be able to edit a comic periodical satisfactorily, for
lack of interest in the work. I value humor highly, & am
constitutionally fond of it, but I should not like it as a steady
diet. For its own best interests, humor should take its outings in
grave company; its cheerful dress gets heightened color from the
proximity of sober hues. For me to edit a comic magazine would be
an incongruity & out of character, for of the twenty-three books
which I have written eighteen do not deal in humor as their chiefs
feature, but are half & half admixtures of fun & seriousness. I
think I have seldom deliberately set out to be humorous, but have
nearly always allowed the humor to drop in or stay out, according to
its fancy. Although I have many times been asked to write something
humorous for an editor or a publisher I have had wisdom enough to
decline; a person could hardly be humorous with the other man
watching him like that. I have never tried to write a humorous
lecture; I have only tried to write serious ones--it is the only way
not to succeed.

I shall write for this magazine every time the spirit moves me; but
I look for my largest entertainment in editing. I have been edited
by all kinds of people for more than thirty-eight years; there has
always been somebody in authority over my manuscript & privileged to
improve it; this has fatigued me a good deal, & I have often longed
to move up from the dock to the bench & rest myself and fatigue
others. My opportunity is come, but I hope I shall not abuse it
overmuch. I mean to do my best to make a good magazine; I mean to
do my whole duty, & not shirk any part of it. There are plenty of
distinguished artists, novelists, poets, story-tellers,
philosophers, scientists, explorers, fighters, hunters, followers of
the sea, & seekers of adventure; & with these to do the hard & the
valuable part of the work with the pen & the pencil it will be
comfort & joy to me to walk the quarter-deck & superintend.

Meanwhile McClure's enthusiasm had had time to adjust itself to certain
existing facts. Something more than a month later he wrote from America
at considerable length, setting forth the various editorial duties and
laying stress upon the feature of intimate physical contact with the
magazine. He went into the matter of the printing schedule, the various
kinds of paper used