glimpse I had of him,
and the dawn of his subsequent triumphs. For four years he supplied the
evening edition and The Sunday World with a comic feature, to say nothing
of a comic opera, written to order in five days. The absence of a
guillotine in New York State accounts for his escape for this latter
offence. Nevertheless, in all else his standard of excellence ascended. He
reported the Thaw trial in long-hand, writing nearly 600,000 words of
testimony and observation, establishing a new style for reporting trials,
and gave further evidence of his power. That performance will stand out in
the annals of American journalism as one of the really big reportorial
achievements.

"At about this juncture in his career Cobb opened a door to the past,
reached in and took out some of the recollections of his youth. These he
converted into 'The Escape of Mr. Trimm,' his first short fiction story.
It appeared in The Saturday Evening Post. The court scene was so
absolutely true to life, so minutely perfect in its atmosphere, that a
Supreme Court judge signed an unsolicited and voluntary note for
publication, in which he said that Mr. Cobb had reported with marvelous
accuracy and fulness a murder trial at which His Honour had presided.

"Gelett Burgess, in a lecture at Columbia College, said that Cobb was one
of the ten great American humourists. Cobb ought to demand a recount.
There are not ten humourists in the world, although Cobb is one of them.
The extraordinary thing about Cobb is that he can turn a burst of laughter
into a funeral oration, a snicker into a shudder and a smile into a crime.
He writes in octaves, striking instinctively all the chords of humour,
tragedy, pathos and romance with either hand. Observe this man in his
thirty-ninth year, possessing gifts the limitations of which even he
himself has not yet recognised.

"In appraising a genius, we must consider the man's highest achievement,
and in comparing him with others the verdict must be reached only upon
consideration of his best work. For scintillant wit and unflagging good
humour, read his essays on the Teeth, the Hair and the Stomach. If you
desire a perfect blending of all that is essential to a short story, read
'The Escape of Mr. Trimm' or 'Words and Music.' If you are in search of
pure, unadulterated, boundless terror, the gruesome quality, the blackness
of despair and the fear of death in the human conscience, 'Fishhead,' 'The
Belled Buzzard' or 'An O