“And so you advise me to make love to the English girl, do you?” asked the Tutor.
Number Five laughed. It was not a loud laugh, she never laughed noisily; it was not a very hearty laugh; the idea did not seem to amuse her much.
“No,” she said, “I won't take the responsibility. Perhaps this is a case in which the true reading of Gay's line would be--
“There are several young women in the world besides our two Annexes.”
I question whether the Tutor had asked those questions very seriously, and I doubt if Number Five thought he was very much in earnest.
One of The Teacups reminded me that I had promised to say something of my answers to certain questions. So I began at once:
I have given the name of brain-tappers to the literary operatives who address persons whose names are well known to the public, asking their opinions or their experiences on subjects which are at the time of general interest. They expect a literary man or a scientific expert to furnish them materials for symposia and similar articles, to be used by them for their own special purposes. Sometimes they expect to pay for the information furnished them; at other times, the honor of being included in a list of noted personages who have received similar requests is thought sufficient compensation. The object with which the brain-tapper puts his questions may be a purely benevolent and entirely disinterested one. Such was the object of some of those questions which I have received and answered. There are other cases, in which the brain-tapper is acting much as those persons do who stop a physician in the street to talk with him about their livers or stomachs, or other internal arrangements, instead of going to his office and consulting him, expecting to pay for his advice. Others are more like those busy women who, having the generous intention of making a handsome present to their pastor, at as little expense as may be, send to all their neighbors and acquaintances for scraps of various materials, out of which the imposing “bedspread” or counterpane is to be elaborated.
That is all very well so long as old pieces of stuff are all they call for, but it is a different matter to ask for clippings out of new and uncut rolls of cloth. So it is one thing to ask an author for liberty to use extracts from his published writings, and it is a very different thing to expect him to write expressly for the editor's or compiler's piece of literary patchwork.