 The Celestial Omnibus by E. M. Forster This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The boy who resided at Agathoc's Lodge, 28, Buckingham Park Road, Serbetton, had often been puzzled by the old signpost that stood almost opposite. He asked his mother about it, and she replied that it was a joke and not a very nice one, which had been made many years back by some naughty young men and that the police ought to remove it. For there were two strange things about this signpost. Firstly, it pointed up a blank alley, and secondly, it had painted on it infaded characters the words to heaven. What kind of young men were they? he asked. I think your father told me that one of them wrote verses, and was expelled from the university and came to grief in other ways. Still, it was a long time ago. You must ask your father about it. He will say the same as I do, that it was put up as a joke. So it doesn't mean anything at all. She sent him upstairs to put on his best things, for the bonzes were coming to tea, and he was to hand the cake stand. It struck him, as he wrenched on his tightening trousers, that he might do worse than ask Mr. Bonds about the signpost. His father, though very kind, always laughed at him, shrieked with laughter whenever he or any other child asked a question or spoke. But Mr. Bonds was serious as well as kind. He had a beautiful house and lit one books. He was a church warden and a candidate for the county council. He had donated to the free library enormously. He presided over the literary society, and had members of parliament to stop with him. In short, he was probably the wisest person alive. Yet even Mr. Bonds could only say that the signpost was a joke, the joke of a person named Shelley. Of course, cried the mother. I told you so, dear, that was the name. Had you never heard of Shelley? asked Mr. Bonds. No, said the boy, and hung his head. But is there no Shelley in the house? Why yes, exclaimed the lady, in much agitation. Dear Mr. Bonds, we aren't such Philistines as that. Two, at the least, won a wedding present in the other, smaller print in one of the spare rooms. I believe we have seven Shelleys, said Mr. Bonds, with a slow smile. Then he brushed the cake-crumbs off his stomach, and together with his daughter rose to go. The boy, obeying a wink from his mother, saw them all the way to the garden gate, and when they had gone he did not at once return to the house, but gazed for a little up and down Buckingham Park Road. His parents lived at the right end of it. After number 39 the quality of the houses dropped very suddenly, and sixty-four had not even a separate servant's entrance. But at the present moment the whole road looked rather pretty, for the sun had just set in splendor, and the inequalities of rent were drowned in a saffron afterglow. Small birds twittered, and the breadwinners' train shrieked musically down through the cutting, that wonderful cutting which has drawn to itself the whole beauty out of Serbiton, and clad itself like any alpine valley with the glory of the fir and the silver birch and the primrose. It was this cutting that had first stirred desires within the boy, desires for something just a little different. He knew not what. Desires that would return whenever things were sunlit, as they were this evening, running up and down inside him, up and down, up and down, till he would feel quite unusual all over, and as likely as not would want to cry. This evening he was even sillier, for he slipped across the road towards the signpost, and began to run up the blank alley. The alley runs between high walls, the walls of the gardens of Ivanhoe and Belvista, respectively. It smells a little all the way, and is scarcely twenty yards long, including the turn at the end. So not unnaturally the boy soon came to a standstill. I'd like to kick that Shelley, he exclaimed, and glanced idly at a piece of paper which was pasted on the wall. Rather an odd piece of paper, and he read it carefully before he turned back. This is what he read, S and C R C C, alteration in service. Owing to lack of patronage, the company are regretfully compelled to suspend the hourly service, and to retain only the sunrise and sunset omnibuses, which will run as usual. It is to be hoped that the public will patronize an arrangement which is intended for their convenience. As an extra inducement, the company will, for the first time, now issue return tickets, available one day only, which may be obtained of the driver. Passengers are again reminded that no tickets are issued at the other end, and that no complaints in this connection will receive consideration from the company, nor will the company be responsible for any negligence or stupidity on the part of passengers, nor for hailstorms, lightning, loss of tickets, nor for any act of God, for the direction. Now he had never seen this notice before, nor could he imagine where the omnibus went to. S, of course, was for Serviton, and R C C meant road car company, but what was the meaning of the other C? Coom and Maldon, perhaps, or possibly City? Yet it could not hope to compete with the Southwestern. The whole thing, the boy reflected, was run on hopelessly un-business-like lines. Why no tickets from the other end? And what an hour to start! Then he realized that unless the notice was a hoax, an omnibus must have been starting just as he was wishing the Bonzes could buy. He peered at the ground through the gathering dusk, and there he saw what might or might not be the marks of wheels. Yet nothing had come out of the alley, and he had never seen an omnibus at any time in the Buckingham Park Road. No, it must be a hoax, like the signposts, like the fairytales, like the dreams upon which he would wake suddenly in the night. And with a sigh he stepped from the alley, right into the arms of his father. Oh, how his father laughed! Poor poor Popsie, he cried, did-ums, did-ums, did-ums think he'd walkie-pockie up to Evink. And his mother, too, also convulsed with laughter, appeared on the steps of Agathok's Lodge. Don't, Bob, she gasped. Don't be so naughty. Oh, you'll kill me! Oh, leave the boy alone! But all that evening the joke was kept up. The father implored to be taken, too. Was it a very tiring walk? Need one wipe one's shoes on the doormat? And the boy went to bed, feeling faint and sore, and thankful for only one thing, that he had not said a word about the omnibus. It was a hoax. Yet through his dreams it grew more and more real, and the streets of Serbiton, through which he saw it driving, seemed instead to become hoaxes and shadows. And very early in the morning he woke with a cry, for he had had a glimpse of its destination. He struck a match, and its light fell not only on his watch, but also on his calendar, so that he knew it to be half an hour to sunrise. It was pitch dark, for the fog had come down from London in the night, and all Serbiton was wrapped in its embraces. Yet he sprang out and dressed himself, for he was determined to settle, once for all, which was real, the omnibus or the streets. I shall be a fool one way or the other, he thought, until I know. Soon he was shivering in the road under the gas lamp that guarded the entrance to the alley. To enter the alley itself required some courage. Not only was it horribly dark, but he now realized that it was an impossible terminus for an omnibus. If it had not been for a policeman whom he heard approaching through the fog, he would never have made the attempt. The next moment he had made the attempt and failed. Nothing. Nothing but a blank alley, and a very silly boy gaping at its dirty floor. It was a hoax. I'll tell Papa and Mama, he decided. I deserve it. I deserve that they should know. I'm too silly to be alive. And he went back to the gate of Agathoc's lodge. There he remembered that his watch was fast, the sun was not risen, it would not rise for two minutes. Give the bus every chance, he thought cynically, and returned into the alley. But the omnibus was there. Two. It had two horses whose sides were still smoking from their journey. And its two great lamps shone through the fog against the alley's walls, changing their cobwebs and moss into tissues of fairyland. The driver was huddled up in a cape. He faced a blank wall, and how he had managed to drive in so neatly and so silently was one of the many things that the boy never discovered. Nor could he imagine, however, he would drive out. Please, his voice quavered through the foul brown air. Please, is that an omnibus? Omnibus est, said the driver, without turning around. There was a moment's silence. The policeman passed, coughing by the entrance of the alley. The boy crouched in the shadow, for he did not want to be found out. He was pretty sure, too, that it was a pirate. Nothing else, he reasoned, would go from such odd places and at such odd hours. About when do you start? He tried to sound nonchalant. At sunrise. And how far do you go? The whole way. And can I have a return ticket which will bring me all the way back? You can? Do you know? I half think I'll come. The driver made no answer. The sun must have risen, for he unhitched the brake, and scarcely had the boy jumped in before the omnibus was off. How? Did it turn? There was no room. Did it go forward? There was a blank wall. Yet it was moving, moving at a stately pace through the fog, which it turned from brown to yellow. The thought of warm bed and warmer breakfast made the boy feel faint. He wished he had not come. His parents would not have approved. He would have gone back to them if the weather had not made it impossible. The solitude was terrible. He was the only passenger. And the omnibus, though well built, was cold and somewhat musty. He drew his coat round him, and in doing so, chanced to feel his pocket. It was empty. He had forgotten his purse. Stop! he shouted. Stop! And then, being of a polite disposition, he glanced up at the painted notice board, so that he might call the driver by name. Mr. Brown, stop! Oh, do please stop! Mr. Brown did not stop, but he opened a little window and looked in at the boy. His face was a surprise, so kind it was and modest. Mr. Brown, I've left my purse behind. I've not got a penny. I can't pay for the ticket. Will you take my watch, please? I'm in the most awful hole. Tickets on this line, said the driver, whether single or return, can be purchased by coinage from no terrain meant. And a chronometer, though it had solaced the vigils of Charlemagne, or measured the slumbers of Laura, can acquire by no mutation the double cake that charms the fangless cerebus of heaven. So saying, he handed in the necessary ticket, and while the boy said, thank you, continued, titular pretensions, I know it well, are vanity. Yet they merit no censure when uttered on a laughing lip, and in an anonymous world are in some sort useful, since they do serve to distinguish one jack from his fellow. Remember me, therefore, as Sir Thomas Brown. Are you a sir? Oh, sorry! He had heard of these gentlemen drivers. It is good of you about the ticket, but if you go on at this rate, however does your bus pay. It does not pay. It was not intended to pay. Many are the faults of my equipage. It is compounded too curiously of foreign woods. Its cushions tickle area-dition rather than promote repose, and my horses are nourished not on the evergreen pastures of the moment, but on the dried bents and clovers of latinity. But that it pays. That error at all events was never intended and never attained. Sorry again, said the boy, rather hopelessly. Sir Thomas looked sad, fearing that even for a moment he had been the cause of sadness. He invited the boy to come up and sit down beside him on the box, and together they journeyed on through the fog, which was now changing from yellow to white. There were no houses by the road, so it must be either Putney Heath or Wimbledon Common. Have you been a driver always? I was a physician once. But why did you stop? Weren't you good? As a healer of bodies I had scant success, and several score of my patients proceeded me, but as a healer of the spirit I have succeeded beyond my hopes and my deserts, for though my drafts were not better nor subtler than those of other men, yet by reason of cunning goblets wherein I offered them, the queasy soul was oft times tempted to sip and be refreshed. The queasy soul, he murmured. If the sun sets with trees in front of it, and you suddenly come strange all over, is that a queasy soul? Have you felt that? Why, yes. After a pause he told the boy a little, a very little, about the journey's end, but they did not chatter much for the boy when he liked a person, would as soon sit silent in his company as speak, and this, he discovered, was also the mind of Sir Thomas Brown, and of many others with whom he was to be acquainted. He heard, however, about the young man Shelly, who was now quite a famous person with a carriage of his own, and about some of the other drivers who were in the service of the company. Meanwhile, the light grew stronger, though the fog did not disperse. It was now more like mist than fog, and at times would travel quickly across them, as if it was part of a cloud. They had been ascending, too, in a most puzzling way. For over two hours the horses had been pulling against the collar, and even if it were Richmond Hill they ought to have been at the top long ago. Perhaps it was Ebsom, or even the North Downs. Yet the air seemed keener than that which blows on, either. And as to the name of their destination Sir Thomas Brown was silent. Crash. Thunder by Jove, said the boy, and not so far off, either. Listen to the echoes. It's more like mountains. He thought, not very vividly, of his father and mother. He saw them sitting down to sausages and listening to the storm. He saw his own empty place. Then there would be questions, alarms, theories, jokes, consolations. They would expect him back at lunch, to lunch he would not come, nor to tea. But he would be in for dinner, and so his day's truancy would be over. If he had had his purse he would have bought them presents. Not that he should have known what to get them. Crash. The peel and the lightning came together. The cloud quivered as if it were alive, and torn streamers of mist rushed past. Are you afraid? asked Sir Thomas Brown. What is there to be afraid of? Is it much farther? The horses of the omnibus stopped, just as a ball of fire burst up and exploded with a ringing noise that was deafening but clear, like the noise of a blacksmith's forge. All the cloud was shattered. Oh, listen Sir Thomas Brown. No, I mean look. We shall get a view at last. No, I mean listen. The sounds. That sounds like a rainbow. The noise had died into the faintest murmur, beneath which another murmur grew, spreading stealthily, steadily, in a curve that widened but did not vary. And in widening curves a rainbow was spreading from the horse's feet into the dissolving mists. But how beautiful! What colors! Where will it stop? It is more like the rainbows you can tread on, more like dreams. The color and the sound grew together. The rainbows spanned an enormous gulf. Clouds rushed under it and were pierced by it, and still it grew, reaching forward, conquering the darkness, until it touched something that seemed more solid than a cloud. The boy stood up. What is that out there? he called. What does it rest on? Out at that other end. In the morning sunshine a precipice shone forth beyond the gulf. A precipice, or was it a castle? The horses moved. They set their feet upon the rainbow. Oh, look! the boy shouted. Oh, listen! Those caves, or are they gateways? Oh, look between the cliffs at those ledges! I see people! I see trees! Look also below! whispered Sir Thomas. Neglect not the divine or acharon. The boy looked below, past the flames of the rainbow that licked against their wheels. The gulf also had cleared, and in its depths there flowed an everlasting river. One sunbeam entered and struck a green pool, and as they passed over, he saw three maidens rise to the surface of the pool, singing, and playing with something that glistened like a ring. You, down in the water! he called. They answered, You, up on the bridge! There was a burst of music. You, up on the bridge, good luck to you! Truth in the depth, truth on the height. You, down in the water! What are you doing? Sir Thomas Brown replied. They sported in the mancipiary possession of their gold, and the omnibus arrived. 3. The boy was in disgrace. He sat locked up in the nursery of Agathoc's Lodge, reading poetry for a punishment. His father had said, My boy, I can pardon anything but untruthfulness, and had caned him, saying at each stroke, There is no omnibus, no driver, no bridge, no mountain. You are a truant, a gutter snipe, a liar! His father could be very stern at times. His mother had begged him to say he was sorry, but he could not say that. It was the greatest day of his life, in spite of the caning and the poetry at the end of it. He had returned punctually at sunset, driven not by Sir Thomas Brown, but by a maiden lady who was full of quiet fun. They had talked of omnibuses, and also of Baruch Landau's. How far away her gentle voice seemed now! Yet it was scarcely three hours since he had left her up the alley. His mother called through the door. Dear, you are to come down and bring your poetry with you. He came down and found that Mr. Bonds was in the smoking-room with his father. It had been a dinner party. Here is the great traveller, said his father grimly. Here is the young gentleman who drives in an omnibus over rainbows, while young ladies sing to him. Pleased with his wit, he laughed. After all, said Mr. Bonds, smiling, there is something a little like it in Wagner. It is odd how, in quite illiterate minds, you will find glimmers of artistic truth. The case interests me. Let me plead for the culprit. We have all romanced in our time, haven't we? Hear how kind Mr. Bonds is, said his mother, while his father said, Very well. Let him say his poem, and that will do. He is going away to my sister on Tuesday, and she will cure him of this alley-sloopering. Laughter. Say your poem. The boy began, standing aloof in giant ignorance. His father laughed again, roared, One for you, my son, standing aloof in giant ignorance. I never knew these poets talk since. Just describes you, hear, Bonds, you go in for poetry. Put him through it, will you, while I fetch up the whiskey. Yes, give me the Keats, said Mr. Bonds. Let him say his Keats to me. So for a few moments the wise man and the ignorant boy were left alone in the smoking-room. Standing aloof in giant ignorance of the eyedream and of the cyclides, as one who sits ashore and longs per chance to visit. Quite right to visit what? To visit dolphin coral in deep seas, said the boy, and burst into tears. Come, come, why do you cry? Because all these words that only rhyme before Now that I've come back, they're me. Mr. Bonds laid the Keats down. The case was more interesting than he had expected. You, he exclaimed, this sonnet, you? Yes, and look further on. I, on the shores of darkness there is light, and precipices show untrodden green. It is so, sir. All these things are true. I never doubted it, said Mr. Bonds. With closed eyes. You, then you believe me? You believe in the omnibus, in the driver, in the storm, and that return ticket I got for nothing, and... Tut, tut! No more of your yarns, my boy. I meant that I never doubted the essential truth of poetry. Someday, when you have read more, you will understand what I mean. But, Mr. Bonds, it is so. There is light upon the shores of darkness. I have seen it coming. Light and a wind. Nonsense, said Mr. Bonds. If I had stopped, they tempted me. They told me to give up my ticket, for you cannot come back if you lose your ticket. They called from the river for it, and indeed I was tempted, for I have never been so happy as among these precipices. But I thought of my mother and father, and that I must fetch them. Yet they will not come, though the road starts opposite our house. It has all happened as the people up there warned me, and Mr. Bonds has disbelieved me like everyone else. I have been caned. I shall never see that mountain again. What's that about me? said Mr. Bonds, sitting up in his chair, very suddenly. I told them about you, and how clever you were, and how many books you had, and they said, Mr. Bonds will certainly disbelieve you. Stuff and nonsense, my young friend. You grow impertinent. I will settle the matter. Not a word to your father. I will cure you. Tomorrow evening I will myself call here to take you for a walk, and at sunset we will go up this alley opposite, and hunt for your omnibus, you silly little boy. His face grew serious, for the boy was not disconcerted, but leapt about the room singing, Joy! Joy! I told them you would believe me. We will drive together over the rainbow. I told them you would come. After all, could there be anything in the story? Wagner? Keats? Shelly? Sir Thomas Brown? Certainly the case was interesting. And on the morrow evening, though it was pouring with rain, Mr. Bonds did not omit to call at Agathok's Lodge. The boy was ready, bubbling with excitement, and skipping about in a way that rather vexed the president of the literary society. They took a turn down Buckingham Park Road, and then, having seen that no one was watching them, slipped up the alley. Naturally enough, for the sun was setting, they ran straight against the omnibus. Good heavens! exclaimed Mr. Bonds. Good gracious heavens! It was not the omnibus in which the boy had driven first, nor yet that in which he had returned. There were three horses, black, gray, and white, the gray being the finest. The driver, who turned round at the mention of goodness and of heaven, was a sallow man, with terrifying jaws and sunken eyes. Mr. Bonds, on seeing him, gave a cry, as if of recognition, and began to tremble violently. The boy jumped in. Is it possible? cried Mr. Bonds. Is the impossible possible? Sir, come in, sir. It is such a fine omnibus. Oh, here is his name. Dan someone. Mr. Bonds sprang in, too. A blast of wind immediately slammed the omnibus door, and the shock jerked down all the omnibus blinds, which were very weak on their springs. Dan, show me! Good gracious heavens, we're moving! Hooray! said the boy. Mr. Bonds became flustered. He had not intended to be kidnapped. He could not find the door handle nor push up the blinds. The omnibus was quite dark, and by the time he had struck a match, night had come on outside, also. They were moving rapidly. A strange, memorable adventure, he said, surveying the interior of the omnibus, which was large, roomy, and constructed with extreme regularity, every part exactly answering to every other part. Over the door, the handle of which was outside, was written, La Shiaute Agni Baldanza Voye Che Antrante. At least that was what was written. But Mr. Bonds said that it was lashy, arty something, and that Baldanza was a mistake for Speranza. His voice sounded as if he was in church. Meanwhile, the boy called to the cadaverous driver for two return tickets. They were handed in without a word. Mr. Bonds covered his face with his hand and again trembled. Do you know who that is? he whispered, when the little window had shut upon them. It is the impossible. Well, I don't like him as much as Sir Thomas Brown, though I shouldn't be surprised if he had even more in him. More in him? he stamped irritably. By accident you have made the greatest discovery of the century, and all you can say is there is more in this man. Do you remember those vellum books in my library, stamped with red lilies, this sits still, I bring you stupendous news. This is the man who wrote them. The boy sat quite still. I wonder if we shall see Mrs. Gamp, he asked, after a civil pause. Mrs. Mrs. Gamp and Mrs. Harris. I like Mrs. Harris. I came upon them quite suddenly. Mrs. Gamp's band boxes have moved over the rainbow so badly, all the bottoms have fallen out, and two of the pippins off her bedstead tumbled into the stream. Out there sits the man who wrote my vellum books, thundered Mr. Bonds. And you talk to me of Dickens and of Mrs. Gamp? I know Mrs. Gamp so well, he apologized. I could not help being glad to see her. I recognized her voice. She was telling Mrs. Harris about Mrs. Prigg. Did you spend the whole day in her elevating company? Oh no, I raced. I met a man who took me out beyond to a race course. You run, and there are dolphins out at sea. Indeed, do you remember the man's name? Achilles, no, he was later. Tom Jones. Mr. Bonds sighed heavily. Well, my lad, you have made a miserable mess of it. Think of a cultured person with your opportunities. A cultured person would have known all these characters and known what to have said to each. He would not have wasted his time with a Mrs. Gamp or a Tom Jones. The creations of Homer, of Shakespeare, and of him who drives us now would alone have contented him. He would not have raced. He would have asked intelligent questions. But Mr. Bonds, said the boy humbly, you will be a cultured person. I told them so. True, true, and I beg you not to disgrace me when we arrive. No gossiping, no running. Keep close to my side, and never speak to these immortals unless they speak to you. Yes, and give me the return tickets. You will be losing them. The boy surrendered the tickets, but felt a little sore. After all, he had found the way to this place. It was hard first to be disbelieved, and then to be lectured. Meanwhile, the rain had stopped, and the moonlight crept into the omnibus through the cracks and the blinds. But how was there to be a rainbow? cried the boy. You distract me, snapped Mr. Bonds. I wished to meditate on beauty. I wished to goodness I was with a reverent and sympathetic person. The lad bit his lip. He made a hundred good resolutions. He would imitate Mr. Bonds all the visit. He would not laugh or run or sing, or do any of the vulgar things that must have disgusted his new friends last time. He would be very careful to pronounce their names properly, and to remember who knew whom. Achilles did not know Tom Jones, at least so Mr. Bonds said. The Duchess of Moffitt was older than Mrs. Gamp. At least so Mr. Bonds said. He would be self-conscious, reticent, and prim. He would never say he lacked any one. Yet, when the blind flew open at a chance touch of his head, all these good resolutions went to the winds, for the omnibus had reached the summit of a moonlit hill. And there was a chasm, and there, across it, stood the old precipices, dreaming, with their feet in the everlasting river. He exclaimed, The mountain! Listen to the new tune in the water! Look at the campfires in the ravines! And Mr. Bonds, after a hasty glance, retorted, Water! Campfires! Ridiculous rubbish! Hold your tongue! There is nothing at all. Yet, under his eyes, a rainbow formed, compounded not of sunlight and storm, but of moonlight and the spray of the river. The three horses had put their feet upon it. He thought of the finest rainbow he had seen, but did not dare to say so, since Mr. Bonds said that nothing was there. He lint out, the window had opened, and sang the tune that rose from the sleeping waters. The prelude to Rhinengold, said Mr. Bonds suddenly, Who taught you these? He, too, looked out of the window. Then he behaved very oddly. He gave a choking cry and fell back onto the omnibus floor. He writhed and kicked. His face was green. Does the bridge make you dizzy? the boy asked. Dizzy! gasped Mr. Bonds. I want to go back, tell the driver. But the driver shook his head. We are nearly there, said the boy. They are asleep, shall I call? They will be so pleased to see you, for I have prepared them. Mr. Bonds moaned. They moved over the lunar rainbow, which ever and ever broke away behind their wheels. How still the night was! Who would be sentry at the gate? I am coming! he shouted, again forgetting the hundred resolutions. I am returning! I, the boy! The boy is returning! cried a voice to other voices, who repeated, The boy is returning! I am bringing Mr. Bonds with me! Silence! I should have said Mr. Bonds is bringing me with him. Profound silence! Who stands sentry? Achilles. And on the rocky causeway, close to the springing of the rainbow bridge, he saw a young man who carried a wonderful shield. Mr. Bonds, it is Achilles armed. I want to go back, said Mr. Bonds. The last fragment of the rainbow melted. The wheels sang upon the living rock. The doors of the omnibus burst open. Out leapt the boy. He could not resist. And sprang to meet the warrior, who, stooping suddenly, caught him on his shield. Achilles! he cried. Let me get down, for I am ignorant and vulgar, and I must wait for that Mr. Bonds of whom I told you yesterday. But Achilles raised him aloft. He crouched on the wonderful shield, on heroes in burning cities, on vineyards graven in gold, on every dear passion, every joy, on the entire image of the mountain that he had discovered, encircled like it, with an everlasting stream. No, no! he protested. I am not worthy. It is Mr. Bonds who must be up here. But Mr. Bonds was whimpering. And Achilles trumpeted and cried. Stand upright upon my shield. Sir, sir, I did not mean to stand. Something made me stand. Sir, why do you delay? Here is only the great Achilles whom you knew. Mr. Bonds screamed. I see no one. I see nothing. I want to go back. Then he cried to the driver. Save me! Let me stop in your chariot. I have honored you. I have quoted you. I have bound you in vellum. Take me back to my world. The driver replied. I am the means, and not the end. I am the food, and not the life. Stand by yourself as the boy has stood. I cannot save you, for poetry is a spirit. And they that would worship it must worship in spirit and in truth. Mr. Bonds, he could not resist, crawled out of the beautiful omnibus. His face appeared, gaping horribly. His hands followed, one gripping the step, the other beating the air. Now his shoulders emerged, his chest, his stomach. With a shriek of, I see London! He fell, fell against the hard, moonlit rock, fell into it as if it were water, fell through it, vanished, and was seen by the boy no more. Where have you fallen to, Mr. Bonds? Here is a procession arriving to honor you with music and torches. Here come the men and women whose names you know. The mountain is awake, the river is awake, over the race course the sea is awaking those dolphins, and it is all for you, they want you. There was the touch of fresh leaves on his forehead. Someone had crowned him. From the Kingston Gazette, Serbaton Times, and Rains Park Observer. The body of Mr. Septimus Bonds has been found in a shockingly mutilated condition in the vicinity of the Bermond Sea Gas Works. The deceased pockets contained a sovereign purse, a silver cigar case, a Bijou pronouncing dictionary, and a couple of omnibus tickets. The unfortunate gentleman had apparently been hurled from a considerable height, foul play is suspected, and a thorough investigation is pending by the authorities. The End of The Celestial Omnibus by E. M. Forster Dr. Heidecker's Experiment by Nathaniel Hawthorne This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Suzanne Houghton Dr. Heidecker's Experiment by Nathaniel Hawthorne That very singular man, old Dr. Heidecker, once invited four venerable friends to meet him in his study. There were three white bearded gentlemen, Mr. Medborne, Colonel Killigrew, and Mr. Gascoigne, and a withered gentleman whose name was the widow, Wicherly. They were all melancholy old creatures who had been unfortunate in life, and whose greatest misfortune it was that they were not long ago in their graves. Mr. Medborne, in the vigor of his age, had been a prosperous merchant, but had lost his all by a frantic speculation and was now little better than a mendicant. Colonel Killigrew had wasted his best years and his health and substance in the pursuit of sinful pleasures, which had given birth to a brood of pains such as the gout and diverse other torments of soul and body. Mr. Gascoigne was a ruined politician, a man of evil fame, or at least had been so till time had buried him from the knowledge of the present generation and made him obscure instead of infamous. As for the widow, Wicherly, tradition tells us that she was a great beauty in her day, but for a long while past she had lived in deep seclusion on account of certain scandalous stories which had prejudiced the gentry of the town against her. It is a circumstance worth mentioning that each of these three old gentlemen, Mr. Medborne, Colonel Killigrew, and Mr. Gascoigne, were early lovers of the widow Wicherly and had once been on the point of cutting each other's throats for her sake. And before proceeding further, I will merely hint that Dr. Heidegger and all his four guests were sometimes thought to be a little beside themselves, as is not unfrequently the case with old people when worried either by present troubles or woeful recollections. My dear old friends, said Dr. Heidegger, motioning them to be seated. I am desirous of your assistance in one of those little experiments with which I amuse myself here in my study. If all stories were true, Dr. Heidegger's study must have been a very curious place. It was a dim old-fashioned chamber festooned with cobwebs and besprinkled with antique dust. Around the walls stood several oaken bookcases, the lower shelves of which were filled with rows of gigantic folios and black-letter quartos, and the upper with little parchment-covered duodesimos. Over the central bookcase was a bronze bust of hypocrisies, with which, according to some authorities, Dr. Heidegger was accustomed to hold consultations in all difficult cases of his practice. In the obscurest corner of the room stood a tall and narrow oaken closet, with its door ajar within which doubtfully appeared a skeleton. Between two of the bookcases hung a looking-glass, presenting its high and dusty plate within a tarnished guilt frame. Among many wonderful stories related to this mirror, it was fabled that the spirits of all the doctors' deceased patients dwelt within its verge and would stare him in the face whenever he looked at the wood. The opposite side of the chamber was ornamented with the full-length portrait of a young lady, arrayed in the faded magnificence of silk, satin, and brocade, and with a visage as faded as her dress. Above half a century ago Dr. Heidegger had been on the point of marriage with this young lady. But, being affected with some slight disorder, she had swallowed one of her lover's prescriptions and died on the bridal evening. The greatest curiosity of the study remains to be mentioned. It was a ponderous folio volume, bound in black leather, with massive silver clasps. There were no letters on the back, and nobody could tell the title of the book. But it was well known to be a book of magic. And once, when the chambermaid had lifted it, merely to brush away the dust, the skeleton had rattled in its closet. The picture of the young lady had stepped one foot upon the floor, and several ghastly faces had peeped forth from the mirror, while the brazen head of Hippocrates frowned and said, Forbear! Such was Dr. Heidegger's study. On the summer afternoon of our tale, a small round table as black as ebony stood in the center of the room, sustaining a cut glass vase of beautiful form and elaborate workmanship. The sunshine came through the window between the heavy festoons of two faded damask curtains and fell directly across this vase, so that a mild splendor was reflected from it on the ash and visages of the five old people who sat around. Four champagne glasses were also on the table. My dear old friends, repeated Dr. Heidegger, May I reckon on your aid in performing an exceedingly curious experiment? Now Dr. Heidegger was a very strange old gentleman whose eccentricity had become the nucleus for a thousand fantastic stories. Some of these fables, to my shame be it spoken, might possibly be traced back to my own voracious self, and if any passages of the present tale should startle the reader's faith, I must be content to bear the stigma of a fiction monger. When the doctor's four guests heard him talk of his proposed experiment, they anticipated nothing more wonderful than the murder of a mouse in an air pump, or the examination of a cobweb by the microscope or some similar nonsense, with which he was constantly in the habit of pestering his intimates. But without waiting for a reply, Dr. Heidegger hobbled across the chamber and returned with the same ponderous folio, bound in black leather, which common report affirmed to be a book of magic. Undoing the silver clasps he opened the volume and took from among its black leather pages a rose, or what was once a rose, though now the green leaves and crimson petals had assumed one brownish hue, and the ancient flower seemed ready to crumble to dust in the doctor's hands. This rose, said Dr. Heidegger with a sigh. The same withered and crumbling flower blossomed five and fifty years ago. It was given me by Sylvia Ward, whose portrait hangs yonder. And I meant to wear it in my bosom at our wedding. Five and fifty years it has been treasured between the leaves of this old volume. Now, would you deem it possible that this rose of half a century could ever bloom again? Nonsense, said the widow witcherly with a peevish toss of her head. It might as well ask whether an old woman's wrinkled face could ever bloom again. See, answered Dr. Heidegger. He uncovered the face and threw the faded rose into the water which it contained. At first it lay lightly on the surface of the fluid, appearing to imbibe none of its moisture. Soon, however, a singular change began to be visible. The crushed and dried petals stirred and assumed deepening tinge of crimson, as if the flower were reviving from a death-like slumber. The slender stalk and twigs of foliage became green. And there was the rose of half a century, looking as fresh as when Sylvia Ward had first given it to her lover. It was scarcely full-blown, for some of its delicate red leaves curled modestly around its moist bosom, within which two or three dewdrops were sparkling. That is certainly a very pretty deception, said the doctor's friends. Carelessly, however, for they had witnessed greater miracles at a conjurer's show. Pray, how was it affected? Did you never hear of the fountain of youth? asked Dr. Heidegger. Which Ponce de Leon, the Spanish adventurer, went in search of two or three centuries ago? But did Ponce de Leon ever find it? said the widow-witcherly. No, answered Dr. Heidegger, for he never sawed it in the right place. The famous fountain of youth, if I am rightly informed, is situated in the southern part of the Floridian Peninsula, not far from Lake Macaco. Its source is overshadowed by several gigantic magnolias, which, though numberless centuries old, have been kept as fresh as violets by the virtues of this wonderful water. An acquaintance of mine, knowing my curiosity in such matters, has sent me what you see in the vase. Ahem! said Colonel Killigrew, who believed not a word of the doctor's story. And what may be the effect of this fluid on the human frame? You shall judge for yourself, my dear Colonel, replied Dr. Heidegger. And all of you, my respected friends, are welcome to so much of this admirable fluid as may restore to you the bloom of youth. For my own part, having had much trouble in growing old, I am in no hurry to grow young again. With your permission, therefore, I will merely watch the progress of the experiment. While he spoke, Dr. Heidegger had been filling the four champagne glasses with the water of the fountain of youth. It was apparently impregnated with an ever-vescent gas, for little bubbles were continually ascending from the depths of the glasses and bursting in silvery spray at the surface. As the liquor diffused a pleasant perfume, the old people doubted not that it possessed cordial and comfortable properties, and though utter skeptics as to its rejuvenous power, they were inclined to swallow it at once. But Dr. Heidegger besought them to stay a moment. Before you drink, my respectable old friends, said he, it would be well that with the experience of a lifetime to direct you, you should draw up a few general rules for your guidance in passing a second time through the perils of youth. Think what a sin and shame it would be, if with your peculiar advantages you should not become patterns of virtue and wisdom to all the young people of the age. The doctor's four venerable friends made him no answer except by a feeble and tremulous laugh. So very ridiculous was the idea that, knowing how closely repentance treads behind the steps of error, they should ever go astray again. Drink then, said the doctor, bowing. I rejoiced that I have so well selected the subjects of my experiment. With palsied hands they raised the glasses to their lips. The liquor, if it really possessed such virtues as Dr. Heidegger imputed to it, could not have been bestowed on four human beings who needed it more woefully. They looked as if they had never known what youth or pleasure was, but had been the offspring of nature's dotage, and always the gray, decrepit, sapless, miserable creatures who now sat stooping round the doctor's table, without life enough in their souls or bodies to be animated even by the prospect of growing young again. They drank off the water and replaced their glasses on the table. Assuredly there was an almost immediate improvement in the aspect of the party, not unlike what might have been produced by a glass of generous wine, together with a sudden glow of cheerful sunshine brightening over all their visages at once. There was a healthful suffusion on their cheeks instead of the ashen hue that had made them look so corpse-like. They gazed at one another and fancied that some magic power had really begun to smooth away the deep and sad inscriptions which father Time had been so long engraving on their brows. The widow witcherly adjusted her cap, for she felt almost like a woman again. Give us more of this wondrous water, cried they eagerly. We are younger, but we are still too old. Quick, give us more. Patience. Patience. Quote Dr. Heidegger, who sat watching the experiment with philosophic coolness. You have been a long time growing old. Surely you might be content to grow young in half an hour. But the water is at your service. Again he filled their glasses with the liquor of youth, an effle which still remained in the vase to turn half the old people in the city to the age of their own grandchildren. While the bubbles were yet sparkling on the brim, the doctor's four guests snatched their glasses from the table and swallowed the contents at a single gulp. Was it delusion? Even while the draft was passing down their throats it seemed to have wrought a change on their whole systems. Their eyes grew clear and bright, a dark shade deepened among their silvery locks. They sat around the table, three gentlemen of middle age, and a woman hardly beyond her buxom prime. My dear widow, you are charming! cried Colonel Kiligrew, whose eyes had been fixed upon her face while the shadows of age were flitting from it like darkness from the crimson daybreak. The fair widow knew of old that Colonel Kiligrew's compliments were not always measured by sober truth, so she started up and ran to the mirror, still dreading that the ugly visage of an old woman would meet her gaze. Meanwhile the three gentlemen behaved in such a manner as proved that the water of the fountain of youth possessed some intoxicating qualities, unless indeed their exhilaration of spirits were merely a lightsome dizziness caused by the sudden removal of the weight of years. Mr. Gascoigne's mind seemed to run on political topics, but whether relating to the past, present, or future could not easily be determined since the same ideas and phrases have been in vogue these fifty years. Now he rattled forth full-throated sentences about patriotism, national glory, and the people's right. Now he muttered some perilous stuff or other in a sly and doubtful whisper, so cautiously that even his own conscience could scarcely catch the secret. And now again he spoke in measured accents in a deeply deferential tone, as if a royal ear were listening to his well-turned periods. Colonel Killigrew all this time had been trolling forth a jolly bottle song and ringing his glass in symphony with the chorus, while his eyes wandered toward the buxom figure of the widow Wicherly. On the other side of the table Mr. Medborne was involved in a calculation of dollars and cents, with which was strangely intermingled a project for supplying the East Indies with ice by harnessing a team of whales to the polar icebergs. As for the widow Wicherly, she stood before the mirror curtsying and simpering to her own image, and greeting it as the friend whom she loved better than all the world beside. She thrust her face close to the glass to see whether some long-remembered wrinkle or crow's foot had indeed vanished. She examined whether the snow had so entirely melted from her hair that the venerable cap could be safely thrown aside. At last, turning briskly away, she came with a sort of dancing step to the table. My dear old doctor, cried she, pray, favour me with another glass. Certainly, my dear madam, certainly, replied the complacent doctor. See, I have already filled the glasses. There, in fact, stood the four glasses, brimful of this wonderful water, the delicate spray of which, as it ever vests from the surface, resembled the tremulous glitter of diamonds. It was now so nearly sunset that the chamber had grown duskier than ever, but a mild and moon-like splendour gleamed from within the vase, and rested alike on the four guests and on the doctor's venerable figure. He sat in a high-backed, elaborately carved oaken armchair, with a gray dignity of aspect that might have well befitted that very fathered time whose power had never been disputed, saved by this fortunate company. Even while quaffing the third draft of the fountain of youth, they were almost awed by the expression of his mysterious visage. But the next moment, the exhilarating gush of young life shot through their veins. They were now in the happy prime of youth. Age, with its miserable train of cares and sorrows and diseases, was remembered only as the trouble of a dream from which they had joyously awoke. The fresh gloss of the soul so early lost, and without which the world's successive scenes had been but a gallery of faded pictures, again through its enchantment over all their prospects. They felt like new created beings in a new created universe. We are young. We are young, they cried exultingly. Youth, like the extremity of age, had effaced the strongly marked characteristics of middle life, and mutually assimilated them all. They were a group of merry youngsters almost maddened with the exuberant frolic sameness of their years. The most singular effect of their gaiety was an impulse to mock the infirmity and decrepitude of which they had so lately been the victims. They laughed loudly at their old-fashioned attire, the wide-skirted coats and flapped waistcoats of the young men, and the ancient cap and gown of the blooming girl. One limped across the floor like a gouty grandfather. One set a pair of spectacles astride of his nose and pretended to pour over the black-letter pages of the Book of Magic. A third seated himself in an armchair and strove to imitate the venerable dignity of Dr. Heidegger. Then all shouted mirthfully and leaped about the room. The widow-witcherly, if so fresh a damsel could be called a widow, tripped up to the doctor's chair with a mischievous merriment in her rosy face. Dr. you dear old soul! cried she. Get up and dance with me! And then the four young people laughed louder than ever to think what a queer figure the poor old doctor would cut. Pray excuse me! answered the doctor quietly. I am old and rheumatic, and my dancing days were over long ago. But either of these gay young gentlemen would be glad of so pretty a partner. Dance with me, Clara! cried Colonel Killigrew. No, no, I will be her partner! shouted Mr. Gascoigne. She promised me her hand fifty years ago, exclaimed Mr. Medborne. They all gathered round her. One caught both her hands in his passionate grasp, and another threw his arm about her waist. The third buried his hand among the glossy curls that clustered beneath the widow's cap. Blushing, panting, struggling, chiding, laughing, her warm breath fanning each of their faces by turns, she strove to disengage herself, yet still remained in their triple embrace. Never was there a livelier picture of youthful rivalship with bewitching beauty for the prize. Yet by a strange deception, owing to the duskiness of the chamber and the antique dresses which they still wore, the tall mirror is said to have reflected the figures of the three old gray withered grandsires, ridiculously contending for the skinny ugliness of a shriveled grandum. But they were young. Their burning passions proved them so, inflamed to madness by the cock-tree of the girl widow who neither granted nor quite withheld her favours. The three rivals began to interchange threatening glances, still keeping hold of the fair prize they grappled fiercely at one another's throats. As they struggled to and fro, the table was overturned and the vase dashed into a thousand fragments. The precious water of youth flowed in a bright stream across the floor, moistening the wings of a butterfly which, grown old in the decline of summer, had lighted there to die. The insect fluttered lightly through the chamber and settled on the snowy head of Dr. Heidegger. Come, come, gentlemen, come, Madame Witcherly, exclaimed the doctor. I really must protest against this riot. They stood still and shivered, for it seemed as if gray time were calling them back from their sunny youth, far down into the chill and dark-sum veil of years. They looked at old Dr. Heidegger who sat in his carved armchair holding the rose of half a century, which he had rescued from among the fragments of the shattered vase. At the motion of his hand the four rioters resumed their seats, the more readily because their violent exertions had weary them youthful though they were. My poor Sylvia's rose ejaculated Dr. Heidegger, holding it in the light of the sunset clouds. It appears to be fading again. And so it was. Even while the party were looking at it, the flower continued to shrivel up till it became as dry and fragile as when the doctor had first thrown it into the vase. He shook off the few drops of moisture which clung to its petals. I love it as well thus as in its dewy freshness observed he, pressing the withered rose to his withered lips. While he spoke, the butterfly fluttered down from the doctor's snowy head and fell upon the floor. His guests shivered again. A strange chillness whether of the body or spirit they could not tell was creeping gradually over them all. They gazed at one another and fancied that each fleeting moment snatched away at charm and left the deepening furrow where none had been before. Was it an illusion? Had the changes of a lifetime been crowded into so brief a space and were they now four aged people sitting with their old friend Dr. Heidegger? Are we grown old again so soon? cried they dolefully. In truth they had. The water of youth possessed merely a virtue more transient than that of wine. The delirium which had created it ever vest away. Yes, they were old again. With a shuddering impulse that showed her a woman still, the widow clasped her skinny hands before her face and wished that the coffin lid were over it since it could be no longer beautiful. Yes, friends, you are old again, said Dr. Heidegger. And lo, the water of youth is all lavished on the ground. Well, I bemoan it not. For if the fountain gushed at my very doorstep I would not stoop to bathe my lips in it, no, though its delirium were for years instead of moments, such as the lesson you have taught me. But the doctor's four friends had taught no such lesson to themselves. They resolved forthwith to make a pilgrimage to Florida and quoth at morning, noon and night from the fountain of youth. End of Dr. Heidegger's experiment by Nathaniel Hawthorne. The Dumb Man by Sherwood Anderson. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Dumb Man. There's a story. I cannot tell it. I have no words. The story is almost forgotten, but sometimes I remember. The story concerns three men in a house in a street. If I could say the words, I would sing the story. I would whisper into the ears of women of mothers. I would run through the street saying it over and over. My tongue would be torn loose. It would rattle against my teeth. The three men are in a room in the house. One is young and dandified. He continually laughs. There is a second man who has a long white beard. He is consumed with doubt, but occasionally his doubt leaves him and he sleeps. A third man there is who has wicked eyes and who moves nervously about the room, rubbing his hands together. The three men are waiting, waiting. Upstairs in the house there is a woman standing with her back to a wall in half darkness by a window. That is the foundation of my story and everything I will ever know is distilled in it. I remember that a fourth man came to the house, a white, silent man. Everything was as silent as the sea at night. His feet on the stone floor of the room where the three men were made no sound. The man with the wicked eyes became like a boiling liquid. He ran back and forth like a caged animal. The old gray man was infected by this nervousness. He kept pulling at his beard. The fourth man, the white one, went upstairs to the woman. There she was, waiting. How silent the house was. How loudly all the clocks in the neighborhood ticked. The woman upstairs craved love. That must have been the story. She hungered for love with her whole being. She wanted to create in love. When the white, silent man came into her presence, she sprang forward. Her lips were parted. There was a smile on her lips. The white one said nothing. In his eyes there was no rebuke, no question. His eyes were as impersonal as stars. Downstairs the wicked one whined and ran back and forth like a little lost hungry dog. The gray one tried to follow him about, but presently grew tired and lay down on the floor to sleep. He never woke again. The dandified fellow lay on the floor too. He laughed and played with his tiny black mustache. I have no words to tell what happened in my story. I cannot tell the story. The white, silent one may have been death. The waiting eager woman may have been life. Both the old gray bearded man and the wicked one puzzle me. I think and think, but cannot understand them. Most of the time, however, I do not think of them at all. I keep thinking about the dandified man who laughed all through my story. If I could understand him, I could understand everything. I could run through the world telling a wonderful story. I would no longer be dumb. Why was I not given words? Why am I dumb? I have a wonderful story to tell, but no, no way to tell it. End of The Dumb Man by Sherwood Anderson. The Egg by Sherwood Anderson. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Egg. My father was, I am sure, intended by nature to be a cheerful, kindly man. Until he was 34 years old, he worked as a farmhand for a man named Thomas Butterworth, whose place lay near the town of Bidwell, Ohio. He had then a horse of his own, and on Saturday evenings drove into town to spend a few hours in social intercourse with the other farmhands. In town he drank several glasses of beer and stood about in Benhead Saloon, crowded on Saturday evenings with visiting farmhands. Songs were sung, and glasses thumped on the bar. At ten o'clock, father drove home along a lonely country road, made his horse comfortable for the night, and himself went to bed, quite happy in his position in life. He had at that time no notion of trying to rise in the world. It was in the spring of his 35th year that father married my mother, then a country school teacher, and in the following year I came wriggling and crying into the world. Something happened to the two people. They became ambitious. The American passion for getting up in the world took possession of them. It may have been that mother was responsible. Being a school teacher, she had no doubt read books and magazines. She had, I presume, read of how Garfield, Lincoln, and other Americans rose from poverty to fame and greatness, and as I lay beside her in the days of her lying in, she may have dreamed that I would someday rule men and cities. At any rate, she induced father to give up his place as farmhand, sell his horse, and embark on an independent enterprise of his own. She was a tall, silent woman, with a long nose and troubled gray eyes. For herself, she wanted nothing. For father and myself, she was incurably ambitious. The first venture into which the two people went turned out badly. They rented 10 acres of poor, stony land on Griggs Road, eight miles from Bidwell, and launched into chicken-raising. I grew into boyhood on the place, and got my first impressions of life there. From the beginning, they were impressions of disaster. And if, in turn, I am a gloomy man, inclined to see the darker side of life, I attribute it to the fact that what should have been for me the happy, joyous days of childhood were spent on a chicken farm. One unversed in such matters can have no notion of the many and tragic things that can happen to a chicken. It is born out of an egg, lives for a few weeks as a tiny, fluffy thing, such as you will see pictured on Easter cards, then becomes hideously naked, eats quantities of corn and meal bought by the sweat of your father's brow, gets diseases called pip, cholera, and other names, stands looking with stupid eyes at the sun, becomes sick, and dies. A few hens, and now and then a rooster, intended to serve God's mysterious ends, struggle through to maturity. The hens lay eggs, out of which come other chickens, and the dreadful cycle is thus made complete. It is all unbelievably complex. Most philosophers must have been raised on chicken farms. One hopes for so much from a chicken, and is so dreadfully disillusioned. Small chickens, just setting out on the journey of life, look so bright and alert, and they are, in fact, so dreadfully stupid. They are so much like people they mix up in one's judgments of life. If disease does not kill them, they wait until your expectations are thoroughly aroused, and then walk under the wheels of a wagon to go squashed and dead back to their maker. Vermin infests their youth, and fortunes must be spent for curative powders. In later life, I have seen how a literature has been built up on the subject of fortunes to be made out of the raising of chickens. It is intended to be read by the gods who have just eaten of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. It is a hopeful literature, and declares that much may be done by simple, ambitious people who own a few hens. Do not be led astray by it. It was not written for you. Go hunt for gold on the frozen hills of Alaska. Put your faith in the honesty of a politician. Believe, if you will, that the world is daily growing better, and that good will triumph over evil. But do not read and believe the literature that is written concerning the hen. It was not written for you. I, however, digress. My tale does not primarily concern itself with the hen. If correctly told, it will center on the egg. For ten years, my father and mother struggled to make our chicken farm pay, and then they gave up that struggle and began another. They moved into the town of Bidwell, Ohio, and embarked in the restaurant business. After ten years of worry with incubators that did not hatch, and with tiny, and in their own way lovely, balls of fluff that passed on into semi-naked pullet hood, and from that into dead hen hood, we threw all aside and packing our belongings on a wagon drove down Griggs Road toward Bidwell, a tiny caravan of hope looking for a new place from which to start on our upward journey through life. We must have been a sad-looking lot, not, I fancy, unlike refugees fleeing from a battlefield. Mother and I walked in the road. The wagon that contained our goods had been borrowed for the day from Mr. Albert Griggs, a neighbor. Out of its side stuck the legs of cheap chairs, and at the back of the pile of beds, tables and boxes filled with kitchen utensils, was a crate of live chickens, and on top of that the baby carriage in which I had been wheeled about in my infancy. Why are we stuck to the baby carriage? I don't know. It was unlikely other children would be born, and the wheels were broken. People who have few possessions cling tightly to those they have. That is one of the facts that make life so discouraging. Father rode on top of the wagon. He was then a bald-headed man of forty-five, a little fat, and from long association with Mother and the chickens, he had become habitually silent and discouraged. All during our ten years on the chicken farm, he had worked as a laborer on neighboring farms, and most of the money he had earned had been spent for remedies to cure chicken diseases, on Wilmer's white wonder collar a cure, or Professor Bidlow's egg producer, or some other preparations that Mother had found advertised in the poultry papers. There were two little patches of hair on Father's head just above his ears. I remember that as a child I used to sit looking at him when he had gone to sleep in a chair before the stove on Sunday afternoons in the winter. I had at that time already begun to read books and have notions of my own, and the bald path that led over the top of his head was, I fancied, something like a broad road, such a road as Caesar might have made, on which to lead his legions out of Rome and into the wonders of an unknown world. The tufts of hair that grew above Father's ears were, I thought, like forests. I fell into a half-sleeping, half-waking state, and dreamed I was a tiny thing going along the road into a far, beautiful place where there were no chicken farms, and where life was a happy, eggless affair. One might write a book concerning our flight from the chicken farm into town. Mother and I walked the entire eight miles, sheed to be sure that nothing fell from the wagon, and I to see the wonders of the world. On the seat of the wagon, beside Father, was his greatest treasure, I will tell you of that. On a chicken farm where hundreds and even thousands of chickens come out of eggs, surprising things sometimes happen. Grotesques are born out of eggs, as out of people. The accident does not often occur, perhaps once in a thousand births. A chicken is, you see, born that has four legs, two pairs of wings, two heads, or what not. The things do not live, they go quickly back to the hand of their maker that has for a moment trembled. The fact that the poor things could not live was one of the tragedies of life to Father. He had some sort of notion that if he could but bring into henhood or roosterhood a five-legged hen or a two-headed rooster, his fortune would be made. He dreamed of taking the wonder about to county fairs and of growing rich by exhibiting it to other farm hands. At any rate, he saved all the little monstrous things that had been born on our chicken farm. They were preserved in alcohol and put each in its own glass bottle. These he had carefully put into a box and on our journey into town it was carried on the wagon seat beside him. He drove the horses with one hand and with the other clung to the box. When we got to our destination, the box was taken down at once and the bottles removed. All during our days as keepers of a restaurant in the town of Bidwell, Ohio, the grotesques in their little glass bottles sat on a shelf back of the counter. Mother sometimes protested but Father was a rock on the subject of his treasure. The grotesques were, he declared, valuable. People, he said, liked to look at strange and wonderful things. Did I say that we embarked in the restaurant business in the town of Bidwell, Ohio? I exaggerated a little. The town itself lay at the foot of a low hill on the shore of a small river. The railroad did not run through the town and the station was a mile away to the north at a place called Pickleville. There had been a cider mill and pickle factory at the station but before the time of our coming they had both gone out of business. In the morning and in the evening buses came down to the station along a road called Turner's Pike from the hotel in the main street of Bidwell. Our going to the out-of-the-way place to embark in the restaurant business was Mother's idea. She talked of it for a year and then one day went off and rented an empty store building opposite the railroad station. It was her idea that the restaurant would be profitable. Travelling then, she said, would always be waiting around to take trains out of town and town people would come to the station to await incoming trains. They would come to the restaurant to buy pieces of pie and drink coffee. Now that I am older I know that she had another motive in going. She was ambitious for me. She wanted me to rise in the world to get into a town school and become a man of the towns. At Pickleville father and mother worked hard as they always had done. At first there was the necessity of putting our place into shape to be a restaurant. That took a month. Father built a shelf on which he put tens of vegetables. He painted a sign on which he put his name in large letters. Below his name was the sharp command, eat here. That was so seldom obeyed. The showcase was bought and filled with cigars and tobacco. Mother scrubbed the floor and the walls of the room. I went to school in the town and was glad to be away from the farm and from the presence of the discouraged sad-looking chickens. Still I was not very joyous. In the evening I walked home from school along Turner's Pike and remembered the children I had seen playing in the town's schoolyard. A troupe of little girls had gone hopping about and singing. I tried that. Down along the frozen road I went hopping solemnly on one leg. Hippity hopped to the barber shop I sang shrilly. Then I stopped and looked doubtfully about. I was afraid of being seen in my gay mood. It must have seemed to me that I was doing a thing that should not be done by one who, like myself, had been raised on a chicken farm, where death was a daily visitor. Mother decided that our restaurant should remain open at night. At 10 in the evening a passenger train went north past our door followed by a local freight. The freight crew had switching to do in Pickleville and when the work was done they came to our restaurant for hot coffee and food. Sometimes one of them ordered a fried egg. In the morning at four they returned northbound and again visited us. A little trade began to grow up. Mother slept at night and during the day tended the restaurant and fed our boarders while father slept. He slept in the same bed mother had occupied during the night and I went off to the town of Bidwell into school. During the long nights while mother and I slept father cooked meats that were to go into the sandwiches of the lunch baskets of our boarders. Then an idea in regard to getting up in the world came into his head. The American spirit took hold of him. He also became ambitious. In the long nights when there was little to do father had time to think. That was his undoing. He decided that he had in the past been an unsuccessful man because he had not been cheerful enough and that in the future he would adopt a cheerful outlook on life. In the early morning he came upstairs and got into bed with mother. She woke and the two talked. From my bed in the corner I listened. It was father's idea that both he and mother should try to entertain the people who came to eat at our restaurant. I cannot now remember his words but he gave the impression of one about to become in some obscure way a kind of public entertainer. When people, particularly young people from the town of Bidwell came into our place as on very rare occasions they did, bright entertaining conversation was to be made. From father's words I gathered that something of the jolly innkeeper effect was to be sought. Mother must have been doubtful from the first but she said nothing discouraging. It was father's notion that a passion for the company of himself and mother would spring up in the breasts of the younger people of the town of Bidwell. In the evening bright happy groups would come singing down Turner's Pike. They would troop shouting with joy and laughter into our place. There would be song and festivity. I do not mean to give the impression that father spoke so elaborately on the matter. He was, as I have said, an uncommunicates of man. They want some place to go. I tell you they want some place to go. He said over and over. That was as far as he got. My own imagination has filled in the blanks. For two or three weeks this notion of father's invaded our house. We did not talk much but in our daily lives tried earnestly to make smiles take the place of glum looks. Mother smiled at the borders and I, catching the infection, smiled at our cat. Father became a little feverish in his anxiety to please. There was no doubt lurking somewhere in him a touch of the spirit of the showmen. He did not waste much of his ammunition on the railroad men he served at night but seemed to be waiting for a young man or woman from Bidwell to come in to show what he could do. On the counter in the restaurant there was a wire basket kept always filled with eggs and it must have been before his eyes when the idea of being entertaining was born in his brain. There was something prenatal about the way eggs kept themselves connected with the development of his idea. At any rate an egg ruined his new impulse in life. Late one night I was awakened by a roar of anger coming from father's throat. Both mother and I set upright in our beds. With trembling hands she lighted a lamp that stood on a table by her head. Downstairs the front door of our restaurant went shut with a bang and in a few minutes father tramped up the stairs. He held an egg in his hand and his hand trembled as though he were having a chill. There was a half insane light in his eyes. As he stood glaring at us I was sure he intended throwing the egg at either mother or me. Then he laid it gently on the table beside the lamp and dropped on his knees beside mother's bed. He began to cry like a boy and I carried away by his grief cried with him. The two of us filled the little upstairs room with our wailing voices. It is ridiculous but of the picture we made I can remember only the fact that mother's hand continually stroked the bald path that ran across the top of his head. I have forgotten what mother said to him and how she induced him to tell her of what had happened downstairs. His explanation has also gone out of my mind. I remember only my own grief and fright and the shiny path over father's head blowing in the lamp light as he knelt by the bed. As to what happened downstairs, for some unexplainable reason I know the story as well as though I had been a witness to my father's discomforture. One in time gets to know many unexplainable things. On that evening young Joe Cain, son of a merchant of Bidwell, came to Pickleville to meet his father who was expected on the 10 o'clock evening train from the south. The train was three hours late and Joe came into our place to loaf about and to wait for its arrival. The local freight train came in and the freight crew were fed. Joe was left alone in the restaurant with father. From the moment he came into our place the Bidwell young man must have been puzzled by my father's actions. It was his notion that father was angry at him for hanging around. He noticed that the restaurant keeper was apparently disturbed by his presence and he thought of going out. However it began to rain and he did not fancy the long walk to town and back. He bought a five cent cigar and ordered a cup of coffee. He had a newspaper in his pocket and took it out and began to read. I'm waiting for the evening train. It's late, he said apologetically. For a long time father, whom Joe Cain had never seen before, remained silently gazing at his visitor. He was no doubt suffering from an attack of stage fright. As so often happens in life he had thought so much and so often of the situation that now confronted him that he was somewhat nervous in its presence. For one thing he did not know what to do with his hands. He thrust one of them nervously over the counter and shook hands with Joe Cain. How'd he do? He said. Joe Cain put his newspaper down and stared at him. Father's eye lighted on the basket of eggs that sat on the counter and he began to talk. Well he said hesitatingly. Well you have heard of Christopher Columbus, eh? He seemed to be angry. That Christopher Columbus was a cheat, he declared emphatically. He talked of making an egg stand on its end. He talked he did and then he went and broke the end of the egg. My father seemed to his visitor to be beside himself at the duplicity of Christopher Columbus. He muttered and swore. He declared it was wrong to teach children that Christopher Columbus was a great man when after all he cheated at the critical moment. He had declared he would make an egg stand on end and then when his bluff had been called he had done a trick. Still grumbling at Columbus father took an egg from the basket on the counter and began to walk up and down. He rolled the egg between the palms of his hands. He smiled genially. He began to mumble words regarding the effect to be produced on an egg by the electricity that comes out of the human body. He declared that without breaking its shell and by virtue of rolling it back and forth in his hands he could stand the egg on its end. He explained that the warmth of his hands and the gentle rolling movement he gave the egg created a new center of gravity and Joe Cain was mildly interested. I have handled thousands of eggs my father said no one knows more about eggs than I do. He stood the egg on the counter and it fell on its side. He tried the trick again and again each time rolling the egg between the palms of his hands and saying the words regarding the wonders of electricity and the laws of gravity. When after a half hour's effort he did succeed in making the egg stand for a moment he looked up to find that his visitor was no longer watching. By the time he had succeeded in calling Joe Cain's attention to the success of his effort the egg had again rolled over and lay on its side. A fire with the showman's passion and at the same time a good deal disconcerted by the failure of his first effort. Father now took the bottles containing the poultry monstrosities down from their place on the shelf and began to show them to his visitor. How would you like to have seven legs and two heads like this fella? He asked exhibiting the most remarkable of his treasures. A cheerful smile played over his face. He reached over the counter and tried to slap Joe Cain on the shoulder as he had seen men do in Benhead Saloon when he was a young farmhand and drove to town on Saturday evenings. His visitor was made a little ill by the sight of the body of the terribly deformed bird floating in alcohol in the bottle and got up to go. Coming from behind the counter father took hold of the young man's arm and led him back to his seat. He grew a little angry and for a moment had to turn his face away and force himself to smile. Then he put the bottles back on the shelf. In an outburst of generosity he fairly compelled Joe Cain to have a fresh cup of coffee and another cigar at his expense. Then he took a pan and began filling it with vinegar. Taken from a jug that sat beneath the counter, he declared himself about to do a new trick. I will heat this egg in this pan of vinegar, he said. Then I will put it through the neck of a bottle without breaking the shell. When the egg is inside the bottle it will resume its normal shape and the shell will become hard again. Then I will give the bottle with the egg in it to you. You can take it about with it wherever you go. People will want to know how you got the egg in the bottle. Don't tell them. Keep them guessing. That is the way to have fun with this trick. Father grand and winked at his visitor. Joe Cain decided that the man who confronted him was mildly insane but harmless. He drank the cup of coffee that had been given him and began to read his paper again. When the egg had been heated in vinegar, father carried it on a spoon to the counter and going into a back room got an empty bottle. He was angry because his visitor did not watch him as he began to do his trick, but nevertheless went cheerfully to work. For a long time he struggled trying to get the egg to go through the neck of the bottle. He put the pan of vinegar back on the stove intending to reheat the egg, then picked it up and burned his fingers. After a second bath in the hot vinegar the shell of the egg had been softened a little but not enough for his purpose. He worked and worked in a spirit of desperate determination to possession of him. When he thought that at last the trick was about to be consummated, the delayed train came at the station and Joe Cain started to go nonchalantly out the door. Father made a last desperate effort to conquer the egg and make it do the thing that would establish his reputation as one who knew how to entertain guests who came into his restaurant. He worried the egg. He attempted to be somewhat rough with it. He swore and the sweat stood out on his forehead. The egg broke under his hand. When the content spurred it over his clothes Joe Cain who had stopped at the door turned and laughed. A roar of anger rose from my father's throat. He danced and shouted a string of inarticulate words grabbing another egg from the basket on the counter. He threw it just missing the head of the young man as he dodged through the door and escaped. Father came upstairs to mother and me with an egg in his hand. I do not know what he intended to do. I imagine he had some idea of destroying it, of destroying all eggs and that he intended to let mother and me see him begin. When however he got into the presence of mother something happened to him. He laid the egg gently on the table and dropped to his knees by the bed as I have already explained. He later decided to close the restaurant for the night and to come upstairs and get into bed. When he did so he blew out the light and after much muttered conversation both he and mother went to sleep. I suppose I went to sleep also but my sleep was troubled. I awoke at dawn and for a long time looked at the egg that lay on the table. I wondered why eggs had to be and why from the egg came the hen who again laid the egg. The question got into my blood. It has stayed there I imagine because I am the son of my father. At any rate the problem remains unsolved in my mind and that I conclude is but another evidence of the complete and final triumph of the egg at least as far as my family is concerned. End of The Egg by Sherwood Anderson. The evidence in the case of Smith versus Jones by Mark Twain. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Reading by Greg Marguerite. The evidence in the case of Smith versus Jones by Mark Twain. I reported this trial simply for my own amusement one idle day last week and without expecting to publish any portion of it. But I have seen the facts in the case so distorted and misrepresented in the daily papers that I feel it is my duty to come forward and do what I can to set the plaintiff and defendant right before the public. This can best be done by submitting the plain unembellished statements of the witnesses as given under oath before his honor judge Shepard in the police court and leaving the people to form their own judgment of the matters involved, unbiased by argument or suggestion of any kind from me. There is that nice sense of justice and that ability to discriminate between right and wrong among the masses, which will enable them, after carefully reading the testimony I am about to set down here, to decide without hesitation which is the innocent party and which is the guilty in the remarkable case of Smith versus Jones. And I have every confidence that before this paper shall have been out of the printing press twenty-four hours, the High Court of the People, from whose decision there is no appeal, will have swept from the innocent man all taint of blame or suspicion and cast upon the guilty one a deathless infamy. To such as are not used to visiting the police court I will observe that there is nothing inviting about the place. There being no rich carpets, no mirrors, no pictures, no elegant sofa or armchairs to lounge in, no free lunch, and in fact nothing to make a man who has been there once desired to go again, except in cases where his bail is heavier than his fine is likely to be, under which circumstances he naturally has a tendency in that direction again, of course, in order to recover the difference. There is a pulpit at the head of the hall, occupied by a handsome gray-haired judge, with a faculty of appearing pleasant and impartial to the disinterested spectator, and prejudiced and frosty to the last degree to the prisoner at the bar. To the left of the pulpit is a long table for reporters. In front of the pulpit the clerks are stationed, and in the center of the hall a nest of lawyers. On the left again are pine benches behind a railing, occupied by seedy white men, negroes, chinamen, canakas, in a word by the seedy and dejected of all nations, and in a corner is a box where more can be had when they are wanted. On the right are more pine benches for the use of prisoners and their friends and witnesses, an officer in a gray uniform and with a star upon his brackets the door. A holy calm pervades the scene. The case of Smith versus Jones being called, each of these parties, stepping out from among the other seedy ones, gave the court a particular and circumstantial account of how the whole thing occurred, and then sat down. The two narratives differed from each other. In reality, I was half persuaded that these men were talking about two separate and distinct affairs altogether, in as much as no single circumstance mentioned by one was even remotely hinted at by the other. Mr. Alfred Sowerby was then called to the witness stand and testified as follows. I was in the saloon at the time, Your Honor, and I see this man, Smith, come up all of a sudden to Jones, who weren't saying a word, and split him in the snoot. Lawyer, did what, sir? Witness. Busted him in the snoot. Lawyer, what do you mean by such language as that? When you say that the plaintiff suddenly approached the defendant, who was silent at the time, and busted him in the snoot, do you mean that the plaintiff struck the defendant? Witness. That's me. I'm swearing to that very circumstance. Yes, Your Honor, that was just the way of it. Now, for instance, as if you were Jones, and I was Smith, well, I come up all of a sudden and says I to Your Honor says I, damn your old tripe. Suppressed laughter in the lobbies. The Court. Order in the Court. Witness. You will confine yourself to a plain statement of the facts in this case, and refrain from the embellishments of metaphor and allegory as far as possible. Witness. Considerably subdued. I beg Your Honor's pardon. I didn't mean to be so brash. Well, Smith comes up to Jones all of a sudden and mashed him in the bugle. Lawyer, stop. This kind of language will not do. I will ask you a plain question, and I require you to answer it simply yes or no. Did the plaintiff strike the defendant? Did he strike him? Witness. You bet your sweet life he did. Gad. He gave him a pastor in the trumpet. Lawyer, take the witness. Take the witness. Take the witness. I have no further use for him. The lawyer on the other side said he would endeavor to worry along without more assistance from Mr. Sowerby, and the witness retired to a neighboring bench. Mr. McWilliams was next called and deposed as follows. I was a stand in as close to Mr. Smith as I am to this pulpit, a chaffin, with one of the logger beer girls. Sofarona by name, being from summers in Germany, so she says. But as to that, I—lawyer. Well, now, never mind the nativity of the logger beer girl, but state as concisely as possible what you know of the assault and battery. Witness. Certainly, certainly. Well, German or no German, which I'll take my oath I don't believe she is, being of a red-headed disposition with long bony fingers and no more hankering after Limburger cheese than—lawyer. Stop that driveling nonsense and stick to the assault and battery. Go on with your story. Witness. Well, sir, she, that is, Jones, he sidled up and drawed his revolver and tried to shoot the top of Smith's head off. And Smith run, and Sophronia, she walloped herself down in the sawdust and screamed twice, just as loud as she could yell. I never see a poor creature in such distress, and then she sung out, Oh, hell's fire, what are they up to now? Ah, my poor dear mother, I shall never see you more. Saying which she jerked another yell and fainted away as dead as a wax figure. Thinks I, too, myself, I'll be danged if this ain't getting rather dusty, and I'll—the court. We have no desire to know what you thought. We only wish to know what you saw. Are you sure Mr. Jones endeavored to shoot the top of Mr. Smith's head off? Witness. Yes, Your Honor. The court. How many times did he shoot? Witness. Well, sir, I couldn't say exactly as to the number, but I should think, well, seven or eight times as many as that, anyway. The court. Be careful now, and remember you are under oath. What kind of a pistol was it? Witness. It was a derringer, Your Honor. The court. A derringer. You must not trifle here, sir. A derringer only shoots once. How then could Jones have fired seven or eight times? The witness is evidently as stunned by that last proposition as if a brick had struck him. Witness. Well, Your Honor, he—that is, she—Jones—I mean, so—the court. Are you sure he fired more than one shot? Are you sure he fired at all? Witness. I—I—well, perhaps he didn't, and—and Your Honor may be right. But you see that girl with her dratted yowling. All together it might be that he did only shoot once. Lawyer. And about his attempting to shoot the top of Smith's head off. Didn't he aim at his body or his legs? Come now. Witness. Entirely confused. Yes, sir. I—I think he did. I'm pretty sure certain of it. Yes, sir. He—he must have fired at his legs. Nothing was elicited on the cross-examination, except that the weapon used by Mr. Jones was a bowie-knife instead of a derringer, and that he made a number of desperate attempts to scalp the plaintiff instead of trying to shoot him. It also came out that Saffronia of doubtful nativity did not faint and was not present during the effray. She, having been discharged from her situation on the previous evening. Washington Billings sworn, said, I see in the row, and it warn't no saloon it was in the street. Both of them was drunk, and one of them was coming up the street, and the other was going down. Both of them was close to the houses when they first see each other, and both of them made their calculations to miss each other. But the second time they tacked across the pavement, drifting like diagonal, they come together down by the curb, all mighty soggy they did. Which staggered them a moment, and then over they went into the gutter. Smith was up first, and he made a dive for a cobble and fell on Jones. Jones dug out and made a dive for a cobble, and slipped his hold and jammed his head into Smith's stomach. They'd done that over again, twice more, just the same way. After that, neither of them could get up any more, and so they just laid there in the slush, and clawed mud and cussed each other. On the cross examination the witness could not say whether the parties continued the fight afterward in the saloon or not. He only knew they began it in the gutter, and to the best of his knowledge and belief they were too drunk to get into a saloon, and too drunk to stay in it after they got there if there were any orifice about it that they could fall out again. As to weapons he saw none used except the cobblestones, and to the best of his knowledge and belief they missed fire every time while he was present. Jeremiah Driscoll came forward, was sworn and testified as follows. I saw the fight, Your Honor, and it wasn't in a saloon, nor in the street, nor in a hotel, nor in the court. Was it in the city and county of San Francisco? Witness. Yes, Your Honor, I think it was. The court. Well, then go on. Witness. It was up in the square. Jones met Smith and they both go at it, that is, blaggering each other. One called the other a thief and the other said he was a liar, and then they got to swearing backwards and forwards pretty generally, as you might say. And finally one struck the other over the head with a cane, and then they closed and fell. And after that they made such a dust and the gravel flew so thick that I couldn't rightly tell which one was getting the best of it. When it cleared away, one of them was after the other with a pine bench, and the other was prospecting for rocks and… lawyer. There, there, there, that will do, that will do. How in the world is anyone to make heads nor tails out of such a string of nonsense as that? Who struck the first blow? Witness. I cannot rightly say, sir, but I think, lawyer, you think, don't you know? Witness. No, sir. It was all so sudden then, lawyer. Well, then, state if you can, who struck the last? Witness. I can't, sir, because… lawyer. Because what? Witness. Because, sir, you see, toward the last they clenched and went down and got to kicking up the gravel again, and… lawyer. Resignately. Take the witness. Take the witness. The testimony on the cross-examination went to show that during the fight one of the parties drew a slingshot and cocked it, but to the best of the witness's knowledge and belief he did not fire, and at the same time the other discharged a hand grenade at his antagonist which missed him and did no damage except blowing up a bonnet store on the other side of the street and creating a momentary diversion among the millners. He could not say, however, which drew the slingshot or which threw the grenade. It was generally remarked by those in the courtroom that the evidence of the witness was obscure and unsatisfactory. Upon questioning him further and confronting him with the parties to the case before the court, it transpired that the faces of Jones and Smith were unknown to him, and that he had been talking about an entirely different fight all the time. Other witnesses were examined, some of whom swore that Smith was the aggressor and others that Jones began the row. Some said they fought with their fists, others that they fought with knives, others tomahawks, others revolvers, others clubs, others axes, others beer mugs and chairs, and others swore there had been no fight at all. However, fight or no fight, the testimony was straightforward and uniform on one point, at any rate, and that was that the fuss was about two dollars and forty cents which one party owed the other, but after all it was impossible to find out which was the debtor and which the creditor. After the witnesses had all been heard, his honor judge Shepard observed that the evidence in this case resembled in a great many points the evidence before him in some thirty-five cases every day, on an average. He then said he would continue the case to afford the parties an opportunity of procuring more testimony. I have been keeping an eye on the police court for the last few days. Two friends of mine had business there, on account of assault and battery concerning Washoo stocks, and I felt interested, of course. I never knew their names were James Johnson and John Ward, though, until I heard them answer to them in that court. When James Johnson was called, one of these young men said to the other, That's you, my boy. No, was the reply. It's you, my name's John Ward. See, I've got it written here on a card. Consequently, the first speaker sung out here, and it was all right. As I was saying, I have been keeping an eye on that court, and I have arrived at the conclusion that the office of police judge is a profitable and comfortable thing to have. But then, as the English hunter said about fighting tigers in India under a shortness of ammunition, it has its little drawbacks. Hearing testimony must be worrying to a police judge sometimes, when he's in his right mind. I would rather be secretary to a wealthy mining company and have nothing to do but advertise the assessments and collect them in carefully, and go along quiet and upright and be one of the noblest works of God, and never gobble a dollar that didn't belong to me, all just as those fellows do, you know. Oh, I have no talent for sarcasm. It isn't likely, but I trespass. Now, with every confidence in the instinctive candor and fair dealing of my race, I submit the testimony in the case of Smith v. Jones to the people, without comment or argument. Well satisfied that after a perusal of it their judgment will be as righteous as it is final and impartial, and that whether Smith be cast out and Jones exalted, or Jones cast out and Smith exalted, the decision will be a holy and a just one. I leave the accused and the accuser before the bar of the world, let their fate be pronounced.