"Here, Bishop Phillipson, is the place at the head of the list. It will be signed by men and women whose names stand for Achievement, Fame, and Disinterestedness."
H. R. held a fountain-pen before him and pursued: "If you sign, I'll feed all the hungry—all! Have you ever seen a starving man? Do you know what it is to be hungry?"
The Bishop shook his head at the fountain-pen. He had seen starving men, but he had read about signatures. He could not officially sanction a plan of which he knew so little. No grown man can say that he did not know what he was signing.
"Listen!" commanded H. R., sternly. "Do you hear your Master's voice?"
"Your intentions, I make no doubt, are highly praiseworthy. But your language is so close to blasphemy...."
"All words that invoke God in unrhymed English are so regarded in the United States. Grace would have it that you would sign in Chinese if by so doing it fed the hungry. 'But the greatest of these is charity.' The reporters are waiting for the list. Everybody else will sign if you head the list."
"Of course." And the Bishop's voice actually betrayed the fact that he had been forced into self-defense. "Of course. I should be only too glad to sign if I were certain such an action on my part would actually feed the hungry—"
"All the hungry," corrected H. R.
"Even a tenth of the hungry of New York," the Bishop insisted. "But, my dear young man, excellent intentions do not always succeed. Your methods might not commend themselves to men who have made this work the study of a lifetime."
"They have not gone about their work intelligently, for there are still unfed men in New York. I am a practical man, not a theorist. Emotions, respected sir, are all very well to appeal to at vote-getting times, but they are poor things to think with. Now I don't suppose I have devoted more than one hour's thought to this subject, and yet see the difference. All the hungry!" In H. R.'s voice there was not the faintest trace of self-glorification nor did his manner show the slightest vanity. Both were calmly matter-of-fact. The Bishop had to have an explanation. So he asked: