Moonbeams from the Larger Lunacy Part 17

"And the nine and two small ones," he went on.

"Two small what?" I asked.

"Two small hearts," he said. "I don't remember which.

Anyway, I remember very well indeed that I had the king and the queen and the jack, the nine, and two little ones."

"Half a second," I said, "I want to mail a letter."

When I came back to him, he was still murmuring:

"My partner held the ace of clubs and the queen. The jack was out, but I didn't know where the king was--"

"You didn't?" I said in contempt.

"No," he repeated in surprise, and went on murmuring:

"Diamonds had gone round once, and spades twice, and so I suspected that my partner was leading from weakness--"

"I can well believe it," I said--"sheer weakness."

"Well," he said, "on the sixth round the lead came to me. Now, what should I have done? Finessed for the ace, or led straight into my opponent--"

"You want my advice," I said, "and you shall have it, openly and fairly. In such a case as you describe, where a man has led out at me repeatedly and with provocation, as I gather from what you say, though I myself do not play bridge, I should lead my whole hand at him. I repeat, I do not play bridge. But in the circ.u.mstances, I should think it the only thing to do."

VIII--Truthful Oratory, or What Our Speakers Ought to Say

I

TRUTHFUL SPEECH GIVING THE REAL THOUGHTS OF A DISTINGUISHED GUEST AT THE FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY BANQUET OF A SOCIETY

Mr. Chairman and gentlemen: If there is one thing I abominate more than another, it is turning out on a cold night like this to eat a huge dinner of twelve courses and know that I have to make a speech on top of it.

Gentlemen, I just feel stuffed. That's the plain truth of it. By the time we had finished that fish, I could have gone home satisfied. Honestly I could. That's as much as I usually eat. And by the time I had finished the rest of the food, I felt simply waterlogged, and I do still. More than that. The knowledge that I had to make a speech congratulating this society of yours on its fiftieth anniversary haunted and racked me all through the meal. I am not, in plain truth, the ready and brilliant speaker you take me for. That is a pure myth. If you could see the desperate home scene that goes on in my family when I am working up a speech, your minds would be at rest on that point.

I'll go further and be very frank with you. How this society has lived for fifty years, I don't know. If all your dinners are like this, Heaven help you. I've only the vaguest idea of what this society is, anyway, and what it does. I tried to get a const.i.tution this afternoon but failed. I am sure from some of the faces that I recognise around this table that there must be good business reasons of some sort for belonging to this society. There's money in it,--mark my words,--for some of you or you wouldn't be here. Of course I quite understand that the President and the officials seated here beside me come merely for the self-importance of it. That, gentlemen, is about their size. I realized that from their talk during the banquet. I don't want to speak bitterly, but the truth is they are SMALL men and it flatters them to sit here with two or three blue ribbons pinned on their coats. But as for me, I'm done with it.

It will be fifty years, please heaven, before this event comes round again. I hope, I earnestly hope, that I shall be safely under the ground.

II

THE SPEECH THAT OUGHT TO BE MADE BY A STATE GOVERNOR AFTER VISITING THE FALL EXPOSITION OF AN AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY

Well, gentlemen, this Annual Fall Fair of the Sked.i.n.k County Agricultural a.s.sociation has come round again. I don't mind telling you straight out that of all the disagreeable jobs that fall to me as Governor of this State, my visit to your Fall Fair is about the toughest.

I want to tell you, gentlemen, right here and now, that I don't know anything about agriculture and I don't want to. My parents were rich enough to bring me up in the city in a rational way. I didn't have to do ch.o.r.es in order to go to the high school as some of those present have boasted that they did. My only wonder is that they ever got there at all. They show no traces of it.

This afternoon, gentlemen, you took me all round your live-stock exhibit. I walked past, and through, nearly a quarter of a mile of hogs. What was it that they were called--Tamworths--Berks.h.i.+res? I don't remember. But all I can say, gentlemen, is,--phew! Just that. Some of you will understand readily enough. That word sums up my whole idea of your agricultural show and I'm done with it.

No, let me correct myself. There was just one feature of your agricultural exposition that met my warm approval.

You were good enough to take me through the section of your exposition called your Midway Pleasance. Let me tell you, sirs, that there was more real merit in that than all the rest of the show put together. You apologized, if I remember rightly, for taking me into the large tent of the Syrian Dancing Girls. Oh, believe me, gentlemen, you needn't have. Syria is a country which commands my profoundest admiration. Some day I mean to spend a vacation there. And, believe me, gentlemen, when I do go,--and I say this with all the emphasis of which I am capable,--I should not wish to be accompanied by such a set of flatheads as the officials of your Agricultural Society.

And now, gentlemen, as I have just received a fake telegram, by arrangement, calling me back to the capital of the State, I must leave this banquet at once. One word in conclusion: if I had known as fully as I do now how it feels to drink half a bucket of sweet cider, I should certainly never have come.

III

TRUTHFUL SPEECH OF A DISTRICT POLITICIAN TO A LADIES' SUFFRAGE SOCIETY

Ladies: My own earnest, heartfelt conviction is that you are a pack of cats. I use the word "cats" advisedly, and I mean every letter of it. I want to go on record before this gathering as being strongly and unalterably opposed to Woman Suffrage until you get it. After that I favour it. My reasons for opposing the suffrage are of a kind that you couldn't understand. But all men,--except the few that I see at this meeting,--understand them by instinct.

As you may, however, succeed as a result of the fuss that you are making,--in getting votes, I have thought it best to come. Also,--I am free to confess,--I wanted to see what you looked like.

On this last head I am disappointed. Personally I like women a good deal fatter than most of you are, and better looking. As I look around this gathering I see one or two of you that are not so bad, but on the whole not many. But my own strong personal predilection is and remains in favour of a woman who can cook, mend clothes, talk when I want her to, and give me the kind of admiration to which I am accustomed.

Let me, however, say in conclusion that I am altogether in sympathy with your movement to this extent. If you ever DO get votes,--and the indications are that you will (blast you),--I want your votes, and I want all of them.

IX.-Our Literary Bureau

[Footnote: This literary bureau was started by the author in the New York Century. It leaped into such immediate prominence that it had to be closed at once.]

NOVELS READ TO ORDER FIRST AID FOR THE BUSY MILLIONAIRE

NO BRAINS NEEDED NO TASTE REQUIRED NOTHING BUT MONEY SEND IT TO US

We have lately been struck,--of course not dangerously,--by a new idea. A recent number of a well-known magazine contains an account of an American multimillionaire who, on account of the pressure of his brain power and the rush of his business, found it impossible to read the fiction of the day for himself. He therefore caused his secretaries to look through any new and likely novel and make a rapid report on its contents, indicating for his personal perusal the specially interesting parts.

Realizing the possibilities coiled up in this plan, we have opened a special agency or bureau for doing work of this sort. Any over-busy multimillionaire, or superman, who becomes our client may send us novels, essays, or books of any kind, and will receive a report explaining the plot and pointing out such parts as he may with propriety read. If he can once find time to send us a postcard, or a postal cablegram, night or day, we undertake to a.s.sume all the further effort of reading. Our terms for ordinary fiction are one dollar per chapter; for works of travel, 10 cents per mile; and for political or other essays, two cents per page, or ten dollars per idea, and for theological and controversial work, seven dollars and fifty cents per cubic yard extracted. Our clients are a.s.sured of prompt and immediate attention.

Through the kindness of the Editor of the Century we are enabled to insert here a sample of our work. It was done to the order of a gentleman of means engaged in silver mining in Colorado, who wrote us that he was anxious to get "a holt" on modern fiction, but that he had no time actually to read it. On our a.s.suring him that this was now unnecessary, he caused to be sent to us the monthly parts of a serial story, on which we duly reported as follows:

JANUARY INSTALMENT

Theodolite Gulch, The Dip, Canon County, Colorado.

Dear Sir:

We beg to inform you that the scene of the opening chapter of the Fortunes of Barbara Plynlimmon is laid in Wales.

The scene is laid, however, very carelessly and hurriedly and we expect that it will shortly be removed. We cannot, therefore, recommend it to your perusal. As there is a very fine pa.s.sage describing the Cambrian Hills by moonlight, we enclose herewith a condensed table showing the mean alt.i.tude of the moon for the month of December in the lat.i.tude of Wales. The character of Miss Plynlimmon we find to be developed in conversation with her grandmother, which we think you had better not read. Nor are we prepared to endorse your reading the speeches of the Welsh peasantry which we find in this chapter, but we forward herewith in place of them a short glossary of Welsh synonyms which may aid you in this connection.

FEBRUARY INSTALMENT

Dear Sir: