ke a sort of indirect revenge on you in order to salve his lacerated
dignity. A young English peer happened to ask a Chicago servant to clean
a pair of boots, and his tone of command was rather pronounced and
definite. That young patrician began to doubt his own identity when he
was thus addressed--"Ketch on and do them yourself!" There was no
redress, no possible remedy, and finally our compatriot humbled himself
to a negro, and paid an exorbitant price for his polish.

Here we have an absurdity quite fairly exposed. The young American
student who acts as a reporter or waiter during his college vacation is
nearly always a respectful gentleman who neither takes nor allows a
liberty; but the underbred boor, keen as he is about his gratuities,
will take even your gifts as though he were an Asiatic potentate, and
the traveller a passing slave whose tribute is condescendingly received.
In a word, the servant goes out of his way to prove that, in his own
idea, he is quite fit to be anybody's master. The Declaration of
Independence informs us that all men are born equal; the transatlantic
servant takes that with a certain reservation, for he implies that,
though men may be equal in a general way, yet, so far as he is
concerned, he prefers to reckon himself the superior of anybody with
whom business brings him into contact.

It was in America that I first began to meditate on the problem of
equality, and I have given it much thought at intervals during several
years. The great difficulty is to avoid repeating stale commonplaces on
the matter. The robust Briton bellows, "Equality! Divide up all the
property in the world equally among the inhabitants, and there would be
rich and poor, just as before, within a week!" The robust man thinks
that settles the whole matter at once. Then we have the stock story of
the three practical communists who forced themselves upon the society of
Baron Rothschild, and explained their views at some length. The Baron
said: "Gentlemen, I have made a little calculation, and I find that, if
I divided my property equally among my fellow-citizens, your share would
be one florin each. Oblige me by accepting that sum at once, and permit
me to wish you good-morning." This was very neat in its way, but I want
to talk just a little more seriously of a problem which concerns the
daily life of us all, and affects our mental health, our placidity, and
our self-respect very intimately. In the first place, we hav