ESSAYS IN MINIATURE Fiction, Fact, and Fancy Series. MERRY TALES. BY MARK TWAIN. THE GERMAN EMPEROR AND HIS EASTERN NEIGHBORS. BY POULTNEY BIGELOW. PADDLES AND POLITICS DOWN THE DANUBE. BY POULTNEY BIGELOW. SELECTED POEMS. BY WALT WHITMAN. AUTOBIOGRAPHIA: THE STORY OF A LIFE. BY WALT WHITMAN. DON FINIMONDONE: CALABRIAN SKETCHES. BY ELISABETH CAVAZZA. THE MASTER OF SILENCE: A ROMANCE. BY IRVING BACHELLER. WRITINGS OF CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. EDITED BY PAUL LEICESTER FORD. ESSAYS IN MINIATURE. BY AGNES REPPLIER. MR. BILLY DOWNS AND HIS LIKES. BY RICHARD MALCOLM JOHNSTON. Bound in Illuminated Cloth, each, 75 Cents. Complete Set, 10 Volumes, in Box, $7.50. ⁂ _For Sale by all Booksellers, or sent postpaid, on receipt of price, by the Publishers_, CHAS. L. WEBSTER & CO., NEW YORK. Fiction, Fact, and Fancy Series EDITED BY ARTHUR STEDMAN ESSAYS IN MINIATURE ESSAYS IN MINIATURE BY AGNES REPPLIER New York CHARLES L. WEBSTER & CO. 1892 Copyright, 1892, CHARLES L. WEBSTER & CO. (_All rights reserved._) PRESS OF JENKINS & MCCOWAN, NEW YORK. CONTENTS PAGE OUR FRIENDS, THE BOOKS 11 TRIALS OF A PUBLISHER 28 THE OPPRESSION OF NOTES 45 CONVERSATION IN NOVELS 59 A SHORT DEFENCE OF VILLAINS 70 A BY-WAY IN FICTION 87 COMEDY OF THE CUSTOM HOUSE 104 MR. WILDE’S _Intentions_ 121 HUMORS OF GASTRONOMY 129 CHILDREN IN FICTION 144 THREE FAMOUS OLD MAIDS 157 THE CHARM OF THE FAMILIAR 171 OLD WORLD PETS 182 BATTLE OF THE BABIES 195 THE NOVEL OF INCIDENT 207 ESSAYS IN MINIATURE OUR FRIENDS, THE BOOKS There is a short paragraph in Hazlitt’s _Conduct of Life_ that I read very often, and always with fresh delight. He is offering much good counsel to a little lad at school, and when he comes to a matter upon which most counselors are wont to be exceedingly didactic and diffuse—the choice of books—he condenses all he has to say into a few wise and gentle words that are well worth taking to heart: