The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1890-12-04
A GREAT GENIUS.
Dir. CIugsa.n Ia Visited by Poet and
Profits Greatly Thereby.

d
Profits Greatly Thereby.
tWhat would this be worth to yous" in
quired a tall, slender man, with a large
and mobile mouth, a retreating chin and
thin fringe of whisker on the angle of
either jaw, as he walked into the Office of
The Doodleville Yelper and laid bundle
of manuscript on the EDITORS table.
Editor Clugston picked it up leisurely
and looked it over.
Him! This is poetry, is it not?" he SAID.
Eyes; poem on Immortality.
81 thought l noticed that most of the
lines seemed to begin with capital. What
was the inquiry you made about it?"
What is it worth to you?"
f'What is your idea of its value?'
well, it took me four hours to write 1t.
burned midnight oil over that poem'
81 have done tic same thing over tariff
editorial many a time,' unused Mr.. Clug-
ston.
"And it seems to me it ought to be
worth S10."
"Are you aware, Mr.
''My name is Isnoggles-Perry Isnoggles.
Accent on the 4. ,"
THANK you. Are you aware, Mr.. Isnog-
giles, that John Milton sold Paradise Lost
for only s72-one-third cash and the rest
on timer"
'sWhyn-
care you aware that Robert Burns once
tried to sell Tam O'Shanter' for suit of
clothes worth about S550?'
''No. l never heard'-
did you know, Mr.. Isnoggles," said
Editor Clugston, with increasing severity,
that Oliver Goldsmith once sold poem
| two stickfuls long for glass of ale and
three links of sausage, and that Homer re-
fused an offer of a sheepskin for his Had
because he thought it was worth two
sheepskins?"
'Tll take IS for Che poem, Mr.. Clugs.
! ton"
Perhaps you have never heard, Mr.
Isnoggles," pursued the editor, ''that
Plautus, the Roman poet, would grind out
a rondeau at any time for half pint OF
| shrimps?"
'Say $780," suggested the visitor.
And you did not know, possibly, that
| Tasso, the Italian poet, hawked a -four
| for six shillings, and couldn't sell it at
that
would 81 50 be too much for this?''
"a dollar and a half for five pages OF
manuscript that Dryden would have sold
even when he was 30 years old, for half a
crown?n
"You can have it for nothing, Mr. Clugs
ton"
HIM, This will take up-let me see
in loaded long primer at least half a col
unln, Mr.. Isnoggles. II
''Pd like to have it go in. l wouldn't
er-mind paying you, say so cents, Mr.
| Clugston, if you can make room for it,
SAT regular rates, Mr. Isnoggles," re-
piled the editor, this would come to about
$50, but l believe in encouraging home
poets as much as can. You are home
| poet, are you not?"
Il was raised out here on the Bilby
| farm"
! And on that account, . resumed the ed
itor, making a few figures on sheet OF
paper before him, 81 will come down to an
even So bill.''
Thank you, Mr. Clugston 1t isn't ex
actly what had expected, but p
Cash in advance of course"
| Mr.. Isnoggles drew out a rather lear
wallet, extracted the money therefrom and
handed it over.
please say nothing about this said
Mr.. Clugston grandly as he put the money
! in pocketbook ten times leaner than his
visitors Il wouldn't do it for every
! body"
Mr. Isnoggles expressed his gratitude
and walked out.
Darn newspaper man that can't de
wise some way to meet a wash billr' solilo
! quized Editor Clugston as he leaned bach
| in his chair and looked at himself in the
/ glass.-Chicago Tribune.