After thrashing the beaten straw to dust on the following day, I agreed at length to give him another L50 down and another L50 later.

Even then he pretended to be very sorry indeed that I had taken what he called "his play," and assured me in the same breath that "Mr.and Mrs.Daventry" would be a rank failure: "Plays cannot be written by amateurs; plays require knowledge of the stage.

It's quite absurd of you, Frank, who hardly ever go to the theatre, to think you can write a successful play straight off.

I always loved the theatre, always went to every first night in London, have the stage in my blood," and so forth and so on.

I could not help recalling what he had told me years before, that when he had to write his first play for George Alexander, he shut himself up for a fortnight with the most successful modern French plays, and so learned his _metier_.
Next day I returned to London, understanding now something of the unreasonable persistence in begging which had aroused Lord Alfred Douglas' rage.
As soon as my play was advertised a crowd of people confronted me with claims I had never expected.