“A coffee-shop becomes a bit of a desert towards three o'clock; and, after a while, young Tidelman, for that was his name, got to putting down his book and chatting to me. His father was dead; which, judging from what he told me about the old man, must have been a bit of luck for everybody; and his mother, it turned out, had come from my own village in Suffolk; and that constituted a sort of bond between us, seeing I had known all her people pretty intimately. He was earning good money at a dairy, where his work was scouring milk-cans; and his Christian name--which was the only thing Christian about him, and that, somehow or another, didn't seem to fit him--was Joseph. “One afternoon he came into the shop looking as if he had lost a shilling and found sixpence, as the saying is; and instead of drinking water as usual, sent the girl out for a pint of ale. The moment it came he drank off half of it at a gulp, and then sat staring out of the window. “'What's up?' I says. 'Got the shove?' “'Yes,' he answers; 'but, as it happens, it's a shove up. I've been taken off the yard and put on the walk, with a rise of two bob a week.' Then he took another pull at the beer and looked more savage than ever. “'Well,' I says, 'that ain't the sort of thing to be humpy about.' “'Yes it is,' he snaps back; 'it means that if I don't take precious good care I'll drift into being a blooming milkman, spending my life yelling “Milk ahoi!” and spooning smutty-faced servant-gals across area railings.' “'Oh!' I says, 'and what may you prefer to spoon--duchesses?' “'Yes,' he answers sulky-like; 'duchesses are right enough--some of 'em.' “'So are servant-gals,' I says, 'some of 'em. Your hat's feeling a bit small for you this morning, ain't it?' “'Hat's all right,' says he; 'it's the world as I'm complaining of--beastly place; there's nothing to do in it.' “'Oh!' I says; 'some of us find there's a bit too much.' I'd been up since five that morning myself; and his own work, which was scouring milk-cans for twelve hours a day, didn't strike me as suggesting a life of leisured ease. “'I don't mean that,' he says. 'I mean things worth doing.' “'Well, what do you want to do,' I says, 'that this world ain't big enough for?' “'It ain't the size of it,' he says; 'it's the dulness of it. Things used to be different in the old days.' “'How do you know?' I says. “'You can read about it,' he answers. “'Oh,' I says, 'and what do they know about it--these gents that sit down and write about it for their living! You show me a book cracking up the old times, writ by a chap as lived in 'em, and I'll believe you. Till then I'll stick to my opinion that the old days were much the same as these days, and maybe a trifle worse.' “'From a Sunday School point of view, perhaps yes,' says he; 'but there's no gainsaying--' “'No what?' I says. “'No gainsaying,' repeats he; 'it's a common word in literatoor.'