l be daamned!"

JARLEY'S EXPERIMENT

Jarley was an inventive genius. He invented things for the pleasure of
it rather than with any idea of ultimately profiting from the results of
his ingenuity, which may explain why it was that his friends deemed many
of his contrivances a sheer waste of time. Among other things that
Jarley invented was a tennis-racket which could be folded up and packed
away in a trunk. The fact that any ordinary tennis-racket could be
packed away in any ordinary trunk without being folded up was to Jarley
no good reason why he should not devote his energies to the production
of the compact weapon of sport which he called the Jarley Racket. He was
after novelty, and utility was always a secondary consideration with
him. Others of his inventions were somewhat more startling. "The Jarley
Ready Writing-Desk for Night Use," for instance, was a really
remarkable conception. Its chief value lay in the saving of gas and
midnight oil to impecunious writers which its use was said to bring
about, and when fully equipped consisted simply of a writing-table with
all the appliances and conveniences thereof treated with phosphorus in
such a manner that in the blackest of darkness they could all be seen
readily. The ink even was phosphorescent. The paper was luminous in the
dark. The penholders, pens, pen-wipers, mucilage-bottle, everything, in
fact, that an author really needs for the production of literature, save
ideas, were so prepared that they could not fail to be visible to the
weakest eye in the darkest night without the aid of other illumination.
The chief trouble with the invention was that in the long-run it was
more expensive than gas or oil could possibly be in the most extravagant
household; but that bothered Jarley not a jot. Nor was he at all upset
when his ingenious Library Folding-Bed, comprising a real bookcase and
sofa-couch, failed to suit his practical-minded friends because, when
turned down for use as a couch, all the books in the bookcase side of
it fell out upon the floor. His arrangement was better than the ordinary
folding-bed, he said, because the bookcase side of it was not a sham,
but the real thing, while that of the folding-bed of commerce was a
delusion and a snare. As a hater of shams he justified his invention,
though of course it couldn't be put to much practical use unless the
purchaser was willing to take his books out of the shelves when he
intended using the piece o