CORRESPONDENCE.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XI, Issue 3753, 6 March 1891, Page 2

CORRESPONDENCE.

IN DARKEST ENGLAND. (To the Editor). Sib, —Th e following may intcreß Mr W. W. Collins, and convince public of at leabt one error into wftch that gentleman has fallen : —"The Rev. 0. F. Aked has received the following letter from Mr W. T. Stead on the subject of General Booth's book: — I cannot write to you as you wish me to write, but I can tell you the exaot facts, which you can make use of if you deem it advisable. The book "In Darkest England" is General Booth's book; the idea of the book was entirely his own. He connived the title, and he set to work at writing it all himself. He hud accumulated a considerable mass of material when the illness of his wife, and the impossibility of getting, tbe matter compressed within requisite bounds led him to issue a cry of distress to me. He asked me if I could get him a literary back who would lick his material into shape, and get the book out in time. I said, ' I would do your hack-work myself," and I did— I was very proud to do it! That is all. I was verysorry that he acknowledged my services as he did in the preface. The form of words which would have covered the situation exactly, that I suggested, he refused. I proposed that he should merely, 'after thanking those who were in the Army who had assisted him in collecting facts and cases, have added an acknowledgment to another not in the Army, who had acted as scribe under my (general) orders, doing some journeyman work in preparing the book for the press. I have no wish to be mentioned in connection with my Bhare any more than the printer or the bookbinder is. It was amply sufficient reward to haveo hand in getting so noble n deliverance into type. I feel this all the more strongly beoause I bad be?n urging upon General Booth for years tar go on this track."—lam, etc,

Interested.