have the little sense I think you have, you will move your soap-box a bit to the side and let the trolley cars go past."
"No! I won't!"
"Just listen to reason, a minute, Ivan. If the trolley cars can't go, then no wagons will be broken and I shall have no repairing to do and my wife and children will have nothing to eat. Come now, be a good man, move your box and allow the wagons to be broken."
"No, I won't!"
"Listen to me, Ivan. To-morrow I must go to the cemetery and it will cost me three rubles for a horse and wagon and I shall have to feed the horse besides, all because the trolley can't go. And why can't it go? Because my best friend sits on its tracks. Move your soap-box over a little and let me trolley to the cemetery to-morrow."
"No, I won't!"
Nothing helped. Ivan continued to sit like a bearded Buddha with his cap on one side of the box and a piece of bread tied in a handkerchief on the other. Evening came on and the cars were backed into the barn. Ivan stretched over the tracks, covered himself with his coat, put his head in the box, and went to sleep.
In the morning he found many pennies and other coins in his hat, but he threw these to the children, who were indeed happy at the sight of a man camping on the tracks.
At ten the three directors of the Community Car Service held a meeting, after which they approached Ivan. Said the secretary:
"We, the directors of the Community Car Service, have decided that no man, woman, or child has the right to interfere with the franchise granted us by the community, to run cars through this street for a period of twenty years. Inasmuch as we have been in service only for three years, we come to ask you to wait aside for seventeen years before resuming your obstruction."
"I am not sitting on your franchise," said Ivan, "I am sitting on my own box."
"But your box is setting on our tracks."
"Well, move your tracks," advised Ivan.
"I never thought of that," replied the secretary, as he turned to consult with the other directors.
"If we move the tracks," said one, "what is to prevent him from moving his box?"
