“Brethren,” said he, “while turning at that infernal Handle I was suddenly seized with an Idea. It is a grand Idea; it is none other than how we may ameliorate the cruel lot of the grinders at the Handle and raise our wages.”
“Raise our wages?” they all cried in astonishment, letting go of the Handle. “Oh tell us how, and tell us quickly.”
“Well,” said he, “you see, it stands to Common Sense that if all dogs would combine and agree not to turn that Handle for less than so much a day, those big bloats would have to give it us or suffer the cessation of the Stream.”
“That’s so; so it is,” cried the other dogs in astonishment; “we never thought of that; why, that must be one of those Revelations, those deep abstrusities which the philosophers call ‘Axioms’—self-evident truths. And only to think it was given to a common dog to make the discovery! But canst thou tell us, oh wonderful discoverer, how we may all combine, with all those other dogs around us who cannot get a chance at the Handle? That is a problem, beside the complexity of which the Great Truth is simplicity itself.”
“Oh, ye simpletons,” said the dog with the Idea, “these things are hidden from the wise and prudent and are revealed unto pups. The thing is self-evidently simple. All we require is simply that all dogs shall agree.”
“But,” said the other dogs, “how art thou going to get the outside dogs to agree not to turn except for so much, when now they neither turn nor get a lick; it is simply asking a dog to abstain from doing what he hasn’t done, and is not going to do. The agreement can only interest those at the Handle, while it does not interest the others who want to be there but cannot get there.”
“Well,” said the dog with the Idea, “we at the Handle must keep up our wages, anyhow; so I propose that we make the agreement and that, as a mark to be known by, each dog that agrees, have a white label bound on his right hind leg; and we will further agree that whomsoever has not on the ‘White Label’ shall be called a Black Leg and be worried and cast away from the Handle.”
But there arose another dog, and said he had an Idea, too, that was much better. Said he: “Suppose all of us do adopt the White Label, and do live up to the solemn agreement—which is not probable—what will it avail us to worry and cast away from the Handle all those that have not the White Label, when there are so many more dogs who through hunger will jump in to take their places? We can’t worry them all. My Idea is to lengthen the Handle so that all the unemployed dogs can catch on and help to turn.”
But some said, “What good would that do? You could not make it long enough to give every dog a place; and besides, the Handle belongs to the Mill, and the Mill belongs to the fleas, and they won’t permit it to be lengthened, so that settles it.”
“Well, then,” replied the other dog, “let us agree to work fewer hours so as to put some of the unemployed at the Handle; average things, as to speak.”