THE POWER THAT PREVENTS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LVI, 31 March 1923, Page 8

THE POWER THAT PREVENTS

A MODERN 3?ABLE Mr Frank Penh Smith relates the following fable in the London Mercury, a fable of charm and devoid of slang. "The Unseen Influences married the Professor to the Peaky-faced Woman. For they tie the tail to the short, the fussy to the silent, that there, may he* be too much of anything. "The brain of the Professor was like an extended telescope, able to see Worlds to us invisible, while the brain of the Peaky-faced Woman was a shallow disc that "magnified trifles and could sec nothing beyond- " Now the Professor was about to make a great discovery: he knew this by the tingling inside him, and by the way he 'trembled when he thought outwards towards it. But fateful influences were si work, and the power that prevents pervaded the house until he felt: his genius siowly dissolving into imbecility. The voice' of the Peaky-faced Woman rang destructively through him: for things had gone wrong and she blamed the Professor. '■N3hi cried with bitterness: 'You think yourself clever for finding out the cat is'colourblind, but you save the shells and throw the peas to the fowls!' "At rapid and uncertain intervals her voice arose, bitter as gall, keen with metallic keenness, till vibrations of wretchedness ran through the Professor and his brain shrank and softened within liiftl. Now if lie had been a savage he could have massacred her: but being a humanitarian be hail to submit to the destruction. I "Then the Discovery which was very anxious to be disjivered tried to como ncarar and nearer until it absolutely touched him: but alas ! his imagination was curved inwardly and shuddered when it was touched. So he began to eat. and drink wildly, and. to read the newspapers, which is fatal to genius, until his friends congratulated him on. having become quite a sensible fellow. "Then the Discovery faded away and went back to the place it came from. knowing that once again, it would not he discovered. "For Discord, the Power that Prevents had drawn a ragged circle round the "°rofessor and turned him into a cypher."