lustration: THE FRONT GARDEN[B]]

I think that it was in an article by a fellow-scribe, where, doubtless
more in sorrow than in anger, that gentleman exposed the worthlessness
of the productions of sundry of his brother authors, in which I read
that whatever success I had met with as a writer of fiction was due to
my literary friends and 'nepotic criticism.' This is scarcely the case,
since when I began to write I do not think that I knew a single creature
who had published books--blue books alone excepted. Nobody was ever more
outside the ring, or less acquainted with the art of 'rolling logs,'
than the humble individual who pens these lines. But the reader shall
judge for himself.

To begin at the beginning: My very first attempt at imaginative writing
was made while I was a boy at school. One of the masters promised a
prize to that youth who should best describe on paper any incident, real
or imaginary. I entered the lists, and selected the scene at an
operation in a hospital as my subject. The fact that I had never seen an
operation, nor crossed the doors of a hospital, did not deter me from
this bold endeavour, which, however, was justified by its success. I was
declared to have won in the competition, though, probably through the
forgetfulness of the master, I remember that I never received the
promised prize. My next literary effort, written in 1876, was an account
of a Zulu war dance, which I witnessed when I was on the staff of the
Governor of Natal. It was published in the _Gentleman's Magazine_, and
very kindly noticed in various papers. A year later I wrote another
article, entitled 'A Visit to the Chief Secocoeni,' which very nearly
got me into trouble. I was then serving on the staff of Sir Theophilus
Shepstone, and the article, signed with my initials, reached South
Africa in its printed form shortly after the annexation of the
Transvaal. Young men with a pen in their hands are proverbially
indiscreet, and in this instance I was no exception. In the course of my
article I had described the Transvaal Boer at home with a fidelity that
should be avoided by members of a diplomatic mission, and had even gone
the length of saying that most of the Dutch women were 'fat.' Needless
to say, my remarks were translated into the Africander papers, and
somewhat extensively read, especially by the ladies in question and
their male relatives; nor did the editors of those papers forbear to
comment on them in leading arti