womanish sign of weakness.
“Sit down!”
This thunder-blast was from old Jacques d’Arc, and Joan was the
object of it. The stranger was startled, and took his hand away, and
there was Joan standing before him offering him her bowl of
porridge. The man said:
“God Almighty bless you, my darling!” and then the tears came,
and ran down his cheeks, but he was afraid to take the bowl.
“Do you hear me? Sit down, I say!”
There could not be a child more easy to persuade than Joan, but
this was not the way. Her father had not the art; neither could he
learn it. Joan said:
“Father, he is hungry; I can see it.”
“Let him work for food, then. We are being eaten out of house and
home by his like, and I have said I would endure it no more, and
will keep my word. He has the face of a rascal anyhow, and a
villain. Sit down, I tell you!”
“I know not if he is a rascal or no, but he is hungry, father, and
shall have my porridge–I do not need it.”
“If you don’t obey me I’ll– Rascals are not entitled to help from
honest people, and no bite nor sup shall they have in this house.
Joan!”
She set her bowl down on the box and came over and stood before
her scowling father, and said:
“Father, if you will not let me, then it must be as you say; but I
would that you would think–then you would see that it is not right
to punish one part of him for what the other part has done; for it is
that poor stranger’s head that does the evil things, but it is not his
head that is hungry, it is his stomach, and it has done no harm to
anybody, but is without blame, and innocent, not having any way
to do a wrong, even if it was minded to it. Please let–”
“What an idea! It is the most idiotic speech I ever heard.”
But Aubrey, the maire, broke in, he being fond of an argument,
and having a pretty gift in that regard, as all acknowledged. Rising
in his place and leaning his knuckles upon the table and looking
about him with easy dignity, after the manner of such as be orators,
he began, smooth and persuasive:
“I will differ with you there, gossip, and will undertake to show the
company”–here he looked around upon us and nodded his head in
a confident way–“that there is a grain of sense in what the child
has said; for look you, it is of a certainty most true and
demonstrable that it is a man’s head that is master and supreme
ruler over his whole body. Is that granted? Will any deny it?” He
glanced around again; everybody indicated assent. “Very well,
then; that being the case, no part of the body is responsible for the
result when it carries out an order delivered to it by the head; ergo,
the head is alone responsible for crimes done by a man’s hands or
feet or stomach–do you get the idea? am I right thus far?”
Everybody said yes, and said it with enthusiasm, and some said,
one to another, that the maire was in great form to-night and at his
very best–which pleased the maire exceedingly and made his eyes
sparkle with pleasure, for he overheard these things; so he went on
in the same fertile and brilliant way. “Now, then, we will consider
what the term responsibility means, and how it affects the case in
point. Responsibility makes a man responsible for only those
things for which he is properly responsible”–and he waved his
spoon around in a wide sweep to indicate the comprehensive
nature of that class of responsibilities which render people
responsible, and several exclaimed, admiringly, “He is right!–he
has put that whole tangled thing into a nutshell–it is wonderful!””
After a little pause to give the interest opportunity to gather and
grow, he went on: “Very good. Let us suppose the case of a pair of
tongs that falls upon a man’s foot, causing a cruel hurt. Will you