comfort, then would I cheerfully admit to anybody that Leonard Merrick
is a Pessimistic Writer. But until this proof be forthcoming, I stick
to my opinion: I stick to the conviction that Mr. Merrick is the
gayest, cheer fullest, and most courageous of living humorists.

This opinion is a general opinion, applicable to Mr. Merrick's general
work. This morning, however, I am asked to narrow my field of view: to
contemplate not so much Mr. Merrick at large as Mr. Merrick in
particular: to look at Mr. Merrick in his relationship to this one
particular book: _A Chair on the Boulevard_.

Now, if I say, as I have said, that Mr. Merrick is cheerful in his
capacity of solemn novelist, what am I to say of Mr. Merrick in his
lighter aspect, that of a writer of _feuilletons?_ Addressing
myself to an imaginary audience of Magazine Enthusiasts, I ask them to
tell me whether, judged even by comparison with their favourite
fiction, some of the stories to be found in this volume are not
exquisitely amusing?

The first story in the book--that which Mr. Merrick calls "The Tragedy
of a Comic Song"--is in my view the funniest story of this century:
but I don't ask or expect the Magazine Enthusiast to share this view or
to endorse that judgment. "The Tragedy of a Comic Song" is essentially
one of those productions in which the reader is expected to
collaborate. The author has deliberately contrived certain voids of
narrative; and his reader is expected to populate these anecdotal
wastes. This is asking more than it is fair to ask of a Magazine
Enthusiast. No genuine Magazine reader cares for the elusive or
allusive style in fiction. "The Tragedy of a Comic Song" won't do for
Bouverie Street, however well and completely it may do for me.