experimenting
to see how much of his story he may leave out. One of the foremost among
the living writers of _contes_ is M. Edmond About, whose exquisite humor
is known to all readers of "The Man with the Broken Ear,"--a Short-story
in conception, though unduly extended in execution. Few of the charming
_contes_ of M. Alphonse Daudet, or of the earlier Short-stories of M.
Emile Zola, have been translated into English; and the poetic tales of
M. Francois Coppee are likewise neglected in this country. "The Abbe
Constantin" of M. Ludovic Halevy has been read by many, but the Gallic
satire of his more Parisian Short-stories has been neglected, perhaps
wisely, in spite of their broad humor and their sharp wit. In the
_contes_ of M. Guy de Maupassant there is a manly vigor, pushed at times
to excess; and in the very singular collection of stories which M. Jean
Richepin has called the "Morts Bizarres" we find a modern continuation
of the Poe tradition, always more potent in France than elsewhere. I
have given this list of French writers of Short-stories merely as
evidence that the art flourishes in France as well as in the United
States, and not at all with the view of recommending the fair readers of
this essaylet to send at once for the works of these French writers,
which are not always--indeed, one may say not often--in exact accordance
with the conventionalities of Anglo-Saxon propriety. The Short-story
should not be void or without form, but its form may be whatever the
author please. He has an absolute liberty of choice. It may be a
personal narrative, like Poe's "Descent into the Maelstrom" or Hale's
"My Double, and How he Undid me;" it may be impersonal, like Mr. F.B.
Perkins's "Devil-Puzzlers" or Colonel De Forest's "Brigade Commander;"
it may be a conundrum, like Mr. Stockton's insoluble query, "The Lady or
the Tiger?" it may be "A Bundle of Letters," like Mr. James's story, or
"A Letter and a Paragraph," like Mr. Bunner's; it may be a medley of
letters and telegrams and narrative, like Mr. Aldrich's "Margery Daw;"
it may be cast in any one of these forms, or in a combination of all of
them, or in a wholly new form, if haply such may yet be found by
diligent search. Whatever its form, it should have symmetry of design.
If it have also wit or humor, pathos or poetry, and especially a
distinct and unmistakable flavor of originality, so much the better. But
the chief requisites are compression, originality, ingenuity, a