ased if you tell him that in the pages of "The Literary Shop" he did
the best work of his life. At another corner, between the two already
mentioned, the early riser of a few years ago might have seen the
literary pride of Indiana assuming the duties of the traffic policeman
who had not yet reached his post, and with the aid of a whistle joyously
acquired ordering east and west-bound vehicles to proceed and north and
south-bound vehicles to halt.

If you know your Avenue well enough, the countenances of nearly all of
the "Best-Selling" kings are easy of recognition. Arriving at the
Thirties, Robert W. Chambers is likely to turn off, bound for one of the
antique shops that are to be found in the parallel thoroughfare two
blocks to the east. At any point on the Avenue between the Washington
Arch and the Plaza you may stumble upon the cane-swinging discoverer of
the principality of Graustark, and the cane-swinging inventor of the
"Tennessee Shad," appraising together the new styles in women's hats, or
investigating the display in a shop-window. What is the subject that
they are so earnestly discussing? The Influence of Rabelais on the
Monastic System of the Fifteenth Century? The obscurity of Robert
Browning? Whether or not the art of the novel is a finer art than it was
in the days of the Victorians? Not at all. The point in dispute is the
figure of Delehanty's batting average in 1867. The vital importance of
the matter is the reason of their obvious excitement.

Of more serious aspect is Mr. James Lane Allen, whose tales of the
Kentucky Blue Grass Region I hope will be read as they deserve for many
generations to come. Rex Beach swings along musing perhaps on the
solitudes of Lake Hopatcong. Rupert Hughes studies the faces in the
Avenue throng with the hope of finding the inspiration for a title for
the projected novel that will be more eccentric, if possible, than the
title of the last. Jesse Lynch Williams and Arthur Train seek rest after
their perambulatory efforts in the luxurious seclusion of the University
Club at Fifth Avenue and Fifty-fourth Street--the "Morgue" of the
flippant--where, from the windows, the former first saw My Lost Duchess,
and the latter discovered the possibilities of McAllister. A few years
ago in one of the business buildings that had broken into the
residential stretch below Fourteenth Street, was the office that F.
Marion Crawford always maintained for use during the occasional visits
he m