ts they'd have the nerve to
carry on that way?" sez he.

"Rights!" sez I. "They didn't have to have rights--they had mothers."

Well, that set him back a good ways, an' by the time he had thought up
some new stuff I was asleep; but he shook me awake an' sez, "Of course
the child's mother will do all she can; but supposin' she ain't got
what the child wants--how'll she explain it to him?"

"She won't bother explainin' nothin' to a baby," sez I. "She'll just
send the old man out to get it."

He looked sort o' disgusted like, as if he wasn't used to arguin' with
a man what could handle logic an' make points. "You're just like the
rest," sez he. "What I mean is, that every man who has ever been on
earth is just sort of an overseer for them what is yet to come. We have
the right to use everything we want in the right way, but we haven't
any right to waste it or destroy it, or hog it up so that all can't
enjoy it. Why, when you start to savin' an' draw in what ought to be
circulatin', you steal from them what haven't had the chance 'at you've
had. It's wicked to be thrifty."

"Well, you're the craziest one I've seen yet," sez I, laughin'. "Why,
if you had your way you'd utterly ruin business."

"Business!" he yells, gettin' excited. "Do you know what business is?"

I thought a moment. "I don't know all the' is to know about it," sez I,
"but I expect to give it a fair good work-out before I'm through with
it."

"Business," he sez, leanin' across the table an' hittin' it with his
finger-nail, "business is simply havin' the laws fixed so you can steal
without havin' to pay any fine. What is business? Ain't it figgerin'
an' schemin' to get away from a man whatever he happens to have? That's
nothin' but stealin'."

"Confound you," sez I, "do you mean to say that just because I'm goin'
to engage in business I'm a thief?"

He looked at me a moment an' then he shook his head. "No," he sez, "you
won't never be that kind, you'll be some other kind; but that's about
all business is--just thievery. Why, I once knew two men 'at was the
best friends 'at ever lived; an' they just ruined their lives 'cause
they couldn't resist the temptation of each tryin' to grab all. It was
over the Creole Belle--"

"Yes, but she was a woman!" I yells, jumpin' to my feet, an' leanin'
over the table.

"No, it was a mine," sez he, sittin' still.

"A Creole is a cross-breed woman 'at came from New Orleans," sez I;
"an' when they're good looki