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each other: then, with a disdainful movement of the lips, the manager removed his hand without having touched the bell, and at once the man took his hand from the manager's shoulder.

As instant as had been their movements so quickly had all anger evaporated from the discharged man’s mind, and where rage had been there remained pride. He was not proud of himself, nor was he proud of the manager; in a curious but satisfactory way he was proud of man, and he was extraordinarily happy.

"You did not ring the bell," said he with a smile, and by that smile the manager's mind was emptied of hate or disdain as if something magical had come and these had not dared to await it.

"No," he replied, "this seemed rather a personal matter."

The man turned to the door.

"Well, I must be off."

"I am to take it," said the manager, "that you tender your resignation?"

"Pooh!" said the man, "you sacked me a minute ago, good-bye."

"Good-bye," said the manager, and the door closed between them.

He sat down, and for a time was shaken by little spasms of laughter; but the remainder of the day passed for him in a stubborn lassitude which he could account for, but could not shake off.

In a week the matter was remembered only as a curious episode, and in a month it was forgotten, and he had sacked two other men. Yet when six months had elapsed he had not discharged any one else, and thereafter he rarely discharged any; but ten years passed before he resigned from a business in which he could take no further, real interest, and in which, he considered, he was leading the life of a donkey.