and the Strawberry-mine." This story did not come as easily as the
other. In fact, Partington found it impossible to write more than a
third of the second tale that night. He couldn't bring his mind down to
it exactly, probably because his mind had been soaring so high since the
publication of his first effusion. For diversion as much as for anything
else during a lull in his flow of language he penned a short letter to
the editor of _Nursery Days_, and announced his intention to send the
story of "Jimmie and the Strawberry-mine" to him shortly--which was
unfortunate. If he had finished the story first and then sent it, it
might have been good enough to convince the editor against his judgment
that he ought to have it. A concrete story can often accomplish more
than an abstract idea. In this event it could not have accomplished
less, anyhow, for the editor promptly replied that he did not care for a
second story of that nature. There was no particular evidence in hand,
he said, that the children liked stories of that kind particularly,
adding that the first was only an experiment that it was not necessary
to repeat, and so on; polite, but unmistakably valedictory.

"No evidence in hand that they are liked, eh? Well, how on earth, I
wonder," Partington said, angrily, to himself, "do they ever find
evidence that things are liked? Do they go about asking subscribers, or
what?"

And then he picked up the issue of _Nursery Days_ that had started him
along on his way to immortality, to console himself, at all events, with
the sight of his published story. In turning over the leaves of the
periodical his eye fell upon a page across the top of which ran a highly
ornate cut which indicated that there was printed the "Post-office
Department of _Nursery Days_," on perusing which Partington found a
number of communications and editorial responses like these: