matically-minded Poe. Washington Irving's brief tales, such as
"Rip Van Winkle" and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow," which are not
short-stories in the technical sense of the term, are far more
valuable as representations of humanity than many a structural
masterpiece of Guy de Maupassant. "For my part," Irving wrote to one
of his friends, "I consider a story merely as a frame on which to
stretch the materials; it is the play of thought, and sentiment,
and language, the weaving in of characters, lightly yet expressively
delineated; the familiar and faithful exhibition of scenes in common
life; and the half-concealed vein of humor that is often playing
through the whole,--these are among what I aim at, and upon which I
felicitate myself in proportion as I think I succeed." There is much
to be said in favor of this meandering and leisurely method; and
authors too intent upon a merely technical accomplishment may lose
the genial breadth of outlook upon life which men like Irving have
so charmingly displayed. Let us admit, therefore, that the
story-which-is-merely-short is just as worthy of cultivation as the
technical short-story.

[Footnote 6: The second story of the second day, and the sixth story
of the ninth day. See "American Short Stories," p. 28.]

But if there exist many brief tales which are not short-stories, so
also there exist certain short-stories which are not brief. Mr. Henry
James' "The Turn of the Screw" is a short-story, in the technical
sense of the term, although it contains between two and three hundred
pages. Assuredly it is not a novelette. It aims to produce one
narrative effect, and only one; and it is difficult to imagine how
the full force of its cumulative mystery and terror could have been
created with greater economy of means. It is a long short-story.
Stevenson's "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," which is conceived, and for the
most part executed, as a short-story, is longer than the same author's
"The Beach of Falesa," which is conceived and executed as a novelette.
Dr. Edward Everett Hale's famous short-story, "The Man Without a
Country," is long enough to be printed in a little volume by itself.
The point to be remembered, therefore, is that the two different types
of brief fiction are to be distinguished one from the other not by
comparative length but by structural method. The critic may formulate
the technical laws of the stricter type; but it must not be forgotten
that these laws do not apply