"They send poems (with stamps inclosed) to the magazines, and have them rejected. They make believe to despise the magazines, but secretly they would give worlds to see their names in print. Heaven knows, the magazines print rubbish enough. But they are sensible in rejecting Arthur Trevor's poems, which are something in this style—I quote from memory:—
"'The hot, fierce tiger-lily madly yearns
To kill with passionate poison the wild moth
That reels in drunken ecstasy above
Its gorgeous bosom....'
"Or in rejecting that bald-pated posing Corson's trash, which runs like this:—
"'Death is far better than the loathsome lot
Of kissing lips that soon must pale and rot,
Of clasping forms that soon must cease their breath
Within the black embrace of haughty death!'
"Or in declining to publish Mr. Leander Prawle's buncombe, which sounds somewhat after this fashion:
"'Man shall one day develop to a god,
Though now he walks unwinged, unaureoled....
To-day we moil and mope—to-morrow's dawn
Shall bring us pinions to outsoar the stars.'
"That's the sort of the thing this brave trio does. All poets are partially mad, of course. But then they are mad without being poets; it's this that makes their lunacy so tiresome."
"And are they always quarrelling when they meet?"
"Oh, they do it for effect. They are privately very good friends. They are all equally obscure; they've no cause, yet, to hate one another. If one of them should get a book published before either of the other two, they would probably both abominate him in good earnest."
Just then a tall, sallow gentleman, with small, gray eyes and a nose like the beak of a carnivorous bird, laid his hand on Kindelon's sleeve.