"That is curious, isn't it?" observed Paul.

"Yes. Think how long ago it was; from 1440 to 1460 he toiled at his invention. He was a versatile man, being not only skilled in polishing precious stones but also at making mirrors. The making of mirrors was a new trade in Germany for outside the borders of Venice, where the monopoly had long been held by Italian workmen, the industry was almost unknown. It is possible that Gutenburg may have used the presses and even the lead employed for molding the mirror frames to work out his metal type. Doubtless his knowledge of melting and pouring lead was derived from his mirror-making trade. We know, however, little of his experiments. He worked in secret, spending years in research and wasting other years in delays, when money to further his invention was not forthcoming. His first printing was done about 1439 or 1440, and from that time up to 1460 he was busy printing and struggling to make his work more perfect."

"What did he print in those early days?" inquired Paul. "Books?"

"Yes. A few pages from them remain and are to be seen at the National Library at Paris. The letters used are very coarse and uneven and are in the Latin type employed by the monks in writing their manuscripts. It is almost a romance to picture Gutenburg shut up in the old ruined monastery where he worked night and day with one of his faithful helpers—a goldsmith who had long been in his employ—and two other tried and trusty apprentices. You can see how necessary it was that he have men whom he could rely on not to divulge his secret. Probably the goldsmith's knowledge of metals was of service to his master in the undertaking; as for the joiner who had previously aided in constructing mirror frames, he made most of the tools. We don't know much about the third workman, but we do know that later one of the trio died very suddenly, and the interruption to Gutenburg's work caused great delay. Fearful that in the meantime the secret of the invention might leak out, or that the old servant's heirs might insist on having a share in the discovery, Gutenburg melted up his forms and abandoned further labor for a time. This was a great pity, for by destroying what he had done the inventor had it all to create over again later on. His rash act did, however, prove one thing which history wanted to know, and that was that Gutenburg used metal forms and not wood to make his letters."

"How soon did he re-make his metal forms?" asked Paul eagerly.

"Not right away," responded Mr. Cameron. "He was deeply in debt and a good deal discouraged by the death of his efficient workman on whom he was very dependent. For six years we hear no more of him. Then he appeared at Metz where he began borrowing money again, just as he had done before. He was fortunate in securing the aid needed, and it is from this period on that his best printing was done. He now branched out into more ambitious tasks, producing a copy of the Latin Bible in three volumes. This pretentious undertaking of course required a great many letters, and he found that to cut them by hand was too slow a process; moreover, the lead letters were very soft and wore down quickly. He must cast his letters in brass molds and make them of more durable metal. But alas, such an innovation was costly and his money had given out. Therefore, much as he dreaded to part with his secret, he was forced to take into partnership a rich metal worker by the name of John Faust."

Mr. Cameron paused to think a moment.

"It was thus that Gutenburg procured the brass for his molds; made in them letters of harder material; and printed his Bible. With the production of this masterpiece came a strange happening, too. You can see that by printing from letters cast in molds the text was more regular than was the handwork done by the priests and monks. Hence when Charles VII of France saw one of the new Bibles he was enchanted with it and eagerly bought it because of its uniform text. The next day he displayed his recently acquired treasure to the Archbishop with no little pride, and great was his astonishment when the Archbishop asserted with promptness that he himself owned a newly purchased Bible that was quite as perfect in execution. The king protested that such a miracle could not be—that no one could write by hand two such copies. To settle the dispute the Archbishop's Bible was produced and placed beside the king's, and there they were, identically the same. The dignitaries were troubled. It was not humanly possible to pen by hand two such books. Why, it would take a lifetime—more than a lifetime; nor could any penman write two manuscripts so exactly alike. To make the matter worse and more puzzling, other copies were discovered precisely like the king's and the Archbishop's. Not a line or letter varied. It was magic!"

Paul laughed with pleasure.

"No wonder the poor king and the stately archbishop were upset!" he said.

"They were very much upset indeed," agreed his father. "It was, you must recall, a superstitious age. Everything that could not be fathomed was attributed to witchcraft. Hence witchcraft was the only explanation of the present miracle. John Faust, of whom the two royal persons had bought the books, must have sold himself to the devil. They would have the unlucky merchant brought, and if he could not satisfactorily tell how and where he had got the Bibles, he should be burned alive."

"I suppose he went and told!" put in Paul indignantly.

"Yes, he did. He wasn't going to forfeit his life. I fancy any of us would have done the same, too. He showed the Archbishop his press and explained how the Bibles had been printed."

"It was a pity he had to."

"It was something of a pity," answered Mr. Cameron. "And yet the secret must have come out sometime, I suppose, for subsequently Faust quarreled with Gutenburg and by and by set up a press of his own at Metz, and with two printing presses in the same town, and the workmen necessary to run them mingling with the populace, it was impossible to keep such an invention from the public. Gradually it became common property and it had become universal when Metz was sacked in the Franco-Prussian War, its printing rooms destroyed, and the workmen scattered."

"Did that put an end to printing?" questioned Paul.

"No. On the contrary it spread the art over France and Germany. By 1500 there were over fifty presses on the continent. In the meantime William Caxton, an English merchant, traveled to Holland to buy cloth, and there became so much interested in the books he saw and the tale of how they were printed that he purchased some type and, bringing it home, set up a printing press in London not far from Westminster Abbey. The first English book to be printed was dated 1474 and was called 'The Game of Chess.' Then came a Bible which was presented to the king. From this time on there was practically an end to the handwritten books made by the monks in cloisters and monasteries. Occasionally such a volume was made for the very rich because, as I told you, the elegant still considered paper and the printed book too common and cheap for their use. But with the steady improvement of ink and paper and the awakening desire of the masses to read what was printed came the dawn of religious liberty and the birth of learning."

"It is a wonderful story!" cried Paul, much moved.

"A book in itself, isn't it?" said his father. "It is an interesting fact, however, that Latin and the Latin text continued to be the language of the printed book for some time; this was not only because of an established precedent, but because the Renaissance in Italy revived an interest in classic literature. But by and by people demanded books in their native tongue. They wished to read something besides the classics—literature that was alive and a part of their own era. The written novello, or story, began to take the place of the ballads which the trouveurs, or minstrels who wandered from castle to castle, had chanted. One was no longer dependent on such a story-teller. The printed novel had arrived. Its form was still very crude, but it was nevertheless a story and a broader field for entertainment than was provided by the threadbare lives of the saints. Science, too, was making remarkable progress and the public was alert to read of Bacon and Galileo, as well as of Luther and Shakespeare. Had printing come earlier it would have been to a passive, indifferent populace; now it appeared in answer to the craving of a people thirsty to read of travel, invention, poetry; to consume the Tales of King Arthur, Sir John Mandeville's Travels, Sidney's 'Arcadia', Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. The Elizabethans reflected in England the rebirth of literature and learning which was sweeping all Europe at the time. Printing was not the herald, nor yet the servant, of this wonderful age; but was rather its companion, going hand in hand with it and making all the wealth of thought that it had to give available to us, as well as to those of its own day."

"Long live Gutenburg!" exclaimed Paul.

"Yes, we owe him a great deal," agreed Mr. Cameron. "But do not become confused and attribute everything to him. He did invent type molds for casting type and thereby brought printing to the point of a practical art. He did not invent engraving on wood, as many enthusiasts acclaim; nor did he invent impressions of relief surfaces. He was not, moreover, the first to print on paper, for the makers of playing cards and image-prints had done that before him. There had also been roughly printed books before his day and printing presses, too. There had even been movable type. But Gutenburg was the first to combine these ideas so that they could be used for practical purposes. In other words, he was the first practical typographer, not the first printer. Upon the foundation that other men had built in, he reared a permanent, useful art without which there could not have been either enlightenment or education."



CHAPTER VIII

THE ROMANCE OF BOOKMAKING

"Ever since last night, Dad," remarked Paul, the next evening at dinner, "I have been wondering how the old printers got rid of the Latin text, lettering, or whatever you call it, and got down to printing in English like ours."

"You're starting on a long story," replied Mr. Cameron, glancing up from his plate. "The development of our modern type requires a volume in itself. Many scholars and many craftsmen contributed to that glorious result. It did not come all in a minute. Gutenburg's uneven Latin lettering was a far cry from our uniform, clear, well-designed variety of print. In the first place, as I told you before, good ink and good paper were necessary to beautiful text, and these Gutenburg did not have. Gradually, however, as a result of repeated experiments, paper and ink that were of practical value were manufactured. China had long been successful in printing because of the fine texture of her paper. Italy, the home of the arts, caught up Gutenburg's invention and brought not only lettering but paper-making to a marvelous degree of perfection."

"Italy and China always seem to be doing things," laughed Paul.

"Both nations were inventive and original," answered Mr. Cameron. "The difference between them was that while China locked all her discoveries up within her own walled cities, Italy shared her knowledge with the rest of the world and made it and herself immortal."

"The Italians were a great people, weren't they?"

"They were true lovers of all that was best and most beautiful," answered his father gravely. "Even their aristocracy felt it no disgrace to toil to perfect a fine art. To make that which was excellent more excellent still was the aim of rich and poor. Nobles, artisans, barefooted friars worked together towards that common goal. It was an Italian prince, Nicholas V, a man who afterward became Pope, who founded the Vatican Library and collected five thousand books, at a time, you must remember, when a book was a rare and almost priceless treasure. To him we owe the preservation of many a valuable old manuscript that might otherwise have been destroyed. Five thousand volumes was in those days a vast number to get together."

"Our public libraries would not think so now," smiled Paul.

"No, because at present books are so easily within reach that we scarcely appreciate them. We certainly read only a very small proportion of them."

"I know I don't read many," said Paul soberly.

"You will read more as you grow older, son," returned his father kindly. "But most of us are intellectually lazy; even grown-up persons devote a good part of their short lives to reading things that profit them nothing."

"Things like the March Hare, for example," suggested Paul facetiously.

"Many a worse thing than the March Hare, I'm afraid," his father responded. "We seem to think we have unlimited time before us, and that there is no hurry about reading the good things we mean to read before we die; so we waste our precious moments on every sort of trash—cheap novels, worthless magazines, newspaper gossip, and before we know it, our lives are gone. I overlook your being so foolish; but for me it is inexcusable. The Italians of the Renaissance did not give themselves over to such folly. They put their hearts seriously into building up their age and generation. Lorenzo de Medici dragged from the corners of Europe and Asia some two hundred Greek and Latin manuscripts. Other Florentines, Venetians, Romans collected private libraries. Princes of the land turned their wealth not to their own idle pleasure but to financing Gutenburg's invention and establishing printing presses which the culture and brain of the country controlled. There was a printing press at the Vatican itself, and scholars who were paid large salaries met in consultation concerning the literature printed. The best artists contributed their skill to the undertaking. Indeed, it was a disagreement about some theological work that Martin Luther had come from Germany to help with that sent him back home in a temper. And not only was the matter printed carefully scrutinized but also every detail of its production was thought out—the size of the page, the size of the type, the width of the margins, the quality of the paper, the variety of type to be used. What wonder that under such conditions printing was rapidly transformed from a trade to an art. When we think of the exquisite books made in this far-away day, we sigh at our present output."

Mr. Cameron's face clouded, then brightened.

"Nevertheless when all is said and done, books are not for the person of wealth alone. The work of the Aldi of Italy, the Elzevirs of Leyden, the Estiennes of Paris, although of finest quality, was much too expensive for universal use. For it is the subject matter inside the book which, when all is said and done, is the thing we are after, and which we are eager to spread abroad; and never in any age has every type of literature been so cheap and accessible, or the average of culture so high as now. If a person is ignorant to-day it is his own fault. Nothing stands between him and the stars but his own laziness and indifference."

"Time, my dear Henry," interrupted Mrs. Cameron. "Do not leave out the element of time. Remember that the farther away we get from the beginning of learning, the greater accumulation there is for us to master. Like a mammoth snowball, each century has rolled up its treasure until such a mass has come down to us that it is practically impossible for us to possess ourselves of it. Sometimes when I think of all there is to know, I am depressed."

"And me, too, Mater," echoed Paul. "It seems hopeless."

"But there are short outs," argued Mr. Cameron. "No one expects any of us to read all the books of the past. The years have sifted the wheat from the chaff, and by a process of elimination we have found out pretty well by this time what the great books are. By classifying our subjects we can easily trace the growth and development of any of the really significant movements of the world; we can follow the path of the sciences; study the progress of the drama from its infancy to the present moment; trace the growth of the novel; note the perfecting of the poetic form. History, philosophy, the thought of all the ages is ours. That is what I mean when I say there is no excuse for persons of our era being uninformed. We are reaping the results of many unfoldings and can see things with a degree of completeness that our ancestors could not; they looked at life's problems from the bottom of the hill and got only a partial view; we are seeing them from the top, and understanding—or we should be understanding—more fully, their interrelation."

"I suppose," mused Paul thoughtfully, "that those who come after us will see even farther than we."

"They ought to, and I believe they will," his father answered. "Nothing walks with aimless feet, in my opinion. It is all part of a gigantic, divine plan. The small beginnings of the past have been the seed of to-day's harvest. We thank Gutenburg for our books. We thank such men as Nicholas V and many another of his ilk for the Vatican Library, the British Museum, the numberless foreign museums; we owe a debt to our nation for our own Congressional Library, to say nothing of the smaller ones that, through the public spirit of generous citizens, have opened their doors to our people and done so much to educate and democratize our country."

There was a moment of silence.

"And quite aside from the thousands of volumes written in our own language, we have access to the literature of other nations both in translation and in their mother tongue. Remember that after printing had got well under way, type in other languages—Arabic, Greek, Hebrew—had to be developed in order that the literature of other languages might augment our own."

"I don't think I took that into account," remarked Paul.

"Of course," continued Mr. Cameron less seriously, "not every person of the olden time was alert for learning. Human nature was much the same then as now.

"I'm afraid even in the midst of all this thirst for knowledge there were those who cared far more for the outside of a book than for the inside," he continued humorously. "Books were bound in brocade, in richly ornamented leather embossed with gilt; some had covers of gold or silver studded with gems, while others were adorned with carved ivory or enamel. As time went on and the religious manuscripts written, illuminated, and bound by the monks gave place to the more elaborate productions of a printing age, ecclesiasts were not skilful enough to do the illustrating demanded, and a guild of bookbinders sprang up. Into the hands of artists outside the cloister were put the more dainty and worldly pictures required by secular text. Then followed a period when scholars who owned books were no longer forced to loan them to students to copy for their own use, as had been the case in the past. Books became less expensive and were accessible to everybody. Slowly they were got into more practical form—were made smaller and less bulky; not only outside but inside they were improved. 'The Lives of Saints' and Fox's 'Book of Martyrs' gave way first to the tales of Merlin and King Arthur in various versions, stories of Charlemagne, and romances of similar character. Copyrights being unknown, there was no law to protect a book, and hence all the adventures of the hero of any one tongue were passed on to the favorite hero of another nationality; as a result French, Italian, Spanish, and Celtic literature teem with heroes who perform marvellous deeds of identical character."

Paul was amused.

"Amadis of France, the popular idol of the French people, worked the same marvels as King Arthur did, only under another name. Every nation borrowed (or rather stole) from every other. It was not considered reprehensible to do so. Shakespeare worked over the Italian novelle of Boccaccio, weaving them into his great English dramas, and nobody censured him. It was this craving for romance that overcame the delight in mere display and roused interest not alone in the binding of a book but in its contents. True collectors and book-fanciers still strove with one another to obtain choice, beautiful, and fabulously expensive volumes. But for the most part the book came back to its original purpose and took its place as a mouthpiece of literature."

"Do you mean that books became cheap?" asked Paul.

"Not what we should consider cheap—that is, not for a long time. You see, the thing that makes a book cheap is not alone the material put into it, or the price for which it can be obtained of the author; it is largely the size of the edition printed that reduces the expense of production. It is practically as much work to print fifty copies of a volume as several hundred. The labor of setting the type is the same. The circle of readers was not large enough in olden times to justify a volume being manufactured in large numbers; nor were there any methods for advertising and distributing books broadcast as there are now."

"Oh," exclaimed Paul, "I see. Of course there weren't."

"Advertising and distribution play a very important part in our present-day book trade," his father went on. "To-day publishers frequently announce and advertise the book of a well-known author before the manuscript is completed, sometimes even before it is written at all. They get a scenario or resume of the story, and take orders for the book as if it were really already finished. Or with the manuscript in their hands they will often begin 'traveling it' long before it is printed. The reason for this is that in a large country like ours it takes a long time for salesmen to get about and secure orders from the various selling houses of our large cities. It means spreading a book from coast to coast. While the publisher is getting the book through the press, correcting proof, having illustrations and the colored jacket designed and printed, perhaps having posters made for advertising, his salesmen are taking orders for it by means of a condensation of the story and a dummy cover similar to the one which later will be put on the volume. Then, when the books are ready, they are shipped east and west, north and south, but are not released for sale until a given date, when all the stores begin selling them simultaneously. You can see that this is the only fair method, for it would be impossible, for example, for San Francisco to advertise a book as new, if it had been already selling in Boston for a month or so. All the selling houses must have the same chance. So a date of publication is usually set and announced. Frequently, however, long before that date an edition, or several editions of a popular book will be sold out. Booksellers will be so certain that they can dispose of a great number of volumes that they will place large orders ahead in order to be sure of securing the books they desire."

"Can they always tell ahead what people will want?" inquired Paul.

"No, not always. Sometimes the public will be caught by a story and it will become popular not only to the amazement of the bookseller, but to the surprise of both publisher and author as well. One cannot always prophesy what readers will like, especially if an author is new. It is a great gamble. But usually an author whose work is known and liked can safely be calculated upon to sell."

"Is it much work for a publisher to get a book ready for the market after he once gets the manuscript from the author?" asked Paul.

"To produce a well-printed, artistic book requires infinite care and pains," replied Mr. Cameron. "Of course a book can be rushed through. Such a thing is possible. But under ordinary conditions it is several months, sometimes a year, before the book is ready for sale. First a galley proof of the manuscript is made; by this I mean the subject matter is printed on a long strip of paper about the width of a page but several times as long. Then this proof, which is made chiefly to be sure the type is correctly set, is examined, and the errors in it are rectified. After this it is again corrected and is cut up into lengths suitable for a page. Following this the page proof is printed, care being taken that the last word at the bottom of one page joins on to the top word of the next. It is very easy to omit a word and thus mar the sense. It is also a rule of most publishing houses that the top line of each page shall be a full line, and in consequence it is often a Chinese puzzle to make the text conform to the rule. Readers often have to insert a line or take one out to meet this necessity, and sometimes an author's text is garbled as a result. No writer likes having words or whole sentences introduced or omitted; and you can't quite blame him, either, for he has to stand behind the book and receive not only what praise it may win but also the blame showered on it by both the public and the reviewers. Naturally the book—not alone the story but the style and choice of words—is assumed to be his. If he is a careful worker he has probably weighed every word that has gone into the phrasing. He therefore does not relish having his style meddled with, even for such a technicality as the filling out of a short line."

"Is it really better to heed this printer's edict?" laughed Paul.

"I think without question the book makes a better appearance if the rule is heeded," declared Mr. Cameron. "A printer does and should take pride in the looks of his page. The beauty of a book is quite an element in its production. After the type has been set up and corrected, and the proof paged, the next consideration is the size of the paper to be used, the quality, the texture. The width of the margins, the clearness or brilliancy of the text, the appearance and flexibility of the binding all have to do with the artistic result which is, or should be, the aim of every publisher. When all these details have been decided upon there is yet another important factor in book-producing—the item of expense. Books being no longer the property of the few, they must be within the reach of the many, and the book-manufacturer's business is to make them so. It is precisely because we have such a large reading public that America has attained her high intellectual average. Not that we are a cultured nation. By no means. What I mean is that our public school system offers education so freely, and even compels it so drastically, that there is a much smaller proportion of illiterate persons here than in most lands. Our illiterates are largely foreigners who have not been in our country long enough to become educated. Most of them have immigrated from places where they had no educational advantages, and some of them are, alas, now too old to learn. The great part of our native-born citizens can read and write, and vast numbers of them have a much broader education than that. It is by means of the wide distribution of learning and enlightenment that we hope to banish ignorance and superstition and spread patriotism and democracy. So you see books are a giant element in our national plan, and the writing and publishing of what is worthy and helpful is a service to the country. To do all this the publisher has no easy puzzle to solve—to produce what is good literature artistically, and at a price where he shall have his legitimate profit, and yet give to the public something within the range of its purse."

"I guess I'd rather stick to my job on the March Hare!" exclaimed Paul.

"I imagine it is quite big enough for you at present," smiled his father. "Between the public, and the printer, and the bookbinder the publisher is torn in many directions. And then there is the author, who, as I say, does not like his text tampered with. Firms differ greatly about this. Some publishers feel perfectly justified in going ahead and remodeling a writer's work to suit themselves; others regard an author's manuscript as a sacred possession and never change so much as a punctuation mark on it without asking permission. They may suggest changes but they will not make them. It is a point of honor with them not to do so."

Mr. Cameron smoked reflectively.

"Authors, however," he went on, "are not as badly off as they were before they had the copyright. Their stories can no longer be stolen with impunity as in the past. They are better paid, too. Many an olden-time author received very scant remuneration for his labor; sometimes he received none at all. Many had to beg the patronage of the rich in order to get their works printed; contracts were unfair and publishers unprincipled. The unfortunate author was the prey of vultures who cheated him at every turn. Many died in extreme poverty, only to become famous when it was too late. In our day the law has revolutionized most of these injustices, and although there are still unprincipled publishers as there are always scamps in every calling, the best class houses deal honorably with their writers, transforming the relation between author and publisher into one of friendliness and confidence rather than one of animosity and distrust."

"I suppose it is policy for a publisher to be fair."

"It is more than policy; it is honesty," returned Mr. Cameron. "It does, however, pay, for without the writer the publisher could not exist, and no writer is going to put his work in the hands of a person he cannot trust. It is a short-sighted man who kills the goose that lays the golden egg!"



CHAPTER IX

PAUL EMBARKS ON ANOTHER VENTURE

"Do you know, Dad, the March Hare is rapidly turning into an elephant," announced Paul to his father one morning not long after the conversation of the previous chapter. "I am having more and more copy to prepare for Mr. Carter all the time, and am doing every bit of it by hand. It takes hours to get it ready. I'm beginning to think I ought to have a typewriter. How much does one cost? Have you any idea?"

"Typewriters come at all prices," his father answered. "What I should advise you to get would be one of the small, light-weight machines. They are far less expensive than the others and do excellent work."

"About how much would one cost?"

"Fifty or sixty dollars."

Paul gave a low whistle.

"That's all very well, sir," he laughed. "But where am I to get the fifty or sixty bones to pay for it?"

"I don't know, my boy. That's up to you. Doesn't your business manager provide you with a typewriter?"

"Not on your life!" replied Paul. "Much as ever I can wring enough money out of him to cover my incidental expenses. No, the paper isn't fitting up offices for its hard-working staff. If I get a typewriter it must be my own venture."

"You would always find such a machine useful," returned his father slowly. "It would not be money thrown away."

Paul glanced down thoughtfully.

"I've half a mind to save up and get one," he said suddenly. "I could put my war-saving stamps into it," he added.

"So you could."

"I have nearly twenty-five dollars' worth of them already."

"Oh, that's fine! I had no idea you had been so thrifty." Mr. Cameron looked pleased.

"We fellows have been racing each other up at school to see who could get his book filled first. I'm afraid it was not all thrift," Paul explained, meeting his father's eyes with honesty.

"The result, however, seems to be the same, whatever the motive," smiled the man. "Twenty-five dollars would be a splendid start toward a typewriter. You might possibly run across a second-hand machine that had not been much used and so get it for less than the regular price. I think, considering the cause is such a worthy one, I might donate ten dollars to it."

"Really! Oh, I say, Dad, that would be grand. I'll pick you right up on your offer."

"You may, son. I shan't pay over my ten dollars, though, until you have the rest of the money."

"That's all straight; only don't forget about it."

"You needn't worry. I don't expect you will give me the chance to forget even if I wanted to," replied his father teasingly.

"You bet I won't. I'm going right to work to get the rest of my cash as fast as I can," responded Paul. "And I'm going to look up machines, too."

"I can give you the names of one or two good makes," his father suggested.

"I wish you would, Dad. You think one of the small machines you spoke of would be good enough?"

"Certainly," assented Mr. Cameron. "Many persons who do a good deal of work use the little machines from preference. They take up less room and are lighter and more compact to carry about. In these days almost nobody is without a typewriter, especially persons who write to any considerable extent. Those who write for publication find a typewriter practically imperative. Editors will not fuss to decipher hand-penned copy. The time it takes and the strain on the eyes are too great. A professional writer must now turn in his manuscript neatly typed and in good form if he expects to have it meet with any attention. The old, blotted, finely written and much marked-up article is a thing of the past. Typewriters are so cheap in these days and so simply constructed that there is no excuse for people not owning and running them."

"I wonder who thought out the typewriter, Dad," mused Paul.

"That is a much mooted question, my boy," Mr. Cameron answered. "There is an old British record of a patent for some such device dated 1714, but the specifications regarding it are very vague and unsatisfactory; there also was an American patent taken out by William A. Burt as early as 1829. Fire, however, destroyed this paper and we have no positive data concerning it. Since then there have been over two thousand different patents on the typewriter registered at the Government Office at Washington,—so many of them that any person applying for a patent on a new variety must have a great deal of courage."

"I should say so!"

"Generally speaking, all typewriters resolve themselves into two styles of keyboard machine: in one the type bars strike the paper when the keys are depressed; in the other the type is arranged around a wheel which rotates in answer to the depressing of a keyboard letter, and prints the corresponding type which is thereby brought opposite the printing point. Either variety is good. It is a matter of preference. Possibly the type-bar kind is the more common. There is, too, a difference in the manner of inking the type. One machine inks the letters from an inked ribbon that is drawn along by the action of the machine between the type face and the paper; the type of the other machine is inked from an ink pad that strikes the type before it is brought in contact with the paper. Sometimes this ribbon or ink pad is black; sometimes blue, green, red, or purple. Sometimes, too, a ribbon is so constructed that it inks in two colors, which is frequently a convenience for business purposes. Text, for example, can be done in black and the numerals—prices perhaps—put in in red."

"I see. I should think that would be fine," said Paul. "Now tell me one other thing: are the letters arranged in the same order on all typewriters?"

"You mean the keyboards?"

"Yes, I guess that is what I mean," replied Paul.

"Keyboards sometimes differ in arrangement," Mr. Cameron explained. "Some keyboards have a key for each letter, and others one key for several characters. It is, however, desirable that machines should differ as little in arrangement as possible, as typists learn a universal method of letter-placing and are consequently annoyed to find the letters in an unfamiliar location on a new machine."

"I can see that would upset them dreadfully," answered Paul. "Of course they could not go so fast."

"Not only that, but they would make frequent mistakes," continued his father. "The most expert typists seldom look at the keys, you know. They memorize the position of the letters and then operate the machine by the touch system, or by feeling. You have often seen a person play the piano in the same fashion. It is a great advantage for a stenographer to be able to do this, for he can keep his eyes on his copy and not constantly change his eye-focus by glancing first at the manuscript and then at the machine. He can also give his entire attention to taking dictation if he so desires. The touch system is a great timesaver; it enables any one to make twice the speed."

"And the bell warns them that they are approaching the end of a line, even if they don't see that they are," Paul added.

"Precisely!"

"It is a great scheme, isn't it—a typewriter?" declared the boy.

Mr. Cameron nodded.

"What wouldn't the old monks have given for one?" went on Paul mischievously. "Think of the years of work that would have saved them."

"Yes, that is true. But if we had no fine old illuminated manuscripts, we would have lost much that is beautiful and interesting. There is no question, though, that typewriters accord with our generation much more harmoniously than do painfully penned manuscripts. In our day the problem is to turn out the most work in the shortest time, and the typewriter certainly does that for us. It is a very ingenious device—a marvel until one sees a modern printing press; then the typewriter seems a child's toy, a very elementary thing indeed."

"I'd like to see a big press sometime," Paul observed. "I have been trying to get my nerve together to ask Mr. Carter for a permit to visit the Echo printing rooms."

"The Echo—humph!" laughed his father in derision. "Why, my boy, much as we esteem the Echo here in Burmingham, it is after all only a small local newspaper and very insignificant when compared with one of the big city dailies. You should visit the press rooms of a really large paper if you want to see something worth seeing. The Boston Post, for example, has the largest single printing press in the world. It was built in 1906 by the Hoe Company of New York and is guaranteed to print, count, fold, and stack into piles over 700,000 eight-page papers an hour."

"Great Scott, Dad!"

"It is tremendous, isn't it?"

"I'd like to see it."

"Sometime you shall. I think such a trip could be arranged," his father replied. "In the meantime I fancy you will have all you can do to earn the money for your typewriter, purchase it, and learn to manipulate it."

"I guess I shall; that's right," agreed Paul. "How am I going to get together the rest of that money! You haven't any suggestions, have you, sir?"

"Not unless you want to do Thompson's work while he takes his trip West. He is going out to Indiana to see his mother and will be away a month or so; in the meantime I have got to hire another man to do the chores about the place. The lawn must be cut; the leaves raked up; the driveway kept trim and in order; and the hedge clipped. If you want to take the job I will pay you for it."

"I'd have to do the work Saturdays, I suppose."

"That wouldn't hurt you, would it?"

Paul thought a moment.

"N—o."

"Undoubtedly it would interfere with your school games, the football and baseball," said his father. "Maybe a typewriter isn't worth that amount of sacrifice."

"Yes, it is."

"Think you want to make a try at Thompson's job?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then I won't hire in another man; only remember I shall expect you to stick to the bargain. I can't have you throwing up the place in a week or two."

"I shan't do that."

"And I can't have my work done haphazard, either," continued Mr. Cameron. "It must be done well and regularly."

"Yes, sir."

"You want me to give you a trial?"

"Yes, Dad."

"Do you want to do the whole job—the brasses indoors too?"

"Yes, I may as well take on the whole thing since I am out for money," laughed Paul.

"That's right. You have the proper spirit—the spirit that buys typewriters," answered his father. "I don't believe the exercise will hurt you, and at the end of it you will have something more to show than a dislocated shoulder, maybe, or a cracked cranium."

"Do you think I can earn what money I shall need to make up the rest of my fifty dollars?" inquired Paul anxiously. "Can I do it in a month?"

"A month of work will give you the rest of your fifty, son; have no fears. It will give you, too, all the work you will want for one while," answered Mr. Cameron. "Unless I am greatly mistaken, you will be quite ready to resign your post to Thompson when he comes back."

"Perhaps I shall," Paul replied, "but if you are repenting your bargain and are trying to scare me off, Dad, it is too late. You have hired me and I mean to stick it out."

"Go ahead, youngster, and good luck to you!" chuckled his father.



CHAPTER X

A DISASTER

It was after Paul had toiled early and late and put aside enough money for the new typewriter, and even a little more, that the first calamity befell the March Hare.

When the accounts were found to be short, it was unbelievable. Melville Carter, the business manager, who handled all the funds, was the soul of honesty as well as an excellent mathematician. His books were the pride of the editorial staff. Therefore when he was confronted with the hundred-dollar deficit, he could scarcely speak for amazement. There must be some mistake, he murmured over and over. He had kept the accounts very carefully, and not an expenditure had been made that had not been talked over first with the board and promptly recorded. There never had been a large surplus in the bank after the monthly bills were paid, but there was always a small margin for emergencies. The treasury had never before gone stone dry. But there it was! Not only was there no money in the bank, but the March Hare was about fifty dollars in the hole.

Paul and Melville went over and over the accounts, vainly searching for the error. But there was no error. The columns seemed to add up quite correctly. So, however, did the deposit slips from the bank. And the tragedy was that the two failed to agree. The bank had a hundred dollars less to the credit of the March Hare than the books said it should have.

In the meantime, at the bottom of Paul's pocket, lay a bill of fifty dollars for publishing expenses. What was to be done? The bill must be paid. It would never do to let the March Hare run behindhand. To begin to run into debt was an unsafe and demoralizing policy.

Paul's father had urged this advice upon him from the first. The March Hare must pay its bills as it went along; then its editors would know where they stood. And so each month the boys had plotted out their expenses and kept rigidly within the amount of cash they had in reserve. They had never failed once to have sufficient money to meet their bills. In fact, their parents had enthusiastically applauded their foresight and business ability.

And now, suddenly and unaccountably, here they were confronted by an empty treasury. What was to be done?

Of course the bill was not large. Fifty dollars was not a tremendous sum. But when you had not the fifty, and no way of getting it, the amount seemed enormous.

Then there was the balking enigma of it. How had it happened?

"If we only knew what we had done with that hundred, it would not be so bad," groaned Melville. "It makes me furious not to be able to solve the puzzle."

"Me, too!" Paul replied gravely.

And worse than all was the humiliation of finding they were not such clever business men as they had thought themselves to be. That was the crowning blow!

"A hundred dollars—think of it!" said Paul. "If it had been twenty-five! But a cool hundred, Mel!"

He broke off speechlessly.

"We can't be that amount short," protested Melville for the twentieth time. "We simply can't be. I have not paid one bill that the managing board has not first O.K.-ed. You know how carefully we have estimated our expenses each month. We have kept a nest-egg in the bank, too, all the time, in case we did get stuck. I can't understand it. We haven't branched out into any wild schemes. Of course, after the party we did make those presents to the school; but we looked over the ground and made sure that we could afford to do so."

"We certainly thought we could," returned Paul glumly. "Probably, though, we were too generous. Wouldn't people laugh if they knew the mess we are in now!"

"Well, they are not going to know it from me," growled Melville. "If I were to tell my father we were in debt he would say it was about what he expected. I wouldn't tell him for a farm down East. And how the freshmen would hoot!"

"I don't think my father would kid us," Paul said slowly, "but I know he would be awfully disappointed that we had made a business foozle."

"I, for one, say we don't tell anybody," Melville burst out. "I've some pride and I draw the line at having every Tom, Dick, and Harry shouting 'I told you so!' at me. What do you say, Paul, that we keep this thing to ourselves? If we have made a bull of it and got ourselves into a hole, let's get out of it somehow without the whole world knowing it."

"But how?"

"I don't know," Melville returned. "All I know is I'm not for telling anybody."

"But this bill, Melville? What is to become of that?"

"We must pay it."

"We?"

"You and I."

The room was very still; then Melville spoke again.

"Haven't you any ready money, Paul?"

"Y—e—s."

"Have you enough so that we could halve a hundred—pay the fifty-dollar deficit and put fifty dollars in the bank?"

"You mean you'd pay half of it if I would?"

"Yep."

"I—see."

"Could you manage it—fifty dollars?"

"Yes. Could you, Mel?"

"Well, I haven't the fifty; but I have a Liberty Bond that I could sell and get the money."

"That seems a shame," objected Paul.

"Oh, I don't care. I'm game. Anything rather than having the whole school twit me of messing the accounts."

"I don't care about being joshed, either," declared Paul. "Still—"

"Something's fussing you. What is it?"

"Well, you see, Mel, I've been doing extra work at home in order to earn enough money for a typewriter. I've just got it saved up. It'll have to go into this, now."

"Darned hard luck, old man! Don't do it if you don't want to. Maybe I can—"

"No, you can't! I wouldn't think of having you pay the whole hundred, even if you had the money right in your hand. This snarl is as much mine as yours. We probably haven't planned right. We've overlooked something and come out short."

"We might let the bill run until another month, I suppose," Melville presently suggested.

Paul started up.

"No. We mustn't do that on any account. We might be worse off another month. I say we clear the thing right up and start fair. If you will turn in your fifty, I will," declared he, with spirit.

"Bully for you! You sure are a sport, Kip."

"I don't see anything else to be done."

There was nothing else. Melville's "Baby Bond" was converted into cash; Paul's typewriter sacrificed; the fifty-dollar bill was paid; and the other fifty was put into the bank.

The boys kept their own council and if the March Hare sensed that its reputation had trembled on the brink of ruin it gave no sign. Gayly it went on its way.

People began to comment on the paper as being "snappy" and "up to date"; they called it "breezy" and "wholesome." Now and then an appreciative note from a distant graduate would make glad the editorial sanctum. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the magazine became more and more the organ of speech for the community. Persons who had never ventured into print—who, perhaps, never would have ventured—summoned up courage to send to this more modest paper articles that were received with welcome. Being first efforts and words that their authors had long desired to speak they were stamped with a freshness and spontaneity that was delightful; if at times the form was faulty it was more than compensated for by the subject matter. Furthermore, many of the contributions were of excellent quality.

Then there gradually came a day when the timid March Hare had more desirable material than it had room to print. A part of this was political, for the school classes in current events had aroused in the students a keen interest in international affairs. As a consequence good political articles had been eagerly sought for. Other contributions were of scientific nature and appeared from time to time in the columns devoted to such matter. The great mass of material sent in, however, was unclassified and found its way into the department labeled: Town Suggestions; or into the pages known as: Our Fathers and Mothers. Neither of these departments had originally been featured in the March Hare plan; they came as a natural outgrowth of the paper. Parents had things which they wanted to say to one another or to their boys and girls. There was many a problem to be threshed out, threshed out more intimately than it could have been in a larger and more formal paper. The questions debated never failed to interest the elder part of Burmingham's population and frequently they appealed to the youngsters as well. In fact, it was not long before these departments were merged into a sort of forum where an earnest and vigorous interchange of opinions 'twixt young and old took place.

And all the while that the sprightly March Hare was thus leaping on to success, Mr. Arthur Presby Carter sat quietly in his office and watched the antics of this youthful upstart. He was surprised, very much surprised; indeed he had, perhaps, never been more surprised in all his life. He had long thought he knew a good deal about the make-up of a paper,—what would interest and what would not; in fact, he considered himself an expert in that sphere. He had put years of study into the matter. Even now he would not have been willing to confess that a seventeen-year-old boy had taught him anything. That would have been quite beneath his dignity. But privately he could not deny that this schoolboy adventurer had opened his eyes to a number of things he had never considered before.

The Echo was a conservative, old-fashioned paper that had followed tradition rather than the lead of an alert, progressive public. From a pinnacle of confident superiority it had spoken to the people, telling them what they should think, rather than giving ear to their groping and clamoring desire for a hearing. The Echo never discussed questions with its readers. Its editor had never deigned to do so, so why should his publication? To bicker, argue, and debate would have been entirely at odds with its standards. People did not need to state what opinions they held; they merely needed to be told what opinions they should hold. Thus thought Mr. Arthur Presby Carter, and thus had his policy been immortalized in his paper.

But now, to his amazement and chagrin, a publication had been born that was undermining his prestige and putting to naught his creeds and theories. This absurd March Hare was actually becoming the authorized mouthpiece of the town. It would have been blind not to recognize the fact. Fools had indeed rushed in where angels feared to tread, as Mr. Carter himself had jeeringly asserted they sometimes did, and as a result there had come into being this unique monthly whose subscription list was constantly swelling.

The publisher shrugged his shoulders. He was a shrewd business man. He had, he confessed to himself, been trapped into printing this amateur thing, and once trapped he had been game enough to live up to his contract; but he had always viewed the new magazine with a patronizing scorn. For a press of the Echo's reputation to be printing a silly High School publication had never ceased to be an absurdity in his eyes. He had regarded the first issues with derision. Then slowly his disdain had melted into astonishment, respect, admiration. There evidently was a spirit in Burmingham of which he had never suspected the existence,—an intelligence, an open-mindedness, a searching after truth. Hitherto the subscribers to any paper had been represented in his mind by a long list of names in purple ink, or else, by their money equivalent. Now, suddenly, these names became persons, voices, opinions. No one could take up the March Hare and not be conscious of a throbbing of hearts. It sounded through every page—that beating of hearts—fathers, mothers, girls, boys speaking with simple sincerity of the things they held dearest in their lives.

Why, it was a miracle, this living flesh and blood that glowed so warmly and sympathetically through the dead mediums of paper and ink!

How had the enchantment been wrought? the magnate asked himself. To be sure, he had never tried through the columns of the Echo to get into actual touch with those into whose homes his paper traveled. He had never cared who they were, what they thought, or how they lived. The problems puzzling their brains were nothing to him. But he now owned with characteristic honesty that had he cared to obtain from them this free expression of opinion and learn the reactions their minds were constantly reflecting, he would have been at a loss as to how to proceed.

Yet here, through the instrumentality of a mere boy, a boy the age of his own son, the elusive result had been accomplished!

Where lay the magic?

The March Hare was not a paper that could speak with authority on any subject, nor was it a magazine of distinct literary merit. On the contrary it naively confessed that it was young and did not know. It explained with frankness that it had not the wisdom to speak; that instead it merely echoed the thought of its readers.

It was this "echoing idea" that was new to Mr. Arthur Presby Carter. He had always spoken. To listen to the opinions of others he had considered tiresome. Very few persons had opinions that were worth listening to.

Nevertheless, after dissecting the reasons for the March Hare's popularity, and lopping off the minor elements of its uniqueness and wide appeal, the elder man faced the real psychological secret of the junior paper's success: it listened and did not talk; it was a dialogue instead of a monologue,—an exact reversal of his policy.

Moreover, this dialogue, contrary to his previous beliefs, presented amazingly interesting opinions. Here were the past and the present generation arguing on the policy of the new America,—what its government, its statesmanship, its ideals should be. The Past was rich in advice, experience; the Present in hope, faith, courage. Youth, the citizen of to-morrow, had a thousand theories for righting the nation's faults; and some of these theories were not wholly visionary.

Did his paper, Mr. Carter wondered, call out in the hearts and minds of those who read it a similar response of patriotism and high ideals? Did it reach the great human best that lies deep in every individual? Alas, he feared it did not. It was too autocratic. It aimed not to stimulate but to silence discussion and it probably did so, descending upon its audience with a confident finality that admitted of no argument.

The March Hare, on the other hand, was apologetically modest. Nobody quailed before it. Even the least of the intellectuals feared not to lift up his voice in its presence and demand a hearing.

Such a novel and rare product was worth perpetuating. From a money standpoint alone the paper might become in time a paying investment. It was, of course, a bit crude at present; but the kernel was there; so, too, was the long list of subscribers,—an asset to which he was not blind.

Suppose he was to buy out this schoolboy enterprise at the end of the year and take it into his own hands? Might it not be nursed into a publication that would have a lasting place in the community and become a property of value?

He would improve it—that would go without saying—touch it up and polish it; doubtless he would think best to revise some of its departments; and—well, he would probably change its name and its cover design. He could not continue to perpetuate such an absurdity as that title. Perhaps he would christen it the Burmingham Monthly.

The notion of purchasing the amateur product appealed to his sense of humor. The more he thought of it, the stronger became his desire to own the paper. Strange he had never before considered publishing a monthly magazine. Yes, he would get out the few remaining issues of the March Hare under its present name and then he would buy out the whole thing for a small sum and take it over. The boys would undoubtedly be glad enough to sell it, flattered to have the chance, no doubt. A check that would provide the editorial staff with some hockey sticks or tennis shoes would without question satisfy them. What use would they have for a paper after they graduated?

Thus reasoned Mr. Arthur Presby Carter to himself in the solitude and silence of his editorial sanctum. And after he had disposed of the matter to his entire satisfaction, he took up a letter from his desk and decided with the same deliberation to purchase also certain oil properties in Pennsylvania. For Mr. Arthur Presby Carter was a man of broad financial interests and a large bank account. The Echo was only one of his many business enterprises, and buying March Hares or oil wells was all one to him, a means of adding more dollars to his accumulating hoard.



CHAPTER XI

TEMPTATION ASSAILS PAUL

While Mr. Carter sat in his editorial office and thus reflected on his many business ventures Paul Cameron was also sitting in his editorial domain thinking intently.

The hundred-dollar deficit in the school treasury bothered him more than he was willing to admit. It was, of course, quite possible for him to repair the error—for he was convinced an error in the March Hare's bookkeeping had caused the shortage. A bill of a hundred dollars must have been paid and not recorded. Melville Carter had never had actual experience in keeping accounts, therefore was it so surprising that he had inadvertently made a mistake? Perhaps he was not so capable of handling money and keeping it straight as the class had thought when they had elected him to his post of business manager. Paying bills and rigorously noting down every expenditure was no easy task. It was a thankless job, anyway—the least interesting of any of the positions on the paper, and one that entailed more work than most. To kick at Mel would be rank ingratitude. It was not likely he had made a mess of things wittingly. Therefore the only alternative, since neither Mel's pride nor his own would permit them to confess to the muddle, was to pay the outstanding bill and slip the rest of the cash as quietly as possible into the bank.

How strange it was that the sum lacking was just an even hundred dollars! Yet after all, was it so strange? It was so easy to make a mistake of one figure in adding and subtracting columns. There did not, it was true, seem to be any mistake on the books; but of course there was a mistake somewhere. It was not at all likely that the bank had made the error. Banks never made mistakes. Well, there was no use crying over spilled milk. The success of the March Hare had been so phenomenal hitherto that one must put up with a strata of ill luck.

He hated to give up buying his typewriter, after all the hard work he had done to earn it. He supposed he could sell his Liberty Bond as Melville was planning to do and use that money instead of the sum he had laid by. But he did not just know how to go to work to convert a Liberty Bond into cash. It was an easy enough matter to buy a bond; but where did you go to sell one? How many business questions there were that a boy of seventeen was unable to answer! If he were to ask his father how to sell the bond, it might arouse suspicion, to ask anybody else might do so too. People would wonder why he, Paul Cameron, was selling a Liberty Bond he had bought only a short time before. Burmingham was a gossipy little town. Its good news traveled fast but so also did its bad news. Any item of interest, no matter how small, was rapidly spread from one end of the village to the other. Therefore Paul could not risk even making inquiries, let alone selling his property to any one in the place.

Yet he could not but laugh at the irony of the signs that confronted him wherever he went: Buy Bonds! Invest! There were selling booths at the bank, the library, the town hall. At every street corner you came upon them. But none of these agencies were purchasing bonds themselves. Nowhere did it say: Sell Bonds! These patriots were not at their posts to add to their troubles—not they!

Once it occurred to Paul to ask the cashier at the bank what people did with Liberty Bonds which they wanted to dispose of; but on second thought he realized that Mr. Stacy was an intimate friend of his father's and might mention the incident. Therefore he at length dismissed the possibility of selling his bond and thereby meeting his share of the March Hare deficit.

No, he must use his typewriter money. There was no escape. He chanced to be at the Echo offices that day with copy for the next issue of his paper and was still rebelliously wavering over the loss of his typewriter when the door of Mr. Carter's private room opened and the great man himself appeared, ushering out a visitor. Glancing about on his return from the elevator his eye fell on Paul.

"Ah, Paul, good afternoon," he nodded. "Come into my office a moment. I want to speak to you."

Paul followed timidly. It was seldom that his business brought him into personal touch with Mr. Carter, toward whom he still maintained no small degree of awe; usually the affairs relative to the school paper were transacted either through the business manager of the Echo or with one of his assistants.

But to-day Mr. Carter was suddenly all amiability. He escorted Paul into his sanctum, and after closing the door, tipped back in the leather chair before his desk and in leisurely fashion drew out a cigar.

"How is your paper coming on, Paul?" he asked, as he blew a cloud of smoke into the room and surveyed the boy through its blueness.

"Very well, Mr. Carter."

"Austin, our manager, tells me your circulation is increasing."

"Yes, sir. It's gone up steadily from the first."

"Humph!" mused Mr. Carter. "Funny thing, isn't it? It was quite a clever move of yours to set the parents to writing. Everybody likes to see himself in print; we're a vain lot of creatures. Of course, the minute you published their articles they bought them. Could not resist it!"

The lad laughed. Although he did not wholly agree with the editor it did not seem necessary to tell him so.

"I guess you've found your enterprise a good deal of work," went on Carter.

"Well, yes. It has taken more time than I expected," Paul admitted.

"You'll be glad to get rid of it when you graduate in June."

The man studied the boy furtively.

"Yes, I shall. It has been great fun; but it has been a good deal of care."

"You're going to Harvard, I hear."

"Yes, sir. Harvard was Dad's college, and it's going to be mine."

"I haven't much use for colleges," growled Mr. Carter. "They turn out nothing but a grist of extravagant snobs. I never went to college myself and I have contrived to pull along and make my pile, thanks to nobody. I've a big half mind to have Melville do the same. But his mother wants him to go, and I suppose I shall have to give in and let him. It will be interesting to see what he gets out of it."

Paul did not answer. He did not just know what reply to make.

"So you're set on college."

"Yes, sir, I am."

"What's your idea?"

"To know something."

The man's thin lips curled into a smile.

"And you expect to acquire that result at Harvard?"

"I hope so."

"Well, you may," remarked Mr. Carter, with a sceptical shrug of his shoulders, "but I doubt it. You will probably fritter away your time and your father's money in boat-racing, football, and fraternity dramatics; that is what it usually amounts to."

"It has got to amount to more than that with me," Paul declared soberly.

"Why?"

"Because Dad is not rich, and hasn't the money to throw away."

A silence fell upon the room.

"I should think that under those circumstances you would do much better to cut out a frilly education and go to work after you finish your high school course," observed the magnate deliberately. "Suppose I were to make you a good business offer? Suppose I were to take over that school paper of yours at the end of June—"

"What!"

"Wait a moment. Then suppose I took you in here at a good salary and let you keep on with this March Hare job? Not, of course, in precisely its present form but along the same general lines. We could make a paying proposition out of that paper, I am sure of it. It would need a good deal of improving," continued the great man in a pompous, patronizing tone, "but there is an idea there that could be developed into something worth while, unless I am very much mistaken."

"B—u—t—" stammered Paul and then stopped helplessly.

"The thing is not worth much as it now stands," went on Mr. Carter, puffing rings of smoke airily toward the ceiling, "but in time we could remodel it into a publication of real merit—make a winner of it."

Paul did not speak.

"How do you like newspaper work?" inquired Mr. Carter, shifting the subject adroitly.

"Very much—the little I've seen of it."

"If you were to come in here you might work up to a place on the Echo."

The boy started.

"You're a bright chap and I like you. I'd see you had a chance if you made good."

"You're very kind, sir, but—"

"Well, out with it! What's the matter?"

"It would knock my college career all—"

"Faugh! College career! Why, here is a career worth ten of it—the chance of a lifetime. I wouldn't offer it to every boy. In fact, I wouldn't offer it to any other boy I know of—not to my own son."

"It's very good of you, Mr. Carter."

"See here, youngster," said Mr. Carter, leaning toward Paul impressively, "when you are as old as I am you will learn that you've got to take opportunities when they come to you. The same one never comes twice. You don't want to turn down a thing of this sort until you've considered it from all sides. Think what it would mean to remodel that paper of yours with plenty of money behind you and put it on a footing with other professional magazines. That would be a feather in your cap! I could buy the March Hare in—"

"I'm not sure you could, Mr. Carter," replied Paul slowly. "The staff might not want to sell it."

"What!"

The tone was incredulous with surprise.

"I don't know that we fellows would feel that we had the moral right to sell out," explained Paul quietly. "You see, although we have built up the paper it belongs to a certain extent to the school."

"Nonsense!" cut in Mr. Carter impatiently. "That's absurd! The publication was your idea, wasn't it?"

"Yes, at the beginning it was; but—"

"They wouldn't have had it but for you, would they?"

"I don't know; perhaps not," confessed the boy reluctantly.

"It was your project," insisted Carter.

"Yes."

"Then nobody has any right to claim it."

"Maybe not the right to really claim it. But all of us boys have slaved together to make it a success. It is as much their work as mine."

"What do they intend to do with it?"

"Pass it on to the school, I suppose. We haven't talked it over, though. We haven't got that far yet."

"Well, all I can say is that if you handed it over to the school free of charge you would be darn stupid. Why not make some money out of it? Offer to sell it to the school if you think you must; but don't give it away."

Paul shook his head dubiously.

"The school couldn't buy it. They've nothing to buy it with."

"Then you have a perfect right to sell it to somebody else," put in Mr. Carter quickly. "In the world of business, people cannot expect to get something for nothing. What you can't pay for you can't have. If the school has no money—" he broke off with a significant gesture. "Now if I offered you fellows a lump sum in June—a sum you could divide amongst you as you saw fit—wouldn't that be a perfectly fair and legitimate business deal?"

"I—I—" faltered Paul.

"Wouldn't it?" Mr. Carter persisted.

"I suppose so," murmured Paul unwillingly. "Only, you see, I still feel that the paper should go to the school. I think the other fellows would feel so too."

Nettled Mr. Carter rose and strode irritably across the room and back. Then he came to a standstill before Paul's chair and looked down with steely eyes into the lad's troubled face.

"But you admitted just now that you and the staff had made the paper what it is, didn't you?"

"Yes."

"Then it belongs to you, doesn't it?"

"In a certain sense; yes."

"Now see here, Paul," began Mr. Carter. "You are the editor-in-chief of that magazine, and the head of the bunch. What you say would go with them—or it ought to. You could make them think about what you pleased. Why don't you put it up to your staff to sell the paper to me and pocket the proceeds?"

"Because I don't think—"

"I guess you could manage to think as I wanted you to if it were worth your while, couldn't you?" smiled the great man insinuatingly.

"I don't quite—"

"Turn it over in your mind. It is a straight business proposition. You land your March Hare here in my office as my property at the end of June, and I will make it worth your while. Understand?" The great man eyed the lad keenly.

"Not fully, I'm afraid."

"But you would before I got through with you," chuckled Mr. Carter, rising.

Paul rose too. He was very glad to have the interview finished.

"We'll talk no more about this matter to-day," declared the editor lightly. "You think over carefully what I've said and come and see me again sometime."

"All right, sir."

Paul moved awkwardly toward the door. He wanted to add some word to conceal how worried, angry, and upset he really was, but he could think of nothing to say. It was ignominious to pass out of the room as if he were a whipped puppy. Men always terminated their business talks pleasantly, no matter how vexed they were with one another underneath.

He must show Mr. Carter that he also could close an interview in true man's fashion. His hand was on the knob of the door now; but he turned.

"Oh, by the way, Mr. Carter," he said with an off-hand air, "do you know where a person goes to sell a Liberty Bond?"

It was the only topic of conversation he could think of.

"Sell one?"

"Yes, sir." The boy blushed.

"In need of cash?"

"I—yes; I'm thinking of getting rid of a fifty-dollar bond I have."

"That's foolish. You'd much better keep it."

Paul shook his head with sudden resolve.

"I think if I can get rid of it without too much red tape, I'll let it go."

"Want the money badly, eh?"

"Y—e—s."

"Your father know you are selling out?"

"No, sir."

The boy began to regret that he had spoken.

"Oh—ho! So you're in a scrape, eh?"

"No, it's not a scrape," protested Paul. "At least, not what you'd commonly call a scrape. It is just that—"

"That you do not want to tell your father."

"Not now."

Mr. Carter winked.

"I see," he said.

He went to a drawer in his desk and innocently Paul watched his movements, wondering what he was going to do. Give him an address where he could sell his bond, no doubt.

Instead Mr. Carter slipped a crisp bill from a roll in the drawer and held it toward him.



"I'll advance you fifty dollars on your bond," he said, "and no questions asked. I was a boy once myself."

"But I can't take your money, Mr. Carter," gasped Paul, trying to hand the crackling bit of paper back again.

"Pooh, pooh! Nonsense!" the man ejaculated, waving him off. "Call it a loan if you prefer. A loan with a bond for security is quite an ordinary business matter. It is only a trifle, anyway."

"But—"

"Run along! I have no more time to give to you. I have a directors' meeting at four. Ah, here's Mr. Dalton now. How are you, Dalton. Run along, youngster. Take the cash with you and welcome." Then he added in an undertone: "Just use your influence with your chums up at school, and we will say no more about this little loan. If you land the March Hare in my hands the deal will be worth the fifty to me. Good night."



CHAPTER XII

TEMPORIZING

It was not until Paul was on his way home that the full significance of Mr. Carter's action dawned upon him. He, Paul Cameron, had been bribed! He had taken from the magnate of Burmingham a sum of money in return for which he had tacitly pledged himself to use his influence to carry through a business deal which he held to be wrong, and with which he had no sympathy. To be sure, he had not done this monstrous deed voluntarily. Mr. Carter had thrust it upon him. He had been put in a difficult position and had failed to act. It was his passivity for which he now blamed himself. He should have repudiated the whole thing, hurled the odious money upon Carter's desk—since the man refused to take it back—and fled from the place. The fact that Mr. Carter had given him no opportunity to discuss the matter or refuse his offer was no excuse. He should have made the opportunity himself.

The only apology he could offer for his conduct was that he was completely stunned by the happenings of the afternoon. The drama had moved too swiftly for him. Until it was over, he had not sensed its trend. Was he really so much to blame?

Nevertheless, twist and excuse the fact as he would, the truth remained that there he was with the hateful fifty-dollar bill in his possession.

It was appalling, terrible! He, who had always prided himself on his honesty! He had not had the least notion of precipitating such a crisis when he had inquired about selling his Liberty Bond. The query had been a purely innocent one. He had to say something, and the chance of getting information from Mr. Carter had seemed too opportune to let slip. But as he reviewed the episode of the past half hour, he saw that Mr. Carter was perfectly justified in misunderstanding him and thinking that he laid himself open to the very situation that had come about.

Paul fingered the bill nervously. Fifty dollars! If he chose to use it to meet the deficit on the school paper he could now take his own savings for the new typewriter he wanted so much. Who would be the wiser? Had not Mr. Carter given him the money? It was his, his own property.

To forfeit that typewriter had been a wrench. He had not dared to admit to himself how bitter had been his disappointment at giving it up. It would be a long time before he could ever again earn enough money to buy a machine. And he needed it so much—needed it right away. Suppose he did buy a typewriter next year? A dozen typewriters would never mean to him what one would mean just now. Until he had made up his mind to do without it, it had seemed an indispensable possession, and now the necessity of having it came back again with redoubled force. He reflected on the machine's myriad advantages. Wasn't it almost imperative that he buy one? Wasn't such a thing for the welfare of the school? Surely it would not be a selfish action if he expended his money for the good of others.

Suppose he were to urge the fellows to sell out the March Hare to Carter? After all, they were their own masters. They need not do so unless they chose. He had no authority over them. To advise was a very different thing from commanding. No matter what measure he advocated, his opinion was neither final nor mandatory. He was no autocrat or imperator before whose decree his subjects trembled. It would be absurd to credit himself with such power.

And, anyway, the editorial board had never promised to bequeath the March Hare to the school. If parents, teachers, pupils, the general public had assumed this, they had had no right to do so. The paper, as Mr. Carter had said, was the property of those who had created it. Were they not free to dispose of it as they chose?

Yet all the while he argued thus, Paul knew, deep down in his soul, that although there had been no written or verbal agreement, the community considered the publication a permanent school property.

Should it be sold to Mr. Carter and continue to be published, what chances for success would another such paper have? It would be useless for 1921 to attempt to duplicate the March Hare. People were familiar with it; they knew and liked it. In all probability a great portion of its regular subscribers would continue to take the magazine, regardless of who published it. That it had ceased to be a school enterprise would not influence them. They liked it for what it was, not as a philanthropy. Probably, too, with Mr. Carter behind it, the March Hare would branch out and be made much more attractive. If the Echo press took up the publication of such a monthly, it would, of course, be with the intention of sweeping all other competitors out of the field. It would sweep them out, too. Mr. Carter would see to that. By fair means or foul he had always accomplished that which he willed to do.

Another school paper running in opposition to such a power? Why, it would not have the ghost of a chance to live! Besides, who would print it? No, if Mr. Carter took over the March Hare, the school must say good-by to further literary attempts.

But after all, was that his lookout? What concern of his would it be what became of Burmingham and 1921. They could struggle on as best they might. That was what his class had had to do.

Paul walked home very slowly, turning Mr. Carter's bill in his hand as he went. How delicate its workmanship! How wonderful its dainty tracery! He had never before noticed the accuracy with which a bill was fashioned.

"Who prints United States money, Dad?" he asked quite irrelevantly of his father, when next he saw him.

"Our United States greenbacks? Those are engraved and printed, my son, at the United States Bureau of Engraving and Printing at Washington. They are made from very fine and exquisitely prepared plates and printed on a special sort of paper. This paper has numberless little silk threads running through it which not only toughen it and prevent it from tearing but also make it almost impossible to duplicate. A counterfeiter would have to go to a deal of trouble to imitate such material."

Paul nodded. He had noticed the blue threads in his fifty-dollar bill. In fact, there was not much about it that he had not noticed while twisting and turning it in his fingers.

"Yes," continued his father, "our paper money and government notes are fine examples of accurate and perfect workmanship. I suppose, as they pass through our hands, we seldom consider the labor that goes into making them. From the time the designer begins his work to the moment the plates are made, tried out, and accepted, many, many hours of toil are consumed. You know, of course, that our government runs a very extensive printing plant where it uses tons of paper every year. There is no end to the government printing. The Congressional Records must be printed and filed, as must also thousands of reports from various boards and committees. Then there is stationery for official use; official documents of all sorts; catalogues; cards for government business."

"I never thought of that."

"Yes, indeed. Uncle Sam runs quite a jobbing office, all the details of which must be carefully systematized, too. Great care is taken that the spelling abbreviations and such details shall be uniform on all government documents. You can readily see how necessary it is that they should be. Therefore the government issues a manual for the use of its employees, a list of punctuation and capitalization marks and rules, as well as printers' marks which shall serve as a standard and must be conformed to for all government purposes."

"That is interesting, isn't it?" murmured Paul.

"You can readily understand that in preparing government reports and such things for the press a uniform abbreviation for the States, for example, must be used. It would be out of the question to have one person abbreviating Alabama one way and another person another. It would not only result in a slipshod lot of documents but the variation might mislead those who read it. In all such documents every detail must be the same. Moreover, often employees are far from being expert in such matters and a book to which they can refer is a great help to them. In addition, it settles all disputes arising between the clerks who make up the reports and the printers who print them; and it saves the time and labor of correcting errors."

"I see."

"Not only does the government printing office do a vast amount of printing for the use of the Washington authorities but it does a great deal of work for the country at large. Think, for instance, of the care and accuracy that goes into making out the United States census."

"Not only care but paper and ink," laughed Paul.

"All such tabulated documents consume quantities of paper," answered his father. "Directories, telephone books, circulars, and advertising matter in general demand tons and tons of paper every year, and the printing of them provides employment for hundreds of printers. As time goes on, more and more business is annually transacted by mail. The country is so tremendous and the expense of sending out salesmen to cover it so great that merchants now do much of their selling from mail-order catalogues. Many of these books are very attractive, too. A careful reproduction of the object for sale is made and the photograph sent broadcast to speak for itself. Jewelry firms issue tempting lists of their wares; china and glass dealers try to secure buyers by offering alluring pages of pictures, many of them in color; dry goods houses send out photographs of suits, hats, and clothing of all sorts. You have seen scores of such books and know how they are indexed and priced. In fact, there are commercial firms whose mail-order department is a business in itself, catalogues entirely supplanting salesmen. It is a much cheaper, wider-reaching means of selling, and often the results are quite as good as are the more old-fashioned methods. Now that artistic cuts can be reproduced with comparatively little expense this means of advertising is becoming more and more popular. Many charities annually make their appeal for funds by leaflet or card; stocks are offered to customers; your patronage to theaters, entertainments, and hotels is thus solicited. The combination of low postage rates and wide mail distribution is accountable for an almost overwhelming amount of printed business being transacted. Then, too, the mail is a great time-saver, or should be, an advantage to be considered in our busy, work-a-day world."

"But people don't read half the stuff they get through the mails," said Paul.

"No, of course not. If they did, they would do little else," smiled his father. "Nevertheless, they glance at it and now and then, as their eye travels over it, an item on the page catches their fancy. Any artistic advertisement will usually command attention; so will the receipt of some trifling article that is pretty or novel. Besides, it is chiefly the rushed city person who tosses the advertisement away unread. Those with more leisure, country people, perhaps, who receive little mail, usually read every word of the printed matter that reaches them. They do not have so many diversions as we do, and this printed stuff entertains them and keeps them in touch with the cities. Therefore they generally go over what is sent them quite carefully. Frequently they are miles from large shops and are forced to do much of their purchasing by mail, so such catalogues are a great convenience to them."

"I can see that," Paul admitted.

"Yes, indeed. Catalogues to those living in sparsely settled districts are a profound blessing. I should not be surprised to see the paper, ink, and printing business one of our largest industries. We cannot do without any of these commodities. Have you thought, for example, of the amount of material and labor that goes into producing the millions of thick telephone directories annually circulated among the subscribers? All these have to be printed somewhere."

"It must be an awful piece of work to get them out, Dad."

"It is. They must be printed absolutely correctly too, for an error will cause both the exchange and the subscriber no end of trouble. So it is with residence directories and many similar lists. If you consider, you can readily see that as a nation we consume an unbelievable amount of paper and ink in a year. That is why the shortage of these materials during the war caused such universal inconvenience. And not only do we demand a great deal of paper, and ink, and printer's skill in every department of our business, but being a country alert for education, we annually use a tremendous number of schoolbooks. Hundreds, thousands, millions of schoolbooks are printed each year for the purpose of educating and democratizing our growing citizens."

Paul stirred in his chair uneasily. The talk had drifted back into the familiar channels of the present. Again the school, Mr. Carter, the fifty-dollar bill, and the thoughts that for the instant had taken flight now returned to his mind, bringing a cloud to his face.

His father, noticing the shadow, looked kindly into the boy's eyes.

"You are tired to-night, son," he said.

"A little."

"Not working too hard?"

"No, sir. I don't think so."

"Everything going all right at school?"

"Yes."

"Paper still booming?"

"Yes, Dad. Going finely."

"I am glad to hear that."

Mr. Cameron waited a second. A wild impulse to take his father into his confidence seized Paul. He hesitated. Then it was too late. His father rose and with a friendly touch on his shoulder strode across the hall and into his den.

"You must not overwork at your editorial desk, my boy," he called jocosely from the distant threshold. "It doesn't pay."

Paul heard the door slam. The moment for confession had passed. His father had gone and he was alone with his conscience and Mr. Carter's fifty-dollar bill.



CHAPTER XIII

THE CAMERONS HAVE A VISITOR

During the next week Paul was obliged to go several times to the Echo offices and each time he went with the secret hope that he would see Mr. Carter and have the opportunity to hand back to him the hateful money that burned in his breast pocket. The chance, however, never came. The door of the great man's private room was continually closed and when the boy suggested to the clerk that he wait and talk with the publisher, he was told that Mr. Carter was engaged and could see no one that day. The thought of mailing the money occurred to Paul, but as this method of returning it seemed precarious and uncertain, he promptly abandoned the idea. For the same reason he was unwilling to leave the bill in a sealed envelope to be delivered to the editor-in-chief by one of the employees. Should a sum so immense, at least so immense in the lad's estimation, be lost, he never could replace it. Certainly he was in trouble enough already without chancing another dilemma.

In the meantime he carried the bill around with him, trying in the interval to decide what to do with it. Gradually he became accustomed to having the money in his possession. It did not seem so strange a thing now as it had in the beginning. After all, fifty dollars was not such a vast sum. To a person of Mr. Carter's wealth it probably was nothing at all, an amount too trifling to cause a second thought. Besides, he had not really bound himself to Mr. Carter. He had not actually guaranteed to do anything. It was Mr. Carter who had insisted that he take the money.