d bet your life, Mawruss, he made it an even break for
the supply people as well as for the demand people."

"And what has all this got to do with setting the clock ahead one hour
in summer, Abe, which was what you was talking about in the first
place?" Morris demanded.

"Nothing, except that setting the clock ahead so as to save bills for
gas and electric light and limiting the price of coal so as the public
couldn't be gouged by the coal operators, so far as I could see, is two
dead open and shut propositions, Mawruss," Abe said, "which of course I
admit that I'm an ignorant man and don't know no more laws than a
police-court lawyer, y'understand, but at the same time, Mawruss, I must
got to say the way it looks to me it ain't the ignorant men which is
blocking the speed of this war. For instance, who is it when Mr. Hoover
wants to have millions of bushels wheat by using whole-wheat bread that
says whole-wheat bread irritates the lining from the elementry canal?
The ignorant man? _Oser!_ He don't know the elementry canal from the
Panama Canal, and if he did he couldn't tell you whether elementry
canals came lined with Skinner's satin or mohair or just plain unlined
with the seams felled. Then, again, who is it that when _any_ order is
made by the government which is meant to help along the war takes it
like a personal insult direct from Mr. Wilson? The ignorant man? No,
Mawruss, it's the feller which thinks that what's the use of having an
education if you couldn't seize every opportunity of putting up an
argument and using all the long words you've got in your system."

"All right, Abe," Morris said. "I'm converted. Rather as sit here and
waste the whole morning I'm content that you should pass a law saving
daylight if you want to."

[Illustration: "For instance, who is it that says whole-wheat bread
irritates the lining from the elementry canal? The ignorant man?
_Oser!_"]

"Don't do me no favors, Mawruss," Abe commented.

"And while you're about it, Abe," Morris concluded, "if you couldn't
save it otherwise, have the legislature pass another law that people
should save something else for the duration of the war which they
ordinarily couldn't live without."

"What's that?" Abe asked.

"Breath," Morris said.

XXIII

POTASH AND PERLMUTTER DISCUSS WHY IS A PLAY-GOER?

"Did you see on the front page of all the newspapers this morning where
Klaw & Erlanger has had another split with the Shuberts, Ma