Page:Alice in Blunderland.pdf/110

Rh class confectioner made a splendid manager of our Gas plant, and a successful Hoki-Poki merchant had the required push to keep our trolley systems going, so the Haberdasher had the precise kind of genius to manage the poets. He won't stand any nonsense from them, and any poem that he can't understand is immediately thrown into the Civic Waste Basket, taken to the Municipal Ferry and used for fuel to run the boats. I guess we burn nineteen tons of refuse verse a day, don't we, Alderman?"

"About that—on the average," said the March Hare. "Sometimes it gets as high as twenty tons and occasionally it falls off to sixteen—but using these rejected manuscripts in place of coal has reduced the loss on the Ferry about thirty-eight dollars a year in real money."

"How much is that in bonds?" asked Alice slyly.

"O—let's see," said the Hatter, his face getting very red, "well—I should