ecialists, poets, essayists--logrollers of high
degree--see their name often enough, are "celebrities," "men of the
time," feted and written about, but eventually retire on the Civil List.
Eccentricity is the breath of their nostrils, their very existence
depends upon it, publicity is essential. My friend's eccentricity was
for his own pleasure. He lived in a frugal--some might think in a
miserly way--in two rooms in one of the Inns of Court. Perhaps I shall
be more correct if I say he _existed_ in one. A loaf of bread and half a
pint of milk was his daily fare. The room he slept in he worked in. The
other was empty, save for bundles of dusty old newspapers containing
articles from his ever active brain. "I keep this room," said he, "for
times when I am over-wrought. Then I shut myself up in it, and _roar_!
When by this process I have blown away my mental cobwebs, my brain
regains its pristine energy, and I go back to my study calm and
collected, having done no one any harm, and myself a lot of good." I
have dined at his Club with him in the most luxurious fashion, quite
regardless of expense. He was a capital host, but, like the magazines he
wrote for, he only appeared replete once a month. His Press work he
looked upon as mere bread and milk. His work was excellent, journalism
which editors term "safe," neither too brilliant nor too dull, certainly
having no trace whatever of eccentricity.

I may here offer an opinion, and make a suggestion to young journalists,
and that is--safe, steady, dull mediocrity is what pays in the long run;
to attempt to be brilliant when not a genius is fatal. To have the
genius, brilliancy, pluck, and success means tremendous prosperity and
favour for a time, but the editors and the public tire of your
cleverness. You are too much in evidence. It is safer from a mere
business standpoint to be the steady, stupid tortoise than the brilliant
hare. The man or woman who writes a carefully thought-out essay is
flattered, and quoted, and talked about: for that article the writer may
possibly receive as many sovereigns as the writer of a newspaper article
receives shillings; but the shillings come every day, and the sovereigns
once a month. It is wiser in the long run to be satisfied with a loaf
and milk once a day than with a dinner at a Club every four weeks.

If in the old days the Bohemian scribbler was not in Society, he could
at least imagine himself there. There was nothing to prevent his