"She did," said the Idiot, sadly. "I never used explosives again. In later years I took up the milder April-fool diversions, such as filling the mucilage-pot with ink and the ink-pot with mucilage; mixing the granulated sugar with white sand; putting powdered brick into the red-pepper pot; inserting kerosene-oil into the sweet-oil bottle, and little things like that. I squandered a whole dollar one April-fool's-day sending telegrams to my uncles and aunts, telling them to come and dine with us that night; and they all came, too, although my father and mother were dining out that evening, and--oh dear, April-fool's-day is not what it used to be. The boys and girls of the present generation are little old men and women with no pranks left in them. Why, I don't believe that nine out of ten boys, who are about to enter college this spring, could rig up a successful tick-tack on a window to save their lives; and the joy of carrying a piece of twine across the sidewalk from a front-door knob to a lamp-post, hat-high, and then sitting back in the seclusion of a convenient area and watching the plug-hats of the people go down before it--that is a joy that seems to be wholly untasted of the present generation of infantile dignitaries that we call the youth of the land. What is the matter with 'em, do you suppose?" "I guess we're getting civilized," said Mr. Brief. "That seems to me to be the most likely explanation of this deplorable situation, as you appear to think it. For my part, I'm glad if what you say is true. Of all rotten things in the world the practical jokes of April-fool's-day bear away the palm. There was a time, ten years ago, when I hardly dared eat anything on the first of April. I was afraid to find my coffee made of ink, my muffin stuffed with cotton, cod-liver oil in my salad-dressing, and mayonnaise in my cream-puffs. Such tricks are the tricks of barbarians, and I shall rejoice when April 1st as a day of special privilege for idiots and savages has been removed from the calendar."