Excerpt from The Real Lord Northcliffe: Some Personal Recollections of a Private Secretary 1902-1922 My mother died when I was a small child. My father died before my school days should have ended, and I was faced with the problem of earning my living, in addition to having the care of two younger sisters. I think all people have a natural talent for some one thing. I knew mine was for clothes. Without being taught I could design, cut out and make any garment, make it so that not even the sharp eyes of my friends could detect the amateur hand. I was tempting Providence by not utilizing this gift, but my heart wasn't in it. Even in my poorest days I parted with my spare pennies to buy newspapers. I hated to feel after my father's death that I was drifting away from the core of things. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.