Show MEN OF LETTERS M Renan declines all offers to write for foreign periodicals A book of fairy tales by Andrew Lang will soon appear in London Browning is said to have an income of 3000 a year from his literary work Ruskin has presented to the Cork high scnool for girls a case of rare and costly minerals stones and gems including five uncut Brazilian diamonds Henry James in one of his stories tells us that a mother permitted her child to die of diphtheria rather than have him grow up and read his fathers books George Bancroft is engaged in writing a life of Martin Van Buren As Mr Bancroft was a friend and follower of Van Buren it may be assumed that the coming work will be friendly to that statesman George Ebeis tho rival of Rider Haggard Hag-gard in Egyptian romancing is 52 years old He is professor of Egyptology in the University of Leipsic and ho took to writing novels because a severe illness ill-ness incapacitated him for better work Father Barry tho author of the pro socialistic article in The Nineteenth Century Cen-tury which is exciting so much discussion dis-cussion is a graduate of Oxford and was until recently at least a Catholic curate in a small English parish Professor John A Paine who wroto an article on Pharaoh the Oppressor and His Daughter which attracted III wide attention when it appeared in Tho Century two years ago contributes to the September number of the same magazine mag-azine a fully illustrated paper on The Pharaoh of tho Exodus and His Son An anecdote about Dickens An old servant intrusted with of70 stole it and made up a story to account for its loss With the aid of a detective a confession was extracted Dickens discharged him and settled upon him an annuity of f60 in consideration of his previous good conduct and in fear that he might resort to some dishonest means for getting a livelihood James Payn tho popular English novelist nov-elist had twentysix articles rejected in one year by various periodicals Still he persevered feeling that he had something some-thing to tell if he only knew how to tell it and could get an editor to read it He did finally write something worth telling and made a successful hit and has since written thirtysix novels all more or less popular Alphonse Daudet had determined to remain bachelor because he was afraid should he make a wrong step in matrimony matri-mony he might dull imagination but meeting Mlle Julio Allard who was a charming writer as well as a lovely woman all his fears were removed His marriage has been a very happy one Hiswife has been the light of his hearth the regulator of his work and the discreet dis-creet counselor of his inspiration |