ALBERT'S UNCLE'S GRANDMOTHER
"There's one thing," Dicky said, "that beastly society We don't want that swarming all over everything when we get home. We ought to dissolve it before we leave here."
The following dialogue now took place:
Oswald—"Right you are. I always said it was piffling rot."
Dicky—'So did I."
Oswald—"Let's call a council. But don't forget we've jolly well got to put our foot down."
Dicky assented, and the dialogue concluded with apples.
The council, when called, was in but low spirits. This made Oswald's and Dicky's task easier. When people are sunk in gloomy despair about one thing, they will agree to almost anything about something else. (Remarks like this are called philosophic generalizations, Albert's uncle says.) Oswald began by saying:
"We've tried the society for being good in, and perhaps it's done us good. But now the time has come for each of us to be good or bad on his own, without hanging on to the others."
"The race is run by one and one.
But never by two and two,"
the Dentist said. The others said nothing. Oswald went on: "I move that we chuck—I mean dissolve—the Wouldbegoods Society; its appointed task is done. If it's not well done, that's its fault and not ours."
Dicky said, "Hear! hear! I second this prop."
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