Mr. Samboye said some of the most remarkable things, at once humorous and highly original, and put in an elaborate frame of big unusual words. He was a huge man in frame, with an enormous head, bushy eyebrows, heavy whiskers, a ponderous manner, a tremendous voice--in fact seemed to Seth precisely the kind of man from whom delicate wit, and soft shading of phrases were not to be expected. He happened for the nonce to be in a complaisant mood, and was relaxing himself in the company of “his young men,” as he liked to call his colleagues. But ordinarily he was overbearing and arbitrary, and this had rankled so deeply in their minds that they listened with apathy, unresponsive, to his choicest sallies, and Watts even combated him, with scant courtesy it seemed to Seth. To him this monologue of the Editor’s was a revelation. He had never heard such brilliant talk, such a wonderful mastery of words, such delicious humor. He drank it all in eagerly, and laughed aloud at its broader points--the more heartily, perhaps, because no one else smiled. This display of appreciation bore fruit after its kind. Before Mr. Samboye went he spoke some decidedly gracious words to Seth, saying among other things: “However harshly we may be tempted by momentary stress of emotion to speak, always remember that we unitedly feel your fresh bucolic interest in things, your virginal capacity for admiration, and your pristine flush of enthusiasm for your work to be distinct acquisitions to the paper,” which Seth felt to be somewhat nonsensical, but still was grateful for. After Mr. Samboye had gone, Tom Watts took occasion to warn him in an aside: “Be careful how you appear to curry favor with Samboye before the other fellows. Oh, I know you didn’t think of it--but don’t laugh at his jokes. They’ll think you’re trying to climb over them, and they’ll be unpleasant to you, perhaps.” CHAPTER XIII.--THIRTEEN MONTHS OF IT. GROWING familiarity with his work did not restore to Seth the lofty conceptions of journalism’s duties and delights which he had nourished on the hill-side farm, and which had been so ingloriously dimmed and defaced by his first day’s experience.