It was with some difficulty that Mr Norrell was able to convince Lord Hawkesbury and the Duke of Devonshire that a school would take up far too much time and moreover he had yet to see any young men with sufficient talent to make the attempt worthwhile. Reluctantly his Grace and his lordship were obliged to agree and Mr Norrell was able to turn his attention to a far more agreeable project: that of destroying the magicians already in existence.

The street-sorcerers of the City of London had long constituted a standing irritation of his spirits. While he was still unknown and unregarded, he had begun to petition members of the Government and other eminent gentlemen for the removal of these vagabond magicians. Naturally, the moment that he attained public eminence he doubled and tripled his efforts. His first idea was that magic ought to be regulated by the Government and magicians ought to be licensed (though naturally he had no idea of any one being licensed but himself). He proposed that a proper regulatory Board of Magic be established, but in this he was too ambitious.

As Lord Hawkesbury said to Sir Walter; “We have no wish to offend a man who has done the country such service, but in the middle of a long and difficult war to demand that a Board be set up with Privy Councillors and Secretaries and Lord knows what else! And for what? To listen to Mr Norrell talk and to pay Mr Norrell compliments! It is quite out of the question. My dear Sir Walter, persuade him to some other course, I beg you.”

So the next time that Sir Walter and Mr Norrell met (which was at Mr Norrell’s house in Hanover-square) Sir Walter addressed his friend with the following words.

“It is an admirable purpose, sir, and no one quarrels with it, but a Board is precisely the wrong way of going about it. Within the City of London – which is where the problem chiefly lies – the Board would have no authority. I tell you what we shall do; tomorrow you and I shall go to the Mansion House to wait upon the Lord Mayor and one or two of the aldermen. I think we shall soon find some friends for our cause.”

“But, my dear Sir Walter!” cried Mr Norrell. “It will not do. The problem is not confined to London. I have looked into it since I left Yorkshire …” (Here he delved about in a pile of papers upon a little table at his elbow to fetch out a list.) “There are twelve street-sorcerers in Norwich, two in Yarmouth, two in Gloucester, six in Winchester, forty-two in Penzance! Why! Only the other day, one – a dirty female – came to my house and would not be satisfied without seeing me, whereupon she demanded that I give her a paper – a certificate of competence, no less! – testifying to my belief that she could do magic. I was never more astonished in my life! I said to her, ‘Woman …’ ”