CHAPTER I.


I am an Englishman by birth. Having however lived for fourteen years
out in America or rather in Canada, I am only half an Englishman.
All the love for the dear old land which I am now revisiting is
still there, deep in my heart, but from so long a residence in
another country certain differences arise of character, habit and
thought, not to be easily shaken off. I was in the Civil Service in
Canada and did very well until I meddled with literature.
Discovering that I had a faculty for verse and story-telling, I was
ambitious and at the same time foolish enough to work so hard at my
new pursuit that I was compelled to "cut" the service, in other
words to resign. Some other Englishman got my post and I found myself,
rather unexpectedly, it is true, free to write to my heart's content.

I got off a number of things, poems, sketches, etc., but my great
work turned out to be a comedy. I slaved at this all day and amused
myself by rehearsing it in my lodgings all night. I incurred the
odium of the landlady by coaxing the maid of all work to learn a
part and act it with me. Finally I resolved to take a great step. I
would go down to New York and get my comedy produced. That was
exactly five years ago and though the comedy was _not_ produced, I
am still sanguine that it yet may be, and perhaps not in New York
after all, but in a much more important creative centre.