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diff --git a/old/65583-0.txt b/old/65583-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index ea36fb5..0000000 --- a/old/65583-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,5006 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook, New Brooms, by Robert J. (Robert James) Shores - - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world 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. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - - -Title: New Brooms - - -Author: Robert J. (Robert James) Shores - - - -Release Date: June 10, 2021 [eBook #65583] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - - -***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK NEW BROOMS*** - - -E-text prepared by Charlene Taylor, Charlie Howard, and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images -generously made available by Internet Archive (https://archive.org) - - - -Note: Images of the original pages are available through - Internet Archive. See - https://archive.org/details/newbrooms00shoriala - - -Transcriber’s note: - - Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). - - - - - -NEW BROOMS - -by - -ROBERT J. SHORES - - -[Illustration] - - - - - - -Indianapolis -The Bobbs-Merrill Company -Publishers - -Copyright 1913 -The Bobbs-Merrill Company - -Press of -Braunworth & Co. -Bookbinders and Printers -Brooklyn, N. Y. - - - - -CONTENTS - - - PAGE - I A PHILOSOPHICAL COOK 1 - - II A BACHELOR ON WOMEN 16 - - III ON PENSIONING WRITERS 20 - - IV A PURITAN IN BOHEMIA 27 - - V AN ARRAIGNMENT OF ORIGINALITY 42 - - VI A FLATTERING TRIBUTE 51 - - VII THE RIDDLE OF A DREAM 53 - - VIII BEDS FOR THE BAD 61 - - IX IS CHESTERTON A MAN ALIVE? 69 - - X FROM A HUNCHBACK 77 - - XI FROM A HOTEL SPONGE 89 - - XII FROM SARAH SHELFWORN 96 - - XIII FROM ANNA PEST 104 - - XIV FROM SETH SHIRTLESS 110 - - XV SARTOR-PSYCHOLOGY 118 - - XVI MR. BODY PROTESTS 126 - - XVII ON A CERTAIN CONDESCENSION IN FASHION WRITERS 138 - - XVIII OF LOOKING BACKWARD 146 - - XIX THE LITERARY LIFE 155 - - XX THE POETIC LICENSE 162 - - XXI THE NECESSITY FOR BEGGARS 168 - - XXII THE ABUSES OF ADVERSITY 173 - - XXIII THE SCIENCE OF MAKING ENEMIES 182 - - XXIV THE FATE OF FALSTAFF 192 - - XXV THE REWARD OF MERIT 202 - - XXVI THE BLESSINGS OF THE BLIND 212 - - XXVII A TALE OF A MAD POET’S WIFE 224 - - XXVIII THE LOCK-STEP 232 - - XXIX THE FRUIT OF FAME 250 - - - - -NEW BROOMS - - - - -A PHILOSOPHICAL COOK - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: Though I am not one of your subscribers I am, I believe, -one of your most faithful readers. I do not take your magazine, it is -true, but I am at present employed in a family some member of which is -evidently a subscriber, as the maid brings it out in the waste-paper -basket regularly, once a month, when, according to her custom, she -permits me to select from the month’s periodicals such journals as seem -to me to be worthy of my attention in my leisure hours. I shall not -conceal from you the fact that my fancy was first attracted to your -publication by the fact that I always found it fresh and clean, with -the leaves still uncut, and not soiled, bedraggled and often coverless -as are some of the others which suffer more usage before reaching me. -But having once cut the leaves with a convenient bread-knife and looked -through one of your numbers, I perceived at once that you are, in -your way, something of a philosopher, and I have ever been partial to -everything that smacked of philosophy. Could you step into my pantry at -the present moment you would find upon my shelves Plato and Aristotle -as well as the immortal Mrs. Rorer, for I am, in my humble fashion, a -philosopher as well as a cook. I do not at all agree with that learned -and talented French gentleman who declared that to study philosophy was -to learn to die; on the contrary, I hold that to study philosophy is -to learn to live, and I see no reason why the study of philosophy is -not as fitting an occupation for a cook as for a collegian. Therefore I -cook or philosophize according to my inclination, and if it seem to you -that I philosophize like a cook, my employer, I am proud to say, will -tell you that I cook like a philosopher. - -In youth I had the advantage of a grammar school education, and that -education I have supplemented with reading and observation. If, as -Pope has said, - - “The proper study of mankind is man,” - -then I have entered the right school for the completion of my -education; for the kitchen is, it seems to me, a natural observatory -for the study of human nature. Working away at my chosen profession -in the seclusion of my kitchen, I can, without ever having laid eyes -upon him, give you a complete character of the head of the household. I -can not with certainty say whether he is a large or small man, because -the appetite is sometimes deceptive in this respect, and I have known -a small man to eat as much as would suffice for two stevedores, and -I have known an athlete to peck at a meal that would leave a child -hungry. It is not, then, by his physical character that I judge him, -but by his mental and psychological symptoms. I do not gage him by -how much he eats, but by what he eats. I can not tell you whether he -is large or small, but I can tell you whether he is voluptuous or -esthetic, good-natured or crabbed, rich or poor, wise or foolish. - -It is really remarkable the knowledge I come to have of this person -whom I have never seen, or it would be if the method by which I reach -my conclusions were not so simple. If he keeps fast days and eats only -fish upon Fridays, I know, of course, that he is a churchman. If he -persistently eats food which is bad for any man’s digestion, I know -that he is both irritable and obstinate, for no man can continue to -eat what does not agree with him without becoming irritable, and no -man will continue such a course in the face of his better judgment -unless he is obstinate. If he eats only of rich food and shows a -constant preference for _taste_ over _nutrition_, I know that he is a -voluptuary; it is seldom that a man indulges himself in a passion for -over-eating who does not indulge himself in other passions as well, -and even though his one indulgence be eating, he is none the less a -voluptuary by nature. If he eats little and that in an abstracted -manner, sometimes overlooking a favorite dish or allowing his soup -to grow cold so that it is returned half-eaten, I know that he is -absent-minded and eats merely because he has to, not because he loves -eating for its own sake. If he insists upon having his toast an exact -shade of brown and his coffee at a given degree of temperature, I know -that he is exacting and particular as to details; that he thinks well -of himself and thinks of himself often. - -So, as you see, there are hundreds of these moral symptoms which are -as familiar to me as physical symptoms are to a physician. Thus I -supplement my theoretical knowledge of philosophy by my observation of -life. - -When I was casting about me for an occupation I had, being an orphan, -a perfectly free choice. Had I followed my first impulse, I think I -should have gone to live in a tub like Diogenes, and have resolved to -spend my life, like Schopenhauer, in thinking about it. But a little -observation soon convinced me that the man who lives in the fashion of -Diogenes is not held in high favor in these days and that philosophy, -as a profession, would be likely to prove unremunerative. Now I am not -one who desires riches or who can not be happy without wealth, but I -soon decided that I must be possessed of a certain amount of money in -order to indulge my taste for personal cleanliness. I soon gave over -the tub of Diogenes, but I was loath to forego all intercourse with the -ordinary domestic tub. - -Having determined, therefore, to enter upon some profession in which -I could make a reasonable amount of money without requiring a great -preliminary outlay, I looked about me for a vocation which might supply -my physical needs, and at the same time, afford me some mental and -spiritual satisfaction. I dismissed the study of the law or medicine as -beyond my means, and I did not find myself sufficiently religious to -permit me to enter the ministry with a clear conscience. For trade I -had your true philosopher’s distaste, and I confess no sort of manual -labor, except as cooking may be so described, held any attraction for -me. I shuddered at the thought of becoming a barber, chiropodist or -hair-dresser, and my pride would not permit me to suffer the rebuffs -which fall to the lot of a pedler, book agent or commercial traveler. - -It was then that I was struck with my happy inspiration. I would become -a member of an old and honorable profession--I would become a cook. -If I could not be a philosopher and nourish men’s minds, I would be a -cook and nourish their bodies. I would make dishes so delicious and -enticing that men upon the brink of suicide would turn back to life -with new hope in their hearts. I would impart energy to the weary, -peace to the troubled in mind and happiness to the discontented. I -would become such a cook as might have won the praise of Lucullus; I -would become an artist worthy to take the hand of Epicurus. Such were -the extravagant hopes I hugged to my breast when I matriculated at the -best cooking-school of my native state. It is true that my achievements -have fallen far short of my ambitions, but I have never swerved from my -allegiance to my ideal of the Perfect Dinner. - -Upon finishing my course at cooking-school, I utilized my savings in -indulging myself in a post-graduate course abroad. I went to Paris, and -there I made the acquaintance of the immortal Frederick of the Tour -d’Argent, he of the famous pressed ducks, and of other masters of the -culinary art. - -This, then, was my preparation for a life of cooking. Possibly you will -think that I took my profession too seriously; possibly you do not -hold the same high opinion of the art of cooking that I have always -held--there are many so minded. It is a never-failing source of wonder -to me that men are so quick to recognize the services of those who feed -their minds and so slow to acknowledge the debt they owe to those who -feed their bodies. I have never regarded cooking in the light of mere -manual labor. Labor, it seems to me, is work that is distasteful and -only performed from necessity; a “labor of love” seems to me to be a -paradox. Work, on the contrary, may be as keen a source of pleasure -as recreation. Work may be the striving of an artist to attain his -ideal. The very word “labor” suggests pain and exhaustion. We speak of -an author’s “works,” but who would think of referring to them as his -“labors”? - -I do not believe, as many seem to believe, that any man or woman who -can juggle a skillet or wield an egg-beater is a cook. Merely to follow -a formula in a cookery book does not make one a cook any more than the -compounding of a prescription makes one a physician. Cooking is an art -as well as a science. The violinist can not express his personality -in the strains of his instrument more fully than can the cook in his -cooking. The favorite dishes of a race are characteristic of that -race. The Spaniard, like his _chili con carne_ and his tamale, is hot, -peppery and economical. The Frenchman, like his many concoctions, is -full of spice, imagination and extravagance. The Italian is indolent -and averse to exertion, as is evidenced by his macaroni and spaghetti. -The Englishman is red and hearty like his roast beef. The German is fat -and fair like his sausages. The Russian is odd and interesting like -his caviar. The American, like his diet, is cosmopolitan. And as the -cooking of a nation or race is characteristic of that nation or race, -so the cooking of an individual is characteristic of that individual. -Coarse people do not prepare dainty dishes. A cook may strike a discord -as surely as a musician. - -To be a good cook, a cook worthy of one’s calling, one must have the -soul of an artist. One must be clean, self-respecting, industrious, -ambitious, earnest, quick to learn and trained to remember. Do other -professions require more? - -The cook wields a tremendous influence for good or for evil. Over a -good dinner the most cynical or the most brutal man must relax into -something like human kindness. It is indeed true that - - “All human history attests - That happiness for man,--the hungry sinner!-- - Since Eve ate apples, much depends on dinner!” - -If there be even the feeblest spark of charity in a man’s breast, a -good dinner will fan it into flame. A bad dinner, on the other hand, -will bring to the surface all that is mean and ignoble in his nature. -Indigestion, I surmise, has been the cause of most of the cruelty of -men. Viewing history in this light, it is easier to understand the -apparently wanton slaughter among barbarians. Fed upon ill-conditioned -food, the barbarian is attacked in his most sensitive part--his -stomach. He is upset, distrait; his nerves are set upon edge and he -knows not what ails him. He grows irritable and quick to anger, and -he wrecks his unreasoning and unreasonable spleen upon the first -convenient victim. It is to be observed that the science of cookery and -the progress of civilization advance together. Well-fed men are slow to -wrath and easily appeased. At the height of the Roman civilization the -Romans became epicures and ceased to be warriors. War has no charms for -the man who is at peace with his own stomach. - -It may be urged by some that cooking, in rendering a man unwarlike, -does him an ill service because it makes him effeminate. But the same -may be said of all the cardinal virtues except, perhaps, bravery. -Forbearance, loving kindness, gentleness, faith--all these and many -others are essentially feminine virtues. Nay, civilization itself is a -feminizing influence. Under our modern civilization, which as far as -we know is the highest the world has ever experienced, men are reduced -to the condition of dependents. Men no longer rely upon their personal -prowess and valor for redress for their injuries or the defense of -their natural rights. The law has become the protector of men, just as -men were once the protectors of women. And this feminizing influence -of civilization is, I take it, a wise provision of Providence for the -benefit of cookery. The less men are concerned with battle, murder and -sudden death, the more they are concerned with their dinners; and the -more solicitous they become for their dinners, the more they desire -the safety of the home, the peace of nations and the prosperity of -mankind--all things, in short, which help to make possible the Perfect -Dinner, perfectly chosen, perfectly cooked and perfectly eaten. - -I say “perfectly eaten” because it seems to me that there is an art -of eating as well as an art of cooking. It is said that a musician -does his best when playing before an appreciative audience; and so -the cook is at his best when cooking for an appreciative diner. It -is a discouraging thing for an actor to peep out from behind the -drop-curtain and see the pit all but empty of spectators; but it is -a heart-breaking experience for a cook to peep through the swinging -doors of his sanctum sanctorum and to behold the diners distant and -indifferent, this one idly chattering and that one buried in a late -edition of a newspaper, while his delicious soups, his super-excellent -omelets, his heart-warming coffee, his inspiring steaks and his -magnificent pâtés grow cold and unpalatable upon the unregarded plates! -To see one’s chef-d’œuvres treated as hors-d’œuvres--that is a tragedy -of the soul! - -To attain the Perfect Dinner we must attain the Perfect Civilization. -The diner must be as free to enjoy his dinner as the cook is to -prepare it; and, in like manner, the Perfect Dinner is the concomitant -of the Perfect Civilization. Man is civilized when he is well-fed and -uncivilized when he is ill-fed. This is a truth which you need not -accept upon my unsupported authority; any housewife will tell you as -much. If the earth were to be visited by a plague which attacked only -those who could cook and carried them off all at one time, I believe -that the world would relapse into anarchy in the space of thirty days. - -It seems to me that the profession of cooking is not at all -incompatible with the study of philosophy. As I apply my philosophy -to my cooking, so I apply my cooking to my philosophy. Some of my -philosophers I take raw, some I boil down to the very juice and some I -season; for philosophy, I believe, is often more digestible when taken -_cum grano salis_. - -I may be wrong, and it may seem egotistical in me to say it, but -really, Mr. _Idler_, I believe that if more people were of my mind -to mix their philosophy and their cooking, there would be many more -intelligent cooks and not a few more palatable philosophers. - - I am, Sir, your humble servant, - BARTHOLOMEW BATTERCAKE. - - - - -A BACHELOR ON WOMEN - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: I have lately been the subject of many animadversions upon -the part of literary critics because of a novel of mine, recently -published, which these critics have been pleased to term “a study in -feminine psychology.” My story has been criticized severely and my -observations upon the female character mercilessly condemned, and in -every one of these adverse criticisms which has been brought to my -attention, the reviewer has taken occasion to say, in substance, “This -book was evidently written by a bachelor.” - -Now, the fact of my bachelorhood I have no wish to deny, nor could I if -I would, for it is well known to my many friends and acquaintances that -I am a single man. But is the fact that I am a bachelor conclusive, -or even _prima facie_, evidence of my incompetency to discourse upon -feminine psychology? I do not see why it should be so considered. It is -plain that a great many people are of the opinion that the man who has -married a woman must know more of women in general than the man who has -not. But, after all is said, Mr. _Idler_, why should the married man -know more of women than the bachelor knows? He is married only to one -woman--not to all womankind. - -No man becomes an expert entomologist through the study of one insect. -There is no one insect which can furnish him with a general knowledge -of entomology. Nor is there any one woman who can furnish us with a -general knowledge of women. There is no one woman so typical of her -sex that all other women may be judged by her. Yet the only advantage -which the married man enjoys over the unmarried man is his intimate -knowledge of one particular woman. The married man has not the same -liberty of observing women which is the perquisite of the bachelor. The -only time when a married man has an opportunity to observe women other -than his wife is when his wife is not with him, and then, for a short -time, he possesses the same degree of liberty which the bachelor enjoys -all of the time. The bachelor observes, not one woman, but many. It is -true that his knowledge of women differs from that of the married man -in one particular: if he has any intimate knowledge of woman at her -worst it is likely to be a knowledge of Judy O’Grady, rather than of -the colonel’s lady. The bachelor sees good women at their best and bad -women at their worst. The married man sees one good woman at her best -and at her worst. - -The question, then, is, which sort of knowledge is more likely -to enable a man to form a just estimate of the female character? -Personally, I think the bachelor has all the best of it. And, Sir, -if none of these arguments has weight with you, there remains one -supreme argument which proves that the bachelor knows more of women -than the married man, and that, Sir, is the simple fact that he _is_ a -bachelor, as - - I am, Sir, - FORTUNATAS FREEMAN. - -N. B. The editor disclaims all responsibility for the sentiments -expressed in the above communication. - - - - -ON PENSIONING WRITERS - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: I observe by the daily press that the English government -has just issued a list in full of such authors as have been selected -for the receipt of a pension. In this list I find the names of a -number of widows and orphans of authors as well as the names of living -authors, and this is no doubt as it should be. I have heard certain -hypercritical persons object to the late project of the “Dickens stamp” -upon the ground that no man is entitled to anything which he has not -earned and that literary heirs are entitled to no more consideration -than monetary heirs. Now, personally, I can not understand what is -so objectionable about the inheritance of money. It seems to me that -a man’s heirs are quite as much entitled to receive the benefits of -his fortune or the fruits of his industry after his death as they -are during his life; and no one has yet gone so far as to say that -a man may not, with perfect propriety, bestow upon his heirs and -relatives such pecuniary gifts and benefits as he may see fit during -his lifetime. It seems to me that the heirs of an author inherit as -great an interest in his work as the heirs of a banker or broker. But, -however this may be, there is one feature about this pensioning of -authors which convinces me that the British government has gone about -the matter in a very wrong fashion. - -I find in looking over the list that pensions have been granted -because of writings upon ornithology, Elizabethan literature, poetry, -socialism, philosophy and so on. While I must confess that I am -unfamiliar with the majority of the names which appear upon the list, -I assume from the manner in which they have been selected that the -British government considers their work to have been of really great -value, although not popular. The British government, in fact, appears -to be offering encouragement, in the shape of pensions, to such writers -as can not hope to please the general public with their work. The -government is supplying a pension in lieu of popular appreciation. - -Now, this is all very well if the government is merely going into the -business of being philanthropic and is willing to extend its system -of pensions to include worthy shoemakers who have been unable to -secure a sufficient custom to keep them in food and clothing because -of the inroads made upon the cobbler’s trade by the manufacturers -of machine-made shoes; lawyers who are learned in the law, but who -have been unable to secure the business of the great corporations; -doctors who are efficient, but who chance to live in unusually healthy -neighborhoods; ministers of the Gospel who are unfortunately assigned -to meager or irreligious parishes; music teachers who are excellent -instructors, but who find formidable foes to business in the automatic -piano and the phonograph. If the British government is bent upon making -up for public indifference to such authors as are willing to benefit -mankind, but who can not make mankind take note of their efforts in -that direction, then, I say, the British government shows a kindly and -courteous disposition, but it should not stop with authors; it should -carry on the good work in every walk of life. - -But if, as I suspect to be the case, the British government is -establishing this system of pensions in the hope that the system will -result in more and better books, then I must say I think the system is -more likely to fail than to succeed. - -One has but to glance back at the history of literature to be convinced -that poverty has never been an effective check upon literary genius. -Poets have starved and philosophers have gone about clad in shabby -raiment rather than forsake their chosen work. Herbert Spencer did not -go clad in rags, to be sure, but where mediocre writers were reaping -fortunes from their literary labors, he was expending fortunes in the -effort to bring his philosophy to the attention of the world. Doctor -Johnson never wrote so prolifically or so well as when he was starving -in a Grub Street garret. - -An empty stomach does not mean an empty head where authors are -concerned. The fact of the matter is, it is easier for men to write -great poetry and to think deeply when they are poor than when they -are well-to-do. A wealthy and famous man has to suffer innumerable -distractions from the work he has in hand; his time and attention -are not his own to command. At every turn he is harassed by the -responsibilities of his position. In obscurity and poverty, on the -other hand, a man is not only brought more closely in touch with life, -but he is absolute master of his own time and effort. Providing he be -not married, and so responsible for others, the obscure and poor author -is absolutely his own master. Whether he drop his greater work for the -sake of earning a meal is a matter which is entirely optional. He does -not have to eat if he does not care to do so. The rich and successful -author, on the contrary, is expected to observe certain social duties -and to return courtesy for praise and patronage. If he treats his -public cavalierly and refuses to admit himself bound by the amenities -of ordinary life, he is in grave danger of losing both his popularity -and his eminence. - -“O Poverty,” wrote Jean Jacques Rousseau, “thou art a severe teacher. -But at thy noble school I have received more precious lessons, I have -learned more great truths than I shall ever find in the spheres of -wealth.” - -Had Louis the Little actually taken up François Villon from his squalor -and wretchedness, his stews and taverns, his thieves and slatterns, and -made him the Grand Marshal of France, as he is made to do in Justin -Huntley McCarthy’s romance, _If I Were King_, he would have spoiled a -good poet to make a poor courtier. When poor and writing for posterity, -the author is at his best; when rich and writing for more money, he -is usually so anxious to make hay while the sun shines that his work -suffers in proportion to his output. No, poverty has never spoiled a -good poet--even the youthful Chatterton might have lost his magic with -the disillusionment which follows on the heels of affluence. - -And since the really great authors can not be kept from writing in any -case, it would seem to me that a much better scheme would be to pension -those who were better idle. Let the British government pension, not -the good authors, but the bad. Let the penny-a-liner be retired in -comfort where he will never need to write another poem, novel, play or -philosophic treatise. Since the inspiration which moves him to labor is -the desire for money, when he has the money he will no longer have any -temptation to write. But for the great authors, who will write whether -or no, let them be kept on their mettle, stung to action by “the slings -and arrows of outrageous fortune,” inspired by their faith in their -work and close to the hearts of humanity, so that they may continue to -pour out the riches of literature, philosophy and science, unimpeded -by the obligations and worries attendant upon the possession of a bank -account! - - I am, Sir, - A LOVER OF LITERATURE. - - - - -A PURITAN IN BOHEMIA - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: You will often hear it asserted by those who assume to speak -with authority, that there is no longer any such thing as Bohemia in -New York; that the Bohemians are scattered hither and thither and that -their haunts are given over to seekers after sensation, sight-seers and -the like. The seeming sophistication of those who speak thus is, more -often than not, entirely _sham_, and is assumed by pert reporters for -the daily press who wish, by appearing worldly, to divert attention -from their patent callowness and youth. - -There _is_, Sir, such a thing as Bohemia, and there _are_ such people -as Bohemians, and this I know to my sorrow, and the way in which I -discovered this I shall presently relate. Bohemia, as I have found -it, is not a place, but a state of mind and a manner of life. The -Bohemians have a fixed abode no more than the Arabs of the desert or -the wild tribes of Tartary. If one of their citadels is wrested from -them by the invasion of the Philistines, they fall back upon another, -and being, for the most part, unencumbered with Lares and Penates, -they have no difficulty in finding another retreat in which they are -soon as happy and content as in the one which they formerly occupied. -They may be said to be a people without attachments (if we except -the writs so called by those of the legal profession), and if they -pay devotion to any god, I know not whom it may be, unless, indeed, -Bacchus, who was always a roving deity, as like to be found in one spot -as another, whose chief attributes are liberty and license, and whose -rites, therefore, may be celebrated wherever his devotees are given the -liberty of a place that has a license. - -But do not let me, by the use of these terms, lead you to fall into the -vulgar error that these Bohemians are people without conventions and -who observe no rules of conduct, but act solely according to the whim -of the moment, for indeed the contrary is the case. The Bohemians, -Sir, are as jealous of their customs and conventions as any class of -people, and they even have certain ideas of caste to which they adhere -as rigidly as the most fanatical of the Hindus. To lose caste in -Bohemia is like losing one’s “face” among the Chinese and results in -ostracism quite as surely. - -The customs and conventions of the Bohemians, as I shall presently -show, are, in truth, very different from the customs and the -conventions of what is known as “good society”; so that it is not -surprising that those who have only, so to speak, touched upon the -frontiers of this country of the imagination, should declare it to -be a land of absolute freedom and of individualistic philosophy. -Myself, when I first came among them, was as astonished and confused -as Gulliver among the Houyhnhnms, for here I found everything turned -about from the manner in which I was used to seeing it. That which I -had been accustomed to consider worthy, I found here to be unworthy, -and that which I had been taught to hold a fault I found here to be a -virtue. I had been taught to admire thrift, but here I found it held to -be the meanest of qualities. The Beau Ideal of a Bohemian I discovered -to be the young man who is free with his purse and careless of his -obligations. I found it a humorous thing to defraud one’s creditors but -a shameful thing to deny one’s purse to a fellow Bohemian. I had been -taught to be circumspect in my conversation with the ladies, but here -I found them conversing upon all subjects with utter freedom and an -entire lack of embarrassment. I had been used to admire innocence, but -here I found that innocence was considered as ignorance and a subject -for mirth or censure. Religion, patriotism, respect for established -customs, reverence for those in power--all those things, in short, -which had been so carefully impressed upon me at home, I found to be -nowhere admired among these people. - -To acquaint you briefly with the manner of my coming among these -citizens: I fell among them by design and not, as you may have -supposed, by accident. Possessed of some talent in a musical way and -having something of a turn for original composition, I had secured -a position in an orchestra in one of the local theaters. Though I -had been brought up in the most orthodox manner by my father, who -was a professor in a small New England college, I chafed under the -restrictions of social life in my native village, where intellectual -attainments were held in such high repute as to overshadow completely -all natural talent and genius, and where a man was more respected -for knowing Boethius than for knowing beans. I had neither taste -nor inclination for pedagogy, but yearned with all my heart for the -artistic life. I had, in short, a somewhat exaggerated attack of what -is known as the _artistic temperament_, and finding that my own people -considered music as a parlor accomplishment rather than a serious art, -I was more than ever impatient of their narrow-minded Puritanism and -more than ever determined to leave the little college town and all that -it stood for, and to go out into the world to seek companionship with -those who shared my own ideals and ambitions. - -The final rupture with my people came when I announced to my father my -intention of becoming a professional violinist, and he replied that -if I were determined to disappoint his hopes of my future I might at -least have hit upon something respectable, and not brought upon him the -reproach of having a fiddler in the family. “I can only hope,” said he, -“that you will be a total and abject failure in your misguided efforts, -for if you were to succeed and I were to come upon your name flaunted -in shameless fashion from the boards of some play-house, I should -certainly die of mortification.” With these good wishes ringing in my -ears, I packed my meager belongings, tucked my violin case under my -arm and turned my back upon my native village and respectability, as I -thought, forever. - -A few weeks of playing in the orchestra at a theater convinced me -that I had yet to seek the intellectual sympathy for which I left -home. My fellow players, with one exception, were all phlegmatic -Germans who played well enough, to be sure, but who appeared to be as -devoid of spiritual aspirations and artistic appreciation as so many -day-laborers. They worked at their music as a barber works at his -trade, and when the evening’s task was done, they retired to a corner -saloon where they drank beer, ate Limburger and talked politics like -so many grocers. There was, as I have said, one exception; a young man -like myself, who seemed to scorn the middle-class ideas and ideals -of our companions and who never joined in the beer-drinking or the -political discussions at the corner. This young man, said I to myself, -has been here for some time, and he, if any one, should be able to -direct me to the haunts of the true friends of art; he, of all these, -is the only one fitted to act as my guide, philosopher and friend. - -Timidly I approached him upon the subject nearest to my heart, and -heartily he replied that not only could he introduce me into the -free-masonry of art, but that he would do so the very next night. -Accordingly, when the curtain fell the following evening, we set off at -once and arrived shortly at a restaurant and café, upon the East Side, -which was situated in a basement. A large wooden sign proclaimed it to -be “Weinstein’s Rathskeller,” but my companion assured me that it was -known to the _elect_ as the “Café of the Innocents,” because those who -came there were yet young and comparatively unknown in the world of art -and letters. - -To describe my sensations upon that evening, Sir, would require the -pen of a Verlaine. My own poor efforts can never do them justice. I -can make shift to express emotion upon the strings of my instrument, -but when I exchange my bow for a pen my fingers become as thumbs and -my emotions defy expression, so that I am as helpless as a six weeks’ -infant plagued by a pin, and can no more make clear my meaning than a -sign-painter could imitate Rubens. - -Suffice it to say that I was overcome, charmed, enchanted! In stepping -through the portals of that dingy East Side resort, I seemed to have -stepped over the border-line that divides the world of the dull and the -practical from the world of romance and desire. I had entered the land -of dreams, the country of magnificent distances! I was as astonished -as William Guppy would have been had he stumbled unwittingly into the -rose garden of Hafiz. Here were men and women after my own heart; men -and women who saw the world as a whole, unbounded by the petty lines of -counties, states and nations. Here the names of the masters of art and -literature were bandied about as familiarly as the names of our local -professors were at home. Here were lights, here music, and here the -good glad laughter of youth! Here were women--not the slim spinsters -and prim matrons that I had known, but hearty healthy women who seemed -to be _alive_. Ah, that was it--they were all, all of them, so much -alive! Between their fingers they held, not knitting-needles, but -dainty cigarettes! Here was wine, wit and winsomeness--a dangerous, a -deadly combination for such as I! - -Well, Sir, to be brief, I was enthralled. I grew so greedy of that -atmosphere that I began to begrudge my work the hours that it called -me away from such good company. Finally I exchanged my place at the -theater for a position in the orchestra at the café. And so I came to -live among the Bohemians and become one of them. - -From the first I was enamored of the conversation of these stepchildren -of Genius, and I soon began descending from the platform and mingling -with the _habitués_ of the place; for at Weinstein’s the only snobbery -is of the Bohemian variety, and those who would blush to be seen dining -with a prosperous bourgeois, were not at all averse to drinking with -an humble member of the orchestra--for was not I, too, an artist? It -was not long before I began to care more for talking of my art than for -practising it, and all the time that I was playing I was impatient to -be down among the tables enjoying the praise which my performance, or, -as I am now inclined to suspect, the subsequent order for drinks, never -failed to secure. Thus I ceased to practise and played no more except -when I was at work. - -Of course I did not come to realize all this in a moment. - -It was some months before I woke from the daze into which I fell at -the first. It came to me gradually as I began to make unpleasant -discoveries. It was disconcerting to find that I had fled my own world -to escape conventions only to come upon others, or rather upon the same -lot, turned topsy-turvy. It annoyed me to find that to be accounted -a true Bohemian one must hold only certain views, and those always -opposed to the views of acknowledged authorities; that one must not -dress too well, eat too well or drink too well. Which was not at all -the same thing as saying _too much_. But this was by no means the most -shocking of my disillusions. I soon learned that while the Bohemians -are forever talking and thinking of success and wishing success for -their friends, the moment one of them really succeeds he is no longer a -member of the company; and for this reason it is said, with some truth, -that there are no successful Bohemians. When one of them who has made -a marked success intrudes himself into the old gathering place, he is -given such a cold shoulder that he never ventures there again. A small -triumph furnishes the occasion for a feast of congratulation, but a -real “arrival” excites the whole company to sneers and innuendoes, so -that such felicitations as are offered are bitter with envy. They have -a sort of optimism of their own, but it is all a personal optimism. -Each one hopes and believes that he will succeed, but each one believes -and secretly hopes that the others will not. A cynical smile and a -shrugging of shoulders is the tribute to the absent artist. - -Well, Mr. _Idler_, the longer I remained among these people, the more I -came to be of the mind of _Alice in Wonderland_, that though some may -be marked off from the pack and may look like kings and queens, they -are nothing but playing-cards after all. - -But there was one young woman who held my waning interest and who bound -me by sentimental ties to the life of which I now began to be somewhat -weary. If I had not made her acquaintance I believe that I should long -ago have left Bohemia and shaken the sawdust of Weinstein’s from my -feet. She was a demure young person, a newcomer from the West, who was -studying art. She seemed so different from the others, so fresh, so -ingenuous, that I could not but believe her to be genuine. She smoked -her cigarette and drank of the _table d’hôte_ wine, it is true (she -could do no less in the face of Bohemian convention), but she did -it all with such a pretty air of youth and innocence as touched me -greatly. For I was by now as strongly attracted by a quiet woman as I -had formerly been by a lively one. - -To spare you a tedious recital of my passion, I determined to ask her -to marry me, thinking that she might arouse in me the old ambition to -become a great musician--the ambition which my long sojourn in the -Lotus land of Bohemia had all but killed. And so one night I put the -question gently over our cups of black coffee, asking her, “Would -you--could you--share with me my career?” Then, Sir, that happened -which you will scarce believe. Yes, she said, she would be glad to -share my career with me, but I must be under no misapprehension; she -could not marry me; she already had a husband in the West; but inasmuch -as she had not seen him in three years and had never found him very -congenial in any case, he need not in any way interfere with our plans. - -As you may imagine, I was thunderstruck. I concealed my confusion as -best I might by pretending to choke upon a bit of cheese, and at the -first opportunity I made my escape and sought the seclusion of my -chamber where I faced my problem. I had striven to become a Bohemian, -but I had been born a Puritan and there was a limit to my acquired -unconventionality. I could not confess my prudery to the lady; could -not ignore the incident. Therefore I have determined to accept the one -course left open to me. I shall fly. I am now going out to pawn my -fiddle and with the money I get I shall buy me a ticket to that little -New England town where I first saw the light of day. - -Others may seek for inspiration at the Café of the Innocents, but as -for me, I am going where a modest young man may live in the protection -of the old-fashioned conventions. I am going where I can be moral -without being queer. _I_ am going home. And so, Sir, - - Farewell, - TIMOTHY TIMID. - - - - -AN ARRAIGNMENT OF ORIGINALITY - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: I am, I doubt not, one of your most devoted readers, and -the reason of my devotion, if I may say so, is because you so seldom -say anything original. Nay, Sir, this is not said in jest, but in -very earnest, for in truth I am vastly wearied of originality in all -its forms. We are so beset upon all sides by “originals” of one sort -or another, that it is a positive relief to open a book or pick up a -magazine which is decently dull and warranted harmless. To sit down for -a quiet evening with one of our sensational monthlies is like lighting -one’s self to bed with a giant cracker--there is no peace or quiet to -be had with ’em. - -From my earliest youth it has been my ambition to keep myself well -informed of the affairs of the day, and to this end I have made it a -practise to glance at least through the monthly numbers of our popular -magazines. I regret to say that I have been compelled to break off -this lifelong habit, as my physician has strongly advised me against -continuing it. The startling and alarming articles which make up the -bulk of the month’s offerings in these periodicals have a very bad -effect upon my heart and my imagination. More than once in the last two -or three years I have been troubled with evil dreams and nightmares -brought on by reading these publications shortly before going to bed. -More than this, I am by nature somewhat irritable and short of temper, -and I have been thrown into a very fury of indignation upon reading -the recital of my wrongs in these magazines; so much so, indeed, that -I have narrowly escaped apoplexy, a disease to which, my doctor says, -I am peculiarly liable. And since I had rather be swindled upon every -hand, as long as it is in happy ignorance, than to die of indignation, -I have left off reading them altogether. - -I can say without dissimulation that I do not miss them greatly. -To say the truth, I have small fondness for the originality which -is everywhere urged upon us in these days. I have small patience -with the spirit which drives us on from one extravagance to another -until there is no telling to what base uses the human intellect may -eventually fall. Sir, I have taken it upon myself to raise my voice in -protest against the prevalent craze for originality and to say a word, -which needs to be said, in defense of imitation. If in so doing I am -unintentionally original, I can only crave your indulgence. - -If I read the signs of the times aright, we are in imminent danger of -falling into the ways of the Greeks, “ever seeking some new thing”; -considering in our art, music and literature not the qualities of -beauty, sense and melody, but only the quality of _newness_, which is -to say, novelty. We do not ask of a musician, is his work harmonious? -But only, is it _different_? We do not ask of a painter, is he -artistic? But only, is he _clever_? We do not ask of an author, is he -sound? But only, is he _witty_? Is it not a sad commentary upon our -insane desire for change, Mr. _Idler_, that our artists, musicians and -authors should urge only these claims upon our consideration, that they -are different, clever and witty? Sir, the music of an Ojibway Indian -is different; a sign-painter may well be clever; and the most ignorant -street urchins are often witty. Are these, then, the only qualities we -should seek in those who presume to instruct and elevate the human mind -and soul? Are we to pass by sound sense for the sake of empty wit? Are -we to forsake harmony for the novelty of a mad jumble of absurd sounds? -Are we to value cartoons above masterpieces? - -For a convenient example of the depths to which we have sunk, let me -cite you, Sir, the case of dancing. Dancing was, I believe, originally -a religious exercise. Like music, it was employed to express the nobler -emotions of the soul. I confess that it may have been sensuous, even -at a very early date, but the most sensuous dance of the ancients, -the bacchante, was, nevertheless, performed in honor of a god. In the -minuet of our grandfathers there was both dignity and grace. There, -Sir, was such a dance as might enhance the noble bearing, the beauty -and the gentility of those who danced it. There was a dance fit for -ladies and gentlemen, a dance which had in it nothing incompatible with -innocent womanliness or manly dignity. Who, let me ask you, can say as -much for the unspeakable modern _original_ dances, the kangaroo, the -grizzly bear, and the bunny hug? Sir, can you bring yourself for one -moment to think upon the spectacle of George Washington dancing the -kangaroo? Can you conceive of such an unthinkable thing as Henry Clay -performing the grizzly bear? Can you, by any force of imagination, -picture Abraham Lincoln lost in the mazes of the bunny hug? God forbid! - -As it is with dancing, so it is with art. The poster insanity has -hardly passed away and we are already overwhelmed with a horde of -symbolists of one sort or another, who appear to agree upon one -point only--that pictures should not in any way resemble nature. -These ambitious daubers, Sir--I can not bring myself to call them -artists--have the impertinence to assume that they can express life -more fully and clearly upon their hideous canvases than the Author of -the Universe has expressed it in nature. As to the absurdity of their -pretensions, I need say nothing; it is apparent to all who can lay -claim to even the most ordinary degree of intelligence. But as to the -effect this nonsense has upon the weak, the easily impressed, I could -never say enough. This insanity has spread like a plague from painting -to poetry, and from poetry to all the arts that are known. Originality, -like charity, is made to cover a multitude of sins. The creative artist -who has not the strength or the patience to win distinction along -recognized lines produces something that is grotesque and defies us -to criticize his work, saying, “There is no standard by which you can -measure this, for it is absolutely new. Nobody ever did anything just -like this before.” The obvious retort to this would be that nobody ever -wanted to do anything like it before, but this would be lost upon the -artist, for the “original” of to-day is as impervious to ridicule as he -is to criticism. - -That music is better for being original, I do not believe. Such an -assumption is without warrant in nature. There is no purer sweeter -melody than that of the birds. What says the poet? - - “Hark! that’s the nightingale, - Telling the self-same tale - Her song told when this ancient earth was young: - So echoes answered when her song was sung - In the first wooded vale.” - -Year after year, century after century, these natural musicians -continue to ravish and delight all mankind with those same songs they -warbled on creation morn. It is no care of theirs to mingle melody with -horrid sounds; to weld their notes into a dagger of discord wherewith -to stab men through the ear. They do not strive to produce those -damnable gratings, shriekings and rumblings which so often pass for -music in these days. Where, Sir, is the originality of the nightingale, -or of the mocking-bird? Sir, all music may be noise, but that all noise -is music I do deny with all my heart. That a noise is new does not -recommend it to my ear. - -Sir, I lay it down as a proposition not to be refuted, that a good -imitation is better than a poor original, and while many men may create -passable imitations, very few can produce anything which is both -original and good. I do not hold it against an author that he is not -wholly original. On the contrary, if he imitate good models, I regard -his imitation as an evidence of sound sense. And, what is more, Sir, I -believe that most people are no more enamored of originality than I am. - -Here is a secret, Mr. _Idler_, known to only a few: We never grow -tired of the things we really like, but only of the things which have -appealed to us momentarily because of their novelty. When we really -like an author, we like another author who is like him. When we really -like a melody, we like another melody which is like it. When we really -like a place, we have no desire to leave it. Early in life we form -attachments for certain things--our homes, our parents, _Mother Goose_ -and the like. This fondness we never entirely outgrow. We like the -books we used to like, the pictures, the songs and the places. I am -speaking now, Sir, of normal human beings. There are some, ever seeking -new things, who never learn to like anything. To them, old books are -wearisome, old pictures are uninteresting, old tunes insipid. To them, -all places are places to go from or go to, but never to stay in. For -them, the past is closed and history is out of date. - -“Beware of imitations!” say the advertisements. “Beware of -originality!” say I. If we were all original, there would be no -living with us. The original genius is well enough when we wish to be -entertained, but it is the old-fashioned reliable imitator who makes -this world the pleasant place it is. And let us not forget, Sir, that -the most original thing in the world is sin. - - I am, Sir, - DAVID DUPLEX. - - - - -A FLATTERING TRIBUTE - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: Some months ago I read in your magazine an article in which -you advocated the keeping of a journal or diary, saying that by this -means one might always keep one’s self well informed as to what -progress one might be making spiritually, morally and mentally upon -the journey through life. This suggestion struck me very forcibly; so -much so, indeed, that I straightway determined to act upon your advice -and to begin forthwith such a record of my intimate life as would -enable me, at any time when the spirit moved me, to inform myself in -this respect. Up to the time when I read the article of which I speak, -I had always considered the writing of a diary as rather a senseless -occupation, since I could not see why one need put down that which -was already well known to one’s self; but when I had read your advice -upon the subject, I soon came to see that there is much which will -inevitably escape, not only the memory, but the attention as well, -unless committed to paper. - -Convinced, then, of the usefulness of such an intimate record, I set -myself to writing down with great particularity all that I saw, heard, -said, did or read; so that I may now look back at the end of the year -and review each day in all its details. As you may suppose, I was much -surprised to find myself given to habits of which I had formerly been -quite unaware. I discovered that much of my reading, for instance, -was of a decidedly frivolous and unprofitable sort. After considering -this for some time, I have come to the conclusion that it is time for -me to mend my ways and to abandon my habit of indiscriminate and idle -reading, and I therefore request that you will cancel my subscription -to _The Idler_. - -Thanking you for the article on diaries, which will, I am sure, prove a -most valuable suggestion to me, I am, Sir, - - Truly yours, - LUCY LACKWIT. - - - - -THE RIDDLE OF A DREAM - - “Set a beggar on horseback and he will ride a gallop.” - --_Shakespeare._ - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: I have had a curious dream and I am at a loss to account for -it. I have consulted an old dream book, which I have in my possession, -and which was formerly the property of my old nurse, Aunt Betty S., but -for all my diligent searching therein, I have failed utterly to find -anything which might serve as an interpretation of my vision. I called -at the public library of our village and asked for the latest and most -up-to-date work of this character, but the librarian only laughed at -my request and assured me that she possessed no such work and that as -far as she knew there had never been any such work upon her shelves. -To my protest that no library could be complete without at least a -few volumes of this character, she retorted that only fools and old -fogies any longer had any faith in the meaning of dreams, and that if I -was troubled with nightmare the best thing I could do would be to stop -lying on my back or be more careful of what I ate before going to bed. - -It would seem that I am a bit old-fashioned in my faith in the meaning -of dreams, though I do not see how any one who pretends to a belief in -the Christian faith can scoff at the interpretation and significance of -them in the face of the many notable instances cited in the Bible, as, -for example, the vision of Jacob and the dream which caused Joseph to -flee into Egypt. I suppose, however, that I should not be surprised at -the light and irreverent fashion in which the young people of to-day -treat this subject, when I reflect that a Christian clergyman has -recently suggested a revision of the Ten Commandments. Notwithstanding -the apparently widespread heresy concerning the futility and emptiness -of dreams, I trust that I am not the only Christian gentleman now -living who clings to the faith of his fathers and who has sufficient -faith in the inspiration of the Gospels to believe that a dream is -something more than a result of injudicious eating. It is in the hope -that some such person may be a reader of your journal and that the -result may be a correct interpretation of my own dream, that I am -writing this to you. I observe that your journal is somewhat behind the -times in many respects and therefore I assume that some of your readers -are likely to be as old-fashioned and as “superstitious” as myself. - -The dream which I am about to relate came to me in the following -circumstances. I had been out rather late the night before and had -partaken of a number of fancy dishes such as I am not in the habit of -eating at my own table, but which my daughter, who is just back from a -young ladies’ finishing school, assures me are much more pleasing if -not more nourishing than the ham and eggs which I was upon the point -of ordering for our supper after the theater. It was in the morning -of the next day and we were out in our new automobile which had only -come from the factory the day before. The automobile, or “car” as my -daughter calls it, is of rather expensive make and luxurious to a -degree. Being somewhat fagged by my unaccustomed dissipation of the -night before, I leaned back upon the cushions and presently I fell -asleep. - -It appeared to me that I was no longer in the automobile, but trudging -along the road as I was in the habit of doing in my younger years. As I -came to a turn in the road I was confronted with a troop of horsemen, -who were by all odds the strangest company it has ever been my lot -to behold. All of them were splendidly mounted on magnificent horses -which were caparisoned like the mounts of the knights in some rich and -gorgeous medieval tapestry. Their bridles were of chased leather with -bits and buckles of solid gold; their stirrups were of platinum and -silver, and their saddles were of silver and gold, upholstered in plush -and velvet. Silk and satin ribbons floated from the bridles of the -horses and flaunted in the wind in gay and beautiful streamers. But -with the horses and their trappings the magnificence came to a sudden -end. The riders themselves were the most incongruous riders for such -noble animals that one could imagine. They were, without exception, -tattered and bedraggled to the last degree of unkempt frowsiness. Their -faces were gaunt and drawn as with hunger and their hair hung unbrushed -and uncombed upon their frayed collars. In more than one instance a -foot was thrust through a silver stirrup while the toes of the rider -came peeping through the broken ends of his boot. A more wretched -company mounted upon more beautiful chargers it would be difficult to -imagine. - -At sight of me the whole company came to a sudden halt, checking their -mounts as at the command of a leader, though no word was spoken. The -leader of the cavalcade, who bestrode a handsome gelding, rode out a -little in advance of his fellows, and removing his crownless hat, swept -me a bow, leaning low over the pommel of his saddle. And when I had -returned his salutation, he addressed me in these words: “I give you -good morrow, gentle sir, and I beg you in the name of Christ and this -our company that you spare us a few coins of silver or of gold that we -may partake of food and drink, for the way is long and weary and we can -not travel without meat and wine to sustain us on our journey.” - -Now this speech greatly astonished me, as I had never seen so large a -company of beggars journeying together, and I was the more astounded -that men mounted in such splendid fashion should be asking alms. - -“What!” I cried in amazement, “are you begging then, while you ride -upon such fine horses, and your bridles and saddles are worth a king’s -ransom?” - -“Even so,” replied the leader, “and much as I loathe discourtesy, I -must remind you that our time is short, so pray give us what funds -you can spare and let us be on our way, for we hope to reach our -destination by nightfall.” - -“And what is your destination?” I asked. - -“The City of Vain Display,” he replied. “But we dally.” - -“But if you need money,” I protested, “why do you not sell your horses -and trappings?” - -At this the whole company cried out in protest, and the leader -answered: “Sell our mounts? Never! Look at them. Are they not -beautiful?” - -And truly they were. And as I looked at them I was seized with a great -desire to feel a horse of like magnificence between my knees, and I -cried, “I wish that I, too, had a horse like that!” - -“Give me all the money that you have,” said the leader, “and you shall -have one.” - -So I gave him the money. Presently I found myself riding with them and -my clothes were as tattered and torn as the clothes of the others. -And we set off at a furious pace, faster and faster, until the horses -panted with exertion, and after a time one stumbled and fell, sending -his rider over his head to the hard road. But nobody stopped, and -looking back, I saw the unfortunate fellow sprawling in the roadway -with his neck broken. On, on we went, one horse after another giving a -final gasp and falling down in the road, and as each one fell we who -were left urged our mounts to greater exertions, plying whip and spur -without ceasing, until finally only the leader and I were riding on. -Then his horse stumbled to its knees and rolled over on its side, and I -rode on alone. Lashing my horse I strained onward till the poor beast -came crashing down with a jar that threw me headlong upon the highway, -where I fell so heavily that I woke. - -I have pondered over this dream ever since, but I confess I can make -nothing of it. I must draw this letter to a close now, for my daughter -informs me that the automobile is waiting, and I have not mortgaged my -house to secure the thing for the purpose of letting it stand idle. - -I hope, Sir, that if you or any of your readers can read me the riddle -of this dream they will be good enough to forward the solution to - - Your humble servant, - TIMOTHY TINSELTOP. - - BLUFFTOWN, NEW YORK. - - - - -BEDS FOR THE BAD - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: It was Sancho Panza, if my memory serves me right, who -invoked a blessing upon the head of the man who first invented sleep; I -think he had done better to bestow his blessings upon the man who first -invented beds. I think it extremely doubtful if sleep can be classed as -an invention of man; it is, rather, a function, like breathing, and I -doubt not that Adam fell a-nodding before ever he knew the meaning of -sleep at all. The bed, upon the contrary, is without question of human -origin, for no other living thing has constructed anything resembling -it except the bird, who makes his nest serve him as both bed and house, -and certainly no deity could have occasion to use such an article, -seeing that eternal wakefulness is a necessary attribute of godhood. - -The bed, in my opinion, is the greatest of all human inventions, -without which sleep were robbed of half its pleasure. Nowhere do we -enjoy such delicious refreshing repose as when snugly ensconced in a -proper bed, and for my part, there is no other luxury which I could -not spare better than my bed. Napkins, tablecloths, knives, forks, -spoons--even the table, I could forego without great loss of appetite, -but I can rest nowhere else than in a bed, and I can rest well in no -bed but my own. So strong is my regard for this article of household -furniture, that, were I a poet, I should ask no greater glory than to -be the author of those beautiful lines of Thomas Hood-- - - “O bed! O bed! delicious bed! - That heaven upon earth to the weary head!” - -No truer words were ever spoken than those of Isaac De Benserade when -he said: - - “In bed we laugh, in bed we cry, - And, born in bed, in bed we die; - The near approach a bed may show - Of human bliss to human woe.” - -A man may be without land or money and still be happy; he may endure -the loss of friends and fortune, and he may preserve his courage even -in the face of shame and disgrace; but, Sir, a man who has not a good -bed is no more than half a man. Without this refuge from the trials and -troubles of the world, a man is robbed of the one consolation which it -should be the right of every man to enjoy. Without a bed, his vitality -is sapped, his courage is broken down and his moral sense is impaired. -I maintain, Sir, that no man can go bedless without becoming a menace -to the community, and this brings me to the subject I had in mind when -I sat down to write this letter. - -I have observed, Mr. _Idler_, that though a great many people of -excellent intentions devote themselves to the task of reforming and -reclaiming members of the criminal class, the result of their labors -is very far from being satisfactory. In spite of the great number -of reformatories, prisons and houses of refuge erected in all parts -of the world; in spite of numberless soup kitchens, missions, free -sanatoriums and the like, men continue to break the laws and all our -efforts to eradicate crime appear to go for little or nothing. Now I -am convinced that there is a very good reason why this is true, and -it is my conviction that our failure to abolish crime is directly due -to our stupidity and block-headedness in attacking the problem from -the wrong angle. Instead of trying to reform our criminals by the fear -of punishment, we should prevent crime by diverting their minds from -evil-doing and direct them into proper paths by the simple expedient -which I am about to lay before you. - -There is nothing in the world which is more likely to put a man into a -good humor with himself, with other men and with existing conditions, -than a good night’s rest. As I have said before, every man who lacks a -bed is a potential criminal and there are a number of reasons why this -is so. To lack repose naturally wears upon the nerves and reduces a man -to a condition bordering upon insanity. It is conducive to cynicism, -self-pity, a feeling of resentment against all other men and a strong -sense of injustice. No matter what the cause of his bedless condition -may be, no man can preserve an even temper when he wants to go to bed -and has no bed to which he may go. Again, being out of bed and out of -temper, he is ripe for various sorts of evil deeds from which he would -turn in loathing after a good night’s rest. He is driven for shelter -and divertisement into the haunts of vice and the dens of iniquity. He -beguiles his sleepless hours in the company of vicious and dissolute -persons. He regards the world from an entirely different point of -view from the man who has just passed seven or eight pleasant hours -in restful slumber. Sleeplessness and crime are as closely related as -insomnia and insanity. Crime leads to sleeplessness and sleeplessness -leads to crime. - -Now, Sir, what I propose is just this: let us put the criminals to bed. -Instead of offering the outcast a cold plate of soup or an inane tract, -let us offer him a warm comfortable bed where he may lie down and pass -at least eight hours of the twenty-four in dreaming that he is John D. -Rockefeller or some other such harmless illusion. Let us offer him an -opportunity to recover his strength, his courage and his moral balance -in innocent sleep. I do not believe that the perfect social state can -ever be brought about until such time as every person in the world -shall own his own bed; until such time as beds shall be assigned by law -to all those who can not purchase them upon their own account; until -such time as a man’s bed shall be sacred to his own use, exempt from -taxation or seizure by writ or other legal process and as inviolate as -the clothes upon his back. I do not believe a perfect social state will -ever be attained until it shall be a crime for a chambermaid to make a -bed improperly or for a merchant to sell an imperfect spring or a lumpy -mattress. I do not believe a perfect social state can ever be reached -until every man in the world, and every woman and child, is guaranteed -a good night’s rest every night in the year. - -But as we have not yet advanced to a state of civilization where it -would be practicable to provide every human being with a personal -bed of his own, let us do what we can. Do you believe, Sir, that any -but the most callow of youthful roisterers prefer the disgusting -atmosphere of the all-night saloon or the bleak cheerlessness of a -park bench to the heavenly comforts of a good bed? If you do, Sir, -you are vastly mistaken. Throw open to these men an absolutely free -lodging-house filled with clean comfortable beds, where all may come -and go unquestioned as long as they enter at a certain hour and remain -a stipulated time, and I warrant you that lodging-house will be filled -to its capacity every night in the year. Let every community erect as -many of these lodging-houses as its financial condition will permit. -Let the vast sums that are now being wasted upon futile missions and -piffling soup-kitchens be diverted to this legitimate end. Once we -have our criminals and our outcasts in bed, we shall have them out of -the streets, out of the parks, out of the gambling hells, out of the -brothels and out of mischief! - -The state plays the father in chastising disobedient citizens; let the -state also play the mother in tucking them into bed. Go look upon them -when every face is wiped clean of frown and leer; go look upon them -when every face is smooth and quiet as the resting soul within - - “And on their lids - The baby Sleep is pillowed ...” - -and I warrant you, you shall find them, not outcasts and outlaws, but -poor tired children whom you can not forbear to wish, as I now wish you, - - Good night, and happy dreams! - CADWALLADER COVERLET. - - - - -IS CHESTERTON A MAN ALIVE? - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: If I were a writer of biographical sketches, I should begin -these remarks with the statement that Gilbert Keith Chesterton was -born in the year 1874; but I am not a writer of biographical sketches. -On the contrary, Sir, I am one who aims to tell the truth as often -as it is possible to tell the truth without appearing eccentric. I -do not begin these remarks in the fashion I have suggested because -I am restrained by scruples which would never trouble a writer of -biographies. The fact of the matter is, I do not know that Gilbert -Keith Chesterton was born in 1874. I do not know that he was ever born -at all--at most I only suspect it. I suspect it because I never knew a -man who had never been born to attract so much attention. His books may -be urged as evidence of his birth, but they are by no means conclusive -evidence. So far as my personal information goes, he may be nothing -more than a name, like _Bertha M. Clay_. Perhaps he is only a creature -of the imagination, like _Innocent Smith_, created by some author who -chooses to write under the name, “Gilbert Chesterton.” I do not suggest -these things as probabilities, but only as possibilities. And yet, what -could be more improbable than Chesterton himself? Is it not, after all, -more probable that he has been evolved from pen and ink, than from the -clay of Adam? - -We come now to the question which I borrow from the title of this -paper: Is Gilbert Keith Chesterton a man alive? Is he not, rather, a -very amusing conception of what a man might be? Let us consider the -matter. - -Of course the fact that you and I have no positive proof of his having -been born does not argue that he is not a living man. Every day we -meet men who are unquestionably as real as ourselves (providing we do -not lean to the theory of Bishop Berkeley, that we can be sure of no -existence but our own), yet we know little or nothing of the origin -of these men. They may have been born, or they may not. If you were to -ask them, they would probably insist that they were born at one time -or another. They believe this because they can not account for their -existence upon any other hypothesis. But they believe it on hearsay -evidence. Not one of them really remembers anything at all about it. -People sometimes grow up to learn that they are changelings; that -they are not at all the people they had thought they were. Is it not -possible, then, that here and there may live a man who was never born -at all? I should not be so bold as to deny the possibility. There have -always been legends of men who can not die--men who live on in spite -of age and accident. I see no reason why one man should not escape -birth if another may escape death. I do not, therefore, insist that Mr. -Chesterton prove himself to have been born. It is only that I find it -hard to believe that he really exists in the flesh. - -Now, Mr. Chesterton, in all his works, dwells upon the subject of -madness or insanity. Does this prove that Mr. Chesterton is mad? By -no means. As he himself has said, the man who is really mad seldom -suspects that he is unbalanced; it is the man who fears madness who -finds madness a fascinating subject. Sir, Mr. Chesterton is not mad, -but I think he fears madness. It is almost impossible to find one of -his essays in which there is no mention of madness. I think it fair to -assume that he writes of madness because he has a fear--not necessarily -a terror, you understand, but still a fear--that some day he may be -afflicted with this malady. Mr. Chesterton also writes a whole book -upon the subject of being alive. Are we to assume, because of this, -that he _is_ alive? By no means. It is quite possible that he only -fears he may some day come alive; that he may some day cease to be the -whimsical creation of some author’s fancy and become a real man of -flesh and blood. - -Do you see no reason why he should fear such a metamorphosis? Surely -you must. From time immemorial, men have shuddered at the thought of -becoming a spirit, an infinite being composed chiefly of memory; a -purely intellectual organism having nothing material in its make-up. -Now if men are disturbed, as they are, at the prospect of becoming -ideas, why should not ideas be disturbed at the prospect of becoming -men? Is it likely that an idea, immune from all the evils of mortal -existence, superior to the weaknesses of the flesh and possessing, at -least, a potential immortality, would be pleased with the prospect of -becoming mere man? Would an idea willingly abandon the clear atmosphere -of a purely intellectual plane for the muggy mists and murky fogs of -London? Assuredly not. - -Lucretius, ridiculing the theory of reincarnation in his work, _De -Rerum Natura_, drew a ludicrous picture of disembodied spirits eagerly -awaiting their turn to enter a vacant human tenement. Lucretius was -thoroughly appreciative of the absurdity of his picture. He knew that -no disembodied spirit would be so foolish as to desire imprisonment -in a mortal frame. And as it is with spirits, so we may suppose it to -be with ideas. It is one thing to be put into a book; it is quite -another to be put into a body. No matter how often an idea may be put -into a book, it can not be confined therein. It is still free to travel -where it lists. It can leap from London to Overroads in the twinkling -of an eye--or it can be in both places at one and the same time. It -may appear to a dozen different men in a dozen different aspects. It -possesses the Protean faculty of being all things to all men. But -confine that idea in a human body; transform that idea into a human -being--and what is the result? Why, the result is an immediate loss of -liberty. The man, who was formerly an idea, can no longer flit about -with lightning-like rapidity. If he wishes to travel from Overroads -to London, he must go by train or motor-car. He can by no ingenuity -contrive to be in both places at the same time. He must wear the same -face wherever or in whatever company he may be. Whether the body which -he inhabits is known to its neighbors as Smith or Chesterton, the -result is the same--he has lost his liberty. And what has he gained? He -has gained the ability to prove his mortal existence--the right to say -that he has been born. - -It is easy enough to see why an idea should fear to become a man. -And when we consider such an idea as Chesterton, the matter is even -clearer. Whimsicalities and contradictions which may have been useful -and even ornamental in the fictitious Chesterton--in Chesterton the -idea--might, Sir, prove most embarrassing to Chesterton the British -Subject. You can not prosecute an idea for treason, nor sue it for -damages. You can not even confine an idea in a mad-house for being -crazy. Most ideas are crazy; none more so perhaps than the one which -I am presenting to you now. It is true that a few ideas have been -confined in a mad-house, but of those few which have been shut up with -the persons claiming them, the great majority have been quite sane. -Just as many sane men are devoted to crazy ideas, so many sane ideas -are devoted to crazy men; so devoted to them that they will follow them -anywhere--even to a mad-house. - -If my idea that Mr. Chesterton is an idea is correct, I am sure I do -not know whose idea he may be; but he is just such a crazy idea as -might belong to a sane man and should therefore be safe in sticking -to his originator. If Mr. Chesterton _is_ an idea and is thinking of -becoming a man, I should strongly advise him against adopting any such -course. I like him much better as an idea. He is so much more plausible -that way. - - I am, Sir, - A. VISIONARY. - - - - -FROM A HUNCHBACK - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: I had the misfortune, through no fault of my own, to be -born a hunchback. This, in itself, Sir, is an affliction sufficient -to render my life a hard one and to embitter such happiness as I may -snatch from the hands of fate; but it is an affliction for which, as -far as I know, nobody is to blame, and one, therefore, which I must -bear with such patience and fortitude as I can command. But I bear in -common with other cripples a far greater burden than mere physical -disability, and that is the contempt and pity of my fellow men. - -I find that some men regard me with contempt alone, some with contempt -and pity intermingled, and some with simple pity--and of the three I -think the last is, perhaps, the hardest to endure with equanimity, -since it is the most sincere feeling of superiority which prompts it. -I do not ask the pity of my fellows; I consider myself in much better -case than many men who have straight backs and smooth shoulders; and -certainly I can not see why I should deserve the contempt of any one -merely because I happen to have been born with a body unlike that of -the majority of men. Yet I find the hump upon my back a hindrance in -every venture that I undertake. - -A few years ago when I was younger and more sanguine than I am now, -when I still had faith in the innate fairness of human nature and in -the spirituality of the love of women, I fell in love. Fortunately, -as I thought then, I had not come into the world naked if I had come -crooked, for I possessed a comfortable balance at the bank; a sum -of money in point of fact which was far in excess of the financial -resources of any of the other young men of my acquaintance. Counting -upon the good times which my supply of ready money seemed likely to -afford them, a number of the more prominent young men of my native town -had taken the trouble to cultivate my society during their college -days when they were often short of money and found it convenient to -have a friend who could always be relied on to help out in a pinch and -who was not at all inclined to play the dun if payments were somewhat -slow. Having, as I say, availed themselves of my generosity and -cultivated my company in those lean years of study, these young men, -upon entering into the world of business and society, could not, with -a good grace, begin to ignore me altogether, and they therefore made -it a point to look me up now and then and to invite me about with them -to such functions and entertainments as I might enjoy, and at the same -time, enter into unhandicapped by my physical deformity. - -I could not, of course, play tennis, golf or any game of that sort. -I was, in truth, deterred from entering into any such sport more by -my natural horror of appearing ridiculous than by reason of an actual -lack of the strength necessary to swing a racket or handle a club. The -fact is, I am not especially weak physically, having always taken great -care of my health and having practised with some success such physical -exercises as might be practised in the privacy of my own chambers -or such as would not be likely to excite comment. But no matter how -muscular a man may be, he can not but appear absurd when he goes about -carrying a golf club nearly as tall as himself or rushing about a -tennis net like a lame camel. - -But though, as I say, I was not in demand for such games as these, I -did play an excellent hand at whist, could thrum the guitar a bit, play -accompaniments upon the piano, sing a little in a fairly good baritone -voice and carry on a conversation light or heavy as the occasion seemed -to require. Of course, I did not dance, but I often sat at the piano -and furnished music for the others, thus making myself useful and at -the same time diplomatically avoiding drawing notice to the fact that -I was disqualified as a dancer. Although I always had a secret longing -for theatricals and knew myself to be possessed of histrionic ability -in no mean degree, I never joined our local amateur dramatic club. I -think perhaps I might have done so had not some tactless member of -the club once sent me an invitation to take part in a performance of -_Richard the Third_, which so incensed me that I never again so much as -attended a play given by that organization. - -It was during this time, when I was almost enjoying life like an -ordinary man, owing to the careful manner in which my acquaintances -concealed their dislike and contempt for my crooked back, that I met -and fell in love with a girl who seemed to me, at the time, a charming -and sweet-souled young woman. I saw a great deal of her, owing to the -fact that we were both of musical tastes and often played and sang -together, and it was not long before I came to the conclusion that if -I were ever to marry I might as well be about it then as any time, and -especially since I had the necessary mate at hand, so to speak. To -think was to act with me in those days, and I put the matter to her -bluntly the very first time I saw her after forming my resolution in -this respect. You may not believe me, but I swear to you that I am -telling the truth when I say that I had grown so accustomed to having -my friends ignore my infirmity that I had quite forgotten to take it -into account in the case of the young woman. In fact, I would have -considered it an unjust aspersion of her character to think her capable -of holding such a thing against me, our relations having been always of -the most spiritual. - -You can imagine, then, the shock it gave me when I saw the horror -growing in her eyes which I had so often surprised in the eyes of -strangers! You can fancy, perhaps, the physical and mental anguish I -suffered in that moment when I realized that even to her I was not as -other men--that she had played with me as one might play with a child, -and that she would no sooner think of becoming my wife than she would -think of wedding with an educated baboon. And yet, Sir, within the -space of two years I saw that same young woman stand at the altar with -a senile and decrepit old roué who had never possessed the tenth part -of my own intellectuality and who had absolutely nothing to recommend -him but a fortune, somewhat smaller than my own, and a straight back. I -am told that she is not happy with him, and small wonder, since he is -never at home save when he is too drunk to be elsewhere; but even so, -I doubt if she has ever regretted her answer to me, so strong is the -prejudice of the normal person against all forms of physical deformity. -The fact that her husband is more crooked in his morals than I am in my -back would, I dare say, have no weight whatever with her. - -I have heard people say that women are often attracted by men of odd -and unusual personal appearance and that many women find an almost -irresistible fascination in cripples and the like, but I have never -encountered anything in my personal experience to incline me to this -view. It is an idea upon which Victor Hugo dilates in his romance, -_The Man Who Laughs_, where the duchess becomes enamored of a monster. -But I am of the opinion that Hugo treated this matter more truthfully -and realistically in _The Bell Ringer of Notre Dame_, where the white -soul and brave heart of Quasimodo count for nothing with Esmerelda -when weighed against the physical attractions of the philandering -captain, who is a thoroughly bad lot. I have heard it asserted that -Lord Byron owed much of his popularity with the ladies to his club -foot, but this I take to be the sheerest nonsense. The fascination -which Lord Byron exercised upon the women was not, I am convinced, due -to his physical deformity, but to what we may call his mental and moral -deformity. And this, Sir, brings us to the milk in the cocoanut and -the point of this letter. I wish to ask you, and to ask your readers, -what I have so often asked myself: Why is it that men and women find -physical deformity so hateful while they so often find mental and moral -deformity attractive? - -Shakespeare, learned in the ways of human nature, laid particular -stress upon the physical shortcomings of Richard the Third, well -knowing that no amount of mere wickedness would serve to turn the -audience against him so strongly as a hump upon his back. The villain -of the play, if he be handsome and brave, will often oust the hero from -his rightful place in the esteem of the audience, so that presently -the pit, the galleries and the boxes are united as one man in wishing -him success in his villainy, or at least in wishing him immunity from -his well-deserved punishment. Instead of hissing him, the spectators -are moved to applaud him. And for this reason the playwrights and -the novelists have, until late years when the worship of virtue is -no longer considered an essential part of art, caused the villain to -appear a coward or burdened him with some physical deformity. And the -devil of it all is, Sir, that most of the villains in real life are -like the villains of the stage who oust the hero. Charles Lamb once -said that it is a mistake to assume that all bullies are cowards; and -in my opinion it is an even greater mistake to assume that a villain -can not be attractive. If villains had no charm, villainy would soon -cease through want of success. - -In the case of Byron, since I seem to have chosen him for an example, -the women were attracted on the one hand by his reputation as a genius -and upon the other hand by his reputation as a rake. Byron, though a -cripple, was an unusually handsome man of the poetic type, and I think -we may safely assume that the aversion which may have been created by -his club foot was more than offset by the fact that he was otherwise of -pleasing appearance and was known to be an athlete. Now, of course, it -would be impossible to say whether more women were fascinated by his -genius or by his rakishness, but on a venture I would be willing to -wager that nine out of ten of the women who knew him would rather have -read his love letters than his poetry. Genius is a thing apart from -love, and, say what they will, I believe that the mistress of such a -man is more like to be jealous of her lover’s genius than proud of it, -and especially so where she can not flatter herself that it has been -inspired by love of her. She is interested in a poem in which she can -find herself, not because it is poetry, but because _she_ is in it. -Therefore I incline to the belief that Byron’s conquests were due to -his reputation as a rake, rather than to his reputation as a poet. But -given the combination of a poet, a rake, a handsome man and a lord, it -would be unnatural if women did not love him. - -But Byron’s case is not the only one I have in mind. It is a common -thing for murderers in jail to receive flowers and sentimental letters -from women. Women, too, who have never so much as set eyes upon -them and who know them only by the stories of their crimes in the -newspapers. The maddest of religious fanatics can always count upon a -goodly number of women as converts. The taint of insanity itself seems -to be less repulsive to women than physical deformity. And the men are -little better than the women. A man will often knowingly wed with a -fool because she has a pretty face, or vote a rogue into office because -he thinks him clever. The juries of men which try women murderers are -ready to grow maudlin over them if the women happen to be good-looking. - -It is a problem, Sir, which I can not solve, turn and twist it as I -may. Sometimes I think that we who are deformed in body are granted -the only straight minds to be found among men, by way of compensation. -And at such times, Sir, I am inclined to thank God that He has seen fit -to put the hump upon the back and not upon the mind or soul of - - HAROLD HISHOULDER. - - - - -FROM A HOTEL SPONGE - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: I feel it my duty to publicly express my disapproval of -the recent ruling of certain hotel proprietors of this city, and to -publicly protest against their hasty and ill-advised agreement that -hereafter they will discourage, in every way possible, the visits of -outsiders who make use of their lobbies and halls. - -I am myself one of the best-known non-resident patrons of the hotels in -this city, or, in the vulgar language of the innkeepers themselves--a -hotel _sponge_. That is to say, I do not register at these hotels as a -guest, but I do make it a point to drop into one or two of them every -afternoon and evening, and I think I may say, without undue egotism, -that you will seldom see a more debonair and smart-looking man than I -appear upon these occasions. I am, I believe, as my tailor says, “an -ornament to any assembly,” and my presence in a hotel lobby or corridor -is sufficient to stamp that hotel as a proper place in the minds of all -those who are sufficiently acquainted with the hall-marks of the _haut -ton_ to recognize a gentleman when they see one. - -I have been a familiar figure about a certain hotel on Thirty-fourth -Street for the last ten years, and though the tide of fashion which -once flowed through those corridors is now somewhat diminished, having -set in a northerly direction, yet that hotel continues to hold its own -with the visitors from out of town. And do you know why this is so, Mr. -_Idler_? Do you know why it is that this hostelry is still enabled to -present an appearance of smartness and exclusiveness? I presume that -you do not, and so I shall tell you. It is simply that I have chosen -to continue to appear there. Though the social leaders whose names -are known across the continent desert the place for the newer and no -less pretentious hotels farther up-town, this place, by reason of my -loyalty, has suffered no loss of standing. I, Sir, am to the hotels of -New York what John Drew is to the American stage. I am that rosy-faced, -perfectly groomed, elegant gentleman of leisure who saunters through -the halls and corridors at tea time and at dinner time, and who -confirms the out-of-town guest in his opinion that he has selected as a -place to stop the one hotel which is the resort of fashion. - -If it were not for me and for the other members of my class, how long -do you suppose these hotels could go on charging the enormous prices -they now charge for food and lodging? How long do you suppose they -could induce the thrifty countryman to part with such sums of his -hard-earned money if he were not provided with the inspiring spectacle -which I present when arrayed in my full regalia? Not one month, Sir. -In less than a fortnight the word would go forth to all parts of the -United States that these hotels had lost caste and were becoming back -numbers. - -It is to me, and to others like me, that the great modern hotels of -this city owe their prosperity; indeed, I might say, their very -existence. It is we who set the pace in luxury and style. The hotels -merely live up to our standards. The manager of a shabby hotel can -not see me walk into his lobby without feeling instantly ashamed of -the poor accommodations he has to offer me. The hotel managers were -so irked at being put out of countenance by the obvious superiority -of the casual hotel visitor that they set out to provide for him a -proper setting. Do you suppose, Sir, that the expensive furniture, the -music, the luxurious reading and smoking-rooms, the glittering bars -and the comfortable armchairs of the modern, up-to-date New York hotel -were necessary to obtain the custom and patronage of the provincial -visitors, or even necessary to hold that patronage? No, Sir! But _I_ -am necessary to hold the business of these people, and the luxuries -are necessary to hold me. All this is so plain, so perfectly apparent -to any observing person, that it seems almost incredible that these -managers should dare to risk our indignation. Drive us out, indeed! -They will be very lucky if we do not withdraw altogether of our own -accord, after such a gratuitous insult. A strike of waiters, Sir, would -not prove one-half so demoralizing as a strike of the _atmosphere -creators_, or, to use the insulting term of the hotel men, the “hotel -sponges.” - -Can you imagine, Sir, trying to paint a forest scene without a tree in -sight? That task would be as easy as trying to conduct an aristocratic -hotel without an aristocrat in sight. “But,” you say, “you fellows -are not really aristocrats--you are only imitation aristocrats.” In -so saying, Sir, you fall into the same error into which these hotel -men have fallen. We are aristocrats. We are the ideal aristocrats, -and let me tell you, Sir, we are much more convincing than those whom -you would doubtless call the real aristocrats. I have not lived as a -man-about-town for the last ten years without coming to know these -dyed-in-the-wool aristocrats of yours very well indeed. I assure you -that you would be much surprised and disappointed should you see -them, as I have seen them, at our leading hotels. They would no more -correspond to the countryman’s idea of an aristocrat than an Indian -Chief would fulfil the romantic maiden’s ideal of a ruler of men. -Sir, where I am urbane, they are ill at ease. Where I am clad in the -very pink of fashion, they are often dowdy, not to say shabby. Where -I appear indifferent and slightly bored, they are often irritable, -easily upset and worried-looking. Oscar Wilde once said that he was -very much disappointed in the Atlantic Ocean, and I can imagine that -his disappointment was not deeper than that of the rural visitor who -happens to stumble upon a member of what is known as our best society. - -Doubtless you fancy that I and the others of my kind concern ourselves -with aping the dress and manners of these society people. If so, you -were never more mistaken in your life. It is they who copy and imitate -us. They go where we go, they wear what we wear, they eat what we -eat and they drink what we drink. Only, as is always the case with -imitators, they fall far short of their models. How is it possible -that any man can appear the perfect gentleman of leisure unless, -indeed, his life is actually a life of ease and pleasure? We have no -cares and no responsibilities. They have a thousand. We have no social -duties to distract our attention. They are constantly consulting their -watches. And, lastly, Sir, we have art, and they have none. - -I can not imagine what has led these misguided innkeepers to think -that they can do without us. But I can tell you, they will soon regret -their recent action, whatever motives may have moved them to take it, -for they will find very shortly that their hotels are not nearly so -necessary to us as we are to their hotels. I am, Sir, - - PERCIVAL PIGEONBREAST. - - - - -FROM SARAH SHELFWORN - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: I have to complain of an abuse which is daily growing -greater and which, if not checked, will soon assume the proportions of -a national menace. It is my purpose, Sir, to call to your attention -and to the attention of all earnest thinking people, a pernicious -influence exercised by a certain portion of our daily press--by those -vulgar flaunting publications known as “yellow journals”. Now do not -misunderstand me, Mr. _Idler_; this letter is no ill-considered general -attack upon the press; no incoherent or fanatical outcry against the -publication of disagreeable facts. It is, on the contrary, a protest -against a certain idealism which pervades the pages of these newspapers -and which unduly excites the imagination of our young men. I do not -refer to stories of crime, extravagance or anything of that sort--but -to the publication of pictures of beautiful women. - -You may ask, what possible harm can come of the publication of these -pleasing portraits? Well, Sir, I will tell you; but in order that you -may understand my point of view, I must first tell you something of -myself and explain somewhat, my own experience. - -I, Sir, am a school-teacher--an instructor in English literature--and -since the school where I am employed is a public high school, it is -hardly necessary to add, I am a woman. Or perhaps it would be more -truthful to say I _was_ a woman once upon a time. When I was young -and fairly pretty, there was no more womanly woman than I in all this -section of the country, but let me tell you, Sir, ten years of teaching -school is an experience calculated to unsex any person, man or woman. -We veteran school-teachers constitute what a magazine writer recently -referred to as “an indeterminate sex.” We have left in us nothing of -the masculine or feminine nature. We think, feel, argue and reason -like one another and like nobody else in the world--we are neuter -throughout. It is, perhaps, for this reason that I can now look back -upon my wasted life with only a passing regret, and that I can, without -any feeling of outraged modesty or womanly reserve, lay bare to you the -dreams of my girlhood and the thoughts of my maturity. - -To begin, then, I have always lived in the little town where I am -now teaching, though to be sure, since I became a teacher, I have -traveled more or less during my vacations. I have visited many places -in Europe and America at one time or another. I have made a pilgrimage -to Stratford-on-Avon six times in as many years, and it is perhaps for -this reason that I have never found time to read any of Shakespeare’s -works beyond the four or five plays which we read in class. Be that as -it may, when I was a girl of seventeen or eighteen, I was a bright, -merry-hearted young creature who had not a care in the world, nor a -thought for anything but pleasure. Not that I was without sentiment, -for truth to tell, I was as sentimental as any, and let me tell you, -Sir, one girl of eighteen has more sentiment in her composition than -all of the old men in the world. I say “old men,” because I have -observed that whereas sentiment comes to a woman early in life, so -that she is soon done with it, men seldom become sentimental until -they have passed middle age. And that is why, Sir, you will observe -in the restaurants and cafés of your city, young men with old women -and old men with young women. Like is naturally attracted to like. The -old man loves the young woman for her romanticism which is akin to his -own, and the young woman loves the old man because he is not ashamed -to admit his infatuation and glories in his subjection to her charms. -The young man, upon the other hand, is attracted to the older woman by -her knowledge of the world, her masculine view-point, her independence -of mind, her air of good-fellowship, and her frank acceptance of a -temporary affection. The old woman finds in the young man the only -sensible, sober and sane being that wears trousers. - -As I say, Sir, I was as sentimental as any; I had my girlish dreams of -home and fireside, of husband and little ones, but I was not obsessed -with this pleasant dreaming. I took all that for granted as my natural -birthright, and a career which was guaranteed to me by virtue of my -very womanhood. I was cheerful, a capable housekeeper, possessed of a -clear complexion, good eyes, sound teeth, a fair figure--in short, I -was passably good-looking. Why should not I be married in due time, -as my mother was before me, and as the girls of my native village had -always been? I was not hump-backed, bow-legged, nor squint-eyed. I -was neither a shrew nor a prude. I could manage a house and (I had no -doubt) I could manage a husband; how could I fail to get him? - -Alas! Sir, my youthful optimism was my undoing. I delayed my choice -and I lost my opportunity. I refused one or two offers of marriage -that came to me in the first flush of my womanhood--and I have never -since received another! The young men of our town had always married -our home girls. With the exception of a few prodigals who left home -to see the world and who never returned, some going to jail and some -to congress, none of our young men sought their wives among strangers. -They were well content with what they found at home. How, then, could I -anticipate a sudden exodus of eligible young men? An exodus, I say! For -an exodus it was, and an exodus it has continued, year by year, ever -since that fatal day when Willie Titheridge Talbott went over to Ithaca -and married Minna Meyerbeer who won the Tompkins County beauty contest! - -No sooner do our young men arrive at that age when they can don a -fuzzy hat and coax a mustache without exciting the ridicule of their -little brothers, than they shake the dust of this town from their -feet and set out to find a wife among those vampire beauties whose -portraits decorate the pages of our Sunday papers. As for our girls, -they are left as I was, to choose between frank spinsterhood at home, -or to follow the young men out into the world, there to become chorus -girls, manicures, stenographers--or to engage in some other similar -profession which exerts such a glamour and fascination over the men as -to make up for their lack of classical beauty. - -And who, Sir, is to blame for this lamentable state of affairs? The -beauties? No, not altogether, for if they were not so exploited by the -newspapers, our young men would never suspect that they existed. For, -Sir, even if he were to meet her face to face, the ordinary young man -is so lacking in sentiment, so matter-of-fact, that he would never -suspect one of those beauties of being anything extraordinary if her -beauty were not vouched for by some newspaper. The young man who has -not been corrupted in this way, and who has not had fostered in him by -these newspapers the silly notion that he is a knight errant searching -the world for beauty in distress, is a docile creature, easily captured -and easily managed. He treats matrimony as he treats his meals, he -takes what is set before him and afterward grumbles as a matter of -course, but deep down in his heart he is very well satisfied. It is the -editors, Sir, who have caused all of the trouble; the editors with -their silly beauty contests and their simpering half-tone, half-world -women of the stage flaunting their coquettish graces and flirting with -our young men from the pages of the Sunday papers. - -Now, Sir, I hope that you will not dismiss this letter as a matter of -no consequence and the peevish complaint of a disappointed spinster, -for I assure you the roots of this evil go deeper than appears at first -glance. Our magazines are asking, “Why do young men leave the farm?” -Our sociologists are asking why are our villages becoming depopulated? -Superficial observers often reply that the young men go to the city -for the sake of money-making. But I, Sir, know better. The young men -are leaving the farms and the villages to hunt for wives because the -newspapers, with their photographs, have made them dissatisfied with -what they find at home. And now that you know the cause of it, Mr. -_Idler_, is there no hope that you may devise some way to put a stop to -it? - - I am, Sir, - SARAH SHELFWORN. - - - - -FROM ANNA PEST - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: Doubtless you are familiar with some of the newer schools -of poetry, as for instance, that one which has abandoned rhyme for -assonance, which has led an ignorant and prejudiced critic to say of it -that its poetry may be rich in assonance, but that he finds in it more -of asininity. Such is the treatment accorded all independent artists by -the hidebound adherents of outworn ideals! - -Now, Mr. _Idler_, nobody is more convinced than I am that we need new -forms of poetry. I have been writing poems for a number of years and -I feel that I speak with authority when I say that the old classical -forms are entirely inadequate for modern poetic expression. I have -tried them all and I have found them all wanting, for though I have -written poems in the form of sonnets, lyrics, triolets, quatrains, -couplets, rondels--and even in blank verse--I was never able to produce -a decent poem in any of them. I therefore conclude that what every -modern poet needs is to shake off the shackles of poetic convention -and follow a form suited to his nature. I have been greatly encouraged -by the introduction of the _vers libre_ in France and I am heartily -in accord with the aims of those pioneers of the new poetry who are -laboring to educate the public taste to modern ideals, but I fear that -in one or two instances they have overshot the mark. - -Much as I admire the courage of Monsieur Alexandre Mercereau, who has, -with splendid audacity, forsaken verse altogether and determined to -write all of his poetry in prose, I do not believe it advisable to -attempt to accomplish the poetic revolution at one step. I am more in -sympathy with those who have abandoned rhyme, but retained rhythm. - -For my own part, I have invented a form which I think better than -either. I believe that this form is as superior to the sonnet as the -sonnet is to the limerick. I call this form the _duocapet_ because -it is, in a sense, double-headed, having two rhyming words in every -line--one at each end. I have discarded rhythm but retained rhyme. I -had good reasons for adopting this course. I regard meter as a useless -encumbrance. It is meter, not rhyme, which hampers the true poet. The -poet should be free--free as the air--free as the birds. It is a crime -against art to bind him with silly meaningless meters and rhythms -which distract his attention from his theme and serve only to furnish -critics with an excuse for picking flaws. I hope that the happy day -will soon arrive when laymen will leave to the poets the settling of -all questions of form, but in the present state of public ignorance and -prejudice I think it advisable to concede them something in order that -they may realize that we are writing poetry. Later, when the public is -sufficiently educated to recognize poetry without any of its ancient -ear-marks, I may discard rhyme also. - -For the present I think the _duocapet_ is the most logical and -artistic of existing forms. Writing in the _duocapet_, the poet has -only one rule to observe--that the first word of every line shall rhyme -with the last. I have, in fact, reduced the couplet to a single line, -making the two rhyming words come one at each end of that line, where -they logically belong, one opening and one closing the line, instead -of placing them one under the other in the manner of Pope. Standing -in this position they may be likened to two sentries that guard the -thought of the poet. It is as if the rhyme at the first end of the -line called out, “Who goes there?” and the other responds, “A friend!” -In the _duocapet_ the poet may make his lines short or long as best -pleases him without regard for the length of lines that go before or -that follow. - -This poetry is produced as all true poetry should be produced, a line -at a time. No whole can be perfect which is defective in any part. -In the _duocapet_ every line is a perfect poem, complete in itself, -every line contains a distinct thought, and though the sentence may -sometimes extend from one line to another, this is never necessary and -rests with the discretion of the poet. Should he choose, he might write -a whole poem consisting of nothing but complete sentences, a sentence a -line, with a period at the end of each. The poem can be made ten lines -in length or ten thousand, and asterisks and italics can be introduced -at will. With the exception of the rhyme, the poet is as free in this -form as in any form of _vers libre_. I append an example of _duocapet_ -which should give you a good idea of the possibilities of this form: - -MIDNIGHT - - Gone is the day and I look out upon - Night bathed in Luna’s sad illusive light ... - Dark are the shadows out in Central Park; - Hushed are the streets through which the traffic rushed ... - _See! Underneath that weeping-willow tree - Prone lies a figure on a bench alone!_ - Why should he lie there ’neath the sky? - Is there no home he can call his? - Creeps now the moonlight where he sleeps ... - Shakes then the outcast as he wakes, - Chill with the bitter winds that fill - All of the Park from wall to wall. - Slinks then away in search of drinks. - Soon he will be in a saloon. - Still as I lean upon the sill - And see the sky on every hand - Sprinkled with those same stars that twinkled - Bright on that blessed Christmas night - When angels sang good-will to men ... - Sore is my heart unto the core! - Sick is my soul unto the quick! - Sick is my soul ... my soul ... how sick! - -I hope that you will publish this poem and letter in the interest of -Poetic Art, and in order that the world may know that we poets of -America are almost, if not quite, as progressive as those of France. - - I am, Sir, - ANNA PEST. - - - - -FROM SETH SHIRTLESS - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: I am the victim of a most peculiar affliction. I am -suffering from what appears to be a sort of disease and which can not -be classified. As I am not able to find the true explanation of this -matter myself and as physicians seem to be equally at a loss in regard -to it, I have decided to appeal to the public at large in the hope that -some one who reads my communication will be able to suggest a cure or -at least some method of alleviation. - -There is an old saying, Mr. _Idler_, borrowed from some author, if I -mistake not, that “the apparel oft proclaims the man.” This I consider -a true saying aptly put; but I believe, Sir, that apparel sometimes -does more than proclaim the man--that it sometimes actually _makes_ -the man. It is well known that men are often affected by the clothes -they wear. Good clothing has a tendency to inspire confidence in the -breast of the wearer, while poor clothing robs a man of his assurance, -if not of his self-respect. That all men are more or less subject to -the influence of their garments, there can be no doubt, but I, Sir, -am peculiarly susceptible to it. It has been so all my life. Even in -childhood I became supercilious and insolent with pride when clad in -my best, and most envious and depressed the moment I had changed to my -every-day wear. - -Since I have come to manhood, I have felt this weakness growing upon me -despite my most earnest efforts to resist it, until now, Mr. _Idler_, -my character and my wardrobe are so inextricably mixed together that -I may be said to change my nature with my clothing. When I am richly -dressed I _feel_ rich, and my thoughts and sentiments are those of a -wealthy person. At such times I am a firm believer in all measures -for the protection of property and vested rights. I am a hearty -adherent of the established order and I am distinctly suspicious of all -so-called reforms and innovations in governmental machinery. When, -on the other hand, I am dressed shabbily, my views and my feelings -undergo a complete change. I am no longer a believer in the sacredness -of property rights. Indeed, I look upon all rich men as so many -robbers who have seized upon the land and the natural resources which -should, of right, be the common property of all mankind. I feel that -I have been defrauded of everything they have which I have not. Their -insolence vexes me and their display drives me into a very fury of -rage which is partly inspired by just indignation and partly by simple -envy. At these times I am fiercely radical in politics. No measure of -reform can be too revolutionary for my taste. My dearest wish is that -the whole social fabric may be rent to shreds and rewoven in a pattern -after my democratic heart. - -To such extremes of sentiment do my clothes carry me. When I am -fashionably clad a Socialistic pamphlet irritates me as a red rag -enrages a bull. But when I am poorly dressed and shod, _I write such -pamphlets_. Write them, and, Sir, incredible as it may seem, leave -them lying about my quarters for the very purpose of irritating -myself, and well knowing that when my eyes light on them while in my -conservative frame of mind I shall fall upon them and tear them to -tatters. I, Sir, am as a house divided against itself--I am a man at -war with his own soul! - -You have heard, I doubt not, of the celebrated case of Doctor Jekyll -and Mr. Hyde, and of other instances of double personality, where men, -by reason of contending spirits within them, have been forced to lead -double lives. I do not hesitate to say that such are blessed when their -lot is compared to my own unhappy state, for I lead, not a double, -but a _treble_ existence. In addition to these two personalities, -which I term for want of a better nomenclature my Aristocratic and my -Proletarian selves, I am also possessed of a Normal self which is in -evidence only when I am completely disrobed. - -Can you fancy, Sir, what this means to me? Can you imagine in what -straits a man must be who can think clearly and logically only -when he is naked, and who, before he can decide upon any matter of -importance, must hurry home and throw off his clothes lest he be led -astray by rabid prejudice or blind enthusiasm? That, Sir, is precisely -my situation. When I awake in the morning I am compelled to make a -choice between my two antagonistic personalities. My wardrobe stares -me in the face as if asking the eternal question, “Which is it to be -to-day--Aristocrat or Proletariat?” Always, upon falling asleep at -night, I am haunted by the specter of the ordeal which awaits me in the -morning. - -In addition to this, my Aristocratic and my Proletarian selves have -recently conceived a violent dislike for each other and they have begun -to vent their spite in many petty ways, much to the disgust of my -Normal self who has small use for either of them. For example, about a -fortnight ago, my Proletarian self indulged himself freely in gin, a -drink which is loathsome to my Aristocratic self. He stayed in this -condition for a matter of four days and upon his return to my--perhaps -I should say _our_ chambers, he wantonly destroyed a new top hat which -my Aristocratic self had carelessly left lying upon the hall table. By -way of retaliation, my Aristocratic self seized some overalls belonging -to my Proletarian self and flung them into the ash-barrel. Altogether, -they behave, Sir, in a fashion to make me thoroughly ashamed of them -both. - -Possibly you are wondering how it comes that I am in the habit of -changing my clothing so frequently and varying the quality of my -dress in this way. I may as well tell you that for many years I was a -professional politician, much in demand as an orator, and that I was -called to speak before audiences of widely different character, so that -I sometimes found it expedient to dress in evening clothes and at other -times it was necessary for me to appear a workingman. My constantly -changing political convictions made it impossible for me to continue -in this work, but by the time I gave it up I had come to know these -two personalities so well that I was unwilling to trust myself for long -in the hands of either of them. I have thought of purchasing a decent -outfit of ready-to-wear clothing, but I realize that the result of such -a step would be to render me hopelessly middle-class, a condition I -have hitherto escaped. I have no desire to add a fourth personality to -those I already possess. - -I have consulted my tailor without good result, and the best that my -physician has been able to do for me was to suggest a period of rest -in the country. I am now very comfortably lodged in a quiet house in -the suburbs, where I came upon the advice of my doctor and two of his -colleagues with whom I discussed my trouble. - -I am very well content here for a man who is virtually a prisoner. Not -that I am confined by force, Sir, but I have determined never to put on -another suit of clothes until I have solved the problem which confronts -me, and I can not leave my room without dressing; the landlord of this -place objects to my doing so. Here, then, I expect to remain until I -hit upon some solution of my difficulty or until some other person is -good enough to suggest a way out of my dilemma. I am, Sir, - - SETH SHIRTLESS. - - - - -SARTOR-PSYCHOLOGY - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: I am a social worker, and it is in this capacity that -I address you upon a subject which appears to me to be of vital -importance to all classes of society. I have, Sir, hit upon a plan -which will, if generally adopted, work the greatest reform that has -ever been effected, and which will, I am convinced, completely do away -with the necessity for long-term sentences to imprisonment. In simple -honesty I must admit that this idea is not entirely my own. It was -suggested to me by the extraordinary and very interesting communication -from Mr. Seth Shirtless which appeared in your January issue. - -The influence of clothing upon character has long been recognized, -but I do not remember ever to have heard of another case so well -illustrating that influence as the case of Mr. Shirtless. His story of -his experiences was profoundly interesting from a psychological point -of view, and while reading it I conceived the plan of which I spoke -just now. It occurred to me that the influence of dress might be of -great use in reforming men of evil habit and temperament. It is well -known to all social workers that many criminals cherish a spirit of -bitter animosity toward society at large, and that not a few habitual -criminals have embarked upon a career of crime urged on by the mistaken -belief that the hand of every man was against them. Having once plunged -into evil ways, these misguided creatures come to be more and more of -the opinion that they are not as other men; that they have lost for all -time to come any hope of being treated with respect and that they must -live and die outside the pale of respectability. - -It must be confessed that the treatment now accorded them, both in jail -and after their release, lends some color of truth to this conviction. -To win these men back to a useful way of life it is only necessary to -show them that they are wrong; that a temporary fall from grace does -not involve an eternal and perpetual atonement. They must be made to -feel that they are still members of the Brotherhood of Man and that -they may again become members in good standing. Once they are convinced -of this, they will certainly mend their ways and gladly conform to -right standards of living. Society is coming to realize, as it never -did before, that the true purpose of imprisonment is to reform, and not -to punish; that our criminals and law-breakers are susceptible to the -same methods as our children, and that our proceedings against them -should be corrective, rather than retaliatory. These men are sick, sick -in mind if not in body, and it is the duty of the state to reclaim them. - -In consequence of this awakening to the real purpose of imprisonment, -many of our prisons have given up the hideous practise of dressing -convicts in the degrading and brutalizing uniforms which were formerly -so common as to be almost universal in penal institutions. Men have -pretty generally come to see that the use of the striped zebra-like -suit for prisoners was a mistake; an added infamy which served no good -purpose, but only deepened the convict’s sense of shame and resentment. -But though the old garb for prisoners is rapidly becoming obsolete, -all reform of this character has, so far, been negative in its nature. -The method which I propose is positive. Why should we be content with -relieving the convicts of their shameful uniforms? Why not go a step -further and institute a constructive reform in their dress? Why not -array them in such a fashion that their self-respect must be reawakened -and their sense of responsibility quickened into life? Why not bring -to bear upon their characters the influence of clean linen and a -respectable wardrobe? - -What I propose, Mr. _Idler_, is just this: Let every convict and -prisoner be clad in clothing suitable for a substantial citizen and -a respected member of the community. Let every inmate of our prisons -and penitentiaries be supplied each week with a liberal allowance of -clean linen and underwear. Let every man of them be furnished with a -decent wardrobe; say, two or three business suits of good quality and -correct cut, a walking-coat or frock for afternoon wear, evening dress, -a silk hat and a dinner coat. We already provide for them good books to -elevate their minds; let us now give them such attire as will increase -their respect for their persons. - -Now, there is no denying that a well-dressed man makes a better -impression upon strangers than a sloven; and if this is true of -strangers, what shall we say of the effect upon the man himself? While -few of us are so strongly affected as Mr. Shirtless, yet we are all -of us, I think, affected in some degree. A pleasing image in a mirror -increases our self-respect, but when we see ourselves unkempt and -ill-clad we are ashamed. When we have made our prisoners presentable, -I believe we should give them the satisfaction of seeing how much they -are improved, and I therefore suggest that a mirror be placed in each -cell where the inmate can see himself at full length. Thus, if in spite -of his new outfit he occasionally feels a disposition to backslide, he -has only to glance into the glass to be restored to respectability. In -this way he can be led to see the possibilities within him. Let a man -look into a looking-glass and see there a reflection which might well -be that of a statesman, and his subconsciousness will at once inquire -_why not_? The inspiring sight will reawaken his ambition. - -Though it will be a great step forward to dress these convicts -like decent citizens, yet this is hardly enough. There must be a -corresponding reform in their occupations and employments. There is -certainly something incongruous in the thought of a man clad in a -frock coat and silk hat breaking stones with a hammer. Such a thing -must appear bizarre even to the dullest of these unfortunates. To keep -them at such labor would seem as if we were making sport of them. It -will therefore be advisable to devise for each inmate of our prisons -some employment which will be in keeping with his clothes and, at the -same time, congenial and respectable. Here is a man, let us say, who -has been convicted of larceny. We will make a promoter of him. Here -is another who has been sentenced for gambling. He would make a good -broker. A third, who has been an anarchist, will make a good magazine -editor. A fourth, confined for highway robbery, can be transformed into -a hotel proprietor. And so on down the list. - -Of course it will be necessary to release some of them upon parole when -the time comes for them to begin the practise of their professions, -but by the time they have mastered the details of their new callings -this will probably be safe enough. If a carpenter has been sent to -prison for burglary, it is not reasonable to keep him employed at the -same trade while in confinement, for then he is released knowing no -more--and no better off--than he was when incarcerated. Perhaps it was -carpentry which drove him to crime. No, Mr. _Idler_, we should elevate -him. - -As for those who are merely dissolute and idle, we will make gentlemen -of them. We will dress them in the latest fashion and establish for -them a club where they may follow their natural bent and continue in -their usual habits, only now with the sanction of society. - -If the system I have outlined should be adopted in all of our prisons, -Sir, I see no reason why our convicts should not soon be a credit to -the community. - - I am, Sir, - AL. TRUIST. - - - - -MR. BODY PROTESTS - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: It is with a feeling of dismay--nay, I may even say -terror--that I read in my morning paper the statement that during -last year there were made and sold in the United States no less than -8,644,537,090 cigarettes! Nearly nine billion of these devil’s torches, -or almost one hundred of them for every man, woman and child throughout -the country. And not only that, but an increase of 150,000,000 cigars -and 15,000,000 pounds of manufactured tobacco over the production of -the preceding year. - -To what, Sir, is this country coming, when such things are possible? -Can it be that the whole nation is bent upon suicide? I have read that -a single drop of the pure essense of nicotine dropped upon the back -of a healthy and robust flea will cause the unfortunate beast to -fall into convulsions, frequently terminating in a partial paralysis -or total dissolution. Now, it is well known to all who make the -slightest pretense to any knowledge of entomology that the flea, or -_Pulex irritans_, is one of the most hardy insects known to man and is -extremely hard to kill. Indeed, it is a matter of record that the fleas -of Mexico encountered the army of Bonaparte and Maximilian and gave -such a good account of themselves that the French soldiers were more -in awe of the fleas than of the natives. If nicotine, then, has such a -disastrous effect upon such a hearty and well-protected beast as the -flea, what must be the effect of its poison upon man, who is, perhaps, -the most easily killed of all living creatures? It is too horrible -to contemplate! I have, by most careful calculations, proved to my -entire satisfaction that the American people have already been totally -exterminated through their persistence in this evil habit of using -tobacco; and if, as may be said, the facts do not seem to fit in with -my figures, I can only say that I am convinced that their survival is -in nowise due either to their hardiness or to the innocuous character -of the herb, but solely to the kindly interposition of Providence, -who, unwilling to see so young and so promising a nation perish by -reason of this folly, has deliberately set at naught the wiles of -the Devil and robbed him of his prey by fortifying and strengthening -the constitutions of this people to withstand the dread effects of -this evil practise. But how long can people given over to this wicked -practise look to Providence for patience and protection? - -I have but now spoken of the American people as a promising nation, -but I am not sure but that I should amend this to “a once promising -nation.” I believe that this nation can never become truly great until -it has become a nation of non-smokers. Did the Greeks smoke? No. Did -the Romans smoke? No, again. Not in the history of any of the great -nations of antiquity do I find a single reference to tobacco smoking. -The Boers are reputed to be great smokers, and it is to this that I -attribute their defeat at the hands of the English. I have heard that -the Boers even went into battle with their pipes alight, and I have no -doubt that it was due to their distraction and lack of attention caused -by their habit of scratching matches to keep their pipes burning, that -they lost many important engagements. Do you imagine, Sir, that Troy -could have withstood the assault of the Greeks for ten long years, had -Hector and his fellow warriors lolled upon the battlements puffing on -cigarettes? Can you fancy, Sir, the grave and dignified Cicero pausing -in the midst of one of his philippics to expectorate tobacco juice? -Yet I am told upon good authority that this may be witnessed among the -learned justices of our own Supreme Court. - -The almost total destruction of the American Indian, I attribute -chiefly to the debilitating effects of this narcotic. Of all of -the American Indians, the Peruvians attained the highest state of -civilization. And why? Because, Sir, they alone used tobacco only as a -medicine and in the form of snuff. Had they forborne the use of snuff, -it might well have been that the Incas had conquered the Spanish and -colonized the coast of Europe. Snuff, I consider the least harmful -of all forms of tobacco; but only because it is the least frequently -used. There is a lady of my acquaintance, in all other respects a most -estimable woman, who so far forgets her duty as a mother as to permit -her offspring to utilize as a plaything a handsome silver snuff-box -which she inherited from her grandfather. I, Sir, should as soon think -of giving my children a whisky-flask for a toy. I am well aware that -many who have been termed “gentlemen” have been addicted to the use of -snuff; nay, that it was even at one time a fashion among men and women -of the mode to partake of it. But I think none the better of it for -that. As much might be said for rum. - -Lord Chesterfield said that he was enabled to get through the last five -or six books of Virgil by having frequent recourse to his snuff-box; -but I say, if the taking of snuff is necessary to the enjoyment of -Virgil, why then, it were better never to read that poet. I had rather -fall asleep over Virgil than to inhale culture tainted with snuff. -I had rather, indeed, snore over the classics, than sneeze at them. -_Trahit sua quemque voluptas_--I suspect that his Lordship did not so -much find snuff an aid to Virgil as Virgil an excuse for snuff. - -Tobacco, Sir, won its way into Europe by a ruse--a pretense. It wormed -its way into the confidence of the European peoples masquerading as -a medicine--a panacea. Introduced by Francesco Fernandez, himself a -renowned physician, and endorsed by many other men supposed to be -learned in _materia medica_, it was taken on faith and retained through -weakness. At the very outset some of the wiser heads saw the danger of -it. Burton sounded a note of warning in his _Anatomy of Melancholy_: -“Tobacco, divine, rare, super-excellent tobacco, which goes far -beyond all the panaceas, potable gold, and philosopher’s stones, is a -sovereign remedy in all disease. A good vomit, I confess, a virtuous -herb if it be well qualified, opportunely taken, and medically used; -but, as it is commonly abused by most men, which take it as tinkers -do ale, ’tis a plague, a mischief, a violent purge of goods, lands, -health,--hellish, devilish, and damned tobacco, the ruin and overthrow -of body and soul.” - -King James, of blessed memory, was not deceived by the fictitious -virtues of this plant, and he condemned it in his noble work, _The -Counterblaste_. Would that more had been so blessed with wisdom! - -The absurdity of the extravagant claims made for the curative powers -of this herb is well illustrated in the words of Master Nicholas -Culpepper, author of _The English Physitian_, published so late as 1671: - -“It is a Martial plant (governed by Mars). It is found by good -experience to be available to expectorate tough Flegm from the Stomach, -Chest and Lungs.... The seed hereof is very effectual to expel the -toothach, & the ashes of the burnt herb, to cleanse the Gums and make -the Teeth white. The herb bruised and applied to the place grieved by -the Kings-Evil, helpeth it in nine or ten days effectually. _Manardus_, -faith, it is a Counter-Poyson against the biting of any Venomous -Creatures; the Herb also being outwardly applyd to the hurt place. The -Distilled Water is often given with some Sugar before the fit of Ague -to lessen it, and take it away in three or four times using.” - -Such vaporings were, indeed, as little worthy of credence as the empty -chatter of Ben Jonson’s Bobadil: “Signor, believe me (upon my relation) -for what I tell you, the world shall not improve. I have been in the -Indies (where this herb grows), where neither myself nor a dozen -gentlemen more (of my knowledge) have received the taste of any other -nutriment in the world, for the space of one and twenty weeks, but -tobacco only. Therefore it can not be but ’tis most divine. Further, -take it in the nature, in the true kind, so, it makes an antidote, -that had you taken the most deadly poisonous simple in all Florence -it should expel it, and clarify you with as much ease as I speak.... I -do hold it, and will affirm it (before any Prince in Europe) to be the -most sovereign and precious herb that ever the earth tendered to the -use of man.” - -Such were the absurd claims of those who held tobacco to be a medicine. -But I contend, Sir, that tobacco has never been proven of any real -medical value whatever; that it is a poison and not a blessing. I have -been told, indeed, that it sometimes destroys the toothache; but for -my own part I had rather taste the toothache than tobacco; and as for -deadening the pain, so, for that matter, will opium or prussic acid. - -I contend, Sir, that tobacco will eventually bring to grief every -nation which makes use of it. Who can contemplate the present -distressing state of Portugal without recalling that it was from Jean -Nicot, a Portuguese, that the poison, nicotine, received its name? - -Tobacco destroys all that is noble in man. There is no more noble -sentiment than chivalry; and tobacco has destroyed the chivalry of -man. How else could we applaud that English poet who sang, - - “A thousand surplus Maggies are waiting to bear the yoke; - And a woman is only a woman, but a good cigar is a Smoke”? - -Tobacco is offensive to all high-minded people of delicate -sensibilities; it is offensive to me. Nay, the smoker himself sometimes -involuntarily recoils from his slavery and feels disgust for the vile -weed, as is shown by the cry of the modern poet, whose name for the -moment escapes me, in that line-- - - “Then, as you love me, take the stubs away!” - -Oh, Sir, it is now high time for all men of sound judgment and -unselfish nature to unite in stamping out this nefarious traffic! Let -every state pass laws forbidding the manufacture, sale _and use_ of -tobacco in any form. Let the government suppress with stringent law and -heavy penalty that wicked and seductive book of J. M. Barrie’s called -_My Lady Nicotine_; that work which has, without doubt, led many young -men to contract this evil habit and confirmed many older men in it -against their own better judgment. Let all books in praise of tobacco -be destroyed publicly, as is befitting a public menace. - -For my own part, having suffered all my life from a quinsy which I -contracted early in youth, and which my family physician assured me -would be greatly aggravated by the use of tobacco, I have been saved -from the vile effects of even the slightest contact with that noxious -plant. But, Sir, being a man of tender sensibilities and imbued with -an almost paternal love of humanity, it has grieved me to the heart to -see my fellow men falling ever deeper and deeper into the clutches of -this sinful practise. Owing to the distress I suffer from the fumes -of tobacco, I have often been compelled practically to abstain from -the company of men, otherwise estimable citizens, who have contracted -this habit. Everywhere I go I see young and old blowing out their -brains with every puff of smoke, until I am sometimes tempted to blow -out my own in sheer despair of ever making them see the evil of their -ways. And they smoke, Sir, with such an air of innocent enjoyment as -is enough to fair madden one whose counsel they scorn and at whose -warnings they scoff. - -I have been told, Sir, that you are, yourself, a victim of this evil -habit of tobacco using, and I have been warned that you will refuse, -with the infatuation of a confirmed smoker, to grant me space in your -publication for these honest and unprejudiced expressions of opinion -upon this subject. I have refused, however, to credit these scandalous -reflections upon your character, and I hope that you will refute -them and cause the utter confusion of your calumniators, as well as -help enlighten an ignorant and misguided people, by printing this -communication in full. - - I am, Sir, very truly yours, - B. Z. BODY. - - - - -ON A CERTAIN CONDESCENSION IN FASHION WRITERS - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: Some writers have an unhappy faculty of adopting a superior -tone which is very offensive to most readers. Even in a writer of -acknowledged excellence this dictatorial style is a blemish, and, -moreover, it is an impertinence. Not only does the writer assume to -be superior to the majority of his readers, but, by implication, to -all the world, since his book is addressed to mankind at large. And -if this air of condescension is hard to bear from men of parts, how -much more galling it is when we suffer it at the hands of insolent -nobodies--writers who seek to hide their obscurity behind the shield of -an imposing pseudonym. I have in mind, Sir, that pestiferous crew who -mar the pages of our theater programs with their uninvited discourses -upon men’s fashions. - -It may be that I am confessing to an unmanly weakness when I confess -that I invariably peruse that column in my program which is signed -_Beau Nash_, _Beau Brummel_, or something equally ridiculous; but if -it is a weakness, I am convinced that it is one which is shared by -nine out of ten men in the audience. I say I am convinced, because, -suspecting that I might be alone in it, I took the trouble to observe -the men about me upon several occasions, and I always caught them at -it at some time during the intermissions. They read it furtively, to -be sure, but they read it none the less. Of course, I can not be sure -what effect these essays upon sartorial matters have upon others, but I -fancy they are affected much as I am, and for my part they distress me -exceedingly. - -In the first place, I am not overly pleased that some unknown hack -writer has assumed to instruct me in such a personal matter as -the clothes which I put upon my back, and in the second place, I -strongly resent the implication that I am interested in such foppish -literature. But, what is worse than all else, these anonymous arbiters -of dress are continually putting me out of countenance by criticizing -explicitly and in detail the very clothes that I have on! It seems to -me that these fellows have a devilish faculty of knowing beforehand -just what I shall be wearing every season. - -Now, Mr. _Idler_, you must not suppose that I am one of those silly -fellows who aspire to lead the fashion or to play the dandy, for, -indeed, I am nothing of the sort. I do not believe there is a man -living who more heartily despises those empty-headed creatures who -are variously known as fops, dudes and dandies. It has never been my -ambition to be the introducer of a new style of neckwear or footgear; -indeed, I fear my very indifference to such matters lays me open to the -vexation caused by these miserable scribblers who prey upon my peace -of mind. Were I in the habit of consulting long and earnestly with my -tailor and haberdasher, no doubt I should be fortified with a sound and -sure confidence in the appropriateness of my apparel. But the fact is, -I leave these things largely to the men who make a business of them, -and content myself with choosing what seems to me to be sufficiently -modish and yet in good taste. - -And yet, Sir, though I am no macaroni, I am not utterly indifferent to -my personal appearance. If I am not a fop, neither am I a sloven. I am -one of those who have faith in the old saying, _In medio tutissimus -ibis_. I would not be - - “The first by whom the new are tried, - Nor yet the last to lay the old aside.” - -Like most practical men, I have a positive horror of appearing queer. -I shun eccentricity in dress as assiduously as I shun eccentricity -in manners. I sometimes envy poets and artists, not for their poetry -or their art, but for that sublime egotism which enables them to -take pleasure in making themselves ridiculous. This seems to me -a vanity which is almost beautiful, a self-confidence which is a -greater blessing than personal bravery. Many a man, otherwise not -extraordinary, may prove himself a hero of physical courage when the -occasion offers, but few there are who can deliberately challenge -attention by their freakish appearance and go out among their fellow -men with an air which seems to say, “I know I look like the devil and I -am proud of it.” - -Now I, Sir--I should not be proud of it. I should be miserably ashamed. -And so I am ashamed when I read in my program that which brands me as -a man of no taste or discrimination. I am horribly humiliated when I -discover in the column of Beau Nash that I have brazenly shattered -every commandment in the sartorial decalogue. I give you my word, -Sir, I break into a cold perspiration whenever I recall the harrowing -experience I had last Saturday-week. It so happened that when I -prepared to go to the play, I found no fresh white waistcoats. This did -not greatly trouble me at the time, for I am a resourceful man, and I -at once recalled that I possessed a black waistcoat which my tailor had -made for me at the same time he had made my dress suit. This I donned -in blissful ignorance of my impending ordeal. I arrived at the theater -rather late and had no opportunity of reading the program before the -curtain rose. That first act is the one bright memory I have of that -awful evening. I enjoyed the first act. But, Sir, I did not long remain -in ignorance of my disgrace. In the first intermission my eyes were -drawn by an irresistible fascination to the column headed, “What Men -Wear,” and in letters which seemed fairly to jump out of the page I -read, “_The black waistcoat worn with evening dress is the height of -vulgarity and is not tolerated._” - -Sir, you can imagine with what a sudden shock my care-free contentment -dropped from me. There I sat in the full glare of the electric light, -conscious that I was surrounded by hundreds of men who had read that -damning paragraph which stamped me as an ignorant underbred boor, who -had attempted evening dress without knowing the very rudiments of the -art. I cast a hasty glance about the theater, and the fleeting hope -which had sprung up died within my breast. _There was not another -black waistcoat in sight._ - -How I lived through the rest of that intermission I can not say. I only -know that I could feel the contemptuous eyes of the audience upon that -dreadful black waistcoat, like so many hot augurs boring holes in the -pit of my stomach. Hastily hiding my face behind my program, I slumped -down in my seat in the vain hope of hiding my disgrace, while drops of -anguish trickled down my brow and fell splashing upon the cruel words -which had rendered me an object for pity and contempt. When the curtain -rose upon the second act, I crept out of the auditorium under cover of -the kindly darkness and slunk away home to hide my shame. - -I do not think I shall ever attend the theater in this city again. -In vain I argue and seek to persuade myself that what I read in the -program was only the opinion of one man, and a man at that who, in all -probability, never owned a dress suit in his life. Whoever he may be, -whatever his knowledge or ignorance of dress may be, he writes with -such a saucy assumption of omniscient authority that my reason stands -abashed before his insolence. As aloof and austere as the Olympian -gods, he crushes my spirit and fills my soul with humility. No, Mr. -_Idler_, I do not believe I shall ever attend the theater here again. -The mental suffering these fashion writers inflict upon me is too great -a price to pay for the pleasure I extract from the drama. - - I am, Sir, - MAURICE MUFTI. - - - - -OF LOOKING BACKWARD - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: It is a constant source of surprise to me that men continue, -at all ages but the earliest, to look back upon the past with a wistful -eye, recalling, with many expressions of regret, the days that are no -more. Thus, while still in the twenties, the youth begins to feel the -burden of worldly cares already pressing heavily upon his shoulders and -sighs when he thinks of the irresponsible school-days of his teens. At -thirty, he is convinced that he has missed the best part of his youth -and would fain be a youngster of twenty once more, his greatest care -the sprouting down upon his upper lip. Come to forty, he is sure that -he should have been most happy when thirty, over the first rawness of -youth, but not yet sensible of any physical deterioration and quite -unmarked by the passage of time. At fifty, he envies the lustihood of -forty, and at sixty he longs for the activity and the muscular ease -which he enjoyed at fifty. And so it goes on, so that we can readily -imagine a patriarch of ancient days exclaiming, “Oh, if I were but -two-hundred-and-twenty once more! How I should enjoy life!” - -Now, to me, Mr. _Idler_, things do not appear in this light at all. -I can not conceive that had I been Napoleon Bonaparte, Emperor of -France, I should have longed to be an obscure youth in Corsica. It is -easier, of course, to understand why he might, at St. Helena, regret -the departed glories of St. Cloud; but for myself, I do not believe -I should ever, whatever my former station might have been, wish to -lay down the present for the past. I have, it is true, some hope for -the future (I am now but fifty), but even if this were denied me, and -I were assured that my condition ten years hence would be no more -enviable than it is at present, yet I think I should not care to -reassume my youthful aspect, or to take up my life where I left it long -ago. - -There is, in truth, no period of my past life upon which I can look -back with complete complacency. I was, at all times, very well -satisfied with myself, barring occasional and inevitable spasms of -self-reproach. I am, to say the truth, well enough satisfied with -myself as I am to-day. But experience has taught me that the time will -come when I shall look back upon to-day and will not be pleased with -my present self at all. At thirty I remembered the Me of twenty as a -callow and conceited boy. At forty I beheld in the Me of ten years gone -a lazy careless idler. At fifty I recollected the man of forty as a -pompous and affected ass. Now, while the most careful scrutiny of my -person and character fails to reveal to me, at this time, any serious -flaw or defect, yet I doubt not that the future Me, the Me of Sixty, -will have grave fault to find with the individual who is inhabiting my -skin at the present moment. - -“We live and learn,” says the proverb, and since we do, it is unnatural -if we do not feel a sort of shame in the ignorance of our former -selves. I feel no shame for my present ignorance because I do not know -wherein that ignorance consists, but be assured I shall, as soon as I -have found myself out. - -It is, I like to think, one of the wisest provisions of a merciful God -that no man is ever permitted to see what a consummate simpleton he -is, but only what a simpleton _he has been_. A complete and certain -revelation of a man’s folly to himself would, without a doubt, result -in an immediate and lasting loss of self-respect. And to lose one’s -self-respect is to lose one’s identity and become a stranger to one’s -self. The inmost mind, however the outward actions of the body may seem -to contradict it, still clings to the noblest principles, so that no -man can be truly said to be _unprincipled_. He may be debauched and -depraved, but he is not without principle so long as his subconscious -personality has the power to arise and accuse his conscious person. -Where there is no such accusation there can be no loss of self-respect, -for surely a man must possess a thing before he can lose it. As some -say of another, “He is his own worst enemy,” so it may be said that -every man should be his own best friend. None other is empowered so -to befriend him. His life and his character must be, to a very great -extent, of his own making, for every man truly lives to himself. He -is the central character of the drama in which he is both actor and -spectator. Others may come and go, but he alone remains throughout the -play. - -For all our intimacy with ourselves, we never come to know ourselves -completely. We discover, day by day, ideas and opinions which we never -suspected ourselves of possessing. We are wrung by emotions which take -us completely by surprise. We are angered by slights which our reason -tells us are beneath our notice. We are moved to compassion when we are -most determined to remain firm and unmoved. We take a liking for this -person whom we have decided to dislike, and we develop an inexplicable -aversion for another whom we have deliberately chosen for a friend. -Whence come these impulses, these orders which we can not disobey? -These commands which override our conscious desires and break down our -natural wills? Where, indeed, but from that Inner Man, that Unknown -Self whose power we feel but can not comprehend? Where else but from -that second and stronger, if submerged, personality--the human soul? -Is it not, indeed, this unanswerable argument, this inexplicable -conviction of another and better Self within, joined with and yet -distinct from, the ordinary self, which persuades men that mankind is -immortal, no matter how ably the Brain may play the Infidel, nor how -aptly the Tongue may second him? - -For our outward selves, our “every-day selves,” as we might say, we -know whence they are derived. We know that we are born of woman and -fathered of man. We can trace to the one or the other this feature -or that, this trait or the other, but there are yet to be accounted -for those strange whims and fancies, those impulses and ideals which -come neither from the father nor the mother, and which, in very truth, -_make_ us ourselves, make us to be different from our sisters and our -brothers, and without which all the offspring of the same parents -would be as like as so many peas in a pod. And it is these things which -convince us that we have within us another Ego, another Self which -comes to us from some unknown place, to guard and to guide us upon the -perilous path of life. We may sometimes close our ears to his counsel, -but he never suffers us to go wrong unadvised. Is it to be wondered -at, then, that we grow to feel for ourselves an affection which is not -wholly selfish, and to take in ourselves a pride which is not wholly -egotistic? I do not feel under any obligation to the man who wears my -face and bears my name; he has made me ridiculous too often for that. -But I do feel a duty to that other _Me_, the _Me_ that is not wholly of -my own choosing. And so, I am convinced, do most men. - -As I was saying, or about to say, the keenest shame we ever feel is -the shame we feel for ourselves. Shame for others may be tempered with -forgiveness, but it is very difficult to forgive one’s self. There is -no question there of giving the accused the benefit of the doubt. -There is no doubt. I feel a certain shame for the young man that I -once was because I naturally feel a tenderness for him. I can forgive -him much more readily than I could forgive myself as I am to-day. Yet -I would not, if I could, change places with him. My taste in Selves, -as in other things, has changed as I have grown older. I blush for the -weak-mindedness of that youth who was the Me of twenty years ago; yet I -feel, in a way, relieved from the sense of direct responsibility, for -am I not, in fact, another and a different person from the man I was? - -As the delightful Holmes once expressed it, that youthful self is -like a son to me. A bit of a cub, but on the whole, not at all a bad -fellow. He is related to me, but he is not me. And he _never was_ -the man that I now am. He wore my body for a time, that was all. We -were never the same, for I was not born until he had ceased to be. I -am no more that young man of twenty years ago than I am that other -young man who interrupts me now--(No, I haven’t. Can’t you see I’m -busy?)--to borrow a match to set his ugly bulldog pipe alight. A vile -habit--pipe-smoking! Unsanitary and beastly annoying to those who have -better sense. That young man we were speaking of--not the one who -asked for the match, you know, but the one who had the impudence to -pass himself off for me twenty years ago--_he_ used to smoke a bulldog -pipe. I stopped it some time ago myself. Bad for the heart, the doctor -said, and--well, I’m getting on and I can see for myself the folly of -it. Decidedly, I should not like to exchange my own calm judgment for -his youthful carelessness and addiction to tobacco. Unless--well, say, -unless for twenty minutes after dinner! - - I am, Sir, - OLIVER OLDFELLOW. - - - - -THE LITERARY LIFE - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: I have read a great many references, at one time or another, -to something which is known as “the literary life”. I have read of it -in novels, in essays, in criticisms and in the reports of the daily -newspapers. Everybody seems to know of it, and everybody speaks of it -as of something to be taken for granted; but though I have made an -earnest effort to discover just what it is and where and by whom it -is lived, I have been quite unable to do so. I had been a newspaper -writer for several years when I first began to take an interest in this -curiously illusive sort of existence. It was in a novel, I think, that -I had read it upon the occasion when my curiosity aroused me to action. -“There it is again,” I said to myself. “What is this literary life, -anyway? Who lives it and in what does the living of it consist? How -does one go about finding out the secret of it?” - -So I set out on my quest. As all good reporters should do, I first took -stock of my possible sources of information, and having done so, I did -what reporters usually do when they wish to find out anything--I asked -the city editor. - -“How the devil do I know?” said he in his unliterary way. “You’re a -reporter, ain’t you? Get busy and find out. If you get anything worth -writing, make a story of it.” That is the way with city editors; they -have no thought for anything but “stories”, no thirst for knowledge -that is not in the way of business, no soul for the higher things in -life. - -With this source of information closed to me, I turned to the staff. I -knew I could learn nothing from the books where I had found the term -used. The books merely referred to “literary life” just as we say -“prison life” or “army life” and expect every one to understand what we -mean. The first man I asked about it simply laughed and said, “That’s a -good one!” The second man told me to go away and stop bothering him. -He was writing an interesting article about the price of onions. The -third man asked me if I thought I was funny. That nearly discouraged -me. I tried one or two others without success, and then I determined to -try a more subtle method of investigation. - -I had failed to gather my desired information as a reporter; I would -try my hand as a detective. I took to following the members of the -staff home from the office. It was an afternoon newspaper and that -was easy to do. The result of my shadowing was that I learned much -of the habits of these men, but little of what I wanted to know. The -police reporter went from the office direct to the butcher shop. There -he made a purchase which he tucked under his arm and went home. He -stayed at home every night that I watched him. The court reporter -spent his evenings in a little saloon on a side street playing poker -with a particular friend of his who was a boilermaker. The hotel -reporter covered the same ground every evening that he had covered -during the day. He went from one hotel to another, playing pool or -billiards and shaking dice with traveling men. After about a fortnight -of investigation I gave up trying to learn anything about the literary -life from newspaper men. I looked up a few magazine writers and the -result was the same: _No two of these men lived the same life at all!_ - -I was astonished. I asked myself how it came about that these men had -overlooked their obvious duty of living the literary life. If literary -men knew nothing of the literary life, then who would? I resolved that -I would solve that problem if it took me a year. From the magazine -writers I went on to the novelists who seemed to have even less in -common than the two former classes had. The publishers were so widely -scattered in so many different suburbs that I had not the courage to -seek them out. - -After a conscientious search which covered a period of six months or -more, I began to think that the literary life might be one of those -traditions handed down from another age; one of those things which -continue to be spoken of in books long after they cease to have any -real existence. Perhaps the authors of other days had lived the -literary life, even if the authors of my own time did not. I would see. -I began to read biography. In Johnson’s _Lives of the Poets_ I found -that: - -Abraham Cowley was the son of a grocer. He showed early signs of -genius; he was expelled from Cambridge. He was, for a time, private -secretary to Lord Falkland. Afterward he spent some time in jail as a -political prisoner. Upon emerging from prison he became a doctor, and -thinking a knowledge of botany necessary to one of his profession, he -retired into the country to study that science. For some reason, he -abandoned botany for poetry and from that time on he wrote poetry. He -died peacefully of rheumatism. - -Edmund Waller was the son of a country gentleman. He attended Cambridge -and was sent to Parliament before he was twenty. Rich by birth, he -added to his wealth by marrying an heiress who died young and left him -free to marry again, which he did. He lived among people of fashion -and wealth, and though he was sent into exile for a short time because -of a treasonable conspiracy in which he engaged, he was soon restored -to general favor. He died in good circumstances of old age. - -Thomas Otway was the son of a rector. He left college without a -degree. He went into gay society and mingled his literary labor with -dissipation. He was, for a short time, an officer in the army. He fell -upon evil days, and when threatened with starvation, borrowed a guinea -from a total stranger. With this he bought himself a roll, but he was -so ravenous that he attempted to bolt it at one mouthful and so choked -himself to death. - -Which one of these men might properly be said to have led the literary -life? - -You need not be surprised to find in your paper some morning an -advertisement to this effect: “Wanted--Some definite information -concerning the character and habitat of the Literary Life.” But if you -know anything about it, don’t wait for the advertisement, but send on -your information at once. I think maybe I would be willing to try it -myself. Certainly _somebody_ ought to live it. - - I am, Sir, - A. J. PENN. - - - - -THE POETIC LICENSE - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: Your recent strictures upon a certain poem by John -Masefield, and the general tenor of several other volumes of verse -recently published, have moved me to address you upon a subject which -holds considerable interest for me; and that, Sir, is the scope and -legitimacy of what is commonly called “the poetic license”. To what -does this license extend and by whom is it granted? Is there no way in -which it may be regulated by law? - -This matter of the poetic license is a source of continual annoyance to -me. I find it invoked upon all occasions. I find that it is considered -a sufficient answer to any criticisms or charges that may be brought -against a poet. I am curious to know if there is any real authority -for it; if it is not, in fact, a mere figment of the imagination, a -polite fiction of letters invented by men of letters for the purpose of -confounding the layman and depriving him of his natural right to pass -an opinion upon all that he reads? - -I confess I am no poet. This being so, I may be lacking in sympathy for -the art, as some of my poetic acquaintances have averred. But I protest -that a man need not be a poet to be a judge of poetry, any more than -he need be a vintner to be a judge of wines, or a cook to be a judge -of preserves. I may lack the finer ear of the poet when it comes to a -question of complicated rhythms, but I am not lacking in an elementary -knowledge of grammar, as some of our poets appear to be. I never could -see any reason why a poet’s grammatical or orthographical errors should -be condoned merely because he chooses to write in verse. We do not -condone such defects in a prose writer, why then in a poet? It may be -urged that the poet has a harder task than the prose writer; that it -is more difficult to express one’s self in verse than in prose. No -doubt it is, but is that any reason why incompetent writers should be -excused their errors? Or their laxness? Or their laziness? Why write -poetry at all if they can not write it properly? Why not choose prose -for a medium? There are men, no doubt, who find prose as difficult as -most men find poetry, but do we therefore overlook their mistakes or -their vagaries? - -Sir, it appears to me that the leniency shown to verse writers in -this respect has worked a great injury to the art of poetry. It has -encouraged men to write verses, who were in no way fitted to write -verses. It has led tyros to choose poetry rather than prose because in -the former they feel more secure from the well-merited censure of their -readers. It has degraded really good poetry to the level of very poor -poetry by allowing virtue where there was none and by holding verses -full of defects to be equal in merit with verses marred by no such -violations of the common rules of grammar and orthography. - -All this, Sir, was bad enough, but I was prepared to pass over it since -it is a practise inaugurated and upheld by professional critics who -will allow us laymen no word at all in the matter. But, Sir, when these -poets attempt to extend their poetic license to clothing, to manners -and to morals, I think they go too far. - -Not long since, I ventured some remarks, not altogether complimentary, -upon the personal appearance of a certain poet, or poetaster, as I -prefer to call him, in the presence of a literary woman. “Oh, yes,” -she replied. “There’s no denying it--he _is_ a sloven. But really -one of his spirituality could hardly be expected to be finicky about -his clothing and that sort of thing.” Upon another occasion, I spoke -harshly with regard to the manners of a well-known versifier, and I was -rebuked for my hasty judgment with the assurance that the oddity of -his conduct ought not to be ascribed to boorishness or rudeness, but -to his poetic temperament. And, Sir, only yesterday, when I condemned -the unbridled license and immorality of a recent book of poetry, I was -informed that a poet could not be expected to view a moral question -from the same angle as an ordinary uninspired mortal. - -Sir, if these scribblers of verse are to be allowed any license, why -should they not qualify for it as do pedlers, saloon-keepers and the -like? Why not require them to prove their fitness for the business -of writing poetry? Let them secure their license from the civil -authorities, and let those licenses be revoked at the first indication -of abuse of privilege. - -As affairs now stand, any one who chances to possess a pen, a windsor -tie and a wide-awake hat can pass himself off for a poet and can claim -indulgence for his bad verse, bad manners and bad morals upon the -plea of poetic temperament. Therefore, to insure the public against -such imposture, I suggest that every poet be compelled, like every -chauffeur, to wear his license in a conspicuous place, and that if he -fail to comply with this requirement, he be immediately impounded. - -This arrangement, I think, would operate as an effective check upon the -too exuberant poetic temperament, and would also be an excellent thing -for the public, for, Sir, if every poet were required, like every dog, -to wear his license attached to a collar, the pound would soon be full -of poets. - - I am, Sir, - P. ROSE. - - - - -THE NECESSITY FOR BEGGARS - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: It is with alarm that I observe the increasing activity -of our charitable organizations and the consequent disappearance -of beggars from our city streets. I, who was formerly constantly -importuned for alms whenever I stirred abroad, have not now been -approached by one of those needy tatterdemalions for a period of six -months or more. This fact has, for me, a deep significance. It means -nothing less than that the ancient fraternity of street beggars is -rapidly dying out. Surely you must have noticed that yourself. Where -are the old blue-spectacled men one used to see standing upon the -corners, bearing the once-familiar placard, “I am Blind”? Where are the -legless men who used to wring discords from little squatty hand-organs? -Where are the street-singers, the match venders, the orphans, the lost -children, the paralytics? Where, even, is the Italian organ-grinder -with his begging monkey? These charitable organizations, Sir, have -spirited them away, and now instead of being approached by the beggars -themselves, we are visited by the agents of the societies. - -Now, Sir, my regret at the passing of the beggar is not altogether -sentimental, like Charles Lamb’s complaint in _The Decay of Beggars in -the Metropolis_. There may be a certain amount of sentiment in it, for -certainly in the loss of beggars we not only lose a picturesque class -of people, but we also suffer a spiritual loss. The spiritual glow -which came of personal giving is entirely, or almost entirely, absent -in making checks for these beggars by proxy. But, Sir, I am a practical -man and I can plainly see that the beggar, so far from being a mere -nuisance and eyesore, as charity-workers would have you believe, is a -very useful and necessary member of the social order. - -Beggars, Mr. _Idler_, are the natural scavengers of the human race. -They live upon the scraps we throw from our tables; they dress in our -cast-off garments. In short, Sir, they make to serve a useful purpose, -that which would otherwise be sheer waste. These humble people are -the economists of humanity. They save what we squander. Every time -one of them goes without a meal, there is that much more food left in -the world for the rest of us. James Howell wrote of the Spaniard in -1623, “He hath another commendable quality, that when he giveth alms -he pulls off his hat and puts it in the beggar’s hand with a great -deal of humility.” Let us say, rather, with a great deal of respect -and gratitude. Truly the Spanish grandee had reason to be grateful and -respectful to the beggar who made possible his own magnificence. - -Now, Sir, what are these charitable organizations trying to do? I -will tell you--they are trying to teach the beggar that he wants the -comforts of life. They are trying to teach him to desire good clothes -and good food. They are trying to awaken in him that selfish desire to -appear better than his fellows, which we call “self-respect”. _They are -even trying to teach him to work!_ What folly! - -“But,” you say, “it would be an excellent thing if all of these -vagabonds could be induced to work, for heretofore they have been -mere idlers and parasites.” To which I answer, “You are wrong, it -would _not_ be a good thing.” Is it not perfectly clear that, once -these beggars become workers, they will immediately demand the means -to enable them to maintain a higher standard of living? Which do you -think costs you the more, the beggar who begs perhaps a dollar a week, -which he has not earned, or the bricklayer who charges you six dollars -a day, of which he has earned only a part? It has been some years now -since the notorious Coxey led his army of unemployed to Washington, -and since that time the number of unemployed workers has been steadily -increasing. Do you think, then, that we need more laborers? Have we -so much wealth that we must force it on those who were content to be -without it? - -Why, Sir, I tell you this corruption of beggars should be put down with -a firm hand. These charitable organizations should be legislated out of -existence before they do an irreparable mischief. - - I am, Sir, - HENRY HARDHEAD. - - - - -THE ABUSES OF ADVERSITY - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: In the course of a long and not uneventful life, I have, upon -more than one occasion, looked upon adversity in its various forms, -and I have, therefore, given the subject some attention, both in the -light of my own experience and in the light of the opinions of others. -I have heard a great deal of the “uses of adversity”; that adversity is -like a great training-school for character which brings out whatever -strength and resolution there may be in a man, and much talk of a like -character. But I must confess that I have not often seen adversity, nor -its lessons, put to any good use whatever, while I have often seen it -abused most shamefully. - -So far from learning useful lessons from ill-fortune, it seems to -me that most men are inclined to turn misfortune to the basest of -uses, making it serve as an excuse for shirking, for moral lapses, -for dishonesty and for an utter lack of charity toward others. I find -that many people boast of their misfortunes as if they were actually -entitled to some credit because they have befallen them, wearing woe -like a feather in the cap and holding themselves somewhat better than -their fellows because they appear to have excited the wrath of the -Goddess of Fortune. It is as if they said: “See, we are the Unfortunate -Ones who are of sufficient importance to be singled out from among -men to receive Sorrows which you are unfit to bear. Look upon our -afflictions and reflect upon the happiness of your own lot, and do -not forget to do us honor for the fortitude with which we bear our -miseries.” - -I count among my friends and acquaintances a number of these habitual -boasters of misfortune, who are always ready, day or night, to relate -their trials and tribulations with a conscious air of distinction and -superiority. - -There is an old fellow of my acquaintance who suffers, or so he -declares, the torments of the damned, by reason of his gout, a disease -which has held him in its grip for the last twenty years. There is no -manner of doubt that he has himself to blame for this painful malady, -which is, without question, the result of his injudicious and riotous -manner of life in his youth. Yet this old man is as proud of his -infirmity as many another man is of physical soundness, and he relates -his pangs and twinges with the greatest relish in the world. Nor does -the fact that he has suffered from the disease for nearly a quarter of -a century have any effect upon the eagerness with which he always turns -the conversation upon his favorite topic. Despite the fact that he has -told and retold his pains and symptoms ten thousand times, the subject -never seems to lose its novelty for him, and to-day he discusses his -infirmity with as much gusto as he did when I first met him ten years -or more ago. It makes no difference what may be the subject of the -company’s discourse, this man can not bear to go twenty minutes without -intruding the matter of his lame foot. - -Politics, business, history, music, literature, art or the drama--all -these are but verbal stepping-stones to his one supreme subject. Does -some one speak of Napoleon at the foot of the great Pyramids, the mere -mention of the word “foot” is enough to set him discoursing of the -inflammation in his great toe. Does some one call attention to the -flaming crimson of the sunset, he swears that it is not so red as his -own instep. He never enters a conversation, in short, but to put his -foot in it, and so persistently does he dwell upon this malformed pedal -extremity as to render him fit company for none but chiropodists. He -has no interest in life but his gout, and he is forever talking of the -pain it causes him, though I dare say it has never caused him a tenth -part of the misery that it has caused his friends and acquaintances. - -Another person whom I have the misfortune to know is a widow lady -of some nine years’ standing, who has never put off her weeds and -who never tires of bewailing the loss of the dear departed. The bare -mention of death is a sufficient warrant for a flood of tears, and -the sight of a hearse sends her into hysterics which abate only -at the prospect of a sympathetic audience for the old story of her -bereavement. She goes about the neighborhood casting the shadow of -death upon all our innocent pleasures and brings with her into our -happy homes the gloom of the mortuary chamber. Her long-continued -mourning and complaint are the less deserving of patience and -sympathy when we reflect that her husband was already past the age -of seventy-five when he died, so that nobody but the most infatuated -mourner could speak, as she does, of his having been “cut off in his -prime.” One would think, to hear her speak of him, that other men -were in the habit of living to the age of Methuselah and that no -other woman in the world had cause to mourn her spouse. For my part, -I think the old man had small reason to complain of premature demise, -and I know that were I her husband I would ask nothing better. To -cast the slightest suspicion upon the genuineness of her grief or the -sufficiency of the cause thereof would be to lay one’s self open to a -tongue which can be most bitter when it chooses; so I fear we shall -have to bear her complaints and her mourning until she dissolves in -tears like Niobe, or until Death gives ear to her publicly expressed -desire to join her mate beyond the grave. - -My cousin, Robert Wasrich, is forever telling of the wealth and luxury -which were his in his younger days and complaining of the lowly estate -into which he is fallen in his middle age. The quarters in which he now -resides are of the humblest, but he speaks of them most ostentatiously -to all who have not visited them, referring to them as “chambers” and -adding that, while they are far above the average, they are not at -all what he has been used to in other years. When we have him for our -guest, which we do out of pity at Christmas and such seasons when it -seems shameful to neglect one’s own kin, he upsets our whole household -with his constant complaints and exactions. - -So, far from trying to make himself as little a nuisance as possible, -he must needs take his breakfast in bed because that was his custom -in the days of his prosperity, and he must be supplied with all sorts -of dainties and extra dishes because his stomach, so he says, craves -them, having become accustomed to them when he was wealthy. He finds -fault with the cooking, saying that it probably seems well enough -to us, who have never been used to anything better, but that it is -death to the palate of one who has been in the habit of eating and -drinking of the best. He picks flaws in our pictures and decries our -taste in furnishings, and so sends my wife off to her chamber in a fit -of indignant weeping. And not content with all this, he is forever -borrowing of me small sums of money which he declares he stands in need -of to pay off certain obligations to friends whom he has known in his -better days and who have seen fit to ask him to dinner or to the play. -To allow such obligations to go unpaid would be most offensive to his -acute sense of honor and would cast discredit upon his honored name. In -fact, Mr. _Idler_, he is twice as arrogant and proud in his poverty as -he was when he was well-off. And more than once I have wished with all -my heart that he might be rich again, and so take himself off and leave -us in peace. - -To come nearer home, my wife is the victim of a nervous disorder which -totally incapacitates her from doing our housework, though we can ill -afford a servant, but which, oddly enough, does not interfere with her -attendance at matinées or card-parties given by her women friends. -This is doubtless due, as she says, to the fact that exertion which -is in the nature of a diversion takes her mind from her trouble and -so mends her condition for the time being. Though this disorder is -not in the least dangerous, it is most obstinate and causes her, so -she assures me, the most acute mental anguish and the most terrible -physical suffering. It is of such a peculiar nature that any mention -of the amount of the month’s bills sets it instantly in motion, and -disappointment in the matter of getting a new hat is enough to cause -her to take to her bed for a week. But though, as you can readily see, -this indisposition puts her to a great deal of trouble and annoyance, -she will not consent to enter a sanatorium where she might be cured -of it, nor will she follow the advice of the doctor whom she calls in -from one to three times a month; so that I am forced to conclude that -she is actually proud of being an invalid. And I am the more of this -opinion, since when I complain of feeling ill or indisposed, she always -assures me that I do not know what suffering is and that I never can -know because I was not born a woman. - -These and other cases which have come under my observation have -convinced me that people are more proud of their afflictions than of -their blessings, and that the most common use of adversity is to make -life miserable for others. - - I am, Sir, - EDWARD EASYMAN. - - - - -THE SCIENCE OF MAKING ENEMIES - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: As I am about to open a school of an unusual nature, I -have determined not only to secure for the same as much publicity -as possible, but also to explain to the public the nature of the -instruction which will be furnished in my new academy. My course of -study is, I think, unique; and I fear that without explanation it would -probably prove quite incomprehensible to the public at large and to -those who may chance to hear of the school through friends or to read -my advertisements in the press. - -In this connection, it seems to me not out of place to acquaint you, in -some sort, with the reasons which led me to settle upon the plan of my -proposed course of instruction, and this I shall accordingly do to the -best of my ability. - -I entered at an early age upon my present profession, which is, as -you may have surmised, that of an educator. I became, in turn, an -instructor, a tutor and a professor of sociology. I have ever been -of an independent character of mind, and in the course of my work I -have been prone to draw my own conclusions without, I confess, much -consideration of, or regard for, the opinions of others who assume, -or have assumed, to be authorities upon the subject. Society, I -believe, is a subject which must be studied at first hand. Text-books -and treatises may be well enough as stimulants to study, but the real -essential is a knowledge of people. I, therefore, devoted myself to -the study of mankind, and I studied the students of my classes with -more enthusiasm and with more application, I dare say, than my students -studied their text-books. But I did not stop with the study of others, -I also studied myself. I studied myself as an isolated individual, and -I studied myself in relation to others, and it was as a result of this -study that I finally made a most disconcerting discovery--a discovery -which was not made until I had entered upon my professorship, and -which shocked me inexpressibly and bade fair, for a time, to put an end -to my career as a teacher. - -Though at first it was only a suspicion, it soon became a conviction. -I discovered that I was _unpopular_. Not unpopular with a few only, -for all of us are that, but generally and hopelessly unpopular; a man -without any friends and with a great many enemies. I do not now recall -what first called my attention to this matter, but I do remember that -I gave it a great deal of thought and attention and I studied the case -in the same impartial manner that I would study any other case of -social phenomena. I took careful note of the demeanor and behavior of -my students and my fellow members of the faculty, and I soon settled -beyond any reasonable doubt all question as to my popularity. I had -never established myself upon a footing of familiarity or friendship -with my students and I now came to see the reason why this was so. My -students did not like me and they would have nothing more to do with me -than was absolutely necessary. It was the same with the members of the -faculty. I was retained in my position because I was an able instructor -and an indefatigable worker. There was no sort of favoritism in my case -and I knew that my colleagues as well as my students would have been -glad to see me guilty of some blunder which would justify my removal. - -As you may suppose, this was not only a hard blow to my vanity, but -a very painful thing to think upon. Like most men, I had always -assumed that people were glad to know me and to have me about, and -it distressed me exceedingly to learn that this assumption was -without foundation or justification. It is one of the enigmas of -human nature--this conviction of personal popularity. No man can -conceive of himself as a pariah, nor even as a very unpopular person, -until he actually finds himself in that situation. Even the greatest -bores seldom realize that they _are_ bores. But most bores are not -sociologists. - -Now, when I had become fully convinced that my unpopularity was a fact -and not a figment of my imagination, I began to turn the matter over -in my mind and to direct my attention to the study of popularity and -unpopularity both as to cause and effect. My study led me to several -discoveries. The first was this: that some people are born with the -attribute of popularity and possess the faculty of making friends -without any conscious effort on their part, while others have a trick -of making enemies without actually being guilty of any offense. This -is not what is called positive and negative “magnetism,” but it is -something like that. When a man possesses this faculty for making -friends he will make them whether or no, even though he be lacking in -all the qualities which men find admirable. He may be selfish, cold, -over-ambitious and ruthless of the rights of others, and yet exercise -a fascination upon other men. Such a man was Napoleon Bonaparte, who -called forth the greatest personal devotion and enthusiasm in the men -whom he destroyed for his own ends. Contrariwise, a man may be noble, -generous, affable and everything that a popular man should be, and yet -be practically without friends. - -But I made another and greater discovery which reconciled me to my -unpopularity and which, indeed, completely revolutionized my views upon -the subject--_I discovered that the greatest men in the world have been -the ones who had the most enemies!_ - -And it was upon making this discovery, Sir--the most important, in my -opinion, that has been made by any sociologist of our time--that I -determined to set up my school for the exposition of the science of -making enemies. All men, said I to myself, are naturally ambitious; -they desire fame, honor and riches. They have but to be shown the way -and they will enter eagerly upon it. - -Elated as I was at my great discovery, I could not but wonder that men -had not discovered this secret long ago. How could such men as Spencer, -Lecky, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and the others have overlooked a thing -so _simple_ and so obviously true? - -Here, I rejoiced, I have a discovery--not a theory, not an -hypothesis--but a fact! A fact which may be tested and proven in any -field of human activity--in government, in commerce, in religion, in -literature, in art--in everything! No religion can live without first -enduring persecution; no government can survive without the patriotism -bred of the fear of enemies and the hatred of foes; no general -can become great without war; no author becomes a classic without -criticism; no prophet can conquer without opposition. Nothing great can -be done without enemies. - -For generations, for ages, men have been proceeding upon an entirely -erroneous theory that friends are more necessary to success than -enemies. Such stupidity! Such utter disregard of the evidence to the -contrary which confronts us upon every hand! Our park benches are -lined with men who had too many friends, our charitable institutions -are overflowing with them. Think of the most popular man you know and -then of the most successful! Are they the same? Of course not. Once you -stop to think of it, the truth of my discovery is self-evident. No -matter where you go you will find that the greatest man is the one who -has the most enemies. - -Friends are not only not necessary to a man’s success, but they are -often a positive detriment. A man surrounded by friends is like a man -blindfolded--he can not see where he is going. How do you improve? By -correcting your faults. And who points out your faults, your friends -or your enemies? An enemy is a spur. An enemy is an inspiration. Your -friends sympathize with you, commiserate with you, agree with you and -flatter you; but your enemies _advertise you_. - -Whistler once wrote a book called _The Gentle Art of Making Enemies_, -and I suspect that Whistler had caught an inkling of the truth of my -great discovery, but his title was a misnomer. The making of enemies -is not an art, but a science. Some people have a special gift for it, -as I have, but almost any one can learn how. By observing a few simple -rules in this connection, any man should be able to acquire all the -enemies he may desire. But any man may save himself a great deal of -time and trouble by taking my course of instruction. When he receives -his diploma from the Sourface Training School he will be so well versed -in this science that he will thereafter follow the principles of the -school without any thought whatever, but purely from force of habit. - -Judging from the number of people I see about me who are trying in an -amateurish way to acquire enemies, the academy should have a large -attendance from the start, and since I have never met a more unpopular -man than myself, I know of no one more eminently qualified to conduct -such a school. I can not afford to make public my method of instruction -because such an action would open the field to a host of imitators, but -I can assure you that the course is most effective. - -There is only one doubt in my mind about the success of the school, -and that is this: I fear that when the public realizes the tremendous -import of my discovery and appreciates the great work which I am doing -for humanity, I shall become so popular that I will be in great danger -of losing the success which I have labored so hard to attain and which -I so richly deserve. - - Truly yours, - SAMUEL SOURFACE, - - Headmaster, Sourface Training School. - CRANKTOWN, NEW JERSEY. - - - - -THE FATE OF FALSTAFF - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: I am an actor; a follower of Thespis, an interpreter of men -and emotions. To become such was the dream of my boyhood’s ambition. -At an early age (I shall not state when, since you would probably -be incredulous) I used, Sir, to act plays for my own amusement and -afterward for the amusement of my elders. Where other children were -content to play in careless fashion, without attempting anything like -an exact reproduction or imitation of Nature, I was most particular in -this respect. If I played Julius Cæsar, I had, to satisfy my artistic -instinct, to carry a short sword and not a long one; I must needs wrap -myself in a sheet and swear by the heathen gods. Nothing short of this -satisfied me. I could not, as so many children do, thrust a feather -duster down the neck of my jacket and play at being an Indian chief; -on the contrary, I must have the feathers in my hair and my complexion -darkened until I bore some actual resemblance to the aborigine. Without -these aids to illusion I could not enjoy myself or get any manner of -amusement from the sport. I was so close a student of details, even at -that age, that in playing Indian I acquired a habit of toeing-in which -caused my mother much distress and which clung to me for many months. - -Nor was I less particular in the matter of my speech. I was forever -mouthing sentiments and speeches culled from my father’s library, some -of them, I dare say, weird and bizarre enough upon my youthful and -innocent lips. However this may be, I had an abiding horror of all -sorts of anachronisms, and I preferred Ben Jonson to Shakespeare for -the reason that he was less frequently guilty of offending my artistic -sense in this respect. - -It was not long before my parents were impressed with my natural bent -in this direction and encouraged me in my favorite diversion by -taking the part of an audience, while my younger brother was pressed -into service with his harmonica and rendered the overtures and the -interludes to the best of his somewhat limited ability; for I could -no more act without an orchestra than I could act without a make-up. -Incidentally I came to practise the art of elocution, and it was said -in our neighborhood that I could interpret _Horatio at the Bridge_ in a -most telling fashion, and that not Riley himself could improve upon my -rendition of _The Raggedy Man_. - -With such a wealth of youthful experience, it was not surprising that -I found myself at the age of twenty-one a supernumerary in a theater, -nor that soon afterward I was given a speaking part and rose, before -long, to the dignity of “leads” in a stock company of the first class. -It was at this time that I was given my first opportunity really -to distinguish myself. A prominent manager, who shall be nameless, -sent for me and told me that he had chosen me to play Falstaff in a -production of _Henry the Fourth_ which he intended putting on the -following winter. - -Elated as I was at this splendid opportunity for a display of my genius -for acting, I could not forbear voicing certain conscientious scruples -as to my ability to do the part justice. - -“I can undoubtedly interpret the character to your most complete -satisfaction,” said I to the manager, “but there is an obstacle, which, -while by no means unsurmountable, must, nevertheless, be overcome at -once or not at all.” - -“And what is that?” he inquired. - -“Why,” said I, “I am not fat enough.” - -“What odds?” he answered; “while there are pads and pillows, this -should be no matter for despair. You have only to stuff your doublet -and pad your hose until you are as swollen as you like.” - -“That,” I protested, “may do very well for your merely commercial -actors who have no concern in their acting beyond the matter of drawing -a salary; but I, Sir, am an _actor_, not a mere buffoon, not a vulgar -clown to waddle about a stage wagging a hypocritical belly and passing -off feathers for fat. If I am to play Falstaff, I will be Falstaff, in -the flesh as well as in the spirit. My corporosity shall be sincere, -my puffing and grunting shall be genuine; I will eat real food and -drink real liquor upon your stage, and when I waddle I shall waddle as -Nature intended fat men to waddle--because I can not help it. My calves -shall be as natural as Sir John’s own, so that if I am pricked with the -point of a rapier, I shall give utterance to a howl which is not mere -mockery, but as real as a howl may well be, and which will delight the -audience as no feigned howl ever could do. - -“No, no! I shall not play Falstaff like a clown in a pantomime, but -like that very knight himself. My performance shall be as real as the -performance of Nature. I will be Sir John redivivus. Falstaff shall -live again in me. He shall be I and I will be he, and there is an end -of it.” - -Well, Sir, to be brief, the manager was so struck with my unusual -and, I may say, unaffected, sincerity, that he voluntarily advanced -me a portion of my salary and agreed to my proposal that, instead of -wasting valuable time in rehearsing a part in which I was already -practically letter-perfect, my part in the rehearsals should be taken -by a substitute, while I retired to the country and devoted myself to -my labor of love--to the task of putting on so much flesh as would be -necessary to act with fidelity the pursy knight errant. And this I did -to so good purpose that from my normal weight of about one hundred and -ninety pounds, I soon came to weigh upward of two hundred and eighty, -and was as fat as any one could wish when we opened in _Henry the -Fourth_ in the Autumn. - -To say, Sir, that my performance was a success is to do scant justice -to the literary ability of William Shakespeare and to my own histrionic -powers. It was not merely a success--it was a triumph! Ah, Sir, if I -could but whisper in your ear the name by which I was known in those -days of superlative glory, you would recall in the flash of an eye the -days when the whole of the English-speaking world was convulsed with -merriment at my performance and when press and public were vying with -each other to do me honor! Never was such a performance of Falstaff -given before, and never, I fear, will such a performance be given -again. I was Falstaff to the very life! Falstaff in person and not to -be mistaken for any one else. You could have sworn that I had stepped -bodily out of the pages of the folio edition and thrust my way into the -theater of my own volition, usurping the place of the actor. - -Four whole seasons we played to crowded houses--New York, Chicago, San -Francisco and London--and everywhere the critics all agreed that never -had such a perfect Falstaff been seen before. This we followed with -_The Merry Wives of Windsor_, repeating our success for two seasons, so -that for six years I was known to every actor and patron of the theater -as the greatest Falstaff that ever was. - -But Fate, alas! however prodigal she may appear for a time, is not -constant in her favors. All things come to an end sooner or later, and -our production of _The Merry Wives_ ran its course in time. How well -do I remember that last night of all--the glitter of the electrics -overhead, the glare of the footlights, the music of the orchestra, -and, oh, above all else, the thunderous applause that greeted me when -I appeared before the curtain, clad in trunks and doublet, to make -my farewell speech! There ended our production, and there ended my -greatness and my life. My grossness I have still, but my greatness has -fled forever! Disconsolate I wander through the haunts of stageland, a -fat pale ghost of my former self; a Falstaff out of place and out of -time; a Falstaff without jollity or joy. I, Sir, have become that thing -which I hate above all other things in the world, I have become an -Anachronism! - -Conceive, if you can, my consternation when I discovered my dilemma. -Having no further need for my excessive flesh, I sought to reduce my -weight only to find that I could not lose it! Six years of playing -Falstaff had made me Falstaff for good or ill. No fighter of the -prize-ring, no beauty of the court, ever labored as I labored to -struggle back to slimness. No Hamlet ever cried more earnestly than I, - - “Oh, that this too, too solid flesh would melt!” - -Like Sisyphus, I toiled for months with my burden, rolling off flesh -only to have it roll on again, until at last I gave up in despair. - -No manager would employ me to play for him--I was too fat. Too fat -to act, too fat to play at any part but one. Once only since that -time have I tried to obtain an engagement and that was when I saw an -advertisement of a revival of my own great play, _Henry the Fourth_. -But would you believe it, Sir, the manager had the impudence to laugh -in my face, to deny the truth of my story and scoff at my insistence -upon my identity. He called me, Sir, _a fat slob_! In desperation -I tried a Dime Museum, only to be told that no “fat freaks” were -employed who weighed less than three hundred and fifty pounds. At -last I fell into my present disgraceful situation; I was employed by -a restaurant-keeper as a decoy. In the window of one of the cheapest -and vilest cafés in this city I sit for eight hours daily drawing a -crowd about the place while I toy with a knife and fork and pretend to -eat of a meal that I would not feed my most bitter enemy. I do not eat -it. I can not eat it. And so, Sir, here I sit each day, a mere husk -of my former self, a hulk, a wrecked Leviathan! A fraud and a freak; -a delusion and a snare. This have I suffered in consequence of my -devotion to an ideal--I who was for six years the greatest Falstaff the -world has ever known! - - T. P. - - - - -THE REWARD OF MERIT - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: I am an ashman, or, as they call me nowadays, a scavenger. It -may appear to you, Sir, a queer thing that a man in my station in life -should address a letter to an editor and upon such a subject, but when -I have made you acquainted with the facts of my case, I think it will -not seem so strange. - -It is true that I am now employed as a scavenger, but I was formerly -the occupant of a very different station in life; I was formerly a -physician. I wish to lay before you what I consider the causes of my -descent in the social scale. When a man who has once been a member -of an honored profession is reduced to manual labor of a peculiarly -disagreeable sort, the common opinion is like to be that he is in some -way responsible for his own downfall; that he has fallen a victim -to drink or drugs, to a passion for gambling, or to some other -injurious habit. In my own case, I will not deny that the change in my -circumstances is probably due to my own conduct, though I do assure -you that it was not caused by my indulgence in the habits which I have -mentioned above. To be brief, Sir, I am of the opinion that my present -poverty and obscurity is nothing more nor less than the reward of merit. - -It has been my observation that most of the favorite theories of the -human race are erroneous. They come into being as mere suggestions, -they grow into convictions, they thrive as platitudes, and they die as -superstitions. There have been millions of them since the world began, -and I have no doubt there will be millions of others before the last -man has vanished from the face of the earth. Some of these theories -live on long after they have been clearly demonstrated to be without -foundation in fact, and sometimes they work great harm to the innocent -persons who accept and act upon them in good faith. Such has been my -sad experience, and the theory which was responsible for my present -unpleasant situation was the theory that merit is always rewarded. - -As a boy I was of a confiding and trusting nature. I believed all that -was told me, and I put especial faith in the admonitions and advice -of those who were set to instruct me in manners and morals. One of -the first lessons I learned was that merit is always rewarded; and -another, that industry is the certain road to success and advancement. -These things I firmly believed to be true. Sundays, when other boys -of my acquaintance stole away to go fishing or swimming, I went to -Sunday-school, firm in the conviction that my virtue and self-denial -would be amply rewarded, though I was a bit hazy as to the manner -in which this would come about. It was often a severe temptation to -hear the truants boasting of the pleasures they had enjoyed at the -swimming-pool or at the fork of the creek where they went to angle. -At the end of my first summer of Sunday-school, I was given a crude -picture card showing two cows of peculiar construction who appeared to -be enjoying themselves immensely in the very river I had shunned so -religiously. Upon this card there was printed a conspicuous legend: -“The Reward of Merit.” - -While this result of my season of piety was not what I had expected, I -continued to hope on until I had acquired quite a collection of similar -cards, some of them varied a little as to subject, but all of the same -order of art, and all bearing the familiar legend. Being of a naturally -optimistic and sanguine disposition, I soon convinced myself that my -mistake lay in looking for material rewards in return for spiritual -industry. - -When I entered the profession of medicine, I still clung to my theory -of the reward of merit, and no sooner did I get a patient than I set -to work to cure him as quickly as possible. If a patient really had -nothing the matter with him, I sent him about his business. I was not a -nerve specialist and I did not care to be bothered with hypochondriacs. -Though I started with an unusually good practise for a young physician, -the result of this course of conduct was that I found myself in two -years’ time sitting idle in my office with my waiting-room absolutely -empty. I had cured all my patients who were really ill and I had -offended all who only thought they were ill. It seems that one can not -offend a man more than by telling him he is well when he prefers to -think that he is unwell. My patients who had been cured had no further -need of me, and those whom I had refused to treat had no further use -for me, so that the tongue of malice completed the work which my own -energy had begun. And thus, for the second time, my theory of the -reward of merit had failed to work out. Having made one failure as -a doctor, I could never again establish myself in the practise of -medicine. Wherever I went, the story of my failure had preceded me, -so that presently I found myself dropping down and down in the social -scale until finally I awoke one morning to find myself a scavenger. - -“Now,” said I to myself, “I have touched bottom and I must presently -go up again like a man who sinks in the water.” But my hopes were not -realized. I remained a collector and remover of garbage. My study of -hygiene had taught me the evils of filth and I could not, therefore, -neglect my work as a less intelligent scavenger might have done. I knew -that my clients were depending upon me, in a great degree, to protect -them from typhoid and kindred evils, and even though I realized that -this dependence was more or less unconscious upon their part, I could -no more have shirked my responsibility than I could have gone into -their houses and killed them in cold blood. So I went to work earnestly -and I flatter myself that there is no more thoroughgoing workman in the -whole body of scavengers than myself. - -Since I have been engaged in this work I have made another discovery. -I have discovered that industry is by no means a sure road to -advancement. When my work is well done I am paid, but I am not -complimented. The thoroughness of my methods does not attract the -attention of my clients. Nobody seeks me out with a proffer of more -congenial employment. Everybody appears to take it for granted that -I like to collect garbage. I do not. I have never been a collector -of anything from choice. I used to think that any man who collected -stamps must be lacking in intelligence, but I see now that one may be -engaged in collecting worse things than stamps. Nobody says anything at -all about my work unless something goes wrong. And this, I believe, is -usually the case. - -I recently read a copy of the _Memoirs of Lieutenant-Colonel Paul von -Pulitz_, which I retrieved from the ash-can of one of my clients who -is of a literary turn, and it was through his receptacle for discarded -matter, by the way, that I first made the acquaintance of your -excellent publication. - -In these _Memoirs_, which are unusually interesting in many respects, -I came upon an anecdote which seems to have a direct bearing upon the -question which we are now considering. It appears that Colonel von -Pulitz was discussing with a number of other officers the chances -and mischances of a military career. Several of the officers had -volunteered the causes to which they attributed their success. -Colonel von Pulitz then related this anecdote, the truth of which he -indorses elsewhere, and in this he is borne out by the editor of the -autobiography, Professor Rudolph Ubermann, of Berlin University. - -“When a young man,” writes Colonel von Pulitz, “I fell into disgrace -with my family because of a certain youthful escapade--no matter -what--and so forfeited my opportunity for entering the Prussian Army as -an officer. I therefore determined to gain by my wits what I had lost -by my folly. I was, as you who know me can testify, an unusually tall -and fine-looking young man. Now it occurred to me that if I could once -attract the attention of the king (he is here referring to Frederick -the Great) he would undoubtedly desire me as a recruit for his ‘tall’ -regiment, and if I had an opportunity to explain to him my situation, I -might, after all, secure my coveted commission. I therefore secured a -situation as a servant in the king’s own household, under a fictitious -name, of course; and I was highly delighted when I found that I had -been delegated as one of the waiters at table, for, thought I, now -is my great opportunity certainly at hand. But alas for my hopes! The -king bestowed upon me no notice whatever, and for all the attention my -height secured from his majesty, I might have been a dwarf. - -“So it went on for weeks, and I had nearly despaired of my commission -when I hit upon the audacious scheme which solved the problem. I -determined to attract the king’s notice at any cost, and when next -I waited upon him, I deliberately pretended to stumble, and with an -air of awkwardness I emptied down the neck of his majesty a plate -of exceedingly hot soup. In a moment there was an uproar. The king -was in a fury of temper and the majordomo was in a fair way to die -of fright and chagrin, but my purpose was accomplished. The king had -looked at me. He observed my height and my aristocratic bearing. He -questioned me, and I told him my whole story frankly, omitting nothing -but the ruse whereby I had brought myself to his notice. I secured my -commission in his regiment, and from that time on I advanced steadily. -The king never forgot me, but kept a friendly eye upon me. He once said -in my presence: ‘Gentlemen, I never see a plate of hot soup that I do -not think of my good friend the Lieutenant-Colonel Paul von Pulitz.’” - -Now, Mr. _Idler_, I have no opportunity for spilling hot soup down the -necks of my clients and my conscience will not permit me to attract -their notice by gross neglect of duty. My effective work has failed to -bring upon me their favorable regard. Finding myself so situated, and -being, even yet, hopeful of some opportunity for bettering myself, I -have written you this letter. I have done so in the hope that it may -meet the eye of some one of my clients, perhaps that of the literary -gentleman through whose barrel I first made your acquaintance and the -acquaintance of the ingenious Lieutenant-Colonel Paul von Pulitz. - - I, am, Sir, - Your humble servant, - CHARLES CLINKER. - - - - -THE BLESSINGS OF THE BLIND - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: Those who are blessed, as the saying is, with two eyes -and the gift of sight, are much given to expressing sympathy with, -and sorrow for, the blind. It would be churlish to quarrel with so -unselfish a sentiment, for it is, indeed, very good-natured of those -who are busily engaged in seeing the sights of the world to spare the -time and the thought which they give to the sightless. Yet I often -wonder if the blind do not sometimes question, as I do, if a great deal -of this sympathy is not wasted? - -I, Sir, am blind. Totally and irretrievably blind. I have been blind -all my life, having been, as the Irish say, “dark” from my birth. Born -blind, in fact. My “affliction,” as it is called, being natural, I was -born with no blemish to betray my infirmity, and it has so happened -upon several occasions that, being thrown into the company of those -who had not previously been warned of my condition, I have been -compelled to make them acquainted with it myself. This information has -invariably been the signal for apology and sympathetic pity. From which -I infer that men generally feel that the blind are to be pitied and -consoled. Also I have read a great deal of the hardship of being blind, -though I have never, I confess, been quite able to see wherein that -hardship lay. You are surprised, perhaps, to hear me say that I have -“read” of this, but I assure you there is no reason to be surprised. If -you are at all acquainted with the progress of science, as I suppose -you are, you must have heard of raised type. Oh, yes, I read quite as -naturally as you, yourself, though I accomplish with my fingers what -you do with your eyes. - -The result of my reading has been that I have come seriously to -question the theory that sight is necessary to human happiness and -efficiency. It has been borne in upon me that men possessed of two good -eyes are often apparently unable to make use of them. I read that men -often fall in love with women who seem, to all others, extremely ugly; -and that women as often do the same by men. And not only that, but -that they are quite frequently completely deceived in the characters -of the persons whom they marry, women discovering their husbands to be -bullies, and men finding their wives to be viragoes and shrews; and -all this when the nuptial knot is tied hard and fast and the damage is -beyond repair. - -If eyes are really of as much use as those who see seem to think them, -how is it possible that people should make such mistakes? Blind as I -am, such a thing could never happen to me, nor do I think it could -befall any sightless person; certainly not one who has been, as I have, -blind from birth. I know the voice of a shrew the moment she opens her -mouth, no matter how pleasantly she may speak at the moment. I can -point out to you the drunkard, the hypocrite and the boor the moment I -have heard them speak. In the tone of his voice every man carries his -true certificate of character, be it good or bad. An ill-tempered man -may conceal his vice from you, who look only at his face and judge his -speech by his words, but he can not deceive me, for I know him by his -voice. I have been engaged in business for the last thirty years and -I have never once been taken in by a swindler. I have never yet been -mistaken in the character of a man with whom I dealt. How many _seeing_ -men can say as much? - -Excepting the human being, we know of no such active or intelligent -creature as the ant--the ant who lives in total darkness. Yet does he -not build his cities and fight his battles as wisely as we do our own? -I sometimes wonder if the possession of the power of sight is not a -hindrance, rather than a help, in labor? The ant, who can not see at -all, goes straight to his object. He is never distracted by the sight -of things along the way. The fly, on the contrary, is possessed of a -great many eyes; his head, in fact, is practically _all eyes_. Yet what -is the fly but a parasite, a nuisance, a very vagabond of insects? -Attracted hither and thither by everything that meets his gaze, he -lights first upon one object and then upon another, without rhyme or -reason save his overweening curiosity, until he finally falls into a -trap and dies an ignoble death in a spider’s web, or caught fast upon -a sticky paper. The fly has no social organization, no family life, -no mating in any proper sense of the word. He pollutes all that he -touches. His entire life is a life of destruction, as opposed to the -ant’s, which is a life of construction. - -According to the Grecian mythology, the largest race of men the world -has ever known, the _Cyclops_, had but a single eye, and that in the -middle of the forehead. The stupidest of all characters of the Grecian -myths was _Argus_, who, though he had more eyes than all the gods and -heroes together, yet allowed _Hermes_ to pipe him to sleep and so cut -off his head. In the tail of _Hera’s_ peacock, his eyes were of as much -use to him as in his own head. _Eros_, the god of love, was blind; yet -he was of all the gods the most joyful. And in this, our own day, is -not _Justice_ blind? - -Is there, in all this, no significance? Is there no hint of an -understanding of the secret that, as he who would save his soul must -first lose it, so he who would see must first be blind? - -Men see, as we say, with the mind as well as with the eye. Men also -see with the spirit. Saul never could see the truth and beauty of -Christianity until he was stricken blind upon the road to Damascus. But -_while_ he was blind, he _saw_, and so became Paul. Would Homer have -been the giant of poets had he had his sight? I doubt it. Would Milton -have attained his heights of inspiration, had he retained his vision? I -can not believe it. For the man who has physical sight looks upon the -earth and the works of men; but he who has only the spiritual sight, -lifts up his eyes to God and His angels. - -The shepherd lad who has never traveled beyond his native valley dreams -a beautiful dream of the world that lies beyond the hills that hem him -in. But the tourist lives a life of constant disillusion, for he finds -in distant lands, where he had thought to find the abiding-place of -Romance, the same humdrum life of the commonplace that he left at home. - -We who are blind, Mr. _Idler_, are the shepherd boys of this life. -Enclosed in our valley of darkness by the everlasting shadow of our -endless night, we dream of the world that lies beyond as a place of -beauty and happiness. For us there is no sad disillusion. For us -there is no rude awakening from the delights of fancy. For us the -sky is always fair and the earth is always sweet. For us the woods -are thronged with nymphs and the grasses with the little people of -fairyland. We do not know the gloom of age or the horror of decay. We -do not know the sight of death. - -Do not imagine, Sir, that because we can not see, we can not create -images. We can, we do. We dream of the earth as fair as other men may -dream of heaven. Because we have never seen beauty, to us all things -are beautiful. When I walk in the garden, the scent of the rose rises -to my nostrils with a sweetness which is but intensified because I can -not see the blossom whence it springs. I finger its fragile petals, -and I rejoice in its beauty of form, for you must know that one can -_feel_ beauty as well as see it. I lean my head against the friendly -and sturdy oak and I hear the beating of his heart. For to me all these -things _live_. What does it signify that they can not see, or hear, -or speak? _I_ can not see; am I the less a man for that? I learn that -nowadays it is possible to communicate with people who are born not -only blind, but deaf and dumb as well. That it is possible to teach -them to read and to speak, even as I was taught to read and speak. Is -it not possible, then, that some day, if we will only try, we may be -able to break through the long silence that has separated us from our -brothers and sisters of the woods and fields? Already, we who are blind -can almost understand the whispered syllables of the rustling leaves -and the waving grass. May not some other, one perhaps more closely shut -in with God than we, reach downward as well as upward, and bring about -the _universal_ understanding? I hope it may be so. - -My wife, who had the sweetest voice of any girl I ever knew, is as -fair to me to-day as upon the day when I first fell in love. Her -voice, if anything, has grown more pleasant as she has grown older. -She, too, is blind, and together we enjoy a state of happiness which -comes as near to being perpetual youth as it is possible for mortals to -attain. How infinitely better this seems to me, than to be compelled, -day after day, to watch the fading of that flower of my early love! To -observe anxiously the lines of care creeping into that dearly beloved -countenance; to see the snow of many winters slowly whiten her soft -smooth hair! What a kindness of the good God is this, that she remains -forever young to me, as I do to her, and that our passion knows nothing -of the insidious poison of departing comeliness! - -Curiously enough, our only child, the dearly beloved son who was the -fruit of our attachment, has a perfect vision. And this, Mr. _Idler_, -odd as it may seem to you who are accustomed to look upon this matter -from a different point of view, is the one worry of my life. Many a -night have I lain awake, listening to the gentle breathing of my wife -at my side, and turned over and over in my mind the dangers which he -must face because of his condition. Often have I prayed God that He -might watch over him and turn aside his eyes from the ugliness, the sin -and the temptation, which his mother and I have mercifully been spared! -It is hard, in any case, to have the child grow up and go out into the -world. But it is infinitely more hard to know that he is almost as -though he were of another race of beings, and that he must endure the -sight of pain, of misery, of squalor, of poverty and of age! That he -must be subject to temptations for which I can not prepare him, having -never met with them myself. - -I once read a story of a man who became mysteriously possessed of the -power to read the thoughts of all those with whom he came in contact. -At first he was transported into the seventh heaven of delight, -reveling in the sense of his new-found power. But soon he came to -realize what a curse had fallen upon him. Turn where he would, he -found the minds of men filled with envy, malice and evil. The fairest -faces served to hide from others, but not from him, the most ignoble -minds. Beneath the frankest and most friendly manner he often read the -secret hatred and jealousy. Confronted upon all sides with the evidence -of the wickedness and baseness of his fellows, he was at last driven to -despair, and by one desperate act destroyed both his power and his life. - -Mr. _Idler_, were I suddenly to be granted the gift of sight, I think -that I should feel like that. It is hard enough to read of some things. -I should not care to look upon them. - -There have been those who, hearing me speak so of sight, have answered, -“That is because you have never been able to see. You do not know what -a blessing sight is, because you have never enjoyed it!” Sometimes I -comfort myself with the thought that it is like that with our son. -He can see, but he was born that way and he will never know the -difference. Gradually he will grow used to looking upon things which -I could not endure to behold. God has chosen to give him the harder -part; may He grant him the strength to bear it! - - I am, Sir, your sincere friend, - NOEL NIGHTSHADE. - - - - -A TALE OF A MAD POET’S WIFE - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: I have long been an interested reader of your interesting -periodical, though I have not hitherto presumed to address you, either -personally or in your character as editor. I have ever had an aversion -for that type of person who is constantly rushing into print to air -personal troubles and casting upon the shoulders of the public the -burdens which should rightly be borne upon his own. I have observed, -however, that a great many of your readers do not scruple to address -you in this respect and are quite in the habit of writing you for -advice upon their personal affairs, and, since you do not appear to -find this burdensome, I have determined to make known to you my own -pitiable plight, in the hope that you, or some of your readers, may -be able to suggest some method of relief; for, indeed, I am deep in -trouble, from which I seem utterly unable to extricate myself by my -own devices. Lest I weary you, I shall tell my sad story in the fewest -possible words. - -While yet a very young woman I fell in love with a poet. In this there -was nothing especially noteworthy, since, I suppose, all women go -through this experience at some time of life. The unfortunate feature -of my own affair was that it ended quite as I wished it to end--in my -marriage. I soon learned that the qualities which make the poet so -satisfactory a suitor do not always appear in so favorable a light when -he has become a husband. I found it very sweet and charming during our -courtship that my lover should be concerned with my spiritual welfare -and that his thoughts should never descend to the common affairs of -life. It would have seemed almost like sacrilege to ask him to consider -with me the sordid problems which are commonly inflicted upon young -men of grosser clay when they have proposed marriage to a young woman. -So certain was I that any mention of such trivialities would mortally -offend my fiancé that I would permit neither my father nor my brothers -to question him upon the subject of his financial condition. For this -sentimental whim I very nearly paid with my happiness, for I found -soon after we had been wed that these questions must inevitably be -considered sooner or later, and whereas it had formerly been only a -question of the expediency of my marriage, it was now become a matter -of vital importance. - -Fortunately, I have always been of an excellent _wheedling_ -disposition, so much so that my father used to say I could coax a -Scotchman into extravagance or a politician into honesty by merely -smiling upon him. I turned this natural gift to account in the case of -my husband by inducing him to constitute me his business agent. I then -went about among the editors selling his verse, and in this I was so -successful that he was soon supplying _no less than a third_ of the -current verse which was printed in the six or seven leading monthly -magazines published in this city. No doubt you have often heard poets -express surprise at the amount of rather mediocre poetry which finds -its way into the columns of standard publications. You may understand -this more readily when I tell you that several other writers of -magazine poetry, learning of our own arrangement, immediately set about -acquiring handsome and attractive wives, to whom they turned over their -output, never appearing at the offices of the editors in person but -always sending their wives as their representatives. - -In this way we managed very well for several years, though latterly I -have encountered one or two editors who were apparently either very -near-sighted or peculiarly unsusceptible. We were doing very well, -however, and my husband had acquired a wide reputation, so that he was -often invited to lecture before associations of one sort or another and -to give readings at entertainments in private dwellings. This added to -our income, but both of us by now being under the necessity of always -appearing dressed in the very neatest and most attractive fashion, we -soon found that whatever sum we had left over from current living -expenses went for keeping up appearances; so that we were able to live -very well but were by no means enabled to lay by a competence for the -future. - -It was at this stage of our career, which is to say some three years -gone, when we were doing better than we ever had before, that the sad -blow fell upon us which has cast a shadow over our household, and -which has left me, at the age of forty, a widow in all but name and -a pauper in anticipation, if not already one in fact. My husband had -been invited to speak before a certain literary club or society, and as -was always his custom, had accepted without hesitation. Little did he -realize, when he carelessly mentioned this appointment to me, that it -would be his last public appearance for a long time to come--perhaps -forever! Little did I know when he left our apartment that evening, -looking so debonair and engaging in his faultless evening attire, that -I should next behold him a pitiful wreck--a driveling idiot! Yet, Mr. -_Idler_, this was, alas! what befell your wretched correspondent. He -came back to me from that reading a man without understanding, a mental -incompetent, a man who, despite his stalwart frame and glowing health -of body, exhibited all the symptoms of senile decay! A man who could -scarcely scrawl his own name in legible fashion, to say nothing of -inditing sonnets, quatrains and ballads. - -And what, Mr. _Idler_, do you suppose those heartless wretches who -composed that literary society had done to my innocent and harmless -husband? Not content with having him read his verses, _they had -insisted that he explain them_! And he, poor weak man that he was, -yielded to the unhappy vanity which is the birthright of all poets, -and had attempted to comply with their request. The result you already -know. His mind was completely overturned. He has spent the time since -that dreadful evening in dictating to an imaginary stenographer a -critical appreciation of each rhyme in _Mother Goose_. Only once -has he attempted anything in the way of original poetry, which I -hastened to jot down in shorthand, and which was so puerile, so empty -of all meaning, that I could not forbear to weep heartbrokenly as I -transcribed my notes. - -Now, Mr. _Idler_, what redress have I against those inhuman creatures, -those compassionless brutes, who brought my husband to this pass? Can -I sue them in a court of law? Or must I bear without compensation the -dreadful sorrow which has befallen me? I beg of you, advise me at once, -as I do not know which way to turn. - - I am, Sir, distractedly yours, - BEDELIA BARDLET. - -P. S.--All is come right after all, Mr. _Idler_. After writing you -the above, yesterday morning, I determined to make one more desperate -trial. I took around to an editor the one original poem, of which I -spoke, which my husband had dictated in his madness. That editor has -just called me on the telephone to say that the poem will be printed in -the next number of his magazine, and that he finds it by far the best -that my husband has ever submitted. And so, please God, it may turn out -that his misfortune will prove to be a blessing in disguise. - - - - -THE LOCK-STEP - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: Thackeray once said: “Every one knows what harm the bad may -do, but who knows the mischief done by the good?” It appears to me -that there is a valuable suggestion in this query which merits the -consideration of all men who live under a civilized government, and -especially the attention of young men who are about to enter upon -the serious business of life. Young people, being by nature somewhat -lacking in logic, are prone to consider everything that is good _per -se_ as a thing which must necessarily be good in its effect, and -similarly to class all thing which are bad in themselves as bad in -their effects. Nothing could be more erroneous than this assumption. -There is no man who will maintain that a beating is a thing which is -good in itself; yet I am old-fashioned enough to believe that many a -beating has been very salutary in its effect. Early in life, I fell -into this common error of confusing the inherent quality of an act with -the quality of its effect, and it is in the hope that I may save some -worthy young man the miseries resulting from such an error that I am -writing this letter. - -As Mr. James Coolidge Carter points out in his book, _Law: Its Origin, -Growth and Function_, and as Blackstone and others pointed out before -him, all law originates in custom. As a custom becomes general--so -general as to be termed the common custom among a given people--it is -usually enacted as law. And even where such legislative sanction is -wanting, a general custom takes on the force of law and operates as -law, as is the case with the great body of the common law of England. -Thus, a custom, which in the beginning all are free to adopt or to -reject as they may see fit, eventually acquires the force of a rule to -which all are obliged to conform, whether from strict legal necessity -or merely by force of public opinion. - -The law, theoretically at least and actually in most cases, is merely -the expression of a public sentiment. It is the constant tendency of -all uniform and generally prevalent customs and opinions to take on -the form of law. The general disapproval of profanity, for instance, -results in laws providing penalties for the use of profane language -in public places. Practically all ordinances may be traced to the -same source of public sentiment. Not all laws, however, represent -the will of the majority. Certain of our laws are representative of -the general opinion of all mankind, others of the sentiments of a -majority of mankind, and still others of the ideas and prejudices of -an active minority. To the extent that such habits, ideas, customs, -opinions and prejudices become crystallized into law, the members of -a community become enslaved to those habits, ideas, customs, opinions -and prejudices; since a departure from them is followed by penalties -and punishments. And there are some customs which, while not actually -laws, exert quite as strong an influence upon the average citizen as -the duly enacted statutes. The fear of social ostracism is often quite -as effective a check upon the inclinations of an individual as the fear -of legal punishment. - -Now, as every man is the slave of general laws and customs, so, in a -lesser sense, is he the slave of his own personal habits. And oddly -enough this is more often true of good habits than of bad ones. -Should the town drunkard make a sudden resolution to reform, the town -may laugh, but nobody will condemn his resolution to mend his ways; -nobody will be scandalized at his change of habits. But should the -leader of the local prohibitionists suddenly resolve to test the joys -of inebriety, what a protest would go up on all sides! Even the town -drunkard would sneer and despise him as a man who had fallen from his -high estate. Much as the inebriate may dislike the sincere teetotaler, -he dislikes the ex-teetotaler even more. No, every man is a slave to -his good habits and he can not hope to change them without exciting the -animosity of all who know him. - -I recall reading not long ago a story of an eastern governor who was -caught in the act of smoking a cigarette. Now, there was nothing -especially horrifying about the fact that he smoked cigarettes except -for the fact that he was the vice-president of an anti-cigarette -society. Under the circumstances this governor, who is in all -probability a capable and fairly honest executive, has endangered, if -he has not destroyed, his political future--and all for the matter of -a cigarette! While it may seem an injustice to him that he be made -to suffer a political eclipse for so slight a lapse, there is hardly -a smoker who will not heartily agree with the idly busy people who -make up the anti-cigarette league, that the governor deserves all the -punishment his outraged associates may choose to inflict upon him. He -has been a double renegade; for he has betrayed his fellow smokers by -publicly indorsing the aims of the society, and he has betrayed his -fellow members of the society by privately indulging in the very habit -which the society condemns. - -And the general public may very justly condemn him not because he -smokes cigarettes--but because he has played the hypocrite. This -statesman is evidently one of those foolish men who believe that it -pays to appear better than one really is, and that an undeserved -reputation for abstinence and virtue is better than none. And of all -the possible attitudes that he might have assumed in this connection, -the one which he did assume was the worst, for it was the most -hypocritical and insincere. And what monumental folly! For the sake of -a cigarette he has jeopardized his career--by such a slender thread is -the Damoclean sword of public opprobrium suspended! - -But I am digressing. I did not intend to write you a dissertation upon -the follies of politicians, but to set forth, in some sort, the results -of my own stupidity in failing to discover early in life the tyranny of -custom and habit. - -I am, as you may possibly have conjectured, a member of the legal -profession; which profession I have followed with some degree of -success for the last thirty years. I think I may say without boasting -that I have attained an enviable reputation among my colleagues of the -bar as an able advocate and a man possessed of a logical mind and a -rather extensive knowledge of the “delightful fictions of the law.” I -have no complaint to make upon the score of my professional career. -If it has not led me to eminence, it has at least preserved me from -want. My practise, while general and not so profitable as that of some -legal specialists of my acquaintance, is yet sufficiently lucrative to -enable me to maintain a comfortable establishment at home and to pay -without pinching the expenses of my son’s collegiate and my daughter’s -“finishing school” education. I have a comfortable home, a healthy -and happy family, a prosperous business, a large number of congenial -friends and a hale and hearty constitution. Doubtless you will say -that I am blessed beyond the majority of mankind. Doubtless I am, and -doubtless, too, beyond my deserts. But for all these blessings, which -are obviously much to be desired, there is, so to speak, a fly in the -ointment of my contentment. And that is just this--_I have too good a -reputation_! In me, Sir, you may behold a man who has become an abject -slave to good Reputation. Totally unknown to the great majority of -my millions of fellow countrymen, and having but a modest degree of -celebrity among the members of my own profession, I am yet compelled -to be as careful of my speech and as circumspect in my actions as -if I were the Czar of all the Russias! I am bound hand, foot and -tongue by the ties of a lifetime; I am manacled at the cart-tail of -Respectability; I am pilloried in the pillory of Dignified Demeanor! -If you will bear with me a bit longer, I shall endeavor to explain my -present situation. - -I was born and reared in the little Missouri town where I now reside. I -am personally acquainted with practically every man, woman and child in -the place, which, while not exactly a village, is hardly large enough -to be called a city outside of the columns of our local newspapers. The -present county attorney is a young man of thirty whom I trotted on my -knee and for whom I made kites many years ago. The county judge and I -fell out many years ago because he insisted that we had been playing -marbles for “keeps”, while I maintained that we had been playing merely -for fun. We are now the best of friends, however, and there is no judge -in the state who passes heavier sentences on convicted gamblers than -he. The pastor of the church which I attend is a lad who in former -years was a member of the Sunday-school class I taught and which used -to embarrass me with all sorts of questions concerning the wives of -Cain and Abel and the origin of the inhabitants of the Land of Nod. And -so it is; I know them all and they all know me. - -“Jimmy” Vance is our family physician; he is the family physician for -at least a third of our population. He has been helping the people -of our town to be born and to die for more than thirty years--but -he is still “Jimmy”. Jimmy and I were born in the same year. It was -once a joke with us to call ourselves “twins” on this account. But -Jimmy and I are “twins” no longer. Jimmy is still a smooth-faced -boy at fifty-five, while I am a gray-bearded oldster. You may gather -something of my life when I tell you that though my Christian names -are Jeremiah Samuel (I do not give my surname for reasons you will -understand), I have never, since my twenty-first year, been addressed -either as “Jerry” or “Sam”. My wife calls me “Jeremiah”, as do my other -relatives, while my business associates and friends never grow more -familiar than “Jeremiah S.” - -When I determined to enter upon the study and practise of the law, my -maternal uncle, who was himself a practising attorney, became a sort of -supplementary preceptor to me by virtue of his avuncular relationship. -He assisted me in my studies and when the time came for me to be -admitted to the bar, he gave me a deal of what he no doubt considered -sound advice as to my future conduct. “Jeremiah,” said he, “there -is no profession on earth which is a more serious business than the -law. Men do not go to law for fun. Nobody brings a lawsuit for mere -amusement. When clients come to you they will come because they have -serious business on hand and they want a sober competent man to attend -to it for them. It is no joke to them and they don’t want you to joke -about it. Now, my advice to you--which you may take or leave as you -see fit--is always to keep a straight face. No matter how funny a case -may seem to you, don’t laugh. Your dignity will be more than half your -capital; see that you don’t forget your dignity.” - -Such was the advice of my maternal uncle. And such was the character -I assumed upon entering the practise of the law. From the day I drew -my first real brief I became the very essence of dignity. I even -wooed and won my wife in the character of a dignified young man of -serious mind and purpose. She has never in all these years suspected -my innate frivolity. Should I yield to my natural impulse and indulge -in the nonsense and fun which has ever been so dear to my heart, I am -convinced that she would at once lose all respect for me, if, indeed, -she did not think me suddenly insane. I am grave. Under all conditions -and circumstances I am as grave as an undertaker. I do smile now and -then, but it is generally the indulgent superior smile which I labored -so hard to acquire when young and which I can not now shake off. I have -been dignified so long that my dignity has become a part of me--not -really a part of my inward personality--but a part of my outward -appearance; I should feel naked and ashamed without it; it would seem -like going about half-dressed. I am so grave that nobody ever tells me -a funny story excepting the kind that one tells a minister. They are -afraid to be natural when in my presence. As Midas turned everything he -touched to gold, so I turn all my friends to bores. No sooner do I come -into my house than the whole family stops talking and waits to hear -what I have to say. Nobody dares to interrupt me; nobody presumes to -contradict me, unless it be old Brownly, who is our oldest inhabitant -and so considers himself somewhere near my own age. Every one is grave -when with me. That is, every one but Jimmy. Jimmy has always seen -through my pose and Jimmy takes a malicious pleasure in pretending he -is young when with me. - -From the day I entered upon the practise of the law, I modeled my -conduct upon that of my maternal uncle who was, as my boy Tom says, -“as cheerful as a crutch.” I abandoned the bright colored scarfs which -have always delighted my eye, and I donned the sober black bow tie -which I wear to this day. Striped and checked clothing gave way to the -non-committal pepper-and-salt suit of indefinite hue which has been my -unvarying garb from that day to this. And I grew that Vandyke beard, -to which, I am convinced, I owed my early reputation for learning and -even now owe a good part of the respect which I command. My beard is as -fixed an institution as our local literary club. Fashion has at least -relieved me of the necessity of wearing a top hat, or “plug” as we call -it here; but fashion will never relieve me of my beard, for beards may -come and beards may go, but mine grows on forever. Should I shave that -beard it would electrify the community. My wife would regard me with -suspicion, my children with pity, my friends with mirth and my clients -with horror. I verily believe that old Brown the banker, who is my best -client, would be less shocked should I tell him that I had forgotten -how to frame a complaint or draw a mortgage, than if he should walk -into my office and find me clean-shaven. - -And as it is with dress, so it is with other things. Jimmy Vance, -although a doctor, never affected that dignity which has come to be -my strongest personal characteristic. Jimmy never imitated anybody’s -dignity. And as a consequence Jimmy is as free as the wind. If he -wants to smoke, he does it. If he wants to drink, he takes a drink. -If he wants to go roller-skating, he goes. And nobody ever thinks -of objecting to anything he does. Jimmy has never led any one to -expect any particular sort of conduct from him. He is full of -surprises and nobody likes him the less for it. I can drink at my -club--occasionally--or at a banquet, or at home; but I can not go into -a bar like Jimmy and shake dice with a traveling man. I can smoke, -but I could not chew tobacco. I can read, but I can not read light -novels--that is, not unless I hide away to do it. If I were to go into -our public library and ask for _The Siege of the Seven Suitors_ I -honestly think that old Miss Peters, our librarian, would faint dead -away. Now it isn’t that I want to _do_ these things which irks me, -so much as the fact that I want to be able to do them if I feel like -it. I thank God I have escaped the gravest danger which lies in the -acquisition of too good habits--I have never become what so many men -of super-excellent reputations do become--a hypocrite. I have been a -poser, a pretender, a rebel--ah, I have fairly seethed with rebellion -against the tyranny of this fictitious self at times!--but I have -never broken my habits on the sly. I have lived up to the straw man -I so foolishly put in my place; I have gone around and around in my -lock-step of respectability when I felt that I might gladly have died -for a single year of absolute personal freedom; I have made my bed and -like Damiens I have lain chained to it with iron chains for years; and -never before now have I cried aloud! - -And Jimmy! What a life is Jimmy’s! Jimmy is as prosperous as I; as -respected as I; far happier than I; and ah, how much more is Jimmy -loved than I! - -When the girls go away to boarding-school, Jimmy kisses them good-by; -when they come home again, Jimmy kisses them hello. Jimmy never misses -an opportunity to kiss them, coming or going. But who cares? Nobody. -“It’s only old Jimmy,” the girls say. “It’s only old Jimmy,” echo their -sweethearts. “It’s only Jimmy’s way!” giggle their mothers--for Jimmy -kisses them, too; Jimmy is no fool. But suppose I should try it? Who -would say, “It’s only old Jeremiah?” - -Since there is small danger that your magazine will ever be read by -any one who will recognize me in this letter, I don’t mind confessing -that I did try it once; it is the only sin of the sort that I have -on my conscience after twenty-five years of dignity, domestic and -foreign. It was last year that it happened. The girl had been visiting -one of my daughter’s chums for the Christmas vacation and she was one -of the guests at the Christmas party we had at our house. I came into -the front hall and found her standing all alone, directly under the -mistletoe. I looked at her standing there so sweet and pretty and so -unconscious of the mistletoe, and I wondered how it would feel to kiss -some one on the lips. I have been kissed on the forehead for years. -Even my children kiss me on the forehead. They learned to do that -early, when they explained that my beard was “cratchy”. I looked at the -girl again. I was tempted and I fell. That is, I tried to fall, but she -wouldn’t let me. - -“Why not?” I asked her. “You let my boy Tom do it.” - -“Oh, but _he’s_ only a boy!” she said. - -“Well,” I insisted, “you let Jimmy do it!” - -“Oh, but he’s an _old_ man!” she exclaimed. - -“Yes!” said I, “and so am I an old man!” - -“Oh, but,” she protested, “you’re not _that kind_ of an old man!” - -That’s it! That’s always been it, and that always will be it--I’m not -_that kind_ of an old man! - - J. S. - - - - -THE FRUIT OF FAME - - - _To the Editor of The Idler._ - -DEAR SIR: I have told many strange and distressing stories in my -time; tales of struggle, of suffering, of sorrow and of bitter -disappointment; for I, Sir, am an author, and the telling of tales has -long been my vocation. But of all the tales which I have spun from -the thread of my inner consciousness, there is none, I believe, more -strange or more filled with disillusionment than the true story which I -am about to tell you now. - -I began writing at an early age. Indeed, I was writing short stories -while yet in the high school and selling them before I had done with -college. The history of my younger years does not differ greatly from -that of most young authors; it is the history of an existence which -would have been inexpressibly sordid had it not been glorified by -youthful hope and ambition. I married young and was forced to write -constantly in order to make both ends meet. The years went slipping by -almost unnoticed until suddenly one day I awoke to find myself upon the -verge of middle age and realized that for years I had been postponing -the writing of my first real book, meanwhile falling unconsciously into -the habit of giving all of my attention to the market value of what -I wrote and growing more and more indifferent to the question of its -literary merit. I had, in fact, become a confirmed hack-writer. - -The discovery shocked me into action. I determined then and there that -I would write a novel worthy of my powers if I had to give to that task -the time which should be employed in rest and sleep. I had never taken -many holidays; now I took none at all. Every odd moment was employed -on the great task which should lift me out of the rut and transform me -from a mere fiction machine into a creative artist. I shall not bore -you with the details of that work; how I toiled far into the night and -arose before daybreak to finish a chapter or retouch a paragraph; how -I struggled with my style which had become corrupted and florid from -the writing of sensational stories of adventure; how I tossed in my bed -when I should have been sleeping, made wakeful by the excitement under -which I labored. Suffice it to say, through infinite pains and toil I -finally wrote the last line of _The Pin-headed Girl_, and sent it off -to Messrs. Buckram and Sons with a high heart. It was accepted. - -The publishers, according to their usual custom, offered me a -royalty of ten per cent.; for you must know, Sir, that it is only -the established and successful author who can make his own terms. We -poor devils who are appearing in cloth for the first time must be -content with what is offered, for no publisher considers a meritorious -manuscript a recommendation in any way equal to a well-known name. The -book of a famous author, like a notorious brand of soap, is supposed -to sell itself, whereas, in the case of an unknown scribbler, a demand -for the work must be created by advertising. Now it is an axiom with -publishers that a modern novel, unless it happen to be a story of -extraordinary vitality, is dead in six months. With the birth of the -autumn list, the spring list dies, which is to say, when the books -which appear in the autumn are thrown upon the market, the demand for -those which appeared in the spring is immediately checked and often -dies out altogether. In six months novels are _old_; good only for -bargain sales, second-hand stores and circulating libraries. It is -therefore necessary that a book achieve a good sale in the first six -months if it is to enjoy such a sale at all. - -Realizing this and taking into consideration the fact that _The -Pin-headed Girl_ was the work of a literary nobody, my publishers set -industriously to work to create a reputation for me. I will say for -them that they spared no expense in making my name familiar to the -public. It was flaunted on every side, so that no man could ride in the -subway, pick up a magazine or open a theater program without being made -acquainted with the fact that Hackett A. Long was the author of _The -Pin-headed Girl_. No man could read a literary supplement or a monthly -review without learning that I took coffee with my breakfast; had a -fondness for Russian boar-hounds (never having owned one); preferred -reading opera scores to hearing the singers; did most of my work -between the hours of three and five in the afternoon; disliked Bohemian -restaurants; bought my cigarettes by the hundred; wore a wing collar; -and many other things, some of which were true and some not. If you -glanced at any of the illustrated papers at that time, you must have -seen me riding in my six-cylinder roadster (loaned for the occasion by -the obliging publisher), sitting upon the stoop of my cottage by the -sea, or seated, pen in hand, at my desk in the very act of producing -literature. I assure you, Sir, your correspondent was no inconsiderable -figure in the public eye at that time. - -This activity upon the part of my publishers was not without -results. The first person to show the effect of my sudden leap into -notoriety was my wife. She assured me that as a well-known author -I must pay some heed to appearances. I must no longer lodge in a -third-class apartment-house without hall-boys or elevators. When my -fellow celebrities sought me out to offer me congratulations upon my -masterpiece, they must find me in a suitable environment. We must have -an apartment fitting for an author already notable and soon to take a -well-deserved place among the foremost writers of the day; an apartment -which should be expensive without being pretentious, furnished in -such a fashion that any one could discern at a glance the touch of -the man of taste and refinement, the natural aristocrat, the man of -temperament; in a word, the artist. Having settled the question of the -apartment, she next turned her attention to my wardrobe, which was, -I confess, sadly in need of attention. I must no longer go about in -ready-made clothing. I must patronize a fashionable tailor, I must -dress for dinner, I must buy me a soft hat with a bow at the back. I -must cease my writing of lurid short stories and hair-raising serials; -to do pot-boilers for cheap monthlies and weeklies was beneath the -dignity of an author of recognized standing. You may well believe that -this unaccustomed notoriety was not without its effect upon me, but I -was not so carried away by it as was my optimistic mate. I hung back a -little; I protested. - -“It is all very well, my dear,” said I, “to talk so glibly of giving up -my short stories and my serials, but we must consider that they have -been, and still are, my chief if not my only source of revenue. They -are nothing to be proud of, I admit. They are cheap, shoddy, stupid and -entirely unworthy of the pen that wrote _The Pin-headed Girl_. But, my -dear, they _pay_.” - -“That,” said my wife, “is a consideration which had some weight before -the publication of your novel, but an author so well known as you now -are can certainly have no need to depend upon such puerile compositions -for his income.” - -I thereupon called her attention to the fact that my contract with -the publishers called for a semi-annual accounting and settlement, -and that under this agreement, no matter how much money might be due -me, I could not hope to collect any of it until six months after the -date of publication. To which she replied, truthfully enough, that it -would be easy for me to obtain anything we might want on credit. The -upshot of it was, Sir, that I yielded to her persuasion and began to -live in a manner which was little short of princely as compared with -our previous hand-to-mouth existence. I stopped writing pot-boilers and -set to work upon my second novel which I named, very aptly as I then -thought, _Out of the Woods_. Where my first novel had been three years -in the making, my second was finished in five months, for I now had -plenty of time at my disposal, and I sent it off confidently enough to -Buckram and Sons, and with it, a letter in which I made it clear that I -would expect a larger share of the profits upon my second story than I -had been content to accept in the case of _The Pin-headed Girl_. For, -as I pointed out to them, whereas the author of _The Pin-headed Girl_ -had been an unknown scribbler, the author of _Out of the Woods_ was a -well-known novelist who possessed the _name_ which had been wanting in -the first instance. - -You can, perhaps, fancy my surprise and consternation when I received -a letter from Buckram and Sons enclosing their statement of the sales -of _The Pin-headed Girl_ and a check for seventy-two dollars and fifty -cents in full payment of all royalties to date. _In spite of the money -expended in advertising, the sale of the book had not exceeded five -hundred copies._ The letter further stated that Messrs. Buckram and -Sons regretted to inform me that they were returning the manuscript of -_Out of the Woods_, as they could not consider publishing another of my -books upon the heels of such a failure as _The Pin-headed Girl_. - -This sudden collapse of my castles in Spain left me completely -demoralized, but it had no such effect upon my wife. She was astonished -at the failure of the book, but she held firmly to her position that -whatever the fate of the book might be, the fact remained that I was -now a celebrated man. I could not be blamed, she argued, because the -book had proved a failure. It was my part of the business to write the -book, it was the publisher’s part to sell it. I had performed my part, -but Buckram and Sons had most lamentably failed to perform theirs. -If they could not sell a book which had been so well advertised as -_The Pin-headed Girl_, that simply went to show that they had a very -poor selling organization, and the very fact that they had spent so -much money in advertising a book which afterward proved a failure, -was in itself a proof that they were no business men. In short, the -only thing for me to do was to find a new publisher for _Out of the -Woods_; preferably some energetic young man who would not only make a -success of the second book, but who would realize something from the -advertising expended upon the first. - -This unanswerable argument encouraged me a little and I submitted the -second book to Franklin Format who, although a young man and a new -man to the business, already had several “best sellers” to his credit. -A few days later he sent for me and when I was seated in his office, -he told me that he had read my manuscript with interest and had found -it most entertaining, but before making me any offer, he would like -to know if the book had been submitted to my regular publishers. His -was a young house, he said, and he could not afford to antagonize so -influential a firm as Buckram and Sons by stealing away one of its -authors. I replied that the book had been offered to them but that they -had refused to publish it. He raised his eyebrows at this and asked -the reason for their refusal. In my innocence I answered truthfully -that Buckram and Sons did not want my second book because they had been -unable to sell my first. On hearing this he remarked sympathetically -that it had been a very bad season for novels and that several on his -own list had fallen quite flat. Indeed, his own losses had been so -great that he had been looking about for some author with a “selling -name” to help him out of his difficulties. Under the circumstances, -however, it would be rank folly, not only upon his part, but upon mine, -to issue another novel bearing my name at a time when the memory of my -first ill-starred book was still fresh in the minds of the booksellers; -for while the public might know nothing of the failure, the booksellers -would most certainly recall it upon seeing my name on a wrapper, and -without orders from the booksellers one might as well burn a book in -manuscript as to let it die more expensively in covers. The best thing -for me to do would be to wait a year or two until the memory of _The -Pin-headed Girl_ had completely faded from their minds. In two years’ -time it would certainly be as completely forgotten as if it had never -been written, and I then might venture, with some hope of success, upon -another novel. - -And there, Sir, the matter rests. In some mysterious way the word has -been passed around among the publishers that _The Pin-headed Girl_ was -a disastrous investment and not one of them will touch _Out of the -Woods_. My wife threatens to leave me if I abandon novel-writing and -go back to my pot-boilers; she says she could not bear the disgrace of -acknowledged failure and that I must maintain my present position as a -celebrated author at all hazards. I have applied to several editors of -my acquaintance for editorial positions and they have all replied that -they had nothing to offer me which would be worth my consideration or -worthy of my talents. My first novel has left me with a reputation, -a two-years lease of an expensive apartment, a load of debts, an -angry wife, a scrap-book filled with favorable reviews, an unsalable -manuscript and a prospect of bankruptcy. - -This, Sir, is the true story of a writer who achieved his ambition of -becoming a well-known novelist. If any reader of your journal, now -engaged in hack-writing and enjoying comfortable obscurity, cherishes -an ambition like mine, let him be warned by my example, lest through -the blighting touch of the publicity agent he be forced, as I am, to -choose between beginning life anew under an assumed name or slowly -starving to death in the midst of luxury. - - I am, sir, - HACKETT A. LONG. - - - - - * * * * * * - - - - -Transcriber’s note: - -Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a -predominant preference was found in the original book; otherwise they -were not changed. - -Simple typographical errors were corrected; unpaired quotation -marks were remedied when the change was obvious, and otherwise left -unpaired. - -Page 1: Transcriber removed redundant book title. - -Page 27: The chapter title was printed as “A PURITIAN IN BOHEMIA,” -but was changed here to “A PURITAN IN BOHEMIA,” as that matches the -spelling in the Table of Contents and in other uses of the word -elsewhere in the book. - -Page 173: The chapter title was printed as “THE ABUSES OF ADVERSISY,” -but was changed here to “THE ABUSES OF ADVERSITY,” as that matches -the spelling in the Table of Contents and in other uses of the word -elsewhere in the book. - - - -***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK NEW BROOMS*** - - -******* This file should be named 65583-0.txt or 65583-0.zip ******* - - -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: -http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/6/5/5/8/65583 - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law 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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