CHAPTER I

Readers are requested to note that this novel has taken
our special prize of a cheque for a thousand guineas.
This alone guarantees for all intelligent readers a
palpitating interest in every line of it. Among the
thousands of MSS. which reached us--many of them coming
in carts early in the morning, and moving in a dense
phalanx, indistinguishable from the Covent Garden Market
waggons; others pouring down our coal-chute during the
working hours of the day; and others again being slipped
surreptitiously into our letter-box by pale, timid girls,
scarcely more than children, after nightfall (in fact
many of them came in their night-gowns),--this manuscript
alone was the sole one--in fact the only one--to receive
the prize of a cheque of a thousand guineas. To other
competitors we may have given, inadvertently perhaps, a
bag of sovereigns or a string of pearls, but to this
story alone is awarded the first prize by the unanimous
decision of our judges.

When we say that the latter body included two members of
the Cabinet, two Lords of the Admiralty, and two bishops,
with power in case of dispute to send all the MSS. to
the Czar of Russia, our readers will breathe a sigh of
relief to learn that the decision was instant and unanimous.
Each one of them, in reply to our telegram, answered
immediately SPOOF.