DEATH OF ARCHBISHOP HATTO.
That night he had troubled dreams, as was proper, and in the morning his servants told him to fly, for his grounds were being filled with rats who had eaten all the corn he had saved. He hastily quitted his castle and sought refuge in the castle on the island, thinking that the steep rocks and swift water would prevent the rats from finding him there. But they swarmed over the island by millions and the cruel Archbishop died a terrible lingering death.
This is a good solid legend, with meat in it. There is a great moral lesson inculcated, and every legend should inculcate a moral. It contains, I thought, a solemn warning to American grain operators.
But Tibbitts found a great many flaws in it, and said he did not consider it a good legend at all. It was full of improbabilities. Hatto made a corner on corn. Very good. He had some purpose in it. Very good. That purpose could have been nothing but a speculative desire to run up the price of his corn and sell out at an advance. Very good. To whom could he sell the corn at a profit? Only to the starving people. Now what an ass he must have been to corner the corn and then go and burn up his customers, the people to whom he could have sold the corn at any price! Mr. Tibbitts insisted, that that wouldn’t wash.
He doubted the rat story also. He knew all about grain operators. He knew many of them in Chicago who frequently saw rats, and snakes, and all that sort of thing. Probably Archbishop Hatto had been drinking, and fancied these things. But it was well enough. One must have legends and it wouldn’t do to go any more closely into particulars about legends, than it does to be too critical as to the character of candidates for Congress. He should accept Hatto, corn, rats and all. It was a very pretty story—for children. It would teach them not to burn people.