They who
were so foolish as to oppose him really did have their souls required
of them. After an encounter with him they never again were quite the
same men in the eyes of their fellows. Whistler's insults always
stuck--stuck and spread round the insulted, who found themselves at
length encased in them, like flies in amber.
You may shed a tear over the flies, if you will. For myself, I am
content to laud the amber.
ICHABOD
It is not cast from any obvious mould of sentiment. It is not a
memorial urn, nor a ruined tower, nor any of those things which he who
runs may weep over. Though not less really deplorable than they, it
needs, I am well aware, some sort of explanation to enable my reader
to mourn with me. For it is merely a hat-box.
It is nothing but that--an ordinary affair of pig-skin, with a brass
lock. As I write, it stands on a table near me. It is of the kind that
accommodates two hats, one above the other. It has had many tenants,
and is sun-tanned, rain-soiled, scarred and dented by collision with
trucks and what not other accessories to the moving scenes through
which it has been bandied. Yes! it has known the stress of many
journeys; yet has it never (you would say, seeing it) received its
baptism of paste: it has not one label on it.
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