London Is A Huge Shop, With A

Money Is Made At Christmas Out Of Holly And Mistletoe, But Who Save The Vendors Would Greatly Care If No Green Branch Were Procurable? One Symbol, Indeed, Has Obscured All Others-the Minted Round Of Metal. And One May Safely Say That, Of All The Ages Since A Coin First Became The Symbol Of Power, Ours Is That In Which It Yields To The Majority Of Its Possessors The Poorest Return In Heart's Contentment.

And Why Should Any Man Who Writes, Even If He Writes Things Immortal, Nurse Anger At The World's Neglect? Who Asked Him To Publish? Who Promised Him A Hearing? Who Has Broken Faith With Him? Your Poem, Your Novel, Who Bargained With You For It?

Perhaps It Is While Drinking Tea That I Most Of All Enjoy The Sense Of Leisure.

How I Envy Those Clerks Who Go By To Their Offices In The Morning! There's The Day's Work Cut Out For Them; No Question Of Mood And Feeling; They Have Just To Work At Something, And When The Evening Comes, They Have Earned Their Wages, And They Are Free To Rest And Enjoy Themselves. What An Insane Thing It Is To Make Literature One's Only Means Of Support! When The Most Trivial Accident May At Any Time Prove Fatal To One's Power Of Work For Weeks Or Months. No, That Is The Unpardonable Sin! To Make A Trade Of An Art! I Am Rightly Served For Attempting Such A Brutal Folly.

People Have Got That Ancient Prejudice So Firmly Rooted In Their Heads That One Mustn't Write Save At I The Dictation Of The Holy Spirit. I Tell You, Writing Is A Business.