f
my feet. In his sensible, uninspired way he showed me his books, and
explained that his profits and his business were increasing rapidly.
He had thought of taking in a partner with some cash. He would rather
have me than any one he knew. When I left his place that afternoon
Peter had my check for the thousand dollars I had in the bank, and I
was a partner in his undertaking business.

I went home with feelings of delirious joy, mingled with a certain
amount of doubt. I was dreading to tell my wife about it. But I
walked on air. To give up the writing of humorous stuff, once more to
enjoy the apples of life, instead of squeezing them to a pulp for a few
drops of hard cider to make the pubic feel funny--what a boon that
would be!

At the supper table Louisa handed me some letters that had come during
my absence. Several of them contained rejected manuscript. Ever since
I first began going to Heffelbower's my stuff had been coming back with
alarming frequency. Lately I had been dashing off my jokes and
articles with the greatest fluency. Previously I had labored like a
bricklayer, slowly and with agony.

Presently I opened a letter from the editor of the weekly with which I
had a regular contract. The checks for that weekly article were still
our main dependence. The letter ran thus:

DEAR SIR:

As you are aware, our contract for the year expires with the present
month. While regretting the necessity for so doing, we must say that
we do not care to renew same for the coming year. We were quite
pleased with your style of humor, which seems to have delighted quite a
large proportion of our readers. But for the past two months we have
noticed a decided falling off in its quality. Your earlier work showed
a spontaneous, easy, natural flow of fun and wit. Of late it is
labored, studied, and unconvincing, giving painful evidence of hard
toil and drudging mechanism.

Again regretting that we do not consider your contributions available
any longer, we are, yours sincerely,

THE EDITOR.

I handed this letter to my wife. After she had read it her face grew
extremely long, and there were tears in her eyes.

"The mean old thing!" she exclaimed indignantly. "I'm sure your pieces
are just as good as they ever were. And it doesn't take you half as
long to write them as it did." And then, I suppose, Louisa thought of
the checks that would cease coming. "Oh, John," she wailed, "what will
you do now?