"I suppose you 're a very brilliant young man," he went on, "very enlightened, very cultivated, quite up to the mark in the fine arts and all that sort of thing.

I 'm a plain, practical old boy, content to follow an honorable profession in a free country.

I did n't go off to the Old World to learn my business; no one took me by the hand; I had to grease my wheels myself, and, such as I am, I 'm a self-made man, every inch of me! Well, if our young friend is booked for fame and fortune, I don't suppose his going to Rome will stop him.

But, mind you, it won't help him such a long way, either.

If you have undertaken to put him through, there 's a thing or two you 'd better remember.