't, Clemmy, my boy,' said Mr. Heeley judicially. 'They'll
stand simply anything. I bet you what you like Onions Winter quotes that
all over the place.'

And he handed the last sheet of the review to a messenger, and ran off
to the editorial room to report that instructions had been executed.
Jack and Clementina relighted their pipes with select bits of _A
Question of Cubits_, and threw the remaining debris of the volume into
the waste-paper basket. The hour was twenty minutes past midnight....

The great majority of the reviews were exceedingly favourable, and even
where praise was diluted with blame, the blame was administered with
respect, as a dentist might respectfully pain a prince in pulling his
tooth out. The public had voted for Henry, and the press, organ of
public opinion, displayed a wise discretion. The daring freshness of
Henry's plot, his inventive power, his skill in 'creating atmosphere,'
his gift for pathos, his unfailing wholesomeness, and his knack in the
management of narrative, were noted and eulogized in dozens of articles.
Nearly every reviewer prophesied brilliant success for him; several
admitted frankly that his equipment revealed genius of the first rank. A
mere handful of papers scorned him. Prominent among this handful was the
_Whitehall Gazette_. The distinguished mouthpiece of the superior
classes dealt with _A Question of Cubits_ at the foot of a column, in a
brief paragraph headed 'Our Worst Fears realized.' The paragraph, which
was nothing but a summary of the plot, concluded in these terms: 'So he
expired, every inch of him, in the snow, a victim to the British
Public's rapacious appetite for the sentimental.'

The rudeness of the _Whitehall Gazette_, however, did nothing whatever
to impair the wondrous vogue which Henry now began to enjoy. His first
boom had been great, but it was a trifle compared to his second. The
title of the new book became a catchword. When a little man was seen
walking with a tall woman, people exclaimed: 'It's a question of
cubits.' When the recruiting regulations of the British army were
relaxed, people also exclaimed: 'It's a question of cubits.' During a
famous royal procession, sightseers trying to see the sight over the
heads of a crowd five deep shouted to each other all along the route:
'It's a question of cubits.' Exceptionally tall men were nicknamed
'Gerald' by their friends. Henry's Gerald, by the way, had died as
doorkeeper at a restaurant called