their
little spite already. The author would treat them with calm disdain!"

"Horribly nasty fellows!" cried Frank. "They ought to be kicked; but
they are below contempt. But if I could only catch them here--"

"I am delighted to find," replied Carne, looking at him with kind
surprise, "that you agree with me about that, sir. Read a few lines, and
your indignation against that low lot will grow hotter."

"It cannot grow hotter," cried the author; "I know every word that the
villains have said. Why, in that first line that I heard you reading,
the wretches actually asked me whether I expected my beautiful goddess
to wear her crown upon her comely tail!"

"I am quite at a loss to understand you, sir. Why, you speak as if this
great work were your own!"

"So it is, every word of it," cried Frank, hurried out of all reserve
by excitement. "At least, I don't mean that it is a great work--though
others, besides your good self, have said--Are you sure that your friend
bought twenty copies? My publishers will have to clear up that. Why,
they say, under date of yesterday, that they have only sold six copies
altogether. And it was out on Guy Fawkes' Day, two months ago!"

Caryl Carne's face was full of wonder. And the greatest wonder of all
was its gravity. He drew back a little, in this vast surprise, and
shaded his forehead with one hand, that he might think.

"I can hardly help laughing at myself," he said, "for being so stupid
and so slow of mind. But a coincidence like this is enough to excuse
anything. If I could be sure that you are not jesting with me, seeing
how my whole mind is taken up with this book--"

"Sir, I can feel for your surprise," answered Frank, handing back the
book, for which the other had made a sign, "because my own is even
greater; for I never have been read aloud before--by anybody else
I mean, of course; and the sound is very strange, and highly
gratifying--at least, when done as you do it. But to prove my claim to
the authorship of the little work which you so kindly esteem, I will
show you the letter I spoke of."

The single-minded poet produced from near his heart a very large letter
with much sealing-wax endorsed, and the fervent admirer of his genius
read:

"DEAR SIR,--In answer to your favour to hand, we beg to state that your
poetical work the Harmodiad, published by our firm, begins to move.
Following the instructions in your last, we have already disposed of
more than fifty copi