I believe all the reprints in
America are more or less incorrect. I have pleasure in sending this copy
to my friend, Mr. Edward W. Bok, for publication in The Ladies' Home
Journal for which he gives me an honorarium, the only one I have ever
received from an American publisher for this song.
"Arthur Sullivan."
At least, thought Bok, he had healed one man's soreness toward America.
But the next day he encountered another. On his way to Paris, he stopped
at Amiens to see Jules Verne. Here he found special difficulty in that
the aged author could not speak English, and Bok knew only a few words
of casual French. Finally a neighbor's servant who knew a handful of
English words was commandeered, and a halting three-cornered
conversation was begun.
Bok found two grievances here: the author was incensed at the American
public because it had insisted on classing his books as juveniles, and
accepting them as stories of adventure, whereas he desired them to be
recognized as prophetic stories based on scientific facts--an insistence
which, as all the world knows, has since been justified. Bok explained,
however, that the popular acceptance of the author's books as stories of
adventure was by no means confined to America; that even in his own
country the same was true. But Jules Verne came back with the rejoinder
that if the French were a pack of fools, that was no reason why the
Americans should also be.
The argument weighed somewhat with the author, however, for he then
changed the conversation, and pointed out how he had been robbed by
American publishers who had stolen his books.
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