In a state of discouragement Jingles next visited Lloyds. There it was the same. What did he want? To become an underwriter! Well and good, let him deposit five thousand pounds and find a clerk at two hundred, with five per cent, on all transactions, till he had himself thoroughly mastered the system of underwriting. He could not afford this. He must be taken on as clerk. Where? At Lloyds, or at one of the Marine Insurance offices that has its base at Lloyds. What did he know of the work? The clerk has to go round with policies to be initialed, and when the books return to the office after four o’clock, he has to make them up. What did he understand about the value of cargoes and the risks run? There was no place for him in a Marine Insurance. Some one recommended him to try stockbroking. Like a greenhorn, as he was, Jingles made at once for the Exchange, and passing the porters, entered the House. The vast space was crowded. The din bewildered him. He heard names shouted from the telegraph offices, the call of porters, the voices of the stock-jobbers raised in dispute or argument. All at once an exclamation, “Seventeen hundred.”[1] Then ensued a gravitation towards himself, and in a moment his hat was knocked over his eyes, then he was thrust, elbowed, jostled from side to side. When he recovered his sight, his hat was snatched from his hand and flung across the House. Next, his umbrella was wrenched from him, and with it he was struck over the back. “You have no right in here, sir,” said a porter. “Don’t mind him,” shouted a dozen around. “We are heartily glad to make your acquaintance.” The horseplay was resumed, and as the young man’s blood rose, and he resented the treatment, and showed fight, he was still more roughly handled, and finally found himself kicked and hustled out of the Exchange. Giles Saltren stood on the step without, minus a hat and umbrella, and with his coat split down the back—his best coat put on to produce a good impression on employers—stood dazed and humbled, an object of derision to match-boys and flower-girls who danced about him, with words and antics of mockery. Presently an old white-haired stockbroker, who came out of the Exchange, noticed him, and stopped and spoke to him, and bade him not be angry. What had occurred was due to his having intruded where he had no right to be. Jingles answered that he had gone there because he was in quest of employment, whereupon he was told he might just as well have jumped into the Thames because he desired engagement on a penny steamer.