the treacherous by-paths of that admirably policed
highway whereon the well-groomed and well-bitted Pegasi
of Vanderhoffen and Charteris (in his later manner)
trot stolidly and safely toward oblivion. And the
result of wandering afield is of necessity a tragedy,
in that the deviator's life, if not as an artist's
quite certainly as a human being's, must in the outcome
be adjudged a failure.
Hereinafter, then, you have an attempt to depict a
special temperament--one in essence "literary"--as very
variously molded by diverse eras and as responding in
proportion with its ability to the demands of a certain
hour.


II

And this much said, it is permissible to hope, at
least, that here and there some reader may be found not
wholly blind to this book's goal, whatever be his
opinion as to this book's success in reaching it. Yet
many honest souls there be among us average-novel-
readers in whose eyes this volume must rest content to
figure as a collection of short stories having naught
in common beyond the feature that each deals with the
affaires du coeur of a poet.
Such must always be the book's interpretation by
mental indolence. The fact is incontestable; and this
fact in itself may be taken as sufficient to establish
the inexpediency of publishing The Certain Hour. For