entertainment. His mother had been right. They were Beans and,
therefore, not much. He had brought his own silver napkin-ring and had
meant to show them how wonderfully he folded and rolled his napkin after
each meal. But it seemed they possessed no napkins whatever. Even his
mother hadn't thought anything so repulsive as that of these people. He
now boldly played the new game at table that his mother had frowned on.
This was to measure off your meat and potatoes into an equal number of
"bites," so that they would "come out even." If you were careful and
counted right, the thing could be done every time.

And for the first time in all his years he asked for more pie. Of course
this was anarchy. He knew well enough that one piece of pie is the
heaven-allotted portion; that no one, even partly a Bunker, should crave
beyond it; yet this fatuous old pair seemed to invite just that
licentiousness, and they watched him with doting eyes while he swaggered
through his second helping.

If more had been needed to show the Beanish lowness, it would have come
after the first supper, for Gramper and Grammer sat out on a little
vine-covered porch and smoked cob-pipes which they refilled at intervals
from a sack of tobacco passed companionably back and forth. His own
father was supposed to smoke but once a week, on Sunday, and then a
cigar such as even a male Bunker might reputably burn. But a _pipe_, and
between the lips of Grammer! She managed it with deftness and exhaled
clouds of smoke into the still air of evening with a relish most painful
to her amazed descendant. Yet she inspired him with an unholy ambition.

Asked the next day about the habit of smoking, Gramper said it was a bad
habit; that it stunted people and shortened their days. Both he and
Grammer were victims and warnings. Grammer had lumbago sometimes so you