urkish cigarettes, for she's got such pretty curly hair; and
how sad it is that Daisy and Dan are going to separate, "but they do
say that he--sh! sh! hush; here she comes." Yet, when you come to wash
your pan of dirt, and the lies have all been carried off down the
flume, and you've got the color of the few particles of solid,
eighteen-carat truth left, you'll find it's the Sultan who's smoking
Turkish cigarettes; and that Mabel is trying cubebs for her catarrh;
and that the cashier of the Teenth National belongs to a whist club in
the suburbs and is the superintendent of a Sunday-school in the city;
and that Dan has put Daisy up to visiting her mother to ward off a
threatened swoop down from the old lady; and that the Czar hasn't done
a blame thing except to become the father of another girl baby.

It's pretty hard to know how to treat a lie when it's about yourself.
You can't go out of your way to deny it, because that puts you on the
defensive; and sending the truth after a lie that's got a running
start is like trying to round up a stampeded herd of steers while the
scare is on them. Lies are great travellers, and welcome visitors in a
good many homes, and no questions asked. Truth travels slowly, has to
prove its identity, and then a lot of people hesitate to turn out an
agreeable stranger to make room for it.

About the only way I know to kill a lie is to live the truth. When
your credit is doubted, don't bother to deny the rumors, but discount
your bills. When you are attacked unjustly, avoid the appearance of
evil, but avoid also the appearance of being too good--that is, better
than usual. A man can't be too good, but he can appear too good.
Surmise and suspicion feed on the unusual, and when a man goes about
his business along the usual rut, they soon fade away for lack of
nourishment. First and last every fellow gets a lot of unjust
treatment in this world, but when he's as old as I am and comes to
balance his books with life and to credit himself with the mean things
which weren't true that have been said about him, and to debit himself
with the mean things which were true that people didn't get on to or
overlooked, he'll find that he's had a tolerably square deal. This
world has some pretty rotten spots on its skin, but it's sound at the
core.

There are two ways of treating gossip about other people, and they're
both good ways. One is not to listen to it, and the other is not to
repeat it. Then there's