How is Mr. Kobble? Well, but finds it warm in town, eh? 15 Well, I should think he would. They are dropping down by hundreds there with sunstroke. You must prepare your mind to have him brought home any day. Anyhow, a trip on these railroad trains is just risking your life every time you take one. Back and forth every day as he is, 20 is just trifling with danger.
Scarlet fever has broken out in the village, Cornelia. Little Isaac Potter has it, and I saw your Jimmy playing with him last Saturday.
Well, I must be going now. I've got another sick 25 friend, and I sha'n't consider my duty done unless I cheer her up a little before I sleep. You don't look so well as you did when I came in. But if anything happens, send for me at once. If I can't do anything else, I can cheer you up a little.
1. This is an old, favorite recitation. What do you think of this type of humor as compared with Mark Twain's?
Thomas Gradgrind was proud of himself. He was a "self-made" man who attributed his own successes in life to his mastery of Facts. He is here represented as officially testing a school upon its knowledge of his favorite Facts.
"Now what I want is Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life. You can only form the minds of reasoning animals upon Facts; nothing else will ever be of any service to them. This is the principle on which I bring up my own 5 children. Stick to Facts, sir; nothing but Facts."
The speaker, and the schoolmaster, and the third grown person present, all backed a little and swept with their eyes the inclined plane of little vessels then and there arranged in order, ready to have gallons of facts poured into them 10 until they were full to the brim.
Thomas Gradgrind, sir. A man of realities. A man of facts and calculations. A man who proceeds upon the principle that two and two are four and nothing over, and who is not to be talked into allowing for anything over. 15 Thomas Gradgrind, sir, with a rule and a pair of scales and the multiplication table always in his pocket, sir, ready to weigh and measure any parcel of human nature and tell you exactly what it comes to.
It is a mere question of figures, a case of simple arithmetic. 20 You might hope to get some other nonsensical belief into the head of George Gradgrind, or Augustus Gradgrind, or John Gradgrind, or Joseph Gradgrind; but into the head of Thomas Gradgrind--no, sir!