Show competition WITH THE DE DEAD A 0 crushing handicap imposed on lod ern men of letters in speaking at a t the r dinner in london of the royal literary fund rudyard kipling said it if ola oa go no farther back than the book of job you will find that letters lite like the nit ait of printing were bern perfect some professions law and medicine for example aie still in a state of evolution inasmuch as no expert in tham seems to be quite sure that lie he can win a case or cure a cold on the other hand the calling of letters carries with it the disabilities from which theme theae are diee when an enil eminent anent lawyer or physician 1 li once dad d ad lie he la Is always dead ilia his ghost dopa does not continue to practice in the law las courts or the operating theater now it cannot have escaped your attention that a writer often does riot not begin to live lire till he has ben been dead for some time lu in certain notorious cases cages the longer lie he has been dead the more alive he Is ie and the more acute la Is his competition against the living 1 I do not F sk you to imagine the feelings of a banister i exposed to the competition of all the dead lord chan that vr ever sat rt on the woolsack each delivering dell verine judgments on any conceivable cei vable case at six alx pence per judg ment paper bound I 1 only ask ak you to allow that what lawyers call the tha dead hand han in this case cae with appen apen in it lies heavy on the calling of letters |