."

"I daresay. But I mean in social position."

"It seems to me you can't think of anything but social position."

"Well, it's worth thinking about."

"No doubt, as far as it is deserved. But when it is founded on
nothing but money, I wouldn't give much for it."

"Of course we all know that the higher classes are more refined--"

"Than printers' devils and vulgar apprentices, I suppose," put in
Oscar, laughing,

"Yes."

"Well, if refinement consists in wearing kid gloves and stunning
neckties, I suppose the higher classes, as you call them, are more
refined."

"Do you mean me?" demanded Fletcher, who was noted for the character
of his neckties.

"Well, I can't say I don't. I suppose you regard yourself as a
representative of the higher classes, don't you?"

"To be sure I do," said Fletcher, complacently.

"So I supposed. Then you see I had a right to refer to you. Now
listen to my prediction. Twenty-five years from now, the boy whom
you look down upon as a vulgar apprentice will occupy a high
position, and you will be glad to number him among your
acquaintances."

"Speak for yourself, Oscar," said Fletcher, scornfully.

"I speak for both of us."

"Then I say I hope I can command better associates than this friend
of yours."

"You may, but I doubt it."

"You seem to be carried away by him," said Fitzgerald, pettishly. "I
don't see anything very wonderful about him, except dirty hands."

"Then you have seen more than I have."

"Of course a fellow who meddles with printer's ink must have dirty
hands. Faugh!" said Fletcher, turning up his nose.

At the same time he regarded complacently his own fingers, which he
carefully kept aloof from anything that would soil or mar their
aristocratic whiteness.

"The fact is, Fitz," said Oscar, argumentatively, "our upper ten, as
we call them, spring from just such beginnings as my friend Harry
Walton. My own father commenced life in a printing office. But, as
you say, he occupies a high position at present."

"Really!" said Fletcher, a little taken aback, for he knew that
Vincent's father ranked higher than his own.

"I daresay your own ancestors were not always patricians."

Fletcher winced. He knew well enough that his father commenced life
as a boy in a country grocery, but in the mutations of fortune had
risen to be the proprietor of a large dry-goods store on Washington
Street. None of the family cared to look back to the beginning of