. After an evening of that kind Yule was unwell and miserable for
several days.
    It was not to be expected that Mr Quarmby, inveterate chatterbox of the
Reading-room and other resorts, should keep silence concerning what he had heard
of Mr Rackett's intentions. The rumour soon spread that Alfred Yule was to
succeed Fadge in the direction of The Study, with the necessary consequence that
Yule found himself an object of affectionate interest to a great many people of
whom he knew little or nothing. At the same time the genuine old friends pressed
warmly about him, with congratulations, with hints of their sincere readiness to
assist in filling the columns of the paper. All this was not disagreeable, but
in the meantime Yule had heard nothing whatever from Mr Rackett himself, and his
doubts did not diminish as week after week went by.
    The event justified him. At the end of October appeared an authoritative
announcement that Fadge's successor would be - not Alfred Yule, but a gentleman
who till of late had been quietly working as a sub-editor in the provinces, and
who had neither friendships nor enmities among the people of the London literary
press. A young man, comparatively fresh from the university, and said to be
strong in pure scholarship. The choice, as you are aware, proved a good one, and
The Study became an organ of more repute than ever.
    Yule had been secretly conscious that it was not to men such as he that
positions of this kind are nowadays entrusted. He tried to persuade himself that
he was not disappointed. But when Mr Quarmby approached him with blank face, he
spoke certain wrathful words which long rankled in that worthy's mind. At home
he kept sullen silence.
    No, not to such men as he - poor, and without social recommendations.
Besides, he was growing too old. In literature, as in most other pursuits, the
press of energetic young men was making it very hard for a veteran even to hold
the little grazing-plot he had won by hard fighting. Still, Quarmby's story had
not been without foundation; it was true that the proprietor of The Study had
for a moment thought of Alfred Yule, doubtless as the natural contrast to
Clement Fadge, whom he would have liked to mortify if the thing were possible.
But counsellors had proved to Mr Rackett the disadvantages of such a choice.
    Mrs Yule and her daughter foresaw but too well the results of this
disappointment, notwithstanding that Alfred announced it to them with dry
indifference. The month that followed was a time of misery for all in the
