Chapter IV: Part 4

"Because I am trying to make you put yourself in the place of the Victory Bond salesman who is trying to sell you bonds," Morris declared.

"Put your _own_ self in the place of the Victory Bond salesman," Abe exclaimed, "which if you want to give me any hypocritical cases for the sake of argument, Mawruss, I have seen the way you practically snap the head off a collector for a charitable fund enough times to appreciate how you would behave towards a Victory Bond salesman, so go ahead on the basis that you are the tough proposition and not me."

"A charitable fund is one thing and this here Victory Loan another," Morris said.

"I know it is," Abe agreed, "but at the same time, Mawruss, a whole lot of people feels that if ever they give a couple dollars to an orphan-asylum, they practically got vaccinated against future attacks of the same complaint, and if three years later the collector for the orphan-asylum calls on them again they say: 'Why, I already gave you two dollars for that orphan-asylum! What did you done with it all?' And I bet yer that just as many people considered that the fifty-dollar bond which they bought during the First Liberty Loan Campaign should ought to have set up such a strong antiseptic in their system that they would be immune to all other Liberty Bond Campaigns, no matter if such campaigns would continue until there was, God forbid! a Fiftieth Liberty Loan already."

"Some people never even got, so to speak, jabbed the first time," Morris observed, "and the way they avoid Liberty Bond salesmen, Abe, you would think that such a salesman was a sort of Liberty Bond Typhoid Mary and would infect them tightwads with a disease where they were liable to break out all over with coupons or something."

"As a matter of fact, Mawruss, that's just the effect which a Liberty Bond salesman should ought to have on the right kind of sitson," Abe said, "which while I don't mean to say that making a good investment like buying of a Liberty Bond should ought to be considered as a disease, Mawruss, it should anyhow be infectious and should ought to spread so rapidly that everybody in the United States could say they had it to the extent of at least one fifty-dollar bond of the Victory Loan."

"But there is over a hundred million people in the United States, Abe," Morris said, "and if they all bought one fifty-dollar bond, y'understand, it would make the Victory Loan five billion dollars, whereas this here Carter J. Glass is only asking for four billion five hundred million."

"Well, to my mind, he's acting too modest, Mawruss," Abe went on, "because if we expect Germany to raise the first five billion dollars of her indemnity with nothing to show for it but the promise that she would have to raise five billion more every two years till the whole indemnity was paid, understand me, how much more should we raise over here with the promise that it is going to be paid back to us in a few years, with interest at the rate of four and three-quarters per cent. per annum? Why, under them conditions, Mawruss, any American which would refuse to buy a Victory Loan Bond should ought to be considered as applying for German sitsonship papers and should ought to be exported to Hamburg, where his adopted fellow-sitsons is getting frisked by the German government for every cent they possess and ain't getting so much as a receipt to show for it."

"For that matter, an American which refuses to buy Victory Liberty Bonds should ought to completely lost his memory, Abe," Morris declared. "Evidently a feller, if some one starts a conversation about the war, is going to say, '_What_ war?' and when it is reminded to his memory that as recently ago as last November the papers was printing every day columns and columns about the war which was going on in Europe, he would probably say: 'Oh, _that_ war! I thought that war was already a thing of the past.' And also probably he might even ask, 'Tell me, was there many people hurt?'"

"Well, if some folks has got such short memories like all that, and is only affected by what they have read in the papers at the latest the day before yesterday, Mawruss," Abe said, "why not have the Victory Liberty Loan salesmen approach them on the basis of what is going on _now_ in Europe? 'You are asked,' such a salesman would say, 'to invest your money in a first-class A-number-one security, backed by the United States government and bearing interest at the rate of four and three-quarters per cent. per annum, and that is the very least you could do for your country when you consider that right now,' the salesman would say, and he should practise in advance to make his voice sound tragical, 'right now _your_ uncles and _my_ uncles is making peace in Paris with all the strength of language which they've got in their system.

"'Yes, Mr. Sitson,' the salesman should go on to say, 'the government is only asking _you_ to invest in interest-bearing cash money, so to speak, and what for a sacrifice is _that_ compared to the suffering of _your_ father-in-laws and _my_ father-in-laws which is bravely standing larynx to larynx in the battle area of the Peace Conference while the air is filled with the French, Italian, Greek, Jugo-Slob, and Polish remarks? _You_ sit here in your comfortable home while the flower of our experts and college professors is exposed to all kinds of coffee and cigars. Ain't you ashamed to be doing nothing but buy bonds when old and feeble men like most of the American Peace delegates is battling with French waiters, French taxicab-drivers, French hotel service, and French laundry-lists, giving and receiving no mercy, y'understand, and you should thank Heaven that your own country has been spared the horrors of having on our own soil this here Peace Conference which is now raging in Paris, understand me.'"

"That would be anyhow an argument," Morris admitted, "but with these here Victory Liberty Bonds it shouldn't ought to be a case of first come first serve. With only four and a half billion dollars' worth of Victory Liberty Bonds for sale, Abe, seventy-five per cent. of the people of the United States should ought to be going around looking as sore as fellers that sell tickets in theater box-offices, and when any one asks 'em why, they should say: 'Ain't it just my luck! I put off buying my Victory Liberty Bonds till April 23d, and when I got round to the bank there wasn't one left.' Yes, Abe, instead of Victory Liberty Bond salesmen having to go about visiting customers, y'understand, they should ought to have luxurious fitted-up offices, and it should ought to be a case of when the customer arrives the Victory Liberty Bond salesman should ought to be playing auction pinochle or rummy with two other Victory Liberty Bond salesmen. Then when the customer says is this the place where they sell Victory Liberty Bonds, the salesman says, 'I'll be with you in a minute,' and makes the customer stand around without even offering him a seat until the salesmen gets through playing two more hands. The customer should then make out his own application, y'understand, have the exact change ready, and close the door quietly when leaving, and that's the way I would sell Victory Liberty Bonds if I was the government."

"That's the way you even try to sell garments," Abe commented.

"Because," Morris continued, evading the challenge, "it is my idee that it is a privilege to be allowed to buy these here Victory Liberty Bonds, and before any one gets that privilege, Abe, he should be made to prove that he has done something to deserve it. Yes, Abe, instead of a man wearing a button to show that he has bought Liberty Bonds, he should ought to go before a notary public and make an oath that he has given up his quota to all Red Cross and United War Relief drives and otherwise done everything he could do to help win the war if he couldn't fight in it, y'understand, and then, and only then, Abe, he should be given a button entitling him to buy Victory Liberty Bonds under the conditions I have stated."

"But, joking apart, Mawruss, and talking business, not poetry, understand me," Abe asked, "do you actually think that this here Victory Liberty Loan would be all taken up by them methods? To my mind, Mawruss, it would be a whole lot better to look the horse straight in the teeth, y'understand, and take it as settled that a lot of people which has got the money to buy bonds would go round saying that they would be very glad to buy bonds if they only had the money, y'understand. To such people, Mawruss, I would remind them again that a war, even when you win it, ain't a cash-in-advance proposition. In fact, a war ain't even a C. O. D. proposition. Wars is paid for on the instalment plan, Mawruss, and while this particular war is over, understand me, the bill has still got to be paid, and if such people won't lend the government the money to pay for the war, the government would have to do what the German government is going to do to the German people--instead of touching them for it and paying it back, they would frisk them for it and not even say much obliged, y'understand."

"At that, Abe, I ain't worried a whole lot about the result of this Victory Liberty Loan," Morris said. "When all is said and done, Abe, the American people love their country."

"I know they do," Abe agreed, "but also, Mawruss, there is a whole lot of fellers which loves their families and at the same time don't lose no sleep nights because they ain't providing for them as they should ought to do. So to them people I would say: 'Which would you rather have it as a souvenir of the war: Victory Liberty Bonds or tax bills?' Also, 'Would you sooner be paid interest or would you sooner pay interest?'"

"In other words, Abe, you would threaten 'em into buying bonds," Morris observed.

"Only when it's necessary, Mawruss," Abe concluded, "and that wouldn't be in the case of one thousandth of one per cent. of the entire population, because the great majority of the people thinks the way I do about their money: the government let me make it, and the government lets me keep it, and if the government would sooner borrow part of it instead of taking it all, Mawruss, that's only the government's good nature, which nobody should presume too much on good nature, Mawruss. Am I right or wrong?"

XIII

WHEN IS A SECRET TREATY SECRET?

"I see where President Wilson sent a letter to the German government that they might just so well save the car fare and not send any delegates to this here Peace Conference which wouldn't be prepared for the worst, Mawruss," Abe Potash said one morning in April.

"You would think, considering how excited the German people gets nowadays, that they would have a hard time finding any one to take the job of delegate, Abe," Morris Perlmutter suggested, "which the least that happens to one of them German delegates after the German people finds out what was in the paper he signed is that his executioners would claim that the daylight-saving law made it unnecessary for them to wait till sunrise, y'understand."

"Well, he would always have the excuse that the only thing he seen of the Peace Treaty before he signed it was a dotted line, Mawruss," Abe said, "and also, Mawruss, it is just possible that the return half of them German peace delegates will read _via_ Amsterdam, and that before taking a three years' lease of an Amsterdam apartment some of them peace delegates would first visit a ticket-scalper and get that much off their minds, anyway."

"And even in Paris them German peace delegates wouldn't be, neither," Morris declared, "which I see that the French government is too safe arranging for the accommodation of them German delegates at a hotel next to the place where the Peace Treaty is going to be signed, Abe, and the lot on which the hotel stands is going to be protected with an egg-proof fence eight feet high so that the German delegates can escape any stray rotten eggs."

"The fence could be twelve feet high, Mawruss," Abe remarked, "and it wouldn't do any good, because nobody could escape rotten eggs in a French hotel, Mawruss, rotten coffee, neither. Also, Mawruss, eggs 'ain't got nothing to do with that fence, because if that fence wouldn't be there, Mawruss, when it comes time for them German delegates to sign the treaty, Mawruss, the Peace Conference would got to appoint a Committee of Resident Buyers to round up them German delegates, on account that nobody else but Resident Buyers who is accustomed to entertaining their American clients would know where them German delegates had disappeared to."

"Well, in a way it is the Peace Conference's own fault because they sent word to the German government that they didn't want to deal with no messengers, but that the German delegates should all be high-up officials, Abe," Morris said, "which seemingly as a general thing the higher up a German happens to be, y'understand, the lower down he can act. Take, for example, the Crown Prince, Abe, and I always thought that no matter how much people abused him, Abe, he could anyhow go home and say to his wife whatever I done, I done it all for you, instead of going somewhere else and saying it to ballet-dancers, as his wife's mother claims."

"I understand he was leading a double life, Mawruss," Abe observed.

"He was leading a double life in spades, Abe," Morris declared, alluding to the game of auction pinochle. "Day after day his wife's mother says he would leave the house to go down-town to the palace, and instead he would go down-town not to the palace and never show up till all hours of the morning. Then when his wife asked him where he was putting in his time, y'understand, instead of acting reasonable and telling her a phony story about being sick and tired of getting stuck at the Reichskanzlei night after night, and that he wished the old man would get through springing a new chancellor on him every week, understand me, he gives himself dead away by getting sore. In fact, Abe, his mother-in-law says that the Hohenzollern royal colors is black and blue, anyhow so far as the Crown Princess is concerned, and that she made up her mind that she wouldn't let her daughter live with him no longer, so the chances is that if the German people goes back to the monarchy, they would not only got to pay indemnities for what the Crown Prince done, but alimony besides."

"Well, even if the mother-in-law couldn't prove what she says about her daughter's husband, which very few mother-in-laws can, Mawruss," Abe said, "the Crown Princess would be able to get her devorce upon the grounds that her husband was convicted of a felony, y'understand, which he will be, Mawruss, just so soon as the Peace Conference has finished drawing up the indictment."

"Then them German people will be paying her temporary alimony permanently for the rest of her life, Abe," Morris said, "because them fellers which is drawing the indictments against the Kaiser and the Crown Prince seems to be taking their own time about it."

"It's a big job, Mawruss, because you take the indictment against the Crown Prince, Mawruss, and the chances is that the first two hundred counts alone is for French château furniture, and when some one steals anything from a French château, Mawruss, it's a hundred to one that he is guilty not only of larceny, y'understand, but of concealing mortgaged property besides, understand me," Abe said, "which it has always been a wonder to me, Mawruss, that some of these ladies of the four hundred who open tea-rooms for European war relief has never considered doing nothing for them Ruined Mortgagees of France, or the Suffering Judgment Creditors of Allied Noblemen. Most of our best families has had experience some time or another with railroad reorganizations, and you would think they would have enough sympathy for them Starving Lienors of France, Mawruss, to get up, anyhow, a bazaar. It could be advertised with a picture by some big artist like C. G. Gibson, where an old man in what used to was a fur overcoat before the moths got into it is bending over Liber 2244 of Mortgages, page 391, which is all the old feller has got to show for what was once a first lien on some gilt-edged château property, Mawruss."

"Well, I'll tell you," Morris said, "there's a certain number of people which nobody has got any sympathy with, like mortgagers, coal dealers, head waiters, garage proprietors, and fellers which works in theayter ticket-offices, to which, of course, must also be added Postmaster-General Burleson."

"And why that feller is so unpopular is a mystery to me, Mawruss," Abe said. "You would think, to hear the way the newspapers talk about him, that the very least he had done was to mix arsenic with the gum which they put on the backs of stamps, whereas, so far as I could see, the poor feller is only trying to do his duty and keep down the wages of telephone operators, which I don't know how strong telephone operators is with the rest of the country, but compared with the hit that they make with me, Mawruss, Mr. Burleson would be a general favorite, y'understand."

"He was already in bad before them telephone girls struck on him, Abe," Morris said, "and for the very reason, as you say, that he has always done his duty as he seen it, which the trouble with them fellers that do their duty as they see it is that nobody else could see it, Abe. It is also the case that them people which do their duty as they see it usually has rotten eyesight, Abe, and when it comes right down to it, Abe, there is even some people which claims that Mr. Wilson should also consult an oculist to find out if he don't need to have his glasses changed. In fact, there's a couple of fellers by the name Orlando and Sonnino which seems to think that Mr. Wilson is practically blind so far as Fiume is concerned."

"You mean to say they 'ain't settled that Fiume thing yet, Mawruss?" Abe asked.

"They did and they didn't," Morris said. "Mr. Wilson give out a long statement about it in which he thought he settled it, Abe, and the Italian peace delegates said they would go home and leave the Peace Conference flat, y'understand, and thought they settled it, but the way it looks now, Abe, if the Peace Conference stays in session till they do settle it, when Mr. Wilson comes back and explains the Peace Treaty to Congress, he will speak with such a strong French accent that only the members from Louisiana will be able to understand a word he says."

"But why does Mr. Wilson say that Italy shouldn't have Fiume?" Abe inquired.

"Because it doesn't square up with his fourteen points," Morris replied, "and seemingly he don't want to stretch a point."

"Well, if he did, Mawruss, it wouldn't be the first time," Abe declared, "because if you recollect them fourteen points, which is more than most people could, Mawruss, point number one said that there should be open covenants of peace openly arrived at, Mawruss, and also something about such terms being discussed openly, frankly, and in the public view, Mawruss, and the way Mr. Wilson has stretched that point, Mawruss, it'll never look like the same point again."

"Say!" Morris interrupted. "As a keep-it-dark proposition, Abe, Mr. Wilson 'ain't got nothing on this here Lloyd George, Clemenceau, and the firm of Orlando & Sonnino, to say nothing of the Japanese delegates, which I suppose you heard about them secret treaties, Abe."

"I never heard tell of them," Abe replied.

"Neither did Mr. Wilson until the other day, which the way it happened was this," Morris continued: "Orlando & Sonnino was talking the whole thing over in a friendly way with Lloyd George and Mr. Wilson, and Mr. Wilson says that when it come right down to it Italy's claims to Trieste wasn't what would be called in the language of diplomacy exactly kosher, neither, and Sonnino says: 'Is that so? Well, how about our treaty?' And although Orlando kicked his partner under the table and Lloyd George give him one of them what-are-you-trying-to-do-spoil-everything looks, Mr. Wilson caught on right away. 'What treaty?' he asked, and Lloyd George says: 'Why, you know what treaty. I was sitting right here when Clemenceau told you all about it,' and it appears that all the time Mr. Wilson was kidding himself along that if he compromised by letting Italy have Trieste, she would pass up Fiume, Abe, it seems she had a secret agreement with France and England that she was to have Trieste, anyway."

"No wonder Mr. Wilson feels sore," Abe remarked.

"Wait, that ain't all," Morris said. "Now it appears that Japan has also a secret treaty with France and England to get a slice of China which formerly belonged to Germany, y'understand, and Mr. Wilson is beginning to experience what it is like when you sit in a poker game all evening and don't find out till the last round is on that everybody else around the table is playing for the house."

"They could all be playing honest at that, Mawruss," Abe suggested.

"Sure they could, with the exception of having a couple of secret treaties or so," Morris agreed, "but at the same time, Abe, I wouldn't be a bit surprised if since the discovery of these here secret treaties, Mr. Wilson has waked up more than once somewheres around three A.M. and asked himself did he or did he not need a mandatory, y'understand, and also wondered what the folks back home is thinking--particularly a few Senators like Lodge and Johnson."

"I don't agree with you, Mawruss," Abe declared. "I think that Mr. Wilson will get the better end of the deal, because from what has happened in this war, Mawruss, diplomacy is one of them games where the feller which don't know how to play it has got a big advantage over the feller that does. So, therefore, while the old-time experienced diplomatist is saying it never has been done that way and therefore couldn't be done, Mawruss, a new beginner like Mr. Wilson has already gone to work and done it, which I bet yer right now, Mawruss, that if Mr. Wilson don't want Italy to have Fiume she won't get it, and the same thing goes for Japan also, Mawruss--secret treaty or no secret treaty."

"Still, there's a whole lot of people in America which would like to see Italy get Fiume, Abe," Morris said.

"There was a whole lot of people, Mawruss," Abe said, "but this secret-treaty business has killed it, which if Italy wanted to be fair about it, why didn't she come right out before the armistice even and say, 'Look-a-here, we got a secret treaty and we may as well tell you so right from the start'?"

"Then the secret treaty wouldn't been no more secret, Abe," Morris said.

"She would have been doing the manly thing, anyway," Abe said.

"I know she would," Morris admitted, "but that's the difference between the old-fashioned Italian diplomacy and the new-fashioned American diplomacy. The Italians believe that there should be secret covenants of peace secretly arrived at, and we believe that there should be open covenants of peace openly arrived at."

"There is also the difference, Mawruss, that the Italians stick to their beliefs," Abe concluded, "and we don't."

XIV

THE FIRST DAY OF MAY

"I see where in Genoa they already changed the name of a street which only last week they called Wilson Avenue, Mawruss," Abe Potash said one morning after the rupture with Orlando.

"Well, that's the trouble with calling articles after the latest popular success, Abe," Morris said. "It don't make no difference if it's streets or cigars, the first thing you know the people gets a grouch on the original of the brand and the manufacturer has got to tear up a few thousand Flor de President Wilson labels and go back to calling it the Regalia de Ginsburg Brothers, or whatever the name was."

"But in Genoa they didn't go back to the name of the old street, Mawruss," Abe said. "They renamed it Fiume Street."

"And it wouldn't surprise me in the least if a few Burleson streets was changed to Second Class Avenue, Abe," Morris declared, "on account this is a time of great ups and downs in the reputations of politicians, not to say statesmen, Abe, which six months from now nobody would be able to say offhand whether the name was Bela Hanson or Old Kun except the immediate family in Budapest or Seattle, as the case may be."

"In a way, Mawruss, the reputations of politicians, not to say statesmen, can get to be, so to speak, a nuisance to their fellow-countrymen," Abe observed, "which it happens once in a while that some politicians and statesmen gets to having such a high regard for their reputations, Mawruss, they would sooner injure their country than their reputation. Italian statesmen, French statesmen, English statesmen, and even, you might say, American statesmen goes about their work with one eye on the job in hand and the other eye on a possible statue or so at the junction of Main Street and Railroad Avenue in their native town, y'understand, with a subscription on the pedestal:

"'HARRIS J. SONNINO

Erected by His Fellow-Townsmen of East Rome, August 1, 1919.'"

"Such an ambition, anyhow, makes the statesmen try to do the right thing," Morris observed.

"And it also occasionally makes him do the obstinate thing, Mawruss," Abe continued. "In fact, Mawruss, sometimes I couldn't help wishing that it was the custom to have corporations and not men as ambassadors and presidents, because it would be such a simple matter when the Republicans nominated the Chicago Title Guarantee, Security and Mortgage Company for President and the Democrats nominated the Algonquin Trust Company, of Pottstown, for the voters of the country to compare the statement of assets of each company and judge which was the most reliable, y'understand. Also, Mawruss, if the Algonquin Trust Company was now President of the United States, understand me, and somebody was to say they didn't like the way the President was running things at the Peace Conference, y'understand, nobody would have the nerve to arrest him for criticizing a great and good corporation like the Algonquin Trust Company. Furthermore, Mawruss, if Italy had been represented at this here Peace Conference not by Sonnino, but by the Milan Trust Company, which no doubt acts as executor, guardian or trustee like any other trust company, and therefore why not as ambassador, understand me, there never would have been no scrap about Fiume arising from the fact that the Milan Trust Company could never go home and face the people of Italy without Fiume, and also nobody would have considered that Mr. Wilson's statement was a direct slap in the face of the Milan Trust Company, Mawruss."

"Listen, Abe," Morris protested, "if you are trying to invent this _schmooes_ about corporations just so you could knock Mr. Wilson, y'understand, such a scheme wouldn't deceive a child even."

"I wouldn't knock President Wilson for anything, Mawruss," Abe retorted. "I _couldn't_ knock him, because when I think of Mr. Wilson I see before my eyes a good-looking gentleman with a pleasant smile on his face, y'understand, and not very far away stands Mrs. Wilson, which, if Mr. Wilson didn't put over even one fourteenth of his fourteen points, Mawruss, his visit to Europe with Mrs. Wilson wouldn't be wasted, Mawruss, because it would have given them people over in the old country a chance to see what an American lady is and should ought to be, y'understand. But on the other hand, Mawruss, if the Democrats _had_ elected the Algonquin Trust Company as President of the United States at the last election, y'understand, whenever I would think of the President of the United States I would see before my eyes a twenty-five-story fire-proof building with all the rents raised one hundred and fifty per cent. since last January, understand me, and I could go to work and knock with a clear conscience."

"But why should you want to knock the President of the United States?" Morris demanded.

"Ain't I telling you that I don't want to knock him?" Abe declared. "All I am saying is that, if such a thing was possible, it would be a whole lot better to have a corporation as President of the United States instead of an individual, Mawruss, because corporations don't get sick, corporations don't get insulted, a corporation _oser_ cares whether it gets cheered or hooted, and finally, Mawruss, a corporation couldn't ride around Italy in an open carriage with the King of Italy and give the Italian people the impression that all they had to do was to ask for Fiume and it was theirs."

"And another thing about a corporation, Abe, is that it ain't a copartnership where one partner could get every day a headache from listening to the other partner talking a lot of nonsense, Abe," Morris declared, "which you must got to remember that, beginning the first of May, if you would go to a soda-fountain and say, 'Give me something for a headache,' they would give you a United States Internal Revenue stamp for which you would got to pay two cents before they would even take the cork out of the bromo-asperin bottle."

"What's the difference whether they tax a headache coming or going, Mawruss?" Abe commented.

"A whole lot of difference," Morris said. "In the first place, the taxes which the country used to collect in one week from people when they were catching headaches would be more than equivalence to the taxes which the country is going to the taxes which the country is going to collect from people curing headaches during the next ten years. Also, Abe, nobody thought it was a hardship to pay taxes on a coming headache, whereas there will be a terrible howl go up over the tax on the same article in the opposite direction."

"At that, I think these here May 1st taxes is going to have a good effect on the American people, Mawruss," Abe said, "because there's nothing like taxes to make a man wake up and take an interest in the way the government is being run."

"A man would got to be an awful sound sleeper in that respect if he wasn't roused up a little by the income tax which he has been paying for the past four or five years, Abe," Morris said.

"That's only once a year, Mawruss," Abe said, "but these here May 1st taxes is going to keep him awake three hundred and sixty-five days out of the year. People which thought you was a tightwad if you happened to mention that six hundred million dollars of the country's money was used up in experimenting with aeroplanes, is now going to shriek in agony every time they buy a three-dollar-and-a-quarter shirt that it's a shame and a disgrace the way every little secretary in the President's Cabinet is gallivanting half over Europe on the people's money, and they'd probably be just as hard if the shirt only cost two dollars and a quarter, excepting that the luxury tax of ten per cent. is only collected from the purchasers of men's shirts of the value of three dollars and upwards on amounts in excess of three dollars each. Also, Mawruss, people which has just paid eight dollars for a bathrobe on which the tax would be ten per cent. of fifty cents, or five cents cash, y'understand, is going to say: 'Couldn't that feller travel to and from Europe in one state-room the same like anybody else? Must he got to have a whole steamboat?' and they will start right in to estimate that the cost of keeping a steamboat the size of the _George Washington_ in commission is forty-five thousand six hundred and twenty-two dollars and thirty-eight cents per diem, and is it any wonder you've got to pay a one-cent tax on every orange phosphate, understand me."

"Some people is willing to get in a knock at Mr. Wilson without even so much as an orange-phosphate tax for an excuse, Abe," Morris said, significantly.

"I know they are," Abe replied, innocently, "and as for Postmaster-General Burleson, seemingly he couldn't suit nobody no matter what he does. Take, for instance, them fourteen bombs which was mailed in New York the other day, Mawruss, and if it wouldn't be that Postmaster-General Burleson has probably given strict orders that no mail should be forwarded which was short even a half-a-cent postage-stamp even, the chances is that every one of them fourteen bombs would have been delivered and exploded by now. But suppose that, instead of Postmaster-General Burleson, we would have had as Postmaster-General some good-natured feller which when his New York representatives called him up and told him they were holding fourteen packages there for additional postage, would have said: 'Oh, let 'em go. We couldn't afford to be small about a little thing like additional postage.' And what would have happened? Why, the fourteen judges, mayors, and assorted Senators and district attorneys to which them packages was addressed would have been lucky if they escaped with nothing worse than singed eyebrows, Mawruss. And to-day yet, Mawruss, them fellers which has got only Postmaster-General Burleson to thank that they can still riffle a deck of cards, understand me, is probably going around beefing about the terrible delay in the delivery of mail under the administration of Postmaster-General Burleson."

"And do you think that the police will ever find out who sent them bombs, Abe?" Morris asked.

"Probably not," Abe replied, "but they will probably find some man or men who would have _liked_ to have sent them and would have been _glad_ to have sent them, and as nobody is going to miss such fellers, Mawruss, it probably won't make much difference in the long run if any such case of mistaken identity ain't discovered until the sentence is carried out, y'understand."

"I see that it says in the paper where the anarchists which sent them bombs was celebrating the first day of May, which is the anarchists' Fourth of July, Abe," Morris observed, "which, considering all the trouble that takes place in Europe with general strikes and riots on the first of May, Abe, it's a wonder to me that the constitution of the League of Nations didn't contain an article providing that in the interests of international peace, y'understand, the month of May should hereafter contain thirty days instead of thirty-one, commencing with the second day of May, and leave them anarchists up against it for a day to celebrate."

"The first of May is the socialists' Fourth of July, not the anarchists'," Abe said, "which, while it is possible that these here anarchists sent them bombs around the first of May out of compliment to their friends the socialists, Mawruss, an anarchist don't attach no particular sentiment to the day when a bomb explodes, just so long as it does enough damage, Mawruss."

"Just the same, I am in favor of doing away with the first of May," Morris insisted, "and if it ain't practical to abolish the date, Abe, let 'em anyhow cut out the celebration. Them general strikes causes a whole lot of trouble."

"They do if you take them seriously," Abe agreed, "because in this country, at least, Mawruss, only a few people takes part in the May first general strike. This year we only had two of our work-people away on account of the general strike, and one of them now claims he stayed home on account of injuring his hand in one of our buttonhole-machines, which I have got proof to show, Mawruss, that when the police threw him out of the hall where the meeting was taking place he landed on his wrist."

"He should have landed on his neck," Morris observed, "because if them socialists get hurt by their nonsense it's their own fault, Abe. They go to work and announce a general strike, and naturally the authorities takes them seriously and gets ready for trouble with a lot of policemen, which you know as well as I do, Abe, when the police gets ready for trouble they usually find it, even if they have to make it themselves. The consequence is, Abe, that a fractured skull has become practically the occupational disease of being a socialist, just the same as phosphorus-poisoning attacked people which worked in match-factories in the old days before the Swedish manufacturers invented matches which strike only on the box one time out of fifty if the weather conditions is just right."

"Sure, I know," Abe observed, "but people worked in match-factories because they couldn't make a living in any other way, Mawruss, whereas nobody compels any one to be a socialist if he don't want to, Mawruss, and what enjoyment them socialists get out of it I don't know."

"It gives them, for one thing, the privilege of wearing a red necktie," Morris suggested.

"And that don't make them a first-class risk for accident insurance," Abe concluded, "around the first of May, anyhow."

XV

THE PEACE TREATY AS GOOD READING

"At last the wind-up of this here Peace Conference seems to be in sight, Mawruss," Abe Potash said to his partner, Morris Perlmutter, the day after the Treaty of Peace was handed to the German plenipotentiaries. "As short a time ago since as last week it begun to look like our American delegates was going to stay in Paris for the rest of their lives, which, according to the tables of mortality prepared by some of our leading life-insurance companies, based on the average ages of all five of them delegates, would be anyhow until August 1, 1919."

"Well, they seem to have done a pretty good job, Abe," Morris observed. "I read over the accounts of the Treaty of Peace, Abe, and what them Germans has got to do outside of restoring the skull of the Sultan Okwawa under Section Eight of the treaty would keep her busy for fifty years yet."

"And who is this here Sultan Okwawa?" Abe inquired.

"I don't know," Morris replied, "but, considering the number of skulls which needs restoring on account of what the Germans done during the past five years, Abe, and also considering the fact that this is the only skull mentioned by name in the Peace Treaty, he must of had some pretty influential friends at the Peace Conference. Also, I see that the Germans is also to give back the papers belonging to M. Reuher which they took in 1871, and, although Section Eight don't say nothing about it, I presume that if the papers are returned the finder can keep the money which was in the wallet at the time it was lost."

"Do you mean to tell me that this here Peace Treaty has got such small particulars like that in it?" Abe demanded.

"It don't seem to have overlooked anything, Abe," Morris went on, "which, when you consider that Mr. Wilson started in--in a small way--with only fourteen points, it's already wonderful how that man worked his way up. There must be several hundred thousand points in that Peace Treaty, including such points like the Sultan's skull and this here Reuher's papers, which Mr. Wilson never even dreamed of when he sat down that day in January, 1918, and thought out the original fourteen."

"He probably considered that if we ever licked Germany sufficient to make her accept as much as thirty-three and a third per cent. of them fourteen points that we would be doing well already," Abe remarked.

"And so did everybody else," Morris agreed. "And now they would got to accept a Treaty of Peace which loads up Germany with practically every punishment that this here Peace Conference could think of except Prohibition."

"I must read that treaty sometime," Abe said. "It sounds like it would be quite amusing already."

"Amusing ain't no name for it," Morris said. "The way the American people is going to enjoy reading that Treaty of Peace, Abe, would put Mr. Wilson not only in the class of favorite American Presidents along with George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, but also would give him an insured position as one of America's favorite authors along with Harry Bell Wright and Bradstreet. A good American could pass a very profitable month or so skimming it over, Abe, which it consists of fifteen sections, of which only the head-lines fills three full pages of the morning papers."

"Well, how long do you think it would take them German delegates to read it, Mawruss?" Abe inquired.

"They ain't going to read it," Morris said. "They're only going to sign it, and it ain't a bad idea, neither, because if they did read it, Abe, some of them Germans would drop dead along about the second section, which describes how much of Germany is left after France, Poland, Denmark, and Belgium gets through helping themselves."

"Might they would expire while they was reading the first section, maybe," Abe suggested.

"The first section 'ain't got nothing to do with Germany," Morris explained. "The first section consists of the constitution of the League of Nations."

"Is that the same constitution of the League of Nations which them United States Senators raised such a round robin about?" Abe asked.

"It has been changed since then," Morris said. "The amendments consist of two commas contributed by ex-President Taft and a semicolon from Charles Evans Hughes. Elihu Root also suggested they insert the words _as aforesaid_ in the first paragraph and also the words _anything hereinbefore contained to the contrary notwithstanding_ in the last paragraph, but couldn't get by with it. However, Abe, the League of Nations is already such old stuff that people reading it in Section One of the Peace Treaty will in all probability skip it the way they did the first time it come out, and, anyhow, the real Treaty of Peace, so far as the plot and action is concerned, don't start till the second section."

"Could you remember any of the second section?" Abe asked.

"That's the section which tells about how much territory Germany gives up to Poland, France, Belgium, and Denmark, and after it goes into effect, Abe, it is going to considerably alter the words, if not the music, of '_Deutschland, Deutschland, ueber Alles_,'" Morris declared. "It also means, Abe, that the school-boys who used to was geography sharks and could bound Germany right off the reel, Abe, would now got to learn them boundaries all over again and then take half an hour or so to tell what they've learned. You see, Abe, the Danzig area, for instance, consists of a V made a W by the addition of a similar V on the west, including the city of Danzig and--"

"Excuse me," Abe interrupted, "but this here sounds like a clothing alteration to me, which, if Germany's boundary was made smaller, why did they got to put a couple of V's into it?"

"The V's was put into Poland's boundary, not Germany's," Morris said.

"And I bet that Poland breathes a whole lot easier now that her boundary has got a couple of V's in it," Abe commented.

"Them two V's ain't all Poland gets," Morris continued. "She also gets the southeastern tip of Silesia beyond and including Oppeln, most of Posen and West Prussia, and a line is drawn from--"

"That's all right," Abe said. "I'll take your word for it, Mawruss, because, while that might be music to some people's ears, when it comes to geography I couldn't tell one note from another. So go ahead and tell me what is in the next section."

"The next section is also got in it a little complicated geography, Abe," Morris said. "It practically repeats what was said in the last section about how much territory Germany gives up, and then proceeds to rub it in. You know, of course, about the Sarre Basin."

"I _say_ I do, but don't let that stop you," Abe replied. "Go ahead and describe it to me just like as if I didn't."

"Well, to make a long story short before I tell it, Abe," Morris said, "the Sarre Valley, which in Germany is like the Scranton and Wilkes-Barre section in Pennsylvania, is to be practically owned by France for fifteen years. At the end of that time, an election is going to be held and the people will vote as to whether they want to stay French or go back to Germany."

"And I suppose France will count the votes," Abe commented, "in which case she will probably appoint a board of elections consisting of whoever happens to be the Philadelphia director of public safety at that time, the leader of the Eighth Assembly District of New York City, and a couple of Chicago aldermen, Mawruss."

"The Treaty of Peace don't provide for it," Morris said, "but if any odds are quoted on the Curb, Abe, it wouldn't be on the result, but the size of the majority. There is also the same kind of an election to be held in Schleswig-Holstein, without much chance of a recount taking place, either, but so far as the rest of Sections Three, Four, and Five is concerned, Abe, Germany gives up all her interests in every part of the world without the privilege of even having all those in favor please saying Aye, y'understand."

"It would have made a big noise, anyhow," Abe declared. "Because the only people who ain't in favor of Germany giving up her colonies is Germans, and not _all_ Germans at that."

"However, what happens to Germany in the first five sections of this here Peace Treaty, Abe, is only, so to speak, the soup and entrée of the meal which the Allies makes of her," Morris said. "Section Six is where the real knife-and-fork work begins, Abe, which it starts right in with the German army and reduces it to the size of the Salvation Army, exclusive of the doughnut-cooking department."

"I'm surprised that you should compare the Salvation Army to a low-life army like the German army," Abe protested.

"I am only talking for the sake of argument, Abe," Morris assured him, "which if this here Section Six is carried out, Abe, the new German army wouldn't be armed with anything near as dangerous as doughnuts. In fact, Abe, the way this here Peace Treaty specifies what arms and ammunition the German army should be supplied with, the only thing that it would got to remind it that it is an army and not a _Sängerbund_ would be the uniforms."

"And I am surprised that the Peace Treaty didn't forbid uniforms also, Mawruss," Abe said, "because if it wouldn't of been for his uniforms, Mawruss, the chances is that the German people would of caught on to that miserable four-flusher of a Kaiser already long since ago, Mawruss. Take these here spiked helmets, in particular the ones which is made of nickel plate, Mawruss, and only to wear such a thing is liable to bring out all the meanness in them naturally mean German soldiers, Mawruss, so therefore I am in favor that the Peace Treaty be amended by providing that the uniform of the German army should be a three-button, black, single-breasted sack suit with no padding in the shoulders, Mawruss, and the helmet should be a brown derby hat of the pattern of 1898, and that the soldiers agree to wear this derby hat, of the same block and width of brim, for at least twenty years, Mawruss, because nothing takes the conceit out of a man so much as wearing a funny-looking hat, y'understand."

"This here Peace Treaty don't need no outside assistance when it comes to taking the conceit out of the German army, and the navy, neither, Abe," Morris continued. "In fact, Section Six does the same to the German navy as you would like to do to the German army, excepting that, instead of derby hats, it refers to battle-ships. In other words, Abe, it says that the German navy should have only six small battle-ships and that none of them could be replaced inside of twenty years. Just consider for a moment how it feels for a speed-bug which once used to consider that if he didn't buy himself every three months a new special-body twin six, y'understand, that he was living pretty close to the cushion, and condemn such a feller to go round for the next twenty years in a four-cylinder 1910-model Punkocar, Abe, and you will get some small idea of what Admiral von Tirpitz and all them other bloodthirsty German admirals feels when they read that part of Section Six which refers to the new German navy."

"That wasn't the way they used to feel," Abe declared. "Up to a few days ago, Mawruss, von Tirpitz and Hindenburg and all them other German army and navy experts was treating this war like it would of been a pinochle game, and each of them was busy explaining by post-mortems how if his partner hadn't played the hand rotten they would have won by three points, not counting the last trick, but what are you going to do with a _Strohschneider_ like that, and so forth."

"Did they mention anything about playing with marked cards?" Morris asked.

"They did not," Abe said, "nor did they say anything about having stacked the cards or dealing off of the bottom of the deck, Mawruss, but you would think from the way them fellers acted at Versailles, Mawruss, that this here Peace Conference is the breakup of a nice little friendly game, y'understand, and that _not_ only should the winners take I. O. U's. from the losers, but that it is also up to the winners to serve a good delicatessen supper and pay for the lights and attendance."

"That must have been before they heard about the _capora_ which is in store for them under Section Seven of this here Peace Treaty, Abe," Morris said, "which in order that there shouldn't be any softening of the sound to them German cauliflower ears, Abe, the words _one billion_ ain't used at all, but instead it speaks about a thousand million pounds, Abe, and, while it ain't any harder to raise than one billion pounds, it certainly gives you the impression that it is."

"And how many of these thousands of millions of pounds must the German people got to pay before they get through?" Abe asked.

"That the Peace Treaty don't say, Abe," Morris replied. "It leaves the fixing of the total amount for a commission to be appointed later, Abe, and the German people will be notified of their liabilities not later than May 1, 1921; but in the mean time, Abe, just to keep up their spirits they would got to pay a few instalments of one thousand million pounds each."

"But if the instalments is one thousand million pounds each, Mawruss, what do you think will be the grand total which Germany would have to pay?" Abe asked.

"About the same grand total as the Allies would have been obliged to pay if Germany had won," Morris replied.

"And how much would that have been?" Abe inquired.

"All they could raise, Abe," Morris concluded, "plus ten per cent."

XVI

THE GERMAN ROMAN HOLIDAY AND THE AMERICANIZATION OF AMERICANS

"I was speaking to my wife's sister's boy which he is just getting ready to gradgawate from High School, Mawruss, and I wish you could hear the way that feller talks, Mawruss," Abe Potash said to his partner, Morris Perlmutter.

"I shall probably got to have that pleasure, Abe," Morris Perlmutter replied, "because the first thing your wife's relations does when they gradgawate from school or go broke, as the case may be, is to get a job in this place and the second thing they do is to get fired."

"Listen, Mawruss," Abe said, "if I would of given jobs in this place to the number of relations by marriage which you already stuck me with, y'understand, I might just so well run a free business college and be done with it, which what I was going to say was that this here young feller was telling me that in the old days when the Romans won a war the way the Allies did, they used to make the losers walk in a parade so that the Roman people could see how them losers suffered."