“No, no, no! I cannot do anything of the sort. You cannot see him,” and once again I was shunted briskly forth. I recall being sent one evening to attend a great public ball of some kind—The Veiled Prophets—which was held in the general selling-room of the stock exchange at Third and Walnut, and which followed as a rule some huge autumnal parade. The city editor sent me for a general view or introduction or pen picture to be used as a lead to the full story, which was to be done by others piecemeal. For this occasion I was ordered to hire a dress-suit (the first I had ever worn), which cost the paper three dollars. I remember being greatly disturbed by my appearance once I got in it and feeling very queer and conspicuous. I was greatly troubled as to what sort of impression my garb would make on the various members of the staff. As to the latter I was not long in doubt. “Say, look at our friend in the claw-hammer, will you?” this from Hazard. “He looks like a real society man to me!” “Usher, you mean,” called Bellairs. “Who is he? I don’t seem to remember him.” “Those pants come darned near being a fit, don’t they?” this from some one who had laid hold of the side lines of the trousers. I could not make up my mind whether I wanted to fight or laugh or whether I was startlingly handsome or a howling freak. But the thing that weighed on me most was the luxury, tawdry enough perhaps to those intimately connected with it, which this ball presented, contrasted with my own ignoble state. After spending three hours there bustling about examining flowers, decorations, getting names, details of costumes, and drinking various drinks with officiating floormasters whose sole duty appeared to be to look after the press and see that they got all details straight, I returned to the office and began to pour forth a glowing account of how beautiful it all was, how gorgeous, how perfect the women, how marvelous their costumes, how gracious and graceful the men, how oriental or occidental or Arabic, I forget which, were the decorations, outdoing the Arabian Nights or the fabled splendors of the Caliphate. Who does not recognize this indiscriminate newspaper tosh, poured forth from one end of America to another for everything from a farmers’ reunion or an I. O. O. F. Ladies’ Day to an Astor or a Vanderbilt wedding?