"All right, then; let's try advertising."
And saying this, I brought out my entire writing-apparatus and displayed it on the table.
"Will you try your fist at it, Jack?" I asked.
"I? nonsense! I'm no good at writing. It's as much as I can do to write an 'I. O. U.,' though I've had no end of practice. And then, as to my letters—you ought to see them! No, go ahead, old boy. You write, and I'll be critic. That's about the style of thing, I fancy."
At this I sat down and commenced the laborious task of composing an advertisement. In a short time I had written out the following:
"A gentleman who accompanied a lady across the ice on the 3d of April, was separated from her, and since then has been anxious to find out what became of her. Any information will console a distracted breast. The gentleman implores the lady to communicate with him. Address Box 3,333."
I wrote this out, and was so very well satisfied with it, that I read it to Jack. To my surprise end disgust, he burst out into roars of laughter.
"Why, man alive!" he cried, "that will never do. You must never put out that sort of thing, you know. You'll have the whole city in a state of frantic excitement. It's too rubbishy sentimental. No go. Try again, old man, but don't write any more of that sort of thing."
I said nothing. I felt wounded; but I had a dim idea that Jack's criticism was just. It was rather sentimental. So I tried again, and this time I wrote out something very different.
With the following result: