Here I pause, as I feel that I may have already gone too far. It is not for me to say how the document from which I have quoted, came into my possession. But before I satisfy the legitimate curiosity of the public further, I consider it my professional duty to consult the Bar Committee, the Council of the Incorporated Law Society, the President of the Probate, Divorce, and Admiralty Division of the High Court of Justice, and the Lord Chancellor, many of whom are unfortunately still absent, enjoying the Whitsuntide Vacation. I have the honour to be, dear Sir,
Your most obedient Servant,
(Signed) A. Briefless, Junior.
Pump-handle Court, June 2nd, 1890.
A NOVEL WITH A PURPOSE.
Dear Mr. Punch,
How a few hundred pounds may be easily and honestly earned is a problem which daily exercises the imaginations of thousands. I was fortunate enough to hit upon a plan which I now feel it to be my duty to make as widely known as possible for the benefit of those whose need is greater than mine; for, curiously enough, not only did my work bring me in that direct emolument, upon which I not unwarrantably reckoned, but an elderly lady of unstable views was so taken with the chaotic benevolence of my book, that she bequeathed to me a very handsome legacy indeed, and almost immediately enabled me to realise it. Thus does the absolutely unexpected serve as the handmaid of the perfectly unintended, and enterprise retires from the lodgings of struggle to the villa of repose. My plan briefly was to write a quasi-religious Novel with a Purpose. I knew nothing about religion, and had no literary experience, but the purpose I had, and that purpose was, to make enough money to spend six weeks at Herne Bay, a locality to which I am passionately addicted.
A brief sketch of my proceedings will be the best explanation and guide to others. I first bought a sixpenny scrap-album, a pot of paste, and a pair of strong scissors; and a shillingsworth of penny novelettes of various kinds and dates, and a shillingsworth of cheap manuscript-paper completed my outlay. I then took the goods home and got to work. Glancing through the pile of novelettes, I soon found an opening that struck me as most suitable, cut it out, and pasted it in the scrap-book. Now came the chief literary exercise of my task. I had to go carefully through the passage, changing the names of the places and people, and making a few necessary substitutions, e.g., "The cuckoo was calling, and the dove cooing from the neighbouring woodland," would stand in my version "The cuckoo was cuckooing, and the dove calling from the adjacent thicket," while a sky described as "azure" in the original, would figure as "lapis lazuli," or, even blue.