Men don't
like to have their seriousness trifled with.
"No longer ago than this morning," I said, "I had exactly that
idea of giving them advantages; but I found that the difficulty
lies not with the ability to give, but with the inability or
unwillingness to take. You see I have a great deal of surplus
wealth myself--"
Mr. Vedder's eyes flickered up at me.
"Yes," I said. "I've got immense accumulations of the wealth of
the ages--ingots of Emerson and Whitman, for example, gems of
Voltaire, and I can't tell what other superfluous coinage!" (And
I waved my hand in the most grandiloquent manner.) "I've also
quite a store of knowledge of corn and calves and cucumbers, and
I've a boundless domain of exceedingly valuable landscapes. I am
prepared to give bountifully of all these varied riches (for I
shall still have plenty remaining), but the fact is that this
generation of vipers doesn't appreciate what I am trying to do
for them. I'm really getting frightened, lest they permit me to
perish from undistributed riches!"
Mr. Vedder was still smiling.
"Oh," I said, warming up to my idea, "I'm a regular
multimillionaire. I've got so much wealth that I'm afraid I shall
not be as fortunate as jolly Andy Carnegie, for I don't see how I
can possibly die poor!"
"Why not found a university or so?" asked Mr.
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