Constantly the thought would intrude itself, "why can't I get something to do during the hours I am free from the office and don't want to sleep?" My fellow-clerks, with but very few exceptions, had outside employment, but this was usually literary, and for that I felt I had neither aptitude nor training. Mechanical bent I felt sure I had none, for I could hardly drive a nail or put a screw in without spoiling the head. In short, I felt that I was a drug in the market, a passable seaman perhaps, but I had thrown that employment behind me for ever, and now I was a very mediocre _junior_ clerk, getting on into middle age and being reminded of my deficiencies--which, alas, I knew only too well--every day by my superiors. Since these are confessions, shall I be blamed for saying that I prayed for extra work? Well, anyhow I did; prayed as fervently as some people do at certain crises for forgiveness of sin. You all know that I was what is called very religious, that is to say, I lived an exceedingly narrow life, looking upon all amusements as snares of the devil, and consoled myself continually, for the loss of all that my fellows seemed to prize in this world, by the thought of the glories of immortality. Happily, I did not condemn all who differed from me in my theological concepts to an eternity of unmentionable agony, because although this was insisted upon as a cardinal item in their belief by the people with whom I associated, my heart or brain or feelings--or my thinking gear--simply would not let me do so. In fact, I felt that such an idea of the God I believed in was blasphemy. And my freely expressed opinions led to my being excommunicated in due form from several bodies of Christians with whom I worked. Yes, I did pray for some means of earning a little extra money, but at the same time I was acutely conscious of my lack of ability to do anything that employers of overtime men had any use for. Anything in the way of manual labour was of course out of the question, while as to canvassing! With shame I confess that I did try one or two of the specious advertisements in the daily papers, which promise so much and perform so little. But I speedily found that at soliciting custom from door to door I should starve. I was too sensitive. So far from realising the ideal of never taking no for an answer, which was always held up to me, a glum look, or a door slammed in my face, was enough to put me off my business for a whole evening. I realised then, as I had never done before, the terrible truth of Longfellow's lines, long as they had been graven in my heart-- "Who amid their wants and woes, Hear the sound of doors that close, And of feet that pass them by. Grown familiar with disfavour, Grown familiar with the savour Of the bread by which men die!" "The Legend Beautiful."