ESSAYS ON LIFE, ART 

 AND SCIENCE 



QUIS DESIDEKIO . . . ? l 



LIKE Mr. Wilkie Collins, I, too, have been 

 asked to lay some of my literary experiences 

 before the readers of the Universal Review. 

 It occurred to me that the Review must be 

 indeed universal before it could open its pages 

 to one so obscure as myself; but, nothing 

 daunted by the distinguished company among 

 which I was for the first time asked to move, 

 I resolved to do as I was told, and went to 

 the British Museum to see what books I had 

 written. Having refreshed my memory by a 

 glance at the catalogue, I was about to try 

 and diminish the large and ever -increasing 

 circle of my non-readers when I became 

 aware of a calamity that brought me to a 

 standstill, and indeed bids fair, so far as I can 



1 Published in the Universal Review, July 1888. 



A 



