CAUSES OF SUCCESS 23 



seemed to have been presiding as Lord Chief- 

 Justice in a court, wherein, had merit regulated the 

 appointments, I should most probably have dis- 

 charged the duties of usher. I had been enthroned 

 as Grand Master of a Rosicrucian Lodge, when 

 I ought to have been standing at the door as 

 tyler; and as I carried away a glorious bouquet 

 of Roses, with their ' best respects to the Missus,' 

 I felt ashamed to think how little I had done, and 

 how much more such men would do, with my 

 larger leisure and more abundant means. But when 

 I reached the station and entered my carriage, I 

 was roused from my reverie by a loud and prolonged 

 'OhT which greeted me from five of my acquaint- 

 ances, as though I had been an asteroid rocket 

 which had just burst, and the Roses were my 

 coruscant stars : and I w^as beginning to regain my 

 self-complacency, and to find solace in the remark 

 of one of my neighbours, who, I knew, had glass 

 by the acre, and gardeners in troops, that ' they 

 were the first Roses he had seen this year,* when 

 I was again discomfited by the insolent behaviour 

 of the company — on this wise. To an inquiry from 

 what garden the Roses came, I responded, in all 

 truthfulness, ' Chiefly from a bricklayer's.' Where- 

 upon an expressive sneer of unbelief disfigured each 

 stolid countenance; and a solemn silence ensued, 



