“Now you are becoming _crescendo_, my Amber. One only says of the best men what you have said of Mr. Richmond. I know that it represents the flood-tide of one man’s praise of another. Personally I don’t see why the papers should have made such fun of Mr. Richmond.” “Oh, my dear Joe, that wasn’t his doing, believe me. Oh, no; that was Willie Bateman’s idea. He’s becoming the great authority on advertising, you know. Yes, he said that you can ridicule any man into success.” “I fancy he’s not far wrong in that. You remember the horrid man who got on--for a time--by pretending that he was the original of one of Mr. du Maurier’s pictures in _Punch?_” “I have heard of him. He was a sort of painter, only he had a habit of dabbing in the eyes outside the face. Mr. Richmond is not an impostor, however; he is only a theorist.” “Now you are hair-splitting, Amber, the Sophist.” Amber frowned and then laughed--freely--graciously--not the laugh of Ananias and Sapphira his wife, who kept back part of their possessions. “Well, I admit that--no, I admit nothing. I say that Mr. Richmond deserves to succeed on his own merits, and that he would succeed even without being ridiculed in the papers. His theories are thoroughly scientific--papa admits so much.” “He not only admits the theorist but the theories as well, into his house. And yet Sir Creighton is a practical man.” “And a scientific man. It is because Mr. Richmond works on such a scientific basis and in such a practical manner we are so anxious to do all we can for him. Why shouldn’t there be a Technical College of Literature as well as one of Wool-combing, or one of Dyeing, or one of Turning?” “Why shouldn’t there be one? You have reason and analogy on your side. I suppose it needs quite as much skill to turn a Sonnet as to turn a Sofa-leg, and yet it is thought necessary to serve an apprenticeship to the one industry and not to the other.” “That’s exactly what I say--exactly what Mr. Richmond says. He once edited a magazine, and he would have made it pay too, if the people who wrote for him had been able to write. But they didn’t. It was reading the fearful stuff he used to get by every post that caused him to think of the great need there was for a Technical School of Literature. Now, suppose you want to write a History of any period, how would you set about it?” “I haven’t the remotest idea of writing a history of even the remotest period, Amber.” “Yes, that’s because you are unfortunate enough to be the daughter of so wealthy a man as Mr. West, the Under Secretary for the Arbitration Department. You have no need to do anything for a living--to do anything to distinguish yourself in the world. But take the case that you were dependent upon writing histories of certain periods for your daily bread, wouldn’t you like to have some place to go in order to learn the technicalities of history-writing?”