s instruments, inarticulate shouts, explosions of
gunpowder and lines of men walking and riding through the streets in cheap
and tawdry costumes more or less alike. Vast sums of money are expended to
procure these strange evidences of the personal worth of candidates and
the political sanity of ideas. It is very much as if a man should paint
his nose pea-green and stand on his head to convince his neighbors that
his pigs are fed on acorns. Of course the money subscribed for these
various controversial devices is not all wasted; the greater part of it is
pocketed by the ax-grinders by whom it is solicited, and who have invented
the system. That they have invented it for their own benefit seems not to
have occurred to the dupes who pay for it. In the universal madness
everybody believes whatever monstrous and obvious falsehood is told by the
leaders of his own _ytrap_, and nobody listens for a moment to the
exposures of their rascality. Reason has flown shrieking from the scene;
Caution slumbers by the wayside with unbuttoned pocket. It is the
opportunity of thieves!

With a view to abating somewhat the horrors of this recurring season of
depravity, it has been proposed by several wise and decent Tamtonians to
extend the term of office of the _Tnediserp_ to six years instead of five,
but the sharpeners of axes are too powerful to be overthrown. They have
made the people believe that if the man whom the country chooses to rule
it because it thinks him wise and good were permitted to rule it too long
it would be impossible to displace him in punishment for his folly and
wickedness. It is, indeed, far more likely that the term of office will be
reduced to four years than extended to six. The effect can be no less than
hideous!

In Tamtonia there is a current popular saying dating from many centuries
back and running this way: "_Eht eciffo dluohs kees eht nam, ton eht nam
eht eciffo_"--which may be translated thus: "No citizen ought to try to
secure power for himself, but should be selected by others for his fitness
to exercise it." The sentiment which this wise and decent phrase expresses
has long ceased to have a place in the hearts of those who are
everlastingly repeating it, but with regard to the office of _Tnediserp_
it has still a remnant of the vitality of habit. This, however, is fast
dying out, and a few years ago one of the congenital idiots who was a
candidate for the highest dignity boldly broke the inhibition an