knows New York a little, and I
because I don't. I am an elderly man, and have spent my life buried
in my books in drowsy villages. Pray go on. Your American slang has
frequently a delightful meaning--a fantastic hilarity, or common sense,
or philosophy, hidden in its origin. In that it generally differs from
English slang, which--I regret to say--is usually founded on some silly
catch word. Pray go on. When you see a new book by Mr. Kipling, you are
ready to 'separate yourself from one fifty' because he 'has the goods
with him.'"

G. Selden suppressed an involuntary young laugh.

"One dollar and fifty cents is usually the price of a book," he said.
"You separate yourself from it when you take it out of your clothes--I
mean out of your pocket--and pay it over the counter."

"There's a careless humour in it," said Mount Dunstan grimly. "The
suggestion of parting is not half bad. On the whole, it is subtle."

"A great deal of it is subtle," said Penzance, "though it all professes
to be obvious. The other sentence has a commercial sound."

"When a man goes about selling for a concern," said the junior assistant
of Jones, "he can prove what he says, if he has the goods with him. I
guess it came from that. I don't know. I only know that when a man is a
straight sort of fellow, and can show up, we say he's got the goods with
him."

They sat after lunch in the library, before an open window, looking into
a lovely sunken garden. Blossoms were breaking out on every side, and
robins, thrushes, and blackbirds chirped and trilled and whistled, as
Mount Dunstan and Penzance led G. Selden on to paint further pictures
for them.

Some of them were rather painful, Penzance thought. As connected with
youth, they held a touch of pathos Selden was all unconscious of. He had
had a hard life, made up, since his tenth year, of struggles to earn his
living. He had sold newspapers, he had run errands, he had swept out a
"candy store." He had had a few years at the public school, and a few
months at a business college, to which he went at night, after work
hours. He had been "up against it good and plenty," he told them. He
seemed, however, to have had a knack of making friends and of giving
them "a boost along" when such a chance was possible. Both of his
listeners realised that a good many people had liked him, and the reason
was apparent enough to them.

"When a chap gets sorry for himself," he remarked once, "he's down and
out. That