ll the milk she
furnishes. There is quite a book-account in her name, and John has a
good time figuring out whether, judged by net results, she is a
consumer or a producer. If I can resurrect sufficient mathematical
lore, I think I shall try to apply this efficiency test to my three
hours just to see if I can prove that hours are as important as cows.
I ought to be able, somehow, to determine whether these hours are
consumers or producers.

I read a book the other evening whose title is "Stories of Thrift for
Young Americans," and it made me feel that I ought to apply the
efficiency test to myself, and repeat the process every waking hour
of the day. But, in order to do this, I must apply the test to these
three hours. In my dreamy moods, I like to personify an Hour and
spell it with a capital. I like to think of an hour as the singular
of Houri which the Mohammedans call nymphs of paradise, because they
were, or are, beautiful-eyed. My Hour then becomes a goddess walking
through my life, and, as the poet says, _et vera incessu patuit dea_.
If I show her that I appreciate her she comes again just after the
clock strikes, in form even more winsome than before, and smiles upon
me as only a goddess can. Once, in a sullen mood, I looked upon her
as if she were a hag. When she returned she was a hag; and not till
after I had done full penance did she become my beautiful goddess
again.

A young man who had been spending the evening in the home of a
neighbor complained that they did not play any games, and did nothing
but talk. I could not ask what games he meant, fearing that I might
smile in his face if he should say crokinole, tiddledy-winks, or
button-button. Later on I learned that much of the talking was done
that evening by a very cultivated man who has travelled widely and
intelligently, and has a most engaging manner in his fluent
discussions of art, literature, archaeology, architecture, places,
and peoples. I was sorry to miss such an evening, and think I could
forego tiddledywinks with a fair degree of amiability if, instead, I
could hear such a man talk. I have seen people yawn in an art
gallery. I fear to play tiddledywinks lest my hour may resume the
guise of a hag. But that makes me think of Atropos again, and the
joke I am planning to play on her. Still, I see that I shall not
soon get around to that joke if I persist in these dim generalities,
as a schoolmaster is so apt to do.

Well, as I