No doubt they thought it a good reason.

Had I known it at the time I should have repudiated the base insinuation with scorn.

For I humbly conceived that I was a poet of the first water; and had indeed corrected a great many mistakes in Wordsworth and other writers, and written fifty-six or fifty-seven sonnets before ever the club was thought of.

And Stray himself, who was accounted our Laureate, had only written thirty-four, and they averaged quite a line less than mine! Be that as it may, I was secretary of the club, and to that circumstance the reader is indebted for the treat to which I am about to admit him.
For in my official capacity I became custodian of not a few of the poetical aspirations of our members; and as, after the abatement of the disease, they none of them demanded back their handiwork--if poetry can ever be called handiwork--these effusions have remained in my charge ever since.
Some of them are far too sacred and tender for publication, and of others, at this distance of time, I confess I can make nothing at all.
But there lies a batch before me which will serve as a specimen of our talents, and can hardly hurt the feelings of any one responsible for their production.
Our club, as I have said, was highly competitive in its operations.

It by no means contented us each to follow his own course and woo his own muse.