Norwich bulletin., 1909-11-06


 I suppose you've all of you heard or read of the Castle of If, near Mar seilles, France. Only the F'renchmen call it the Castle d'If,~ which I un- derstand they have the indubitable right to, as they built it and it be- longs to them. If man can't call the thing he makes by the name he chooses what's the good of the constitution and the Declaration of Independence, any way? But, while I freely admit their right to say "Shattow deef," if they want to, horses and oxen can't make me call it anything but the Castle of
 1t has been a notable prison, and many famous names. historical as well as Dumas-invented, are represented on the roster of its involuntary guest book. Standing on a rocky island, surrounded by the deep waters of the bay of Marseilles, 1t has always been considered a mighty hard place to get out of. People confined there could wander around the corridors or stand on the towers and gaze longingly tow ards the vine-clad hills. of the blue shore, without much chance of getting away. They didn't wear shackles and chains, didn't have to be confined in burglar-proof cells. A visitor might hardly distinguish the prisoner from the guard by any outward mark Yet around those picturesque roofs the un- scalable air and the unswimable gulf set barriers more impossible than triple walls of steel and concrete.
 But you don't have to go to Mar seilles to find another Castle of If" I've got a farmer neighbor who lives in one. not a mile from me. It doesn't look in the least little bit like & castle Or a nrigOn If ha Cnif anu tOyarC nor any thick walls with barred windows. Nor is there the slightest trace of moat around it. It looks, for all the world, like a common, everyday farm house-a little time-worn, perhaps; out -at-the- as one might say; a trifie discouraged. if such a word may be applied to mere building. But it's not dilapidated nor really forbidding. There's nothing about it to draw the special attention of the casual passer.
 Yet, # ever there was Castle of IT," 1t is this farmhouse. There's an If" standing guard forever at the front door, and another. even bigger watching at the rear. One sits down to dinner with the family regularly and one roosts on the headboard of the masters bed each night. There's an- other out at the barn sitting on the haymow and a little one lies always between the blow handles. It's If" here and "If' there. If it would only'' -; If it only wouldn't"-
 "lf" 1t hadn't been for the weather, he'd have plowed that back lot last spring and got good crop of pota- toes. 'If'' the moving machine hadn't been broken, he'd have got that hay in from the east meadow without it's having been soaked and spoiled by the R0 hnS nr7Irv l. s.-r- eggs were going to be, he'd have saved those bullets that went into the pot last summer and had eggs to sell now. "If' he could only get some shingles As good as he used to buy fifty years tgo, he'd shingle the barn and stop ts leaking. "If'' he only had a thou )and dollars more, he would buy that ldJoining lot. hire an extra man and 10 wonders next year. 'Tfg the town you'd only straighten the road, fill in he swamp, bore short tunnel through ne hill the road now goes over, why, hen he could draw bigger loads to 1arket and perhaps make something. IT. his neighbors would only keep ID their line fences better, then he'd jx his, too. 'If' somebody else would Snly do something different, then ev- rything would be lovely.
 Oh, yes. and if turnips grew already boiled and buttered, he wouldn't have D store 'em and have 'em cooked. If pumpkin pies hung on trees he could let his lunch very easily. If the brooks ian milk he wouldn't have to keen lows, and If little roast pigs roaned tround begging him to slice lem up lnd eat 'em, he wouldn't need a pig len. If 1t rained automobiles and aero planes he could get to town regardless ef roads-if he didn't blow up or treak his neck starting. If there wasn't any winter 1t would be summer lll the year-or something else. If the world was only different why, then, it Eould be a different world. Oh JhuckSi
 Some poet once said that
 Tn the bright lexicon of youth
 There's no such word as fail" Perhaps not; don't know. I've got