the way
things are: you know it won't do to babble it all just as it is. But
you understand me. To make a long story short, since day before
yesterday Shund is the honestest man in the world. Our men of money
have made him that, you know," giving a sly wink. "What the men of
money do, is well done, of course, for the proverb says, 'Whose bread I
eat, his song I sing.'"

"Shut your mouth, Koenig! What stuff is that you are talking there?"
said another fellow roughly. "Hans Shund is a free-spirited, clever,
first-class, distinguished man. Taken altogether, he is a liberal man.
For this reason he will be elected councilman to-morrow, then mayor of
the city, and finally member of the assembly."

"That's so, that's so, my partner is right," confirmed Koenig. "But
listen, Flachsen, you will agree that formerly--you know, formerly--he
was an arrant scoundrel."

"Why was he? Why?" inquired Flachsen.

"Why? Ha, ha! I say, Flachsen, go to Shund's wife, she can tell you
best. Go to those whom he has reduced to beggary, for instance, to Holt
over there. They all can tell you what Shund is, or rather what he has
been. But don't get mad, brother Flachsen! Spite of all that, I shall
vote for Shund. That's settled." And he poured the contents of his
beer-pot down his throat.

"As you gentlemen are strangers, I will undertake to explain this
business for you," said Flachsen, who evidently was an agent for the
lower classes, and who did his best to put on an appearance of learning
by affecting high-sounding words of foreign origin.

"Shund is quite a rational man, learned and full of intelligence. But
the priests have calumniated him horribly because he will not howl with
them. For this reason we intend to elect him, not for the sake of the
free beer. When Shund will have been elected, a system of economy will
be inaugurated, taxes will be removed, and the encyclical letter with
which the Pope has tried to stultify the people, together with the
syllabus, will be sent to the dogs. And in the legislative assembly the
liberal-minded Shund will manage to have the priests excluded from the
schools, and we will have none but secular schools. In short, the
dismal rule of the priesthood that would like to keep the people in
leading-strings will be put an end to, and liberal views will control
our affairs. As for Shund's doings outside of legitimate wedlock, that
is one of the boons of liberty--it is a right of humanity; and when
Koenig