[Illustrated by A. I. Keller, Herbert Ward and the author.] For what this story attempts it is an unusually good example of the type. It is hardly a novel at all; merely a series of interesting tales and episodes woven around several picturesque and attractive characters. It owes direct lineage to the Tales of a Wayside Inn, though Mr. Smith has not been entirely the victim of a pedigree. {...] He has selected, as the starting point to the story, a group of hungry men who have been annually meeting at an old historic inn on the coast of France. [...] the talk covers, in fact, the entire range of human activities, from the psychology of fear to the justification of le mariage de convenance, with incidental side lights on hunting, eating, art, literature, love and religion.—From a review in The Bookman, October 1912
2561743The Arm-chair at the Inn1912F. Hopkinson Smith
THE ARM-CHAIR AT THE INN
BOOKS BY F. HOPKINSON SMITH Published by CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY
A. I. KELLER. HERBERT WARD
AND THE AUTHOR
NEW YORK CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 1912
Copyright, 1912, by
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
Published August, 1912
AUTHOR'S PREFACE
If I have dared to veil under a thin disguise some of the men whose talk and adventures fill these pages it is because of my profound belief that truth is infinitely more strange and infinitely more interesting than fiction. The characters around the table are all my personal friends; the incidents, each and every one, absolutely true, and the setting of the Marmouset, as well as the Inn itself, has been known to many hundreds of my readers, who have enjoyed for years the rare hospitality of its quaint and accomplished landlord.
