A sharp shower came on as I walked along the Strand, but I did not put up
my umbrella. The truth is I couldn't put up my umbrella. The frame would
not work for one thing, and if it had worked, I would not have put the
thing up, for I would no more be seen under such a travesty of an umbrella
than Falstaff would be seen marching through Coventry with his regiment of
ragamuffins. The fact is, the umbrella is not my umbrella at all. It is the
umbrella of some person who I hope will read these lines. He has got my
silk umbrella. I have got the cotton one he left in exchange. I imagine him
flaunting along the Strand under my umbrella, and throwing a scornful
glance at the fellow who was carrying his abomination and getting wet into
the bargain. I daresay the rascal chuckled as he eyed the said abomination.
"Ah," he said gaily to himself, "I did you in that time, old boy. I know
that thing. It won't open for nuts. And it folds up like a sack. Now, this
umbrella...."

But I leave him to his unrighteous communings. He is one of those people
who have what I may call an umbrella conscience. You know the sort of
person I mean. He would never put his hand in another's pocket, or forge a
cheque or rob a till--not even if he had the chance. But he will swop
umbrellas, or forget to return a book, or take a rise out of the railway
company. In fact he is a thoroughly honest man who allows his honesty the
benefit of the doubt. Perhaps he takes your umbrella at random from the
barber's stand. He knows he can't get a worse one than his own. He may get
a better. He doesn't look at it very closely until he is well on his way.
Then, "Dear me! I've taken the wrong umbrella," he says, with an air of
surprise, for he likes really to feel that he has made a mistake. "Ah,
well, it's no use going back now. He'd be gone. _And I've left him mine_!"

It is thus that we play hide-and-seek with our own conscience. It is not
enough not to be found out by others; we refuse to be found out by