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ABOU BEN ADHEM was asked one day by a
sorrowing man if there was n't a screw loose
somewhere in the economy of nature, as regards the
duration of life. “Why,” asked this individual,
“why was Death permitted to come into the world
at all?”

Abou was never in so good humor as when he had
an opportunity to moralize, and this was one not to
be wasted. So he arranged himself in his easy-chair
and got the man safely under his eye, and, as the
Orientals say, “went for him.”

“Death,” said Abou, “is not to be catalogued
among the evils of this world; it is to be considered
as the greatest blessing the world enjoys, and as the
most useful of all the provisions of nature, — that is
to say, when it is taken into account how men are
made.

“If men were all as honest, as true, and as good
as I am, for instance, Death could be dispensed with;
but as they are not, it is an absolute necessity as a
great equalizer. It is the great balance-wheel and

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the great distributor. It is the bad rich man's check
and the poor good man's protection; it is the salvation
of the State and the hope of the individual.

“Listen to a brief history: —

“In Persia, a hundred years or more ago, lived
Hogem. Hogem, in his youth, sailed a small
schooner on the Gulf of Persia, from Koamud to
Bangay. He accumulated dirhems, in a small way,
at the business, for he allowed no competition. If
another man started a schooner in the same trade,
Hogem's craft always got to sailing wild, and was
certain to collide with the new one, and burst a hole
in her side and lay her up. Accidents of this kind
got so frequent that no one cared to sail on Hogem's
route, and he had the whole trade to himself.

“Of course, Hogem learned the advantage of having
control of an entire trade, and he kept his eye
out for it. When steam was introduced into Persia,
he was the first to put on boats propelled by the new
power, and he observed the same tactics that he did
with his schooner, and of course made great piles of
shekels by his steamboats.

“Then came railways, and Hogem kept his weather-eye
cocked in that direction. He did not embark
in railroads at the beginning, for he was talented.
He waited till the people built them with their own
money, and found they could n't make them pay.
He watched the road from Bangay to Koamud, the
two most important cities in the Empire, and he
waited his time. The road cost twenty millions of
dirhems, but as it had never paid a dividend, the

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stockholders were willing to sell at any price. So
Hogem bought a little over half of the stock, for little
or nothing, to make himself President; then he
swindled the others out of their stock and owned it
all himself. It paid immediately, for he stopped all
the stealing, and the time had come when it was possible
for the road to pay.

“Owning the road, he had a sure thing on the
people. They had to travel over it, and they were
compelled to use it to transport their produce, for
there was no other way for them. He put on just
such rates as he pleased, and he regarded their murmurs
no more than the sighing of wind through rosebushes.

“The people murmured, and applied to the Council
for relief. They said, in their Oriental way, `Lo!
this Hogem has gobbled our railroad, and has us
where our hair is short. After other roads are built
he captures them, and we are helpless. Save us from
Hogem!'

“But Hogem laughed in his sleeve. `Shall I let
this fat thing go out of my hands? What says Niggah-mynstrel,
the poet of the people?


“When you have a good thing, save it, save it,
When you ketch a white cat, shave it, shave it —
When you ketch a white cat, shave it to de tail.'
These people are my white cats. Go to!'

“And he went to Teheran, where the Council met,
the same time that the representatives of the people
did; and he took gorgeous rooms at the Teheran

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Hotel, and he put therein bottles of the juice of the
grape and great jars of the strong waters of the
Giaour, and tobacco cunningly rolled by the Espagnol,
and he stored in his closet bags of dirhems.

“And then Hogem asked the members of the Council
to visit him, and he gave to them the juice of the
grape, and he warmed their hearts with strong waters.
And as each went out, he took him aside and
laid his finger beside his nose, saying, `Here, take
this bag of dirhems, for thou art a pleasant fellow,
and a brick, and I love thee. And when my enemies,
the people— whom may Allah confound!—come
to the Council, and demand laws against my just
charges for carrying their rice and things, say, “Go
to! Hogem is a good man and an honest man. His
charges are just.” And when the vote is taken, vote
against them, and if you prevail, come to me again;
come alone, and there will be more strong waters —
and perchance, haply, another bag of dirhems.'

“And Hogem put his finger to his nose, and
winked a solemn wink of ineffable meaning, which
was comprehended, for the member did likewise.

“Now, there were two hundred members of the
Council, and the great man saw one hundred and five
of them, and each, with a bag of dirhems under his
robe, voted against the people. And straightway
each of the one hundred and five had two bags of
dirhems about him.

“Thus, you see, Hogem had the entire country
at his mercy. He owned the Council so that it would
not permit other roads to be built. In a little while

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he did not have to seek the members, for they sought
him. They would say, `If he has the gold, why
should I not have my divvy?' Divvy is a Persian
word, used in Councils, the meaning of which you,
probably, do not understand.

“Now, here is where Death comes in to advantage.
Hogem had all the Councils under his thumb; he
was moving on the Shah himself; he would, in ten
years more, have had all Persia at his feet: and you
may imagine the condition we should have been in,
with this one man as our sole ruler. Just as he was
making a bigger and wickeder combination than ever,
paralysis struck him and the people were saved. His
combinations melted; his railroads had to be sold;
competition came in, and things were again lovely in
Persia.

“Suppose that the Frank, Bonaparte, had had
eternal life. He would have gone on swallowing one
nation after another, till he would have controlled the
whole world. He would have met another Bonaparte,
you say? Very good; that would have been worse,
for the two would have kept the world at blood-letting
forever.

“And then think of a world with such pests as
George Francis Train and the Woodhull in it, with
no prospect of relief from Death?

“`Good men die too.' Verily. But that does n't
detract from the strength of my position a particle.
For where there is one honest, or to put it stronger,
where there is one man like myself, there are a
thousand bad ones.

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“The disparity between the two classes being so
great, Death is an advantage. It is the safety-valve
of society; it is the limit to human action; and as
human action tends to the bad, why, the limit is an
excellent good thing.

“When men all do right, probably there will be
no more Death. But I really don't expect to ever
see it. The man whose ancestors lived correctly and
who lives correctly himself, lives longer than the one
in whom these conditions do not exist. It is very
likely that when the old virus is all out, that Death,
which was intended as the cure for it, will go out
with it. But as long as the virus is in, Death is
necessary, as the cure for it. Poison spreads faster
than wholesome things. A rum-mill will infect an
entire neighborhood in half the time that a prayer-meeting
can possibly convert it. Wickedness moves
faster than an express train: goodness moves at the
speed of the ox-cart.

“There are so many bad men, and disease is so
slow, that I sometimes think there is a great deal of
lightning squandered every year. With its quick
action, its wonderful killing capacity, and so great
a use for it, it is a thousand pities that more of it
cannot be judiciously directed. But there are mysteries
in nature.

“Were there no Death, what would the young
woman married to an old man do, or the young man
married to an old woman? Take offices where promotion
comes by seniority. What anguish would
wring the bosoms of the juniors if the seniors were

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immortal! Death makes room for men; Death checks
the wicked, betters the condition of the good, — in
short, it is altogether a sweet boon.

“My young friend, I long for Death; for the next
world, to a perfect man, can only be a blissful one.
I long to go! And now leave me.”

“Stay!” said the young man, as he turned to go.
“If you so long to go, why don't you go? Death is
attainable to any one.”

“I continue to live,” said Abou, “because I can
do my fellow-men good by living.”

And he walked slowly into his habitation.

p632-158

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