al ambitions to an end.

'Theer are at least twelve notes in an ordinary singin' voice,' said the
conductor, 'and theer ought to be eight half-tones scattered in among
'em, somewheer. You've got two notes at present, and one's a squeak
and t'other's a grumble. I think you might find a more advantageous
empl'yment for your time elsewheer.'

Paul submitted to this verdict with high good-humour. He retired to the
far end of the schoolroom, and sat out 'the practice' with a growing
sense of pleasure. He exulted in the possession of a new sense which
made all these people lovable.

'Now I've found this out,' said Paul to himself, 'I shall never be
lonely any more. There'll always be summat to think about--summat with a
relish in it.'

He must needs, of course, try to get the relish on paper, and he wrote a
great deal of boyish stuff in flagrant imitation of Dickens, and hid
it, jackdaw-like, in such places as he could find. In the slattern old
office where Paul was learning more or less to be a workman at his trade
there was no such thing as a ceiling. Frayed mortar, with matted scraps
of cow-hair in it, used to fall frequently into the type-cases
whenever a high wind shook the crazy slates, and, to obviate this, some
contriving person had nailed a number of sheets of brown paper to the
rafters. Paul's hiding-place for his literary work was above these
sheets of paper, and one day when old Armstrong stood by his side, a
tintack gave way beneath the superincumbent weight, and the whole bundle
of scraps in verse and prose fell at the author's feet Armstrong stooped
for it, and Paul went red and white, and his legs shook beneath him.
There was an upturned box by the side of the cracked and blistered old
stove which warmed the room in winter, and Armstrong went to it and sat
down to untie his bundle. The author had never had any confidences with
anybody, and his father was one of the last people in the world to whom
he would have dared to make appeal for advice or help. In his agitation
he went on pecking at the case of type before him, and setting the
stamps on end at random, inside out and upside down, and in any
progression chance might order. The old man coughed, and Paul dropped
his composing-stick into the space-box with a clatter, and spilt its
contents there. Armstrong slipped the string which bound the roll of
papers, and began to glance over his discovery. Paul felt as if the
ramshackle building had been out at sea