terfamilias,
'at least you owe it to him' (as if I, and not Nature herself, had made
the lad dissatisfied with his high stool in a solicitor's office!) 'to
give him some practical hints by which he may become a successful writer
of fiction.'

One would really think that this individual imagined story-telling to be
a sort of sleight-of-hand trick, and that all that is necessary to the
attainment of the art is to learn 'how it's done.' I should not like to
say that I have known any members of my own profession who are 'no
conjurors,' but it is certainly not by conjuring that they have
succeeded in it.

'You talk of the art of composition,' writes, on the other hand, another
angry correspondent, 'as though it were one of the exact sciences; you
might just as well advise your "clever Jack" to study the art of playing
the violin.' So that one portion of the public appears to consider the
calling of literature mechanical, while another holds it to be a soft of
divine instinct!

Since the interest in this subject proves to be so wide-spread, I trust
it will not be thought presumptuous in me to offer my own humble
experience in this matter for what it is worth. To the public at large a
card of admission to my poor manufactory of fiction--a 'very one-horse
affair,' as an American gentleman, with whom I had a little difficulty
concerning copyright, once described it--may not afford the same
satisfaction as a ticket for the private view of the Royal Academy; but
the stings of conscience urge me to make to Paterfamilias what amends in
the way of 'practical hints' lie in my power, for the wrong I have done
to his offspring; and I therefore venture to address to those whom it
may concern, and to those only, a few words on the Art of Story-telling.

The chief essential for this line of business, yet one that is much
disregarded by many young writers, is the having a story to tell. It is
a common supposition that the story will come if you only sit down with
a pen in your hand and wait long enough--a parallel case to that which
assigns one cow's tail as the measure of distance between this planet
and the moon. It is no use 'throwing off' a few brilliant ideas at the
commencement, if they are only to be 'passages that lead to nothing;'
you must have distinctly in your mind at first what you intend to say at
last. 'Let it be granted,' says a great writer (though not one
distinguished in fiction), 'that a straight line be drawn from a