aid a thousand a year," so Greyson read to them, "for keeping my
own opinions out of my paper. Some of you, perhaps, earn more, and
others less; but you're getting it for writing what you're told. If I
were to be so foolish as to express my honest opinion, I'd be on the
street, the next morning, looking for another job."

"The business of the journalist," the man had continued, "is to destroy
the truth, to lie, to pervert, to vilify, to fawn at the feet of Mammon,
to sell his soul for his daily bread. We are the tools and vassals of
rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping-jacks. They pull the
strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities, our lives are the
property of other men."

"We tried to pretend it was only one of Jack's little jokes," explained
Greyson as he folded up the cutting; "but it wouldn't work. It was too
near the truth."

"I don't see what you are going to do," commented Mary. "So long as men
are not afraid to sell their souls, there will always be a Devil's market
for them."

Greyson did not so much mind there being a Devil's market, provided he
could be assured of an honest market alongside, so that a man could take
his choice. What he feared was the Devil's steady encroachment, that
could only end by the closing of the independent market altogether. His
remedy was the introduction of the American trust law, forbidding any one
man being interested in more than a limited number of journals.

"But what's the difference," demanded Joan, "between a man owning one
paper with a circulation of, say, six millions; or owning six with a
circulation of a million apiece? By concentrating all his energies on
one, a man with Carleton's organizing genius might easily establish a
single journal that would cover the whole field."

"Just all the difference," answered Greyson, "between Pooh Bah as
Chancellor of the Exchequer, or Lord High Admiral, or Chief Executioner,
whichever he preferred to be, and Pooh Bah as all the Officers of State
rolled into one. Pooh Bah may be a very able statesman, entitled to
exert his legitimate influence. But, after all, his opinion is only the
opinion of one old gentleman, with possible prejudices and preconceived
convictions. The Mikado--or the people, according to locality--would
like to hear the views of others of his ministers. He finds that the
Lord Chancellor and the Lord Chief Justice and the Groom of the
Bedchamber and the Attorney-General--the