A PROTEST
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] Sia,—Only once before, during my long—perhaps too long— literary, life, have I written to an editor to protest against what I ,held to be unfair treatment. A reviewer summarily condemned a novel of 'thine because, so he said; he could take no interest in a hero who cheated at cards. I felt myself that any " hero " who cheated at cards would arrest my interest, but in self-defence I had to ask the editor of the paper why his reviewer had accused my hero of such a misdemeanour when cards were not once mentioned in the book. He made a most handsome apology. His reviewer had confounded my novel with another. As an amende honorable he placed me on the " free list " for a year. I am not suggesting for a moment that you should do the same. When I lived on a cattle ranch in California forty years ago, I was a subscriber to the Spectator ; and because your paper is dear to me I write these lines.
You sent my latest book, The Best of England, which, as I am careful to point out, is merely what is " best " to me, to a reviewer who stigmatizes what I think " best " as worst, because he happens to dislike, or even detest, what he calls " blood sports." Now my book deals with hunting, stalking, fishing and shooting. Is it fair on my publisher or me to send such a book to a man who is bound, conscientiously, to decry such sports ? Would you send my friend's book, The Art of Good Living (Andre Simon), to a vegetarian and Prohibitionist to review ? Did you send Siegfried Sassomes book about fox-hunting to the reviewer who has dealt, according to his lights, with my chapters on sport ? I have no bone to pick with him. It was his duty to protest against what he sincerely believes to be wrong. I submit to you that no book should be sent for review to any man or woman who, before he reads it, is conscientiously opposed to what is in it.
[We have carefully reread our notice. In view of the Spectator's consistent attitude on the subject of cruelty to animals, we do not think that we owe Mr. Vachell an apology, and we endorse our reviewer's point of view that " blood sports " are not the " best " of England.—En. Spectator.]
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