my sympathy with one particular brand
(perhaps not numerous) was at times imperfect. The brand in question, as
to which I was amiably cautioned before even leaving the steamer, is
usually very young, and as often a girl as a youth. He or she cheerfully
introduces himself or herself with a hint that of course it is an awful
bore to be interviewed, but he or she has a job to do and he or she must
be allowed to do it. Just so! But the point which, in my audacity, I
have occasionally permitted to occur to me is this: Is this sort of
interviewer capable of doing the job allotted to him? I do not mind
slips of reporting, I do not mind a certain agreeable malice (indeed, I
reckon to do a bit in that line myself). I do not even mind hasty
misrepresentations (for, after all, we are human, and the millennium is
still unannounced); but I do object to inefficiency--especially in
America, where sundry kinds of efficiency have been carried farther than
any efficiency was ever carried before.

[Illustration: THE DOWN-TOWN BROADWAY OF CROWDED SKY-SCRAPERS]

Now this sort of interviewer too often prefaces the operation itself by
the remark that he really doesn't know what question to ask you. (Too
often I have been tempted to say: "Why not ask me to write the interview
for you? It will save you trouble.") Having made this remark, the
interviewer usually proceeds to give a sketch of her own career,
together with a conspectus of her opinions on everything, a reference to
her importance in the interviewing world, and some glimpse of the amount
of her earnings. This achieved, she breaks off breathless and reproaches
you: "But, my dear man, you aren't saying anything at all. You really
must say something." ("My dear man" is the favorite form of address of
this sort of interviewer when she happens to be a girl.) Too often I
have been tempted to reply: "Cleopatra, or Helen, which of us is
being interviewed?" When he has given you a chance to talk, this sort of
interviewer listens, helps, corrects, advises, but never makes a note.
The result the next morning is the anticipated result. The average
newspaper reader gathers that an extremely brilliant young man or woman
has held converse with a very commonplace stranger who, being confused
in his or her presence, committed a number of absurdities which offered
a strong and painful contrast to the cleverness and wisdom of the
brilliant youth. This result apparently satisfies the average newspaper