“On that principle,” he said, “I suppose you’d call a line a line whether it goes right across the page or not?” “Yes,” I confessed. He gave a grunt of contempt. “And then you say _The Loom of Youth_ is 110,000 words long; why, half the lines you call ten words long only consist of two words--‘Bloody Hell.’ That’s not the way to do things.” And so Tarrant laboriously added up every word. It became quite a mania with him. So much so, in fact, that he used to embark on long discussions as to the derivation of amalgamated words, and whether “lunch-time” should count as two or one. For his rough draft he kept beside him a small slip of paper, on which at the end of each sentence he used to make mathematical calculations, that reminded me of school cricket, the scoring box, and the attempt to keep level with the tens. Correction involved much labour. At the end of the sentence he might have noted down 277 words. Then he would revise; half a clause consisting of eight words would be omitted, and on the slip of paper down went 269. Then a celibate noun called for an adjectival mate, and 270 was hoisted amid applause. It was an amusing game, but it took up a great deal of time. Very rarely did Tarrant produce more than 400 words as the result of three hours’ work, and his absolute maximum for a day was 1100. “All great men work slowly,” he said. “Flaubert took seven years over _Madame Bovary_, and I shall take only a year over this,” and with a sudden sweep he flashed the discussion back on to his pet subject of words. “You see, I’ve done 48,374 words, and there are three more chapters of approximately 3000 words each. Now will that be enough?” I told him that Mr. Grant Richards had stipulated in one of his weekly advertisements, that if he liked a book, it could range between the limits of 45,000 and 200,000 words, and Tarrant once more returned peacefully to his addition. * * * * * Stone, Tarrant’s constant companion through the tedium of eighteen months’ imprisonment, was chiefly conspicuous for his conversation. Nobody ever actually saw him writing, or had indeed read anything he had written, but he always carried about with him a notebook, that gave the impression that he had either just risen from his labours, or was merely waiting the inspiration of the moment. As a scholar and a critic he was easily the most brilliant of our little circle, and it was delightful to hear him dethrone the idols of the twentieth century. He had very little use for any critic since Pater, or any novelist since Sterne. Of the modern novelists he maintained that the only two worth considering were H. H. Richardson and Arnold Bennett, though to Gilbert Cannan he extended a hand of deprecatory welcome. Wells was the chief target of his wit.