But if I should say to him: "Mr. So and So" is a writer who is excellently posted upon the value of cloth, as his father sold dry-goods, it would appeal to his mind as bad taste. Another journalist paid his respects to me some months ago in _El Parlamentario_, saying I baked rolls, oppressed the people, and sucked the blood of the workingman. It would appear to be more demeaning to own a small factory or a shop, according to the standards of both literary and non-literary circles, than it is to accept money from the corruption funds of the Government, or bounties from the exchequers of foreign Embassies. When I hear talk nowadays about the dues of the common people, my propensity to laugh is so great that I am apprehensive that my end may be like that of the Greek philosopher in Diogenes Laertius, who died of laughter because he saw an ass eating figs. THE VEXATIONS OF A SMALL TRADESMAN The trials and tribulations of the literary life, its feuds and its backbitings are a common topic of conversation. However, I have never experienced anything of the kind in literature. The trouble with literature is that there is very little money in it, which renders the writer's existence both mean and precarious. Nothing compares for vexation with the life of the petty tradesman, especially when that tradesman is a baker. Upon occasion, I have repeated to my friends the series of outrages to which we were obliged to submit, in particular at the hands of the municipal authorities. Sometimes it was through malice, but more often through sheer insentient imbecility. When my brother and I moved to the new site, we drew up a plan and submitted it to the _Ayuntamiento_, or City Government. A clerk discovered that no provision had been made for a stall for a mule to run the kneading machine, and so rejected it. When we learned that our application had not been granted, we inquired the reason and explained to the clerk that no provision had been made for the mule because we had no mule, as our kneading machine was operated by an electric motor. "That makes no difference, no difference whatever," replied the clerk with the importance and obtuseness of the bureaucrat. "The ordinance requires that there be a stall for one." Another of the thousand instances of official barbarity was perpetrated at our expense while Sánchez de Toca was Alcalde. This gentleman is a Siamese twin of Maura's when it comes to garrulousness and muddy thinking, and he had resolved to do away with the distribution of bread by public delivery, and to license only deliveries by private bakeries. The order was arbitrary enough, but the manner in which it was put into effect was a masterpiece. It was reported that plates bearing license numbers would be given out at the _Ayuntamiento_ to the delivery men from the bakeries. So we repaired to the _Ayuntamiento_ and questioned a clerk: "Where do they give out the numbers? "There are no numbers."