unreadable in a new sense. I
don't know how many years it is since I was informed that Villiers de
l'Isle-Adam's "L'Eve Future" was a really fine novel. I bought it, and I
was so upset, in my narrow youthfulness, to find that the author had made
a hero of Thomas Alva Edison, and called him by his name, that I could not
accomplish more than two chapters. Later I was again informed that "L'Eve
Future" was a really fine novel, and I had another brief tussle with it,
and was vanquished by its dullness. I received a third warning, and
started yet again, and disliked the book rather less, and then I
completely lost it in a removal. After months or years it mysteriously
turned up, like a fox-terrier who has run off on an errand of his own. But
I did not resume it. And then after another long interval the idea that I
absolutely must read "L'Eve Future" gathered force in my mind, and I
decided that the next time I went away for a week-end I would take it with
me. This was in France. I took it away with me. I read a hundred pages on
the outward journey and I got on terms with "L'Eve Future." _"Ce livre
m'attendait,"_ as a certain French novelist said when he read "Tom Jones."
On the return journey I was deep buried in "L'Eve Future," when a fearful
jolting suddenly began to rock the saloon carriage in which I was. The
jolting grew worse, very much worse. Women screamed. I saw my stick fly
out of the rack above my head across the carriage. The door leading to the
corridor jumped off its hinges. Then shattered glass fell in showers, and
I saw an old lady beneath an arm-chair and a table. The shape of the
carriage altered. And then, after an enormous crash, equilibrium was
established amid the cries of human anguish. I had clung to the arms of my
seat and was unhurt, but there were four wounded in the carriage. My
eye-glasses were still sticking on my nose. Saying to myself that I must
keep calm, I put them carefully away, and began to help to get people out
of the wreck. It was not until I looked about for my belongings that I saw
that the corner of a tender had poked itself into our carriage. Outside, a
mail-van and two enormous coaches were lying very impressively on their
sides, and two wounded girls were lying on the grass by the track, and
people were shouting for doctors. I ultimately got away with my bag and
stick and hat, and walked to the nearest station, where a porter naturally
asked me for my ticket. I hired an auto and re