James Oliver Curwood, a novelist, tells of a recent encounter with the law. The value of a short story he was writing depended upon a certain legal situation which he found difficult to manage. Going to a lawyer of his acquaintance he told him the plot and was shown a way to the desired end. "You've saved me just $100," he exclaimed, "for that's what I am going to get for this story."
A week later he received a bill from the lawyer as follows: "For literary advice, $100." He says he paid.
"Tried to skin me, that scribbler did!"
"What did he want?"
"Wanted to get out a book jointly, he to write the book and I to write the advertisements. I turned him down. I wasn't going to do all the literary work."
At a London dinner recently the conversation turned to the various methods of working employed by literary geniuses. Among the examples cited was that of a well-known poet, who, it is said, was wont to arouse his wife about four o'clock in the morning and exclaim, "Maria, get up; I've thought of a good word!" Whereupon the poet's obedient helpmate would crawl out of bed and make a note of the thought-of word.
About an hour later, like as not, a new inspiration would seize the bard, whereupon he would again arouse his wife, saying, "Maria, Maria, get up! I've thought of a better word!"
The company in general listened to the story with admiration, but a merry-eyed American girl remarked: "Well, if he'd been my husband I should have replied, 'Alpheus, get up yourself; I've thought of a bad word!'"
"There is probably no hell for authors in the next world--they suffer so much from critics and publishers in this."--_Bovee_.
A thought upon my forehead, My hand up to my face; I want to be an author, An air of studied grace!
I want to be an author, With genius on my brow; I want to be an author, And I want to be it now!
--_Ella Hutchison Ellwanger_.
That writer does the most, who gives his reader the most knowledge, and takes from him the least time.--_C.C. Colton_.
Habits of close attention, thinking heads, Become more rare as dissipation spreads, Till authors hear at length one general cry Tickle and entertain us, or we die!
--_Cowper_.
The author who speaks about his own books is almost as bad as a mother who talks about her own children.--_Disraeli_.
AUTOMOBILES
TEACHER--"If a man saves $2 a week, how long will it take him to save a thousand?"
BOY--"He never would, ma'am. After he got $900 he'd buy a car."
"How fast is your car, Jimpson?" asked Harkaway.
"Well," said Jimpson, "it keeps about six months ahead of my income generally."
"What is the name of your automobile?"
"I don't know."
"You don't know? What do your folks call it?"
"Oh, as to that, father always says 'The Mortgage'; brother Tom calls it 'The Fake'; mother, 'My Limousine'; sister, 'Our Car'; grandma, 'That Peril'; the chauffeur, 'Some Freak,' and our neighbors, 'The Limit.'"--_Life_.
"What little boy can tell me the difference between the 'quick' and the 'dead?'" asked the Sunday-school teacher.
Willie waved his hand frantically.
"Well, Willie?"
"Please, ma'am, the 'quick' are the ones that get out of the way of automobiles; the ones that don't are the 'dead.'"
"Do you have much trouble with your automobile?"
"Trouble! Say, I couldn't have more if I was married to the blamed machine."
A little "Brush" chugged painfully up to the gate of a race track.
The gate-keeper, demanding the usual fee for automobiles, called:
"A dollar for the car!"
The owner looked up with a pathetic smile of relief and said:
"Sold!"
Autos rush in where mortgages have dared to tread.
_See also_ Fords; Profanity.
AUTOMOBILING