Walking-Stick Papers

AS A CAT MAY LOOK AT A KING - SO I DEDICATE THIS LITTLE DOINGS TO - THREE FINE MEN: - W. C. BROWNELL - HILAIRE BELLOC - ROYAL CORTISSOZ - BECAUSE THEY REPRESENT TO MY MIND - THE BEST THINGS GOING: - THE PURE MILK OF THE WORD - FOREWORD

WALKING-STICK PAPERS - PROLOGUE - ON CARRYING A CANE

I. THE FISH REPORTER

II. ON GOING A JOURNEY

III. GOING TO ART EXHIBITIONS

IV. A ROUNDABOUT PAPER

V. THAT REVIEWER "CUSS"

Book reviews are in nearly all the papers. Proprietors of newspapers don't read these things: they think they are deadly stuff. Many authors don't: because they regard them as ill-natured and exceedingly stupid. Book clerks don't read them much: for that would be like working overtime. Business men infrequently have time for such nonsense. University professors are inclined to pooh-pooh them as things beneath them. Still somebody must read them, as publishers pay for them with their advertising. No publishers' advertising, no book reviews, is the policy of nearly every newspaper; and the reviews are generally in proportion to the amount of advertising. Now publishers are sagacious men who generally live in comfortable circumstances, and who occasionally get quite rich and mingle in important society. They set considerable store by reviews; they employ publicity men at good wages who continually supply reviewers with valuable information by post and telephone; they are fond of quoting in large type remarks from reviews which please them; and sometimes, at reviews they don't like, they stir up a fuss and have literary editors removed from office.

VI. LITERARY LEVITIES IN LONDOW

VII. HENRY JAMES, HIMSELF