It is a common question of my correspondents, "Are your novels ever founded on fact?" Sometimes; not often. This one is.

A year ago I had an attack of neurasthenia, as did "Donald Camran." I did not die, nor go to an insane asylum, both of which items of "news" appeared in the daily papers from one end of the country to the other; but I wasn't exactly well for awhile. In January of this year I made my second trip to the Caribbean Islands and wrote this novel among the scenes I have described.

Before going I advertised in the New York Herald "Personal" column for a typewriter to accompany me as private secretary. I received more than a hundred letters from women who desired the situation and interviewed quite a number of them. I decided, however, to go alone. (If the reader doesn't believe me I refer him to the passenger lists of the "Madiana" and "Pretoria.") The basis of this story, however, grew out of the advertisement and answers.

"Marjorie" and "Statia" have a genuine existence, and so have many of the other characters in this tale. I have used real people as an artist does his models, taking a little from one, a little from another, and a great deal from the vivid imagination with which nature has endowed me. I hope the result will be satisfactory to my friends, who have waited double the usual time for this novel.

My health seems wholly recovered and unless something unforeseen occurs my stories will continue to appear each July and January, as they have for the past ten years. This is the nineteenth volume of the "Albatross Series." I again send a too indulgent public my warmest thanks for their appreciation.

Very Truly,

ALBERT ROSS.

Cambridge, Mass., May, 1898.

A NEW SENSATION.