EDITOR'S WALLET.

Otago Witness, Issue 2240, 4 February 1897, Page 53

EDITOR'S WALLET.

Kouud to Succeed.

He was a man of undoubted talent, but Fame i had hitherto passed him over. There was a look [ of triumph, however, on his face as he explained | how he bad solved the problem of honr to sell his manuscripts. " I've simply formed a partnership that is of advantage to both me and my partner," he said. " You see, my stories and articles were always all right, but no one knew me and no editor or publisher wanted anything by a man who wasn't known. Consequently I set out to find a man who wm known. I fiuaily ran down an ex-con-vict who was notorious from ono end of the country to the other. "Of conrte he couldn't write, but the publishers and magazine editors didn't know that, and I gave him a percentage of what I got for the use of his name. I jnst put that on some of my old stories that I had been trying to sell for the l*st five years, aud disposed of them inside of 30 day*. "Then I got hold of a woman who had juet had heavy damages in a breach of promise case, put her name on a couple of essays, and sold them for about twice what I had ever expected to get for them. Jasfc now lam using the name of a man who has become notorious through his connection with a well-known slander case. He eoaFdn^t write a grammatical sentence, but the magazines are ready to pay high for his views on the political system of France, and I am giving them an old college essay of mine with his name on it. " Next week I expect to sell a book of poems to a publishing house. I'm conducting thenegotiations, but I'm posing ss the private secretary of a man who couldn't maka a rhyme in seven v.sars, bat bis sister m&rried a wealthy iiobleruan, and he got himself talked about in a notorious card scandal. Betides, he had a famous father, which makes the outlook doubly promising "