"regular," though not without grimaces, through Bryanism. The _Post_
was, in short, a paper with an honorable history, and everybody felt a
kind of affection for it. The plain fact remained, however, that within
recent years a great many worthy persons had acquired the habit of
reading the more hustling _State_.

The _Post_, not to put too fine a point upon it, had for a time run fast
to seed. The third generation of its owners had lost their money, mostly
in land speculations in the suburbs of New York City, and in the State
of Oregon. You could have thrown a brick from their office windows and
hit far better land speculations, but they had the common fault of
believing that things far away from home are necessarily and always the
best. The demand rose for bigger, fatter newspapers, with comic sections
and plenty of purple ink, and the _Post's_ owners found themselves
unable to supply it. In fact they had to retort by mortgaging their
property to the hilt and cutting expenses to rock-bottom. These were
dark days for the _Post_. That it managed to survive them at all was due
chiefly to the personality of Colonel Cowles, who, though doubtless
laughable as a political economist, was yet considered to have his good
points. But the Hercules-labor grew too heavy even for him, and the
paper was headed straight for the auctioneer's block when new interests
suddenly stepped in and bought it. These interests, consisting largely
of progressive men of the younger generation, thoroughly overhauled and
reorganized the property, laid in the needed purple ink, and were now
gradually driving the old paper back to the dividend-paying point again.

Colonel Cowles, whose services had, of course, been retained, was of the
old school of journalism, editor and manager, too. Very little went into
the _Post_ that he had not personally vised in the proof: forty galleys
a night were child's play to him. Managing editor there was none but
himself; the city editor was his mere office-boy and mouthpiece; even
the august business manager, who mingled with great advertisers on equal
terms, was known to take orders from him. In addition the Colonel wrote
three columns of editorials every day. Of these editorials it is enough
to say at this point that there were people who liked them.

Toward this dominant personality, the reluctant applicant for work now
made his way. He cut an absent-minded figure upon the street, did Mr.
Queed, but this time he m