"I thought the object of the tickets was to feed hungry—" began a serious-eyed reporter.
"It is; but charity carries a reward in cash. It is the modern way. You might add that there will be no reserved seats, no privileged classes. Where all men are alike charitable, all men are equal before God and man!"
Napoleon revolutionized the art of war by moving quickly and overwhelming the foe with artillery. H. R. made charity a success by appealing not alone to the charitable instinct of New-Yorkers, but to every other instinct he could think of. Therefore everybody who was not hungry logically decided to go to the Mammoth Hunger Feast. The newspapers printed long and reassuring accounts of the police arrangements.
H. R., being a republican at heart, had reserved the Imperial Box for Grace Goodchild and her friends, and ninety-nine Royal boxes for the other ticket-sellers and their fiancés. His free sandwich men occupied the front row of arena seats and had been coached by the leader of the Grand Opera claque. At a given signal they were to cheer Grace Goodchild. When the bugle announced H. R.'s entrance they were to go crazy.
XXII
At half after seven that night H. R., accompanied by eighteen contemporary historians and six magazine psychological portraitists, went to the entrance of the hungry. It was in the rear of the Garden and was dark and narrow.
Symbolism!
It was the same entrance that a few weeks previously had admitted the circus's beasts; only the beasts were not hungry.