{"product_id":"2940012344816","title":"THE RISE OF SILAS LAPHAM","description":"Good-looking chap, ain't he?\"\u003cbr\u003eWHEN Bartley Hubbard went to interview Silas Lapham for the \"Solid Men\u003cbr\u003eof Boston\" series, which he undertook to finish up in The Events, after\u003cbr\u003ehe replaced their original projector on that newspaper, Lapham received\u003cbr\u003ehim in his private office by previous appointment.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Walk right in!\" he called out to the journalist, whom he caught sight\u003cbr\u003eof through the door of the counting-room.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe did not rise from the desk at which he was writing, but he gave\u003cbr\u003eBartley his left hand for welcome, and he rolled his large head in the\u003cbr\u003edirection of a vacant chair.  \"Sit down! I'll be with you in just half\u003cbr\u003ea minute.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Take your time,\" said Bartley, with the ease he instantly felt.  \"I'm\u003cbr\u003ein no hurry.\" He took a note-book from his pocket, laid it on his knee,\u003cbr\u003eand began to sharpen a pencil.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"There!\" Lapham pounded with his great hairy fist on the envelope he\u003cbr\u003ehad been addressing.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"William!\" he called out, and he handed the letter to a boy who came to\u003cbr\u003eget it.  \"I want that to go right away.  Well, sir,\" he continued,\u003cbr\u003ewheeling round in his leather-cushioned swivel-chair, and facing\u003cbr\u003eBartley, seated so near that their knees almost touched, \"so you want\u003cbr\u003emy life, death, and Christian sufferings, do you, young man?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"That's what I'm after,\" said Bartley.  \"Your money or your life.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I guess you wouldn't want my life without the money,\" said Lapham, as\u003cbr\u003eif he were willing to prolong these moments of preparation.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Take 'em both,\" Bartley suggested.  \"Don't want your money without\u003cbr\u003eyour life, if you come to that.  But you're just one million times more\u003cbr\u003einteresting to the public than if you hadn't a dollar; and you know\u003cbr\u003ethat as well as I do, Mr. Lapham.  There's no use beating about the\u003cbr\u003ebush.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"No,\" said Lapham, somewhat absently.  He put out his huge foot and\u003cbr\u003epushed the ground-glass door shut between his little den and the\u003cbr\u003ebook-keepers, in their larger den outside.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"In personal appearance,\" wrote Bartley in the sketch for which he now\u003cbr\u003estudied his subject, while he waited patiently for him to continue,\u003cbr\u003e\"Silas Lapham is a fine type of the successful American.  He has a\u003cbr\u003esquare, bold chin, only partially concealed by the short reddish-grey\u003cbr\u003ebeard, growing to the edges of his firmly closing lips.  His nose is\u003cbr\u003eshort and straight; his forehead good, but broad rather than high; his\u003cbr\u003eeyes blue, and with a light in them that is kindly or sharp according\u003cbr\u003eto his mood.  He is of medium height, and fills an average arm-chair\u003cbr\u003ewith a solid bulk, which on the day of our interview was\u003cbr\u003eunpretentiously clad in a business suit of blue serge.  His head droops\u003cbr\u003esomewhat from a short neck, which does not trouble itself to rise far\u003cbr\u003efrom a pair of massive shoulders.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I don't know as I know just where you want me to begin,\" said Lapham.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Might begin with your birth; that's where most of us begin,\" replied\u003cbr\u003eBartley.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA gleam of humorous appreciation shot into Lapham's blue eyes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I didn't know whether you wanted me to go quite so far back as that,\"\u003cbr\u003ehe said.  \"But there's no disgrace in having been born, and I was born\u003cbr\u003ein the State of Vermont, pretty well up under the Canada line--so well\u003cbr\u003eup, in fact, that I came very near being an adoptive citizen; for I was\u003cbr\u003ebound to be an American of SOME sort, from the word Go! That was\u003cbr\u003eabout--well, let me see!--pretty near sixty years ago: this is '75, and\u003cbr\u003ethat was '20. Well, say I'm fifty-five years old; and I've LIVED 'em,\u003cbr\u003etoo; not an hour of waste time about ME, anywheres! I was born on a\u003cbr\u003efarm, and----\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Worked in the fields summers and went to school winters: regulation\u003cbr\u003ething?\" Bartley cut in.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Regulation thing,\" said Lapham, accepting this irreverent version of\u003cbr\u003ehis history somewhat dryly.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Parents poor, of course,\" suggested the journalist.  \"Any barefoot\u003cbr\u003ebusiness? Early deprivations of any kind, that would encourage the\u003cbr\u003eyouthful reader to go and do likewise? Orphan myself, you know,\" said\u003cbr\u003eBartley, with a smile of cynical good-comradery.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLapham looked at him silently, and then said with quiet self-respect,\u003cbr\u003e\"I guess if you see these things as a joke, my life won't interest you.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Oh yes, it will,\" returned Bartley, unabashed.  \"You'll see; it'll\u003cbr\u003ecome out all right.\" And in fact it did so, in the interview which\u003cbr\u003eBartley printed.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Mr. Lapham,\" he wrote, \"passed rapidly over the story of his early\u003cbr\u003elife, its poverty and its hardships, sweetened, however, by the\u003cbr\u003erecollections of a devoted mother, and a father who, if somewhat her\u003cbr\u003einferior in education, was no less ambitious for the advancement of his\u003cbr\u003echildren.","brand":"SAP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47069212180720,"sku":"2940012344816","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940012344816_p0.jpg?v=1763567711","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940012344816","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}