Quote of the day

"The generous reception accorded by both the British and American press and public to Mr McCarthy's previous volume, Incidents in the Life of a Mining Engineer (1918), induced the publishers to beg the author to continue his account of his travels, adventures, and impressions of countries and localities of which comparatively little is known to the general reader. They are pleased to say that Mr McCarthy readily adopted their suggestion, and the present volume, Further Incidents in the Life of a Mining Engineer, is the result. The publishers believe that it will be found even more interesting than its predecessor, which is making a considerable claim for it."

From the preface to a book found on shelves at the lodge we were staying in recently in Scotland. The publishers in question were my current employers - somehow I don't see our commissioning editors begging an author to write such a book these days...