“Seek your fortune!” he repeated, with a slighting sort of laugh. “One used to read about fellows doing that in story books when a child, but it's rather strange to hear of it nowadays.”
“And may I presume to ask why should it be more strange now than formerly? Is not the world pretty much what it used to be? Is not the drama of life the same stock piece our forefathers played ages ago? Are not the actors and the actresses made up of the precise materials their ancestors were? Can you tell me of a new sentiment, a new emotion, or even a new crime? Why, therefore, should there be a seeming incongruity in reviving any feature of the past?”
“Just because it won't do, my good friend,” said he, bluntly. “If the law catches a fellow lounging about the world in these times, it takes him up for a vagabond.”
“And what can be finer, grander, or freer than a vagabond?” I cried, with enthusiasm. “Who, I would ask you, sees life with such philosophy? Who views the wiles, the snares, the petty conflicts of the world with such a reflective calm as his? Caring little for personal indulgence, not solicitous for self-gratification, he has both the spirit and the leisure for observation. Diogenes was the type of the vagabond, and see how successive ages have acknowledged his wisdom.”
“If I had lived in his day, I'd have set him picking oakum, for all that!” he replied.
“And probably, too, would have sent the 'blind old bard to the crank,'” said I.
“I'm not quite sure of whom you are talking,” said he; “but if he was a good ballad-singer, I'd not be hard on him.”
“O! Menin aeide Thea Peleiadeo Achilleos!” spouted I out, in rapture.
“That ain't high Dutch,” asked he, “is it?”
“No,” said I, proudly. “It is ancient Greek,—the godlike tongue of an immortal race.”