this is an agreeable pastime: for you, it is a life-and-death struggle;
all is hazarded on the one throw. For it will of course occur to you,
that if you are rejected at the first trial, you will never pass current
with any one else. A thousand different feelings now distract you. You
are jealous of your rivals (for we will assume that there is competition
for the post); you are dissatisfied with your own replies; you hope; you
fear; you cannot remove your eye from the countenance of your judge. Does
he pooh-pooh your efforts? You are a lost man. Was that a smile? You
rejoice, and hope rises high. It is only to be expected, that many of the
company are your enemies, and others your rivals, and each has his secret
shaft to let fly at you from his lurking-place. What a picture! The
venerable grey-beard being put through his paces. Is he any use? Some say
yes, others no. Time is taken for consideration. Your antecedents are
industriously overhauled. Some envious compatriot, some neighbour with a
trivial grievance, is asked his opinion; he has but to drop a word of
'loose morality,' and your business is done; 'the man speaks God's
truth!' Every one else may testify to your character: their evidence
proves nothing; they are suspected; they are venal. The fact is, you must
gain every point; there must be no hitch anywhere. That is your only
chance of success.

And now, take it that you _have_ succeeded--beyond all expectation.
Your words have found favour with the great man. Those friends, by whose
judgement in such matters he sets most store, have made no attempt to
alter his decision. His wife approves his choice; the steward and the
major-domo have neither of them anything against you. No aspersions have
been cast on your character; all is propitious, every omen is in your
favour. Hail, mighty conqueror, wreathed in the Olympian garland! Babylon
is yours, Sardis falls before you. The horn of plenty is within your
grasp; pigeons shall yield you milk.