“'Numerous, but monotonous,' says Sam. 'As a lib'ry them books don't give the variety of topics they oughter. They all cling to the same subject too faithful. Eight hundred an' sixty-four volumes of the “Wage of Sin,” all bound alike, don't make what I call a rightly differentiated lib'ry. When you've read one you've read all.'
“'Alas!' I says, or somthin' like that, sympathetic an' attentive.
“'Likewise,' says Sam, 'they clutter up the barn. They ought to be got out to make room for more hay.'
“'This was indeed true. I saw it was all good sense. Horses don't take to literatoor like they does to hay.
“'Well,' says Sammy, 'what's the matter with chuckin' them eight hundred an' sixty-four “Wages of Sin” into the rustic communities of this commonwealth of Iowa, U.S.A.? Here we've got a barnful of high-class, intellectooal poem, an' yon we have a State full of yearnin' minds, clamorous for mental improvement at one fifty per volume. It's our duty to chuck them poems into them minds, an' to intellectooally subside them clamors.'
“I shook my head quite strenuous.
“'Nix for me!' I remarked; 'no book-agenting for me.'
“'Who said book-agenting?” asked Sammy, deeply offended. 'Do you calculate that the son of a high-class author of a famous an' helpful book would turn book agent? Never!'
“'What then?' I asks him.
“'Just a little salubrious an' entertainin' canvassin' for a work of genius,' he says. 'A few heart-to-heart talks with the educated ladies of Gallops Junction an' Tomville on the beauties of the “Wage of Sin.” That ain't no book-agenting,' says he, 'that's pickin' money off the trees. It's pie ready cut an' handed to us on a plate with a gilt edge. All we've got to do is to bite it.'