roper that I should make a
note of the base ingratitude of Barkis, M.D. I have hesitated to do this
hitherto for several reasons, any one of which would prove a valid
excuse for my not doing so. To begin with, I have known Barkis ever
since he was a baby. I have tossed him in the air, to his own delight
and to the consternation of his mother, who feared lest I should fail to
catch him on his way down, or that I should underestimate the distance
between the top of his head and the ceiling on his way up. Later I have
held him on my knee and told him stories of an elevating nature--mostly
of my own composition--and have afterwards put these down upon paper and
sold them to syndicates at great profit. So that, in a sense, I am
beholden to Barkis for some measure of my prosperity. Then, when Barkis
grew older, I taught him the most approved methods of burning his
fingers on the Fourth of July, and when he went to college I am
convinced that he gained material aid from me in that I loaned him my
college scrap-books, which contained, among other things, a large number
of examination papers which I marvel greatly to-day that I was ever able
successfully to pass, and which gave to him some hint as to the ordeal
he was about to go through. In his younger professional days, also, I
have been Barkis's friend, and have called him up, to minister to a pain
I never had, at four o'clock in the morning, simply because I had reason
to believe that he needed four or five dollars to carry him through the
ensuing hours of the day.

Quotation books have told us that in love, as well as in war, all is
fair, and if this be true Barkis's ingratitude, the narration of which
cannot now give pain to any one, becomes, after all, nothing more than a
venial offence. I do not place much reliance upon the ethics of
quotation books generally, but when I remember my own young days, and
the things I did to discredit the other fellow in that little affair
which has brought so much happiness into my own life, I am inclined to
nail my flag to the masthead in defence of the principle that lovers can
do no wrong. It is no ordinary stake that a lover plays for, and if he
stacks the cards, and in other ways turns his back upon the guiding
principles of his life, blameworthy as he may be, I shall not blame him,
but shall incline rather towards applause.

On the other hand, something is due to the young ladies in the case, and
as much for their sake as for any ot