Chapter XXVI: Patrons and Profits for Twenty-Two Years 175 (2)

As a matter of course the dollar dreadful is better done. The author probably took six months or a year to do it, and if it is well advertised and proves a success he reaps a modest fortune. On the other hand, the nickel novel is written in three days or a week and brings the author $50. Why shouldn't the dollar book show a higher grade of craftmanship? But is it less vicious than the novel that sells for five cents? To draw the matter still finer, is either form of fiction vicious?

If we turn to Webster and seek a definition of "sensational" we find: "Suited or intended to excite temporarily great interest or emotion; melodramatic; emotional."

This does not mean that sensational writing is vicious writing. It is wrong to classify as vicious or degrading the story of swift action and clean ethics, or to compare it with that prurient product of the slums which deals with problems of sex.

The tale that moves breathlessly but logically, that is built incident upon incident to a telling climax with the frankly avowed purpose to entertain, that has no questionable leanings or immoral affiliations--such a tale speeds innocently an idle hour, diverts pleasantly the harrassed mind, freshens our zeal for the duties of life, and occasionally leaves us with higher ideals.

We are all dreamers. We must be dreamers before we are doers. If some of the visions that come to us in secret reverie were flaunted in all their conceit and inconsistency before the world, not one of us but would be the butt of the world's ridicule. And yet, out of these highly tinted imaginings springs the impulse that carries us to higher and nobler things.

A difference in the price of two commodities does not necessarily mark a moral difference in the commodities themselves. _The Century Magazine_ sells for 35 cents, while _The Argosy_ sells for 10 cents. You will be told that _The Century_ is "high class" and with a distinct literary flavor, perhaps that it is more elevating. Even so; yet which of these magazines is doing more to make the world really livable? Ask the newsdealer in your town how many _Centuries_ he sells, and how many _Argosies_.

Readers are not made for the popular magazines, but the popular magazines are made for the people. Unless there was a distinct and insistent demand for this sort of entertainment, so many all-story magazines, priced at a dime, could not exist.

Nickel thrillers cater largely to a juvenile clientele. Taking them by and large--there are a few exceptions, of course--they are as worthy of readers as the dime magazines; and many a serial in a dime magazine has been republished in cloth and made into a "best seller."[D]

Why is it that, if a lad in his teens robs a jewelry store and is apprehended, almost invariably the newspaper report has a bundle of nickel libraries found in his pocket? Why a nickel library and not a "yellow" newspaper?

The standard of judgment which places a nickel novel in the heart-side pocket of the young degenerate, harks back to a period when "yellow-back" literature was really vicious; it is a judgment by tradition, unsupported by present-day facts. The world moves, and as it moves it grows constantly better. Reputable publishers of cheap fiction have elevated the character of their output until now some of the weekly stories they publish are really admirable; in many instances they are classics.

A few years ago, at a convention of Sunday School teachers at Asbury Park, N. J., a minister boldly praised the "Diamond Dick" stories. He declared that while action rattled through the pages of these tales like bullets from a Gatling, he had found nothing immoral in them, nothing suggestive, nothing to deprave. The lawless received their just reward and virtue emerged triumphant. It was his thought that a few "Diamond Dick" stories might, with benefit, take the place, in Sunday School libraries, of the time-honored book in which the boy goes a-fishing on Sunday and falls into the river.

One of the "Frank Merriwell" stories tells of a sensitive, shrinking lad at an academy who was hazed into a case of pneumonia from which he died. The hero breaks the news of the boy's death to his widowed mother and comforts her in her bereavement. From beginning to end the story is told with a sympathy, and such a thorough understanding of boy-nature, that the hold on the juvenile reader is as strong as the theme is uplifting.

This is not "trash." It is literature sold at a price which carries it everywhere, and the result is untold good.

The fact remains, however, that not every publisher of nickel novels has so high a standard. The paternal eye, in overseeing the fiction of the young, must be discriminating. Blood-and-thunder has had its day; but, if the rising generation is not to be a race of mollycoddles, care must be exercised in stopping short of the other extreme.

The life of today sets a pattern for the fiction of to-day. The masses demand rapid-fire action and good red brawn in their reading matter. Their awakened moral sense makes possible the muck-raker; and when they weary of the day's evil and the day's toil, it is their habit to divert themselves with pleasant and exciting reading. And it must be CLEAN.

FOOTNOTES:

[D] "Dan Quixote," for instance published in =The All-Story Magazine=, and republished as "The Brass Bowl."

VI.

MAKING GOOD
BY HARD WORK.

With the beginning of the year 1894 Edwards was learning the knack of the nickel novel and its ten-cent brother, and making good with his New York publishers. During 1893 the work he turned in was of fair quality, but he was not satisfied with that and labored to improve. Each succeeding story came nearer and nearer the high mark. Believing that whatever is worth doing is worth doing well, he was constantly asking himself, "How can I make my next story better than the one I have just finished?" The publishers helped him. Every manuscript submitted was read personally by Mr. Perkins, and brought a letter dissecting the story and stating which incidents were liked, and why, and which incidents were not liked, and why. Edwards feels that he can never be sufficiently grateful to Mr. Perkins for this coaching in the gentle art of stalking a reader's elusive interest.

Had Edwards remained a paymaster in the employ of the contracting firm, he would have received $1,200 for his services in 1893. He severed his connection with his paymaster's salary in June, and at the end of the year his Fiction Factory showed these results:

4 Five-Cent Library stories at $50 each $ 200.
1 Juvenile serial 100.
1 Juvenile serial 75.
13 Ten-Cent Library stories at $100. each 1300.
1 Serial for Saturday Night 150.
---------
Total $ 1825.

In other words, Edwards had taken out of his Fiction Factory $625 more than his salary as paymaster would have amounted to for the year. He felt vastly relieved, and his wife laughingly fell back on her woman's prerogative of saying "I told you so." This was a good beginning, and Edwards felt sure that he would be able to do even better during 1894. He was coming along splendidly with the Ten-Cent Library work. On Jan. 30 Mr. Perkins paid this tribute to his growing powers:

"I have just finished reading your story, 'Dalton's Double,' which I
find to be as good as anything you have given us. I must compliment
you upon the varied incident which you cram into these stories, of a
nature that is well suited to them."

It was Edwards' custom to forward a Ten-Cent Library story every two weeks, and there were months in which he wrote three stories, taking ten days for each one. As these stories were 40,000 words in length, three in thirty days were equivalent to 120,000 words.

During 1893 he wrote his stories twice: first a rough draft and then the printer's copy. In 1894 he began making his first copies clean enough for the compositor. Had he not done this he could never have accomplished such a large amount of work.

On April 10, when everything was going swimmingly and he was taking in $300 a month for the library work, he was brought up short in his career of prosperity. Mr. Perkins wrote him to finish the story upon which he was engaged and then to stop the library work until further orders. It had been decided to use "re-prints" in the series. This could very easily be done as the Library had been published for years and some of the earlier stories could be brought out again without injuring the sale. The letter, which was a profound disappointment to Edwards, closed as follows:

"I regret the necessity of curtailing your work, for I am entirely
satisfied with it, and if we did not find it necessary to adopt the
measure referred to above, with a view to decreasing expenses during
the summer months and dull season, I should have wished to have you
continue right along. I have no doubt that you will be able to find a
place for your material in the meantime."

This fell upon Edwards like a bolt from a clear sky. He began to regret his "paymaster crutch" and to imagine dire things. He had been giving his time almost exclusively to Harte & Perkins, and had lost touch with publications for which he had been writing previous to 1893. Where, he asked himself, was he to place his material in the meantime?

There is little sentiment in business. Harte & Perkins, whenever they find a line of work is not paying, will cut it off at an hour's notice, by telegraph if necessary. The man receiving the telegram, of course, can only make the best of it. This is a point which Edwards has always disliked about the work for publishers of this class of fiction: the writer, no matter how prosperous he may be at any given time, is always in a state of glorious uncertainty.

But Edwards fell on his feet. It so happened that he had sent to Harte & Perkins, some time before, copies of _Saturday Night_ containing two of his stories. He had done this in the attempt to prove to them that he could write for _The Weekly Guest_, their story paper. This little incident shows how important it is for a writer to get as many anchors to windward as possible.

Eight days after being cut off from the library work, Edwards received a letter from Mr. Harte. Mr. Perkins had left New York on business, but had turned over the printed work in _Saturday Night_ for Mr. Harte's inspection before leaving. Mr. Harte wrote, in part:

"I like your work in _Saturday Night_, and think we shall be able to
give you a commission for a _Weekly Guest_ story, provided you can
lend yourself successfully to our suggestions as to style, etc., and
give us permission to publish under any of the pen names we use in
the office.

We want a story of the Stella Edwards type. We send you to-day one or
two samples of the class of work desired, so that you may be able to
see just what it is. If you can do the work, we shall be pleased to
send you a title and plot, with synopsis. You can then write us two
installments for a trial, and, if satisfactory, I have no doubt we
could arrange to give you a quantity of work in this line.

I feel, after reading the samples you submitted, that you will be
able to meet our requirements in this class of story. The two stories
we send you are the work of a masculine pen, and though not so easy
to lose one's identity in literary work, this class of story does
not seem to present the ordinary difficulties; at least, that is the
testimony of our authors who have tried it."

Edwards was booked to attempt a gushing love story, to follow a copy and make it appear as though a woman had done the writing! Quite a jump this, from a rapid-fire Ten-Cent Library story for young men to a bit of sentimental fiction for young women. However, he went at it, and he went at it with a determination to make good. It was either that or go paymastering again.

On April 24 he received title, synopsis and plot of "Bessie, the Beautiful Blind Girl," and began charging himself with superheated sentiment preparatory to beginning his work. The popular young lady authoress, "Stella Edwards," whose portrait in a decollete gown had been so often flaunted in the eyes of "her" public, was a myth. The "stuff" supposedly written by the charming "Stella Edwards" was ground out by men who were versatile enough to befool women readers, with a feminine style. Edwards, it transpired, was able to do this successfully for a time, but ultimately he failed to round off the rough corners of a style too decidedly masculine for "Miss Edwards." But this is anticipating.

On May 3 he had sent the two trial installments, and from New York came the word:

"We like the two opening installments of 'Bessie, the Beautiful Blind
Girl.' The style is good, the action brisk and sensational and of a
curiosity-arousing character.

It is our belief that you are capable of presenting a desirable
variation from the former Stella Edwards' stories, by introducing
romantic incidents of a novel and more exalted character.

In most of the other Stella Edwards' yarns there was little plot and
the action was rarely varied. The action comprised the pursuit and
capture, the recapture and loss of the heroine, she being constantly
whirled, like a shuttle-cock, from the hero to the villain, then to
the female villain, then back again to the hero for a few tantalizing
moments, and so on to the end.

You can readily improve upon this by introducing scenes a little more
fresh, and far more interesting.

It is about time for Stella to improve, and we believe you are just
the man to make her do better work.

Go on with the story and force our readers to exclaim, 'Well, that's
the best story Stella has written!'"

While Edwards was deep in the sorrows of "Bessie, the Beautiful Blind Girl," he received from his publishers on May 10 orders which hurled him headlong into another "Stella Edwards" yarn.

"Owing to a change in our publishing schedule of Guest stories, it
will be necessary to anticipate the issue of 'Bessie, the Beautiful
Blind Girl' by another story of the same type, sixteen installments,
same as the one you are now working on. The title of this new story
will be 'The Bicycle Belle,' and will deal with the bicycle as the
matter of central interest in the first installment or two. I send
you a synopsis of the story prepared by one of our editors. This will
simply give you an idea of one way of developing the theme. It does
not, however, suit our plans, and we will ask you to invent something
quite different."

Always and ever Harte & Perkins kept their fingers on the pulse of their reading public. The safety bicycle was the fashion, in those days, and Harte & Perkins were usually first to exploit a fashion or a fad in their story columns. Whenever they had a story with a particularly popular and striking theme, it was their habit to flood the country with sample copies of _The Weekly Guest_, breaking off a generous installment of the serial in such a breathless place that the reader was forced to buy succeeding issues of the _Guest_ in order to get the rest of the story. So that is what the change in their publishing schedule meant. They wanted to boom the circulation of the _Guest_ with a bicycle story.

Edwards shelved Bessie the beautiful at the 7th installment and threw himself into the tears, fears and chivalry of "The Bicycle Belle." This was on May 12. Three days later, on May 15, he forwarded two installments of the bicycle story for Harte & Perkins' inspection. On May 16, before these installments had reached the publishers, Edwards was requested as follows:

"As we shall not be able to begin, in the Guest, your story, 'Bessie,
the Beautiful Blind Girl,' until after January the first, next, it
will be well to change the scene to a winter setting. This can be
very easily done in the two installments that we have on hand, if you
will make a note of it and keep it up for the balance of the story.
In the first installment we will show the girl leaping into the river
with a few cakes of ice floating about, and in the scene where she is
expelled from the house there will be plenty of snow. It will make a
more effective picture and be more seasonable for the story."

More trouble! Harte & Perkins had two installments, and did not seem to know that Edwards had five more installments on hand, pending the completion of the bicycle yarn. But he was ready to turn summer into winter, or day into night, in order to make good. On May 18 he received a report on the two installments of the bicycle story.

"The two installments of 'The Bicycle Belle' have been read and
approved by our editor, who says that the story opens very well, with
plenty of animated action, briefly yet graphically pictured. You seem
to have caught our idea exactly, and we would be pleased to have
you go ahead with the story, finishing it before you again take up
'Bessie, the Beautiful Blind Girl.'"

On June 3 Edwards sent installments three to sixteen of the bicycle story, which was the complete manuscript. Ten days later he was informed:

"'The Bicycle Belle' is crowded with dramatic action and is just
what we want. In the next it would be well to have a little more
of the female element just to demonstrate that 'Stella Edwards' is
up-to-date."

None the less pleasant was this news, contained in a letter dated June 18:

"We have placed to your credit, upon our books, the sum of three
hundred dollars in payment for 'The Bicycle Belle,' which will be the
figure for all this class of stories from your pen which are accepted
for _The Weekly Guest_."

Up to that time this was the most money Edwards had ever received for a serial story, and very naturally he felt elated. Under date of June 20 he wrote Harte & Perkins and told them that he was planning a trip East as soon as he had finished with "Bessie, the Beautiful Blind Girl." He received a cordial invitation from the publishers to come on as soon as possible as they had something which they particularly wanted him to do for them.

The story of the blind girl was forwarded on June 30. A flaw was discovered in it and several installments were returned for correction--not a serious flaw, indeed, but one which necessitated a little revision. The revision made, the story passed at once to acceptance.

In July Edwards was in New York and called personally upon Harte & Perkins. He found them pleasant and capable gentlemen--all that his fancy had pictured them through months of correspondence. Inasmuch as it was Edwards' first visit to the metropolis, he studied the city with a view to using it in some of his fiction.

The special work which Mr. Harte wanted Edwards to do for the firm was a story of which he gave the salient features. It was to be written in the best Archibald Clavering Gunter style.

As Edwards had imitated successfully the mythical "Stella Edwards," he was now confronted with the more trying task of imitating the style of a popular living author. He read Gunter from "Barnes of New York" down; and then, when completely saturated with him, turned off two installments of "The Brave and Fair" and sent them on. He was visiting in Michigan, at the time, and a letter under date of August 20, reached him while he was still in that state.

"I have just finished reading the two installments of 'The Brave and
Fair.' I think you have made a very good opening indeed. It reads
smoothly and seems to me to be very much in Gunter's light narrative
style, which is what we are after. It remains to be seen whether you
can get as close to Gunter in what might be called his tragedy vein
as opposed to the comedy vein, which you have successfully worked up
in these two installments."

"The Brave and Fair," going forward to the publishers piece by piece, seemed to arouse their enthusiasm. "We have read up to installment eight. It is fine! Full of heroic action! Bristling with exciting scenes!" When the completed manuscript was in the publishers' hands, on October 20, there came another complimentary letter.

"'The Brave and Fair' bristled with exciting action to the close.

The best incidents in it are those descriptive of Chub Jones' heroic
self-sacrifice. In our opinion, this stands out as the gem of the
story, because it makes the reader's heart bound with admiration for
the little hero."

Hundreds of thousands of sample copies of _The Weekly Guest_, with first chapters of this story, were scattered all over the land. Later, the book was issued in paper covers. Harte & Perkins paid the author $500 for the story, then ordered another of the same type for which he was given $450.

These stories were written under a _nom de plume_ which Harte & Perkins had copyrighted. The _nom de plume_ was their property and could not be appropriated by any other publisher. Edwards wrote three of the yarns, and a friend of his wrote others.

All the year Edwards had been patted on the back. On Dec. 14 came a blow between the eyes. He had been commissioned to write another "Stella Edwards" rhapsody, but was overconfident and did not take time to surround himself with the proper "Stella Edwards" atmosphere. Two installments went forward, and this letter came back:

"I have just finished reading 'Two Hearts Against the World.' I
regret to say that the story will not do, and it would be as well for
you not to attempt to remodel it. In other words, the way you are
handling the subject is not satisfactory to us and is not a question
of minor detail. We shall be obliged to give this work into other
hands to do. The story, as far as it goes, is wildly improbable
and has a lack of cohesion in the incident. I think you wrote it
hurriedly, and without mature thought. These stories have to seem
probable even if they deal with unusual events."

There was bitterness in that, not so much because Edwards had lost $300 but because he had failed to make good. His pride suffered more than his pocket. Later, however, he wrote some more "Stella Edwards" stories for Harte & Perkins and they were highly praised; but that type of fiction was not his forte.

The year 1894 closed with Harte & Perkins giving Edwards a chance at a new five-cent weekly they were starting. It was merely a shift from _The Weekly Guest_ back to the libraries again.

His work for Harte & Perkins, during the year, showed as follows:

10 Ten-Cent Libraries at $100 each $ 1000.
Two "Stella Edwards" stories at $300 each 600.
"The Brave and Fair" 500.
"The Man from Montana" 450.
2 Five-Cent Libraries at $50 each 100.
1 Juvenile serial 100.
---------
Total $2,750.

The work tabulated above approximates 850,000 words, and takes no account of work sold to other publishers. By industry alone Edwards had secured a fair income.

W. Bert Foster, a friend of Edwards', who for twenty-five years has
kept a story-mill of his own busily grinding with splendid success,
has this to say about a slip he once made in his early years:

"When I was a young writer I sold a story to a juvenile paper. It
was published. And not until the boys began to write in about it did
either the editor or I discover that I had my hero dying of thirst
_on a raft in Lake Michigan_!"

VII.

INSPIRATION
ALIAS INDUSTRY.

Jack London advises authors not to wait for inspiration but to "go after it with a club." Bravo! It is not intended, of course, to lay violent hands on the Happy Idea or to knock it over with a bludgeon. Mr. London realizes that, nine times out of ten, Happy Ideas are drawn toward industry as iron filings toward a magnet. The real secret lies in making a start, even though it promises to get you nowhere, and inspiration will take care of itself.

There's a lot of "fiddle-faddle" wrapped up in that word "inspiration." It is the last resort of the lazy writer, of the man who would rather sit and dream than be up and doing. If the majority of writers who depend upon fiction for a livelihood were to wait for the spirit of inspiration to move them, the sheriff would happen along and tack a notice on the front door--while the writers were still waiting.

More and more Edwards' experience, and the experience of others which has come under his observation, convinces him that inspiration is only another name for industry. When he was paymaster for the firm of contractors, he went to the office at 8 o'clock in the morning, took half an hour for luncheon at noon, and left for home at half-past 5. When he broke away from office routine, he promised himself that he would give as much, or more, of his time to his Fiction Factory.

What he feared was that ideas would fail to come, and that he would pass the time sitting idly at his typewriter. In actual practice, he found it almost uncanny how the blank white sheet he had run into his machine invited ideas to cover it. After five, ten or fifteen minutes of following false leads, he at last hit upon the right scent and was off at a run. With every leap his enthusiasm grew upon him. A bright bit of dialogue would evoke a chuckle, a touch of pathos would bring a tear, an unexpected incident shooting suddenly out of the tangled threads would fill him with rapture, and for the logical but unexpected climax he reserved a mood like Caesar's, returning from the wars and celebrating a triumph.

In the ardor of his work he forgot the flight of time. He balked at leaving his typewriter for a meal and went to bed only when drowsiness interfered with his flow of thought.

Whether he was writing a Five-Cent Library, a serial story or a novel which he hoped would bring him fame and fortune, the same delight filled him whenever he achieved a point which he knew to be worth while. And whenever such a point is achieved, my writer friend, there is something that rises in your soul and tells you of it in words that never lie.

No matter what you are writing, unless you can thrill to every detail of excellence in what you do, unless you can worry about the obscure sentence or the unworthy incident until they are sponged out and recast, it is not too much to say that you will never succeed at the writing game. Love the work for its own sake and it will bring its inspiration and its reward; look upon it as a grind and melancholy failure stalks in your wake.

There can be no inspiration without industry, and no industry without inspiration. Start your car on the batteries of industry and it will soon be running on the magneto of inspiration. Drive yourself to your work, and presently interest will be aroused and your eager energies will need a curb instead of a spur.

Edwards has written two 30,000-word stories a week for months at a time; he has written one 30,000-word story and one 40,000-word serial in one week; he has begun a Five Cent Library story at 7 o'clock in the morning and worked the clock around, completing the manuscript at 7 the next morning; and he has done other things that were possible only because industry brought inspiration, and inspiration takes no account of time.

Edwards knows a writer of short stories who is like a crazy man for days while he is frantically groping for an idea. When the idea comes, he figuratively sweats blood for a week in pulling it through his typewriter; and then, when the story is in the mails, he takes to his bed for a week from physical exhaustion. Result: Three weeks, one story, and anywhere from $50 to $75. He is conscientious, but his method is wrong. Instead of storming through the house and tearing his hair while the idea eludes him, he should roll in a fresh sheet, sit calmly down in front of the keys, look out of the window or around the room and start off with the first object that appeals to him.

There are writers who will have a Billikin for inspiration, or some other fetich that takes the place of a Billikin. Edwards has an elephant tobacco-jar that has occasionally helped him. Sometimes it is a pipeful of the elephant's contents, and sometimes it is merely a long look at the elephant that starts the psychology to working.

Of course it isn't really the Billikin, or the elephant, or the tobacco that does the trick. They merely enable us to concentrate upon the work in hand: from them we gather hope that work will produce results, so we get busy and results come.

The main thing is to break the shackles of laziness and begin our labors; then, after that, to forget that we are laboring in the sheer joy of creation with which our labor inspires us.

New York, Sept. 2, 1911.

My dear Mr. Edwards:

You fairly have me stumped. With the greatest pleasure in the world
I would give you what you ask for your book, but I am not certain
that I can recall any humorous anecdotes; and as for "quips," I
look the word up and discover that it means: "A sneering or mocking
remark; gibe; taunt." And I am afraid I am not equal to evolving
any of these.... All I can recall now is that in my early days an
editor of the _New York Herald_ wanted to kick me down the editorial
stairs because I asked pay for amusement notes they had been printing
for nothing. I fled, leaving my last Ms. behind me--which they also
printed gratis. Now this wasn't humorous to anybody at the time, and
if there was any 'quip,' that editor uttered it, and I don't remember
now just the language he used.

Very truly yours,
Matthew White, Jr.,
Editor _The Argosy_.

VIII.

THE WOLF ON
THE SKY-LINE.

For Edwards, the year 1895 dawned in a blaze of prosperity and went out in the gathering shadows of impending disaster.

Spring found him literally swamped with orders, and he tried the experiment of hiring a young man stenographer and typist to assist him. The young man was an expert in his line and proved so efficient an aide that Edwards hired another who was equally proficient. Two stenographers failing to help him catch up with his flood of orders, he secured a third.

One assistant put in his time copying manuscripts and cataloguing clippings, to another the library work was dictated, and the third was employed on "Stella Edwards" material.

Edwards was versatile, and he experienced no difficulty in passing from one class of work to another. He was able to chronicle the breathless adventures of the hero of the Five-Cent Library to one stenographer, then turn to the other and dictate two or three chapters of a serial of the class written by Laura Jean Libby, and then fill in the gaps between dictation with altogether different work on his own machine.

Although Edwards kept these three stenographers for several months, and although he has since frequently availed himself of the services of an amanuensis, yet he is free to confess that he doubts the expediency of such help. Successful dialect cannot be wrapped up in a stenographer's "pothooks," and so much dialect was used in the library stories that the young man at work on them had to familiarize himself with the contorted forms and write them down from memory. It took him so long to do this, and required so much of Edwards' time making corrections, that the profit on his work was disappointing.

With such an office force grinding out copy, during the early months of 1895 the Fiction Factory was a very busy place. During January and February the cash returns amounted to $1,500. This, Edwards discovered later, was no argument in favor of stenographer assistance, for he has since, working alone, earned upward of $1,000 in a month.

In February Edwards was requested by Harte & Perkins to submit a story for a new detective library which they were starting, and of which they were very choice. The work was as different as possible from the two or three detective yarns Edwards had written in 1893. He wrote and submitted the story, and Mr. Perkins' criticisms are given below by way of showing how carefully the stories were examined. The letter from which the excerpt is taken was written Feb. 13, 1895. The mythical detective, who has become known throughout the length and breadth of the land, shall here be referred to as "Joe Blake."

"There is one point to which I would call your attention. On page
5, Chapter II opens in this way: 'A young man to see Dr. Reynolds;
no card.' Joe Blake, otherwise 'Dr. Reynolds,' told the boy to show
the visitor in. The place was Chicago. Scene in room in prominent
hotel the second day after Joe Blake had had an interview with Abner
Larkin, 9 o'clock in the evening.

This is too trite and not easily expressed. Such references to time,
place, etc., impress the reader with the fact that he is reading
a romance and not a real story of Joe Blake's experiences. This
particular point should be kept in mind. We want these stories to
appear as natural as possible.

In the opening of the installment, where Mr. Larkin presents himself
to Joe, you have duplicated the common-place method of most writers.
There should be more originality in the way Joe Blake's attention
is called to various cases and not a continual repetition of calls
at his office, which, though natural enough, become tiresome to the
reader. In this same opening there is not enough detective flavor,
and here, as well as in other places, Joe does not appear to be the
man of authority, which he is usually found to be. These are little
things, but I believe if you will take care of them they will help
the story greatly."

This will illustrate the care with which Harte & Perkins looked over the manuscripts submitted to them, to the end that they might be made to reflect their ideas of what good manuscripts should be. If a writer could not do their work the way they wanted it done he was not long in getting his _conge_. In the case of the story mentioned above, it was returned, rewritten, and made to conform to Mr. Perkins' ideas.

On Jan. 9 Harte & Perkins had written Edwards:

"It is more than apparent that the library business is not very
flourishing, and hereafter we shall only be able to pay $40 for these
stories. I think this will be satisfactory to you, for I know you can
do this class of work very rapidly."

This meant a loss of $10 a week, and Edwards endeavored to make up for it by increasing his output. Particularly he wanted a chance to write another "Stella Edwards" story, just to show the firm that he could do the work. Mr. Harte gave him an order for the serial, stating that the new story was to follow "The Bicycle Belle," then running in _The Weekly Guest_. The story was to be in twelve installments of 5,250 words each, totalling some 63,000 words. For this Edwards was to receive $200. This hint was given him:

"Have plenty of romance, without too great extravagance, and make
sure of at least one wedding and that in the beginning of the story."

With the order came a picture which it was desired to use in illustrating the opening installment. Edwards was to write the installment around the picture. He completed the story, called it "Little Bluebell," and received the following commendation after two installments had been received and read:

"I have just finished reading the first two installments of your
story, 'Little Bluebell,' and I have to say that the same is entirely
satisfactory, unquestionably the best thing you have given us in this
line of work."

Although he was turning out Five-Cent Libraries, Stella Edwards serials, short sketches for _Puck_ and stories for other publishers than Harte & Perkins, Edwards was constantly on the alert for more work in order to keep his stenographers busy. He asked Mr. Perkins for orders for the Ten-Cent Library, and for juvenile serials for the boys' paper. He was allowed to send in some "Gentlemen Jim" stories for the dime publication. The pay was not munificent, however, being only $50 for 37,000 words.

The "Little Bluebell" story was followed by another "Stella Edwards" serial entitled "A Weird Marriage." This yarn hit the bull's-eye with a bang. In fact, it was said to be the best thing ever done by "Stella Edwards." And then, after scoring these two successive hits, Edwards tripped on a third story called "Beryl's Lovers," and he fell so hard that it was ten years before the firm ever asked him to do any more writing in that line.

In the Fall of 1895 Edwards discovered that he had been working too hard. A doctor examined his lungs, declared that he was threatened with tuberculosis and ordered him to the Southwest. In November he and his wife left Chicago, Edwards carrying with him his typewriter and a plentiful supply of typewriter paper. He transformed a stateroom in the compartment sleeper into his Fiction Factory, finishing two installments of the ill-fated "Beryl's Lovers" while enroute.

These installments, forwarded from Phoenix, Arizona, by express, went into a wreck at Shoemaker, Kansas, and were delivered to Harte & Perkins, torn and illegible, two weeks after the story had been taken over by another writer. Edwards filed a claim against the express company for $300, and then compromised for $50--all the express people were liable for by the terms of their receipt.

From November, 1895, until April, 1896, Edwards was located on a ranch near Phoenix, Arizona, writing Five-Cent Libraries for Harte & Perkins and sketches and short stories for other publishers. His health was steadily declining, and he could bring himself to his work only by a supreme effort of the will and at the expense of much physical torture. In May, 1896, he was told that he must get farther away from the irrigated districts around Phoenix and into the arid hills. To this end he interested himself in a gold mine, and went East to form a company and secure the necessary capital to purchase and develop it.

About the middle of July he returned to Phoenix, still writing but hoping for golden rewards from the mining venture which would ultimately make his writing less of a business and more of a pastime.

His health continued to decline and he was ordered to give up writing entirely and exercise constantly in the open. He at once telegraphed Harte & Perkins to this effect. On Oct. 13 they wrote:

"We have heard nothing from you since receipt of your telegram to
take all work out of your hands. This, of course, we attended to at
once, but on your account, as well as our own, we were very sorry to
learn that you found it necessary to give up the work, and trust that
the illness from which you are suffering will not be lasting.... If,
in future, you should be able to write again, we shall try to find a
place for your work."

So the old firm and Edwards parted for a time. A few weeks proved the mining venture a failure, and $10,000 which Edwards had put away out of the profits of his writing had vanished--gone to make the failure memorable. Nor had his health returned.

In some desperation, just before New Year's of '97, Mr. and Mrs. Edwards entrained for New York, Edwards pinning his hopes to Harte & Perkins. He had less than $100 to his name when he and his wife reached the metropolis.

One hundred dollars will not carry a man and his wife very far in New York, even when both are in good health and the man can work. Ambition alone kept Edwards alive and gave him hope for the future.

The Factory out-put for 1895:

3 Five-Cent Libraries at $50 each $ 150.
29 Five-Cent Libraries at $40 each 1160.
2 Detective stories at $40 each 80.
2 Ten-Cent Library stories at $50 each 100.
"Little Bluebell," serial 200.
"A Weird Marriage," 300.
---------
$ 1990.
Detroit Free Press, Contributions 22.
---------
Total $ 2012.

For 1896:

24 Five-Cent Libraries at $40 each $ 960.
Short fiction 71.50
--------
Total $ 1031.50

For cold brutality perhaps the rejection slip worded as below is
unequalled:

We are sorry to return your paper, but you have .

Respectfully yours,
The Editor.

* * * * *

Before Mr. Karl Edwin Harriman, of The Red Book, had ventured into
the editorial end of the writing trade, he wrote an article on an
order from a certain Eastern magazine. Later, that magazine decided
that it could not use the article, although it had been paid for,
and, with Mr. Harriman's permission, turned it over to an agent to
market elsewhere.

The agent, not knowing Mr. Harriman had associated himself with a
certain magazine, sent the manuscript to that publication, in the
ordinary way.

It was up to Mr. Harriman, then, to consider it in an editorial
capacity. He was unable to purchase the manuscript, and returned it
to the agent with a reproof for having submitted such an article, and
indicating that the author had a great deal to learn before he could
feel justified in seeking a market among the best known magazines.

IX.

RAW MATERIAL

Where does the writer get his plot-germs, the raw material which he puts through the mill of his fancy and finally draws forth as a finished and salable product? Life is a thing of infinite variety, and the plot-germ is a thing of Life or it is nothing. Being a mere basic suggestion of the story, the germs must come from the author's experience, or from the experiences of others which have been brought to his attention. Unconsciously the germ lodges in his mind, and his ingenuity, handling other phases of existence, works out the completed plot.

It follows that the richer an author's experience and the more ardent his imagination the better will be the plot evolved, providing his fine sense of values has been adequately cultivated. But no matter how adventurous and varied a personal experience, or how warm the fancy, or how highly cultivated the mind in its adaptation of fact to fiction, the experience of others compels attention if a writer's work is to be anything more than self-centered.

Newspapers, chronicling the everyday events of human existence, have not only suggested countless successful plot-germs but have likewise helped in the rounding out of the plot. An editor wrote Edwards, as long ago as March 30, 1893: "What we require in our stories is something written up to date, with incidents new and original. The daily press is teeming with this raw material." This fact is universally recognized, so that very few authors neglect to avail themselves of this source of inspiration.

As a case in point, a few years ago one noted author was accused of appropriating the work of another noted author. Plagiarism was seemingly proved by evoking the aid of the deadly parallel. Nevertheless the evidence was far from being conclusive. Each author had done no more than build a similar story upon the same newspaper clipping! Neither was in the wrong. No one writer has a monopoly of the facts of life, or of the right to use those facts as they filter through columns of the daily press.

Fortunately for Edwards, he realized the value of newspaper clippings very early in his writing career. Twenty-five years ago he began to scissor and to put away those clippings which most impressed him. Until late in the year 1893 his clipping collection was either pasted in scrap-books or thrown loosely into a large box. During the winter of 1893-4 he felt the necessity of having the raw material of his Factory stored more systematically. The services of an assistant were secured and the work was begun.

Large manila envelopes were used. The envelopes were lettered alphabetically, and each clipping was filed by title. On the back of each envelope was typed the title of its contents.

This method was found to be wholly unsatisfactory. Frequent examination had given Edwards a fair working knowledge of his thousands of clippings, but he was often obliged to go through a dozen or more envelopes before finding the particular article whose title had escaped him.

In 1905 he bought a loose-leaf book and tried out a new system on an accumulation of several thousand magazines. This indexing was done in such a way as to suggest the character of the clipping (written in red), and the title of the article, the page number and number of the magazine (written in black). All the magazines had been numbered consecutively and placed on convenient shelves. The first page of "W," for instance, appeared as shown below:

_Washington_ "A Job in the Senate" 771-3
_Wild Animal Story_ "The Rebellion of a Millionaire" 477-4
_Washington, Booker T._ "Riddle of the Negro" 519-4
_White Cross_ "Work of the American W. C." 129-5
_Waitress_ "Diary of an Amateur W." 543-6
_Wall Street_ "The Shadow of High Finance" 336-8
_Woman Suffrage_ "Worlds Half-Citizens" 411-8
_Woman_ "How to Make Money" 495-9

The above is only part of one of many pages of W's, and will serve to exemplify the advantages and disadvantages of the system in practical use. For instance, if it was desired to find out something about Booker T. Washington, all that was necessary was to take down old magazine No. 4 and turn to page 519.

This manifestly was an improvement over the old envelope method of indexing, but still left much to be desired. To illustrate, if Edwards wished to exhaust his material on Booker T. Washington it was necessary for him to hunt through all the pages under "W," and then examine all the magazines containing the articles in which he was mentioned. It is patent that if the indexing were properly done, every reference having to do with Booker T. Washington should follow a single reference to him in the index; and, further, the various articles should be grouped together.

Two years later, Edwards discarded the loose-leaf for the card system. This, he found, was as near perfection as could be hoped for.

His first step was to buy a number of strong box letter-files. These he numbered consecutively, just as he had numbered the manila envelopes. Articles are cut from magazines, the leaves secured together with brass fasteners, and on the first page margin at the top are marked the file number and letter of compartment where the article belongs. Thus, if the article is kept out of the file for any length of time it can be readily returned to its proper place. Newspaper clippings are handled in precisely the same way.

The card index has its divisions and sub-divisions. Cards indexing articles on various countries have a place under the general letter, and another place in the geographical section under the same letter. So with articles concerning Noted Personages, Astronomy, Antiquities, etc. Below, for the benefit of any one who may wish to use the system, is reproduced a card from the file:

ARMY, U. S.

Hand Bill used to secure enlistments "A" 1
Army Story "Knew It" "K" 1
Army Story "A Philippine Romance" "P" 1
Army Story "He is Crazy Jack" "C" 1
Army Story "Their Very Costly Meal" "T" 1
Army Story "Siege of Bigbag" "S" 1
"Fighting Life in the Philippines" "F" 1
Pay of Soldiers "Young Man--" "Y" 2

In this system the character of the material is first indicated, as _Pay of Soldiers_. If there is a title it follows in quotation marks. Where the title suggests the character of the material sufficiently, the title comes first, in "quotes." Then follows the letter under which the article is filed, and the number of the file. Suppose it is desired to find out what soldiers of the United States' Army are paid for their services: File No. 2 is removed from the shelf, opened at letter "Y" and the information secured under title beginning, "Young Man--."

As a saver of time, and a guard against annoyance when fancies are running free, Edwards has found his card-index system for clippings almost ideal.

A friend of Edwards' is what the comic papers call a "jokesmith."
Recently he concocted the following:

"You must be doing well," said Jones the merchant to Quill the
writer, meeting him in front of his house. "You seem to be always
busy, and you look prosperous."

"So I am, Jones," answered Quill, "busy and prosperous. Come into the
basement with me and I'll show you the secret of my prosperity."

They descended into the basement and Quill rang up the curtain on a
ragman weighing three big bags of rejection slips.

"My stories all come back," confessed Quill, triumphantly, "and I get
three cents a pound for the rejection slips that come with them."

This, of course, was not much of a joke, but the perpetrator sent it
to _Judge_. _Judge_ sent it back with about twenty blank rejection
slips inclosed by a rubber band. On the top slip was written: "Here
are some more.--Ed. _Judge_."

X.

THE WOLF
AT THE DOOR

Perhaps very few men in this life escape a period as black and dispiriting as was the year 1897 for Edwards. If not in one way, then in another, it is the fate of a man to be chastened and subdued so thoroughly, at least once in his career, that a livid remembrance of it remains always with him. Edwards has always been an optimist, but those blows of circumstance of the year 1897 found many weak places in the armor of his philosophy.

In tangling and untangling the threads of a story plot Edwards had become tolerably proficient, but in straightening out the snarls Fate had made in his own life he was crushed with a feeling of abject helplessness. There is a vast difference, it seems, in dealing with the complications of others and those that beset ourselves. The impersonal attitude makes for keener analysis and wiser judgment.

In a story, the poverty stricken hero and his wife may exist for a week on a loaf of bread, ten cents' worth of potatoes and a twenty-cent soup-bone; but let the man who creates such a hero attempt to emulate his fictional fancies and stark realism plays havoc with the equation. The wolf at our own door is one sort of animal, and the wolf at our neighbor's is of an altogether different breed.

The thermometer in Southern Arizona was "eighty in the shade" when Mr. and Mrs. Edwards, during the Christmas holidays, set their faces eastward. New York City, the shrine of so many pilgrims seeking prosperity, was their goal; and the metropolis, on that bleak New Year's Day that witnessed their arrival, was shivering in the grip of real, old-fashioned winter. The change from a balmy climate to blizzards and ice and a below-zero temperature brought Edwards to his bed with a vicious attack of rheumatism. For days while the little fund of $100 melted steadily away, he lay helpless.

The great city, in its dealings with impecunious strangers, has been painted in cruel colors. Edwards found this to be a mistake. On the occasion of their first visit to New York he and his wife had found quarters in a boarding house in Forty-fourth street. A pleasant landlady was in charge and the Edwards had won her friendship.

Here, forming one happy family, were actors and actresses, a salesman in a down-town department store, a stenographer, a travelling man for a bicycle house, and others. All were cheerful and kindly, and took occasion to drop in at the Edwards' third floor front and beguile the tedious hours for the invalid.