Gilbert had dedicated his life to the renascence of the drama and had written a couple of plays which, he admitted to his friends, had not got the right stuff in them. "I don't know enough yet," he said once to Henry, "but I'm learning...." His dramatic criticism was very pointed, and he speedily acquired a reputation among people who are interested in the theatre, as an acute but harsh critic, and already attempts had been made by theatrical managers either to bribe him or get him dismissed from his paper. The bribing process was quite delicately operated. One manager wrote to him, charmingly plaintive about his criticism, and invited him to put himself in the manager's place. "I assure you," he wrote, "I would willingly produce good work if I could get it, but I can't. Come and see me, and I'll show you a pile of plays that have arrived within the last fortnight. I know quite well, without reading them, that not one of them will be of the slightest worth!" And Gilbert had gone to see him, and had been received very charmingly and told how clever he was, and then the manager had offered to appoint him reader of plays at a pleasant fee!... Following that attempt at bribery came the anger of an actor-knight who declined to admit Gilbert to his theatre, a piece of petulance which delighted him. "The great big balloon," he said to his editor when he was told of what the actor-knight had said over the telephone. "My Lord, when I hear him spouting blank verse through his nose!..." "That's all very fine," the editor retorted ruefully, "but your criticism's doing us a lot of harm. Jefferson of the Torch Theatre cancelled his advertisement the day after your notice of his new play appeared!" "Ridiculous ass!" said Gilbert. "Well, if you say his play's the worst that's ever been put on any stage, what do you expect him to do? Fall on your neck and say, 'Bless you, brother!'? You might try to be kinder to them, Farlow, and do for the love of God remember the advertisement manager. If you could get the human note in your stuff!..." "The what?" "The human note. I'm a great believer in the human note." Gilbert left the office as quickly as he could and went home. He came into the dining-room where the others were already seated at their meal. "You're late again, Gilbert," said Roger. "Hand over your sixpence!" Roger, who was never late for anything, had instituted a system of fines for those who were late for meals. The fine for unpunctuality at dinner was sixpence. "I haven't got a tanner, damn it," Gilbert snapped, "and I'm looking for the human note. That's why I'm late. My heavenly father, I'm hungry! What is there?" "Sixpence for being late for dinner," said Roger quietly, "and tuppence for blasphemy!"