" boomed a voice within.

The two young men, it should be said, sat on the broad porch of Mitchell
House. The booming voice came from the library.

"Mustn't Francis Charles go to work?"

In the library a chair overturned with a crash. A startled silence; then
the sound of swift feet. Thompson came through the open French window; a
short man, with a long shrewd face and a frosted poll. Feigned anxiety
sat on his brow; he planted his feet firmly and wide apart, and twinkled
down at his young guests.

"Pardon me, Mr. Sedgwick--I fear I did not catch your words correctly.
You were saying--?"

Francis Charles brought his chair to level and spoke with great feeling:

"As our host, to whom our bright young lives have been entrusted for a
time--standing to us, as you do, almost as a locoed parent--I put it to
you--"

"Shut up!" roared Ferdie. "Thompson, you see this--this object? You hear
it? Mustn't it go to work?"

"Ab-so-lutissimusly!"

"I protest against this outrage," said Francis Charles. "Thompson, you're
beastly sober. I appeal to your better self. I am a philosopher. Sitting
under your hospitable rooftree, I render you a greater service by my
calm and dispassionate insight than I could possibly do by any ill-judged
activity. Undisturbed and undistracted by greed, envy, ambition, or
desire, I see things in their true proportion. A dreamy spectator of the
world's turmoil, I do not enter into the hectic hurly-burly of life; I
merely withhold my approval from cant, shams, prejudice, formulae,
hypocrisy, and lies. Such is the priceless service of the philosopher."

"Philosopher, my foot!" jeered Ferdie. "You're a brow! A solemn and
sanctimonious brow is bad enough, but a sprightly and godless brow is
positive-itutely the limit!"

"That's absurd, you know," objected Francis Charles. "No man is really
irreligious. Whether we make broad the phylactery or merely our minds, we
are all alike at heart. The first waking thought is invariably, What of
the day? It is a prayer--unconscious, unspoken, and sincere. We are all
sun worshipers; and when we meet we invoke the sky--a good day to you; a
good night to you. It is a highly significant fact that all conversation
begins with the weather. The weather is the most important fact in any
one day, and, therefore, the most important fact in the sum of our days.
We recognize this truth in our greetings; we propitiate the dim and
nameless gods of storm and sky; we reverence th