five years in vain; and you begin to doubt
the genial goodness that you once believed to
form an element in human nature; for has not
society been deaf as an adder for five years to
the valuable offer you have made ? Your
voice, no doubt, has been extremely faint
beneath the common din of life, because you live
in an obscure corner of the world, and can
make no sound above a whisper. But you
call it hard, and think there ought to be a
society of men established, in this country—at
any rate, for the express purpose of seeking
out obscure men who possess ideas, and of
listening about for valuable whispers.

You hope we are not jesting at a fact which
you consider very serious. You should like
us to know something of your struggles and
rebuffs as an inventor. Small as your voice
is, you knew the need of energy in this life,
and have used it to the utmost.

You wrote to the Prime Minister, who
answered that he knew nothing of engineering,
and could not give an opinion on your
scheme; but bade you understand that, good
or bad, it never could receive assistance from
the Government.

You visited a nobleman from whose well-
known benevolence you cherished hopes of
aid. He told you that, with the best wishes
to assist all men, he had not the power; and
that in his own path of life he had five times
as many calls for aid as he could duly answer:
that he must confine his support, therefore,
to those schemes which he was most qualified
to understand.

You called upon the noble Earl of Dusthole,
who was said to be not over-wise, but to
have a decided genius for mechanics. You
obtained an introduction; he was overjoyed
to see you; you laid out your drawings, and
began your explanation. At your thirty-
seventh word the noble Earl fell back in his
chair. You never saw a man who tumbled
into sleep so suddenly. You ceased your
explanation, and you dared not shake your
noble patron; what should you do? You
poked your finger at his parrot, and excited
that bird. But the noble Earl snored on.
You groped, since it was dusk now, to the
kitchen, summoning candles; for the bell was
broken. The arrival of the light aroused
your noble friend, who resumed his attentive
attitude with,

"You were saying"——?

You went on. He asked for more ocular
information. You had only a little pamphlet,
which you called your little book. "Books!"
said the noble Earl, "I'm overdone with books.
You've no conception how much I'm obliged
to read!" You pulled your pamphlet out.
"Ah, well!" said your patron, "it's a little
one, isn't it? Well, now, I really think I 'll
read." He drew a candle to him, and read
your own pamphlet to you, intermixed with
ejaculations of applause. When he had done,
he said, "Good—very good; your plan is
excellent. Let me see, you mentioned
something about a lever. By-the-by, what is a
lever ? Isn't it a thing that lifts ?" You left
the mechanical Earl, and you placed no more
hope in noble patronage.

As for the engineers, you, a mere amateur,
a hobby-rider from the outer world—what
welcome should you get on their domain?
But you laboured hard to find a railway
engineer who would consent to recommend
your device for trial on his line.

Obtaining an introduction, you left your
drawings with the celebrated Mr. Deaf,
requesting leave to call for his opinion and his
aid, if he thought fit to give it, in a few days.
You called in a few days upon that famous
engineer, who, upon seeing you, said, "O yes,
you come about your drawings? I have looked
at them—a plan for effecting communication
between guard and driver——" You begged
his pardon, and explained how your scheme
was designed, in case of fogs or inattention,
for the mechanical prevention of collisions.
"Collisions!" cried the railway engineer.
"Sir, there never are collisions. It is all a
phantom of the public's. I don't mean to
boast in telling you how many miles of line
are under my care; now, sir, there never has
been a collision on any of my lines." So Mr.
Deaf, who had no ear for newspaper reports,
and ignored inquests, bowed you out.

You were introduced, in the next place, to
Mr. Dumb, a twin celebrity—a very high
authority—who, with constrained politeness,
heard your case and examined your plans.
"Well, sir," he told you very frankly, "your
apparatus is effective. It would prevent
collisions." You triumphed and expressed
your joy at that, hinting that Mr. Deaf had
thrown cold water on you. "Well, what
did Deaf say?"—"O! he said there never
were collisions."—"He is quite right; I quite
agree with Mr. Deaf. Besides, if your
invention were wanted, it's not good. Look!
there is a rod uncovered which would not
work in a snow-storm." You explained that
this rod was uncovered only in the working
plan, and not in the reality. Finally, Mr.
Dumb promised that you might have your
invention tried on his line, if you brought an
engineer's certificate of its success elsewhere.
You went away in hope; but when you next
called upon Mr. Dumb for the redemption of
his promise, alas for you! he had retired
from railway business.

You called upon a railway potentate, who
told you that his lines were all level, all straight,
and all innocent of accidents, and gave you to
understand that you were a mischievous
person, with your cry about collision; a sort
of scarecrow to frighten travellers from
railways.

In short, you called upon all manner of
engineers; wrote to all manner of directors.
You found engineers in general opposed to you
as a quack, and combining, as wild herds often
combine, to keep out an unrecognised animal;
you felt that this was a habit not peculiar to