_The young lady shivered._ _“The ‘Smart Set’!” she exclaimed. “How can you? Why, they publish stuff about girls in blue bathtubs, and silly things like that.”_ _And I had the magnificent joy of telling her that she was referring to “Porcelain and Pink,” which had appeared there several months before._ FANTASIES THE DIAMOND AS BIG AS THE RITZ _These next stories are written in what, were I of imposing stature, I should call my “second manner.” “The Diamond as Big as the Ritz,” which appeared last summer in the “Smart Set,” was designed utterly for my own amusement. I was in that familiar mood characterized by a perfect craving for luxury, and the story began as an attempt to feed that craving on imaginary foods._ _One well-known critic has been pleased to like this extravaganza better than anything I have written. Personally I prefer “The Offshore Pirate.” But, to tamper slightly with Lincoln: If you like this sort of thing, this, possibly, is the sort of thing you’ll like._ THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON _This story was inspired by a remark of Mark Twain’s to the effect that it was a pity that the best part of life came at the beginning and the worst part at the end. By trying the experiment upon only one man in a perfectly normal world I have scarcely given his idea a fair trial. Several weeks after completing it, I discovered an almost identical plot in Samuel Butler’s “Note-books.”_ _The story was published in “Collier’s” last summer and provoked this startling letter from an anonymous admirer in Cincinnati:_ _“Sir--_ _I have read the story Benjamin Button in Colliers and I wish to say that as a short story writer you would make a good lunatic I have seen many peices of cheese in my life but of all the peices of cheese I have ever seen you are the biggest peice. I hate to waste a peice of stationary on you but I will.“_ TARQUIN OF CHEAPSIDE _Written almost six years ago, this story is a product of undergraduate days at Princeton. Considerably revised, it was published in the “Smart Set” in 1921. At the time of its conception I had but one idea--to be a poet--and the fact that I was interested in the ring of every phrase, that I dreaded the obvious in prose if not in plot, shows throughout. Probably the peculiar affection I feel for it depends more upon its age than upon any intrinsic merit._ O RUSSET WITCH! _When this was written I had just completed the first draft of my second novel, and a natural reaction made me revel in a story wherein none of the characters need be taken seriously. And I’m afraid that I was somewhat carried away by the feeling that there was no ordered scheme to which I must conform. After due consideration, however, I have decided to let it stand as it is, although the reader may find himself somewhat puzzled at the time element. I had best say that however the years may have dealt with Merlin Grainger, I myself was thinking always in the present. It was published in the “Metropolitan.”_