when the discovery is made known, I am sure ten thousand will try. The
rascals! I can see their brass-plates gleaming over scores of doors.
Competition will ruin my professions, as it has all others.

It must be premised that the two professions are intended for gentlemen,
and gentlemen only--men of birth and education. No others could support
the parts which they will be called upon to play.

And, likewise, it must be honestly confessed that these professions
have, to a certain degree, been exercised before. Do not cry out at this
and say it is no discovery! I say it IS a discovery. It is a discovery
if I show you--a gentleman--a profession which you may exercise without
derogation, or loss of standing, with certain profit, nay, possibly with
honor, and of which, until the reading of this present page, you never
thought but as of a calling beneath your rank and quite below your
reach. Sir, I do not mean to say that I create a profession. I cannot
create gold; but if, when discovered, I find the means of putting it in
your pocket, do I or do I not deserve credit?

I see you sneer contemptuously when I mention to you the word
AUCTIONEER. "Is this all," you say, "that this fellow brags and
prates about? An auctioneer forsooth! he might as well have 'invented'
chimney-sweeping!"

No such thing. A little boy of seven, be he ever so low of birth, can do
this as well as you. Do you suppose that little stolen Master
Montague made a better sweeper than the lowest-bred chummy that yearly
commemorates his release? No, sir. And he might have been ever so much
a genius or gentleman, and not have been able to make his trade
respectable.