We brought a thousand offerings to his judgment; many of them he
rejected with an impatient cry of "Next! Next! For God's sake!" But if
any subject, whether from its intrinsic importance or from its style,
reached the standard of his discrimination he took it up, enlarged upon
it, illuminated it, until what had come to him as crude material for
conversation assumed a new form, everything unessential rejected,
everything essential disclosed in the clear and vigorous English which
was the vehicle of his lucid thought.
When I recall the capaciousness of his understanding, the breadth of his
experience, the range of his information, and set them side by side with
the cruel limitations imposed upon him by his blindness and by his
shattered constitution, I forget the severity of his discipline, I
marvel only that his self-control should have served him so well in the
tedious business of breaking a new man to his service.
CHAPTER V
GETTING TO KNOW MR. PULITZER
As time passed, my relations with Mr. Pulitzer became more agreeable. He
had given me fair warning that the first few weeks of my trial would be
more or less unpleasant; a month at Cap Martin and a month on the yacht
had amply verified his prediction.
But this period of probation, laborious and nerve-racking as it was,
enabled me to appreciate how important it was for J.
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