Changing others over to suit yourself is not always the easiest thing in
the world, although it is often tried. The head of a large firm thought
he would try it, and his experience is related by one of the "boys" in
the office:
The old man--for we always referred to the head of the firm in this
way--called the young fellow in to him one day and said:
"Look here, young man; you've got to be more agreeable. I want everybody
in this place to have a smiling face. If I didn't think you had ability
I would have fired you long ago. Your manners are bad. Make 'em better.
Don't be a grouch."
The young chap didn't seem to take kindly to this advice. The frown on
his face was still there. But he bowed and said:
"All right, sir."
Then the old man--for it was his busy morning--called another young
fellow in and said:
"Look here, young man; I don't want you to be so genial. You're always
telling funny stories around the place and waiting on the girls. Your
sunny smile is all right, but you carry it too far. Why, when you come
around everybody stops work. Get down to business."
"That reminds me, sir," said the young chap--but his employer waved him
off.
"Do as I tell you," he said sternly, "or--"
At the end of another week the old man called them both into his office.
"Neither of you seems to be improving in the way I want. But I have an
idea. I'm going to put your desks next to each other. That ought to do
it. You're both good men, but you lean too far in the opposite
directions. Run away now and act on each other."
At the end of still another week, however, when once more they both
stood in front of him, he betrayed his disappointment.
"It doesn't seem to work," he exclaimed. "What's the matter with you
boys, anyway? I thought my experiment would cure both of you, but it
doesn't seem to work."
Turning to Mr. Sunshine, he said:
"Look here; why hasn't he done you any good?"
Mr. Sunshine beamed and chuckled.
"Well, sir," he said, "I can't help it. Why, that fellow over there
hasn't got a thing in the world to worry him. He isn't married, his
salary is really more than he needs. He has no responsibilities, and if
he should die to-morrow nobody would suffer. But he hasn't got sense
enough to have a good time. He strikes me as being such a joke that it
makes me laugh harder than ever."
Turning to Mr. Gloom, the old man said:
"Well, how about you? Why hasn't this chap done you any good?"
Mr. Gloom looked more sour than ever.
"He hasn't the slightest idea of the problems that confront me," he
said, "or what I suffer. But what really makes me mad is this: He has a
wife and four young children on his hands, on the same salary I get. How
they manage I don't know. It isn't living at all. And when I see a
fellow like that, who ought to be worried to death all the time--and who
would be if he looked the facts squarely in the face--grinning and
telling stories like a minstrel, it makes me so d----d mad that I can't
see straight."