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 I pretend to no literary excellence or style. In these pages I talk to you in the language of men on the quarter-deck, in the reporter's room, 'round the camp-fire, in the bush, in the theatre and in everyday life.

My i's are not dotted nor my t's crossed any more than they would be were I recounting these stories viva vocaviva voce [sic]. Such niceties are the attributes of fiction rather than fact. But if I have helped in these pages, to lighten the dullness of even a minute of your time, I shall have done well, and so I leave you to go ahead and read my book, or not, just as you please.