find it fastened. So he passed round into the front garden, and by
listening intently enough I could presently hear the outer gate
close behind him with a bang. I thought again of the thirty-seven
influential journals and wondered what would be his revenge. I
hasten to add that he was magnanimous: which was just the most
dreadful thing he could have been. The Tatler published a charming
chatty familiar account of Mr. Paraday's "Home-life," and on the
wings of the thirty-seven influential journals it went, to use Mr.
Morrow's own expression, right round the globe.



CHAPTER VI.



A week later, early in May, my glorified friend came up to town,
where, it may be veraciously recorded he was the king of the beasts
of the year. No advancement was ever more rapid, no exaltation
more complete, no bewilderment more teachable. His book sold but
moderately, though the article in The Empire had done unwonted
wonders for it; but he circulated in person to a measure that the
libraries might well have envied. His formula had been found--he
was a "revelation." His momentary terror had been real, just as
mine had been--the overclouding of his passionate desire to be left
to finish his work. He was far from unsociable, but he had the
finest conception of being let alone that I've ever met. For the
time, none the less, he took his profit where it seemed most to
crowd on him, having in his pocket the portable sophistries about
the nature of the artist's task. Observation too was a kind of