518
PARTISAN REVIEW
ius and the microphone, as if no one could do anything which
would not come under his authority.
"Oh," said Cornelius, "I do many things," into the micro–
phone.
The audience laughed, and Cornelius, pleased, grinned in
spite of himself. But he was uneasy. He did not wish to tell the
truth, that he was a writer, for he was an unknown writer, and
besides the profession always appeared to him as seeming
peculiar and anomalous to others. On the other hand, he did not
want to say he was unemployed, his usual subterfuge, because
that also seemed a shameful admission. And then he was
ashamed of himself, angered at himself for not wishing to tell
the truth, for being ashamed of a noble calling, so that he forced
himself to the other extreme, and specified his kind of writing
and told the functionary that he was a poet. He knew this would
be equivalent to sissy or bohemian for some of the audience.
"Mr. Schmidt is a poet" announced the young man unctu–
ously, patronizingly, and then, desiring to be humorous himself,
he spoke cutely into the microphone:
He's a poet,
His feet show it,
They're Longfellow's!
The audience roared as the young man drew out the last word
with a triumphant tone, and Cornelius blushed and wished he
were elsewhere, and became extremely angered at the young
man, who had previously merely annoyed him. As a matter of
fact, Cornelius's feet were by no means small, and, becoming
still more self-conscious, he tried to withdraw his shoes some–
how from public view.
"I am sure we would like to hear one of the poems of so
fortunate
il
young man," said the official young man. He was
trying to delay matters until one of the ushers could bring
enough money from the box office to pay Cornelius. " Please, "
he said, "recite some verses for us."
"0 no!" said Cornelius firmly, backing away. The young
man gestured to the intrigued audience which then began to
applaud in unison to express. its desire to hear Cornelius recite
his verses.
