McClure's Magazine/Volume 9/Number 6/Editorial Notes

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McClure's Magazine, Volume 9, Number 6

Editorial Notes

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2678670McClure's Magazine, Volume 9, Number 6 — Editorial Notes

EDITORIAL NOTES.

McCLURE'S MAGAZINE.— REMINISCENCES AND FORECASTS.

Four years and a half ago the first number of McClure's Magazine was published, and the price of the magazine at that time was fifteen cents a copy. There was then no magazine sold for less than twenty-five cents a copy that gave its readers the best current literature and employed the best artists for the illustration of its text. Without laying stress upon the question of price as necessary or essential, to this publication, we record this fact as of interest in the history of periodical publishing. We have a certain pride that we were the pioneers in the field of low-priced periodical literature, and it is in the interest of the truth, which has been more or less distorted in various ways, that we revive the recollection of the position of McClure's Magazine and its price at the time it was started.

Two years ago, in announcing the reduction of the price of McClure's from fifteen cents to ten cents a copy, we made the statement that there were "no contributions, literary or pictorial, suitable for a great popular monthly that were not within the reach of the publishers of McClure's Magazine at ten cents a copy." At the time these words were written there was considerable discussion in the publishing craft in regard to the future of the ten-cent magazine, and in this discussion the public took a lively interest. Our contribution to the discussion was simply an elaboration of the idea expressed in the words quoted above: that is, the realization in fact of our faith—the publication of a magazine which proved the point. Within the last two years the discussion has died out. In the case of McClure's Magazine, which was founded at the beginning of the hard times, its circulation steadily increased in those two years, in spite of the general adverse business conditions, from 75,000 to over 275,000. Within that short period we have been enabled to set up a manufacturing plant which is not surpassed by any other printing and binding establishment of its kind in the world, and our business has so extended that we require for offices and printing establishment the equivalent of an ordinary tenstory building. That we carried out the statement made as to contributions, both literary and pictorial, is proved by the appreciative friendship that has been shown the magazine by the public, the newspapers, and the advertisers.

Such facts speak louder than any theories or speculations, and show why the discussion as to the future of the ten-cent magazine has died out. There is nothing left to speculate about now.

The purpose of the founders of this magazine has been and is to bring within reach of a greater mass of readers than before enjoyed the opportunity, the fresh product of the best writers of fiction, the clear presentation of the latest and most far-reaching developments of science, the most vivid and human pictures of the great men and events of our history—in short, to give our readers from month to month a moving, living transcript of the intelligent, interesting, human endeavor of the time. We, like other men, wish to gain material success, but we want to gain it by those means which appeal to our intellectual as well as to our moral self-respect.

We are striving to make a wholesome, entertaining, stimulating magazine, and we are editing for our readers with the same sense of sympathetic responsibility as if the magazine were only intended for ourselves and our own kin.

THE MAGAZINE'S NEW CONTRIBUTIONS TO AMERICAN HISTORY.

Following an instinct which we have good reason to believe is shared by all of our readers, we have had as one of our foremost interests, in editing the magazine, the inspiring history of our own country. Our series of life portraits of great Americans, for instance, is positively the first full and adequate presentation of the real features of those sterling patriots whom we all honor and revere. Miss Tarbell's papers on the early life of Lincoln gave the first, and indeed the only, full and accurate account of Lincoln's youth and early manhood that the world has had. Mr. Hamlin Garland's series of papers did somewhat the same service for the early life of Grant. Then the papers which appeared in the magazine from time to time, on specific vital episodes or incidents in recent history, written by men who were themselves participants in the events they related, have brought to general knowledge facts and proceedings of the highest interest, that, but for these papers, might have gone forever unrecorded. We have sought, wherever there still survived a man whose own life has been a significant chapter in the history of the country, to have him tell the world his story in the pages of the magazine. Autobiographic history, in addition to being the most entertaining to read, is perhaps the most valuable. It is the one kind that is infallibly vivifying; it gives us the fact, hot and direct, from the hand of the one man capable of delivering it. In matter of this kind, by far our most important and interesting publication is one that is to begin in the next (November) number; namely,

C. A. DANA'S REMINISCENCES OF MEN AND EVENTS OF THE WAR.

Mr. Dana is one of the few men now living who was intimately associated with the important personages and events of the Civil War. Publishers and war students have long demanded from him his reminiscences of this period, and particularly his matured judgment on the three greatest actors in the struggle, Lincoln, Stanton, and Grant. But it is not until now that he has consented to give any one this important contribution to history.

The value and variety of Mr. Dana's memoirs are apparent when we consider that he was one of the first men called to a confidential position in the War Department by Edwin M. Stanton, and that he from first to last had the entire confidence of the great War Secretary. This confidence led to his appointment to many private missions, and it was his reports which influenced the action of the government at many critical periods. It was his full, unprejudiced account of Rosecrans's administration at Chattanooga, after the disaster of Chickamauga, which led to the retirement of that general; and it was his account of Thomas's skill and courage which led to Thomas's appointment to the head of the Army of the Cumberland. In company with Grant, Dana saw Admiral Porter's fleet run the Vicksburg batteries. At Grant's headquarters he saw the siege of Vicksburg, and at Grant's side he rode into the capitulated city. He was swept from the field of Chickamauga, and was present at the midnight council of war at the Widow Glenn's after the first day's battle.

Beside Grant, Thomas, and Granger, Mr. Dana beheld the battle of Missionary Ridge. At the special request of President Lincoln, he accompanied Grant throughout the second Peninsular campaign. Sheridan received his commission as Brigadier-General from Dana's hands. When Richmond surrendered, Dana went, at Stanton's request, to report the condition of the city and to secure Confederate documents. His last interview with Lincoln was on April 13th, the day before the President's assassination. He spent the night at Lincoln's death-bed, writing dispatches at Stanton's dictation. He was an important witness at the trial of the conspirators.

There will be embodied in Mr. Dana's papers numerous hitherto

UNPUBLISHED DOCUMENTS AND LETTERS,

including unpublished letters to Mr. Dana from Edward M. Stanton, Secretary of War: Stanton's confidential orders to Mr. Dana in regard to the treatment of Jefferson Davis at Fortress Monroe — now first made public; many confidential letters written at the request of the Secretary of War, and giving Mr. Dana's opinion of all the leading officers in Grant's army; unpublished letters to Mr. Dana from Generals Sherman and Grant; a long confidential dispatch to Mr. Stanton, now first published, relating what Mr. Dana saw of the transfer of Jefferson Davis to Fortress Monroe.

For the illustration of these reminiscences we are permitted to draw on the collection of

HITHERTO INACCESSIBLE WAR PHOTOGRAPHS

made and arranged for the government under the painstaking and invaluable direction of General A. W. Greely. In its great store of negatives and original historical documents it stands quite alone. Under the permission of the War Department we shall give our readers many of its priceless portraits of the great personages of the war. It seemed to us that the dignity and straightforwardness of these absolutely authentic human documents made them the only fitting illustrations of a text so close to real facts, so ruddy with real life, as Mr. Dana's reminiscences.

MISS TARBELL'S LATER LIFE OF LINCOLN.

We are glad to announce to our readers that Miss Tarbell has been making considerable progress in her work upon the last four years of Lincoln's life. Although these years cover the war period, the work is written entirely from the personal standpoint; it has to do with Lincoln, and it follows closely his footsteps, only dealing with the war and its events so far as he personally was concerned in molding them. It is our belief that these articles will make Lincoln the man, the great War President, more real, and the dramatic story of those last four years of his life more absorbing, than they have ever before been made.

THE NEWEST SCIENCE, INVENTION, AND EXPLORATION.

Always seeking for the significant discoveries or speculations which touch the edge of the future, the magazine has been the first to give authoritative and attractive accounts of many new scientific achievements. Every volume of the magazine furnishes illustrations of this policy. McClure's published the first full description of Professor Langley's "flying-machine," by the inventor himself. We had the first authoritative paper on the discovery and application of the X-rays, written from material furnished by Professor Roentgen; the first magazine account of Nansen's wonderful voyage to the Far North, of Professor Dewar's experiments in liquefying oxygen, of the discovery of the new element argon, etc. We shall soon publish an important paper,

LORD KELVIN ON PROBLEMS OF RECENT SCIENCE.

Lord Kelvin is the foremost living authority on physical science. While in America, at a meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, at Toronto, he gave Dr. Henry Smith Williams, with full permission to publish it in McClure's Magazine, an interview of real scientific interest. Their talk dwelt particularly upon the vortex theory of matter, of which Lord Kelvin is the author, and which is one of the few great scientific speculations of our century. The conversation also dealt with the upper limits of heat, and the suggested speculation in regard to the age of the sun; also with recent experiments in seeking for the absolute zero the lowest possible temperature. A character sketch of the personality of Lord Kelvin and an account of his achievements form the framework of this interview.

TELEGRAPHING WITHOUT WIRES.

Mr. W. H. Preece, Engineer-in-Chief of the Telegraph Department of the English Postal System, who has helped Marconi in developing the invention described in this magazine last March, has for many years been experimenting with methods for telegraphing without the use of wires. He is unmistakably the greatest expert of the world on this subject. The latest results of the experiments of the English postal authorities are of far-reaching importance, and the authoritative account which Mr. Preece gives of them in an article for McClure's forms a wonderful chapter in recent scientific history.

IN UNEXPLORED ASIA.

An illustrated account of Dr. Sven Hedin's adventures in the great desert of Chinese Turkestan, one of the most remarkable feats of exploration of the past year, will soon appear. The article is not only a contribution to knowledge, but contains a story of great human interest.

CHARACTER SKETCHES AND REAL CONVERSATIONS.

We have maintained from the foundation of the magazine, as one of its special features, the presentation of the great personalities of our own time. By series of portraits, conversations, and character studies, we have exhibited to our readers, in his actual every-day life, at the moment when they were most interested in him, the eminent living author, artist, statesman, scientist, business man, or inventor. We expect to publish in an early number, probably the November number, with numerous illustrations, a real conversation between

MARK TWAIN AND ROBERT BARR.

As we write this paragraph Mr. Barr is just returning to England from Lucerne, in Switzerland, where he has been visiting Mark Twain. His conversations with Mr. Clemens will form the basis of an article about the great humorist. Our readers, who are so well acquainted with Mr. Barr's work, with his humorous stories and his delightful articles, will realize that in this article they are sure to have a fresh, unconventional, and vivid presentation of Mark Twain.

THE BEST FICTION.

McClure's Magazine has been notable for its fiction. It has been the editor's purpose and his good fortune to get from the great writers of fiction of our day the best expression of their genius. It is our pride that in these few years we have published so much of the finest work of Stevenson, Kipling, Anthony Hope, and other masters of fiction. There will appear in the Christmas number

A TALE OF A CLOUDED TIGER BY RUDYARD KIPLING,

entitled, "The Tomb of his Ancestors." It is another powerful and absorbing tale of India. The extraordinary plot is as convincing and realistic as anything Kipling has ever written; and the young officer who is the hero of the tale is a character that one will be glad to know and remember. We have sought, by the collaboration of two artists of the first order, one with a strong grasp of the character of the human figure, the other with the imaginative instinct for dramatic composition and setting, to secure illustrations worthy of the tale, entirely novel, and certainly most interesting as an artistic experiment.

ANTHONY HOPE.

An event of much interest to the many readers of "The Prisoner of Zenda "is the coming of the author of that entrancing tale to the United States this month, to give public readings from his works. There is certainly no living writer of pure romance to be named with Anthony Hope. At a time when it seemed that no one could follow in the footsteps of Scott, Dumas, and Stevenson; that all that human invention could do in devising interesting complexities and situations had long since been done; Anthony Hope came quietly forward, and with only the men and conditions of our own day in mind, constructed stories that in novelty of incident, picturesqueness of character, and delightful, unexpected complications, compare with the great romances of the past. He proved that there was still no lack of good stories with a good story-teller at hand; and he found, in return, that the good story-teller has not to wait long for an audience.

THE SEQUEL TO "THE PRISONER OF ZENDA"

will begin publication in McClure's Magazine for December. It is entitled "Prince Rupert of Hentzau," and it takes the characters of "The Prisoner of Zenda," surely one of the most attractive groups of people created by a story writer, and carries them through a series of adventures even more dramatic and absorbing than those they underwent in the earlier book. The story is complete in itself; the first paragraphs put the reader in possession of all the knowledge of persons and events necessary to a full understanding of the tale.

It has been magnificently illustrated, in absolute sympathy with the text, by C. D. Gibson, with a series of page pictures, where our great American illustrator reveals a new and most important side of his talent. These pages, full of beauty and romantic spirit, are the most striking productions of Mr. Gibson's genius, and in themselves, while belonging intimately to the text, are artistic masterpieces.

GOOD STORIES BY NEW WRITERS.

We, who have had the distinction of publishing the first productions of Kipling and Hope in America, have always eagerly looked for and warmly welcomed spirited, stirring tales by writers still unknown to the public or to the older and more conservative publications. Only last February we published the first story that has appeared in a magazine of the young Western writer, W. A. White of the "Emporia Gazette," from whom we shall have