"Seven years, my lord, have passed since I waited in your outward room, or was repulsed from your door, during which time I have been pushing on my work through difficulties, of which it is useless to complain, and have brought it at last to the verge of publication, without one act of assistance, one word of encouragement or one smile of favor. Such treatment I did not expect for I never had a patron before.... The notice which you have been pleased to take of my labor, had it been early, had been kind; but it has been delayed till I am indifferent, and cannot enjoy it; till I am solitary, and cannot impart it; till I am known, and do not want it.... I have long awakened from that dream of hope, in which I once boasted myself with so much exultation, my lord, "Your lordship's most humble, most obedient servant, "Sam Johnson." The lapse of a century has brought a change. Self-respecting, courageous young workers do not seek a patron to help them to fame. To-day they ask only to fight their own battles, win their own victories. III UNCOMPLAINING Nor do courageous workers complain when little things go wrong. "I don't know what I shall do if the mail does not come to-morrow. Think of being two days without a morning paper!" The complaint was heard when railway traffic had been tied up by washouts on the railway. The inconvenience suffered by the speaker seemed to him very great. Though there had been no other interruption to the many comforts and conveniences to which he had been accustomed, the single difficulty made him lose his temper and spoiled his day. When one is tempted to magnify such a small difficulty into a mountain it is worth while to look at things from the standpoint of a man whose life far from the centers of civilization makes him so independent of circumstances and surroundings that he can be cheerful even in the face of what seem like bitter privations. A company of travelers in the forests of Canada thought that the knowledge of the most recent news was necessary to happiness. They learned their mistake when they reached the camp of a man from whom they expected to learn news more recent than the events reported in the paper the day they left civilization, seven weeks before. They felt sure that, as he lived on the trail, he would have seen some traveler who had left the railroad since their own departure. When they asked him for late news from the States, he said he had some very recent news, and proceeded to tell of events eight months old! "Do you call that recent?" he was asked, in disgust. "What's the matter with that?" was the wondering reply. "It only happened last fall, and there ain't been nobody through here since." And he contentedly resumed the task at which he had been engaged when interrupted by the demand for "recent" news.