Hinde urged him to do journalism and advised him to make a study of the
London newspapers so that he might discover which of them he could most
happily work for. "You could do a few articles, perhaps, and then it
wouldn't matter whether you agreed with the paper or not, but I'd
advise you to try and get a job on one paper for a while. You'll learn
a lot from journalism if you don't stay at it too long. It'll be a good
while yet before you can make a living at writing books, and you'll
want something to keep you going until you can. Journalism's as good as
anything, and in some ways, it's a lot better than most things, and let
me tell you, Mac, anybody can make a decent living out of newspapers if
he only takes the trouble to earn it. Half the fellows in Fleet Street
treat journalism as if it were a religious vocation, and they lie about
in pubs all day waiting for the Holy Ghost to come down and inspire
them with a scoop!"
John studied the London newspapers, as Hinde advised him, but he did
not feel drawn towards them. He considered that the morning papers were
very inferior to the _Northern Whig_, and he was certain that the
_North Down Herald_ was far more interesting than the
_Times_. The London evening papers, he said to Hinde, gave less
value for a half-penny than the _Belfast Evening Telegraph_, and
he complained that there was nothing to read in them.
"You'll have to start a paper yourself, Mac," said Hinde. "All the best
papers were started by men who couldn't find anything to read in other
papers. It would be a grand notion now to set up a paper for Ulstermen
who can't find anything in London that's fit to read. By the Hokey O,
that would be a grand notion. We could call the paper _To Hell With
the Pope or No Surrender!_..."
"Ah, quit your codding," John interrupted. "You know rightly what's
wrong with these London papers. They're not telling the truth!"
"And do you think the _Whig_ and the _Telegraph_ are?" Hinde
demanded.
"Well, it's what _we_ call the truth anyway," John stoutly
retorted.
Hinde slapped him on the back. "That's right," he said. "Ulster against
the whole civilised world!"
"If I was to take a job on one of these papers," John continued, "I'd
insist on telling the truth to the people!"
"You would, would you? And do you know what 'ud happen to you? The
people 'ud cut your head off at the end of a fortnight."
"I wouldn't let them."
Hinde sat in silence for a few minutes. Then he leant forward and
tapped John on the shoulder, "The editor of the _Daily Sensation_
is a Tyrone man," he said. "He comes from Cookstown!..."
"I never was in it," John murmured.
"Mebbe not, but it exists all the same. Go up the morrow evening to his
office and tell him you want a job on his paper so's you can start
telling everybody the truth. And see what happens to you."
John answered angrily. "You think you're having me on," he said, "but
you're queerly mistaken. I will go, and we'll see what happens!"
"That's what I'm bidding you do," Hinde continued. "And listen! There's
a couple I know, called Haverstock, living out at Hampstead. They have
discussions every month at their house on some subject or other, and
there's to be one next Wednesday. Will you come with me if I go to it?"
John nodded his head.
"Good! The Haverstocks'll be glad to welcome you as you're a friend of
mine, but it's not them I'm wanting you to see. It's the crowd they get
round them. All the cranks and oddities and solemn mugs of London seem
to go to that house one time or another, and I'd just like you to have
a look at some of them. The minute they find out you're Irish, they'll
plaster you with praise. They'll expect you to talk like a clown, one
minute, and weep bitter tears over England's tyranny the next. They're
all English, most of them, and they'll tell you that England is the
worst country in the world, and that Ireland would be the greatest if
it weren't for the fact that some piffling Balkan State is greater. And
they'll ram Truth down your throat till you're sick of it. You've only
to bleat about Ireland's woes to them, and call yourself a member of a
subject race, and they'll be all over you before you know where you
are. There's only one other man has a better chance of shining in their
society than an Irishman, and that's an Armenian."
"Well, that's great credit to them," John, replied. "I must say it
makes me think well of the English!..."
"Don't do that. Never acknowledge to an Englishman that you think well
of him. He'll think little of you if you do. Tell him he's a fool, that
he's muddle-headed, that he's a tyrant, that he's a materialist and a
compromiser and a hypocrite, and he'll pay you well for saying it. But
if you tell the truth and say he's the decent fellow he is, he'll land
you in the workhouse!..."