Note 5 — Chapter VIII

Since writing these lines, I have been amused to discover the following reference in the brilliant biography of Stopford Brooke, by his son-in-law, Principal Jacks, to my unlucky attempt. "The only advantage," says Mr. Brooke in his diary for May 8, 1899, "the older writer has over the younger is that he knows what to leave out and has a juster sense of proportion. I remember that when Green wanted the Primer of English Literature to be done, Mrs. ---- asked if she might try her hand at it. He said 'Yes,' and she set to work. She took a fancy to Beowulf, and wrote twenty pages on it! At this rate the book would have run to more than a thousand pages."