When I was a boy, I knew (?) more than I do now. I lived in a world of THINGS and accepted my world for what it seemed to be.

My mental equipment passed for knowledge because I made the same mistakes that others did. A counterfeit coin that one thinks is gold, will buy as much as real gold if everyone makes a similar mistake.

Once I 'knew' that solid things are solid and when my teachers told me that even granite was made up of particles in tremendous commotion, they made it easier for me to believe in miracles. Physicists introduced me to a whirling universe and a world of VIBRATION; sound, light, heat, atomic solar systems, everything in ceaseless motion.

When they crumbled my world into molecules, I reasoned that the molecules must be solid and stuck together. When they divided the molecules into atoms and then dissolved the atoms into electrons; smaller than the smallest small things man had before conceived; and these electrons merely whirlwinds of energy, what I had called THINGS turned out too be only the BEHAVIOR of things.

Once I understood (?) time, space, matter, force, gravitation, life, and had hopefully tackled eternity and infinity. After I had been deflated by a philosopher that the world called great, I was willing to know less and let God know more. I offer below some questions like the ones this man asked.

Does time flow past us or do we flow through time? If both flow together, then what is past time or future time? Is the FUTURE a thing, before it is PRESENT; or is the PAST anything after it has gone? Since even a split second is made up of what has not arrived and what has past, what is the PRESENT?

If a thimble filled with space is moved into a room filled with space does the thimble space displace any room space? Does the thimble have the same space before and after being moved?

If what we call matter is only a manifestation of molecules made up of atoms that are the wrapping paper of electrons that are themselves only imprisoned forces, what would matter be, apart from force?

If force is only pulls and pushes, attractions and repulsions, that do business with what we call matter, what would force be in a universe empty of matter?

Is half of eternity as long as eternity? Unless half of eternity is endless, then must not the other half also have an end, and can eternity have ends?

Can there be infinity times infinity times infinity? One can imagine a line infinitely long; then one may multiply it by an infinite number of imaginary lines to the right and left and multiply this multiplied infinity by infinite levels imagined above and below—why not?

After looking through a powerful microscope at unfathomed depths of detail and through a mighty telescope at unmeasured immensity, who are you, to butt your brains into the biography of God to tell Him what He has done or how He did it?

"The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God." The double barreled fool has said in his logic, "God has done nothing contrary to my reason."

or  

RASTUS AUGUSTUS EXPLAINS EVOLUTION

Gleaned from B. H. SHADDUCK - Copyright 1928

Rastus Augustus, a pompous old man, is the college janitor who "listens in" on the class in biology and is aided and abetted by fun-loving students who delight in teaching him theories which work confusion in the community, and rehearse him in words and phrases quite beyond his reach.

Mammy Lou, the accepted sage among the women and known in the little local church as a "Scriptorian," makes no secret of her scorn for any theory that would put the Bible in eclipse. As occasion demands, she works in the home of one of the professors who, not sharing the views of his colleagues, helps Mammy Lou to defend her faith, much to the discomfort of her mate.

Jeff is a visiting nephew who wonders why his uncle is no longer a worker in the church, and Rastus undertakes an explanation.

Rastus cogitates that "guessing" is not a "pedigogical word" and the Bible is not an "educated book."

"I is an evolutionary, I is."

"Uncle Ras, is you all agin the gov'ment?"

"Most emphatical no! I is agin supe'stition. I is agin Santa Claus stories and snake stories and rib stories foah thousan' years old. Science never make no headway long as she haf to be 'sponsible for ever'thing what the Bible specify.

"Is you turned infidel?"

"That ain't no polite word for no college folks; I is a ‘vestigator."

"Ain't you believe in no God?"

"I ain't deny no God, but he ain't scientifical; he never got hisself differentiated."

"You mean he ain't done been segregated?"

"That ain't no fitten word for no God. 'Pears like the human fambly need a more or less God, but he is just promiscuous like, same like what you call anonymous. The scientifical p'fessors 'low evolution need a God same like a doughnut need a hole. It ain't a sure-nuff doughnut if it got no hole, but the hole never make no doughnut. The Bible ain't no educated book and man ain't originated from no dust. Science cogitate that God never git hisself scientificated cause he is an abstraction.

"Abstracshum? That don't say nothin' to me."

Mammy Lou gave vent to her pent-up feelings. "He done tol' you, chile; Abstrac' is anything what soon as it gits by itself, it ain't."

"They ain't no sich thing," said the puzzled Jeff.

"Shore they is, continued Mammy. "Ain't they sich a thing as a bunghole?"

"They is."

"And when you take it away from the bar'l, it ain't. I like to know how this Rastus person goin' to get his evolushum started if he ain't got no sure-nuff God.

"As I was about to say," said Rastus, "Scholar men hypothecate that matter and fo'ce git evolution started when they wrassel and wrassel with each other."

"I like to know," said Mammy, "if your scientificators ever 'scover any matter what can stay by itself without fo'ce, and if they ever find any fo'ce what git lonesome and act up all by itself?'

"Madam," said Rastus, with mock politeness, "you is accidentally approximated what no instructified man deny. Matter and fo'ce project around like one is the inside and t'other is the outside of what nobody exactly understand."

"Then these yere matter and fo'ce is same like bungholes; when either one of them go off solitary alone by it self, it ain't."

Rastus was clearly disconcerted, but he elected to treat the interruption as though he had not heard it. "As I was sayin', 'bout a billium years ago, this matter and fo'ce combine [!] in some for-tu-itous way to git life."

"Uncle Ras', is that a abstrac' word?"

"That is an educated word what you can't understand," said Rastus, feeling that he had put his theory over the heads of common critics.

Mammy was not diverted from the track so easily. "This Rastus man start in with two bunghole abstrac's what he say nobody understan', and now he tote in another abstrac' what nobody got to loan. He bow God out one way and the de'bbil out the other and stick bungholes together till he spile his pedigree and bust his religion. When he git his bunghole bar'l together, God and the debbil laugh, 'cause it won't hold anything but embalming fluid and posies in his hand."

Mammy had mixed her metaphors till Jeff did not see she was referring to the logical end of brute progeny.

"Co'se a bunghole bar'l wouldn't hold embalming fluid," said Jeff.

"Your uncle will," said Mammy. "This yere miscellaneous god of hissen didn't say, 'let us make man'; it jest say, 'let us make abstractums and then git excused.' When a human critter is jest seven hops ahead of a toad, in this yere evolutionism, he ain't no fitten vessel for eternal life. Rastus got three abstractums now and every time he tote in another, I 'low to make a tally mark on the stove pipe."

"How come you say I got three abstractions?" asked Rastus.

"Does you 'low life keep on bein' life when it separates from what it live in?"

"Mebby not," said Rastus sheepishly.

"Course not," said Mammy, "it jest same like the letter O; when it git its rim knocked off, it ain't.

Rastus hastened to escape the logic by reducing life to the minimum and fading it into the past so far that criticism could not follow.

"Woman, this life is only a little protoplasm what git alive so long ago, it ain't worth argufying. It ain't 'mount to nothin', 'cause it ain't big enough to make a 'skeeter sneeze if it git snuffed up his nose. It jest a little shadder of something so next to nothin' that the pint of a needle seem same like a ten-acre paster field. It know nothin', see nothin', hear nothin'; it ain't even got a head end and tail end."

"If it got any life, it got more than a mountain and it would bust up evolution to make it now. It take only one word more to say eternal life. 'Pears like you is mighty persnickery 'bout trinity in the Bible, but you 'low they is matter, fo'ce and life in a little proto-spasm and every one of 'em ain't nothin' when it git un-trinified. Resurrection ain't any more miracle than when your hypothecators turn what ain't life into what is life."

"This yere little one-cell feller ain't nothin' atall but a factor," said Rastus.

"How you goin' to git a factor if you ain't got a factory? How you goin' to git a factory what will make jest one proto-plaster and quit before it makes two? If it make two, it might make plenty."

"Woman, I ain't specify no habit, this yere plasm git alive by accident."

"Bunghole four," said Mammy. "Is accident anything before it happen? Is it anything when the thing what it aim to happen to, ain't there when it git there? Anyhow, if you 'low accidents happen and 'riginate life, you is shore goin' to bust up your evolution, 'cause when you got enough accidents, you got accidental creation."

"They ain't no call to originate no life after you git it started. Evolution cogitate only what it needs. It don't need no miracles and it tolerate only scientific accidents."

"'Pears like you need tame accidents, else some accident runnin' 'round loose might kill your accidental life. Anyhow, how you goin' to stop gittin' accidental life? 'Pears like you need an accident to happen to your accident so that one bunghole fills up the other one afore you git two kinds of ancestors."

With a pretended disregard for Mammy's remarks, Rastus addressed himself to Jeff. "It ain't no use for science to argufy agin ignorance. This yere life git alive by spontaneous combustion. You, got to have a powerful mikerscope to see it, same like it take a mikerscopic mind to assimilate this yere hypothesis."

"Uncle Ras, has you all seen this hippothemus what is so triflin' that it can't make a skeeter bat his eye?"

"Jefferson Lee, you don't understand educated words. This yere hypothesis is same like prognosticate only it's backwards. When you all prognosticate, you tell what ain't, 'cause it's coming; when you hypothesize, you tell what ain't, 'cause it's gone. When Zeke Jonsing display egg yaller on his vest, his wife hypothesize and say, 'Zeke, you been shootin' craps with strange guys at Slabtown.' How she 'scover this? She know it take money to git eggs. Zeke got no money 'cept he gamble. He don't win 'cept he use loaded bones. Guys what know him 'zamine the bones. They ain't no strange gentlemen in town; hence and whereas, he 'bliged to been over to Slabtown."

"Or in my chicken coop," said Mammy.

""Pears like this yere apothesis is same like guessing," said Jeff.

"Your observation is most 'zasperating. They ain't no word more incorrectly dislikable to evolutionaries. Guessing ain't no pedagogical word. When you all put one lone shot in the ole musket and pint it at a rabbit what am precipitate in his momentum, you 'scovers that they is a heap of places where they ain't no rabbit; but when you puts a han'ful of shot in the musket, then the rabbit 'scovers that they is mighty few places where they ain't no shot. One shot is guessin', and a han'ful is hypothesizing."

"Trouble is," said Mammy, "this yere hypotheneuse ain't no ole musket; it's a double bar'l blunderbust and they don't load shot in it. Rastus, he load one bar'l with like-beget-like and t'other with like-beget-different and wad it with hope-so's and happen-so's and can't-help-its and sets traps of abstrac's and missing links and hobble his rabbit with accidents, so the critter jest pintedly bound to surrender. Co'se they ain't nothin' what depend more on its legs than it does on its brain, goin' to 'scape such like ambushment. But you deliberate this fact—if he 'splode his whole ammunition factory, it can't make a rabbit what is, out of something what ain't, and it can't shoot rabbit into some critter what ain't a rabbit."

Rastus mopped his bald head with his red bandanna and addressed Jeff. "As I was sayin' when interrupted with highly flippant remarks, this little cell git alive, and it ain't nothin' but stomach, and co'se is bound to grow scandlous fast."

"Where it git vittles?"

`"It jest float 'round in the water till it bump up agin other things and jest soak 'em up. Evolution jest need three things, matter, fo'ce and life. No matter how we git 'em, we got 'em and they 'splain evolution."

"Rastus Augustus, you is 'most 'zasperating," said Mammy. "You specify you is got three THINGS and nary one of 'em ever been 'scovered bein' a thing by its own self. You is all perked up 'cause you 'low God is abstracshum, but you ain't signify anything else in your evolushum, and now you try to sneak in some more doughnut holes."

"I ain't narrate any more abstractions."

"When you got your little proto feller alive, how you goin' keep him alive? First off, you 'low he is hungry, but he never find it out less he have an appetite. He have to have instinct to know what is good to eat, else he might eat pizen ivy or something just as worse. After he git hisself full, he bound to die with colic less he have digestion, and digestion do him no good 'less he got creation in him to make what ain't alive and ain't hisself into what is alive and is hisself, same like God made Adam. Then you-all certify he is bound to grow. Now I ask you if hungry and taste good and instinct and digestion is things that hang around waitin' to git in the first proto when it git here? Moreover, you is bound to have starters and stoppers."

"How come stoppers?"

'"You 'low it bound to grow, and if it keep on growin' it bye in by git so big it make the world lop-sided. You implidate they is a little invisible doodad, git alive all by itself by accident and it 'scovers it is hungry when it know nothin' and it hold a collision with something what know less than nothin' and it jest wrap itself around what is scientifical dinner and it don't make mistakes like humans and its dinner is bigger than its diameter and it don't bust its circumference. This evolushum is same like a crooked card game; Rastus start with two aces what he dealt hisself and then he keep fillin' his hand from a cold deck what he got up his sleeve. Now he got a little invisibility growing and you watch what he dictate next."

Rastus shifted uneasily and resumed: "When this yere little mite git big enough it begin to pucker in the middle and pucker till it pinch itself plum in two. That's how they come to be two."

"That don't explain how you keep 'em from gettin' too big," said Mammy. "If they keep growin' it ain't make no difference whether they is one or two, they done fill the world up after a while. How they know when to stop growin' and start bustin'? Rastus have to have just as many stoppers as he have starters and first you know, he goin' to plan another accident and git some other critter to eat 'em up so they don't git too multi-numerous. Now Rastus has to have bossism and puckerism and Adam-and-Eve-ism in this invisible mote of gravy before he can git two of 'em."

"I don't participate in your meanin', Aunt Lou" said Jeff.

"Rastus can't abide no virgin birth, and he scoff at a piece of Adam growin' into a mate, yet he slip all these doctrines into a little hickey so triflin' that it don't know which end is the other end. This yere little mote of vapor what is so small that enough of 'em to bust up a 'rithmetic can git lost in a smell of noodle soup, can do what Rastus say God can't do with Adam or the mother of Jesus."

Rastus resorted to the oft used plea that scholarship may ignore the common herd. "'Tain't no use to 'spute with 'literate folks what contradic' science. How else we get a population of 'ordial [primordial] germs 'cept they just nacherly dissipate when nature say, 'You is too big to cooperate in one unity'?"

"I been 'specting this nature person to git here mos' any time," said Mammy, as she made an extra long mark on the pipe. "I 'low it's been projectin' round with Uncle Sam and John Bull and the Spirit of '76."

"Ain't nature a sure 'nuff real?" asked Jeff.

"Can you measure or weigh or count it? Can you move it or nail it down or find the middle of it? When you 'scover where' it 'riginate, if you look close, you find the shell outa which Santa Claus hatched."

"Uncle 'Ras, when these little splasms pucker in two, is one the old one, and t'other the young one?"

"'Co'se not, no more as two ends of a tater cut in two: I seed it my own self in a mikerscope what the p'ofessor show us yisterday, and they ain't no 'sputing it."

"Is the ones you seen just pieces of the 'riginal first one?"

"I 'spose they gotta be;" said Rastus, after some confusion.

"Then the first one ain't dead yet," said Mammy, "but Rastus can't swaller Melchizedek stories."

"If they ain't change none in a twillion years, how you 'scover that ever'thing that live come from 'em?"

"As I was sayin', when your aunt start to recite and git me flustered, these protoplasms git so multitudinous many that some 'bliged to starve if they don't git fittings what help 'em swim and fight and swaller, and so some of 'em happen to have a wart or a hair or a wrinkle grow on 'em and now comes the mostest importantest law in evolution--'The fittenest shall survive'. So it come that they is always too many, and the turrible struggle go on, and they get more and more fitten till man git here."

"What come of the ones what don't git no fittings, like you git to see?"

"Pears like they is the only ones that sure nuf survive," said Mammy. Rastus was trapped, and when they laughed at his confusion he left in a huff. As a parting shot, he said,

FLAGGING UNCLE RASTUS AT EVERY CROSSING
As he tries to explain how "Protoplasters git flixins" and other phases
of the evolutionary hypothesis.

Next day Rastus sought help from the college boys, who rehearsed him in words and phrases calculated to overawe his household. When evening came, Jeff began: "Uncle Ras, when the pro-to-plasters ain't got no fixin's, how do they suddenly git 'em?"

"They ain't no sudden in evolution. It take ages to 'velop fins and wings and legs. At first it's jest a hair or a wart or a wrinkle come on the little bag of jelly, and the little feller wiggle it and it 'velop."

"But he got to have muscle to wiggle it, and nerve and brain to wiggle it systematical, and if he ain't got no eyes or nose, he is jest as like to wiggle into trouble as not."

"If you listen instead of scrutinate ev'ry p'int, I can 'splain it."

Mammy made her contribution: "Co'se all these disfigurements on the little plaster is a great hindrance for a thousand years, but this hypothesis say, 'You gotta put up with it, 'cause you is goin' to need it powerful much some day,' and so they stick to it till accidents git to be a habit, and then they can't quit it."

"It's jest as bad as profanity swearin' for your aunt to make fun of heredity."

"I ain't make fun of heredity. Heredity don't turn snakes into birds like you say. Your first little smiggin' don't inherit nothin', and when the east end break loose from the west end they is still orphans. If when they is two ends they ain't inherit nothin', then they ain't help it any to make four ends. A whisker on one end don't inherit to the other end. This educated foolishment made you drunk in your head."

"They is a law of variation go with heredity."

"You say last week that they is a hundred millium times as many one-cell animals as they is animals big a nuf to see."

"They ain't no scholar man dispute it."

"Then your variegated law tech only one in a hundred millium."

Rastus was in a pinch, and deemed the time opportune to unreel his phrase of "educated words," and stun his too critical wife and nephew.

"The exegesis of this Can [awkward pause] acclamation of ultimate cogitation specify that the cosmos is invested with circumambient laws what interact between the dictates and the dictums."

Jeff's jaw dropped in a reverential way. Mammy was both staggered and disgusted. "When God make the Bible, He don't have to bust a 'rithmetic, beswizzle the almanac, and put the alphabet out of j'int, ' was her comment.

"Nothin' but shaller minds 'spute what nobody don't deny," said Rastus.

"I ain't 'spute no sure nuf laws. One time you hypothefyers let on that laws is things, and 'nother time you act like they is pulls and pushes what make 'emselves without a puller and a pusher. Law is nothin' but words, and if they is real laws they is God's words. Laws is God Almighty's verbs, and nature is jest the habit God has of doin' things. I got it right here in Genesis: 'And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind ... and it was so.' If you got a law of variegation what makes itself and info'ce itself, why don't it git holt of these squidrillions of protomolasses what keep right on bein' protos in spite of all the laws and the asses?"

Even Rastus laughed sheepishly, and answered unwisely: "I 'low it is jest same as some laws: they is some what don't come in the jurisdiction of the co't."

"That is jest the p'int," said Mammy. "When you hypothecators git cornered, you git out an alibi or a change of venue, or limit the jurisprudence of the co't "

"Co'se it is oblivious to mental minds, what is used for intellectual pu'poses, that law can't pick and sort where they ain't any variation."

"Ain't you got variation nuf now?" said Mammy. "You tell Tilly's chillun last week that they is a hundred kinds of telescopic germs what float in the air and sleep in the dirt and swim in the mud, and they is jest watchin' to git in 'em and, raise a rookus like smallpox and scarlet fever. It wonders, what they had for vittles afore man evolute."

"I ain't hol' no contrac' to 'splain ever'thing at once,'" said Rastus. "I jest showing' how they is a one-cell life at one end of this evolution and a—"

"Hopeless grave at the other," finished Mammy Lou.

"I git it 'splained if the bystanders didn't all the time throw every switch and flag me at ever' crossin'."

"Never min', Uncle, please tell us how come man," said Jeff.

"As I was sayin', some of these cells don't teetotal pinch in two, but hang together in a bunch like tapioca puddin', and then comes 'nother great law. They change from homoge [n] eity to heterog [n] eity."

Please, sir, can't you say it in talk-words?"

"Homoge'eity is when they is one cell what is monotounous and all alike. Heteroge'eity is when they is many cells and they is different and 'vide up the work. Same, like a first settler—he live simple and do it: all, and he is a homogee; but when a Iota settlers come to jine him, one say— 'I'll be miller,' and another say—'I'll be blacksmith,' and sech like, and they is heretogees, 'cause they foller different trades. When these cells git in a bunch like grapes, some eat and some digest, and some make the wiggles and some do the thinkin', and some lay the eggs."

"H-m-m," said Mammy, "Rastus done import another shipment of accidents, and yet he say nothin' happen sadden in evolushum. 'Pears-like these protos got to practice up a long time afore they lay eggs and each generation inherit what their ancestors didn't do and by-em-by they almost lay eggs and by-em-by after geographical ages, some of the protos lay a half an egg."

"But, Uncle Ras, in the settlement each is a individual. Each one eat and drink and die separate. How can many critters suddenly 'come one critter? How can they change to egg layin' gradual?"

"I can't 'splain it now; evolution got no call to 'splain ever'body's question; it jest cipher out its own questions."

"What do she do next?

"They ain't no he and no she, 'cause they ain't no sex develop yet. By-em-by somehow this heterogeeous feller bust apart, and one part is the pappy person and one part is the mammy person."

"After they quit bustin' apart' 'cause it help 'em survive, why do they start it up agin, and if they survive all this time without sex, why do they got to be pestered with it?"

"Evolution backfires sometimes," said Mammy.

"Co'se they is inscrutables, but they don bother hypothesis none, 'cause it figger nothin' can survive 'cept it do help. If a thing got to be so, it is so. It git you apart what look' unreasonable."

"Jest like a sign board say, 'Bridge' washed out. Detour'."

"Nary a detour," said 'Rastus disgustedly. "This is follerin' a trail like a rabbit-dog. When the dog lose the trail, he pick it up agin on t'other side of the creek. Same when your mind foller a'trail and it come where they ain't no tracks, you stop thinkin' here and resume thinkin' when you find more tracks."

"If they is a thousand years between tracks, it could be another rabbit."

"It's the same rabbit, but he is got a new factor."

"I cain't 'magine how you git a sex factor gradual like. How can it be an is, till it is clear past bein' an ain't?"

"Easy nuf to git a factor in installments if you got a 'magination factory," said Mammy. "First you git a hypotekettle-factor, and then you git a millium years, and then you put 'em in a plug hat and slip in some abstractions, and, hocus pocus, the magic man take a bran' new factor outs the borried hat. Poor little stuck-together cells, they got to be 'sponsible for what their ancestors put on 'em, and they got to inherit what they bust loose from; and if they ain't anuf factors to make trouble in the world; they got to survive a malefactor."

"Uncle, how these little pa and ma fellers ever 'scover what the plan is?"

Mammy was ready. "The great god Jubiter say to Cupid, 'That little tapioca puddin' that is alive has got pulled 'apart, and they ain't inherit any sex instinct yet, and you better git a supply and go down and fix 'em up, so I won't be delayed none in this terrible slow process of makin' a man. That is one hypothesis; another is that Santa Claus come along and he mistake 'em for a pair of socks, and he put in a passel of laws."

Seeing his uncle-ready to quit, Jeff said in a sympathetic tone, "Never mind, Uncle Ras; what come next in this pedigree?"

"We don't, mostly know: some say worm; some say it's somethin' like an eel."

"Is they guessin'?"

"You is goin' to spile your sagacity if you all the time is suspicious. When you got to supply evidence what is lost, it is conjecture. Ever' time life pass through birth, it put something off and take something on. It's same like a 'spress train start from San Franfrisco, and when it git to N'York we ax the 'spress man, 'Where this train come from?' and he say, 'I dunno, I git on at Jersey City.' Then we look in the cars, and there is a 'Gomery-Roeback catalog wrapped in a Philadelphy newspaper, and we figger it come via Chicago and Philadelphy, but did it come via Denver or St. Paul? One feller say, 'They is icycles on the car, and it been way North, where it is cold,' and another say, 'It takes a thaw to make icycles,' and so each one conject for hisself."

"But how do you reckon it 'riginate in San Francisco?''

"'Cause it spile the hypothesis if it don't."

"This Darwin palaver make me riled," said Mammy. "This 'maginary 'spress train start a billium years ago, without a starter and no conductor and no track laid. When it start it is a thousand times less than nothin' for eyesight to see, and when it stop it is a circus train with Homo the highbrow ape got outs his cage. If the station is where there is birth, then the ole train don't take anything on at the station; it jest drop a splinter off, and the splinter grow into a train, and load up purty nigh ezactly the same as the train it fell off of, and it pass the mammy-pappy train where it has jumped the 'maginary track. Ever'body know brute life begin so small that it's hid in mystery beyond the reach of any mikerscope, and it end in the crumblin dust of death. The only train what ever run on a evolution track end in wreck. They ain't no train despatcher and they ain't no orders 'cept one that Rastus don't own up to: that one is, 'Might makes right; dog eat dog; root hog or die; everyone for hisself and the debbil take the hindmost.' Outa, the greed, strife, hate, jealousy, selfishness, cruelty, pain, and death of a billium years man come a crawlin' out somehow. This 'spress train fable of hissen is like a top start spinnin' itself, and when it is spun long nuf, it's a Noah’s ark. I can make fables, too. Once they was a man step on a banana skin, and he fall through a worm hole in the sidewalk, and he git up and find he have roller skates on, and he skate right into a pile of shavin's, and bresh hisself off, and his skates is turned to a wheelbarrer, and he git in the wheelbarrer and take hisself for a ride, and he trip hisself up on a hen feather and come home in an airyplane. If Rastus 'low he was a protoplaster a billum years ago and he go on a 'scursion and come in a cattle car and they was monkeys on the train but his folks crowded 'em off, he ain't gott no call to fuss about any folks crowdin' him off. Anyhow, I is right glad he ain't no blood relation of mine."

"Madam," said Rastus, with a show of wounded dignity, "you insult me when you 'low I is descended from apes. Colonel Darrow and Colonel Cadman say this yere aspersion certifies ignorance, 'cause apes is cousins not ancestors."

"Excuse me, Rastus," said Mammy, with a low bow, "I done forgit that the 'ology book what you brung home, testify that you all come from reptiles 'way back when they quit washin' theirselves—when they stopped bein' a big word that I can't remember. If you-all 'low you is in the head cage-wagon of a circus parade, I reminds you that some of these days you is goin' for a ride and six men goin' help you out and walk solemn and I like to know if this yere evolutionism goin' git you any wings for your soul to flap when you can't go afoot."

"If your Aunt Lou goin' to preach, I don't 'low to set in the amen corner," said Rastus, as he left the room, shutting the door with more force than was really necessary.

"Jefferson," said Mammy, "your poor old uncle is parrot-ized."

"Yes ma'am, but I don't assimilate your meaning."

"These big words the college boys tell him, done gone to his head. He say what they tell him, same like a parrot. I ain't got enough politeness for his 'varmint'-ism; 'pears like you is the one to sanify [bring to sanity] him.

Then come ears and eyes and "sich like," so declares Uncle Rastus
on Evolution.

A week passed without the subject being discussed with Rastus. Meanwhile, the boy and his aunt had asked many explanations of her employer and favorite professor—the only one in the college who had really weighed the evidence against evolution. Before Rastus would continue his explanations, Mammy was required to erase her many chalk marks from the stove pipe and promise to restrain herself.

"Uncle Ras, explain how come bones to git in critters before any of them had bones."

"First off, they is tough places git in the meat and lime settle there and make bone."

"How come the lime to settle so they is a hole in the settlin's what is closed up at both ends, and grease git stored away in the hollow place?"

"'Cause that's the scientifical way to make a bone."

"How come the lime and tough places can plan it out so they is joints that git themselves made same like hinges only better?"

Rastus only shook his head.

"How you 'spose it come that after the lime and tough places git themselves fixed up and settled down, with a head end and a foot end and a hollow middle, they can grow bigger 'round and longer and git bigger hinges same like they knew ezzactly what is needed?"

"Colonel Darwin say they is some things in-ex-plicable."

"And when they git broke, they can mend theirselves?"

"Nature is un-screw-table," said Rastus. "When a crawfish git a claw pulled off, it jest grow another one on. The 'ology books certify that they is some critters that when they git broke in two like a freight train, the caboose end grow another engine end and the engine end grow another caboose end so they is same like two trains."

"How come we can't do that? When we git broke in two, do we die 'cause we ain't fittenest to survive or is it 'cause we ain't evoluted up to it yet?"

In his perplexity, Rastus, without knowing it, acknowledged the HANDICAP that exists in all higher forms of life--a fact that utterly demolishes the theory of evolution.

"'Pears like evolution work both ways. It bound to see that everything survive that is a survival but it 'low it can't tolerate anything survive too much, else it unsurvive everything else."

"Rastus, I offers my congratulashums," said Mammy:

"Woman, your congratulations need scrutinizing."

"How you 'spose backbones git brakes on all the hinges so they don't bend too much and they git a hole through every joint so the telephone cable run through it?"

"Evolution do what have to be done and the spinal cord 'bliged to be protected, else the critter git paralyzed."

"How come the critters don't git paralyzed before they git backbone?"

"’Cause the paralysis evolve same time the protection evolve. Neither one git ahead of the other."

"Uncle Ras, how you 'spose nature ever come to think all these plans and contraptions.?"

Rastus started. "Where you git that word—think? Nature don't think. Has your aunt been, settin' you up! to such foolishment?"

"'Pears like something have to think better than man, 'cause man never ketch up only to the tail end of nature with his thinkin'."

"It jest happen 'cause the fittenest survive."

"Did the ones what didn't git bones all die?

"Evolution don't take 'em all. They is two kinds of survivors: them that is fittenest and them that is unfittenest "

"Amen!" said Mammy.

"This ain't no prayer meetin'," said Rastus disgustedly.

"There is two kinds of folks git what's a cumin' to 'em, them what pray and them what don't," said Mammy. "Uncle Ras, how you 'spose critters come to git hot blood before anything gits it?"

"'Cause it helps 'em survive.

"Is a hen survive better 'cause she is hot, than a turtle cause she is cold?"

"Jefferson Lee, can't you see the turtle don't need to be hot?"

"Did the hen git the need same time she is gittin' the hot?"

"Ezzactly so. I is glad you is scrutinizing that pint. She need to be hot, else how she goin' to hatch her eggs?"

"Why don't she lay turtle eggs what don't have to, be hot-hatched?"

"A hen chicken got to be hot 'cause nature plan it that a-way."

"I got to git air," said Mammy, going to the door.

"Lots of critters can freeze up plum stiff and it don't hurt 'em. Do a hen git hot blood so she can freeze up and die?"

"Nature fix 'em up feathers when it fix 'em up shivers," explained Rastus.

"Don't it 'pear like a hen is planned same like mebbe a God would if he was allowed?"

"They ain't no call to meddle any God into it. Fact is, nature make some mistakes and miseries and misfits."

"Mebbe they is a devil gits hisself meddled in."

"Devils aint' needed for mistakes. If they is a devil meddle he can make worse than a mistake."

"Is a mosquito worse than a mistake?"

"Look a-here, boy, you is gittin' too super-scrutinous."

"Uncle Ras, how you 'spect blood git to circumambulating all through the body like a government inspector, and it take along a wreckin' crew and a repair gang and a supply train and a travelin' hospital and a billion soldiers [leucocytes], else when a feller scratch hisself in a berry patch, he ain't fitten to survive?"

"How the blood do so many things is a mystification, but it git circulatin' 'cause first off, they is a hollow place. Bits full of blood and has cramps and squeeze the blood out. After awhile it git valves to hold the blood till it can git another cramp. That's how come a heart, and by em by there gits to be four hollow places and four kinds of cramps."

"When the critter change from three hollows and three valves to four hollows and four valves, does it come gradual like, so it gits three and a half hollows and valves before it gits four?"

"That air question ain't in evolution; hypothesis never git down to cipher in fractions, to answer such like foolishment "

"Uncle Ras, tell us how come eyes and ears and such like."

"'Pears like they is come a time when some little wiggler let his head float outa the water, and he git a freckle or a blister or a sunburn, and it feel different in sunlight as it does in shadder, and so he 'void sunstroke and sickly dark corners, and it help him survive. When it help him survive, he 'bliged to heredify it, all the chillun git it more so, and after a million years it's eyes."

"Heredify?"

"That mean, he make a heredity outa it. Same way they is come a loose place on his head what rattle and buzz when they is a noise, and it gits heredified, and the chillun use it more and more, and it gits to be ears. Same way, voice is a rattle box in the throat."

"How do the little children understand what evolution aim for them to git? How they know that by em by it will help their great great grand young ones to have a blister or a wart or rattle box heredified?"

"They got instinct."

"How come instinct?"

"Instinct is jest memory heredified."

"Can they remember they are goin' to get eyes and ears and voice before they git 'em?"

Rastus was cornered, but tried a new hypothesis that is hereby referred to evolutionists and "hypothefyers" in general. "I reckon instinct got to heredify what is goin' to be memories."

"This yere evolutionism is more wonderfuller to me than a miracle," said Jeff. "It take a sore spot, and make a holler ball, and put it in a socket, and fill it with juice, and make it a lens, and show it how to focus, and make a pucker curtain for it, and fix an overflow drain, and wash it with tears and put it on a universal j'int, and fit a steerin' gear to aim it, and slidin' doors to kiver it."

"Where you git all this machine shop stuff? I was 'splainin' eyes, not automybiles," said Rastus in alarm. "You is purty nigh as cantankerous as your aunt."

"Even if a feller can heredify eyes afore they are eyes, it 'pears to me it would be a heap of botheration to have goin 'to' be eyes before you git sure-nuff eyes. Mebbe evolution plan it out to have eyelids first, so they can't any dirt git into the works while they are being heredified into seeing eyes."

"You hypothecate all wrong, 'cause they is eyes milliums of years afore they is lids."

"How do the heredifyers keep dirt out of them?"

"Dirt don't hurt 'em 'cause they is like fish eyes-extra powerful tough."

"Then when the fish turn into frogs or something that can live on the land, does evolution make their eyes tender so they can need to keep dirt out?"

Rastus was puzzled and evaded the question, as some others—named "Legion" have done:

"I 'low evolution worked milliums of years ago, so they ain't anyone there to ask fool questions."

This observation was not wide of a great truth. If Rastus had said that evolution-ists make their theories work in the far past, beyond the range of human experience, where impossibilities are lost in the cracks of geological ages, it would have been both truth and treason.

"Uncle Ras, why don't we see warts and moles' and blisters and whiskers turning into new kinds of contraptions now?"

"'Velopment of new organs is so slow that history ain't live long a nuf to ketch 'em at it, but geologers dig up shells and bones and peterfied remains what show that some animals git here after others. The Bible say they is jest created that away; but science say one kind jest add and subtract a little to a time, and so one kind git to be another kind."

"How many cells did our ancestors have before they began to leave bones?"

"The p'fessor hypothesize that mebbe they had a hundred millium cells, before, they had sure-nuff bones."

"Then they had to git a hundred million times as big as when they started before they leave evidence for evolutioners."

"Well, what of it?"

"Ain't that a long ways for hypothesizers to hypot before they git any evidence?"

Seeing his uncle was nettled by the question, Jeff hastened to relieve the situation by offering an answer himself. "Mebbe it ain't size that, counts, 'cause insects have more legs and wings than we have and the study books say a fly has 8,000 eyes and a dragon fly has 56,000. Do you reckon that in another million years we will git trigged up with a flashlight like a lightning bug or a spinning machine like a spider or a lot of legs likes caterpillar?"

"You fellers, what make fun of science, is got all you ever goin' to git except brains, 'cause evolution only give you what you can't survive if you don't git 'em."

"But, Uncle Ras," said Jeff meekly, "don't 'most everything git trade marks and 'velopments to make 'em look pirty and don't they git, equipment so they can help other folks?"

"No, sir-ee'!"' said Rastus, striking a fist into an open palm. "Where you git that fool nonsense? Colonel Darwin say, if any critter git a 'quipment made to help another kind of animal or for folks to, look at, or jest for variety, it, 'stroy his doctrine." (Chapter 6. "Origin of Species.")

"Uncle Ras, it 'pears like every bug and bird and beast on earth, except `varmints,' is helpin' something else same like they is in partnership. The bee, carry pollen for the flowers and the flowers call 'em? with pirty colors and pay 'em with honey. The plants breath off oxygen what they don't want and the animals say, 'That's jest what I need and you can have a big word what is pizen to me.' The groundhogs dig holes for the rabbits—in the summer-time and the rabbits keep 'em open and ventilated in the winter-time."

"That Ain't prove nothin', 'cause when critters' git 'velopments, they git 'em for their own selves first."

"Do it help the cat to wobble his tail so the little birds see he is goin' to jump, or do it help the hawk to make a squeal-noise so the birds and baby rabbits hide?"

"Evolution 'low that every 'velopment what don't help critters to survive, help 'em 'cause it gits mates for 'em."

Jeff took from his coat pocket; a box containing a beautiful sea shell, a chrysalis of a butterfly marked with colors of burnished gold, a bird's egg marked with a unique design, and a small caterpillar as resplendent with plumes as the cavalcade of a king. "Uncle Ras; how do such pirtyments help them to survive?"

"Mebbe it help 'em git mates.

"They don't git mates, and anyhow, the fellers what live in the sea shells is blind."

"I ain't read up on it," said Rastus-doggedly, "but it 'bliged to help them somehow.'

"Don't you think the little white spots on the out corners of a robin's tail are just because God want everything different?"

"No sir! Them spots come 'cause when the birds mate they choose mates colored up jest how they like 'em."

"Do you have two evolution—one to pull and another to push—like when a freight train goes up the grade, they have one engine to pull and another to push?"

"What you all mean with that fool question?"

"Pears like you 'bliged to have two evolutions—one to go ahead and make the birds hanker for spots and another to come along behind pushin' the spots."

"Boy, they is somebody been a settin' of you up to such foolishment.

"I craves to ask a question," said Mammy meekly.

"You may inquire, unless it is uncompetent, irrelevant and not proper cross-examination," said Rastus with a flourish.

"You say that critters never git any contraption unless it is ezzactly what they need their own selves."

"I answers yes in the affirmative."

"Can you name any kind of contraption that man could think of, or God could make that evoluters wouldn't claim it came 'cause it helped the fellers what got it? I dare you to specify any kind of contraption a critter could have that God ain't already put it on something."

Rastus was discomfited and the situation was becoming tense, when Jeff renewed the discussion and enabled his uncle to ignore the challenge.

"Uncle Ras, it ain't so much what birds and beasts have that helps other ones, as it is what they lose or what they ain't allowed to git, that helps the others."

"Does you meditate that evolution help one kind of critter by taking something away from another one?"

"I allude that somebody see to it that evolution (or whatever it is) ain't allowed to overdo itself."

"'Pears like you postulate that everything ain't allowed to git all the evolution it can hold."

"S'posen the hawk raise sixteen babies and the quail raise two? S'posen they is one proto-feller outa all the squintillion of 'em 'velop into a big bird, fast as a pigeon, with quills like a porcupine, and claws like an eagle, and smell like a skunk, and appetite like a crow, and pizen like a rattlesnake, and it swim like a duck and lay eggs like a tater bug; how is anything else goin' to survive? If all the birds had an appetite for seeds instead of worms, won't the worms multiply and ‘vour ever'thing?"

"They ain't none of your fool s'posens in evolution. Nature jest see to it that everything git to survive and they ain't no such thing as double survive. Science narrate that some kinds of animals can't keep up with 'evolution and they get extinct-ified."

"Uncle Ras, do chicken lice keep up with evolution, and did the great monsters in the Natural History book, go extinct 'cause they couldn't keep up?"

"I tell you nature regulate everything so that this is a tol'able like world to live in," said Rastus with a display of irritation.

At this labored effort to ignore the evidence of an overruling God who holds evil in check, and substitute some impersonal fictional authority that men call "nature," Mammy said softly, "Oh fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken."

"Look-a-here, ole woman, if you got to set the Scripter up, agin hypothesizers, I got a question to ask you."

"Suits me. We'll ask questions turn about."

"How do animals git from Ameriky to Noar's ark and back agin?"

"Cain said (Gen. 4:14), God has driv' him from the face of the earth. That Scripter make out they is some places ain't face. Noar gits orders (Gen. 7:3,4) to save seed on the face of the earth. God ain't told us yet how things happen on the back of the head. Now I ax you, if little germ-bugs can drown and freeze up and dry up and blow away, and live anyhow, how do it help 'em to git giblets and hot blood and a thousand places to have a misery in, and if your religion is the survival of the fittenest or the fightenest, what for you complain if folks tromp on other folks and survive 'em? You evolutionaries 'mind me of Abe Swayback what steal a little pig of his neighbor and then complain scan'lous 'cause the ole sow foller him home."

"I didn't 'gree to answer speeches; now I ax you, if you don't like evolution 'cause it's cruel and selfish, how you 'splain why your God plan a world that a way?"

"He never plan it so. Genesis 6 say he is grieved in his heart and sorry he made man and beast 'cause all flesh had corrupted his way. When God have his way, the lion git an appetite for straw like an ox. Now I ax you if it help a gobbler to survive to have ugly red meat-beads on his bare neck to git hurt when he fights, and have a paint brush on his crop and a red snake tail hangin' down apast his nose? Do it help a snake to have a rattlebox on his tail? Do a rowdy ruffian struttin' rooster survive 'cause he dress to be seen, like a target, and crow in the middle of the night, so every varmint in a mile can locate him? Do a flea have pizen itch in his bite, so he can make friends? If a queen bee and the drone bee don't work, how do they hereditate work into the chillun that ain't like neither one; and how do work bees pass on variations what help 'em when they got no babies? You say man is cousin of an ape, 'cause they cut on the same pattern. I ax you how could God make a man so as he don't have any plan, and God has used every plan they is in makin' critters? Anyhow, if man is beast like, it ain't no wonder, 'cause God say he has corrupted his way. Maybe a magician can put a fried egg in a plug hat and take out a white rabbit, but your divlution can't take a wart and blister and hives and seven-year itch and make legs and eyes outa 'em, no more than you can grow feathers on a mud turtle in a million ages. It's jest a barnyard religion—"

But Rastus had escaped.

If Rastus is a lost sheep, he "don't sheep-blat," says Mammy

As is usual with the purveyors of false doctrine, Rastus showed ten times as much zeal in disturbing the church as he had formerly displayed in building it up. One evening the pastor called at the cabin' to discuss with Rastus the obsession that had so fired him with zeal. Rastus met him at the gate much as a high school senior greets a freshman, only that his air of superiority was tempered with a generous determination not to be too severe with the parson.

"Pa'son, it is about time you is lookin' after your sheep what git away."

"Are you getting away?"

"I have done escaped."

"From what?"

"From supe'stition and whale stories and miracle yarns and folkslore."

"If you have escaped from all these, what have you escaped to?"

AS FREE TO SPEAK AS A PARROT

"I has escaped to freedom in my mind. I is free to think my own thoughts and I ain't have to follow in the mental feetsteps of tradition. I has got the new 'lightenment and I don't tag along after what my pappy and mammy say, but speak what I think out of my own head."

"Are you freer than Jesus, who said, 'I have not spoken of myself; but the Father which sent me, he gave me a commandment, what I should say and what I should speak'?"

Ain't I allowed to think out things for myself?"

"Rastus, will you tell me just one thing about your new freedom that someone has not told you?"

"I--I 'low your question is not proper cross-examination."

"Perhaps not. I withdraw the question, but the college boys are having fun, believing they are using you to peddle evolutionary theories among the community."

"People need the truth to make 'em free."

"People can discover that without a saving faith, mere physical freedom may be dangerous. There is no slavery so hopeless as the shackles forged by misused liberty. How will it help people to resist temptation, if you prove to them they are the children of the ape?"

"Hold on, pa'son! Hold on! I hopes you will 'scuse me for amplifying your sagacity, but scientifical people long ago remonstrate that man ain't come from no ape. Man descended from a 'pithecus."

"Do you deny that teachers of evolution have gotten their names in the Sunday papers by teaching that some races came from a different kind of ape and more recently than other races?"

"I never heard of such stuff. I 'low to ask—I mean I deny it. That jest some man's insult."

"Yes, it would bean insult if applied to but one race, but people consider it a mark of progress to accept animal ancestry, if it is far enough back. Here is a picture of a 'graven image' called 'The Chrysalis' that was unveiled in the West Side Unitarian Church in New York City. I paid that same church one dollar for it. As you see, it is the figure of a man coming forth from a gorilla. It is true that the sculptor adds a statement that not knowing just what the ancestor of man was, he chose the gorilla for symbolical sculpture because it has more in common with man than any other anthropoid ape'."

Rastus tried to laugh off the conviction that somehow he had been insulted and said rather vigorously, "That doggone church done evolution more harm than good. It's scientific to talk about animal kin-folks but it's an insult to make pictures of it like it happened sudden."

"It seems, then, it is an insult to picture a man as though he came from an animal in one generation."

"I would hit any man who say I come from an animal even in twenty generations."

"Then evolution is an insult if it works too fast. Rastus, if you are really free, I congratulate you, but how long can you keep what you call freedom? The papers tells of a hundred or more convicts in a Western penitentiary who overpowered their guards and barricaded themselves in the dining room of the prison. Is that the kind of freedom you enjoy?

"I ain't 'low to git in no prison," said Rastus uneasily.

"You are under sentence of death."

"Same like everybody," said Rastus relieved.

"Let me give you a fable," said the pastor.

Two crows were feeding in a barn lot. One was a tame crow and tame is sometimes a word to describe captivity. The other was a crow from the tree tops and clouds that came to hobnob with his barnyard neighbor.

"Tell me your experience," said the tree-top crow.

"My name is Jim Crow. The god of this farm took me from my nest when I neared the age where crows try to fly. Already I feared that I might fall out of the nest and break my neck when the wind blew a gale. He who rescued me said, 'Poor Jim Crow, you are burdened with too many long feathers, I will set you free.'

One by one the kind man cut the long feathers in my wings. Really, I had never used them, and they were long and dragging and clumsy. Since then, it has been so easy to flap my wings and keep them clean, that I greatly rejoice in my freedom. Moreover, I am as fat and as well sheltered as the Brahma hens. Now let us have your story."

"My name is James Crow. I have known hardship and sometimes hunger. My parents taught me from the first that there were many places that were not safe places for crows. Indeed, this is one of the places, but now in my mature months, I see that you are safe. My parents must have been old fogies. Now that you remind me of it, I remember that it was hard work to lift myself into the air with wings when my craw was full and I must get back to the tree top on the mountain. Many times the winds buffeted me as I beat my way against them. I have noticed that when the dew was on the meadows, my wings were wet and bedraggled because of the long feathers. Really, I envy you your freedom."

"Why not live on the ground with me?"

"Could I do that?"

"Certainly, but you must give up your hankering for the clouds. The god of this world—I mean this farmer—will not suffer you to remain here unless you conform to the fashions of this farm. You must have your wings clipped; that is the circumcision of the world—on this farm.

"Might I not keep some feathers so I can fly when trouble comes?"

"You cannot and be consistent. If you elect to live a barnyard life, do not be divided in your allegiance; if it is good now, it is good all the time. Some of the hens try to be half and half-part of the time on the ground and part in the air. They only get a few feet in the air and usually get into their master's garden and before the dog gets them out, they lose many feathers they would like to keep, besides losing the respect of all."

"Shall I be in good company?"

"Indeed, this is a ranch of highly advertised thoroughbreds."

"I am with you in mind; how shall I go about it to enjoy your freedom?"

"You use your mouth to hold fast to that brier and I will use my mouth to pull your flight feathers." Thus it came to pass that the crows had great liberty after a fashion. Now this barnyard was on the banks of a river called "Jordan," that overflowed its banks once a year.

Not many days after, the flood came and the knoll on which the crows were feeding soon became an island with the water rising fast.

James Crow lamented and said, "Oh that I had kept some of my feathers," then would I flap hard to rise.

"It would do no good," said Jim, "for the lowlands are covered with water and the mountain is far and you are heavy with corn."

"Alas! I see it all now. What surprises me is that a crow could be fooled so easily."

"Is you-all aimin' that fable at me?"

"You bartered your faith for a temporary freedom; How wilt thou do in the swelling of the Jordan'?'

"Pa'son, I don't reckon God will be hard on a man jest 'cause he is scientifical."

"The wisdom of this world is foolishness with God."

"What difference is it goin' to make when I die, if I have descended from animals?"

"I know," said Mammy, "it say in the Book, 'Thou must go to be with thy fathers'."

Rastus looked a severe rebuke at her and resumed, "Ain't the shepherd bound to hunt up the lost sheep 'until he find it'?"

"Rastus, are you lost or escaped?"

"Well, pa'son, I ain't blat much to git back like a lost sheep do," acknowledged Rastus.

"That is a most important p'int," said Mammy. "Rastus don't sheep-blat; he go about rooster-crowin' how free his barnyard is."

The pastor admonished Mammy kindly, and this mollified Rastus somewhat.

"Ain't everybody a lost sheep what ain't in the flock?" asked Rastus.

"Suppose it is something in the flock scattering the flock; is that a sheep?"

"Pa'son, you is rubbin' it in, ain't you?"

"Is a lost sheep a happy sheep?

"No he ain't, pa'son."

"The same shepherd who told us about the lost sheep also spoke of wolves and He gave another parable about dividing the sheep from the goats. He said, 'If ye were my sheep, ye would hear my voice'."

Mammy could restrain herself no longer. "Is a sheep belong to the shepherd unless the shepherd git his wool? That's a p'int worth scrutinizing."

No one answered, and she continued, "Is he a sheep if he go projectin' around with the inside of a menagerie?"

"Now, Mammy Lou, let us be generous," said the pastor.

"Excuse me, pa'son, but it do 'pear to me like the shepherd won't say, 'Rastus is my black sheep even if his four fathers [forefathers] is a 'pithecus and a marsoop and a lizard and a toadfrog'."

"Scuse me, Rev'rend, I got some work I is done 'bliged to do at the college. I hopes you will call again," said Rastus with a meaning look at Mammy as he left.

Rastus had a horror for reptiles of any kind and he was much disquieted that even a book so unscientific as he deemed the Bible would promise a return to his ancestors. As soon as occasion offered, he took counsel with his student patrons and they were eager to add to his uneasiness. After consulting with a concordance, they read to him from the Book, "He shall go to the generation of his fathers," and assured him that generation meant the beginning.

They very freely exaggerated the oriental doctrine of reincarnation and unanimously agreed that according to the eternal fitness and science of things, it was logical that any man who failed to live a perfect human life must go back to the beginning—perhaps on some other world—and start again. They confided in him that it was a secret among scientists that this was the only hell that would be practical and was in reality the purgatory that is misunderstood by many.

"Well," said Rastus, "if that air is scientifical, I 'low to walk more circum-spectable. I speculate that I is 'bliged to jine the meetin' house again."

Highly entertained by Rastus' fears of a possible association with reptiles: and "varmints" in the future, the boys hatched a plan to further entertain themselves by initiating Rastus into a fake secret order, that they decided to call the A. O. Z. (Ancient Order of Zoo.) To this proposition, Rastus objected that it was not "fitten" for a older man to mingle thus with young folk, but they argued away his scruples.

Not far from the dormitories, there was an old building used by these students for a club house and this was chosen as the place for the ceremonies. If there is any limit to the lengths that college boys will go to stage a joke, it has not yet been discovered. It was decided to give Rastus three degrees ending with a grand climax.

For this occasion,. the boys spared neither brains, labor nor expense, and various disguises to represent animals were borrowed, rented or bought. For the third degree, they secured from the museum several stuffed reptiles of various sorts and borrowed from someone a live alligator not yet half grown. The first two degrees consisted chiefly of horse-play with Rastus dressed in a fur suit resembling a gorilla.

After the second degree, they sat down to a feast while a committee put the finishing touches on the arrangement of another room for the third degree. The plan was to usher Rastus into this room blindfolded and seat him on the floor facing the alligator and flanked on either side by stuffed snakes, a huge turtle and a skeleton suspended from the ceiling. They understood very well that when the bandage was removed, his departure would be precipitous, and to delay his leave-taking, they plentifully covered the floor with banana skins.

To add to the confusion, they filled some washtubs with tin pans, broken dishes, a few more stuffed snakes - and a small quantity of sneeze powder. These tubs were placed on top of high step-ladders set to collapse on slight provocation. It was planned that the boys would stand near the door to block the exit, trip the ladders and cry out, as though frightened and so add to the pandemonium. One tub in falling was to pull a string and fire a gun that in a closed room would be deafening. The final act was to catch poor Rastus as he fled from the building, and quiet his fears.

Now it turned out that when Rastus was seated by the alligator ready for his debut as a full member of the zoo, a sentinel, posted outside, gave the alarm that college authorities had discovered the lights in the building. As the boys fled in the darkness, one of them pulled the electric wires loose from the building and left the rooms in darkness. Panic begets panic, and one frightened boy adds to the fear of another, and no boy thought of returning that night.

Rastus, in his gorilla make-up, stretched himself on the floor and was soon in a deep sleep, and with no one to disturb him, he slept late. When he opened his eyes, he saw before his face what appeared to be a very real snake coiled to strike. As he rolled away in terror, he rolled onto the alligator. Gathering his feet under him, he made a wild leap to escape the new horror, but landing on banana skins he skidded into a step-ladder and brought the wreck upon his prostrate form. If his heart had been weak, he must have died then, but with the strength of madness he came out of the ruins like an explosion, headed anywhere to get away.

Again the banana skins denied him traction and he plunged head first into another stepladder, bringing on another rain of pots and pans and the roar of the gun. Crazed with fright and seeking only to escape a convention of horrors, he made a flying leap for the window, carrying the sash with him into the sunshine. Down the street toward his home chased by dogs and urged on by the screams of women and children who had gathered about a peddler's wagon, he finally reached his house one jump ahead of the dogs and dropped on the floor.

Mammy Lou, mistaking him for some unnamed monster, threw the teakettle of boiling water at him but fortunately missed him. When the crockery began to rain from Mammy's direction, Rastus dove under the bed until he could make her understand it was he.

"Rastus Augustus, what has happened?" said Mammy, beginning to doubt her senses.

"I is all chawed up with 'varmints' and dynamited and pizened and scared to death," said Rastus.

Before the college authorities could probe the matter, the boys had cleared up the debris and had bribed Rastus to keep silent, adding to the bribe the exhortation that he was pledged not to betray his lodge brothers. As an added inducement, they promised him that they would regard him as having taken one more degree than had ever been experienced by any member of the order.

Notwithstanding all this, Rastus is uneasy about the ‘purgatory’ the boys have hypothesized.

Note: Years ago, the author witnessed a performance something like that described above. In that case, it caused a drunkard to take the pledge and keep it. This was a fortunate ending of a dangerous piece of folly planned by a company of young men. The author knew of another initiation of which he was not a witness, that had fatal results, and he solemnly warns any who may read this, to discourage dangerous jokes.

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