half-profits system, but it is very common in England, where,
owing probably to the moisture in the air, which lends a fairy
outline to every prospect, it seems to be peculiarly alluring.
One of my own early books was published there on these terms,
which I accepted with the insensate joy of the young author in
getting any terms from a publisher. The book sold, sold every
copy of the small first edition, and in due time the publisher's
statement came. I did not think my half of the profits was very
great, but it seemed a fair division after every imaginable cost
had been charged up against my poor book, and that frail venture
had been made to pay the expenses of composition, corrections,
paper, printing, binding, advertising, and editorial copies. The
wonder ought to have been that there was anything at all coming
to me, but I was young and greedy then, and I really thought
there ought to have been more. I was disappointed, but I made
the best of it, of course, and took the account to the junior
partner of the house which employed me, and said that I should
like to draw on him for the sum due me from the London
publishers. He said, Certainly; but after a glance at the
account he smiled and said he supposed I knew how much the sum
was? I answered, Yes; it was eleven pounds nine shillings, was
not it? But I owned at the same time that I never was good at
figures, and that I found English money peculiarly baffling. He
laughed now, and said, It was eleven shillings and nine pence.
In fact, after all those charges for composition, corrections,
paper, printing, binding, advertising, and editorial copies,
there was a most ingenious and wholly surprising charge of ten
per cent. commission on sales, which reduced my half from pounds
to shillings, and handsomely increased the publisher's half in
proportion. I do not now dispute the justice of the charge. It