LORD SUMMERHAYS. Not at all. Is your father at home?

JOHNNY. No: he's opening one of his free libraries. Thats another
nice little penny gone. He's mad on reading. He promised another
free library last week. It's ruinous. Itll hit you as well as me
when Bunny marries Hypatia. When all Hypatia's money is thrown away
on libraries, where will Bunny come in? Cant you stop him?

LORD SUMMERHAYS. I'm afraid not. Hes a perfect whirlwind.
Indefatigable at public work. Wonderful man, I think.

JOHNNY. Oh, public work! He does too much of it. It's really a sort
of laziness, getting away from your own serious business to amuse
yourself with other people's. Mind: I dont say there isnt another
side to it. It has its value as an advertisement. It makes useful
acquaintances and leads to valuable business connections. But it
takes his mind off the main chance; and he overdoes it.

LORD SUMMERHAYS. The danger of public business is that it never ends.
A man may kill himself at it.

JOHNNY. Or he can spend more on it than it brings him in: thats how
I look at it. What I say is that everybody's business is nobody's
business. I hope I'm not a hard man, nor a narrow man, nor unwilling
to pay reasonable taxes, and subscribe in reason to deserving
charities, and even serve on a jury in my turn; and no man can say I
ever refused to help a friend out of a difficulty when he was worth
helping. But when you ask me to go beyond that, I tell you frankly I
dont see it. I never did see it, even when I was only a boy, and had