Morning journal and courier., 1889-04-19
PROFEssIONAL GAINS.
How Much Money the Leaders Make
 fin Year.

fin a Year.
 From the Philadelphia Press.
 No doubt the author of the 'Ingoldsby Legends" spoke for sll time and for all peo- l ples when he said that Literature is a very good walking stick; but d. poor crutch." It is not easy in this day and land to use 1 it as walking stick. The late E. P. Roe, l indeed, found no difficulty in writing $50, 900 worth year (whether he wrote literature is | is idle to inquire: he wrote for good, honest
 money, at any rate ); and Mark Twain swore in the court some time ago. in a suit against a Canadian publisher, that his annual in- come was $S0,000. But the re was only one
 Roe, ana it is perfect paradox that there is but one Twain.
 In the profession of letters the whole thing boils itself down to this: One trained writer out of many thousand suddenly sue ceeds in pleasing the public, and the public buys his books. Then the publisher pays him living prices. or he publishes for himself.
 But his books will not keep him. He writes novel, let us say 6O,OOO to 75,OO0
 words in length. He sen ds it to magazine
 and gets from $500 to $1, 800 for its serial
 publication. If he writes three or four of
 these year. and half doz en short stories
 at from $10O to $500 apiece, and variety of
 sketches and squibs, and the public and
 publishers retain their interest in him why
 he's an amazingly lucky fellow and con-
 spicuous figure in the republic of letters. Just at the present his name is anything else but legion.
 There is Edgar Saltus, who doubtless could, if he would, earn from $80OO to SIG, ,0O0 year. But he is not in need of money, and he writes but iittle-say, from $2, 300 to $3, 900 worth. He raised his rates lately; he comes very high. The Lippincotts paid him fnr amount the HarpeIs gave Amelie Rives for a sonnet Mrs Chanler, by the way, makes about S10, 900 year. She has received her highest pay from Once-a-week, an enter prising New York weekly which has been delighting it's contributors with prineely oompen sation. It gave Frank Stockton $10- 900 for his late story. The usual magazine rates are from $10 to $15 8 page. But Brander Matthews is another independent author. Like Edgar Saltus he writes when he feels like it and for special pay. He aver ages an annual income of about $3, 900. Francis Hodgson Burnett is getting rich at the rate of from $20, 900 to %, 900 year; Frances Courtney Bayler not so fast; she earns about $2, 900. Miss Murfree's (''Charles Egbsrt Craddock'D novels yield her about $S,0O0: Grace Kings about $1,OOO (she writes little or nothing), and George W. Ca- ble's about $4,000 Che makes more reading them to the public). Edgar W. Fawcett is @ very prolific author; he has something or other printed everywhere but in the Century, with whose editor he is not on speaking, much less writing, terms. It would be fair
 to say that he receives s4,O00 year for all
 his writings, though last year he did better
 owing to the remarkable generous sum of $S GOO paid him by tie late American Maga-
 zine for his novel of "Olivia Delaplaine."
 There is no sinister suggestion in this refer. ence to the generosity of the magazine and
 it's death. There is no way of getting at the total income of the poet pure and simple.
 Some of the minor singers, like Frank
 Dempster Sherman and E. 0. Steadman,
 make goodly aggregate ot the $15 and $25
 checks for their sprightly verses. It is said
 that Walt Whitman of late years has earned about $500 annually with his pen.
 But there is no end to this kind of chatter. We have not mentioned the authors on sal- come from the New York Herald, probably makes SIG, ,0e0; W. D. Howells, who receives outside of his $1O.e0O salary from the Har- pers, from g, 500 to $5,000; Charles Dudley Warner, who is paid $1.200 year for his department in Harper's Magazine; Rossiter Johnson, whom the Appletons used to pay $6, 900 year for editorial work; B. H. Stod- dard, who now earns about $2, 500 over and above the salary of the same amount paid him as literary editor of the New York Mail and Express, and R. W. Glider, who receives $2O, ,00O yearly for editing the Century. Mayo W. Hazeltine, the brilliant book re- viewer and editorial writer of the New York i Sun, is said to receive $175 week, and | there are no doubt several other writers or are paid as well. Perhaps dozen of the ! foremost journals of the land employ man. l aging editors at $5, ,000 6 year, and there are at least four Washington correspondents who receive as much more. The journalist whose
 salary is 0, 900 year has right to consider