It was sheer cannibalism—but what was to be done! Their slender stock of books had been reduced entirely to poetry. If there had only been a philosopher or a modern novelist, the sacrifice wouldn't have seemed so unnatural. And then Beauty's eyes fell upon a very fat informing-looking volume on the poet's desk.
"Wouldn't this do?" she said.
"Why, of course!" he exclaimed; "the very thing. A new history of socialism just sent me for review. Hang the review; we want our dinner, don't we, little one ? And then I've read the preface, and looked through the index—quite enough to make a column of—with a plentiful supply of general principles thrown in! Why, of course, there's our dinner, for certain, dull and indigestible as it looks. It's worth fifty minor poets at old Moser's. Come along. . . ."
So off went the happy pair—ah! how much happier was Beauty than ever so many fine ladies one knows who have only, so to say, to rub their wedding-rings for a banquet to rise out of the ground, with the most distinguished guests around the table, champagne of the best, and conversation of the worst.
Old Moser found histories of socialism profitable, more profitable perhaps than socialism, and he actually gave five-and-sixpence for the volume. With the ninepence already in their pockets, you will see that they were now possessors of quite a small fortune. Six-and-threepence! it wouldn't pay for one's lunch nowadays. Ah! but that is because the poor alone know the art of dining.
You needn't wish to be much happier and merrier than those two lovers, as they gaily hastened to that bright and cosy corner of the town where those lovely ham-and-beef shops make glad the faces of the passers-by. O those hams with their honest shining
