“Like Christ?” I interposed with a half smile. He looked shocked,—he was a Non-conformist,—but remembering in time how rich I was, he bowed with a meek patience.

“Yes”—and he sighed—“as you suggest, Mr Tempest, like Christ. Mocked and derided and opposed at every turn,—and yet by the queerest caprice of destiny, they succeed in winning a world-wide fame and power——”

[p 100]
“Like Christ again!” I said mischievously, for I loved to jar his non-conformist conscience.

“Exactly!” He paused, looking piously down. Then with a return of secular animation he added—“But I was not thinking of the Great Example just then, Mr Tempest—I was thinking of a woman.”

“Indeed!” I said indifferently.

“Yes—a woman, who despite continued abuse and opposition is rapidly becoming celebrated. You are sure to hear of her in literary and social circles”—and he gave me a furtive glance of doubtful inquiry—“but she is not rich, you know,—only famous. However,—we have nothing to do with her just now—so let us return to business. The one uncertain point in the matter of your book’s success is the attitude of the critics. There are only six leading men who do the reviews, and between them they cover all the English magazines and some of the American too, as well as the London papers. Here are their names”—and he handed me a pencilled memorandum,—“and their addresses, as far as I can ascertain them, or the addresses of the papers for which they most frequently write. The man at the head of the list, David McWhing, is the most formidable of the lot. He writes everywhere about everything,—being a Scotchman he’s bound to have his finger in every pie. If you can secure McWhing, you need not trouble so much about the others, as he generally gives the ‘lead,’ and has his own way with the editors. He is one of the ‘personal friends’ of the editor of the Nineteenth Century for example, and you would be sure to get a notice there, which would otherwise be impossible. No reviewer can review anything for that magazine unless he is one of the editor’s friends.[2] You must manage McWhing, or he might, just for the sake of ‘showing off,’ cut you up rather roughly.”

“That would not matter,” I said, diverted at the idea of ‘managing McWhing,’—“A little slating always helps a book to sell.”

[p 101]
“In some cases it does,”—and Morgeson stroked his thin beard perplexedly—“But in others it most emphatically does not. Where there is any very decided or daring originality, adverse criticism is always the most effective. But a work like yours requires fostering with favour,—wants ‘booming’ in short——”

“I see!” and I felt distinctly annoyed—“You don’t think my book original enough to stand alone?”

“My dear sir!—you are really—really—! what shall I say?” and he smiled apologetically—“a little brusque? I think your book shows admirable scholarship and delicacy of thought,—if I find fault with it at all, it is perhaps because I am dense. The only thing it lacks in my opinion is what I should call tenaciousness, for want of a better expression,—the quality of holding the reader’s fancy fixed like a nail. But after all this is a common failing of modern literature; few authors feel sufficiently themselves to make others feel.”