'll be all right to-morrow, and
I'll enjoy to-morrow all the more for to-day's megrim. But for the
present, I repeat, this is a weary world."

"Oh, I don't think so," observed the School-master. "The world doesn't
seem to me to betray any signs of weariness. It got to work at the usual
hour this morning, and, as far as I can judge, has been revolving at the
usual rate of speed ever since."

"The Idiot's mistake is a common one," put in the Doctor. "I find it
frequently in my practice."

"That's a confession," retorted the Idiot. "Do you find out these
mistakes in your practice before or after the death of the patient?"

"That mistake," continued the Doctor, paying apparently little heed to
the Idiot's remark--"that mistake lies in the Idiot's assumption that
he is himself the world. He regards himself as the earth, as all of
life, and, because he happens to be weary, the world is a weary one."

"It isn't a fatal disease, is it?" queried the Idiot, anxiously. "I am
not likely to become so impressed with that idea, for instance, that I
shall have to be put in a padded cell and manacled so that I may not
turn perpetual handsprings under the hallucination that, being the
world, it is my duty to revolve?"

"No," replied the Doctor, with a laugh. "No, indeed. That is not at all
likely to happen, but I think it would be a good idea if you were to
carry the hallucination out far enough to put a cake of ice on your
head, assuming that to be the north pole, and cool off that brain of
yours."

"That is a good idea," returned the Idiot; "and if Mary will bring me
the ice that was used to cool the coffee this morning, I shall be
pleased to try the experiment. Meanwhile, this is a weary world."

"Then why under the canopy don't you leave it and go to some other
world?" snapped Mr. Pedagog. "You are under no obligation to remain
here. With a river on either side of the city, and a New York Juggernaut
Company, Unlimited, running trolley-cars up and down two of our more
prominent highways, suicide is within the reach of all. Of course, we
should be sorry to lose you, in a way, but I have known men to recover
from even greater afflictions than that."

"Thank you for the suggestion," replied the Idiot, transferring four
large, porous buckwheat-cakes to his plate. "Thank you very much, but I
have a pleasanter and more lingering method of suicide right here. Death
by buckwheat-cakes is like being pierced by a Toledo blade. You do