The Cheerful Smugglers

Excerpt

THE FENELBY TARIFF

Bobberts was the baby, and ever since Bobberts was born—and that was nine months next Wednesday, and just look what a big, fat boy he is now!—his parents had been putting all their pennies into a little pottery pig, so that when Bobberts reached the proper age he could go to college. The money in the little pig bank was officially known as “Bobberts’ Education Fund,” and next to Bobberts himself was the thing in the house most talked about. It was “Tom, dear, have you put your pennies in the bank this evening?” or “I say, Laura, how about Bobberts’ pennies to-day. Are you holding out on him?” And then, when they came to count the contents of the bank, there were only twenty-three dollars and thirty-eight cents in it after nine months of faithful penny contributions.

That was how Fenelby, who had a great mind for such things, came to think of the Fenelby tariff. It was evident that the penny system could not be counted on to pile up a sum large enough to see Bobberts through Yale and leave a margin big enough for him to live on while he was getting firmly established in his profession, whatever that profession might be. What was needed in the Fenelby family was a system that would save money for Bobberts gently and easily, and that would not be easy to forget nor be too palpable a strain on the Fenelby income. Something that would make them save in spite of themselves; not a direct tax, but what you might call an indirect tax—and right there was where and how the idea came to Fenelby.

“That’s the idea!” he said to Mrs. Fenelby. “That is the very thing we want! An indirect tax, just as this nation pays its taxes, and the tariff is the very thing! It’s as simple as A B C. The nation charges a duty on everything that comes into the country; we will charge a duty on everything that comes into the house, and the money goes into Bobberts’ education fund. We won’t miss the money that way. That’s the beauty of an indirect tax: you don’t know you are paying it. The government collects a little on one thing that is imported, and a little on another, and no one cares, because the amount is so small on each thing, and yet look at the total—hundreds of millions of dollars!”

“Goodness!” exclaimed Mrs. Fenelby. “Can we save that much for Bobberts? Of course, not hundreds of millions; but if we could save even one hundred thousand dollars—”

“Laura,” said Mr. Fenelby, “I don’t believe you understand what I mean. If you would pay a little closer attention when I am explaining things you would understand better. A tariff doesn’t make money out of nothing. How could we save a hundred thousand dollars out of my salary, when the whole salary is only twenty-five hundred dollars a year, and we spend every cent of it?”

“But, Tom dear,” said Mrs. Fenelby, “how can I help spending it? You know I am just as economical as I can be. You said yourself that we couldn’t live on a cent less than we are spending....