ge. He lost his job. No reason was given. His wife, before her
marriage, had been a trained nurse, and in her professional life had
nursed the wife of a bank president, who was a director in the gun
company. One day these ladies met, and the lady of the bank said she
would find out why the husband of her former nurse was discharged. The
director got at the facts, and gave them to his wife, _sub rosa_: "He
belongs to Irvine's church--and Irvine is an anarchist." The young man
got another job in another city. After a few discharges of that kind,
men who did not want to leave the city got scared and gave me a wide
berth.

I looked around for something to do to earn a living. I found a young
bookbinder in a commercial house, and as he was a master craftsman, I
advised him to hang out a shingle and work for himself. He did so.
When I was casting around for a new method of earning a living I
thought of him, and asked him to take me as an apprentice. He did so,
and I put an apron on and began to work at his bench. One day, when
the reporters were hard up for news, one of them called for an
interview.

"Have you ever published any sermons, Mr. Irvine?"

"Yes; one, and a fine one."

"Where was it published?"

"Right here in New Haven!"

"A volume?"

"Yes."

I went to my case and produced a book--I had sewed it, backed it,
bound and tooled it. It was my first job, and I was proud of it. I am
proud of it now. It is the best sermon I ever preached.

Another day a professor in the Yale Medical School called to have some
books bound at the bindery.

"Who is that fellow at your bench?" he asked.

"Mr. Irvine," the bookbinder replied.

"The Socialist?"

"Yes."

He took the young man aside and told him that he could expect no
recognition from the "best citizens" as long as he kept me. Off came
my apron, and I looked around again.

I was very fond of Dr. T.T. Munger. In his vigorous days his was a
great intellect, and when in his study one day he told me that I had
no gospel to preach, I felt deeply the injustice of the charge. I
could not argue. I would not defend myself. I valued his friendship
too highly. I hit upon a plan, however. I had published in a labour
paper seventeen sermons for working people. I went to a printer and
told him that, if he would print them in a book, I would peddle them
from door to door until I got the printer's bill. They were printed in
a neat volume, entitled "The Master and the Chise