g it by study and
severe discipline, by training for it as for a trade, but simply to toss
it off easily, as one makes a call, or pays a compliment, or drives
four-in-hand. One does not need to have that interior impulse which
drives a poor devil of an author to express himself, that something to
say which torments the poet into extreme irritability unless he can be
rid of it, that noble hunger for fame which comes from a consciousness of
the possession of vital thought and emotion.

The beauty of this condescension to literature of which we speak is that
it has that quality of spontaneity that does not presuppose either a
capacity or a call. There is no mystery about the craft. One resolves to
write a book, as he might to take a journey or to practice on the piano,
and the thing is done. Everybody can write, at least everybody does
write. It is a wonderful time for literature. The Queen of England writes
for it, the Queen of Roumania writes for it, the Shah of Persia writes
for it, Lady Brassey, the yachtswoman, wrote for it, Congressmen write
for it, peers write for it. The novel is the common recreation of ladies
of rank, and where is the young woman in this country who has not tried
her hand at a romance or made a cast at a popular magazine? The effect of
all this upon literature is expansive and joyous. Superstition about any
mystery in the art has nearly disappeared. It is a common observation
that if persons fail in everything else, if they are fit for nothing
else, they can at least write. It is such an easy occupation, and the
remuneration is in such disproportion to the expenditure! Isn't it indeed
the golden era of letters? If only the letters were gold!

If there is any such thing remaining as a guild of authors, somewhere on
the back seats, witnessing this marvelous Kingdom Come of Literature,
there must also be a little bunch of actors, born for the stage, who see
with mixed feelings their arena taken possession of by fairer if not more
competent players. These players are not to be confounded with the
play-actors whom the Puritans denounced, nor with those trained to the
profession in the French capital.

In the United States and in England we are born to enter upon any
avocation, thank Heaven! without training for it. We have not in this
country any such obstacle to universal success as the Theatre Francais,
but Providence has given us, for wise purposes no doubt, Private
Theatricals (not always so pri