the have to pay not only to th cook so that she ll use twice as much as she can give away three or four times as much to the poor as she ought but have to be seen to and boys and all that come high for the reason oh no flat life isn t the life for anybody i say give me a good first class am i not right john yes indeed said mr every time i lived in a flat once and it was an awful nuisance above me lived a who gave lessons at every hour of the day in the room directly over my study so that i was always being disturbed at my work while below me was a music teacher who was all night so that i could hardly sleep worst of all on the same floor with me was a miserable person of tendencies who always my door for his when he came home after midnight and who gave some quite people two floors below to believe that it was i and not he who sang comic songs between three and four o clock in the morning there has not been too much love lost between the and but i cannot be so i as to recommend liim to live in a flat i can bear testimony to the same effect put in mr brief who was two weeks in and anxious to his landlady testimony to the effect that mr sang comic songs in the early morning said the idiot nonsense i i don t believe it i have lived in this house for two years mr and i ve never heard him raise his voice in song yet i didn t mean anything of the sort retorted mr brief you know i didn t don t to me said the idiot to mr he is the man you have wronged what did he say put in mr with a stern look at mr brief i didn t hear what he said i didn t say anything said the lawyer except that i could bear testimony to the effect that your experience with flat life was similar to mine this young person with his customary nerve tries to make it appear that i said you sang comic songs in the early morning i try to do nothing of the sort said the idiot i simply expressed my belief that in spite of what yoa said mr was innocent and i do so because my experience with him has taught me that he is not the kind of man who would do that sort of thing he has neither time voice nor inclination he has an ear � two of them in fact � and an mind but � oh interrupted the school master when i need a you may spare yourself the trouble of flying to my rescue i know i said the idiot but with me it s a question of can and can t i m willing to attack you personally but while i live no other shall do so wherefore i tell mr brief plainly and to his face that if he says you ever sang a comic song he says what is not so you might hum one but sing it � never we were talking of i believe said mr yes said the idiot and these persons have changed it from flat talk to sharp talk well anyhow put in mr brief i lived in a flat once and it was anything but pleasant i lost a case once for the simple and only reason that i lived in a flat it was a case that required a great deal of on my part and i invited my to ray home to my plan of action i got interested in the scheme as i unfolded it and spoke in my usual impassioned manner as though addressing a jury and would you believe it the opposing counsel happened to be visiting a friend on the next floor and my eloquence floated up through the air shaft and gave our whole plan of action away we were on the point we had supposed would pierce the enemy s and lay him at our feet for the wholly simple reason that that abominable air shaft had made my move a matter of public knowledge that s a good idea for a play said the idiot a roaring farce could be built up on that basis villain and on one floor innocent victim on floor above plot up air shaft innocent victim villain and say ha ha for three acts and take a back seat in the fourth with a grand showing the in the county jail as a write it up with lots of live stock wandering in and out bring in and and show up some of the of flat life if there be any such call it a hole in the flat and put it on the stage nine hundred nights is the very shortest run it could have which at fifty dollars a night for the author is in good hard dollars mr poet the idea is yours for a say the word thanks said the poet with a smile vm not a then i ll have to do it myself said the idiot and if i do good bye shakespeare that s ro said mr nothing could more effectually ruin the dramatic art than to have you write a play people seeing your work would say here this will never do the stage must be discouraged at all costs a throws the into disgrace an brings shame upon education and an lawyer gives the bar a bad name i think you are just the man to ruin shakespeare then i ll give up my ambition to become a and stick to said the idiot but to come back to your feeling in regard to 