“In many—there is nothing like it to get a man through; but for snuff I should scarcely be where I am now.”
“Have you been long here?”
“Three-and-twenty years.”
“Dear me,” said I; “and snuff brought you through? Give me a pinch—pah, I don’t like it,” and I sneezed.
“Take another pinch,” said Taggart.
“No,” said I, “I don’t like snuff.”
“Then you will never do for authorship; at least for this kind.”
“So I begin to think—what shall I do?”
Taggart took snuff.
“You were talking of a great work—what shall it be?”