Page:Tex; a chapter in the life of Alexander Teixeira de Mattos (IA texchapterinlife00mcke).pdf/28

 slon of Fabre's natural history, which he lived to complete and which he himself regarded as his greatest achievement, for the later plays and essays of Maeterlinck, for the novels and stories of Ewald and for the novels of Couperus. These, however, formed only a part of his output; and his bibliography includes the names of Zola, Chateaubriand, de Tocqueville, President Kruger, Maurice Leblanc, Madame Leblanc, Streuvels and many more. One work alone ran to more than a million words; and he married on a commission to translate what he called "the longest book in any language".

The improvised censorship was not long suffered to function unmolested. The home secretary, learning that his majesty's mails were being opened without due authority, warned the unorthodox censors that they were incurring a heavy fine for each offence and advised them to regularize their position. Simultaneously, the Customs were thrown into difficulty and confusion, by the proclam-