They did not, it is true, always approve of my leading articles. “Couldn’t you try to make them a little more popular,” suggested the managing director, “a little more practical too, Mr. Chelifer? For instance,” and clearing his throat, he unfolded the typewritten sheet of complaints which he had had prepared and had brought with him to the board meeting, “for instance, what’s the practical value of this stuff about the use of the word ‘cony’ as a term of endearment in the Elizabethan dramatists? And this article on the derivation of ‘rabbit’”—he looked at his paper again and coughed. “Who wants to know that there’s a Walloon word ‘robett’? Or that our word may have something to do with the Spanish _rabear_, to wag the hind quarters? And who, by the way,” he added, looking up at me over his pince-nez with an air—prematurely put on—of triumph, “who ever heard of an animal wagging its hind quarters?” “Nevertheless,” I said, apologetically, but firmly, as befits a man who knows that he is right, “my authority is no less than Skeat himself.” The managing director, who had hoped to score a point, went on, defeated, to the next count in the indictment. “And then, Mr. Chelifer,” he said, “we don’t very much like, my fellow directors and I, we don’t much like what you say in your article on ‘Rabbit Fancying and its Lesson to Humanity.’ It may be true that breeders have succeeded in producing domesticated rabbits that are four times the weight of wild rabbits and possess only half the quantity of brains—it may be true. Indeed, it is true. And a very remarkable achievement it is, Mr. Chelifer, very remarkable indeed. But that is no reason for upholding, as you do, Mr. Chelifer, that the ideal working man, at whose production the eugenist should aim, is a man eight times as strong as the present-day workman, with only a sixteenth of his mental capacity. Not that my fellow directors and I entirely disagree with what you say, Mr. Chelifer; far from it. All right-thinking men must agree that the modern workman is too well educated. But we have to remember, Mr. Chelifer, that many of our readers actually belong to that class.” “Quite.” I acquiesced in the reproof. “And finally, Mr. Chelifer, there is your article on the ‘Symbology of the Goat.’ We feel that the facts you have there collected, however interesting to the anthropologist and the student of folk-lore, are hardly of a kind to be set before a mixed public like ours.” The other directors murmured their assent. There was a prolonged silence. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER III