"I can't understand it, nohow; I swan, I'm completely knocked off my feet," said Jared to the young man of the _Evening Rounder_, in the rustic dialect of the vaudeville. "Why, that there man--I've allus looked on him as my best friend. It was that book of his'n that give me my start, and now he turns agen me. But he's wrong, and I've got the hull town to prove it. And if he's wrong, by gum, he'll have to pay for it. He can't trip up the heels of an honest country boy and not get tripped up hisself. I don't know yet just what I'll do, but----" With the _Evening Pattern_ Jared was more academic. "I acknowledge that this attack comes as a great surprise. I had always regarded the reverend gentleman as the chief of my friends. His own book for young men [name not mentioned--Print, Push, and Co. did not advertise in the _Pattern_] was my earliest inspiration. Such conduct seems as inconsistent as inconsiderate. The public, I think, will be certain to support me. And if the words of the address are correctly reported, I shall be found, I believe, to have good grounds for an action at law. An intelligent jury, I make no doubt----" The two Meyers were delighted. This was advertising indeed! Van Horn, a shade less thick-skinned, stuck at the animadversions made so spiritedly by the Doctor and so vociferously supported by his audience. They wore upon him; they seemed almost actionable. He sent for the son of their credit man, a youth enrolled at the Academy, where he was learning to design carpets and curtains, and tried to get from him just what the Doctor had really said. This solicitude reacted upon the Meyers, and Meyer junior, who gave the interview, intimated that such language was actionable beyond a doubt. "Our Mr. Levy will attend to this. We have the endorsement of the general public, and that makes us still less willing to have anybody challenge our business acumen"--all this was but an elegant paraphrase of Sidney Meyer's actual remarks, for he had left school at sixteen and had never looked into a book since--"or our business integrity."