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 CHAPTER XIV

"TEMPORAL POWER"

This, Marie Corelli's latest work, appeared on August 28th, 1902, the first edition totalling up to the unprecedented number of 120,000 copies. We understand that, since the primary issue, a further 30,000 copies have been printed. Thus it comes about that in spite of all the newspaper invective of which she has been the victim and the verbal flood-*gates that have been opened upon her, Marie Corelli has with her latest production broken the book-*selling record for a six-shilling volume on its first appearance.

"Temporal Power" is not an inviting name. As a schoolmiss would say, "It sounds dry." It has not the mystery-suggesting flavor of "The House on the Marsh" or the thrilling and adventuresome qualities of a title like "Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea"; yet "Temporal Power," despite its appellation, is, at the time of writing, the most-talked-about book in the world.

"For," to quote Marie Corelli, "it must be borne in mind that 'Temporal Power' are the two daz