i paid a visit yesterday to the model village of syndicate, founded by mr. s. s. mcclure for the benefit of the literary hands employed in his great enterprises, and i am bound to say that in point of neatness, order, and the completeness of its sanitary arrangements it is infinitely superior to the similar town of pullman or any of the colonies established by the late baron hirsch.

it is situated on a bit of rising ground that overlooks the hackensack river, the site having been chosen with a view to economy and convenience in the shipping of material by water. the village[pg 300] has been in existence a little less than two years, but it already has a population of nearly four thousand able-bodied authors, poets and syndicate hands, together with their wives and families, most of whom do their work in the village, though fully a hundred go each day to the mcclure factory, in twenty-fifth street, returning in the evening in time to take part in the social life of the community.

on the banks of the river mr. mcclure has built a dock and warehouse for the reception and storage of goods. yesterday the scene on the water-front was an animated one. a bark from palestine, manned by the swarthy children of the east, was discharging its cargo of photographs of the holy land, reminiscences of the hebrew patriarchs, bales of straw garnered by boaz especially for the mcclure monthly, and other raw materials to be used in the[pg 301] literary works. in the offing i saw the fleet canal-boat potato bug, hailing from galesburg, ill., and laden with hitherto unpublished photographs of ulysses s. grant and recollections of that warrior, and of his uncles, his aunts, his progenitors, his progeny, his man-servant, his maid-servant, his cattle, and the reporter within his gates.

at the same time a stanch schooner was receiving its cargo of serials, short stories, poems, and memoirs, destined for the new york office. i observed that the greatest care was exercised by the men in the work of stowing away the cargo, the ship having previously been ballasted with humorous articles and pungent literary reviews.

i found the village apparently deserted; only the smoke from the chimneys showed me that the place was inhabited. but very soon the noon whistle blew, and almost immediately[pg 302] the streets swarmed with well-fed, cheerful literary toilers. i was deeply impressed with the evidences of contentment and happiness that greeted me on every side. in the bright faces that smiled into mine i saw nothing to remind me of the sullen, low-browed, haggard literary weavers that one encounters at the authors’ club, or that may be seen lurking in the doorways of union square, with poems clutched in their toil-stained hands.

some of the work is done in the shops under the supervision of foremen, but there is a great deal of piece-work given out and taken by the authors to their homes. nearly a hundred hands are kept constantly busy on the grant memoirs, under the careful supervision of mr. hamlin garland. near by, working under glass, i saw half a dozen pallid young men, all recent discoveries of mr. w. d. howells. the work of these[pg 303] spring lambs will be placed upon mr. mcclure’s counters at an early day.

with mr. mcclure’s permission i talked with several of the authors and questioned them closely in regard to the wages paid them and the conveniences and luxuries that the village of syndicate affords to its inhabitants. nearly every one of these frankly said that he preferred his life there to the more diverting existence in the congested sections of new york. “and,” he replied, “mr. mcclure frequently drafts off a squad of us for some special work in new york, and that makes a very pleasant variety in our lives. we are conveyed in a small steamboat from here to the foot of twenty-fifth street, and then transferred to the factory, near lexington avenue, where we work until four o’clock, when we are returned in the same manner. sometimes, when there is a great pressure of work on hand, the[pg 304] cabin of the steamboat is fitted up with benches and we do piece-work, both coming and going, thus adding considerably to our pay.”

at one o’clock the factory whistle blew again and the men returned to their work. mr. mcclure took me through one of the large buildings and explained every detail of the work to me. every morning the foreman goes from bench to bench and gives an idea to each author. just before noon he passes along again and carefully examines the unfinished work, and, late in the afternoon, a final inspection is made, after which the goods are packed and sent down to the wharf for shipment.

i inquired whether there was any truth in the report that several authors had been taken with severe illness immediately after beginning work at syndicate, whereupon the foreman explained that this had happened several times,[pg 305] but it had always resulted from giving an author a whole idea all at once—something to which very few of them had ever been accustomed.

i learned, also, that child labor is strictly prohibited on the mcclure property. this was rather a surprise to me, for i have been a diligent reader of “mcclure’s magazine” ever since it was started. the art department has not been put into working order yet, but there is a large blacksmith shop near the village, which is celebrated for the inferior quality of its work, and, as its proprietor and foreman are both drinking, shiftless men, the place will probably develop into an art shop, in which case it will turn out all the pictures for the magazine and syndicate.

as i was taking my leave, my attention was drawn to several large oat fields in the neighborhood of the village, and i was thereby led to suspect that mr.[pg 306] mcclure was turning out literature by horse-power.

“not at all,” he said, when i questioned him on the subject. “everything here is made by hand, but i have made a contract with a padrone for a force of scotch dialect authors, whom i must feed, clothe, and house while they are writing for me. i expect them within a week. i shall put them at once on a serial called ‘blithe jockie’s gane awee,’ which will be my ‘feature’ for the coming year.”