secretary, but he was greatly too high an official to be seen at
first by a new junior clerk. I was taken, therefore, to his eldest
son Henry Freeling, who was the assistant secretary, and by him
I was examined as to my fitness. The story of that examination is
given accurately in one of the opening chapters of a novel written
by me, called The Three Clerks. If any reader of this memoir would
refer to that chapter and see how Charley Tudor was supposed to have
been admitted into the Internal Navigation Office, that reader
will learn how Anthony Trollope was actually admitted into the
Secretary's office of the General Post Office in 1834. I was asked
to copy some lines from the Times newspaper with an old quill pen,
and at once made a series of blots and false spellings. "That
won't do, you know," said Henry Freeling to his brother Clayton.
Clayton, who was my friend, urged that I was nervous, and asked
that I might be allowed to do a bit of writing at home and bring
it as a sample on the next day. I was then asked whether I was
a proficient in arithmetic. What could I say? I had never learned
the multiplication table, and had no more idea of the rule of three
than of conic sections. "I know a little of it," I said humbly,
whereupon I was sternly assured that on the morrow, should I succeed
in showing that my handwriting was all that it ought to be, I should
be examined as to that little of arithmetic. If that little should
not be found to comprise a thorough knowledge of all the ordinary
rules, together with practised and quick skill, my career in life
could not be made at the Post Office. Going down the main stairs
of the building,--stairs which have I believe been now pulled down
to make room for sorters and stampers,--Clayton Freeling told me
not to be too down-hearted. I was myself inclined to think that I
had better go back to the school in Brussels. But nevertheless I
went to work, and under the surveillance of my elder brother made