to confess that there wasn't much between them. His son expressed the
same thought by regretting that his father "did not speak his language."

So, in the winter vacation when Payson, Sr., fagged from his long day at
the office sought the "Frolics" or the "Folies," Payson, Jr., might be
seen at a concert for the harpsichord and viola, or at an evening of
Palestrina or the Earlier Gregorian Chants. Had he been less
supercilious about it this story would never have been written--and
doubtless no great loss at that. But it is the prerogative of youth to
be arrogantly merciless in its judgment of the old. Its bright lexicon
has no verdict "with mitigating circumstances." Youth is just when it is
right; it is cruel when it is wrong; and it is inexorable in any case.
If we are ever to be tried for our crimes let us have juries of white
whiskered old boys who like tobacco, crab flakes, light wines and
musical comedy.

All of which leads up to the sad admission upon our part that Payson,
Jr., was a prig. And in the very middle of his son's priggishness
Payson, Sr., up and died, and Tutt and Mr. Tutt were called upon to
administer his estate.

There may be concealed somewhere a few rare human beings who can look
back upon their treatment of their parents with honest satisfaction. I
have never met any. It is the fate of those who bring others into the
world to be chided for their manners, abused for their mistakes, and
pilloried for their faults. Twenty years difference in age turns many
an elegance into a barbarism; many a virtue into a vice-versa. I do not
perform at breakfast for the edification of my offspring upon the
mustache cup, but I chew my strawberry seeds, which they claim is worse.
My grandpapa and grandmama used to pour the coffee from their cups and
drink it from their saucers and they were--nevertheless--rated AA1 in
Boston's Back Bay Blue Book. And now my daughters, who smoke cigarettes,
object loudly to my pipe smoke! _Autre temps autres manieres_. And no
man is a hero to his children. He has a hanged-sight more chance with
his valet--if in these days he can afford to keep one.

His father's death was a shock to Payson, Jr., because he had not
supposed that people in active business like that ever did die,--they
"retired" instead, and after a discreet period of semi-seclusion
gradually disintegrated by appropriate stages. But Payson, Sr., simply
died right in the middle of everything--without any chance of a