February, 1899.
DEAR McDONALD,--You should never take the pains to answer the details of
my letters: it is very sweet of you to do it,--but it means the trouble
of writing, as it were, with a sense of affectionate obligation, and it
also means the trouble of re-reading, line by line, letters which are
not worth reading more than once--if even once. Please forget my letters
always, and write whatever you like, and don't think that I expect you
to take me very seriously. Why, I cannot even take myself always very
seriously!--By the way, that was a very pretty simile of yours about the
nebula condensing into a sun. But the nucleus, to tell the truth, has
not yet begun to integrate: there is a hardening here and there upon the
outermost edges only,--which is possibly contrary to the law that makes
great suns.
It is pleasant to know that the sickness was not very severe. Still, I
am inclined to suspect that you underrate it. Naval men always call a
typhoon "a gale," or "a smart breeze"--don't they?
I did receive a book and various letters, and I have had by this
mail four requests for autographs--two from England. The book I
would send you if it were worth it, but it is a very stupid attempt
at an anti-Christian-Spiritist-Theosophico-Buddhist novel, written
anonymously. I don't like this kind of thing, unless it be extremely
well done, and does not meddle with "astral bodies," "luminiferous
ether," and "sendings." There has been so much disgusting nonsense
written about Buddhism by Theosophists and Spiritists that ridicule is
unjustly sprinkled upon the efforts of impartial men to explain the real
beauties and truths of Eastern religion.
Affectionately,
LAFCADIO.