o guesses at the number of people who have passed through
the gates that day, and announcements of the re-painting of the
boat-houses and the near approach of the open-air concerts. You end
this story with an allusion to the presence in the park of the
"wan-faced children of the tenement," and the worthy workingmen (if it
is a one-cent paper which the workingmen are likely to read), and tell
how they worshipped nature in the open air, instead of saying that in
place of going properly to church, they sat around in their
shirt-sleeves and scattered egg-shells and empty beer bottles and
greasy Sunday newspapers over the green grass for which the worthy men
who do not work pay taxes. Then there is the "Hottest Sunday in the
Park," which comes up a month later, when you increase the park
policeman's former guess by fifteen thousand, and give it a news value
by adding a list of the small boys drowned in bathing.

The "First Haul of Shad" in the Delaware is another reliable story, as
is also the first ice fit for skating in the park; and then there is
always the Thanksgiving story, when you ask the theatrical managers
what they have to be thankful for, and have them tell you, "For the
best season that this theatre has ever known, sir," and offer you a
pass for two; and there is the New Year's story when you interview
the local celebrities as to what they most want for the new year, and
turn their commonplace replies into something clever. There is also a
story on Christmas Day, and the one Conway had just written on the
street scenes of Christmas Eve. After you have written one of these
stories two or three times, you find it just as easy to write it in
the office as anywhere else. One gentleman of my acquaintance did this
most unsuccessfully. He wrote his Christmas-day story with the aid of
a directory and the file of a last year's paper. From the year-old
file he obtained the names of all the charitable institutions which
made a practice of giving their charges presents and Christmas trees,
and from the directory he drew the names of their presidents and
boards of directors; but as he was unfortunately lacking in religious
knowledge and a sense of humor, he included all the Jewish
institutions on the list, and they wrote to the paper and rather
objected to being represented as decorating Christmas trees, or in any
way celebrating that particular day. But of all stale, flat, and
unprofitable stories, this releasing of prisone