He had been educated in one of the numerous colleges of India.

Upon inquiry I was told that the country was full of young fellows of his like.

They had been educated away up to the snow-summits of learning--and the market for all this elaborate cultivation was minutely out of proportion to the vastness of the product.

This market consisted of some thousands of small clerical posts under the government -- the supply of material for it was multitudinous.

If this youth with the flowing style and the blossoming English was occupying a small railway clerkship, it meant that there were hundreds and hundreds as capable as he, or he would be in a high place; and it certainly meant that there were thousands whose education and capacity had fallen a little short, and that they would have to go without places.