[_Edinburgh, January 1875._]
I wish I could write better letters to you. Mine must be very dull. I
must try to give you news. Well, I was at the annual dinner of my old
Academy schoolfellows last night. We sat down ten, out of seventy-two!
The others are scattered all over the places of the earth, some in San
Francisco, some in New Zealand, some in India, one in the backwoods--it
gave one a wide look over the world to hear them talk so. I read them
some verses. It is great fun; I always read verses, and in the vinous
enthusiasm of the moment they always propose to have them printed; _Ce
qui n'arrive jamais du reste_: in the morning, they are more calm.
_Sunday._--It occurs to me that one reason why there is no news in my
letters is because there is so little in my life. I always tell you of
my concerts: I was at another yesterday afternoon: a recital of Halle
and Norman Neruda. I went in the evening to the pantomime with the
Mackintoshes--cousins of mine. Their little boy, aged four, was there
for the first time. To see him with his eyes fixed and open like
saucers, and never varying his expression save in so far as he might
sometimes open his mouth a little wider, was worth the money. He laughed
only once--when the giant's dwarf fed his master as though he were a
child. Coming home, he was much interested as to who made the fairies,
and wanted to know if they were like _berries_. I should like to know
how much this question was due to the idea of their coming up from under
the stage, and how much to a vague idea of rhyme. When he was told that
they were not like berries, he then asked if they had not been flowers
before they were fairies. It was a good deal in the vein of Herbert
Spencer's primitive man all this.
I am pretty well but have not got back to work much since Tuesday. I
work far too hard at the story; but I wish I had finished it before I
stopped as I feel somewhat out of the swing now.--Ever your faithful