"A WHAT," ejaculated Herman, jumping from his chair. "A shoemaker," repeated Arthur Dermoyne. "I gain my bread by the work of my hands, and by the hardest of all kinds of work. I am not only a mechanic, but a shoemaker." Herman could not repress a burst of laughter. "Excuse me, but, ha, ha, ha! You are a shoemaker? And you visited the house of the wealthy Burney, and aspired to his daughter's hand? You will excuse me, ha, ha, ha!--but it is so very odd." Dermoyne's forehead grew dark. "Yes, I am a shoemaker. I earn my bread by the work of my hands. But before you despise me, you will hear why I am a shoemaker. As an orphaned child, without father or mother, there was no other career before me, than the pauperism of the outcast or the slavery of an apprentice. I chose the latter. The overseers of the poor bound me out to a trade. I grew up without hope, education, or home. In the day-time I worked at an occupation which is work without exercise, and which continued ten years, at ten hours a day, will destroy the constitution of the strongest man. From this hopeless apprenticeship, I passed into the life of a journeyman, and knew what it was to battle with the world for myself. How I worked, starved and worked, matters not, for we folks are born for that kind of thing. But as I sat upon my work-bench, listening to a book which was read by one of my own brother workmen, I became aware that I was not only poor, but ignorant; that my body was not only enslaved, but also my soul.--Therefore, I taught myself to read; to write; and for three years I have devoted five hours of every night to study." "And are still a shoemaker?" Herman's smooth face was full of quiet scorn and laughter.