Taboo

Clinton W. Gilbert, more eminent as a political correspondent than as a mythologist, nevertheless produced a learned treatise on the taboos and folk ways of America, especially as regards its supreme ruler:

TABOO No. 1. No President shall touch oil.

TABOO No. 2. No President shall come from south of a certain line.

TABOO No. 3. No President shall ever have set foot upon a common thoroughfare known as Wall Street.

TABOO No. 4. No President shall ever touch money, except the money of the poor, which is held to be blessed.

TABOO No. 5. No President shall ever look upon wine, although sometimes he may be compelled to wink at it.

TABOO No. 6. No President shall be too much anything.