https://historysoa.com/files/original/5/480/1903-02-01-The-Author-13-5.pdf 1e5aa645c52403b048a7a72e72f53418 PDF Text Text �������������������������� Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource The Author Subject The topic of the resource <em>The Author</em> Description An account of the resource A digitised run of the Society of Authors' monthly periodical, <em>The Author</em>, 1890<span>–</span>1914, made available together for the first time.<br /><br />Currently users can browse issues and <a href="https://historysoa.com/items/browse?search=&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bjoiner%5D=and&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=51&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&amp;advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=Index&amp;collection=&amp;type=&amp;tags=&amp;exhibit=&amp;date_search_term=&amp;submit_search=Search+For+Items&amp;sort_field=Dublin+Core%2CTitle">indices</a> (not available for all volumes). Full text search for all issues, and other additional search functionality, will be added in 2022. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1890–1914 Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context The-Author-Issues Publication Date The date of an event (in YYYY, YYYY-MM or YYYY-MM-DD format) 1903-02-01 Volume 13 Issue 5 Pages Page range in volume 109–132 Ngram Date Version of the date in YYYYMMDD format for use by the Ngram plugin 19030201 Ngram Text Version of the text with no HTML formatting for use by the Ngram plugin Che Hutbor. (The Organ of the Incorporated Society of Authors. Monthly.) FOUNDED BY SIR WALTER BESANT. Vou. XIII.—No. 5d. FEBRUARY {Price SIXPENCE. THE TELEPHONE. —+—»—+ The Telephone connection has now been estab- lished, and the Society’s number is— 374 VICTORIA. —____¢—_<@—__e— NOTICES. eg ee geee T,\OR the opinions expressed in papers that are # signed or initialled the authors alone are responsible. None of the papers or para- graphs must be taken as expressing the opinion of the Committee unless such is especially stated to be the case. Tur Editor begs to inform members of the Authors’ Society and other readers of The Author that the cases which are from time to time quoted in The Author are cases that have come before the notice or to the knowledge of the Secretary of the Society, and that those members of the Society who desire to have the names of the publishers concerned can obtain them on application. ++ — List of Members. Tu List of Members of the Society of Authors can now be obtained at the offices of the Society, at the price of 6d. net. It will be sold to the members of the Society only. 1+ The Pension Fund of the Society. THe investments of the Pension Fund at present standing in the names of the Trustees are as follows. This is a statement of the actual stock; the Vou, XIII. Ist, 1903. money value can be easily worked out at the current price of the market :— Se £816 5 6 ocaloans 6 104 10 0 Victorian Government 3 % Con- solidated Inscribed Stock............ 291 19 11 OWeayi LOAN eh ee 201. 9 3 Motel ese. £1,714> 4.8 SpeciaAL APPEAL. Tur Appeal sent out by the Chairman of the Society at the request of the Pension Fund Com- mittee has been very successful. The list of subscriptions and donations promised and given is set forth below. Further subscrip- tions and donations will be acknowledged as they come in. Subscriptions. Nov. 14, Tuckett, F. F. £1.00 » Cox, Miss Roalfe 0.5 0 » Loynbee, William . 010 6 ,, Anonymous . ‘ : t.07.0 ,, Todd, Miss Margaret, M.D. Le 0 x Pearson, Mrs. Conney 2 2 0 » Seaman, Owen : ; sel 10 ,. Abbot, Rev. Hdwin A., D.D.. 1 0 98 » . Witherby, Rev. C. . : 0 9 0 » Salwey, Reginald E. 010. 0 », Vacher, Francis 1 tO Nov. 15, Parr, Mrs... : Tt 10 » Davy, Mra. EE. : - 010556 , Allingham, William, F.R.CS. 1 1 0 , Armstrong, Miss Frances i. 5 0 Holmes, Arthur H. (condi- tional) ; : Rattray, Alex. : ; : ,, Brodrick, The Honble. Mrs. . Nov. 17, Nisbet, Hume : : : Keene, H. G., C.S.I. : 0 Bayly, Miss A. E. (Edna Lyall) 1 5 Forbes, E. ; : : » Spiers, Victor. : . 7 0 Hon oo ” & ” So ee) ok mba OOF oe oS co o  110 Nov. 17, Kroeker, Mrs. Freiligrath Burrowes, Miss Elsa » Cooke-Taylor, R. W. Noy. 18, Voysey, Rev. Charles : Jones, W. Braunston Anonymous . Salmond, Mrs. Walter . Anonymous . Clough, Miss B. . - Stanton, Miss H. M. s “ Tucas Malet ” Noy. 20, E.G. . Jenkins, Miss "Hadow Morrah, H. A. : Hatton-Ellis, Mrs. . Bertouch, The Baroness de Anonymous Nov. 21, Parr, Miss Olive Nov. 22, Forbes, Lady Helen a Twycross, Miss M. Nov. 24, Smythe, Alfred . Haggard, Mrs. John ” ” oe) ” 2. 9 > Anonymous 5, Dale, Miss Nellie . 5 “ Tresham Quaines” ‘ Nov. 25, Young; W. Wellington . Nov. 26, Young, Capt. Charles Dec. 1, Finnemore, Mrs. . Dec. 3, Caulfield, Miss Sophia Dec. 5, Hecht, Mrs. . 5 Hamilton, Mrs. G. W. », Brinton, Selwyn Dec. 9, Dill, Miss Bessie Dec. 18, Sutherland, Her Grace the Duchess of : Dec. 19, Toplis, Miss Grace . Dec. 22, Anonymous Dec. 29, Seton-Karr, H. Ww. 5 Pike Clement, E. 1903. Jan. 1, Pickthall, Marmaduke » Deane, Rey. A.C. . Jan. 4, Anonymous » Heath, Miss Ida » Russell, G. H. : Jan. 16, White, Mrs. Caroline ,, Bedford, Miss Jessie Jan. 19, Shiers-Mason, Mrs. Donations. Noy. 13, Bullen, F. T.. : : < . Roberts, Morley (an annual subscriber). Nov. 14, Rossetti, W.M. . : » Marshall, Capt. Robert . » Hoyer, Miss . : 3 EHO 8. cooroococoe ooocow ee ee ee OR OF © or e wpoanoournrnrnooH hn ee ee MOANA OMNS CLOUD OO CLOW Ot OL OU OU e COS Orbo pe oe OMNoOo oocouoeo oO oococoo ScooocoocoescooooSoSOASCSOaASoSoSCSOascSooSseseseseoe cooooooo oocoocoe So THE AUTHOR. Nov. 14, Lefroy, Mrs. » Sinclair, Miss May (an annual subscriber) . : » McBride, Capt. E. E. Garnier, Russell Nov. 15, Burchell, Sidney H. » ESpero 2 ; 3 Ceol Medlicott ” » Harker, Mrs. Allen. ,, Banks, Mrs. M. M. ,. Spielmann, M. H. . 5 Garnier, Col. J. », Benecke, Miss Ida . ,» Atton, Henry : Nov. 17, Panter, Rev. C. R.. » Keene, H. G., C.8.1. . », Spielmann, Mrs. M. H. . es Begbie, Harold » Stevenson, J.J. . , Minniken, Miss Bertha M. Nov. 18, From sale of autograph . » Wintle, H. R. ; 5, Brickdale-Corbett, H. M. » Defries, Miss Violet : Nov. 19, Stanton, Miss Hannah M. Warren, Major-General Charles, K.0.M.G. » ‘Lucas Malet” . Nov. 20, Wynne, Charles Whitworth Nov. 22, Skeat, The Rev. Prof. W. W. . Nov. 25, Jacobs, W. W. : : : Young, W. Wellington . Batty, Mrs. Braithwaite . Nov. "26, Cook, OC. H. . . Noy. 27, Gleig, Charles » Harraden, Miss Beatrice Frankland, F. W. , @Auvergne, Mrs. Nov. 28, Sutcliffe, Halliwell Nov. 29, Weyman, Stanley J. 2? Sir Dec. 1, Sanderson, Sir J. Burdon Dec. 2, Trevor- -Battye, Aubyn » Marks, Mrs. . Dec. 9, Moore, Henry Charles Dec. 11, Lutzow, Count , “Leicester Romayne ” Dec. 12, Croft, Miss Lily . Panting, J. Harwood Tattersall, Miss Louisa . Dec. ‘19, Egbert, Henry Dec. 28, Muirhead, James F. Dec. 28, A. 8. ; » Bateman Stringer . : Dec. 31, Cholmondely, Miss Mary 1903. Jan. 3, Wheelright, Miss E. : » Middlemass, MissJean . Jan. 6, Avebury, Lord co ace eocorocoooonwoorn ao wSoooNOrre HPOCOrFRCOMrFOCOOHF Oe OH HOH OCOORANWOH or — WOO WHOUNTHIHOWOMONOrOM Hee eoo°o AIR OoOMMNS a a HOON OUMNUNONOHCORFRMNOCOrF OHS _ e bs oO  oo To LE pial add ITE sd add cone wi BH ral We fD T a sl > THE AUTHOR. 11 Jan. 6, Gribble, Francis. : 010 O FROM THE COMMITTEE. Jan. 13, Boddington, Miss Helen . 010 6 (eee Jan. 17, White, Mrs. Wollaston lot 0 » Miller, Miss BE. T. . Oo 5 40 a first committee meeting of the year was Jan. 19, Kemp, Miss Geraldine 0-10 6 held at the offices of the Society on January The following members have also made subscrip- tions or donations :— Meredith, George, President of the Society. Thompson, Sir Henry, Bart., F.R.C.S. Rashdall, The Rey. H. Guthrie, Anstey. Robertson, C. B. There are in addition other subscribers who do not desire that either their names or the amount they are subscribing should be printed. SPECIAL CONDITIONAL SUBSCRIPTIONS. Mr. Hamilton Drummond, who is a member of our Society, has offered a subscription of £10 for five years, if nine other members of the Society will promise the same contribution before 31st March, 1903. We sincerely hope that sufficient members of the Society will be found to come forward and meet Mr. Drummond’s generous offer, and that before the time expires we may be able to print in the columns of Zhe Author the full list of ten subscribers of the required amount. Subscriptions. Hawkins, A. Hope. : : -£10 0 0 Barrie, J. M.. : : : - 102:0:.0 Drummond, Hamilton ; : ~ 10. 0.0 Wynne, Charles Whitworth : = 10.0 0 Gilbert, W.S. . ‘ : : - £02 0 0 —_+—+— Sir Walter Besant Memorial Fund. THE amount standing to the credit of this account in the Bank is......... £330 38 6 There are a few promised subscriptions still outstanding. The total of these is, roughly, about £4. Thesubscriptions received from July 1st to the date of issue are given below :— Patterson, A. . : : : Sl 1 20 Salwey, Reginald E. ; : j 010 0 Gidley, Miss E. C. 010 0 Nixon, Prof. J. E. 0 7 6 Dill, Miss Bessie 0 5.0 Moore, Henry Charles 0 5 0 Kemp, Miss Geraldine 010 6 Clarke, Miss B. 0 5 0 12th. The Committee had the pleasure of electing thirty-one members. They consider this a very satisfactory and encouraging sign of the continuance of the Society’s prosperity. The names are set out on another page, except in cases where a member expresses any special reason to the contrary. Mr. Edward Rose and Mr. A. W. A Beckett have been re-elected to the Committee, and Sir Henry Bergne, K.C.M.G., C.B., has been elected to fill the place made vacant by the resignation of Mr. Henry Norman. Mr. Norman resigned from the Committee owing to pressure of work, and his inability to give his constant attention to the weighty affairs of the Society. He has, however, consented to give whatever aid he can in his position as a member of Parliament, and still retains his position on the Council. If the Copy- right Law should again come before the House of Commons, the Committee will be glad to avail themselves of his valuable assistance. Sir Henry Bergne, as all members of the Society know, was the representative of England at the Berne Convention, and again at the Paris Con- vention of 1896. He is one of the chief authorities on copyright in England. It is impossible to over-estimate the help he will be able to render to the Committee. It was decided, at the suggestion of Mr. Frampton and the architects of St. Paul’s Cathedral, that the Besant medallion should be set up in bronze, and not in marble as at first suggested. Three cases were under discussion at the meeting. After going carefully through the papers and with the advice of the solicitors of the Society, it was decided to take up one, on behalf of the member, should the matter come to an issue. The Committee regretted that they could not give their support to the other two. —_1+—<— —_ Elections, January 12th, 1903. The following members and associates were elected on January 12th, 1903. Bedford, Miss Jessie Red House, South- bourne, Hants. Silkstone Vicarage, Barnsley. Maynard Lodge, Upper- ton Road, Hast- bourne. Bellamy, Rev. R. L. Blunt, Norman 112 Browne, Tom. Bulkeley-Johnson, (*« Adoc ’’) “ Carlton Carlisle”? . Chartres, Anita Vivanti . Cobbett, Miss Alice M. Dealtry, Mrs.B. (‘‘ Clarice Danvers ””) Dewhurst, R.B.A. Fleet, J. Faithful . Gaye, Wilfrid. Geere, H. Valentine Hailett, Col. W. Hughes («W. H. H.”) Howatson, Miss Nettie . Hutchins, Miss L. Jesse, W. Kingsley, Miss Lucas, St. John W. L. Mackenzie, H. Milecete, Helen (Mrs.) Montgomery, K. L. Perrin, A. Roe, Mrs. (“ George Wemyss ”) Sherrington, Charles 8. “ Stephen Langton ”’ Tonier, Theodore White, Caroline (Mrs.) . Miss Wynford, Richard THE AUTHOR. “ Wollatton,’ Hardy Road, Blackheath, S.E. 1, St. George’s Ter- race, Brighton. c/o T. Cook and Sons, Ludgate Circus. Hansler House, Lewes, Sussex. 56, Bedford Court Mansions, W. Chelmscott, Leighton Buzzard. 79, Eaton Rise, EHal- ing, W. 122, Hill Lane, South- ampton. 2, St. Leonards Road, Ealing, W. The Cottage, Fala, Carnwath, Lanark- shire. 48, Holland Street, Kensington, W. La Martiniére College, Lucknow, India. Keys, Eversley, Winch- field. 25, Langham Mansions, Earls Court Square, S.W. 1, Henrietta Place, Dalkey, Co. Dublin. 5, Hereford Square, S.W. Crane House, Twicken- ham. 16, Grove Park, Liver- pool. 65, May Square, Kew, Victoria, Melbourne, Australia. Bedford Lodge, Whyte- leafe, Surrey. One member alone does not desire publication. $$ —_—_ BOOK AND PLAY TALK. —— R. OSCAR BROWNING has written im- pressions of the visit he paid to Lord Curzon in India, in the form of “ Letters from India,” which are now appearing in King and Country. Mr. Browning is also engaged on a history of the youth of Napoleon I., from his birth to the siege of Toulon, a very interesting and little known period of his life. Mr. Arthur W. Marchmont’s next book, “ By Snare of Love,” is to be serialised in the Hnglish Tilustrated Magazine, and is to start in the April number. Arrangements are in course for its serial appearance in the United States simultaneously. It will be published in volume form on this side by Messrs. Ward, Lock & Co. when the serial has run its course, and in America by a firm who have issued several of Mr. Marchmont’s previous works there. “ By Snare of Love” is a novel of adventure, the scene being laid in Turkey. Mr. Thomas Cobb’s new 6s. novel, “The Intri- guer,” is to be published this month by Mr. Eveleigh Nash. Another novel of his, “The Composite Lady,” will be issued sometime in July by Messrs. Chapman and Hall. Besides placing eight or ten short stories with various magazines, Mr. Cobb has just finished a story for Methuen’s Children’s Series. It is called “The Lost Ball.” Messrs. Methuen have brought out a fresh Indian story by Mrs. F. Penny, called “ A Mixed Marriage.” It deals with the love affairs of a Mohammedan noble and an English lady ; showing that tragedies as well as comedies take place behind the jealously guarded purdah of the harém, and that the course of true love does not run any smoother in the East than in the West. “The Little Colonel,” by Mina Doyle (Mrs. C. W. Young), authoress of “ On Parole,” etc., is just out. The characters in “The Little Colonel” are interesting, and most of them are lovable. For many readers the chief interest of the story will probably centre in the picture of Rottingdean— called Cliffdean in the book. Messrs. Macmillan have recently issued a trans- lation from the French of M. Ostrogorski’s work, “Democracy and the Organisation of Political Parties.” ‘To the translation by Mr. Frederick Clarke a preface is prefixed by the Right Hon. James Bryce, which emphasises the importance and unique character of this study of the modern party system—the organisation of political forces which exists apart from recognised political institutions. Mr. John Davidson’s new comedy, “ The Knight of the Maypole,” consists of four acts in prose and  THE AUTHOR. 113 in verse. Ina prefatory note Mr. Davidson says : “This play was written in 1900, and after various adventures is now published—twenty-five years having come and gone since in ‘An Unhistorical Pastoral’ I first wrote of the Maypole.” We quote the following verses from Mr. Rowland Hill’s “Songs in Solitude and Photographs in Verse,” recently issued by Messrs. Simpkin Marshall :— THE LIBRARIAN. “The volumes ranged about his room Retain the mighty thoughts of man Compressed as in a little tomb : He clasps a life-work in his span. “One wall holds many nations’ brains : The poets grouped fill up a shelf : A folio Shakespeare’s soul contains : The Bible takes an inch itself. ‘He gropes among illustrious minds On great deeds brooding of the dead : Then lonely lifts aside the blinds, And views the vast stars overhead.” In the Hampstead Annual just published (2s. 6d. nett), there is a delightful, personal, and critical paper by Mr. Sidney Colvin on “ Robert Louis Stevenson at Hampstead.” In June, 1874, Steven- son and Mr. Colvin occupied jointly for awhile a set of lodgings in Abernethy House at the corner of Mount Vernon and Holly Place. “Stevenson,” Mr. Colvin tells us, ‘was then in his twenty-fourth year, in the full glow—a glow that mounted some- times near fever heat—of his brilliant and unquiet youth.” It was at this time R. L. S. was elected to the Savile Club. Mr. Colvin’s time and strength are almost wholly taken up with official work ; but we are glad to know, that sooner or later, he means to give us the book on Stevenson—critical and personal-—-which he has had in his mind, and partly on the stocks, for a long time. Certainly it will be an illuminating book. We learn that it is proposed to publish further translations of the works of Friedrich Nietzsche as soon as possible. An edition in eleven volumes—exclusive of the posthumous works— was projected in 1895 by Messrs. Henry in England in connection with the Macmillan Company in America, and arrangements were made for the translation of the volumes under the editorship of A. Tille, Ph.D. Only three volumes were issued however, and the MSS. of five unpublished volumes—now very carefully revised—are in the translator’s hands. Of Nietzsche’s works still to be published (Fisher Unwin), Miss Helen Zimmern is the able translator of two, viz.:; “ Beyond Good and Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future ;’ and “Human all too Human: A Book for Free Spirits,” Vol. I. Those who order copies before- hand will receive them when published at two- thirds of the nett price, which is 8s. 6d. for the larger volumes and 7s. for the smaller ones. Such previous orders should be sent to (1) Miss Helen Zimmern, Palazzo Acciajuoli, Lung Arno, Florence; or to (2) William A. Haussmann, Ph.D., 3,712, Sydenham Street, Philadelphia; or to (3) Thomas Common, 112, George Street, Edinburgh. There was a painfully interesting article in the Daily Chronicle of January 17th trom the expert pen of Mr. Arthur Morrison, entitled “ Winter and Want: East London in the North-East Wind.” It was at the office of the Rev. Peter Thompson (242a, Cable Street, E.), who is administering the Hast-End Relief Fund, that Mr. Morrison began his walk, through regions intimately known to him of old: regions he has so convincingly described in his “ Tales of Mean Streets ” :— “ Those dull little rows of decent houses, every window making its best show to the world, with its mended curtain, its poor little wool mat, its barren flower-pot in faded pink paper. I have watched the tragedy—the slow tragedy, the tragedy of no stirring action—played out, and now playing out, behind many of those quiet little windows—played sometimes to an end too bitter for printed words... . A general impression is best of multitudes of desperate little homes, bared of their moveables, and cold in the grate ; each with a thin-clad father and mother—or perhaps only one of them—striving to the last to fend away the hour when nothing shall be left for the mouths of sick and hungry children; and meanwhile to keep themselves ‘independent.’ ” Mr. E. A. Reynolds-Ball, F.R.G.S., has recently published a capital little book (E. Marlborough & Co.), called “ Practical Hints for Travellers in the Near East.” This companion to the Guide Books contains just the sort of information the average traveller needs to know. The Medical Hints section has been read and approved by a London medical man of high standing. Mr. Ball’s, “ Cairo of To-day,” is in a third edition. This, and his “ Jerusalem,” are issued by A. and C. Black, at 2s. 6d. The annual annotated edition of the “Statutes of Practical Utility,” which is brought out by Mr. J. M. Lely in continuation of “ Chitty’s Statutes ” (Sweet and Maxwell, Limited ; Stevens & Sons, Limited), will appear this year early this month, containing, amongst other important statutes, the Education Act, the Licensing Act, and the Cre- mation Act. There is an “ Additional Note” on the Education Act, and that Act and the Licens- ing Act are followed by Board of Education and Home Office Circulars and Forms respectively.  112 Browne, Tom. Bulkeley-Johnson, (*« Adoc ’’) “ Carlton Carlisle”. Chartres, Anita Vivanti . Cobbett, Miss Alice M. Dealtry, Mrs.B. (‘ Clarice Danvers ’’) Dewhurst, R.B.A. Fleet, J. Faithful . Gaye, Wilfrid . Geere, H. Valentine Hallett, Col. W. Hughes (°W. 1. BH.) Howatson, Miss Nettie Hutchins, Miss L. . Jesse, W. Kingsley, Miss Lucas, St. John W. L. Mackenzie, H. Milecete, Helen (Mrs.) Montgomery, K. L. Perrin, A. Roe, Mrs. (“ George Wemyss ”) Sherrington, Charles 8. “ Stephen Langton ”’ Tonier, Theodore White, Caroline (Mrs.) . Miss Wynford, Richard THE AUTHOR. “ Wollatton,” Hardy Road, Blackheath, S.E. 1, St. George’s Ter- race, Brighton. c/o T. Cook and Sons, Ludgate Circus. Hansler House, Lewes, Sussex. 56, Bedford Mansions, W. Chelmscott, Leighton Buzzard. 79, Eaton Rise, EHal- ing, W. Court 122, Hill Lane, South- ampton. 2, St. Leonards Road, Ealing, W. The Cottage, Fala, Carnwath, Lanark- shire. 48, Holland Street, Kensington, W. La Martiniére College, Lucknow, India. Keys, Eversley, Winch- field. 25, Langham Mansions, Earls Court Square, S.W. 1, Henrietta Place, Dalkey, Co. Dublin. 5, Hereford Square, S.W. Crane House, Twicken- ham. 16, Grove Park, Liver- pool. 65, May Square, Kew, Victoria, Melbourne, Australia. Bedford Lodge, Whyte- leafe, Surrey. One member alone does not desire publication. ——— eS BOOK AND PLAY TALK. —1—<>—+ R. OSCAR BROWNING has written im- pressions of the visit he paid to Lord Curzon in India, in the form of “ Letters from India,” which are now appearing in King and Country. Mr. Browning is also engaged on a history of the youth of Napoleon I., from his — birth to the siege of Toulon, a very interesting and little known period of his life. Mr. Arthur W. Marchmont’s next book, “By — Snare of Love,” is to be serialised in the Hnglish Illustrated Magazine, and is to start in the April number. Arrangements are in course for its serial appearance in the United States simultaneously. It will be published in volume form on this side by Messrs. Ward, Lock & Co. when the serial has run its course, and in America by a firm who have issued several of Mr. Marchmont’s previous works there. ‘“ By Snare of Love” is a novel of adventure, the scene being laid in Turkey. Mr. Thomas Cobb’s new 6s. novel, “The Intri- guer,” is to be published this month by Mr. Eveleigh Nash. Another novel of his, “The Composite Lady,” will be issued sometime in July by Messrs. Chapman and Hall. Besides placing eight or ten short stories with various magazines, — Mr. Cobb has just finished a story for Methuen’s Children’s Series. It is called ‘The Lost Ball.” Messrs. Methuen have brought out a fresh Indian story by Mrs. F. Penny, called “ A Mixed Marriage.” It deals with the love affairs of a Mohammedan noble and an English lady ; showing that tragedies as well as comedies take place behind the jealously guarded purdah of the harém, and that the course of true love does not run any smoother in the East than in the West. “The Little Colonel,’ by Mina Doyle (Mrs. C. W. Young), authoress of “ On Parole,” etc., is just out. The characters in “The Little Colonel” are interesting, and most of them are lovable. For many readers the chief interest of the story will probably centre in the picture of Rottingdean— — called Cliffdean in the book. Messrs. Macmillan have recently issued a trans- lation from the French of M. Ostrogorski’s work, “Democracy and the Organisation of Political Parties.” To the translation by Mr. Frederick Clarke a preface is prefixed by the Right Hon. James Bryce, which emphasises the importance and unique character of this study of the modern party system—the organisation of political forees which exists apart from recognised political institutions. Mr. John Davidson’s new comedy, ‘‘ The Knight — of the Maypole,” consists of four acts in prose and  THE AUTHOR. 113 in verse. In a prefatory note Mr. Davidson says : “This play was written in 1900, and after various adventures is now published—twenty-five years having come and gone since in ‘An Unhistorical Pastoral ’ I first wrote of the Maypole.” We quote the following verses from Mr. Rowland Hill’s “Songs in Solitude and Photographs in Verse,” recently issued by Messrs. Simpkin Marshall :— THE LIBRARIAN. “The volumes ranged about his room Retain the mighty thoughts of man Compressed as in a little tomb : He clasps a life-work in his span. “ One wall holds many nations’ brains : The poets grouped fill up a shelf : A folio Shakespeare’s soul contains : The Bible takes an inch itself. “He gropes among illustrious minds On great deeds brooding of the dead : Then lonely lifts aside the blinds, And views the vast stars overhead.” In the Hampstead Annual just published (2s. 6d. nett), there is a delightful, personal, and critical paper by Mr. Sidney Colvin on “ Robert Louis Stevenson at Hampstead.” In June, 1874, Steven- son and Mr. Colvin occupied jointly for awhile a set of lodgings in Abernethy House at the corner of Mount Vernon and Holly Place. ‘“ Stevenson,” Mr. Colvin tells us, *‘ was then in his twenty-fourth year, in the full glow—a glow that mounted some- times near fever heat—of his brilliant and unquiet youth.” It was at this time R. L. 8. was elected to the Savile Club. Mr. Colvin’s time and strength are almost wholly taken up with official work ; but we are glad to know, that sooner or later, he means to give us the book on Stevenson—critical and personal—_which he has had in his mind, and partly on the stocks, for a long time. Certainly it will be an illuminating book. We learn that it is proposed to publish further translations of the works of Friedrich Nietzsche as soon as possible. An edition in eleven volumes—exclusive of the posthumous works— was projected in 1895 by Messrs. Henry in England in connection with the Macmillan Company in America, and arrangements were made for the translation of the volumes under the editorship of A. Tille, Ph.D. Only three volumes were issued however, and the MSS. of five unpublished volumes—now very carefully revised—are in the translator’s hands. Of Nietzsche’s works still to be published (Fisher Unwin), Miss Helen Zimmern is the able translator of two, viz.: “ Beyond Good and Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future ;’ and “Human all too Human: A Book for Free Spirits,” Vol. I. Those who order copies before- hand will receive them when published at two- thirds of the nett price, which is 8s. 6d. for the larger volumes and 7s. for the smaller ones. Such previous orders should be sent to (1) Miss Helen Zimmern, Palazzo Acciajuoli, Lung Arno, Florence; or to (2) William A. Haussmann, Ph.D., 3,712, Sydenham Street, Philadelphia; or to (3) Thomas Common, 112, George Street, Edinburgh. There was a painfully interesting article in the Daily Chronicle of January 17th trom the expert pen of Mr. Arthur Morrison, entitled “ Winter and Want: Hast London in the North-East Wind.” It was at the office of the Rev. Peter Thompson (242a, Cable Street, E.), who is administering the East-End Relief Fund, that Mr. Morrison began his walk, through regions intimately known to him of old: regions he has so convincingly described in his “ Tales of Mean Streets ” :— “Those dull little rows of decent houses, every window making its best show to the world, with its mended curtain, its poor little wool mat, its barren flower-pot in faded pink paper. I have watched the tragedy—the slow tragedy, the tragedy of no stirring action—played out, and now playing out, behind many of those quiet little windows—played sometimes to an end too bitter for printed words... .. A general impression is best of multitudes of desperate little homes, bared of their moveables, and cold in the grate ; each with a thin-clad father and mother—or perhaps only one of them—striving to the last to fend away the hour when nothing shall be left for the mouths of sick and hungry children; and meanwhile to keep themselves ‘independent.’ ” Mr. E. A. Reynolds-Ball, F.R.G.S., has recently published a capital little book (E. Marlborough & Co.), called “ Practical Hints for Travellers in the Near East.” This companion to the Guide Books contains just the sort of information the average traveller needs to know. The Medical Hints section has been read and approved by a London medical man of high standing. Mr. Ball’s, “ Cairo of To-day,” is in a third edition. This, and his “ Jerusalem,” are issued by A. and C. Black, at 2s. 6d. The annual annotated edition of the “ Statutes of Practical Utility,’ which is brought out by Mr. J. M. Lely in continuation of “ Chitty’s Statutes ” (Sweet and Maxwell, Limited ; Stevens & Sons, Limited), will appear this year early this month, containing, amongst other important statutes, the Education Act, the Licensing Act, and the Cre- mation Act. There is an “ Additional Note” on the Education Act, and that Act and the Licens- ing Act are followed by Board of Education and Home Office Circulars and Forms respectively.  114 Mr. Cecil Clarke, author of “An Artist’s Fate,” “Tove’s Loyalty,” etc. etc, has commenced another novel on somewhat romantic lines, but in consequence of other claims upon his time, it cannot be finished yet awhile. Mr. Clarke is a regular contributor to The Philanthropist, and reprints of his contributions are frequently ordered. “ Alsatian Tales,” by Madame Jean Delaire, illustrated by Alfred Touchemolin (Sands & Co.), is a volume of short stories or sketches. There are four of them: “Mademoiselle Beaux Yeux,” a schoolroom tragedy; “The Deserter,” a frontier incident; “ Pro Patria,” an episode ; and “Vive la France,” a reminiscence. They are strongly French in sympathy, breathing a fervid patriotism. “A Romance of the Nursery,” by Mrs. L. Allen Harker, is a charming story about children. here are some good illustrations by Katherine M. Roberts. It is published by Mr. John Lane. Though, unfortunately, rather late in the day, we are glad to acknowledge a South African Christmas Annual called “Silver Leaves” (1s.), edited by Mr. W. H. Stokes, a member of this Society. The illustrations are very good indeed, the complete panorama of Cape Town being especially interesting. “Silver Leaves” is a small volume of South African views well worth buying. We wish Mr. Stokes’ Annual a long and hardy life. John Oliver Hobbes’ “School for Saints” has just been issued in a cheap sixpenny edition by Mr. T. Fisher Unwin. We understand that Sir Charles Wyndham hopes to open his new theatre in St. Martin’s Laneaboutthe middle of this month. “ Rosemary” is the play chosen for the first performance, and the receipts are to be devoted to charity. A new operatic and dramatic society, to be called “The Londoners,” is being formed. It is to produce comic operas and musical comedies from time to time at some London theatre for quite short periods. The proceeds will go to charities, It seems that “Iris” has been doing very well financially in America. If Mrs. Patrick Campbell can secure a New York theatre she will probably produce a series of Shakespearian and Sardou plays under her own management. THE AUTHOR. PARIS NOTES. — 1 2 1 Profonde” is the title of M. Paul Bourget’s new novel. In the first chapter the author explains his title, and with his usual analytic method proceeds to discuss the meaning of the proverb “Still waters run deep,” as rendered by the English, the French and the Italians, and, strangely enough, it is the English version which the French author adopts for the title of his book. “ Chez les Anglais,” we are told, “l’esprit réaliste saccompagne de la plus solitaire, de la plus méditative réverie—l’Anglo-Saxon est durement brutal quand il est brutal, étrangement songeur quand il est songeur.” After this introduction one might expect some further reference to the English in the novel, but nothing could be more absolutely un-English than the whole story from beginning toend. The eternal theme once more, of which even Parisians are at last getting weary! There is nothing very original even in the plot itself, with its inevitable accom- paniments in the way of clandestine rendezvous, anonymous letters, and the discovery by one of the principal characters of the fact that he is not the son of the man he has been taught to call father. In all this there is nothing very new, so that the charm of the book is due simply to the skill of the analyst. “a Princesse Errante,” by Léon de Tinseau, is a very readable novel. The subject as it happens is quite apropos, for it is the romantic history of a Crown Prince and the tribulations of his daughter, the wandering princess. The book is full of incident, and the description of life in the various countries mentioned is most curious and interesting. The second volume of Barbey d’Aurevilly’s literary criticisms, ‘‘ Le Roman Contemporain,” has just been published, and will no doubt be read by all who appreciate the great novelist’s own works of fiction. As a critic Barbey d’Aurevilly was by no means merciful. His ideals were high, and the modern realistic and materialistic schools did not appeal to him. His judgment of Zola’s work is scathing. “ Zola,” he says, “n’a point d’idéal dans la téte et, comme son siécle, il aime les choses basses eb ne peut s’empécher d’aller a elles. Tout ce qui répugne le fascine. . . . “ Quand de pareilles choses se lisent et ont du succes, il n’y a plus de critique a faire. Il y a une page de moeurs et d’histoire a écrire sur la société qui les lit.” Later on he says: “Ily a toujours dans tout grand artiste une hauteur originelle et une pureté de génie qui dédaigne de toucher a ces = THE AUTHOR. 115 choses honteuses dans lesquelles l’auteur de ]’Assom- moir ne craint pas de plonger sa main. . . . Ces réalistes qui s’accroupissent ou se trainent sur le ventre pour ramasser les moindres poussiéres, trou- vent Dieu et lime des réalités trop menues pour daigner les voir et s’en occuper ; et ils ne se doutent pas que l’absence de Dieu et de l'ime dans une ceuvre humaine fait un vide par lequel, quand on en aurait, s’en va le génie,— et méme le talent!” Among the other authors whose works are criti- cised in this volume are Octave Feuillet, Flaubert, Daudet, Fabre, Richepin, Catulle Mendés, Huys- mans and the de Goncourts. Very far-seeing was d’Aurevilly, for after criti- cising Huysmans’ “ A Rebours,” he says that he is tempted to say to the author, as he did to Baudelaire: « Aprés ce livre il ne vous reste plus, logiquement, que la bouche du pistolet ou les pieds de la croix.” Both Baudelaire and Huysmans chose the latter. Then, too, d’Aurevilly saw more clearly than the author of “ Renée Mauperin” that this novel, which the de Goncourts intended to be strictly realistic, was “un livre d’imagination exquis.” Renée herself says d’Aurevilly was ‘‘an absolutely imaginary creation,” although in the preface the author says he has endeavoured to “peindre la jeune fille moderne avec le moins d’imagination possible.” The first part of Paul Friedmann’s book, “ Anne Boleyn,” bas just been translated into French, and most interesting it is, not only as a character study of Henry VIII., Catherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn, but also on account of the picture which the historian gives us of London in the first half of the sixteenth century. The population of the capital of Great Britain at that time was 90,000, whilst Paris had 400,000 inhabitants. The houses in London were no higher than two storeys, and were surrounded with gardens. The commerce was almost entirely monopolised by foreigners. The King’s revenue was a sixth of that of the King of France, and a tenth of the Sultan’s. The hypocrisy and the untruths of Henry VIII. in his dealings with the Pope and the clergy are specially dwelt on by the historian, who declares that Macchiavelli himself would have been disgusted with such a liar and impostor. He speaks, too, of the courage of the nation in refusing to acknowledge Anne Boleyn as Queen, and we are told that when in Church prayers were offered up for her as the new sovereign, the congregation left the building in a tumult. The ‘‘ Journal du Dr. Prosper Meniére” should be read by all authors, for never has there been a more enthusiastic and sincere admirer of literary men and their work than this doctor of the Second Empire. Prosper Meniére was born in 1799, and during the year of the famous July Revolution he must have alleviated the sufferings of hundreds of his wounded countrymen. Later on he was appointed medical attendant to the Duchess of Berry, when she was in the fortress of Blaye under the guard of General Bugeaud. He knew personally a great many of the celebri- ties of his times, and he tells us in his memoirs of the Chancelier Pasquier, who had seen eleven changes of government. He was born during the reign of Louis XV., and had then seen Louis XVI., the Convention, the Directoire, Napoleon L., Louis XVIII., Charles X., Louis Philippe, the Republic of *48, the Presidence, and then the Empire. Nine out of the eleven changes of govern- ment had been brought about by a revolution. Dr. Meniére might have told us many interesting details about the political celebrities he knew, but with a few rare exceptions, he preferred jotting down notes about his acquaintances in the literary world. Jules Janin, Lamartine, Gautier, Jules Sandeau, Scribe, de Girardin, M. 'Thiers, and a host of others he mentions, and in many cases tells us some anecdote or speech of theirs which had interested him. Very amusing is his account of Alexandre Dumas describing the Battle of Waterloo before certain generals who happened to have been on the field themselves, and who ventured to correct some of the statements the novelist was making. “What you say is quite new to us,” they declared, “and we were present at Waterloo.” ‘Oh, you could not have seen this, then,” said Dumas, con- tinuing his description so graphically, that at the end the generals began to think he must be right after all. For all who delight in legends, “Le Folk Lore de la Beauce et du Perche,” by M. Félix Chapiteau, will be found most captivating. Among recent illustrated editions are two series of books which are marvels of art. The one is entitled ‘ Les Grands Artistes,” and is published under the direction of M. Roger Marx, Inspecteur au Ministere des Beaux Arts. Hach number con- tains 128 pages and 24 engravings. The volumes already published are Raphaél, Albert Diirer, Wat- teau, and Léonard di Vinci. ‘The other series is entitled “ Les Villes d’Art Célébres,” and of these Venise, Paris, Bruges et Ypres, Gand et Tournai, have appeared. There are 100 to 140 engravings in each volume. The text is by men who are considered authorities on the subject they undertake, and the idea of the latter series is ‘to connect the present life of each city with its historic past, and give us the opportunity of knowing its artistic riches.” A very fine édition de luxe of “La Dame de Monsoreau,” by Alexandre Dumas, has just been brought out. There are 250 wood-cuts by J. Huyot and  116 Maurice Leloir. The price of the two volumes is £2, and with a special binding, £3. Comte Robert de Montesquiou has arrived in America, and was entertained almost immediately by Miss Elisabeth Marbury, who has done so much for French literature in the United States. It is as a missionary of literature that M. de Montes- quiou has undertaken this voyage, and he is to give some eight or ten lectures during his tour. Among the authors of whom he will speak are Marceline Desbordes Valmore, Barbey d’Aurevilly, Leconte de Lisle, Verlaine, and Ernest Hello. The Académie founded by the Goncourt brothers has held its first assembly. Its members are MM. Huysmans, Mirbeau, Rosny, Hennique, Paul Mar- gueritte, G. Geoffroy, all of whom were chosen by M; de Goncourt. The members elected since his death are MM. Léon Daudet, Elemir Bourges, and Lueien Descaves. The journal Gil Blas has made a fresh start with M. Périvier (formerly of the Figaro), and M. Ollendorff, the well-known publisher, as directors. The quantity of new pieces this winter is alarm- ing, and the critics have been occupied with first nights. “Théroigne de Méricourt” is certainly a success. The mise en scéne is excellent, as every detail is exact. The first act takes place in Vienna in 1791. Théroigne has been arrested for revolutionary proceedings, and is released by the emperor. The second act is at the Tuileries, and Louis XVI. appears. It is only a few hours before he leaves the palace with his family. The next two acts are also at the Tuileries. The king is a prisoner, and Théroigne incites the crowd to the murder of Francois Suleau. The Swiss guards are massacred and the palace invaded, when Captain Bonaparte appears. In the last act, Théroigne is imprisoned in a cage at the Salpétriere. Sieyés comes with two of the court ladies to visit the establishment, and Théroigne is brought out of her cage. In an eloquent monologue she evokes the grand days of the Revolution. She is supposed to have lost her reason, but she is quite lucid in her bitter re- proaches as she points to the spectres of the victims who have perished for their ideas. So gruesome is the scene that the Abbé Sieyes rushes away in terror as the curtain falls, Sarah Bernhardt is very fine in this ré/e, which suits her,admirably. The play itself is a fine piece of literature, but, as in most historical subjects, a certain liberty has been taken with facts. M. Pierre Decourcelle is one of the most prolific of writers. A long serial of his has not long ago finished in one of the daily papers, and another, ‘* Les Deux Frangines,” has just commenced. His play, “Le Chien du Régiment,” is now having THE AUTHOR. great success at the Gaité. “La Meilleure Part,’ in which he collaborated with Pierre de Coulevain, is soon to be put on at the Vaudeville by Madame Réjane, and now he is writing “ Werther” for Madame Sarah Bernhardt. “ Le Secret de Polichinelle”’ has taken very well at the Gymnase, but “ La Chatelaine,” by M.Capus, is certainly the piece that seems likely to have the longest run this winter. Auys HaLLARD. a LITERARY, DRAMATIC, AND MUSICAL PROPERTY. ee I, Publishers and Copyright. CORRESPONDENCE took place recently in the literary supplement of the 7imes, which illustrated well the attitude of unscrupulous publishers and proprietors of periodicals towards their occasional contributors, while it called attention to a particular variety of their methods. The method in question was thus described in the original letter, signed “ Author.” “Qn the backs of cheques certain publishers print a receipt form which the author is requested to sign, whereby he acknowledges the receipt of so much money in respect of ‘copyright’ sold to the publisher. On the face of the cheque is usually the announcement that the cheque will not be cashed unless the receipt at the back is signed.” On a subsequent date Mr. Herman Cohen, a barrister, discussed the purely legal questions involved, being of opinion that the document described not being an unconditional order to pay is not a cheque and need not be honoured by the banker, while he further considered that a cheque not being legal tender need not in any case be accepted as payment by the author. The secretary of the Society of Authors followed with some suggestions as to the practical aspects of the case, and pointed out that the way of dealing de- scribed is resorted to in the publication of books where an agreement has only been made for their production in consideration of a royalty, as well as in the more frequently occurring instances where a short story or article has been accepted by the editor of a newspaper or magazine. The law of the case in so far as it relates to the authors and their customers has been dealt with by Mr. Cohen. It is technical, not easy for laymen to follow, and not entirely free from doubt to lawyers. There can be no doubt, however, that the law will not compel an author to accept a pay- ment given conditionally on his entering into a  Ae. Se et OW Sw Se DO. Ge re Bln oe ee Sy a ce OO OS ee | Gf a THE AUTHOR. fresh contract, differing from one which he has already made, and in respect of which money is already due to him. He would act unwisely, as Mr. Cohen points out, in deleting the obnoxious receipt, and trying to cash the cheque without it, but it is to his advantage that a cheque in some form should have been sent tohim. It is evidence that a sum is due to him, although not perhaps evidence that the sum on the cheque is owing, because the publisher will say (in a case where no sum has been agreed upon) “I made the cheque out according to my usuai rate when I buy the copyright,” and if he sends another cheque for the serial rights only, will send a smaller one. It is submitted, therefore, that the author, dis- satisfied with a cheque in the form described, can do little else than send it back with a request for another not so added to, saying courteously, but clearly, that he has not agreed to sell, and does not desire to sell, the copyright of his article. Inany correspondence which may follow he will be able to take up a strong position and to point out that ata hearing of the case, should legal proceedings arise, he will call for the production of the returned cheque as evidence. This will, however, probably mean a quarrel with that particular publisher or magazine proprietor, and the future exclusion of the author’s work by him; in other words, the narrowing of the author’s market. In this the strength of the buyer of the author’s wares lies. The supply is large enough for his purpose ; he, the buyer, has the money, and the author usually wants to sell. Mr. Thring, in the letter referred to, urged that the publisher or editor should, in making an offer, state whether he desires to purchase the copyright or not. No doubt he should, and this whether the subject has been mentioned already or not. But, on the other hand, it may be suggested that the author makes the first move as a rule by sub- mitting his work unsolicited, and that the person opening the negotiations is the party on whom it is incumbent to state what it is he desires. It is for authors and editors of experience to say whether the insertion of a printed slip or letter- heading with every manuscript sent in the manner indicated would be useful in obtaining a clear understanding, or would be liable to diminish the likelihood of acceptance. Such a heading might run as follows: “The article herewith is offered for publication in the magazine only, with- out transfer of copyright.” As a rule minor authors make no attempt such as this to protect themselves. In his ordinary dealings the author, not being one of established position, forwards to the editor of a magazine or newspaper, a manu- script of a short article or story with a covering letter which does not define the right that he 117 offers. The editor often accepts only by having the contribution printed, sometimes, but not always, forwarding a proof before publishing it. When payment is sent, if it is sent at all without being asked for, the condition of sale of copyright appears for the first time. It is submitted that in such a deal the transaction only amounts in fact to the offer and acceptance of the article for publi- cation in the ordinary way in the periodical to which it has been sent. In the case of more Important works a different course of dealing is followed, and the negotiations ought to raise the question of the disposal of copyright at an early stage, and usually doso. It is in the smaller trans- actions that the point discussed in the literary supplement of the Times arises, and they are often transactions so small that they hardly seem, at the time at all events, worth fighting over. In these the attitude of the author must depend on his inclination and power to fight for his rights. The publisher and editor are not likely to mend their ways for the asking, and the banker may with Justice say, that as far as he is concerned at all, his interests coincide with those of the man whose doubtless substantial account is entrusted to him. Cases of the kind indicated involve, to a large extent, questions of fact rather than of law, but perhaps some day a good typical instance involving the practices alluded to above may be taken up and fought by the Society of Authors. Such a case might help to define the law on the subject, and also to indicate the kind of view likely to be adopted by juries as to the questions of fact. The conclusions arrived at, both as to law and fact, could hardly fail to be useful to authors. HE. A. A. ee IL. American Publishers and the Nett System. [From Zhe American Author. ] a E give below a complete list of the members of the American Publishers’ Association. This list includes all publishers whose names are generally known to the book trade and to the reading public. It is now more than two years since the American Publishers’ Association was organised. During that time it has practically reorganised the general trade of publishing and selling books. Under the nett-price system new copyrighted books are no longer used to advertise bargain counters for dry goods stores. It was found by experience that the great majority of new copyrighted books were 118 being killed by this means before they were fairly on the market, and before they had an opportunity to test public favour. In this manner the property of both authors and publishers was being de- stroyed in order to build up the business of dry goods stores. All authors have ample reason for congratulation that this beneficent measure has been put into operation and is being rigidly enforced. The essential principles upon which the reform of the American book trade is established are practically the same as those adopted in Germany in 1887, which have restored the German book trade to a basis satisfactory to all concerned. The same principles have been adopted by the book trade in Austria, Belgium, England, France and Switzerland with excellent results. What has been described as the major premise upon which the reform of the American book trade is founded, isan agreement upon the part of all of the leading booksellers of the country, not to buy, not to put in stock, nor to offer for sale, the books of any publisher who declines to co-operate in the reform movement by joining the American Publishers’ Association; and, on the other hand, the publishers agree not to sell their books to any dealer who fails to maintain the established nett prices. It is understood that since October 1st all mem- bers of the American Booksellers’ Association, com- prising all of the leading booksellers of the country, have discontinued handling the books of all pub- lishers still remaining outside of the American Publishers’ Association. This fact should not be lost sight of by authors seeking to arrange for the publication of their manuscripts, if they desire to give their books any possibility of success. List or MEMBERS OF THE AMERICAN PUBLISHERS’ ASSOCIATION. Henry AltemusCo., Philadelphia, Pa. ; American Baptist Publication Society, Philadelphia, Pa. ; American News Co., New York, N. Y. ; D. Apple- ton and Co., New York, N. Y.; A. C. Armstrong, New York, N. Y.; Arnold and Co., Philadelphia, Pa.; Baker and Taylor Co., New York, N.Y.; A. S. Barnes and Co., New York, N. Y.; Drexel Biddle, Philadelphia, Pa. ; The Bowen-Merrill Co., Indianapolis, Ind. ; Albert Brandt, Trenton, N. J.; Brentano’s, New York, N. Y.; John S. Brooks and Co., Boston, Mass.; The A. L. Burt Co., New York, N. Y. ; The Century Co., New York, N. Y.; C. M. Clark Publishing Co., Boston, Mass. ; The Robert Clarke Co., Cincinnati, O.; H. T. Coates and Co., Philadelphia, Pa. ; Thomas Y. Crowell and Co., New York, N. Y.; G. W. Dillingham Co., New York, N. Y.; Dodd, Mead and Oo., New York, N. Y.; Doubleday, Page and Co., New York, N. Y.; E. P. Dutton and Co., New York, N. Y. ; THE AUTHOR. Dana Estes and Co., Boston, Mass. ; The Federal Book Co. New York, N. Y.; Funk and Wagnalls Co., New York, N. Y.; Charles E. Goodspeed, Boston, Mass. ; Harper and Brothers, New York, N. Y.; Herbert Publishing Co., Washington, D.C. ; A. J. Holman and Co., Philadelphia, Pa. ; Henry Holt and Co., New York, N. Y.; Home Publishing Co., New York, N. Y.; Houghton, Mifflin and Co., Boston, Mass. ; Geo. W. Jacobs and Oo., Philadelphia, Pa.; Jamieson-Higgins Co., Chicago, Ill. ; John Lane, New York, N. Y.; Lee and Shepard, Boston, Mass. ; J. B. Lippincott Co., Philadelphia, Pa.; Little, Brown and Co., Boston, Mass.; Longmans, Green and Co., New York, N. Y.; The Lothrop Publishing Co., Boston, Mass.; McClure, Phillips and Co., New York, N. Y.; A. CO. McClurg, Chicago, Ill.; The Mac- millan Co., New York, N. Y. ; National Publishing Co., Philadelphia, Pa. ; Thos. Nelson and Son, New York, N. Y.; New Amsterdam Book Co., New York, N. Y.; Open Court Publishing Co., Chicago, Ill.; Outlook Co., New York, N. ¥.; Oxford University Press, New York, N. Y.; L. C. Page and Co., Boston, Mass. ; Penn Publish- ing Co., Philadelphia, Pa.; James Pott and Co., New York, N.Y.; Presbyterian Board of Publica- tion and Sabbath School Work, Philadelphia, Pa. ; G. P. Putnam’s Sons, New York, N. Y.; Fleming H. Revell Co., Chicago, New York and Toronto ; R. H. Russell, New York, N. Y.; Charles Scrib- ner’s Sons, New York, N. Y.; Small, Maynard and Co., Boston, Mass. ; Frederick A. Stokes Co., New York, N. Y.; H. 8. Stone and Co., Chicago, Il. ; J. F. Taylor and Co., New York, N. Y.: HOB: Turner and Co., Boston, Mass. ; United Brethren, Publishing House, Dayton, 0. ; D. Van Nostrand Co., New York, N. Y. ; Vir Publishing Co., Phila- delphia, Pa. ; Frederick Warne and Oo., New York, N. Y.; A. Wessels Co., New York, N. Y.; Thomas Whittaker, New York. N. Y.; W. A. Wilde Co., Boston, Mass.; John Wiley and Sons, New York, N. Y. ; John C. Winston Co., Philadelphia, Pa.; E. and J. B. Young and Co., New York, N. Y.; Clinton S. Zimmerman, New York, N. Y. —_—_—_—_——_+—>—_+___—_ RESUME OF BOOKS PUBLISHED IN THE PAST YEAR. t+ — (Reprinted from Zhe Publishers’ Circular, by kind permission of the Editor.) PY HE total number of books recorded in 1902 T is slightly above that of 1900, nearly two hundred below 1899 and 1898, more than five hundred below 1897, just eight hundred above 1896, and a thousand above 1901 ; but about five  THE AUTHOR. hundred of that one thousand were “ Miscellaneous” —chiefly pamphlets at a few pence each—and about two hundred and fifty were sixpenny fiction. If up in number, the books of 1902 are down in value compared with those of 1901. The number under “ Miscellaneous” is almost the same as in 1898. In Fiction the number is almost the same as in 1898, slightly above 1900 and 1896, but below 1897 and 1899. In six other subjects the increase is not large ; in the case of Theology it is partly due to the issue of pious pamphlets and of sermons, and in that of Politics and Trade to publication of political skits and economical tracts. In History and Biography the numbers were almost 119 the same in 1901 and 1902—five hundred and thirty-one, five hundred and thirty-seven ; in Medicine precisely the same, two hundred and thirty-seven, which is lower than in 1900. Law books and Educational publications in 1902 show a falling off, the number being lower than in either of the previous six years. In Travel it is almost the same as in 1896, 1897, 1899, 1901, forty-four lower than in 1900. Belles-Lettres show almost the same number as in 1897, much less than in 1900 and 1901. The number of Year Books is almost the same as in 1897 and 1900. In the Drama and Poetry the number is higher than in 1901, lower than in the five previous years. | | | | | | loge 8 a : B po iS So-a° Subjects. BS e 5 | 43 | a x 2 = lees. 3 2 ee : 3 Ze g | 3 5 & |238.38 Se eee Ee Pe ee Ee ees ee se (| a 44 Psp 39 | ve 59 28 26 31 30 | ee 19 68 | 567 1. Theology, Sermons, Biblical ... a7 9 6 q Bo 7 | 1 10 10 Si | 648 2, Educational. Classical, and \| @ 56 OB e471 33 lo 38 |< 304) 82) 41 29 | 50 | 50 | 6b | 504 Philological... ... -- J) 211 7 8 1 6 5 31. 4 7 > 6 5 | 68 | 572 8, Juvenile Works and Tales, )| q 52 | 105 | 96 | 134 | 142 | 65} 58 | 126 | 132 | 807 | 301 | 225 1743 ies) Tales, and other j HG} G0 | be | 6b | 84 | bf] by | bl | 41 | 91 | 91 | 46 | 72% iction ie. oe ive 2470 a 6 12 9 17 9 3 3 5 4 2 9 88 4. Law, Jurisprudence, Xc. $ { b 3 3 8 5 4 4 2 3 ge 1 6 71 46 — 134 Sei and Social Econoiny,) 2 26) 42) 88) 44} 65) 28 | 95) 30) 88 30 | 44} 49 | £63 a 8 | | | ye, — 5 6. Arts, Science, and Illustrated )| 4% 31 22| 36| 43| 45 | 38] 25} 28| 27/ 33 | 40| 52 | 420 Works ee ac vey ee 2 2 3 a 3 2 4 3 8 1 T | 44 464 7, Voyages, Travels, and Geo- )| @ 8) 11; 10 8} 27] 13) 22 14 9 7 | 13} 20 162 graphical Research ... oo 2 1 3 3 3 t 9 3 3 2 1 8s 200 : : a 30 41 41 35 56 38 29 17 31 33 55 74 | 480 8. History, Biography, &c. i i bd: 3 q 9 3 7 3 6 2 1 4 4 8 | 57 537 (| @ 25 14 24 22 16 17 15 16 14 39 28 42 | 272 9. Poetry and the Drama “116 6 6 Sie 1s 7 4 5 5 5 i 9 6 | 76 —— 348 10, Year-Books and Serials in }| ¢ 66 | 21 7 7 B18, 2) 20) 2h) 53 | 96 | 75) wee Vv ae Cee el me oe lee | ee ee olumes ) 408 . Joe 7) og] 22) 2] Tee} 1 | 6) 14} 20 | 168 11. Medicine, Surgery, &c. oe 1b 5 q Q| 13 8 A: 4 3} 10 9 8 | 1) 84 —— 237 12, Belles-Lettres, Essays, Mono- || @ 19 7} 19 81) M ? Bite Bhs ee _ oe gape he ca ae de? 2 4 4 2 : ae I 2 ‘ O71 13. Miscellaneous, includin 426) 301 28 | 24) 81 24) 30] 27 32 35 | 389 31 352 Pamphlets, not Sermons = } bi) 14) 26) 10) Ba | 4) MY AB arp dy 18 | Ae poses — - 499 492 | 516 | 543 | 606 | 702 | 445 | 439 | 467 | 491 | 876 | 910 | 894 an a New Books; b New Editions. THE AUTHOR. The Analytical Table is divided into 13 Classes; also New Books and New Editions. Divisions. Theology, Sermons, Biblical, &c. Educational, Classical, and Philological Novels, Tales, and Juvenile Works Law, Jurisprudence, &c. Se — eae <n Political and Social Economy, Trade and Commerce Arts, Sciences, and Illustrated Works ‘ Voyages, Travels, and Geographical Research History, Biography, &c. 3 a Poetry and the Drama ... ru, ee Year-Books and Serials in Volumes ... Medicine, Surgery, &e. ... ers ne Belles-Lettres, Essays, Monographs, &c. Bae noe Miscellaneous, including Pamphlets, not Sermons ... 1901. | 1902. New Books. New Editions. New Books. New Editions, ee eee | 441 78 | 567 81 541 qT. 504 68 1,513 479 1,743 127 109 37 88 46 351 104 463 130 310 28 420 44 174 | 30 162 38 438 98 480 57 202 60 | 272 76 844 408 _ 169 68 153 84 293 32 227 : 44 70 8 352 147 4,955 1,089 5,839 1,542 4,955 5,839 6,044 | 7,381 THE DISTRIBUTION OF BOOKS. ee HE question of the Distribution of Books 1 is one that deserves much more attention than is usually given to it. It is compara- tively easy for a publisher to produce a book ; it is very much more difficult to secure its distribution. For the former a certain amount of taste and experience of printing, paper, and boarding is necessary ; for the latter much more is needed. Sir Walter Besant frequently insisted that a book is not really published till it finds its way to the bookseller’s counter, and this truth cannot be too often repeated. ‘The problem that faces every publisher is how to get his books brought before the direct notice of the public. The usual method adopted by publishers for giving publicity to their books is the following :— An edition of a given quantity of copies is printed. This may vary from a few hundreds in the case of an edition de luxe, or expensive art or technical book, or an historical work, to many thousands in the case of a popular novel. Of this first edition a certain number of copies are boarded. In the case of a popular novel the whole edition may be boarded at once; in the case of a work on history, of which say one thousand copies are printed, perhaps 400 copies may be boarded to begin with. When the book is boarded copies are sent to news- papers for review ; and the book is “ subscribed,” 2.e., it is shown to all the booksellers in London who buy such quantities as they think they can use. In the “ provinces,” 7.¢., in all places outside London, books can rarely be shown to the book- sellers on the day of publication, as the commercial travellers who take them round visit the various towns only twice a year as a rule. Sometimes, especially in the case of popular novels, books are ordered in advance of publication. The public and the booksellers in the “ provinces” have to trust for their information about new books to the publisher’s advertisements. Where and how much to advertise is the problem of publication. In many cases many hundreds of pounds are spent in advertising an individual book, and it is impossible to tell how far this expense is profitable. Such is the method adopted almost universally for bringing books before the notice of the public. Reviews and advertisements, and, in some cases, circulars, are all that the public can depend on for information as to books. The booksellers buy or do not buy according as they think there is likely to be or not to be a demand for the books shown to them by the publishers, and the publishers in almost all cases rest satisfied that with advertise- ments and copies sent for review their responsibility to the public ceases. In the case of novels by popular writers they are probably quiteright. Thepublicwanttoread these, and they are content to order them without seeing them. But it is quite different with books which can- not have more than a limited sale. The bookseller often cannot risk the purchase of these. The public will not buy them withoutseeing them. Ifthe books do not therefore reach the booksellers’ counters they do not get a fair chance. It is with regard to these books that a modified form of “sale or return” might, I think, be adopted with great advantage, alike to publisher, bookseller, and the public. The plan of sending out books “on sale or return” has so far not been popular in this country with either publishers or booksellers. But times and conditions are changing. Before the introduction of the “ nett ” system the bookseller made little or no profit off those books which had only a limited sale, as he was expected to give off them the same discount as he gave off popular novels which he bought in quantities on much better terms. The adoption of the system of “sale or return,” so frequently advocated in The Author, had therefore  THE AUTHOR. no attraction for him. But the introduction and rapid development of the “nett” system has placed ‘sale or return” on quite a different footing. On “nett ’’ books the bookseller can make a profit on in- dividual copies, and it may in many cases be of great value to him to have books sent “ on sale or return.” Before going further it is necessary to point out that it would be impracticable to make this plan compulsory on either publisher or bookseller. The reasons for such restriction are obvious. On the side of the publisher if he were to be compelled to send books “on sale or return” to any bookseller who asked for them, he might be forced to print and board far more copies of a book than was advisable; while if the book- seller were to be compelled to receive “on sale or return” all the books that the publisher wished to send him, his shelves would very soon overflow. But with the reservation that publishers and book- sellers would, therefore, both have to be allowed to refuse to send or to accept books “onsale or return,” the system might, I think, well be allowed a fair trial. Let us now look at its advantages and disadvan- tages from the points of view of (1) the publisher, (2) the bookseller, (3) the public. (1) The disadvantages to the publisher are three- fold: (a) He does not know at once what number of copies he sells outright ; (b) the system would involve a slightly more elaborate bookkeeping ; (c) he might receive back some copies with the boards soiled. But the advantages would greatly outweigh the disadvantages. The publisher would be entitled to charge a slightly higher price for books sent “on sale or return” than for those a bookseller bought outright, and this would probably recoup him for the cost of his extra bookkeeping. The risk of copies coming back damaged need not be considered seriously. For if a publisher boarded, say, 400 copies of a book, and sold 200 outright —and this is no uncommon experience—it is a matter of little moment whether the other 200 are damaged or not if they have eventually to go into his stores. On the other hand, if these 200 copies are shown on booksellers’ counters, the chances are that a considerable proportion of them will be sold. All booksellers know how often the sale of a book is lost because it is not at hand or cannot be seen. Moreover, the publisher would be saved much expense in advertising. He advertises and inserts extracts from reviews in his advertisements to let the public know of the books and their contents. Much of this advertising would be unnecessary if the public knew that in every large town one book- seller at least would be sure to have in stock, or could get on sight, all really good books. The judicious use of “sale or return,” by which book- sellers would become agents for the publishers, should be to the publishers of very great value. 121 (2) That this system would be of great advan- tage to the bookseller is obvious. He would be saved much bad stock—which is as bad for the publisher as for the bookseller—as the latter is cautious with the books of those publishers whose books become bad stock, and he would frequently be able to oblige his customers by letting them see books in which they are interested. (8) Lastly, the system would be of great value to the public. At present the public may fairly complain that in many cases they cannot see a book before purchasing it. The booksellers cannot be blamed for this. It is unreasonable to ask them to buy a particular book on the chance of an individual customer wishing, after seeing it, to purchase. But surely it would be wise for the publisher in such cases to be willing to submit his publication for inspection through the book- sellers. The bookseller or his customer would pay the carriage, and in the event of the book not being kept, it would be returned free of cost. Of course, the publisher might have to refuse if his stock of copies of the book in question were small, but if he had plenty of copies he would be consulting his own interest in meeting the convenience of the public. The “nett” system has done much to improve the conditions of bookselling. I believe the adop- tion of the system of “sale or return” in some such way as I have indicated would improve those conditions still more. It would be no small thing for the spread of literature if in every town there was a bookseller’s shop where practically all good books might be seen. The cry of the “decay of bookselling” would cease to be heard in the land. Rosert MacLeHoss. —_———__1+—}— A DICKENS’ FELLOWSHIP DINNER. [Printed with the kind permission of The Sunday Times. | Se T is probable that when he wrote “The | Christmas Carol” Dickens did not dream of the practical spirit in which his precepts would be carried out by the Fellowship which has identified itself with his name. Indeed, when the novelist penned the moving story of the miserly spirit turned philanthropist, the idea of a Fellow- ship had not yet taken shape in any man’s mind. It was only last October that the Fellowship came into concrete existence, and to-day it has members wherever the English language is spoken and English literature is read. This is a proof, if proof there need be, that the humanitarian spirit which moved one of the greatest masters of fiction of recent times still animates his fellow-countrymen in whatever part of the globe they may find  122 themselves. The day of the Dinner was a red-letter one in the history of the Fellowship. It was a day of merry-making, of feasting, and of song, upon which the spirit of Dickens’ work cast a benign and happy influence. For in the practical spirit of the world-famous Carol, the Dickens’ Fellowship entertained a thousand of London's poor children to dinner and an entertainment at the Alexandra Trust, City Road. Funds had come in from members of the Fellowship and their friends sufficient in amount to entertain 3,000 little ones ; and as it was impossible, owing to the exigenciesof building space, to entertain them all at the same time in the same place, the other 2,000 will take their turn later. The invitations to the feast were distributed with a catholicity of spirit as broad as that which pervades Dickens’ every volume. It was enough that the little guest was a child of poor parents, no matter what their party or creed, to enable it to be bidden to a festive board laden with Christmas fare and distri- buted by an army of willing workers without stint. In their anxiety to seat themselves at the tables the little ones fell over each other in climbing the stairs, in some instances sadly disarranging the best attire. But they quickly picked themselves up and passed in a continuous stream into the rooms on the first and second floors marshalled by many willing helpers. When all had found seats, a ménu was served, in which the principal items were roast beef and roast mutton, with two vegetables, and plum pudding ; and then, when the small guests had eaten to satiety, they were handed each a bag of sweets and an orange, and finally a bon-bon, the gift of Mr. Hall Caine. Then came the second half of the entertainment, for which the first half had prepared them. The children screamed with laughter, and were moved to tears by many of the readings, recitations, and songs contributed by a number of ladies and gentlemen, who gave their services gratuitously. The I.D.K. Minstrels presented a programme with more than a dozen good things in it, and as the shadows gathered, and evening grew into night, the little guests were dismissed to their homes in the neighbourhood, smiling and happy, to experi- ence anew in their childish dreams the incidents of a day which they will not soon forget. ———_ ++ CORRESPONDENCE, <1 — NETT OR NET? To the Editor of THE AUTHOR. S1r,—It is pleasant to note how The Author con- sistently upholds in its columns the first-named mode of spelling this word. Why are publishers, THE AUTHOR. for the most part, equally persistent in their adherence to the latter method ? I have had more than one friendly bout with them upon the subject, and still travel along sanguine lines in the hope of a conversion to my way of thinking. For it cer- tainly does seem to me, as it may to other writers, that uniformity is very desirable over so important an indicator. I plump, as does this organ of ours, for the employment of “nett” as opposed to the less distinctive “net,” and am inclined to believe that the adoption would meet with fuller accept- ance from the literary world in general. There is much value in a ‘‘t,” say I, Oup Birp. Authors’ Club, 8.W. —<>—+ — To the Editor of THe AUTHOR. Sin,—Publishers complain of the absence of first-class authors, and they admit, as far as my acquaintance with them goes, that a large amount of the books published have no permanent value. But is not some of all this dearth caused by the publishers themselves ? I know a gentleman, a good writer, but not very well known, who devoted ten years to writing a really clever book, and well spoken of. The publisher he came in contact with (a London publisher) would publish the book on commission— cost about £90; but mark, the profit to author would be £17. Is such an agreement and profit likely to induce people of ability to write? I think not. Publisher said there would be some extra profit for advance proof copies sold in America. Yours, “ SENEX.”” oe To the Editor of THe AUTHOR. Srr,—I lately published a volume of poems which called forth some twenty notices, from which I give some extracts :— “The title of this volume indicates accurately enough ” —Scotsman. “Thought predominates over fancy.”—Sceotsman. “Has the power of clearly expressing his views.”— Yorkshire Herald, “ Well worth reading,” re- ferring to the book as a whole.—ZJrish Times. “The title gives no clue to the contents.”—Church of England Pulpit. “The author is the servant of hisrhymes and metres.” —Sheffield Telegraph. “Never succeeds in pro- ducing clear impressions.” —Daily News. “ Regretfully we lay aside” the volume with dis- appointment.— Birming- ham Post. “ Every white will have its black, And every sweet its sour.” But of what use are the critics to the public or to Yours faithfully, , LANK ?  GENERAL MEMORANDA. —_ -—~<—+ — ERE are a few standing rules to be observed in an q agreement. There are four methods of dealing with literary property :— : I. Selling it Outright. This is in some respects the most satisfactory, if a proper price can be obtained. But the transaction should be managed by a competent agent, or with the advice of the Secretary of the Society. i Il. A Profit-Sharing Agreement (a bad form of 198 agreement). [ In this case the following rules should be attended to: (1.) Not to sign any agreement in which the cost of pro- 5 duction forms a part without the strictest investigation. (2.) Not to give the publisher the power of putting the profits into his own pocket by charging for advertisements in his own organs, or by charging exchange advertise- a ments. Therefore keep control of the advertisements. (3.) Not to allow a special charge for “ office expenses,” it unless the same allowance is made to the author. (4.) Not to give up American, Colonial, or Continental ol rights. ) (5.) Not to give up serial or translation rights. (6.) Not to bind yourself for future work to any publisher. A As well bind yourself for the future to any one solicitor or sob doctor ! III. The Royalty System. It is above all things necessary to know what the | proposed royalty means to both sides. It is now possible 101 for an author to ascertain approximately and very nearly sf} thetruth. From time to time the very important figures connected with royalties are published in Zhe Author. Readers can also work out the figures themselves from the “ Cost of Production.” IY. A Commission Agreement. The main points are :— (1.) Be careful to obtain a fair cost of production. <) (2.) Keep control of the advertisements. (3.) Keep control of the sale price of the book, wh General. All other forms of agreement are combinations of the four ig above mentioned. : Such combinations are generally disastrous to the author. : Never sign any agreement without competent advice from i! the Secretary of the Society. ey Stamp all agreements with the Inland Revenue stamp. i Avoid agreements by letter if possible. 7 The main points which the Society has always demanded “from the outset are :— ya C1.) That both sides shall know what an agreement s ‘means. (2.) The inspection of those account books which belong to the author. We are advised that this is a right, in the nature of a common law right, which cannot be denied or withheld, —~<++ WARNINGS TO DRAMATIC AUTHORS. 2 ge EVER sign an agreement without submitting it to the Secretary of the Society of Authors or some com- petent legal authority. 2. {t is well to be extremely careful in negotiating for the production of a play with anyone except an established manager. THE AUTHOR. 123 3. There are three forms of dramatic contract for PLAYS IN THREE OR MORE ACTS :— (a.) SALE OUTRIGHT OF THE PERFORMING RIGHT. This is unsatisfactory. An author who enters into such a contract should stipulate in the con- tract for production of the piece by a certain date and for proper publication of his name on the play-bills. (b.) SALE OF PERFORMING RIGHT OR OF A LICENCE TO PERFORM ON THE BASIS OF PERCENTAGES on gross receipts. Percentages vary between 5 and 15 per cent. An author should obtain a percentage on the sliding scale of gvoss receipts in preference to the American system. Should obtain a sum in advance of percentages. A fixed date on or before which the play should be performed. (c.) SALE OF PERFORMING RIGHT OR OF A LICENCE TO PERFORM ON THE BASIS OF ROYALTIES (%.¢., fixed nightly fees). This method should be always avoided except in cases where the fees are likely to be small or difficult to collect. The other safeguards set out under heading (0.) apply also in this case. 4, PLAYS IN ONE ACT are often sold outright, but it is better to obtain a small nightly fee if possible, and a sum paid in advance of such fees in any event. It is extremely important that the amateur rights of one-act plays should be reserved. 5. Authors should remember that performing rights can be limited, and are usually limited, by town, country, and time. This is most important. 6. Authors should not assign performing rights, but should grant a licence to perform. The legal distinction is of great importance. 7, Authors should remember that performing rights in a play are distinct from literary copyright. A manager holding the performing right or licence to perform cannot print the book of the words. 8. Never forget that AMERICAN RIGHTS may be exceed- ingly valuable. ‘They should never be included in English agreements without the author obtaining a substantial consideration. 9. Agreements for collaboration should be carefully drawn and executed before collaboration is commenced. 10. An author should remember that production of a play is highly speculative : that he runs a very great risk of delay and a breakdown in the fulfilment of his contract. He should therefore guard himself all the more carefully in the beginning. pS 11. An author must remember that the dramatic market is exceedingly limited, and that for a novice the first object is to obtain adequate publication. As these warnings must necessarily be incomplete, on account of the wide range of the subject of dramatic con- tracts, THOSE AUTIIORS DESIROUS OF FURTHER INFORMA- TION ARE REFERRED TO THE SECRETARY OF THE SOCIETY. << HOW TO USE THE SOCIETY. — + — Li VERY member has a right toask for and to receive advice upon his agreements, his choice of a pub- lisher, or any dispute arising in the conduct of his business or the administration of his property. If the advice sought is such as can be given best by a solicitor, the member has a right to an opinion from the Society’s solicitors. If the case is such that Counsel’s opinion is desirable, the Committee will obtain for him Counsel’s opinion. All this without any cost to the member,  124 2. Remember that questions connected with copyright and publishers’ agreements do not generally fall within the experience of ordinary solicitors. Therefore, do not scruple to use the Society. 3. Send to the Office copies of past agreements and past accounts, with a copy of the book represented. The Secretary will always be glad to have any agreements, new or old, for inspection and note. The information thus obtained may prove invaluable. 4, BEFORE SIGNING ANY AGREEMENT WHATEVER, send the document to the Society for examination. 5. Remember always that in belonging to the Society you are fighting the battles of other writers, even if you are reaping no benefit to yourself, and that you are advancing the best interests of literature in promoting the independence of the writer. 6. The Committee have now arranged for the reception of members’ agreements and their preservation in a fire- proof safe. The agreements will, of course, be regarded as confidential documents to be read only by the Secretary, who will keep the key of the safe. The Society now offers: —(1) To read and advise upon agreements and to give advice concerning publishers. (2) To stamp agreements in readiness for a possible action upon them. (3) To keep agreements. (4) Io enforce payments due according to agreements, 7. No contract should be entered into with a literary agent without the advice of the Secretary of the Society. Members are strongly advised not to accept without careful consideration the contracts submitted to them by literary agents, and are recommended to submit them for inter- pretation and explanation to the Secretary of the Society. 8. Many agents neglect to stamp agreements. This must be done within fourteen days of first execution. The Secretary will undertake it on behalf of members. 9. Some agents endeavour to prevent authors from referring matters to the Secretary of the Society ; so do some publishers. Members can make their own deductions and act accordingly. ————__ ~~ + THE READING BRANCH. t+ EMBERS will greatly assist the Society in this branch of its work by informing young writers of its existence. Their MSS. can be read and treated as a composition is treated by a coach. The term MSS, includes NOT ONLY WORKS OF FICTION, BUT POETRY AND DRAMATIC WORKS, and when it is possible, under special arrangement, technical and scientific works. The Readers are writers of competence and experience. The fee is one guinea. 1 NOTICES. — \HE Editor of Zhe Author begs to remind members of the Society that, although the paper is sent to them free of charge, the cost of producing it would be a very heavy charge on the resources of the Society if a great many members did not forward to the Secretary the modest 5s, 6d. subscription for the year. THE AUTHOR. Communications for Zhe Author should be addressed to the Offices of the Society, 39, Old Queen Street, Storey’s Gate, 8.W., and should reach the Editor NOT LATER THAN THE 21st OF EACH MONTH. All persons engaged in literary work of any kind, whether members of the Society or not, are invited to communicate to the Editor any points connected with their work which it would be advisable in the general interest to publish, eh 9 COMMUNICATIONS AND LETTERS ARE INVITED BY THE EDITOR on all subjects connected with literature, but on no other subjects whatever. Every effort will be made to return articles which cannot be accepted. > THE SECRETARY OF THE SOCIETY begs to give notice that all remittances are acknowledged by return of post, and he requests members who do not receive an answer to important communications within two days to write to him without delay. All remittances should be crossed Union Bank of London, Chancery Lane, or be sent by registered letter only. AUTHORITIES. — ()* the 29th November, 1902, the Danish Lower House passed, by a unanimous vote of the sixty members present (fifty members were absent), the new law for the codification of the Danish Law of Copyright, as a preliminary step towards the entrance of Denmark into the Berne Union. This action of the Danish Parlia- ment is highly significative. In 1894 a contrary decision was carried by a vote of forty-seven against forty ; and in 1897 a majority of seven votes (forty- eight against forty-one) resolved upon a course of restrictive measures certain to render entrance into the Berne Convention impossible. et A Hungarian author has done us the honour of calling at the office. Amongst other questions that came under dis- cussion he pointed out that a great many of the Hungarian newspapers and magazines pirate the works of English authors in translated form ; and he promised, on his return to his native land, to forward a list of stories with the names of the authors and the papers that were pirating them. He asked the secretary if it would be possible to do anything to stop these cases of infringement, and frankly confessed that he did not desire this so much for the benefit that might accrue to the English author, as for the benefit to the young Hungarian. Any action taken would give to native authors a chance of some adequate reward  it il HW | Q > cdl > peng? poten, a) + J ) THE AUTHOR. in return for their labour, and to Hungarian literature a chance of expansion. Not many months ago a deputation of Hungarians waited on the authorities and urged on the Govern- ment the necessity of joining the Berne Convention. One important reason was put forward. Thepiracy of French and English authors fostered in the Hungarian youth the sentiments and feelings of foreigners and failed to inspire them with a patriotic feeling and a love of their country. The whole of this movement points to the fact often reiterated in these pages, that the wider the protection given to authors of any individual country for their works throughout the world, under the Berne Convention or separate treaty, the wider and fuller will be the literature of that country. It may be as well to remark once more that any deviation on the part of an English colony from this standpoint, in order to obtain some supposed benefit to its own authors, or to foster its own literature, must meet with failure. The mere fact that publication throughout the British Empire carries with it, not only copyright throughout the British Empire, but copyright under the Berne Convention in all the civilised countries of Europe, and, with certain limitations, in the United States of America also, is a sure guarantee that the best assistance that it is possible to grant to authors is being given to the colony that adheres to the Imperial copyright Acts. We quote the following from the S/. James’ Gazette :— “The next is to be a Habitual Writers Act. It is de- signed for the prevention of bad and hurried books. Any author against whom three publications can be proved in one year will be placed on the black list, and for a period of three years publishers will be forbidden to serve him. Any author who attempts to write a novel while in charge of babies or young children will, on conviction, be made todo so. So we are incredibly informed.” Ink Drunkards! According to some—we print a short essay on the subject—this is already a reality. It may be, therefore, that one day the jester of the St. James’ will find his prophecy realised. One question, however, may arise under the Licensing Act affecting copyright. We under- stand that the police intend to send a series of photographs of habitual drunkards to the owners of public-houses and others. The danger of giving away the copyright in a photograph is constantly recurring, and has been alluded to in the pages of The Author. It is not impossible that the following events might happen :— A man writes a book entitled “The Confessions 125 ofa Habitual Drunkard.” The book has a successful sale. Immediately one or two of the editors of reviews are seized with a desire to publish the photograph of the author, yet owing to the modesty of the writer fail to obtain one. All they have got to do is to enter the nearest public-house. Here no doubt they could procure a copy for nothing. To whom would the copyright in the likeness taken for the purpose of the Act belong? Would it belong to the police authorities, or would it be public property ? If to the police authorities, could they restrain publication ? Is it possible that the author could claim damages ? The probability of such a complicated question arising seems to be remote. The point is academic. _ The following brief extract from a long parody in the “Outlook,” puts forward in no indistinct. manner the opinion of some modern critic. He writeth best who writeth least Of trumped-up loathsomeness ; Who trusteth man is more than beast, And doth this faith confess. He writeth best who writeth most Of high and wholesome things, Not making man’s clay feet a boast, But his soaring, heavenly wings. It is the custom of many authors to carry note- books with them, in which to jot down their own ideas and,—rumour reports,—the ideas of other people. We trust that no member of the society has ever met with the following experience :— “+A lady went into a stationer’s shop and inquired of the obsequious assistant for a notebook. ‘ 1 want something I can carry in my pocket to jot down ideas.’ The assistant, with extraordinary lack of judgment, replied, ‘Oh! you want something very small.” Unfortunately he did not explain whether his remark applied to the size of the lady’s pocket or of her brain.” —__—_—__—_—_+——_e__. A LITERARY ACADEMY. —+ + I. OBSERVE that the project of Mr. Herbert Trench which began “Academy,” with all the implications of that title, is now changing its nature to a “Guild.” This is more hopeful. It is to be a self-constituted guild, electing the academy—which is really quite a new thing in academies altogether. I sympathise deeply with all the noble prelusions of Mr. Herbert Trench ; I feel, perhaps even more deeply than he does, the:  126 need of a common chamber of literature in which men of all professions may meet ; but I think it will only be by toil and extraordinary good fortune that this guild of his can be made any better than the abandoned idea of an Academy by Royal Charter. Suppose, in order to get to something definite, we take his assertions about the con- temporary prospects of letters as true, and ask him to go on from his “ brave beginning ” of Messrs. Shorthouse, Bury, Housman, and so forth, to give us a really definite scheme for his guild. There are some enormous difficulties. How will he pre- vent the impostor swamping his guild from the outset if he leaves the door wide open? If he does not, what will it be but a clique—Mr. Trench and party? I submit it is these practical diffi- culties that trouble me. The enormous good the guild might do if only it could be invented I do not for one moment dispute. But Mr. Trench has not by any means invented it yet. His waving rhetoric, his generous bunting, must not hide from us that elementary defect. If I might offer a suggestion, it would be that Mr. Trench should give us a list, or conspire with a few others to give us a list, of his possible guild. He might write to this authoritative person or that for the suggestion of a name or so. Suppose he were to begin with two hundred or three hun- dred names, appending by way of justification the name of at least one diploma work to each name (for example, I will confess I did not know what Professor Bury had written until I consulted a work of reference). That list could be printed close in small type in a page or so of The Author. Then we could criticise omissions and inclusions, mote the excessive representation of any type or school, and get a clearer conception—and help Mr. Trench perhaps to a clearer conception—of his desirable, but I fear quite impracticable, project. H. G. WELLS. — Il. Ir an Academy of Letters did no more than ‘publish an official magazine, uninfluenced by ad- vertisement, in which only books of a certain -standard were reviewed, it would justify its exist- ence. I suppose Londoners can have no conception. of the darkness in which provincial lovers of literature dwell. We never see a good book either in our public libraries or bookshops, and we have no guide in which to place confidence. In my country town there are three or four libraries, and from these into my home every week come at least six or seven novels of a general badness unspeakable. Half of them go back unread even by the devourer of light fiction, for whom they are brought. I don’t believe any one on earth could read them. THE AUTHOR. But there is little else to be had ; and although [ hear the continual plaint, “I can’t get anything fit _ to read” from all sorts and conditions of men, yet the stream flows on, giving no satisfaction to any- body. Iam convinced that if a stamp were put upon works of merit, the average man and woman of no great literary taste, but of sterling common sense, would be thankful for such a chance of deliverance from the time-wasting toils of the twaddlemonger. As things are, they have to swallow the mess that is put before them and make the best of it. : The shocking muddle we are now in—our libraries choked with rubbish, our publisherg’ shelves groaning with books that no bookseller will show—calls for a radical change. Of the thousands of books printed, only a comparative few ever sell, and it is a wonder any publisher can be induced to issue one by an unknown author, in face of the fact that no bookseller will stock it, How can he? No shop is large enough to ho even a tenth of the spring and autumn output in novels alone. Poor bookseller! He is bewildered with advertisements and reviews. Poor publisher ! He never knows what the public will ery after or reject. Poor author! There is one chance in @ thousand that his book will reach the public at all. Something must be done. Can an Academy of Letters do it ? We nurse a fainting belief that the best will survive, and that if we try strenuously to produce works of art, our aspirations and our efforts wil be recognised sooner or later. At present recog nition certainly seems to come by accident rathe than by any inevitable law, but this is because 0 the muddle we are in. An Academy of Letters might sift the grain from the chaff; and if i could not make artistic merit popular, which is perhaps, too much to expect, it could keep aliv the flame that is fed by sympathy and apprecia tion, for the lack of which many a soul-starved genius has been driven to desperate deeds 0 mediocrity. To lose the faith is to let ideals sink and how shall a man continue to believe in art when all his world flouts it ? Mary L. PENDERED. —-— 4 —— Til. WHEN so many celebrities are writing in you pages on the subject of a proposed Academ, Letters, perhaps it may amuse your readers to hear what an absolute nonentity has to say about it. My impression, on reading the various letters from the great and published, appearing from time to time in Zhe Author, has been, and is, that it. all, to quote a type of author, “ very beautiful.  og ? d ig oh od Se otf de a9 Ue p ak HOLE dg But its beauty on a close inspection strikes one as a trifle disingenuous in some cases. With all the talk, and there is much, about benefiting us honest strivers, hardly a word of honours to be conferred, of knighthoods—perchance peerages—for presidents, of social advantages to be reaped by every member. It is almost too beautiful to be true, Mr. Trench indeed recognises the possibility of such blessings, for he writes : “It behoves greatly, therefore, that for the State’s own sake, some honest endeavour is made to distinguish and reward those who practise this art (literature) with signal excellence.” Now, when, in the name of goodness, was distinction and reward from the highly-placed, aught but tortoise dropped on the head of genius ? Hardy talent may withstand the blow, but delicate genius is inevitably cracked thereby. In the same way competition, which an organ- ised system of rewards and distinctions would inevitably beget, is death to genius, though it is the breath of life to mediocrity. By the way, what is genius? Thus much | know of it: that there is nothing more individual under the sun; nothing that so objects to restrictions of any kind. Now, who is going to assure us that this, perhaps, forthcoming Academy will not set up a standard of its own? Genius would assuredly shy at any hard and fast desider- atum of style, say, anything at all resembling a chalked blackboard ; and, unless I misunderstand Mr. Trench, it is principally for genius that his Academy is designed. Think of the Newdigate and Seatonian prize compositions, and wonder whether productions as ungainly may not some day be crowned by an English Academy of Letters. In order that the rarest order of genius may have a chance of _ growth, I believe that the Bohemian character of our brotherhood should be preserved, rather than abandoned for an organisation, however august, however much patronised and decorated by Royalty. And are women to be taken into glory if they deserve it? Mr. Trench has not, that | can find, committed himself on this point, perchance for fear of alienating so large a section of our society. But he has hazarded a statement calculated to rouse another, and, I think, a large section. His suggestion of a “ Guild of Literature” is nice and soothing after that awe-inspiring vision of a Royal Academy full of immortals, like an omnibus on a rainy day, until we get to the end. And then— i and then: “ Recruited from the intellectual refuse of Europe”! How polite to the numerous clerical members of the Society of Authors. What exquisite good taste! But better follows. THE AUTHOR. 127 Of the churches, he says: ‘‘The brains are out, the man must die.” A haunting metaphor, and an ominous. A man whose brains are out is very near dead. Poor churches ! And “this new Society of the Spirit—this new Guild of Literature” is, he as good as tells us, going to supersede all the churches that ever were. He declares his hostility to Christianity, an unwise step at the very outset, if he really wishes to found a representative Academy of Letters in a Christian land. “We must look to art and science (!) to bear on the torches relinquished by religion.” Truly Mr. Trench is laying about him with a vengeance, smoky torch in hand, And all this about an unformed Academy, which we nonenti- ties, being far removed from the chance of entering it and reaping any of the benefits there to be con- ferred, should regard as a very doubtful blessing indeed—possibly a nuisance. That, in place of Religion (the capital is Mr. Trench’s). What a comfort for us sinners on our deathbeds! MARMADUKE PICKTHALL. —_——_+—_<>__—___—_-_ THE NEW BRITISH ACADEMY. ——1—<—+ ——- HE British Academy for the Promotion of Historical, Philosophical, and Philological Studies has at length come into being. The story of its evolution, and the practical reason for its existence may be stated shortly as follows. At a meeting of the chief European and American Academies held at Wiesbaden in October, 1899, a scheme was drawn up for the organisation of an International Association of the principal scientific and literary academies in the world. This association was to be divided into two sec- tions:—Natural Science, and Literary Science, the term “literary”? being used to indicate sciences of language, history, philosophy, and antiquities, and other subjects, the study of which was based on scientific principles. The Royal Society was, of course, a fitting repre- sentative of Natural science ; but certain of those who were present considering that no existing institution was competent to stand for the section dealing with historical,philosophical, and philological studies, deemed it a matter of vital importance that the United Kingdom should be effectively and honourably represented at any future International Congress. This view the delegates of other nations strongly supported. ‘The United Kingdom they said should take immediate steps to secure corporate representation. Accordingly, measures were adopted to procure a charter of incorporation for a British  ie Academy to promote the study of the subjects set out above. The draft charter which was submitted to His Majesty states succinctly the purposes for which the Academy has been called into existence, and the powersthattheydemand. The Academy isto consist of a President, Council, and Fellows ; the President and Council being elected by the Fellows from among their own number. The government of the Academy is to rest in the Council and in the Fellows assembled in general meeting, the Academy having power to elect honorary members should it deem fit to do so, and to hold land in perpetual succession, not exceeding in the whole the annual value of £2,000. As there was noserious opposition, His Majesty granted the charter. The list will be of interest to members, as they will see among the names a great many of those who belong to the Society. This, then, is the beginning of the Academy. Its future lies in the womb of time. Will it bea practical Academy, aiding and stimulating study by honouring those who adorn the ranks of his- torians and philosophers, by encouraging those who are at the beginning of their career, or will it be merely ornamental, crowning a life of hard and strenuous work with anempty honour? It remains to be seen whether, to use a terribly trite phrase, it “fills a want.” At present, we understand, the executive are engaged in settling bye-laws and other details. A few days ago the French Academy of Political and Modern Sciences gave formal welcome to this the youngest member of the academic family. Lord Reay, as president, responded in an appropriate speech. President—The Right Hon. The Lord Reay. Council. Sir W. R. Anson, Bart. Sir R. C. Jebb. The Right Hon. James The Rev. Prof. Mayor. Bryce. Dr. J. A. H. Murray, Prof. I. Bywater. Prof. H. F. Pelham. Prof. T. W. Rhys The Rev. Prof. W. W. Davids. Skeat. The Rev. Prof. 8S. R. Sir E. Maunde Thomp- Driver. son. The Rev. Principal Dr. A. W. Ward. Fairbairn. Prof. James Ward. Sir C. P. Ibert. List of Fellows. Sir W. R. Anson, Bart. The Right Hon. James M.P. Bryce, M.P. The Right. Hon. A. J. Prof. J. B. Bury. Balfour, M.P. Prof. S. H. Butcher. THE AUTHOR. Prof. Ingram Bywater. Dr. Edward Caird. Prof. E. B. Cowell. The Rev. William Cun- ningham, D.D. Prof. T.W. Rhys Davids. Prof. A. V. Dicey, K.C. The Right Hon. Vis- count Dillon. The Rev. Prof. S. R. Driver, D.D. Prof. Robinson Ellis. Dr. A. J. Evans. The Rev. Principal A. M. Fairbairn, D.D. The Rev. Prof. Robert Flint, D.D. Dr. J. G. Frazer. Mr. Israel Gollancz. Dr. Thomas Hodgkin. Mr. 8. H. Hodgson. Prof.T.E. Holland, K.C. Sir C. P. Ibert, K.C.S.1. Sir R. C. Jebb, M.P. The Right. Hon. W. BE. H. Lecky, M.P. Prof. F. W. Maitland. Prof. Alfred Marshall. Sir H. C. Maxwell-Lyte, K.C.B. The Rev. Prof. J. E. B. Mayor. Dr. D. B. Monro. Secretary—Mr. Israel Gollancz. ——_——___—_- OF BOOKBINDING. San Aine ane a recent disturbance in the bookbinding trade has, among other things, aroused some mild discussion as to the importance The Right Hon. John Morley, M.P. 2 Dr. J. A. H. Murray. Prof. H. F. Pelham. Sir Frederick Pollock, Bart. Prof. W. M. Ramsay. The Right Hon. The Lord Reay, G.C.S.1., G.C.L.E. Prof. John Rhys. The Right Hon. The Earl of Rosebery, K.G., K.T. The Rev. Prof. George Salmon, D.D. The Rev. Prof. William Sanday, D.D. The Rey. Prof. W. W. Skeat. Sir Leslie Stephen, K.C.B. Dr. Whitbey Stokes, C.S.1., C.1.E. The Rev. Prof. H. B. Swete, D.D. Sir E. Maunde Thomp- son, K.C.B. The Rey. H. F. Tozer. Prof. R. ¥. Tyrrell. Dr. A. W. Ward. Prof. James Ward. of the cover in the scheme of things that go to the making of abook. At one time it seemed possible that the autumn of 1902 might be memorable as the one in which books appeared wrapped in sere and yellow leaves; and the possibility of a pheno- menon go rare in this country could not fail to provoke debate as to its effect upon the trade. It should be premised that these notes are directed to case-work—to the binding of ordinary editions, and not to extra or library binding, which involves different and more elaborate treatment, and which may be brought into the domain of art by the caprice of individual taste, and the resources of a deep purse. It was only the ordinary editions  ant THE AUTHOR. 129 of which publication was lately jeopardised, and it is with the outside eovering of such books only that these random remarks are concerned. For my own part, I am willing to admit that to me the outside of a book is a matter of relatively small concern. Binding is to a book what dress is to a man, and I agree with Lord Chesterfield in thinking that dress is one of the various ingredients that contribute to the art of pleasing, and, there- fore, an object of some attention; for we cannot help forming some opinion of a man’s sense and character from his dress. I would, consequently, clothe my books as I would clothe my children, sensibly, but artistically withal ; but were I a millionaire, I would do no more. Their garments should be sufficiently distinctive to contribute something to the formation of that first impression upon which so much depends. They should be accurately clean for their own sakes; they should be of good workmanship, and able to withstand ordinary use at the hands of a man who loves his books and recognises his obligation to them ; and generally they should be unobtrusive, and an unnoticeable part of the book’s own entity. I have never been able to accustom myself to regard the cover in which a book leaves the pub- lisher as a merely temporary vestment. From this it follows that the yellow paper wrapper of the ordinary French book is an abomination in my eyes, although its frankly ephemeral nature is, perhaps, more honest than the ill-adjusted boards of many of our home products. The few French books which I possess cannot stand erect upon their shelves, but droop against the sides of the bookcase as if conscious that their moral character could not bear investigation, although they are in reality as innocent of evil as the sturdy Hcclesi- astical Polity which presents broad shoulders from the shelf above. They accumulate dirt, get dog- eared, split down the back, and fall to pieces at the first reading. If they hold together sufficiently long to reach the binder round the corner, it is well. The cheapest boards are preferable to the paper wrapper, and I almost think I would rather possess no books than paper-covered ones. Still, the French publisher makes no protesta- tions. My grievance with English publishers i; that, while professing to regard case- work as merely temporary, and consequently tolerating bad work from the binders whom they employ, they are, in fact, aware that the profession they make is not quite ingenuous. The public look for decent workmanship in the binding of the average novel, and, in England, they do not get it. It would be invidious to give specific instances, but the general assertion put forward by Mr. Putnam, for one, in his suggestive manual of suggestions, ‘‘ Authors and Publishers,” is well founded. ‘That assertion is that in America “it is the intention to produce case-work so strongly and effectively put together that the books may open well, and at the same time be so firmly bound as to stand all proper usage, and to remain as permanent coverings to the volumes ; whereas, abroad, it has never been considered necessary to treat edition work as any- thing more than a temporary covering for the book. Hence, abroad, the cloth-bound books are lacking in substantial sewing and in general strength of structure.” As regards that indict- ment, I think a true bill must be found ; and if the verdict be adverse, it is surely a matter for self-reproach. If a book is worth producing at all, it is worth producing well; and there must be something wrong somewhere for the difference in merit to be so marked as it is in this matter of binding between English and American books. A novel of my own was lately issued in both countries at approxi- mately the same published price. In England I was permitted to have a voice in the selection of the cover, and chose an ordinary cloth, plainly lettered, which, I thought, would be serviceable and unostentatious, and in every way appropriate. In America the matter was left entirely to the publisher’s discretion. I duly received presenta- tion copies from both houses, both, be it remarked, well-known and old-established firms of repute. The English volume would fall to pieces at the sniff of the first reviewer. The book is badly sewn, the sheets gape, the edges are unevenly trimmed, and all the mechanical details have been carried out in a slovenly fashion. The American volume opens freely, is perfectly folded and cased in, the cover is embellished with a peculiarly appropriate design of minute proportions, the lettering is plain and unmistakeable, and the volume will last longer than I shall. I can find no good reason for this difference between the two editions of a book, which I have singled out as an instance only because it happens to be my own. There seems to be a curious uncertainty of opinion among publishers as to the effect of the binding of a book upon its sales. I have known fifteen guineas to be paid for the design for the cover of a novel, published at three shillings and sixpence, and the design comprised nothing but some lettering, not particularly original in form. The novel was really literary, and its sale was counted by tens. I know another novel, not literary at all, of which the sale, counted by thousands, is attributed by the publishers entirely to the picture on the cover, the design for which cost a guinea. I am at a loss to understand the motive which prompted the publisher to spend fifteen guineas in the one case and one guinea In the other, and I am at a loss to understand why he 130 attributes the sale in the one case to the binding, and does not attribute the failure to sell in the other case to the same cause. : In this matter of florid decoration our English novels are also inferior to the American, and the fact can only be due to an idea that picture designs excite curiosity and promote sales. There is certainly no other justification for many of them. And yet such ornamentation may have a contrary effect ; one case has certainly occurred lately where the bookstall sale of a book was prohibited because the proprietors objected to the design upon its cover as meretricious, or in some way “im- proper,” and refused to stock the work ; yet this particular design was good art. — From these considerations arises a question of some importance to authors. Ifa publisher insists for commercial reasons upon having a picture cover, should not the author have some defined right to yeto any design to which he may take exception as being, say, in bad taste, or as conveying a false impression of the tone and scope of the book? It is not enough to suggest that this is a matter which may be left to mutual amicable arrangement, nor to reply that anything may be made a condition of the contract. A very usual and proper clause in agreements provides that all details of production and publication of a work shall be left to the publisher’s sole discretion, and even when the agreement is a royalty one it is possible that the author might have a legitimate grievance against the publisher in this connection. In the case ofa sale of copyright, whether for a term of years or absolutely, the author would, of course, have even less locus standi, the publisher being entitled to do what he pleases to sell his own property, even to the extent of printing it in white letters on purple paper, if he thinks such a line would appeal to a large public. Ifa modest and refined gentlewoman sold the copyright of her novel entitled, say, “ My Uncle,” would she, or would she not have cause for complaint if the publisher issued it with a cover emblazoned with the golden Balls of Lombardy. And the question opens up the still wider one of illustrations generally. ‘To say that the author shall have a legal right to dictate to the artist would be to drive the already worried publisher to distraction ; but on the other hand it would be manifestly hard upon a sensitive delicate-minded woman if her novels were issued by a comimercial- minded publisher adorned with pictures intended to appeal to the coarse imagination of peuple of the baser sort. Is it necessary to provide against such a contingency in all agreements, and, if so, how is to be done ? That the difficulty may arise, and even become acute, I do from my own experience know. V. E. M. THE AUTHOR. LONDON IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.* te HERE is a passage in Montaigne’s “ Essays ” fe which comes almost instinctively to mind as one opens this handsome, and alas ! posthumous, quarto. “ Nous sommes nayz pour ayir,” says he in the Nineteenth Chapter of his First Book. “Je veux qu’on agisse, et quon alonge les offices de la vie, tant qu'on peult; et que la mort me treuve plantant mes choulx, mais nonchalant Welle, et encores plus de mon tardin imparfaict.” No one had learned that lofty lesson of doing more thoroughly than the author of “London in the Eighteenth Century.” It was more than thirty years ago that he first began to make notes for a vast “Survey,” which was to accomplish for the metropolis in the nineteenth century what John Stow had accomplished for it in the sixteenth, and tell its story from period to period. The task would have been a life work for an idle man ; it was a labour of Hercules for one whose sleepless energy and warm human sympathies, dissipated in many ways, left him barely breathing space; and it is no wonder, perhaps, that the “garden ” remains “ imperfect.” But, fortunately, there are different forms of imperfection. ‘There is the imperfection which is frankly truncated or fragmentary; and there is the imperfection which consists merely in the absence of other parts of the plan, each part being complete in itself. This is the case with the book which Sir Walter Besant has left behind him. It is an isolated portion of his contemplated ‘‘ Survey,” but inasmuch as it. comprises and includes a full and detailed account. of “ London in the Eighteenth Century,” it can afford to stand alone. “It represents,’ says Lady Besant in her Preface, “the continuous labour of over five years, and the active research of half a life-time. He [Sir Walter] was wont to: refer to it as his magnum opus, and it was the work by which he himself most desired to be remembered by posterity.” That his desire will be realised, there can be: little doubt. Other histories of London in the Eighteenth Century there may be, but it is not probable that any other historian is likely to approach the task with the same combination of qualities, the same faculty for extracting local colouring from obscure sources, the same feeling for the picturesque and graphic, the same passion for minute investigation, and the same enthusiasm: for the Past. To give an adequate idea of such a book would be difficult ; to turn its pages is to- tread the Eighteenth Century once more. In one picture you shall see the mouth of the old Fleet river; in another, Covent Garden, with its piazzas ; * By Sir Walter Besant (Adam and Charles Black, 1902).  THE AUTHOR. ai in another, the Foundling Hospital, with its wide so) forecourt; in another, St. Bartholomew’s. With the aid of Gay’s “ Trivia,”, one of the chapters makes the tour of the ill-paved, cobbled streets ; another is devoted to that curious and rare pamphlet on “ Low Life” which suggested Sala’s “Twice Round the Clock.” There is an excel- lent dissertation on Dissenters ; there is another as good upon Superstitions, not omitting the Cock Lane Ghost. But those portions over which the » reader will probably linger longest are the sections headed “Manners and Customs,” and ‘‘ Society and Amusements,” the importance of which is admitted by Lady Besant when she says, in her Preface, that the “book may be regarded as a social picture of London in the Highteenth Century, rather than as a detailed history.” Certainly, it is these sections that most markedly exhibit the curious recondite reading which has gone to fill the full-packed pages. Shops and Coffee-houses, Costume and Diet, Wigs and Barbers, Clubs and Night-cellars, Gazebos and Country-boxes (among which we are delighted to find that typical one from the ‘ Connoisseur ”’) Crafts, Weddings, Funerals, Servants, have all their due chronicle and illustration, while a specially careful chapter is given to the “ Position of Women.” The section on “ Society and Amuse- ments” is not less interesting. Drums and Assemblies, the Parks, the Wells, the Spas, Ranelagh and Vauxhall, Drury Lane and Covent Garden, the Cock Pit, the Prize-ring, the Gambling- hells, and the Fairs have each full and adequate treatment. But, to make an end of mere enumera- tion, we shall take leave to transcribe, as a specimen of the more vivid passages, the following, which almost reads like an expansion of Hogarth’s clever little print, copied at page 524, of “ A Country-Inn Yard” : “Upon one who considers the tavern of the time there presently falls a reminiscence of the past when we were all living in the eighteenth century. We are standing in a courtyard of a tavern in Leadenhall ; our carriage—for we drove into town this morning from the country—is drawn up in the open court, where are also the waggons, now un- loaded, which rumbled in from Edinburgh this morning. Three girls, come up from service all the way from York, which is ten days’ journey, are waiting for their new masters to call for them ; an old lady, whose smile is meant to be benevolent, is whispering to one of the girls—the prettiest one—that she can offer her a place of much higher wages and much less work ; there is a great yoho- ing and whistling from the stable which one can see—and smell—through the gate on the other side of the court ; messengers and porters are bringing parcels for another waggon now receiving its load ; at intervals the housemaids running about the galleries above lean over the rails and exchange a little light satire with the grooms below ; gentlemen graye of aspect walk into the tavern and call for a bottle and a privateroom. You can see them through the open window ; they exchange papers, they talk in low tones, they make notes, they drink but without merri- 131 ment. There are twenty or thirty of these rooms; they are all occupied by merchants who are more private here than on ’Change. At four o’clock;a company of gentlemen, headed by a rosy-cheeked divine, all of them sleek and some of them even obese, enter the inn with a kind of pro- cession. They are met by the landlord, who bows obse- quiously. * Gentlemen,” he says, ‘“‘ youare welcome. John, show his Reverence and the Vestry to the Anchor. Gentle- men, you shall be served immediately.” Itisa parish feast. People from the country arrive, some in postchaises, some by stage-coach. There is a bride with her bridegroom and her bridesmaid, blushing sweetly. Shesees London for the first time : it will be the last time, yet it will remain the dream of her life. Outside there is the bawling of the street-criers, the grinding and the rumbling of the carts. Here, in the tavern yard, there is the atmosphere of comfort and of rest. One perceives, after a hundred years, the fragrance of the kitchen ; one hears the drawing of corks ; one listens to the gobbling of the select vestry ; one hears the laughter of the country visitors. The servants run about; the landlord gives his orders; when the night falls, the passengers for the eight o’clock stage arrive, and the great coach, piled high with luggage, rumbles out through the archway into the street.” It would require a paragraph of equal length to indicate the sources from which this little picture has been so patiently built up, and there are many others as effective in their happy ming- ling of erudition and imagination. It should be added that the book is excellently illustrated by facsimiles of old views, old prints, and old carica- tures. Hogarth is naturally very prominent in Sir Walter’s pages, but many of the plates are drawn from sources which are rarer and less familiar. It may be safely affirmed—and here we close our brief and _ all-too-perfunctory notice—that there is no existing English book on the Eighteenth Century, social and topographical, which can in any way compete with Sir Walter Besant’s “ magnum opus.” Austin Dosson. ———————EE INK DRUNKARDS. R. F. MARION CRAWFORD, in his novel, ‘“ The Three Fates,” deals graphic- ally with those unfortunate individuals “who have looked upon the ink when it was black and cannot be warned from it, and whose nostrils have smelled the printer’s sacrifice.” Just as there are men and women shattered bodily and mentally by an eternal craving for alcohol and the ceaseless effort to appease it ; just as there are self-immolating victims to narcotics, such as opium, chloral or morphine ; 80 there are beings who are rendered objects of pity to their friends and of despair to themselves by an in- satiable desire to write. “For one man who succeeds in literature,”  132 affirms Mr. Crawford, “a thousand fail.” He is one of the fortunate competitors who has been suc- cessful. Nevertheless, his knowledge of the ter- rible difficulties obstructing the path of a literary beginner appears to be deep and well-founded. Publishers do not greedily accept the work of un- known writers; being business men and not philanthropists, their desire is to deal with authors already established favourites with the reading public, whose books are consequently sure to be well received. Speculative risk attends upon the productions of a tyro without regard to their merit. It is not astonishing, therefore, that writers who have not made a name for themselves are accorded but a cold welcome by the trade. There isa rumour that Thackeray’s Vanity Fair was rejected by no fewer than thirty-eight publish- ers! Charlotte Bronté and her less famous sisters, Robert Louis Stevenson, and a host of very important witnesses, have testified, again and again, to the conservative predilections of Pater- noster Row. A renowned American author, whose writings had always been eagerly accepted, once made the experiment of offering a manu- script, anonymously, to several leading publishers. Each of them declined it with thanks ! Yet in spite of disappointment after disappoint- ment, in the face of perpetual rebuffs, there are men and women powerless to resist the intoxica- tion imparted by ink-soaking. Write, write write! Until eyes are heavy, the brain is weary, and the head swims; until worn- out nature strikes by refusing to endure the strain imposed upon it—such is the curse of ink- drunkards. Though there is little or no pecuniary profit in their slavery, these luckless creatures will still pur- sue it. Though health is lost, and hope almost abandoned, ink-drunkards will yet, like Sisyphus, attempt the impossible. “We all hear of the miserable end of the poor wretch who has subsisted for years upon stimu- lants or narcotics, and whose death is held up as a warning to youth ; but who ever knows or speaks of the countless deaths due solely to the over-use of pen, ink and paper?” Mr. Crawford is right in asking this question. Why do we pretend ignorance of a disease which is, as he says, more fatal than dipsomania ? That such a disease exists can be readily proved by an investigation into some of the ‘secluded haunts of Fleet Street. “Who counts the suicides brought about by failure, the cases of men starving because they would rather write bad English than do good work of any other sort ?” asks Mr. Crawford. Further than this, there are men who have been University scholars unable to earn their bread by THE AUTHOR. their pens. It will be remembered that in hi early days Dr. Johnson, on occasion, walked the streets of London all night because he could nof afford a bed. Coleridge, even at a time when he had attained celebrity as a scholar, a poet, and an essayist, was in the saddest state of destitution For all the recognition his brilliant genius re ceived during his brief lifetime, Keats might well have deemed his name “ writ in water.” Literature, like marriage, is something of g lottery, and its prizes do not always fall to those most worthy to wear them ; but for such ag are intellectually unfitted to participate in the draw ing, it isan Inferno. When we hear of successfy authors who have reached positions of comfort and even of affluence, we are apt to forget the thousands of hack writers whose lives are one continued struggle for the bare means of subsist ence. Sir Walter Besant, the zealous founder of the Society of Authors, has earned a measure of gratitude from all who claim brotherhood with efforts to protect and encourage the profession of Letters can be described as universal predominant. The blind, the maimed, and the halt, who, figuratively speaking, encumber the out- skirts of the literary country, could hardly be re- lieved bythe exertions of a benevolent Hercules. Mr. Crawford has done a service, therefore, by calling attention to a class which he realistically dubs “ink-drunkards.” Poverty, despair, heartsickness, and a spirit of restlessness ever present with the poor victim, are such rewards as fall to the lot of a large proportion of these possessed toilers.. “‘ Let a writer work until his brain reels and his fingers can no longer hold the pen, he will never- theless find it impossible to rest without imagining he is being idle. He cannot escape from the devil that drives him, because he is him- self the driver and the driven, the fiend and his victim, the torturer and the tortured.” Authors who have passed through what is called “the mill” can corroborate Mr. Crawford’s remarks, even though determination, strength of constitution, and perhaps good fortune, may eventually have combined to pull them safely through the Slough of Despond, and to have in some degree toned down the remembrance of it; but it is to the less robust, physically and mentally, that Mr. Crawford more particularly addresses him- self, to the weaker ones whose qualifications may be summed up in three letters—nil ! Like opium to an opium-eater, drink to a drunkard, gold to a miser, is the pen to an ink drunkard ; yet there is nothing tangible in th fascination to which he falls an abject slave! Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource The Author, Vol. 13 Issue 05 (February 1903) Subject The topic of the resource <em>The Author</em>, Vol. 13 Issue 05 (February 1903) Type The nature or genre of the resource Publication Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 1903-02-01-The-Author-13-5 publications The Author