Part 15

I hope you all had a good Thanksgiving at Upshack. (That is my name for Sloots' place. It will be understood by anyone that has walked to it from Montesano, carrying a basket of grub on a hot day.)

I trust Sterling got his waistcoat and trousers in time to appear at his uncle's dinner in other outer garments than a steelpen coat. * * * I am glad you like (or like to have) the books. You would have had all my books when published if I had supposed that you cared for them, or even knew about them. I am now encouraged to hope that some day you and Carlt and Sloots may be given the light to see the truth at the heart of my "views" (which I have expounded for half a century) and will cease to ally yourselves with what is most hateful to me, socially and politically. I shall then feel (in my grave) that perhaps, after all, I knew how to write. Meantime, run after your false fool gods until you are tired; I shall not believe that your hearts are really in the chase, for they are pretty good hearts, and those of your gods are nests of nastiness and heavens of hate.

Now I feel better, and shall drink a toddy to the tardy time when those whom I love shall not think me a perverted intelligence; when they shall not affirm my intellect and despise its work--confess my superior understanding and condemn all its fundamental conclusions. Then we will be a happy family--you and Carlt in the flesh and Sloots and I in our bones.

* * * * *

My health is excellent in this other and better world than California.

God bless you.

AMBROSE.

[Washington, D. C., December 22, 1910.]

DEAR CARLT,

You had indeed "something worth writing about"--not only the effect of the impenitent mushroom, but the final and disastrous overthrow of that ancient superstition, Sloots' infallibility as a mushroomer. As I had expected to be at that dinner, I suppose I should think myself to have had "a narrow escape." Still, I wish I could have taken my chance with the rest of you.

How would you like three weeks of nipping cold weather, with a foot of snow? That's what has been going on here. Say, tell Sloots that the front footprints of a rabbit-track

are made by the animal's hind feet, straddling his forelegs. Could he have learned that important fact in California, except by hearsay? Observe (therefore) the superiority of this climate.

* * * * *

AMBROSE.

[Washington, D. C., January 26, 1911.]

DEAR LORA,

I have just received a very affectionate letter from * * * and now know that I did her an injustice in what I carelessly wrote to you about her incivility to me after I had left her. It is plain that she did not mean to be uncivil in what she wrote me on a postal card which I did not look at until I was in the train; she just "didn't know any better." So I have restored her to favor, and hope that you will consider my unkind remarks about her as unwritten. Guess I'm addicted to going off at half-cock anyhow.

Affectionately, AMBROSE.

[Washington, D. C., February 3, 1911.]

DEAR LORA,

I have the Yosemite book, and Miss Christiansen has the Mandarin coat. I thank you very much. The pictures are beautiful, but of them all I prefer that of Nanny bending over the stove. True, the face is not visible, but it looks like you all over.

I'm filling out the book with views of the Grand Canyon, so as to have my scenic treasures all together. Also I'm trying to get for you a certain book of Canyon pictures, which I neglected to obtain when there. You will like it--if I get it.

Sometime when you have nothing better to do--don't be in a hurry about it--will you go out to Mountain View cemetery with your camera and take a picture of the grave of Elizabeth (Lily) Walsh, the little deaf mute that I told you of? I think the man in the office will locate it for you. It is in the Catholic part of the cemetery--St. Mary's. The name Lily Walsh is on the beveled top of the headstone which is shaped like this:

You remember I was going to take you there, but never found the time.

Miss Christiansen says she is writing, or has written you. I think the coat very pretty.

Affectionately, AMBROSE.

[Washington, D. C., February 15, 1911.]

DEAR GEORGE,

As to the "form of address." A man passing another was halted by the words: "You dirty dog!" Turning to the speaker, he bowed coldly and said: "Smith is my name, sir." _My_ name is Bierce, and I find, on reflection, that I like best those who call me just that. If my christen name were George I'd want to be called _that_; but "Ambrose" is fit only for mouths of women--in which it sounds fairly well.

_How_ are you my master? I never read one of your poems without learning something, though not, alas, how to make one.

Don't worry about "Lilith"; it will work out all right. As to the characters not seeming alive, I've always fancied the men and women of antiquity--particularly the kings, and great ones generally--should not be too flesh-and-bloody, like the "persons whom one meets." A little coldness and strangeness is very becoming to them. I like them to _stalk_, like the ghosts that they are--our modern passioning seems a bit anachronous in them. Maybe I'm wrong, but I'm sure you will understand and have some sympathy with the error.

Hudson Maxim takes medicine without biting the spoon. He had a dose from me and swallowed it smiling. I too gave him some citations of great poetry that is outside the confines of his "definition"--poetry in which are no tropes at all. He seems to lack the _feel_ of poetry. He even spoils some of the "great lines" by not including enough of the context. As to his "improvements," fancy his preference for "the fiercest spirit of _the warrior host_" to "the fiercest spirit _that fought in Heaven_"! O my!

Yes, Conrad told me the tale of his rescue by you. He gave me the impression of hanging in the sky above billows unthinkably huge and rocks inconceivably hard.

* * * * *

Of course I could not but be pleased by your inclusion of that sonnet on me in your book. And, by the way, I'm including in my tenth volume my _Cosmopolitan_ article on the "Wine" and my end of the controversy about it. All the volumes of the set are to be out by June, saith the publisher. He is certainly half-killing me with proofs--mountains of proofs! * * *

Yes, you'll doubtless have a recruit in Carlt for your Socialist menagerie--if he is not already a veteran exhibit. Your "party" is recruited from among sore-heads only. There are some twenty-five thousand of them (sore-heads) in this neck o' woods--all disloyal--all growling at the Government which feeds and clothes them twice as well as they could feed and clothe themselves in private employment. They move Heaven and Earth to get in, and they never resign--just "take it out" in abusing the Government. If I had my way nobody should remain in the civil service more than five years--at the end of that period all are disloyal. Not one of them cares a rap for the good of the service or the country--as we soldiers used to do on thirteen dollars a month (with starvation, disease and death thrown in). Their grievance is that the Government does not undertake to maintain them in the style to which they choose to accustom themselves. They fix their standard of living just a little higher than they can afford, and would do so no matter what salary they got, as all salary-persons invariably do. Then they damn their employer for not enabling them to live up to it.

If they can do better "outside" why don't they go outside and do so; if they can't (which means that they are getting more than they are worth) what are they complaining about?

What this country needs--what every country needs occasionally--is a good hard bloody war to revive the vice of patriotism on which its existence as a nation depends. Meantime, you socialers, anarchists and other sentimentaliters and futilitarians will find the civil-service your best recruiting ground, for it is the Land of Reasonless Discontent. I yearn for the strong-handed Dictator who will swat you all on the mouths o' you till you are "heard to cease." Until then--How? (drinking.)

Yours sincerely, AMBROSE BIERCE.

[Washington, D. C., February 19, 1911.]

DEAR LORA,

Every evening coffee is made for me in my rooms, but I have not yet ventured to take it from _your_ cup for fear of an accident to the cup. Some of the women in this house are stark, staring mad about that cup and saucer, and the plate.

I am very sorry Carlt finds his position in the civil service so intolerable. If he can do better outside he should resign. If he can't, why, that means that the Government is doing better for him than he can do for himself, and you are not justified in your little tirade about the oppression of "the masses." "The masses" have been unprosperous from time immemorial, and always will be. A very simple way to escape that condition (and the _only_ way) is to elevate oneself out of that incapable class.

You write like an anarchist and say that if you were a man you'd _be_ one. I should be sorry to believe that, for I should lose a very charming niece, and you a most worthy uncle.

You say that Carlt and Grizzly are not Socialists. Does that mean that _they_ are anarchists? I draw the line at anarchists, and would put them all to death if I lawfully could.

But I fancy your intemperate words are just the babbling of a thoughtless girl. In any case you ought to know from my work in literature that I am not the person to whom to address them. I carry my convictions into my life and conduct, into my friendships, affections and all my relations with my fellow creatures. So I think it would be more considerate to leave out of your letters to _me_ some things that you may have in mind. Write them to others.

My own references to socialism, and the like, have been jocular--I did not think you perverted "enough to hurt," though I consider your intellectual environment a mighty bad one. As to such matters in future let us make a treaty of silence.

Affectionately, AMBROSE.

[The Army and Navy Club, Washington, D. C., March 1, 1911.]

MY DEAR RUTH,

It is pleasant to know that the family Robertson is "seeing things" and enjoying them. I hate travel, but find it delightful when done by you, instead of me. Believe me, I have had great pleasure in following you by your trail of words, as in the sport known as the "paper chase."

And now about the little story. Your refusal to let your father amend it is no doubt dreadfully insubordinate, but I brave his wrath by approval. It is _your_ work that I want to see, not anybody's else. I've a profound respect for your father's talent: as a literateur, he is the best physician that I know; but he must not be coaching my pupil, or he and I (as Mark Twain said of Mrs. Astor) "will have a falling out."

The story is not a story. It is not narrative, and nothing occurs. It is a record of mental mutations--of spiritual vicissitudes--states of mind. That is the most difficult thing that you could have attempted. It can be done acceptably by genius and the skill that comes of practice, as can anything. You are not quite equal to it--yet. You have done it better than I could have done it at your age, but not altogether well; as doubtless you did not expect to do it. It would be better to confine yourself at present to simple narrative. Write of something done, not of something thought and felt, except incidentally. I'm sure it is in you to do great work, but in this writing trade, as in other matters, excellence is to be attained no otherwise than by beginning at the beginning--the simple at first, then the complex and difficult. You can not go up a mountain by a leap at the peak.

I'm retaining your little sketch till your return, for you can do nothing with it--nor can I. If it had been written--preferably typewritten--with wide lines and margins I could do something _to_ it. Maybe when I get the time I shall; at present I am swamped with "proofs" and two volumes behind the printers. If I knew that I should _see_ you and talk it over I should rewrite it and (original in hand) point out the reasons for each alteration--you would see them quickly enough when shown. Maybe you will all come this way.

You are _very_ deficient in spelling. I hope that is not incurable, though some persons--clever ones, too--never do learn to spell correctly. You will have to learn it from your reading--noting carefully all but the most familiar words.

You have "pet" words--nearly all of us have. One of yours is "flickering." Addiction to certain words is an "upsetting sin" most difficult to overcome. Try to overcome it by cutting them out where they seem most felicitous.

By the way, your "hero," as you describe him, would not have been accessible to all those spiritual impressions--it is _you_ to whom they come. And that confirms my judgment of your imagination. Imagination is nine parts of the writing trade. With enough of _that_ all things are possible; but it is the other things that require the hard work, the incessant study, the tireless seeking, the indomitable will. It is no "pic-nic," this business of writing, believe me. Success comes by favor of the gods, yes; but O the days and nights that you must pass before their altars, prostrate and imploring! They are exacting--the gods; years and years of service you must give in the temple. If you are prepared to do this go on to your reward. If not, you can not too quickly throw away the pen and--well, marry, for example.

"Drink deep or taste not the Pierian spring."

_My_ vote is that you persevere.

With cordial regards to all good Robertsons--I think there are no others--I am most sincerely your friend,

AMBROSE BIERCE.

[Washington, D. C., April 20, 1911.]

DEAR LORA,

Thank you for the pictures of the Sloots fire-place and "Joe Gans." I can fancy myself cooking a steak in the one, and the other eating one better cooked.

I'm glad I've given you the Grand Canyon fever, for I hope to revisit the place next summer, and perhaps our Yosemite bunch can meet me there. My outing this season will be in Broadway in little old New York. That is not as good as Monte Sano, but the best that I can do.

You must have had a good time with the Sterlings, and doubtless you all suffered from overfeeding.

Carlt's action in denuding the shaggy pelt of his hands meets with my highest commendation, but you'd better look out. It may mean that he has a girl--a Jewess descended from Jacob, with an hereditary antipathy to anything like Esau. Carlt was an Esaurian.

You'll have to overlook some bad errors in Vol. V of the C. W. I did not have the page proofs. Some of the verses are unintelligible. That's the penalty for philandering in California instead of sticking to my work.

* * * * *

Affectionately, AMBROSE.

[Washington, D. C., April 28, 1911.]

DEAR GEORGE,

I've been having noctes ambrosianae with "The House of Orchids," though truly it came untimely, for I've not yet done reading your other books. Don't crowd the dancers, please. I don't know (and you don't care) what poem in it I like best, but I get as much delight out of these lines as out of any:

"Such flowers pale as are Worn by the goddess of a distant star-- Before whose holy eyes Beauty and evening meet."

And--but what's the use? I can't quote the entire book.

I'm glad you did see your way to make "Memory" a female.

To Hades with Bonnet's chatter of gems and jewels--among the minor poetic properties they are better (to my taste) than flowers. By the way, I wonder what "lightness" Bonnet found in the "Apothecary" verses. They seem to me very serious.

Rereading and rerereading of the Job confirm my first opinion of it. I find only one "bad break" in it--and that not inconsistent with God's poetry in the real Job: "ropes of adamant." A rope of stone is imperfectly conceivable--is, in truth, mixed metaphor.

I think it was a mistake for you to expound to Ned Hamilton, or anybody, how you wrote the "Forty-third Chapter," or anything. When an author explains his methods of composition he cannot expect to be taken seriously. Nine writers in ten wish to have it thought that they "dash off" things. Nobody believes it, and the judicious would be sorry to believe it. Maybe you do, but I guess you work hard and honestly enough over the sketch "dashed off." If you don't--do.

* * * * *

With love to Carrie, I will leave you to your sea-gardens and abalones.

Sincerely yours, AMBROSE BIERCE.

I'm off to Broadway next week for a season of old-gentlemanly revelry.

[Washington, D. C., May 2, 1911.]

DEAR GEORGE,

In packing (I'm going to New York) I find this "Tidal" typoscript, and fear that I was to have returned it. Pray God it was not my neglect to do so that kept it out of the book. But if not, what did keep it out? Maybe the fact that it requires in the reader an uncommon acquaintance with the Scriptures.

If Robertson publishes any more books for you don't let him use "silver" leaf on the cover. It is not silver, cannot be neatly put on, and will come off. The "Wine" book is incomparably better and more tasteful than either of the others. By the way, I stick to my liking for Scheff's little vignette on the "Wine."

In "Duandon" you--_you_, Poet of the Heavens!--come perilously near to qualifying yourself for "mention" in a certain essay of mine on the blunders of writers and artists in matters lunar. You must have observed that immediately after the full o' the moon the light of that orb takes on a redness, and when it rises after dark is hardly a "towering glory," nor a "frozen splendor." Its "web" is not "silver." In truth, the gibbous moon, rising, has something of menace in its suggestion. Even twenty-four (or rather twenty-five) hours "after the full" this change in the quality and quantity of its light is very marked. I don't know what causes the sudden alteration, but it has always impressed me.

I feel a little like signing this criticism "Gradgrind," but anyhow it may amuse you.

Do you mind squandering ten cents and a postage stamp on me? I want a copy of _Town Talk_--the one in which you are a "Varied Type."

I don't know much of some of your poets mentioned in that article, but could wish that you had said a word about Edith Thomas. Thank you for your too generous mention of me--who brought you so much vilification!

Sincerely yours, AMBROSE BIERCE.

[Washington, D. C., May 29, 1911.]

MY DEAR RUTH,

You are a faithful correspondent; I have your postals from Athens and Syracuse, and now the letter from Rome. The Benares sketch was duly received, and I wrote you about it to the address that you gave--Cairo, I think. As you will doubtless receive my letter in due time I will not now repeat it--further than to say that I liked it. If it had been accompanied by a few photographs (indispensable now to such articles) I should have tried to get it into some magazine. True, Benares, like all other Asiatic and European cities, is pretty familiar to even the "general reader," but the sketch had something of the writer's personality in it--the main factor in all good writing, as in all forms of art.

May I tell you what you already know--that you are deficient in spelling and punctuation? It is worth while to know these things--and all things that you can acquire. Some persons can not acquire orthography, and I don't wonder, but every page of every good book is a lesson in punctuation. One's punctuation is a necessary part of one's style; you cannot attain to precision if you leave that matter to editors and printers.

You ask if "stories" must have action. The name "story" is preferably used of narrative, not reflection nor mental analysis. The "psychological novel" is in great vogue just now, for example--the adventures of the mind, it might be called--but it requires a profounder knowledge of life and character than is possible to a young girl of whatever talent; and the psychological "short story" is even more difficult. Keep to narrative and simple description for a few years, until your wings have grown. These descriptions of foreign places that you write me are good practice. You are not likely to tell me much that I do not know, nor is that necessary; but your way of telling what I do know is sometimes very interesting as a study of _you_. So write me all you will, and if you would like the letters as a record of your travels you shall have them back; I am preserving them.

I judge from your letter that your father went straight through without bothering about me. Maybe I should not have seen him anyhow, for I was away from Washington for nearly a month.

Please give my love to your mother and sister, whom, of course, you are to bring here. I shall not forgive you if you do not.

Yes, I wish that you lived nearer to me, so that we could go over your work together. I could help you more in a few weeks _that_ way than in years _this_ way. God never does anything just right.

Sincerely yours, AMBROSE BIERCE.

[Washington, D. C., July 31, 1911.]

DEAR GEORGE,

Thank you for that Times "review." It is a trifle less malicious than usual--regarding _me_, that is all. My publisher, Neale, who was here last evening, is about "taking action" against that concern for infringement of his copyright in my little book, "Write It Right." The wretches have been serving it up to their readers for several weeks as the work of a woman named Learned. Repeatedly she uses my very words--whole passages of them. They refused even to confess the misdeeds of their contributrix, and persist in their sin. So they will have to fight.

* * * I have never been hard on women whose hearts go with their admiration, and whose bodies follow their hearts--I don't mean that the latter was the case in this instance. Nor am I very exacting as to the morality of my men friends. I would not myself take another man's woman, any more than I would take his purse. Nor, I trust, would I seduce the daughter or sister of a friend, nor any maid whom it would at all damage--and as to _that_ there is no hard and fast rule.

* * * * *

A fine fellow, I, to be casting the first stone, or the one-hundredth, at a lovelorn woman, weak or strong! By the way, I should not believe in the love of a strong one, wife, widow or maid.

It looks as if I may get to Sag Harbor for a week or so in the middle of the month. It is really not a question of expense, but Neale has blocked out a lot of work for me. He wants two more volumes--even five more if I'll make 'em. Guess I'll give him two. In a week or so I shall be able to say whether I can go Sagharboring. If so, I think we should have a night in New York first, no? You could motor-boat up and back.

Sincerely yours, AMBROSE BIERCE.[14]

[14] Addressed to George Sterling at Sag Harbor, Long Island.

[Washington, D. C., Monday, August 7, 1911.]

DEAR GEORGE,

In one of your letters you were good enough to promise me a motorboat trip from New York to Sag Harbor. I can think of few things more delightful than navigating in a motorboat the sea that I used to navigate in an open canoe; it will seem like Progress. So if you are still in that mind please write me what day _after Saturday next_ you can meet me in New York and I'll be there. I should prefer that you come the day before the voyage and dine with me that evening.

I always stay at the Hotel Navarre, 7th avenue and 38th street. If unable to get in there I'll leave my address there. Or, tell me where _you_ will be.

Sincerely yours, AMBROSE BIERCE.

If the motorboat plan is not practicable let me know and I'll go by train or steamer; it will not greatly matter. A. B.

[Washington, D. C., Tuesday, August 8, 1911.]

DEAR GEORGE,