very solemn, and some of them very funny, which makes it very pleasant to drive up the street. We drove through the street, which was crowded with camels and elephants and donkeys, and women wrapped up like bundles, and men chattering like monkeys, and monkeys themselves, and naked little children rolling in the 10 dust and playing queer Jeypore games. All the little girls, when they get to be about your age, hang jewels in their noses, and the women all have their noses looking beautiful in this way. I have got a nose-jewel for you, which I shall put in when I get home, and also a little button for the side of Susie's nose, such as the smaller children wear. Think how the girls 20 at school will admire you! Well, we drove out the other side of the queer pink town, and went on toward the old town which they deserted a hundred years ago, when they built this. As we drove along toward it, the fields were full of peacocks and all sorts of bright-winged birds, and out of the ponds and streams the crocodiles stuck up their lazy heads and looked 30 at us.

The hills around are full of tigers and hyenas, but they do not come down to the town, though I saw a cage of them there which had been captured only about a month and they were very fierce. Poor things! When we came to the entrance of the old town there was a splendid great elephant waiting for us, which the rajah 40 had sent. He sent the carriage too. The elephant had his head and trunk beautifully painted, and looked almost as big as Jumbo. He knelt down and we climbed up by a ladder and sat upon his back, and then he toiled up the hill. Behind us as we went up the hill came a man leading a little black goat, and when I asked what it was for they said it was for sacrifice. It

seems a horrid old goddess has a 50 temple on the hill, and years ago they used to sacrifice men to her, to make her happy and kind. But a merciful rajah stopped that and made them sacrifice goats instead, and now they give the horrid old goddess a goat every morning, and she likes it just as well.

When we got into the old town it was a perfect wilderness of beautiful things 60 lakes, temples, palaces, porticos, all sorts of things in marble and fine stones, with sacred, long-tailed monkeys running over all. But I must tell you all about the goddess and the way they cut off the poor little goat's poor little black head, and all the rest that I saw, when I get home. Don't you wish you had gone with me?

Give my love to your father and mother and Agnes and Susie. I am dying to know about your Christmas and the presents. Do not forget your affectionate uncle PHILLIPS

TO SIDNEY COLVIN ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON

Valima, Samoa, Oct. 6, 1894

70

I know I am at a climacteric for all men who live by their wits, so I do not despair. But the truth is I am pretty nearly useless at literature. Were it not for my health, which so made it impossible, I could not find it in my heart to forgive myself that I did not stick to an honest, commonplace trade when I was young, which might have now supported me during all these ill years. But do not suppose me to be down in anything else; only, for the nonce, my skill deserts me, such as it is, or was. It was a very little dose of inspiration, and a pretty 90 little trick of style, long lost, improved

by the most heroic industry. So far, I have managed to please the journalists. But I am a fictitious article and have long known it. I am read by journalists, by my fellow-novelists, and by my boys; with these, incipit et explicit my vogue. Good thing anyway! For it seems to have sold the edition. And I look forward 10 confidently to an aftermath; I do not think my health can be so hugely improved, without some subsequent improvement in my brains. Though, of course, there is the possibility that literature is a morbid secretion, and abhors health! I do not think it is possible to have fewer illusions than I. I sometimes wish I had more. They are amusing. But I cannot 20 take myself seriously as an artist; the limitations are so obvious. I did take myself seriously as a workman of old, but my practice has fallen off. I am now an idler and cumberer of the ground; it may be excused to me perhaps by twenty years of industry and ill-health, which have taken the cream off the milk.

As I was writing this last sentence, 30 I heard the strident rain drawing near across the forest, and by the time I was come to the word "cream" it burst upon my roof, and has since redoubled, and roared upon it. A very welcome change. All smells of the good wet earth, sweetly, with a kind of Highland touch; the crystal rods of the shower, as I look up, have drawn their criss-cross over everything; and 40 a gentle and very welcome coolness

comes up around me in little drafts, blessed drafts, not chilling, only equalizing the temperature. Now the rain is off in this spot, but I hear it roaring still in the nigh neighborhood-and that moment, I was driven from the veranda by random rain drops, spitting at me through the Japanese blinds.

6. incipit et explicit, begins and ends.

These are not tears with which the page is spotted! Now the windows 50 stream, the roof reverberates. It is good; it answers something which is in my heart; I know not what; old memories of the wet moorland belike.

Well, it has blown by again, and I am in my place once more, with an accompaniment of perpetual dripping on the veranda-and very much inclined for a chat. The exact subject I do not know! It will be bitter at 60 least, and that is strange, for my attitude is essentially not bitter, but I have come into these days when a man sees above all the seamy side, and I have dwelt some time in a small place where he has an opportunity of reading little motives that he would miss in the great world, and indeed, today, I am almost ready to call the world an error. Because? 70 Because I have not drugged myself with successful work, and there are all kinds of trifles buzzing in my ear, unfriendly trifles, from the least to the-well, to the pretty big. All these that touch me are Pretty Big; and yet none touch me in the least, if rightly looked at, except the one internal burden to go on making an income. If I could find a place where I could 80 lie down and give up for (say) two years, and allow the sainted public to support me, if it were a lunatic asylum, wouldn't I go, just! But we can't have both extremes at once, worse luck! I should like to put my savings into a proprietarian investment, and retire in the meanwhile into a communistic retreat, which is double-dealing. double-dealing. But you men with 90 salaries don't know how a family weighs on a fellow's mind.

Good-by, my lord. May your race continue and you flourish. Yours ever,

TUSITALA

95. Tusitala means "teller of tales." It is the name given Stevenson by the Samoans.

TO FRANK N. DOUBLEDAY

WALTER HINES PAGE

London, November 9, 1917 DEAR EFFENDI: . . This infernal thing drags its slow length along so that we cannot see even a day ahead, not to say a week, or a year. If any man here allowed the horrors of it to dwell on his mind he would go mad, so we have to skip over these things somewhat lightly and try to keep the long, definite aim in our thoughts and 10 to work away, distracted as little as possible by the butchery and by the starvation that is making this side of the world a shambles and a wilderness. There is hardly a country on the Continent where people are not literally starving to death, and in many of them by hundreds of thousands; and this state of things is going to continue for a good many years 20 after the war. God knows we-I mean the American people are doing everything we can to alleviate it, but there is so much more to be done than any group of forces can possibly do that I have a feeling that we have hardly touched the borders of the great problem itself. Of course here in London we are away from all that. In spite of the rations we get quite 30 enough to eat and it's as good as it is usually in England, but we have no right to complain. Of course we are subject to raids, and the wise air people here think that early next spring we are going to be bombarded with thousands of airplanes, and with new kinds of bombs and gases in a well-organized effort to try actually to destroy London. Possibly that will come; we 40 must simply take our chance, every man sticking to his job. Already the slate shingles on my roof have been broken, and bricks have been knocked down my chimney; the skylight was

Title. Frank N. Doubleday, Page's business associate for years. 1. Effendi, a name coined from Double

day's initials.

hit and glass fell down all through the halls, and the nose of a shrapnel shell, weighing eight pounds, fell just in front of my doorway and rolled in my area. This is the sort of thing we incidentally get, not of course from 50 the enemy directly, but from the British guns in London which shoot these things at German airplanes. What goes up must come down. Between our own defenses and the enemy, God knows which will kill us first!

In spite of all this I put my innocent head on my pillow every night and get a good night's sleep after the bombing is done, and I thank Heaven 60 that nothing interrupts my sleep. This, and a little walking, which is all I get time to do in these foggy days, constitute my life outdoors and precious little of it is outdoors.

Then on every block that I know of in London there is a hospital or supply place and the ambulances are bringing the poor fellows in all the time. We don't get any gasoline to 70 ride, so we have to walk. We don't get any white bread, so we have to eat stuff made of flour and corn meal ground so fine that it isn't good. While everybody gets a little thinner, the universal opinion is that they also get a little better, and nobody is going to die here of hunger. We feel a little more cheerful about the submarines than we did some time ago. For some so reason they are not getting so many ships. One reason, I am glad to believe, is that they are getting caught themselves. If I could remember all the stories that I hear of good fighting with the submarines I could keep you up two nights when I get home, but in these days one big thing after another crowds so in men's minds that, the Lord knows if, when I get home, 90 I shall remember anything.

Always heartily yours,

W. H. P.

Lady Montagu. 1. Do you find any details in this letter that indicate that it was written two centuries ago? 2. What features of life in Rotterdam does Lady Mary observe? 3. Why is this a good letter?

Franklin. 1. Do you think Franklin had any difficulty in writing this letter? He had only the year before concluded the treaty between France and the United States. 2. How does this letter reveal his popularity? 3. Is Franklin puffed up or amused by it? How do you know? 4. What is the chief trait of Franklin in this letter? Quote passages. 5. Does he reveal it in a merry or in a censorious way? Again quote.

Washington. 1. What is the chief impression of Washington you derive from this letter? 2. How large was the table? How do you know? 3. How did the meal differ from one that might be served today? 4. Do you think more or less of Washington after reading this letter? Why?

Cowper. 1. What differences do you notice between the subject matter of this letter and that of Lady Mary? Account for these differences. 2. Which letter seems more like an essay? Why? 3. Explain, giving illustrations, the idea that a modern is only an ancient in a different dress.

Irving. 1. How does Irving's letter remind you of Morley's essay? 2. Was he anything like Morley in disposition? 3. Where does he express his feelings with courtly grace? 4. Why does he admire the Moors? What other traits appear? 5. Why had he put off writing?

Lamb. 1. What occasioned this letter? 2. Evelyn wrote a diary that became famous. Why does Lamb mention it? Did he enjoy reading it? 3. Why did Lamb introduce the verses into his letter? Do you think he thought them to be good poetry? 4. Why is this a good letter?

sides his sense of humor, what other traits does Lowell exhibit?

Lincoln. 1. How does Lincoln show that Greeley's letter printed in the New York Tribune was inaccurate in fact and illogical in reasoning? 2. What were the chief criticisms of Lincoln's policies, so far as you can gather from this letter? After reading it, do you consider them just? Why? 3. Why does Lincoln close the letter as he does? 4. Remember that this was written during one of the greatest crises in American history. Does it display an impatient and dictatorial tone? 5. What does it reveal about Lincoln's ideals and disposition? Where?

Lee. 1. In what way does Lee's nobility of soul appear in this letter?

Brooks. 1. How does the humor displayed in this letter differ from Lowell's? 2. How does this letter show love of family? Power of observation?

Stevenson. 1. This letter, which was written but a few weeks before Stevenson's death, is more melancholy in tone than was usual with this buoyant author. What attitude does Stevenson take toward his illness? 2. Do you agree that his skill was only "a pretty little trick of style"? 3. Does the description of the rainstorm fit the writer's mood? 4. Why does Stevenson say "I am almost ready to call the world an error"?

Page. 1. How does this picture of war-time conditions, written almost exactly a year before the Armistice, differ from or compare with the impressions you gained from Franklin's letter? Washington's letter? Lincoln's letter? How does it compare with the impressions gained from the war poems on pages 302304? 2. How does Page, who was Ambassador to England at the time, resemble or differ from Franklin, who was Ambassador to France when he wrote? Which has the more humor? Which feels the more deeply? 3. Do you think letterwriting was actually hard for any of these men? Give your reasons. Is it hard work for you? Why?

In Goldsmith's time, and even earlier, the five-act play was considered the only form in which drama could be written. Such plays supplied a full evening's entertainment; they were like the modern novel in that they presented a story of considerable length, with numerous characters. But besides the full-length novel, we now have the short story, and along with the great development of the short story in recent years has come the analogous form of the short story told through action and dialogue, the one-act play.

The characteristics of the one-act play are very similar to those of the short story. (For the short story, see Book One, page 76; for the one-act play, see Book Two,

page 612.) Both of these deal with a single situation, a single plot, introduce few characters, and move rapidly to a climax. They may be chiefly stories of action, in which interest is aroused by the thrilling or amusing situations; or stories of character, in which the interest depends chiefly on the personalities of the people who take part in the action, or on the social conditions represented.

In some of these one-act plays, as in the full-length drama, the novel, and the personal essay, you will find representation of men and manners in our own time. Two examples are given here for your entertainment and as illustrations of one of the most popular forms of literature today.

The scene presents an upstairs sitting room in a comfortable house in a small city. The wall on the spectator's left is broken by a fireplace, and beyond that a door leading into the hall. At the back of the stage is a deep bay window from which one may have a view up and down the street. A door in the right wall leads to Anne Carey's bedroom. The sitting room, being Anne's particular property, is femininely furnished in chintz. A table desk with several drawers occupies an important place in the room, which is conspicuously rich in flowers.

The curtain rises on an empty stage. Ruth Carey, a pretty girl of eighteen, enters hurriedly, carrying a large box; she wears a hat and coat.

RUTH. [Opening door left.] I was just going when the expressman left theseand I wanted to see them. [Looking into the bedroom.] Oh, how pretty your dress is. Turn round. Just adorable! May I open these?

THE VOICE. Yes, but hurry. It's late. RUTH. [Throwing her sister a kiss.] You dear! It's almost like having a fiancé of my own. Three boxes in two days! He's adorably extravagant. Oh, Anne, exquisite white roses! Come, look!

[ANNE CAREY appears in the bedroom door. She is a girl of twenty-two. Her manner in this scene shows nervousness and suppressed excitement.]

ANNE. Yes, lovely. Get a bowl, Ruth. Quickly.

RUTH. I will. Here's a card. [She

*Reprinted by special arrangement with the author, Miss Theresa Helburn. Application for permission to produce this play must be made to Miss Helburn, Theater Guild, New York City.