The Editor asked us a lot of questions, and we told him a good deal, though of course I did not tell a stranger all our reasons for thinking that the family fortunes wanted restoring.

We stayed about half an hour, and when we were going away he said again-- 'I shall print all your poems, my poet; and now what do you think they're worth ?' 'I don't know,' Noel said.

'You see I didn't write them to sell.' 'Why did you write them then ?' he asked.
Noel said he didn't know; he supposed because he wanted to.
'Art for Art's sake, eh ?' said the Editor, and he seemed quite delighted, as though Noel had said something clever.
'Well, would a guinea meet your views ?' he asked.
I have read of people being at a loss for words, and dumb with emotion, and I've read of people being turned to stone with astonishment, or joy, or something, but I never knew how silly it looked till I saw Noel standing staring at the Editor with his mouth open.

He went red and he went white, and then he got crimson, as if you were rubbing more and more crimson lake on a palette.

But he didn't say a word, so Oswald had to say-- 'I should jolly well think so.' So the Editor gave Noel a sovereign and a shilling, and he shook hands with us both, but he thumped Noel on the back and said-- 'Buck up, old man! It's your first guinea, but it won't be your last.
Now go along home, and in about ten years you can bring me some more poetry.