Waterbury evening Democrat., 1895-08-10
A WORK OF GENIUS.

when some people entered the chamber.
 They were the few friends who ad- hered to tho dead man in the last black days of his adversity. Between them they had paid his landlady, his doctor and his nurse. One of thom had adopted his littlo child-thS only relative that he was known to have. Now they had come to sec the removal of such papers and personal effects as he might have left More particularly they wanted to take possession, on the child's behalf, of the Work of Genius" " the great play to which he had been putting his finish ing touches when he was taken i'll. Mrs. Saunders, the servant girl said, was out. Yes, she had had Mir. Bourne's letter, but didn't expect him quite so early. She had gone shopping, but Wa sure to be back soon. Would the gentle mon step ill and wait?
 They would. So she showed the wis itors into the little front parlor, where the man of genius had lived and worked
 There were three of them-St. John Bourne, the great trugodian, lessee and manager of tho Hyde Park theater, who, seven years before, had produced the play which had first made the man of genius known. Philip fayth0rne, tho dramatic critic, who had cXtollcd it, in hyStCrical and almost fearful periods, in the columns of The Daily Meteor, and Ralph Ericsson, the young bohemian harristCr, who did not practice, but cul tivated the musvS on a parental allow anco of &, 900 year.
 The room ill which they sat down to wait was nliSerably dismal. A medical student, who was just then away enjoy ing himself ill the operating theater of St. Thomas hospital, had succeeded to it. Indications of his calling were not wanting. On the mantelpiece were a skull and disurderly arrangement of t microscopic slides. On the table there was d StcthoScopc half covered with a dirty pack of cards In corner thore were test tubes filled with glycerin, for the culture of tuberclo hacili. There was d mingled Odor of ioloform and stale tobacco smoke. Altogether tho place Was very melancholy and not at all fit to he tho dwelling of a man of genius.
 The thrco men took off their hats and gloves and unbuttonCd their fur lined OvrrcUatS and sat down on tho least un- comfortable of the chairs and talked Their talk, aS was natural, Was of the man of gUniuS-Nf his sudden rise, of his gradual decline, of tho great work that was at last to havo retrieved his fortunes, if he had lived.
 For the man had sprung ill night from ohscurity to greatness His name n1 1pH1N fn those who make it their business to keep their eyes upon the young men of promise who arc presently to rise. One jay it had been mystcriously whispered abroad that St. John Bourne had discov- cred a new dramatist of extraordinary talent. When public curiosity was thus sufficiently aroused, there had duly fol .Uwed the ralWuuncGmCnt of 'The Knight Errmt, d N|w and Original Play, by Norman NrulrS, - Then camo the pro duCti,n, hailed with tunultuuus ac- clamatiun$, and tho author passed at Q single step into the front rank of writers for the English stage.
 Philip Gaythurno spoke of tho mem orahle first night.
 II never saw ;t house moro enthusias-
 
 Bourne, which fitted you better, but, for once, 1 think, there Was even more en- | thuSiasm for the author than for the actor. NU!,udy knew him. We wcre ull ! asking each other who he was and where ! he came from, and nobody would say. ! Indeed I'm not sure that know where | he came from even now, He was always ! very rctictnt about his beginnings. I Have you any idea what they wcre?"
 Something commercial. Bourne an swcred. ''I rather fancicd he manufac- l turcd vinegar, in Il small way, ill Der mundstv, or Was it mineral waters? 1 cant hr sure Whatever it was, the pnor | fellow would haNr done better for him. self if he'd stuck to it.
 "Yuu think his success turned his head, them" said Ericscn.
 Undoubtedly. He'd been working and waiting for it for years, caring for nulhrt r.,C. thinking of nothing else. | Nuhudy ruruur. '5rd him; nobody would read his plays. only read 'Thc Knight Errant myself by the nctc$t accident. l tu"k it mp on" night when l N;ts suf frrinS from insomnia, thinking it would send me t., lrrp. Instead of that it kept me awake and put it i'll rehearsal anG 1 produced it two months afterward. Pool 1 NUulrS Was quito overwhelmed by the surC">s. IL, walked about like mal in d tlrcaDl He couldn't work He cuuldn | duanythinS but talk about him self and ask what people were saving about kim. He gave up his business anc fell away from his old friends and be
 
 Ralph Ericson, who himself had de serted PhiliStia for Bohemia, put in ; word for the bohemian life.
 Bohemia is all very we'll for som, of Us, Bourne continued, ''but it il 1 very bad for d man like Norman VOules who plunges into it suddenly at 35. H, can t take it as q matter of course. H, enjoys it too much. He gets to regard midnight supperS as the serious busl ness of life He hangs about club drinking whisky and saying smar things when he ought to be sitting a homo putting them on paper. When Il, does get home, he finds that the whisk, and soda have taken away all his energ, for work; that, instead of going to beC early and getting fit for it, he sits n drinking more whisky and soda an,
 thinking of it. Then he finds, as poo ; Norman did, that he is spending none n good deal faster than he is making it
 Sometimes he makes desperate effor and recovers himself; sometimes h
 doesn't"
 In this way the talk turned upon tn
 gradual lapse of Norman Noules, whic , made melancholy story His first sig
 nal triumph had never been followed b |, a second. In the course of seven year
 two one act pieces of moderate but b , no means startling merit were the onl
 works of his pen that had been see , upon the stage.
 A part of the money earned by "Tl
 Knight Errant" he had lost in a mag; zine which had failed miSerably Owiu