SOCRATES:  But this would be a club of quite a different sort.  It would be devised to offer a truly domestic atmosphere to those who have sent their wives and juveniles to the country for the benefit of the fresh air, and have to stay in the city themselves to earn what is vulgarly known as kale.

AJAX:  How would you work out the plan?

SOCRATES:  It would not be difficult.  In the first place, there would be a large nursery, with a number of rented children of various ages.  Each member of the club, hastening thither from his office at the conclusion of the day’s work, would be privileged to pick out some child as nearly as possible similar in age and sex to his own absent offspring.  He would then deal with this child according to the necessities of its condition.  If it were an extremely young infant, a bottle properly prepared would be ready in the club kitchen, and he could administer it.  The club bathroom would be filled with hilarious members on their knees beside small tubs, bathing such urchins as needed it.  Others would be playing games on the floor, or tucking the children in bed.  It ought to be quite feasible to hire a number of children for this purpose.  During the day they would be cared for by a competent matron.  Baby carriages would be provided, and if any of the club members were compelled to remain in town over the week-end they could take the children for an airing in the park.

AJAX:  This is a brave idea, Socrates.  And then, when all the children were bedded for the night, how would the domestic atmosphere be simulated?

SOCRATES:  Nothing simpler.  After dinner such husbands as are accustomed to washing the dishes would be allowed to do so in the club kitchen.  During the day it would be the function of the matron to think up a number of odd jobs to be performed in the course of the evening.  Pictures would be hung, clocks wound, a number of tin cans would be waiting to be opened with refractory can openers, and there would always be several window blinds that had gone wrong.  A really resourceful matron could devise any number of ways of making the club seem just like home.  One night she would discern a smell of gas, the next there might be a hole in the fly-screens, or a little carpentering to do, or a caster broken under the piano.  Husbands with a turn for plumbing would find the club basement a perpetual place of solace, with a fresh leak or a rumbling pipe every few days.

AJAX:  Admirable!  And if the matron really wanted to make the members feel at home she would take a turn through the building every now and then, to issue a gentle rebuke for cigar ashes dropped on the rugs or feet elevated on chairs.

SOCRATES:  The really crowning touch, I think, would lie in the ice-box raids.  A large ice-box would be kept well stocked with remainders of apple pie, macaroni, stewed prunes, and chocolate pudding.  Any husband, making a cautious inroad upon these about midnight, would surely have the authentic emotion of being in his own home.