e lust or pride of
life, without curiosity or adventure, a mere timid missionary of a
religion of "Nicer Ways," a quiet setter of a good example. I can assure
you this is no exaggeration, but a portrait. It seems to me that the
thing must be pathological, that he and this goodness of his have
exactly the same claim upon Lombroso, let us say, as the born criminal.
He is born good, a congenital good example, a sufferer from atrophy of
his original sin. The only hope I can see for Bagarrow, short of murder,
is forcible trepanning. He ought to have the seat of his ideals lanced,
and all this wash about doing good to people by stealth taken away. It
may be he might prove a very decent fellow then--if there was anything
left of him, that is.

THE BOOK OF ESSAYS DEDICATORY

I have been bothered about this book this three months. I have written
scarcely anything since Llewellyn asked me for it, for when he asked me
I had really nothing on hand. I had just published every line I had ever
written, at my own expense, with Prigsbys. Yet three months should
suffice for one of Llewellyn's books, which consist chiefly of decorous
fly-leaves and a dedication or so, and margins. Of course you know
Llewellyn's books--the most delightful things in the market: the
sweetest covers, with little gilt apples and things carelessly
distributed over luminous grey, and bright red initials, and all these
delightful fopperies. But it was the very slightness of these bibelots
that disorganised me. And perhaps, also, the fact that no one has ever
asked me for a book before.

I had no trouble with the title though--"Lichens." I have wondered the
thing was never used before. Lichens, variegated, beautiful, though on
the most arid foundations, half fungoid, half vernal--the very name for
a booklet of modern verse. And that, of course, decided the key of the
cover and disposed of three or four pages. A fly-leaf, a leaf with
"Lichens" printed fair and beautiful a little to the left of the centre,
then a title-page--"Lichens. By H.G. Wells. London: MDCCCXCV. Stephen
Llewellyn." Then a restful blank page, and then--the Dedication. It was
the dedication stopped me. The title-page, it is true, had some points
of difficulty. Should the Christian name be printed in full or not, for
instance; but it had none of the fatal fascination of the dedicatory
page. I had, so to speak, to look abroad among the ranks of men, and
make one of those fretful forgotte