_A great work_
Lausanne, 20 _Jan._ 1787.
... As long as I do not inform you of my death, you have good grounds
to believe me alive and well. You have a general, and will soon have a
more particular idea of my system and arrangement here. One day glides
away after another in tranquil uniformity. Every object must have
sides and moments less luminous than others; but, upon the whole, the
life and the place which I have chosen are most happily adapted to my
character and circumstances: and I can now repeat, at the end of three
years, what I soon and sincerely affirmed, that never in a single
instant have I repented of my scheme of retirement to Lausanne.... And
though I truly rejoice in my approaching visit to England, Mr. Pitt,
were he your friend and mine, would not find it an easy task to
prevent my return....
I am building a great book, which, besides the three stories already
exposed to the public eye, will have three stories more before we
reach the roof and battlements. You too have built or altered a great
Gothic castle with baronial battlements. Did you finish it within the
time you intended? As that time drew near, did you not find a thousand
nameless and unexpected works that must be performed; each of them
calling for a portion of time and labour? and had you not despised,
nobly despised, the minute diligence of finishing, fitting up, and
furnishing the apartments, you would have discovered a new train of
indispensable business. Such, at least, has been my case. A long while
ago when I contemplated the distant prospect of my work, I gave you
and myself some hopes of landing in England last autumn; but, alas!
when autumn grew near, hills began to rise on hills, Alps on Alps, and
I found my journey far more tedious and toilsome than I had imagined.
When I look back on the length of the undertaking, and the variety
of materials, I cannot accuse, or suffer myself to be accused of
idleness; yet it appeared that unless I doubled my diligence, another
year, and perhaps more, would elapse before I could embark with my
complete manuscript. Under these circumstances I took, and am still
executing, a bold and meritorious resolution. The mornings in winter,
and in a country of early dinners, are very concise; to them, my usual
period of study, I now frequently add the evenings, renounce cards
and society, refuse the most agreeable evenings, or perhaps make my
appearance at a late supper. By this extraordinary industry, which I
never practised before, and to which I hope never to be again reduced,
I see the last part of my _History_ growing apace under my hands; all
my materials are collected and arranged; I can exactly compute, by
the square foot, or the square page, all that remains to be done; and
after concluding text and notes, after a general review of my time
and my ground, I now can decisively ascertain the final period of the
_Decline and Fall_, and can boldly promise that I will dine with you
at Sheffield Place in the month of August, or perhaps of July, in the
present year; within less than a twelvemonth of the term which I had
loosely and originally fixed; and perhaps it would not be easy to
find a work of that size and importance in which the workman has
so tolerably kept his word with himself and the public. But in this
situation, oppressed with this particular object, and stealing every
hour from my amusement, to the fatigue of the pen, and the eyes, you
will conceive, or you might conceive, how little stomach I have for
the epistolary style; and that instead of idle, though friendly,
correspondence, I think it far more agreeable to employ my time in
the effectual measures that may hasten and exhilarate our personal
interview....