Miss Armstrong's and other circumstances Author:John Davidson Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: A WOULD-BE LONDONER. SANDRIDGE came to London too late for what he wished to accomplish. His ambition was to be a Londoner. It is true the Londoner is made, n... more »ot born ; but, at the very latest, the process must begin at twenty-five. Sandridge was two-and-thirty when he left a North of England town, a circle of interesting acquaintances, of which he was the centre, and a roomy, old-fashioned house of his own, for London solitude and a modest apartment near Oxford Circus. In the provincial bosom, faith, even at thirty-two, meditates Metropolitan miracles. Sandridge expected to have the London mountains removed by a Member of Parliament who was his second cousin. ' Ah !' said the Member, ' you must begin to learn the ropes at a club.' Needing for himself all the influence he could snatch, he resented Sandridge's unconnected state, and refused him a single bone. That is the use of the fable of ' knowing the ropes'; nobody believes in it, but it is very convenient to refer to when you are asked for assistance. 'It's a shame!' grumbled the Member. ' A man's relatives ought to be able to help him, instead of requiring help.' So he put up his cousin at an expensive new club. ' Let him find out the ropes there if he can,' he snarled to an acquaintance. ' As well there as anywhere, when you think of it, though,' he continued, reconsidering. ' Have you found out the ropes ? Has anyone ever found out the ropes ? No; there's no rigging about it. It's simply a huge tumbling coil of hemp and iron, all tarred with the same stick; and you get hold of a hawser- end or a chain-cable, and hang on or drop off.' In the smoking-room of the new club, Sandridge made diffident remarks about the young Disraeli, the young Bulwer; about Count D'Orsay, about great talkers, about personalities ...« less