But Arnold was sure that he had read something recently about it――he remembered he had cut it out――it was in the _Pall Mall_.
Arnold bunched up his black eyebrows and had a good look at me across the table. After dinner he said in that off-hand, desultory way that hindered him getting to the hearts of some Manchester men――Oxford has its drawbacks, after all――
“Do you care to write for the _Manchester Guardian_ occasionally?”
Did I care to write? What a question to ask a young man with a wife and daughter and rent and taxes and no hope of an old age pension.
The bargain was struck, and the next week I commenced dramatic critic. Arnold approved, and I remained.
I never caught the _Manchester Guardian_ manner, and I know I was too enthusiastic and unacademic, but I wrote on all sorts of subjects, and shall always remember the kindness of Arnold, who was my immediate chief, and all the staff, from the highest to the lowest. Generally Arnold’s blue pencil was rightly wielded, but now and again, of course, enthusiasm scored.
I remember among a lot of books to review I had singled out the “Auld Licht Idylls,” by J. M. Barrie. I am glad to say for my reputation as a reviewer that it captured me and I enthused. I came into Arnold’s room in the office after the theatre. I can see him now, sitting wearily in the midst of proofs and papers. He looked up at me as I entered with an amused smile――he regarded me, I think, as an irrepressible, journalistic infant.
“That Scots’ book, you know,” he said, pulling out a proof――“Walter Scott and Bret Harte and Mark Twain rolled into one. Really, Parry, when will you grow up?”
I defended my point of view earnestly, and after listening a while he shrugged his shoulders, saying, “Good night; it’s not badly written――except for the adjectives. I’ll see to it.” He did see to it――with the blue pencil. For Arnold did not believe with the moderns in discovering a new literary genius once a week and canonizing him on the spot. He was a high priest of letters, and his literary saints had to be thoroughly tested in the pure fires of his critical insight before they were consecrated. But months afterwards he was just enough to say as I brought him in a theatre notice, “By the way, Parry, that Scots’ book. I’ve read it. We might have left in all that about Mark Twain and Bret Harte――and even Scott. But mind you don’t do it again; you won’t find another Barrie in a hurry.”