American Notes

by

Rudyard Kipling



With Introduction




Introduction

In an issue of the London World in April, 1890, there appeared
the following paragraph: "Two small rooms connected by a tiny
hall afford sufficient space to contain Mr. Rudyard Kipling, the
literary hero of the present hour, 'the man who came from
nowhere,' as he says himself, and who a year ago was consciously
nothing in the literary world."

Six months previous to this Mr. Kipling, then but twenty-four
years old, had arrived in England from India to find that fame
had preceded him. He had already gained fame in India, where
scores of cultured and critical people, after reading
"Departmental Ditties," "Plain Tales from the Hills," and various
other stories and verses, had stamped him for a genius.

Fortunately for everybody who reads, London interested and