ay back, at the Albergo La Luna, in Venice, he met an elderly
Russian lady in whose company he spent most of his time there. She was
no doubt impressed by his versatility and charmed, as everyone always
was, by his conversation and original views on the many subjects that
interested him. We may be sure he told her all about himself and what he
had done and was intending to do. At the end of his stay, when he was
taking leave of her, she said:

"Et maintenant, Monsieur, vous allez creer," meaning, as he understood
her, that he had been looking long enough at the work of others and
should now do something of his own.

This sank into him and pained him. He was nearly thirty-five, and
hitherto all had been admiration, vague aspiration and despair; he had
produced in painting nothing but a few sketches and studies, and in
literature only a few ephemeral articles, a collection of youthful
letters and a pamphlet on the Resurrection; moreover, to none of his work
had anyone paid the slightest attention. This was a poor return for all
the money which had been spent upon his education, as Theobald would have
said in _The Way of All Flesh_. He returned home dejected, but resolved
that things should be different in the future. While in this frame of
mind he received a visit from one of his New Zealand friends, the late
Sir F. Napier Broome, afterwards Governor of Western Australia, who
incidentally suggested his rewriting his New Zealand articles. The idea
pleased him; it might not be creating, but at least it would be doing
something. So he set to work on Sundays and in the evenings, as
relaxation from his profession of painting, and, taking his New Zealand
article, "Darwin among the Machines," and another, "The World of the
Unborn," as a starting-point and helping himself with a few sentences
from _A First Year in Canterbury Settlement_, he gradually formed
_Erewhon_. He sent the MS. bit by bit, as it was written, to Miss Savage
for her criticism and approval. He had the usual difficulty about
finding a publisher. Chapman and Hall refused the book on the advice of
George Meredith, who was then their reader, and in the end he published
it at his own expense through Messrs. Trubner.

Mr. Sydney C. Cockerell told me that in 1912 Mr. Bertram Dobell, second-
hand bookseller of Charing Cross Road, offered a copy of _Erewhon_ for 1
pounds 10s.; it was thus described in his catalogue: "Unique copy with
the following note in