[Illustration: KILLED BY LIONS] A rather curious incident took place with respect to this book, which annoyed me greatly at the time, because I was quite unacquainted with the queer crotchets and imaginary grievances that would-be literary persons often take into their heads. Somebody wrote to complain that he had written (not published) a story upon the same lines, and even incidents, as 'The Family Scapegrace,' just before its appearance in the columns of _Chambers's Journal_, and the delicate inference he drew was that, whether in my capacity of editor or otherwise, I must have somehow got hold of it. He gave the exact date of the conclusion of his own composition, which was prior to the commencement of my story in the _Journal_. Conscious of innocence, but troubled by so disagreeable an imputation, I laid the matter before Robert Chambers. 'You are not so versed in the ways of this class of person as I am,' he said, smiling; 'but since he has been so injudicious as to give a date, I think we can put him out of court. I am one of those methodical individuals who keep a diary.' And on reference to it, he found that I had read him my story long before that of my traducer, according to his own account, had left his hands. It was a small matter, but proved a useful lesson to me, for there is a great deal of imposture of this kind going on in the literary world; sometimes, as perhaps in this case, the result of mere egotistic fancy, but also sometimes begotten by the desire to levy blackmail. The above, so far as I can remember them, are the circumstances under which I published my first novel. I am sorry to add that poor Tickeracandua, to whom it owed so much, subsequently met the very fate in reality which I had assigned to him in fiction; though as good a fellow as many I have met _out_ of a show, he came to the same end as 'Don't Care' did in the nursery story, and was 'eaten (or at all events killed) by lions.' [Illustration: signed drawing: W. Clark Russell] '_THE WRECK OF THE "GROSVENOR"_' BY W. CLARK RUSSELL [Illustration: CLARK RUSSELL AS A MIDSHIPMAN OF SEVENTEEN]