I
It was one of the secret opinions, such as we all have, of Peter Brench that his main success in life would have consisted in his never having committed himself about the work, as it was called, of his friend, Morgan Mallow. This was a subject on which it was, to the best of his belief, impossible, with veracity, to quote him, and it was nowhere on record that he had, in the connection, on any occasion and in any embarrassment, either lied or spoken the truth. Such a triumph had its honour even for a man of other triumphsa man who had reached fifty, who had escaped marriage, who had lived within his means, who had been in love with Mrs. Mallow for years without breathing it, and who, last not least, had judged himself once for all. He had so judged himself in fact that he felt an extreme and general humility to be his proper portion; yet there was nothing that made him think so well of his parts as the course he had steered so often through the shallows just mentioned. It became thus a real wonder that the friends in whom he had most confidence were just those with whom he had most reserves. He couldnt tell Mrs. Mallowor at least he supposed, excellent man, he couldntthat she was the one beautiful reason he had never married; any more than he could tell her husband that the sight of the multiplied marbles in that gentlemans studio was an affliction of which even time had never blunted the edge. His victory, however, as I have intimated, in regard to these productions, was not simply in his not having let it out that he deplored them; it was, remarkably, in his not having kept it in by anything else.
The whole situation, among these good people, was verily a marvel, and there was probably not such another for a long way from the spot that engages usthe point at which the soft declivity of Hampstead began at that time to confess in broken accents to St. Johns Wood. He despised Mallows statues and adored Mallows wife, and yet was distinctly fond of Mallow, to whom, in turn, he was equally dear. Mrs. Mallow rejoiced in the statuesthough she preferred, when pressed, the busts; and if she was visibly attached to Peter Brench it was because of his affection for Morgan. Each loved the other, moreover, for the love borne in each case to Lancelot, whom the Mallows respectively cherished as their only child and whom the friend of their fireside identified as the third, but decidedly the handsomest, of his godsons. Already in the old years it had come to thatthat no one, for such a relation, could possibly have occurred to any of them, even to the baby itself, but Peter. There was luckily a certain independence, of the pecuniary sort, all round; the Master could never otherwise have spent his solemn Wanderjahre in Florence and Rome and continued, by the Thames as well as by the Arno and the Tiber, to add unpurchased group to group and model, for what was too apt to prove in the event mere love, fancy-heads of celebrities either too busy or too buriedtoo much of the age or too little of itto sit. Neither could Peter, lounging in almost daily, have found time to keep the whole complicated tradition so alive by his presence. He was massive, but mild, the depositary of these mysterieslarge and loose and ruddy and curly, with deep tones, deep eyes, deep pockets, to say nothing of the habit of long pipes, soft hats and brownish, greyish, weather-faded clothes, apparently always the same.
He had written, it was known, but had never spokennever spoken, in particular, of that; and he had the air (since, as was believed, he continued to write) of keeping it up in order to have something moreas if he had not, at the worst, enoughto be silent about. Whatever his air, at any rate, Peters occasional unmentioned prose and verse were quite truly the result of an impulse to maintain the purity of his taste by establishing still more firmly the right relation of fame to feebleness. The little green door of his domain was in a garden-wall on which the stucco was cracked and stained, and in the small detached villa behind it everything was old, the furniture, the servants, the books, the prints, the habits and the new improvements. The Mallows, at Carrara Lodge, were within ten minutes, and the studio there was on their little land, to which they had added, in their happy faith, to build it. This was the good fortune, if it was not the ill, of her having brought him, in marriage, a portion that put them in a manner at their ease and enabled them thus, on their side, to keep it up. And they did keep it upthey always hadthe infatuated sculptor and his wife, for whom Nature had refined on the impossible by relieving them of the sense of the difficult. Morgan had, at all events, everything of the sculptor but the spirit of Phidiasthe brown velvet, the becoming beretto, the plastic presence, the fine fingers, the beautiful accent in Italian, and the old Italian factotum. He seemed to make up for everything when he addressed Egidio with the tu and waved him to turn one of the rotary pedestals of which the place was full. They were tremendous Italians at Carrara Lodge, and the secret of the part played by this fact in Peters life was, in a large degree, that it gave him, sturdy Briton that he was, just the amount of going abroad he could bear. The Mallows were all his Italy, but it was in a measure for Italy he liked them. His one worry was that Lanceto which they had shortened his godsonwas, in spite of a public school, perhaps a shade too Italian. Morgan, meanwhile, looked like somebodys flattering idea of somebodys own person as expressed in the great room provided at the Uffizzi Museum for Portraits of Artists by Themselves. The Masters sole regret that he had not been born rather to the brush than to the chisel sprang from his wish that he might have contributed to that collection.
It appeared, with time, at any rate, to be to the brush that Lance had been born; for Mrs. Mallow, one day when the boy was turning twenty, broke it to their friend, who shared, to the last delicate morsel, their problems and pains, that it seemed as if nothing would really do but that he should embrace the career. It had been impossible longer to remain blind to the fact that he gained no glory at Cambridge, where Brenchs own college had, for a year, tempered its tone to him as for Brenchs own sake. Therefore why renew the vain form of preparing him for the impossible? The impossibleit had become clearwas that he should be anything but an artist.
Oh dear, dear! said poor Peter.
Dont you believe in it? asked Mrs. Mallow, who still, at more than forty, had her violet velvet eyes, her creamy satin skin, and her silken chestnut hair.
Believe in what?
Why, in Lances passion.
I dont know what you mean by believing in it. Ive never been unaware, certainly, of his disposition, from his earliest time, to daub and draw; but I confess Ive hoped it would burn out.
But why should it, she sweetly smiled, with his wonderful heredity? Passion is passionthough of course, indeed, you, dear Peter, know nothing of that. Has the Masters ever burned out?
Peter looked off a little and, in his familiar, formless way, kept up for a moment a sound between a smothered whistle and a subdued hum. Do you think hes going to be another Master?
She seemed scarce prepared to go that length, yet she had, on the whole, a most marvellous trust. I know what you mean by that. Will it be a career to incur jealousies and provoke the machinations that have been at times almost too much for his father? Wellsay it may be, since nothing but clap-trap, in these dreadful days, can, it would seem, make its way, and since, with the curse of refinement and distinction, one may easily find ones self begging ones bread. Put it at the worstsay he has the misfortune to wing his flight further than the vulgar taste of his stupid countrymen can follow. Think, all the same, of the happinessthe same that the Master has had. Hell know.
Peter looked rueful. Ah, but what will he know?
Quiet joy! cried Mrs. Mallow, quite impatient and turning away.
II
He had, of course, before long, to meet the boy himself on it and hear that, practically, everything was settled. Lance was not to go up again, but to go instead to Paris, where, since the die was cast, he would find the best advantages. Peter had always felt that he must be taken as he was, but had never perhaps found him so much as he was on this occasion. You chuck Cambridge then altogether? Doesnt that seem rather a pity?
Lance would have been like his father, to his friends sense, had he had less humour, and like his mother had he had more beauty. Yet it was a good middle way, for Peter, that, in the modern manner, he was, to the eye, rather the young stockbroker than the young artist. The youth reasoned that it was a question of timethere was such a mill to go through, such an awful lot to learn. He had talked with fellows and had judged. One has got to-day, he said, dont you see? to know.
His interlocutor, at this, gave a groan. Oh, hang it, dont know!
Lance wondered. Dont? Then whats the use?
The use of what?
Why, of anything. Dont you think Ive talent?
Peter smoked away, for a little, in silence; then went on: It isnt knowledge, its ignorance thatas weve been beautifully toldis bliss.
Dont you think I have talent? Lance repeated.
Peter, with his trick of queer, kind demonstrations, passed his arm round his godson and held him a moment. How do I know?
Oh said the boy, if its your own ignorance youre defending!
Again, for a pause, on the sofa, his godfather smoked. It isnt. Ive the misfortune to be omniscient.
Oh well, Lance laughed again, if you know too much!
Thats what I do, and why Im so wretched.
Lances gaiety grew. Wretched? Come, I say!
But I forgot, his companion went on, youre not to know about that. It would indeed, for you too, make the too much. Only Ill tell you what Ill do. And Peter got up from the sofa. If youll go up again, Ill pay your way at Cambridge.
Lance stared, a little rueful in spite of being still amused. Oh, Peter! You disapprove so of Paris?
Well, Im afraid of it.
Ah, I see.
No, you dont seeyet. But you willthat is, you would. And you mustnt.
The young man thought more gravely. But ones innocence, already
Is considerably damaged? Ah, that wont matter, Peter persistedwell patch it up here.
Here? Then you want me to stay at home?
Peter almost confessed to it. Well, were so rightwe four togetherjust as we are. Were so safe. Come dont spoil it.
The boy, who had turned to gravity, turned from this, on the real pressure of his friends tone, to consternation. Then whats a fellow to be?
My particular care. Come, old manand Peter now fairly pleaded Ill look out for you.
Lance, who had remained on the sofa with his legs out and his hands in his pockets, watched him with eyes that showed suspicion. Then he got up. You think theres something the matter with methat I cant make a success.
Well, what do you call a success?
Lance thought again. Why, the best sort, I suppose, is to please ones self. Isnt that the sort that, in spite of cabals and things, is, in his own peculiar line, the Masters?
There were so much too many things in this question to be answered at once that they practically checked the discussion, which became particularly difficult in the light of such renewed proof that, though the young mans innocence might, in the course of his studies, as he contended, somewhat have shrunken, the finer essence of it still remained. That was indeed exactly what Peter had assumed and what, above all, he desired; yet, perversely enough, it gave him a chill. The boy believed in the cabals and things believed in the peculiar line, believed, in short, in the Master. What happened a month or two later was not that he went up again at the expense of his godfather, but that a fortnight after he had got settled in Paris this personage sent him fifty pounds.
He had meanwhile, at home, this personage, made up his mind to the worst; and what it might be had never yet grown quite so vivid to him as when, on his presenting himself one Sunday night, as he never failed to do, for supper, the mistress of Carrara Lodge met him with an appeal as toof all things in the worldthe wealth of the Canadians. She was earnest, she was even excited. Are many of them really rich?
He had to confess that he knew nothing about them, but he often thought afterwards of that evening. The room in which they sat was adorned with sundry specimens of the Masters genius, which had the merit of being, as Mrs. Mallow herself frequently suggested, of an unusually convenient size. They were indeed of dimensions not customary in the products of the chisel and had the singularity that, if the objects and features intended to be small looked too large, the objects and features intended to be large looked too small. The Masters intention, whether in respect to this matter or to any other, had, in almost any case, even after years, remained undiscoverable to Peter Brench. The creations that so failed to reveal it stood about on pedestals and brackets, on tables and shelves, a little staring white population, heroic, idyllic, allegoric, mythic, symbolic, in which scale has so strayed and lost itself that the public square and the chimney-piece seemed to have changed places, the monumental being all diminutive and the diminutive all monumental; branches, at any rate, markedly, of a family in which stature was rather oddly irrespective of function, age, and sex. They formed, like the Mallows themselves, poor Brenchs own family having at least, to such a degree, the note of familiarity. The occasion was one of those he had long ago learnt to know and to nameshort flickers of the faint flame, soft gusts of a kinder air. Twice a year, regularly, the Master believed in his fortune, in addition to believing all the year round in his genius. This time it was to be made by a bereaved couple from Toronto, who had given him the handsomest order for a tomb to three lost children, each of whom they desired to be, in the composition, emblematically and characteristically represented.
Such was naturally the moral of Mrs. Mallows question: if their wealth was to be assumed, it was clear, from the nature of their admiration, as well as from mysterious hints thrown out (they were a little odd!) as to other possibilities of the same mortuary sort, that their further patronage might be; and not less evident that, should the Master become at all known in those climes, nothing would be more inevitable than a run of Canadian custom. Peter had been present before at runs of custom, colonial and domestic present at each of those of which the aggregation had left so few gaps in the marble company round him; but it was his habit never, at these junctures, to prick the bubble in advance. The fond illusion, while it lasted, eased the wound of elections never won, the long ache of medals and diplomas carried off, on every chance, by every one but the Master; it lighted the lamp, moreover, that would glimmer through the next eclipse. They lived, however, after allas it was always beautiful to seeat a height scarce susceptible of ups and downs. They strained a point, at times, charmingly, to admit that the public was here and there, not too bad to buy; but they would have been nowhere without their attitude that the Master was always too good to sell. They were, at all events, deliciously formed, Peter often said to himself, for their fate; the Master had a vanity, his wife had loyalty, of which success, depriving these things of innocence, would have diminished the merit and the grace. Any one could be charming under a charm, and, as he looked about him at a world of prosperity more void of proportion even than the Masters museum, he wondered if he knew another pair that so completely escaped vulgarity.
What a pity Lance isnt with us to rejoice! Mrs. Mallow on this occasion sighed at supper.
Well drink to the health of the absent, her husband replied, filling his friends glass and his own and giving a drop to their companion; but we must hope that hes preparing himself for a happiness much less like this of ours this eveningexcusable as I grant it to bethan like the comfort we have alwayswhatever has happened or has not happenedbeen able to trust ourselves to enjoy. The comfort, the Master explained, leaning back in the pleasant lamplight and firelight, holding up his glass and looking round at his marble family, quartered more or less, a monstrous brood, in every room the comfort of art in itself!
Peter looked a little shyly at his wine. WellI dont care what you may call it, a fellow doesntbut Lance must learn to sell, you know. I drink to his acquisition of the secret of a base popularity!
Oh, yes, he must sell, the boys mother, who was still more, however, this seemed to give out, the Masters wife, rather artlessly conceded.
Oh, the sculptor, after a moment, confidently pronounced, Lance will. Dont be afraid. He will have learnt.
Which is exactly what Peter, Mrs. Mallow gaily returned why in the world were you so perverse, Peter?wouldnt, when he told him, hear of.
Peter, when this lady looked at him, with accusatory affection a grace, on her part, not infrequentcould never find a word; but the Master, who was always all amenity and tact, helped him out now as he had often helped him before. Thats his old idea, you knowon which weve so often differed; his theory that the artist should be all impulse and instinct. I go in, of course, for a certain amount of school. Not too much, but a due proportion. Theres where his protest came in, he continued to explain to his wife, as against what might, dont you see? be in question for Lance.
Ah, welland Mrs. Mallow turned the violet eyes across the table at the subject of this discoursehes sure to have meant, of course, nothing but good; but that wouldnt have prevented him, if Lance had taken his advice from being, in effect, horribly cruel.
They had a sociable way of talking of him to his face as if he had been in the clay orat mostin the plaster, and the Master was unfailingly generous. He might have been waving Egidio to make him revolve. Ah, but poor Peter was not so wrong as to what it may, after all, come to that he will learn.
Oh, but nothing artistically bad, she urgedstill, for poor Peter, arch and dewy.
Why, just the little French tricks, said the Master: on which their friend had to pretend to admit, when pressed by Mrs. Mallow, that these aesthetic vices had been the objects of his dread.
III
I know now, Lance said to him the next year, why you were so much against it, He had come back, supposedly for a mere interval, and was looking about him at Carrara Lodge, where indeed he had already, on two or three occasions, since his expatriation, briefly appeared. This had the air of a longer holiday. Something rather awful has happened to me. It isnt so very good to know.
Im bound to say high spirits dont show in your face, Peter was rather ruefully forced to confess. Still, are you very sure you do know?
Well, I at least know as much as I can bear. These remarks were exchanged in Peters den, and the young man, smoking cigarettes, stood before the fire with his back against the mantel. Something of his bloom seemed really to have left him.
Poor Peter wondered. Youre clear then as to what in particular I wanted you not to go for?
In particular? Lance thought. It seems to me that, in particular, there can have been but one thing.
They stood for a little sounding each other. Are you quite sure?
Quite sure Im a beastly duffer? Quiteby this time.
Oh!and Peter turned away as if almost with relief.
Its that that isnt pleasant to find out.
Oh, I dont care for that, said Peter, presently coming round again. I mean I personally dont.
Yet I hope you can understand a little that I myself should!
Well, what do you mean by it? Peter sceptically asked.
And on this Lance had to explainhow the upshot of his studies in Paris had inexorably proved a mere deep doubt of his means. These studies had waked him up, and a new light was in his eyes; but what the new light did was really to show him too much. Do you know whats the matter with me? Im too horribly intelligent. Paris was really the last place for me. Ive learnt what I cant do.
Poor Peter staredit was a staggerer; but even after they had had, on the subject, a longish talk in which the boy brought out to the full the hard truth of his lesson, his friend betrayed less pleasure than usually breaks into a face to the happy tune of I told you so! Poor Peter himself made now indeed so little a point of having told him so that Lance broke ground in a different place a day or two after. What was it then thatbefore I wentyou were afraid I should find out? This, however, Peter refused to tell him, on the ground that if he hadnt yet guessed perhaps he never would, and that nothing at all, for either of them, in any case, was to be gained by giving the thing a name. Lance eyed him, on this, an instant, with the bold curiosity of youthwith the air indeed of having in his mind two or three names, of which one or other would be right. Peter, nevertheless, turning his back again, offered no encouragement, and when they parted afresh it was with some show of impatience on the side of the boy. Accordingly, at their next encounter, Peter saw at a glance that he had now, in the interval, divined and that, to sound his note, he was only waiting till they should find themselves alone. This he had soon arranged, and he then broke straight out. Do you know your conundrum has been keeping me awake? But in the watches of the night the answer came over meso that, upon my honour, I quite laughed out. Had you been supposing I had to go to Paris to learn that? Even now, to see him still so sublimely on his guard, Peters young friend had to laugh afresh. You wont give a sign till youre sure? Beautiful old Peter! But Lance at last produced it. Why, hang it, the truth about the Master.
It made between them, for some minutes, a lively passage, full of wonder, for each, at the wonder of the other. Then how long have you understood
The true value of his work? I understood it, Lance recalled, as soon as I began to understand anything. But I didnt begin fully to do that, I admit, till I got là-bas.
Dear, dear! Peter gasped with retrospective dread.
But for what have you taken me? Im a hopeless muffthat I had to have rubbed in. But Im not such a muff as the Master! Lance declared.
Then why did you never tell me?
That I hadnt, after all the boy took him up remained such an idiot? Just because I never dreamed you knew. But I beg your pardon. I only wanted to spare you. And what I dont now understand is how the deuce then, for so long, youve managed to keep bottled.
Peter produced his explanation, but only after some delay and with a gravity not void of embarrassment. It was for your mother.
Oh! said Lance.
And thats the great thing nowsince the murder is out. I want a promise from you. I mean and Peter almost feverishly followed it up a vow from you, solemn and such as you owe me, here on the spot, that youll sacrifice anything rather than let her ever guess
That Ive guessed? Lance took it in. I see. He evidently, after a moment, had taken in much. But what is it you have in mind that I may have a chance to sacrifice?
Oh, one has always something.
Lance looked at him hard. Do you mean that youve ha ? The look he received back, however, so put the question by that he found soon enough another. Are you really sure my mother doesnt know?
Peter, after renewed reflection, was really sure. If she does, shes too wonderful.
But arent we all too wonderful?
Yes, Peter granted but in different ways. The things so desperately important because your fathers little public consists only, as you know then, Peter developedwell, of how many?
First of all, the Masters son risked, of himself. And last of all too. I dont quite see of whom else.
Peter had an approach to impatience. Of your mother, I sayalways.
Lance cast it all up. You absolutely feel that?
Absolutely.
Well, then, with yourself, that makes three.
Oh, me! and Peter, with a wag of his kind old head, modestly excused himself. The number is, at any rate, small enough for any individual dropping out to be too dreadfully missed. Therefore, to put it in a nutshell, take care, my boythats allthat youre not!
Ive got to keep on humbugging? Lance sighed.
Its just to warn you of the danger of your failing of that that Ive seized this opportunity.
And what do you regard in particular, the young man asked, as the danger?
Why, this certainty; that the moment your mother, who feels so strongly, should suspect your secretwell, said Peter desperately, the fat would be on the fire.
Lance, for a moment, seemed to stare at the blaze. Shed throw me over?
Shed throw him over.
And come round to us?
Peter, before he answered, turned away. Come round to you. But he had said enough to indicateand, as he evidently trusted, to avertthe horrid contingency.
IV
Within six months again, however, his fear was, on more occasions than one, all before him. Lance had returned to Paris, to another trial; then had reappeared at home and had had, with his father, for the first time in his life, one of the scenes that strike sparks. He described it with much expression to Peter, as to whomsince they had never done so beforeit was a sign of a new reserve on the part of the pair at Carrara Lodge that they at present failed, on a matter of intimate interest, to open themselves if not in joy, then in sorrowto their good friend. This produced perhaps, practically, between the parties, a shade of alienation and a slight intermission of commercemarked mainly indeed by the fact that, to talk at his ease with his old playmate, Lance had, in general, to come to see him. The closest, if not quite the gayest relation they had yet known together was thus ushered in.
The difficulty for poor Lance was a tension at home, begotten by the fact that his father wished him to be, at least the sort of success he himself had been. He hadnt chucked Paristhough nothing appeared more vivid to him than that Paris had chucked him; he would go back again because of the fascination in trying, in seeing, in sounding the depthsin learning ones lesson, in fine, even if the lesson were simply that of ones impotence in the presence of ones larger vision. But what did the Master, all aloft in his senseless fluency, know of impotence, and what visionto be called suchhad he, in all his blind life, ever had? Lance, heated and indignant, frankly appealed to his godparent on this score.
His father, it appeared, had come down on him for having, after so long, nothing to show, and hoped that, on his next return, this deficiency would be repaired. The thing the Master complacently set forth wasfor any artist, however inferior to himselfat least to do something. What can you do? Thats all I ask! He had certainly done enough, and there was no mistake about what he had to show. Lance had tears in his eyes when it came thus to letting his old friend know how great the strain might be on the sacrifice asked of him. It wasnt so easy to continue humbuggingas from son to parentafter feeling ones self despised for not grovelling in mediocrity. Yet a noble duplicity was what, as they intimately faced the situation, Peter went on requiring; and it was still, for a time, what his young friend, bitter and sore, managed loyally to comfort him with. Fifty pounds more than once again, it was true, rewarded, both in London and in Paris, the young friends loyalty; none the less sensibly, doubtless, at the moment, that the money was a direct advance on a decent sum for which Peter had long since privately pre-arranged an ultimate function. Whether by these arts or others, at all events, Lances just resentment was kept for a seasonbut only for a seasonat bay. The day arrived when he warned his companion that he could hold outor hold inno longer. Carrara Lodge had had to listen to another lecture delivered from a great heightan infliction really heavier, at last, than, without striking back or in some way letting the Master have the truth, flesh and blood could bear.
And what I dont see is, Lance observed with a certain irritated eye for what was, after all, if it came to that, due to himself tooWhat I dont see is, upon my honour, how you, as things are going, can keep the game up.
Oh, the game for me is only to hold my tongue, said placid Peter. And I have my reason.
Still my mother?
Peter showed, as he had often shown it beforethat is by turning it straight awaya queer face. What will you have? I havent ceased to like her.
Shes beautifulshes a dear, of course, Lance granted; but what is she to you, after all, and what is it to you that, as to anything whatever, she should or she shouldnt?
Peter, who had turned red, hung fire a little. Wellits all, simply, what I make of it.
There was now, however, in his young friend, a strange, an adopted, insistence. What are you, after all, to her?
Oh, nothing. But thats another matter.
She cares only for my father, said Lance the Parisian.
Naturallyand thats just why.
Why youve wished to spare her?
Because she cares so tremendously much.
Lance took a turn about the room, but with his eyes still on his host. How awfullyalwaysyou must have liked her!
Awfully. Always, said Peter Brench.
The young man continued for a moment to musethen stopped again in front of him. Do you know how much she cares? Their eyes met on it, but Peter, as if his own found something new in Lances, appeared to hesitate, for the first time for so long, to say he did know. Ive only just found out, said Lance. She came to my room last night, after being present, in silence and only with her eyes on me, at what I had had to take from him; she cameand she was with me an extraordinary hour.
He paused again, and they had again for a while sounded each other. Then somethingand it made him suddenly turn pale came to Peter. She does know?
She does know. She let it all out to meso as to demand of me no more than that, as she said, of which she herself had been capable. She has always, always known, said Lance without pity.
Peter was silent a long time; during which his companion might have heard him gently breathe and, on touching him, might have felt within him the vibration of a long, low sound suppressed. By the time he spoke, at last, he had taken everything in. Then I do see how tremendously much.
Isnt it wonderful? Lance asked.
Wonderful, Peter mused.
So that if your original effort to keep me from Paris was to keep me from knowledge! Lance exclaimed as if with a sufficient indication of his futility.
It might have been at the futility that Peter appeared for a little to gaze. I think it must have beenwithout my quite at the time knowing itto keep me! he replied at last as he turned away.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
To Messrs. G. Bell & Sons, Ltd., 6 Portugal Street, London, W.C.
In arrangement with whom the late W. J. Stillmans famous story Billy and Hans, which has been widely circulated by them for the benefit of the S.P.C.A., is here reprinted.
To Messrs. Chatto & Windus, 97 St. Martins Lane, London, W.C.
Who publish Ambrose Bierces stories in book form, and by whom permission is given for the reprinting of The Man and the Snake, The Damned Thing, An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge, and The Affair at Coulters Notch.
To Messrs. Methuen & Co., Ltd., 36 Essex Street, London, W.C.
For their courtesy in allowing us to include The Tree of Knowledge, from The Soft Side, by the late Henry James, the author himself having approved of a selection from his work two years before his death.