'Disappointed?' he went on, as he walked between them under the trees.

'Yes. No doubt I am disappointed. Hurt? Yes. No doubt I am hurt. That's

only natural. But what I mean when I say that people who put themselves

in the same position are mostly used in the same way--' 'In England,' said Mr Meagles.

'Oh! of course I mean in England. When they take their inventions into

foreign countries, that's quite different. And that's the reason why so

many go there.' Mr Meagles very hot indeed again.

'What I mean is, that however this comes to be the regular way of our

government, it is its regular way. Have you ever heard of any projector

or inventor who failed to find it all but inaccessible, and whom it did

not discourage and ill-treat?' 'I cannot say that I ever have.'

'Have you ever known it to be beforehand in the adoption of any useful

thing? Ever known it to set an example of any useful kind?'

'I am a good deal older than my friend here,' said Mr Meagles, 'and I'll

answer that. Never.' 'But we all three have known, I expect,' said the inventor, 'a pretty

many cases of its fixed determination to be miles upon miles, and years

upon years, behind the rest of us; and of its being found out persisting

in the use of things long superseded, even after the better things were

well known and generally taken up?' They all agreed upon that.

'Well then,' said Doyce, with a sigh, 'as I know what such a metal will

do at such a temperature, and such a body under such a pressure, so I

may know (if I will only consider), how these great lords and gentlemen

will certainly deal with such a matter as mine.

I have no right to be surprised, with a head upon my shoulders, and

memory in it, that I fall into the ranks with all who came before me. I

ought to have let it alone. I have had warning enough, I am sure.'

With that he put up his spectacle-case, and said to Arthur, 'If I don't

complain, Mr Clennam, I can feel gratitude; and I assure you that I

feel it towards our mutual friend. Many's the day, and many's the way in

which he has backed me.'

'Stuff and nonsense,' said Mr Meagles. Arthur could not but glance at Daniel Doyce in the ensuing silence. Though it was evidently in the grain of his character, and of his

respect for his own case, that he should abstain from idle murmuring,

it was evident that he had grown the older, the sterner, and the poorer,

for his long endeavour. He could not but think what a blessed thing

it would have been for this man, if he had taken a lesson from the

gentlemen who were so kind as to take a nation's affairs in charge, and

had learnt How not to do it.




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