Delphi Complete Works of Stephen Leacock, page 637
“It tells how to make butter yellow in the winter; how to make love powders; how to make the famous eggs of Pharaoh’s serpent, from one of which when lighted, though but the size of a pea, there issues forth a coiling, hissing, writhing reptile similar to a genuine snake, affording excitement and pleasure to young and old alike.”
He inhaled deeply and continued:
“It tells how to make sympathetic or secret writing ink; how to conduct flirtations with cards, postage stamps and the pocket handkerchief. It tells how to train bloodhounds to track criminals. It tells how to make a horse appear as though badly foundered when he is in reality absolutely unfounded — how to make him appear lame; how to make him stand by his food without eating; how to put a young countenance on an old horse; how to cover up the heaves; how to make a true-pulling horse appear lame. It tells how—”
I think it was just at this point that I made up my mind to invest in the book. Looking back on the transaction, I do not seem to be able to recall how it all came about. Mentally I appear to have been in a dazed state for the moment. Naturally it is worth while to have ten thousand priceless facts and secrets in one’s possession — one then has subjects of conversation ready for almost any company. Yet really many of the topics touched on in this book were things that never vitally concerned me before; they are interesting, I concede you, but they have not entered into my life to any noticeable extent.
For example, take butter. I have never even thought about making butter yellow in the winter. Both winter and summer we buy our butter ready made from a person who is in that line of business, and if we could only keep it from smelling yellow I would not care what its color might be. The complexion of butter is a thing that does not appeal to me particularly, one way or the other.
I would like, of course, to make those who meet me lové me and to be able to charm persons at a distance, though when you are already married I imagine even this may be embarrassing at times. But we have never owned but one horse and if we did own one I could imagine nothing more distasteful to me than spending any considerable period of time trying to put a young countenance on a horse of mine. If the horse had a naturally youthful face, very well and good; if not he would have to look elsewhere for his cosmetics. I realize I never would be a success as a beauty doctor to a horse. I lack the requisite sympathy that makes for success in any calling. And why should I cover up his heaves? Let him cover up his own heaves or leave them out. A horse’s heaves are no affair of mine.
My feelings have always been much the same in regard to training bloodhounds to run down criminals. I know something about bloodhounds. I was reared in a section where the authorities at one time put much dependence upon bloodhounds, and therefore I say never again will a bloodhound be able to impose upon me by his air of profound wisdom and his long drooping ears.
It has been my experience that one is forever reading of the wonderful feats in tracking accomplished by bloodhounds; but those feats always take place at some remote point that one never heard of before and will probably never hear of again. You read in the paper a dispatch stating that an estimable lady, the wife of a presiding elder in the Southern Methodist Church, inadvertently took a drink out of a wayside spring in the dark and, after suffering severely for months, was discovered during the following summer to be full of sprightly green lizards. You read a reprinted clipping purporting to describe how the champion eater of Ossibawhaw County, while attending a street fair and carnival, ate three dozen raw eggs on a wager and immediately afterward, while riding on a steam merry-go-round, was scrambled to death before medical assistance could reach him. And, still again, you read a spirited account telling how a pair of bloodhounds belonging to a sheriff trailed a fugitive four days and nights back and forth across land and water, crossing one creek so often they wore a path in it, and finally treed their exhausted quarry two hundred miles from the starting-point. But these startling things never seem to occur at places mentioned in the Postal Guide. You cannot find them on the map. If you desire confirmation of such reports you do not know who to write to.
On the other hand, I have frequently seen bloodhounds engaging in their favorite pastime of tracking somebody and except once in a while, at an Uncle Tom’s Cabin show, their work was invariably disappointing in the extreme. I never saw a bloodhound that I thought could track a Brie cheese across a pool table, without getting hopelessly lost in one of the side pockets. Even at that exciting moment when Eliza is crossing the ice I have an idea that, instead of a baby, she is really carrying a sirloin steak or an aniseed bag dressed up in a cap and long clothes. There must be some stage secret to account for the relentless way in which those baying bloodhounds pursue her; otherwise they would be morally sure to wind up in the orchestra or the box-office or somewhere. If I had lost a criminal I would let the bloodhounds start and then I would go in the opposite direction and look for him.
All these reflections came to me later; but at the time that the agent was sitting there on our porch I did not stop to reason them out. There was a kind of mental numbness that came stealing over me, and the faculty of argument had fled, leaving me in a helpless and unresisting state. I have a vague recollection of having a fountain pen pressed into my nerveless grasp, of signing along a dotted line, and of paying something on account — and the deed was done. I emerged from my trance, if you could call it that, to find our little home enriched with still another literary treasure of inestimable value; yet at the same time our library now undeniably has a lopsided and uneven appearance, due to the Ten Thousand Priceless Facts and Secrets not matching our thirty other volumes, they being larger and the color of a full calf.
The point I have been trying to bring out by reciting these incidents is that I personally have not that instinct which makes so many persons succeed in trade. To me the intricacies of this profession are a source of constant amazement. In me they rouse not only wonder but admiration and vain longings.
The power to sell people things they do not want, and at the same time make them think you are conferring a favor upon them by so doing, is indeed a wonderful power. I know I will never have it, and it is a cause of great sorrow to me. I am a natural-born buyer, but I am no seller. Daily I realize the truth of this more and more and I envy those who have the gift. I would like to be a promoter and interest investors in attractive oil propositions located in the states of the West. It seems such an easy way of earning a living. I notice after a few years the average promoter is able to retire to a handsome country estate near some large city and take things easy. To be sure, a few of them from time to time have retired to one or the other of large estates maintained by the Federal Government in the suburbs of Atlanta, Georgia, and Leavenworth, Kansas, but those are sporting risks that must be figured on as a part of the game in certain lines of commercial endeavor.
LARDNER GIVES A HAIRCUT
Ring W. Lardner (1885-1933) was born at Niles (Mich.) and educated chiefly at the Armour Institute of Technology, Chicago. He worked as a reporter in Chicago and elsewhere and first won the hearts of the public with his baseball stories and the quaint original colloquialism of his letters to “Dear Friend AT’. His books You Know Me, Al, Gullible’s Travels and his collected sketches have been widely admired, and his death, all too early for his ripening genius (1933) deeply deplored. The following story, taken from the volume Round Up, is entitled:
HAIRCUT
I GOT ANOTHER BARBER that comes over from Carterville and helps me out Saturdays, but the rest of the time I can get along all right alone. You can see for yourself that this ain’t no New York City and besides that, the most of the boys works all day and don’t have no leisure to drop in here and get themselves prettied up.
You’re a newcomer, ain’t you? I thought I hadn’t seen you round before. I hope you like it good enough to stay. As I say, we ain’t no New York City or Chicago, but we have pretty good times. Not as good, though, since Jim Kendall got killed. When he was alive, him and Hod Meyers used to keep this town in an uproar. I bet they was more laughin’ done here than any town its size in America.
Jim was comical, and Hod was pretty near a match for him. Since Jim’s gone, Hod tries to hold his end up just the same as ever, but it’s tough goin’ when you ain’t got nobody to kind of work with.
They used to be plenty fun in here Saturdays. This place is jam-packed Saturdays, from four o’clock on. Jim and Hod would show up right after supper, round six o’clock. Jim would set himself down in that big chair, nearest the blue spittoon. Whoever had been settin’ in that chair, why they’d get up when Jim come in and give it to him.
You’d of thought it was a reserved seat like they have sometimes in a theayter. Hod would generally always stand or walk up and down, or some Saturdays, of course, he’d be settin’ in this chair part of the time, gettin’ a haircut.
Well, Jim would set there a w’ile without openin’ his mouth only to spit, and then finally he’d say to me, “Whitey,” — my right name, that is, my right first name, is Dick, but everybody round here calls me Whitey — Jim would say, “Whitey, your nose looks like a rosebud tonight. You must of been drinkin’ some of your aw de cologne.”
So I’d say, “No, Jim, but you look like you’d been drinkin’ somethin’ of that kind or somethin’ worse.”
Jim would have to laugh at that, but then he’d speak up and say, “No, I ain’t had nothin’ to drink, but that ain’t sayin’ I wouldn’t like somethin’. I wouldn’t even mind if it was wood alcohol.”
Then Hod Meyers would say, “Neither would your wife.” That would set everybody to laughin’ because Jim and his wife wasn’t on very good terms. She’d of divorced him only they wasn’t no chance to get alimony and she didn’t have no way to take care of herself and the kids. She couldn’t never understand Jim. He was kind of rough> but a good fella at heart.
Him and Hod had all kinds of sport with Milt Sheppard. I don’t suppose you’ve seen Milt. Well, he’s got an Adam’s apple that looks more like a mushmelon. So I’d be shavin’
Milt and when I’d start to shave down here on his neck, Hod would holler, “Hey, Whitey, wait a minute! Before you cut into it, let’s make up a pool and see who can guess closest to the number of seeds.”
And Jim would say, “If Milt hadn’t of been so hoggish, he’d of ordered a half a cantaloupe instead of a whole one and it might not of stuck in his throat.”
All the boys would roar at this and Milt himself would force a smile, though the joke was on him. Jim certainly was a card!
There’s his shavin’ mug, settin’ on the shelf, right next to Charley Vail’s. “Charles M. Vail.” That’s the druggist. He comes in regular for his shave, three times a week. And Jim’s is the cup next to Charley’s. “James H. Kendall.” Jim won’t need no shavin’ mug no more, but I’ll leave it there just the same for old times’ sake. Jim certainly was a character!
Years ago, Jim used to travel for a canned goods concern over in Carterville. They sold canned goods. Jim had the whole northern half of the State and was on the road five days out of every week. He’d drop in here Saturdays and tell his experiences for that week. It was rich.
I guess he paid more attention to playin’ jokes than makin’ sales. Finally the concern let him out and he come right home here and told everybody he’d been fired instead of sayin’ he resigned like most fellas would of.
It was a Saturday and the shop was full and Jim got up out of that chair and says, “Gentlemen, I got an important announcement to make. I been fired from my job.” Well, they asked him if he was in earnest and he said he was and nobody could think of nothin’ to say till Jim finally broke the ice himself. He says, “I been sellin’ canned goods and now I’m canned goods myself.”
You see, the concern he’d been workin’ for was a factory that made canned goods. Over in Carterville. And now Jim said he was canned himself. He was certainly a card!
Jim had a great trick that he used to play w’ile he was travelin’. For instance, he’d be ridin’ on a train and they’d come to some little town like, well, like, we’ll say, Benton. Jim would look out the train window and read the signs on the stores.
For instance, they’d be a sign, “Henry Smith, Dry Goods.” Well, Jim would write down the name and the name of the town and when he got to wherever he was goin’ he’d mail back a postal card to Henry Smith at Benton and not sign no name to it, but he’d write on the card, well, somethin’ like “Ask your wife about that book agent that spent the afternoon last week,” or “Ask your Missus who kept her from gettin’ lonesome the last time you was in Carterville.” And he’d sign the card, “A Friend.”
Of course, he never knew what really come of none of these jokes, but he could picture what probably happened and that was enough.
Jim didn’t work very steady after he lost his position with the Carterville people. What he did earn, doin’ odd jobs round town, why he spent pretty near all of it on gin and his family might of starved if the stores hadn’t of carried them along. Jim’s wife tried her hand at dressmakin’, but they ain’t nobody goin’ to get rich makin’ dresses in this town.
As I say, she’d of divorced Jim, only she seen that she couldn’t support herself and the kids and she was always hopin’ that some day Jim would cut out his habits and give her more than two or three dollars a week.
They was a time when she would go to whoever he was workin’ for and ask them to give her his wages, but after she done this once or twice, he beat her to it by borrowin’ most of his pay in advance. He told it all round town, how he had outfoxed his Missus. He certainly was a caution!
But he wasn’t satisfied with just outwittin’ her. He was sore the way she had acted, tryin’ to grab off his pay. And he made up his mind he’d get even. Well, he waited till Evans’s Circus was advertised to come to town. Then he told his wife and two kiddies that he was goin’ to take them to the circus. The day of the circus, he told them he would get the tickets and meet them outside the entrance to the tent.
Well, he didn’t have no intentions of bein’ there or buyin’ tickets or nothin’. He got full of gin and laid round Wright’s poolroom all day. His wife and the kids waited and waited and of course he didn’t show up. His wife didn’t have a dime with her, or nowhere else, I guess. So she finally had to tell the kids it was all off and they cried like they wasn’t never goin’ to stop.
Well, it seems, w’ile they was cryin’, Doc Stair came along and he asked what was the matter, but Mrs. Kendall was stubborn and wouldn’t tell him, but the kids told him and he insisted on takin’ them and their mother in the show. Jim found this out afterwards and it was one reason why he had it in for Doc Stair.
Doc Stair come here about a year and a half ago. He’s a mighty handsome young fella and his clothes always look like he has them made to order. He goes to Detroit two or three times a year and w’ile he’s there he must have a tailor take his measure and then make him a suit to order. They cost pretty near twice as much, but they fit a whole lot better than if you just bought them in a store.
For a w’ile everybody was wonderin’ why a young doctor like Doc Stair should come to a town like this where we already got old Doc Gamble and Doc Foote that’s both been here for years and all the practice in town was always divided between the two of them.
Then they was a story got round that Doc Stair’s gal had throwed him over, a gal up in the Northern Peninsula somewheres, and the reason he come here was to hide himself away and forget it. He said himself that he thought they wasn’t nothin’ like general practice in a place like ours to fit a man to be a good all round doctor. And that’s why he’d came.
Anyways, it wasn’t long before he was makin’ enough to live on, though they tell me that he never dunned nobody for what they owed him, and the folks here certainly has got the owin’ habit, even in my business. If I had all that was cornin’ to me for just shaves alone, I could go to Carterville and put up at the Mercer for a week and see a different picture every night. For instance, they’s old George Purdy — but I guess I shouldn’t ought to be gossipin’.
Well, last year, our coroner died, died of the flu. Ken Beatty, that was his name. He was the coroner. So they had to choose another man to be coroner in his place and they picked Doc Stair. He laughed at first and said he didn’t want it, but they made him take it. It ain’t no job that anybody would fight for and what a man makes out of it in a year would just about buy seeds for their garden. Doc’s the kind, though, that can’t say no to nothin’ if you keep at him long enough.
But I was goin’ to tell you about a poor boy we got here in town — Paul Dickson. He fell out of a tree when he was about ten years old. Lit on his head and it done somethin’ to him and he ain’t never been right. No harm in him, but just silly. Jim Kendall used to call him cuckoo; that’s a name Jim had for anybody that was off their head, only he called people’s head their bean. That was another of his gags, callin’ head bean and callin’ crazy people cuckoo. Only poor Paul ain’t crazy, but just silly.
You can imagine that Jim used to have all kinds of fun with Paul. He’d send him to the White Front Garage for a left-handed monkey wrench. Of course they ain’t no such thing as a left-handed monkey wrench.
And once we had a kind of a fair here and they was a baseball game between the fats and the leans and before the game started Jim called Paul over and sent him way down to Schrader’s hardware store to get a key for the pitcher’s box.
They wasn’t nothin’ in the way of gags that Jim couldn’t think up, when he put his mind to it.
