" If he had not
been an especially plucky little beggar he would have died under the
libels long ago. For my own part I cannot conceive how a man with good
red blood in his veins could look a chirky little robin in the eye and
call him to his face a "_Planesticus migratorius_," when as chubby
youngster he had known the bird and loved him as Robin Red-Breast. One
is inclined to ask with suspicion, "Is naming a lost art?" Any new
flower discovered these days, every clever invention in the realm of
machinery, is forthwith saddled with an impossible name. If it had not
been easy to clip the term "automobile" down to the working stub "auto,"
the machine would never have run our streets. Again, the decimal system
is conceded to be far ahead of the asinine "five and one-half yards make
one rod, pole or perch"; the only reason why the commonsense thing does
not supersede the foolish one is that the sensible measurement has the
fool tag on it. Who could imagine ever going into a store and asking for
seven decimetres and nine centimetres of picture-moulding, or dropping
into the corner grocery to buy a hectolitre of green onions? When man
dug gold and iron and tin out of the earth he made things with them.
Pages:
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93