There seems in this to lie error as well as scandal; when a new organisation is created, say for the control of lamp oil, obviously a novelist should not be made its chairman, but why should a blotting paper merchant be preferred? Indeed, one might side with Mr Zangwill, who demands representation for authors in the Cabinet itself, on the plea that they would introduce the emotion which is necessary if the Cabinet is to manage impulsive mankind. As he finely says, we are professors of human nature; if only some University would give us a title and some initials to follow our name, say P.H.N., people might believe that we knew something of it. But the attitude of the State in these matters is steadfast enough. It recognises us as servants rather than as citizens; if in our later years we come upon hard times, we can be given, through the Civil List, pensions which rescue us from the indignities of the poorhouse, but no more. Mostly these pensions benefit our heirs, but the offering is so small that it shocks; it is like tipping an archbishop. Thus Mr W. B. Yeats enjoys a pension of L150, Mr Joseph Conrad, of L100. Why give us pensions at all if they must be alms? One cannot be dignified on L100 a year; one can be dignified on L5000 a year, because the world soon forgets that you ride a gift horse if that horse is a fine, fat beast. The evidence is to be found in the retiring pensions of our late Lord Chancellors, who receive L5000 a year, of our Judges, L1000 to L3750, in the allowances made to impoverished politicians, which attain L2000. Out of a total of L320,000 met by our civil list, literature, painting, science, research, _divide_ every year L1200. Nor do the immediate rewards show greater equality. Lord Roberts was voted L100,000 for his services in South Africa; Mr Thomas Hardy has not yet been voted anything for _The Dynasts_. The shame of literature is carried on even into following generations. The present Lord Nelson, who is not a poor man, for he owns 7000 acres of land, is still drawing a pension of L5000 a year, earned by his august ancestor, but the daughter of Leigh Hunt must be content with L50. We are unknown. We are nobody. Rouget de l'Isle, author of _La Marseillaise_, gave wings to the revolutionary chariot, but tiny, bilious, tyrannic Robespierre rode in it, and rides in it to-day through the pages of history, while men go to their death singing the words of Rouget de l'Isle and know him not.