"BRAINS FOR CASH."
Reading edition
["The unbridled greediness of some authors."—Mr. Gosse.]
Publisher (nervously). And what will your terms be for a short story, in your best style?
Author (loftily). I have only one style, and that is perfection. I couldn't think of charging less than fifty guineas a page.
Publisher (aghast). Fifty guineas a page! But are you aware that Lord Macaulay got only ten thousand for the whole of his history, and that Milton——
Author (rudely). Hang Macaulay and Milton! Surely you would not compare those second-rate writers with myself! If they were content to work for starvation wages, I am not.
Publisher. But, say your story runs to twenty pages, as it probably will, I shall have to pay you for that one short tale the really ridiculous sum of a thousand pounds!
Author (coolly). Yes, it is rather ridiculous—ridiculously small, I mean. Still, out of regard to your pocket, I am willing to accept that inadequate remuneration. Is it a bargain?
Publisher (with a groan). It must be. The public demands your work, and we have no option. But allow me to remark that your policy is——
Author (gaily). A Policy of Assurance, on which you have to pay the premium. Ha, ha!
A Year Or Two Later.
Author (deferentially). I have a really capital idea for a work of fiction, on a subject which I believe to be quite original. What—ahem!—are you prepared to offer for the copyright?
Publisher. Couldn't think of making an offer till we saw the work. It might turn out to be worth nothing at all.
Author. Nothing at all! But you forget how my fame——
Publisher. Disappeared when we were obliged to charge the public six shillings for a story of yours about the size of an average tract. Other writers have come to the front, you know. Still, if there's anything in your novel, when it's finished, we should, I daresay, be prepared to offer you a couple of guineas down, and a couple more when—say—a thousand copies had been sold. Is it a bargain?
Author (sadly). I suppose it must be! Yet I can hardly be said to be paid for my work.
Publisher. Perhaps not. But you can be said to be paid out!
"The Female Ostrich at the Zoo is dead."
THE STREETS OF LONDON.
The stately streets of London Are always "up" in Spring, To ordinary minds an ex- traordinary thing. Then cabs across strange ridges bound, Or sink in holes, abused With words resembling not, in sound, Those Mrs. Hemans used. The miry streets of London, Dotted with lamps by night; What pitfalls where the dazzled eye Sees doubly ruddy light! For in the season, just in May, When many meetings meet, The jocund vestry starts away, And closes all the street. The shut-up streets of London! How willingly one jumps From where one's cab must stop, through pools Of mud, in dancing pumps! When thus one skips on miry ways One's pride is much decreased, Like Mrs. Gilpin's, for one's "chaise" Is "three doors off" at least. The free, fair streets of London! Long, long, in vestry hall, May heads of native thickness rise, When April showers fall; And green for ever be the men Who spend the rates in May, By stopping all the traffic then In such a jocose way!
In Bloom.—On Saturday last there was a letter in the Daily Telegraph headed "Trees for Londoners." The lessee and manager of the Haymarket Theatre thinks that for Londoners two Trees are quite sufficient, i.e. his wife and himself.