1891-09-22 to the Editor of the Pall Mall Gazette

Printed letter signed, Pall Mall Gazette (22 September 1891, page 2), 729 words

[Edited for paragraph breaks, capitalization, spelling and punctuation.]

[Friday] Sept. 18. [1891]

Sir

In reference to a letter which appeared in your issue of the 17th, allow me to say that it is quite true that when I was collecting material for my novel, A Mummer’s Wife, I was fortunate enough to meet Mr. James Glover.

He kindly related to me many anecdotes about himself and others while touring in the provinces with small opera companies. He told me, among other things, that it was the custom among these theatrical folk to pilfer buns and sandwiches from the refreshment bars; he told me too how on one occasion they had managed to secure an excellent lunch, free of cost, by sending an artfully worded telegram to the refreshment contractor. The narrative of the buns and the lunch is to be found in the tenth or eleventh chapter of A Mummer's Wife.

Mr. Glover also informed me that the theatrical companies with which he travelled in the capacity of musical director were in the habit of defrauding the railway companies, and he explained to me with much detail how the trick was done. Honour to him to whom honour is due!

Mr. Glover, it seems, wishes it to be known that he was the complaisant spectator of such adventures "in his Bohemian days." Very well: if he chooses to take the responsibility of connecting his name with them, I have no objection.

If I have made no mention of this matter before, it was on account of certain scruples which Mr. Glover will not readily understand; moreover, I did not think that the assistance that I have described could be considered by any one to constitute a literary claim. I may be wrong, but if I am, may not some descendant of the Dodger prefer a claim against Charles Dickens? "It was my father wot stole the ’wipe,* and werry cleverly he did it, too; as for the other bloke, he only ‘eard of it, and then ’e goes and writes a book and puts it in, and very much like as I told it ’im."

Mr. Mansel, the gentleman to whom Mr. Glover alludes, gave me much more information about travelling companies than Mr. Glover did, and it was owing to his amusing anecdotes that I was able to write the chapter in which I tell the story of the Constellation Company.

But if the claims of Messrs. Mansel and Glover are to be admitted to the authorship of A Mummer's Wife, there are many others whose claims are equally well founded. There is the old family servant, who gave me a graphic description of asthma, which I introduced into the first chapter; there is the dressmaker who explained to me the mysteries of dressmaking (see second and third chapters); there is the guide who took me through the Hanley potteries and told me all about the painting and baking of porcelain. And this by no means exhausts the list of those whose knowledge of technicalities I turned to account in A Mummer's Wife.

In the book I am now writing, Mother and Child, I am availing myself of the experiences of servants, jockeys, betting men, and pot¬boys. Shall I have to keep a list of the names of these collaborateurs, and point out in the appendix exactly where and how the experiences of each assisted me in the composition of the book?

Regarding the other charges Mr. Glover brings against me, I have little to say; they are so many and so various that I will not waste your space and my time in disproving them. But among them there is one so grossly false, and, at the same time, so easily disproved, that I will ask you to allow me to point it out.

Mr. Glover says that I wrote an article in the Fortnightly Review praising Beau Austin in order to induce Mr. Tree to accept a play called The Strike at Arlingford. Mr. Tree had definitely decided not to produce The Strike at Arlingford long before he produced Beau Austin. Mr. Tree and my collaborateur, Mr. Arthur Kennedy, will testify to the truth of this statement.

I am, Sir, truly yours,

GEORGE MOORE.