Chapter I: Front Matter

THE BEST SHORT STORIES OF 1915

AND THE

YEARBOOK OF THE AMERICAN SHORT STORY

EDITED BY EDWARD J. O'BRIEN

BOSTON SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY PUBLISHERS

Copyright, 1915, 1916, by The Boston Transcript.

Copyright, 1915, by Charles Scribner's Sons, Harper and Brothers, The Century Company, The Masses Publishing Company, P.F. Collier & Son, Incorporated, Margaret C. Anderson, Mitchell Kennerley, The Ridgway Company, Illustrated Sunday Magazine, John T. Frederick, Every Week Corporation, Boston Daily Advertiser, The Bellman Company, The Outlook Company, and The Curtis Publishing Company.

Copyright, 1916, by Maxwell Struthers Burt, Donn Byrne, Will Levington Comfort, William Addison Dwiggins, James Francis Dwyer, Ben Hecht, Arthur Johnson, Virgil Jordan, Harris Merton Lyon, Walter J. Muilenburg, Newbold Noyes, Seumas O'Brien, Katharine Metcalf Roof, Benjamin Rosenblatt, Elsie Singmaster Lewars, Wilbur Daniel Steele, Mary Synon, and Fannie Hurst.

Copyright, 1916, by Small, Maynard and Company, Incorporated.

Second Printing, June, 1916 Third Printing, October, 1916 Fourth Printing, December, 1916 Fifth Printing, May, 1917

THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A.

* * * * *

TO BENJAMIN ROSENBLATT

* * * * *

BY WAY OF ACKNOWLEDGMENT

Grateful acknowledgment for permission to include the stories in this volume is made to the following authors, editors, publishers, and copyright holders:

To Charles Scribner's Sons and Mr. Maxwell Struthers Burt for
permission to reprint "The Water-Hole," first published in
_Scribner's Magazine_; to Harper and Brothers and Mr. Donn Byrne for
permission to reprint "The Wake," first published in _Harper's
Magazine_; to The Masses Publishing Company and Mr. Will Levington
Comfort for permission to reprint "Chautonville," first published in
_The Masses_; to Mr. William Addison Dwiggins for permission to
reprint "La Dernière Mobilisation;" to P.F. Collier & Son,
Incorporated, Galbraith Welch, and Mr. James Francis Dwyer for
permission to reprint "The Citizen," first published in _Collier's
Weekly_; to Mitchell Kennerley and Mrs. Frances Gregg Wilkinson for
permission to reprint "Whose Dog--?" first published in _The Forum_;
to Miss Margaret C. Anderson and Mr. Ben Hecht for permission to
reprint "Life," first published in _The Little Review_; to the
Century Company and Mr. Arthur Johnson for permission to reprint
"Mr. Eberdeen's House," first published in _The Century Magazine_;
to the Ridgway Company and Mr. Virgil Jordan for permission to
include "Vengeance is Mine!" first published in _Everybody's
Magazine_; to _The Illustrated Sunday Magazine_ and Mr. Harris
Merton Lyon for permission to reprint "The Weaver Who Clad the
Summer," first published in _The Illustrated Sunday Magazine_; to
Mr. John T. Frederick and Mr. Walter J. Muilenburg for permission to
reprint "Heart of Youth," first published in _The Midland_; to the
Every Week Corporation and Mr. Newbold Noyes for permission to
reprint "The End of the Path," first published in _Every Week_ and
_The Associated Sunday Magazine_; to _The Illustrated Sunday
Magazine_ and Mr. Seumas O'Brien for permission to reprint "The
Whale and the Grass-Hopper," first published in _The Illustrated
Sunday Magazine_; to _The Boston Daily Advertiser_, _The Boston
Evening Record_, and the Newspaper Enterprise Association for
permission to reprint "In Berlin," by Mary Boyle O'Reilly, first
published in _The Boston Daily Advertiser_; to the Century Company
and Miss Katharine Metcalf Roof for permission to reprint "The
Waiting Years," first published in _The Century Magazine_; to The
Bellman Company and Mr. Benjamin Rosenblatt for permission to
reprint "Zelig," first published in _The Bellman_; to The Outlook
Company and Mrs. Elsie Singmaster Lewars for permission to include
"The Survivors," first published in _The Outlook_; to Harper and
Brothers and Mr. Wilbur Daniel Steele for permission to reprint "The
Yellow Cat," first published in _Harper's Magazine_; to Charles
Scribner's Sons and Miss Mary Synon for permission to reprint "The
Bounty Jumper," first published in _Scribner's Magazine_; and to The
Curtis Publishing Company and Miss Fannie Hurst for permission to
reprint "T.B.," first published in _The Saturday Evening Post_.

Acknowledgments are specially due to _The Boston Evening Transcript_
for permission to reprint the large body of material previously
published in the columns of that paper.

I wish to specially express my gratitude to the following who have materially assisted by their efforts in making this year-book of American fiction possible and more complete:

Mr. A.A. Boyden, Mr. Bruce Barton, Mr. Henry A. Bellows, Professor
Albert Frederick Wilson, Mr. Barry Benefield, Mr. Douglas Z. Doty,
Mr. Karl Edwin Harriman, Mr. Edward Frank Allen, Mr. Carl Hovey,
Miss Sonya Levien, Mr. William Griffith, Mr. Arthur T. Vance, Mr.
Mitchell Kennerley, Mr. H.M. Greene, Mr. Robert Bridges, Mr. J.B.
Carrington, Mr. Hayden Carruth, Mr. Frederic A. Duneka, Mr. Henry J.
Forman, Mr. Gilman Hall, Mr. Charles Hanson Towne, Miss Margaret
Anderson, Mr. Charles Edison, Mr. Guido Bruno, Mr. William Marion
Reedy, Mr. John T. Frederick, Mr. Burton Kline, Miss Dorothea
Lawrance Mann, Miss Katharine Butler, Mr. Thomas H. Uzzell, Mr.
Virgil Jordan, Mrs. Elsie Singmaster Lewars, Mr. Alfred A. Knopf,
Miss Hilda Baker, Mr. William Stanley Braithwaite, and Mr. Francis
J. Hannigan, in charge of the Periodical Department of the Boston
Public Library. To Mr. Hannigan my special gratitude is due. My
ability to find certain back numbers of periodicals which the
publishers were unable to supply is due to his personal helpfulness
and unsparing pains. In fact, his assistance at certain times almost
amounted to collaboration.

I shall be grateful to my readers for corrections and particularly for suggestions leading to the wider usefulness of this annual volume. In particular, I shall welcome the receipt from authors and publishers, of stories published during 1916 which have qualities of distinction, and yet are not printed in periodicals falling under my regular notice. For such assistance I shall make due and grateful acknowledgment in next year's annual.

If I have been guilty of any omissions in these acknowledgments, it is quite unintentional, and I trust that I shall be absolved for my good intentions.

E.J.O.

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