The Transvaal from Within: A Private Record of Public Affairs

a pair of doors respectively painted "Warehouse" and "Private"; and having performed the superfluous ceremony of knocking at the former, Mary found herself in front of a rough

the table and heaped on the floor; and the young men handled them with as

llins by a miniature boy endowed with a gape that threatened to lift his he

wo of the Dic." and "The fourth of the Ency." Against the window an ac

elling him that she was on the brink of destitution. The perspiring young packers, sure of their dinners by-and-by, looked to her individuals to be felicitated on their prosperity, and, luckless as they were, it is a fact that a person's lot is seldom so poor but that another person worse off can be found to envy it. The book-keeper who has grown haggard in the firm's employ at a couple of pounds a week is the envy of the clerk who lives on eighteen shillings, and the wight who sweeps the offi

ed, and, with a yawn so tremendous tha

Bret

f appreciation. A man who had risen to the position of conducting the travelling department of a firm that published on the subscription plan, he was someth

he said; "what c

se things Mr. Collins noted. Before she had explained her desire he had wished that she might have it. The book-agent is of many types, and skilful advertisements hinting at noble earnings, without being explicit about the nature of the pursuit, had brought penurious professional men and reduced gentle

rience hav

se with a fair amount of intellige

As a rule it was he who advocated the attempt,

pture, "that the art of the business is to se

is wanted. Always watch the face of the person you are showing it to

O

able to tell by his eyes when you have come to one that illustrates a subject that

s

ly, say how useful an encyclopedia is for general reference in a household

o engage me for

smi

n a hurry

I in too much

he easiest reply to give in a hurry is 'No.' I'm not sure about sending you out with the Ency.; after

it be b

, and you needn't be afraid of he

of that. What is

old the boy to bring in

iography of the inventors. You want to know who invented the watch-look it up under W; the telephone-turn to T. It's a history of the progress of science and civilisati

bound book from its case

could," she said; "I sh

e the first agent to ca

ut terms?" s

bout five or six pounds a week. You may do more; we have travellers w

ld be my commencing sal

Saturdays you needn't go out-it's a bad day, especially to catch professional men. But saying you make twelve calls five days a week, and out of every dozen calls you book two orders, there is your five guineas a week for you as regular as clockwork! I'll tell you what I'll do: just give me a receipt for the specimen, and go home this m

very much

s half a guinea to you. You have no further trouble-a deliverer takes the volumes round and col

s all

shook hand

ck," he repea

think, she would never have dreamt of trying Pattenden's-never have heard of the occupation-if she had not met Mr. M

at she was to do. Gaining her room, she eyed her little bag of linen forlornly; she did not think she could borrow anything on articles like these, neither could she spare any of them, nor summon the courage to put them on a counter. Suddenly the inspiration came to her that there was the bag itself. And at dusk she went out wi

ing like a housemaid. "If you wou

on her apron, and agreed with less h

ary now considered calling on the Macphersons to inform them of the result of their suggestion. Reluctant to intrude, she had half decided

the parlour in a state of confusion, and gathered from the trio in a breath that destiny, in the form of Pilcher's,

by an armful of shirts that fell from her one by one as she moved; "and it wasn't ti

ken, it should be thirty-sax! I canna see the use o' a b

ust looked in to say it's all satisfactory, and

s: that's thirty-four! My dear, would you mind countin

y, and, dropping on to the traveller'

cos of the trouble of getting 'em washed when he goes abou

ye," returned her parent shortly.

replied Mary, struggling with a la

nce apiece wasted-lost through repreheensible carelessness!" He sat down on the box by his wife's side, and contemp

very nic

mak' a penny by it. But the pu

enny by it?"

partner; "he's got the 'ump, th

y; "'tis pleasant walkin' in the fine weather. Now mind ye, 'oman, I d

s, haven't I rummaged ev

sax, an' it is for ever short," he compl

pretended. Appealed to for support, however, her pa sighed again, and it was obvious that he was impelled towards an unusually pessimistic view of everything that night. A brief reference to a "sink o' ineequity" was accepted as a comment upon the "win

Have plenty of cheek, and you'll get along like a house afire!

tep she called to

to fetch 'em, but don't do it!" She jerked her head towards the parlour.

e as it was, distressed her. Last night too there had been a mention of the possibility, and, knowing that she could never be any man

pearls that she has laid so reverently at her master's feet is left to lie there, she exonerates him and accuses herself. But his caresses never quite fill the unsuspected wound. If it happens that he neglects them all, then the woman, beggared and unthanked, wonders why the sun shines, and how people can laugh. Some women can take back a misdirected love, erase the superscription, and address it over again. Others cannot. Mary could

uch a thing as that was not a sentiment to be plucked out and destroyed at the dictates of common-sense. It was not a thing that Carew could kill with baseness. She could have looked him in the face and sworn she hated him; she felt that, though that might not be quite true, she co

reliminary expedition. Mr. Collins, true to his promise, had prepared a list for her. The houses were all in the neighbourhood of the Abbey, and mostly, he informed her, the offices of civil engineers. He said civil engi

a pocket large enough to hold your specimen? Never mind! Keep it out of sight as much as you can when

of prospective riches, on which she could advertise for other employment

that a porter in livery asked her whom she wanted? She told him, "Mr. Gregory Hatch"; to which he replied, "Third floor," evidently with the supposition that she would make use of the lift. She profited by this supposition of his,

erceiving her, one of these lordly beings lounged forward, and descended from his high estate su

. Hatc

ooked suspiciously at the specimen

what

Bret

uld be summoned directly afterwards to eject her, made her yearn to take flight before he reappeared. She was debating wh

aspect was busy at a desk; he

id interrogatively. "

ook the seat that he had indicated, because she was too much embarrassed to decline it, and s

she abominated herself for the omission-"I have called, Mr.--" his name had suddenly sailed away fr

rom the case and put it

ntatively, and she began to collect her wits. To take it into her hands, however, and expatiate on its me

gentleman. "The Album of Inv

new work." She felt idiotic to keep repeating how new i

on, and it looked within the regions of possibility that he might give an order. Up to that mo

to know something that one has forgotten about something: who thought of it, and

dam-my nam

'Mr. Hatch.' I was going to say that, if you

y the price

at twelve and sixpence,

e f

olumes they are; do

o!-a very valuable b

order for it?" she inquired, sca

article, "I will not give an or

isappointment while he read

f making 'pictures' of them, to the detriment of their usefulness; clearness is always the grand desideratum in an illustration of a mechanical contrivance. With this, the customary blunder has been avoided; in looking through the specimen I've scarcely detected

uy it?" demande

ver buy books-I have so many. No trouble at al

y, and seemed to be under the impres

entlemen were out of town. Number 6, on reference to her paper, proved to be a "Mr. Crespigny." His ou

and was ready to introduce herself in coherent phrases. Instead of her being admitted to the inner room, however, Mr. Crespigny came out, in the wake of his clerk, and it devolved u

n, the publishers, have asked me to wait up

ked to the threshold of the private office without

don't you know a book-ag

ion was always liable to be ridiculed or resented according to the bent of the person importuned. Oh, how hateful it was to be poor-"poor" in the fullest meaning of the term; to be compelled to cringe to cads, and swallow insults, and cal

dvised her to jot down brief memoranda of the interviews in future, that he m

, all trying for an order for something or another, and all beginning the same way. Go in brightly. Don't let him know your business till you've got the specimen open under his nose. Cry, 'Well, Mr. So-and-So, here i

ul," she sai

ant without a red cent he travelled with a work called L'Histoire de la Révolution? My dear young lady, if you go to Par

uppose he

any different account this afternoon, I can tell you! No, no, you mustn't be disheartened because you aren't lucky at the start; and as to that Victoria Street fellow who was in a ba

are being clamoured for. You may be sure I want to do well with the thing. If, by

d for incompetence; but Mr. Collins was always complaisant, and perpetually assured her that she was enduring only the disappointments inevitable to a beginner. In his own mind he began to doubt her fitness for the occupation, but he liked her, and knowing that, in the trade phrase, some orders "booked themselves," he was willing to afford her the chance of making a trifle a

ublishers, and I haven't earned a single commission." Mrs. Shuttleworth scrutinised her grimly, and she held her breath. She might be commanded to leave, a

ets, for I know what I'd be doing. But I can't afford to lay out for your breakfas' and your tea with never a farthing coming bac

ustion. However fatigued her fruitless expeditions might have made her now, she went back to the publishing-house enduringly afoot, grudging every halfpenny, husbanding the meagre sum with the tenacity of deadly fear. The windows of the foreign restaurants with viands temptingly displayed and tastefully garnished, the windows of the English cook-shops, into which the meats were thrown, enchanted her eye as she would never have believed that food could have the power to do. She understood what starvation was; began to understand how people could be

a failure, to its case. The sight of Victoria Street and its neighbourhood came to be loathsome to her. Often her instructions took her on to different floors of the s

he flights of stairs, and drooping down them, a shade the weaker for the absence of the pitiful breakfast. It was not until one o'clock that the hopelessness of routine was admitted. Then, the prospect of the

ling her to cry feebly at the recollection of some unkind answer that she had once given, at a hurt expression that she saw

ul of water from the bottle on the wash-hand-stand, and, driven to exertion by necessity, took her

appearance and strongly adv

with genuine concern. "Stay indoors to-day;

is idea that staying indo

. "Yes, give me the list. Only don't expect me to co

a few nam

o-day," he said. "Here ar

oared in her ears; the jam and jostle of the pavements confused her. She felt like a child buffeted by giants, and coul