We are now looking round after an appalling disruption of normal life, and the possibilities are all in favor of greatly increased artistic endeavor. The time is unrestful, but it is not unreceptive. We need concerted action among writers as we need it in all other sections of the community. But not the concerted action of committees or cliques, for committees kill the thing they love with over-much consideration, while cliques, jealous and sneering, kill the creative impulse in their members. Collectivism in art can be nothing more than desire for the freedom to attain a common ideal. It does not imply a herd of writers busy upon the same job and giving their chief thoughts to the destruction of rivals with dissimilar methods; but uses at its highest the motto 'live and let live,' because in creative freedom lies the road to true creative wealth. Concerted effort, therefore, is the effort to justify art to the philistines, and not to destroy its examples for the banal amusement of dilettanti.

There is something worthy in such an enterprise. There is nothing at all worthy in getting together in restricted circles and making a private magic for half a dozen persons; in grasping opportunities for the belittlement of those for whom we entertain distaste or dislike; and in pushing the wares of our friends by persuading others to over-estimate their virtues. The whole of the influence of the coterie is evil, because it is stained with pettiness and with the pursuit of immediate ends.

The member of any coterie cannot, for example, praise with warm sincerity the work of writers outside its circle. He must join in the chorus of depreciation which arises from his fellows. He catches their tone; and he repeats their catchwords. The distaste rises, is talked into vehemence, is a thing settled finally, so that the ques

VOL. 17-NO. 856

tion cannot afterwards be reconsidered. The dangers of such warfare upon all that lies outside the coterie must be manifest. It is a direct encouragement to the spirit of intolerance and persecution. Coupled with a sort of complementary resentment, a tearing at the works of the aggressive coterie, and retaliatory depreciation of all its deeds, it is an unhappy challenge to dislike and animosity. Malice spreads abroad; tales are disseminated; and there are hostilities the more lamentable because they are so petty and so ungenerous

This is a wrong spirit in which to live with one's fellow craftsmen, and if it is not checked by some appeal to reason and common aim its consequences will embitter and corrode the creative impulse of our time. We shall strive, not to express our true intent, but only to restrain or destroy our rivals, who have become in such mean, such ungracious, comparison our enemies. The coterie, then, is a sign of perverted social effort, since its effects are those of exclusion. It is the sign, also, of a decay of creative force. Just as one does not whistle and run, so one does not, at the same time, create and persecute. There can be no question as to which is the more valuable part of the writer's occupation. It is by his work, and not by his jealousies or his repressions, that we judge a man. But to be judged at all he must work; and if he gives to his friendly rivals the gratitude of a flattered child, and to his unfriendly rivals the bitter and wasteful detraction of an enemy, our young writer will live no life but the literary life of his coterie, and will never break through its conventional bounds into the wider realm of untrammeled effort. It is not in the bloodless life of the coterie that he will find health and vigor. It is in the free exercise of his talent.

These are some of the considerations which I may reveal to aspirants who marvel at my present of an inkpot with so baffling a motto. But the gift will not occur for many years, when I am as old as Mr. Edmund Gosse.

[To-day] POCKETS

BY CLAUDE TESSIER

In the old and happy far-off days of an army in red coats and striped, blue trousers, the soldier, fighting his mimic battles on Salisbury Plain, had many things to be thankful for. But now he has lost the distinction of belonging to a professional caste clad in rainbow raiment; he has been democratized, and clothed in bilious yellowbrown, and his quondam finery has been relegated to the region of opera and farce; even so, he has gained one privilege which, to some extent, atones for the vanished glories of his pre-war days- he may now possess and use a pocket.

Not so in the time of pipe-clay, and pill-box over the right ear. True, there were one or two slits masquerading as pockets in the less accessible parts of his stifling regimentals, but sergeant-majors of the old school had an eagle eye for a crinkle or bulge which spoiled the symmetry of a company at the "tion,' and many a warrior worked out in 'C.B.' the unpardonable crime of pocketing anything more substantial than his pride or an insult. The poker-backed, tight-belted Tommy found it expedient to keep his handkerchief (if he were luxuriously inclined) up his sleeve, his fags in his hat, his girl's photograph round his neck, and his money in his boots. If there was no money, as quite frequently was the case when the service meant one shilling per diem, and

nothing said about deductions, I'm afraid his heart occupied the place left vacant by the coin.

Tempora mutantur . . however, and the khaki tunics have four pockets, which are even more obtrusive than their civilian counterparts, the khaki trousers have at least two, and the khaki soldier not only keeps his hanky, Woodbines, dibs, and girl's photo where his hands can easily reach his treasures, but I whisper it low for fear the troubled shade of a pre-war non-com. should go a-haunting if he hears - he even keeps his hands there too. Not always, you understand, not on parade; but when, on leave for a brief spell, he feels himself justly entitled to relax the rigor of military law in favor of an attitude of nonchalance and to hell with all red-caps.

Civilian dress in the twentieth century certainly has many disadvantages. Scarcity of pocket space cannot be counted one, though, for I have just gone over my pockets as I sit here writing, and I find there are no less than twelve scattered about my puny person. That number should be enough for anyone except, perhaps, a burglar or conjurer, and, in fact, is more than sufficient for my needs; rather the trouble lies in the direction of keeping them well filled in these days of rations and high prices. Some types of persons are known by their pockets. Who has not wondered at the vasty deeps of the recesses in the garments of the gentleman with the unshaved chin and the tea-can? Give a tramp a piece of meat, and you will be amazed to see appear from nowhere a huge chunk of grimy bread, a mighty clasp-knife, the aforesaid tea-can, half full of cold tea or beer, and many other et ceteras all from the gentleman's coat pockets.

Then there are boys. The weaker

sort of humorist has exploited ad nauseam the amusement that can be got from the enumeration of the miscellany that reposes in the average urchin's scanty habiliments. Pieces of string, marbles and mice, toffee and tram-tickets, peg-tops and periwinkles, and the-lord-knows-what, which inhabited our pockets at the age of eleven, used to be very funny to think of; but since Thackeray began it the thing has been decidedly overdone, like some war-time regulations which I had better not particularize. And now to the ladies. Grannies, for instance. Why on earth do the dear old things have their pockets placed in such inaccessible eyries? To observe -one of them fumbling amid the folds of a capacious red petticoat, whenever her kind heart prompts her to distribute largess in the public highway, brings a blush to my cheek and a sadness in my soul at the thought of the vagaries of benevolence and dressmakers.

Working back from age to youth I take my next example from the days of the hobble. I recollect seeing some pretty manœuvres by fair forms in the effort to discover a hidden hanky or purse. Not every young lady cares about carrying a hand-bag wherever she goes, and once when I was out with a very particular friend, I was puzzled to note that I repeatedly caught her bending throughout the evening. I knew she had acquired a good, all-round cold a few days before, but that did not account for her continual shrimp-like postures. A suspicion crossed my mind that, like Sir Walter Scott on one occasion, she had been taken in company with cramp in the stomach, and was too maidenly modest to mention the matter. Being a writing man and, consequently, rather irritable, at the fifth time that I found myself speaking to her shapely back, I asked her mildly, when her

flushing face reappeared by my side, whether she desired to be taken home. Oh, no, she was quite well, thank you, but as a hobble left absolutely no room for it anywhere else, she was compelled to carry her handkerchief in the top of her stocking.

To a young child a grown-up's pockets are a boundless mine of fairy gold. Only very occasionally, however, are little hands permitted to explore. But then do the bright eyes shine with a joy which is excelled only on the day when they see pockets of their own. As we grow older we often develop favoritism toward a particular pocket. This depends chiefly on position, and I suppose side trouser pockets are easily first in popularity. They are so very handy. Mr. Jerome K. Jerome has placed on record that with a bunch of keys on one side and some small change on the other, and each hand well buried and jingling hard, he feels equal to face all the supreme issues of life. He can then even boldly interrogate a railway booking-clerk, question a female postoffice assistant, or order a taximan to take him home at night.

Which reminds me. One day a short while ago, about the beginning of the month, when publishers usually send out their checks, I was hurrying along a main thoroughfare in order to catch a train, when I felt a slight tickling sensation along my right leg. As I was bent on being on the inside of that train I paid no heed and strode onward. Presently, however, there seemed to be something happening in my rear, and 'Hi, mister! hi, mister! hi, mister!' was wafted into my preoccupied consciousness. I stopped, and glancing behind, saw such a searching going on as had scarcely happened in Britain since the days of 'hidden treasure.' Then half a dozen gamins came careering forward, the

vanguard of that army of the unoccupied which is always to the fore in street accidents and the like, holding aloft coin of the realm of various values which they gave me to understand had been dribbling from my trousers for the last five minutes. By the time I had settled the unspoken, but none the less insistent, claims of the restorers of my wealth, I was not much better off than had I left it along the roadway. I did not catch that train. I remained in town and retired to a quiet little place round the corner, where I soothed my shattered soul and swore softly to myself on the treachery of the shoddy cloth of my second-best trousers.

The man who designs a satisfactory method of carrying lead pencils in a pocket will, I believe, benefit humanity only second to the inventors of gun-powder, tanks, telephones, tinned meats, and the many other inestimable blessings of our civilization. Should you carry a pencil in your waist pocket it will rattle to the ground whenever you say your prayers, stoop to recover a dropped stud, run after your hat, or do anything else that jerks or inclines your body from the strictly vertical. If you place one in the pocket of your jacket it will sooner or later mysteriously disappear and be discovered wandering along the lining of your clothes. Of course, you can use one of those shining fountain pen clips, but I dislike them, for they smack too much of the groceryorder man or the small rent collector. Like the pen or pencil stuck behind an ear they are too businesslike for ordinary genteel life. So occasional memoranda must, meanwhile, be written on the tablets of the mind, because pencils and pockets disagree.

My cousin, Ebenezer Potwollop, hates pockets as some men hate women and cats. Whether it be pres

ent vanity or past misadventure that causes his aversion, I know not, but certainly the old gentleman looks wondrous slim and sleek in his pocketless suits. But during the war he was in difficulties. You see, although Cousin Potwollop did n't carry a pudding in his hat, like the man in The Uncommercial Traveler, he was forced, during the strenuous recent past, to wear headgear a little generous in interior accommodation. Also, although usually regarded as a rather churlish fellow, he pleased his relations by unaccustomed politeness; for he was quite often seen with his hat in his hand, even as the person Sam Johnson met while walking down the Strand. The reason being that when traveling, and having no pockets, he was compelled to carry in the lining of his hat the treasury notes and the sugar card and the tea-and-margarine card and the registration card and the birth certificate and the meat coupons and the sugar bottle and the pass into prohibited areas and all the other ephemera (let us hope) so necessary for a British citizen to produce on the demand of competent and incompetent authorities and officials while Britain

was at war.

He is now contemplating the founding of a 'No-pocket Society,' and has secured a promise of membership from a large number of persons who don't eat meat and don't wear hats and don't smoke and don't drink, and can't bear fishing and don't shoot and won't kill; in fact, the class of 'antis' who seem not to indulge in anything that makes life worth living, and he is looking forward to being the Society's first president. But the Society is not unanimous on my cousin's fitness to occupy that noble post, and I regret to say that the highbrows have descended to some bitter recriminations over the respective claims of several

MONSIEUR FAUCIGNY, the father of Odette, was spared the most cruel experience which can befall a ruined man. He died before he knew how great his ruin was, died between two invitations to dinner. The funeral, in spite of the financial difficulties of the family, was decorous and grave; there was even music, and it was not until a week had passed that the notary revealed to Madame Faucigny the news which aged her over night.

When she knew that she would soon have to give up everything, leave her apartment, her furniture, her companions, perhaps even Paris itself, and go to live, heaven knows how, in some forlorn place along with a twentyyear-old daughter without either a future or a dowry, she underwent an incredible change and became a hopeless old woman. She became incapable of resolution; her mind found a place only for nervous distress. And the matter which tormented her the most was the question-'How shall I tell this to Odette? How can she bear such a blow?'

Slim, and elegante, Odette Faucigny little thought that the spring of their financial means had gone dry, and that it was hers to weep two losses at once. She had never seemed anything else than a doll. She was not exactly pretty; there was a something oriental, a certain Chinese look in her eyes. Yet

her coloring was rosy and clear. Her charm lay in her smile. Instead of having one smile which did duty for every occasion, Odette's smiles ranged. the entire keyboard from the bass notes to the highest trebles; with a smile she could express everything, even the little fugitive sorrows which an unpleasant word thrusts into the heart. And she was a real living woman, a true jeune fille, such as are to be found, not in books, but in France itself. Modern minded, honest, and brave, she was neither self-conscious nor bold.

What would happen when the truth of affairs was revealed to Odette? What would she say on discovering that of the family fortune a sum less than twenty thousand francs net remained? That the daily bread even would soon be lacking?

When Odette entered, with a smile on her lips that said 'I am with you still-let us try to be happy,' Madame Faucigny drew her to her side, and in a troubled and broken voice began to tell her of long past events, of her father's first losses on the stock exchange. Then, as the story continued, Odette, who had at first understood but little, grasped the truth and said:

"Then we are ruined?'

The mother kept silence. Odette burst into a storm of tears so impetuous and sincere, that her mother knew that her own sorrow was less keen than her daughter's.

'Do not cry like that,' begged Madame Faucigny, 'if I could but tell you how it hurts me

But her words were of no avail. At the end of a half hour, Odette became calmer, and after studying the golden light of late afternoon which was pouring into the chamber, she said: