Mark Twain - The Yankee's frugality
Hey Folks,
I’ve been re-reading Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur’s Court and sharing pieces of Twain’s political commentary with you here (this is the 12th entry) .
His insights remain pertinent to this day. We haven’t changed much from Twain’s day – or from King Arthur’s, for that matter.
- Uke Man
Chapter 26 – Long ago the Kings “touched” the sick to heal them (as TV evangelists do today). Part of the operation involved giving each afflicted soul a small coin (evangelists have the coin going in the opposite direction). The Yankee replaces the worn and irregularly shaped gold bit currently the practice with a less-valuable nickel he had minted especially for this purpose.
I judged that a sharp, bright new nickel, with a first-rate likeness of the king on one side of it and Guenever on the other, and a blooming pious motto, would take the tuck out of scrofula [a lymph disorder, the predominant malady that day– Uke Man] as handy as a nobler coin and please the scroulous fancy more; and I was right. This batch was the first it was tried on, and it worked to a charm. The saving in expense was a notable economy.
. . . In making this substitution I had drawn upon the wisdom of a very remote source - the wisdom of my boyhood . . . in my boyhood I had always saved my pennies, and contributed buttons to the foreign missionary cause. The buttons would answer the ignorant savage as well as the coin, the coin would answer me better than the buttons; all hands were happy, and nobody hurt.
I’ve been re-reading Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur’s Court and sharing pieces of Twain’s political commentary with you here (this is the 12th entry) .
His insights remain pertinent to this day. We haven’t changed much from Twain’s day – or from King Arthur’s, for that matter.
- Uke Man
Chapter 26 – Long ago the Kings “touched” the sick to heal them (as TV evangelists do today). Part of the operation involved giving each afflicted soul a small coin (evangelists have the coin going in the opposite direction). The Yankee replaces the worn and irregularly shaped gold bit currently the practice with a less-valuable nickel he had minted especially for this purpose.
I judged that a sharp, bright new nickel, with a first-rate likeness of the king on one side of it and Guenever on the other, and a blooming pious motto, would take the tuck out of scrofula [a lymph disorder, the predominant malady that day– Uke Man] as handy as a nobler coin and please the scroulous fancy more; and I was right. This batch was the first it was tried on, and it worked to a charm. The saving in expense was a notable economy.
. . . In making this substitution I had drawn upon the wisdom of a very remote source - the wisdom of my boyhood . . . in my boyhood I had always saved my pennies, and contributed buttons to the foreign missionary cause. The buttons would answer the ignorant savage as well as the coin, the coin would answer me better than the buttons; all hands were happy, and nobody hurt.
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