tween
a novice's aspiration and his attainment, and I do not contend that
Angela as she appears in 'Dawn' fulfils this ideal; also, such a person
in real life might, and probably would, be a bore--

Something too bright and good
For human nature's daily food.

[Illustration: MR. RIDER HAGGARD'S STUDY]

Still, this was the end I aimed at. Indeed, before I had done with her,
I became so deeply attached to my heroine that, in a literary sense, I
have never quite got over it. I worked very hard at this novel during
the next six months or so, but at length it was finished and despatched
to Mr. Truebner, who, as his firm did not deal in this class of book,
submitted it to five or six of the best publishers of fiction. One and
all they declined it, so that by degrees it became clear to me that I
might as well have saved my labour. Mr. Truebner, however, had confidence
in my work, and submitted the manuscript to Mr. John Cordy Jeaffreson
for report; and here I may pause to say that I think there is more
kindness in the hearts of literary men than is common in the world. It
is not a pleasant task, in the face of repeated failure, again and again
to attempt the adventure of persuading brother publishers to undertake
the maiden effort of an unknown man. Still less pleasant is it, as I can
vouch from experience, to wade through a lengthy and not particularly
legible manuscript, and write an elaborate opinion thereon for the
benefit of a stranger. Yet Mr. Truebner and Mr. Jeaffreson did these
things for me without fee or reward. Mr. Jeaffreson's report I have lost
or mislaid, but I remember its purport well. It was to the effect that
there was a great deal of power in the novel, but that it required to be
entirely rewritten. The first part he thought so good that he advised me
to expand it, and the unhappy ending he could not agree with. If I
killed the heroine, it would kill the book, he said. He may have been
right, but I still hold to my first conception, according to which
Angela was doomed to an early and pathetic end, as the fittest crown to
her career. That the story needed rewriting there is no doubt, but I
believe that it would have been better as a work of art if I had dealt
with it on the old lines, especially as the expansion of the beginning,
in accordance with the advice of my kindly critic, took the tale back
through the history of another generation--always a most dangerous
experiment. Still, I did as I wa