The next day was the Fourth of July, and an extra man would be needed for that day.

I went to the bicycle rink on Huntington Avenue and found that what Wilmot wanted was a man to teach be5 ginners to ride. Now, I had never been on a bicycle in my life nor even very close to one, but I was in the predicament of the dog that had to climb a tree. In a couple of hours I had learned to ride a wheel myself and was teaching other people.

IO

Next day Mr. Wilmot paid me a dollar. He did not say anything about my coming back the next morning, but I came and went to work, very much afraid I would be told that I wasn't needed. After that Mr. Wilmot did not exactly engage me, but he forgot to discharge me, and 15 I came back every day and went to work. I kept myself inconspicuous and worked diligently. At the end of the week Colonel Pope sent for me and placed me in charge of the uptown rink, over the general offices of the Pope Company on Washington Street.

20

Colonel Pope was a man who watched his workmen. I had not been mistaken when I felt that a young man would have a chance with him. He used often to say that "water would find its level," and he kept an eye on us. One day he called me into his office and asked me if I 25 could edit a magazine.

"Yes, sir," I replied quickly. I remember it flashed through my mind that I could do anything I was put at just then that if I were required to run an ocean steamer I could somehow manage to do it; I could learn 30 to do it as I went along. I answered as quickly as I could get the words out of my mouth, afraid that Colonel Pope would change his mind before I could get them out.

Resolved, That the personal appearance of an applicant for a position carries more weight than the written recommendations he may produce.

CLASS EXERCISES

1. Select equivalent expressions for the following:

a. If I had had my wits about me

b. Water will find its level

c. He forgot to discharge me

d. The dog that had to climb a tree

2. Write a description of the author and Mr. Pope during the interview.

3. Write what Colonel Pope might have said had Mr. McClure replied that he could not wash windows or scrub floors. 4. Write the dialogue that you imagine took place when Mr. McClure met Wilmot and was told his duties.

5. Make a list of ten striking advertisements.

6. Make a list of five maxims that apply to business (for example, "Honesty is the best policy").

7. Explain what is meant by a patent.

8. Mr. McClure has become a successful publisher. What qualities do you think have enabled him to become successful?

COLLATERAL READING

MCCLURE, My Autobiography; MARDEN, How they Succeeded; MARDEN, Pushing to the Front; FRANKLIN, Autobiography; EGGLESTON, Hoosier Schoolmaster; LARCOM, A New England Girlhood; PALMER, Life of Alice Freeman Palmer; RIïs, Making of an American; TARBELL, Early Life of Abraham Lincoln; WILLIAMS, Some Successful Americans; ROOSEVELT, Autobiography; STANLEY, Autobiography; KELLER, Story of my Life; HOAR, Autobiography of Seventy Years; EASTMAN, An Indian Boyhood; GILDER, Autobiography of a Tomboy; GATES, Biography of a Prairie Girl.

Dear Pierrepont:

GEORGE H. LORIMER

Omaha, September 1, 189—

Yours of the 30th ultimo strikes me all wrong. I don't like to hear you say that you can't work under Milligan or any other man, for it shows a fundamental weakness. 5 And then, too, the house isn't interested in knowing how you like your boss, but in how he likes you.

I understand all about Milligan. He's a cross, cranky old Irishman, with a temper tied up in bowknots, who prods his men six days a week and schemes to get them 10 salary raises on the seventh, when he ought to be listening to the sermon; who puts the black snake on a clerk's hide when he sends a letter to Oshkosh that ought to go to Kalamazoo, and begs him off when the old man wants to have him fired for it. Altogether he's a hard, crabbed, gen- 15 erous, soft-hearted, loyal, bully old boy who's been with the house since we took down the shutters for the first time and who's going to stay with it till we put them up for the last time.

But all that apart, you want to get it firmly fixed in 20 your mind that you're going to have a Milligan over you all your life, and if it isn't a Milligan it will be a Jones or a Smith, and the chances are that you'll find them harder to get along with than this old fellow. And if it isn't Milligan or Jones or Smith, and you ain't a butcher, but a 25 1 From "Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to his Son."

parson or a doctor, or even the president of the United States, it'll be a way-back deacon, or the undertaker, or the machine. There isn't any such thing as being your own boss in this world unless you're a tramp, and then there's the constable.

Like the old man if you can, but give him no cause to dislike you. Keep your self-respect at any cost, and your upper lip stiff at the same figure. Criticism can properly come only from above, and whenever you discover that 10 your boss is no good you may rest easy that the man who pays his salary shares your secret. Learn to give back a bit from the base-burner, to let the village fathers get their feet on the fender and the sawdust box in range, and you'll find them making a little room for you in turn. Old 15 men have tender feet, and apologies are poor salve for aching corns. Remember that when you're in the right you can afford to keep your temper, and that when you're in the wrong you can't afford to lose it.

When you've got an uncertain cow it's all O.K. to tie 20 a figure eight in her tail if you ain't thirsty and it's excitement you're after, but if you want peace and her nine quarts you will naturally approach her from the side and say, "So, boss" in about the same tone that you would use if you were asking your best girl to let you hold her 25 hand.

Of course you want to be sure of your natural history facts and learn to distinguish between a cow that's a kicker, but whose intentions are good if she's approached with proper respect, and a hooker, who is vicious on gen30 eral principles and any way you come at her. There's never any use fooling with an animal of that sort, brute or human. The only safe place is the other side of the fence or the top of the nearest tree.