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attempting to get some man made a policeman
and threatening to use the reportorial power he had in
being �down upon� the officers in case of refusal. One
wrote to Hudson, who expelled Edge. What a con-
trast must his recent experience of Paris, in connection
with Morphy, present to his former visit, when he ran
away from home, lived in a garret and obtained ad-
mission to the theatres by joining the claque! He�ll be
sure to turn up in New York again, some day. Of
all cities in the world it would suit him best.
Watson, of �Frank Leslie�s,� told me a good thing
to-day, apropos of old Park Benjamin, who once,
for a week or two, �edited� Leslie�s paper. After
his usual fashion he did nothing but append para-
graphs of two or three lines each to prodigious scissor-
ings, which paragraphs the compositors subsequently
stuck up on the walls under the caption of�Gens
from Park Benjamin!� Leslie seduced by his �blow-
ing� about what he would do, and his quasi-reputa-
tion (based on the �New World,� twenty years ago)
engaged him at $50 a week, I�ve heard � much
the same case as Roberts�. Benjamin did a still
more rascally thing which I may have chronicled before.
He sold a story to Frank Leslie for over $100, which
story subsequently was discovered to have been written
by some New Orleans man, who had sent it to Ben-
jamin�s �literary agency.� The old thief either had
never communicated with the author, or told him