“That is a probability, only. You may be sure that distinction will
not come without those qualities. The only way to succeed, therefore,
is to have them; though having them will not necessarily guarantee
distinction. I can only say that I began with a lofty ideal, without
saying how closely I have held to it. My own youth was not specially
marked by advantages. There were none, unless you can call a small
bookcase full of books, which my home contained, an advantage. The
printing office was my school from a very early date. My father
thoroughly believed in it, and he had his belief as to work, which
he illustrated as soon as we were old enough to learn the trade he
followed. We could go to school and study, or we could go into the
printing office and work, with perhaps an equal chance of learning; but
we could not be idle.”
“And you chose the printing office?”
“Not wholly. As I recall it, I went to and fro between the schoolhouse
and the printing office. When I tired of one, I was promptly given my
choice of the other.”
“Then you began life in poverty?”
“I suppose that, as the world goes now, we were poor. My father’s
income was never above twelve hundred a year, and his family was large;
but nobody was rich then. We lived in the simple fashion of that time
and place.”
“You found time to read?”
“My reading, somehow, went on pretty constantly. No doubt my love for
it won me a chance to devote time to it.”
“Might I ask how much time you devoted each day to your literary
object?”
“The length varied with varying times. Sometimes I read but little.
There were years of the work, of the over-work, indeed,—which falls
to the lot of many, that I should be ashamed to speak of except in
accounting for the fact. My father had sold his paper in Hamilton, and
had bought an interest in another at Dayton, and at that time we were
all straining our utmost to help pay for it.”
“And that left you little time?”
“In that period very few hours were given to literature. My daily tasks
began so early, and ended so late, that I had little time, even if I
had the spirit for reading. Sometimes I had to sit up until midnight,
waiting for telegraphic news, and be up again at dawn to deliver the
papers, working afterward at the case; but that was only for a few
years.”
“When did you find time to seriously apply yourself to literature?”