“I never was more serious in my life.”

“That I am to make shoes?”

“No, I don’t quite think that.  I don’t suppose you can make them.  You’d have first to learn the trade and show that you were an adept.”

“And I must show that I am an adept before I can write for The Coming Hour.”  There was a tone of sarcasm in this which was not lost on Quaverdale.

“Certainly you must; and that you are a better adept than I who have got the place, or some other unfortunate who will have to be put out of his berth. The Coming Hour only requires a certain number.  Of course there are many newspapers in London, and many magazines, and much literary work going.  You may get your share of it, but you have got to begin by shoving some incompetent fellow out.  And in order to be able to begin you must learn the trade.”

“How did you begin?”

“Just in that way.  While you were roaming about London like a fine gentleman I began by earning twenty-four shillings a week.”

“Can I earn twenty-four shillings a week?”

“You won’t because you have already got your fellowship.  You had a knack at writing Greek iambics, and therefore got a fellowship.  I picked up at the same time the way of stringing English together.  I also soon learned the way to be hungry.  I’m not hungry now very often, but I’ve been through it.  My belief is that you wouldn’t get along with my editor.”

“That’s your idea of being independent.”

“Certainly it is.  I do his work, and take his pay, and obey his orders.  If you think you can do the same, come and try.  There’s not room here, but there is, no doubt, room elsewhere.  There’s the trade to be learned, like any other trade; but my belief is that even then you could not do it.  We don’t want Greek iambics.”

Harry turned away disgusted.  Quaverdale was like the rest of the world, and thought that a peculiar talent and a peculiar tact were needed for his own business.  Harry believed that he was as able to write a leading article, at any rate, as Quaverdale, and that the Greek iambics would not stand in his way.  But he conceived it to be probable that his habits of cleanliness might do so, and gave up the idea for the present.  He thought that his friend should have welcomed him with an open hand into the realms of literature; and, perhaps, it was the case that Quaverdale attributed too much weight to the knack of turning readable paragraphs on any subject at any moment’s notice.

But what should he do down at Buston?  There were three persons there with whom he would have to contend,—­his father, his mother, and his uncle.  With his father he had always been on good terms, but had still been subject to a certain amount of gentle sarcasm.  He had got his fellowship and his allowance, and so had been lifted above his father’s authority.  His father thoroughly despised his brother-in-law, and looked down upon him as an absolute ass.