 seemed intent on glorifying
the Mr. Butlers, the sordid dollar-chasers, and the commonplace little love
affairs of commonplace little men and women. Was it because the editors of the
magazines were commonplace? he demanded. Or were they afraid of life, these
writers and editors and readers?
    But his chief trouble was that he did not know any editors or writers. And
not merely did he not know any writers, but he did not know anybody who had ever
attempted to write. There was nobody to tell him, to hint to him, to give him
the least word of advice. He began to doubt that editors were real men. They
seemed cogs in a machine. That was what it was, a machine. He poured his soul
into stories, articles, and poems, and intrusted them to the machine. He folded
them just so, put the proper stamps inside the long envelope along with the
manuscript, sealed the envelope, put more stamps outside, and dropped it into
the mail-box. It travelled across the continent, and after a certain lapse of
time the postman returned him the manuscript in another long envelope, on the
outside of which were the stamps he had enclosed. There was no human editor at
the other end, but a mere cunning arrangement of cogs that changed the
manuscript from one envelope to another and stuck on the stamps. It was like the
slot machines wherein one dropped pennies, and, with a metallic whirl of
machinery had delivered to him a stick of chewing-gum or a tablet of chocolate.
It depended upon which slot one dropped the penny in, whether he got chocolate
or gum. And so with the editorial machine. One slot brought checks and the other
brought rejection slips. So far he had found only the latter slot.
    It was the rejection slips that completed the horrible machinelikeness of
the process. These slips were printed in stereotyped forms and he had received
hundreds of them - as many as a dozen or more on each of his earlier
manuscripts. If he had received one line, one personal line, along with one
rejection of all his rejections, he would have been cheered. But not one editor
had given that proof of existence. And he could conclude only that there were no
warm human men at the other end, only mere cogs, well oiled and running
beautifully in the machine.
    He was a good fighter, whole-souled and stubborn, and he would have been
content to continue feeding the machine for years; but he was bleeding to death,
and not years but weeks would determine the fight. Each
