Various

“ It is evident that the son of the conqueror possessed little of the pluck and spirit of his famous father, who was a governor at fourteen, a general at sixteen, a king at eighteen, a conqueror at twenty. The strength of his father's name was great, and had the little Alexander been of equal valor he might have changed the history of the world.
But he did not. The life that began in glitter and glory in the splendid palace at Babylon, tasted privation and misery behind the gates of Pydna, and went out in secrecy and death in the grim dungeons of Amphipolis. ”

“ GOOD MUSIC arouses a spirit of good-will, creates a harmonious atmosphere, and where harmony and good-will prevail, the disobedient, turbulent, unruly spirit finds no resting-place. Herbert Spencer puts his final test of any plan of culture in the form of a question, "Does it create a pleasurable excitement in the pupils?" Judged by this criterion, Music deserves the first rank, for no work done in the school room is so surely creative of pleasure as singing. Do we not all agree, then, that Vocal Music has power to benefit every side of the child nature? ”

“ You wonder at once if the spider that could have strung this web in the air would have hot breath, and it is not until you hear a noise and are conscious that a train of cars has passed you that you begin to realize that it really isn't a spider chasing along one of the paths of his web after you, in the hope of catching you and making of you a very choice morsel of a fly.
For nearly five years I have been going over the Brooklyn Bridge night and day, and it seems to me that every few days I see something in the arrangement of the details of the structure that I never saw before. ”

“ Each reader hands in a written opinion as to its merits and demerits, its chances of success or failure. Sometimes, if these opinions are conflicting, the publisher hands them all, together with the book in question, to a seventh reader—a sort of a court of final appeal—and requests him to write an opinion on the opinions. Even if all the opinions are favorable, the publisher may still refuse to bring out the work in question. There are a hundred good reasons for declining to publish a book, and the manuscript must run the gauntlet of them all. ”

“ When he too meets with failure he blames everybody and everything except himself, and rarely discovers that the reason he cannot become a successful author at his time of life is because he has not been trained to the business, and does not know how to write.
Authorship, or book-writing, is a trade that must be learned the same as any other, and I believe that any boy or girl of average intelligence may be trained to successful authorship if only he or she is willing to work hard enough and long enough at the trade. Even imagination can be cultivated. ”

“ It has demanded an equal amount of careful planning, skilled labor, and close attention to the thousand details that go to the making of a completed whole. In reading an interesting book how very little we think of this, or realize the amount of time and hard work expended in thus giving us a few hours of pleasure. Most people consider writing to be a very easy method of making a living, and nothing is more common in an author's experience than to have his friends express surprise when he speaks of going to his work. ”

“ I guess a burglar would soon wish he was somewhere else."
"I have a baseball bat all ready at the head of the bed too," said Harry. "Do you suppose it would kill a man to hit him over the head with it, Tom? I shouldn't like to kill a man, not even a burglar. I guess I'd give him a rap over the shoulders. But I'm afraid father would fire some bullets into him before I had a chance."
"I almost wish we'd have a chance," Joe put in. "But, of course, there won't be any burglars around, now that we're all ready for them." ”

“ Of course publishers and publishers' readers sometimes make mistakes concerning the value of a book, and decline one that, in the hands of another publisher, or brought out at the author's expense, achieves a tremendous success. ”

“ Missiles hurled by the mob on one side came raining down into the faces of their fellows on the other, and even as Fred was imploring his brother to come away now and at once, a rock, hurtling over the nearest car, struck the roof and bounded into the throng below, cutting a gash on the younger brother's white forehead, and striking him senseless to the earth, just as some untaught, undisciplined fool among the deputies pulled trigger and fired. Whistling overhead the bullet went hissing away up the tracks the signal for a mad rush of men and boys. ”

“ I always like to see the workmen paint these cables. The men walk along the tracks with pots of red paint in their hands. They have great mitts of lamb's wool on their hands, and they use these for brushes. They dip their hands in the paint, and then run them along the cables until the paint is transferred from the hands to the cable. It is dangerous work, for not only must the workmen guard against falling between the ties to the water below, but they must face the danger of being run over, for every minute a train of cars comes along. ”

“ The formation of the league created a great boom in football in the schools. Up to that time playing had been of a desultory nature, and games had been arranged from week to week as the captains chose. There had never been any training or system. Now all this changed. Schedules were prepared and adhered to, and the players all made it a point to keep in as good training as possible. Each school had its eye on the cup. The Harvard men were much pleased at the success of their scheme, and the 'Varsity Captain looked hopefully toward the development of good material for the next year. ”

“ For this reason it is generally cheaper to buy a book from a dealer than from the publisher.
If a book is successful enough to run into a second edition or reach its second thousand, which very few first books ever do, then the author begins to receive ten cents for every copy sold. If, however, it fails to pass its first thousand, he receives nothing for his labor, except the advertising of his name gained by the publication of a book. A well-known and popular author whose work is certain to sell, bringing out a book on the royalty plan, receives from 10 to 15 per cent. ”

“ Occasionally the author is consulted concerning some of these questions, especially in regard to illustrations, for which he is sometimes requested to furnish photographs; but more often he is not. The publisher, who bears the expense of illustrating the book, generally reserves the right to select the artist for this work as well as to decide upon the number, the style, and the size of the pictures.
There is so much art in the making of a book that by the aid of large type, wide spaces between lines, heavy paper, and broad margins a small manuscript may suffice for a large volume ”

“ The making of covers is a distinct branch of book-building that gives employment to a great many skilled workmen and workwomen. The most conspicuous of these is the artist who draws the cover design, and suggests its scheme of color—for the sale of a book depends very hugely upon whether or not its cover is attractive. Covers are made of paper, cloth, or leather. ”

“ The four big cables curve down from the top and hide themselves in some masonry at your feet, and when you look up the narrow spaces between them, as they reach away before you, the eye catches sight of strands of steel rope, woven regularly and gracefully, hanging from the cables and extending to the structure on which you are standing. ”

“ I noticed one day last winter, when the greatest crush in the history of the bridge occurred, and when it was estimated that 2500 tons of human beings were distributed along the bridge at one time, that this slip joint in the middle was drawn out at least fifteen inches because of the unusual weight. ”

“ Harvard football men had for several years been deploring the necessity of devoting two or three weeks at the beginning of each fall term to the weeding out and selection of new football material, and the idea finally suggested itself that if the schools could be used for this purpose the university would gain much by such an arrangement. It then became clear that the way to use the schools would be to get up some sort of a football league that would train players who would eventually enter Harvard, and furnish material for the university eleven. ”

“ The engines had switched to the side tracks a block away, and, protected by armed guards on the tender, the pilot, and footboard, were coupling on to the standing trains. Fred felt himself swept along, tugging at his brother's arm. Half a dozen agile men edged out of the crowd and dove under the cars to which the foremost engine was now attached. Shriek went the whistle, clang the bell, back leaped the guards, some of them swarming up the freight-car ladders. The engine jetted smoke and steam and backed promptly away, but a roar of triumph and derision went up from the mob. ”

“ After leaving his school or college he should spend at least two years—and four would be better—as a reporter, a private secretary, an amanuensis to some skilled writer, or as assistant editor of some first-class publication that insists upon the use of grammatical English in its columns. During this apprenticeship he may try his hand at sketches, essays, or short stories, and must learn to accept calmly a dozen disappointments with each success.
When the author is ready to write a book his most difficult task is to select a subject that shall be interesting, timely, and not already overdone. ”

“ Once every four years the structure is painted in every part. It is fascinating to see the painters swinging in their chairs far up one of the cables or along the strands that make the cobwebs at night. Every eight months a new flooring has to be laid down on the driveway, and so you see there is something going on constantly on the bridge that is worth watching. ”

“ Our book having escaped the many perils that beset it, and been accepted, the publisher makes the author one of three offers for it. He will buy it outright, publish it subject to royalty, or on shares. If he buys it and its copyright outright, he gives an unknown author for his first book from $100 to $400, rarely more; while offers to well-known and successful authors often run up into the thousands of dollars. ”

“ At the end of the Wissahickon drive turn left into the new road, which has been recently opened, thence turn right up the Ridge Road, and continue on to Barren Hill. Here you should turn sharp to the left again, and run down a hill, keeping to the right at its foot. This road carries you on to Spring Mill, and from here the road again, running along by the Schuylkill, will bring you into Conshohocken, a distance of seventeen miles and a half from the public buildings in Philadelphia. The road along the route is gravel, but it is good bicycling over almost every foot of it. ”

“ Cobweb Lane is nothing more nor less than the promenade on the Brooklyn Bridge. It doesn't exist until after midnight, because not until then do the strands that hang from the big cables resemble the huge cobwebs that have [Pg 787] suggested the name Cobweb Lane. The moon has to be in just the right position; the great cities of New York and Brooklyn must have gone to bed and left numerous lights, some in full glare and some turned down ”

“ Every book should be written twice, the first draft being made on soft unglazed paper with a No. 2 pencil, while the second is a revised and punctuated copy, written in ink or type-written on sheets of a medium size. The neatness of a manuscript has much to do with its favorable reception at the hands of an editor or a publisher's reader. Some authors do not write at all, but dictate to a stenographer or an amanuensis ”

“ The instruments are in the boys' sleeping-rooms, except Barker's; he uses his workshop for the purpose, and an electric bell gives warning when he is wanted. Burglars will give those three houses a wide berth in the future."
"Give us a wide berth!" Tom exclaimed. "Well, I guess they will! They wouldn't have any chance at all. Father always keeps a revolver in his room, and I have my baseball bat. Now mind, fellows, if we hear a burglar at night, we send an alarm first thing, and the minute we get an alarm we call our fathers. ”

“ If you cannot write without lines to keep your words from a zigzag course, slip in between the folds of your paper a heavily ruled sheet, which will be a guide until practice enables you to control your hand so that you can keep your writing straight and even without an outside help. ”

“ It is well to be less demonstrative with others, and "Dear Susie," or "My Dear John," are in better taste when writing to your cousins at a distance. "Dear" is considered less formal than "My Dear." Should you have occasion to write a letter of business, make clear to your correspondent what you wish to say. Business letters should be straightforward and to the point, and as short as is consistent with telling all that ought to be told. ”

“ On the press the printed pages of our book meet and make the acquaintance of the illustrated or picture pages with which they are henceforth to be so intimately associated. In the building of a book the artist's part must by no means be overlooked, for a well-illustrated book, especially if intended for youthful readers, like the one we are considering, is doubled in value by its pictures. ”