MORE MEREDITH MEMORIES.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1645, 11 January 1913, Page 9

MORE MEREDITH MEMORIES.

:Vln a conversation,.with George Meredith, .which ho .'noy? reports in the•, "North American Review," J. P. Collins, literary editor of the "Pall Mall Gazette," "had the temerity" to ask 1 the novelist what was his.favourite book as a boy. Meredith mentioned several of the older favourites, and then smiled and neld up a warning' finger, his usual signal that; ha was not.to.be quoted after which he went on: "Thero was one book I was fond, of when I was quite a small follow, and that was • a story called "The Boy Crustfe.' I forget who wrote it, and can't imagine why. I believe it was a woman. It was a,strange andi bewildering affair." And, with increasing relish in the recollection, he entered upon a burlesque of the narrative, winding up to a tremendous passage of. revenge on tho edge of a lake or somewhere, where the villain was inconsequently melted by the playing of' a flute. Mr. Collins, was reminded of tho tin-whistle idyll in :"Richard Feverel." Meredith laughed and cohtimfed: "At last some 'flne gave mo .'The Arabian Nights,' and 'I lived and lrral in them until I said to myself, 'Why, I can write ,a story in. that vein,' and I wrote a (book called. 'The Shaving of Shagpat.' >■ That was years afterwards, and there are, people who read it still." This remote way of talking of his books, comments Mr. Collins, "was-the only trace of mannerism'in his humour I perceived, and innocent enough it was to one who had seen something of the weak side of authorship, its unbridled egotism, its affectation of humility or neglected worth, and a ceremonial manner, of rip-' proaching its own concerns, air in tho. manner' of the artless Mr. Crummies." An interesting part •of Meredith's talk upon this occasion was his account of a piece of advice, which he had once received from Carlyle: "I was bold enough to show some of my early works to Carlyle, and he advised me to turn to Tiistory as the.repository of facts. I said to-him, with all deference,. I thought,there were greater things in the worldf than facts. He turned on mo and said, 'But facts are truth and truth is facts.' I said: 'No, pardon me. If I may say so, truth I'take to be tho broad heaven above, and petty doings .of mankind which we call facts.' He gave me a smile of pity, for my youth, as I suppose, and then said, 'Ah weel, if yo liko to talk in that poetic way ye "may; but ye'll find it in your gest interest, young man, to stick tofahcts.'"