Perceiving that Cable could not talk, and could not draw, although he had a blackboard at hand, Mark Twain sprang to his feet, seized one of Cable's books that lay on the table, opened it at a certain chapter, thrust it into the lecturer's hand, and said "Read it!"

The death of Gene Stratton-Porter last December was mourned more by her readers than by her critics. If not a great writer, she was at all events an extraordinary person. Nine million copies of her novels were sold, and the publishers reckon five readers to every copy. She therefore had a prodigious army of admirers. She was a naturalist, but her books on moths would not sell; she had the mistaken notion that she was a great poet, but no one cared for her verse. Yet her sentimental novels had a vogue paralleled only by that of Harold Bell Wright. Most of her books I found too soft; but she produced one work of fiction which I am not ashamed to call a good book; and I am supported in this opinion by a discriminating and fastidious critic, who is an American novelist and a distinguished Judge. The novel I refer to is "A Daughter of the Land," which has a good plot and characters, and is marred only by crudity of style.

I never saw Gene Stratton-Porter, but I had a good many letters from her. She began the correspondence by asking me why the critics ridiculed her books. I attempted to evade the question by replying that if she had forty-five million readers, she ought not to worry about the critics. She was not satisfied. I then told her that her literary style was childish and crude. She sent me one of her books, asking me to mark the faults. I covered the first twenty pages with many corrections, and I think it a tribute to her character that our friendship survived it. She had a decidedly interesting personality, and I wish I had had the opportunity to talk with her.

William E. Barton's huge "Life of Abraham Lincoln," which I hope to review in a later issue, reminds me by contrast of the composition on this subject written by a New Haven schoolboy. He said, "Lincoln lived to a green old age,

and died in 1896. He is as famous in England as in America, Lincoln Cathedral being named after him." Shortly after reading this original contribution to biography, I stood in front of that magnificent cathedral, and it seemed to say, Before Abraham was, I am.

Adelaide Margaret Delaney, writing from Philadelphia, and Welles Bosworth, writing from Cannes, disagree with me in my condemnation of Xmas; early Christian writings prove that the abbreviation is legitimate. But I am not talking about what was, but what is; and to-day Xmas is as jarring as it would be to abbreviate Job:

When the a.m. stars sang together.

My saying that F. P. A. was the first person to attack Xmas in print drew an editorial from the Herald of Pawnee, Colorado; "F. P. A. is the first only if he beat W. L. Thorndyke, who in the Loveland (Colorado) Reporter twenty-five years ago wrote: 'Have enough respect for the Saviour of mankind to write it Christmas.' Thorndyke has been gone from Loveland these many years; but there are people there and throughout Colorado who still remember his trenchant writings.". I lay a wreath on his grave.

Lewis C. Grover of Brooklyn is a fellow sufferer in the dark. "With the coming of darkness all my courage disappears, optimism gives way to foreboding, and the least thing to be done on the morrow seems impossible." He thinks this can be explained by heredity, because his mother and her father suffered in like manner. But I think Mark Twain is correct in making it human.

A brilliant defense of the dark, of the night, and of black weather comes from Melissa Nash of Harrington, Maine. I envy her such nerves and such a conscience. She closes with a climax. "And for the worlds to come-, well, to be thoroughly consistent, I should choose the outer darkness. I love dogs." It is really too bad that St. John the Divine excluded dogs, but he was Biblically consistent. There is only one friendly allusion to dogs in the entire Bible, and that is in the Apocrypha. The Sanskrit books

treated our canicular friend more courteously.

Doctor Horace Hart, of New Haven, sends me a quotation from the late Emerson Hough's "Out of Doors":

Any man who goes into the wild regions ought to know how to use a compass. A study of it will introduce him to the psychology of getting lost. The truth is that we are made up largely of a subconscious survival—a bundle of doubts, fears, superstitions, and terrors handed down to us from the Stone Age. Given certain conditions, we dread the dark; we anticipate dinosaurs: and dragons: we cry aloud before the saber-toothed tiger. The subconscious mind governs us. We are indeed as a reed shaken with the wind.

My remarks on bootjacks caused a long and able editorial in the Indianapolis News of March 27. The writer thought it incredible that I had never seen a bootjack, seeing that I was born in 1865. My wife says there has been an antique bootjack in my library for fifteen years, but I have not noticed it. It is true that my father wore heavy knee-boots, even in summer, with the trousers over them. But I cannot remember his using a bootjack, though I do remember his language in pulling off this footwear. Father also wore on Sunday mornings a full-dress claw-hammer broadcloth coat, and he never owned a soft shirt. When a boy, I often wore leather boots with red tops and brass toes, but I stuck my pants into them.

Men, women, and children are interested in clothes. There has been no greater advance in comfort than in men's garments. I wear low shoes the year round, and, except in formal evening attire, I have not worn a stiff shirt for twenty years. Never do I wear suspenders in the daytime, or a waistcoat in warm weather. And, as for the oldfashioned "heavies," no, not by a long shot. The advance of civilization is shown mainly in the discarding of superfluous and therefore troublesome garments, by both sexes. And a good thing it is. The human body in the temperate zone is freer than ever before.

Look at the ancestral portraits, the 'constipated" portraits, as Stevenson called them, and see how the men were wrapped up, with stocks around the neck, and huge boots around the ankle.

The most uncomfortable male attire to-day is worn by American soldiers; high stiff coat-collars and stiff puttees must be the last word in human misery. The English officers looked more comfortable with their soft rolling collars.

The best defense of uncut leaves that I have seen comes from Frances Chapman, of Brookline. "To me, a book with uncut leaves always brings a little spirit of adventure, a sense of possession, as if the book were peculiarly my own. But above all is the delightful sense of unhurried leisure. Here is a book that invites me to take my time, and I can lay it aside without book-mark or notation, for I cut as I read." She explains what I felt only subconsciously.

In a recent number of SCRIBNER'S I called attention to Weekley's "Concise Etymological Dictionary." Let me also recommend the "Pocket Oxford Dictionary," a book small enough to be easily carried in the pocket, yet clearly printed, and containing one thousand pages! It is called a dictionary of Current English, compiled by F. G. Fowler and H. W. Fowler. It is a marvel of condensation by the editors, and a triumph for the publishers.

The Public Library of the City of Coventry, England, has recently issued a bibliography of works by and about John Galsworthy, under the direction of Charles Nowell, City Librarian. This is a fine and useful undertaking, and all who are interested in studying the famous novelist may write to Coventry without being sent there.

Rose Macaulay's "Orphan Island” I found disappointing, as I have found everything she has written since "Potterism." This is not to say that "Orphan Island" is a bad novel; she set so high a standard of accomplishment in "Potterism" that she has not yet been able to equal it. "Orphan Island" is an attempt at satire, where the effort is too obvious. Should any one doubt the astounding genius of Swift, the doubt would be dispelled by first reading "Orphan Island" and then "Gulliver's Travels."

I divide all readers into two classes: those who read to remember, and those who

read to forget. Unfortunately the second class is larger than the first. But there are times when every one must read to forget: on a tedious railway journey, or during convalescence from illness, or under the shadow of grief. Let me therefore recommend three new novels, which are so exciting that I will guarantee to all readers forgetfulness of environment, pain, and what is most difficult to forget, one's own self. These are "A Voice from the Dark," by Eden Phillpotts; "The Monster," by "Harrington Hext"; and "Black Cargo," by J. P. Marquand. The last is much the best of the three, from the point of view of style and characterization; but all three are veritable thrillers. And there are times in every one's existence when a thriller is the only adequate remedy to prescribe. I am a literary physician; I can diagnose, and I

can cure.

An excellent novel is "The Doom Window," by Maurice Drake. This is an original and charming story, on a subject that I think has never before been treated in fiction-Stained Glass. I recommend it especially to my friend, General Charles H. Sherrill, of New York, who is an authority on cathedral windows.

In "The Rector of Wyck," May Sinclair has changed her ordinary writing fluid from vitriol to ink; I am grateful for the change. Readers will realize how great is the change when in this book there is actually a happy marriage and a good clergyman.

I congratulate Sister M. Madeleva on her scholarly and delightful book, "Chaucer's Nuns and Other Essays." She has made a contribution to Chaucerian scholarship; and her treatment of the famous Prioresse, professionally equipped as she is, will be of marked assistance to many professors of English Literature. I cannot sufficiently commend the spirit of this little book, which is as beautiful as its criticisms are penetrating. One of the minor essays is devoted to Edna St. Vincent Millay-indicating the range of human interest displayed by Sister Madeleva.

Mrs. Thomas B. Stowell, of Los Angeles, is welcomed into the Faerie Queene Club. How was it possible for her in such a climate to read so long a book? Most

of the intellectual work of the world has been accomplished in bad weather.

Mrs. John C. Wyman, of Newtonville, Massachusetts, enters the Faerie Queene Club with the following confession. "I read it all through in 1880-81. A prominent librarian in the Congressional Library did not exactly dare me to do it, but spoke as though it would be an almost unprecedented feat to accomplish." She goes on to say that she became lost as in a labyrinth; and indeed it would take a marvellous memory to follow the trail.

Miss Mayone Lewis, of Pasadena, writes me an admirable and spirited defense of Burke's Speech on Conciliation, so that I am almost inspired to make another trial of it. She nominates Michael Angelo's "David" for the Ignoble Prize. She agrees with George Wright's opinion, given in the December SCRIBNER's, that it is "bunchy." She continues: "Why is it that the man in the street knows this work of Michael Angelo's and only this, and has probably never heard of the entrancing figure of 'Night' on the Medici tomb?" I supposed that the reason "David" was so bunchy and musclebound was that old Michael tried to see what he could do with a block of insufficient length.

I have met two dogs in Augusta. One is a huge Newfoundland, Don Hill, of Norwalk, and the other a Pomeranian, Jennie, of Brooklyn. I am not versed in zoology; but is there any other animal of such divergence of size? A Great Dane and a Pom are both dogs. How unlike man! The physical divergence in man is inconsiderable; the Chinese giant, eight feet four inches, was not nearly so far from Barnum's Midgets as the canine range. But when it comes to the consideration of character, it is quite the other way around. No dogs are villains. But think of St. Francis and Cesare Borgia, St. Anthony and Casanova!

I conclude this essay with a tribute to the marvellous Nurmi, one of the greatest athletes of all time. I do not hesitate to say that, while some of our native runners are best at the American style, Nurmi is best at the Finnish.

"WO or three months ago, on the death of Senator W. A. Clark, it developed that he had bequeathed his collections to the Metropolitan Museum, subject to the condition that they be preserved by themselves somewhere within the vast building in Central Park. The condition was in conflict with the policy of the museum, and the gift was declined, wisely, I think, both in view of the policy aforesaid and because the collections, while containing many treasures, do not form precisely a unit. As I write, the alternate offer of them to the Corcoran Gallery is under consideration, and the decision will probably be made before this number of the magazine is printed. It was natural while the subject was in the air to think over the collections and

the Model." I could perfectly understand anybody's being surprised by this selection, for if there is one tradition in painting that is nominally played out it is the tradition of Fortuny. Our modern ideas date peculiarly from the rediscovery of Velasquez and Hals, and the demigods

to find this or that reason for forming one's own opinion as to their disposition. As I went over them in memory I could see how certain pieces would practically duplicate others in the Metropolitan; how one old picture or another modern one might really enrich the museum or leave it not appreciably strengthened. The reader may be a little puzzled by my own choice of the one picture which I hated to have the Metropolitan miss. It was Fortuny's "Choice of

VOL. LXXVIII.-8

One of the "right" ways of painting is the way of Mariano JoséMaria Bernardo Fortuny. I like to give him his full Spanish style, if only for old sake's sake, in memory of the day long ago when I was all set to write his biography. In Paris I fell in with Philip Gilbert Hamerton, and he asked me to write one of those "Portfolio Monographs," which he was editing in place of the old miscellaneous "Portfolio." We discussed subjects

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