Apropos of detective stories, anoiller death to be mentioned is that of Mr. J. S. Fletcher, also aged 72. Although' he is. best known author of thilers "he "turned out masses of other books, No. fewer han 230 volumes follow his name in the British Museum cataloy histories, poems, rural studies and serious novels, "He delved deeply into the history of his native York shire, made" steriling discoveries bout the St. Leger, which T am not expert enough in Facing to understand, and gained the honour of a Fellowship of the Royal Historical Society. Of his crime stories, he is reported to have said that he often did not know who was to be the murderer till he got near the end, Having once seen something at close quarters of "the manufacture st Uurillers T can believe it. But he was a fine artist when he chose, Tu early years he wrote dialect stories of rustic Yorkshire and the eastern counties which deserved much more attention than they got. But dialect is apt to be tiresome reading, and what has been sarcastically called "the mud and love-child" school of novel-writing has had to walt for the "gloomy salons of "modern Bloomsbury to get a real yom Like "Arnold Bennett, Fete spurned a. type-writer, and. wrote small, rugged but very neatly form. ed handwriting, the discipline of which saved tim, even when most, prolific, from being. slipshod Comparison of Salaries Miss Gracie Fields has jut signed what Is said to be the biggest contract ever given to a firn. satin England, being worth to her £150. (000 in two years. Possibly this a record. Greta Garbo gets £00,000 for a single film, but dots not make more than two in two years. Miss Ficlds is reported to have said, don't really ike it There is too much responsibility. Give me 10s. and a cottage." The last. statement may be taken for what It is worth, the rest, with a person of Gracie Fields' sincerity, is probably perfect genuine. Such figures seem erly disordered, when compared with the biggest' salaries paid other employment, even, let us say, to the manager of a big American all or steel concern. Yet the only way of looking at it ts that millions of people want to hear and see Miss Gracie Fields, and if she did not get the money, it would merely the film-producer.
But even the prises of film-land may be less than those of the gramophone. Films live their life and die. Records sell for years. Caruso drew a princely income from his re~ cords, lived like a prince, and, dying, still could leave a large fortune. Mischa Elman was tone time credibly rebored to be aking $100.000 a year from records alone. And I believe that the famous Temple choirsboy need never work all his life, unless he chooses, Mechanism is often dertounced ax the curse of the azo. but it is a golden godmother to those who can make use of it in order to catch the pennies of the public.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.