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lisher for a lower rate of royalty for the publication of cheap editions, and I have known perfectly reasonable requests of the kind to be absolutely refused, with the result that the public has been deprived of cheap editions of books which it would purchase in considerable quantities, merely because of the author's failure to understand the plain logic of the situation. It would seem sufficiently evident that, the current rate of royalty being based on a relatively high price, if a book is offered at a low price, the rate of royalty to the author must be reduced also. Yet I have. in mind at the moment a work for which a very considerable demand exists in a cheap edition, and for which in the high-priced edition there is practically no sale, but which cannot be published in the cheap edition that the public demands, because of the refusal of the author to reduce the royalty below the original rate of twenty per cent., as provided in the agreement for the publication of the expensive edition of the work.

"In this connection, it seems worth while to offer a protest against the unfounded criticism of publishers and publishing methods which has been so rife in recent years, and which has its origin almost entirely in the failure to obtain adequate sales for books of the classes we have been considering, as a result of the want of confidence on the part of the authors in the good faith or business judgment of publishers, so that authors very often approach the question of arranging with publishers for the publication of their books in an attitude of suspicion, or, at any rate, failing to grasp the actual facts of the situation.

"A publisher of high standing, doing a large business through a long period of time, undoubtedly has built up a machinery and acquired a reputation which are of the greatest possible value to the work of any author, and are almost indispensable for a new author seeking for the first time the presentation of his book to the public. Moreover, in intrusting to a publisher the publication of a book, the author really should exercise more discrimination than in

the selection of a banker to take care of his funds, for the depositor in a bank knows as well as the banker himself the precise amount he is intrusting to the care of another, while the author intrusts to the publisher the unknown earning capacity of his books, and the author must, consequently, rely entirely upon the publisher's good faith and honesty to see that the sums due him are properly and faithfully paid over. Yet, notwithstanding these facts, it is not an uncommon experience with nearly all of the older ublishers to have authors endeavor to drive hard bargains with them for the publication of their works, on the plea that some unknown, new and possibly impecunious publisher has offered a rate of royalty on the publication of a work which, from the established publisher's point of view, is impossible of pavment with pecuniary profit to himself. With some authors, to paraphase Byron's words, it would almost seem as if Death to the publisher to them is sport.'"

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"Current fiction," Mr. Brett goes on to say, has been purposely excluded in the survey of present conditions in the publishing of works in general literature, because the writer feels that not only the publication, but the author's part as well, of the new novel of the day has become highly commercialized. It is said that many of our journals are edited strictly with a view to increasing the receipts from the advertising pages, with what truth I do not know; but it is certain that much of the current fiction is written with a view to supplying just the sort of thrills the public demands. Indeed, I am told that the author of a long series of 'best-sellers,' immediately after a new work of his appears, sits in solemn conclave with his publishers and their editors and advisers, wherein the subject and scenes of his next effort are outlined and voted on, with a keen regard to the supposed dreams and desires of the rising generations of readers. Novels of merit and value, representing honest work and the real convictions of their authors, still, from time to time, make their appearance, but it is seldom indeed

that one of these finds its way into the ranks of the 'six best-sellers.' Their appeal is to that part of the public which still discriminates in its reading, a smaller percentage of the whole, I fear, at present, than in any recent period of our history. One is reminded of the remark of one of our best critics, himself an author of many books well known to lovers of the best literature: 'I should consider myself disgraced if I had written a book which in these days had sold one hundred thousand copies.""

Playwrights must observe the signs of the times, and write plays of the kind that are in fashion. Alfred Sutro declares that there is a fashion in theatrical likes and dislikes just as there is in clothes and whiskers. "Sometimes tears will be much worn during the season," he says, "at others thieves and burglars will be popular; then again, the woman with a past will be all the go, or it may be pajamas will leap into sudden request and every self-respecting manager will hasten to his hosiery department." To embryonic dramatists Mr. Sutro says: "Lay it to your heart, inscribe it over your mantelpiece, the most deadly of all sins that the playwright can commit is to be dull."

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eral of Miss Ashley's poems have been very widely copied.

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George Vaux Bacon, whose story, "The Peace of Sault Saint Francois," was published in the Red Book for April, was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1888. When he was nine or ten years old, while his father was serving as a captain in the Spanish American war. he went to Sault au Recollet, which is upon the Island of Montreal,and is the original of Sault Saint Francois, -and for two years attended Loyola College in Montreal. Coming back to this country he sent for the next seven years to Saint Mary's College, at Saint Mary's, Pottawatomie County, Kansas. At the age of nineteen he took a job as a member of an electrical construction gang building the Indiana steel mills at Gary, Indiana, and from that he went to Cleveland as a reporter for the Cleveland Press. Leaving the Press, Mr. Bacon returned to Gary and worked for a while on the pony desk of the United Press. The wanderlust then overtook him, and he rambled about the country for a year or two, and then for a year and a half made money in the real estate business. He began writing short stories for Art Hoffman of Adventure and Ray Long of the Red Book. He says he also indulged in verse, but was smart enough not to try to sell it, although one of his poems was printed in Current Literature. At present he is dramatic editor of the Green Book in New York, and firmly believes that some day the United States will have a real playwright and a producer with sense enough to produce his plays.

Clarence Budington Kelland. author of the story, "Pieces of Silver," in Harper's Magazine for April, is the assistant editor of the American Boy. He was educated in the public and high schools of Detroit, and received his degree of LL. B. from the Detroit College of Law. He did not, however, practice law, but went to work on the Detroit News as police reporter, and subsequently filled positions there. as sport writer, special writer, political reporter. and Sunday editor. Five years ago he left

newspaper work to take his present place. Mr. Kelland has had fiction published in Harper's Magazine, Collier's, Lippincott's, the Pictorial Review, the Red Book, the Youth's Companion, the People's Magazine, Holland's Magazine, the National Magazine, Young's Magazine, and the New Magazine, as well as in the American Boy. Harper & Brothers will soon issue his juvenile, “Mark Tidd," in book form, and expect later in the year to bring out his novel of Michigan life in the '80's. "Pieces of Silver" will also be issued in booklet form during the year. Mr. Kelland is non-resident lecturer at the University of Michigan and the Washington Normal School on the subject of Juvenile Literature.

Mabel S. Merrill, whose juvenile serial, "The Camp of the Gilt Horseshoe," is concluded in the May number of the Woman's Home Companion, is a writer of stories for children and girls, with only an occasional grown-up tale. She prefers to write stories of the out-of-doors, and even her college girls are sometimes snatched away to the open, where they have adventures by flood and field. As for her younger characters. they are allowed to have a roof over their heads only for conventional reasons, and the roof hardly ever figures in the story. Miss Merrill has been a newspaper woman, and still counts herself a member of the newspaper guild, as she writes sketches regularly for two dailies. She has contributed to a number of distinctly juvenile papers and magazines, to the Youth's Companion, Judge, the Beacon (Boston), and Young People (Philadelphia).

Margaret Widdemer, who had a poem, "A Folk-Song," in Harper's Magazine for April, was born in Doylestown, Penn., but her home is now in Philadelphia. She never attended school, but studied at home, and as a child won several prizes in juvenile competitions. A little more than a year ago she began to sell child verse to St. Nicholas, Little Folks, and other children's and women's magazines. Her first "grown-up" poem was "The Factories,"

which was printed in McClure's for last August, and was noticed as one of the fortytwo best poems of the year by Mr. Braithwaite of the Boston Transcript. Miss Widdemer has also sold poems to Scribner's, Everybody's, the Century, the Craftsman, the Designer, the American, the Poetry Magazine, the Woman's Magazine, and the Magazine-Maker; articles and sketches to the Atlantic, the Century, Satire, and the Woman's Magazine; and stories to Young's Magazine, To-day, and the Forum. Her poem, "The Forgotten Soul," was one of the hundred selected for "The Lyric Year." Miss Widdemer says she always writes things tail-end first, on different pieces of paper, and then cuts the paper up and puts the story or poem together the way it belongs, for, she says, if you wait until the proper place in the story or poem arrives to put down a gorgeous idea, that idea is very likely to get away from you.

PERSONAL GOSSIP ABOUT AUTHORS.

Collins.- When Wilkie Collins had finished The Woman in White" it was still without a name. He appealed to Dickens, with whom he had a warm friendship, for a title which would effectively advertise it to the world."Boz," however, was unable to aid him. Forster was then approached, but, although he was apt in such matters, he could do nothing in this case. Collins was desperate, and one day started for Broadstairs with the determination not to return without a title for the book. For a long time he walked along the cliff, and, finally, as the sun went down, threw himself on the grass. He was facing the North Foreland lighthouse, and half-unconsciously began to apostrophize it: "You are ugly and stiff and awkward, you know; as stiff and as weird as my white woman white woman woman in white-the title, by Jove!" Collins had another interesting experience in connection with the novel. Some time after it had appeared, he received a letter from a lady. She began by congratulating him somewhat coldly upon his

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success, and then said: "But, Mr. Collins, the great failure of your book is your villain. Your Count Fosco is a very poor one, and when next you want a character of that description, I trust that you will not disdain to come to me. I know a villain, and have one in my eye at this moment that would far eclipse anything that I have read in your books. Don't think that I am drawing upon my imagination. The man is alive and constantly under my gaze. In fact, he is my own husband." The lady was the wife of Bulwer-Lytton. -Sewanee Review.

Fielding. While the

very particularly

pure custodians of various public libraries are busily engaged in throwing Fielding's "Tom Jones" into the garbage can it is worth noting that the story was originally accepted for publication upon the advice of a woman. Andrew Millar was the publisher, and after reading the manuscript he handed it to his wife for her opinion, as was the worthy man's invariable custom with the lighter forms of literature. Mrs. Millar praised it highly and advised her husband upon no account to neglect such an opportunity. Mainly on the strength of this advice Millar offered Fielding $3,000 for the manuscript, a large sum as prices then went, but he actually made $90,000 profit from the sale, and out of the goodness of his heart he paid the author an additional $10,000 over and above the original price. — The Argonaut.

Parker. Interesting information about Sir Gilbert Parker's methods of literary work is given in the several prefaces that he has written for the Imperial edition of his works.

"Most of the novels and most of the short stories," he says, were suggested by incidents or characters which I had known, had heard of intimately, or, as in the case of the historical novels, had read of in the works of historians. In no case are the main characters drawn absolutely from life; they are not portraits; and the proof of that is that no one has ever been able to identify absolutely any single character in my books. . . . As will be noticed

in the introductions and original notes to several of my books, I have declared that they possess anachronisms; that they are not portraits of people living or dead and that they only pretend to be in harmony with the spirit of men and times and things. Perhaps in the first few pages of The Right of Way' I came nearer to portraiture than in any other of my books, but it was only the nucleus, if I may say, of a larger development, which the original Charley Steele never attained. In the novel he grew to represent infinitely more than the original ever represented in his short life.

"So far as my literary work is concerned, 'Pierre and His Pepple' may be likened to a new city built upon the ashes of an old which a fire had destroyed. Let me explain While I was in Australia I began a series of short stories and sketches of life in Canada which I called Pike Pole Sketches on the Madawaska.' A very few of them were published in Australia in the Sydney Mail, and I brought with me to England in 1889 about twenty of them to make into a volume. I told Archibald Forbes, the great war correspondent, of my wish for publication and asked him if he would mind reading the sketches and stories before I approached a publisher. His verdict was Those stories, Parker - you have the best collection of titles I have ever known.' He paused. I got to my feet. I understood. To his mind the tales did not live up to their titles. He hastily added : 'But I am going to give you a letter of introduction to Macmillan. I may be wrong.' My reply was: You need not give me a letter to Macmillan unless I write and ask you for it."'"

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Sir Gilbert then goes on to tell how he put the manuscripts in the fire one by one and watched them burn. The next day he stood before a theatrical second-hand shop in Covent Garden. "In the window there was the uniform of an officer of the time of Wellington, and beside it - the leather coat and fur cap of a trapper of the Hudson's Bay Company! At that window I commenced to build again upon the ashes of last night's fire. Pretty Pierre, the French halfbreed, or rather the original of him as I

knew him when a child, looked out of the window at me. So I went home, and sitting in front of the fire which had received my beloved manuscript the night before, with a pad upon my knee, I began to write the story which opens 'Pierre and His People,' called The Patrol of the Cypress Hills.'"

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The idea for the historical novel, The Seats of the Mighty," came, Sir Gilbert says, from a little volume of memoirs : "It was in the winter of 1892, when on a visit to French Canada, that I made up my mind I would write the volume which the public knows as 'The Seats of the Mighty,' but I did not begin the composition until early in 1894. It was finished by the beginning of February, 1895, and began to appear in the Atlantic Monthly in March of that year. It was not my first attempt at historical fiction, because I had written 'The Trail of the Sword' in the year 1893, but it was the first effort on an ambitious scale, and the writing of it was attended with as much searching of heart as enthusiasm. I had long been saturated by the early history of French Canada, as perhaps The Trail of the Sword' bore witness, and particularly of the period of the Conquest, and I longed for a subject which would in effect compel me to write, for I have strong views upon this business of compulsion in the mind of the writer. Unless a thing has seized a man, has obsessed him, and he feels that it excludes all other temptations to his talent or his genius his book will not convince. Before all else he must himself be overpowered by the insistence of his subject, then intoxicated with his idea, and being still possessed become master of his material while remaining the slave of his subject. I believe that every book which has taken hold of the public has represented a kind of self-hypnotism on the part of the writer. I am further convinced that the book which absorbs the author, which possesses him as he writes it, has the effect of isolating him into an atmosphere which is not sleep and which is not absolute wakefulness but a place between the two where the working world is indistinct and the mind is swept along a flood submerging the self-conscious but not

drowning into unconsciousness. Such, at any rate, is my own experience. I am convinced that the books of mine which have had SO many friends as this book, 'The Seats of the Mighty,' has had in the English-speaking world were written in just such conditions of temperamental isolation or absorption. First the subject, which must of itself have driving power, then the main character, which becomes a law working out its own destiny, and the subject in my own work has always been translatable into a phrase. Nearly every one of my books has always been reducible to its title.

For years I had wished to write a historical novel of the conquest of Canada or the settlement of the United Empire loyalists and the subsequent war of 1812, but the central idea and the central character had not come to me; and without both and the driving power of a big idea and of a big character, a book did not seem to me possible. The human thing with the grip of real life was necessary. At last, as pointed out in the prefatory note of the first edition, published in the spring of 1896, I ran across a tiny little volume in the library of George M. Fairchild, Jr., of Quebec, called 'The Memoirs of Major Robert Stobo.' It was published by John S. Davidson of Market street, Pittsburg, with an introduction by an editor who signed himself 'N. B. C.'

"The Memoirs' proper contained about 17,000 words, the remaining 3,000 words being made up of abstracts and appendices collected by the editor. The narrative was written in a very ornate and grandiloquent style, but the hero of the memoirs was so evidently a man of remarkable character, enterprise, and adventure that I saw in the few scattered bones of the story which he unfolded the skeleton of an ample historical romance. There was necessary to offset this buoyant and courageous Scotsman, adventurous and experienced, a character of the race which captured him and held him in leash till just before the taking of Quebec. I therefore found in the character of Doltaire which was the character of Voltaire spelled with a big D-purely a creature of the imagination, one who, as the

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