bit, on a holiday, and since I wasn't visiting any crowned heads, and was a bit short on cash, I went, so far as appearance was concerned, somewhat incognito. That is to say, I had a weather-beaten, soft gray hat that was shapeless, a rainmarked raincoat, and the rest of the outfit to match. I rather enjoyed this, however; I could poke around into all sorts of corners without being noticed.

I was greatly surprised, therefore, when a friend of mine brought me an invitation to lunch from a somewhat famous English story writer who was also a member of Parliament and had a Sir on his name. I will call him here Sir John Rogers.

My friend had met Sir John Rogers, and Sir John, on hearing my name, expressed a fervent wish for my friend and me to come around and have a bite on Thursday.

"Well," thought I, swelling up, "miracles do happen. Here's a great one who appreciates my work."

"Informal?" I asked.

"Just lunch," said my friend.

Without the least suspicion, we two plain and simple Americans set forth on Thursday in a misty London rain. I had my gray hat, my rain coat, and all the

fore we could defend ourselves, they had our hats and coats; and before we could explain ourselves, they had propelled us through an opening into a large and sombre living room.

A lady in a massive picture-hat and clothes to match rose from the sofa. I have beheld the scene on the stage, but always took it for a bit of burlesque. Now, before our eyes, it happened. She lifted an arm and let the hand dangle as it wanted to, so that I had to clutch the ends of her fingers; and as she withdrew aforesaid hand, arm, and fingers, she said, in the ultra-est voice of England:

"Beastly weather we're having, don't you think?"

Whether I did or didn't think, I'm not sure. I think I didn't. This was getting too, too, too.... ! And I sat facing that Lady, an American tramp. . . . .

We hadn't noticed that at the far end of the room there were folding doors, shut. But a sudden sound turned our heads in that direction. By unseen means these two huge doors flung apart, and at the same moment, a stiff gentleman in a Prince Albert marched toward us between them, and kept on marching until he actually reached us. Sir John Rogers of the high hand. . . .

By this time my friend and I didn't dare look at each other. If you could translate Charles Evan Hughes into English, with a touch of London fog and a touch of Tory, you'd have something faintly resembling our host. We saw at once that "life is real, life is earnest." We never batted an eyelash, but moved on down that long room, passed through the spacious portal and entered the dining

room.

Here we met the battalion of five who had greeted us at the front door. The leader was passing around the table with a critical eye; the other four stood, one behind each chair. One of these big fellows shoved me in. That was service for you, eh?

was getting perfectly senseless, and only my will-power kept me going.

It takes nerve to face five perfect EngFish servants; and they knew, as my Lord and Lady didn't know, the secret about my gray hat and my rain-washed raincoat. They knew, they knew.

Sir John had good wines. And it was a good lunch, substantial, appetizing, and dainty. And served with precision, silence, and all the rest. But all through it I had the uncanny sense that something was going to happen; perhaps I might meet my friend's eye by accident and we'd explode; or something worse. Wait and see.

Sir John talked ponderously. Neither wine nor our company made the slightest impression upon him. He talked-hmon the duties of the statesman—and ahhm-the responsibilities of Empire-and ah-the fact that never-ah-never could he bear the burden he was bearing-hm -ah-unless his house ran-ah-by clockwork-card-indexed, y'know-and

all that.

"At seven-ah-I rise, shave-ahhave breakfast at 7.30-ah-to the dotah-get to Parliament at-”

I leave it to your imagination. Let it run riot.

But never a word about me; and as I sat there, and sat there, with Sir John voluble and his Lady in a grim and stony silence and my friend invisible to me and the wine at work, the questions began thundering at me: "What can a man like this see in MY work? And is this man a writer? There's a nigger in this woodpile, or I'm a poor guesser."

Then the bolt fell from the blue. We had come as far as coffee, with escape in sight, when Sir John turned to me, and for the first time smiled. I basked in it and began to warm.

"I am so glad to meet you, Mr. Oppenheim," he said with an actual touch of affability, "but I owe you a kind of grudge." He paused; my heart went

pit-a-pat. Then he went on: “One of your books," he said, "kept me awake a whole night on a sleeper. I didn't get a wink of sleep."

I looked at him cautiously. One of my books keep anyone awake a whole night, on a sleeper, or on anything else? How come?

"What was the name of the book?" I asked nervously. “Ah, let me see I have read so many of yours . . . . ah, yes . . . . ah . . . . "The Yellow Crayon'."

....

Ye Gods! And E. Phillips Oppenheim to boot. I feared then that my friend would houl aloud, but if he did, I didn't hear it. My brain spun. Here we'd had a whole luncheon, with five servants, wine, cigars, and in a swell neighborhood. Should I spill the beans? Should I make this man look truth squarely in the face? And if not, what? Did I have the brass to do anything else? Or even the brass to do it? What do they do with imposters in England? Would the five uniformed serving men bounce us out?

I looked at Sir John and gave a sick smile.

"I'm awfully glad," I said, "you liked it. Awfully glad."

My friend heard that, too.

We rose. Sir John hm'd something and ah'd something about his pressing duties. We had some, too. Next, we were in the hall, each in the arms of two Englishmen. On went the coats, ditto the hats. The door shut politely behind

us.

We were out. We were free. We made a sight, a spectacle, and a public nuisance. We howled, doubled, danced, rocked, shrieked, and rolled home.

For all I know, Sir John doesn't know yet. And that dinner, that wine, and the memory of all thereof, including everything as narrated, is all I ever got out of being confused with E. Phillips. It is confusing, isn't it?

I

Fa writer feels depressed because his first novel comes flying back-depressed even though he believes some other publisher will take it-consider the depression of the editorial reader who has, in one afternoon, returned four books which he knows will never be printed except at the author's expense.

A "reader" for magazines need not feel depressed over returns. If a poem is bad, still its author had the joy of a vision of beauty, even if he could not express it. If an article or story is unprintable, still the writer is lucky to be able to get his troubles and ideas off his chest by the easy device of writing them out poorly. He needs no pity.

But a novel, a full-length book, is another matter. It represents, roughly, a year's work, and high hope. It represents weary hours of recopying, or a large bill from a typist. Even its journeys back and forth from publishers are expensive and bothersome. The first reader's heart sinks within him as he reads the first pages of many a voluminous effort. He samples a few more pages taken at random further along in the book-and then the book goes back.

He knows the author would feel outraged if he knew how short a reading the book had, that he would feel the least the publisher could do was to read his book through. But every book read through, even by the first reader, costs the publisher several dollars, and the books received are many every day. A book that is seriously considered-passed through several hands before its rejection-means a dead loss of quite a little money. Publishers are not in business to flatter authors, they read no longer than they have to in order to make sure they do not want to publish the book. In four cases out of five, this is from ten to

twenty minutes. The fifth case may take the rest of the day.

Yes, four out of five books are returned practically unread because no matter how good their ideas, characters, and action, the author has not the skill to get these across. They are returned simply because the English is amateurish.

The difference between professional and un-professional writing is difficult to explain. It is impossible to convince anyone that his English-the English he now uses-is not good enough for a book. He cannot see what is wrong with it. When he will be able to, he will be writing better. Anyone will confess that his early writing was poor, but nobody writes poorly now.

In justice it must be added that there are all degrees of finish in writing and that the distinction between English that is adequate and English that is almost adequate is a very fine one. But though fine, it is important, for clumsy, sloppy English annoys the cultivated reader and distracts his attention from the subject matter.

Plot development, story-technique, character analysis can be taught by books and paid teachers. They are important, but the first test the book must meet is whether or not its English is effective enough to grip the reader's attention to the story. And effective English is not easily or quickly taught. It involves taste, natural aptitude, and usually several years' struggle to write as well as one can. From the effort to say exactly what one means, clearly, briefly, without hackneyed expressions, childish ejaculations, or an overabundance of clauses ending with prepositions, there emerges finally that indefinable and individual thing we call style. It is not

a question of grammar, but of polish, of sureness of touch, in short, of effective

ness.

The lesson is very clear: do not write books until you can write sentences. Use the shorter forms-articles, editorials, reviews, short-stories, until you have fully demonstrated your ability to write printable English. The shorter forms are more manageable to rewrite, than books, and will bring you in a revenue much earlier. Until you can publish easily in the best magazines that carry the type of thing you write, you are not ready to begin your first book.

Also, for the sake of human-kindness discourage those well-meaning, altruistic people who are not writers and do not wish to be, yet feel called upon to write. a book in order to further some worthy cause. There are more of these than anyone knows. Oh, the weary months of fruitless labor that are spent-often by professional people-in an effort to end. war, teach sex-purity, temperance or religion, by the pen. Occasionally one finds a man of affairs who is gifted with a naturally whimsical, finished style, but the great majority must go through the same mill as the professional writer, must spend months writing before they are ready to tackle a book. Usually they could advance their pet cause better by executive work, letting public education through the press come as a result of newspaper accounts of their activities. Usually public speaking is more effective. than writing for an enthusiast who is neither orator nor writer.

Ideally, everyone capable of thinking and feeling deeply should be equipped to express himself in written and spoken form. Education should look after that. In civilizations with a relatively small educated class, this can, and has been, attempted frankly and with some measure of success. In antiquity, rhetoric was the chief branch of education and men of affairs were expected to have some skill as orators and writers. Caesar was not

a "literary" man, but his Commentaries are still read. And a certain Chinese general has attained an immortality that would amaze him because of a single sad little poem in which he laments that his verse is so bad that he feels ashamed to wear the insignia of a general! Plainly he assumed that poetry was expected of a gentleman of war!

England-judging by its manuscripts. -gives its educated class a better command of their native tongue than we give ours. Perhaps the English are greater readers, or read better books. Or perhaps the emphasis laid on literary studies and the classics in the universities is responsible. The English undergraduate is not allowed to smatter over so wide a field as do most American students.

Theoretically, in a democracy, everyone completing the highest free education offered by his community should be able to speak and write well on any subject near his heart. But the ideal is particularly hard to attain in a democracy, since education must be adapted to so many types and situations. At any rate, instead of all our graduates being able to write effectively, hardly any can, and the holders of higher degrees are little better off. Instead we have a class of professional writers-many of whom are not creative but merely report the ideas and activities of non-writers-who by dint of years of effort, after the completion of their formal education, have achieved a degree of mastery over their native tongue and made it their stock in trade. It is this gap between the command of English given in our schools and that attained by professional writers. writers that makes the prematurely written book depressing.

Of course the writing of a book affords plenty of opportunity for practice if you are willing to write several years to your scrap-basket. But if you are not, begin with shorter forms. They save time and postage.

HALL we write novels or short

S stories?

There are a good many angles to the question. Short stories, granting equal quality, pay much better. On the other hand, the novel establishes the reputation of the writer much more firmly. The Author's League Bulletin has recently published an amusing exchange of correspondence on that subject. One writer who claims authorship of a thousand short-stories which have been read by many millions of readers guesses that he is unknown by name to more than a handful of fellow-members in the League. Probably he is right. The authorship of a singie novel of five thousand circulation might have established his name more firmly than all his stories. He might also have sold shortstories subsequently at a higher price.

for the aspiring young writer to bear this in mind. In many ways the novel is excellent discipline for short-story writing, chiefly because its larger scope often develops the writer's powers of good characterization. He has a chance to get acquainted with his characters; he begins to see them more clearly as they travel the longer road-an exceedingly important element in training in fiction writing.

The series of short stories about one chief character or a group of characters has many of the merits of both novel and short-story writing, nor does it limit the author in his development so much as it appears. He does not need to write to a set pattern, but he does need to guard against the temptation to do so. Editorial good-will and reader good-will seems to come much more rapidly to the writer of a series than to the writer of a heterogeneous mass of stories. If a character is good for one story he is good for several.

Certain types of novels, notably westerns and detectives, have a fairly good magazine market as serials. It is well