the public as possible. The lion's portion
naturally goes to the heads of the concern--then come the shareholders'
dividends. The actual workers in the business, such as the 'editors,'
are paid as little as their self-respect will allow them to take, and as
for the other fellows _under_ the editors--well!--you can just imagine
they get much less than the little their self-respect would claim, if
they were not, most of them, so desperately poor, and so anxious for a
foothold somewhere as to be ready to take anything. I took the first
chance I could get, and hung on to it, not for the wretched pay, but for
the experience, and for the insight it gave me into men and things. I
witnessed the whole business;--the 'doctoring up' of social
scandals,--the tampering with the news in order that certain items might
not affect certain shares on the Stock Exchange,--the way 'discussions'
of the most idiotic kind were started in the office just to fill up
space, such as what was best to make the hair grow; what a baby ought to
weigh at six months; what food authors write best on; and whether modern
girls make as good wives as their mothers did, and so on. These things
were generally got up by 'the fool of the office' as we called him--a
man with a perpetual grin and an undyingly good opinion of himself. He
was always put into harness when for some state or financial reason the
actual facts had to be euphonised or even suppressed and the public 'let
down gently.' For a time I was drafted off on the 'social'
business--ugh?--how I hated it?"

"What did you have to do?" asked Mary, amused.

"Oh, I had to deal with a motley crowd of court flunkeys, Jews, tailors
and dressmakers, and fearful-looking women catering for 'fashion,' who
came with what they called 'news,' which was generally that 'Mrs.
"Bunny" Bumpkin looked sweet in grey'--or that 'Miss "Toby" Tosspot was
among the loveliest of the debutantes at Court.' Sometimes a son of
Israel came along, all in a mortal funk, and said he 'didn't want it
mentioned' that Mrs. So-and-So had dined with him at a certain public
restaurant last night. Generally, he was a shareholder, and his orders
had to be obeyed. The shareholders in fact had most to do with the
'society' news,--and they bored me nearly to death. The trifles they
wanted 'mentioned' were innumerable--the other trifles they didn't want
mentioned, were quite as endless. One day there was a regular row--a
sort of earthquake in the p