Clerical Positions

Rightly or wrongly, it seems to be ascumed tiiat the Gerrnans, partly becanse of their plodding h:;})its, partly on account of their linguistic accomplii,hments, are inoro fitted for clerical positions thim tlie average Englishmen. Well, why not accept that fact? If the Germans want to be clerks then by all means let them be clerks, and leave the Englishman under the pressure of necessity to carve out some nobler career for himself. For what is clerkdoin, what are ita prospects and its infhiences? I speak froin experience, and i. assert that it is a wretched leveling dovn, ambition crushing existence. Sooner than be a clerk I would say to any young man beginning life, be an artisan- whose honest toü offers a future of happiness wholly denied to the down at heel clerk. Yet it is not difficult to understand why young men become clerks. It is supposed to be a gentlemanly profession, but the black coat, the top hat and the incipient mustache may all be taken as the signs of shabby gentility. The veneer of respectability is very thin. I remember once being sadly taken down by a vender of razors who stood withhis stock in trade outside the bankers' clearing nouse in .a passage off Lombard street. I asked him for a strop. Said he gruffly: "It will cost you 2 shillings. A steak would do you moregood." And the man was right. I did not forget the lesson, and I ceased to be a clerk as soon as I could, but it was a trial to my feelngs to be deprived of the genteel air of the city and to earn my bread amid less