Our story today is called "Pigs is Pigs." It was written by Ellis Parker Butler. Here is Shep O'Neal with the story.

Mike Flannery, the agent of the Interurban Express Company, leaned
over the desk in the company's office in Westcote and shook his fist.
Mr. Morehouse, angry and red, stood on the other side of the desk
shaking with fury. The argument had been long and hot. At last Mr.
Morehouse had become speechless.
The cause of the trouble lay on the desk between the two men. It was a box with two guinea pigs inside.
"Do
as you like, then!" shouted Flannery. "Pay for them and take them. Or
don't pay for them and leave them here. Rules are rules, Mr.
Morehouse. And Mike Flannery is not going to break them."
"But
you stupid idiot!" shouted Mr. Morehouse, madly shaking a thin book
beneath the agent's nose. "Can't you read it here – in your own book of
transportation rates? 'Pets, domestic, Franklin to Westcote, if
correctly boxed, twenty-five cents each.'"
He threw the book on
the desk. "What more do you want? Aren't they pets? Aren't they
domestic? Aren't they correctly boxed? What?"
He turned and
walked back and forth rapidly, with a furious look on his face. "Pets,"
he said. "P-E-T-S! Twenty-five cents each. Two times twenty-five is
fifty! Can you understand that? I offer you fifty cents."
Flannery reached for the book. He ran his hand through the pages and stopped at page sixty-four.
"I
don't take fifty cents," he whispered in an unpleasant voice. "Here's
the rule for it: 'When the agent be in any doubt about which two rates
should be charged on a shipment, he shall charge the larger. The person
receiving the shipment may put in a claim for the overcharge.' In this
case, Mr. Morehouse, I be in doubt. Pets them animals may be. And
domestic they may be, but pigs I'm sure they do be. And my rule says
plain as the nose on your face, 'Pigs, Franklin to Westcote, thirty
cents each.'"
Mr. Morehouse shook his head savagely. "Nonsense!"
he shouted. "Confounded nonsense, I tell you! That rule means common
pigs, not guinea pigs!"
"Pigs is pigs," Flannery said firmly.
Mr.
Morehouse bit his lip and then flung his arms out wildly. "Very well!"
he shouted. "You shall hear of this! Your president shall hear of
this! It is an outrage! I have offered you fifty cents. You refuse
it. Keep the pigs until you are ready to take the fifty cents. But, by
George, sir, if one hair of those pigs' heads is harmed, I will have
the law on you!" He turned and walked out, slamming the door.
Flannery carefully lifted the box from the desk and put it in a corner.


Mr. Morehouse quickly wrote a letter to the president of the
transportation express company. The president answered, informing Mr.
Morehouse that all claims for overcharge should be sent to the Claims
Department.
Mr. Morehouse wrote to the Claims Department. One
week later he received an answer. The Claims Department said it had
discussed the matter with the agent at Westcote. The agent said Mr.
Morehouse had refused to accept the two guinea pigs shipped to him.
Therefore, the department said, Mr. Morehouse had no claim against the
company and should write to its Tariff Department.
Mr. Morehouse
wrote to the Tariff Department. He stated his case clearly. The head
of the Tariff Department read Mr. Morehouse's letter. "Huh! Guinea
pigs," he said. "Probably starved to death by this time." He wrote to
the agent asking why the shipment was held up. He also wanted to know
if the guinea pigs were still in good health.
Before answering,
agent Flannery wanted to make sure his report was up to date. So he
went to the back of the office and looked into the cage. Good Lord!
There were now eight of them! All well and eating like hippopotamuses.
He
went back to the office and explained to the head of the Tariff
Department what the rules said about pigs. And as for the condition of
the guinea pigs, said Flannery, they were all well. But there were
eight of them now, all good eaters.
The head of the Tariff Department laughed when he read Flannery's letter. He read it again and became serious.
"By
George!" he said. "Flannery is right. Pigs is pigs. I'll have to get
something official on this. He spoke to the president of the company.
The president treated the matter lightly. "What is the rate on pigs
and on pets?" he asked.
"Pigs thirty cents, pets twenty-five," the
head of the Tariff Department answered. "Then of course guinea pigs
are pigs," the president said.
"Yes," the head of the Tariff
Department agreed. "I look at it that way too. A thing that can come
under two rates is naturally to be charged at the higher one. But are
guinea pigs, pigs? Aren't they rabbits?"
"Come to think of it,"
the president said, "I believe they are more like rabbits. Sort of
half-way between pig and rabbit. I think the question is this – are
guinea pigs of the domestic pig family? I'll ask Professor Gordon. He
is an expert about such things."
The president wrote to Professor
Gordon. Unfortunately, the professor was in South America collecting
zoological samples. His wife forwarded the letter to him.
The
professor was in the High Andes Mountains. The letter took many months
to reach him. In time, the president forgot the guinea pigs. The head
of the Tariff Department forgot them. Mr. Morehouse forgot them. But
agent Flannery did not. The guinea pigs had increased to thirty-two.
He asked the head of the Tariff Department what he should do with them.
"Don't sell the pigs," agent Flannery was told. "They are not your property. Take care of them until the case is settled."
The guinea pigs needed more room. Flannery made a large and airy room for them in the back of his office.


Some months later he discovered he now had one hundred sixty of them. He was going out of his mind.
Not
long after this, the president of the express company heard from
Professor Gordon. It was a long and scholarly letter. It pointed out
that the guinea pig was the cavia aparoea, while the common pig was the genus sus of the family suidae.
The
president then told the head of the Tariff Department that guinea pigs
are not pigs and must be charged only twenty-five cents as domestic
pets. The Tariff Department informed agent Flannery that he should take
the one hundred sixty guinea pigs to Mr. Morehouse and collect
twenty-five cents for each of them.
Agent Flannery wired back.
"I've got eight hundred now. Shall I collect for eight hundred or
what? How about the sixty-four dollars I paid for cabbages to feed
them?"
Many letters went back and forth. Flannery was crowded
into a few feet at the extreme front of the office. The guinea pigs had
all the rest of the room. Time kept moving on as the letters continued
to go back and forth.


Flannery now had four thousand sixty-four guinea pigs. He was
beginning to lose control of himself. Then, he got a telegram from the
company that said: "Error in guinea pig bill. Collect for two guinea
pigs -- fifty cents."
Flannery ran all the way to Mr. Morehouse's
home. But Mr. Morehouse had moved. Flannery searched for him in town
but without success. He returned to the express office and found that
two hundred six guinea pigs had entered the world since he left the
office.
At last, he got an urgent telegram from the main office:
"Send the pigs to the main office of the company at Franklin." Flannery
did so. Soon, came another telegram. "Stop sending pigs. Warehouse
full." But he kept sending them.
Agent Flannery finally got free
of the guinea pigs. "Rules may be rules," he said, "but so long as
Flannery runs this express office, pigs is pets and cows is pets and
horses is pets and lions and tigers and Rocky Mountain goats is pets.
And the rate on them is twenty-five cents."
Then he looked around
and said cheerfully, "Well, anyhow, it is not as bad as it might have
been. What if them guinea pigs had been elephants?"

"Pigs is Pigs" was written by Ellis Parker Butler. It was adapted
for Special English by Harold Berman. The storyteller was Shep O'Neal.
The producer was Lawan Davis.
I'm Shirley Griffith.

ع الطرح الرائع