第20章

I wish I knew as much about natural history and the habits of animals as Calvin does.He is the closest observer I ever saw; and there are few species of animals on the place that he has not analyzed.Ithink he has, to use a euphemism very applicable to him, got outside of every one of them, except the toad.To the toad he is entirely indifferent; but I presume he knows that the toad is the most useful animal in the garden.I think the Agricultural Society ought to offer a prize for the finest toad.When Polly comes to sit in the shade near my strawberry-beds, to shell peas, Calvin is always lying near in apparent obliviousness; but not the slightest unusual sound can be made in the bushes, that he is not alert, and prepared to investigate the cause of it.It is this habit of observation, so cultivated, which has given him such a trained mind, and made him so philosophical.It is within the capacity of even the humblest of us to attain this.

And, speaking of the philosophical temper, there is no class of men whose society is more to be desired for this quality than that of plumbers.They are the most agreeable men I know; and the boys in the business begin to be agreeable very early.I suspect the secret of it is, that they are agreeable by the hour.In the driest days, my fountain became disabled: the pipe was stopped up.A couple of plumbers, with the implements of their craft, came out to view the situation.There was a good deal of difference of opinion about where the stoppage was.I found the plumbers perfectly willing to sit down and talk about it,--talk by the hour.Some of their guesses and remarks were exceedingly ingenious; and their general observations on other subjects were excellent in their way, and could hardly have been better if they had been made by the job.The work dragged a little, as it is apt to do by the hour.The plumbers had occasion to make me several visits.Sometimes they would find, upon arrival, that they had forgotten some indispensable tool; and one would go back to the shop, a mile and a half, after it; and his comrade would await his return with the most exemplary patience, and sit down and talk,--always by the hour.I do not know but it is a habit to have something wanted at the shop.They seemed to me very good workmen, and always willing to stop and talk about the job, or anything else, when I went near them.Nor had they any of that impetuous hurry that is said to be the bane of our American civilization.To their credit be it said, that I never observed anything of it in them.They can afford to wait.Two of them will sometimes wait nearly half a day while a comrade goes for a tool.

They are patient and philosophical.It is a great pleasure to meet such men.One only wishes there was some work he could do for them by the hour.There ought to be reciprocity.I think they have very nearly solved the problem of Life: it is to work for other people, never for yourself, and get your pay by the hour.You then have no anxiety, and little work.If you do things by the job, you are perpetually driven: the hours are scourges.If you work by the hour, you gently sail on the stream of Time, which is always bearing you on to the haven of Pay, whether you make any effort, or not.Working by the hour tends to make one moral.A plumber working by the job, trying to unscrew a rusty, refractory nut, in a cramped position, where the tongs continually slipped off, would swear; but I never heard one of them swear, or exhibit the least impatience at such a vexation, working by the hour.Nothing can move a man who is paid by the hour.How sweet the flight of time seems to his calm mind!