Star of Mercia

There are three reading-publics to which a tale-writer whoattempts the uncertain business of writing about Wales mayappeal. One is the homebred Welsh public that asks for a talein the old tongue, yr hen iaith, and has never been quitesatisfied, I believe, by any novel or short story about its life, orits real or romantic concerns, written in English. The second isthe quasi-Celtic public, which may or may not know theMabinogion or Borrow's Wild Wales, and is glad of anythingthat gets the romance atmosphere. The third is the ordinaryfiction-loving English public, which asks for a good story, ratherlikes a Welsh background as in Blackmore's Maid of Sker (amuch better book than Lorna Doone to my mind), and doesnot trouble about the fidelity of the local colour in the reality ofthe setting. It is from the second and third of these audiencesthat Miss Devereux can look to gain her "creel-full of listeners,"as the story of The Yellow Hag has it.