Things in this world are often the precise opposite of what we should expect. The shoemaker's wife and the blacksmith's horse frequently go poorly shod. The man who makes his sole living from the product of his brains does not use them in disposing of his wares. He remains the slave of publishers who have enriched themselves from his labor, while he thoughtlessly plods on, apparently content with a few crumbs from the feast which he has provided for them.

One striking difference between the two halves of the nineteenth century is the gigantic combination which the shuttle of these latter years is weaving. The wealth of no single man was found sufficient to place a railroad across the continent. Men combined their capital, and to-day we can ride from New York to San Francisco in a car as luxuriously furnished as a drawing-room. Had it not been for this union of dollars, we should to-day be forced to use the stage coach or to walk. When the railroads were once built, their owners found combination necessary to keep them from cutting each other's throats and to maintain a good rate of profit.

By combination the working man has reduced his hours of toil, obtained a fairer share of the profits coming to capital from his labor, and made his own life better worth the living. These concessions did not come voluntarily: combination wrung them from capital, and then stood guard over them.

The author stands almost alone with no union among his craft. The refiners of sugar and coal oil, the makers of matches, lead-pencils, screws,—in short, almost all other interests,—have some sort of combination. The brewers stand by each other in fixing the price of beer, and if a saloon keeper fails to pay one brewer, the others will not furnish him with the product of their vats.

There is plenty of freemasonry among publishers. Their contracts read very much alike. They resort to the same subterfuges to get the lion's share of the profits. They care nothing for the logic of the situation. What did a grasping palm ever care for logic which told against itself? An American author has just shown by indisputable figures that many of our publishers treat the writers of books as badly as the worst Hebrew sweating shops do their employees. An author in one instance worked for years upon a book which had every prospect of not being ephemeral. He signed a contract with a firm of publishers to receive a ten-percent. royalty only after the first thousand copies were sold. The work had much free advertising and sold well, as many booksellers testified. More than two years have elapsed since it appeared, and though clerks in book stores still say it sells well, the author has never received a cent for those weary years of labor. He knows there is an Indian lurking somewhere in the forest, but one author is not powerful enough to enter and dislodge the enemy.

It may do us good to know that the English Society of Authors protects writers from dishonest publishers; but why should not our authors form a union of their own and enjoy the same advantages? It has been shown that our literary men have been repeatedly imposed upon; that the publisher in many cases takes all the profits; that his accounts are not open to the verifiable inspection of authors; and that this is one of the few exceptions of the kind in all business, that one of two interested partners is alone allowed to audit the accounts.

Mr. Besant has shown that in England the perfectly honest publisher is a rare exception. Are Englishmen less honest than Americans? Or is it true that human nature is very much alike everywhere and easily warped to look at things only in the line of its own advantage, wherever that can be done without coming to the knowledge of the world?

There will, of course, be strong opposition on the part of publishers to the formation of any protective authors' association, which would insist that the writer know the exact facts in those cases in which he is to be a partner in the share of the profits from his own work. If only a few authors joined the movement, publishers would undoubtedly combine to boycott them; but here, as in England, safety will be found in numbers. There is not a railroad in the United States that dares select any special engineer and treat him unjustly. The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers is too strong to admit that for one week.

Some hysterical publisher may exclaim, "If you think we are rascals, you had better not deal with us." Ask him what he would think of the president and the cashier of a national bank if they said to the examiner, "You have come here to insult us by implying that we would steal the depositors' money. We resent such treatment; we are honest."

"Why, then, do you object to a careful inspection of your methods?" asks the examiner.

"Because it throws suspicion on us," is the reply.

"Are you aware that officials with reputations quite as good as yours are now embezzlers in foreign lands? I want to remove from you the temptation of making money in that way, so that nothing may rest heavily on your consciences in the great hereafter."

"Nevertheless, we object to an examination."

"Then I had better at once go over your accounts thoroughly. I shall probably be here several days."

History tells us that for a long time the English Parliament forbade any newspaper to publish a line of what was said there. A disobedient editor was speedily imprisoned. The members desired to receive bribes for their votes in as many cases as possible. If a member could keep his constituents in ignorance of the way he voted, he could often make money by voting in opposition to their interests. Of course, he dreaded to have the newspapers turn the light on his record, and he developed many remarkable arguments against such privileges on the part of the press. When more light streams in on certain publishers' methods, authors may then be able to select better men to represent them.

It has been said that the jealousy of authors is such as to keep them from working in harmony; that authors who have won their spurs have a supreme contempt for one who has not; that they omit no opportunity of indulging in sarcasm at his expense; that they would not throw him a plank if he were drowning, unless they could so throw it as to strike him on the head. If this were so, they would not differ much from the world in general, for it will not give quarter to any man who cannot claim it by his own might. But the case of Mr. Besant, the president of the English Society, disproves these sweeping statements against authors. He stands among the foremost of living novelists, and yet he is willing to spend a great deal of his valuable time to assist a writer just beginning to climb the tiresome ladder. This pure and undefiled religion of being willing to help a fellow-toiler is far more common than cynics will allow. It prevails among engineers, factory hands, and miners. With the exception of a few cads, it is doubtful if authors have sunk so low in the scale of humanity as to be unwilling to assist each other, when by so doing they will help themselves.

Some authors have been dreaming of a time when they could control the entire literary output of the United States in the same way that the Standard Oil Company controls kerosene, or the chief of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers directs his men. He can tie up any railroad with a snap of his finger if his men are not treated squarely. In such a literary dreamland an author might do one-third of his present work and get far more pay than now. Publishers and editors would not then have a superfluity of matter. They would then have to bow to the authors' trust before the desired material could be obtained.

It might be claimed that if writers would pool their issues, put their manuscripts into a common stock, allow the publisher to select from them at a good round figure, and after a certain lapse of time burn all the rejected ones,—there would be less work and more money for all authors. Of course, it would be necessary to have a committee to decide when an author wrote well enough to be admitted to the pool, and also to determine what greater portion of the common fund the authors of specially meritorious work should receive.

Such a scheme certainly does work with sugar, kerosene, starch, and numberless other articles; but it is more than doubtful if it would prevail in literature. Some authors would be too desirous of seeing themselves constantly before the public. They could not be prevailed upon to limit the output of their brain, and they would be conceited enough to demand that everything appear in print.

It is well to lay aside thoughts of such a Utopia until we have secured an authors' protective association of wide membership, with permanent headquarters, legal counsel, and agents to learn the publishing business and expose unfair methods.

Let writers remember that Greece, in spite of her Æschylus, Sophocles, Xenophon, Thucydides, Demosthenes, Plato, and Aristotle, perished because her independent states would not combine against a common foe.

John Braincraft.
Louisville, Ky.