_To Madame Paul Bourget._
_The Awkward Age_ began to appear in _Harper's Weekly_ on October
1, 1898. Madame Bourget had sent H. J. her translation into French
of Mathilde Serao's _Paese di Cuccagna_.
Lamb House, Rye.
August 22nd, 1898.
Dear Madame Paul,
I rejoice in your charming letter and find it most kind. I wrote to
Bourget four or five days ago, so that you are not without my news
(unless my misconstruction of the name of your villa has deprived you,)
and meanwhile it is an immense satisfaction to have something of the
detail of yours. It rather sounds, indeed, as if it were summed up in
the one word (con rispetto parlando) perspiration--but I doubt if the
difference between Rye and Nauheim has been other than that of the
frying-pan and the fire. Here we have very sufficiently fried, and I
have been moved to see the finger of Providence in the large, fat, dirty
_index_ of the bouncing dame who, to your vision, pointed away from
Watchbell St. I have said to myself on the torrid afternoons: "Les
malheureux--boxed up with that staircase in that stuffiness--comment y
eussent-ils survecu!" Such reflections are what has principally happened
to me--except, thank heaven, to get on more or less with my novel, the
serial publication of which begins, in New York, on October 1st. I hope
with all my heart that, in spite of everything, you feel your cure to be
deep-based and wide-striking.... I am distressed that "Maisie" hasn't
yet reached you, and will immediately write to London to see how my
publishers have _envisage_ the address I sent them. But I trust she may
perhaps be in the act of arriving--now. It is a volume the merit of
which is that the subject--and there is a subject--is, I think,
exhaustively treated--over-treated, I dare say. But I feel it--suppose
it--to be probably what I have done, in the way of meeting the artistic
problem, of best. The elements, however, are none of the largest. Let me
thank you more directly for the solid _cadeau_ of your so accomplished
translation. I am only waiting for the first cool day to begin it: I
shrink a little, otherwise, under the dog-star, from Naples and the
ardent Matilda. But you will neither of you lose by it.... My
affectionate greeting to Bourget. Believe me, dear Madame Paul, yours
very constantly,