Out Of The Question - William Dean Howells

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young friends. Iwill occupy this vacant room."

      II. "IN FAYRE FOREST."

      I. Two Tramps.

      Under the shelter of some pines near a lonely by-road, in the neighborhood of the Ponkwasset Hotel, lie two tramps asleep. One of them, having made his bed of the pine-boughs, has pillowed his head upon the bundle he carries by day; the other is stretched, face downward, on the thick brown carpet of pine-needles. The sun, which strikes through the thin screen of the trees upon the bodies of the two men, is high in the heavens. The rattle of wheels is heard from time to time on the remoter highway; the harsh clatter of a kingfisher, poising over the water, comes from the direction of the river near at hand. A squirrel descends the trunk of an oak near the pines under which the men lie, and at sight of them stops, barks harshly, and then, as one of them stirs in his sleep, whisks back into the top of the oak. It is the luxurious tramp on the pine-boughs who stirs, and who alertly opens his eyes and sits up in his bed, as if the noisy rush of the squirrel had startled him from his sleep.

      First Tramp, casting a malign glance at the top of the oak: "If I had a fair shot at you with this club, my fine fellow, I'd break you of that trick of waking people before the bell rings in the morning, and I'd give 'em broiled squirrel for breakfast when they did get up." He takes his bundle into his lap, and, tremulously untying it, reveals a motley heap of tatters; from these he searches out a flask, which he holds against the light, shakes at his ear, and inverts upon his lips. "Not a drop; not a square smell, even! I dreamt it." He lies down with a groan, and remains with his head pillowed in his hands. Presently he reaches for his stick, and again rising to a sitting posture strikes his sleeping comrade across the shoulders. "Get up!"

      Second Tramp, who speaks with a slight brogue, briskly springing to his feet, and rubbing his shoulders: "And what for, my strange bedfellow?"

      First Tramp: "For breakfast. What do people generally get up for in the morning?"

      Second Tramp: "Upon my soul, I'd as soot have had mine in bed; I've a day of leisure before me. And let me say a word to you, my friend: the next time you see a gentleman dreaming of one of the most elegant repasts in the world, and just waiting for his stew to cool, don't you intrude upon him with that little stick of yours. I don't care for a stroke or two in sport, but when I think of the meal I've lost, I could find it in my heart to break your head for you, you ugly brute. Have you got anything to eat there in your wardrobe?"

      First Tramp: "Not a crumb."

      Second Tramp: "Or to drink?"

      First Tramp: "Not a drop."

      Second Tramp: "Or to smoke?"

      First Tramp: "No."

      Second Tramp: "Faith, you 're nearer a broken head than ever, me friend. Wake a man out of a dream of that sort!"

      First Tramp: "I've had enough of this, What do you intend to do?"

      Second Tramp: "I'm going to assume the character of an impostor, and pretend at the next farm-house that I haven't had any breakfast, and haven't any money to buy one. It's a bare-faced deceit, I know, but" — looking down at his broken shoes and tattered clothes — "I flatter myself that I dress the part pretty well. To be sure, the women are not as ready to listen as they were once. The tramping-trade is overdone; there's too many in it; the ladies can't believe we 're all destitute; it don't stand to reason."

      First Tramp: "I'm tired of the whole thing."

      Second Tramp: "I don't like it myself. But there's worse things. There's work, for example. By my soul, there's nothing disgusts me like these places where they tell you to go out and hoe potatoes, and your breakfast will be ready in an hour. I never could work with any more pleasure on an empty stomach than a full one. And the poor devils always think they've done something so fine when they say that, and the joke's so stale! I can tell them I'm not to be got rid of so easy. I'm not the lazy, dirty vagabond I look, at all; I'm the inevitable result of the conflict between labor and capital; I'm the logical consequence of the prevailing corruption. I read it on the bit of newspaper they gave me round my dinner, yesterday; it was cold beef of a quality that you don't often find in the country."

      First Tramp, sullenly: "I'm sick of the whole thing. I'm going out of it."

      Second Tramp: "And what'll you do? Are ye going to work?"

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