fashion and thereby, upon things and not _under_ things
articulariously He stands."

"I should laugh if the Governor dropped on him," said Platt. "He'd
never hear him coming."

"The O' Man's drunk with it--fair drunk," said Polly. "I never did.
It's worse than when he got on to Raboloose."



Chapter the Second

The Dismissal of Parsons


I

Suddenly Parsons got himself dismissed.

He got himself dismissed under circumstances of peculiar violence,
that left a deep impression on Mr. Polly's mind. He wondered about it
for years afterwards, trying to get the rights of the case.

Parsons' apprenticeship was over; he had reached the status of an
Improver, and he dressed the window of the Manchester department. By
all the standards available he dressed it very well. By his own
standards he dressed it wonderfully. "Well, O' Man," he used to say,
"there's one thing about my position here,--I _can_ dress a window."