Stephen Leacock

M ake r s o f Can adian Lite ra ture STEPHEN LEACOCK

STEPHEN L EACOCK

PETER MC ARTHUR

CONTENTS

Bio gr a ph i c al

Ant h olo gy

App r e c i at i o n

Biblio gra ph y 1 65

In de x

STEPHEN LEACOCK

HIL E an author is still living he h asrights that a biographer r is bound to espect . If he states that he was born on a

certain day, in a certain year , i at a certain place , it s the bio ’ garph er s duty to accept these statements with out question . He may suspect that the author has taken the facts on hearsay evidence , but he must leave it to some conscientious biographer of the future to consult the parish register and r ve ify the details . r Mo eover , if the author occasionally indulges in autobiography and sets forth explicitly what he regards as the effects of the various events

r of his life on h i s career , the biog apher will be wise to accept these conﬁdences in a thankful i sp rit . Being convinced of th e soundness of these r views , the work of the present biog apher of

r ﬁ Stephen Leacock is g eatly simpli ed . By let M r ting . Leacock , as far as possible , tell the STEPHEN LEACOCK

story of his own life , his labors will be reduced to a minimum and the enjoyment of the reader greatly increased . Mr . Leacock can tell the — story of h is life better than anyone else and this is how he does it . “ w r I was born at S anm oo , Hants , England , 1 on December 3 0 , 869 . I am not aware that ' there was any conjunction of the planets at the time , but should think it extremely likely. My parents migrated to Canada in 1 876 , and my father took up a farm near Lake Sim coe , in On tario . This was during the hard times of Cana dian farming , and my father was just able by great diligence to pay the hired man , and , in years of great plenty , to raise enough grain to ’ have seed for the next year s crop without buy ing any . By this process my brothers and I were inevitably driven off the land , and have become professors , business men , and engi neers, instead of being able to grow up as farm r labore s . Yet I saw enough of farming to speak exuberantly in political addresses of the joy of early rising and the deep sleep , both of body and intellect, that is induced by honest manual toil . “ I was educated at Upper Canada College ,

1 8 . Toronto , of which I was head boy in 8 7 BIOGRAPHICAL

From there I went to the University of Toronto , 1 1 where I graduated in 89 . At the Univer sity I spent my entire time in the acquistion of

- languages , living, dead , and half dead , and knew nothing of the outside world . In this diligent pursuit of words I spent about sixteen hours of each day . Very soon after graduati on I had forgotten the languages and found myself intellectually bankrupt . In other words I was what is called a distinguished graduate , and , as such , I took to school teaching as the only trade I could ﬁnd that needed neither experience nor intellect . I spent my time from 1 89 1 to 1 899 on the staff of Upper Canada Col lege , an experience which has left me with a profound sym pat hy for the many gifted and brilliant men who are compelled to spend their r lives in the most d eary , the most thankless ,

- and the worst paid profession in the world . I have noted that of my pupils those who seemed the laziest and least enamored of books are now rising at the bar , in business , and in public life ; the really promising boys , who took all the prizes , are now able with difficulty to earn the wages of a clerk in a summer hotel or a deck hand on a canal boat . “ In 1 899 I gave up school teaching in disgust, STEPHEN LEACOCK borrowed enough money to live upon for a few months , and went to the University of Chicago to study economics and political science . I was soon appointed to a fellowship in politi cal economy, and by means of this , and some M temporary employment by cGill University , I survived until I took the degree of doctor of 1 philosophy in 903 . The meaning of this de gree is that the recipient of instruction is ex am ined for the last tim e in his life and ispro n u o nced completely full . After this no new ideas can be imparted to him “ From this time I have belonged to the staff of M cGill University , first as a lecturer in poli tical science , and later as the head of the De partm ent of Economics and Political Science . As this position is one of the prizes of my pro r fession, I am able to egard myself as singu l rl so a y fortunate . The emolument is high as to place me distinctly above the policemen , - postmen , street car conductors , and other sala ried officials of the neighborhood , while I am able to m ix with the poorer of the business men of the city on terms of something like equality . In point of leisure , I enjoy more in the four corners of a single year than a business man knows in his whole life . I thus have what

STEPHEN LEACOCK

Apart from my college work , I have writ ‘ ’ ten two books , one called Literary Lapses ‘ ’ and the other Nonsense Novels . Each of these is published by John Lane !London and c New York) , and either of them anbe obtained , absurd as it sounds , for the mere sum of th ree r r shillings and Sixpence . Any eade of this paper ,for example ,ridiculous though it appears , could walk into a bookstore and buy both of these books for seven shillings . Yet these works are of so humorous a character that for many years it was found impossible to print them . The compositors fell back from their task suffocated with laughter and gasping for air. Nothing but the invention of the lino — type machine or rather of the kind of men — who operate it made it possible to print these books . Even now people have to be very careful in circulating them , and the books should never be put into the hands of people not in robust health . “ Many of my friends are under the impres sion that I write these humorous noth ings in idle moments when th e wearied brain is unable to perform the serious labors of the economi st .

My own experience is exactly the other way .

The writing of solid , instructive stuﬁ, fortiﬁed

—6 BIOGRAPHICAL

by facts and ﬁgures , is easy enough . There is no trouble in writing a scientiﬁc treatise on

- the folk lore of Central China , or a statistical enquiry into the declini ng population of Prince

Edward Island . But to write something out ’ of one s own m i nd , worth reading for its own

sak e , is an arduous contrivance , only to be

achieved in fortunate moments , few and far b e r r r tween . Pe sonally I would athe have writ ‘ ’ ten Alice in Wonderland than the whole ‘ ’ Encyclopaedia Britannica . Of the two books mentioned above he gives elsewhere an account that may be added appro

priately to this autobiographical sketch . The attention of the reader is called to the fact that the sketches included in “Literary Lapses”

were written between 1 89 1 and 1 897, when the

author was in his early twenties . They were not published in book form until ﬁfteen years

later , when they made an immediate success . Although they did not attract the attention of book publishers when they ﬁrst appeared in S a rda Ni h L e Tru h Puck Th e De tu y g t, if , t , , F P troit ree ress, and similar publications , they ’ L eacock s r as established Mr . eputation a humorous writer with all who read these papers for enth usi at that time . They won him many

S L —2 . . STEPHEN LEACOCK astic admirers who were not surprised at the favor with which his writings were received when gathered in book form . For years this literary gold-mine lay hidden in the files of old papers , while the author occupied himself with the uncongenial task of school teaching i and with serious forms of writ ng and study. Of his first book he writes : “ ‘ ’ The sketches in Literary Lapses were very largely written in my younger days , just ‘ after I left college . The one called A , B , and ’ C was the first of them . The editor of a To ronto paper gave me two dollars for it . This opened up for me a new world : it proved to me that an industrious man of my genius , if he worked hard and kept clear of stimulants and bad company, could earn as much as eight dollars a month with his pen . In fact , this has since proved true . “ But for many years I stopped this sort of thing and was busy with books on history and r politics , and with college wo k . Later on I gathered these sketches together and sent them to the publishers of my ‘Elements of ’ Political Economy . They thought I had gone mad . “I therefore printed the sketches on my own

8 BIOGRAPHICAL account and sold them through a news com pany . We sold copies in two months . In th is modest form the book fell into the hands of my good friend -as he has since become

Mr . Joh n Lane . He read the sketches on a steamer wh ile returning from Montreal to

London , and on hi s arrival in England he ca bled me an offer to publish the book in regular ‘ form . I cabled back, Accept your offer with ’ many thanks . Some years after Mr . Lane , at a dinner in London , told this incident and said that it proved to him that I must be the kind of man who would spend seventy-ﬁve ‘ ’ cents in saying many thanks . Of “Nonsense Novels” he writes “ The stories in this book I wrote for a news 1 1 paper syndicate in 9 0 . They were not meant as parodies of the work of any particular author .

They are types done in burlesque . “ Of the many forms of humorous writings pure burlesque is , to my thinking , one of the hardest—I could almost feel like saying the — , hardest to do properly . It has to face the cruel test of whether the reader does or does not laugh . Other forms of humor avoid this . Grave friends of mi ne tell me that they get an exquisite humor , for instance , from the works STEPHEN LEACOCK

of John Milton . But I never see them laugh ‘ ’ at them . They say that Paradise Lost is saturated with humor . To me , I regret to say, it seems scarcely damp . “ Burlesque , of course , beside the beauti k ful broad canvas of a Dickens or 9. Scott , shrin s to a poor mean rag . It is , in fact , so limited in scope that it is scarcely worth while . I do not wish for a moment to exalt it . But it appears to me , I repeat , a singularly diffi cult thing to do r r p ope ly. It is to be remembered , of course , that the work of the really great humorists , let us say Dickens and Mark Twain , contains pages and pages that are in their essence bur ” lesq ue. It would be possible to make quite a bulky volume of autobiography if one pursued the ’ r search th ough all of Mr . L eacock s writings . There are passages in the literary essays that are frankly autobiographical , and doubtless many of his sketches are burlesque renderings of personal experiences . But we shall content ourselves with just one more glimpse of his life that he has given . “When I was a student at the University of

Toronto , thirty years ago , I lived , from start to ﬁnish , in seventeen different boarding BIOGRAPHICAL

A houses . s far as I am aware these houses have not , or not yet , been marked with tab lets . But they are still to be found in the ’ vicini ty of M cCaul, D Arcy, and St . Patrick streets . Anyone who doubts the truth of what

I have to say may go and look at them . “ I was not alone in the nomadic life that I led . There were hundreds of us drifting about in this fashion from one melancholy habitation to another . We lived as a rule two or three in a house , sometimes alone . We dined in the basement . We always had beef , done up in some way after it was dead , and there were always soda biscuits on the table . They used to have a brand of soda biscuits in those days in th e Toronto boarding houses that r I have not seen since . They we e better than dog biscuit, but with not so much snap . My contemporaries will remember them . A great many of the leading barristers and professional ” men of Toronto were fed on them . While these quotations are satisfying r enough , they fail in several important pa ti i culars. They fail to tell that he was married n “ New York , in the Little Church Ar ound the ” 1 00 Corner , in Aug—ust of 9 , to Beatrix , daughter of Lieut . Col . Hamilton , of Toronto , STEPHEN LEACOCK

and that he has one son , who was born on

August 1 9 , 1 9 1 5, and named Stephen h Lus ingh ton Leacock . Above all they fail to tell us what he looks like , so that we may recognize him when we see him on the street . But this omission can be remedied by extracts from the writings of his contemporaries . An open letter to him in the Montreal S tandard has thisgem “ bi u I saw you in your native h a tat, with yo r protective coloring all about you , and I have

r been able to pick you out eve since . “ r It was a b ight August afternoon , as I remember , and you were honoring Lake

C u h i h in r o c c g with your p esence on holiday .

You were fully clad in a suit of dungarees ,

- waders , a cow bite hat, and whiskers of at

- least three days wilfulness . Waist high in the water you pushed ahead of you a sort of young scow, pausing ever and anon to curse a short , black pipe with a hiccup in its stem .

The scow was loaded with stones , with which you calculated to build an oven in a remote part of the island and pretend you were an u Indian . Even at that early date yo r playful ” fancy was at work .

STEPHEN LEACOCK

r with merriment . His conve sation was every a jot s witty as his books , and not for one r instant did he even suggest the professo .

Much more was he the big, happy schoolboy , brim ful of fun , very interested in all the things that go to make or mar the world of

- to day . For this picture of him we are indebted to an employee of the Library of M cGill University : “ ’ When three o clock came round it was no unusual thing to see him , a host of books and papers under his arm , make giant and hasty r strides into the lib ary to the delivery counter . “ ‘ ’ With the coming of Literary Lapses , Dr . Leacock appeared before me in an altogether ff di erent light . His familiar ﬁgure assumed a ’ new meaning . His ﬁne , grave face , that boy s mop of hair which always looks as if it had r just been washed the night befo e , and simply refused to be brushed , the deep , vibrating tones of his voice and h is peculiar stride , had ” always appealed strongly to me .

When Dr . Leacock was discovering England ,

English observers discovered him . One of them wrote his impressions as follows “ r Nobody, we must think , could be chu lish

1 4 BIOGRAPHICAL

r r with such a man . A ripple of laughte sp eads round h im wherever he moves ; vexation

- r vanishes , ill tempe ed people begin to chuckle

r in spite of themselves , everybody c owds

r about him to be ente tained . So it must happen ; and it is not surprising if such a visitor as this has found many nice things to say of us. He has a way with him to soften the ruggedest , to rouse the most inert , and there is not the least credit in being jolly in his company . Let his im pression of the

r r English , the efo e , be accounted to his own

' r r irresistibih ty, not to ou s . P ofessor Lea

cock as an explorer, is at a certain disad vantage ; he can never see people as they are without the charm and enlivenment of his society . “ is What peculiarly delightful about him , v moreover , is that he never seems to be friendly r and kindly out of me e politeness . Indeed he is a man of whom at ﬁrst sight we might expect to feel sh y ; his quizzical glances have a dangerous look ; and sometimes we suspect

him of meaning more than he says . His compliments have now and then a tweak of ” sarcasm . STEPHEN LEACOCK

Another English observer conveyed his impressions in this fashion : “ Leacock was smiling all the while . He was smiling just before when he stood in the gangway of Eltham Parish Hall , looking out at and up at the great audience who had come to greet him . Whilst the chairman was h introducing im to the audience , Mr . Leacock sat and smiled , and for nearly an hour Lea cock smiled like a great human sunbeam . “ Well , if some one smiles at you and says nothing, you are constrained to smile back at him . It is a sm ile that invites a smile .

Leacock must have found that out , and just as one tacks down an oil cloth to hold it to the

ﬂoor , so has Stephen Leacock nailed down his world with that infectious , merry smile of his which takes one right to a merry heart and P c a merry brain . un h once wrote of him

“ h ’ Any ow, I d b e as proud as a peacock To h ave inscrib ed on m y tom b : He followed th e footsteps of L eacock ’ l m In banish ing g oo . His laughter quietly rocks a not entirely giant frame , for Leacock is not a really big man .

He just escapes being this . Perhaps to him the body just merely matters . About the

- 1 6 BIOGRAPHICAL

shoulders he is built largely and strongly, these shoulders heaping up slightly behind into ’ the student s back . There is a not easily forgettable face of fairly large proportions . It is a live face , a kindly face . One writer has spoken of h is shaggy locks ; they are hardly this . A mat of closely growing hai r lies all over the head , and it has made its way, almost - r creeper like , far down on his b oad forehead . — There is no curl , no wave just what one may

- call useful hair over a large , well shaped head . It is a head that rem i nds one of that of John

M aseﬁeld, the poet , but the faces of these two r men are very diﬁe ent . “ ’ Does L eacock s body really matter? Not that we wish to convey the idea that he is mystic and ethereal . Body means appearance .

Mr . Leacock wears clothes , in spite of the fact that he once wrote ‘To Nature and Back ’ r again . For dinner and lecture pu poses he wears a form of dress which is quite careless ‘ ’ ’ and h r easy . It as no ﬁt in the tailo s sense r of the wo d , but just that looseness which it should have for the ﬁreside talk he likes so well . Is there the supreme insouciance of some professors about h im ? There is and there is not . When one looks at the high ly STEPHEN LEACOCK

glossed , turned down !perhaps a touch of

Bohemianism) collar , and neat black bow above r the white shirt f ont , there i s not ; but allowing the eyes to travel downwards to his trousers , one has to admit they have a peculiar vague ness about the knees that can only be obtained ” by intensive scholarship . r Since his ﬁrst success as an autho , Mr . ’ L eacock s life has passed quietly as a pro fessor at M cGill, and in his summer home at r O illia . According to popular belief, he built the house in which he lives in Orillia with his r own hands . This popular belief will be ve i

ﬁed or disproven before going to press , if the information can be dragged from him by correspondence . Since the publication of “Literary Lapses in book form , he h as added a book a year to i w r r h s rapidly gro ing lib ary of humo . In

1 92 1 he visited England on a lecturing tour , — and officially discovered the country re cording his impressions in a book that may A be regarded as part of his autobiography . s a matter of fact, the final biographer of Mr . Leacock will only find it necessary to select from his published works the material for an adequate record of h is life . Many of his

1 8 BIOGRAPHICAL sketches record faithfully his dealings with educationists , clubmen and the world in “ ” general . In Fetching the Doctor he gives i us a gl mpse of his boyhood . ’ Mr . L eacock s writings have placed him so clearly before the public that there is little for a biographer to do beyond recording the usual facts of a quiet academic life . His hi story is written in his own books for the perusal of his host of admirers , who may be found wherever the English language is read .

MY FINANCIAL CAREER

HEN I go into a bank I get r r r attled . The cle ks attle me ; the wickets rattle me ; the sight of the money rattles r me ; everything attles me . The moment I cross the threshold of a bank and attempt to transact

business there , I become an irresponsible

idiot . r I knew this befo ehand , but m y salary had

been raised to ﬁfty dollars a month , and I

felt that the bank was the only place for it . So I shambled in and looked timidly round

at the clerks . I had an idea that a person about to open an account must needs consult

the manager . “ ” I went up to a wicket marked Accountant .

The accountant was a tall , cool devil . The

very sight of him rattled me . My voice was

sepulchral . “ ” r Can I see the manage ? I said,and added — 2 3 S .L . 3 STEPHEN L EACO CK

” ’ solemnly, alone . I don t know why I said “ ” al one . “ n ” Certai ly, said the accountant, and fetched him .

The manager was a grave , calm man . I held my ﬁfty-six dollars clutched in a crum pled ball in my pocket. “ ” Are you the manager? I said . God knows ’ I didn t doubt it . “ ” Yes , he said . ” ” ’ Can I see you , I asked, alone? I didn t “ ” want to say alone again , but without it the

- thing seemed self evident .

The manager looked at me in some alarm . h He felt th at I ad an awful secret to reveal . “ ” Come in here , he said ,and led the way to r a private oom . He turned the key in the lock . “ ” We are safe from interruption here , he “ i said ; s t down .

We both sat down and looked at each other .

I found no voice to speak. “ ’ You are one of Pinkerton s men , I pre ” sume , he said . He had gathered from my mysterious man ner that I was a detective . I knew what he was thinking, and it made me worse . M Y FINANCIAL CAREER

’ ” N 0 , not from Pinkerton s , I said , seeming r to imply that I came f om a rival agency . “ ” To tell the truth , I went on , as if I had “ been prompted to lie about it , I am not a detective at all . I have come to open an account . I intend to keep all my money in ” this bank .

The manager looked relieved , but still serious ; he concluded now that I was a son of hi Baron Rothsc ld or a young Gould . “ ” A large account, I suppose , he said . ” “ r Fairly la ge , I whispered . I propose to deposit ﬁfty-six dollars now and ﬁfty dollars ” a month regularly . r The manage got up and opened the door .

He called to the accountant . “ ” M r . Montgomery , he said unkindly loud , i this gentleman s opening an account . He ” - ix r r will deposit ﬁfty s dolla s . Good mo ning . r I ose . A big iron door stood open at the side of the room . “ ” Good morning , I said , and stepped into the safe . “ ” Come out , said the manager coldly, and showed me the other way . I went up to the accountant’s wicket and

_ 2 5 _ STEPHEN LEACOCK

poked the ball of money at him with a quick , convulsive movement, as if I were doing a r conju ing trick .

My face was ghastly pale . “ ” “ ” r He e , I said , deposit it . The tone of the “ r wo ds seemed to mean , Let us do this painful ” thing while the ﬁt is on us. He took the money and gave it to another r cle k . He made me write the sum on a slip and sign my name in a book . I no longer knew what I was doing . The bank swam before my eyes . “ ” Is it deposited? I asked in a hollow, r vib ating voice . “ i ” It s, said the accountant .

Then I want to draw a cheque . My idea was to draw out six dollars of it for present use . Someone gave me a cheque book through a wicket and someone else began telling me how to write it out . The people in the bank had the impression that I was an n invalid m illionaire . I wrote somethi g on the r cheque and thrust it in at the cle k . He looked at it . “What ! are you drawing it all out again?” r r he asked in su p ise . Then I realized that - ix I had written ﬁfty six instead of s . I was

—2 6 MY FINANCIAL CAREER

too far gone to reason now . I had a feeling that it was impossible to explain the thing .

All the clerks had stopped writing to look at me .

Reckless with misery , I made a plunge . “ Y ” es, the whole thing . ” You withdraw your money from the bank? ” Every cent of it . Are you not going to deposit any more?” said the clerk , astonished . “ ” Never . An idiot hope struck me that they might think something had insulted me while I was writing the cheque , and that I had changed my mind . I made a wretched attempt to look like a man with a fearft quick temper . r The cle k prepared to pay the money . “ ” How will you have it? he said . “What?” How will you have it?” Oh” —I caught his meaning and answered —“ ” without even trying to think in ﬁfties . - l He gave me a ﬁfty do lar bill . “ ” And the six? he asked dryly. ” In sixes , I said .

He gave it me and I rushed out . As the big door swung behind me I caught the echo of a roar of laughter that went up to

_ 27 _ STEPHEN LEACOCK

the ceiling of the bank . Since then I b ank no more I keep my money in cash in m yt rousers pocket and my savings in silver dollars in a sock . — L iterary L apses.

BOARDING-HOUSE GEOMETRY

DEF INITIONS AND AXIOMS

LL boarding-houses are the

- same boarding house . Boarders in the same boarding-house and on the same ﬂat are equal to one

another . A single room is that which has no parts and no magni tude . The landlady of a boarding-house is a paral — lelogram that is , an oblong, angular ﬁgure , which cannot be described , but which is equal to anything . A wrangle is the disinclination of two boarders to each other that meet together but are not in the same line .

All the other rooms being taken , a single room is said to be a double room .

POSTULATES AND PROPOSITIONS

A pie may be produced any number of times . The landlady can be reduced to her lowest terms by a series of propositions .

3 1 STEPHEN LEACOCK

A bee-line may be made from any boarding r - house to any othe boarding house .

- The clothes of a boarding house bed , though produced ever so far both ways , will not meet . Any two meals at a boarding-house are to gether less than two square meals . If from the opposite ends of a boarding house a line be drawn passing through all the rooms in turn , then the stovepipe which warms the boarders will lie within that line . On the same bill and on the same side of it there should not be two charges for the same thing .

If there be two boarders on the same ﬂat, and the amount of side of the one be equal to the amount of side of the other , each to each , and the wrangle between one boarder and the landlady be equal to the wrangle between the landlady and the other , then shall the weekly bills of the two boarders be equal al so , each to each .

For if not, let one bill be the greater . Then the other bill is less than it might have — been which is absurd . — Literary Lapses.

_ 32 _ L ' ENVOI

L ' ENVOI

THE TRAIN TO MARIPOSA

T leaves the city every day about ﬁve o ’clock in the even i ing, the tra n for Mariposa . Strange that you did not

know of it , though you come — from the little town or did , long years ago .

Odd that you never knew , in all these years , that the train was there every afternoon , puff ing up steam in the city station , and that you might have boarded it any day and gone home . “ ” — ’ No , not home oi course you couldn t call “ “ ” r it home now . Home means that big ed sandstone house of yours in the costlier part of “ ” the city . Home means , in a way , this Mausoleum Club where you sometim es talk with me of the tim es that you had as a boy in

Mariposa . But of course “home would hardly be the r wo d you would apply to the little town , unless ’ perhaps , late at night, when you d been sitting

35 STEPHEN LEACOCK reading in a quiet corner somewhere such a r book as the p esent one . Naturally you don’t know of the Mariposa train now . Years ago , when you ﬁrst came to the city as a boy wi th your way to make you — , knew of it well enough only too well . The price of a ticket counted in those days , and ’ though you knew of the train you couldn t take ‘ it ; but sometimes from sheer homesickness you used to wander down to the station on a

Friday afternoon after your work , and watch the Mariposa people getting on the train and wish that you could go .

Why , you knew that train at one time better ,

I suppose , than any other single th ing in the city , and loved it too for the little town in the r sunshine that it an to . Do you remember how when you first began to make money you used to plan just as soon ’ r as you were rich , really ich , you d go back home again to the little town and build a great — big house with a fine verandah no stint about — it , the best that money could buy planed lum ber, every square foot of it , and a fine picket fence in front of it It was to be one of the grandest and finest houses that thought could conceive ; much

STEPHEN LEACOCK catch below the mill dam and the green bass that used to lie in the water-shadow of the ’ rocks beside the Indian s Island , not even the long, dull eveni ng in th i s club would be long enough for the telling of it . But no wonder they don’t know about the

five oclock train for Mariposa . Very few people know about it . Hundreds of them know that there is a train that goes out at five ’ o clock, but they mistake it . Ever so many of ’ them think it s just a suburban train . Lots of people that take it every day think it’s only the train to the golf grounds , but the joke is that after it passes out of the city and the suburbs and the golf grounds , it turns itself little by little into the Mariposa train , thunder ing and pounding towards the north with hem lock sparks pouring out into the darkness from ’ the funnel of it . Of course you can t tell it All just at first . those people that are crowding into it with golf clubs , and wearing knicker b ockers and flat caps , would deceive anybody. That crowd of surb urb an people going home on commutation tickets , and sometimes stand — ing thick in the aisles those are , of course , not

Mariposa people . But look round a little bit ’ and you ll ﬁnd them easily enough . Here and

—38 L’ENVOI

there in the crowd those people with the clothes that are perfectly all right and yet look odd in

some way, the women with the peculi ar hats — — ’ and the what do you say? last year s ? fashions Ah yes, of course , that must be it .

Anyway, those are the M ariposa people all

right enough . That man with the two dollar panama and the glaring spectacles is one of the greatest judges that ever adorned th e i r bench of M ssinab a county . That cle ical

gentleman with th e wide black hat , who is ex plai ning to the man with him the marvellous mechanism of the new air brake !one of the most conspicuous illustrations of the divine

structure of the physical univ erse) , surely you r 0 l have seen him befo e . Mariposa pe p e ! r Oh yes , there are any numbe of them on the

train every day . But of course you hardly recognize them while the train is still passing through the sub urbs and the golf district and the outlying parts Bu of the city area . t wait a little , and you will

see that when the city i s well behind you , h it

by bit the train changes its character . The electri c locomotive that took you through the city tunnels is oﬁ now and the old wood engine

is hitched on in its place . I suppose , very — _ 39 S . L . 4 STEPHEN LEACOCK

’ probably, you haven t seen one of these wood engines since you were a boy forty years ago the old engine with a wide top like a hat on its funnel , and with sparks enough to light up a r suit for damages once in eve y mile .

Do you see, too , that th e trim little cars that came out of the city on the electric suburban express are being discarded now at the way stations , one by one , and in their place is the old familiar car with the stuff cushions in red plush !how gorgeous it once seemed !) and with a box stove set up in one end of it? The stove is burning furiously at its sticks this autumn evening, for the air sets in chill as you get clear away from the city and are rising up to the higher ground of the country of the pines and the lakes .

Look from the window as you go . The city is far behind now and right and left of you there are trim farms with elms and maples near them and with tall windmills beside the barns that you can still see i n the gathering r i r r dusk . The e s a dull ed light f om the win r dows of the farmstead . It must be com fo t able there after the roar and clatter of the city, and only think of the still quiet of it !

As you sit back half dreaming in the car , you

40 L’ENVOI keep wondering why it is that you never came up before in all these years . Ever so many times you planned that just as soon as the rush and strain of business eased up a little , you would take the train and go back to the little town to see what it was like now , and if things had changed much since your day . But each time when your holidays came , somehow you changed your mind and went down to Nara gansett or Nagah uckett or Nagasom eth ing , and left over the visit to Mariposa for another time . i It s almost night now . You can still see the trees and the fences and the farmsteads , but they are fading fast in the twilight . They have lengthened out the train by this time with a string of flat cars and freight cars between where we are sitting and the engine . But at every crossway we can hear the long, muffled roar of the whistle , dying to a melancholy wail that echoes into the woods ; the woods , I say , for the farms are thinning out and the track plunges here and there into great — stretches of bush tall tamarack and red scrub l wi low, and with a tangled undergrowth of brush that has defied for two generations all attempts to clear it into the form of fields . STEPHEN LEACOCK — Why, look that great space that seems to open out in the half- dark of the falling evening — i i why, surely yes Lake O ssaw pp , the big lake , as they used to call it, from which the river runs down to the smaller lake , Lake Wissa notti , where the town of Mariposa has lain r r r waiting for you the e fo thi ty years . i This i s Lake O ssawi pp surely enough . You r would know it anywhere by the b oad , still , black water with hardly a ripple , and with the grip of the coming frost already on it . Such a great sheet of blackness it looks as the train thunders along the side , swinging the curve of the embankment at a breakneck speed as it rounds the corner of the lake . How fast the train goes this autumn night !

You have travelled , I know you have , in the

Empire State Express , and the New Limited and the Maritime Express that holds the record of six hundred whirling miles from Paris to — Marseilles . But what are they to this this r e th is mad career, this b eakneck sp ed, thun . dering roar of the Mariposa local driving hard to its home ' Don’t tell me that the speed i s ’ - only twenty ﬁve miles an hour . I don t care r what it is . I tell you , and you can p ove it for yourself if you will, that that train of mingled L’ENVOI

ﬂat cars and coaches that goes tearing into the night, its engine whistle shrieking out its warn ing into the silent woods and echoing over the 1 dull , still lake , 8 the fastest train in the whole world . — Yes , and the best, too the most com fort able , the most reliable , the most luxurious and the speediest train that ever turned a wheel .

And the most genial , the most sociable too . See how the passengers all turn and talk to one another now as they get nearer and nearer to the little town. That dull reserve that seemed to hold the passengers in the electric suburban h as clean vanished and gone . They — — are talking listen of the harvest, and the late election , and of how the local member is mentioned for the Cabinet and all the old fami liar topics of the sort . Already the conductor has changed his glazed hat for an ordinary round Christie , and you can hear the passen gers calling him and the brakesman “Bill” and ” r Sam , as if they we e all one family.

— - What is it now nine thirty? Ah , then we must be nearing the town—this big bush that we are passing th rough : you remember it surely as the great swamp just this side of the STEPHEN LEACOCK bridge over the O ssawippi? There is the bridge itself , and the long roar of the train as it rushes sounding over the trestle work that rises above the marsh . Hear the clatter as we pass the semaphores and the switch lights ! We must be close in now ! What? —it feels nervous and strange to be coming here again after all these years? It ’ must , indeed . No , don t bother to look at th e

- reﬂection of your face in the window pane , shadowed by the night outside . Nobody could tell you now after all these years . Your face has changed in these long years of money getting in the city . Perhaps if you had come back now and again , just at odd times , it ’ wouldn t have been so .

— - There you hear it? the long whistle of the r locomotive , one , two , th ee ! You feel the sharp slackening of the train as it swings round the curve of the last embankment that brings it to the Mariposa station . See , too , as we round the curve , the row of the ﬂashing lights , the bright windows of th e depot .

How vivid and plain it all is . Just as it used to be thirty years ago . There is the string of ’ r th e hotel buses , drawn up all eady for the train , and as the train rounds in and stops

—44

THE LITTLE GIRL IN GREEN

” OME , said Mr . Newberry ; “ there are Mrs . Newberry and the girls on the veran ’ h ” dah . Let s go and join t em .

A few minutes later Mr . Spillikins was talking with Dul h em ia Rassel er M rs. Newberry and p y

M rs. Brown , and telling Newberry what sh a beautiful house e had . Beside them r h stood Philippa Fu long , and s e had her ’ arm around Dulph em ia s waist ; and th e picture that they thus made , with their ’ ul h em i heads close together , D p a s hair being ’ - r golden and Philippa s chestnut b own, was

r l i . such that M . Spi l kins had no eyes for Mrs

Newberry nor for Castel Casteggio , nor for so anyt hing . So much that he practically ’ didn t see at all the little girl in green who r r stood unobtrusively on the fu the side of Mrs .

Newberry . Indeed , though somebody had murmured her name in introduction , he couldn’t have repeated it if asked two minutes STEPHEN LEACOCK

afterwards . His eyes and hi s mind were else where .

But hers were not.

For the Little Girl in Green looked at Mr .

Spillikins with wide eyes , and when sh e looked at him sh e saw all at once such wonderful things about h im as nobody had ever seen before . For sh e could see from the poise of 11 1 8 head how awfully clever he was ; and from the way he stood with h i s hands in his side pockets she could see how manly and brave he must be ; and of course there was ﬁrmness and strength r w written all over him . In sho t, she sa as sh e looked such a Peter Spillikins as truly x — r never e isted , or could exist o at least such a Peter Spillikins as no one else in the world had ever suspected before . All in a moment sh e was ever so glad that sh e ’ w rr accepted Mrs . N e b e y s invitation to Castel ’ Casteggio and hadn t been afraid to come . r For the Little Girl in Green , whose Ch istian name was Norah , was only what is called a poor r relation of M s. Newb erry, and her father was a person of no account whatever , who ’ didn t belong to the Mausoleum Club or to any other club , and who lived , with Norah , on a THE LITTLE GIRL IN GREEN

street that nobody who was anybody lived upon . Norah had been asked up a few days before — out of the city to give her air whi ch is the onl y thing that can be safely and freely given to poor relations . Thus she had arrived at

Castel Casteggio with one diminutive trunk , so small and shabby that even the servants r who carried it upstai s were ashamed of it . In it were a pair of brand new tennis shoes

- !at ni nety cents reduced to seventy ﬁve) , and a wh ite dress of the kind that is called “almost ” r n evening , and such few othe thi gs as poor relations might bring with fear and trembling , to join in the simple rusticity of the rich . r M r Thus stood No ah , looking at . Spillikins .

As for him , such is the contrariety of human h r thi ngs , he had no eyes for e at all . “ i Wh at a perfectly charming house this s,

Mr . Spillikins was saying . He always said this on such occasions , but it seemed to the Little Girl in Green that he spoke with wonder ful social ease .

I am so glad you think so, said Mrs . New rr h be y !this was what s e always answered) .

The whole th i ng from the point of view of STEPHEN LEACOCK

i Mr . Spillik ns or Dulph em ia or Philippa re r r f p esented usticity itsel . To the Little Girl in Green it seemed as brilliant as the Court of Versailles , especially — evening dinner a plain home meal , as the — others thought it when sh e had four glasses to drink out of and used to wonder over such prob r lems as whethe you were supposed , when

Franklin poured out wine , to tell him to stop or w to wait till he stopped ithout being told to stop , and other similar mysteries , such as people af r before and te have meditated upon .

During all this time Mr . Spillikins was nerv ing himself to propose to Dulph em ia Rasselyer r h i m B own . In fact , he Spent part of s ti e walking up and down under the trees with Philippa Furlong and discussing with her the proposal that he meant to make , together with such topics as marriage in general and his own unworthiness . He might have waited indeﬁnitely had he r i not learned , on the thi d day of h s visit , that Dulph em ia was to go away in the morning N h ke to join her father at aga a tt . That evening he found the necessary nerve r to speak , and the p oposal in almost every aspect of it was most successful .

STEPHEN LEACOCK

“ an awful ass in a way, or , Of course I know ’ ” r . that I m not at all the so t of fellow, and so on

r But not one of them ever was delive ed .

For it so happened that on the Thursday, ’ rr i one week after Mr . Spillikin s a ival ,Ph lippa

r went again to the station in the moto . And when sh e came back there was another passen

h r ger with e , a tall young man in tweed , and they both began calling out to the Newberrys r r f om a distance of at least a hund ed yards . And both the Newberrys suddenly exclaimed ’ ” Why, it s Tom ! and rushed oﬁ to meet the motor . And there was such a laughing and jubilation as the two descended and carried ’ Tom s valises to the verandah , that Mr . Spilli kins felt as suddenly and completely out of it — as the Little Girl in Green herself especially as his ear had caught, among the ﬁrst things “ r said , the wo ds , Congratulate us, M rs. New ’ ” berry , we re engaged .

r After which M . Spillikins had the pleasure of sitting and listening while it was explained , in wicker chairs on the verandah , that Philippa and Tom had been engaged already for ever — so — long in fact , nearly two weeks only they had agreed not to say a word to anybody till THE LITTLE GIRL IN GREEN

Tom had gone to North Carolina and back to

see his people .

So the next day Tom and Philippa vanished

together . “ We shall be quite a small party now , “ r rr said M s. Newbe y ; in fact , quite by our

r r selves till M s. Eve leigh comes , and sh e ’ ” won t be here for a fortnight . At wh i ch the heart of the Little Girl in Green

was glad , because sh e had been afraid that

r othe girls m ight be coming , whereas sh e

M r r knew that s. Eve leigh was a widow with

— r four sons and must be ever so old past fo ty .

r The next few days we e spent by Mr . Spilli

kins almost entirely in the society of Norah . He thought them on the whole rather pleasant

r days , but slow . To h e they were an unin terrupted dream of happiness never to be for

gotten . The N ewb errys left them to themselves ; not with any intent ; it was merely that they were perpetually busy walking about the

r g ounds of Castel Casteggio , blowing up things

with dynamite , th rowing steel bridges over

L — S . . 5 STEPHEN LEACOCK

gullies , and hoisting heavy timber with der ricks .

They left Peter and Norah to themselves all af day . Even ter dinner , in the evening , Mr . Newberry was very apt to call to his wife in the r dusk f om some distant corner of the lawn . “ Margaret , come over here and tell me if ’ you don t think we might cut down this elm , tear the stump out by the roots , and throw it ” into the ravine .

And the answer was , One minute , Edward ; just wait till I get a wrap . Before they came back the dusk had grown r m i to darkness , and they had edyna ted half the estate . r Du ing all of which time Mr . Spillikins sat r h with No ah on the piazza . He talked and s e h r r listened . He told e , fo instance , all about rr x r his te iﬁc e pe iences in the oil business , and about his ex citing career at college ; or pre r sently they went indoors , and No ah played the piano , and Mr . Spillikins sat and smoked and listened . In such a house as the N ew ’ berry s , where dynamite and the greater ex r - plosives were eve y day matters , a little thing

—56 THE LITTLE GIRL IN GREEN like the use of tobacco in th e drawing-room ’ “ didn t count . As for the music , Go right ” “ ’ ah ead , said Mr . Spillikins ; I m not musical , ’ i ” but I don t m nd music a bit . r In the daytime they played tennis . The e was a court at one end of the lawn beneath the trees , all chequered with sunlight and mi ngled shadow ; very beautiful , Norah thought , though Mr . Spillikins explained that l hi m oﬂ the spotted ight put his game . In fact, it was owing entirely to this bad light r ’ that M . Spillikins fast drives , wonderful though they were , somehow never got inside the service court . r No ah , of course , thought Mr . Spillikins — a wonderful player . She was glad in fact — it suited them both when he beat her six ’ ’ to nothing . She didn t know and didn t care that there was no one else in the world that

Mr . Spillikins could beat like that . Once he h er even said to , “ ’ By Gad ! you don t play half a bad game , you know . I think, you know, with practice ’ ” you d come on quite a lot . After that the games were understood to be more or less in the form of lessons , which put

Mr . Spillikins on a pedestal of superiority ,

57 STEPHEN LEACO CK and allowed any bad strokes on his part to be v iewed as a form of indulgence .

‘ Also , as the tennis was viewed in this light , it was Norah’s part to pick up the balls at the net and throw them back to Mr . Spillikins . r He let h e do this , not from rudeness , for it ’ wasn t in him , but because in such a primeval place as Castel Casteggio the natural prim i tive relation of the sexes is bound to reassert itself . lli But of love Mr . Spi kins never thought . He had viewed it so eagerly and so often from a distance that when it stood here modestly at h is very elbow he did not recognize its presence . His mind had been fashioned , as it were , to connect love with something stun r ning and sensational , with Easte hats and harem skirts and the luxurious consciousness of the unattainable . r n Even at that , the e is no k owing what might r have happened . Tennis , in the cheque ed light of sun and shadow cast b y summer leaves , is a dangerous game . There came a day when they were standing one each side of r i i the net , and M . Spillikins was expla n ng to Norah the proper way to hold a racquet so as to be able to give those magniﬁcent backhand

—58 THE LITTLE GIRL IN GREEN

sweeps of his , by which he generally drove the ball half-way to the lake ; and ex plaining this ’ involved putting h i s hand right over Norah s on the handle of the racquet , so that for just half a second her hand was clasped tight in his ; and if that half-second had been lengthened out into a whole second it is quite possible that what was already subconscious in his mind would have broken its way triumphantly to the ’ surface , and Norah s hand would have stayed — in his , how willingly for the rest of their two lives .

But just at that moment Mr . Spillikins looked up , and he said in quite an altered tone , “ ’ By Jove ! who s that awft good-looking ” woman getting out of the motor?

And their hands unclasped . Norah looked r ove towards the house and said , “ i ’ Wh s . r h y , t Mrs Eve leigh . I thought s e ’ f r r wasn t coming o anothe week . “ ” ai . I say, s d Mr Spillikins , straining his “ short sight to the uttermost, what perfectly ” wonderful golden hair , eh? “ ’ Why , it s Norah began , and then sh e ’ stopped . It didn t seem right to explain that ’ M r E r i s. ve le h g s hair was dyed . STEPHEN LEACOCK

’ ” I didn t know she was coming so soon , h s e said , and there was weariness already in ’ r i her hea t . Certa nly she didn t know it ; still less did she know, or any one else , that the ’ r E r i reason of M s. ve le gh s coming was because

Mr . Spillikins was there . She came with a set purpose . “ ’ ?” Oughtn t we to go to the house she added . ” r r All ight , said M . Spillikins with great “ ’ ” alacrity , let s go .

There is no need to pursue in detail the ’ stages of Mr . Spillikins wooing . Its course r was swift and happy . M . Spillikins , having ’ E r i seen the back of Mrs . ve le gh s head , had decided instanter that she was the most beauti ful woman in the world ; and t—hat impression is not easily corrected in the half light of a shaded drawing room ; nor across a dinner-table lighted only with candles with deep red shades ; n r o even in the daytime through a veil . In M r any case , it is only fair to state that if s. Everleigh was not and is not a singularly ’ beautiful woman , Mr . Spillikins still doesn t know it .

—60

STEPHEN LEACOCK — know a woman like her, with so much atten ’ r tion and eve ything . I can t imagine what h e s sees in me .

Which was just as well .

And then Mr . Spillikins checked himself — , for he noticed this was on the verandah in — the morning that Norah had a hat and a jacket on and that the motor was rolling to wards the door . “ ” “ I say, he said , are you going away? ’ ” Y ? r es, didn t you know No ah said , thought you heard them speaking of it at din ’ ner last night . I have to go home ; father s ” alone , you know . “ ’ l Oh , I m awfully sorry, said Mr . Spi li “ ’ ” kins ; we shan t have any more tennis . “ ” - r h Good bye , said No ah , and as s e said it and put out her hand there were tears brim ming up into her eyes . But Mr . Spillikins , ’ being short of sight , didn t see them .

“ - ” Good bye , he said .

Then , as the motor carried her away, he stood for a moment in a sort of reverie . Per haps certain things that might have been rose unformed and inarticulate before his mind . — And so in the fulness of time nor was it so THE LITTLE GIRL IN GREEN

very full either , in fact , only about ﬁve weeks r Peter Spillikins and M s. Everleigh were ’ Plu ori married in St . Asaph s Church on t a Ave . And the wedding was one of the most beauti ful and sumptuous of the weddings of the

September season . There were ﬂowers , and bridesmaids in long veils , and tall ushers in r f ock coats , and awnings at the church door , and strings of motors with wedding favors , and imported chauffeurs , and all that goes to invest marriage on Plutoria Avenue with its r peculiar sac edness . The face of the young rector , Mr . F areforth Furlong , wore the added saintliness that Springs from a ﬁve-hundred r dollar fee . The whole town was the e , or at least everybody that was anybody ; and if there was one person absent , one who sat by herself in a darkened drawing room of a dull r little house on a shabby street , who knew o cared? — Ar d e Ri h cadian Adventures wi th th e I l c .

A HERO IN HOMESPUN

OR THE LIFE STRUGGLE OF HE! EKIAH HAYLOFT

AN you give me a job?” The foreman of the brick layers looked down from the

scaffold to the speaker below . ’ Something in the lad s up turned face appealed to the

m an. He threw a brick at him .

It was Hezekiah Hayloft . He was all in

- homespun . He carried a carpet bag in each hand . He had come to New York , the cruel r city , looking for wo k . i ah Hezek moved on . Presently he stopped r in f ont of a policeman . “ ” “ Sir , he said , can you tell me the way to The policeman struck h im savagely across the side of the head . “ ’ ” “ k I ll learn you , he said , to as damn fool questions

Again Hezekiah moved on . In a few

—67 STEPHEN LEACOCK

moments he met a man whose tall black hat, black waistcoat and white tie proclaimed him r a cle gym an. “ “ Good sir, said Hezekiah , can you tell

The clergym an pounced upon him with a growl of a hyena , and bit a piece out of his ear .

Yes , he did , reader . Just imagine a clergy man biting a boy in open daylight ! Yet that r happens in New Yo k every minute . — Such is the great , cruel city and imagine r looking for wo k in it . You and I who spend our time in trying to avoid work can hardly n realize what it must mean . Thi k how it must r r feel to be alone in New Yo k , without a f iend r o a relation at hand , with no one to know or ! care what you do . It must be great For a few moments Hezekiah stood irreso lute . He looked about him . He looked up at the top of the Metropolitan Tower . He saw no r - work there . He looked ac oss at the sky sora pers on Madison Square , but his eye detected r no wo k in any of them . He stood on his head - i and looked up at the Flat iron building . St ll r no wo k in sight . All that day and the next Hezekiah looked for work .

STEPHEN LEACOCK

For fourteen weeks Hezekiah Hayloft looked r for wo k . Once or twice he obtained tem rar po y employment, only to lose it again . For a few days he was made accountant in a trust company . He was discharged because he would not tell a lie . For about a week he r held a position as cashie in a bank . They dischar ged the la‘l because he refused to forge a cheque . For three days he held a conductor r ship on a B oadway surface car . He was dis missed from this business for refusing to steal

a nickel.

Such , reader , is the horrid degradation of r business life in New Yo k . Meantime the days passed and still Hayloft r found no wo k . His stock of money was ex n ha sted . He had not had any money anyway . For food he ate grass in Central Park and drank the water from the Cruelty to Animals - horse trough . Gradually a change came over the lad ; his face grew hard and stem ; the great city was h setting its mark upon im . One night Hezekiah stood upon the side — ’ walk . It was late long after ten o clock .

Only a few chance pedestrians passed . “ ” By Heaven ! said Hezekiah , shaking his A HERO IN HOMESPUN

“ ﬁst at the lights of the cruel city , I have ex

l . h austed fair means , I will try foul . I wi l beg h ” No Hayloft as been a beggar yet, he added , “ ” with a bitter laugh , but I will begin .

- A well dressed man passed along .

Hezekiah seized him by the throat . “What do you want?” cried the man in sud “ ’ r f r den terro . Don t ask me o work . I tell i you I have no work to g ve . “ ’ ” r m . I don t want work , said Hezekiah g i ly ” I am a beggar . ” r Oh ! is that all , said the man , elieved .

Here , take this ten dollars and go and buy a ” drink with it . Money ! money ! and with it a new sense of power that rushed like an intoxicant to Heze ’ kiah s brain . “ ” “ r D ink , he muttered hoarsely , yes , drink . The lights of a soda-water fountain struck

his eye . “ ” as Give me an egg phosphate , he said , he i r dashed h s money on the counter . He d ank

phosphate after phosphate till his brain reeled .

Mad with the liquor, he staggered to and fro

in the shop , weighed himself recklessly on the

slot machine three or four times , tore out chewing gum and matches from the automati c — 71 S . L . 6 STEPHEN LEACOCK

nickel boxes , and ﬁnally staggered on to the street , reeling from the effects of thirteen phosphates and a sarsaparilla soda . “ ” “ ’ r r C ime , he hissed . Crime , c ime , that s ” what I want. He noticed that the passers-by made way for him now with respect . On the corner of the street a policeman was standing .

Hezekiah picked up a cobblestone , threw it , and struck the man full on the ear .

The policeman smiled at him roguishly, and h i r then gently wagged s ﬁnge in reproof . It was the same policeman who had struck him r r f r fou teen weeks befo e o asking the way.

Hezekiah moved on , still full of his new idea r of c ime . Down the street was a novelty shop , ’ the window decked with New Year s gifts . “ ” Sell me a revolver , he said . ” ir i Yes , s , sa d the salesman . Would you like something for evening wear , or a plain kind ’ f r o home use. Here s a very good family

- ” revolver, or would you like a roof garden size?

Hezekiah selected a revolver and went out . “ ” “ r Now then , he muttered , I will bu glarize ” a house and get money. Walking across to Fifth Avenue he selected one of the ﬁnest residences and rang the bell . A HERO IN HOMESPUN

A man in livery appeared in the brightly lighted hall . “ ” Where is your master ? Hezekiah asked , showing his revolver . “ i He is upstairs , sir, count ng h i s money , “ the man answered , but he dislikes being dis ” turb ed. “ ” “ Show me to h i m , said Hezekiah , I wi sh ” to shoot him and take his money . “ ” m Very good sir , sai d the an , deferentially . l ” You wil find him on the first floor . Hezeki ah turned and shot the footman twice i through the livery and went upsta rs . In an upper room was a man sitting at a desk under a reading lamp . In front of him was a pile of gold . He was an old m an, with a foolish , benevolent face . “ ” What are you doing? said Hezekiah .

I am counting my money, said the man . “ ?” i What are you asked Hezek ah sternly . ” “ I am a ph ilanthropist, said the man . I give my money to deserving objects . I estab l ish medals for heroes . I give prizes for ship captains who jump into the sea, and for ﬁre men who throw people from the windows of upper stories at the risk of their own ; I send r Ame ican missionaries to China , Chinese m i s STEPHEN LEACOCK

i sionar es to India , and Indian m i ssm naries to

Chicago . I set aside money to keep college professors from starving to death when they ” deserve it . “ “ Stop said Hezekiah , you deserve to die .

Stand up . Open your mouth and shut your eyes .

The old man stood up . r h il There was a loud repo t . The p anth ro w pist fell . He as shot through the waistcoat r r and hi s suspende s we e cut to ribbons . r Hezekiah , his eyes glitte ing with the mania r r of c ime , c ammed his pockets with gold pieces . There was a roar and a hubbub in the street below . “ ” “ The police ! Hezekiah muttered . I must set fire to the house and escape in the con ” fusion . He struck a safety match and held it to the leg of the table . r It was a firep oof table and refused to burn . fir He held it to the door . The door was e

i . r proof . He applied t to the bookcase He an r the match along the books . They we e all

r r r . ﬁrep oof . Eve ything was ﬁrep oof

Frenzied with rage , he tore off his celluloid h i collar and set ﬁre to it . He waved it above s

74 A HERO IN HOMESPUN

r head . G eat tongues of flame swept from the windows . “ ” Fire ! Fire ! was the cry . Hezekiah rushed to the door and threw the blazing collar down the elevator shaft . In a r moment the iron elevator , with its steel opes , burst into a mass of flame ; then the brass fit r tings of the doo s took fire , and in a moment the cement floor of the elevator was one roar ing mass of flame Great columns of smoke burst from the building . “ ” ! r ! Fire Fi e shouted the crowd . fir Reader , have you ever seen a e in a great r city? The sight is a wond ous one . One realizes that , vast and horrible as the city is , it nevertheless shows it s human organization r in its most perfect fo m . Scarcely had the fire broken out before i r resolute efforts were made to stay ts p ogress . Long lines of men passed buckets of water from hand to hand . The water was dashed on the fronts of the neighboring houses , th r own all over the street, r splashed against the teleg aph poles , and poured in torrents over the excited crowd . Every place in the neighbourhood of the fire

r r was lite ally soaked . The men wo ked with

_ 75 _ STEPHEN LEACOCK

a will . A derrick rapidly erected in the street rear ed itself to the height of sixteen or seven teen feet . A daring man mounted on the top of it , hauled bucket after bucket of water on the pulley . Balancing himself wi th the cool daring of the trained fireman, he threw th e all r water in directions over the c owd . fir The e raged for an hour . Hezekiah , standing at an empty window amid the flames , rapidly filled his revolver and emptied it into r the c owd . From one hundred revolvers in the street a r fusillade was kept up in eturn . r r r This lasted for an hou . Seve al pe sons were almost hit by the rain of bullets , which would have proved fatal had they struck any one .

Meantime , as the ﬂames died down , a squad of policemen rushed into the doomed building . Hezekiah threw aside his revolver and re i a ce ved them with folded rms . “ ” h “ Hayloft, said the c ief of police , I arrest ons ir you for murder , burglary , arson , and c p m an acy. You put up a splendid ﬁght, old , and I am only sorry that it is our painful duty ” to arrest you . As Hayloft appeared below a great cheer

—76

STEPHEN LEACOCK

’ You won t mind accepting these things ,

M r. Hayloft . Our force would like very much to enable you to make a suitable appearance in ” the court . l r Carefu ly d essed and shaved , Hezekiah descended . He was introduced to the leading r ofﬁcials of the fo ce , and spent a pleasant hour of chat over a cigar , discussing the incidents of the night before . In the course of th e morning a number of persons called to meet and congratulate Heze

” I want to tell you , Sir , said the editor of “ a great American daily, that your work of last night will be known and commented on all r ove the States . Your shooting of the footman was a splendid piece of nerve , sir, and will do i ” much n defence of the unwritten law . “ ” n ll “ Mr . Hayloft, said a other ca er, I am sorry not to have met you sooner . Our friends here tell me that you have been in New York r for some months . I egret , sir , that we did not know you . This is th e name of my ﬁrm , r r r r M . Hayloft . We a e leading lawye s he e , and we want the honor of defending you . We ir may? Thank you , s . And now, as we have still an hour or two before the court, I want to

—78 A HERO IN HOMESPUN

r run you up to my house in my moto . My wife is very anx ious to have a little luncheon ” for you .

The court met that afternoon . There was a cheer as Hezekiah entered . “ ” “ Mr . Hayloft, said the judge , I am ad f r journing this court o a few days . From what I hear the nerve strain that you have under gone must have been most severe . Your friends tell me that you can hardly be in a state to take a proper interest in the case till you ” r have had a tho ough rest . As Hayloft left the court a cheer went up from the crowd , in which the judge joined . The next few days were busy days for Heze kiah , ﬁlled with receptions , civic com mittees , and the preparation of the brief in which Heze kiah’s native intelligence excited the admira tion of the lawyers .

Newspaper men sought for interviews .

Business promoters called upon Hezekiah . His name was put down as a director of several r leading companies , and it was rumo ed that in the event of h is acquittal he would undertake a merger of all the great burglar protection corporations of the United States .

The trial opened a week later , and lasted

79 STEPHEN L EACOCK

two months . Hezekiah was indicted on ﬁve — charges arson , for having burned the steel cage of the elevator ; misdemeanour , for shoot ing the footman ; the theft of the money , petty r la ceny ; the killing of the philanthropist, infanticide ; and the shooting at the police with out hitting them , aggravated felony . The proceedings were very complicated expert evidence was taken from all over the

United States . An analytical examination was made of the brain of the philanthropist.

Nothing was found . The entire jury were dismissed three times w on the grounds of prejudice , t ice on the ground of ignorance , and ﬁnally disbanded on r the g ound of insanity . r The proceedings d agged on . Meantime Hezekiah’s business m terests accumulated . ’ At length , at Hezekiah s own suggestion , it was necessary to abandon the case . “ ” Gentlemen , he said , in his ﬁnal speech “ to the court , I feel that I owe an apology for not being able to attend these proceedings any an further . At y time , when I can snatch an hour or two from my business , you may always count on my attendance . In the meantime ,

- 80 A HERO IN HOMESPUN rest assured that I shall follow your proceed ” ings with the greatest interest . He left the room amid th ree cheers and the “ ” singing of Auld Lang Syne . After that the case dragged hopelessly on s a from t ge to stage . The charge of arson was met by a nolle r e ui t w p os q . The accusa ion of theft as stopped ne lus ul ra by a p t . The killing of the foot man was pronounced justiﬁable insanity . The accusation of murder for the death of the ph ilanthropist was withdrawn by common

consent . Damages in error were awarded to Hayloft for the loss of his revolver and cart ridges . The main body of the case was carried on a writ of c ertiorari to the Federal Courts and appealed to the Supreme Court of the ni U ted States .

It is there still .

Meantime , Hezekiah , as managing director ’ of the Burglars Security Corporation , remains one of the rising generation of ﬁnanciers in

New York , with every prospect of election to the State Senate . — Nonsense Novels.

—81

THE SPIRITUAL OUTLOOK OF D E M R . OOM R

STEPHEN LEACOCK

” ! uite unprepared , he answered . I had reason to know it as one of his executors .

r — Eve ything in confusion nothing signed , no

r r proper power of atto ney, codicils d awn up in blank and never witnessed ; in short , sir, no sense apparently of the nearness of his death ” and of his duty to be prepared . “ ” “ ’ I suppose , I said , poor Podge didn t ” r n ealize that he was goi g to die . “ ’ ” r Ah , that s just it, esumed Mr . Doomer, “ r with something like ste nness , a man ough t to realize it . Every man ought to feel that at any moment—one can’t tell when—day or ” night , he may be called upon to meet his

Mr . Doomer paused here as if seeking a phrase “ his ﬁnancial obligations , face to face . At any time , sir, he may be hurried before the — — Judge or rather his estate may b e of the

sir. Probate Court . It is a solemn thought, And yet when I come here I see about me men i laughing, talking , and play ng billiards , as if there would never be a day when their estate would pass into the hands of their adm inis trators and an account must be given of every ” cent . “ ” But, after all, I said , trying to fall in with

86 OUTLOOK OF MR . DOOMER

“ h i s mood , death and dissolution must come to ” all of us . “ ’ ” That s just it, he said solemnly. “ ’ They ve dissolved the tobacco people , and ’ ’ they ve dissolved the oil people , and you can t ” tell whose turn it may be next .

Mr . Doomer was silent a moment and then

resumed , speaking in a tone of humility that was almost reverential : “And yet there is a certain preparedness

for death , a certain ﬁtness to die that we ought

all to ai m at . Any man can at least think

solemnly of the Inheritance Tax , and reﬂect whether by a contract inter vivos drawn in

blank he may not obtain redemption ; any man ,

if he thi nks death is near , may at least divest himself of h is purely speculative securities and trust hi mself entirely to those gold-bearing bonds of the great industrial corporations whose value will not readily dimini sh or pass ” away . Mr . Doomer was speaking with some

r r r thing like eligious aptu e . “ ” see? And yet what does one he continued . Men affected with fatal illness and men stri cken in years occupied still with idle talk and amusements instead of reading the ﬁnan — 87 L . 7 STEPHEN LEACOCK

cial newspapers , and at the last carried away with scarcely tim e , perhaps , to send for their ” brokers when it is already too late . “ ” It is very sad, I said . ” “ Very , he repeated , and saddest of all , perhaps , is the sense of the irrevocability of death and the changes that must come after ” it .

We were silent a moment . “ You think of these things a great deal , ” ? . Mr . Doomer I said “ ” I do , he answered . It may be that it is r something in my tempe ament . I suppose one - would call it a sort of spiritual mindedness .

But I think of it all constantly. Often as I stand here beside the window and see these ” — cars go by h e indicated a passing street —“ car I cannot but realize that the tim e will r come when I am no longer a managing directo , and wonder whether they will keep on trying to hold the dividends down by improving the rolling stock or will declare proﬁts to inﬂate the securities . These mysteries beyond the ir grave fascinate me , s . Death is a m yste riou s thing . Who , for example , will take my seat on the Exchange? What will happen to my majority control of the power company?

- 88

STEPHEN LEACOCK

It was about a month later that I learned of ’ m r Mr . Doo e s death . Dr . Slyder told me of it r in the club one afte noon , over two cocktails in the sitting room . “ ” “ A beautiful bedside , he said , one of the r most edifying that I have eve attended . I r knew that Doome was failing , and of course the time came when I had to tell him . ‘ ’ ‘ Mr . Doomer, I said , All that I , all that any medical skill can do for you , is done ; you are going to die . I have to warn you that ’ it is time for other ministrations than mine . ‘ ’ ‘ r Ve y good , he said , faintly but firmly, send ’ r for my broke . “ — They sent out and fetched Jarvis you know him I think ; most sympathetic man and ’ yet most business-like he does all the firm s ; — business with the dying and we two sat b e side Doomer , holding him up while he signed stock transfers and blank certificates . “ Once he paused and turned his eyes on ‘ r Jarvis . Read me f om the text of the State ’ Inheritance Tax Statute , he said . Jarvis took th e book and read aloud very quietly and ‘ r simply the part at the beginning , Wheneve ’ and wheresoever it shall appear , down to the ‘ words , shall be no longer a subject of judg

_ 90 _ OUTLOOK OF MR . DOOMER

ment or appeal , but shall remain in perpetual ’ possession . “ Doomer listened with his eyes closed . The reading seemed to bring him great com fort . When Jarvis ended he said with a sigh , ‘ ’ ’ That covers it . I ll put my faith in that . After that he was silent a moment and then ‘ r r said , I wish I had already c ossed the rive .

Oh , to have already crossed the river and be ’ n safe on the other side . We k ew what he meant . He had always planned to move over r to New Je sey. The Inheritance Tax is so r r much mo e libe al . “ ‘ ’ r P esently it was all done . There , I said ; ‘ ’ ‘ ’ ‘ r it is fini shed now . No , he answered , the e i ’ s still one thing . Doctor , you ve been very good to me . I should like to pay your account r now without it being a cha ge on the estate . ’— I will pay it as h e paused for a moment and a fit of coughing seized him , but by an effort of will he found the power to say I took the account from my pocket !I had it r with me , fearing the wo st) and we laid his - r r cheque book befo e h im on the bed . Ja vis , thinking him too faint to write , tried to guide h is sum hand as he filled in the . But he shook h i ‘ ’ s head The room is getting dim , he said , STEPHEN LEACOCK

‘ ’ ‘ I can see nothing but the figures . Never n ’ a ’ mi d , said J rvis , enough . ‘Is it four hundred and th i rty?’ he asked ‘Y ’ faintly. es, I said , and I could feel the ‘ ’ ar fif te s rising in my eyes , and ty cents . “ After signing the cheque h i smind wandered for a moment and he fell to talking, with his eyes closed , of the new federal banking law, and of the prospect of the reserve associations being able to maintain an adequate gold supply. “ ‘ ’ i Just at the last he rallied . I want , he sa d , ‘ in quite a firm voice , to do something for both ’ ‘ ’ ‘ of you before I die . Yes , yes , we said . You ?’ are both interested ,are you not he murmured , ‘ ’ ‘ ’ r ? in City T action Yes , yes , we said . We knew, of course , that he was the managing r directo . “ He looked at us faintly and tried to speak . ‘ ’ Give h i m a cordial , sai d Jarvis . But he found ‘ ’ ai his voice . The value of that stock, he s d , ‘is going to take a sudden His voice grew ‘ ’ r faint . Yes , yes, I whispered , bending ove ‘ him !there were tears in both our eyes) , tell ’ ‘ ’ me is it going up , or going down? It is going, — —‘ he murmured then h i s eyes closed it is ‘ ’ ‘ ? ’ ‘ i going Yes, yes , I said ; which It s ’ going, he repeated feebly, and then , quite

SORROWS O F A SUMMER GUEST

STEPHEN LEACOCK

Hullo ! everybody ! What a ripping m om ing !” And young Poppleton will call back in

' a Swi ss yodel from somewhere in the shrub

- bery , and Beverly Jones will appear on the piazza with big towels round his neck and “ ’ ?” shout, Who s coming for an early dip ’ — And so the day s fun and jollity heaven help — me will begin again . Presently they will all come trooping in to

r b eakfast, in colored blazers and fancy blouses , laughing and grabbing at the food with mimic r r udeness and bursts of hila ity . And to think that I might have been breakfasting at my club with the morning paper propped against the ﬁ - co ee pot, in a silent room in the quiet of the city .

r I repeat that it is my own fault that I am he e . F or many years it had been a principle of my life to visit nobody. I had long since learned that visiting only brings misery . If I “ ’ got a card or telegram that said , Won t you run up to the Adirondacks and spend the week “ ” 0 end with us? I sent back word : N , not unless the Adirondacks can run faster than I ” f r can , or words to that e fect. If the owne of “ a country house wrote to me Our man will SORROWS OF A SUMMER GUEST meet you with a trap any afternoon that you ” care to name , I answered , in spirit at least :

“ ’ - No , he won t , not unless he has a bear trap or one of those traps in which they catch wild ” h i r antelopes . If any fas onable lady f iend wrote to me in the peculiar j argon that they use “ Can you give us from July the twelfth ” at half-after-three till the fourteenth at four? “ I replied : Madam , take the whole month , ” take a year , but leave me in peace . Such at least was the spirit of my answers to

r u invitations . In p actice I used to ﬁnd it s fﬁ “ cient to send a telegram that read : Crushed

r with wo k ; impossible to get away, and then stroll back into the reading room of the club and fall asleep again .

i r But my com ng he e was my own fault . It resulted from one of those unh appy moments of expansiveness such as occur , I im agine , to everybody—moments when one appears to be something quite diﬂ erent from what one really — is when one feels oneself a thorough good fellow, sociable , merry , appreciative , and ﬁnds the people around one the same . Such moods are known to all of us . Some people say that - it is the super self asserting itself . STEPHEN LEACOCK

That at any rate was the kind of mood that I was in when I met Beverly-Jones and when he asked me here .

It was in the afternoon , at the club . As I recall it , we were drinking cocktails and I was thinking what a bright , genial fellow Beverly

Jones was , and how completely I had mistaken — — r him . For myself I admit it I am a b ighter, better man after drinking two cocktails than at — any other time quicker, kindlier ,more genial — i r and h ghe , morally . I had been telling stories in that inimitable way that one has after r two cocktails . In eality, I only know four ’ stories , and a ﬁfth that I don t quite remember , but in moments of expansiveness they feel like a fund or ﬂow . It was under such circumstances that I sat - with Beverly Jones . And it was in shaking hands at leaving that he said : I do wish , old chap , that you could run up to our summer place and give us the whole of August !” and I answered , as I shook him warmly by the hand “ ’ ” “ My dear fellow, I d simply love to ! By ’ ” gad , then , it s a go ! he said . You must ” come up for August , and wake us all up ! Wake them up ! Ye gods ! Me wake them up !

STEPHEN LEACOCK

r ! r Jones had w itten . Small G eat heavens , what would they call a large one ? And even those at the station turned out to be only half of them . There were just as many more all lined up on the piazza of the house as we drove up , all waving a fool welcome with tennis rackets and golf clubs . r Small pa ty , indeed ! Why , after six days there are still som e of the idiots whose names I haven’t got straight ! That fool with the i ? ﬂuffy moustache , which s he And that jack ass that made the sal ad at the picnic yesterday —is he the brother of the woman with the guitar,or who

But what I mean is , there is something in that sort of noisy welcome that puts me to the bad at the start . It always does . A group of strangers all laughing together , and with a set of catchwords and jokes all their own , always r throws me into a ﬁt of sadness , deepe than words . I had thought , when Mrs . Beverly

Jones said a sm all party, she really meant small . I had had a mental picture of a few sad people greeting me very quietly and gently, , — and of myself, quiet , too , but cheerful some ff how lifting them up, with no great e ort , by my r m o e presence .

—1 02 SORROWS OF A SUMMER GUEST

Somehow from the very ﬁrst I could feel that

- Beverly Jones was disappointed in me . He

said nothing . But I knew it . On that ﬁrst

afternoon , between my arrival and dinner he

took me about his place , to show it to me . I wish that at some proper w e I had learned just what it is that you say when a man shows

you about his place . I never knew before how

deﬁcient I am in it . I am all right to be shown

- - - an iron and steel plant , or a soda water factory r or anything really wonde ful , but being shown

a house and grounds and trees , things that I

have seen all my life , leaves me absolutely

silent .

“ - These big gates , said Beverly Jones , we ” r only put up this yea . ’ That was all . Why shouldn t they put them up this year? I didn’t care if they’d put them up this year or a thousand

years ago . “ ” We had quite a struggle , he continued , “ ” before we ﬁnally decided on sandstone . “ ” r You did , eh? I sai d . The e seemed noth ’ ing more to say ; I didn t know what sort of a

struggle he meant , or who fought who ; and personally sandstone or soapstone or any other all stone is the same to me .

1 03 L — S . . 8 STEPHEN LEACOCK

“ ” - “ This lawn, said Beverly Jones , we laid ” down the ﬁrst year we were here . I an sw r e ed nothing . He looked me right in the face as he said it and I looked straight back at him , but I saw no reason to challenge his statement . “ ” The geraniums along the border , he went “ ’ on , are rather an experiment . They re ” Dutch . I looked ﬁxedly at the geraniums but never said a word . They were Dutch ; all right , why ? not They were an experiment . Very good ; let them be so . I know nothing in particular a to s y about a Dutch experiment . I could feel that Beverly-Jones grew de r pressed as he showed me ound . I was sorry h im for , but unable to help . I realized that there were certain sections of my education that had been neglected . How to be shown things and mak e appropriate comm ents seems ’ to be an art in itself . I don t possess it . It is not likely now, as I look at this pond , that I ever shall . Yet how simple a thing it seems when done r f by !othe s . I saw the di ference at once the r ve y next day , the second day of my visit , when Beverly-Jones took round young Pop

- 1 04

STEPHEN LEACOCK

of talk that he always used . I resented it .

No wonder it was easy for him . “ ” r G eat mistake , said Poppleton . Too ”— soft . Look at this here he picked up a big stone and began pounding at the gate post “ see ! ff how easily it chips Smashes right o . r Look at that, the whole co ner knocks right ” off see?

- ‘ Beverly Jones entered no protest . I began to see that there is a sort of understanding, a kind of freemasonry, among men who have summer places . One shows his things ; the other runs them down , and smashes them .

This makes the whole thing easy at once .

- Beverly Jones showed his lawn . “ Your turf is all wrong , old boy, said Pop “ pleton. Look ! it has no body to it . See , I can kick holes in it with my heel . Look at that , and that ! If I had on stronger boots I ” could kick this lawn all to pieces . “ These geraniums along the border, said “ - r Beverly Jones , are ather an experiment . ’ They re Dutch . “ ” But my dear fellow , said Poppleton , ’ you ve got them set in wrongly . They ought to slope from the sun you know , never to it. Wait a bit”—here he picked up a spade that

—1 06 SORROWS OF A SUMMER GUEST was lyi ng where a gardener had been working “ ’ I ll throw a few out . Notice how easily Ah ’ they come up . , that fellow broke ! They re ’ apt to . There , I won t bother to reset them , but tell your man to slope them over from the ’ ” sun. That s the idea . Beverly-Jones showed his new boat-house next and Poppleton knocked a hole in the side with a hammer to show that the lumber was too

” “ ’ m — If that were y boat house , he said , I d rip the outside clean off it and use shingle and u ” st cco . ’ It was , I noticed , Poppleton s plan ﬁrst to - ’ i imagine Beverly Jones things h s own , and then to smash them , and then give them back r - smashed to Beve ly Jones . This seemed to please them both . Apparently it is a well understood method of entertaining a guest and

- being entertained . Beverly Jones and Popple r r ton , after an hou or so of it, we e delighted r with one anothe . r Yet somehow, when I t ied it myself , it failed r to wo k . “Do you know what I would do with that ” cedar summer-house if it was mine? I asked my host the next day. STEPHEN LEACOCK

N he said . “ ’ ” I d knock the thing down and burn it, I

r answe ed .

r But I think I must have said it too ﬁe cely .

r - i Beve ly Jones looked hurt and sai d noth ng . Not that these people are not doing all they

' can for me . I know that . I admit it . If I — sh ould meet my end here and ii to put the — thing straight out m y lifeless body is found

ﬂoating on the surface of this pond , I should like there to be documentary evidence of th at “ much . They are trying their best. This is ” r - Libe ty Hall , M rs. Beverly Jones said to me “ on the ﬁrst day of my visit We want you to feel that you are to do absolutely as you like !” Absolutely as I like ! How little they know “ : me . I should like to have answered Madam , I have now reached a time of life when human society at breakfast is impossible to me ; when

r m any conversation p ior to eleven a. . must be considered out of the question ; when I prefer to eat my meals in quiet , or with only such mild hilarity as can be got from a comic paper ; when I can no longer wear nankeen pants and a col c ured blazer without a sense of personal indig nity ; when I can no longer leap and play in the

—1 08

STEPHEN LEACOCK

- It happened last night . Beverly Jones took me aside while the others were dancing the

- fox trot to the victrola on the piazza . “We ’re planning to have some rather good

- ” —“ fun to morrow night, he said something that will be a good deal more in your line than ’ a lot of it, I m afraid has been up here . In fact , my wife says that this will be the very ” thing for you . “ ” Oh , I said . We ’re going to get all the people from the other houses over , and the girls this term Beverly-Jones uses to mean h is wife and her —“ friends are going to get up a sort of enter tainm ent with charades and things , all im r r prom ptu, mo e o less , of course “ ” w r n . Oh , I said . I sa al eady what was comi g And they want you to act as a sort of

- - master of ceremonies , to make up the gags r and introduce the diffe ent stunts and all that . I was telling the girls about that afternoon at the club , when you were simply killing us all ’ with those funny stories of yours , and theyre ” all wild over it . “ ” r Wild? I epeated . r i Yes , quite wild ove it. They say it w ll be ” the hit of the summer .

1 1 0 SORROWS OF A SUMMER GUEST

Beverly-Jones shook hands with great a warmth s we parted for the night . I knew that he was thinking that my character was about to be triumphantly vindicated , and that he was glad for my sake . ai Last night I did not sleep . I rem ned awake ” r all night thinking of the ente tainment . In my whole life I have done noth ing inpub lic except once when I presented a walking-stick to the vice-president of our club on the occasion of his taking a trip to Europe . Even for that I used to rehearse to myself far into the night

“ - sentences that began : This walking stick , gentlemen , means far more than a mere walk - ” ing stick . And now they expect me to come out as a merry master-of-ceremonies before an assem f bled crowd o summer guests . r But never mind . It is nea ly over now . I have come down to this quiet water in the early morning to throw myself in . They will ﬁnd me ﬂoating here among the lilies Some few will understand . I can see it written , as it will be , in the newspapers . “ What makes the sad fatality doubly poig nant i s that the unh appy victim had just eu t ered upon a holiday vi sit that was to have been

1 1 1 STEPHEN LEACOCK

r prolonged th oughout the whole month . Need less to say, he was regarded as the life and soul of the pleasant party of holiday makers that had gathered at the delightful country home of Mr .

- and Mrs . Beverly Jones . Indeed , on the very day of the tragedy, he was to have taken a leading part in staging a merry performance of — charades and parlor entertainments a thing for which his genial talents and overﬂowing ” r r high spirits ende ed him specially ﬁt .

When they read that , those who know me best will understand how and why I died . ” He had still over three weeks to stay there , “ they will say . He was to act as the stage ” manager of charades . They will shake r their heads . They will unde stand . But what is this? I raise my eyes from the paper and I see Beverly-Jones hurriedly ap r r i p oach ing f om the house . He is hast ly dressed , with ﬂannel trousers and a dressing t i gown . His face looks grave . Some h ng has i happened . Thank God , someth ng has ! ! happened . Some accident Some tragedy Something to prevent the charades !

I write these few lines on a fast train that is carrying me back to New York, a cool , com

1 1 2

STEPHEN LEACOCK

the sleeping household . I never felt so jolly

and facetious in my life . I could feel that Bev erly-Jones was admiring the spiri t and pluck

r with which I took my misfortune . Late on he would tell them all about it .

The trap ready ! Hurrah ! Goodbye , ’ ! r old man Hurrah ! All ight . I ll telegraph .

- Right you ar e, good bye . Hip , hip , hurrah !

! r r ‘ Here we are T ain ight on time . Just ’ r r r these two bags , po te , and the e s a dollar r for you . What mer y, merry fellows these dar ky porters are , anyway !

And so here I am in the train , safe bound for home and the summer quiet of my club . Well done for Robinson ! I was afraid that it had missed ﬁre , or that my message to h im had gone wrong . It was on the second day of my visit that I sent word to him to invent an — i ﬁ h i acc dent som et ng , anything to call me back . I thought the message had failed . I had lost hope . But it is all right now, though he certainly pitched the note pretty high . ’ Of course I can t let the Beverly-Joneses

- know that it was a put up job . I must set ﬁre ’ to the ofﬁce as soon as I get back . But it s ’ worth it. And I ll have to singe Robinson about ’ ! th . h t e face and hands But it s w—orth t at oo F renzied F ic tion 1 1 4 OXF ORD SMOKING

STEPHEN L EACOCK

—i to teach , and yet t gets there . Whether we like it or not, Oxford gives something to its f students , a li e and a mode of thought, which in Am erica , as yet, we can emulate , but not equal .

The lack of building fund necessitates the Oxford students living in the identical old boarding- houses they had in the sixteenth and r seventeenth centu ies . Technically they are “ ” “ ” “ ” called quadrangles , closes , and rooms ; but I am so broken in to the usage of my stu dent days that I can’t help calling them board ing houses . In many of these the old stairway has been worn down by the generati ons of stu dents ; the windows have little latticed panes ; there are old names carved here and there i r upon the stone ,and ath ck g owth of ivy covers - n’ the walls . The boarding house at St . Joh s

College dates from 1 509 , the one at Christ h Church from the same period . A few un dred thousand pounds would sufﬁce to replace these old buildings with neat steel and brick structures , like the normal school at Sche ne d N Y cta y, . . , or the Peel Street High School i in Montreal . But noth ng is done . A move ment was indeed attempted last autumn to

1 1 8 O XFORD SMOKING

wards removing the ivy from the walls , but the result was unsatisfactory and they are

putting it back . Any one could have told them beforehand that the mere removal of the ivy r would not brighten Oxfo d up , unless at the same tim e one cleared the stones of the old r ﬁr - insc iptions , put in steel e escapes , and in ar n fact brought the bo di g houses up to date .

The effect of the comparison is heightened by the peculiar position occupied at Ox ford ’ by the professors lectures . In the colleges of Canada and the United States the lectures are supposed to be a really necessary and useful ’ ni part of the students trai ng . Again and again I have heard the graduates of my own r college asse t that they had got as much , or r nearly as much , out of the lectu es at college as out of athletics or the Greek letter society r or the Banjo and Mandolin Club . In sho t, with us the lectures form a real part of the

so. college life . At Oxford it is not The lec r tures , I unde stand , are given , and may even

be taken , but they are quite worthless and are not supposed to have anything much to do ’ with the development of the student s minds . — 1 1 9 S . L , 9 STEPHEN LEACOCK

r The lectures he e , said a Canadi an student “ ” to me , are punk . I appealed to another “ ’ student to know if this was so . I don t know ’ ” whether I d call them exactly punk , he an “ ’ ” r r swe ed, but they re ce tainly rotten . Other judgments were that the lectures were of no im portance : that nobody took them : that they ’ don t matter : that you can take them if you like : that they do you no harm . It appears further that the professors them selves are not keen on their lectures . If the f r i lectures are called o they g ve them ; if not , ’ r the p ofessor s feelings are not hurt. He merely waits and rests his brai n until in some later year the students call for his lectures . There are men at Oxford who have rested their brains this way for over thirty years . The accumulated brain power thus dammed up is said to be colossal . I understand that the key to this mystery is found in the operations of the person called r r r the tuto . It is f om him , o rather with him , that the students learn all that they know one and all are agreed on that. Yet it is a “ little odd to know just how he does it. We ” “ go over to his rooms , said one student, and ” “ he just lights a pipe and talks to us . We

1 20

STEPHEN L EACOCK

u the last sheep has j mped over the fence . He need wait for no one . He may move forward as fast as he likes , following the bent of his genius . If he has in him any ability beyond that of the common herd , h is tutor, interested in his studies , will smoke at h im until he kin ’ dles him into a ﬂame . For the tutor s soul is r n not harassed by he di g dull students , with dismissal hanging by a thread over his head in the class room . The American professor has no time to be interested in a clever student . He “ ” r has time —to be inte ested in his deportment , his letter writing, h i s executive work, and his organizing ability and his hope of promotion to r i a soap facto y . But with that his mind s ex hansted . The student of genius merely means to h im a student who gives no trouble , who “ ” passes all his tests , and is present at all his “ ” recitations . Such a student also , if he can be trained to be a hustler and an advertiser , “ ” will undoubtedly make good . But beyond r that the p ofessor does not think of him . The everlasting principle of equality has inserted r itself in a place where it has no ight to be , and where inequality is the breath of life .

Viewing the situation as a whole , I am led then to the conclusion that there must be

1 2 2 OXFORD SMOKIN G something in the life of Oxford itself that i h i makes for h gher learning . Smoked at by s in ’ i tutor , fed Henry VIII s k tchen , and sleep in an g in a t gle of ivy, the student evidently gets somethi ng not easily obtai ned in Am erica . And the more I reﬂect on the matter the more I am convinced that it is the sleeping in the ff ivy that does it . How di erent it is from student life as I remember it ! — nd M y Discovery of Engla .

AN APPRECIATION

0 you remember Col . Hogs “ ” head inthe LiteraryL apses? He claimed that there was a character called S aloonio in “ ” the Merchant of Venice , though no one else had ever “ heard of him . He was the man who came on the stage all the time and sort of put things ” through .

Well , I am in much the same case as Col .

Hogshead . In preparing to write this paper I have read everything I could ﬁnd about

Stephen Leacock . But no one else seems to have seen the Stephen Leacock who h as had a place of honor in my gallery of favorites for r r ove thirty years . Of cou se I ﬁnd him in the i all books and , like Saloon o, he is on the stage — — the time or at least very often and sort h r of puts things t rough . Wo st of all , he ’ doesn t look a bit like the published portraits of ’ Leacock , and I couldn t imagine him making one of those brilliant after-dinner speeches

—1 27 STEPHEN LEACOCK that I see reported in the papers from time to time . But to me he is the real Stephen Lea cock , and no learned doctor, nor professor of political economy, nor brilliant author, nor r lectu er who can make even old England laugh , can make me give him up . You may not be able to ﬁnd him in the books , even after I de scribe him to you , but for me he is there all the i “ t me , concealed behind the arras or feasting w ” ith the doge . L k ’ The reviewer who said that Mr . eacoc s work received instant recognition and appre i r c ati on fell short of the truth . His humou was current among the students of Toronto Univer i s ty even before he began to write . The ﬁrst example of it that was repeated to me by one of his youthful admirers has never been pub i h h is l s ed, but it is still as fresh to me as lat r est p oduction . It was a burlesque account of for Noah building the Ark , that he used to give the amusement of his immediate circle of l friends . Noah , with his mouth full of nai s , a h et was issuing orders to Shem , Ham , and J p about bringing in the animals . They had a lot of trouble getting the hippopotamus out of the river and , meanwhile , the neighbors stood ’ around and guyed Noah . They didn t think

—1 2 8

STEPHEN LEACOCK away a billiard cue and looking at me over his

rv shoulder . The inte iew did not last for r mo e than ﬁve minutes , and I do not remember

a word that was said . I have never been able to decide whether the impression he made was sh or n -oﬂi sh of being y of bei g stand . Any ’ r ur way , we didn t get ve y far in o interview . And he didn’t look a bit like the pictures of s him that appear o often in the papers . But that quiet, youthful Stephen Leacock has come down the years with me and persists in walking r befo e me on every page he publishes . “ His nex t published article was My Finan i — c al Career , and I am willing to contend if “ ” — necessary, with grinded lances that no grown-up person ever fully appreciated the r abundant humor of that little maste piece .

It is an outburst of reckless , effervescent r youth that only the young can ente into fully .

Of course , if you read it ﬁrst when you were young, its full humor may have remained with r r you , but no pe son of mature age , eading it for the ﬁrst time , can appreciate its joyous insolence . Just think of it ! He has dared to be merry with a bank . What awful blasphemy ! To the grown up man a bank i s a combination of a temple and a tomb . It is the holy of

—1 30 AN APPRECIATION holi es of that which he worships and serves h i every hour of s life . And his chief tragedies r raf are connected with it . Ove d ts , equitably ” “ ” rationed credit , and selective curtailment have made the bank a charnel of dead hopes . How many of his dreams of avarice have been shattered by the refusal of an unfeeling bank er to extend the necessary credit . No ! No ! You cannot expect a grown-up man to indulge “ ” - r in care free laughte at My Financial Career . 1 am in a position to back up my opini on on th is point . For some years past I have been “ using My Financial Career as a reading on the public platform and have watched its effect on many audiences . The young are al ways the ﬁrst to laugh and the last to stop laughing .

The mature join in of course , but to even the most successful men a bank recall s unpleasant moments . And if there happens to be a banker in the audience the older people look r towards h i m and sobe up at once . I have — known even a branch bank manager a man no — more impressive than Peter Pumpkin to check the enjoym ent of all the mature people in an audience . But the young just let themselves r go . Most of them have un a message to a bank or have been inside of one , and they have

1 31 STEPHEN LEACOCK experienced the same feelings that Leacock expresses so poignantly. They do not realize that their future in life may depend on the smiles of a banker , and they let themselves r f go , no matte who may be o fended . It has always seemed to me that “My Finan ” cial Career could have been written only by x a young man who was e quisitely sensitive . Contact with the inex plicable grown-up world made him feel sh y and awkward , and perhaps li - r it hurt a ttle . In self defence he tu ned it all to ridicule- just to bluff the young people of his o wn age . He was like a boy taking a dare to throw a snowball at the schoolmaster or the r r ministe . He would let his contempo aries see ’ r that even a bank couldn t ove awe him . And in all his later dealings with club -men and the idle rich there is a touch of the same bravado . I doubt if either the student or the professor has been wholly at ease with the soli d citizens and r solid institutions of the wo ld . And he gets back at them by having a joke at their expense . The same solemn boy !wearing a grey suit by the way) who walked through the awful adven tures in the bank, now walks through the Mau soleum Club and glares deﬁantly at Mr . Doomer and the other worthi es of High

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STEPHEN LEACO CK

conceivable subject , and has expressed them m with i petuous vigor . Usually h i s dominant V r uote is one of ebellion . “The rewards and punish ments in the une qual and ill-adjusted world in which we live are ” r most unfair . His comments a e at all times ff penetrating . But he seldom o ers a solution V of any of the problems he scornfully analyzes . Why Should he? Others have been? offering solutions down through the centuries and

piling foolishness on foolish ness . The great fact to be gathered from all this is that the

contacts of life have not made him callous . His sym pathy with all human hurts and needs im i i is never failing . He rages at the poss b lity of setting things right and then ﬁnds re i fuge in his marvellous g ft of laughter . If he

4 u r cannot help us , he can make s laugh and fo n r n get . Possibly he ﬁ ds fo getful ess himself

- in his outbursts of fun making . In any case , it is something to be thankful for that his fun i s w ith out malice . It is an anodyne for the r miseries that he cannot co rect . To laugh with him in his gay moods i s to be refreshed for the — battle of life to share in his high spirits . And r if , after laughing with him , the wo ld goes back to its cares and thinks of him only as a fri

—1 34 AN APPRECIATION

volous entertainer , who deserves attention only

in idle hours , it is only making th e same mis take it has always made in dealing with those i who bring good g fts and enrich life . He has equipped himself as a scholar and thinker to deal gravely with the gravest problems but all that his ever-increasing following sees is the Sparkle of his wit and the anti c nimble ’ ness with whi ch he turns life s hypocrisies r and stupidities to laughte . Surely it is excusable if he has moments of cynicism and

f bitterness . The more he i s acclaimed for his o humor the more he must feel the futility of h i things . It was after s fame had been estab lish ed that he wrote An acquired indifference to the ills of others i s the price at which we live . A certain dole

of sympathy, a casual mite of personal relief, is the mere drop that any one of us alone can

cast into the vast ocean of human m i sery . r ourselveslest Beyond that we must ha den we ,

too , perish . We feed well while others starve . We make fast the doors of our lighted houses n against the i digent and hungry . What else ? can we do If we Shelter one , what i s that?

If we try to Shelter all , we are ourselves shelter less) ’ — 1 35 S . L . 1 0 STEPHEN L EACOCK

’ Mr . L eacock s most ambitious book is the “ ” series of Sunshine Sketches that reveal the town of Mariposa and its typical inhabitants . In commenting on it himself he points out all the faults that could be pointed out by the most censorious critic . “ I wrote this book with considerable difﬁ l culty . I can invent characters quite easi y, but I have no notion as to how to make things happen to them . Indeed I see no reason why anything Should . I could write awfully good Short stories if it were only permissible merely to introduce some extremely original character, and at the end of two pages an nounce that at this point a brick fell on h is head r r r and killed him . If the e we e oom for a school of literature of this kind I Should offer r to lead it . I do not mean that the he o would always and necessarily be killed by a brick .

One might sometimes use two . Such feeble plots as there ar e in this book were invented r r by brute fo ce , afte the characters had been l m i introduced . Hence the atrocious c u s ” ness of the construction all through . “ ” A r k S a sto y, Sunshine S etches has no Af r r plot . Very well . te eading it, we pre r i fer our novels that way. The eader s satis

1 36

STEPHEN LEACOCK r aking period , yet makes the fat rascal so human and deep-read in human frailty that we know he must be descended from a younger scion of the F alstaﬁ fam ily who adventured to the New World in the days of Elizabeth or

Jam es . The prohibition wave may have swept the saloon from existence , but it breaks i “ n vain against the colossal ﬁgure of JOS . if SMITH , PROP . And it is doubtful the waves of time will submerge him any more than the prohibition wave . There is not a character in this book that is not in place in a New World small town , and nothing happens that would not happen in any other small town . Only a touch of literary ‘ gloom would be needed to m ake th is picture of contemporary life as sordid and mean and futile as any to be found in the most depress “ ” ing best seller . But the sunshine in which tr sﬁ it is revealed has an gured it . And the

r i sunshine never fails . Judge Peppe le gh and r Dean D one and Henry Mullins , and all the

r rest of them , move th ough the years , aureoled “ in kindly light and laughter . The art of Sun shine Sketches” successfully blends the keen observation of the realist with the glamour of

1 38 AN APPRECIATION

the idealist . Whether the book ranks as a classic time alone can tell , but for the present it is very satisfying . “ Nonsense Novels , whose success es ’ tabli sh ed Stephen L eacock s fame , deserve attention for a number of reasons . He ridi — culed the best sellers and in doing so pro duced a best seller . But these little novels are sheer fun from start to finish . It is not as parodies on current fiction that they excel . Their chi ef merit lies in the opportunity they ” gave Mr . Leacock to give full scope to h is genius for attractive nonsense . More than anything else they are just what he has named —“ ” them Nonsense Novels . They can be enjoyed even by those who know nothing of h ar t e types of novels they st t out to parody. Every character and every incident gives the h um ori st ach ance to bubble over with delight fully inconsequent nonsense . If Hazlitt could have seen this book he would have devoted a special essay to it . He claimed that non sense i s an essentially English form of fun that is unknown to other people . “ I flatter myself that we are almost the only

r people who unde stand and relish nonsense.

—1 39 STEPHEN LEACOCK

‘ ’ We are not merry and wise , but indulge our mirth to excess and folly . When we tr iﬂe we triﬂe in good earnest ; and , having once t e lax ed our hold of the helm , drift idly down the stream , and , delighted with the change , are tossed about by every little breath of whim or caprice , ‘ ’ That under Heaven is blown,

All we want is to proclaim a truce with reason , and to be pleased with as little expense of ” thought or pretension to wisdom as possible .

Of this nonsense which Hazlitt admired , — Stephen Leacock is a master and also he is almost its Slave Whether writing burlesque , or satire , or humor or even pathos , he must st0p every little while to indulge in an out burst of nonsense . That Mr . Leacock agrees with Hazlitt is Shown by his admiration for “Alice in Wonderland”—that world master f piece o nonsense . But his own nonsense in its way is just as masterly as that of Lewis

- Carrol , and even more mirth provoking . It may not have the poetic whimsicality of “Alice ” in Wonderland , but it is just as unexpected

r and even mo e lavish . “ ” A S a single book Nonsense Novels does

1 40

STEPHEN LEACOCK

” r trying the expe iment of cheaper talent. “ Let anybody who knows the discom ﬁture of coming out before an audience on any terms , judge how it feels to crawl out in front of them ” ch ea er tale labelled as p nt . The satirical master of ceremonies is there also and gives us such comments as th i s : “ The Rasselyer-Brown residence was the kind of cultivated home where people of educa tion and taste are at liberty to talk about things they don’t know and utter freely ideas they ’ ” haven t got . L ’ If Mr . eacock s later books were as adver ti sed and popularly acclaimed they would be “ ” r m o e imitations of Nonsense Novels , but fortunately he h as not allowed himself to be submerged by his ﬁrst success . There are ele ments of even greater success in other phases

r h i r of his humo . Many of s since est admirers wish that his work had developed along the “ ” line of Sunshine Sketches rather than on “ ” the line of Nonsense Novels .

r Like every one else , I have ead Mr . Lea cock’s writings as they have appeared in pori odicals and from time to time in books , but never with the purpose of appraising his powers

—1 42 AN APPRECIATION

h re- and ac ievements . Now that I have read his books I am forced to a number of conclu i sions . To beg n with , I cannot conﬁne my mental picture of him to the sh y and sensitive

boy . I must admit that he has somehow de

v l e oped into a man with a com petent chuckle ,

who laughs at things , not because they hurt, but because he knows them and sees through r thei solemn pretentiousness . Then this man is sometimes aroused to indignant scorn and

plies a satiric lash , that is none the less lacerat i ing because it is light . Sometimes , for he s

human , he blunders into something like peevishness and might almost be accused of

scolding . But in every book , and in almost

every article , I still ﬁnd ﬂashes of the boy, and

am glad . I do not want to give him up , for that would mean giving up one of the last outposts

of my own youth . To laugh with Leacock in hi ’ s boyish moods is still to be in one s twenties ,

and is very precious . So much has been said about Leacock as a

r i satirist that a word of conside ation s indicated . Somehow I cannot class him with the great

. e h dec ed -saﬁﬁcal h _ as . id satirists Although ,

power , it is Slight compared with his genius

1 43 STEPHEN LEACOCK

- hi as a fun maker . I Should never t nk of apply ing to him the quotation from Milton that Hugh Miller applied to Voltaire :

orewarn th h I f ee, s un Hi s d eadly arrow ; neith er vainly h op e To b e inv lnera le in t o e ri h t arm u b h s b g s, h o h t em ere h eav enl for th at m ortal t T ug p d y ; din , ” S av e H wh o rei n a ov non i t. e g s b e, e can res s

It 1 S true that his can provoke laugh “ ridicule ter at many things th at deserve the lash of satire , but it is not the laughter that one w r associates ith the great maste s of the lash .

The subtle malignity of Swift , the delicate , brilliant savagery of Pope , and the indignant scorn of Dryden , are nowhere in evidence . ’ L o k do Mr . eac c s l vely mocker es not voice y m i ” r the rancou s of h is time . While his treatment r of enemy statesmen , generals and rule s , for r instance , moves us to laughter , the ave age man will prefer to leave the Hohenzollerns and Hapsburgs and their retinues to the ﬁerce in vective of Henry Watterson and of others who are skilled in expressing the unprintable opin ions of their fellow men . The ordinary reader is not satisﬁed to see these great offenders tapped with a bauble . He wants someone to go after them with an ax e. Mr . Leacock lacks

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STEPHEN LEACOCK

humanity is doubtful . It gives expression to B emotions that should not be cultivated . ut wholesome laughter , such as he has evoked so freely, has a tonic effect , and we cannot be too grateful to h im for his contributions to the bewildered sanity of the trying period through which we have passed . ff Though the war a ected the writings of Mr .

Leacock, as it did the writings of all who came through that terrible experience , it is not in his humorous and satirical books published during the war and after that his real thought is revealed . Moved to the depth of his soul by the problems developed by the conﬂict , he dropped his role of jester for democracy, th rew aside the cumbrous instruments of the political r economist , and evealed himself as a man “ keenly alive to human needs . The Unsolved Riddle of Social Justice” is the truest expres sion of himself that he has given . And , more i over , t i s one of the most serious and purpose ful books published since the war . “ ” But it is serious ! protests the average admirer of Leacock . r ! uite t ue . But unless you can appreciate this book to the full you have never caught a glimpse of the man who has been amusing

—1 46 AN APPRECIATION

you . Unless you can enter into the spirit of this book you have mi ssed the pathos that r underlies so much of his humorous wo k . “Pathos Stephen Leacock writing pathos

I can hear a chorus of laughers exclaiming . Certai nly ! “ What 1 S the storyof the Little Girl 1n Green that 1 5 tucked away in the burlesque narrative of Peter Spillikins but a li ttle masterpiece of — pathos And Peter Spillikins himself enth u

- - siastic , clean minded , futile , innocent who is h i i vamped because of s wealth , s almost a r tragic ﬁgure . And he is p esented in an at r w m osph ere of bu lesque . Because of the ide range of his observation and sympathy , Mr . Leacock is one of the best interpreters of con i i s d t on in the United States and Canada . In his writings the sordidness of things i s not made repulsive . It is pathetic . Even his wildest b urlesqueing and most boisterous laughter has an undertone of pathos . The M r R impossible aspirations of s. assel er — y Brown are absurd and laughable and piti ful . The mocker sees through them so clearly r that one could weep fo them . These things r — d r all hu t an he cove s the hurt with laughter . M r R r- Take the case of s. asselye Brown.

1 47 STEPHEN LEACOCK

Her name is burlesque and h er friends are

l r al bu lesque characters . The people of an old and aristocratic civilization no doubt ﬁnd h r e very amusing . The strivings of such peo

r r ple are favo ite jests with the comic pape s . But if you read the chapters in which sh e

r appears with any app eciation , you will feel that the crude yearnings for culture , and the follies and swindlings to which they lead , are fully as f piti ul as they are laughable . In the same

r sto y, the suddenly wealthy farmer, Tom linson , and his vague wife and their immature

r son , are po trayed with a pathos that has not “ a false note . The real laughter in The Wiz ” “ ard of Finance , and its sequel, The Arrested ” r m l Philanth opy of Mr . To inson , is all directed against the greed and hypocrisy of the ﬁnan ciers and bunkum educationists and parasites who always fasten themselves on ﬁnancial success . Their greed makes them just as “ ” blind as the simplest come-on who ever

- listened to the glozings of the gold brick artist .

Mr . Leacock gives us plenty of fun and satire directed at the Shams of the world , but his mockery does not glance at the innocent . If they blunder into laughable foolishness , the

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STEPHEN L EACOCK

to his popular successes , it would not do to fol

low this method too far . In his various essays and books he has dealt with almost every phase of his own work that a critic might be disposed

to consider . It might be shown that even this

essay is an impertinence , for he concludes his essay on American humor wi th this paragraph : “ One is tempted in such an essay as the present to conclude with a discussion of the r w1i te s of the immediate moment . But dis

cretion forbids . Criticism is only of value where the lapse of a certain time lends per

spective to the view . Of the brilliance and promise of a number of th e younger humorists

- of to day there can be no doubt . But it is difﬁcult to appraise their work and to dis tinguish among the mass of transitory effects ” the elements of abiding value . ’ Mr . L eacock s stand on such controversial subjects as prohibition and public ownership V have attracted so much attention that one can

not help at least mentioning them . The roar of anger that has risen against him all bears th e burden that he is a professor and a humor

ist ﬁ , and consequently is not quali ed to . . di!

so r r cuss matters p ofound and p actical . The AN APPRECIATION

best reply to this attitude that occurs to me is

a quotation from his own essay on Charles II . “ The man of real enlightenment is inevit ably reckoned a triﬂer and is accused of Shal i lowness and insincerity, wh le a dull man ,

heavily digesting his few ideas , is credited

with a profundity which he does not possess . r But if time should p ove Mr . Leacock to be right—ii prohibition and public ownership of the railways Should prove to be failures it is highly probable that he would ﬁnd him self the victim of one of the keenest ironies

of fate . An attempt to remedy conditions would probably force him to elaborate from his personal experience two more of the economic paradoxes with which he deals from time to r F r tim e in his serious w iting . o instance , in an American State where prohibition has been in force for many years it was found

impossible to repeal it, not because of the

strength of the prohibitionists , but because all the bootleggers and blind-piggers who proﬁted by the illicit trafﬁc in liquor supported

the law . Under a licensing system their pro

ﬁts would disappear , so they supported the law

they were breaking . Similarly, if the public ownership of railways should prove a failure

1 51

S . L . 1 1 STEPHEN LEACOCK it is logical to suppose that the chief opposition to a change would come from the powerful private railway interests that found competition with the government easy, and consequently would not want to face the keener competition they would ﬁnd if the railroads were de nationalized . i In addition to h s literary success , Mr . Lea cock has made an unusual success as a humor ous lecturer . England , Scotland and Wales , as well as the United States and Canada , have listened to him and laughed—and the only complaint is that audiences cannot listen enough because they laugh so much . It has not been my good fortune to hear and see him

r r as a lecture . F om those who have heard him I understand that seeing is just as necessary to a full enjoyment as h earm g , for he is an actor

r as well as a Speake . Wh en he tells a story, it is his habit to assum e a part in it and act it

r wi r du ing the telling . The follo ng repo t from the L ondon Spectato r gives a suggestion of both the matter and th e method of his lectures . “ Once he was playi ng in that wonderful ‘ ’ ’ piece , Uncle Tom s Cabin . The audience would remember that the climax of the play

1 52

STEPHEN LEACOCK

’ An American critic of Mr . L eacock s method as a lecturer is less learned , but more illum i nating “ Leacock hurt me at the Brunswick yester day . He strained my stomach . I was wear ing a suit that was made in 1 902 , and I split the back of the vest . I laughed until I had a

- - sort of reflex , double acting come back of the r diaphragm that was eally painful . And he was merciless . I would straighten out my face and determine not to be an absolute fool ; but Leacock kept coming back at us with Harry r Lauder stufl , and Ma k Twain stuff, so far as acting goes ; and Jim Riley stufi, and all of it

’ - Stephen L eacock s home brew , absolutely fresh and full of kick . And bang ! would go a ligament of my vest and a sinew of my will . I then cast all discretion to the winds and joined the merry throng . I have heard no such cachinnation in a sedate audience before in years . “He should be ﬁned for cruelty to sedate people . He Should pay me for the back of my vest . I will bet that the janitor picked up a bushel of buttons from the ﬂoor after Leacock got through . “ It is a wonderful gift, this histrionic power

1 54 AN APPRECIATION

- over audiences . It is a form of auto intoxica r tion , too , when it attacks a professo of politi cal economy and sets him to going around and r making the wo ld laugh , even against its set and ﬁxed habits of declining to laugh at any n thi g . “ This Canadian professor , with h is hair in a bang , his twinkling eyes , his sturdy ﬁgure , his outdoor bronze , his deep voice , his sort of ‘ ’ Behind the Beyond imagination that turns f laughs against himsel , can doubtless move to if ” tears , he please , as easily as to laughter . r r The fundamental cha acte istic of Mr . Lea ’ r cock s writing , both se ious and humorous , is intellectual fairness . He takes the trouble tov know what he is writing about , whether his purpose at the moment is to instruct or to amuse . Many of his lighter sketches are r sca cely humorous . They are singularly clear studies of things as they are, and these things seem funny because we never before saw them so clearly . Of course every serious observa tion or statement is inevitably followed by an

r l or af r absu d , nonsensica , humorous te thought , but that does not detract from the soundness r of the se ious part . When he burlesques the a “ ” modern problem play i Back of the Beyond ,

1 55 STEPHEN LEACOCK it is at bottom a searching analysis of that particular form of the drama . But though in his serious writing historical r dignity is neve violated , the humorist was nevertheless awake and storing up material r r i that eme ges as bu lesque later on . For n i stance , t seems very good burlesque when the ’ “ r ector of St . Asaph s bowed to Episcopalians , nodded amiably to Presbyterians , and even ao knowledged with his lifted hand the passing ” of persons of graver forms of error .

But Leacock, the historian , records gravely “ that in the days of John , by Divine permission , ” first Bishop of Toronto , this description was seriously embodied in a public document . We find that in a petition addressed to Par liam ent Bishop Strachan had protested against “ an educational programme which placed all forms of error on an equality with truth” truth in that case being Anglicani sm . Although his volume in “The Makers of ” Canada series gives evidence of much re search and sets forth impar tially the establish ment of responsible government , there is no reason to suspect that it was a piece of drud r r ge y and hackwo k . The grave historian quotes with evident relish from the fierce

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STEPHEN LEACOCK

thorough grasp of the serious aspects of life , h h i he as not lost is sense of boy sh playfulness . He can lay aside his books at any tim e and “ ” play at push pin with the boys . But no one who makes a survey of h is work as a whole can doubt that if he chose to stick to his books and to cultivate a pose of unshakable serious ness , he could have been as dull and depend able as any college professor or eminent editor of them all . Fortunately his high spirits could not be sub dued to that that it worked in , and now that his fame as a jester h as obscured his authority as r an educationist , he need feel no egrets . The world h as many sober-minded citizens who can deal with history and political econ om y, and altogether too few who have the genius to make life more endurable with humor and laughter. But there i s one point that gives me some disquietude . Mr . Leacock has poked fun at — everything and everybody except the modern enterprising publisher . And yet the publisher has deserved his satire more than any one else . If any one has done Mr . Leacock harm i it s the publishers , syndicate managers and i r directors of lecture bureaus . It s t ue that he

- l 58 AN APPRECIATION

h i . gives them a love tap in s essay on 0 Henry . This Shows that he i s aware of the danger of i listening to their blandishments , and that s a hopeful Sign . But they have already tried to direct the current of his literary output , as is shown in the following announcement which “ ushered Winsome Winnie and other N on sense Novels ” to the public “ It is in response to repeated requests that ” these new novels have been written . “ ! uite so . Because Nonsense Novels were a wonderful success the publi sher wanted i more of them . I can imag ne him beside Lea ’ “ ” r cock s desk , squat like a toad , and u ging the certain proﬁts to be made from a new r book of bu lesques . Or perhaps he took him to the top of a high mountain and Showed h im ' “ the world full of people laughing at Nonsense ” — Novels and the rich royalties pouring into n so the ba k account of the author . If , it is a pity that Leacock did not push him over a cliﬂ and watch h im land in a squashy mess among the fossils and geological specimens in the i tal us at ts base . The curse of modern literature is the enter If prising publisher . one book succeeds , every publisher tries to lure or bulldoze the author,

—1 59 STEPHEN LEACOCK and every other author over whom he has in

r ﬂuence, to write anothe book like it that will

r r be a su e winner . And if the har ied author cannot do it the enterprising publisher takes whatever book he writes and puts a jacket on it that will fool the public into thinking that it is like the prosperous best seller of the hour . Some day an enterprising publisher will un

‘ dertake to publish the Bible along up-to-date lines . When a society novel makes a hit and sets the fashion , he will issue the Bible with a jacket by Montgomery Flagg, Showing Vashti or “ ” the Shulamite . When he man stories are the rage , he will issue it with a Lyendecker jacket , showing Samson leaning on the jaw ’ r bone afte—r doing his day s wo k . A rage for Back-to Nature novels will inspire a new edition with a jacket by Livingstone Bull , Show

r ing Nebuchadnezza out to pasture . Up to the present the publisher has not done r as h M r. Leacock as much ha m he as to most modern authors who have had a measure of success , but I shall not feel satisﬁed until he turns and reads him . Only then can we be sure that he has realized the danger and that i i his genius s free to develop along ts own lines .

—l 60

STEPHEN LEACOCK

4 American and Canadian life that we have had ; but by giving free play to all h is powers he may ﬁnally win recognition as a broad and sym r r lif pathetic inte p eter of e as a whole . In the classical masterpieces of the past great scenes and speeches and ch aracteriza tions were shown against a background pre ar r p ed by the poet or lite ary artist . In the lapse of time the great passages tend to b e come separated from their matrix and are enjoyed by themselves without the cumber r some machinery by which they we e introduced . f r r x r T—he conditions o mode n lite ary e p ession —through magazines and serial publications are such that a writer elaborates his ﬁne scenes without other backgr ound than the r evanescent inte ests of his own time , that may or may not have served as their inspira

tion . To the casual student this gives to much contemporary writing a fragmentary i aspect . It may even give a sense of d s u h h lf M r co ragem ent to the artist se . . Lea cock somewhere eXpresses a sense of the tri

vial character of his sketches , as compared with the broad canvases of the great mas is unw r ters of the past. This dissatisfaction a

ranted , for against the background of his own

- 1 62 AN APPRECIATION time the mass of his productions has a scope and richness that will enable it to bear compari son with the work of master artists working in other times and in other circumstances . As i time passes , h s ﬁnest work will tend to enter into comparison with the great passages that r embody the literatu e of the past . How it will bear this comparison no critic can deter in m e , but Mr . Leacock need not fear for the future of his work on the ground that it lacks r r breadth and volume . He has p oduced unde the conditions and lim itations of h is own time , just as the acknowledged masters produced under the conditions and limitations of their times , and in the ﬁnal verdict of mankind his work will be judged with the sam e impartiality as that of the established master writers , whose ir power he adm es and applauds .

BIBLIOGRAPHY PART I

HIS TORICAL WORKS AL W L F A C S B D IN, A ONT INE , HIN K l M oran R on i ov ernm ent . oronto esp s b e g T , g

l h vo . x ii and 1 . o. . 0 . t 8 C , L td , 1 9 7 C o , , 3 7 pp , V l M r fronti spi ec e !portrait) . o . XIV of th e ak e s

of ana a Par m an iti on. C d , k Ed

F S BAL DWIN , LA ONTAINE , HINCK

Responsible gov ernm ent . Edition de L ux e.

oronto M oran Co. L td. 1 0 . Cloth 8vo. T , g , , 9 7 , ,

x ii d 1 . ronti i e e ortrait . al an 37 pp , f sp c ! p ) H f t t Th e M r o Cana a e i te b n an i le: ak e s f d , d d y Du c

Cam ell S ott Pelh am ar Ph . D pb c , Edg ,

A . . and William D aw son L e S ueur, B. LL D , “ Th is editi on i s lim ited to F our Hundred Si ne and m re S et of wh i h th i s i g d Nu b e d s, c s ” Num b er ! Signed) George N . M orang . ADVENTURERS OF THE F AR NORTH

A h r oni l o e Ar ti S ea . oronto la c c e f th c c s T , G s

ow ro o. 1 1 . l e leat er m . g , B ok C , 9 4 B u h , 1 2 o , vii 2 lor ro i e e la e o an . t t d 1 5 pp , co ed f n i sp c , p s, p r

trai t o m . Vol X o h r i l s and f ld ed ap . X f C on c es o a i r Wron f Can a eri e e te b eo e M . d s s, d d y G g g

and H . H . L angton. MAR R F T M THE INE O S . ALO h roni le o th v o ti A c c f e yages of Jacq ues C ar er. l oronto G a ow ro . . l T , sg , B ok Co , 1 9 1 5 B u e l eath er 1 2 m o. vii and 1 2 . olore ront , , 5 pp , c d f is i e l e ates ortrait ol e m a . Vol. o p c , p , p s, f d d p II f “ ” Ch roni le of Cana a eri e e it e r e c s d s s, d d by Geo g M Wron . g and H . H . Langton.

S . L . I ! BIBLIOGRAPHY

THE DAWN OF CANADIAN HISTORY

h roni le of a ori inal Cana a. oronto A c c b g d T ,

Glas ow roo C o. 1 . l e le th er 2 m 0 . g , B k , 1 9 5 B u a , 1 ,

vii and 1 1 2 . olore ronti i e e late or pp , c d f sp c , p s, p “ ” trai t . Vol. of Ch roni le of Cana eri s I c s da s es,

edi ted by Georg e M . Wrong and H . H . Langton.

PART II WORKS ON ECONOM ICS ELEMENTS OF POLITICAL S CIENCE on on C on ta le New or o h ton L d , s b ; Y k, H ug ,

M i . v tﬂin Co , 8 o. , 1 906 . ELEMENTS OF POLITICAL S CIENCE N w Revi e e i t n. t le s d d i o London, Cons ab ; e M i l or o h ton lin C o. 1 1 . C oth 8vo. Y k, H ug , ff , 9 3 , ,

ix and 1 . ol e ta le. 4 7 pp , f d d b THE UNS OL VED‘RIDDLE OF S OCIAL JUSTICE

on on and New or oh n ane Co. oronto L d Y k, J L , T ,

l h . S . . v 2 . ot B Gundy, 1 92 0 . 8 o. , 1 5 pp , c ELEM ENTS OF POLITICAL S CIENCE

New and enlar e e iti on. 1 2 m o. x iii and g d d , NeW r o on 1 . on on on bl t 4 5 pp L d , C sta e; Yo k, H ugh ,

M ifﬁin Co . NATIONAL ORGANI! ATION F OR WAR Reprinted for th e N ati onal S ervi ce Board of

an w 1 v w . C ada, O tta a, 1 9 7. N arrow 8 o. , se ed 1 1 pp .

PART III ES SAYS E S SAYS AND LITERARY S TUDIE S

Toronto , S . B . Gundy ; London, Joh n Lane v 1 9 1 6 . 3 1 0 pp . , crown 8 o.

—1 68

BIBLIOGRAPHY

M R S ’ C R 6 THE A IONETTE ALENDA , 1 9 1

Drawings b y A . H . F i sh . New York, Joh n Lane F oli o a er Co. , 1 9 1 5. p p . M ARIONETTES ’ ENGAGEMENT BOOK

r win . . F i h w D a gs by A H s . Ne York, Joh n Lane ll Co. , 1 9 1 5. 8vo. , i ustrated pap er. F URTHER F OOLISHNESS e h and a re ol Sk tc es s ti s on th e f li es of th e day. N w London and e York, Joh n Lane Cc . , 1 9 1 6 .

8vo. , 3 1 2 pp . F REN! IED F ICTION

on o w or . L d n and Ne Y k, Joh n Lane Co , 1 9 1 7. v 2 8 o. , 94 pp .

THE HOHEN! OLLERNS IN AM ERICA : with th e ol v rl d er m o i B sh e iki in B e in an Oth I p ss bili ti es.

S . B . Gundy , Toronto ; Joh n Lane Co. , London

w . m . and Ne York 1 9 1 9 . 1 2 o 2 69 pp . WINS OM E WINNIE AND OTHER NEW NON SENSE NOVELS

London and New York, Joh n L ane Co. , 1 92 0 .

2 43 PP~ THE LETTERS OF SI WHIF F LETREE—F RE SH M AN

ite b F ran . Genest with a Pre a e b Ed d y k D , f c y ll S teph en L eac ock . I ustrated by G . E . Trem ble. ’ Publi sh er s j acket in red lettering and with a red

ill . l ustration not in th e book M ontrea , 1 92 1 . " x . ll !i ) 69 pp , 5 x y e ow board s. M Y DIS COVERY OF ENGLAND v London and New York, Joh n Lane Co . , iii and 2 6 2 4 pp . London, Joh n Lane Co. , 1 92 . OVER THE F OOTLIGHTS

Joh n Lane Co . , London, and D odd, M ead Co.,

New York, 1 92 3 . 8y o. , 2 80 pp . BIBLIOGRAPHY

COLLEGE DAYS

oh n e C o . n on d M J Lan , Lo d , an D odd , ead Co. , N w e or x or Press oronto 1 2 . 8vo. Y k, O f d , T , 9 3 , I S3 PP THE GARDEN O F F OLLY

S . . G r n C L B undy , To o to ; Joh n Lane o. , ondon,

a d o M ea Co. New or 1 2 . 8vo. n D dd , d , Y k, 9 4 , !m ) 2 82 pp

PART V

M AGA! INE ARTICLES

on er M a a ine arti les oth er th an th ose re- rinte !L g g z c , p d i n books) RE SPON S IBLE GOVERNMENT IN THE BRITISH COLONIAL S YS TEM Th e m eri an Politi al S i en e Revi ew Wa h A c c c c , s l - 2 ington, Vo . 1, pp . 355 39 , M ay, 1 90 7. SIR WILF RID LAURIER’ S VI CTORY

- t on l Revi ew on on Vol. lvii . 8 2 6 N a i a , L d , , pp 833 ,

em . 1 0 . J , 9 9 CANADA AND THE M ONROE DOCTRINE

Univ er it M a a ine M ontreal Vol. viii . s y g z , , , pp - 1 0 . 351 374 . O ct , 9 9 CANADA AND THE IM M IGRATION PROBLEM

- t o Revi w on on Vol. lvii 6 2 N a i nal e , L d , , pp . 3 1 3 7,

April, 1 9 1 1 . THE GREAT VI CTORY IN CANADA

t on Revi ew on on Vol. lviii . 8 1 Na i al , L d , , pp 3 v 39 2 , No . , 1 9 1 1 . THE CANADIAN SENATE AND THE NAVAL BILL

V l lx vi 86 N ati onal Revi ew, L ondon. o . . pp . 9 l 998. Ju y. 1 9 1 3 1 71 BIBLIOGRAPHY

S OCIAL REF ORM IN THE COM ING CENTURY Two arti les oronto S at t ! c ) T urday Nigh ,

. oronto 1 1 . T , 9 3 AM R C UM R t t t E I AN H O , Nine een h C en ury .

- Vol. lx x vi . , pp 444 457, Aug . , 1 9 1 4 . EDWIN DROOD IS ALIVE Th e ellm an M inn a oli l B , e p s. Vo . x x iv, pp . 655

662 , June 1 5, 1 91 8 . THE WARNING OF PROHIBITION IN AM ERICA

ational Revi ew on on. Vol. lx x iii N , L d , pp . 680

687. July. 1 9 1 9 ON THE ART OF TAKING A VACATION

Th e tloo New or Vol. x x viii . 1 60 Ou k, Y k, c , pp

1 62 , M ay 2 5, 1 92 1 . ON THE GRAIN OF TRUTH IN POPUL AR ECONOM IC F AL LACIES l Proc eedings of th e Roya S oci ety of Canada.

M ay , 1 92 3 . Th ird S eri es, vol. x vii .

PART VI BOOK AND M AGA! INE REF ERENCES PORTRAIT l ovem er C anadian M agazine, Vo . 4 0 , p . 9 1 , N b ,

2 ine Vol. . une 1 9 1 ; Am erican M agaz , 77, p 5, J ,

1 9 1 4 .

S P C C Ph . D . : S avant and m ourist TE HEN LEA O K, Hu l 8 . P . ollins. ivin A e Vo . 2 1 . J C L g g , 9 , pp 79

m 0 6 . 804 , D ec e b er 3 , 1 9 1 TO STEPHEN LEACOCK M ar h Po ivin A e Vol. 2 2 . 8 1 2 1 em . L g g , 9 , p , c 3 ,

1 9 1 7.

1 72

INDEX

A, B, and C , 8 ; 1 2 9 . A Hero in Hom es n ote in ll 6 -8 1 pu , q u d fu , 5 . on nd 1 0 Alice in W derla , 7; 4 . ” Arcadian Adventures with th e Idle Rich , 63 .

Boardin - o se Geom etr ot in ll 2 - 2 g h u y, q u ed fu , 9 3 . l 6 Bul , Livingstone, 1 0 .

v rl Cal e y, 1 33 .

C oll ewi 1 0 . arr , L s, 4

Ch le 1 1 . ar s II, 5

Ch r h of n lan . u c E g d, 5

Conservative Part . y, 5

Detroit F ree Press, 7.

i en 1 0 . D ck s, - 2 D oom er, M r. , 83 93 ; 1 3 .

Dryden, 1 44 .

m i Econo cs, 4 . o ol i l E onom 8 1 Elem ents f P it ca c y, ; 57. i Encyclopaedia Britann ca, 7. l Eng and, 2 .

2 F arm ing, . o F etch ing th e Doct r, 1 9 . F l M ont om r 1 60 agg , g e y, . d F ion 1 1 F renzie ict , 4 .

- lton ie t . Col. 1 1 . Ham i , L u , 2 Hants, .

Hap sburgs, 1 44 . - 1 Hazlitt , 1 39 4 0 .

oll rn . H oh enz e s, 1 44 1 6 1 Hoh enzollerns in A m erica, .

1 74 INDEX

m erial r ani ati on I p O g z , 5.

Kai ser, 1 6 1 .

2 Lake Couch i ch ing, h olidaying at, 1 . e im o h om e 2 Lak S c e, near, .

am Ch arles 1 2 . L b, , 9

Lane, Joh n, 6 ; 9 . ea o S te h en a to io ra h 2 - irth la e 2 L c ck, p , u b g p y, 7; b p c , ; am e to Cana a 2 o h oo 1 e ati on c d , ; b y d , 9 ; duc , 2 - first re tation first a m ent for writin 4 ; pu , 7 ; p y g , 8 li e at oronto Uni v er it 1 0 -1 1 as tea h er ; f T s y , ; c , m arria 1 1 intervi we 1 at M cGill 3 ; ge, ; e d, 3 ; Uni v ersit 1 n li sh om m ents 1 -1 8 as a y, —4 ; E g c , 4 ; l r l r ffor 1 2 8 ecture , 1 52 1 55; ear y h um o ous e ts, ; ‘ in o th 1 2 -1 0 fii s ért 1 s e f on y u , 9 3 ; , 33 ; m aL r_o _n sense 1 0 ev elo m ent of art 1 1 s atir st , 4 ; d p , 4 ; a s i , ’ - wri r o th e real m an, 1 46 1 47 ; a te f o 1 r r o l e 1 —1 path s, 47; e an in te et i if , 4 7 49 ; g m rp e _ d li on Am erican h um our, proh ibition an pub c ownershi 1 1 intelle t al airness 1 as p, 5 ; c u f , 55; i 6- h storian, 1 5 1 57. 2 L eacock, S teph en L ush i ngh ton, 1 . o M r x l oron o ea . Ste h en eatri am i ton of t L c ck, s p ! B H T ) ,

1 1 . ’E - L nvoi , 33 45.

L iterar L a ses 6 8 1 8 2 8 2 y p , , 7, ; ; ; 3 . ittle Ch r h aro n e C r 1 L u c u d th orne , 1 . L k yendec er, 1 60 .

M ar wain 2 k T , 1 0 ; 1 9 . M ari os - p a, 33 45. M a sole m Cl b 1 2 u u u ,35; 37; 45; 3 . M cGill Uni ver it s y, 4 . M ill er . , Hugh , 1 44 M ilton o , J h n, 1 0 ; 1 44 . M oonb eam s rom th e L ar er L na f g u cy, 93 . M Dis over o En land ote rom - y c y f g , q u d f , 1 1 7 1 2 3 . M F inan ial Career ote in ll 2 1 -2 r y c , q u d fu , 8 ; evi ewed , 1 0 - 3 1 33 . INDEX

N t n P r igh L ife i a is, 1 45. - 2 Nonsense Novels, 6, 9 ; 8 1 ; 1 39 1 4 1 ; 1 4 ; 1 59 .

li m Oril a, h o e at, 1 8 . o - Oxf rd S m oking , 1 1 7 1 2 3 .

Poli ti al S i en e O ini on of 1 . c c c , 4 , 5; p , 49

Politi al S i en e sso iati on of m eri a . c c c A c A c , 5

Ro al oloni al n tit te y C I s u , 5.

loo i 2 S a n o, 1 7.

S aturday Nigh t, 7.

S ott 1 0 . c , e tator otati on rom 1 Sp c , q u f , 53 .

tand rd M ntr e l ot t o rom 1 2 . S a , o a , q u a i n f , h i h o 6 S trac an, B s p, 1 5 . n o n 1 6 1 2 S u sh ineﬁﬁetg h es gi a L ittle T w , 45; 3 ; 4 .

Swanm oor, b orn at, 2 .

Swi t 1 . f , 44

- Th e L ittle Girl in Green, 47 63 . - Th e S orrows of a S um m er Guest, 95 1 1 4 . - t l o M r Doom er 8 . Th e Spiri ua Outl ok of . , 3 93

1 6 1 . Th e Unsolved Riddle of S ocial J ustice, 4 ; 49 t ” Tru h , 7.

Uni ver it of h i a o . s y C c g , 4

Univ r it of oronto 1 0 . e s y T , 3 ; ll Upp er Canada Co ege, 2 , 3 .

Voltaire 1 . , 44

W r o n atte n e r 1 . s , H y, 44

Winsom e Winnie and oth er Nonsense Novels, 1 59.

1 76