"Gentlemen," he said, after he had given to each an appropriate greeting, "I have brought with me one who wishes to know you. He is an American and a poet."
"Ach!" cried Eisenberg. "An American—that is good. A poet? Well we shall see. That is not always so good. Do you write, sir?"
"Occasionally," I answered.
"Good," said Otto. "That is better than often."
"True," assented Jurgurson, "though not so good as hardly ever."
I laughed. "You do not seem to think much of poets," said I.
"We do not say that," said Otto. "We do not know you as a poet, and so we do not pass judgment. When one says because one or two, or even two thousand, shoemakers are bad, all shoemakers are bad, one speaks foolishness. So with the poets. Because Heinrich von Scribbhausen writes bad stuff, you do not therefore write bad stuff. A poet should be judged, not by his shoes, but by his poems. I, a shoemaker, must not be judged by my poems, but by my shoes, which points a moral, and that moral is, what is sauce for the goose is not always sauce for the gander. The gander may be a person who makes fine clothes. The goose should not be judged by his clothes, but the gander should; therefore, never judge a man for what he ain't."
"Bravo!" cried Jurgurson. "I could not have spoken more wisely myself."
"Nor I," said Eisenberg. "Yet I could add somewhat. You do not print your poems?"
"Of course," I replied, "and why not?"