Another editor. That thing behind his ear is his pencil. Whenever he
finds a bright thing in your manuscript he strikes it out with that.
That does him good, and makes him smile and show his teeth, the way he
is doing in the picture. This one has just been striking out a smart
thing, and now he is sitting there with his thumbs in his vest-holes,
gloating. They are full of envy and malice, editors are. This picture
will serve to remind you that Edward II. was the first English king who
was _deposed_. Upon demand, he signed his deposition himself. He had
found kingship a most aggravating and disagreeable occupation, and you
can see by the look of him that he is glad he resigned. He has put his
blue pencil up for good now. He had struck out many a good thing with
it in his time.
Edward III. next; fifty _red _squares. (Fig. 15.)
This editor is a critic. He has pulled out his carving-knife and his
tomahawk and is starting after a book which he is going to have for
breakfast. This one’s arms are put on wrong. I did not notice it at
first, but I see it now. Somehow he has got his right arm on his left
shoulder, and his left arm on the right shoulder, and this shows us the
back of his hands in both instances. It makes him left-handed all
around, which is a thing which has never happened before, except
perhaps in a museum. That is the way with art, when it is not acquired
but born to you: you start in to make some simple little thing, not
suspecting that your genius is beginning to work and swell and strain
in secret, and all of a sudden there is a convulsion and you fetch out
something astonishing. This is called inspiration. It is an accident;
you never know when it is coming. I might have tried as much as a year
to think of such a strange thing as an all-around left-handed man and I
could not have done it, for the more you try to think of an unthinkable
thing the more it eludes you; but it can’t elude inspiration; you have
only to bait with inspiration and you will get it every time. Look at
Botticelli’s “Spring.” Those snaky women were unthinkable, but
inspiration secured them for us, thanks to goodness. It is too late to
reorganize this editor-critic now; we will leave him as he is. He will
serve to remind us.
Richard II. next; twenty-two _white _squares. (Fig. 16.)
We use the lion again because this is another Richard. Like Edward II.,
he was _deposed_. He is taking a last sad look at his crown before they
take it away. There was not room enough and I have made it too small;
but it never fitted him, anyway.
Now we turn the corner of the century with a new line of monarchs—the
Lancastrian kings.
Henry IV.; fourteen squares of _yellow _paper. (Fig. 17.)
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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