The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1904-08-28

really no stylist, but of the common
sort of writer's. So 1 rejoice in no
| being allowed to undertake grave his
toric writing. 1 planned a volume OF
| two volumes of another kind Els
| says in Biography and Criticism. II
| ALL first and last, | wrote enough &c
| print perhaps one hundred pages, pu'
not including a thousand or lWo
| thousand pages of opinion ana crlti-
cism of writer's in the course OF near
| ly forty years of Journalism was
not permitted to carry out my pun
| pose, and l rejoice i'll 1t now loi II
! published the volumes hIlShl nav
been mercilessly slaughtered; anu IN ~ y
/ might have died a'born1n. or lolS
ago been relegated to the llmpo con-
tanning the remains of pretendefS ana
| scribbIers and ignoramuseS. planned
| farther; About 1875, l had almost
! resolved to try the preparation Oh d
volume of sketches in biography OF
North Carolinians, beginning pfoDapiy
with General w. r. DaVle IN ReVo-
| lutionary days and coming down TO
| Governor William A. Graham, ana,
! if may have been, to Hon. ZeDulon Is.
! Vance. Remember that thirty years
ago there had been very little OF SUI
production. There are more sketches
| of North Carolinians written in the
| present century in three years than
were written in the first half of the
| Nineteenth Century, l think. The
prompting to undertake one or more
series of the kind indicated, came
from an accomplished personal friend
a gentleman OF superior reading, of
fine talents of elegant manners, OF
high conceptions and noble principles,
the late Hon. Montford McGehee. He
had but just read five short sketches
I had published of living North Caro-
linians. He was so interested and
kind in judgment that he wrote to me,
and suggested that l prepare series
of a longer and more pretentious
character This 1 would have attempt
ed to do, but just then | was most
unexpectedly invited to come to Will
mington, and during the following
twenty-six years nearly / had my nose
on the grindstone, and had neither
the leisure, the inclination, the money
nor the encouragement to attempt
careful work like that indicated, that
would require much research, CORE
spondence, and some travel, and the
most fastidious, careful, best quail
ties as to style that l could command.
l am now glad that the opportunity
did not come TO me, for l might have
written two volumes that in literary
skill and merit would have been re-
garded as contemplate, and in
monetary results quite disastrous.
One other point, and l am done with
statements, personal to myself in con-
nection with journalism and literary
projects. forever. Since l was TWEEN
ty-four 1 have written vast deal
such as it was. My impression, my
conviction is, that in the number of
words L have written more than are
found in the novels of Scott and
Thackeray combined. l may be mis-
taken in this. but | believe not. What
ever else might be said to my detri-
ment as a journalist, and however
commonplace and inferior otherwise,
in thought and diction and construc-
ton, the amount written was great.
1 have often averaged twenty columns,
and some times twenty-four columns
in a week, for months-and for many
years wrote rarely less than eighteen,
and unless interfered with never less
than fifteen or sixteen columns. In
some years, l think, l wrote all of csc
columns, possibly more. l consider
all my work in my final estimate, in
Guiding essays, sketches, speeches,
documents lectures, ETC., / have not
counted, but l believes l have, LOCO
pages of manuscripts in an old trunk
in the garnet. So / have been indus
trious and faithful and that is all the
claim | set up. | count not the value
of anything L have produced, for ]
at least have not set high estimate
on anything that is mine. 1t is ali
pershable stuff and is forgotten as
fast as produced-as evanescent as
cloud as soon dead as created, pass
ing shadow, a mere literary will-o'-
the wisp. ] have lacked two most
important elements in successful writ
ing-a pure, virile style, and strong
powers of thought that last and burn.
Let the curtain drop and at the enc
write-Failure. Let me make three
quotations from some of the most IA
nous gnomic sayings of the three
greatest tragic writer's of Greece, of
all antiquity-Aeschylu Sophocles,
Euripides. Success is mans god.
Aeschylus. Thoughts are mightier
than strength of hand. '-Sophocles
"a bad beginning makes bad end
ing. '-Euripides.
[ was really much instructed by q
letter in the Charlotte presbyterian
Standard, which is. so far as L am
informed, the very best of all the re-
Iigious organs in our Southland, as to
the existence of benevolent institutions
in China for many centuries, and pos
3 blv before Chrst's advent or the
of His blessed Gospel. One
who lives in China, and is a mission
arv. no doubt a Presbyterian, writes
70 correct a misapprehension at this
all institutions of mercy
for the relief and aid of suffering hui
manity are of Christian origin. The
writer gives a very cheerful and in
forming account of those near to
where he dWells. He tells of a home
for the old and destitute only some
fifty yards from the mission he is con-
nected with. 1t is filed with the poor
and miserable. There is a very large
known as "The Uni
versal Charity Hail." near BY him. 1t
has several departments. l copy
part of what is said of it:
zone department is "a school where
needy boys may get an education. An
other department is a founding es-
adjustment where infants may be
placed There is a window recess in
the wall on the street, where an in
FAINT may be placed by day or night
and it will be taken care of without
further formality. Another depart
ment is for virtuous widows"
Another is for DID, decrepit men
who are provided for all their re-
naming days. There is a free dis
pensary of medicine for the sick. Also
A dispensary of rice for destitute peo-
nj TTbara c clOSa nv on