The Opinions of a Philosopher | Page 5

to the level of my brow, let them fall clamorously on
the floor. The welkin rang, so to speak, and I sank with nervous
exhaustion into an arm-chair.
The house seemed deathly still and it struck me that Josephine on her
part was ominously quiet. When she spoke at last it was to ask:
"Haven't you a pistol?"

"Yes, dear."
"Are you going to let them take everything?"
"It is for them to decide, darling."
"But, Fred----" Josephine did not finish her sentence. The words she
uttered were, however, so full of poignant surprise and disappointment
that I felt constrained to inquire with a guilty attempt at nonchalance:
"Is there anything you would like to have me do?"
"You are the best judge, of course," she answered, coldly. "Only, do
you think it is the usual way?"
"The usual way?" I echoed. Among the few points in Josephine's
character which irritate me is her weakness for custom, and it is
growing on her. "No, I suppose that the correct social thing would have
been to stand at the head of the banisters in my nightgown with a
lighted candle and make a target of myself."
"Why did you buy a pistol, then?" inquired my better half.
"So that the children needn't shoot themselves with it after it was
locked up and the cartridges carefully hidden," I replied, with levity.
We were both so heated that we had practically forgotten that flat
burglary was supposed to be going on.
"You didn't use to talk in that way," said Josephine, with slow precision.
"I only hope, Fred, for your sake that people won't hear about this."
"They will not, certainly, unless you tell them, Josephine."
"Tell them? I wouldn't mention what has happened for the world," she
answered, looking at me with a sort of sorrowful disdain. Thus is it that
the ideals which women form concerning us are one by one shattered! I
am sure that Josephine would have been inconsolable had I fallen a
victim to the bullet of a house-breaker. You will recall that her first
impulse was to prevent me from exposing myself for the sake of the

solid silver service. She had taken it for granted that I would slip the
bolt and go part way down stairs, at least, pistol in hand, and she had
wished to caution me against undue rashness. Consequently, it was a
rude blow to her sensibilities to find that I was such a craven. She cared
no more for our apostle spoons and gold-lined vegetable dishes than I
did; it was the principle of the thing which distressed her. Why had I
bought a six-shooter shortly after our marriage except to be equipped
for just such an emergency? It did certainly seem that I was bound by
all the laws of custom to pop at least once over the banisters, even
though I took no aim and scurried back into my bedroom immediately
after. That would have satisfied her, she subsequently admitted to me;
but to drop a pair of Indian clubs on the floor in order to make a clatter
could be regarded as little less than pusillanimous, philosophy or no
philosophy.
We have talked it over many times since, and I have endeavored to
make plain to her that in the process of evolution thinking men have
come to the conclusion that the husband and father who chops logic at
dead of night with an accomplished burglar on the wrong side of his
chamber door is akin to a lunatic. She listens to my arguments
attentively, and she has done me the honor to admit that there is more
to be said in my behalf than she thought at first; but I remember that the
last time we conversed upon the subject she shook her head with the air
of a woman who, in spite of everything, is still of the same opinion, and
she murmured gently:
"As I told you before, Fred, if you had fired once over the banisters, I
would say nothing."
"But I might have been killed or maimed for life as a consequence," I
blurted, feelingly. Josephine looked a little grave, as she is apt to do at
any suggestion of my sudden taking off, but with a sweet sigh she
answered, succinctly:
"There are certain risks in this world that a man has to take."

II
You may remember that I have four children; my namesake Fred,
David, who was christened in honor of his maternal grandfather,
Josephine, or Josie as we call her in order not to confound her with her
mother, and Winona, the baby of the family. We have lately moved
into another house. The old one would not hold us any longer. At least
Josephine declared that it would not shortly after