[Pg 47] [Pg 47] CHAPTER IV. HOW THE OVERLOOK PAPERS CAME TO BE WRITTEN. "I believe," said the Judge one morning shortly after my arrival, "that I must supply you with pen and paper, and assign to you a task." "What can I do? Tell me how to be useful." "Do not offer too hastily. Let me inform you of a custom which is observed here like the laws of the Medes and Persians. "All our guests, at our festival seasons, and I hope that whenever it can be in your power you will be present, are most seriously enjoined to bring with them a contribution to our Overlook Papers. From each is demanded a story, a poem, or an essay. In the evening these are read. And indeed, I require from each of my friends who receives an invitation, if he cannot accept it, still to transmit his paper. "These or copies of them are preserved in the huge book-case in the library. We sometimes draw upon the old collection, and it is pleasant to revive the old associations as they are again read to a happy circle. I ought to have sent you word, and told you to prepare[Pg 48] your paper. It is an unusual thing for me to be guilty of such an omission. As I have been negligent I must now enjoin you to prepare to do your part with the others." [Pg 48] "My dear sir, has ever any guest written a paper after his arrival here?" "Come! come! I have never asked any guest to do it after he came, who could probably accomplish it more easily than yourself." "What shall I write?" "Whatever you please. A Poem if you will." "I might make the attempt. But will poetry come 'under compulsion?' Surely not 'under compulsion.' Shall I cudgel my brains? Will Pegasus go at my will when I smite him with my staff? How long might I sit here, the image of despair, and what despair on monumental marble, as desolate as the poet with fixed eye, unable to indite a line? How long might I be like the hopeless bird—all promise, but
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