have passed away and these old people no doubt have joined their ancestors but i can see them still sitting in that a the en the en style d empire j the waiter lighting the gas in the evening that white haired man that tall thin faced american has dined at this table d for the last thirty years � he is vain foolish and the clean neatly dressed old gentleman who sits by him looking so much like a french gentleman has spent a great part of his life in spain with that piece of news and its subsequent your acquaintance with him begins and ends the eyes the fan the how it began how it was broken off and how it began again opposite sits another french gentleman with beard and hair he spent twenty years of his life in india and he talks of his son who has been out there for the last ten and who has just returned home there is the italian of sixty who dresses like a girl of sixteen and a cigar after dinner � if there are not too many strangers in the room she terms a stranger any one whom she has not seen at least once before the little fat man with the great bald head fringed below the ears with hair is m he is a dramatic author � the author of a hundred and sixty plays he does not intrude himself on your notice but when you speak to � of a young him on literary matters he a pair of tiny like eyes on you and talks of his i was soon deeply interested in m and i invited him to come to the after dinner i paid for his coffee and i offered him a choice cigar he did not smoke i did it was of course inevitable that i should find out that he had not had a play produced for the last twenty years but then the of the hundred and sixty was about his poor bald head i thought of the chances of life he alluded to the war and so this was passed over and we entered on more genial subjects of conversation he had written plays with everybody his list of was longer than any list of lady for an english county ball there was no literary kitchen in which he had not helped to dish up i was at once amazed and delighted had hi written his hundred and sixty plays in the seclusion of his own rooms i should have been less surprised it was the mystery of the of the the discussion the illustrious company that overwhelmed me in a rapture of wonder and respectful admiration then came the anecdotes they were of all sorts here are a few specimens he had written a one act piece with it had been refused at the and then it had been about here there and everywhere finally the had asked for some alterations and e affair i made the alterations one afternoon and wrote to and what do you think � by return of post i had a letter from him saying he could not consent to the production of a one act piece signed by him at the t s because his son was then giving ss op a young han a five act piece at the then came a string of by and they were as old as the world but they were new to me and i was amused and astonished these don were followed by an account of how wrote his sunday and how he and had once nearly come to blows they had agreed to was to contribute the the dialogue one morning came with the of the first act here it is i suppose you can let me have it back finished by to morrow afternoon and the old gentleman would along in this fashion till midnight i would then accompany him to his rooms in the � rooms high up on the fifth floor � where between two pictures supposed to be by m had written plays for the last twenty years and where he would continue to write plays until god called him to a world perhaps of eternal but where by all accounts r de la piece la de m is still unknown how i used to enjoy these conversations i remember how i used to stand on the pavement after having bid the old gentleman good night i had not demanded some further explanation regarding it or la f de m de manager la situation why not write a comedy so the thought came i had never written anything save a few ill letters but no matter to find a plot that was the first thing to do take for hero and for heroine surround them with the old gentlemen who dined at the table d flavor with the italian who smoked ss of a young cigars when there were not too many strangers present after three weeks of industrious stirring the did begin to into something resembling a plot put it upon paper ah there was my difficulty i remembered suddenly that i had read the as poems without ever thinking of how the dialogue looked on paper besides they were in blank verse i hadn t a notion how prose dialogue would look on paper shakespeare i had never opened no instinctive want had urged to read him he had remained therefore at should i buy a copy no the name me � as all popular names me in preference i went to the and listened attentively to a comedy by m fits but strain my imagination as i would i could not see the spoken words in their written form oh for a look at the s copy the corner of which i could see when i leaned forward at last i discovered in s library 