Chapter V: Part 5

“Don’t mind me,” I said, pouncing on the carte du jour of the Café aux Oranges. “In Paris I am equally content as you to forget it--that I am American. _Alors_, Marcel!--it will be hors d’œuvres variés, and then an omelette fines herbes, and then, I think, an assiette anglaise with a bit of salad, eh? and a Camembert, to finish.”

Marcel regarded me solemnly--consideringly--from over the wide block rims of his glasses. “But yes, m’sieu,” he said at last, grudgingly, “I suppose that it can go, as a breakfast. And monsieur drinks----?”

“Beer,” I was suddenly occupied with an extraordinarily pretty girl in the orangier opposite, “demibrune, Marcel.”

“Pardon, m’sieu, demiblonde--er--I--a thousand pardons, m’sieu!” Confused, the old fellow brought his eyes back from the same direction; made a violent effort to blush, and hurried off, murmuring, “demibrune, m’sieu, it is understood!”

I looked again at the girl. Even for the Café aux Oranges, where in spring, like this, there are as many pretty girls as blossoms on the chestnut trees above the little tables,--she was extraordinarily pretty. And she was American. One knew that by the upholstered shoulders of the young man and the shopping-bag of the lady, who were with her. The lady was frowning over the menu.

“I will not come here again!” she was heard to say, in a voice with as many corners as her shopping bag. “The second time this week--no roast beef! I’ll not come again. It’s a cheap place.”

“But, mamma” (by straining one’s ears, one could just get the low response of the pretty girl) “it’s a very nice place, really! And don’t you know it is one of the very few old cafés of the Quarter--the old French cafés--Roger told us?”

“Roger!” exploded the lady (there was no difficulty in hearing her). “If Roger knew less about cafés, it would be a great deal better for----”

Marcel returned with the hors d’œuvres. But not before I had seen a thin smile overtake the features of the heavy-shouldered young man.

“Who are they?” I asked Marcel, carelessly enough.

With a thump he set down the radishes. “They, m’sieu?” Scornfully, “they are Americans who are come since m’sieu went away. While m’sieu was in Italy they came to live in the Rue Vavin, near by. They are friends of Monsieur Roger Elmont--_ce beau garçon!_ But mademoiselle is an angel--but of a goodness! Only last Sunday she gave me two francs ten, and always when she takes coffee here in the evening--but she is very good for me.”

“And the others? The mother and brother?”

“Pah! what would you? _Canaille!_--tourists--but it is not her brother, m’sieu. It is the _futur_ of mademoiselle, _saints dieux_!”

“Not possible! But are you sure, Marcel? How do you know?”

“Listen, m’sieu”--he lowered his voice--“m’sieu eats his crevettes, and I shall recount to him: listen. A month ago, before one began to take the repasts outside at Café aux Oranges, there came one evening these three and Monsieur Roger. They are gay--but of a gaiety! They order dinner and--_mais si!_ champagne _and_ champagne--first Monsieur Roger, then this young man, Stuart, he calls himself, I think. This Monsieur Stuart, of champagne he himself orders two bottles. But they are friendly, he and Monsieur Roger; they are like brothers.

“Then--I am serving them, I and Little-John--all of a sudden something happens. Something is said--I am out, searching their dessert, I do not hear. But Little-John hears, and he murmurs to me, stupidly in high voice as he always does, ‘it is the _futur_ of Mademoiselle, that one with the made shoulders. Madame has come from telling Monsieur Roger.’ This, then, is the cause of the quick silence, and of Monsieur Roger’s pale face, and mademoiselle’s blushes--ah, but she is beautiful, mademoiselle; m’sieu finds her brunette! For myself, to me she seems blonde. Such blue eyes and the skin so white, like camelia, though certainly her hair----”

“Never mind,” I said, buttering a heel of bread, “I can see her hair.”

“But perfectly, m’sieu. I was saying, Monsieur Roger is all of a surprise with the news. He has not known mademoiselle is engaged. But yes, says madame with victory, since two months--since the ship in which they came from America. This--how you say?--Chames? Chames Stuart was on that ship. Madame is an intimate of M. Stuart’s mother. To Monsieur Roger, madame tells with what singular air of _double entendre_, this Chames Stuart is a man to be trusted. A _good_ man. Monsieur Roger throws back his head and laughs--very long.

“But, m’sieu, I do not like to hear that laugh. Myself, I am foolish for Monsieur Roger, like all the rest at Café aux Oranges, more than all the other _garçons_ I am foolish for him. Do I not know him since he came, poor obscure student, five years ago? But of a certainty! And that laugh, it is not the laugh of Monsieur Roger--rich, successful, _grand artiste_. No! it is a laugh that hides tears, suffering maybe. I do not know. Surely it makes me regard Monsieur Roger more closely, while he says, with what _legereté_, ‘but certainly madame! one knows that you would give Julie to none but a good man--that you would assure yourself as to his goodness.’

“Then, while mademoiselle and Chames Stuart sip their coffee, madame speaks to him severely. I understand but meagerly English, m’sieu knows, I attrap a word here and there--of girls and student balls and the gay life of the Quartier that has embroiled Monsieur Roger. Truly, m’sieu, he has always seemed to me a brave young man, _ce beau garçon_, not at all a mean young man or of _mauvais sang_, like some who come here; but he has been young, parbleu! The saints be thanked, he has been young. Yet with that does Madame reproach him, in low tones. Monsieur Roger’s mother, madame says, has heard of his follies but too often; her heart is broken. ‘Nor can your success repair it,’ adds madame with harshness. ‘All Baltimore knows of your wild affairs and your mother’s shame.’ M’sieu, I do not know who is this Baltimore, but I think he must be droll, if he is shocked at Monsieur Roger’s _folies de jeunesse_. _N’est ce pas?_ But certainly, m’sieu--the omelette!”

When he had brought it, “M’sieu does not ennui himself? M’sieu permits that I go on?”

“Go on,” I said--looking at the wide blue eyes of the girl in the orangier opposite.

“That evening passes itself. I do not know why, mademoiselle--the blush once gone--looks pale and _distraite_. She speaks quite gay and very fast, yet--why she is sad one can but imagine. This Chames Stuart, he is scarcely of a beauty, _hein_? A beauty like Monsieur Roger with his black hair and his gay smile and his figure like--Dame! But I am foolish for Monsieur Roger, all the Café knows. And he, what does he do? He says good-night with _empressement_, formally, and hopes he may have the pleasure of seeing these ladies again very soon. With Chames Stuart he shakes hands--yet more formally. They separate.

“Second chapter, it is--what do you think, m’sieu? Mademoiselle and Monsieur Roger _alone_! But of a surety! They come in one warm afternoon and order tea--but they come inside and far over in one corner, and mademoiselle glances about, nervously and says, ‘Oh, Roger, it is rash! It is wrong--I ought not to have come.’ But he soothes her--_Mon Dieu_: what a voice: what strength--what tenderness divine! The emotion a young girl must feel for him--one can but imagine--he soothes her and tells her it was of a necessity for him, this little hour alone with her.

“‘For I was to have married you, Julie, you know,’ he says sadly. ‘Our mothers planned it when you were a little girl in--how you say, m’sieu? pinafore? and I a clumsy boy in knickers. Have you forgotten?’

“‘No,’ says mademoiselle with a little sigh; ‘but--they say _you_ did. They say--mamma and your mother too--that you forgot everything but what you should have forgotten; that you flung your name and the reputation of your family to the four winds, and cared for nothing but pleasure!--and dissipation and mad gaieties. They say!’ mademoiselle tells him with a break in her lovely voice, ‘that you aren’t fit to marry a young girl--that you would break her heart.’

“Monsieur Roger cursed--softly, under his breath. But I, m’sieu, heard him.

“‘Idiots!’ he mutters between his teeth. ‘Fools--prurient-minded canaille!--to fill a child’s head with such drivel. But it’s dangerous drivel.’ He turns to mademoiselle.--‘Listen, Julie,’ he says with what gentleness, ‘Americans have different ideas from ours over here. _They lead the same lives_,’ says Monsieur Roger bitterly, ‘but they have different ideas about those lives. They take trouble to conceal. Here in Paris, one lives as one lives,--openly. One is ashamed of nothing,--except meanness. I,’ says Monsieur Roger proudly, ‘am ashamed of nothing. I have been foolish, yes! wild. Did I not come here, a boy of twenty-one, from my mother and _Baltimore_ (I wonder what is this Baltimore, m’sieu?), from all the stupid conventions of a society that is nothing but _afraid_? _Of course_ I was wild; and the people we know, who came to Paris, would go back with great tales of my escapades.’

“Monsieur Roger folds his arms suddenly. ‘Julie,’ he says with earnestness, ‘I am ready to tell you anything--answer any question you may care to put, about my life here in Paris.’

“Mademoiselle looks frightened--confused. Also she reddens,--she is of a youth, enchanting!

“‘But, Roger,’ she says timidly, ‘I would not know how to ask you questions. I----’

“‘Then listen,’ he says, leaning forward until his black eyes stare into her blue ones; ‘I could tell you almost anything, and you would believe me, Julie?’

“‘Yes,’ says mademoiselle faintly.

“‘I could tell you no, I have not been all these things--I have not drunk much nor gambled nor lost at cards, as they all say, nor--had flirtations with women. I could tell you that, couldn’t I, and you would believe me?’

“‘Ye-es,’ mademoiselle says--yet more faintly.

“‘Well, I tell you nothing of the sort! I tell you, yes, Julie--I have done all these things; I have been wild and extravagant, and what you call dissipated, perhaps. I have been all these; but since how long? and to whose harm--except my own? Can you find me a man in the Quarter who will tell you that, since a year, I have been anything but what you see me now--sane and keen for my work? Can you find me a woman who will tell you that since a year she has seen me anywhere but drinking coffee in some place like this--or that ever, in all the five years, I was anything but gentle and courteous to her? You cannot, Julie!’ cries Monsieur Roger passionately, ‘you cannot!’

“Mademoiselle Julie is trembling--and there are tears in her blue eyes.

“‘With you,’ declares Monsieur Roger, ’as with all the world--Paris, Baltimore, all!--I am what I am. I seek to be nothing else. But I think you have never quite understood what I am--is it not so?’

“Mademoiselle shakes her head. She is overcome--_pauv’ petite!_--But m’sieu is famishing! M’sieu’s _assiette anglaise_--an instant!”

He hurried back with it, and stood anxiously mixing my salad dressing--though his sharp old eyes strayed sometimes to the trio in the orangier opposite. “After that,” he went on triumphantly, “Monsieur Roger is bold--but of a boldness! He takes mademoiselle’s hand--they have no shame whatever over the tea which is still in the pot!--and says to her with a simplicity that alarms, ‘tell me--do you love this Chames Stuart?’

“‘Love him?’ almost screams mademoiselle. ‘Are you out of your mind?’

“‘Then,’ says Monsieur Roger, with the air of a King of France, ‘I’m going to marry you. It is decided. You have nothing more to say about it.’

“Mademoiselle blushes divinely--leans a suspicion towards him. They sigh--ah, youth enchanting! What they feel one can but imagine. He kisses her hand--of me they are oblivious; until--I cough like one in the throes of sudden death. They start apart. _Madame_ has entered! And Chames Stuart!

“I wring my hands and babble Holy Mary’s. In such a case what can one do that is practical? Nothing. I wait--in terror for Monsieur Roger and mademoiselle. But Monsieur Roger speaks, with a calm supernal, ‘Will you not have tea, madame?’ he demands, offering her his place all politely. But she--madame--sweeps by him. Catches mademoiselle by the arm. ‘I thought this,’ she cries--‘when I missed you! I suspected it, you ungrateful girl! Perhaps when you hear that you are to be married next week at the Consulate, and to Chames Stuart’--then she does look at Monsieur Roger, and with scorn. Chames Stuart looks at Monsieur Roger too--and gives a little smile. It is like his shoulders, that smile, m’sieu--made up and put on. When I see this Chames Stuart, I feel like Bibi, our café dog, who shows her teeth at him. Madame says he is a good man--_tant pis!_ For myself, if it is true, I prefer a devil.

“The three go out, mademoiselle looks at Monsieur Roger not at all. She looks very far away from him. And Monsieur Roger is left with the pot of tea--that has grown cold. When I ask him shall I renew it, he says ‘to be married next week! And to Chames Stuart!’ And then he laughs one laugh--very short--‘Indeed!’ he says--throwing back his head like he does--‘indeed!’ And he marches out of the café, with two steps--but he has legs, Monsieur Roger!--forgetting to pay--everything. But I do not worry, m’sieu. I know, when he comes to-morrow, he will give me the two francs fifty--and something more. He is very good for me, Monsieur Roger.

“_Enfin_, that was two weeks ago. And still mademoiselle is not married. But _hèlas_, it approaches. Yesterday when madame came with her alone, I heard madame say, ‘Monday--not a day later.’ And I know that it is because of money difficulties that she is anxious. Chames Stuart has much money. So has Monsieur Roger, but not so much as Chames Stuart, and, as madame insists to mademoiselle, Monsieur Roger is not good. One day--yesterday--mademoiselle cried out, ‘Oh, how do you know what is good and what is not good? What matters is what is true!’ Madame is shocked--horrified at this temper. And after an instant mademoiselle apologizes--with meekness--_Pauv’ petite!_ What she feels, one can but imagine.”

He gave me my cheese, and stared gloomily at the back of Chames Stuart’s sandy head. “Monday!” I heard him mutter, belligerently. Then to me--“But where then is Monsieur Roger? Only now does mademoiselle whisper to me if he has been here--Monsieur Roger. Since that day when he comes to pay for the tea, he is not here. I think he tries somewhere to console himself, but I do not tell mademoiselle. A young girl cannot understand such things.”

“Then she should,” I declared with a warmth that surprised myself--forty, and inclined to take young girls and the rest of life negligently. “It is because young girls don’t understand such things better, that they let themselves be overruled by James Stuarts and mammas with empty shopping-bags,” I snapped, to the wonder of old Marcel.

My eyes just then had met the troubled blue of the girl’s--the three were leaving. James Stuart took her arm, always with that thin, satisfied smile. I glared at him. I do not like good young men with padded shoulders, and a smile for features. I grumbled as much to Marcel, who shook his head astonished (delighted, too) at my vehemence. “Madame tells mademoiselle there is nothing in his life which this Chames Stuart might not tell to her,” he said scornfully. “That no one has seen him or heard of him doing anything to be condemned. _Eh! la! la!_” The Frenchman rolled his eyes. “_C’est un drôle d’idéale, hein_ m’sieu? These Americans!--pardon, m’sieu! M’sieu’s hat? _À ce soir_, alors, m’sieu.”

That evening at dinner he came up to my table, with an air of tremendous excitement. Indeed the whole Café aux Oranges seemed curiously alert, almost explosive. Mademoiselle Julie and her mother were there in their corner, sipping _petits verres_--mademoiselle’s cheeks the color of jacqueminots, to be sure, and madame’s with more corners than ever--if possible. But what caught my attention was--heaven of heavens!--Roger Elmont sitting directly opposite them, _between Margot and Suzette_! the two madcaps of the Quarter! James Stuart was not in the café.

“But, m’sieu, listen--listen while I tell you,” old Marcel’s words tumbled over themselves in his eagerness--“M’sieu has dined, _hein_? M’sieu takes only coffee and his liqueur? Listen, then, m’sieu: these ladies, they come in alone. They order dinner--which mademoiselle will scarcely touch. She is miserable, she is without herself. At last she says with a bitterness that is to break the heart, ‘If it’s only the money, Roger has plenty; and I am going to tell him to-night that if it’s true, what he says about his life this last year, and if he can prove to you that it’s true, I will marry him. Chames Stuart,’ says mademoiselle--but with a calm--‘can go back to America.’

“Madame is furious. ‘But,’ she repeats, ‘he cannot prove it--Roger can never prove it, that he has been good this last year.’

“‘_I_ can,’ flashes mademoiselle with a defiance, mon Dieu, divine! ‘We can prove it. Only wait and----’

“M’sieu, at this heart-rending moment, I ask you does not Monsieur Roger come in! Monsieur Roger and” (Marcel groaned in anguish) “that mad Suzette!--arm in arm, singing, laughing--m’sieu, I, the old _garçon de café_, Marcel, want to perish! And, can you believe me, they do not see those ladies, no! But--_nom de Dieu!_--another sees them! Margot--the vixen--who was mad for Monsieur Roger all last year; Margot sees them. She makes a rush--she leaves her escort--she insults Suzette--tears her hat off. They scream! they pull each other’s hair--the café is of a _furore_! And Monsieur Roger, he only laughs--he just laughs, and teases those girls to wilder and wilder rage.

“Still he does not see mademoiselle--_pauv’ petite_, so white, suddenly!--who begs to go; but madame will not permit her. Hard as iron she holds mademoiselle’s arm and _makes_ her see. ‘Now will you prove?’ she demands, with triumph. ‘Now can you prove?--this scandal!’ Mademoiselle answers nothing. She looks very little and very white. Now the patron has come in, peace is ruled, and Monsieur Roger with good nature promises to give both those girls dinner. But _ciel!_ m’sieu, at the instant, he has seen mademoiselle! It is tragedy. What will happen? It is just at the moment of m’sieu’s entrance that he perceived this--oh, poor young man! Is he desolated!--what he feels one can but imagine. I am bringing m’sieu’s liqueur.”

I glanced about. Mademoiselle Julie was indeed abject; nor did madame and her shopping-bag look too happy in their triumph. As for Roger Elmont--dark, gloomy-eyed, between the two now chattering girls--he looked, if anything, the most wretched of the three. All at once he rose, walked swiftly over to mademoiselle. They were sitting quite near me, to-night, and I heard him say in a firm voice, “Julie, I want to explain.”

“Sir!” said madame, indignantly. (One could have sworn she would say, ‘Sir!’)

Roger beautifully disregarded her. “What I told you was true, Julie,” he concentrated all the conviction of his black eyes on mademoiselle. “I have been this afternoon to the studio of a friend for whom Suzette poses. I was sad--God knows I had reason--she suggested we should come here. Margot--the other girl--came across us. And--you saw the rest. If you do not believe me, others will tell you--what I told you was true! And there is nothing else to tell--nothing.”

The girl looked at him--straight in the eyes. Then suddenly she stood up. “I believe you,” she said--with a smile for which I would give all the philosophy of forty and a bald head.

“Julie!” cried madame sharply. “You foolish girl, what do you mean?”

“I mean,” said Julie slowly, “that I am going to marry Roger.”

“You shan’t do it!” declared madame. By this time again the café was on the verge of uproar. “You are to marry James Stuart, who is a man of moral sense, a good man who----”

Just here, James Stuart came in--in evening dress, very debonair and with the smile. “Er--how de do?” he said feebly--seeing Roger.

Then some one saw him--and darted forward. “_C’est lui, c’est lui_,” screamed Suzette, seizing him with an impish laugh--“that one who was with me at the Olympia last night--with whom I did the tour of Montmartre. La! la! _ces anglais!_” And the minx kissed Chames Stuart loudly on both cheeks--before the outraged eyes of madame.

As for Roger Elmont--he looked steadily at madame.

Madame had shrunk back--for an instant crushed. Then she regained confidence, caught the girl’s hand. “Come,” she said in a voice choking with emotion, “come, Julie! Let us go, quickly--let us get out of this mire--this mud of Paris, where nothing seems to be clean or good. Come!”

But the girl--with a new gleam in her blue eyes--turned and gave her hand to Roger. “I think,” she said to her mother in a clear voice, “it is not the mud that counts, but the way one comes out of it.”

“And did you perceive, m’sieu,” chuckled Marcel--when later I was drinking their health in a _fine champagne_--“did you see that Chames Stuart had, fault of the wet evening, mud on his boots? Chames Stuart--that ‘good man,’ _eh nom d’un pipe_! These Americans--pardon, m’sieu!”

THE END

The Chalk Line

By Anne Warwick

Author of “The Unknown Woman,” “Victory Law,” etc.

_12mo, Cloth._ _$1.25 net_

“This dramatic story grips from the first page and holds tensely until at the end of the four days of quarantine comes the solution of a problem more than ordinarily complex.”

--_Boston Transcript_

“An interesting novel; the dialogue is easy and there is a great deal of clever character analysis.”--_New York Times_

“The situation is handled in an able and original manner, and the way in which it is finally solved provides an unexpected ending for a thoroughly engrossing and unusual story.”

--_Newark Evening News_

“It is all very clever, the dialogue, the character drawing, the development of the situation, the understanding which comes to all the persons concerned.”--_Buffalo Express_

“The story is unusual, both in sentiment and in circumstance. The dénouement is dramatically worked out.”

--_Philadelphia Public Ledger_

“When a woman, her past lover, her present lover and her husband are caught in the same house and quarantined for something like a fortnight, the reader will acknowledge that the situation is one requiring literary tact. After reading ‘The Chalk Line’ he will concede that Anne Warwick has done more with her material than he expected ... a story that is distinctly good.”--_Chicago Evening Post_

John Lane Company, _Publishers_, New York

Novels by Anne Warwick

VICTORY LAW

_12mo, Cloth, $1.30 net_

“Miss Warwick’s novel gives special emphasis to the fascination of the world behind the footlights; to the call of the stage ever ringing in the ears of those who have trodden its boards.... A delightful book.”

--_New York Times._

THE UNKNOWN WOMAN

_Colored Frontispiece by_ WILL GRÉFÉ

_12mo, Cloth, $1.30 net_

A society novel with a fresh, original touch, with scenes laid in New York and Italy. The story revolves around an artist who is almost ruined through catering to the vanity of a millionaire art patron, but is saved in the end by the scarlet woman.

COMPENSATION

_12mo, Cloth, $1.30 net_

“Anne Warwick’s problem novel has certain attributes that redeem it from the ordinary class of problematic tales. It is a study of social and political life in Washington, written with sincerity and earnestness of purpose. Some of the professional hangers-on in Washington society are humorously delineated and the more prominent characters are admirably drawn. From first to last the tale holds the undivided attention of the reader.”

--_Newark Evening News_

John Lane Company, New York

BOOKS BY STEPHEN LEACOCK

BEHIND THE BEYOND

AND OTHER CONTRIBUTIONS TO HUMAN KNOWLEDGE

_ILLUSTRATED BY A. H. FISH_

“In Mr. Stephen Leacock we have a humorist of very marked individuality. His new book, ‘Behind the Beyond,’ is undeniably mirth-provoking. Dull must be the soul who does not find something to laugh at in the five sketches called ‘Familiar Incidents’--visits to the photographer, the dentist, the barber, and so on.”

--_Boston Transcript._

“Out of apparently very abundant experience of life both off and on the stage, Mr. Leacock has presented an uncommonly clever satire on the modern problem play and some short stories of familiar happenings that are treated with a delightful sense of humor.”--_Baltimore Sun._

NONSENSE NOVELS

“A knack of story telling, a gift of caricature, and a full sense of humor are displayed in these ten nonsense novels.”

--_Washington Star._

“Even the most loyal admirers of Sherlock Holmes and his marvelous feats of induction and deduction will hardly grudge a smile of appreciation to Stephen Leacock.”--_New York Sun._

“Mr. Leacock bids fair to rival the immortal Lewis Carroll in combining the irreconcilable--exact science with perfect humor--and making the amusement better the instruction.”

--_Pall Mall Gazette._

LITERARY LAPSES

“This book deserves a wide reading, for it is spontaneous, fresh, and unforced.”--_Chicago Tribune._

“Philosophic humor, amusing and bubbling over with the froth of a delightful, good-natured cynicism.”

--_Philadelphia Public Ledger._

“Mr. Stephen Leacock is not only that very rare thing, a humorist, but that still rarer thing, a humorist in high spirits. A collection of good things which will entertain any human being who appreciates the humor of high spirits. The sketch entitled ‘How to be a Doctor’ no really serious medical student can afford to be without.”--_Onlooker (London)._

SUNSHINE SKETCHES OF A LITTLE TOWN

“Humor, unspoiled by irony, satire, or even the gentlest raillery, characterizes this book. And few books are more suitably entitled, for these sketches do shed into the cracks and crannies of the heart glorious sunshine, the companion of pure mirth.”--_Chicago Record-Herald._

“Mr. Leacock’s fun is always good-natured, and therefore doubly enjoyable.”--_New York Times._

“We cannot recall a more laughable book.”--_Pall Mall Gazette._

Arcadian Adventures

With the Idle Rich

BY

STEPHEN LEACOCK

Author of “Nonsense Novels,” “Sunshine Sketches,” etc.

_12mo_ _Cloth_ _$1.25 net_

“Mr. Leacock is always worth our while. He is a sharp-sighted, laughing philosopher.”--_New York Tribune._

“Whoever reads it must laugh, particularly if he reads it aloud.”

--_Boston Evening Transcript._

“He is able to analyse subjects that loom large in our public life and to illuminate the weak points in them with flashes of satire which are the more telling in that they are entirely good-natured.... The characters are deliciously conceived.”

--_New York Evening Post._

“Crisp conversation and paragraphs jammed with American sarcasm of the gilt-edged variety.... Mr. Leacock penetrates the upper-class sham and satirizes it cheerfully. This is almost certain to generate little chuckles and long smiles from the intelligent proletarian who treats himself to these adventures.”

--_Chicago Evening Post._

“Every one of the sketches is clever, humorous, but never unkind. An analytical gift of character reading is one of the salient attributes of Mr. Leacock’s style, and his present volume is one that will be seized with avidity and read with delight.”

--_Buffalo Express._

“A master of keen, pointed satire, a lover of a good laugh, a writer capable of dexterously holding up to the light the foibles, weaknesses, craftiness and guile of his fellow man and woman, is this Stephen Leacock, and never before has he exemplified all this so patently, and withal so artfully, as in the present volume.”

--_Cleveland Town Topics._

JOHN LANE COMPANY, _Publishers_, NEW YORK

“By all odds the most beautiful periodical printed.”--_New York Tribune._

The International Studio

_Subscription 50 cents per copy $5.00 per year_

_Three Months’ Trial Subscription $1.00_

Every number of the International Studio contains authoritative articles on the work of artists of established, as well as of rising, fame. The reader is kept informed of exhibitions, museums, galleries and studios in all the important art centres of the world. The illustrations, both in color and halftone, are unequalled in quantity and quality by any other periodical. The subjects discussed each month are: paintings, etchings, drawings, photography, sculpture, architecture, decorations, tapestries, rugs, textiles, furniture, embroideries, landscape architecture, stained glass, pottery and the numerous other handicrafts, etc. The International Studio has maintained its place as the leading art magazine in the English language ever since its first issue in March, 1897.

“It is a treasure house of everything of value in the way of
art.”--_Indianapolis Star._

“An art gallery in itself.”--_Brooklyn Eagle._

JOHN LANE COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK

Typographical errors corrected by the etext transcriber:

All the subleties=> All the subtleties {pg 24}

man would be a tryant=> man would be a tyrant {pg 37}