to dinner.

Martin grinned and accepted the invitation, marvelling the while at his
complacence. And at the dinner, where, with their womankind, were half a
dozen of those that sat in high places, and where Martin found himself
quite the lion, Judge Blount, warmly seconded by Judge Hanwell, urged
privately that Martin should permit his name to be put up for the
Styx--the ultra-select club to which belonged, not the mere men of
wealth, but the men of attainment. And Martin declined, and was more
puzzled than ever.

He was kept busy disposing of his heap of manuscripts. He was
overwhelmed by requests from editors. It had been discovered that he was
a stylist, with meat under his style. The Northern Review, after
publishing "The Cradle of Beauty," had written him for half a dozen
similar essays, which would have been supplied out of the heap, had not
Burton's Magazine, in a speculative mood, offered him five hundred
dollars each for five essays. He wrote back that he would supply the
demand, but at a thousand dollars an essay. He remembered that all these
manuscripts had been refused by the very magazines that were now
clamoring for them. And their refusals had been cold-blooded, automatic,
stereotyped. They had made him sweat, and now he intended to make them
sweat. Burton's Magazine paid his price for five essays, and the
remaining four, at the same rate, were snapped up by Mackintosh's
Monthly, The Northern Review being too poor to stand the pace. Thus went
out to the world "The High Priests of Mystery," "The Wonder-Dreamers,"
"The Yardstick of the Ego," "Philosophy of Illusion," "God and Clod,"
"Art and Biology," "Critics and Test-tubes," "Star-dust," and "The
Dignity of Usury,"--to raise storms and rumblings and mutterings that
were many a day in dying down.

Editors wrote to him telling him to name his own terms, which he did, but
it was always for work performed. He refused resolutely to pledge
himself to any new thing. The thought of again setting pen to paper
maddened him. He had seen Brissenden torn to pieces by the crowd, and
despite the fact that him the crowd acclaimed, he could not get over the
shock nor gather any respect for the crowd. His very popularity seemed a
disgrace and a treason to Brissenden. It made him wince, but he made up
his mind to go on and fill the money-bag.

He received letters from editors like the following: "About a year ago we
were unfortunate enough to refuse you