FOR COPY.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 9192, 23 March 1908, Page 2

FOR COPY.

WRITISRS' EXPEDIENTS. A story has been going the rounds that in' order to get copy first hand Mr Upton Sinclair, of " Jungle " fame, disguised himself as a butier, and entered the service of the Vanderbilts. The rumour has been emphatically denied by the author himself, but "if it had been true it would not be the first time that a writer has gone down to what Americans call bedrock for his knowledge of the subject around which he proposed to weave a story. A very pom-La-- writer of sea stories, Mr James B. Connollv, not long ago enlisted in the United States Navy with ! the object of getting realistic knowledge of every phase of the life of the American sailor. Mr Connollv took ' this step with the approval of Mr | Roosevelt. The President wished him to try to do for the American. Naw what Mr ELipling has done for ours. Mr Connolly was enlisted as a yeoman, j and although he was giver, the privilege I of a private cabin, had to do hia share of the work.' The amusing part of the business was that the men, when they, came to know, very much resented, the fact. They weren't going to be put into any " blooming " stories, they averred. So they laid their heads together and put poor Mr Connolly in "Coventry." And so, after a while, the disappointed novelist was forced to . take Iris discharge. • We have at least one British author who likes to get his experiences first hand. That is Mr Cutcliffe Hyne, who get caught out in rather amusing fashion. One day he had gone aboard an old tramp-steamer and made his way down into the engine room. The chief, a brawny Scotsman, seemed pleased at the tall stranger's thirst for knowledge, and Mr Hyne, pretending that he was a perfect innocent in all matters marine, asked a number of ridiculous questions. The other wag explaining matters as ho might have to a child, when suddenly a figure, clad in greasy overalls, emerged from a dark corner, and sriKipiujx swiftly drew a chalk.circle round tho visitor"** feet. ** Noo, M'Todd." he said, "ye don't £o from hero till ye've paid your footing!" It was tho second engineer who had recognised the writer of " Captain Kettle" and '* Kato Meredith." It is on record that Mr Hyne paid up. Mr Jack London, who has done everything from washing shirts in a steam laundry to digging gold froni the end of a Klondyke glacier, walked one day into the offices of his London publishers. They were very pleased to see him. ./ " You have just arrived, I suppose," said tho chief. " I've been in England eight weeks," was the unexpected reply.. "But where?". "In the East End," said Mr London. "This, is tho first call I have made." ' " So it was. r^- two months this young Amorican, rigged out in a cheap second-hand suit, nad been working and living in the worst part 6 of the slums. The result of this si-range and in many ways horrible exjverience was " The. People of the Abyss." Some years after Mr Crockett first began to write he found that he had not the necessary knowledge of boats and sea life for a noval which he had" in his mind. What must he do but hire three Orkney fishermen to take him over to Norway in an open boat ! And this, if you please, in the depth of winter. Mr Morley Roberts once turned tramp for copy. He nearly starved in Chicago on that occasion, and afterwards drew up a mock examination paper for th© benefit, as he said, of fat undergraduates. The first question was: " Describe from experience the sensations of hunger prolonged over three jclays?" And it went' on, "How far j can you walk without food? — (a) when 1 you are trying to reach a- given point; (b) when you are walking with an inj sane view "to getting .o some place unknown where a good job awaits you."