I heard some time ago of a Scot who, full of that brave sturdy spirit of self-reliance which is the precious endowment of the race of North Britons, came up to London to fight his way in the ranks of literature. The grand inflexible independence of the man asserted itself with such obstinacy that he was granted a Civil List Pension; and while in receipt of this form of out-door relief for poets who cannot sell their poetry, he began a series of attacks upon literature as a trade, and gave to the world an autobiography in a sentence, by declaring that literature and deterioration go hand in hand.
This was surely a very nasty thing for the sturdy Scotchman, who had attained to the honourable independence of the national almshouse, to say, just as people were beginning to look on literature as a profession.
But then he sat down and forthwith reeled off a string of doggerel verses, headed “The Dismal Throng.” In this fourth-form satirical jingle he abused some of the ablest of modern literary men for taking a pessimistic view of life. Now, who on earth can blame literary men for feeling a trifle dismal if what the independent pensioner says is true, and success in literature can only be obtained in exchange for a soul? The man who takes the most pessimistic view of the profession of literature should be the last to sneer at a literary man looking sadly on life.
CHAPTER II.—THE OLD SCHOOL.
The frock-coat and muffler journalist—A doomed race—One of the specimens—A masterpiece—-“Stilt your friend”—A jaunty emigrant—A thirsty knave—His one rival—Three crops—His destination—“The New Grub Street”—A courteous friend—Free lodgings—The foreign guest—Outside the hall door—The youth who found things—His ring—His watch—The fruits of modesty—Not to be imitated—A question for Sherlock Holmes—The liberty of the press—Deadheads.
I HAVE come in contact with many journalists of the old school—the frock-coat and muffler type. The first of the class whom I met was for a few months a reporter on a newspaper in Ireland with which I was connected. He had at one time been a soldier, and had deserted. I tried, though I was only a boy, to get some information from him that I might use afterwards, for I recognised his value as the representative of a race that was, I felt, certain to become extinct. I talked to him as I talked—with the aid of an interpreter—to a Botjesman in the South African veldt: I wanted to learn something about the habits of a doomed type. I succeeded in some measure.
The result of my researches into the nature of both savages was to convince me that they were born liars. The reporter carried a pair of stage whiskers and a beard with him when sent to do any work in a country district; the fact being that the members of the Royal Irish Constabulary in the country barracks are the most earnest students of the paper known as Hue and Cry, and the man said that, as his description appeared in every number of that organ, he should most certainly be identified by a smart country policeman if he did not wear a disguise. Years afterwards I got a letter from him from one of her Majesty’s gaols. He wanted the loan of some money and the gift of a hat.