A self-made man ain't no time for grammar, sez I.If a man expects to get on in this world he mustn't be too fine.

This is the second time Bennet's busted.

Better have no grammar and more goods, sez I.You remember--hey, ma ?" When, a little while afterward, Mr.Bennet applied for a situation as book-keeper in the bank of which Mr.Van Boozenberg was president, that officer hung, drew, and quartered the English language, before the very eyes of Mr.Bennet, to show him how he despised it, and to impress him with the great truth that he, Jacob Van Boozenberg, a self-made man, who had no time to speak correctly, nor to be comely or clean, was yet a millionaire before whom Wall Street trembled--while he, Gerald Bennet, with all his education, and polish, and care, and scrupulous neatness and politeness, was a poverty-stricken, shiftless vagabond; and what good had grammar done him?
The ruined gentleman stood before the president--who was seated in his large armchair at the bank--holding his hat uncertainly, the nervous smile glimmering like heat lightning upon his pale, anxious face, in which his eyes shone with that singular, soft light of dreams.
"Now, Mr.Bennet, I sez to ma this very mornin'-- sez I, 'Ma, I s'pose Mr.
Bennet 'll be wantin' a place in our bank.

If he hadn't been so wery fine,' sez I, 'he might have got on.

He talks be-youtiful grammar, ma,'" said the worthy President, screwing in the taunt, as it were; "'but grammar ain't good to eat,' sez I.'He ain't a self-made man, as some folks is,' sez I; 'but I suppose I'll have to stick him in somewheres,' sez I--that's all of it." Gerald Bennet winced.