im general manager with almost unlimited
powers.

M. Schenk was indeed a man to impress people at the outset with a sense
of strength and of power to command. He was over six feet in height,
broad, but with rather sloping shoulders, and very stoutly built. His
head, large itself, almost seemed to merge in a greater neck, and both
were held stiffly erect as he glowered at the world through cold and
rather protruding eyes, much as a drill-instructor glares at his pupils.
He was florid-complexioned, with short, closely-cropped grey hair and a
short, stubby, dirty-white moustache. Of his grasp of the affairs of the
firm and his business ability generally, people were not so immediately
impressed as they were with his power to command, but they invariably
learned to appreciate this side of his character in time.

The matter of the direction of the affairs of the firm settled to
everyone's satisfaction, the question as to what was to be done with Max
came up for discussion.

"I think it will be best, Max, if you go into M. Schenk's office and
assist him there," said Madame Durend at last. "You will there pick up
the threads of the business, and when you are two or three years older
we can consider what we are going to do."

"But, Mother," replied Max, "that was not the way Father learned his
business. You have often proudly told me how he used to work as a simple
mechanic, going from shop to shop and learning all he could of the
practical side of the different processes. How he then bought a small
business, extended it and extended it, until it grew to its present
size. And the whole secret of his success was that he knew the work so
thoroughly from top to bottom that he could depend upon his own
knowledge, and needed not to be in the hands of men with more knowledge
of detail but vastly less capacity than himself."

"Yes, Max, that is true; but the business is now built up, and is so big
that it does not seem necessary for you to go through all that. We have
an able manager, and from him you can learn all that you will ever need
to know of the work of directing the affairs of the firm."

"I should then never know the work thoroughly. I should always be
dependent upon those who had learned the practical side of the work,
Mother. Let me spend a year or two in learning it from the bottom. I
shall enjoy the work, and shall then feel far more confidence in
myself."

Max spoke earnestly, and his mother could see that he wa