you
know, or think you know, more political and social science than he does.
Where you got your preposterously exaggerated idea of the value of
text-book science I am at a loss to understand. The people you aspire to
lead--for that is what an editorial writer must do--care nothing for it.
That tired bricklayer whom you dismiss with such contempt of course
cares nothing for it. But that bricklayer is the People, Mr. Queed. He
is the very man that Colonel Cowles goes to, and puts his hand on his
shoulder, and tries to help--help him to a better home, better education
for his children, more and more wholesome pleasures, a higher and
happier living. Colonel Cowles thinks of life as an opportunity to live
with and serve the common, average, everyday people. You think of it as
an opportunity to live by yourself and serve your own ambition. He
writes to the hearts of the people. You write to the heads of
scientists. Doubtless it will amaze you to be told that his paragraph on
the death of Moses Page, the Byrds' old negro butler, was a far more
useful article in every way than your long critique on the currency
system of Germany which appeared in the same issue. Colonel Cowles is a
big-hearted human being. You--you are a scientific formula. And the
worst of it is that _you're proud of it!_ The hopeless part of it is
that you actually consider a few old fossils as bigger than the live
people all around you! How can I show you your terrible mistake?... Why,
Mr. Queed, the life and example of a little girl ..." she stopped,
rather precipitately, stared hard at her hands, which were folded in her
lap, and went resolutely on: "The life and example of a little girl like
Fifi are worth more than all the text-books you will ever write."

A silence fell. In the soft lamplight of the pretty room, Queed sat
still and silent as a marble man; and presently Sharlee, plucking
herself together, resumed:--

"Perhaps you now begin to glimpse a wider difference between yourself
and Colonel Cowles than mere unlikeness of literary style. If you
continue to think this difference all in your own favor, I urge you to
abandon any idea of writing editorials for the _Post_. If on the other
hand, you seriously wish to make good your boast of this morning, I urge
you to cease sneering at men like Colonel Cowles, and humbly begin to
try to imitate them. I say that you are a failure as an editorial writer
because you are a failure as a man, and I say that y