The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-12-25
SOME GREAT INCREASES
EVEN LEAST FAVORED WRITER'S
FIND IT PROFITABLE.
w. A. Fraser's First Book to Come
Out In Spring = New Method of
Selling Books Being Tried-Big
New York Publishers-Dr. Weir's
Last Novel.
Especial correspondence

writing Juveniles" seems to have sui
fered no decline since the days when
Louisa M. Alcott secured sale OF
about 100 600 copies of Little Women
in about three years. Even Miss Alcott
was not the first to prove that Culck
and wide popularity awaited Sood
book for children. For fifteen years
before the publication of Little Wom-
en-, - William T. Adams ("Oliver Optic')
had been finding juveniles considerably
better than the proVerbial wheat IN
the milf as a source of SuStenance:
and as early as 1851, Mrs. Ellzapetn
Stuart Phelps (mother of Mrs. Eliza
beth Stuart Phelps Ward had written
children's book. Sunny Side, tnat,
within a year, attained a sale OF 1UO,-
600 copies. There is nobody producing
juveniles Just now-at least in this
Countrywide sweeps the whole Held In
the royal fashion of those departed
masters. Mrs. Burnett did it, and more,
with Little Lord Fauntleroy," winch
must have had a sale in the United
States alone of about 100000 copies; but
this was about her only venture into
the field of juveniles. AS a steady,
plain, unromantic, everyday occupa-
ton, however. the writing of Juveniles
never was better.
There are a good many people who
follow it. They hope to get, and gen
orally do get, about cent word for
the use of their matter in periodicals,
and a royalty of 10 per cent when it is
published in book form. The periodical
publication is their main dependence.
The number of exclusively juvenile
periodicals and the number of other
periodicals that maintain a juvenile de-
partment makes the demand for such
matter steady and large. The writer's
| who make a. business of meeting this
! demand proceed with much the same
matter Of actnesS and method as II
! they We're curing pork or packing 1ce
| They keep an eye constantly open, as
1t We're to the weather; they see what
| is coming, and shape their course
! shrewdIy to fit what they see. For in
| stance. the first discoveries of gold in
! the Klondike were not well rested from
| their journey home before the writer
! of juveniles had produced a full-bloWn
novel, conducting some favored lads
! through all the rare adventures and
experiences of a journey in, season
! of prospecting and mining, a royal
find" the journey out, and a heroic
reunion with anxious and admiring
friends. A man or woman well versed
| in the craft, and following it with faith
fulness. day by day, easily produces
5000 words q week, and this, at a cent
a word, means $50 a. week; and $50 a
week for work that you can dc with
out expense, and mainly in the quiet
and seclusion of your own library, is a
reward not to be dismissed lightly
except by promoters and politicians.
1 fancy it will be in the nature Of
news to number of my readers if tell
! them that Mrs. Emma e. D. n. South
worth is still living. In a day or two
now (Dec. 26) she win be eighty years
H.. Too
she built for herself over forty wears
ago at Washington, on a high point
that commands a superb view of the
| Potomac valley. She is now feeble, and
] visitors are generally refused admission
| to her, mot" as they carefully explain
to you at her door, because she does
/ not wish to see people, but simply be-
cause she is not strong enough to do
! So" Washington is her native place;
she was born there in 1918, the descend
ant of an old and we'll known family
the Nevittes. The death of her husband
! in 1913 left her without resources and
with two young children to support
| Some years of extreme difficulty fol-
| lowed for her. In 1919, while teaching In
a public school, caring for her house
and family, and even nursing one of her
children through a long illness, she
| wrote her first novel, "Retribution." 1t
was written for the National Era, the
paper that two years later made the
first publication of Uncle Toms Cab
in" Under the strain of all her cares
and labors. her health finally gave way.
But her novel proved Immediately pop
ular; after the serial publication it was
issued in book form by Harper & Bros,
and the author to quote her own
words, found herself born, as it were,
into a new life; found independence,
| sympathy. friendship and honor, and
an occupation in which she could de-
light "All this she adds, came very
suddenly, as after terrible storm a
sunburst." Having thus, by hard de-
grees, got her start she went on pro-
ducing with wonderful abundance,
writing one, two, and, at times, even
three novels a year. She had written
not less than fifty when she finally laid
by her pen.
w. A. Fraser, the Canadian engineer
who writes stories out of his own
strange experience in two opposite
quarters of the globe, Canada and In
dia, is rejoicing in the arrival of new
daughter. The young lady enjoys the
distinction of having Mr.. Rudyard Kip
ling for her godfather, and she has
been christened Ruth Kipling Fraser
Her father says she is to be called
Kip" OF course, it is open to any