single one may hang that of a hundred
others just like it. But whatever be the standard fixed, it is equally
for the interest of all concerned that it be enforced without flinching.

Nor is there the slightest foundation for the supposed editorial
prejudice against new or obscure contributors. On the contrary, every
editor is always hungering and thirsting after novelties. To take the
lead in bringing forward a new genius is as fascinating a privilege as
that of the physician who boasted to Sir Henry Halford of having been
the first man to discover the Asiatic cholera and to communicate it to
the public. It is only stern necessity which compels the magazine to
fall back so constantly on the regular old staff of contributors, whose
average product has been gauged already; just as every country-lyceum
attempts annually to arrange an entirely new list of lecturers, and ends
with no bolder experiment than to substitute Chapin and Beecher in place
of last year's Beecher and Chapin.

Of course no editor is infallible, and the best magazine contains an
occasional poor article. Do not blame the unfortunate conductor. He
knows it as well as you do,--after the deed is done. The newspapers
kindly pass it over, still preparing their accustomed opiate of sweet
praises, so much for each contributor, so much for the magazine
collectively,--like a hostess with her tea-making, a spoonful for each
person and one for the pot. But I can tell you that there is an official
person who meditates and groans, meanwhile, in the night-watches, to
think that in some atrocious moment of good-nature or sleepiness he left
the door open and let that ungainly intruder in. Do you expect him to
acknowledge the blunder, when you tax him with it? Never,--he feels it
too keenly. He rather stands up stoutly for the surpassing merits of the
misshapen thing, as a mother for her deformed child; and as the mother
is nevertheless inwardly imploring that there may never be such another
born to her, so be sure that it is not by reminding the editor of this
calamity that you can allure him into risking a repetition of it.

An editor thus shows himself to be but human; and it is well enough to
remember this fact, when you approach him. He is not a gloomy despot,
no Nemesis or Rhadamanthus, but a bland and virtuous man, exceedingly
anxious to secure plenty of good subscribers and contributors, and very
ready to perform any acts of kindness not inconsistent with this