"He is a model," said the Idiot. "He has done more to make my life here easy than any one in my service. For instance, you know the hurly-burly of existence in town. I go to my office in the morning, and whether I have much work or little to do, I come home in the afternoon absolutely worn out. The constant hustling and bustling of others in the city wears upon my mind, and consequently upon my body. The rush and roar of cables and electric-cars; the activity of messengers running to and fro in the streets; the weary horses dragging great lumbering wagons up and down the crowded thoroughfares, all affect my nature and impair my energy; and then, the day's work done, I return here, where all is quiet and still, and the very contrast between that man, standing silently on his appointed spot, or leaning against the house, or lying off in sheer content under some tree, and the mad scramble for lucre in the city, invigorates my tired body until I feel that I could go out and mow three acres of grass before dinner; in fact, I generally do." "I did not know that a restful nature was a requisite of a successful career as a hired man," said Mr. Pedagog. "It is evident, then, that you have never had a hired man," rejoined the Idiot. "Nor can you ever have studied the species at close range. Ceaseless activity would be his ruin. If he did to-day all there is to do, he would be out of employment to-morrow, consequently he never does to-day's work to-day, and cultivates that leisurely attitude towards life upon which you have commented. Do you see that small beech-tree over there?" he added, pointing to a scrawny little sapling whose sole virtue appeared to be its rigid uprightness. "Is that a beech-tree?" asked Mr. Brief. "I thought it was a garden stake." [Illustration: "'He WOULD GO OUT DAY AFTER DAY AND SIT DOWN BESIDE IT'"] "It is a beech-tree," said the Idiot. "I planted it myself last autumn, and while it has as yet borne no beeches, I think if we give it time, and it withstands the rigors of the climate, it will produce its fruit. But it was not of its possibilities as a beech-bearing tree that I intended to speak. I wanted to indicate to you by a material object the value of having a hired man who likes to lean against things. At the close of this last winter that tree, instead of being as erect as a grenadier, as it now is, was all askew. The strong westerly winds which are constantly blowing across that open stretch bent the thing until it seemed that the tree was bound to be deformed; but Mike overcame the difficulty. He would go out day after day and sit down beside it and lean against it for two and three hours at a time, with the result that the tendency to curve was overcome, and a tree that I feared was doomed to fail now bids fair to resemble a successful telegraph-pole in its uprightness. And, of course, the added warmth of his body pressing down upon the earth which covers its roots gave it an added impulse to grow."