I'm sorry your time for poetry is so brief. But take your pencil and
figure out how much you would write in thirty years (I hope you'll
live that long) at, say, six lines a day. You'll be surprised by the
result--and encouraged. Remember that 50,000 words make a fairly long
book.
You make me shudder when you say you are reading the "Prattle" of
years. I haven't it and should hardly dare to read it if I had. There
is so much in it to deplore--so much that is not wise--so much that
was the expression of a mood or a whim--so much was not altogether
sincere--so many half-truths, and so forth. Make allowances, I beg,
and where you cannot, just forgive.
Scheff has mentioned his great desire that you join the Bohemian Club.
I know he wants me to advise you to do so. So I'm between two fires
and would rather not advise at all. There are advantages (obvious
enough) in belonging; and to one of your age and well grounded in
sobriety and self-restraint generally, the disadvantages are not so
great as to a youngster like Scheff. (Of course he is not so young as
he seems to me; but he is younger by a few years and a whole lot of
thought than you.)
The trouble with that kind of club--with any club--is the temptation
to waste of time and money; and the danger of the drink habit. If one
is proof against these a club is all right. I belong to one myself in
Washington, and at one time came pretty near to "running" it.
* * * * *
No, I don't think Scheff's view of Kipling just. He asked me about
putting that skit in the book. It _was_ his view and, that being so, I
could see no reason for suppressing it in deference to those who do
not hold it. I like free speech, though I'd not accord it to my
enemies if I were Dictator. I should not think it for the good of the
State to let * * * write verses, for example. The modern fad Tolerance
does not charm me, but since it is all the go I'm willing that my
friends should have their fling.
I dare say Scheff is unconscious of Kipling's paternity in the fine
line in "Back, back to Nature":
"Loudly to the shore cries the surf upon the sea."
But turn to "The Last Chanty," in "The Seven Seas," fill your ears
with it and you'll write just such a line yourself.
* * * * *
God be decent to you, old man.