J. M. Barrie

“ Andrew paused.
"Go on," said Mr. Labouchere.
"Well, you have now got fame, honour, everything for which it is legitimate in man to strive.
"So far back as I can remember, you have had the world laughing with you. But you know what human nature is.
"There comes a morning to all wits, when their public wakes to find them bores. The fault may not be the wit's, but what of that? The result is the same.
"Wits are like theatres: they may have a glorious youth and prime, but their old age is dismal. ”

“ Then Andrew had seen no sharper audience since he was one of a Scotch congregation on the scent of a heretic.
"At a full meeting of committee," said Mrs. Fawcett, with a ring of bitterness in her voice, "you passed a law that women should not enjoy the advantages of the association. Be they ever so eminent, their sex deprives them of your care. You take up the case of a petty maker of books because his tea-leaf solutions weary you, and you put a stop to him with an enthusiasm worthy of a nobler object. ”

“ It has been the wish of this society to avoid the prejudices engendered of party strife. But though you are a social rather than a political organisation, you cannot escape politics. You do not call yourselves Radicals, but you work for Radicalism. ”

“ They were in Holborn, but turned up Southampton Row for quiet.
"You have told me," said the stranger, now speaking rapidly, "that at times you have felt tempted to take your life, that life for which you will one day have to account. Suicide is the coward's refuge. You are miserable? When a young man knows that, he is happy. Misery is but preparing for an old age of delightful reminiscence. You say that London has no work for you, that the functions to which you looked forward are everywhere discharged by another. ”

“ Debating societies, like the company of reporters, engender a familiarity of reference to eminent persons, and Andrew had in his time struck down the champions of woman's rights as a boy plays with his ninepins.
To be brought face to face with a lady whose name is a household word wheresoever a few Scotchmen can meet and resolve themselves into an argument was another matter.
It was with no ordinary mingling of respect with curiosity that he stood up with the others to greet Mrs. Fawcett as the president led her into the room. ”

“ Perhaps my feeling for Clarrie is only brotherly—"
"Hers for you, Andrew, is more than sisterly."
"Admitted. But consider, Mr. Eassie, she has only seen the world in soirées. Every girl has her day-dreams, and Clarrie has perhaps made a dream of me. She is impulsive, given to idealisation, and hopelessly illogical." ”

“ Andrew took a long breath, and the president considerately turned away his head until the young probationer had regained his composure. Then he proceeded:
"The society only asks from its probationers the faith which it has in them. They take no oath. We speak in deeds. The Brotherhood do not recognise the possibility of treachery; but they are prepared to cope with it if it comes. Better far, Andrew Riach, to be in your grave, dead and rotten and forgotten, than a traitor to the cause." ”

“ Labouchere rankled for many days in Andrew's mind. Had he been proposing for the great statesman's hand he could not have felt it more. Perhaps he did not make sufficient allowance for Mr. Labouchere; it is always so easy to advise.
But to rage at a man (or woman) is the proof that we can adore them; it is only his loved ones who infuriate a Scotchman. ”

“ Their faces, drunk with rage, awoke Andrew to a sense of his danger.
"They were drawing lots for you when I left the room," said the president.
"But what have I done?" gasped Andrew.
"They didn't like your thesis. At least, they make that their excuse."
"Excuse?"
"Yes; it was really your neck that did it."
By this time they were in a cab, rattling into Gray's Inn Road.
"They are a poor lot," said Andrew fiercely, "if they couldn't keep their heads over my neck."
"They are only human," retorted the president. "For Heaven's sake, pull up the collar of your coat." ”

“ When we left the Embankment my intention was to dispose of you in a doorway. But your story moves me strangely. Could I be certain that you felt the sacredness of human life—as I fear no boy can feel it—I should be tempted to ask you instead to become one of us. ”

“ Andrew raised his hat.
"Though he was over eighty years of age," continued the stranger. "Carlyle would hardly rest content with merely giving us his countenance. He wanted to be a working member. It was he who mentioned Froude's name to us."
"For honorary membership?"
"Not at all. Froude would hardly have completed the 'Reminiscences' had it not been that we could never make up our minds between him and Freeman."
Youth is subject to sudden fits of despondency. Its hopes go up and down like a bucket in a draw-well.
"They'll never let me join," cried Andrew, sorrowfully. ”

“ He felt that something was about to happen. He had never seen this man disturbed before.
Chancery Lane swarmed with lawyers, but if they had not made way Andrew would have walked over them.
He clove his way between those walking abreast, and struck down an arm extended to point out the Law Courts. When he neared the stranger, he slightly slackened his pace, but it was a stampede even then.
Suddenly the pursued came to a dead stop and gazed for twenty minutes in at a pastry-cook's window. Andrew waited for him. Then they started off again, much more leisurely. ”

“ What is Radicalism? It is a desire to get a chance. This is an aspiration inherent in the human breast. It is felt most keenly by the poor.
"Make the poor rich, and the hovels, the misery, the immorality, and the crime of the East End disappear. It is infamous, say the Socialists, that this is not done at once. Yes, but how is it to be done? Not, as they hold, by making the classes and the masses change places. Not on the lines on which the society has hitherto worked. ”

“ Why attempt to account for the nameless fascination he exercised over the young Scotchman? We speak lightly of mesmeric influence, but, after all, there is only one mesmerist for youth—a good woman or a good man. Depend upon it, that is why so many "mesmerists" have mistaken their vocation. Andrew took to prowling about the streets looking for this man, like a dog that has lost its master. ”

“ There are times when I don't care a hang for her."
"Andrew!"
"I beg your pardon. Still, it is you who have insisted on discussing this question in the particular instance. Love in the abstract is of much greater moment."
"I have sometimes thought, Andrew," Mr. Eassie said, "that you are lacking in the imaginative faculty."
"In other words, love is a mere fancy. Grant that, and see to what it leads. By imagining that I have Clarrie with me I am as well off as if I really had. ”

“ In your public utterances you have let it be known what value you set on pretty phrases; but I speak the blunt truth, as you have taught it. I am only a young man, perhaps awkward and unpolished—"
Here Andrew paused, but as Mr. Labouchere did not say anything he resumed.
"That as it may be, I should like you to know that your political speeches have become part of my life. When I was a student it seemed to me that the Radicalism of so called advanced thinkers was a half-hearted sham; I had no interest in politics at all until I read your attack—one of them—on the House of Lords. ”

“ It was when alone that these testimonials were his truest solace. Had you met him in the Strand conning them over, you might have taken him for an actor. He had a yearning to stop strangers in the streets and try a testimonial's effect on them.
Every young man is not equally unfortunate.
Riach's appearance was against him.
There was a suggestion of latent strength about him that made strangers uncomfortable. Even the friends who thought they understood him liked him to go away.
Lord Rosebery made several jokes to him, and Andrew only looked at him in response. ”

“ Andrew asked, "who was he?"
"Oh, I picked him up at Charing Cross. He was better dead."
"I think," said Andrew, hopefully, "that my estimate of the sacredness of human life is sufficiently high for your purpose. If that is the only point—"
"Ah, they all say that until they join. I remember an excellent young man who came among us for a time. He seemed discreet beyond his years, and we expected great things of him. But it was the old story. For young men the cause is as demoralizing as boarding schools are for girls." ”

“ Work is the sovereign remedy for this unhealthy state of mind, and fortunately Andrew had a great deal to do.
Gradually the wound healed, and he began to take an interest in Lord Randolph Churchill.
Every day the Flying Scotchman shoots its refuse of clever young men upon London who are too ambitious to do anything. ”

“ When the newspaper placards announced the serious illness of a distinguished man, he made up characteristic anecdotes about his childhood, his reputation at school, his first love, and sent them as the reminiscences of a friend to the great London dailies. These were the only things of his they used. As often as not the invalid got better, and then Andrew went without a dinner. ”

“ It is a crying scandal.
"Things are the same in medicine, art, divinity, law—in short, in every profession and in every trade.
"Young ladies cry out that this is not a marrying age. How can it be a marrying age, with grey-headed parents everywhere? Give young men their chance, and they will marry younger than ever, if only to see their children grown up before they die. ”

“ This society at its noblest was instituted for taking strong means to prevent men's slipping down the ladder it has been such a toil to them to mount, but the women who have climbed as high as they can fall from rung to rung. ”

“ In the lower form of life the process of preying upon animals whose work is accomplished—that is, of weeding—goes on continually. Man must, of course, be more cautious. The grand function of the Society is to find out the persons who have a claim on it, and in the interests of humanity to lay their condition before them. After that it is in the majority of cases for themselves to decide whether they will go or stay on."
"But," said Andrew, "had the gentleman in the Thames consented to go?" ”

“ What shall we do, Society asks, with our boys? I reply. Kill off the parents.
"There can be little doubt that forty-five years is long enough for a man to live. Parents must see that. Youth is the time to have your fling.
"Let us see how this plan would revolutionise the world. It would make statesmen hurry up. At present, they are nearly fifty before you hear of them. How can we expect the country to be properly governed by men in their dotage? ”

“ Lord Randolph had come to the window in his greatcoat. His follower waited for him outside. It was possible that he would take a hansom and drive straight to the House, but Andrew had reasons for thinking this unlikely. The rain had somewhat abated. Lord Randolph came out, put up his umbrella, and, glancing at the sky for a moment, set off briskly up St. Martin's Lane.
Andrew knew that he would not linger here, for they had done St. Martin's Lane already.
Lord Randolph's movements these last days had excited the Scotchman's curiosity. ”

“ You have been tending towards us ever since you came to London. You are an apple ripe for plucking, and if you are not plucked now you will fall. I would fain take you by the hand, and yet—"
"And yet?"
"And yet I hesitate. You seem a youth of the fairest promise; but how often have I let these impulses deceive me! You talk of logic, but is it more than talk? Man, they say, is a reasonable being. They are wrong. He is only a being capable of reason."
"Try me," said Andrew.
The stranger resumed in a lower key:
"You do not understand what you ask as yet," he said ”

“ The president's motives were not more disinterested than his actions were defensible. He even deserved punishment.
All these things may be. The great social question is not to be solved in a day. It never will be solved if those who take it by the beard are not given an unbiassed hearing.
Those were the young Scotchman's views when the president opened the door to him, and what he saw and heard that night strengthened them.
It was characteristic of Andrew's host that at such a time he could put himself in the young man's place. ”

“ The master of the Wheens Grammar School had died. Andrew had only to send in his testimonials, and the post was his.
The salary was 200 pounds per annum, with an assistant and the privilege of calling himself rector.
This settled, Andrew asked for Clarrie. He was humbler now than he had been, and in our disappointments we turn to woman for solace.
Clarrie had been working socks for him, and would have had them finished by this time had she known how to turn the heel.
It is his sweetheart a man should be particular about. Once he settles down it does not much matter whom he marries. ”

“ You have your enemies, but the very persons who blunt their weapons on you do you the honour of sharpening them on 'Truth.' In short, you have reached the summit of your fame, and you are too keen a man of the world not to know that fame is a touch-and-go thing. ”

“ Riach had a very long neck. He was twenty-five years of age, fair, and somewhat heavily built, with a face as inexpressive as book-covers.
A native of Wheens and an orphan, he had been brought up by his uncle, who was a weaver and read Herodotus in the original. The uncle starved himself to buy books and talk about them, until one day he got a good meal, and died of it. Then Andrew apprenticed himself to a tailor. ”