came back, through the manager, of course:

"Tell M---- he could earn more money at the job he mentions, but that
it would not take him so long to learn wood-sawing as it will to learn
banking."

The inspector might have gone one step further and got to the truth of
the matter. One requires no education to saw wood, and no intellect;
but both education and a certain degree of intelligence must appertain
to him who would make successful application to a bank; and education
itself requires an expenditure of time and money. The ability a young
man possesses has cost him something and has cost his father or widowed
mother a great deal. What right has the bank to use it without paying
what it is worth? It ought to be worth a bare living, at least--like
wood-sawing.

Time flew, for Evan, on his new post. There is certain excitement
about bank work, just as there is in playing checkers. It is said of
both occupations that they develop the faculties. Counting the stars
also strengthens certain brain-tissues. In fact, there are many
educational agencies in the world and the universe: it is no trouble to
find one or a thousand--the difficulty comes in selecting. He who can
choose, with open eyes, the factors that shall enter into his
education, is going to be among the fittest. But few boys of seventeen
know where to look; certainly Evan Nelson did not. He was naturally a
specialist; that is, he was one to put his whole heart into anything.
If he had been left to the moulding influence of a university he would
have fastened upon literature or science and created something for the
world; but, unfortunately, he was thrown headlong into a
counting-house, and, being an enthusiast, began to dig among musty
books with an energy that was, in great measure, wasted--except, to the
beneficiaries of the concern.

The life he had led at home had given Evan scope for his imagination.
The life he now led made no demand on his creative powers, with the
result that his imagination turned away from great things and
concentrated on little things--like pleasure.

It was the old story, the story that Sam Robb and others knew. With
Nelson it began later than usual, but came with a rush in the following
way:

One night in his room above the vault he sat reading in French a story
from De Maupassant, a dictionary beside him. Bill Watson walked into
the room and sat down with a grunt, and a cigarette. He lounged back
in a chair, we