ll a lie for the fun of it; they will
not tell it when it hasn't even a suggestion of damage or advantage in
it for any one. This has a restraining influence upon me in spite of
reason, and I am always getting out of practice.

Of course, they tell all sorts of little unspoken lies, just like
anybody; but they don't notice it until their attention is called to it.
They have got me so that sometimes I never tell a verbal lie now except
in a modified form; and even in the modified form they don't approve
of it. Still, that is as far as I can go in the interest of the growing
friendly relations between the two countries; I must keep some of my
self-respect--and my health. I can live on a pretty low diet, but I
can't get along on no sustenance at all.

Of course, there are times when these people have to come out with a
spoken lie, for that is a thing which happens to everybody once in
a while, and would happen to the angels if they came down here much.
Particularly to the angels, in fact, for the lies I speak of are
self-sacrificing ones told for a generous object, not a mean one; but
even when these people tell a lie of that sort it seems to scare them
and unsettle their minds. It is a wonderful thing to see, and shows that
they are all insane. In fact, it is a country which is full of the most
interesting superstitions.

I have an English friend of twenty-five years' standing, and yesterday
when we were coming down-town on top of the 'bus I happened to tell him
a lie--a modified one, of course; a half-breed, a mulatto; I can't seem
to tell any other kind now, the market is so flat. I was explaining to
him how I got out of an embarrassment in Austria last year. I do not
know what might have become of me if I hadn't happened to remember to
tell the police that I belonged to the same family as the Prince of
Wales. That made everything pleasant and they let me go; and apologised,
too, and were ever so kind and obliging and polite, and couldn't do too
much for me, and explained how the mistake came to be made, and promised
to hang the officer that did it, and hoped I would let bygones be
bygones and not say anything about it; and I said they could depend on
me. My friend said, austerely:

'You call it a modified lie? Where is the modification?'

I explained that it lay in the form of my statement to the police. 'I
didn't say I belonged to the Royal Family; I only said I belonged to the
same family as the Prince--meaning