Part 31 (1/2)

Second Cable from England. The Two New Cases. Claim both s.h.i.+ps torpedoed. Offer proofs. Situation very grave.

Feeling in Was.h.i.+ngton very tense. Roosevelt out with a signed statement, _What will the President Do?_ Surely he knows what I will do.

Cables from Germany. Chancellor now positive as to _Torpid_. Sworn evidence that she was sunk by some one throwing a rock. Sample of rock to follow. Communication also from Germany regarding the New Cases. Draws attention to fact that all of the crews who were not drowned were saved. An important point. a.s.sures this government that everything ascertainable will be ascertained, but that pending juridical verification any imperial exemplification must be held categorically allegorical. How well these Germans write!

THURSDAY. A dull morning. Up early and read Congressional Government. Breakfast. Prayers. We prayed for the United States, for the citizens, for the Congress (both houses, especially the Senate), and for the Cabinet. Is there any one else?

Trouble. Accident to naval flotilla _en route_ to Piccolo Domingo. The new battles.h.i.+p the _Woodrow_ has broken down. Fault in structure. Tried to go with both ends first. Appeared impossible. Went sideways a little and is sinking. Wireless from the barges the _Wilson_, the _Thinker_ and others. They are standing by. They wire that they will continue to stand by. Why on earth do they do that? Shall cable them to act.

Feeling in Was.h.i.+ngton gloomy.

FRIDAY. Rose early and tried to sweep out the White House.

Had little heart for it. The dust gathers in the corners.

How did Roosevelt manage to keep it so clean? An idea!

I must get a vacuum cleaner! But where can I get a vacuum?

Took my head in my hands and thought: problem solved.

Can get the vacuum all right.

Good news. Villa dead again. Feeling in Was.h.i.+ngton relieved.

Trouble. s.h.i.+p torpedoed. News just came from the French Government. Full-rigged s.h.i.+p, the _Ping-Yan_, sailing out of Ping Pong, French Cochin China, and cleared for Hoo-Ra, Indo-Arabia. No American citizens on board, but one American citizen with ticket left behind on wharf at Ping Pong. Claims damages. Complicated case. Feeling in Was.h.i.+ngton much disturbed. Sterling exchange fell and wouldn't get up. French Admiralty urge treaty of 1778.

German Chancellor admits torpedoing s.h.i.+p but denies that it was full-rigged. Captain of submarine drew picture of s.h.i.+p as it sank. His picture unlike any known s.h.i.+p of French navy.

SAt.u.r.dAY. A day of trouble. Villa came to life and crossed the border. Our army looking for him in Mexico: inquiry by wire, are they authorised to come back? General Carranza asks leave to invade Canada. Piccolo Domingo expedition has failed. The _Woodrow_ is still sinking. The President and the _Thinker_ cable that they are still standing by and will continue to stand where they have stood. British Admiralty sending s.h.i.+pload of fragments. German Admiralty sending s.h.i.+pload of affidavits. Feeling in Was.h.i.+ngton depressed to the lowest depths. Sterling sinking. Marks falling. Exports dwindling.

An idea: Is this job worth while? I wonder if Billy Sunday would take it?

Spent the evening watering the crocuses. Whoever is here a year from now is welcome to them. They tell me that Hughes hates crocuses. Watered them very carefully.

SUNDAY. Good news! Just heard from Princeton University.

I am to come back, and everything will be forgiven and forgotten.

Timid Thoughts on Timely Topics

XVI. Are the Rich Happy?

Let me admit at the outset that I write this essay without adequate material. I have never known, I have never seen, any rich people. Very often I have thought that I had found them. But it turned out that it was not so. They were not rich at all. They were quite poor. They were hard up. They were pushed for money. They didn't know where to turn for ten thousand dollars.

In all the cases that I have examined this same error has crept in. I had often imagined, from the fact of people keeping fifteen servants, that they were rich. I had supposed that because a woman rode down town in a limousine to buy a fifty-dollar hat, she must be well to do. Not at all. All these people turn out on examination to be not rich. They are cramped. They say it themselves.

Pinched, I think, is the word they use. When I see a glittering group of eight people in a stage box at the opera, I know that they are all pinched. The fact that they ride home in a limousine has nothing to do with it.

A friend of mine who has ten thousand dollars a year told me the other day with a sigh that he found it quite impossible to keep up with the rich. On his income he couldn't do it. A family that I know who have twenty thousand a year have told me the same thing. They can't keep up with the rich. There is no use trying. A man that I respect very much who has an income of fifty thousand dollars a year from his law practice has told me with the greatest frankness that he finds it absolutely impossible to keep up with the rich. He says it is better to face the brutal fact of being poor. He says he can only give me a plain meal, what he calls a home dinner --it takes three men and two women to serve it--and he begs me to put up with it.

As far as I remember, I have never met Mr. Carnegie. But I know that if I did he would tell me that he found it quite impossible to keep up with Mr. Rockefeller. No doubt Mr. Rockefeller has the same feeling.

On the other hand there are, and there must be rich people, somewhere. I run across traces of them all the time. The janitor in the building where I work has told me that he has a rich cousin in England who is in the South-Western Railway and gets ten pounds a week. He says the railway wouldn't know what to do without him. In the same way the lady who washes at my house has a rich uncle.