poem from some other source. As I had no desire to appear mercenary, I said nothing about my own copy, and made no attempt to borrow. I did, however, casually remark to Baxter that I should like to look at his copy of the proof sheets, since I wished to make some extended quotations for my review, and would rather not trust my copy to a typ ist for that purpose. Baxter assured me, with every evidence of regret, that he had considered them of so little importance that he had thrown them into the fire. This indifference of Baxter to literary values struck me as just a little overdone. The proof sheets of Hamlet, corrected in Shakespeare's own hand, would be well-nigh priceless.

At the next meeting of the club I observed that Thompson and Davis, who were with me on the reviewing committee, very soon brought up the question of the Procrustes in conversation in the smoking-room, and seemed anxious to get from the members their views concerning Baxter's production, I supposed upon the theory that the appreciation of any book review would depend more or less upon the degree to which it reflected the opinion of those to whom the review should be presented. I presumed, of course, that Thompson and Davis had each read the book, - they were among the subscribers, and I was desirous of getting their point of view.

"What do you think," I inquired, "of the passage on Social Systems?' I have forgotten to say that the poem was in blank verse, and divided into parts, each with an appropriate title.

"Well," replied Davis, it seemed to me a little cautiously, "it is not exactly Spencerian, although it squints at the Spencerian view, with a slight deflection toward Hegelianism. I should consider it an harmonious fusion of the best views of all the modern philosophers, with a strong Baxterian flavor."

"Yes," said Thompson, "the charm of the chapter lies in this very quality. The

Baxter had come in during this colloquy, and was standing by the fireplace smoking a pipe. I was not exactly sure whether the faint smile which marked his face was a token of pleasure or cynicism; it was Baxterian, however, and I had already learned that Baxter's opinions upon any subject were not to be gathered always from his facial expression. For instance, when the club porter's crippled child died Baxter remarked, it seemed to me unfeelingly, that the poor little devil was doubtless better off, and that the porter himself had certainly been relieved of a burden; and only a week later the porter told me in confidence that Baxter had paid for an expensive operation, undertaken in the hope of prolonging the child's life. I therefore drew no conclusions from Baxter's somewhat enigmatical smile. He left the room at this point in the conversation, somewhat to my relief.

"By the way, Jones," said Davis, addressing me, "are you impressed by Baxter's views on Degeneration?"

Having often heard Baxter express himself upon the general downward tendency of modern civilization, I felt safe in discussing his views in a broad and general manner.

"I think," I replied, "that they are in harmony with those of Schopenhauer, without his bitterness; with those of Nordau, without his flippancy. His materialism is Haeckel's, presented with something of the charm of Omar Khayyám.”

"Yes," chimed in Davis, “it answers the strenuous demand of our day, — dissatisfaction with an unjustified optimism, -and voices for us the courage of human philosophy facing the unknown." I had a vague recollection of having

read something like this somewhere, but so much has been written, that one can scarcely discuss any subject of importance without unconsciously borrowing, now and then, the thoughts or the language of others. Quotation, like imitation, is a superior grade of flattery.

"The Procrustes," said Thompson, to whom the metrical review had been apportioned, "is couched in sonorous lines, of haunting melody and charm; and yet so closely inter-related as to be scarcely quotable with justice to the author. To be appreciated the poem should be read as a whole, I shall say as much in my review. What shall you say of the let ter-press?" he concluded, addressing me. I was supposed to discuss the technical excellence of the volume from the connoisseur's viewpoint.

ered up his delight at our appreciation by this simulated interest in the hunting print.

When the night came for the review of the Procrustes there was a large attendance of members, and several visitors, among them a young English cousin of one of the members, on his first visit to the United States; some of us had met him at other clubs, and in society, and had found him a very jolly boy, with a youthful exuberance of spirits and a naïve ignorance of things American, that made his views refreshing and, at times, amusing.

The critical essays were well considered, if a trifle vague. Baxter received credit for poetic skill of a high order.

"Our brother Baxter," said Thompson, "should no longer bury his talent in a napkin. This gem, of course, belongs to the club, but the same brain from which issued this exquisite emanation can produce others to inspire and charm an appreciative world."

"The author's view of life," said Davis, "as expressed in these beautiful lines, will help us to fit our shoulders for the heavy burden of life, by bringing to our realization those profound truths of philosophy which find hope in despair and pleasure in pain. When he shall see fit to give to the wider world, in fuller form, the thoughts of which we have been vouchsafed this foretaste, let us hope that some little ray of his fame may rest upon the Bodleian, from which can never be taken away the proud privilege of saying that he was one of its members." I then pointed out the beauties of the volume as a piece of bookmaking. I knew, from conversation with the publi cation committee, the style of type and rubrication, and could see the cover through the wrapper of my sealed copy. The dark green morocco, I said, in summing up, typified the author's serious view of life, as a thing to be endured as patiently as might be. The cap-and-bells

border was significant of the shams by which the optimist sought to delude himself into the view that life was a desirable thing. The intricate blind-tooling of the doublure shadowed forth the blind fate which left us in ignorance of our future and our past, or of even what the day itself might bring forth. The black-letter type, with rubricated initials, signified a philosophic pessimism enlightened by the conviction that in duty one might find, after all, an excuse for life and a hope for humanity. Applying this test to the club, this work, which might be said to represent all that the Bodleian stood for, was in itself sufficient to justify the club's existence. If the Bodleian had done nothing else, if it should do nothing more, it had produced a masterpiece.

There was a sealed copy of the Procrustes, belonging, I believe, to one of the committee, lying on the table by which I stood, and I had picked it up and held it in my hand for a moment, to emphasize one of my periods, but had laid it down immediately. I noted, as I sat down, that young Hunkin, our English visitor, who sat on the other side of the table, had picked up the volume and was examining it with interest. When the last review was read, and the generous applause had subsided, there were cries for Baxter.

"Baxter ! Baxter ! Author! Author!" Baxter had been sitting over in a corner during the reading of the reviews, and had succeeded remarkably well, it seemed to me, in concealing, under his mask of cynical indifference, the exultation which I was sure he must feel. But this outburst of enthusiasm was too much even for Baxter, and it was clear that he was struggling with strong emotion when he rose to speak.

"Gentlemen, and fellow members of the Bodleian, it gives me unaffected pleasure sincere pleasure some day you may know how much pleasure cannot trust myself to say it now - to see the evident care with which your

I

Baxter took his seat, and the applause had begun again when it was broken by a sudden exclamation.

"By Jove!" exclaimed our English visitor, who still sat behind the table, "what an extraordinary book!"

Every one gathered around him.

"You see," he exclaimed, holding up the volume, "you fellows said so much about the bally book that I wanted to see what it was like; so I untied the ribbon, and cut the leaves with the paper knife lying here, and found and found that there was n't a single line in it, don't you know!"

Blank consternation followed this announcement, which proved only too true. Every one knew instinctively, without further investigation, that the club had been badly sold. In the resulting confusion Baxter escaped, but later was waited upon by a committee, to whom he made the rather lame excuse that he had always regarded uncut and sealed books as tommy-rot, and that he had merely been curious to see how far the thing could go; and that the result had justified his belief that a book with nothing in it was just as useful to a bookcollector as one embodying a work of genius. He offered to pay all the bills for the sham Procrustes, or to replace the blank copies with the real thing, as we might choose. Of course, after such an insult, the club did not care for the poem. He was permitted to pay the expense, however, and it was more than hinted to him that his resignation from the club would be favorably acted upon. He never sent it in, and, as he went to Europe shortly afterwards, the affair had time to blow over.

In our first disgust at Baxter's dupli

city, most of us cut our copies of the Procrustes, some of us mailed them to Baxter with cutting notes, and others threw them into the fire. A few wiser spirits held on to theirs, and this fact leaking out, it began to dawn upon the minds of the real collectors among us that the volume was something unique in the way of a publication.

"Baxter," said our president one evening to a select few of us who sat around the fireplace, "was wiser than we knew, or than he perhaps appreciated. His Procrustes, from the collector's point of view, is entirely logical, and might be considered as the acme of bookmaking. To the true collector, a book is a work of art, of which the contents are no more important than the words of an opera.

Fine binding is a desideratum, and, for its cost, that of the Procrustes could not be improved upon. The paper is above criticism. The true collector loves wide margins, and the Procrustes, being all margin, merely touches the vanishing point of the perspective. The smaller the edition, the greater the collector's eagerness to acquire a copy. There are but six uncut copies left, I am told, of the Procrustes, and three sealed copies, of one of which I am the fortunate possessor."

After this deliverance, it is not surprising that, at our next auction, a sealed copy of Baxter's Procrustes was knocked down, after spirited bidding, for two hundred and fifty dollars, the highest price ever brought by a single volume published by the club. Charles W. Chesnutt.

AT college it was always easy to create a prepossession in favor of a man by recommending him as a "nice, quiet sort of fellow." In the case of the athlete who had demonstrated his vitality and manly qualities, the reason for this prepossession was clear; the declaration of his friends was an assurance that his head had not been turned by his achievements, and that he was modest and unassertive. But it always seemed to me singular that so negative a statement should so generally have guaranteed the worth of one of whom little else was known. Even in the larger world outside of college, the same guarantee holds good; let a stranger in a city have but one friend who makes it known that he is a "nice, quiet sort of fellow," and he will not lack for a welcome.

Yet many of the primary and obvious reasons for quietness in a man are not prepossessing. It may be that he

is a weakling; bullied because of his lack of strength in the Spartan age of boyhood, he has had fixed upon him the habit of timidity and self-effacement. Or he may be stupid, yet with just enough intelligence to perceive his dullness and so to be dumb. Or he may by nature be one of those passionless, unenthusiastic, indifferent creatures who find sufficient occupation in buttoning on their clothes in the morning and unbuttoning them at night, eating their three meals, and going through the daily routine work or routine idleness to which necessity or circumstance has accustomed them. The classification is incomplete; there are quiet men who are not weaklings, who are not stupid, who are enthusiastic, men of firm will and steadfast purpose. But if we pass over these for the present, it will appear that the self-control practiced by quiet persons had oftentimes better give place to self

abandon, and that many a man is respected for his restraint when he should be pitied for his diffidence. There is, for instance, the case of one whose quiet ways have resulted from a sense of physical inferiority in boyhood.

No matter what victories may be attained in the development of character, the point of view and the manner that were fixed in the early formative years are never quite discarded. The boy who has less strength than his fellows, less athletic skill, and yet admires and longs for these possessions, invites only too often demonstrations upon himself of the vigor and prowess that he covets. A boy likes above all things to show his power over another boy; and the most instant method is by putting him down and sitting on him, or by seizing his wrist and twisting it till he howls, or by gripping the back of his neck and forcing him to march whither the tyrant wills. Once the unlucky weakling is discovered and his susceptibility to teasing exposed, he becomes the plaything of his stronger mates. The amusement is the greater if he resents it with spirit, the keener if he has a sensitiveness which is hurt by the abuse, the more frequently invited if he has the fatal admiration for deeds of strength, and haunts, in spite of its terrors, the society of those who can perform them. His spirit is not crushed, but it learns discretion; his sensitiveness grows into a shy and morbid pride; he likes to look on at better men, and to know them, but he finds it wise to be inconspicuous, inasmuch as to draw attention to himself usually means to suffer from a display of the very abilities which he admires.

And out of this what results? He acquires the habit of looking on and being socially inconspicuous. He may have energies that in the end win for him eminence, but he will probably be to the end a shy and quiet man. It is not necessary that a boy should be a weakling to arrive at this develop

ment; some trifling peculiarity, a curious quality of voice, or a nervous and easily mimicked laugh, or an alien accent may suffice to create in him an undue tendency to hold his tongue. I know one man who attributes his "cursed quietness" to an ailment of the throat that he had when a boy, and that made his speech husky and often liable to break down. Another thinks he is quiet because he never could sing; nearly always, in any gathering in which he found himself, there was singing, and he, utterly without the musical sense, sat and contributed nothing. This inability in expression extended even to his speech; he could not manage his voice to tell a story effectively, and though no one has a keener appreciation of the humorous or dramatic, no one is less able than he to realize it in his talk.

Then there are the humble-minded people who fancy themselves too dull or too uninformed to be interesting, and who cut themselves off from sharing freely with others their thoughts and opinions. Often they do themselves scant justice in their modesty, and win all the more on that account the regard of the few who come near enough to know them. But they are always understood of but few, and they are bottled-up people, a nervous, self-conscious, timorous folk, of pleasant dispositions and much sentiment, who seldom cut any large figure in the world.

The others, who really are dull and without being oppressed by the knowledge preserve a befitting retirement, constitute perhaps a majority of the quiet men. To be dull is certainly not to be disliked; and yet I question if any one of this numerous, agreeable, and necessary company quite fills out the original mental picture summoned by the recommendation, "a nice, quiet sort of fellow." For the phrase suggests a man who has reserves of thought or knowledge or moral force. Indeed, we often follow up the desig