The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1891-04-10

| from a success in the venture are most
keenly enjoyed, yet it furnishes most pre-
J carious support He also found, as the
! English novelist James Payn has recent
| ly declared to be true, that he who is an
| exclusive writer of fiction is nobody in
| the affairs of life. Even Dickens and
! Thackeray, with all their fame, were I'M
successful when they stepped out of the
| field on which they won their honor, and
| Thackeray was congratulated by his best
| friends because ne WAS defeated when he
ran for parliament. Mr.. Stimson therefore
| decided that while the law was less fas-
| cinating pursuit it was far more promis-
ing one, and he therefore put his literary
| temptations behind him.
| That is the reason why no more stories
come from y. S. of Dale;' and while he
| does not see his name 50 often in print,
| yet be possesses a sense of content which
| honor does not bring, and that is the COM
| fort which arises from seeing a swelling
bank account. IL is possible TO recall on
the moment many cases of authors whose
names have been familiar who have done
exactly what Mr.. Stimson did, and have
had no reason TO regret il. During the
war Mr.. James r Gilmore. under the
nom de plume of Edmund kirke." gained
splendid reputation as a novelist with q
book called Among the Pines" and If it
is true that literary fame is also money
Mr. Gilmore should have been able to gain
competency. But he was wary, and he
entered business life where, for a time, he
had much success. Misfortune came upon
him later through no fault of his.
Mr.. W. S. Andrews thirty years ago was
net only regarded as a most promising
writer of short stories, but he had suifi-
cient ability as an actor to be cast with Ed
win Booth in that splendid series of Shake
spearian plays which Booth produced in
New York at his own theater. Mr. An
drews, however, abandoned the pen and
the stage and took up Blackstone and pol
itics instead.
Forty years ago George William Curtis
delighted New York with a novel and with
his ''Potiphar Papers and he was regard
ed, with Donald 6. Mitchell, as the coming
literary light. But Mr.. Curtis saw that he
needed something more substantial than
royalties on novels TO support his family
He therefore gave UP pure literature to be-
come a journalist and the editor of the
Harpers' publications.
For many years Mr. Frank r. Stockton.
short stories, depended in the main for his
support not upon his weird creations, but
upon the drudgery of reader for one or
two publishing houses; and Robert Grant,
who was esteemed one Of the most witty
and brilliant of the younger novelists OF
Boston, has practically abandoned liter
airy work because his law clients are SO
much more profitable.
e L
would be better known if he wrote more of
them, is Henry A. Beers; but the writing
of fiction is a momentary diversion with
him, for his chief business in life is that of
instructor of English literature to the Yale
college students. Another college professor
who has won some fame as writer of
stories, but who is not tempted away from
his life business by this fame, is Professor
Hardy, Of Dartmouth college. Mr.. John
Habberton, who with ''Helen's Babies"
achieved one Of the phenomenal successes
as surprising to him as it was enormous
did not permit himself 10 be misguided,
but stuck steadily TO his desk, which was
that of editorial writer of The Herald, and
has remained there ever since. He occa-
sionally writes story now but fiction is a
mere incident of his career
Mr. Henry X. Elliott, whose novel The
Bassett Claim" won very great approval,
is the editor of one cf the most technical of
trade journals in New York.
A most singular case was that Of the
young authoress of little book which APP
peared some ten years ago, called IAN
Earnest Triher." The book made a genu-
inc sensation, and received especial praise
from Mr.. KoweIls and Mr.. James But
the authoress could never be induced TO
write another, and she will be known in
literature rs that man was in oratory
who was called Single Speech Hamilton"
The list could be greatly extended, bat
these examples are sufficient to show that
those v~ho have won fame as writers of
fiction are nevertheless busy in other voca-
lions than that OF story writing.
L J. EDWARDS