I am more sorry than I can say to be unable to send you the copy of
the Builder's Review that you kindly sent _me_. But before receiving
your note I had, in my own interest, searched high and low for it, in
vain. Somebody stole it from my table. I especially valued it after
the catastrophe, but should have been doubly pleased to have it for
you.
It was indeed a rough deal you San Franciscans got. I had always
expected to go back to the good old town some day, but I have no
desire to see the new town, if there is to be one. I fear the fire
consumed even the ghosts that used to meet me at every street
corner--ghosts of dear dead friends, oh, so many of them!
Please accept my sympathy for your losses. I too am a "sufferer," a
whole edition of my latest book, plates and all, having gone up in
smoke and many of my friends being now in the "dependent class." It
hit us all pretty hard, I guess, wherever we happened to be.
Sincerely yours,
AMBROSE BIERCE.
[Washington, D. C,
August 11, 1906.]