his anger, but in reality it +is not I, but the waffles. He has seen me gradually absorbing them and +it has irritated him. Every waffle that I eat _he_ might have had if I +had not been here. If there had been no one here but Mr. Pedagog, he +would have had all the waffles; as it is, his supply is limited. This +affects his geniality. It makes him--" + +"Pardon me," said Mr. Pedagog. "But you are all wrong. I haven't thought +of the things at all." + +"Consciously to yourself you have not," said the Idiot. "Subconsciously, +however, you have. The Philosophy of the Unconscious teaches us that +unknown to ourselves our actions are directly traceable to motives we +wot not of. The truth of this is conclusively proven in this case. Even +when I point out to you the facts in the case you deny their truth, +thereby showing that you are not conscious of the real underlying motive +for your irritation. Now, why is that irritation there? Because our +several rights to the individual waffles that are served here are not +clearly defined at the outset. When Mary brings in a steaming platter +full of these delicious creations of the cook, Mr. Pedagog has quite as +much right to the one with the six of hearts on it as I have, but I get +it. He does not. Hence he is irritated, although he does not know it. So +with Mr. Whitechoker. Five minutes ago he was hastening through the four +of spades in order that he might come into possession of the ten of +diamonds that lay smoking before him. As he was about to put the last +spade in his mouth I requested him to hand me the ten of diamonds, +having myself gulped down the deuce of clubs to get ahead of him. He +couldn't decline to give me that waffle because he wanted it himself. He +had to give it to me. He was irritated--though he did not know it. He +sighed and gave me the waffle." + +"I did want it," said Mr. Whitechoker. "But I did not know that I +sighed." + +"There you are," said the Idiot. "It is the Philosophy of the +Unconscious again. If you are not conscious of so actual a thing as a +sigh, how much the more unconscious must you be of something so subtle +as motive?" + +"And your waffle-deck?" said the Genial Old Gentleman who occasionally +imbibes. "How will that solve the problem? It seems to me to complicate +the problem. As it is, we have about thirty waffles, each one of which +is a germ of irritation in the breast of the man who _doesn't_ eat it. +If you have fifty-two waffles you have twenty-two more germs to sow +discord in our midst." + +"You would have but for my scheme," said the Idiot. "I'd have a pack of +cards at the table, and I'd deal them out just as you do in whist. Each +card would represent the corresponding waffle. We'd begin breakfast by +playing one hand after the manner of whist. Each man would keep his +tricks, and when the waffles were served he would receive those, and +those only, represented by the cards in the tricks he had taken. If you +took a trick with the king of diamonds in it, you'd get the waffle with +the king of diamonds on it, and so on. Every man would be clearly +entitled through his skill in the game to the waffles that he ate." + +"Very good," said Mr. Whitechoker. "But suppose you had bad luck and +took no tricks?" + +"Then," said the Idiot, "you'd have bad luck and get no waffles." + +"Tutt!" said Mr. Pedagog. + +And that was the sole criticism any of the boarders had to make, +although there is reason to believe that the scheme had objectionable +features to the majority of them, for as yet Progressive Waffles has not +been played at Mrs. Smithers-Pedagog's. + + + + +IX + +A Clearing-house for Poets + + +"How is your Muse these days, Mr. Idiot?" asked the Bibliomaniac one +Sunday morning while the mush was being served. + +"Flourishing," said the Idiot. "Just flourishing--and no more." + +"I should think you'd be pleased if she is flourishing," said the +Doctor. + +"I'd rather she'd stop flourishing and do a little writing," said the +Idiot. "She's a queer Muse, that one of mine. She has all the airs and +graces of an ordinary type-writer with an unconquerable aversion to +work." + +"You look upon your Muse as you would upon your type-writer, eh?" said +Mr. Pedagog. + +"Yes," said the Idiot. "That's all my Muse is, and she isn't even a +capable type-writer. The general run of type-writers make sense of what +you write, but my Muse won't. You may not believe it, but out of ten +inspirations I had last week not one of them is fit for publication +anywhere but in a magazine or a puzzle column. I don't know what is the +matter with her, but when I sit down to dictate a comic sonnet she turns +it into a serious jingle, and _vice versa_. We can't seem to get our +moods to fit. When I want to be serious she's flippant, and when I +become flippant she's serious." + +"She must be very serious most of the time," said the Doctor. + +"She is," said the Idiot, innocently. "But that's only because I'm +flippant most of the time. I'm going to give her warning. If she doesn't +brace up and take more interest in her work I'm going to get another +Muse, that's all. I can't afford to have my income cut down fifty per +cent. just because she happens to be fickle." + +"Maybe she is flirting with somebody else," suggested the Poet. "My Muse +does that occasionally." + +"I doubt it," said the Idiot. "I haven't observed any other poet +encroaching upon my particular province. Even you, good as you are, +can't do it. But in any event I'm going to have a change. The day has +gone by when a one-muse poet achieves greatness. I'm going to employ a +half-dozen and try to corner the poetry market. Queer that in all these +years that men have been writing poetry no one has thought of that. +People get up grain corners, corners in railway stock, monopolies in gas +and oil and everything else, about, but as yet no poet has cornered the +market in his business." + +"That's easily accounted for," said the Bibliomaniac. "The poet +controls only his own work, and if he has any sense he doesn't want to +monopolize that." + +"That isn't my scheme at all," said the Idiot. "You have a monopoly of +your own work always if you choose to avail yourself of it, and, as you +say, a man would be crazy to do so. What I'd like to see established is +a sort of Poetic Clearing-house Association. Supposing, for instance, +that I opened an office in Wall Street--a Bank for Poets, in which all +writers of verse could deposit their rhymes as they write them, and draw +against them just as they do in ordinary banks with their money. It +would be fine. Take a man like Swinburne, for instance, or our friend +here. Our poet could take a sonnet he had written, endorse it, and put +it in the bank. He'd be credited with one sonnet, and wouldn't have to +bother his head about it afterwards. He could draw against it. If the +Clearing-house company could dispose of it to a magazine his draft +would be honored in cash to its full value, less discount charges, which +would include postage and commissions to the company." + +"And suppose the company failed to dispose of it?" suggested the Poet. + +"They'd do just as ordinary banks do with checks--stamp it 'Not Good,'" +said the Idiot. "That, however, wouldn't happen very often if the +concern had an intelligent receiving-teller to detect counterfeits. If +the receiving-teller were a man fit for the position and a poet brought +in a quatrain with five lines in it, he could detect it at once and hand +it back. So with comic poems. I might go there with a poem I thought was +comic, and proceed to deposit it with the usual deposit slip. The teller +would look at it a second, scrutinize the humor carefully, and then if +it was not what I thought it, would stamp it 'Not Comic' or +'Counterfeit.' It is perfectly simple." + +"Very simple," said Mr. Pedagog. "Though I should have used a synonym of +simple to describe it. It's idiotic." + +"That's what people said of Columbus's idea that he could discover +America," said the Idiot. "Everything that doesn't have dollars +slathered all over it in plain view is idiotic." + +"The word slathered is new to me," said the School-master; "but I fancy +I know what you mean." + +"The word slathered may be new to you," said the Idiot, "but it is a +good word. I have used it with great effect several times. Whenever any +one asks me that foolish question that is asked so often, 'What is the +good word?' I always reply 'Slathered,' and the what's-the-good-word +fiend goes off hurt in his mind. He doesn't know what I mean any more +than I do, but it shuts him up completely, which is just so much +gained." + +"I must confess," said the Poet, "that I cannot myself see where there +is any money for your Rhyme Clearing-house. Ordinarily I quite approve +of your schemes, but in this instance I go over to the enemy." + +"I don't say that it is a gold-mine," said the Idiot. "I doubt if I had +every cent that is paid for poetry in a year by everybody to everybody +that my income would reach one hundredth part of what I'd receive as a +successful manufacturer of soap; but there would be more money in poetry +than there is if by some pooling of our issues we could corner the +market. Suppose every writer of a quatrain in America should send his +whole product to us. We could say to the magazines, 'Gentlemen, +quatrains are not quatraining as hard as they were. If you need a +four-line bit of gloom and rhyme to finish off your thirty-second page, +our price is twenty-five dollars instead of seventy-five cents, as of +yore.' So with all other kinds of verse. We'd simply name our figure, +force the editors to accept it, and unload. We might get caught on the +last thirty or forty thousand, but our profits on the others would +enable us to more than meet the losses." + +"And would you pay the author the twenty-five dollars?" asked Mr. +Whitechoker. + +"Not if we were sane," replied the Idiot. "We'd pay the author two +dollars and fifty cents, which is one dollar and seventy-five cents more +than he gets now. _He_ couldn't complain." + +"And those that you couldn't sell?" asked the Bibliomaniac. + +"We'd simply mark 'Not Good' and return to the author. That's what +happens to him now, so no objection could be raised to that. But there's +still another side to this matter," said the Idiot. "Publishers would +be quite as anxious to help it along as the poets. Dealing through us, +they would be spared the necessity of interviewing poets, which I am +informed is always painful because of the necessity which publishers +labor under to give the poet to understand that they are in the business +for profit, not for pleasure or mere love of sinking money in a +magazine. So the publishers would keep a standing account of hard cash +in our bank. Say a magazine used one hundred dollars' worth of verse in +a month. The publisher at the beginning of the year would deposit twelve +hundred dollars with us, and throughout the year would draw out sonnets, +ballads, or pastels-in-metre just as he needed them. The checks would +read something like this: 'The Poets' Clearing-house Association of the +City of New York will pay to John Bluepencil, Editor, or Order, Ten +Sonnets. (Signed) Blank Brothers & Co.' Or perhaps we'd receive a +notice from a Southern publisher to this effect: 'Have drawn on you at +sight for eight quatrains and a triolet.' Now, when you consider how +many publishers there are who would always keep a cash balance in the +treasury, you begin to get some notion as to how we could meet our +running expenses and pay our quarterly dividends to our stockholders +anyhow; and as for future dividends, I believe our loan department would +net us a sufficient amount to make the stock gilt-edged." + +"You would have a loan department, eh?" said Mr. Pedagog. + +"That would be popular," said the Poet; "but there again I dispute the +profit. You could find plenty of poets who would borrow your funds, but +I doubt the security of the loans." + +"All of your objections are based on misconceptions," said the Idiot. +"The loan department would not lend money. It would lend poems for a +consideration to those who are short and who need them to fulfil their +obligations." + +"Who on earth would want to borrow a poem, I'd like to know?" said the +Bibliomaniac. + +"Lovers, chiefly," said the Idiot. "Never having been a poet yourself, +sir, you have no notion how far the mere faculty of being able to dash +off a sonnet to a lady's eyebrow helps a man along in ultimately +becoming the possessor of that eyebrow, together with the rest of the +lady. _I_ have seen women won, sir, by a rondeau. In fact, I have myself +completely routed countless unpoetic rivals by exploding in their ranks +burning quatrains to the fair objects of our affections. With woman the +man who can write a hymn of thanksgiving that he is permitted to gaze +into her cerulean orbs has a great advantage over the wight who has to +tell her she has dandy blue eyes in commonplace prose. The +commonplace-prose wight knows it, too, and he'd pay ten per cent. of his +salary during courtship if he could devise a plan by means of which he +could pass himself off as a poet. To meet this demand, our loan +department would be established. An unimaginative lover could come in +and describe the woman he adored; the loan clerk would fish out a sonnet +to fit the girl, and the lover could borrow it for ten days, just as +brokers borrow stock. Armed with this he could go up to Harlem, or +wherever else the maiden lived, and carry consternation into the hearts +of his rivals by spouting the sonnet as nonchalantly as though he had +just thought of it. So it would go on. For the following call he could +borrow a ballad singing the glories of her raven locks, likening them to +the beautiful night, or, if the locks were red instead of black, to the +aurora borealis." + +"You'd have trouble finding a rhyme to borealis," said the Poet. + +"Tutt!" said the Idiot. "What's the matter with 'Glory, Alice,' 'Listen +to my story, Alice,' 'I'm going to war so gory, Alice,' 'I fear you are +a Tory, Alice' (this for a Revolutionary poem), or 'Come rowing in my +dory, Alice'? There's no end to 'em." + +"If you'll write a rhyming dictionary I'll buy a copy," was the Poet's +sole comment. + +"That will come later," said the Idiot. "Once get our clearing-house +established, we can branch out into a general Poetry Trust and Supply +Company that will make millions. We'll make so much money, by Jove!" he +added, slapping the table enthusiastically, "that we can afford to go +into the publishing business ourselves and bring out volumes of verse +for anybody and everybody. We can deal in Fame! A man that couldn't +write his own name so that anybody could read it could come to us and +say: 'Gentlemen, I've got everything but brains. I want to be an author +and 'mongst the authors stand. I am told it is delightful to see one's +book in print. I haven't a book, but I've got a dollar or two, and if +you'll put out a first-class book of poems under my name I'll pay all +expenses and give you a royalty of twenty per cent. on every copy I give +away!' No money in it? Bah! You gentlemen don't know. If you say fortune +would not wait upon this venture _I_ say you are the kind of men who +would sell government bonds for their value as mere engravings if you +had the chance." + +"You certainly do draw a roseate picture," said Mr. Whitechoker. + +"I do indeed," said the Idiot, "and the paint is laid on thick." + +"Well, I hope it goes," said the Poet. "I'll make a deposit the first +day of three hundred and sixty-seven ballads, four hundred and +twenty-three couplets, eighty-nine rondeaus, and one epic about ten +yards in length, all of which I have in my desk at this moment." + +"Very well," said the Idiot, rising, "With that encouragement from you I +feel warranted in ordering the 'Not Good' stamp at least." + + + + +X + +Some Electrical Suggestions + + +"If I were beginning life all over again," said the Idiot, "I'd be an +electrician. It seems to me that of all modern pursuits, barring +architecture perhaps, electricity is the most fascinating." + +"There's probably more money in it than there is in Idiocy, too, I +fancy," said the Bibliomaniac, dryly. + +"Well, I should think so," assented the Idiot. "Idiocy is merely an +intellectual diversion. Electricity is a practical science. Idiocy +cannot be said to be anything more than a luxury, while electricity has +become a necessity. I do not even claim that any real lasting benefit +can come to the world through Idiocy, but in electricity are +possibilities, not yet realized, for which the world will be distinctly +better and happier." + +"It is kind of you to speak so highly of electricity," said the Doctor. +"The science may now advance, knowing that you approve." + +"Approve?" cried the Idiot. "Approve is not the word, sir. I +enthuse--and why should I not, feeling, as I do, that in the electrical +current lies the germ of the Elixir of Life! I thoroughly believe that a +bottle of liquefied electricity would make us all young." + +"Then don't take it!" said the School-master. "You have suffered from an +aggravated case of youngness for as long a time as I have known you. +Pray do nothing to intensify your youth." + +"I fear I shall be forced to deny myself that pleasure, Mr. Pedagog," +returned the Idiot, mildly, "for the unhappy reason that as yet the +formula for the Electrical Elixir has not been discovered; that it will +be discovered before I die I hope and pray, because, unlike the man in +the hymn, I would live always. I'd like to be an immortal." + +"An immortal Idiot! Think of it!" said the Doctor. + +"I didn't expect much sympathy from you, Dr. Capsule," said the Idiot. +"The man with car-horses to sell does not dote upon the trolley-car." + +"The application of the allegory is not entirely apparent," said the +Doctor. + +"No?" said the Idiot. "I am surprised. I thought you intellectuals +absorbed ideas more quickly. To deal in plain terms, since it appears to +be necessary, a plan which involves the indefinite extension of mortal +life and the elimination of bodily ills is not likely to receive the +hearty endorsement of the medical profession. If a man could come home +on a stormy night and offset the deleterious effects of wet feet by +swallowing an electric pill, one containing two volts, like a two-grain +quinine pill, for instance, with greater certainty than one feels in +taking quinine, your profession would have to put up the shutters and go +into some such business as writing articles on 'Measles as It Used to +Be,' or 'Disorders of the Ante-Electrical Period.' The fine part of it +all is that we should not have to rely for our medicines upon the state +of the arsenic market, or the quinine supply, or the squill product of +the year. Electric sparks can be made without number whether the sun +shines or not. The failure of the Peruvian Bark Crop, or the destruction +by an early frost of the Castor Oil Wells, would cease to be a hideous +possibility to delicate natures. They could all fail for all mankind +need fear, for electricity can be generated when and wherever one has +need of it. If your electric pills were used up, and the chemist too far +away from your house for you to get the supply replenished at the +moment, you could put on your slippers and by walking up and down your +carpeted floor for ten or fifteen minutes generate enough electricity to +see you through. Of course you'd have to have a pair of +dynamic-storage-reservoir slippers to catch the sparks as they flew, but +I fancy they'd be less costly in the long run than the medicines we have +to-day." + +"Why have wet feet at all if electricity is to be so all-powerful?" +suggested Mr. Whitechoker. "Why not devise an electrical foot-protector +and ward off all possibility of damp, cold feet?" + +"You couldn't do that with men and women constituted as they are," said +the Idiot. "Your foot-protector would no doubt be a good thing, but so +are rubber overshoes. Nothing will ever be patented to compel a man to +keep his feet dry, and he won't do it except under compulsion, but once +having his feet wet he will seek the remedy. It's the Elixir of Life +that I bank on most, however. I don't believe there is one among us, +excepting Mrs. Pedagog, to whom twenty-five was not the most delightful +period of existence. To Mrs. Pedagog, as to all women, eighteen is +the limit. But men at twenty-five and women at eighteen know so much, +enjoy so much, regard themselves so highly! There is nothing _blase_ +about them then. Disillusion--which I think ought to be called +dissolution--comes later. At thirty a man discovers that the things he +knew at twenty-five aren't so; and as for a woman at twenty-five, if so +be she is unmarried, her life is empty, and if so be she is married, she +has cares in the shape of children and a husband, who as a theory was a +poet, but who as a reality is a mere business machine who is oftentimes +no fonder of staying at home than he was before he was married and went +out to see her every night." + +"What a wise little pessimist he is!" said Mr. Pedagog to the Doctor. + +"Very. But I fail to comprehend why he branches off into Pessimism when +Electricity was his text," said the Doctor. + +"Because he's the Id--" began the Bibliomaniac, but the Idiot +interrupted him. + +"Don't jump fences, gentlemen, before you know whether they are made of +barbed wire or not. I'm coming to the points you are bringing up, and if +you are not careful they may puncture you," he said. "I am not in any +sense a pessimist. Quite the contrary. I am an optimist. I'm not old +enough or cross-grained enough as yet to be a pessimist, and it's +because I don't want to be a pessimist that I want this Elixir of +Electricity to hurry up and have itself patented. If men when they +reached the age of twenty-five, and women at eighteen, would begin to +take this they might live to be a thousand and yet retain all the spirit +and feelings of twenty-five and eighteen. That's the connection, Dr. +Capsule. If I could be twenty-five all my life I'd be as happy as a +bird--and if I were the Poet here I'd immortalize that idea in verse-- + + "A man's the biggest thing alive + When he has got to twenty-five; + And as for woman, she's a queen + Whose summers number just eighteen." + +"That's a good idea," returned the Poet. "I'll make a note of that, and +if I sell it I'll give you a commission." + +"No, don't do that," said the Idiot, slyly. "I shall be satisfied to see +your name in print." + +The Poet having accepted this sally in the spirit in which it was +intended, the Idiot resumed: + +"But of course the Elixir and the Electrical Pills are as yet all in the +air. We haven't even taken a step in that direction. Mr. Edison and +other wizards have been too much occupied with electric lights and +telephones and phonographs and transatlantic notions to pay any +attention to schemes to prolong life and keep us, despite our years, +perpetually young." + +"I fancy they are likely to continue to do so," said the Doctor. +"Whatever motive you may attribute to me for pooh-poohing your notions, +I do so. No sane person wants to live forever, and if it were possible +that all men might live forever, you'd soon find the world so crowded +that the slighter actors in the human comedy would be shoved off the +stage. There are enough people in the world now, without man's adding +all future generations to their number and making death an +impossibility." + +"That's all nonsense," said the Idiot. "My Elixir wouldn't make death an +impossibility. Any man who thought he'd had enough at the end of a +thousand years could stop taking the Elixir and shuffle off the mortal +coil. As a matter of fact, not more than ten per cent. of the people in +the world would have any faith in the Elixir at all. I know people +to-day who do not take advantage of the many patent remedies that are +within their reach, preferring the mustard-plaster and catnip-tea of +their forefathers. There's where human nature works again. I believe +that if I were myself the discoverer of the formula for my mixture, and +for an advertisement secured a letter from a man saying, 'I was dying of +old age, having reached the advanced period of ninety-seven; I took two +bottles of your Electrical Elixir and am now celebrating my +twenty-fifth birthday again,' ninety-nine per cent. of the people who +read it would laugh and think it had strayed out of the funny column. +People lack confidence in their fellow-men--that's all; but if they were +twenty-five and eighteen that would all be changed. We are very trustful +at twenty-five and eighteen, which is one of the things I like about +those respective ages. When I was twenty-five I believed in everybody, +including myself. Now--well, I'm older. But enough of schemes, which I +must admit are somewhat visionary--as the telephone would have seemed +one hundred years ago. Let us come down to realities in electricity. I +can't see why more is not made of the phonograph for the benefit of the +public. Take a man like Chauncey M. De Choate. He goes here and he goes +there to make speeches, when I've no doubt he'd much prefer to stay at +home cutting coupons off his bonds. Why can't the phonograph voice do +_his_ duty? Instead of making the same speech over and over again, why +can't some electrician so improve the phonograph that De Choate can say +what he has to say through a funnel, have it impressed on a cylinder, +duplicated and reduplicated and scattered broadcast over the world? If +Mr. Edison could impart what poets call stentorian tones to the +phonograph, he'd be doing a great and noble work. Again, for smaller +things, like a dance, Why can't the phonograph be made useful at a ball? +I attended one the other night, and when I wanted to dance the two-step +the band played the polka; if I wished the polka it played a waltz. Some +men can only dance the two-step--they don't know the waltz, the polka, +or the schottische. Now why can't the phonograph come to the rescue? In +almost any hotel in New York you can drop a nickel in a slot and hear +Sousa's band on the phonograph. Why not extend the principle and have a +phonograph for men who can dance nothing but the two-step, charged with +'The Washington Post March,' and supplied with four tubes with receivers +to put in the ears of the listeners? Make it small enough for a man to +carry in his pocket; then at a ball he could go up to a young lady, ask +her to dance, put two of the receivers in her ears, two in his, and trip +the light fantastic toe utterly independently of what other people were +dancing. It's possible. Mr. Edison could do it in five minutes, and +every one would be satisfied. It might be rather droll to see two people +dancing the two-step while eight others were fastened on to a lanciers +phonograph, and a dozen or more other couples were dancing respectively +the waltz, schottische, and Virginia reel, but we'd soon get used to +that, and no man need become a wall-flower because he couldn't dance the +dance that happened to be on. Furthermore, you'd be able to do away with +the musicians, who always cast a pall over dances because of their +superiority to the rest of the world in general and the dancers in +particular." + +"How about your couple that prefer to sit out the dance on the stairs?" +said the Poet, who, in common with the Idiot, knew several things about +dances that Messrs. Pedagog and Whitechoker did not. + +"It would be particularly attractive to them," said the Idiot. "They +could sit on the stairs and wax sentimental over any dreamy air the man +happened to have in his vest-pocket. He could arrange all that +beforehand--find out what song she thought divinest, and go loaded +accordingly. And as for the things that usually happen on stairs at +dances, as well as in conservatories at balls, with the aid of a +phonograph a man could propose to a girl in the presence of a thousand +people, and nobody but the maiden herself would be the wiser. I tell +you, gentlemen," the Idiot added, enthusiastically, as he rose to +depart, "if the phonograph people only knew their power they'd do great +things. The patent vest-pocket phonograph for music at balls and +proposals for bashful men alone would make their fortunes if they only +could see it. I almost wish I were an electrician and not an Idiot." + +With which he left the room, and Mr. Pedagog whispered to Mrs. Pedagog +that while he considered the Idiot very much of an idiot, there was no +denying that at times he did get hold of ideas that were not wholly bad. + +"That's true," said the good landlady. "I think if you had proposed to +me through a phonograph I should not have had to guess at what you meant +and lead you on to express yourself more clearly. I didn't want to say +yes until I was fully convinced that you meant what you didn't seem able +to say." + + + + +XI + +Concerning Children + + +The Poet had been away for a week, and on his return to his accustomed +post at the breakfast-table seemed but a shadow of his former self. His +eyes were heavy and his long locks appeared straggly enough for a man of +far more extended reputation as a singer of melodious verse. + +"To judge from your appearance, Mr. Poet," said the Idiot, after +welcoming his friend, "you've had a lively vacation. You certainly do +not look as if you had devoted much of it to sleep." + +"I haven't," said the Poet, wearily, "I haven't averaged more than two +hours of sleep daily since I went away." + +"I thought you told me you were going off into the country for a rest?" +observed the Idiot. + +"I did--and this is what comes of it," returned the Poet. "I went to +visit my sister up in Saratoga County. She has seven children." + +"Aha!" smiled the Idiot. "That's it, is it--well, I can sympathize with +you. I've had experience with youngsters myself. I love 'em, but I like +to take 'em on the instalment plan--very little at a time. I have a +small cousin with a capacity for play and impudence that can't be +equalled. His mother wrote me once and asked if I thought Hagenbeck, the +wild-animal tamer, could be induced to take him in hand." + +"That's the kind," put in the Poet, his face lighting up a little upon +discovering that there was some one at least at the board who could +sympathize with him. "My sister's seven are all of the wild-animal +variety. I'd rather fall in with seven tigers than put in another week +with my beloved nephews and nieces." + +"Did they play Alp with you?" the Idiot asked, with a grin. + +"Alp?" said the Poet. "No--not that I know of. They may have, however. I +was hardly conscious of what they were doing the last two days of my +stay there. They simply overpowered me, and I gave in and became a toy +for the time." + +"It isn't much fun being a toy," said the Idiot. "I think I'd rather +play Alp." + +"What on earth is Alp?" asked Mr. Pedagog, his curiosity aroused. "I've +heard enough absurd names for games in the last five years, but I must +say, for pure idiocy and lack of suggestiveness, the name of Alp +surpasses all." + +"That's as it should be," said the Idiot. "My small cousin invented +Alp, and anything that boy does is apt to surpass all. He takes after me +in some things. But Alp, while it may seem to lack suggestiveness as a +name, is really just the name for the game. It's very simple. It is +played by one Alp and as many chamois as desire to take a hand. As a +rule the man plays the Alp and the children are the chamois. The man +gets down on his hands and knees, puts his head on the floor, and has a +white rug put on his back, the idea being that he is an Alp and the rug +represents its snow-clad top." + +"And the chamois?" asked Mr. Whitechoker. + +"The chamois climbs the Alp and jumps about on the top of it," said the +Idiot. "My experience, based upon two hours a day of it for ten +consecutive days, is that it's fun for the chamois but rough on the +Alp; and I got so after a while that I really preferred business to +pleasure and gave up playing Alp to return to work before my vacation +was half over." + +"How do you score in this game of Alp?" said Mr. Pedagog, smiling +broadly as he thought of there being an embryo idiot somewhere who could +discomfit the one fate had thrown across his path. + +"I never had the strength to inquire," said the Idiot. "But my +impression is that the game is to see which has the greater endurance, +the chamois or the Alp. The one that gets tired of playing first loses. +I always lost. My small cousin is a storehouse of nervous energy. I +believe he could play choo-choo cars with a real engine and last longer +than the engine--which being the case, I couldn't hope to hold out +against him." + +"My nephews didn't play Alp," said the Poet. "I believe Alp would have +been a positive relief to me. They made me tell them stories and poems +from morning until night, and all night too, for one of them shared his +room with me, and the worst of it all was that they all had to be new +stories and new poems, so I was kept composing from one week's end to +the other." + +"Why weren't you firm with them and say you wouldn't, and let that end +it?" said Mr. Pedagog. + +"Ha--ha!" laughed the Idiot. "That's fine, isn't it, Mr. Poet? It's very +evident, Mr. Pedagog, that you're not acquainted with children. Now, my +small cousin can make the same appeal over and over again in a hundred +and fifty different ways. You may have the courage to say no a hundred +and forty-nine times, but I have yet to meet the man who could make his +no good with a boy of real persistent spirit. I can't do it. I've +tried, but I've had to give in sooner or later." + +"Same way with me, multiplied by seven," said the Poet, with difficulty +repressing a yawn. "I tried the no business on the morning of the third +day, and gave it up as a hopeless case before the clock struck twelve." + +"I'd teach 'em," said Mr. Pedagog. + +"You'd have to learn 'em first," retorted the Idiot. "You can't do +anything with children unless you understand them. You've got to +remember several things when you have small boys to deal with. In the +first place, they are a great deal more alert than you are. They are a +great deal more energetic; they know what they want, and in getting it +they haven't any dignity to restrain them, wherein they have a distinct +advantage over you. Worst of all, down in your secret heart you want to +laugh, even when they most affront you." + +"I don't," said Mr. Pedagog, shortly. + +"And why? Because you don't know them, cannot sympathize with them, and +look upon them as evils to be tolerated rather than little minds to be +cultivated. Hard a time as I have had as an Alp, I'd feel as if a great +hole had been punched in my life if anything should deprive me of my +cousin Sammie. He knows it and I know it, and that is why we are chums," +said the Idiot. "What I like about Sammie is that he believes in me," he +added, a little wistfully. "I wouldn't mind doing that myself--if I +could." + +"You might think differently if you suffered from seven Sammies the way +the Poet does," said the Bibliomaniac. + +"There couldn't be seven Sammies," said the Idiot. "Sammie is unique--to +me. But I am not at all narrow in this matter. I can very well imagine +how Sammie could be very disagreeable to some people. I shouldn't care +much for Alp, I suppose, if when night came on Sammie didn't climb up on +my lap and tell me he thought I was the greatest man that ever lived +next to his mother and father. That's the thing, Mr. Pedagog, that makes +Alp tolerable--it's the sugar sauce to the batter pudding. There's a +good deal of plain batter in the pudding, but with the sauce generously +mixed in you don't mind it so much. That boy would be willing to go to +sleep on a railway track if I told him I'd stand between him and the +express train. If I told him I could hammer down Gibraltar with putty +he'd believe it, and bring me his putty-blower to help along in the +great work. That's why I think a man's so much better off if he is a +father. Somebody has fixed a standard for him which, while he may know +he can't live up to it, he'll try to live up to, and by aiming high he +won't be so apt to hit low as he otherwise might. As Sammie's father +once said to me: 'By Jove, Idiot,' he said, 'if men could _only_ be what +their children think them!'" + +"Nevertheless they should be governed, curbed, brought up!" said the +Bibliomaniac. + +"They should, indeed," said the Idiot. "And in such a fashion that when +they are governed, curbed, and brought up they do not realize that they +have been governed, curbed, and brought up. The man who plays the tyrant +with his children isn't the man for me. Give me the man who, like my +father, is his son's intimate, personal friend, his confidant, his chum. +It may have worked badly in my case. I don't think it has--in any event, +if I were ever the father of a boy I'd try to make him feel that I was +not a despot in whose hands he was powerless, but a mainstay to fall +back on when things seemed to be going wrong--fountain-head of good +advice, a sympathizer--in short, a chum." + +"You certainly draw a pleasant picture," said Mr. Whitechoker, kindly. + +"Thank you," said the Idiot. "It's not original with me. My father drew +it. But despite my personal regard for Sammie, I do think something +ought to be done to alleviate the sufferings of the parent. Take the +mother of a boy like Sammie, for instance. She has him all day and +generally all night. Sammie's father goes to business at eight o'clock +and returns at six, thinking he has worked hard, and wonders why it is +that Sammie's mother looks so confoundedly tired. It makes him slightly +irritable. She has been at home taking things easy all day. He has been +in town working like a dog. What right has she to be tired? He doesn't +realize that she has had to entertain Sammie at those hours of the day +when Sammie is in his best form. She has found him trying to turn +somersaults at the top of the back stairs; she has patiently borne his +musical efforts on the piano, upon which he practises daily for a few +minutes, generally with a hammer or a stick, or something else equally +well calculated to beautify the keys; she has had to interfere in +Sammie's well-meant efforts to instruct his small brother in the art of +being an Indian who can whoop and scalp all in the same breath, thereby +incurring for the moment Sammie's undying hatred; she has heard Sammie +using language which an inconsiderate hired man has not scrupled to use +in Sammie's presence; she has, with terror in her soul, watched him at +play with a knife which some friend of the family who admires Sammie had +given him, and has again incurred his enmity by finally, to avoid +nervous prostration, taken that treasure from him. In short, she has +passed a day of real tragedy. Sammie is farce to me, comedy to his +father, and tragedy to his mother. Cannot something be done for her? Is +there no way by means of which Sammie can be entertained during the day, +for entertained he must be, that does not utterly destroy the nervous +system of his mother? Can't some inventive genius who has studied the +small boy, who knows the little ins and outs of his nature, and who, +above all, sympathizes with those ins and outs, put his mind on the life +of the woman of domestic inclination, and do something to make her life +less of a burden and more of a joy?" + +"You are the man to do it," said the Bibliomaniac. "An inventive genius +such as you are ought to be able to solve the problem." + +"Perhaps he ought to be," said the Idiot; "but we are not all what we +ought to be, I among the number. Almost anything seems possible to me +until I think of the mother at home all day with a dear, sweet, bright, +energetic boy like Sammie. Then, I confess, I am utterly at a loss to +know what to do." + +And then, as none of the boarders had any solution of the problem to +suggest, I presume there was none among them who knew "How To Be +Tranquil Though A Mother." + +Perhaps when women take up invention matters will seem more hopeful. + + + + +XII + +Dreamaline + + +"Well, Mr. Idiot," said Mr. Pedagog, as the guests gathered about the +table, "how goes the noble art of invention with you? You've been at it +for some time now. Do you find that you have succeeded in your +self-imposed mission and made the condition of the civilized less +unbearable?" + +"Frankly, Mr. Pedagog, I have failed," said the Idiot, sadly. "Failed +egregiously. I cannot find that of all the many schemes I have evolved +for the benefit of the human race any single one has been adopted by +those who would be benefited. Wherefore, with the exception of +Dreamaline, which I have not yet developed to my satisfaction, I shall +do no more inventing. What is the use? Even you, gentlemen, here have +tacitly declined to accept my plan for the elimination of irritation on +Waffle Days, a plan at once simple, picturesque, and efficacious. With +such discouragement at home, what hope have I for better fortune +abroad?" + +"It is dreadful to be an unappreciated genius!" said the Bibliomaniac, +gruffly. "It's better to be a plain lunatic. A plain lunatic is at least +free from the consciousness of failure." + +"Nevertheless, I'd rather be myself than any one else at this board," +rejoined the Idiot. "Unappreciated though I be, I am at least happy. +Consciousness of failure need not necessarily destroy one's happiness. +If I do the best I can with the tools I have I needn't weep because I +fail, and with his consciousness of failure the unappreciated genius +always has the consolation of knowing that it is not he but the world +that is wrong. If I am a philanthropist and offer a thousand dollars to +a charity, and the charity declines to accept it because I happen to +have made it out of my interest in 'A Widows' and Orphans' Speculation +Company, Large Losses a Surety,' it is the charity that loses, not I. So +with my plans. Social expansion is not taken up by society--who dies, I +or society? Capitalists decline to consider my proposition for a General +Poetry Trust and Supply Company. Who loses a fine chance, I or the +capitalists? I may be a little discouraged for the time being, but what +of that? Invention isn't the only occupation in the world for me. I can +give up Philanthropy and take up Misanthropy in a moment if I want +to--and with Dreamaline I can rule the world." + +"Ah--just what is this Dreamaline?" asked Mr. Whitechoker, interested. + +"That, sir, is the question which I am now trying to answer for myself," +returned the Idiot. "If I could answer it, as I have said, I could rule +the world--everybody could rule the world; that is to say, his own +world. It is based on an old idea which has been found by some to be +practicable, but it has never been developed to the point which I hope +to attain." + +"Wake me up when he gets to the point, will you, kindly?" whispered the +Doctor to the Bibliomaniac. + +"If you sleep until then you'll never wake," said the Bibliomaniac. "To +my mind the Idiot never comes to a point." + +"You are a little too mysterious for me," observed Mr. Whitechoker. "I +know no more about Dreamaline now than I did when you began." + +"Which is my case exactly," said the Idiot. "It is a vague, shadowy +something as yet. It is only a germ lost in my cerebral wrinkles, but I +hope by a persistent smoothing out of those wrinkles with what I might +call the flat-iron of thought, I may yet lay hold of the microbe, and +with it electrify the world. Once Dreamaline is discovered all other +discoveries become as nothing; all other inventions for the amelioration +of the condition of the civilized will be unnecessary, and even +Progressive Waffles will cease to fascinate." + +"Perhaps," said the Bibliomaniac, "if you will give us a hint as to the +nature of your plan in general we may be able to help you in carrying it +out." + +"The Doctor might," said the Idiot. "My genial friend who occasionally +imbibes might--even the Poet, with his taste for Welsh rarebits, +might--but from you and Mr. Pedagog and Mr. Whitechoker I fear I should +receive little assistance. Indeed, I am not sure but that Mr. +Whitechoker might disapprove of the plan altogether." + +"Any plan which makes life happier and better is sure to meet with my +approval," said Mr. Whitechoker. + +"With that encouragement, then," said the Idiot, "I will endeavor to lay +before you my crowning invention. Dreamaline, as its name may suggest, +should be a patent medicine, by taking which man should become oblivious +to care." + +"What's the matter with champagne for that?" interrupted the Genial Old +Gentleman who occasionally imbibes. + +"Champagne has some good points," said the Idiot. "But there are two +drawbacks--the effects and the price. Both of these drawbacks, so far +from making us oblivious to our cares, add to them. The superiority of +Dreamaline over champagne, or even over beer, which is comparatively +cheap, is that one dose of Dreamaline, costing one cent, will do more +for the patient than one case of champagne or one keg of beer; it is not +intoxicating or ruinous to the purse. Furthermore, it is more potent for +good, since, under its genial influences, man can do that to which he +aspires, or, what is perhaps better yet, merely imagine that he is doing +that to which he aspires, and so avoid the disappointment which I am +told always comes with ambition achieved. + +"Take, for instance, the literary man. We know of many cases in which +the literary man has stimulated his imagination by means of drugs, and +while under the influence has penned the most marvellous tales. That man +sacrifices himself for the delectation of others. In order to write +something for the world to rave over, he takes a dose which makes him +rave, and which ultimately kills him. Dreamaline will make this +entirely unnecessary. Instead of the writers taking hasheesh, the reader +takes Dreamaline. Instead of one man having to smoke opium for millions, +the millions take Dreamaline for themselves as individuals. I would have +the scientists, then, the chemists, study the subject carefully, decide +what quality it is in hasheesh that makes a writer conceive of these +horrible situations, put this into a nostrum, and sell it to those who +like horrible situations, and let them dream their own stories." + +"Very interesting," said the Bibliomaniac, "but all readers do not like +horrible situations. We are not _all_ morbid." + +"For which we should be devoutly thankful," said the Idiot. "But your +point is not well taken. On each bottle of what I should call 'Literary +Dreamaline,' to distinguish it from 'Art Dreamaline,' 'Scientific +Dreamaline,' and so on, I should have printed explicit directions +showing consumers how the dose should be modified to meet the consumer's +taste. One man likes a De Maupassant story. Let him take his Dreamaline +straight, lie down and dream. He'd get his De Maupassant story with a +vengeance. Another likes the modern story in realism--a story in which a +prize might be offered to the reader who finds a situation, an incident +in the three hundred odd pages of the book he reads. This man could take +a spoonful of Dreamaline and dilute it to his taste. A drop of +Dreamaline, which taken raw would give a man a dream like Doctor Jekyll +and Mr. Hyde, put into a hogshead of pure water would enable the man who +took a spoonful of it before going to bed to fall asleep and walk +through a three-volume novel by Henry James. Thus every man could get +what he wanted at small expense. Dreamaline for readers sold at a +dollar a quart would give every consumer as big and varied a library as +he wished, and would be a great saving to the eyes. People would have +more time for other pleasures if by taking a dose of Dreamaline before +retiring they could get all their literature in their sleeping hours. +Then every bottle would pay for itself ten times over if on awakening +the next morning the consumer would write out the story he had dreamed +and publish it for the benefit of those who were afraid to take the +medicine." + +"You wouldn't make much money out of it, though," said the Poet. "If one +bottle sufficed for a library you wouldn't find much of a demand." + +"That could be got around in two ways," said the Idiot. "We could +copyright every bottle of Dreamaline and require the consumers to pay us +a royalty on every book inspired by it, or we could ourselves take what +I would call Financial Dreamaline, one dose of which would make a man +feel like a millionaire. Life is only feeling after all. If you feel +like a millionaire you are as happy as a millionaire--happier, in fact, +because in reality you do not have to wear your thumbs out cutting +coupons on the first of every month. Then I should have Art Dreamaline. +You could have it arranged so that by a certain dose you could have old +masters all over your house; by another dose you could get a collection +of modern French paintings, and by swallowing a whole bottle you could +dream that your walls were lined with mysteries that would drive the +Impressionists crazy with envy. In Scientific Dreamaline you would get +ideas for invention that would revolutionize the world." + +"How about the poets and the humorists?" asked the Poet. + +"They'd be easy," said the Idiot. "I wouldn't have any hasheesh in the +mixture for them. Welsh rarebit would do, and you'd get poems so +mysterious and jokes so uproarious that the whole world would soon be +filled with wonder and with laughter. In short, Dreamaline would go into +every walk of life. Music, letters, art, poetry, finance. Every man +according to his bent or his tastes could partake. Every man could make +with it his own little world in which he was himself the prime mover, +and so harmless would it be that when next morning he awoke he would be +as tranquil and as happy as a babe. I hope, gentlemen, to see the day +when Dreamaline is an established fact, when we cannot enter a household +in the land that does not have hanging on its walls, after the manner of +those glass fire hand-grenades, a wire rack holding a row of bottles +labelled Art, Letters, Music, and so on, instead of libraries, +picture-galleries, music-rooms, and laboratories. The rich and the poor +alike may have it. The child who loves to have stories told to him will +cry for it; the poor wanderer who loves opera and cannot afford even to +pass the opera-house in a cable-car, can go into a drug-store, and for a +cent, begged of a kind-hearted pedestrian on the street, purchase a +sufficient quantity to imagine himself a box-holder; the ambitious +statesman can through its influences enjoy the sensation of thinking +himself President of the United States. Not a man, woman, or child lives +but would find it a boon, and as harmless as a Graham cracker. That, +gentlemen, is my crowning invention, and until I see it realized I +invent no more. Good-morning." + +And in a moment he was gone. + +"Well!" said Mr. Pedagog. "That's the cap to the climax." + +"Yes," said Mrs. Smithers-Pedagog. + +"Where do you suppose he got the idea?" asked the Bibliomaniac. + +"I don't know," said the Doctor. "But I suspect that without knowing it +he's had some of the stuff he describes. Most of his schemes indicate +it, and Dreamaline, I think, proves it." + + + THE END + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Inventions of the Idiot, by John Kendrick Bangs + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE INVENTIONS OF THE IDIOT *** + +***** This file should be named 33623.txt or 33623.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/3/6/2/33623/ + +Produced by Clarity, Suzanne Shell and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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