when his box of books comes from the circulating library, it by no means
contains the books he has asked the librarian to send. The batch does
not exclusively consist of the plums and prizes of the publishing season,
of Sir Henry Gordon's book on his illustrious brother, of the most famous
novel of the month, of Mr. Romilly's "New Guinea and the Western
Pacific"--as diverting a book of travel as ever was written, of Mr.
Stockton's "Mrs. Null," and generally of all that is freshest and most
notable in biography, fiction, and history. A few of the peaches of the
best quality there are, but the rest are fruit less valued, are, in fact,
amateur novels. There are two sets of three gaudy novels by unheard-of
ladies; and perhaps three shilling novels, with such titles as "Who Did
It?" "Chopped in Cover," or "Under a Cloud," none of which names we
trust are copyright. A similar phenomenon presents itself at the
bookstalls, which are choked with cheap and unenticing brief tales of the
deadly sins. And whose fault is it that we do not get the good books and
are flooded with the bad books? Why, it is the fault of the ambitious
amateur, of the ladies and gentlemen who publish at their own risk, and
at the cost of the world of readers and professional writers.

This is, with a few remarkable limitations, a free country. No law
exists which says to publishers, "Thou shalt not publish on commission."
No law confines the vagaries of amateur romance. Hence the market is
choked, and the circulating libraries are overwhelmed with rubbish, and
good books, as the Americans of the West say, "get no show." The
debauched novel reader, to whom every story is a story, and one no better
nor worse than another, may not heed it, but the judicious grieve, and
the artist in fiction returns a smaller income tax. Then the very
revenue suffers with the general decline of letters. It may, of course,
be urged that all artists are amateurs before they secure a paying
public. The amateur novelist may be compared to the young dramatic
author who gives his piece at a _matinee_, and who, once in a hundred
times, finds a manager to approve it. May not publishing _en amateur_ be
the only way of reaching the public? To this question the answer is, No!
The risk of publishing a novel by a new author is nothing like so great
as the risk of producing a play with an unknown name to it. Publishers
exist for the purpose of bringing out books that will pay