"My signature to what?" asked the Bishop in the tone of voice in which people usually say, "Never!" He felt that the interview was ended. A suspicion flashed in his mind that this young man might reply, "To a check!" But he paid H. R. the compliment of instantly dismissing the suspicion. This was, alas! no common impostor.
"To an appeal to New York's better nature," said H. R., enthusiastically. "The masses always follow the classes; if they didn't there wouldn't be classes. Mr. Wyman, of the National Bank of the Avenue, will act as treasurer."
It was the fashionable bank. Stock in demand at seventy-two hundred dollars a share, and all held by Vans.
"Has he—"
"He will," interrupted H. R. so decisively that the Bishop forgot to be annoyed at not being allowed to finish his question. "We shall appeal to all New-Yorkers. Your name must therefore lead the signatures. Much, Bishop Phillipson, depends upon the leader! Of course there will be other clergymen, and leading merchants, and capitalists, and the mayor, and the borough presidents, and the reform leaders, and everybody who is Somebody. They must give the example. Do you not constantly endeavor, yourself, to be an example, reverend sir?"
Before the Bishop could deny this H. R. gave into his hands a book beautifully bound in hand-tooled morocco. The leaves were vellum. On the first page was artistically engrossed: