There is a half-promise about this reply which too often produces a false satisfaction in the breast of a beginner. With such a one it is the second interview which is to be dreaded. But my friend Mr. Molloy was not new to the work, and was aware that if possible he should make further use of the occasion which he had earned for himself at so considerable a cost. “Ye’ll read it;—will ye?” he said.
“Oh, certainly. We’ll read it certainly.”
“And ye’ll use it if ye can?”
“As to that, Mr. Molloy, we can say nothing. We’ve got to look solely to the interest of the periodical.”
“And, sure, what can ye do better for the periodical than print a paper like that, which there is not a lady at the West End of the town won’t be certain to read?”
“At any rate we’ll look at it, Mr. Molloy,” said we, standing up from our chair.
But still he hesitated in his going—and did not go. “I’m a married man, Mr. ⸻,” he said. We simply bowed our head at the announcement. “I wish you could see Mrs. Molloy,” he added. We murmured something as to the pleasure it would give us to make the acquaintance of so estimable a lady. “There isn’t a betther woman than herself this side of heaven, though I say it that oughtn’t,” said he. “And we’ve three young ones.” We knew the argument that was coming;—knew it so well, and yet were so unable to accept it as any argument! “Sit down one moment, Mr. ⸻,” he continued, “till I tell you a short story.” We pleaded our engagements, averring that they were peculiarly heavy at that moment. “Sure, and we know what that manes,” said Mr. Molloy. “It’s just—walk out of this as quick as you came in. It’s that what it manes.” And yet as he spoke there was a twinkle of humour in his eye that was almost irresistible; and we ourselves—we could not forbear to smile. When we smiled we knew that we were lost. “Come, now, Mr. Editor; when you think how much it cost me to get the inthroduction, you’ll listen to me for five minutes anyway.”
“We will listen to you,” we said, resuming our chair—remembering as we did so the three-and-sixpence, the two cigars, the to kalon, the line from Pope, and the half line from Horace. The man had taken much trouble with the view of placing himself where he now was. When we had been all but naked together I had taken him to be the superior of the two, and what were we that we should refuse him an interview simply because he had wares to sell which we should only be too willing to buy at his price if they were fit for our use?
Then he told his tale. As for Paris, Constantinople, and New York, he frankly admitted that he knew nothing of those capitals. When we reminded him, with some ill-nature as we thought afterwards, that he had assumed an intimacy with the current literature of the three cities, he told us that such remarks were “just the sparkling gims of conversation in which a man shouldn’t expect to find rale diamonds.” Of “Doblin” he knew every street, every lane, every newspaper, every editor; but the poverty, dependence, and general poorness of a provincial press had crushed him, and he had boldly resolved to try a fight in the “methropolis of litherature.” He referred us to the managers of the “Boyne Bouncer,” the “Clontarf Chronicle,” the “Donnybrook Debater,” and the “Echoes of Erin,” assuring us that we should find him to be as well esteemed as known in the offices of those widely-circulated publications. His reading he told us was unbounded, and the pen was as ready to his hand as is the plough to the hand of the husbandman. Did we not think it a noble ambition in him thus to throw himself into the great “areanay,” as he called it, and try his fortune in the “methropolis of litherature?” He paused for a reply, and we were driven to acknowledge that whatever might be said of our friend’s prudence, his courage was undoubted. “I’ve got it here,” said he. “I’ve got it all here.” And he touched his right breast with the fingers of his left hand, which still wore the tattered glove.
He had succeeded in moving us. “Mr. Molloy,” we said, “we’ll read your paper, and we’ll then do the best we can for you. We must tell you fairly that we hardly like your subject, but if the writing be good you can try your hand at something else.”
“Sure there’s nothing under the sun I won’t write about at your bidding.”
“If we can be of service to you, Mr. Molloy, we will.” Then the editor broke down, and the man spoke to the man. “I need not tell you, Mr. Molloy, that the heart of one man of letters always warms to another.”
“It was because I knew ye was of that sort that I followed ye in yonder,” he said, with a tear in his eye.
The butter-boat of benevolence was in our hand, and we proceeded to pour out its contents freely. It is a vessel which an editor should lock up carefully; and, should he lose the key, he will not be the worse for the loss. We need not repeat here all the pretty things that we said to him, explaining to him from a full heart with how much agony we were often compelled to resist the entreaties of literary suppliants, declaring to him how we had longed to publish tons of manuscript—simply in order that we might give pleasure to those who brought them to us. We told him how accessible we were to a woman’s tear, to a man’s struggle, to a girl’s face, and assured him of the daily wounds
