as a dozen smaller ones. These people get great sympathy
from the public and the newspapers and their case is obviously pitiable.
Was it not so in this country during the transition stage, and did not
these poor gentlemen have to"--the right words would not come; I hardly
knew how to finish. "Were they not compelled to go to work?" I finally
asked, rather humbly.

The great official was silent for several minutes. Then he spoke.

"I am not sure that I understand you about our transition state. So far as
our history goes matters with us have always been as they are to-day. To
suppose them to have been otherwise would be to impugn the common sense of
our ancestors. Nor do I quite know what you mean by 'small dealers,'
'middle men,' 'drummers,' and so forth."

He paused and fell into meditation, when suddenly his face was suffused
with the light of a happy thought. It so elated him that he sprang to his
feet and with his staff of office broke the heads of his Chief Admonisher
of the Inimical and his Second Assistant Audible Sycophant. Then he said:

"I think I comprehend. Some eighty-five years ago, soon after my induction
into office, there came to the court of the Panjandrum a man of this city
who had been cast upon the island of Chicago (which I believe belongs to
the American archipelago) and had passed many years there in business with
the natives. Having learned all their customs and business methods he
returned to his own country and laid before the Panjandrum a comprehensive
scheme of commercial reform. He and his scheme were referred to me, the
Panjandrum being graciously pleased to be unable to make head or tail of
it. I may best explain it in its application to a single industry--the
manufacture and sale of gootles."

"What is a gootle?" I asked.

"A metal weight for attachment to the tail of a donkey to keep him from
braying," was the answer. "It is known in this country that a donkey
cannot utter a note unless he can lift his tail. Then, as now, gootles
were made by a single concern having a great capital invested and an
immense plant, and employing an army of workmen. It dealt, as it does
to-day, directly with consumers. Afflicted with a sonant donkey a man
would write to the trust and receive his gootle by return mail, or go
personally to the factory and carry his purchase home on his
shoulder--according to where he lived. The reformer said this was
primitive, crude and injurious to the interests of th