"Next year, Frank, I may have four or five; I could write one every two months with the greatest ease. It all depends on money. If I need money I shall write half a dozen plays next year." His words reminded me of what Goethe had said about himself: in each of the ten years he spent on his "Theory of Light" he could have written a couple of plays as good as his best. The land of Might-have-been is peopled with these gorgeous shadow-shapes. Oscar had already found his public, a public capable of appreciating the very best he could do. As soon as "The Importance of Being Earnest" was produced it had an extraordinary success, and success of the best sort. Even journalist critics had begun to cease exhibiting their own limitations in foolish fault- finding, and now imitated their betters, parroting phrases of extravagant laudation. Oscar took the praise as he had taken the scandal and slander, with complacent superiority. He had changed greatly and for the worse: he was growing coarser and harder every year. All his friends noticed this. Even M. Andre Gide, who was a great admirer and wrote, shortly after his death, the best account of him that appeared, was compelled to deplore his deterioration. He says: "One felt that there was less tenderness in his looks, that there was something harsh in his laughter, and a wild madness in his joy. He seemed at the same time to be sure of pleasing, and less ambitious to succeed therein. He had grown reckless, hardened and conceited. Strangely enough he no longer spoke in fables..." His brother Willie made a similar complaint to Sir Edward Sullivan. Sir Edward writes: "William Wilde told me, when Oscar was in prison, that the only trouble between him and his brother was caused by Oscar's inordinate vanity in the period before his conviction. 'He had surrounded himself,' William said, 'with a gang of parasites who praised him all day long, and to whom he used to give his cigarette-cases, breast pins, etc., in return for their sickening flattery. No one, not even I, his brother, dared offer any criticism on his works without offending him.'" If proof were needed both of his reckless contempt for public opinion and the malignancy with which he was misjudged, it could be found in an incident which took place towards the end of 1894. A journal entitled "The Chameleon" was produced by some Oxford undergraduates. Oscar wrote for it a handful of sayings which he called "Phrases and Philosophies for the Use of the Young." His epigrams were harmless enough; but in the same number there appeared a story entitled "The Priest and the Acolyte" which could hardly be defended. The mere fact that his work was printed in the same journal called forth a storm of condemnation though he had never seen the story before it was published nor had he anything to do with its insertion.