From Trafalgar Square through Westminster's Strand Street, past the Church of Our Lady and St Clermont's Church, along this street almost parallel to the River Thames all the way to the east, looking up to the south, the Thames mansions are lined up, since the Duke of Normandy 'William' the Conqueror defeated King Harold in the Battle of Hastings to come to London, Strand Street has gradually become a gathering place for London's political and religious leaders.

Almost half of the 26 clergy seats in the House of Lords own property here, and many former and current cabinet ministers have also bought properties here.

Because there are so many dignitaries and dignitaries living here, when the local diocese holds a diocesan council to elect a respected church elder, it is occasionally possible to see a few former prime ministers or a group of former cabinet ministers appearing on the list of candidates.

Due to the political importance of Strand Street in London's political and religious circles, it is natural that other agglomerations have spawned in its vicinity.

For example, the London Temple Church, located in the heart of the City of London, the Palace of Westminster and Whitehall, but next to Strand Street, was built in the 12th century and was the headquarters of the Knights Templar in England.

However, due to the fact that Henry VIII had a falling out with the Holy See for divorce, he naturally ordered the Knights Templar property to be confiscated and leased out to a group of London lawyers who valued the special location.

Although the clergy and lawyers fought over the ownership of the Temple Church for centuries, the two groups finally came to an agreement through the mediation of James I, and the ownership of the church was given to the lawyers, but the lawyers had to bear the cost of maintaining the church forever and not interfere with its function of providing religious services.

After obtaining the title, the lawyers not only opened a law firm here, but also conducted legal education in the temple church, where two of the four major law houses in London, the Middle Temple and the Inner Temple, originated.

The lawyers took the lead in seizing the Temple Church, and after the improvement of printing technology, all kinds of big newspapers and tabloids sprung up in the streets of London, and newspaper reporters who were highly sensitive to the timeliness of the news naturally followed the smell and moved to the side of Strand Street, where dignitaries gathered, in an effort to get first-hand reliable information.

Drawing on the tradition of Western journalists running fast, they began to congregate on Fleet Street, east of Strand Street, as early as the 17th century, and by the 19th century, Fleet Street had become the heart of the entire British news and magazine scene.

Almost every British newspaper you can name has its headquarters here, and even if it is not based in London, it has to have a permanent office in Fleet Street.

Blackwood, a pioneer of British literary magazines that originated in Edinburgh, was not to be outdone, and they also set up a London office here with professional literary editors, cashiers, accountants and other staff.

In the office at this time, Arthur and Elder sat on the chairs in the editor-in-chief's office, looking at the big-bellied middle-aged man sitting at the desk and wearing gold-rimmed glasses.

The middle-aged man had all the necessary characteristics of an English gentleman, a neat white shirt and black trousers, a pocket watch tucked into his pocket to reveal a half-gold chain, and a head that was smooth and shiny, but unusually stubborn with three hairs.

Elder winked at Arthur and motioned for him to look at the three hairs that were blown by the wind and fluttered like the flag of the Royal Navy, but Arthur ignored his hints, not because he didn't value the friendship between the two, but because he feared that if he looked at them any more, he would be blinded by those three hairs, so that he would forget the purpose of being here today.

The middle-aged man leaned back in his office chair, flipped through Alexandre Dumas's manuscript in his hand, and finally shook his head with some pity.

Seeing his expression, Arthur felt bad, and he couldn't help but ask, "Mr. Wallace, do you think this manuscript looks okay?" ”

Wallace put down the manuscript, propped his hands on the table and shook his head, "Before answering this question, I would like to ask you, are you a loyal reader of Blackwood?" Or have you had a preliminary understanding of our magazine? ”

If Wallace had asked this question a while ago, Arthur would have really been hard to answer him. Because he really didn't buy Blackwood much, and as a Scottish Yard cop with a meager income and a mortgage, he had to be smart when it came to buying books.

While serving as a patrol officer, most of Arthur's salary was contributed to the combination of political and entertainment such as "Scourge", "Police Chronicle", and "Poor Man's Political Monthly", as well as newspapers and magazines related to his work.

He didn't really have the time and energy to care about a magazine like Blackwood, which emphasized literary character and literary criticism.

After all, very few people would be willing to take a precious break after fourteen or five hours of work to find out the connection between romantic and realist literature, and Blackwood's main readership basically shows this, and most of the gentlemen and ladies who will buy it are gentlemen and ladies above the middle class.

But fortunately, in order to investigate Mr. Disraeli's life a while ago, Arthur deliberately bought several issues of "Blackwood" in the second-hand bookstore that attacked him, so at this time Wallace asked, he was not ignorant.

After a few brief questions, Wallace leaned back in his chair with his hands folded: "It seems that you do know what type of magazine we are. In that case, you should know that in the previous issues I personally wrote a critique of The Count of Monte Cristo in the magazine. ”

Speaking of this, Wallace took out a copy of the magazine stack on the tableside, skillfully turned to the marked page, and pointed to the original text on it.

"Thousands of readers open their wallets, spend their money on paid reading, anxiously waiting for one shoddy, sick-free, disgusting fabrication to be produced like garbage from the 'literary factory'. These fashions, which claimed to encapsulate the essence of the noble life and were written by brilliant masters, brought Britain's literary world to miasma. ”

After speaking, Wallace couldn't help but criticize two more sentences: "Sir, what we publish here is poetry, prose, and literary criticism, as well as reflection and satire on social phenomena.

Perhaps, this book "The Count of Monte Cristo" seems interesting to you, but in my eyes it is a piece of rubbish out of haste work.

There is no thought in the book, the beginning is a love story of a French sailor, is it intended to describe the love and hate between several families later? Come on! That's the way it was written during Shakespeare's time, times have changed, and I don't want you to have any new ideas, but we have to at least write something new.

Secondly, the rhetoric of the article is not flowery, and it can even be said to be bad. The sentence structure used in this book is so simple that I suspect that it may have been written by a child who is still in grammar school, but the author uses a lot of short sentences to cover it up, but this fools others and can't fool me.

And this guy doesn't pay attention to the details of the article, and often puts a lot of descriptions in unnecessary places, just a simple dinner, as for the lobster shells are written so clearly? He likes lobster shells so much that he might as well be a cook. I have a deep suspicion that the author may have done this in order to print two more pages and sell them for a good price.

Of course, if you insist on submitting your article after listening to this, I won't continue to advise you, but I would suggest that you should change to another magazine. For the sake of your friend of Mrs. Norton, I'll recommend you a suitable one, and you can try to vote for the Magazine Monthly, where the requirements are a little more relaxed. ”

If it weren't for Arthur's raid tutoring for literary magazines some time ago, maybe he really thought Wallace was helping him.

But as far as he knew, "Magazine Monthly" was Blackwood's main competitor, and the two sides often mocked each other in their own magazines, and the subtext of Wallace's words was actually no different than telling him to hurry up and get the manuscript out.

He was about to argue with the other party, but before he could think of it, Elder spoke first, "That's right, Mr. Wallace. I think Blackwood really should maintain its high standards of submission, and I support you on that. I don't really see anything good about the Count of Monte Cristo, and I have written a literary criticism about it, how about you take a look? ”

With that, Elder handed over the manuscript with a grin.

Wallace didn't intend to look at it, but for Elder to agree with him, he had to pinch his nose and glance twice.

After a while, his brow furrowed, and he slapped the manuscript on the table: "Now I feel that maybe 'The Count of Monte Cristo' isn't so bad." ”

"What did you say?" Eld jumped up from his chair, he grabbed the other party's neckline, and almost punched him twice: "Believe it or not, I threw you directly through the window into the fleet river next to me?" ”

Wallace, taken aback by Elder's Royal Navy temper, warned, "I...... I advise you to calm down, we are a literary magazine, not a place for ruffians to fight. If you insist on doing this, I'll call the police!" ”

"Police? You can't call the superintendent today! ”

Elder looked really angry, and he was about to raise his hand to slap the fat man twice, but before he could do so, Arthur stopped him.

Arthur grabbed him by the collar and dragged him back to his chair: "Forget it, since he doesn't want to make money, then we don't have to force him." ”

Then he turned to Wallace and said, "Then, sir, we'll see you back." ”

He dragged the unhappy Elder out, and just opened the door, Arthur and Elder were stunned, they looked at the little man standing outside the door and raised their eyebrows in surprise: "Charles, what are you doing here?" ”

Dickens was holding a manuscript of "The Pickwick Papers" in his hand, and looked at the two in surprise: "Arthur, Elder , are you two also here to contribute?" ”

Arthur shrugged, he got up and took the manuscript from Dickens's hand and glanced at it, and then quipped: "Charles, don't bother, I just inquired, people don't accept fashion here." ”

"Is that so...... Alas, that can't be helped, it's a big deal that I'll change the magazine to social vote. ”

When Dickens heard this, he couldn't help but be a little disappointed, but he quickly accepted the reality, after all, he had experienced many things that were more severe than this blow over the years.

He turned to a young man sitting in the hall and shouted, "Mr. Tennyson, I have been rejected, and it will be your turn next." ”

"Tennyson?"

When Elder heard the name, he stretched out his head and glanced out, and as soon as his eyes met the face, he couldn't help but look down and spit out: "What a fucking bad luck today!" How can you really be that Cambridge kid! ”

But when Arthur saw Tennyson, he didn't react as violently as Elder, he first glanced at "The Count of Monte Cristo" in his hand, and then at Dickens's "The Pickwick Papers", and finally his wandering eyes focused on Tennyson, who had a restrained smile.

Suddenly, Arthur slapped his face and couldn't help shouting, "There is." ”

(End of chapter)