Every word of this was written at sea,
during the two months required for our voyage, and was done day by
day--with the intermission of one day's illness--for eight weeks,
at the rate of 66 pages of manuscript in each week, every page of
manuscript containing 250 words. Every word was counted. I have
seen work come back to an author from the press with terrible
deficiencies as to the amount supplied. Thirty-two pages have
perhaps been wanted for a number, and the printers with all their
art could not stretch the matter to more than twenty-eight or -nine!
The work of filling up must be very dreadful. I have sometimes been
ridiculed for the methodical details of my business. But by these
contrivances I have been preserved from many troubles; and I have
saved others with whom I have worked--editors, publishers, and
printers--from much trouble also.
A month or two after my return home, Lady Anna appeared in The
Fortnightly, following The Eustace Diamonds. In it a young girl,
who is really a lady of high rank and great wealth, though in her
youth she enjoyed none of the privileges of wealth or rank, marries
a tailor who had been good to her, and whom she had loved when she
was poor and neglected. A fine young noble lover is provided for
her, and all the charms of sweet living with nice people are thrown
in her way, in order that she may be made to give up the tailor.
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