George Randolph Chester (1869– ) gained distinction by creating the genial modern business man of American literature who is not content to “get rich quick” through the ordinary channels. Need I say that I refer to that amazing compound of likeableness and sharp practices, Get-Rich-Quick Wallingford? The story of his included in this volume, _Bargain Day at Tutt House_ (June, 1905, _McClure’s_), was nearly his first story; only two others, which came out in _The Saturday Evening Post_ in 1903 and 1904, preceded it. Its breathless dramatic action is well balanced by humor. Other stories of his deserving of special mention are: _A Corner in Farmers_ (February, 29, 1908, _Saturday Evening Post_), _A Fortune in Smoke_ (March 14, 1908, _Saturday Evening Post_), _Easy Money_ (November 14, 1908, _Saturday Evening Post_), _The Triple Cross_ (December 5, 1908, _Saturday Evening Post_), _Spoiling the Egyptians_ (December 26, 1908, _Saturday Evening Post_), _Whipsawed!_ (January 16, 1909, _Saturday Evening Post_), _The Bubble Bank_ (January 30 and February 6, 1909, _Saturday Evening Post_), _Straight Business_ (February 27, 1909, _Saturday Evening Post_), _Sam Turner: a Business Man’s Love Story_ (March 26, April 2 and 9, 1910, _Saturday Evening Post_), _Fundamental Justice_ (July 25, 1914, _Saturday Evening Post_), _A Scropper Patcher_ (October, 1916, _Everybody’s_), and _Jolly Bachelors_ (February, 1918, _Cosmopolitan_). His best collections are: _Get-Rich-Quick Wallingford_ (1908), _Young Wallingford_ (1910), _Wallingford in His Prime_ (1913), and _Wallingford and Blackie Daw_ (1913). It is often difficult to find in his books short stories that one may be looking for, for the reason that the titles of the individual stories have been removed in order to make the books look like novels subdivided into chapters. Grace MacGowan Cooke (1863– ) is a writer all of whose work has interest and perdurable stuff in it, but few are the authors whose achievements in the American short story stand out as a whole. In _A Call_ (August, 1906, _Harper’s_) she surpasses herself and is not perhaps herself surpassed by any of the humorous short stories that have come to the fore so far in America in the twentieth century. The story is no less delightful in its fidelity to fact and understanding of young human nature than in its relish of humor. Some of her stories deserving of special mention are: _The Capture of Andy Proudfoot_ (June, 1904, _Harper’s_), _In the Strength of the Hills_ (December, 1905, _Metropolitan_), _The Machinations of Ocoee Gallantine_ (April, 1906, _Century_), _A Call_ (August, 1906, _Harper’s_), _Scott Bohannon’s Bond _(May 4, 1907, _Collier’s_), and _A Clean Shave_ (November, 1912, _Century_). Her best short stories do not seem to have been collected in volumes as yet, although she has had several notable long works of fiction published, such as _The Power and the Glory_ (1910), and several good juveniles.