The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1902-08-09

been done TO that en0. Sir Hiram
Maxim, who has been experimenting
with aeroplanes for several years, con-
tributes preface to the volume, from
which it may be understood that this
book teaches that little confidence is
to be placed in the solution of the aerial
problem by such investigators as San
tos-Dumont who are trying Ito steer
feather through the air." 1t seems to
be a general belief of scientific men and
those who have given the problem much
thought that the air will never be con-
quered by air ships Fighter than the
air) and that successful aerial naviga-
ton will be accomplished-if at abby
flying machines (heavier than the air.l
At any rate it will doubtless be some
time before Santosdumontobiles will
come into general use though, of course.
each of US hopes to live to see the
heavens filled with commerce and
argosies of magic SAIL
When the volume of stories recently
published under the title of "A Prince OF
Good Fellows was being made up 1t
was proposed to call them 1.-THE Jimmie
Stories" The present title is doubtless
more attractive. though, with some ex-
PLANTATION. the former would have been
entirely appropriate, for the tales are
James ". of Scotland. and, if half of
the stories are founded on facts of his
career, he was as merry
monarch as ever sat on a throne. The
Mr.. Robert Barr for having given them
this book, for not since The Border
Tales of John Wilson christopher
North) have better stories been written
about these characters and times In
"a Prince of Good Fellows" Jamie is
shown as one of a band of conspirators
against himself, as beggar. as poet,
as a traveller over his own kingdom, as
an adventurer at home. lover abroad,
etc-in all of which adventures he car
ries himself well. Jamie was often go
ing about among his people, unknown
to them, in order to discover what was
going on in his kingdom and to learn
what his subjects thought of their young
king. There is a good plot in each
tale.
Last week there was celebrated in
France the centennial of Alexander
Dumas-a fact worthy of note because
of the long continued popularity of this
great novelist. Critics will call him a
second-rate writer, just as they have
done for years. but in point of demand
for his work on the part of the public
and of attempt to supply this den and
on the part of the author, Dumas surely
ranked above all other writer's. so
many tales are told of the Dumas novel
factory that it is probably safe to put
most of them down as untrue. but
assuredly it would have been phys
icai impossibility for Dumas to have
written by hand himself all of the books
which bear his name on their title
pages. Dumas admitted that he en-
ployed collaborators, the public suppos-
ing these persons to be merely private
secretaries to whom the novelist die
tated his stories. For a long time
novel a month was issued from the
novel factory, and had not the pro-
prietor been so prodigal with his money
he might have been immensely wealthy.
so popular was his work and such good
prices did he obtain. Dumas was once
asked about some inaccuracy in one of
his books.
Il never read the book" he is said to
have replied Let ne see; who wrote
that story All, remember. 1t was the
little Auguste MacQuet- I must go and
box his ears"
Naturally enough during his lifetime
Dumas was the object of bitter criti-
cism from his fellow craftsmen. One
of them wrote of the Dumas novel fac
tory (Fabrique de Romanst Maison
Dumas ct Cie.):
Truly it is difficult to define the
limits of a writer's fecundity, or to
compute the number of lines he can
write in given time. The novel espe-
cially, being a frivolous work. has the
right to hurry and scatter volumes in
profusion. Still the subject has to ma
ture. the plan has to be laid, the
threads of an intrigue have to be got
in hand, the different parts of a work
have to be co-ordinated.
Every well. Allowing for these prepa-
ratiOns, SuppOS1ng an author to take no
more rest than is absolutely necessary
supposing him to eat hastily and sleep
hypothesis, 1 say, the most fecund
writer might produce fifteen volumes
year. Fifteen volun es, M. Dumas And
even so he would have no time to pol
ish his style or to correct his proofs.
you published sixty volumes in 1845
Very well. Now we will make the fol-
lowing simple calculation.
1.-The most skillful copyist, writing
%x1yo hon q lU 2
letters an hour. At the end of the day
he will have got through $500 letters,
or sixty pages of the average novel. He
will be able to copy five octave vol
umes in month. or sixty in a year,
on condition that he never stops for an
hour, and never loses second.
Monsieur Dumas, you area very mer-
itorious copying clerk
From the 1st Of January to the 31st
of December you work regularly twelve
hours a day, sleeping little, and eating
in haste; you never devote a moment to
pleasure. you hardly ever travel, you
| are never met out of doors. Conss-
quently, on the assumption that your
| dramatic work, your correspondence
with the newspapers and the theaters,
and your importunate callers only take
| up bare half of your time, you have
| had the time left, not to write but to
copy out, thirty volumes in the course
of 1915. All the others must be the
work of the men whom you have train
| ed to initiate your handwriting"
''Ah, that 1 must thus unveil your
| shame and destroy the possibility of
doubtf'
Altogether about 1000 volumes bear
| the name of Dumas and, in addition to
| these are sixty dramas 1t is impossi-
Bile to determine how many of these
were actually written by him.
| Not long since, Sir Gilbert Parker
gave utterance to the following ideas as
| to the art of fiction:
"A man must know the truth to write
/ a fable.
Fiction can be learned but cannot be
| taught.
mo great writer has ever had the
| idea Of founding a school of this or
/ that
In the art fiction the Individual is
| thrown on his own talent.
Love and fighting are not necessar-
| lily romance; nor are SOUP kitchens and
| divorce courts necessarily realism