'I think
perhaps I can explain it.'

'You!' they all cried, while Uncle Solomon added something about
'young men having grown cleverer since his young days.'

'Yes, that letter is addressed to me--M. Ashburn, you see, stands for
Mark, not Matthew. It's from--from a firm of publishers,' said the
unlucky Mark, speaking very hoarsely; 'I sent them two novels of
mine--one was called "One Fair Daughter," and the other "Sweet Bells
Jangled"--and they, they won't take them--that's all.'

There was a 'sensation,' as reporters say, at this announcement:
Martha gave a sour little laugh of disgust; Cuthbert looked as if he
thought a good deal which brotherly feeling forbade him to put in
words; but Trixie tried to take Mark's hand under the table--he
shrank from all sympathy, however, at such a moment, and shook her off
impatiently, and all she could do was to keep her eyes in pity from
his face.

Mrs. Ashburn gave a tragic groan and shook her head: to her a young
man who was capable of writing novels was lost; she had a wholesome
horror of all fiction, having come from a race of Dissenters of the
strict old-fashioned class, whose prejudices her hard dull nature had
retained in all their strength. Her husband, without any very clear
views of his own, thought as she did as soon as he knew her opinions,
and they all left it to Mr. Lightowler to interpret the 'evident sense
of the house.'

He expanded himself imposingly, calling up his bitterest powers of
satire to do justice to the occasion: 'So _that's_ all, is it?' he
said; 'ah, and quite enough, too, _I_ should think; so it was the
bells on _your_ cap that were jingling all the time?'

'Since you put it in that pleasant way,' said Mark, 'I suppose it
was.'

'And that's how you've been studying for the Bar of evenings, this is
the way you've overcome your fondness for scribbling nonsense? I've
spent all the money I've laid out on you' (it was a way of his to talk
as if Mark had been a building estate), 'I've given you a good
education, all to 'ave you writing novels and get 'em "returned with
thanks!"--you might have done that much without going to College!'

'Every writer of any note has had novels declined at some time,' said
Mark.

'Well,' said Uncle Solomon, ponderously, 'if that's all, you've made a
capital start. You can set up as a big littery pot at once, _you_ can,
with a brace of 'em. I 'ope you're satisfied with all this, Jane, I'm
sure?'

'It's no use s