ludicrous incidents I ever
remember. The courteous confusion of the chairman, the dismay of the
committee, the colossal nature of the fiasco filled me, I am glad to
say, not with mortification, but with an overpowering desire to laugh.

I may add that there had been a mistake about the announcement of the
hour, and ten minutes later a minute audience did arrive, whom I
proceeded to address with such spirit as I could muster; but I have
always been grateful for the humorous nature of the snub administered
to me.

Again on another occasion I had to pay a visit of business to a remote
house in the country. A good-natured friend descanted upon the
excitement it would be to the household to entertain a living author,
and how eagerly my utterances would be listened to. I was received not
only without respect but with obvious boredom. In the course of the
afternoon I discovered that I was supposed to be a solicitor's clerk,
but when a little later it transpired what my real occupations were, I
was not displeased to find that no member of the party had ever heard
of my existence, or was aware that I had ever published a book, and
when I was questioned as to what I had written, no one had ever come
across anything that I had printed, until at last I soared into some
transient distinction by the discovery that my brother was the author
of Dodo.

I cannot help feeling that there is something gently humorous about
this good-humoured indication that the whole civilised world is not
engaged in the pursuit of literature, and that one's claims to
consideration depend upon one's social merits. I do honestly think that
Providence was here deliberately poking fun at me, and showing me that
a habit of presenting one's opinions broadcast to the world does not
necessarily mean that the world is much aware either of oneself or of
one's opinions.

The cure then, it seems to me, for personal ambition, is the humorous
reflection that the stir and hum of one's own particular teetotum is
confined to a very small space and range; and that the witty
description of the Greek politician who was said to be well known
throughout the whole civilised world and at Lampsacus, or of the
philosopher who was announced as the author of many epoch-making
volumes and as the second cousin of the Earl of Cork, represents a very
real truth,--that reputation is not a thing which is worth bothering
one's head about; that if it comes, it is apt to be quite as
in