THE McGLADSTONE!

"TO LAND McGLADSTONE LIGHTLY SPRANG,

AND THRICE ALOUD HIS BUGLE RANG

WITH NOTE PROLONG'D AND VARIED STRAIN,

TILL BOLD BEN-GHOIL REPLIED AGAIN."

"Lord of the Isles." Canto IV.

WANTED—-A SOCIETY FOR THE PROTECTION OF "CELEBRITIES."

When some years ago EDMUNDUS ED. MUNDI first introduced to London the gentle art of Interviewing, the idea was in a general way a novelty in this country. It "caught on," and achieved success. Some public men affected, privately, not to like the extra publicity given to their words and actions; but it was only an affectation, and in a general way a great many suddenly found themselves dubbed "Celebrities," hall-marked as such by The World, and able therefore to hand themselves down to posterity, in bound volumes containing this one invaluable number as having been recognised by the world at large as undoubted Celebrities, ignorance of whose existence would argue utter social insignificance. So great was the World's success in this particular line, that at once there sprang up a host of imitators, and the Celebrities were again tempted to make themselves still more celebrated by having good-natured caricatures of themselves made by "Age" and "Spy." After this, the deluge, of biographies, autobiographies, interviewings, photographic realities, portraits plain and coloured—many of them uncommonly plain, and some of them wonderfully coloured,—until a Celebrity who has not been done and served up, with or without a plate, is a Celebrity indeed.

"Celebrities" have hitherto been valuable to the interviewer, photographer, and proprietor of a Magazine in due proportion. Is it not high time that the Celebrities themselves have a slice or two out of the cake? If they consent to sit as models to the interviewer and photographer, let them price their own time. The Baron offers a model of correspondence on both sides, and, if his example is followed, up goes the price of "Celebrities," and, consequently, of interviewed and interviewers, there will be only a survival of the fittest.

From A. Sophte Soper to the Baron de Book-Worms.

SIR,—Messrs. TOWER, FONDLER, TROTTING & Co., are now engaged in bringing out a series of the leading Literary, Dramatic and Artistic Notabilities of the present day, and feeling that the work which has now reached its hundred-and-second number, would indeed be incomplete did it not include your name, the above-mentioned firm has commissioned me to request you to accord me an interview as soon as possible. I propose bringing with me an eminent photographer, and also an artist who will make a sketch of your surroundings, and so contribute towards producing a complete picture which cannot fail to interest and delight the thousands at home and abroad, to whom your name is as a household word, and who will be delighted to possess a portrait of one whose works have given them so much pleasure, and to obtain a closer and more intimate acquaintance with the modus operandi pursued by one of their most favourite authors.

I remain, Sir, yours truly,

A. SOPHTE SOPER.

To the BARON DE BOOK-WORMS, Vermoulen Lodge.

From the Baron de Book-Worms to A. Sophte Soper, Esq.

DEAB SIR,—Thanks. I quite appreciate your appreciation. My terms for an article in a Magazine, are twenty guineas the first hour, ten guineas the second, and so on. For dinner-table anecdotes, the property in which once made public is lost for ever to the originator, special terms. As to photographs, I will sign every copy, and take twopence on every copy. I'm a little pressed for time now, so if you can manage it, we will defer the visit for a week or two, and then I'm your man.

Yours truly,

BARON DE BOOK-WORMS.

Mr. A. Sophte Soper to the Baron de Book-Worms.

MY DEAR BARON,—I'm afraid I didn't quite make myself understood. I did not ask you to write the article, being commissioned by the firm to do it myself. The photographs will not be sold apart from the Magazine. Awaiting your favourable response,—

I am, Sir, Yours,

A. SOPHTE SOPER.

From the Baron to A. Sophte Soper.

DEAR SIR,—I quite understood. With the generous view of doing me a good turn by giving me the almost inestimable advantage of advertising myself in Messrs. TOWERS & Co.'s widely-circulated Magazine, you propose to interview me, and receive from me such orally given information as you may require concerning my life, history, work, and everything about myself which, in your opinion, would interest the readers of this Magazine. I quite appreciate all this. You propose to write the article, and I'm to find you the materials for it. Good. I don't venture to put any price on the admirable work which your talent will produce,—that's for you and your publishers to settle between you, and, as a matter of fact, it has been already settled, as you are in their employ. But I can put a price on my own, and I do. I collaborate with you in furnishing all the materials of which you are in need. Soit. For the use of my Pegasus, no matter what its breed, and, as it isn't a gift-horse, but a hired one, you can examine its mouth and legs critically whenever you are going to mount and guide it at your own sweet will, I charge twenty guineas for the first hour, and ten for the second. It may be dear, or it may be cheap. That's not my affair. C'est à laisser ou à prendre.

The Magazine in which the article is to appear is not given away with a pound of tea, or anything of that sort I presume, so that your strictly honourable and business-like firm of employers, and you also, Sir, in the regular course of your relations with them, intend making something out of me, more or less, but something, while I get nothing at all for my time, which is decidedly as valuable to me as, I presume, is yours to you. What have your publishers ever done for me that I should give them my work for nothing? Time is money; why should I make Messrs. TOWER, FONDLER & Co. a present of twenty pounds, or, for the matter of that, even ten shillings? If I misapprehend the situation, and you are doing your work gratis and for the love of the thing, then that is your affair, not mine: I'm glad to hear it, and regret my inability to join you in the luxury of giving away what it is an imperative necessity of my existence to sell at the best price I can. Do you honestly imagine, Sir, that my literary position will be one farthing's-worth improved by a memoir and a portrait of me appearing in your widely-circulated journal? If you do, I don't; and I prefer to be paid for my work, whether I dictate the material to a scribe, who is to serve it up in his own fashion, or whether I write it myself. And now I come to consider it, I should be inclined to make an additional charge for not writing it myself, Not to take you and your worthy firm of employers by surprise, I will make out beforehand a supposititious bill, and then Messrs. TOWER & Co. can close with my offer or not, as they please.

£.s.d.
To preparing (in special costume) to receive Interviewer, for putting aside letters, refusing to see tradesmen, &c.300
To receiving Interviewer, Photographer, and Artist, and talking about nothing in particular for ten minutes.500
To cigars and light refreshments all round106
To giving an account of my life and works generally (this being the article itself)2000
To showing photographs, books, pictures, playbills, and various curios in my collection500
To being photographed in several attitudes in the back garden three times, and incurring the danger of catching a severe cold300
(***On the condition that I should sign all photos sold inspect books, and receive 10 per cent. of gross receipts.)
To allowing black-and-white Artist to make a sketch of my study, also of myself000
(***On the condition that only this one picture is to be done, and that if sold separately, I must receive 10 per cent. of such sale.)
Luncheon, with champagne for the lot, at 15s. per head250
Cigars and liqueurs0100
For time occupied at luncheon in giving further details of my life and history1000
Total£4956

The refreshments are entirely optional, and therefore can be struck out beforehand.

Pray show the above to the eminent firm which has the advantage of your zealous services, and believe me to remain

Your most sincerely obliged

BARON DE BOOK-WORMS.

To the above a reply may be expected, and, if received, it will probably be in a different tone from Mr. SOPHTE SOPER's previous communications. No matter. There's an end of it. The Baron's advice to all "Celebrities," when asked to permit themselves to be interviewed, is, in the language of the poet,—

"Charge, Chester, charge!"

then they will have benefited other Celebrities all round, and the result will be that either only those authors will be interviewed who are worth the price of interviewing, or the professional biographical compilers will have to hunt up nobodies, dress up jays as peacocks, and so bring the legitimate business of "Interviewing" into well-deserved contempt.

Two Men in a Boat. By Messrs. DILLON and O'BRIEN.